Operation Carpetbagger

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).

During a hiatus in operations from mid-September 1944 to the end of 1944, the Group ferried gasoline to depots on the Continent for two weeks to supply advancing Allied armies, then three squadrons went into training for night bombing operations, whilst the 856th participated in the return of Allied airmen on the Continent who had either evaded capture or had walked out of Switzerland after that country relaxed its internment practices.

In December 1944, the 859th was sent on Detached Service with the Fifteenth Air Force in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations with the 2641st Special Group (Provisional) at Brindisi, Italy.

The 857th was detached and sent to RAF Bassingbourn (91st Bomb Group) at the end of March 1945, while the 856th and 858th dropped small numbers of agents and sabotage teams into the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway and Germany.

The pilot, copilot, and bombardier all had maps to aid them in keeping track of their location, whilst the navigator kept position by dead reckoning, with all four of these officers staying in close interphone contact.

On flights to French targets the aircraft crossed the coast at around 6,000 feet (1,800 m) to avoid light anti-aircraft fire, dropping to 500 feet (150 m) or so to avoid night fighters once inland and to make it possible to verify location, assuring that checkpoints on the ground corresponded exactly to the area being looked at in the cockpit and nose of the aircraft.