January 2, 2024 • 27 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, between the Korean and the Vietnam Wars, U.S. Navy Captain Royce Williams flew over 220 missions. The following story was classified as Top Secret, and for more than 50 years Captain Williams didn’t tell a soul—not even his wife. Nobody knew what this 27-year-old South Dakotan did that day over the skies of Korea—until now.
Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
and we tell stories about everything here on this show,
from the arts to sports, and from business to history
and everything in between, including your story. Send them to
our American Stories dot com. There's some of our favorites.
Between the Korean and the Vietnam wars, US Navy Captain
Royce Williams flew over two hundred and twenty missions. The
(00:34):
following story was classified as top secret because if the
word got out that the Russians were now engaging our
troops in the Korean War, World War III could have
easily broken out. For more than fifty years, Captain Williams
didn't tell a soul, not even his wife. Nobody knew
what this twenty seven year old South Dakotan did that
(00:56):
day over the skies of Korea.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Now yes, born more or less to the Fosse clan
of South Dakota, which is rather famous. My mother was
one of thirteen. My dad who was the mail carrier
on motorcycle. He was in World War One and then
(01:24):
settled near where he was born in South Dakota town
called Wilmot. Very patriotic upbringing. He was large in the
local legion commander of the unit at times, and I
(01:49):
grew up engaged in the community. I took on scouting
as a serious matter and was their community's first eagle
sky up. But I turned out to be an awfully
good farmer, and though my brother and sisters pretty much
worked for my dad in the grocery business, I worked
(02:13):
for a lot of family. It was a lot of
uncles and their farms, and then when I moved to Minnesota,
I was sort of on demand and farming, and I
worked for my uncle at a resort. Mother didn't worry
much about me. She came out one time because we
(02:34):
weren't back as expected, and she found out that we
had been in the trestle of a railroad track and
the train was coming, and we ducked down below the
rails and brought underneath in the wood supporting the bridge,
(02:57):
and we were safe. But mothers don't like those sort
of things. I was full time, engaged and very athletic.
I played in all sports and lettered in all of them,
and I was taller of it. I've lost five and
a half inches with the compression of my back, but
(03:20):
that is manageable, and every life's good. I had my
first flight when I was four years old and a
Ford tri motor out of a pasture in South Dakota,
along with my grandma her first flight too, when she
was eighty and interested in aviation. From that time on,
(03:43):
my brother likewise, and when I was about seven or eight,
two years older, we made a pact. The famous avie
eaters in those days were Lindy Lindbergh and Roscoe. Well,
his name is lin. If i'd call him Lindy, he
(04:06):
called me Roscoe. Later on, when I was signed duty
on the USS Independence, Roscoe Turner came aboard as a
VIP and I was his guide. Takes us to World
War Two. My brother, about two years older than me,
(04:28):
and I were roller skating in front of his grocery shower,
and he came out and said, boys, come in and
listen to this, And it was FDR on the radio
proclaiming the attack on Pearl Harbor. We all got very
serious and are thinking thereafter how we're going to participate.
(04:51):
My dad likewise thought he ought to jump in, but
they wouldn't take him, but he sent his two sons.
Everybody in America was full time engaged in some way
or other in support of their country. In World War two,
(05:13):
little kids were saving the foil from gum, and in
the slightest little thing like shoestrings or whatever, everything was
going into a war effort, and that made them special
and changed their life. I was sixteen and I joined
(05:35):
the local Minnesota Guard. The Guard was called up, and
I had two cousins in it. They went to Morocco
and both were killed. I didn't go because I was sixteen,
and I went up to Camp Ripley for training in
northern Minnesota. Let me finish high school, and when I
(05:57):
turned seventeen, I was eligible for naval aviation and applied
and accepted and sent down to Corpus Christy, Texas. I
didn't get any actual combat in World War Two. I
flew the airplanes and we were instructed to keep an
(06:21):
eye out because we were flying over areas of the
ocean where termed submarines were operating. But I was pretty
much hit. My brother finished a little bit ahead of me,
chose the Marine Corps for his aviation, was in on
(06:43):
the Okinawa combat for our area, and I went through
a full career pretty much same as I did. He
got more carrier landings than most any other marine I know,
and it was in World War Two, Korea and Vietnam.
And I relieved him in his final station on Admiral
(07:06):
McCain's staff at sink Pack and Hawaii, and he retired
the next day. Talk to him a couple of days ago.
He's almost ninety.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Seven, and you're listening to the voice of Captain Royce Williams,
and my goodness, it hearkens back to a different day
in this country. The story of Captain Royce Williams continues
here on Our American Stories. Lie Hibib here the host
of All American Stories. Every day on this show, we're
(07:36):
bringing inspiring stories from across this great country, stories from
our big cities and small towns. But we truly can't
do the show without you. Our stories are free to
listen to, but they're not free to make. If you
love what you hear, go to Alamerican Stories dot com
and click the donate button. Give a little, give a lot.
Go to Alamerican Stories dot com and give and we
(08:10):
continue here with our American Stories. And let's continue now
with Captain Royce Williams in his own words about his
own life.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
I made patrols in nineteen fifty two second tour in
South Pacific on the Princeton. We were shadowing with the
ship that the Admiral was on and we were all
slated to go around the world. We hit a typhoon
(08:44):
off kam and one squadron lost eight airplanes on one flight,
and we were sent back to the States and they
continued on the around the world cruise well. I got
selected for regular Navy, and having only high school background,
(09:04):
I was sent to the University of Minnesota for eighteen
months to get a two year degree. I got a
four year degree and still had another quarter due me,
so they sent me to postgraduate school and coming out
of there, the Korean War was underway and I went
(09:25):
to a fighter squadron out of Miramar in the fall
of fifty two, and I was flying in F nine
F five, which was the new model of the Panther,
and our mission was primarily clos air support and reconnaissance
(09:49):
where targets were trains, train tracks, trucks, bridges, tunnels, and
we were not getting to some of the prime targets
with manufacturing far to the north. So late November, Task
(10:12):
Force seventy seven and others decided to put together a
task force of three carriers and associated ships, probably numbering
twenty some and in the press of night we headed
on up off Changing, which is one of the major
(10:34):
northern cities of North Korea. And in that morning I
was on the first combat flight that attacked ran Well.
When I came back from that flight, I was told
that take a quick snack and come back. You're on
(10:55):
the combat air patrol next, So I thought it was
going to be not too exciting. But we took off
in a snowstorm blizzard five hundred feet ceiling, formed as
a division of aircraft under the clouds, climbed through to
(11:21):
on top, which was twelve thousand feet Well, while we
were in the clouds, we got a message from our
controller in the combat information center saying that there were
bogies unidentified aircraft inbound headed toward the task force eighty
(11:41):
some miles north of us. So when we arrived on
top of the clouds, I could see to the north
contrails they were very high. About time, the flight lead
(12:03):
had a light indicating he had a warning regarding his
fuel pump and he was instructed to detach with his
wingmen and remain over the task force, and I proceeded
with my wingmen instructed to intercept. There were seven contrails
(12:26):
and as they came over us, I could see that
they were MiG fifteen's. I didn't know what country. I
assumed probably Russia because we weren't very far from their territory,
but as assigned, I pursued them, climbing in their direction.
(12:46):
As they turned, they headed back, and in my assumption
I thought they were going home, but when I got
to twenty six thousand feet, they split into a group
of four airplanes going to the right and three to
the left and descending, and when they dropped below the
(13:06):
contrail level, I couldn't see them anymore and reported that
to Combat Information Center on the eriscane, and they had
also lost contact with them. At being a smaller target,
the radar no longer picked them up, so we didn't
know where they were what they were doing. So I
(13:27):
was instructed to turn around and come back and establish
a barricade at twenty six thousand feet between the last
contact of the MEGS and the task force. Well, it
was while in that turn the four that turned off
to the right came in and met me from a
(13:49):
ten o'clock position relative to the clock and where I
was flying, and they were all shooting, so I didn't
pick them up until they were thought they were in range,
and I turned hard into them, and as they passed by,
I was within range and tracking their number four airplane.
(14:11):
The one that was closest to me in the farthest
behind the lead and fired a short burst and he
dropped out of formation. I reported to the information center
that I had just thought i'd just hit one, and
(14:32):
they said, do not engage, and I said, we are engaged.
They said, go get them. The three remaining pulled up
hard and showed me how classy an airplane they were flying,
if they could really out maneuver high climb, and zoomed
(14:54):
to about two thousand feet above me, and they had
split to were The guy who just plus his wingman
was coming in and I was going to track him,
but he was in the sun and I kind of
lost him, and I saw the other two, who already
turned into me, coming back, so I changed my aim
point and was tracking the lead and he fired at me,
(15:18):
and I thought he was a little out of range,
but he was coming in fast, so I fired and
I may have hit him because he turned away, and
then his wingman came in and I changed my point
of aim onto him, and he was firing away and
I was shooting at him a rather long burst, and
(15:41):
then he quit, but he continued flying toward me and
flew directly underneath me, and I would assume that he
was probably hit the pilot. And while this was happening,
the other three came in from the other direction. So
depending on what happened to these that I hit or
(16:04):
didn't hit, I may be up there with six. My
wingman wasn't with me anymore, because when I hit the
first guy and he dropped out, my wingman trailed him,
tracked him on down to where thought he was going
in the ocean, and I don't know what he did
(16:24):
from that time on, but I didn't see him again. Well,
it was now mightily engaged. These guys were no longer formation.
They were singles, operating as a single fighter trying to
shoot me down. And I wasn't trying to do anything fancy.
(16:47):
I was countering their attacks. And then as they pulled off,
they would pull abruptly up so high that I couldn't
track them anymore. They weren't a target. They were just
getting positioned to come back in and let the next
guy have his turn. Well, one time a guy failed
(17:13):
to do that pull up and he kind of slid
in front of me, and while he was in close,
I fired and hit him, and it was almost as
though he stopped and his their plane pieces were coming
off him and I had to turn abruptly to avoid
running into him. So lasted about a half.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Hour, and you've been listening to Captain Royce Williams in
his own words, which we love to do here on
this show. When we come back, we're going to continue
with the remarkable story of Captain Royce Williams here on
our American Stories. And we continue with our American Stories
(18:12):
and the story of Captain Royce Williams. Let's pick up
where we last left off.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
So lasted about a half hour. And toward the end
of this thing, I was on the tail of one
of them and he stopped maneuvering and was slowing down
and losing altitude, and I was out of ammunition. So
(18:43):
I turned around and I saw a meg was coming
in on my tail, and I turned real hard into him,
and I'd say it was a lucky shot. But he
hit me with a thirty seven millimeter right in the wing.
Butt had exploded in the accessory section of the engine,
destroying all of the hydraulics and a lot of the
(19:05):
electrical severed the cable to the rudder. The guy settled
right in behind me at perfect shooting range. But I
had my elevator working and I would jam the stick
forward and then I would pull it back, and this
would be pretty high ge zooms, and I was always
(19:28):
had one hundred percent power of the whole fight, and
so I had pretty good control for this maneuver that
really saved my life. I dove into the clouds and
lost sight of him, and so I knew I was
in bad shape, and I thought about ejecting, but this
(19:51):
is wintertime and the ocean is extremely cold, and though
I'm wearing an immersion suit, that probably would have extended
my survival to maybe twenty minutes, and there was no
time for me to be rescued, so that would have been.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
It.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
My commanding officer of the squadron had taken off and
with a division four airplanes to go up and relieve me.
On takeoff, he saw me coming into the task force
area under the clouds and being shot at by the destroyers.
(20:39):
They didn't know who I was, and they were at
general quarters ready to fight and cleared to shoot if
they had an unidentified and they were concerned, so they shot,
and he called off the dog, saying he's friendly. I
was talking to a group of people in Pensacol, the
(21:00):
first time I ever talked about this at all, many
years later, and one of the gentlemen afterwards came back
and said, I was one of the guys shooting at you.
I was under destroyer and said, I said, you didn't
hit me. Don't worry. I saved the adrenaline for after
(21:20):
my landing, and then I did get a flush of
that once I realized what I'd been through. The plane captain,
who kind of owned that airplane, got a grease pencil
and went around, circled all the perforations and counted two
hundred and sixty three. So I did meet the captain
(21:41):
and they congratulated me for whatever I did, and said
he thought I had just earned the Navy Cross. I
had a meeting with the senior admiral in the Western Pacific,
who told me that we were covered by the operation
of a new capability called NSA, and this being their
(22:06):
first venture, had a team on the Helena, which was
right off the coast of Vladivostok where the base was
located that these bigs came from, and their censors told
them that I got at least three. And I was
(22:26):
told that this is after we got into port and Yokoska,
and told to never tell anybody ever. And so I
spent maybe fifty some years or something like that. We're
never told a soul. They told me there was a
lot of surmising by other people, and they were concerned
(22:48):
about maybe World War three, it's going to get out
of hand. I was told that because we had this
new capability of n say, we didn't want him to
know about it, and if I were to come out
with all this information that it would be more than
(23:11):
I as a single fighter pilot than there would actually
have gleaned by myself. At some point I received word
that the President elect was on his way out and
had requested to meet with me. And so the president
(23:33):
came over to me and then took me by the
elbow over to a big, overstuffed leather chair, placed me
in it. The little shove sat on the arm and said,
before we get down to business, we ought to have
a drink, don't you think well? I concurred, I said yes, sir,
(24:00):
And he says, well, we have bourbon, Wisconsin, water and soda.
What do you have, my son, John's the bartender Bourbon
and water please? He said, we have awfully good scotch.
I said, well, sir, prefer the bourbon and water, and
then we have awfully good scotch. I said, well, sir,
(24:25):
really bourbon and water, Lieutenant, We've got the world's finite scotch.
Mister President, I'd drink bourbon and odd John give him
a bourbon and water. So he did, and then we
chatted and we didn't talk directly anything about the Russians.
We talked about his new position as president and uh
(24:50):
that I uh indicating that was a career man, and
he said, we'll make me your boss, and uh, we'll
have well to do with the equipment he use, and
so we sort of discussed fighting equipment and how much
better the big happened to be in performance and that
(25:10):
sort of thing. Awful. Accompanying him was everybody who was
anybody in the command structure in the Korean War. So
he'd asked me a question, and one of I wanted
to engage, so they would talk about it, and then
he kind of me, and then another general will come
(25:30):
in and say his peace, and then he's and Lieutenant,
what were you going to sing? And the Secretary of
Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chief of f
Omar Bradley. So I was proud of the company I
was in. I got other awards and other wars and
(25:55):
other holes in my airplane hit by sam missil one day,
barely just knocked off a chunk of my tail. So
life went on and I engaged fully and life's been good.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
And life indeed has been good. You've been listening to
the voice of Captain Royce Williams, the only American aviator
to single handedly shoot down four Soviet miggs, and then well,
he had to keep it secret for just about fifty years.
And by the way, the first person Captain Williams shared
(26:35):
his story with after it was declassified was his bride.
And today William's friends at his local American Legion Post
four sixteen in Encinitas, California, are working very hard to
get him the Medal of Honor. With over twelve thousand
American Legion posts across this great country. Be sure to
stop by one in your neighborhood and think of it,
(26:56):
or even better join. If you or your family men
have been vets, you would be supporting all the great
things the Legion does, and who knows, you may even
get to meet a national hero like Captain Royce Williams.
Celebrating Captain Williams, the American Legion, and all of our
veterans for their service to this great country. This is
(27:19):
our American Stories.
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
and we tell stories about everything here on this show,
from the arts to sports, and from business to history
and everything in between, including your story. Send them to
our American Stories dot com. There's some of our favorites.
Between the Korean and the Vietnam wars, US Navy Captain
Royce Williams flew over two hundred and twenty missions. The
(00:34):
following story was classified as top secret because if the
word got out that the Russians were now engaging our
troops in the Korean War, World War III could have
easily broken out. For more than fifty years, Captain Williams
didn't tell a soul, not even his wife. Nobody knew
what this twenty seven year old South Dakotan did that
(00:56):
day over the skies of Korea.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Now yes, born more or less to the Fosse clan
of South Dakota, which is rather famous. My mother was
one of thirteen. My dad who was the mail carrier
on motorcycle. He was in World War One and then
(01:24):
settled near where he was born in South Dakota town
called Wilmot. Very patriotic upbringing. He was large in the
local legion commander of the unit at times, and I
(01:49):
grew up engaged in the community. I took on scouting
as a serious matter and was their community's first eagle
sky up. But I turned out to be an awfully
good farmer, and though my brother and sisters pretty much
worked for my dad in the grocery business, I worked
(02:13):
for a lot of family. It was a lot of
uncles and their farms, and then when I moved to Minnesota,
I was sort of on demand and farming, and I
worked for my uncle at a resort. Mother didn't worry
much about me. She came out one time because we
(02:34):
weren't back as expected, and she found out that we
had been in the trestle of a railroad track and
the train was coming, and we ducked down below the
rails and brought underneath in the wood supporting the bridge,
(02:57):
and we were safe. But mothers don't like those sort
of things. I was full time, engaged and very athletic.
I played in all sports and lettered in all of them,
and I was taller of it. I've lost five and
a half inches with the compression of my back, but
(03:20):
that is manageable, and every life's good. I had my
first flight when I was four years old and a
Ford tri motor out of a pasture in South Dakota,
along with my grandma her first flight too, when she
was eighty and interested in aviation. From that time on,
(03:43):
my brother likewise, and when I was about seven or eight,
two years older, we made a pact. The famous avie
eaters in those days were Lindy Lindbergh and Roscoe. Well,
his name is lin. If i'd call him Lindy, he
(04:06):
called me Roscoe. Later on, when I was signed duty
on the USS Independence, Roscoe Turner came aboard as a
VIP and I was his guide. Takes us to World
War Two. My brother, about two years older than me,
(04:28):
and I were roller skating in front of his grocery shower,
and he came out and said, boys, come in and
listen to this, And it was FDR on the radio
proclaiming the attack on Pearl Harbor. We all got very
serious and are thinking thereafter how we're going to participate.
(04:51):
My dad likewise thought he ought to jump in, but
they wouldn't take him, but he sent his two sons.
Everybody in America was full time engaged in some way
or other in support of their country. In World War two,
(05:13):
little kids were saving the foil from gum, and in
the slightest little thing like shoestrings or whatever, everything was
going into a war effort, and that made them special
and changed their life. I was sixteen and I joined
(05:35):
the local Minnesota Guard. The Guard was called up, and
I had two cousins in it. They went to Morocco
and both were killed. I didn't go because I was sixteen,
and I went up to Camp Ripley for training in
northern Minnesota. Let me finish high school, and when I
(05:57):
turned seventeen, I was eligible for naval aviation and applied
and accepted and sent down to Corpus Christy, Texas. I
didn't get any actual combat in World War Two. I
flew the airplanes and we were instructed to keep an
(06:21):
eye out because we were flying over areas of the
ocean where termed submarines were operating. But I was pretty
much hit. My brother finished a little bit ahead of me,
chose the Marine Corps for his aviation, was in on
(06:43):
the Okinawa combat for our area, and I went through
a full career pretty much same as I did. He
got more carrier landings than most any other marine I know,
and it was in World War Two, Korea and Vietnam.
And I relieved him in his final station on Admiral
(07:06):
McCain's staff at sink Pack and Hawaii, and he retired
the next day. Talk to him a couple of days ago.
He's almost ninety.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Seven, and you're listening to the voice of Captain Royce Williams,
and my goodness, it hearkens back to a different day
in this country. The story of Captain Royce Williams continues
here on Our American Stories. Lie Hibib here the host
of All American Stories. Every day on this show, we're
(07:36):
bringing inspiring stories from across this great country, stories from
our big cities and small towns. But we truly can't
do the show without you. Our stories are free to
listen to, but they're not free to make. If you
love what you hear, go to Alamerican Stories dot com
and click the donate button. Give a little, give a lot.
Go to Alamerican Stories dot com and give and we
(08:10):
continue here with our American Stories. And let's continue now
with Captain Royce Williams in his own words about his
own life.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
I made patrols in nineteen fifty two second tour in
South Pacific on the Princeton. We were shadowing with the
ship that the Admiral was on and we were all
slated to go around the world. We hit a typhoon
(08:44):
off kam and one squadron lost eight airplanes on one flight,
and we were sent back to the States and they
continued on the around the world cruise well. I got
selected for regular Navy, and having only high school background,
(09:04):
I was sent to the University of Minnesota for eighteen
months to get a two year degree. I got a
four year degree and still had another quarter due me,
so they sent me to postgraduate school and coming out
of there, the Korean War was underway and I went
(09:25):
to a fighter squadron out of Miramar in the fall
of fifty two, and I was flying in F nine
F five, which was the new model of the Panther,
and our mission was primarily clos air support and reconnaissance
(09:49):
where targets were trains, train tracks, trucks, bridges, tunnels, and
we were not getting to some of the prime targets
with manufacturing far to the north. So late November, Task
(10:12):
Force seventy seven and others decided to put together a
task force of three carriers and associated ships, probably numbering
twenty some and in the press of night we headed
on up off Changing, which is one of the major
(10:34):
northern cities of North Korea. And in that morning I
was on the first combat flight that attacked ran Well.
When I came back from that flight, I was told
that take a quick snack and come back. You're on
(10:55):
the combat air patrol next, So I thought it was
going to be not too exciting. But we took off
in a snowstorm blizzard five hundred feet ceiling, formed as
a division of aircraft under the clouds, climbed through to
(11:21):
on top, which was twelve thousand feet Well, while we
were in the clouds, we got a message from our
controller in the combat information center saying that there were
bogies unidentified aircraft inbound headed toward the task force eighty
(11:41):
some miles north of us. So when we arrived on
top of the clouds, I could see to the north
contrails they were very high. About time, the flight lead
(12:03):
had a light indicating he had a warning regarding his
fuel pump and he was instructed to detach with his
wingmen and remain over the task force, and I proceeded
with my wingmen instructed to intercept. There were seven contrails
(12:26):
and as they came over us, I could see that
they were MiG fifteen's. I didn't know what country. I
assumed probably Russia because we weren't very far from their territory,
but as assigned, I pursued them, climbing in their direction.
(12:46):
As they turned, they headed back, and in my assumption
I thought they were going home, but when I got
to twenty six thousand feet, they split into a group
of four airplanes going to the right and three to
the left and descending, and when they dropped below the
(13:06):
contrail level, I couldn't see them anymore and reported that
to Combat Information Center on the eriscane, and they had
also lost contact with them. At being a smaller target,
the radar no longer picked them up, so we didn't
know where they were what they were doing. So I
(13:27):
was instructed to turn around and come back and establish
a barricade at twenty six thousand feet between the last
contact of the MEGS and the task force. Well, it
was while in that turn the four that turned off
to the right came in and met me from a
(13:49):
ten o'clock position relative to the clock and where I
was flying, and they were all shooting, so I didn't
pick them up until they were thought they were in range,
and I turned hard into them, and as they passed by,
I was within range and tracking their number four airplane.
(14:11):
The one that was closest to me in the farthest
behind the lead and fired a short burst and he
dropped out of formation. I reported to the information center
that I had just thought i'd just hit one, and
(14:32):
they said, do not engage, and I said, we are engaged.
They said, go get them. The three remaining pulled up
hard and showed me how classy an airplane they were flying,
if they could really out maneuver high climb, and zoomed
(14:54):
to about two thousand feet above me, and they had
split to were The guy who just plus his wingman
was coming in and I was going to track him,
but he was in the sun and I kind of
lost him, and I saw the other two, who already
turned into me, coming back, so I changed my aim
point and was tracking the lead and he fired at me,
(15:18):
and I thought he was a little out of range,
but he was coming in fast, so I fired and
I may have hit him because he turned away, and
then his wingman came in and I changed my point
of aim onto him, and he was firing away and
I was shooting at him a rather long burst, and
(15:41):
then he quit, but he continued flying toward me and
flew directly underneath me, and I would assume that he
was probably hit the pilot. And while this was happening,
the other three came in from the other direction. So
depending on what happened to these that I hit or
(16:04):
didn't hit, I may be up there with six. My
wingman wasn't with me anymore, because when I hit the
first guy and he dropped out, my wingman trailed him,
tracked him on down to where thought he was going
in the ocean, and I don't know what he did
(16:24):
from that time on, but I didn't see him again. Well,
it was now mightily engaged. These guys were no longer formation.
They were singles, operating as a single fighter trying to
shoot me down. And I wasn't trying to do anything fancy.
(16:47):
I was countering their attacks. And then as they pulled off,
they would pull abruptly up so high that I couldn't
track them anymore. They weren't a target. They were just
getting positioned to come back in and let the next
guy have his turn. Well, one time a guy failed
(17:13):
to do that pull up and he kind of slid
in front of me, and while he was in close,
I fired and hit him, and it was almost as
though he stopped and his their plane pieces were coming
off him and I had to turn abruptly to avoid
running into him. So lasted about a half.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Hour, and you've been listening to Captain Royce Williams in
his own words, which we love to do here on
this show. When we come back, we're going to continue
with the remarkable story of Captain Royce Williams here on
our American Stories. And we continue with our American Stories
(18:12):
and the story of Captain Royce Williams. Let's pick up
where we last left off.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
So lasted about a half hour. And toward the end
of this thing, I was on the tail of one
of them and he stopped maneuvering and was slowing down
and losing altitude, and I was out of ammunition. So
(18:43):
I turned around and I saw a meg was coming
in on my tail, and I turned real hard into him,
and I'd say it was a lucky shot. But he
hit me with a thirty seven millimeter right in the wing.
Butt had exploded in the accessory section of the engine,
destroying all of the hydraulics and a lot of the
(19:05):
electrical severed the cable to the rudder. The guy settled
right in behind me at perfect shooting range. But I
had my elevator working and I would jam the stick
forward and then I would pull it back, and this
would be pretty high ge zooms, and I was always
(19:28):
had one hundred percent power of the whole fight, and
so I had pretty good control for this maneuver that
really saved my life. I dove into the clouds and
lost sight of him, and so I knew I was
in bad shape, and I thought about ejecting, but this
(19:51):
is wintertime and the ocean is extremely cold, and though
I'm wearing an immersion suit, that probably would have extended
my survival to maybe twenty minutes, and there was no
time for me to be rescued, so that would have been.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
It.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
My commanding officer of the squadron had taken off and
with a division four airplanes to go up and relieve me.
On takeoff, he saw me coming into the task force
area under the clouds and being shot at by the destroyers.
(20:39):
They didn't know who I was, and they were at
general quarters ready to fight and cleared to shoot if
they had an unidentified and they were concerned, so they shot,
and he called off the dog, saying he's friendly. I
was talking to a group of people in Pensacol, the
(21:00):
first time I ever talked about this at all, many
years later, and one of the gentlemen afterwards came back
and said, I was one of the guys shooting at you.
I was under destroyer and said, I said, you didn't
hit me. Don't worry. I saved the adrenaline for after
(21:20):
my landing, and then I did get a flush of
that once I realized what I'd been through. The plane captain,
who kind of owned that airplane, got a grease pencil
and went around, circled all the perforations and counted two
hundred and sixty three. So I did meet the captain
(21:41):
and they congratulated me for whatever I did, and said
he thought I had just earned the Navy Cross. I
had a meeting with the senior admiral in the Western Pacific,
who told me that we were covered by the operation
of a new capability called NSA, and this being their
(22:06):
first venture, had a team on the Helena, which was
right off the coast of Vladivostok where the base was
located that these bigs came from, and their censors told
them that I got at least three. And I was
(22:26):
told that this is after we got into port and Yokoska,
and told to never tell anybody ever. And so I
spent maybe fifty some years or something like that. We're
never told a soul. They told me there was a
lot of surmising by other people, and they were concerned
(22:48):
about maybe World War three, it's going to get out
of hand. I was told that because we had this
new capability of n say, we didn't want him to
know about it, and if I were to come out
with all this information that it would be more than
(23:11):
I as a single fighter pilot than there would actually
have gleaned by myself. At some point I received word
that the President elect was on his way out and
had requested to meet with me. And so the president
(23:33):
came over to me and then took me by the
elbow over to a big, overstuffed leather chair, placed me
in it. The little shove sat on the arm and said,
before we get down to business, we ought to have
a drink, don't you think well? I concurred, I said yes, sir,
(24:00):
And he says, well, we have bourbon, Wisconsin, water and soda.
What do you have, my son, John's the bartender Bourbon
and water please? He said, we have awfully good scotch.
I said, well, sir, prefer the bourbon and water, and
then we have awfully good scotch. I said, well, sir,
(24:25):
really bourbon and water, Lieutenant, We've got the world's finite scotch.
Mister President, I'd drink bourbon and odd John give him
a bourbon and water. So he did, and then we
chatted and we didn't talk directly anything about the Russians.
We talked about his new position as president and uh
(24:50):
that I uh indicating that was a career man, and
he said, we'll make me your boss, and uh, we'll
have well to do with the equipment he use, and
so we sort of discussed fighting equipment and how much
better the big happened to be in performance and that
(25:10):
sort of thing. Awful. Accompanying him was everybody who was
anybody in the command structure in the Korean War. So
he'd asked me a question, and one of I wanted
to engage, so they would talk about it, and then
he kind of me, and then another general will come
(25:30):
in and say his peace, and then he's and Lieutenant,
what were you going to sing? And the Secretary of
Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chief of f
Omar Bradley. So I was proud of the company I
was in. I got other awards and other wars and
(25:55):
other holes in my airplane hit by sam missil one day,
barely just knocked off a chunk of my tail. So
life went on and I engaged fully and life's been good.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
And life indeed has been good. You've been listening to
the voice of Captain Royce Williams, the only American aviator
to single handedly shoot down four Soviet miggs, and then well,
he had to keep it secret for just about fifty years.
And by the way, the first person Captain Williams shared
(26:35):
his story with after it was declassified was his bride.
And today William's friends at his local American Legion Post
four sixteen in Encinitas, California, are working very hard to
get him the Medal of Honor. With over twelve thousand
American Legion posts across this great country. Be sure to
stop by one in your neighborhood and think of it,
(26:56):
or even better join. If you or your family men
have been vets, you would be supporting all the great
things the Legion does, and who knows, you may even
get to meet a national hero like Captain Royce Williams.
Celebrating Captain Williams, the American Legion, and all of our
veterans for their service to this great country. This is
(27:19):
our American Stories.
Host
Lee Habeeb
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!