The next day the fun began. I checked out in the first of the squadron's fighters, a Bell P-63 Kingcobra. This airplane was much beloved by the Russians, who were furnished them under lend-lease, largely because its 37mm cannon was effective against tanks and because Russians, for reasons known only to God, prefer flying at tree-top level. Low-level capability was what they wanted. The AAF found it unsuitable for combat because it, like its predecessor the Bell P-39 Airacobra, had limited range and poor high-altitude performance. I found it an enjoyable airplane to fly, maneuverable and easy to handle. The Allison V-12 engine was mounted behind the pilot and drove the propeller via a long shaft that went under the cockpit, leaving room in the nose for the cannon that fired through the propeller hub. It was a bit disconcerting when the engine was started because the instrument panel became a blur and the alcohol in the compass was churned to a froth until the engine smoothed out. Sometime later I was checking out one of the bomber pilots in the P-63. When he started the engine and the vibration began, he cut the engine and said, "What the hell is the matter?" I replied, "Nothing. It always starts like that." He didn't reply but quickly got out of the cockpit and walked away, never to return.
That evening I saw to my surprise that I, with a total of three hours copilot time, was to fly the B-26 the next morning with Dick Jones, who had never even been in it as copilot. As we climbed in, Dick jokingly remarked that because we were both single-engine fighter pilots we should each fly one engine. The long-suffering flight engineer, a grizzled sergeant with hundreds of hours in the B-26, knew I'd been in it only once and wondered what ill fate had put him in this squadron of super-hot fighter pilots. He kept a wary eye on us to be sure that we didn't do anything stupid enough to kill him.
A few minutes later he almost had a wary black eye and a concussion as well. Shortly after we started to taxi I applied the brakes to slow down a bit, but to my surprise the wheels locked. We stopped so suddenly that the flight engineer, who was standing between the pilots, was hurled forward onto the console. When I apologized for the sudden stop, he said he should have been ready, as all the fighter pilots did that on their first flight as pilot. Fighter brakes have to be applied firmly, but the B-26 had power brakes that had to be used gently. Automobile drivers who have switched from standard hydraulic to power brakes are familiar with this problem.
After that the flight went smoothly enough, with Dick and me sharing the flying, but I had a bit of trouble in the landing pattern. On my first try I put the base leg in so close that I couldn't make the turn to line up with the runway without making a vertical bank, which none of us, especially the flight engineer, thought was advisable. I went around and on the next approach moved the base leg out a bit and was able to turn onto final with only a 70-degree bank, which felt okay to Dick and me, if not to the engineer. The landing was fine, and I was very gentle with the brakes as we taxied back to the flight line. We parked and cut the engines, and now Dick, too, was a bomber pilot. I'm sure, however, the flight engineer hoped that we would stick to flying fighters.
During the next few weeks I was checked out in the P-47D Thunderbolt, the P-38L Lightning, the CQ-3 (C-45), the P-47N, the P-61 Black Widow, the P-51H, and rechecked out in the P-51D and the AT-6, which we used for instrument training. If this wasn't Valhalla, it was damn close to it.
On June 21, I became a member of a select group of pilots when I was checked out in the Bell P-59A Airacomet, the first U.S. jet. It was powered by two small General Electric turbojet engines based on the design of Sir Frank Whittle, the British inventor of the jet engine, whom I was privileged to get to know some thirty-five years later at the National Air and Space Museum. Aside from being jet powered, it was not an impressive airplane. It was not very fast or maneuverable and had limited range. It even looked rather clumsy and confirmed the pilot's maxim that an airplane that looks good, flies good not terribly profound, but generally true.
On the day of my checkout I climbed from the large shoulder-high wing down into the bathtublike cockpit, where Barney Turner briefed me on the starting procedure. It was quite simple: you just pressed the button for the left engine, waited until the rpm reached 10 percent, then opened the stopcock. The rise in tail-pipe temperature and engine rpm were the only indications that the engine was running. You could barely hear it in the cockpit when it was at idle rpm (about 35 percent). You then repeated the procedure for the right engine.
I was surprised that almost full power was required to get the P-59 moving. I probably shouldn't have been, since the two engines together generated only 3,200 pounds of thrust and the airplane weighed about 14,000 pounds. I taxied directly to the runway and lined up for takeoff. It seemed strange to eliminate the engine run-up and magneto check that I had performed on every flight until this one.
I ran the engines up to full power, 100 percent (16,800 rpm), and released the brakes. Instead of pushing me back in the seat with its acceleration, it gained speed very slowly. The engines were so smooth and silent that I had the eerie feeling that the plane shouldn't be moving. I felt as though I were in a glider being pulled by an invisible tow plane. Gen. Adolf Galland, leader of the Luftwaffe fighters in World War II and a 104-victory ace, had somewhat the same feeling on his first jet flight in an Me 262. He, however, expressed it much better when he said, "It felt like the angels were pushing." Years later I was to meet and get to know General Galland, and we have had many long conversations on World War II and aviation in general.
There was only enough fuel for about forty minutes of flight, so I climbed up to 20,000 feet — where fuel consumption was much lower — and ran through a few maneuvers to get the feel of the airplane. It was slow for a jet but cruised much faster than propeller fighters. Its rate of roll was quite slow, which was expected because of its large wing area. It accelerated well in a dive without the drag of a propeller but was difficult to slow down for the same reason. These effects were more pronounced in the P-80, which was a much cleaner aircraft. I returned to the field and found that landing the P-59 was quite easy because of its wide gear and large flaps. Because of its poor performance, only a small number were built, and they were used to initiate pilots into the mysteries of jet flying. Nevertheless, I was proud to have flown the first American jet.
I was now officially a jet pilot, which gave me a sense of accomplishment even though it wasn't much of a thrill. The real excitement came about six months later when I checked out in the Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star, the AAF's first operational jet fighter.
2
Bombs Bursting in Air
One type of mission I particularly enjoyed was chasing, and occasionally shooting down, JB-2s, an American copy of the German V-1. In the latter part of World War II, the Germans introduced the first of their so-called vengeance weapons, the V-1 flying bomb. A forerunner of the present-day cruise missile, the V-1 was a pilotless airplane powered by a pulse-jet engine. Launched from ramps in German-occupied Europe by jettisonable rockets, it held its heading and altitude by means of a gyro-stabilized autopilot. Range was controlled by counting the revolutions of a rotor, driven by the airflow, until a preset number had been reached. At that point, the engine was shut off and the V-1 would dive into whatever was below it, detonating the explosive-filled nose on impact.
It was not very accurate but was effective against large targets like London. Its effectiveness was increased by its characteristics. The engine made a loud, deep buzzing sound that could be heard from a great distance. As long as the people on the ground could hear it, they were safe; but once the noise stopped, they knew it had started its final dive, and they had little time to seek shelter.