a/c B-17 231548 D

Submitted by Timothy Lloyd

SSGT Richard G. Lloyd was the tailgunner on Shu Shu Baby.  This account was written by his son Timothy Lloyd based on research and memories of what his father had described to him regarding his final mission.

April 11th 1944

My dad was a tail gunner on a B-17 in the 325th Bomb Squadron, 92nd Bomb Group. The plane was named the "Shu Shu Baby," after the Pilot, Donald Shufeldt. They flew out of a base located in Podington, Northhamptonshire, England.

The initial target on April 11th was Brunswick Germany. The secondary target was Stettin, Germany.

My dads crew was the same crew he trained with in the states except on this, their eighth mission, there was a fill-in Co-Pilot because the crews regular Co-Pilot was ill. My dad and another crew member claimed that they had a Signal Corps Motion Picture Cameraman on board as well although records do not substantiate this.

My dads plane was 548

Low Squadron of High Composite Group
325th Squadron

263 O Easley

587 G Mikesell
548 D Shufeldt

044 L Weaver

240 P Rasmussen 851 J Burdge

248 B Fortson


Group Bombardier's Report
Bombing accomplished visually on a target of opportunity with good results.
The bomb sight of the lead bombardier was synchronized with MP2 [sic], reference point 015054/8.
On the bomb run extremely accurate flak not only bounced the lead a/c around in the air viciously, but one fragment entered the AFCE set, destroying it and causing a shallow dive.
This left the lead bombardier trying to accomplish a manual run.
On this manual run a very close burst of gunfire tilted the a/c more than 20 degrees from position and tumbled the bombsight gyro, resulting in a loss of the horizon.

The 92nd group led the 40th Wing and also had seven a/c fly as low squadron of the high group. All a/c except one bombed visually on the target of opportunity, which was the industrial area of Stettin. One a/c bombed six minutes late due to malfunction of bomb release. Both primary and secondary targets obscured by 8/10 cloud cover. Friendly fighter support was good, but in several areas insufficient to cope with the strong e/a opposition. A/c 649 from this group seen to go down in flames from the first e/a attack just west of Hannover. Four other 17s seen to go down in flames at approximately the same time, six chutes coming from one and five from another. Five other 17s seen to go down in flames at 1105 about twelve miles north of Brunswick. Three of these a/c are believed to be from this group, 044, which exploded; 248, which remained under control long enough for ten chutes to get out; and 587, which went down with left wing on fire. It is believed possibly ten chutes came from this a/c. 17 from 351st group with no apparent damage seen to turn away from formation and head for Sweden at 5430-0655 at 1334 hours. What appeared to be occupied dinghy was observed 14 miles NE of Great Yarmouth at 1718 hours. Eight of our a/c are missing.

My dads ball turret gunner claimed a kill:
Claims
Sgt. Roland H. Paquette - 325 Sq - BT
pilot Shufeldt
Me 109
Hamburg area
corroborated by Samuel Penfield - LE
considered destroyed.

My Dad was wounded in the upper rear end by Flak Shrapnel and as he explained later, he thought someone on the plane had punched him extremely hard and that he turned around, incensed that someone would be “fooling around” at such a time, only to find no one there. It was then he realized that he was wounded.

Out of ammunition, the B-17 was hit and lost an engine. The replacement Co-Pilot failed to properly feather the engine and the plane shook violently. To make matters worse, they were being trailed by a German JU 88, after lagging behind the group. According to my talks with Lt. Joe Tobin, the Shu Shu Baby’s navigator, the German plane was surrealistically firing right through the fuselage of the B-17 and miraculously hitting no one. he said that "sparks were flying". To further add to their problems, another engine was hit on the other side and again the replacement co-pilot failed to properly feather the engine. The plane was really shaking now.

I remember my dad telling me a strange part of the story which was later substantiated by Navigator Tobin that my dad would always take lots of reading material, newspapers and such on their missions because he’d get bored being all alone in the tail for many hours of flight over to the target and back.
Apparently when my dad ran out of ammunition and the JU 88 was peppering the B-17 from the rear, panicked, he tore up the newspapers in small pieces and would release them periodically as if to simulate smoke from gun fire. After my dad passed away I contacted Joe Tobin and he had much the same story. He couldn’t help wonder if that was why the German JU 88 never closed in on the B-17. The German thought the crippled B-17 still had ammo.
The German plane was eventually chased off by American P-51’s which then had to leave for fuel reasons and the Shu Shu Baby was on her own.

The decision was made to try to make it to Sweden and away they flew. Vibrating away from the direction of the Group, away from fighter support and away from home.

As they neared Sweden it became apparent that they were desperately low on fuel and they threw everything that they could, out of the plane. Machine guns etc, including the motion picture camera that the Signal Corps. Cameraman was using during the entire bomb run. They tried to jettison the bottom ball turret but it hung up.

As they neared Sweden, horror took over as they spotted a sky full of Me 109’s! Soon they realized that the aggressive 109’s had Swedish markings. The B-17 was ordered down by a close flying Swedish pilot and they eventually landed on a Swedish airfield that had a large number of B-17’s parked on the fields perimeter.

Once landed, a truck load of Swedish soldiers approached the plane and with rifles drawn they surrounded the emerging bombers crew. A Swedish officer approached and asked for the pilot to step forward. He told Lt. Don Shufeldt that the men are considered prisoners of war in a neutral country and that they would be interned for the duration of the war. He then requested that the pilot taxi the bomber to the perimeter and he would then join his crew in being processed in as prisoners of war. As the crew moved off, they watched as Lt. Shufeldt began to taxi the bomber when suddenly the ball turret dropped and jammed under the B-17 becoming stuck and halting the plane. The Swedish officer was laughably irate. He could not believe it! He was hopping mad. He wanted that plane OFF of his runway! Shufeldt got out of the plane and they all left to be processed, never to see the bomber again. They barely made it.

My dad was separated from the rest of the crew because he was hospitalized for his wound. The rest of the crew stayed together while interned and my dad never re-united with them.

My dad loved his year in Sweden. It wasn’t long after he was there that he was contacted by an individual who told him that he would be flown out under secrecy eventually and to always be ready to go. About a year later he was contacted and told to be ready late that night where he was taken to a field in the country. He waited along with other American flyers when a black B-24 landed. It had no markings, no guns and was piloted by an American civilian. They were all flown back to England and processed back into the AAF. My dad never flew missions after that because if you were caught by the Germans you could be shot as an escaped prisoner of war. My dad was retired to a desk job of some sort. I talked to his waist gunner years ago and he said they made him a mechanic and wasn’t too happy about it!



SWEDEN

As I said, my dad loved Sweden. He could pretty much go where ever he wanted and he liked the people. The Swedes had a different culture and lifestyle back then. An unusual encounter happened when he met a very proper, beautiful Swedish girl and dated her briefly. She asked one day if he would like to meet her parents who lived on a farm. My dad went and had a great time with this very generous family. After dinner, my dad excused himself and said he had to get back to town before it was too late and he would miss the curfew. The father would not hear of it and invited my dad to sleep over. Later, when bedtime rolled around my dad asked where he would be sleeping and the father replied “with her” pointing to his daughter!

My dad said that he would be in bars or taverns and often might be sitting next to a German soldier. It wasn’t unusual to brush shoulders with them. He said that he only saw one in full uniform though. He and a friend were drunk, in a hotel elevator when a full dressed German Officer entered the elevator with a Swedish girl. My dads friend, also an American AAF "POW," took out his comb and did his best Hitler imitation , mustache, salute and all. Sieg Heil! Needless to say the German wasn’t too thrilled. He and his girl got off on the next floor.

My dad also said that the Swedes leaned toward Germany during the war. He said that they were often trying to find out information from American flyers. Any new weapons? New planes? Etc.

My dads navigator, Lt. Joe Tobin told me he was on a train one night moving through the cars to find a seat when he came into a car and sat down, not noticing who was in the car. When he looked up he saw the train car full of fully uniform German combat soldiers in white parkas. He was shocked and realized they were being moved through Sweden from Finland with the knowledge of the Swedish government. Joe also realized that he had on a lapel pin that was American. He got up and proceeded to mosey on back to the cars that were carrying civilians.

My dad enjoyed Sweden. Lucky to be alive, he said that he spent the best year of his life there.

 

a/c B-17 231548 D

"Shu Shu Baby"
Damaged and diverted to Sweden