Photos WW2 US Forces
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USS Lexington (Essex-class) flight deck personnel spotting one F6F-5 Hellcat that has just landed as next one taxis forward and next one is about to land, all returning from raids on the Ryukyu Islands, 10 Oct 1944
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Crew of the Flying Fortress “My Lovin’ Dove,” resting at Guadalcanal after being lost in the Pacific for 66 days. Left to right, front row: Lieutenant Ernest C. Ruiz, AAF, co-pilot; Sgt. Theodore H. Edwards, radio operator; Sergeant William H. Nichols; assistant engineer; Tech Sergeant Donald O. Martin; engineer; back row; Sergeant Robert J. Turnbull, tail gunner; and Sergeant James H. Hunt, radio operator. Photographed June 4, 1943
On February 9, 1943 took off from Henderson Field on Guadalcanal pilot Captain Thomas J. Classen on a reconnaissance mission over Nauru Island. Over the target, intercepted by eight A6M Zeros and attacked for ten minutes, until some of the B-17's guns jammed. The guns still operative claimed two Zeros and probables for two more. The Zeros circled the crippled bomber, raking it with machine gun fire for an hour and a half, wounding all nine of her crew. When the Zeros ran low on fuel, they departed.
The B-17 had its no. 1 engine frozen from damage. Then, a second engine went out. Then a third, causing it to ditch over 450 miles from the nearest island. The B-17 hit a wave, nosed into another and sank within sixty seconds. The crew found themselves in the water, clinging to an inflated life boat and pumping another and managed to tie the two boats together and drifted away from the oil slick from the sunken bomber.
The crew spent sixteen days in a life raft, until making landfall on an island off Buka Island. Spotted by friendly natives, the crew was divided among several villages. There, they met U.S. Navy radio operator, RM3c Delmar D. Wiley who was the sole survivor of TBF Avenger 00418 lost August 24, 1942 during the Battle of the Eastern Solomons (Second Battle of the Solomon Sea). He too had drifted in a raft for 15 days before landing at these same islands.
In an attempt to move closer to the Allied lines, the group attempted to buy a canoe from locals, but it failed to be seaworthy with only four aboard. Later, they hired another native and his canoe to sailed down the coast for four days and met another group of natives, who had been sent by a pair of coastwatchers to find them. Escorted over a jungle trail to the coastwatchers mountain observation post, they met the coastwatchers and arranged their rescue by radio.
On April 10, 1943 sixty days after their ditching, the group of survivors was rescued by a U.S. Navy (USN) PBY Catalina piloted by Robert B. Hays from Patrol Squadron 44 (VP-44) escorted by two PB4Y-1 Liberators from Bombing Squadron 101 (VB-101). During the flight, Hays spotted a group in an outrigger and landed at Boe Boe Harbor to rescue as many as as able. On April 13, 1943 the same Catalina returned to rest of the remaining crew.
On February 9, 1943 took off from Henderson Field on Guadalcanal pilot Captain Thomas J. Classen on a reconnaissance mission over Nauru Island. Over the target, intercepted by eight A6M Zeros and attacked for ten minutes, until some of the B-17's guns jammed. The guns still operative claimed two Zeros and probables for two more. The Zeros circled the crippled bomber, raking it with machine gun fire for an hour and a half, wounding all nine of her crew. When the Zeros ran low on fuel, they departed.
The B-17 had its no. 1 engine frozen from damage. Then, a second engine went out. Then a third, causing it to ditch over 450 miles from the nearest island. The B-17 hit a wave, nosed into another and sank within sixty seconds. The crew found themselves in the water, clinging to an inflated life boat and pumping another and managed to tie the two boats together and drifted away from the oil slick from the sunken bomber.
The crew spent sixteen days in a life raft, until making landfall on an island off Buka Island. Spotted by friendly natives, the crew was divided among several villages. There, they met U.S. Navy radio operator, RM3c Delmar D. Wiley who was the sole survivor of TBF Avenger 00418 lost August 24, 1942 during the Battle of the Eastern Solomons (Second Battle of the Solomon Sea). He too had drifted in a raft for 15 days before landing at these same islands.
In an attempt to move closer to the Allied lines, the group attempted to buy a canoe from locals, but it failed to be seaworthy with only four aboard. Later, they hired another native and his canoe to sailed down the coast for four days and met another group of natives, who had been sent by a pair of coastwatchers to find them. Escorted over a jungle trail to the coastwatchers mountain observation post, they met the coastwatchers and arranged their rescue by radio.
On April 10, 1943 sixty days after their ditching, the group of survivors was rescued by a U.S. Navy (USN) PBY Catalina piloted by Robert B. Hays from Patrol Squadron 44 (VP-44) escorted by two PB4Y-1 Liberators from Bombing Squadron 101 (VB-101). During the flight, Hays spotted a group in an outrigger and landed at Boe Boe Harbor to rescue as many as as able. On April 13, 1943 the same Catalina returned to rest of the remaining crew.
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The glazed chin-gunner's position in a Douglas B-18 “Bolo" bomber at Barksdale Field, Louisiana - 1941
A mid-1930s design, the Bolo was approaching obsolescence by WW2 with better medium bombers in the pipeline or just enetering service.
Nevertheless, surviving B-18s were deployed as transports and maritime patrol aircraft...one was actually credited with sinking a U-Boat in the Caribbean in 1942.
Original Colour Picture
A mid-1930s design, the Bolo was approaching obsolescence by WW2 with better medium bombers in the pipeline or just enetering service.
Nevertheless, surviving B-18s were deployed as transports and maritime patrol aircraft...one was actually credited with sinking a U-Boat in the Caribbean in 1942.
Original Colour Picture
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HQ Company, 2nd Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division. Inside of the camouflaged lean-to which sets to conceal gunners, manning 37mm AT gun, from both aerial and ground observation. Michigan, 10 March, 1943.
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US Military Cemetery at Omaha Beach in Normandy France - 1951
What started out as a temporary cemetery, was dedicated in 1956 as the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial. It contains 9,388 graves including the graves of 45 pairs of brothers (30 of which buried side by side), a father and his son, an uncle and his nephew, 2 pairs of cousins, 3 generals, 4 chaplains, 4 civilians, & 4 women.
304 of the burials are “unknown” soldiers
What started out as a temporary cemetery, was dedicated in 1956 as the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial. It contains 9,388 graves including the graves of 45 pairs of brothers (30 of which buried side by side), a father and his son, an uncle and his nephew, 2 pairs of cousins, 3 generals, 4 chaplains, 4 civilians, & 4 women.
304 of the burials are “unknown” soldiers
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Sailors and naval aviators from Independence-class light aircraft carrier USS Monterey (CVL-26) play basketball in the downed forward aircraft elevator shaft. The player jumping out on the left is the future 38th President of the United States, Gerald Ford.
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After taking the town of Enna, Sicily, on July 20, 1943, soldiers of Company I, 1st Infantry Division ride through the town in a captured German vehicle that has been emblazoned with the U.S. star insignia.
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Composite Sherman Tanks of the 1st Cavalry Division prepare to move out while locals chat with US soldiers after being freed from Japanese occupation in Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines - October 24, 1944
Composite Shermans consisted of a cast front section attached to a welded rear section
Composite Shermans consisted of a cast front section attached to a welded rear section
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