World War II Honoree

William Walter Bergren

Branch of Service

U.S. Army Air Force

Hometown

Willow Creek, Montana

Honored By

Sam E. Pennartz

Flight Engineer, Boeing B-29 Superfortress, serial #42-24600, tail code Z-Square-47, nicknamed Adam's Eve, 883rd Bomb Squadron, 500th Bombardment Group (VH), 73rd Bomb Wing, XXI Bomber Command, 20th Air Force, at Isley Field on Saipan in the Mariana Islands; Pacific Theatre of Operations. On 7 April 1945, Adam's Eve was one of 101 B-29 aircraft dispatched from the 73rd Bomb Wing to bombard the Nakajima Aircraft Plant at Musahino in Tokyo, Japan. While over the target area, Z-47 was rammed by a Japanese fighter pilot flying a single-engine Kawasaki Ki-61 Hien (flying swallow). The B-29 aircraft crashed and burned in the Kugayama residential area approximately 17 kilometers west of down-town Tokyo. All 11 airmen perished. Only the tail gunner was rescued by nearby residents from the wreckage; but he died at the Kagogiyama Hospital. The remains of ten bodies, recovered from the site, were buried in a joint cemetery in Komyoji Temple; located in the east side of Takaidama Dai 2nd Elementary School, Kugogiyama 4-Chome District.