"INFORMATION FROM 
TIM EARNEY, 
HOWARD'S SON

 My Dad was born in 1917 and died in 1976 from complications of surgery. He married my mother in 1946 and they had 5 children. Kelley, 1947, me, 1948, Larry, 1950, Brian, 1953, and Mary, 1961.  My father was a construction worker when we were children. He enjoyed hunting and fishing and other sports and spent very much time teaching my brothers and I about these things. Although I was curious and asked many questions he seldom talked about experiences during the war except when talking with his friends. Most of the things that I learned were from listening to these conversations. Many of them thought that his efforts to escape and some of the other things that he did were extraordinary but he did not. He was bothered his entire life by the shrapnel in his body from the injuries he suffered before being captured by the Germans but he never complained about it."

And from his last mail :

" He told me that it was a very big fire and that there was a lot of scar tissue in his lungs as a result of it. He also told me that on that mission there were more German fighter planes and more anti aircraft fire than he had ever experienced. He did not know how he got out of the plane and thought that he may have been thrown out when it broke into pieces."