began intense training on formation flying and various procedures for approaching our station during inclement weather. On 6 June 1944, we participated in the D-Day landings at Utah Beach, Normandy, France. For the next several days, we attempted to bomb specific targets near Normandy but were unable to due to inclement weather. Finally, on 11 June, we were able to release our bombs over Flers, France. This was our first successful mission after three previous attempts. We continued bombing at irregular intervals until 8 July 1944. Our Navigator, Lt. Robert H. Thompson was removed from our crew, and I was made Navigator. Lt. John 'Shorty' Lee was appointed bombardier. Lt. Lee was formerly from the crew of Lt. Jack Daigle, who was relieved of duty after his 5th mission, his crew then being scattered to other crews. In September, we converted from B-24 aircraft to the B-17G which came equipped with an early form of radar called the 'GEE box'(Ground Electronic Equipment). I spent three days at a base near Norfolk being checked out on this radar navigation system. Shortly thereafter, we began flying all our missions over Germany, bombing strategic targets, principally oil refineries and manufacturing plants. I flew my last mission on 30 December 1944 to Kassel, Germany. This was my 35th official mission, not including the three missions during the D-Day period which were not counted since no bombs were released for various reasons. I also flew with another crew on 13 August 1944, to cover for a navigator friend who was absent. I was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for Meritorious Service as well as the Air Medal with six oak leaf clusters - five for routine bombing performance and one for defusing a number of bombs which failed to clear the plane during a raid shortly after D-Day over St. Lo, France. This and a like award to SSgt. Gordon M. Hayden were presented at Midland, Texas, in April 1945. I was also awarded five Battle Stars for my ETO ribbon for the following campaigns: Air Offensive Europe, Normandy, Northern France, Ardennes and Rhineland. I was released from active duty 28 November 1945 at Ft. Douglas, Utah, and held in the Inactive Reserve for several years. On 3 February 1950, during the time of the Korean Conflict, I was recalled to active duty and sent to Long Beach, California, along with about 25 other officers for 15 days of training in B-26 bombers. Before we completed training, though, we were all released (with the exception of one man) and returned home. I resigned from the Air Force Reserve on 3 May 1962 with the rank of Major. My total military flying time was 752.55 hours including 222. 15 hours combat flying time. The most difficult of the 38 missions I flew with the Eighth Air Force in England occurred on 4 August 1944. That morning we were alerted for flight at 0400 and served a breakfast of pancakes and two fresh eggs each, a clear signal that the mission was real. (If we got powdered eggs and Spam, it was probably a practice.) This mission was #15 for our crew and #38 for the group. We all attended the briefing and were given the usual instructions about flak maps, our fighter escorts (if any), target photos, bomb load, weather and so forth. Then I attended the navigators' briefing and was I given the day's code and the most recent flak map and aerial photos. Our bomb load was twelve 500-pound GP (general purpose high explosives) bombs. The target was the Hemmingstedt Oil Refinery near Heide, Germany, and the mission was expected to last six hours after formation. As best I remember, everything went pretty well according to plan until we were near the LP. (Initial Point). This is the geographical position at which the crew is committed to the bomb run; the lead bombardier essentially takes over and directs the flight from here to the bomb-release point. By this time the Germans knew our target and had kicked their antiaircraft defenses into high gear with hundreds of guns, mostly 88 and 130-mm. B-24 returning from bombing run We were hit early into the bomb run and #1 engine was knocked out. This was not a big problem yet because our B-24 could fly on three engines, especially after we dropped the bombs. The bomb run lasted between one and two minutes. We had some problems with clouds and with hundreds of smoke generators released by the Germans, all obscuring the target. When we were within about ten seconds of the bomb-release point, Sgt. Syverson, the top turret gunner, tapped me on the right shoulder with his foot, indicating that he needed oxygen. At the moment he put his boot down, a shell exploded just in front of our right wing. Fragments 40 of the red-hot shell casings knocked out the #3 engine and started a fire in the engine. Flak punched a hole in the radio operator's compartment, slicing through the junction box of radio wires. This instantly caused us to lose all radio and interphone communication. Little fires were suddenly burning wherever flak hit. My first reaction was that Syverson had kicked me in the face with his boot hard enough to knock my oxygen mask off, but it was the flak hitting his foot that did it. In the confusion, I first got rid of the bombs (we didn't have a bombardier that day) but was unable to reach anyone to see if the bomb bays were actually clear. That's when I realized that I had no interphone. I left my station and jumped up to the flight deck to check on Paul and Dan. They were all right and were trying to get the plane leveled off and out of the formation, the better to put out the fire which was now burning fiercely in #3 engine. Gates, the flight engineer, came up from the waist to find out what had happened, as the men in other positions were beyond sight of the damage. I yelled in his ear to check the nose and tail turrets and see if anyone was hurt. The wind noise coming through the many flak holes, especially from the radio operator's position, made it virtually impossible to communicate verbally. The radio operator, Red McDowell had left his seat seconds before the shell hit to make sure the bombs had all fallen, and when he returned, he found the backrest of his seat completely shot away. The nose gunner, Sgt. Duecker, could see #1 engine feathered and could see the fire in the #3 engine, but he couldn't see behind and was unable to reach anyone on the ruined interphone or get out of the turret without help. So he was totally without information and helpless. Paul motioned to me that he was going to slip the plane on its right wing in a dive to try to blow out the fire. The engineer had already shut of the gas supply to #3, and the immediate problem was to extinguish the fire before the wing came off. We slipped - dove about 5,000 feet and finally blew out the fire. The rest of the formation was now Ions gone. This left us alone with only two engines running and 500 miles from home. Sgt. Duecker told us later that while the Plane was diving, he thought we had all bailed out and abandoned him in the nose. We were flying a B-24 H model, with the navigator sitting directly behind the pilot, only the iron 'coffin lid' separating us. The top turret was directly overhead. We put all the power we dared on the remaining two engines, but this was not enough to maintain altitude. I did not know exactly where we were, and we had about 8/10 undercast blocking the view below. worked out a new course home, avoiding any known German cities and heavy flak concentrations. A few minutes after we got straightened out and headed westerly toward England, the turret gunner tapped me again on the shoulder with his foot, and I noticed blood dripping on my maps and charts. Sgt. Syverson was still above me, watching for German fighters. Blood was flowing over the top of his boot. I pulled his boot off and a pint or more of blood poured down on my charts and all over me. After I had wiped off his foot, I could see a piece of flak about the size of a half-dollar sticking out the top of his foot behind his toes in the arch. The flak had entered from the front; split open his boot and foot, and was stuck in his bones. I couldn't remove it with my fingers, so I got a pair of pliers and pulled it out and motioned for him to get out of the turret. Sgt. Gates took his place in the turret while I had Syverson lie on the floor. I bandaged his foot tightly to stop the bleeding. Someone had stolen the morphine from our first aid kit, but I found a vial in a second kit and gave him a shot before sending him down to the waist to roll up in a blanket on the floor. I put the flak in my coverall pocket, thinking he'd want that for a souvenir someday. We were now out of immediate danger as long as German fighter planes didn't see us. If we were spotted we were in for trouble, however, as we were making only 140 miles an hour and the last 92 miles home were over the North Sea. The Germans occupied both Belgium and Holland, so there was no place even remotely safe to bail out. When we got to the coast of Holland, we were down to 5,000 feet altitude, and I figured we could make it if both engines continued on full power. Soon after we left the Dutch coast, a fighter plane did approach from the north. We were worried about whose it was until about 600 yards out; he threw his silhouette up so we could recognize that it was a P-47, one of ours. He slid in almost to our wingtip and waved to let us know he would escort us home. Then he moved out and stayed 500 feet above us, and we knew that we had protection. We just needed engine power. If we went down, he would notify the Air-Sea Rescue and circle above while his gas held out or until help arrived. He had probably tried to call us earlier to exchange identity information, but of course we couldn't know that. Since our base at Debach was only three miles from the coast, we landed there rather than at Woodbridge, the emergency base nearby. We fired a few red flares when the base was in sight to alert them that we had wounded on board and were coming straight in downwind, not going around the traffic pattern. We were the last plane in and over thirty minutes late but more than happy to be home. The old B-24 was sent to salvage, as it wasn't worth fixing. Syverson was treated at the base hospital and then sent to a field hospital for 41