… and back on duty again
On December 8, 1941, General Brereton, Commander in Chief of the USAAF in Philippines confiscated all Philippine Airlines aircraft as well as two Philippines Air Force
Beechcrafts. Gunn was ordered to report in
Fort William McKinley where he was told
by the General’s aide that he was assigned
to the USAAF. The same day the Japanese
aircraft showed up and their fire damaged
two Philippine AF Beechcraft and Philippine Airlines Sikorski S-43 amphibian.
It was clear to Gunn that it was only a matter of time when they lose all the remaining aircraft and therefore decided to relocate them to a small airfield at Grace Park
which directly bordered with the graveyard. That grew around the unused airfield
so much that Gunn had to break couple of
tombs so as they were not in the way while
the aircraft were taxiing.
October 2022
A happy family captured in photograph in Honolulu during Pappy’s service
on Hawaiian Islands.
Harold G. “Buzz” Slingsby and Louis James
Connelly flew together with Gunn various
transportation and supply flights. They
formed a provisional transportation flight
under the USAAF command operating four
Beechcraft (they managed to repair one
damaged army aircraft). This kind of flying
triggered a lot of adrenalin, the pilots had to
maintain the treetop altitude, even at night,
in their unarmed aircraft otherwise they
risked being shot down by the Japanese
fighters which ruled the skies. Soon they
lost one airplane which was shot to pieces by the Japanese fighters on the ground
at the Bataan airport where Connelly had
flown the military supplies in. After that,
on December 13, Gunn himself was shot
down on his return from Del Monte where
he had flown medical material and several
officers in. At dusk a Zero attacked him and
showered him with bullets but Gunn, wildly
maneuvering, managed to escape the Japanese at the treetop altitude. However, when
he was passing the Zablan Field base, he
received further “friendly” hits from the AA
defense which confused him with the Japanese aircraft. With the failing engine he
turned around and at 10 pm, in pitch black,
(photo: the family archives)
he performed an emergency landing with
his Beechcraft at the local runway …
Shortly before Christmas Gunn was ordered to transport a group of Americans to
Australia. He said goodbye to his family
with the promise to be back in ten days.
At that time almost everyone in Philippines still believed that within a few days the
American reinforcements would arrive to
push Japanese out of the country. Regardless, Gunn instructed his wife, in the case
of the Japanese occupation, not to say her
husband served with the USAAF. She was
to claim he had perished in the air accident
over the ocean and his body was never
found. Shortly after midnight on December 24 Gunn and Slingsby took off with five
passengers each on the heading to Australia. Two days later they landed in Darwin.
On January 2, 1942, the Japanese entered
Manila. Polly with children was put in the
prisoners’ camp built on the University of
Santo Tomas campus where they all remained until the end of hostilities. For Gunn
this meant fighting on two fronts: for the
United States and for his family.
To be continued
(photo: author’s collection)
in 1934 launched the air transport within
Hawaiian Islands as the K-T Flying Service company. Paul usually spent weekends
with them, trained the mechanics and together with Tyce new pilots as well. After he
retired from the Navy he continued to work
for K-T full time. He trained the pilots, performed the inspections and test flights and
occasionally flew the regular commercial
flights with passengers or mail. It is of interest that later Bob Tyce became the first
civilian casualty of the Japanese attack on
Pearl Harbor. He stood in front of his airlines’ hangar on Oahu when the first wave
of the Japanese attacks stormed above him
and one of the fired bullets mortally wounded him. And another curiosity: One of the
aircraft operated by then K-T airlines, and
supposedly flown by Gunn as well, was
a Waco UIC serial number N13408. It is still
flying nowadays.
In 1939 Paul met Andres Soriano, head of
the influential Filipino family industrial clan
of Ayalas. Soriano owned twin-engine Beechcraft and was looking for a pilot for it.
Paul accepted his offer for the position and
in the end of 1939 moved to Manila. His family left Hawaii for their US home for three
months while Paul made all arrangements
in the new home. At the same time, he managed to convince Soriano to finance the
creation of the Philippine Airlines where
in 1941 the Philippine government invested
its share as well. Paul always spoke about
Philippine Airlines as of “his” airline but in
fact he has never had any shares in it. After
Paul found the nice house, the family was
reunited. All prospects looked great. Paul
was the airline’s flight director in charge of
three Beechcraft Model 18 and one Sikorski
S-43. And then December 7, 1941, came …
On March 15, 1941, the maiden flight of the Philippine Airlines was flown by this Beechcraft Model 18
registered NPC-54.
INFO Eduard
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