Ross and Beverley: National Museum Of The mighty Eight Air Force

We visited the National Museum Of The Mighty Eighth Air Force. From May 1942 to July 1945, the 8th Air Force executed daylight strategic bombing against Nazi-occupied Europe. The Eighth suffered about half of the U.S. Army Air Force's casualties (47,483 out of 115,332), including more than 26,000 dead.

The Museum is set out in sections which provides a good understanding of how WW11 was conducted from both the Allies and the German side. Use is made of screening real life action to maps and correspondence. The planes on display are those used in combat.

The Museum starts off with a Prelude to War and focuses WW1 which left Europe exhausted and people apathetic. However, Hitler was appointed Chancellor in 1933. It then moves onto the Battle Of Britain and the blight of Great Britain who stood alone against the Nazi war machine in the early days of WW11.

Day of Infamy came when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbour and America finally joined the War.

While no gas was used during WW11 here is a nurse whois fitting a baby with special equipment used to protect against poisons gas.

Corporal Arthur Parker cut this insignia from the tail section of a Messersschmitt Me 109 (4076) downed on the morning of August 31, 1940. The aircraft crashed in Elham Park wood at 9.30 am after being shot down by First Lieutenant Denys Gilliams 616 Squadron Spitfire. The pilot OBLT. Eckhardt Pribebe ( Iron Cross 1st class)go 1/JG bailed out and was captured. - Battle of Britain.

Lots of encouragement was given to abled bodied persons to enlist. The actor, James Stewart was one of the few Hollywood film people who wanted to join the military to fight for America. However, when he first went to enlist he was underweight by 10 pounds. Eventually he met the criteria and became an Air Force Officer and subsequently saw military action in WW11.

The POW exhibit shows the daily life of a downed airman and the harsh living conditions of a prisoner of war in a German Sttalag Lueft.

This blanket below is called SAM's Blanket. On 16 July 1944, the 398th Bomb Group attacked the aircraft factory at Munich and lost two B-17s. Samual Miller was flying as a tail gunner and his plane was shot down. He bailed out and upon landing fractured his spine and both ankles. He lay in the Tyrolean Alps near Achenkirk, Austria for two days until members of the Hitler Youth found him and reported him to Nazi authorities. Miller became a hospitalized POW, held in the german orthopedic hospital, reserve -Lazaret Obermassfeld.
While recovering from his injuries he created a blanket by collecting military patches and pieces of fabric from people he met in the hospital. By the time he was liberated in 1945 , he had stitched 121 insignia patches to the fabric pieces to make this 41/2 by 6 foot blanket.

There is also the an area dedicated to those brave civilians who provided protection to downed military personnel.

This wall provides information on the Escape Lines providing escape to so many who otherwise would have been captured by the Nazi's.

Finally the end of the war.

Unconditional surrender.

The lights come on again.

One never imagines acts of compassion in combat however, on December 20, 1943, Luftwaffe fighter pilot, Franz Stigler, approached the most severely damaged B-17 he had ever seen. He was about to shoot but saw the waist gunner giving first aid to the mortally wounded tail gunner. He could not bring himself to fire on the helpless bomber. Instead , he invited the bomber to surrender, but the American pilot Charles Brown, refused. Stiggler then permitted the B-17 to fly to safety. His act of compassion remained unknown to his superiors in the Luftwaffe. In 2000 both men met at the museum.

Women also played a part in WW11. Over 1,000 young American women served America as military pilots. They were classified as civilians, the Women Airforce Pilots ( WASP). They carried out dangerous missions, flying America's most advanced aircraft.

Becoming a WASP was not for the faint hearted. More than 25,000 applied, but only 1,830 were chosen. They had to pay their own way to their training facility in Texas. Then went through greater than 6 months of rigorous training before receiving their pilot's wings. After the war WASP was closed down. They were not given military rank, they were not considered as veterans and had to pay their own way back home.

For more than 30 years the WASP were forgotten. The press described these trainees as the "first" women to fly American military aircraft. The WASP came forward to set the record straight. They also demanded that they be recognized as veterans. In 1977 the government finally gave recognition to them this long overdue status.
Since 1976, American women have made great progress in aviation. Colonel Collins was the first woman to command a space shuttle mission.