UnBroken -American Heroism

 

To the Officers and Enlisted men of the of the 27thBombardment Group (L) dead or missing in action in the
Philippine Islands, Australia Java, and New Guinea, we
dedicate this book and all our efforts to repay, ten thousand
times over, the Japanese for every one of our men lost.

Thomas P. Gerrity ( Leo 1930) Top row extreme right - shortly after his escape from Bataan.

 It was great to see that Angelina Jolie's film of UnBroken, based upon Laura Hillenbrand’s wonderful book of the same name, has exceeded box office expectations.  Hollywood no longer wants movies that extol common values like valor, honor, courage and faith. Instead, movies are churned out that cast doubt on any one's ability to reach deeply to the human core forged in faith, commitment, sacrifice and duty.  Valor comes not from a political bequest and certainly not from a reparation of grievances and is therefore taboo to the Procrustean themes forced by Harvey Weinstein, Peter Gruber, or Scott Rudin.

Marvel and DC Comics are the script templates replacing the Torah, the Pentateuch, or the Rights of Man.  Abe Lincoln fights Vampires, Werewolves, or the demons of his sexual identity.  Valor only works when pagan totems are doled out by Odin, Zeus, Minerva, or learned in the classrooms of Hogwarts Staff.

Anything that leads a person to behave selflessly and in good-faith from a First Cause is verboten.

Yet, thanks to Ms. Jolie's UnBroken, it is evident that People will pay to witness a man act without the aid of PC, or magical powers.

Our Thumb-Dummy Kultur Kampf is meant to keep people from talking with another person and arriving at mutually satisfying conclusion that 'boy, a man's faith in God and himself can sure give him an edge in a tough situation.'

Tough situations abound, but tough people ( people who can it - whatever it happens to be) are getting scarce it seems.  Seeming is not being.   We can be tough without Bat Utility Belts, a bog-ass Mjǫlnir in our mitts, or help from President Obama.

I linked a story writtten by a group of very tough people - the battered, under equipped, out-numbered and alone survivors of the 27th Bomb Group, including Lt (later Captain) Tom Gerrity of 17th Bomb Squadron who were sent to the Phillipine Islands less than a month before Pearl Harbor.

Tom Gerrity (Leo Class of 1930) flew a B-18 bomber that only seems to appear in a Bugs Bunny Cartoon

The plane was obsolete and Gerrity never got his plane off the ground of Nichols Field on December 9, 1941 when the Japanese destroyed General Mac Arthur's air power on the ground. 

The next day, (9th), found the 17th with some of the crews manning machine gun
posts at Nichols Field and with flying crews standing by to man the B-18’s. Tom Gerrity
and Ed Townsend had one, Pete Bender and Harry Roth of the 16th had the second, and
Gus Heiss and F.E. Timlin of the 17th had the third. All had it easy on the 9th but on the
10th all were called out. Tom and Ed were down at Nichols preparing for a bombing
mission when shortly afternoon the Nips staged a huge raid. Tom and Ed ran for cover as
the Zeros began to strafe the B-18’s that they were to use on their mission. Tom
unfortunately was hit in the hand by a piece of shrapnel and Ed got to cover just as the B-
18’s load of bombs blew up. “Tim” and “Gus” ran into a dog fight but finally managed
to get to San Marcelino.
In the same raid, several of the 17th gunners at Nichols were strafed and one crew
manned its post until blown out by bombs.

Nine days later:

The 27th Group Commander, Major Davies and a number of pilots left early this

morning by plane for Australia. They plan to pick-up the 27th’s A-24 dive bombers, and
ferry them back to the Philippines. In the absence of Major Davies, Major Sewell acted
as Group Commander with Captain Whoffell as executive officer and Tom Gerrity as
group Material Officer.
Due to the lack of aircraft and the dis-organization of the entire situation, the 27th
was left high and dry. A complete air corps unit with no airplanes with which to fight.
The “Powers the be” later turned the Group into an infantry outfit.
On December 20th Tom Gerrity was assigned to the North Luzon force as Air Corp
Liason Officer. On the way north he stopped off at Stotsenberg. Clark Field was a
shamble. Wrecked airplanes lay burned all over the field.

Tom Gerrity served as liason to General Wainwright, flying from the island fortress of Corregidor to Bataan and back keeping the man desiganted by MacArthur to be the goat for his monumental failures and arrogance in the Phillipines apprised of the appaling air defences,

Gerrity front row far right on Bataan as a P-40 pilot

 Tom Gerrity later went to Bataan as a pursuit pilot in one of few remaing P-40's, until malaria, dengue fever and the Japanese Zero turned pilots into rifle men.
Gerrity was one of the last men to escape the Death March when he was ordered to Australia only hours before the fall of Bataan. Gerrity patched up a Grumman Floatplane and flew himself and others one thousand miles south Mindanao's Del Monte Field, where he was picked up by comrades from the 27th Group ordered to Australia months earlier.

The next day two more missions were flown by
each flight. Cebu Harbor and Dabao was heavly bombed. Anti-aircraft fire was heaby
on all missions, but the Japs consistenly underestimated the speed of the B-25. After the
last mission both flights landed at Del Monte, and under cover of darkness bomb bay
tanks were reinstalled and the ships were serviced for the long hop back to Darwin. Up at
the clubhouse, the 27th Pilots welcomed back into the fold, two 27th men who had make
their way down from Bataan bare hours before it’s fall.
The faces of Tom Gerrity and Jack Wienert clearly showed the strain of four
months on beleaguered Bataan. They could give no information about the men of the
27th who remained on Bataan to the last, except that all the officers were still alive up to
the last day and that the casualties among the men had been small.
Take-off time was set at 2300, and shortly before midnight ten B-25s, each
overloaded to capacity with officers recently evacuated from Bataan - - took off from Del
Monte, bored up through a low overcast, and headed south toward Darwin, 2000 miles
away in the darkness. The scourge of the tropic “old man dengue” had smacked Talley
squarely between the eyes just before the last mission, and Pete gladly let Jack Wienert take his place as co-pilot during most of the return trip. All the ships landed at Batchelor
Field, forty miles south of Darwin, after daylight the morning of April 14, staying only
long enough to gas up, and taking off immediately. Night found them back in Charters
Towers, more than a little weary from nearly fifty hours of hard flying in four days, and
asking for nothing but a bed.
After a few days of rest, the group was called on to furnish ships for constant patrol
out of Port Moresby. J.R. Smith and Talley – now recovered from his battle with dengue
- - took two ships up April 23 and spent the usual four or five days, running a nine hour
recon flight every day over all Jap bases from Kavieng in the North to the deboyne
Islands in the south. The recons were long, lonely, and dangerous, but the pilots who
flew them gained an intimate knowledge of the entire combat area which was to be
invaluable to them later on.

Gerrity flew B-25s against the Japanese is credited with sinking 28 ships in the Bismark Sea.

UnBroken.   There are many tales of Unbroken people. We need to tell those tale. Shared memory is civilization.

Gen. Tom Gerrity - Leo High School 1930: American Hero

Tom Gerrity after his escape from Bataan

Left to right:"THE LAST SLUG"
The 3rd Bomb Group had a club called "The Last Slug" located at 26 Aland Street, Charters Towers, Darwin Australia 1942.
Verandah: Rube Rubenstein, "Jim" Davies, James Smith and Tom Gerrity
Top step: Alex Salvatore, Scanlon, Zeke Summers
3rd step: Ron Hubbard, Oliver Doan
4th step: Harry Managan, Howie West, Frank Tally
5th step: Harry Galusha
6th step: Harry Rose, Bob Ruegg, "Pappy" Gunn, Bob Strickland
Bottom step: Leland Walker, Frank Timlin, Jim McAfee

In the winter of 1941 through the spring of 1942, Guam, Wake, and Midway Islands, the Singapore, Malaysia,Hong Kong, and the Philippines, and all shipping in between were targeted by Japan.

At Nichols Field in the PI, a 1930 graduate of Leo High School in Chicago, prepared to take off in an obsolete B-18 medium bomber. Lt. Tom Gerrity and most of the Far East Asian Air Force was caught on the ground. He and his crew chief were wounded and his plane destroyed.

Gerrity would then serve as Gen Wainwright's air liaison officer, fight as an infantryman, transfer to the six P-40's of the 24th Pursuit Group, contract malaria and dengue fevers, lose forty pounds, rebuild a shot up amphibious plane and escape to Australia when ordered out on April 8th, 1942.

Lt. Tom Gerrity would go on to fly almost fifty combat missions in a B-25, sinking 28 Japanese ships in the Bismark and Coral Seas. He would go on to become a four-star general in the Air Force.

He is a fit subject for students of history, as are the millions of average men who stood up to evil.

Thomas P. Gerrity helped develop the United States Air Force and was a key figure in America's Race for Space.

Please read Tom Gerrity's Phillipine War Diary - this is a treasure. The account preserved by the Linda Dow Family ( click my post title) is clear and compelling account of the heroism of Americans in a hopeless fight pages 119- 122). This is very compelling reading.

Thomas Patrick Gerrity American Manager. Born 8 December 1913. Died 24 February 1968. Head of Air Force ballistic missile programs 1960-1961.
Personal: Male. Born in Harlowton, Montana, USA.

Gerrity, son of a railroad boilermaker, grew up in Chicago, where his family moved before he was two. He attended the Armour Institute (later the Illinois Institute of Technology). He joined the Army as an aviation cadet in 1939. He was serving in the Philippines at the time of the Japanese invasion in December 1941, becoming commander of a bomber squadron in New Guinea after the American evacuation. In November 1942 he was assigned to the Army Air Forces Materiel Command at Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio, and worked as project officer on the B-25, B-26, B-29, B-32, B-35 and B-36 bombers. In January 1946 he was made Chief of the Bomber Branch in the Aircraft and Missile Section, and then later Chief of the entire Aircraft and Missile Section.

In March 1950 Gerrity commanded the 1lth Bombardment Group of the Strategic Air Command at Carswell Air Force Base, Texas. In March 1953 he went to the Pentagon, serving in senior staff posisions in procurement and production engineering. From August 1957 he commanded the Oklahoma City Air Materiel Area of the Air Materiel Command in August 1957 t Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma.

In July 1960 he was made commander of the Ballistic Missile Center of the Air Materiel Command at Los Angeles, California, reorganized as the Ballistic Systems Division in April 1961. During this period he oversaw the most intense phase of development and deployment of the Atlas, Titan, and Minuteman ICBM's.

In July 1962 General Gerrity was assigned to duties at the Pentagon, followed by a stint as the senior Air Force member, Military Staff Committee, United Nations. In August 1967 he became commander of the Air Force Logistics Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.

Gen. Tom Gerrity Leo Man: All Veterans Invited to Leo High School -Nov.6th 2009 at 11AM

All Veterans, Law Enforcement and Firefighter members, please join the Students, Staff and Alumni of Leo High School for the

Veterans Observance at Leo High School
7901 S. Sangamon Street
Chicago, IL 60620
(773) 224-9600

Call to Colors, Flag Raising, Honors will be announced at 11AM by the bagpipes of David McKee ( Leo '46) - Pipe Master of the Stockyard Kilty Band.

The Leo War Memorial was constructed by the Leo Alumni Association and dedicated by General Thomas P. Gerrity* in 1965. Just the day before the Fall of Bataan in April, 1942, a group of American and Filipino pilots ( among them future President Carlos Romulo) escaped from Bataan by flying out a Grumman Amphibious Plane that they had repaired.

Lt. Tom Gerrity who had served as a bomber pilot, fighter pilot, ground liaison to Gen. Wainwright and infantryman on Bataan organized the repair and flight of the aviators. They would evade Japanese naval and air units and make it to Dole Field on Mindanao where they would meet Gen. Rosie O'Donnell ( not to be confused with the contemporary icon) and fly to Australia.

Gerrity would fly B-25 Missions against the Japanese in the Bismark Sea; sink 28 ships; and become a leading force in American Air Power. Gen. Thomas P. Gerrity, USAF.

General Thomas Patrick Gerrity was a United States Air Force general and was commander of the Air Force Logistics Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.

Gerrity was born in Harlowton, Montana, in 1913. His family moved to Chicago, Illinois when he was a child. He graduated from St.(sic) Leo High School in 1930, attended Tilden Tech and later the Armour Institute, now the Illinois Institute of Technology, all three schools located in Chicago. He entered military service in August 1939 as an aviation cadet, completed flying school in May 1940 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Army Air Corps Reserve.

His first assignment was with the 15th Bombardment Squadron at Barksdale Field, Louisiana, and in October 1940 he was transferred to the 17th Bombardment Squadron at Savannah Field, Georgia. While stationed at Savannah, he attended Armstrong Junior College.

He went to the Philippine Islands in October 1941 with the 17th Bombardment Squadron and was assigned to the Air Ground Support Section of the Luzon Forces. In February 1942 he joined the 21st Pursuit Squadron at Bataan, transferring in April to the 13th Bombardment Squadron for duty in Australia. He assumed command of the 90th Bombardment Squadron on New Guinea in August 1942. During this period he flew 49 combat missions.

In November 1942 Gerrity was assigned to the Army Air Forces Materiel Command at Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio, as project officer on B-25, B-26, B-29, B-32, YB-35 and B-36 bombardment aircraft. During this assignment he attended the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. After graduation in October 1945 he resumed his former position at Wright Field, and in January 1946 became chief of the Bomber Branch in the Aircraft and Missile Section. While Chief of the Bomber Branch he attended the advanced management course at Harvard University. Later he was named chief of the Aircraft and Missile Section.

In March 1950 Gerrity assumed command of the 11th Bombardment Group, Strategic Air Command at Carswell Air Force Base, Texas. He was transferred to Headquarters U.S. Air Force, Washington, D.C., in March 1953 as director of procurement and production engineering in the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Materiel and later was named assistant for production programming in the same office.
Gerrity was transferred to the Air Materiel Command in August 1957 and assumed command of the Oklahoma City Air Materiel Area at Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma. In July 1960 he was appointed commander of the Ballistic Missile Center of the Air Materiel Command at Los Angeles, California. As a result of the reorganization of the Air Research and Development Command and the Air Materiel Command into the Air Force Systems Command in April 1961, General Gerrity became the first commander of the Ballistic Systems Division in Inglewood, California.

In July 1962 Gerrity became deputy chief of staff for systems and logistics at Headquarters U.S. Air Force, Washington, D.C. He also served as senior Air Force member, Military Staff Committee, United Nations. In August 1967 he became commander of the Air Force Logistics Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.
His decorations included the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal with oak leaf cluster, Silver Star, Air Medal with oak leaf cluster, Army Commendation Medal, and the Purple Heart. He received an honorary doctor of humanities degree from the University of Tulsa, Oklahoma. Gerrity died on February 24, 1968, and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery, next to his wife, Margaret B. Gerrity.[2]