World War II Chronicle: November 27, 1942

Today’s front page reports that the French Navy scuttled their fleet at Toulon. Dozens of ships are sunk in the harbor and some submarines have decided to sail for the Mediterranean to join the Allies… Below the fold: two future Hall of Fame football coaches are being inducted into the Navy. Washington Redskins skipper Ray Flaherty is swearing in after the Redskins play the Chicago Bears in the NFL Championship game. Dick Harlow is also signing up after Harvard’s football season is over… Another football coach is mentioned on the second page: former West Point assistant Col. LaVerne G. Saunders — commanding the 11th Bombardment Group — safely ditched a B-17 near Vella Lavella when enemy aircraft fire kills the pilot and mortally wounds the copilot. Although injured himself, Saunders removes the copilot from the seat and takes control of the crippled airplane.

Saunders is a veteran of Pearl Harbor, one of the few pilots able to get a bomber airborne and search for the Japanese fleet… He commands several outfits during the war, including XX Bomber Command. He organized and trained the first unit to fly the B-29 Superfortress and flew lead for the first bombing mission against mainland Japan since the Doolittle Raid. When Saunders is selected to lead a newly formed bomber group, his replacement is Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay, a former classmate during pilot training. Shortly before Saunders was due to ship back to the States, he was in a deadly B-25 crash. LeMay found the Saunders among the wreckage and helped extricated him…

Maj. Tommy Hitchcock, former assistant air attaché to the U.S. Embassy in London, says the P-51 Mustang will be the war’s premier fighter in 1943. Hitchcock flew for the Lafayette Flying Corps during the First World War and captured by the Germans. He escaped by jumping out of a moving train and hiked over 100 miles to Switzerland. He competed in the 1920 Olympics, winning Silver for the U.S. Polo team. His father Thomas Hitchcock Sr., a Hall of Fame horse racer and breeder, commanded the 15th Aero Squadron during the war…

Maj. Gen. James H. Doolittle is pictured on page 26 receiving the Military Order of China from Chiang Kai-shek’s wife… Page 39 features a story of how wounded American soldiers evaded Japanese mop-up squads who were killing wounded Americans left on the battlefield… Sports begins on page 46

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Evening star. (Washington, D.C.), 27 November 1942. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1942-11-27/ed-1/