Tenmenbak

On Sunday, December 17, 1944, the 15th USAAF launched a major bombing operation against German oil facilities in Upper Silesia. More than 500 American bombers, escorted by hundreds of fighters, attacked targets including the industrial complexes at Blechhammer and Odertal. German fighters intercepted the American formations over Moravia, triggering a major aerial battle known as Bloody Sunday, one of the largest air battles over occupied Czechoslovakia.

Among the 231 B-24 Liberators assigned to attack Odertal was an aircraft with serial number 42-51324. It was a B-24J Liberator assigned to the 764th Bomb Squadron, 461st Bomb Group (Heavy), 15th USAAF. Its home base was Torretta airfield in Italy.

The aircraft had already completed dozens of combat missions and originally carried the name Paulette. Its new crew, led by Second Lieutenant Kenneth B. Smith, renamed it Ten Men Bak, a phonetic rendering of the phrase "Ten Men Back." The name expressed the crew’s hope that all ten men would return safely from their missions. The crew had joined the squadron on November 29, 1944, and the December 17 flight was their first combat mission together.

During the flight, the turbocharger on engine No. 3 failed. At 11:23 a.m., the aircraft fell behind the bomber formation over Slovakia. Smith turned east, hoping to reach the German-Soviet front line. At approximately 11:50 a.m., German Fw 190 fighters from II./JG 300 attacked the bomber.

A 20 mm shell struck the aircraft behind engine No. 2, the inner engine on the left wing, and started a fire. The bomber sustained severe damage, and engine No. 3 subsequently failed as well. Corporal Roland W. Morin, who was manning the ventral ball turret, suffered a fatal wound.

Smith attempted to jettison the bombs, but damage to the hydraulic system had jammed the bomb-bay doors. Realising that the aircraft could not be saved, he ordered the crew to abandon it. The airmen escaped one by one by parachute. Smith remained aboard until last. When the left wing tore away, the bomber plunged toward the ground. Smith managed to bail out and open his parachute only moments before impact.

The wreckage came down in the forested Kamenická Valley near Omšenie, close to Trenčianske Teplice. Corporal Roland W. Morin was the only fatality of the encounter with the enemy. German soldiers took his body to Trenčín, where he was buried. After the war, his remains were transferred to an American military cemetery in France.

The other nine crew members survived the crash. Most were captured by German forces and became prisoners of war. Co-pilot Chester H. Rudel suffered a severe spinal injury when his parachute became caught in the trees. Charles F. Foss later lost part of his arm. Edwin A. Burkhardt evaded capture, hid in the mountains and joined Slovak partisans. In March 1945, he reached Soviet forces with them and eventually returned to American forces in Italy. All nine survivors lived to see the end of the war.

The loss of the aircraft was documented in Missing Air Crew Report (MACR) No. 10683. The story of Tenmenbak preserves not only the history of a major air operation, but also the individual experiences of the airmen whose wartime journey brought them to what is now Slovakia.