3
Brutus Hamilton diary entry for June 28, 1943. The officer had been a two-time Olympian and silver medalist in the decathlon at the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp, Belgium. The Missouri-born Hamilton was track and field coach at the University of California, Berkeley, and was in his early forties when he entered the army after Pearl Harbor and was assigned to the 93rd’s 330th Squadron as an intelligence major. Hamilton was a gifted poet and writer and kept a diary that documented the 93rd’s exploits as the air war against Nazi Germany ramped up in 1943.
4
Post-mission intelligence report, July 19, 1943, 93rd Bomb Group Records. Author’s collection.
5
Rome radio reported the deaths of 166 persons on the ground the day following the raid. Over the next several days, the official death toll rose to 700 people. A 2003 investigation launched by Rome’s municipal government concluded that the actual number of deaths in the city’s San Lorenzo district alone was more than 1,500.
6
Gelorme Musco’s first name is spelled inconsistently in government records and news accounts. He was born “Gelorme Musco,” according to birth and census records. In US military records, his name appears as “Jerome” and “Gelrome.” On November 13, 1943, the New York Daily News ran a feature article about the death of Musco, written by a London-based correspondent for the United Press news service, Walter Cronkite, later of CBS News fame. Cronkite’s story began, “All his life Gelrome Musco wanted to see Sicily. His parents were born there. His grandparents still live there. Gelrome today is buried in Sicily, in the little town of Cassible—but he never saw the Mediterranean isle.” See Walter Cronkite, “Bury Slain Flier on Isle He Pined to See,” New York Daily News, November 13, 1943, p. 65.
7
Brutus Hamilton diary entry for July 24, 1943.
8
Edward Sand diary entry for July 31, 1943.
CHAPTER 26: TIDAL WAVE
1
Background information on Charles Stenius Young is drawn from several sources, including U.S. federal census records for 1920, 1930, and 1940, and Young’s Selective Service and army enlistment records. A fascinating source was a letter about Young from his great-niece, Kate Jensen, published as “Reader Voices: Discovering Uncle Bubba,” Deseret (Utah) News, February 10, 2010.
2
Background information on Ivan Canfield is drawn from U.S. federal census records for 1920, 1930, and 1940, and Canfield’s army enlistment records. Additional information about Canfield is drawn from various news clippings, including: “Gulf Coast Training Center Pins Wings on Biggest Flying Classes,” Fort Worth (Texas) Star-Telegram, January 15, 1943, p. 15; “99 Texans Decorated for Participation in Ploesti Oil Refineries Raid,” San Angelo (Texas) Standard-Times, November 17, 1943, p. 8; and “Airman’s Mother Receives His Medal for Raid,” Fort Worth (Texas) Star-Telegram, December 30, 1943, p. 4.
3
I separately interviewed the two Kickapoo survivors, Russell Polivka and Eugene Garner, and they agreed on most key facts. Both, for example, said that Kickapoo lost three engines shortly after takeoff, precipitating the emergency that culminated in the deadly crash. Garner described how the pilots guided the aircraft over the sea, where they dumped their bombs, before circling back to attempt an emergency landing. It was Garner’s recollection that they were airborne for more than thirty minutes before the attempted landing. Polivka said he left the nose compartment and made his way back to the bulkhead area “when I knew we were going to crash.” As the pilots attempted to land, “there was a telephone pole out in the desert and we hit that,” Polivka told me. “Cut off a wing and the next I knew everything was on fire.” Polivka said he escaped through the hole where the top turret had caved in. It was Garner’s recollection that Polivka got stuck in a window while trying to exit the burning aircraft and that he had pulled Polivka free and dragged him to a nearby railroad embankment. Garner said his burns weren’t as severe as Polivka’s because he was doused by a five-gallon can of hydraulic fluid that burst when the plane broke up. The hydraulic fluid didn’t burn easily and “insulated” him, Garner said. Ploiesti was Polivka’s first and last mission of the war. Garner returned to duty about five weeks later and flew twenty-five missions with the 93rd. One of Garner’s first missions after his return to duty was the October 1, 1943, raid on which my uncle, Technical Sergeant L. H. White, and eight crewmates were killed. Author interviews with Eugene Garner, July 17, 1991, and Russell Polivka, November 19, 1991.
4
Ben Kuroki interview with Bill Kubota, August 26–27, 1998.
5
Edwin Baker, One of Many, unpublished memoir dated 1982, p. 16. Baker shared his manuscript with me in the early 1990s.
6
The descriptions of the banter among members of the Tupelo Lass crew on the flight to Ploiesti and the singing of the “Blue Danube” waltz are drawn from Bill Kubota’s interviews for his Most Honorable Son documentary: Ben Kuroki interview with Bill Kubota, August 26–27, 1998, unedited footage; K. O. Dessert interview with Bill Kubota, October 16, 1998, unedited footage; and Edward Weir interview with Bill Kubota, August 29, 1998, unedited footage.
7
Dugan and Stewart, Ploesti, pp. 106–7; Stewart, Ted’s Travelling Circus, pp. 168–69.
CHAPTER 27: A HELLHOLE OF FIRE, FLAME, AND SMOKE
1
Ben Kuroki interview with Bill Kubota, August 26–27, 1998.
2
Dugan and Stewart. Ploesti, p. 112.
3
The gunner who broke down at his waist gun was a member of my uncle’s crew, which was flying in Jerk’s Natural, tail number 41-23711, piloted by Cleveland Hickman. The crew’s regular command pilot, William F. Stein, flew as copilot. The breakdown of gunner Kermit Morris was described to me by the crew’s tail gunner on the Ploiesti raid, William G. Anderson. “Morris just wilted. [Technical Sergeant L. H. White] had to come back and take over his waist gun. Morris sat down and cried,” Anderson told me in the first of several interviews and conversations we had through the 1990s. William G. Anderson, author interview, December 17, 1991. By all accounts, Kermit Morris was never the same after the Ploiesti raid. He flew one more mission then took himself off flying status, although he remained with the 93rd in various ground duties for several months afterward. Morris continued to struggle after the war. He drank heavily and, according to public records, was arrested for public intoxication in New Mexico and California. He died in 1968 at the age of fifty. “He never was the same after the war,” his former wife told me. Tootie Summersgill, author interview, December 30, 1990.
4
Ben Kuroki’s descriptions of what he saw and experienced over Ploiesti are primarily drawn from his August 26–27, 1998, interview with documentary filmmaker Bill Kubota, unedited footage. Jake Epting described what he saw from the cockpit of Tupelo Lass in Dugan and Stewart, Ploesti, p. 112.
5
The pilot was 328th Squadron commander Joseph Tate, quoted in Dugan and Stewart, Ploesti, p. 117.
6
Ben Kuroki interview with Bill Kubota, August 26–27, 1998. Ben believed the aircraft was Jose Carioca, piloted by Nicholas Stampolis with copilot Ivan Canfield. Other accounts described Jose Carioca as the aircraft that plowed into the third floor of Ploiesti’s women’s prison. Regardless of how Jose Carioca met its end, there were no survivors.
