Hartwell, Lt. Col.: World War II Hero

The Lusk Herald, January 13, 1944

Norris Hartwell, Jr. Promoted to Major

Mr. and Mrs. N.E. Hartwell recently received word of the promotion of their son, Norris, Jr., to the rank of Major. For some months, Major Hartwell has been stationed in England. He is a pilot with the Army Air Corps.

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The Lusk Herald, February 24, 1944

Hartwell Decorated

Maj, Norris E. Hartwell, Jr., as he was awarded the oak leaf cluster to the air medal for meritorious achievement in accomplishing five photographic reconnaissance missions over enemy occupied Europe. The award was presumably made in England.

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The Lusk Herald, April 27, 1944

Thrilling Activity of Maj. Norris Hartwell Told by Army Writer

(Written for The Lusk Herald by T/Sgt. Don B. Renn)

An Eighth AAF Photo Group, England

Probably that lone plane caused little more than fleeting, curious glances from below as it winged high over France and Nazi-occupied Northern Italy. A tidy speck pointing a webby ribbon contrail seven miles high in the endless stretches of sky.

It was an American Photographic plane, a speedy but unarmed “Lightening.” In its nose were three-thousand-dollar cameras, and in its cockpit was one man, Major Norris E. Hartwell, Jr. 23-year-old former Lusk and Cheyenne. Wyo. pilot.

For that sortie he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, an achievement all pilots dream of attaining during their Army flying careers. Previously he had received the Air Medal and two Oak Leaf clusters to that medal, and is now well on the way to the required number of missions for still another cluster.

Riding the skyways is not a new experience to Major Hartwell, for he did his first flying in 1939, soon after graduating from Lusk High School. He obtained employment at the Cheyenne Municipal Airport to help finance his flight instruction there. That fall he entered the University of Wyoming at Laramie, joined the R.O.T.C. and the Gamma Psi Chapter of Alpha Tau Omega national social fraternity, and continued his flying instruction in the classes offered by the University.

Late in his Sophomore year, January, 1942, he put his textbooks aside and said farewell to his parents at his home at 306 East Twentieth Street, Cheyenne, and entered the Air Corps as a cadet.

He was commissioned a second lieutenant in August on completing his Army flight training at Stockton, Ca., and was promoted to first lieutenant in February, 1943, at Colorado Springs, Colo. Several months later his photographic squadron arrived at the aerial reconnaissance station in England and he traded off his single bar for a captain’s double track. Last December he was promoted to his present rank, that of a major.

Here, at this station, he is not only a pilot, but is group operations officer. It is his responsibility to plan and direct operational flights from the station. He and fellow photo pilots are making the aerial pictures that are so important to the Allies’ round-the-clock attack against the enemy. He is one of the modern “Mata Haris” who probe out Hitler’s most zealously guarded secrets. These “focus cats” have collected a great percentage of all we know about the enemy’s military time and industrial activities and installations. Their tools are a speedy aircraft with glass eyes that see all and forget nothing.

You don’t hear much about these lone wolves of the Air Force. Yet they and the hundreds of men who comprise the photographic group, are doing a highly important job and are doing it well. Their pictures determine what targets are to be destroyed, or, if the mission is for damage assessment, the effectiveness with which the target has been bombed. Their work makes it possible to conserve valuable war materials and much more valuable lives in unnecessary raids on targets that require no additional bombing.

Sometimes “focus cats” follow so closely on bombing missions that their pictures catch the “Big-B’s” and escorting fighters below as they lay their potent “eggs” or grapple with German interceptors. Then especially, must the photo pilots be wary, for they would be easy prey for heavily armed German fighters.

However, flak and interceptors are not the only opponents they encounter. Weather disturbances can be just as dangerous. Several have had to “hit the silk” when a thunder-head ripped their sturdy craft to shreds.

Then, too, there are mechanical troubles that may beset these airmen. The altitudes at which they fly, 30,000 to 40,000 feet, often cause physical discomfort and freezing of intricate controls. Sometimes the punishment the planes take in twisting evasive action disturbs fine navigation and radio equipment. When that happens the photo pilot gets his acid test. For in addition to being a skilled pilot and photographer, he must be a first-class navigator.

But they usually win through. For these men with silver wings have been selected from the ranks of America’s top-notch fighter pilots. For weeks and months, they are trained in the fine points of flying, photography and navigation, both in the States and in the theater in which they operate.

Their missions are assigned through station operations on orders from higher headquarters. Before the pilot takes off, he is thoroughly briefed and given complete information about the target, which may be in Germany, Holland, France or Belgium. Intelligence officers inform him where he may expect flak or interceptors and weather experts tell him what atmospheric conditions to anticipate.

After the briefing, he is whisked by jeep to his waiting plane. This hop is poised for the sky hop. Motors have been tuned, tanks have been charged with high octane fuel and automatic cameras have been loaded and prepared for the target run.

The pilot swings onto the wing and into the cockpit, adjusts his oxygen mask and meticulously inspects each item of equipment. Down comes the Plexi-glass canopy. Crewmen signal the ship out of the dispersal area to the runway.

The pilot guns the motors and the purr swells to a howling symphony of power as the plane bolts across the field and leaps into the air like a frightened grouse. It darts skyward and quickly flashes from sight.

From then on until he drops back down at home base at the conclusion of the mission, the pilot is on his own …. one man, one plane, without protection of companionship.

Once in a while the pilot returns with purely “accidental” pictures. Pictures he took of territory on the trip back just to fill out pictures that brought about the destruction of an unknown plant (deleted by censor). Trained interpreters discovered the plant as they studied the negatives and it was bombed so effectively the enemy never attempted to rebuild it.

If the mission is successful, the pilot hurtles low over home base in a roof-top skimming buzz. He circles and drops his plane onto the runway and taxis back to the dispersal area. Enlisted men swarm over the craft, removing exposed film, refueling and making necessary repairs or adjustments. The film is rushed to the laboratory and the pilot immediately goes to operations office, where he is interrogated by intelligence and weather officers. Every drop of information pertaining to the mission and target is “pumped” from him.

Then, as far as he is concerned, the mission is over. But the activity doesn’t stop there. Rather, it really begins, for as soon as the film reaches the “Lab,” experienced technicians rapidly process it, using elaborate equipment valued at thousands of dollars.

Trained interpreters view the finished negatives a few minutes after the film first entered the developing tanks. Negatives showing objectives are marked, printed and quickly delivered by well-guarded jeep to headquarters from which the original request was received.

Frequently they are used for map making purposes. When the invasion comes these maps will be carried by thousands of soldiers. They will show military emplacements, defense areas, routes, terrain and minute details necessary for a successful invasion and ground offensive.

The photo pilots play a very important and dangerous role and yet they are only the stars of the team, small, colorful stones in the over-all photographic reconnaissance mosaic. Every man, from the most insignificant buck private “K-P” to pilots like Major Hartwell, has his job, his assignment, and does it to the best of his ability.

Each takes pride I his work and knows that on his ability and efficiency depends in some small respect the rapidity with which the victory shall be won. They don’t ask for recognition, for fanfare, but they do demand a quick and safe victory . . . as quickly as possible with as little loss of life as possible.

War is not their profession. They are all just ordinary citizens who want their homes and their wives and their families. . . but not until the world has been purged of aggression and is once more free for life as they have known it.

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The Lusk Herald, June 1, 1944

Major Hartwell is Again Decorated

An Eighth A.A.F. Photo Group in England. The oak leaf cluster to the air medal recently was presented to Maj. Norris E. Hartwell, Jr., 23-year-old son of Mr. and Mrs. Norris E. Hartwell, Sr., 306 East 20^th
Street, Cheyenne, Wyo. Lt. Gen. James H. Doolittle, commanding general of the United States Army Eighth Air Force, has disclosed.

The award was made for “meritorious achievement in accomplishing” his second series of “five photographic missions over enemy-occupied Europe. The courage, coolness and skill displayed by Major Hartwell reflect great credit upon himself and the armed forces of the United States.”

Major Hartwell was a pilot and operations officer for the phot group at this aerial reconnaissance station. Recently he was transferred to the reconnaissance wing of which the group is a part.

Prior to entering the Army in January, 1942, he was a student at Wyoming University at Laramie, Wyo. He was graduated from Lusk High School in 1939, and is a member of the Camma Psi Chapter of Alpha Tau Omega national social fraternity.

The Lusk Herald, June 8, 1944

Major Hartwell has Ringside Seat on Invasion From Plane

A Lusk boy, Major Norris E. Hartwell, Jr., had a ringside seat on the invasion, only 500 feet above the burning, smoking rim of the continent.

According to an Associated Press dispatch from an Eighth U.S.A.A.F. Photo Reconnaissance base., June 6. Major Hartwell and Lieut. Col. C.A. Shoop of Beverly Hills, Calif., where the first reconnaissance pilots back from the scene of the initial thrust.

” There were lots of burning buildings and bomb craters,” Hartwell declared. “Towns were burning all over the area.”

Shoop said “At each location along the beaches our warships were standing off throwing in shells. There were groups of ships both coming and going across the channel. Some of them were big ones and they were as close to the shore as they could possibly get. I think their fire was being thrown pretty far in.”

As usual, these photo pilots flew unformed, each Lightening carrying four cameras instead of guns. They penetrated 25 miles inland and ranged up and down the coast., taking a total of 1440 pictures.

Men like these shot thousands of pictures covering every foot of Nazi Europe in recent weeks to aid in planning the gigantic invasion operation.

Hartwell said the only opposition to naval forces was furnished by ground batteries and their fire apparently was almost as heavy as ours,” Hartwell said.

“You could see the guns hitting building, and every now and then you’d see a building explode. “The air was filled with our planes –all kinds. Visibility was good when we arrived, but smoke began covering the area, and it was pretty thick by the time we left.”

Both pilots said they saw not a single person in the streets of the towns even before the bombardment got well under way, indicating the civilian population was complying with Gen. Dwight Eisenhower’s request to get out of the way.

Of the landing operations, pilot Shoop said, “Everything seemed to be moving very fast. I saw many of our troops running.”

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The Lusk Herald, June 29, 1944

Norris Hartwell is Lieutenant Colonel

Norris E. Hartwell, Jr., has been promoted to lieutenant-colonel, his parents Mr. and Mrs. Norris E. Hartwell, Sr. were advised this week in Cheyenne, The Herald learned by phone yesterday.

Having just passed his 23^rd birthday, Hartwell is one of the youngest lieutenant-colonels on record in the Army.

His performance with an Eighth Air Force photo group has recently received radio and nation-wide newspaper publicity.

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