May 1917, Artois Province, France
April 1917 had been a singularly poor month for the Royal Flying Corps. No, Warren corrected himself, a singularly poor month for the Allied armies. The Nivelle Offensive, a joint British and French attempt to burst through the German lines, had turned into an unmitigated disaster. Bloody April, as the air war was called, had turned into May, and several new pilots would soon join Warren’s flight. The new pilots kept coming, but they needed more training. They were eager to fly and could control a plane during normal conditions, but they were no match for experienced German pilots, especially when the enemy attacked in packs. Some of the German pilots were becoming legends, like Manfred von Richthofen, leader of Jasta 11 and pilot of an all-red Albatross D.III. But whether they were shot down by the Red Baron or a less famous opponent, the new men were just as dead.
Warren was desperate for replacement pilots, but he wished the RFC would keep them in training a little longer. After April, he was hesitant to even learn their names, let alone befriend them. And he dreaded the inevitable letter he would have to write to their next of kin. He had written so many of them now that he could finish a letter in five minutes. I regret to inform you that your son has been killed in action. His courageous service was an asset to his country, and he will be sorely missed. He always said the fallen had died in action doing something brave, even if they’d really done something as foolish as flying into a tree during takeoff.
Sitting at the desk in his tent, Warren finished his latest letter of regret for a pilot who’d been shot down on his second combat mission. The poor chap’s wings had been shot off, and he’d had a long tumble to the ground. Why did the RFC still have a no-parachute policy? Supposedly there was fear that pilots would abandon damaged planes too quickly if they could bail out, but good pilots were just as hard to replace as quality airplanes. Not that the new men survived long enough to become good pilots.
After the letter, Warren sorted through his mail. The handwriting on most of the envelopes was unfamiliar, probably written by people he didn’t know, replying to one of his condolence letters. He hated it when they wrote back to ask for more details about their son’s or brother’s deaths. The last thing he wanted was to write to the dead men’s families and tell them the pilot had burned to death when his engine had caught fire or been cut in pieces by the Red Baron’s twin Spandau guns. He would write back eventually, but first he found one of Claire’s letters and savored each word. More about the new puppy and the latest collection of sheet music. It was all so different from the slaughter over Arras. He needed that—a reminder that somewhere life was continuing as usual.
“Sir?”
Warren looked around to the open tent flap. “Yes?”
“The new men are here.”
Warren stowed away the letters and went to meet the recently arrived pilots. Dare he hope they would last long enough to become experienced? As he walked toward the waiting pair of men, one of them seemed familiar. “Boyle?”
Warren’s old observer and mechanic smiled. “Yes, sir.”
“Congrats on getting your wings, Flight Sergeant Boyle.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Warren relaxed a little. At least one of the men was an old sweat, even if his experience was with observing rather than flying, and mechanical skills like Boyle’s often came in handy in the air. Maybe the tide was about to turn.
* * *
After a few days of training his new men, Boyle and Reeves, Warren led them up for a midday patrol. The Huns preferred to do their reconnaissance then, when the sun was bright and shadows were small. Reconnaissance planes made good targets for men on their first mission. Warren led them up to altitude and waited, but the Hun was late this morning.
It was nearly time to turn back when Warren spotted something to the north. The speck grew larger and larger until he recognized it as a two-seater plane. Even better, it was heading for the British side of the front. Warren held back for a few minutes, letting the reconnaissance plane fly deeper into enemy territory, where, if it was shot down, the crew would be captured rather than rescued by their compatriots.
When the time was right, Warren led his squadron in the attack. The German plane soon noticed them and circled north to postpone their meeting. But Warren had let the plane come too far west to escape completely. The Sopwith Pup’s superior speed easily closed the distance. It was a pity there weren’t more targets to go around. As previously agreed, Warren would keep the lead and the new men would follow, gaining experience so that eventually they could claim victories of their own.
The Hun observer aimed well, but Warren came from below, presenting his enemy with the smallest possible silhouette. He dodged the German bullets and saw his own projectiles hit home. It wasn’t a perfect run, but it was sufficient to send the enemy plane to the ground.
Warren decided to follow it as it crash landed. New men were usually in search of souvenirs, and the damaged German plane was heading for a decent field. If Warren led the men back to the aerodrome, the enemy plane would be picked over by infantrymen before they could reach it. By following it in, his men would have first dibs, and seeing an enemy plane up close, even a wrecked one, would give them additional knowledge for the next engagement.
He gave the AEG C.IV a wide berth when he landed. Most German airmen wouldn’t shoot at a plane while it came in, even if it was the plane that had shot them down, but there were always exceptions. After Boyle and Reeves landed, Warren led them to the wrecked German craft. An artillery crew had beaten them there and were taking custody of the pilot and his gunner.
A pair of British artillerymen lifted the wounded pilot out. The gunner, who had left the plane under his own power, immediately rushed to the pilot’s side, his words foreign but urgent as he motioned for the pilot’s wounds to be treated. He removed a scarf from his neck to staunch the blood flow, and the British men did their best to help but to no avail. It was a sucking wound, most likely a bullet through the lungs, and each gasp from the mouth caused a corresponding gurgle from the chest. The pilot reached a hand out to his gunner and gave his arm a weak squeeze. Then his hand fell away, and the man died beside his plane. The captors seemed subdued, the gunner devastated.
As the artillerymen led their surviving prisoner away, Warren sighted tears on the gunner’s cheeks. More noticeable was the expression on his face. His chin was clenched, his lips trembling. His eyes were numb at first, until they met Warren’s. The power of his accusation went directly into Warren’s soul.
* * *
Two weeks passed, and Warren still couldn’t forget the way the downed German gunner had looked at him. For some reason, it made him miss Claire. Even when she couldn’t put it into words, he felt her comfort, her lack of condemnation with each touch of her hand.
Warren’s own hands might be covered in German blood, but he was doing his best to minimize British deaths. He had given Boyle and Reeves regular, consistent missions, and Boyle was now one of the best pilots in the squadron, rivaling men who had been with Warren since his promotion to captain.
After receiving their next assignment, a patrol deep into Hunland rather than on the line, Warren walked with Boyle to his plane. “You’re doing well, Flight Sergeant.”
“Thank you, sir.” Boyle grinned. “I’m trying.”
“You’re succeeding. Good luck up there today.”
“Same to you, sir.”
Warren glanced at Boyle’s flash of teeth and went to his own scout plane with a smile, remembering Boyle’s hesitant admission earlier in the war that he wanted to fly. The war had destroyed a multitude of dreams and crushed a mass of hopes. Maybe that was what made Boyle’s advancement so satisfying. It was one small bright spot in a world gone dark.
When they reached altitude, Warren led the four other planes east in search of German targets. He hoped they would be fighters. Reconnaissance planes observing the British troops or spotting for Hun artillery made easier targets, but the same was true in reverse. German fighters had an easy time shooting down British spotters, but if the squadron could knock out a few of the aggressive Hun machines, the air would be safer for other British pilots. Warren was up for the challenge, and so were his men.
Twenty minutes later, he spotted a pair of German two-seater aircraft. They weren’t fighters, but he turned toward them anyway, slowly gaining altitude as he closed the distance. When the Huns noticed, they split up. Warren motioned for three of his pilots to follow one while he and Reeves followed the other.
Warren caught the plane, dove, and sheared off a wing before the Hun could return fire. He watched the plane fall, then noticed Reeves signaling east. Two Hun fighters were flying toward them. Warren made a smooth turn so he would meet the Albatrosses head-on. Reeves stayed on his left wing. One of the Hun planes had a trio of red stripes on each of its four wings, but neither of them was painted solid red. That was a relief. Warren was in a good position for the attack, but he didn’t want to face off against the Red Baron.
Bullets flew as the two flights neared each other. Several ripped through Warren’s right wing, but he saw his bullets do the same to his opponent’s engine. Black smoke bellowed from the enemy fuselage. Warren glanced behind him. Smoke streamed from Reeves’s plane too.
As the two injured planes turned for home, Warren looped his plane into a tight turn and went back for a pass at the other Albatross. The second German fighter appeared undamaged and turned to meet him. As Warren passed it, he felt a whir of bullets whizzing past his head, but he managed to shoot his opponent’s engine. The German plane spiraled out of control. Warren didn’t envy the man. Nor did he envy the other German pilot when he saw the first plane’s engine burst into flames.
That made three victories for the day. Three fewer planes to fight the Allies, three fewer trained pilots, and one less gunner. But Warren didn’t feel like celebrating.
He picked out Reeves, now in the distance. Even if he didn’t make it back to the aerodrome, it looked as though his plane was functioning well enough to land within Allied lines. Warren searched for the other half of his squadron, but he hadn’t seen them since they’d chased the other observation plane. It was probably time to head back anyway, before he ran out of fuel.
After landing his plane and examining the minor damage to the canvas, Warren walked to Major Cook’s tent. One of his pilots, Flight Sergeant Grimsley, was already inside.
“Grimsley, how did it go?”
“We got him, sir. But then we got jumped by three Hun fighters. I barely made it back. Potter looked like he was going to crash land on our side of the line.”
“And Boyle?”
“He shot down one of the Hun scouts, sir, but he’ll not be coming back.”
“What happened?” Warren’s muscles tensed, but maybe Boyle had landed behind German lines. Being a POW was better than being dead, and sometimes prisoners escaped.
“Gone west, sir. His plane caught fire. Turned into a flamer.”
Warren left the tent. He’d seen and heard of so many deaths—what was one more? Yet when he thought of Boyle’s grin, of his enthusiasm for flying, of the way he had bucked social norms and gotten into pilot training, this one hurt more than the others. And going down in flames—what an awful way to die.
With his eyes to the sky, Warren whispered the Royal Flying Corps motto. “Per ardua ad astra, my friend.” Through adversity to the stars.