Female WW II aviators showcased at Topsail Beach museum

One section of the Missles & More Museum at Topsail Beach, N.C.,  is dedicated to the story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) who served during World War II at Camp Davis Army Air Field in nearby Holly Ridge.

The federal program was organized in 1942 when military leaders, faced with a shortage of pilots in World War II, decided to allow women to fly military aircraft stateside, so that male pilots could be deployed overseas for combat duty.

WASPs performed test flights, provided instruction for raw recruits, delivered new aircraft to air bases and transported cargo and personnel. They proved that a woman was as capable as a man in the cockpit.

The WASP program produced female pilots from July 1943 to December 1944. After their basic training, the WASP pilots were stationed at 126 bases across the United States. Just two were located in North Carolina – Army Air Forces Weather Research Center at Asheville in Buncombe County and Camp Davis in Onslow County.

The 52 WASP pilots assigned to Camp Davis played an essential role in military training. They towed targets and flew simulated strafing missions for anti-aircraft gunnery training over the firing range on Topsail Island, which was uninhabited at the time.

Betty Deuser of Oakland, Calif., was one of those WASP pilots. A collection of letters she wrote to her family back home while serving at Camp Davis has been published as a book. Kevin Maurer, an author and award-winning journalist, shared highlights in an article published in Our State magazine in 2017.

One letter described Deuser’s experience flying at night under a full moon, skirting the North Carolina coast at 10,000 feet. “For three hours, she flew back and forth as soldiers from Camp Davis scanned the darkness with a searchlight, looking for her plane. They were training to man anti-aircraft guns overseas, and it was Deuser’s job to prepare them,” Maurer wrote.

Deuser grew up in Oakland, Calif., and earned a private pilot’s license in 1941. She volunteered to enter the WASP program. She completed training at Avenger Field in Sweetwater, Texas, before reporting for duty at Camp Davis.

There was risk involved in the training flights. The soldiers were firing live rounds of ammunition, the outdated planes that the pilots flew were unfit for combat duty. Engine failures and maintenance problems were common, and there was a shortage of parts.

Two WASP aviators died in airplane crashes at Camp Davis in 1943, and these women are memorialized at the Missles & More Museum.

The North Carolina Highway Historical Marker program recognized the Camp Davis WASP unit in 2021 with the installation of signage on U.S. Route 17 near Camp Davis Road at Holy Ridge. 

While the accompanying essay salutes the bravery of these female pilots, it reminds us that the WASP was “underappreciated” by the military brass, as “WASP aviators never achieved military status during wartime.”

Despite the valiant efforts of WASP leaders, including Jackie Cochran and Nancy Harkness Love, who served under Gen. Henry H. “Hap” Arnold, commander of the U.S. Army Air Forces, the female pilots were never militarized. Hence, as “civilians,” they did not qualify for veterans’ status or benefits.

Jackie Cochran

Nancy Love 

In total, more than 25,000 women applied to enter the WASP, but fewer than 2,000 were accepted, and only 1,074 were awarded silver wings. The badge itself is believed to have been designed by Cochran.

 

At its center is the shape of the shield carried by Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom, weaving, crafts and war.