God bless you all. My Dad was a gunner in the Bloody Hundredth, most of my immediate family have visited the museum and appreciate the tribute the locals have made by saving it from being just a pig sty. I did an exchange tour flying the LYNX in the Royal Navy, one of the highlights of my flying career was arranging to land my LYNX there (was still a bit of the runway remaining) and tour the museum.

Great story. Good job. Thanks.

Thanks for sharing.

God bless Carol and Ron Batley for their love of Thorpe Abbott’s and loving my mother by preserving my Dad’s legacy with the 100th. Thank you for volunteering!

Bless you Woody, thank you 🙏

I bet you were delighted to see that? I would have been 👍

footage used in a lot of documentaries@@Pesmog

that’s amazing

Salute!

Thank you both for your service.

Good one mate

Hundreth?

Firmly agree :) It was on the way to my nans RIP 🪦 That and Flixton are real gems 💎

Yes 💯 agree, went last year twice in a week as there's so much to see. I really hope this series brings more interest into these museums and create more restoration projects.

@@davidedwards8552 There a few museums I volunteer at one in Hertfordshire

@@davidedwards8552 The museum i volunteer at has many genuine artefacts, part of a B17 wing which as used was a footbridge

I've never been in a B-17, but I did "walk" through a Lancaster which was so constricted over the bomb bay I nearly pulled a muscle trying to get to the rear. I can't imagine how terrifying it was to be under attack thousands of feet above enemy territory. These guys earned their accolades and it's no wonder many didn't want to talk about it after the war was done.

I went in a b17 in McMinnville OR at their air museum. I was shocked how narrow and tight everything was.

I'm one of the lucky few who's flown in a B-17 (the Yankee Air Museum's "Yankee Lady") it was incredibly cramped and loud, huge respect to the men who flew those long, high altitude missions in them.

Walked through one in Morristown, NJ a few years ago. There was a B-25 and a P-51 Mustang there also.

The Germans occupying that part of the Netherlands agreed to allow the flights and their FlaK crews withheld their fire.

@@RogerWKnight True. But only after those Germans withheld food shipments to densily populated Holland for the whole winter of 1944-1945. In Dutch it is called "Hongerwinter"; the winter of hunger. Thousends died of starvation.

100th Bomb Group Foundation website classes the "gear down" story as unfounded. And also the site says that Adolph Galland, in a post war interview, said he'd not heard of a special effort by the Luftwaffe to target the 100th - the Luftwaffe always targetted the most vulnerable part of a formation if they could. In my opinion it's nonsense - a lone damaged B17 straggler with a Nazi fighter escort is not going to do something as stupid as firing on the escort when one of two disabled engines restarts. It's a long way home alone. The a/c crashed near Liege & six of the crew died the rest were POWs - the "story" surfaced after the war with no German corroboration. Interestingly there is another "gear down" story within the 100th which might be the origin of this legend. However the 100th were known to be ill-disciplined & rather 'relaxed' [they had to be retrained before leaving the States] so it is possible a plane broke the rules of war re surrendering & fired on their captors - but I doubt that the escort would fly close enough to be in much danger. Baloney - just another war story that's become larger in the retelling.

Real or not, the gear down story made its way through the 8th Air Force, even my USAAF father’s fighter group in Wattisham.

My old man was an original member of this group as a ROG and trained in the same ship/plane as Harry Crosby, with whom he retained a lifelong friendship. l have a personally inscribed and autographed copy of Harry's wartime memoir, "A Wing And A Prayer'' among my prized possessions, along with my old's slowly disintegrating A2 jacket. For a meticulously accurate and detailed description of Harry's wartime service in the 100th, this is well worth the read. He was Bob "Rosie" Rosenthal's navigator when Rosie commanded the lead "ship" on the thousand plane raids over Berlin. For a photo of the three of them together at Thorpe Abbots, check out page 194 of Ed Jablonski's "Flying Fortress." Ed wasn't a member of a flight crew, but served with the group in an administrative role.

I'm sure I read that Galland said that there would have been no time for the Luftwaffe pilots to try and find a particular bomb group to attack it. I'm sure the crews in the 100th certainly felt like they were being singled out though.

My grandfather was the navigator for the Picklepuss crew. This is an interview he did in 1998 kzfaq.info/get/bejne/a9iPqcul18C6g2w.htmlsi=INhJJSqC5ExoMOGc

Unfortunately, many Americans do not know about the 3 generations of Dutch families who tender the American Military cemeteries in your home country. When sleazy politicians like Donald Trump deride our allies like NATO, it makes me boil when there is still much respect for USA, UK and Canada for the liberation of Europe. I visited Normandy and I think it’s the only place in France where they fly the American British and French flags side by side. There are around 8 cemeteries in the Normandy area for British and American and Allied soldiers. The British suffered 60,000 casualties and 2,000 tanks were destroyed in the Normandy campaign.

@@tonymanero5544 : In the Netherlands we have Remembrance Day every year on May 4, and we celebrate Liberation Day on May 5. Once every 5 years that day is a national day off. My grandparents' generation is almost gone, and it is therefore extremely important that we, the free generation, never forget what a horribly high price was paid for that freedom. All the best to you, TW.

@@tonymanero5544 Joe Biden approves your message and will love you for a specified sum of cash via Hunters bank account.

My Dad was a gunner in the 100th. I got into WWII air war history, and he never mentioned he'd been a part if it. I didn't know about it until showing my grandmother a book with a picture about the Schweinfurt raid and she said he'd been on it. Total suprise. After that he'd tell me stories about peripheral things, but not the fighting. Like bar fights, the fact that a good breakfast with real eggs meant the mission was going to be a tough one, and getting busted to private and promoted back to sergeant within 24 hrs. That kind of thing. But nothing about the missions themselves. For lack of a better term, I don't think he wanted me to 'hero-worship' him for that part of his life.

I found four crashplaces of B-17 Bombers in Germany, they were shot down during the Schweinfurt Raids in August and Oct 1943. Two Of them belonged to the 350Squadron of 100thBombGroup, named Tweedle O Twill and Escape Kit. Most airmen could bail out and became POW, the killed were later buried in the US.

thanks for that info .. nice to know that after the fight he worked for justice too ...

Just before shipping out as a recently licensed, junior deck officer on cargo ships, l asked my father to arrange a lunch meeting in a restaurant with him, Harry and Bob. They asked politely about my upcoming assignment on a ship. After thanking them for their interest, l asked them to pretend l wasn't ever there and just reminisce among themselves about the war. lt was the listening experience of a lifetime. l knew it at the time, but not in the way l did much later or now.

Rosie was just a straight up badass. What a legend.

How come "no politics" when it's about nazis?

@@CrasySailor Not everyone who fought in the Luftwaffe or Wehrmacht was a Nazi. You were called up for military service and had no choice.

LIberal democracies don't want their drones knowing about the mass destruction carried out against civilians for their infantile slogans.

Yep I’ve read it.

@CrasySailor unless they were SS the majority were drafted

Ummm...we have a Presidential candidate quoting Hitler...

@@garryferrington811 Better than Biden, he talks Martian.😉

Better off with a Martian then a nazi. Plus all that nazi has done is spread hate, increase the national debt, and fill his pockets. A failure of a human being. Oh, he also dodged the draft.

It is also believed that Robert Rosenthal’s plane dropped the bomb that killed Roland Friesler.

Harry and my father were in same flight crew in training and on the first few missions. They became lifelong friends and Harry later spoke at his memorial service in the late 70s. My personally autographed and inscribed copy of "A Wing And A Prayer" is among my prized possessions. l'd never have gotten it autographed and inscribed if not for my aunt, who lived in Tamworth, NH, only few a miles from where Harry retired in Lovell, Maine. She told l "had to go visit him" and l'm forever grateful for her "order." Miss them all very much. You might recall that later in the War, as lead navigator for the entire 8th AF 1000 plane raids over Germany, Harry's solo decision to spare Bonn from being bombed as a "target of opportunity" because he'd recently read that Beethoven had grown up there. The fact the Bonn was barely touched by allied bombs and largely intact in 1945 caused it to chosen as the capital of postwar West Germany. When l read the story in his book as an adult, l recalled him telling the same story to my parents, many years earlier, when l was a wide eyed little boy.

@@frankmiller95 Thanks for the reply, I got interested in B24s when I found out our Great uncle was an Observer on one. Flying Officer Victor Edward Crowther RNZAF, he served with 224 Sqn. RAF Coastal Command. He was the squadron bombing leader. His aircraft crashed on the way home from an anti submarine sweep in the bay of Biscay. Six of the seven crew died, including Victor, he was only 24. The pilot was 21, the eldest on the crew was 26 and the only survivor was the tail gunner, he was 19. Their aircraft FK242, had fuel problems and they were diverted to a nearer airfield in Plymouth but the struck a couple of barrage balloons damaging the aircrafts wing. It was really poor weather and circling the air field the wingtip hit a tree causing it to cartwheel. It then slid across a field coming to rest on a stone banked wall near a farmhouse. Do a search for 'K-King, FK242, 30th October 1942'. I've been researching what it was like for the aircrews and that's why I got a copy of Harry's book. They are all heroes to me, to get in an airplane not knowing what was going to happen takes a lot of courage. But one thing that has struck me is how young they all were. Best wishes to you from NZ.

I have a copy of that book. I keep it as a reference.

I have it the audio version.

Судьба.

Really helps you to remember that they were really just kids as well!

Splitting the force was not the issue, Where the issue happened was the Schweinfurt force didn't launch because the Air Division doing it had not trained to take off in mist or fog. The Ravensburg attack force lead by Curtis Lemay's Air Division had practiced taking off in bad weather before the raid and they couldn't hang about as their landing airfields in North Africa would have been in darkness had they waited for the Schweinfurt force.

You're completely right. This was a typo in the captions. It should say that Lucky is the last surviving 'original' member of the 100th. Thankfully, there are a few 100th veterans still with us.

Was going to say this as well, there are multiple surviving members of the 100th

George McGovern, a US Senator and nominee for president was also a bomber pilot.

Thanks so was Tom Landry former coach of the Cowboys. FLY NAVY!!!@@your_royal_highness

Tom Landry former coach of the Dallas Cowboys was too. Andy Rooney also flew with the 8th as well. I'm sure there are probably more as this is why they were and still are "The Greatest Generation". FLY NAVY!!! @@your_royal_highness

I heard the weight of B-17s was so much so, that once it faced a certain angle when facing down, the G force is too strong to change direction and it’s a one way trip to the bottom. And most pilots feared this when getting shot at by flak, as the imapact/damage could cause a momentary dip of the nose to that dangerous angle of no return as no corrective action would help.

@Maxrodon The museum where I volunteer we have a photo of a B 17 with no nose yet the pilot got it back remarkable

A Quinn Martin Production

I was recently given a square D badge by no less than the current base commander of the 100th at Mildenhall. We had a lovely chat for about 15 minutes. As you say they are very proud of the 'D', and he did mention that the 100th are the only unit of the USAF that are permitted to continue to use their WW2 tail markings, such is their reputation. One of the crew with him said that there may be a TV documentary about the modern 100th ARW coming up in the next couple of years. 👍

*60, not thirty.

@@frankmiller95 I understand the Germans lost 62 aircraft. 30 B-17s didn't return, with a human toll of 38 aircrew MIA/KIA.

Lol maybe it’s a British “thing”? 😂

@@Puppy_Puppington Nope, its been mis spelled.

Wauwilermoos was a penal camp for internees, including Allied soldiers, among them members of the United States Army Air Forces, who were sentenced for attempting to escape from other Swiss camps for interned soldiers, or other criminal offences. Together with Hünenberg and Les Diablerets, Wauwilermoos was one of three Swiss penal camps for internees that were established in Switzerland during World War II. The intolerable conditions were later described by numerous former inmates and by various contemporary reports and studies

Lack of Moral Fibre or LMF was a punitive designation used by the Royal Air Force during the Second World War to stigmatize aircrew who refused to fly operations