AMERICAN BOMBER CREWMAN 1941–45 GREGORY FREMONT-BARNES ILLUSTRATED BY SEÁN Ó’BRÓGÁIN ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com WARRIOR • 119 AMERICAN BOMBER CREWMAN 1941–45 GREGORY FREMONT-BARNES ILLUSTRATED BY SEÁN Ó’BRÓGÁIN ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 4 CHRONOLOGY 6 RECRUITMENT AND ENLISTMENT 8 TRAINING 9 APPEARANCE AND DRESS 14 EQUIPMENT 22 DAILY LIFE AND CONDITIONS OF SERVICE 30 EXPERIENCE OF BATTLE 36 AFTERMATH 56 COLLECTIONS AND MUSEUMS 60 BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING 61 INDEX 64 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com AMERICAN BOMBER CREWMAN IN WORLD WAR II 1941–45 INTRODUCTION When the United States entered World War II on December 7, 1941 as a result of the Japanese aerial attack on Pearl Harbor, it had virtually no air force to speak of, not least any bombers. The Eighth Air Force, which was to control bombing and fighter missions over Europe, did not exist. As a result of an agreement between President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill reached nine months before the United States even entered the war, priority was to be given to the defeat of Germany, and hence the majority of American assets were designated for service in Europe. If aircraft themselves were not entirely new, the bomber itself was a very new form of aviation technology and the principles behind large-scale bombing of military and civilian targets were only formulated in the 1920s. Though not fully appreciated by 1941, much had already been learned A bomber crew posing in front of their aircraft. (Library of Congress) 4 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com from the Blitz the year before. Men like Billy Mitchell and, more importantly, Giulio Douhet in the 1920s, had already advocated the importance of air power and the concept of what would later become strategic bombing rather than the tactical support of ground forces, that is, hitting the enemy’s capacity for war: civilian population centers, transportation and communication, railway yards, factories, military installations, and dockyards, so crippling wartime production and so terrorizing the enemy population as to potentially break its will and cow it into surrender. It appeared to many that merely by bringing bombers to bear directly against the enemy’s vital centers and means of production the war could be won. The United States played a vital part in this effort, in the form of the strategic bombing campaign fought between 1942 and 1945, first against Germany and, by 1944, also against Japan. This book seeks to describe the lives and experiences of the men who served in these campaigns, particularly those who served in the most famous bomber aircraft of their day: the B-17 Flying Fortress, B-24 Liberator, and B-29 Superfortress. A great deal is known about the lives and experiences of the men who flew in these machines, not least because they were generally more literate than their compatriots in the Army and Navy, but more importantly because they often had a respite between combat missions on the safety of an air base far from the enemy, where they could log their thoughts and experiences in a diary or journal, or write home. Foot soldiers had nothing more than a tent in which to sleep and could only carry with them what was absolutely essential. Only when withdrawn from the front line might they have the time to jot down some thoughts, but even then there was nowhere to leave such a journal, and they were in any event discouraged from doing so to avoid its capture by the enemy, who could obtain valuable intelligence from its contents. Airmen, on the other hand, could write down what they pleased and leave it safely in their quarters. Even if captured or killed, their journals Sunset silhouette of a Flying and letters remained safely back at their base. Fortress. (Library of Congress) ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com CHRONOLOGY 1933–34 The Boeing Aviation Company designs and builds its first B-17, a four-engine bomber whose prototype makes its first flight in 1935. 1939 September 1 World War II begins in Europe. 1940–42 To supply the need for a bomber heavier than the B-17 and B-24, US aeronautical engineers design the B-29 Superfortress, which doubled the range and bomb load of other aircraft. In August 1943 the Joint Chiefs of Staff decide to confine the use of the B-29 to the Pacific Theater, where the bomber’s impressive 1,600-mile combat radius could be put to best use. 1941 December 7 The United States enters World War II as a result of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Germany declares war on America four days later. 1942 January 28 The US Eighth Air Force is formed, responsible for the European Theater of Operations (ETO), with headquarters established in England on February 23. April 18 Doolittle Raid against Tokyo and other Japanese cities, involving 16 B-25s. May 11 First contingent of American bomber crew arrives in England – 39 officers and 384 enlisted men. July 4 First United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) operation over western Europe; six borrowed British bombers participate in an RAF raid against airfields in Holland. July 6 First B-17s of the Eighth Air Force arrive in Britain. August 17 The Eighth Air Force launches its first heavy bomber raid against occupied Europe, with 12 B-17s attacking the railway marshaling yards at Rouen, in northern France. October 9 First American bombing raid from Britain involving more than 100 bombers, now including B-24 Liberators. 1943 January 3 During an attack on the submarine base at St. Nazaire, Eighth Air Force bombers employ formation precision bombing, instead of individual bombing, for the first time. January 27 Eighth Air Force launches its first attack against Germany, striking Wilhelmshaven with 55 B-17s. March 4 First Eighth Air Force attack on a factory complex in the Ruhr, Germany’s industrial heartland. May 4 P-47 fighters begin escorting Eighth Air Force bombers as far as 175 miles. May 18 The Combined Chiefs of Staff of the United States and Great Britain approve a plan for the Combined Bomber Offensive (CBO), involving constant attacks on German targets by the Eighth Air Force and RAF Bomber Command. 6 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com July 23–30 “Blitz Week”: First sustained air offensive mounted by the Eighth Air Force against important industrial targets in Germany. August 17 Eighth Air Force launches its deepest penetration of Germany thus far, raiding a fighter aircraft plant at Regensburg and ball bearing factories at Schweinfurt with 315 bombers, a staggering 60 of which are lost. August 30 First use of radar-equipped bombers designed to locate targets in Germany through overcast conditions. September 27 First American bomber raid escorted throughout its entire journey to a German target (Emden) by P-47 fighters. October 14 Staggering loss of another 60 B-17s in a second attack on Schweinfurt, leading to a temporary halt on daylight bombing of strategic targets deep inside Germany. 1944 March 4 First American bombing raid on Berlin area. April Eight airfields for B-29s now available in India and China for operations against Japanese-occupied Asia and the home islands themselves; Operation Matterhorn, the bombing of Japan from China, begins. May 7 Largest number of B-17s and B-24s flying on a single day thus far, with more than 900 bombers operating against various targets. June 15 First raid against Japan since the Doolittle attack in April 1942 with 68 B-29s taking off from China, marking the beginning of the strategic bombing campaign against Japan. July The capture of the Marianas, above all Saipan in the western Pacific, enables American bombers to raid Japan without recourse to the more vulnerable and logistically problematic bases in China. July 20 More than 1,200 heavy bombers, the largest number of attacking aircraft by the Eighth Air Force thus far, strike various targets in central Germany; this figure will peak at 1,900 on Christmas Eve. November 12 First Superfortress attack on Japan from the Marianas, involving 111 B-29s. 1945 February 25 Massive B-29 raid against Tokyo, the first of many to follow, involving incendiary bombs dropped on a densely populated city constructed mostly of wood. March–June Series of highly destructive fire raids launched against major Japanese cities, including Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, and Kobe, leading to the incineration of large urban areas. April 25 Last of the American heavy bomber raids in Europe, directed against an armaments factory and airfield in German-occupied Czechoslovakia. May 7 Germany surrenders unconditionally, with effect from the following day. May 25–26 Last fire raid against Tokyo. September 2 Japan formally surrenders, bringing World War II to a close. 7 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com RECRUITMENT AND ENLISTMENT A bomber crew of the United States Army Air Forces (often known as the Army Air Corps, the US Air Force did not exist as a separate branch of the armed forces until 1947) normally consisted of ten men: a pilot, co-pilot, radioman, ball turret gunner, tail gunner, bombardier, flight engineer (who also served as the top turret gunner), the right waist gunner, the left waist gunner, and the navigator. The flight engineer, radio operator, and gunners were all enlisted men; the others were officers. Crews necessarily contained a cross-section of American society – a microcosm in fact – since it required men of varying skills, abilities, and educational backgrounds. As bomber crews were partly composed of men with technical abilities, they generally needed to be quite intelligent. At the outset of the war the US Army Air Force (USAAF) therefore required men to have a minimum of two years of college education. When the number of qualified candidates began to dry up due to losses and the heavy demand by all branches of the service for good men, applicants were required to pass an entrance examination. Flight engineers and radio operators also required an ability to acquire certain technical knowledge and skills, and thus, in administering intelligence tests to such men, the Air Corps was looking for men with a reasonable command of reading comprehension and verbal skills. Motives for enlistment varied greatly: attraction to the new phenomenon of flight at a time when commercial air travel was virtually unknown; the glamor of the uniform and the wings pinned to a man’s chest; or perhaps dislike or fear of the experience of fighting on foot. Signing up was a simple affair – hopefuls could make an appearance at a recruiting station where they could then state their preference for the Army Air Corps, and more specifically to work with fighter or bomber aircraft, or as ground crew. Bomber crews were composed entirely of volunteers owing to the particularly hazardous nature of their task. Men could also enter the service via the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) program at their college or university in which, while they continued to work toward their degree, they were simultaneously trained as a junior officer, entering the army (or navy) upon graduation. Bill Odell, 27 years old and from Chicago, entered the Army in 1942 as a reserve officer in the ROTC program at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. After spending a year at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, in an antiaircraft artillery regiment, he applied for pilot training. His motives for joining up were several, including the romance of flying and an attraction to some of the comforts enjoyed by the Air Corps as opposed to those in the infantry: Having endured four maneuvers during which Air Corps units were involved, I saw no torrential rain, shin-deep mud, well-digger’s butt temperatures, im- penetrable woods and thickets, inadequate maps, missed meals and sleep up where the Air Corps were. The hazardous duty pay was a windfall. There were few classmates who had increased their income by 50 percent in two years to $187.50 a month since graduation. Richard Fitzhugh, a B-17 pilot with the 457th Bomb Group, based in England, needed little in the way of incentives. As a boy he had admired Charles Lindbergh and had watched commercial C-47s and DC-3s take off from Hoover Field in Washington. In May 1942, after passing a recruiting poster for B-17s with a friend, they spontaneously signed up. B. C. Reed started training as a B-18 co-pilot in August 1940, unaware that war would soon put a stop to Wednesday and Friday afternoons off and completely free weekends. 8 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com B-17 Flying Fortress. Nose art usually came in one of two forms: either as a cartoon, as here, or a voluptuous, semi-clad woman. Note the numerous bomb motifs, which indicate the number of missions this aircraft has flown. The three swastikas indicate the number of enemy fighters shot down by the gunners of this bomber. (Corbis) He simply wanted “wings,” which imparted a special form of prestige not only within the armed forces, but within American society as a whole. Marshall Draper, 24, having run out of money for his education, had dropped out of UCLA the previous year and applied for pilot training in order to save enough money to finish college. In the event he was not trained as a pilot, however, but as a bombardier, learning to operate the Norden bombsight on both B-17s and B-24s while based in Florida. Once recruited, men were shipped off to their training bases. Ben Smith, a B-17 radio operator, remembers the journey: We came east on a troop train that seemed to make no progress at all. It toiled on for days, chugging and wheezing and clanking along, stopping for hours at a time, then backing up for miles, then stopping and starting again... Sometimes we would sit on a siding, sweating and dirty, as a streamliner flashed by us at lightning speed, compounding our discomfort... The troop trains were pulled by the old iron-horse locomotives. Because of the heat we rode with the windows up. There was no air conditioning. The cinders were flying about like sooty snowflakes. Rivulets of dirty sweat streamed down our faces, our clothes became filthy, and we stank abominably. TRAINING Well before the United States entered the war in December 1941, the government was aware that war with Germany and Japan was virtually certain, as a result of which many military observers had come to Britain during 1940–41 to observe the RAF’s tactics in fighting the Luftwaffe. They also scouted the countryside for potential bases for American aircraft, and had sent bombers to Britain for the use of the RAF. Much, after all, could be learned from the combat experiences of these crews. Thus, once war began men and machines began to arrive in Britain in ever-increasing numbers and bases sprang up, particularly in the eastern counties of England. Lieutenant-General Henry (Hap) Arnold, chief of the Army Air Forces, appointed MajGen Carl Spaatz to head the Eighth, established in January 1942, with BrigGen Ira Eaker in charge of the bomber component, known as Eighth Bomber Command. At the end of May 1942, Operation Millennium, the beginning of saturation bombing by the RAF, began, and the following month the first B-17s, together with fighter groups of P-38s and P-39s, arrived in England. 9 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com Pilot training required a minimum of 400 flying hours and pilots were trained by the particular unit to which they were assigned. In addition to instruction in flying, they practiced gunnery, both in the air and on the ground, navigation, instrument handling, formation, night flying, and aerobatics, depending on the type of aircraft, of course. Bill Odell, on arrival in England in May 1942, was immediately assigned to fly in RAF Bostons in order to acquire immediate combat experience and such skills as aircraft identification, communications procedures, ditching techniques, combat flying, and many other aspects of aircraft operation. In one simulated attack he dropped four bombs on a range from 75ft and later bombed and machine-gunned a partly sunken ship off the coast. On rare occasions, training ended in disaster, as aircraft practicing at low levels could strike trees. In July 1942, two officers were killed in a crash at the USAAF base at Molesworth in East Anglia when, on returning from an altitude chamber test, their controls apparently locked during a descent from 4,000 feet. Cadets were expected to make four three-point landings. “Evaluation,” Bob DeGroat, recalled, “was based on approach, landing control, form, and proximity to a hypothetical spot directly in front of the parked control plane. As luck would have it, I was really ‘on’ this day. I strung together probably the best four BT landings that I ever made, and stuck them in with my wing tip dead in front of the ‘judges.’” Although the B-17 was not used as a night bomber, cross-country flight training often took place at night, with near mid-air collisions not uncommon in the days when there were no radar stations to manage air traffic. DeGroat recalled his final day of training: BELOW The assignment was a low-level cross-country [flight] designed to sharpen Cadet ground school class at identification of physical checkpoints and map reading, but was understood Randolph Field, Texas, 1942. by student and instructor alike to be a legalized “buzz job.” In my own case, (Air Force Historical Research during the early moments of the trip, every time I glanced at my instructor in the Agency) co-pilot seat, his hand seemed to subtly indicate that I was too high. It was great BELOW RIGHT fun. We went down valleys, climbed over tree lines and high tension wires, AT-11 training bombers at the scared some livestock, and even startled a few people driving on the highway. USAAF advanced flying school dropping practice bombs near Those destined not to fly bombers – either because they did not possess Carlsbad, New Mexico. (Library of Congress) the requisite skills or because they preferred to play a different role aboard 10 ©OspreyPublishing(cid:129)www.ospreypublishing.com