Combat Crew

by John Comer

  He located Jim in the cockpit.

  “What am I going to do? Let it go in the bomb bay?”

  “Here, take one of these paper bags the lunches came in. Urinate in this and throw it out of the waist window.”

  Jim solved his problem. It worked fine until Shutting tossed the sack out of the window; the swirling wind caught the sack and flung it back into the Navigator’s face. There was not much Jim could do for him except offer a handkerchief.

  In the radio room Balmore was trying to make contact with any station that might help. At that time of crew training, the radio operators had not yet been instructed in how to get a fix or a Q.D.M. — a magnetic bearing — but fuel was running low and they had to know exactly where they were. George raised a Coast Guard station and the operator suggested a fix. An officer was called in and explained the procedure to Balmore by Morse code. A few minutes later he was able to give Shutting his exact position at a given time. With that definite information, the Navigator brought them over the air base at Eugene, Oregon. The fog was still solid over the western part of the U.S. Visibility was near zero and fuel too low to proceed east far enough to clear the fog. Below were rugged mountains. An instrument letdown in unfamiliar mountain surroundings was beyond the experience of the pilot.

  Carqueville turned to Jim. “How much fuel do we have left?”

  “Less than an hour.”

  “We’re goin’ to have to do somethin’ before long, even if it means takin’ some risks.”

  The control tower at Eugene understood the gravity of the situation and called Carqueville. “We can hear your engines so we’re going to try to talk you down by sound. Keep circling and start lettin’ down an’ we’ll call your turns and headings. Let down at two hundred feet per minute.”

  “OK — we’re ready.”

  “Pilot to crew. The tower is goin’ to talk us down. We will be lettin’ down in mountains, so everyone get in position an’ keep a sharp lookout. If you see anything up ahead call me quick.”

  “Navigator to crew. We’ll be lettin’ down in a valley with mountains on each side. You know what that means.”

  Cautiously they began easing down, following the instructions from the tower. The tension was intense. Every eye strained into murk, hoping to spot an obstacle in time. Surely there is no experience in flying more nerve-wracking than to know you may, at any second, hit a mountain head on.

  Down! Down! Down! Down!

  “Pilot to Navigator, we’re below the height of the mountains on either side of us now.”

  “Mountain — straight ahead,” screamed the copilot.

  “Oh, my God.”

  Out of the gloom was the sight that all pilots hope never to see coming at them from close range! Carqueville jerked the nose of the aircraft sharply upward so that they were flying parallel to the sloping side of the mountain, almost brushing the treetops. They could not maintain that steep angle of climb more than a few more seconds before the ship stalled out. Then number-three engine could not take the strain of prolonged high power and conked out. That appeared to seal their doom, if it was not already certain! Seconds before stalling out, the ship cleared the top of the mountain and Herb quickly leveled off. There is no way it could have been nearer to a disaster!

  Suddenly Wilson roused himself.

  “Hey, John, remember the day we left Boise? We were about ready to clear the field, and a horrible accident took place right in front of our eyes?”

  “I certainly do remember — I’ll never forget it!”

  When First Phase Training was over, our crew, along with another crew, was ordered to proceed to Casper, Wyoming, by train. There was a delay on the morning of our departure, however, because the pilot of the other crew had to be pressed into duty as an instructor for a two-hour flight. Men of both crews were waiting together, in front of an orderly room. Fifteen minutes later we heard the roar of a B-17 taking off. Then suddenly, there was the earth-shaking sound of a horrendous crash, followed by intermittent explosions.

  “Look at that parachute!” shouted Jim.

  How weird! I saw a parachute billow into the sky with no one in it! The next second the air was filled with debris, flames, and smoke. We were stunned! The pilot we were waiting for was in the aircraft that just crashed! The plane ran wild on takeoff, veered from the runway, and streaked across the parking ramp, crashing into several B-17s. It ended up in a pile of burning wreckage against one of the school buildings where our training classes had been held. Two men were pulled from the flaming wreckage and seven others died.

  It was so pathetic. The lives of seven young men wiped out instantly, either due to a pilot error or some mechanical failure of the plane. I could visualize the arrival of telegrams, and the tears of grief and anguish! I could see the flag-draped coffins and the solemn services. I could hear the lovely haunting echoes of “Taps,” bidding the young men a final good-bye. I knew that after a short time the memory of those men would begin to fade. In a little while only their families and a few close friends would remember. The rest of the community would soon forget them. After a year or two, most of the people who once knew them well would have a hard time recalling exactly what they looked like.

  Next page: The available pictures of the Gleichauf Crew.

  Next page: The available pictures of the Cahow Crew.

  The triangle “L” insignia that identified the 381st bomb group.

  The Joker — a well-known aircraft of the 381st group.

  Chapter XIV

  Second Mission to Schweinfurt

  Black Thursday14

  Johnny Purus was an unusually good man to have on a crew. He was as steady in the nose as Jim Counce was in the rear of the aircraft. The rest of us would screw up at times, but Johnny never did, except on that first fighter attack when three of us failed so miserably. He entered the service as an enlisted man and had some aircraft mechanical experience. Purus could handle the controls of a B-17 well enough to get back to the base if something happened to the pilot and copilot. Counce showed natural flying ability, and I had flying experience also. That was good insurance for the crew.

  Coming out of the mess hall at noon, I found Purus waiting for me. “Paul’s got a flu bug an’ a bad case of the G.I.s, so Captain Ralston has grounded him for the rest of the week an’ sent word to Operations that none of the rest of the crew has to fly any missions ’til Gleichauf recovers.”

  Jim spoke up, “Well, maybe we can get a four-day pass to London.”

  “Go ahead an’ try, but John can’t go ’cause he’s goin’ to be busy with me putting in those two restrictors in the chin turret.”

  “You mean they’re ready?” I asked.

  “They’ll be finished today. I was at Armament this mornin’ checking on them.”

  By mid-morning the next day Purus and I were working with an armament mechanic on the tricky job of installing those hastily made assemblies at the best positions. We did not know how much back pressure would be needed to correct the malfunctioning of the ammunition, or at what point too much restriction would interfere with the movement of the ammunition to the receiver of the gun. Late in the afternoon the Major who commanded Armament, which included turret maintenance, came out to 719. After examining the installation he remarked, “Looks to me like you’re about finished.”

  “Another thirty minutes will do it,” Purus answered.

  “How do you know how to adjust it?” asked the Major.

  “We don’t,” Purus said. “That will have to be done under fire.”

  “That’s what I thought. If 719 goes out in the morning, who is goin’ to do the adjusting?”

  There was complete silence while the Major waited. Then he looked at me. “Wasn’t this your drawing? Isn’t this your ship?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Well, I think I can get you on it as Navigator — OK?”

  “Wait! Wait! I’m not on combat status for the rest of the week,” I answered.

  “What
’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing. Our pilot is sick an’ Captain Ralston gave the rest of the crew time off ’til he recovers.”

  “But you could go?”

  “I suppose I could.”

  “I think you should — it’s your ship an’ you’re the engineer. We don’t want some damn navigator foulin’ up this test and that is what we’re going to get unless one of you does it. I never saw a navigator who knew anything about guns except which end the bullets come out.” (That wasn’t quite fair to navigators. Even though they did not have as much opportunity to fire the guns, some navigators did take their gunnery seriously.)

  “You got a good point there, Major.”

  “Well, how about it?” he answered.

  “I’d like to, but hell, I — uh — you know what happens when you volunteer. You get the shaft ever’ time.”

  He laughed. “Oh, that’s just barracks talk — let’s go to Operations and see what they say.”

  At Operations Franek said, “You can go if you want to, but you got a medical excuse for the rest of the week. It’s your choice.”

  The Major asked, “Can’t you give him some hint about where we might go in the morning?”

  “We don’t have the target yet an’ couldn’t tell him or anyone else if we did know where it was. But you have the bomb load. You could tell him what your men are goin’ to load tonight.”

  He turned to me. “I’m not supposed to talk about the kind of bombs, but I guess it won’t hurt to tell you. We’re loading block busters.”

  Block busters? Where did we use those two-thousand-pound big ones? Wheels turned in my brain. Lights flashed on and off. Submarine pens! That’s the only place we had ever used them. Where were submarine pens? On the coast! It was going to be an easy target somewhere on the coast. I was not about to let a milk run get by me. The easy ones counted the same as the mean ones.

  “OK, Major, I’ll do it.”

  Turning to Lieutenant Franek I asked, “Can you put me on 719 as Navigator if we go out in the morning?”

  “I guess I could this one time. I hope to hell 719 don’t get lost with you doin’ the navigating.” He paused for a moment. “I’ll put Cahow on 719 ’cause his navigator’s sick.”

  “That’s fine with me.”

  Franek called as I started out the door, “Not a word to any of Cahow’s men until wake-up call if we go in the morning. Got that straight?”

  “OK, not a word.”

  October 14 — Schweinfurt Ball-Bearing Plants

  Aircraft 719: Hellcat

  At three-thirty, George Reese turned on the lights. “Pitts, Lancia, Tedesco, Green, Bechtel, Kettner, and Comer flying 719 with Cahow — briefing at 0530 hours — good luck.”

  “Hey, wait,” said Lancia. “Comer is not on our crew.”

  “He is today,” Reese replied. “He’s your Navigator.”

  “Navigator! That bastard, a navigator?”

  “I’ve been taking a correspondence course in navigation for the last week,” I answered.

  “Come off the bullshit! What are you doin’ with us?”

  “Seriously, the chin turret guns jam up real bad on these new G models. Yesterday, we put some special-made restrictors in the ammunition chutes. I’m going to adjust them in action an’ see if they work.”

  “You think they’ll work?” Tedesco asked.

  “You better hope so, ’cause Franek told me he is goin’ to assign the other G model we have on the field to your crew.”

  Pitts moaned, “God! I hope we don’t get lost today with you up there in the nose.”

  They had decided that this mission was going to be an easy one, probably because Operations assigned me as navigator. As they saw it, I would not be up in the nose if it was going to be a long, tough raid. So no one on the crew stood by the Briefing Room that morning to catch the reaction when the curtain was pulled back revealing the target. We had the usual early morning murk, but there was a good chance it would break by takeoff time.

  In the briefing room when the curtain was pulled and they saw that long string pointing straight to Schweinfurt, the pilots let out one long obscenity in unison — the last place on earth any of them wanted to go.

  Dawn found the gunners in a breezy mood. The copilot, Lieutenant Stanley Parsons, got out of the personnel truck looking glum.

  “Where are we goin’ this morning?” asked Pitts.

  “Schweinfurt,” Parsons replied.

  “Very funny,” said Lancia, “where are we really going?”

  “Now listen, you’ve had your fun! Get this straight! We’re goin’ over the middle of Germany to Schweinfurt an’ back.” He hesitated a moment, then added, “If we get back.”

  My mind recoiled in disbelief. “No! No! No! Not Schweinfurt! Was this some kind of joke? If so, it was on me. But I thought we were going on a milk run! Thought? If I had done any thinking, I would have been back at the hut,” I said to myself. “Anyone stupid enough to volunteer for a combat mission deserves exactly what you are going to get today.” I looked around at the other men. The silly grins had faded out. Tedesco tried some comic remark. No one laughed. Only the sound of the electric generator broke the silence. Gunners started drifting back to the aircraft. A little more head space for heavy firing. More ammunition. The oil buffer could be adjusted to allow more rapid firing. I came out of my shock and decided to recheck the two nose guns I had already set up for the bombardier, Lieutenant John Leverette. They had to be right for what I knew was coming.

  When Cahow arrived I wondered if he was as calm as he looked. “I see that you already know what the target is. No need to tell you about the fighters. You know what to expect, so be careful with ammunition. Don’t waste one round ’cause we’re going five hundred miles into Germany. Three divisions will participate on this mission. The First Wing will lead the attack and the 381st will be the low group …”

  That drew heavy moans and sarcastic remarks. “Here we go again! Is the 381st on the Wing shit list?”

  “Knock off the bitching and listen to what I am telling you. We’ll have an escort going in — P-47s — as far as their fuel will permit …”

  The whole thing sounded ominous. A low position against the heavy opposition we knew would be waiting meant a brutal fight for survival for hours over Germany. The thought went through my mind that many of our 381st men would not survive the day.

  At engine starting time the fog was expected to be no higher than four thousand feet, but we had to grind up slowly through ten thousand feet of murk before breaking clear of it. I recall how bitterly I cursed that miserable English weather and the ever-present chance of a sudden collision in the soup. By the time we pulled out on top of the fog the Group had to circle and circle until our widely scattered planes could be gathered into a formation. They were always in confusion when climbing that high through fog. Meanwhile, other groups in the Wing broke into good weather at four thousand feet and were on schedule, but we lost too much time collecting our scattered aircraft and were late. Major George Shackley, leading the Group, set out to try to intercept the Wing over the Channel. But we were not the only group that missed their rendezvous. The 305th was behind time and their Wing was out of sight. When the 305th commander sighted the 1st Division with the low position open he pulled into it. A little later, when Shackley caught up with the Wing, he was astounded that our assigned position was occupied. At that time I did not know what group had usurped our position or why.15 The 91st was leading and I noticed that they appeared to be under strength. I watched with delight while the 381st pulled up to a position adjacent to the high group. It was a peculiar combat formation but certainly a fortunate one. (Recently George Shackley told me he made that decision.) The escort arrived much too early, in another failure of timing, and therefore was of little help, because they had to turn back before we passed Aachen. As we started angling in toward the Rhine River, various gun positions began to call out warnings of approaching fighters.


  When it was time for the escort to leave us I watched with growing apprehension as enemy fighters gathered in unusual strength for the opening attacks. I had other things to do when the fighting began so I could not estimate how many fighters hit the Division. One report said that the Germans threw two hundred interceptors against us early in the fight. The action was a lot like the August 17 mission. They came in from all angles but what I remember most is that they seemed to line up in groups of three to six and come head on, thus dividing the defensive fire of the formation. Once while looking down at the heaviest action the thought struck me that it was an aerial version of cavalry tactics. I saw single-engine fighters carrying rockets that were fired from close range. Fortunately for me most of the worst action was below the high position of the 381st. I could not see the 305th very well but the reports of the Ball and Tail indicated that it was being struck hard. I could not keep from remembering that our group was supposed to have been down there. One Fortress after another was reported as hit. Some I could see, but most were out of my viewing range. Some blew up. Others were set on fire. Possibly a third of the men were able to bail out in time. The battle was as furious as any I saw over Europe.

  During the early firing action I was lying face down on the deck watching the ammunition slide in the chute and tinkering with the restrictor adjustment. The device worked perfectly and the ammunition jamming problem was solved. From that point on, my main responsibility was to reload the chin turret cans when the ammunition ran low.

  The pilot described the action as he saw it from the cockpit: “When I saw the fighters go through the formations ahead and come at us without breaking off, and seeing Fortresses going down everywhere I looked, I knew our chances for survival were not too good. But the luck of the Irish and a few side-slips as they came at us helped. I had a theory that if I slipped a Fortress up or down, and into the fighter’s attack curve just as he started firing, it might throw him off just enough to miss us in the few seconds of his pass. But if the fighter was not aiming at our plane I flew a level path and gave the gunners a better crack at him.”