The Mission

Arriving in Libya

On arrival at airbase Berka Four near Benghazi, Libya, in early July 1943, the 564^th immediately took notice of the challenges of life in the desert.  Capt. Ardery, once again, sets the scene:

The officers of the highest rank and the enlisted men of the lowest alike began to pitch tents and put up cots and, in the process, found a few snakes and a great many scorpions.  Across the desert, there was nothing but flat, arid country shimmering in the clear, dry air.  You could see for miles.  It was July, and this was the Middle East, Cyrenaica, Libya, Bengasi—take your choice.  And aside from the really objectionable snakes and scorpions, there were literally a million huge locusts–grasshoppers to me.  While we pitched our tents, they lit on our necks, flew down our backs, hit us in the face, and got in anything left lying around.  They were nasty things, but after a while, we got tolerably used to them.

– Capt. Phil Ardery

Veterans of the 389^th Heavy Bomb Group had assigned the perfect nickname to their Group.  The veteran B-24 crews that had previously served in North Africa already knew of and appreciated the significance of the scorpion to that region when they adopted its name.  There were, in contrast, the rookie aircrews of the 564^th Squadron, under the command of Capt. Ardery, that had not seen air combat and had likewise not yet experienced life in the desert and appreciated the prevalence of the scorpion.  

The misery of the encampment would persist through July 1943 as the logistical challenges of water, food, medical care, sanitation, parts and equipment equaled the amazing capacity of the airmen and ground crews to perform their jobs despite the extreme environment.  Occasionally, the men would find relief when they were allowed to take a short trip to the beach and go for a swim in the clear, blue Mediterranean waters.

Early Combat Missions

After a few days into the encampment, the Group started planning and assigning missions to the crews.  Capt. Ardery readily accepted the opportunity to expose his aircrews to combat.

On July 9, the Group flew a bombing mission to the Marlene Airfield on the island of Crete.  The bombers were intercepted by German fighters, and a B-24 and its entire crew were lost.  Few bombs were delivered on target.  

Between July 9 and 19, the Group would fly six missions from Berka Four into Italy and Crete.  The 564th Squadron flew four of those on July 9 (Marlene, Crete), July 11 (Reggio Airdrome), July 16 (Bari Airdrome) and July 19 (Rome Railyards).  Pete’s crew now had four missions to their credit and were no longer inexperienced in a deadly combat environment.

After completing the sequence of six missions, Berka Four was quarantined, as were all the other airfields with the other operational elements that had been sent from the 8th and 9th Air Forces.  Intensive low-level bombing practice began using full-size mockups of refineries.  This training took place for ten days, with crews dropping dummy bombs on the imaginary refinery and targets scratched out in the desert.

Mission Training

The low-level bombing practice in the desert affirmed rumors that had been circulating since the Group had been training in England: there would be a raid on the oil fields of Ploesti, Romania.  By now, the squadron commanders, including Capt. Ardery, had all taken up residence in a single tent and were spending a lot of time together.  Their collective experience confirmed that the raid would take place very soon.  After some additional targets were installed in the desert and additional very low bombing practices occurred, the rumors were confirmed.

The secret mission to bomb the refineries in and around Ploesti, Romania, was planned by West Point graduate Col. Jacob Smart who was on the staff of General “Hap” Arnold.  The 34-year-old Smart had been at the Casablanca Conference with Arnold when the mission had been approved by Churchill and Roosevelt.  After putting together an elite team of planners, Col. Smart settled on a low-level bombing run on refineries in Ploesti and Campina, just north of Ploesti.  

With the B-24 being designed for high-altitude missions, asking this lumbering giant with slender wings and an awkward-looking tail to perform at low altitude struck many of Smart’s colleagues as insane.  Regardless, Smart stuck with his instincts and a low-level bombing plan was developed utilizing all the B-24 assets available in 1943.  Commanders reporting to Gen. Dwight Eisenhower projected losses as high as 50% of participating aircraft, but the potential to destroy the primary supply of Nazi fuel and oil was worth the gamble to the Allies.

Near the end of July, Capt. Ardery reports that all participating crew members were brought in for a briefing.  They were shown movies of how their various runs to the target would look.  There were British Intelligence men present to answer questions.  A relief model of Campina and the Steaua Refinery target was shown to crews attacking the refineries in Campina.

The crews were told to write letters home on July 31, 1943, with 2^nd Lt. Ronald Helder’s letter to his parents about the naming of their aircraft “Ole Kickapoo” being notable, along with his mention of the crew’s acquisition of a chicken for their celebratory meal after their return to base.  Capt. Ardery describes using masking tape to secure a hacksaw blade to the bottom of his right foot as a contingency escape tool should he be captured.

Operation Tidal Wave

Sometime around 2 a.m., Sunday, August 1, 1943, the sounds of alarms, men in jeeps riding through the camp yelling “Get up, up, up” brought everyone into full focus that they were about to fly the most ambitious and dangerous mission of the war thus far, Operation Tidal Wave.  The crews dressed and moved to their aircraft.  Engines were started.  Fares were fired to start the order of takeoff for the 178 bombers.  Capt. Ardery recalled that the first rays of dawn were starting to appear as his squadron gathered after takeoff and started across the Mediterranean.  Crews were ordered to maintain radio silence even though the Nazis had already picked up the bombers.

The 564^th was headed to Campina or “Red Target.”  The planners assigned them to Campina since their aircraft were newer and had greater range than some of the older B-24s going to Ploesti.  It was also felt that the less experienced crews of the 564^th would be able to manage navigation and formation flying better if they were not assigned to the large assemblage of bombers going into Ploesti.

Capt. Ardery recalls that his C Flight of aircraft piloted by Fowble, Wright and Hughes were behind the second flight and among the last in the formation headed to Red Target.   Col. Woods’ Sky Scorpions made their initial point where they deviated from the larger group flying to Ploesti.  A navigational error by the lead groups going to Ploesti also resulted in a break in radio silence to correct their error.

Hughes B-24 “Ole Kickapoo” is Hit

The Sky Scorpions were on course.  Making an adjustment for their approach into Campina with a gentle turn towards the correct valley, all the Sky Scorpions realigned for the run to Red Target and descended, in turn, at the last moment to the attack altitude.  

Right behind the three-ship flight ahead of them, Capt. Ardery’s “Famous C Flight” closed on the target.  The center “command” ship in C Flight with Ardery on board, “I for Item,” was flown by Ed Fowble.  To his left wing was “Old Blister Butt,” flown by Robert Wright, and to his right was Pete Hughes flying the newly christened “Ole Kickapoo.”  As the antiaircraft fire was creating a wall in front of them, Fowble’s radio operator, who was manning a camera in the waist compartment, called out, “Lieutenant Hughes’ ship is leaking gas.  He’s been hit hard in his left-wing fuel section”.  

Capt. Ardery says he saw a sheet of gasoline streaming out of Pete’s left wing.  The gas was of such volume that Ardery says he could not see the waist gunners in “Ole Kickapoo.”  Pete kept his plane in formation and did not deviate, taking his plane into ”a room of fire with a tremendous stream of gasoline gushing from his ship.”  Bombs were away from chimney height as Flight C was enveloped in smoke and fire. As Capt. Ardery looked to his right coming out of the inferno; there was Pete’s plane in perfect formation position but with a raging fire at the root of his left wing where it entered the fuselage.

Capt. Ardery writes:

I could feel tears come into my eye and my throat clog up.  Then I saw Pete pull up and out of formation.  His bombs were laid squarely on the target along with ours.  With his mission accomplished, he was making a valiant attempt to kill his excess speed and set the ship down in a little river [Prohava] valley south of the town [Campina] before the whole business blew up.  He was going about 210 miles per hour and had to slow up to about 110 to get the ship down.  He was gliding without power, as it seemed, slowing up and pulling off to the right in the direction of a moderately flat valley.  Pete was fighting now to save himself and his men.  He was too low for any of them to jump and there was not time for the airplane to climb to a sufficient altitude to permit a chute to open.  The lives of the crew were in their pilot’s hands, and he gave it everything he had.

Wells [radio operator], in our waist gun compartment, was taking pictures of the gruesome spectacle.  Slowly the ship on our right lost speed and began to settle in a glide that looked like it might come to a reasonably good crash-landing.  But flames were spreading furiously all over the left side of the ship.  I could see it plainly, as it was on my side.  Now it would touch down—but just before it did, the left wing came off.  The flames had been too much and had literally burnt the wing off.  The heavy ship cartwheeled and a great flower of flames and smoke appeared just ahead of the point where we had seen a bomber.  Pete had given his life and the lives of his crew to carry out his assigned task.  To the very end he gave the battle every ounce he had.

– Capt. Phil Ardery

Pilot Pete Hughes, Co-pilot Ronald Helder, Navigator Sidney Pear, Bombardier John McLoughlin, Engineer/Top Turret Gunner Joseph Mix, Radio Operator Louis Kase Waist, Gunner Malcolm Dalton, and Tunnel Gunner Avis Wilson were all killed in action.  McLoughlin survived the crash but died of wounds.  Waist Gunner Edmond H. Smith and Tail Gunner Thomas A. Hoff survived the crash but were captured and held as Prisoners of War.  The bodies of the dead Americans were recovered by Romanian authorities and buried at a cemetery in Ploesti.

Operation Tidal Wave Statistics

Red Target did not resume production until after the war.  The targets at Ploesti were not as damaged and started resuming production shortly after the raid.

Mission statistics for the 178 participating bombers are that 162 reached the target areas, 51 were lost, and 22 landed or crashed at Allied bases.  Of the 89 B-24s that returned to base near Benghazi, only 31 were flyable.

Of the 1,620 crew members who were estimated to reach the target areas, 330 were killed, 54 were wounded and returned to friendly areas, 79 were detained in Turkey, 70 wounded were held in Romania, and six were captured in Bulgaria.  One hundred eight men were taken prisoner of war in Romania.

The mission statistics for Operation Tidal Wave have varied over time and by source.  The above figures were reported by Col. James Woodall in his well-researched and documented book, “Texas Aggie Medals of Honor”. 

Five Medals of Honor were awarded to airmen in Operation Tidal Wave, the most in any single air action in U.S. history.  2^nd Lt. Pete Hughes became the first Texas Aggie Medal of Honor recipient of WWII.  Lt. Col. Addison Baker and Major John Jerstad, both killed in the raid, received Medals of Honor posthumously.  Col. John Kane, commander of the 98th Bomb Group, and Col. Leon Johnson, commander of the 44th Bomb Group, survived the mission and received Medals of Honor.

All of Pete Hughes’ crew members of “Ole Kickapoo” were awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.  The United States Army defines the Distinguished Service Cross as the Army’s second-highest military decoration for soldiers who display extraordinary heroism in combat with an armed enemy force.  The only higher award for heroism in the U.S. Army is the Medal of Honor. 

To this day, the photographs taken from the Flight C command ship of Capt. Ardery of the last seconds of flight of the wounded ship “Ole Kickapoo” with Pete Hughes on the controls are among the few instances when the acts that preceded recognition for a Medal of Honor were documented and preserved.