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on the 1st of November, 1943, were flown in ‘their’
B-17F, which carried noseart on both sides of the
nose, unusual for the 100th Bomb Group. While
the right side was decorated with a scantily clad,
well...actually completely nude, young lady (which
was also unusual for the 100th BG) with the name
of the aircraft, the right, in front of the pilot’s win-
dows, sported a large gremlin type figure, taken
from the unit patch of the 350th BS, climbing up
the plane and releasing bombs from a chamber
pot. Their number varied. Originally, it could have
been an unusual record of the number of missions
flown, which would be evidenced by the fact that
a small number 13 was placed above one of them.
Later, however, they became a rather prominent
drawing across the entire height of the nose, part
of the noseart, and others were no longer painted.
On Sunday, November 5th, Mismalovin’ was seri-
ously damaged by flak over Gelsenkirchen, punc-
turing engine number 4’s oil tank.
Lt. McClain, the aircraft’s pilot, later recalled:
‘
We flew a little ways further, still in formation.
Another burst caught our number two engine. With
two engines left to get home on, we had to drop
out of formation.’
Ground and combat crew (under Lt. Stewart A. McClain) with Mismalovin’
during her early combat period, likely in late fall 1943.
B-17F 42-30788 LN
-
R Mismalovin‘, Lt. Stewart A. McClain crew,
350th Bomb Squadron, 100th Bomb Group, Thorpe Abbotts,
early 1944
A group of Messerschmitts targeted the lonely
Mismalovin’. They came from behind at a bad time,
just as the rear gunner, Sgt. Bennett struggled
with the frosted glass of his gun turret. The top
turret gunner, Sgt. Walters, was however able
to answer. He managed to shoot down one of
the attackers, the others retreated out of range.
The pilots struggled with the controls as fuel was
continuously leaking from the punctured fuel
tanks.
Co-pilot Lt. McBride added:
‘We started back,
losing altitude all the way. By the time we reached
England, we were down to six thousand feet.’
They eventually landed on the runway of their
own base at Thorpe Abbotts. An Army PR mes-
sage added:
‘The Fortress landed with less gas
you can get on a A card
(authors note: during WWII
a special card/sticker that allowed the car own-
er to purchase about 4 gallons of gas each week),
and so full of flak holes that it looked like a mech-
anized sieve.’
Mismalovin’ suffered various damage in the fol-
lowing months as well. Even so, her and McClain’s
crew’s mission credits were rising.
There were cities whose names, when uttered
during briefings at the 100th Bomb Group, sent
chills down the spine, to say the least. Berlin,
Schweinfurt, Bremen, Münster, Merseburg, Ruh-
land… and also Regensburg. Since the legendary
mission on August 17th, 1943, The Hundredth had
not been over this target. The return was to come
at the end of Big Week, February 25th, 1944. Mc-
Clain’s crew took off again in Mismalovin’, their
22nd mission. They almost saw themselves on
their way home…
Flak over the target knocked out engine num-
ber 2 on the left shortly after 2 pm Immediately,
the oil pressure dropped and the entire aircraft
shook violently. Before the pilots managed to shut
down the engine and feather the prop, the engine
appeared to be torn apart. Lt. Delbert S. Pearson,
a pilot flying a nearby B-17, observed the event:
‘A/C #788 was observed to be hit by flak just after
bombs away over the target. Gasoline immediate-
ly began to flood back over the wing and the A/C
began to fall behind.’
With the engine shut down, the B-17 began to
rapidly lose altitude. The crew had to leave the
formation. She had over 800 kilometers to return
home alone. Most of it through Germany and the
territories of the occupied continent. It didn’t take
long for German fighters to pounce on the lonely
and damaged Mismalovin’.
A chase began which ended up just above the
tops of roofs and trees, at a height of 200-300 feet.
It almost seemed that the situation of November
5th of the previous year might be repeated. How-
ever, this was not the case... At low altitude, the
aircraft became an easy target even for light flak,
and in addition, fighter attacks did not stop. Their
rounds inflicted additional damage on the B-17
and gradually killed the navigator, radio operator
and co-pilot, and seriously wounded the top turret
gunner, tail gunner, bombardier, pilot.... Never-
theless, the plane slowly dragged itself through
Germany, Belgium, France, while it continued to
be attacked by fighters. Miraculously, the shot-up
B-17 stayed in the air. The tail gunner, Sgt. William
T. Cook recalled the event:
‘In spite of the licking
we were taking, we still managed to give a pret-
ty good account of ourselves. The engineer shot
down two fighters, the bombardier had one possi-
ble, and I shot down two of which I am sure.’
In the area of Calais, France, the plane came
over the English Channel. At one point, glimpses
of England could be made out. At the same time,
however, the attacks of German fighters inten-
sified and increased in number. At that moment,
Sgt. Cook noticed that instead of flying towards
England, the plane was turning left and slowly
losing altitude. He tried to call the pilot on the in-
tercom, but there was no answer. He figured that
the pilot had been wounded or killed by the last
rounds. As he had partial experience flying a B-17,
he decided to go into the cockpit and possibly try
to fly to England himself. As he climbed out of his
rear gun position and into the fuselage, he just
saw one of the airmen parachute out. Howev-
er, they were only about 50-100 feet above
the surface and the crew’s replacement,
waist gunner Sgt. Knudsen, died after
falling into the water.
Sgt. Cook continued in his memoirs:
‘Out ball turret gunner, S/Sgt. Lawrence
Bennett, was standing in the door
ready to jump. I reached for him, pulled
him back into the plane, and told him to
take off his chute because we were about to
crash. He was having some difficulty removing
his chute and I was assisting him when the plane
crashed into the English Channel. I was knocked
unconscious in the crash and woke up floating
in the Channel. When I regained consciousness, I
saw one other person, a spare gunner flying with
us that day, who had survived. We were picked up
by some German Marines, taken to a hospital in
Calais, France, where we stayed for about three
or four days, and I was then moved to an interro-
gation center in Frankfurt. I spent about 20 days
in Frankfurt (in solitaire) and was then sent to
a POW camp.’
That gunner, whose name Sgt. Cook could not
remember, was Sgt. Clade Zukowski. Only he and
Cook survived. Other members of Lt. McClain’s
crew died either as a result of being hit by Ger-
man fighters, or by hitting the surface of the water.
The plane went down about 2 miles off the coast
near Calais. In addition to the two survivors, Ger-
man sailors also recovered the bodies of some of
the crew members.
Official German reports stated:
‘The aircraft
crashed in the water at Sangatte about 1701h
during an attempted return flight to England.
The dead man (Lt. McClain, authors note) was re-
covered and buried at the cemetery of Marquise
on February 28th, 1944. Passport papers and
B-17F 42-30788 LN
-
R Mismalovin‘, Lt. Stewart A. McClain crew, 350th Bomb Squadron,
100th Bomb Group, Thorpe Abbotts, early 1944
Speciál B-17F / The Bloody Hundredth 1943 INFO Eduard
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June 2024