Shot down 9 October 1942 in B-17 #41-24510 while serving as Engineer/Top Turret Gunner. Evaded to Spain. Aircraft attacked by fighters which killed pilot Olsen and copilot Gates. Assigned target Lille I/A, France. Plane crashed near Nechin, Belgium. His story was published in Time Magazine, September 6, 1943.





His twin brother Erwin was in the 367th BS and flew on John Olson crew. Darwin's most unusual experience: 'was when I saw my twin brother shot down on our first combat mission. Their plane was flying to the right side of ours. We were attacked by German fighter planes and their plane was the first plane hit. It seemed to me that the whole top part of the plane blew off in an explosion and then the airplane went into a spin falling towards the ground. I watched until it was out of sight and did not see any parachutes come out. That evening when back to England a gunner from a plane behind our squadron came to me and said he saw two parachutes from the plane my brother was in. Somehow I knew Erwin was one of them. One day, several months later while I was a Prisoner of War (POW) at Stalag 7A, a group of American airmen who had just been shot down were broght to the Prisoner of War (POW) camp where I was. Two of them saw me and said 'Erwin, how did you get here?' It was then I learned Erwin had returned to England alive. I learned he had managed to get into the French underground and with their help made his way to Gibraltar. There he hitched a ride to Engalnd on a B-17 bomber which was later shot down on a mission over Germany. These two men who thought I was Erwin were part of the bomber crew who gave Erwin the ride back to England.'