Shortly after nose art was applied — notice chalk marks and half-finished Shamrock. Schulze, who claimed it as their own. They flew a total of 14 of their missions in this aircraft. ALC amassed a total of 20 combat missions and was lost on its 21st on April 25, On this date, 1Lt John H. Combs and Crew 44 BS were flying their 10th mission to the marshaling yards near Mannheim, Germany.
Take off that morning was AM. The tactics employed were in the nature of a scissors attack with half of the fighters swooping down through our formation while the remainder passed below.
Eight of the crew were able to bail out. In a questionnaire filled out by Eugene Hoag N , he recalled that Miller was last seen in the plane near his station in the waist and that he was uninjured. Hoag also remembered that Tamboer had his parachute on in the waist when the plane was still at Bombardier Charles Bieber did make it out, but delayed his jump until it was too late. His parachute did not have time to fully open and he was seen lying about forty feet from the plane near his partially deployed parachute.
Tail gunner Richard McCarthy also made it out of the plane, but conversely to Bieber he opened his chute too soon. It fouled the wing and he was dragged down to the ground with the aircraft. I was staying at his home at the time. John Combs was captured fairly quickly by a German corporal on a transport train.
Joe Wagner G made it to the Spanish border before being captured. Both men were eventually taken to prison camps in Germany. Roof made it back at the end of July. Ground Crew of ALC, same time frame as the crew photo above. Original aircraft. Lost 25 Apr 44 — went down at Ponthion near St. Dizier , France. MACR Admirable Little Character. Pictured mid-April , just a few days prior to the loss of ALC.
