[Mark R.]

It would be neat to find out, but I can only offer speculation. I would think it feasible that Richardson got lost in bad weather. After all, he was new to the operating area. Plus he would not have been the only USAAF plane to land in Sicily during overcast and cloudy conditions. I cannot see him deliberately crashing his plane or bailing out over the sea if perhaps he was over friendly territory. Otherwise it would be destroying a very rare and useful photo recon platform.

As for Italian or German interceptors, Prien's JG 53 Vol. 2 certainly indicates III/JG 53 was flying on 28 March as evidenced by one of its aircraft being damaged when ground looping (p. 590) That said, III/JG 53 did not make any claims for 28 March (Die Jagdfliegerverbande der Deutschen Luftwaffe 1934 bis 1945 Teil 11/II, Prien, Stemmer, Rodieke & Bock, s. 267) From my perspective, it doesn't seem like Richardson went down as a result of air to air combat.

Now here is a late breaking interesting coincidence: Lewis H. Richardson, whose obituary listed him as attaining the rank of Colonel in the USAF with service in WW2. Korea, and Vietnam, was born on March 3, 1918. He died on September 19, 2006 at 88 years of age. He is buried in San Joaquin Valley National Cemetery Section 9 Site 743, Santa Nella, Ca. How many Lewis H. Richardson's do you suppose were in the USAAF in WW2?