Warbird Information Exchange

Looks like the crew of this PV-1N "Eight Ball" chose to list a memorial for another crew who were lost on a previous mission.

Circumstances Of Loss:

Captain Duane Jenkins flew a PV-1 Ventura night fighter with VMF(N)-531. His crew – which included Staff Sergeant Charles H. Stout, Sr. (radar operator) and Sergeant Thomas J. Glennon (turret gunner) – were credited with scoring the squadron’s first kill when they splashed a “Betty” bomber on 13 November 1943.
Sergeant “Tommy” Glennon operated the turret guns aboard a PV-1 Ventura night fighter with VMF(N)-531.
Staff Sergeant Charles Stout operated the radar set aboard a PV-1 Ventura night fighter with VMF(N)-531.

On the night of 3 December 1943, Jenkins’ crew departed from Barakoma in PV-1(N) #29857 to patrol over a task group heading for Torokina, Bougainville. Japanese planes found the ships at 2000 hours, and the Ventura vectored in to intercept. The details of the fight were lost in the darkness, but played out on radar screens:

At 2211 a plane was seen shot down in flames by another plane seven miles east of the formation. The PV-1 night fighter was the only friendly plane in the area. Afterwards, the plane still flying showed friendly, and flew east for about one minute, where it was lost.

Dane Base at Torokina Point followed the night fighter chasing [a] bogey and saw the blips merge. Nothing further was heard from the PV-1, and the plane did not return to base.

War Diary, VMF(N)-531
Jenkins, Stout, and Glennon were officially credited with a second kill – but were never seen again. Exactly what caused their loss is not known.

No remains were ever found. All three Marines were reported missing after the mission, and officially declared dead as of 5 December 1944.
More information here: https://missingmarines.com/duane-r-jenkins/




PV-1N Ventura, Bureau Number 29811, "Eight Ball." Photographed at Bougainville, 25 June 1944


Detail of 'Eight Ball' with nose art, painted-over windows, and crew memorial.


War Diary of VMF(N)-531, December 1943. Very poorly written IMO.

To the Department of Defense, this is a definitive study of the Lockheed PV-1N Ventura: a “patrol, twin-engine, 4-crew, land, monoplane” built by Vega Aircraft. An uncredited photographer snapped Bureau Number 29811 “Eight Ball” undergoing routine maintenance at a Bougainville airfield on June 25, 1944.
“Eight Ball” was eye-catching in many respects. Configured as a night fighter – something still unusual in the South Pacific at the time – it was assigned to VMF(N)-531, the first Marine Corps night fighter squadron and the only one to fly Venturas in combat. The nose art also attracted attention: while Army Air Corps crews frequently decorated their planes with bold, garish designs, the practice was much less common among Marines. The crew of #29811 not only christened their craft after a slang term for habitual slackers, they added its “eight ball” motif to the wheels for comedic effect.
And they turned their Ventura into a flying, fighting memorial. Between the blacked-out windows on the nose is inscribed:
In Memory
Capt. D. R. Jenkins
TSgt. C. H. Stout
Sgt. T. J. Glennon
The Jenkins crew were legends in VMF(N)-531. Duane Russell Jenkins was one of the first pilots aboard the squadron, joining straight from flight school in 1942. On the night of 13-14 November 1943, Jenkins – with TSgt. Charles Holcombe Stout, Sr. manning the radar, and Sergeant Thomas Joseph “Tommy” Glennon in the turret – intercepted a Mitsubishi G4M “Betty” south of Bougainville. “The starboard engine nacelle of the Betty started flaming,” he reported, “and it went into a shallow dive… [I] gave it a third burst and the turret gunner gave it a two second burst into the fuselage…. The Betty went into a steep dive and was seen to explode as it hit the water at 0420.” This dramatic scene was the first kill for a Marine night fighter, and the second in American naval aviation.
On 3 December 1943, the Jenkins crew took off to provide cover for a task force approaching Bougainville’s Torokina coast. Japanese planes found the fleet first and were dropping bombs and torpedoes when the Ventura arrived on station. Sailors saw a streak of flame arc across the sky several miles east of the task force – another Japanese plane falling to the Ventura’s guns. Radar operators tracked the Jenkins plane as it approached another bogey – “and saw the blips merge.”
Jenkins, Stout, and Glennon never returned to base. Reports from radar personnel suggested that a mid-air collision with a Japanese plane was the cause of their loss; they were officially credited with two kills. All three Marines were declared dead on 5 December 1944.
Their names and memories lived on with the “Grey Ghosts” of VMF(N)-31 – in simple gestures like a memorial painted on the nose of a buddy's plane.

Best story I've heard about a Ventura. Funny enough I've been trying to figure out a good "story" for one to build a model of. A model shop down in Austin practically gave me three Ventura kits that are sitting on the shelf.

_________________
Aerial Photographer with Red Wing Aerial Photography currently based at KRBD and tailwheel CFI.
Websites: Texas Tailwheel Flight Training, DoolittleRaid.com and Lbirds.com.

The horse is prepared against the day of battle: but safety is of the LORD. - Prov. 21:31 - Train, Practice, Trust.

You could model the one that found the crew of the Indianapolis.

_________________
Defending Stearmans on WIX since Jeff started badmouthing them back in 2005.