Lt. Jimmy P. Robinson's Speech to the Lion's Club Oct. 17, 1944

Now that we are at war with Iraq we must think back to wars of the past and pray that no weapons of mass destruction are used in future wars, that few of our men and women are held as prisoners of war and that we not lose our loved ones. We must pray for the safe and swift return of our troops.

This is the speech Capt. Jimmy P. Robinson gave to the Lion's Club Oct. 12, 1944 in Memphis, Tennessee. He had just returned from WWII where he was held as a POW in Romania after the B-24 in which he was a bombadier had lost two engines. They all bailed out over Bulgaria.Their mission was to bomb the Ploesti Oil Fields in Romania. They were all members of the 15th Air Force, 455th Bomb Group,743rd Bomb Squadron.

I am indeed happy to be here today for more than one reason. Mainly, it means that I am back home again. I wasn't away too long, but the time I was away wasn't any too pleasant.

I have something to say and it may make a few of you angry. I am sorry if I do, but, what I have to say will be the voice of not only myself, but it will be the feeling of all the fellows overseas as well as the ones in the service here at home. I am speaking of the minority of the people and not of the greater majority of the folks here at home. It does not make those of us in the service very happy when we hear of the strikes that are going on. The boys over there are putting out all they have in them to get this bloody thing over with. They go for stretches without sleep lasting from 24 hours to 3 to 4 days. Then some of the folks here at home stand around and gripe about one thing or another, such as the shortage of sugar and being unable to get all the tires they want for their cars and hundreds of other gripes along those lines. I want all of you to know that there is a shortage of things like that because your boys, your husbands and your relatives are making darn good use of them where they will do the most good. They use all of that equiptment and a lot of it. They are sweating blood to do a job that is in a hell of a mess and by the grace of God and with your help they will get it cleaned up in jig time.

You hear a lot about heroes. I don't believe in heroes and I would like to tell you a story about a boy who had the Congressional Medal and how he felt about heroes. This boy was asked how it felt to be a hero and in the plain words of our typical fighting men he answered,

" I am not a hero. The heroes are the boys that don't come back."

I know that I do not have to ask you members of the Lions Club to donate to the WAR WALFARE FUND DRIVE that is on now, but maybe it would help out if you would say a word to your friends and to your associates and I know that the boys will appreciate all you do.

I have been asked to tell you about my experiences as an prisoner of war in Romania.

It all started about 0200 in the morning on the 11th. of June. We had been to briefing and I was out at the ship putting my equipment in the plane when a feeling came over me that put a lump in my throat. Something told me that we weren't coming back, but I thought it was just too much thinking about the flak and the target so I said nothing to the rest of the fellows on the crew. About 10 minutes before reaching the I.P. one of the engines started spitting oil and caught on fire. The pilot called us and told us to put on our chutes in case things got worse and it wasn't long before they did. In increasing the pull on the other engines they were getting hot and the number 2 engine went out on the same side as the first. By this time we were losing altitude and we could not hold our course because of the 2 engines out on the same side. I crawled up to the pilot's compartment to see if I could help and my co-pilot and I tried to talk the pilot into trying to get back to Italy, but he proved to us that it was hopeless and ordered me out of the plane. At that time we were at 16,700 feet and I didn't like to think of what would happen if my chute failed to open.

I told my nose gunner that I was going to jump and for him to follow me. As I jumped, my chute caught on something in the bomb bay and began to open. I hung there for what seemed like hours, but was only about 30 seconds. When I did fall, my chute dragged along the bottom of the fuselage and I know that it would be ripped but, God was with me and it finally did open and it jerked the daylights out of me.

I believe that was about the most wonderful feeling I have ever known and I settled down to watch the chute. Everything was quiet and so peaceful that I could almost hear music. I looked at my watch and it was 0915. I started getting out my maps to locate myself and I also lit a cigarette. It seemed as though I wasn't even moving and I wondered if I was ever going to hit Good Old Mother Earth.

Finally, I did and I looked at my watch again. It was 0940. It was hard to believe that I had been in the air 25 minutes. I knew that I had bailed out over Bulgaria and I didn't like the idea of hanging around so I bandaged my leg that had been cut on the plane and buried my chute. I started out in the direction of Italy.

I had taken no more than 4 or 5 steps when the woods surrounding the field where I had landed seemed to become alive with people. Among them were soldiers, farm people and others that seemed to have a mixture of both. They were armed with everything from pistols and rifles down to pitchforks and clubs. One of them stepped up to me and in a language that I had never heard before, asked me my nationality. He traveled all through from German naming all those in the world before he ever said American.

I told him that I was an American and then he asked me if I was from Canada. When he learned that I was just a good old American he turned and said something to the others and then they started treating me like a long lost brother. From their kind actions I surmised that I was in partisan hands and would probably be back in Italy by the next day. That hope was soon destroyed when they took me to a police station and I saw my engineer sitting there with a foul look on his face and cursing a blue streak. I learned from him that we were prisoners of war.

We were told stories that made our load a little lighter and we thought that our treatment would be not too tough. Those impressions were also destroyed when we were taken to Bucharest the next day and treated like we were criminals and murderers.

In Bucharest, instead of sports and good food we found concrete floors for beds and lice and bedbugs for company instead of the pretty girls they had told us about. We got what they called soup, but what reminded me of dishwater with fish heads floating around in it. We were not beaten and we were not tortured into telling anything that we did not want to tell, but the intellegence officer seemed to find out all about you and your outfit without any of your help.

After 2 1/2 months of counting hours that seemed like days and days that seemed like years, we got our first Red Cross packages. It was like an early Christmas. The candy, cigarettes and food made our spirits brighter. About 11:10 that night on August 23rd, a Romanian Colonel of the General's staff and a Captain who acted as an interpreter told us that we were no longer prisoners and that Romania had capitulated and was now on the allied side.

We celebrated in a quiet manner and said prayers, thanking God for our liberation. We also prepared for any trouble that the remaning Germans might give us. Machine guns were set up and we organized a defense.

The night passed without mishap and the next morning the Romanians who before had spit at us and called us names were acting as though we had been lifelong friends. They gave us food and wine and offered us the hospitality of their homes. Things were going fine until about 10:00 and the Germans who had not been driven out came back in planes and started an air raid that lasted for 48 hours without let up.

Their bombers were in the sky all the time, droppng their revenge and destruction on the city. Only one American was killed and he was the top gunner of my crew. The Germans stopped bombing for 6 hours after their 48 hour shower of hell and nerve shattering assault,then they resumed their inhumane assault again. This time it lasted until our bombers and fighters came over on the 27th. and knocked out the German's airfied and planes. While the Germans were bombing they had no opposition since they had sabotaged all of the Romanian planes and flak guns and also had control of the air raid warning network.

Once the Romanians blew the all clear and when we went out into the streets to look at the damage they came down and strafed us. I was caught out in the open and the bullets started flying all around me. I dug a foxhole with my fingernails and when they had gone I found bullets within 2 inches of my foxhole. I was one scared boy and I felt like I had aged ten years.

Of all the raids that we went through, and we went through 57 all together, the Germans was the most devastating and nerve racking. In none of the allied raids was one single American injured and although the Romanians were in adjoining rooms and were killed, not once did an American get as much as a serious scratch. We used that strange work of fate to impress upon the Romanians that they were on the wrong side. People say that the day of miracles is past, but I know that God's hand protected us all the way through.

After the Germans were silenced for good we walked around the city on a sight seeing tour to see what it was like in the ruins of what was once a beautiful city. We saw destruction that war had brought and the devastation that the inhumae bombing by the Germans had done. The Germans used as their targets such buildings as the King's palace, libraries, hospitals, museums, churches and banks. I couldn't help but be thankful that our people were not undergoing the same things back home.

We got a chance to see what the people were really like and we found a little of home in their actions and in the things they liked. The people in Romania who live in the city are a lot like you and I, but the peasants differ greatly from our farmers. They dress in coloful costumes and have nothing to do with the city folk.

I know that you are anxious to hear the story of how we were returned to Allied control. Our evacuation was brought about by an American Lt. Col. who was a prisoner in our camp. He flew back to Italy and got the B-17's ,P-83s and P-51's that came to fly us out. We were waiting at the airport when the planes came into view and I think that that was one of the happiest moments in our lives. The planes circled and landed and yet we couldn't even yell. We all were so happy we could have cried. There were several newsreel cameramen and reporters and they told us to wave and shout, but we could only manage a weak HEY! It was too good to be true.

We sweated out the flight from take off until we taxied up to the hardstands back in Italy. When we arrived no time was wasted and in a matter of minutes we were on our way to the delousing area. We shed our clothes, bathed, and then they sprayed us with DDT. We were given clean clothes and fried chicken. A few days later we were on a boat for home.

In closing, I would like to say that I know you folks are doing a good job here at home. Without your help, the fellows over there could not be successful. Your cooperation is what we want more of. You are the folks that are putting the guns in the hands of your fighting men and the clothes on their backs that make them the finest soldiers in the world. As a matter of comparison, the Romanian soldier receives about 6 cents a month and a pack of cigarettes costs 8 cents so you see how big the difference is. The Romanians thought that we were spoofing when we told them that our privates receive $50.00 a month.