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Remer L. Harding
Pilot
KIA June 28, 1950
William J. Goodwin
Gunner
KIA June 28, 1950
Lewis O. McNeill
Gunner
KIA June 28, 1950
William T. O'Connell
Pilot
MIA July 29, 1950
Gordon O. Smith
Pilot
MIA October 3, 1950
James R. Hollyfield
Gunner
MIA January 9, 1951
Fred B. Rountree
Pilot
MIA January 14, 1951
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"Oh Lord - is tonight the night?"
I must have said that prayer 50 times. I sat in the navigator's seat while the aircraft accelerated down the runway. I could see, by the reflected light from the landing lights, the airstream turn into fog behind the propeller tips. Not far from my right shoulder the blue flame from the engine exhaust stacks streamed back over the leading edge of the wing. I watch the green lights approach indicating the end of the runway. The lights move under the nose and the pilot pulls the wheel back.
If tonight were the night, no one at home would know what happened.
A difficult part of dealing with combat losses was not knowing. The crew departed the base with an assigned mission -- maybe to interdict traffic on some route, or to cut rails at some point and then hit targets of opportunity -- which meant to search for trucks or trains.
You made your mission departure, checked in with air controller "Dentist" inbound over Pt "Oboe", crossed into North Korea at Hajeu, flew your assigned mission, and probably never talked to anybody until you gave your strike report to "Dentist" on the way home.
When something went wrong you usually just disappeared.
Sometimes the wounded aircraft could make an emergency radio call with some skimpy information. Then nothing. B-26s were extremely difficult to bail out from in the days before ejection seats. The pilot and the navigator went out the top; dived for the trailing edge of the wing and hoped they went under the tail.
The North Korean civilian and military population hated and feared the B-26. There was a lot of what is today called "collateral damage". If the crewman got out of the plane and reached the ground alive he would be most lucky to be caught by the Chinese, who at least wanted to interrogate him. Woe to the crewman captured by the civilians.
Generally we did not talk about getting killed in philosophical terms but it was on everybody's mind. There was a lot of jocularity in short discussions about "buying the farm" or "flying through a rock filled cloud" or being "gotten".
On a black night you could see the headlights of truck convoys snaking their way down a winding road. So long as you could see the headlights you knew there were no hills between you and the targets. But what was beyond the lights in the blackness of your escape path? Before you made the attack the lights would probably go out. Usually there was a difference in the shade of black between the hills on the horizon and a lighter black of the sky, with higher and lower clouds always being a factor.
Everything depended upon the pilot. Was he an old hand or was he green? Was he a hot-dogger or was he cautious? Did he need to make a record for his career or did he plan to make it home? Did he know everything because, after all, he was the pilot, or was he willing to listen to other opinions?
Navigation was very difficult even for the best of us. You flew from a known point with an estimated speed on a planned heading for some period of time. It was called DR for "Dead Reckoning". You should be on your map about right .... here ... -- if the winds are now as they were forecast 18 hours ago, and the pilot had held the heading you had given him. None of those conditions would likely be true. |
Walter S. King
Squadron Commander, Pilot
KIA February 21, 1951
(L-R) Nelson King, Nav.
Robert J. Martin, Pilot
MIA May 5, 1951
John V. Chitwood, Gunner
MIA May 5, 1951
Donald D. Tegt
Pilot
MIA July 4, 1951
William J. Watson
Gunner
MIA July 4, 1951
Ray W. Olcott
Pilot
MIA October 15, 1951
Richard Ross
Gunner
MIA January 6, 1952
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