Bomber Pilot

by Philip Ardery

  Regretfully, I watched Smitty losing altitude. Then my attention was called to another ship of the formation. It was R for Roger, of Paul Burton's squadron. A lieutenant named Furst was flying it, and he evidently had his oxygen lines knocked out. He let down to the left and Smitty pulled his ship over in that direction.

  Just then I heard a call over the interphone from one of the waist gunners. “Fighters at eight o'clock high.” This meant, of course, they were coming in above us from our rear, left-hand quarter. They made one pass on the formation and then zoomed off to the left in the direction of the two cripples. Five Ju88s, the German twin-engined fighters, made repeated attacks on those two ships. Our waist gunner gave us a continuing report of the fight, since he could see what was going on in that quarter much better than we could from the cockpit.

  “Gee, those Libs are catching hell,” he moaned. “There goes Furst, he's on fire going down, but there are two Ju88s down.” Shortly after that our gunner lost sight of Furst. It was evident R for Roger was lost. It was burning hard on the way down. Maybe the crew got out. We never knew.

  Then we lost sight of Smitty, who was far to our rear still fighting like a porpoise beset by barracuda. He had all guns going, and when last we saw him he was inflicting as much sting as he could.

  We were out of flak. We got two or three more halfhearted attacks by fighters, but our formation was good and the Nazis seemed to have little spirit that day to continue. We went out past the coast toward the island of Helgoland which was off to the right spewing up more flak. We were not going to go over that patch. After flying north a while we turned west toward home. All the way home I thought of Smitty, a quiet redhead and a very shy, fine person. I again recalled his wanting me to be the best man in his wedding. Smitty was gone. He hadn't had a chance. Was it my fault? I had done just as I had been instructed to do many times, but even so, could I have done otherwise than I had without risking my formation? I wondered. There was Furst, too, doubtless another fine pilot with a great crew. I had not known him well and naturally my feelings were not quite like they were about Smitty, with whom I had been closely associated for many months.

  At length we sighted England and after a few minutes more we were over our own base peeling off to land. It was just getting dark and was about an hour later than the time we had been due. We had lost time when the lead group went wandering over half of Germany off course, looking for the target. As our plane pulled into its hard stand and the engines killed, a jeep pulled up. It was Bill Taylor, my squadron adjutant. He shouted at me from the jeep.

  “Sure glad to see you. We were sweating you out. We've been waiting for you for over an hour.”

  I told Bill about Smitty and then got into the jeep to go to the interrogation room. No use to sweat Smitty out, I thought. When I walked into the interrogation room I saw Colonel Wood. “Nice work, Phil!” he said. “Miller had engine trouble and when I heard he'd had to abort I was worried. Guess you did all right.”

  “Well, I don't know,” I replied. “I don't think we hit the briefed target. We hit some kind of an important looking factory. I guess the photographs will tell the story as soon as they are developed.”

  We got out pictures of the target area, and I was able to point out the spot where the bombs fell. We had no records on what the buildings were that we hit, but the intelligence people could figure it out in time.

  Just then one of my men rushed in and up to where I was standing. “A ship is coming in. It may be Lieutenant Smith.”

  I jumped in a jeep at the door and sped to the tower. I saw the big letter E on the tail of a plane at the end of the runway. Its inboard engines were out, and it was taxiing with the outboards toward the hard stand assigned to it.

  “Thank God!” I thought. I never had believed it possible. I drove down to where the ship parked and ran shouting to it. The bomb doors opened and out jumped Smitty. He was laughing and then in a moment so was I.

  “You look worried,” he said. “I knew I'd make it. I just couldn't get home as fast as you did. Furst and I got three of those Ju88s, but I'm afraid there isn't much hope for Furst. We're going to need a little help with Sergeant Lesho.” The sergeant, it turned out, had taken a .50 caliber machine gun Hollywood style, when it was shot from its mount by enemy fire, and held it against his body. With the gun held in this manner he had scored a probable kill. The attacking Ju88 had been seen headed down with smoke pouring from an engine. Sergeant Lesho had received serious bruises about his chest and had to be taken to the hospital. Several of the boys had picked up splinters of 20 mm. shells, which had burst in virtually every part of the airplane, but none of them was seriously wounded. It was really a miracle. Smitty seemed so calm about it all, but he knew as well as I that he had used up more good luck than one man's ration normally allows. He was going to forget that. He was home now, and you could see he was trying to bring down the curtain on the memory of some horrible hours.

  After that I found myself something of a hero with the group command for having taken over the formation and led it on the first raid into Germany. I really wondered what else I could have done. Later intelligence reported we had done considerable damage to the factory we hit. It wasn't as high-priority a target as the one we were supposed to hit and couldn't. But for a first trip into Germany and for a target of opportunity, the results looked pretty good. At least they were good enough so that the next day we got a teletype commendation from General Hodges, the division commander.

  I reflected that it was fine to be considered a hero, but if that raid is any sample of the way the rest of our raids are to be, I doubt that I shall live to finish a tour. We were extremely lucky to have lost only one ship. Nearly all the planes in the formation had suffered flak damage. You could figure the losses mathematically against the number of raids in a tour and get yourself into a state of melancholia. Because, mathematically, at that time and figured from the way it went for some time after, no one had a chance to get through. Of course, those of us who were not actual combat crew members were not supposed to feel it necessary to get in a tour. Theoretically, we had administrative functions in addition to our combat work. Nevertheless, our business was bombing, not administering. The men who went out day in and day out couldn't long be expected to retain respect for their commanders if the commanders shirked their part of combat.

  The fall of 1943 was terrible for flying. Mission after mission went out with poor results. It was the kind of thing that was hard on everyone, but I think it was worst for the few of us who acted as command pilots. We felt ourselves responsible for the success of the missions we led. And though a mission might fail because of bad weather, the command pilot assigned would brood over it. He was likely to get the idea that perhaps someone else thought he had done poorly or made improper decisions, or that some other commander might have done better.

  Colonel Miller felt very bad about having to abort at the enemy coast on the Vegesack mission. After that he led a couple of other missions when the weather was terrible, and those missions were fizzles, all from circumstances utterly beyond his control. I knew other commanders were suffering from bad missions, but at that time I didn't quite get their point of view. I had a lot of confidence in myself as a leader, but I had not much confidence in my ability to finish a tour alive.

  Soon after Vegesack I was assigned to lead the group on a mission to an airfield near Oslo, Norway. The B-17s were going after some power stations in that area. The weather was so bad as to make it utterly impossible to go over Western Europe. Tom Conroy, the new junior squadron commander, was to be my deputy leader. The weather over base and in the direction we were going was also poor, but we were briefed to expect it to get better as we neared the coast of Norway. Again we had no fighter support, but were told that we might expect enemy defenses to be light. There was little flak in the area, and supposedly there were only a few enemy fighters.

  I set up Bob Wright and crew to fly with me in the lead ship. We took off in
instrument weather, ceiling nearly zero. We climbed out on the prescribed course trying to get through the overcast. Up and up we went, much higher than we had been told we would have to go to reach the top of the stuff. Then we turned back, using our radio aid to navigation to come directly over the field. The overcast at this altitude was not as dense as I have seen it, but it was dense enough so that I couldn't see another ship in the sky. I did hear all sorts of radio calls from other ships obviously as much lost as I was as far as assembling the formation was concerned. Occasionally I would see a flare signal fired, but I would either not be able to catch a glimpse of the plane from which it was fired, or would see it only for a moment and then lose it. All my crew members were searching the sky with me and reporting over interphone in an effort to help.

  As the lead crew of the group, we fired many flares trying to get the other ships of the group to form on us. We called them on the radio, giving our position. We did everything we knew to do in an effort to lure someone to us. Finally we struck out on course alone to the point on the northern English coast where we were to meet the other group formation and head out over the North Sea. We got there and saw no one. It was as hazy there as it was over home base. Generally the weather was instrument weather with some spots where the haze lightened, but we could see no one.

  We hadn't picked up a single wing man of a whole group formation which was supposed to be with us. We stooged around in the stuff for half an hour later than our briefed time of departure from the friendly coast. Finally, finding no one to make any part of the formation, I aborted the mission and landed. It was evident from the radio calls we had heard that nearly all the ships of our group had already returned to base after failing to make formation. Our division tactical doctrine contained in it one mandate that my mind particularly applied to this situation. It said, in effect, that under no circumstances will an air commander take a unit over the enemy coast if it were not properly formed. I had heard this doctrine many times. And yet I was uncertain. Should I have gone on? Did any of the others succeed in going on and getting to the target? Was I afraid to go on?

  As soon as I got on the ground I went to group operations to find out who had landed. I found all of us had returned except Tom Conroy, the deputy leader, and one other. I was burned up. Tom was an up-and-coming young leader, and I had let him give me the slip. He would return in the blaze of glory of being the only one in a “lead” capacity who had been able to get over the target. My reaction to this situation on the spur of the moment was so typical and so narrow that I later looked back upon it with shame.

  Many hours later Tom flew in. He had been to Norway. The weather had cleared somewhat en route, but never got good enough for him to bomb the primary target. He had joined with a few ships of another group that had managed to get together, and the bunch of them finally picked a target of opportunity and bombed. Bombing results were dubious, pending the developing of the bombing pictures.

  I went through agony over my apparent failure to get the formation together and get over the target. At least I could have gone on alone, but I didn't. It was almost too much for me to bear. I found out later, to add to my misery, that General Timberlake was in one of the planes of another group that had been able to get together and bomb. Why hadn't they told us the general was flying? They usually did. Why hadn't I gone on? What must the others think about it? I was deeply ashamed of myself.

  The final report of the bombing of the mission proved that bombing results were generally poor. An improper target of opportunity had been bombed, but Tom was in no way to blame because he had joined another formation having none of his own to fly with, and was accordingly under the authority of the other leader. He had bombed as they bombed, and they had bombed as best they could under the limitations imposed by the weather. There was no enemy opposition of any kind and all of the ships returned without damage.

  That evening I saw Tom at the bar in the officers’ club. A surge of feeling almost made me play the little boy, envious and angry, but I forced it down; and painfully swallowing my pride, I went up to him. “Tom,” I said, “you did today what I should have done. I aborted for no reason, and you went on and bombed the target. I am ashamed of myself, but I admire you and admit I envy your performance.” He accepted my compliment with what seemed to me to be a bit of surprise. I was never particularly close to Tom. No one was, but I knew he was a very efficient squadron commander, and I recognized the envy in my attitude.

  Though anguished, I was later relieved when reports indicated the raid was a poor one even for those crews who got to Norway. But after that temporary relief, my brooding about the mission began to build up again in spite of my strongest efforts to put the thought of it behind me. The more I thought about it, the more important it seemed. The fact that the weather had been as it was and the fact that only a handful of ships out of the whole combat wing had managed to get out and bomb more or less ineffectively meant nothing. I would have given years of my life to have been with them.

  I got Colonel Wood to say that I could lead the next mission. I had to clear my mind of this bad one. For two or three days missions were planned and scrubbed on account of the weather. Then finally Colonel Wood said he had decided to lead the next one but that I might go as deputy lead. The next day after that announcement we were waked early to perform the same mission which had been hanging fire—the airdrome near Oslo. The weather was still bad, but we were to try it again, this time with Colonel Wood leading and me in the number two slot.

  I had a suspicion that this time it might be a rough raid, but I didn't care how rough it would be. I remembered my thesis of what happens on the second raid on a new target. We had been briefed on this mission four or five times now, and there might well have been leaks in security. The fact that little opposition was met before was no indication it would be light this time. However, I was mad enough to care nothing about opposition until I had reestablished my reputation as a leader.

  We took off in weather almost as bad as it had been the time before. Colonel Wood took off. I told Bob Wright, who again was my pilot, to give our ship the gun before the lead plane cleared the runway. This is bad practice for aircraft so heavily loaded. Usually more interval between takeoffs is allowed, but the weather was so bad I knew if we didn't follow close upon the leader we would lose him and perhaps never find him again.

  Sure enough we tacked onto the lead ship right after takeoff. Climbing through the heavy cloud over the area, we never lost it. But for a little more than an hour our two ships circled over the field, unable to get a single other airplane in formation with us. It was the same old story of haze almost as thick as solid cloud. When the time allotted for formation of the group expired, Colonel Wood put out a radio call to say we were proceeding to the point of departure from the friendly coast. He directed any other ships of our unit to proceed there individually where they might again try to pick us up. Just after we left the coast we met one other ship. It was V for Victor, bearing the name Vagabond King, flown by a starry-eyed young captain named McCormick. Thus our three Libs set forth to bomb Norway. We had no fighter escort, and heavy weather intervened between us and our target.

  For a while we managed to get over the overcast into rather clear air. But farther out over the North Sea the tops of the clouds got higher and higher as we approached the line where our weather officer had told us to expect a front. When we neared the front I got a call on the radio from Colonel Wood. He told me he was having supercharger trouble. He said he would keep on going as long as he could, but if the cloud layer got much higher he didn't believe he would be able to get over it. I acknowledged his message and told him I stood ready to take over should he have to turn back.

  After a while, however, the cloud level began to subside, and it was evident he was going to make it. At this point we saw a fourth Lib way out to the right of us. The pilot had evidently spotted us because he headed our way. Soon it came near enough for me to see it was B for Baker, and g
ood old Mac McLaughlin. Mac came over and tacked high right on our ship, making us four in all.

  We soon saw the coast of Norway. Underneath were the extremely cold waters of the Skagerrak. Under no circumstances would a man bail out over such water. It's not possible to live more than ten or fifteen minutes in it. It was early December, but the sea had the look of water that is icy cold twelve months a year. Just about that time I looked out and saw four fighter planes. Our gunners saw them at the same time. I called the other ships of the formation and told them to expect attack momentarily from fighters at two o'clock high.

  The fighters were queuing up, as the British say. They drew along in line astern until they were in perfect position to make a diving, quartering attack from our right. Then one by one they peeled. I could see the first increase his speed as down, down he came. A beautiful, perfectly streamlined Focke-Wulf 190. At fairly short range he opened fire on us with the four cannons in his wings. He fired a long burst and passed very close under us. Our gunners got in only a few shots. When first I had seen his guns smoking I thought he was being hit by our fire, but then I realized he was giving it to us and the smoke along his wing was from the mouths of his own cannons. Apparently our gunners hadn't laid a thing on him.

  In orderly and quick succession the other three came by. They were not as close as the first but were easily close enough to get hits. As they passed under, my right waist gunner called me on the interphone. “The number four engine is losing oil.”

  I nudged Bob Wright. “I won't feather that prop unless the oil pressure begins to drop as long as we are under attack. I'll watch the oil pressure gauge and catch it if the pressure falls off.” Bob nodded. You have to feather props while there is oil pressure left or else they won't feather. It is sometimes bad policy to feather or stop a prop when under fighter attack because it lets the fighters know you are a cripple and they concentrate on you. Of course they might have seen our oil leak, but oil on an engine nacelle is less prominent than a feathered prop. If an engine is dead, however, and the prop is allowed to windmill, it exerts much more drag on the plane than if it is feathered. Also a dead engine with a windmilling prop and no oil is apt to heat up and cause a fire. All these considerations work automatically in a combat pilot's mind to help him reach a conclusion.