Education
Born in Providence, Rhode Island on 7 March 1889, Chevalier graduated from the United States Naval Academy in June 1910.
Born in Providence, Rhode Island on 7 March 1889, Chevalier graduated from the United States Naval Academy in June 1910.
He was appointed a Naval Air Pilot on 7 November 1915 and a Naval Aviator on 7 November 1918. On 8 May 1913, ensign Chevalier was the passenger in a long-distance flight of 169 miles, flown in a Curtiss flying boat piloted by Lieutenant John Henry Towers, Naval Aviator Number. 3, from the Washington Navy Yard in Washington, District of Columbia down the Potomac River and then up the Chesapeake Bay to the United States. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland.
The flight took three hours and five minutes.
In 1916 he participated in the installation of the first real aircraft catapult used in the United States. Navy and piloted the first plane to be launched by catapult, from the armored cruiser United States Ship North Carolina. In 1922 he was attached to United States Ship Langley (CV-1), the first American aircraft carrier, in connection with fitting her out.
On 26 October 1922 Lieutenant Commander Chevalier made the first landing on Langley"s deck, flying Aeromarine 39B Number. 606.
A distinguished pioneer of naval aviation, Chevalier died at the Norfolk Naval Hospital at Naval Station Norfolk in Norfolk, Virginia, on 14 November 1922 as a result of injuries sustained in the 12 November 1922 crash near Lockhaven, Virginia, of a Vought VE-7 he was flying from Naval Air Station Norfolk to Yorktown, Virginia.
Two United States. Navy destroyers have been named United States Ship Chevalier in his honor, as was Chevalier Field, an airfield at Naval Air Station Pensacola in Pensacola, Florida.