Harry H. Crosby - A Wing and a Prayer

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A Wing and a Prayer

The Bloody 100th Bomb Group of the US Eighth Air Force in Action Over Europe in World War II

Harry H. Crosby

To the memory of Jean Crosby, and to Mary Alice Crosby, in appreciation for so much of the joy in my life then and now .

Contents

Acknowledgments

First of all, it is not enough merely to thank the two pilots with whom I flew when I was on a crew. Were it not for John Brady and Ev Blakely I would not be here, and there would be no story.

Secondly, I must thank the men and women of the 100thnot only the flyers, but those who kept us flying. They all made this narrative the grand story to which I hope I have done adequate service. I must thank, especially, the three great leaders of the 100th, Jack Kidd, John Bennett, and Tom Jeffrey, who did so much to make us proud to be members of the group whom history now knows as The Bloody 100th.

Since the war, I have been indebted to Horace Varian, Bill Carleton, Bob Rosenthal, Ray Miller, Bud Buschmeier, Butch Goodwin, Hong Kong Wilson, and Cowboy Roane. As leaders of our postwar association, they have kept the group together; they have kept the juices flowing, and the stories growing. I am not sure whether our reunions have preserved fact or legendespecially about Frank Valesh and his indomitable crewbut they certainly have strengthened our friendship and respect through the years.

For the opportunity to check my memories and records, I express my appreciation to Roger Freeman, Richard LeStrange, Ed Jablonski, Tom Hatfield, Ian Hawkins, David MacIsaac, and Martin Middlebrook, whose studies have caught not only the history of the 100th Bomb Group and the Eighth Air Force, but their spirit. Roger Freeman is, of course, the one who gave us our name, The Mighty Eighth.

Much of the credit for the illustrations in this book must go to John Schwarz, who, during those years, was our Photo Lab Officer.

Credit surely must go to the two editors of The 8th A F News , John Woolnough and James Hill, and to Lew Lyle, the founder and guiding light of The Mighty Eighth Air Force Heritage Center at Savannah. They, too, have kept the memories alive.

Two people, who did not fly with the 100th, deserve to be honorary members. My agent, Nancy Love, and my editor at HarperCollins, M. S. (Buz) Wyeth, lived the missions and survived the hazards of bringing this book to publication. They were immensely helpful.

And, finally, I want to express my special gratitude and affection to Jim Brown, Ellis Scripture, and Irv Waterbury, an inner circle of confidants. Their friendship alone has, for me, made this whole project a grand adventure.

Chapter 1

Practice Mission to the Orkneys

Lieutenant, Lieutenant!

The orderly from Squadron Ops shook me again.

Wake up, sir. You are flying.

I squinted at my wrist watch, 1942 G.I. Air Corps issue to all airmen. At four A.M ., in England, with Double British Summer Time, it was already light.

The 418th is stood down today. I turned over and tried to go back to sleep.

I know, Lieutenant, but you are flying on a practice mission.

Shivering, I got up and started to put on my pants and shirt. My eyes came into focus. The long Nissen hut had two rows of beds with eight beds in each row. Most of the beds were empty. That meant the crews of Crankshaft, Keissling, and Knox were flying. Next to me and across the aisle my own pilot, copilot, and bombardier were still asleep.

Why arent you waking Brady, Hoerr, and Ham?

Captain Blakely doesnt have a navigator. You are flying with him. Lieutenant Payne didnt get back from pass.

Poor round, smiling, butch-haircut, hard luck Bubbles! He hadnt dated much till he met a nice Land Army girl in Norwich. Since then he had spent nearly every night in town. Once again he had missed the motor pool truck back to the base.

I put on my mission gear. Long johns, blue flannel underwear wired for connection to the planes electrical system, O.D. wool pants and shirt, low-cut brown oxford shoes, black wool tie. Over this, my flying coveralls. Over everything, fleece-lined boots, leather fleece-lined pants, jacket, and a hat. I picked up my navigation kit, two bags, one like a briefcase and one like a zippered notebook. Just to make sure Ernie Warsaw hadnt borrowed anything I looked inside: E6B computer, Weems plotter, two triangles, pencils, eraser, a collection of U.K. maps, plotting charts, my logbook. Check. After checking the clip to make sure it was loaded, I strapped on my .45 revolver. Carry it always, we were told.

The briefcase. Yep. Five #10 grocery sacks, just about how many I would need when I got airsick and vomited.

Automatically I checked to locate my packet of pictures of Jean. If I got shot down and ended up in a hospital or prison camp, it would be nice to have some pictures of my wife. Although this was a practice mission, for luck I zippered her pictures in the leg pocket of my flying coveralls.

Okay. Ready for the blue.

Usually before a mission we went to Group Ops for a briefing, then to the Flying Officers Mess for breakfast, and then to Equipment for our oxygen masks, parachutes, and any equipment specially required for the mission. Then we would go to the flight line where our B-l7s were moored on concrete pads called hard stands. This would be done with ten or twelve officers climbing in and out over the back end-gate of a truck personnel carrier.

Now, when the orderly and I went out the door of our hut, he got into a jeep. I sat in the copilots seat. Instead of stopping at the mess or Group Ops, the corporal drove straight on toward the flight line.

Hey, Corporal, what about breakfast? My breath steamed as I spoke.

Sorry, sir, but they forgot to wake you in time. We thought Lieutenant Payne would be with the crew.

At Blakelys plane, number Zero-Six-One, with the stupid name Just a-Snappin , the officers and crew were getting ready. Ev Blakely, pilot, Charlie Via, copilot, Jim Douglass, bombardier, and the enlisted men. Top turret gunner Monroe Thornton, ball turret Bill McClelland, radio operator Ed Forkner, waist gunners Lester Saunders and Ed Yevich, and tail gunner Lyle Nord. Forky, the radio operator, curly hair, round, eager face, looked about fifteen years old. I remembered him lipping off at meetings. A smart-ass kid.

Ev Blakely and Jim Douglass were about the two skinniest men I ever saw. Blakes face had so little flesh on it that his head looked like a skeleton. Doug had a mustacheBlake called him Brushbut his face was almost as thin. They lived in a different barracks, so I didnt know them well.

Charlie Via, the copilot, smiled and said, I see weve got a new navigator. How about that? Since he was from Virginia, it came out, Hoo-a boot that?

Blake was in the pilots seat, on the left side, and the ground crew chief was in the right seat. Ev was running up the engines with the crew chief watching the dials. Although it was a practice mission, the gunners were installing their .50-caliber machine guns On its first practice mission, our bomb group, the 100th, lost a plane to a flight of intruding Messerschmitts.

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