THE WALL OF FACES

The wing broke of off the B-26 flown by Andrew Mitchell and Jerry as they made a bomb run. Capt. Bandera (first name not recalled) was flying with them and saw it. I was originally scheduled to fly with Mitchell. The Sqdn. changed me to fly with Mike Newmeyer.

Jerry and I were in the 16th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron (Night Photo)stationed at Shaw AFB, South Carolina in 1960-1961. I was the Intel Officer and worked with Jerry quite a bit. I remember Jerry as a jovial, outgoing type of guy, and when a call came for volunteers for Jungle Jim, a project leading up to deployment to Vietnam, several of us applied and Jerry was one who was selected. He went eagerly and proudly, with the best wishes from his squadron mates. Jerry was a navigator in a class just a few ahead of mine and was a fine line navigator, turning in accurate photo runs with excellent results. Word came back to the unit, and those of us who had gone to other assignments, that he had gone down with his B-26 aircraft. My turn to go to Southeast Asia would come soon and I carried my memory of him with me.