36th/856th
Lemke
Crew

The crew are shown below prior to overseas departure.

Back Row,L-R:
Bradley,Bofink,Salmons,Lemke

Front Row,L-R:
Elmore,Cazzell,Albright,Olsen,Koliada,Johnston

The crew are shown below at Harrington in the summer of 1944.



Standing,L-R:

Daniel A.    Bradley        - Bombardier      ASN 0762896
Frederick C. Bofink         - Copilot         ASN 0822921  (DNB)
Frederick    Lemke          - Pilot           ASN 0696381  (DNB)
Henry E.     Salmons        - Navigator       ASN 0717148  (DNB)

Front row,L-R:
Leslie C.    Cazzell        - Engineer        ASN 38380728 (DNB)
James K.W.   Albright       - Dispatcher      ASN 33669701 (DNB)
Johnn        Koliada        - Gunner          ASN 31332341 (DNB)
Gordon W.    Elmore         - R.O.            ASN 16113201 (DNB)

Not pictured:
Garrett C.   Parnell,Jr.    - Gunner          ASN 38341096 (DNB)

ASNs so-colored for EMs link to their NARA Enlistment Records.

The crew arrived at Harrington in mid-June '44 at the earliest, and flew only 3 combat missions in July of 1944. By close of Carpetbagger operations on 17 September '44 they had 17 combat missions and 8 gas-haul missions and were put on loan to Cheddington, flying with the 406th Night Leaflet Squadron.On the night of 4/5 September 1944 the crew delivered a three-man team to the MARC-19 DZ, the agents have not yet been identified. Crashes on British soil were usually classified as non-combat flights, thus the men killed were classified as "Died Non-Battle"(DNB) by the World War II Honor Roll administrators. Further details are available on thee Honor Roll page of the web site. Briefly, the crew returned from their eighth leaflet mission but Cheddington was socked in and they were diverted to Oulton. In the afternoon takeoff to return to Cheddington, the plane smacked a tree with one wing, and crashed and burned in a woods before making it back to the base runway.

Parnell's younger brother Ben wrote the first history of the Carpetbaggers to be published, titled "Carpetbaggers: America's Secret War In Europe", ISBN: 0890155925.


Leaflets Dispersed:
PWE F-77
USF-128


Agents inserted/attempted:
MR 1491  DZ Paul 69C    (1) No Drop
MR 1926  DZ Marc 19B    (
3) Unidentified
MR 2017  DZ Bob 280A    (
3) No Drop

Additional Crew Data Sources:
Lemke Crew Mission Reports

Lemke Crew Personnel Files

Lemke Crew NARA Honor Role cards
Lemke Crew NLS 3x5 cards
Daniel Bradley's Incident Account
Parnell-Osborne Correspondence

Group-Related Downloads:
AAFRH-21 "AAF Aid to European Resistance"
Allied Leaflets Index
"Carpetbaggers" by Parnell
"They Flew by Night" editor Robert Fish
Serial Number Index of B24s
Station 179 Operations Log
(handwritten Apr44-Jul45)
Station 179 Operations Log (transcribed Sep44-Jul45)

Available on Request:
Group Mission Reports Jan-Sep44 (On disk $12ea - $10ea via Paypal)
"Chronology of SOE Operations with the Resistance In France During WWII" by Foot & Boxhall
"Spies,Supplies & Moonlit Skies Vols 1&2" by Ensminger
(On disk $12ea - $10ea via Paypal)

Redirect to: Crews  Main  Agents  Gas Hauls  Honor Roll