War Journal - April 10, 1945

4/10/1945
Thursday
#38 - Mission today to Checkoslavakia - bridge near the town of Altenburg. It was destroyed. Bombing results have been so good lately that they only sent four flights of us out yesterday. We got the bridge! It was the first time B-26's ever hit that country.

War Journal - April 9, 1945

4/9/1945
Wednesday
Unloaded box cars all day and moved to our new quarters in the old chateau. Quarters are pretty crowded now. Lots of work to do.

War Journal - April 8, 1945

4/8/1945
Tuesday
#37 - First mission from new field today to small town about ten miles east of Hanover. Seems like all of Germany is burning over that way. Oil fires gave us a 60 mile smoke screen to come out over. Visual mission - light flak - good results. 7 Superiors - 2 Excellents.

Grandma Starr (the oldest) and her sisters.

Mike's first birthday.

It seems like just yesterday!

War Journal - April 6, 1945

4/6/1945
Sunday
Moved to A-89 today by plane. We are living in 449th area until our place is fixed up.

War Journal - April 4, 1945

4/4/1945
Friday
Made shuttle run to new field - A-89 this afternoon to haul supplies. Field looks pretty good but we are going to live about 5 miles away.

War Journal - April 2, 1945

4/2/1945
Wednesday
Weather holding us down continually now. Pappas, Pehr & Renchkovsky left for the flak home today on the Riveria. We are drawing 3-wks PX Rations tomorrow so guess we will be moving within a week to Belgium.

War Journal - March 28, 1945

Zombie III

White River Special

3/28/1945
Friday
#36 - Weather has had us grounded two days. The troops across the Rhine are moving so fast that they have taken several of our targets after we were briefed. Pulled a mission this afternoon to Naumburg (near Kassel) oil storage depot. PFF so couldn't see anything - milk run too. Germans are so busy running they don't have time to shoot at us. We had one engine cutting all the way - in addition to bad weather - so we all did a lot of sweating. Things like that are what crack men's nerves in combat.

War Journal - March 25, 1945

B-26 Nose Art.

"Sit'N Git"

3/25/1945
Tuesday
#35 - Bombed today in support of Patton's new bridge head across the Rhine near Worms. We were over the target 55 minutes making a good bomb run. I sweated ten years from my life. There was plenty flak. On the way away from the target we were separated and alone over Germany and a ME-109 decided we were crippled from flak I guess. He came up - looked us over & was probably preparing for the kill when a P-47 nailed him. Weather stopped us from going on a mission this afternoon.

(I asked Dad about this story a few days ago. He still remembers that day. He said that their plane received some damage during the bomb run and fell behind the rest. The German fighter approached from the front and flew over them. Going opposite directions, it took several miles and minutes for the fighter to make a loop and come back after the bomber. Lone bombers were "sitting ducks" to enemy fighters. As the German was on the approach to shoot down the bomber, an American fighter dropped out of the sky and took out the German on the first pass.)

War Journal - March 24, 1945

Sgt. Pehr ready for a mission.

Nose art - Seabees

3/24/1945
Monday
#34 - Today was the day of the big invasion across the lower Rhine north of the Rhur Valley. This outfit went out about daylight to bomb flak position ahead of the incoming air-borne Army. This is what our past few days have been working up to. In the afternoon I went on a mission in support of the Remagen bridge head. We bombed the RR bridge just east of the bridgehead. Received considerable flak. - This mission was the 400th for this group - over 100 in France.

War Journal - March 23, 1945

B-26 nose art - Little Sue

3/23/1945
Sunday
#33 - Bombed the town of Dinslaken in the Rhur twice today. I went the second time. Very short time inside enemy territory but there is plenty flak along the Rhine at this place and we made three bomb runs. We were carrying 100# clusters of frags. Bombs from the ship ahead of us blew back on us hitting our plane & props in several places. We were lucky none of them exploded as in the case of one other ship with us. I saw it go down in flame & explode - we believe five of the men got out but some of them drifted into German territory. Our ship was pretty well battered between flak & our own bombs.

War Journal - March 21, 1945

3/21/1945
Friday
#32 - This sqdn. made two missions today both to same area as mission yesterday. I went on the afternoon mission to the town of Stadtlohn - little west of Munster. Almost all the ships in this group were shot pretty bad but no one was hurt. Something big must be up in that area as there were so many planes in that area it was hard to make a bomb run. Even the RAF was in with us. Every town (large or small) east of the Rhine was a smoking inferno. We were all dropping fire bombs. I saw our bombs destroy an entire town - smoke was visual for many miles.

War Journal - March 20, 1945

03-1945, Lts. Cowart, Grant, Borst; Sgts. Edwards, Pappas, Foil - made on the day of Grant's last mission.

B-26 Nose Art - Lil Murf

3/20/1945
Thursday
#31 - Bombed an amno. Refilling plant North of the Rhur. We were window ships on the mission and bombed a small town on the way out. Couldn't see the results. There was considerable flak in this area as they even shot at the window ships. We brought back two holes.

War Jourrnal - March 18, 1945

B-26 Nose Art - Just Take Us Home Again Kathleen

Je Reviens - I'll Return

3/18/1945
Tuesday
#30 - Silver cluster mission today - Bombed in support of Patton's Army in the Saar Valley today. We were to totally destroy the town of Bad Durkheim - due west of Mannheim. Two wings & two groups went in on the same target. Clouds cover obscured details. - Had a mid-air collision over the field this morning. One plane exploded and blew two others together in formation killing about twenty men.

War Journal - March 17, 1945

B-26 Nose Art - Ice Cold Katy

Hank's Yanks

3/17/1945
Monday
#29 - Bombed the Dillenburg bridge again today. Half the group went here and the balance went down South to hit a barracks area. It was a visual mission. Made three runs but results weren't too good. We received very little flak but the ones down south were shot all to pieces. They had several wounded and crash landed a couple of ships.

War Journal - March 15, 1945

Flak-Bait at Beauvais, France in March of 1945. This plane now hangs in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, DC. It became the B-26 with the most missions flown in WWII. It was at the same base in France where dad was stationed and he believes he flew one mission on this plane with most of it's crew.

Pappy's Pram - This was Dad's plane and is believed to be the B-26 with the second most missions in WWII. This photo is at Beauvais, France; at the base where they were stationed. Having the second most missions does not get you into the Smithsonian, but instead, this plane was destroyed at the end of the war, just like most of the B-26s in Europe.

3/15/1945
Saturday
Mission #28 - Flying constantly these days. Pathfinder is trying to develop a new technique for bombing so six of us were sent out today on an experimental mission. We bombed just behind the Remagen bridge head. We were only a small flight with no escort but managed to come back without being attacked. They always pick this sqdn. for pioneering every new development in bombing. That is a compliment to our record but also pretty dangerous.

War Journal - March 14, 1945

Trying out the AA guns at our base.

El Lobo Loco - This is the ship we flew across the Atlantic.

3/14/1945
Friday
Mission #27 - Dropped bombs on a small town & railroad junction furnishing supplies to the Remagen bridge head area. Good results. There wasn't much flak but it was very accurate. The ship on our right wing was shot up pretty bad with one man wounded and the one on our left wing was shot down. The ship spun in - Pappas saw three men get out but only one chute open. It was a new crew on their 2nd mission (Lt. Logue). We are flying deputy lead regular now. The Lord is protecting us because we received no holes. It was getting pretty close and I heard the plane explode when it was hit.

War Journal - March 12, 1945

B-26 Nose art - Gasparilla IV

An 88mm shell went thru this tail without exploding. Pehr was in the tail at the time.

3/12/1945
Wednesday
Mission #25 - Dropped 250's on town of Frondenburg just north of Iserlohn. No flak. In the afternoon made a run on the town of Frankenborg (#26) due west of Kaln about 75 miles. Carried a front line infantry man along with us just for the ride. No flak - both missions PFF.

War Journal - March 9, 1945

Nose art - Dixie Hurricane

A-"bomber" pursuit plane

3/9/1945
Sunday
Returned from a 2-Day pass in Paris yesterday. The bomb line has moved up to the Rhine River along the entire front so it makes our missions shorter and easier. We are alerted to move on April 5 to a field in the vicinity of Brussels. Also we are changing to A-26's - the change being completed about May 5.

War Journal - March 5, 1945

3/5/1945
Wednesday
#24 - To the city of Stadtmeckenheim south of Bonn about 10 miles. PFF & Gee went out so we tagged onto another group going in 20 minutes after us and bombed. Received moderate flak in several places.