After being reported missing for 79 years, the remains of 2Lt Fred L. Brewer have been positively identified and will soon be returned to his family for burial with full military honors in his hometown of Charlotte, NC.

Tuskegee Airmen, Inc. has been asked by the Brewer Family to provide representatives and event support.  Memorial Service and Military Burial details are as follows:

• On  Wednesday, December 6th, 2023, there will be a Visitation Period starting at 10:30 AM EST, followed by a  Celebration of Life Service at 11:00 AM, at the Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, Charlotte, NC. 
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• Following the service, a funeral motorcade procession will depart for the Salisbury National Cemetery which is an approximately 40-minute drive. At 2:00 PM, 2Lt Brewer will be laid to rest with full military honors, followed by a military flyby (weather permitting).
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At this time, no repast is scheduled.

In lieu of flowers, the Brewer Family has authorized Tuskegee Airmen, Inc. to receive donations on behalf of the Coleman W. Kerry Scholarship Fund. Please click the link below for information on how to donate:

Click here to donate 

Biography of 2Lt Fred L. Brewer

2Lt Brewer joined the U.S. Army Air Forces in November 1942 and applied for flight training. He was accepted and then received pilot training at Tuskegee Army Airfield where he graduated in March 1944.  2Lt Brewer was then assigned to the 100th Fighter Squadron, 332nd Fighter Group, and forward deployed to Ramitelli Air Field, Italy.

On October 19, 1944, he piloted a single-seat P-51C Mustang (tail number 43-25108, nicknamed “Traveling Light”) as one of fifty-seven fighters on a bomber escort mission over enemy targets in Regensburg, Germany. The flight left Ramitelli and split into three groups over the Udine area of Italy to continue on to the target area. However, heavy cloud cover forced nine fighters to return to Ramitelli early, and none of the other fighters could locate their bomber aircraft or the target. Forty-seven fighters eventually returned to base, and 2nd Lt. Brewer was not among them. Reports from other pilots on the mission indicate that 2nd Lt. Brewer had been attempting to climb his aircraft out of the cloud cover but stalled out and fell into a spin. After the war, a body was recovered by U.S. personnel from a civilian cemetery in the area, but the remains could not be identified using techniques available at the time and were interred as an unknown.

In 2011, researchers examined the case of those unknown remains and discovered that an Italian police report indicated they were recovered from a crashed fighter plane on the same day as 2LT Brewer’s disappearance. German wartime records corroborated this information. In June 2022, the remains were disinterred and sent to a Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency laboratory for further study. The totality of evidence allowed a positive identification of the remains as those of 2LT Brewer in August  2023.