Chapter XX: Introduction: Bravery (14)

“His nose dipped and his tail flicked up, and he went roaring down, full out, after his last Hun. A rapid crackle of one machine gun after another struck his ear before ever he had the last hostile fully centered in his sights. Ricky knew that at last the flight had arrived and were joining in the fight. But he paid no heed to them; his enemy was in the ring of his sights now, so with his machine hurling down at the limit of speed of a falling body plus all the pull of a hundred and odd horsepower, the whole fabric quivering and vibrating under him, the wind roaring past and in his ears, Ricky snuggled closer in his seat, waited till his target was fully and exactly centered in his sights, and poured in a long, clattering burst of fire.

_Drawn by Joseph Cummings Chase._

Major James A. Meissner

He was decorated for bravery in action in the Toul sector. He attacked many enemy observation balloons. He was shot down in his plane several times.]

“The hostile’s slanting nose-dive swerved into a spin, an uncontrolled side-to-side plunge, back again into a spinning dive that ended in a straight-downward rush and a crash end on into the ground.

“Whether it was Ricky or some other machine of the flight that got this last hostile will never be known. Ricky himself officially reported having crashed two, but declined to claim the third as his. On the other hand, the rest of the flight, after and always, with enthusiastic unanimity, insisted that she was Ricky’s very own, that he had outplayed, outfought, and killed three Huns in single combat with them—one down and t’other come on. If Ricky himself could not fairly and honestly claim all rights to the last Hun, the flight did. ‘_Three!_’ they said vociferously in mess that night, and would brook no modest doubts from him.

“As the last Hun went reeling down, Ricky, in the official language of the combat reports, ‘rejoined formation and continued the patrol.’ He pulled the stick toward him and rose buoyantly, knowing that he was holed over and over again, that bullets, and explosive bullets at that, had ripped and rent and torn the fabrics of his machine, possibly had cut away some strut or stay or part of the frame. But his engine appeared to be all right again, had never misbehaved a moment during the fight, was running now full power and blast; his planes swept smooth and steady along the wind levels, his controls answered exactly to his tender questioning touch. He had fought against odds of three to one and—he had won out. He was safe, barring accident, to land back in his own ’drome; and there were two if not three Huns down on his brazen own within the last—how long?

“At the moment of his upward zoom on the conclusion of the fight he glanced at his clock which had not been hit by the enemy fire, could hardly believe what it told him, was only convinced when he recalled that promise to himself to turn back at the end of that minute, and had his belief confirmed by the flight’s count of the time between their first hearing shots and their covering the distance to join him. His clock marked exactly noon. The whole fight, from the firing of the first shot to the falling away of the last Hun, had taken bare seconds over the one minute. That pilot was right; in air fighting ‘you don’t get time to think.’”

“THE PICTURES ARE GOOD”

That’s All That Observation Pilot Miller Cared About When the End Came

Among the men killed at Château-Thierry was John Q. Miller, of Fairview, N. C., first lieutenant of the air service, shot down July 24, 1918. He was one of the airmen of whom the public had probably not heard, for his courage and daring were not as spectacular as the bravery of Luke, Rickenbacker or Lufbery. At the time of his death he was the greatest observation pilot on the front, according to the story of Major Elmer R. Haslett in an issue of _United States Air Service_, the official publication of the Army and Navy Air Service Association.

In this historic spot a hero of the World War is being decorated for bravery.]

The unsung, silent heroes of the air are the observation pilots, who at the risk of life go forward into impossible places to get pictures of enemy positions and come back with their machines riddled with shrapnel from “archie” fire. At the outset Miller, says Major Haslett, attracted attention for the serious way in which he took his work. He took assignment after assignment when he might have stayed back in the barracks, and never failed to complete his mission. Momentarily driven off by hostile aircraft or by too heavy “archie,” he would return to the job and come back with his pictures or observations, and his plane so full of holes that it had to be salvaged.

IN SPITE OF WOUNDS

Six Germans finally brought Miller and his observer down on his last trip over the lines, but not until the photographs had been made. Badly wounded, Miller pulled his plane out of a spin and landed his observer with the pictures. Major Haslett says:

“He gave the plane the gun, and they took off on Johnny’s last ride. The plane accompanying was piloted by Lieut. Baker and an observer by the name of Lieut. Jack Lumsden, both of whom were the very finest of our personnel. On this mission Thompson, I believe, was taking photographs—oblique views—which must be taken very low, in fact, dangerously low, in order that the advancing troops may see from the photographs exactly what is in front of them. It was a very poor day, and the clouds were low.

“As they were just finishing this perilous work, a drove of eleven Huns swooped out of the clouds and made for them. Five attacked Lumsden and Baker, and six attacked Thompson and Miller. Our boys were about two or three kilometers within the enemy’s lines, and, with such a superiority of numbers, of course, were immediately outclassed.

“The Hun planes surrounded Thompson and Miller, pouring in lead from all sides. Thompson, who had shot down a Boche before and had been in a number of scraps, was giving them the fight of his life. Miller was heading toward No Man’s Land. It is hard in such a fight to know exactly one’s location, and it is better to pick out one’s general direction when at such a low altitude, and be sure the plane is on the friendly side of the line before hitting the ground.

“While still about a kilometer within German territory, a bullet struck Miller in the chest and another in the arm. Thompson told me that Miller put his hand over the fuselage as if semi-conscious, then the plane started to go from right to left, climb and dive as if partly under control.

“As Thompson described it, it seemed as if Miller were doing his best to keep up his strength to go on with the flight. They crossed the lines, and as they did so Miller motioned to him in one of his conscious moments as if to point to home. He then put the plane into a dive.

“One of the German planes had dropped out of the combat, but the others were determined upon putting the plane down in flames or out of control. In these last few seconds they closed in with every gun concentrated on Miller. This fighting was so close that Thompson was aiming point blank. Miller was shot again; he made some sort of a motion as if falling forward.

MILLER’S RALLYING FEAT

“In a moment Thompson scored a direct burst into one of the planes; it made a sudden climb, then went into a tail spin from which it never recovered. Thompson swung his tourrelle round to get the one coming up on his tail. While himself falling, by sheer good fortune Thompson, fighting to the end, turned loose all he had, and the plane underneath his tail ceased firing, dived and fell within a hundred yards of the other he had just got.

“The three remaining Huns followed Miller down. One of them got Thompson in the arm and leg with an explosive bullet. The plane was out of control. By some miracle, Thompson says, as they were about to strike earth, Miller came out of his forward position, pulled the stick back, and the plane landed without a crash.

“Thompson had enough strength to jump out of the cockpit and run around to Miller, who, with a strength that was superhuman, was climbing out of the cockpit, bleeding profusely, his face ghostly white.

“He reached his arms up, man-like, and let them rest limply on Thompson’s shoulders. With closed eyes, and with a voice barely audible, he mumbled: ‘Thompson, God bless you! They got me, but I got you home, boy—and we brought the pictures back. Get a motorcycle, Tommy, and take them to headquarters. You write a report—I can’t, Tommy; you see I can’t, Tommy. And be sure to put in it that the pictures are good—that the mission was successful.’

“These were his last words, and he fell over unconscious. His wounds were of a hopeless nature, and he died without regaining consciousness a few minutes later in a sort of improvised dressing station in the front lines.

“Well, those are incidents in the life of the observation game.

“The official records credit Johnny Miller with the destruction of two enemy planes, and the French Government has bestowed upon him posthumously the Croix de Guerre with Palm, but those of us who had the pleasure of serving with him and who have lived to tell the tale credit Johnny Miller with having been just a plain, ordinary, brave fellow, who gave his life with all willingness to insure the successful completion of the mission to which his country assigned him.”

SUBDUING THE TURK

When Captain Butt, the British Ace, Found Bakshish a Cure of Captivity

When the war broke out, Alan Bott was one of the younger set of newspaper men in London. Soon after England cast in her lot with France, Bott was training with the airmen. Right speedily he became a fighting flyer and anon an Ace, with seven German planes to his credit. He won the Victoria Cross, and the rank of Captain. Readers may remember having heard him lecture when he made a tour of this country early in 1919, and gave very impressive pictures of adventures in the air. Not many aviators had the varied experiences that fell to the fortune of Captain Bott, for though he was for a time with his fellows of the Royal British Air Force operating in France, he was transferred to the East later and many of his thrilling adventures were in the Holy Land. He gave an account of one of these soon after his arrival in this country. He said:

“It all began when I fell out of the clouds from a height of six thousand feet and bumped my nose after a fight with a Boche plane. It wasn’t exactly a fight with one plane, either. I was chasing a Boche who had a machine nearly as fast as mine, and by the time I caught up with him we were forty miles behind the enemy lines and above some rough, rocky, partly wooded hills.

“I was just beginning to pepper the Boche when two enemy scout planes I had not seen literally dropped from the clouds right above and shot me up, especially the petrol tank. I whirled and crashed down, and the next thing I knew it was moonlight and my leg was paining like the deuce, held down by part of my engine. It was a very lonely, desert spot, and I figured that hill would be my last resting-place. I figured they would name it after me.

“Whether fortunately or not a bunch of Arabs came along, sort of bandits, I suppose, and found me. As far as I could make out, after they lifted the engine off me they were tossing up whether they should kill me or turn me over to the Turks and get some bakshish, which is a popular pastime in that part of the country. They used to say that with £1,000 you could bribe the Grand Vizier himself.

“While they were drawing lots to see whether I would live or die, a party of Turkish soldiers came along and chased the Arabs off, but detained me. In fact, they were decent enough to take me to an Austrian hospital at Afion-Kara-Hisson, about seventy miles from our base at Jaffa. It was three weeks before I could get around much, and then I foolishly tried to escape. My leg was so bad that the attempt was a foozle, as the guards caught me up before I had gone very far.

_Drawn by Joseph Cummings Chase._

Sergeant Pearl J. Wines

_90th Division, 358th Infantry, Company “E”_

While fighting in the St. Mihiel sector on September 12, 1918, Wines was wounded in his side by a party of Germans. Becoming infuriated he engaged the entire party: killed three of them, and captured the other two without aid of any kind.]

IN JAIL AT NAZARETH

“Finally, I was taken to Nazareth and put in a criminal jail with murderers and brigands, all filthy brutes. At first I was put in an underground dungeon, with one other man, an Arab, whose great penchant was chasing cooties. There were other English prisoners there, and we were all treated pretty badly. Our food consisted of a bowl of soup and a loaf of bread each day. It was some bread!

“Several of us planned to escape and tried several stunts, none of which appealed to the Turks, until I selfishly hit on the scheme of becoming temporarily insane. I was very crazy, for a few days, and then the highly ornate boss of the jail shook his head seriously and said he would have to send me to Constantinople.

“We finally began to rumble across the desert in a very slow train, and I decided to drop off at the first convenient way-station and cut across lots for Jaffa. We were quite near Constantinople before an opportunity came, and then, at the psychological moment, there was a very opportune train wreck, and I walked away and hid in among some rocks.

“When night came I met a Turkish officer dressed in a German uniform, and then worked the popular game of bakshish, which is really the national game of Turkey.

“I gave the officer a couple of Turkish pounds and he peeled the uniform. He put on mine and I have no doubt he was duly captured by the guards. I went to Constantinople and was saluted very regularly by Turkish and German soldiers. It took a lot of dodging to keep clear of the Germans in Constantinople, but I managed to get along, having a lot of fun sometimes in the cafés, listening to the gossip and plotting.

A STOWAWAY ON A “HELL SHIP”

“It appeared at that time that Turkey had been ready for quite a while to sign a separate peace, but the Allies couldn’t get the idea. My greatest desire was to get out of Constantinople, and I finally stowed away on a little rusty cargo-steamer bound for Odessa. We were rolling around the Black Sea one day when the crew were seized with Bolshevism and went on strike.

“It was great on that ship with the engines dead. We rolled and rolled for days on end. I had bought a Russian sailor’s uniform by that time and so could go about without fear of capture. The main thing was to get a crust of bread and cup of water. It was a hell ship and no mistake, with the sun beating down all day and the officers and crew in continual fights.

“Finally they patched up a truce and we made Odessa, the trip taking almost three weeks. It was bad in Odessa and when we heard that Bulgaria had made a separate peace I decided to make a try for the Bulgarian coast. I stowed away aboard another cargo steamship and finally reached Bulgaria and my British countrymen.”

A DARING PURSUIT

In An Ordinary Plane Aviator Bone Chased a German Sea-Plane Over Sea

On Sunday, March 19, 1916, four German sea-planes sailed over East Kent, England, in a bombing raid upon defenseless towns—Deal, Margate, Ramsgate—and arrived over Dover about 2 o’clock in the afternoon and dropped more than a dozen bombs, doing a considerable amount of damage. One bomb went through the roof of a Home where there were a large number of children; fortunately, the children, at the first sound of the raiders, had been taken to the shelter of the basement. Several children going to Sunday school were killed or injured. A woman walking along the street was blown into a doorway of a shop and badly hurt. The invaders were given very little time to do their work. British aeroplanes rose in pursuit. A sharp fight followed, both attackers and defenders using their machine guns freely in the air. One British airman particularly distinguished himself. Flight Commander R. J. Bone, R. N., pursued one of the German sea-planes out to sea for nearly 30 miles, in a small single-seater land machine. There, after an engagement lasting about a quarter of an hour, he forced it to descend, the German machine having been hit many times, and the observer disabled or killed. For this, Flight Commander Bone received the D. S. O.

The commander left the aerodrome while the enemy machine was still in sight, and making no attempt to climb steeply, kept the enemy in view. After a pursuit of nearly 30 miles he rose to 9,000 feet, 2,000 feet above the enemy. Rapidly overhauling the other machine, he attempted to make a vertical dive for it, both sides firing vigorously. Then he maneuvered ahead of the other and steered straight at him, diving below him and turning with a vertical right-hand bank immediately under him.

BROUGHT HIM DOWN

The German pilot swerved his machine to the left before they met, and the Englishman as he passed could see the German observer hanging over the right side of the fuselage, apparently dead or severely wounded. The gun was cocked at an angle of 45 degrees. Continuing his courageous maneuvers, Flight-Commander Bone brought his machine within 15 or 20 feet of the enemy, and poured in five or six bursts of six rounds until the enemy dived deeply, with smoke pouring from his machine. The propeller stopped, but the pilot kept control and succeeded in landing safely on the water. Here the English airman had to leave him, as he could not come down on a land machine, and his engine showed signs of giving out.

One machine apparently escaped from the fight at Dover and rapidly made its way to Deal, where it dropped seven bombs, doing considerable damage to property, but not killing or injuring any persons. A second pair of sea-planes appeared over Ramsgate at 2.10 p.m. and dropped bombs on the town. Four children on their way to Sunday school were killed, and a man driving a motor-car near by was also killed. A hospital for Canadian troops was damaged, but no one in the building was hurt, and the nurses went out in the streets to assist in the work of tending the injured. One of the sea-planes traveled on from Ramsgate to Margate, where it dropped a bomb, damaging a house. The German aircraft were now all pursued by British machines and driven out to sea.

THE ROOSEVELT BOYS

Four Sons of a Famous Fighter Gather Their Own Laurels of War

The Roosevelts are not the only family to have given four sons to the cause of their country, and those other sons have fought as bravely as Archibald and Theodore and Kermit, and died as daringly as Quentin. It isn’t, then, because the sacrifices of the Roosevelts are unique that they have become so dear to the hearts of Americans. The Roosevelts would be the first to decry any attempt to single out their deeds as any nobler than the deeds of their millions of comrades in arms. It seems only fair, however, to the traditions of our democracy that having recounted so many exploits by heroes who before the war were not known outside their little towns, we should include a few of the many, many names which proved that connection with more noted families did not make them any slower to welcome the dangers which war brought alike to rich and poor.

ARCHIE GOES TO FRANCE

Back in June, 1917, Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., went across with Archie. Theodore was a Major then; Archie a Captain. Both were assigned to General Pershing’s staff. In August it was reported that the two, anxious for real action, had been transferred to the 26th Infantry. So anxious was Archie to get into line duty that he accepted a reduction to Second Lieutenancy in order to get into the trenches.

© _Pirie MacDonald._

Theodore Roosevelt

The late Ex-President of the United States, and great American Patriot.]

All this had happened quickly. It was only in April that Archie had been engaged to Grace Lockwood. Some five days after that he had passed his examination for the Officers’ Reserve Corps. By April 15 he had married. June 20 he left Plattsburg with confidential orders. June 25 his father announced that Archie and Theodore had left for France.

Archie did not stay long as a Second Lieutenant. By Christmas, following distinguished service in leading patrols in No Man’s Land, General Pershing recommended that Archie be promoted. In February Archie was made a Captain. One month later Captain Archie was wounded in the arm and leg by shrapnel. He received the French War Cross while lying on the operating table. “He lay wounded for fourteen hours unattended,” writes an American surgeon in a letter home. In May Archie was reported able to walk again.

His wounds did not make Archie callous to the suffering of others. In July (1918) we read that “Archie’s request for aid for Sergeant F. A. Ross whose hand was amputated will be heeded by Colonel Roosevelt.”

A shrapnel wound of its nature usually results in more serious complications than an ordinary bullet wound. On July 13 the Captain had to undergo another operation for partial paralysis of the left arm. His spirit never wavered. When wounded he had directed that the wounded men in his command be attended first. Archie was hurt worse than he knew. It would take eight months, at least, for him to recover. In September he was brought back to the United States for special treatment.

© _Underwood and Underwood._

Theodore Roosevelt and Family at the Time He Was Governor of the State of New York]

THEODORE, THE IDOL OF HIS MEN

In the meantime Theodore was making himself feared, loved and famous. He was a Major, we said. He had been a Major once before, but under what different conditions—a Major in the Connecticut National Guards. He got into action from the very start. You could find him at the head of the most dangerous charges. In June (1918) he was cited for bravery after he had been gassed in the fight at Cantigny.

Theodore, too, retained his tenderness despite war’s horrors. In July we read of his paying homage to Lieut. G. Gustofson, Jr. In September he writes to the widow of Lieut. Newbold telling her that he would be proud to have his two little sons grow up to live and die like the Lieutenant. Theodore’s men made an idol of him. That, however, did not save him a second wound—this time (July 24) it was in the left knee. He received it while leading a battalion in a charge at Ploisy. It was the same fearlessness which a month before had called forth the official citation.

“On the day of our attack on Cantigny, although gassed in the lungs and gassed in the eyes to blindness, Major Roosevelt refused to be removed and retained the command of his battalion under a heavy bombardment throughout the engagement.”

After his second operation Major Roosevelt was promoted once more, and it was as Lieutenant-Colonel that in November he occupied the headquarters of von Hindenburg’s son at Luxemburg.

KERMIT IN MESOPOTAMIA AND FRANCE

The Major’s younger brother Kermit had, like the rest, come in from the very start, but fortune kept at least this one member of the family a little safer. He had left Plattsburg to accept a position in the British Army as early as July, 1917. In September he was made Temporary Honorary Captain. After being rewarded with the Distinguished Service Order for bravery with the British in Mesopotamia, Kermit, through the aid of Lord Derby, obtained a transfer to the American Army. In April he was appointed Captain. By June he had received the British Military Cross.

QUENTIN

Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, Junior.

He was gassed in the fight at Cantigny, and wounded when making a charge at Ploisy.]

Kermit, Archibald, Theodore—all have done their duty, but, of course, death has made the youngest of the Roosevelts dearest to American hearts. Perhaps, indeed, the death of no other man at the front has so touched the people as that of young Lieutenant Quentin. He stands almost like the symbol of young America giving itself up for freedom. “In the sorrow of his parents,” writes the _Outlook_, “his fellow-countrymen have felt the sorrow of all who have lost sons in this struggle. In the pride his parents have simply expressed his fellow-countrymen have been able to understand in part the pride of all those who have learned that for his purpose of making mankind free God has had need of their dearest. In honoring Quentin Roosevelt Americans honor all those young men who have rendered to their country their full measure of devotion.”

Part of the special glory of the Roosevelts comes from the fact that they were watched so closely. Quentin, especially, was known to the nation from his very childhood. The nation knew him, and it watched him. Quentin died fighting against odds—a symbol of young American manhood.

When we think of what Colonel Roosevelt and his sons stood for in this war there is something soul-stirring in the fact that the father and his youngest boy have both so suddenly passed away, and in the light of all this there is a pathetic significance in the answer which Colonel Roosevelt gave to the man who at a public meeting asked the Colonel why he himself had not gone across:

© _Underwood and Underwood._

Quentin Roosevelt’s Entrance Card Into the Ecole de Tir Aerien]

“I asked not only to go over there, but I came with one hundred thousand more men in my hands to help. And I will tell you, you man over there, that I have sent my four sons. I have sent over my four boys, for each of whose lives I care a thousand times more than I care for my own.”

© _Underwood and Underwood._

Dr. Richard Derby,

Lieutenant Colonel, Medical Corps, Army of the United States.]

Of these four sons Kermit received his cross for bravery. Archibald and Theodore rose steadily from rank to rank—wounds and honor marking their path. And Quentin gave his life. There is something more than fortitude in the words of the proud, strong, old man bearing up against the saddest of tidings:

“Quentin’s mother and I are very glad he got to the front and had the chance to render some service to his country, and to show the stuff there was in him before his fate befell him.”

Quentin Roosevelt was not yet twenty-one. He was born in Washington, November 19, 1897, while his father was Assistant Secretary of the Navy. After 1901 Quentin, starting out as the “White House baby,” kept Washington interested and amused for seven years.

Sturdy, impetuous, frank, and democratic, he was friends with everybody. He rode locomotives between Washington and Philadelphia with his chums, the engineers and firemen of the Baltimore & Ohio and the Pennsylvania.

Meantime, he was captain also of a crew of warrior Indians recruited from members of his classes in a public school.

One day, during an illness of his brother Archie, Quentin decided that a sight of a pet pony might prove better than the White House doctor’s prescriptions.

Without waiting for permission he went out to the stables, introduced the Shetland into one of the private elevators, and had the little horse on the way into his sick brother’s room before he was stopped.

As recorded by the New York _Times_: “Quentin’s life while in Washington—he was running around here in kilts and afterward in short trousers when his father was President—was just the adventurous childhood of the boy who later slammed his motor cycle into a tree at Oyster Bay when he was trying to establish a new speed record and smiled when a home-assembled automobile took a corner under his guidance on one wheel. He was not afraid for himself and worried only about the expense of rebuilding the motor cycle.”

Quentin was sent to Harvard. He took a prominent part in athletics. He inherited his father’s pluck and determination. Like his father, too, Quentin suffered from a defect of vision. That is why when the first officers training-camp was organized and Archie was admitted and won a commission, Quentin, on account of his eyes, was rejected.

He thereupon applied for enlistment in the Canadian Flying Corps. That was in April, 1917. When the United States decided to send troops to Europe he was transferred to the United States Signal Corps as a private.

He underwent a brief period of training at Mineola. He reached France a few weeks after Archie, who, we remember, was then a Captain. Theodore, Jr., was already commanding one of the first American battalions to go under fire. Kermit also had by that time sailed for the war zone.

HE MAKES A DOWN

© _Underwood and Underwood._

Captain Kermit Roosevelt]

Quentin became known to his fellow flyers as “Q.” Before the fatal day he had been fighting in the air five weeks. A few days before that last fight Quentin had a very narrow escape. He was cut off by a cloud from his fellows and coming out of the clouds saw three aviators whom he took for Americans. When he got quite close he found they were Boches, and coolly opened fire on them. All three attacked him. Quentin “did” for one of them and got home safe. An account of this is included in Captain McLanahan’s description of Quentin’s last days.

© _Underwood and Underwood._

Lieutenant Quentin Roosevelt]

“Our airdrome was north of Verdun, about twenty miles back of the American front line. Quentin had joined us June 1. He had been instructor at the aviation school at Issoudun, and I had formed his acquaintance there. I left Issoudun for patrol work at the front about two months before Quentin was allowed to join us. They liked his work at the aviation school so well that he had a hard time to obtain leave to get into the more perilous work at the front, for which he was always longing.

“Our regular occupation in the patrol service consisted of two flights a day, each lasting from an hour and a half to two hours. As this involved the necessity of going over the enemy lines, it was, of course, extremely trying upon the nerves. I doubt whether anybody, except perhaps the most foolhardy, ever performed this sort of work without feeling greatly exhausted after a few hours of so tense a strain. Nevertheless, we were often required, when circumstances demanded it, to go aloft four or even more times in the course of a day. This was of rare occurrence and only when the enemy showed extreme activity and every resource at our command had to be called into service in opposition.

“Usually a patrol consisted of three squads of from six to eight planes, one squad going to a height of 20,000 feet, the second 12,000, and the third 4,000 feet. They would fly in V formation, the leader about a hundred feet below the level of the next two, these 100 feet lower than those next after them, and so on to the last ones of the squad, who were always the highest.”

July 14 was an exceptionally fine day for the sort of work the squadron was doing. “We went up at eleven o’clock in the forenoon,” says Captain McLanahan, and describes the flight and the fatal fight that followed:

“There were eight of us, all, at that time, Lieutenants—Curtis, of Rochester, N. Y.; Sewall, of Bath, Me.; Mitchell, of Manchester, Mass.; Buford, of Nashville, Tenn.; Roosevelt, Hamilton, Montague, and I. As was customary, we chatted together before we went up, and of course, planned what we were going to do. It was arranged that Lieutenant Hamilton was to lead, and in case of any hitch to his motor Lieutenant Curtis was to take his place in the van.

© _Western Newspaper Union._

Captain Archie Roosevelt

on Fifth Avenue in New York. He was wounded in action.]

© _Underwood and Underwood._

Facsimile of Quentin Roosevelt’s record card in the Ecole de Aerien de Casuaz.

The captain’s remarks at the bottom of the card: “Very good pilot;
regular landings; very good shot; excellent military spirit, and very
daring.”
]

“There was a rather stiff wind blowing in the direction of the German lines, and when we reached an altitude of about 10,000 feet we began to be carried with great rapidity toward them. We had not yet sighted any enemy airplanes after we had been aloft an hour. Hamilton’s motor went wrong about that time and he had to glide back home. In a few minutes he was followed by Montague, whose motor also had gone back on him.

MEETING THE ENEMY

“Half an hour after this, when we were five miles inside the German lines, we saw six of their Fokker planes coming toward us. They had been concealed until then by clouds between them and us, they flying on the under side of the clouds. Our planes were of the Nieuport type, of the lightest pursuing kind, and in almost every respect like the type the Germans approaching us were using. The chief difference was that they carried stationary motors while ours were rotary ones, which gave us a trifle the advantage in turning. But this was more than neutralized by the very much greater inflammable material in our machines.

“When we got to within 500 feet of each other both sides began firing. The weapons on each side were virtually identical, each Nieuport and each Fokker carrying two machine guns. As each plane had but one occupant, upon whom, of course, devolved the work not only of steering his craft but firing the guns, there was an arrangement by which these two duties could be executed with, so to speak, one movement. The steering gear and the firing and aiming devices were adjusted to a stick in front of the aviator, in such a manner that his hand could clutch all three levers at once and work each by a slight pressure.

“Each of the machine guns carried about 250 rounds of ammunition, and unless it got jammed it was capable of firing the entire lot in half a minute. In order to determine whether the aim is accurate some of the bullets are so constructed that they emit smoke and can thus be seen. These are called tracers. Without them it would be well-nigh impossible to gage one’s range so far up in the air, remote from anything by which comparisons could be made to rectify the judgment in aiming.

“From the moment that I singled out the enemy whom I was to engage in duel I naturally lost sight of everything else and kept my eyes pretty well glued upon him alone. Now and then, of course, I would, when I got a chance, look backward, too. For one can never tell but that another enemy plane, having disposed of its opponent, may pay his respects to another one.

“But if anybody imagines that an aviator engaged in battle with an active opponent gets a chance to help along an associate, or even to pay attention to what is happening to any of the others, he is mistaken. One has to be on the alert for every move the enemy makes, and even do a lot of correct guessing as to what would be the most logical next move for him to make. For it is upon that next move that the entire fortunes of the war for those particular two aviators may hinge.

“After I had fired every round of ammunition, which seemed to be about the same time as my adversary discovered himself to be in the same plight, we drew away from each other and flew toward our respective bases. During our duel my airplane had become separated from the others of our unit and I could see no trace of them. I assumed, however, that they were either still fighting or had also finished and were on their way back home. Somehow I did not think of the third alternative, namely, that anything serious had happened to any of them.

“Indeed, one’s thoughts are so completely directed toward the business in hand, especially during a fight, that there is not a moment’s time that can be devoted to other matters, even those of the dearest, tenderest, or most sacred nature. To divert the mind even for an instant from the grim business of battle itself would be scarcely short of suicidal. And the home-bound journey after the battle is enlivened by so continuous a gauntlet of bursting enemy anti-aircraft shells that they suffice to keep the mind engaged in ways and means of dodging them until the home base is finally reached. During an air-battle, of course, the anti-aircraft guns are silent, for their shells would be equally dangerous for friend and foe.”

ALL BUT QUENTIN RETURNED

Lieutenants Buford and McLanahan arrived after all of the others, except Lieutenant Roosevelt, had returned to the field. They were not worried about him at the time, but when hours went by and he failed to return, they knew that something had gone wrong. Still, they did not think he had been killed. As Captain McLanahan explains:

“We were encouraged to hope for the best by the fact that Quentin had remained out a considerable time longer than the rest of us three days before. On that occasion he had become separated from the squad, I don’t just know in what way, and when we saw him again he jumped out of his airplane in great excitement and so radiant with elation and with so broad a smile that his teeth showed exactly in the same famous way as his father’s used to do. He never reminded us so much of his father as on that occasion.

“He told us that after losing track of us he sighted a group of airplanes which he believed to be ours and headed his airplane toward them. He was too cautious, however, to take anything for granted, and so in steering toward the group he kept himself in the rear of them, and when he got closer he discovered that they had the cross of the Germans painted on them.

“His first impulse was to get away as fast as possible; but then the hero in him spoke up and he decided to avail himself of the chance to reduce the number of our enemies by at least one. And so, flying quite close to the last one of the airplanes, he fired quickly and with such good aim that the plane immediately went down, spinning around, with its nose pointed to the ground.

“‘I guess I got that one all right,’ he said; but he did not wait to see what the final outcome might be, for aviators are full of tricks and, by feigning disaster to their own machine, often succeeded in drawing an overconfident enemy to destruction. Quentin knew this; and moreover, he had another big contract on his hands, namely, to get away from the associates of the man whom he had attacked. They all turned upon him, firing from a dozen machine guns; but in firing his own gun he had wheeled about at the same instant, and in that way had a big handicap over the pursuers. He kept far enough in advance of them to get back within the American lines before they were able to lessen the distance sufficiently to make their shells effective. The rate of speed, by the way, was 140 miles an hour.

“Despite his excitement and the really exceptional achievement, Quentin modestly refrained from declaring positively that he had bagged his man. It was only afterward, when we learned through an artillery observation-balloon that the airplane brought down by Quentin had been seen to strike the earth with a crash, that he himself felt satisfied that he was entitled to be regarded the victor. This was the occasion which brought him the Croix de Guerre.”

When the day passed and Quentin failed to return, his associates still remained hopeful that he had landed in the enemy lines, and had been taken prisoner. But there was further news, bad news, as Captain McLanahan relates:

© _Underwood, and Underwood._

Lieutenant Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.]

“Even this forlorn hope was dispelled the following day, when news was received that an observation-balloon’s crew had seen a Nieuport machine fall at Chamery, east of Fère-en-Tardenois, the place where Quentin had gone into the battle.

GERMANS REPORT DEATH

“A few days after that German aviators flying over the American lines dropped notes announcing that Lieut. Quentin Roosevelt had been killed by two bullet wounds in the head and had been buried with military honors by the Germans.

“After the armistice was signed, we saw the aviator who had killed Quentin. He was a non-commissioned officer and one of the most expert flyers in the enemy’s air service. After the armistice he was acting as an inspector in the surrender of German airplanes to the Allies.

“This man said that when he learned that the officer whom he had brought down belonged to so prominent a family in America he felt sorry.

“‘He was identified by a metal identification-plate fastened by a little chain to his wrist,’ said the German, ‘and I was then told of the young man’s prominence and his own personal popularity. Of course, even if I had known during the battle who he was, I would not have hesitated to try my best to down him; because, if I hadn’t, he surely would have downed me.

“‘He made a gallant fight, although I recognized almost from the beginning of our duel that he was not as experienced as some others I had encountered and won out against.

“‘As it was, he dipped and circled and looped and tried in a variety of ways to get above and behind me. It was not at all an easy task for me to get the upper hand and down him.’”

© _Underwood and Underwood._

When the Great American Patriot Died Flyers Dropped Wreaths from the Air Over the Roosevelt Home at Sagamore Hill]

Simple praise this is, but sincere we feel. The German felt sorry for our boy-hero. “He made a gallant fight,” he said. And he was not the only German who was forced to give due admiration to the dauntless American. The enemy buried him with military honors, and marked his grave. The German Cross, however, has been removed from the grave of Quentin. The grave is now simply fenced with stones. The French strew flowers over it. It bears a soldier’s inscription:

“Here rests on the field of honor First Lieutenant Quentin Roosevelt, killed in action July, 1918.”

A memorial just as eloquent in its simplicity is the letter from General Pershing to the father of Quentin:

“Lieutenant Quentin Roosevelt during his whole career in the air service both as a cadet and as a flying officer was a model of the best type of young American manhood.”

Quentin is a hero—a soldier—an officer—yet most of all he remains to our memory as our ex-President’s youngest boy. Eleanor Reed expresses this lasting appeal in her poem to Quentin, in the New York _Times_:

“Young Roosevelt is dead—and I whose son
Is just a little boy, too young to go,
Read with bewildered eyes the tales recalled
Of pranks the little White House boy had played.”

JUST WHAT HE WANTED

A Restless Seeker After Excitement, the War Filled the Bill for Lieutenant Roberts

Few young men enlisted for the war more frankly in the spirit of adventure than did Lieutenant E. M. Roberts, an American boy, born in Duluth, and seemingly born with the unrest of the winds of the Northwest in his blood. When he was but ten years old he ran away from home in obedience to the restless longing to fare for himself, go whither he listed, and taste the ruggedness of nature in experience. He tried lumbering in the Northwest. He crossed the border into Canada and successively turned his hand to many things—mining, automobile repair, railroad construction, cow-punching, sheep-raising, etc.—getting a liberal education in the “University of Hard Knocks,” as he expressed it, but never finding just the excitement he vaguely yearned for.

He was in Calgary in October, 1914, and by chance learned from a newspaper in which he had wrapped a purchase, that there was war doing in Europe. It struck him that the thing sought, the desired excitement, was now ready to hand. He met an old friend and talked the news with him. The friend told him that there had been a call that morning for men for service in Europe. “Let’s join!” Both were of the same mind; both were ready for adventure. Next morning he enlisted as a member of the 10th Canadian Infantry Battalion. But the officer in charge of the barracks knew Roberts, and recalling that he was familiar with mechanics, transferred him to a mechanical transport section, not at all to his liking, mechanics being but a tame affair.

In time he went with the battalion to France as driver of a lorry. He got a dose of gas at Ypres and was sent back to England for hospital treatment. On recovery he was returned to France as Section Sergeant, his duty being to scout the roads ahead on a motor cycle. He found that he was getting very little out of the war but hard work, plodding knee deep in mud much of the time while up there the flyers were having a jolly, enviable time. Ambition to get into the Royal Flying Corps seized him and never let go of him, but it was long before the opportunity to join came to him. Much experience of many kinds came his way, despatch riding among the rest, before the happy day when he was attached to an air squadron as gunner on probation, the getting of which position was in itself an adventure, as is duly set forth in _A Flying Fighter_, the intensely interesting story of his career told by Roberts himself.

Though on the way he was yet far from his goal. He had first to go into the trenches to learn what infantrymen had to go through. He got a thorough lesson, which included prowls in No Man’s Land, charging enemy trenches and plunging in to prod with the bayonet and fling hand grenades and much like matter rather adapted, one would imagine, to disqualify an aspirant for service in the air, for rising above ground. But he arrived in due time at the dignity of an accepted aviator, and made his first flight. Then came the excitement of shooting down his first Hun, but we pass that and many other arresting incidents and exploits of his apprenticeship to come to his account of an exceptional sort of encounter with hostile planes that has in it all the elements of dramatic surprise.

He was assigned to pilot duty with a scout and fighting squadron doing service in France, and his first turn of service consisted of patrol duty for three days running. It was an uneventful start, nothing occurring in the three days. On the fourth day he went up again on patrol to 20,000 feet. He was looking for Huns up there but found none. As it was very cold he decided to go down a way, and shut off power. He says:

“At the level of 18,000 feet, I found myself sweeping along a very large peak of cloud. Intending to spoil its pretty formation I dived into it, and coming out on the other side, found myself along side of a Hun plane of the Albatross type. [Roberts was in a Spad.] I had no intimation at all that a Hun was present, and I guess he was in the same position.

“THE HUN WAVED AT ME AND I WAVED AT HIM”

“I suppose he was as much surprised as I was when he saw me emerging from the cloud. Neither of us could shoot at the other for the reason that the guns of the machines we were flying were fixed to the machine so that the machine itself has to be pointed.

“We were so close together that this could not be done without our ramming one another, which both of us had to avoid if we did not wish to crash to the earth together.

“The Hun waved at me and I waved at him.

“We found ourselves in a very peculiar situation. I was so close to him that I could see with the naked eye every detail of his machine. His face also I could see quite clearly, even to the wrinkles around his mouth.

“There was something odd in our position. I had to smile at the thought that we were so close together and yet dared not harm one another. The Hun also smiled. Then I reached down to feel the handle on my pressure reservoir to make sure that it was in its proper place, for I knew that one of us would soon have to make a break.

“I had never before met a Hun at such close quarters in the air and though we flew parallel to one another for only a few minutes, the time seemed like a week. I remembered some of the tactics told me by some of the older and best fighters in the corps, and was wondering how I could employ them. Finally a thought occurred to me. Two machines flying at the same height are not necessarily on exactly the same level, as they keep going up and down for about 20 feet.

“I was flying between the Hun and his own lines and I had fuel for another hour and a quarter anyway. I wanted to make sure of this bird, but decided to play a waiting game. We continued our flight side by side.

“After a while, however, much sooner than I expected, the Hun began to get restless and started to maneuver for position; like myself he was utilizing the veriest fraction of every little opportunity in his endeavor to out-maneuver the antagonist. Finally, the Hun thought he had gotten the lead.

“I noticed that he was trying to side-slip, go down a little, evidently for the purpose of shooting me from underneath, but not far enough for me to get a dive on him. I was not quite sure as yet that such was really his intention, but the man was quick. Before I knew what had happened he had managed to put five shots into my machine, but all of them missed me.

THE HUN SPINS EARTHWARD

“I maneuvered into an offensive position as quickly as I could, and before the Hun could fire again I had my machine gun pelting him. My judgment must have been fairly good.

“The Hun began to spin earthward. I followed to finish him, keeping in mind, meanwhile, that it is an old game in flying to let the other man think you are hit. This bit of strategy will often give an opportunity to get into a position that will give you the drop on your antagonist. The ruse is also sometimes used to get out of a fight when in trouble with gun jam, or when bothered by a defective motor.

_Drawn by Joseph Cummings Chase._

Sergeant James B. Lepley

_42nd Division, 168th Infantry, Company “M”_

On the night of July 14 and 15, 1918, to the northeast of Châlons-sur-Marne, near Souain, Lepley left his trench in a dense gas attack, and made his way to a wood through a rain of shrapnel. He went in search of two men lost from his platoon. He found them and guided them back to the trenches. A few days later, near Sergy, he led his platoon in a charge upon six machine-gun emplacements, which they captured, together with over thirteen prisoners of the Prussian Guards.]