by Griff Hosker
He nodded and pointed to the ground. As the third Albatros flew by us I took out my Luger and emptied the magazine. The enemy was only forty yards from our wing and I managed to strike the pilot. The aeroplane banked to port and I wondered if they would be able to recover. The Albatros almost reached the trenches before the pilot regained control and it limped east over the trenches.
The last aeroplane had seen what had happened to the others and he did not even fire. He must have thought I still had loaded guns. As I sat back in the cockpit I breathed a sigh of relief. We had survived.
We were the first to land. Gordy jumped from his bus and chocked it. By the time we had rolled to a halt he had joined us. He slapped me on the back. That looks like half an Albatros each for you and Ted.”
“Did it crash?”
He mimed with his hands, “Kaboom!”
I had not heard the explosion but I had been concentrating on the other aeroplanes. Captain Burscough was delighted. “That gun was a godsend, Harsker.”
“Yes sir but I need to be able to reload; especially if we are to be bait again.”
He nodded and pointed to our shredded tail. “And we nearly came a cropper when the Hun hit us. Still a couple of balloons aren’t too bad.”
Gordy shouted, “No sir, he and Ted shot down that first Hun. I saw him crash!”
“Well done Flight Sergeant.”
We turned as we saw the other aeroplanes cough and splutter across the field. It was Ted, lighting a cigarette, who spotted the missing planes. “There are two short.” That dampened our enthusiasm. It had not all gone our way. What had happened to the others?
We found out that one of the aeroplanes had been shot down behind the enemy lines but the second had crash landed on our side. The major had his first kill and so we have broken even. The other Flight Sergeants were all convinced that at least two of the aeroplanes must have crashed and so we had won but, without confirmation, we had to settle for half each and our balloons.
The snow and the ice put an end to operations and the last two weeks of December 1914 were peaceful. Three things happened the week before Christmas which made our chilly lives more bearable: the barn was made habitable and became our mess. We received a present of a tin from Princess Mary and a card from King George and the most important event was that we finally got our back mail.
The tin was a nice memento. Even though I was a non-smoker I was given the one intended for smokers. It had a pipe, pipe tobacco, tinder lighter, cigarettes and a photograph of the young Princess Mary. I didn’t mind. I would give dad the pipe and tobacco when I was granted leave and the cigarettes I could trade. The photograph I would send to mother as a Christmas present. The letters were the most important Christmas present we received. I waited until I could read them in the lighted barn drinking my rum ration. I wanted to savour every word.
I read mum’s first.
October 31st 1914
Dearest William,
I pray that you are safe. This war is an evil visited on us by wicked foreigners.
I have some bad news to give you. Your brothers Jack and Tom were both killed in the Battle of Ypres. Their commanding officer said that they were both brave soldiers and had saved the lives of many others. I wish someone had saved their life. We never had the chance to speak with them after that terrible night. I hope that they can hear me now as I tell them I wish we had not parted on such bad terms.
Your father has taken the news particularly badly. He blames himself and says he should have forgiven them before they went to France.
Your brother Albert is desperate to join up. He is old enough to do so next month. I hope the war is over by then but I do not believe it will be.
Kathleen is walking out just now with a fine young man. He is the new curate in the church. I am just grateful that they cannot take him to war. Sarah’s husband is also safe. Now I worry each night that you will be taken from me. Please, my dearest son, take care of yourself for you are precious to us now. Keep this letter and, when you read it, remember your mother and your father for we think of you constantly. Each night we talk of you and wonder how you are doing.
Pray God he spares you.
Your loving Mother
xxx
I could not believe it; my older brothers were both dead. They had lasted, in the army, barely two months. I had flown over the site of their end and I had never known it. I raised my glass and sipped my rum. “To you John and Tom, I am sorry we fell out.”
I saw Ted and Gordy looking at me curiously but there was an unwritten rule that a man’s letters from home were private.
I opened Sarah’s letter.
20th November 1914
Dear Bill,
I suppose you have received Mother’s letter about John and Tom. It is heartbreaking to see the two of them now. They both blame themselves for the argument but I know it was drink that did it. John and Tom would never have said what they did if they had been sober. The whole estate is shocked. Dad is a shadow of his former self. Even Lord Burscough is worried. He brought round some flowers for mother and spent the longest time talking to them. He does care.
I have tried to talk Bert out of joining up but he is adamant. He wants to be just like you. Please write to him and tell him not to join. He will listen to you. Mother could not bear to lose another son.
Kathleen has a young man now. I am not keen on him but she is besotted and Mother likes him. He is pompous and full of himself. He believes we have a God given right to fight. That is all very well but he will be safe.
We do worry about you and read in the newspapers about the Royal Flying Corps and their endeavours. We are proud of what you are doing but we can’t help being afraid for you. Promise me that you will take care of yourself.
I would not be doing my duty as a sister if I didn’t chastise you. Where are the letters you promised? Poor Mother waits for the postman each day and when there is no letter she then waits for the boy with the telegram to say you are dead. I know you mean no harm but it is killing Mother slowly and our Father too.
I pray to God that he keeps you safe,
Your loving sister
Sarah xxx
That was worse than the first letter and I felt so guilty. I felt tears springing into my eyes. Why was I such a heartless bastard? I had promised that I would write and I had not. I swallowed my rum and hurried from the barn. I had letters to write.
It took me several hours but I wrote letters to my mother, Sarah and Albert. I put everything in my heart into those letters. I suppose I was saying to them what I had not said to Tom and John. Now it was too late. I would not make that mistake with my family. I put the photograph in mother’s letter. I made a parcel of the pipe and the pipe tobacco and addressed that to my dad. I did not write a letter but I put in a note which I hoped would tell him how I felt. The men in our family did not go in for shows of emotion. It was late when I had finished but I felt that a weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I now had even more responsibility; I was the hope and dreams of my whole family. That was far more important than a Government and even a King and Queen.
The next day I was asked by the captain what was wrong and I told him. Even though he was a different class and an officer, he understood far better than either Gordy or Ted. He had known Tom and John. A day or so later he took me to Armentières, a small town not far from Ypres. They had met recently at a bar behind the front. A chum of his was an officer at the front. The man looked like a skeleton and even the captain was shocked. He told us of the Battle of Ypres. It seemed the battle had raged for many days. In fact the battle of the Yser had been the preliminary engagement and I had been in hospital at Winwick when my brothers had died. The young major knew of my brothers’ regiment. They had fought with the Dragoon Guards and the London Scottish regiments. Outnumbered by twelve to one they had allowed the rest of the army to stabilise the line and foil the enemy attack. It was when he described the conditions: the weather and the mud that I
realised how hopeless it had been for my brothers. They must have known it was hopeless and yet they continued to fight. They had redeemed themselves. I would not commit this to a letter home; the censors would not allow it through but I vowed to tell my family of the bravery of my brothers.
Chapter 17
After Christmas we endured freezing temperatures when it was impossible to fly. It was all that we could do to keep the engine warm. We wrapped blankets and tarpaulins around each engine. Every morning we struggled to start them and run them for fifteen minutes to stop them freezing completely. We, at least, were not having to fight off enemy attacks and we had somewhere warm to go each evening. I could not get the picture of Tom and John struggling through mud with frozen fingers and limited ammunition out of my mind. It made me more determined than ever to do the best job that I could and that job meant killing Germans. I would do that with a passion.
As soon as the weather improved we were able to fly. We did not fly every day and, when we did not patrol, then I badgered anyone I could for more flying lessons. I knew that, as a pilot I could hurt the Germans more than as a mere observer and gunner. I could be the one making the decisions about who to shoot.
It was early in February and we were patrolling north of Ypres. We no longer flew the whole squadron; we just flew in flights of three. Once again we were after balloons. The balloons could spot for the German artillery. British soldiers were dying because of the German balloons. We found six of them tethered along a long section of the front. By now the pilots had mastered the technique of flying just a couple of hundred feet above the ground, sometimes even lower. We had discovered that the ground fire could not react quickly enough to hit us and we were, ironically, safer. It also meant that the balloons could not get down in time. As we roared, in line abreast, towards them the winch crew desperately tried to bring down to ground level and safety. This time I aimed at the observer rather than the balloon. I waited until we were eighty yards from the target and gave a ten shot burst. The observer’s head disappeared in a red explosion. I fired five more shots at forty yards and the balloon collapsed. As Captain Burscough banked I repeated my action with the next balloon in line and had the same success. By waiting until I was so close and by using fewer bullets I could kill more Germans. It was simple arithmetic. The last balloon was struck by both Gordy and myself.
“Captain, let’s machine gun the winches. I still have a full magazine.” Even as I was speaking I was reloading.
“Righto!”
We screamed down to one hundred feet and I sprayed the winches and the men operating them. All forty seven .303 bullets struck something, either man or machine. The other two aeroplanes had not been as frugal with their bullets and it was we alone who inflicted the damage.
That evening, in the mess, Gordy looked at me quite seriously. Normally this was the time for laughing and joking but Gordy looked deadly serious. “That was good shooting today, Bill, but it seemed to me you were going for the men and not the balloon.”
I nodded, “Damned right I was.”
“They are just doing their job the same as we are.”
“I know but this war will be over a lot quicker if we kill them faster than they kill us. They can make more balloons but a trained observer or winch man is harder to replace.”
“It won’t bring your brothers back.”
I clenched my fists and then unclenched them. “I know that; I am not stupid but I can make the Germans pay.” I stood. “When you have lost two brothers then feel free to come and lecture me about the morals of war until then keep your nose out of my business.”
I stormed off. Even as I went I felt guilty. I should not have spoken to Gordy that way; he meant well. My brothers’ deaths had affected me more than I cared to admit but blood is thicker than water. We had parted on bad terms and that thought haunted me.
We received replacement aeroplanes later that week and more equipment. They fitted another Lewis gun for the captain to operate. It was fixed and would just fire in the direction we were flying but it doubled our firepower. My seat was moved slightly so that I would not get my head blown off and the captain could not fire it when I used the rear Lewis but it meant we could still fire when I changed the magazine. Ted was delighted to be flying in a brand new F.E.2. The Avro was reserved for flying lessons and I became quite competent as a pilot. I had no doubt that, if we ever flew in a dual control aeroplane, I would be able to fly it should the captain become incapacitated.
The new pilots looked remarkably young. The major gave one of them, Lieutenant Shaw to us. The other two had been promoted to captain and were no longer the novices who terrified Gordy and Ted. The Flight Sergeant was also young. I remembered how kind Gordy and Ted had been to me and I determined to do the same for young Stan. He took in every word I said.
On our first patrol with our new guns we ran into some of the new Albatros aeroplanes. We were flying high for it was more of an initiation into life on the Western Front. Lieutenant Shaw needed to know how to fly with other aeroplanes. Ted saw them and he attracted my attention.
I recognised the shape of the aeroplane and told the captain. “Sir, three Albatros aeroplanes directly below us to the east.”
It looked like they were heading back from a patrol. “Good. This might be an opportunity to try out the new kit eh?”
He banked the aeroplane and set it into a shallow dive. It was the most efficient way to pick up speed. We were a couple of hundred feet above the Germans when they spotted us and by then it was too late to do anything about it. The captain had targeted the last aeroplane and we would be able to hit multiple targets as they were still, largely, in one line.
“I shall fire too, Flight. Just to see what it is like.”
“Sir.”
I have to say that I was more than intrigued about the effect. The captain fired too early and the Albatros veered to the right. It gave me the chance to fire at the pilot when he came into my sights. I began firing when I saw the propeller and used half a magazine. Smoke came from the engine and then I hit the pilot. As he fell forward the aeroplane went into a vertical dive. We were so close to the ground that I saw the whole aircraft burst into flames as it hit the earth and we all felt the concussion of the explosion.
When we climbed into the sky we saw the other two aeroplanes limping east. Both were damaged. The new arrangement worked. “I can see I need to time my shots a little better, eh Bill?”
“It worked sir. It gave me an easier shot but yes, I like to wait until we are closer.”
The war in the air was changing. We were now needed more to observe enemy movements in the rear of their lines and report back. That meant we had smaller patrols but ranged further behind the enemy lines. Captain Dundas and Lieutenant Shaw were paired up and we worked with Captain Devries. I felt that we had the advantage over the other three aeroplanes of our flight as we had the rear firing machine gun. It slowed us down but not by much.
The third week in February the weather improved. We were sent beyond Ypres to see what reserves there were available to the German Army. The British Army had lost many men and it was hard to replace the Old Contemptibles who had died slowing down the enemy advance. They were doggedly defending the trenches around Ypres and anything we could do would alleviate the pressure a little. We travelled with ten miles between the two halves of the flight. We flew very high until we had passed the enemy lines. We did to want not be jumped by a Jasta of Albatrosses.
We used the air speed and a watch to estimate where we were. “I think that is far enough, sir. We could go down for a look see.”
“Righto.”
The captain signalled the other aeroplane and we gently swooped to a lower altitude. As soon as we cleared the cloud cover I looked at the map and identified where we were. Some of the other squadrons had been fitted with cameras but we were still doing it the old fashioned way. I would have to identify what we saw. I saw a train heading west and it was laden with heavy artillery. The
y looked to me to be the 42cm howitzers. The road which ran parallel with the railway line was thronged with a column of German infantry. As our engines whined they all took cover and one or two fired hopeful shots at us. We could have strafed them but our task was to observe. We flew down the length of the column. I estimated it to be at least four regiments. An attack was coming.
“Seen enough, Flight?”
“Yes sir, let’s go home.”
We had just climbed to five hundred feet when they jumped us. There were three of them. There were two Aviatiks and an Albatros. Their firepower was less than ours but they had superior numbers. I saw Ted take out his rifle as I stood on my seat and faced to the rear. They swooped down on us and fired their machine guns. They had to fire over their propellers which made aiming difficult. Of course, once they had passed us then the observer could fire the rear gun. I used short bursts to discourage them. They had height advantage and they used it to gain speed. As they sped by us I felt the hail of bullets as the captain dived towards the earth. The barrel of my Lewis gun was pointed at the sky as I clung on for dear life. As we banked left an Aviatik was suddenly in the captain’s sights and he fired a burst. It was a frightening experience as the Lewis spat bullets just inches from my legs. I heard a crack and, as we completed our turn I saw the German aeroplane tumbling from the sky. The captain had his first kill! The other two Germans headed east again as we turned west for home.
