Mission

ON THIS DAY...OCTOBER 12,1944

On October 10, the planned mission had been scrubbed before take-off and more buzz bombs flew over Thorpe Abbotts at 0430 and 0500 hours. The next day, the 100BG was under a Stand Down and the crews were released for ‘training.’ However, the alert light was back on that evening and HQ prepared through the night for the next day’s mission.

On October 12, under Field Order 447, the 3rd Division would send its B-17s to Bremen in northwest Germany, to attack the Borgsward and Goliath plants producing armored vehicles and a Focke-Wulf 190 engine parts factory.

At Thorpe Abbotts, thirty-eight of the 100BG's crews were briefed at 0430 hours. The 13CBW would fly three wings: the 390BG in the 13A, the 95BG in the 13B and the 100BG as the 13C CBW, fifth in line out of the seven wings in the Division flying.

Major Sammy Barr would fly as the 13C’s Command Pilot, flying in the lead PFF with James Seamans. Major Channing Emberson would fly as Deputy Lead in John Ernst’s Pathfinder in the High Squadron.

Seated for their #1 combat mission would be the James Adair crew and if all went well, it would be the final combat briefing for Harvey Dickert who was scheduled to fly the #2 position off of John Ernst and Major Emberson.

With each of the B-17s loaded with two thousand five hundred gallons of fuel, the aircraft flying in the lead and low squadrons would carry five 1000 lb general purpose bombs while the low squadron aircraft were loaded with ten M17 incendiaries.

Takeoff commenced at 0750 hours starting with the high squadron’s aircraft, followed by the lead, then the low. With the 100BG successfully assembled into the 13C over buncher 28, it proceeded to Buncher 8, where Division assembly was accomplished at 20000’.

The English Coast was crossed at Great Yarmouth and the 3rd Division’s column of two hundred sixty-two B-17s flew the route over the North Sea. The Dutch coast was crossed near Zanvoort and at 1045, the escort fighters of P-47s and P-51s arrived, always a welcomed sight by the heavy bomber crews.

By 1132 hours, the 13C CBW had climbed to its briefed bombing altitude, with the high squadron echeloned right. When the fanout procedure commenced at the IP with a left turn, the bomb bay doors were opened and the bombers turned onto the bomb run. A few jets were observed but fortunately, none attacked the 13C’s formation.

Flying through the expected flak on the bomb run, it was considered moderate and tracking to barrage but inaccurate on the 13C. There was a “convergence of the High and Low squadrons at the target” but bombs were away visually from the 13C through 4/10 clouds on the primary target at Bremen at 1142 hours.

On his #19 mission, NAV Roland Hetrick in Walter Radke’s crew tells us, “…We tried to hit the same aircraft plant we went after before. This time we came in and the clouds broke so we could make it visual. We hit it this time. Now maybe we wont have to go back again. We got by awfully easy as far as flak went. I don't know why because they could see us. I expected it to be like #1. It was clear enough Bill could do pilotage. As a result we went to town again. I'm getting so I like to work on my log because I know where we are better all the time.”

With the Rally Point made, the 100BG followed the briefed route out, exiting the enemy coast. Crossing over the North Sea, the heavy bombers crossed back over the English coast and were seen coming in over base at 1424 hours, with all ships accounted for.

Although the flak was considered meager by the veteran hardened fliers, some of those newer to combat had a different perspective when comparing what their flak training videos described to the real thing. Pilot James Adair remembered, “We discovered there was real flak out there and realized we could get killed!!!!” Once safely on the ground, the men breathed a little easier and perspectives had softened by the time the men returned to their huts. Adair’s TTE James Hendrix recorded into his journal, “I was expecting flak to scare me but it wasn’t too bad.”

Making his last entry into his combat journal, Harvey Dickert, recorded, “Target same as September 26th F.W. plant. Dropped ten 500 lb G.P. bombs on primary with better results than last time. But still doubt if we knocked it out. Weather was good until we hit England where a cold front was located. … Flak over target meager and inaccurate. Seven hour 20 minute mission. Flak on the way out between Brammerhaven and Couxhaven where they have closed the corridor. No enemy aircraft attacked - saw jet fighters – our fighter support excellent and on time. THAT’S ALL”

The fighter support that day was excellent as they were credited with shooting down nineteen German aircraft. The men of the 100BG may have been saved from a rough fighter attack. Leading a squadron of fighter planes that day in support of the bombers over Bremen was a twenty-two year-old P-51 mustang pilot named Chuck Yeager. A 2nd Lieutenant flying with the 357th Fighter Group, his squadron was patrolling fifty to one hundred miles ahead of the targets at Bremen when they encountered a group of twenty-two German fighters heading towards Bremen. Yeager and sixteen of his mustangs circled the fighters and went to work. Yeager himself was credited with shooting down five German planes, becoming an “Ace” in one day. He would claim that he only had to work for three of them as the other two German fighters collided into each other in an attempt to get away from Yeager’s P-51.

Crews known to be flying this mission: Ivosevic, Kennedy, Miller, Radke, Schaffhausen, Urban, Dickert, Bailey, McLaughlin, Downing, Dyatt, Ernst, Frazier, Gay, Hempy, Hopkins, Jenkins, Kramp, Marmorine, Seamans, Willoughby, Williams C, Rojohn, Porter, Baker, Adair, Hughes, DePlanque, Blanding, Kemp (9 crew names missing)