US WWII 44th Fighter Squadron "The Vampires" Pacific Theater Grouping
This item is listed for historical interest only. It was listed on our site previously but has been sold and is no longer available for purchase.
Sold for: $1495.00

Original period manufacture. This is a recentpurchase of the WWII effects of one young USAAF NCO, nicknamed "The Flying Sergeant", all are housed in his WWII issue footlocker with a hand painted (likely by him) flying bee on its lid. The contents are a varied lot, all pertaining to his service and experiences during WWII in the South Pacific. He began his service prior to December 7th, qualifying for flight school, but did not graduate. For a time he served in the Intelligence and was assigned to the Royal Dutch Air Force where he was awarded the Dutch Aircrew Wing which is noted on his Discharge (none came with the group). Later in the war he was assigned to the 44th Fighter Squadron based in the Philippines.He was a talented illustrator which is displayed onmany artifacts in the collection including the lid to his footlocker. However the most extravagant display of his talent has to be the hand painted map of the Pacific done on a section of his parachute. It's originality is proven beyond a doubt by the original bw photo with caption showing the map displayed in New Guinea during the war. To while away the hours he hand decorateda number ofenvelopes and letters with cartoons and drawings of his living quarters in the islands, a few of these are shown here. A number of these letters were addressed to his Mother's sister and are filled withdetails about wartime life in the tropics with Japanese bombing raids mentioned and the interesting local flora and fauna. There are two original Blood Chits with anofficial Armydocument allowing himto send these home since the war was over at that point. A few souvenirs include Japanese money and a soldiers paybook with a fragment of a surrender leaflet. An original 8.5x11 autographed photo of the tragic beauty, Carole Landis, with a dedication to the 44thSq. Vampires to "give them H....", There are numerous original bw photographs of his service, nearly everyone aviation related with some excellent views of aircraft noseart (bet some were done by him), with captions on the reverse naming the individuals in the photo, sometimes with the comment "killed or missing". Another great photo is the one of the three pilots seated below the sign "Kill The Bastards", declaring the days victories of four enemy airplanes. The 58 photographs which Terri took, give an excellent idea of the quantity and quality of the material included in this grouping, but there was no way to focus in on every highlight, a gooddeal of the "cool stuff" had to be overlooked for brevity. The grouping has not been plundered, nothing removed with the single exception of a pair of Navy surplus flight trousers which came with the purchase. The 44th Fighter Squadron "Vampires" was a hard fighten' outfit with loads of information resources available, quite likely a number of these photographs have never been seen before.