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Is the commonly accepted relationship between the 330th Air Service Group and the 500th Bomb Group correct?

Traditionally, the 330th Air Service Group has been associated with the 500th Bomb Group.  For example, the cbi-history.com website entry for the 330th says that they were assigned to “73 Bombardment Wg (500 Bombardment Gp)” while on Saipan.  The association between the two units is such a part of conventional wisdom that a couple of years ago I worked with Ed Lawson (former member of the 500th Bomb Group) so that he could include the members of the 330th in his list of servicemen assigned to the 500th.

However, in the absence of any orders connecting the 330th and the 500th, as I’ve continued my research of the 330th I have begun to question this association.  So, I am going to lay out a case against the conventional wisdom and propose an alternate view.  That is:

Given the info summarized below, it appears to be more appropriate to associate the 330th Service Group with the 499th Bomb Group than it is to do so with the 500th Bomb Group. 

After leaving Pendleton, Oregon in December 1943 the 330th was formally assigned to the Oklahoma City Air Service Command.  For their entire time in Oklahoma and Kansas (December 1943 to June 1944), their unit reports list them as part of the Air Service Command (and not assigned to the 500th or the 73rd Bomb Wing.)  Conversely, I have not identified any orders connecting the two units while the 330th was in Kansas.

Additionally, there appears to be no direct physical connection with the 500th either. In Kansas the 330th was assigned to Smoky Hill Army Airfield (AAF) in Salina.  When the 73rd Wing’s Bomb Groups (the 497th, 498th, 499th, and 500th Bomb Groups) moved to Kansas the 500th went to Walker AAF, not Smoky Hill AAF in Salina. It was actually the 499th Bomb Group that moved to Smoky Hill in April 1944 to share a base with the 330th.

A short time after the 499th arrived Colonel Samuel Harris, commander of the 499th, recounts a meeting in his diary.  At the meeting are Harris, Colonel Arthur Melanson [the base CO] and “Phillips, my maintenance Group C.O.”  Presumably this is Colonel Lyman Phillips, commander of the 330th to whom Harris is referring as “my” C.O. So, it appears that while at Smoky Hill, the 330th established a functional relationship with the 499th Bomb Wing even though they were not formally assigned to them.

That functional relationship persisted when the 330th first arrived on Saipan and drove their early actions on Saipan too. In September 1944:

  • As the advance members of the Bomb Groups begin to arrive on Saipan, the 330th assigned “liaison officers between the 73rd Bomb Wing and the 499th Bomb Group.”
  • The men of the 330th “had a large part of the 73rd Wing Area cleared as well as that of the 499th Bomb Group.”
  • The 330th also set up Headquarters tents for the Wing and the 499th when their personnel began arriving on Saipan.

So, it appears their activities were aimed at helping the 499th when they arrived on Saipan, not the 500th.

In October 1944 General O’Donnell, Commander of the 73rd Bomb Wing, gave a speech to the Wing. In that speech, “The talk of the General’s disclosed one fact, the Service Groups were now, and had been since their departure from the States, a part of the 20th Air Force, XXI Bomber Command and 73rd Bombardment Wing.”   This suggests that the Service Groups were assigned at the Wing level and not to the individual Bomb Groups.

Further evidence supporting the belief that the 330th was assigned at the Wing level and not to an individual Bomb Group how the four Air Service Groups on Saipan were utilized at Isely Field. Some functions of the services groups (e.g., firefighting and photographic work) were consolidated at the Wing level using men from all four service groups. Other functions (e.g., aircraft maintenance and supply) were consolidated into the two Service Centers, each combining men from two services groups. In turn, those two Service Centers supported two Bomb Groups.

The last piece of evidence is in a letter prepared by Corporal Ed Schurich of the 330th. In September 1945 he wrote to Walter Winchell about how certain battle participation stars were being awarded.  He wrote: “In the 73rd Wing here on Saipan, there are four bomb groups, four Air Service Groups and a Wing Headquarters Squadron. Each Air Service Group services one bomb group.  In our case the 330th Air Service Group has been connected with the 499th Bomb Group since training days in Salina, Kansas.”

Although Cpl Schurich’s conclusions about the 330th being formally assigned to the 499th on Saipan appear to be incorrect, his letter clearly associates the 330th with the 499th Bomb Group, not the 500th. So, although I have found no definitive proof yet, my belief is that:

  • The Service Groups were assigned at the Wing level on Saipan and may never have been assigned one-to-one with a Bomb Group.
  • If there was a one-to-one relationship between the 330th Air Service Group and a Bomb Group, that relationship was with the 499th Bomb Group, not the 500th.

Do you have any information to shed more light on this?  If so, I would love to hear from you at [email protected].