The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1945-07-19

Next morning Lieut.. Pat Daniels
got up begging the General to LET
him lead a dive-bombing attack on
an aircraft assembly plant in Can
ton. His plan was good. and the
mission was made ready. All of
us went down to the alert shack
and watched the ground crew load
ing the little yellow augmentation
bombs under the wings of six
P-40E's. A short time later they
were off, with Daniels waiting to
blow up the factory. and all set with
his movie camera to take pictures
automatically as he dove the bombs
into the target.
Three hours later only five of
the six returned. Pat Daniels was
missing in action. His wing man
had seen his leader lose part of his
wing in an explosion on the way in
with the bombs. Anti-aircraft could
have done it, but most of us agreed
from the description that Daniels
bombs might have hit his own pro-
peller. AT the tremendous speed
that fast fighter-ship builds up in a
long and nearly vertical dive, pres
sures are also built up from the in
creased speed. This torque ne
cessitates so much compensating
pressure on the rudder that one
must actually stand on the rudder
control. While doing this, Pat might
have relaxed pressure just as he
reached down to pull the bomb re-
lease; this would have allowed the
speeding plane to "yaw' or skid,
and the bombs could have struck the
arc of the prop.
The only note of encouragement
was that a chute had been seen
when the fighters left the target.
Lieut.. Patrick Daniels was one of
our best and most aggressive pilots,
and we missed him Immediately
and hoped for the best.
That same night, Johnny Alison
led eight ships In fighter sweep
and dive-bombing attack on the
docks at Hankow, over four hundred
miles to the North. In the river
harbor, with the sky criss-crossed by
tracers from the ground, Johnny
dropped his bombs on the hangers
and on large freighter. Then for
ten minutes he stGafed the enemy
vessel and badly disabled it. Cap
tain Hampshire dove and shot the
searchlights out until he was out of
ammunition. The night attack so
deep into enemy territory was a
daring one and did much to confuse
the Japs further. Johnnys ships
were rather badly shot up from the
ground-fre, and he was lucky to
get them all back to base safely.
But it was such missions as these
which built up the circumstances
that would assure the success of
the big attack the General was plan
ming.
Next day, with eighteen fighters,
we escorted the bombers to raid
Sienning, an occupied town near
Hankow. We kept the circling move
ment all around our B-25's and tried
to give them an added feeling of
security by our presence. Through
heavy anti-aircraft fire, Morgan led
the attack in and didn't waste
bomb. We left the warehouses in
flames, and there was much less
ack-ack coming up towards us than
when we first approached.
Arriving back at our advanced
base, we refueled and bombed up
again. Then we made the second
raid of the day towards Hankow,
over the town of Yoyang. Once
again Morgan blasted the target,
with black bursts of anti-aircraft
fire bouncing around the formation.
But there was no interception, and
now we were feeling blue. We
couldn't destroy the Jap Air Force
if they were going to try to save
their airplanes.
We spent the next day, Thanks
giving, working on the airplanes and
resting. We had flown seven missions
in four days, and both men and ma
chimes were tired and in need of re-
pair. We had a special dinner that
night, but remained extra vigilant
against a surprise by the Jap.
On that Thanksgiving evening, as
we were grouped around the Cen
eral, he brought out a bottle of
Scotch some one he4 MIN.