He was shot down on one of our early
missions and we heard him call on his radio "So long guys here goes
fat, dumb, and happy bailing out. We were beginning to lose pilots
now and were getting replacements from the States. I'm glad I never
had to Join a group like that, not knowing anyone. We had been
together so long by then that we knew each other and were good
friends. We did not dwell much on the friends we had begun losing.
Each of us had accepted the probability that it could happen to us
any day, so had conditioned ourselves to the situation. Some of the
missions made us nervous but I wouldn't say that we were inordinately
bothered by fear. We were so occupied and it was a thrilling
experience to actually be a part of combat over enemy territory.
However we did look forward to the days that the weather was bad and
no missions were flown. We would sit around the "Ready Room" playing
cards and discussing past missions. I should mention that my Flight
Leader T.J. Tilson or Bruce had given me the nickname of "Buck"
Benson when we were in training in California and that is what I was
called from then on. I don't remember anyone ever calling me Bunny.
One of our missions was a dive bombing run on some factories in
France. We flew in formation to the target and peeled off one at a
time diving down at a large building and releasing our bombs. I saw
some of them go right into a large door at one end of the building.
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