Shot down 10 October 1943 in B-17 #42-30830 "M'lle Zig Zag", Prisoner of War.

John Clarence 'Bucky 'Egan was everybody's idea of the devil-may-care wartime bomber pilot. Pictures of him hat askew, often with a moustache, he was the role model for for the newly arrived air crews joining the 100th Bomber Group at Thorpe Abbots. It all began for Egan in March 1940 as a Flying Cadet at Randolph Field Texas as it did for Gale Cleven who was to go with him all the way. In November of that year he was promoted 2nd Lieutenant in the Air Corps Reserve and in April 1942 made it to 1st Lieutenant and to the 29th Bombardment Group as an Instructor. That August he was promoted to Captain and posted to Gowan Army Air Field as Operations Officer for the 100th BG. In May 1943 - by then a Major - he flew with the advance party to England, flew two missions with the 305th Bomb Group at Chelveston and in June took over command of the 418th Bomber Squadron at Thorpe Abbotts.

Egan in his trademark sheepskin jacket flew on some dozen combat missions with the 100th, usually in the co-pilot's seat. As written up by navigator Harry Crosby in 'A Wing and a Prayer' he and Gale Cleven were 'Air Corps raunch, their hats cocked on the back of their heads, ...both wearing white scarves, the souls of romanticism....hated discipline'. In 'Splasher Six the newsletter of the Group Egan is described as 'a lean dark young man with a wisp of a
27 but looked older'. He could turn on the charm and turn it off whenever he liked'. He frequented the local pub in Dickleburgh sometimes rolling up in a jeep, then singing songs in the bar with the locals. The nickname' Bucky' was aquired when as a cadet he reminded a team-mate of someone known as Bucky - 3 of the cadets would henceforth be known by that soubriquet, one of them being Gale Cleven.

Egan was present on the ill-famed Regensburg raid of August 17th 1943 when nine B-17's in the Group went down. He described the experience later 'We were under fighter attack for three and a half hours and saw three Fortresses immediately around us shot down between the German border and the target. No one turned back, although some of us thought we were as good as dead'. The survivors landed as planned in North Africa 'I never saw such a feeling of fraternity as when we landed.

Everyone shook hands and slapped each other on the back, then stamped on the good solid earth'. It was not long after that that the Group became known as the 'Bloody Hundredth'. In the first two weeks of October the Group was again decimated, in three operations the Group lost almost one hundred men, only three of the 140 officers who had arrived four months earlier were still operational. On The Munster raid of October 10th Egan was Command Pilot -sitting in the right hand seat - on John Brady's lead crew in 'Mlle Zigzag' when they were attacked by over two hundred FW 190's which harried them for 45 minutes; Pilot Lt Robert Rosenthal in 'Rosie's Riveters' was the only plane that got back to base be it on two engines and with two badly wounded crewmen on board. Two days earlier Cleven had gone down on a raid over Bremen and - according to Crosby - Egan had the following day badgered their commanding officer demanding to lead the next mission and avenge his buddy.

The Group had lost 20 bombers and two hundred men missing or killed in the space of one week (Roger Freeman) Egan his wish being one of that number. When he eventually arrived at Stalag Luft III, Cleven reputedly greeted him with the words 'What the Hell took you so long?' The two buddies were to spend the next eighteen months as POWs in each other's company.

Stalag Luft III, located some hundred miles south east of Berlin, had been the home of downed RAF airmen since 1942 and the aim of one occupant - Squadron Leader Roger Bushell- was to tie up as many Germans as possible in hunting escaped POW's. He had initially escaped in October 1942 but was re-captured. He put the experience to good use and was the instigator for the long term planning of tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry which were eventually to be used in the 'great' escape of March 1944. Three men got away, of the 76 captured as they emerged from the tunnel fifty were shot on Hitler's personal orders.

There were some USAAF airmen in the camp by December 1942, initially living in the East compound, as numbers grew the camp was enlarged, Americans mostly in the South and West compounds. Following the mass escape attempt controls tightened, the Luftwaffe camp commandant Colonel Friedric von Lindeiner-Wildau was dismissed and the SS became more involved with the running of the camp. Post D-Day escape attempts were rare, the senior Allied officers in the compounds tightly controlled all covert activities and supplies.

During the winter months 1944/45 nobody knew what to expect as the Allies were advancing from the west and the Russians closing in from the east. Red Cross parcels were few and far between, the weather was particularly severe and the prisoners saved rations and made preparations for all eventualities. On 17th January 1945 the Germans broadcast news of the Russian advances, the men stepped up preparations and on the evening of January 27th the order came to evacuate. An estimated 10,000 men marched out of Sagan in a line fifteen miles long.

The horrors of that journey in freezing temperatures are well documented as the roads west became jammed up with fleeing German civilians as well as the vast numbers of POWs. There was often nowhere to shelter at night, frostbite and dysentery rampant and the guards trigger happy.

Some men did get away, many more died. The men from Sagan were on the road for five days and nights - Egan recalled one night spent in a 'building so infested with bugs that the bunks and straw mattresses were moving by themselves' before being entrained for Moosburg. Somewhere along the way Gale Cleven got away.

Egan got back to the USA and stayed on in the Air Force. Late in 1945 he married Josephine Pitz who had been a pilot with WASP assigned to New Castle AFB ferrying B-17's, PT-19's and C-47's. and they were to have two daughters. Egan later served in Korea and following duties in the Far East attended the National War College in Washington DC.

In July 1958 he was assigned duties in the Policy Division, Directorate of Plans. Colonel Egan died in 1961 at the age of 45 of a heart attack and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors on 19 April 1961.

A comprehensive history of the 100th Bomb Group, and John Egan's role, can be found in
"Eighth Air Force", by Donald L. Miller.

Further service details and biographical information can be found at the '100th Bomb Group Foundation' website:
http://100thbg.com/index.php?option=com_bombgrp&view=personnel&id=1466&…