The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1918-03-15
AMERICAN ACE SEES
YEARS. WAR AHEAD
Bert Hall Modest in Story of
Own Gallant Feats on
Many of the Fronts
THRILLS HEARERS
IN STOICAL TALK
cd Career of Battalion of Death
Experience Showed That the officers
Were Pro-German.

Were Pro-German.
NEW YORK. March 1J-Dropping
bombs on the kaiser's battle lines in
France, fighting battles 10000 feet in
the air or fleeing from Bolshevik rcvo-
lutiOnists in Russia would seem com
monplace and thrilllcss business if one
Judged by the Unconditional accounts of
Bert Hall, an "ace' of the Lafayette
escadrille, who told of these and other
adventures through which he has passed
| since aiding in driving back the German
| hordes from the gates of Paris in 1914.
Major William Thaw and he are the two
remaining survivors of the ten Amer-
cans who formed the cscadrlle at the
start of the war.
-Four or five hundred persons gathered
/ in Wanamaker 5 to be thrilled by the
war experiences of this youthful Ken
tuckian. And thrilled they were
despite the calm, placid and almost
stoical way in which he told of them.
Sometimes I am asked if it is not
terrible to kill a man, he said, rolling
one heel on the floor before him and his
hands stuffed in his trouser pockets. lit
is terrible proposition to kill a man,
but a German is a different PROPOSE
ton.
Turning to the early days of the war
he told of planting spies in the country
behind the kaiser ) lines and returning
later and bringing them back TO the
; French headquarters.
"Onec they captured my man and
d learning through third degree that
was coming buck for him, laid an am
bush for me. Something about the fig
: urc on the ground waving white flag,
, which was the prearranged signal
caused me to hesitate and AS | did SO
> machine guns in bushes around cut loose
ON nv machine. l counted Gs bullet
, holes when l got back.
=, After two years Of fighting in France
he went to Russia to train Il group OF
airmen for the ear ; army.
! II found their hicrs lazy and shift
- less, - he continued. 1.-The Russian Off
GERS were pro-German and said so. They
said they would feel about as well of
8 under Germany rs they did aund"rn his
ear.
= I'm Rumania | ran into tvphu,
!. scourgc, but escaped before it got me
!. Back on the Russian lines / was tol,
/ that the kaiser and his generals woulC
hold a conference in Sofia the next dat
10 and the following morning set out witt
i, a French fier for Sofia to blow mp tha
~ conference. We dropped bombs on th'
~ palace and parliament buildings, bu
- failed TO put an end to the war tina
+. day.
n Lieut.. Hall said that the revolution
), started in Russia only after the ehurcl
r had given its consent to il.
"Onc day the word went out frof
Moscow that God didn t love the cza
l. any more, and the revolution startc
II next day. In Petrograd a new revolt
tn ton would start every few minutes.
~ Lieut. Hall recounted the career o
Is the F." Battalion of Death. -
at This battalion went into camp nca
r. Pctrograd,'' lie said, "and somebod
70 dug UP some rusty guns for the women
ell Everything went smoothly until qua
". rel among them took place one nigh
followed by a free for all fight, in While
about so or 10 Of them were Ille,
Then their guns were taken away fro
them, and that was the end OF the Ba
o- talon of Death. -
Lieut.. Hall said that he will retm
to the front in France this spring.
81 "There are from four to seven yea
all of fighting ahead yet, he prophcsicd'