Willis Bradley Haviland


Willis Bradley Haviland, was a pioneer military pilot in World War I and a Naval Air Station Commanding Officer in World War II. As the sixteenth American volunteer in the Lafayette Escadrille, he was among the first air combat pilots to fight the Germans in World War I, before the United States officially entered the war. He would later become the first pilot to launch a plane from a battleship.

Early life

Born on 10 March 1890 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Willis was the only son of Dr. Willis Henry Haviland by his first wife Grace Hynes. His parents divorced 28 Jun 1895, when he was only about 5 years old, and Dr. Haviland remarried to Mary Page Irvine on 22 Jul 1895 in Butte, Montana. Willis Bradley Haviland would remain close to his biological mother well into his adulthood.
He attended Kemper Military School and Iowa State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts at Ames.
His father was elected a Montana State Senator in 1906 for one term in the Democratic Party. Meanwhile, young Willis B. Haviland enlisted in the United States Navy from 1907–1911. When war broke out in Europe, Willis joined the American Field Service in 1915. There he drove ambulances for seventeen months at the Alsace front. When the Field Service and American Ambulance severed ties in the summer of 1916, Willis received a pilot's license on 7 September in that year and entered the American Escadrille becoming the sixteenth American volunteer pilot in the squadron.

Aviation career

Willis Bradley Haviland was primarily an escort and reconnaissance pilot in the Lafayette Escadrille, and occasionally was assigned a bombing run. He was permitted only to engage in air combat with the enemy in defense. Consequently, he earned only two confirmed "kills" in this time period, not nearly as many as his ace peers who had more aggressive assignments. He was adept at keeping his plane out of the enemy's firing angle, and if provoked he was skilled enough to send the German and Austrian pilots into retreat when he turned on them.
After the United States joined the war, Haviland became Executive Officer of a Naval Air Station at Dunkirk, France with one month of special duty in the 13th Squadron RNAS flying a Sopwith Camel single-seater biplane. In July, 1918, Lt. Haviland was reassigned to command the Naval Air Station near the village of Porto Corsini in Italy and train pilots there. "So successfully did the station carry out its mission that Admiral H. T. Mayo, USN, stated on the basis of his inspection 10 November 1918, that the station had 'the distinction of being the most heavily engaged unit of the U.S. Naval Forces in Europe.'"
Following the war, Lt. Haviland was assigned to the USS Texas near Guantánamo Bay as a combat pilot. There, he became the first pilot to launch a plane off a U.S. battleship, and the first pilot to launch a military aircraft off any ship, motivating the United States to begin developing the first military aircraft carriers. The idea was inspired by experiments in 1910 when stunt aviator Eugene Ely launched a Curtiss Model D biplane off of a custom platform built onto the United States Cruiser USS Birmingham. Haviland's idea, which he had proposed to Captain Nathan C. Twining on the USS Texas, was to build a, runway of timbers lashed together on the Number 2 guns of the Battleship's forward deck. His Sopwith Camel biplane would then be winched down on the runway and its wheels held by a bridle to be released at Haviland's command, after the plane's propeller had sufficient speed for takeoff. "Haviland climbed into the cockpit and revved and raced the plane's motor until it seemed to the nearby sailors that the prop blast and vibration would tear the fuselage apart. Haviland signaled for the cables to be released. The straining aircraft roared down the runway, dropped precipitously toward the sea, then climbed into the sky."
Lt. Haviland subsequently served on the USS Oklahoma, whose fate would end at Pearl Harbor in 1941. In 1942, Haviland became the Executive Officer assigned to the establishment of a Naval Air Station on Whidbey Island, Washington which was commissioned 21 Sept 1942. He assumed the role of Commanding Officer of that station in November, 1943 upon the detachment of the previous CO, Captain Cyril T. Simard. On 18 February 1944 Captain Willis B. Haviland was appointed the role officially by the Bureau of Personnel, which he held until 1 Sept 1944 when his superior officers, impressed by his efficient management of the facility, asked him to relinquish command for a special assignment in the Central Pacific War Zone.

Death

Captain Willis B. Haviland fell ill at the time of his accepting the new position in the Central Pacific, delaying his assignment. He died suddenly at the Naval Hospital at Corona, California on 28 Nov 1944. He is interred at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia in Section 8, Site 6024.

Honors

Haviland's piloting skills in World War I earned him a U.S. Navy Cross, a French Croix de guerre with two palms and one star, a Belgian Croix de guerre with palm, an Italian Croce di Guerra, and an Italian Medal of Military Valor. Pilots under his command at Porto Corsini, Italy won sixteen Navy Crosses and one Congressional Medal of Honor, the latter being Ensign Charles Hammann.

Family and genealogy

Willis Bradley Haviland's father was Dr. Willis Henry Haviland, M.D., born 10 Sep 1864 in Haviland Hollow, Putnam County, NY, died 15 Jan 1939 in Butte, Silver Bow County, MT. He was a career physician, and a Montana State Senator in 1906–1910. Willis Henry Haviland married 5 Jun 1889 in St. Paul, Minnesota to Grace Hynes, who was Willis Bradley Haviland's mother. They divorced 28 Jun 1895, and Dr. Haviland remarried 22 Jul 1895 in Butte, Montana to Mary Page Irvine who was born in 1870 and died 19 Jun 1956. Dr. Haviland had two daughters with Mary, being: Katherine Irvine and Elizabeth; Willis Bradley Haviland's half-sisters. Dr. Haviland married a third time, to Frances Elbert Harris, born ca 1881 and died 13 Aug 1944 in Butte, where she is buried next to her husband at the Mountain View Cemetery in that city.
Willis Henry Haviland's parents were Willis Hoag Haviland, and Hannah Wing Haviland.
Willis Hoag Haviland, a farmer, and his second wife, Hannah Wing Haviland, were first cousins once removed, which caused friction with the Quaker Meeting to which they belonged, ending in severance with the church. Hannah Wing Haviland's half-sister was Ann Elizabeth Button, wife of David Jay Haviland ; they were the parents of Elizabeth R. Haviland who would marry Duane Williams Carrier and have only child Willis Haviland Carrier in 1876, later the inventor of modern air conditioning technology. Willis Haviland Carrier was named after Willis Hoag Haviland, who after Elizabeth's father's death took care of her before she was married.
Willis Bradley Haviland married Mary Lucile Satterthwaite, a cousin of U.S. Senator George Smathers of Florida and had one daughter, Barbara Grace Haviland who married James Burlon Lamm. Barbara's son, Willis Haviland Lamm, inherited Willis Bradley Haviland's scrapbooks, documents and memorabilia.