“EVADING ENEMY FIRE”
by
Don R. Fisher
 
(An eyewitness account of air action over Germany on January 11, 1944.
The artist’s drawing shown here depicts a segment of the air
action that occurred over Brunswick, Germany on January 11, 1944
between the 94th BG and the German Luftwaffe.)
 
 
There have been a number of accounts written about this mission in Harry E. Slater’s book, “Lingering Contrails of the Big Square A “ (required reading).  My written account of this mission deals specifically with the artist’s drawing.  I was the copilot on John Wedding’s crew.  We were the lead crew for the 331st Squadron.  On many occasions, when our crew was leading the group or “wing”, a senior officer from the group or wing headquarters would occupy the right seat with Wedding in the left seat.  I became the tail gunner and group or wing observer for the senior officer in the co-pilot’s position.  I became his “eyes” to what was happening in his formation behind him.
 
John Wedding’s crew had completed six missions when I joined the crew.  The Wedding crew had completed their required twenty-five (25) missions just prior to January 11th and I became a “free agent” for my remaining missions.
 
On the evening prior to January 11th, I was informed that an alert was on for the next day and I would be flying in the tail gun position on Captain Lewis’ crew.  Captain Lewis’ crew would be leading the 94th group who, in turn, would be leading the combat wing.  Lieutenant Colonel Louis G. Thorup came down from wing headquarters to assume command of the combat wing on this mission from the right seat of Captain Lewis’ lead ship.  I was the wing observer in the tail gun position.
 
The early morning briefing revealed the target for the day as an aircraft factory in Brunswick, Germany.  The take off, group assembly, and then, wing assembly, were routine.  We joined the bomber stream and proceeded on our mission.  Over the North Sea, we test fired our guns.  We then crossed the coast into enemy territory.  I don’t remember any flak at the coast and, as we proceeded inland, there was no enemy action.  The 1st Bomb Division preceded us in the bomber stream and had been engaged with the bulk of the German fighter force.  The trip into the target area was shortened by the fact that we had about a 100 mile-per-hour tail wind.  This also meant we would take much longer coming back from the target.  When we were about 20 minutes from the target, I heard the radio operator report to Colonel Thorup, via intercom, that the Division had been recalled because of worsening weather over England.  Colonel Thorup asked the radio operator to call back and confirm the recall.  A few minutes later, the radio operator reported back that he could not get a confirmation of the recall.  Meanwhile, I was observing the wing behind us starting to turn back.  The next transmission I heard over the intercom was Colonel Thorup asking the navigator how far we were from the target.  The navigator replied, “about 15 minutes.”  A few minutes later, after the other 2 group commanders in our wing had been contacted, Colonel Thorup informed us that we would proceed to the target.
 
The next 15 or so minutes were uneventful; no enemy action.  We reached the I.P. and made our turn for the bomb run.  New snow from the night before covered the ground in Brunswick.  This made the target very difficult to identify.  When the bombardier zeroed in on the aircraft factory, it was too late for the bomb drop.  The bombardier reported this to Colonel Thorup and suggested that, if we did a 360-degree turn and made a second pass on the target, he wouldn’t miss it again.
 
At the briefing following the mission, Colonel Thorup stated that he decided to do the 360 degree turn and that he had called the other 2 group commanders and informed them that “our group was going to do a 360 degree turn to make another pass on the target and that they should follow us.”  These two groups were now trailing behind us.  Our group initiated a turn to the right to begin the 360-degree turn; and I watched the two groups behind us as they flew over the target.  They each dropped their bomb loads on the target run.  After dropping the bombs, they, one after another, made a left turn and headed toward England.  The 94th Bomb Group was now alone over Brunswick, Germany!  To do a 360-degree turn in a wide enough circle to give the bombardier a 6-minute straight and level bomb run on the target took about 18 minutes.  As we proceeded in the turn, I observed what appeared to be twin-engine fighters taking off from an airfield in the vicinity.  As I said before, the single-engine fighters had engaged the 1st Bomb Division who had preceded the 3rd Bomb Division into Germany that day and were down refueling and reloading ammunition.  Before we had dropped our bombs on the second run, the twin-engine fighters were at our altitude ready to engage us.  Their initial attach formation was one I had seen before – they would form several abreast at 6:00 o’clock level, @ about 1,000 yards and fire their rockets one each from under the right and left wings.  They would fire their rockets all at the same time.  I could see when they fired as their wings would “blink” and light up brightly and it would take 6 or 7 seconds for the rockets to arrive at their target and explode.  The size of the explosion was about the same as for a 105-millimeter anti-aircraft shell.  I informed Colonel Thorup of the situation and told him that when I saw them fire the rockets, I would say, “Move-it, Colonel!” at which time Captain Lewis would pull up sharply or push over sharply.  The other flight leaders were informed of the intended evasive action.  The group managed to evade 4 or 5 of these formation attacks and then, with all the enemy rockets having been fired, they attacked singly with 20-millimeter canon fire.  Their attack was very aggressive.  They attacked the high squadron.  First closing to short range at 6:00 o’clock level.  More than one of them paid the price for this bold action.  There was one B-17, a new replacement aircraft with no camouflage paint; they really went after that aircraft!  He was aflame from nose to tail.  His attacker burst into flame also and went down.  The attacks continued and I saw B-17 after B-17 drop out of formation and go down.  With the loss of so many planes out of our group, we were losing a lot of our firepower.  Our progress was slow on the homeward journey as we were heading into the headwind.  I took time out to tighten my chute straps as I felt it was only a matter of time and we would all go down.  After what seemed like a very long time, but was actually about 20 or 30 minutes, they broke off their attack.  Perhaps they were out of ammunition.  They sure used plenty on us.   A short time later some of our little friends showed up as a result of Colonel Thorup’s desperate radio call for fighter protection.  The rest of the mission was uneventful unless there were some landing difficulties that I don’t remember.  After parking the aircraft, the crew assembled in front of the airplane for a picture by the group photographer.  This picture is on page 329 of “The Lingering Contrails of the Big Square   A  “ (in the lower left-hand corner.)  I can only name a few in the back row of the picture.  Captain Lewis is second from the left.  Lieutenant Colonel Thorup is third from the left side and I am standing on the far right.
 
A day or so after the mission, the London Daily Mirror sent a reporter and sketch artist to get the story about our mission to Brunswick.  The group public relations officer asked me to describe the action of the enemy rocket attack on our group to the sketch artist, which I did.  The following Sunday after the interview, the story appeared in the London Daily Mirror and included the sketch artist’s picture.  A week or so later, the Mirror sent a photographic copy of the artist’s sketch to the group for me.  I still have it; and you also have seen it in “Nostalgic Notes of the 94th Bomb Group!”
 
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