After two days of separated and disorganized existence in different slit trenches and revetments alongside the airfield, writers and photographers here have succeeded in establishing airdrome press headquarters inside and underneath the shade giving and rain-shedding corpse of a shot-up C-47 transport.
CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE |
Bernie Hoffmann of Life Magazine and Sgts. Dannie Novak of Minneapolis and Bill Safran of the Bronx, Army combat photographers, decided one morning that the fuselage was a good place in which to store their film and spare cameras. About the same time discovered that the navigator's desk up in the nose made a good spot at which to pound a typewriter. Lieut. Clancy Topp, public relations officer with Brig. Gen. Frank Merrill's raiders, formerly with The Associated Press in New York, and Sgt. Dave Richardson of South Orange, N.J., correspondent of Yank Magazine, wandered over to sample the shade under the right wing. Their initial experience with the decommissioned Douglas were satisfying. More belongings were brought over and a full tenancy was established.
Other Tenants Attracted
Others attracted to the plane were
Sgt. Warren A. Boecklen, formerly a photographer with The Associated Press in St. Louis and now an Army
combat photographer; Sgt. Dave Quaid of Richmond Hill, Queens, another Army combat photographer,
and Jack Dowling of The Chicago Sun and PM. The amenities grew, and bed spaces
were staked out and pads from air dropped supply bundles were collected for cushions. The ration
dumps were raided and food stocks laid in.
Capt. Peter Cole of Stafford, Tex., who played guard for the New York Giants football team from 1937
through to 1940, liked the look of the transport and became an occupant. Captain Cole got a warm
welcome from all the other tenants. He is supply officer for a Chinese-American detachment here and
knows where the best rations are located. His arrival was signalized by the acquisition of a couple of cases of
"Ten in One" from an American ration dump sack of tinned beans and fresh tomatoes and cucumbers
from a Chinese ration pile.
The transport has now become our established home. While everyone else around here is still eating cold rations, press headquarters is having hot food prepared under the amateur but practiced tutelage of head chef Boecklen. Boecklen and his buddies, Quaid and Richardson, made a grueling march through the mountains to Myitkyina with General Merrill's raiders and know their menus, especially with regard to quickly mixed and heated field chow.
The water problem has been solved by the catchment system involving the placing of a steel helmet under the main rain run-off points along the trailing edge of the plane's wings. As time goes on more people will cast covetous eyes on our plane. So a perimeter defense has been established against marauders. Yesterday we fought a prolonged battle with a Chinese pack train that sought to wrest one wing from our possession. Eventually we pressed back the invaders, with minor casualties on both sides.
The transport is not really badly damaged. It got well punctured with bullet holes the other day when
Zeros strafed the field and it has a flat tire. Now it is being cannibalized daily for the repair
of other planes. Yesterday a mechanic came and removed the propellers. However, the radio still
works and at night we get programs from New Delhi and London. The photographers are thinking of
making the plane's lavatory into a dark room. Wary eyes are constantly kept peeled for Japanese planes and
everyone stands ready to conduct a hurried evacuation to distant foxholes if any are spotted because
the press home would be a prime target of any Japanese air raid. At night the Japanese artillery
causes some to desert the precincts of press headquarters for the miseries of dozing in the rain at the
edge of a slit trench. But morning brings them back and as the day waxes activity flourishes and all the
tenants are on hand.
Occupants of "Press Headquarters" at Myitkyina in this photo by LIFE's Bernie Hoffman are (L-R):
T/Sgt. Dave Richardson, YANK Magazine;
Capt.Clancy Topp, P.R. Stilwell s HQ.;
T/Sgt. Warren Boecklen, still photographer, Stilwell s HQ;
Sgt. Dave Quaid, 164th
Signal Photo Co.;
William Safran, 164th Signal Co.;
Pvt. Joseph Raczkowski,
164th Signal Photo Co.;
Pvt Daniel Novak, 164th Signal Photo Co.;
Tillman Durdin, N.Y. Times.
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Dave Quaid's comments...
This is the story Tillman Durdin was typing while we were being sniped. In Hoffman's photo Tillman Durdin can be seen typing the enclosed story for his paper, The New York Times. Tillman was the only civilian correspondent to do his job during the hairy days immediately after the Jap airstrip was taken by the Marauders. All the other accredited war correspondents stayed at General Stilwell's Headquarters hundreds of miles away. They came in on a press junket in Stilwell's C-47, The Magic Carpet, stayed for 20 minutes and departed, but Tillman decided to stay. Tillman passed away in 1998 and he leaves us with my respect.
Capt. Clancy Topp was a PR at Stilwell's HQ. Bill Safran and Danny Novak landed at Myitkyina with the glider assault. They were both decorated for their work; one got the Air Medal, the other the Bronze Star. Richardson, Boecklen and I came over the mountains with the Marauders. I never did know just how Raczkowski got on the strip during those early times, but he was a great guy and a fine combat cameraman. He was a news photographer, prewar, with the Syracuse Journal and Boecklen was a photographer with the St. Louis Post Dispatch. The reason photographic professionals like Raczkowski, Safran and Novak were Privates, is that the 164th Signal Photo Company was originally formed on the West Coast and all T.O. rank had been given out then. By the time cameramen who went through the Signal Corps Photo Center in Astoria, NY arrived at the outfit in Camp Crowder, Missouri only the rank of private remained to be given.
Tillman Durdin's story had some ramifications for me.
Since I had gone AWOL to join the Marauders no one knew where I was, not my family, nor the 164th.
My sister was working at her office in New York City and a co-worker asked if she had a brother Dave.
He showed her the enclosed article and the family for the first time in three months knew that I was still alive.
The sniping was constant and normally ignored since the Japs were way back from the strip, but this guy obviously
got in closer. He put one right into the small fire we had.
The photograph appeared in the June 26, 1944 issue of LIFE magazine.
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Copyright © 2005 Carl Warren Weidenburner
Portions copyright © 2003 International Combat Camera Association, Inc.