On October 10, 1943, the 100th Bomb Group of the 8th Air Force launched an ill-fated raid on the German city of Munster. The raid’s impact on the men of the 100th Bomb Group, the Bloody 100th, is featured in the 2023 Apple TV+ miniseries, Masters of the Air.

Among the dozens of Americans killed in the skies over Germany that day was Sergeant Orlando Edward Vincenti of Carbondale, Pennsylvania.

Vincenti served aboard a B-17 Flying Fortress on a crew led by Captain Charles Cruikshank, a plane featured in the episode – “Aw-R-Go.”

Vincenti, a mineworker with the Northwest Coal Company before joining the US Army Air Force, served as a radioman and gunner aboard B-17s.

The Lackawanna County airman is featured prominently in Frank Murphy’s war-time memoir, Luck of the Draw – My Story of the Air War in Europe.

From Murphy’s memoirs:

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The radio operator, who would be one of the permanent members of the crew, was Technical Sergeant Orlando Vincenti, a quiet, intelligent, soft-spoken, polite fellow from Carbondale, Pennsylvania.

He possessed intelligent brown eyes and an easy smile. During our long association, I never heard him use profanity, raise his voice to anyone, or lose his self-control.

His goal, he said, was to complete his combat tour, enter the army aviation cadet program, and become a pilot…

The radio operator on a B-17 aircraft was one of two highly trained and specialized noncommissioned officers of the crew, the other being the flight engineer, the flying crew chief.

The radio operator was the airplane’s contact with the outside world. Although he principally operated the long-range HF liaison radio set, through his several radio sets came all orders, warnings, changes, and other messages; out through his radios went all messages from the ship and its crew.

Orlando Vincenti had completed the USAAF rigorous eighteen-week radio school. He was first-rate in his understanding of everything from Morse code, and code typing to direct and alternating current circuits, transmitters, and receivers, and he could operate and repair every piece of the extensive radio equipment on a B-17.

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In the skies over Munster on October 10, 1943, the Cruikshank crew flew in B-17 #42-30725, nicknamed “Aw-R-Go.” The aircraft was set on fire by the attacks of German fighter aircraft and began falling from the sky. Vincenti tried in vain to fight a fierce fire in the radio room as the plane began to fall from the sky.

The crew were given orders to bail out of the aircraft at 20,000 feet. Orlando Vincenti apparently never made it out. His remains were found in the pieces of the aircraft that slammed into the ground on the farm of the Berdelmann family near Munster. Vincenti was 23 at the time of his death.

From Murphy’s Luck of the Draw:

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When members of the Berdelmann family were finally able to recover their composure from the shock of having a large aircraft unexpectedly crash on their farm, they approached and examined the wreckage.

Inside the severed tail section, they found the body of Sergeant Charles Clark of Highland Park, Illinois, in his rear gun position. He had a self-applied cloth bandage wrapped around his head; otherwise, he appeared to be asleep.

Approximately 150 yards away, inside the center section of the aircraft, they found the badly burned body of Technical Sergeant Orlando Vincenti from Carbondale, Pennsylvania. The bodies of both men were removed to a large farm outbuilding a short distance from the main house.

The following day Mr. Berdelmann, the grandfather, made wooden boxes for the bodies of the two men who were then buried in the Roman Catholic churchyard at Lienen.

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Vincenti and Clark were the only two crewmembers of the plane killed as it fell from the sky. The other eight parachuted to the ground and were captured by German forces, becoming POWs.

There was some speculation as to whether or not Vincenti ever made it out of the plane, as Captain Cruikshank looked into the radio room as he escaped the falling bomber but did not see Vincenti.

Others reported that he had jumped out of the plane with his parachute on fire or had been blown out. But, as Murphy recalled in his book, that wouldn’t explain why his body was found badly burned among pieces of the aircraft’s fuselage. Likely, Vincenti was still inside the plane when it exploded into multiple pieces on its fall to earth.

Vincenti’s remains were later moved to an American military cemetery in Belgium after the war. In 1949 his remains were brought home to Lackawanna County.

The Scranton Times-Tribune announced the return of Vincenti’s remains and the plan for the funeral in June 1949:

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War Hero’s Body Is Due Tuesday

CARBONDALE – The body of Sgt Orlando E. Vincenti, son of Mrs. Rose Spigarelli, 171 Gordon Ave., will arrive at the D&H Station on Tuesday at 4:30 P.M., and will be met by members of Gerald Buckley Post 1507, VFW.

The funeral will take place from the home Thursday, with mass in Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church at 9:30. Interment, Our Mother of Sorrows Cemetery, Finch Hill.

Sergeant Vincenti, who was employed by the Northwest Coal Co. before entering the service, was killed while on a combat mission over Munster, Germany, Oct 10. 1943. He was a member of a B-17 crew.

He was awarded the Purple Heart, the Distinguished Flying Cross and two citations for heroism. One of the citations was for bravery on his last combat mission.

His plane was set afire by attacks from the enemy, and he fought the flames with every means at his disposal until the plane exploded Besides his mother, he is survived by his stepfather, Carlo Spigarelli, and a brother, Armond, Carbondale.

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Learn more about the 100th Bomb Group and Masters of the Air

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