World War II Honoree

Carroll Earle Gray

Branch of Service

U.S. Army Air Force

Hometown

Boothbay, Maine

Honored By

Sarah Sherman Brewer

Relationship

Friend

Drafted into the Army Air Corps on July 14, 1942, at the age of 30. He attended basic training at Scott Field, Illinois. Received further training at Columbia Army Air Force Base in South Carolina and at Hunter Field in Savannah, Georgia. He was stationed in Italy at the Air Force Base in Corsica during the war. He served as a radioman, gunner and official photographer with the 488th Bombardment Squadron, 340th Bomb Group on B-25 aircraft in the Mediterranean Theater. He flew 49 combat missions over Tunisia, North Africa, the Island of Sicily, Italy and Austria; bombing railroad bridges, ammunition dumps, ferry stages, gun positions, troop concentrations and pontoon piers. His missions included flights over the Po Valley and North Apennines Mountains during Allied campaigns in those regions. His unit also sunk the Italian cruiser Taranto, frustrating German attempts to block the entrance of a vital harbor. He was discharged at Seymour Johnson field in North Carolina on October 10, 1945 after serving three years and three months in the Army Air Corps. He was awarded the European-African-Middle Eastern Theater Medal with two bronze stars, an Air Medal with four oak leaf clusters, an Aviation Badge, Two Distinguished Unit Citations and the Good Conduct Medal for his service.