The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1918-09-19
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SOLDIER BOY LETTERS
Letters from Lieut.. Lyman Case.
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Letters from Lieut.. Lyman Case.
August 1, 1918.
Dear Folks: 1t is a wonderful
war anyway. | can hear the large
guns banging away now up on the
front. And every clear night we
have sweet music to put us to sleep
aircraft batteries.
troll this a. m. and believe me, they
sure did some good shooting at us.
You could see the shells bursting all
around. One hit me and gave me a
though some of the bombing ma
chimes did. Got letter from Ralph
Silvers this week. He is o. k. When.
we have been over here Is months
we get two months in the States, so
look for me. Am rather tired to-
working on our tennis court. We
are gettings things fixed up pretty
nice over here now. We painted
our mess hall and are having fine
Our work is very interesting and
we are doing fine so far. We have
MT run into many Huns yet but we
have one SO far, got my first shot
at Hun this afternoon. Five OF us
were flying at $1,000 when one
loader dived on him and we ali
followed. | went on him straight
down and fired at him. l could see
my, tracer bullets go all around him
and some OF them hit the machine.
Eyer Every o. one shot 6fd at him and Nd he went
see, him crash, but are in hopes
that we got him. If we did it will
be one ffth of Hun for each of us.
The, other day | had a complete
washout with my machine and never
got a scratch. My engine went dead
fifty, feet off the ground. l at once
started to pump pressure and also
pick landing place. The result
was me, hitting a wheat field about
100 miles per hour and making a
G G2d p LOOP POP on the ground 1t
what had happened. When it sto-
ped the tail of my machine was un-
der my engine. 1t had broken off
just behind my. head. l will send
you picture Of it soon. | crawled
sight but never even scared me.
Aug. 6, 1918.
My letter in the Chronicle was
sure funny | sent it to Bishop May
s snnf aooHt W. n 1nst ea11ed good
.week: He was in patrol and they
ran into Huns He was not seen
after that. We have four Huns SO
ar. now. ! haven't been in real
scrap yet: 1t seems like | miss every
Ratrol, when we meet Huns. We
ed yet. | was >p to the front lines
day before yesterday l could hear
the shells Whist1ing/ overhead. Things
We're sure shot up. l got some piec-
es Of shrapnel from the shell bat
b eTed {oW U e of Ypres Two Of US
1000 feet and the Huns started to
shoot machine guns at us. You
could see the tracers going by you.
We about turned" and came back.
May have scrap to tell you about
next time
France, Aug. 10, 1918.
we. have been busy over here all
the time. Have had some bad
weather so we couldn't fly. We
have several Huns now to our credit
troll. Will tell you about one of our
throat.) Eight of us were flying
over Hunland about fifteen miles in
when we saw four Hun machines be-
low 70 us. wy, We turned and dived on
tasned and ,feS to saV diy Ss away snsy
I We kept on diving about 200 miles
per hour and caught them. They
Kept diving trying to get away from
us, but we kept on their tails. We
got down pretty close to the gruond
at the last and when we quit We had
three crashed on the ground. 1
shot at one but another man chased
him down. When we started home
they opened up on us with machine
guns from the ground. We were
only 1900 feet up. Believe me,
! when, you hear ca Gee! ca Gee! all
round you. you know they are com
clouds and had to find my way home
by compass. They kept shooting at
me wit, machine guns up to 1000
feet then they started with anti
aircraft guns. They sure were COM
ing close. too Well, got home all
Q. k. and only had two bullet holes
IN my machine and one bunch of
shrapnel hit my wing. One bullet
hole was Just in my fusilage and
had missed my head by about three
feet Coming close /eh?
son yesterday. VIII look him up
are strong over here and the Huns
will soon have their hands full of
hot mush.
Lieut.. Lyman E. Case
II U. S. Aero Squadron, A. E. F.
Oscar Bennett Writes from France.
Aug. 20, 1918.
Dear. Mother and George: will
trx nd I i