PT 109: An American Epic of War, Survival, and the Destiny of John F. Kennedy

by William Doyle

Having done more than his duty, Joe, Jr. was eligible to return to the United States. But in August 1944 he volunteered for an exquisitely complex and dangerous operation to bail out of a PB4Y Liberator aircraft stuffed with 12 tons of explosives that would be guided by radio signals to crash into a German rocket complex. If successful, the assault could help slow the onslaught of German rockets on London, and earn Joe, Jr. medals and fame to rival those of his younger brother. He took off from an RAF base in England on August 12, 1944. Eighteen minutes into the mission, his aircraft blew up over Newdelight Wood near the Suffolk hamlet of Blytheburgh, instantly killing Kennedy and his single crew member, Lieutenant Wilford John “Bud” Willy. “Driven by a hunger to redeem the Kennedy name from his father’s errors of political and moral judgment,” noted historian Alan Axelrod, “by lifelong competitiveness with his younger brother, Lieutenant (jg) John F. Kennedy, hero of PT 109, and, more selflessly, by a passionate desire to spare London further V-weapon devastation, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. answered the call.”