Ships
- USS Bennington (CV-20) Captain from 30 June 1945 · Relieved on 8 July 1946
Boynton Lewis Braun was born in Lorain, Ohio, on 31 December 1897. He entered the Naval Academy in July 1917 and was commissioned an ensign on 3 June 1921, in the class listed as 1921B. For the next six years he served in the fire-control divisions of battleships, the part of the ship that worked the rangefinders, directors, and calculations behind the main battery.
He went on to postgraduate study in aviation ordnance and in 1929 reported to the Naval Proving Ground at Dahlgren, Virginia. Flight training at Pensacola followed in the autumn of 1930. In 1934 he returned to Dahlgren as assistant to the officer in charge of the air detail and, after that officer was transferred, took charge of the detail himself for about three years. On 19 August 1936, then a lieutenant, he and Aviation Chief Ordnanceman W. B. Marvelle finished a bombing trial against the old submarine R-8 off the Virginia Capes. From a T4M-1 at 2,500 feet they dropped twelve 100-pound bombs over two days. Four near misses, taken together, sank the target boat.
In 1937 Braun left Dahlgren for a scout squadron on the West Coast. The control planes were built for endurance, and crews remained airborne for more than a day on long flights. During his flying years he also served in one of the Navy's early heavy dive-bombing squadrons. He was promoted to lieutenant commander on 1 November 1938 and to commander on 1 July 1941. On 20 June 1942 he was appointed temporary captain.
On 5 October 1943 he took command of the escort carrier Manila Bay (CVE-61) as she went into commission, and he remained her commanding officer through the summer of 1944. Manila Bay was a Casablanca-class ship, smaller than a fleet carrier, with a flight deck devoted to aircraft that covered landings and the sea lanes around them. His tour covered her first year in service.
On 30 June 1945 Braun relieved James Bennett Sykes in command of Bennington (CV-20). The Essex-class carrier had already fought with the fast-carrier force at Iwo Jima, off Okinawa, and in the raids on Japan. Under Braun she finished the war with the task groups striking the Japanese home islands. For his service from 1 July to 15 August 1945, the weeks that closed with Japan's surrender, he received the Legion of Merit with Combat V. The award recognized leadership that kept the ship's fighting efficiency high while the group struck enemy forces at sea and installations ashore.
After the surrender Bennington returned to the United States and reached San Francisco on 7 November 1945. In 1946 she passed through the Panama Canal and entered the yard at Norfolk for the overhaul that prepared her for reserve. Braun was relieved on 8 July 1946. He retired on 1 September 1947 as a rear admiral and died in King George County, Virginia, on 6 November 1980.