Date:	Monday 9 February 1942
Time:	14:30
Type:	Vultee BT-13 Valiant
Owner/operator:	84th School Sqn USAAF
Registration:	40-823
MSN:
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 2 / Occupants: 2
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Wetumpka, AL -   United States of America
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Training
Departure airport:
Destination airport:

Narrative:
Beginning in 1941, thousands of RAF crew members were trained at Maxwell and Gunter Fields, Montgomery, Alabama, as well as at auxiliary airfields in the area. 78 lost their lives in Alabama during the war and are buried there.

On 9 February 1942 the BT-13 40-823 of 84th School Squadron USAAF stalled and span to the ground at 1430 hrs. six miles east of Gunter Field (so around Wetumpka, Alabama). Both crew, 2nd Lt Willard R. DeGolyer, the Army Air Force instructor, and Cpl Reginald Arthur Price, a RAF student of class SE-42-E, were killed. The 240 British cadets of class SE-42-E arrived at Gunter Field in January 1942 and Price was one of the two fatalities until the end of their sojourn here in March 1942.

Investigators stated: "Apparently the student had been given a simulated forced landing by the instructor (as shown by the position of all controls after the accident), and the student or instructor allowed the airplane to assume a steep and or slow gliding turn which precipitated a spiral or incipient spin from which recovery was not made."

27 years old DeGolyer was the son of Supervisor & Mrs. C. Scott DeGolyer, and a graduate from the Perry High School in 1934. He graduated from Cornell University in 1940, worked at Production Credit Association in Batavia, resigned his position there in October to become a flying cadet. He did his preliminary training in Lakeland, Florida. He won his wings and commission as a second lieutenant at Maxwell Field, Alabama. He married Edith Cecil Carson on 5 June 1941.

"Fatal Army Air Forces Aviation Accidents in the United States, 1941-1945. Volume 1, January 1941-June 1943", by Anthony J. Mireles. ISBN 0-7864-2788-4
http://www.aviationarchaeology.com/src/AARmonthly/Feb1942.htm
https://www.findagrave.com/page=gr&GRid=72194480
http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMG4KX_RAF_Memorial_Montgomery_AL
"The Arnold Scheme: British Pilots, the American South, and the Allies’ Daring Plan", by Gilbert Sumter Guinn. ISBN 978-1-86227-446-4
https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2719560/PRICE,%20REGINALD%20ARTHUR
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunter_Annex
http://wikimapia.org/#lang=en&lat=32.530605&lon=-86.226196&z=12&m=b

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
10-Feb-2016 08:20	Laurent Rizzotti	Updated [Time, Operator, Total fatalities, Total occupants, Location, Phase, Nature, Source, Narrative]
29-Nov-2018 08:47	angels one five	Updated [Other fatalities, Narrative]
16-Dec-2018 10:59	Nepa	Updated [Operator, Operator]
08-Nov-2022 02:05	Ron Averes	Updated [Location]