The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1945-04-19

ma am, I didn't learn it in school.
Why. my greatest victory in the air
was on a cross-country-that's what
we call a navigation fight" And
here's the story.
Early one morning-July 81, 1912
Il took off from Running head
quarters to return to the eastern
theater at Kweilin and Hengyang.
High mountains are on this five
hundred-mile route to the East, and
/ went on top of the overcast right
away. From my twenty-thousand
foot altitude / kept looking down at
the solid cloud layer just below me,
and guess that subconsciously I
prayed there would be breaks at nv
destination. There were mountains
at my destination too, and it's still
not the best feeling to have to dive
through overcast into hilly country
with a fighter ship-or with any
ship, for that matter.
As the minutes rolled by and the
miles spun behind the P-40, still
didn't see the welcome shadow of
hole In the clouds. In just little
over two hours I arrived over the
point above the clouds where Ling
ling should have been. You see this
point was in fiat country, and be-
tween Kweilin and Hengyang. By
Intentionally making an error to the
North / knew at least what side of
Kweilin / was on, and knew further
more that I could go down much
more safely there than farther South
IN the mountains that surrounded
Kweilin.
called Lingling over the radio,
but before could get reply, Sas-
ser, the operator at Kweilin, broke
in with an "alert" warning. He
said: Chinese net reports noise of
enemy airplanes coming up the Can
ton-Hengyang Railway at high al
titude. Last report Section AS"
Looking at my map, which was
marked off in squares with letter
and numeral co-ordinates, saw that
/ was very close to that section.
But at the same time I was really
not oriented as to position, and was
into the last twenty or SO gallons of
my fuel. Here was a chance at last
to intercept enemy planes; by the
time the P-40's from our fighter sta
tons could get there, the enemy
would have gone on with their mis-
sion. What was / to do?
AS considered it for the second
that was necessary to make up nv
mind, remember thinking that my
loss of this ship would be justified
If shot Japanese ship down. and
If was out of fuel above the clouds
I could dive down and land in
rice paddy. That would be an even
trade. But I guess my ego thought
I could shoot the whole formation
down and the exchange of the
japanese flight for my one ship
would certainly be favorable to our
side. &.sn~s-~t-
But my mind was already made
up. Even then I was on my way
towards the position that I thought
was Section AS, there on the pretty
white tops of the overcast.
Calling to Sasser, | told him ]
thought I was just East of Lingling
and very close to the Jap formation,
and was going to try to intercept. !
dove down until ! was just over the
tops of the clouds, at 1880 feet.
I lodged in among the tops of the
fluffy cumulus, looking ahead for
the first sign of the black silhouette
of an airplane. As the enemy ships
had been reported heading North,
I estimated where they should now
be and flew to intercept them.
I'll never forget. I had just looked
at the fuel gauge for the hundredth
time, and as my eyes left the in
strument board to 60 back to my
diligent search, saw the clock, and
the hour was 9:08. At that instant
| saw an enemy airplane-one sill
houette From that second on,
know / moved automatically. ! saw
that on our courses we were going
to meet head-on.
The other ship was now much
nearer, and closing fast. 1t was
twin-engine bomber and was right
down low over the clouds, just as
I was. Down below now were holes
in the overcast, and l imagine the
bomber was trying to locate its po-
sition to go down through. He didn't
see my ship, and / kept hidden by
the clouds as much as possible. l
felt my left hand 60 to the instr
ment panel to turn on the gun
switch. Then, as I looked at the red
switch, saw that | had evidently
turned it on without being conscious
of the act. l moved it off, then
back on again, as kind of test.
turned the gun-sight rheostat on and
got the lighted sight reflected on
my glass armor in front of my
eyes. The enemy ship came on,
'mushrooming" in my vision; our
relative speed of approach was per-
haps five hundred miles an hour.
BY now I had showed everything
forward on the throttle quadrant
the engine was pulling full power,
and the prop pitch was set to high
speed, low pitch.
Then, just before l pressed the
trigger, I saw the other planes,
two enemy fighters above and be-
hind the bomber. | had evidently
not been seen by any of the three
ships, for after all I was coming on
very close to the clouds. But I
nearly stopped my aiming from the
surprise of seeing them. They were
about three thousand feet above the
bomber, and were weaving back and
forth in loose formation. | saw the
square wing-tip that told they were
Navy Zeros. There flashed in my
mind the warning that I had heard