Evening Star Newspaper, January 17, 1928, Page 10

10 ! ACES UP! im By JOHN KNOX e The Fact Story of American Aviators in the World War ‘ Part 2—The Lafayette Escadrille CHAPTER IIL bery had been nrpx-::e menf‘h:}l\nc be- axeuil the Americans were | fore the war and others of e new Tm}-xmb\l- Capt. Gm[g.ps Tfig. | escadrille had had more or less flying nAult, who was to be their | €Xperience when they came to Luxeuil. commander and friend for the | All had been trained in the French entire life of the mnurm-?l\{:’gm :;hmxs nt‘m‘or: a":c rl’au-( W i en the American members of his Al s e A 3% | new command acrived at Luxeull, Capt, Thenault immediately set to work to make them feel at home and his first step was to introduce them to the French pilots in adjacent escadrilles, “The Chicken Coop.” The Luxeuil bombing group was then well deseribed by James Norman Hall, | a later recruit. in his book. layette Flying Corps.™ “The La- | Hall says: “Thenault’s leadership during the | whole of this period was never an irk- some one. His association with his | pilots. who regarded him as a friend and good comrade as well as their cap- | tain, was intimate and cordial. He performed his duties with kindness and tact. delegating much of his authority | to his French seconds-in-command, Lieuts. de Laage de Meux, de Maison- Rouge and Vervier-Fauvety. and to Thaw and Lufbery. After his pilots, had served their apprenticeship at the | fron®, it was only occasionally that he | took part in the patrols and combats of the squadron: but this was chicfly due to the fact that there was adwa! a nucleus of older men equipped both in natural endowment and long train- ing as flight leaders of the first order. He knew and trusted in their ability and in time came to exercise only & | nominal leadership m matters of the air. For the members of N 124 it is an association never to be forgol ten. Their memories of Capt. The- of his good-fellowship. of his htful consideration for them upon i sions, through days of danger and great strain, must al- | ways remain among the happiest which theyr have of the Great War. Let it be said to the eternal credit ©of Capt. Thenault that he was and is 8 man of fine discernment. He know that while his American subordinates held for him the warmest of feeling. they were Americans and that the wished to fight as Americans, with- out supervision except from among ' their own number. He never forced upon them unduly the fact that they were under command of a French u(-£ Raoul Lufbery, H. Willis, Campbell, E. Hinckle, Capt. Thaw. few group photographs of the Lafayette Escadrille fiyers. Rare historic value. ficer nor did he make the fact of that | command onerous. He paid them the | high compliment of assuming that they | joiced in the nickname of “The Red | where the beauties of Louis XV's court commanded by Capt. happe, who re- ' had once laved themselves. Then they bl were competent in their chosen work | Pirate.” and the further compliment of acting upon that assumption. Capt. Thenault is now military at- tache of the French Embassy at Wash- ington. Much of the material in this story of his command is drawn from his memories and the entire manu- script has passed under his eye. Like most real fighting soldiers. he is a quiet man of almost gentle manner and the same fine consiceration fot others that marked his conduct of the Esca- drille Americaine so many years ago. Several of the American members ©f the new sguadron had already un- derogne their baptism of fire in the ai served more than a year in Escadrille Caudron 42, which for part of that period was under the command of Capt. Thenault. Thaw had distin- guished himself in aerial scouting and artillery observation. Although his Caudron was not a fighting plane, he Happe was an air fighter of such daring and ferocity that the Ger- mans had set a price of 25,000 marks on his head. He flew an ancient Maurice Farman plane, which was such a network of struts and wires that it had been christened “the Chicken Coop.” This relic could fly only 40 miles an hour, but it had a huge wing spread and could carry a THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, TUESDAY, JANUARY 17, 1928, all around Happe's ship and his only armament was a Winchester rifle with which his mechanic would fire at every enemy which came in range. The “Chicken Coop" often returned with its flimsy frame ventilated with scores of bullet-holes, but the “chickens" were never hit. The same luck did not favor the other flyers in his escadrille. Capt. Happe's Little Joke. When Thenault entered Happe's of- fice to present the Americans, the host was busily engaged writing names and addresses on several small boxes. “These,” he announced, “are the eight war crosses I am sending to the | families of the eight pilots who were shot down by the Boche the last time we bombed Habsheim. It's a good | thing you are here to go with us!” { I thought of the luxury we were | enjoying,” said McConnell afterward, “of our comfortable oeds, baths and motor cars, and then I recalled the old custom of giving a condemned man | & royal time before the execution.” |~ Luxeuilles-Bains _(Luxeuil of _the Baths) was as comfortable as McCon- nell said. Every morning the Amer- fcans would go down to the bath house and bathe in the pink granite pools One of the would return to the Hotel of the Gold- en Apple for breakfast—one of those vanished hosteleries where the proprie- tor was more concerned with sustain- | ing the good name of his. house than | he_was with making money. | Flaky trout from the nearby mount- ! tain streams, fat fowls from the barn- | yard, game from the forests, hares from the bushy dells and wild ducks | and pheasants combined with inspired | of the German planes could play tag ' trips through the surrounding country Capt: Wilian Tluwiol Pitburgh et |~ T e ——— hundred pounds of bombs and gasoline | cooking to create an Elystum of which for long flights. Capt. Happe would not the least attraction was the 4 take his flying truck far behind the | francs (80 cents) a day which the pro- German lines, shower bombs on muni- | prietor exacted for board and lodging. tion factories along the Rhine and then | While waiting for their planes to ar- | plod solemnly back home. The slowest | rive, Thenault took his men on motor M= g e Edmonston & Co., Inc.| Exclusive Washington Agency | STACY-ADAMS & CO.’S once cruised for hours over the lines in | search of an enemy plane which he | could attack. That was before the was before airplanes had begun to| fight each other at all. The Beginning of Air Fighting. | At the beginning of the war nr-! planes were used for scouting and ob- | servation entirely: it was not until| late in 1915 that they began to attack | each other. One of the first adven- tures of aerial warfare was the at- tempt of some Prench fiyers to disable easion mentioned above Thaw's me- chanic was armed with a Winchester | rifie with which to attack any German | lane which might come within range. | nfortunately for the success of the | plan, the German planes were all | faster than Thaw's Caudron and used | their speed to keep out of his way. 3‘!:31- was given a double-motered Cau- ron equip; - You Men who know lines. Norman Prince of Boston had trained as an aviator before he to France with his great idea NIAGARA FALLS Sunday, January 29 SPYCIAL THROUGH TRAIN o oh 1 ear o] t_-——-:mlElmElmr'_——T_lmé'lElmn‘Elm 612 13th Street . 855am o {.E,:- Fails” (New” York Central) o Beturning in. iarars Fulle (New York Centrsl) “Mineral waters of the right sont are preferable 10 many cathartic compounds. 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The Nieuport was a fast and handy machine with a comparatively large wing-spread, and 80-horsepower Rhone rotary motor and a speed of 95 miles an hour. It was armed with a Lewis gun attached to the upper plane and firing over the propeller. While the position of this gun had its advantage, the gun itself was nothing to excite great en- | thusiasm. The ammunition drums held | only 27 cartridges each; to put in a new | drum the flyer must swing the gun down by means of a lever to where he could reach it. The wind created by the plane’s flight and the wash of the | propeller brought the gun down with | enough force to crack the flyer's head unless he ducked in time. It was no | easy job to insert a new drum with | fingers encased in heavy gloves and | numbed by the sharp cold of the upper ' spared from the task of piloting the | plane. More often than not the wind | would carry away the extra drum and the fiver would be at the mercy of an| alert enemy. The Enemy Plane. ‘The Fokker was a sturdier but less handy ship than the Nieuport and had | the advantage of being armed with a ! machine gun of larger magazine capac- ity which fired through the propeller by means of synchronizing gear: greater handiness and mane of the Nieuport gave it an advantage KAU 18 Months' to Pay Puzzled as to how you are going to furnish your home with so many demands upon the family budget? Kauf- mann’s allows you 18 months topay for your selections. No penal- ties — no extras. Fireside Chair to Match ... 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