Mitt's '109 by Kenneth Wallace Fields

Inside the Swamp Ghost Recovery Flugmuseum Messerschmitt’s ‘109 By Kenneth Wallace Fields B-17E s/n 41-2446 was delivered to the USAAF in Seattle, Washington on December 6, 1941. On February 23, 1942, her pilot, Capt. Fred Eaton, crash landed in Papua New Guinea after receiving combat damage after attacking Japanese shipping in Rabaul. She was recovered from the swamp 68 years later and now resides at the Pacific Aviation Museum on Ford Island, Oahu, Hawaii. Photo: Kenneth W. Fields Although unnamed when issued to the USAAF, s/n 41-2446 is known worldwide as Swamp Ghost. This aerial view of the crash site gives evidence to her well-deserved moniker. Photo: Kenneth W. Fields was my great fortune to be raised in the household of my hero, my father, the late Lt. Col. John Wallace Fields, of Shamrock, Texas. He was a graduate of what By Kenneth Wallace Fields It was then called Texas Technological College, now Texas Tech University. Dad was already a pilot in the 7th Bombardment Group (BG) when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. The 7th BG had been ordered to the Philippines prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. My father was doing a fuel consumption check on a new Boeing B-17E on December 6, 1941, and was due to depart for Hickam Field on Oahu on December 7, en route to Codename “Plum,” the Philippine Islands. Some of his squadron mates had picked up their Flying Fortresses earlier and actually arrived during the Pearl Harbor attack, completely unaware and unarmed. Deconstruction of Swamp Ghost got underway in 2006. This photo was taken from a plywood makeshift helicopter landing pad. Photo: Kenneth W. Fields The 7th BG personnel were then diverted to Australia. On fadi River, filled with chest-high water, kunai grass, and February 23, 1942, this group of a dozen B-17s com- saltwater crocodiles. The landing was successful, and prised the entirety of the heavy bombardment forces in the crew survived with only a few minor injuries, but they Australia, and they flew the first U.S. Heavy Bombard- found themselves in kunai grass so dense and water so ment mission there. Taking off from RAAF Garbutt Field at deep that it took them four days to get out of the swamp. Townsville, Australia, the mission was designed to bomb They were eventually found by natives and evacuated Japanese shipping at Rabaul, New Ireland, refuel at Port by an Australian resident magistrate, Allen Champion. Moresby, New Guinea, then return to Townsville. Nine The aircraft, 41-2446, remained with its ammunition and aircraft participated in the raid but only three reached the machine guns intact, until 1972 when it was rediscovered target, the rest of the formation was broken up by heavy by the Australians, who removed the guns and most of storms and forced to return to Townsville. One of the the live ammunition. The aircraft was visited later by the Forts to reach Rabaul on this maiden mission, flown by well-known Pacific aviation authority, Charles Darby, who Lt. Fred Eaton, failed to drop on the first run and made a removed most of the instruments. second, and possibly a third run, giving Japanese fighters ample opportunity to engage his aircraft. During the battle By the time I was 10 years old, I was devouring anything the B-17 received damage from 7.7mm machine gun and I could find related to my father’s 51 combat missions in 20mm cannon fire. After a 45-minute running battle with the Pacific, flown primarily in B-17Es, and occasionally Zeros and Claudes, the fighters turned back and Eaton in LB-30s, the export version of the B-24. One of the first attempted to make Port Moresby to refuel. However, accounts I read was in a book called The Fight for New Eaton spent so much time at war emergency power dur- Guinea by Patrick J. Robinson. The author recounts having the battle with the fighters, not to mention leaks from ing a steak dinner in Brisbane with a young pilot named a holed fuel tank, that Eaton’s B-17 lacked the necessary Fred Eaton, who suddenly fainted from the effects of ma- fuel to climb over the Owen Stanley Mountain Range, laria. Fred was the pilot of 41-2446 and, when interviewed which runs down the spine of New Guinea. Eaton elected by Robinson, was fresh out of the New Guinea swamp. to make a gear-up landing in what looked like a grassy I became acquainted with Fred when I began attending field on the northeast coast of New Guinea. The “grassy 435th Squadron and 19th BG reunions with my father. I field” turned out to be the Agaiambo Swamp near the Koi- also became acquainted with Glen Spieth, son of the late ## WARBIRD DIGEST # 67 In 1986, I went to Papua Glen Spieth stands on the wing of Swamp Ghost in New Guinea (PNG), having 2006. A pilot in the 435th BS, Spieth’s father checked gotten in touch with Bruce off the author’s father as a command pilot early in the Hoy, an Australian who was war. Their fathers each earned the DFC with Oak Leaf Cluster for missions they flew together.Photo: Kenneth then the curator of the Na- W. Fields tional Museum and Art Gal- lery of Papua New Guinea, which has authority over all war materiel and World War II artifacts in PNG. We chartered a Jet Ranger and flew through passes in the Owen Stanley Range to the Swamp Ghost site and jumped onto the wing as the helicopter hovered. The aircraft was half- submerged in water and almost completely covered in kunai grass. For many years Glen and I worked with a number of groups, including the Travis Air Force Base Historical Society, Admiral Nimitz 435th pilot Harry Spieth, who checked off my father as a Foundation, and National Museum of the Pacific War, to command pilot early in the war. Dad and Spieth were both raise interest in the recovery of this priceless connection awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross with Oak Leaf to our fathers’ service with the 435th BS. Our fundrais- Cluster for two of the missions they flew together. ing efforts continued without success, until 1998 when I received a phone call from David Tallichet, a warbird Through our friendship with Fred Eaton, and other collector, businessman, and restaurateur who owned a 41-2446 crew members, Glen Spieth and I decided to at- series of aviation-themed restaurants across America and tempt a recovery of 41-2446 in order to save it for poster- numerous World War II aircraft. Tallichet had been alerted ity. It was Glen who coined the term Swamp Ghost. In to my recovery efforts by a dedicated Swamp Ghost discussions with my father and Fred Eaton, we learned enthusiast, Rod Mish. Tallichet asked me to work with that none of the aircraft that were flown by the early him to recover the aircraft, and I was delighted to do so. nucleus of the 7th BG out of Australia, which soon became th th Being an attorney came in handy, as I drafted an Aircraft the 435 Bomb Squadron (BS)/19 BG, had been named. Recovery Agreement that was submitted to the National As my father told me, “we had neither the time, nor the Museum and Art Gallery in PNG, in accordance with their paint, nor the luxury of flying the same aircraft with any statutes. After many years of negotiation, Tallichet’s orga- regularity to fool around with naming them.” When 41- nization, Military Aircraft Restoration Corporation (MARC), 2446 bellied into the Agaiambo Swamp, she was there- was given contractual authority to recover the aircraft fore unnamed, but she will be forever known as Swamp Ghost. After being removed from the wings, the right wing’s engines are lifted by a Russian helicopter. Photo: Kenneth W. Fields Banana boats ferry personnel up the Koifadi River during the 2006 recovery. Photo: Kenneth W. Fields JUL/AUG 2016 ## Ken Fields (standing, left) and Fred Hagen (cockpit) survey Swamp Ghost in 1999. Photo: Wade Fairley and Taillchet asked me to help put together a recovery the wreckage of a B-25 Mitchell bomber that his uncle, crew. Quite coincidentally, through correspondence with Bill Benn, had disappeared in during the war. Fred’s expe- George Chandler, a P-38 Ace from Kansas, I learned that rience gave him intimate knowledge of aircraft recovery a friend of his, Alfred “Fred” Hagen of Pennsylvania, had operations in the very challenging environment of PNG. just visited Swamp Ghost! As matters developed, MARC handed off the Flying For- tress recovery rights to Fred’s company, Aero Archeology, I made a call to Fred Hagen, who ultimately turned out to LLC. be the key to our successful recovery of Swamp Ghost. My (then) new friend Fred Hagen turned out to be an ex- Fred and I returned to PNG in 1999 to survey the aircraft perienced New Guinea explorer, who earlier had located for the recovery mission planned for later that year, but A WWII-era landing craft was used to deliver the recovery crew’s tools at the remains of a boat dock at Tufi where PT Boats were moored during the war. Photo: by Kenneth W. Fields ## WARBIRD DIGEST # 67 Above: Water drains from the starboard wing as it is airlifted by a Russian Mi-8 helicopter to the WWII landing craft. Photo: Kenneth W. Fields Left: Papua New Guinea locals provided extra manpower during the recovery project.

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