Valor

The Saga ofBarrel House BessieThere were many crisesthat day on the wayback from Bremen,and each time TSgt.Maurice Henry camethrough.

BY JOHN L. FRISBEE

BREMEN, in northwest Germany,stood high on the Eighth Air

Force's target list. It was Germany'ssecond largest port, the site of sub-marine pens, and the center of anindustrial complex that producedaircraft, ships, trucks, ordnance,and petroleum products. With somany prime targets, it was welldefended by guns and fighters.Bremen was no milk run, especiallyin late 1943 when there was only ahandful of P-38 and P-51 long-rangeescort fighters.

On November 26, 1943, theEighth launched 633 aircraft in itslargest strike up to that time. The384th Bombardment Group, com-manded by Col. Dale O. Smith, wasassigned targets in the Bremen area.The group had been there before.Colonel Smith (now a retired majorgeneral) led the mission on a bitterlycold day with layer after layer ofheavy stratus clouds.

Among the 384th B-17s was Bar-reLHouse Bessie, piloted by Maj.William Gilmore. His flight engi-neer and top turret gunner, twenty-nine-year-old TSgt. Maurice Henry,emerged as one of the heroes of themission. Because of conflicting re-ports, the exact sequence of eventsthat befell Bessie and in whichMaurice Henry played a key role isimpossible to recount with certainaccuracy, though there is agreementon Sergeant Henry's acts of hero-ism.

AIR FORCE Magazine / August 1989

In the target area, the group en-countered intense flak and from 150to 200 enemy fighters. Short of thetarget, Bessie sustained extensivestructural damage and the loss ofNo.3 engine. Bessie was unableto keep up with the formation. Ma-jor Gilmore ordered the bombs tobe jettisoned, but one, fullyarmed, hung up in the bomb rack.Sergeant Henry left the top turret,went into the open bomb bay atforty degrees below zero, and freedthe bomb.

The fighter attacks continued,and an incendiary shell started a firein the cockpit. Again Sergeant Hen-ry left his turret to put out the fire,though he was almost overcome bythe acrid smoke. In the interval be-tween these events, Sergeant Henryis credited with shooting down oneenemy fighter and damaging an-other.

Diving into the clouds for protec-tion, Bessie broke out at 6,000 feetdirectly over the city of Emden,where she came under heavy attackby antiaircraft guns. By this timethe oxygen and electrical systemsand all instruments were knockedout, a quarter of the nose shot away,the flight controls and all four en-gines damaged. Once over the icywaters of the North Sea with morethan 200 miles between Bessie andher home base at Grafton Under-wood, Sergeant Henry helped thepilots restart the No.3 engine,which ran only spasmodically. ThenNo.4 quit, and its propellercouldn't be feathered. Ditching wasimminent. Henry made repeatedtrips through the open bomb baypassage to supervise the jettisoningof equipment. Finally Nos. I and 2engines, which had been running er-ratically, failed.

The wake of a ship was sighted inthe distance. Major Gilmore headed

for it with little hope of success.Bessie, now an oversized glider, waslosing altitude too rapidly. Since theradio was out, Sergeant Henryfound a Very pistol and fired flaresin hopes that the ship's crew wouldsee them.

Henry next assembled the crew inthe radio compartment and pre-pared them for ditching about fortymiles from the coast of England inrough seas. When the B-17 hit thesurface, water poured in throughthe damaged nose and the openbomb bay, breaking Bessie in twojust aft of the radio compartment.Henry directed the other crewmembers in inflating and launchingan undamaged liferaft and helpedthose who couldn't get aboard theraft into the water. He was last toleave the sinking B-17, but onlyafter he had searched for and foundthe emergency radio.

Maurice Henry was last seenplunging into the icy water, stillclutching the radio. Before he couldfight his way to the liferaft, he wasswept away by the waves and lost.Ten minutes later an RAF rescueboat pulled one man from the waterand took aboard six from the raft.Lost with Sergeant Henry were tailgunner SSgt. Albert Schamber andone of the waist gunners, SSgt.James Bucher.

TSgt. Maurice Henry was post-humously awarded the Distin-guished Service Medal, second onlyto the Medal of Honor, for his hero-ism and "selfless devotion to othermembers of the crew." BarreLHouse Bessie didn't make it home,but that she got as far as she did withno greater loss of life was due inlarge part to Maurice Henry's lead-ership, professional competence,and heroism. "He was," said MajorGilmore, "an example to the entirecrew." -

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