1944
	17th TROOP CARRIER SQUADRON MEDITERRANEAN ALLIED AIR FORCE 12th TROOP CARRIER COMMAND
6-15/7-6	Comiso Air Base, Sicily. Squadron resumes missions in support of Mark Clark's 5th Army in Italy. Ordered to Ciampino Airdrome, Italy.
July 1944	Ciampino Airdrome, Italy. The group moves to this large facility, which in later years would be Ciampino International Airport, Rome. Most of the buildings have been destroyed, and I find quarters in a bombed-out hangar. The 82nd Airborne has established its Airborne Training Center at Ciampino, and in addition to flying our normal missions, we now commence an intensive training program involving paradrops and glider tows
16 July 44	The 50th and 53rd Troop Carrier Wings, with four groups each, have arrived in the theater from 9th Air Force in England. I am assigned to a new C-47A, with one of my old crew chiefs. Brigadier General Paul L. Williams activates the Provisional Troop Carrier Air Division.
	17TH TROOP CARRIER SQUADRON PROVISIONAL TROOP CARRIER AIR DIVISION Ciampino Airdrome, Italy
7-17/8-13	Ten troop carrier groups are dispersed in central Italy at 11 take-off fields, including two from our 51st Wing. The 60th TCG is on a Special Missions assignment, supporting Marshal Tito's guerrilla army in the Balkans, and will not participate in our operation. Working' closely with the Airborne Training Center, training missions are accelerated as D-Day draws nearer. NOTE: On 10 August, while towing a glider from Naples to Rome, my ship strays over an enemy-held pocket of resistance east of Rome and is fired on. We take a number of small-arm hits, with one bullet striking us dead-center, severing a fuel line, cutting all but two strands of our horizontal stabilizer control cable, and lodging beneath my chair in the radio compartment. The ship fills with fumes, and we sweated out a fire all the way to the base, where we landed safely, with gasoline pouring out of the fuselage. The aircraft once again don flame suppressors and parapack racks, and following the Normandy landing practice, black and white "invasion stripes" are applied. We want no more fiascoes like the Sicily operation. However, whereas Host aircraft have the stripes on both the upper and lower sides of the wings, and completely around the rear fuselage, the 17th paints the recognition markings only on the lower wings, and below the fuselage. We prefer to maintain our camouflage advantage on the upper part of the ships, in event of aerial attacks from above.
14 Aug 44	We receive our final briefing for OPERATION ANVIL, which will commence after midnight. After due consideration of the shortest distance, prominent terrain features, naval convoy routes, position of amphibious assault beaches, enemy radar avoidance and position charts of flak installations, the powers that be expected minimal losses. The word "minimal" was not defined, but "losses" always had a dismal connotation. The briefing was routine, giving us take-off times, formation locations of each individual ship, times between checkpoints, our IP and DZ. We were issued two items that were never seen before: (1) An over-sized toy "cricket", such as those we had received in boxes of Cracker Jack as children, only much larger and stronger. Should we find ourselves on the ground in enemy territory, one click would be an interrogation; two clicks a favorable response. It was suggested that we not instigate these recognition signals, but should respond with two clicks immediately, or risk being shot by a nervous paratrooper. And (2) a very welcome flak vest, our first! The second part of the briefing dealt with the glider assault phase of the operation, and covered essentially the same subjects.
Back to Top