Subject: SHUT UP !!! YOU'LL JINX THE MISSION !!!!
From: (ANDREW ROBERT BREEN)
Date: 8/9/2004 7:44 AM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

In article ,
ArtKramr wrote:
Subject: SHUT UP !!! YOU'LL JINX THE MISSION !!!!
From: (ANDREW ROBERT BREEN)
Date: 8/9/2004 6:44 AM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

Over and above that, I'm particularly interested in your take on the
air war, given that my father spent two years doing air-sea rescue
in the channel[1], much of the "custom" being US aircrews coming back
from the big daylight raids. They didn't get many Marauder survivors
though (nor many from Beaufighters - neither ditched well) and for
that reason alone rated those crews highly.

The reason there were so few Marauder suvivors is because the Marauder
wouldn't
float for more that 20 seconds It would be at the bottom of the channel
before
you could ever get to it. And it was not an easy plane to evacuate in 20

Same with the Beau, they said - big, heavy and the way out was underneath.
My father's line was "no-one got out of a Beau".

seconds. When we were came home from missions with damage we would all pray
not
to have to ditch in the channel. As we crossed the French coast we would
strain to see the white cliffs of Dover.The most beautiful sight in the
owrld.
That is where home was.

He talked about sitting in the channel and everybody in the boat /willing/
the returning planes over the cliffs, especially the cripples at the tail
end of the stream.
The worst ones for him - for all of them on the boats - were the planes
which crashed in on ditching, either flying down through the sea mist
or trying to land on it. Grim.

Your father was a hero. We all revered the work doine by air sea rescue.We
never needed them, but we were sure glad they were there below us waiting
to
snatch us out of the sea..

He was always much prouder of the lives he saved - both in ASR and in the
Atlantic - than the ones he took. And I'd not argue with your description
of him.

Thanks for the kind words. I really appreciate it.

Thank you for coming over and helping this country and this continent.
Anything I can say is kind of inadequate thanks.

--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
"Time has stopped, says the Black Lion clock
and eternity has begun" (Dylan Thomas)


One of the things I came away with was a feeling that in some small way I wasa
part of England. Every time I return to Englasnd I feel as though it is a
small homecoming. BTW, there is a plaque at our old airifeld at Stansted
dedicated to the 344th Bomb Goup. Take a look at it if yuo are ever there. And
if you are so inclined you might want to place a small flower at the plaque.
Lest we forget.
Lest we forget.



Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer