| Show 1 f e m r QUEENS DIE DIE DIE- f fU U PROUDLY n rl WH IT JIe es Li i STORY T THUS TAUS US FAR FAU CoL Frank Kurt Kurtz Flying Fortress pilot tells the Japs struck in when e I of f tn that t fatal day Eight of his men aref are the tho Philippines for fer shelter and Old 99 Is f ed fleeing oto off orr thet the tie demolished before It can ret get t ground Kurtz Kutt escapes to Australia Australla there and then rues lees a ac Christmas ads nis 1 o 1 nitres Fortress c to Java On a mission to toniT the Philippines their squadron n o In niT papao o battleship and sinks links two cruisers NO a transport They take off from fromField fromI and j a I Field for a target off orr Borneo and fly through terrible for fog for hours bourse Uben they ther pull out of It they see a black cloud which proves to be smoke moke from burning Dutch oU oil fields InBOrn In had bad fired their fields BOrn Borneo to Dot Dutch h i C CHAPTER AP R x RI X R I 1 finally decide to give It that thousand and i if I get back let them jerk the wreck and put in a anew anew new cew one With that extra thousand thousand thou- thou sand jand now V maybe I can get over the target were target were we're about to begin our bomb runs runs and and bag a cruiser which Is 15 a good trade for a ruined airplane airplane air air- plane motor Now how were we're approaching the the ex ex- exact exact act position of the target and I begin be egin e- e gin to realize the predicament I Im I'm ImIn ImIn m in In In- Because i If I lose another motor on the same side Ill I'll have little chance of getting this s plane home Y All the time Jims Jim's doing his best to stay with me but I continue to fall back And just lust then Harris my bombardier peering down through the broken overcast calls caUs Target ahead Im I'm glued to the needle now but when my bombardier starts to make his run and the bomb bay doors come open their extra drag dragen dragan en In the air slows me down still more and I fall further behind Jim as I trim the ship both to compensate for or those open doors and to keep the wing which carries that limping engine from falling l Then When over my earphones Jim Is Isling r ling Bombs away Frank Frank Im Im I'm ImI ming ning oft off I the target and far ahead I J can see the sun glint on his up- up cocked wing as he be heads for home borne But rm Im still on the needle my bombardier has picked up a beautiful target target target-a a gang of transports transports transports trans trans- ports and nd a cruiser down through the overcast the sea is laced with their curving wakes as they try to jet get away but away but he cant can't seem to hold any anyone one of them In his sights long enough to make a good run Finally Harris in desperation pleads over the Frank I Just cant can't hang onto that cruiser- cruiser lets let's turn east U Can you just hold It Frank pleads Harris over the Just hold it and well we'll hang out one In just a second And then Jim Connally For Gods God's sake drop your bombs and come on Frank I can see Jim inthe In Inthe Inthe the distance getting smaller and smaller Harris the bombardier peering down from the navigators navigator's compartment compart compart- ment couldn't see anything when his bomb train hit the surface But the tub gunner peering straight down from the belly of the ship swears he saw one of them go smack down for a direct hit on a Jap cruiser With my limping motor I could l hack tb ck and really begin to worry I t I tried to level off oft but of course I couldn't I knew new we were somewhere someI somewhere some some- I where over Borneo by now The altimeter showed we were feet high and in spite of everything I Iwas Iwas Iwas was doing we were dropping feet lower every minute I thought of landing on the camouflaged field here on Borneo but we might be too low even to bail ball out i if we nosed down through this dense weather and couldn't find the field at once I Now dropping feet a minute lf U you can keep it from falling no faster than that at the end of the first hour you'll be down to the ithe second hour the third r hour So you see haw it is If you youve you've ye got gas enough for four hours youve you've got barely enough altitude to tomake tomake tomake make it back to Java I argued with myself i I But it was going to be tough on the other boys Wed We'd been on oxygen oxy oxy- gen for four hours and ordinarily after a fight In the high air which Is Is a strain o the on n everyone first thing tig you do Is bring her down to so everyone can take off oft his j mask and relax Only I had to hang onto my precious altitude and it f would be another two hours before I We had fluttered down to But K it t seemed it t was the only thing wing to do so I 1 told my mv navi navigator ator a- a tor We Walt It Seamon Seamen to set a course ourse f for j Malang Field Then it was up to me I tried every trick in the book and a a few Id I'd heard of to keep that rate fate of fall faU from rising because if i It went to or 3 00 feet teat a minute 1 f only for a few minutes I 1 knew wed we'd lose se the toe Plane The automatic pilot was Nas out a little gadget had busted and aoa of course we had no spare parts so my pilot co-pilot and I had to do doall 5 all au the flying g worn-out worn as we were but at least we didn't have to keep stations on any other plane now or have j ve the nightmare of maybe crash- crash t tag E into cote someone else Then suddenly we the had a breath breath- er r tor for the clouds vanished behind 1 I us and we were floating free fret out 1 into OJ the abyss of a cloud canyon canyon- ram b b- b ame e old one Peering down I Jean to See the gray wisps of that I canyons canyon's S bottom practically practical y trailing on on nl the K dull dull- green clad jungle moun moin- tams a I ns far tar below I doubt l if there Was so We even u a 11 thousand feet of ceiling kept on our course When we 7 1 I finally cleared the weather weather weather-we we were I out over the Java Sea south of I Borneo Borneo we we were so far out that I realized wed we'd passed the point of no return The only way we could go on now was towards Java which was the nearest land The field at Surabaya was a little little little lit lit- tle closer than Malang but I was afraid of its short runway so with what gas and altitude we had left we decided to try for Malang but as we approached the mountain pass we could see the weather was settling settling settling set set- down tighter and tighter on us and looking ahead I got afraid that when we got on up into the pass the cloud ceiling might push us right do down onto the pass floor and Id I'd spill all the boys bos out into a rice paddy pad pad- dy in that fog I could see the crew was anxious too I hadn't ne needed cd to tell them much of the thc fix we were in they hadn't missed a trick So then I took my last decision Rather than nose on into that pass and use up my last gas trying to see what the weather there was really like it turned out later it was terrible I turned and headed beaded back toward Surabaya Field while I still had contact flying and while I had gas and altitude enough to get in Which means mearn while he could still till see seethe seethe ee the ground When I fi finally llY saw Surabaya Field we had less than 1000 feet of altitude left and I didn't dare think how bow little gas So I didn't try to circle just circle just dropped my wheels asked for the wing flaps and set sether sether her ber down on that short runway and andI I SA r 1 c r t t 0 1 I 1 got Col Eubank on the telephone at l Malang He lie was most anxious could be thankful the Japs had left me my hydraulics so that my brakes would stop me on that strip We taxied into our revetment and andI I got Colonel Eubank on the telephone telephone telephone tele tele- phone at Malang He was most anxious I was the only one hed he'd heard from I could only tell him what I thought were the results of the mission It turned out later that the other planes had all come down at and He told me to take my crew I and stay overnight at the hotel In Surabaya and come back to Malang the next morning It was the first time wed we'd seen the big beautiful seaport seaport sea sea- port metropolis of Java except from the air months air months since wed we'd seen any big city Here were stores and glittering glit gilt wring bars movie houses and the picturesque natives and the Dutcha Dutch Dutch- a pageant of the Far East But we were tired beyond any words I have to tell from those eleven cleven and anda a half hours In the air The longest mission Id I'd ever flown The manager manager manager man man- ager of this big hotel wanted to tomake tomake tomake make a big occasion of it It was the first time they had seen the uniforms uniforms uniforms uni uni- forms of those American aviators who were going to save Java But after what wed we'd seen that day down through the mist I wasn't so sure we would do it There had to be bemore bemore bemore more of us and us-and and soon So we told him no thanks no party We all wanted to tumble into bed We had hadan hadan hadan an early carly alert scheduled to check the ship for our return to Malang We soon got our first reinforcements reinforcements reinforcements reinforce reinforce- ments Frank Kurtz continued They were Fortresses of the brand brand- new E model Wed We'd heard them talked of in the States Stales but hut Id I'd never neverseen neverseen neverseen seen one There were many improvements improvements Improvements im im- but most vital of all were the new tail taU guns The old D model which I flew had been almost almost al al- most defenseless there if iI a Zero came in directly on your tail tall you had to depend on the cross fire put putout putout putout out from the plane flying next you on your wing If II you were alone you were a goner The boys who flew these new Es E's were old friends of ours the Bombardment Group Group friendly friendly ri rivals rivals ri- ri vals in the Air Corps to our Group Wed We'd competed with them at maneuvers and in practice bombing At ot Lake back home But in January the reinforcements reinforcements reinforce reinforce- ments were a little thin trickle of the thousand planes we hoped for Of course they were then terribly short of seasoned pilots and often quickly trained kids were flying them and cracking them up all across Africa and Asia But it was all they had to send us Sometimes six would start out from Tampa Field and maybe two would arrive at Malang During the whole month of January we got only half a dozen We were in the old which came out to reinforce you said Master Sergeant Charles T. T Reeves the bombardier He had been sitting sitting sitting sit sit- ting beside the pilot under the planes plane's wing whig So was I said Master Sergeant Rowland A. A Boone the gunner who sat next to himOn himOn himOn him On the day of Pearl Harbor the was sitting on Hamilton Field I California poised California poised waiting for one new plane to come off the Boeing assembly line before we took off I Iacross across the Pacific for Manila Of course the big news from Hawaii I r canceled that trip Wed We'd have to go around the world another way Then they put me to work ferrying ferrying ferry ferry- ing tog Es E's from the factory to Sacramento Sacramento Sacra Sacra- mento continued the Gunner I Iwas Iwas 1 was picking them right oft off the assembly assembly assembly as as- asI I line two or three a day It would have been wonderful i if we could have had that many in Java But the bottleneck then was pilots the the planes were all stacked up waiting for them and no matter how fast you build Fortresses you cant can't Jerk a kid out of a B trainer train train- er and put him in a Boeing And by bythe bythe bythe the way when we got back to the States this summer the bottleneck was still stUl pilots They still had several several several sev sev- eral dozen Es E's stacked up on the factory field waiting for men to fly them Ill never forget my first look at atthe atthe atthe the model E-model Fortress She had bad that big dorsal fin and she looked a lot bigger more bigger more deadly too Because not only were were there tail guns but much better side guns And a whole stack of power turrets On the old D model the angle of fire from the radio guns and the belly guns had been very small but this was corrected in the E and the top turret turret turret tur tur- tur- tur ret was a honey I It doesn't hurt to talk about the theD theD theD D model because the enemy has captured plenty of them Its It's no nomore nomore nomore more secret than the Model T Ford But in those days the E was a surprise surprise sur sur- surprise prise package package like like the new F model Is now And when something Is really new the combat boys who have bave to take it up dont don't want it blabbed around For instance when we were still out East a copy of an American Ameri Amen can magazine arrived which gave a complete diagram of the E. E It showed everything the everything the angle of fire Ore of every gun even the break In the fire angles for the propellers There weren't many blind spots on the E where an enemy fighter can sneak in but this diagram showed every one Our gang talked over that damned picture for days Hells bells we said why dont don't they give the Japanese a set of blueprints blueprints blue blue- prints In addition it showed the exact position of every man on the plane so the Japs could work in through the blind spots and pick us off It was all stuff we knew the Japanese didn't know because all the Es E's we h had d lost up to then had either dropped in the ocean or burned after alter beaching My God the other other other oth oth- er gunners said selling us out back home They might just justas as well take the guns off oft the plane and let the Japs shoot us down That picture knocked our morale for days But what the hell Now the F model is out out nobody nobody knows the exact exact exact ex ex- act Improvements on that yet and ond when the enemy fighters hit the F they'll find out they've picked up a areal areal areal real hot potato Lets get back to the trip over said the Bombardier In my plane we left the States December 28 Id I'd had a blue Christmas missed Christmas missed dinner dinner dinner din din- ner because we were out testing guns guns but but didn't mind much because because because be be- cause we were itching to get over and into it As we wc were approaching Brazil we ran into a hell of a front couldn't get over It so our navigator could take sun shots and find out our post position tion weren't sure where in hell we were My pilot Captain Duane Skiles first went up to but there wasn't a break Then he went back down through it staying just feet above the Atlantic We hoped we were headed right for our field at Belem but we didn't know Finally I called to him over the and said that in my old geography book it said you could see the line where the yellow Amazon Amazon Amazon Ama Ama- zon mixed into the blue Atlantic as far as four hundred miles out to tosea sea sea maybe maybe he could pick this up and follow It InSure inSure In Sure enough we found this line between yellow and ond blue But we were farther out to sea than wed we'd figured By the time we hit shore we were plenty low on gas and an nn hour overdue It was getting dark and there are no lights in that jungle jun jun- gle now gle-now now and then you'd see a n glint of a n native with a B torch down there We couldn't pick up Belem and we had just twenty minutes' minutes gas left ITO TO BE DE CONTINUED |
