Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Good evening,

can anybody tell me the middle name, date of birth and/or date of death of Consolidated PB4Y ace Sheldon Sutton ?

Michael

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Hi Michael,
Found this in Flight Magazine 1946:
Lt. Sheldon L. Sutton’s crew destroyed seven Japanese aircraft in the air. As the result of a tree top level chase 26 year old, Sutton USNR drove a single engine fighter into Luzon Hill without firing a single round. His aerial score was the best of any Liberator pilot in the Pacific War.

Regards
Andy Bird

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

His middle name is Lloyd. This is from a 1942 Illinois paper ( The Pantagraph from Bloomington, Illinois ).

"SHELDON LLOYD SUTTON, son of Mr. Harold W. Sutton of Malden, was recently appointed a naval aviation cadet and transferred to Pensacola, Fla for flight training. He attended Illinois Wesleyan university for two years. He reported to the naval reserve aviation base at St. Louis, Mo., In February. There he successfully passed the elimination training course In March."

He "may" still actually be alive (age 95) living in North Carolina. He stayed in the Navy until retirement.

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Cool.
Where can I get his address ? ;-)

Have a nice Tuesday,

Michael

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Try zabasearch.com with the name Sheldon L Sutton and North Carolina for the state, or
www.anywho.com/whitepages with just the name Sheldon Sutton and NC.



Note that these search sites are often not up to date, but one of them gives an age for the man (Sheldon L) in Raleigh as 95, so probably worth a stamp to find out.

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Great !
I'll have a try. Thank you.

Michael

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Hello there Gentlemen,

can you tell me if all 323 kills that Consolidated PB4Y's scored in WW2 were scored in the Pacific theatre of operations (PTO) ?

Cheers,

Michael

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

You will find a list of air-to-air claims for American patrol aircraft during WWII here: http://aces.safarikovi.org/victories...e.aircraft.pdf

These included claims by PB4Y but also PBY and possibly PBM. But still you will find in this list some claims for JU 88 C-6 and Do 217 over Biscay Bay by VB-103 and VB-105, using PB4Y, so the answer of your question is: almost all PB4Y kills were scored in the Pacific, but not all of them.

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Hello Laurent,

thanks for your answer.
I found five PB4Y claims against German aircraft: two by VB103, two by VB105 and one by VB110. I tracked the locations by the latitude and longitude given although the hyphens in the data were quite troublesome. I think we can safely say that these five German planes were downed in the Atlantic and thus represent ETO kills (not MTO).

Can you tell me if all PB4Y claims against Japanese aircraft represent PTO kills (and not CBI) ?

Kind regards,

Michael

PS: Intriguingly I found two guys who narrowly missed becoming PV Ventura/Harpoon aces : John Harshberger and Frank Schwable (4 kills each).

Re: Sheldon Sutton and the Consolidated PB4Y
 

Looks like there are about 321 total credits to gunners aboard PB4Y’s operating in the Pacific. As near as I can tell from looking at what squadron was stationed where and when during the war there were no PB4Y squadrons operating in the CBI.

You may wish to look at
https://www.history.navy.mil/researc...ld-war-ii.html
“Air to air claims and credits for Navy and Marine Corps patrol type aircraft during World War II”


You’ll find LTJG Sheldon Sutton as PPC of a VBP-117 PB4Y appears seven times with credits falling to his gunners:

On 12 Dec 1944, 1 Tony near 12°-23’N 120°-59’E
On 24 Dec 1944, 1 Jake near 21°-30’N 122°-40’E
On 24 Dec 1944, 1 Pete near 21°-30’N 121°-03’E
On 5 Jan 1945, 1 Jake near 15°-55’N 119°-35’E
On 5 Jan 1945, 1 Jake near 15°-30’N 119°-35’E
On 8 Jan 1945, 1 Jake near 11°-30’N 109°-15’E
On 21 Jan 1945, 1 Jill near 26°-55’N 128°-00’E

The only fighter on this list, from the lat/long noted, went into the water off the SSW coast of Mindoro, about six miles NW of the present San Jose Airport.

Likewise the other six locations are all over water.

Regards