This Military Service Page was created/owned by
AB Raymond Guinn
to remember
Banfill, Charles Yawkey, Brig Gen USAF(Ret).
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Contact Info
Home Town Bonifay, FL
Date of Passing Mar 14, 1966
Location of Interment Arlington National Cemetery (VLM) - Arlington, Virginia
Appointed a second lieutenant in the Signal Reserve in March 1918, General Banfill was assigned as an instructor at Camp Dick, Texas, going to Gorstner Field, La., a month later. From September 1918 to July 1919 he served as an instructor at Carlstrom Field, Fla., and then joined the Fourth Aero Squadron at Mitchel Field, N.Y. Going to Hawaii in January 1920 he served with the Fourth Observation Squadron at Luke Field, joining the 21st Balloon Company at Fort Kamehameha that October, and becoming assistant to the Hawaiian Department officer in June 1922.
Entering the Air Corps Technical School at Chanute Field, Ill., in March 1923, General Banfill graduated that November and joined the 24th Photo Section at Brooks Field, Texas, later becoming a flying instructor there. From July 1927 to May 1928 he was at Duncan Field, Texas in charge of filming the motion picture "Flying Cadet", and then returned to Brooks Field. Two months later he went to Logan Field, Md., as an instructor of air units for the 29th Division of the Maryland National Guard.
Entering the Air Corps Tactical School at Maxwell Field, Ala., in August 1934, General Banfill graduated the following June, and a year later he graduated from the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. He was then ordered to Washington, D.C., for duty with the Operations Section, Office of the Chief of Air Corps, on Air Corps photo-mapping. In August 1938 he took part in the Army flight to Colombia, South America. Entering the Army War College in September 1939, he graduated the following June and was assigned for duty in the Office of the Chief of Air Corps.
Assigned as Air Corps representative with the Engineer Board at Fort Belvoir, Va., in July 1940, during that October and November General Banfill attended a special course in assault operation technique at the Engineer School there. In January 1941 he became chief of the Geographic Section, Military Intelligence Division, War Department General Staff, and in June 1942 he was appointed commandant of the Military Intelligence Training Center at Camp Richie, Md.
The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) was the military aviation arm of the United States of America between 1926 and 1941. The statutory administrative forerunner of the United States Air Force, it was renamed from the earlier United States Army Air Service on 2 July 1926 and part of the larger United States Army. The Air Corps was the immediate predecessor of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), established on 20 June 1941. Although discontinued as an administrative echelon during World War II, the Air Corps (AC) remained as one of the combat arms of the Army until 1947, when it was legally abolished by legislation establishing the Department of the Air Force.
The Air Corps was renamed by the United States Congress largely as a compromise between the advocates of a separate air arm and those of the traditionalist Army high command who viewed the aviation arm as an auxiliary branch to support the ground forces. Although its members worked to promote the concept of air power and an autonomous air force between the years between the world wars, its primary purpose by Army policy remained support of ground forces rather than independent operations.
On 1 March 1935, still struggling with the issue of a separate air arm, the Army activated the General Headquarters Air Force for centralized control of aviation combat units within the continental United States, separate from but coordinate with the Air Corps. The separation of the Air Corps from control of its combat units caused problems of unity of command that became more acute as the Air Corps enlarged in preparation for World War II. This was resolved by the creation of the Army Air Forces (AAF), making both organizations subordinate to the new higher echelon.
The Air Corps ceased to have an administrative structure after 9 March 1942, but as "the permanent statutory organization of the air arm, and the principal component of the Army Air Forces," the overwhelming majority of personnel assigned to the AAF were members of the Air Corps.
