| Frank Maxwell Andrews | |
|---|---|
| February 3, 1884 – May 3, 1943 (aged 59) | |
 Gen. Frank M. Andrews |
|
| Nickname | Andy |
| Place of birth | Nashville, Tennessee |
| Place of death | Mt. Fagradalsfjall, Iceland |
| Allegiance |  United States of America |
| Service/branch |  United States Army Air ForcesUnited States Army Air Corps U.S. Air Service Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps United States Army, Cavalry |
| Years of service | 1902-1943 |
| Rank | Lieutenant General |
| Commands held | 1st Pursuit Group General Headquarters Air Force Panama Air Force Caribbean Defense Command U.S. Army Forces in the Middle East European Theater of Operations |
| Battles/wars | World War I (Stateside service) World War II |
| Awards | Distinguished Service Medal Distinguished Flying Cross |
Frank Maxwell Andrews (February 3, 1884 – May 3, 1943) was a general officer in the United States Army and one of the founding fathers of the United States Air Force. In leadership positions within the Army Air Corps, he succeeded in advancing progress toward a separate and independent Air Force where predecessors and allies such as Billy Mitchell had failed. Andrews was the first head of a centralized American air force and the first air officer to serve on the Army's general staff. In early 1943, he took the place of Dwight D. Eisenhower as commander of all U.S. troops in the European Theater of Operations.
He was killed in an airplane accident during an inspection tour in Iceland, in 1943. He was the highest ranking U.S. officer to die in combat at the time, the first of three lieutenant generals to die in combat during the war. Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland is named after him, as well as Andrews Barracks (a kaserne in Berlin, Germany), General Andrews Airport (demolished) in Santo Domingo and Andrews Avenue in Pasay City, Philippines.
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Early life and World War I
Born in Nashville, Tennessee, Andrews was the grandson of a cavalry soldier who fought alongside Nathan Bedford Forrest and the great-great-nephew of two Tennessee governors, John C. Brown and Neill S. Brown (Nashville Banner, 5 May 1943). He graduated from the city's Montgomery Bell Academy in 1901 and entered the United States Military Academy at West Point in July 1902. The United States Army he joined upon graduating in 1906 was smaller than that of Bulgaria and beset with internal turmoil, but it gave the young second lieutenant ample opportunities to play polo, see the world (serving as a cavalry officer in the Philippines and Hawaii), and observe the high and low politics of leadership in an ossified organization. After marrying the high-spirited daughter of Maj. Gen. Henry Tureman Allen in 1914, Andrews gained entrée into elite social circles in Washington and within the military.
A story related in the press many times during Andrews' lifetime claimed that Gen. Allen forestalled aeronautical aspirations of his future son-in-law by declaring that no daughter of his would marry a flyer. Andrews' service records, however, show that his commanding officer in the Second Cavalry vetoed his application for temporary aeronautical duty with the Army Signal Corps in February 1914, a decision that held firm despite a plea from the Chief Signal Officer's for reconsideration by higher-ups.
Within a month after the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Andrews was transferred, over the objections of his cavalry commander, to the Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps. After a short time in Washington, D.C., Andrews went to Rockwell Field, California, in April 1918. There, he earned his aviator wings at the age of 34. Andrews never went overseas during the war as a member of the Air Service. Instead, he commanded various airfields around the United States and served in the war plans division of the Army General Staff in Washington, D.C. Following the war, he replaced Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell as the air officer assigned to the Army of Occupation in Germany, which his father-in-law, Gen. Allen, commanded.
Air Service and Air Corps duty
After returning to the United States in 1923, Andrews assumed command of Kelly Field, Texas, and he became the first commandant of the advanced flying school established there. In 1927, he attended the Air Corps Tactical School at Langley Field, Virginia, and the following year he went to the Army Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Promoted to lieutenant colonel, Andrews served as the chief of the Army Air Corps' Training and Operations Division in 1930-1931 before being replaced by the new Chief of the Air Corps, Maj. Gen. Benjamin D. Foulois. He then commanded the 1st Pursuit Group at Selfridge Field, Michigan. After graduation from the Army War College in 1933, Andrews returned to the General Staff in 1934.
In March 1935, Andrews was appointed by Army Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur to command the newly formed General Headquarters (GHQ) Air Force, which consolidated all the Army Air Corps' tactical units under a single commander. The Army promoted Andrews to brigadier general (temporary) and to major general (temporary) less than a year later. Under his command, GHQ Air Force started the development of air power that became the mighty US Army Air Force.
A vocal proponent of the four-engine heavy bomber in general (as was MacArthur) and the B-17 Flying Fortress in particular, General Andrews advocated the purchase of the B-17 in large numbers as the Army's standard bomber. MacArthur, however, was replaced as Chief of Staff by Gen. Malin Craig in October 1935. Craig, who opposed any mission for the Air Corps except that of supporting ground forces, and the Army General Staff, actively combatting a movement for a separate air force, disagreed with Andrews that the B-17 had proven its superiority as a bomber over all other types. Instead it cut back on planned purchases of B-17s to procure smaller but cheaper twin-engine light and medium bombers such as the Douglas B-18. However, the war in Europe would soon prove Andrews correct.
Later career, and World War II
Andrews was passed over for appointment as Chief of ther Air Corps following the death of Maj. Gen. Oscar Westover in September 1938, primarily because of his aggressive support for strategic bombing. He became a trusted air adviser to George C. Marshall, newly appointed as deputy chief of staff of the Army in 1938, but Andrews pushed too hard for the taste of more senior authorities.
In January 1939, at a speech to the National Aeronautic Association, Andrews described the United States as a "sixth-rate airpower", antagonizing isolationist Secretary of War Harry Woodring, who was then assuring the public of U.S. air strength. At the end of Andrews’ four-year term as Commanding General of GHQAF on March 1, he was reverted to his permanent rank of colonel from his temporary rank of major general, and reassigned as air officer for the Eighth Corps Area in San Antonio, the same exile to which Billy Mitchell had been sent. Expected to retire, he instead was recalled to Washington just four months later by Marshall after President Roosevelt named Marshall to serve as Chief of Staff following the retirement of Gen. Craig. Marshall's first senior staff selection, the selection and its permanent promotion to brigadier general prompted furious opposition from Woodring and others, over which Marshall prevailed after threatening to resign his new post. As Assistant Chief of Staff for Operations (G-3), he was in charge of readying the entire Army in the run-up to America’s inevitable involvement in the war.
In 1940, Andrews assumed control of the Air Corps' Panama Canal Air Force, and in 1941, he became commander of the Caribbean Defense Command, which had the critically important duty during World War II of defending the southern approaches to the United States, including the vital Panama Canal. In 1942, General Andrews went to North Africa, where he spent three months in command of all United States forces in the Middle East from a base in Cairo.
At the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, Lieut. Gen. Andrews was appointed commander of all United States forces in the European Theater of Operations, replacing Dwight D. Eisenhower. In his memoirs, Gen. Henry H. Arnold, commander of the Army Air Forces in World War II, expressed the belief that Andrews would have been given the command of the Allied invasion of Europe — the position that eventually went to Gen. Eisenhower.[citation needed] Gen. Marshall would say, late in life, that Andrews was the only general he had a chance to groom for a possible Supreme Allied Command later in the war[citation needed].
However, on May 3, 1943, the B-24 carrying Andrews on an inspection tour crashed in Mount Fagradalsfjall on the Reykjanes peninsula in southwest Iceland, after an aborted attempt to land at the Royal Air Force Base at Kaldadarnes, Iceland. Andrews and thirteen others died in the crash; only the tail gunner survived. Andrews was the highest-ranking Allied officer to die in the line of duty to that point in the war.[citation needed]
Andrews is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Legacy
Andrews Air Force Base, located a few miles southeast of Washington, D.C. and the home base of Air Force One, is named in honor of Andrews.
Another base named for him, Andrews Field, in Essex England was the first airfield constructed in 1943 by army engineers in the United Kingdom during World War II. It was notable as having been the only named US airfield in the United Kingdom during World War II. It was used by the USAAF 96th Bombardment Group (Heavy) and the 322nd Bombardment Group (Medium) during the war, and also by several RAF squadrons before being closed in 1946. Today, a small part of the former wartime airfield is still in use as a small private flying facility.
Andrews Avenue, a road leading to the Philippines' Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 3 was named after him.
See also
References
- Biography from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base museum. Public domain. [1]
- Andrews' pre-World War I personnel file: File #1139074, Record Group 94, National Archives, Washington, D.C.
- Larry I. Bland, ed., George C. Marshall Interviews and Reminiscences for Forrest C. Pogue (Lexington, VA: George C. Marshall Research Foundation, 1991), pp. 510, 582.
External links
- Biographical pamphlet by DeWitt C. Copp
- Frank Maxwell Andrews at Find a Grave Retrieved on 2008-02-10
| Military offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Dwight D. Eisenhower |
Commanding General of U.S. Army Europe 4 February 1943 - 3 May 1943 |
Succeeded by Jacob L. Devers |
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