The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
you later." And he goes over and gives the handbook to one of the other guys and so we took off.
And I'd never seen a Corsair! But, these other guys, you know, they checked out for hours in the
States on these damned things and so we took off and we flew them to Buttons, which is the New
Hebrides. We were stationed out there at Turtle Bay where the Marine Corps had a base. We'd come
out of Gaudalcanal to Turtle Bay and that's where we had our quarters, etc. So we flew in there and
then we reformed VF121. That was the one Joe Foss was in and he and his gang went back to the
States. So we were there with VF121 and we had a new skipper, Ray Broom, who was line officer
that got into flying. He hardly ever flew because he wasn't a very good pilot, and he knew this, and so
he let all of us captains run the squadrons. At any rate, we went up to Guadalcanal shortly after that,
and Henderson Field was still operating. Fighter I and Fighter II are (Landing Figloc) were operating,
too, but we went, for some reason or other, to Henderson Field for our tour there.
MR. COX: Now, had Guadalcanal been completely captured at that time?
COL. PORTER: Yeh, it was pretty much captured when we got up there. It was secured, I think in
February, January or February, I'm not sure of these dates. You'd have to check them out but there
was still a lot of activity there. I mean they were coming down bombing at night. The slot where we
went up hadn't been taken. Munda was still in Japanese hands and that wasn't too far from
Guadalcanal. So they would fly down from Kahili and from that area and have strafing runs, etc.
From Rabaul would be quite a ways away, but Kahili was not that far. Bougainville was about 400
miles from Guadalcanal and they'd come down for big strikes. The Japanese would come from
Rabaul down to Kahili and restage and everything else. Rabaul was more or less like a back area for
the Japanese where they'd reform after they'd got from Truk to Rabaul. So we got into Guadalcanal,
and that's where I had my first combat in the Corsair on intercept and I think it was June 30th It
might be written down there in my book on the dates. I'm a little hazy on these dates but we were at
constantly on alert there at Guadalcanal for intercepts and so we were called for an intercept some
time in June. A huge intercept! That was when the Admiral Yammomoto wanted to really send a lot
of things down there and that was their last big thrust at Guadalcanal. They had some where around
70-80, maybe it was 120 Zeroes come down on a fighter sweep. They didn't have any bombers or
anything. Well, we intercepted that. That's when I got my first kill and it was a situation there with,
some fellow was interviewing me the other day about down at our American Fighter Ace reunion
down in Reno, and they're getting together with the Japanese and they're correlating the kills like that
day, how many we said we had and how many they said they had. You know, there's a lot of and also
putting together the like this guy sorta got into the fact that I might've shot one of their top Zero aces
down and it could have been his 'cause I described my, I'll never forget it, was a silver Zero, it wasn't
camouflaged. And you could see probably 15 to 20 miles when we were at 20,000 feet. You could
see planes coming, you know, and we were right in the middle of 'em and before I knew it, I was dog
fighting with this Zero, my wing man was covering me. We tried to stick together, covering one
another, and I shot down this Zero and I damaged another. But I never had such a fight, you know.
You read about it, think about it, and never see it when it happens. This Zero came at me and I came
at him etc., and then he just pulled straight up. Now we're at 20,000 feet, you know, and that's
something. That Zero just went straight up out of my sight when I was firing head on at him and I
went right after him in this Corsair and he was surprised. They hadn't really gotten into combat with
us in Corsairs too much. None of these (Japanese) guys had encountered the Corsairs. But that
Corsair had the power, you know, so I just pulled up right after I got him on the top of the loop and
blew him up and went down to help my wing man and I got one off his tail. As I was explaining to
somebody, it's amazing those dog fights, there might be 70-80 airplanes in the air and all of a sudden
9