Fairfax Davis Downey – Lieutenant Colonel, United States Army

FAIRFAX DOWNEY, 96, MILITARY HISTORIAN

June 6, 1990 – Fairfax Downey, a biographer and military historian, died last Thursday at New London (New Hampshire) Hospital.  He was 96 years old and had lived in West Springfield, New Hampshire, since the mid-1950s, when he moved there from Manhattan.

Mr. Downey was a newspaper reporter in Kansas City and New York before he became a full-time writer of books and magazine articles.

His biographical subjects included the journalist richard Harding Davis, the illustrator Charles Dana Gibson and the adventurer Sir Richard Burton.  Among his more than 50 books on historical and military themes were “Our Lusty Forefathers,” about life in Revolutionary times, published in 1947; “Sound of the Guns.” (1956), which traced the history of artillery and “Storming of the Gateway” (1960), which dealt with the Civil War.

Mr. Downey was a graduate of Yale.  In World War I he was awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action at Belleau Wood.  In World War II he served in North Africa and retired as a Lieutenant Colonel.

He is survived by his wife, the former Mildred Adams a daughter, Peggy Knowlton of Arlington, Virginia; four grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.


DOWNEY, FAIRFAX D JR

  • CAPT 12TH FLD ART US ARMY
  • BURIED AT: SECTION FT MY  SITE LOT 48
  • ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY

fddowney-gravesite-photo-october-2007-001

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