Combat Crew (37 page)

There was an unspoken feeling among men who have lived together and fought side by side that has no parallel in civilian life. We all went to the train to see Ugo off. I realized that barring some unforeseen coincidence I would never see him again. Oh, we mumbled words like “we'll write and keep in touch” but it would not happen, and we knew it. Separated by time and distance, the letters and cards we intended to write would get sidetracked until the relationships would fade out. Tucked away in a far corner of the mind a flicker of remembrances would surface at odd moments, but by then the addresses would be lost or obsolete.

That night things were depressed after the departure of Ugo's exuberant personality. Tedesco remarked, “Well, it's the beginning of the end for Cahow's crew.”

Someone asked, “How many missions does Cahow need?”

“I don't know for sure — three I think,” Tedesco answered.

Jim Counce and I had the same number of missions completed, but Balmore trailed by five, due to recurrent frostbite injuries that grounded him three or four times.

“John, you and Jim will finish way ahead of me, and I'll end up as a spare radio for whatever crew needs one.”

“Now wait, George Reese is your friend and he'll see that you get on decent crews.”

“But you and Jim will go back to the States and we will get separated an' you know what that means.”

“You're probably right,” Counce added, “but I know the three of us will keep in touch and get together now and then after the war is over.”

Three days earlier Carroll Wilson had been on a rough raid with another crew and he suffered internal injuries from the banging around in the waist caused by the pilot taking severe evasive action to blunt the effectiveness of fighter attacks. In spite of his goof-offs, which were legion, he was a likable youngster with good potential. All he needed was some responsibility to bring out his merit. When the going was extra tough, Wilson reached back into the reserve that some people are born with and came up with whatever was needed for the day to see it through. Compared to that, what else really mattered? He was transferred to a recovery hospital at another base and it was depressing to see him go. I knew there was a good chance I would be gone from Ridgewell before he returned.

Harold Harkness was back with us in the ball turret after recovering from the painful glass in his eye injury. It was good to have a competent man watching things below the aircraft. Raymond Legg was grounded, due to burns suffered when he became unconscious for too long in the tail. Wineski, a member of the Free Polish Air Force, was with us on the tail guns. He had escaped from Poland when the Germans invaded his country and joined the R.A.F. for a while before he was transferred to the American Air Force. He was an experienced gunner and we were glad to have him. La Buda was on the left waist guns taking Wilson's place.

The aircraft lifted from the runway at eight-thirty, just as dawn was breaking. Shutting called the Copilot. “Did you ever see a more beautiful sunrise?”

Before he could answer Gleichauf cut in, “Keep the intercom clear — no personal conversation.”

“Navigator to crew — Navigator to crew, the altitude today will be twenty-nine thousand, five hundred feet and the temperature will be sixty below. Watch yourselves for frostbite.”

It turned out to be the coldest temperature I have ever had to endure. At nine-thirty we went on oxygen and the long climb began. At ten-thirty the Wing headed over the North Sea toward Germany. The target was Bremen again, with that awful flak. When I saw the coast approaching, I called the Navigator. “What is our altitude and temperature?”

“We are at twenty-seven, five hundred and the temperature gauge is against the stop — low as it can register — sixty-two degrees below.”

“Navigator, how cold is that on the Fahrenheit scale?”

“About eighty below — an' we got another two thousand to climb. It's goin' to be between eighty and ninety below Fahrenheit at our top altitude — real balmy — you can take off your shirt and get a good suntan in the turret.”

“Turret to crew, at this temperature if any of your electric units go out, it will take heavy exercise to keep from freezing, so watch it.”

“Bombardier to crew, we'll take more frequent oxygen checks today.”

Fifteen minutes into Germany Purus came on intercom: “Oxygen check — report in.”

“Turret an' cockpit OK.”

“Radio, rajah.”

“Ball OK.”

“Navigator OK.”

“Waist OK.”

“Bombardier to Tail — come in.”

“Bombardier to Tail — Bombardier to Tail — report in.”

There was no response. “Bombardier to Waist.”

“This is Jim, go ahead.”

“Go back and check out the Tail.”

“Rajah, will do.”

Counce snapped his mask into a walk-around bottle, picked up a reserve constant-flow oxygen container and headed for the tail. Jim found Wineski passed out and immediately started working on him. Then his own regulator froze and cut off his oxygen supply. The demand-type regulator was supposed to be impervious to freezing at any temperature, so Jim thought his mask had frozen and hastily went through the procedure to clear a frozen mask. By that time he was too far gone and collapsed on top of the tail gunner. La Buda, the other waist gunner, could not see into the Tail with Jim blocking the view.

“Bombardier to Waist, what is Counce doing? Everything OK?”

“Something is wrong back there! Counce is not moving — repeat — Counce is not moving!”

“Waist! Get back to that Tail quick an' revive those men.”

“Radio!”

“Go ahead.”

“Take over the waist guns and let us know what is happening back there.”

Three to five minutes went by and a frantic Balmore called, “Bombardier! Bombardier! La Buda just passed out an' fell on Counce. For God's sake, send John back there quick! I don't know what to do. Don't let these men die!”

“I'm on my way, Radio. Calm down and keep your mask clear of ice. We can't have another man down.”

“Pilot to Copilot, get in the turret until John gets back.”

My mind was in a turmoil. I kept asking myself, “What is happening in that tail that has knocked out three experienced men? Anything different today from other days? Yes, the temperature. But that shouldn't cause major trouble. The demand regulators are not affected by low temperature.
²⁰
But what if the regulators are freezing?” Those thoughts raced through my mind as I got out of the turret and plugged into a walk-around bottle. Instantly my oxygen failed. Hastily I switched back to the turret hose and tapped the walk-around bottle several times hard with a heavy screwdriver. I switched back to the bottle and it worked. So that was the problem! The demand regulators were freezing.

“Turret to crew — Turret to crew — listen carefully. The demand regulators are freezing! Repeat: The demand regulators are freezing! If it happens to you, tap the regulator several times with anything handy, screwdriver works fine.”

Grabbing four or five bailout bottles and two walk-arounds, I went aft as rapidly as possible. I kept telling myself, “You must not make any mistakes — if you do some people are going to die — watch what you are doing — no mistakes — .”

I heard the nose and turret guns chatter over and over. “All right, keep your mind on what you're doing. Forget the fighters.” George was slowly going insane with three men needing help so badly. He had the mental ability to know that if he rushed back to the tail, there would be four men unconscious in short order. When he saw me he was like a man reprieved. I could see a change come over him as he regained his mental composure.

When I reached the tail, La Buda had to be revived first to get him out of the way so I could get to the other two men. Both of their faces were black as coal. The tail gunner looked like he was dead and Jim looked almost as bad. I poured oxygen down La Buda continuously until his color returned and he revived enough for me to clear his regulator and readjust his mask. With La Buda on his feet and helping, we pulled Jim out to where I could get to him. He was awful to look at. The unreal blackness of his usually pale face was terrifying. I had never seen a person off of oxygen that long at thirty thousand feet. “Oh, God,” I whispered as a stream of oxygen coursed down his throat, as much as I felt he could stand, “let him come back — please! Don't let him die!” When I saw the first signs of color returning, I felt a surge of joy. He was going to make it! As soon as he came to enough to move, we got his mask in position and his regulator working. I sent La Buda to help Jim back to the waist and turned hurriedly to Wineski. There was no doubt in my mind that the tail gunner was dead. His face was coal black, like something out of a bad dream. He was not breathing, because the slightest breath could be seen in that intense cold, and he had already been off of oxygen longer than the medics told us a man could continue to live at thirty thousand feet.

La Buda returned and helped me pull him out of the cramped tail space. Hopeless or not, I had to make every conceivable effort to revive him. I rammed a tube down his throat and injected extra-heavy doses of oxygen for a full minute with no success. I knew that if he had the slightest chance it would require some desperate measures! I increased the oxygen pressure, deliberately running the risk of serious if not fatal injury. Those bottles held eighteen hundred pounds of pressure and too much could have ruptured his lungs. It seemed to me that the risk was necessary. That went on for another minute and I had given up all hope when I had a vague feeling of slight movement. At first I thought it was my imagination playing tricks. No! He did move! I was sure I felt something. Then there was a sharp twist of his left leg, and there was no longer any doubt. The man was going to revive. I would not have given him one chance out of a hundred a few minutes earlier. The color slowly returned to his face and I reduced the amount of oxygen and timed the intakes to coincide with my breathing rate. It was a great feeling to see a man return from what I believed to be death. When his color became normal I began working on his regulator with my free hand, while continuing to keep oxygen flowing with the other. Physically, he was coming along well, but I could see from the wild look on his face that he was mentally disoriented. I hoped that it was not a matter of brain damage. Suddenly he drew back his fist and struck me hard on the jaw. I failed to see the blow coming and it knocked me backward and my head hit a metal joint so hard that for a couple of minutes I was mentally out. Counce, who by now was fully recovered, ran back and straightened my mask and helped me up. Meanwhile, Wineski had passed out again when he lost the oxygen I had been feeding him. We got his mask in place and the regulator working normally and watched him closely until sure that his brain was once again functioning. In another five minutes he was back on the tail guns, OK as far as I could determine.

The aircraft was bouncing around so I knew we must be in the middle of the flak. I hoped we were past the target and would quickly get out of the antiaircraft gunners' range. I was working my way forward carrying an armload of empty oxygen containers. To enter the radio room from the waist one used the top of the ball turret as a step because it was directly in the way. Harkness chose that exact moment to whirl the ball around. Both feet went out from under me and I took a nasty fall. The worst part was that two of the heavy cylinders bounced into the air and struck me on the head with stupefying force as I lay prone on the deck, feeling like a losing fighter just before the referee stops the fight. Two knockout blows in ten minutes — it was not my day!

When I climbed wearily into the turret we were past the target on the way home. I knew from the sounds of gunfire that there was a brisk battle while I was in the tail. The report said that sixty fighters jumped us and I missed the action. The only good thing about the mission was that I did not have to look at the detestable flak over the city of Bremen.

“Radio to Turret.”

“Go ahead, George.”

“It was close. You got back there just in time. Little longer, an' both Jim and Wineski would have been gone. Right?”

“Yes, it was close for Wineski. He was partly inside the Pearly Gates — or that other place.”

“Tail to Turret, was it that close?”

“At first I did not have any hope you would come out of it — how are you feeling?”

“OK, except for a bad headache.”

“Navigator to Turret,
Tinker Toy
got it while you were in the tail.”

“Was it flak or fighters?”

“A 109 slammed into her waist and both ships went down locked together, turning end over end.”

“It's hard to believe. I thought
Tinker Toy
would always make it back.”

“Turret to Navigator, were we supposed to have P-38s on the return?”

“Yes, but they didn't show.”

A strong headwind was slowing down the return.

“Bombardier to crew, fighters at twelve o'clock low.”

The enemy made two passes and vanished without doing any damage.

“Tail to crew, that B-17 strugglin' behind the formation is about to get it — four fighters are ganging up on her.”

I turned around to watch that Fort put up a furious battle and hold off the attackers. I believe it was the only time I ever saw a B-17 survive a fight with that many interceptors. The American papers were full of stories about wounded Fortresses holding off ten or fifteen fighters. Most of those stories were purely imaginary. In the real life of combat over the Continent, it simply did not happen against experienced fighters.

Halfway across the North Sea the tail gunner reported, “Lone 109 closin' fast from the rear.”