Eugene Bullard

Eugene Jacques Bullard (9 October 1895 – 12 October 1961), born Eugene James Bullard, was the first African-American military pilot.[1] His life has been surrounded by many legends.[2]However, Bullard was unquestionably one of the few black combat pilots inWorld War I, as was Ahmet Ali Çelikten.

Early lifeEdit

Bullard was born in Columbus, Georgia, the seventh of ten children born to William (Octave) Bullard, a black man who was from Martinique, and Josephine ("Yokalee") Thomas, a Creek Indian.[3] His father's ancestors had been slaves in Haiti to French refugees who fled during the Haitian Revolution.[4] They reached the United States and took refuge with the Creek Indians.[5][6][7][8]

Bullard was a student at the Twenty-eighth Street School from 1901 to 1906.[9] As a teenager, he stowed away on a ship bound for Scotland, hoping to escape racial discrimination. (He later claimed to have witnessed his father's narrow escape from lynching). Bullard arrived at Aberdeen and made his way south to Glasgow. On a visit to Paris, he decided to settle in France. He became a boxer in Paris and also worked in amusic hall.

World War I experienceEdit

Eugene Bullard, posing in uniform with his pet monkey, Jimmy (1917)

Bullard exhibit at the National Museum of the United States Air Force

World War I began in August 1914, and on October 19, 1914, Bullard enlisted and was assigned to the 3rd Marching Company of the 1st Foreign Regimentof the Foreign Legion (1er Régiment étranger)[10] as volunteers from overseas were then allowed only to serve in the French colonial troops.[11]

Ground combatEdit

By 1915, Bullard was a machine gunner and saw combat on the Somme front in Picardy. In May and June, he was at Artois, and in the fall of that year fought in a second Champagne offensive (25 September – 6 November 1915) along the Meuse river.[12][13] The 1st and 2nd Foreign Legion Regiments were serving as part of the 1st Moroccan Brigade (1re Brigade Marocaine) of the 1st Moroccan Division (la Division Marocaine). Formed by Hubert Lyautey, a Resident-General of Morocco, at the outbreak of World War I, it was a mix of the Metropolitan and Colonial French troops, including Legionnaires, zouaves and tirailleurs.[14]Towards the end of the war, the 1st Moroccan Division became one of the most decorated units in the French Army.[15]

The Foreign Legion suffered high casualties in 1915. It started the year with 21,887 soldiers, NCOs and officers, and ended with 10,683.[16] As a result, the Foreign Legion units fighting on theWestern front were put in reserve for reinforcement and reorganization. On November 11, 1915, 3,316 survivors from the 1st and the 2nd Etranger were merged into one unit – the Marching Regiment of Foreign Legion (Le régiment de marche de la légion étrangère), which in 1920 became the 3rd Regiment (3e régiment étranger d'infanterie) of the French Foreign Legion.

As for Americans and other volunteers, they were allowed to transfer to the Metropolitan French Army units, including the 170th Line Infantry Regiment. 170th had a reputation of crack troops and was nicknamed Les Hirondelles de la Mort, or The Swallows of Death.[17] Bullard opted to serve in the 170th Infantry Regiment and the 170 military insignia is displayed on his uniform collar. In the beginning of 1916, the 170th Infantry along with the 48th Infantry Division (48e division d'infanterie) to which it belonged, was sent to Verdun.

Family requests helpEdit

After hearing about the horrors of the trench war in France, Bullard's father wrote to the U.S. Secretary of State pleading for his help in bringing his son home. He explained that Eugene was born in October 1895, not in 1894, and added a year to his age when he enlisted. However, the French government officials decided that Bullard had been old enough to enlist.[12]

AviationEdit

While serving with the 170th Infantry, Bullard was seriously wounded in March 1916 at the Battle of Verdun.[12][18] After recovering, he volunteered on October 2, 1916 for theFrench Air Service (Aéronautique Militaire)[19] as an air gunner. He was accepted and went through training at the Aerial Gunnery School in Cazaux,Gironde.[10] Following this, he went through his initial flight training atChâteauroux and Avord, and he received pilot's license number 6950 from the Aéro-Club de France on May 5, 1917.[10][12] Like many other American aviators, Bullard hoped to join the famous squadron Escadrille Americaine N.124, the Lafayette Escadrille, but after enrolling 38 American pilots in spring and summer of 1916, it stopped accepting applicants. After further training at Avord, Bullard [20] joined 269 American aviators at the Lafayette Flying Corps on November 15, 1916,[21]which was a designation rather than a unit.[22] American volunteers flew with French pilots in different pursuit and bomber/reconnaissance aero squadrons on the Western Front.Edmund L. Gros, who facilitated the incorporation of American pilots in the French Air Service, listed in the October 1917 issue of Flying, an official publication of the Aero Club of America, Bullard's name is in the member roster of the Lafayette Flying Corps.[23]

On June 28, 1917 Bullard was promoted to corporal.[10] On August 27, he was assigned to the Escadrille N.93 based at Beauzée-sur-Aire south of Verdun, where he stayed till September 13.[24]The squadron was equipped withNieuport and Spad aircraft that displayed a flying duck as the squadron insignia. Bullard's service record also includes the aero squadron N.85 (Escadrille SPA 85), September 13, 1917 – November 11, 1917, which had a bull insignia.[25][26] He took part in about twenty combat missions, and he is sometimes credited with shooting down one or two German aircraft (sources differ).[13] However, the French authorities could not confirm Bullard's victories.[27]

When the United States entered the war, the United States Army Air Serviceconvened a medical board to recruit Americans serving in the Lafayette Flying Corps for the Air Service of the American Expeditionary Forces. Bullard went through the medical examination, but he was not accepted, as only white pilots were allowed to serve. Some time later, on a short break from duty in Paris, Bullard allegedly got into a fight with a French commissioned officer and was punished by being transferred to the service battalion of the 170th in January 1918.[13] He served beyond theArmistice, not being discharged until October 24, 1919.[12]

After the warEdit

For his World War I service, the French government awarded Bullard the Croix de guerre, Médaille militaire, Croix du combattant volontaire 1914–1918, and Médaille de Verdun, along with several others.[13][18] After his discharge, Bullard returned again to Paris.

In ParisEdit

Bullard found work as a drummer and anightclub manager at "Le Grand Duc", and he eventually became the owner of his own nightclub, "L'Escadrille". In 1923 he married Marcelle Straumann, from a wealthy family, but this ended in divorce in 1935, with Bullard gaining custody of their two surviving children, Jacqueline and Lolita.[28] As a popular jazz venue, "Le Grand Duc" gained him many famous friends, including Josephine Baker, Louis Armstrong, Langston Hughes and French flying ace Charles Nungesser. When World War II began in September 1939, Bullard, who also spoke German, agreed to a request from the French government to spy on the German citizens who still frequented his nightclub.

Following the German invasion of France in May 1940, Bullard fled Paris with his daughters. He volunteered to serve with the 51st Infantry in defendingOrléans, and he met an officer whom he knew from Verdun.[12] Bullard was wounded, but he escaped to neutral Spain, and in July 1940 he returned to the United States.

In New York CityEdit

Bullard spent some time in a New York hospital and never fully recovered from his wound. Moreover, he found the fame he enjoyed in France had not followed him to the United States. He worked as a perfume salesman, a security guard, and as an interpreter for Louis Armstrong, but a back injury severely restricted him. In 1945, he attempted to regain his nightclub in Paris, but it had been destroyed during the war. He received a financial settlement from the French government, and was able to buy an apartment in Harlem, New York City.

Peekskill RiotsEdit

Main article: Peekskill Riots

In 1949, a concert held by Black entertainer and activist Paul Robeson inPeekskill, New York to benefit the Civil Rights Congress resulted in the Peekskill Riots. These were caused in part by members of the local Veterans of Foreign Wars and American Legionchapters, who considered Robeson a communist sympathizer.[29] The concert was scheduled to take place on August 27 in Lakeland Acres, north of Peekskill. Before Robeson arrived, however, a mob attacked the concert-goers with baseball bats and stones. Thirteen people were seriously injured before police put an end to it. The concert was then postponed until September 4.[30]The re-scheduled concert took place without incident, but as concert-goers drove away, they passed through long lines of hostile locals, who threw rocks through their windshields.

Eugene Bullard was among those attacked after the concert. He was knocked to the ground and beaten by an angry mob, which included members of the state and local law enforcement. The attack was captured on film and can be seen in the 1970s documentaryThe Tallest Tree in Our Forest and theOscar winning documentary narrated bySidney Poitier, Paul Robeson: Tribute to an Artist. None of the assailants was ever prosecuted. Graphic pictures of Eugene Bullard being beaten by two policeman, a state trooper and a concert goer were published in Susan Robeson's biography of her grandfather,The Whole World in His Hands: a Pictorial Biography of Paul Robeson.[29