1. Roy H Boehm was born in Brooklyn, New York, and was a veteran of 30 years of military service in the United States Navy, serving in three wars and various clandestine operations.
16 Facts About Roy Boehm
1. 2.
At the age of 17, Roy Boehm enlisted in the United States Navy in April 1941 to become a diver and saw action in the Pacific theater of operation during World War II from February 1942 until the conclusion of the war in 1945.
3.
Roy Boehm confessed that he found the job of recovering dead sailors so distressing that he actually vomited inside his diver's helmet the first time he was required to do it.
4.
Roy Boehm was a veteran of one of the largest "all surface" sea engagements of World War II, the Battle of Cape Esperance at Guadalcanal.
5.
Roy Boehm participated in the following campaigns and engagements: Battle of the Coral Sea, Bougainville, Truk, Green Island, Emerau, Saipan, Tinian, and Guam.
6.
Roy Boehm was engaged in supplying arms and ammunition to the guerrillas in the Philippines and fought the Japanese in Kerama Reto and Okinawa.
7.
In 1955 Roy Boehm went through UDT training at the age of 31.
8.
Roy Boehm was the first Officer in Charge of SEAL Team Two.
9.
Roy Boehm envisioned highly motivated and highly trained warriors like the Frogmen and UDTs operating beyond the beachhead.
10.
Roy Boehm felt that his men should have a variety of training to give them an edge in unconventional warfare beyond diving, shooting, demolitions, martial arts, and parachuting and expanded the curriculum to include photography, intelligence gathering, and sailing.
11.
Roy Boehm even sent SEALs to train in prisons to learn skills such as lockpicking, safecracking, and hotwiring cars from professional criminals.
12.
On November 4,1963, Roy Boehm arrived in South Vietnam to act as an advisor for Army of the Republic of Vietnam Underwater Demolition Teams.
13.
Rather than train for the conventional UDT mission Roy Boehm employed his frogmen in the unconventional warfare role conducting recon missions, ambushes and raids against the Viet Cong.
14.
Roy Boehm was eventually evacuated on medical grounds in late 1964 with viral hepatitis and a deformed kneecap.
15.
Roy Boehm assisted in the design and implementation of the Navy's first counterinsurgency course, for which he received the Navy Achievement Medal.
16.
Roy Boehm died December 30,2008, at his home in Punta Gorda, Florida.