JAPS DROP WREATHS

One day we had a short alert. Everyone thought it to be a false alarm for the all clear sounded before any Jap planes came around. Later in the day an announcement came over the public address system stating that a single Jap plane was shot down by a P-38 at 30,500 feet. Two parachutes were spotted, however, there were no men in them. Investigation proved that they were wreaths which were dropped in remembrance of the Japs who had been lost on previous strafing missions. Evidently, the Japs that come over here belong to the famous "Suicide Squadron".

December 7, 1944, the moon was high and bright. Everyone was in the sack, fast asleep. Without any previous warning all hell broke loose again. Every gun on the island opened up. The din was so loud that it was important to keep calm to prevent panic. Men were racing all over the place carrying everything from shoes to gas masks. Some were in their fox holes, stark naked wearing a helmet. Others had shoes on backwards and some had nothing. I always made sure to have my camera along. I guess I did just as many wild things as the rest, for the next morning I was covered with bruises and couldn't remember where or how I received any of them. Some of us managed to dash out of the barracks just in time to see the first Jap plane go roaring across the sky in flames. When it hit and exploded cheers could be heard coming from all over the camp. Our smiles soon reversed for upon the hill was a familiar sight. Smoke rose high, silhouetted by a mass of flames. Another Superfortress would never bomb Japan. Forty-five minutes had passed since the alarm was first sounded and in that time we saw three attacking planes go crashing down in flames. One of these days I'll manage to get a good picture of a night raid. So far my results have been exactly zero.

It may seem hard to believe that after the last night raid over a hundred men were treated for cuts and bruises acquired from diving into coral fox holes, and falling over one another. That all may sound a bit foolish, however, until you have looked down the flaming gun barrels of a Jap fighter, and think that he is after you personally. Until then you don't really know the meaning of fear.

Air rair damage - photo courtesy of John Cooper

MEN START CRACKING

The hospital had been getting a case or two a day of men who have completely cracked or who were in the first stages. A captain in our squadron, who came over with us, went to pieces when a Jap plane crashed near him and exploded, about a week ago. Right now he is on his way back to the States completely finished with flying, after only two weeks on Saipan. Another captain, an airplane commander in our Squadron is also on his way back to the States, suffering from a complete nervous breakdown after two Tokyo missions. Almost everyone has been on edge here lately and I'm no exception. Every time the engineers blast the coral on the hill, someone always jumps. Rumors have been going around about the possibility of the Japanese using gas. "Tokyo Rose" said if we didn't stop using fire bombs, they might start playing with gas. Now most all of us have one eye on our job and the other on our gas mask.

Three weeks have elapsed since we landed here and in that time the enemy has raided us about eight to ten times. So far the tally is about twenty Jap planes destroyed and ten Superfortresses put out of action. When you figure a B-29 costs $600,000.00 it seems that the enemy has done quite well for himself.

MISS MITSUBISHI RAID

Approximately five days dragged by without any excitement or happenings. All my spare time was taken up with designing ship insignias, writing and taking pictures.

December 12th was mission day again. The Mitsubishi aircraft plant at Nagoya, a hundred miles southwest of Tokyo, was the target. We were scheduled for this one, but our plane was again out of commission so we had to sweat them all out on the ground. Lt. Jackson's crew took off on this deal early in the morning and we all wished them luck. The officers on Jackson's crew, coincidentally, live in the same Quonset hut with us.

It was late in the evening before we received the final results of the raid. Main target 40% destroyed and surrounding factories badly damaged. We were all very well pleased with the results, however, it wasn't long before our smiles reversed. Four B-29's were lost, one of them ours. That brought the losses in our 500th Bomb. Group to four planes and crews. Jackson got back OK. with a cannon shell in his wing and a bunch of nervous fellows for which we can't blame them. The flak was extremely heavy and accurate, and it has been expected to get worse, sorry to say. There is no getting around it; we are all scared and scared plenty. This stuff of losing crews on every mission is a hard pill to swallow. It wouldn't be quite as bad if our losses were just because of the enemy, however, planes ditch out in the middle of the Pacific at night because of engine trouble and other mechanical troubles. The thought of landing a $600,000.00 plane and twelve men on a rough ocean at night, a thousand miles from nowhere, makes men out of boys and at the same time puts gray hair on the men.

FORCED TO TURN BACK

December 17th we briefed for another raid on the dock area at Nagoya. Our crew was scheduled and on December 18, 1944, my third anniversary and my co-pilot's third anniversary in the army, we left the Island of Saipan and headed for Japan again.

About four hundred miles out, the lead ship wiggled his wings to loosen the formation because of bad weather ahead. The clouds and rain got worse as time progressed, and it was an hour and twenty minutes before the weather cleared. We could see two other 29s and that was all. None of us had any idea where the rest were, so the three of us progressed to the target all by ourselves. Everything went like clock work until we reached 31,000 feet. It was then we developed engine trouble and couldn't keep up with the leader. If our windows hadn't iced up so badly we would have gone in on our own. However, the odds were against it so I headed our plane back to Saipan. The bombardier dumped his bombs on a small Jap island of their mainland, so our mission wasn't a total loss. Eight o'clock, Saipan showed up on our radar as being about ten minutes flying time straight ahead. Both Marty and I lost our sense of balance when we came in because of the sudden glare of searchlights. It took both of us to straighten out the ship before landing.

CRASHES IN LANDING

A G.I. truck was waiting to take us to interrogation so we could give the intelligence officers all the latest dope. Just as we turned off the runway", one of the enlisted men gave a yell. Two planes were coming in for a landing and one was only a few feet under the other. The plane on top went on in for a landing and the other veered off to the right. What happened next made many a stomach turn for we could see he was in trouble and couldn't climb to circle -the field again. The huge silver ship hit the road, tore up two tents, crashed into a supply shack and left a trail of wreckage for two-hundred yards. The wings of the plane were broken and the fuselage was twisted like a cruller. In all, the wreck looked more like a junk yard than an airplane. Here's the pay-off; all men on the crew walked away from it except one. He had a broken leg. God must have been with them on that landing for one look at the remains of the bomber and you'd think it impossible that anyone lived.

The final tally for this mission was one plane shot down over the target, one that ditched, and the one that crashed at our field. Captain Bricker, who was in our Squadron and on his first raid, landed out in the Pacific. That makes five out of our group that have been lost. Captain Hatch followed him down and watched him ditch so there is a good chance of them being picked up by a friendly submarine. We will all be praying for him and his crew for Bricker is well liked by all of us.

Wrecked B-29's

PAINTS ON OFF DAYS

There isn't much doing around here during our off days, so to take up my time, I've gone back to art in a small way, painting pictures on the sides of the bombers. Each job is worth about fifty dollars, figuring two dollars an hour, which isn't too bad. If I had had any foresight while in Honolulu, I'd have been well supplied with paints and brushes now. As it is, my supply is very limited so will probably close up shop when I run out of paint.

Marines come around often looking for liquor at a price of thirty to forty dollars a bottle. That might seem high, however, prices sure have changed over here and the cost went up as the article became scarce. Most anything was sold or bartered that once belonged to the Japs on the island.

So far I've taken over eighty pictures and all have come out almost perfect except a few. A Swedish fellow has been developing my negatives for me and he does excellent work so now my worries are over as to how I was going to preserve my negatives. Everyone has asked for a set when they get back to the States, so I can see myself going into a drug store and asking for about ten thousand prints!

ANOTHER RAID ABORTED

December 22nd the Superforts were again scheduled to raid Japan. Lt. Jackson and his crew took Snafuperfort on this mission and the same old story was the result; they aborted about an hour-and-a-half with engine trouble. For once our group suffered no losses. Things had been getting rough for it got so we expected to lose someone on each mission. This time the 499th Bomb. Group took it on the chin. They had one plane shot down by enemy pursuit, one ditched on the way to the target and two ditched on the way home. Four planes out of one group on one raid was too costly a price to pay for raiding the Japanese homeland. We are all hoping for things to change for the better because they can't get much worse.

One day is like another around here - no one has or wants a calendar. We all just live from day to day, and raid to raid. There was some talk about Christmas being only two days away, however, no one seemed to get too enthusiastic about it.

Just about every afternoon three planes take off and head out for Japan. These night missions are called weather strikes for each plane records data on the weather all the way to Japan and back, for the following raid's use. Each plane also loads up with incendiaries and drops them by radar over the target. These nuisance raids have been going on since the first Tokyo raid on Thanksgiving Day.

CHRISTMAS NIGHT VISIT

During the last week in December things got a bit rough. We all expected the Japs over at night for the moon and weather were perfect for bombing. A lot of us made bets on the fact that the Japanese would pay us a Christmas visit. It was a good bet for around eight o'clock in the evening, December 25th, the alarm sounded. Everyone, or rather most everyone, knew by now how to conduct himself during a raid, so by the time the Nips came over, all of our personnel were ready for them. The dozens of search lights on the island picked up the first few that got through the night fighters and though our anti-aircraft guns blazed away at them, they got no results. Both Japs got over the field and one salvoed his bombs smack on a Superfortress. We all were quite disgusted with our gunners at the time. Nevertheless, after the enemy left the island our night fighters picked up most of them and sent a good many of their bombers crashing into the sea. This raid lasted almost three hours, but only a few ever got over the island to do any good.

JAPS RETURN NEXT DAY

The next night, the Nips again paid us a visit. This time the radar control was broadcasting all their reports and it was undoubtedly the most interesting thing I've heard in a long while. The radar operators would pick up "boggies" on unidentified planes on their screens and could tell their exact course, speed and altitude when they were well over a hundred miles from the island. Many of us stayed in bed until they were reported to be twenty miles out. This happened the other night for we went out to the fox hole when the enemy was reported only seven minutes away. We could hear the radar operators send out instructions to our night fighters, for it was sent out over our public address system also. A few minutes after instructions were sent out to our "Black Widows", a report came in; "One 'Boggie' shot down off the coast about fifteen miles!" More instructions were sent out to our night fighters and again the report came back. "One 'Boggie' shot down thirty miles off the coast!" It was like a big league game, for cheers would come up from our whole group after each victory. We could look out on the horizon and see a red glow in two places, gradually die out. That verified everything about the enemy being shot down. On this raid, no Jap plane got to the island for they were either shot down or forced to turn back.

If it wasn't for the next day's mission, I really could have enjoyed the raid, but as it was, my crew had less than three hour's sleep for we had to get up at three in the morning.

ANOTHER TOKYO RAID

This was to be another strike at Tokyo. Colonel McDowell was leading the group of eight planes and I was leading the second element in the group. Take-off happened to be much earlier this time and at six A.M. we went roaring down the runway which was hard to see because of the rain and darkness. It was impossible to see the other planes so I flew a pre-arranged course and finally came out of the clouds. By luck other planes spotted me and joined on my wing. Kingsley had all the information for the course out, and for a time it looked as if we were going to lead the whole outfit over Tokyo. A half-hour later the Colonel's plane finally saw us and soon they were catching up to take over the lead.

The weather out wasn't too bad and it was just smooth flying for the first five hours. As the group approached twenty-five thousand feet, my ship became sluggish and we fell behind. It was impossible for me to catch the other ships until they reached thirty-thousand feet and leveled off. It was lucky the Colonel made a right turn just before hitting the target for that made it possible for me to get into bombing position without too much trouble.


LUCK WITH JAPS

Everything looked fine-very little flak and pursuit. We all thought that this was to be a killer of a raid and took for granted that the large Jap aircraft engine plant in Tokyo was about to be demolished. Sorry to say the luck was with the Japanese, for the bombardier didn't see the target. Instead of continuing on to the secondary target, our colonel lead the group of planes back over Tokyo for another try. This was unexpected and it screwed up the formation. I had to climb to 31,000 feet to keep from ramming other planes. It was on this second run over Tokyo that the whole sky blossomed out with ugly flak bursts. We went from the brink of a volcano right smack into the boiling center. By this time enemy fighters were swarming up from all sections and the sky was a mass of bursting anti-aircraft shells. This was the first time my crew became mad. The officers swore at the enlisted men and vice versa for this was not our own plane and all but two of the gun turrets went dead. No one knew who had control of what guns, and pursuit were coming up fast on all sides. At this time the lead ship pulled another crazy trick and led the whole bunch back over Tokyo for the third time to try to do some good with their bombs. I was thrown out of formation during the steep turn so I headed our ship for home, completely unnerved and down-right scared to death for fighters were lining up to shoot "hell" out of us. The wind at 30,000 feet was well over a hundred miles an hour which made my actual ground speed more than 500 miles an hour since we were going down wind when we took off for home. John Wright dropped his bombs on the industrial areas of Tokyo, south of the main target so the mission wasn't a complete failure.

I happened to look ahead of the plane before we left Japan and saw a Jap single engine fighter coming in for a head-on attack; well it looked like a head-on attack, anyway. It was embarrassing, to say the least, for most all our turrets were dead. Instead of the Jap making a pass at us, we were going so fast that we passed him as he was going in our direction. Imagine his surprise when he saw us go by him about a hundred miles an hour faster!

We were a few miles off the Japanese mainland when the tail gunner called in to report a crippled B-29 that was following us home. We kept our planes in sight of each other most all the way home for mutual aid in case one of us had to ditch. About seven hours after leaving Japan, good old Saipan showed up on the radar and we knew we were close to home - once again.

During the bull session about the mission the following morning, much was said about the possibilities for improvements in our future raids. One thing is positive, there will be no more second runs over any target.

COLONEL RESCUED

It was around noon time, December 28th, when we were shaken by the news that Colonel Dougherty had ditched near an uninhabited island about 150 miles north of here on the way back from a night raid over the Japanese mainland. This time the Navy was on the spot and before the day was up, he and all the crew were picked up, safe. The very next day I went to the bar at our club and congratulated him on his good luck. He acted as if nothing unusual whatsoever had happened. Since Colonel King was shot down over the target, Colonel Dougherty has been the commanding officer for our group.

The next few days were uneventful except for a few more night raids by the Japs. Our island defense had improved a thousand percent in the past six weeks. Lately, the Japs haven't been able to get through our defense to bomb the B-29's.

My spare time was taken up with painting pictures on a number of planes, at fifty dollars a job. There are very few of us around here who can carry on their peace time job, and still do their army work at the same time.

With the New Year, came new bombing missions and the same amount of "sweating out" by all. Twelve o'clock, December 31st, was far from a dull moment. A bunch of block heads decided to shoot off their fire arms. It sounded like an air raid, only this time no one knew where the bullets were being fired from, which made it more dangerous. One soldier was accidentally shot in the arm.


NAGOYA FIRE RAID

January 3rd brought on another mission to Nagoya. This was strictly a fire raid, each plane carrying 15 fire bombs. Jackson went on this mission and took our new Fortress. I guess all the bugs hadn't been ironed out for he had to abort about 200 miles from the target. This mission proved to be a success for a large section of Nagoya was left in flames. Again our group was hit bad. Colonel Mullins, our group operations officer and Major Hurlburt were rammed over the target. They took many pursuits with them anyway.

Lt. Amos, from another squadron, was hit bad and had to ditch about 300 miles from Japan. A search mission was immediately put into effect. Four more B-29's were lost in the other groups which brought the total to six! Our worst loss for one mission to date. It is getting so every combat man lives from one raid until the next. I know that after each mission I feel that I have a new lease on life. It is not pleasant to have those kind of thoughts hanging over your head day after day, week after week, and month after month. At present no one knows how many missions we will have to pull. Some fellows will crack and it is likely to be most anyone.

Getting back to the search mission that took place after Lt. Amos went down, Lt. Sederick took off with a full load of gas and was in the air for over twenty hours! At the time they approached the location of the ditched crew, they spotted a Jap convoy headed south. Some of the boats shot at him. A Japanese twin engine "Nell" was spotted in the same locality and Lt. Sederick took after the enemy plane. As the story goes, the Jap plane tried to make it into the clouds but the bombardier shot the hell out of it with his four gun turret and they watched it go into the Pacific in flames. When the search plane came home they reported spotting the friendly submarine that was stationed in that locality to pick up any crews that had to ditch. As yet there has been no word about the lost plane being picked up. Because they were so close to enemy territory, it was the consensus of opinion that the Japs picked them up first.


NEW SHIP FALTERS

Less than a week later our crew was scheduled for the next raid. This time we were to break in our new ship. One hour out from Saipan, Lt. Shinn, reported our fuel transfer system on the blink so we too had to return. Enroute home, two P-47's came up and flew formation with us. They came extremely close so I was able to get some beautiful pictures of them. The mission wasn't a flop as far as I was concerned.

Sunday, January 14th, came another Nagoya strike. Our crew was also scheduled for this one because of the fact that we didn't complete the previous one.

On the previous raid three B-29's were lost. Lt. Charters, from another squadron in our group, was one of them. Much to our great dismay our losses continued to rise. While on the search for ditched planes following this raid, one of the search planes failed to return.


FORMATION LEADER

I was scheduled to lead the second formation in our group on January 14th. This was the second mission in which I was leading a formation of three ships. There was more responsibility attached to this position in the formation for we had two other planes depending on us. All the bombers got off OK and except for a few rain clouds the weather to Japan was perfect. While in some of these clouds, our radar man, S/Sgt. Evans, located all the other planes in the formation on his radar scope so we knew where they all were every minute of the time. Six-hundred miles from Japan, a solid overcast formed at 12,000 feet and the navigators had to really work to stay on course. The winds became extremely strong as we climbed to altitude. The only way we knew this was the fact that the coast of Japan didn't appear on the radar scope until almost an hour later than expected. Lt. Kingsley reported winds from the west at about 150 miles an hour at 30,000 feet! No doubt that seems a bit fantastic, but it is a known fact that they sometimes get up to almost 200 miles an hour.

Eight hours after leaving Saipan, Sgt. Evans reported the coast of Japan on his radar. This meant approximately thirty minutes before bombs away. All the planes except one were in perfect formation. Things looked very good, including our new plane that was operating like a dream.

The lead ship was all set up for a radar run on the target for it was not visible because of the solid undercast. We turned on our "IP", which is "Initial Point" and from there we began our bomb run. A few minutes from the target, enemy pursuit were spotted circling up to intercept us. One had flown along with our formation, out of gun range, radioing to the anti-aircraft batteries our exact altitude, number of ships, and heading. In a matter of seconds, the bomb bay doors swung open and then "Bombs away! " Through a small opening in the clouds, some of the gunners spotted bomb bursts in the vicinity of the target. No definite results were observed for our cameras were useless because of the clouds. By this time the fighters began coming in from all directions. Everything was under control-the gunners were all set -we ignored the flak and headed for home. It was easy to see that the Nip pilots were plenty scared of us for out of 30 fighters spotted only ten attacked. The B-29 gunners returned all the fire and completely disrupted their attack. Our formation suffered no damage whatsoever. The enemy did not fare quite so well.

"ENJOYABLE" MISSION

One of the bombers accidentally dumped his bomb bay tanks out over the target so we worried plenty about him getting home before he ran out of gas. Tall winds on the way home proved to be a God-send to those short on gas for the ship that lost its bomb bay gas tanks had two engines konk out just after it landed. We covered the 1,500 miles home in just six hours; an hour before we had expected to land.

This whole mission, for our group, was actually enjoyable for most everything went off like clock work. This was the first raid in which I got up enough nerve to take a few pictures over the target area. Total loss in the four groups for this trip was three B-29's. One of which caught fire on the way to the target and crashed into the ocean. Half the crew was saved. It wasn't until a few days later that I found out about the plane from the 499th Squadron that ditched on the way home. It was the one that I painted the pretty Spanish girl on, with the slogan "Hasta Luego" meaning "See you later". The alternate crew who flew the plane came around and sorrowfully asked if I would paint another picture on their new Superfortress.

January 19th was just another mission day. Our B-29 groups hadn't been doing very sharp bombings. This was mainly caused by bad weather over the target. The bomber command was convinced that accurate bombing couldn't be achieved at 31,000 and 32,000 feet so our outfits had orders to go over at 25,000 on this mission. Most all armor plate was removed, plus an extra bomb bay gas tank to lighten the ship on this mission. The target was an aircraft assembly plant west of Nagoya, considered top priority for bombing.

It was Jackson's turn to take our plane so, like all the rest on the ground, we commenced "sweating 'em out". About eight hours after take off, the planes over the target sent back strike reports by radio. They sounded good! An hour or so after the last B-29 landed, we received all the details of the mission. The primary target was completely destroyed, a number of pursuits were shot down and all our aircraft returned safely! No wonder so many of the boys went out and got stinkin! This was the first time the four groups in the wing all returned O.K. since the first day of operations out of Saipan.

We could well imagine all the Japanese pursuit pilots getting completely "chewed out" for not touching any of the Superfortresses.

Because we had such good luck going in at 25,000 feet, the next mission was scheduled for the same altitude. My plane was having its guns harmonized so we weren't able to go on this deal either. I was appointed one of the runway control officers. The job consisted of controlling bomber traffic on the ground, and seeing that they all took off on time without trouble.

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