Howard L. Chatelaine

Rank: Sergeant, U.S. Army Air Forces

Serial Number: 13176648

Unit: 367th Bomber Squadron, 306th Bomber Group (Heavy)

Entered service from: New Jersey

Died: January 11, 1944

Burial: Locustwood Memorial Park, Route 70 & Cooper Landing Road, Cherry Hill, NJ

Awards: Purple Heart

Sergeant Howard Leon Chatelaine was born on November 24, 1923, to Louis and Emma Chatelaine of 213 Toledo Avenue, Westmont, NJ. He was a 1941 graduate of Collingswood High School and an aviation enthusiast who had flown small planes at the Pine Valley airfield before the war.

Howard Chatelaine enlisted in the Army on his 19th birthday. Sent to Camp Lee, Virginia, for basic training, he qualified for the Air Corps and was sent to Miami, Florida. On January 1, 1943, he was sent to Air Force Technical School in Amarillo, Texas, where he spent five months, graduated with honors, and was promoted to Sergeant. On the last day of May he was transferred to the Air Force Flexible Gunnery School at Yucca, Arizona, for a two-month course. He arrived at Salt Lake City, Utah, on August 5, 1943, and was subsequently sent to Ephrata, Washington, where he joined a B-17 crew as a flight engineer and top turret gunner. He was sent, with his crew, to Spokane, Washington, for flight training on September 4, 1943, and then to Pendleton Field, Washington, for training with the 383rd Bomber Group. On October 25, he flew to Grand Island, Nebraska, for final preparations. His crew arrived at the East Coast point of embarkation on November 11, and he arrived in England on his 20th birthday, November 24, 1943.

Sergeant Howard Chatelaine was killed on his third mission, an attack on German aircraft factories at Brunswick, Oschersleben, and Halberstadt, on January 11, 1944. Initially listed as missing, his loss was reported in the February 5, 1944 edition of the Camden Courier-Post. A later report on March 15, 1944 stated that at least one of the crew had survived the crash and had been taken prisoner.

His death was later confirmed. Howard Chatelaine’s body was found in Holland and he was buried in a Dutch cemetery at Epe. The wife of the caretaker of the cemetery sent a picture of his grave to his family in the United States. After the U.S. Army arrived, his body was removed to the American Cemetery at Margraten, Holland. After the war, Howard Chatelaine was brought home and was buried in Locustwood Memorial Park on March 26, 1949.

He was survived by his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Leon Chatelaine, of 213 Toledo Avenue, Westmont, NJ, a sister, Mrs. Robert Davis, and his brother, Raymond Chatelain.

Howard L. Chatelaine is memorialized on the War Memorial on Haddon Avenue in Westmont (Haddon Township), NJ.