850th/857th BS Combat Crew Pictures
850th/857th BS - Complete Mission Reports are available on CD for this Squadron for the period May-Sep 1944. Special Orders defining Officer Leaves and other incidentals such as training and travel are mostly complete for the period May-Dec 1944.
Squadron History (Oct43-Sep44): One of the better Squadron Histories written during WWII, it is has been transcribed from microfilm, and is available, with additional material, on CD.
The 850th Bombardment Squadron (H) was activated October 11, 1943 at the Army Air Base, Mountain Home, Idaho. With it, were activated the Headquarters Detachment, 490 Bombardment Group (H), the 848th Bombardment Squadron (H), and the 849th Bombardment Squadron (H); and together with the parent 851st Bombardment Squadron (H)---formerly designated the Seventh Anti-Submarine Squadron---all became the subordinate units of the newly activated 490th Bombardment Group (H) at the Army Air Base, Mountain Home, Idaho.
850th/857th BS Commanding Officer
LtCol Jack M. Dickerson
Profile: A graduate of Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Dickerson was not well-liked by many of his fellow officers, and many of his Enlisted Men strongly resented his disciplinarian attitudes. Accused of cronyism by a number of men, Enlisted and Officers, he had few friends in his squadron. When the order came down to the 490th BG at Eye to donate a squadron to the Carpetbaggers, many were certain that Colonel Watnee, Group C.O. of the 490th BG, would send Dickerson, and they were right.
At Harrington, his squadron suffered by far the worst casualty rate, nearly a third of his men lost between the crash of the McNiel crew in mid-June of 1944 and the two casualties of the Bales crew on 9 August 1944. More casualties would follow with later-arriving crews.
In mid-summer of 1944 he replaced Willard Smith, who had been Ops Officer since Mountain Home, in favor of Darby, whose crew finished out their tour with Smith. Though his (remaining) original crews started returning to the ZI by mid-September 1944, Dickerson stayed on at Harrington with new crews from the Combat Crew Replacement Centers, and near the end of the war in the ETO, he became temporary Group Commander for a short period. The 857th BS had by that time been transferred to Bassingbourne (March 1945 onward).
In spite of his reputed disposition at Harrington, he had a successful career in the Air Force and a successful family life after the war.
Crews with RED had combat casualties Names added or data modified last on: 03/28/2009 08:18:32 AM
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