1917 Eagles Fall Read online

  Chapter 2

  To my embarrassment I was cheered by the whole mess when I entered. Johnny and Freddie had saved a place between them for me. I could see that Ted and Gordy were put out. I smiled and sat between my two wingmen. Charlie Sharp gave me the thumbs up. His face showed his delight at my return. After we had said Grace I was bombarded with question from my two young pilots about my escape, my crash and my flight across northern France and Belgium. I noticed that all the other younger officers were listening keenly.

  I was glad when we had the toast and were able to retire to the comfortable seats. This time I managed to get my own chair and Gordy and Ted sat close by while Charlie sat on the arm of the settee.

  “The Luger came in handy then, sir.” Charlie had been my sergeant and could not get into the habit of calling me, while in the mess, Bill.

  “It did but, ironically, it almost got me shot when we landed in England.”

  “That Ebbs sounds like an idiot. He must be one of those armchair generals we hear so much about.” Gordy had never been keen on officers when he was a sergeant and now that he was one himself it was only those in our squadron whom he rated.

  “Looking at the way the war on the ground is going there must be some of those armchair generals making the decisions right now. We made great advances on the ground in the first days of the Somme offensive and then they make a mess of it.”

  I remembered Albert. “Some of those who live here seem to have suffered greater losses than we have. We can’t change our generals. We just have to do the best that we can. There was an old man called Albert who gave his life so that Lumpy and I could escape. I owe it to him to keep on.”

  Charlie said quietly, “I don’t think any of us thought about giving up but when you fly over the front and see the wasted deaths, it makes you wonder. The fighting has eased off lately and that gives you more time to look when you fly over the front. It scares me.”

  Gordy waved the mess orderly over. “Enough depressing talk. Did you see Mary when you were in London?” The orderly came. “Same again, Jackson, on my bill.”

  “Yes sir.”

  I shook my head. “I was only there for a couple of hours. Just enough time to get a dressing down from the general. Beatrice said she had caught up with her a couple of weeks ago. They had lunch with my sister, Alice. Beatrice said she was really excited about the wedding.” I smiled at the relief on Gordy’s face. “Don’t worry; it is the women organising the wedding not us. It will all go swimmingly!”

  The sombre mood was lightened by the talk of the wedding for that meant leave. The Major had said that the flight commanders could all have leave in late November, early December and he, Captain Marshall and the younger pilots would all have the end of December. It was not altruistic; most of the young pilots did not have wives and children. New Year was a better celebration for the single young men. None of the wedding guests would be home for Christmas but I would be able to travel and see my family before I had to return to the front. If Beatrice could manage leave too then I would be able to have my family meet her.

  It felt strange, the next morning, not to be flying. It was just Ted and Gordy’s flights that were on patrol. As I had been told already the front was quiet. The Somme offensive had ground to a muddy, bloody halt. The patrols were over the front to discourage the Germans from reclaiming any of the precious land our lads had gained.

  Lumpy and the armourer, Flight Sergeant Richardson, were busy fitting the Lewis guns to the new bus and I was like a spare part. I walked with Charlie who was also having a rest day. We wandered down the airfield. Charlie had seen a few apples which had not fallen and he wanted to gather them. I was not much use with the one arm. However I had learned how to fill and light my pipe with one hand. I did so while he collected the latest windfall apples and reached up for the ones still on the tree.

  I leaned on the fence as Charlie began to open up. “I have never really thanked you, sir, for giving me my chance to be a pilot and an officer.”

  “There is nothing to thank me for. I was glad to do it. You deserve it.”

  “My mum and dad were so proud when I was made an officer. The other lads in the street are all privates or corporals. You know how it is.”

  I nodded. I did know. His people were like mine, working class and always keen to brag about their children who had bettered themselves. Charlie was still the same bright lad I had known as a young gunner but he had taken his chance.

  “What will you do after the war then, Charlie?”

  He put down the bucket which was now full and lit a cigarette. “I haven’t given it much thought. This war seems never ending.”

  “But it will end. What then?” I knew that Charlie had worked in a factory before the war; most of his uncles and cousins also worked in the grim northern factories.

  “I don’t think I could go back to the factory. I know cotton is supposed to be in my blood but I have been in the fresh air for the last two years and I like it.” He picked up an apple. “I would never have been able to do this if I had worked in a factory, would I? I’d like to fly. Perhaps I will stay on. I like the Royal Flying Corps and I like the blokes I serve with.”

  “What about a wife? A family?”

  “We don’t get much chance for that here do we sir? Besides, any woman who wants to marry me would have to let me fly.”

  He flicked his cigarette stub away and picked up his bucket. We began to walk back. I was thinking about my future. What would I do? I didn’t want to stay in the Corps. I wanted a home for me and Beatrice and not a barracks. I heard the drone of engines behind us. The flight was back early. Something was not right. Suddenly Charlie shouted, “Sir, they aren’t our lads. It is the Boche!”

  He dropped his bucket and began to run. I turned and saw a line of five aeroplanes. They were coming in either to strafe or to bomb us. I heard the bell being rung and the gun crews ran to the guns and their sandbags.

  I heard the unmistakeable chatter of a machine gun and saw an airman pitched in the air by the nine millimetre steel jacketed bullets. The gunner just made the sandbags.

  “In there Charlie, you can feed the machine gun!”

  We just made it behind the wall of sandbags before the first bullets thudded into them. I ducked down. I was annoyed that I could do nothing. I did not even have my service revolver. The five aeroplanes, which I did not recognise, machine gunned the gun pits and then climbed. The gunner had managed to cock his Vickers. “Is that it sir? Will they be off?”

  As they had flown over I had seen that they were a two seater and they had bomb racks fitted next to the cockpit. “No, airman, they’ll be back. Let’s see if you and Lieutenant Sharp can bag one.” I watched as they looped to return. Their first run had been to silence the guns. This time they would go for the six parked aeroplanes. I looked around for a weapon. The only one I saw was the Very pistol. I picked it up. It was loaded.

  They came in again. This time they flew a little higher and down the centre of the airfield. The heavy Vickers began to pump out bullets. There were tracer rounds which enabled the gunner to be more accurate but the Vickers was a heavier weapon than the Lewis and the gunner and Charlie had to tap the barrel around to follow the flight of the fast moving Germans. I had a sudden idea. I stepped out and aimed the pistol. Instead of firing it high I fired at a low trajectory. I had one chance in a thousand of hitting an aeroplane but that was not my main intention.

  The gunner was also the bomb aimer and no bullets came in my direction. I fired the pistol and then ducked behind the sandbags. I saw the flare arc over the first two aeroplanes and then, as it dipped just in front of the third aeroplane it exploded. The flash must have terrified and disorientated the pilot who suddenly jerked his bus up into the air. The fourth German kept on coming and when the third aeroplane over corrected his wing tip caught the fourth German’s tail. The crippled German plunged vertically and exploded in a fireball just a hundred yards from us. The explosion and the V
ickers hit the other aeroplane which also crashed and exploded on the runway.

  I heard the bombs from the first two aeroplanes as they hit our airfield but the fifth, having seen his fellow fliers crash and burn, banked and headed east. Archie came down the airfield. He was shaking his head when he met me. “And don’t think for one minute you can claim that one laddie!” The medical team were examining the dead airman. “We were lucky then. Very lucky. They didn’t hit any of the buses.”

  Charlie pointed to the dead and wounded airmen who were being attended to. “They weren’t lucky though, were they sir?”

  An hour later we heard the familiar drone of Rolls Royce engines. However I could detect that not all of the engines were running smoothly. I saw the six aeroplanes in the distance. That was a relief; they had all made it but I saw smoke drifting from the engines of two of them. When Ted fired his Very pistol we knew that they had wounded men in the buses. I watched as Senior Flight Sergeant Lowery and every man not attending to the wounded tried to put out the fires on the two German aeroplanes and clear the airfield. There was just enough room for a Gunbus to land but if they were damaged then it could be tricky.

  It was with some relief that we saw all six landed safely. We ran over to the most damaged of them. Doc Brennan was still busy with the wounded from the raid.

  Ted jumped down. “That was a nightmare. Some of the new Albatros D.III jumped us. They are so fast and manoeuvrable that we didn’t have time to make a circle. And they have two machine guns! I have no idea how Paddy McCormack managed to land his.”

  We went to Paddy’s aeroplane. The medical orderly climbed into the cockpit only to return five minutes later shaking his head. Paddy’s gunner lay on the ground being attended to. “He must have landed it while in his last dying moment, sir. He’s gone.” The gunner lay on the ground being attended to, Paddy had given him a chance.

  Another young pilot had gone west. The new German aeroplanes were gaining the upper hand and that was no mistake. We lost three gunners and four of the aeroplanes were too badly damaged to fly. The next day it was down to Charlie and the major to take up just five aeroplanes. They stayed well inside our lines. Their intention was to stop the Germans bombing our field. We were no longer on the offensive but were just hanging on for dear life.

  Randolph discovered, after the remains of the two aeroplanes were examined, that they were a type called Albatross CIII. Obviously the single seaters we had encountered were a newer version. We buried the four dead Germans but their belongings were collected and dropped, at dusk, two days later over the closest German airfield. The Germans had begun the tradition. This was one of the few opportunities we had had to reciprocate.

  And that was the way the Somme Offensive ended. It just petered out. Both sides were like punch drunk boxers. Neither wanted to quit but they had no strength to carry on. Nature and the French winter determined that there would be little flying until the Spring.

  The wedding party, as we were termed, left France on the 25th of November. We would all have to return to the airfield by the 8th of December. It was not long but it would have to be enough. Johnny and Freddie also took leave at that time but they did not come to the wedding.

  The day before we were due to leave Airmen Bates came in with that look of his which I now knew meant there was something he was unhappy about. “Come, on then Bates, spit it out!”

  He wrinkled his nose at my choice of words, “Well sir, I am pleased that you are going on leave; heaven knows you deserve it, but you need someone to look after you.”

  I smiled, “Don’t worry, John, I have Nurse Porter. She can see to me.”

  “Sir!” He was shocked, “You cannot have the young lady helping you to dress that would not be acceptable. She is not your nurse now, she is your young lady!”

  I shrugged, “Well you are going home on leave so I will just have to manage.”

  “No sir, I could look after you.”

  “You mean you would spend the leave looking after me rather than having time with your family?”

  He looked at me sadly, “I have no family sir. If I went home… well sir this is as near to a home as I have.” He turned to leave, “Of course, if you don’t need me, sir.”

  “Of course I need you, but I didn’t want to take advantage of you.”

  He looked puzzled, “How sir? I am a gentleman’s gentleman, it is what I do.”

  “Very well then although I am not certain about the available accommodation at the hotel.”

  He beamed, he was happy now. “Leave that to me sir. I have dealt with hotel staff before. I shall go and pack our things.” He went off to his little room whistling. He was a strange little man but I began to wonder how I had managed before he had been posted to us. He seemed to work in a different way to the rest of us. I wondered what he would do when the war was over. The world would be a different one then. Too many fine young men had gone west for it to be anything else.

  Chapter 3

  The journey back to England was far jollier than I had expected. Bates looked after us like a faithful sheepdog. The two young pilots were happy to be part of the group and Gordy was as excited as a puppy with two tails. Even Charlie seemed more relaxed and managed to call me Bill!

  We had a compartment to ourselves. Bates rarely sat down for he was usually fetching or carrying for one of us. Gordy took out the letter from Mary when we pulled out of the station at Amiens. “Now, it would be inappropriate for us to stay at Mary’s and so she has booked four rooms for us at the Lanchester Hotel. It isn’t far from the church. Of course, after the wedding there will be a spare room.”

  Johnny asked, “Why is that sir?”

  Freddie laughed and nudged him in the ribs. He whispered in his ear and the young lieutenant blushed.

  “I will need to get a room for Bates here when we arrive.”

  Charlie smiled, “He can bunk in with me if you like, Bill.”

  Bates was outraged, “A very kind offer, sir but I could not take a gentleman’s room. Do not worry, Lieutenant Sharp, I know the Lanchester. They have rooms for servants and I am sure I can arrange something. I shall find the conductor and see what time we reach the ship. There is no buffet car aboard this train! The French!”

  Charlie laughed after he had left. “A gentleman! We live in a little two up two down house!”

  Freddie asked, “Really? Where do the servants live?”

  It was Johnny’s turn to clip his friend around the ears.

  I laughed, “The point Lieutenant Sharp was making was that four of us here were not born gentlemen. We are gentlemen because of our rank. My family are servants. My sister is a housekeeper and my brother in law is a butler. If the war hadn’t come along then I would have followed in their footsteps. I would be a servant rather than having someone like Bates to take care of me. It takes some getting used to.”

  “But you are all gentlemen. Some of those who visited our family might have dressed well and spoken well but they were no gentlemen. I think, sir, that being a gentleman is something you are born with and, if you don’t mind me saying so, all four of you are gentlemen.”

  “Thank you, Freddie.”

  Charlie was probably as excited as the young pilots but for different reasons. He had been lonely as a gunner being a very shy young man but now he was part of a team and he had real friends. For him the Royal Flying Corps had opened doors, not closed them. In addition this would be the first wedding he had attended. That was also a cause for excitement, especially as it would be in London, a city that Charlie had never visited before.

  Poor Johnny and Freddie looked disappointed when they left us at Victoria. We had really had a good time on the boat and the trains and we had laughed a ridiculous amount at jokes and stories which did not warrant such laughter. That was war.

  When we arrived at the Lanchester it was the inestimable Bates who, confidently, took charge. He decided that the rooms we had been allocated were not good enough for someone who had won
the Military Cross. He had a word with the manager. We found ourselves in the best four rooms in the hotel while Bates was more than happy with his accommodation. He had a servant’s room on the top floor. He even gave us the address of a good restaurant nearby. It was too late to meet with Mary, Beatrice and Alice anyway and the five of us had a boys’ night out in London. Bates ensured that we all behaved but he had to help me put a very drunken Lieutenant Sharp to bed. He was simply too big for me to handle on my own.

  As he took me back to my room to lay out my clothes for the following day I asked, “What did you get up to Bates?”

  “Oh I just wandered the streets of London. It is such a lively place. You seem to have had a pleasant night.”

  “Well Mr Sharp certainly did.”

  “He is a nice chap, that Lieutenant Sharp. The men in his flight think the world of him. I dare say one night where he is the worse for drink is no bad thing; just so long as he doesn’t make it a habit!” I think Bates would have made an excellent teacher!

  I forced Bates to take the next day off and enjoy the sights of London while we went to meet Mary and Alice. Trafalgar Square was the place we had chosen as the rendezvous. The four of us were there early admiring the magnificent lions and the monument to a great hero. My dad had never been in the navy but he admired Nelson. I think one of my ancestors must have been a Jack in the Navy.

  We felt as though the cares of the world had been lifted from our shoulders but that contrasted with the faces that we saw on the streets. There were many women dressed in black; the deaths at the front had impacted greatly. We had been at war for just over two years now and almost every home had been touched. We saw few men and the ones we did see were, like us in uniform. We also saw a huge number of staff officers in smart red uniforms with the red band around the caps. We saluted them all but the senior ones, and there were many of them, seemed not even to notice us. The junior ones seemed almost embarrassed when they saw us, especially when they say the M.C. on my chest.