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World War II veteran heads to England
North Shore Towers resident is set to travel overseas to honor his fellow service members
Joseph Reveman (top, second from l.) and fellow members of the
398th Bomb Group. Courtesy of American Air Museum in Britain
BY JENNA BAGCAL
This Veteran’s Day, World
War II veteran Joseph Reveman
will travel to England to honor
fellow veterans in a special way.
On Nov. 11, the longtime
North Shore Towers resident
and former radio operator and
backup gunner on the B-17 Flying
Fortress will lay wreaths on
cemetery plots at the Cambridge
American Cemetery and Memorial.
Each year, the cemetery in
Madingley, England hosts an
annual Veteran’s Day ceremony
to honor fallen war heroes.
Marilyn Gibb-Rice, the president
of the 398th Bomb Group
Memorial Association (BGMA),
approached Reveman about the
opportunity after she heard he
would be vacationing in Europe.
The pair met at several
reunions for the 398th Bomb
Group, which Reveman served
in from 1944 to 1945.
“We have a big ceremony.
She says, ‘I am going to involve
you in the ceremony. You are
going to lay the wreaths on the
cemetery plots.’ That is very,
very big honor,” Reveman said.
“You know who gets to do this
in the United States? Whoever
is president.”
The ceremony is free and
open to the public to attend.
The Bronx native got an
early start in the military, hav-
ing been drafted in 1943 at the
ripe age of 18. His training included
Morse Code and radio
and gun training before joining
the 398th Bomb Group. He and
the other members of the crew
flew to Nuthampstead, Hertfordshire
in England to destroy
industrial plants and factories
in Germany.
During his military tenure,
the 398th Bomb Group flew 24
missions over Germany, the
last of which took place in April
1945.
He experienced plane crashes
in Greenland and Germany
during his tour. During the first
crash, adverse weather conditions
caused them to reroute a
scheduled landing in Reykjavik,
Iceland, to Greenland.
“I got a radio message that
said, ‘Iceland is closed in. It’s
storming and you can’t land,”
Reveman recalled.
The crew was informed they
would have to turn around and
land at the last point of embarkation,
which was Happy
Valley-Goose Bay in Canada.
But at that point, Reveman said
they were “past the point of no
return” and they instead made
plans to land in Greenland,
where they made an emergency
landing.
Three days later, Reveman
and the crew were getting ready
for takeoff to Iceland.
“We were taking off on this
small runway. Now you have
to picture it — runway’s small
with mountains all around,”
he said.
As they got to the end of the
runway, the engine stalled and
the plane went off the end of the
runway into a fjord a long and
narrow inlet with steep sides.
All members of the crew survived
the crash.
What didn’t survive were
five cases of Yoo-Hoo, Reveman’s
favorite beverage, which
he had brought on board.
“When we were getting
ready to leave the states, all the
crew took whatever they wanted.
They took liquor, clothes,
cameras and I took five cases of
chocolate Yoo-Hoo.”
After the crash, the Yoo-Hoo
sank in the ocean.
The second crash took place
during Reveman’s final mission
. “The Army Ordnance had
developed very sophisticated
bombs that did the work of two
to three normal bombs,” said
Reveman, who added that each
plane carried 10 500-pound
bombs.
Due to the bombs’ sensitivity,
the crews were told, “Don’t
jostle them. Don’t bounce them
around.” While their plane and
others were flying in formation,
one of them malfunctioned and
the bombs did not release. When
the pilot finally released the
bombs, they dropped en masse
amongst the plane formation.
“Four B-17 flying forces went
down immediately. Forty men,
dead,” he said.
The the impact threw the
plane Reveman was on hundreds
of feet into the air, breaking
two out of four engines.
Eventually, they decided they
had to prepare for a belly up
landing at a nearby German airport.
While attempting to land,
the plane careened into walls of
dirt and stone that the Germans
built to prevent Allied planes
from landing.
He woke up amongst burning
rubble, trapped in his radio
seat. He pushed his way out of an
opening at the top of the plane
and fellow crew members pulled
him “right out of my boots.”
Reveman received a Purple
Heart for the injuries he
sustained.
His nephew Bryan Falk created
the documentary “Riding
the Airwaves: Stories of a B-17
Radio Operator” detailing the
crashes and other stories from
Reveman’s time in the Air Force.
The film is part of the Library of
Congress in Washington, D.C.
Vol. 28 No. 42 56 total pages
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