Colonel (then First Lieutenant) RUBY E. JOHNSTON, 65th Bombardment Squadron, 43rd Bombar ment Group, Air Corps, United States Army. For extraordinary heroism in action over Bougainville Island on 16 June 1943. First Lieutenant Johnston was navigator of a volunteer bomber crew which undertook an important and dangerous photomapping mission over the heavily defended enemy base at Buka. Just before the photographing was completed, about twenty enemy fighters attacked. The bomber was extensively damaged and five of the crew were seriously wounded. First Lieutenant Johnston, with multiple wounds about the head so that bleeding interfered with his vision, continued to man his guns until the explosion of a twenty millimeter shell in the nose of the bomber threw him back into the catwalk. He saw that fire had broken out behind the pilot’s seat, got to his feet, tore out the burning oxygen bottles, and extinguished the fire bare-handed. After a forty-five minute running fight, in which five enemy planes were destroyed and two damaged, the bomber was flown safely to its base five hundred and eighty miles away, First Lieutenant Johnston supervising the navigation despite his injuries. He showed admirable skill and determined courage on this voluntary mission, which secured information of great value in subsequent operations.

Colonel Johnston resided in Florida