Source:
www.americanairmuseum.com
| General | |
|---|---|
| Manufacturer: | Boeing |
| Production-Block: | , B-17F-90-BO: 42-30132 to 42-30231 |
| Operational History | |
|---|---|
| Bomb Group: | , 381st Bomb Group |
| Bomb Squadron: | , 532nd Bomb Squadron |
| RCL: | VE-V |
| MACR: | 379 |
| Fate: |
, Lost by flak/aa-fire (17 August 1943) |
History of
B-17 42-30140 / King Malfunction II
Delivered Cheyenne 15/4/43; Smoky Hill 25/4/43; Walla Walla 2/5/43; Smoky Hill 10/5/43; Dow Fd 26/5/43; Assigned 532BS/381BG [VE-V] Ridgewell 23/6/43; Missing in Action 6m Schweinfurt 17/8/43; Flak KO’d #3 & #4 feathered, crashed Esch, five miles SE of Munstereifel, Ger. 1 x KIA; 8 x Prisoner of War; 2 x Crew EVD (Nelson & Genz) Missing Air Crew Report 379. KING MALFUNCTION II.
Information may include corrections and additions based on Jing’s research.
B-17 42-30140 / King Malfunction II Details
Shot down by Oblt Herbert Kleinschmidt in Bf 110G-4 of NJG 1/6 Esch, Germany during Schweinfurt raid
Subject: Report on ship #42-30140, Lt. Nelson & Lt. Painter
The A/C was hit during combined fighter and heavy Flak attack about thirty minutes into the Continent on route in. No 3 engine smoked and was feathered. Fire spurted out between #3 & #4 engine and No 4 engine began to smoke. A/C dropped down and pulled off to the right and #4 engine was feathered. Approximately five (5) chutes were seen to come out and the ship left the vicinty of the formation in a gradual let-down under control to the right of the formation. Two E/A follows the A/C out but did not attack. Later a few more chutes were picked up in my field of glasses in the direction in which the B-17F had led down, but could not be certain if they came from Lt. Nelson’s ship.
1Lt. Marvin D. Lord
Air Corps
42-30140 went down under control at 49°50’N – 08°1440. Another ship reported this A/C had #2 engine burning fifteen minutes inside coast after first enemy attack. Went into a very steep dive. Three chutes came out. Then one moment later entire ship caught fire. Shortly after entire tail assembly from Ball Turret back snapped off and five more chutes came out. Another ship reported seven chutes came out of this A/C.
1Lt. Don S. Williams
Air Corps
B-17 42-30140 / King Malfunction II Crew
| Position | Rank | Name (First Name, Middle Initial, Last Name) | Status | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| P | 1LT | Jack Painter | KIA | - |
| CP | 1LT | Robert Nelson | EVD | - |
| NAV | 2LT | William J. Keays | POW | - |
| BOMB | 2LT | Lloyd Duke | POW | - |
| ENG/TT | S/SGT | Matthew Kowalski | POW | - |
| RO | S/SGT | William Balentine | POW | - |
| BT | S/SGT | Allen J. Kellogg | POW | - |
| WG | S/SGT | Norman G. Whitman | POW | - |
| WG | S/SGT | Raymond Genz | EVD | - |
| TG | S/SGT | James Mizell | POW | - |
| OBS | 2LT | Everett Ragan | POW | - |
7,001 Aufrufe
This page was last updated on 02 August 2020
24. February 2023 access_time 3:27
2nd Lt was my grandpa! He had amazing stories to tell. He survived time in a concentration camp, I remember as a kid visiting him and swing that their pantry was always stocked full because he never wanted to feel like he was in a situation where he was starved again like he was in the camp!
02. September 2025 access_time 0:24
B-17F My dad’s plane
25. September 2026 access_time 9:13
Look what i found in a german newspaper today:
https://www.ksta.de/region/euskirchen-eifel/bad-muenstereifel/bad-muenstereifel-us-pilot-opferte-sein-leben-und-rettete-esch-1381589
Memorial plaque planned US pilot Jack B. Painter sacrificed his life and saved Esch
Hubert Ginster is the last living witness. The 90-year-old can still clearly remember the day Esch narrowly escaped disaster. “I was in the field with my mother,” he recounts. As the plane approached, his mother shouted to him: “Get down!” It was 1943, and even in the Eifel region, people knew the sound of an approaching bomber and understood the mortal danger it posed. The seven-year-old watched the plane come in on a curved path, then crash into a field at the edge of the village, 70 to 100 meters from mother and child. What the child couldn’t have known at the time: the US pilot most likely sacrificed his life so that the B-17 bomber wouldn’t crash into the village.
Edgar Fass has researched the story of this near-catastrophe. And not only that — he pushed for the young American’s humanity and courage to be honored now, 83 years later. In May, the town council of Bad Münstereifel decided to erect a memorial plaque in Esch. At an event on Esch’s village square, town archivist Anna Rosemann and deputy mayor Wolfgang Greuel presented the plans.
“It proves that even in the darkest times, humanity makes a difference.” — Wolfgang Greuel
To find out what happened on August 17, 1943, Edgar Fass and Norbert Liebing dug through archives, evaluated sources, and interviewed witnesses. Thanks to this research work, the events have been reconstructed quite precisely. Edgar Fass says: “I think it’s a shame that I didn’t start researching earlier, and that the pilot is only being honored after 80 years.” A squadron of the United States Army Air Force had taken off from Ridgewell in Britain, heading toward Germany.
In fact, the archive of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Luftkriegsgeschichte Rhein/Mosel (Rhine/Moselle Air War History Working Group) contains a photo of the exact aircraft that crashed near Esch. The official designation of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress: B-17F, 42-30140 “KING MALFUNCTION II,” 532nd Squadron, 381st Bomb Group. The B-17 came under fire from German anti-aircraft defenses and was severely damaged. Over the forest northeast of Esch, the crew dropped their bomb load. Fass and Liebing looked closely here as well and located the drop site.
The flight route around Bad Münstereifel-Esch has been reconstructed
They discovered around 13 bomb craters, some filled with rubble, others still clearly visible, Liebing reports. There is dense spruce forest there, so it can be ruled out that the soldiers had been bombing a target at that location. The two local historians were able to find not only the bomb drop site but also reconstructed the flight route — not least based on the accounts of a woman from Reckerscheid, who has since passed away.
In an interview a few years earlier, she had clearly remembered how the damaged aircraft flew over the village at the time. This makes it clear to Fass and Liebing that the pilot steered a wide arc around Esch. Jack B. Painter was 26 years old when he made the fateful decision. Nine of the ten crew members parachuted out, while Painter steered the aircraft toward its inevitable crash in the field near Esch.
Two crew members were able to flee to Gibraltar
Bad Münstereifel town archivist Anna Rosemann describes how things continued for the crew. Most of the men became German prisoners of war. However, co-pilot Lieutenant Robert E. Nelson and Sergeant Raymond A. Genz managed to escape. In about twelve days they made their way through to Luxembourg, where they were able to make contact with Luxembourgish-French resistance cells.
Via France, Barcelona, and Madrid they fled to Gibraltar and were flown from there to Great Britain. According to current research, they were the first US soldiers to successfully escape from Germany, and were awarded the “Silver Star” medal for it. Edgar Fass had managed to get in contact with Jack B. Painter’s son. However, the son recently passed away, and since then the researcher says he has received no more responses from the USA.
Hubert Ginster brought an old photo to the event at the village square. It shows him with a team of oxen not far from the spot where he had once crouched on the ground with his mother. He no longer remembers exactly when it was taken, but it must have been in the early 1950s. In any case, the seven-year-old had by then grown into a young man. Klaus Burggraf also brought a memento with him: a paddle. Every B-17 bomber carried an inflatable boat on board in case the aircraft had to make an emergency landing on water.
Burggraf’s grandfather had taken both paddles from the crash site; one is kept safe in the home of the grandson and his wife. Klaus Burggraf also has an idea where the matching one is: “It was sold along with Grandpa’s house when it was sold.” He is in talks with the current owners to reunite the two paddles. Perhaps someone will also come forward who knows what kind of wood the old paddle is carved from — it is, in fact, surprisingly light.
It’s not known exactly whether further parts of the aircraft, which was smashed but not burned out, ended up disappearing into cellars or barns in and around Esch. Shortly after the crash, in any case, the crash site was cordoned off by the Wehrmacht. Jack B. Painter was buried two days after his death in the Ehrenfriedhof (Honor Cemetery) in Bad Münstereifel. After the end of the Second World War, he was reinterred in 1949 at Zachary Taylor Cemetery in Louisville, Kentucky.
Anna Rosemann shows a photo of the 26-year-old, with a young woman at his side. The memorial is meant to help ensure that he is not forgotten in Esch. It has not yet been decided what the plaque will look like or exactly where it will be placed. Deputy mayor Wolfgang Greuel expressed his admiration for the young soldier’s selfless behavior: “It proves that even in the darkest times, humanity makes a difference.”