The Air Medal is a wrap brooch US Mint strike with a two-piece pendent in the earliest green case. The Navy and Marines used at least four distinctly different presentation cases for the Air Medal during WWII. The earliest untitled case was green with a black medal pad.

Ensign George W. Obenour 321012 VF(N) 79 ight Fighter Pilot went Missing in Action on October 12th, 1944. He  was from Santa Clara, CA and was the son of Mrs. Susan Jane Obenour of San Jose, California. He was never found and was declared Killed in Action and a head stone was placed at the Manila American Cemetery for him in October, 1945.

The U.S. Navy had been working on carrier-based night fighters for nearly a year before O’Hare’s death, making use of British technological and operational experience. However, the initial Air Interception radar sets installed in experimental F4U-2 Corsairs were custom-built by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and were “all-American.”

The Navy’s night fighter program was coded Project Affirm, begun at NAS Quonset Point, Rhode Island, in early 1942. The first squadron produced by the program was the Corsair-equipped VF (N) -75 which was flying in the Solomons that fall, though half the unit was redesignated VF (N) -101 and went to the fleet carriers in four-plane detachments. The second and third squadrons, equipped with F6F-3Es, likewise went to the fast carriers in four-plane detachments, becoming operational in early 1944.

There was relatively little difference between the Corsair and Hellcat in adaptability to night fighting, as both had good visibility and could accommodate the radar equipment. The F4U had a slight speed advantage and a somewhat better altitude performance, but the F6F was much easier to land and was considered a more stable gun platform. For these two reasons, primarily, the Grumman was identified early on as the more promising night fighter.

Initial enthusiasm was such that half of the subsequent Hellcats produced were to be night fighters, but both technical and human resources precluded anything of the sort. The AI Model A sets were still being virtually custom built, and the 29-week specialized pilot training course ensured that night fighters would remain a limited commodity for quite some time.

Still, there was reason for optimism. Mounted in a bulbous pod under the starboard wing, the AN/APS-4 (Army-Navy/Airborne Pulse Search Equipment) weighed only 180 pounds and gave coverage out to four miles. It was designed with simplicity in mind, being operated and monitored by the pilot without undue diversion from his more immediate task of flying the airplane.

The F6F-3E, using APS-4, had a very limited production run. Barely two hundred -3 Hellcats were completed with AIA fittings, and of these a mere 18 were actually equipped with APS-4. They were allotted to the detachments of VF (N) -76 and -77 which went aboard various fleet carriers at the end of 1943 and in early 1944. The remaining F6F-3 night fighters became the -3N variant, with the newer APS-6 radar.


Though heavier than the earlier unit by some 70 pounds, APS-6 in the search mode gave the night fighter pilot a search radius of five to five-and-one-half miles. Its blind-fire control capability was considered unreliable and its use was proscribed in some squadrons. In search mode, APS-6 was effective as close as 400 feet, and could usually detect a large ship at over 20 miles. A fleet formation such as a task force could be picked up as far out as 60 miles.

APS-6’s greatest improvement over previous AI sets was its new “double dot” display system. Besides the true blip reflected from the target, a “ghost” dot was painted on the screen immediately to the right of the bogey, and this second image indicated relative height above or below the night fighter. Thus, height and bearing were presented simultaneously on one scope. This feature, coupled with the set’s simplicity of operation—only six dials or knobs besides the on-off switch—made APS-6 highly popular with pilots. Many frankly considered it superior to the sets which followed for several years.

The -3 Night Hellcats became a proving ground for night fighter equipment and techniques. Cockpit lighting was a primary feature, and red instrument panel lights, coupled with flat windscreens in place of the standard curved variety, helped reduce glare. A radar altimeter provided the exact height information so crucial in instrument flying, and an APS-13 tail-warning radar provided 60° coverage behind the fighter at 800 yards. With a top speed of about 360 mph at 18,000 feet and a climb rate of almost 3,100 feet per minute, the Hellcat night fighter was well matched against its opposition.

The -3Es and -3Ns aboard the Hornet, Yorktown, Bunker Hill, Wasp, Essex, and Lexington in the first half of 1944 helped establish night fighters in the fleet, but acceptance was slow in coming. Largely this was due to the inherent contradiction involved in operating night fliers aboard daytime carriers. The flight schedule aboard a fast carrier often called for 15 hours of operations, usually from 0430 to 1930. By dark, the deck crews were exhausted from spotting and respotting aircraft for numerous launches and recoveries. It hardly seemed worth the effort to recover a few night fighters when radar-controlled gunfire could presumably deal with nighttime raiders.

As a result, the night fighter pilots spent an inordinate amount of time sitting in their ready rooms, chafing at the inactivity. And with idleness their skills lost the sharp edge so essential to success. It was a vicious circle which tended to feed on itself, and early night fighter actions hardly inspired confidence. During the two-day Truk raid in February, 1944, a Yorktown Night Hellcat pursued a Japanese torpedo plane into gun range of the task force, causing the AA director to hold fire for fear of hitting the Grumman. Result: the Intrepid limped back to Pearl Harbor with a hole in her stern.

Nocturnal fighter protection for the Fast Carrier Task Force was provided by detachments of F6F-3Ns in the early 1944, as by this VF-(N)-76 aircraft aboard the USS Essex. The squadron also had detachments aboard the Yorktown, Lexington, Bunker Hill, and Hornet.

The situation was not improved by an incident at the end of March. During an operation near the Palaus, the Lexington launched four F6F-3Ns in response to bogeys on the scope in the early morning. Almost three hours later, well after sunrise, a conventional Hellcat mistook one of its nocturnal kin for a hostile and, as one might say, shot the living daylights out of it. The night fighter plopped down to a water landing, though happily the pilot was rescued.

Three Night Hellcat squadrons were at sea from January to September of 1944: VF (N)-76, VF (N)-77, and VF (N)-78, with detachments spread among nine carriers. The most successful was Detachment Two of VF (N) -76 aboard the Hornet. From April to September, Lieutenant Russell L. Reiserer’s team accounted for 25 confirmed kills, over half of all F6F night fighter kills during this period. But only eight were actually made in the hours of darkness, seven of which came in a single spectacular offensive mission.

Lieutenants (jg) Fred L. Dungan and John W. Dear were launched at 0030 on 4 July to conduct an intruder strike against Chichi Jima in the Bonins. Their primary mission was to locate and attack enemy shipping with 500-pound bombs, since no Japanese aircraft were expected on the island.

The two Hellcats remained on station four hours before a large procession of vessels departed the harbor. Dear had just attacked a destroyer when “Buck” Dungan radioed for help; three Rufe float fighters were on his tail.

In all, there were nine or ten Rufes airborne. Dear quickly splashed two, but the next half-hour was one long, dark dogfight. Dungan shot down four and Dear bagged another before the surviving Rufes disengaged, leaving both Hellcats badly damaged. Dungan, with a bullet in his shoulder, landed aboard the

Yorktown, and Dear was right behind. His engine ran out of oil just as his hook engaged the wire. Nor was that all. Chichi Jima proved just as rugged a target for Russ Reiserer, who returned to the Hornet with face wounds inflicted by the spectacular, intense flak.

Though night fighters demonstrated their potential in such missions, problems remained. There were too few Night Hellcats available at any one time due to the continuing maintenance schedule for electronics. And task group commanders were loath to interrupt their nightly routine with the unpopular chore of launching and recovering BatCaps. Furthermore, many captains still put their faith in evasive shiphandling and AA guns to counter the nocturnal bomber threat.

But even the most expert seamanship couldn’t prevent a snooper from tracking a task force with near impunity in the absence of defending night fighters. It therefore became plain that the most logical solution to all these problems was a full-time night air group operating from a night carrier.

Enter Lieutenant Commander Turner F. Caldwell. Out of the Naval Academy Class of ’35, Caldwell was something of a legend from the Guadalcanal campaign, where he won three Navy Crosses as an SBD squadron commander. He commissioned VF (N) -79 at Quonset Point on 20 January 1944 and moved the infant unit to NAAF Charlestown, Rhode Island, at the end of the month. Charlestown became Project Affirm’s permanent home.

Caldwell set about building his squadron around three lieutenants, all former Dauntless pilots like himself with combat experience in the Solomons, vintage 1942. His executive officer was William E. Henry, a husky blue-eyed Californian who would finish as the most successful night fighter pilot in the U.S. Navy. The rest of the squadron was filled out with hand-picked ensigns fresh from operational training. One of them was Jack S. Berkheimer, an engaging 20-year-old New Yorker who could fall asleep on his feet after two beers. He would become one of the Navy’s most proficient night hunters, but he would never reach 22.

After four months at Charlestown, VF (N) -79 moved to San Diego in preparation for deployment to the Pacific. Arriving in Hawaii in early June, Caldwell’s Hellcats and the attached Avengers went through Captain J. Griffin’s “finishing school” at Barber’s Point, home of the Night Combat Training Unit. The night fliers were now at their peak readiness: highly proficient in instrument flying, carrier-qualified for day and night, and versed in gunnery and radar interception. Even their night vision was improved with constant practice. By using only the peripheral area of their eyesight, night fighters could better distinguish forms rather than details in darkness.

Most of the pilots now had close to 300 hours in Hellcats, much of it on instruments. In preparation for three-to four-hour missions, they had to be able to read the gauges by second nature and force themselves to disregard totally what their natural senses tried to tell them. Vertigo could be fatal, as one’s inner ear might demand corrective measures for a right turn when the needle and ball said the aircraft was perfectly level.

Meanwhile, the energetic Caldwell, now a full commander, had been selling his concept of a “pure” night air group to anyone who would listen. The prospect improved with the availability of the light carrier Independence, recently returned to Hawaii from a six-month overhaul in the States. The flattop’s skipper, Captain E. C. Ewen, found Caldwell’s enthusiasm infectious, though the squadron commander was not without reservations. He characterized the project as “a new experiment in suicide,”1 and much later confessed he felt a bit like the steward who said, “Man was never made to fly, nohow. And if he was made to fly, he was never made to fly off a ship. And if he was made to fly off a ship, he was never made to fly off a ship at night.”