Road to the Black Forest	Jim & Karen high above Schramberg at a German Flak position

We arrived in England and stayed with Ben’s mother and father for a few days and again visited the old Wendling air base. Then we crossed the English Channel to Rotterdam and stayed with friends of the Jones' in Enschede, Holland. Heading south we stopped at the American cemeteries listed in the previous link, and finally we arrived in the Black Forest town of Schramberg, just a few miles away from the crash site.

On March 18, 1993, forty -nine years after the Books crew was shot down, we were on a mission. Not a mission like the boys had been on, but we may have felt some of the same nervousness. What would we find? Would anyone talk to us? What if we came all this way and found nothing! I was really nervous, and my thinking was making it worse. Maybe I had made a mistake thinking I could find out the answers to all my questions! What made me think that these people cared about what happened to my uncle and his crew 49 years ago. Little did we know at that moment that they did care. Soon it became apparent to all of us just how much information was here and that these people wanted to tell their story.

Our first stop was at the Bergermeister’s office in Schramberg, and right away we received some bad news. The contact person we were to see was ill; however, another person by the name of Carsten Kohlmann, a local historian, might be available. As it turned out, this was our first meeting with Kohlmann, who is now one of our most respected research team members. Basically speaking, if it weren’t for Carsten, most of the crash site photographs and eyewitness accounts would never have been possible. That first meeting was a short one, but he was impressed with the historic documents we had, and we were impressed with his knowledge of the crash that was very near his home. He was unable accompany us to Hardt, the site of the Books crash, but he was very interested in continuing a dialogue with us. He gave us some great information and direction on how to go about finding information, “Talk to the old people."

Jim & Ben meet Carsten Kohlmann

Jim meets Bergermeister Hurbert Halder

We went directly to Hardt and found the office of the Bergermiester. The Mayor Hurbert Halder was a young fellow who could speak some English and was very interested in our visit and the documents we had on his community that were taken by the American Graves Registration some 49 years earlier. It was hard at first for us to understand some of his questions, but it all worked out. While we were in the office, a man came in who had seen the crash of the Books plane, and he described the crash in detail on a large map in the mayor’s office . The mayor’s secretary, a young man, did the translating. Then a call came in from a man who heard we were in town who would take us to the crash site. Another stroke of luck! The mayor offered us his secretary for translations, and we were off to pick up Georg Laufer who would take us to the crash site of the tail section of the Books plane. I looked at Ben Jones and said, “ This is unbelievable; it’s almost like it was meant to be." And shortly after we would have another surprise in store for us that would be unbelievable.

Georg Laufer leads the way to the crash site

Georg Laufer leads the way to the crash site Georg Laufer, a 70 year old man, was in the military, had been wounded, and was home recuperating on Saturday, March 18, 1944. He was to report for duty the next Monday. Georg recalled that at 3:00 that afternoon the 392nd Bomb Group was returning from Friedrichshafen when they were attacked by Me109 fighters. The air battle took place over the town of Hardt. As Georg watched, white puffs of smoke came from four of the Liberators. They were hit, on fire, and started to fall back from the formation,

while one of the planes (we know now to be the Books plane) fell from the sky and looked as though it were going to crash on the nearby Kopp farm. Just before the plane crashed, Georg recalled the pilot pulled the plane out of the dive. It looked to Georg as though they had made it when all of a sudden it blew up. The cockpit was propelled out of site while the tail section turned very often as it fell. Georg continued, “I put on my snow skis and went to the place Steinreute where the tail section had fallen. A soldier Sgt. Dan Jones was still alive in the tail gunner position. Another man soon came, and we both attempted to remove this man, but it was not possible because his legs were tangled in the crushed aircraft. He died a short time later. Exploding shells and small fires in the aircraft caused us to move away from the plane. It was then I picked up a piece of wreckage, which was strictly forbidden, and took it home."

Tail section wreckage March 18, 1944

Tail section crash site March 18, 1993

Information was coming so fast I couldn’t keep up with it. I was watching Georg and listening to him speaking in German and also listening to our interpreter at the same time. It was hard to believe that we were standing on the spot where part of the plane came down with the same man who had been here 49 years earlier. I looked at my watch and pointed to the time; it was 3:00 PM. Georg shook his head as if he understood. We didn’t say anything; we both knew what the other meant. This was the exact time that the plane had blown up some 49 years earlier. We had done it! We had come to Germany, found what had happened, and talked to an important eyewitness to the crash.

As we walked back to the car we stopped and talked to the owner of the property, Sofie Kopp and thanked her for allowing us to visit the crash site. Still to this day, 49 years later wreckage from the Books plane is found in her garden every year.

Discussing the crash with Sofie Kopp

Georg Laufer gives Jim a piece of wreckage

As we drove Georg back to his home, I heard our young translator and Georg talking from the back seat, and just as we were turning into Georg’s driveway, our translator said, “I have some good news for you ,Jim. Georg wants to give you the part from your uncle's aircraft that he picked up 49 years ago." Ben, Karen, and I all looked at each other in disbelief. It was a piece of the ball turret from the Books Plane, which had been lying in his basement for 49 years. Georg said through the interpreter, “Soldiers came to this place after the war and wanted to know about wreckage and what happened. We told them nothing and gave them nothing, but I’ll give it to you in remembrance of your uncle. I’m sorry about your Uncle, and all the others that died here."

We made several more stops at the place where the crew’s bodies were taken after the crash. Exhausted, we drove back across Germany into Holland for our trip back across the English Channel. Back in England before heading home to the US, Ben and I stopped in to visit Ian Hawkins, an English writer, who is well known among 8th Air Force personel. Ian was a great help to me while planning the research trip, and we thought it would be a good idea to stop in and say "Hello," and thank him personally.

Jim and Ben with Ian Hawkins

Then we headed home to contemplate what we had seen and heard in the Black Forest that must have seemed so far away during the war. So far away from the hometowns where these airmen grew up. I was thinking as we flew home how the war made less sense then it did before we came here. I was sure I knew why they died, and now it makes no sense. The Germans we were at war with 50 years ago are now our friends. What is going on; I must be missing something. I think the real reason my uncle died so far from home 49 years ago was so that I can now visit this place Hardt 49 years later without fear or hate. But what a price was paid. The search continues.