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Post by varsity07840 on Sept 4, 2012 7:03:39 GMT 8
Hey Chad....This photo "rattled" my cage to the degree of maybe reading, years ago, of one lightly damaged B-17 being salvaged by the Japanese down at Del Monte or Java. I am not aware of our forces leaving any aircraft in salvagable condition at Clark,etc. I am probably hallucinating again, but that's my "infamous SWAG" for this Labor Day morning. Cheers.  It's the same B-17D shown on the first page, 40-3095. Colin Kelly took this aircraft from Hickam to Clark in Sept. 1941 as part of the 14th Bomb Squadron. Reassigned to the either the 28th or 30th Bomb Squadron in November '41 after arrival of the 19th Bomb Group. Badly damaged at Clark on Dec. 8th and later abandoned. Rebuilt by the Japanese using salvaged parts from several other aircraft and eventually flown to Japan with two B-17Es captured in Java. There were no flyable or rebuildable B-17s captured at Del Monte. It's also the same aircraft shown in the color shots at Iba in the Aircraft In the Philippines 1 Dec. 1941 thread. Note the 11th Bomb Group designator from its days at Hickam. Duane |
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Post by okla on Sept 4, 2012 7:54:17 GMT 8
Hey Varsity....Thanks for the update. I am relieved that I am not completely losing it. I was fairly certain that there was possibly a "Java" connection, i,e. captured "Fort/Forts", although this "cannibilized" version never touched down in the NEI. Cheers.
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Post by chadhill on Sept 4, 2012 10:01:07 GMT 8
Hello Duane, Thanks for this most interesting information about 40-3095. Several years ago another photo of that plane surfaced in a 19th BG association magazine: (photo courtesy Gene Eisenberg)  Colin Kelly's B-17D at Midway Island, September 1941. Leaning on the prop is PFC Robert E. Altman, radio operator and belly gunner. Staff Sergeant William J. Delehanty, flight engineer and waist gunner, is on the far right facing away. Delehanty was KIA with Kelly on December 10th. Below is a link to another thread here that revolved much around Kelly, starting about Reply #57 and onwards: corregidor.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=forum&action=display&thread=657&page=3Please feel free to jump in. All comments are appreciated, and welcome to the forum! Chad |
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Post by varsity07840 on Sept 4, 2012 21:46:32 GMT 8
Robert Mikesh's book Zero-Combat History And Development has an excellent photo of 3095 after capture at Clark, taken from the rear. It shows numerous 7.7mm and 20mm hits from strafing, but no apparent bomb damage. The tail is badly shot up, and there are many fuselage hits and at least one 20mm hit in the starbord wing that may have damaged the main spar and rendered the a/c unflyable. Having seen quite a few photos of damaged a/c abandoned at Clark, the one thing that I find striking is that they were not demolished prior to the evacuation, lending credence to accounts that say Clark was evacuated in a hurry, which proved to be premature. Apparently, several days after the evacuation, Air Force personnel went back up to Clark and flew out at least one P-35A and perhaps one P-40B that were hidden in the surrouding jungle, and they collected more salvaged parts. Here's a link to a Japanese newsreel showing captured a/c at Clark. Click on the upper right hand jpeg when you get the page. Hope it works. cgi2.nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives/jpnews/list.cgi?cat=y&value=19422Duane |
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Post by okla on Sept 4, 2012 22:33:40 GMT 8
Hey Duane...Thanks again for posting this new (to me at least) info pertaining to the evacuation of Clark. As much as I thought I knew about the PI Campaign of 1942, I had no idea that we jumped the gun so quickly in our withdrawal from Clark/Stotsenberg. I had always been under the impression that we did a fairly good job in wrecking the facilities and aircraft that couldn't be flown out. I did learn, sometime back, that the "Mulebarns" at the Fort were left mostly intact. Seems that I was "in the dark" in the assumption that the airfield was "torched"etc. Were we in a semi "bug out" mode??? I gotta wonder about that. It wouldn't have taken too large an effort, in my humble, to completely destroy aircraft that were not air worthy. Those two B-17Es that were plucked up by the Japanese down in the NEI has me wondering also. I was almost positive that there was a "Java" angle somewhere in the story of our letting the enemy grab up a Fortress or two. Thanks again for enlightening me on this always intriguing period in our Military History. Cheers.
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Post by chadhill on Sept 4, 2012 22:53:56 GMT 8
Thanks Duane, I don't believe I've seen that photo and will try to find a copy. Appreciate the information about Clark also. I tried your link to the NHK newsreel but was unable to connect. I've had trouble in the past getting their videos to play; sometimes they work and sometimes they don't. I went thru another path to their 2/1942 newsreel (is that the correct one?) just now but could not get it to play. Last night the 5/1942 Corregidor newsreel worked...go figure! P.S.-I'll bet you already know about Japanese translator sites but for those who are interested here is a link to the Bing site: www.bing.com/translator/Just copy the webpage URL off the Japanese site and paste it in the left hand box, then click "Translate". I first heard about this from fots and it usually works pretty well- |
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Post by varsity07840 on Sept 4, 2012 23:20:06 GMT 8
Try the link again. I had a typo in it. cg12 should have been ci2.
Duane
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Post by varsity07840 on Sept 4, 2012 23:29:15 GMT 8
Okla,
Nichols did a much better job on the a/c there. Photos exist of two
P-35As and a B-18 with the cockpits blown out.
Duane
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Post by chadhill on Sept 5, 2012 0:08:38 GMT 8
Hello Duane, the link worked fine-thank you. I viewed the top right video (#87). Yes, very interesting views of several aircraft abandoned mostly intact (the Bing Translator says it's at Nichols). Also interesting was the beginning of the video, where the sub Sealion (SS-195) can be seen half sunken at Cavite. What is striking is the many torpedoes the USN left behind, too. Lots of haste in those early days.
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Post by varsity07840 on Sept 5, 2012 0:53:31 GMT 8
Well, now that I think of it, some could be at Nichols. Especially the clip of the B-18 in front of the wrecked hangers. Clark's hangers suffered much less damage and were cleaned out and used by the Japanese soon after taking over. A couple of things make me think that some of the clips are indeed Clark. The P-40Bs near the hanger line. Most of the 20ths P-40Bs at Clark were damaged or destroyed the first day and the hanges are relatively intact. The B-17 decoys, known to have been built at Clark. Nichols didn't base B-17s. Also the backround to one of the B-18 decoys appears to be part of the mountain range
to the east of Clark. Just my best guess.
Duane
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