On February 28, 2026, Major Charles “Charlie” E. Rose will turn 100 years old.

He has lived through the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, the Cold War, and the digital age. He fought in some of the most consequential battles of the twentieth century, commanded soldiers, taught children, and today, he lives quietly in the Waxhaw community.

The Waxhaw Board of Commissioners were so moved by his story, that they decided to honor him with a proclamation during their regular work session meeting on February 24, 2026. 

Proclamation Honoring The Service of Major Charles E. Rose (PDF)

Early Life and Joining the Navy

Born in 1926 in Kansas City, Missouri, Charlie was the oldest of eight children who lived to adulthood. His father, a streetcar driver, carried lingering injuries from his service in World War I.

When Charlie was 12, the family moved to rural Fordland, Missouri. Charlie says he went to a one-room country school where the teacher had each student read to determine which grade she would place them in.

“I could read so I read, and she promoted me to the eighth grade right then. And then about a month later I had to drop out of school and go to work, and I’ve worked ever since,” said Charlie.

He worked a farm by driving a tractor and milking cows during the hardest years of the Great Depression. Then, at just 17 years old and equipped with farm experience and an eighth-grade education, Charlie decided to enlist in the U.S. Navy in 1943, something he was always destined to do.

“When I was real young, I went to a movie starring Bing Crosby about the Navy and Hawaii, and from that moment on I decided I was going to join the Navy when I was old enough,” said Charlie.

He served as a signalman aboard the USS Bolivar (APA-34), a Bayfield-class attack transport operating in the Pacific theater. For the duration of the war, he remained at sea.

He participated in the Battle of Saipan, the Battle of Guam, and operations at Lingayen Gulf during the liberation of Luzon – an Allied operation involving more than 875 U.S. warships near the Philippines that ultimately resulted in more than 37,000 casualties.

“Those were the worst casualties I ever saw,” said Charlie. “The ship was full of men on stretchers.”

He described the condition of the wounded as completely burned.

“You couldn’t identify them,” said Charlie. “I often wondered if any of those guys survived.”

That was also his first introduction to kamikaze fighters – Japanese pilots who would intentionally fly suicide attacks into Allied naval vessels to cause maximum damage.

“One kamikaze dropped a bomb with a delayed fuse on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier because it went down and then exploded somewhere down in the ship. Then the pilot went around and hit the ship. When he hit it, there must have been a bomb or something because there was a loud explosion,” said Charlie.

He remembers the aircraft carrier swelling and then rolling to the side as it started to frantically send an SOS message. He described an intense sea and air battle with so much shooting that he couldn’t see sunlight.

"There were thousands of guns shooting and the sky was black with smoke,” said Charlie.

Charlie would later be awarded for spending 30 days under sustained kamikaze air attacks.

He was also part of General Douglas MacArthur’s return to the Philippines during the landing at Leyte, more than two years after MacArthur’s famous “I shall return” declaration.

“That was not an easy landing because the Japanese had indirect fire all concentrated on the beach,” said Charlie. “Our boat was really cramped, and we got hit by a mortar or artillery shell.”

Luckily, they made it onto the beach. After several days on the island, they were abandoned when all the ships went out to open sea to take part in the decisive Battle of Leyte Gulf that effectively destroyed the remainder of the Imperial Japanese Navy.

That led them to the Battle of Iwo Jima in February 1945, where he celebrated his 19th birthday on the beach. In the briefing before the invasion, the commanding officer said they would take the island in five days. That turned out to be wishful thinking.

“Iwo [Jima] was not pretty. I saw more dead people there than I saw in all the other places,” said Charlie. “I kept thinking about the briefing we got… we were supposed to leave in five days. Five days we were this far inland,” as he gestured a small gap with his hands.

It would be nearly a month and more than 25,000 casualties before they sailed away to New Caledonia, a small island about 900 miles east of Australia to rest and recover.

“We didn’t know it at that time, but for us the war was over,” said Charlie.

When the war ended, Charlie returned home to Missouri and was honorably discharged in December 1945, but the transition to civilian life was uncertain. Jobs were scarce, and he had family responsibilities waiting.

Joining the Army

In 1946, he visited a recruiter station to reenlist in the Navy, but he wasn’t thrilled when they said he’d either go back to the Pacific or to the Boston Naval Yard. Charlie turned to the Army recruiter and asked, “Can you send me to Germany?” and he said “Sign here.”

Charlie served as a radioman in the Army because of the skills he developed as a signalman in the Navy, like a mastery of morse code. He spent a few years in Germany and then came back the U.S.

When war broke out in Korea in 1950, Charlie was sent back overseas to a very different battlefield.

Instead of vast Pacific waters, Korea meant mountains, frozen ground, and constantly shifting front lines. Five-man communications teams were dispatched to frontline units to maintain radio contact. Charlie was part of one of those teams.

He recalled being ordered to report to an advanced headquarters near the frontlines. He and another soldier set out from Seoul, the capital of South Korea, in a jeep.

It was dark when they reached a gravel road that felt like a dried creek bed. Charlie walked ahead to guide the driver, believing it was just the two of them in that area.

“All of a sudden I heard, ‘Halt!’” he recalled.

It was American troops demanding a response to their challenge to prove Charlie and his friend were American.

“We didn’t know the password. We’d been out of communication for a week,” said Charlie.

Eventually the soldiers confronting them were convinced they were Americans. Then came the news.

“They said, ‘Haven’t you heard? The Chinese entered the war. They’re on the high ground. Stay on the low ground’,” said Charlie.

Which made Charlie even more confused because their unit’s motto was ‘Take the high ground.’

The next morning revealed what that meant. The entire 2nd Infantry Division had been caught unaware by the Chinese. He described the division as “burned out” and remembers seeing vehicles lined up bumper to bumper along the road in full retreat.

For a week, Charlie and his companion navigated back toward Seoul, traveling by day and hiding at night to avoid being attacked.

When they finally rejoined their unit, the First Sergeant was not amused.

“He was mad because he had to undo his records that marked us as missing in action (MIA),” Charlie said.

That paperwork mishap may have contributed to his extended stay in Korea. He was only supposed to be deployed for 12 months but ended up serving 16 months.

Charlie finally boarded a ship home in December 1951, in the middle of a blinding snowstorm.

“I said, ‘Boy, I’m glad to see this snowstorm,’” he remembered. “Now I’ll never have a pleasant memory of this place.”

Becoming an Officer

During his Army service, Charlie was offered a battlefield commission, an immediate combat promotion from enlisted ranks to a commissioned officer. Many would have accepted without hesitation, but Charlie turned it down.

“I said no,” he recalled. “I’d rather go to Officer Candidate School (OCS) to learn how to be an officer and what to do.”

He entered Officer Candidate School at Fort Knox in November 1952 and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant on May 1, 1953. Assignments followed at Fort Hood, Texas, where he served as a platoon leader in the 702nd Armored Infantry Battalion.

While stationed there, his battalion was assigned to provide security during the dedication of Falcon Dam, a 150-foot-high, 26,000-foot-long structure built along the U.S.-Mexico border over the Rio Grande. The ceremony was attended by President Dwight D. Eisenhower and the President of Mexico. Charlie said the dedication took place on a square platform that looked like a boxing ring.

“I was in one of the four corners of the platform while [President Eisenhower] gave his speech,” Charlie said.

After the ceremony moved across the border into Mexico, the American security detail remained behind along with the food and refreshments prepared for the president’s party.

“So we helped ourselves before we went back to Fort Hood,” he added with a grin.

Later Army Career

Promotions followed steadily: First Lieutenant in 1954, Captain in 1959, and Major in 1965. He served in tank companies and cavalry units in both the United States and Germany, eventually becoming Headquarters Troop Commander of the 2nd Squadron, 9th Cavalry Regiment.

Later, at Fort Ord, California, he served with the Combat Development Experimentation Center, helping test and refine Army operational concepts during the early years of the Vietnam era. By 1966, he was 40 years old and considering retirement.

“In Vietnam there were 30-year-old majors,” he said. “They don’t want a 40-year-old major. I’m too old.”

After 23 years of combined service in the Navy and Army, he chose to retire. But retirement, once again, was only the beginning of another chapter.

Second Career in Education

Charlie moved to San Jose, California, and obtained his teaching credential. For the next 21 years, he taught special education in Santa Clara County, shaping the lives of students who needed structure, patience, and belief.

His military career had required discipline and leadership. The classroom required compassion. He retired from teaching in 1989.

Hanging His Hat in Waxhaw

Today, Major Charles E. Rose lives in the Waxhaw community with his daughter Liz and her family. He has become a regular at the local Veterans Coffee House, where stories are shared easily among those who understand.

This week, the Town of Waxhaw’s Board of Commissioners honored him with a proclamation recognizing his distinguished military career and lifelong dedication to service.

But the measure of a century cannot be captured fully in dates, ranks, or formal resolutions.

It is found in a farm boy who left school after eighth grade and never stopped working. A 19-year-old who celebrated his birthday on the beach at Iwo Jima. A soldier who chose to learn how to lead rather than accept rank without preparation. A teacher who spent two decades helping children find their footing.

On February 28, Charlie turns 100.

A century of service. A life defined not by the battles he fought, but by the responsibility he carried wherever he was called to serve.

Honoring a Century

Museum of the Waxhaws will honor Charlie for his service with a special ceremony at 10:15 a.m. on Saturday, February 28, at its Century of Courage: WWI & WWII event. Visit the Museum of the Waxhaws website for ticketing information.

Our team recorded an oral history with Charlie Rose on February 16, 2026. View the entire recording on our YouTube channel.