A Higher Call: An Incredible True Story of Combat and Chivalry in the War-Torn Skies of World War II (31 page)

“Where’s Blackie?” Andy asked.

Jennings said that Blackie was back in his turret, checking if his guns had thawed.

Andy moved toward the rear of the bomber.

“Don’t go there,” Jennings told him. “Ecky’s dead.”

Andy heeded his advice. Wheeling, he hurried to the cockpit to report to Charlie.

“It’s like an operating room back there,” Andy said, as he described the casualties. “Everyone’s out of it.”

Charlie instructed Andy to go back and ensure that the others were wearing flak jackets, helmets, and parachutes. Andy looked confused. “We’re approaching the coastal flak,” Charlie told him. “We’re going to try to barrel through it.” Andy started to say something, but no words came out. Pinky’s cheeks could not have sagged further with a look of dread. Andy hurried from the cockpit to retrieve his flak vest.

But there was an error in Doc’s course that neither he nor Charlie had spotted. When Doc drew their course on the violently convulsing map, he was so fixated on the flak rings that he had failed to see that the course he drew would dodge the village of Jever, but not its German airfield.

F
RANZ HEARD THE
bomber before he saw it. The ground crewmen had just strapped in a fresh belt of 20mm cannon shells and slammed shut his fighter’s engine cowling when a low drone emanated from south of the field, drawing everyone’s attention. There, several miles away, a B-17 flew toward them, so slow and so low it looked like it was coming in to land. The drone grew louder and deeper, like the thundering of a thousand bass drums. The sergeant’s eyes lit up. Franz flicked away his cigarette and climbed up the wing into his plane. The ground crewmen yanked the fuel lines. Tossing on his straps, Franz made a twirling motion with an outstretched finger, and two crewmen cranked the engine over. As the revolutions climbed, Franz tugged the starter lever and ignited his fighter’s engine.

Franz and the others watched, their mouths agape, as the bomber skirted the base and disappeared behind the trees. Franz knew the bullet was in his radiator and could have caused the engine to overheat at any minute. He did not care. Franz throttled forward and the ground crew scrambled out of his way. Franz saluted the portly sergeant. Without stopping for clearance from the tower, Franz fast-taxied to the runway and blasted off toward the bomber, in pursuit of his Knight’s Cross.

P
INKY HAD BEEN
stewing ever since Charlie told Andy to gather parachutes for the men. Finally, Pinky blurted, “You know we’re never going to make it!” Charlie focused impassively on the horizon. He knew Pinky was right. One hit from a flak shell or even a near miss would shake the bomber from the sky.

“Should we jump?” Pinky asked.

“Russian won’t survive if he lands in the woods,” Charlie said.

Pinky nodded.

“There’s another option,” Charlie said. “Go deliver a message to
the men. I’m going to try to fly back to England but anyone who wants to bail out has my permission.”

Pinky agreed. Charlie and Pinky both knew that a P.O.W. camp would be preferable to being blown apart by flak or ditching in an icy sea. As Pinky departed, Charlie put a hand onto his copilot’s shoulder. “I’m going to give us some altitude,” Charlie said. “If anyone wants to jump, it needs to be right now.”

Pinky departed as Charlie pulled back on the stick to climb.
The Pub
resisted at first, content to fly level and low. Charlie tugged harder. The bomber climbed, slowly, straining through two thousand feet, where Charlie felt the plane begin to shake. Leveling off, he saw the cold, gray coastline in the distance.

Charlie knew his odds had been better down along the treetops. At least there the flak gunners would have had a tougher time aiming at him. But he had made his choice, to sacrifice himself and Russian if need be, to allow seven men to jump.

Charlie held the bomber steady and waited for his men to hit the silk. To Charlie his decision was not heroic—it was his job as their leader. In his mind, the rest of his men still had a chance to live.

B
EHIND
THE PUB
, Franz’s 109 appeared, a small black spec racing above the forests. Climbing up from the treetops, Franz began his attack run.

In his ball turret, curled around his guns, Blackie eyed the coast ahead, a finish line and invisible fence he longed to clear. He never considered that a firing squad of flak guns lay there. Nor did Blackie have any idea that his buddies in the fuselage above him were debating whether or not to bail out. Instead, he worked the triggers of his frozen guns, squeezing them, hoping the guns would thaw. They made a dull clicking sound.

Remembering his duty, Blackie spun his turret to watch for enemy fighters. He planned to bluff them if they attacked. He stopped his spin when his guns faced the tail.

“Dear Jesus,” he muttered. There, a mile away, a 109 was climbing straight for him.
^*
Soon the 109 had climbed above Blackie’s line of sight. Blackie wanted to shout, but his microphone was dead. He wanted to slap his turret to summon his buddies’ attention, but no one would have heard him. He was alone.

Franz saw the bomber’s ball turret aim toward him so he climbed even with the bomber’s tail, above the ball turret’s line of sight. Because the bomber was alone, without the overlapping guns of a formation to protect it, Franz decided to attack it from behind. He throttled back to steady his approach and avoid overflying the slow, wounded machine. He worked the rudder and settled his
Revi
gun sight on the bomber’s tail, where he knew a tail gunner sat with two guns aiming back at him. He hovered his gloved index finger ahead of the trigger. Whoever fired first and straightest, Franz decided, was the man meant to live.

Franz squinted and aimed through his gun sight. He lowered his finger onto the trigger, a pound of pressure away from igniting the guns. When the bomber’s thin wings spread past the ring of his gun sight, Franz narrowed his eyes on the tail gun position, looking for the blink of his opponent’s guns. But nothing happened.

Something’s wrong
, Franz thought when he saw the tail guns pointing lifelessly to earth. His eyes fixed on the bomber’s left stabilizer. He realized it had been shot away. “My God,” he muttered. “How are you still flying?” When the bomber’s wings filled his windscreen, Franz knew it was time to shoot. His finger arched on the trigger, ready to squeeze. But still the tail guns pointed silently downward.

From a hundred yards away, Franz saw the tail gunner’s position and knew why the nearly four-foot-long guns had never been raised. Shell fragments had obliterated the compartment. The glass was missing from its windows. Nursing his throttle back to match the bomber’s
speed, Franz settled in behind the tail. He saw fist-sized holes on one side of the tail gunner’s position where 20mm shells had entered. On the other side, he saw where they had burst, peeling the bomber’s skin outward.

Then Franz spotted him, the tail gunner. With the rudder’s frayed fabric silently flapping overhead, Franz saw the gunner’s fleece collar red with blood. Inching closer to a plane’s length from the bomber, Franz saw the gunner’s blood frozen in icicles where it had streamed down the barrels. Franz lifted his finger from the trigger.

There, floating behind the B-17, Franz looked at the bomber with the curiosity of his boyhood, a time when he would run from his house at the sound of an airplane. In a rush of long-dormant emotions, Franz forgot he was a German fighter pilot.

Franz had seen planes come back from battle shot to pieces. But he had never seen anything like this. Every foot of the bomber’s metal had silver holes where the bullets had entered and flaked away the paint. Franz became entranced with wonder. Kicking his rudder pedal and nudging the throttle forward a bit, Franz swung his 109 past the tail and flew along the bomber’s right side, parallel to the fuselage.

Franz scanned the craft for guns that the bomber’s crew could still turn on him. He saw that the waist gun was missing, blasted from its mount. He saw that the top turret was empty and that the radio room had been blown apart. He flew just high enough that he was beyond the elevation of the ball turret. Then, alongside the bomber, Franz saw something troubling. Exploding shells had stripped away its skin in the waist. Through the plane’s exposed ribs he saw its crew, huddled over one another, caring for their wounded. Moving forward, Franz settled his 109 into position above the bomber’s right wingtip. He could see that the bomber’s nose was blown away. The bomber flew as if held up by an invisible string.

What now?
Franz thought.

Suddenly, movement beneath the bomber drew his eyes. Franz
watched as the ball turret gunner swiveled his guns toward him.
You’d shoot me if you could
, Franz thought. He knew the turret lacked the elevation to aim at him.

From his turret, Blackie looked in shock at the 109 pilot. A minute before, Blackie had prepared to die, expecting the 109 pilot to shoot him from the sky after disappearing behind the tail. But the pilot had never fired. Now, instead, the German fighter pilot flew formation with the American bomber.
^*
Blackie abandoned his efforts to clear his guns. Instead, he folded his hands. “What are you waiting for?” Blackie said quietly as the German’s eyes met his.

The Franz Stigler who went to Africa to avenge his brother’s death would have had an answer. He would have destroyed the bomber and killed its crew. But there, in the desert, and over ancient Sicily, the last of Europe’s Knights had taught Franz Stigler a new code. Their code said to fight with fearlessness and restraint, to celebrate victories not death, and to know when it was time to answer a higher call.

Franz gazed at the men in the waist tending one another’s wounds. He looked into the ashen face of the ball turret gunner. He thought about what his brother August would have done.

A gear clicked in Franz’s soul. He laid a hand over the pocket of his jacket and felt his rosary beads within.
This will be no victory for me
, Franz decided.
I will not have this on my conscience for the rest of my life
.
¹