Staff Sergeant Joe Morris Johnson was a B-25 Aerial Engineer and Gunner with the 321st Bomb Group; 448th Bomb Squadron; stationed in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO) during WW II. His Hometown was Kopperl, Bosque County, Texas

Monday, 17 April 1944

448th BS Mission Summary: (Ops Order 302/mission 301) Group Mission # 264: Mission 215 (264). At 08:35 27 planes off to bomb RR bridge 2 miles S of Attigliano and dropped 96 x 1000 bombs from 10,500 feet at 10:30. One plane was lost and the rest returned at 11:45. Captain Crowell the leader of the flight was hit in the Navigator’s compartment by flak and was soon going down under control over the target. The tail of Captain Crowell’s ship was shot off (#655). Two to five chutes were reported to have opened by the rest of the formation, the plane crashed just N of town. In spite of very turbulent air and the flight leader being shot down just before the target bombs were observed hitting both NE and SE approaches with several direct hits reported on the bridge itself. Some bombs fell short and over. Flak: Heavy, intense and accurate, starting at IP and going to target. Weather: Hazy. F/L: Capt. Crowell.

448th BS: Extracts from Missing Air Crew Report # 4193:

A/C No. 42-64655 (MACR-4193 - shot down)

Pilot: Crowell, Weymouth (NMI), Jr., Capt - KIA

Co-Pilot: Elliott, Floyd A., 2Lt - POW, liberated and RTD

Navigator: Hough, William S., 2Lt - MIA, evaded enemy and RTD 10 Jun 44

Bombardier: Kreutz, Alfred W., 2Lt - KIA

Engineer: Johnson, Joe Morris, S/Sgt - KIA

Radio Operator: Doss, Charles W., Jr., S/Sgt - KIA

Gunner: Graham, Herbert J., S/Sgt - KIA

F (Photographer): None

Excerpt from Casualty Questionnaire: Hough, William S., 2Lt, navigator, 448th BS

I feel that this report would be incomplete without a description of how the actual occurrence happened. We flew the course exactly as briefed and had reached the vicinity of the target. Capt. Crowell had leveled the airplane off on the bomb run and Lt. Kreutz was adjusting his sight on the target. The plane was hit by two direct A.A. on the tail assembly, and lost the complete unit. Then the plane climbed out of control and fell off on its back. Capt. Crowell succeeded in getting the ship off its back and out of a spin with the use of ailerons and engines alone. At his command I bailed out through the front hatch, and as I left he was still attempting to hold the aircraft under control in order to give the rest of the crew a chance to jump. The bombardier, Lt. Kreutz had the presence of mind to close the bombay doors before trying to climb up the narrow, slippery crawlway that leads from the nose to the pilot’s cockpit. As I passed underneath the ship I had a clear view of the damage; the entire rear from the bombay aft was riddled and the entire tail assembly was gone. It is my belief that the gunners were either killed or too badly injured to try to jump. After my chute opened, I watched one other chute open up and then the ship crashed by the outskirts of a small Italian town. I landed in an orchard about two miles from the crash, and it was around five minutes after I had landed that the ship blew up. I succeeded in getting rid of my chute and making my way to a hiding place in a drainage ditch some distance from where I had hit the ground. Somehow, although I heard several patrols and actually saw four Fascist soldiers, I was not discovered. I was unable to contact the other member of my crew and I thought it best to start out of the vicinity by the escape route upon which we had been briefed. The rest was my personal troubles and did not include the rest of the crew.

W. S. Hough

1st Lt. A.C. (Res. Inactive)

0-701371

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Eyewitness Account: Denman, John L., 2Lt, pilot, 447th BS

448th BOMBARDMENT SQUADRON (M) AAF

321st BOMBARDMENT GROUP (M) AAF

A.P.O. # 650

18 April 1944

I was flying in the 3rd element, 2nd flight, and the 2nd plane

I didn’t see the plane get hit, but I saw it just after it was hit, when it pulled to the right of the formation and went upwards to almost a stalling position, and as it seemed to hang there, I could see that the left stabilizer was gone.

It was then started down, falling about 1000 feet level with the nose slightly pointed downward. It then went to practically a flat spin, falling approximately 4000 feet in this position. Then it seemed to partially come under control, and it was at this point that I saw five (5) parachutes begin to open.

We then went into a steep bank to the left and therefore impossible for me to follow either the ship or the parachutes.

JOHN L. DENMAN, 0-807511

2nd Lieut., Air Corps,

Co-pilot, 447th Bomb. Sq. (M)

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Eyewitness Account: Hajny, Zdenek (NMI), S/Sgt, engineer-gunner, 448th BS

448th BOMBARDMENT SQUADRON (M) AAF

321st BOMBARDMENT GROUP (M) AAF

A.P.O. # 650

18 April 1944

The first I knew that airplane 42-64655 was hit, was when her rudder went past our side, then I saw the ship go by us on her back She turned right side up and went into a slow flat wide spiral down.

One man parachuted after the first spiral and about ten seconds later a second parachute opened, and the ship crashed in the north end of the town NNE of the target, bursting into flames immediately upon impact.

ZDENEK HAJNY,

S/Sgt., Air Corps,

Engineer-Gunner

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Joe M Johnson