In between painting, right-clicking Jack and Martin's pics (but first going to Footnote.com to see if I can find the high-rez versions of those pics they're posting!), I thought I'd shoot this out from Don Gentile's logbook. I got a copy from one of his sons back in the early 80s, and it had a few handwritten narratives in the back.
This one was was written March 4th about Gentile's March 3rd mission experiences ... enjoy the words of an ace:
The corresponding logbook line entry (crosses mean two destroyed):
Mar 3....P-51/W....Target Support - Hamburg....7:00 hrs.... + + 2 FW 190s
[Notes: Don flew as 'Shirtblue Red 1'. Kills #8 and #9 today - 1130-1150. 1 DO-217 damaged also on this mission. Longest mission listed. On return, Don landed at Hurn airdrome on the English coast as he was almost out of gas and couldn't make Debden.]
Mar 3....P-51/W....Hurn to Debden....0:40
[Same day return flight to Debden after refueling]
Narrative written in the back of his logbook concerning the mission of 3 March::
[ . . . ] indicates the word is not clear, and my comments in ( ) parentheses.
Saturday - March 4, 1944. Since this is a day of rest for me I feel that now is a good time to note, what I feel has been my roughest mission, so far, and hope the last of that kind - anyway. Yesterday morning I took off (Don was flying P-51B VF-W) in the roughest weather I have yet to see couldn't even see down the runway. We were scheduled to escort "Big Boys" to Hamburg, Germany. I took off with my wingman Johnny Godfrey and the rest of the flight was to join me (Don was "A" Flight commander at this time) but due to weather we never met. So Johnny and I set course for Hamburg hoping the rest would join us above overcast. While on course I could hear different boys calling on R.T. (Radio/Telephone: RAF slang for "radio") saying they were returning because of trouble one way or the other on their aircraft. Johnny and I continued on course hoping that when we broke overcast that at least a few planes would join us.
J. G. and I finally broke overcast at 33,000 feet after flying instruments for an hour with the gas slanging away at the tanks. I was ready to quit and return to base. After being on course for a couple hours still no one joined us. So we decided to continue on alone. As we were approximately 100 miles from target the weather seemed to clear up as if you would take a knife and cut it. Looking back now I wish the soup would have been all the way around the target and back. In the distance I spotted approximately 50 D.O. 217's in formation climbing for altitude and above them were about 100 F.W. 190's. They were getting ready to attack the "Big Boys" head on. I called Johnny on the R.T. and asked him if he wanted to go ahead and attack knowing there were no other friendly fighters in this area. So as usual Johnny said "You're the boss."
I then dove down to engage the D.O.s hoping to break up the German fighters formation, so the "Big Boys" could bomb before the German fighters could get organized again to attack, which they never did due to our breaking their formation. I began firing at tail end "Charlie" and the D.O.s started diving in formation for the deck. About this time Johnny started screaming that the 100+ F.W.s were coming down on us The D.O.s were cross-firing on us at the same time. I had one D.O. smoking badly when I had to break away due to the 100+ coming in on us. J. and I met them head on going through the complete German formation from then on all "hell" broke loose.
Planes were going up and down and every which way. F. W.'s were firing at us from all directions I thought this was it. In the midst of twisting and turning I managed to get on an F.W., who overshot me, and was lucky enough to get him. Johnny started to scream on the R.T. saying 50+ was coming in at 6:00, so I started to aileron roll for the deck. They were closing in so I had to pull up in a vertical climb into the F.W.s. At this time I noticed a brightly painted F.W. on my tail blazing away and Johnny screaming for me to break. I broke so hard that my plane started doing snap-rolls when I got the aircraft under control the F.W. was slightly ahead and above. So we ended up with me on his tail diving and twisting, which lasted a good ten minutes. I managed to get his aircraft on fire and noticed he had it, so I broke away. Johnny's and my ammo was expended so we tried to head for home but the F.W.'s kept coming in on us and we kept breaking into them each time we broke into them we got closer to the cloud bank my gas supply was getting so low, and also Johnny's, so we had to dive for the clouds with them on our tail, of course we were skidding at the same time by the grace of God we reached the cloud bank, and after flying instruments for a while we let down through (the bottom of the cloud deck). During the combat I lost my maps so I didn't know my position, and Johnny didn't know either so we took the general direction home.
When we hit the coast line, it didn't look familiar for we were supposed to come out over the Dutch coast. I finally recognized the Jersey Islands which meant we were 200 miles south of our course, and with only 20 gals. Gas left I thought I'd never make it, of course Johnny was in the same fix. I throttled back to nothing, just barely staying in the air. (We were) running out of gas on the English coast. Thus making a forced landing on Hurn Airdrome, after refueling I headed home. Thank God for a good wingman, or I wouldn't be able to write this today.
(A few days later . . .)
I was just notified that the brightly colored F.W. ------ couple of days ago (see above) was a German ace who had [ . . .] victories to his credit. Kurt Von Meyer. Thank God I didn't know it was him or I'd probably passed out. (This short entry was written with a shaky hand - Don probably just came from post-mission interrogation and was still pumped up with adrenalin).
Much more here:
http://wademeyersart.tripod.com/id40.html
Wade
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