As a boy he was very interested in flying. When he was eight, his family moved to Hialeah, Florida, to escape from harsh midwestern winters. When he was five years old the family moved to Davenport, Iowa, and then to Iowa's capital, Des Moines, where he was raised, and where his father became a confections wholesaler. was born in Quincy, Illinois, on 23 February 1915, the son of Paul Warfield Tibbets Sr. 7.1 Distinguished Service Cross citation.After leaving the Air Force in 1966, he worked for Executive Jet Aviation, serving on the founding board and as its president from 1976 until his retirement in 1987. He commanded the 308th Bombardment Wing and 6th Air Division in the late 1950s, and was military attaché in India from 1964 to 1966. After the war, he participated in the Operation Crossroads nuclear weapon tests at Bikini Atoll in mid-1946, and was involved in the development of the Boeing B-47 Stratojet in the early 1950s. In September 1944, he was appointed the commander of the 509th Composite Group, which would conduct the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Tibbets returned to the United States in February 1943 to help with the development of the Boeing B-29 Superfortress. After flying 43 combat missions, he became the assistant for bomber operations on the staff of the Twelfth Air Force. Tibbets was chosen to fly Major General Mark W. He flew the lead plane in the first American daylight heavy bomber mission against Occupied Europe on 17 August 1942, and the first American raid of more than 100 bombers in Europe on 9 October 1942. In July 1942, the 97th became the first heavy bombardment group to be deployed as part of the Eighth Air Force, and Tibbets became deputy group commander. In February 1942, he became the commanding officer of the 340th Bombardment Squadron of the 97th Bombardment Group, which was equipped with the Boeing B-17. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, he flew anti-submarine patrols over the Atlantic. Tibbets enlisted in the United States Army in 1937 and qualified as a pilot in 1938. He is best known as the aircraft captain who flew the B-29 Superfortress known as the Enola Gay (named after his mother) when it dropped a Little Boy, the first of two atomic bombs used in warfare, on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. (23 February 1915 – 1 November 2007) was a brigadier general in the United States Air Force. Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and NagasakiĬharter Pilot and President of Executive Jet Aviation.3 -Prayer with the crew of the Enola Gay, 6 Aug 45.ģ Murrow, Edward R. We shall go forward trusting in thee, knowing that we are in Thy care, now and forever. May the men who fly this night be kept safe in Thy care and may they be returned safely to us.
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We pray Thee that the end of the war may come soon and that once more we may know peace on earth. You can listen to Chaplain Downey’s prayer in the following video and watch actual video footage of the bomb run and aftermath. “Reading what he had jotted down on the back of an envelope, Downey, then a captain, prayed for the men’s safe return.” 2 Realizing the historic significance of that day, video and audio recordings were made of the pre-flight briefings, the bomb run and other aspects of the mission, including Chaplain Downey’s prayer with the Enola Gay crew. According to Downey in a 1987 interview, “one of the security officers told me a little time before, there was going to be a really fantastic new thing, only one of the greatest things that ever happened in the history of the world.” 1 In the midst of this “greatest thing,” Chaplain Downey was there bringing God to the crews of the Enola Gay and Bockscar who would drop the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 and 9 August 1945.Ĭhaplain Downey prayed with the 12-man crew of the Enola Gay on Tinian Island just before they took off on their mission to drop “Little Boy” on Hiroshima. Downey, of the 509th Composite Bomb Group, was there when history was being made. Many chaplains find themselves in the middle of history in the making, some of them making that history.