The Sh—n cousins know him as Ed Miller, but his buddies in the Air Force’s 303^rd Bombardment Group know him as Lt. Col. Edgar C. Miller, and they are grateful that he has spent the last 22 years preserving their heritage.   During those 22 years that began in 1987, he was doing the same for the descendants of Leonard and Barbara Slemp Shoun.  Ed has researched and recorded more than 26,000 Shouns, published his findings in 18 books (along with 42 books of pioneer families of Johnson County, TN) and made the information available free of charge to other genealogists.

   In the meantime, he has accumulated the records of 7,336 airmen who served with the B-17 “Flying Fortress” unit at Molesworth, England between 1942 and 1945.     His extensive records were presented in a ceremony at Molesworth March 13. Ed’s daughter, Suzanne Miller Poole, who lives in Deenethorpe, England, represented her father who was unable to attend.     Ed was in his early 20’s when he served as a pilot and co-pilot of a B-17 bomber over the skies of Nazi Germany.    He survived 30 bombing missions, ten of them over the heavily-defended Nazi capitol of Berlin.  He believes he may be the only pilot in the entire 8^th Air Forces to complete 10 missions to Berlin and live to tell about it. 

   Forty years later at a reunion, when Ed became membership chairman, he determined to record the legacy of each of the 7,336 men who valiantly served in the 303^rd Bombardment Group for future generations.  He started with 385 names on 3 x 5 cards. By the end of the first year, he had a database of 1,200 names. By 1995, the list had grown to more than 5,600.  The final names were discovered in 2004 on the order for the 303^rd’s personnel to board the Queen Mary for its September 1942 trip to England.  Ed’s work for the 303^rd grew to 13 three-ring binders, some 3,400 pages in all.  The first is titled “A Group of Heroic 8^th Air Force Comrades” and is arranged in six binders with more than 1,800 pages.

   The second is five binders with 1,400 pages entitled “Personnel Casualties of Triangle ‘C’” and summarizes each mission flown by every crew member. The third volume is a special set of two binders called, “The Order of the Purple Heart.” It gives the names and circumstances of those Killed or Wounded in Action and the location of the 467 members memorialized in nine American national cemeteries in Europe.  As part of the March 13 ceremony, the documents were blessed by the Base Chaplain and placed in the Major General Lewis E. Lyle Conference Room.  As with the Sh—n Family Association, the 303^rd Bomb Group Association is grateful for Ed Miller’s “Labor of Love” and lasting legacy.  Cousin Ed Miller and his wife, Jill, live in Crystal River, FL.