By this time, Dewey had been drafted, and enlisted in the cadets also.  When his class was scheduled to start they announced that they had more than they needed, so the class was cancelled before it even got started.  They asked if any of us wanted to be gunners, or we could be sent to the infantry.  Dewey told them he wanted to go to gunner school, so they sent him to Harlingen, Texas for training.  After gunnery school, Dewey went to Omaha to meet what would become his first crew and they would begin their assignment learning to fly together on a B-24 bomber.  Dewey was sent to Boise, Idaho, and by luck his brother David was already there.  David had been to Casper, Wyoming and then was in Idaho preparing to meet his new crew.  When he found out Dewey was there, he also found out that Dewey was to ship out the next morning.  The day Dewey was to be shipped out, I went to the main office looking for the CO and PFC was sitting there working behind the desk.  He saluted me and stated, "Sir what can I do for you?"  I asked him, hey can you do a favor for me?  The young PFC said, sure thing sir, what do you need?  I told him, I want you to reline Dewey Holst and move him off that transfer list and put him on the list to Omaha.  The PFC saluted me and stated 'no problem",  sir it will be done.  Dewey was already on the truck and on his way to be shipped off the base when the truck was ordered to stop.  He was told to get his gear, get off the truck and go back to headquarters.  Dewey did not know exactly what was going on, but he knew "something was up".   Dewey was already flying with a pilot and a copilot, but they had no navigator assigned to their crew.  David knew they were looking for a navigator, so David went to his superior officer and as to be added to Dewey's crew.  His superior had no problem with the request.  David and Dewey were going to be together, same bomb group and fly the same missions because they are both on the same airplane.

  They picked up a new B-24 in Topeka, Kansas and headed for the UK. We were on our way flying the northern route when David opened up our orders and knew that we were going to be a replacement crew in the 448th Bomb Group, 714th Squadron , 8th AF, 2nd AD.  The Holst brothers arrived in England in July of 1944 and began flying the first of their thirty-five bombing missions over Germany.  it was on their third bombing mission on the 26th of August, 1944, target Ludwigshafen, Germany, that things began to look bleak.

  Their B-24 was hit by flak just at the time that the Bombay doors opened and bombs were dropped.  David remembers, "We fell about 10,000 feet; the plane was on fire and before I knew it, two of our guys had already bailed out."  He added the bombardier and one of the waist gunners had already left the burning plane and that the bomb bay doors were blown off; the bombardier and the waist gunner unfortunately were never heard from again.

  David said "We lost six of our twelve planes on that mission, us being one of them.  We were losing altitude and as soon as the pilot was able to get the plane level again, I knew that I needed to get a heading toward home."  David always knew where General Patton was on the continent and I always knew the direction he and the Third Army were traveling.  David always had a course set for where he thought that General Patton might be just in case we needed a landing spot.  Today we needed that spot!  They flew almost an hour on three engines and then lost another.  By the time we were down to two engines, David knew we wouldn't stay in the sky, so I gave the pilot a heading and headed for south of Paris.

  We flew as long as we thought we could keep the plane in the air and then the pilot gave the signal to bail.  By the time they jumped, the props froze and the plane was only about 1,500 feet off the ground.  Four of the crew bailed out around Le Mans, France.  Dewey knew the situation was bad, but he wasn't too anxious to jump out of the airplane.  He landed in a hayfield with startled and scared French farmers with pitchforks running toward him.  Dewey started yelling, Americano!!! Americano!!! and immediately the farmers knew he was friendly.  As for David, he had the luck of landing almost in the middle of Patton's Third Army.  The Germans had moved out of the territory less than 24 hours earlier as Patton's Army was moving through.  Dewey was taken to Le Mans, France and told to wait for further orders.  That wait turned out to be somewhere between seven and nine days.  David knew Dewey had jumped, and was fairly sure that he saw his chute open, but was not exactly sure where he had landed.  David found himself hung up in a tree, an American soldier ran up as David got himself out of the tree and joined the American infantrymen and headed for allied lines and was shipped back to base.  The remainder of the squadron that returned to base had reported that their plane exploded and they didn't see chutes and they thought that all of us had perished.  David was concerned because he knew that when a plane went down with the crew, it meant the families of the crewmen were immediately notified by letter.  By the time David could get information, he found out that his family had already been sent a letter.  David was able to get on the telephone and call Washington and try to stop the letter.  It was several days before David could get information about what happened to Dewey.  David didn't know Dewey had been picked up and taken to safety and was waiting to be sent back to England.

David sent a cable to his parents saying that he was safe and that he felt Dewey was safe, but at that time he did not have any further information. The family received official notification that Dewey was MIA. Finally , David learned that Dewey was on a transport back to the base at Seething and the two brothers were reunited. They went on to fly 32 more missions with the 448th Bomb Group and in completion of their 35th mission, both received news that they would be leaving for home. Orders were cut for the two men to travel back to the U.S on May 8th, 1945, the day Germany surrendered.

   David stayed in the military and was called for the Korean Conflict Dewey left the air corp after
receiving the air medal with five oak leaf clusters, the ETO ribbon with five battle stars, the,
World War II victory medal, the American Campaign medal with battle star and a Certificate of
Valor, David received the same honors. Dewey received the Knight of the Legion Honor medal from the French Government.
The letter sent with the medal said You gave your youth to France and the French people. Many of your soldiers did not return but they remain in our hearts."Thanks to your courage and to our American friends and allies, France and Europe have been living in peace for the past seven decades you saved us. We will never forget, For us, the French people, you are heroes , Gratitude and remembrance are forever in our souls. To show our eternal gratitude, the government of the French Republic has decided to award you the Legion of Honor. Created by Napoleon, it is the highest honor that France can bestow upon those who have achieved remarkable deeds for France. " The letter was signed Vincent Floreani, Concul General de France a` Chicago.

DEWEY