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Dad's third journal, and once again, it's the ending that gets me, "Thank God once more we are home in bed." This after the somewhat jocular, "This wasn't bad enough" and "Woe is me," and I always remember Dad saying that the one good thing about being in the Air Corps (not the Air Force yet) was that IF you got home, you had a bed and food. He was always aware that his older brother and his hero, Uncle Les, was on the ground, in fact, in the very middle of the Battle of the Bulge, which was occurring as these journals were written. Uncle Les went days without dry socks, never mind a dry bed.
Counter Clockwise from
l. front: Les, Dad, Leroy, Bob
And now, this is off track, but here is a story about Uncle Les, who was in the war as were two of Dad's other brothers (Uncle Bumps --Robert-- and Uncle Curly--Leroy). At one of Uncle Les's war reunions, decades later, Malcom Forbes showed up looking for Les Kendig. He said, "I heard it said during those days, 'We have no idea who Les Kendig is, but he is working miracles with whatever he gets, so get as many weapons to him as you can.'" Uncle Les went on to help liberate Belgium, where the citizens decades later, gave him a national award. Uncle Les was not at the reunion to meet Malcolm Forbes, nor in Belgium for his award because although he was most alive still, he wouldn't get on an airplane.
I am struck too by the fact that that day they "never lost a ship" because the 100BG lost many ships. Another memory Dad shared with me later in life was the horrible experience of knowing a plane had gone down and in the evening, seeing workers come in to pack up the downed men's effects and carry them away. "They wheeled them away in a cart," Dad said, "and the sound made me sick." To be "home" in bed was no small thing.
12-11-44
No. 3
TARGET –
DERBEN – OIL STORAGE
VISIBILITY – VISUAL RESULTS- GOOD HIT
FLAK- MEDIUM -
INACCURATE
TAKE OFF 0739 LAND 1535
BOBMS AWAY 13O4 ALTITUDE 26,700´
TEMP – 44 °
LOAD – 5- 10000 LB. G.P.’S
OXYGEN 4 HRS. MISSION 8 HRS
POSITION HIGHELEMENT LEAD
We were awakened at 3 o’clock for briefing and it was pretty
cold this morning. At briefing we[re] were informed that our target was to be
an underground storage for oil at Derben, near Hamburg. There was to be flak
and a few fighters. Everything seemed O.K. on the ground, but once in the air
we test fired and I found that my right gun was out of commission and I
couldn’t get it working. It was pretty cold today and the contrails were heavy.
Just before we got to the target, the viskers unit in my turret went bad and
started to burn, and then my sight went out. This wasn’t bad enough, because
just about then bandits appeared out of 3 o’clock level. I believe this to be one
of the biggest air battles I will ever see because the sky was literally
covered with burning planes and there were as many ours as theirs going down.
About this time woe is me a FW 190 hit us from 11 o’clock low and he was close
enough that I could have kicked him but my turret was in bad shape and I never
got a decent shot, but I let him know I was there. The group in front of us
took the brunt of the battle and we dropped out bombs and came home. We never
lost a ship, but we had a fairly tough time of it. We hit the target and that
is what counts. Thank God once more we are home in Bed.
Sgt.
Russell Kendig
One brave family.
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