March 3, 2025 • 38 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, Loretto M. Thompson recounts her significant yet distant memories of her father - and how she grew to know him so much better by reading his letters from his service in World War Two. Her book is called An Unexpected Coddiwomple: The Story of a Father's Sudden Death, a Box of WWII Letters, and a Daughter's Life Transformed.
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib, and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Up next, a listener's story from Loretto M. Thompson.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Loretta was the author of an Unexpected Condiewomple, the story
of a father's sudden death, a box of World War
two letters, and a daughter's life transformed.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Today. She shares that story. Take it away, Loretto.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
I never really knew him. I remember him shaving, being
on the sync with him when he was shaving, and
he'd put a dob of shaving cream on my nose.
I remember that I had pushed my younger brother off
the chair, and then when my father asked me if
I had done that, I said no. I think the
(00:57):
spanking that I received was more about the lie then
about pushing my brother off the chair. And I remember
the day that he died. He was forty four years
old and I was four, and our mother raised us,
(01:19):
seven of us for ten years by herself, and we
were dependent on the stories that our mother told us,
stories that she would tell over and over again, and
one of those was the story about how our father
had written his mother every day when he was in
World War two.
Speaker 4 (01:40):
But it never.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
Really clicked that the letters still existed, and as she aged.
At one point we were at lunch and.
Speaker 4 (01:50):
She said, I have all the letters.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
I kept them because I always thought I would read them,
but I'll never read them now because of her vision problems.
She had gleacoma and macular degeneration. So I said, well,
I'll read them to you. And I couldn't imagine there
would be that many letters, because I'm thinking, here's a
twenty two year old guy, and he's really going to
(02:14):
write his mother every day. But when she told me
where the box was, I went down into the basement
and brought it up and dusted it off, and when
I opened it up, I had to catch my breath
because I was shocked. It was packed full of letters,
all handwritten script, letters, perfect condition, and they were haphazard
(02:40):
thrown into this box. Five hundred and twenty two letters
passed into this box. Well I had said I would
start reading them to my mother, and so on Sundays
after church we would get coffee and we was quiet,
(03:01):
nobody else was there, and we started to read the letters.
Speaker 5 (03:08):
February ninth, one, ten pm. Dear Mother, Harry and Mike Well.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
I guess I'll have to snap off a quickie.
Speaker 5 (03:15):
I planned on having an extra time yesterday, but since
the barracks at a GI party, I was delayed again.
January twenty seventh, Company C, Barracks, Number eight, January thirtieth,
three o'clock pm. Dear mother, Harry and Mike, Well, how
are things at the old four fifteen and a half
these days? I'm afraid it didn't get enough chicken, but
I'm learning to give the cook that come hither.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Look, I didn't really know too much about my father
as far as his background. My mother, even in reading
the letters to her, she said she didn't really know
him at that time. He was only twenty two and
she didn't meet him until ten years after he'd returned
from the war. He and his brother were born in Buffalo,
(03:56):
and my father, Frank, would have been seven and his
older brother would have been nine when their father came
down with pneumonia, and within six days he had actually died,
and so that left their mother with these two boys.
And I look at it and I think, wow, it's
like history repeating itself. Because my older sister, Barbara had
been seven when my father died. When Pearl Harbor hit.
(04:22):
He was too young for the draft, so he decided
that he was going to sign up, because then if
you enlisted on your own, you got to choose what
you wanted to be. So he signed up for the
Army Air Corps and that he wanted to be a pilot.
(04:43):
He had to report in January of nineteen forty four
to Fort Dixon. This is so funny because his first
letter postcard that he sends home is dear mother and Harry.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
Just arrived at Trenton.
Speaker 5 (04:57):
Was delayed when I got off a Quaker town instead
of Jenkintown. But it proved worthwhile. Is they grow great
a redheads here? Lay over for three hours. This was
a great way to get here, and people are still
more fun than anybody. All's well, and we'll start for Dixon.
A few moments. Loved all Frank and.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
I thought, oh, well, here we go. Because my mother
was a redhead. All in all, my mother had eight
years with him, and it's kind of a fairy tale
relationship how they met. My father was a doctor at
the time. My mother had really bad allergies and so
she was going to visit my uncle, who was her
(05:37):
medical doctor. However, he was out of town, and so
this young doctor was filling in for him, doctor Thompson,
So he scheduled the appointment for her to go to
the specialist, and then he also scheduled a fillopal appointment
with him. In the beginning with the allergy shots. Apparently
you're supposed to have him like once a week, and
then it goes to once every two weeks. Regardless, it
(05:57):
meant that she had to have quite a bit of visits.
So what happened was they couldn't date. He was her doctor,
So I don't know how the decision came up, but
he quit the practice, went back to school, and my
mother at the time was working on her master's and
she would take the bus to Buffalo State Teacher's College.
And my mother would say, well, you know, I'd be
(06:19):
waiting at the bus stop and he would just happen
to drive by and offer me a ride to school.
She said, well, he said that it was on his way. Well,
we all know that buff State is completely in a
different direction than you be. We try to tell her mom,
and this was not a mistake. He was probably timing
it out to make sure that you would be at
that bus stop. Part of their courtship would be done
(06:41):
while he was on house calls, and so he would
pick her up and they would drive tell the house calls,
and then she would wait for him and then they
would drive to the next one. Eventually he proposed to her,
and I'm not quite sure what he gave to her,
but I did find a little card and it said
something about how he had not put her last name
(07:02):
initial on whatever this was, because he was hoping to
change that. They are engaged in fifty six and they
would have married in fifty seven, and the first baby
arrived in fifty eight.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And we're listening to a listener's story from Loretto M.
Thompson about how she came to know her father and
when we come back, we're going to learn more about
this relationship. This relationship spawned through in the end letter writing.
When Our American Stories continues, Lihabibe here the host of
Our American Stories.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Every day on this show, we're bringing.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
Inspiring stories from across this great country, stories from our
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Speaker 2 (07:54):
Give a little, give a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
Go to Ouramerican Stories dot com and give, And we
returned to our American Stories in Loretto M. Thompson's story,
or more specifically, the story of her father Frank. When
(08:17):
we last left off, Loretto, who never knew her father,
had discovered his letters, all five hundred plus in her
mother's basement and begun reading them to her mother. Frank
wanted to be a pilot, it turns out, but the
Army had other ideas. Let's return to the story.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
At that time, they were saying they had too many pilots.
Speaker 5 (08:40):
February twenty eighth, four to thirty pm Monday, Greensboro, North Carolina. Well,
I've been in the Army a month now, a month
to get a crack at what I did today. Today
we took exams to qualify for aircrew. But I fear
it didn't do too well. Some of the fellows even
feel confident. I have no such feeling. Perhaps have been
away from concentrated men to endeavor for far too long.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
I don't know, but I'm not going to worry too
much about it.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
So it was really touch and go for a little while,
and I have a little letter here. At this point
he's not only writing Harry and his mother, he's writing
also his dog Mike. So from here on in all
of his letters are dear mother, Harry and Mike the dog,
which just crack me up.
Speaker 5 (09:29):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike. We were interviewed today by examiners.
This is in case we don't get cadet, and I
believe that they are going to make a radio gunner
out of me. I'm not too keen about this, but
it is a good deal and that I shall be
in school and in country for at least five months.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
You see a lot of the boys who funked out
are sent directly to Poe Port of Embarkation, which means
they were shipped out immediately. And so that's when he
embarked on becoming a radio operator and a gunner for
at least seventeen.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
October sixteenth, nine pm Monday, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Received no mail from you people today, but I did
get three gazettes. In a letter from Coach, he slipped
a couple of greenbacks in which to me at this
time was quite acceptable any loose changes just before you shipped.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
To any place.
Speaker 5 (10:23):
For somehow you always managed to spend more than you plan.
Speaker 4 (10:27):
Dear Mother, Harry, and Mike.
Speaker 5 (10:30):
I wrote to the aunts last night, They've been so
good to me, miss out asking for opinion in her
last letter of coach going to Niagara Falls High school boy,
I told them never would have said a damn thing
if I had seen home. Guess I think I have
special privileges since I'm away.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
Interesting for me in researching my father's life is there
was a couple that were like grandparents to Sarah Coach
Mister and Missus Franklin Attz, the Mamiot and Papa, And
when we asked about were they related to us, my
mother would just tell us that they were friends of
(11:09):
your father's.
Speaker 6 (11:10):
Well, I learned that the Ats, who had no children
and they were both teachers, lived in the flat in
the house next door to them, And so growing up, Papa,
my father would refer to him as coach.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Because he was a coach at the high schools. He
served as the father figure for them growing up, and
then as my father married my mom and the children came,
Papa was just there for every baptism, every first Communion,
every Sunday dinner, every holiday, Easter, every Christmas, every birthday.
(11:48):
They were just always there. I wish I would have
known that when he was here. He lived to be
ninety six years old. But it was nice to find
out that connection, because apparently those boys, Frank and Harry
really like children to mania and pop out, and then
they in turn got to have grandchildren. In a way
(12:10):
by taking care of all of us. Abot taught all
of us how to swim. They would go on vacations
with my parents and they would watch the kids so
that my parents could have a dinner without children.
Speaker 4 (12:23):
November, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 5 (12:26):
It looks as though I'll be off in a cloud
of dust tomorrow at around four pm.
Speaker 4 (12:30):
Yep.
Speaker 5 (12:30):
I'm on shipping orders and I've been to sign a crew.
Looks like a fairly good crew. I just went up
to get the names of the fellows. Seems like a
fair bunch. Two second Louise pilot and co pilot nobambaeder
or navigator assigned to the crew as of yet.
Speaker 4 (12:43):
We'll pick them up later.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
Ah.
Speaker 5 (12:46):
Yes, the destination will be Gulfport, Mississippi. I believe The
one thing I hope for is that they don't make
New Orleans off limits to us.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Too bad.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
We will miss the KFC supper dance this evening, but
that's the way it goes, Love Frank.
Speaker 3 (13:00):
He did write at one point about how he felt
much safer in what he always referred to as the
Big Birds, and he also felt good about his crew.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
And he says, our crew is of course very green,
no men with combat experience on it whatsoever. And I
still think we have the framework for a smooth working team.
The pilot is a tall six foot my guess Swede
from Rhode Island. I'm glad to say he seems like
a stand up guy. The quality of enthusiasm is priceless.
(13:34):
This bunch seems to have it. Frankly, I would rather
have a young, eager bunch to work with than that
experienced know it all attitude to fly with. This way
we will all learn together.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
He's been writing all these letters and talking about his
antics and just normal life on a base.
Speaker 5 (13:54):
February thirteenth Telegram, Dear folks, please telegraph twenty or twenty
five dollars as soon as poss Love equal Frank Sunday,
twelve ten Golfport, Air Force Base, Mississippi.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 5 (14:07):
First, the weather here, as you can realize, being right
on the golf, it is essentially damp. Dear Mother, Harry
and Mike. From what I can see now, I will
be a very busy boy. We will be on duty
ten to twelve hours when we fly. Dear Mother Harry
and Mike. This morning they got us up for child
late to go to mass so we fully intended to
go at ten thirty.
Speaker 4 (14:26):
But the sack looks so good that we climb back in.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
But you didn't really hear too much about whether or
not he was afraid. And then I found this letter
he wrote to Harry just before he left for the UK.
Speaker 5 (14:42):
Dear Harry, I've been meaning to write this a little
missive for some time now, thought a lot about it,
And besides, I've owed the only breadweather of the family
an exclusive one for some time now. And the truth
of the matter is, I'm scaredless.
Speaker 4 (14:58):
We all are.
Speaker 5 (15:00):
Trying not to dramatize it. A hell of a lot
of darn good men have gone, but I expect that
we are all at least a little leery of the unknown.
I fully expect, if it is God's will, to return
to you one of these fine days, and begin a
new something from which we've all drived so much pleasure,
happiness and security, But just on the outside. If I
(15:20):
don't quite make it, let's call this a final confession,
or whatever the hell we will. I don't honestly expect
that what follows will influence you too much. I've been
away for too long, and mainly I have failed you
for a year now to contribute to the prerequisite of
our triumvirate my presence, my bitching, my morale, and least important,
my economic support. However, I would set a few things
(15:44):
down here, a little advice, I suppose you'd call it.
Even if you were in my obligation, I would not
try to insist you consider them too seriously, for you
are now the pilot, so let's just call them ideas.
Speaker 4 (15:56):
God knows.
Speaker 5 (15:56):
I don't leave you much, but you'll have two thousand cash,
will get sixty dollars a month for better for my
government insurance with her property. This should, in a very
modest way, make her almost independent. You will have to
help them, of course, but it should not be too much,
and should in a way give you even more of
an opportunity to shape your own life.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
I know we both in our.
Speaker 5 (16:15):
Hearts, always considered it a privilege if you enjoyed to
live at home in our piano box with Mom and Mike.
But as you continue to succeed at your own work,
you owe it to yourself and mother and me to
have a family of your own. Please name one of
the boys after me.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
Huh.
Speaker 5 (16:30):
Your breeding so adequate and by one hand alone, must
dictate you to compromise with nothing and accept only the
best and most perfect. This means friends, the selection of
a wife, and in living a life in itself you
are blessed with honesty and truth. Guard them zealously as
you go along. I wish I had your spiritual faith.
It has and will ever be your best criterion in
(16:52):
all things. I was most proud of you when you
came in with two jobs one night and also one afternoon,
when you bounced upon the high school stage and walked
off with what represented three years of sweating out night school.
I couldn't stomach that deal and admitted it by doing
so poorly. I never did get to do much that
amounted to anything, honestly, seems like a man of twenty
(17:15):
four should have left a greater mark on life. Well,
it still remains to be seen what I could do
when I get back. I want you to keep on
being a good boy, Harry. You're still the best buddy
a guy ever had, and I have some pretty good ones. Now,
don't show this to mother, Not now anyway, My special
Tuesday blessing fella, love Frank.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
And you've been listening to Loretto M. Thompson's story and
the story of her father, Frank, a radio gunner on
bombers in World War Two. We'll learn more about Frank,
his doubts, his fears when we continue here on our
American stories. And we returned to our American stories and
(18:10):
Loretto M. Thompson's story, the story of her father, Frank Thompson,
a radio gunner on bombers in World War Two. When
we last left off, Frank had gone to Britain. Let's
continue with the story and with.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
His letters.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 5 (18:29):
The four things the British don't like about an American soldier.
He's overdressed, he's overpaid, he's over sexed, he's over here.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
But I didn't want to talk about before he left
for the UK. One of the things he learned before
then is that they were training for a ditching, and
he wrote about it and he seemed really annoyed by it.
They keep training us for the stitching.
Speaker 5 (18:54):
December twentieth, Wednesday, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike. We had
the usual ground school today, had a three hour session
of ditching. You remember Jack Stolt said we get that
till we turn blue in the face. Well it has begun,
you know. It's the procedure involved in landing your ship
in the water and safely abandoning it. December twenty first, Thursday,
(19:17):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
Another long day.
Speaker 5 (19:21):
Up at four am and up into the wild blue yonder.
When we were down, I got my mail, goped some
pork chops and French fries at the base cafeteria and
hurried over to the ditching drill. Just finished eating again
at the mess hall. And I'm a little pooed out.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
And for me because I was reading it in the present.
He was writing his present. I would be his future.
He is my past. But he and I want to
tell him, you need to pay attention to this because
you're going to need this and I couldn't tell him.
And it was the strangest feeling, because the more I
(19:55):
read about what he was doing, the more I wanted
to give him a heads up. Course, you know, that
was not something that would happen. One of the things
that also intrigued me was that I learned that while
they were leaving the States to go to Europe, they
(20:18):
had flown from Savannah, Georgia, to Gander, Newfouland. Well, from Gander,
they had to fly into Iceland, but they flew on
my father's birthday, so I can imagine that they had
themselves a little bit of a party the night before,
because my understanding is that they were up quite late
(20:39):
and then they had to fly to Iceland will While
they were flying, the pilot said, well, that he would
take the first watch. The plane was on automatic pilot,
so all the rest could sleep well while he was
on watch. He also fell asleep, And so here's this
be seventeen with ann tire crew sleeping. It wasn't until
(21:02):
the navigator woke up and said, well, where are we going?
And the pilot woke up and realized that he had
leaned on the joystick, which then starts to take the
plane off track, and so they had to quick hustle
and manually calculate all of the what they called search
problems in order to find their way back to the
(21:24):
path they were supposed to be taking to Iceland. I
read about this happening to Cruise and there were well
over a thousand crews that on their way to the
European Theater. They never made it. They got lost somehow,
and then we're never heard from again. So I mean,
(21:44):
so it seems like at every step of the way
there were chances that he would not have made it.
And he gets to England and he starts flying these missions.
They were all declassified in two thousand and ten.
Speaker 5 (22:04):
April fourth Mission three oh nine Keel, Germany aircraft forty
two ninety seven one ninety four aka good Pickin primary
target U boat submarine installations thirty seven B seventeens took off,
thirty seven returned major flak damage. April fifth Mission three
(22:26):
ten Nurburg, Germany aircraft forty four eighty two seventy two
aka Lizabeth II, Primary target raillyards east of city, Unable
to attack due to clouds. Attack secondary target, moderate flack
Mission three point fifteen Bird Germany aircraft forty four sixty
(22:47):
four seventy five primary targets, hangars and runways of Bird Airfield.
Malfunctions left and right, from electrical systems to scopes, to
transmitters to engines.
Speaker 4 (22:58):
Attacked by two six two U two shot.
Speaker 5 (23:01):
Down by P fifty one Mustangs, two B seventeens hit
by enemy aircraft and blown up one behind aircraft forty
four sixty four seventy five, No shoots seen exiting the bomber.
April tenth, Tuesday. Dear mother, Harry and Mike, just one
of the unsatisfactory type. Purpose to let you know that
(23:23):
all is well and my crew is fine. Please keep
watching my boy Mike, and please don't forget to keep
the crew in your prayers. Lots of love, Francis, George.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
You just have to ask yourself, you know, how did
an entire crew come back on scathe is miraculous?
Speaker 4 (23:40):
This is London, Cory.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Here is a news flash. The German radio has just
the nuns that Hitler is dead.
Speaker 5 (23:49):
Mission three twenty two Haig Holland Aircraft forty four sixty
four seventy five, one day after Hitler's suicide. Mission I
having seven hundred tons of ten and one rations food
to the people of Holland, dear mother, Harry and Mike.
I flew yesterday with a Captain Thomas. He has finished
(24:10):
but wanted to fly in one of those mercy missions,
so I went along as ro. This was the first
time I've been over Holland since the crowds they're capitulated.
I don't know where they kept all the Dutch flags
during the German occupation, but they were everywhere yesterday. They
waved at us from bridges, horse stops, road junctions, everywhere.
It was a wonderful sight. Crowds down there shaking their fists.
(24:32):
Two the beds cut up the spell.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Thank you.
Speaker 5 (24:34):
Yes, delivering groceries of them was certainly worthwhile. Makes you
feel a little better to be dropping something constructive instead
of those hell raisers.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
What the childhow missions were. There was a limited ceasefire
on the behalf of the Germans in order to allow
the Allies to drop food to the Dutch people who
were starving. And what my father did at the time
was his eventual wife, my mother, my mother's father, came
(25:07):
from Holland and some of those people that he was
dropping food Duke could easily have bene his future relatives.
Of course, that would never have occurred to him.
Speaker 5 (25:19):
May eighth Tuesday, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike. Today's V Day,
her Churchill speak and everything. No doubt you people are
very elated.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
I hear of.
Speaker 5 (25:29):
Big doings in NYC and also London, and well it
might be we have cause to rejoice and thank the
Good Lord for being so kind to us.
Speaker 4 (25:38):
And then to the debt.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
Civilian Americans will never never be able to repay the
debt ode to the men that did the job for them.
Speaker 4 (25:45):
Oh, I don't mean guys like me, but.
Speaker 5 (25:48):
The fellows who really had it rough, the ones who
really know what it's all about. To a lot of
us here, it is a little anti climax. I flew
of co pilot while he took an instrument chech yesterday.
We had advanced information then, so we came back and
opened up the seagrum seven some of the crew and
started a little celebration.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Of our own.
Speaker 3 (26:06):
After flying the missions, they had had V Day and
all of the crews now were preparing to come back
to the States. But my father and his crew, they
didn't realize they were going to be sent on a mission.
But they were tracked down by the pilot and co
pilot and they said, it's called a Showtime, Showtime and Engine.
(26:27):
So this particular ship, the name of it was Heavy Date.
And then they were told, well, they were going to
do this dead reckoning mission the next day, and they
took it out over the North Sea. Well, while they
were out there, I knew that their plane had ditched,
because my mother had told me that their plane had
gone down in the water. But it took a little
(26:47):
while to figure out exactly what happened. And then finally
I came across this letter that was written a few
days after it had happened. And again it was written
only to Harry.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
And you're listening to the story of Frank Thompson as
told by Loretto M. Thompson reading her father's war letters.
When we come back more of this remarkable story, and
Loretto M. Thompson here on our American stories, and we
(27:37):
returned to our American stories in the final part of
Loretto Thompson's story on her father, Frank, a radio gunner
on bombers in World War Two. When we last left off,
the war it ended, but Frank had been sent up
for another mission over the North Sea that would end
in disaster. Let's return to the story in Frank's letter about.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
That incident.
Speaker 5 (28:08):
May thirty, first Thursday, Dear Harry, Well, oh boy. Following
my lifetime policy of letting you in on hold the poop,
I'll get you this one off, which should serve the
dual purpose of informing you and also keeping something for
the record. Under no circumstances. Do I want you to
let Mom read this. You'll only worry her. A few
(28:30):
days ago we found out we had a DR mission
dead reckoning. It's a navigational training mission, and so we
went to bed early and we woke up in the
morning early. We got up, went to more or less
token briefing where we found out we were to fly
over the North Sea. Also, in addition to pilot copilot
navigator Engineer An ro who must fly at the ship,
we took on Ourbamadier Herb Robinson, who hadn't wanted to
(28:54):
fly that day, didn't really feel like it, but the
squadron navigator wanted him to go along and get checked
out on DR navigations. So that made six of us.
When we got out to the big bird. We found
out that a Sea one maintenance man was supposed to
go too. C one is automatic pilot, and we call
him George.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
He didn't show up at takeoff, so we took off
without him.
Speaker 5 (29:12):
The weather was bad. We couldn't fly over the stuff,
so we flew under it. I was supposed to send
it in position report every hour, so about ten minutes
after nine I called a navigator for a fix. The
bombitedeer told me that he was taking a double drift
wind reading and would call me as soon as he
was through. I was tuned up on my radio on
an emergency DF frequency as soon as I had left
(29:34):
the coast, and it called in and obtained a fix,
which was seven miles off according to the navigator. The
trouble with accuracy was we were too low for a
good transmission. When I found I couldn't get a fixed
position report from the navigator, I tuned up to the
base ground stations so i'd be ready when he got
ready to give it to me, for it was late
already when I asked for it, the pilot had heard
(29:54):
me and said we were too low to send it.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
Then we were too low for comfort.
Speaker 5 (29:59):
I was unhappy because it was not much fun getting
there all alone doing nothing, so I called up the
base station and got a frequency check okay in a
maximum single strength. I was about to call again when
I heard the copilot over the interphone giving the.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
Order prepared to ditch.
Speaker 5 (30:13):
I better explain here that ditching refers to landing your
aircraft on the water when you were run out of
gas or in dire distress. We were losing altitude fast,
so I immediately changed my radio set up to the emergency,
and by the time the navigator and bombitier had come
from the nose through the bombay to the radio room,
all members of the crew took places seated on the
radio room floor with their hands locked behind their necks.
(30:35):
For when you were to ditch, there is a terrific
impact when you hit. Figure it out for yourself. We
hit the water at one hundred and five miles per hour.
I was hopelessly trying to get in an SOS to
the DF station, but I knew that by that time
we were far too low. I was setting into the
blind for I had to listen to the interphone for
the prepared to impact order until the three boys who
(30:57):
were seated so they'd be ready. The copilot had kept
ask me are you ready, and finally I said they were,
and in a few seconds he gave the order I
related to the boys.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
They got set.
Speaker 5 (31:07):
I pulled my chute and stuffed it between me and
my radio to absorb the shock, and then we hit.
Water came in from all places immediately, although the actual
shock had not been as bad as I expected. That
was a tribute to a damn good pilot. As soon
as we observed the first shock, we started to climb
out and turned from the radio room hatch. The cover
had been taken off and thrown out, and they came back.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
Joe got out first.
Speaker 5 (31:31):
I got out second to last, and it was then
that I finally discovered why we ditched. The number four
engine was burning, still going in the water, flames about
six to eight feet high when I got out. Herb,
the bombadier, tried to lift the radio out, but it
couldn't do so since the water was up to his waist,
so we got out and into the dinghy. I was
reluctant to leave the radio, so I finally got a
(31:53):
hold of Herb's knife and tried to cut it out.
With the impact the radio had become jammed in the rack.
We used the house to raid our JAMMI equipment on
combat missions. It was impossible to cut her loose, and
I left the top of the ship just a few
seconds before.
Speaker 4 (32:06):
She went down.
Speaker 5 (32:08):
We had to push our rubber boat away to avoid
being hit by the tail, which was the last section
to disappeared under the water. Then we were alone, nothing
on the horizon but water. It was cold too, and
no radio. This was unfortunate, for we knew there were
ships at least within fifty miles of us as far
as we knew, though no one knew that we were down.
(32:29):
It was a chance in a million that my SOS
had been picked up, and we were so low we
were a bunch of sad looking sacks. The four of
us who had been in the radio room were drenched
the skin. We sat there about five minutes, checking to
make sure no one was hurt. And then there was
when providence entered in. A beautiful big bird came over us.
We frantically grabbed flare pistols and flares and shot them
(32:50):
off like crazy. We yelled like mad men, although we
knew they couldn't hear us. At first, it looked as
though they wouldn't see us, but they did. Shortly after
the end of the second hour in the water, a
British plane arrived with a small boat tied to the
bottom of it. The B seventeen that had been keeping
us company buzzed us and left. That ship had been
on a dead reckoning from our base, just as we had,
(33:12):
but it was a wonder that their course followed so
closely to our own.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
We waved her grateful goodbye and turned our attention to
the RAF ship.
Speaker 5 (33:21):
It made seven or eight passes at us, and finally
dropped the boat. None of the shoots on one end open,
and when we had finally paddled to it in the dinghy,
we found it splintered to pieces.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
We ditched at nine thirty am, and we were picked
up about five thirty PM, very little the worse for wear.
We didn't get back until one thirty that night, for
it seems we went down dead center in the North Sea,
about one hundred and fifty five to one hundred and
sixty miles out. They fed us two quarts of good
(33:52):
scott and hot ham and eggs. We went to bed
in nice, warm English blankets. Joe got sick from drinking
too much, but got some sleep. Later. The Wrens woke
us up at seven in the morning with a cup
of tea. Oh it was rough. We had breakfast with
the naval officers and I got to mass and we
got a chance to go through an English submarine before
(34:15):
we left for an RIF base, where a big bird
picked us up and flew us back to the base. Well, fellow,
that is it. We returned about three pm Sunday, and
at eight they told us we could have a forty
eight hour pass if we wanted it, so we took
off for London. Herb Bombadier didn't go had to have
(34:35):
his back X rayed. So I hope you at least
will understand why I didn't write for a few days.
Have to run off to lunch now except to take
a cross country over Ireland this PM. So be good,
oh boy, and please keep remembering us. We sure need it, love, Frank.
(35:01):
When I started on this project, I'll be honest with you,
I didn't have a lot of attachment to my father.
I mean, I knew I loved him, but I didn't
know him. I just loved him because he was my father,
and I know he had died. I know he had
been a doctor and he had helped a lot of
people because I heard about it all the time, but
there was no real emotion. Even when I watched the
(35:24):
family movies from when he was alive, I didn't really
feel a connection to him. But after going through this
whole project, reading all of these letters that he had written,
I feel as though I know him that and to me,
what didn't seem to move me emotionally beforehand is truly
(35:48):
heartbreaking too when you think about it. Here's a guy
who fought in World War Two, came home against all odds,
became a doctor, helped all these people start, did his family,
and to have his life cut short at forty four
years old, and then we never talked about him. I
don't really know why. I mean, I realized after reading
(36:10):
all these letters that that was really just a shame,
Like how could this entire life, this man who had
accomplished so much in such a short amount of time
and then left us, all of us could just be forgotten.
So that was one of the driving forces for me
behind this project. And if it weren't for the pilot
(36:34):
who told me to write the damn book, I probably
wouldn't have shared this story, but I can imagine that
there are other adult children of World War Two veterans
that would have loved the opportunity to talk to their
parents about what happened over there. And I think that
my father speaks for a lot of them because he
(36:57):
was an everyman. He wasn't one of these heroes that
you see these films that are about He represented the
average gi and what they were going through and how
they felt, and the only thing that they wanted to
accomplish was to get home, just get through this war
(37:18):
and get home. And for him to leave behind five
hundred letters, I mean, it's miraculous that they even survived
one His mother had to keep them, which he did
ask in one of his letters, he said, you know,
I'd like you to hang on to these. I'd like
to read them to my grandchildren one day. Well, now
his grandchildren are reading them. His story was meant to
(37:39):
be told, and he left those letters for us in
order to give us his voice.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Superb effort by Monte Montgomery on the production, and again
a special thanks to Loretto Thompson, a listener and fan
of the show, and we're fans of hers and we
became listeners.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
And that's what we love about this show. Sometimes we
listen to
Speaker 1 (38:02):
You the story of Loretta Thompson's father, Frank, a radio
gunner on bombers in World War Two, as she described
him in every Man Here on Our American Stories
This is Lee Habib, and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Up next, a listener's story from Loretto M. Thompson.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Loretta was the author of an Unexpected Condiewomple, the story
of a father's sudden death, a box of World War
two letters, and a daughter's life transformed.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Today. She shares that story. Take it away, Loretto.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
I never really knew him. I remember him shaving, being
on the sync with him when he was shaving, and
he'd put a dob of shaving cream on my nose.
I remember that I had pushed my younger brother off
the chair, and then when my father asked me if
I had done that, I said no. I think the
(00:57):
spanking that I received was more about the lie then
about pushing my brother off the chair. And I remember
the day that he died. He was forty four years
old and I was four, and our mother raised us,
(01:19):
seven of us for ten years by herself, and we
were dependent on the stories that our mother told us,
stories that she would tell over and over again, and
one of those was the story about how our father
had written his mother every day when he was in
World War two.
Speaker 4 (01:40):
But it never.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
Really clicked that the letters still existed, and as she aged.
At one point we were at lunch and.
Speaker 4 (01:50):
She said, I have all the letters.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
I kept them because I always thought I would read them,
but I'll never read them now because of her vision problems.
She had gleacoma and macular degeneration. So I said, well,
I'll read them to you. And I couldn't imagine there
would be that many letters, because I'm thinking, here's a
twenty two year old guy, and he's really going to
(02:14):
write his mother every day. But when she told me
where the box was, I went down into the basement
and brought it up and dusted it off, and when
I opened it up, I had to catch my breath
because I was shocked. It was packed full of letters,
all handwritten script, letters, perfect condition, and they were haphazard
(02:40):
thrown into this box. Five hundred and twenty two letters
passed into this box. Well I had said I would
start reading them to my mother, and so on Sundays
after church we would get coffee and we was quiet,
(03:01):
nobody else was there, and we started to read the letters.
Speaker 5 (03:08):
February ninth, one, ten pm. Dear Mother, Harry and Mike Well.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
I guess I'll have to snap off a quickie.
Speaker 5 (03:15):
I planned on having an extra time yesterday, but since
the barracks at a GI party, I was delayed again.
January twenty seventh, Company C, Barracks, Number eight, January thirtieth,
three o'clock pm. Dear mother, Harry and Mike, Well, how
are things at the old four fifteen and a half
these days? I'm afraid it didn't get enough chicken, but
I'm learning to give the cook that come hither.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Look, I didn't really know too much about my father
as far as his background. My mother, even in reading
the letters to her, she said she didn't really know
him at that time. He was only twenty two and
she didn't meet him until ten years after he'd returned
from the war. He and his brother were born in Buffalo,
(03:56):
and my father, Frank, would have been seven and his
older brother would have been nine when their father came
down with pneumonia, and within six days he had actually died,
and so that left their mother with these two boys.
And I look at it and I think, wow, it's
like history repeating itself. Because my older sister, Barbara had
been seven when my father died. When Pearl Harbor hit.
(04:22):
He was too young for the draft, so he decided
that he was going to sign up, because then if
you enlisted on your own, you got to choose what
you wanted to be. So he signed up for the
Army Air Corps and that he wanted to be a pilot.
(04:43):
He had to report in January of nineteen forty four
to Fort Dixon. This is so funny because his first
letter postcard that he sends home is dear mother and Harry.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
Just arrived at Trenton.
Speaker 5 (04:57):
Was delayed when I got off a Quaker town instead
of Jenkintown. But it proved worthwhile. Is they grow great
a redheads here? Lay over for three hours. This was
a great way to get here, and people are still
more fun than anybody. All's well, and we'll start for Dixon.
A few moments. Loved all Frank and.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
I thought, oh, well, here we go. Because my mother
was a redhead. All in all, my mother had eight
years with him, and it's kind of a fairy tale
relationship how they met. My father was a doctor at
the time. My mother had really bad allergies and so
she was going to visit my uncle, who was her
(05:37):
medical doctor. However, he was out of town, and so
this young doctor was filling in for him, doctor Thompson,
So he scheduled the appointment for her to go to
the specialist, and then he also scheduled a fillopal appointment
with him. In the beginning with the allergy shots. Apparently
you're supposed to have him like once a week, and
then it goes to once every two weeks. Regardless, it
(05:57):
meant that she had to have quite a bit of visits.
So what happened was they couldn't date. He was her doctor,
So I don't know how the decision came up, but
he quit the practice, went back to school, and my
mother at the time was working on her master's and
she would take the bus to Buffalo State Teacher's College.
And my mother would say, well, you know, I'd be
(06:19):
waiting at the bus stop and he would just happen
to drive by and offer me a ride to school.
She said, well, he said that it was on his way. Well,
we all know that buff State is completely in a
different direction than you be. We try to tell her mom,
and this was not a mistake. He was probably timing
it out to make sure that you would be at
that bus stop. Part of their courtship would be done
(06:41):
while he was on house calls, and so he would
pick her up and they would drive tell the house calls,
and then she would wait for him and then they
would drive to the next one. Eventually he proposed to her,
and I'm not quite sure what he gave to her,
but I did find a little card and it said
something about how he had not put her last name
(07:02):
initial on whatever this was, because he was hoping to
change that. They are engaged in fifty six and they
would have married in fifty seven, and the first baby
arrived in fifty eight.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And we're listening to a listener's story from Loretto M.
Thompson about how she came to know her father and
when we come back, we're going to learn more about
this relationship. This relationship spawned through in the end letter writing.
When Our American Stories continues, Lihabibe here the host of
Our American Stories.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Every day on this show, we're bringing.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
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 Ouramerican Stories dot com and click
the donate button.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Give a little, give a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
Go to Ouramerican Stories dot com and give, And we
returned to our American Stories in Loretto M. Thompson's story,
or more specifically, the story of her father Frank. When
(08:17):
we last left off, Loretto, who never knew her father,
had discovered his letters, all five hundred plus in her
mother's basement and begun reading them to her mother. Frank
wanted to be a pilot, it turns out, but the
Army had other ideas. Let's return to the story.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
At that time, they were saying they had too many pilots.
Speaker 5 (08:40):
February twenty eighth, four to thirty pm Monday, Greensboro, North Carolina. Well,
I've been in the Army a month now, a month
to get a crack at what I did today. Today
we took exams to qualify for aircrew. But I fear
it didn't do too well. Some of the fellows even
feel confident. I have no such feeling. Perhaps have been
away from concentrated men to endeavor for far too long.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
I don't know, but I'm not going to worry too
much about it.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
So it was really touch and go for a little while,
and I have a little letter here. At this point
he's not only writing Harry and his mother, he's writing
also his dog Mike. So from here on in all
of his letters are dear mother, Harry and Mike the dog,
which just crack me up.
Speaker 5 (09:29):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike. We were interviewed today by examiners.
This is in case we don't get cadet, and I
believe that they are going to make a radio gunner
out of me. I'm not too keen about this, but
it is a good deal and that I shall be
in school and in country for at least five months.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
You see a lot of the boys who funked out
are sent directly to Poe Port of Embarkation, which means
they were shipped out immediately. And so that's when he
embarked on becoming a radio operator and a gunner for
at least seventeen.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
October sixteenth, nine pm Monday, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Received no mail from you people today, but I did
get three gazettes. In a letter from Coach, he slipped
a couple of greenbacks in which to me at this
time was quite acceptable any loose changes just before you shipped.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
To any place.
Speaker 5 (10:23):
For somehow you always managed to spend more than you plan.
Speaker 4 (10:27):
Dear Mother, Harry, and Mike.
Speaker 5 (10:30):
I wrote to the aunts last night, They've been so
good to me, miss out asking for opinion in her
last letter of coach going to Niagara Falls High school boy,
I told them never would have said a damn thing
if I had seen home. Guess I think I have
special privileges since I'm away.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
Interesting for me in researching my father's life is there
was a couple that were like grandparents to Sarah Coach
Mister and Missus Franklin Attz, the Mamiot and Papa, And
when we asked about were they related to us, my
mother would just tell us that they were friends of
(11:09):
your father's.
Speaker 6 (11:10):
Well, I learned that the Ats, who had no children
and they were both teachers, lived in the flat in
the house next door to them, And so growing up, Papa,
my father would refer to him as coach.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Because he was a coach at the high schools. He
served as the father figure for them growing up, and
then as my father married my mom and the children came,
Papa was just there for every baptism, every first Communion,
every Sunday dinner, every holiday, Easter, every Christmas, every birthday.
(11:48):
They were just always there. I wish I would have
known that when he was here. He lived to be
ninety six years old. But it was nice to find
out that connection, because apparently those boys, Frank and Harry
really like children to mania and pop out, and then
they in turn got to have grandchildren. In a way
(12:10):
by taking care of all of us. Abot taught all
of us how to swim. They would go on vacations
with my parents and they would watch the kids so
that my parents could have a dinner without children.
Speaker 4 (12:23):
November, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 5 (12:26):
It looks as though I'll be off in a cloud
of dust tomorrow at around four pm.
Speaker 4 (12:30):
Yep.
Speaker 5 (12:30):
I'm on shipping orders and I've been to sign a crew.
Looks like a fairly good crew. I just went up
to get the names of the fellows. Seems like a
fair bunch. Two second Louise pilot and co pilot nobambaeder
or navigator assigned to the crew as of yet.
Speaker 4 (12:43):
We'll pick them up later.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
Ah.
Speaker 5 (12:46):
Yes, the destination will be Gulfport, Mississippi. I believe The
one thing I hope for is that they don't make
New Orleans off limits to us.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Too bad.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
We will miss the KFC supper dance this evening, but
that's the way it goes, Love Frank.
Speaker 3 (13:00):
He did write at one point about how he felt
much safer in what he always referred to as the
Big Birds, and he also felt good about his crew.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
And he says, our crew is of course very green,
no men with combat experience on it whatsoever. And I
still think we have the framework for a smooth working team.
The pilot is a tall six foot my guess Swede
from Rhode Island. I'm glad to say he seems like
a stand up guy. The quality of enthusiasm is priceless.
(13:34):
This bunch seems to have it. Frankly, I would rather
have a young, eager bunch to work with than that
experienced know it all attitude to fly with. This way
we will all learn together.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
He's been writing all these letters and talking about his
antics and just normal life on a base.
Speaker 5 (13:54):
February thirteenth Telegram, Dear folks, please telegraph twenty or twenty
five dollars as soon as poss Love equal Frank Sunday,
twelve ten Golfport, Air Force Base, Mississippi.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 5 (14:07):
First, the weather here, as you can realize, being right
on the golf, it is essentially damp. Dear Mother, Harry
and Mike. From what I can see now, I will
be a very busy boy. We will be on duty
ten to twelve hours when we fly. Dear Mother Harry
and Mike. This morning they got us up for child
late to go to mass so we fully intended to
go at ten thirty.
Speaker 4 (14:26):
But the sack looks so good that we climb back in.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
But you didn't really hear too much about whether or
not he was afraid. And then I found this letter
he wrote to Harry just before he left for the UK.
Speaker 5 (14:42):
Dear Harry, I've been meaning to write this a little
missive for some time now, thought a lot about it,
And besides, I've owed the only breadweather of the family
an exclusive one for some time now. And the truth
of the matter is, I'm scaredless.
Speaker 4 (14:58):
We all are.
Speaker 5 (15:00):
Trying not to dramatize it. A hell of a lot
of darn good men have gone, but I expect that
we are all at least a little leery of the unknown.
I fully expect, if it is God's will, to return
to you one of these fine days, and begin a
new something from which we've all drived so much pleasure,
happiness and security, But just on the outside. If I
(15:20):
don't quite make it, let's call this a final confession,
or whatever the hell we will. I don't honestly expect
that what follows will influence you too much. I've been
away for too long, and mainly I have failed you
for a year now to contribute to the prerequisite of
our triumvirate my presence, my bitching, my morale, and least important,
my economic support. However, I would set a few things
(15:44):
down here, a little advice, I suppose you'd call it.
Even if you were in my obligation, I would not
try to insist you consider them too seriously, for you
are now the pilot, so let's just call them ideas.
Speaker 4 (15:56):
God knows.
Speaker 5 (15:56):
I don't leave you much, but you'll have two thousand cash,
will get sixty dollars a month for better for my
government insurance with her property. This should, in a very
modest way, make her almost independent. You will have to
help them, of course, but it should not be too much,
and should in a way give you even more of
an opportunity to shape your own life.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
I know we both in our.
Speaker 5 (16:15):
Hearts, always considered it a privilege if you enjoyed to
live at home in our piano box with Mom and Mike.
But as you continue to succeed at your own work,
you owe it to yourself and mother and me to
have a family of your own. Please name one of
the boys after me.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
Huh.
Speaker 5 (16:30):
Your breeding so adequate and by one hand alone, must
dictate you to compromise with nothing and accept only the
best and most perfect. This means friends, the selection of
a wife, and in living a life in itself you
are blessed with honesty and truth. Guard them zealously as
you go along. I wish I had your spiritual faith.
It has and will ever be your best criterion in
(16:52):
all things. I was most proud of you when you
came in with two jobs one night and also one afternoon,
when you bounced upon the high school stage and walked
off with what represented three years of sweating out night school.
I couldn't stomach that deal and admitted it by doing
so poorly. I never did get to do much that
amounted to anything, honestly, seems like a man of twenty
(17:15):
four should have left a greater mark on life. Well,
it still remains to be seen what I could do
when I get back. I want you to keep on
being a good boy, Harry. You're still the best buddy
a guy ever had, and I have some pretty good ones. Now,
don't show this to mother, Not now anyway, My special
Tuesday blessing fella, love Frank.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
And you've been listening to Loretto M. Thompson's story and
the story of her father, Frank, a radio gunner on
bombers in World War Two. We'll learn more about Frank,
his doubts, his fears when we continue here on our
American stories. And we returned to our American stories and
(18:10):
Loretto M. Thompson's story, the story of her father, Frank Thompson,
a radio gunner on bombers in World War Two. When
we last left off, Frank had gone to Britain. Let's
continue with the story and with.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
His letters.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 5 (18:29):
The four things the British don't like about an American soldier.
He's overdressed, he's overpaid, he's over sexed, he's over here.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
But I didn't want to talk about before he left
for the UK. One of the things he learned before
then is that they were training for a ditching, and
he wrote about it and he seemed really annoyed by it.
They keep training us for the stitching.
Speaker 5 (18:54):
December twentieth, Wednesday, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike. We had
the usual ground school today, had a three hour session
of ditching. You remember Jack Stolt said we get that
till we turn blue in the face. Well it has begun,
you know. It's the procedure involved in landing your ship
in the water and safely abandoning it. December twenty first, Thursday,
(19:17):
Dear Mother, Harry and Mike.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
Another long day.
Speaker 5 (19:21):
Up at four am and up into the wild blue yonder.
When we were down, I got my mail, goped some
pork chops and French fries at the base cafeteria and
hurried over to the ditching drill. Just finished eating again
at the mess hall. And I'm a little pooed out.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
And for me because I was reading it in the present.
He was writing his present. I would be his future.
He is my past. But he and I want to
tell him, you need to pay attention to this because
you're going to need this and I couldn't tell him.
And it was the strangest feeling, because the more I
(19:55):
read about what he was doing, the more I wanted
to give him a heads up. Course, you know, that
was not something that would happen. One of the things
that also intrigued me was that I learned that while
they were leaving the States to go to Europe, they
(20:18):
had flown from Savannah, Georgia, to Gander, Newfouland. Well, from Gander,
they had to fly into Iceland, but they flew on
my father's birthday, so I can imagine that they had
themselves a little bit of a party the night before,
because my understanding is that they were up quite late
(20:39):
and then they had to fly to Iceland will While
they were flying, the pilot said, well, that he would
take the first watch. The plane was on automatic pilot,
so all the rest could sleep well while he was
on watch. He also fell asleep, And so here's this
be seventeen with ann tire crew sleeping. It wasn't until
(21:02):
the navigator woke up and said, well, where are we going?
And the pilot woke up and realized that he had
leaned on the joystick, which then starts to take the
plane off track, and so they had to quick hustle
and manually calculate all of the what they called search
problems in order to find their way back to the
(21:24):
path they were supposed to be taking to Iceland. I
read about this happening to Cruise and there were well
over a thousand crews that on their way to the
European Theater. They never made it. They got lost somehow,
and then we're never heard from again. So I mean,
(21:44):
so it seems like at every step of the way
there were chances that he would not have made it.
And he gets to England and he starts flying these missions.
They were all declassified in two thousand and ten.
Speaker 5 (22:04):
April fourth Mission three oh nine Keel, Germany aircraft forty
two ninety seven one ninety four aka good Pickin primary
target U boat submarine installations thirty seven B seventeens took off,
thirty seven returned major flak damage. April fifth Mission three
(22:26):
ten Nurburg, Germany aircraft forty four eighty two seventy two
aka Lizabeth II, Primary target raillyards east of city, Unable
to attack due to clouds. Attack secondary target, moderate flack
Mission three point fifteen Bird Germany aircraft forty four sixty
(22:47):
four seventy five primary targets, hangars and runways of Bird Airfield.
Malfunctions left and right, from electrical systems to scopes, to
transmitters to engines.
Speaker 4 (22:58):
Attacked by two six two U two shot.
Speaker 5 (23:01):
Down by P fifty one Mustangs, two B seventeens hit
by enemy aircraft and blown up one behind aircraft forty
four sixty four seventy five, No shoots seen exiting the bomber.
April tenth, Tuesday. Dear mother, Harry and Mike, just one
of the unsatisfactory type. Purpose to let you know that
(23:23):
all is well and my crew is fine. Please keep
watching my boy Mike, and please don't forget to keep
the crew in your prayers. Lots of love, Francis, George.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
You just have to ask yourself, you know, how did
an entire crew come back on scathe is miraculous?
Speaker 4 (23:40):
This is London, Cory.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Here is a news flash. The German radio has just
the nuns that Hitler is dead.
Speaker 5 (23:49):
Mission three twenty two Haig Holland Aircraft forty four sixty
four seventy five, one day after Hitler's suicide. Mission I
having seven hundred tons of ten and one rations food
to the people of Holland, dear mother, Harry and Mike.
I flew yesterday with a Captain Thomas. He has finished
(24:10):
but wanted to fly in one of those mercy missions,
so I went along as ro. This was the first
time I've been over Holland since the crowds they're capitulated.
I don't know where they kept all the Dutch flags
during the German occupation, but they were everywhere yesterday. They
waved at us from bridges, horse stops, road junctions, everywhere.
It was a wonderful sight. Crowds down there shaking their fists.
(24:32):
Two the beds cut up the spell.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Thank you.
Speaker 5 (24:34):
Yes, delivering groceries of them was certainly worthwhile. Makes you
feel a little better to be dropping something constructive instead
of those hell raisers.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
What the childhow missions were. There was a limited ceasefire
on the behalf of the Germans in order to allow
the Allies to drop food to the Dutch people who
were starving. And what my father did at the time
was his eventual wife, my mother, my mother's father, came
(25:07):
from Holland and some of those people that he was
dropping food Duke could easily have bene his future relatives.
Of course, that would never have occurred to him.
Speaker 5 (25:19):
May eighth Tuesday, Dear Mother, Harry and Mike. Today's V Day,
her Churchill speak and everything. No doubt you people are
very elated.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
I hear of.
Speaker 5 (25:29):
Big doings in NYC and also London, and well it
might be we have cause to rejoice and thank the
Good Lord for being so kind to us.
Speaker 4 (25:38):
And then to the debt.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
Civilian Americans will never never be able to repay the
debt ode to the men that did the job for them.
Speaker 4 (25:45):
Oh, I don't mean guys like me, but.
Speaker 5 (25:48):
The fellows who really had it rough, the ones who
really know what it's all about. To a lot of
us here, it is a little anti climax. I flew
of co pilot while he took an instrument chech yesterday.
We had advanced information then, so we came back and
opened up the seagrum seven some of the crew and
started a little celebration.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Of our own.
Speaker 3 (26:06):
After flying the missions, they had had V Day and
all of the crews now were preparing to come back
to the States. But my father and his crew, they
didn't realize they were going to be sent on a mission.
But they were tracked down by the pilot and co
pilot and they said, it's called a Showtime, Showtime and Engine.
(26:27):
So this particular ship, the name of it was Heavy Date.
And then they were told, well, they were going to
do this dead reckoning mission the next day, and they
took it out over the North Sea. Well, while they
were out there, I knew that their plane had ditched,
because my mother had told me that their plane had
gone down in the water. But it took a little
(26:47):
while to figure out exactly what happened. And then finally
I came across this letter that was written a few
days after it had happened. And again it was written
only to Harry.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
And you're listening to the story of Frank Thompson as
told by Loretto M. Thompson reading her father's war letters.
When we come back more of this remarkable story, and
Loretto M. Thompson here on our American stories, and we
(27:37):
returned to our American stories in the final part of
Loretto Thompson's story on her father, Frank, a radio gunner
on bombers in World War Two. When we last left off,
the war it ended, but Frank had been sent up
for another mission over the North Sea that would end
in disaster. Let's return to the story in Frank's letter about.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
That incident.
Speaker 5 (28:08):
May thirty, first Thursday, Dear Harry, Well, oh boy. Following
my lifetime policy of letting you in on hold the poop,
I'll get you this one off, which should serve the
dual purpose of informing you and also keeping something for
the record. Under no circumstances. Do I want you to
let Mom read this. You'll only worry her. A few
(28:30):
days ago we found out we had a DR mission
dead reckoning. It's a navigational training mission, and so we
went to bed early and we woke up in the
morning early. We got up, went to more or less
token briefing where we found out we were to fly
over the North Sea. Also, in addition to pilot copilot
navigator Engineer An ro who must fly at the ship,
we took on Ourbamadier Herb Robinson, who hadn't wanted to
(28:54):
fly that day, didn't really feel like it, but the
squadron navigator wanted him to go along and get checked
out on DR navigations. So that made six of us.
When we got out to the big bird. We found
out that a Sea one maintenance man was supposed to
go too. C one is automatic pilot, and we call
him George.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
He didn't show up at takeoff, so we took off
without him.
Speaker 5 (29:12):
The weather was bad. We couldn't fly over the stuff,
so we flew under it. I was supposed to send
it in position report every hour, so about ten minutes
after nine I called a navigator for a fix. The
bombitedeer told me that he was taking a double drift
wind reading and would call me as soon as he
was through. I was tuned up on my radio on
an emergency DF frequency as soon as I had left
(29:34):
the coast, and it called in and obtained a fix,
which was seven miles off according to the navigator. The
trouble with accuracy was we were too low for a
good transmission. When I found I couldn't get a fixed
position report from the navigator, I tuned up to the
base ground stations so i'd be ready when he got
ready to give it to me, for it was late
already when I asked for it, the pilot had heard
(29:54):
me and said we were too low to send it.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
Then we were too low for comfort.
Speaker 5 (29:59):
I was unhappy because it was not much fun getting
there all alone doing nothing, so I called up the
base station and got a frequency check okay in a
maximum single strength. I was about to call again when
I heard the copilot over the interphone giving the.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
Order prepared to ditch.
Speaker 5 (30:13):
I better explain here that ditching refers to landing your
aircraft on the water when you were run out of
gas or in dire distress. We were losing altitude fast,
so I immediately changed my radio set up to the emergency,
and by the time the navigator and bombitier had come
from the nose through the bombay to the radio room,
all members of the crew took places seated on the
radio room floor with their hands locked behind their necks.
(30:35):
For when you were to ditch, there is a terrific
impact when you hit. Figure it out for yourself. We
hit the water at one hundred and five miles per hour.
I was hopelessly trying to get in an SOS to
the DF station, but I knew that by that time
we were far too low. I was setting into the
blind for I had to listen to the interphone for
the prepared to impact order until the three boys who
(30:57):
were seated so they'd be ready. The copilot had kept
ask me are you ready, and finally I said they were,
and in a few seconds he gave the order I
related to the boys.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
They got set.
Speaker 5 (31:07):
I pulled my chute and stuffed it between me and
my radio to absorb the shock, and then we hit.
Water came in from all places immediately, although the actual
shock had not been as bad as I expected. That
was a tribute to a damn good pilot. As soon
as we observed the first shock, we started to climb
out and turned from the radio room hatch. The cover
had been taken off and thrown out, and they came back.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
Joe got out first.
Speaker 5 (31:31):
I got out second to last, and it was then
that I finally discovered why we ditched. The number four
engine was burning, still going in the water, flames about
six to eight feet high when I got out. Herb,
the bombadier, tried to lift the radio out, but it
couldn't do so since the water was up to his waist,
so we got out and into the dinghy. I was
reluctant to leave the radio, so I finally got a
(31:53):
hold of Herb's knife and tried to cut it out.
With the impact the radio had become jammed in the rack.
We used the house to raid our JAMMI equipment on
combat missions. It was impossible to cut her loose, and
I left the top of the ship just a few
seconds before.
Speaker 4 (32:06):
She went down.
Speaker 5 (32:08):
We had to push our rubber boat away to avoid
being hit by the tail, which was the last section
to disappeared under the water. Then we were alone, nothing
on the horizon but water. It was cold too, and
no radio. This was unfortunate, for we knew there were
ships at least within fifty miles of us as far
as we knew, though no one knew that we were down.
(32:29):
It was a chance in a million that my SOS
had been picked up, and we were so low we
were a bunch of sad looking sacks. The four of
us who had been in the radio room were drenched
the skin. We sat there about five minutes, checking to
make sure no one was hurt. And then there was
when providence entered in. A beautiful big bird came over us.
We frantically grabbed flare pistols and flares and shot them
(32:50):
off like crazy. We yelled like mad men, although we
knew they couldn't hear us. At first, it looked as
though they wouldn't see us, but they did. Shortly after
the end of the second hour in the water, a
British plane arrived with a small boat tied to the
bottom of it. The B seventeen that had been keeping
us company buzzed us and left. That ship had been
on a dead reckoning from our base, just as we had,
(33:12):
but it was a wonder that their course followed so
closely to our own.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
We waved her grateful goodbye and turned our attention to
the RAF ship.
Speaker 5 (33:21):
It made seven or eight passes at us, and finally
dropped the boat. None of the shoots on one end open,
and when we had finally paddled to it in the dinghy,
we found it splintered to pieces.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
We ditched at nine thirty am, and we were picked
up about five thirty PM, very little the worse for wear.
We didn't get back until one thirty that night, for
it seems we went down dead center in the North Sea,
about one hundred and fifty five to one hundred and
sixty miles out. They fed us two quarts of good
(33:52):
scott and hot ham and eggs. We went to bed
in nice, warm English blankets. Joe got sick from drinking
too much, but got some sleep. Later. The Wrens woke
us up at seven in the morning with a cup
of tea. Oh it was rough. We had breakfast with
the naval officers and I got to mass and we
got a chance to go through an English submarine before
(34:15):
we left for an RIF base, where a big bird
picked us up and flew us back to the base. Well, fellow,
that is it. We returned about three pm Sunday, and
at eight they told us we could have a forty
eight hour pass if we wanted it, so we took
off for London. Herb Bombadier didn't go had to have
(34:35):
his back X rayed. So I hope you at least
will understand why I didn't write for a few days.
Have to run off to lunch now except to take
a cross country over Ireland this PM. So be good,
oh boy, and please keep remembering us. We sure need it, love, Frank.
(35:01):
When I started on this project, I'll be honest with you,
I didn't have a lot of attachment to my father.
I mean, I knew I loved him, but I didn't
know him. I just loved him because he was my father,
and I know he had died. I know he had
been a doctor and he had helped a lot of
people because I heard about it all the time, but
there was no real emotion. Even when I watched the
(35:24):
family movies from when he was alive, I didn't really
feel a connection to him. But after going through this
whole project, reading all of these letters that he had written,
I feel as though I know him that and to me,
what didn't seem to move me emotionally beforehand is truly
(35:48):
heartbreaking too when you think about it. Here's a guy
who fought in World War Two, came home against all odds,
became a doctor, helped all these people start, did his family,
and to have his life cut short at forty four
years old, and then we never talked about him. I
don't really know why. I mean, I realized after reading
(36:10):
all these letters that that was really just a shame,
Like how could this entire life, this man who had
accomplished so much in such a short amount of time
and then left us, all of us could just be forgotten.
So that was one of the driving forces for me
behind this project. And if it weren't for the pilot
(36:34):
who told me to write the damn book, I probably
wouldn't have shared this story, but I can imagine that
there are other adult children of World War Two veterans
that would have loved the opportunity to talk to their
parents about what happened over there. And I think that
my father speaks for a lot of them because he
(36:57):
was an everyman. He wasn't one of these heroes that
you see these films that are about He represented the
average gi and what they were going through and how
they felt, and the only thing that they wanted to
accomplish was to get home, just get through this war
(37:18):
and get home. And for him to leave behind five
hundred letters, I mean, it's miraculous that they even survived
one His mother had to keep them, which he did
ask in one of his letters, he said, you know,
I'd like you to hang on to these. I'd like
to read them to my grandchildren one day. Well, now
his grandchildren are reading them. His story was meant to
(37:39):
be told, and he left those letters for us in
order to give us his voice.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Superb effort by Monte Montgomery on the production, and again
a special thanks to Loretto Thompson, a listener and fan
of the show, and we're fans of hers and we
became listeners.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
And that's what we love about this show. Sometimes we
listen to
Speaker 1 (38:02):
You the story of Loretta Thompson's father, Frank, a radio
gunner on bombers in World War Two, as she described
him in every Man Here on Our American Stories
Host
Lee Habeeb
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