Lloyd Covelle

A. Combat

b. 84 th Fighter Squadron

c. 7 June 1944

d. 0915 hours

e. Area, Montdidier , France

f. 10/10ths low cloud – ceiling 1,000 feet – tops 9,000 feet

g. ME 109

h. One (1) ME 109 destroyed i . I was leading Shampoo Yellow Flight, when in the vicinity of Montdidier we started in string to glide bomb a bridge. As I started in on the bridge, I noticed about 8-10 Bogies off at about 10 o'clock. I bombed and turned toward them. The Bogies were ME 109's. a couple of them broke off as I turned into them, but about six of them turned in on me and I started turning with them. We had just dropped our tanks before bombing so the auxiliary tank was full, making it difficult to turn very tight. I was staying fairly even with some of them, but the first e/a turned inside me and his tracers started getting too close. Then I pulled up into the first layer of cloud, which at that particular place was only about 200 feet thick. All of them came up with me. We had a rat race for a while up and down and through this low layer of cloud. I couldn't seem to get up to the next cloud, which was at about 7,000 feet. Incidentally I hadn't seen or heard from any of my flight since starting to bomb. The ceiling was very low and there were scattered showers. Anyway, I finally turned while pulling up through the cloud and shook the e/a. Then I dropped back through, right on the last man. I fired at him and he hit the deck, so I followed him. He was so damned low that I couldn't fire on him except when he pulled up over a fence, etc. Finally I got a couple of small hits, and he chopped his throttle. I couldn't stop so I pulled up and watched him belly land. I made a little over a 360 degree turn and since his ship wasn't burning, I strafed it until it started burning. Then the rest of the e/a were after me again, so I dodged them in the cloud again. As I got about 5,000 feet, another P-47 came by, smoking slightly, with a ME 109 on his tail. I broke into this 109 and he tacked on to me, but I managed to out turn him until I reached the clouds. I didn't think I had enough ammunition or gas to do any more than take him off this guy's tail, and then go home. All the e/a encountered were very aggressive, and did a nice job of flying. I claim one (1) ME 109 as destroyed.