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EARLY MARINE CORPS AVIATORS
The date on which Marine Aviation began was on 22nd May 1912, when First Lieutenant Alfred A. Cunningham, USMC, reported to the Naval Aviation Camp at Annapolis. The very first three Navy’s aviators were:
- Lieutenant T. G. Ellyson,
- Lieutenant John Rodgers, and
- Lieutenant J. H. Towers
These three men oversaw the camp’s three aircraft.
Shortly after this time, there were two more Marines assigned to the school, namely:
- First Lieutenant Bernard L. Smith, and
- Second Lieutenant William M. McIlvain
It was in June 1915 that First Lieutenant Francis T. Evans then joined them.
Along with Roy Geiger, who began flying at Pensacola in 1916, these men were the early core of Marine Aviation.
| Early Marine Aviators | Marine Aviator | Naval Aviator | | First Lieutenant Alfred A. Cunningham | #1 | #5 | | First Lieutenant B. L. Smith | #2 | #6 | | Second Lieutenant William M. McIlvain | #3 | #12 | | First Lieutenant Francis T. Evans | #4 | #26 | | First Lieutenant Roy S. Geiger | #5 | #49 | | David L. S. Brewster | #6 | #55 | | Edmund G. Chamberlain | #7 | #96 1/2 | | Russell A. Presley | #8 | #100 3/4 |
Cunningham attended flying lessons at the Burgess Company and Curtiss factory at Marblehead, Mass. After receiving less than three hours instruction, he proceeded to fly solo on 20th August.
1914 was the year which had one of the first contributions by Marine aviators during a combined forces exercise in Puerto Rico. Scouting and reconnaissance missions were flown by Lieutenants Smith and McIlvain in a C-3 Curtiss flying boat. During the exercise the two pilots took officers over the island to show them the ease of speed of aerial reconnaissance as well as the range of vision that there was available. It was due to this experience that Lt. Smith recommended that an advance base Marine air unit be composed of five aviators and 20 enlisted ground crew.
The Secretary of the Navy ordered Smith to the U.S. Embassy in Paris in 1914, and he served as aviation observer and as an intelligence officer. Smith visited French aviation units during this tour and occasionally flew in combat with them. He was then ordered back to France in 1917 whereby he directed much of the design and procurement of naval aircraft, and also organized the aerial gunnery and bombing school at Miami. Smith was then ordered back to Europe in 1918 for the purposes of organizing the Intelligence and Planning Section for Naval Aviation at Navy Headquarters in Paris. He had full charge of assembling material and equipment for the famous transatlantic flight of the Navy’s NC-4 after the war in 1919.
In December 1912, Second Lieutenant McIlvain reported to Annapolis for flight instruction, becoming Marine Aviator No. 3 and officially designated Naval Aviator No. 12. McIlvain was the only Marine left in January 1915 at the Navy Flying School. As the war in Europe escalated, an agreement was made in August between the Navy and the Army for the training of Navy and Marine pilots in land planes at the Signal Corps Aviation School in San Diego. McIlvain was one of the first two Naval Aviators to be sent to the Army flight school. McIlvain flew for the first time, during his training at the school, in a cockpit inside a fuselage rather than from a seat in the open, in front of the wings of primitive “pusher.” He stressed that he felt a great sense of security having a fuselage around him.
First Lieutenant Francis T. Evans became one of the first aviators in 1917 to recover a seaplane from a spin. This is a basic element of aviation safety. It was not known, up until that time, the recovery technique and both the aircraft and pilot were lost. There were many debates as to whether or not a seaplane could be looped successfully because of its heavy pontoons. Therefore when flying over Pensacola Bay in early 1917 in a new N-9 seaplane, Evans decided to resolve the debate. He dived from 3,500 feet, trying to pick up enough speed to get “over the top” of the loop. He lost too much speed on the way up, stalling the plane on the way up, which sent it into a spin. Evans proceeded to push his control wheel forward to regain air speed and controlled the turning motion of the spin with the rudder. Once he had recovered from the spin, he climbed back up and tried again: stalling, spinning, and recovering, until he successfully completed the loop without stalling. He flew over the hangers and repeated his performance to ensure that he had witnesses. Almost twenty years later in 1936, he was awarded with the Distinguished Flying Cross because of his extraordinary discovery.
It was 31st March 1916 when First Lieutenant Roy S. Geiger reported to Pensacola as Marine Aviator No. 5. On the 9th June 1917 he was formally designated a Naval Aviator, becoming the 49th naval pilot to win his wings. During his training, Geiger made 107 heavier-than-air flights which totaled 73 hours of flight time, plus 14 free balloon ascents, which totaled 28 hours and 45 minutes. Geiger was most certainly the most distinguished aviator in Marine Aviation history and one of its greatest pilots.
As the war in Europe increased and the United States became closer to being involved, these five great men: Cunningham, Smith, McIlvain, Evans and Geiger, were the foundation on which Marine Aviation was built.
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