He was also the youngest naval aviator. Were the serving sons of high-wealth individuals afforded any particular favours in the war or were they the same as every other G.I.?
Very normal for downed aircrew. Submarines were assigned to "Lifeguard" duty, being on-call for rescuing shot-down pilots. In the course of doing that, they often encountered Japanese resistance and would get air support as required, particularly after Navy analysis revealed that the rescue attempts were far more effective with air support:
"An April 1945 review of 74 lifeguarding missions conducted in 1944 showed that with air support in 60 calls for help, 51 were rescues. Seventy-five calls for help with unescorted submarines responding resulted in only seven rescues.
The analysis, done for the commander-in-chief of the U.S. fleet, also emphasized that escorting aircraft increased the search capabilities and communication between rescuers and the rest of the task force. In ad- dition, the escorts widened radar and radio reception and increased protection of both the submarine and downed pilot."
(from https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2014/fall/lifeguard.pdf, p.19; just before it there's an account of another submarine rescure of a downed pilot due to the aid of air support)