‘Herk’ Taylor, combat pilot in 3 wars, dies

Donald “Herk” Taylor, an Army Air Corps enlisted man who piloted bomber missions in three wars and rose through the ranks to command the 325th Bomb Squadron at Fairchild Air Force Base, died in his sleep July 14 at the Spokane Veterans Home. He was 82.

“Not a bad way to go after three combat tours,” said Rod Taylor of Ontario, Calif., whose father lived at Maplewood Gardens Retirement Apartments until he injured his back recently in a fall and was taken to the veterans home to recuperate.

Taylor, who often told his son, “Any landing you can walk away from was a good landing,” was never shot down flying B-24s in World War II, B-29s in the Korean War and B-52s in the Vietnam War.

Taylor was born in Madison, Neb., on July 26, 1921, to Maurice and Lucy Taylor. After graduating from high school in 1939, he joined the Army Air Corps as a mechanic, but the Army needed pilots and Taylor applied for flight school. He got his wings in 1942. He was a staff sergeant.

“Only problem was, a lot of units didn’t want sergeants flying (combat missions), so he ended up towing targets” with the 3rd Ground Support Command in Birmingham, Ala., Rod Taylor said.

It was in Alabama that Taylor married Betty Davidson in 1942.

By 1944, the need for bomber pilots was so great the Air Corps let Taylor fly missions over Europe as a flight officer with the 492nd Bomb Group, which had among the highest casualty rates of the war. Taylor flew B-24s out of North Pickenham, England. In 25 missions, his son said, Taylor never had to bail out and never lost a crew member.

He came pretty close to it several times, earning a Distinguished Flying Cross for bringing his plane and crew home safely despite taking extensive damage from anti-aircraft fire.

“Never bail out of a perfectly good airplane,” Rod Taylor remembers his father saying.

Taylor’s friend Ed Nystrom, of Spokane, described the time Taylor’s B-24 was shot up on a mission over Europe.

“The crew took a vote: Bail out over Sweden or crash-land in England,” said Nystrom, a former Air Force pilot who flew B-52 missions over Vietnam.

Taylor’s control cables were shot out and he flew the B-24 back to England using the elevator control cable from the auto pilot system, Nystrom said.

“He almost broke the plane in two on landing,” Nystrom recounted. “He said it was his hairiest mission.”

During World War II, Taylor also flew 12 “carpetbagger” missions, special operations to deliver personnel or supplies to resistance fighters in Nazi-occupied Europe, according to Nystrom and Taylor’s son. The B-24s were painted black and the bottom gun turret was removed to accommodate parachute drops.

In this way, Taylor delivered canisters loaded with skis, clothes, weapons and explosives to the Norwegian resistance who eventually destroyed Germany’s heavy water plant at the end of the war, Nystrom said. The plant was part of the German effort to develop an atomic bomb.

After the war, Taylor trained radar navigators at Victorville, Calif., and instructed foreign military pilots at Randolph Field, Texas. The Air Force sent him to Ohio State University to obtain a degree, but his education was interrupted by the outbreak of the Korean War.

From 1950 to 1951, Taylor flew 40 combat missions over North Korea as a B-29 pilot with the 19th Bomb Group, which flew out of Kadena Air Force Base, Okinawa.

He returned to the United States to become a B-52 instructor pilot for the 93rd Bomb Group at Castle Air Force Base, Calif.

Later he was assigned to the Strategic Air Command at Offutt Air Force Base, Neb., and he attended the Air War College in Alabama and Omaha University in Nebraska, where he received a bachelor’s degree.

After graduating, Taylor commanded the 325th Bomb Squadron at Fairchild from 1966 to 1968, when the B-52 squadron was then sent to Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, to fly missions into Vietnam. As air commander, Taylor flew 16 combat missions into North Vietnam.

Taylor retired from the Air Force as a lieutenant colonel in 1969 with more than 10,000 hours of flight time.

“The Lord made him an aviator,” Nystrom said, “and he was the best.”

Taylor’s wife, Betty, died six years ago, Rod Taylor said.

He said his father was buried Monday, on what would have been his 83rd birthday.