by Adam Makos
Charlie thanked him. He knelt and sifted through the box as the orderly stood back. Charlie held Dale’s Guide to Understanding England book, and Dale’s postcards of California, where he said he planned to live after the war. Stuck to the lid of the box with tape, Charlie saw photos of Dale with his farm family and a photo of him standing proudly in front of his B-17, his hands on his hips. Charlie’s frown lifted slightly as the thought struck him. He and Dale had gone from being farmhands to captains of B-17s.
Charlie suddenly remembered the pride of flying a B-17. He remembered how the gunners waved when he formed up on another bomber’s wing. He remembered seeing white American stars on the flanks of bombers that stacked up to the heavens. He remembered looking across the frozen gap between cockpits and seeing a pilot like Dale or Walt look back at him and nod. The other pilots were just as scared to die as he was, but up there, Charlie knew they had mastered their fears by keeping the formation tight and sticking together. After two weeks away from the formation, Charlie had forgotten his pride. Looking at Dale’s photos, he remembered why he would not back out of the brotherhood he had volunteered for.
Charlie stepped from the footlocker and backed toward his bunk. The orderly scooped Dale’s belongings into his cardboard box, nodded to Charlie, and departed, the box between his arms. Charlie sat on his bunk in the empty barracks and looked across the aisle to where Dale’s footlocker sat empty. He suddenly knew what he had to do.
THAT SAME NIGHT
Charlie opened his footlocker and removed his leather jacket. With the jacket folded over his arm he entered the enlisted gunner’s hut. The gunners stood to salute, but Charlie told them to relax. Charlie approached a group of gunners huddled in the hut’s center around one man who was striking something with a clanging noise. When they saw Charlie, the gunners stood and backed away.
The man at the center turned and looked up at Charlie with a grin. Charlie could not help but smile when he saw that the rumors were true—Sam Blackford had returned. Charlie squatted next to Blackie and discovered he had laid a small sheet of metal on the floor over which he had piled wood shavings and sticks. Blackie held a flint clip in one hand and a square of steel in the other. With a smirk he explained that he was giving a Boy Scout lesson to his buddies.
“Back home, they call me Sour Dough Sam on the trail,” he said proudly. Charlie told Blackie he was not a bit surprised. Blackie noticed that Charlie carried his jacket.
“Do you still want to paint your jacket?” Charlie asked Blackie.
Blackie nodded, his grin growing.
“Will you paint mine, too?” Charlie asked.
“Sure,” Blackie said. “What do you want on there?”
“Two bombs,” Charlie said. “One for each mission and leave room for more.”
“How about I paint all the guys’ jackets?” Blackie asked.
“Good idea,” Charlie told him. “Paint ’em up.”
On his way out the door, Charlie stopped, having forgotten something.
“Blackie, can you paint the word ‘Bremen’ on the bombs?” he asked. “When we get home,” Charlie said, “we’ll want to tell everyone where we’ve been.”
TWO DAYS LATER, JANUARY 7, 1944
In the dimness of the hut Charlie dropped Marjorie’s letter into his footlocker and shut the locker’s lid. He had decided to write to her only after he had completed his tour, when he had something worth saying.*
On the airfield, a truck pulled up alongside the B-17 The Celestial Siren. Charlie and his crew—Pinky, Doc, Andy, Frenchy, Jennings, and Blackie—jumped from the lift gate along with three replacement crewmembers named Liddle, Miller, and Paige. War paint covered all of their jackets. Blackie had painted the squadron patch, a skull and crossed bombs, on the front breast of some and “The Quiet Ones” across the upper backs of others. On the jackets of the men who had flown on December 20, he had painted two swastikas, one for each fighter that the crew had shot down, and a bomb with the word “Bremen” written across it. On each man’s jacket read the words “379th Bomb Group.”
Charlie looked at his watch and declared, “All right, let’s get on with it.” The gunners sauntered around the plane to enter from the rear door. Charlie waited while Doc, Andy, and Pinky swung up through the hatch beneath the nose. The tired old crew chief, Shack, and his ground crew stood watching. Charlie tossed his kit bag through the hatch. He reached up and with an underhand grip seized the bar that ran across the hatch. In one smooth motion he curled his legs and swung up and into the bomber. His hand reached back down and slammed the hatch shut.
THAT DAY, CHARLIE flew the Quiet Ones to Ludwigshaven, Germany, and safely back. In the days that followed, the Quiet Ones would be issued a bomber of their own, a B-17G named Carol Dawn. They would fly their next twenty-six missions together. They would survive a mission to Brunswick when the bombers on their right and left wings would be shot from the sky, and the ride home from Berlin when they would lose two engines simultaneously over the sea. They would return from Frankfurt when a massive headwind slowed them to a crawl over a flak zone. During those moments of terror, Charlie would have flashbacks and glance at the bomber’s right wing tip expecting to see the German pilot there, flying with him.
On April 11, 1944, Charlie and his original crew would complete their twenty-eighth and final mission after an eleven-hour flight to Sorau, Germany. Beneath their bomber’s nose, Charlie would smoke a cigar and drink from a bottle of whiskey that he would pass between Pinky, Doc, Andy, Frenchy, and Blackie. Even Jennings would break his rule and take a sip. They had survived their tour and more. By the war’s end, they and other young men like them would have helped the 379th earn the title “the Grand Slam Group” for flying more missions, dropping more bombs, achieving higher bombing accuracy, and suffering fewer losses than any other group in the 8th Air Force. By war’s end, the 379th would be the best in the bombing business.
On that day when Charlie would watch his men toast their survival, in the back of his mind he would wonder about the German pilot who had escorted them out of hell. Who was he and why did he let us go? Charlie would look to the eastern horizon and secretly hope that his enemy would survive the war.
* * *
* “I told him that I was combat certified—war weary—and could get away with it,” Charlie would remember.
* Franz would remember, “At that time religion wasn’t the highest thing in Germany, but that did not stop us.”
* “There was no way that you could express that you made a mistake in volunteering,” Charlie would remember. “There was nobody that I could talk to. I couldn’t tell my copilot, any of my crew, or even the other pilots. I could not do anything that indicated any weakness.”
* “For combat people, self-medicating is a big part of their reason for drinking,” Charlie would remember. “I only had two men on my crew who were not heavy drinkers, and both men ended up with psychological problems.”
* The official accident report would declare that no one was responsible because “it is impossible to avoid such accidents with so many aircraft in the same vicinity.”
* Charlie would write to Marjorie, months later. When he did write, his letter would come back: “Undeliverable.”
18
STICK CLOSE TO ME
THAT SAME WINTER, MARCH 19, 1944, SOUTHERN AUSTRIA
LIGHT FLURRIES FELL from the gray clouds across the grass airfield as Franz knelt on the wing of the 109. Behind him, the wind blew across the city of Graz from the snowy blue mountains to the north. It was 1:00 P.M., but the winter weather made the day feel later. Franz leaned in close to the rookie pilot who sat strapped into the plane, his face long, pale, and harmless.
“We hit hard, hit first, then get the hell out of there,” Franz told the pilot, a young corporal named Heinz Mellman. Mellman nodded rapidly with fear. Today would be his first combat mission. Mellman looked like a teenager compared to Franz, now twenty-nine years old. Franz’s face had grown leaner,
his jaw stronger, and his nose sharper. Flying three hundred combat missions had turned him into a grown man. Franz and the rookie wore the new flight uniform: all gray leather with a black velvet collar. The rookie wore the other new fashion, a forage cap, a boxy ball cap with a long brim that kept falling snow from one’s eyes. Franz didn’t like the forage caps and instead kept his gray officer’s crush cap that was crumpled and worn in spots.
Franz gazed south across the airfield and saw three squadrons, some thirty-six fighters, scattered about. Graz Airfield was an earthen strip set almost within the city’s southern limits. On some days the grass runway wore a blanket of snow. On either side of Franz and Mellman sat ten other pilots in their 109s, each waiting for a flare to arc across the field and tell them to start their engines, the sign that the Four Motors were near. The ground crewmen in their dirty black coveralls kept their distance out of respect for the aviators.
Two months earlier, Roedel had taken Franz from Bobbi, Willi, and his comrades in Squadron 6 and shipped him to Yugoslavia. Roedel had promoted Franz and made him the leader of JG-27’s Squadron 12. Eleven pilots came under Franz’s care. Bobbi had to remain with Squadron 6 because he was their mascot, but before Franz and Willi parted, Willi had promised Franz, “Don’t worry, I’ll look after the bear.”
Just three days prior, Franz had led Squadron 12 to its new home at Graz. At Graz, new faces appeared—rookie replacement pilots. Within the batch of rookies were Mellman and another youngster, Sergeant Gerhard Sonntag, both assigned to Franz. Both of the young men were in their early twenties, but neither had flown combat yet. That day Franz had scheduled them to fly as his wingmen on their first mission. He knew if they survived a week’s worth of missions they might just make it as pilots.
Franz thrust a hand into his thigh pocket and scooped out a handful of roasted coffee beans. He chewed a few, savoring the caffeine kick. Franz offered some to Mellman, who declined. The days were gone when replacements were veterans of Spain or the Channel Front. What veterans the Air Force still had left were scattered at all ends of the continent, dropping one by one, leaving rookies like Mellman to take their place.* When Franz looked at Mellman, he knew he was looking at Germany’s great tragedy—a generation of innocents too young to have seen the rise of Hitler or The Party who now were forced to pay for their leaders’ sins.
Franz looked to the tower but still saw no flares. He knew the bombers were on the way. The early reports said three hundred American heavies had departed Italy and were heading north. At that moment, German Air Force spotter girls were sitting in the mountains of Italy and Yugoslavia, tracking the bombers with binoculars and calling in their progress to JG-27. The lower half of Italy had become the Allies’ newest base after their conquest of Sicily. Everyone knew the invasion of France would come next, giving the Allies new airfields, even closer ones.
“If you’re hit, bail out away from the bombers,” Franz reminded Mellman. “Float through a bomber formation and the gunners will shoot you.” The rookie nodded, gulping.
Seeing the ill effect of his warning so close to takeoff, Franz slapped the rookie on his back and assured him, “Stick close to me and you’ll come home alive.” Mellman managed a smile. Franz never was cocky before, but now he exuded a forced confidence to bolster the spirits of the younger guys.
Franz slid from the wing and walked to the fighter of his other rookie, Sonntag, to give him the same talk. Franz stopped and shouted back to Mellman, “If you’re going to get sick, do it now, outside your plane!” The ground crewmen thanked Franz with a chuckle.
After talking with Sonntag, Franz settled into his fighter. He still flew his old Yellow 2, only now the plane’s rudder was painted white, the mark of a squadron leader. Franz’s plane no longer wore the Berlin Bear crest on the nose. Instead, an edelweiss flower had been painted in its place, the badge of his new parent unit, IV Group. Sealing the canopy, Franz relaxed within the familiar aroma of oil, gun powder, and sweat-drenched leather. Franz rapidly cycled his black rosary beads through his fingers. The black paint had begun to fleck from the beads, revealing their true color, a pale purple. His prayers had changed lately. He now prayed that he would lead others well. He no longer prayed for himself or for his safety. He had long given up on the idea of surviving the war. Franz had been away from Squadron 6 for only two weeks when a sergeant came looking for him on his base in Yugoslavia. The sergeant nervously told Franz that the wing commander—Roedel—was on the phone in the tower, waiting to talk with him. The sergeant thought Franz was in trouble, not knowing that Franz and Roedel were protégé and mentor. The date was January 29 and Roedel was calling from his headquarters near Vienna. He sounded disturbed. The day’s casualty report, a teletype, had come across his desk. Willi was dead.
Willi had led his squadron against eight hundred bombers that had bombed Frankfurt. The bombers’ P-38 escorts had chased Willi down to earth, where the clouds were low and foggy. Disoriented, Willi had flown into the ground. Franz could not believe it. Willi was gone, at twenty-two years old, planted into the earth fifty miles west of Wiesbaden, near the town of Wurrich. All Roedel could say was that he was sorry. Franz heard defeat in Roedel’s voice. When he hung up, Franz buried his face in his hands. For a few days he beat himself up over the thought that he could have saved Willi, because they had once handled a dozen P-38s—just the two of them.
A red flare shot across the field. Dropping his rosary into his chest pocket, Franz signaled his ground crewman to crank over the engine. Franz and his pilots ignited their fighters’ snarling V-12s. The spinners of planes belonging to their sister squadrons—Squadrons 10 and 11—also spun to life around the field. Franz looked to his left and right to confirm that all his pilots’ engines were humming. White smoke belched from their exhaust ports. When green flares arced across the field, Franz flashed a half salute to his crew chief and taxied away. His two young wingmen and the others followed him into the skies.
Franz had not shot down a plane since encountering the wounded B-17 over Bremen on December 20. Since that encounter Franz’s priorities had changed. He no longer strove for victories. Now his mission was to get his boys home. With the arrival of 1944, the benchmark for the Knight’s Cross had been raised to “magic 40.” Franz couldn’t care less.
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, FORTY MILES SOUTHWEST OF GRAZ
From his perch at twenty-nine thousand feet, Franz and his squadron mates circled. Franz smiled through his oxygen mask. Some ten thousand feet beneath him flew thirty-five B-24 Liberators without fighter escort. The B-24s looked like mustardy brown Ts against the thick winter clouds. Several miles behind the bomber formation Franz saw a second batch of B-24s that looked to be even fewer in number.
Checking his wingtips, Franz told his rookies to tighten up. Mellman flew on his left wing and Sonntag on his right. The old days of staggered formations were gone. Now, with so many rookies in the ranks, the new German formation was to fly side by side so the flight leader could keep an eye on his wingmen.
The B-24s kept motoring northward, their gunners undoubtedly watching the 109s, waiting for them to attack. His heart pounding, Franz scanned the skies for their escort fighters. He saw none. This never happened over Germany. Franz was accustomed to raids of five hundred bombers and had heard that the 8th Air Force was now sending thousand-bomber raids, since February 20, a milestone the Americans called “Big Week.” What Franz saw below him seemed too good to be true.
“Keep your eyes peeled for escorts!” Franz’s group leader snapped over the radio. The group leader was talking to him. “Yes, sir,” Franz replied. Franz’s squadron was on “high patrol,” and their job was to watch for escort fighters and cover the other squadrons so they could attack the bombers. Below, Franz could see the group leader as he led the unit’s other two squadrons.
Franz scanned the skies, again, but was certain that the bombers had come without escorts. “Sir, you’re clear to attack,” he radioed the group leader. But something was
wrong. The group leader was not attacking. Instead, he led his twenty-four fighters in an orbit beyond the range of the B-24s’ guns.
“Sir, no enemy escorts in sight,” Franz said again.
“Keep looking!” the group leader replied tersely.
Franz saw the B-24s turning northeast. Franz’s heart sunk. The bombers were aiming for a target near Graz, maybe one in the city itself.
“Sir, what are you waiting for?” Franz asked the group leader, alarmed.
“Shut up!” the group leader retorted. “I’m watching for their escorts!”
Franz had seen some leaders, after they had won the Knight’s Cross, grow cautious and weary of combat, as if their incentive to fight had waned, but this group leader had no Knight’s Cross and half the victories that Franz had. Still, he was in command.
As the B-24s curved right, toward Graz, their American crews marveled at the sight of so many 109s doing nothing. In the lead plane a navigator of the 450th Bomb Group would report: “From the lack of aggressiveness displayed it was evident that the enemy aircraft were trailing our formation waiting for stragglers damaged by flak.”
Angry, Franz radioed the group leader and told him they needed to attack at once. He could see they were headed for Graz, the city of all cities that they were to protect. The group leader did not reply.
The first thirty-five bombers got away. Franz could see them, turning onto their bomb run. Flashes blinked through the gaps in the clouds over Graz and told Franz the bombers had dropped their payload. Franz saw the second formation of nineteen bombers now passing beneath him. Franz radioed the group leader and asked permission for Squadron 12 to attack the bombers below.
“Hold position!” the group leader replied. The second flight of bombers slowly slipped away. Franz had heard that Roedel was in the air with planes from I Group and III Group, patrolling northwest of Graz. But summoning him would require an act of mutiny.