OJ Sitzes Radio Operator

Oscar Jean Sitzes born 12/30/1923, Pilot Point, Texas in oldest brick house in Denton County. My father was cattle buyer and trader and he also ranched and farmed. I started to school in Pilot Point Sept 1928. In 1940 I graduated from high school at 16 years old, I knew I would go to college but didn't know where, or what I was capable of doing. I could either go to college or make $12.00 - $15.00 a week. I finally enrolled in North Texas State Teachers College in September 1940, started with a business major, shorthand discouraged me after the first semester, but I did pass all subjects. I liked History, Government and Economics and survived Freshman English with a C. Frequently on Friday’s I would go to Dallas and spend the weekend working to pick up a few dollars for spending money at school. I commuted to college daily, caught a ride at 7:15 am and returned from Denton about 5:50 PM except on a few days that I would walk across Denton and hitchhiked home early.

In 1941 I heard President Roosevelt’s speech declaring war while I was in the college auditorium at NTSTC. During the summer of 1942 I worked in Dallas finally I got a job working as a carpenter’s helper at Love Field. During 1942 many of my friends had enlisted in the service. In the fall of 1942, I filled out my application for the Navy cadet program and also the Marine Corps. But I was turned down by both on account of a slight deficiency in color distinction, red - green. I had never known I was colorblind until I saw those charts. Finally on Feb. 9, 1943 Tom Mountain and myself journeyed to Denton where we were sworn into the U.S. Army. We were shipped Camp Wolters at Mineral Wells, Texas. After a week of testing, uniforms being issued and inoculation shots. I was assigned to the Army Air Force and shipped with several hundred more men to Biloxi Field, Mississippi. After six weeks of basic training and introduction to army life, which included drill, bivouacs, more shots and testing, I was shipped out again, this time on my way to downtown Chicago for Air Force Radio School. Here I were stationed in the largest hotel in the world at that time, The Sherman Hotel, 9000 men were stationed in this 3000-room hotel, just across the Blvd. from Lake Michigan and Soldiers Field. Here we leaned the basics of radio operation and mechanics, we liked the service here, people of Chicago were extra nice to servicemen and the girls were friendly. After the first phase of the training in the Windy and cold city transferred to Scott Field, IL. just 30 miles east of St. Louis, Mo. Spent the rest of the summer here and enjoyed it also, the riverboats, the zoo, the opera, Budweiser Brewing Co. the stockyards. Completed the course in November 1943 and waited for assignment, had two week leave at home before my next assignment

I thought I was headed for gunnery school but Instead I was shipped to March Field, Calif. about 60 miles east of Los Angeles and assigned to 7th Tow Target Squadron. Here we towed targets for Infantry and artillery in the Mojave Desert. We also flew missions over San Diego for the defense of the harbor there. I flew many missions in either A-24’s, A-25’s, B-19’s and B-25’s and many of these planes were piloted by women pilots the WASPS, ( Women’s Auxiliary Service Pilots), boy were they were good pilots. I operated the tow target reel and took instructions from the radio for maneuvers in the air. I was a Pfc. now and had earned my wings with the first 50 hours of flight and entitled to flight pay of an extra $50.00 a month, now making about 75.00 dollars a month plus free room board and clothes. Enjoyed many trips into the Los Angeles area, Hollywood, Long Beach, Riverside. Here too the people were friendly and treated service men well, also a couple of trips to San Diego to see Raymond (my brother) who was in the Navy there as a cook, J.M. Davis, my cousin, was also stationed there. I realized by now how fortunate I had been in not getting into the Marine Corps as an officer candidate. The ninety-day wonders were getting killed by the hundreds in the southwest Pacific where they operated against the Japanese.

It was during 1944 while stationed in California that volunteers were called for, for a new assignment in Syracuse New York, where a Combat Cargo Group was being formed. A troop train took several hundred of us from Calif., by Chicago, where several of us had a great night on the town courtesy of U.S. Govt. and then on to Syracuse, N.Y.

In Syracuse New York, I assigned to the 13th Combat Cargo Squadron, of the 4th Combat Cargo Group U.S. Army Air Force Ser No 58 450 527. During the summer months we began training in C-47 the old ‘Gooney Bird’ of the air the military version of the DC-3. We flew over all the northeastern states, Maine, Vermont, Niagara Falls, beautiful country from the air. Very few service men in the area and lots of friendly people, and lots of working and college age girls around town. In the fall of 1944 the 4^th Combat Cargo Group was transferred to Bowman Field, Kentucky close by to Louisville, KY. Here we continued the training but now assigned to a new aircraft, the brand new C-46 (Cargo) 2000 horsepower engines with quad bladed props. Training missions continued for a couple of months flying night and daytime missions, practiced, towing gliders and riding in them, it was fun and we had done some of this in Syracuse.

We knew time was approaching for the overseas assignment - most of us thought we were on our way to Russia because of the training in cryptograph, coding and decoding so many messages. All radio operators were required to take a least 20 words per minute by Morse code and also transmit at the same speed, also blinker code at 8 words per minute. Made the horse races in Louisville and all the bars in town, found a group of girls from Indiana whose family farmed and they had an automobile- had lots of fun while in this area also - lived it up because we knew we were going overseas shortly. Had a furlough - 2 weeks at home and then back to Bowman Field.

Here we went through final processing and new issue of all clothing and flight gear at Baer Field, Fort Wayne, Ind. Here we had new C-46 airplanes issued and we checked them out on tests. We were then assigned to our flight crews which would become our family for the next year or more. Lt. Earl Fitch, ship captain, Lt. Dalton D. White, co-pilot, Sgt. Hackowicz, flight engineer, and Cpl. O.J. Sitzes, radio operator. 25 ships in each of the four squadrons departed for Palm Beach and on to Key West, Fla. in Nov 1945, destination unknown. A couple of days confined to base in Florida - final processing for overseas shots and emergency flight training. Headed southeast early one morning with our destination orders which were to be opened in flight after one hour on this heading. First stop San Juan, Puerto Rico, overnight there and early morning departure, second stop Georgetown, British Guinea; a night of beer drinking and revelry among ourselves and the natives in this strange land in South America. Early morning departure, next stop Belem, Brazil-- another night and rumors were going strong as to destination, Russia. We flew across the Amazon River- a beautiful sight across this flood plain a couple of hundred miles across these rivers and green deltas and on to Natal, Brazil. Every night on this journey was spent in the base Post Exchange, telling stories and passing on the most current rumors. Early take off before dawn and out over the South Atlantic, we had crossed over equator the previous day, next stop the Ascension Island In south mid Atlantic Ocean. It’s a small Island In a big ocean, we were all thankful when we saw It In that Immense expanse of water. Our aircraft was loaded with various types of equipment and about 15 passengers, which included ground crewmen for our new assignment. It was exciting for me and I was anxious to find out what would happen next. The dangers involved were secondary, for a small town boy this was a real adventure. We spent the night on this desolate, but beautiful island surrounded by the blue Atlantic next stop Accra on the Gold Coast of Africa were we spent the night Accra at the air base there and we were began to notice poorer accommodations and poorer food with each jump from base to base. From Accra we flew to Kano and the next day on to El Fasher, Germany's General Rommell had held this base in North Africa at one time. We slept on the roof of an old German barracks, I have never seen a more beautiful night sky than here, millions of stars were just overhead. Leaving El Fasher one of our ships ground looped with, no serious casualties but its departure was delayed for repair a couple of weeks for repairs. We did fly at a low altitude over part of Africa and saw numerous wild animals and small villages with grass shacks plus lots of sand and desert on our way to Khartoum. It was at one of our overnight stops that we had to hand fill our gasoline tanks and filter the gas thru chamois to remove any water, because no pump trucks were available. Before every flight we always checked our equipment and had to clean up the interior of the plane. When starting the engines it was my duty to stand by the engines armed with a fire extinguisher in case either of them caught on fire. Occasionally I would start the booster generator on the belly of the aircraft for extra starting power. The entrance to the belly was just beside the radio operators seat, at a later time I would realize the importance of this exit because there was an emergency escape hatch thru the belly of the plane in case of emergency. You see parachutes were only issued to the flight personnel, the four (4) of us, the passengers flew without parachutes in most cases. So we did have an emergency exit without fighting our way thru the passengers. All crewmembers carried .45 cal automatic Colt weapons. This last stop in Khartoum, Africa from here we flew on to Aden, Oman. We lost our first aircraft and crew at Aden, when one of our C-46’s crashed on take-off, many aboard were lost. We flew from Aden to the island of Al Masira. From Al Masira it was onto Karachi, India, by now we realized we weren't going to Russia, unless we were going to fly over some high mountains way to the North. From Karachi it was on to Agra, India. Every days flight was from 700 to over 1000 miles, our cruising speed was approximately 165 -175 miles per hour so we were in the air 5- 6 hours per day, plus pre-flight and post-flight maintenance. From Agra we flew east to our first semi-permanent base at Sylhet, India.

We took over an old British base in Assam Province, India, in the northeast part of this huge overpopulated country. 20 to 50 of us assigned to a basha for sleeping. It was a strange new world to me but most interesting. After just a few days we started our operations. We were to fly tons and tons of munitions into Burma to assist the Indians, the Burmese, the South African, the Irish, the American, British and Australian troops in fighting the Japanese. In the CBI theatre of Operations (China Burma India} our assignment was to haul by air strategic war materials, high priority items into the closest air landing strip to the front line troops. Materials included lots of gasoline in 55 gallon drums, ammunition, milk, fresh meat, Bailey pontoon bridges, shoes, socks, etc. Some of these materials would be dropped by parachute (hotly contested areas). Frequently we were called on to evacuate wounded and injured troops or move new fresh troops into new operations. On one occasion we evacuated Prisoners of War from a Japanese prison camp close by Rangoon, many of them were litter patients, some had to be strapped into their litters completely insane after the long imprisonment. We hauled a lot of Chinese troops, they had a completely different philosophy, little regard for life. We were Christian people in a land of Hindus, Moslems, Bhuddalsm. During my time in service I had spent less time in church than any previous time in my life up until then; but now I was to begin spending more time in prayer - some of these prayers were uttered very swiftly just before every take-off and landings, I would give thanks to my Maker.

Our crew, 1st Lt. Fitch, 2ndLt. White, T/Sgt. Hackowitz, and myself Staff Sgt. led the squadron for months in the number of missions flown under combat operations, we also led In total flight time for the squadron during the next year I would put In about 1200 hours in the air, 800 plus of these hours being combat hours. I was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross with two oak leaf clusters, Air Medal with three clusters, Overseas ribbon with three clusters, South east Asia Medal, all together I had a pretty good cluster of fruit salad by the time I got back to the states.

Chang Kai Chek was still the boss of China but the communists were taking over rapidly In China. It was the very first of the Red China and we watched it develop during the latter part of World II. The communists would steal the supplies taken Into China, just about as fast as we could take them in. I had a rest leave in Chittagong, now a part of East Pakistan, also a rest leave In Shillong, India where we could see Mt. Everest the worlds tallest mountain. One of the worlds heaviest rainfall areas, over 400 inches per year. One day on record it rained more than 36 inches. An old Indian Sikh stopped me on the rest leave in Shillong and wanted three rupees to tell my fortune about $1.00, I refused him, but to get me interested, he looked at the palm of my hand and told me my birthday to the month, day and year, also where I was born, exactly. This was half a world away, I can think of no way he could have known this information. Visited the Taj Mahal in Acra, the old Red Fort, watched the Indian people bury their dead by cremation on the banks of the holy river, and cast the bodies of the children to the turtles in the same river. Such a mass of humanity, starvation and disease everywhere, much of this I think a by product of their religion and some a result of the policy of British supremacy during, those years India a part of the British commonwealth. Flew into Calcutta on numerous occasions flying for equipment, booze or delivering Red Cross entertainment units. I was stationed for a long while at Myitkyina, Burma, on the banks of the Irrawaddy River where the flying fishes play. Food was of the canned variety - lots of C-rations, which were standard issue for long flights. We could snitch a little from the food in transit, occasionally we would haul the rum rations, which was given to all British troops daily, we could also take care of our own supply by helping ourselves to a gallon or so of theirs. It took a strong stomach to drink it. Crews Gin was a local Product, we nicknamed it ‘Crews booze for Air Crews'. Cigarettes at .50 cents a carton would sell in China for $8-10 dollars. All air crew members after a day of flying were issued to 2 oz. of bourbon, this was a part of the debriefing process, it didn't take me long to make friends with the Flight Surgeon who issued the whiskey. We lived in tents most of the time, four to a tent, McCreary from Seattle, Austin from Pennsylvania and Glover from Louisiana made up our tent In Myitkyina.

We lost several planes and crews, some would fly into the mountains on night missions, others would crash into the jungle and it was near impossible to get them out. While others would get lost and finally crash never to be heard from again. The mountain passes that we flew into China were about 22,000 feet high. With a loaded plane, it was sometimes difficult to get over them. One morning we were taking a load of gasoline into Kunming China. We got over the Hump before daylight and started letting down for Kunming. Probably a hundred airplanes were doing the same thing that morning; we would let down our altitude and be cleared by the tower at 500-foot levels. We were down to about 4000 feet when we heard over the radio a distress call from another aircraft that had just crossed the Himalayan Mountains and was coming in at about 22,000 feet; this aircraft lost an engine and the other one was threatening. The operations officer on the ground instructed the crew of the disabled ship to salvo the cargo. This meant that someone above us, about 15000, feet was kicking out 55 gallon barrels of gasoline and they were falling thru (we hoped) the rest of us below to the ground. Just one of many anxious moments experienced in this year of duty in India. Then there was the drop parachute that entangled in the tail aileron and the Chinese troops that threw out one of their buddies while the plane in flight over the hump. Once the South African troops, started the fire in the cabin during flight to keep warm by. There was the time the door that flew open during flight and the stall during flight that put us in a C-46 into a spin. And there was the crew that took off just before us for a 20-minute flight to our home base and was never heard of again. And the fight of the mongoose against the cobra, the mongoose won. The snake charmers on the street- and the holy cows of India walking thru the jewelry stores while people lay starving in the streets around the corner. And the elephantltis where one leg would be swollen four times the size of the other, the schools of Calcutta, and the rickshaws, the Limey cigarettes, the monsoon season with the flooding of the plains around Calcutta, and the Mina birds, the work elephants, the monkeys, water buffalo, the ravens, the native Burmese people in canoes going up and down the Irrawaddy River. Frequently our missions would take us to front line bases, mostly dirt runways and frequently our take off pattern would take us over the Japanese troops. At night we could see the ground fire directed at our ships. Most of the Japanese air support had been eliminated by the Flying Tigers of Clare Chenault, the British also had helped eliminate them so we did not have to worry about air attact too much. The weather was so unpredictable, the winds, the rain, the snow, and icing conditions at the high altitude the equipment failure- these were the dangers'. We were fortunate, and I gave thanks for it daily. About 5 crews were lost during this year 1945 and about a dozen airplanes about the time of Hiroshima and Nagasaki when replacement crews started showing up, we had flown more than the designated number of combat missions before replacement.

I worked some in September and October assigning flights and performing some administrative duties, but kept getting my flight time in for the additional money. We kept flying into China even after the truce had been signed and the communists kept stealing, they were even hijacking some of the airplanes now. Some of us had offers to stay In China and India as Civilians and fly for Air China, but all during the past several months my legs had been hurting an awful lot, real pain where I could hardly walk sometimes. Later diagnosed as arthritis in lower back and legs. I was finally sent to Karachi, India for our trip home by boat. 8000 of us came back on a troop ship named General CALLAN steamed out of Karachi Into the Indian Ocean through the Red Sea up to the Suez Canal out at Port Said and into the Mediterranean Ocean - across the southern part of It and close enough to see the lights of Tunis - a beautiful and calm body of water in November across the Mediterranean and out at Gibraltar where we saw the Rock and could see some of the gun emplacements into the Atlantic, took us about 8 days to cross the Atlantic- the first few were smooth but cold and the last several very rough.

I had never been air-sick (occasionally while flying In India the pilot or co-pilot would get sleepy and he would go lay down in the cabin. Instead of flying with the chair empty either the engineer or myself would sit in the vacant seat. So on several occasions I got to fly the big ship, it was a big treat for us to get to do so) or sea sick and haven't until now, but on the troop ship home we got some bad food and many of us got dysentery (we had had it many times before in India along with a weeks confinement with malaria, atabrine tablets were a necessity there). Hundreds of the troops on the ship got sick all at one time some were sea sick and others were dysentery sick.

The passengers loved to play Craps, I have never seen so many dollars on the table, I didn’t loose much, and neither did I make much. At times I had seen over a thousand dollars on the table. Those stakes were a bit to rich for my blood. I had learned to play craps when I was a kid working in Dallas, I had learned from the Negro cooks and dishwasher at a restaurant I once worked in. I felt learning under these circumstances I could at least break even, which I did,

We arrived in New York Harbor late one night in late November 1945. One of the most impressive sights of my life was the beautifully lighted Statue of Liberty- the deck was not too crowded with men at two o'clock in the morning, it brought tears to our eyes remindful. of the great country that we had represented. Disembarked the following morning and traveled by train to Camp Kilmer, New Jersey. It was my first sight of the great city of New York. After a few days of medical examinations, I complained of the pain in my legs and back, the doctors decided that I should have some treatment before discharge. I was sent to an Army hospital in Tyler, Texas. Thoroughly examined and diagnosed as arthritis in my back and legs after many X-rays. Spent several weeks there and was visited by Mom and Dad Mr. and Mrs. Beck brought then, down on Sunday for the day. Later transferred to Army Navy General Hospital in Little Rock Arkansas and spent a couple of months there, Physical therapy, Roentgen treatments, exercise, hot baths, diet etc. Released from the Army with honorable discharge in March of 1946.

I went to Pilot Point where I goofed off until June and enrolled again at North Texas State College - I had a much better attitude toward college now with a little maturity. The GI bill paid a large part of expenses $75.00 per month plus tuition and supplies. Part of this time I lived at barracks attached to Chilton Hall and a part of the time I commuted to Pilot Point, it was fun to be back in school. I helped Dad trade cattle and drove the loads to Ft. Worth for him frequently, we made some pretty good money, he liked to have the help and it pushed him a little bit, it was good for him and me too. Graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in summer of 1947, major in Economics, History and Government.

Between 1948 and 1950 I taught school in Pilot Point, Texas, grades 1-8. From 1950 -1952, I was principal and teacher in Ruidoso, New Mexico. Between 1953-1973 I was a textbook salesmen for the American Book Company. From 1973-1990 I became self employed with Abilene Portable Buildings. From 1990-present, I own and manage Sitzes Self Storage, Abilene, Texas.

Some CBI flying statistics of Oscar J. Sitzes

Most combat hours in one month: 152:35 hours; March 1945

Longest single day in Air: 12:14 hours; May 16, 1945 (includes 2 drop missions to Pyagio, Burma – near Rangoon

Most days flown in one month: 27 days; January 1945

Most missions in one day: 7 missions; March 14-15, 1945

Number of days with at least 6 missions: 25 Days