Phil George

Phil George was born in Austin, Texas on June 3, 1924. At the age of 18, George hitchhiked to San Antonio with a friend to sign up for the United States Army Air Corps, and was selected to join the pilot training program. He completed his aviation training in the US before being deployed to the Pacific, where he spent most of his time at Chikyang, a remote airfield in western China the US had taken over from the Japanese.

Phil George with his wife, Toddy.

Following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in early August of 1945, George was sent on a mission to transport displaced members of the Chinese government from Chungking to Nanking in eastern China, which the Japanese had overtaken in 1937. In this interview segment, George recounts the mission and the unexpected Japanese welcoming party that met them in Nanking with characteristic humor and candor.

Transcript Excerpt

This is an excerpt from the interview with Phil George, pgs. 35-38.

GEORGE: So, the command post calls me down to Chikyang right after - we didn’t know what to - we didn’t have iPhones or any of that.

GRITTER: Yeah.

GEORGE: So, it was probably - and I’m guessing, my memory’s - probably two and half or three days after Hiroshima that we heard that some exceptional big bomb had gone off and killed a lot of people.

GRITTER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: And, uh, we didn’t know what it meant at that time. And then when the second one went off, at Nagasaki, I guess it was a day later, and they called me to command post and said, “You need to go to Chungking and pick up the Nationalist government.” Now, if you’ll check your history, …

GRITTER: Wow.

GEORGE: …the Japanese overran Eastern China in 1937.

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: They came in through Manchuria and all down the Eastern side and Nanking, which is over on the Eastern side, was the capital of China. And so, they killed many, many thousands of Chinese and they assaulted and raped a lot of women and it was horrible.

GRITTER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: That was in 1937. So, the Chinese civilian people that had been in the government that had escaped had been evacuated to Chungking, which is over in Western China. Said, “You need to go over and pick ‘em up and take ‘em to Nanking so that they could be in place to take over the government.” And hopefully get a bunch of the Japanese files and stuff before they destroy them, hopefully.

GRITTER/DICKMEYER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: Heck yeah, I’ll go do that.

GRITTER: Yeah.

GEORGE: Well that’s going pretty much all the way across East of China. So, I’ve got these, uh, I think there were 42 of them, Chinese civilians in the back and I’ve got a copilot and I’ve got my engineer and myself and we’re headed to Nanking. We have no charts or anything we had an old surface map that showed rivers and terrain heights and stuff like that and we did it by pilotage that picked up headings and then we’d try to figure drift because we could see it wasn’t weather…

GRITTER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: …and we’d see and. Anyway, we’d been flying about uh, I’d say four and a half, uh, forty-five minutes and my copilot said, “Phil, look out here on the right wing.” I looked out there and there was a Japanese Zero sitting out there.

GRITTER: Oh wow.

DICKMEYER: Oh, my goodness.

GEORGE: The first thought I - first thought I had, honestly - I hope he knows about Nagasaki and…

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: …Hiroshima. Okay there’s international hand signals you use when you see each other in the cockpit. And he was wagging his wings and I was wagging mine. He’s sitting in a canopy and you can see his head up and we’re in a closed canopy but he - we got windows you can see. And he’s pointing down and, okay. So, we’re going down in formation and I’m not gonna do anything to give him a false impression, I’m gonna go slow and easy and maintain the heading until he gives me some indication to change.

GRITTER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: And probably we were like that for 20 to 25 minutes and he took us into Nanking. And when we landed, ‘course they weren’t expecting us, so masses of Japanese surrounded the plane. And I thought, “Oh boy.” And I’m just 20 years old so what do I know about anything?

GRITTER: [Chuckles]

GEORGE: So, I say, “Okay it’s my responsibility I’ve got to do something, I don’t know what but I’ve got to.”

GRITTER/DICKMEYER: [laughter]

GEORGE: So, I told ‘em, the guys on the crew, “Y’all stay on the plane.” Then I told the leader of the Chinese, “Y’all stay on the plane.”

GRITTER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: And I went back and got off the plane.

GRITTER: Mhmm.

GEORGE: And I have no idea what the rank of the Japanese guy was but I’m sure he was a colonel or something because he spoke with authority. And I’m looking and here’s these hundreds of Japanese, all armed to the teeth, and I - all I’ve got on is a side-arm.

GRITTER/DICKMEYER: [Laughter]

GEORGE: I’m not about to turn her in or anything. But anyway. They had briefed us months before that if you encounter Japanese for either - in any way, in other words if they’re captives or if you’re captives or whatever about one in four can speak English. So, I had remembered that and I said “Do any of y’all speak English?”

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: And about three or four of them said “Yes, we do.” And so I apologized for not speaking Japanese and said, “Tell me what it is y’all want me to do.”

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: Okay, the guy wanted to know what we were doing there. And I figured don’t, don’t try to fool these people just be honest, tell them the truth. And I said, “I have on board 42 Chinese civilians that were in the municipal government in Chungking that I was ordered to bring here to try to help in the transition for the peace and all.”

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: And then the guy says, “The peace hasn’t been signed.” I thought what in the world have I…

GRITTER/DICKMEYER: [Laughter]

GEORGE: …done now? I mean.

GRITTER: Wow.

GEORGE: So, he says, ‘You’re on Japanese territory.” He could have told me I was a rocket ship and I’d have to believe it ‘case he’s got me outnumbered and everything.

GRITTER: Yeah. [Chuckle]

GEORGE: But anyway. So, I said to him, “What do you want me to do?” He said, “I want you to get back in that airplane and go back to your base.” I said, “I’m sorry, I can’t do that.” He said, “Are you refusing to do it?” And I said, “Yes and no.” or words to that affect.

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: He said, “I’m ordering you.” And I said, “You’ll have to do something else. I’m not gonna fly this plane out of here.”

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: Okay let me tell you why I wouldn’t. We didn’t have enough fuel to go back and it was getting dark and Chikyang doesn’t have one light-bulb.

GRITTER/DICKMEYER: Mhmm

GEORGE: So, I would have crashed somewhere - lack of fuel.

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: And so, I started to explain that to him and I see him turning and speaking Japanese to some of them.

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: And their conversation maybe lasted uh, three minutes, four minutes. They were really jabbering. He said, “Okay, we’re gonna take your crew and we’re gonna incarcerate y’all. The Chinese have to stay on the plane and we’re gonna put guards on - can’t get off of it. They got to stay on board the plane.” They said, “In the morning we’ll give you some gas and you get your butt out of here.” Excuse me, “get - get out of here.”

GRITTER: Mhmm

GEORGE: So, I thought, that’s a lot better than getting shot so.

GRITTER/DICKMEYER: Mhmm

GEORGE: I wasn’t crazy about getting shot - little bit crazy

GRITTER: [Laughter]

GEORGE: And now this wasn’t any bravery on my part ‘cause I didn’t think I had another option; if I got in there and tried to go we would’ve all died and I wasn’t gonna do that. So, I’d rather take my chances.