NIGHT BOMBING
WITH THE BEDOUINS
By One of the Squadron
ROBERT H. REECE
LIEUT. D.F.C., R.A.F.
With Illustrations
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge
1919
COPYRIGHT, 1919, ROBERT H. REECE
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
DEDICATION
In a spirit of the deepest reverence I dedicate this unworthy effort to the memory of a true sportsman, a loyal friend, and a gallant officer who was killed in action while serving his Country as a Pilot in the American Air Service,
LIEUTENANT SAMUEL PIERCE MANDELL
America has given of the finest of her Youth to uphold the Cause of Right, but she has given no one of more splendid promise than he, whose service was an example of devotion to duty, of readiness for action, and of undaunted courage.
His life was an inspiration to the living "to carry on" and finish the great struggle for which he died, that he and those like him may not have died in vain.
CONTENTS
ILLUSTRATIONS
NIGHT BOMBING WITH THE "BEDOUINS"
CHAPTER I
PER ARDUA AD ASTRA
In prehistoric times the first man to make for himself a stone hatchet probably became the greatest warrior of his particular region. He may not have been as strong physically as his neighbor, but with the aid of so marvellous an invention as a stone hatchet he undoubtedly conquered his enemies and became a great prehistoric potentate, until some other great man made a larger and stronger hatchet; so down to the present invention has followed invention and improvement has been added to improvement to such an extent that it is difficult to imagine what new weapon of destruction man can develop in the future.
What would the past generation have said of a man who had prophesied great armies fighting in the air? Even in the early months of the war there were but few who realized what an important part of the war was to be carried on in the newly conquered element. When the infantry saw an occasional box-kite-looking machine drifting slowly over the lines, struggling to keep itself aloft, how many, I wonder, foresaw that in a few months these machines would be swooping down on them like swallows, raking them with machine guns by day and bombing them by night? How many artillery officers laughed at the suggestion that a day was coming when thousands of great guns would be directed from the air? Yet in a few short months two great blind fighting giants, their arms stretching from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border, learned to see each other; and their eyes were in the air.
The first aeroplanes to cross the lines carried no armament; they were for reconnaissance work only; they would fly a few miles back of the enemy lines, have a good look around, and then come back and report what they had seen. Often British and German machines would pass quite close to each other. Flying was considered sufficiently dangerous, not to add a further danger to it by attacking enemy machines.
The Germans, however, because they greatly outnumbered the British in the air, had more eyes to see with; something had to be done; so rifles were carried by the British and a finer sport than shooting ducks came into vogue. This quickly led to the carrying of machine guns. Ingenuity in devising sights to compensate for the speed of our own machines and to gauge a proper deflection according to the speed and angle of approach of the enemy machine, soon decreased the advantage the enemy aviators had through superior numbers.
For example, if our machine was flying at the rate of one hundred miles per hour and the enemy's machine was travelling past us in the opposite direction at an equal rate, our fore-sight nullified our motion and enabled us to shoot as if from a stationary base, while our back-sight
Then a new aeroplane was developed, the single-seater tractor, with a Vickers gun, synchronized to shoot through the rapidly revolving propeller so as to avoid the blades. These machines were used to patrol the lines and keep enemy machines from crossing, or to accompany a reconnaissance machine as protector; for they were very much faster, easier to manœuvre, and altogether very much more efficient fighters. At first they operated singly, but it was soon discovered that two of these scout machines operating together invariably obtained better success than when operating alone. This led to formation flying, and up to the cessation of hostilities these formations grew in size and varied in shape.
The reconnaissance work was soon divided into classes: long and short reconnaissance and photographic reconnaissance. The long reconnaissance dealt with enemy movements far behind the lines; the short reconnaissance with enemy activities near the front. The photographic reconnaissance consisted of taking aerial photographs of everything of military importance within flying radius. These photographs pieced together showed the enemy defences along the entire British front and their changes from day to day.
Wireless apparatus was soon attached to aeroplanes, and this enabled an aviator to communicate with people on the ground many miles away; and so what was called artillery observation was developed. Roughly speaking, this is the direction of the fire of our batteries against enemy targets; but, just as specialization came in reconnaissance and fighting, so now machines specialized in artillery observation. To-day the efficiency of the artillery depends largely upon its direction from the air. For instance, when a battery takes over a new area the gunners may be called upon to fire at certain targets, such as cross-roads or houses used as infantry headquarters or ammunition and stores dumps, at a moment's notice. Consequently, if these targets are registered by aeroplane, all the gunners have to do when called upon to open fire is to refer to their registration book which will give them the necessary angles to use on their sights, then, by allowing for the temperature of the day and the direction and velocity of the wind, their shooting is certain to be far more accurate than it would be if the target had not been previously registered. The registration of targets to-day without the use of areoplanes is very often impossible.
The registration of targets from the air, however, is not the most important part of this work. For instance, a machine will be flying over enemy territory; the observer will see the flash of an enemy gun and will pin-point its position on his map, which is marked off into large and small lettered and numbered squares. This operation enables him to send by wireless what is known as a zone call, giving the exact location of the enemy battery to all of our batteries within range. The enemy battery then has to move suddenly, if it is ever to move at all.
Barrages can also be controlled very efficiently from the air, so, considering the comparatively short time that aeroplanes have been used in this work and the wonderful results that have been obtained, it does not take much imagination to see the necessity for all future artillery officers to be trained as aviators.
In the earlier stages of the war it was very difficult for Headquarters to keep in close touch with the infantry during a "push"; consequently, considerable loss of life might result from one portion of the line advancing out of contact with another. Probably the eagerness of raw troops to keep on advancing regardless of their objective has led to a considerable and unnecessary loss of life. The aeroplane can be used in these situations to great advantage, and after the development of what is known as "contact patrol" the aeroplane became the connecting link between Headquarters and the infantry.
It was not until 1916 that the full powers of the aeroplane as an offensive weapon began to be realized. Bombing was done, but it was of a desultory nature, and although the number of machines engaged in this work steadily increased, and the work itself became more and more diversified and specialized, it was not until 1918 that the possibilities of the aeroplane as a purely offensive weapon were appreciated.
An aeroplane can operate far back of the enemy lines, both in the day and at night; enemy troops in transport can be bombed: railway stations, sidings, etc., damaged; transports of all kinds delayed; and ammunition dumps, when located, can be blown up. In fact, military targets of all sorts can be attacked from the air that cannot be reached in any other way. The very foundation of a nation's strength in war, its industry, can be attacked from the air and, if attacked on a large enough scale, can be destroyed. For instance, eighty per cent of the German steel industry was within bombing range of the Allies. The Westphalian group of high-grade steel industries centred at Essen is about two hundred miles from Nancy. If this group had been bombed on a large scale the source of supply of German guns and munitions could have been destroyed; for a blast furnace destroyed cannot be replaced within nine months, and the destruction of the central electrical plant of a steel factory would place the entire factory out of operation for at least six months. The hundreds of bombing machines which the English aeroplane factories were turning out at the time hostilities ceased, and the thousands of men being trained for bombing, make one wonder what would have happened to the German industries if the war had continued through the spring of 1919.
Besides these hundreds of aeroplanes under construction and the thousands of men in training, the Royal Air Force had in operation, November 11, 1918, over twenty thousand aeroplanes, over thirty thousand aviators, and over two hundred thousand mechanics and other personnel.
CHAPTER II
THE "BEDOUIN" SQUADRON
The "Bedouin" Squadron, so called because as a unit it was constantly moved from place to place, and because its members as individuals were wanderers at heart, was formed in September, 1917, equipped with the large Handley-Page bombing planes, and sent to the Nancy front to carry out pioneer work in long-distance bombing. The "Bedouins," as the officers of this squadron were called, first saw the light of day in England, Scotland, Ireland, America, India, Canada, South Africa, and Australia. Before becoming aviators many of them had fought in the infantry on the western front, in Gallipoli, and in Egypt; some as officers, some as privates, but for no general reason, unless the law of nature which prevents squirrels from remaining on the ground also applies to men, they one by one in divers ways drifted into the Flying Corps, and flew different types of machines on different fronts until brought together and formed, "willy-nilly," into the Bedouin Squadron.
I
There was "Jimmie," whose insides had been shot away in Gallipoli. He was the envy of the officers' mess, because his newly acquired digestive apparatus, composed principally of silver tubes, could assimilate
Jimmie was the First Lieutenant of the Station; it was his job to see to the discipline of the two hundred and fifty mechanics, riggers, carpenters, armorers, drivers, and officers' stewards. He did this in such a way as to make all the men love him except the few, very few, who were surly slackers, and these feared him worse than death itself. Jimmie was always just, but he demanded results. To those who shirked he was a just judge and an unsympathetic jury; so, under Jimmie, slackers soon became demons for work, and later on learned like the others to love him. To those who produced results, he was a father.
I remember that shortly after the squadron took up its residence on the Nancy front, the Huns came over and bombed us severely; many of the mechanics were fresh from the factories in England and were quite unaccustomed to seeing the damage that one hundred pounds of high explosive can do to the delicate anatomy of the human being; panic seized them; but a greater fear possessed them when Jimmie's orders burst upon them like the rat-tat-tat of a machine gun; they marched as if on parade into the trenches, recently dug behind the hangars; then Jimmie, smoking an occasional cigarette, strolled up and down in front during the three hours' bombardment.
So the men soon learned, under Jimmie, the value of discipline; it meant their safety when under fire, and it meant freedom from military punishments. They were quick to grasp the fact that any negligence on their part might mean death to the aviator who flew in the neglected aeroplane. Flagrant neglect they soon learned might cause other deaths than those suffered by the unfortunate aviators.
II
There was Sammie, a prototype of the caricatured Englishman in our comic papers. Every American theatre-goer has seen Sammie exaggerated on the music-hall stage.
Sammie was a small boy with an eyebrow on his upper lip and an apparently permanent window over his right eye. Before joining the Flying Corps he had served seventeen months in the trenches as a private; finally, driven mad with filth, rats, and other vermin, he captured an enemy machine-gun emplacement single-handed, and was given a commission. Shortly afterwards he joined the Flying Corps, probably because he could not keep his new uniform clean while in the trenches.
Sammie was always immaculate, and as a uniform gives one very little opportunity to express one's individuality in dress, Sammie carried his handkerchief up his sleeve. Even Generals envied Sammie's field boots and every one who met him wanted to know the name of his tailor.
In peace-time Sammie would have looked like a toy Pom with a ribbon around its neck; but a more imperturbable man in the face of danger never lived.
"My word" was the expression used by Sammie to denote every degree of human emotion. If it was Sammie's lot to draw the occasional egg served in the Bedouin mess, his only remark when it hopped out of reach would be, "My word."
I remember one night when both of our machines were out of action, Sammie and I, who slept in the same hut, went to bed at the early hour of twelve o'clock; at about one in the morning the Huns dropped their first bomb very close to us; a picture of Sammie's mother was on a stand beside the head of his cot; a fragment of the bomb came through the wall of the hut and shattered this picture; I landed, as far as I know involuntarily, in the middle of the floor with a lighted torch in my hand; Sammie saw the shattered remains of his mother's picture; "My word, mother will be pleased," he said, turned over and was sound asleep instantly. I know Sammie slept because he never remarked on my taking a short cut to the trenches through the window.
Another time when a Hun bomb dropped in the officers' trench and failed to explode, Sammie, who was but two feet away, tried to lift it, failed, and then lay full length upon it, believing it to be of the "delay action" variety; when our Major, a bomb expert, appeared on the scene a few moments later and laughingly declared the bomb a "dud," Sammie's embarrassment expressed itself in "My word." If the detonating apparatus of this bomb had been all that the Huns intended it to be, Sammie would have returned to minute specks of dust and his name would have been added to the long list of dead heroes; but since the bomb was a "dud," Sammie was made the butt of his friends' wit.
Sammie was always philosophical. He was once ordered to take a new machine on a very long raid. We had all examined this new aeroplane and declared it a "dud"; so we cheered Sammie up as well as we could by drinking his health and inquiring into his taste in flowers. Undismayed, Sammie took the machine off the ground, with the wheel held into his stomach; the rigging of the machine was such that it would fly on an even plane longitudinally if the wheel was kept back as far as possible. By all the laws of aeronautics this aeroplane should have crashed before leaving the ground, but it did not. Sammie climbed it to five hundred feet in an hour and a half. As Sammie now had seven and one half hours petrol left and was still four hours away from his objective, it would have been quite justifiable for him to return without going any farther; in fact, it was the only reasonable thing for him to do; but Sammie always trusted to luck rather than reason, and his luck did not fail him. One engine "conked" and he was forced to turn back. He fired his forced landing signal when approaching the aerodrome, but the aerodrome was being bombed by the Huns in a very thorough manner and Sammie had to land in complete darkness, the inevitable result being a crash. Sammie extricated himself from the wreckage, found that both of his companions were dead, rescued one of the machine guns from its damaged mounting, together with several drums of ammunition and practised his marksmanship on the enemy planes until an enemy bomb ruined his clothes and left him, after a few months in the hospital, minus an arm.
III
There was "Jock," a "wee bonnie laddie," from the south of Scotland. He stood five feet three inches tall when wearing field boots with exceptionally high heels, but that did not prevent him from braining a Hun with the Hun's own wrench some sixty miles back of the enemy's front lines, and this is how it happened.
One morning, about three o'clock, information arrived, together with a complete and undamaged Hun aeroplane and two friendly Hun aviators, that at a certain German switch station a troop train and an ammunition train were due to pass at a certain hour. Jock and his pal left the congenial beer barrel,
In due time Jock and his companion landed in a small field a few hundred yards away from the all-important switch station. Here they descended and under pretence of examining their engine, although the first one of the ever-curious crowd was still several fields away, they looked up the word "wrench" in an English-German pocket dictionary; they then marched off to the switch station. Fortunately there was but one occupant, for neither Jock nor his companion could talk German, and the idiocy of not carrying a more serviceable weapon than a pocket dictionary never occurred to the mad Scot until his companion began to make weird gurgling sounds, evidently intended for the language of the Hun, addressed to the astonished station-master.
Then down through generations of oatmeal-eating bandits came a glimmer of sense to Jock. He grabbed the first thing within reach, a wrench, and brained the Hun station-master with a blow; then the mad but somewhat sobered adventurers found and pulled the switch lever so as to bring the approaching trains into collision, and departed. When Jock saw the crowd which had collected about his aeroplane, he took a solemn oath never to touch beer but to stick to whiskey; but the crowd, which included a few Hun soldiers, respectfully made way for the "camouflaged" British aviators and a few moments later, wet with cold perspiration, they were in the air. Thoroughly sobered, they made for home with their engine "full out." Six weeks later "intelligence" reported that a German troop train and ammunition train had collided.
IV
There was "Mac," a North of England man. Before the war he was a typical English sportsman; he lived for hunting, and polo was his hobby. Like the rest of his class he pushed his way into the fighting line as soon as possible, as a private in the First Hundred Thousand. But eventually his genius expressed itself and leaving the known walks of man he became a master of the newly conquered element. Mac's mind was not limited by science, his soul was not dwarfed by religious prejudice, he held no political position, and he had no personal military ambition. He fought to defeat a threat to the civilization he believed in, to preserve a form of government that his ancestors had bled and died for, and to secure a future for his tiny son free from the hell of war. Mac, like every other man who had the courage to fight, and if necessary, die for his beliefs, hoped that the fighting man would be allowed to fight on until these ends had been achieved so that those who had died should not have made the great sacrifice in vain. He hoped, like all other fighting men, that politicians would not be given the power to render valueless to posterity the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of lives; but Mac was merely a man, of fearless integrity, honesty of purpose, with humanitarian ideals, and a believer in Democracy; he could not realize that a large majority, because of selfishness, ignorance, and a lack of the spirit of self-sacrifice, do not deserve the right to vote. But Mac was a sportsman and a gentleman, the descendant of generations of men who faced death willingly in a cause they knew was honorable and who died happily in the thought that their death made life easier for future generations. So Mac did not worry about the selfish ambitions of men; he did all he could to win the World War.
I first met Mac a few months after he flew a Handley-Page machine from London to Constantinople and back to Salonica, a distance of over two thousand miles. Mac was a Captain then, he is a Captain now, but no living man has done more damage to the Hun than Mac has done. A far greater leader of men than his great uncle, who was a General in our Civil War, Mac gave a soul to the Bedouin Squadron. To Mac's leadership is due the first bombings of Mannheim, Coblenz, Thionville, Frankfort, and Cologne.
It was Mac who flew a German aeroplane to Sedan, followed a "spotted" train to a near-by station, swooped down as the German High Command left the train and opened on them with his machine gun. It was Mac who landed over ten times near Karlsruhe at night and returned with invaluable information. But it is not because of the innumerable suicidal adventures of which Mac is the hero that every Bedouin, no matter in what part of the world he may be, always drinks a silent toast to Mac whenever possible; it is because every Bedouin realizes that a great man carried out a small man's job in a great way.
V
"Gus" was the president of the Bedouin mess, and probably because of an early education at Heidelberg, he believed in starving the British aviator. At all events, while Gus was mess president we all starved with agonizing slowness, for Gus had but two ideas of what constituted a menu. Our meals consisted solely of "bully beef" and Brussels sprouts; this meal was varied occasionally by leaving out the sprouts. To every indignant complaint from long-suffering members of the officers' mess, Gus would answer with the incontrovertible statement that "humming-birds' tongues cannot be purchased with tuppence"; this incontrovertible statement always reduced the complaining member to frothings at the mouth and other signs of inexpressible rage. Nevertheless, under the starvation system of Gus's stewardship a large credit balance was established at the Société Générale, which enabled the succeeding mess president to replace the expert electrician, who by army wisdom had been converted into a poisonous cook, with a Frenchman, whose cooking was not cooking at all, but an art which filled the Bedouins with admiration and destroyed their waist lines. Six-course banquets, ending with a rare old yellow Chartreuse, became the order of the day, and whenever some seductive delicacy defied analysis we would ask Gus if it contained the tongue of the humming-bird.
But Gus, although a failure in always satisfying the epicurean tastes of the Bedouins, won fame by being the first to bomb Cologne.
VI
"Mid" was a Yank who joined the squadron a few months before its "bust-up." Mid had been a private in the first American contingent to arrive in France; but because he was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and knew that automobiles were manufactured in Detroit, Michigan, he was given a commission. The Bedouins first met Mid in January, 1918. He had run his car—Mid was always driving a car—into a snowdrift, and wandered a couple of miles through a blizzard in search of help. Fortunately for us, he tumbled into our mess in the midst of a "storm celebration"; i.e., a celebration in honor of a storm which forces
Mid soon won the hearts of the Bedouins by showing a proper appreciation for hot rum, and when he prefaced his first remark to the C.O. with "Say, kid," the Bedouins realized that Mid gave every promise of making this "storm celebration" unique in Bedouin history, and as far as Mid was concerned it certainly was.
Mid entered into the spirit of the occasion with Western thoroughness and learned a lesson in a few hours which it has taken some men years to learn—that hot rum when taken on a cold and empty stomach must be treated with respect; in fact, a certain amount of coyness is not out of place. Mid was soon being supported on a chair while he delivered an epic on the "soul of a jellyfish"; he was then tossed in the "sacred blanket" and put through other Bedouin initiations; after which he was tucked comfortably in Jock's bed, while Jock, bound hand and foot and rolled in blankets, made horrid Highland remarks from the draughty floor of the hut.
Dear old Mid, however, bore no ill-will to the Bedouins for what he might have considered unceremonious treatment of an American officer who was an honored guest. The next morning with a humble but dignified mien, Mid apologized for everything that he had done. As a matter of fact, the only disreputable thing Mid had done while under the influence of an excess of hot rum on an empty stomach was to make friends with a few men whom the Huns had sworn to kill on sight.
Nothing daunted, Mid soon "wangled" permission to become attached to the Bedouin Squadron, and a more dare-devil spirit and lovable comrade than Mid did not exist among the Bedouins. He was always as keen for work as he was "full out" for a party, and he was always the life of a celebration. I remember one night when the C.O. read out at dinner a telegram which concisely stated that His Majesty the King had awarded to one of the Bedouins a very great honor, Mid broke loose. "Say, kids," he said, "I want to say right here that it's a great honor for my mother's younger son to be a Bedouin, and since it's a 'dud' night I want to ask your permission, Sir" (turning to the C.O.), "to present every Bedouin with a quart of the best." Permission being given by the C.O. on the condition that the C.O. himself would be allowed to share in the "largess," every Bedouin had placed before him a quart of Heidsieck Monopole. Songs and speeches followed, and Mid, since he could not "take the air," took the floor.
"Fellow citizens," he said, balancing himself on an upturned beer barrel, "it gives me great pleasure to be able to stand before you this evening"; support given and applause. "It has always seemed to me that the greatest country in the world might be considered a bit slow in entering the war." [Hear! Hear!] "But, gentlemen, now that we are in, I want to say that we will be the first out." [Loud applause!] "I want you to understand that because the United States has always been considered the historic enemy of Great Britain, Germany was enabled to persuade an ignorant electorate that the United States and Germany were friends. But now we are in, we are in to the finish. When I say finish, gentlemen, I mean a finish to the fighting, but I beg of you to be careful of the non-fighting part of my country's population, and their representatives. More I cannot say, except this, if ever your King or your sea-power is threatened, you may depend upon every true American; we owe you a debt, and depend upon it every descendant of the founders of our country will die before that obligation is allowed to be repudiated." With loud cheers, Mid was lifted from his perch.
VII
The Bedouin who held the unenvied record for crashes was known throughout the service as "Killem." Almost every time he went on a raid he crashed his machine, fortunately for him on this side of the lines. One night, returning from a raid on the Boche magneto works at Stuttgart, he lost his way and was forced to land, because of engine trouble, in France, near the Swiss border. The topography of the country here being mountainous, he was fortunate in merely "writing off" his aeroplane. He might easily have killed himself and his two companions, but he came out of the crash quite unhurt except for a severe chill contracted by a forced sojourn in the icy waters of a shallow pond. Pinned beneath the wreckage of his machine with an unpleasant ripple of water in close proximity to his chin, Killem had an excellent opportunity to think over his past sins while his companions in misery, who had been thrown clear for no other reason apparently except that the devil takes care of his own, struggled manfully, one with a broken arm and the other with a wrenched knee, to release him from the pressure of wreckage which held him helpless.
A few nights after this unpleasant experience the mad fellow "took off" down wind. This idiotic method of leaving the ground resulted in his being barely able to rise above the roofs of the near-by village and brought him into direct contact with the church spire. The spire being of solid construction withstood the impact; the aeroplane did not. So Killem and his companions, together with the wrecked Handley-Page and one thousand five hundred and sixty-eight pounds of undetonated bombs descended onto the street below—UNDETONATED. It was exceedingly fortunate for the inhabitants of the French village that the bombs remained undetonated. Killem crawled out of the wreck, looked ruefully at the church spire, and muttered, "I've always felt that I should have gone oftener to church in my youth. Now look at the damned result of my negligence."
It was Killem who tested out a new aeroplane one day while a south wind equal to the air speed of his machine was blowing. While flying north he travelled over the ground twice as fast as he travelled through the air, but when he turned around over the city of Toul he remained stationary. He was travelling through the air as fast as before, but now he was headed south, and as the wind passed over the ground toward the north as rapidly as Killem travelled through the air toward the south, the inhabitants of Toul were amazed to see a heavier-than-air machine remaining stationary above their heads. This situation greatly alarmed a dear old lady of Toul, who eventually arrived at our aerodrome in a donkey cart with the astounding information that one of our planes "had run out" of petrol and was stalled directly above her house.
CHAPTER III
THE BEDOUINS AT OCHEY AERODROME
If you had visited the Bedouin Squadron at about eleven o'clock in the morning you would have received quite a shock when entering the officers' mess. In the first place, you would have found the mess deserted except for several dogs of unknown species and innumerable cats,—some proudly nourishing recent offspring, others in various stages of anticipation of a similar pleasure. Secondly, you would have been surprised at the comfortable, if not artistic, interior of our exteriorly unattractive hut. In the centre of the "ward-room" or sitting-room was an open fireplace of ingenious design. On a stone and earth base, covered with sheet iron, rested a large cast-iron box with
The walls of the room were draped with rich damask; as the officers' steward who produced this incongruous luxury was an ex-convict, no inquiries were made concerning it.
In the same hut with the ward-room and adjoining it was the mess or dining-room and beyond this was the "galley" or kitchen. While the Bedouins were inflicted with a cook who had been in pre-war days an expert electrician, the kitchen would not have been your most attractive route to the officers' sleeping-quarters.
Presuming that you left the mess through its more congenial exit, the ward-room, the next hut you would have come to was the officers' quarters. There at eleven o'clock in the morning you would have heard a full symphony rendered by twenty lusty sleepers. "Is this war?" you might have asked yourself if you did not have in mind that you were visiting a night-bombing squadron. The officers in this hut had returned but five or six hours previously from an all-night raid over Germany.
Beyond this hut are the men's quarters which are deserted at this hour. Across the road is the workshop or repair factory which, under the eye of "Bill," the engine officer, runs "full blast" from six in the morning to nine or ten at night. Next to this miniature factory is the armorers' hut where all the machine guns are overhauled daily, ammunition tested as regards rims, sunken caps, etc., and every possible precaution taken to render the guns thoroughly efficient.
Near by are the huge, camouflaged hangars, or buildings containing the aeroplanes. Here the mechanics are "tuning up" the engines; the riggers are trueing up the aeroplanes, tightening a flying wire here, loosening a landing wire there, testing controls; in fact, doing all that scientific knowledge and care can do to reduce the chance of accident from mechanical imperfection. And upon these patriotic, scientific mechanics, working for their country and their ideals and recompensed from a pecuniary point of view with a shilling or two a day, rested to a large extent, the lives of the aviators and the success of their various adventures.
Back of the hangars and near the officers' quarters is the squadron office. Here are several clerks constantly engaged in recording all the details relating to the men's pay, their military records, their issues of clothes, blankets, etc.,—in fact, recording and filing everything dealing with the squadron's activities.
Next to the squadron office is the large map-room. If a squadron on active service can be compared to the human body, the map-room is the brain of the squadron, for here is kept all the information essential to the aviators. On one wall is a huge map of the whole war zone from the coast to the Swiss border. On this the front-line trenches are accurately marked, with their changes made from day to day. On the wall next to this map and at right angles to it, is a large-scale map of the entire region over which the squadron operates. On this map are numerous conventional markings which would have no meaning to the casual observer.
In maps of the enemy territory are hundreds of red drawing-pins. These mark the positions of enemy anti-aircraft batteries. As soon as information is received of the movement of one of these batteries, the pin which represents that particular battery is moved to the new position. Small yellow squares or oblongs with minute black marks represent the enemy aerodromes and hangars. These conventional signs correspond accurately to the aerial photographs of these aerodromes.
Small blue crosses represent the position of enemy balloon barrages and their height. The position of these barrages must be known accurately, for to run into them is fatal and at night they are very apt to trap the unwary. Roughly, they are a series of balloons supporting a huge wire net or cable streamers. The balloons, anchored to the ground and carrying the nets with them, are sent up to a considerable altitude about large cities and important industrial centres. They are to the night aviators what the spider's web is to the fly.
Another conventional sign of this map which is always puzzling to the uninitiated is a series of small pins with streamers attached. These streamers are marked with green dots. One streamer will have one green dot, another two green dots, another three, etc., while others will have different spaces between the dots. These pins mark the position of what is called the "Hun green-ball batteries," and these green balls, fired up to a height of about six thousand feet, direct the Hun aviators to their respective aerodromes when returning from a night raid.
A better system than this for directing aviators at night has never been devised, for low clouds or mist cannot obliterate the signal and they are visible to the aviator for over fifty miles. In fact, this type of signal was so very excellent that our knowledge of the exact positions of the various batteries was of great assistance to us in our raids over Germany.
On our side of the lines this map was marked with conventional signs similar to those which marked the position of enemy anti-aircraft batteries, aerodromes, and balloon barrages; but on our side of the lines there were large areas marked in red to indicate what was called "prohibited areas"; i.e., areas over which no aeroplane, Allied or enemy, could fly without being subjected to the fire of our anti-aircraft batteries.
There were also white drawing-pins, each bearing a letter, placed at irregular intervals. These located accurately the position of small lighthouses which are usually about fifteen miles apart and from three to ten miles back of the front-line trenches; the letter marked on each drawing-pin designates the letter flashed in Morse code by that particular lighthouse. This system of signals, used by
On the third wall of the map-room are aerial photographs of enemy aerodromes, railway stations, sidings, etc., and large-scale plans of German towns and factories.
On the table in the centre of the room are the various instruments by the aid of which the aviators are enabled to figure out their magnetic courses. Every afternoon the map-room is crowded with aviators. Here all the plans for the raid are made, the courses figured and marked on individual charts, the photographs or plans of targets studied and the best methods of approaching the target discussed. In the evening the wind soundings made by the meteorological expert are reported and again the map-room is crowded with aviators figuring out "drift" and "ground speed" and making out charts which will facilitate their navigation when in the air.
CHAPTER IV
A NIGHT RAID
Every precaution having been taken, the engines run, the controls tested, the compasses swung, the courses made out, the charts prepared, and the drift figured, the Bedouins sat down to dinner free from care or worry. The dinner hour was always set, winter or summer, at least two hours before the night's raid was to start.
A guest of the Bedouin mess on the night of an important raid would have been surprised if told that the jolly, laughing officers, who apparently had no thought in the world other than the enjoyment of various wines and viands, were soon to set out on a pioneer raid against a far-distant German industrial centre. For the Bedouins made the best of the present; they all knew what a long-distance raid over Germany usually meant; many of their jolly comrades would not be seen again. So they made merry at dinner and drank each other's health. The wine, however, was light, and even the most reckless Bedouin drank it in tiny sips, for the work to be done was important. The personal dangers of the raid the reckless Bedouins might ignore, but they knew that these raids fitted into the general tactical plan of operations; consequently, every Bedouin was imbued with a spirit of determination in spite of an apparent frivolity.
On entering the ward-room a few moments before dinner, the guest of the Bedouin mess would have been greeted joyfully by the officers who were singing lustily in perfect tune with a piano which was very much out of tune. A few moments later he would see these rollicking fellows stand silently at attention on the entry of the Commanding Officer until "Good-evening, gentlemen," from the C.O. granted them permission to "carry on."
Before the chief steward announced dinner, "apéritifs" were passed around; then the C.O. led the way from the ward-room into the adjoining mess, where the officers stood at attention on each side of the long table until the C.O. said, "Gentlemen, be seated." If any one came in late to dinner, he apologized to the C.O. before taking his place at the table; and no matter how oily and dirty he may have been a few moments earlier, he entered the mess clean, freshly shaven, and in neat uniform. This mess etiquette, as it was called, did not interfere in any way with the good-fellowship existing between the C.O. and his junior officers; but it prevented men who had been away from home and the society of ladies for many years from growing lax in manners and careless of personal appearance.
After dinner, decanters of port were passed around and the King's health was drunk: "Gentlemen, The King."
This toast means nothing to us Americans unless we have drunk it among British officers at the front. Under such conditions, "Gentlemen, The King," is a call to patriotism, a spur to endeavor, and an ideal of courage which must be lived up to. We Americans are so apt to think of a king as a despot or tyrant that it takes us a long time to understand the love which the Englishman has for his King. The King of England is as much of a symbol to Englishmen as the Stars and Stripes are a symbol to us. The King, as an individual, has no power, except the power of influence. This power is great when the influence exerted is in the right direction, but the King has no dictatorial power similar to that which may be granted to our Presidents. The King is merely a symbol which stands in the minds of Englishmen for patriotism, justice, democracy, and humanity. So when the Bedouins raised their glasses to the toast, "Gentlemen, The King," they paid a tribute to all that Great Britain and her Allies were fighting for—democracy, justice, and freedom of the individual from oppression.
After this final toast, every aviator went to his quarters and clambered into his bulky but warm flying clothes. There was no hurry or bustle, but each aviator, thoroughly equipped for the raid with maps, charts, and instruments, arrived at the map-room on a definite moment. Here he received a few final instructions from the Commanding Officer; then, smoking a last cigarette, he made his way through the dusk to his own aeroplane.
While the aviators drank to "Gentlemen, The King," the mechanics were warming up the twin motors of each aeroplane, the bomb-racks were being filled with fourteen one-hundred-and-twelve-pound bombs, the guns were being mounted, and by the time the aviators arrived on the aerodrome the huge Handley-Page bombing planes were in readiness for a nine hours' flight over Germany.
After climbing up a ladder to their respective positions, the aviators made a final survey of the machine on the reliability of which depended the success of their adventure. The engines were again run up to see that they gave the proper revolutions, the gauges inspected, the controls tested, and the return spring of each gun weighed. When thoroughly satisfied, each aviator took his place and his pilot signalled for the "chocks" to be withdrawn from in front of the wheels.
While the aviators carried on this final inspection of their machines, the aerodrome officer, stationed on a high platform situated in one corner of the field, awaited the signal to light the "landing T"; i.e., a huge "T" of electric lights headed into the wind, which shows to the aviators the taking-off and landing path. Each machine is given its respective letter for the day, which is flashed in Morse code on the navigation lights by the aviator when ready to leave the ground; he then awaits an answer from the directing stand. Simultaneously with the lighting up of the huge "landing T," the letter flashed from the first machine ready is repeated by the signal officer. The answer received, the machine taxies across the aerodrome to the starting-point, turns, hurtles down the flare-path and leaves the ground at the head of the "T." Under this simple method of direction I have seen twenty aeroplanes leave an aerodrome on a pitch-black night in twelve minutes without a single mishap.
On leaving the ground the aeroplanes fly dead into the wind for a couple of miles, circle back to the left around the aerodrome, and head into the wind again until the height
The night aviator, however, has many things to think of besides a constant checking and readjustment of his course according to variations in direction and velocity of wind. On his own side of the lines he is constantly challenged by searchlights which must be answered immediately if the aviator wishes to avoid the risk of being shot down by his own anti-aircraft guns or of being attacked by his own night-patrol machines. The method of answering these challenges is extremely simple. All that is required of the aviator is to shoot at the searchlight with a large pistol loaded with an enormous cartridge. The aviator, intent on his calculations and annoyed by any interruption, often wishes that this pistol was a deadly weapon, but it is not. It merely fires a certain colored light which floats slowly down changing in its descent to certain other colors, which prove to the officer in charge of the challenging searchlight that an Allied aeroplane is above him. The colors which are shown on one night, however, will not do on another, for these "colors of the day," as they are inappropriately called, are changed every night and the utmost secrecy is maintained in regard to them. Even the aviators do not know the "color of the day" until ten minutes before the start of a raid, neither do the officers in charge of the anti-aircraft batteries. The reason for this secrecy became apparent to the Bedouins one night when a Hun flew over our aerodrome shooting down our "color of the day," blinking his navigation lights, and finally firing down a red light which was our prearranged forced-landing signal. The aerodrome officer, believing that one of the Bedouin machines was returning from that night's raid with engine trouble, lit up the "landing T" and brought upon himself a shower of bombs which carried him into the Unknown.
After crossing the lines the aviators are intent on steering an accurate compass course, checking their position from time to time by various landmarks such as canals, rivers, cross-roads, and woods, and figuring changes in wind. The bursting shells of the enemy anti-aircraft batteries must be disregarded, for a slight détour around a particularly heavy barrage might mean an error of several degrees in their course which, unless corrected, would bring them twenty to thirty miles away from their objective after a flight of one hundred and seventy miles or more, and an accurate correction of a compass course after a wide détour is always difficult and sometimes impossible. Therefore, it is of the utmost importance for long-distance night bombers to hold their course regardless of the enemy's efforts at destruction.
The hatred in the hearts of the Huns, expressed by the constant "whonk" of bursting anti-aircraft shells, contrasts disagreeably with the loveliness of the moonlit panorama. All man's disfigurements of the earth are obliterated by distance and nothing but a scene of inspiring beauty is in view from the aviaors' lofty outlook at a height of several thousand feet.
The flashings of the guns, the "flaming onions,"—i.e., strings of phosphorus balls shot up to light the sky and to ignite any inflammable substance with which they come in contact,—and the black puffs of smoke from the bursting shells add a weird and startling brilliancy to the surroundings. No matter how many times a man may fly at night the immensity of the heavens above him, crowded with unknown worlds, cannot fail to impress him with his own insignificance in the general scheme of the universe, and Death itself appears of small importance compared to the way in which he faces it.
The aviators, however, have little time for reflection, for on a long flight they must keep a constant outlook for such landmarks as will enable them from time to time to mark their exact position on the chart and by comparison with their compass course and "ground speed" vary their course according to changes in direction and velocity of wind. An instrument called the "pitot tube" indicates the speed at which the aeroplane passes through the air, but the speed at which the plane travels in relation to the ground depends on the direction and velocity of the wind. They must also watch the flashes from anti-aircraft batteries and pin-point them on their maps if possible; aerodromes which are lit up, train movements, the lighting of towns, the blaze of steel factories; in fact everything of military importance must be recorded and reported upon, if accurately located. The night aviator, however, must be extremely careful in his observations, for it is very easy to get lost and it is extremely difficult to keep an accurate check, on the charts, of your exact position over the ground, even after long practice; especially is this true when the flight covers three to four hundred miles in distance and lasts from eight to nine hours.
After several hours of intense concentration the aviators approach their target, and although they have charted the course constantly they now spend some time in flying back and forth while they check off on a large-scale map the landmarks about the target and satisfy themselves that their long flight will not be valueless if the bombs are dropped with accuracy. In the meantime the sound of the motors, together with the telegraphed intelligence from other Hun towns, tells the enemy that Allied night bombers are in the vicinity. The Huns in charge of the anti-aircraft defences stationed about the target direct huge beams of numerous searchlights toward the sky and an intense barrage is put up above and around the target by the Hun batteries. The air is filled with shrapnel from bursting shells at the altitude at which the machine is flying, for the Huns have accurate instruments which gauge the altitude of an aeroplane from the sound vibrations of its engines. The aviators, however, are still intent on picking out their target (probably a factory which manufactures war material) and have not yet entered the barrage. The Huns, I imagine, often wondered why British bombers flew about a town for such a long time before bombing; the inhabitants always had more than enough time to enter the dug-outs before the bombs dropped. The British bombers, however, were not making war on women and children; they were intent on destroying a poisonous gas factory or other targets of military importance; so they flew about the town until the target was accurately located; then and not till then, they throttled down their engines
Great care must be taken when bombing a factory, for usually very close to it the Hun has located an unprotected prison camp filled with Allied prisoners, and we have official information that prisoners have so infuriated the Hun guards by singing "God save the King" or the "Marseillaise" during a bombardment of the near-by factory that they have been bayoneted to punish them for their "insolence." As soon as the aviators are away from the barrage, they steer a straight course for home, and again an intent outlook is kept for landmarks which will enable them to mark their position on the charts and figure their ground speed and drift. If their course is correct, they will see after a few hours a lighthouse several miles away dimly flashing a letter in Morse code. They head straight for this, and when over it they steer a course which will bring them to the lighthouse situated near their aerodrome. As they approach the aerodrome they fire down the "color of the day" and if the aerodrome is not under bombardment by the Huns the flare-path is lighted and the pilot spirals slowly down while the allotted letter of the plane is being flashed in Morse code on its navigation lights; as soon as this signal is answered from the ground, the pilot glides swiftly down to the flare-path. When fifteen to ten feet from the ground the Holt's flares attached to the wing tips of the planes are lit by electrical contact and the landing is made in a momentary but brilliant blaze of light.
It is interesting to sit in the officers' mess of a night-bombing squadron and watch the returning aviators enter. They are cold and stiff and all are very tired, for no man can fly without fatigue from dusk to dawn under conditions which demand intense concentration and entail a considerable amount of nervous strain, but now is shown the difference in temperament; some return with bloodshot eyes and haggard faces which indicate a condition of intense fatigue; others come in gaily as though home from a late dance; still others thoughtfully quiet. All of them, however, show signs of nervous strain and mental tension and they must relax their taut nerves before going to bed, especially if the raid was but another similar to those that had been carried out on several previous nights. So, while relaxing they eat bully beef sandwiches and drink hot chocolate or beer or, if the night has been particularly cold, a glass of hot rum. Deafened by the roar of the engines and the sudden change in atmospheric pressure they either whisper or yell if they speak at all, during the first few minutes after entering the mess. But the raid is over, so very little is said about it; every now and then some one looks at his watch and sees that nine hours have elapsed since the raid started; he says nothing but he and all realize that the machine which has not returned has used up its supply of petrol and that the fate of a dear friend will remain unknown perhaps for weeks, perhaps for all time.