9-4-44

Dear Folks,

Received all your letters today, so I couldn’t do anything less than write back.

We returned from Estrella yesterday and we really did set a new record down there. We all finished with 40 hrs. of flying time in six days (and nights) without a major or minor accident. No one even blew out a tire or scraped a wing tip. Considering the shape that the planes were in that was pretty good. It seemed like every flight that you went something came up that made you sweat alittle. It was so hot down there that the engines vapor locked a great deal and it is quite a sensation to be flying along and have one engine cut out on you, (however that’s a good argument for having two engines).

Another time I had a cross country at night over to Bakersfield up to Sacramento and back to Estrella. I got about 30 min. out of Bakersfield and decided to use the gas out of my bomb bay. I switched over to bomb bay tank and was surprised to find that the ground crew had forgot to fill it. Under ordinary cruising conditions these use about 100 gal./hr. When I got back we figured that I had averaged about 50 gal./hr. after leaning out the mixture and cutting down my other settings. I landed with about 20 gal. Mort B. got lost the same night but finally found the field. He landed, taxied up to the line and both engines stopped, all his tanks were dry, that’s playing it alittle too close. The weather was in our favor all the time which helped alot.

We have had another shake up. Things got tied up in Fresno where we were suppose to go next so anyway I am staying here this month. However the way it use to stand was that you went to Fresno and then came back here for gunnery but they needed 5 more in this gunnery class that is going through starting the tenth of this month and anyway I and 4 others are starting gunnery the 10th. The rest of my class will be here 2 more mos. getting some more instrument time. Mort is staying so that is going to break that up.In a way I am glad to be going on because I wouldn’t care just to lay around here. Our gunnery course is suppose to be pretty good. We get it in P70’s and all of it is over the ocean firing at targets on the H2) and then aerial town targets. I don’t see how we can miss with 4 – 50’s and two cannons. It won’t be like our gunnery in the AT-6‘s at Gila Bend because the P70’s don’t handle like the 6. These weigh as much as the B25 so it is a good deal harder to put them where you want them.

Say Dad it really sounds like you have a pretty nice apt. lined up. You might as well get a large place and $80.00 doesn’t sound at all bad for the place you described. Hope I get to try out one of those three bedrooms. I am sending you a few pictures of the P70. It looks alot like the A20 and there are alot of different modifications of it, we had just about all of them at Estrella.

Elaine and Stan I received your letter today and Karens note also. She is really getting to be quite a artist. You asked about flying 15′ above the ground. You are suppose to know where the houses and any other obstructions were by studying your maps, however, the Col. who was telling this was on convoy patrol over the  _________, up and with a radar altimeter you can read your altitude within inches above the ground or water. When everything’s working right. I received the pictures and they _______ are good, Karen really looks like Mama’s little helper especially sitting there in the chair holding Tommy, (Tom). If you don’t mind Uncle Tom is going to call him Tom, he’s big enough.

I think we are getting 5 days off so I’ll go to B. with Mort. I’ll let you know about it. That covers just about everything. Stan, hope the weather has cleared up for golf. Maybe you can get Dad and Cleda to continue their golf up there.

With love,

Tom.

(over)

Dad, I am sending $150.00 to Mrs. McCane to deposit. Do you get the monthly statements? If so check on it.

8-26-44

Hello Folks,

Wanted to drop you a line tonight before leaving for Estrella. We go down there in the morning and I think we’ll fly the P70’s down from here. I think perhaps I had one of my biggest thrills today when I flew the P70. We got a piggy back ride yesterday which doesn’t teach you much other than the fact that when a person is cramped into a place a sardine would complain of he generally gets stiff. Anyway Today I certainly did sweat through a flying suit.

They are a nice plane but an awful lot for one \fellow to handle but it did feel good being up there alone doing things the way you wanted to do them without someone sitting beside you thinking they should of done some other way. They are a pretty heavy ship that tires you out pretty quick if you rack it around very much. They also have all their guns in the nose right in front of the pilot which makes them alittle nose heavy in landing, but still alot better than the B25 in that respect. I flew for 2 hrs. and shot two landings and it landed nice, which was a relief to me, however they do land pretty fast. The one I had today was a heavy model and I had to bring it in at 150 and hit the ground at about 120. There are a few things that you have to watch out for in the air and one is not to let the thing go into a spin because they just won’t come out. Most combat planes you are suppose to try and recover them from a spin but they say in these to get out. Getting out of one of them involves quite a problem because of the high rudder and the engines back of the pilot. They have a rope that you hold on to and crawl back over the backside of the wing and try to dive under the tail. It is worse than the 25 in this way.

Dad I got yours and Cleda’s letter today and also Stan and Elaine’s package of Advocates. I am going back and read them now. I am enclosing a copy of the will which they wanted us to make out. The government has one and I have a copy in my personal 201 file. The public affairs officer seemed to think that was the way to make it out, to E. first as her being the younger. I think everything else is in order and it is all in my 201. We’ll probably send it home before going across unless they file them for us here in the states.

This covers about everything and I am glad you finally got the house deal settled. I’ll let you know all about Estrella. Goodnight –

With love,

Tom

8-20-44

Dear Folks,

Finally had a day off and believe me just about all of us were ready to drop. I finished my instrument flying yesterday afternoon which was quite a relief but  good training and interesting. The last ten hours of it was all low level instrument work which was the most unusual type of flying we have ever done but will be doing alot of it on our own hood from now on without an instructor to watch the ground. We did most of this flying over in the valley by Fresno where the country was flat. Before each mission we would be briefed as to the route we would fly and then assimilate an attack against a railroad. We would make an instrument take off, the entire trip was made with the hood down and you wouldn’t once see out of the plane.  After taking off you would climb up to an altitude which would clear you of the mountains and cross over them. On the other side we would drop down to about 100′ above the ground (or lower), and believe me after the first ride of this kind you appreciate the altimeter alot more. We would do our own navigation which was all deadreckoning and it was surprising how close you could come to hitting things on the head. We were never more than a half a minute off at the target. When we got to the target we could take the hood off the front and make the pass. The target was usually a railroad so we could drop down and fly below the telephone poles for several miles, then raise up to 100′, pull down the hood and fly home. The thing that makes wonder, is that we had an instructor who would pull you up over and oil derrick, but what do you do in combat. A Lt. Col. who had just come back from flying P61’s and Beaufighters (British night fighters) in Italy and England said that they were flying missions as low as 15 ft. which was a good way to avoid detection, all the flying had to be done on instruments because you couldn’t see the ground. However, we certainly have some wonderful equipment, and as long as it is working it seems almost foolproof. I wish you could see how it works. Tues, we go over to a radar station by Fresno and will get to work some of the stuff, even though we will have an RO (radar operator) who handles it most of the time, it is still a good thing to know. The whole thing looks very interesting and I am even beginning to like the instrument flying.

We go to the Estrella air strip Fri. and start flying the P70’s and A20’s (the same ship only the P70 is a A20 converted into a night fighter with radar equipment and 4 20mm cannons in the nose). We will be down there about 10 days, but just keep writing me here as they will bring our mail down. We just heard last night that orders have just come through from Washington which changes our status from night fighters to night intruders. Up until now about all the night program for fighters was protection of home bases but they are going to start using them over enemy territory. Our training will change alittle and from all reports we will be buzz happy before so very long.

We will be leaving here about the 10th of the month for Fresno (Hammer Fld.) and will be there 2 mos.

I have averaged about 6 hrs. of sleep a night, we had 15 hrs. of link trainer time to get and the only time to get it was after 9:00 P.M. We had classes every morning from 7:00 till 12:00 and flew in the afternoon. We will probably get off Wed. and Thurs. and I might go to Berkeley with Mort.

I have been receiving all of your folks letters and needless to say enjoyed them. I guess it is a relief to get things settled at home, but I doubt if selling the house was a very easy job, but we can’t be too sentimental. It sounded like a pretty good deal but can’t see that Denny would have any complaints,. When you folks move up there let me know so I can change your address on some of my forms. Elaine and Stan I received your letter and was glad to know that everything was OK. The picture did look alot like Eddie G. Have you seen him lately?

Had better close and get to bed, we have our last class at 78:00 A.M. Goodnight

With love,

Tom

8-8-44

Dear Folks,

Just finished eating and I must say that it is really good to have some good meals again. We arrived here Sun. eve. We processed yesterday, and this morning went out to shoot the carbine. It is a pretty nice little gun but not very accurate over 300 yds.

The base itself is pretty nice, that is it seems that we are here for just one thing and that is to learn some more flying. The housing quarters are shacks something like that you would expect to find in a combat area but it is home for the time being. At the present time I am in the officers club, the C.O. who is a Col. is here and seems to be a regular fellow, he is a command pilot and even so is a pretty young fellow. We are supposed to be here at this field for about 2 weeks, that is if we start right away, and get in about 30 hrs. of inst. flying in the AT-10s and then go down the coast to another airstrip and get some gunnery in the A-20’s. I _______ around here we shoot down radio controlled airplanes it seems like a waste of good air-planes. They look something like a Culver Cadet only they have tricycle landing gears. We don’t do any flying for about 5 days, and during this we will get some ground school, which will finish that for the time being any way.

We haven’t heard about a furlough so it will probably be in about 3 mos., the rest of the night fighters that stayed at Lemoore will get one before coming here. The boys that came with me here are about the 15 best that were in our original group. We are all hoping that they form a new squadron out of us rather than sen us across as replacements for the combat sqds, however I would like a few old timers mixed in with us, it might not hurt to be babied around a little at this point.

I ____ you are wondering what the seal in the _____ is, it is the 4th Air Force arm patch, which is like all the regular air corps patches off our clothes, that is the one that I have on in the picture, and put these on. It is some job getting them all changed, and I still have some that aren’t done. about 5 of us are going to the show and it starts in about 15 min. so had better get going. I’ll be _____ of you.

With love,

Tom.

Just back from the show, it is really cold here and awful foggy tonight, definitely not flying weather at the present time.

Good night.