Ships
- USS Bullard (DD-660) Captain, 1943 – 31 May 1945
Bernard William Freund was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, on 30 July 1910. He graduated from the United States Naval Academy with the Class of 1932 and remained in the Navy. He was a lieutenant from 1 February 1940, a temporary lieutenant commander from 15 June 1942, and a temporary commander from 18 November 1942.
In November 1943 he became captain of the Fletcher-class destroyer Bullard (DD-660). He relieved Glenn Roy Hartwig, who had commissioned the ship at Kearny, New Jersey, on 9 April 1943 and taken her to Pearl Harbor that summer. Freund kept the command through the Central Pacific campaign and into the fighting off Okinawa, leaving the ship on 31 May 1945.
His first actions as captain came within weeks. On 11 November 1943 Bullard screened the carrier strike against Rabaul. From 18 to 26 November she supported the assault on the Gilbert Islands, including the landing at Tarawa. For his conduct in those two operations he received the Silver Star.
Through 1944 the destroyer stayed with the fleet in the forward areas. She took part in the occupation of Kwajalein and Majuro, the landings in the Admiralty Islands, the Hollandia operation on New Guinea, and the seizures of Saipan and Guam. Between those assaults she furnished gunfire support, stood plane-guard and patrol stations, and served on the radar picket line. From 10 September 1944 to 18 February 1945 she made a voyage to California, then returned to the western Pacific.
Off Okinawa in the spring of 1945 the duty grew harder. For his service as commanding officer on the night of 19–20 March 1945 he received the Bronze Star Medal with Combat “V.” On 11 April a Japanese suicide aircraft struck Bullard and damaged her slightly. Action on 11, 16, and 17 April brought him a Gold Star in lieu of a second Bronze Star, again with the combat distinguishing device. He remained in command through the Okinawa operation until the end of May.
On 31 May 1945 he turned Bullard over to Henry Frederick Rodner, who held temporary command. Eigel Thornton Steen took the ship on 16 June 1945 and stayed with her until she was decommissioned in December 1946. Freund later retired from the Navy as a captain. He died on 9 February 2007 at the age of ninety-six.