On Sunday, I attended Legends with a friend who has never been to Duxford, so after the flightline walk we did the full tour. The Land Warfare Hall drew some oohs and aahs, but the American Air Museum just took my friend’s breath away. She walked dumbstruck around aircraft she’d heard of but never seen, able to see, touch and even smell them, while I (in a rather smug I’ve-been-here-before kind of way) explained what they were and what their significance was.
But then something happened which even silenced me. We met these three chaps…
By: ageorge - 14th July 2003 at 22:43
Good photo Steve , heroes – every one of them , respect.
By: macky42 - 14th July 2003 at 22:36
Living Legends at Flying Legends.
By: Arabella-Cox - 14th July 2003 at 22:30
To my eternal shame, I didn’t catch their names. But they were part of a group from the 379th Bomb Group (as Kev told me today), and according to the pilot’s daughter-in-law, they were here in England for a week before heading to Paris for a week. So far, they’d visited the former USAAF bases at Kimbolton (now an industrial estate) and Podington (a dragster racetrack).
The guy on the left is an ex-B17 navigator. A man who fought his war with a map, compass and pencil. In an aeroplane which was being shot at from every direction, while he had no way of returning fire. He had to concentrate on his job, and trust that his mates would do theirs. A very brave man indeed.
The chap in the white shirt to the right was the Group’s Lead Bombardier. Think about that responsibility for a moment. He decides exactly when to drop his, and therefore the Group’s, bombload. Get it right and the target’s destroyed. Get it wrong, and he and his mates will have to come back and do it again, knowing full well that not all of them will come home. What a truly terrifying responsibility to have.
And the chap in the middle? Well he was a former B-17 pilot – started on F’s and ended up on G’s – and was accompanied by his son and daughter-in-law. And after he and his mates had had their picture taken standing in front of ‘Mary Alice’, I plucked up the courage to talk to him. Unfortunately, all I could think to ask was, What was the B-17 like to fly?
His answer was just wonderful.
“Easy. Just like any other airplane. Just got more engines.”
And he followed that up with;
“Pretty slow though, until you dropped your bombload. In fact, yeah, she was still pretty slow after that.”
To be honest, I couldn’t ask him any more questions as I was getting quite awestruck – here was a man who’d gone through hell so many years ago, yet was making light of it. But he was a character – when his son pointed out that over there was a B24 and hadn’t Dad flown one of those, ‘Dad’ replied;
“Hell no. Ain’t never been anywhere near one, and you know that. And I ain’t going near one now…”
What a guy…
🙂
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July 14, 2003 at 10:29 pm