BISMARCK SEA, WESTERN PACIFIC, 1944
NATHAN G. GORDON
LIEUTENANT JUNIOR GRADE, U.S. NAVY Commander of Catalina patrol
plane
NATHAN GORDON HAD PRACTICED LAW FOR TWO YEARS when he decided to
enlist in the Navy in 1941. He had always wanted to fly, and he
figured that it would be more interesting to see the war he was
sure the United States would become involved in from the air than
on the ground.
At the end of training, young aviators had some say in the kinds of
aircraft they wanted to fly. Many of Gordon's buddies chose the
glamorous fighter planes, but he preferred the ungainly PBY patrol
planes. He joined a squadron in Norfolk, Virginia, and later went
to the Caribbean, where he flew a Catalina PBY on night missions
searching for the German U-boats preying on Allied convoys. Then he
was sent to Hawaii, Midway, and Perth, Australia, before being
ordered to Samarai, a small island off the southeastern tip of New
Guinea, from which he flew bombing and torpedo missions against
Japanese merchant shipping in the Bismarck Sea.
On February 15, 1944, a large force of American bombers attacked
the strongly defended Japanese air-field at Kavieng, New Ireland, a
stepping-stone to the Admiralty Islands. In the daylong battle,
several were hit by antiaircraft fire. When they could, the pilots
circled back and went down in Kavieng Harbor to avoid crashing in
enemy-held territory, and the PBYs went to their rescue.
Over the radio Gordon heard that a B-25 had gone down and flew to
the position where he was told the crew had ditched. Seeing the
yellow dye marker in the water, he made a risky landing in
fifteen-foot swells, hitting with such force that his plane popped
rivets and developed several cracks. He found wreckage, including a
deflated life raft, but no survivors, and after taxiing for several
minutes to make sure that no one was still alive, he got the plane
airborne again.
Shortly afterward, Gordon was guided to another downed bomber by a
B-25 that had just finished its bombing run. This time he saw six
American fliers, several of them badly injured, in a life raft. He
made another difficult landing, and while his crew tried to plug
the leaks in the plane, he taxied toward the raft as Japanese
artillery on shore opened fire. After several abortive attempts to
reach the airmen in the rolling seas, Gordon had to cut the engines
and stop, making the plane a sitting target--only its erratic
bobbing in the waves prevented the PBY from being hit by Japanese
guns. Finally, he got the airmen aboard, restarted the engines, and
positioned the plane for takeoff by forcing the nose up to keep
from being capsized by the high swells.
Just as he was airborne, he received a call about another downed
B-25, this one much closer to shore. To rescue the crew, he would
have to fly directly over enemy guns at three hundred feet and land
close to them. His crew pulled in another three American fliers as
fire from the enemy shore batteries bracketed his plane.
Gordon got airborne again and was headed for home when he received
yet another call. He made another risky landing and picked up six
more airmen. After the last rescue, with the plane leaking badly as
he crashed through the high waves on takeoff, he managed to return
to base with his precious cargo of fifteen airmen.
Several months later, Gordon found out he was to be awarded the
Medal of Honor. Great! he thought.
I guess that means I'll get to go back to Washington. Instead, he
was ordered to Brisbane, Australia, where Admiral Thomas Kincaid,
the senior U.S. Naval officer on General Douglas MacArthur's staff,
presented the medal to him on July 13, 1944. Later that same day,
he was in the air again, flying a fifteen-hour patrol.
BIOGRAPHY
BORN
January 14, 1916, Morrilton, Arkansas
ENTERED SERVICE Arkansas
BRANCH U.S. Navy
DUTY World War II
CURRENT RESIDENCE Arizona
