42-37886 – Blitzing Betsy

Staande v.l.n.r.: 1/Lt Lowell Watts, 2/Lt Bob Kennedy, 2/Lt Emmett Murphy, 2/Lt Ed Kelley Gehurkt v.l.n.r.: T/Sgt Joe Ramsey, S/Sgt Ray Hess, T/Sgt Ivan Finkle, S/Sgt Bob Sweeney, S/Sgt Harold Brassfield, S/Sgt Don Taylor

Letter: C
Model: Boeing B17G-BO Flying Fortress
Sqn: 562BSQ
Crash oorzaak: In de lucht gebotst met 42-40054
Crash Locatie: Zuid van Zwartemeer
Tijd: 14:50

The crew

Vlieger: 1st Lt. Lowell Hoyt Watts - Krijgsgevangene
2e Vlieger: 2nd Lt. Robert Maxwell (Bob) - Kennedy Krijgsgevangene
Navigator: 2nd Lt. Emmett John Murphy - Krijgsgevangene
Bommenrichter: 2nd Lt. Edward J. Kelley Jr. - Krijgsgevangene
Radiotelegrafist: T/Sgt. Ivan Nathan Finkle - Krijgsgevangene
Boordwerktuigkundige: T/Sgt. Joseph Bryan (Joe) Ramsey - Krijgsgevangene
Buikkoepelschutter: S/Sgt. Robert M. Sweeney - Overleden
Zijkoepelschutter: S/Sgt. Raymond Edward Hess - Overleden
Zijkoepelschutter: S/Sgt. Donald Willis Taylor - Overleden
Staartschutter: S/Sgt. Harold Adrian (Ad) Brassfield - Overleden

Raid on the Big City

Over Berlin

The trip to Berlin was relatively uneventful though fighters were hitting the groups above and behind. When “Blitzing Betsy” arrived at the IP, for whatever reason the Group Leader did not make the turn on the IP but continued in a slow turn around to the east and north of Berlin. This was to prove fateful later as it caused the group to miss it’s fighter escort home by at least 30 minutes. The bombs were dropped on a northern suburb of Berlin. “Blitzing Betsy” gained several new holes but no one was injured and the only real damage was the loss of oxygen on the left side of the airplane. Ad Brassfield and Don Taylor had to go on walkaround bottles.

Attacked

Later as they approached the Dutch/German border border, without fighter escort fighters were sigted almost simultaneously at 12 o’clock and 6 o’clock. Ed Kelley and Joe Ramsey opened up on the fighters approaching from the front, 2/Lt. Emmett J. Murphy, the navigator: “The planes attacking us from the front were FW190’s; after a burst from a distance of about 50 feet, one of them zoomed over our plane and flew right through the whole formation. Some of us believed we had hit him as we saw some smoke coming out of his engine. We were not sure however with everything happening so quickly.”

Ad opened up on the 190’s attacking from the rear. Emmett got a couple of bursts in from the cheek guns, and then felt his knee buckle as he was hit behind the knee by shrapnel.

On fire

Lowell Watts tells: “Our plane went on fire from 20-mm incendiary shells, fired by FW190’s, attacking us from our 11, 12 and 1 o’clock position. From the conversation over the intercom I digested that we were also attacked from behind, although I was not able to observe. The 20-mm shells protruded our plane via the nose section and exploded underneath my feet, close to the fuel lines and our primary oxygen supply. The combination of incendiary shells, 100-octane fuel and oxygen of course was highly flammable which caused the fire to spread in no time.”

Ad called on the intercom “I got one, I got one!” and then almost immediately called and said “I have been hit in the eyes.” Don left his left waist gun position to go help Ad.

Lowell continues: “I remember that someone called via the intercom that the aircraft was on fire and simultaneously noticed smoke and flames coming from underneath my seat. As we were in the first position of the bottom squadron, I was sat in the co-pilot seat on this mission. I asked the navigator to try and fight the fire with a hand-extinguisher.”

Emmett smelled smoke from the bomb bay and opened the hatch to find it awash in flames. He tried to put the flames out, but couldn’t’ work the extinguisher.

“Abandon Aircraft”

“Further action would have been useless”, according to Lowell: “At that point I gave the order via the intercom to abandon aircraft but I received no confirmation. Whether this was due to the fact that the communication system was shot to smithereens of due to commotion, I don’t know. The switch for the alarm bell in a B17 is installed on the left panel, on the captain side; as I sat in the right seat, I was not able to operate it. I did not hear it go off and if my co-pilot, Bob Kennedy, had activated it, I don’t know either, although I had the impression the alarm was not sounding.

The flames had grown so big now that I could not look outside anymore, let alone see the instrument panel. Via the intercom I asked Bob for assistance. As I got no answer, I turned my head in his direction and decided

I had already abandoned the aircraft. The escape hatch in the nose was still open, which ingited the fire even more. My lack of visibility made it impossible to establish what happened next.

Collision

While the crew bailed out, I pressed the yoke forward to avoid a burning aircraft to the left of me attempting to descend underneath the formation. I leaned backward to activate the automatic pilot. Just as I felt it engaging, there was a heavy impact and great confusion that, as I only heard afterward, was caused by my aircraft colliding with the command plane of our formation, which flew over our aircraft, flown by Capt. Job. As I had been unable to see anything because of the fire, I had not been aware that our plane actually had started to climb although I had tried to descend. Personally I think that the tail section of our plane got damaged, causing the trim to change and the aircraft to climb instead of descend. I tried to reach the throttles to reduce power but the aircraft went into sort of a spin, as I suspect. This caused so many G’s that I could not manage to take my hands off the auto-pilot controls to adjust the throttles. Because of the fire in the cockpit I am not sure, but I had the impression that both inner engines were also on fire.” (In reality the flames were not in the bomb bay but were shooting in a large whole in the side of the aircraft form the engine and wing.)

Emmett explains his side of the story: “In that frontal attack, our inner engines were hit by 20-mm shells; one shell went through the plexiglass nose, missed Ed Kelley’s head and mine and exploded in the oxygentanks underneath the cockpit. The whole compartment went ablaze. Ed immediately evacuated through the nose hatch and I followed him, scorching my eyebrows. Bob Kennedy also got out in time, he had to beat off the flames from his parachute before he could clip it on.”

Emmett Murphy just bailed out when the aircraft blew up: “When I last saw our aircraft from underneath my parachute, it was laying on its back in a steep dive, burning like a torch with howling over-speeded engines. Then it exploded. We had flown at an altitude if 15.000 feet when we got hit and I opened my parachute after I had fallen maybe up to 7000 feet, as I intended to get away from the aircraft and the combat as soon as possible. Hanging underneath my parachute, I saw our fighter escort – P-47’s – arrive and consequently a huge dogfight evolved. had we held out a little longer, the Huns would have fled without a doubt.

Lowell Watts leaps back into the story a few seconds: “Knowing my ball turret gunner, Bob Sweeney, had no chance to escape, I tried to reduce the G-force on the aircraft by pulling the yoke towards me with all the power I had in me. I knew now that the windshield, the canopy and the upper turret had been destroyed and that, frankly said, I was sitting in a burning piece of junk. Ultimately, the G’s decreased a bit, but I could not say anything of the position of the aircraft at that moment. We had been in a spin so long that I expected the aircraft to hit the ground anytime.

Jump to safety

Lowell Watts, Joe Ramsey, Ivan Finkle and Ray Hess were blasted clear of the aircraft. All but Ray Hess were able to open their chutes. “At that instant there was an explosion in the aircraft and I was blown out of the aircraft with considerable

force as by a catapult. As I wore a seat type parachute instead of a chest one, it was already in place and I could open it before I hit the ground. An FW190 zoomed right beside me into the deep, its pilot apparently wounded or dead in the cockpit and crashed close to where I landed.”

Ray was found away from the wreckage with his parachute on, but unopened. During the spin he had been pinned on top of Joe Ramsey when the aircraft exploded.

Lowell Watts evaded for a couple of days and walked due south thinking that would take him into Belgium and eventually France. Unfortunately at the point he landed Germany justs into Holland so he actually walked into Germany where he was captured and interrogated by German Officers on the spot. They showed him Captain Job’s billfold, telling him that Job had died. Watts however did not admit knowing Job and did not receive any further information regarding details of his aircraft.

Ad Brassfield, Don Taylor and Bob Sweeney never bailed out. They rode the remains of Blitzing Betsy down to the fields of eastern Holland. Joe Ramsey was pretty seriously injured by the explosion. Emmett Murphy had the shrapnel injuries and a broken nose from the gyrations of the spin.

Emmett Murphy came down near Amsterdamscheveld (now Weiteveen). Upon landing he badly sprained his ankle. Some people had seen him coming down. Two of them assisted him and took him to Ed Kelley, who had landed approximately 500 yards from Emmett. There they ran into Ivan Finkle who told them Joe Ramsey was wounded. Ivan said he would try to get Joe to a hospital.

In German captivity

Though the traces of the men have never exactly been reveiled, it has become clear that Emmett and Ed were supplied with civilian clothes by Dutchmen and that they were brought to the house of the Schnoing family, Zuidersloot 34, were they were hidden in a chickenshack behind the house. That night they were allowed in the house, where Mrs. Schnoing gave them a meal. Then two Dutch policemen came. They said that too many people had seen the Americans and for that reason they were forced to take them in. They went to the Marechaussee quarters in Klazienaveen by bike. The chief officer called for a doctor, who examined Emmett’s ankle; it appeared not to be broken. The constable had a daughter who spoke English; she was very friendly and explained the situation. (The policeman was very likely mr. Scheepmaker; the daughter must have been Rie). Emmett and Ed spent the night in a cold cell behind the police office. The next day the girl brought them food. That night the Germans came to take them to Assen. The day after, they traveled to Leeuwarden and from there they went to Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Stalag Luft I near Barth.

Ivan Finkle and Joe Ramsey apparently were in more luck and were assisted by helpful Dutch people. As the story goes, they were admitted in the monastry of hadden blijkbaar meer geluk en konden door goedwillende Nederlanders worden geholpen. Naar verluidt werden ze opgenomen in het klooster van Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Weiteveen. In the night they were put on an escape line by the Nieuw Amsterdam resistance.

Lowell Watts, Emmett Murphy, Don Taylor and Ad Brassfield were each on their 25th and last mission of their tour. Ed Kelley was on his 22nd, Ivan Finkle was on his 22nd, Bob Sweeney was on his 24th, Joe Ramsey was on his 22nd, Ray Hess was on his 24th and Bob Kennedy was on his 24th.