The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-11-30
BACK FROM DEAD
American Flyer, Believed
Killed, Escapes Germans.
Twice Shot Down, He Finds
Self in German Hospital.
JUMPS FROM SPEEDING TRAIN
After Being Fugitive 72 Days
Reaches Dutch Frontier.
Narrowly Escapes Being Elee-
trOcuted by Border Fence.

London, Nov. 3O.-Lieut. Patrick
O'Brien of Momence. Illinois, south or
Chicago. the first American member
of the British flying corps to escape
from Germany. has arrived IN LONDON
O'Brien eluded his captors by jump
ing from the window of speeding
train He then became a fugitive for
seventy-two days and as his goal was
within sight. narrowly escaped cleo
trocution from the charged wires
along the Holland frontier
After cabling his aged mother. Mrs
Margaret O'Brien at Momence to eX-
pect to see him soon, Lieutenant
O'Brien called upon American Am
bassador Page to seek advice regard
ing his desire to be transferred to the
American flying corps. Last night /
O'Brien was ldined by a group of ad-
miring flyers who had believed he
had been killed when he was reported
missing on August II.
Is wounded and Stunned.
O'Brien, who is a sturdy young man
of 81, was flying in the American
aviation squadron at San Diego, Cal,
when he went to Victoria, B. c., and
obtained a commission in the Cana
dian army. Gong to France the next
year he distinguished himself by his
great daring over the German lines.
On the morning of August IT enemy
gunners forced him to descend but
fortunately he landed behind his own
lines. Late the afternoon of the next
day saw him up again over the Ger
man lines fighting the enemy. There
were twenty German machines to six
British in the encounter, O'Brien's
machine alone engaging four enemy
craft and accounting for one before
O'Brien was shot thru the upper lip.
He fell with his damaged air plane
from a height of eight thousand feet.
O'Brien says he cannot explain VIII
he was not killed When he regained
consciousness he was in German
hospital
Later the lieutenant spent three
weeks at a prison camp at Courtrai
before he was started for the interior
of Germany. There were three other
prisoners under strong guard in his
compartment when O'Brien, as a ruse,
had the window opened by complain
ing of the smoke.
Taken to Interior Prison.
The train was now sixty miles in
side of Germany and travelling at
thirty miles an hour. But O'Brien
decided to take a desperate chance.
He jumped from the train, Skinning
the whole side of his face, reopening
the wound in his lip and losing con-
seriousness. 1t was about 4 o'clock in
the morning and the darkness shielded
him. When he recovered he was ly-
ing in a field
Then for seventy-two days he was
fugitive, travelling only at night He
trudged thru fields and SWAN rivers
and canals in Germany. Luxembourg
and Belgium before he reached the
Dutch frontier At the time of his
flight he had a piece of sausage on
which he subsisted for several days,
after which his sole sustenance con-
sisted of turnips and other vegetables
found in fields.
Befriended by a Belgian
O'Brien did not know the German
language. but he used a little French
on a kindly Belgian. who was so happy
to meet an American in British uni
form that he sheltered him for several
days The Belgian then gave him old
clothes to cover his Uniform and
directed him to the nearest route to
the frontier O'Brien swan the river
Mouse near Namur and the next day
was challenged by German sentries
who decided he was a peasant. But
his narrowest escape was reserved for
his last day as a fugitive, when he
could see Dutch territory. To circum-
vent the charged wires O'Brien built
a bridge in a nearby wood and threw
it across the wires. but it broke under
his weight and O'Brien received a
shock which he says he can still feel.
When he recovered he dug with his
bare hands a tunnel under the wire
and. altho it was slow progress. after
several hours he had a hole big
enough to crawl thru, which he did,
unobserved.
Even then O'Brien was not sure he
was in Dutch territory, so he con-
cealed himself in a hay barn until the
next morning. When daylight came
the first thing he saw was people
making wooden shoes. He then
walked out into the open and hurried
to the nearest British consul. who ar
ranged for his transportation to Lon
don.
WAS SANTA FE ENGINEER