Don Robert Underwood

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Allan Underwood WW II Story

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Training photo: 838th Bombardment Squadron, Heavy, 1943
Training photo: 838th Bombardment Squadron, Heavy, 1943. Allan Underwood in top row, 4th from left.

Despite reservations about the military-industrial complex, and the disproportionate weight given to war storytelling, the story of Allan Underwood is worth telling. The details are provided by a web site for the 487th Bomb Group, which as of this writing is still holding reunions. As the site explains, the toll on U.S. airmen was considerable; the air battles cost 26,000 lives and 18,000- wounded — 10% of all U.S. deaths in the war. This group flew B-24H/J and B17G aircraft, and it lost 33 aircraft. Its bases of operation were farflung, including locations in Nebraska, New Mexico, Florida and New Jersey. In Europe, the base was Station 137 in Lavenham, Suffolk, England.

Like his four brothers, Allan was born in Nogales. As a young man, he moved to Los Angeles where he completed one year of college, and worked in a semiskilled occupation in the building of aircraft. He was single when he enlisted in the U.S. Army in Phoenix on 21 January 1943. The version of the story I know does not include details of his training, but we know this about air crew training:

Allan Underwood marker at Arlington - credit Ross Underwood
Marker at Arlington Nat’l Cemetery (credit Ross Underwood)

Becoming a USAAF pilot during WWII wasn’t an easy, simple or quick procedure. To illustrate how difficult and dangerous the task was, consider that 324,647 cadets entered training between January 1941 and August 1945. 132,993 washed out or were killed during training. This attrition rate of nearly 40%, was due primarily to physical problems, accidents or inability to master the rigorous academic requirements. –WRAFS Museum, Arkansas

Allan’s experience would have been highly compressed. The group’s first combat mission was not flown until its control was transferred to England’s Eighth Air Force. That event took place in 7 May 1944.

Missions flown were not limited to Germany. For instance, the group flew numerous missions to attack V-weapon installations in France, marshalling points in Belgium and airfields in Holland.

From here, Paul Webber, who researched the history for the 487th Bomb Group Association, takes the story:

After training, he was assigned as navigator on the heavy bomber crew of Second Lieutenant Charlton A. Deuschle, in the 838th Bomb Squadron of the 487th Bomb Group. This Group was based at Army Air Forces Station 137, near the village of Lavenham, Suffolk, England, and was part of the 8th U.S. Army Air Force in Europe.

Lt. Underwood and seven of his crew mates were killed in action on 5 August 1944 while on a mission to bomb an aircraft factory at Magdeburg, Germany. Their aircraft, B-17G 43-38007 [which the crew dubbed “The Moldy Fig”], was shot down by flak during the bomb run, and crashed near Lostau, Germany, 13 kilometers southwest of Burg, Germany, just northeast of Magdeburg. Pilot Lt Deuschle and gunner Sgt Robert J. Crooker survived and became prisoners of war. The dead were buried initially at the village cemetery in Lostau. (Lostau is a village and a former municipality in the Jerichower Land district, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Since 1 Jan 2010, it is part of the municipality Möser). After the war, Underwood’s remains were returned to the United States and re-interred at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia. He is buried in Section 11, Site 253 LH.

Allan Underwood, 1943There are a few other details. Survivor Sgt Crooker, who told relatives that he was “severely mistreated by German civilians” while he served as a POW, reported that their B-17G took a direct flak hit on the right wing and in its bomb bay 1-2 minutes before the start of the bombing run. Part of the wing came off and the aircraft exploded, all in a matter of seconds.

German civilian losses from Eighth Air Force strategic bombing, while not associated with this particular mission, were at times consequential. For instance, a raid two months later on Duisburg, about 250 miles from the crash site, caused a firestorm and killed 2,500. Duisburg was a logistics center for the Nazis and a center for chemical, steel and iron industry at the time.

The war stories from Bill, John and Robert have not been a major part of family lore — at least not so far. From what has been determined so far, the Underwood boys were loyal, disciplined and answered a calling that — as wartime callings go — had a moral high ground.

Ellen Rentzmann’s Service Letter from WW I

By

ellen-rentzmann-navy-dept-certification-332-190

Bureau of Medicine & Surgery
Navy Department
Washington DC
October 17, 1917

To: Ellen C. Rentzmann

18 Taylor
Oak Park Ill.

Subject: Enrollment in the Naval Coast Defense Reserve, (Class 4.), U.S.N.R.F

1. You are hereby enrolled in the provisional grade of nurse, in the Naval Coast Defense Reserve (Class 4), U.S.N.R.F., in accordance with the Act of Congress making appropriations for the Naval Service for the fiscal year ending June 3, 1917, and for other purposes, approved August 29, 1916, to serve for a period of four years from September 18, 1917.

(Signed) W.C.Braisted.

By Direction.
Oath executed.
Before. (Signed) A.C. Nordil
Date. 9-24-17
Commission Expires May 4, 1919.

ALWAYS KEEP THIS PAPER

Certified to be a true copy.

signed by Ellen C. Rentzmann

Historical Notes

1. W.C. Braisted referred to Navy Surgeon General William C. Braisted (who had been born the year before Lincoln was assassinated). While the War effort was uppermost, an even greater challenge lay ahead for the Navy’s caregivers. The story is retold by Braisted himself, but a 2010 NIH report offers this shorter account:

 . . . in the fourth dreadful year of the war, as the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) assumed fighting strength and prepared their first great offensive against the Germans, the flu struck. By the War Department’s most conservative count, influenza sickened 26% of the Army—more than one million men—and killed almost 30,000 before they even got to France.2,3 On both sides of the Atlantic, the Army lost a staggering 8,743,102 days to influenza among enlisted men in 1918.4 (p. 1448) The Navy recorded 5,027 deaths and more than 106,000 hospital admissions for influenza and pneumonia out of 600,000 men, but given the large number of mild cases that were never recorded, Braisted put the sickness rate closer to 40%.5,6 (p. 2458)

 

Military-Industrial Service

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Eisenhower Farewell Address - TV via Wikipedia
Eisenhower Farewell Address

As Eisenhower noted in his farewell speech cautioning the nation about the rising power of the military-industrial complex (MIC), Americans are touched in many ways by the U.S. military. In the draft era, some were called to serve directly. In the voluntary service era, some chose to serve. Many more were affected by working as civil servants on military bases or defense laboratories, developed personnel or weapons systems, worked in VA hospitals and clinics. Still more were indirectly affected by the toll that war takes on a family.

In this sense, our family is no different.  In World War I, DRU’s mother Ellen was a volunteer in the Navy nursing corps. Don Robert and his brothers John, Bill and Allan Underwood all served in World War II.  Bill became a career officer in the Air Force. DRU’s first wife Billie was an Army nurse, and the two met when DRU was convalescing at a Van Nuys hospital from what was then called shell shock. Billie’s brother John served in the Navy during World War II, and brother Jay served as an officer in the Army, working in electronics. Mark’s first wife Kathleen worked in a Navy Personnel laboratory where Mark also later worked, and she continued to help military wives and family members when she became a clinical psychologist. Mark’s business ventures often entailed work that was sponsored by DARPA, Air Force or Army research initiatives, and he worked at several defense contract outfits (Visicom Labs, Applied Visions).

This is just a sampling of the military-industrial reach. Many family members have been omitted from this brief list. How families have been affected by such service is perhaps less well understood than the conversation about PTSD would indicate. For those who survive — and of course most do — it can be a steady, sometimes even rewarding career choice. For others, the frequent relocations can put a burden on families, especially women. The goal of military work — to deter and in necessary defeat by destroying what is today’s enemy — contains many paradoxes that not everyone has worked through.

There is little doubt that what became the MIC had a major impact on DRU and his family.