I was told about a P-47 pilot whose plane was lovingly or derisively called the “Jug”. This American pilot flying out of a field in France got in a dog fight with two German ME 109s. A well trained fighter pilot against a single enemy can usually maneuver so that he [...]
| ||||||
Issue 20.13 Issue 19.13 In the early morning between breakfast and briefing,some of the crew members would to the Flight Surgeon and complain of not sleeping. That was the excuse but not the reason for the visit. The real reason was that pre mission anxiety had a grip on that person. The remedy was [...] Issue 18.13 Flying combat bombing missions over Germany wasn’t all blood,sweat and tears. We could count on the European winter weather to give us some breaks. There was only so much that my crew members and I,our crew’s lower ball turret gunner,could take. Our 351st Bomb Group did not have [...] Issue 17.13 I was the lower ball turret gunner on Robert Parnell’s B-17 bomber crew during my tour of oriel combat as part of the 351st Bomb Group and the 508th Squadron based at Polebrook,England during World War Two. If we bombed a target to the far reaches of Germany,the typical [...] Issue 16.13 In all wars there are four main categories of casualties. They are killed,wounded,missing in action and prisoners of war or POW. Germany thought they could subdue nations by bombing population places such as Rotterdam,Coventry and then the population of London. It did not work. This tactic stiffened the [...] Issue 15.13 The military abbreviates or Acronyms just about everything so this is called MIA. As my crew and I were flying our bombing missions over Germany,when one of the other crews was shot down,and unless we saw the bomber blow up and could confirm that all of the crewmen were [...] Issue 14.13 I have gained information from Eighth Air Force flyers that have been shot down over Germany and how they fared. Without exception,my combat crew members and I were fortunate because we completed our assigned thirty-five missions without being shot down over Germany. For sure we have had some close calls. [...] Issue 13.13 When our crew was about half way through our tour of 35 missions,we as a crew got a one week stay at a “FLAK”house;that is all of us except Luin Lewis,our top turret gunner/engineer who spent his week in Scotland to look up relatives. This place was [...] Issue 12.13 I recently talked with Donald Henderson about his brother-in law,Lewis Haas. Lewis enlisted May 1943 into the U.S. Army Air Force and took his basic training after which he went to Armament school at Lowery field,Denver,Colorado where he learned to disassemble and assemble a heavy machine gun while [...] Issue 11.13 Some crew members would go to the flight surgeon and say they did not sleep the night before and could they have something to keep them awake? Can you imagine someone falling asleep with all those guns shooting at you and all holes popping in the plane? The medic would them [...] |   | |||||
| Copyright ©2013 Senior Sampler - All Rights Reserved | Site maintained by Wildfire Design Group | St. George | Utah | ||||||