Memorial Day

[thirrdegreetusker]

With Memorial Day approaching, it is a time to remember. This is the story of a boy born and raised in Arkansas, Nathan Green Gordon, who did undergrad at ArkTech, and law school at UAFay. While at Fayetteville, he lettered two years for the football Hogs. 

On a WW2 mission piloting a navy Catalina flying boat, in 1944, Gordon risked his life time and again to pick up aircrew who had been shot down in the harbor. When his plane already full of rescued airmen, another plane went down. There are reports in which witnesses said that some of the rescued men were pleading "You have done your job! Let's get out of here. Do not turn back!!"

But he could not leave those last men to be captured or killed by the Japanese. So, in full sight of the Japanese guns, he swung back around, landed again.

From wiki:

Medal of Honor mission
On February 15, the Fifth Air Force attacked Kavieng on the island of New Ireland. The mission consisted of four squadrons of A-20 Havocs from the 3rd Bombardment Group that attacked shipping in the harbor, and seven squadrons of B-25's from the 38th and 345th Groups that bombed facilities along the harbor front. Accurate antiaircraft fire shot down eight of the low-level strafers.

Gordon's PBY Catalina, Gardenia Six, was on station near Witu, escorted by four P-47 Thunderbolts of the 348th Fighter Group. In one of the "most striking rescues of the war," he made four separate landings and take-offs under Japanese fire. On his first landing, endangered by waves that were breaking 16 to 18 feet high, he searched for the crew of a downed A-20 without locating survivors. The aircraft was severely stressed and took on water from numerous burst seams.

After taking off, Gordon was directed twice to pick up nine men of two B-25s that had ditched, forced to shut down one or both engines to effect the rescues, while two other B-25s strafed the Japanese gun positions to suppress their fire. After the PBY started back to base and its fighter escorts had departed, low on fuel, one of the B-25s spotted two rafts and called back the rescue aircraft.

Despite heavy seas and a damaged aircraft, Lt.(j.g.) Gordon executed another landing only 600 yards from shore, overflying Japanese gun positions at low level to land, and picked up an additional six airmen. His final takeoff with 24 men aboard was with a dangerously overloaded aircraft, but he managed to keep the Catalina's nose up until he reached flying speed without nosing over in the rough seas.

Gordon received the Medal of Honor in September 1944, and his crew of eight each received the Silver Star.

Medal of Honor citation

Lieutenant Gordon's official Medal of Honor citation reads:
For extraordinary heroism above and beyond the call of duty as commander of a Catalina patrol plane in rescuing personnel of the U.S. Army 5th Air Force shot down in combat over Kavieng Harbor in the Bismarck Sea, February 15, 1944. On air alert in the vicinity of Vitu Islands, Lt. (then Lt. j.g.) Gordon unhesitatingly responded to a report of the crash and flew boldly into the harbor, defying close-range fire from enemy shore guns to make 3 separate landings in full view of the Japanese and pick up 9 men, several of them injured. With his cumbersome flying boat dangerously overloaded, he made a brilliant takeoff despite heavy swells and almost total absence of wind and set a course for base, only to receive the report of another group stranded in a rubber life raft 600 yards from the enemy shore. Promptly turning back, he again risked his life to set his plane down under direct fire of the heaviest defenses of Kavieng and take aboard 6 more survivors, coolly making his fourth dexterous takeoff with 15 rescued officers and men (plus his crew of nine) . By his exceptional daring, personal valor, and incomparable airmanship under most perilous conditions, Lieutenant Gordon prevented certain death or capture of our airmen by the Japanese.





Nathan Green Gordon. Lest we forget.

[DeltaBoy]

I always stop and remember my Grandfathers Friends who are on Eternal Patrol entombed in the bowels of the USS Arizona and a Cousin who died in Nam.

[OS2 (SW) Razor Back]

Thank you for sharing.
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