The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1944-09-14

when l peeked In, and he said In
a typical British manner Of offhand
friendliness, "Oh, hello"
Are you all right" I asked,
stupidity.
He answered, Eyes. quite. Now
that you chaps are here"
I asked him how long he had been
trapped in the wrecked plane. He
said he didn't know for sure as he
had got mixed up about the pas
sage Of time. But he did know the
date of the month he was shot down.
He told me the date. And I said out
loud. Good God!"
For, wounded and trapped, he
had been lying there for eight
days!
His left leg was broken and
p%unctured by an ack-ack burst.
His back was terribly burned by
raw gasoline that had spilled.
The foot of his injured leg was
pinned rigidly under the rud-
der bar.
His space was so small he couldn't
squirm around to relieve his own
weight from his paining back. He
couldn't straighten out his legs,
which we're bent above him. He
couldn't see out Of his little prison.
He had not had a bite to eat or a
drop Of water. All this for eight
days and nights.
Yet when we found him his physi-
cal condition was strong, and his
mind was as calm and rational as
though he were sitting in a London
club. He was in agony, yet in his
correct Oxford accent he even
apologized for taking up our time
to get him out.
The American soldiers of our res
III party cussed a S they worked,
cussed with open admiration for
this British flier's greatness Of heart
which had kept him alive and sane
through his lonely and gradually
hope-dimming ordeal.
One Of them said, God, but these
Limies have got guts!"
It took US almost an hour to get
him out. We don't know whether he
will live OF not, but he has a chance.
During the hour we were ripping the
plane open to make a hole. he talked
to US. And here, in the best nutshell
I can devise from the conversation
of a brave man whom you didn't
want to badger with trivial ques-
tons. is what happened
He was an Raj flight lieutenant.
plotting a night fighter. Over a Ger.
tain area the Germans began letting
him have it from the ground with
machine-gun fire.
The first hit knocked out his
motor. He was too low to jump,
so-foolishly, he said-he turned
on his lights to try a crash
landing. Then they really poured
1t on him. The second hit got
him in the leg. And a third bull
let cut right across the balls Of
his right-hand forefingers, clip
ping every one of them to the
bone.
He left his wheels up, and the
planes belly hit the ground going
uphill on a slight slope. We could
see the groove it had dug for about
so yards. Then it Topped. tail ovel
nose, onto its back. The pilot was
absolutely sealed into the upside
down cockpit.
That's all I remember for 9
WHILE" he told US. when I came
to. they we're Smelling all around
me-"
Thus began the eight days. He
had crashed right between the Ger
mans and Americans in a sort O.
pastoral no-man's-land.
For days afterwards the field IL
which he lay surged back and fortt
between German hands and ours.
His pasture was pocked with hun
dreds Of shell craters. Many CT then
were only yards away. One wa!
right at the end Of his wing. Thu
metal sides of the plane were
speckled with hundreds Of shrapne
holes.
He lay there. trapped in the mids
of this inferno Of explosions. Tn,
fields around him gradually becam,
Uttered with dead. At last Ameri
can strength pushed the German,
back, and silence came. But n,
help. Because, you see. it wa,
In that vacuum behind the battle