Evening star., 1932-04-17

But. in no time at 'll, tracer bullets came
whizzing by and knew was in for it.
Twisting and turning, climbing and div
ing as best could, tried to dodge their
fire. Still the Germans gained. One of
them dove on my tail; overshot and
zoomed up to the right. Fed up on this
one-sided gunnery practice, turned and
ripped a few rounds in his direction.
ct looked around and was amazed to
find only one German in sight. I was
lust about to attack him when shots
came up through my wings-one of them
was underneath and shooting up. A rot
ten feeling The only way out was to go
into a dive. Then our game of tag be-
gan again.
Bullets tore through the fuselage and
wings I had almost reconciled myself
to the thought that was headed for the
Pearly Gates when the Germans turned
and quit me cold Instead of blessing
nv fate. I got mad as hornet. Drop
ping me like that was an insult. kicked
the ship over and went after them, but
their lead was too great and had to give
mn the chase What made them quit l
don't know. Perhaps they ran out OF
ammunition or wanted to get home be
fore dark.
"A day or two later I bagged my brst
German a cumbersome two-seater. AT
the time I was thrilled, but later pride
gave way to regret The pilot was evi-
IDENTIFY green and his observer a very poor
marksman. It took only few bursts
from my guns and the ship became
crazy top in which two men went spin
ming to their doom.
Not that the sluggish, two-place
Rumplers were easy pickings. Far from
It, One of them, spotting in the vicinity
of La Paune, gave me the closest snaVe
I ever had. The rear gunner was
marksman, and I soon found 1t out he
repelled my diving attacks SO capaoly
that the only way to close the deal was
to dive under the Rumpler and flre
through its bottom. slipped under him
time and again, zoomed up, hung on my
prop with both guns blazing, only to
find that had overshot my target. On
top Of that, the pilot maneuvered his
plane so that the observer got whaek
at me ever SO often. Once he almost
got me.
I'VE were less than 10 yards apart
w and his tracerS whiStled between
the struts on my let wing. Too hot to
he comfortable. I could see my two an
tagonists perfectly, and couldn't resist
an impulse to wave. Sportsmen that
they were, they waved back minute
later climbed above the Rumpler, dove
and ripped off rs to 100 rounds. The
plane went down in flames.
During the combat had drifted deep
into enemy territory over sector heavily
sprinkled with anti-aircraft and machine
guns. To avoid the former I could climb
out of range or skim the ground I de-
cided to come down and reckon with the
machine guns It is difficult to hit a
plane from the ground, but it can be
done. 1t happened to me.
'T was scouting along SWirnmingly
when, without warning, my motor went
dead Gas poured from the tank under
the seat, the plane nosed into dive
and the aileronS would not respond.
With the ground less than 200 feet be-
meath and machine guns chattering
everywhere, there was no time to think.
Instinctively I turned the gas on from
the gravity tank in the wing, the engine
caught on and I cleared some trees by
the skin of my teeth.
"Those German machine gunnerS must
have thought me insane, for, instead of
climbing and turning as any normal pilot
would do in such predicament, plowed
a straight furrow across the fields. I had
no alternative. Flying speed was all that
kept my nose up. The slightest pull on
the stick might break whatever strands
remained of the aileron cables and my
goose would be cooked I managed to