Anthony R. Paladino

T/Sgt. Anthony R. Paladino (Serial No. 15195367), born February 18, 1920, in Albany, New York, served as top turret gunner and flight engineer with the 409th Bomb Squadron, 93rd Bomb Group, at Hardwick. On March 2, 1944, his fifth combat mission, his B-24 was hit by anti-aircraft fire during a bombing raid on Frankfurt. The flak knocked out engine No. 4 and set the plane ablaze, and the pilot ordered bailout at approximately 21,000 feet. Paladino was the first man out, jumping through the bomb bay over northeast France at around 11:00 AM.

He landed about ten feet from a barbed wire fence, quickly buried his parachute, and took cover in a gully. A French farmer warned him that German soldiers were close. He hid beneath a fallen tree while two armed soldiers passed by twice. That night, a local man provided civilian clothing, food, and directions south. For the next four days Paladino walked, navigating by escape compass, sleeping in wheat stacks and a storm cellar, living entirely on his escape kit rations, and purifying water from village pumps with Halazone tablets.

After four days of difficult marching through occupied territory, Paladino approached a farmer near La Boussiere and identified himself as an American aviator by showing his dog tags. The farmer transported him by wagon to a safe house where he was fed and sheltered. From there he was passed south through an organized evasion network, traveling through Bayonvillers, Grivesnes, Broue, Plainville, Angy, and eventually Le Mesnil-en-Thelle (Oise), where he was connected with the French underground.

He eventually reached Paris, where he was moved through multiple safe houses alongside other evaders before crossing the Pyrenees into Spain. He arrived in Spain on June 5, 1944, reached Gibraltar on July 3, and departed by air the same day, landing in Bristol, England on July 4, 1944, some 124 days after being shot down. At Gibraltar and again in the UK he was debriefed by British intelligence. The officer commended his tactics and endurance, noting that Paladino had survived the first four days of evasion solely on the contents of his escape aids box.

Paladino had been officially listed as Missing in Action (MIA) as of May 25, 1944. His name also appears in a German prisoner-of-war document as "Palladena" (a phonetic transcription), though he was never captured.