13. Segregation in the US Armed Forces Led to Calls for the Creation of an All-Black Fighter Unit
In the First World War, African Americans tried to fly or serve as aerial observers in the US military, but were rejected. Their numbers included Eugene Bullard, a black pilot who flew for the French air force during the war, because his own country’s military aviation would not have him. Blacks continued to be barred from service in US military aviation until pressure and successful lobbying by civil rights groups got Congress to pass a bill in 1939 to train black flyers.
The War Department and the military aviation establishment dragged their feet and slow walked the implementation of the legislation. In 1941, they finally gave in to pressure and created the 99th Pursuit Squadron. In accordance with the military’s racial segregation policies, the 99th was an all-black flying outfit. The unit had 47 officers and 429 men, and training began in Tuskegee, Alabama, in July of 1941. The first class of five black fighter pilots graduated in March, 1942. They included Benjamin O. Davis Jr., the first black officer to solo an Army Air Corps plane. He was promoted to lieutenant colonel that July, and placed in command of the 99th.