Claude Hardison McConnell

Military

Claude grew up in Tennessee, graduated from Marshall County High School in 1943 and immediately enlisted in the US Army Air Corp as a Technical Sergeant/Flight Engineer/Bombardier with the Eighth Air Force.



He flew 32 missions over Germany in B-24 Liberators and proudly remembered being on the crews flying fuel to General Patton in Africa.



At the end of WWII, he attended and graduated from Northern Illinois College of Optometry.

Claude was a member of the Mitchell crew...

Connections

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Units served with

Personnel of the 458th Bomb Group gather around a B-24 Liberator (serial number 41-29303) nicknamed "Liberty Lib" in order to transfer a casualty into a waiting ambulance. Image via Harry Holmes. Written on slide casing: '458th BG.'

458th Bomb Group

  • Unit Hierarchy: Group
  • Air Force: Eighth Air Force
  • Type Category: Bombardment

Events

Event Location Date Description

Born

Lewisburg, Tennessee 28 May 1924

Enlisted

Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia 3 June 1943

Died

Davidson, North Carolina 17 January 2020 The Pines at Davidson

Revisions

Date
ContributorKD4ITI
Changes
Sources

Dave Wentzel
8th AF Historical Society (Charlotte Chapter)

Date
ContributorKD4ITI
Changes
Sources

Dave Wentzel
8th AF Historical Society (Charlotte Chapter)

Date
ContributorKD4ITI
Changes
Sources

Dave Wentzel
8th AF Historical Society (Charlotte Chapter)

Date
ContributorKD4ITI
Changes
Sources

Dave Wentzel
8th AF Historical Society (Charlotte Chapter)

Date
ContributorAAM
Changes
Sources

Drawn from the records of the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force, Savannah, Georgia / Page 344 in the book 2ND AIR DIVISIONby Turner Publishing Company, 1998 edition (D790.A2S45)