For all intents and purposes, the Luftwaffe failed to make any serious attempt in the first few days of July to challenge the awesome number of B-24's and B-17's being hurled against them. But finally on July 7^th, the Nazi Sturmgruppe J.G. 3 lead by Wilhelm Moritz in the Leipzig area viciously attacked the 2^nd Division B-24 Liberators again. For the second time, our 14^th Combat Wing companions, the 492^nd Bomb Group, suffered severely loosing 12 of the 37 heavies lost that day. The 44^th lost 3 of our crews.

Now five days later on Wednesday, July 12, 1944 we were assigned the deepest penetration of Hitler's Fortress Europe that our crew was ever to fly. The Group had gone to Munich, Germany the day before with the loss of one plane but the bombing results were so poor that the 8^th Air Force was returned for a second try. Our target was the Marshaling yards in the City of Munich. Cloud cover the day before and again today was so complete that PFF (Pathfinders) lead the group this time. We flew in three squadrons (67^th, 68^th, and 506^th) of 12 planes each carrying 6 500 pound bombs and 4 500 pound incendiary clusters. Take off was at 0900 hours.

A system had been initiated whereby a P-51 long range fighter was dispatched ahead of the bomber stream to radio back weather information, especially the whereabouts of thunderheads extending upward thousands of feet endangering the flight of our bombers. This was not needed today as I had never before nor ever again saw such a solid flat 10/10^ths cloud cover. From the time we broke above the clouds over East Anglia until we returned, I never saw the ground again. Once above the clouds, there was a level layer of the most beautiful white clouds I've ever seen. They were at perhaps 10,000 feet where as we flew most of the way at 24,500.

The 44^th Bomb Group was under the orders of Major Lehnhausen as Command Pilot and we were deputy lead for the 68^th Squadron. I often pinpointed my position by observing the flak barrage thrown up by the enemy over the various cities as we passed by. It was a very unusual sight to see the beautiful white blanket of clouds with the sun shinning on then so brightly but with splashes of black flak smoke hanging in little balls above them. I don't know what the AA gunners thought they were shooting at as our armada was often miles away. Maybe they were just frustrated and it made the population feel better. At any rate it was easy for me to know where their city was a I certainly could not see it or anything else on the ground.

Another beautiful sight was to watch the various Combat Wings (usually made up of three Bomb Groups) flying behind or in front of our position in the Bomber Stream. Sometimes they would be off to the side below us and we could look down to see dozens of 4 motor bombers flying in formation. But the planes of our own 68^th squadron as well as those of the other two nearby squadrons were the most fascinating to watch. Coming off of the wings of each plane was a set of snowy white, ribbon like streams of contrails (cloud like condensations due to the lift of the wing creating a rapid vacuum). I can't describe the grandeur of it all. The sight is so breathtaking that I can only ask the reader to view a picture of it and try to imagine it in motion. All in all, this had to be the most beautiful day above the clouds that I have ever seen. It was difficult to realize we were at war except for the black flak. The Luftwaffe was completely absent. I saw not one enemy plane the entire day even though we went the greatest distance over Germany and 50 miles further than Berlin from our base at Shipdham.

It was the middle of the afternoon when our Group reached the IP to start our bomb run. Ahead of us lay Munich, hidden under a thick layer of clouds but we knew it was there as a tremendous flak barrage , with the typical black puffs of smoke, were everywhere. We were lucky, they could not see us from the ground and we had blinded their radar with our shaff (aluminum strips of metal). I never became concerned about flak unless it was at our altitude. Today it was too low, not one shell came near enough to punch a hole in our fuselage for which we were mighty thankful. Flak could be much worse that enemy fighters and we all dreaded it.

Our bombardier released our bombs when the PFF (Pathfinder) lead Radar Bombardier dropped his. There was no way for us to judge where our bombs landed but we later found out that they hit right on target. Our H2X radar proved itself on this day. I can't vouch for the accuracy of the following statement but I was told back at base that the mission of the 11th was followed by an R.A.F. night attack which was followed by our mission of the 12^th. I was told that the high explosive bombs that all three attacking forces dropped had delayed fuses set to go off anytime upon impact to as long as 36 hours later.. The proposed purpose of this was to have bombs exploding at random anytime for up to 36 hours after the last bomber left.

We had another first on this mission to Munich. As we were passing over the city, we sighted B-24's of the 15^th Air Force that had come up from Italy to join in the destruction. I don't know why now but at the time the idea of two different Air Forces meeting over one German city sent a thrill all through me. I liked what I had just witnessed.

The flight home was uneventful as the Luftwaffe refused to come up to meet us. I really had expected them to put on a show of force but it never materialized. I at least had something interesting to do being a navigator but almost 7 out of the 9 hours that this flight took, our gunners had to be on constant alert for any sudden attack. When it was all over, the gunners had an anticlimax let down.

Again the beauty of the flight back to base at times mesmerized me. I wanted to forget the war. We arrived over our field about 1800 hours (6 p.m.) and spiraled through the overcast once more to be in touch with the real world.