Book Description
The untold history of a top-secret operation in the run-up to D-Day in which American flyers and Allied spies carried out some of the most daring cloak-and-dagger operations of World War II.
In 1943, the OSS—precursor to the CIA—came up with a plan to increase its support to the French resistance forces that were fighting the Nazis. To start, the OSS recruited some of the best American bomber pilots and crews to a secret airfield twenty miles west of London and briefed them on the intended mission. Given a choice to stay or leave, every airman volunteered for what became known as Operation Carpetbagger.
Their dangerous plan called for a new kind of flying: taking their B-24 Liberator bombers in the middle of the night across the English Channel and down to extremely low altitudes in Nazi-occupied France to find drop zones in dark fields. On the ground, resistance members waited to receive steel containers filled with everything from rifles and hand grenades to medicine and bicycle tires. Some nights, the flyers also dropped Allied secret agents by parachute to assist the French partisans.
Though their story remained classified for more than fifty years, the Carpetbaggers ultimately received a Presidential Unit Citation from the US military, which declared: “it is safe to say that no group of this size has made a greater contribution to the war effort.” Along with other members of the wartime OSS, they were also awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.
Based on exclusive research and interviews, the definitive story of these heroic flyers—and of the brave secret agents and resistance leaders they aided—can now be told. Written in Bruce Henderson’s “spellbinding” (USA TODAY) prose, Midnight Flyboys is an astonishing tale of patriotism, courage, and sacrifice.
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Elise’s Thoughts
Veteran’s Day is a holiday to honor US veterans and victims of all wars. Bruce Henderson wrote about real life heroes of WWII.
Midnight Flyboys by Bruce Henderson details how the American bomber crews dropped Allied secret agents behind the Nazi lines to aid the French resistance. The mission, known as Operation Carpetbagger, had American aircrews flying B-24 Liberators to secret Resistance drop zones. Through their planes’ bomb hanger doors, containers of guns, explosives, grenades, radios, and food were dropped along with agents. On this Veterans Day, Americans should think about the incredible heroism displayed by these men and women.
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Author Interview
Elise Cooper: What do you want to say about Veteran’s Day?
Bruce Henderson: It is a day that Americans should remember. I am a veteran. I choose this day to honor the greatest generation for their duty, commitment, and mission. When darkness was descending on the world they answered the call. They tried to preserve our democracy and personal freedom. I hope today we do not let their sacrifices be in vain.
EC: Why did you write this story?
BH: I have always had a personal interest for airmen. The uncle I never knew had been lost in WWII over the North Sea. I have never written a book about pilots before. After I was approached by a carpetbagger pilot’s granddaughter, I decided to investigate it and found it to be a really good story about a specific period, about ten months before the liberation of France and the preparation for the Allied invasion over the coast of France.
EC: One of the most interesting parts of the book was the story of Nancy Wake, described as “the most feminine woman I know, until the fighting starts. Then she is like five men.” Please explain
BH: Her story is amazing. She was a British agent sent into France to organize, arm, and train the resistance forces. Interestingly, she was afraid of heights and needed a push from a crewman to parachute out of the plane. Nancy was a free spirit, capable, resourceful, instinctive, tough, hardened, and improvised. She was born an Aussie, married a Frenchman, and was a loyal British subject. She was highly motivated personally and patriotically because of her love for her adoptive country France and the love for her husband she left behind there. The Germans put a substantial bounty on her and labeled her “The White Mouse.”
EC: How would you describe the 400-mile bike ride she made?
BH: She herself said after the war that she was most proud of that event. She made that trip in 72 hours to get an urgent message to London. This was an incredible accomplishment. She felt she had to do it and after she did it, she was on her back for a week, unable to walk. Nancy succeeded and the message got to London.
EC: How would you describe the carpetbagger airmen?
BH: They were American pilots. Operation Carpetbaggers was a joint secretive operation between the American OSS and their British counterparts the SOE who trained most of the agents that were dropped. Eisenhower felt that about 9 months from the invasion there had to be a bigger effort to get the munitions into occupied France. He ordered some squadrons of the B-24s to be available. They had a high casualty rate, 230 were killed in action and about 33 planes went down.
EC: Did the Carpetbaggers have to be retrained?
BH: The B-24 Bomber were designed to fly at a high altitude in formation. Instead, they have been asked to fly solo at night to find a dark field in France. They had to fly the plane slower and lower than it was meant to fly. This could cause stalling. If they were at 1500 feet of altitude they could recover but they were 600 to 800 feet off the ground and would probably crash.
EC: How effective were they?
BH: I use the quote from Eisenhower who estimated that the French resistance forces were equal to five army divisions. They were a huge help when the Allied forces hit the beach at Normandy. They took out bridges to stop the German reinforcements coming from the South and blowing out German trains. Eisenhower thought that the organized resistance forces in the German occupied territories helped to shorten the war by six months. It was like a domino effect because the resistance would not have been effective. SOE Agents like Wake were dropped down to organize and the Carpetbaggers were the ones who dropped them. She was a leader to the resistance and was dependent on the Carpetbaggers who resupplied them.
THANK YOU!!
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BIO: Elise Cooper has written book reviews and interviewed best-selling authors since 2009. Her reviews have covered several different genres, including thrillers, mysteries, women’s fiction, romance and cozy mysteries. An avid reader, she engages authors to discuss their works, and to focus on the descriptions of their characters and the plot. While not writing reviews, Elise loves to watch baseball and visit the ocean in Southern California, with her dog and husband.
