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VF-11 SunDowner F6F-5 Hellcat "Ginger-29" on the USS Hornet 1944/1945	Curtiss SB2C Helldiver, Pilot & Gunner known as the "Beast"
Valley Forge	Group photo taken in 1964 Photo courtesy of Tony Longo Submitted by Henk "Omar" van der Lugt
F6F-5 flown by VF-11 when they were based at NAAS Santa Rosa. (circa 1945) Photo submitted by Henk "Omar" van der Lugt	F4F-4 Wildcat taken in Fiji Islands piloted by Lt Sully Vogel (feb/mar 1943 ), prior to the Guadanal Tour Photo submitted by Henk "Omar" van der Lugt
	1943 Guadalcanal Photos
	Charles Wesley (in flight gear)
1947 8 air Group 11 insignia	Squadron
For images of 2 F4F wrecks on Guadalcanal - click here

I was searching for information that I could put into an album that I have put together in memory of my father. He was a career Navy man and a fighter pilot, along with Pearl Harbor survivor #12639.

My Father was in Fighter Squadron 3 at Puunene and in February of 1943, eleven pilots included him and their F4Fs were transferred to Fighter squadron 11. They headed out to go aboard the USS Wasp but it was sunk before they got there so they were sent to Guadalcanal. The fighters were sent to Fighter One with the Marines (VMF 224) and the bombers and torpedo planes to Henderson Field to augment the Navy Squadrons there. They flew combat patrols , escorted strikes to Munda, Vila, Recada Bay, Segi and provided combat patrol for the surface ships. June 12 & 16, 1943 my father got three confirmed kills and two probables. On July 11, Fighting 11 flew 10 of the 48 planes we started with back to Espirto Santos. At this point in time my father was promoted to full Lt. and what was left of Air Group 11 was sent back to the U.S. to reorganize.

My Father made up a two page history of his career in the Navy and the above was just a short section referring to his time spent with VF-11. I am well pleased that there is some effort made by individuals to place on a WEB site the history and beginning of such organizations as the Sundowners.  I remember well his Navy Flight Jacket and the Sundowners Squadron Insignia, along with Felix the Cat, and others.

I have some photos of my Father and his planes. One shows him in a Grumman F4F-4 Wildcat. Might not be able to make out the Sundowners decal but it is even with the front window and down a little. The photo of the SNJ is what he flew in the 70's when he was a member of an organization called the Military Aircraft Pilots Association. We tried to find decals to represent "ALL" the different squadrons he flew
with over the years he was in the Navy, but I finally ended up painting them on the plane by hand myself. Hope that you found the above of some interest.

Keep up the good work, Ken Viall, Jr.

My father, Ens. Wallace C. "Robbie" Robinson, was a Sundowner aboard the Hornet in January of 1945, participating in strikes against Hong Kong, Formosa, and French Indochina (at Cam Ranh Bay). My dad, a native of Georgetown, KY, served as wing man to fellow Sundowner Fritz Wolf, who had gotten his first four kills several years earlier with the American Volunteer Group in China. Wolf's service record with VF-11 is not widely known, because it was so brief. Fritz and my dad first hooked up in training at Green Cove Springs, FL after Fritz had joined up. My dad, Wolf and twenty other replacement pilots reported aboard the Hornet on January 8th, 1945. They had been ferried from Guam by the USS Cape Esperance, CVE-88. When the Hornet reached Ulithi after the conclusion of its South China Sea action in early February of 1945, Fritz Wolf was made CO of the newly formed VBF-3 aboard the Yorktown, CV-10. He then requested the transfer to the Yorktown of my dad, Wallace Robinson, along with Ens. Donald Borgeson and Ens. Fred Scharrer, ending the brief, but productive association with VF-11. CO of VF-11 in Jan. of 1945 was LTCDR Eugene Fairfax, a boxer of some note from Annapolis. Wallace C. "Robbie" Robinson's first strike assignment was Cam Ranh Bay on Jan. 12th, 1945. There were two strikes on the target that day, and during the other strike, fellow Sundowner and Navy ace Blake "Rabbit" Moranville survived a crash that was followed by several months of captivity, courtesy of the Vichy French. Moranville walked back to civilization with the aid of a French Foreign Legion unit, the only WWII Navy ace ever to escape captivity. It had been Blake's job to care for VF-11's mascot, a Boston Terrier named "Gunner", that eventually rejoined him at his home in Guide Rock, Nebraska.
Go Sundowners!
 

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