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Sgt Mae Moss (MayDay)
to remember
Kinkela Keil, Lillian, Capt.
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Contact Info
Last Address Arcata
Date of Passing Jun 30, 2005
Location of Interment Riverside National Cemetery (VA) - Riverside, California
Lillian Kinkela Keil, Captain, U.S. Air Force. Air Force Flight Nurse Pioneer.
She flew on 425 combat missions and took part in 11 major campaigns that included the D-Day invasion and Battle of the Bulge in World War II and the Battle of Chosin Reservoir during the Korea War. (250 air evacuations throughout Europe and 25 trans-Atlantic crossings during WWII. 175 missions during the Korean War.)
She was one of the earliest Flight Nurses trained during WWII at the School of Air Evacuation at Bowman Field, Kentucky. Upon graduation, she joined the 810th Medical Air Evacuation Squadron that sailed to Europe in preparation for D-Day. Even prior to D-Day, she participated in picking up wounded troops all over England, Scotland, Iceland and the Azores. She landed in France aboard a C-47 during the battle.
During the Korean War she participated in 175 missions, including during the Battle of Chosin as part of the 801st Military Air Evacuation Squadron. She also served with Operation Little Switch with the 801st MAES accompanying 36 POWs on a C-124 to Tachikawa, Japan.
One of the most decorated women in American military history, she was awarded 19 medals, including a European Theater medal with four battle stars, a Korean service medal with seven battle stars, four air medals and a Presidential Citation from the Republic of Korea.
Between the wars, she flew with United Airlines. She was the inspiration for the 1953 movie, "Flight Nurse" serving as technical advisor for the film.
She passed away in 2005 at age 88. She was interred in Riverside National Cemetery, Riverside, California, Section 20A, Site 1235.
Notes:
1. "Despite opposition from the Army Surgeon General, the designation 'Flight Nurse' was created for specially trained members of the Army Nurse Corps assigned to the AAF Evacuation Service. In February 1943, the first class of Flight Nurses graduated from a four-week training course at Bowman Field, KY, that taught aeromedical physiology, aircraft-loading procedures, and survival skills. Flight nurse duty was voluntary, requiring strenuous work and sometimes exposure to enemy fire, but the risk was justified by the reduced death rate and increased morale among the wounded."
Source: http://www.olive-drab.com/od_medical_evac_fixedwing_ww2.php
2. Even for the C-47 hospital ships used for medical evacuation: "The impracticality of changing aircraft markings before such medical flights meant the aircraft bore no identification as a hospital ship so the crew and patients on board had no greater degree of safety from enemy attack than if the aircraft was hauling combat supplies."
Source: http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=3364
A history of the U.S. Army Nurse Corps, by Mary T. Sarnecky (a detailed history of the Medical Evacuation units) G.I. Nightingales: The Army Nurse Corps in World War II, Part 807,"by Barbara Brooks Tomblin (detailed history)
Korean War
From Month/Year
June / 1950
To Month/Year
July / 1953
Description The Korean War; 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953) began when North Korea invaded South Korea. The United Nations, with the United States as the principal force, came to the aid of South Korea. China came to the aid of North Korea, and the Soviet Union gave some assistance.
Korea was ruled by Japan from 1910 until the closing days of World War II. In August 1945, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, as a result of an agreement with the United States, and liberated Korea north of the 38th parallel. U.S. forces subsequently moved into the south. By 1948, as a product of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, Korea was split into two regions, with separate governments. Both governments claimed to be the legitimate government of all of Korea, and neither side accepted the border as permanent. The conflict escalated into open warfare when North Korean forces—supported by the Soviet Union and China—moved into the south on 25 June 1950. On that day, the United Nations Security Council recognized this North Korean act as invasion and called for an immediate ceasefire. On 27 June, the Security Council adopted S/RES/83: Complaint of aggression upon the Republic of Korea and decided the formation and dispatch of the UN Forces in Korea. Twenty-one countries of the United Nations eventually contributed to the UN force, with the United States providing 88% of the UN's military personnel.
After the first two months of the conflict, South Korean forces were on the point of defeat, forced back to the Pusan Perimeter. In September 1950, an amphibious UN counter-offensive was launched at Inchon, and cut off many of the North Korean troops. Those that escaped envelopment and capture were rapidly forced back north all the way to the border with China at the Yalu River, or into the mountainous interior. At this point, in October 1950, Chinese forces crossed the Yalu and entered the war. Chinese intervention triggered a retreat of UN forces which continued until mid-1951.
After these reversals of fortune, which saw Seoul change hands four times, the last two years of conflict became a war of attrition, with the front line close to the 38th parallel. The war in the air, however, was never a stalemate. North Korea was subject to a massive bombing campaign. Jet fighters confronted each other in air-to-air combat for the first time in history, and Soviet pilots covertly flew in defense of their communist allies.
The fighting ended on 27 July 1953, when an armistice was signed. The agreement created the Korean Demilitarized Zone to separate North and South Korea, and allowed the return of prisoners. However, no peace treaty has been signed, and the two Koreas are technically still at war. Periodic clashes, many of which are deadly, have continued to the present.
