Charles Weatherly Bryant, Jr., U.S. Army Air Corps.

Born April 13, 1921 in Atlanta, Georgia
Died February 27, 1944

This was my brother, who served in the U. S. Army Air Corps during WW II.

I barely remember Charles Jr. He was fifteen years older than I. I remember him coming home from college and picking me up by my ankles and holding me upside down. It made me so mad. We had no central heat in those days, but a wood stove in the kitchen, along with the electric stove, and a coal stove in the living room. I remember Daddy saying, "Charles Jr., if you don't leave that boy alone I am going to hit you in the head with this poker!" I hated it but I loved the attention nonetheless. Bubba, as I called him, promised me he was going to teach me how to play baseball and football when I got old enough.

When WW II broke out on December 7, 1941, Charles Jr. enlisted in the Army Air Corps. When he first went in the enlistment office in downtown Atlanta his blood pressure was low and they rejected him. He walked around the block three times, getting madder by the minute, went back in and asked them to take his blood pressure again. It was fine and he was sworn into the Army. His eyesight was not good enough to become a pilot, so they made him a navigator on B-17's. He reached the rank of 1st Lieutenant.

He had many close calls. Once the landing gear would not come down and they did a belly landing. Bombs rolled everywhere, but none went off. Once he was scheduled for a flight and a friend asked if he could go instead, because his best friend was the pilot. They never came back. Their plane was shot down and all were killed. Bubba'a friends began to call him Lucky. He told them it was not luck but God.

I have the little Gideon's New Testament, brown with wings on the cover, that he was given before he shipped overseas for the first time. In the back was a prayer asking Jesus to come into one's heart and save him. My brother signed and dated that. It is a precious keepsake.

After several years overseas, he was brought back to become a Navigators' Instructor. During the brief furlough, he married Bernice Rabun, a girl he had grown up with in the Gordon Street Baptist Church. They married on December 25, 1942. The wedding was scheduled for 2:00 PM on Christmas afternoon in the Chapel at the air base in Monroe, Lousianna, his home base. Because Daddy worked for the railroad, we took a train from Atlanta to Monroe. The Bride and her mother were traveling with us on the train. Because every train seemed to be a troop train and troop train movements were often delayed, the wedding could not be held until midnight. The two couples (it was a double wedding) and we, were the only ones present.

He was transferred to Langley Air Force Base in Virginia to become an instructor. There was not adequate family housing at Langley at that time so Bernice stayed in Atlanta and worked as secretary at the Gordon Street Baptist Church.

Beverly Lorraine Bryant was born in Atlanta on January 5, 1944. Charles Jr. was allowed a five day pass to see his new daughter. He held her in his arms when she was about two weeks old. He never saw her again. On a training flight the entire east coast was fog bound. This was just before they put radar on planes. They flew as far south as Florida, trying to find a place to land. There was nothing but fog. They flew back to Virginia and circled until they burned up all of the fuel. They made a pass at the field and missed it by only fifty feet. They hit a barn. Everyone except one airman was killed. He lost his mind.

My sister and I were in school at the Cascade Elementary School. The principal, Mrs. Mitchell, called us out of our rooms into the hall, where Mr. Mayfield, our closest neighbor, was waiting to take us home. He told us Charles Jr. had been hurt. When we got home we found out he had been killed. The way mother found out about his death was from a phone call from the Atlanta Journal. The reporter asked if he had reached the home of Charles W. Bryant, Jr. When she that she was his mother, the reporter asked, "How old was he?" Mother said, "What do you mean, "was?" Mr. Mayfield, who happened to be outside, heard mother scream from a quarter mile away.

It was an unusual thing, but there were two Charles Weatherly Bryant, Jr.'s on that plane. The military had sealed the casket because of the condition of the body. My mother always wondered if we buried the right one. But Charles Jr. had his dog tags on, and they survived the crash and were found around his broken neck. I still have them today. He died on February 27, 1944.

I remember going with Daddy to the Terminal Station in Atlanta when the wooden casket arrived. We watched as it was loaded off the train into a hearse. Gordon Street Baptist Church was packed the day of his funeral. Flowers crowded the front of the large church where his flag draped casket stood. West View Cemetery was about a mile west of the church. It was reported that when the hearse pulled into the cemetery, the last car had not yet left the church. We waited at the graveside for fifteen minutes waiting for everyone to arrive.

My mother never got over her grief. I never learned how to play baseball or football.

Submitted by
Dr. James W. Bryant, his brother
Senior Professor of Pastoral Theology
Criswell College
Dallas, Texas
jwbmobile@aol.com