Sergeant Pire, a graduate of Austin High School, Chicago, entered the service on October 28, 1942. He received training at the Boeing Flying Fortress School and was graduated as an aerial gunner at the Amarillo Army Air Field. 

He went overseas on September 28, 1944. 

Contributed by Norma Pire

An Austinite carrier for about three years and a graduate of Key School and of the Austin High School in June 1941, he was employed by a meat products company in Eau Claire, WI, learning the sausage-making trade, when he enlisted last October 29 and was called to service the same week.

According to Sam Pire, the Army Air Force is everything he expected it to be. He likes it so well that he says that he's going to stay in service after the war ends. The food is wonderful, he says, and he has gained 25 pounds since entering the Air Force.

Willard Pire, 25, brother of Sam, who is a salesman for the same meat products company, was sworn in as an Air Cadet in December and is awaiting call to start training. He passed his tests with an average of 97. 

Their sister, Lois, is in nurse's training at Mayo Brothers Hospital, Rochester, MN and is looking forward to enlisting as a nurse in the Navy after finishing her course. 

Their mother, Mrs. George W. Porter, resides at the Washington Boulevard address.

Sam, who is 20, has been overseas since early October. A flight engineer and top turret gunner, he joined the Army Air Corps in October 1942 and received his wings in June of 1943.

Sam, a graduate of Key School and Austin High School, is a former Austinite carrier. His wife, Betty Russell Pire, and their son, Billy, 20 months, live in Eau Claire, WI. His older brother, Bill, 27, is a co-pilot on a Marauder in France.

Missing since November 8, Sergeant Pire, who was on a Flying Fortress, is now announced to be a prisoner of war in Germany.

After basic training, I went to Amarillo, Texas for Airplane Mechanic School for six months. Around April of 1943, I went to a Boeing factory in Seattle, Washington for a month's training.  From there, I took a train to Las Vegas, Nevada for gunnery school at Indian Springs outside Las Vegas. I was there for six weeks in May and June of 1943. I graduated and received my gunner's wings. 

On my return from furlough, our Flight Surgeon, Captain Barry, had arranged for me to go into training as an Aviation Cadet, so I was taken off the combat crew and assigned work on planes on the line at Kearney, Nebraska until they had an opening in the Aviation Cadet Program. I worked on the Flight Line until about February 1944, when I was sent to Biloxi, Mississippi to take tests to be an Aviation Cadet. I was there about a month and then sent to Texas A & M at Bryan, Texas to begin my training in a college training program, CTD. I spent the next three months there.

June 6, 1944 was D-Day and the Air Force lost a lot of men. After D-Day, I was told the Air Force needed trained combat crews, so those of us who had been combat trained were sent to various combat air fields and assigned to a combat crew. 

In July 1944, I was sent to Rapid City, SD and assigned to Bill Drake's crew as an Aerial Engineer-Top Turret Gunner. At that time I was a Staff Sergeant. We trained for three months and then were assigned for overseas duty on September 28, 1944. 

We went to Lincoln, Nebraska and picked up our new B-17 and flew to Grenier Field, New Hampshire for refueling. From there, we flew to Goose Bay, Labrador. There, we were snowed in for ten days. Then we flew to Iceland to refuel and stayed overnight. The next morning we flew to Scotland. We left our new plane in Scotland and took a train to Grafton-Underwood, which was our new base in England—it was October 1944. 

We began our combat missions. We flew seven missions and only made it back to our base on three missions. We were shot up bad on three missions and had to land at emergency fields on the coast of England. During one of those missions, we flew 50 feet above the English Channel and barely made it to the emergency field. 

November 8, 1944
On our seventh mission to Mersberg, Germany, we were hit over our target and lost our No. 2 engine and could not feather the prop. We had a runaway engine and it caught on fire and was shaking the plane so badly we could not keep our landing wheels up and could not keep up to our formation. We found ourselves losing altitude and we were on fire. The pilot told the navigator to plot a course to France but to be sure not to fly over Frankfurt, as they had a lot of anti-air guns. 

As luck would have it, the navigator goofed, and we came out of the clouds over Frankfurt at about 5000 feet and the Germans had a field day. Like shooting ducks in a barrel. We lost two more engines and were on fire. Finally, the pilot turned on the bailout alarm. We proceeded to bail out. In the Air Corps, we didn't get any training in actual jumping. 

The co-pilot, Dick Johnson, always said he would be the first one out, and the navigator and pilot went next. I went down to the hatch to bail out and, just as I was about to jump, I noticed I didn't have my chute on. I had a chest pack, and I couldn't get into the turret with it on, so I always threw it in the corner, as I never really planned on using it anyway. I went back and got my chute snapped on and bailed out. I pulled my D ring and my chute opened, and I floated in the air. It was very quiet and, as I looked towards the airplane, I saw a body fall out of the plane. My eyes were riveted on this body, and I watched it all the way down but never saw the chute open. Later, I found out it was my bombardier, Dan Hart, and that he had died.

I hit the ground hard and was knocked out. When I came to, I found I had dislocated my shoulder and was being dragged along the ground by my parachute. There was a strong wind. After managing to get my chute under control, I hid in some bushes. I ran in a crouch towards a creek and planned to hide and try to escape after dark. This was about noon. I heard some gunfire and dove for the ground. I lay there, face down, and suddenly I felt some cold steel on the back of my head. There was a German farmer and a young boy. The man motioned for me to get up, and the little boy kept saying "all's kaput" and drawing his hand across his throat. I was 20 years old.

This farmer marched me into a small village and took me to a town hall, which soon became full of old women and men and kids. They stripped me down and all I had on was my dog tags. A young teen-age girl grabbed off my dog tags and took off. 

Afterwards, they threw me into an old building. As it was getting dark, two German soldiers came and got me and marched me to a German garrison. They were calling me a spy because I didn't have my dog tags. I finally got them to understand that a girl had stolen them. Somehow they got them back and that was sure a relief. They threw me into another dark building that seemed to be full of military clothing, or something like that, for the night. As I was lying there in the pitch dark, I got the feeling I wasn't alone, so I hollered out and I got an answer. It turned out it was our tail-gunner, Dugan. It was a good feeling  not to be all alone. He had landed in the river and, even though he couldn't swim, had managed to get to shore. 

Interrogation and Confinement 
The next day, the two of us were taken to Frankfurt and  put in solitary confinement for three days of interrogation. During this interrogation I was put in a long room and made to stand at one end while a guard stood at the other end with his rifle aiming at me. He kept working the bolt and aiming it at me. This was at Dulag Luft at Wetzlar. I got very little to eat at this time but got some shoes from the Red Cross. 

After our interrogation process, we were taken to the Frankfurt railroad depot to board a train for Stalag Luft IV. While we were in the station, an air-raid alert sounded, and we had to go down into a German air-raid shelter filled with German civilians. Needless to say, the civilians did not like us. We had only two guards with us, and we feared for our lives. Later, the civilians spit on us and threw rocks at us. 

After about a week, we got to Stalag Luft IV. This camp held an estimated 10,000.  This was about the middle of November 1944. My tail-gunner and I were put in different compounds. There were 24 men in my room but not enough bunks, so six of us slept on the very cold floor. We had very little food but lots of fleas, lice, dysentery and pneumonia. The conditions there were at least tolerable compared to what was to come. 

BLACK HUNGER DEATH MARCH 
By early 1945, the war was going badly for the Germans, and the Russian army began approaching from the east, so the Germans decided to move the POWs farther west. On February 5, 1945, we started on our BLACK HUNGER DEATH MARCH. This march numbered about 6000 men. The rest, the sick and wounded, were taken by train to Stalag Luft I at Barth. 

During the day, the prisoners marched four or five abreast. At night, we were herded into nearby barns with any luck. Often, the farmers would not let us into the barns, as they thought we would contaminate the animals with our lice and fleas and dysentery. We often slept on the ground. I remember that, at one place we stopped for the night, the ground was so covered with the feces of the group who had passed before us that we tried sleeping standing up against a tree. 

We walked from morning till night every day. This was through one of Germany's worst winters. 

We were wet most of the time either from snow or sleet or cold sweat. We got frostbite. We only had GI shoes, overcoat, cap, and winter underwear. Also we had two blankets. Four of us stuck together for protection and to share whatever food we could find. We slept together to try to keep warm. 

At some point on the march, we were locked in boxcars for three days. The cars were in a marshalling yard, and we were not allowed out during this time. We were packed in like sardines, standing room only. During this time, the yard was bombed in an air raid. I believe the Germans were hoping we would be bombed by our own men. Also, at some point of the march, we were strafed by our own planes. 

Finally, on May 2, 1945, after three months, the march, that we had been told was going to be for a few days, came to an end when we were liberated by the British Royal Dragoons. This was near Buchen, Germany. We were in a horse barn at the time. They got rid of the Germans for us and gave us some food and told us to march in a certain direction and we would find the Americans, as they could not take care of us. I remember being so weak I could hardly get up. I would guess I weighed about 80 pounds. We had not had a bath or a change of clothes for three months. 

I don't remember exactly when we found the Americans but do remember almost being recaptured by the Germans on the way. I also do remember that, on VE-Day, May, 8, 1945, we were in Brussels, Belgium being deloused and given new clothes. 

We eventually got to Camp Lucky Strike in France and, I guess, a tent hospital. There, they fed us chicken and milk shakes to try to fatten us up. The government didn't give us any physicals and we stayed away from doctors. We just wanted to get home. We were kept at Camp Lucky Strike for a month to wait for a boat to go home. 

We came home on a boat named Admiral Benson. We arrived in New York about the 20th of June 1945. 

We went to Camp Kilmore and were issued new pants and shirt and shoes and then put on a train to Chicago. There, I visited my mother and then arrived in Eau Claire about the 23rd of June. I had a 66-day furlough in Eau Claire and was then sent to Miami Beach for two weeks of R & R. 

Next, I went to Truax Field in Madison, Wisconsin and was assigned to Military Police duty for two months or so.

I received my Honorary Discharge from the Army Air Corp on October 30, 1945 as a Technical Sergeant.

After my discharge, I went back to work at Claire Mont Meat Products (which later became Peters Meats) with my father Irwin Pire ,Sr. and brother Willard (Bill) Pire. In 1947, I was married to Norma (Rindal) and am now retired and reside in Eau Claire. We have four children and several grandchildren and great grandchildren.

According the the document I have before me, the recipe "comes from the official record from the Food Providing Ministry" located in Berlin (I assume). It is designated as "Top Secret Berlin 24.XI-1941 from the Director of Ministry Herr Mansfeld and Herr Moritz."

50% bruised rye grain
20% sliced sugar beets
20% tree flour (sawdust)
10% minced leaves and straw

There are no directions as to mixing or rising of the dough or how hot and how long in the oven. BUT I would like to point out, as someone who does bake her own bread, occasionally, there is no yeast listed in the ingredients, no sugar, and no salt. 

One might assume that the grain was sufficiently "rotten" to provide the gases to cause the bread to rise, and that the sugar beets provided enough sugar to "feed" the yeasty rye. However, I would assume that whomever made the bread cared little for the niceties of baking and probably did nothing more than dump all the ingredients into a mixer, dump it out, and then create loaves and then bake them. 

In all likelihood, the "sugar beets" were nothing more than the pressed remains of sugar beets rather than slices of whole beets. As to the sawdust and leaves and straw, I would like to point out that, closer to the end of the war probably, there were larger proportions of non-edible materials as well as smaller proportions of edible materials. Today, when we purchase bread, I would like to note that some of the brands contain some sawdust. It is listed as roughage, among other things.

• Air Medal
• Good Conduct Medal
• American Campaign
• Europe-Africa-Middle East
• POW
• Purple Heart
• Victory Medal