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May 18, 1945
Dear Mrs McAllister,
I don't exactly know how to start
this letter. You see, I was your son's gunner from Ft Lauderdale
training on up to March 19th. Mr. Self told me he wrote you yesterday,
and that it was ok to write now, as the Franklin's story has been
released.
On March 18th we took off against
Kyushu on the first strike. We were flying in the 2nd [3rd?] section,
and hit Kagoshima (a naval base on the southern part of the island.
Mr.
Mac (as I usually called him), was very excited and happy about hitting
Japan. All the time, he was also instilling confidence in Hute (our
radioman and also missing) and
I. We got hit by anti aircraft fire but not bad at all. In fact the hole
was so small we didn't notice it until we landed.
We were to [2 illegible words] the
next morning, but the raid was changed,
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