Kenneth L Carpenter - 11th Pursuit Squadron -11th AAF in the Aleutians 1942-43 ...................

work in progress
Kenneth Carpenters war was in the far North Pacific. Keeping aircraft flying in a climate that alone killed more men and destroyed more planes than did the enemy, was an accompishment few can appreciate. The capture of the Aleutian islands of Kiska and Attu were designed as a diversion for the Midway operation. With the failure of Midway the Japanese, to save face, tried to hold American soil. The US forces in the Aleutians were not prepared to repel an invasion and the distances missions were flown meant, that to crash land or bail out was certain death. Ken served with the forces that eventually drove the enemy from the island chain and then created bases that attacked the Japanese Kurile Islands and Hokkido. The Japanese were so concerned about an invasion from the north that they tied up considerable air and ground forces in the to repel such an event. This effort stretched them beyond what their industrial capacity was capable of sustaining. The Aleutian Airforces impact far exceeded its small size. It is one of the least documented airforces of the war. Ken wrote this for his sons and I thank him for letting me host it here. (I regret to report an e-mail form his son Jeff informing me that that Ken has passed away. March 2006)



This is about my service in Alaska with the 11th Pursuit Squadron in the Aleutian Islands in WWII. I put the following together to give my sons an idea of those early days of WWII, as I remember them. Also I added some earlier war history and airplanes so that you will have the flavor of the environment we were in.

I was enlisted in the Army Air Corps at Flint, Michigan, prior to WWII, on November 2, 1939 after high school at the age of 18. Immediately after enlistment, in fact the same day, I was transported to Selfridge Field, Mt. Clemens, Michigan for basic training arriving at midnight. After 6 weeks of Basic training, with the 3rd Air Base Squadron under the command of Lt. Col Burge I was assigned to my first line organization, the 94th Pursuit Squadron, 1st Pursuit Group.
This squadron was famous in France during WW1 as the “Hat in the Ring” Squadron because of the emblem painted on their Spad aircraft. The plane was built in France. This was the unit in which Captain Eddie E. Rickenbacker served during WW1. in France, where he became an ace with 26 victories. The Ace designations originated in France during WWI and each country had its own criteria. France and the U.S. made them aces after 5 combat victories, the Germans 10, and England didn’t award ace titles to their pilots. The methods and criteria of confirming the victories were so different that a comparison is meaningless.

A SPAD S.X111 in France. The 94th was then known as the 94th Aero Squadron. Designed and built in France there were several versions beginning in 1913. Originally SPAD was an acronym for Societe Provisoire des Aeroplanes Deperdussin. It was designed by Louis Bechereau Chief Engineer. It had a top speed of 135mph at 6500 ft., which it could reach in about 5 minutes. Engine was 200 hp Hispano-Suiza and its armament was two 7.7 mm Vickers machine guns.

Capt. Rickenbacker in France.

After WWI Rickenbacker was named honorary Commander of the 94th Pursuit Squadron stationed at Selfridge Field, Michigan.

During WW1 the French Government awarded their Croix de Guerre (cross of war) to the 94th. Because the citation was awarded to the squadron as a unit, all members of the 94th, were entitled to wear a colorful red and green braided cord representing the citation although it was seen more on the Officer’s uniforms than on the enlisted uniforms The braided cord was looped through the shoulder epaulet. Of course those of us who did wear it were very proud and the envy of other soldiers at Selfridge. I wore it a few times when I went home to impress my friends and neighbors.

Capt. Rickenbacker came to our unit at 1939 for Christmas dinner. I had the honor of being on KP washing dishes and peeling potatoes at the time. I saw him briefly at one of the tables in the officer’s mess. I remember an incident that happened when Capt. Rickenbacker was there. One of the men on KP was a big strong Indian man with the last name of Proudfoot. Another on KP was also a big strong white man whose name I can’t remember. On a bet they foot raced each other up and down the street that was behind a row of red brick barracks between the 17th Pursuit Squadron barracks and the 94th barracks. The white guy lost and said something to Proudfoot to the effect that he was not given a fair start. Proudfoot told him that he could beat him with a pancake griddle on his back. By this time quite a number of us were watching including officers. Someone went in to the mess hall and brought out a huge black pancake griddle. It had to be something like 3 feet long and 2 feet wide, made of cast iron. The sight of Proudfoot stripped to his waist with that heavy griddle flopping on his back and running up the street will always be with me. Proudfoot lost and we all felt bad. His life ended in December of 1941. He was on guard duty on one of the troop train flatcars on our way from Mississippi to Seattle just after Pearl Harbor. It happened at night over a high trestle somewhere in Idaho I believe. Another guard saw it happen and said it looked like he lost his footing and fell into the canyon below the trestle.


The aircraft above are Boeing P-26’s nicknamed peashooters, I don’t know why. Our squadron had a few of these when I first arrived at Selfridge Field. Also at Selfridge were others such as the Seversky P-35, the forerunner of the Republic P-47 and the Curtis P-36, forerunner of the P-40. As I remember the P-35’s were assigned to the 27th Pursuit Squadron. (They had nose-mounted machine guns, which were synchronized by a propeller gear to allow them to fire in between the rotation of the blades. Later our 11th Squadron was equipped with the first line models of the P-40 right out of the Buffalo Curtis factory, then models such as the P-40 D, E and N. Once I was on temporary duty at a little practice field at Oscoda, MI (now Wurtsmith AFB) where we occupied an old CCC (CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS ) camp. I remember watching one of the P-26’s landing when it blew a tire and nearly went off the runway. The plane was being flown by Lt. Romberg who later became one of the commanders of the 11th in the Aleutians.

I believe there is a mistake in the emblems on the above planes, which I scanned from a book. Neither plane has the hat in the ring emblem of the 94th Pursuit Squadron. The Indian head in an arrowhead is familiar to me; I think it was the 27th Pursuit Squadron insignia also stationed at Selfridge when I was there.

Early in 1940 the U.S. was building up its armed forces following the German U boat torpedo attacks on merchant marine ships in the Atlantic. Draftees began arriving at Selfridge by the hundreds. New units were quickly formed and staffed by regular Army cadres. I was re-assigned as part of the cadre for the Hq & HQ Squadron of the 31st Pursuit Group. About November of 1940 I received orders to the Rising Sun School of Aeronautics in Philadelphia.

Below you see the graduating class of the Rising school of Aeronautics on Rising Sun Boulevard in Philadelphia. I am the man kneeling at the very left end of the front row with folded hands. Our class was billeted at the Lorraine hotel on Broad St. and bussed to the school. Years later this hotel was purchased by a black preacher called Father Devine. He and his followers occupied the hotel for a few years. I think the hotel has been torn down.

During this period I remember that we played subway tag a lot because the hotel was just beside a subway entrance on Broad St. A group 6 or so would go to the entrance followed by another group about 10 or 15 minutes later when a train was due. Rule was that the first group had to leave the subway (going between downtown and uptown) at one of the next three stops and go to nearest bar on Broad. The second group would try to locate the first group and if they did the beer was on the first group. If the first group got back to the hotel before they were found they were the winners and the second group bought the beer. (or something like that, it’s been over 60 years now).

After I graduated as an airplane mechanic I returned to Selfridge where I was re-assigned to the 11th Pursuit Squadron of the 50th Group in 1941. The 11th was under the command of Capt John Chennault. The 11th was ordered to Key Field, Meridian, Mississippi in the spring of 1941. We were moved to Mississippi by truck convoy through part of the Louisiana maneuvers occurring in the Southern part of the U.S. As we rolled through the small towns bystanders were lined up on the streets to look at us. Some were not too friendly with their words, as they didn’t understand what was going on. After we got into Mississippi we often found ourselves mixed in with the maneuvers and 2-mile long convoys of hundreds of 2 ½ ton trucks carrying troops.

We arrived at Key Field in June or July. The field was actually a municipal airport that was shared by the National Guard, so we had barracks and hangars. Key Field was named after the Key brothers who owned an aviation service there and were famous in the 30’s. They held the world’s endurance record for staying in the air for a couple of weeks or so without landing and in about the mid 30’s that was newsreel stuff. They refueled their small plane, a Piper of some kind, by flying low over a car top and picking off cans of gasoline).


On Pearl Harbor day, December 7, we listened to FDR”s famous day of infamy speech live on a barracks radio. A few days later the 11th received orders to Elmendorf Field, Alaska. We began packing our equipment, tools, engines, aircraft parts, etc. getting ready for leave by troop train to Seattle. I remember standing in a being inspected by General Spats just before we boarded the troop train about December 15th bound for Ft. Lewis, Washington.

We camped on the Ft. Lewis parade ground in bitter cold weather. We were in two man tents with coal burning sibley stoves. They looked like an inverted funnel and put out very little hear. The temperature had to be below zero even in the middle of the day. We shipped out on December 24th aboard a renovated WW1 troop transport named the St. Miheil (sp). I was about 2 decks down under the main deck, in one of the bunk beds 3 or 4 high. I recall that each of us was handed a Christmas package from the people of Seattle that held writing paper, pencils, etc. I always had a warm spot in my heart for Seattle because of it.

Our course was up via the inside passage to Seward, Alaska. On the way I was one of those assigned to night duty submarine watch at the port (left) side of the ships bow. On the way up the scenery was spectacular with high mountains rising seemingly right out of the water at shore line. But when we hit open water between the inside passage and Seward the ocean became very rough with mountains of waves. The bow pitched up and down and on the down pitches the bow was almost buried in the water. I was tied in my position with a rope and wearing a rubberized parka of some kind. Although my duty was to watch for submarines, I had no chance to see or feel anything but big splashes of very cold water and my freezing feet. Later we heard that a ship behind us was torpedoed and sunk. (I was not able to confirm this but later I saw newspaper headlines about U.S. ships being torpedoed by Japanese submarines off the U.S and Canadian shores).

Below are snapshots I took during the early days in Alaska at Elmendorf Field and the Aleutian chain. The first is a picture I took a day or so after we arrived at Elmendorf on or about December 30, 1941. Shown here is a scene in our barracks squadron day room. The temperature outside at the time was around 20 deg. below zero. I can still name most of those in the picture. We had all kinds of experience’s there, like the guy who formerly worked in carnivals who sewed buttons on his bare chest with needle and thread, the orientation at the base theater where we were told not to drink whisky left in the cold as it would not freeze but remain liquid at sub-zero temperatures. If we drank it we would probably choke us to death. There was a prisoner of war camp near the PX at Ft. Richardson with Germans in it. I never found out where the Germans were captured so soon after Pearl Harbor. I think they were detainees of some kind like some of the Japanese in California. Near the field was a store and bar that served construction workers called Anderson’s camp. We could buy beer, sandwiches, etc. so it was a popular place with us. Also popular was the bars on the main street of Anchorage.

There was a certain amount of apprehension during our stay at Elmendorf and Ft. Richardson at the time. We practiced defense drills in the woods around our area. We had about 20 P-40’s on the line and in revetments constructed near the runway to facilitate scramble take offs. We had to keep the aircraft engines warm by running them periodically, and I remember the long cold hours sitting in the cockpits. Our P-40’s were parked in revetments at various places near the runway for scramble take-offs. One day I was in a revetments at the end of the runway and saw an accident where 2 P-40,s crashed head on taking off from the opposite ends of the runway. At the time the explanation was given that the pilots were practicing a scrambling procedure, which would get more aircraft in the air quicker. One would delay starting his take off roll until he saw that the other aircraft was airborne. He would start his take off roll intending to become airborne only at the point the first aircraft was over his head. (The runway at Elmendorf was to narrow for any kind of formation take-offs). Today as I think about that I wonder if explanation was really true. What was true is that one of the pilots was seriously injured and nearly died. I think his name was Lt. Wite or White, something like that.

Most of our P-40’s were flown up from Mississippi via the Alcan highway route. I think my rank at the time was corporal or buck sergeant and promoted to Staff Sgt sometime in 1942. I was an aircraft mechanic crew chief serving on the line. We were in barracks about ½ mile away.

I was one of the few that had a camera when we were in Alaska but very little film. It was given to me by Mom and Dad Carpenter soon after I enlisted in 1939, an old Kodak bellows type camera, but it did a good job considering I knew absolutely nothing about photography. I think it is incredible that the prints scanned as well as they did after they had been around in boxes for over 60 years. (There are no shots of me, I don’t know why I didn’t get someone to do it but did not). I took the shot below of snowball fighting outside of our barracks on Ft. Richardson. I can’t remember the name of the guy in his long johns but the one throwing the snowball was one of my good friends, Elmer J. Pottsman, from St. Louis. We called him EJ of course. I looked him up one time in the 1960’s in St.Louis where he had become an executive in the Budweiser beer company. No doubt he is retired by now or is no longer with us.

Taken on the island of Umnak. Probably I had taken the top cowling off to get to the carburetor, etc. on an inspection or repair job. Note the rack which could also carry a belly tank holding extra fuel. (After take off with the belly tanks, the procedure was to use that fuel first and drop them before engaging in maneuvers, combat, or landing). Light bombs could also be mounted on wing racks. You can see a nose hangar in the background. In the bitter cold we put the nose of the aircraft in these hangars to work on the engines. We also spread cloth wing covers on the wings to keep off a snow and ice buildup. If you look closely you can see that the lower engine cowling has been painted with the Squadron emblem, the head of a Bengal tiger. This was the idea of our Squadron Commander, Capt. John Chennault the son of General Claire Chennault commander of the AVG of China (the Flying Tigers of China). The Flying Tigers of Gen Chennault’s AVG had the heads of tiger sharks painted on the cowling of their P-40’s. The P-40 was equipped with an Allison 12 cylinder engine and generated over1100 HP for takeoff and climb to 5000 ft.

A P-40 of our “Flying Tigers of Alaska” It shows the actual way the Bengal tiger was painted on our aircraft’s cowling. The designer and painter of the cowlings was a member of our squadron.



One of my friends and barracks mate in the Aleutians. T/Sgt Douglas I can’t remember his first name or where he was from or where he wound up after the war. Actually our squadron did not have barracks in the Aleutians, we usually lived in tents or huts (metal buildings that we erected ourselves and sometimes buried part way in a hill and camouflaged). This was taken in early 1943 on the island of Adak (out near the end of the island chain). He was a great guy and I wish I knew what happened to him or where he is living.

I took the above in the mess hall of our squadron but I don’t remember which island we were on at the time. It looks like they were getting ready for Thanksgiving with all the turkeys, so it is probably the island of Umnak on Thanksgiving of 1942. Umnak island is close to Dutch Harbor that was bombed by the Japanese in June of 1942. The Japs had 2 aircraft carriers off shore of our island about 10 miles along with other parts of their task force that had split from the Midway island main attack force. At that time we had our 6 man tents dug in up to the where the sides sloped to the peak. We camouflaged them well and the Jap Zeros and other types off their carriers nearby flew right over us on the way to bomb Dutch Harbor without seeing us. On one of their return trips from Dutch Harbor we had scrambled 5 or 6 P-40s that were high above waiting for them. The 40’s dove through the formation of Japanese and shot down five of their aircraft. We lost Lt. Cape, the pilot of the P-40 that was shot down and died in the crash. I believe the airfield there is today named Cape Field, at least it used to bear his name. After that the Japanese pulled out of the area and moved their carriers, troop ships, etc. to the islands of Kiska and Attu near the end of the Aleutian chain.

Our squadron moved to the Island of Adak, far out on the chain, and that is where I was when I got orders to return to the States in Sept. 1943. Below is a shot taken of the island of Adak ( I found this picture and the others below on the internet). In the revetment you will see a couple of parked P-40’s. I drew an arrow to one of them. I am certain that it is one of my P-40’s (before I left I had line responsibility for several P-40’s and that revetment is the one I was using at the time).You can see the opening to the PSP taxiway and runway. (the runway is made by laying down interlocking metal plates called PSP) In the background (the long arrow) is the location of our squadron living area, mess hall, tents and huts, supply, etc. The freighter at the wharf is anchored. I have seen Russian freighters a little bit further out in the water. Usually they did not come in close. I think they unloaded and loaded cargo to and from barges. At times they had women sailors aboard who attracted the attention of a lot of us that had not seen a woman in many months. Of course they did not come ashore but waved a lot from the decks.

The picture is of the bombed barracks of the Marines at Dutch Harbor. In June of 1942, a short distance away from our squadron location on the island of Umnak at the time of the Japanese attack. In the photo you see part of a scouting platoon on the island of Attu, which was the site of a great loss of life in the Aleutians from frostbite as well as from fighting. Several thousand Americans died as did as many Japanese. The soldiers here are probably part of an infantry scouting squad.

Below is an aerial shot of the beachhead at Attu where our troops landed. The arrow points to a downed Japanese zero. There was little activity at the time this aerial pic was taken, but earlier this was the site of a beachhead for our troops..

That’s about all I have to tell you about the early years. In those days we didn’t have the camera equipment that we have today. I have memories of our alert shacks that were setup along side the and where we had to sit in the cockpits for many hours on alert. We kept the engines warm and ready for scramble take-offs. In the alert shacks we usually played cards, primarily pinochle. We kept the same game of pinochle going for several weeks. As one alert crew was relieved, the new crew would just take over the game, and continue. I think we drew a line on the score table showing where the scores where before the new crew took over the game.

I remember when I was sent over to the north side of Umnak island with a flight of P-40’s patrolling the Bearing sea. It was in the winter and snow was deep. We ran short of food except for C & K rations. We had been there about 2 weeks longer than we expected. No radio transmission was permitted, not even to our base on the Pacific side. There were about 14 of us and fortunately one was a butcher in civilian life. We killed a caribou and the butcher made steaks, etc. out of the animal. There was an infantry unit nearby who gave us some bread they baked. So we got by. One night we heard an aircraft overhead in a blinding snowstorm. He had his landing lights on and circling very low. The were no runway lights and other lights were not allowed because the Japanese fleet was not far away. We had a few vehicles, jeeps and ¾ ton trucks that we parked on each side of the runway with the headlights on. The pilot got the plane lined up to approach the runway but came in too hot. The plane bounced three or four times, but stayed right side up. It turned out to be a C-46 transport plane ( about the same as a C-47 but bigger), and when the crew got off the plane we discovered the pilot was a staff sergeant. He was one of the few enlisted pilots in the Army Air Corps at the beginning of WWII. I also remember one alert scramble, about 0600, when all aircraft took off. We watched as one of them stayed low for some unknown reason and we watched him crashed head on into a nearby mountain. The fireball had such finality to it. We could not get to the wreckage.

I remember the poker and blackjack games usually played in the tents, huts, and alert shacks. The radio broadcast of “Tokyo Rose” from Japan. The bull sessions and joking that often relieved the tensions. Many of us had nicknames that stuck with us, “Manila” for one who had spent years in the Philippines), Baribu for a line crew chief from Baribu, Wisconsin), etc. We were usually anxious about what would happen next. We went weeks without mail, food supplies down to spam and c rations, powdered milk and eggs. Sometimes we had to eat outdoors in the cold and snow holding on to mess kits with thick gloves. Memories of catching sea trout and frying them in mess kits with margarine that was hard to melt. Making our own booze using canned fruit in a big crock. Drinking torpedo juice, the alcohol used by the navy to power submarine torpedoes), also the 99% medical alcohol, we could get sometimes by trading with the Navy, etc. but the hangovers put a damper on drinking, along with tight control exercised by the commanders.

When we were in tents we usually dug out the perimeter down to the top of the sidewalls because of the high winds. At times we camoflouged them with canvas and other materials. We put stoves in the center that we rigged to burn kerosene or diesel These were very effective but the soot clogged the smoke pipes a lot and we had to clear them by dropping stones down through the pipe from the top. Sparks would fall on the tent and burn holes in it. I remember blinding snow storms in high winds so strong that we had to run ropes between our tents and huts to the mess hall so we could hold on and find our way. We built Quonset huts for living quarters, supply, line alert shacks, etc. ( we had help from the engineers and Seabees). I was living in one when it snowed hard during the night and the next a.m. we couldn’t get out because the snow was packed against the doors. The storm and williwaws kept up and were in there about 4 days before we could get the doors open.

I will certainly never forget being on a C-47 flight carrying about 15 mechanics and tool boxes between Umnak and Adak. We flew into a pocket of extreme turbulence, the pilot lost control and the plane went into a nose dive and made tight spiral straight down. The loaded 40 lb tool boxes and tools flew around crashing into the seats and sides of the cabin; I was on my knees holding on to my seat, ducking boxes, loose hammers and wrenches while watching the Bearing sea come up into my face. (one does not survive the cold water of the bearing sea for more than 2 or 3 minutes). The pilot recovered about 200 feet over the water. We returned to Umnak where the plane was grounded because the stress had popped the rivets on the wing panels.

And I remember the visit of Bob Hope, Jerry Cologna and Francis Langford to Umnak They stayed only a few hours as General somebody made them go back to Anchorage due to the existing dangerous military situation.



I think that the most stressful times were on Umnak. We were at the mercy of the Japanese battle force of thousands of men on troop ships, carriers, destroyers, and cruisers laying off shore. We could see them on the horizon. If they invaded we would have been outnumbered 100 to 1. At the time there was only a few hundred on the island, a small infantry unit, an anti-aircraft artillery battery and other small units in addition to our 2 flights of P-40’s with about 90 men and 14 aircraft. We were told to expect an invasion, but it never occurred mostly because of the skirmish over Umnak. The Japanese were surprised that land based fighters and bombers were in the vicinity. I remember carrying a 45 automatic pistol and a 30.06 rifle around wherever I went. Some of us wore a cartridge belt loaded with clips of 30 cal machine gun rounds of armor piercing, tracer, copper heads, and incendiary. (why I don’t know as tracers show your position. I and others carried razor blades in case capture was imminent. I will never know if I would have had the guts to use the blade, but then the rumors of the way the Japs treated their prisoners were horrifying and some of us decided we would rather die than to be captured. Thankfully their task force pulled out and invaded the islands of Attu and Kiska at the end of the Aleutian chain.

I left Adak in September of 1943 on a C-47 that had engine trouble at the Kodiak Naval base where I lost several sessions of poker with the Navy Chiefs.


E-Mail Me @ worldwar2mem@yahoo.com


Copyright © Ken Arnold 1999. All rights reserved. Links: WWII Memories MAIN WEB PAGE INDEX of the other 50+ veterans profiles

11th P-38 Recovery & restoration on ATTU

A 54th squadron History

The 11 AAF web page

Aleutians web page

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