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<div>On June 9, 1942, a group of B-26 Marauders attacked the formidable Japanese air base at Lae. One of the Marauders, The Wabash Cannonball, was shot down with the loss of the entire crew and an observer from the War Department General Staff. The observer was Lieutenant Colonel Francis Robert Stevens. The death of Stevens instead of the Lieutenant Commander, USNR, whose seat he had pre-empted, was destined to change the future history of the United States and therefore of the world. But that is the end of the story. Let’s start at the beginning.</div>
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<div><em>Francis Robert Stevens</em> was born in the town of Clear Creek, Alabama, on January 1, 1903. As a small child, he moved with his family to Mississippi where he was educated in the McComb grammar school and high school. His mother, who was determined that Steve should continue his education, had managed to get him a principal appointment to the United States Military Academy from the 7th District of Mississippi. She knew nothing about the Academy nor did Steve. If he had been required to take an entrance examination, he would have almost certainly failed across the board, for in addition to other inadequacies in his education, Steve had elected not to take mathematics in high school. His total mathematical underpinning was simple arithmetic.</div>
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<div>No one in the Class of 1924 will ever know how he managed to survive those first six months academically. He was turned out in every subject, but to the astonishment of his classmates, he eked out the minimum passing grade in each. Perhaps Steve could not fail because, like every man, he had his particular “Appointment in Samara” and to keep that appointment, he would have to graduate with the Class of 1924 and wear the uniform of an officer of the United States Army.</div>
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<div>And so on June 12, 1924, Steve took his commission as a second lieutenant and was assigned to Brooks Field, Texas, for flight training. After a few solo flights, he was washed out under the catchall phrase “lack of inherent flying ability.” He was transferred to the 23d Infantry at Fort Sam Houston, Texas in March 1925. There he met, courted, and married Marguerite Buist Dick which turned out to be one of those story-book marriages so often read about but so seldom seen.</div>
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<div>Steve’s career settled into the routine of the neglected and forgotten Army of the 1920s and 1930s—the 33d Infantry in the Canal Zone; the Company Officer’s Course at The Infantry School; Paris, France, as Conducting Officer, American Pilgrimage of Gold Star Mothers and Widows; Tactical Officer and Assistant Adjutant at the Academy; the Command and General Staff School; the 21st Infantry in Hawaii; and then, in 1941, to the War Department General Staff as a member of the prestigious Operations Division.</div>
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<div>Although this was one of the darkest periods for the Army, where there was little opportunity for any officer, junior or senior, to distinguish himself, Steve’s quick mind, fine judgment, dry wit, and radiant personality had attracted the attention of many of those officers whose names would echo like thunder over the great battle areas of the Second World War. Steve was clearly marked for rapid advancement once the drums of war began the long roll. And the drumheads were being tightened.</div>
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<div>Shortly after Pearl Harbor, Steve was given the critical Southwest Pacific Desk for Army activities. His colleague for Air was Colonel Samuel Anderson who would later wear four stars. On May 4, these two friends left Washington on a top priority trip for a detailed survey of the conditions in this tortured theatre. They were to report back in person to General George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff, U.S. Army.</div>
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<div>Steve’s promotion to colonel reached Hawaii several hours after his departure. It would never catch up with him. Later, General Marshall was to say that Steve was slated for promotion to general officer rank almost immediately after his return.</div>
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<div>The trip was arduous. Despite the urgency of their mission and the top priority carried by Steve and Anderson, transportation was makeshift and often nonexistent. Delay piled on top of delay. During one tedious wait in Noumea, New Caledonia, these two officers met a third man—a young reserve lieutenant commander in the Navy—whose mission corresponded almost exactly with theirs, except that the commander’s assignment came directly from the President of the United States. The three became friends at once and forthwith decided to make the rest of the trip together.</div>
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<div>On the morning of June 9, these three friends landed at Seven-Mile Air Strip in New Guinea, the advance base of the 22d Bomb Group. There they were met by the base commander and the group commander and taken at once to the flight line where the B-26 Marauders, armed and fueled, were waiting to take off on a raid against Lae.</div>
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<div>The lieutenant commander found a seat available on The Wabash Cannonball and climbed aboard while the rest of the party moved down the line. A moment later, he climbed out to retrieve his camera. When he returned, he found that Steve had taken his seat. He pointed this out, but Steve merely grinned and told him that he would have to find another vacant seat. And so, Lieutenant Commander Lyndon Baines Johnson, USNR, climbed out of The Wabash Cannonball, out of the waiting arms of death, and walked to The Heckling Hare and into history.</div>
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<div>An hour later, the great Japanese ace, Saburo Saki, sent The Wabash Cannonball plunging to destruction in the sea off Lae. Steve had fulfilled his destiny. Lyndon Baines Johnson would fulfill his as the 36th President of the United States.</div>
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<div>In retrospect, it is obvious that Steve’s death was freighted with more meaning than any other single death in that great war, for it altered the very course of history.</div>
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<div>May the waters of the sea rest lightly on him.</div>
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<div><em>—C. T. Lanham Major General, USA, Ret.</em></div>
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