B 17G 42-37790 - The long version                  På dansk                        Updated:  18 JAN 2011

On 20 February 1944 in the afternoon B-17G 42-37790 »Miss Behavin« crashed into Haarslev Mark (about here 7 km S of Bogense). (Source: FT)
Many details and names of places on Google Map p267 B17 42-37790. See also B-17G 42-37790+propeller and
The long version
from Anders Bjørnvad: They found a way (De fandt en vej p. 103-105 translated and names added by AS) about this crew:

"About 3 p.m., still on 20 February 1944, a crew of 8 airmen bailed out from a Flying Fortress, which crashed into a field at Haarslev south of Bogense (about here). All of the airmen landed safely around Harndrup (here). The Germans had a radar station in Skovby (here), and from here they must
have had a good view of what happened. (10 airmen. Markussen and Egan were captured and taken to the radar station at Skovby. AS)

Some airmen were captured almost immediately. Others went into the woods to avoid the German soldiers that were searching for them. Some
American airmen had hidden in a wood (here) belonging to the vicarage of Fjellerup. (5: Britko, Cribbs, Dunbar, Dyblie and Udick) Tenant farmer
Rasmus Thrane went into the wood and met the airmen. He invited them to the farm and sent for Rural Dean R. Fauerskov Laursen. When he arrived
at about 6 or 7 p.m the airmen were sitting at a well-provided table. The rural dean had brought the tools of his profession, the bible and a hymn book,
so that if necessary he could plead that he was giving pastoral care, as Rasmus Thrane's mother was old and infirm.

The rural dean talked to the airmen and urged them to seek hiding in the parish. Both he and others were ready to assist them. However, the airmen wanted to go on at any price. They wanted to go to the beach to get a boat. They wanted to go to Sweden. The rural dean tried to dissuade them from
that tour, but in vain.  As there was no other option, the airmen were shown the direction to Baaring Beach. They thanked for the stay and left with
good supplies of food.

The Germans captured them somewhere in the direction of Baaring Cove (about here - Source: AOD). The following day there were searches in the
area, but they were far from thorough. The airmen could very well have stayed, as suggested by the residents.

Two other members of this crew landed in a wood at Nymarksgaarden, 1 km from the village of Harndrup. (Nymark Gård is here)
Carpenter Knud Andersen, Nymark Railway Station (here) east of Harndrup, says, "My brother and I ran down there immediately. One airman had just come down from a tree, and his parachute was still hanging up there. The other one was breaking the ice of a small pool. He shoved his parachute
and helmet under the ice. One of them appeared to be nervous. They thought they had fallen down in Sweden. We told them that this was Denmark.
They gave us cigarettes from big pockets at their knees. Several people came to see what had happened. Two of them were Ida and Morten from
Nymark Railway Station where their father was the station master. They walked with the two airmen and others to Harndrup Wood."

Ida Pedersen continues, "My brother Morten and I could speak a little English, so we joined them when some people living in Harndrup Wood took
them to their home. The wife in the house did not dare to host them. She immediately telephoned to the police. My brother and I tried to dissuade her
from doing so, but as our pleas and anger were in vain, we made the airmen put on their clothes again and we ran away. We could not take them anywhere in broad daylight, so we hid them in a cave in the wood. As night fell, we took them home again. We had to take them further away immediately, as everyone had seen us with them. We had called another brother, Valde, who lived in Odense. He came home and then he joined them
in the train to Odense. By then they had changed their clothes.... Valde knew some people in Odense who he hoped would take care of the airmen. Nobody was at home, so he had to take them to his home. On the following day they were captured. He does not know who reported him ..."
Certainly the will to assist was present here. Accidents happened. Ida and Morten did very well! No wonder that till this day they regret that their assistance could not be accomplished.

Another American airman, Radio Operator Ira Gordon Ewans,  was hiding in the woods near Harndrup. He managed to contact residents of the area, among them District Nurse Inger Nøsted. He was provided with plain clothes, and as the German search calmed down at nightfall on 20 February
Inger Nøsted and the airman went by train to Odense (here). From here they took a taxi to Faaborg (here), where she handed the airman over to
teacher Junker. Some years before Inger Nøsted had been a substitute for a nurse in Faaborg. Then she had taken care of an old lady who lived just
below the Junker's. That was why she knew Mrs. Junker was British, so she figured that the family somehow must have a connection with the
resistance movement. We know that Junker had been on Horne Land (here) a couple of days earlier to look for the Scottish airman McLean.
We also know that Junker was in touch with Edmund Larsen, who had a connection to the heads of the resistance movement in Odense.

Ewans was quite upset to have landed in a country occupied by Germans. He had caught a cold and he did not feel very well, so he was not very communicative. He did not want to give information to Junker about their targets, which airfield he had taken off from and so on. Junker was beginning
to be afraid that he had got hold of a German spy.

Aage Willumsen from Odense had just been to Faaborg in February. He had instructed the aids of airmen to be very cautious with people they got hold
of. The Germans were said to have started making members of the Gestapo pretend they were crashed allied airmen to infiltrate the resistance
movement. If the airman gave his name, his airfield and more, it would be possible to send the information to England on the wireless to get his identity confirmed. If they had got hold of a German, the only option was to shoot him at once.

Temporarily the airman was declared OK, and he was taken towards Odense. Edmund Larsen has reported that Merchant Jens Fr. Busk-Rasmussen
fetched Ewans in Faaborg. On 29 February Police Inspector Clemens Petersen turned up at Vicar E. Miland's in Sønder Højrup Vicarage (here) with Ewans. Later a member of the resistance movement with the cover name "Knud" came on a visit. He talked to the airman alone and some hours later
he announced that the identity of the airman had been established.

On 3 March late in the evening a car arrived at the vicarage. A couple of men brought plain clothes. The airman was dressed and then taken to
Dyreborg (here) where fisherman Peter Christensen was waiting with his fishing boat. Peter Christensen sailed the airman to Sjælland. At Skælskør
there was a good landing place from which the tour to Copenhagen could be started.

Archives have that on 7 March 1944 the boat "Hans Steensen" transferred "Cand. Pharm. Ira Gordon Ewans (a crash landed American airman), born
on 21 February 1912 in Virginia."

Ewans appears to be the only allied airman to be taken to Sweden during the first quarter of 1944.

This was a short descriptions of events in the wake of the American overflight of Denmark on 20 February 1944."

(Before this about B-17G 42-37790 Anders Bjørnvad stated that 316 B-17 Flying Fortresses passed over Denmark at noon that day.
See
Google Map p266-270 20FEB44. 4 were shot down and 1 crash landed in Denmark.
See B17 4239894 Brahesholm, B17 4231126 Bellinge, B17 4237951 Haldagerlille og B17 42-37790 Haarslev. Crash landed: B17 4230246 Tirstrup.)