Howard, James Howell

(b. 8 April 1913 in Canton, China; d. 18 March 1995 in Bay Pines, Florida), fighter pilot who single-handedly defended thirty American B-17 bombers against thirty Luftwaffe fighters over Oschersleben, Germany, during World War II and became the only pilot in the European theater to win the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Howard was one of three children born to two American medical missionaries, Harvey James Howard, an eye surgeon, and Maude Irene Stroebel, a nurse. In childhood he yearned for adventure and once found it while on a hunting trip with his father, when he barely escaped Chinese bandits who held the elder Howard for ten weeks. When James was fourteen years old the family moved from China to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he attended Haverford boarding school from 1927 to 1929. At Haverford, he was nicknamed “China” and was relieved when his father explained that—by jus sanguinis, right of blood—he was an American citizen like his classmates. He graduated in 1932 from John Burrows School in St. Louis, where the family had moved in 1927. He earned a B.A. degree in 1937 from Pomona College in Claremont, California. He was over six feet tall, slender, with blond hair and blue eyes.

At Pomona, Howard attended a talk by a naval aviation cadet recruiting aviation trainees. The talk steered Howard away from medicine to “something exciting and challenging” where he would “find romance and adventure.” After graduation, and because of this talk, Howard went to Long Beach, California, for naval aviation training. He entered military service in December 1937 and began training in Pensacola, Florida. In January 1939, Howard completed this training and was assigned five months later to Fighting Squadron Seven on the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Wasp in Norfolk, Virginia. He eventually transferred to Fighting Squadron Six on the U.S.S. Enterprise in San Diego, California.

Howard left the Navy on 12 June 1941 to return to China and join its air force’s American Volunteer Group—the Flying Tigers—to defend the Burma Road against Japan. He considered this “the opportunity of a lifetime” and a chance to “exercise some leadership and authority.” In the Flying Tigers, Howard became a squadron leader under General Claire Chennault and flew a P-40 for $600-$750 per month plus a $500 bonus for each confirmed enemy aircraft destroyed. The Tigers, who were stationed at Toungoo and Kunming, Burma, began combat in December 1941 and fought Japanese Zeros, I-97s, and Ki-27s. In fifty-six missions, Howard destroyed six Japanese planes and became an ace over Burma and China. In ten weeks’ fighting in Rangoon, Burma, the Tigers destroyed 217 Japanese planes, likely destroyed 43 more, and lost only sixteen P-40s and six pilots. Such victories bolstered America’s hopes in spite of many Allied defeats elsewhere. The Tigers disbanded on 4 July 1942 to become the Twenty-third Fighter Group of the Fourteenth Army Air Force.

On 31 January 1943 Howard began active service in the 332nd Fighter Squadron, Fourth Air Force, U.S. Army Air Forces, stationed in Santa Ana, California. Later that spring Howard transferred to Hamilton Field near San Francisco, as a captain and commander of the 356th Fighter Squadron of the Ninth Air Force’s 354th Fighter Group. In the 354th, he initially flew P-39s. From roughly July to October 1943, the 356th went to Salem, Oregon, so Howard could “galvanize this outfit into a fighting organization.” In September 1943 Howard became a major.

Howard and the 354th moved to Boxted, England, in the fall of 1943, becoming the first Army Air Force unit in the European theater to be equipped with the new P-51 Mustangs, and calling itself the Pioneer Mustang Group. The 354th escorted Eighth Air Force B-17 and B-24 bombers on long-range missions into Germany and France. On these missions, P-51s replaced shorter-range P-38s and P-47s. German opponents of the 354th flew ME-109s and 110s, Focke Wulf 190s, and JU-88s. On 1 December 1943, the 354th flew its first mission. Several missions later, Howard flew into history.

On 11 January 1944, when the 354th escorted 600 B-17s and B-24s to bomb German aircraft factories, Howard became separated from his group during combat over Os-chersleben, Germany. When thirty German fighters assailed thirty B-17s of the 401st Bombardment Group, he single-handedly attacked the fighters in Ding Hao!, his P-51, destroyed four of them, and scared others away in a frantic thirty-minute battle, saying afterward, “Today I was the hunter, not the hunted.” No B-17s were lost. During the battle, the enemy was not Howard’s only worry. He was dangerously low on fuel, three of his four guns malfunctioned, and B-17 “waist and tail gunners shot at anything that approached” from the rear. Since P-51s were new to Europe, had been kept secret, and resembled ME-109s, friendly fire was a threat. (Indeed, Ding Haol suffered only one hit during the battle: a stray .50 caliber bullet from a B-17.) For psychological advantage over the enemy, pilots were trained never to turn away from a frontal attack but deliberately ram the enemy head-on. When a reporter asked why he took this risk, Howard facetiously replied, “I seen my duty and I done it.” For this selfless act Major Howard received the nation’s highest award for bravery, the Congressional Medal of Honor, on 27 June 1944. Howard eventually became an ace over Europe.

In February 1944 Howard became a lieutenant colonel and the 354th’s commander. He was promoted to colonel on 29 March 1944 and later transferred to the Ninth Fighter Command at Uxbridge, England, to help supervise Normandy invasion operations. In November 1944 Howard returned home to command the Third Fighter Gunnery School at Pinellas, Florida. Because he wanted to leave the military and get married, he rejected an August 1945 request to become liaison officer to Chinese forces fighting communism. Howard left active duty on 30 November 1945 and became a brigadier general on 22 March 1948.

Civilian life caused Howard “years of anguish and adjustment.” He married twice, first to Mary G. Balles in 1948, then to Florence Buteau several years later. He had one stepdaughter. Both marriages ended in divorce because Howard was impotent, a painful contrast to the obvious gallantry and manhood behind his combat heroics and a condition for which he was never medically treated. After the war, Howard was briefly chief of aeronautics for the city of St. Louis. In 1961 he formed Howard Research Corporation, which sold and installed intercom and telephone systems, primarily for the navy. It merged with Control Data Corporation in 1965, and Howard retired in 1977. He retired from the Air Force Reserve in 1966. Howard died of cancer at Bay Pines VA Medical Center and is buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.

Howard’s Medal of Honor signified that the dangers of aerial combat equaled that of fighting on the ground. A quiet, strict, rule-abiding man and a confident, expert dog-fighter who destroyed enemy planes even while flying inverted, he stressed training and vigilant, disciplined flying from his comrades. He loved China and America and found adventure defending them.

Howard’s memoir is Roar of the Tiger (1991), the source of the above quotes. The book contains several photos that include his childhood, the planes he flew, and the men with whom he served in the skies over Burma, China, and Europe. Howard is also covered in Walter P. Tracy, St. Louis Leadership (1944). Articles about Howard include John L. Frisbee’s “One-Man Air Force,” Air Force Magazine 66 (Nov. 1983): 127; Harold W. Bowman, “Little Friend,” Aerospace Historian 30 (winter 1983): 235–239; and Timothy P. Barela, “I Seen My Duty, and I Done It,” Airman 39 (Aug. 1995): 10–11. Bowman’s article contains five photographs of Howard and B-17 formations over Germany, one in heavy flak. The congressional citation for Howard’s Medal of Honor is in Medal of Honor Recipients 1863–1994, vol. 2, World War II to Somalia (1995) compiled by George Lang et al., and Kenneth N. Jordan, Sr., Yesterday’s Heroes: 433 Men of World War II Awarded the Medal of Honor 1941–1945 (1996). Obituaries are in the New York Times (22 Mar. 1995), St. Louis Post-Dispatch (23 Mar. 1995), Los Angeles Times (25 Mar. 1995), and Air Force Times (22 May 1995). The U.S. Air Force produced a seven-minute black-and-white film titled One Man Air Force.

Gary Mason Church