Jerry Yellin, who flew the last combat mission of World War II and later helped fellow veterans overcome their trauma, has died.
Yellin died last week in Florida at the home of one of his four sons after battling lung cancer. He was 93.
Captain Jerry Yellin, United States Army Air Forces, the P-51 pilot who flew the final combat mission of World War II. (Bob Eldridge/Wikimedia/ Creative Commons)
Yellin, a lieutenant in the 78th Fighter Squadron of the Army Air Forces, was leading an attack on Japanese airfields on August 15, 1945, when Emperor Hirohito announced Japan’s surrender. When he returned to his base on Iwo Jima, Yellin learned that a ceasefire had taken hold, and that his squadron had not received the coded signal informing them to halt their attack, the last of the war.
Yellin was born and grew up in Newark, New Jersey, and enlisted in the military two months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, on his 18th birthday.
His wife of 65 years, Helene, died in 2015. He is survived by four children, David Yellin of Winter Haven, Florida, Steven Yellin of Orlando, Florida; Michael Yellin of Montclair, New Jersey; and Robert Yellin of Kyoto, Japan; a sister; and six grandchildren.
— JTA
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