Operation Manna-Chowhound: The world's first airborne humanitarian mission
Just days after the end of its combined bombing offensive, the RAF and US Army Air Forces embarked on a new campaign. In response to the plight of the starving Dutch people, the same Allied bombers that had dropped bombs on Germany would be used to deliver food parcels to civilians across the Nazi-occupied Netherlands. Operation Manna-Chowhound was one of the most memorable and ambitious missions of the European air war.
The Hunger Winter
The winter of 1944-1945 was the harshest the Netherlands had ever experienced. While the execution of Operation Market Garden in the autumn of 1944 had raised hopes that the country would soon be liberated after five years of German occupation, in reality, the failed attempt to cross the Rhine at Arnhem led to months of hardship for the occupied west of the country. A railway strike that had been organised to support the Allied advance led to long-lasting disruption of food and fuel supplies, causing shortages that were compounded by a temporary German blockade in retaliation for the strike. To make matters worse, the harsh winter had caused many lakes and canals to freeze, further impeding the transport of vital supplies to Dutch cities.
The ensuing famine cost the lives of an estimated 20,000 Dutch civilians. While the onset of Spring offered some hope, food was still scarce by the end of April. In desperation, families resorted to eating anything they could find, from dogs to tulip bulbs.
Planning Operation Manna-Chowhound
To help relieve the devastating 'hongerwinter' ('Hunger Winter'), the Allies planned an ambitious airborne operation to drop food parcels to starving civilians in the so-called ‘B-2’ area of the Western Provinces; a region that contained some 3.5 Million people and the major population centres of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht.
The job of planning this humanitarian mission fell to Air Commodore Andrew Geddes, who was in charge of Operations and Plans at 2nd Tactical Air Force. On reporting to Eisenhower’s Headquarters on 17th April, Geddes was informed that he had ten days to make the necessary plans. The most pressing concern was organising a ceasefire with the Germans, who feared that the mercy mission would be used as a deception for an airborne assault.
Geddes also oversaw the logistics of dropping such a large quantity of supplies from bombers. Engineers set to work on testing the most suitable packaging and modifying the B-17s' bomb bays to hold cargo nets. Geddes also negotiated how the supplies would be collected from the drop zones. Due to a shortage of parachutes, the drops would have to be conducted at low level. Such was the concern that civilians would be hit by falling sacks that medical services were put on standby to treat potential injuries.
Operation Manna-Chowhound Begins
On the morning of 1st May, 1945, supply trucks trundled along narrow Suffolk lanes towards Debach, where their cargo was transferred to the bellies of thirty-eight expectant Fortresses. Elsewhere on the base, four hundred airmen of the 493rd Bomb Group were woken at 5.30am, ate breakfast in the combat mess hall, and filed into the briefing room; a routine that had become engrained into the day-to-day lives of Debach’s occupants since it began flying missions on 6th June, 1944.
At the front of the room was a map and a piece of string tracing a familiar path from East Anglia to German-occupied Europe. But rather than the deep penetration missions into Germany that the crews were used to flying, this would be a relatively short hop over the North Sea to the city of Rotterdam, which had been under Nazi occupation since May 1940.
The crews were to fly in formation at 130 mph. At just 400 feet they would drop their cargo of food bundles into the drop zone below. They were relieved to learn that a ceasefire had been agreed with German forces in the area, as long as their B-17s stuck to their assigned air corridor. Whether or not the truce would hold was another thing altogether. To be sure, the crews would man their guns, but not fire unless fired upon.
The crews of the 493rd weren't the only ones preparing to fly so-called 'mercy missions' that day. Nine other Eighth Air Force bomb groups, all operating B-17s, would be involved in Operation Chowhound. The missions were flown alongside thirty-three squadrons of the Royal Air Force's Bomber Command, which had begun food drops on 29th April under the codename Operation Manna (in the Bible, Manna is the edible substance miraculously bestowed on the Israelites to save them from starvation). In American slang, 'Chowhound' refers to a person who likes to eat food in large quantities.
On the RAF's first sortie, 242 Lancasters had successfully dropped more than 500 tons of supplies across six drop zones, much to the relief of Air Commodore Andrew Geddes. The delay in the American involvement was due to ground fog over their East Anglian bases that persisted until the 1st May.
The first American Chowhound mission was not without danger. Even for combat veterans, the thought of flying low and slow while releasing an unfamiliar cargo was nerve-wracking. Compounding the fears were the poor weather conditions, particularly as the bombers were required to get into formation at low level. On approaching the targets, some crews recalled seeing civilians waving bed sheets to guide the bombers to the drop zones.
As the food parcels were released from the modified bomb bays, the American and British crews witnessed the joy and relief of the Dutch civilians below. "Such signs of celebration we had never seen before nor since as the people hurried to retrieve their food from the sky. People waved at the planes, flags where everywhere and we had no doubt that the effort had been appreciated", recalled Max Krell, a Pilot with the 96th Bomb Group. All of the B-17s that took part in the mission returned to England after a flight-time of four to five hours. The first day of Operation Chowhound was a success. 396 American bombers had dropped 704 tons of food, while 492 Lancasters dropped 1113 tons of food to their drop zones.
Such signs of celebration we had never seen before nor since as the people hurried to retrieve their food from the sky
- Max Krell, 96th Bomb Group
The Missions Intensify
The success of the first mission and the ratifying of the truce between the Allies and Germans on 2nd May helped to alleviate the crews' earlier fears. Following the formal truce, the number of drop zones increased from five to eleven. One of the 493rd pilots to fly on the second Chowhound mission was Capt. Earl W. Reynolds, who took off from Debach on 2nd May with a crew of seven. The waist gunners and ball turret gunners stayed behind, leaving room for ground personnel to take part in the mission.
Sgt Abel Lechuga, a Photographic Laboratory Technician, was invited to accompany Reynolds' crew on the drop. For the first time, Lechuga would be seeing Europe from the air, rather than from the grainy combat photographs he was used to developing.
Others had more personal motivations for flying on Chowhound. Intelligence officer Joseph van Balen's father was from Amsterdam and many of his relatives still lived in the Netherlands. He saw his contribution to the missions as the proudest moment of his war service.
On 7th May - the day of the final Chowhound mission - 95th Bomb Group pilot Lionel 'Spider' Sceurman invited five men from the base Photography unit to join his eight-man crew on the trip to Utrecht. 'Queen of the Skies' dropped her cargo as planned, but as the aircraft crossed the channel on its way home an engine fire broke out. Unconfirmed reports stated it was the result of enemy flak. Sceurman attempted to keep the B-17 steady and gave the order to bail out. On reaching the waves, the B-17's wingtip clipped the water, sending the aircraft cartwheeling. Bombardier Dave Cordon was picked up by an American PBY-Catalina, while Co-Pilot Jim Schwartz and Engineer Robert Korber spent 55 minutes in the sea before being rescued by an RAF Walrus. Korber died of hypothermia on the journey back to England. Eleven of the thirteen personnel on board were killed. They were the last Eighth Air Force personnel to be killed during the war.
Despite the loss of three Eighth Air Force aircraft (Queen of the Skies and two B-17s that collided with each other), Operation Chowhound was deemed to be a success. By VE Day, American bombers had dropped more than 4,000 tonnes of supplies, in addition to the 7,000 tonnes dropped by the RAF. The food they delivered brought relief to thousands of starving Dutch civilians, some of whom wrote the words ‘Thanks, Yanks’ in tulip bulbs as a gesture of appreciation. However, the air drops weren’t enough to end the famine. At the same time as B-17s and Lancasters were dropping supplies from above, British and Canadian trucks were delivering thousands of tonnes of food from Allied depots in Ede and Nijmegen. Operation Faust continued until 10th May, when the distribution of supplies was handed over to civilian organisations.
Operation Manna-Chowhound’s most enduring legacy can still be felt today. As the first of its kind, the operation paved the way for future humanitarian airdrops, most famously the Berlin Airlift, which saw the US and UK deliver more than 2.3 million tonnes of food, fuel and supplies to West Berlin between 1948 and 1949.
For the airmen and ground personnel who participated in the Chowhound missions, the operation provided a psychological boost. For the first time, they were facilitating the dropping of food rather than bombs. Many servicemen would recall the missions as the proudest moment of their wartime careers. For Hank Cervantes, 100th BG, his three Chowhound missions were among his “most treasured memories”. 95th BG pilot Ray Hobbs arrived in England too late to fly in combat, but he did fly all six Chowhound missions. “I did good,” he declared, “and I didn’t have to drop any bombs on anybody. I dropped food.”
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