Leon Vance - Military Service

Military Service

Vance requested pilot training and completed Basic School at the Spartan School of Aeronautics in Tulsa. On September 13, 1939, he was assigned to Randolph Field, Texas for Primary flight training, graduating the following March, and then to nearby Kelly Field for Advanced Flight School, where he graduated with Class 40C, earning his wings on June 21, 1940. Vance was also recommissioned as a first lieutenant, Air Corps. He served as an instructor until February 1941, when he was transferred to Goodfellow Army Air Field in San Angelo, Texas, and assigned to command the 49th School Squadron. He was at Goodfellow when the United States entered World War II in December 1941, was promoted to captain on April 6 and major on July 17, and remained in command of his basic flight training squadron until re-assigned to Strother AAF, Kansas, in December 1942 as Director of Flying. While at Goodfellow, Horace Carswell and Jack Mathis (then an enlisted clerk), both of whom would subsequently receive the Medal of Honor posthumously, served in Vance's squadron. Vance was promoted to lieutenant colonel in September 1943, after little more than four years' service.

After transition training to the Consolidated B-24 Liberator, Vance was assigned in December 1943 to the 489th Bombardment Group at Wendover AAF, Utah, as Deputy Group Commander. The group completed its training and prepared for overseas movement in April 1944, one of the last heavy bombardment groups to be assigned to the Eighth Air Force. The group was assigned to the 95th Combat Bombardment Wing of the 2nd Bomb Division and based at RAF Halesworth. Vance led the group on its first combat mission, bombing the Luftwaffe airfield at Oldenburg, Germany, on May 30, 1944.