Dates: 1944

Biography:

Charles Truman Phillips

Charles Truman Phillips was born in Louin, Jasper County, Mississippi, on November 6, 1922. He attended Antioch School through the tenth grade. Phillips then attended Louin High School for one year. He entered the military on December 31, 1942, earning his high-school diploma while in the service. Phillips entered basic training in Miami, Florida. From there he was sent to Amarillo, Texas, where he was trained as an airplane mechanic. He then received additional training in Seattle, Washington, at the Boeing Aircraft Factory School, where B-17 bombers were manufactured. Phillips was then sent to a series of special training assignments, including gunnery school at Kingman, Arizona, and crew-training school at Pyote, Texas, to practice bombing runs on targets. Here he was given his first permanent assignment as a ball-turret gunner on a B-17. He was then transferred to staging areas in Nebraska, Virginia, and finally at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey. On June 2, 1944, he sailed to England on the New Amsterdamas part of the Eighth Air Force, arriving there on June 9, 1944. The invasion of Normandy, or D-Day, occurred on June 6, 1944.

After arriving in England, Phillips was stationed at an air base near Kimbolden. He flew twenty-five bombing missions over Europe between July and September of 1944. Phillips returned to the United States on the Queen Mary in November of 1944. He was honorably discharged on September 30, 1945.

Phillips married Jessie Lee Montgomery on February 17, 1945. They had three children: Charles Danny (deceased), Ruby Faye, and Mary Loleeta. Phillips has been an active member of Antioch Baptist Church since 1945. He worked at the Northern Electric plant in Bay Springs, Jasper County, Mississippi, and then for Sumrall Oil in Bay Springs. Phillips later worked for Sumrall Vending as a money-room manager. Phillips retired at the age of seventy-seven.

 

Scope and Content Note:

This collection consists of a photocopy of an original diary documenting a series of twenty-five bombing missions in Czechoslovakia, Denmark, France, Germany, and the Netherlands from July 11 to September 30, 1944, and a copy print of a photograph of Phillips around the time of his military service. A table of contents lists the mission numbers and bombing targets. The entries contain dates, targets, bomb loads, amount of fuel on board, and aircraft damage. Phillips frequently includes vivid details about teamwork during a mission, mechanical failures en route, and bombing action he witnessed, always noting the number of men parachuting from airplanes in his squadron. Sheet 19c is an epitaph for the bomber, Mairzy Doats, that crashed in the English Channel with only two survivors. Mission 22 is the most detailed in the diary, relating a near-fatal attack on the plane and how Phillips and others saved their wounded crewmen, made the plane lighter, and returned to base safely. Phillips's descriptions are succinct, but his tone in recounting events is understated. Consequently, the researcher may better understand how such crewmen were able to function well under the stress of battle.

 

Series Identification:

Series 1: Diary (photocopy). 1944. 1 folder.

 

Series 2: Photograph (copy print). ca. 1944. 1 folder.