Mission

At 0400 hours, the shuttle crews in Kirovograd returned to Mirgorod, where their ships were once again being loaded up with sixteen 300 lb. Russian bombs.

Ready to move on to Italy, the group regretted that the shuttle planning had not included bringing along a Flight Surgeon. Many of the men had suffered from diarrhea while in Russia and it was noted that the cooking was particularly bad in Mirgorod. Pilot Edgar Wolf remembered that morning, “The breakfast didn't agree with us. Stachel threw up waiting for takeoff, others had the runs.” The 100th’s summary stated that Combat crews,“even the fairly hungry, refused to eat parts or all of their meals… and throughout Russia, the latrine situation was, to put it mildly, nauseating.” 

While in Russia for five days, the crews had been on constant alert status and S-2 Intelligence Officer Bowman recorded, “The shuttling between airfields, occurring twice, leaving before dark, and returning at the first light of dawn was hard on the combat personnel. However, the morale was excellent, in spite of some sickness and other handicaps.”

The crews were briefed for their target that day, an oil refinery located at Drohobycz, Poland and from where they would fly on to a 15th Air Force base near Foggia, Italy. The 13CBW would be led by the 390BG, with the 100BG flying as the Low group as well as supplying six ships to fly as the Low squadron with the 95BG in a composite High group. The 45CBW which had lost the majority of its B17s when their field was bombed by the Germans, would supply the eight spare Fortresses. Colonel Thomas Jeffrey would fly as the Wing’s Command Pilot.

Flying in Helmick’s ship with Joseph Zeller as Command Pilot was NAV Harry Crosby. Losing an engine at taxi time, the rest of the ships continued their taxiing and take-off. Joseph Picard, a ground maintenance sergeant flying on Helmick's ship, jumped out and changed “a whole bank of sparkplugs in ten minutes” allowing the pilots to catch up with the formation. Crosby wrote, “We should have been disappointed. Actually we all felt a guilty surge of elation. We saw visions of our one single plane being held back a day, then having to go back by the ATC route, maybe to Teheran, Cairo, and Casablanca. There would be hotels, expense money, and good food, a regular tourists’ trip.”

Crossing the Russian front, the formation encountered moderate flak and again at the target, where it was accurate and tracking. The High squadron’s lead ship hit by flak, dropped out of formation and trailed behind, safely under fighter protection.

Under CAVU conditions, bombs were away at 1330 hours from 20000 feet. Emmett Schmitt, ROG on Ransom’s ship recorded, “Got some good hits and started fires that we could see for nearly 100 miles. The bombs that missed the buildings, hit storage tanks” and other crews reported “voluminous smoke and flames shooting high into the air.”

Reassembling promptly, the wing’s formation headed south through Poland, Hungary and Yugoslavia. Although no enemy aircraft was encountered, Bowman noted that the “Group was fired at over the Jugo-Slavian mountains when the 390th let down sooner than briefed and dragged the 100th practically through the treetops of mountains seven or eight thousand feet high.” A single gun targeted the formation and although “meager,” the flak was accurate in altitude and burst in the middle of the formation. The ship that Lloyd “Bucky” Mason was riding in lost an engine from the flak. Crosby relates the story, “We all heard him call by radio to Colonel Jeffrey’s plane and ask to talk to Major Rovegno…When Major Rovegno answered, Mason said, 'Hey you old coot, you better have your hammer and nails ready. This duck I’m riding is about to fall apart.'"

Crossing the Adriatic, the wing headed for Foggia. Crosby tells us, “…our small force, the representatives of the 8th Air Force in England, really started packing the planes into the best formation they could fly, to impress pilots of the 15th Air Force in Italy. Each wingman poked his wing into his flight leaders waist windows and held it there. Naturally everyone else on the crew was scared stiff, but the pilots were happy.”

Unfortunately, the 100th had landed at the wrong base. TG Nelson Berger on Kenneth Dille’s crew remembered, “…While standing around on the flight line waiting for things to get straightened out two G.I.'s rode by on bicycles, George Baytos-TTE-said that one looked like his brother and sure enough it was! They had not seen each other for nearly two years. When we landed at the correct base which was only a short distance away George mentioned the event to the commanding officer. He told George to go to the motor pool and check out a Jeep and go spend time with his brother.” And TG Robert Satchel on Wolf’s crew remembered, “When we landed at Foggia, Italy at 2030, we were given lemonaide and doughnuts and this was a treat after the slop we had in Russia.” Confirming that in fact the 100th had landed at the wrong base, Bowman wrote, “Upon arriving in Italy, due to incorrect information given in Russia, the Group landed at the wrong field. It was necessary to take the entire formation off again after an 8 hours flight and move to another field.”

The Group moved to the Tortorella airfield, just northeast of Foggia where Bowman described their conditions.“Tents, dust and mosquito repellent the chief features of the place - not to mention the terrific heat in daytime and the remarkable coldness at night.”

Meanwhile, still in Russia, the three shuttle crews that had run out of gas, Chadwick, Mylius and Simmons, were working their way back to England. TG Vincent Wood, on Mylius’ crew recorded, “In Kiev, we were given the best hotel to stay in and we & 3 other crews had the pick of the city. I spent my time on tours, shows, operas and walks thru the park with girl named Zena, and on last day there, a girl named Vera….Left Kiev at 8:15pm for Piryatin, Russia where we stayed overnight.”