page_title: 427th Reconnaissance Squadron
section_title: Combat in the European Theater
hierarchical_section_title: 427th Reconnaissance Squadron / History / World War II / Combat in the European Theater
caption_attribution_description: English: Aircrew and squadron support personnel (including the mascot dog) pose in front of Boeing B-17F Flying Fortress 42-5392 "Stric Nine/City of Albuquerque" at Molesworth England. Aircraft was assigned to the 427th Bombardment Squadron, 303rd Bombardment Group. Note the aircraft shows 20 combat missions completed with 11 enemy aircraft shot down on its fuselage. This aircraft was lost Aug 19, 1943 attacking the Gilze-Rijen and Flushing Airfields in Belgium.
context_page_description: The 427th Reconnaissance Squadron is an active United States Air Force unit assigned to Beale Air Force Base, California.
  The squadron's roots go back to World War I, when it was organized as the 38th Aero Squadron, a training unit that served in Texas and Illinois. When the United States Army Air Service reorganized its training units in July 1918, the squadron was renamed Squadron A, Chanute Field. Following the Armistice of 11 November 1918, the squadron was demobilized in December.
  The World War I squadron was consolidated with the 38th Pursuit Squadron when that unit was activated in 1933, although it was not equipped before it was inactivated in 1935. The squadron was activated again in 1936 as the 38th Reconnaissance Squadron, forming the long range reconnaissance arm of the 1st Wing. The squadron was attached to the 19th Bombardment Group and began its deployment to join the group in the Philippines in December 1941. However, the 38th's Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses arrived at Hickam Field while it was under attack by the Imperial Japanese Naval Air Service.
context_section_description: In April the Army Air Forces recognized there was little difference between the reconnaissance squadrons assigned to heavy bombardment groups and their companion bombardment squadrons, and dropped their "reconnaissance" designation. In this renaming, the 38th became the 427th Bombardment Squadron. The ground echelon departed Biggs Field, Texas in August 1942, arriving at Fort Dix on 24 August. It sailed aboard the RMS Queen Mary and arrived in Great Britain on 10 September. The air echelon flew through Kellogg Field, Michigan and Dow Field, Maine before ferrying its planes across the Atlantic.
  Due to the haste to move heavy bombers to Europe, the squadron was insufficiently trained for combat and it continued to train in England until it entered combat on 17 November 1942 in a strike against Saint-Nazaire, but returned without striking, having been unable to locate its target. It attacked Saint-Nazaire the following day, although its intended target was La Pallice. Its initial raids were on airfields, railroads and submarine pens in France. As a unit of one of only four Flying Fortress groups in VIII Bomber Command during late 1942 and early 1943, the squadron participated in the development of the tactics that would be used throughout the air campaign against Germany.
  In 1943, the squadron began flying missions to Germany, participating in the first attack by American heavy bombers on a target in Germany, a raid on the submarine yards at Wilhelmshaven on 27 January 1943. From that time, it concentrated primarily on strategic bombardment of German industry, marshalling yards, and other strategic targets, including the ball bearing plants at Schweinfurt, shipyards at Bremen and an aircraft engine factory at Hamburg.
  The 427th received a Distinguished Unit Citation when adverse weather on 11 January 1944 prevented its fighter cover from joining the group, exposing it to continuous attacks by Luftwaffe fighters. Despite this opposition, the unit successfully struck an aircraft assembly plant at Oschersleben.
  Although a strategic bombing unit, the squadron was diverted on occasion to close air support and interdiction for ground forces. It attacked gun emplacements and bridges in the Pas-de-Calais during Operation Overlord, the invasion of Normandy, in June 1944; bombed enemy troops during Operation Cobra, the breakout at Saint Lo, and during the Battle of the Bulge. It bombed military installations near Wesel during Operation Lumberjack, the Allied assault across the Rhine. Its last combat mission was an attack on 25 April 1945 against an armament factory at Pilsen.
  Following VE Day in May 1945 the 303d Group was reassigned to the North African Division, Air Transport Command and moved to Casablanca Airfield, French Morocco to use its B-17 bombers as transports, ferrying personnel from France to Morocco. However, the two B-17 groups moved to Casablanca proved surplus to Air Transport Command's needs and the squadron was inactivated in late July 1945 and its planes ferried back to the United States.
caption: 427th Squadron personnel with unit B-17[note 4]
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