Koller Canine Brandon
Second Lieutenant Koller C. “Casey” Brandon was a Marine pilot with VMF-121.
He was reported missing after a combat mission over Guadalcanal on 14 October 1942.
Branch
Marine Corps Reserve
Service Number O-9416
Current Status
Remains Not Recovered
Pursuit Category
The DPAA has not publicized this information.
Capsule History
Pre-War Life
Birth
December 4, 1918
at Balsam, MN
Parents
Herman Thurman Brandon
Florence Clara (Koller) Brandon
Education
Grand Rapids High School
Itasca Junior College
University of Minnesota (1941)
Occupation & Employer
Student
Service Life
Entered Service
March 31, 1941 (enlisted)
April 6, 1942 (commissioned)
Home Of Record
Grand Rapids, MN
Next Of Kin
Father, Mr. Herman Brandon
Military Specialty
Pilot
Assistant Materials Officer
Campaigns Served
Solomon Islands / Guadalcanal
Individual Decorations
Purple Heart
Additional Service Details
—
Casey was an Irish-Norwegian farm boy, rugged, gifted, argumentative, and persistent. By the time he was sixteen he had breezed through high school at Grand Rapids, Minnesota. After junior college he went to the University of Minnesota, picking up medals along the way and graduating with high honors. He was smart — at Corpus Christi he got a 4.0 grade on the first third of his navigation work, leading the whole class....
Casey was a Boy Scout and, like many farm youngsters, belonged to the 4-H Club. When his dad was ill with rheumatism, he ran the farm, passionately trying to make his field of potatoes the best in the United States, and every calf, pig or chicken on the farm a county fair champion. Other boys liked to be with him, because he knew how to do things. Every week end he brought home friends who learned such diverse arts as the proper way to shovel manure or solve trigonometry problems.
Illness at home delayed his education, but Casey was graduated cum laude from Minnesota in March, 1941. He went right into naval aviation and that's where he met Danny [Cecil J. Doyle], who was almost two years younger.... Both boys were original members of the eight-man flight that became known as the Flying Circus. When everyone was given a nickname for radio communication in the air, Casey was tagged "Fool" and Danny "Ish"— the Foolish Twins. They reveled in the name. In camp they were inseparable, and they always flew together. "I have to go along and look after Casey," Danny always said, ignoring the fact that Casey was more than able to take care of himself.
Loss And Burial
Circumstances Of Loss
Second Lieutenant Koller C. “Casey” Brandon, a fighter pilot assigned to VMF-121, arrived at Guadalcanal’s Henderson Field on 9 October 1942.
On 14 October, after a sleepless night under the guns of a pair of Japanese battleships, the Cactus Air Force scrambled no less than three times to meet reported air raids. They made contact on the third: Lieutenant Brandon, flying F4F-4 Bureau Number 5058, joined the fight over the field at 1303 but never returned to base. He was reported missing in action when the day’s fighting ended.
On the night of October 13, at the height of the worst shelling the island ever got, Danny, Casey, Furlow, and Haberman were crowded in a foxhole. After two and a half hours of it, a near-by oil dump was shooting flames two hundred feet high, ammunition dumps were going off, planes were blazing around the field, and flares were hanging in the sky like an evening at the planetarium.
One day Danny's plane needed repairs and he couldn't go up. It was the first time he hadn't flown with Casey. That night we waited uncomfortably for a plane that hadn't come back. It was Casey's. I don't like to think of the expression on Danny's face. He quit his wisecracking abruptly and became grim and quiet. By that time he had official credit for five planes shot down. "Those goonies are going to pay if it's the last thing I do," he said bitterly. "I'm going to double my score for Casey."
Burial Information or Disposition
At the end of October 1942, a native patrol located Brandon’s wrecked Wildcat and retrieved his identification tags, which were returned to VMF-121. Unfortunately, the location of the crash site and the disposition of the pilot’s body were not recorded in contemporary records.
Despite this discovery, Casey Brandon was carried as missing in action until an official declaration of death on 19 February 1945. He was posthumously promoted to the rank of captain.
Memorials
Next Of Kin Address
Address of parents, Herman & Florence Brandon
Location Of Loss
Brandon was shot down while defending Henderson Field.
