16 April 1944 - Collision and Death of Two Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP)

#WASP

Jayne Elizabeth Erickson 44-6

(14 Apr 1921)

&

Mary Holmes Howson 44-4

 (Feb 16, 1919)

16 April 1944

Collide in training while both are flying AT-6 Texans at Avenger Field, Sweetwater, Texas.

Women Airforce Service Pilots Jayne Erickson & Mary Howson

Excerpt from To Live and Die a WASP:

At Avenger Field on April 16, 1944, Elizabeth Erickson (44-W-6), with 111 days still left before graduation, was almost half way through her training. Twenty-five-year-old Mary Howson (44-W-4) was in the homestretch, with just 38 days to go. It was a warm Sunday afternoon with a light, southeasterly breeze—a good day for flying. Mary, flying solo, was the last of her classmates to approach for a landing. They were completing a 530-mile roundtrip training flight around San Antonio. Elizabeth was practicing touch and go landings. Previously, she had made three of these practice landings with her instructor, but now, she was alone in the cockpit and lining up for another landing. Both women were flying AT-6 Texan trainers. For some reason, the ground controller didn’t notice that the women were both at 800 feet and descending from opposite directions. Both were on their next to the last turn, in preparation for their final approach to the runway. Elizabeth and Mary were on a collision course. …

Women Airforce Service Pilots Jayne Erickson & Mary Howson

Just after 1:20 p.m., Mary Howson and Elizabeth Erickson’s AT-6s slammed into each other. As the planes began tumbling, Mary managed to unfasten her harness, climb out of the cockpit, and jump, but she was too low and her parachute never completely opened. Elizabeth had no chance at all. She was trapped in her cockpit and unable to jump. Both women died instantly just a few yards apart.

The following evening, all of the trainees and training staff attended a memorial service for both women in the Avenger Field gymnasium. Classmates took up a collection to send both friends home.

Mickie Carmichael (44-W-4) accompanied Mary home for her funeral and burial in the Washington Memorial Chapel Churchyard, Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.

Elinor Fairchild (44-W-6), Elizabeth’s friend, accompanied Elizabeth to her burial in Seattle’s Lake View Cemetery.

RIP     

Views of a Hanging

Views of a hanging

 by Bill Miller for the Mail Tribune

Monday, April 15th 2019

The most interesting part of the story about Southern Oregon’s first hanging is how many variations to the story there actually are. No one can even agree where in town the hanging took place.

In May 1852, Jacksonville was a mini boomtown of about 400 miners and businessmen, no “respectable” women, and a small contingent of “camp followers” we never seem to hear about.

In the midst of a few shacks and tents, and nothing that looked like a real street, stood the “Round Tent,” a place to kick back in the evening with a drink, some company, and a card game.

The only part of this hanging story that everyone seems to agree on is that one man shot another man dead in the tent, and after a jury trial, Jacksonville’s first, the shooter was quickly hanged.

The murdered man was either Sam Potts, Plot, or Platt. Another account simply calls him “the Big Missourian.” Whatever his real name, they say he settled on land just north of Ashland, although even that can’t be confirmed.

The shooter was John Brown, but, then again, just before his hanging, he apparently told everyone his real name was Jackson Maynard. That agrees with the earliest found report of the hanging, a June 1852 edition of the Oregon Statesman newspaper.

Reports of the incident by A.G. Walling, in his 1884 “History of Southern Oregon,” and Oregonian articles by early Jackson County residents William Plymale, in 1903, and Eli Anderson, in 1910, all blame Maynard for the incident. Eli Anderson had a front-row seat. He was not only on the jury that convicted Maynard, he also witnessed the hanging.

“It was shown at the trial that murderer Brown [Maynard] was a worthless young man who loafed about the saloons and gambling places,” Anderson said. “A miner named Potts was shot dead, without provocation,” wrote Walling. “Potts made no attempt to assault Maynard,” Plymale wrote, “he was shot without provocation other than words, and Maynard was quite as offensive as Potts.”

The only defense Maynard received was written in Herman Reinhart’s memoirs. Reinhart had worked a gold claim next to Maynard in Siskiyou County, California.

“He had come out in 1849 or 1850,” Reinhart said. “He was a good foot racer and rassler [sic]. If he had a cool, fair and impartial trial, he might have been cleared. But he was in a manner justified, for he had great provocation.”

Reinhart described Potts as a man standing taller than 6 feet and weighing over 200 pounds who had been drinking and bragging that he could outrun, out-jump, and whip anyone in town.

Potts challenged Maynard to a race, but Maynard refused, saying he was sick and couldn’t run. Potts was sure Maynard was afraid of him and began cursing, calling Maynard a son of a female dog, a horse thief, “and abused him to whatever he could lay his tongue to.”

Maynard raced away, retrieved a navy revolver, put it under his shirt, returned to the “Round Tent,” and dared Potts to repeat his words. Potts came forward, expecting a fist fight. Maynard pulled his pistol and shot Potts through the heart.

The miners formed a vigilance committee and the jury convicted Maynard, sentencing him to hang.

Reinhart believed the only reason for the hanging was the appearance in Jacksonville of Potts’ wife and her children a short time after the deadly confrontation.

“All the miners sympathized with the widow and her three children,” Reinhart said, “and agreed her husband had been cruelly murdered by a gambler.”

Reinhart said that before Maynard died, he told the crowd, “I think I done right and, if it was to be done over, I would do the same.”

“

He bid his friends goodbye,” Reinhart said, “and he died game.”

Writer Bill Miller is the author of “History Snoopin’,” a collection of his previous history columns and stories. Reach him at newsmiller@live.com or WilliamMMiller.com.

Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) Pilot Marie Ethel Chiler Sharon - One of the 38

WASP Marie Ethel Chiler Sharon 43-W-4

(21 April 1917 – 10 April 1944)

 

WASP Pilot Marie Chiler Sharon

While in final navigation training in a B-25 near Tecumseh Nebraska, she and instructor Lt Hinton Daniel

 died while flying through heavy rain and wind.

Excerpt from To Live and Die a WASP

On April 10, barely 24 hours after WASP Evelyn Sharp’s funeral in Ord, Nebraska, Marie Ethel Sharon, (43-W-4) took off from Rosecrans Army Airfield in St. Joseph, Missouri with her instructor, Lt. Hinton Daniel. This was a navigational training flight in a B-25 Mitchell bomber. The Midwest weather that had delayed Evelyn Sharp on her flight across the country had gotten worse. As Marie maneuvered their bomber for over an hour in a thick overcast, passing from point to point and into Nebraska, pelting rain began smashing against the aircraft’s skin. The B-25 began to rattle and shudder violently against “extremely hard winds,” gusting at 45 mph. Lt. Daniel and Marie frantically fought to maintain altitude and control. Suddenly, the nose wheel door began to twist with a screeching metallic sound. The hinges gave way in the wind and the door flew away, slamming into the right side motor. Sixty-five miles south of Omaha, there was smoke, the engine failed, and the bomber lunged into a nose first dive. It shattered in pieces as it hit the ground and buried itself deep into a farmer’s field.

The 38

RIP