Mission

ON THIS DAY...MAY 9, 1944

As Captain Bowman pulled the black curtain back at the 0300 briefing, the crews were relieved to see that the red string on the map stopped in France rather than continue into Germany. In response to a request from RAF Bomber Command, the 8th Air Force would send most of its Groups to airfields in Northern France where the Germans had been using bases for their night fighter attacks against the RAF, causing a loss of more than forty RAF fighters in recent nights.

The 3rd Division would send four wings of B-17s to the French airfields near Laon, led by the 45CBW and whose target would be the Juvincourt airfield, SE of Laon. The 13CBW would fly two formations: its ‘A’ formation along with the 4CBW would target the Athies airfield while its ‘B’ formation, along with the 92 CBW would target the Couvron airfield.

The 13 CBW’s ‘A’ formation would be led by the 95BG, flying the 390BG as its High Squadron and seven ships from the 100th BG as its Low. The 100A would be led by Jack Swartout and Richard Helmick, flying with Williamson, Gibbons, Pearson, Rogers, Rosine and Giles.

The 13 CBW’s ‘B’ formation would be led by the 100th BG with Sumner Reeder flying as Command Pilot next to Charles Stapleton. In this formation, the 100th would supply twenty-one ships in the Lead Group with the 385 BG flying as its Low Squadron.

Loaded with thirty-nine 100 lb bombs and 1700 gallons of fuel, all ships took off starting at 0600 hours. Warned again to follow the course exactly as briefed, the crews were able to avoid the known flak guns at Dieppe, Neuchatel, Oisemont, Poix and Beauvais on the way to their targets.

All ships in the 13A formation would carry chaff and were to discharge their aluminum strips for thirteen minutes, commencing at the turn for the IP. Although escorted by P-47s, five Groups of P-51s would also sweep the target areas fourteen minutes before the formations were scheduled over them.

Making the turn at the IP at 0918 hours, the 100th’s ships set up for visual bombings of their Primary targets with bombs away from 19000-20000 feet between 0920-0936 hours. Strafing the targets again after bombing, the P-51’s followed close support on the ships' withdrawal and route back to England.

The 13A was the only formation that reportedly encountered flak at the target, albeit meager. Flying in the Low Squadron, Richard “Dickie” Kendall in Julian Rogers ship recorded, “There wasn’t much flak. Our plane was hit only twice. Damage very light.”

The flak however, required evasive action to be taken by several ships and tragically at bombs away, a bomb dropping from another Group's ship flying fifty to sixty feet above that flown by Burdette Williams, imbedded itself unexploded in Williams’ tail compartment, gravely wounding and pinning his TG Raymond Cohen.

The ship had successfully returned to base where Robert Major and others from Ordnance “used a length of wire threaded through the bomb lug to remove pressure from the nose fuse.“ Soon, Flight Surgeons Emory Kinder, Wendell Stover and medic John Erp arrived and valiantly tried to cut the unconscious but still breathing Cohen free. “Doc Kinder,” thinner than the others, crawled in and cut Cohen’s boots freeing the Gunner. Although the bomb was successfully disarmed, the twenty-two year-old TG from Philadelphia died later that day in the hospital from his injury.

The remaining ships had landed at 1100 hours from what all except the Williams crew would consider a “milk run.” The mission light indicated another mission was on for the next day.

Crews flying in A: Bethea, Dille, Evans, Ferbrache, Greiner, Herres, Lischer, Lunsford, Moore, Mylius, Rake, Roeder, Roth, Rumley, Suppert, Schwank, Shelly, Siewart, Simmons, Zapf and Reeder

Crews flying in B: Gibbons Giles, Helmick, Pearson, Rogers, Rosine, Williamson