Death at Dayton

Death, which often fluttered close to the wings of Lieut. Irvin A. Woodring, last of the Army's "Three Musketeers." overtook him last week at Wright Field. Dayton, Ohio. Week before at the same field it had flung to earth another crack Army pilot, Captain Hugh M. Elmendorf. Both men were performing their routine work of testing experimental planes. Captain Elmendorf crashed with his spinning pursuit ship. Lieut. null fighter snapped to bits in mid-air when something, possibly the propeller, broke.

Of the two, Lieut. Woodring, 31, had the more spectacular career. Shortly after beginning duty at Selfridge Field, Mich, in 1927 he landed a new-type pursuit plane which he was testing, got out, left the engine running. A brother officer took it up. Hardly had the ship gained altitude when it burst into flame. The officer died. A year later Lieut. Woodring flew with the First Pursuit Group on a goodwill tour of Canada. In a formation take-off his plane collided with another, killed its pilot. Shortly after he flew as one of the daring "Three Musketeers" of the Air Corps at Rockwell Field, Calif. First he saw Musketeer "Willie" Williams land on his back. A month later Musketeer W. L. Cornelius died in a mid-air collision. Lieut. Woodring carried on, helped refuel the Army's famed Question Mark endurance plane; flew from Vancouver to New York in record time with a copy of Japan's ratification of the London Naval Treaty (1930). Another officer flying with a duplicate copy crashed in a Wyoming blizzard.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.