“I scouted around and tried to find him, "Ernie explained, "but he was nowhere in sight. By that time I was running low on gas; so I decided to land, too. I came in on one of the newly built air strips near the beach and almost lost my lunch when I discovered I still had a 1,000-pound bomb hooked to my ship.
"A British infantry unit took good care of me, but it wasn't much fun crouching in a slit trench all night while German planes bombed and strafed our airfield. Next day I got passage back on a subchaser."
Rader was well over the Channel before he gave up hope of making it all the way to England. His story goes like this.
"My left engine was dead as a mackerel and I knew there was danger of the other conking out. Most of the electrical system in my ship was shot away and the general situation looked bad, so I turned back towards the French coast.
"A few miles off shore I bailed out, after making sure I was near some boats. My life raft had blown away and I had to depend on my Mae West and a rubber cushion to keep me afloat. I shivered there for about fifteen minutes before a British frigate came and picked me up. I was later transferred to a destroyer, given warm clothing and food and the next day the destroyer took me back to England."
It seems every guy in this Loco Group has a story something like this, but one of the funniest comes from the record of Lt. William K. Coon of Compton, Cal. Coon was returning from Frankfurt, but still wasn't satisfied with his day's bag of locomotives, so he went looking for more trouble. He found a ship steaming across a certain body of water and began to get goofy ideas. Putting his Lightning into a dive, he swooped down and raked the ship from stem to stern with machine gun and cannon fire. A cannon shell sent the flagmast toppling and for some minutes the flag itself was draped over his wingtip.
Now Bill claims to be the only Yank in the E.T.O. who has flown in active service under the German flag!
When the Loco Group can't find planes or locomotives, they try anything -- anything to keep their hand in.
For instance, the other day Capt. Donald H. Reihmer of Elmhurst, Ill. saw a large barrage balloon which had broken from its moorings and was sailing all over France. Reihmer figured that would be a hazard to any of our bombers, since it was still dragging a long length of steel cable. He gave it a couple of bursts and watched it collapse like a paper bag. Lt. Jack E. Davis of New Castle, Pa., also went balloon strafing when he found two Jerry weather balloons up over France. With Lt. Arlon D. Payne of Detroit and Lt. Irwin D. Fernandes of Oakland, Cal., he went in pursuit and the three of them had as much fun as a trio of kids in a shooting gallery.
But it's not all fun and games in the Loco Group. Once in a while one of them gets clobbered properly, as they put it.
Coming back from over Holland where he had been shooting a Nazi Me-210 into junk, Lt. Jack Martin of Whittier, Cal., (they call him Smiling Jack) was jumped by two Me-109s. Jack was tired after a long day and the Huns attacked out of the sun.
The first Jerry burst was a pip. A chunk of 20 mm shell cut a deep gash in his head and a piece lodged near his brain. He was dizzy and half blinded with shock and the loss of blood, but he fought his crippled Lightning through the concerted attack. His radio went out and the enemy slugs slashed his craft from nose to rudder. It later had to be scrapped.
"I have never prayed so hard in my life," Martin said. "Blood was streaming down my face and shoulder. I was terribly weak and could hardly see at all. I had to close one eye to read what instruments I had left. I guess I was getting dizzier all the time, too."
"I lost contact with my flight. I headed home alone -- and very fast! That's one time I really sweated out the English coast. Once I thought the jig was up when my one good engine started sputtering, but it soon smoothed out."
"I reached an emergency landing field and brought my plane down and found they had an ambulance waiting for me. How they knew about me, I never found out, but I just remember getting out and walking under my own steam to it and they took me off to the hospital."
A delicate surgical operation removed the piece of steel from Martin's skull, but he still carries fragments in his neck and shoulder. Practically recovered, he is now waiting to fly the new fighters they are being equipped with."
Things happen to the Loco Group that shouldn't happen to a sky dog. They can even go and get themselves shot up by their own side. This is what happened to Lt. Albert R. Fogg who came from Somer's Point, N.J.
"On that day," Fogg told me, "everything happened. To start off, my right engine went dead over enemy territory and I had to slip away from the formation. Well, usually you can find someone to hook up with and together maybe you can cripple home together.
"But this time I felt jittery....I guessed I sensed something glorious was about to happen to me. Anyway, I plugged away at it, watching out for enemy planes until I reached a point within sight of the French coast. Just then a lone Thunderbolt came up and I slowed down even more to allow him to get on my wing tip. You see, I figured he was in bad shape, too, and, misery liking company, I waited for him.
"Well, you can imagine what I said and did when this American P-47 opened fire at me. He came in full tilt with everything spitting. I managed to evade him and tried to figure out whether this was some dumb cluck guy who didn't recognize his own crowd or whether it was a Hun flying a captured Thunderbolt.
"I dived and made a weak pass at him, even though I had but one engine, but this egg kept coming back and eventually he made several strikes on me. Meanwhile my turbo-regulator went out and the good engine started acting up. I finally made one more pass at that Hun, as I now call him, and drove him off.
"Finally I got across the Channel and made the English coast. I headed for the nearest emergency field, but they gave me a red light, indicating their runway was tied up. My engine was now smoking badly and I was losing altitude fast and there was nothing for me to do but bring her down in the nearest open space. I tried to lower my landing gear, but one of the wheels jammed. I had to bring the other up again. I decided on a belly landing.
"I picked out what looked like a fairish spot, but it turned out to be an old surface iron mine. I t would be iron, wouldn't it? I sat her down in there, but it was like ramming a stone wall. I was dazed for a minute and when I came to, I was all wedged in the middle of alot of wreckage.
"I sat there and then wised up and looked around. I got the royal creeps when I saw a small flame start out from under one of the engines and work its way toward me. I struggled wildly
