Eugene Bullard Eugene Jacques Bullard ( 9 October 1895 – 12 October 1961 ) , the first African - American military pilot , was born Eugene James Bullard . His life has been surrounded by many legends . Bullard was one of only two black combat pilots in World War I ( the other being Ahmet Ali Çelikten ) . Early life . Bullard was born in Columbus , Georgia , one of the 10 children of William O . Bullard , nicknamed " Big Chief Ox " , and his wife Josephine Thomas , a Creek Indian . He was a student at Twenty - eighth Street School in 1901 - 1906 , where he learned to read and write . As a teenager , Eugene Bullard stowed away on a ship bound for Scotland , seeking to escape racial discrimination ( he later claimed to have witnessed his father ' s narrow escape from lynching ) . Bullard arrived at Aberdeen before making his way south to Glasgow . He became a boxer in England and also worked in a music hall . World War I experience . On a visit to Paris , Bullard decided to settle in France . At the outbreak of World War I , according to his personnel file at the French Ministry of Defense , he enlisted on October 19 , 1914 in the 1st Regiment of Foreign Legion ( " 1er Régiment étranger " ) since volunteers from overseas in 1914 were allowed to serve only in the French colonial troops . Ground combat . As a machine gunner , Bullard was in 1915 in combat on the Somme front in Picardy : in May and June 1915 at Artois , and in the fall of the same year took part in a second Champagne offensive ( 25 September - 6 November 1915 ) along the Meuse river . The 1st and the 2nd Foreign legion regiments were fighting as a part of the 1st Moroccan brigade ( " 1re Brigade Marocaine " ) of the ( " la Division Marocaine " ) . Formed by Hubert Lyautey , a Resident - General of Morocco , at the outbreak of WWI , it was a mix of the Metropolitan and Colonial French troops , including legionnaires , zouave s and tirailleur s . Towards the end of the war , the 1st Moroccan division became one of the most decorated unit in the French army . The Foreign Legion suffered high casualties in 1915 . It started the year with 21 , 887 soldiers , NCOs and officers , and ended with 10 , 683 . As a result , the Foreign Legion units fighting on the Western front were put in reserve for reinforcement and reorganization . On November 11 , 1915 , 3 , 316 survivors from the 1st and the 2nd " Etranger " were merged into one unit - the Marching Regiment of Foreign Legion ( " " ) , which in 1920 became the 3rd Regiment ( " " ) of the French Foreign Legion . As for Americans and other volunteers , they were allowed to transfer to the Metropolitan French Army units , including the . 170th had a reputation of crack troops and was nicknamed " Les Hirondelles de la Mort " , or " The Swallows of Death " . Bullard opted to serve in the 170th Infantry Regiment to which fact testifies his collar military insignia . In the beginning of 1916 , 170th Infantry along with the ( " 48e division d ' infanterie " ) to which it belonged , was sent to Verdun . Family request . After hearing about the horrors of the trench war in France , Bullard ' s father wrote to the U . S . Secretary of State pleading for help in order to bring his son back home . He said that Eugene was born in October 1895 , not 1894 , and simply added himself a year when he enlisted . However , the French government officials decided that Bullard was old enough to enlist . Aviation . As a part of the 170th Infantry , Bullard fought and was seriously wounded in March 1916 during the Battle of Verdun . After recovering from his wounds , Bullard volunteered on October 2 , 1916 to join the French Air Service ( " Aéronautique Militaire " ) as an air gunner , and went through training at the Aerial Gunnery School in Cazaux , Gironde . Later , he went through initial flight training at Châteauroux and Avord and received his pilot ' s license number 6950 from the Aéro - Club de France on May 5 , 1917 . Like many other American aviators , Bullard wanted to join the famous aero squadron Escadrille Americaine N . 124 , the Lafayette Escadrille , but after enrolling 38 American pilots in spring and summer of 1916 , it stopped accepting new flyers . Therefore , after receiving more training at Avord , Bullard on November 15 , 1916 , joined 269 American aviators at the Lafayette Flying Corps of the French Air Service , which was a designation rather than a unit . American volunteers flew with French pilots in different pursuit and bomber / reconnaissance aero squadrons on the Western Front . Edmund L . Gros , who facilitated the incorporation of American pilots in the French Air Service , listed in the October 1917 issue of " Flying " , an official publication of the Aero Club of America , Bullard ' s name in the member roster of the Lafayette Flying Corps . On June 28 , 1917 Bullard was promoted to the rank of corporal . On August 27 , 1917 he was assigned to the based at Beauzée - sur - Aire south of Verdun , where he stayed till September 13 . The squadron was equipped with Nieuport and Spad aircraft that bore a flying duck as nose art . Bullard ' s service record also includes the aero squadron N . 85 ( " Escadrille SPA 85 " ) , September 13 , 1917 - November 11 , 1917 , which had a bull insignia . He took part in about twenty combat missions , and is sometimes credited with shooting down one or two German aircraft ( sources differ ) . However , the French authorities did not confirm Bullard ' s victories . When the United States entered the war , the United States Army Air Service convened a medical board to recruit Americans serving in the Lafayette Flying Corps to the Air Service of the American Expeditionary Forces . Bullard went through the medical examination , but was not called in since only white pilots were allowed to serve . A time later , while being on short break from duty in Paris , Bullard allegedly got into a fight with a French officer and was punished by being transferred to the service battalion of the 170th in January 1918 . As a noncombatant , he served past the Armistice being finally discharged on October 24 , 1919 . After the war . For his World War I service Bullard was awarded the " Croix de Guerre " , Médaille militaire , Croix du combattant volontaire 1914 – 1918 , and Médaille de Verdun , among others . Following his discharge , Bullard returned to Paris . In Paris . In Paris , Bullard found employment as a drummer and a nightclub manager at " Le Grand Duc " and eventually became the owner of his own nightclub , " L ' Escadrille " . He married Marcelle Straumann from a wealthy family in 1923 , but the marriage ended in divorce in 1935 , with Bullard gaining custody of their two surviving children , daughters Jacqueline and Lolita . As a popular jazz venue , " Le Grand Duc " gained him many famous friends , including Josephine Baker , Louis Armstrong , Langston Hughes and French flying ace Charles Nungesser . When World War II began in September 1939 , Bullard , who spoke German , agreed to a request from the French government to spy on Germans frequenting his nightclub . After the German invasion of France in May 1940 , Bullard fled from Paris with his daughters . He volunteered with the 51st Infantry defending Orléans when he met an officer whom he knew from fighting at Verdun . He was wounded in the fighting but was able to escape to neutral Spain , and in July 1940 he returned to the United States . In New York City . Bullard spent some time in a New York hospital and never fully recovered from his wound . Moreover , he found the fame he enjoyed in France had not followed him to the United States . He worked as a perfume salesman , a security guard , and as an interpreter for Louis Armstrong , but his back injury severely restricted him . He attempted to regain his nightclub in Paris , but his property had been destroyed during the WWII . He received a financial settlement from the French government , which he used to buy an apartment in Harlem , New York City . Peekskill Riots . In 1949 , a concert held by black entertainer and activist Paul Robeson in Peekskill , New York to benefit the Civil Rights Congress resulted in the Peekskill Riots . These were caused in part by members of the local Veterans of Foreign Wars and American Legion chapters , who considered Robeson a communist sympathizer . The concert was scheduled to take place on August 27 in Lakeland Acres , north of Peekskill . Before Robeson arrived , however , a mob attacked the concert - goers with baseball bats and stones . Thirteen people were seriously injured before police put an end to it . The concert was then postponed until September 4 . The re - scheduled concert took place without incident , but as concert - goers drove away , they passed through long lines of hostile locals , who threw rocks through their windshields . Eugene Bullard was among those attacked after the concert . He was knocked to the ground and beaten by an angry mob , which included members of the state and local law enforcement . The attack was captured on film and can be seen in the 1970s documentary " The Tallest Tree in Our Forest " and the Oscar winning documentary narrated by Sidney Poitier , " " . None of the assailants was ever prosecuted . Graphic pictures of Eugene Bullard being beaten by two policeman , a state trooper and a concert goer were published in Susan Robeson ' s biography of her grandfather , " The Whole World in His Hands : a Pictorial Biography of Paul Robeson " . Later life . In the 1950s , Bullard was a relative stranger in his own homeland . His daughters had married , and he lived alone in his apartment , which was decorated with pictures of his famous friends and a framed case containing his fifteen French war medals . His final job was as an elevator operator at the Rockefeller Center , where his fame as the “ Black Swallow of Death ” was unknown . In 1954 , the French government invited Bullard to Paris to help rekindle the everlasting flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier under the Arc de Triomphe . In 1959 he was made a " chevalier " ( knight ) of the " Légion d ' honneur " . While this gained him some recognition , his last years were spent in relative obscurity and poverty in New York City . He died in New York City of stomach cancer on October 12 , 1961 at age 66 . Eugene Bullard was buried with military honors in the French War Veterans ' section of Flushing Cemetery in the New York City borough of Queens . Legacy . Eugene Bullard received fifteen decorations from the government of France . He was made a knight of the Legion of Honor , which is France ' s most coveted award . He was also awarded the Médaille militaire , another high military distinction in France . In 1972 , Bullard ' s exploits as a pilot were retold in a biography , " The Black Swallow of Death " . Bullard is also the subject of the nonfiction young adult memoir " Eugene Bullard : World ' s First Black Fighter Pilot " by Larry Greenly . On 23 August 1994 , thirty - three years after his death , and seventy - seven years to the day after the physical that should have allowed him to fly for his own country , Eugene Bullard was posthumously commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the United States Air Force . The 2006 movie " Flyboys " loosely portrayed Bullard and his comrades in World War I .