2nd Lieutenant Walter F. Perra

77th Fighter Squadron, 20th Fighter Group

KIA, June 15, 1944

*****

Walter Perra’s P-38 Lighting went down over the Normandy village of Les Corvees on June 15th. He had been flying cover for the Allied invasion: escorting bombers, strafing air fields, and hitting critical transportation targets. His fellow pilots, immersed in the business of staying alive, saw that he had gone down but knew little of what had happened. At age 24, he was reported missing in action. Years later, when his body was recovered, Walter’s friends and family learned the exact details of the crash.

Walter loved to fly.  He graduated flight training in 1943 and by April, 1944 Walter was stationed "somewhere in England" and seeing plenty of action – flying 19 sorties over Luxemburg, Berlin, Paris, and a host of other occupied cities, including five during the Normandy invasion.

On June 15th, Walter was hit by intense anti-aircraft fire on his way back from a mission escorting bombers across France. Fighter pilots were no strangers to flak, and the P-38 could take a beating, but it was too much, and Walter knew he was going down. Jean Conte was just 11 when he saw Walter’s plane crash. Standing in the field that once held the charred hulk of Walter’s plane, Jean described how Walter "wanted to avoid crashing his plane into the city. So, by the time that he made this big circle, the plane had lost altitude, and then when he wanted to jump, it was too late." Though he was initially reported missing, at age 24, Walter was dead.

German soldiers investigated the crash site, took all of Walter’s identification, and forbid the local civilians to bury him. The French citizens buried him nonetheless, in a small, well-kept grave marked with as much identification as could be pulled from the plane itself. When the US Military finally recovered Walter’s body and contacted the Perra family in 1947, the Perras chose to have him remain in France. "Spiritually, we feel the he is as close to us buried in France as if he was buried here," wrote Richard Perra, Sr. "We are consoled to some extent in knowing he is buried in soil he flew over and helped to win back."

In interviews, Walter’s brother Medrick Perra spoke expressively about Walter’s love of flying and the decision to keep his brother’s remains interred in the French earth. Mark Perra, Walter’s nephew and Medrick’s son, explained how he came to discover Walter and understand the uncle he was never able to meet. And beside a still-operational P-38, Walter’s fellow fighter pilots in the 77th Fighter Squadron, Al Gese and Doug MacArthur, described what it was like to fly P-38s in 1944. All completing the portrait of Walter with the family, hometown, and planes he loved so much.

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