Herbert Saylor was born in Altoona, Pennsylvania in September 1925. He was brought up during the Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States] in a two-room bungalow with ten people in it. He has seven brothers and sister. His parents, them, and an uncle lived together. Six of the children slept in two double beds in the attic. They lived that way until they married and left home. His father befriended two butchers during the Depression, and on Wednesday afternoons he would go to collect what was called a dog box, full of meat and cheeses that would not sell because they had turned green or cracked. He would wash slime off the meat and scrape the green parts off the cheese for them to eat. They ate a lot of hard cheese. They had a good-sized garden that the dug and planted by hand. His mother canned a lot of food. His father had work off and on, but six weeks prior to the stock market crash of October[Annotator's Note: Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, September to October 1929], he was injured when he fell off a roof he was working on. Saylor graduated high school in 1943. By this point, his father had decent work because of the war effort which caused the economy to pick up a bit. His father was a remodeling carpenter. Saylor remembers the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. It was a Sunday, and he was on his way to his father's friend's hunting camp when another car on the road forced them to stop and told him about the bombing. They did not know where Pearl Harbor was, but they knew it meant war and that in a couple years he would be involved in it.

Herbert Saylor was drafted shortly after graduating from high school. His father and sister brought Saylor to the train station in Altoona [Annotator's Note: Altoona, Pennsylvania] where he left for New Cumberland for processing [Annotator's Note: New Cumberland, Pennsylvania]. He was asked to volunteer to enlist in the Army Air Corps. He figured if he had to go into combat, he would rather fly into it than crawl on his belly. He was sent to Miami Beach, Florida and did his basic training there, doing marching, running, and calisthenics. Eventually, they traveled two days to Harlingen Air Force Base [Annotator's Note: now Valley International Airport in Harlingen, Texas], a gunnery school. They learned to take apart and reassemble .50 caliber machine guns [Annotator's Note: Browning ANM2 .50 caliber machine gun], which they had to do blindfolded to pass. They also learned to shoot rifles, .45 caliber pistols [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber M1911 semi-automatic pistol], .30 caliber carbines [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic carbine], and Thompson submachine guns [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber Thompson submachine gun]. They shot trap, then skeet, and would then advance to shooting out of the back of a moving pickup truck. Then they went to the flight line and trained on AT-6s [Annotator's Note: North American AT-6 Texan advanced trainer aircraft] with a pilot in the front and a gunner in the back. The planes would trail target sleeves. Saylor had never been in a plane before training. Once this part of training was completed, he ended up in the Mojave Desert in Tonopah, Nevada where his bomber crew of ten men was assembled. Saylor was assigned as a waist gunner and assistant armor gunner. They were flying on war-weary B-24s [Annotator's Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber] which had returned from overseas. After more training there, they went to Hamilton Field [Annotator's Note: now Hamilton Air Force Base, in Novato, California] where they were issued brand new winter, woolen clothing and told to ship their summer clothing home. They knew right away they were going to England. They were issued a brand-new B-24. The women who built the plane had put their names and phone numbers inside the plane. The crew never named their plane. They were sent to Lincoln, Nebraska, stayed overnight, then on to Bangor, Maine. From there, they were sent to were Gander, Newfoundland, and were given a folder but told not to open it until two hours after takeoff. When they did, they were amazed to see they were being sent to India. They were shocked. They departed Gander at midnight but developed a gas leak in the right wing within an hour of taking off, so they returned for the plane to be repaired. The same thing happened again the following day. Blocked in by a big storm, they tried again four days later to head for the Azore Islands [Annotator's Note: in the north Atlantic Ocean]. They landed there on a steel mat runway; he thought the landing gear had collapsed. They stayed one night there, then flew to Marrakesh [Annotator's Note: Marrakesh, Morocco], then to Tunis [Annotator's Note: Tunis, Tunisia], on to Cairo, Egypt, and then to Abadan, Iran where they stayed the night in a basement and were warned to never have their pistols out of reach. There were groups of bandits who would attack military personnel. Finally, they left for Karachi, India, which was in India at that time [Annotator's Note: but is now part of Pakistan]. They were still in their wool clothing in 120-degree weather. From Karachi, they were sent to the Assam Valley north of Calcutta [Annotator's Note: Calcutta (Kolkata), India] on the eastern edge of India where there were two Army air bases, one called Madhaiganj and Pandaveswar, they were sent to the latter. When the crew arrived, they were not expected there and told to stay the night and go to Madhaiganj the next day. Saylor's crew was assigned to the 436th Bomb Squadron [Annotator's Note: 436th Bombardment Squadron, 7th Bombardment Group, 10th Air Force].

Herbert Clyde Saylor [Annotator's Note: a waist gunner with the 436th Bombardment Squadron, 7th Bombardment Group, 10th Air Force stationed at Madhaiganj in West Bengal, India] was stationed with two squadrons, his own, the 436th along with the 92nd [Annotator's Note: possibly the 92nd Fighter Squadron, both stationed at Madhaiganj], and at the other base [Annotator's Note: Pandaveswar Airbase in West Bengal, India] was the 492nd [Annotator's Note: 492nd Bombardment Squadron, 7th Bombardment Group, 10th Air Force] and a group learning how to use an azimuth bomb sight that was in development at the time. The 492nd and 436th were often grouped on raids. Most of their targets were railroads and bridges. At the beginning of the war, the Japanese made tremendous strides in conquering territory, including all of Burma [Annotator's Note: now Myanmar]. Madhaiganj was only about 10 miles from the India-Burma border. Thailand was also occupied by the Japanese, as was the southern half of China. The Japanese army wanted to build a railroad from Singapore through Thailand and Burma to supply their troops. They called it the railroad of death because thousands of prisoners were used to build the railroad. The Air Force's goal was to bomb the railroads to keep the Japanese from supplying their troops. They also bombed shipping docks. The prisoners included British, men from the battleship Houston [Annotator's Note: USS Houston (CA-30)], and natives. Saylor was shot down over the river Kwai [Annotator's Note: Khwae Yai River in western Thailand].

Herbert Clyde Saylor's [Annotator's Note: a waist gunner with the 436th Bombardment Squadron, 7th Bombardment Group, 10th Air Force stationed at Madhaiganj in West Bengal, India] unit got notice on 2 April [Annotator's Note: 2 April 1945] that they would be briefed for a mission the following morning. They were being sent to bomb the bridge over the river Kwai [Annotator's Note: Khwae Yai River in western Thailand], called bridge number 0954 at the time. They would be preceded by a B-24 [Annotator's Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber] flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] suppression plane which would go ten minutes ahead of Saylor's squadron and drop frag [Annotator's Note: fragmentation] bombs to hit the antiaircraft guns. The 10th and the 14th Air Forces had been trying to take down the bridge for years, but it was too heavily defended. On 3 April [Annotator's Note: 3 April 1945] they took off at two in the morning for the seven-and-a-half-hour trip. When they neared the river and the bridge, they did not see any dust or smoke, and wondered where the flak suppression plane was. They could not wait for it because they did not have enough fuel to return if they did. They were instructed to make three passes at 6,000 feet and drop two 1,000-pound bombs on each pass. They made their first pass, but only one bomb dropped, hitting the center of the bridge. They were unscathed. There was still no flak suppression plane, so they made their second run, making two very near misses with their bombs. On their third run, the bombardier dropped three bombs, including the one that did not drop on the first run, again near misses. The antiaircraft shot them up pretty good, blowing off the rear bomb bay doors, shooting off three feet of the right wing, shooting out three of the four radios, cutting their aileron cables and the plane went into a spiraling dive. The plane generated enough speed that the air pressure manually forced the ailerons to level out at 2,000 feet, but they were going the wrong direction into enemy territory. They were eventually able to change course and hoped to reach the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Islands [Annotator's Note: an archipelago off the coast of Burma (now Myanmar) in the Indian Ocean] where the Allies had a supply cache on which they could survive after bailing out. They crashed adjacent to a British airbase, trying to land on a beach and going through heavy water. As they approached, the wind blew them to the side and when the pilot tried to correct for it, the plane stalled and dropped. They went through about 60 yards of four-foot water and hit the beach. The nose dug into the sand that filled the cockpit. Everyone survived, though the tail gunner and bombardier were injured. When he saw the film "The Bridge on the River Kwai" [Annotator's Note: a 1957 film based on a novel by Pierre Boulle], Saylor thought that was not how it really happened.

Herbert Clyde Saylor [Annotator's Note: a waist gunner with the 436th Bombardment Squadron, 7th Bombardment Group, 10th Air Force] flew a few more missions in 1945 [Annotator's Note: after being shot down]. When the crew was first assembled in Tonopah [Annotator's Note: Tonopah Army Air Field, later Tonopah Air Force Base in Nye County near Tonopah, Nevada], the pilot said "We're going to live and die together so let's have drinks." They each had a beer. Saylor thought it tasted terrible and began pouring it out. The men told him he had to get used to the taste, but Saylor said he would only drink beer again if they made it through the war together. They would regularly get rations of beer, but he would trade his for V-8 [Annotator's Note: a brand of vegetable juice]. Then one day, while he was in the shower, he learned that the war was over and was reminded of what he had promised them two years before. They had lost their copilot, but there were nine men of their crew remaining and he shared a beer with them. They flew on a B-24 [Annotator's Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber], which was much less comfortable than a B-17 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber], and more difficult to handle. It could fly a heavier load a further distance at a faster speed than the B-17. The B-24 was a good plane and flew The Hump [Annotator's Note: aerial supply route over the Himalayan Mountains between India and China], delivering gasoline to China. When on the waist gun of a B-24 flying The Hump, one minute you are standing there, the next you are on your knees, and then on your back on the ceiling [Annotator's Note: Saylor gets emotional]. C-46s [Annotator's Note: Curtiss C-46 Commando transport aircraft] also flew The Hump. A lot of the planes never arrived in China. They called the area Aluminum Alley because of the turbulence that tore planes apart. There was a story in the Altoona Gazette [Annotator's Note: newspaper] previously about an Altoona [Annotator's Note: Altoona, Pennsylvania] boy whose mother gave him a stainless-steel wristlet with his name engraved on it before he shipped out to serve in the 10th Air Force. Recently, some natives found the plane and the wristlet [Annotator's Note: Saylor gets emotional]. He had disappeared in 1944. Saylor was discharged in November 1945. They left Calcutta [Annotator's Note: Calcutta (Kolkata), India] by boat, on the USS General Greely [Annotator's Note: USS General A. W. Greely (AP-141)]. The captain announced that he was going to try to break a speed record from Calcutta to New York. They hit a hurricane in the Atlantic Ocean and were not able to hit the speed record. Once they arrived, Saylor was able to go home and then reported to Greensboro, North Carolina, where he was discharged. He then moved home and worked in carpentry with his father until he got married. He eventually ended up Lampeter [Annotator's Note: Lampeter, Pennsylvania] working for Exide [Annotator's Note: Exide Technologies]. He retired in 1990.