Could Someone Help Nail down this US serviceman’s role in his unit?

I have this letter that I’m currently trying to find information on. It was written by a George J. Chiros. He was the rank of Captain at the time of the letter. He served in the AAF with the 36th Troop Carrier Squadron, 316th Troop Carrier Group. This unit dropped paratroopers on D-Day. I’m primarily trying to find out what his job was. Pilot, ground services, etc? I appreciate any help.

 

Can you request his service docs
Request Military Service Records

 

There is a book about the unit by Lt. Col. Brian J. Duddy. See: ttps://www.lulu.com/shop/brian-j-duddy/invasion-stripes/paperback/product-18nm568w.html?q=&page=1&pageSize=4 Book id'd after author gave a 2024 lecture: Free lecture Jan. 25 at Champaign Aviation Museum - Urbana Daily Citizen

There are many online bios of him, looked at a few and none stated what his actual role was, but he was a major by the war's end. Clearly proud of his service, as the squadron is on his headstone.

 

Thank you!

 

He may have been a qualified pilot but flying slots for senior officers were few. Too many young hot shots coming down the pike, while experienced officers were often specialists in jobs related to the performance of the squadron as a whole. Doesn't mean he didn't bump somebody to get a seat in the cockpit of a invasion plane if he could wrangle it.

 

316th Troop Carrier Group is mostly a photo album, most anonymous. He is in the "Roster" which is simply postwar street addresses.

https://www.amazon.com/Armed-Armored-Escorted-Airborne-Remembers/dp/1494709058 may have something.

A Troop Carrier Squadron consisted of 68 officers, 16 "flight officers" (non-commissioned pilots), 1 warrant officer, and 275 enlisted men. They manned 16 aircraft, each with a Pilot (O), Co-pilot (O), Engineer (EM), and Radioman (EM). Each Flight of 4 aircraft also had a Navigator (O). So at any one time, up to 36 officers were duty flight crew, while the remaining 32 were ground staff and reserve flight crew.

Note that the standard AAF Squadron organization included as the Air Echelon one Lieutenant Colonel commanding and one Major who was the squadron operations officer. Both were pilots. There were also typically an equal number of 1st and 2d Lieutenants, while Captains were typically one per Flight, plus five specialists: Headquarters, Medical, Engineering, Intelligence, and Operations.

The Ground Echelon also included a Major (XO) and one Captain (Mess), with three 1st Lieutenants who were the Assistant Engineer, Intelligence, and Operations officers.

So it was likely he was a pilot, but whether or not he was an active pilot is a different matter.

 

"Yes, Army pilots in WWII received extra pay in the form of flight pay, in addition to their standard base pay. This flight pay was a percentage of their base pay, specifically 50%. Additionally, Army Air Corps men who were qualified to fly or took regular flights received an extra 50% of their base pay per month. Paratroopers and officers in training also received extra hazard pay."

 

Indeed. The point I was making is that the abbreviation "A.C." appears after his rank. He was a commissioned officer in the Air Corps. He was not "S.C". "Ord.", "Engr." or any number of other commissioned corps in the Army that would not include "pilots". Pilots were all commissioned Air Corps officers, with very few exceptions. So, he was almost certainly a pilot.

 

"So, he was almost certainly a pilot"

Disagree. The Air Corps officers included maintyenance, weather, and other ground support officers. The Air Corps/Army Air Forces specifically trained over 30,000 officers in these categories. In fact, applicants for these areas could be selected as npon-flying duty aviation cadets and these areas were also used to place qualified/selected washouts from pilot training.

There are several discussions on selection & related matters at the Air Force Historical Studies HyperWar: U.S. Army Air Force Numbered Historical Studies

Bill

 

Sorry, but no. I already mentioned the Squadron Ground Echelon. Yes, it was possible he was one of those officers, but at the squadron level there was no "Weather" officer - Weather Squadrons were separate specialist units. So were most of the maintenance and other supporting units of an air force, but they were not part of the Group or Squadron. In flying Squadrons and Groups nearly all of the commissioned officers were pilots, even of they were not in flight status as part of the Air Echelon.

And yes,when he was promoted to Major he may have been assigned as either the Ops Officer or the XO...but those posts were typically drawn from the pilots within the squadron. When he was a Captain he may have been assigned as the Mess Officer, but he was still a pilot before that. Notice too, the assistant Engineer, Intelligence, and Operations officers in the Ground Echelon were all assisting pilots in the Air Echelon and when they were promoted they typically moved to that post in the Air Echelon as flyers. The only way he was an officer at squadron-level in a flying unit and not a pilot is if he was the Medical Officer.

 

As an example, here is the organization of the 316th TC Group as of 1 June 1944:


316th TC Gp, HQ – AAF Sta 489, Cottesmore, Rutland
36th TC Sq
37th TC Sq
44th TC Sq
45th TC Sq

Station Complement
65th SCS
Det A, 1185th MP Co
2066th Eng FF Plat (Av)
204th Med Disp (Av)
Det ZX, 21st Weather Sq [HQ Ninth AF]
Det NN, 21st Weather Sq [HQ Ninth AF]
Det NN, Mbl Comm Sq [HQ Ninth AF]
323d SCS [IX AFSC]
1069th QM Co (Sv Gp) (-) [IX AFSC]
17th Sec, 2d Vet Det (Av)

Note that the Group is based at a Station and that the Station had a separate organization. Those were the units supporting the flight operations of the 316th, but they were not part of the 316th. The majority of officers in the Station Complement were not pilots and were not commissioned in the Army Air Corps, but would have been commissioned as Engineers, Quartermaster Corps, Veterinary Department, Medical Corps, Signal Corps, Military Police, and so forth. Officers in the Station Complement Squadron (SCS) were typically drawn from all corps of the Army. Note too that many of the personnel of the Air Force support units were not even assigned to the Army Air Forces, but were rather part of the Army Service Forces on assignment or attachment to the Army Air Forces. However, none of that applies to Captain Chiros who was an Air Corps officer assigned to the 36th TCS, 316th TCG.

 

It takes a brave civilian to venture into military ranking in almost every branch of every service I've looked into. Best to get local help. Like the time I was lost in Delhi:

I approached a Sikh cop.

"Excuse me, do you speak English."
"Yes, and I understand American."

 

Richard:
I think you misundersttod my comment. I was using weather,et al as examples of the types of activities that the Air Corps groind officers were used for.

he ground officer program came into being because of the need to put specialist personnel, such as maintenance officers, in place instead of pilots detailed to the activity. This was a change from pre-1940 practice where maintenance and support activities were filled by pilots.

My comment was, and is, that for example, the maintenance and administrative officers were not necessarily pilots but would be Air Corps officers. Not all of the 68 officers in a troop carrier Squadron under TOE 1-317 (12 May 1944, C1) were pilots.

 

I can just imagine the hissy fit today if a pilot was assigned to, say, the "Enlisted Mess Management Officer" slot.

 

Yes, indeed, and I think you misunderstood my reasoning and what I meant by "he was almost certainly a pilot".

George entered the Army as a selectee (he was drafted) 28 February 1941, when he was 24 and a college graduate (Tufts University, BS Biology), so almost certainly was soon selected for OCS. At that time the Technical Training Program of the USAAF was just beginning to expand from prewar - in 1941 only 14,375 officers completed the TTP and 443,028 in 1942, compared to 1,377,753 from 1942-31 August 1945. Pilot training graduates in 1941 totaled 27,531, plus 206 bombardiers and 137 navigators.

So when he entered the Air Force he was one of 42,249 AAC officers in training of whom 14,375 were TTP officers. So, a roughly one-in-three chance that he was not a flyer. Then he was assigned to a TCS, where there were 9 of 68 officer billets that were typically assigned to "non-flying" as well as "flying" officers. The odds that he was one are small, so I suspect he was almost certainly a pilot.

The major questions are when he was assigned to the 36th TCS given the attrition that occurred in the Group in HUSKY and NEPTUNE. Any definitive answers would require searching the Squadron Muster Rolls, which you may be able to request from the Air Force History Office at Maxwell AFB, Florida.