The Lloyd G. Delaney Crew Robert Brown, Clarence Calvert, Ralph Rall, James Finnegan. Thanks to George Tolbert for this correction.

CREW JOINED 100TH 26 MAY 1944. ORIGINALLY ASSIGNED TO 349TH SQDN BUT MOVED TO 351ST SQDN. BEFORE START OF MISSIONS

GEORGE W. TOLBERT WRITES: (mpf 2001)
"AFTER A FEW INDOCTRINATION FLIGHTS, THE CREW WAS TRANSFERRED TO THE 351ST SQUADRON WHERE WE FLEW ALL OF OUR MISSIONS, MOST OF THEM IN "ALL AMERICAN GIRL". WE GOT HER SHOT UP SO BADLY AT MERSEBURG ON SEPT 28, 1944 THAT WE RETURNED ALONE HALF AN HOUR LATE AND WE HAD TO FINISH OUR LAST FEW FLIGHTS IN THE NEXT WEEK IN UNASSIGNED PLANES WITH THE ALUMINUM FINISH. "

"ON OUR LAST MISSION, OCT 6, 1944 (TARGET WAS BERLIN), WE FOUND OURSELVES IN THE TAIL END POSITION AND THE SQUADRON COMMANDER, WHO I THINK WAS MAJ. EMBERSON AT THE TIME BUT MAY HAVE BEEN MAJ. CRUVER, ASKED THE OPS OFFICER NEIL SCOTT, IF HE COULDN'T DO BETTER FOR US ON A RAID TO BERLIN. ON OUR LAST MISSION, HE MOVED US INTO THE UPPER SQUADRON AND THE ONE PLANE THAT WAS LOST THAT DAY WAS THE POOR CREW THAT MOVED INTO OUR OLD SPOT. FATE PLAYS STRANGE GAMES. "

S/Sgt Brown flew 15 missions before catching pneumonia. S/Sgt Tomaszewski moved from WG to TG. Crews were also reduced to 9 men around this time so S/Sgt Brown was put into the Spare gunners pool when he recovered. He was also trained to be a Toggelier and flew 5 missions at this position. (flew total of 20 missions)

Mission List from George Tolbert

“I do happen to have a list of the missions we flew as a crew. It is from "The Story of the Century" which has a listing of the 306 missions the Group flew and I made it by checking my Personal Flight Record (Form 5) about 50 years ago while still on flying status and ticking off those days on which I was shown to have flown. Unfortunately, it doesn't tell which plane we flew on that date, but most of our first thirty missions were in The All American Girl. All were in 1944. ”

Lt Delaney flew one mission as Copilot with Lt Massol on June 5, 1944 to Boulogne, France to gain combat experience before flying his first mission with his own crew.

Jun 6 Falaise, town (A) Our first. We were in the second wave that day.
Just a big traffic pattern and came home with our load. My thought, "This is easy. "
Jun 7 Nantes, bridge © The list shows no aircraft lost that day but I
Distinctly remember the plane in the echelon ahead of us blowing up and our flying through the
pieces of debris. My thought, "Hey, you can get hurt here."

Jun 20 Fallersleben © Motor transport
Jun 21 Basdorf (Berlin) © Aero engines
06/22 Paris © River docks
06/24 Grand Couronne © Rouen-Grand Couronne, oil depot
07/06 Fleury-Crepeuil © noball
07/07 Merseburg © oil refs
07/11 Munich © aero engines
07/12 Munich © industrial area
07/17 Auxerre © railway bridge
07/18 Unknown © Kiel, docks or Hemmingstedt, oil ref
07/20 Merseburg © oil ref
07/21 Regensburg © Aircraft factory, don't know if complete or abort
07/24 St. Lo (A) ground support (last mission of S/Sgt Brown-caught pneumonia)
07/25 St. Lo © ground support
07/31 Munich © aero engines
08/02 Tergnier, La Fere © railway bridges
08/03 Troyes © rail junction
08/04 Hamburg © oil refy
08/05 Magdeburg © tanks and aircrft factory
08/08 St. Sylvain ground def, don't know if complete or abort
08/13 Nantes-Gassicourt © roads
08/14 Ludwigshafen © oil plant
08/18 Pacy sur Armancon © oil dump
09/03 Brest © ground def
09/05 Stuttgart © aero engines
09/09 Dusseldorf © arms factory
09/25 Ludwigshafen © marshalling yard
09/28 Merseburg © oil refy. (See note)
09/30 Bielefeld © ordnance dump
10/02 Kassel © aero engines
10/03 - unknown © could have been Illesheim, Ludwigsburg or Nurnburg
10/05 Handorf (A) Air field
10/06 Berlin © factory

Note: Sep 28 was our last mission in The All American Girl. We were hit over the target and lost our No. 2 engine. A fire started but Lloyd managed to put it out. Due to loss of oil, we couldn't feather the engine so it was wind milling and the vibration was alarming. Then the prop shaft burned through so the engine stopped turning but the prop still was. Lloyd tried to shake it off by some violent maneuvers but to no avail. Due to the vibration and wind resistance we could fly at barely over stalling speed and by now the group was long out of sight and we were alone over Germany. More by good luck than by management we avoided any flak areas and did not attract the attention of some Jerry fighter. We were losing altitude all the while and debated whether we should try to make it to a field in the American area of northern France or keep on toward home. The majority voted to go on as long as we could as we wanted to get back for the 200th mission party soon to be held. Fortunately, things held together and we were able to land at Thorpe Abbots almost out of fuel and with the engine catching fire again as we landed almost half an hour after the rest of the group had landed. Needless to say, we were out of it as soon as it came to a stop and the fire was soon extinguished. When we finally got back to our hut we found our hut mates had already been through our things and sorted out some things they thought they could use, such as bottles of Scotch, cigarettes, chewing gum, chocolate, etc. That was our last trip in the Girl as it had to go in for major rework and we flew the rest of our sorties in borrowed aircraft.

George Tolbert writes:
"I really can't account for the gaps between missions. I remember we flew quite a few weather observation flights and radio relay missions, which, of course, didn't count towards our 25, which grew to 30 and then 35. I know they wanted us to train for lead crew status but Lloyd would have nothing of it; he wanted to get back home the quickest way. The closest we came was flying in 2nd element of lead flight as alternate bomb run lead. I am quite sure it was the latter part of August that we had our R&R leave and were supposed to go near Blackpool, as I remember, but we never got past London. There was always something to do there. I don't know what happened between Sep 9 and Sep 25, 1944.

Conversely, on Jul 12, after a mission to Munich the day before, we were supposed to get a stand-down so we celebrated at the club. It was quite a shock when they roused us out on the 12th to go to Munich again. I'm afraid we broke into our escape kits and took a pep pill to try to overcome a serious hangover. It worked as expected on me, but apparently Spud is one of those on whom it has an opposite effect. I can remember writing in my log, looking out both sides for fighters, and kicking Spud to try to keep him awake on the bomb run until we could get rid of our bombs. I often wish I had taken the trouble to keep a diary of those days, but I was only living life one day at a time and didn't really expect to be around to read it. As you can see, I was proven wrong and now regret it."

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