I'm searching for any and, all photos of this plane B-17G 43-37687. My father was one of her ball-turret gunners and, Lt. Arnold A Tillman his pilot. This aircraft made a crash-landing in Poland 2/15/45 after bombing the Cottbus railroad martialing yards. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
 
       Regards, Bill MacLeod

[image]local://upfiles/15056/FCA016E7E3DE4334843D68056208AE37.jpg[/image]

Attached Image(s)

I am the Museum Registrar at the Texas Military Forces Museum in Austin, Texas. Last week I got in two scrapbooks belonging to Lt. Arnold A. Tillman. One scrapbook cotains apprx. 200 photos. I have a possible photo of your father with the caption "The Ball turret gunner & his ball" taken in Jan 1945. There are many photos of the crew as well as the plane in this scapbook. Some of the pictures have the name "Dow" From your list of the crew I couldn't figure out which one that would be.  "Daly" is in many of the photos, as is the co-pilot. I have pictures from Russia, tehran, cario and paris.
The scrapbook was donated by a member of Tillman's family who lives in Austin. It will be going into our research collection. Lt. Tillman put captions on the back of some of the photos and I am currently making a list that will be placed with the scrapbook. I have printed out your other post with all the information on their missions it will be a great help to our photo staff in figuring out they uncaptioned photos.
If possable I would love to have a copy of his obituary.
There are so many photos I can't make copies of them all, but If you want to get back to me with specific ones you might be interested in I will see if I can find them. There are a number of planes pictures, many close-up some distance shots. The only one with tail info I can read is K46803, that is in the later pictures.
The scapbook will be available for research purposes if you ever get to Austin, Texas and want to take a look.
thank you
lisa sharik
lisa.sharik@ng.army.mil

#43-37687 force-landed in the area of Staszow near Mielec in Poland.
 
The crew was evacuated via Lwow, Poland; Poltava, USSR; Teheran, Iran; Bagdad; Iraq; Istambul, Turkey; Cairo, Egipt; Naples and Rome, Italy; Marseilles, France to Snetterton, England.
 
Their Fortress was repaired and returned to the USA via USSR and England.
 
Regards,
Mike Mucha
Aircraft M.I.A. Project
mikefly@poczta.onet.pl
 

wonderful, thanks for the info. The back of one of the pictures says Lwow and I was wondering if that was the correct spelling.
lisa sharik

Lisa -
Not sure about the K?
12/44:  B - 17 # 44 - 6803 assigned 388th BG , 562d Sq.
10/45: Walnut Ridge , Ark. Scrapped
If you can read any Nose Names , Post them and we
can look them up.
Mike

Lisa:
 
The spelling is correct. However, the city is not in Poland, but in Ukraine now. Its Ukrainian spelling is Lviv.
 
Regards,
Mike
 

Unfortunately while there are numerous pictures of planes; singlely in groups, close up of various parts, inside the cockpits etc... there are only 4 pictures that show nose art. 2 are of the 5 Grand plane, one with it's pilot one with Sgt Meyers inside the plane. One has a large letter C which was used to make two words one under the other "Crash Crew's". The other is a plane that Tillman identifies as his on the back. It is a close up showing part of the nose, the numbers 432 appear on the side of the tip of the nose and there is part of a mouth with 6 teeth. I will try and get a picture uploaded once our photo archivist get in later this week.

For the rest of the planes I can make out several with a large captial C on the very top of the tail and these numbers:
338618
337716  has captial letters BXH on side
48742
 
also side views of 2 planes  one with BXK and one with OJN on side and wings

I also have one with the Capital C and the number 48451 that is either crashed and in flames or right next to a crashed plane in flames. The picture has started to degrade and it is difficult to tell exactly. It has the letters DOW or DAW on the side.

The other plane is later in the book and might be the one he flew after crashing. It show up first as a plane with a Captial letter H on the top of the tail with a capital letter K right above the numbers 46803. Later in the book the same plane appears but now with a captial letter C on top of the tail.

Eventually I might have time to have our photo archivist blow up or clean up the photos to try and get more detail. However, this week we have a big event going on both Sat. and Sunday and are swamped.
Thank you again for all the info. We don't have alot of Air Force material as the Texas Forces only had an Air Guard and this board had proven an invaluable resource for the few Air Force items I have gotten it donation.
Lisa

Bill,
Book Snetterton Falcons has several paragraphs about the aircraft 43-37687 describing events of the mission and statements of a Waist gunner S/Sgt Aronold Eschola of events from plane leaving formation heading for Russian lines, landing in field ,staying in small town for about a week then headed toward Moscow,and eventual return to Snetterton where he states they had been listed as missing in action and their belongs were gone. Can email or PM with more details of statement if interested or do not have information.

Other info from book:
Crew listed in New Crews Assigned (Snetterton) Dec. 44
Request correct spelling of any of the crew misspelled below.

Feb. 15th
AC 43-37687
B17G-70-BO 338th Sqdn  BX-
P  2Lt Arnold A Tillman
CP  2Lt Stanley I Neese
N 2Lt Cornelius F Daly
TOG Sgt Dennis Guimaraes
R S/Sgt David J Colgon
TT S/Sgt Hugh H  Mutagh      
BT Sgt Donald P McCloud
WG Sgt James A Rich
TG Sgt Aronld H Echola
 
You may find after more research that your father may have flown on several different aircraft.

Berk

Lisa:
 
I have send you a message via e-mail and hope you will answer it.
 
Regards,
Mike
 

My photo archivist is still out but I took some pictures with a digital camera, this is the only one that turned out ok. Tillman's plane:
 


[image]local://15826/96ABB8A1121543239D089B16F5409598.JPG[/image]

Attached Image(s)

Lisa:
 
It might have been BX-K.
 
There were at least 2 B-17G's coded BX-K in 388th BS/96th BG.
 
#44-6081 was lost at Poltava, Ukraine during a Luftwaffe attack on June 21, 1944
#43-37725 survived the war to be scrapped at Kingman, AR [I believe the picture presents this ship]
 
Regards,
Mike
 

my photo archivist was able to get some pictures taken Since I can only do one per post here's the first :
picture of the ball turret gunner
 
Lisa Sharik
 
 
 
 


[image]local://15826/2B0839852D3B44C3BF3A22CA75FFE299.JPG[/image]

Attached Image(s)

next picture of "CrashCrews" plane

[image]local://15826/C43A19F6938F4ADCA1EB017F76FBFD5D.JPG[/image]

Attached Image(s)

picture of a crashed B-17, don't have any info on this

[image]local://15826/FF5C246432834F98A7CF9E5C5F896C69.JPG[/image]

Attached Image(s)

second picture of crashed plane

[image]local://15826/5D6C0D9604844FADA9E7F5E3F87B9931.JPG[/image]

Attached Image(s)

picture of Tillman in front of a plane
 
If anyone would like a larger copy of any of the photos you can PM or email me
lisa


[image]local://15826/5782CFB4DFE94C93A579436F1650A56D.JPG[/image]

Attached Image(s)

Lisa,

The burning B-17 with "C" on tail is 44-8451. Crashlanded on 23 June 45 at base, Snetterton Heath, England. Pilot was Gerald H. White.
(21 Jun 45 also mentioned).

Regards,

Leendert

Outstanding thread. Great pics and info. Thanks!