The Briefing Room

General Category => Military/Defense News => Topic started by: SZonian on March 24, 2017, 09:45:22 pm

Title: Piggyback Hero
Post by: SZonian on March 24, 2017, 09:45:22 pm
In 2003 they laid the remains of Glenn Rojohn to rest in the Peace Lutheran Cemetery in the little town of Greenock, Pa., just southeast of Pittsburgh. He was 81, and had been in the air conditioning and plumbing business in nearby McKeesport. If you had seen him on the street he would probably have looked to you like so many other graying, bespectacled old World War II veterans whose names appear so often now on obituary pages.

But like so many of them, though he seldom talked about it, he could have told you one hell of a story. He won the Air Medal, the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Purple Heart all in one fell swoop in the skies over Germany on December 31, 1944. Fell swoop indeed.

Capt. Glenn Rojohn, of the 8th Air Force’s 100th Bomb Group was flying his B-17G Flying Fortress bomber on a raid over Hamburg. His formation had braved heavy flak to drop their bombs, then turned 180 degrees to head out over the North Sea. They had finally turned northwest, headed back to England, when they were jumped by German fighters at 22,000 feet. The Messerschmitt Me-109s pressed their attack so closely that Capt. Rojohn could see the faces of the German pilots.

[excerpted]
https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/piggybackhero.html
Title: Re: Piggyback Hero
Post by: Fishrrman on March 25, 2017, 01:41:05 am
Great story, read it all.
Title: Re: Piggyback Hero
Post by: Smokin Joe on March 25, 2017, 02:14:55 am
Wow.
Title: Re: Piggyback Hero
Post by: Sanguine on March 25, 2017, 02:48:58 am
Good story.