Aerial Gunnery training at Ardmore was a constant honing of a sharp edge. All aircrew, except the pilots, had been to gunnery school and were qualified gunners, including the Bombardier and Navigator. We had gone through the basics already. At Gunnery School, we had training in turrets, sights, the adjustments and repair of the caliber .50 M2 machine guns (we had to disassemble completely then reassemble the gun blindfolded, making all adjustments for efficient firing.) We shot skeet constantly. This was fun. At first we fired on a regulation skeet range. Then moved to a range that tossed the birds at you from odd angles from a "high house, and finally shot skeet from the back of a pickup truck moving around a sort of race track. This was a challenge because both the target and the gunner were in motion while firing. It was excellent training in the art of "leading a target. At the end of the day all students had bruised shoulders from shotgun recoils.

At Ardmore we did both air-to-air and air-to-ground firing. All air/air firing was done down over the gulf. A B-26 would tow a rectangular cloth target parallel to our formation's course and we would fire cases of Ca .50s at the target. There was one GREAT problem with this setup. The ammunition was old stuff from World War I. We would have misfires about every sixth round because of so many "duds". We would handcharge twice and start over. We had a gunnery instructor with us. He said he had definite orders NOT to bring any of this WW1 stuff back to base. Consequently, hundreds of rounds of belted Ca .50 ammunition were seen floating down to a watery grave in the Gulf of Mexico. We felt that the quicker we got rid of this crap the sooner we might get good ammo to fire. We NEVER had any trouble with ammunition once we got overseas.

This brings to mind a near tragedy with this old WW1 ammunition. We were doing air-to-ground firing on the range at Ardmore. We would make passes over the range at about 500 feet and aim at selected targets on the ground. I had fired all of my rounds from the tail, and crawled up to the waist aria, where the waist guns were still hammering away. Don Abens, the Radio Operator, had not yet fired, and was called back to the left waist gun to fire his quota of this lousy ammunition. With the gunnery instructor and Abe in the waist, I decide to give them room to fire and went forward to the radio room. The guns were hot from the heavy firing. Abens commenced firing, but very shortly encountered a stoppage. He handcharged it twice, which was the standard way of clearing it, so that firing could begin again. After a few more rounds...another stoppage. He handcharged again. This time there is a loud BOOM! from the waist area. There is Cordite smoke all over the waist area. I ran back into the waist. Don Abens is holding onto the spade grips of the gun. The sides of the receiver are bowed out from the explosion. The top cover is twisted...Abe quietly says..."I'm shot...I'm shot." We take him into the radio room and lay him on the floor. He has brass from the cartridge casing sticking into his stomach. He is bleeding heavily from a hole in his thigh. We cut away his clothes. We call the pilot and inform him of the situation, advise return to base and have an ambulance ready on the runway. Abe is conscious. The thigh wound goes all the way through and exits the back of the thigh. This is a pretty serious wound. After checking out his stomach we find that none of the brass shards have penetrated.

When we roll to a stop on the runway the ambulance is there and takes Abe to the base hospital. In trying to recreate what happened we climb into the plane and survey the waist section. On the opposite side I see a bloody object near the floor. It is the back 3/8 of an inch of a Cal .50 cartridge. The dimensions are 3/4 inch by 3/8 inch. This is what made the 3/4 inch hole in Aben's right thigh. The explosion took place when this WW1 cartridge exploded in the open receiver of the gun. It blew out the sides and top of the gun. The back of the cartridge was still retained by the bolt but was slammed down into a deflector plate and vectored through the fleshy part of Abe's thigh. No bones were involved. I scooped up this souvenir and gave it to Abe later...He carried it on his key ring for years. Talk about irony...the guy hasn't left the states yet and he's already got a war wound and the projectile that caused it. Abe was in the hospital for about two weeks but Jerry Steil talked like hell to the medics and we kept him on the crew. Don Abens is to good a man too lose.

One of the things stressed at Ardmore was tight formation flying. As was said before, the heart of any bomber defense is tight formations. This concentrates defensive firepower. Along about the middle of our training, we started to fly mock formation bombing missions against different Midwestern cities. We would "bomb" Wichita, Topeka, Kansas City, and even St. Louis. With cameras of course. We did everything but drop real bombs! We would even have "fighter attacks" from P-47s stationed at Winfield, Kansas. The fighters would come in on a pursuit curve and we would dry-run fire on them. One word about formation flying for long periods. Pilots tell me it is very tiring. It's a constant fight with throttles and controls. It demands FULL concentration of the pilots. It can be very hard physical work, and threat of midair collision is ever present. These "missions" were valuable training for all of us. The one thing lacking was the terrible weather in Northern Europe. This is not to say that Midwestern weather is ideal. It can be very, very tricky, but the stuff that comes in off the Atlantic, is much worse, in my opinion.