Flight Officer Dominic Salemme

Army Air Corps

437th Troop Carrier Group, 83rd Troop Carrier Squadron

Service Number: T121462

Where and when did Flight Officer Dominic Salemme die? Was it Normandy, France, on D-Day? Or three months later over Holland during Operation Market Garden? Records of Dominic’s life and death are sparse and information sometimes contradictory.

What we do know is that, in 1915, Dominic Salemme was born in Connecticut to a large family with roots in Italy. He was raised near New Haven. And he died in 1944, in Europe, in the service of the United States of America.

Dominic’s parents Alesandros Salemme (1871 – 1964) and Filomena Farina (1880 – 1963) were both from Campania, Italy. Filomena, who came from Santa Maria Capua Vetere, Caserta, arrived in New York in March 1896, just 15 months before she, at age 17, married 25-year-old Alesandros, from San Prisco, Caserta, in 1897.

The family may have considered returning to live in Italy. A family tree on Ancestry.com shows Filomena giving birth to a daughter in April 1898, in San Prisco, Caserta. And a 1907 ship manifest for the Sicilian Prince records that an Alesandros Salemme left Naples on January 22, 1907, arriving at the Port of New York on February 6. He was traveling alone; his final destination - Connecticut.

But the couple apparently decided to stay in America, and they raised their family in eastern Connecticut. The 1930 US Federal Census shows us that, in addition to Dominic, the couple had six more sons and four daughters. By 1930, they owned a farm on Marsh Hill Road in Orange, New Haven County. Their home was valued at $4,000. And the family had a radio, indicating a modest level of financial comfort. Dominic, now 16, was still in school.

Ten years later, the 1940 US Federal Census recorded the family as still living on Marsh Hill Road. Dominic’s 18-year-old-brother Anthony is marked as the person who provided the census taker with the information. Six sons and two daughters still lived at home with Alesandros and Filomena. By this time, Dominic, 25, and five of his siblings all worked at a rubber plant. Dominic reportedly had earned $1,250.00 (equivalent to about $23,000 in 2021) in the prior year. Nearby neighbors to the Salemme family on Marsh Hill Road included a Dominic Farina, age 48, and his family; this was probably Filomena’s brother and Dominic Salemme’s namesake.

It seems that shortly after this, Dominic married. His biography on www.americanairmuseum.com and a single page of a Missing Air Craft Report (MACR) found on Fold3.com both list Dominic’s next of kin as Mrs. Marion G. Salemme (wife), Congress Avenue, New Haven. A 1959 New Haven City Directory found on Ancestry.com includes Marion Salemme, widow of Dominic, living on Derby Avenue; her occupation in the directory is recorded as machine operator at the BB Company.

Dominic joined the US Army and was assigned to the Army Air Corps, 437th Troop Carrier Group, 83rd Troop Carrier Squadron. According to the website of the National WWII Glider Pilots Committee/Silent Wings Museum Foundation, Dominic attended the Army Air Force Advanced Glider School and trained at Dalhart Army Airfield in Dalhart, Texas. He graduated on February 27, 1943, in class 43-04, with the rank of Flight Officer.

Early in 1944, Dominic was deployed to England, possibly to Greenham Common Airfield, about 55 miles west of London. On D-Day, it is believed that he was the Flight Officer on Glider No. LJ-161, which carried servicemen across the English Channel to Normandy, as part of the Elmira mission. Several family trees on Ancestry.com indicate that Dominic died during the invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, but they do not include any documentation to support this claim.

However, a brief biographical sketch of Captain Norman Aigner, on the website for the National WWII Glider Pilots Committee reports that, on D-Day, Aigner was a copilot with Dominic in Glider No. LJ-161, which was hit by machine gun fire over Landing Zone W in France. According to this website, while Captain Aigner was killed at this time, Flight Officer Salemme was “…MIA until September 44 when he was reported as KIA.” On another website, that of the American Air Museum, a profile of Dominic indicates that, on D-Day, in addition to the crew of two, Glider No. LJ-161 carried soldiers from the 82nd Airborne, a jeep and a 57mm gun.

Two other websites www.PointVista.com, which also has information on the Glider Pilots of World War II, and www.honorstates.org support Dominic’s place of death as taking place later in 1944 in Holland. Both sites list Dominic Salemme as one of 41 glider pilots who died on September 17, 1944, somewhere in Holland during Operation Market Garden. In fact, www.honorstates.org reports that Dominic “…survived the crash of Horsa LJ-161 on June 6, 1944. He was later killed on September 17, 1944.”

Operation Market Garden was an attempt to facilitate an early end to the war by establishing a salient into German territory and a bridgehead over the Rhine, creating a route into northern Germany for the Allies. Conceived by Field Marshall Montgomery, it involved more than 40,00 British, American, Canadian, and Polish troops in one of the largest airborne operations in history. It began on September 17, 1944, and ended nine days later, on September 25. Despite its early success, the operation was ultimately considered a failure. The Allies lost almost 15,000 men, with the British taking the largest number of casualties estimated at about 8,000 men. The Allies also lost more than 80 tanks, as well as more than 300 gliders and fighter planes.

During the fierce campaign, in an effort to support the Allied assault, Dutch railway workers went on strike. In retaliation, Germany forbade the transportation of food to the Netherlands. As a result, during the harsh winter of 1944 – 1945, an estimated 20,000 Dutch citizens starved to death.

The war in Europe finally ended in May 1945. Three years later, a June 27, 1948 Hartford Courant article entitled “Bodies of 53 Due Soon in Connecticut” included the name of Flight Officer Dominic Salemme, husband of Marion G. Salemme, of Derby Avenue, New Haven. This information matches the name and address for Dominic’s widow Marion in the 1959 New Haven City Directory.

Whether he died on D-Day or three months later during Operation Market Garden, whether in France or in Holland, Flight Officer Dominic Salemme did not give his life in vain. He was posthumously awarded a Purple Heart in recognition of his service. May he rest in eternal peace.

*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 smartphone app that will allow people to visit any war memorial or cemetery, scan the fallen's name and read his/her story. If you noticed anything missing in this profile, you may contact the author. Click on the author’s name located at the bottom of the story page next to the words “added by.”

SOURCES

www.airandspace.si.edu. “Fighting Gliders of World War II” by Russell Lee, Aeronautics Department, posted on May 8, 2020.
http://www.americanairmuseum.com/person/240940 Biographical sketches of Flight Officer Dominic Salemme and Captain Norman Aigner. It also contains information on the 437th Troop Carrier Group.
www.ancestry.com. 1930 and 1940 U.S. Federal Census showing the Salemme family in New Haven County, Connecticut; Roster of World War II Dead; 1959 New Haven City Directory listing his widow Marion G. Salemme; 1907 “Ship Manifest for the Sicilian Prince” listing an Alesandros Salemme leaving Naples and bound for Connecticut. Several Salemme family trees record Dominic Salemme’s date of death as D-Day, June 6, 1944 but provide no documentation.
www.dollartimes.com This site calculates and converts the value of currencies.
www.newspapers.com. “Bodies of 53 Due Soon in Connecticut,” originally published in the Hartford Courant, June 27, 1948, page 17.
www.pointvista.com. This site contains information on glider pilots killed in the line of duty.
https://www.ww2gp.org. This website, maintained by the National WWII Glider Pilots Committee/Silent Wings Museum Foundation, mentions Dominic in the biography of Norman Aigner.

Additional information on Operation Market Garden can be found on these websites:

In popular culture, Operation Market Garden was memorialized in a non-fiction book entitled A BridgeToo Far, by Cornelius Ryan, which was published in 1974. The book was later adapted for the 1977 movie of the same name, which was directed by Richard Attenborough.