Victor Tatelman: World War II B-25 Pilot in the Pacific

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> As he skimmed over the trees and lined up the sights of his North American B-25C Mitchell’s eight .50-caliber nose guns on the Japanese airstrip at Wewak, New Guinea, Lieutenant Vic Tatelman was astounded to see rows of Mitsubishi G4M ‘Betty’ bombers, Yokosuka D4Y ‘Judy’ dive bombers and Mitsubishi A6M ‘Zekes’ lined up wingtip to wingtip all along the tarmac. What a rare opportunity! All he would have to do was line up on the targets and squeeze off burst after burst. No time to check results or worry about AAA — just keep shooting! Co-pilot Lieutenant Willie Graham deployed parafrag bombs at intervals as the bomber, dubbed Dirty Dora, passed over the sitting ducks, completing a sort of double whammy that left chaos behind them on the ground.

The Japanese at Wewak were caught flatfooted on October 16, 1943, paying dearly for not having dispersed their newly arrived aircraft. The final tally was 82 enemy aircraft destroyed — a loss that enabled the Americans to make a successful raid on Rabaul two days later. All members of the 499th ‘Bats Outa Hell’ Bomb Squadron of the 345th ‘Air Apaches’ Group made it back to base that day, at Port Moresby, New Guinea, where their ground crews found lots of AAA holes to patch.

Not many people have heard of Victor Tatelman, who earned numerous Air Medals, two distinguished Flying Crosses and a Purple Heart in nearly 120 combat missions piloting Mitchell bombers. Tatelman got his Army Air Forces pilot wings in June 1942 as a member of class 42F at West Coast Training Command, in Stockton, Calif. As a new second lieutenant, he and several others of his class were sent to Williams Field, at Chandler, Ariz., to fly bombardier cadets in Beechcraft AT-11s. On each flight he carried five bombardier cadets, who each got to drop a practice bomb on a target. Within six months he had become bored with that duty and asked for a combat assignment — unconcerned that reassignment might cost him his seniority.

In November 1942 Tatelman was sent to Columbia Army Air Field at Columbia, S.C., where a new bomb group was being organized. There, the pilots were assigned to the 498th, 499th, 500th and 501st squadrons, which were to make up the 345th Bomb Group. At the 345th Group, assigning pilots to squadrons was a simple matter: The pilots were gathered in a room with four large tables and told to divide themselves equally among the four tables. Then each table was assigned a squadron number. The table Tatelman chose became the 499th Squadron.

During the first two months at Columbia, the pilots concentrated on familiarizing themselves with the Mitchell bomber, as well as practicing with bombardiers and navigators. Then the group moved to Walterboro, S.C., where the emphasis was on formation flying and bombing operations at altitudes of 8,000 to 10,000 feet. After that, they moved to Hunter Air Base, at Savannah, Ga., where they received their new planes and were outfitted for overseas. Years later, Tatelman recalled that when he left Savannah, in the excitement of heading for the West Coast on his way to combat, he forgot to set the mandatory 10 degrees takeoff flaps that all B-25s require. But when he began running out of runway, he quickly remembered. A quick pull on the flap handle and they were off the ground and on their way to Mather Field, at Sacramento, Calif. There, the latest combat modifications were made to the B-25s. All winter adaptations were removed, the flight crews turned in their winter flying suits and the ships were thoroughly tropicalized.

After its bomb-bay fuel tanks were installed at San Francisco’s Hamilton Field, the 499th left for Hickam Field, on Oahu. Tatelman remembered that he left Hamilton with 12 hours and 45 minutes of fuel aboard and had used 12 hours and 15 minutes’ worth when he arrived at Hickam. Of the 16 crews from the 499th that had set out from Hamilton, 14 reached Hickam. The squadron had already lost one-eighth of its strength, yet the 499th’s survivors were still half an ocean away from combat.

Tags: 20th - 21st Century, Airborne Operations, Aviation History, Historical Conflicts, World War II

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