Off into the wild blue yonder has been more than just words to a song in Geneseo, Illinois. The Maple City has had many of its citizens make a name for themselves by taking off into the blue sky above. In the 1930’s Harold Newman became a world class airplane racing pilot and then became a well known commercial pilot later on in his career. Geneseo hosted an air show in 1948 to the excitement of all who were thrilled by the adventures in the sky. As World War II came along so did the draw of young men from Geneseo to fly our nation’s aircraft over enemy skies.
One such man was Earl Horn. Horn graduated from Geneseo Township High School in 1936 and enlisted for services on March 13, 1940. He went to serve our country after working a short time at the Midland Coal Mine near Atkinson, Illinois. Horn was stationed in an infantry division at Fort Sheridan, Illinois at the beginning of his service. When war was declared after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Horn enlisted in the Army Air Corps as a mechanic. He would continue his training at Chanute Field at Rantoul, Illinois. A short time later Horn entered cadet training in California and by January 4, 1943 he had earned his wings, which is the aeronautical badge meaning he is earned the right to fly planes. When he received his wings Horn was commissioned a second lieutenant at Stockton Field, California. Lt. Horn next moved on to be trained as a pilot of a B-17 Flying Fortress at Wendover Field in Utah.
The Flying Fortress was a B-17 heavy bomber that was developed during the 1930’s into a strategic bomber for the United States Army Air Corps. During World War II the B-17’s were used for bombing raids over Germany during daylight hours. The planes saw limited action in the Pacific Theater, mostly being used against enemy shipping.
The B-17 was built by the Boeing Company and was almost 75 feet long and 103 feet in width. To power the bomber, Boeing has placed four 1,200 horsepower engines on its wings. The B-17 could fly at 35,000 feet at 287 mile per hour and have a maximum range of 2,001 miles. The plane would be armed with up to ten 12.7 mm machine guns arranged in a dorsal and belly turret, in the tail section, and located at the waist and cheek sections of the body. While on bombing missions the B-17 could be loaded with up to 17,600 pounds of bombs.
The crew on the Flying Fortress had up to ten men with a pilot, co-pilot, a navigator, a bombardier, a tail gunner, a radio operator, two waist gunners, an engineer and a belly turret gunner. While stationed at Gowan Field near Boise, Idaho Lt. Horn was assigned to his crew. Their plane was nicknamed “A Little Horne.” After flying training flights out of Gowan Field, the crew made stops at Wendover Field, than they went out to the northern west coast to make several training flights over the Pacific Ocean. Once training was complete, the crew flew the plane over the Atlantic Ocean to their new base in England.
Lt. Horn and his crew were attached to the 388th Bombing Group and to the 560th Squadron in the United States Army Air Corps. They were based at station 136, Knettishall, England, which is about seven miles southeast of Thetford, England.
The crew would fly their first combat mission on July 24, 1943, a bombing run over Amsterdam, Holland to hit a Fokker Aircraft Factory. The second mission was a short run dropping bombs over Bergen, Norway, which they flew on July 25th. The next day, July 26th the crew was scheduled to fly its third combat mission this time over Hannover, Germany. Once over the target, The Little Horne had just released its payload of bombs. They were hit in engine number three by flak, which caused them to drop out of flying formation. Now with “The Little Horne” being powered by just three engines it was attacked by Nazi fighter planes. During this attack the co-pilot was killed. The plane was hit many times by the fighter planes so the crew had to bail out over Germany. The plane crashed near Deckbergen, Germany with the surviving seven crewmembers being taken prisoners of war by the German Army. One of crewmembers, Lt. Cohen the plane’s navigator, was hung up in a tree when his parachute became tangled in the braches. He did not survive the entanglement in the tree.
Lt. Horn was taken to a hospital in Germany to be treated for burns, which covered over 30% of his body. He was treated by the German medical staff who would soak him in a bath of salt water in the morning and follow that with a sugar water bath in the evening. This treatment lasted four to five days until his skin started to flake off and the new skin grew in. After about 40 days in the German hospital Lt. Horn had recovered enough to be transferred to a prisoner of war camp.
Lt. Horn was held at Stalag Luft III in Sagan, Germany, which is today Zagan, Poland in the camps center compound. While Lt Horn was held in Stalag Luft III there were several escape attempts. One such escape attempt had 76 POWs making there way out of the camp. This escape would become the basis for the 1963 movie “The Great Escape” starring Steve McQueen. In a letter home dated October 7, 1943, which was written while Lt. Horn was a POW, he reported that everything was O.K. and they were eating chocolate cake. What he did not say in his letter was that the cake was made out of tooth powder, which came to the POW’s from the Red Cross.
In January 1945, Horn and about 10,000 other POW’s from Stalag Luft III were forced to march to Spremberg, Germany a distance of about 52 miles during the coldest winter Germany had seen in 50 years. Once near Spremberg the POW”s were forced into 40 x 8 box cars to travel to Stalag VIIA in Moosberg, Germany, which was near Munich. While Lt. Horn was held at Stalag VIIA, General Patton’s Third Army would liberate all POW’s held in the camp. It is not known if Lt. Horn was still inside the camp when General Patton toured it or if he had already left the grounds. After liberation Lt. Horn was sent to Camp Lucky Strike at LeHavre, France with the rest of the American POWs from Stalag VIIA. After being processed at Camp Lucky Strike, Lt. Horn was sent back to the United States via a US Naval troop transport ship.
In 1946, after being held for two years as a prisoner of war, Horn would leave the Air Force with a Purple Heart and the rank of Major. Horn then went on to get a degree in civil engineering in 1950 and worked for 30 years as a resident engineer in the state of California. Earl Horn had ventured off from the green fields of Geneseo to serve our country with honor up in that wild blue yonder. He will always have a special place in the flying history of the Maple City.
Flying Fortress like the one Lt. Horn was the pilot of when shot down during WWII
Photograph of POW Camp where Lt. Horn was sent after being shot down
Second POW Camp in which Lt. Horn was held and the one he was liberated from
General Patton's Third Army liberating the POW Camp where Lt. Horn was held during WWII
Author's Note: A special thank you to Author Marilyn Jeffers Walton who helped guide me in locating information about Lt. Horn's time as a POW. Marilyn also was kind enough to supply to photographs of the two POW camps and the liberation photograph
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