Fighting the Flying Circus

by Captain Eddie V. Rickenbacker

  While engaged in one of these mock combats over our field one afternoon we came down to find Captain Merian C. Cooper, the official motion picture expert, standing below watching us. He had his camera with him and had been attempting to grind out some movie films while we were flying overhead. He spent the night with us and after some planning of the scenario we decided to take him up in the rear seat of a Liberty (D.H.-9A) airplane and let him catch with his camera a real movie of an airplane combat in mid-air. All the details carefully arranged, we gathered next morning on the field, put him in the rear seat of the Liberty and helped him strap in his camera so that the pressure of the wind would not carry it overboard. Jimmy Meissner was to be his pilot. Jimmy climbed in the front seat, warmed up his engine and when everything was ready and we other “actors” were sitting in our seats waiting for him to get away, Jimmy gave the signal, opened up his engine and began to taxi over the grass. Several hundred feet down the field he turned back, facing the wind, which was blowing from the west. Here he prepared for his real take-off. His machine rushed along with increasing speed until the tail lifted, the wheels next skimmed the ground and the Liberty rose gradually into the air. Just as they approached the road which skirts the west side of the aerodrome, the Liberty's engine stopped. A line of wires ran along the roadside some fifteen feet above ground. Jimmy saw them and attempted to zoom over them—but in vain. The Liberty crashed full in the middle of the highway, bounded up a dozen feet and after a half somersault, stuck her nose in the ground the other side of the road and came to a rest.

  We hurried over, expecting to find the occupants badly injured, as the Liberty herself appeared to be a total wreck. But out stepped Jimmy and Captain Cooper, neither of them the worse for their experience. And to complete our surprise, the camera, although covered with the debris of the machine, was quite unhurt!

  That ended our little movie show for this day. We had no other two-seater machine on hand. But we were delighted to find that Captain Cooper, in spite of his narrow escape, was quite determined to go through with the show. So we went to the Supply Station for another machine and put the captain up for the night while awaiting its arrival.

  Next day, October 19, I was directed to appear before Major General Mason M. Patrick at Souilly to receive the American decoration, the Distinguished Service Cross, with four oak leaves. These oak leaves represent the number of citations in Army Orders that the wearer of a decoration has received.

  The usual formalities, which I have already described, attended the ceremony. Over twenty pilots of the American Air Service were presented with the D.S.C. by General Patrick, after which the military band played the National Anthem while we all stood at attention.

  I could not help thinking of the absent pilots whose names were being read out but who did not answer, and for whom decorations were waiting for deeds of heroism that had ended with their death. There was White, for whom the whole Group mourned. What a trivial recognition was a simple ribbon for heroism such as his! There was Luke—the most intrepid air fighter that ever sat in an airplane. What possible honor could be given him by his country that would accord him the distinction he deserved!

  One thing was certain. The reputation of these great American airmen would live as long as the comrades who knew them survived. Perhaps none of us would ever live to see our homeland again. I glanced down the line of honor men who were standing immobile in their tracks, listening to the last notes of “The Star-Spangled Banner!” Who will be the next to go, I wondered, knowing only too well that with every fresh honor that was conferred came a corresponding degree of responsibility and obligation to continue to serve comrade and country so long as life endured.

  CHAPTER XXXIII

  An Airplane Movie Show

  The new Liberty duly arrived and after a brief rehearsal of our parts in the coming show we again had our machines run out on the field on the morning of October 21 and took our stations in the line. Captain Cooper was again placed in the rear seat of the Liberty, with Jimmy Meissner in the front seat acting as his pilot. Jimmy was to keep his machine as near the actors as possible, always flying to the left side, so that the photographer might face the show and keep his handle turning with the least possible difficulty.

  Reed Chambers sat in the front seat of the captured Hanover and piloted it. He carried two guns which would fire only tracer and flaming bullets, and with true movie instinct Reed was prepared to do his utmost to imitate with two guns the Roman candle effect of the latest four gun effort of the Huns whom he was supposed to represent. In the rear seat of the Hun machine sat Thorn Taylor, the villain of the play. He was dressed in villainous-looking garments that would deceive even the most particular Hun. He too had a gun, one which swung on a tournelle and which would emit a stream of smoky and fiery projectiles when the climax of the action was reached. As a clever pidce de resistance Thorn carried with him, down out of sight of the camera, a dummy Boche pilot stuffed with straw. At the height of the tragedy Thorn was supposed to duck himself down out of sight behind his cockpit and heave overboard the stuffed figure, which would fall with outstretched arms and legs, head over heels to earth. This would portray the very acme of despair of the Boche aviators, who, it would be seen, preferred to hurl themselves out to certain death rather than longer face the furious assaults of the dashing young American air fighters.

  As to the latter—I was supposed to be it. In my old Spad No. 1, with the Hat-in-the-Ring insignia plainly inscribed on the side of the fuselage and the red, white, and blue markings along wings and tail sufficiently glaring to prove to the most skeptical movie fan that this was indeed a genuine United States airplane—I was to be Jack the Giant Killer, with an abundance of smoky and fiery stuff pouring from all my guns every time the hostile machine hove in sight. A few films of a distant formation passing through the sky had been taken early in the game so as to delude the innocent public into the belief that I was going up to demolish the whole caravan with my lone machine. A series of falls and spins would put the one Hanover out of the fighting enough times to account for a whole formation of them. Then as the last desperate encounter took place Thorn Taylor, after shooting all his spectacular ammunition well over my head, would force the dummy to commit suicide rather than longer endure the suspense of waiting.

  It was a clever plot. The whole aerodrome was in raptures over the idea and everybody quit work to gather on the field to witness the contest. I doubt if the later performances will ever have a more expectant, more interested or so large an audience.

  Jimmy and his camera operator got away safely this time and right behind them the comedian and tragedians of the show winged their way. Arrived at two thousand feet over the field we pulled up our belts and began the performance. It was necessary to keep an eye on the camera, so as not to get out of its beam while pulling off our most priceless stunts, and at the same time we had to be a little careful as to the direction in which our bullets were going. Captain Cooper was thrusting his head out into the slipstream manfully trying to keep my swifter-moving machine always within the range of his camera. As I came up under the Hanover airplane's tail I would let off a terrific stream of flaming projectiles which are perfectly visible to the naked eye and certainly ought to be caught by a camera even in the daytime. Thorn shot as lustily under me and over me as I approached and even Reed's front guns were spitting death in a continuous stream at the imaginary enemy planes ahead of him.

  Over and over we repeated the performance, the Hanover dying a dozen deaths in as many minutes. At last, our movie ammunition beginning to near exhaustion, it became necessary to stage a big hit that denoted the climax of the play. Coming about above the Hanover, while Captain Cooper was grinding industriously away not over twenty feet from its side, I came down in a swift dive, made a zoom and a renversement on the opposite side of the Hanover, and kicking my rudder over came back directly at the enemy, full into the gaping lens of the camera. Firing my last rounds of ammunition as I approached, I sa
w them go safely over the tops of both machines. As I drew in to the closest possible distance that was safe for such a maneuver I threw my Spad up into a zoom, passed over the vanquished Boche and came back in a loop somewhere near my original position. As I glanced at the Hanover I saw that she was doomed! A quantity of lampblack, released by the crafty Taylor, was drifting windward, indicating that something seriously wrong had occurred with the enemy machine. Such a dense cloud of smoke would satisfy the dullest intellect that he must soon begin to catch fire. Ah, ha! There she comes! I knew she was afire! Sure enough several bright landing flares suddenly ignited under the Hanover's wings throwing a bright gleam earthward but prevented from injuring the wings themselves by the tin surfaces above them. Finding existence on such a burning deck unendurable the poor dummy gathered himself together in the arms of the stalwart Taylor and with one tremendous leap he departed the blazing furnace forever!

  While Taylor kept himself hidden below deck Chambers, throwing out the last of his sack of lampblack, lifted over onto the side the doomed machine and gave a good exhibition of the falling leaf. Down—down it drifted, the daring photographer leaning far out of his cage to catch the last expiring gasps of the stricken Hanover —the last of the wicked formation of hostile machines that had dared to cross our frontiers early in the picture. And then—just as he was prepared to flash on the “good night” sign and entertain the departing audience with views of the best line of corsets to be had at reasonable prices at Moe Levy's emporium—just then the real climax of the play did appear.

  We had wandered some little distance away from the vicinity of our aerodrome while firing genuine flaming bullets over each other, so that the falling missiles would not cause any injuries to property or persons below. Paying little attention as to just where we were flying, so long as open country was below us, we had not noticed that we were some miles south and west of our starting place and almost over the edge of a French aerodrome. Suddenly a puff of real Archie smoke in the vicinity of the Hanover told me that some enthusiastic outsider was volunteering his services in behalf of our little entertainment. Another and another shell burst before I could reverse my direction and get started to place my Spad close to the black machine wearing the Iron Cross of the Kaiser. Reed Chambers took in the situation at a glance. He pointed down the Hanover's nose and began to dive for a landing on the French aerodrome below us. At the same time several French Breguets left the field and began climbing up to assist me in my dangerous task of demolishing the Hanover.

  Diving down to intervene before any more shooting was done I succeeded in satisfying the Frenchmen that I had the affair well in hand and that the Hanover was coming down to surrender. Without further incident we all landed and got out of our machines. The French pilots, their mechanics and poilus gathered about in a curious body while I laughingly hurried over to the side of Reed's machine and explained to the assembly the meaning of this strange performance. They all laughed heartily over their mistake—all except Reed and Thorn Taylor of the Hanover crew who, from the expressions on their faces seemed to feel that the joke was on them.

  Getting away again the Hanover flew home under my protection. After it had landed I climbed up through the clouds where Jimmy and the movie man were still waiting for me. There I stunted for a while in front of the camera, giving some excellent views of an airplane bursting through the clouds and some close-up views of all the aerial tumbling that a Spad is capable of performing.

  Next day Captain Cooper departed with his films for Paris, where he expected to turn them over to the American authorities and if permitted, take a copy of them for public exhibition in Paris and the United States. A day or two after Christmas, on my way through Paris to New York, I learned that these pictures had turned out very well and would soon be shown in the movie palaces of the cities of America.

  The captured Hanover was flown into the American Station at Orly, near Paris, a few days after the armistice was signed, and from there was shipped to America to be placed upon exhibition. Major Hartney and Laurence L. Driggs of New York, who were visiting us at that time, flew in it from Verdun to Paris in a little less than an hour and a half. One captured Fokker machine and an escort of two Sopwith Camels and one Spad accompanied them, for the enemy machines still carried the war markings of the German air service, and inquisitive Frenchmen along the way might be tempted to try to capture them a second time. So far as I know these were the only two enemy airplanes captured by the American forces during the war. The Fokker came down upon our field at Verdun just a day or two before the end of hostilities, and was turned over to 95 Squadron as their capture, since they operated this field. The pilot had given himself up, saying he thought he was landing upon his own aerodrome at Metz. He had become lost in the fog, and as the two aerodromes are similarly situated along the edge of a river's course, his mistake was quite understandable.

  Another two-seater, a Halberstadt machine, came down upon the American field at the Supply Station at Columbey-les-Belles under similar circumstances a few days before the armistice was signed. But in this case, the “capture” was a deliberate surrender. The two occupants climbed out of their machine and in pure New York patois informed the startled mechanics that they wished to make a bargain with them.

  They were, it transpired, two Yiddish gentlemen of German extraction, who for some years had been in business in New York. The war caught them in Germany and they were perforce thrust into the service of what had once been their mother country. After many vicissitudes, they both entered aviation, seeking the opportunity of flying over the lines and giving themselves up. Now a chance had arrived. Both of them getting permission to cross the lines in the same machine they had made straight for our headquarters at Columbey-les-Belles and now offered a perfectly good machine, valued at not less than ten thousand dollars in exchange for their freedom, and a pass back to the Bronx.

  It was an attractive offer, but since they were already in our custody as prisoners and the machine was regarded as a capture, their conditions were respectfully declined. The Halberstadt was likewise later sent to Orly and thence to America with the Fokker and Hanover, which had been taken in by 94 and 95 Squadrons.

  The following afternoon I escaped death by four red-nosed Fok-kers by the narrowest margin ever vouchsafed to a pilot, and at the end of the combat flew safely home with my twenty-first and twenty-second victories to my credit. Curiously enough I had gone out over the lines alone that day with a craving desire to get a thrill. I had become “fed-up” with a continuation of eventless flights. Saying nothing to any of my fellows at the aerodrome I went off alone with an idea of shooting down a balloon that I thought might be hanging just north of Montfaucon. While I did not get a shot at the balloon I got all the thrill I needed for several days to come.

  It was about five-thirty in the afternoon when I ordered out my machine and set off for Montfaucon. As I neared the Meuse valley I found the whole vicinity was covered with a thick haze—so thick in fact that the Germans had hauled down all their observation balloons. There was nothing a mile away that could be observed until another day dawned. Over to the south the sky was clearer. Our own balloons were still up. But no enemy airplanes would be likely to come over our front again so late in the evening.

  While I was reflecting thus sadly a bright blaze struck my eye from the direction of our nearest balloon. I headed around toward this spot in the shortest space of time. There could be but one explanation for such a blaze. A late roving Hun must have just crossed the lines and had made a successful attack upon our balloon over Exermont! He ought to be an easy victim, I told myself, as soon as he should start to cross back into Germany since I was on his direct line to the nearest point in his lines. He was now coming my way. Though I could not see him, I did see the bursting Archie shells following his course northward. He must pass well under me, and no doubt would be alone.

  Just then a series of zipping streams of fire flashed by my face and through my fuselage and
wings! I divined rather than saw what this was without looking around. Two, or perhaps more than two enemy machines were diving on me from above. Utterly absorbed in planning what I should do to catch the other fellow I had been perfectly blind to my own surroundings. The Hun balloon strafer had a protective formation waiting for him. They had seen me come over and had doubtless been stalking me for many minutes without my knowing it.

  These thoughts flashed through my mind as I almost automatically zoomed and did a climbing chandelle to escape the tracer bullets directed at me. I did not even stop to look at the position of my assailants. Knowing they were above, I concluded instantly that they had prepared for my diving away from them and that therefore that would be the best thing for me to avoid. I fortunately had reasoned correctly. As I corkscrewed upward two red-nosed Fok-kers, my old friends of the von Richthofen Circus sped down and passed me. But even before I had time enough to congratulate myself upon my luck I discovered that only half of the formation had passed me. Two more Fokkers had remained above on the chance that I might refuse to adopt the plan they had determined for me.

  One glimpse of the skillful maneuvers of these two upper Fok-kers showed me that I was in for the fight of my life. I lost all interest in the progress of the balloon strafer that had destroyed one of our balloons under my very nose. My one desire was to get away off by myself, where thrills were never mentioned. The masterly way in which the Fokkers met and even anticipated every movement I made assured me that I had four very experienced pilots with whom to deal. Zigzagging and side-slipping helped me not one whit and I felt that I was getting a wind-up that would only sap my coolness and soon make me the easy prey of these four extremely confident Huns. The two machines that had first attacked me remained below me in such a position that they invited my attack, while also preventing my escape in their direction. I made up my mind to start something before it was too late. Even though it meant getting into trouble, I decided that would be better than waiting around for them to operate upon me as they had no doubt been practicing in so many rehearsals. Noting a favorable opening for an attack on the nearest man below me I suddenly nosed over at him and went hurtling down, shooting from both guns.