Allen At 60

Allen" Dry" Martini At

88 years young

Allen "Dry" Martini and

 Fred Smith Web Site

 Administrator

The Distinguished Service Cross is awarded to a person who while serving in any capacity with the Army, distinguished himself or herself by extraordinary heroism not justifying the award of a Medal of Honor; while engaged in an action against an enemy of the United States; while engaged in military operations involving conflict with an opposing or foreign force; or while serving with friendly foreign forces engaged in an armed conflict against an opposing Armed Force in which the United States is not a belligerent party. The act or acts of heroism must have been so notable and have involved risk of life so extraordinary as to set the individual apart from his or her comrades.

Left to right. Distinguished Service Cross, Silver Star  ,United States  Legion of Merit, Distinguished Flying Cross with Oak Leaf Cluster,  British Distinguished Flying Cross, Air Medal and 3  clusters, Six theaters of combat medals French Legion of Honor, French Croix De Guerre and the Italian Order of Merit. And below them thePresidential Citation with 2 oak leaf clustere

They took off in four formations of six planes from their airbase in England to bomb the Renault plant in Abbeville France along the river just North of Paris The Bomb run was 85% accurate and they caused serious damage to the plant, However after the bomb run they were attacked by 60 German FW109's a new aircraft with the capability of firing 20 MM canons. The first run by the 190's knocked down Martini's  left wingman and a 20mm blast through their windshield knocked out his co-pilot and knocked him temporarily unconscious and when be had recovered they had dropped a thousand feet and were out of their formation, the blast had also knocked out their number 3 engine, so they were were struggling to keep the plane flying at an air speed of about 120 miles an hour. Of course the FW 190's came at this single distressed B17 in full force ( Martini's gunners were called the Cocktail kids and were specially trained by  Martini to be the best Here is what happened, in the next 15 minutes. his gunners shot down 12 190's with 4 other probable kills and 8 more damaged. Martini had sent a request for help from the RAF and as they neared the channel a flight of spit fires intercepted the Germans and Martini was able to fly the almost un flyable aircraft back to his base 80 miles north of London. When he landed to force of the landing knocked the right wing off . It had been hit and was hanging on with one strut. all of his crew members were wounded but there were no deaths

BBC copied Radio Berlin who stated that Field Marshall Goering challenged  Dry Martini to fly over German territory once again and he would shoot him down. Martini flew 12 more missions over German territory Charles de Gaule who was in England awarded him the French Legion of Merit

He then went back into training in B 29s

Several years later he joined some friends in taking over a large conglomerate called National General consisting of 1500 Fox Theatres, Bantom Books , Graet american Insurance and Grosset Dunlop Publishing. as an executive he was envolved in all phases of the Company capping it off by moving to London to open  that branch.

When the Company split up he moved to Palm Springs where he went to work with Marriot as supervisor of Security and Conceirge services. Retiring in 1998

When he was in London he paired up with a Czeck defector Jaroslav Drobny who in singles had defeated Ken Roswell in mens singles. In 1967 they teamed up as amateurs in the Wimbeldon mens doubles and won the championship . Then the next year in 1968 when professionals were allowed in the Wimbeldon  they won the Championship again defeating Bobbie Riggs and Poncho Segura. For  back to back titles  a record. He refereed the Davis Cup match in Barcelona. between Spain and Italy.