Only one man in history has shot down an enemy fighter plane with a pistol.
March 31st, 1943.
Second Lieutenant Owen Bagot is falling through the sky over Burma.
Parachute open, left arm bleeding from a bullet wound 4,000 ft above the jungle.
13 Japanese fighters just tore his bomber squadron apart.
Now they’re circling back to finish the job.
The Japanese are hunting parachuting Americans, executing them in the air.
Two of Bagot’s crew mates are already dead.
He’s wounded, helpless, no cover, no escape, just a slow drift toward Earth while enemy fighters circle like sharks.
Then one K43 breaks formation, coming straight for him.
And Owen Bagot does something no one has done before or since.
This is that story.
Burma 1943.
The China Burma India Theater.
The forgotten war.
While the world watched Europe and the Pacific Islands, American bombers flew missions in Southeast Asia that nobody wanted.
The 10th Air Force operated from bases in Eastern India.
Their job, cut Japanese supply lines, feeding the war machine in Burma.
The missions were brutal.
12 to 14 hours in the air.
No fighter escort.
Japanese air bases everywhere below.
The seventh bomb group flew B24 Liberators.
The B-24 could haul heavy loads across enormous distances, but it had a deadly reputation.
Unlike the B17 Flying Fortress, the Liberator caught fire easily when hit.
Punctured fuel tanks meant instant inferno.
Pilots called it a flying torch.
Owen Bagot was 22 years old.
Small town kid from Graham, Texas.
December 7th, 1941, Pearl Harbor.
December 10th, Bagot walked into a recruiting station.
By July 1942, he’d earned his wings.
By December, he was in India as a second lieutenant co-pilot in the 9th Bomb Squadron.
Six months ago, he’d been a college graduate working on Wall Street.
Now he was flying suicide missions over Japanese-h held territory.
March 31st, 1943.
Mission briefing.
Target: A railroad bridge at Pin Mana, halfway between Rangon and Manderlay.
Critical Japanese supply link.
The problem? The bridge sat between two active Japanese fighter bases.
The Americans would be flying straight into a hornet’s nest.
12 B-24s would make the run.
Colonel Conrad Nekerson commanded the formation.
On his right wing, the Liberator piloted by First Lieutenant Lloyd Jensen.
Bagot was his co-pilot.
Nine men total crew.
They knew the odds.
They went anyway.
They never reached the target.
Somewhere over Burma, Japanese observers spotted the formation.
From bases near Pinmana, the 64th Centai scrambled 13 fighters.
Nakajima K43s.
The Allies called them Oscars.
The Japanese called them Hayabusa, Paragan Falcon.
These army fighters were light, maneuverable, and in experienced hands, absolutely lethal.
The Japanese pilots had months of combat experience.
They knew exactly where to hit a B-24 to bring it down.
The attack came before the bombers reached their target.
Bagot saw them first, distant specks against the clouds, then closer, closer.
The distinctive silhouette unmistakable.
13 fighters coming fast.
The K43s came in waves, focusing fire with tactical precision.
Jensen’s B24 took hits almost immediately.
Multiple rounds punched through the fuel tanks.
In a Liberator, that’s a death sentence.
The fuel ignited.
Fire erupted through the fuselage.
Black smoke filled the cabin.
The heat was instant and fierce.
Jensen gave the order.
Bail out.
No time for fear.
No time for second thoughts.
The fire was consuming the aircraft.
Men scrambled for parachutes, forced open exits.
One by one, they jumped into the sky.
Bagot helped coordinate the evacuation.
Even a smoke seared his lungs, and the controls went dead in his hands.
Then he grabbed his own chute and went out.
The wind hit him.
The parachute snapped open.
He counted four other shoots deployed.
Then the B-24 exploded behind him.
The shock wave hit him even as he fell.
For one moment, relief.
The parachute had opened.
He was alive.
4,000 ft of air between him and the ground.
Then he heard the sound.
Aircraft engines.
The Japanese fighters came back around.
What happened next violated every code of warfare.
The K43s began deliberately targeting the helpless Americans as they drifted down.
This wasn’t combat.
This was execution.
Fighters made firing passes, machine guns stitching tracers through the air.
Baggot watched as one of his crew mates was hit.
The parachute collapsed.
The body fell.
Then another.
There was nothing he could do.
No cover, no evasion, no way to fight back.
Just a slow drift earth while enemy fighters circled.
Then Bagot felt the impact.
A bullet tore through his left arm.
Pain immediate.
Fierce.
He spun in his harness.
4,000 ft above the jungle.
Still minutes from reaching the ground.
If the fighters came back for another pass, he was dead.
Owen Bagot made a decision.
He went completely limp.
let his head l forward, arms dangle, body sag in the parachute harness.
He played dead, the only card he had left to play.
Through slitted eyes, he could see the fighter still circling, his heart hammered.
He thought they’d see his chest moving, the pain in his arm was white hot, but he forced himself motionless.
Everything depended on the next 60 seconds.
If the Japanese pilots believed he was dead, they might leave him alone.
If they didn’t, he’d join his crew mates.
One of the K43s broke formation, coming straight for him.
Baggot heard the engine note change.
The fighter was slowing, decelerating to match the speed of his descent.
The pilot was curious or thorough.
After watching his squadron gun down parachuting Americans, he wanted to confirm another kill.
The K43 came in close, very close.
The fighter was maneuvering at the edge of controllability, nose high, speed bleeding off.
Then the canopy slid back.
The pilot wanted a better look.
Bagot’s right hand, hidden against his leg, was wrapped around his service pistol.
The M1911 Coat 45 standard sidearm designed for ground combat close quarters.
not by any definition designed to shoot down aircraft.
The K43 came within 20 ft of him.
The exact distance doesn’t matter as much as what it represented.
A fatal tactical error.
The Japanese pilot had slowed his fighter to near stalling speed to inspect what he thought was a corpse.
His canopy was open and he was close enough that Bagot could see into the cockpit.
Owen Bagot raised the 45 and fired.
Four shots, rapid succession.
He watched the K43’s nose pitch up sharply.
The aircraft stalled.
It began to spin, falling away from him in a tight spiral.
The engine note rising and falling as it tumbled toward the jungle below.
Within seconds, it was out of sight.
Baggot had no idea if he’d hit the pilot.
no idea if the plane had crashed or if the pilot had recovered control at lower altitude.
All he knew was that the fighter was gone.
The attacks had stopped and he was still alive, still falling toward Burma.
The landing was hard but survivable.
Bagot hit the ground in dense jungle terrain, his wounded arm screaming in protest.
Lieutenant Jensen landed nearby along with one of the gunners.
Sergeant Crostic also survived the jump.
Four men out of nine.
The Japanese fighters continued to strafe the area even after they landed.
The survivors hid behind trees.
There was no chance of evasion.
They were deep in Japanese controlled territory, wounded without supplies or support.
Local Burmese civilians found them within hours, turned them over to Japanese ground forces.
Jensen, Crossstik, and Bagot were flown out of Burma in an enemy bomber, imprisoned near Singapore.
The war for them was over.
The captivity was just beginning.
Singapore, the P camp, had no name.
Prisoners called it the place where men stopped being human.
Life as a prisoner of the Imperial Japanese Army was a descent into hell.
Baggot entered the camp weighing 180 pounds.
The daily rice ration fit in his palm, 200 g, nothing else.
For the next 2 and 1/2 years, he endured starvation, tropical diseases, forced labor, the daily uncertainty of whether he’d survive another day.
His weight dropped.
150 lb, 120 lb, 90 lb, 90.
He was skeletal, barely able to stand.
His ribs showed through his skin.
His uniform hung loose on a frame that had become bone and senue.
He watched other prisoners die around him.
Malnutrition, dysentery, malaria, and the casual brutality of their capttors.
Every morning was the same question.
Will I survive today? In the monotony and horror of camp life, Bagot had plenty of time to think about those seconds suspended from his parachute, about the four shots, about the fighter spiraling away.
Had he hit the pilot or missed entirely? Maybe the pilot recovered control? Maybe the plane landed safely.
Maybe the whole thing was adrenaline and wishful thinking.
He wasn’t sure he believed it himself.
Shooting down a fighter plane with a handgun while falling through the sky seemed like something from a pulp adventure novel, not reality.
The physics alone seemed impossible.
But gradually, pieces of information began filtering through the camp.
The first piece came from an unexpected source.
A guard mentioned something quietly, almost respectfully.
An American who’d shot at a Japanese fighter from a parachute.
The story was spreading.
Days later, Bagot and Jensen were summoned.
A Japanese major general in charge of PS in the region wanted to see them.
Baggot expected execution.
Instead, something strange happened.
The general studied Bagot in silence.
No rage in his eyes, no contempt.
Something else, something Bagot couldn’t identify at first.
Through a translator, the general spoke.
I have heard about you, about what you did in the sky.
Bagot said nothing.
In our culture, such courage, even from an enemy, deserves recognition.
The general paused, then made an offer, an honorable death, the opportunity to commit ritual suicide rather than endure years of imprisonment.
In the twisted honor code of the Japanese military at that time, this was meant as a gesture of respect.
Bagot declined.
I’d rather take my chances.
The general nodded slowly, and Bagot was returned to the camp.
But the rumor spread further.
An American had done something impossible.
Shot at a fighter from a parachute, and even the enemy knew it.
Later accounts suggest the general had heard that the pilot Baggot fired at had been killed.
That this act of defiance, fighting back when helpless, was seen as extraordinary courage.
Some sources claimed the camp commander even expressed admiration.
Bagot never bragged about the incident.
He remained modest, almost reluctant to discuss it.
That’s not the behavior of a man spinning tall tales for glory.
That’s the behavior of someone who experienced something remarkable, wasn’t entirely sure what to make of it, and would rather be remembered for surviving with his humanity intact.
Months into captivity, another man passed through the Singapore camp.
Colonel Harry Melton, commander of the 311th Fighter Group.
Melton had also been shot down that day.
Different engagement, same chaos.
He sought out Bagot.
I heard about you.
About the pistol.
Melton had information.
Something a Japanese colonel had told him.
The K43 pilot Bagot fired at had been found dead, ejected from his crashed fighter.
Not injuries from the crash, a bullet wound to the head.
Melton intended to make an official report when he returned to Allied lines, document what had happened, verify the story.
He never got the chance.
The ship transporting PWs to Japan was sunk, likely by American submarine or aircraft that had no way of knowing it carried Allied prisoners.
A thousand men went down with that ship, Colonel Melton among them.
Only one British officer survived to confirm the story.
He preserved it through a unique method, hiding Melton’s last letter to his wife between the insole and sole of his shoe.
He kept it there for the remainder of the war.
That letter mentioned Bagot.
That’s how the story survived.
2 and 1/2 years, 912 days of starvation, disease, forced labor, and uncertainty.
Bagot survived, not through luck, through will.
He watched friends die, endured brutality that would break most men, wasted to 90 lb, but he didn’t break.
September 7th, 1945.
Eight agents of the Office of Strategic Services parachuted into Singapore.
They were looking for prisoners.
They found 38 American PWs, barely alive.
Owen Bagot was one of them.
The war in the Pacific had ended.
Japan had surrendered.
The prisoners were finally going home.
Bagot returned to the United States as something of a reluctant celebrity.
The story of the parachuting pistol shot had spread through military channels.
Air Force magazine investigated the incident.
They found three pieces of evidence.
One, Melton’s testimony about the Japanese colonel’s admission.
A pilot killed by gunshot while attacking parachuting Americans.
March 31st, 1933.
Two, no Allied fighters in the area that day.
Nothing else could have shot down that K43.
Three, the altitude at which the incident occurred, 4 to 5,000 ft, high enough that a conscious pilot could have recovered from an accidental stall, but the fighter didn’t recover.
Air Force magazine concluded, “There appears to be no reasonable doubt that Owen Bagot performed a unique act of valor unlikely to be repeated in the unfolding annals of air warfare.
Then researchers gained access to Japanese military records after the war, including logs of the 64th Centai.
Those records show no pilot losses for March 31st, 1933.
Not one.
If Bagot shot down a Japanese fighter, there’s no corresponding entry in enemy documentation.
So, did Owen Bagot shoot down a Japanese fighter with a pistol? The honest answer, we’ll never know with absolute certainty.
Japanese recordkeeping in Burma was imperfect.
A pilot killed in an unusual manner might have been recorded differently or omitted entirely.
The wounded pilot might have limped back to base and died later.
Or the K43 recovered at lower altitude.
The pilot survived and it was never reported.
Or in the chaos with adrenaline flooding his system and his arm bleeding, Bagot fired, the fighter broke off for other reasons, and the connection was coincidental.
But here’s what’s undeniable.
Bagot fired a handgun at an enemy fighter while helpless in a parachute harness.
The fighter departed the scene in a manner consistent with loss of control.
Witnesses, including enemy officers, reported information supporting his account.
The US Air Force investigated for decades and concluded credible, and no one before or since has done anything like it.
Bagot stayed in the newly independent US Air Force, served 28 more years, rose to colonel.
He retired in 1973, worked as a defense contractor manager.
He never sought publicity for the parachute incident.
Colleagues at Mitchell Air Force Base remembered him for his work with children, sponsoring kids through the Commander for a Day program.
When asked about the pistol shot in later years, he remained modest, almost reluctant.
I don’t know if I hit him.
Maybe the plane stole on its own.
That’s not a man spinning tall tales.
That’s humility.
He lived quietly, first in Texas, later San Antonio.
Owen John Bagot died July 27th, 2006.
He was 81 years old.
His obituary mentioned the pistol incident, but it focused on something else.
His forgiveness, his kindness, his quick smile.
His community remembered a man defined not by violence, but by grace under the weight of terrible experience.
He survived two and a half years of starvation and torture, watched friends die, dropped to 90 lb, and emerged without consuming hatred.
He forgave his capttors, lived without bitterness.
That might be more extraordinary than shooting down a fighter plane.
There’s no museum pistol labeled the gun that shot down a Japanese fighter.
No crashed K43 preserved as evidence.
The physical proof doesn’t exist.
Lost to Burma’s jungles 80 years ago.
What remains is testimony of a man who faced his worst moment with desperate courage, survived years that would have broken most people, and lived the rest of his days with dignity and compassion.
Whether Bagot shot down a fighter is ultimately less important than what’s undeniable.
He fired those shots while wounded, watching friends die, suspended helplessly as fighters circled.
He refused to surrender to despair.
He fought back with his only weapon.
That defiance makes the story worth telling.
Stories like Owen Baggots from the forgotten corners of World War II don’t get told often enough.
If you want more, we’re creating a series on the China Burma India Theater.
The missions nobody talks about.
The men history forgot.
Subscribe so you don’t miss the next one.
Let us know in the comments.
Do you think he shot down that fighter or is it one of history’s great mysteries? Thanks for watching.
See you in the next one.
