Herbert Tennyson and 10 Other Airmen Were Shot Down in 1944

Nearly 80 years after a doomed World War II mission, a US Army Air Force aviator was finally identified as 1st Lt. Herbert G. Tennyson of Wichita, Kansas. He was among the crew members of the 'Heaven Can Wait’ bomber, which was shot down in March 1944.

Tennyson, then 24, was one of 11 airmen aboard the aircraft when it was struck by anti-aircraft fire, causing onboard bombs to explode. The Defense Prisoners of War/Missing in Action Accounting Agency (DPAA) said in a statement, "Several aircraft circled the crash site in hopes of locating any possible survivors, but none could be seen." For decades, Tennyson and his fellow crew members remained lost to history.

The Heaven Can Wait B-24 bomber was part of a mission targeting Axis forces at the Boram Airfield. According to military records, the aircraft had already flown 30 combat missions before it was lost in a fiery explosion over the Pacific. By 1950, the U.S. military had declared all 11 crew members missing in action.

The DOD has identified several others on the B-24, including 2nd Lt. Thomas V. Kelly. Scott Althaus, Kelly’s first cousin once-removed, was previously in the dark about the fate of his family member. "His sister, who passed before this journey started, had maintained a collection of every letter he had written from the war," Althaus said. "So, we had that, and we could read what was his day to day, what was his business, and what he was excited about. So that brought us a sense of who this man was that we never could have had the chance to know."

In 2017, Project Recover, a nonprofit specializing in finding missing military personnel, located the wreckage of Heaven Can Wait using sonar and underwater imaging. Two years later, the DPAA sent a U.S. Navy diving team to confirm the find. COVID-19 delays slowed recovery efforts, but in 2023, the aircraft was finally pulled from the ocean. The search yielded key artifacts like life support equipment and identification tags.

Though four crew members have been found, the remains of seven others have yet to be identified. The DPAA continues its mission, with over 81,000 Americans still missing from past conflicts.

"This is a scale of connection that is actually quite large," continued Althaus. "Yet it's so unusual for one of these missing to be found and to be brought home."

FMI: www.projectrecover.org