Aircraft History
Built by Curtiss in Buffalo, New York. Delivered to the U. S. Army. This aircraft was either a P-40E Warhawk or P-40K Warhawk, serial number unknown. Disassembled and shipped overseas to Australia and reassembled.

Wartime History
Assigned to the 5th Air Force, 49th Fighter Group, 8th Fighter Squadron. No known nickname or nose art.

Mission History
On December 18, 1942 took off from 3-Mile Drome (Kila) near Port Moresby at 12:55pm as part of a four plane formation, to patrol the Cape Ward Hunt area. 25 minutes 25 minutes before the patrol was over, Lt Dennis left the formation and headed south. The rest of the flight joined him, and then in the vicinity of Kokoda he again left the flight by making a slight turn to the left. This was the last time that he and his aircraft were seen, at approximately 2:30pm. When he failed to return, Dennis was officially declared Missing In Action (MIA).

Memorials
Dennis was officially declared dead on December 10, 1945. He is memorialized on the tablets of the missing at Manila American Cemetery. Dennis also has a memorial marker at Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland, OH at section 1, Shaw Memorial Lot 0-0.

References
Other sources state this P-40 was lost over Lae.
Individual Flight Record - 1st Lt. Richard H. Dennis - December 1942
News "Missing Cleveland Pilot, Lieut. Dennis, Awarded D.F.C."
News "Ace Pilot, Former Shaw Pupil, Missing"
American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC) - Richard H. Dennis
FindAGrave - Lieut Richard H Dennis
PNG Museum Aircraft Status Card - P-40 Kittyhawk piloted by Dennis
Army Air Forces - 1Lt. Richard H. Dennis (diary, photos)
Army Air Force - Lt. Richard Dennis, MIA 70 years ago

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Last Updated
June 29, 2019