Our Veterans: Louis Fowler
Left. Lou Fowler in uniform after he entered the Army Air Corps and before he deployed to combat operations in Europe. Right. Mr. Fowler at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. Photos courtesy of Mr. Fowler.
It is always an honor to meet an American hero. Stuff legends are made of, those select few with true grit who stood the watch with honor and integrity above all else to safeguard a nation.
Daily I encounter dozens of American heroes as I walk along the quiet hallways at the William Jennings Bryan Dorn Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Columbia, S.C. You know them—our Veterans—our patients—our friends—our families. Many are older and grayer now, although a new crop of American heroes now comes through our doors.
If you passed them on the street you might not know their story. You likely wouldn't even know they were former military except for a tattered, faded shirt with an Army 101st Airborne patch sewn above their hearts or a U.S.S. Enterprise ball cap perched atop their heads.
Whether they stood the watch along the frozen DMZ during the Cold War or guarded a check point at an isolated air base deep in the deserts of Iraq–they are all heroes who have served and sacrificed for America and all have a distinctive story to tell.
I was fortunate that just a few weeks ago, I shook the hand of one of these great American heroes—Louis Blanding Fowler. Our Chief of Voluntary Services Tammy Finney and her staff brought him on campus as part of the “Lunch-n-Learn” program that educates our summer interns about Veterans and their sacrifices for our country.
From my perspective, everyone who attended the presentation learned that Lou Fowler had a story of youth, war, capture, escape, freedom, and life that assuredly could be told on the big screen. Certainly it should be heard directly from him, but I will do my best to accurately reflect his powerful words— words that conjured up painful memories from long ago—and some that he wished he could have forgotten or never experienced.
Hailing from Greenville County in South Carolina, Lou enlisted in the military at age 18 during World War II.
“I volunteered for the Army Air Corps in 1942,” Lou described. “By volunteering, I was assured of being in the Air Corps branch of the Army.”
Lou also chose the Army Air Corps because his twin brother had volunteered for the Marine Corps and his older brother had been drafted in the Army Infantry.
“We were a very close family and I didn’t want to be in combat with either of my brothers as I would be trying to take care of them or they would be trying to take care of me and that might get us both killed,” noted Fowler, “And too, I always wanted to fly.”
After basic training in Miami Beach, aircraft mechanics school in Amarillo, gunnery school in Las Vegas, and flight training at various other locations, Lou found himself assigned on a B-24 Liberator as a side or tail gunner.
According to the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force, the B-24 was employed in operations in every combat theater during World War II. At 56,000 pounds, the heavy bomber carried a crew of 10, had a max speed of 303 mph, was armed with ten .50-cal machine guns, and carried 8,000 lbs. of bombs. A range of 2,850 miles made the aircraft an excellent choice for long duration and over-water missions. Interestingly, the name of Lou’s B-24 Liberator bomber was the “VIRGIN ANNIE.”
“VIRGIN meaning not having previous missions,” noted Fowler. “It was a brand new aircraft assigned to our crew at Mitchell Field in Hempstead, New York, and flown immediately to Italy and into combat. ANNIE was the name of the pilot’s wife.”
Unlike many of the WWII bombers seen in photos and film, the VIRGIN ANNIE was not adorned with sensual nose art or messages to the enemy often depicted in during the war.
“There was not an artist handy to paint a picture,” said Fowler. “Neither was there enough time for art work from getting our plane in New York, to flying it to Italy, and into combat operations.”
Ultimately the B-24 arrived in Italy and joined the 378th Bomb Squadron, 454th Bomb Group with the 15th Air Force at a time when completion and survival of 25 bombing missions earned you a trip home.
On Sunday, March 19, 1944, Lou Fowler’s fate and the fate of the entire 10-man crew would be changed forever as it took off from an airfield near Cerignola, Italy. On this mission, number 14—some 4,000 airmen took to the sky, flying 400 bombers bound to destroy enemy targets in Austria and ultimately to defeat Nazi Germany’s Third Reich.
Their enemies, the highly experienced and deadly pilots of the German Luftwaffe, were flying the best fighter aircraft available at that time, according to Lou who talked about the feeling of being attacked by enemy aircraft with yellow-painted nose cones. “Those were aircraft flown by German aces with 50 or more kills,” he said continuing, “pilots who had been fighting since the start of the war.”
The enemy fighters would wait until the bombers were unprotected, as the American fighter escorts were forced to return home because they were low on fuel. “That is when the Luftwaffe would attack, focusing on those unlucky aircraft that fell out of formation due to mechanical problems or that were damaged by flak,” said Lou.
To recall Lou Fowler’s epic story, his B-24 was first hit by an exploding barrage of German 88 mm anti-aircraft flak guns after they released their bombs and were making the turn away from the target. Now his aircraft dropped out of formation and enemy fighters pounced on their crippled prey that had little hope of escape.
Overall, the cumulative damage was far more than severe—it was utter death. Part of the wing and tail section were blown off, and as Lou described, there was a hole in the fuselage large enough to “drive a car” through.
The crew was ordered to bail out at 18,000 feet, but the centrifugal force of the aircraft falling toward earth pinned the young airman against the opposite fuselage. To make matters worse, parachutes were not worn due to the bulky clothing needed to protect crewmembers from the extreme cold temperatures at high altitude. Instead, the parachute harness was worn under the protective clothing and the parachutes were stowed in a rack inside to be donned when needed.
Well, it was desperately needed now, but to Lou’s shock, his parachute disappeared with the explosion that tore the gaping hole in the aircraft. Horribly, the belly gunner also disappeared with that explosion, but his ultimate sacrifice was Lou’s saving grace. He could see the belly gunner’s parachute remained inside the plane.
Although wounded with shrapnel in his neck, shoulder and side, Lou struggled to shed his protective clothing and then to snap the parachute into his harness. Suddenly, the aircraft turned in the other direction and the force pitched Lou out the hole in the fuselage. Lou Fowler and only two other crewmembers made it out of the dying aircraft.
Now the fight shifted from the enemy to deploying a parachute with only one good arm and with no oxygen as he plummeted toward the Austrian Alps thousands of feet below. After he banged on the parachute and pulled the ripcord handle repeatedly, it finally deployed at 16,000 feet. Lou could see holes in the canopy likely caused by the exploding flak, but it wasn’t long until he passed out due to lack of oxygen at high altitude.
When Lou awoke he was surrounded by five Austrians who were wiping the blood from his face with a rag soaked with wine. Instead of surrendering him to the Germans, they hid him in an attic for the night when they saw he was alive. Despite his wounds, Lou survived the night and the next day he joined a band of Yugoslav rebels fighting against the Nazi Empire, who would attempt to help him escape to the border. Sadly, the group was captured by German soldiers who immediately executed three of the others. Lou was now a prisoner of war.
He was then transported to Frankfurt, Germany, where he was brutally interrogated for about three weeks and deprived of all medical treatment.
“I awoke during one interrogation session and found I had clenched in my hand the same rag soaked with blood and wine the Austrians who sheltered me had used to wipe my face,” Lou recalled. “Somehow the Germans had not taken it, so I used it to clean out my wounds because they did not provide me with any type of medical care.”
After bombing raids began in the area, the POWs were relocated to Poland via a train that would stop and pick-up people along the route. Lou remarked they did not understand why the Germans were adding civilians—men, women and children to POW railcars. To his horror, he would soon find out.
About 40 additional boxcars were added by the time the train pulled into Auschwitz—one of the German’s concentration camps where it is estimated up to 3 million people died—including 2.5 million from being gassed and a half million from disease and starvation.
As Lou talked with us, it was apparent the trauma of his wartime experiences had not passed with time. “I can still hear the cries of people and the smell of the crematoriums,” recalled the aging airman.
After leaving the civilians to their fate, the train crossed Poland into East Prussia where Lou was imprisoned at the German Luftwaffe’s Stalag Luft VI prison camp. The Stalag Luft camps operated by the Luftwaffe imprisoned aircrew members from the Allied air forces.
He was there for several months until the advancing Russian Army forced the evacuation of the camp. It was then that the POWs were marched to the Baltic Sea and loaded onto a cargo ship that sailed to Poland.
“We were put into chains in the hold of the ship,” recalled Fowler. “By this time diseases such as typhus, cholera and dysentery had set in. Everyone was dying. The dead were simply thrown overboard. There was no food or water and no place for sanitation during the 3-day voyage across the Baltic Sea.”
Upon arrival in Poland, Hitler Youth, a paramilitary youth organization of the Nazi party, made the weaker prisoners still chained together run about three miles to Stalag Luft IV.
Lou recalled those who fell out of the column, or who did not get back in line were executed along with the prisoner shackled next to them. "We lost hundreds of Americans—the Germans left no one behind," he remembered.
With the continued Russian advanced, the Germans evacuated Stalag Luft IV and the POW's were marched on foot about 500 miles through Poland into Germany. The relocation was tragically similar in some way perhaps to the death march at Bataan in the Pacific.
During the march that lasted more than three months, a German guard informed the POWs that they were being held as hostages and would be executed if Germany could not negotiate peace terms with the United States to end the war.
“We knew that America would not agree to anything other than total victory,” remarked Lou, “so we realized we must escape or risk execution.” He would need a successful escape plan to survive any attempt but it was not easy to make friends or to trust someone.
“The Germans were always moving us, so rarely did you see another prisoner again,” said Lou. “Plus, they would send in German soldiers who spoke English to infiltrate our ranks in an attempt to discover our escape plans.”
Fortunately, he was able to befriend a POW from Wisconsin who spoke fluent German. This skill would prove pivotal in deceiving their captors.
On the evening of April 25, 1945, Lou Fowler, the Wisconsin POW, and another POW made their daring escape. As the Wisconsin POW began speaking in German with their guard, the other two prisoners came up from behind and dispatched the enemy soldier. The Wisconsin then put on the German uniform and marched the other two prisoners past the other guards to an area close to a treeline.
"He would yell in perfect German to deceive the guards as he marched us along," remarked Fowler. "Once we reached a ditch, we hid there until the next morning.” This is when lessons learned as a teenager paid off.
"I remembered learning as a Boy Scout that the sun rises in the east," he reflected. "We knew American and British forces were pushing in from the west, so we put the sun to our back and started to run west. The trick was not to get killed by the Germans in the process."
The trio made their way across enemy lines for hours when they heard the sound of rumbling tanks. Cautiously edging closer to the road to see if the vehicles were enemy or friendly—they were spotted by American Soldiers in an armored half-track vehicle from the American 104th "Timber Wolf" Infantry Division.
"They didn't know we were American POWs and not Germans," remarked Fowler. "Most of our uniforms were gone; I had a beard and hair down to my shoulders so it wasn't easy to identify us as Americans." This made their situation even more precarious at that tense moment.
As they stepped out into the open with their hands over their heads, a machine gun followed their every move. "Then we were ordered to drop our clothes and turn around so we started yelling we were POWs and everything we could think of to keep from getting shot."
After seeing how thin the men were from starvation and malnourishment, the American Soldiers were convinced the three were prisoners. Weapons were lowered and Lou and the others were prisoners of war no more.
Over his 13-month ordeal as a prisoner of war, Lou Fowler lost 87-pounds and he never received proper medical care to remove the shrapnel he still carries today. Despite the horrors observed and the trauma of his combat experience, he never lost his spiritual faith.
"Before I left to fight in Europe, my sister asked if I needed anything," recalled Lou, "so I asked her to send me a Bible because mine was left behind. I was shot down before I received it."
Sometime after he was honorably discharged on October 22, 1945, Lou returned to visit his sister. During dinner, she remembered some of his personal belongings were inside a bag in the attic.
Among the items was a small package wrapped in brown paper that was returned as it was never delivered to him before he was shot down. Upon opening it, Lou found it was a Bible signed by his congregation and dated March 19, 1944—the very same day misfortune fell upon the crew of the VIRGIN ANNIE.
After the war, Lou returned to South Carolina and married Glennie McLaurin of Dillion, S.C., in 1948. After 64 years of marriage, they have three children, seven grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren.
Lou went to school on the GI Bill after his discharge, graduating from Presbyterian College in 1949, followed by a 40-year career with IBM as a sales representative.
As I heard him speak, I wondered if he had stayed in touch with any of his fellow Soldiers.
"I never stayed in contact with other crewmembers or POWs as the only thing we could talk about was our war experiences and that was what I was trying to forget and get my life back in order," reflected Fowler.
It took four decades for this to change.
"It was only after 40 years that I decided to talk about my experiences,” he said, “and only after I began to see and hear that what happened during the war had gradually changed history. I felt it was my duty to tell it like it really happened.”
Now he speaks to diverse groups about his experiences in hope that it educates people about the sacrifices of the greatest generation in WWII, inspires others to join or support the military, and motivates Veterans to seek out VA healthcare.
"I first started receiving VA healthcare in 1945, but more so in 1999," he said. For the last 14 years he has been a patient here at the medical center.
"I like VA healthcare for its high quality of total health treatment: VA individual attention; professionalism in all departments and staff; its efficiency; the follow thru after appointments; staff respect and showing their concerns for us; and the My HealtheVet computer program," noted Lou.
In hearing about his experiences, I took away three values instilled by talking with this great American patriot.
First, keep the faith, despite even the most overwhelming odds. Second, have a purpose in life and work to fulfill that purpose. And third, love and serve our nation.
Louis Blanding Fowler—Veteran and American hero—has mastered these values and it was an honor to meet this gentleman from South Carolina.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Upper left: B-24 Liberator bombers in formation flight. Lou Fowler served on-board a B-24 named “VIRGIN ANNIE” during combat missions over Europe in World War II. Photo courtesy of the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force. Lower right: Prisoners at Stalag Luft 6. Photo courtesy Stalagluft4.org.
.
Upper left: Lou Fowler and Glennie McLaurin cutting their wedding cake. Lower right: Mr. Fowler holding a B-24 Liberator aircraft model that he uses when speaking to audiences about his World War II combat experiences. Photos courtesy of Mr. Fowler.
.
