Prologue
With the departure of the 17th Bomb Group, the mission of McChord Field became more supporting the Army Air Forces Training Command's mission for the training of units, crews, and individuals for bombardment, fighter, and reconnaissance operations.
So it came to pass, one very young, rookie pilot from Stillwater Pennsylvania, had bluffed his way into joining the USAAF, he was sixteen years old, but had made everyone believe he was 18 almost nineteen. Years of working out doors on the family farm, Jackson had self-taught himself the mechanics, of an old World War One Curtis Jenny. This was used for crop dusting and much to his mother's horror, had taught himself to fly. Crop dusting the fields from this, and then a Piper J-3 Cub, which the local co-operative had clubbed together to buy. It was a known fact that at the start of the war the majority of pilots had flown one of these Cubs, it was a training machine.
Jack was a strapping lad, the fresh air of the land; the hands on manual work had made him tall and muscled for his age, he had no trouble convincing the recruitment office of his ability. They, on the other hand knew that at least this lad was capable of flying a plane so less training, they let him enlist.
But instead of being sent to the Pacific, Jackson was trained on a P43 Lancer and was told his orders would be 55th fighter group, which was part of 8th Air Force currently located at RAF High Wycombe, three operational squadrons, made the move to England: the 38th, 338th, and the 343rd. So, by August 1943, the new recruits had finished with their stateside training and began the preparations for the transatlantic deployment to England, and this was how one newly commissioned 2nd Lieutenant Jackson Gibbs, left McChord Air Force Base on the 1st September 1943 for New York.
Departing New York on 5th September 1943, as part of a convoy to Britain, he and his fellow pilots, embarked on the HMS Orion. This ship could normally carry 1,500 persons across the ocean, but for this trip, 300 officers and 3,200 enlisted men made the voyage, to England and new adventures.