New Britain herald., 1917-07-10
BOMBING ESSEN AS
 TOLD BY AVIATOR
Sergt. GalloiS Describes Air At-
 tack on Krupps Works

Grand Headquarters of the French l Amy in France July 1O.-The most 1 daring air raid yet carried out against | the great Krupp MunitlOn Work at | Essen was recounted to a staff corre- | spondent of the Associated Press by Sergt. Maxine Gal1ois, who detied all the German anti-aircraft defenses and bombarded the heart of the German armament producing factories with high explosives, crossed the German front line twice, flew over many
 Rhenish cities and reached home
 scratchless.
 The whole flight lasted seven hours during which the intrepid French aviator was guided only by the moon ana, stars and the compass, as the voyage was made in the darkest hours of the night, the destination being reached exactly according to plan
 Sergeant Gallois narrated his story
 Tn the simplest manner. He said: t'our of us-Lieut. Ardisson de Perd1guier, Sergt. Durand, another 1 comrade and myself-left our base at
 nlghtfall Friday with the intention of reaching Essen. Soon afterward we ran into fOggy weather anl lost
 sight of each other. I flew at an al-
 
 over Metz and Thionville, following
 the course of the River Moselle.
 which, however, rapidly disappeared in the mist
 The batteries fired at me crossing
 the Rhine, and as I passed over Metz
 searchllghts played about the sky At Thlonville I heard another air
 plane nearby, but made it out to be Ardlsson's Afterward I was com pelled to travel by the aid of the
 compass, the stars and the moon.
 At Treves I saw heavy bonn bardment, which I calculated was directed at my comrade Therefore knew 1 was travelling in the right direction I did not see Coblenz.
 saw the reflection of the moon on the Rhine and found Bonn From there to Dusseldorf there was a regular
 sea Of electricity which increased as I
 got further north
 cologne was a. blaze of luminosity and at Duesseldorf there was all kinds of light, blue, red and white. All the
 tlme the anti-aircraft guns fired as I passed, and around Cologne the gum nerS were very accurate in the range Leaving there, I saw, like cliffs on the horizon, brilliant illumination
 Which seemed thousands of yards in length stretching to the left of Es
 sen, while southward was another long line of lights coming from the fac tories Arriving over Essen, I rose
 about mile and a half I circled
 around, searching for a place where the lights from the workshops ap-
 peared densest. Then I threw the l first bomb.
 Metz Chimneys Afame After counting ten 1 dropped the second, and then the remainder of the ten l carried at similar intervals.
 could not tell whether the bombs ex- ploded. but they probably did 1t was impossible to distinguish their effect owing to the flaming furnace chin,
 neys.
 My duty done, I turned home ward not having seen m;- comrades again. I came back exactly the same way I went and was fired at many | times.
 Nearing the base. owing to the 1 darkness, I could not tell exactly where I was. I thought possibly | 1 was still over the German lines and ] decided to continue westward as long as the petrol lasted. Suddenly I rec 1 ognized prearranged signal and ! manage to land just at dawn at the sme place from which I had depart ed. The distance covered was about 1 466 F miles.
 The correspondent saw the notes
 made by Gallois during the flight 1 There were just a few words and fig
 ures marking the places sighted and 1 the hours of arrival. The last entry 1 is Essen. It is there.' Showing that he reached that point on scheduled | time.
 Sergt. Gallois, who is thirty fight i years old, served in the Dragoons ] when the war started. He applied four times for the aviation corps unsuc- cessfully, but was accepted on the fifth application although he had no l knowledge of flying. He rapidly | learned piloting and overcan1e the /, difficulties in night flying, which en- /, abled him to carry out his latest eX- ! petition with success.
 His comrades, Lieut. Ardsson and 1 Sergt Durand, both returned to the i French base. having gone as far as l Treves, where they found that their l supply of gasoline would not permit i them to reach Essen, so they dropped i all their bombs on Treves before flying | home.
 It is believed that the fourth man | reached and bombed Essen. but he 1 has not returned to the base. When Gallois landed he was unable ] to get out of his machine owing to
 fatigue and blindness, but is
 quite recovered and is prepared to i undertake further expeditions He l told the correspondent that he had
 never been a great sportsman except 1 so far as concerned cycling.