Colin Kelly


Colin Purdie Kelly Jr. was a World War II B-17 Flying Fortress pilot who flew bombing runs against the Japanese navy in the first days after the Pearl Harbor attack. He is remembered as one of the first American heroes of the war after ordering his crew to bail out while he remained at the bomber’s controls trying to keep the plane in the air before it exploded, killing him. His was the first American B-17 to be shot down in combat.

Life

Kelly was born in Madison, Florida in 1915 and graduated from high school there in 1932. He went on to West Point in 1933, graduated in the Class of 1937, and was assigned to a B-17 bomber group. He was the first Army officer to fly the Boeing Flying Fortress in the Far East.

Battle and death

On December 10, 1941, a single B-17C Flying Fortress heavy bomber, #40-2045, departed from Clark Field, on the island of Luzon, Commonwealth of the Philippines, alone and without escort, to search for an enemy aircraft carrier which had been reported near the coastal city of Aparri, at the northern end of the island. The aircraft was under the command of Captain Colin P. Kelly, Jr., Air Corps, United States Army, of the 14th Bombardment Squadron, 19th Bombardment Group. Kelly’s Flying Fortress had not been fully fueled or armed because of an impending Japanese air raid. It carried only three 600-pound demolition bombs in its bomb bay. While enroute to their assigned target area, Captain Kelly and his crew sighted a Japanese amphibious assault task force north of Aparri, including what they believed was a Fusō-class battleship. The crew was unable to locate the reported aircraft carrier and Kelly decided to return to attack the ships that they had seen earlier.
Kelly made two passes at 20,000 feet while the bombardier, Sergeant Meyer Levin, set up for a precise drop. On the third run, Sergeant Meyer released the three bombs in trail and bracketed the IJN light cruiser Natori. It and an escorting destroyer, IJN Harukaze, were damaged during the attack:
...The battleship was seen about 4 miles offshore and moving slowly parallel with the coastline... A quartering approach to the longitudinal axis of the ship was being flown. The three bombs were released in train as rapidly as the bombardier could get them away. The first bomb struck about 50 yards short, the next alongside, and the third squarely amidship... A great cloud of smoke arose from the point of impact. The forward length of the ship was about 10 degrees off center to portside. The battleship began weaving from side to side and headed toward shore. Large trails of oil followed in its wake...
On its return flight, the bomber was then engaged by the Tainan Air Group A6Ms which had been patrolling over Vigan. They attacked it, followed it, and attacked again. Captain Kelly ordered his crew to bail out and though the fire had spread to the flight deck, Kelly remained at the bomber's controls while he tried to keep the plane straight and level. Staff Sergeant James E. Halkyard, Private First Class Willard L. Money, and Private Altman were able to escape from the rear of the B-17. The navigator, Second Lieutenant Joe M. Bean, and the bombardier, Sergeant Levin, went out through the nose escape hatch. As co-pilot Lieutenant Donald Robins tried to open the cockpit’s upper escape hatch, the Flying Fortress exploded. Robins was thrown clear and was able to open his parachute. Boeing B-17C 40-2045 crashed approximately three miles east of Clark Field. The bodies of Captain Kelly and Sergeant Delehanty were found at the crash site.
The wreckage was found along a rural road two miles west of Mount Aryat. The tail assembly was missing. Parts... were scattered over an area of 500 yards. The right wing with two engines still in place remained almost intact although it was burning when the search party arrived. The fuselage and left side of the plane were badly wrecked and burned. T/Sgt Delehanty’s body was lying about 50 yards north of the wreckage. Capt Kelly's body... was found very near the wreckage with his parachute unopened....
The attacking planes did not see this, and initially were credited only with a probable "kill", shared jointly by Toyoda, Yamagami, Kikuchi, Nozawa, and Izumi. SaburĹŤ Sakai, who has often been credited with destroying this aircraft, was indeed a flight leader engaged in this fight with the bomber, but he and his two wingmen do not appear to have been given official credit for its dispatch.
Early reports misidentified ship attacked as the Japanese heavy cruiser Ashigara, which was present, or as the battleship Haruna, which was not. While initial reports incorrectly stated that the ship was sunk, it was hit but did not sink, although Kelly's crew did report major damage was inflicted.

Honors

Kelly was posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Cross For "extraordinary heroism" and "selfless bravery". Kelly had earlier in peace time also been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.
The United States Junior Chamber of Commerce posthumously gave its 1941 distinguished service award to Kelly on January 22, 1942, in Chicago. The award is given annually to the man under 35 years of age who has rendered the “most significant” service to the nation.
Aviation artist Robert Taylor painted a picture entitled The Legend of Colin Kelly.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote a letter, "To the President of the United States of America in 1956" asking for an appointment for Kelly's infant son. In 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower honored the request and appointed Colin P. Kelly III, who graduated from West Point in 1963.
Colin P. Kelly Jr. Street in San Francisco, near Oracle Park, was named in his honor in 1942. The street had previously been named Japan Street. Colin Kelly Dr. in Dayton, OH, is one of many streets near Wright Patterson Air Force Base named to honor Air Force heroes. Colin Kelly Drive in Forest Acres, SC, is also named in his honor, as is Colin Kelly Street in Cranford, NJ. Colin Kelly Rd in South Portland, ME was one of multiple streets in the city named to honor WW II heroes.
The patriotic song There's a Star-Spangled Banner Waving Somewhere by Paul Roberts and Shelby Darnell places Colin Kelly alongside other legendary Americans in the line "I'll see Lincoln, Custer, Washington, and Perry, / Nathan Hale, and Colin Kelly too".