Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Alone & Unarmed: An Army Pilot Sharing the Skies with Artillery Fire in WWII Italy

Alone & Unarmed: An Army Pilot Sharing the Skies with Artillery Fire in WWII Italy

Bayer, John R.
Kowalik, Ernest E.

Paperback

Biographies GeneralTransportation GeneralWorld War II

ISBN10: 1546810269
ISBN13: 9781546810261
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Published: May 23 2017
Pages: 414
Weight: 1.33
Height: 0.92 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
EXPANDED AND REVISED 2017 Edition. Over 110 illustrations and photographs; this new edition includes 90 more illustrations than the 2005 book.ALONE AND UNARMED is the story of a lone US Army Liaison Pilot, Staff Sergeant Ernest Kowalik, flying the military's version of the 65-hp Piper Cub, during the Italian Campaign in WWII.

Flying without an Observer, because he was the spare pilot for the 88th Division Artillery HQ Battalion, Kowalik actually flew more than twice the average number of sorties and hours than the typical division Liaison Pilot, often at dangerously low altitudes.Artillery spotting and scouting for the 88th Infantry Blue Devil Division, he saw a wide variety of action, from destroying large enemy guns and rescuing supply caravans from ambush, to making possible several significant breakthroughs of enemy lines. Join Staff Sergeant (later Lieutenant) Kowalik as he relives significant episodes of the world's struggle for freedom in that time.

Directing artillery fire from an unarmed, unarmored light aircraft was surely one of the most dangerous tasks performed on a daily basis during World War II. Flying from rough, unimproved airstrips, often within range of enemy shellfire, added to the perils faced by Field Artillery pilots, as did the ever present threat of bad weather. Such operations are covered in graphic detail by Ernest Kowalik, whose Alone and Unarmed is a welcome addition to the small number of books on a little known aspect of WWII.

KEN WAKEFIELD, author of Lightplanes at War, The Flying Grasshoppers, and Luftwaffe Encore.

About the Editor/Continuation edition: John R. Bayer worked with Mr. Kowalik to reprint his 1968 memoirs in 2005.

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