Flying Top Cover for General Clark (Part 1 of 2)

Two interesting escorts in Italy, may I go back to Italy? I was told to take four of us, myself, the Australian was leading and three others. Australian and his number 2, me and my number 2, we had to fly over to the mouth of the Volturno River and there wait on the strip. Finally two little communications aircraft landed, came up to where we were, turned around and the biggest man I have ever seen in my life unfolded out of one of these aircraft. It was General Mark Clark of the United States Army. He was a huge man. And he came over to us and met us all, “Thank you gentlemen for helping us today.” Still didn’t know what the hell we were doing. And we were, he was going to fly out over the, over the Mediterranean, over the water and come in, land at the Anzio strip and see how things were going and we were to provide top cover. Delightful man and they flew on the deck and we were about 1000 feet above them flying and we had to land and meet him again. Marvellous man, that impressed me. In Germany, we are now at Schneverdingen, B-154 was the name of the, and we were told that we were going to escort, I was going to escort with four aircraft, me and three others, to escort two Dakotas to land at Copenhagen. The war isn’t over. It turned out that this was the group going in to negotiate VE-Day and we were to provide top cover for them and we did.

Mr. Yarnell describes flying top cover for General Mark Clark into Copenhagen, and the reception he received.

Cyrill St. Clair (Cy) Yarnell

Mr. Yarnell was born August 9, 1920 in Carlow, Ireland. He moved to Canada when he was 8 years old. He enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1940 at the age of 20. Mr Yarnell received his initial pilot training in Victoriaville, Quebec where he learned to fly the Fleet Finch, he then graduated on to the Harvard. He received flying instructor training in Trenton and trained pilots from many countries. After instructing for a year, Mr. Yarnell was sent overseas. He flew missions over North Africa, Italy and Germany and was involved in the battles at Liri Valley and Monte Cassino. Following the war, Mr. Yarnell continued with the RCAF, retiring in 1975 as a colonel. He is a member of the Air Force Association of Canada and is very active with the Air Force Museum in Trenton, Ontario. Mr. Yarnell and his wife, Phyllis, have three children, seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild.