Dutchboy 94 Poem by Clyde King

'I've got this turkey cold! '
First Lt. Jack King radioed
as he dropped the B26 Invader
to 150 feet to strafe a North
Korean railroad.
Naval flares illuminated the train
as it chugged it's way south
through mountainous terrain.
'Jack, the bomb bay doors are stuck,
they won't open, what luck! ' shouted
Airman 1st. Class St. Mary, the bombardier.
'There's more than one way to shoot a turkey, '
came back the navigator, Capt. Culbertson.'
'Ok, let's get him, ' replied Jack
as they engaged the attack. He opened
up with the eight 50. calibers in the plane's nose
and the 50.'s in the wings. The locomotive
was wasted. His partner B26, Dutchboy 95,
dropped his payload and that was
all she wrote.
Dutchboy 94 would see combat no more.
What happened on that hellish night
no one knows for sure.
Of the men and aircraft, no trace was ever found,
not in the sea or on the ground.
'The B26 is a great plane but hard to fly;
your dad had to be one hell of a pilot and a man.
It's tragic that he died.'
'Yes, it was, ' I replied. Betty Lee, his wife,
got a condolence letter and some of his clothes.
Not much to honor a lost life.
His sons, Sonny and Mike,
grew up but not without a price.
If only they could have known him
how different would have been their lives.