From time to time the Southern Oregon Warbirds confer the title of Honorary Member on certain outstanding warbirds who deserve special recognition, and on certain other people who may not otherwise qualify as Warbirds. All are citizens of Oregon. From the start of the Warbirds two men, Colonel Rex Barber and Maj.Gen. Marion Carl, both native Oregonians, were designated Honorary Members.
Colonel Barber is the man who, on 18 April 1943, at great risk to himself, shot down the bomber carrying Admiral of the Japanese Fleet, and architect of the Pearl Harbor raid, Isoruko Yamamoto. He went on to a distinguished career in the Air Force, collecting a number of Air Medals, two Silver Stars and a Navy Cross along the way. After his retirement he lived in Terrabonne, Oregon. Several members of the Warbirds History Committee visited with him, discussed his military career and the Yamamoto mission, and, with his permission, put together the personal Rex Barber history contained herein.
MajGen Carl was this country's first Marine ace, eventually shooting down 18-1/2 enemy aircraft. He then went on to an outstanding career as a Marine fighter pilots' fighter pilot. He was also retired and was a long time resident of Roseburg, Oregon, until he was killed in his home by an intruder. Unfortunately, the Warbirds History Committee did not reach him for a personal history before his untimely and tragic death. Efforts are being made to construct such a history from available published material.
COLONEL REX T. BARBER -- PILOT
BRIEF BIO:
Rex Barber was born in Culver, Oregon, on May 6, 1917. After graduating high school Rex briefly attended Linfield College, in McMinnville, Oregon, and then Oregon State College, in Corvallis, majoring in Agricultural Engineering. However, he was anxious to fly and he could see the war coming so in September 1940, with just a few weeks to go to his bachelor's degree, he enlisted in the Army Air Corps. He immediately requested Cadet School and in March 1941 was sent off to the Rankin Aeronautical Academy in Tulare, California, where he learned to fly, in Stearman biplanes. He received his wings and his second lieutenant's bars at Mather Field, Sacramento, California.
His first duty assignment was with the 70th Fighter Squadron, 35th Fighter Group, based at Hamilton Field, California, the Fiji Islands, and Guadalcanal, flying both P-39s and P-38s. While there he participated in the famous flight to Bougainville, where he shot down the bomber carrying Admiral of the Japanese Fleet Isoroku Yamamoto. After that, from late 1943 to early 1944, he flew P-38s with the 449th Fighter Squadron, 23rd Fighter Group, in China, where he shot down several more planes (unrecorded) and was himself shot down -- injured but not captured. In January 1945 Rex was assigned to the 412th Fighter Squadron, 29th Fighter Group, at Oxnard, California, where he flew and tested for combat America's first operational jet fighter, the P-80 Shooting Star.
Rex flew 110 combat missions from Guadalcanal and 28 from China. He is credited with five confirmed kills and three probables. He was awarded the Purple Heart, numerous Air Medals, two Silver Stars and a Navy Cross. After the war he continued on active duty in flying status finally retiring on March 31, 1961, from the 354th Fighter Wing, with the rank of Colonel.
On October 3, 1947, in Panama City, Florida, he married Margaret. Rex and Margaret have one son. Rex has another son from an earlier marriage. On July 26, 2001 Rex died in his sleep, in Terrabonne, Oregon. On August 9, 2003 the State of Oregon dedicated the new US 97 bridge over the Crooked River Gorge, just north of Terrabonne, the "Rex Barber Veterans Memorial Bridge".
HIS STORY:
I had an uncle, Edgar King, who was a pilot in World War I. Even when I was a small child he would relate stories of flying back in those adventurous days. He told me about the good times and he told me that pilots are the best, that they are really nice people. So, from early childhood I was convinced that I wanted to be a pilot when I grew up. My father homesteaded in Oregon and was instrumental in laying out the town of Culver, where I was born and raised.
When I finished high school I briefly attended Linfield College, in McMinnville, Oregon, and later Oregon State University, in Corvallis, in the class of ‘40. Marion Carl was in the OSU Class of ‘38. However, I was anxious to begin flying and in the summer of 1940 I could see war coming on. When I was just a few weeks short of my degree I left OSU, went to Portland and enlisted in the Army Air Force. I never looked back, and I never got my degree.
At the time of my enlistment the flight schools were crowded. The AAF advised me to enlist anyway, as a Sergeant, and to apply immediately for Cadet School. I was soon was transferred to the Rankin Aeronautical Academy, in Tulare, California, in Class 41H. At Rankin I went through primary and soloed in the Stearman biplane. Basic Training was at Moffett Field, flying the PT-13s. Advanced was at Mather Field just outside of Sacramento, California, and it was there that I received my wings and commission as a First Lieutenant.
Early Combat
My first active duty assignment was to the 70th Fighter Squadron, 35th Fighter Group, based at Hamilton Field, flying P-39s. The P-39 was beautiful looking airplane. The engine was behind the pilot. It drove the propeller through a long drive shaft that passed just beneath the cockpit. You entered the cockpit through vertical doors on either side. A 37 millimeter cannon fired through the propeller hub. Unfortunately, the plane did not fly well. It was too slow and underpowered and just couldn't do very much. It was fast in a roll and if it had been 4000 pounds lighter and had had twice the horsepower it would have been a good machine.
In addition, with the heavy engine so close to the center-of-gravity, the P-39 had a vicious high speed stall. It seemed to tumble end over end. Later photographic studies showed that it actually went into a series of snap rolls. Recovery technique was just to hold the stick full forward and wait -- if you had enough room and time it would eventually come out of it. Nearly all P-39 pilots experienced this maneuver and lived through it. None of us were looking forward to aerial combat in this plane.
In December 1941 were transferred to the Fiji Islands for further training. Lock, stock and barrel we were loaded aboard a luxury liner, the President Johnson , with our P-39s partially disassembled and tucked in the holds. Our first stop was to be Pearl Harbor and by December 7, 1941 we were about halfway there. When we heard of the Japanese bombing we immediately turned around and fled the other way, back to Hamilton Field.
Later that month we proceeded to Fiji on the USS Polk, bypassing Pearl. When we arrived the airfield was just a small, dusty strip. We set up the base there and for the next ten months we trained. Our squadron commander was John W. Mitchell, by far the most wonderful commander I ever had. It was he who taught us to fly. He told us what we had to do, showed us how to do it and we did it. If we didn't we heard about it.
Meanwhile the Pacific war swirled around us. Early May 1942 saw the Battle of the Coral Sea, 1400 miles west of us, which for the first time effectively stopped the Japanese advance across the Pacific. A month later the Japanese fleet was decisively defeated at Midway, some 3000 miles north of us. Then in early August the Marines landed on Guadalcanal, 1000 miles west-northwest of us. It was in those early battles for Henderson Field that my fellow Oregonian and OSU alumnus (Class of '38) Marion Carl made his mark, shooting down 16 enemy aircraft while flying the Navy F4F fighter.
In October 1942 we were finally transferred to Fighter II on Guadalcanal. We personnel went by ship and our P-39s were shipped in later.
It was there at Guadalcanal that I shot down my first Japanese plane, that one in a rather unusual way. We were over Munda when I spotted a Nell approaching the island for landing. I figured that was as good time as any to shoot him down so I began my dive on him. By the time I was almost in shooting range I recognized that I had not accelerated as much as I expected, that there was some extra drag somewhere. Suddenly I realized that I had not dropped my empty fuel tank. So, just as I closed on the Nell and began firing I dropped that tank and shot down the Nell. Coast watchers who saw the encounter swore that I had bombed the plane out of the air. For a while I was the only pilot in all of the history of aerial warfare to have "bombed down" an enemy plane.
Around the first of 1943 our squadron transitioned into the P-38. The planes were shipped to and assembled in Noumea and were eventually flown down to us in Guadalcanal from New Caledonia. The pilots that flew them in showed us around the cockpit and described appropriate operational settings, flight characteristics and emergency procedures. There were no Pilot's Handbooks on the island. Then we just took off, circled the field and landed, and we were "checked out", ready for combat in the P-38. The process seemed to work, there were no fatalities directly linked to that informal checkout.
The P-38 was the best airplane I ever flew. Coming out of the P-39 as we were it was an absolute dream. The cockpit was relatively small and it used a control "yoke" rather than the control "stick" of most fighter planes. To roll the plane you rotated the yolk. In the nose, firing straight ahead, were four 50-caliber guns and one 20 millimeter cannon.
With those two big, heavy engines sitting out there on the twin booms and the relatively high wing loading the P-38 could not turn with the Zero fighters, in one-on-one combat. On the other hand, those engines gave it the power and speed to walk and climb away from those Zeros. Therefore, air-to-air combat tactics involved keeping your speed up. We would dive at the Zeros, make a high speed firing pass, and then pull away and circle back, if necessary. A head-on firing pass was particularly effective. To slow down to Zero speed, to try to turn with him, was invite destruction. This would be a critical issue later on in the Yamamoto attack.
No one in the combat area was yet aware of the problem with compressibility with the P-38. Test pilots back at Lockheed knew but the word had not yet reached the front line troops. When the plane was put in a steep dive at high altitude, with appreciable power on, it soon reached a speed where shock waves formed on the control surfaces and upset the aerodynamics. The plane tended to "tuck under" and, in many cases, the pilot was not able to pull out of the dive. They went straight on into the ground, at very high speed. We lost a number of pilots that way.
The basic combat unit was the section of two planes. In most cases two of these sections flew together as a division. The section leader was charged with the primary aggressive role while the wingman served as their defensive eyes, checking for danger in all directions and keeping their tails clear of enemy planes. This allowed the leader to focus on the attack without having to worry about being attacked. The leader had to trust that his wingman was there, clearing his tail, no matter how aggressively he flew. This would also be a critical issue later on in the Yamamoto attack.
While flying P-38s out of Guadalcanal I was also credited with shooting down a ship. Four of us in P-38s and one Marine in a Corsair found a small Japanese destroyer in the Harbor in the Shortland Islands. None of us had any bombs so we began making strafing passes. Soon we had the return fire silenced and could go to work methodically on the ship. We all made repeated passes, as much as possible shooting at momentarily exposed parts of the hull that were normally under water. The biggest danger was that we would get too focused on the ship and run into each other on the pullout. Eventually we did it, and the ship sank. However, on one run I got too aggressive and struck the mast, and lost several feet off my wing. Even with that damage that P-38 took me home safely. Thereafter I had symbols painted on the side of my plane not only for the three aircraft that I had shot down by then but for one ship as well.
There were several squadrons of P-38s on Gaudalcanal but the dividing lines between them were not sharp. Living conditions were so spare that, while on the ground, we lived together most of the time. All of the P-38 maintenance was done by one squadron. Aircraft and pilots were in such short supply that we frequently flew together, borrowing aircraft and pilots from all of the squadrons to make up the missions. We frequently flew with Gaudalcanal-based Marines flying Corsairs.
The Yamamoto Mission
By the beginning of 1943, after years of concentrated and innovative effort, American codebreakers had largely broken the Japanese Naval code. One of the tantalizing bits of information that came to their attention early in April 1943 suggested that Isoroku Yamamoto, architect of the Pearl Harbor raid and top Admiral of the Japanese Navy, would make an inspection visit by plane to Bougainville at a certain date and time. The Admiral was known to be very organized and punctual so it seemed reasonable to expect that he would in fact be in that location at that time. It was considered certain that the war could be significantly altered, and many lives saved on both sides, if the Admiral's plane were intercepted and shot down. On the negative side, the powers that be did not want this precise interception to cause the Japanese to suspect that their top code had been broken, and to change to a new one. The mission was approved at the highest levels but top secrecy was the order of the day.
In mid-April our squadron commander, John Mitchell, was called to the operations tent and advised of the mission. There was a great deal of argument about exactly how the mission should be flown. Finally Admiral Mitscher himself intervened and said that since Mitchell would be running the mission he should do it his way.
The real hero of the Yamamoto mission, then, was John Mitchell. It was largely he who spent the time in virtual seclusion formulating the strategy and laying out the mission. It was largely he who selected the pilots, from two squadrons, to fly it. And it was he alone who led it to complete success. I was fortunate enough to be one of the pilots selected for the mission.
The night of 17 April 1943 we pilots were advised of an important mission coming up the next day and of the general mission plan. It was to be a long flight, 432 miles in five legs and over two hours just to reach Bougainville. To prevent detection and possible advance warnings from coast watchers the whole flight would be flown 50-100 feet off the water and completely out of sight of land. We could see that special fuel tanks had been flown in for the occasion. We would carry one standard 165-gallon tanks under one wing and one of the new 310-gallon tanks under the other. All available P-38s then in commission (18) would be involved.
The first two divisions were from the newly commissioned 339th Fighter Squadron, of which Mitchell was the CO. I was in the second division, led by Captain Tom Lanphier. I was flying on Lanphier's wing, I was his wingman. The second section was led by Jim McLanahan with Joe Moore on his wing. The third and fourth division were from my old squadron, the 70th, and were led by Major Louis Kittel. Besby Holmes and Ray Hine were designated the "duty spares", to fill in for any who might have to abort the mission.
At 6:00 AM on 18 April 1943 Mitchell briefed us on the mission. Lanphier's (my) division was designated as the "killer" division. We four were to go in and shoot down the Admiral's plane while the other three divisions climbed for altitude and prepared to cover us against the expected massive fighter defense. We expected just one bomber, carrying the Admiral, escorted by perhaps three fighters. It was up to our division not only to shoot down the bomber but to handle those three fighters as well. The majority of the Japanese air defense, perhaps as much as 75 fighters, was expected from the welcoming committee from nearby Kahili fighter base.
Mitchell then told us that the sole purpose of the mission was to shoot down a Betty bomber going into Kahili that would be carrying Admiral Yamamoto. He strongly impressed us with the importance of the mission and of the vast implications of success on the course of the war.
He also noted that chances of complete success were perhaps one in a thousand. Not only did it depend on absolute, precise adherence to schedule on the part of Yamamoto but on absolute, precise navigation on our part to arrive at exactly that same place and time. A half-dozen miles or minutes one way or the other, on either the Admiral's or on our parts, could easily negate the entire opportunity. Small differences in the reported winds enroute could be enough to drift us too far off course. To help Mitchell in his overwater navigation the Navy had installed a special compass in his plane.
All eighteen of us taxied out to the runway. McLanahan blew a tire and had to abort. After we were airborne Mitchell orbited while everyone joined up on him, and then headed out. Soon thereafter Moore found that he could not draw fuel from the new tank on his plane and he turned back. Holmes and Hine filled in as the second section on my division. Holmes was a good addition but Hine was brand new to combat.
Mitchell then proceeded out on course with all the rest of us just following. We did little or no navigation, we just followed wherever Mitchell led us, in absolute radio silence. As always the day was warm and humid down there on the water. We were used to the clear cold air at 20-30,000 feet. We were close to the water but not so close as to require constant alertness. One of our pilots claimed that he counted sharks as we went along. For us the flight in was almost boring.
Then after more than two hours of this Major Mitchell started climbing, and we figured we were approaching Bougainville. All of a sudden Doug Canning sang out "Bogies, 11 o'clock high!". There in front of us, exactly at the planned confluence of time and space, were two Betty bombers, escorted by six Zero fighters. Although no other enemy fighters were in sight, Mitchell and the rest of the flight broke away from our division and began climbing for fighter cover altitude, to take on the expected major air defense.
Lanphier turned toward the bombers and he and I dropped our belly tanks, in preparation for combat. Holmes was unable to drop his tanks so he and Hine pulled off to the side to try to shake them off. This left just Lanphier and I to take on the six Zeros and to shoot down the two bombers.
We were approaching the Bettys from approximately 90 degrees and still climbing to get to an altitude at least level with the two bombers. I was flying on Lanphier's right wing. The Bettys were traveling left-to-right in front of us, and started to nose down, evidently starting their normal destination letdown. Suddenly they increased their rate of descent markedly.
The six Zeros suddenly nosed over in a steep descent and jettisoned their external fuel tanks. We had evidently been sighted. It was apparent that the three Zeros on the left side, closest to the Bettys, would catch up with the bombers about the time as we would be turning in on our firing pass. We would be perfect targets.
Just when we were in position to break right, to fall in behind the Bettys, Lanphier suddenly broke about 90 degrees to the left and started a head-on pass up and into the oncoming Zeros. This was the tactically correct defensive maneuver on his part -- keep his speed up and zoom in for a head-on firing pass. As wingman my tactically correct (and safest) move would have been to stick with him and to follow him into the Zeros. On the other hand Mitchell had impressed on us the extreme importance of success on this mission. The bomber carrying Yamamoto was even now moving right and diving for the deck and for the protection of the Kahili fighter base. If I went with Lanphier there would be no one going after the target bomber, the objective of the entire mission.
I don't recall consciously debating these options. I knew full well that I had little chance of shooting down the bomber unless I quickly turned right, onto the bomber's tail, and slowed my rate of closure to give me more firing time. I was also fully aware that turning my tail to the oncoming Zeros and slowing down would put me in great jeopardy. However, my primary job, as I saw it, was to get that bomber.
I banked sharply to the right to fall in behind the diving Bettys. In so doing my left engine and wing briefly blocked out my view of both bombers. When I rolled back, there was only one Betty in front of me. My turn had carried me above, slightly to the left and about fifty yards behind the Betty. I did not know it at the time but I was right on top of the second bomber. The pilot of that bomber survived the war and said that he was not aware that they were under attack until he saw tracers going into the Admiral's plane.
Now that I was committed to the attack it became automatic to throttle back, to stay behind the Betty longer and to jockey around to get lined up for the shoot. By this time, we were no more than 1,000 feet above the terrain. The Betty again increased his dive in an evident attempt to get to treetop level.
I opened fire, aiming over the fuselage at the right engine. My aim was good and immediately I could see bits of engine cowling coming off. As I slid over to get directly behind the target, my line of fire passed through the vertical fin of the Betty, and some pieces of the rudder separated. As I moved further right I continued firing into the right engine. The engine began to emit heavy, black smoke from around the cowling. I still had time to move my fire back along the wing root and into the fuselage, then on into the left engine.
Now I was no more than 100 feet behind the Betty and almost level with it. Suddenly, the Betty snapped left and abruptly slowed. His right wing reared up in front of me and I almost ran into it. As I roared by I looked over my left shoulder and saw the bomber with its wing upended vertically and black smoke pouring from the right engine. I believe he then dived into the jungle but I did not see the actual crash.
As far as I was concerned I had achieved my objective and number one priority now was to save my own skin, if I could. All six Zeros had caught up and, now that I was clear of the bomber, three were on my tail, making aggressive firing passes. I jammed on full throttles, turned hard to the right and headed toward the coast at treetop level, taking violent evasive action. The Zeros had found the range and I was taking hits all over my plane. A later count back at the base showed 104 holes, including seven in the two props.
But I was accelerating rapidly now so if I could avoid getting shot down over the next ten seconds or so I would move out beyond their range. When I looked back inland I could see a large column of black smoke rising from the jungle. I believe that was from the Betty I had shot down. To my great relief I could also see that the Zeros were falling behind, out of their gun range.
As I continued toward the coast I saw Lieutenant Holmes and Lieutenant Hine circling over the water at about 1,500 feet. I also saw a Betty very low over the water and just off shore, heading south. The Betty was so low that its props were making wakes in the water. Holmes also spotted the Betty, and he and Hine, flying very closely on Holmes' right wing, peeled off after it. At first Holmes' bullets hit the water behind the bomber but then they walked up and through the right engine. White vapor started trailing behind that engine. Hine also fired but all his rounds hit well ahead in the water. The two of them then passed over the Betty and headed on south.
With the Zeros off my tail I was free to go after that Betty myself. I dropped in behind, closed to less than fifty yards and opened fire, aiming at the right engine. Almost immediately, the bomber exploded. As I flew through the black smoke and debris, a large chunk hit my right wing, cutting out my turbo supercharger intercooler. Another large piece hit the underside of my gondola, leaving a large dent.
Ahead of me, Holmes and Hine had encountered Zeros which I think had taken off from the Kahili airstrip. Holmes shot one of them down. I saw Hine heading east, out to sea, smoking from his right engine. A second Zero, which had broken off from Holmes, started to pass under me. I turned sharply left and down, got in behind him and with one burst shot him down.
When I again looked for Holmes and Hine I saw neither. I was particularly concerned about Hine because he apparently had suffered some damage. I saw only three oil slicks on the water, one where the Betty had gone in and one each where Holmes' and my Zeros had crashed. I hoped that Hine was heading for Guadalcanal but that turned out not to be the case. We never heard from or of him again.
I was now low on fuel and could not stay in the area much longer. In the swirling aerobatics of aerial combat the combatants quickly become separated. The Yamamoto encounter was no different. After shooting down the Zero I found myself all alone in the sky, out over the ocean just off Bougainville. It seemed the better part of valor to make a solitary beeline for home, for Guadalcanal. The same was generally true of the rest of the strike.
The Rest of the Story
When I got back to Fighter II and into the debriefing tent I heard Lanphier shouting, "I got Yamamoto!" It seemed to me that I alone shot down one bomber and Holmes and I got another so I wondered what bomber Lanphier was talking about. I asked him, "How do you know you got Yamamoto?" His only answer was, "You're a damn liar, you're a damn liar!"
And so started a long and ugly conflict for credit that continues to this day. At first the Air Force gave full credit to Lanphier. Later, after much examination of the written records, verbal testimony and of the wreckage, still in the jungle in Bougainville, they gave Lanphier and me each half credit. Several close friends, prominent among them George Chandler of Pratt, Kansas, have carried on an effort to amass sufficient evidence to change the official record to give full credit to me. But that's another story.
Those of us on the Yamamoto mission were not allowed to fly further combat in the South Pacific. If we had been shot down and captured we could have been forced to relate details of that mission, making it clear that the top Japanese Navy code had been broken. We all got a little rest leave in New Zealand and then were sent back to the states.
I soon volunteered to go to China to fly for General Chennault, with the 449th Fighter Squadron, 51st Fighter Group, 14th Air Force. This war was still against the Japanese, just in a slightly different theater of the Pacific War. For some unexplainable reason the Air Force okayed it and I was gone.
In China I again flew P-38s. No records were kept of combat victories but I think I shot down three or four enemy planes before I myself was shot down. With all of my experience against the highly maneuverable Zero it was an Army Oscar that got me. He hit my right engine and it burst into flames. I was low to the ground so I figured I'd better get out, and in a hurry. I just opened the cockpit and jumped out. That was not the right way to get out of a P-38, and my ankle and one arm hit the tail.
I landed, painfully, in a field near Tungting Lake, Yueyang, Hunan. Two young boys, both about ten years old, watched me land. They picked me up and took me to a house where I could be hidden from the local Japanese soldiers. Chennault had wisely established a network of loyal Chinese in our operating area specifically to help downed pilots escape. Besides my ankle my arms were all black and blue. The people in the house soaked my arm in hot water, just the thing that was needed at the time. Six weeks later they spirited me out of the reach of the enemy, to safety.
For me, then, the war was over. I was shipped back to the states. My first duty assignment after the war was with the 412th Fighter Squadron, 29th Fighter Group, at Oxnard, California, where I flew and tested for combat America's first operational jet fighter, the P-80 Shooting Star.
In 1946 the Air Force gave me a regular commission and I flew in various assignments for another 16 years. These included tours in the Tactical Air Command at Langley AFB, Virginia (1946-1950), and the Air Defense Command in Colorado Springs (1950-1952). It was during the latter period, on October 3, 1947, that I married Margaret. For over the four years (1952-1956) I was Air Attache to Colombia and Ecuador, based in Bogata, Colombia. In 1956 I got a Jet Refresher course at Selma, Alabama, and finished up my career at Myrtle Beach, South Carolina (1956-1961). I retired in 1961, as a Colonel.