Issue 47.12
When a flyer has finished his training and is ready to fly his first wartime combat mission, he seems to suddenly have in his possession, two suitcases. One, labeled number of missions to fly, is empty and one labeled “Luck” is full. We can always see the level of “Missions to fly” because we keep track of them but the other suitcase is supposed to be full but it is locked and it has no weight so we never know how full that one is. My “Mission” suitcase started with 25 missions. After I had flown 18 missions, word came down that the number we would have to fly was now upped to 35. However, if a flyer has flown 20 missions, he could stop at the original 25. Darn, I had only 18 and was two short of the magic number so I had to have an additional ten missions added to my missions suitcase.
Most if not all combat flyers have tricks to slow down the using up their store of luck. Prayer was the first option for many both from themselves and their families. However if their first mission was successful, a flyer may try to copy wearing the same clap, scarf or other clothes or try to perform the same ritual. One gunner on another crew wore a piece of his girlfriend’s under clothes around his neck. Some guys would loan a coin to a friend who was not flying that day and would collect it upon his return. On all of my 35 missions, I always wore a silver bracelet that had a hinged cap with my girl friend’s picture in that was a gift from her. In addition, she said a daily prayer on my behalf. No self respecting combat flyer would ever be caught dead flying a thirteenth mission. It would be his twelfth-B mission. We have heard it said that there are no atheists in fox holes but also there are no atheists among the heavy persistent contrails that filled the skies over Europe. By halfway through a guys mission, he probably would have a chunk of FLAK and a story to go with it to tell how that piece just missed his head or was stopped by his flak jacket or a similar story to tell how he almost ran out of luck. I had a piece of shrapnel pass through my inflatable life jacket called by us a “Mae West”. Our radio operator-gunner, Wally Sanchez, had a piece of shrapnel come up through the floor entered under his steel helmet and curved between the helmet and his skull. He was fixed up at the base hospital but there was not enough blood for a Purple Heart medal. He has a scar across the top of his head that showed 60 years later. One of my friends carried around a piece of shrapnel that had his initial and last four fidgets of his Army identification number.
For example, mine was W-5354. On one mission a high explosive shell fired from the ground came up through the floor in the three foot space between the pilot’s seat and the top turret gunner and out the top without exploding. If that had exploded at that place it would have killed the whole crew or at least half of us, with me in the ball turret for sure. Shells are set to explode at a pre set altitude or on contact. Thank you to a brave slave laborer in Germany for your sabotage. If you had been discovered, you would have been shot on the spot. John Kihm, our co-pilot, had an explosion go off in front of his position; it blew in the windshield and filled his eyes with bits of glass. He was taken to the base hospital where they dug the pieces out. Again there was not enough blood to warrant a Purple Heart medal. It took my suitcase longer to be emptied of luck than it took the other suitcase to be filled with missions.