Lcdr "Jim" James J. Lamb (Ret.)

James Joseph Lamb, 83, of Jacksonville Beach, Florida and Virginia Beach, Virginia, died peacefully in his sleep on March 28, 2025, at Dolphin Pointe Health Care Center in Jacksonville.
Jim was born in the Bronx, NY, on October 2, 1941 to Edward, a manager with Bell Telephone, and Margaret, a Hunter College graduate who later taught kindergarten at the Lavelle School for the Blind. The oldest of four children, he graduated from Blessed Sacrament High School in New Rochelle, NY and received an appointment to the United States Naval Academy, where he graduated in 1963. Jim rowed with winning crew teams at both Blessed Sacrament and the Naval Academy.
He married Ellen Clair McLaughlin in 1965. In short order they welcomed fraternal twins Kathleen Ann and Ellen Clair, followed by identical twins Margaret Judith and Susan Elizabeth three years later; Edward John a year after that; and James Joseph, Jr., six years after that.
Jim's naval career as a Surface Warfare Officer included tours on the USS Duncan; the USS Galveston; the USS Austin; the USS America, where he was the Deck Officer; and the USNS Rigel. He served on the staff of Chief of Naval Operations Elmo Zumwalt at the end of the Vietnam conflict, and he completed shore tours at Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek and Naval Station Norfolk. He retired from the Navy as a lieutenant commander in 1983. Having earned a Master of Business Administration degree from St. Leo's College, he then held a variety of civilian management jobs in the defense industry.
After the death of his beloved wife in 2006, Jim returned to the water for another three years as a working seaman on commercial ships operating in the Mediterranean Sea and Persian Gulf. He moved to Jacksonville Beach, FL, but kept a summer apartment in Chic's Beach, where he was a regular at the Green Parrot Grille.
He was a passenger on the MS Zaandam, the cruise ship stranded for weeks at the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, but never contracted COVID himself. His great regret was that the ship had not been able to make its planned circuit of Cape Horn, the one major sea passage he had never transited.
Jim is survived by his six children, his son-in-law, Scott Lavinder, and his daughter-in-law, Sara Lamb; his grandchildren: Christopher and Claire Bea, George and Patrick Miller, George's wife Carissa, Matthew, Henry and Margaret "Meg" Lavinder, Gina Harris and Kristan Stallings; his great-grandchildren: Lina Miller, Andi, Hattie and Maverick Harris, and Weston and Lillian Stallings; his sister and brother-in-law, Debra and Richard Ziegler of Arlington, VA; and his brother and sister-in-law, Edward J. and Marie Lamb of Walkertown, NC. His sister Judith Lamb Johnson died in 2003.
Funeral arrangements are being made by Hollomon-Brown Bayside Chapel of Virginia Beach, where a viewing and memorial are scheduled for April 3 from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. A Mass of Christian Burial will be held at St. Pius X Church in Norfolk, VA on April 4 at 11:00 a.m.
Jim's children ask that in lieu of flowers, memorial contributions be made to the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society.