DATE: May 29, 1945

TARGET: CITY OF YOKAHAMA

TIME: Daylight

Briefed at nineteen-hundred (1900), then ate and made the guns ready for the mission. The take-off was at o-three-hundred (0300). Nothing hardly ever happens on the trip to the target. I usually sleep.

On this trip we flew at an altitude of eighteen-thousand-nine-hundred (18.900) feet, and directly over Mt. Fujiyama. On this trip, as on all the others, we were told we were to have fighter escort, but we did not believe it until we saw them coming to meet us. They were sure a beautiful sight. The Japs were sure surprised too. The P-51's would chase the enemy fighters directly into the ground. After they went down, I never saw them come back into the air. Before dropping our bombs we flew through a few bursts of flak (barrage). There were a couple of bursts fired from the lower aft turret, but that was about all. On this trip we dropped one hundred (100) pound incendiaries. I watched one plane unload over the target and I thought that the bombs would never stop coming out.

DATE: June 5, 1945

TARGET: CITY OF KOBE, HONSHU

TIME: Daylight

Briefed at eighteen-thirty, started toward the plane at twenty hundred, made the guns ready, and took off at twenty-four hundred (2400) with only one gun in the tail.

We hit the target at o-nine-o-five (0905) and we could not see the target for the smoke. The smoke was around twenty-five-thousand (25,000) feet when we released our one hundred and seventy-eight (178) one hundred (100) pound bombs. We had flak which was from medium to heavy. And fighters, about twelve (12) to fourteen (14). At one time twelve came at us from the nose at one time. Boy! I was sure sweating when the bombardier called them in. On this trip we really kept the runs hot. I think we all fired. The bombardier damaged one, and the right gunner, the tail gunner, and myself all got in a few hits.