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 Army
Air Corps 2nd Lt. David Kingsley, a bombardier in World War II, who
knowingly traded his own life for that of an injured compatriot.
Kingsley was born in 1918 and grew up in Portland, Oregon, as
the second-oldest of nine siblings. When his father died in 1928 and
his older brother joined the Navy to help with finances, he very
quickly became “man of the house” until his mother died in 1939.
Kingsley became a firefighter in the years that followed. But
then the war began, and in April 1942, the 23-year-old enlisted in
the Army Air Corps. He eventually became a bombardier and was
commissioned as a second lieutenant in April 1943. A year later, he
was sent to Europe with the 97th Bomb Group’s 341st Squadron.
On June 23, 1944, Kingsley was serving in his role as a
bombardier in a B-17 Flying Fortress on a mission to Ploesti,
Romania, in which he was tasked with dropping bombs on enemy oil
refineries. The mission was a success, as Kingsley’s delivery skills
severely damaged vital enemy installations.
But during the flight, his aircraft was damaged by German gunfire
and forced to drop out of formation. As the plane was losing
altitude, it was targeted by several Messerschmitt Bf-109 enemy
aircraft, damaging the plan further and seriously injuring two of
the plane’s gunners.
 Kingsley
jumped into action, helping tend to the wounds of the gunners, one
of whom was stripped of some layers of clothes and his parachute
harness so he could be covered in blankets.
The plane
continued to get hit by enemy fire, so the pilot ordered the crew to
bail out. Kingsley continued helping the gunners, getting them ready
to jump. But no one could find the parachute harness of the man who
had been stripped of it. It disappeared and was believed to be
damaged, anyway.
So without hesitating, Kingsley took his own harness off
and attached it to the injured man. He then helped them both
bail out, knowing he would be left behind. All eight crew
members who were able to bail out survived.
The crew said the last they saw of Kingsley, he was standing on
the bomb bay catwalk. Minutes later, the plane crashed into a heap
of fire in the small village of Suhozem, Bulgaria. The bombardier’s
body was later found in the wreckage, along with seven casualties
who were on the ground.
Records show Kingsley was initially buried in a makeshift grave
by sympathetic Bulgarians, but his body was exhumed and later laid
to rest with full military honors in Arlington National Cemetery.
For the incredibly selfless actions at the cost of his own life,
Kingsley was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor on April 9,
1945. It was presented to his oldest brother.
Kingsley is the first and only Medal of Honor recipient from the
97th Bombardment Group, now known as the 97th Air Mobility Wing. An
Air Force airfield in Oregon was named Kingsley Field in his honor
in the 1950s, and in 2004, a memorial near the site where his plane
crashed was dedicated to him and the seven villagers who died.
By Katie Lange
D0D News
Copyright 2017
David Kingsley's
Medal of Honor Citation |
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