GLEN E. MORRISON
Photo From The Strain Family Collection
From a Seminole, OK newspaper, April 16, 1944:
S/Sgt. Glen E. Morrison, 25, who is back in the United States for a period of rest after completing 50 bombing missions over enemy territory in the Mediterranean theater, left Seminole Thursday, for Miami, Fla., to report for his new assignment.
The nature of his likely new assignment was not known by Sergeant Morrison as he left here, but a number of other such men have received appointments as instructors in training camps.
Sergeant Morrison, a son of Mr. and Mrs. D. E. Morrison, 827 North First St., was an employee of the Noble Drilling company before entering military service two years ago. Previous to that he was employed at the Central Drug store here.
He is best remembered by his friends here as "Fatso," but the nickname is inappropriate now. Sergeant Morrison still is a chunky built lad, but he is as hard as nails.
A ball turret gunner on Flying Fortresses during the year he was overseas, Sergeant Morrison is credited with shooting down one German Messerschmitt in a raid on Sofia over Bulgaria, and probably another over Sicily.
The known plane that the Seminole sergeant downed was one of a group of four that attacked his Flying Fortress. The other three enemy aircraft turned and fled after losing one of the group.
"I shot at him (the German plane) from about 800 yards and followed through to the tail, shooting all the way," Sergeant Morrison related here Thursday. It was verified by my pilot and the other pilots of the squadron that he crashed to earth."
The "probable" that Sergeant Morrison knocked down was fired upon at a distance of about 800 to 1,000 yards, and was seen to burst into flames, but was not seen to crash.
"I'm satisfied in my own mind that he didn't crack up, but of course, you don't get credit for anything like that unless you actually see it happen," the sergeant said.
He confessed that he didn't feel a bit bad about seeing enemy aircraft fall out of the sky.
Sergeant Morrison served on three different Flying Fortresses overseas. One was "Precious," which was shot down over Italy. Happily the Seminole man was not on that bombing mission.
The other forts he saw service on were "Wolf Pack," which was "transferred out" of the area, probably for repairs, and "Pistol Packing Mamma," which is still in service.
Lucikly none of the men on the 50 bombing missions Sergeant Morrison made were seriously wounded. Three of them, however, suffered minor hurts. They were a bombardier, tall gunner and waist gunner.
"I was scared several times, but that's as far as my wounds went," the sergeant chuckled. "I wasn't scared when I was up in the air as much as I was when I got back on the ground and got to thinking about what had happened. Then I was really scared."
The worst part of a bomber mission in his opinion is enemy flak. "Enemy aircraft isn't so bad," he said. "You can fight back at another plane, but you can't at flak. All you can do is sit tight and hear it hit your plane."
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