Highlights of Day by Day Air Operations
10 August 1944

Operations were somewhat reduced by low stratus clouds moving in from the Channel late in the afternoon. Nevertheless, 659 sorties comprising 54 missions were flown. Forty-six and one-quarter tons of high explosive were dropped on targets and four enemy planes were shot down. XIX TAC lost six aircraft and pilots. Thirty sorties were flown by tactical reconnaissance P-51's, flying chiefly over areas on the outer fringe of operations.

Targets ranged from motor transport, armored vehicles, and similar objectives to the flak-defended bastion of St. Malo, still defying Allied forces to drive them out, still responding to the Fuehrer's express command to hold out to the last man.

One of the six casualties of this day was Col. Morton D. Magoffin, commanding the 362d Group. Hit by flak while on a dive-bombing and strafing mission in cooperation with the XV Corps east of LeMans, he continued to lead the squadron in its bombing run, hoping that the dive could blow out the fire in his engine. When it failed to do so, he pulled up and bailed out. The sequel to this episode did not come to light until weeks later. Colonel Magoffin fell into enemy hands and was taken to a hospital in Paris with a flak wound in his right thigh. When the enemy evacuated Paris, he hid in a closet and escaped notice. French surgeons performed a badly needed operation, and the colonel was subsequently evacuated by air to England.