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M/SGT. WALTER M. PATRICK
AND THE FIGHTING LADY, A/C # 41-23778 F
M/Sgt. Walter M. Patrick, USAF (Ret), a member of the 66th Sq. of the 44th Bomb Group, flew some of the most awesome missions of WWII. He
started as a well gunner, then waist gunner, eventually tail gunner. He flew with such renowned pilots as Lt. James Kohl and the late Lt.
Thomas S. Scrivner. His most profound experience, however, was the one he did not fly--to Ploesti.
Patrick's fifth mission, February 26, 1943, was to the ports and docks of Wilhelmshaven, Germany. German defenses took a heavy toll on A/C #
41-23778F, named Jenny, for Lt. Kahl's wife. After limping back to England, everyone expected a crash landing at Shipdham. They had no
hydraulics or brakes. The future looked bleak, but in the words of Patrick, "Pilot Jimmy Kahl and his flight deck crew really came through
in true heroic style. When that landing gear finally fell safely into the down-and-lock position (there was no hydraulic fluid to operate it),I could not believe it. Most of the crew had gathered back around the
waist area to take their crash positions, but on landing, Jenny held together. We made it. That was just one of the many miracles
performed that day by the 44th."
After that fearsome adventure, several crewmen decided they deserved a night in town, so they swiped a weapons carrier, and parked it in an
alley. This was to avoid the MPs. Unfortunately, in the total darkness of the English night, a bicycling Englishman crashed into it, and
reported its presence to the authorities. Colonel Leon Johnson reduced all six of the AWOL crew members to privates. However, Jenny was
under repair, and gunners were sorely needed, so Patrick volunteered to fly with other crews. Since the policy was that airmen had to hold the
rank of at least Buck Sergeant, he rose from his private status.
During that time, Pilot Lt. Kahl was moved to another plane, Jenny II, and Lt. Scrivner moved to the right seat on #41-23778F, renamed Lady
Luck. On one of extra missions to Vegesack, March 18, 1943 to an Airfield in Germany, Patrick lost one of his original crew members,
Lucius Balsey, flying with Major William H. Brandon on the Suzy Q, the first Lady Luck crew member killed. The extra missions probably saved
Patrick's life. Low level flying began around June 15th, 1943, and the crew knew that it foretold something special down the road.
"During that time I had a perceptive dream," he recalled. "I'm not sure if I was partially awake when it occurred, but one thing is for sure,
that dream was embedded deeply into my mind, and it is still there today. During this time I was Lady Luck's third gunner, and Walter
Hazelton was the right waist gunner. The dream picture is as follows: Although I didn't see myself on the in-going flight, I did see that our
plane had crashed in the target area. Walter Hazelton and I were outside the plane looking in. We saw that everyone else on board was
dead. I could see a small stucco farmhouse a bit off to the left of where I was standing by the nose compartment of the crashed plane.
Standing in the doorway of the farmhouse was a man and a woman; two children were hanging on to the parents' legs. Between the plane and
the farmhouse was a wheat field.
The target area itself as pictured in many photos that I would later see. It was definitely an oil refinery area. In the dream I clearly
saw all of the installations: cracking plants, storage areas, etc. It was a mess, bombs exploding all around us and fires raged. In the dream
I didn't see any other planes nearby (although later facts revealed that Lt. Henry Lasco, flying in Sad Sack, had also crashed in the general
area.) What I saw in the dream was as if a snapshot had been taken of the crashed plane, the dead crew, the target area in the midst of being
bombed, and Hazelton and I standing there at the scene of the crash. As it turned out, Hazelton and I were the only survivors of Lady Luck. We
did not go to Ploesti.
The crew moved to Benghazi, North Africa, when Generals Patton and Montgomery were planning to invade Sicily as a stepping stone to
continental Europe. The Scrivner crew flew missions to Italy and Sicily, and after the Naples mission on July 17, 1943, Patrick had
completed 27 missions. On August 1st, 1943, when the group were ready to raid the oil fields of Romania, he was not required to fly.
Patrick remembers August 1st, 1943 very clearly. "When we went out to Lady Luck in the early morning hours to board, Lt. Scrivner noticed
profuse leakage of gasoline from the wing tanks. He decided on the spot that the plane was inoperable for the mission to Ploesti. So he and the
crew were transferred to another bomber parked nearby, Scrappy II. Hazelton and I had
already flown the required twenty-five missions (In both cases twenty-seven missions), and were not required to go on the
Ploesti raid. As the crew was boarding, Lt. Scrivner asked me, 'Pat, are you going with us on this mission?' I was undecided and for some
reason did not even remember the dream.
"Lt. Scrivner, this is what I'm gonna do," I told him. "I'm gonna flip a coin. 'Heads' I go, 'tails' I stay." The coin turned up 'tails' and
I stayed. I don't know why Hazelton decided to stay. The crew was cut from eleven to nine, going without well gunners. A new tail gunner took
my place."
The crew of Lady Luck, now aboard Scrappy II, with Tom Scrivner in the pilot's seat, dashed headlong into the 44th's target, code-named White
Five which was the Colombia Aquila Refinery at Ploesti. It was there that they ran into the German command's most prized air defense secret:
the deadly Q Train. It racked the attackers with vengeance, and possibly took out Sad Sack II, piloted by Henry A. Lasco, with the same
blast of fire that brought down Scrappy II.
The Scrappy II crew was: Pilot: Lt. Thomas Scrivner; Co-Pilot, Lt. Everett P. Anderson; Navigator, Lt. Philip P. Phillips, Jr.; Bombardier,
2nd. Lt. Robert E. Young; Engineer, T/Sgt. William F. Coll; Radio Operator, S/Sgt. Channing N. Satterfield; L. Waist Gunner, Sgt. Marvin
R. Mickey; R. Waist Gunner: Sgt. Thomas F. Schappert, and Tail Gunner, S/ Sgt. Hugh J. Malone.
Between the time I experienced the dream and the day of the fateful raid, I never told Hazelton or anyone else about it. But I certainly
had thoughts about it when I sat in on the mission briefing the night before that last mission. Sitting there that night I again recalled the
events of my dream from several months before. The next day I knew in my heart and without a doubt, that as Hazelton and I sat around waiting
for the planes to return, our crew wouldn't make it. They never did.
That night Major Jimmy Kahl drove up to our tent and asked Walt and me to get into his jeep, so he could take us for a ride. We rode out to
the parking area and sat as Jim told us what actually happened to our comrades. Captain Robert E. Miller had led his flight into the White
Five Target, which was already on fire when he got there. When he emerged from the fire and smoke, both of his wingmen were gone. One of
the wingmen, Captain Thomas E. Scrivner, did come out of the smoke, the plane in flames and the pilots were seen fighting gallantly for a crash
landing. They managed to crash land into a farmer's wheat field, but before the plane had ground to a halt, it exploded, killing all nine men
aboard.
"As he spoke about the last moment before the plane exploded, it seemed like that was the exact same time Hazelton and I showed up in the
dream. I was so deeply touched by this mission, I still mourn for my lost comrades. Even now, they are remembered in my prayers.
"I never told Hazelton about the dream until recently, when we got back in touch. I do not know what his feelings are about my story, but I
will swear on a stack of Bibles, that this is the whole truth, so help me God."
Just before leaving for the States, the 66th Squadron Adjutant called Hazelton and Patrick into his office and presented them with T/Sgt.
Chevrons. "Well deserved," he said. After returning to the states, the two crewmen flew together on Standardization Board missions until
Victory Day in Europe. Their beloved plane, Jenny/Lady Luck went down in Foggia, Italy, on August 16, 1943, with only one member of its new
crew surviving.
Walter M. Patrick and his wife Marie live in Mount Pleasant, SC. He is a Life Member of the 44th Bomb Group Veterans Association.
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