Today is the 60th anniversary this plane was shot down in WWII

[soleft]

http://www.483rd.com/105.html

I just got this email from my cousin, her father was on this plane. Incredible story.

Today, July 14th, marks the 60th anniversary of the day my father's WW2 B-17 Bomber (the MIZPAH) was shot down over Hungary while on a bombing mission to Germany. It was July 14th, 1944. A shell exploded in the nose of the plane instantly killing the Navigator and Bombardier.  All crew members bailed out but my father (Flight Engineer), the Pilot and the Co-Pilot tried keeping the plane aloft until the plane was over Yugoslavia. They knew if they went down over Hungary they'd be taken Prisoners of War so they tried making it to Yugoslavia. Unfortunately, they were losing altitude too fast with the #2 engine burning seriously and the #3 engine vibrating the ship violently.  Since the controls were shot and wouldn't respond and they were afraid the ship would go into a stall, they decided to bail out over Hungary. There was no other choice. They were taken prisoner and sent to STALAG LUFT IV in Germany where my father remained for 11 months until he escaped and made his way home to the USA

[Desertrose]

1. My Uncle's plane went MIA July 20,1944 Papua, New Guinea

They have never recovered it....a B17. They have recovered one from the same area that went down in March '44.

Uncle john was only 24 ...so handsome and his life ahead of him. My Mom said her Mother was never the same after they got word.....but they were lucky- out of the 4 brothers who went in John was the only one who never returned.....


This is a very interesting site for those who are still missing anyone from any of the wars....

http://www.cilhi.army.mil/

click on the link to the left...


Peace
DR

[plcdude]

6. where did the plane

go down in PNG I lived there for several years.

[Desertrose]

7. Man, I'd have to look that up

Think he was stationed at Port Moresby and not sure which direction the place was headed. He was a navigator- pretty sure it was a B17. All this was before I was born and my Mom has since passsed away so there is no one to ask....I should go through some of his letters & yearbook.

They never found the plane. I think it was a period of time they lost a lot due to the weather conditions.

I would love to go there some day...have had vivid dreams of what I feel could be that area....

Peace
DR

[BOHICA06]

2. Back when men were men ....

and planes had props. The courage it took to fly daylight raids is beyond my imagination. George McGovern & Jimmy Stewart were two that I can recall. Thanks for sharing the history.

[Bridget Burke]

3. Almost the 61st anniversary of my father being shot down over France

He was one of the crew members who evaded capture with the help of the French Resistance. Called up as a reservist when the Cold War heated up, he was killed in a crash more than 51 years ago.

The Luck of the Irish.

[zx22778a]

4. Just short of the 60th anniversary of the loss

of my uncle Donald who I would never get to know

http://www.cwgc.org/cwgcinternet/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=2095209

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

5. My father's B-17 was shot down over Germany

He was the co-pilot of the "Mary Ruth", the bomber that John Steinbeck was assigned to cover as a war correspondent. My father's photo is in Steinbeck's published war writings entitled "Once There Was A War" and his name is mentioned several times. The plane was shot down on (I believe) their 8th mission while bombing the rubber factories around the German city of Huls. His plane exploded just after he bailed out. My dad had the misfortune of falling through the roof of a barn, breaking both his legs. The Germans shot him in the hip as well. He was taken to a German hospital where they tortured him. His only friends were a giant Russian named Ivan who was recovering from a terrible wound at Stalingrad and a French soldier named Louis who had been badly wounded. The Russian used to give my father baths because he was too injured to walk. During air raids, the three of them met and planned to steal a German plane and fly to Switzerland, but my father was transferred to Stalag Luft III just a few days before their planned escape attempt. At Stalag Luft III, my father met Col. Jeffrey Sage, the American OSS operative who is played by the Steve McQueen character in the movie "The Great Escape". My father was in Stalag Luft III while the three tunnels of escape were being dug, just like in the film. My father was very ill in the prisoner of war camp because the bones in his legs had not mended. But he did participate in helping to warn of the approach of German ferrets when they came by unannounced. My father was one of the few prisoners of war to get exchanged between the US and Germany, because he was considered too badly injured to ever walk again. He took a train across Germany, France, and Spain into neutral Portugal, from where he was placed aboard a ship and sent back to the US. He said that mile after mile of track through France, along with hundreds of railroad cars had been destroyed by the French Resistance, but somehow they knew not to touch his train.

[Xithras]

8. 60 year anniversary of my great uncles death was last month.

Both my grandfather and his brother served in D-Day, my grandfather signed up to become a chaplain, but was bumped into the infantry when they found out that he'd dropped out of the seminary to join. His brother was in the AAC and flew a P-47.

My grandfather told me that he never heard from his brother after they left the U.S., even though they were stationed fairly near each other in England during the buildup to D-Day. Before he climbed into the landing craft to begin the assault, he prayed to God that he be allowed to see the end of the day, and said he prayed that he be allowed to see his brother one more time.

As his landing craft made its way towards the coast, he glanced up and saw a pair of aircraft flying out from the French coast towards England, barely 200 feet off the water and heading right for their boat. The lower 47 was in flames and obviously wasn't going to make it, and the men in his craft watched as the plane slowly lost altitude and finally exploded just as it struck the water a few hundred yards away. There was an Army photographer on board who took several shots of the plane as it went down, and one of the other men in his boat had a small pocket camera and got an image of it. They watched the wreckage quickly slide beneath the surface of the water and waited in vain hoping to see the pilot struggle to the surface. When it became obvious that he hadn't made it, my grandfather said a prayer for the lost man.

Fate can be a quirky thing, because the lost pilot turned out to be his own brother. He was performing fighter sweeps and ground interdiction over the French countryside when his plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire and his fuel tank ignited. The second plane was flown by a good friend of his who was screaming at him over the radio to bail out, but my GU refused...at first because he didn't want to bail over German controlled lands and risk being taken prisoner, and later because the boats were so dense off the French coast that he was afraid the wreckage would take out a landing craft and kill Allied soldiers. His last words to his wingman were "Calm down, I'm almost to open water, I'm about to bail out". The body was never recovered.

The wingman tracked my grandfather down after the war to tell him about his brothers bravery, and the story reminded him of the two planes he'd seen while heading in to Omaha. After a bit of digging he managed to get a couple of the photos that had been snapped from the boat, and the numbers on the planes verified that it was indeed his brothers plane.

My grandfather, a devout Catholic, always cited that as an example of how God answers our prayers. He'd prayed to see his brother one last time, and by some quirky twist of fate, he'd had the opportunity to not only see him, but to be there as he died.