MIDTOWN — Police Commissioner Bill Bratton’s father passed away Thursday night, officials said.
William E. Bratton, 89, a World War II veteran, died near Boston, of an undisclosed illness. He was remembered as a hard-working man, who pulled himself up from poverty to join the navy and then raise a family.
“He had a hard scrabble upbringing and always worked two jobs to support himself and later his family,” said Commissioner Bratton. “He’d tell you that the highlight of his life was meeting our mother.”
William met his wife, June, in the Boston's Bunker Hill housing project in the early 1940s. He joined the navy in 1944, and married June in 1946.
They moved to Dorchester, where William worked two jobs to raise the young Bill Bratton and his sister, Pat.
He and June were married for 61 years until she passed away about a decade ago.
William would visit her grave every day.
Other members of the department expressed their support for the commissioner.
“On behalf of the Community Affairs Bureau we wish to extend our deepest sympathies and condolences to Police Commissioner Bratton on the loss of his father,” the bureau said in a statement. “Please keep Commissioner Bratton and his family in your thoughts and prayers at this time.”
A funeral Mass is set for 11 a.m. Tuesday at the Holy Family Church in Rockland, Mass.
