Mission Date: April 12, 1945
NEUBURG
Mission Summary
ON THIS DAY...APRIL 12-13, 1945
After a briefing for a mission to Neuberg on the 12th, the mission had been scrubbed.
The base’s newsletter ‘Century Bulletin’ provided everyone the schedule of festivities that would occur every day of the week for the next seven days in celebration of the 100th BG’s 300th mission: dances, a USO show, a base open house, a concert in the base theater and chapel services.
However, at midnight on the 12th, the men that were still awake and listening to their radios heard the news firsthand on the BBC broadcast that the American President, Franklin Roosevelt had died from a cerebral hemorrhage.
On April 13, the 418th Squadron Diary carried the entry, “This morning the C.Q. woke us up with the sobering news that President Roosevelt had died. At first none of us wanted to believe it, but the BBC confirmed our fears…The 300th Mission party was scrubbed immediately. All of us were shocked by the news. We wonder how the Vice President will shape up. Can he fill his responsible position.”
The 350th Squadron Diary recorded, “The men of the Squadron had been divided during the past November elections. But in April their shock was uniform. It was not only the death of the President. Nor the passing of the Commander-in-Chief. Nor the end of an era. But rather the shock of losing someone who everyone had somehow come to accept as a part of their family life, an intangible friend…The flag was at half mast on the Post. Throughout England the men and women of Britain stopped the American soldiers on pass and furlough to express their shock and sense of loss. And the men of America, the men of the Squadron watched a week-end pass into the dignity of sorrowful history.”
The 300th mission celebration would be postponed to April 22-29 and that evening, the 100th was alerted for another mission.
Bombing Results
Bombing Results: SCRUBBED
Aircraft Lost:
Crew Lost:
Claims of Enemy Losses (CLS):
Aircraft Returned:
