Rare archival footage, circa 1945 of Shaw planes in action (video) Shaw Field -- Old photographs (Gallery)

By SAMMY WAY
Item researcher / archivist

Early in 1941 a committee of citizens from Sumter sent a proposal to the War Department in Washington that an air field be established in their city. Along with the proposal they sent a prospectus of two locations they thought would be suited for construction as a military flying field.

After many hours of preliminary planning, several representatives of the War Department arrived in Sumter to look over the recommended sites and to make recommendations to the district engineer.

The War Department agents after careful surveying and consultation chose the site, which the Sumter committee had originally selected as an alternate site. Specifications as to the exact location were accepted by the Army on May 27, 1941.

Project Officer for the new field was Major Burton M. Hovey, former Operations Officer at Maxwell Field, Alabama. He was appointed on June 6, and arrived in Sumter a few days later to set up a temporary headquarters in Cherryvale Manor. This was to be the headquarters for the field for several months.

Contracts for the construction of the field were given to various construction companies during the next few weeks, including the Boyle Construction Company of Sumter.

The base was officially named Shaw Field on August 14, 1941, in honor of Lieutenant Erwin David Shaw, the only Sumter County flier to lose his life in combat during World War I.

A few days later Major Hovey officially took command of the base and the first enlisted man to be assigned to the station arrived the last day of August 1941.

The crew chief on Major Hovey’s aircraft, a BT-13A, spent his first few weeks living in a hotel in the downtown area and worked out of Sumter’s airport. The plane was based at Sumter’s airport until a landing runway could be completed.

Early in September 1941 headquarters was moved from the Cherryvale Manor to the first headquarters building at Shaw Field. Only two rooms were completed at this time. The men stationed Shaw used nail kegs for chairs and boxes for tables.

Captain Norman C. Veale arrived in September and was the first flight surgeon to be assigned to the base. It was almost two months before they would have a hospital. The first patient ward was not opened for patients until November.

Major Hovey landed the first aircraft on the new runways on October 22. The first aircraft was a BT-13A, and a Captain Gerdis, the base engineer, was his passenger. Major Hovey took off and landed on the main runway and then did the same on the other runways that were completed.

In December 1941, the 29 officers and first instructor cadets arrived to organize and plan the pilot training the base would shortly assume. The first group of cadets, 138 men from 22 states, who had just completed their primary flight training, followed twelve days later. Of the original 138 cadets, 130 graduated the following February and Shaw was to see thousands of cadets follow them in the next few years.





In June 1942 the first of hundreds of foreign officers arrived at Shaw Field. Canadian cadets came to the field to begin their training and hundreds followed the original 13.

In October 1942 several RAF officers arrived to help instruct the large number of cadets being put through their training at the field.

Later in 1942 the number of cadets who graduated were more 2,600. In succeeding years thousands of men from the United States, France, Canada and Britain joined the ranks of fighting airmen around the world.

Following World War II Shaw became a separation center for thousands of men processing for discharge in order to return to civilian life. As the number of men being processed decreased, so did the number of men stationed at the base.

Soon Shaw Field was in a holding status—just enough men present to keep up the facilities. Flying activity dropped until soon there were very few aircraft on the station and very little flying occurred.

However, Shaw would soon become the key military installation in the country's defense scheme.

Today Shaw is the home of the 9th Air Force Headquarters and the 20th Fighter Wing.

For more information concerning Shaw Air Force Base visit Shaw Air Force Base's Official Website



LT. ERVIN DAVID SHAW





Information taken from an article that appeared in the Sumter Daily Item, circa August 1941.

The army basic flying school near Sumter would be named Shaw Field in honor of Lieutenant Ervin David Shaw of Sumter.

Shaw was an American soldier attached to the 48th Squadron of the R.A.F., who was killed in action over enemy lines July 9, 1918. He was born September 30, 1894, and was a member of the Sumter High School class of 1911.

Mayor F. B. Creech, mayor at the time, made the announcement honoring Lt. Shaw after he received word from the War Department confirming Sumter’s selection for an Army Air Force Training School.

Lt. Shaw, the eldest son of Mr. and Mrs. D.C. Shaw of Sumter, was the first military pilot from this county to be killed in France during WWI.

Shaw was enlisted in the United States Army in September 1917 shortly before his twenty-third birthday. He was sent first to Columbus, Ohio, where he received training in aviation at Ohio State University. He later sent overseas with the American Expeditionary Force, which was stationed in Britain.

In April 1918 Shaw was attached to the Royal Air Force.

After completing his advanced air corps training at Oxford, he was sent to France to become one of the first Americans to enter military action against the enemy in the air.

Fellow aviators spoke of Lieutenant Shaw as the “… the most daring and skillful pilot among us.”

Once when he was ordered to go 15 miles to the rear of the enemy lines on a dangerous reconnaissance mission, one of his fellow pilots wrote “He went back 18 or 20 miles to bring in a better and more accurate report.”

In June 1918 Shaw wrote home in great excitement of bringing down his first plane.

A month later in Bristol, he took off in a B-113 plane carrying Sgt. Smith as a lone observer on a single aircraft reconnaissance mission. On the return trip he encountered three enemy scouts, one of which he downed, but his own ship was blown to pieces in the air – killing Shaw and Sgt. Smith.