Lieutenant Dean E. Hallmark

Dean Hallmark was born on 20 January 1914 in Robert Lee, Texas. His father was Ollie Dean Hallmark and his mother was Raleigh Amanda Ake Hallmark. Dean had one sister,  Mozelle Amanda Hallmark.

Mozelle Amanda Hallmark 

Dean Hallmark grew up the son of a cattle farmer in Texas, in a time when if the livestock wasn’t prospering the family might whither away. That may be why the west Texas native became a boy of east Texas. He played football in high school, appearing unnaturally large next to his teammates. He towered over others at six-feet tall. He could push around opponents with his ranch-hardened 200 pounds of muscle.

With Dean playing on the line his team almost won a state championship. He graduated from high school in 1932 and eventually played a season of junior college ball in Paris, Texas. Soon after he got a scholarship offer to play at Auburn.

Auburn football, circa 1935. Dean Hallmark is lined up at left end.

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He spent one year in the Loveliest Village, majoring in education and playing for the Baby Tigers. Back then freshmen didn’t play on the varsity squad. Dean’s reasons for leaving Auburn remain unclear, though Adam has learned that about this time Dean’s father lost a leg in a farming accident. Perhaps he went home to help the family.

Dean Hallmark was the pilot of the Green Hornet during the Doolittle Raid - Short of fuel, most of the planes crashed far short of the friendly Chinese airfields they were to find, ending up inside Japanese lines, and 8 crewmen (2 men had died/drowned when their planes crashed) were captured by the Japanese.

Dean Hallmark standing left

Initially the Japanese jailed the flyers, torturing them for information. Confined and poorly fed, the men contracted dysentery and beriberi. After interrogation, the men were sent to Tokyo, Japan for further interrogation, then returned to Shanghai, China where they were again imprisoned. On 14 October 1942, Japanese officers gave the 2 crews a mock trial, and although never told of the charges against them, they were quickly found guilty and sentenced to death.

Dean E. Hallmark, William G. Farrow, and  Harold A. Spatz were selected for execution, while the Japanese gave "mercy" to the others by commuting their sentences to life in prison. Dean Hallmark and the rest of his crew 6 were capture by the Japanse on 29 april 1942. The other crew (Frrow's crew 16) was captured by the Japanese on 27 April 1942. Hallmark and his surviving crewmembers, Meder and Nielsen were betrayed by a Chinese.

The three men were executed in the Kiangwan Cemetery, Shanghai, China in accordance with Japanese military tradition: they were forced to their knees, blindfolded with their arms tied behind them, then shot simultaneously by three soldiers with rifles in the center of their foreheads.

Their ashes were buried at Shanghai's Public Cemetery No. 1,  in the International Funeral Home of the cementery, Shangai, China. Four crewmen of the 8 captured by the Japanese survived the war (Robert G. Meder died in captivity in December 1943) and returned to the US. The ashes of the three who were executed where found after the war. The ashes of Dean Hallmark were stored under the name “J. Smith”

Four crewmen of the two crews captured by the Japanes survived the war and returned to the US.  

Dean Hallmark was inducted in the Texas Aviation Hall of Fame on 9 November 2001.

A bond drive was named after him in Texas during the war.

A VFW hall in Greenville, Texas, is named after Dean Hallmark. Dean Hallmark post 4011 VFW.

In February 1946, four Japanese officers were tried for their mistreatment of the Doolittle aircrews and sentenced to five years imprisonment. After the war,  Hallmark's ashes were recovered and buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Read more about Hallmark ; https://www.thewareaglereader.com/2011/01/there-goes-hallmark-story-of-former-auburn-student-captured-during-doolittle-campaign-slowly-coming-to-light/  - this is not my article - copyright @ Kenny Smith - copyright pictures -  Adam Hallmark. Please respect the copyright.

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