Stories of Faith and Courage from World War II

by Larkin Spivey

  Later, witnesses helped him piece together what happened. When the fire started he turned his plane upside down, unlatched and opened the canopy. He unfastened his seat belt and pushed the stick forward to safely bail out. Then he pulled the rip cord to deploy his chute. He remembered none of this. He was thankful that he had his Catechism and Prayer Book in his pocket at the time, and felt that it was “a miracle that I survived.” He was also thankful for the training that had prepared him for this moment:

  I would quarrel about doing certain things over and over, things that I felt I already knew how to do, but my instructor insisted that I do them again just to make sure that I understood and got it right. I have often thought back to the day when I was shot down over St. Lo, and the sub-conscious actions I took to save my life in that emergency situation. I must give credit to heroes of mine, those very farsighted Pilot Training Instructors, for the grueling and repetitive training they put me through. I shall never forget them.289

  This story is a tribute to demanding teachers everywhere. I have the same affectionate respect for my high school algebra teacher, Mr. S. L. Lemmon. He was the toughest teacher I ever had. Under his wary eye generations of students did the hard, repetitive work necessary for a solid grounding in algebra. We are blessed to have educators who set high standards and who have the moral courage to hold themselves and their students to them. Such teachers are surely doing God’s work in this world and richly deserve our appreciation.

  Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.

  —James 3:1

  July 23

  Sixty-two Missions and an Outcast

  A World War II pilot told a sad story about a member of his squadron. He called him Captain “Johnson” for sake of anonymity. This man suffered extensive injury from a bad parachute landing when his aircraft was shot down on a bombing mission over Germany. With sixty-two missions to his credit, he only needed three more to go home. However, he refused to fly again. This became a source of great controversy within the squadron where most felt that, “If I have to fly, then he has to fly.” This festered for a while until one day he was gone.

  Fifteen years later the squadron had a reunion, and our storyteller relates what happened when a certain member appeared:

  Who should walk in but our old friend Captain Johnson. No one spoke to him. Many just turned their backs on him. I felt sorry for him. But while we were risking our necks over Germany and losing good men, he was curled up and whining under a blanket. He flew with us, but not a single man considered him to be one of us.290

  I understand the attitude of these airmen who served their country so honorably, and I intend no criticism of them. They earned the right to feel how they felt. I relate this story simply to illustrate the contrast between the value systems of our world and that of God’s kingdom. In this world Captain Johnson flew sixty-two missions, fell apart, and became an outcast. In the world of our Savior, Jesus Christ, he could have done the wrong thing sixty-two times and still have had a way to reclaim his status as “one of us.” Repentance would be required, but forgiveness would be certain.

  Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.”

  —Matthew 18:21–22

  July 24

  The Greatest Compliment

  The mission was a navigator’s nightmare. The bombing run to Karlsruhe should have been an eight-hour trip, but bad weather forced the formation to make frequent course changes. Frank Federici was lead navigator for a flight of six B-24s and felt that they were “touring Germany.” By the time they were over the target he was hearing complaints from the other aircraft that fuel and oxygen were in short supply.

  At this point Federici recommended a complete departure from the planned route that had been ordered for the mission. He took his lead aircraft down to an altitude of 500 feet and headed straight for home base, ignoring orders. At such low altitude he had to do the navigating job of his life. Cloud formations required constant maneuvering and new sets of calculations for each course change. He said later, “I could have used one hundred twenty seconds in a minute instead of sixty!”291

  Federici reached his base in England with ten minutes fuel to spare. However, instead of congratulations, he and his pilot received reprimands for violating their orders. He was almost too tired to care:

  I decided that sleep was more important (than eating) and started walking in the snow toward our Quonset hut. As I walked toward the hut, I was tempted numerous times to lie in the snow and go to sleep. However, I continued to walk to the hut, when suddenly I was confronted by another navigator who caught up to me and said, “Thanks a lot, Frank.” He was one of the navigators in an aircraft flying in our six-ship formation back to base. I have considered his “thank you” as the greatest compliment received during my seventy-nine years! He was thanking me for saving his life.292

  To have your work judged positively by someone you respect is one of life’s great rewards. We should also remember, however, that our work can have eternal consequences as well. Although our salvation in Jesus Christ is guaranteed, when our work for him is judged worthy, we will be rewarded. Someday, every one of us will want to hear our Savior say, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21, 23).

  The fire will test the quality of each man’s work. If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward. If it is burned up, he will suffer loss; he himself will be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames.

  —1 Corinthians 3:13–15

  July 25

  The Hunters

  After the Battle of Britain, Royal Air Force Spitfires and Hurricanes were usually employed as escorts for Allied bombers over Europe. Lt. Johnnie Johnson flew many of these missions in his Spitfire, and by the end of the war was the highest-scoring RAF pilot. He made some interesting observations about his fellow aviators:

  It is fascinating to watch the reactions of the various pilots. They fall into two broad categories… the hunters and the hunted. The majority of the pilots, once they have seen their names on the board, walk out to their Spitfires for a pre-flight check and a word or two with their ground crews. They tie on their mae-wests, check their maps, study the weather forecast and have a last-minute chat with their leaders or wingmen. These are the hunters.

  The hunted… turned to their escape kits and made quite sure that they were wearing the tunic with the silk maps sewn into a secret hiding-place; that they had at least one oilskin-covered packet of French francs, and two if possible; that they had a compass and a revolver and sometimes specially made clothes to assist their activities once they were shot down.293

  Johnnie Johnson obviously put himself in the “hunter” category. He may be implying that he was braver than some of his fellow pilots, or at the very least more optimistic. Maybe he and the other hunters just didn’t have very good imaginations. Whatever the case, I think that we can assume that these pilots were more positive in their actions and more effective in the air.

  Focusing on the negative has never been good for pilots or for anyone else. Jesus Christ came into this world to direct our attention in a new and positive direction. He brought the message that we can’t work our way to God by eliminating the negatives in our lives. We will never be good enough on our own. By simply accepting God’s forgiveness through his Son, we take the one positive step necessary to gain a place in his kingdom. We continue this positive focus as we live in the body of Christ and joyfully share the truth of this gospel message.

  Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin. But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who
believe.

  —Romans 3:20–22

  July 26

  The Men Were Noble

  The routine started at 2:30 a.m. The B-17 crewmen stumbled out of bed, dressed in the cold, and plodded through the rain and mud to breakfast. Then they began assembling in the briefing room. Someone yelled, “Attention!” as the commanding officer walked down the center aisle and mounted the stage. Everyone finally came awake as the mission for the day was announced.

  Jon Schueler paid close attention to every detail. As navigator for the Bad Check(named in hope that she would always come back) he carried a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. After the pre-mission briefing he and the rest of his crew climbed aboard their aircraft.

  As long as the momentum of activity was going, everything would be OK. I felt the excitement, the blood coursing through my veins. I felt the intensity of it. We would start the engines reving and I’d lay out my charts and have everything ready, oxygen mask, parachute. Check all the dials. Computer, pencils, Weems plotter. Milt Conver would be making wisecracks. We could feel the plane being readied, we could feel the vibration of readiness of men moving back and forth at their dials, controls and guns. Everything was OK. We were a team and we knew each other and loved each other. The men were truly noble.294

  These feelings are not uncommon in combat. You grow very close to others when you share an important mission and some degree of hardship or danger.

  Twenty-five years after having such an experience, I rediscovered the same kind of intense feeling for others in the body of Christ. There is no mission that brings men and women closer together than working to bring others into the family of God. Everyone contributes unique gifts to the task, and every gift is prized by all. The key ingredient that holds this great and noble family together is the love of Jesus Christ for every member, which all the members share freely with each other.

  But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

  —1 Corinthians 12:18–20

  July 27

  The Missions Had to Be Flown

  Early in the war scattered British and Australian forces, often with obsolete equipment, tried to oppose the Japanese advance through East Asia. Many Royal Air Force pilots were still flying biplanes that proved easy prey to the modern Japanese Zero fighters. As comrades failed to return from missions, it became ever harder for the survivors to keep going up. One airman commented on his own feelings and on a fellow pilot’s determination to oppose the enemy invasion of Sumatra:

  We were terribly fearful, some of us literally shaking… But the missions had to be flown and it was then that I saw real valour… not just flashes of it but as a part of every member’s daily life. A special bravery seemed to be generated, where fear was greatest… The courage that we saw was in the calm before the storm, of very young men… doing something that petrified them… But they did it because it was their duty.295

  I think of Bob’s sheer guts on that day only with deep admiration. He was going on a mission… to find a Japanese sea force, to try to break through its fighter and anti-aircraft screens and bomb it. Scared stiff like everyone who had to make such attacks, he was so overwrought that he actually vomited on the tarmac as he went to climb into his Hudson. But he just vomited, shook his head, climbed aboard and took off.296

  Could anything be more difficult than finding courage in a losing cause? These airmen knew that defeat was inevitable, but continued to find the will to do their duty. Many times we, as Christians, are discouraged by far less formidable risks. We think that certain people are hopeless and that any effort on our part to share the gospel would be futile. When we hear moral issues being discussed and sense we’re in the minority, we sometimes feel that our solitary voice will have no effect. At these times, we need the courage of these RAF pilots, who were able to leave the bigger picture in the hands of a higher authority while focusing on their individual responsibilities. Courage is action in the face of possible embarrassment or failure.

  I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

  —John 14:12

  July 28

  The Real Hero

  The chaplain was up before dawn with the aircrews, sharing their last moments before another mission. He listened to the briefings and assignments, and followed their route laid out with tape across the map. As he looked at the young airmen he was almost overcome with feelings of love and fear. He knew them well, and he admired and loved them deeply. He also knew that, “For some of them it was the dawning of their last morning in this world.”297 For all of these men he was a link to home, and, as always, he gravely received their messages. This morning he was deeply moved when one man asked him to, “Tell my mother I know she is the real hero.”298

  The chaplain pondered the bond between mothers and sons and concluded that both were soldiers with difficult roles to play in a difficult war, but…

  The greatest soldiers are the mothers of men. While men go to battle-fronts mothers endure a bloodless martyrdom. Theirs is fortitude’s braver part, for their hearts, life-laced and “love-laced” to their sons, must endure the hungering interval when human hate makes them childless in motherhood, long before they face the sorrows of death.299

  The chaplain’s thoughts turned to history’s greatest example of a heroic woman, the mother of our Savior. “ Enduring her sufferings, by her compassion, Mary then became the strength and consolation for sorrowing mothers through the ages. She who had seen the shadow of death over His whole life from the crib to the Cross, could do nothing to help her dying Son.”300 May God bless all mothers who have to stand aside as their sons go into harm’s way. They send them into the world with the gift that is the most Christ-like of all gifts: a mother’s love.

  When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Dear woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.”

  —John 19:26–27

  July 29

  We Trusted in Prayer

  After a particularly harrowing mission through heavy flak Tommy Hayes landed his P-51 at home base in England. He described what happened as his aircraft finally rolled to a stop: “I climbed out of the cockpit, got on my hands and knees in the mud to kiss the good earth and thank the Lord.”301 When his crew chief realized what he was doing, he got down beside him and joined in.

  Hayes was a veteran pilot from Portland, Oregon. He had seen action early in the Pacific flying P-40s and had been with the 357th Fighter Group in England since its first combat mission. He was a little older and wiser than many of his fellow pilots, eventually rising to command a squadron of P-51s flying escort missions deep into Germany. He saw more than his share of aerial combat and downed eight German aircraft. His family at home was never far from his mind.

  When I left the States for Europe, I left my wife and daughter of sixteen months. We each had a job to do and we talked about that. I know the stress was greater for her than for me. She wrote me a letter every day. We lived our lives together by our letters. It helped when I shot down a plane and the local paper or radio had a story or a few words on the local boy, Major Hayes. If she hadn’t had a letter for a week or more, at least on this date she knew I was okay. I was not a drinking man. We both trusted in prayer.302

  A priest once used a simple blackboard diagram to illustrate how a couple can strengthen their relationship. He drew two separate lines from the bottom of the board converging into one point at the top. The lines represent our separate lives and can, in fact, go in any direction. However, if both parties in a marriage continually strive to grow nearer to Christ at the top of the board, they will also grow closer to each other, as their lines converge. This has been an enduring image in our marriage as my wife and I have tr
ied to keep our focus on this common goal, to be one in love and service to our Lord.

  So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.

  —Matthew 19:6

  July 30

  What Would I Do?

  Max Woolley bailed out of his P-38 fighter at 18,000 feet. Wounded by ground fire on the way down, his descent seemed to take forever. His parachute was riddled by bullets and almost useless by the time he hit the ground hard near Charleroi, Belgium. In a dazed state, fully expecting to be captured, he was instead picked up by a Belgian family and taken to their home. Woolley stated later that during this time,

  “Prayer was the greatest source of inspiration for me… It gave me strength, consolation, and a way to talk, to plead for help and life itself.”303 The Belgian family hid him from the Germans and gave him all the care that they could:

  They sacrificed their safety and gave me the best they had to offer, a place to rest, food from their sparse pantry, wet towels to subdue the stifling heat from being crammed into an eighteen-inch high enclosure and to wipe the blood and infected pus that oozed from my wounds for almost two months.

  I’ve often asked myself, ‘Could I befriend a bloody, dirty, wounded man whom I had never before seen, share my scant supply of food, jeopardize the safety and welfare of myself and my family?’304