FLIGHTPATH | 31Betrayed!
A series of unfortunate events conspired against a Lightning
pilot in late October 1943. Malfunctioning guns, lucky hits
from the gunire of a ‘Zero’, a forced landing in a swamp,
and the whim of a German missionary led to the most inal
of outcomes. South Paciic correspondent Michael John
Claringbould tells the sorry tale of Second Lieutenant
Christopher Bartlett and the Lightning that disappeared.
B
artlett was a member of the 475th Fighter Group
(FG) whose pilots started arriving in Brisbane
from July 1943 onwards. On 14 September, Bartlett
delivered a brand new P-38H from Eagle Farm
(Brisbane) to Dobodura, the 475th’s first forward New
Guinea base. The first eleven days of September were
comparatively quiet for the unit. The weather was suitable
for operations on only seven of these days, during which
the group’s Lightnings escorted Mitchell bombers on
barge hunts along the northern New Guinea coast. How-
ever, things took a more serious turn on 11 October when
the pilots and operations officers were summoned to a
special briefing. Under the cover of a drab tent at Dobo-
dura, they were informed that their next target would be
Rabaul. This was the big league. More than 300 bombers
and fighters, the largest force assembled by the Fifth Air
Force to date, headed north the following morning. The
Lightnings of the 475th refuelled at Kiriwina in order to
fly top cover for Mitchells as they strafed Vunakanau and
Rapopo airfields. Such attacks against Rabaul continued
with a vengeance for the rest of the month and into early
November 1943.