We had been shadowed by some P-47's up until now, but we could see them turning back to home plate, as they just didn't have the range to go to Berlin with us. There was always some "B" model P-51's which "sweep" the skies ahead of us to about a 150 miles inland off the coast and then they had to return. We have heard of the new P-51D's which were being developed and be glad when they are here.
We would always get jumped just inside the German borders most of the time, FW-190's coming at us from our 10 O'clock position, as that was the hardest angle for us to get a line on them with the guns. They would pass all the way through our group, jinking up and down except for last second or two when they were shooting at us. The ME-109's we would see every once in a while, always were above 30,000 and they would pick on the high group and usually that is where most of our losses were, from the high group. The 190's would circle out and come back from our 2 O'clock position on their second pass, most of the time it was only 3 or 4, which looked like they were working together.
Its quite now on the inner com as everyone knows we are getting close to the German border and sure enough, the low group is calling out bandits, 10 O'clock high and diving into them, so we started looking and we could see a bomber going down in flames, so they got somebody! My top turret calls, one coming in at 11 O'clock and I looked and I could see his nose winking as he was firing at the bomber on my left side, so my boys didn't fire on that one. Suddenly, one of the 190's attacking the lead group, turned as he passed through them and as he turned to us, started climbing up directly at us. Suddenly, everybody is clamoring about this fighter or that one and all hell had suddenly broke loose. I had never seen so many fighters up at one time after us! My tail caught one broad side as he passed behind us, so we got one of the 190's, but there is still plenty to go around.
Then, just as suddenly as they had appeared, they disappeared, but we knew what that meant! FLAKE! Lots of flak out in front now, but for some reason, we were ordered to a target of opportunity because they were so many clouds down low and our "lead" bombardier could not drop on target. I knew then we were in for a rough time, as the groups started splintering off in different directions, which mean we were now down to 15 bombers for equal protection from fighters when we left target area. Navigator and bombardier suggest we hit the Marshaling yards at small town right outside Berlin and I said, "go for it"
We had to make about a 20 degree heading change for new target, 4 minutes to drop. Bombardier called bomb bay doors open! I could always tell when they went open as it slowed us just a little and they would vibrate sometimes, so I knew we were close to drop. About that time, 3 ME-110's, with rockets of some kind, started lobbing rockets at us, but usually no problem to dodge them, but I have to stay steady on heading for bomb drop calibration! I heard a large explosion off our right side and I knew a bomber was hit and sure enough, it was on the way down and we could see 3 guys tumbling through the sky, so we figured the blast must have blown them out! I have no idea where not any chutes were opened as we were busy now, not only with those 3 ME-110's, but 4 ME-109's were now making passes through the formation. "Bombs Away", cried out the bombardier and just as quick, he said rack 3 and 7 did not release! Now we had 2 500 lbers on board with a running gun battle with these Kruts, so I told him to close the bomb bay doors and we would try to relaease them when we could, but the flight engineer said he would go back and release them manually! I told radio operator to go with him as a safety, since the bomb bay doors were still open.
They came back and could only release rack 3, so we still had one on board. Of course now, I could maneuver a little so it would limit the aim time of the fighters. For the next hour, they kept snipping at us, finally they got one our bombers who had lost an engine and fell behind and they all jumped him and finally, he went down. We had standing orders not to slow up to help protect a bomber in that situation as the brass figured we would just lose more bombers instead of just one.
A large crash sounded behind me and we lurched sideways and I knew with out asking, we had been collided with! Having to hold a lot of right rudder and a little aileron to stay in position, but we were slowing down and I knew we could not hold altitude, so I told crew what was going on, that we would have to descend to a lower altitude, so we started down and as luck was with us then, as the fighters disappeared, guess back to base. But we had problems, didn't know if we could hold any altitude because we had slowed down to 110MPH and it was still descending.
Now, as we were approaching the coast line, down to 8,000 feet, I had some hard decisions to be made and quick! I put it to the crew, ":you guys want to bail over Belgium or do you want to take a chance on us getting over the channel and landing somewhere in England." Vote was clear, stay with the bomber! So then I ordered everything they could get loose, guns, equipment, what ever, throw it overboard and we can lighten our load a little.
We are now down to 3500 feet and I really don't think we are going to make dry land, but I found that at 105MPH IAS, we were only losing about 50 feet per minute and I thought as we get lighter from fuel burn, maybe, just maybe we could make it somewhere. Navigatior is telling me to steer 20 degrees to right, a RAF station 53 miles ahead! Now we are down to 1800 feet but holding altitude for right now, so we just might make it. Then I thought about the gear and flaps! Will they work, or we going to have to belly land! Christ, we still got a bomb on board, so belly landing out! We gotta get the gear down, just hope it works! I told the guys to get ready, if the gear wouldn't come down, they were to jump from 1500 feet, I would give the signal!
Field in sight now, don't try gear until 2 miles out, would still give the guys time to jump. I had everybody get in bail out positions, as we had no time to waste! I had the copilot lower the landing gear handle down and wow, they start coming down! Wow, what a feeling, 2 green lights and runway in front of us, but as we slowed down prior to touchdown, it begin to veer off to the left and I couldn't stop it and called for crash positions as I knew I could not keep it on the runway! Off into the grass we went, bouncing around a bit, but finally sled to a stop.
This is what it looked like after we got out! Dame "fate" was with us this day! We found out in debriefing that a 190 had clipped us and it went down, so that was some consolation anyway!
