Friendly Monster: Warbird and Its Crew

By John W. Cox

Friendly Monster was the code name for the B-29 bomber in the pacific area during World War II. The author is John W. Cox, the commander of a remarkable flight crew and their tour of duty during the war. It starts with their training period and introduction to the state-of-the-art airplane. The crew participated in the first bombing attack on Tokyo since the Doolittle raid in 1942, then on to the end of the war. Highlighted are descriptions of the bombing,strafing and air combat the crew experienced on the missions they flew from the Marianas Island of Saipan, shortly after arriving in November 1944.

The book covers a period from April 1944 to July 1945. John Cox left the service in 1945 as a Captain with over 1000 hours flying the B-29 including 450 hours in 33 combat missions against Japan. Although the crew of the “Mary Ann” experienced some close calls and survived dangerous missions, no man on the crew was lost or wounded. A remarkable feat and a testament to the crew’s professionalism and dedication. They were credited with shooting down 21 Japanese aircraft with 10 confirmed kills and the tailgunner Cpl. John Sutherland of San Antonio, Texas emerged as the Ace of the Marianas with 5 confirmed kills. The crew was awarded the Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters, the Distinguished Flying Cross, and three battle stars. In addition to the adventures of the “Mary Ann” the book chronicles and demonstrates the capability of air power to destroy and defeat a modern empire without the need to set foot on enemy territory.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 27, 2007
• ISBN: 9781450069762

John W. Cox

John Cox spent over 16 months and flew 33 combat missions from Saipan in the Mariannas to Japan. Although the battles to control the Pacific Islands were long and bloody, once the islands were taken it fell to sea power and air power to topple the Japanese Empire. No invasion was necessary and many American lives were spared because, for the first time in history, air power soundly defeated an enemy. The lessons learned in the B29 air campaign were not used effectively until 2002 in Afghanistan. John separated from the service in early December 1945. He married childhood friend Dixie and raised 2 daughters and a son in California. He attended USC on the GI Bill. He studied Electrical Engineering obtaining his Electrical Engineering degree in 1949 and Master of Science in 1952. He went on to work for Rockwell in servo mechanisms. John continues to fly. He is the Treasurer of the Flying Club at Fullerton Airport in Fullerton, California, and a flying instructor.

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Contents

INTRODUCTION

PROLOGUE

BOOK 1

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

BOOK 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

BOOK 3

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

POSTSCRIPT

INTRODUCTION

Letter to brother Norman; Christmas 2001:

Friendly Monster is a story about my crew and myself in 1944 and 1945. It will help explain the pitiful person that returned home in the middle of July 1945, twenty pounds underweight, with a missing front tooth, shaky, nervous and jumpy, who couldn’t sit still and needed both hands just to light a cigarette. It was difficult to get away from the military way of living where everything was decided for me. Where and how I lived, the clothes I wore (uniforms), what I did or worked on, where I was on duty 24 hours a day with no personal choices to make. Sometimes I would try to volunteer just to attempt to gain control over my circumstances, but most of the time with very unpredictable results. Compare that to the complete freedom I returned to with only you, Dad and Mother to reeducate me. I want to thank you for helping me get started on my trip back to normal (?). Mother and I were at a loss on how to fatten me up. I couldn’t stand to see, smell or taste lamb or mutton, Mother and Dads favorite, and some of my reactions to other foods were just as bad. I had forgotten that I wasn’t in command any more and the civilian world was so non-structured. It was hard for me to function without a road to follow and a goal defined by others.

I separated from the service in early December 1945 and decided to try to follow the plan I had before I left Saipan to restore order in my life. Luckily, the first step was to start my advanced education on the GI bill. Since USC was the closest university I started there in 1946. Then an amazing thing happened out of the blue to solve my problems. Dixie took pity on me and we were married in January 1947. She redirected me and gave me new goals, desires and ambitions to fulfill me and mine. It was wonderful and the most important and greatest thing that has ever happened to me. She had a wonderful method of giving me direction without my knowing it. It was a combination of loving and buttering-up that was effective every time. It was after some of these sessions that suddenly a little son or daughter would appear who surprised, thrilled and excited me to go forward with confidence to the lives we have enjoyed these many years.

Your Brother, John

PROLOGUE

WAKE UP YOUR BUDDY, THIS IS AN AIR RAID! The P.A. system blared and anti-aircraft on the hillside punctuated the alert sirens. I raced to the door of the Quonset to see tracers flashing across the squadron area. A low flying Jap fighter zoomed right over our hut, flame shooting from his wings. It was an air attack!

After recovering from the initial shock, I joined with the others and ran downhill toward the water’s edge to hide among the rocks. We waited. Several minutes passed. I think I held my breath most of that time. Searchlights attempted to pinpoint the enemy planes as they made strafing passes back and forth across the dispersal area. Tracers crisscrossed the sky. It was like the 4th of July. One of the fighters was hit and flamed like a comet as it plunged into the water. Suddenly pieces of metal began to drop from the sky. It was a shower of flak, hunks of airplanes and spent bullets. I remember thinking how ridiculous we must have looked, dressed only in under shorts and combat boots, holding our helmets on our heads. We felt like ostriches with no place to stick our heads. Suddenly, there was a horrendous explosion on the flight line. An orange cloud rose from the airstrip. G. P. bombs were exploding. Obviously, one or more of the B-29s had been hit and their bomb loads were going off. We stood shivering among the coral rocks. We shook from the nervous helplessness as much as the night chill. While another shower of fragments rained down on us we realized how vulnerable we were. I guess that’s when we all decided that the bomb shelter we were advised to build upon arriving was a good idea.

The all clear sounded some two hours later and we moved cautiously back to the Quonset hut. The moon was almost full and I could easily see our way up the hill. The main fire in the aircraft area was very close to the hardstand where our bomber was parked. The firemen were trying to control the blaze, but the ammunition and bombs cooking off made it a dangerous and slow process. We couldn’t even approach the area so we went back to bed and tried to sleep.

As I lay there I thought back to my high school graduation. I thought back to when I was 17. Could that have been 6 years ago? Who would have thought at that time that I was to embark on an adventure that would literally last a lifetime?

BOOK 1

Let him who desires peace prepare for war.

Vegetius (Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus) 4th century military writer

CHAPTER 1

ARMY AIR CORPS CADET

I graduated from Huntington Park High School in 1937. My diploma read John W. Cox, commercial major. I got a bookkeeping job at B. M. Ball Candy and Tobacco Wholesale Company on Jefferson in Los Angeles just north of Exposition Park. In those days cigarettes were fifty cents a carton wholesale, and a dollar twenty-five retail. That’s a dollar twenty-five for a carton not a pack. My goal was to get as much experience as I could before taking the test to become a licensed CPA. Not that there was anything wrong with being a CPA, but the fates had other plans for me.

For a few years my life was very predictable. But in September 1940 that began to change. The conscription law was passed requiring all young men over 18 to register for the draft. With the problems increasing in Europe and with our troop strength at 175,000, millions of inductees would be needed. There was no Air Force then but each force had it’s own air support unit. I decided to volunteer for the Army Air Corps. Maybe I could become a pilot. I had heard that the cadet training consisted of about six months, two months of primary, 2 months of basic and two months of advanced training. If you passed you received your wings and became a 2nd Lieutenant. Imagine that; John Cox from Huntington Park, California, an officer and a gentleman!

I passed the physical and written three-day entrance exams at March Field August 1941 and was called to active duty as a Pilot Cadet Private, December 16, 1941, just 9 days after Pearl Harbor. I reported to Tulare California for Primary training in the Stearman biplane with civilian instructors. Most pilots at the time were trained on this dependable, forgiving two-seater biplane, built originally by Stearman and acquired by Boeing. The Stearman PT17 had no gyro instrument or radios, just an oil temperature gauge, airspeed indicator and compass. It had no electrical system and was started by a hand crank. We learned to fly by the seat of our pants and the way the wing wires looked as we did our maneuvers. Our performance was graded carefully during our flying and ground school classes to make sure we were learning and at the proper rate. One key indicator was time to solo. If you hadn’t soloed within 8 flying hours for whatever reason, you were washed out from the pilot cadet program and were reassigned. Some guys got sick during the aerobatic maneuvers and weren’t able to complete the course.

Things were happening quickly. The country was mechanizing and preparing to get into the war at a blinding rate. Everything around us was always in a state of change and we were all caught up in the newness and excitement. It was while I was at Tulare that the coast north of Santa Barbara was shelled by a Jap sub. We all wanted to take our Stearman and go do something. I don’t know what we could have done but by God we wanted to give them hell!

After Primary it was off to Basic. In my case that meant Minter Field at Shafter, California a little northwest of Bakersfield. There we had military instructors and the Vultee Valiant BT13, which had a 450 HP engine, radios, and gyro instruments. Our pilot courses consisted of aerobatics, cross countries, night and day, instrument flying, a little formation flying, and hooded flying to simulate instrument flying conditions using the radio range. All of the approaches consisted of timing to the airport from a known fix then looking for the runway. As with Primary we had ground school half of the day and flying the other half plus some night flying. I was amazed how much I learned with the 12-hour days we put in and the constant repetition of the subject matter. There was an enormous amount of information to cover about aircraft systems, navigation, flight planning and the military courtesy that an officer needs to know.

missing image file

2nd Lieutenant John W. Cox, Southgate, California.

Home for a visit with not a clue of his future exploits.

After Basic was completed it was up to Mather Field in Sacramento, California for advanced training. It was just the same as basic but with more advanced retractable gear aircraft and more precision flying. My first plane was the AT9, a two-place twin-engine trainer. It was an all-metal aircraft, tear drop shaped with small engines built by Curtis Aircraft. Controls in the AT9 were pretty tricky particularly during landing so it made a good training plane. For a while, at Mather, I had a famous instructor. James Maitland Stewart, better known as Jimmy Stewart. If memory serves, he was a First Lieutenant at the time. We worked for about a month with the AT9 then suddenly the school was changed from twin to single engine and we switched to the North American AT6 a beautiful 650HP fighter style plane. I thought Oh Boy! I am sure to get into fighters now. About the same time we heard that Boeing Aircraft Company creator of the B17 was working on a new state of the art aircraft that would dwarf every bomber existing.

June 23, 1942. The big day! Graduation! I completed all requirements and I received my diploma from the Air Corps Training Center at graduation ceremonies. I got my pilot Wings, and was informed that the President appointed and commissioned me a 2nd Lieutenant in the Air Reserve in the Army of the United States.

I was amazed. In only six months I had been able to go from private enlisted man to commissioned officer in the Army. My status in this life had jumped!! Everybody could see by looking on my shoulders that I was an officer and gentleman. I was literally flying high! You can imagine my shock and disappointment later in the day when I received my assignment orders. I had been retained to take a month long flight instructor’s course then would be sent wherever needed to teach. My future was becoming more and more set in concrete and my choices more and more limited. There was nothing I could do. I was slowly beginning to realize that my life now belonged to the Army Air Corps. The enormous need to expand the air corps required cadets and instructors to man the many new training fields. Instructors were in great demand. It was with misgivings that I proceeded to the next step of training at Mather.

missing image file

Instructor John W. Cox in the rear cockpit of basic trainer

Vultee Valiant BT13 Gardner Field, Taft, California

There is no type of human endeavor where it is so important that the leader understands all phases of his job as that of the profession of arms.

—Major General James C. Fry

CHAPTER 2

THE B-29 CREW

It was April 1944 and I had spent two years struggling to get a transfer from the training Command to an active bomb group and Clovis, New Mexico Army Air Base didn’t seem to be a particularly good start. But that was about to change.

I heard the sirens and rushed from the transient officers quarters. In the distance I could see a huge four-engine plane with an engine on fire circling the field. It was the first time I had ever seen a B-29 in flight.

I was a 23-year-old 1st Lt. flight instructor who had accumulated 1500 hours flying time, 400 of which was in instructing pilots in the B-17. I had seen and flown bombers before but I was overwhelmed when I first saw the B-29.

The B-29 was a revolutionary state of the art airplane; not like anything before it. It was the first pressurized bomber, first with remote-controlled turrets, the heaviest production airplane built, with the most powerful engines and highest wing loading. All of my experience and training in the Air Corps had been in tail wheel aircraft and the B-29 was a tricycle aircraft, which had different takeoff, landing and flight characteristics than tail wheel planes. In addition it was the first aircraft with a flight engineer who shared the engine control and other aircraft operation with the two pilots. It was the first plane that had an Aircraft Commander in charge of the aircraft operation.

Because of my experience, I was assigned the position of Airplane Commander with the duty to select crewmembers, train them and form a combat crew in the impossible time of six months. After my experiences teaching and motivating low time pilots in advanced modern aircraft I couldn’t understand how the Army expected me to put together an effective flight crew from young men with a few months training in their specialties who had never seen the inside of a B29 before, but that was my assignment.

Flight transition to the B-29 was not simple. First of all, the nose was forty feet in front of the wings. There was no fixed horizontal reference for the attitude of the wings. It was different from any other airplane in that way, and required a number of flights to become acclimated to the new flight view and operational characteristics. For each takeoff the Flight Engineer had to calculate from the weight and distribution of the load being carried, the length of the runway required and the speed needed to raise the nose. Similar calculations were required for landing. Such information had to be ready at the request of the Airplane Commander so he could bring the aircraft in without overshooting or undershooting the runway. In some