The B-24D Liberator, 42-40787, Vagabond King, was in the 565th Bombing Squadron, the 389th Bomb Group, in the the 8th Air Force in the U.K. It's primary pilots were Copilot Lt. Doyle Hicks, and Lt. John McCormick. They Arrived overseas, 21 Jun 43, and flew their first mission on, 9 Jul 43, temporarily detached (TDY) to the 9th Air Force in Benghazi, Libya, for Operation Tidal Wave, the mission to destroy the oil refineries at Ploesti, Romania. The,Vagabond King, piloted by Lt. McCormick and Lt. Hicks, successfully bombed their target and returned to base (RTB).



Sunday August 1, 1943, over Ploesti, Romania, in German occupied Europe: On it's bomb run into the target, Vagabond King, the B-24D Liberator, 42-40787, shook from the flak concussions, the flak shell splinters hitting it's structure, and from the roaring of its four Pratt & Whitney R-1830 fourteen cylinder radial engines. 1st.Lt. John McCormick swore as SSgt.Van Buren, his radioman and top turret gunner, opened up with his twin fifties on the flak batteries ahead of them. He was affecting the bomb run, and McCormick really wanted to hit this target, the Steaua Romana oil refinery at Campina, north of Ploesti. McCormick barked out his orders to his crew, just as he had done so often, in the past two weeks, when the 389th Bomb Group practiced for Operation Tidal Wave over the hot Libyan desert outside of Benghazi.



Now, approaching his target for real, McCormick yelled over the intercom to the bombardier, 1st Lt. Marvin Mosco, "Mosco, bomb bay doors open !" and, "Start the camera, Van !", (one of the movie cameras filming the mission out of the backs of a number of B-24s flying the mission). McCormick and Copilot Doyle Hicks, were concentrating hard on the waypoints to the target, coming at them fast, along with watching their height and course, as their big Liberator roared along the deck, with full throttles and 225 mile per hour, not far behind Capt. R.C. Mooney's plane, Hitler's Hearse, immediately ahead, close enough so that Mooney's bombs, with their 45 second delay fuses, wouldn't blow up under, Vagabond King's, nose. It was a man made hell down at their 250 foot altitude, with thick black smoke and walls of fire everywhere around them, from the bombs previously dropped on their targets by the 389th's planes ahead of them. Suddenly, McCormick, yelled, "Bombs away, Mosco!". Immediately, Bombardier Lt. Mosco toggled the bombs, and the, Vagabond King, jumped up in the air, 4,000 pounds lighter. At that instant, Hitler's Hearse, ahead of them, took several direct flak hits, killing it's pilot, Capt. Mooney, almost instantly. As more flak shell splinters tore into his own bomber, Lt. McCormick hoped the workers at Consolidated's San Diego plant had been paying attention when they built his plane. They had. Consolidated's planes were known as among the best of the several manufacturers' airplanes. The, Vagabond King, was flying on, so far, but it was taking a lot of damaging hits. An anti aircraft shell splinter suddenly hit Sgt.Van Buren, in his chest, in his top turret gunner position, and he was bleeding badly. Doyle, McCormick, and Lt. Mosco had hit the target squarely. Sgt. Paul Miller, the A-6 power tail turret gunner, reported that their particular target, the Steaua Romana boiler house, had been flattened and was burning fiercely. Leaving the target area, with their throttles still at war emergency power, McCormick and Doyle dropped down again to just 20 feet off the deck as they made their getaway from Campina, knowing the Romanian and German fighters couldn't dive on them down that low.



The two pilots and the, Vagabond King, headed south, knowing they couldn't make home base, badly damaged, and desperate for medical attention for the wounded SSgt. Van Buren. They flew south over Turkey and touched down at the British air base at Nicosia, Cyprus, fourteen hours after they had taken off, just after dark. They were among the small group of the lucky survivor planes. Of 78 B-24's in their bomb groups, the 389th Sky Scorpions, the 44th, and the 98th Bomb groups, that took off that morning, one, John Young's, Kickapoo, crashed on takeoff, and 54 others didn't come back from the mission (FTR).



Like so many of the 8th Air Force's planes, that survived Operation Tidal Wave, and returned to England after the Ploesti mission, Vagabond King, was later shot down and lost over Europe, shot down over the North Sea by FW-190 fighters, on a mission to Oslo, Norway, with, Vagabond King's entire crew Killed In Action. 11 KIA. 18 Nov 1943. MACR 2885

The Vagabond King's crew when it went down in the North Sea. (* Not in picture)



McCormick, John B. - Capt.

Mendelsohn, Marvin R. - 1st Lt.

Mosco, Marvin - 1st Lt.

Raines, Lewis H. - S/Sgt.

Murphy, Gerald E. - SSgt.

Budai, William J. - SSgt.

Rossi, Alfred B. - Sgt.



*Chelini, Enrico - 2nd Lt.

*Tourison, Charles W. - 2nd Lt. - Co-Pilot

*Turnipseed, Donald E. - TSgt.

*Scott, Kenneth R. - SSgt.