author
Dinsmore Ely
1894–1918
A young American aviator whose letters home became a vivid firsthand record of courage, training, and war in France during World War I. His published work feels both personal and historical, shaped by a life cut short at just twenty-three.
1 Audiobook
Dinsmore Ely, One Who Served
by Dinsmore Ely
About the author
Born in Chicago in 1894, Dinsmore Ely studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was part of the class of 1918 and studied architecture. In 1917, as the war intensified, he volunteered for service and went to France, first through the American Field Service and then with the Lafayette Flying Corps.
Ely is remembered for Dinsmore Ely, One Who Served, a 1919 collection of his letters, edited by his father, Dr. James O. Ely. The book draws on Ely's own writing to trace his path from arrival in France to flight training and front-line service, giving readers an immediate sense of his energy, idealism, and sense of duty.
He was assigned to the front in early 1918 and later received a commission as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Air Service, but chose to return to his French escadrille. He died in April 1918 after an accident while flying to rejoin his unit near Versailles, and his letters remain the work for which he is best known.