OBJECTIVE: Dive-bomb targets in town of Samshui near Canton and run fighter sweep over White Cloud airbase
RESULTS: The American pilots encounter a formation of Japanese fighters, which forces the American pilots to abort the mission and engage in an extended dogfight.
TIME OVER TARGET: Morning
AMERICAN UNITS AND AIRCRAFT: Eleven P-51s from the 76th Fighter Squadron (23rd Fighter Group)
AMERICAN PILOTS AND AIRCREW: Lt. Wilson; Lt. Newsome; Lt. Anderson; Lt. Baker; Lt. Schaeffer; Lt. Raymond; 2nd Lt. Jerome F. Eisenman; Lt. Watt (76th FS); Major Treacy (23rd FG); Lt. Hall (26th FS); Lt. Tolhurst (93rd FS). Though the pilots are from multiple units, the aircraft all apparently belong to the 76th FS.
ORDNANCE EXPENDED: The American aircraft are loaded with 16 x 250-pound bombs and 8 x 500-pound incendiary bomb clusters. However, the appearance of Japanese fighters forces the American pilots to abort the bombing mission. They jettison all bombs, since P-51s cannot dogfight effectively when loaded up with bombs.
JAPANESE UNITS, AIRCRAFT, AND PILOTS: An unknown number of Ki-44s, probably from the 85th Sentai
AIRCRAFT LOSSES: American pilots claim to shoot down up to four Ki-44s and to damage two more, though Japanese records indicate no pilots are lost on this date.
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).