Helen Greene Kent lost her pilot husband to World War II. Widowed at age 22, she took that sorrow and enlisted in the war effort following his death. She saw the world thru her army service and encountered a fascinating journey that ended tragically.

Born August 29, 1921, she was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Harold F. Green. The family of five lived at 300 Madison Avenue in Taft, California, which is about 40 miles southwest of Bakersfield. She had two brothers, Harold Greene and Mickey Greene.

HER LIFE BEFORE MILITARY

Helen attended Lufkin’s Business College,[i] where she made the honor roll in multiple school terms.[ii]

Helen Greene became Helen Kent after she fell for and married Earl Charles Kent of Peoria, Illinois and Kansas City, Missouri. He was a graduate of Peoria High School.[iii] Earl worked as a lineman in the telephone/telegraph/power field and before the war was living in Baltimore, Maryland.[iv]

Before their marriage, he joined the Army Air Corp in August of 1941[v], before the United States entered the war.[vi] He trained in California, the state where Helen lived bringing them together.[vii]

In June of 1942,[viii] he received the Distinguished Flying Cross for sinking a German submarine in the Gulf of Mexico when he was based out of Fort Myers, Florida. Later, his duties in Libya and off the coast of England, kept him away from Helen. He was serving in the 409th Bomber Squadron of the 93rd Bomber Group -Heavy out of Hardwicke, England.[ix]

During a visit to her husband’s parents,[x] Helen received terrible news. On March 31, 1943, tragedy struck when Earl, flying a Liberator Bomber, was lost during a mission over Antwerp. [xi] At first, he was listed as missing in action.[xii] He did not return from his mission to bomb shipyards in Europe.[xiii] Earl is remembered at the Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial in Cambridgeshire, England.[xiv]

HER MILITARY STORY

Following the death of her husband Earl, Helen joined in the war.[xv] She enlisted in the WAC on June 28, 1943 in Los Angeles, California.[xvi] Her service number was A-902290.[xvii] She served as a WAC in the Army Air Corps. She began her training at the first women’s army corps training center in Fort Des Moines, Iowa.[xviii] Later, she did additional training in Georgia.[xix]

Helen then attended WAC administration school in Conway, Arkansas at the Arkansas State Teachers College. She arrived on September 30, 1943, as a member of class No.9.[xx] While she was there, in front of a crowd of 3,000, Private Helen G. Kent [xxi]was presented the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal and three Oak Leaf Clusters on behalf of her fallen husband.[xxii]

By the time she enlisted, her brother, Harold Greene was a Lieutenant serving in the United States Navy. Her other brother, Mickey Greene, resided in her hometown of Taft.[xxiii]

Before being shipped overseas, Helen was able to visit her home in Taft in August of 1944.[xxiv]

She headed overseas on December 15, 1944.[xxv] Sergeant Helen Kent was stationed in Hollandia in Dutch New Guinea.[xxvi] She was a stenographer in the Far East Airforces Command Headquarters[xxvii] and was involved in keeping track of supplies as well as shipping supplies.[xxviii]

During her time in New Guinea, she was fast friends with another WAC, Ruth Coster, whose daughter talked about Helen Kent with the Bakersfield Californian newspaper. It was reported that the WACs slept in tents protected with barbed wire as protection from Japanese soldiers on the island. The ranking female officer in each tent was issued a firearm as additional protection.[xxix]

HER LAST DAY

The WACs didn’t just work hard, they also had fun. Her friend’s daughter remembers stories of picnics with pork and beans, sausages and bourbon.[xxx] On one particular day off, the girls in the office decided to play tourist.

With a day off to spend, Helen, joined 23 other Army personnel for a site-seeing trip in a transport plane.[xxxi] Colonel Peter J. Prossen was the pilot. Prossen was the chief of maintenance for the Far East Air Service Command. Others on board were:

· Major George H. Nicholson

· Major Herman F. Antonini

· Major Phillip J. Dattle

· Captain Herbert F. Good

· Captain Louis E. Freyman

· Lieutenant Lawrence F. Holding

· Lieutenant Robert E. McCollom

· Staff Sergeant Hilliard Norris

· Corporal Charles R. Miller

· Corporal Melvyn A. Weber

· PFC Melvin A Mollberg

· PFC George R. Newcomer

· T/3 Marion W. McMonagle

· Staff Sergeant Laura Besley

· Sergeant Belle G. Naimer

· PFC Eleanor Hanna

· PFC Alethia Fair

· PFC Mariam C. Gillis

· PFC Mary Landau

· Corporal Margaret Hastings

· Lieutenant John B. McCollom

· Sergeant Kenneth W. Decker[xxxii]

Corporal Margaret Hastings described the day in The Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper months later. Hastings’s boss was Colonel Prosson, the pilot. She reported the eight WACs were excited for a chance to fly over the legendary area nick-named “Shangri-La.” The pilots who had flown over the area came back with many tall tales of the sights they had seen – or imagined they had seen- from native’s the size of fictional Paul Bunyon to native women who looked like movie stars.

The WACs filed into the camouflage-painted plane first and the men filled in around them. Hastings said she took the first seat but when she realized she didn’t have a good view, she moved to the last seat near the back door, near Eleanor Hanna and opposite of Laura Besley who she recalled winking at during takeoff.

The plane, taking off from Santini Airstrip, flew at 9,000-10,000 feet for 55 minutes before arriving over Hidden Valley. It only took a few minutes to cross the valley. The plane was in a climb. Suddenly the plane was shearing the tops off tall, jungle trees.[xxxiii] The plane shook fiercely, and suction drew the walls inward. Upon impact with a mountain, the tail section broke off and the plane burst into flames.[xxxiv]

The plane crashed into a 4-mile thin but 25-mile-long jungle surrounded by the Oranje Mountains. The only gorge that serves as an entrance to the valley is cut off by a mountain wall running at direct cross angles, according to a Pittsburge Sun-Telegraph article. It is believed the wall was hidden by clouds when the plane crashed.[xxxv]

Only three people survived the crash including Corporal Margaret Hastings, Lieutenant John B. McCollom and Sergeant Kenneth W. Decker.[xxxvi] Hastings and McCollom crawled out of the torn tail. Decker, with a head wound, was thrown out of the front of the plane. McCollom heard screaming and went into the burning plane and pulled out two women, Eleanor Hanna and Laura Besley. It was too late to save Helen or any of the others.[xxxvii]

Eleanor Hanna died the first night in the jungle, May 13, 1945.[xxxviii] Laura Besley died during the night of May 15, 1945 at Balim Valley, Dutch New Guinea which is now Papua New Guinea, Indonesia,[xxxix] presumably from internal injuries.[xl]

The crash happened in the nearly inaccessible Owen Stanley Mountains of Netherland New Guinea.[xli] The survivors buried Helen and the others at the crash site.[xlii] It was three days later before the survivors were spotted.[xliii] They had hiked through the jungle to a rock clearing so they could be seen.

The three survivors suffered burns and shock,[xliv] and eventually two had developed gangrene. Decker had deep back wounds[xlv]. They were trapped in the jungle for 47 days, were delivered a walkie-talkie, food and medical supplies by parachute. Eventually, a medical team and other help parachuted in to tend to them.

An airborne funeral service was held at 11,000 feet above the wreckage site with Catholic and Protestant rites. Volunteer service members parachuted into the area then hiked to the wreckage. Helen’s body and the others were then deemed impossible to move so were buried properly at the crash site. Twenty crosses and one Star of David were dropped into the jungle.[xlvi] The crosses and Star of David were placed by the volunteers on the graves.

Another team, that parachuted in, built a landing strip to support a glider. It was hacked into the jungle. It took several days to create. After the injured were deemed well enough to make a three-day hike through the jungle, they were moved to the landing strip. For several days, failed attempts were made before the glider rescue worked. The glider was then lifted aloft by a C-47 with a grabline.[xlvii]

Sergeant Helen Kent’s body remained buried near the wreckage in the New Guinea jungle for the next 14 years until it could be recovered for a proper burial. According to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin newspaper, the army believed at first it would not be able to retrieve the body from the rugged mountains. [xlviii] Many years after the crash, men sent by the Army traveled by plane, boat, and foot, traveling over mountains and through jungles, to reach the Hidden Valley.[xlix]

Helen’s body was recovered and buried at the Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri. She was the first WAC to be killed from her community.[l]

COMMENDATIONS

World War II Victory Medal

American Campaign Medal

Army Presidential Unit Citation

Army Good Conduct Medal

Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal[li]

HER GRAVE

Helen Kent remained on the mountainside until 1958 when an American Search and Recovery team recovered and identified her body.[lii] She is buried at the Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri. Her grave can be found at Section 70, Site 16187-89.[liii]

MEMORIALS

Sergeant Helen G. Kent is memorialized on the Walls of the Missing however her name is noted with a rosette which indicates her remains were eventually recovered. The Walls of the Missing are in the Manila American Cemetery in Taguig City, Philippines.[liv]

Helen Greene Kent is remembered on the Wall of Valor at the Kern Veteran’s Memorial in Bakersfield, California. She is the only woman on the memorial.[lv]

In November 1945, Helen G. Kent was remembered in the Armistice Day remembrance in Techachapi, California. After advancing the colors, a floral wreath was placed on a cross on her grave.[lvi]

RESEARCH NOTES

The name of Helen’s mother was not discovered during this research.

ABOUT THIS STORY

This story is part of the Stories Behind the Stars project (see

www.storiesbehindthestars.org). This is a national effort of volunteers to write the stories of all 400,000+ of the US WWII fallen here on Fold3. Can you help write these stories? Related to this, there will be a smart phone app that will allow people to visit any war memorial or cemetery, scan the fallen's name and read his/her story.

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