Top Photo: A painting illustrating Jefferson Joseph DeBlanc's final kill on January 31, 1943, shortly before being shot down. Artist: Rivers Torres.

Cruising at a low altitude over the Japanese-held Island of Kolombangara, Second Lieutenant Jefferson J. DeBlanc investigates his instrument panel and his wristwatch. It’s getting late, the sun is beginning to set, and he knows his return window to land safely is disappearing as fast as his remaining fuel. 

Suddenly, a bullet from a tailing Nakajima Ki-43 Oscar blasts the watch off his wrist, sending DeBlanc into evasive maneuvers. Twisting and turning, the armor plating of his F4F Wildcat, and a lot of luck are the only things keeping him in the air as he tries to escape the enemy pilot. DeBlanc’s luck runs out, however, as a series of bullets destroy his propeller, forcing him to bail out over the ocean. 

Floating to shore, an exhausted DeBlanc finds himself captured by natives and traded to a friendly tribe for a sack of rice. “Most people cannot price out the amount of money they are worth, but I know exactly how much I am worth,” DeBlanc would later note. “One 10-pound sack of rice!”[1]

Destined to Fly

Jefferson Joseph DeBlanc was born a railroad breaker's son in Lockport, Louisiana, on February 15, 1921. From an early age, a young DeBlanc was transfixed by airplanes, recalling an encounter with a barnstorm pilot: “[He] lifted me up for a quick look into the cockpit. I was transfixed by the instrument panel with its gauges, dials, switches. … As it turned out this was truly a defining moment in my life!”[2] 

DeBlanc eagerly waited for his chance to fly, poring over stories of flying aces in World War I, memorizing their names and learning their tactics. In 1939, at the age of 18, his chance came: As Europe became consumed by war, the US military began to mobilize in preparation for an inevitable conflict. Noticing a deficiency in trained pilots, an initiative was launched to expand civilian air training.

Jefferson J. DeBlanc, USMC, Medal of Honor recipient; United States Marine Corps, History Division

The Civilian Pilot Training Act permitted colleges nationwide to offer flying courses to civilians and allowed DeBlanc to get his start at Southwestern Louisiana Institute (now University of Louisiana at Lafayette). He enlisted in the US Naval Reserve as a Seaman Second Class in July 1941 and received flight training at the Naval Reserve Aviation Base in New Orleans and the Naval Air Station in Corpus Christi, Texas.[3] In May 1942, DeBlanc was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the US Marine Corps Reserve and traveled to join the 2nd Marine Air Wing stationed in San Diego. There he would learn to fly the F-4F Wildcat, the standard carrier fighter at the time, before departing for the Pacific. DeBlanc and others in his section received only nine hours of flying time in their new planes, along with minimal survival, night flying, and gunnery training[4], making their next assignment on Guadalcanal, codename “Cactus,” a true trial by fire.

The Battle for Guadalcanal

At this point, the Japanese offensive was in full swing. Alongside the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, massive offensives were launched throughout the Pacific. French Indochina, British Malaya, the Dutch East Indies, the Philippines, Wake, and Guam all quickly fell against the seemingly unstoppable Japanese Empire; the time was at hand to halt this rapid advance before the Pacific was lost entirely. 

Critical naval battles in the Coral Sea and at Midway showed that the Japanese could not only be dueled but be beaten on the water—and soon their might on the land would be tested as well. As Japanese forces reeled after their defeat at Midway, Admiral Ernest King, commander of the US Navy in the Pacific, decided to go on the offensive. 

On August 7, 1942, Marines landed on the island of Guadalcanal with minimal resistance, soon establishing a presence and moving toward their primary objective, an airfield located further inland. The Japanese noose around Australia could hopefully be loosened by seizing the island and projecting power in the Solomons. As the operation developed, both sides knew that Henderson Airfield and the coming air war would be decisive in the ensuing battle. [5]

U.S. Marine Corps (and maybe U.S. Navy) Grumman F4F-4 Wildcat fighters at Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands on 14 April 1943. U.S. Navy photo 80-G-41099

When DeBlanc entered Guadalcanal, the Marines on the ground and his squadron, VMF-112, had been fighting a defensive campaign against Japanese attempts to retake the airfield and dominate the surrounding seas. Soon, American forces began to pursue a retreating enemy. 

'The Big Fight'

As Japanese troops began to slip away, DeBlanc would prepare for the most exciting dogfight of his life: “The big fight was on Sunday, January 31, 1943, as 12 SBD-3 dive bombers, escorted by a handful of fighters, were ordered to strike a fleet 250 miles away from Guadalcanal.”[6]

At 3:00 p.m., DeBlanc boarded his assigned plane, the F4F Wildcat Impatient Virgin, and took off after the slower dive bombers. As the escorts flew over the Solomon Island of Kolumbangara, DeBlanc immediately ran into trouble, as his experimental wing fuel tanks had issues connecting to the plane’s engine, forcing him to rely on his relatively small internal tank. This would come back to haunt him.

Almost immediately after the dive bombers finished their run, a pair of Japanese F1M Pete floatplanes began to chase the vulnerable bombers, who called for help. Coming in from a dive, DeBlanc opened up on the first Pete, knocking it into a fiery tailspin despite the defensive fire from the tail gunner. He then effortlessly nailed the tail of the second floatplane, taking some heat off the thankful bombers. 

U.S. Marine Corps Grumman F4F-4 Wildcats head-out from Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, probably in August or September 1942, to intercept incoming Japanese aircraft. U.S. Navy photo

The coast was not yet clear, however, as DeBlanc and his impromptu wingman, Sergeant James Feliton, noticed 10 Nakajima Ki-43 Oscar fighters (often mistaken for the Mitsubishi A6M Zero) heading their way. Luckily, the two pilots were about 500 feet below the advancing enemy, affording them the element of surprise. Approaching the squadron leader from below, DeBlanc pulled the trigger on his machine guns, causing the lead plane to explode in a massive fireball and the rest to scatter in confusion. He quickly dispatched the enemy wingman who was attempting to dive a roll away and get a better understanding of the situation. 

“This started one of the wildest dogfights I had ever been in,” DeBlanc noted. “To this day, I cannot tell how many Zeroes came down on us.”[7]

DeBlanc and Feliton used a popular tactic among American fliers called the “Thach Weave” to dispose of the next two tailing fighters. This maneuver sought to make up for the Wildcat’s low maneuverability by using a pair of Wildcats to take out a more agile plane. As a Japanese plane began to tail one of the Wildcats, both planes would break into a wide figure-eight pattern that converged on itself, allowing the free plane to have a clean shot of the enemy.[8] 

As the skies cleared once more, the dive bombers reassembled and began the trip back home. DeBlanc’s day, however, was not yet done: Two more Oscars approached, and with limited fuel, he made the decision to draw the two planes away from the bombers and put himself in danger. 

Coming from a low approach vector, DeBlanc and one of the Japanese planes engaged in a head-to-head duel, with DeBlanc’s angle and superior firepower allowing him to ignite the enemy long before he was in range. The determined Oscar kept coming despite its peril and threatened to ram the Wildcat. Squeezing on the trigger as tightly as ever, the plane’s machine guns caused the Japanese plane to explode, throwing debris and oil all across DeBlanc’s fuselage. 

With another plane on his tail, DeBlanc sank to a low altitude in an attempt to get the enemy plane to overshoot his trajectory. Bullets bounced off his Wildcat’s armor plates as he bombed and weaved above the glistening Pacific. In an incredibly skilled maneuver, DeBlanc chopped his throttle, dropped his flaps, and managed to get behind the speeding Oscar. Lining up his sights and squeezing the trigger, DeBlanc scored his fifth confirmed kill of the day, making him one of a few “aces in a day.” 

DeBlanc soon found himself at the end of his luck after his encounter with another Oscar left him stranded on an island of natives in enemy territory.

Landing in the sea, DeBlanc discovered that he was badly wounded in the back, arms, and legs and that he was a long way from shore.[9] He would spend two days with untreated wounds living off coconuts before being discovered and traded to friendly tribes, with another 15 days passing before he could be taken to a US Navy Hospital. 

Returning Home

DeBlanc returned home to recover, as the US military continued to push the Japanese out of the Solomons before launching attacks on further Japanese strongholds. Upon his return to the Pacific, now-Captain DeBlanc would participate in these offensives, seeing combat during the Marshall Island campaigns until May 1945.[10] From there he fought at and around Okinawa and the Ryukyu Islands until the end of the war, bagging his last kill there. 

With nine confirmed kills, DeBlanc was transferred to Seattle and returned home to Louisiana on December 31, 1945, after the Japanese surrender earlier that year. On December 6, 1946, DeBlanc was invited to the White House by President Harry S. Truman to receive the Medal of Honor “for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.”[11]

US Marine Corps Captain Jefferson DeBlanc awarded the Medal of Honor by President Harry S. Truman with DeBlanc's wife Louise in between.

In addition to the Medal of Honor, DeBlanc received the Distinguished Flying Cross; the Air Medal with four gold stars in lieu of second through fifth award; a Purple Heart; a Presidential Unit Citation with one bronze star; the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with three bronze stars; the American Campaign Medal; and the World War II Victory Medal.[12]

After the war, DeBlanc earned a bachelor’s degree in physics and math from Southwestern Louisiana Institute in 1947, a master’s in education from Louisiana State University in 1951, a second master’s in education (mathematics) in 1963, and a doctorate in education from McNeese State University in 1973.[13] DeBlanc worked in St. Martin Parish schools for many years and retired as a Colonel from the Marine Corps Reserve on July 1, 1972. DeBlanc died on November 22, 2007, having given his country and the people around him his very best.

DeBlanc’s Medal of Honor, donated to the Museum by Colonel DeBlanc in 2008 and on display at The National WWII Museum. Accession 2008.001

Contributor: Rivers Torres