Clyde E. Simmonds was born at Wisconsin in 1921 to Clyde and Mary J. Simmonds of Ironwood in Gogebic County, Michigan. He attended Michigan College of Mining and Technology at Houghton for three years before enlisting as a Private (ASN: 16119674) in the Army Air Corps on 27 October 1942 at Muskegon, Michigan.

After aviation cadet training, he was commissioned (ASN: O-863315) a Second Lieutenant in the USAAF, and underwent B-29 aircraft operational combat crew training at Smoky Hill Army Air Field near Salina, Kansas.

In October 1944, he deployed from Mather Field, California (with re-fueling stops at Hawaii and Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands) to the central pacific theatre of operations and was assigned to 20th Air Force, XXI Bomber Command, 73rd Bomb Wing, 499th Bombardment Group (VH), 878th Bomb Squadron stationed at Isley field on Saipan in the Mariana Islands.

On 18 December 1944, he flew as the Flight Engineer aboard a Boeing B-29 Super Fortress, tail code V-square-24 (serial #42-24773). It was one of 89 aircraft launched in a multi-group formation to bombard the Mitsubishi heavy industries company and aircraft engine plants near Nagoya, Japan.

Flak from anti-aircraft artillery was meager and Japanese fighter aircraft attacks were described as moderate. However, his aircraft sustained approximately 30 fighter attacks and went into a steep wing-over to the left dive, with flames coming from the forward bomb bay area and smoke trailing from the #2 engine.

When last sighted, two enemy fighter planes followed his aircraft as it descended through the cloud cover at 20,000 feet over Nagoya Bay. He was initially listed as MIA, and then declared Killed-In-Action after the war ended.

Clyde E Simmonds