PORTLAND, Ore. -- Sunday, June 18, 1944: American forces in Normandy strove to isolate the German-held port city of Cherbourg by cutting across the base of the Cotentin Peninsula (also known as the Cherbourg Peninsula) on the northwest coast of France. American tactical airpower wielded by Ninth Air Force was heavily engaged in the effort. In Ninth Air Force, the 371st Fighter Group’s 406th Fighter Squadron was commanded by Eagle Squadron combat veteran Maj. Edwin D. “Jessie” Taylor. And in Taylor’s squadron was P-47 Thunderbolt pilot 1st Lt. John H. Shepard.
John H. Shepard
John H. Shepard was born in Berkley, California on September 6, 1920, the younger son of Mr. and Mrs. William M. Shepard. In 1929 he accompanied his family in a move to Buenos Aires, Argentina, where his father worked for an electric power company. John and his siblings, an older brother and a younger sister, grew up in Argentina and adopted some customs and culture of the country, having dual citizenship.
John attended the English High School in Buenos Aires and later went to the United States where he studied electrical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He joined the Reserve Officer Training Corps at MIT and upon graduation from college was commissioned as a second lieutenant.
In Training
Lieutenant Shepard was trained as a pilot, though it appears his training proved challenging in some ways. According to the Aviation Archaeological Investigation and Research (AAIR) website database, on January 4, 1943, Lt. John H. Shepard bailed out of a PT-17 Kaydet trainer, serial number 41-8247, during his first phase of military flight training when the aircraft stalled and/or spun out of control four miles northeast of the Municipal Airport at Lakeland, Florida. The aircraft was a total loss, but Lt. Shepard survived the mishap, continued training and eventually earned his pilot wings.
Later that year, on August 20, 1943, Lt. John H. Shepard was involved in a landing accident in P-47D Thunderbolt, serial number 42-74832, while assigned to the 338th Fighter Squadron of the 365th Fighter Group at Dover, Delaware, with substantial damage to the plane. Going from a 220-horsepower engine in a PT-17 to a 2,000-horsepower P-47 engine is a big difference!
Although details are lacking, it appears that Lt. Shepard may have been reassigned sometime in the summer of 1943 from the 365th Fighter Group to the 371st Fighter Group. But 1st Lt. John H. Shepard’s name and service number, O-449525, definitely appear in the 371st Fighter Group’s 406th Fighter Squadron section of the Roster of Troops for overseas movement in HQ Army Air Base, Richmond, VA, Special Orders No. 41, dated February 12, 1944.
At War
John’s squadron reached England in early March, 1944 and began combat operations with the group on April 12. About six weeks later, Lt. Shepard was awarded the Air Medal for his initial combat service on May 24, 1944.
Lt. Shepard flew in the period when airpower was softening up the continent for the Allied landings which commenced on D-Day, June 6, 1944. He kept flying in the Normandy Campaign which began that day.
In Normandy, US ground forces expanded and linked their beachheads and gradually pushed inland. They reached the west coast of the Cotentin Peninsula on June 17, cutting off Cherbourg and preventing any German reinforcements from reaching the peninsula, Units then turned to sweep up the peninsula and capture Cherbourg. The 371st Fighter Group ranged ahead of the ground forces, seeking out enemy forces either dug-in, trying to hide and/or on the move.
All four missions the group and its three fighter squadrons flew on June 18 were armed reconnaissance, searching for and attacking enemy ground forces in the area between Quittehoy (probably Quettehou) to Valognes.
Last Combat Mission
In the last mission of June 18, an evening mission flown by 11 P-47s of the 406th FS led by 1st Lt. Donald Ross and again carrying clusters of fragmentation bombs, the 406th took off at 1820 and covered their assigned target area between 1850 and 2000 hours. They strafed and dropped their bombs on gun emplacements, dozens of trucks in separate locations and on hundreds of troops in a wooded area which resisted with heavy, intense and accurate anti-aircraft fire up to 7,000-foot altitude.
The guns on the ground hit 1st Lt. John H. Shepard’s P-47D with little time for him to react - a parachute was seen near the plane but appeared not to have opened in time as his aircraft crashed and burned near St. Saveur, about 17 miles southeast of Cherbourg. (Note: The 371st FG post-mission Operations Report indicated Lt. Shepard was shot down at grid coordinate vT2095 in the Modified British System, French Lambert Zone 1, the coordinate system used during the war, a point known today as St. Sauveur-le-Vicomte.)
Strangely, we have not been able to find a Missing Air Crew Report for Lt. Shepard’s loss, nor even the serial number of the P-47 which he flew that fateful day. His loss occurred just as the group was preparing to move from England to Advanced Landing Ground A-6 near Ste. Mere Eglise in Normandy, and perhaps the formal reporting was lost in the shuffle.
Lt. Shepard’s parents in Argentina were informed of the loss of their son by the American military attache, General John W. Lang, who received a cable from the War Department in Washington DC and brought it to Mr. Shepard’s office. Mr. Shepard was the manager of the Commercial Section, Compania de Electricidad Argentina del Sud. His oldest son William was in the US Army as well, stationed in California at the time.
Lt. Shepard’s loss was described in an English language newspaper article titled “First U.S. War Casualty From Argentina” and that he was “The first American volunteer from Argentina to give his life in the second World War...”
Lt. Shepard was initially buried in Ste. Mere Eglise Cemetery 1, near to Advanced Landing Ground A-6, where his squadron and group soon moved to from England. After the war, Lt. Shepard was laid to rest at the Normandy American Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer, France, at Plot E, Row 28, Grave 38. He was awarded the Purple Heart and the Air Medal with four Oak Leaf Clusters. Lt. Shepard was 23 years old.
Remembering Lt. Shepard
Here in the 142nd Wing, we remember Lt. Shepard, and mentioned his loss in a 2024 article titled “Second Campaign: The 371st Fighter Group in Normandy,” at: https://www.142wg.ang.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/3849230/second-campaign-the-371st-fighter-group-in-normandy/
Lt. Shepard is also remembered at his alma mater, MIT, where his name is inscribed on the wall of the Memorial Lobby of Building 10, the large domed building in the central part of the campus, along with the names of other MIT alumni lost in military service.
But Lt. Shepard is remembered now in another part of the Americas, down South American way in Argentina, thanks to work underway by historian and author Mr. Alejandro Prina of Buenos Aires. Mr. Prina is a graphic designer who works for the communications department of a company which also provides services to the Argentine armed forces. He has been featured several times in Argentine newspapers in articles about World War II subjects.
Ten years ago, Mr. Prina pursued his longtime passion for military history and obtained a master’s degree in the subject from the International Institute for Global Security Studies in Madrid, Spain. His first military history book, Operation Jedburgh: Allied Special Forces in the Normandy Landings, was published in Spanish in 2024, with a second edition forthcoming soon. He is currently writing a book about Americans with an Argentine connection, either born in Argentina or who lived there for some period of time before they left to join the US military to serve in World War II. Some 135 such “Argentines” from American families served in World War II, a little-known story. Lt. Shepard will be remembered in the Spanish language in a chapter of this book.
And more, as Mr. Prina also posted in his segunaguerramundial_oficial group in Instagram on the D-Day anniversary earlier this month, a video of a recognition effort for Lt. Shepard which took place at the Normandy American Cemetery above Omaha Beach in France. He himself went to visit Lt. Shepard’s grave in 2023, and conceived of a unique idea to honor him. Earlier this year, his friends in the military reenactment group Airsoft Bizkaia from Bilbao, Spain donned US Army uniforms from World War II to place a floral bouquet in the shape and colors of Argentina’s flag along with a picture of Lt. Shepard at the base of the lieutenant’s cross marking his grave.
On this anniversary of the loss of Lt. John H. Shepard, killed in action in 1944, let us remember him and the other members of the 142nd Wing who made the ultimate sacrifice in service to community, state and nation. The ripple effects of war touch many shores, as we see in the case of this Argentina connection to Lt. Shepard and the 371st Fighter Group.