Evening star., 1943-08-06
BY CARTER BROOKE JONES,
Star Staff Correspondent

Star Staff Correspondent
LAURINBURG, MAXTON ARMY
AIRBASE, N. c., Aug 6.-Midnight
was approaching and the scrubby,
weed-high field was dark, and so
quiet the crickets and frogs were
loud 1t was a hot night and the
stars glistened in intricate patterns.
There was faint whirring sound.
A vague black shape that looked like
an enormous bat darted through
the darkness. TIE invisible hun
dreds secreted in the wood held
their breaths.
The colossal bat vanished. Minutes
later there was scraping sound on
the field. A muffied "ah" of relief
swept through che crowd.
The first glider had landed And
this was the first public demonstra-
ton in history of gliders without
lights landing on a completely
t'-cked out objective.
Sets Precedent.
Gen. Henry H. Arnold, chief of
Army AirsForces who had pre-
view of the amazing performance the
night before, said ne never had seen
anything like it, adding that no one
else had.
When the witnesses assembled, the
officers at the loudspeaker waved
them back with searchlight from
the approaches to the rough field
There was no telling, he explained,
where the glider pilots might come
in-they couldn't see much. they
could only feel and remember what
they could of the terrain.
While we waited, shooting stars
streaked across the ornamental sky.
There was a lower flash, like one
carrying a comet. The first plane
with a glider in tow had passed.
Others cleaned by, almost indis-
tinguishable from the nervous lights
of the stars.
The minutes dragged by.
The watchers had been warned
not to talk. This was a severe test
for the glider pilots, and they were
to get no help from the ground. All
lights within large area of the air
base had been put out. even road
lights. For tactical purposes, it
could be assumed that they had
hind enemy lines "a coup pre-
hind enemy lines-a group pre-
pared perhaps by paratroopers or
fifth columnists dropped from our
planes. They were presumed to have
a map of the field selected.
Released Fairly High.
The gliders, each carrying IS air
borne troops equipped for instant
fighting-and this included the pi-
lot and co-pilots, who jump out and
battle with the others-Were re-
leased from their tows at fairly high
attitudes, several minutes apart The
ellders doused their pale lights as
soon as their red-lit aerial tugs
dropped them.
The gliders were not merely
blacked out they were actually
without candlepoWer of illumina
ton. Even their instrument boards
were dark as they undertook, each
alone and without power, the haz-
ardous descent to the black patch
o1 "CCuS anu SCIuU trees.
Once the relief at seeing the first
pilot make it subsidized, anxious ewes
were raised again. There" whis-
pered some one. Yes, another had
come-another great bat figure. its
wings whlrring softly, darting bat
like above the woods It was gone
and then it could be barely dis
cerned again ct another side of the
f1eld, feeling its way downward.
Again that scraping sound on the
field, and this glider rolled to a
stop at the designed rendezvous, lust
beyond the first one. The two dark
shapes landed with only faint stir
rings, but, your eyes accustomed to
the gloom, you could see the heavily
armed soldiers boiling out of them
IN silence, ready to fight.
Eerie Sound in Sky.
One after another, at intervals o1
minutes, three more made it safely
There was only one more due.
Suddenly there was an eerie
sound high above us-an account.
able sound. Perhaps 1000 feet above
music was playing. Thin strains Of
Comm in on Wing and a Prayer, ;
waited down. then Blue Skies"
1t was no radio. The men II
this last glider had got up a little
band, and they were playing ir
complete darkness. That undoubt
edly would have struck terror intt