Claude Smith, Jr., who went by "Junior" to his friends and family, was a ball turret gunner on a B-17 Flying Fortress in World War II. He was stationed in Snetterton, England, from which his bomber crew flew dozens of daytime missions through the flak-filled skies of Nazi Germany in the closing months of 1944.

I was fortunate to know Junior Smith. He was my maternal grandfather. Although I thought I knew my Grampa Junior pretty well, I never knew much about the war. I never knew that quiet, gentla man sitting across the table from me was a hero. That is to say, I knew he was my hero, but I never knew that my own Grampa Junior was a real-life, world-saving hero. I never knew that he'd risked his life time and time again to bring freedom to people he'd never even met, and probably never would. I never knew that he'd finished all the missions the Army asked of him, and then volunteered for more, despite being assigned to one of the least coveted jobs in the Army Air Corps.

During his time training around the U.S. and his deployment in Snetterton, England, Junior wrote tons of letters back home to his relatives in Oklahoma and California. During the years 1943 and 1944, Junior wrote a letter home "nearly every other day" by his own account.

Through these letters, we see a portrait of a young man from rural Oklahoma caught up in a cause much bigger than himself. Claude Smith, Jr. was just a small-town boy when he left for England, but he came back a young man who'd already seen more of the best and worst of life in a few months than most men will see in a lifetime.

In the interest of perserving these precious gifts of history, we've begun archiving Junior's letters and storing them in electronic form.

We'll be uploading the scans of Junior's letters so they can be downloaded from here. Please check back soon.