{"id":6042,"date":"2020-11-16T14:36:54","date_gmt":"2020-11-16T21:36:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/?page_id=6042"},"modified":"2024-07-12T12:21:15","modified_gmt":"2024-07-12T18:21:15","slug":"william-hamlin-neely","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/the-biographies\/william-hamlin-neely\/","title":{"rendered":"William Hamlin Neely"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\u00a0(Mifflintown, Pennsylvania, February 2, 1896 \u2013 Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, August 2, 1962).1<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>Princeton<\/a> \u272f Oxford<\/a> \u272f Stamford<\/a> \u272f Feltwell, Harling Road, Sedgeford, Marske<\/a> \u272f Issoudun, Tours, 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero<\/a><\/p>\n

Neely\u2019s ancestors on both his father\u2019s and his mother\u2019s sides had resided and farmed in central Pennsylvania since emigrating from Ireland and Scotland in Colonial times. Some in Neely\u2019s parents\u2019 generation broke with the farming tradition and attended university. Neely\u2019s father, John Howard Neely, and one of his maternal uncles, Andrew Banks, studied at Princeton; both pursued careers as lawyers.2<\/a> John Howard Neely married Ella Kate Banks in 1891; they had six children. William Hamlin Neely was the third child and third of three sons (the oldest son died in infancy).3<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>Princeton<\/a><\/h6>\n
\"\"
Neely, from p. 186 of the Princeton Nassau Herald of 1917. (The Morgan Library & Museum, New York.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Neely attended Harrisburg Academy, a private college preparatory school, before entering Princeton in the fall of 1913.4<\/a> His course work prepared him to go on to law school. His brother, John Howard Neely, Jr., who graduated from Princeton a year ahead of him, was working on his law degree at the University of Pennsylvania when Neely started his senior year in the autumn of 1916, and Neely intended to follow his lead. However, on February 3, 1917, the day after Neely turned twenty-one, the U.S. cut diplomatic relations with Germany, and the future began to look less certain. Neely closed his diary entry that day by remarking that \u201cMaybe this diary will be finished in the trenches.\u201d5<\/a><\/p>\n

A \u201cPrinceton Provisional Battalion\u201d was soon organized by the university for the training of military officers.6<\/a>\u00a0Neely noted on February 26, 1917, that \u201cDrill started today. My hour is 7:30 to 8:30 in the morning.\u201d Around the same time, Neely began to consult with his family about going into aviation and was soon asking for and obtaining letters of recommendation from Princeton faculty members in support of his application. \u201cI understand that applications are coming into Minneola [sic<\/i>] at the rate of twenty per day. This means that they are going to be pretty strict on the examinations. I surely do hope that I get by, for it will be a wonderful training.\u201d7<\/a><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, a committee had been appointed at Princeton to look into \u201cthe feasibility of having a government aviation camp established at Princeton,\u201d8<\/a> and on April 12, 1917, Neely learned from his friend Walter Melville Boadway that \u201cthere would be a flying unit here of 30 men, with two machines, by the first of May. I want to get in it if I can.\u201d This again warranted consultation with his parents: \u201cIf I am admitted I will have to give up all classes and devote the entire day to that branch of the service.\u201d9<\/a> Having received his parents\u2019 blessing\u2014though with some concern that he make sure he would receive his diploma\u2014Neely handed in his application for the Princeton Aviation School to Professor Joseph Raycroft of the School\u2019s faculty board on April 18, 1917, and took his preliminary examination for it the next day.<\/p>\n

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Neely’s diary entry the day he flew for the first time. His brother Howard was visiting him at Princeton.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ten days later his eyes were examined and his equilibrium tested: \u201cthey put me on a stool and spun me around ten times, then asked me to look at the doc\u2019s fingers which were off in the opposite direction from what I was spinning.\u201d10<\/a> On May 2, 1917, he got his physical and was \u201cfound O.K. in everything.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. I understand that Kenneson has the arbitrary power to choose whoever he wants to be taken onto the squad. I surely do want to do this. I don\u2019t know when I have ever wanted to do anything quite so much.\u201d Edward Ralph Kenneson had been assigned as chief instructor at the Princeton Aviation School<\/a> and oversaw much of the initial organization and construction.11<\/a>\u00a0On May 3, 1917, having learned that he had passed the exam, Neely was sure that he would be accepted. He doesn\u2019t mention his official acceptance in his diary, but on May 8, 1917, he was taken up on his first flight in one of the school\u2019s Curtiss JN-4s (\u201cJennies\u201d): \u201cIt was a new sensation and highly pleasing. Was in the air about twenty two minutes. Was not in the least bit nervous from the time I left the ground until I returned.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neely continued to hedge his bets by moving forward with his application to \u201cthe government school,\u201d meaning presumably the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps and thus one of the recently established Schools of Military Aeronautics: \u201cI think I shall take the exam and afterwards decide where to stay.\u201d12<\/a>\u00a0Six days later (May 15, 1917) Neely went \u201cto see Mr. Mills and he told me they would hold my place open here until I decided what I wanted to do\u201d (this was probably Marshall Freeborn Mills, who had helped set up the Princeton Aviation School). Neely went to Philadelphia on May 16, 1917, and \u201cTook the exam\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. and passed it all right. However I have decided to remain in Princeton. I think I will learn a great deal more by staying here. Also will learn much more quickly. At the government schools they send you up to Cornell or Boston Tech for six weeks to get theoretical junk. By the end of that time if I stay here I think I will have gotten almost enough minutes to know how to fly.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a result of this decision, Neely did, indeed, get a good deal of experience flying. After his first flight on May 8, 1917, he went up with Princeton Aviation School<\/a> instructor Frank Ralph Stanton on May 11, 1917, and then flew with an instructor at least twenty-five more times over the course of May and June 1917. His progress was uneven, and on one day he found he \u201ccouldn\u2019t even keep the machine level and this is one of the most elementary things one learns,\u201d but a few days later he was practicing landings: \u201cThey don\u2019t seem very difficult.\u201d13<\/a> He had a particularly tough time on the last day of May, nearly nose-diving into the ground instead of landing smoothly. \u201cWhen we got back to the field [Stanton] lit into me.\u201d Neely\u2019s landings quickly improved, but two weeks later Stanton apparently still had reservations about him: \u201cStanton gave most of his men the back seat to-day. However I was not one of the lucky guys.\u201d14<\/a>\u00a0Neely notes making five more flights after this, but does not say whether he was ever given the instructor\u2019s seat.<\/p>\n

By the end of May 1917 it was evident that the U.S. government would establish a School of Military Aeronautics at Princeton\u2014which had been left off the initial list of six such schools (which included Cornell and Neely\u2019s \u201cBoston Tech,\u201d i.e., M.I.T.).15<\/a>\u00a0The Princeton \u201cground school\u201d would be an official training site for men accepted into the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps, and thus for many students like Neely who had flown at the privately funded and operated Princeton Aviation School.<\/p>\n

Neely attended Princeton\u2019s graduation ceremonies the weekend of June 16 and 17, 1917, and then went home to Mifflin for a week. He arrived back at Princeton on June 25, 1917, only to find that ground school\u2014which he called \u201ctheoretical school\u201d\u2014would not start for another week, \u201cmuch to my disgust.\u201d This meant he was able to make a few more flights and also to have a few more days at home before being summoned to campus on July 5, 1917, by a telegram announcing that \u201cthe theoretical school was about to start.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two days later, Neely, now rooming with Frank William Sidler and Frank John Newbury, who had also been students at the Princeton Aviation School, wrote in his diary: \u201cVery hard day\u2019s work. Four hours drill, two buzzer, 40 minute calisthenics, one military law. Reveille 5:30, taps 9:30.\u201d His August 25, 1917, graduation from ground school<\/a> and inclusion in what would come to be known as the second Oxford detachment are proof that he did well\u2014despite demerits for things like answering roll call by saying \u201cNeely\u201d instead of \u201c\u2018Private Neely\u2019 with emphasis on the private\u201d\u2014but he clearly found the \u201ctheoretical school\u201d work much less engaging than actual flight training.16<\/a> He made a conscious decision not to keep up his diary through the summer, \u201cfor the work is routine & pretty much the same throughout the course.\u201d17<\/a><\/p>\n

Government flight training facilities in the U.S. existed at this time mostly on paper, and offers from the Allies to train American pilots were welcomed. According to a classmate of Neely\u2019s, Arthur Richmond Taber, \u201ca notice was posted on the bulletin board\u201d some time in mid-August \u201csaying that all men who wished to go to Italy for their flying instruction were to sign below.\u201d18<\/a> Neely, along with about half of his Princeton ground school class, put his name on the list and was accepted for Italy. (His classmate and good friend Newbury was \u201cdetailed to France\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. I wish I could go with him.\u201d19<\/a>) Ordered to Mineola on August 27, 1917, the Italy-bound group spent three weeks hurrying up and waiting in and around New York. Finally, on September 18, 1917, they boarded the\u00a0Carmania<\/i>\u2014a Cunard line ship being used to transport troops\u2014and set sail. \u201cBoat left about noon. Have three good bunk mates. One is [Joseph Frederick] Stillman, old Yale end\u201d; the other two were Dudley Hersey Mudge and Joseph Kirkbride Milnor, who had both gone through ground school at Ohio State University. The detachment travelled first class, and the four men were assigned to an outside stateroom, C.47.20<\/a><\/p>\n

The\u00a0Carmania<\/i>\u00a0sailed initially to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where she arrived the morning of September 20, 1917. Late the next afternoon, as part of a convoy, the\u00a0Carmania<\/i> began the Atlantic crossing. Soon rough seas meant that those who were susceptible to it, including Neely, fell prey to sea sickness: \u201cI have been feeling wobbly all day. You get what is known as a Coney Island drunk.\u201d21<\/a>\u00a0This seems to have worn off by the 28th<\/sup>, when men from the detachment were required to stand submarine watch; the next day Neely shared this duty with Mudge\u2014a day also marked by the appearance of a number of destroyers sent out to guard the ships of the convoy as they approached the dangerous waters off the coast.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Oxford<\/a><\/h6>\n

On October 2, 1917, \u201cwhen I awoke this morning I found myself in Liverpool.\u201d There the men of the detachment learned that, while the enlisted men on board were proceeding to the continent, they themselves were to remain in England and attend ground school (again) at Oxford University. \u201cThe orders were mixed up & it now seems that we are not going to Italy. . . . Although I should prefer Italy, I know I shall enjoy England.\u201d22<\/a> The men boarded a train for Oxford; Neely spent his first night in Exeter College, but the next day was moved, along with more than half the men in the detachment, to Christ Church College. \u201cI am now living with Walter Knox and Bob [George Augustus] Vaughn\u201d\u2014both of whom had been at Princeton with him. \u201cWe have a top floor room, looking out on the quadrangle.\u201d23<\/a><\/p>\n

Their first full day at Oxford being a Wednesday, and classes commencing on Mondays, the detachment members had several free days before beginning their course at the Royal Flying Corps\u2019s No. 2 School of Military Aeronautics at the university. On Thursday \u201cWalter Knox, Ed Keenan, Frank Dixon and myself continued our tour of the university\u201d\u2014all of them had been at Princeton, the Aviation School, and ground school together. Neely was favorably impressed by the architecture he saw at Oxford University, a model for Princeton\u2019s. After drill and inspection on Friday (\u201cour detachment can\u2019t hold a candle to the English cadets in drill\u201d), Neely \u201ctook a walk down by the Thames with Walter Knox.\u201d He was glad the next day to hear that \u201cwe will only be kept three weeks [at Oxford] if we can pass the examinations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Classes<\/a> began Monday October 8, 1917, and Neely had \u201cRigging, aerial observation, engines and bombs,\u201d as well as a lecture \u201cby the head of the engine department.\u201d The next day there was again aerial observation, but also \u201cwireless, Clerget rotary engine, machine gun and a general lecture,\u201d which consisted of \u201can outline of the flying in France.\u201d Wednesday brought compass and map, and a general lecture by the head of the gunnery department on \u201cthe importance of understanding the gun thoroughly, so that you yourself could look it over before going up into the air.\u201d After this, Neely began to find this second edition of ground school monotonous, although \u201cnot as bad as it was at Princeton,\u201d mainly because the instructors were more experienced, many of them having flown on active service.24<\/a><\/p>\n

On the free half day on Saturday, October 13, 1917, Neely went with Keenan and Dixon to watch a game of rugger, and the next day, with Dixon, he took \u201ca canoe trip up Mesopotamia river\u201d\u2014I assume Neely thought the island in the Cherwell gave its name to the river. These excursions were undertaken despite dismal English autumn weather. Monday, October 15, 1917, \u201cwas a unique day. It was the first day it did not rain during our two weeks stay in Oxford.\u201d Neely continued hopeful that exams in the third week would bring his time at Oxford to a close. At the beginning of that third week, however, he was preoccupied with moving \u201cfrom our quarters in Christ Church to Exeter College. We have had a rather disagreeable time of moving. The day was rainy and we had to stand in formation in the rain, then chase up & down hunting our baggage by search light & cart it up two flights of stairs. . . \u00a0. My room-mates are now Walter Knox and Howard Raftery.\u201d25<\/a>\u00a0The reason for the move, unmentioned by Neely, forms the substance of the diary entry for October 22, 1917, in\u00a0War Birds<\/i>. Cadets of both the first Oxford detachment (fifty Americans who had arrived in early September) and the second had held well-lubricated parties the previous evening and gotten cross-wise with the Commandant of the S.M.A. In addition to a thorough dressing-down, it was determined that all the American cadets should be segregated into one college, Exeter. Thus Neely ended up in a small room with the two others and \u201cabsolutely no room to put all your stuff away.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, October 24, 1917, some of the cadets were taken out to a machine gun range \u201csunk down in an old quarry,\u201d and Neely \u201cgot a fairly good shoot\u201d on a Vickers gun. Two days later he received 265 out of 300 on a machine gun test and thought he \u201cShould have done better.\u201d The test was thought to be one of the exams that meant \u201cwe are going to get out very soon. Elliot [sic<\/i>] Springs says the flying men will be posted first. I hope I get out soon & get thru flying school. The sooner you get to the front the better chance you will have of getting a higher commission out of it.\u201d26<\/a> Neely also noted a few days later that he had \u201cnot been in a plane since June, and am getting anxious to get back into the old ozone once more.\u201d27<\/a><\/p>\n

On his fourth weekend in Oxford, Neely took part in a soccer match between the Americans of Exeter and the English of Jesus College\u2014an uneven contest, given that \u201cnone of our men had ever played the game before.\u201d \u201cIn return for playing soccer, Elliot gave me a pass,\u201d which meant he and Knox could go to the movies.28<\/a>\u00a0The next day, Sunday, he joined Knox and Dixon for a bike ride to Abingdon, south of Oxford: \u201cvery amusing\u201d until Knox and Dixon \u201cimbibed quite heavily\u201d and a sober Neely abandoned them to their hilarity.<\/p>\n

Finally, on the first day of November, \u201cWe learned \u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. the men who are going to go to flying school. I am one of the twenty. We go to Stamford, Lincolnshire. Of the Princeton bunch, Frank Sidler, Bob Vaughn, Ed Cronin, Bostwick [sic<\/i>; sc. Bonham Hagood Bostick], Newt Bevin, Harold Bulkley, Elliot Springs and myself go to flying squadron. Walter Knox, Ed Keenan, Howard Raftery, and Paul Carpenter will go to Grantham and take up gunnery. I rather hate to part with them, especially Walter Knox. We have bummed around quite a bit together.\u201d29<\/a> \u00a0At Stamford the twenty men from the second Oxford detachment would be joining men from the first Oxford detachment who had started flying training there about two weeks previously.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Stamford<\/a><\/h6>\n

On November 3, 1917, Neely \u201cgot up in time to bid the boys good-bye. Went down to the station to see them off\u201d to Grantham and machine gun school. The next day, a Sunday, he and Bostick rode bikes out to Woodstock and \u201cwent through the Duke of Marlborough\u2019s park\u201d at Blenheim before returning to Exeter College to pack. The six-hour train journey via Rugby to Stamford on November 5, 1917, was memorable for an encounter with some German prisoners. Neely\u2019s fellow detachment member, William Ludwig Deetjen, spoke German and was able to interpret.30<\/a>\u00a0Neely noted in his diary that the prisoners \u201cwere in good spirits. If all the populace is as indomitable as they were we have our work cut out for us to beat them.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Part of Deetjen’s diary entry for November 5, 1917 (left) and Neely’s diary entry for the same day (right).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As luck and English weather would have it, Neely\u2019s first twelve days at Stamford and No. 1 Training Depot Station at the air field south of the town were frustratingly flightless. On November 6, 1917, \u201cIn the afternoon we took the lorry and went out to the field. I didn\u2019t get a flight due to the fact that the instructor who took Elliot Springs with him crashed up and flying was off for the rest of the afternoon.\u201d31<\/a>\u00a0The next day was one of the field\u2019s alternating Wednesdays off\u2014Neely occupied himself by taking a walk with Sidler and changing rooms in the house where the men quartered. The men who, like Deetjen, were scheduled for morning flying, got in some time in the air on Thursday before the weather closed in. The next day, November 9, 1917, Neely wrote that \u201cI go on morning flying next week. The weather will then probably switch around.\u201d And, indeed, he appears not to have flown until the end of his second week at No. 1 T.D.S.<\/p>\n

Otherwise, the event of that second week at Stamford was another change of quarters. (Neely\u2019s diary entries become increasingly sporadic after he arrived at Stamford, so information about him is largely second hand.) The \u201cvacant private house,\u201d \u201csupposed to be a haunted one,\u201d where the men were initially quartered (Deetjen gives the address \u201c60 St. Martin\u2019s Road\u201d), was cold and the plumbing defective.32<\/a> In response to complaints the men were moved the evening of November 12, 1917, to the workhouse, literally.33<\/a> Vaughn remarked that \u201cThe place is not half so bad as the name would indicate, on the contrary we like it quite well, except for the fact that it is ten minutes walk to town.\u201d34<\/a> Taber noted, with slight exaggeration, that 1 T.D.S. \u201cIs near the sea coast\u201d and thus potentially in the flight path of German bombers; night-time blackout was required.35<\/a>\u00a0At least twice, according to Deetjen, police found that light could be seen coming from the workhouse building; the second time, \u201c\u2018Cop\u2019 came out tonight again & raised hell.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. because our lights shone & he took Bill Neeley\u2019s [sic<\/i>] name, and not mine. Why he picked on Bill I don\u2019t know.\u201d36<\/a><\/p>\n

By this time, however, Neely was finally flying again and was perhaps not too bothered by the reprimand. On November 17, 1917, according to his Pilot\u2019s Flying Log Book, he went up for fifteen minutes, still in the front seat, and circled the aerodrome. Neely\u2019s records of his flight that day and those on the next two days are of interest because he notes flying JN-4A\u2019s with both stick and wheel controls. The JN-4B\u2019s at Princeton had had the older Deperdussin wheel controls.37<\/a> It was on a Jenny with a \u201cDep. control\u201d that the plane in which Springs was a passenger at Stamford on November 6, 1917, had come to grief\u2014the English pilot being accustomed to the stick control that was by then in much wider use.38<\/a> Taber wrote of flying at Stamford that \u201cThe different types of control are confusing,\u201d and that switching between them was \u201clike changing from a saddle-horse which is bridle-wise to one which is not.\u201d39<\/a><\/p>\n

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Neely’s initial Pilot’s Flying Log Book entries at Stamford. Weeks were apparently reckoned from Thursday through Tuesday, separated by the regular Wednesdays off.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Neely got in one more flight during November, on the 22nd<\/sup>, a \u201cjoy ride\u201d with Duncan Ronald Gordon MacKay, the officer in charge of no. 4 flight at Stamford. After this, the weather was, according to Vaughn, \u201cpretty bad for flying.\u201d40<\/a> The day before Thanksgiving, Neely, Deetjen, Sidler, and Raymond Watts \u201cwent thru the Blackstone Co\u2019s shell plant here in town.\u201d41<\/a> Blackstone and Company had been founded as a maker of farm implements, but was evidently at this time part of the war effort. \u201cMost all of the machine shop labor has been replaced by girls. They all wear blue jumpers and we saw them turning out 18 lb. and 6 inch shells.\u201d42<\/a> In the evening Neely and Deetjen went to the movies. Neely wrote the next day that \u201cI went down to Grantham and had Thanksgiving dinner with the original detachment. It was a mighty good dinner but the fellows ran it out entirely too much,\u201d or as Deetjen put it: \u201cafter the dinner \u2013 oh! I won\u2019t describe it, but take it from me \u2019twas the wildest party I ever attended.\u201d43<\/a><\/p>\n

Neely apparently got in two more flights on December 4, 1917 (\u201capparently\u201d because his log book is hard to read), finally flying in the back seat. Two days later he flew solo\u2014an event noted in his much neglected diary: \u201cAs I was taxying into the hangars the sergeant nodded his approval of the show, so I felt as tho\u2019 I had gotten away with it all right. It surely did feel good to get up in the air alone and feel that you were your own boss.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Neely and a British Curtiss Jenny in a photo presumably taken at Stamford. The photo was apparently in an album, kept by Neely and loaned to Mike O’Neal by Neely’s son. My thanks to Mike O’Neal and Steve Ruffin for this copy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Over the next five days, when weather was decent, Neely was able to get in another five solo flights, one lasting seventy minutes. His second flight on December 11, 1917, left him shaken and berating himself. \u201cAt the end of my afternoon flight I came to grief, in the form of my first crack up.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. Just before I would have hit the ground I saw a machine directly under me. It was too late to do anything. In fact I was then finally leveling off for my landing. Almost the same instant that I saw the edge of the plane on the ground I hit plump on top of it. I quickly shut off my switch. But Gregg\u2014the fellow in the lower plane, must have put on throttle, for he started across the field with me on top.\u201d Neely got to the ground and \u201cwent around to the right hand side and shut off the motor. [Gregg] could not reach it. The undercarriage of my plane was in his way.\u201d Neither Neely nor Gregg (probably David Gregg of the first Oxford detachment) was injured. \u201cThey say everyone must have a crash. Maybe so, but this one was avoidable. If I had looked carefully over the aerodrome I would not have landed.\u201d Neely\u2019s mishap was not unique that day: Deetjen wrote that \u201cOut on the patch\u2014there at the field\u2014you\u2019ll find a bunch of rubbish. Quite a bunch at that, for seven more crashed today. In fact we all have our \u2018wind up\u2019 to a great degree. Twice a landing buss crashed onto one on the ground. In neither case were there any injuries. Bill Neeley just crawled out on top of Gregg, both in Curtiss planes. [Daniel] Waters broke his twice.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. We can thank our Maker that no one has been killed. There have been far too many bad accidents with simply miraculous escapes. If this luck follows us to France, we will be world beaters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Their luck gave out before they crossed the channel. Neely\u2019s next (and antepenultimate) diary entry records the death of Harold Ainsworth of the first Oxford detachment on December 19, 1917: \u201ckilled while stunting a Curtiss plane. He was doing a loop when the wing came off. He plunged headlong to the ground. This is the result of the order which makes us stunt these old Curtisses. It is an order given by somebody that either knows nothing about conditions or else by a man who doesn\u2019t care whether any of these men come through or not. These machines are as old as the hills & most of them should be condemned for straight flying let alone stunting.\u201d Similar accounts of Ainsworth\u2019s accident and criticism of the authorities can be found in Deetjen\u2019s diary for that day and in the\u00a0War Birds<\/i> entry for January 1, 1918.44<\/a><\/p>\n

Neely records in his log book having gotten in fifty minutes solo flying on December 15, 1917. He describes in his diary in some detail his next, and final, two flights at Stamford on December 22, 1917 (the day of Ainsworth\u2019s funeral): \u201cIn the morning I had up a JN3, a very old Curtiss type of pre-war design. It is a much harder machine than the A [presumably JN-4A] to fly, but is good practice as we will have to go on the planes of lighter control.\u201d Later in the day, he took up JN-4A B1942: \u201cI had a stick control & as I am not used to it it was rather difficult landing & taking off. I am going to use a stick however, from now on, because you have to fly that exclusively later.\u201d His total flying time at Stamford was two hours and fifty-five minutes dual, and five hours fifty minutes solo, all, but for the one flight in a JN-3, on JN-4A\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Neely\u2019s last, inauspicious, diary entry was written the next day, describing the collision of two DH-6s that killed George Longley Lewington and Stanley James Young.<\/p>\n

Some of the men training at Stamford, like Deetjen and Springs, took advantage of Christmas leave to travel, but, according to Vaughn, \u201cMost of us spent our Christmas right here in Stamford.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. At night we had a Princeton dinner ordered at a little restaurant or tea room here, and all the Princeton fellows not on leave (10 in all) were there,\u201d probably including Neely.<\/p>\n

I am not aware of a journal kept by Neely in 1918, although that is not proof that such did not or does not exist. It is possible that Neely felt that his Pilot\u2019s Flying Log Book alone provided an adequate record of his activities going forward. In any case, the log book and the summary of his service that Neely wrote for the Pennsylvania War History Commission are the sources for most of the sparse information about what he did after his time at Stamford in what follows.45<\/a>\u00a0There are apparent date discrepancies between the two documents. I suspect that the dates Neely provided for the Pennsylvania War History Commission were based on memory and approximate; I have assumed that dates in the log book are accurate.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Feltwell, Harling Road, Sedgeford, Marske<\/a><\/h6>\n

Early in the new year Neely was posted to No. 7 Training Depot Station at Feltwell in Norfolk. There, on January 6, 1918, he made his first flight in an Avro, the ubiquitous R.F.C. training plane, as a passenger. The next day, and again on the twelfth and fifteenth, he went up with an instructor but controlled the plane from the rear seat.\u00a0 On January 21, 1918, he began flying solo again. Evidently winter weather was improving; No. 7 T.D.S. probably also had a better ratio of training planes to students than No. 1 T.D.S. at Stamford. Neely started piling on the hours. He began stunting (\u201cloop, 3 spins, Immelmanns\u201d on January 25, 1918), practicing vertical banks, and then did some formation flying. In early February Neely passed his height test (flying at 9,000 feet), and in mid-February he made a cross country flight: \u00a0one hour and forty minutes\u00a0 to Harling Road air field at Roudham, fifteen miles to the east of Feltwell, and back, thus fulfilling another prerequisite for graduating<\/a> from this stage of R.F.C. training.\u00a0 The next day, February 16, 1918, he completed a further requirement, flying an operational plane for the first time, a Sopwith Pup. That day he did only \u201cstraight flying,\u201d but over the next few days, he practiced stunting and brought his total flying time (in England) up to just over thirty-seven hours, thirty of which were solo. His exact R.F.C. graduation date is not noted, but he made his last flight at No. 7 T.D.S. on February 19, 1918.\u00a0 Graduation entitled him to several days leave, which he took in London.46<\/a> \u00a0He also qualified for his commission around this time; Pershing\u2019s cablegram forwarding the recommendation is dated March 6, 1918.47<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"
This photo was probably taken to mark Neely’s becoming a first Lieutenant. I am grateful to Mike O’Neal for a copy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For the next stage of his training Neely was posted to Harling Road and No. 94 Squadron, a squadron at this time tasked with training pilots to fly Sopwith Camels. For his first flights at Harling Road at the end of February and the beginning of March, Neely once again flew an Avro (solo), but on March 6, 1918, he was back on Pups, flying nearly every day and, on March 19, 1918, he flew a Camel. During his second time in a Camel, on March 21, 1918, he had a bad landing, damaging both a tire and the propeller, but he went up in a Camel again on the next and subsequent days. In the meantime, Washington sent a cable dated March 10, 1918, that included approval of his commission; it apparently became official on March 22, 1918, and \u201cNeeley\u201d was placed on active service on March 28, 1918.48<\/a><\/p>\n

In his log book\u2019s remarks section, Neely noted of his final flight on a Camel at Harling Road on April 2, 1918: \u201cRoll, engine cut out.\u201d After this Neely had a nearly three week break from flying until April 22, 1918. According to his log book, he was posted to No. 110 Squadron at Sedgeford and was on that date flying an \u201cA.W.\u201d\u2014presumably an Armstrong Whitworth FK.8.<\/p>\n

This switch\u2014from Camels to FK.8s\u2014is unusual and drastic. Neely had spent three months training to be a fighter pilot and was now apparently destined for observation or bombing in two-seater aircraft. Without further information, one can only speculate on the logic, if any, for the reassignment. Possibly Neely was yanked off Camels because the U.S. Air Service anticipated the need for DH-4 pilots. Or, after having his engine cut out on him during his flight in early April, Neely may have chosen not to continue on Camels. Because of the torque of their rotary engines, Camels were notoriously tricky to fly, as attested by the large number of accidents associated with them in training (one of the second Oxford detachment men, when told he was to transfer to Camels, complained vociferously and was put back on S.E.5s49<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\"\"
Neely and a Sopwith Camel in a photo probably taken when he was training with No. 94 Squadron at Harling Road. The photo was apparently in an album, kept by Neely and loaned to Mike O’Neal by Neely’s son. My thanks to Mike O’Neal and Steve Ruffin for this copy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There is another puzzling bit of (mis)information related to Neely during this period. Deetjen, who knew Neely well from Stamford, wrote in his diary on March 28, 1918, that there was \u201ca rumor that Bill Neely had gone west\u201d; on April 2, 1918, Deetjen wrote that \u201cBill Neely did die at Ayre [sic<\/i>]. He was rolling an S.E.5 and his wings came off.\u201d There were a number of fatal flying accidents at Ayr in March 1918, including ones involving Thomas Sydney Ough Dealy and Harry Glenn Velie, either of whose last names could have been garbled as \u201cNeely.\u201d50<\/a>\u00a0Dealy and Velie were both killed flying Camels, but Thomas Cushman Nathan of the first Oxford detachment was killed on an S.E.5 at Ayr on March 20, 1918, when one of his wings collapsed. Perhaps the details of Nathan\u2019s accident were attached to Neely\u2019s name. Nevertheless, Deetjen\u2019s mistake was an odd one to make; that he did not later correct it may be an index of Neely\u2019s isolation from others in the Oxford detachments while he was at Harling Road.<\/p>\n

After four flights on an \u201cA.W.\u201d and one on a Martinsyde (probably a G100 or G102),51<\/a>\u00a0Neely spent most of the rest of his time at Sedgeford flying DH.9s (planes based on and closely related to the DH.4); he practiced loops, aerial firing, and bombing. He last records a flight there on May 13, 1918, and notes a total of over seventy-seven hours flying. There are no log book entries for the second half of May 1918, perhaps reflecting his having been given some leave or perhaps ground course work.<\/p>\n

\"\"
This photo of Neely and a DH.9 was probably taken at Sedgeford or Marske. The photo was apparently in an album, kept by Neely and loaned to Mike O’Neal by Neely’s son. My thanks to Mike O’Neal and Steve Ruffin for this copy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Neely\u2019s final training posting was to No. 2 Fighting School at Marske-by-the-Sea in North Yorkshire, a good 130 miles north of Norfolk where he had done most of his previous training.<\/p>\n

At Marske, from June 3 through June 26, 1918, Neely made two flights in an Avro and then seven in a D.H.9, working on aerial fighting, firing, and formation flying. Neely\u2019s log book, seems to break off at this point.\u00a0 Perhaps as a result of his transfer overseas in early July 1918, the subsequent entries were separated from his training log book and not passed on to family and researchers; perhaps once he was transferred to the A.E.F. he no longer kept up his R.F.C. issued book.<\/p>\n

At Marske Neely would have crossed paths with a number of second Oxford detachment men, many of them training on scout machines, but also at least two who were, like him, training for observation and bombing: Allen Tracy Bird and Walter Ferguson Halley.52<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>Issoudun, Tours, 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero<\/a><\/h6>\n
\"\"
S.O. 192 ordering Neely and others to 2 A.I.C. at Tours. The original is among the papers of Harold Ernest Goettler at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio. I am grateful to Steve Ruffin for this image.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bird and Halley, along with Harold Ernest Goettler and Claude Stokes Garrett, who had trained with the R.F.C. in Canada, were ordered to travel from Marske to London in early July, preparatory to going overseas, and it seems likely that Neely received similar orders around the same time.53<\/a>\u00a0Neely is documented among a large group of men ordered on July 5, 1918, to travel from London to the 3rd<\/sup>\u00a0Aviation Instruction Center at Issoudun in the Loire region of central France, and then in a group ordered on July 14, 1918, from Issoudun to the 2nd<\/sup> Aviation Instruction Center at Tours some seventy miles to the northwest of Issoudun.54<\/a><\/p>\n

Goettler notes in his diary on July 19, 1918, that \u201c[Paul Temple] Hardin, [Winfield Earl] Sisson, Neely and [Thomas Forrest] McCook received a little dual on the old French Breguets that are in camp.\u201d Goettler himself was soon asked to serve as an instructor on Breguets at Tours. At some point a similar request was evidently made of Neely, whose account of his military service for the Pennsylvania War History Commission indicates that at 2nd<\/sup>\u00a0A.I.C. he was \u201cChief Instructor on D.H.4\u2019s.\u201d While Goettler, Bird, McCook, and Hardin were posted to the U.S. 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero Squadron in August, Neely remained at Tours until the first part of October 1918, when he also was also posted to the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero. In his account of his military service Neely gives October 10, 1918, as the start date for his time with the squadron. Daniel Parmelee Morse, the commanding officer and historian of the 50th<\/sup> Aero, writes that Neely was one of three pilots who reported for duty on October 13, 1918.55<\/a>\u00a0Neither Neely nor Morse is entirely reliable when it comes to dates, but it seems reasonable that three days should have elapsed between the date of Neely\u2019s assignment and his arrival at the 50th<\/sup>, which was located over two hundred miles to the east of Tours.<\/p>\n

The 50th<\/sup> Aero was an observation squadron flying DH-4s.56<\/a>\u00a0It had taken part in the St. Mihiel Offensive. Not long before the opening of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive on September 26, 1918, the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0had, along with the 1st and 12th Observations Squadrons, moved to the 1st Corps Observation Group aerodrome near Remicourt at the western edge of the American First Army and about sixteen miles south of the front. The 50th<\/sup>\u00a0was there initially tasked with supporting the 77th<\/sup>\u00a0Infantry Division. By the time Neely was flying, the 77th<\/sup>\u00a0had advanced a good ten miles north to the vicinity of Grandpr\u00e9; the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0subsequently cooperated with the 78th<\/sup>\u00a0Infantry Division, which on October 15, 1918, relieved the 77th<\/sup> and continued the advance north.57<\/a><\/p>\n

While Morse\u2019s published history of the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero and the typescript \u201c50th Aero Squadron, Historical Account,\u201d evidently also written by him, note the number and nature of missions flown by the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0during the period Neely was with the squadron, they seldom provide such details as the names of the men who flew them. One of the exceptions is Morses\u2019 account of a reconnaissance mission flown on October 29, 1918 that included Neely. The squadron had the previous day relocated about thirteen miles to the northeast, so missions on the 29th<\/sup> were flown out of Clermont-en-Argonne. \u201cGerman aerial activity was particularly marked, necessitating two protection ships to accompany each mission ship. In this manner two successful reconnaissance missions were carried to completion, although one mission formation was attacked by a large formation of Fokkers.\u201d58<\/a>\u00a0Morse goes on to record that the mission formation that was attacked consisted of planes piloted by Floyd Meredith Pickrell and Neely with their observers Mitchell Harvey Brown and Horace Osment respectively, along with their \u201cprotection ships.\u201d Pickrell later recalled that<\/p>\n

the most serious battle I had with enemy aircraft was on 29 October 1918 when Lt. Mitch Brown and myself were attacked by 18 planes. I was leading and Brown was my observer, and Lt. Bill Neely, . . . was flying the second plane. We were going over the front lines just before sundown, and they came at us out of the sun. We never saw them until they were right on us. My escort and I went into a tight circle to give the observers a chance to fire. Mitch saw them before I did. I was watching where we were going. Over here was Grandpr\u00e9 at the head of the Argonne Forest, . . . [Mitch] shot two of them off our tail and I saw them go down in a spin. Now, we couldn\u2019t hang around to see whether or not they crashed, you know, we had other things to do. We asked for confirmation on those but we never got it. . . . Those were Fokker biplanes. They had red noses, every one of them. . . . they said it was [Richthofen\u2019s] squadron. Neely and Osment also put in for confirmation for one of them but never got it.59<\/a><\/p>\n

Morse provides a summary showing the number of missions and hours flown by each pilot and observer of the 50th<\/sup> Aero. Bird, who was with the squadron during both St. Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne, flew twenty missions and thirty-six hours. Neely\u2019s total of ten missions and fifteen hours, compares favorably, given that he flew only during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive.60<\/a><\/p>\n

Neely indicated in his own account of his military service that he served with the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero through mid-January 1919. He and fellow second Oxford detachment member Robert Arthur Kelly returned to the United States on the\u00a0Roma<\/i>, which left Marseille in mid-March 1919, arriving at New York on April 4, 1919.61<\/a> Neely settled in Harriburg and pursued his delayed career as a lawyer, eventually serving as a county court judge.62<\/a><\/p>\n

mrsmcq November 16, 2020<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Notes<\/h3>\n
\n

(For complete bibliographic entries, please consult the list of\u00a0works and web pages cited<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

1<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0For Neely\u2019s place and date of birth, see Ancestry.com,\u00a0U.S., World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917\u20131918<\/i>, record for William Hamlin Neely. For his place and date of death, see Ancestry.com,\u00a0Pennsylvania, Death Certificates, 1906\u20131963<\/i>, record for William H Neely. It should be noted that newspapers reported his death as having occurred on August 3, 1962; see, for example, \u201cJudge Neely of Dauphin Dies at 66.\u201d\u00a0 The photo is a detail from a\u00a0photo<\/a>\u00a0of the Princeton School of Military Aeronautics ground school class that graduated August 25, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

2<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0On John Howard Neely and his descent, see\u00a0Commemorative Biographical Encylcopedia of the Juniata Valley<\/i>, vol. 2, pp. 784\u201386. On the Banks family, see McAllister,\u00a0The Descendants of John Thomson<\/i>, pp. 107 ff.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

3<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0On Neely\u2019s immediate family, see documents available at Ancestry.com.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

4<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0McAllister,\u00a0The Descendants of John Thomson<\/i>, p. 109.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

5<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary,\u00a0passim<\/i>, and entry for February 3, 1917. Unless otherwise noted, the following account of Neely in 1917 is largely based on his diary; quotations from the diary are footnoted when the date of the entry might not otherwise be evident.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

6<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Hunt, Tomlinson, and Sheridan, \u201cTimeline: Princeton in the Great War.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

7<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for March 7, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

8<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Hunt, Tomlinson, and Sheridan, \u201cTimeline: Princeton in the Great War.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

9<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for April 13, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

10<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for April 29, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

11<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u201cEdward Ralph Kenneson.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

12<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for May 9, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

13<\/strong><\/a> \u00a0Neely, diary entries for May 21 and 29, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

14<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for June 12, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

15<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Hunt, Tomlinson, and Sheridan, \u201cTimeline: Princeton in the Great War.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

16<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for July 12, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

17<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for July 19, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

18<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Taber,\u00a0Arthur Richmond Taber<\/i>, p. 70.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

19<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, summary diary entry p. 250.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

20<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Milnor, diary entry for September 18, 1917, names all of the room mates and provides the room number.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

21<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for September 23, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

22<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 2, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

23<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 3, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

24<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 11, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

25<\/strong><\/a> \u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 22, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

26<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 26, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

27<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 31, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

28<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely, diary entry for October 27, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

29<\/strong><\/a> \u00a0Neely does not list Dixon and Arthur Taber, both of whom were Princeton S.M.A. graduates and among the twenty men who went to Stamford.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

30<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0See Deetjen\u2019s diary entry for November 5, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

31<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0See Springs account of the incident in his letter of November 6, 1917, to his father on p. 49 of Springs,\u00a0Letters from a War Bird<\/i>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

32<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Vaughn,\u00a0War Flying in France<\/i>, pp. 29 and 30; Deetjen, diary entries for November 7 and 13, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

33<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Deetjen, diary entry for November 13, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

34<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Vaughn,\u00a0War Flying in France<\/i>, p. 31. Whether this was the older work house on Barnack Road or the one on the Bourne Road, I have not been able to determine. Both Deetjen and Vaughn state that it was a half mile out of town, which would suggest it was the latter\u2014although it seems odd that they would be placed in a still functioning institution, rather than in a building of the one that had been repurposed. See \u201cStamford, Lincolnshire.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

35<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Taber,\u00a0Arthur Richmond Taber<\/i>, p. 93.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

36<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Deetjen, diary entry for November 18, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

37<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Mike O\u2019Neal, personal communication.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

38<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Springs,\u00a0Letters from a War Bird<\/i>, p. 49 (Springs indicates the accident had taken place the previous day).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

39<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Taber,\u00a0Arthur Richmond Taber<\/i>, p. 96.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

40<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Vaughn,\u00a0War Flying in France<\/i>, p. 32.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

41<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Deetjen, diary entry for November 30, 1917.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

42<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Ibid<\/i>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

43<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Ibid<\/i>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

44<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0See also Ogilvie, \u201cTraining Errors of the A.E.F\u201d; Springs,\u00a0Letters from a War Bird<\/i>, p. 67; and Skelton,\u00a0Lt. Henry R. Clay<\/i>, pp. 7 and 19. Both Springs and Clay had apparently flown the plane, A1259, in which Ainsworth was killed, as had, according to\u00a0War Birds<\/i>, Lindley Haines DeGarmo (Clay and DeGarmo were in the first Oxford detachment).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

45<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Included in Ancestry.com,\u00a0Pennsylvania, WWI Veterans Service and Compensation Files, 1917\u20131919, 1934\u20131948<\/i>, record for William Hamlin Neely.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

46<\/strong><\/a> \u00a0\u201cMifflintown Boy Graduates as Aviator in London Camp.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

47<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0 Cablegram 657-S.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

48<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Cablegram 895-R; Neely\u2019s account of his military service for the Pennsylvania War History Commission, included in Ancestry.com,\u00a0Pennsylvania, WWI Veterans Service and Compensation Files, 1917\u20131919, 1934\u20131948<\/i>, record for William Hamlin Neely; and McAndrew, \u201cSpecial Orders No. 205.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

49<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Barksdale, diary entries for June 22 and July 9, 1918.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

50<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0See the commentary<\/a> and notes to Parr Hooper\u2019s letter of April 3, 1918, in Hooper,\u00a0Somewhere in France<\/i>, regarding some of the confusion surrounding these names.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

51<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Neely\u2019s log book, unlike most of the others I have seen, does not record airplane serial numbers, so that one must speculate as to precisely which planes are meant by \u201cA.W.\u201d and \u201cMartinsyde.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

52<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Brown, Jesse Campbell, Curtis, Forster, Fulford, Wicks, and perhaps others were training on S.E.5s; Barksdale was also at Marske training on Avros and Pups.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

53<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Biddle, \u201cSpecial Orders No. 109.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

54<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0 [Biddle?], \u201cSpecial Orders No. 109″; Benedict, \u201cSpecial Orders No. 192\u201d; see also Goettler, diary entries for July 3\u2013 15, 1918.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

55<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Morse,\u00a0The History of the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero Squadron<\/i>, p. 54.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

56<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Conventionally, \u201cDH.4″ refers to the British plane, \u201cDH-4″ to the American-built version of the same plane.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

57<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Morse,\u00a0The History of the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero Squadron<\/i>, pp. 56 and 73; Historical Branch, War Plans Division, General Staff,\u00a0Brief Histories of Divisions, U.S. Armies 1917\u20131918<\/i>, p. 60.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

58<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Morse,\u00a0The History of the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero Squadron<\/i>, p. 59.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

59<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Ruffin, \u201cFlying in France with the Fiftieth: 1\/Lt. Floyd M. Pickrell, USAS,\u201d p. 164.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

60<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0Morse,\u00a0The History of the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0Aero Squadron<\/i>, p. 83.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

61<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0War Department. Office of the Quartermaster General, Army Transport Service,\u00a0Lists of Incoming Passengers, 1917 – 1938<\/i>, Passenger list for Casuals, on S. S.\u00a0Roma<\/i>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

62<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u201cJudge Neely of Dauphin Dies at 66.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0(Mifflintown, Pennsylvania, February 2, 1896 \u2013 Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, August 2, 1962).1 Princeton \u272f Oxford \u272f Stamford \u272f Feltwell, Harling Road, Sedgeford, Marske \u272f Issoudun, Tours, 50th\u00a0Aero Neely\u2019s ancestors on both his father\u2019s and his mother\u2019s sides had resided and farmed in central Pennsylvania since emigrating from Ireland and Scotland in Colonial times. Some in Neely\u2019s … Continue reading “William Hamlin Neely”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6054,"parent":30,"menu_order":92,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-6042","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6042"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6042\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8846,"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6042\/revisions\/8846"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/30"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parr-hooper.cmsmcq.com\/2OD\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}