Operation Carpetbagger

During World War II, Operation Carpetbagger was a general term used for the aerial supply of weapons and other matériel to resistance fighters in France, Italy and the Low Countries by the U.S. Army Air Forces that began on 4 January 1944.

In late 1943, the 22nd Anti-Submarine Squadron of the Eighth Air Force was disbanded at RAF Alconbury and its aircraft used to form the 36th and 406th Bomb Squadrons. After some shuffling of commands, these two squadrons were placed under the provisional 801st Bomb Group at RAF Harrington at the beginning of 1944 and the first "Carpetbagger" missions were carried out by this unit under the control of General "Wild Bill" Donovan's Office of Strategic Services (OSS).

In April 1944, the group moved to RAF Harrington (Station 179), a more secluded and thus more secure airbase. A month later, in advance of the expected invasion of Europe, it was expanded to four squadrons to increase its capabilities and to pick up workload from RAF Bomber Command; the two new squadrons were the 788th and 850th Bomb Squadrons.

The Group had already adopted the nickname of "Carpetbaggers" from its original operational codename. In August 1944, the group dropped the "Provisional" status and absorbed the names of the 492d Bombardment Group from RAF North Pickenham, which had stood down after severe losses in its initial operations but stayed at Harrington; its squadrons became the 856th, 857th, 858th and 859th Bomb Squadrons. From January 1944 to the end of the war, the Group, in liaison with the British Special Operations Executive and later the Special Forces Headquarters (SFHQ) in London, dropped spies and supplies to the resistance forces of France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark and Norway.

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