I was sitting around talking to the guys at the gun shop the other day. This is small world stuff.
I was working on another write up of a local veteran and my good friend Ron tells me his Uncle Frank was a Retired Brigadier General, and had a great story to tell. So I started to look into the history of Mr. Frank J. Collins.
Frank was just another local boy who did good things for his love of this country. Hang on to your hat as they used to say. This is going to take a few turns and twists.
Frank Junior Collins was born June 19, 1918 in Breckenridge. He attended and played football for the Breckenridge Buckaroos in high school. In 1935 and 1936 he was an All-State guard.
Frank was known to all as “Spot.” This was because he had a white spot of hair on the front of his head that could be seen from under his football helmet.
As a junior in high school he transferred to the Allen military academy, then went to junior college at Texas Technical College where he was then accepted into Texas Wesleyan College and earned his bachelors degree. While he was there, he played football and was an All-State guard.
In 1942, Collins enlisted into the Army Air Corps at Kelly Field in San Antonio. He completed his primary training in Pine Bluff, Arkansas.
From there he went to basic training in Sherman, then onto his advanced flight training on the east coast in Rhode Island. He was then commissioned as a First Lieutenant in Victoria at Foster Field.
While all of this was happening, on July 30, 1942 President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared that American troops were to be deployed to French North Africa to provide support to the allied cause. This operation was called Operation “Torch.”
This campaign was commanded by Major General Dwight D. Eisenhower. The operation was to provide help and relief to the Soviet Union on the Eastern Front.
This effort was to force the Germans and the Italians to shift their attention to the combined efforts of the Anglo-Americans troops and spread out the efforts of the war.
British and American troops landed in Morocco and into Algiers on Nov. 8, 1942. Frank was deployed to North Africa in 1943, and was assigned to the 319th Fighter Squadron of the 325th Fighter Group.
Collins, flying the P-40 Curtis, participated in air raids over Essen, Sardinia, Pantelleria, Italy, Tunisia, North Africa and Parts of Sicily. The name on his first airplane was “Lula” after his mother.
This airplane was said to have fallen out from underneath him and was no longer serviceable to fly. His second P-40 was named “Texas Tornado.”
During his military tour Frank also flew the P-40 War Hawk, P-47 Thunderbolt and the F-100 Super Sabre.
During this time Collins was a flying ace, having shot down five enemy airplanes. He shot down his fifth plane Aug. 29, 1943. He was said to have strafed as many as nine different MI 43 Hawabusias airplanes while they were still on the ground trying to lift off.
He was then promoted to the rank of captain and in that same time frame he was also awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. He was also awarded the Silver Star, and an Air Metal.
At the end of his career he retired with a total of 26 oak leaf clusters. The Silver Star is the third highest award you could earn for gallantry in action against the enemy of the United States.
His squadron flew 100 missions in 100 days. Frank flew on 52 of those missions. He flew a total of 79 combat missions during his career.
Once while flying, he was separated from the others planes in his squadron, but still managed to shoot down his fifth Messerschmidt, M-109 German fighter airplane, did a strafing run on a large convoy of trucks and did a bomb run doing major “sinking damage” to a merchant marine cargo ship. And then on his way back he shot down one MI-43 Japanese plane.
He flew a total of 79 missions. He shot down a total of nine enemy aircraft, and “two possibles.” One went down damaged and landed, one unconfirmed downing.
During the Korean War, Frank also downed two MIG-17s earning oak leaf clusters 24-25-26. More on that part of his history later.
One of his missions was to escort a secret flight of several world leaders to Cairo, Egypt, for the historic “Tehran Conference” meeting. This flight was to guard President FDR, Winston Churchill and General Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Later on into the North Africa Campaign he also received a Purple Heart for being wounded on a mission in Japan. On a bombing run July 12, 1945, while on a mission, Frank’s plane was hit by the concussion of a ship blowing up and he went down into the ocean.
I could not find any information on the ship. But I think it was Frank who blew it up. Frank spent two days in the water awaiting rescue.
He was captured by the Japanese and spent the remainder of the war as a P.O.W. in Japan. Once he was released and returned to the USA, he spent many months in recovery.
He returned to the military and spent many more years in service. It would take up this entire newspaper to tell of all of his different assignments and places he served.
He also served as a test pilot for the F-80 and the F-84. Frank retired as a Brigadier General in 1967. He died Dec. 13, 2000 and is buried at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio.
He served in the Army Reserves from 1934-1937, U.S. Army Air Corps from 1942-1947, U.S. Air Force from 1947-1967, was a World War ll POW from 1942-1945 and was involved in the Cold War from 1945-1967.
Frank also received the Air Force Longevity Metal with five oak leaf clusters, for 28 years of service to this country. He served two combat tours.
His list of decorations is long but includes the Silver Star, Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Metal with 26 oak leaf clusters, Purple Heart, the POW metal, Air Force Commendation Metal, Air Defense Metal, the WWll Victory Metal, the Europe-African-Middle Eastern Metal, the Asiatic Pacific metal, the National Defense Metal with a Star and a small arms metal.
