319th Bomb Group

Fencer · **Posted:** Mon Oct 13, 2008 9:14 pm

A friend of mine's Grandfather was in the 319th BG during WW2. He had an extensive collection of photos which were thought destroyed after his death in the mid 80s by his then current wife.

Fortunately they were just re-discovered at a relative's after 20 years. Attached below are two of them. The family knows the basics of the 319th BG history and that the unit was on Okinawa after the A-Bombs were dropped.

Could anyone fill in any other information and maybe identify some aspects of the second picture.

His name was William George. He is sixth in from the right in the center row and in the middle of the first row in the second picture.

He also fought in Korea flying the B-26 Invader.

I am told there are alot more pictures, hopefully some from their time in the Med during WW2.

Holedigger · **Posted:** Mon Oct 13, 2008 9:28 pm

Second pic down, seem to be RAF Badges on the caps. Not sure what the AC is, I'm sure someone will nail that pretty quickly, at least to the type.
Interesting pics

Mark Nankivil · **Posted:** Tue Oct 14, 2008 2:12 pm

Looks to be an Avro Anson....

HTH! Mark

Fencer · **Posted:** Tue Oct 14, 2008 2:41 pm

My friend just pointed out that a Mercury Astronaut is in the first picture.

Anyone see him?

jamesintucson · **Joined:** Sat Jan 29, 2005 1:42 am **Posts:** 546

Fencer wrote:

My friend just pointed out that a Mercury Astronaut is in the first picture.

Anyone see him?

Don K. "Deke" Slayton. Cool.

James

P51Mstg · **Joined:** Tue Jan 25, 2005 11:36 am **Posts:** 1202

For those who don't know....

In April 1945, Deke Slayton was sent to Okinawa with the 319th Bombardment Group and flew seven combat missions over Japan

Mark H

Ztex · **Posted:** Tue Oct 14, 2008 3:19 pm

Yep...he's there! How cool is that!

It's great to see these photos. glad that they survived!

Found this on the 319th Website....http://319thbombgroup.com/

Fencer · **Posted:** Wed Oct 15, 2008 9:06 am

Something new has come up from the archives.

The following is one of three newspaper articles..

Quote:

Indianapolis Star
Sunday September 23, 1945

Indianapolis Flier Blown 7,000 Feet By Atomic Bomb

The atomic bomb blew one Indianapolis soldier 7,000 feet into the air.
He is 1st Lt. William Glenn George, husband of Mrs. Lillian George 3822
Byram Avenue and father of Leslie Ann George, 20 months old.

Lt. George recently wrote to his parents Mr. and Mrs. Glenn George 2949
East 38th Street, formerly of Bedford, “Remember when they used the
atomic bomb on Nagasaki? Well, I was leading our squadron that day on
a low level attack on Nagasakai to precede the atomic bombing by three
minutes, which isn’t much time to get out.”

“Over the target I got half my tail and one engine shot out, so I told my
wingman to take the squadron and get out of there. I was struggling
along about 200 feet of the ground trying slowly to nurse my shop to
higher altitude, when the atomic bomb hit about two miles behind me.”

“The next thing I knew, I was going straight up and out of control. At
around 7,000 feet I quit going up and started losing height. I luckily got it
under control again at about 1,500 feet and crawled by to Okinawa which
was 500 miles away.”

Pilot of an A-26 bomberfighter plane, Lt. George has completed 24
missions with the 319th Bomb Squadron. He is a former carrier of The
Star in Bedford and attended Franklin College, enlisting in the Royal
Canadian Air Force in November, 1941. He transferred to the Army Air
Force in April, 1944 and went overseas in May 1945.

I have already given my opinion on this, but I would be interested in everyone elses.

InvaderHF · **Joined:** Tue Nov 12, 2019 11:16 am **Posts:** 8

Fencer wrote:

Something new has come up from the archives.

The following is one of three newspaper articles..

Quote:

Indianapolis Star
Sunday September 23, 1945

Indianapolis Flier Blown 7,000 Feet By Atomic Bomb

The atomic bomb blew one Indianapolis soldier 7,000 feet into the air.
He is 1st Lt. William Glenn George, husband of Mrs. Lillian George 3822
Byram Avenue and father of Leslie Ann George, 20 months old.

Lt. George recently wrote to his parents Mr. and Mrs. Glenn George 2949
East 38th Street, formerly of Bedford, “Remember when they used the
atomic bomb on Nagasaki? Well, I was leading our squadron that day on
a low level attack on Nagasakai to precede the atomic bombing by three
minutes, which isn’t much time to get out.”

“Over the target I got half my tail and one engine shot out, so I told my
wingman to take the squadron and get out of there. I was struggling
along about 200 feet of the ground trying slowly to nurse my shop to
higher altitude, when the atomic bomb hit about two miles behind me.”

“The next thing I knew, I was going straight up and out of control. At
around 7,000 feet I quit going up and started losing height. I luckily got it
under control again at about 1,500 feet and crawled by to Okinawa which
was 500 miles away.”

Pilot of an A-26 bomberfighter plane, Lt. George has completed 24
missions with the 319th Bomb Squadron. He is a former carrier of The
Star in Bedford and attended Franklin College, enlisting in the Royal
Canadian Air Force in November, 1941. He transferred to the Army Air
Force in April, 1944 and went overseas in May 1945.

I have already given my opinion on this, but I would be interested in everyone elses.

I know that this is an old post, but I wanted to set the record straight on this in case anyone comes across it in the future. This story, as interesting as it is, never happened. Ignoring for a moment the physics of what would have happened to a plane being in the immediate vicinity of an atomic blast like that, it's just simply not corroborated by the historical record. The Nagasaki bomb was dropped on 9 Aug 1945. The 319th Bomb Group was nowhere near Nagasaki on that day. Mission #18, 9 Aug 1945 was to attack the Kanoya Airdrome Dispersal Areas. Kanoya is 110 miles to the southeast of Nagasaki. Now, pilots returning from this mission did report seeing the mushroom cloud. From the 319th Bomb Group Monthly Summary for August, 1945: "Returning crewmen from the mission against Kanoya Airfield on the Ninth of August reported that they saw a brilliant flash and then a large dust cloud which rose to 35,000 feet while they were making their break from the target of Kanoya. The reported flash was observed to be approximately thirty miles North of Kanoya. It is presumed that the flash and smoke originated from Nagasaki where a B-29 from the XXth Air Force reportedly dropped an "Atom" bomb that morning." Without a doubt, this pilot was nowhere near Nagasaki when the bomb was dropped. His unit was not ordered to attack Nagasaki to soften it up. Nothing about this account should be considered factual or true in any way.
-Inavader Historical Foundation

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