Ships
- USS Salerno Bay (CVE-110) Captain from 10 April 1947
Joseph Malcolm Carson was born in Enniskillen, Ireland, on 22 June 1901, the son of Joseph Lougheed Carson and Jeanie McNeal Carson. He grew up in Front Royal, Virginia, attended the Army-Navy Preparatory School in Washington, and entered the Naval Academy from Virginia in 1920. There he played football, wrestled, and lettered in lacrosse. He was commissioned on 4 June 1925.
After service in Texas, Oklahoma and Argonne, he won his wings in May 1928. He flew with Fighting Squadron 3 in Lexington, served in the training and experimental divisions at NAS Norfolk, and flew from Texas and Ranger. He commanded the minesweeper Avocet in 1938 and Cruiser Scouting Squadron 4 in Northampton, and he led the Naval Reserve Aviation Base at Anacostia early in the war.
He joined Bunker Hill in May 1943 as air officer and became her executive officer in January 1944. Through the strikes on Rabaul, Kavieng and Nauru and the Gilberts and Kwajalein campaigns, the ship escaped damage while her aircraft inflicted heavy losses, and he won the Bronze Star. As chief of staff of escort carrier Task Group 77.4 at Leyte Gulf on 24 October 1944 he won the Navy Cross.
After commanding NAS Glenview he took Salerno Bay in April 1947 and then Mindoro. In the Korean War he commanded Fleet Air Wing 6 around the Inchon landing, and then the carrier Valley Forge from October 1950 to March 1951, earning the Legion of Merit with Combat "V." As a rear admiral from 1953 he commanded Fleet Air Japan, Naval Air Bases Japan and Fleet Air Western Pacific, winning a second Legion of Merit.
No reliable source found for his retirement or death.