The Mammoth Book of Fighter Pilots (26 page)

Mrs. Bishop had a lady with her and she invited us to tea with them. We explained that we were all pretty dirty, which we were, but she said to never mind that and come along as we were; so we did. We all went into the squadron office and had tea brought over from the mess. The lady with her proved to be very nice and was very much interested in Americans and America. She was the most patriotic person I’ve met over here because she was always talking about the King. When I told her how much all the Americans liked serving with the British, she said she was so glad and she knew the King would be delighted to hear it. That sounded a bit far fetched to me. We got on fine with her and we told her some funny stories and she nearly died laughing. We had a taxi waiting for us and offered to take her back to town with us as soon as we got dressed. She said she’d rather take a bus and get the air and it would take her right by the palace. I didn’t get that either. As we went out we saw Cunningham-Reed’s mother and she nearly broke a leg curtsying and I noticed Mrs. Bishop do the same thing when we left her and took the lady out to the bus. I asked Cunningham-Reed why the gymnastics and he told me it was for royalty. I asked him wherefore and he told me the lady was Princess Mary Louise. All three of us have been trying to remember whether we cracked any jokes about the King or not.

May 25th

France!

Here’s where we sober up and get down to real serious work.

Here I am at the front, the victim of many emotions. We had a fine send off and come what may, nothing can ever take away from me the joy that has been mine.

We left Hounslow about eleven and our take-off was a scream. Billy and Babs were there over at one end, Dora and Lillian and Cecil were also present in another group. Nigger’s fiancée was there with her family, and the Princess was there with Mrs. Bishop. We nearly broke our necks running from one group to another and pretending we didn’t know anybody else. Then the staff arrived from the American Headquarters. We hadn’t expected them – Col. Morrow, Col. Mitchell, Jeff Dwyer and a couple of others. We tried to get in the ground but couldn’t find a hole.

The Princess was very cordial. She said she told the King about us and that he was very pleased to hear that American pilots were so enthusiastic about serving with the R.F.C. and that he hoped some day he would have the opportunity to decorate one of us. Mrs. Bishop made us promise to stick to the major and not let a Hun get on his tail.

That was one morning when I would rather not have been so conspicuous. Our style was badly cramped. Col. Morrow was very nice and spoke of the time I had come to him to enlist and only had one letter of recommendation. But that was from the ex-secretary of war so he wrote the other one for me himself.

Dora was much interested in our silk skull caps that we wear under our fur helmets. She wanted to know whose stocking mine was made from.

All nineteen machines were arranged in position for taking off in formation and the engines warmed up. The major’s machine was out front in the center and the three flights arranged in a V on each side and in back of him. We’d practised getting off that way and it was all right as long as no machine got directly behind another and hit the backwash.

Bishop lined us up before the crowd and some general made us a little speech. Then Bishop gave us our final instructions. He told us that Lympe would be our first stop and to be sure and take a good look at the wind sock and to land squarely into the wind. But he didn’t call it a sock. He called it by the name we always call it on the field when there are no ladies or gentlemen present. He turned red and the ladies lowered their parasols and he ran and jumped in his machine and we all took off together. I got in Spring’s backwash and nearly cracked up getting off.

Cal didn’t get far. He disappeared from the formation about fifteen minutes after we took off, and didn’t get here until today. He had an air bubble in his water line and he had to land in a field south of London to let his motor cool off and get some more water. He got down all right and got out of the field again and decided he’d stop at Croydon and get his radiator drained. He made a bad landing at Croydon and crashed. So he went back to London for another night and got a new machine from Brooklands the next day.

We stopped at Lympe near Folkestone for lunch and Brown cracked up there. We took off after lunch and Canning cracked up on the beach when his motor conked. We landed at Marquis near Boulogne, for tea. We had a beautiful trip across the channel. It was as clear as a bell and we crossed at eight thousand feet. My motor was missing a little and I kept picking out destroyers and trawlers below to land beside in case it gave out. MacDonald crashed at Marquis when he landed short in the rough and turned over and Cunningham-Reed washed out his plane by pancaking.

On the way across, Springs motioned for me to come up close to him. I flew up to his wing tip and he took out his flask and drank my health. I didn’t have a thing with me but a bottle of champagne and that was in my tool box and I couldn’t get to it.

We arrived at our airdrome about six.

June 2nd

There are six machines in a flight. Nigger leads and MacGregor and Cal are on his right, behind and a little above. Springs and I are on the left and Thompson is in the center in the space between Cal and me. We fly in the form of a triangle with the back corners high. MacGregor is deputy flight commander and takes command in case anything happens to Nigger. We fly pretty close together and have a set of signals. If Nigger is going to turn sharp, he drops his wing on that side. If he is going to dive steep, he holds up his arm. If he wants us to come up close or wants to call our attention to something he shakes both wings. If it’s a Hun, he shakes his wings and points and fires his guns. If he means “yes” he bobs his nose up and down and if he means “no” he shakes his wings. If we see a Hun and he doesn’t, we fire our guns and fly up in front and point. We fly at three-quarters throttle so we can always pull up. If he has trouble and wants us to go on, he fires a red light from his Very pistol. If he wants us to follow him out of a fight, he fires a white light. If he wants to signal the other flights, he fires a green light.

MacGregor has been out before. He was out on Pups for six months when they were service machines. He came over with the Australian infantry. Thompson has been out before too. He was out last fall on Camels but crashed too many of them.

We’ve been doing rather well. We have a score board in the mess and there’s a big red 6 staring me in the face now. We don’t count any unless they go down in flames or break up in the air or someone sees them crash. The wing commander, Col. Cunningham, is over here all the time and is tickled to death because all this is voluntary for we aren’t supposed to get into action the first two weeks. I’m going to get a Hun this week if I pull a wing off in the attempt.

June 6th

I went up and had a private battle of my own. I saw a Hun two-seater away the hell and gone over Roulers. I chased him a bit but couldn’t catch him. Then about three Archie batteries opened up on me! The whole sky turned black. A barrage grew up in front of me like a bed of mushrooms and I swung around just in time to avoid it. Scared? Of course, I was scared. There were heavy clouds below me and I didn’t know where the lines were. My compass was spinning around so fast that I couldn’t tell anything from it. Then I forgot whether the sun set in the east or the west and had to stop and figure it out. Every time Archie would get close to me, my heart would skip a beat. It has an awful sound when it’s close, like a giant clapping his hands and it has a sort of metallic click. So I put my nose down and ran for it. First Archie would be ‘way behind me and then he’d get ‘way in front and I’d zoom and he’d be a mile away. I crossed the lines down below Wipers where I didn’t know the country and for a few minutes I was lost. I got out my maps and found a town on the map that I located on the ground and then I came on back by Bergues.

June 10th

What a nightmare this war is! I’m beginning to understand the term “Anti-Christ.” Both the Allies and the Germans pray to the same God for strength in their slaughter! What a joke it must seem to Him to see us puny insignificant mortals proclaiming that we are fighting for Him and that He is helping us. Think of praying to the God of Peace for help in War! The heavens must shake with divine mirth.

I can’t kick. It’s the best war I know anything about. It’s been worth a lot to me so far. Sooner or later I’ll join the company of the elect but I want to get a Hun first. I want to get one sure one – a flamer or a loose-winged flop. I know how hard it is, but unless I get one, the government will simply be out all it cost to train me. If I get one, it’ll be an even break. If I get two, I’ll be a credit instead of a debit on the books.

June 30th

We got into a dogfight this morning with the new brand of Fokkers
¹⁷
and they certainly were good. They had big red stripes on the fusilage diagonally so they must be Richthofen’s old circus. There were five of us and we ran into five Fokkers at fifteen thousand feet. We both started climbing, of course. And they outclimbed us. We climbed up to twenty thousand five hundred and couldn’t get any higher. We were practically stalled and these Fokkers went right over our heads and got between us and the lines. They didn’t want to dogfight but tried to pick off our rear men. Inglis and Cal were getting a pretty good thrill when we turned back and caught one Hun napping. He half rolled slowly and we got on his tail. Gosh, it’s unpleasant fighting at that altitude. The slightest movement exhausts you, your engine has no pep and splutters; it’s hard to keep a decent formation, and you lose five hundred feet on a turn. The other Huns came in from above and it didn’t take us long to fight down to twelve thousand. We put up the best fight of our lives but these Huns were just too good for us. Cal got a shot in his radiator and went down and Webster had his tail plane shot to bits and his elevator control shot away. He managed to land with his stabilizer wheel but cracked up. I don’t know what would have happened if some Dolphins from 84 hadn’t come up and the Huns beat it. I think we got one that went down in a spin while Cal was shooting at it but we couldn’t see it crash.

I got to circling with one Hun, just he and I, and it didn’t take me long to find out that I wasn’t going to climb above this one. He began to gain on me and then he did something I’ve never heard of before. He’d be circling with me and he’d pull around and point his nose at me and open fire and just hang there on his prop and follow me around with his tracer. All I could do was to keep on turning the best I could. If I’d straightened out he’d have had me cold as he already had his sights on me. If I had tried to hang on my prop that way, I’d have gone right into a spin. But this fellow just hung right there and sprayed me with lead like he had a hose. They have speeded up guns too. All I could do was to watch his tracer and kick my rudder from one side to the other to throw his aim off. This war isn’t what it used to be. Nigger has noted the improvement in the Huns and is awful thoughtful.

We went to see Springs this afternoon and he seems to be doing all right. He’s got lips like a nigger minstrel’s and a mouthful of thread and a couple of black eyes. We took him a couple of bottles of champagne but he didn’t need it as they serve it to him there. Things have been sort of quiet at the front lately in this sector and there were only three of them in there. One is a brigadier general who had been wounded seven times before this last shot in his leg. He and Springs were full of champagne and have a bar rigged up in a tent outside. The third is a Chink from a labor battalion who has been parted from his appendix forcibly.

There are about eighteen nurses there and it is the custom for all the nurses from the Duchess down to walk by and ask each patient how he feels each morning. The general says if they just had short skirts on and would whistle he’d applaud and join the chorus. Spring’s face is going to be all right because they sewed it up from the inside.

Mac made a date to call on a pretty little nurse. That boy is a fast worker. I’ll bet he gets sick in a few days.

July 20th

Mannock
¹⁸
is dead, the greatest pilot of the war. But his death was worthy of him. Inglis had been doing a lot of fighting but had never gotten a Hun. But he tried hard and Mannock told him that he would take him out alone and get him a Hun. So just the two of them went out late in the afternoon. Mannock picked up a two-seater over Estaires and went down after him. Mannock has a special method of attacking a two-seater. He takes them from the front at an angle and then goes under them if he misses his first burst. It is very hard to do but is unquestionably the best method. Instead of going under and getting him for himself, he held his fire and turned the Hun and held him for Inglis. Inglis got him and they started back but they were down low. Mannock got hit by machine gun fire from the ground just like Richthofen and dove right on into the ground. Inglis went back and flew right down to the ground and saw the wreck and is sure he’s dead.

August 11th

Again I’ve got that feeling, gee, it’s great to be alive! The last three days have been particularly strenuous and eventful. Ordinarily I wouldn’t be able to sleep at all, but I’m so tired that I slept like a baby last night. And I’m getting so bored at being shot at that I don’t bother to dodge any more. I sat up in the middle of Archie bursts yesterday for five minutes, yawned and refused to turn until they knocked me about a hundred feet. I used to be scared to death of Archie and gunfire fire from the ground. Now it almost fails to excite even my curiosity.

Day before yesterday we had four dogfights. In the morning we attacked five Huns. I paired off with a Fokker on my level and we maneuvered for a couple of minutes trying to get on each other’s tail. I finally got inside of him, put one hundred rounds into him and he went down out of control. Another one was after me by that time and we had quite a scrap but he made the fatal blunder of reversing his bank and I got on his tail and pumped about two hundred rounds into him. I couldn’t see what happened to him as another one was coming down on me from above. This one should have gotten me but he didn’t. He had every advantage and one of my guns jammed. I was down on the carpet by that time and had to come back low for five miles with this Hun picking at me while I was trying to clear the stoppage and do a little serious dodging.