June 4, 1942 - Commemorating the 82nd Anniversary of the Last Flight of Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Jr.

In 1981, during a meeting of the Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Jr. Memorial Foundation's board, a trustee noted that C. Markland Kelly, Sr. died unhappy with the lack of information surrounding the death of Ensign Kelly during the Battle of Midway on June 4, 1942. Published in 1993, The Last Flight of Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Jr., USNR Battle of Midway June 4, 1942, by childhood friend and fellow aviator Bowen P. Weisheit, Sr., Major, USMCR (Ret.), sought to reconstruct the circumstances from the time of takeoff to the pilots of Squadron VF-8 ditching their planes, and approximately where Ensign Kelly perished in the Pacific.

Ensign Kelly entered flight training at Anacostia in October of 1940 and was assigned to the Naval Air Station in Jacksonville, FL, in December 1940 as part of the first class of 27 cadets at the newly built training facility. From Jacksonville, he completed fighter pilot training in Miami before earning his wings in August 1941 and being assigned to the USS Hornet, New Port News, VA, under commanding officer Marc. A. Mitscher. After a short leave to Baltimore in February 1942, Ensign Kelly rejoined the ship as it cruised to the Pacific through the Panama Canal. From Pearl Harbor, the Hornet set a course to intercept the Japanese and attack Midway Island.

Kelly Family at Memorial Stadium, February 1942, L-R: C. Markland Kelly, Sr., Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Jr., Leitha Wickert Kelly, Leone Humphreys Kelly, unknown.

Early morning on June 4, 1942, aboard the Hornet, the brand new F4F-4 Wildcats of fighter Squadron VF-8 prepared to accompany two fellow squads of dive and torpedo bombers on their flight to locate the Japanese fleet. After several canceled orders, launch orders finally came at 07:02. In the image below, Ensign Kelly is seated in the lead plane on the deck of the Hornet just before takeoff at 07:14. Behind Kelly's plane are fellow VF-8 pilots Ens. John Magda (plane 2), Ens. John A. Talbot (plane 3), LCDR Samuel. G. Mitchell (plane 4), Lt. Stanley E. Ruehlow (plane 5), Ens. Humphrey L. Tallman (plane 6), LTJG Minuard F. Jennings (plane 7). After takeoff, the F4F-4s had a fuel capacity of 2 hours and 40 minutes of flying on their escort of the long-range, slower VS, VB, and VT strike force to find the enemy, which they never did before running out of fuel. Not shown are the three additional pilots of VF-8, who had already taken off: Ensign C. R. Hill, Ensign I.E. McInerny, and LTJG Richard Gray.

After flying for 2 hours and 15 minutes, Ensign Kelly, flying alongside section leader Mitchell, thought he saw, about 15 to 20 miles away, the unmistakable white wake of his aircraft carrier, when suddenly it disappeared, and the time came for the VF-8 pilots to ditch in the ocean. The first to ditch was Ensign Hill, who was never recovered. LTGJ M.F. Jennings followed and next Ensign Humphrey L. Tallman, who had been a fellow aviation cadet at Jacksonville. At about 10:22, Kelly's engine sputtered and quit. In a post-war interview, J.A. Talbot recalled seeing Ensign Kelly's plane fall back and start downward toward the Pacific. As Talbot prepared to ditch, he sent a May Day call before landing in the water about a mile from Kelly's plane. Eventually, the final members of VF-8, Mitchell, Gray, Ruehlow, Magda, and McInerny made their way from the sky to the open ocean. By 10:45, all ten of the squadron's planes were in the water, with only eight pilots safely floating in life rafts or their Mae West life vests awaiting rescue.

The VF-8 pilots were trained in survival tactics, but four days floating in the open ocean was not ideal. Finally, on June 8, a ship appeared, rescuing Talbot, Jennings, and Tallman. McInerny, Magda, Ruehlow, Mitchell, and Gray were picked up on June 9. Of the ten VF-8 pilots downed, only C. R. Hill vanished without a trace.

During his research for The Last Flight, Bowen P. Weisheit investigated the origins of a short-snorter bill, an artifact of the Kelly Collection. Writing on the ten-dollar bill indicated it was presented to Ensign Jerry Crawford, a crew member of PBY-5B, which had rescued four of the ten VF-8 flyers, Talbot (15:36 June 8, 1942), and the other three at 09:30 on June 9. During an interview, Jerry Crawford described an incident on June 10. The PBY-5B crew were back on the job searching for the final two members of VF-8 when suddenly a life raft, believed to be Ensign Kelly's, appeared and just as quickly disappeared in the dusk of nightfall. The search was renewed on June 11, but neither the raft nor Ensign Kelly were located.

A month after the battle, just before July 4, 1942, two naval officers carrying the personal effects of Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Jr. entered the showroom of Kelly Buick at Charles Street and Mount Royal Avenue in Baltimore. They reported to Mr. Kelly that his son, flying high fighter escort for bombers from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet, failed to return from the initial strike of the Battle of Midway.

All references and photographs reproduced from "The Last Flight of Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Junior, USNR," by Bowen P. Weisheit, Major, USMCR (Ret.).  Published by The Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Jr. Memorial Foundation, Inc., Baltimore, Md. (Second Ed. 1996.)

Kelly Collection