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ENS Jesse LeRoy Brown
October 13, 1926 – December 4, 1950

ENS Jesse Brown USN (left in photo), a section leader, and LTJG Thomas Hudner, flew Vought F4U-4 Corsairs and were assigned to fighter squadron VF-32 aboard USS Wright (CVL-49) part of Fast Carrier Task Force 77. On 4 December 1950, on the way to Chosin Reservoir with his squadron to provide close air support to the Marines and soldiers during the breakout, Brown announced over the radio, “I think I may have been hit. I’ve lost my oil pressure.”

He crash-landed his Corsair on the side of a mountain in the snow.

Circling over the crash site in his own Corsair, squadron commander Lieutenant (j.g.) Thomas J. Hudner Jr. realized something was wrong when Brown didn’t emerge from the cockpit of the wrecked aircraft. Hudner made the decision to crash-land next to Brown’s wrecked Corsair, risking court-martial, capture by the Chinese, and his own life by ignoring his commanding officer’s directive, “If a plane goes down, that’s one down. We don’t need Hollywood stuff.”

Hudner successfully “pancaked” his aircraft in near Brown’s Corsair and found Brown in pain, bleeding, and trapped in his aircraft by a damaged instrument panel, with no way to rescue him. A Sikorsky helicopter piloted by Marine First Lieutenant Charlie Ward arrived in response to Hudner’s radio distress call, but there was nothing that could be done to extricate Brown from the Corsair. Brown asked Hudner to tell his wife, Daisy, how much he loved her before he died in his cockpit. As daylight dwindled and the possibility of capture grew increasingly imminent, Hudner and Ward were reluctantly forced to leave Brown’s body behind.

Unable to safely recover his body, Brown’s shipmates instead decided to honor him with a warrior’s funeral. On 7 December 1950, seven aircraft loaded with napalm and piloted by Ensign Brown’s friends made several low passes over his downed Corsair. The top of Brown’s head was still visible with snow on his hair when they dropped the napalm on his plane while reciting The Lord’s Prayer.

Ensign Jesse Brown would posthumously receive the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal, and the Purple Heart. Hudner nervously anticipated a court-martial for defying a direct order and willful destruction of a Navy aircraft. Instead, he would receive the Medal of Honor for “exceptionally valiant action and selfless devotion to a shipmate.” When USS Jesse L. Brown (DE-1089) was launched in 1973, Hudner was in attendance, standing next to Brown’s widow. In 2017, USS Thomas Hudner (DDG-116) was christened in Hudner’s honor.

Warrior Brothers – Fair winds and following seas, ENS Jesse Brown, Rest In Eternal Peace…