Dear Mother,
Believe it or not, I'm actually writing a letter! You can't imagine how busy I've been - and I do mean busy. This job of running a crew keeps a fellow on the go all the time. Everything is coming along swell down here. For the past two weeks Crew #101 (that's my crew) has been the honor crew on the field. We've completed more missions, dropped more accurate bombs and flown more hours than any other first phase crew on the field.

Burhart's crew is second - seems slightly regular, doesn't it? As yet we don't have a navigator. The work that we're doing now is high and low altitude bombing, high altitude gunnery, ground strafing gunnery, lots of formation and my instructing my co-pilot on flying the "Old Lib."

[click to enlarge]

Lieutenant Hinckley is one smart boy - he really works with me when it comes to flying the ship. Here's a list of my crew:

Lieutenant Howard Hinckley - blonde fellow, 24 years old from Salt Lake City. He's been married 2 years now and has a 4-month-old baby girl. He's real smart and we can work together perfectly.

Lieutenant Robert Butler - he's my bombardier - from Indianapolis, Indiana, married for 8 weeks, 23 years old and has red hair. Bob and I work together swell - he has the best score of any bombardier on the field.

All three of us officers are the same height - weigh within 5 pounds of each other, so we can get along on each others clothes quite nicely.

Corporal James Robinson - Jim is my aerial engineer and crew chief - from Marietta, Ohio and 19 years old. He's a good kid, a hard worker and really knows a B-24 inside and out. He's really my right hand man.

Corporal Leo Stephens  - from Minneapolis - Leo is my Radio Operator and has the highest rating as a R.O. of any man on the field. He really knows the "dits" and "da's." He's 24 years old, married and will become a father in about a month. I'm going to do my best to get him a furlough.

Corporal Alex Kocheran - Alex is my Armorer and Nose Gunner - a big, Russian boy, the hardest working fellow I've ever known. He's 30 years old, more or less the "father" of the crew. I like Alex about the best of all the gunners - no doubt he knows more about machine guns and bombs than any other man on the crew. Alex has the technique of being able to accomplish more in the least time with the worst of tools and equipment - he's tops as a gunner and a good fellow. He's married and from Pennsylvania.

Private First Class John Burkhead - he's from Metropolis, Illinois and is my Sperry Ball Turret Gunner. Being from Metropolis, we call John, "Superman." He's another hard working boy who really knows the machine gun. He fires from the Sperry Ball Turret, which in flight hangs beneath the plane - really a hard turret to fire. John's married, is my age, but is one of the smartest men I have when it comes to the working of a turret.

My original tail gunner I removed from the crew because he did not come up to the standards I've established. We're awaiting a new man to be assigned to that position.

Private First Class Louis Babini - you can plainly see that Lou is Italian - he's my Upper Turret Gunner. Lou is 19 years old, single and from Boston. He's a good, hard-working boy and knows his turret well.

So, that's my crew - I'm quite pleased with all of them and they "claim" to like their airplane commander! You'll meet them all when you come down here.

Thanks lots for the stationery, nuts, candy, and the letters. Today is Mother's Day - I sent you a present - hope you received it in time. Since I've been so busy, I haven't seen much of Pueblo - so, Burhart and I still stick together - fly formations together also.

To ease your worry, I haven't had a letter from Houston since I left Fort Worth. And I haven't had the time to meet any of these Pueblo girls. So, I'm completely free. Betty and Ruth Sturgeon write every once in a while - that's my only feminine contact!

I'm going to close for tonight, since I have an early mission to fly tomorrow. I have to get up at 2:00 a.m. for these early missions - that's so we have time for briefing, loading the bombs, machine guns and ammunition. Take-off time is at 5:30 a.m., then we will land at about 3:00 p.m. tomorrow afternoon. Then comes unloading, filling out forms, interrogation, a quick shower and link trainer at 6:00 p.m. My day ends at about 11:00 p.m.

Guess you're wondering when we eat. Well, we carry two meals on board in the plane, which we eat while flying. Then the other meal comes at any spare moment we can find. No kidding, we have a rough schedule!

I still must go to bed for a few hours.

Lots of love,
Jack

 Leo Stephens was the only survivor

 return to top

  return to transition training