Pacifica Military History Free Sample Chapters.pmd

Free Sample Chapters 59
the Philippines, but by December 7 one-third of the group—Tom Hayes
included—had not yet shipped out. In January 1942, Hayes’s group of
pilots, crew chiefs, armorers, and P-40 fighters ended up on Java,
battling the Japanese. On February 19, Hayes was shot down by a
Japanese Zero fighter and severely injured. He was evacuated to
Australia just as the American survivors of the one-sided air battles
were being withdrawn. After recuperating from his injuries, Hayes helped
to recommission the 35th Pursuit Group. He flew Bell P-39 Airacobras
with the 35th in New Guinea until he was ordered home in October
1942 to help prepare newly trained fighter pilots for the rigors of combat
flying in the Pacific.
After completing a month-long War Bond tour, Captain Hayes was
assigned as a flight leader to a P-39 replacement training group in
northern California. In May 1943, he was selected by the commander
of the new 357th Fighter Group to replace a squadron commander who
had been killed in a training accident. Hayes assumed command of the
364th Fighter Squadron in Tonopah, Nevada, and helped train the new
P-39 unit. By October 1, 1944, the 357th Fighter Group was ready to
ship out from its base at Marysville, California; it had been trained to
perfection and was, in every respect, ready to go to war. Instead, the
group was ordered to leave immediately for several bomber bases in
Nebraska, Wyoming, and North Dakota.
*
We didn’t know what was going on. It turned out that we had been
scheduled all along to ship out to England on October 1. The new groups
bound for England were scheduled to complete their phases of train-ing
every six weeks and then move on to new bases. But, as we eventually
learned, we couldn’t go straight to England because our base there was
not ready. We were sent to the upper Midwest to mark time. As long as
we were there, we kept up our flying skills by simulating German fighter
attacks against heavy bombers. That helped get the B-17 and B-24 crews
certified a little more quickly for deployment overseas. The stopover
turned out to be of great value. We quickly learned that the war-time
shortage of small-arms ammunition had caused a huge increase in the
local population of pheasant and other game birds, so fifteen or twenty