Stephen Potter (officer)

Ensign Stephen Potter, USN (26 December 1896 – 25 April 1918) was a United States Navy officer and early Naval Aviator, who was killed in action during World War I. He was a member of the second Yale University unit which left college in April 1917 to enter naval aviation. He was a native of Saginaw, Michigan, and attended Phillips Exeter Academy.

Training
Potter trained with Volunteer Aerial Coast Patrol Unit No. 2 at Buffalo, N.Y., and was commissioned ensign on 2 November 1917. Ensign Potter volunteered to go overseas immediately and was assigned to the Advanced School at Montchic, Gironde, France. He was later assigned to the British Royal Naval Air Station at Felixstowe, England.

Action and Distinctions
As second pilot to a British captain on North Sea service, Ensign Potter won the distinction of being the first American naval aviator to shoot down a German seaplane. He flew from the North Sea Station on 25 April 1918 in company with another plane. The pair spotted two German planes, one of them piloted by Oberleutnant zur See Friedrich Christiansen with observer Bernhard Wladika, heading toward them approximately six miles from North Hinder Light. Five additional enemy planes joined them, and together the seven German combatants attacked the two British aircraft. Ensign Potter was killed after his plane was shot down by Christiansen's observer Wladika in the ensuing action.

Namesake
The World War II destroyer USS Stephen Potter (DD-538), (1943–1972), was named in his honor.