The U.S. Capitol |
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| Washington, D.C. If he could have afforded the cost of getting there, Dad would have prowled the halls of Congress to get us home sooner after VJ Day. |
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1 Oct 45 - No. 72 - � to Luliang--9:45--Pilot McDonald 3 Oct 45 - No. 73--� to Luhsien--13:10--Pilot Overton 4 Oct 45 - Yesterday, I was wakened at four in the morn while it was yet dark for the purpose of making another Hump trip, my 54th.[milk runs don't count] We left the ground about an hour before the sun did. In the cargo compartment were twenty or thirty barrels (55 gal. drums) of 100 octane which was to be delivered to Luhsien, China. It is a town on the Yangtse River, northeast of Kunming. The trip took six and a half hours. While the Chinese unloaded us, we went into the line mess to eat the usual....eggs. As far as I can find out, this gas, which we risk our necks to haul over, is floated down the river to Chungking to be used by CNAC, the Chinese National Airlines. It's the same as if the Army Air Force would haul gas for TWA during peacetime. There is absolutely NO shortage of gas in China. At one field the other day we told them to drain 500 gals. from our wing tanks as we wouldn't need it for the return trip. They refused, said they would rather give US 500. The utter futility of it all! Politics?--I need 60 hours to make 750 hours and one month to compete one year. May fly a battle-weary (tired plane)back to the states. 5 Oct 45 - No. 74--� to Kunming--9:40--Pilot Terry 5 Oct 45 - All men with 750 hours would leave this field in October, so says Col. Morgan. I have 700 and will have 750 in ten days. 6 Oct 4 - It's five-thirty in the evening and I'm resting in my sack with the sunset's rays shining through the mosquito net. I only managed to sleep about five hours last night since I didn't get back from yesterday's trip till four in the morning. I'm due to be called out soon. 7 Oct 45 - No. 75--� - Turn around--3:10--Pilot O'Shea 8 Oct 45 - I took off yesterday with the hope of getting about 22 hours closer to the finish but a bad engine made us turn back. So I only picked up 3 hours. 10 Oct 45 - I'll be taking off this morning. The thieves raided our tents again last night but they didn't get a thing from our tent. 10/11 Oct 45 No. 76--� to Liuchow--12:25--Pilot Capt. Riggles 13 Oct 45 - I have 38 more hours to go and I'll be done with the Hump 13/14 Oct 45 - No. 77--� to Kunming and Shanghai--22:10--Pilot Boone Amyx--Took gas to Kunming (after we landed at Chengkung by mistake; took GIs to Shanghai--J.J. Murray (?) 16 Oct 45 - Returned from Shanghai yesterday--have 5 more points from China battle star--have 63 points--eligible for discharge Nov. 1st. Right now I need 15 hours to finish my 750. But there is a rub in the scrubbing. After flying 75 hours this month, radio ops are grounded. I have 70 now. That means I have one more trip to go. If it is a Shanghai trip, I'm in with 22 hours. If it is a Kunming, I'm up the estuary with 9 hours. Listen in next month for the end of this heart-rending story. Who will win, Stumpf or the ATC? --talk of civvie clothes--Latest rumor: The United States has been declared off limits to CBI personnel. Letter from Dad 10-17-45, Braddock, PA Dear "Bob":- Well at last I had a long talk with Sam'l Weiss, congressman from this district. We met at a banquet in honor of Leonard Funk, who was given the Congressional Medal of Honor. I talked with him both before and during the banquet and I am sure I put the cause of you and your buddies to him in a forceful way. He seemed surprised to learn that you were still taking gas over the hump. Then I told him about night flying and all the other daffy things you told me about. He promised to look into these things and asked me to write to him and keep him informed. He seemed sincere about it all and he knows that I do carry political weight around here and in Oakmont and Verona. He has just returned from a trip to Europe and off the record he is not too pleased with things. He told me a lot of things that I cannot mention at this time. I also asked him why they stopped the D.F.C. on the tenth of Aug. and he did not seem to know a thing about it. The army just does things without publicity. I told him that I was not asking that you receive personal consideration above the other fellows, but that the whole gang deserved to come home and be discharged. So, Bob, I do not know if anything will come of this but at least it was a try and I am not through yet. I also met Congressman Fulton and had a nice chat with him. If I had the money I would go to Washington and see a Senator or two and also the Congressman from the York district, but I'm nearly broke. Last Sunday evening one of the commentators, I think his name was Lewis, told about still carrying gas over the hump. I didn't hear him but several men at church told me about it; so it will soon become known generally. Tell the boys to keep after that five point D.F.C. and any extra battle stars that they can get; those things count with a Congressman. I'll write you later about personal things, but I thought you would like to know what I have done so far. So long. Love, Dad Hello Boy! Will write personal messages later on but had to send you my best. We hope & pray this talk of Dad's will do some good. Love, Mom 18 Oct 45 - No. 78--� to Kunming--9:30--Corrected final total=751:50--Pilot (Robert C.?) Taylor 19 Oct 45 - I'm now a retired Hump flyer. My rockpile days are past. God really protected me because I was never in a bad storm, never lost an engine and always made it to safety when lost. You may well give a prayer of thanks as I do, for your prayers for me were answered. The nights are gradually getting cooler so sleeping is easier. Of course I could always sleep except when I was first or second on the alert list expecting to be called. Then was when nerves or expectation got me. But now I'm a grounded pigeon and am no longer working in politics. [Note: In recalling my flight assignments. memory told me that there was always a short restbreak between flights. Now finally in 2009, I have studied the pattern of my days in the air and on the ground during the overall stretch of 279 days. Of that total, I was off duty for 12 days; 7 at rest camp and 5 on a pass. Just over 40% of the duty time was spent with the planes. There were 38 times when I got 1 or 2 days off between flights and there were 17 times when I had more. So, on balance, it seems my memory graded 70% correct.] 20 Oct 45 As our bearer would say, "It is many, many cold today." Quite a relief after the past sweat season. The sun hasn't been visible for two days. My suntan won't be worth two hoots in Owltown if we don't have a few more sunny afternoons.--This base no longer flies the Hump 25 Oct 45 - Gen. Tunner says the Hump closes on Nov. 15. It should have closed last month but it will be half a break if he is speaking the truth. I shouldn't care when the Hump closes for I'm safe myself, but I do care and I'll tell you why.--I've lost buddies on this rockpile. Two of the 19 men I went to Scotland with last year died on the Hump. At least 6 or 7 of the boys I went through Reno with got it here. When I moved up here from Tezgaon in January, there were four in our tent--Berkman, Reiter, Lindsey and myself. About the last week in Jan. Lindsey was the sole survivor of a crash at Chengtu. He was reported as dead for about three weeks but we finally got word he was in a hospital with severe burns. Two weeks after he crashed, Joe Reiter got it in a mid-air collision near Kunming. You can imagine how Berky and I felt about then when the Quartermaster boys came around to get their clothes, personal items and the unused beer they had hoarded. We had to kid each other with such remarks as "Well, do you want me to go next or are you in a hurry?" Anyway, Lindsey wrote me from the hospital (in Calcutta) later using his left hand. We exchanged a couple letters and then he suspected something and asked why Joe didn't write. I had to tell him. That isn't the end. I hate to tell you stuff like this but there's more. Last month, three weeks after hostilities and a week after the war, one more buddy went down with a load of Chinese. The worst single aircraft accident on record, I think they classed it. Four Americans and eighty Chinese. True to ATC efficiency, they didn't even miss the plane for three weeks. He was a good joe with a wife and a little kid. I remember when he was in my tent at Nashville last Sept. He had flown in from Reno without a delay enroute and hadn't had furlough in a year or so. After seeing the C.O. and Chaplain and Air Inspector, they finally gave him a big-hearted two weeks. {*Note- Excerpt from Time magazine, Nov.12, 1945, p.7: 'One C-54 with 80 Chinese passengers and a crew of four Americans crashed near Hangchow, killing all the occupants - the greatest loss of life in any U.S. plane anywhere.'] Maybe these things would happen in the states also but at least the odds are for the boys there. It's very easy to become a fatalist over here. Two boys over here were definitely afraid to fly the Hump, so they worked the angles and got themselves ground jobs. They said they weren't risking their necks anymore. Ironically, they capsized in a makeshift boat on a rice paddy and both drowned. All I'm trying to say is this: I hope someone burns for this and so do a lot of the other guys. We all doubt if they ever will. What a cheerful letter. Tunner wired from Tripoli and said to cancel all C-54s going (home) via the Atlantic. 26 Oct 45 - GI (George Item) is the radio call sign of the Kurmitola tower. I've probably used these two words nigh on to a thousand or more times. One thing I've learned is how to use a mike.--Pretty dull life--six months ago we would have enjoyed this. And so I've completed sweating out another day in India without ending up in a straight jacket. 27 Oct 45 - Played bridge in the sun--rumors abound--another China battle star to make 68 points. 29 Oct 45 - Yes, sir. The first of the month the colonel said, :"Here's the pitch, men. By the end of October there won't be a man left in Kurmitola. I and my staff will be the last to leave." 30 Oct 45 - There is anything but fair play and square shooting in this flea-bitten outfit. This morning the colonel who early this month stated that there wouldn't be a man left at Kurmitola by Nov. 1st. and he and his staff would be the last to leave, took off in a C-54 for the old U.S.A. --So now we have a new C.O. |
One of the "natives" who went Hump-happy. |
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