John Alley, Jr. served as a Captain in the U.S. Army Air Corps and led a crew in the 769th Bomber Squadron, 462nd Bomb Group, Very Heavy in the China-Burma-India theater of operations in World War II. He was killed in action flying the Hump in a B-29 bomber in the Asiatic Theater on September 16, 1944. He and four of his 462nd crew were assigned to temporary duty with the 2nd Air Transport Squadron, a C-109 tanker unit to haul fuel from India to Bomber Command's advance base in Chendgu, Sichuan, China. On September 16, 1944, the plane took off from Kalaikunda, India heading for Chengdu over the Himalayan Mountains. After takeoff, the base lost contact with the airplane. The crash investigation pinpointed the crash site as Mt. Omei and found wreckage scattered over a 3-square mile area. Personal effects found for one of the crew men identified the aircraft.
