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Rescue at Rabaul, PBY Blister Gunner, 1944

During World War II, a PBY amphibian air­craft was sent to res­cue a Marine air­man who had been shot down while attacking Japanese forces at Rabaul Harbor. With the airman tempo­rarily blinded and help­less in the water, the gunner from the rescue plane stripped down, getting rid of his encumbering flight suit and boots, dove into the water, and brought the injured man on board. In a combat situation, under enemy fire, the gunner had no time to get dressed again before returning to his battle station.

Photographer Horace Bristol remembered: “As soon as we could, we took off. We weren’t waiting around for anybody to put on formal clothes. We were being shot at and wanted to get the hell out of there. The naked man got back into his position at his gun in the blister of the plane.”

(I ran across another portrait taken at the same time entitled: "Rescue at Rabaul, Airmen Smoking, 1944". At first I thought the man on the left might be the rescued airman because his hair appears to be wet, but I'm not sure. Most infor­ma­tion focused on the naked gunner who did the rescue.)

The Other Naked Gunner

During my research another story popped up of a naked military man during WWII, this time in Aus­tralia. Wilbert Hudson was shower­ing when he reacted to sirens warning of a Japanese air raid over Darwin. Wearing only his helmet and his boots and clutching a towel for modesty, the 20-year-old grabbed a Lewis machine gun and used his mate’s shoulder as a steady­ing rest, but lost his towel as he fired at the bombers.

Then, there's this classic image that's made the rounds...

Finally, if you're interested in seeing many more images of naked men during wartime (as well as lots of other very interesting stuff), visit The Unashamed Male and check out his extensive collection.