Minuard Francis “Frank” Jennings

Minuard Francis "Frank" Jennings. Image Source: East Carolina Yearbooks, Tecoan, 1937. UA50-01. University Archives, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC.

Minuard Francis “Frank” Jennings was born the third child and first son Minuard Pritchard Jennings (1882-1948) and Ella Mae Pritchard (1886-1968) in Pasquotank, N.C. Jennings studied at Wake Forest College (now Wake Forest University) before transferring to ECTC where he excelled as an athlete, playing on the men’s basketball and baseball teams his senior year. Jennings also studied briefly at Iowa State College. After graduating from ECTC in 1936, he taught in Grimesland before enlisting in the Navy in 1938. He completed flight training at Pensacola Air Station in Florida on October 4, 1939, and was commissioned as an ensign.

Jennings’s service during the WWII years was extraordinary. Just months before Pearl Harbor, in August 1941, he was aboard the USS Tuscaloosa when Pres. Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1945) met, on the so-called “presidential flagship,” British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (1874-1965) to draft the Atlantic Charter, a mission statement for the post-WWII world. Jennings also reportedly attended church services with the two world leaders on board a British battleship.

After Pearl Harbor, Jennings was sent to the Pacific for duty on the USS Hornet, a Yorktown-class aircraft carrier. It was from the Hornet that Lt. Col. James Doolittle (1896-1993) launched his bombing raid on Tokyo, April 18, 1942. Reportedly, Jennings witnessed Doolittle’s take off.

The following month, the Hornet and Jennings assisted during the Battle of Coral Sea. Then in June, with the Battle of Midway, Jennings’ bomber had to ditch at sea after exceeding its fuel capacity for return. Jennings and Ensign H. L. Tallman, his wing man, were adrift in a rubber raft for four days before a PBY Catalina amphibious aircraft rescued them. They were taken to Midway and then Pearl Harbor for recovery from “exhaustion due to exposure.”

Jennings was next transferred to the Naval Air Station at Miami for duty as a flight instructor. In May of 1944, he was promoted to lieutenant commander. The same year, he was sent to Hollywood to help make a movie for Navy trainees. Jennings returned to the Pacific theatre for service aboard the USS Omanney Bay, an escort carrier, and was on aboard when, on January 4, 1945, the carrier was sliced by a Yokosuka P1Y kamikaze that detonated the ship’s explosives reducing it to conflagration. While over 90 crewmen were lost, Jennings escaped before the ship, a raging inferno, was finally scuttled by the torpedo of a destroyer, the USS Burns.

Following WWII, in July of 1946, Jennings served on the USS Shangri-La, an Essex-class aircraft carrier, during “Operation Crossroads,” a Manhattan Project study of the impact of atomic bomb blasts conducted by the Army/Navy Joint Task Force One on Bikini Atoll in the mid-Pacific. The Shangri-La was positioned 44 miles from the blasts, Able and Baker, and launched drones to gather “radio activity data from Atomic Cloud.”

Later the same year Jennings got married at the Naval Training Station chapel in Newport, Rhode Island, and in June of 1947, graduated from the General Line School for non-Naval Academy graduates in preparation for naval command service.

Tragically, however, Jennings was killed when his F8F Bearcat collided with another F8F during training maneuvers over Block Island, Rhode Island, November 18, 1947. Military rites for the pilots were conducted in Charlestown, Rhode Island, on November 22, and Baptist services for Jennings were held the following day in Elizabeth City.

Jennings was the first ECTC alumni after WWII to die in the armed services. His sacrifice was remembered at the 1953 dedication ceremony for Memorial Gymnasium, along with that of Charley Harris Mayo (1919-1949), the second post-WWII ECTC alumni lost in service, and that of the 24 alumni who had died in the armed forces during WWII.

Sources:

• “Anniversary Log of the U.S.S. Shangri-La CV-38: The Year of ‘Operation Crossroads.'” Second Anniversary Log of USS Shangri-La CV-38. U.S. Navy Memorial Foundation Collection: John K. Marvin, Jr., Papers. East Carolina Manuscript Collection # 677-072. J. Y. Joyner Library, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/36388
• “Arrives in States.” News and Observer. February 19, 1945. P. 5.
• “Block Island Sound-November 18, 1947.” New England Aviation History. Updated July 16, 2019. https://newenglandaviationhistory.com/tag/lt-cmdr-minuard-f-jennings/
• “Commd. M. F. Jennings.” Newport Mercury (Newport, Rhode Island). November 21, 1947. P. 2.
• “ECTC Graduate Dies In Crash.” Teco Echo. November 21, 1947. P. 1.
• “Elizabeth City Flier Is Home After Midway: Lt. Jennings Was Adrift Four Days in Rubber Boat After Landing at Sea.” News and Observer. July 9, 1942. P. 7.
• “Elizabeth City Man Sails for Atom Test.” News and Observer. March 22, 1946. P. 2.
• “Elizabeth City Youth Is Back on Duty.” News and Observer. June 20, 1942. P. 3.
• Goggin, Jean. “With the Armed Forces.” Teco Echo. April 1945. P. 2. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/37952
• “Jennings Service to Be Held Friday.” News and Observer. November 22, 1947. P. 12.
• “Jennings, Minuard Francis.” Clippings Files, University and N.C. Baptist Biographical Files Collection. Special Collections & Archives, Z. Smith Reynolds Library. Wake Forest University. Winston-Salem, N.C. http://hdl.handle.net/10339/69095
• “Military Rites for Flier Today.” Daily Press (Newport, Virginia). November 22, 1947. P. 2.
• “The Manhattan Project: Operation Crosssroads.” U. S. Department of Energy – Office of History and Heritage Resources. https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1945-present/crossroads.htm
• “Veteran Of War Keeps in Fight: Few Tar Heels Can Boast of Battle Record Equal to Frank Jennings, USN.” News and Observer. March 26, 1945. P. 8.

Related Materials

Minuard Francis “Frank” Jennings. Image Source: East Carolina Yearbooks, Tecoan, 1936. UA50-01. University Archives, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC.

Minuard Francis “Frank” Jennings. Image Source: East Carolina Yearbooks, Tecoan, 1936. UA50-01. University Archives, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC.

Minuard Francis “Frank” Jennings. Image Source: East Carolina Yearbooks, Tecoan, 1937. UA50-01. University Archives, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC.

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