Pictured is “Blackie’s Gang,” a United States Air Force squadron that went on rescue missions to save downed pilots during World War II, showing success on 95 percent of its missions. John “Blackie” Porter II, pictured on the far right, assembled the squadron in 1943 and frequented “the Hump,” an air route above India, China and Burma, now Myanmar. Porter and his gang were sent out on their final, fatal mission to recover downed pilots near the Arunachal Pradesh region of India on Dec. 10, 1943.
(Photo submitted)
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Marysville has its own World War II hero story, and a Florida woman is trying to bring it to the conclusion it deserves.
The story of Capt. John “Blackie” Porter II, of Marysville, involves an Army Air Corps pilot who, along with his team named “Blackie’s Gang,” spent much of his military career saving airmen in India and Burma, now Myanmar.
His last mission, an answer to a mayday call, came to an end when his B-25 plane was shot down by enemy fire over the Arunachal Pradesh region of India on Dec. 10, 1943. He died during that mission. Another Marysville man, Sgt. Harold Neibler, who was Blackie’s flight engineer, also died in the crash.
Both Porter and Neibler were products of Marysville. They both graduated from Marysville High School, Porter in the class of 1934, Neibler in the class of 1936. Both were outstanding athletes. Porter was on the football and track teams. He was also an excellent swimmer and was a Red Cross lifeguard at the Marysville swimming pool.
Porter attended The Ohio State University and married his love, Ellen “Jane” Smith. Some years after Porter’s death, his widow married Patrick Watson and their daughter, Ellen Vinson, of Pensacola, Florida, has been working to make sure Blackie’s memory can be properly respected.
She became interested in finding out more about her mother’s first love after poring through old pictures and wartime love letters. She came to the conclusion then that her mission was to recover his remains and bury him along with his parents and brother, George, in Marysville’s Oakdale Cemetery.
“Some days, I’m really optimistic, and other days, I feel like, ‘gosh, it’s just going to be like it’s always been,’” Vinson said. “Sometimes, I feel like we’re getting close, so I have my fingers crossed.”
“Blackie” and his gang
After attending college, Porter joined the air corps. Although originally he and Jane Smith had agreed while with friends at Butler’s Restaurant to wait until after the war to get married, they changed their minds and were wed after Pearl Harbor in late 1941 before he became involved in the war effort. Porter learned his brother, Lt. George Porter, died in the African campaign, and requested an assignment overseas, which resulted in his being sent to the India Theater.
In his air corps service, he created his own search and rescue squadron in 1943, which became known as “Blackie’s Gang.” The squadron had a 95 percent success record for finding lost planes and their crews along “the Hump,” an air route above India, Burma and China. The squadron was also known for dropping off supplies. On one of his missions, he rescued the crew from a downed plane that included CBS newsman Eric Severeid.
Then, on Dec. 10, 1943, Porter, who was 27 years old at the time, and his gang went off on their last mission. He embarked with Neibler, and other members of his crew. Neibler had signed on beforehand at Blackie’s request to become a member of “Blackie’s Gang.”
After enemy fire struck down their plane, the only person to survive the flight was his copilot, 2nd Lt. Jim Spain, who was not from the Marysville area. Porter had ordered him to bail out, but, according to Spain, he got stuck in the escape hatch and Porter was able to free him and throw him out of the plane with his parachute to save him. Spain reportedly got caught in a tree and walked through the jungle for 15 days to get back to his camp to tell the story.
The search for Porter’s remains
Vinson’s husband, U.S. Judge Roger Vinson, became interested in her mother’s stories about Porter. When her mother died in 2010, Vinson’s husband wrote her obituary and mentioned her stories. In 2011, the obituary prompted a member of The Gold Star Family Research and Memorials to call her about Porter.
The couple was told that a mountain climber, Clayton Kuhles, discovered Porter’s plane wreckage in India, which started Vinson’s curiosity into learning more about her mother’s first husband.
“I never knew him because my mother married my father as a war widow,” Vinson said. “I know how important it was to my mother and my father that the remains would be brought back if they ever located the crash site.”
She knew her mission to recover Porter’s remains would be difficult because of India’s tough laws on transporting them. However, those restrictions became more relaxed in 2015, giving her more incentive to pursue them.
Vinson started putting together a scrapbook devoted to her mother and Porter in 2017. This past January, she started writing to her congressman to secure the rights to Porter’s remains. She’s experienced some bumps along the way, but she remains hopeful in her mission.
Her latest updates in her endeavors include contacting Ohio Representative Jim Jordan and getting him to partner with Florida Representative Matt Gaetz. She received a response from one of Gaetz’s staffers in February, giving her hope that Jordan and Gaetz could both help sign a letter to send to India’s ambassador.
“If a point comes where they actually do a recovery of the remains, then maybe there will be more to the story,” she said. “The story is not over until Congress does the right thing.”
Along her journey, she said Kuhles, Gary Zaetz of the Families and Supporters of America’s Arunachal Missing in Action and the Pensacola News Journal helped her the most. Zaetz helped her look up information about Porter’s crash and the Pensacola News Journal wrote the initial story to get the word out.