Sergeant Bombardiers in 8th AF?

[JohnB]

I just got a reminder from Amazon that Jeff Shaara's book "No Less a Victory" is coming out in paperback.

I haven't read it...but in reading the reviews I found..."Thanks to Shaara's visceral descriptive powers, we ride on a bombing mission with bombardier Sergeant Buckley as his B-17 flies through the flak-filled skies over Germany."

Were there enlisted bombardiers? I can't imagine someone making that Mistake.

Also, late in the war, weren't bombardiers dispensed with on some heavies in Europe? (The crew (navigator?) would dorop them when everyone else did, IIRC)

[b29flteng]

They were called toggleers. They manned the chin turret and dropped the bombs when the lead dropped theirs. It was cheaper to train someone to drop bombs on a signal from the lead than to train a bombardier. The navigator was busy doing navigator stuff.

[warbird2]

Were there enlisted bombardiers? I can't imagine someone making that Mistake.

I hope you meant a mistake in the review of the book. Otherwise that was written like a true enlisted hater.

[Hemiman]

In early 42', many of the 13th Sqdn Bombardiers in the B-25's were enlisted men. Manpower shortage was the main driving force. 13th Sqd. T/Sgt Jack Methvin was credited with hitting a transport ship in the Battle of the Bismark Sea. Also, some of the Crew Chiefs actually flew combat as Co-Pilots. 13th Sqd member T/Sgt "Jug" Main is one example, flying almost 20 missions as copilot on the a/c he took care of, including the Royce Mission .


Bill

[JohnB]

Were there enlisted bombardiers? I can't imagine someone making that Mistake.

I hope you meant a mistake in the review of the book. Otherwise that was written like a true enlisted hater.

What I meant was a mistake in the book which also showed up in the review.
I had to read your comment twice to see where you were coming from...far from my intention. (or dimension ).

Am I correct in assuming it was late in the war? Everything I've read about 8th AF had bombardiers as officers...including an uncle who was shot down in a B-24.
He's still alive and living (unassisted) in Minnesota!

[RyanShort1]

If you do a quick search on Footnote - which is a tremendous resource - for "sgt bombardiers" or some other likely search terms, you'll likely find some of pictures of them if you dig far enough. So far I haven't found a ton, but there are a few. For instance: http://www.footnote.com/image/#32150334 and http://www.footnote.com/image/#32147909.

Ryan