ch2 . Japanese Couldn’t Believe This P-51 Shot Down A US Plane — Until 12 Americans Escaped Their Trap…

At precisely 10:47 a.m. on February 10th, 1945, Captain Lewis Edward Kurds caught sight of a silver-gray C-47 transport gliding steadily toward what he instantly recognized as a Japanese-controlled airfield on Batan Island. At twenty-five, Kurds already had ten confirmed aerial kills across two theaters of war, yet nothing in his training, nothing in his experience, had prepared him for the nightmare unfolding before him. Inside that plane, twelve Americans were trapped: two of them nurses, all completely unaware that the ground ahead was a death trap, and that the radio meant to warn them had failed completely. Their destiny was sealed unless Kurds acted—and the decision he faced would be incomprehensible to anyone who had never flown over enemy territory with a life-or-death choice pressing down on their shoulders like a lead weight.

The C-47 had lifted off from Lingayen Gulf barely thirty minutes earlier, its engines humming a gentle, deceptive rhythm that belied the peril it faced. Its mission was ostensibly simple: rescue Lieutenant Lacroy, downed and drifting helpless in the waters near Batan, who had managed to cling to a life raft amid Pacific swells. The transport crew had spotted him and circled once, reconnaissance confirming the target, yet misfortune lurked in the smallest detail—the pilots were lining up for the wrong airstrip. Batan had two runways, nearly identical, carved roughly into volcanic rock, running east to west. The southern strip was under American control; the northern one was a fortified Japanese stronghold. From three thousand feet, the two strips were indistinguishable, twin stretches of gray death beneath the glaring sun.

Kurds tightened his grip on the Mustang’s control stick, eyes narrowing as he observed the C-47 descending toward the northern strip. Japanese trucks rumbled along the tarmac, machine guns glinting in the sun, anti-aircraft positions dug into the hillsides. Four enemy fighters sat poised on the taxiway, their pilots likely unaware of the American transport approaching—or perhaps simply waiting for it to commit to the runway so they could destroy it on the ground. The C-47’s landing gear clicked into place as it dropped lower, descending toward imminent capture. By February 1945, the Pacific war had reached a brutal crescendo unmatched in Europe. Japanese forces executed captured airmen at rates that would have made the heart of any soldier freeze: 37% on average, 52% in the Philippines. Female prisoners faced even worse fates; in Luzon, two American nurses had been bayoneted within forty-eight hours of capture.

The C-47 continued its approach, steady and unaware, and Kurds realized with grim certainty that if he did nothing, twelve Americans would walk straight into a machine of violence, waiting with rifles, stretchers, and barbed brutality. His mind raced, calculating every possible outcome. He checked his fuel gauge. Eighteen minutes remaining—not nearly enough to escort the transport back to Lingayen, not nearly enough to land himself. He tried the radio again. Static. Blanketing, incomprehensible, a cruel mockery. No warning could reach the C-47. Kurds felt a cold bead of sweat slip down his temple.

He made a decision that no pilot had ever trained for in simulation. Descending to five hundred feet, he flew directly across the transport’s nose, an aggressive maneuver meant to catch attention. The crew inside waved back, smiling, mistaking his aggressive passes for escort formation. One of those smiles belonged to Second Lieutenant Helen Warner, a nurse he had taken to dinner just the night before in Lingayen. They had spoken of reassignment orders, of Guam, of trivialities far removed from the mortal peril she now faced without knowing it. She was seated in canvas, oblivious to the fact that enemy soldiers awaited, bayonets sharpened, ready to execute prisoners. The runway stretched below them. Flat volcanic rock etched with tire marks from Japanese bombers, a field of death disguised as normality.

Kurds’ hands moved over the firing controls of his P-51 Mustang. He had exactly one option left, and the enormity of it pressed down on him like the ocean’s own weight. The C-47 was seventy seconds from touchdown, and he was about to fire upon an American plane. He had fired in combat thirty-four times across the Mediterranean and Pacific, knew precisely what his Browning M2 machine guns could do. Six guns, each spitting eight hundred rounds per minute, and yet he would have to place every shot with surgical precision. Hit too far off, and the fuselage would erupt, killing everyone aboard. Hit just right, and he might save twelve lives while destroying their only means of landing safely.

He positioned his Mustang four hundred yards behind the transport. The C-47’s left engine filled the gunsight, and with a deep breath, he squeezed the trigger. Tracer fire streamed across the sky, six parallel arcs of death aimed with unwavering calculation. The engine erupted, black smoke curling into the sunlit sky, propeller seized, the plane lurching violently to the right. Asymmetric thrust yanked it off course, yet the pilot struggled, attempting to maintain control with one engine. It was not enough. He had to commit again, line up on the right engine, and finish the job.

The C-47, now crippled, hurtled toward the water. The coastline of Batan was visible, jagged volcanic rocks threatening to tear the fuselage apart, yet it offered a better chance than the enemy-controlled runway. Seconds stretched like eternity. Tracers cut through the air again, the engine shrieked and fell silent. Both propellers ceased. Maximum damage inflicted. Kurds banked hard, climbing, circling, observing.

The ditching was violent, brutal. Water exploded as fuselage struck the sea. Inside, passengers were thrown forward against harnesses, metal groaning, rivets screaming in protest. The plane held together just long enough for the occupants to scramble onto the wings, improvising with debris and life vests. Lieutenant Lacroy, in his raft four hundred yards away, watched in stunned silence as Kurds’ calculated destruction transformed into salvation. The C-47, designed for durability, was now a fragile platform floating atop merciless swells, twelve lives balanced precariously between survival and annihilation.

Kurds checked his fuel. Six minutes remaining—not enough to return to Lingayen. He had to ditch his Mustang, a half-ton machine not built for water, without joining the doomed inside the sea. The tail struck first, the nose dropped, the engine shattered. Water surged around him, threatening to drag him under, yet he forced himself up, kicked away, scrambled to the surface. The Mustang slid beneath in a cascade of bubbles and fury. Kurds, alive but exhausted, swam toward the survivors, battling six-foot swells that mocked every stroke of his arms, turning survival into a tormenting, physical calculus.

By 11:37, he reached the survivors. Twelve Americans, two nurses, one downed lieutenant, all clinging to floating wings and wreckage. They huddled, strategy forming organically—strongest on the edges, nurses protected in the center. Helen Warner recognized him, relief mingling with terror. The story of the wrong airfield, the failed radio, the Japanese waiting to kill them, the impossibility of Kurds’ decision, all unspooling in shocked comprehension. Survival was tenuous; the ocean, enemy patrols, and malfunctioning communication threatened to erase them in an instant.

Minutes later, Japanese patrol boats appeared, circling, diesel engines rumbling, armed and methodical. The survivors pressed themselves into the shadows of the wing, hiding, silent, barely breathing. Kurds held the signal mirror, reflecting sunlight toward a distant submarine, a gamble on hope. Seconds became lifetimes. The patrol boats approached, almost discovering them. Yet the currents, shadows, and Kurds’ meticulous planning kept death at bay. Slowly, the enemy withdrew, confusion marking their retreat, leaving the survivors alive yet drenched in fear, shivering from the dual assault of cold and adrenaline.

Time crawled, each wave and splash a heartbeat of suspense. They remained on the floating wreckage, eyes scanning the horizon, until a periscope appeared, a glimmer of salvation. The USS Pomrret, an American fleet submarine, emerged from the depths. The rescue was executed with the precision of combat drills: lines, life rings, rope ladders, pulling the survivors one by one into safety. Kurds went last, fatigue a leaden weight, every breath a fight against the relentless Pacific.

The survivors were accounted for, medical checks made, no serious injuries beyond bruises and cuts. The C-47 lay submerged, its destruction paradoxically a lifeline. Kurds had shot down an American plane to save Americans—a decision that would haunt him yet define heroism in its starkest form. Reports were filed, witnesses interviewed, every bureaucratic obstacle navigated. Fifth Air Force validated his actions, authorized a unique kill marking: an American flag painted on his P-51 Mustang, alongside German, Italian, and Japanese kills. A symbol of the most impossible choice in wartime history.

Even as survivors resumed duty, even as war continued its relentless grind, the memory of that moment—shooting his own side to save lives, the ocean swallowing steel beneath, the Japanese patrol boats circling, the terror in Helen Warner’s eyes—remained etched into every nerve, every heartbeat. Kurds returned to combat, but nothing would ever compare to the moral and physical tempest of that single, fateful morning over Batan Island.

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At 10:47 a.m. on February 10th, 1945, Captain Lewis Edward Kurds spotted a C-47 transport turning toward a Japanese airfield on Batan Island. The 25-year-old pilot had 10 confirmed kills across two theaters, but he’d never faced a decision like this. 12 Americans sat aboard that transport, two of them nurses, heading straight into Japanese hands with no radio to warn them.

 The C-47 had launched from Lingayan Gulf 30 minutes earlier. Its mission was simple. Rescue Lieutenant Lacroy shot down over the water near Baton. The transport crew had spotted LCroyy’s life raft. They circled once, then the pilot made his approach, but he was lining up for the wrong island. Baton had two air strips.

 The Americans controlled the southern strip. The Japanese held the northern one. From 3,000 ft, they looked identical. both carved into volcanic rock, both running east to west. The C-47 crew aimed for the northern strip. They had no way of knowing their mistake. Their radio had failed over the water. Kurds flew his P-51 Mustang closer. He could see Japanese trucks moving on the northern airirstrip.

 He saw anti-aircraft positions dug into the hillside. He counted four fighters on the taxiway. The transport kept descending. 500 ft now. The landing gear came down. By February 1945, the Pacific War had grown brutal in ways the European theater never matched. Japanese forces executed captured air crew at a rate of 37%. In the Philippines, that number climbed to 52%.

Female prisoners faced worse. Two American nurses captured at Luzon in January had been bayoneted within 48 hours. The Japanese command on Baton followed the same protocols. The C47’s pilot began his final approach. 300 ft. The runway stretched ahead. Flat volcanic rock with tire marks still visible from Japanese bombers. Kurds checked his fuel.

 18 minutes left. Not enough to escort the transport back to Lingan and land himself. He tried his radio again. Static. The transport’s crew couldn’t hear him. He dropped to 500 ft and flew directly across the C-47’s nose. The transport kept coming. He climbed and dove again, crossing their path a second time. No response.

 The crew thought he was providing escort. They waved from the cockpit window. One of the nurses aboard that C-47 was second lieutenant Helen Warner. Kurds had taken her to dinner in Lingan the night before. They’d talked until 2300 hours. She’d mentioned her transfer orders. Two more weeks in the Philippines, then reassignment to Guam.

 Now she sat in a canvas seat, unaware that her transport was seconds from landing in enemy territory. The C-47 dropped to 200 ft. Japanese soldiers gathered at the strip’s edge. Curtis counted 15 men. Some carried stretchers, others held rifles. They were prepared for prisoners. Will Helen and the 11 others survive. Please hit the like button.

 It helps more people discover these stories. Subscribe for more. Back to Curtis. Kurds armed his guns. He had one option left. The C-47 was 70 seconds from touchdown. His hands moved to the firing controls. He lined up behind the transport’s left engine. Standard gunnery training taught pilots to aim for the fuselage.

 Maximum damage, quick kills. But Kurds needed something different. He needed the C-47 to crash without killing everyone inside. He had to shoot down an American plane to save American lives. Kurds had fired his guns in combat 34 times across two years. Mediterranean theater, Pacific theater. He knew what 50 caliber rounds did to aircraft.

 Six Browning M2 machine guns mounted in his Mustang’s wings. Each gun fired 800 rounds per minute. At 200 yd, those rounds punched through aluminum like paper. The C47 was built tough. Douglas designed it to take damage. But that strength came from redundancy, not armor. Two Prattton Whitney engines, dual hydraulic systems, multiple fuel tanks.

 Knock out one system, the others kept working. That’s what kept transports flying through Flack over Europe. But Curtis didn’t want it to keep flying. He needed both engines dead fast. The left engine sat 18 ft from the fuselage. hit it wrong and fragments would tear through the passenger cabin. 12 people sat behind that thin aluminum skin.

 Kurds had to place his rounds precisely. Engine cowing only. Miss by 2 ft and he’d kill everyone he was trying to save. He positioned his P-51 400 yd behind the C-47. The transport was at 150 ft now, 45 seconds from touchdown. Japanese anti-aircraft crews tracked both planes. They held fire. They wanted prisoners, not wreckage. Kurds checked his gun site.

 The C-47’s left engine filled the reticle. He adjusted for deflection. The transport was moving at 110 mph. His Mustang flew at 180. He needed to lead the target by three aircraft lengths. His thumb pressed the firing button. Six streams of tracers arked forward. The sound hammered through his cockpit. a mechanical roar that drowned out his engine.

 Spent casings ejected from the wings. 400 rounds in three seconds. The C-47’s left engine erupted in black smoke. Oil sprayed across the cowling. The propeller seized, stopped. The transport lurched right as asymmetric thrust yanked it off course. The pilot fought the controls, but the C-47 kept descending. One engine was enough to fly. Douglas had tested it. Single engine operations were standard procedure for damaged transports.

 The pilot adjusted his trim, compensated for the dead engine. The runway was still ahead. 30 seconds out. Kurds banked hard. He came around for the second pass. The C-47 was at 75 ft. Too low for the crew to bail out. Too high to survive a crash on land. He had one more chance. He lined up on the right engine. The transport was slower now. 90 mph with one engine out.

 Easier target, harder decision. Kill the second engine and the C-47 would drop. No power, no altitude. The crew would have seconds to find water. Baton’s coastline ran along the airirstrip’s western edge. Kurds could see waves breaking on volcanic rock. The water looked rough, 6-foot swells.

 A ditching in those conditions could break the aircraft apart, but it was better than landing among Japanese soldiers. The C-47 crossed the beach, 20 seconds from the runway. Curtis pressed the trigger again. His remaining ammunition, roughly 800 rounds, converged on the right engine. Tracers walked up the cowling. Metal peeled away. The engine coughed once, died. Both propellers were stopped now. The C-47 had no power.

 The pilot pushed the nose down. He needed air speed to maintain control. The transport dropped toward the water. The C-47 hit the water at 11:03 a.m. The pilot held the nose up until the last second. The tail struck first, then the fuselage slammed down flat. Water exploded around the aircraft. The impact threw everyone forward against their restraints.

 Metal groaned, rivets popped, but the fuselage held together. Water poured through gaps in the hull. The C-47 started sinking immediately. Douglas had designed the aircraft for land operations, not water landings. No watertight compartments, no flotation gear. The crew had maybe 3 minutes before it went under. Kurds circled overhead. He watched 12 figures scramble out of the emergency exits.

They jumped into the water. Some inflated life vests, others grabbed floating debris. The C-47’s wings kept it afloat temporarily, creating a platform. The survivors gathered there. Lieutenant Lacroy was still in the water 400 yardd away. He’d watched the entire sequence from his life raft. The P-51 shooting down the C-47. The controlled ditching. The scramble for survival.

 Now he had company. Kurds checked his fuel gauge. 6 minutes of flight time remaining. Not enough to reach Lingayan. He’d have to ditch, too. But first, he needed to mark the survivors position. Japanese patrol boats operated near Baton. They’d reached the crash site within 30 minutes. American rescue boats were 60 mi south.

 He dropped to 50 ft, flew over the survivors, counted heads, 12, all accounted for. Helen Warner waved from the wing. She still didn’t know why her transport had crashed. The crew probably thought they’d suffered engine failure. They’d learned the truth later. Kurds climbed back to 500 ft. He transmitted on the emergency frequency. No guarantee anyone heard him.

 His radio had been unreliable all morning, but he gave the coordinates anyway. Baton Island, western shore. 12 survivors in the water. His fuel warning light came on. 3 minutes left. He needed to find his own landing spot. The ocean east of Batam looked calmer. Smaller swells, better chance of a controlled ditching. He turned away from the crash site.

 The P-51 Mustang was not designed for water landings. The liquid cooled engine sat low in the nose. Hit the water wrong and the engine would act like an anchor, flipping the aircraft. Kurds had seen it happen during training. Pilots who survived the ditching drowned when their planes went inverted. He ran through the emergency procedures.

 Canopy open, harness loose, radio destroyed. The last item was standard protocol. Military radios contained encryption equipment. Better to destroy it than let the enemy capture it. Kurds flew east. He passed over Laqua’s position. The lieutenant was paddling his raft toward the C-47 survivors. Smart move. Strength and numbers.

 Kurds waggled his wings. Laqua waved back. Two minutes of fuel remaining. Curtis found his spot. A stretch of open water between Bayan and the next island. No reefs visible, no Japanese patrol boats. He set up his approach, reduced power, dropped his flaps. The Mustang slowed to 120 mph. He held the nose high.

 The tail struck first, just like the C47, but the Mustang weighed half as much. It skipped once, twice. Then the nose dropped. Water hit the propeller. The blades shattered. The engine torqued hard. The entire aircraft pitched forward. Kirus released his harness. He pushed himself up, grabbed the canopy rail.

 The cockpit was flooding. Cold seaater rushed past his knees. The Mustang’s nose was already underwater. The tail lifted. The aircraft was going vertical. He had seconds to get clear before it pulled him down. Kurds kicked away from the sinking Mustang. The aircraft’s tail rose above him. Water pulled at his flight suit. His boots felt like anchors.

 He kicked them off, swam hard. 20 ft. 30. He turned to look back. The P-51 slid beneath the surface, nose first. The tail vanished last. Air bubbles marked where it went down. Then nothing, just waves. Kurds inflated his life vest, started swimming toward the C-47 survivors. They were 600 yd away.

 The water temperature was 78°. Warm enough to avoid hypothermia. Cold enough to sap strength over hours. Kurds was in good shape. He trained for water survival at Luke Field back in Arizona, but training pools didn’t have 6-ft swells. Each wave lifted him up, then dropped him into a trough where he couldn’t see anything.

 He swam for 20 minutes. His arms burned. His flight suit soaked up water like a sponge. Added 30 lb of dead weight. He considered removing it, but the suit provided protection from sun and jellyfish. He kept swimming. At 11:37 a.m., he reached the C-47. The aircraft had settled lower in the water. Only the wings remained above the surface. The fuselage was completely submerged.

 The 12 survivors sat on the left wing. They’d organized themselves efficiently. The strongest swimmers positioned at the edges, ready to help anyone who fell in. The two nurses sat in the middle surrounded by crew. Helen Warner recognized him immediately. She grabbed his hand, pulled him onto the wing, asked what happened.

 Curtis explained the wrong airfield. The Japanese troops his decision to shoot. The C47 crew understood immediately. Their pilot, a lieutenant whose name was Richards, checked his map. He’d made the navigation error, mixed up the two air strips. The radio failure had prevented ground control from warning them.

 Kurds had saved their lives by destroying their aircraft. Lieutenant Lacroy reached the wing 10 minutes later. He’d paddled his raft across 400 yardds of open ocean. Now all 13 survivors sat together. They had no food, no fresh water, no radio. The C-47 was sinking. They needed rescue within 6 hours. Kurds looked toward Baton’s northern shore. He could see the Japanese airfield.

 Trucks moved along the runway. The enemy knew about the ditching. They’d watched it happen. Patrol boats would be launching soon. The Pacific Theater Rescue System worked on a simple principle. Submarines patrolled near enemy territory. Surface vessels stayed back at friendly bases. When a pilot went down, submarines responded first.

 They were faster, harder to detect, and carried enough firepower to fight their way out if necessary. But submarine rescues took time. The nearest boat was USS Pomrred, operating 60 mi southeast of Batan. Even at maximum speed, she’d need 3 hours to reach the survivors. 3 hours exposed on a sinking aircraft wing.

 3 hours for Japanese patrol boats to find them first. Kurds organized the group. He told them to stay low, minimize silhouettes, watch for Japanese boats. If they saw one approaching, everyone would slide into the water, hide under the wing. Japanese patrols typically didn’t search thoroughly. They expected survivors to be visible, waving for help. Hidden survivors often went undetected.

 The C-47’s left wing dipped lower. Water sloshed across the aluminum surface. The aircraft was settling faster now. Air trapped inside the fuselage was escaping through gaps in the hull. Basic physics. As air left, water entered. The wing wouldn’t stay afloat much longer. At noon, someone spotted movement on the northern horizon. A vessel, small, fast, heading their way.

The vessel was 3 mi out. Kurds squinted against the sun glare. He couldn’t identify it yet. Too much heat shimmer. Could be American. Could be Japanese. The survivors watched in silence. Richards pulled out a signal mirror from his survival kit. Standard issue for all air crew. 3-in diameter, polished steel.

He angled it toward the approaching boat, flashed three times, waited, no response. Japanese patrol boats in the Philippines operated under strict radio discipline. They maintained silence to avoid American directionf finding equipment. American rescue boats did the opposite.

 They broadcast continuously advertising their position to guide survivors. The silent vessel suggested Japanese Kurds made the decision. Everyone into the water now. The 13 survivors slipped off the wing. They positioned themselves along the submerged fuselage, held on to any handhold they could find, stayed low, only their heads above water. The C-47’s wing provided cover from one direction, but the approaching vessel would circle.

Standard search pattern. The survivors would be visible from certain angles. They needed the wing to block the sight line at the critical moment. The boat closed to 2 mi. Curtis could see its profile now. Low freeboard, single mast, diesel engine by the sound.

 Japanese type A patrol boat armed with one 20 mm cannon and two machine guns. Crew of eight. These boats specialized in picking up downed air crews for interrogation. The patrol boat slowed at one mile. It began circling the crash site. Wide circles first, then tighter. The crew was scanning the water, looking for survivors. The C-47’s tail section remained visible above the surface.

Obvious crash site. Fresh. The Japanese knew people had walked away from this. Kurds watched through a gap in the wing structure. The patrol boat completed its first circle. No sign they’d spotted anyone, but the circles were getting tighter.

 The next pass would bring them within 300 yd, close enough to see heads in the water. Helen Warner floated next to Curtis. She’d removed her flight jacket, let it sink, reduced her profile. Smart thinking. The other nurse had done the same. The crew followed their example. less visible material above water. The patrol boat’s second circle brought it to 400 yardds.

 Japanese sailors lined the rails. They had binoculars. They were searching methodically, sector by sector. The boat’s captain had done this before. He knew how to find survivors. Lieutenant Lacroy still had his life raft. He deflated it partially, pushed it under the wing, kept it hidden. That raft was their backup plan.

 If the Japanese left without finding them, they could reinflate it. Use it to stay afloat after the C-47 sank completely. The patrol boat turned for its third circle. This pass would bring it directly alongside the wing. The survivors pressed against the fuselage, tried to merge with the wreckage. Curtis could hear the diesel engine clearly now. A deep rumble maybe 200 yd away.

The Japanese crew called to each other. Kurds didn’t speak Japanese, but he recognized the tone. confusion. They’d found the crash site. They could see the aircraft was recent, maybe 30 minutes old, but no survivors, no bodies, nothing. The patrol boat idled at 150 yards, dead stop. The captain was thinking, trying to solve the puzzle. Downed aircraft, empty water.

 The math didn’t work. Someone had survived this crash. He was certain. The question was where. One of the Japanese sailors pointed at the wing. He’d seen something. Movement or a reflection or a shape that didn’t match the aircraft’s outline. The patrol boat’s engine revved. It turned toward the survivor’s position. The patrol boat moved closer, 100 yd now.

 Kis could see individual sailors on deck. Three of them aimed rifles at the water. They were ready to fire on site. Standard procedure. Japanese forces treated swimming survivors as active combatants. No surrender from the water. The captain shouted orders. The boat circled the wing one more time, slower, methodical. 50 yards out, the sailor scanned every meter of water.

 They looked for debris patterns, oil slicks, anything that indicated recent human activity. Kurds forced himself to breathe slowly, quiet, small bubbles only. He trained for this at survival school. Captured air crew had reported that Japanese searchers listened for breathing sounds. Heavy breathing carried across water got people killed.

 The patrol boat completed its circle, stopped again. The captain climbed onto the bow. He studied the C-47’s tail section, checked his watch. Curtis could see him calculating. Time since crash, drift patterns, survival probability. The math suggested survivors were close, but the captain had a problem.

 His orders were to capture air crew for interrogation, not waste time on empty crash sites. He’d already spent 15 minutes searching, found nothing. Other patrol boats were operating nearby. They had their own sectors to cover. He needed to make a decision. The diesel engine rumbled. The patrol boat began moving. North back toward Baton. The captain had given up. Kurds watched it pull away. 100 yards, 200, 500.

 The boat’s profile shrank against the horizon. The survivors stayed hidden for another 10 minutes. They waited until the patrol boat disappeared completely. Then they climbed back onto the wing. Everyone accounted for. No one injured, no one spotted. Richards checked his waterproof watch. 12:17 p.m.

 They’d been in the water for 74 minutes. The C-47 had maybe 30 minutes of flotation left. The fuselage was almost completely submerged now. Just the wings and tail remained above surface. Kurds looked south. No sign of American rescue boats yet. His emergency transmission had given their coordinates, but had anyone received it? His radio had been malfunctioning all morning, the message might have been pure static. The Pacific Rescue System depended on radio communication.

 Submarines monitored emergency frequencies continuously. Surface vessels did the same. Patrol aircraft listened while flying search patterns. But all of it required clear transmissions. Static didn’t save lives. At 12:41 p.m., Lacroy spotted something. A periscope 400 yd southeast. Breaking the surface for 3 seconds, then gone. He pointed. The others saw it, too. Submarine.

 American or Japanese? Impossible to tell from a periscope alone. Both navies operated submarines near the Philippines. Japanese boats hunted American shipping. American boats hunted everything. But American submarines had specific orders regarding air crew rescue. Find them. Surface. Retrieve them. Japanese submarines had different orders.

Submerge. Report position. Let patrol boats handle capture. The periscope appeared again. closer. 300 yd. Still on course toward the survivors. It stayed up longer this time. 5 seconds. The submarine was making an observation run, checking for enemy vessels, confirming survivors position.

 Standard procedure before surfacing. Kurds made a decision. He grabbed the signal mirror from Richards, aimed it at the periscope, flashed the emergency code. Three short, three long, three short. International distress signal recognized by all nations. The periscope disappeared. 30 seconds passed. Nothing.

 The survivors watched the water, searched for any sign of movement. The submarine could be anywhere. Submerged boats were invisible, silent, deadly. Then the water erupted 200 yd away. A submarine’s conning tower broke the surface. Water cascaded off the hull. The bow appeared. Then the deck. The entire boat surfaced in 40 seconds. USS Pomfrret, fleet submarine, 300 feet long, 80 crew.

 She’d been hunting Japanese shipping when she received Kurdis’ emergency transmission. Pomret’s captain was Commander Maurice Ferrara. He’d commanded the boat for 8 months, completed four war patrols, sunk 11 Japanese vessels, rescued six downed air crew. Now he was adding 13 more to that list. The submarine’s deck crew appeared immediately. They carried lines, life rings, rope ladders.

 They’d practiced this procedure dozens of times. Speed mattered. Every minute on the surface was a minute exposed to Japanese patrol boats and aircraft. Ferrara wanted everyone aboard in under 10 minutes. The survivors swam toward Pumprit. The strongest swimmers went first. They grabbed the lines. Deck crew hauled them up one by one. The two nurses came next.

 Helen Warner climbed the rope ladder without assistance. She’d trained for water survival at Camp Llejun. The second nurse needed help. A sailor descended the ladder, pulled her up manually. Kurds went last. He counted heads as each survivor reached the deck. 12 from the C-47. Lacroy himself. 14 total. Everyone accounted for.

 He grabbed the rope ladder at 12:53 p.m. climbed aboard 60 seconds later. Pomrret’s deck was already clearing. The crew moved the survivors below immediately down the Conning tower hatch through the control room into the forward torpedo room. Submariners had converted it into a temporary medical station. Blankets, hot coffee, first aid supplies.

 A pharmacist mate checked each survivor. Minor injuries only. Cuts from torn metal. Bruises from the ditching impact. Mild dehydration. Nothing serious. The C-47’s controlled water landing had worked. No broken bones, no internal injuries. Ferrara’s luck was holding. The captain interviewed Curtis in the control room.

 He needed details for his patrol report. Time of ditching, position, reason for shootown, number of survivors. Curtis explained the entire sequence. Wrong airfield. Japanese troops waiting. The decision to fire. Ferrara listened, took notes, asked no questions about the decision itself. Rescuing downed air crew was the mission.

 How they got down didn’t matter. At 13:08 p.m., Palm’s radar operator reported surface contact. Range 8 mi, bearing north, speed 12 knots. Japanese patrol boat, possibly the same vessel that had searched earlier. It was returning to the crash site. Ferrara ordered dive stations. The claxon sounded twice. Deck crew scrambled below. The hatch clanged shut. Vents opened.

 Seawater flooded the ballast tanks. Pumpred began her descent. 30 seconds from surface to periscope depth. 2 minutes to full submersion at 100 ft. The submarine slipped beneath the waves. The survivors felt the descent. A subtle pressure change, deck angle shifting forward. They were safe now. Japanese patrol boats carried depth charges, but they needed to know where to drop them. Pumpred could be anywhere within a 3m radius.

 Finding her would take hours. Ferrara kept the boat at 100 ft. Silent running, minimum engine noise. He wanted distance from the crash site before surfacing again. Japanese patrol patterns were predictable. They searched in expanding circles. Pomrred needed to be outside that circle before dark. At 1500 hours, Ferrara surfaced.

No contacts on radar. No aircraft overhead. He set course for Subi Bay. 240 mi south, 14 hours at cruising speed, the survivors would reach friendly territory by dawn. Kurds sat in the forward torpedo room. Helen Warner sat across from him. She’d changed into dry clothes borrowed from the submarine’s crew.

 Standard Navy dungarees too large by three sizes. She asked him about the decision, why he’d fired, whether he’d hesitated. Kurds told her the truth. He hadn’t hesitated. The math was simple. Shoot down the C-47 or watch 12 Americans get captured. There was no choice. But now he faced a different problem.

 He destroyed an American aircraft, shot down his own side. That kill would require explanation. Pompret reached Sub Bay at 0600 hours on February 11th. The survivors disembarked. Medical staff examined them again, cleared everyone for duty. No serious injuries, no lasting trauma, just another rescue in a war full of rescues. But Kurds faced questions.

 His commanding officer, Major Vincent Elliot, wanted details. Kurds had destroyed an American C-47. that required justification. Written report, witness statements, chain of command approval. Kurds filed his report on February 12th. Four pages single spaced. He described the navigation error, the broken radio, the Japanese troops waiting on the airfield, his decision to fire, the controlled ditching, the submarine rescue. He included statements from Richards LCROY and both nurses.

Elliot forwarded the report to Fifth Air Force headquarters. They reviewed it for 3 days, checked the facts, interviewed the survivors, verified the Japanese presence on Baton’s northern airfield. Everything matched Kurd’s account. On February 16th, Fifth Air Force issued their decision.

 Kurd’s actions were justified, necessary, heroic. They credited him with saving 12 American lives. But they faced a bureaucratic problem. How do you record this in official documents? Standard kill markings used enemy flags, German crosses, Japanese rising suns, Italian fascis.

 Kurds had shot down aircraft from all three axis powers, but he’d also shot down an American plane. Fifth Air Force decided to make it official. They authorized an American flag kill marking on his P-51. Kurds painted it himself. a small American flag on the fuselage of his replacement Mustang right next to his German, Italian, and Japanese kills.

 The only such marking in American military history, a symbol of the hardest decision he’d ever made. The C-47 crew returned to duty within a week. Richards flew transport missions until the war ended. Lacroy recovered his original P38. Both nurses completed their tours in the Philippines. Helen Warner married Curtis on June 3rd, 1945.

They’d been dating for 4 months. The shootown had brought them closer. Kurds flew 43 more combat missions after Baton. He survived the war, returned to the United States in October 1945, left the Army Airore in 1946. He and Helen settled in California, raised three children. He never spoke publicly about the shootown until 1989.

The Navy credited Pomrred with 13 air crew rescues during her fifth war patrol. Ferraro received a commenation. The submarine completed three more patrols before the war ended. She was decommissioned in 1946, sold for scrap in 1947. Kurds died on February 5th, 1995. He was 75 years old. His final tally, seven German aircraft, one Italian, one Japanese, one American.

 The most unusual kill record of World War II. If Louis Kurds’ story moved you, hit that like button right now. It tells YouTube to show this to more people who need to hear it. Hit subscribe and turn on notifications so you never miss another story like this. We share Forgotten Heroes every single day.

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