The letters M-E-R-S-E-B-U-R-G are emblazoned across the col- ander for the month of November. November will long be remem- bered as the month in which 4 missions to Merseburg/Leuna Syn- thetic Oil Refinery were flown. These four missions to Germany's second largest synthetic oil plant and one of the "toughest" targets in Europe were on the 2nd and 21st, 25th and 30th. Act- ually, weather turned the mission of 21 November back before it reached the target, and Osnabruck was bombed instead. But the other 3 missions were as rough as always. Flak was intense and accurate. The trips were exhaustingly long - Merseburg is just west of Leipzig, deep in Central Germany. The November 2nd mission was the one that set the record for German Air Force fighters destroyed in a single day - 157: 132 in the air and 25 on the ground. This squadron suffered no attacks, but one of our gunners, S/Sgt. Leroy H. Cowling, was wounded by flak. Bombing was by PFF, because the target area was overcast. While the crews refer to the mission of the 30th as a Mer- seburg mission, the target was actually Lutzkendorf, a smaller synthetic oil plant, just seven miles west of Merseburg, but in the same flak area. The November 2nd mission marked the close of an era for the 486th Group (to which the 835th squadron is assigned) - the com- pletion of its first 100 missions. This achievement was cele- brated by the elaborately planned 100th mission party. But even