World War II Honoree

Frederick Crockett Hawkes

Branch of Service

U.S. Marine Corps

Hometown

Greenfield, Massachusetts

Honored By

Orville L. Kline

Rank: First Lieutenant. He entered the United States Marine Corps from Massachusetts. After the completion of boot camp, he was accepted into the Flight Aviation Training program. Served as a Corsair F-4U Fighter-Bomber Pilot, who was stationed on Kwajalein Island in the North Pacific Theater of Operations. He was assigned to the Marine Attack Squadron ‘VMF-311 AKA: Tomcats’-Marine Air Group-31, Fourth Marine Base Air Wing. Reported missing in action, lost at sea Sunday, April 23, 1944 when his fighter was observed as losing airspeed in a tight turn, crashing into the ocean during a routine training flight. His name is permanently inscribed in the tablets of the missing, memorialized at the Honolulu National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, ‘Punchbowl’ Hawaii. This sortie flight was considered to be a non-battle incident. This American Patriot, so gallantly died for his country.