After 57 years, WWII Corsair wreckage found (Major Quintus B. Nelson)

stories shared by our readers

Veteran's Name: Quintus B. Nelson
Rank: Major
Divison/Unit: VMF-122
Service Branch: USMC
Conflict: World War II
Shared By: narawhiz on 9/19/07

 upload stories, videos, pics
 printer friendly version
 email this page to a friend
 rate this story
 comment on this story

This story's category:
World War II

Finding, mapping and identifying WWII U. S. Corsair fighter crash site, Malakal Harbor, 12-14 March 2003.

Maj. Quintus B. Nelson

Dr. Patrick Scannon Md. PhD travels to Palau once a year and has done so since 1993. Dr. Scannon is on a quest to unravel the mysteries of MIAs lost during World War II in and around Palau. He is searching for and identifying aircraft wrecks strewn about the islands of Palau. The wreck sites are found in the waters, the jungles and deep in the mangrove swamps. The aircraft have been ripped to pieces and buried in muck.Getting to them, slogging through crock infested waters or scrambling up and across coral islands might sound like the hard part of the endeavor but the tricky part comes in identifying them. Sorting out which of the many it could be, and who was flying and if they are still missing. You’d think that the military records would be transparent and complete.They are nothing of the sort.

Once it is determined that a site might contain the remains of one of the many MIA’s, 78,000 from World War II alone, Scannon and his team contact the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC).JPAC is the military team responsible for recovering, repatriating and identifying the remains of those listed as Missing In Action.It is then, under the purview of JPAC, that recovery efforts are launched on these sites. It’s interesting to note that while JPAC is responsible for these recovery efforts and in turn getting the remains of these missing men back to their families, JPAC does not have the budget to launch the search efforts needed to locate possible sites. Thus JPAC relies on local witnesses and, in Palau, Dr. Scannon, to find and identify locations of “interest”.

For fourteen years, Dr. Pat Scannon conducted numerous unsuccessful searches for the missing aviator, MAJ. Quintus B. Nelson, squadron commander VMF-122, and his Corsair. MAJ. Nelson was reported by two other Corsair aviators to crash 16 APR 1945 into (or near) an uninhabited island near Koror.Dr. Scannon had found the mission report of MAJ. Nelson’s last flight during a 1994 visit to the U. S. Marine Corps Historical Research Center, Navy Yard, Washington, DC and was astounded that his aircraft had never been found even though he had crashed into the most populated area of Palau.In preparation, Dr. Scannon reviewed all available archives, as well as conducted interviews with many Palauan elders and several surviving Corsair aviators. This had opened up several possible sites. In 2002, MAJ. Nelson’s son, James Nelson, contacted Dr. Scannon in hopes of learning more about his father. He supplied more information, including an enigmatic hand-drawn map from his uncle, written just after the war, pointing to what one Marine thought had been his crash site.

In April 2002, James Nelson traveled to Palau with the BentProp team to assist in the search for his father’s corsair.Nelson spent two weeks with the team, and was present when a corsair, not unlike his fathers, was found and identified.It took another expedition however, one in March of 2003 for his father’s corsair to be found.That phone call; “We’ve found your fathers aircraft” was the only possible salve to heal the wound left by the words “Missing in Action”.The phone call was only possible due to the work of Dr Scannon’s BentProp Project (www.BentProp.org) the only such private endeavor in the world. The story follows:

In 2002, during P-MAN IV, after reviewing all leads, large and extensive jungle searches were conducted, on two uninhabited islands between Malakal and Koror - exhausted, dehydrated and dejected, the team walked away with nothing.During one of these searches, Flip Colmer, our resident retired US Navy aviator, dropped his sunglasses overboard into Malakal Harbor, a seemingly minor incident. Knowing we must be close to MAJ. Nelson’s crash, the P-MAN IV team held a ceremony with MAJ. Nelson’s son and wife, along with Bill Cantrell (who had been a Corsair aviator on Peleliu during WWII) and his wife and a visiting Marine fighter squadron, VMFA-225. That night at a restaurant sitting along the waters of Malakal Harbor, all the Marines spontaneously stood at attention and sang the Marine Corps Hymn. The next day, VMFA-225 honored MAJ. Nelson and flew a lone man formation.

For all of this searching, the area described is relatively small. Approximately 1 square mile, much of the area is either inhabited or along major waterways. This makes it all the more difficult to imagine how an aircraft known to have crashed here with its associated debris could go missing for almost 60 years. It is possible such a debris field might have been salvaged after the war, but no one interviewed recalls such salvaging. Accordingly, frustrating as it was, it was agreed at the onset of P-MAN V not to conduct further searches UNLESS new and convincing information was obtained. So much for plans...

When the P-MAN V team arrived in Palau in 2003, the master guide, Joe Maldangesang, reported that a very sick elder in Koror had recently told his son that he had seen or heard of an aircraft during WWII crashing into the west face of the small island of Ngermalk. As is the nature of these searches for something that happened almost 60 years ago, this elder died just a few days after we arrived. Feeling that this recollection was credible enough, the P-MAN V team agreed to make a one-day search. The west side of this island is a coral cliff topped with dense jungle, so the team was divided into two sub-teams taking separate high and low routes. Armed with new radios with greater power than in P-MAN IV (thanks to the research of Dan O'Brien), they were able to keep in touch in spite of sub-team separation. The jungle conditions, as reported last year, on this coral island were horrendous. The steep western face is never traveled these days. Nonetheless, a complete search was conducted. Some evidence was found that Japanese military had been in the area with one interesting deep multi-room cave that had clearly been built in defense of Malakal Harbor (see map below).

With this trek behind them and with no further information, the search for MAJ. Nelson had no where to go – so they halted further work and went on with the remainder of their agenda. With the exception of the southwest quadrant, virtually all the area within the red box has been searched from 1996 on, without success, by P-MAN teams.

But, just a few days before their scheduled departure from Palau, they were once again reminded that one never knows what might happen on these missions and, sure enough, something new came up – along with an anchor being hauled out of Malakal Harbor. They had just returned to Neco Marine late in the day on 11 APR 2003.The dive shop owners, Mandy and Shallum Etpison, eagerly told the team that in the process of pulling up an anchor nearby, they found what they thought was airplane debris.

The next day they dove the site and came across a tail wheel assembly imbedded into the coral in about 20 feet of water. Immediately it was identified it as belonging to a Corsair.Since there were no other Corsairs lost anywhere near this field, even during the SCUBA dive, they realized that this must be MAJ. Quintus B. Nelson’s crash site and, more importantly, his final resting place.

To demonstrate how to visually confirm identification of objects found at crash sites, here is a side-by-side comparison between the Nelson site tailwheel (left) and a Corsair tailwheel photo taken at the National Museum of Naval Aviation, Pensacola NAS (right). Left: © PostStar Productions 2003, photo by Clem Major. Right: © Reid Joyce 2003

Other features quickly confirmed this as a Corsair. They found one of the main landing gear assemblies, a section of the underside of the fuselage, which would have been just beneath the cockpit, part of the tail assembly and other debris that made the typing certain. They also found two coral encrusted .50 caliber machine guns, and parts of all three blades of the Hamilton-Standard propeller. No human remains were found.During one of the dives, Joe found something in the middle of the crash site - Flip's sunglasses that he had lost last year. Because the water was so shallow (and warm), most of their time was spent initially gaining a sense of the debris field. They determined that this Corsair was contained in a relatively small area (approximately 75 yards by 150 yards). Based on the training provided during P-MAN IV by Dr. Bill Belcher, an underwater archeologist from the US Army Central identification Laboratory, Hawaii (CILHI), they devised a plan after the first dive to map/document this debris field to help determine what had happened. The next day, armed with every empty water bottle they could find, they numbered and attached them to key pieces within the debris field, allowing us to see and target from the boat the bottles, when released to the surface. We also searched extensively for evidence of the cockpit area, finding only a small piece of the instrument panel. With bottles bobbing up to the surface, several team members also surfaced and, with two separate GPS devices, recorded in duplicate the latitude/longitude coordinates for all the labeled pieces in the debris field after which the bottles were recovered. With the debris field contained into such a small area, we have concluded preliminarily that MAJ. Nelson's Corsair was hit by enemy antiaircraft fire while in a steep dive (headed west on an approximately east-west line) and entered the water with no course or attitude change. Of course, massive destruction occurred and is evidenced by the R-2800 engine lying fragmented in small pieces, along with the prop. It appears the tail section was thrown forward, toward the shoreline. Although he reportedly took off from Peleliu field with two bombs, they were not found, supporting his wingman's observation that he had released both prior to crashing. MAJ. Nelson's wingman, LT Dilks, commented in his After Action Report about seeing an explosion near the southeast dock of Malakal just before MAJ. Nelson disappeared, he noted the explosion as unexplained both in location (not on target) and timing (not timed, as would be expected, with the other explosion seen on target). It appears that what LT. Dilks saw, in all likelihood, was his squadron commander's crash. LT. Dilks was killed in action over Palau a few days later.

During P-MAN IV, a ceremony was held for MAJ. Nelson while his son was in Palau. With MAJ. Nelson's Corsair now identified, a second American flag ceremony was held on the dive boat. In the Hawaiian tradition taught by Bill Belcher, they gathered flowers and, after Jennifer quietly sang “Amazing Grace”, they gathered along the port side of the boat and threw the flowers onto the calm and warm waters of Malakal Harbor. We waited till late that night, impatiently I might add, for dawn in far away Houston, Texas and called the Nelsons to let them know. As the phone was passed around to allow each person to share their thoughts with Jim, they all gained a deepened sense that what we provide from our searches extends way beyond documenting bent pieces of aluminum and iron in written reports - which will be filed away and, most likely, forgotten.

Bent Prop at Nelson crash site.
© PostStar Productions, 2003, photos by Clem Major.

Main gear strut at Nelson site.
© PostStar Productions, 2003, photos by Clem Major.

Catapult hook located under cockpit area.
© PostStar Productions 2003, photo by Clem Major.

Here's another visual comparison - a main gear strut found at the Nelson crash site, and an inboard view of a right-side Corsair main gear strut - from the museum in Pensacola.Left photo © PostStar Productions 2003, photo by Clem Major

Right photo © Reid Joyce 2003

Val Thal-Slocum Examining Machine Gun Found by Jennifer Powers.
© PostStar Productions 2003, photo by Clem Major

Pat Scannon examining vertical stabilizer.

© PostStar Productions 2003, photo by Clem Maj.or

Subsequent to discovery and identification of this site, the findings were reported to the Palauan Ministry of Justice, the Palauan Historical Preservation Office, other Palauan dignitaries, the U. S. Embassy in Palau, the U. S. Navy Historical Center, and the U. S. Army Central identification Laboratory, Hawaii. Ordinarily, U. S. Navy policy is to leave underwater remains in place. Furthermore, it has been the policy of the BentProp Project to respect the wishes of both Palauan and United States agencies not to disclose publicly any crash site location. However, this situation is unusual in that a) the site’s proximity to the local community is such that Palauans had heard of the find the same day it was located and b), the crash site (with artifacts highly desired by collectors) lies in relatively shallow water in a very accessible area which may be disturbed in the near future due to dredging considerations. These agencies and individuals were sent a summary of the findings and it was requested that consideration be given to protecting the site, especially since it is the final resting place for MAJ. Quintus B. Nelson. The Minister of Justice advised that Palauan laws already exist which protect identified underwater archeological sites (such as this one). Additional evaluations are also underway.

In April, Jim and Neel Nelson invited the P-MAN V team to their home in Houston, TX, to acknowledge the finding of his father’s crash site. The gathering consisted of two key events. The first of these was to meet privately with the Nelson family to deliver, as a team, the American flag that was flown at his father’s crash site. This ceremony, conducted in the Nelson home, was emotional – with the purpose of the occasion at least partially offset by the fulfillment of knowing the location of MAJ. Quintus B. Nelson’s final resting place. The second event was a cocktail party presumably for the Nelson family to introduce the PMAN team to interested neighbors. Unknown to the team, one of the Nelson’s invited neighbors was one with quite a personal interest in our efforts. It was a surprise and pleasure to meet former President (and former Ensign) George Herbert Walker Bush that evening. Ensign Bush was a U. S. Navy Avenger pilot, who flew missions over Palau during WWII.

The Nelson family surrounded by the P-MAN V team (Neel, center, with flag).
©Tom Krasny, 2003

Former President Bush recalling WWII in Palau to Dr. Pat Scannon
© Barbara Bush 2003

More details can be found at the following URLs:

http://www.bentprop.org/

http://www.bentstarproject.org/

http://www.lastflighthome.org/

Upload Your Own Stories, Photos and Videos

 Start Uploading Now!

Discuss this Article