Ships
- USS Gatling (DD-671) Captain from 26 November 1945
- USS Murray (DD-576) Captain from 15 October 1951
Frank L. Fullaway was born on 15 November 1909, a son of David Timmins Fullaway, an entomologist who spent the greater part of his working life in Hawaii. Fullaway came into the Navy through the reserve and later transferred to the regular service. He served at sea through the Second World War and again in the early 1950s, and he retired as a captain.
From 17 July 1943 to 20 July 1944 he commanded the destroyer Rathburne (DD-113). On 25 April 1944 Rathburne arrived at the Puget Sound Navy Yard to begin conversion into a high-speed transport. His next ship was the auxiliary Semmes (AG-24), a former destroyer, which he commanded from 4 August 1944 until 23 August 1945. On 20 July 1945, while he still had Semmes, he was given the temporary rank of commander.
On 26 November 1945 Fullaway became captain of Gatling. He relieved Vincent James Meola, who had commanded the destroyer since December 1944. Gatling, a Fletcher-class ship, had been commissioned in August 1943 under Alvin Franklin Richardson and had fought through the Pacific war, entering Tokyo Bay on 3 September 1945 with the occupation force. Fullaway's tour was the duty that followed that cruise. He turned Gatling over on 28 June 1946, and the ship decommissioned on 16 July 1946.
He next took a destroyer out of reserve. Murray, also a Fletcher, had first been commissioned on 20 April 1943 with Richard F. Stout in command, had been present in Tokyo Bay for the Japanese surrender on 2 September 1945, and had been laid up at Charleston after decommissioning on 27 March 1946. The Navy assigned her the escort-destroyer designation DDE-576 on 2 January 1951 and began the conversion that June. On 15 October 1951 Murray recommissioned at Charleston with Commander Frank L. Fullaway in command. Early in 1952 she trained from Norfolk, working along the East Coast and in the Caribbean.
By December 1964, when his father died at home in Honolulu, Fullaway was a retired captain. His brother, William H. Fullaway, was then living in Hilo. Frank L. Fullaway died on 9 April 1997, residing in Honolulu.