Everett Crew – Assigned 752nd Squadron – November 18, 1944

The Everett crew arrived at Horsham St Faith on November 18, 1944 and were assigned to the 752nd Squadron.  The next day they were transferred to the 754th Squadron where they would remain until the end of the war.  2Lt Lou Pressman(?), the crew’s bombardier in training, was not assigned with the crew.

After being on station for 36 days without flying a mission, their first combat sortie came on December 24, 1944.  This was a “maximum effort” (i.e. anything with wings was to fly) by the Eighth Air Force, and the 458th dispatched 56 aircraft, of which 53 reached the target area.  After cooling their heels so long, the crew flew another four missions in the next nine days.

They would fly only three missions in January; and nine in February, one of which, on the 20th was recalled due to weather.  The mission on February 26th was the group’s 200th, and all crews marked the occasion by returning safely from bombing Berlin.  In March the crew would fly ten combat missions, all but two of them in the aircraft “Briney Marlin”.  Everett flew this aircraft on 15 of his 30 credited missions.  It was during March that 2Lt Thomas E. Walsh, the crew’s navigator, was transferred to the 755th Squadron to be a lead crew navigator.  Records show that he flew his last combat flight on April 25, 1945 as the Pilotage Navigator on the crew of 1Lt Ralph O. Hoffman.

Beginning in April the crew flew four missions and were then sent on Rest Home Leave on April 10th for seven days.  Everett and Shupp went to Coombe House, Shaftesbury, Dorset, while the enlisted men went to the Palace Hotel, Southport, Lancashire.  They all arrived back in time to participate in the last Eighth Air Force mission of the war on April 25th, when the 458th bombed rail installations near Bad Reichenhall, Germany.  Their navigator on this mission was 2Lt Andrew D. Bowles, originally assigned with 2Lt Richard M. Sharp and crew.

Sgt Francis P. Birmingham, the crew’s armorer-gunner, was assigned on the same day that his brother, Sgt Robert C. Birmingham arrived at Horsham as gunner on the crew of 2Lt Roger F. Hicks. The Hicks crew was in the 752nd Squadron and flew five missions before they were forced to Sweden on January 17, 1945.  Most of the crew bailed out (two men remained in the pilot-less plane when it crashed, suffering no injuries!) and all were eventually returned to England.

Since the crew did not quite complete a full combat tour of 35 missions, it is possible that they were assigned to ferry a Liberator back to the States in June 1945.

Members of the crew with Briney Marlin

Standing: Unknown, Frank Birmingham, William Everett
Kneeling: James Needham, John O’Malley, Unknown

Combat Missions of S/Sgt Francis P. Birmingham

Mission List

(Courtesy: Marybeth Dyer)