Issue 22.13
After flying a certain number of missions as usual I got back to the barracks dog tired. Before I flopped onto my bunk, I saw a small black container lying in the middle of the blanket. I opened the box and saw that it contained an Air Medal complete with the authorization paper that went with it. As I stood there looking at it, another gunner with more missions under his belt than I had, said “That Air Medal might come in handy. When you get back to the States, you can take that medal to any diner in the country and they will give you a cup of coffee for a nickel” He didn’t say but we both knew that in 1944 the price of a cup of coffee was a nickel. I kind of doubt that I could show it and get a cup for that price in this year of 2013.
Often times there was an empty bunk in our barracks and there was a private who was on permanent KP (kitchen police) who hung out with us anytime he could. He often slept there instead of going to his own place. He talked with us just like one of the crewmen, played cards with us and sometimes brought us a large tin of spam. He seemed more like one of us than a buck private kitchen helper so one day I asked him what was his situation. Nick told me “1and my crew had flown their 8th mission and they were briefed for the 9th mission to “Big B”
(Berlin) and his group was assigned to be the lead group of the bomber train. There was always a primary target and a secondary target and if Eighth Air Force headquarters decided for the bombers to hit the secondary, they would send out a pre arranged Morris code signal such as the letter J. Takeoff, assembly and over the North Sea was normal. On this day, headquarters sent out the pre-arranged signal to hit the secondary target but Nick’s group of thirty-six bombers did not receive that signal so Nick’s and one other group went over Berlin alone and without escort protection to face the 3,500 ground flak guns and numerous enemy fighters.
They had a very rough day because out of Nick’s 36 bombers, 33 were shot down and the three that did get back all had severe battle damage with killed and wounded that kept the meat wagons and hospital busy. It could have been worse because on two different times the
“Bloody Hundredth” group had every bomber that was sent out shot down. Nick was wounded and was sent for sometime at the hospital but when he was well enough, he was put back on combat status. Nick flew on another mission but he had serious problems. He went on sick call but after doing what they could, the medics sent him back to combat status. Nick flew on another mission but the crew he flew with would have been better off without him. After that Nick realized his limitations so he refused to fly again. The result was that he was busted from Staff Sergeant to buck private. He was then transferred from his group to our 351st group and put on permanent kitchen helper for the rest of the war. At that time the official way to treat Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome was to treat it as cowardice. As told to Sam by Nick.