On this raid our squadron went down and we dove shooting at some1arge boats on the Danube River. Every tenth bu11et was a tracer thatmade a ye11ow trai1 in the sky a11owing you to track them. It seemedstrange to set your bu11ets going down and those from the shipscoming up. I watched my bu11ets hitting the decks. We f1ew a11 theway back to Eng1and Just far above the tree tops but never saw a train orairfie1d to shoot at. There were f1ak towers, but they were toodangerous and we a11 f1ew around them. They were concrete towers withmany guns that cou1d shoot in a11 directions. It did no good to shootat them.

By now I had f1own twe1ve missions and was entit1ed to receive the AirMeda1. At a ceremony at the base, we were presented with the meda1 byGenera1 Whe1an. For each additiona1 five missions we got an Oak Leafc1uster which we rapidened to our theatre ribbon. I received two ofthese before being shot down.