Ships
- USS Dunlap (DD-384) Captain from 12 June 1937 · Relieved on 5 March 1938
Albert Ernest Schrader, Jr., was born on 4 March 1895. His home was Batesville, Indiana. He graduated from the United States Naval Academy with the Class of 1916 and made his career in the Navy. He was promoted to commander on 1 July 1936.
On 12 June 1937, Commander Schrader commissioned the new destroyer Dunlap at New York and became her first commanding officer. The ship had been launched on 18 April 1936 from the United Shipbuilding and Dry Dock yard, sponsored by Mrs. Robert H. Dunlap, widow of Marine Brigadier General Robert H. Dunlap, for whom the destroyer was named. For the rest of 1937 and the opening months of 1938, Schrader kept Dunlap on the East Coast, running trials and training the crew of a ship that had just entered service.
He was relieved on 5 March 1938 by Rockwell Justus Townsend. Dunlap remained in commission through the Second World War. Later commanding officers included Carl Hilton Bushnell, Virginius Randolph Roane, Clifton Iverson, and Cecil Rice Welte. On the night of 6–7 August 1943, with Iverson in command, Dunlap fought in the Battle of Vella Gulf as part of a destroyer group led by Frederick Moosbrugger.
On 12 June 1941 Schrader took command of the repair ship Medusa and kept that duty until 27 February 1943. Medusa was at Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941. During the Japanese attack her guns helped engage the raiding aircraft, she assisted in the destruction of a midget submarine, and her repairmen turned to ships damaged in the harbor. While he still commanded Medusa, he was made a temporary captain on 1 January 1942 and a captain on 1 March 1942.
In the last year of the European war he served with the naval command responsible for ports and bases in Germany. From October 1944 to March 1945 he was acting commander of U.S. Ports and Bases, Germany, and from March to October 1945 he was chief of staff to that command. He received the Legion of Merit for that service. Schrader retired from the Navy as a captain and died in 1960.