Assigned to RAF Grafton Underwood in early 1943, the group dropped the last Eighth Air Force bombs of the war on 25 April 1945.

The aircraft left Sioux City for Kearney, Nebraska on 3 May 1943, and then to the United Kingdom via Bangor, Goose Bay, and then Gander.

The Group's targets included aerodromes at Orléans, Bricy, and Nancy; motor works at Cologne; a coking plant at Gelsenkirchen; an aircraft component parts factory at Halberstadt; weapons manufacturers at Solingen; steel works at Magdeburg; and ball-bearing plants at Schweinfurt.

The Group made a damaging raid on aircraft factories in central Germany on 11 January 1944 and received a Distinguished Unit Citation for the action.

Received another DUC for the mission of 24 April 1944 when the group, although crippled by heavy losses of men and planes, led the 41st Bomb Wing through almost overwhelming opposition to attack an aircraft factory and airfield at Oberpfaffenhofen.

Supported ground troops during the breakthrough at Saint-Lô, 24–25 July, by bombing enemy strong points just beyond Allied lines.

Aided the Allied assault across the Rhine in March 1945 by attacking marshalling yards, railway junctions, and bridges to cut off enemy supplies.