Latest content added for UNT Digital Library Location: England - Northamptonshire County - Kettering District - Grafton Underwood

Oral History Interview with David L. Rucker, July 16, 2000

2024-09-26T16:19:56-05:00

Interview with David L. Rucker, Army Air Forces veteran (346th Bomb Squadron, 384th Bomb Group, 8th Air Force), concerning his experiences as a B-17 pilot in the European Theater during World War II. His enrollment in the Civilian Pilot Training Program, 1940; enlistment in the Aviation Cadet Program, 1942; Aviation Cadet Classification Center, San Antonio, Texas, 1942; pre-flight training, San Antonio, 1942-43; primary flight training, Cimarron Field, Oklahoma City, 1943; basic flight training, Strother Army Air Base, Winfield, Kansas, 1943; advanced flight training, Altus, Oklahoma, 1943; bomber transition training, Sebring, Florida, 1943; crew formation at Dalhart, Texas, 1944; troopship to England, 1944; assignment to the 384th Bomb Group, Station 106, Grafton Underwood, England; bombing missions over France in preparation for the D-Day landings; his observations from the air of the D-Day landings; mission to Stettin, Germany, May 13, 1944; rotation back to the States after his thirty-first mission on July 6, 1944; postwar career in business.

Oral History Interview with Robert Bruce Kilmer, May 26, 2001

2024-07-30T09:19:39-05:00

Interview with Robert Bruce Kilmer, Army Air Forces veteran (547th Bomb Squadron, 389th Bomb Group, 8th Air Force), concerning his experiences as a B-17 pilot in the European Theater during World War II; also his experiences with the French Resistance and as a prisoner-of-war in Germany. His educational background; his reaction to the Pearl Harbor attack; enlistment in the Aviation Cadet Program, April, 1942; basic training, Kelly Field, San Antonio, Texas, 1942; primary flight training, Sikeston, Missouri, 1942; basic flight training, Majors Field, Greenville, Texas, 1942; advanced flight training, Pampa, Texas, 1942-43; B-17 transition training, Windover, Utah, 1943; stationing at Grafton Underwood, England, 1943; his description of preparations for a bombing mission; post-mission debriefings; description of missions and his getting shot down, October 14, 1943; rescue by the French Resistance and his six-month experience operating with them; capture by the Gestapo and incarceration at Fresnes Prison, Paris; solitary confinement and interrogation at Wiesbaden, Germany; transfer to Dulag Luft, Frankfurt, Germany, for further interrogation by the Luftwaffe, 1943; transfer to Stalag Luft-III, Sagan, Germany, 1943; physical description of Stalag Luft-III and his compound; daily life in the POW camp; value of Red Cross parcels; evacuation and forced march to Nürnberg, Germany, January, 1945; forced march to Moosburg, Germany, 1945; liberation and reunion with his brother at Moosburg; processing at Camp Lucky Strike, Le Havre, France, and return to the States by troopship.

Oral History Interview with W. D. Whitson, November 15, 1995

2021-11-22T07:04:56-06:00

Transcript of an interview with William D. Whitson, a businessman and an Army Air Corps veteran (442nd Bomb Squadron, 8th Air Force), from Denton, Texas, concerning his experiences as a B-17 pilot in the European Theater during World War II. Whitson discusses flight training, his flight from the U.S. to Grafton-Underwood, England, his personal relationship with Curtis Le May, his missions and German defenses, his nineteenth mission and crash landing, and his twenty-fifth mission.