The Bomber Boys Page 5

  January 13, 1945, found the men of Lieutenant Jerome Chart’s bomber crew twenty-five thousand feet over Germany in B-17 number 033. The target was another bridge on the Rhine. The structure was clearly visible to Tony as Chart started his bomb run. John Cuffman watched the bombs strike the target with “good results.” Compared to Cologne, the flak was light; however, at least one or more bursts were close enough to put four holes in the aircraft, including one in the Tokyo tank. Each wing of the newer B-17Gs housed an extra Tokyo fuel tank to provide the airplane with the long-range capability needed to reach targets deep inside the Third Reich.

  With his bomber damaged and possibly leaking fuel, Chart headed for England, but he was not confident they could make it back. The weather back in Britain would resolve the issue for him. Chelveston was reported to be hampered with thick clouds and low visibility—Chart’s aircraft was diverted to Weston Zoyland airfield, in southern England.

  The crew was glad to be on the ground anywhere but in Germany, and they soon found their stay at the Royal Air Force base a pleasant experience. The barracks were nicer, the chow was good, and their British hosts could not have shown more hospitality. Ball turret gunner Bill Goetz was the only crew member who did not enjoy his visit to Weston Zoyland. Eighth Air Force rules required someone must guard the aircraft. Goetz drew the short straw.

  The British ground crews worked through the night to have the B-17 repaired by daybreak the following morning. The Americans were in the air by 10:30, and Tony was charting a course for Chelveston. They were back at their home base at one in the afternoon.

  After their mission on January 15 was scrubbed, Chart’s crew got a few days of well deserved rest. Some of the boys headed to London to enjoy its sights and delights, but the normally fun-loving little navigator begged off.

  “Ah come on, Tony, you aren’t afraid of those V-1s, are ya?” one of his buddies teased, referring to the German rockets the Nazi regime was launching against Londoners.

  “You guys go ahead. I’ve got other plans.” Tony’s boyish smile revealed more than he intended.

  “Okay, what’s her name, Short Round?” John Cuffman wanted to know.

  “See you later, boys!” Tony laughed and walked away in the direction of the base PX.

  Her name was Peggy. She was a pretty young English school-teacher whom Tony had met at one of the Chelveston base dances. On this particular day, he had been invited to have dinner with her parents, and he did not intend to arrive empty-handed. Exiting the PX, Tony carried a large bag filled with many of the items local citizens found difficult to obtain—including chocolate and American cigarettes. The latter item was an instant hit with Peggy’s father, who Tony would soon learn was a chain-smoker.

  It was the first of many enjoyable visits to his English girlfriend’s home. Her parents liked the polite young American and if they worried that their daughter’s relationship with Tony was just a wartime romance, they kept it to themselves. After all, it was wartime.

  Tony was not surprised on the morning of January 20, when Jerry Chart told him they would once again be flying a different B-17 to Reims, Germany. The aircraft’s number was 015, and she brought Chart’s crew safely home from the Ruhr Valley mission. For only the second time, there was no flak over the target, and once again, Tony and his crewmates had seen no enemy fighters. They did see a couple of American fighter planes attacking some German trains.

  The Luftwaffe was down but not out in the early months of 1945. The constant combat against the Americans in the daytime and the British Royal Air Force at night had done more than destroy thousands of Germany’s fighter planes. It had destroyed thousands of her irreplaceable pilots. Equipped with drop tanks, the new American P-51 Mustang fighters were able to escort their “big friends” all the way to the target and back. The Mustang was also faster than any fighter in the Luftwaffe’s arsenal, at least until German jets started showing up in the final weeks of the war. On some missions, like the one to Reims, the Mustangs, Thunderbolts and B-17 gunners controlled the air to such an extent that the American fighters could leave the bomber formation to attack targets of opportunity on the ground.

  Since the mission to Reims had been the easiest yet for Chart and his crew, some considered B-17 number 015 a lucky airplane. Tony did not dismiss anything that might help their chances and decided he would not mind flying the bomber again. There would be several more opportunities to fly 015, and the final one would test the airplane’s luck and endurance, and leave the lives of her nine airmen hanging in the balance.

  “You’re flying again today.” The sergeant’s voice was quiet, but it cut the darkness of the navigators’ barracks like a honed knife. It was the morning after the Reims raid, and Chart and his crew had drawn the second leg of back-to-back missions. The target of the day was Pforzheim, Germany, on board B-17 number 571. Although the mission went well, with the crew watching their bombs burst right in the center of Pforzheim’s marshaling yards, it was still a difficult trip for everyone. First of all, it was extremely cold. Bill Goetz suffered the worst of any of them. There was no heat in the ball turret. In addition to the cold, at nine hours and twenty-five minutes, the run to Pforzheim was the longest mission Chart’s crew had ever flown.

  January 28 marked the crew’s tenth mission to Germany and their third raid over dreaded Cologne. Flak over the city was no less severe than the first two times, but flying B-17 number 015 again, Jerry Chart brought them home with only one hole in the radio room. The bomber was patched up and ready to go on a mission to Koblenz the very next day. Tony figured the Fortress was in better shape than most of her crewmen. Luckily, the flak was light, and both 015 and the crew returned unscathed.

  That evening Tony lay in his bunk fully clothed, covered with two blankets, and still he could not get warm. To take his mind off the chill in the barracks, he began to review the past couple of months since his arrival at Chelveston. Eleven missions completed and twenty-four to go. After what he had seen in the skies over Germany, twenty-four more missions seemed unattainable. During the first ten missions, the various B-17s his crew had been aboard had been hit by flak on five of the missions. Only the grace of God, pure luck and Jerry Chart had prevented their destruction.

  The crew itself was the upside of the situation. They had come together like brothers in a crisis, looking out for one another whether they were in combat or on liberty. They had made it through eleven missions together, why not twenty-four more? As his exhaustion began to usher him into sleep, Tony thought, Right now, I’ll settle for making it through one more mission.

  In late January of 1945, while the men of the Eighth Air Force in Europe lived from mission to mission, their leaders were busy planning an attack that might bring the staggering German government to its knees. Berlin was not only the capital of Germany, it was also the very core of her military organization. The war could not be ended without the fall of Berlin, and accordingly the American bombers had been striking the city since the first week of March 1944. Britain’s RAF had been pounding the German capital long before that.

  Finally the American high command felt it had the resources to hit the center of Berlin with an armada of such enormous size and destructive power, if it did not end the war outright, it would certainly shorten it considerably. On the morning of Saturday, February 3, Tony Teta sat with his friends, Skipper, Snuffy, Baldy, Big Swede, Hermit and the rest, as a briefing officer gave the airmen of the 305th Bomb Group the details of a new mission to Berlin.

  Over one thousand Fortresses would take part. The American bombers would be escorted by more than nine hundred P-51 Mustangs and P-47 Thunderbolts. The target was the center of Berlin—more specifically Gestapo headquarters, the Reich Chancellery, the German Air Ministry and any other government or military building. Just as important as targets were thousands of German soldiers, who were being reorganized or were passing through Berlin—so the rail system needed to be knocked out.

  The bomber crews could exp
ect heavy flak, the briefing officer continued. “And the Luftwaffe,” which had been keeping a low profile during recent raids, could be expected to be “up in force” to protect Berlin. Four hundred more American B-24 Liberators would be striking Magdeburg and should “divert some attention away from the Berlin raid.” Tony doubted the Germans could miss noticing a thousand B-17s heading for their capital. He glanced at Jerry Chart and tried to read the pilot’s facial expression. To Tony, their skipper seemed to have a look of resolution. He hoped he was reading it right, because that was what they would need on their first mission to Berlin.

  The boys in Chart’s crew were glad to see it was bomber number 015 waiting for them as they piled out of their truck. She had taken them to Reims, Cologne and Koblenz and had always brought them home. If they had to go to “the Big B,” she was as good a gal as any.

  Later at several thousand feet above the English Channel, Tony surveyed the scene from his perch inside the airplane’s nose section. Ahead of the aircraft, as far as the eye could see on a beautiful clear day, were hundreds of gleaming B-17s. It was a sight that he knew he would never be able to sufficiently describe to anyone who was not there.

  He also knew history was being made, and he was a part of it. For a while, the young navigator forgot about what he knew was waiting for them in the sky over Berlin—dense flak, a long bomb run and probably German fighters. His hunger to fly, along with destiny, had placed him on board this B-17 as a part of a massive strike at the heart of the Nazi government, and like every man on board, he planned to do his job.

  Thousands of other Eighth Air Force airmen were also buckling down for the long trip to Berlin. Far below, German citizens on farms and in small villages ran from their homes to stare up at the fleet of American bombers that soon stretched from horizon to horizon. Most of the German spectators must have realized how the war must now end—if an aerial invasion of such unimaginable size could cross their homeland unopposed.

  From the lead aircraft to the last B-17, the bomber formation stretched for more than three hundred miles. When the first Fortress dropped its bombs on Berlin at ten thirty a.m., the last American bomber was just passing over Holland.

  Tony checked and rechecked his coordinates to the Initial Point. Then he checked them again—more to occupy his mind than for any other reason. Time passed slowly as the rumble of the bomber’s engines mingled with the noise of the other 305th B-17s, flying in a tight combat box formation.

  Visibility was excellent and miles away from Berlin, Tony spotted clouds of dark smoke rising from the Earth. He knew the source of the smoke was the fires burning out of control in the German capital. The first wave of American bombers had marked the target area with high explosives and incendiaries. The city’s firemen would be helpless to extinguish the fires until the last bomber was gone. The attack would last for one hour and forty-five minutes. Hitler’s vow that “we will raze their (English) cities to the ground” had come home to haunt Berliners.

  As the 305th Bomb Group approached the Initial Point, Tony could see that despite the devastation she had already suffered, Berlin was still ready to put up a fight. Black flak bursts pocked the sky above the city. Twenty-five thousand feet below, veteran Luftwaffe gunners manned the flak towers that had been constructed to make the capital the most strongly defended of all German cities. The towers were augmented by numerous other antiaircraft installations operated by teenage boys and members of the German Home Guard.

  Moments after Tony reported to Jerry Chart, “Skipper, we’re at the IP,” the B-17 began to get bounced around by flak concussions. Waist gunner Tom Christenson was the first of the crew to have a brush with death. A piece of shrapnel flew by him, just missing his head—but not missing him completely as it grazed him over the eye.

  In the airplane’s nose, Tony began his personal survival routine, which he had been using on the last several missions. Maybe it did not provide any real protection and it certainly was uncomfortable, but it was his routine and it had worked so far.

  Tony reasoned it was his job to get his B-17 to the Initial Point. After the dangerous bomb run, it was his job to guide the pilot and the aircraft back to England—but during the bomb run, Tony’s only priority was to stay alive.

  The navigator held the small cross that hung around his neck with the forefinger and thumb of his left hand. He crossed himself with his right hand. Already wearing one flak jacket, he placed another on the floor beneath the navigator’s desk. His friend Carl Robinson had procured the extra jacket for him. Tony had reciprocated by purchasing a new pair of officer’s dress shoes at the PX and giving them to the flight engineer.

  Exchanging a quick glance with the toggler who was kneel ing at his bombsight, Tony tightened the strap on his flak helmet and squeezed his five-foot, two-inch frame underneath his desk. It was a tight fit even for his size.

  The toggler watched Tony’s routine and wished he had a desk, too. Of course, every man on the bomber knew that for the next fifteen minutes, there would be no safe place inside the B-17. Flak bursts were already starting to shake and rattle the bomber. Should the nose of the airplane take a direct hit, Tony’s routine would not matter. Everything would be gone—the desk, the toggler and the navigator.

  The German antiaircraft gunners in Berlin were to be respected. They had gained plenty of experience since the American B-17s and Liberators had begun flying daylight raids on the German capital almost a year before. To Allied airmen, Berlin was The Big B, and as far as Tony was concerned, the “B” stood for Bad!

  As large as New York City, Berlin presented a long bomb run. Some bombers were going to be hit, and some crews would not be going home. Flying LeMay’s straight-in bomb pattern, it was mostly a matter of luck or fate. So Tony had nothing to do but to ride it out. His only obligation during the bomb run was to log in the time of the bomb release, and he had even worked that out in a way that limited his exposure.

  More flak bursts. Heavy impact. Very close. B-17 number 015 was a tough bird, Tony reminded himself. Jerry Chart was a top-notch skipper. He had brought them home from eleven missions and often with a shot-up airplane. Top-notch skipper.

  Two loud flak explosions seemed to say, “This is different!” This was The Big B, and she had a special welcome for the 305th Bomb Group on its first visit to Berlin since December of the previous year. That mission had cost the 305th dearly, with three of its bombers being shot from the sky—one of those, commanded by pilot Charles R. Todd, had broken apart in midair, killing Todd and all eight of his crewmen.

  Now Tony could hear the sound of metal fragments glancing off the airplane’s Plexiglas nose cone. It sure seemed as if they had been in the bomb run long enough to be over target. Why had he not felt the bombs being released?

  “What’s going on?” he asked the toggler without moving from his spot below the desk.

  “Lead plane hasn’t dropped his bombs yet,” the toggler replied, making no attempt to hide the impatience in his voice.

  Tony shifted his weight to keep his legs from cramping up and freed his left hand, checking his watch. Only seven minutes had passed since I.P. Still, they had to be close to target. Then, suddenly, there it was. The airplane lurched upward as several hundred pounds of bombs fell from its belly.

  As the B-17 lifted, so did the crew’s spirits—at least a little. The flak was just as bad on the way out, of course, but now their pilot’s flying skills could come into play. He could take evasive action and use his instincts, which they had all come to believe in. In the cockpit, Jerry Chart was well aware that evasive action was really a guessing game when the flak was this heavy.

  He tried his best to find clear patches of sky but by the time an antiaircraft shell exploded, it was by then too late to avoid it. There was also the ever-present concern of collision with another bomber. Pilots had to fly evasive action as a part of their squadron. On instructions from the lead aircraft, the rest of the 366th Squadron’s bombers would make turns or change a
ltitude, sometimes dropping five hundred feet together.

  The object of these coordinated maneuvers was to shake the radar fix of the antiaircraft gunners that had zeroed in on the B-17s by the time they had released their bombs. Flying evasively like a flock of geese was no easy task for the American pilots. Their combat formation placed the bomber’s wingtips as close as a hundred feet from each other. One bad move by any of the squadron’s pilots could result in disaster.

  Assured that his bombs were on their way to Berlin, the toggler scrambled to the back of the nose compartment to make himself as small as possible. On the way past the navigator’s desk he saw Tony’s hand appear above the desk to write in the time of the bomb release perfectly on the log.

  As Chart weaved the Fortress through the thick flak above Berlin, his crew hunkered down as best they could. The three exceptions were Chart, copilot Wisniewski and flight engineer Robinson. Robinson was busy checking the bomb bay. Everyone was listening on the interphone when he reported back to Chart.

  “Skipper, we’ve got five bombs stuck in the bay!”

  “Can you drop them manually?” the pilot asked.

  “Tried it. They’re stuck good!” Robinson replied.

  Tony continued to listen as Chart ordered his flight engineer to go back to the bay for a second shot at manually dropping the bombs. Between the continuous flak concussions and the pilot’s evasive maneuvering, it almost seemed a possibility the bombs would shake free on their own. Tony knew that was a long shot and soon Robinson was reporting back.

  “I tried to kick them loose, Skipper. They’re still stuck!”

  When he heard Chart tell Wisniewski to close the bomb bay doors, Tony knew they would be carrying the five unwanted bombs back to Chelveston—provided they made it back to England. At the time, Berlin’s antiaircraft gunners were doing everything possible to prevent it.

  A strong impact shoved the B-17 to the left and almost toppled the young navigator out of his little desk fort. If that one had not hit them, it had damn well come close. Tony crawled out to investigate. Looking forward through the Plexiglas he could see flak bursts quickly appearing, one after another. How was Jerry flying them through that stuff?