I'm Right Again Dot Com

                               A new commentary every Wednesday — November 11, 2015

2015 VETERANS DAY SPECIAL

    Long before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941, all of America, and much of the World knew about Edward Vernon ("Eddie") Rickenbacker, famous early race car driver and the highest scoring American flying ace during World War One. Among his many recognitions was being awarded the U.S. Medal of Honor. A strong advocate for air power, he rose to become president of Eastern Airlines by the time the U.S. entered the Second World War.

    In 1942, at age 52,  he was asked by Secretary of War Henry Stimson and Air Force Chief of Staff Henry ("Hap") Arnold to evaluate the status of air combat units stationed in New Guinea and Guadalcanal, where U.S. armed services were engaging Japanese forces occupying those areas. One leg of the journey was planned to be from Hawaii to Canton Island, about 1,800 miles to the southwest off what is now our 50th State. Rickenbacker and six other Air Force personnel took off from a field there in a converted B-17 "Flying Fortress" at 1:30 p.m, on October 1, 1942. One of those aboard was Staff Sgt. Alexander Kaczmarczyk, who was island hopping back to his outfit in Australia, following a serious illness.

    Aircraft instrumentation for navigation at the time was primitive.  A loop antenna for their radio gave them a bearing, but it could not tell them whether they were flying toward or away from from their destination. It is believed that an octant used for navigation could have been defective. The crew became lost in the vastness of the ocean. They circled for 24 hours, but sighted neither land nor ship. With one hour's fuel remaining, they sent continual S.O.S signals (that were heard), donned life vests, and prepared to deploy three, small, self-inflating life rafts.  Rickenbacker stuffed a map, several handkerchiefs and a 60-foot rope in his pockets. After ditching successfully, all occupants exited the quickly sinking  bomber, but in their haste they lost some of their emergency equipment, including thermoses full of water and  all emergency food rations. All they had eat were four oranges a crewman had stuffed into his pockets. They used the 60 foot rope to tie the rafts so they wouldn't drift apart.

    An inventory showed they had a first-aid kit, a Very pistol with 18 flares, two hand pumps for bailing water, two collapsible bailing buckets, two sheath knives, a small compass, some patching gear, two fishing lines (but no bait), the two pistols belonging to the pilots, Rickenbacker's rope, handkerchiefs and the map. 

   The ensuing days were excruciating. The sun blistered their flesh. Rickenbacker fashioned head covers from his handkerchiefs to help protect them from the relentless sun. Somehow, he had rescued his hat during the evacuation.

    There was little room in the tiny rafts. If one moved, all had to shift positions. They ate the last of the orange portions being doled out on the sixth day. The pistols quickly rusted from the salt water and were useless in attempts to fire them at large fish, deep in the water.

    They prayed and sang hymns.

      On the eighth day, Rickenbacker was lying on his back with his hat covering his face when he felt something light upon it. It was a sea gull. Rickenbacker slowly reached around it's legs and grabbed it tightly. They divided they gull's meat between them and saved its intestines for bait. They caught a small mackerel almost immediately, then a small sea bass. The abundance of fish became easy prey.

     Yet, Sgt. Kaczmarczyk had a relapse, weakened, and on the 13th day, died. When they consigned his body to the deep, they realized that all were rapidly beginning to fail, due to dehydration—some more rapidly than others.   

      Clouds gathered and it began to rain about 3 a.m. the next day. Had not a squall ensued, all probably would have soon expired. They caught water in shirts, trousers, socks, and underwear spread out on the rafts, then wrung them out into the buckets. "The sweetest water they had ever tasted," they said.

    The entire story can be read in Max Lucardo's book "In the Eye of the Storm;"  How they saw a monoplane with pontoons far away on the 17th day, and the next day two planes flying close together, still miles away. They thought they had failed to gain the attention of the pilots or their crews, (they actually had, but the two aircraft were low on fuel, and were forced to return to their base), but Rickenbacker's crew felt they were near civilization and were being sought.

    The story of their ultimate rescue after 21 days and how Rickenbacker refused to return to the United States, but instead, continued his mission after a brief hospital stay—is one of the greatest stories we of the "Greatest Generation" gloried in hearing—in the midst of that long, terrible struggle that did not end until August of 1945.

    Eddie Rickenbacker died in 1973, at the age of 83. 

-Phil Richardson, Observer of the human condition and storyteller. "He goes doddering on into his old age, making a public nuisance of himself." - Joseph L. Menchen

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