My dad, George Edwin Farrar, was a waist gunner on a B-17 crew based in England during WWII. I have written extensively about his bomb group, the 384th of the 8th Army Air Force, his base in Grafton Underwood, and his crew piloted by John Oliver “Jay” Buslee.
While many people are familiar with the makeup of a B-17 crew, many are unaware that by the time that Daddy was flying his missions, a B-17 crew was generally made up of nine airmen instead of ten. The crew positions were:
- Pilot
- Co-pilot
- Navigator
- Bombardier
- Radio Operator
- Engineer/Top Turret Gunner
- Ball Turret Gunner
- Tail Gunner
- Waist Gunner (originally two were assigned to each crew, but during Daddy’s time, the crews flew with only one)
And the crews on each mission were not always made up of the same original crew members that were trained together and assigned to the group together. In fact, on the sixteen missions my father completed before becoming a POW, he served with thirty-two different crewmates.
I have written about them before, so today will be a recap, a list only, of who they were. I’ll follow up next week with Part 2 which will include a photo of each man.
6 Crewmates who served in the cockpit of the B-17: Commanders, Pilots, and Co-Pilots
- Buslee, John Oliver, 15 missions
- Albrecht, David Franklin, 13 missions
- Fairfield, William Adelbert, 1 mission
- Reed, William M, 1 mission
- Shwery, Arthur J, 1 mission
- Springsted, Donald George, 1 mission
11 Crewmates who served in the nose of the B-17: Navigators, Bombardiers, and Toggliers
- Davis, James Buford, 11 missions
- Rybarczyk, Chester Anthony, 9 missions
- Henson, William Alvin, 3 missions
- Stearns, Robert Sumner, 2 missions
- Fryden, Marvin, 1 mission
- Galloway, Leonard (NMI), 1 mission
- Jacobs, Edward Gregory, 1 mission
- Jacobson, George John, 1 mission
- Leschak, Nickolas, 1 mission
- Lord, Kenneth Smith, 1 mission
- Ward, Donald L, 1 mission
3 Crewmates who served in the radio room of the B-17: Radio Operators
- Peluso, Sebastiano Joseph, 14 missions
- Meyer, Melvin J, 1 mission
- Sherriff, Albert Keith, 1 mission
3 Crewmates who served in the top turret just behind the pilots of the B-17: Engineers/Top Turret Gunners
- Bryant, Lenard Leroy, 14 missions
- Murphy, William C, 1 mission
- Seeley, Clarence Benjamin, 1 mission
5 Crewmates who served in the ball turret of the B-17: Ball Turret Gunners
- Foster, Erwin Vernon, 6 missions
- Miller, Irving L, 5 missions
- Mitchell, Robert McKinley, 2 missions
- Watson, Paul Leland, 2 missions
- McMann, George Francis, 1 mission
4 Crewmates who served in the tail of the B-17: Tail Gunners
- Lucynski, Eugene Daniel, 11 missions
- Andersen, Gerald Lee, 3 missions
- La Chine, Lloyd Earl, 1 mission
- Macuch, Albert Richard, 1 mission
To be continued next week…
© Cindy Farrar Bryan and The Arrowhead Club, 2020
The Arrowhead Club 