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An
Army Brat, William N. Leonard is a 1938 graduate
of the U.S. Naval Academy. Upon graduation he
served on the USS Honolulu
(CL-48) and USS Arkansas
(BB-33) for the, then, mandatory two years fleet
service before attending flight school. He went
to Pensacola in June, 1940 and was designated
Naval Aviator # 6953 in January, 1941. His first
assignment was to VS-41 on the USS
Ranger (CV-4), flying
SBU-1's. The squadron was redesigned VF-42 and
transitioned to the F4F-3 beginning in March 1941
and completing the process in early may.
Following deployments on the Ranger
and the USS Wasp
(CV-7), VF-42 was assigned to the USS
Yorktown (CV-5) in June,
1941 to replace the nominal Yorktown
fighter squadron, VF-5, which was to make the
transition from F3F biplanes to F4F’s. VF-42
stayed on the Yorktown
through the Neutrality Patrols period and
remained with the ship when she departed for the
Pacific on December 16, 1941. VF-42 was the fighter squadron
on the Yorktown
through the Battle of the Coral Sea. Upon the
ship’s return to Pearl Harbor at the end of
May, 1942, Leonard, then a Lieutenant (jg), was
the senior of the sixteen VF-42 pilots sent to
Kaneohe NAS to join up with the eleven pilots of
Lieutenant Commander John S. ("Jimmie")
Thach’s VF-3 for the Midway deployment. When
VF-3, flying F4F-4's, flew out to the Yorktown
on May 29th, Thach was commanding, LCDR Don
Lovelace was Executive Officer, and Leonard was
Flight Officer. Lovelace was killed that day in a
tragic flight deck crash. Leonard, as the next
senior pilot, was assigned the additional duty of
Executive Officer. Servicing the squadron were
the crewmen from VF-42 who had remained on the
ship. Following the sinking of the Yorktown,
the majority of the VF-3 pilots ended up on the USS
Hornet (CV-8)
in a composite squadron
commanded by LCDR Thach, made up from the Yorktown
pilots and the remaining VF-8 pilots. Returning
to Pearl Harbor on June 13th,
the planes of this squadron were launched; the
VF-8 pilots flew to Ewa MCAS as did Leonard and
the VF-42 contingent of VF-3. Thach and the
remaining VF-3 pilots landed at Kaneohe NAS.
Shortly thereafter, Fighting 42 was
decommissioned; most flying personnel were sent
back to the mainland and most crewmen were
reassigned to other squadrons in the theater.
In August, 1942,
Leonard, who had been promoted to Lieutenant in
June, was assigned to VF-11 and deployed with
that squadron as to Guadalcanal in April 1943.
VF-11, in F4F-4's, operated out of the Fighter 1
auxiliary field near Henderson Field until July
1943. VF-11 was one of the last squadrons to fly
the Grumman F4F in combat operations. It was
during this tour that Leonard scored his 5th
and 6th
confirmed victories. Leonard flew some 170 combat
missions during the war.
After that tour,
Leonard was assigned to the Commander Fleet Air,
West Coast (CFWC) staff, working on fighter
doctrine and training new fighter pilots until
November 1944. During this period he flew the
noted "Aleutian" A6M2-21 Zero fighter
(b/n 4593) and the Ryan XFR-1. He was then
assigned to Task Force 38 as assistant operations
officer on the staff of Vice Admiral John S.
McCain, whose operations officer was Commander
Thach. He was in this position when the war
ended, through November, 1945.
As his next assignment,
Leonard, now a Commander, was assigned to NATC at
the Patuxent Naval Air Station. In this
assignment he flew more than 20 different types
of aircraft, including the P-59, P-80, P-51, RAF
Mosquito, F6F, F7F, F8F, F4U, F2G, XF15-C, FH,
FJ, XBT2D, AM, TBM, SB2C, PV, PBJ, and PB4Y. In
January 1946, in a P-59B, he became the 73rd
naval aviator to qualify in jets.
In 1948, he was in
command of VF-17A (soon thereafter designated
VF-171) when it became the first Navy jet
squadron and the first jet squadron to qualify
for carrier operations. During his tour as CO of
VF-171 he presented testimony to Congress in the
B-36 hearings regarding the Navy’s ability
to perform intercepts at altitudes greater than
50,000 feet using F2H Banshees.
Other operational
assignments included Commander, Air Group 17;
Executive Officer, VX-3 (all-weather operations);
Commander, VX-5 (special weapons delivery);
Executive Officer, USS
Bonhomme Richard (CV-31);
Captain, USS Salamonie (AO-26);
Captain, USS Ranger (CVA-61);
Commander, Carrier Division 14 (USS
Wasp, CVS-18); and
Commander, Naval Safety Center. During a tour in
OPNAV (OP-55) in the mid 1950's, Leonard directed
the team responsible for developing the military
requirements/specifications that led to the A-6
series all-weather attack airplane. CARDIV14,
during Leonard’s time as its Commander, was
the primary recovery group for the Gemini series
of manned space expeditions.
Even with the loss of
information on flights recorded in his first
logbook (it went down with the Yorktown),
in all, Leonard logged some 4087 flight hours,
including 2761 hours in propeller driven aircraft
and 1326 hours in jets,, approximately 2600 hours
in VF/VA types and 150 hours in VT types, and 330
carrier landings. He has flown some 82 different
aircraft or major model variants.
He retired in July 1971
as a Rear Admiral and lives in Virginia Beach,
VA. RADM Leonard was awarded the Navy Cross for
action in the Battle of the Coral Sea and a
second Navy Cross for action at the Battle of
Midway. His other awards include: the Legion of
Merit, with Combat ‘V’ and star for 2nd
award; the Distinguished Flying Cross; the Bronze
Star, with Combat ‘V’; the Air Medal,
with gold stars for 5 awards; the Joint Service
Commendation Medal; a Presidential Unit Citation;
the Navy Unit Commendation, with star for 2nd
award; the American Defense Medal, with
‘A’ for Atlantic Neutrality Patrol
service; the American Campaign Medal; the
Asia-Pacific Campaign Medal, with 5 stars; the
World War II Victory Medal; the Occupation Medal;
the National Defense Ribbon; and the Philippines
Liberation Medal, with 2 stars.
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