In February and March of 1943 we were at Gunter Field in Alabama for our basic training. The airplane was the BT-13 with one wing and an enclosed cockpit. It was bigger, more powerful and flew like a truck. The controls were much harder to move but it was a safe plane to fly. I don't remember anyone crashing a plane in primary or basic training. At Gunter we started formation flying, night flying and instrument flying. My instructor here was R.E. Umbaugh and I had thirty two hours flying with him and forty two solo. When we were flying solo in formation we were now developing confidence and were starting to do things like flying close to the ground and chasing each other around in the clouds.
We began doing more cross country flights to airports in the area. Sometimes we flew with other students and the one in the rear seat always flew the plane as that is where the instructor always sat. One time I was flying with Bill Bell ( the son of the founder of Bell Aircraft Inc. of Buffalo N.Y.) and he was flying the plane, with me in the front seat. When coming in for a landing he was going so slow I thought we were going to stall and crash. I yelled at him and pushed the stick forward and we landed okay. I was really scared and told my instructor I never wanted to fly with Bill again. He must have agreed with me because I never had to again.
During Basic training was our first experience with the Link Trainer. It was a replica of the cockpit of an airplane and was used to learn how to fly by instruments only. It operated about the same as the "mechanical bull" they have in Western nightclubs now. It was completely closed and dark with only the instruments lit up. It was run by a sergeant who would put it into a spin, upside down or any dangerous situation and you had to get back to level flight again. It was frightening and exactly like being in a plane in fog or a cloud. Fifteen hours of Link Training were required in Basic, Advanced, all my flying in California, even in England while flying missions.
At the end of March 1943 I graduated from Basic and went to Advanced Training at Napier Field in Alabama. We were beginning to know a lot of the other students and would stay together with them right on through, except for the ones who washed out. In Advanced we flew the AT-6 which was a faster plane and easier to fly. We had about the same schedule at this field flying one or two hours a day. There were several small level fields in the area that were used for practice landing and takeoffs. I had an Englishman for an instructor. After the Americans were flying out of England, some of the English pilots who had flown a lot of missions were sent to this country to be instructors as we had a shortage of them. Like school teachers, it took a special kind of man to be able to teach flying in a short period of time. They had to have a lot of nerve also to be able to get out of the situations an inexperienced student could get them into! The one I had wasn't worth much as he would fly to one of those other fields and let me land and then he would get out and stand around smoking cigarettes for half an hour. I was supposed to be getting an hours instruction and I was afraid I would be washed out. I went to the commanding officer and requested a change of instructors and got it. Perhaps others had done the same. I can't remember the name of my new instructor but he was tough and strict, which was okay with me as then I knew I would learn something.