[bsmith13]

Two of my favorites are Major William Shomo and Major James Howard.

Shomo and his wingman (Lt Paul Lipscomb) had just arrived at their operational squadron, and took two photo-recce Mustangs up for a patrol. They encountered a japanese bomber accompanied by twelve japanese fighters. Shomo shot down seven, including the bomber, and his wingman got three. Upon returning to base, Lipscomb landed immediately, but Shomo performed a victory roll. It happened that General George Kenney was visiting, and saw the victory roll. Shomo approached the field again, and performed another victory roll. The third time he did this, General Kenney started getting angry, thinking that Shomo was mocking or abusing the time honored tradition of performing a victory roll to indicate a kill. He stormed out to the flight line and confronted Lipscomb: "What the hell does Shomo think he's doing?!"
Lipscomb responded "He shot down seven enemy airplanes, and I shot down three."
This took a minute to sink in, but after it had, General Kenney asked the obvious question..."Why didn't you do any victory rolls?"
"Well sir, to tell you the truth, I don't have that many hours in a Mustang, and I'm not sure what would happen if I tried a victory roll."

Major Howard racked up several kills in China as a Flying Tiger before joining the 9th Air Force in Europe. On one mission escorting the 8th Air Force, he singlehandedly attacked between 30 and 40 german aircraft.