Every Day a Nightmare: American Pursuit Pilots in the Defense of Java, 1941-1942

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: “Give Us Twenty-four Hours to Get Out of This God-damned Place”

322 CHAPTER SIXTEEN “Give Us Twenty-four Hours to Get Out of This God-damned Place” looking down from the high-flying B-17E, Frank Kurtz could make out the northwestern coastline of Australia in the brilliant moonlight. It was 0200 on Monday, March 2, some seven hours after Lieutenant Vandevanter had taken his ship out of Jogjakarta loaded down with evacuees. To Kurtz the coast looked like flat desert only, bathed in “a ghostly hue.1 Continuing south, Vandevanter soon made out what he figured should be Broome. As he descended and circled the area, flares suddenly lit up the night sky, providing a path for the B-17 to come in to the field. It appeared that men in a moving auto were throwing kerosene flares out of the vehicle to indicate the perimeters of the runway for him. After the Flying Fortress touched down for an uneventful landing, Kurtz joined Colonel Eubank and the others, including the Ngoro pursuit veterans Ed Kiser, Jack Dale, Joe Kruzel, Ben Irvin, Bill Hennon, Jim Morehead, Andy Reynolds, Bob Dockstader, and Les Johnsen, and headed for the field’s long hangar. Drowsy after the long night flight, they were hoping for a few hours’ sleep on terra firma. But sleeping would prove impossible; there were too many mosquitoes buzzing about, disturbing their slumber. Giving up, Kurtz arose and looked out the hangar door. The first pale light of dawn was breaking . He could make out a general store, a gas station, two horses, and the hangar shack “perched on the edge of nothing.” Striking up a conversation with an old sheep rancher who approached him, Kurtz inquired if there had been “any trouble” at Broome. “No,” the Australian replied, except that Japanese planes had been coming over once in a while. In fact, he added, one had flown over that very night, very high.2 24 Hours to Get Out 323 After the others awoke, too, Kurtz and the evacuees and B-17E crew joined Lt. Col. Dick Legg and his staff for breakfast. When Kurtz mentioned to Legg that he had heard that a Japanese reconnaissance plane was over Broome the night before, Legg—in charge of Broome’s evacuation operations—did not seem to know about it. After his aircraft was refueled, Vandevanter immediately took off with the Java evacuees for Perth, another eleven hundred miles to the south, on the way to Melbourne, their ultimate destination.3 By now, another five B-17s and two LB-30s that had left Jogjakarta with evacuees late the night before had landed. On bringing his B-17E in at about 0600, Ed Teats told Paul Gambonini, Ed Gilmore, Bob McWherter, and the other evacuees to help roll out gas drums to the ship from the fuel truck so that the Broome ground crews could get the Fortress gassed up quickly. Like Vandevanter, Teats wanted to get off for Perth as soon as possible. On takeoff after a quick breakfast for all, Gambonini was standing between Teats and the copilot in the cockpit, ready to fill in for one or the other to allow him to go back and get some sleep on the long haul south.4 Ed Green’s and Dick Beck’s B-17Es also took off for Perth after being serviced , as did the two LB-30s piloted by Elbert Helton and Murray Crowder. But after landing at 0630, Duane Skiles was not able to take his B-17E, No. 41– 2454, off to Perth. It needed work on its defective brakes first. In bringing it in, Skiles had feared he would need to make a crash landing, but he managed B-17Es lined up at Broome Airfield, March 2, 1942, after having flown FEAF evacuees out of Java. Courtesy Victor Poncik. 324 Chapter Sixteen to develop enough braking to stop in time. Harold Smelser’s No. 41–2449 was being held on the ground, too. Only those ships serviced by noon were being allowed to proceed to Perth and on to Melbourne, and although Smelser had brought his B-17E in at 0710, it still had not been gassed up when the noon hour arrived. Smelser and his crew were ordered to wait overnight.5 Delays in servicing all the aircraft bringing evacuees in from Java were becoming a real problem for Legg and his staff. Maj. Ray Schwanbeck and his maintenance section, assisted...