Target: Rabaul (13 page)

Lousy weather prevented further May raids against Rabaul. Because the weather was “consistently foul,” as Whitehead put it, the heavies frequently hit Wewak instead. But even that was sometimes impossible. On the last day of May, Kenney flew to Port Moresby and temporarily relieved Whitehead, who returned to Australia to undergo medical treatment for a badly infected toe.

Making the most of his opportunity to run ADVON, Kenney decided to attack Rabaul again. Five Liberators took off before midnight on June 2, but again a tropical front stymied them. For another week the weather remained uncooperative, but conditions improved sufficiently to launch an effort on the night of June 9. Between 0215 and 0520, twenty-one heavy bombers dropped an estimated seventy-three thousand pounds of bombs on Lakunai, Vunakanau, and Rapopo. It was a long, noisy night for the Japanese. The bomber crews reported numerous large fires, including one that set off “violent explosions,” probably from the destruction of an ammo dump. But the Japanese were not defenseless. Searchlight beams swept back and forth, accompanied by intense antiaircraft fire—and one of the J1N1 interceptors prowled the night sky.

Chief Flight Petty Officer Satoru Ono, a veteran of the China war, had lifted off from Lakunai at 0310 with his observer, Lt. j.g. Kisaku Hamano. Less than an hour later, searchlights locked onto a B-17. Ono maneuvered into attack position and fired from 1,500 feet below, observing hits on the bomber’s left wing. But before he could fire again, the B-17 dove and escaped into the darkness.

Fifteen minutes later, another B-17 was coned in the searchlights. Ono spent twenty minutes working into a suitable attack position, finally opening fire at about 0458. He struck the right wing, and this time he briefly saw flames. Once again, however, the bomber vanished into the night.

After landing at Lakunai, Ono claimed the destruction of one B-17 and another as “uncertain,” the Japanese equivalent to “probably destroyed.” His claims were exaggerated. Both bombers returned safely to Port Moresby. An official summary stated: “Two B-17s were attacked. The wing, engine, and propeller of one B-17 were damaged. The other aircraft was holed and one member of the crew severely wounded. Three Fortresses were also damaged by [antiaircraft fire].”

Crewmembers of the first bomber attacked reported seeing tracer fire, described as “pink-colored balls,” zipping downward from a position above and behind them. This indicates that Ono attacked with his lower guns at least once. He then shifted positions and fired from below. The B-17’s copilot, Lt. Jack L. Campbell, saw “a short burst of pink-colored tracers come up between the #1 and #2 engines, at the same time our left wing was hit.” Still trapped in the searchlights,
the bomber escaped by maintaining a high-speed, diving right turn. After landing, the crew counted eleven big holes in the aircraft. One 20mm round had burst through the camera well into the radio compartment, badly wounding Tech. Sgt. Clair L. Wrights. Just the day before, he had received a Distinguished Flying Cross from Kenney.
^*

The attacks on the two B-17s caused a commotion back at Port Moresby. Kenney mentioned the incidents in his diary, though with erroneous details: “Two enemy night fighters were reported. One was listed as a Type 100 reconnaissance plane (Dinah). The other was unidentified. Both worked with the searchlights and fired Very lights once in a while, evidently to check each other’s position. No casualties to either side reported. Some firing by our bombers but I suspect that sometimes it was us firing at each other instead of the Nips.”

Judging from Kenney’s interpretation, the intelligence officers responsible for the after-action reports believed that the intercepts were the work of more than one fighter. However, the
Gekko
piloted by Ono was the only one airborne that night. As for the mistaken identity, nearly everyone who caught a glimpse of a night fighter over Rabaul reported it as a Dinah, the Allied recognition name for the similar-looking Type 100 twin-engine reconnaissance plane (Mitsubishi Ki-46) of the JAAF.

Despite the resistance by the Japanese, Kenney was pleased with the mission’s success, particularly the reports of large fires at the airdromes. Calling the raid “a pretty swell show,” he followed up with another mission the next night, sending up a dozen B-24s of the 43rd Bomb Group. They were joined by Capt. Paul G. Smith and ten men aboard
The Leila Belle
, a B-24D of the 380th Bomb Group (Heavy), which had recently arrived in Australia and was attached temporarily to the veteran 43rd for training.

The thirteen Liberators were to hit Vunakanau airdrome, but three of them became separated in bad weather. The remaining ten kept the Japanese awake from midnight until 0500 on June 11, dropping about thirty-nine thousand pounds of bombs on the airdrome. Kenney noted in his diary that photographs taken by a reconnaissance crew showed “a lot of wrecked aircraft in the Rabaul area and signs of a lot of fires in the dispersal bays at both Vunakanau and Rapopo.”

The results were not without cost. Although Kenney’s diary made no reference to the loss a heavy bomber, an official operations summary did note that one aircraft had not returned from the mission. The missing Liberator,
The Leila Belle
, was apparently among the three B-24s that went after alternate targets. Two bombers attacked Gasmata airdrome, reporting “unobserved results.” The third aircraft never returned to base. Tracked by radar heading south over the Milne Bay area, it eventually flew out of contact range.

There is no way to know what happened to
The Leila Belle
, for no trace of it has ever been discovered. The eleven souls on board hailed predominantly from
the breadbasket of the United States: three from Indiana, four from towns in Iowa, Nebraska, Ohio, and Minnesota. Summer was days away when the dreaded War Department telegrams began to arrive. Mothers, fathers, wives, sisters, and brothers learned that a family member was missing in action. There would never be closure, only another letter, two and a half years later, declaring the missing men officially dead.

Seven decades later the parents are long gone, but there still are siblings, widows, sweethearts, and others who struggle with the lack of information.

GENERAL WHITEHEAD RETURNED to duty on June 11, whereupon Kenney placed the operations of ADVON back in the hands of his talented deputy and flew to Brisbane. Maintaining pressure on Rabaul, Whitehead scheduled a raid for the wee hours of June 13. A string of twenty-one heavies attacked the airdrome complex, dropping some eighty-seven thousand pounds of bombs over a span of three-and-a-half hours. At Lakunai airdrome, a
Gekko
crewed by Ono and Hamano took off at 0240, followed a few minutes later by Kudo and Sugawara. Curiously, Ono and Hamano “could find no enemy aircraft” despite patrolling for three hours in the vicinity of the attackers.

Kudo, on the other hand, was alerted to a bomber in the searchlights at 0314, and went after it. This was
Georgia Peach
, the B-17 in which Jack Wisener flew as bombardier. Having already dropped its bombs, the B-17 was heading for Port Moresby and the crew had started to relax. Wisener had shed his parachute and was filling out mission reports when
Georgia Peach
came under violent attack.

Unseen, Kudo had gotten into position and began firing at approximately 0326, shredding the aircraft with shells. When the shooting stopped, Wisener hurried up to the flight deck. The cockpit was a horrifying mess, with both pilots and the flight engineer already dead. Lieutenant Philip L. Bek, the navigator, was the only other survivor, but Wisener was unaware of this as he donned his parachute. He barely had time to fasten the shoulder straps and one leg strap before he dived out of the plane.

Twenty miles south of Rabaul,
Georgia Peach
hit the ground and exploded. Wisener came down in the jungle and managed to evade the Japanese for more than a week, but ultimately a plantation owner betrayed him. Taken prisoner on June 22, Wisener initially went to the navy prison. Approximately a week later, transferred to the Kempeitai compound in Chinatown, he told the POWs that no one else from his crew had survived. Lieutenant Bek had—and was also captured—but for unknown reasons was held a different cell in the navy prison and remained there for several months after Wisener’s transfer to the Kempeitai.

At Port Moresby, meanwhile, one of the other B-17s crash-landed after returning from Rabaul. Antiaircraft fire had been heavy over the target, leading V Bomber Command to speculate that ground fire had downed
Georgia Peach
—despite clear evidence that night fighters had been active. The intelligence community, it
seemed, did not want to consider the possibility that the enemy possessed a lethal night interceptor.

But the Irvings were encountered again just two nights later, when almost two dozen Liberators of the 90th and 380th Bomb Groups attacked Lakunai airdrome in the predawn hours of June 15. Ono claimed one bomber destroyed and another “uncertain.” American crews reported that night fighters had “fired on some of the ships,” but acknowledged no damage. In the confusion, the gunners of two B-24s briefly dueled with each other in the darkness, validating the diary comment made by Kenney several nights previously.

The next encounter with night fighters occurred on the morning of June 26, when eleven heavy bombers attacked Rabaul’s airdromes and shipping in Simpson Harbor. Kudo, flying a
Gekko
with Warrant Officer Michitaro Ichikawa as observer, duplicated his first feat by blasting two more B-17s out of the night sky.

The bombing mission started at Dobodura just after midnight. Of the seven Fortresses from the 43rd Bomb Group participating in the raid, one was a B-17F named
Taxpayer’s Pride
, paid for with a bond drive. The pilot, 1st Lt. Donald D. MacEachran, warned his crew they might encounter night fighters.
Taxpayer’s Pride
made two bomb runs over Rabaul, passing through searchlights and heavy flak without damage. MacEachran then turned toward home. Minutes later the tail gunner, Cpl. Joel W. Griffin, called on the intercom that a suspected night fighter had just crossed behind him.

Moments later Griffin “heard something that sounded like gravel hitting the plane.” From his isolated, rear-facing position, Griffin could see the reflection of flames in the bomber’s right wing. MacEachran came on the intercom to reassure the crew, but Griffin heard more enemy gunfire. This time the B-17 lurched out of control. The intercom no longer worked, so Griffin snapped on the leg straps of his parachute and pulled himself through the tail wheel section to the emergency escape hatch, pausing long enough to look into the waist section. The compartment appeared empty. Seeing “large sparks” flying through the fuselage, Griffin realized the aircraft was in its final plunge. He dived through the escape hatch and tumbled momentarily, then pulled the ripcord to open his parachute. Just as it snapped open, he heard the thunderous explosion as the B-17 slammed into the ground.

Suffering from scalp lacerations and a wrenched back, Griffin was discovered by natives. They escorted him to their village, but soon thereafter, a squad of Japanese soldiers took him prisoner. Roughed up during several interrogations, Griffin was moved two or three days later to the Kempeitai compound in Rabaul, where he joined Wisener, McMurria, and the other American POWs in their nine-by-eighteen cell.

Kudo’s other victim that moonlit morning was
Naughty But Nice
, a B-17E of the 65th Squadron. Piloted by Lt. William J. Sarsfield Jr., it completed several runs over Lakunai airdrome. On the last run, the bomber was caught in the searchlights and
hit hard by antiaircraft fire. The copilot, Lt. Charles E. Trimingham, was mortally wounded and the right inboard engine caught fire. Needing help with the aircraft, Sarsfield called the navigator up to the flight deck.

On his way up to the cockpit, Lt. Jose L. “Joe” Holguin opened the lower escape hatch. He slid into the copilot’s seat and helped Sarsfield extinguish the engine fire and feather the number 3 prop. Several minutes elapsed while the B-17 limped southward on three engines. Suddenly the ball turret gunner shouted that they were being fired upon from underneath.

A thousand feet below the bomber, Kudo aimed the reticle of his upper gun sight, pressed the trigger on his control stick, and raked the B-17 from one wing to the other with bursts of cannon fire.

A 20mm shell exploded beside Sarsfield, killing him instantly. A piece of shrapnel hit Holguin, still in the copilot’s seat, and broke his lower jaw. Another fragment entered his left leg. The next burst from the
Gekko
smashed into the B-17’s left wing, which burst into flames. The plane nosed over, flight controls no longer working. Holguin hastened back to his station in the nose, where he found the bombardier, Lt. Francis G. Peattie, struggling with his parachute straps. Holguin reached out to lend a hand, but the dive angle suddenly increased and the B-17 rolled violently, tossing Holguin to the opposite side of the nose. The bomber reversed, rolling sharply the other way, causing Holguin to lose his grip on Peattie’s harness. Thrown through the open escape hatch, Holguin found himself tumbling through the night air.

Dazed but conscious, Holguin opened his chute at about four hundred feet, just as
Naughty But Nice
hit the ground. The fuel tanks exploded, sending flames and thick smoke into the sky. Holguin drifted through the fire, then collided with several treetops and finally slammed into the ground. Suffering a painful back injury—possibly from hitting the trees, but more likely because of his body position and high velocity when the parachute snapped open—he promptly passed out.

When he regained consciousness a few hours later, Holguin saw that the sun had risen. Checking his injuries, he discovered superficial burns, a broken jaw with a large puncture wound, and a hole in his left leg. And his adventure was just beginning. Desperately thirsty, Holguin slowly made his way around the smoldering wreckage of the B-17, hoping to find a canteen. Instead he made one gruesome discovery after another: the mangled corpse of the tail gunner in his cramped compartment, the left waist gunner’s body lying halfway out of the open gun port, and the ball turret gunner, horribly burned, still hunched in his spherical coffin. Most of the bomber’s nose section was smashed. There was no sign of the bombardier or the pilots—but the stench of burned flesh was thick in the humid air.