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THE LAST COMBAT PILOT OF THE MEMPHIS BELLE


KASTAUFFER
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Capt Robert Morgan and crew completed their 25th mission on the Memphis Belle on May 17, 1943. It was however not the last mission for the plane.

On May 19, 1943 1st Lt Clayton L Anderson flew her on a mission to Kiel Germany. He actually flew 2 missions with her during the Belle’s combat tour. On June 8, 1943, she began her flight back to the USA with Morgan at the helm.

Capt Anderson completed his missions and received his DFC in July 1943. His DFC is unofficially hand engraved and numbered.

He went on the fly missions with the 20th Air Force later in the war .

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7 minutes ago, otter42 said:

Kurt, Very nice medal and  engraving style. Is that style harder to come by, looks more time consuming? Ken

 

I like WWII "Non Officially" hand engraved medals. There is some variety to them and in my opinion are harder to fake . Machine engraving is usually what fakers use today when engraving medals. Hand engraving is a lost art, 

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That’s a great DFC Kurt! Here’s a pic of William Wyler by the Memphis Belle at the old National Guard Armory in Memphis at about the same time I used to play around it. You can see the chain link fence behind him, which wasn’t much of a deterrence when it came to theft of some parts.

 

The next pic is from my visit to Wright-Patterson three months ago. 

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