Tokyo May 24 1945

Crew P-17 left Guam at 8:00 pm the evening of May 24, 1945 arriving over Tokyo at about 2:00 am on the 25th. The flak was intense and accurate along with a new “flare” bomb and various rockets. Of course we claimed that bombing from 7000 feet allowed BB guns and sling shots to be used against us. Fires could be seen for 150 miles. Managed to get back with only minor damage about 11:00 am the 25th. Results were announced as excellent and we were credited with mission No. 10 and 16:00 combat time.

Tokyo May 26 1945

The Crew P-17 departed Guam on May 26 around 8:00 pm. we arrived over target area at 7000 feet about 2:00 am the 27th. Flak was very intense and accurate and almost all of our squadron planes had some battle damage. In our case a couple of Jap fighters picked P-17 as their primary target. Diving in from both sides they whacked us pretty good.  By blowing both No. 1 and No, 3 engines. A 20mm shell hit the Navigator Lt. Walter Rossig killing him almost instantly. After what seemed like forever, the fighters broke away and returned to Japan. In the meantime, Capt. Barton was having trouble keeping P-17 in the air. He decided that if we would strip the plane he might be able to keep it flying. So, starting in the tail and working forward we tossed over board every item that was not bolted down and a lot that was. Finally we leveled off at about 2000 feet and began to limp toward Iwo Jima. When we arrived at Iwo we found it “socked” in 10/10 and couldn’t possibly land so we headed on south.

By this time the Flight Engineer had calculated cur remaining fuel would get us almost to Saipan. By the time we arrived at Saipan, Capt. Barton requested and got permission for a direct landing on Tinian. we managed to taxi off the runway onto the apron before the fuel expired. We stayed on Tinian six days for repairs before we finally went back to Guam. Bombing results excellent, we got mission 11 and 16:30 min combat time.

Kobe June 5 1945

Crew P-17 departed Guam shortly after midnight on June 5. We arrived at the assembly point at about 9:00 am and made our bomb run at 11,500 feet.  The flak was intense and accurate. we suffered minor damage to our plane; however, one of the b-29’s in the formation sustained severe damage and was struggling to keep up. Our Skipper maneuvered P-17 over the crippled B-29 and escorted them out of the flak and fighters back to Guam. We had several patches to paint, nothing serious. The raid results were good, we got Mission No. 12, 16:20 combat hours and a Distinguished Flying Cross for escorting the crippled bird.

Osaka June 7 1945

Crew P-17 left Guam for a daylight attack on Osaka. Unfortunately after 45 minutes we had an oil line break forcing the shutdown of No.2 engine and we returned to base. We were credited with 1:25 combat hours.

Tokyo June 10 1945

Crew P-17 had a part in a relatively easy raid on June 10 and 11. The target was 4/10 cloud cover.  Fires could still be seen for about 100-125 miles off shore. Flak was intense but not accurate. Our damage was minimal but still gave us a couple of patches to paint. Results for mission 13 good. Combat Time 14:45.

Chiba

Cloud cover at target 10/10. No flak. No damage. Results never official. Mission 14 Combat Time 14:50.