Missions

Incident – June 29, 1944

The 458th’s target for this date was the Junkers Airframe Factory near Aschersleben, Germany.  This was the group’s 82nd  mission and they managed to put 23 Liberators in the air. Of these aircraft, three aborted due to mechanical failure, leaving 19 planes to continue on to the target.  Two B-24s were lost over the target, one piloted by 2Lt William P. Perkinson (755th) and the other piloted by 2Lt Charles B. Armour (754th).  Of the 20 men who parachuted from these two bombers, 16 were captured and 4 evaded, eventually making their way back to England.

The B-24 Top O’ The Mark, piloted by 1Lt Kenneth M. Gorrell (pictured at left) was flying in the lead element.  Gorrell was an original 752nd pilot who had crashed on takeoff on March 2, 1944 (the group’s first combat mission).  Seven of the ten man crew was killed, with Gorrell, his radio operator and flight engineer being injured.  Gorrell had only resumed operational flying on June 5th and this would be his 12th mission.  His crew was mostly comprised of members from two different crews who were making up missions in order to complete their tours.  In addition, two crew members were relatively new to combat flying.  Assigned to Gorrell for this mission was navigator 2Lt Milton M. Feldman (2Lt Theodore E. Haydon crew) and Sgt James R. Murray as nose turret gunner.  Murray had been with the 752nd Squadron as an armorer (MOS 511) and had been reclassified as a gunner on June 20, 1944.  It is not known for certain, but this may have been his first mission in that capacity.  Top O’ The Mark also made it to the target before sustaining numerous flak hits.  One of these bursts hit in the cockpit, setting the pilot’s oxygen system on fire.

According to a statement made by Gorrell:
“At about 0930 on 29 June 44 while on the bombing run attacking ASCHERSLEBEN, we received several flak hits, one of which started a fire in the Pilot’s oxygen system and spread over the left side of the cockpit.  The CO2 Fire Extinguisher was used, but did no good.  The fire was getting worse and it appeared that we would be unable to get it out, so the signal was given to prepare to abandon ship.  The interphone system was out and the alarm bells in the tail and on the flight deck did not work and it is not known whether the bell in the nose compartment worked or not. We continued to work on the fire and finally managed to beat it out.  At this point the Engineer made an inspection of the ship to see if there were any further damage or injuries to personnel.  It wasn’t until then that we found out that the Navigator and Nose Turret gunner had bailed out.  The waist gunners saw the two parachutes open, but did not realize at the time who it was.  The rest of the crew was uninjured and returned with the ship to the base safely.”

Upon landing Lt Feldman was captured “between Bernburg and Calbe…” and spent the rest of the war in Stalag Luft III.  After the war, he stated that it was his first time flying with this crew and that he had heard the bailout alarm.  It is possible that this crew had a prearranged signal that consisted of using the alarm bell (maybe a short ring or two) to warn the crew to “prepare to abandon ship” (as stated by the pilot), and then a different use of the alarm bell, perhaps (long sustained ring) to tell the crew to actually jump.  That is pure speculation, but it seems that whatever happened, this crew’s bailout procedure was not communicated to the navigator and the nose turret gunner.  Feldman did not see Murray after reaching the ground.

On December 8, 1944 the Swiss Red Cross reported Sgt James R. Murray was killed in action on June 29, 1944 and was buried in the “cemetery at Muschlingen at Glothe, Germany.” The true fate of Sgt Murray was not known until well after the war. It was then, while Army investigators were trying to determine the whereabouts of U.S. airmen still reported as MIA that the truth about Sgt Murray came to light. A request for the status of Sgt Murray was made in March 1946, but investigators were hampered by the fact that Glothe lay in the Russian Zone of Occupation. While U.S. Graves Registration units were permitted to operate in this zone, their operational scope was limited.  [See rest of story here: Murder Unresolved]

Photo: Dave Ehnebuske / Painting: Mike Bailey, as commissioned by Stephen Adams

B-24H-25-DT 42-51110 7V P  Top O’ The Mark
1Lt William L. Jackson Crew

Disposition

B-24H-25 DT 42-51110 TOP O’ THE MARK
NMF
RCL: P 7V (752)
RCL: P Z5 (754)
RCL: M 7V (752)

Lead aircraft. RCM equipment.

Transferred from 752nd BS to 754th BS between 4 & 9 Aug 44 and reverted to 752nd BS between 11 Sep & 14 Oct 44.

According to Joseph Schultz, flight engineer/gunner on TOP O’ THE MARK, although it [emergency land] crash-landed at Horsham St Faith on 29 Jun 44 (on return from the mission to Aschersleben) and was officially written off the station records, the base depot crews rebuilt the aircraft and made it airworthy. Mr Schultz and his crew took it over after it was repaired. They eventually flew the airplane back to the USA. In fact, they were the “unofficial” last crew and aircraft to leave the base as they had to return to Horsham St Faith (from Prestwick) in order to have the fuel cells replaced. MACR 7085 but the aircraft was not MIA. RZI ‘45

(Info Courtesy: Tom Brittan)