Sixty-years-ago this Sunday, M.C.
”
Brick
”
Hagins, 83, was sneaking peeks out the window of the B-17 he was
piloting, at the smoke filled air around him and the massive battle
occurring directly below him.
Sixty-years-ago this Sunday, M.C. “Brick” Hagins, 83, was sneaking peeks out the window of the B-17 he was piloting, at the smoke filled air around him and the massive battle occurring directly below him.
“It was a mess down there,” he said. “You could see the ships pounding the coast. The Germans had the beaches so well fortified, they knew we were coming, they just didn’t know when.”
This Sunday, June 6, is the 60th anniversary of D-day, when the allied forces invaded Europe and began to gain control back from Adolph Hitler. Hagins, who was a 1st Lt. in the Air Force, was one of the 16 million American men that made up the United States Armed Forces.
“The war cost a lot of lives, but it had to happen because otherwise Japan and Hitler would have taken over,” he said. “You’ve heard it a 1,000 times. If we had lost, we would all be speaking Japanese and German.”
That afternoon as he flew over what would become a monumental turning point in world history, Hagins saw aircraft carrying young men with parachutes strapped to their backs getting ready to jump into a sky filled with explosives and thousands of Germans on the ground pointing their guns at them.
“Those poor guys,” he said. “We felt so sorry for them and had the most respect for them.”
Hagins originally got into the Air Force when he attended San Benito Junior College in 1941. Back then, young men were volunteering for the military in large groups, Hagins said. In fact, at one point “damn near” the entire football team at San Benito High School got their diplomas early and enlisted. Hagins said many young men felt it was their patriotic duty to enlist after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941 and the Nazi-ruled concentration camps became more visible.
“It was the hatred that somebody would dare blow up our ships like that, and the fact that the torturing of the Jews was so highly publicized,” he said.
Hagin’s wife Carol Ann was in grade school at the time, but she remembers her brother leaving to war as well.
“It was just terrible, terrible, terrible,” she said.
After he was finished with training in December of 1943, Hagins met with his flight crew, with whom he developed a close brotherhood during the next year. On April 10, 1944, two months before D-day, Hagins went on his first combat bombing mission as a co-pilot over Germany.
“The first thing I saw was a hole come up through the wing and I thought to myself, ‘Oh God what did I get myself into,'” he said.
After each bombing mission, Hagins and his crew would return to the 92nd Bombing Base in Pottington, England. The airmen would rest and wait for their next orders. The day before D-day, June 5, Hagins said the troops were briefed, but he wasn’t aware of the magnitude of the mission. Regardless, the crew climbed up in the plane and took off for the beaches of France.
“It was about 50 degrees below zero, but we were still sweating up there,” Hagins said. “We knew what our jobs were and you never saw fear in anyone’s eyes. It was always going to happen to someone else but not you. But anyone who tells you they weren’t scared is a damn liar.”
After guiding his bomber back out of the black, war-generated clouds of smoke and landing safely back in England, Hagins said the troops were given some scotch to settle their nerves and were debriefed by the commanding officers about their mission. The average loss of planes was 2 percent and during his 32 bombing flights, Hagins said there were many times he would get back to base with fewer people than he took off with in formation.
“The officers and the enlisted men shared barracks and sometimes when we’d get back there would be guys missing from it,” he said. “Then they would come and clean out their foot lockers, pack up their belongings and ship them home.”
The morning of his final mission, Hagins was woken up at 1 a.m. and told “there’s 1,780 gallons out there, you want to go?” The small amount of fuel meant it was a short flight to Belgium or France, which was a less dangerous trip. He immediately hopped up and got dressed to fly his last mission, which almost ended up being his last flight ever.
“As we were flying over Belgium, a piece of flak cut into the plane and nicked a piece of steel plating behind my head,” he said. “The Germans were very accurate with their flak.”
A year, 405,000 American lives and a German and Japanese surrender later, the war was over. Hagins hung his medals including a distinguished flying cross for completing all his missions, on the wall and returned to his life in Hollister.
According to the Veterans of Foreign Wars Junior Vice Commander Richard Herrera, there are approximately 100 World War II veterans in San Benito County, and nearly four million nationwide. With roughly 1,000 World War II veterans dying each day, Herrera feels it’s important to document their stories.
“It’s important for the community to hear their stories because they’re a huge part of history,” he said. “It was more than a battle, it was a world war.”
Christine Tognetti can be reached at 637-5566, ext. 330 or at
ct*******@fr***********.com
.
