75 years ago 18 April, 1942

[Missionary]

Greetings
Some of you will automatically recognize this date. For many months our leaders were searching for some way to encourage our nation having suffered a too long string of defeats in the war.
That is what the Doolittle Raid on Japan did. While little daily hope existed our Navy launched 16 B-25 Mitchell Army Air Corp bombers from the deck of the USS Hornet. And the rest was history bought by the courage of those airmen.
Last month I finished reading an excellent well written book. The First Heroes by Craig Nelson is so far the best researched historical account of near every facet of the raid that changed the national outlook of the war. Your library may have it. I purchased our copy a year ago so it is around.
Mike in Peru

 

[Ian]

The last living member lives about 15 miles from me, I'm one who definitely recognizes the date.

 

[Brad]

True heros. The moral boost to the US and the crushing blow to the psyche of the Japanese was far more important than the minimal damage done.
I am often left in awe when discovering the truly bold actions of many in WW2. Our troops did whatever it took no matter how impossible it seemed to many.

There is a reason they are called out greatest generation.

 

[gman]

Those men had some big stones!

 

[358156 hp]

I live in Lincoln, NE. We had a Raider (Richard Joyce) in our midst until he passed away several years back. We also hosted a couple of Raider reunions as well, usually with our annual airshows. The must be a locally owned B25 around here somewhere because we still see the odd B25 fly overhead in the summertime. And a P51 Mustang of all things. Our last Raider reunion was in 2011, Two of the Raiders were born in Lincoln. for certain. Richard Joyce & Donald Fitzmaurice, others appeared to have lived here short-term. These are the kind of men I grew up around, and my respect and admiration for all of the "Greatest Generation" knows no bounds.

 

[oscarflytyer]

Saw one of the last, if not THE last of the flyovers they would do for Doolittle out in Monterey way back in early '90s. It would have been right before he passed away in Sept '93 )was stationed there '90-'93). IIRC the flyovers were to celebrate his birthday, but may have been on the Raid date.

VERY cool! And yes, those guys had some stones!

 

[Pistolero]

A lot of interesting history things have happened on April 18.

I listened to the three remaining Raiders a couple of years ago speak about the
job. Reading the book, it is interesting that the fact that they got disoriented on launch
and each navigaotr found a different way, so they wandered around, hit the coast of Japan
too far north and south and then found their bearings and arrived at different
times from different directions. This meant that just as one aircraft had left, and
the firemen were getting on the fires, another aircraft arrived from a different
direction, headed to his different assigned targets and blew them to pieces and
roared off. The various international embassy staffs went up onto their roofs
and set up chairs and watched the show, cheering them on. Kept the Japs off
balance for a far longer time, made it seem like a much bigger raid. Scared the
holy hell out of the civilians and they kept a large contingent of aircraft home all
through the war, helping us our.

Another historic event, from that same day.

Listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend, "If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of the North Church tower as a signal light,--
One if by land, and two if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be,
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm,
For the country folk to be up and to arm."

Skipping a bunch....

You know the rest. In the books you have read
How the British Regulars fired and fled,---
How the farmers gave them ball for ball,
From behind each fence and farmyard wall,
Chasing the redcoats down the lane,
Then crossing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn of the road,
And only pausing to fire and load.

So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm,---
A cry of defiance, and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo for evermore!
For, borne on the night-wind of the Past,
Through all our history, to the last,
In the hour of darkness and peril and need,
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

 

[358156 hp]

'Twas the eighteenth of April in forty-two
When we waited to hear what Jimmy would do,
Little did Hiro think that that night
The skies above Tokyo would be alight
With the fires Jimmy started in Tokyo's dives
To guide to their targets the B-25's.

One if by land and two if by sea
But if from the air the signal was three
When all of a sudden from out of the skies
Came of basket of eggs for the little slanteyes
So Hiro and Tojo just buried their heads
Under the carpets and under the beds

Their posteriors turned into rising suns
As bombs they fell by tons and tons
Then a stab of pain made Hiro shiver
Was it his kidney or was it his liver?
Or was it perhaps; alack, alas
A returned Jap medal was assaulting his (Honorable self)....

~Written by Commander Stanhope C. Ring, chief of the Hornet's air group, for the ship's newpapaer.

 

[oscarflytyer]

I LOVE History, especially MILITARY History!

 

[KHornet]

Military history is made every day, some more significant than others,
often it is classified, and that that is not, is seldom reported.

Paul

 

[Pistolero]

Reading a good book, covering the naval war in the Pacific (WW2) and was reminded that the 18th of April in 1943 was
when we wiped out Admiral Yamamoto. P-38 Lightnings, operating out at extreme range, intercepted his Betty bomber
transport over Bouganville Island and shot it down. Big shock to the Japanese war effort, and even worse planning after that.
Auspicious date in American history, many different ways.

Also, the battles of Lexington and Concord occurred that day after Paul Revere's ride, April 19, when the Revolution really started.

 

[Missionary]

It is interesting how dates get repeated. I will have to recheck the dates when Charles "Lucky Lindy" was out there to "help" with the P-38's. Seems like it was late 42 very early 43. He flew several missions with the p-38 squadron and always came back with far more fuel than the other pilots. His aircraft mechanic asked about if he only flew part ways landing at an emergency strip.
His knowledge of fuel conservation increased the effective range of the 38's 100 miles .
The Yamamoto shoot down was the first time the 38's flew out there. To cover the code breakers work they continued flying that same mission for some time.

 

[Pistolero]

My father was a Navy pilot, just missed combat at the end of WW2 - the nuke likely saved his life and made me possible.
He told me that Lindberg taught the Navy and Air Corp how to run the engines, counter to what they had all been
taught, to really conserve fuel. All those engines were supercharged and you have a prop governor so your manifold pressure
is an independent variable from your RPM, unlike a car where you have top gear and then RPM and manifold pressure (throttle
setting) are locked together. Imagine having a transmission with 100 gears to choose from (actually infinite) - that is your
prop governor - and even better, whatever RPM you select, it adjusts the prop pitch (gear ratio) to keep that RPM as you
climb and dive (like going up and down hills in a car).

So - what Lindberg showed them was that you slow the prop way, way down (hit 6th gear) and then push the manifold pressure (throttle)
up to get back the HP you gave up by slowing down the engine. Pilots were told not to do this because, "it will destroy the
engine". This operation at lower than normal RPMs and higher than normal manifold pressures, as long as you were at
low power settings, like the 30% or so that they were doing, it was fine. At 80% power, low RPM and high manifold pressure
would cause detonation, and destroy the engine in seconds. This is why, in training, they were told to never do it.

He also had them go to lean mixtures, also deadly to the engines at high power, but OK at very low power. The two things saved
huge amounts of fuel. He often had an hour's more fuel in his tanks when they returned than the other guys. The supercharger/turbochargers
let them develop high manifold pressures at low RPMs, making this all possible. But only safe at very low percent power.

Lindberg showed them that, done carefully, at low power settings used for max range cruise, and high manifold pressures, low
RPM and lean mixtures were OK. Since many had already lost friends who ran out of gas on long flights over water, they
listened up once he showed it could be done safely.

My father said that on his Wildcats they had the prop down to very low RPMs maybe 1000 or so, said "it looked like you could
almost count the blades", and push the manifold pressure up until you held the normal long range cruise speed, usually pretty
slow airspeed. This was standard Navy operating procedure by the end of the war, and probably in the AF in south Pacific, at least.

Bill

 

[RBHarter]

Altitude was also their friend .

 

[Pistolero]

Yes, but that would depend on the winds, and whether there was radar. Most Japanese
ships and land installations did not have radar, esp early in the war. Some did, though, later.

On the Yamamoto raid they had to go low since the Japanese had a radar unit at Bougainville.

 

[RBHarter]

Distance to target played a roll as well .
The P38 came with a lot of engineering that was good on paper but less accurate in practice cruise power was just point . Never turn into the dead engine ........ Lefty Gardener disproved many of it's paper flaws . Quite the showman also .

A 20 min climb out at 500 fpm would allow a 100 mile let down to sea level at 300mph and next to idle fuel consumption . Then on the waves the last 70-100 miles the last 50 were probably 10 pilots running on razor blades rehearsing the prop/ throttle change and quadruple double checking guns an release switches ...... Well except for that one guy with ice in his veins .

Having spent a little time with a few of those guys and read many books with lots of unbookable right seat time ..... I now understand why guys like Greg Boyington were drunk or on the stick . Where the valor came from and why it was missing .

Most normally aspirated engines are pretty happy out of square for cruise . The 0470 likes 18 inhg by 2250-2325 rpm in a V35 while the 0540 235-250 is more content @ 21/2300 or backed down to 19/2100 for 7,9,11 gph respectively .
Add pressure and as I recall it goes the other way . Seems like the TIO541 liked 24/2200 at about 15,000 and 24/2100 below 10,000 .

 

[Todd M]

Holy smokes there is a huge amount of knowledge in you guys' heads! This is why I read read read and rarely contribute, all I do is learn. Thank you! Great stories, great history, priceless lessons.

 

[Missionary]

Greetings Todd
That is why I am so happy there still are books in libraries written by the feller "who were there".
Fixing to start reading Eddie Rickenbacker 's fine book titled "Fighting the Flying Circus"...
Mike in Peru Where there are no public libraries.

 

[Pistolero]

Learned a lot from my Dad about WW2 flying, and that led to reading a LOT more about it. I got to fly a T-6 (Navy calls them SNJ)
WW2 advanced fighter trainer and do aerobatics in it, real learning experience. Also learned much from years talking to my FIL, Mustang pilot in
Europe in WW2. He educated me a lot, too. Talking to folks who were really there is real education. Many other friends who
were pilots or aircrew. Love the one friend, B-26 radio operator with many stories. When I first found out he was aircrew on them,
I asked what he thought of the B-26. He laughed and said he got sick of jumping out of them. Another guy was B-17 copilot who
wound up interned in Sweden after their shot up bird wouldn't make it back to England and they crossed to Sweden. Smuggled out,
but names to the Nazis, so he was an instructor in the US. Nazis said they would shoot internees who were caught fighting again.

Fewer and fewer alive to tell their stories, need to rely on books more and more. In a few years, there will be none left.

Bill

 

[KHornet]

I was 3 1/2 years old at that date. I remember the end of the war however,
seeing dummies of ToJo, and Hitler burned, and the day FDR died. Lost an
old friend (Lt.Cmdr) WWII vintage about 3 months ago. As Bill said, "in a
few years, there will be none left".