OBJECTIVE: Bomb riverfront godowns at Canton
TIME OVER TARGET: ~3:00 p.m.
AMERICAN UNITS AND AIRCRAFT: Four P-38s from the 449th Fighter Squadron (23rd Fighter Group)
AMERICAN PILOTS AND AIRCREW: 1st Lt. Lewden Enslen; 2nd Lt. Billie M. Beardsley
ORDNANCE EXPENDED: 8 x 500-pound bombs
RESULTS: Pilots report direct hits on godowns
JAPANESE UNITS, AIRCRAFT, AND PILOTS:
- Ki-43-II and Ki-44-II from the 25th Sentai and 85th Sentai. Pilots may have included Major Toshio A. Sakagawa.
- One Ki-57 transport plane.
AIRCRAFT LOSSES: P-38s shoot down the Ki-57 transport plane, killing Lt. General Nakasono Moritaka and members of his staff.
SOURCES: Original mission reports and other documents in the Air Force Historical Research Agency archives at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama.
Information compiled by Steven K. Bailey, author of Bold Venture: The American Bombing of Japanese-Occupied Hong Kong, 1942-1945 (Potomac Books/University of Nebraska Press, 2019).