Since today is the anniversary of Victory in Europe Day, we wanted to take this opportunity to talk about a relative of ours who made the ultimate sacrifice in World War II. Judson Paul Chewning was the youngest son of Ernest Chewning and his wife Idella “Pearl” Stinson. Paul, as he was called by his family, was born in Harrisonville, Missouri, in 1921. When he was eight years old, his father moved the family to El Dorado Springs, Missouri, where he became pastor of the Baptist Church.
In 1942, like so many other men his age, Paul signed up for the Army Air Corps to become a pilot. He underwent training at Altus Army Air Field, near Oklahoma City, and in January 1944 he was commissioned a second lieutenant and was assigned duty as the pilot of a C-47 cargo plane. These planes were used extensively by the U.S. and the United Kingdom to haul troops and supplies. We know very little of the missions that Paul Chewning flew, but we can assume that he made many trips back and forth across the Atlantic supplying the war effort.
On August 29, 1944, Paul’s plane disappeared somewhere on the northern route to Meeks Field in Iceland. Very little is known of the circumstances, but his family speculated at the time that weather was a factor in the crash that claimed the lives of Paul and four other crew members somewhere between Greenland and Iceland.
Paul is remembered on the Tablets of the Missing at Cambridge American Cemetery in England, as well as a small marker near his parents’ grave in Cass County, Missouri.
