July 30. The Group stands down but the 55th, 78th, 339th, 353rd and 357th FGs swept Evreux to Paris. The rest of 8th AF stood down due to extremely bad weather. The 353rd destroyed 9 twin engine a/c at Orleans/Bricy airfield and the 357th shot down four Bf 109s northwest of Paris. Captain Bert Marshall took new replacements from all three squadrons up for take off, form up, radio procedures and squadron escort tactics. The nearby 91st BG at Bassingbourn loaned a B-17 to the effort. Marshall was named to preside over the Accident Board as well as organize Instrument Flight training in addition to his duties as 354FS CO. The Group sent several P-51Bs that were close to 600 airframe hours to Goxhill to augment the 496FTG inventory and received several new P-51D-5s as replacements. Major John Moon Elder returned from stateside leave a couple of days ago and nearly through mandatory re-familiarization flight time was also with Marshall during the training. He flew a couple of thousand feet above them and called out sloppy formation and flight disciplines.
Posted on: Wed, 30 Jul 2014 14:16:13 +0000
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