April 1944 - continued

I found the "war diary" (http://www.norfield-publishing.com/449th/wardiary.html) of Lieutenant Damon Turner of the 449th Bombardment Group of the 15th Air Force. Here is his entry of April 25, 1944:

"Today's mission was abortive. When well on the way to Varese, Italy, the Group encountered bad weather and returned without bombing. Some of the departments have organized softball teams. Those inclined toward athletics have every opportunity to pursue their interests. The Eyeties look with amazement on the effort expended in developing baseball diamonds."

When I was stationed in southern Italy we called the locals "Ee-tals." I checked with Geoff Haley, whose brother Paul is stationed in Iraq. I knew that there must be a mildly derogatory name that our troops use for the locals, and it turns out to be "Hajis", apparently after the turban-wearing Sikh sidekick of Jonny Quest.

This little entry captures so much for me. In England, in North Africa, later in in southern Italy, these airmen lived life where building a baseball diamond was a priority. In England, they rode bikes around the East Anglia countryside.

Then, at the crack of dawn, the pilots, navigators and bombadiers, in other words, the officers, would muster in a big room. They would be told the target of the day. The news would be met with groans or maybe half-hearted cheers. Imagine the rumor mill that must have been churning in those days. Earlier in April 1944 the 15th Air Force had conducted murderous (on them - close to 50% losses) raids on oil refineries in Romania, had flown all the way to bomb Vienna, and so on. You have to assume that few if any had ever heard of Varese until that very morning.

The crews (about ten in all, the rest being gunners) would clamber aboard. The group would take off - lots of racket, smell, general commotion. Probably a plane or two on average of the thirty some would abort the mission for some mechanical reason.

Then, hours of silence. The majority of the people stationed there would not have been flyers: cooks, MPs, mechanics, clerks. The missions probably averaged eight hours or so - quite a bit of time to work on a ball field, write letters home.

Then, someone in the tower would signal the groups return. They would look and begin instinctively counting. . . we've seen the movies.

That night, probably some empty bunks. Some letters to write home. How could the Colonel find new ways to say "your son's plane was seen to be hit by enemy flak. Although no one actually saw any chutes, we were all a little busy at the time and there is a good chance. . ."

Del Kenyon's family probably got such a letter.