Denny Lewis Starr

Denny Starr was bom on April 20, 1918, a son of Henry F. and Sarah B. Starr of Bamberg.  He was a graduate of the Walterboro high school, where he was team captain of the football squad his senior year.  He attended Clemson for three years with the Class of 1939, leaving early in his senior year to be associated with the Edisto Auto Finance Company, and later aided his father in the operation of the family business.

Denny married Louise Boggs May 30, 1941.  He joined the Army as a private on September 23, 1943, and trained at Camp Wheeler, GA.  While he was at Camp Wheeler, Louise gave birth to a son, Denny Joe Starr, on February 16, 1944.  From Camp Wheeler, Denny was sent to Fort George Meade, MD, and thence to England, arriving in April of 1944, just in time for the D-Day invasion.  He was assigned to "E" Company, 12th Infantry Regiment, 4th Division. In early June Corporal Starr wrote his parents, saying that he was in France and well.  On June 25, 1944 he was mortally wounded in the battle to secure Cherbourg.  He was initially buried in the Normandy American Cemetery near Omaha Beach, but his body was returned in 1947 or 1948 to his family for burial in the Starr plot in the Live Oak Cemetery in Walterboro.

Surviving were his widow and son; his parents; a sister and brother-in-law, Elizabeth S. and B. George Price, III (Clemson ʼ35); and a brother, P.H. Starr (Clemson '37) of Norfolk, VA.  In 1947, his widow married Rupert E. Rhodes, and Denny Joe Starrʼs name was changed to Denny Starr Rhodes.

Biography written by James O, Sweeny, Clemson College Class of 1939.