A World War II Bomber Pilot’s Crash and Tale of Survival
Fringe elements could try to explain to what remains of 110,000 European allied POWs, and the 14th Armored Division who liberated them (and helped liberate Dachau a few days later) some nutty theory about a “Holocaust Hoax” or the merits of “Neo-Nazism” and they’d likely get a bony fist in the chops, since these were the brave soldiers who witnessed the horrors of WW II in Europe first-hand. Even more so, these heroes respected the lives of those who died in the process, and so they don’t even like to bring it up for discussion. I know one man, the B24 copilot of the “Ready Teddy” who went down over Hungary in July 1944 and spent the remainder of the war in Stalag Luft III (the “Great Escape” prison camp in Poland) felt this way, as I have finished my research in his World War II journey after reading his diary, first-hand accounts and examining these places for myself last May.
Dr. Lyle Baker DVM, was a farm boy and the first of his family to finish college. His ancestors had fought in all American conflicts going back through the Civil War, Revolution and King Phillip’s War of 1676, so it was natural for him to join up. He jumped at the chance to be sent to aviator’s school after graduation from Penn State in 1943, and was soon in Italy flying on a bombing run to a Vienna ball-bearing factory, according to his diary. He noted the irony that this sortie was at the exact time his family would be in church back home. The gallows-humor of the day was the fear of German fighters and how “they seem to fly pretty well without ball-bearings” (after endless bombing runs had supposedly taken out the ball-bearing factories). In a “Catch-22” like moment, his bubble-turret gunner placed a flak-helmet under a certain critical part of his anatomy, and was teased by his crew-mates. His squadron was escorted that day by the famous “Red Tail” fighters of Tuskegee (you never forget who’s got your back…the first veterinarian he hired in the Central Valley Dairy country was from Tuskegee). All of a sudden, two engines on the right side were on fire, and the plane was in a spin. By some miracle, my father was lurched out at the last second, and in short order his chute opened and he hit some plowed earth on a Hungarian farm, both miracles as he and the bombardier were the only ones of ten crewmembers to survive.
“We were told by the chaplain that if the instruments didn’t respond, to put the controls in the hands of the Lord. Well, we did and then found out He couldn’t fly worth a darn”
-Lt. Lyle Baker, copilot
I was very fortunate to have been the guest of Hungarian author Talosi Zoltan, who had chronicled WW II aircraft crashes over Hungary in his book, “War Years” and offered to show us the site of my father’s B24 wreckage, near Tamasi, Hungary. In May of 2019, along with several other Hungarian archeologists, war artifact collectors, and students, we hopped into a 4wd and drove to a remote meadow which was then combed with metal detectors. Mr. Zoltan found several rounds of ordinance (exploded and unexploded), twisted pieces of fuselage, and a large part that helped hold an engine, some of which I somehow managed to get through Moscow, Yerevan, and Istanbul airport security on return. I began to fully understand my father’s belief that he was spared by “a miracle” as he easily could have landed into chute-mangling forest on all sides.
Soon after the crash, Lt. Baker managed to gather himself and hide in the forest for a few days before villagers found him and gave him food. No sooner did he thank these kind people than he was given over to the authorities in Budapest who imprisoned and beat him (Hungary was firmly pro-Nazi and anti-Soviet, at least among the ruling class). In his diary, my father rather naively states “and I didn’t even know we were at war with Hungary”. After a few weeks, the Luftwaffe (German air-force) authorities took him to Stalag Luft III with other allied Air Force officer prisoners, many from Britain and other UK countries. He was to learn that the Luftwaffe took relatively good care of them (perhaps knowing that the war was a lost cause and wanting to curry favor with their aircraft brethren). There was pressure from the fanatical SS and Gestapo for the Luftwaffe to treat prisoners more harshly, and at some point the Luftwaffe (under Soviet attack from the East) did not have it so good themselves. As for the ill-fated “Great Escape” in early 1944, my father once said “by the time we got there, the fun and games were over, and we were under strict orders to not try to escape”
Last May we were lucky enough to see Stalag Luft III for ourselves, on a short trip from Berlin to Zagan, Poland. At this location is a very well-kept museum of the “Great Escape Prison Camp”, including tunnel locations, a barrack replica, accounts of the escape attempts, and remnants of the camp itself. My father wrote extensively of camp life in his diary, and I suppose movies like “Stalag-17”, “The Great Escape”, and even “Hogan’s Heroes” are somewhat accurate. My father and others fondly recalled a guard named “Popeye” (an old veteran whose eye was shot out in Stalingrad) who seemed to have been the model for Hogan’s foil, Sergeant Schultz. When he one day asked “Vas ist das, Popeye?” he was delighted to be told that he was named after a strongman in the movies. They had a camp newsletter, and their humor seemed to be a large part of their ability to cope. Some examples from the newsletter are “The Chaplain told us if all else fails to put the controls in the hands of the Lord. We did and found out he couldn’t fly worth a darn!”. Funny letters from home included “I’m so glad you got shot down before flying became dangerous” and “Joe’s in Stalag Luft 88, you should pop in and see him sometime”
In late January of 1945, with the Soviet troops knocking on the door, the Stalag Luft III prisoners were sent on a forced march westward through the snow, staying in old barns, churches, factories, or whatever they could find (there were over 10,000 of them so the logistics for meals and basic health were daunting). By this time Luftwaffe guard, prisoner, and even German citizens were becoming friends as the prisoners often traded their Red Cross parcel cigarettes and chocolate for bread (with guards often helping negotiate with citizens). By April of 1945, the Germans had consolidated over 110,000 prisoners at Stalag VII-A in Moosburg, where they were liberated by the 14th Armored Division on April 29th to May 2nd. During the brief and futile German defense of Moosburg, the SS desperately enlisted the help of elderly Luftwaffe guards, infuriating the liberators and POWs, and resulting in the near “elimination” of the SS resistance. When the first beat up Allied tanks rolled into the camp, a ragtag group of Norwegians, Brazilians, Poles, Dutch, Greeks, Bulgars, Russians, Serbs, Italians, New Zealanders and South Africans, along with the majority Americans, British, French, Canadian and Australian prisoners mobbed the vehicle. There were men and women in the prison camp, of every rank and branch of service. “You damned bloody Yanks, I love you!” shouted a 6’-4” Australian as he threw his arms around a jeep driver. A weary bearded American paratrooper kissed one of the subsequent tank commanders as tears rolled down his cheeks. There are those that claim Hitler wanted to kill the prisoners or use them as human shields as his minions made their last stand, but they were too late. A few days after the liberation, General George Patton came to speak to the prisoners. As he reviewed one group of emaciated POWs he was heard to exclaim “I’ll kill every one of those bastards for this”. On the 2nd and 3rd of May the 14th Armored Division liberated several elements of the Dachau Concentration Camp cluster, within 35 miles of Moosburg.
Our May visit included a stopover at the Dachau memorial, one of the sobering reminders of why we have Memorial and Veteran’s Days, and why the “Greatest Generation” knew that these wars were fought for the sake of all good people and their right to exist and be free. We were reminded further when we subsequently visited the Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan a few days later, educating us about WW I atrocities. Le Memorial Museum in Caen France is another reminder WW II horrors, including the “Rape of Nanking” and the “Bataan Death March”, such vast and shameful reminders of what dark forces lurk and the heroic efforts to overcome them.
Lt. Lyle Baker never forgot how lucky he was to have survived WW II and came home determined to make a better world. He entered Cornell Veterinary School on the GI Bill and settled in the Central Valley in 1950, helping establish what is now one of the State’s biggest large animal Veterinary practices. His cousin Lt. Burdette Baker was the same age and a B25 pilot. He was not so lucky and died in a Japanese prison camp. One came home and went on to glory, the other didn’t and is nearly forgotten, though no less a hero.
Dr. Lyle Baker died in an auto accident in 1981. He seldom liked to talk about the war, nor did he revel in seeing onscreen POW Steve McQueen jump barbed-wire fences with a motorcycle in “The Great Escape”. Though they wise-cracked their way through the war in the best tradition of the Americans, most GIs knew that sometimes the better among us didn’t return. Remember them on Nov. 11th, and make sure this never happens again.
