Apartment22

Return to Thunder

In June 1943, B-17 pilot Lt. Robert Payne from Holyoke, Massachusetts, arrived at Great Ashfield air base in the English countryside and joined the 548th Squadron of the 385th Bomb Group. He soon befriended a stray dog outside a nearby pub, and the two became inseparable. When Payne and his crew were driven to their “Gremlin Buggy” aircraft, the dog, named “Thunderbolt” by Payne after the P-47 fighter escorts, followed to watch the aircraft fly away. When Thunderbolt heard the returning aircraft hours later, he hurried to the flight line to await his master’s return.

In November 1943, Thunderbolt watched Payne and his crew fly off on their 20th mission—a raid on Bremen, Germany. Near the target the aircraft was shot down and Payne and the other surviving crew members were captured and taken to Dulag Luft, the German interrogation center. Next stop was the Stalag Luft I prison camp.

Meanwhile, at Great Ashfield during the day of the fateful mission, Thunderbolt returned to the Gremlin Buggy’s parking spot after hearing the first sounds of returning aircraft. He patiently waited while each plane landed and remained at the Gremlin Buggy hardstand, through the night and into the next day. He would not leave the spot without his master.

Payne’s base comrade, Lt. Bob Lipsett, finally coaxed Thunderbolt away from his post and with his missing friend gone, began caring for the faithful dog. It took months before Payne’s family and the men at the Great Ashfield base learned that the downed pilot had survived and was imprisoned.

In correspondence between Payne and his wife, the pilot continuously expressed his concern for his dog. Lt. Lipsett sent information about the dog to Payne’s wife, who in turn included the news in letters to her POW husband. Men stationed at air bases were not permitted to write directly to POW friends in prison camps.

Soon after the D-Day invasion, Lt. Lipsett was ordered to France and he decided to take Thunderbolt with him, hoping to reunite the dog and his master when Lt. Payne was released from captivity. During the ensuing months, the dog had a number of thrilling experiences, including being wounded in action and saved by a surgeon at a field medical station.

In May, 1945, Lt. Payne was liberated by Russian troops from Stalag Luft I and before he could be reunited with Thunderbolt, was returned to the United States through Camp Lucky Strike. Afterwards, Lt. Lipsett, still caring for Thunderbolt, found himself still in Europe. He received orders to return home but red tape prevented him from bringing Thunder with him. He feared he might have to abandon the dog in Europe.

Relaxing in a Red Cross canteen before leaving, by chance Lipsett struck-up a conversation with Red Cross Field Director Dr. James Eagan and told him the story of Bobby Payne and the odyssey of his dog Thunderbolt. Because of his position, Eagan, also about to return to the United States, volunteered to personally escort the dog during his voyage home on the Queen Mary and on November 27, 1945, the ship arrived at a New York City pier. Down the gangway came Eagan. Waiting on the pier with a group of reporters and photographers was Payne’s wife. Thunderbolt was handed-over as the flash bulbs popped.

The November 28, 1945, New York Herald Tribune carried a story headlined “Bomber Pilot’s Dog Arrives on The Queen Mary. Mascot at Flying Field in England Will Rejoin Master After Two Years.” The reporter wrote, in the lead paragraph, “Thunderbolt, a mournful-eyed three-year-old brindled mongrel, whose devotion to his pilot master became a United States Army Air Forces legend in England, arrived aboard the Queen Mary yesterday. The dog is on a 4,500-mile journey to rejoin his owner, who was liberated last May from a German prisoner-of-war camp and is now stationed at Hendricks Army Airfield in Sebring, Fla.”

The pilot and his remarkable wartime dog were reunited.

Art Beltrone - May 21, 2010