Charles Ervin Shelton, age 33, from Owensboro, Kentucky, Daviess county.
Spouse: Marian Shelton
Service era: Vietnam
Military history: 712 Air Force
Date of death: Monday, May 24, 1965 was the least day he was seen alive.
Death details: Spy plane shot down; His sister, Wanda Newcom, maintained that her brother was alive. The Shelton family successfully sued the U.S. government to not let Shelton be declared dead with about 2,200 other POWs during the Carter administration.
Captain Charles Ervin Shelton, who joined the U.S. Air Force from Kentucky, was a member of the 15th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron. On April 29, 1965, he piloted a single-seated RF-101C Voodoo (tail number 56-0190, call sign “Wolf 20”) as the flight leader of a two-plane photo reconnaissance mission over northern Laos. The mission’s primary target was obscured by poor weather conditions, so Capt Shelton directed the flight to a secondary target near Sam Neua, Laos. As he passed over the secondary target, Capt Shelton’s Voodoo was struck by enemy ground fire. The aircraft crashed in the vicinity of (GC) 992 632. Capt Shelton successfully parachuted to the ground and stayed in radio contact with the other aircraft on the mission. He was observed on the ground and rescue helicopters were dispatched to his location but inclement weather delayed rescue attempts, and he was not seen again. Further attempts to locate him were unsuccessful. Following the incident, the Air Force promoted Capt Shelton to the rank of Colonel (Col). Today, Colonel Shelton is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. He was declared dead in 1994, years after Marian Shelton took her own life after years of fighting for her husband.
Source: National Archives, Evansville Courier & Press, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agnecy, New York Times 1994)
