The B 26 Story

Video Statistics and Information

Video

Captions Word Cloud

Captions

this is the story of the b-26 in the right the story starts on January 25th 1939 the US Army Air Corps with its sights on military developments in Europe and with only a few obsolete b18 airplanes in its inventory put out bids two aircraft manufacturers to design a new medium bomber with pursuit speeds of 250 to 350 miles per hour and to carry a maximum bomb load to replace these old BA teens on July 5th 1939 the bids were opening and the Glenelg Martin company was offered and accepted a contract to build 201 planes the Martin b-26 Marauder was born on paper developments in Europe were making it clear it was get the Marauder out of the paper stage and into the air new plants had to be built tons of material had to be bought thousands of workers new to aircraft hired and trained there would be no time to build a prototype nor time for the long testing of prototypes as it turned out the first airplane off the production line on November 25th 1940 was the first flown and tested an unprecedented situation in the delivery of aircraft to the Army Air Corps the tests were gratifyingly successful and that aircraft was delivered to the Army Air Corps for further testing on February 25th 1941 the flow of b-26s to the Army Air Corps began by December 8 1941 one day after Pearl Harbor 53 of the first 56 b-26s built took off from Langley field Virginia and route to Australian the war for the b-26 had begun by April of 1942 they were in combat against the Japanese from Townsville Australia refueling a Darwin they hit tomorrow from Townsville refueling at Port Moresby they hit Booma salamu lay cavion we WA robbed all and other southwest Pacific areas they fought the Japanese wherever they were needed their record was outstanding for the b-26 it was its first high but the airplanes were the first built and only carried the load they were designed to carry they were being flown by pilots who had plenty of peacetime training and were maintained by all hand crew chiefs trouble was on the way all of the new b-26s were being sent to training fields were mostly young inexperienced pilots were assigned to fly them to make matters worse the southwest Pacific combat had caused the army to start loading the airplane with additional equipment in fact over two and a half tons of it heavy caliber guns powered turrets self-sealing fuel tanks and armored plate was just part of it this almost made the already hot airplane area dynamically unsound to top it off the maintenance crews were also new lacking experience the heavier model was causing the loss of planes and crews at an alarming rate day after day plane after plane they would take off and then just disappear the short wing airplane was being called the Widowmaker one a day in Tampa Bay became the catchphrase at MacDill Field Tampa Florida this plane didn't even make the bay pilots were asking for transfers by the dozens they were afraid to fly the b-26 I'm Ted hanky I was in the b-26 program at MacDill field from the beginning first as a pilot then as an instructor and then his operations officer of the training group I saw all this happen the problem was the airplanes single-engine performance was minimal of course there were some other factors one was inexperienced pilots the other is inexperienced maintenance personnel and then there was some small defects in the carburetor the distributor and the propeller feathering system well inexperienced and poor maintenance of these defects caused the loss of engine inexperienced pilots and an overloaded airplane was the formula for disaster now I had done a lot of instructing I'm single injured procedures and the airplane would fly on one engine but as I said his performance was minimal the real problem was what happened when you lost an engine on takeoff and they just wasn't anyone around to tell us they were in the bottom of Tampa Bay well as the operations officer I felt it was incumbent upon me to find out what really happened when you lost an engine on takeoff so I checked out an airplane picked up a pilot and I put him in the left seat to fly so that I could better observe from the right seat what happened we took the airplane up to 7,000 feet and then slowed it down to slightly under 150 miles per hour and then we lowered the landing gear and put down 30 degrees flaps then we pull the nose up slightly and gave it full throttle and full low pitch other propellers in this position we were in an attitude that you would be right after takeoff then I cut the right engine I had warned the pilot that he was going to have to very very quick to turn the aircraft but before he could even start to reach for the trim tab which was overhead we were over on our backs and spinning I yelled at him that I would take controls the controls and did so and I immediately cut the other engine as we were in inverted flat spin I pulled the control column into my chest to get the nose down and then we were in a normal spinning condition and I gave it regular spin recovery procedures and after approximately two and a half turns we came out of the spin into a steep dive and I slowly pulled the nose up into a normal flying attitude but we had lost 4,000 feet it became painfully obvious you couldn't afford to lose an engine on takeoff well the inevitable happened by September of 1942 the accident rate was so high that the Army Air Safety Board had to conduct an investigation public pressure also sent Senator Harry Truman's investigation committee to McGill field when asked about the b-26 he said it should be grounded it was the first low for the Martin b-26 in the midst of this turmoil the sixth b-26 group at MacDill field was formed the commanding officer was Colonel Lester J Maitland the first man to fly the Pacific Ocean California to Hawaii in a tri-motor fokker the second man to receive the Distinguished Flying Cross Charles Lindbergh was the first his leadership and dedication to discipline both for flying crews and ground maintenance personnel plus the fact that the engine manufacturer had made the needed changes in carburetor distributor and propeller feathering systems quickly overcame the jinx of the b-26 his group flew over 10,000 hours in training and never lost a plane or crew they had proved the airplane though still hot as a firecracker could be flown safely the demands for transfers fell off the reputation that the b-26 was up again six b-26 groups four squadrons each had been formed at MacDill field by this time the first and second the 3:19 and 320th had been sent to the North Africa campaign the rest were all slated for England in order the three 22nd 323rd 344th and the 386 the 387 the three 91st the 394th and the 397 were being formed to follow these eight groups in all flew out of England considerable stateside flight training for b-26 groups had been low level treetops flying the idea of being the b-26 would come in under enemy radar bombing practice was also at low level so the first operational missions from England were flown low level against power stations that ran enemy submarine pens in Holland I'm Roland B Scott and I'm very proud of the fact that I led the first b-26 mission from England on to Western Europe we got to England in early March 1943 and immediately began to do practice runs of zero altitude missions and in May the 13th 1943 I was briefed along with two of the squadron commanders for a mission to be run on the 14th of May my flip of the coin with Odie Turner I won the pilot's seat the left seat in the lead b-26 at the briefing the next morning that was high enthusiasm by all the air crewmen who knew that they were making the first b-26 mission we left the base at about 950 and headed for offered nasaan the coast of England dropping down to water level to cross the North Sea with excellent navigation we hit the coast at Nord ouack and immediately began taking 20 millimeter and other small arms fire which we had all the way to the target we made a turn at lease and headed north to the target which was roughly eight minutes away picked up the checkpoint Nord Z canal and immediately solve the target which was outlined by four large smokestacks we've pulled up over them dropped our bombs and immediately headed back to the deck and we took a hit of a 20 millimeter shell in the cockpit and it exploded between Turner and me and destroyed my right eye and gave me other substantial wounds I felt that in the interest of the safety of the aircraft and crew that I should get out of the cockpit and I was pulled back into the radio compartment and Charlotte Lane and Turner took over the control of the aircraft and headed back to England I'm Charlie Layne squadron navigator the 450th squadron and I'm honored to have been part of the crew Scottie Turner and myself to lead this mission on May 14th I'd like to back up to the point where Scottie says we made our landfall and started receiving gunfire there's a contradiction that we're flying over these fields of brilliant red and yellow tulips at the same time the enemy is shooting at us and we knew then that we were in the war we did hit his eye dersy and headed toward the smokestacks and dropped their bombs shortly after that the first knowledge I had of any problem was when they Scotty said over the intercom god I'm hit at this time Scotty elected to go back to the radio compartment and Turner to move over to the left seat during this exchange I tried to hold the yoke to maintain an altitude until such time as I could get out and sit in the right seat we went back to we went up to altitude and a set of course and headed back to England as I was in England advance of my group Bomber Command sent me to burry sait Edmonds to observe the first b-26 mission of the three 22nd Bomb Group it was almost a disaster every airplane had battle damage almost every crew man was wounded and they lost one airplane the second mission was a disaster for whatever reason they made their landfall south of course and were over enemy territory three or four times longer than the first mission so they not only received heavy ground fire but they would jump alerted German fighters not an airplane came back none it was a very depressed group of people that were left at that airfield that night General IRA Eaker who was commanding general of the 8th Air Force which was our Air Force at that time came down to the base and met with a group of US officers it was with a great deal of relief that we heard him say the b-26 is grounded and will remain grounded unless some method can be found to deploy the airplane without such disastrous results it was the biggest low yet for the b-26 a group of US officers got together to decide the fate of the b-26 it was an officer from Bomber Command Buzz sealeo represented the three 22nd Bomb Group or what there was left of it herb Thatcher represented the three 23rd which had just arrived in England and I represented the 386 which was on his way over it had become evident that you could not fly a sustained mission over enemy territory low level in a b-26 so we had to consider something at medium altitude our maximum altitude is 12,000 feet because we didn't have any oxygen so we talked to anybody and everybody that had combat experience our heavy bombers had just become operational but they were flying at altitudes we couldn't reach due to lack of oxygen we talked to the British bombers but their medium bombers were flying at night so they weren't much help but the British fighters told us that with our firepower if we could fly a real tight formation we'd be a formidable adversary to the German fighters and thank God they turned out to be right the British anti-aircraft people told us there would take the Germans 17 seconds to track load fire and the shell to reach an altitude of 12,000 feet they suggested that if we could take a slight evasive action every 15 seconds we'd have a good chance of survival of course the problem was the bomb run well we'd have to fly straight and level for 45 seconds if we expected any accuracy we decided the basic unit would be a flight of six aircraft three flights of six would make a box of 18 in tight formation with 17 planes dropping their bombs with a leader we would have a high degree of concentration on the target the flights would be slightly staggered in altitude to allow for room and lateral movement as the formations were flown very close the identical second box of 18 aircraft following and slightly lower would make up a group effort of 36 aircraft a group of 36 aircraft as shown forming up over their airfield was like a moving parka pine dangerous to attack from the German fighter point of view with this new plan we felt we were ready to give the b-26 another try the record of the b-26 and the b-26 groups flying from England and North Africa is a magnificent vindication of a great airplane and a tribute to the pilots and crews who had the courage to stick with him and fly them in combat crippled the German air force destroyed the approximant 27 airfields they were using in France Belgium and Holland drive them back to Germany out of range of England this was the first assignment of the b-26s with their new plan of attack the war in England started for the b-26 they expected flak and they donned their flak suits and they got it the camera tells the story of the beginning of the end for German airfields here the Bombardier still camera shows the strikes of his group on the airfield runway watch as the camera catches the bomb strikes of the second group on the hanger area a dreaded one-two punch day after day the Germans did not give up easily they quickly found out they could not penetrate the 26s tightly flown formations the concentrated firepower of 650 caliber machine guns on each b-26 in 36 airplanes was deadly led by general laid-off Ghulam the German ace their tactics quickly became wait until a b-26 got hit by flak and fell out of formation then go after him gunner and Silver Star winner tell us what it was like I'm bill Norris I flew his tail gunner on a b-26 Marauder we were on the bombing run we received a hit and the left engine and we had to fall out of formation the fighters received another hit in the left wing and the tail the airplane went into a half snap-roll as a pilot momentarily lost control I was thrown from the tail to the waist where I saw the waist gunner was badly wounded I applied a tourniquet and gave him a shot of morphine I noticed two fighters coming in from the waist made their pass notice two more fighters going for the tail I went back to the tail guns and to my surprise the plastic glass cover over the tail guns was gone and I was bleeding badly from the face the first fighter came in I scored good hits he pulled up over our planes smoking and burning the pilot saw him bail out the second plane came in I scored good hits he caught fire and exploded right in front of me by then fighter cover was reached and the Germans pulled off we live back to England where we crash-landed at Menston by the sea we were taken to the hospital and checked out and those that were able went back to view the plane there was severe wing damage and over 350 holes from flak and 20 millimeter shell flak was to be the big enemy of the b-26s on these airfield missions at 10 to 12,000 feet the b-26s were in the thick of it maps were made showing the location of known flak batteries from information of the French underground aerial observation and camera filming a six mile circle indicated the guns range at 12,000 feet the coastline and important points were heavily defended routes were guided through the least defended areas as this attacked on the airfield at Abbeville shows the b-26 groups destroyed or eliminated from use all of the airfields and Holland and France being used by the Germans driving them back to Germany by this time the men who flew the b-26 were high in praise of its ability in combat to take severe damage and still get home single engine performance was commonplace now to these seasoned pilots Bob Considine one of World War two his great combat reporters wrote in September of 1943 like a turbulent Bronco reforming overnight into a fine saddle horse from the problem child of u.s. aviation heaped with scorn and ridicule by thousands of Airmen a plane that suffered more word-of-mouth abuse than any plane ever built the b-26 is daily proving itself to be one of the major American weapons of the war b-26 group losses after just two months in England was the safest and best combat record by percentage of any allied plane in the theater but some were not so lucky ray Sanford tells his story I'm ray Sanford first part b-26 Marauder hell's fury I was flying deputy lead position number four position in the lead box behind the lead pilot and his two wingmen with why to lead to wingman we made up the lead box 6 for the group my group is number four of a four group flight and when we miss rendezvous with the third group which didn't show up at the English coast Arg lead pilot tried to close the gap between flights 1 & 2 but because of the short distance over the English Channel we never close the gap the first and the second group made their bomber run and went to considerably heavy flak however there was a gap between the first second group in our group at which time had already gotten the altitude and airspeed and had a chance to zero in on us the flatness of heavy around us we could get on and walk on them it was quite accurate so that we tightened up our ships formation and I was looking up at the tail gunner the lead flight and their lead pilot who was just a few feet away from me we're close to bombs away when I take a direct hit give my left main fuel tank between the engine and the cockpit I must have passed out from boxes and being burnt out of the cockpit by the fire when I came to from the explosion I was floating through the air still strapped to my pilot's seat and to finalize this story I'll say I'm a sole survivor of a seven-man crew during the effort to destroy German hell airfields another and more terrible German engine of destruction was uncovered the German v1 bombing their bases is a great challenge to the b-26s the rocket sights were small the launching ramp only a hundred yards or so in length and most were well hidden under trees and by camouflage the aerial camera searches for the v1 sight that only the bammed ears camera sees the aerial camera locates an open v1 sight just before concentrated bombing of the b-26s destroyed it the b-26 proved to be the best weapon to eliminate this monstrous threat to England Bhama dear al hill labels one of his strikes the v1 threat by just a few v2 s from the remaining sights then the new phase for the b-26s the invasion fortress Europe the landings and the ground assault against heavily defended beaches the final stroke necessary to subdue the Nazi monster the key to the invasion would be surprise where would it strike the lowland beaches of the Netherlands Frances pas de Calais area the closest point to England anywhere along the French coast all the way around to the Normandy Peninsula was open for consideration and therefore necessary to defend by the enemy to test this defense the b-26 groups attacked some of the big gun emplacements defending the channel edward iron merle CBS correspondent in london tells of one raid london if you want to fly over france these days you must get up early in the morning and drive for an hour or two over deserted roads that seemed to have been whitewashed by that four o'clock in the morning moon miles from the field as you coast down the winding hill in order to save gas you can hear the blasting roar of motors being tested the ground crews are already at work the guard at the gate looks at your credentials looks at the sky and remarks looks like a good day he means a good flying day the only kind that counts up there today the ship was the dynamite just another war scarred Marauder the pilot was Colonel Hankey who calls California home the target well it was what the communique is called military installations on the coast of France as we were crossing the channel it seemed possible that the Weathermen had made a mistake there was solid cloud below but the target was clear we could see the coast of France dead ahead then the target could be scenes with a bombe it's a gun emplacement more than one in fact and our bombs are still going down and the German flak is coming up black and greasy and dangerous looking it's bruising the sky around the formation to our right one of our ships drops out of formation and there is time to wonder how badly he's hit and then the bombs are down and today they were bang on the target the flash of fire and the boiling smoke obscured the gun position the number of direct hits can only be assessed from photographs but our bombs walked right through the target some of these targets are small and hard to hit and they're protected by plenty of flak today the German Gunners displayed great courage they continued to fight their guns when the bombs were falling all around them you couldn't actually see the guns but the flash of fire from the muzzles kept flickering and it's not pleasant to look into gun muzzles even when there are several thousand feet below you but today the Germans shot down not a single Marauder Colonel Hankey merely reported mission completed returning to base and the base acknowledged his message when the dynamite touchdown the bombs for the second mission of the day were already there resting on their trolleys waiting to be hoisted up into the bomb bay in September of 1943 all of the b-26 beeps were assigned to a the guns belong France a diversionary attack while the commandos stormed the beaches at Dieppe a false d-day to test the enemy's readiness they were ready b-26 crews leaving the English coast could see the constant exploding balls of fire as b-26s took direct hits this one raid proved there was a lot more work to be done before the invasion to start the isolation of any possible invasion area a b-26 groups were assigned to destroy as much of the enemy's rail system as possible in France to cripple logistics that fed the war production to this vital western area as the invasion who near the targets became more selective bridges and their rail approaches that carried trains troops and supplies over the river of France leading to the West had to be destroyed the b-26s operating closer to the possible invasion areas encountered more in the deadly anti-aircraft fire from the elite Panzer divisions guarding the western wall of France losses of b-26s increased but to respect even the love of the b-26 aircraft lands steadfast and loyal in all kinds of weather they came back they needed flares to locate the end of the runway plans with a hydraulic shoutout landed off the runway they knew the wheels would not stay down unlocked crews watched the dust clouds as one plane hits the dirt they held together protecting the crews from crash injuries fix the hydraulics put on new propellers hammer out the dents from the belly landings and fly it the next day was commonplace for the b-26 most of the planes were being flown twice a day and had well over 100 missions to their credit this crew helped proved harry truman was long in trying to scrap the b-26 the crews were proud parents of their particular plane nursing them into the air day after day with metal patches to cover the holes made by jagged pieces of flak silent testimony to the nearness of death but all that had gone before was just preliminary to the main event the invasion and the invasion was imminent flying in and out of England the air crews could see massive buildup of men and equipment and the harbors were amassed with shipping and the gun crews were at the ready it would be the greatest Armada in history there were other indications the b-26 groups because of their exceptional record had been chosen by General Eisenhower and Bradley to be the last groups to bomb the beaches just before our troops landed Eisenhower visited the 386 Bomb Group airfield to check the readiness of one of these important groups no one knew the exact date not even Eisenhower in those expectant days of May 1944 but his visit was an indication that the invasion was near other indications were the war reporters they moved in among them was a young cub reporter from the London Daily Telegraph Cornelius Ryan his stories of d-day and the hectic days that followed has told from a b-26 was the start of his illustrious career as one of the great historical reporters he was to write the longest day a bridge too far the last battle and others that were all bestsellers the weather was a major factor on d-day for the b-26s forming up the eight groups each with 36 airplanes in the clouds was a major and dangerous achievement in itself finding the target areas was almost an impossible challenge to the navigators but the b-26 is flying almost at masthead level over the invasion fleet found their assigned targets on the beaches the assault forces to take the beach hits as d-day progressed situations turned critical some beachheads needed help all of the b-26 groups were called upon to fly three missions that day the crews were on standby under the crippled planes of their squadrons they waited for a plane that could still fly load the bombs changed the crew it was an around-the-clock operation this is how Cornelius Ryan described the scene on one of his rides over the beaches I look down last evening over the shurberg Peninsula from the nose of a b-26 Marauder and saw bombs from my group blow a German six gun battery out of existence we took off in exceptionally bad weather with the rain pelting madly against the glass nose over the French coast unable to find the target due to the clouds below us our flight wheeled and headed out over the coast still in formation and with wingtips so close that it seemed as though they must touch in any moment we turned and covered a second with a massive explosions we had hit the target still turning we streak for home the invasion ended the first of five campaigns the b-26s would fly it was called the air offensive against Europe the campaign that followed the invasion was called the Normandy campaign in the air offensive against Europe campaign the b-26 groups flew approximately 44,000 sorties a Sardi is one aircraft one flight and dropped 57,000 tons of bombs they lost 180 planes over enemy territory and suffered battle damage over 9,000 times they attacked some 192 targets 55 airfields 53 flying bomb sites 34 coastal defenses 23 marshalling yards and 22 bridges as our ground forces penetrated further onto French soil the b-26 with its capabilities of heavy bomb load speed and bombing accuracy moved into his final phase as a tactical aircraft that could give fairly close support to the ground forces their targets became troop concentrations and troop movements fuel and supply ducts and gun emplacements hampering the landing of our troops and equipment on the beaches anything that kept the enemy from supplying his own effort repaired bridges and marshalling yards again came under the attack disrupt the enemy's transportation and supplies became the order of the day working just ahead of our own troops the b-26s were instrumental in helping the British under Montgomery break out of car and busting General Patton loose on his drive around saint-lo ha was the eastern hinge of the enemy's defenses held by strong formations of Panzer units the raids on car and saint-lo were some of the greatest concentration of air blows during the war losses were high Bob Perkins first pilot tell us what happened to him we were flying in the right wing position in the high fly out of an 18 ship formation and as we approached the target we encountered heavy flight and one of the early bursts hit us in the right engine and people tank and the plane turned into an inferno I unbuckle my seatbelt reach for the alarm bell switch to signal a bailout and I turned toward the radio compartment just as a wall of fire came in the cockpit the next thing I knew that I was falling through the air with my clothing on fire I tried to smother the flames with my hand as I was falling before I pulled the ripcord I looked around and I saw one of the parachute I didn't know until after the war that Sam Cochrane had also survived the fire there were artillery exchanges occurring down below me as I was coming down and the shells were passing by me in the air as I came down into the target area there were three Germans waiting on me to hit the ground they made me gather up my chute loaded me into a motorcycle sidecar and took me toward the edge of a patch of woods just as we got there the British started a terrific barrage and at the same time American bombs were raining down and my captors as well as a bunch of other German who dived into a bunker and I followed close behind shortly I passed out from my burns and after a few hours I guess I came to and I was the only one left in the bunker my captors had been captured and there was a British soldier outside the mouth of the bunker getting ready to toss something into the bunker which I feared was a hand grenade so I yelled at him and he told me to come out with my hands up and when he recognized me as an American he pointed me in the direction behind the lines and I started walking I must have walked a mile or two and I finally hitched a ride on a British half track that dropped me off at a field hospital in the Normandy campaign the b-26s flew some ten thousand eight hundred sorties many groups through three times a day over 18,000 tons of bombs were dropped the railroad yards caught hell the massive airstrikes against the enemy troop concentrations around saint-lo was the beginning of the northern France campaign for the b-26 groups the orders were the same destroy anything to deter the enemy his troop concentrations his supply depots the railroads bringing in supplies and Men and the bridges they went over the camera catches the first of 18 plane strike on a bridge while the second 18 hits his supply devil he was a Kurd in firing over his shoulder the crack Panzer units were their deadly anti-aircraft guns took their toll of b-26s but the b-26 groups denied the enemy and easy retreat as they continued their harassment in the northern france campaign alone they attacked 44 targets flew over 9,000 sorties and dropped 16,000 tons of bombs and so it was across France to the Seine and I under the Siegfried line and through the Rhineland campaign the Ardennes campaign and the last Central Europe campaign the b-26s were hitting targets at a relentless pace during the last great effort of the enemy the Battle of the Bulge in the worst of flying conditions with snow covering all targets the b-26 groups denied the Germans their ability to move troops and supplies to the frontlines especially the supply dumps where their precious oil was hidden the final mission of the b-26s was their close support in the crossing of the Rhine and the mopping up of the room every place the enemy decided to make a stand was hit by the b-26 groups the city of Magdeburg was an example the b-26 is leveled the town the troops took it the next day the enemy was now fighting in his own backyard but his communications were gone bombed by the b-26s his supplies were gone bombed by the b-26 he was surrounded by our troops there was no place to retreat and the enemy surrendered and so the war ended for the b-26s and the men who flew them and the men who kept them flying the last plane landed the record which has never been told must now be as Bob Considine one of the great war reporters said the b-26 was one of the major American weapons of the war but like the gallant men who fell in combat and were buried on foreign soil the b-26s were stripped and left in Europe and one of the many graveyards of American equipment the airplane will never be forgotten by the men who flew and flew in them thanks in part to the dedication of these men they have erected a marble and bronze monument at the Air Force Museum in Dayton Ohio in honor of their airplane in this beautiful old church in the village of little Easton the English people have dedicated a chapel to the memory of the men who flew the b-26 designed stained-glass windows will tell the story for years to come of the men who lived among them and flew the b-26 to defend them

Info

Channel: John Deam

Views: 30,039

Rating: 4.7818184 out of 5

Keywords: Martin B-26 Marauder (Aircraft Model)

Id: Pq-vg7E6JmI

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 52min 9sec (3129 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 16 2014

Reddit Comments