Byron Quinby Jones (April 9, 1888 – March 30, 1959) was a pioneer aviator and an officer in the United States Army. Jones began and ended his career as a cavalry officer, but for a quarter century between 1914 and 1939, he was an aviator in the various organizations that were the Army's air arm. He appeared to be on track in the 1930s to becoming one of the senior commanders of the Air Corps, but his views on the role of airpower diverged from those of his Air Corps peers and he returned to the Army's ground forces at the beginning of World War II.
Early life Jones was born on April 9, 1888, near Henrietta, New York, to Samuel Titus Jones and Sarah Minerva Quinby.Gardner (1922), p. 61 His family moved to Rochester, where he graduated from Public School 24 and East High School.
After a year of study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Jones was appointed to the United States Military Academy by Representative James Breck Perkins of New York, and entered the Class of 1911 on June 15, 1907.Cullum's Biographical Register Vol. 6, pp. 1580–1581Heaton (2012), p. 8
Following an unremarkable fourth class (plebe) year, Jones performed summer training duties in 1908 between June 16 and July 11 for the incoming Class of 1912, out of which eight upperclassmen, including Jones and five other third class cadets, were accused of hazing violations, some of which involved the beating of the new plebes, prohibited by law since March 1901. As a result of three days of disciplinary hearings convened July 17, 1908, the eight cadets were recommended for dismissal from the academy. The specification against Jones, that he "inaugurated" a new form of punishment for plebes in which they were required to double time, was found to be "conclusive" by the testimony of all cadets called before the board. Jones affirmed that he had double-timed every plebe in his company, but denied that any serious violations of hazing had occurred.
Despite the scandalous notoriety of the incident, supporters of the cadets mounted a campaign directly to President Theodore Roosevelt, who had signed the no-hazing law that had resulted in their dismissal. On August 20, Roosevelt ordered the third class cadets reinstated but suspended with loss of all pay and allowances until June 15, 1909. After Roosevelt approved the December 1908 recommendation of the superintendent of West Point, Colonel Hugh L. Scott, that they be permitted to return to the academy, Jones and the other third class cadets joined the same class that they had hazed on February 1, 1909.Heaton (2012), pp. 9–10 Jones graduated on June 12, 1912, 27th in a class of 95.Official Register of the Officers and Cadets (1912), p. 36
Military career
Signal Corps Jones entered active duty and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 14th Cavalry. He performed troop duty at Fort Clark and Marfa, Texas from September 14, 1912, to December 2, 1913, when he volunteered for pilot instruction. Jones was detached to the Aeronautical Division, U.S. Signal Corps and assigned to the Signal Corps Aviation School at North Field in San Diego, California, on December 5, 1913.
He was taught to fly by civilian instructor Oscar A. BrindleyHennessy (1958), p. 99 and assigned to the 2nd Company, 1st Aero Squadron on August 5, 1914. On August 19, he earned his rating of Junior Military Aviator (JMA) and was immediately placed on flight status.Hennessy (1958), p. 120 Congress expanded the air arm into the Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps in July 1914, and Jones remained assigned to the 1st Aero Squadron until September 23, 1915, when he returned to MIT for a post-graduate course on aeronautical engineering, the first such course ever,Hennessy (1958), p. 124 graduating on June 7, 1916. While at MIT, Jones served with both Milling and Captain Virginius E. Clark on the Technical Aero Advisory and Inspection Board in April and May 1916, testing aircraft and balloons at the Curtiss Aviation School in Newport News, Virginia, for possible use in Mexico.Hennessy (1958), pp. 156, 162
During 1915, Jones set two flight duration records: for an aviator alone with a flight time of eight hours and 53 minutes flying S.C. 31, a new Martin TT tractor airplane, on January 15,Hennessy (1958), p. 135 and for an aviator and two passengers with a flight time of seven hours and five minutes flying S.C. 28, a Burgess H with extra fuel tanks, on March 12, both at North Field.Hennessy (1958), p. 122 For these flights, Jones received the Mackay Trophy.Hennessy (1958), p. 139 On July 2 at San Diego, he became the first army pilot to execute a loop and stall an airplane without crashing, and on December 12, to execute a tail spin, flying S.C. 30, a Curtiss J tractor on both flights.
Jones and First Lieutenant Thomas D. Milling, while on temporary duty from mid-April to late May 1915 at Brownsville, Texas, flew the first United States Army aerial reconnaissance mission under combat conditionsCivilian pilot Philip Orin Parmelee and Lieutenant Benjamin Foulois had flown a reconnaissance mission under non-combat conditions during US Army maneuvers in Texas in 1911. on April 20, 1915.Fredricksen (2011), p. 15 Using one end of the cavalry drill field at Fort Brown as a landing strip, the pair flew S.C. 31 to observe for movements of Pancho Villa, with Jones piloting and Milling to record the location of Villa's troops. Their morning flight was uneventful, but on their afternoon sortie, despite being on the American side of the Rio Grande, they were fired upon by at least one machine gun, the first time an American military pilot had ever come under fire. Jones climbed to and returned to Fort Brown with both men unscathed. After landing, Jones taxied S.C. 31 into a ditch at Fort Brown and damaged it beyond repair; the chief of the Aviation Section refused to replace the aircraft until pressured to do so on May 1.Hennessy (1958), p. 145The chief of the Aviation Section, Lieutenant Colonel Samuel Reber, was a career signal officer and a non-flyer. At the time of the incident he was also the acting Chief Signal Officer. Considerable friction over safety issues existed between Reber and the young flyers that culminated in 1916 with Reber's censure and replacement.
On July 26, 1915, Jones and the 1st Aero Squadron moved by train to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, to work with the field artillery. In August, Jones was part of a detachment of two planes and four pilots sent to the Mexican border at Brownsville. On September 5, the detachment commander, First Lieutenant Joseph C. Morrow, was severely injured in a crash of one of their Curtiss JN2 airplanes, making Jones acting detachment commander. He promptly filed a report that the heavy, underpowered JN2s were too inherently dangerous to use as military aircraft, and that the artillery officers they were to train as observers had refused to fly with them. As a result, the JN2s were grounded on September 13 by the commanding general of the Southern Department,Major General Frederick Funston. It was the second time in four years that a Southern Department commanding general had grounded aircraft, the other being in May 1911 after the fatal crash of Lieutenant George E.M. Kelly. and in January their use discontinued by the Aviation Section.Hennessy (1958), pp. 147–148
Upon completion of his engineering course, Jones returned to the Aviation School, where he was promoted to first lieutenant, Cavalry, on July 1, 1916, and transferred in grade on the same date to the Field Artillery when an increase in the peacetime strength of the army authorized by the National Defense Act of 1916 resulted in the creation of 15 new regiments. At San Diego, his duties included instruction in aeronautical theory to pilot candidates, engineering support for the 1st Aero Squadron in Mexico with the Punitive Expedition, and Officer-in-charge of Engineering and Repair.Hennessy (1958), p. 158
World War I and the Air Service While still on duty at the Aviation School, Jones received a promotion on May 15, 1917, to captain, Field Artillery, in the first wave of officer promotions following the entry of the United States into World War I. At the beginning of June, he reported to the Office of the Chief Signal Officer (OCSO) in Washington, D.C. for temporary staff duty assisting Major Raynal Bolling in standardizing airplane specifications for the aviation services of the Army and the United States Navy preparatory to Bolling's mission to Europe on behalf of the Aircraft Production Board.
On June 30, he reported to the newly leased aviation field at Mount Clemens, Michigan, soon renamed Selfridge Field, where he organized and commanded an aviation school. On September 27, after reaching the legal requirement of three years' pilot experience as a JMA, he was awarded the advanced pilot rating of Military Aviator, one of the first in the Aviation Section to do so. His duties at Selfridge continued until October 23, 1917, when he received a temporary commission as lieutenant colonel in the Signal Corps to act as an observer for the OCSO during an inspection tour of aviation schools in the United States and Canada. On November 30, he returned to Washington to assume the duties of Chief of Air Service Training in the OCSO until April 22, 1918, when the Division of Military Aeronautics (DMA) was created to remove aviation from the purview of the OCSO. He was immediately sent to Europe to observe the training methods of British, French and American aviation schools.
Jones returned from Europe on June 12 and was assigned to the office of the Director of Military Aeronautics. In his absence, the DMA had replaced the Aviation Section as the nation's air arm when President Woodrow Wilson issued an executive order on May 20 removing all military aviation activities from the overtaxed Signal Corps, and then itself had been merged with the Bureau of Aircraft Production as the Air Service. As an indirect consequence, Jones reverted to his permanent establishment rank of captain when his Signal Corps commission was discharged on July 9. His new duties were with the Engineering Division at Wilbur Wright Field, Fairfield, Ohio, testing and evaluating new aviation equipment. On November 4, he was again promoted to lieutenant colonel (temporary, Air Service) and assigned as officer in charge of all test and evaluation there.
In December 1918, with the war ended, Jones became commandant of the aviation school at Wilbur Wright Field until December 1919, when he was transferred to the Executive of the Director of Air Service in Washington as an Engineering Representative, with membership on the Joint Army and Navy Board on Aeronautics. On March 15, 1920, the wartime temporary promotions of Air Service officers expired, and Jones reverted a second time to his permanent rank of captain. Jones transferred from the Field Artillery to the Air Service on July 1, 1920, the date that the Air Service became a statutory combatant arm of the line, commissioned as a major.
He then went on an extended leave of absence of three months in New York City "trying out a position in civil life." On July 3, the designations for all aeronautical ratings were changed and Jones received a new rating of Airplane Pilot, which also qualified him for the rating of Airplane Observer.