While at Dulag Luft, Frankfurt Germany, the holding camp for personnel to be shipped to a permanent camp, a German Sergeant asked me how many men were killed on the crew. I told him none. He informed me that two (2) men were killed and showed me their identification tags and told me that they were buried at some town close to where the plane crashed by the name of Walpersbach. I asked what kind of a burial they had and he said it was not a military one but that they did get a decent burial.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was on the loose until November the 4th and when captured I estimated I was approximately thirty (30) miles South of Wiener Neustadt. The gendarme responsible for the capture took me to a little village ( cannot remember the name) here he showed me the dog tags of the two boys that he reported killed, also he showed me a pair of baby shoes that belonged to Sgt. Zelasko and were always tied to the “Y” of the Ball Turret on our ship. The same day he took me to Vienna Austria and on the way he drove up on a small hill top which had a few farm houses on it. (This was only a short way from the town he took me to after capture) He stopped at one of the farm houses to get information from them about our ship which was crashed in their field a short way from the house. I was not allowed to leave the automobile, and the weather was cloudy and foggy. Through the fog and to the best of my ability and memory I thought I could distinguish what looked like the tail and part of a wing with an engine on it not over five hundred yards from the farm house and buildings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Donald E. Elder Source: MACR 1112<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Delivered Cheyenne 17\/4\/43; Smoky Hill 23\/4\/43; Morrison 5\/5\/43; Warner Robins 8\/5\/43; Morrison 18\/5\/43; Assigned 429BS\/2BG Chateau-du-Rhumel 4\/6\/43; Ain M’Lila 17\/6\/43; Massicault 31\/7\/43; Missing in Action {41m} Wiener Neustadt 1\/12\/43 with Dick Eggers, Co-pilot: Don Elder, Navigator: Bill Thompson, Bombardier: Chas Major, Flight engineer\/top turret gunner: Chester Ehredt, Radio Operator: Claude Roper, Ball turret gunner: Malcolm Mathews, Waist gunner: Marion Benbrook (8 Prisoner of War), Waist gunner: George Brand,Tail gunner: Tom Zelasko (2KIA found in wreckage); shot down by enemy aircraft. Crashed Schlatten, 18km south of Wiener-Neustadt, Austria. Missing Air Crew Report 1112. RAGGEDY ANN.","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"airplane-status":[136],"status-date":[656],"status-day":[1854],"status-month":[1867],"status-year":[1894],"production-block":[31],"manufacturer":[130],"delivered":[1813],"project-number":[],"bomb-group":[274],"bomb-squadron":[449],"raf-service":[],"b17tags":[],"class_list":["post-4564","b17database","type-b17database","status-publish","hentry","airplane-status-lost-by-enemy-aircraft","status-date-02-11-1943","status-day-1854","status-month-november","status-year-1894","production-block-b-17f-90-bo-42-30132-42-30231","manufacturer-boeing","delivered-cheyenne","bomb-group-2nd-bomb-group","bomb-squadron-429th-bomb-squadron"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.0","language":"en","enabled_languages":["de","en"],"languages":{"de":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":true},"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":true}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/b17database\/4564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/b17database"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/b17database"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"airplane-status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/airplane-status?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"status-date","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-date?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"status-day","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-day?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"status-month","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-month?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"status-year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-year?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"production-block","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/production-block?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"manufacturer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/manufacturer?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"delivered","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/delivered?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"project-number","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/project-number?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"bomb-group","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bomb-group?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"bomb-squadron","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bomb-squadron?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"raf-service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/raf-service?post=4564"},{"taxonomy":"b17tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/b17tags?post=4564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
02 March 1946<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n