Orville Ralston flew the DH.4 bomber before joining 85 Squadron.
Nerves Worn to a Frazzle
While the 17th Aero Squadron was being assembled at Petite Synthe, poor Orville Ralston had been reduced to a ferry pilot, transporting aircraft across the Channel to France so that some young daredevil could fly them into combat. He wondered what he’d done wrong. The answer was nothing. But despite his skills as a pilot, “Tubby” wasn’t like Springs, Hamilton, or Callender; he didn’t have a face that people remembered or a personality that attracted attention. His file sat buried on a desk somewhere, gathering dust, while he gathered planes and flew them to the front.
It was the same role assigned Arthur Taber; he, however, reveled in the job. Throughout the summer of 1918 he kept his parents abreast of his travels: a few days down to Bordeaux, a trip here and there to the seaside (“the smooth, hard sand-beach made an ideal place for landing”), up to Scotland, down to Cambridge, and then a few days in London. “I’m overworked,” he complained to his mother. “All I do is fly, fly, fly new planes.” What he wanted, he added, what was his most fervent desire, was a posting to a fighter squadron. “The men in our squadrons at the front have been having a gorgeous time firing up the retreating Hun while flying one hundred feet up only, and I wish more than words can say that I’d been with them.”
On July 6, Ralston took matters into his own hands. In France on another ferrying mission he paid a courtesy call to 85 Squadron at St. Omer. Elliott Springs was no longer with them, but Larry Callahan was still there. Perhaps it was he who introduced his compatriot to Maj. Mick Mannock, recently arrived to replace Billy Bishop.
Mannock was a brilliant pilot, with fifty-two kills to his name, but he should never have been at the front. He was sick, physically and mentally, convinced that he had a rendezvous with death. His attitude certainly made him even more savage in the air. He hated Germans, and, starting July 7, he shot down nine in nineteen days.
Mannock was a thirty-one-year-old Anglo-Irishman, a shy, socially diffident man who felt an outsider because he lacked the privileged swagger of so many young British pilots. Perhaps in Ralston he recognized a kindred spirit. He accepted him into the squadron, and even made him 85’s bartender, the position vacated by Springs.
Ralston couldn’t have wished for a better mentor than Mannock. He was a theorist, a pilot who weighed up each risk and never dived recklessly into attack. Much of what he taught Ralston the American already knew, about the best angle of attack and every instructor’s favorite phrase—“beware the Hun in the Sun.” But Mannock passed on to Ralston some of his own combat rules: keep yourself physically fit; look after your guns as if they’re your children; enemy fighters should be attacked from above, but two-seaters from under their tail; open fire when you’re within one hundred yards of the target; aim for the pilot and keep firing until you’ve hit him. His philosophy of dogfighting was a metaphor for his life—don’t get involved, stay on the periphery, and look for a clear target. Then attack swiftly and withdraw from the scrap.
The great British ace Mick Mannock replaced Billy Bishop as C.O. of 85 squadron and took Orville Ralston under his wing, in time turning the young Nebraskan into an ace.
If Mannock said he wanted Ralston in his squadron, then have him he would. No administrative officer could stand in the way of Britain’s most ruthless ace. The young Nebraskan was soon filling his diary with ribald accounts of life in the RAF’s most glamorous fighter squadron. One memorable night in the mess involved Callahan on the piano leading the squadron in an evening of ragtime. “Two great kegs of beer were near at hand and everyone was ‘quaffing’ beer,” wrote Ralston. “Late in the evening we sat around the anteroom smoking, singing and I finally got out my old uke. Whiskey toddies were frequent and we sang and played around with Major Mannock as happy and boyish as the worst of us.”
On July 24, Ralston scored his first victory when his flight came upon six Fokker D.VIIs northwest of Armentières. Remembering Mannock’s advice, he singled out one of the six and attacked from above. “He turns slightly and goes into a vertical dive,” Ralston wrote in his diary. “I follow at a terrible rate and fire my remaining shots from the Lewis drum. He still dives on. The speed is so terrific that I flatten out at 5,000 [feet] and see the Hun go on down and vertically into the ground.”
Ralston returned to base, intoxicated by his success. Like Springs, Grider, Callahan, and every fighter pilot, the first victory tasted the best. “Believe me, it was great sport,” he wrote in his diary that night. “I was thoroughly crazed over the fight.”
His euphoria was short-lived. Two days later Mannock crashed in flames, shot down by ground fire in a moment of carelessness after dispatching another Hun. Hadn’t he told Ralston never to come down low to inspect the wreckage of your kills? In Mannock’s honor, 85 Squadron threw an almighty wake with “music, liquor and a ‘hilarious’ time.” Ralston found it hard to join in. “I guess there is no doubt it will come to all of us in the end,” he wrote in his diary.
Ralston shot down his second German on August 22. A fortnight later he received orders transferring him to 148th Aero squadron. He was furious. It was all Elliott Springs’s doing, aided—albeit unwittingly—by his old friend from 85 Squadron, Capt. Malcolm McGregor, who in passing had mentioned to Springs the sharp-eyed Nebraskan in his flight.
Springs was on the lookout for good pilots, so he arranged for Ralston’s transfer. That wasn’t all, he told his father in a letter dated September 10. “I have at last succeeded in getting Larry Callahan in my flight. He arrived yesterday.
Springs was overjoyed to welcome Callahan to the 148th. Although he had only accrued a modest tally of three enemy aircraft since arriving in France in May, Callahan was an emotional crutch for the increasingly worn Springs. Since August 8, the first day of the Battle of Amiens, Springs had been on countless low-level offensive patrols over enemy lines. That was pressure enough, but the responsibility of command weighed heavily on his young shoulders. In England, Springs had cultivated an image of insouciance—the happy warrior who lived only for women, wine, and war—but the reality was different. Conscientious, and deeply concerned for the welfare of the men in his flight, he wrote his mother on August 8 that “the excitement and strain is trebled for the leader.…[W]hen you are responsible for all that takes place from the time you leave the ground you find the old frazzle on the nerves.”
Unwilling to confide in his father, Springs instead revealed some of his anxieties to his stepmother, a woman with whom he had only a lukewarm relationship. “I fought Huns all night in my sleep,” he told her on August 14, a day after he’d claimed his sixth victory. “Today I feel all washed out.” Three days later, after a ferocious dogfight between eleven Sopwith Camels and twenty Fokkers, Springs wrote he was unsure what would get him first, “a bullet or nervous strain.” But to his comrades he maintained the pretense of nonchalance, using for his flight commanders’ streamers a pair of ladies’ silk stockings.
Then came the joint escort operation with 17th Aero Squadron on August 26, a murderous day that left three of the 17th dead and three more in captivity. It was, Springs wrote home, “the hardest scrap of my career.” He came through unscathed but it had left him “feeling really depressed.” What he needed was the company of Callahan, he told his mother, explaining that he was trying to prize him from 85 Squadron. “If so it ought to help a lot as my nerves are worn to frazzle.”
Springs brightened the moment he saw Callahan saunter through the mess, kit bag slung over his shoulder, as imperturbable and inimitable as ever. Callahan had just returned from two weeks’ leave in London, and within minutes Springs was laughing so much his sides ached. Callahan had passed part of the time as a guest of Col. Bishop, now head of the Canadian Flying Corps, and the rest of the leave was shamelessly spent in the most disreputable clubs of the British capital. “Every blonde and brunette is weeping for Grider,” reported Callahan. Well, almost. Billie Carleton “has recovered sufficiently to become engaged to another American officer.”37
The remaining two Musketeers vowed to make up for lost time. On September 11, the pair went to dine in a village bistro some ten miles from their new base at Remaisnil, where they had been moved to support the British Third Army in the Battle of Bapaume. It was an intimate dining room, crowded with “British colonels, a couple of stray Australian and Canadian majors and a sprinkling of Scotch and French dining there also.” But what a flat atmosphere! Springs looked at Callahan. Without a word his friend rose and took his seat behind the piano in the corner of the room. “Almost immediately everyone became bosom friends,” explained Springs to his mother. “A couple of the English officers were so affected by Larry’s rag [time] that they gave an excellent imitation of the Gaity chorus and put on a very good ballet. We all parted friends and we’re going over some night to dine with a couple of the English officers at their mess.”
The next evening, September 12, Callahan and Springs dropped in at 148th Aero Squadron to celebrate with George Vaughn, their old friend from the Carmania. After a slow start with 84 Squadron, Vaughn had embarked on a devastating killing spree, resulting in the award of the DFC. “In all,” concluded the medal’s citation, “he has accounted for six enemy aircraft, five machines destroyed and one driven down completely out of control, and one kite balloon.” Vaughn had subsequently been transferred to the 17th to fill the empty chairs left in the mess by the disastrous events of August 26.
Although Orville Ralston had shot down two enemy aircraft, he’d been flying an S.E.5. Now he had to master the inferior Sopwith Camel. Ralston didn’t appreciate its lack of agility but it was the machine’s rotary engine that caused him the greatest anxiety. “I really am afraid I cannot fly them,” he wrote in his diary on September 10. Disclosing his fears to Morton Newhall, 148th’s commander, Ralston was given a choice: make good in a Camel, or spend the rest of the war in a low-level bombing squadron.
Known as the Arizona Balloon-Buster, Frank Luke of 91st Squadron shot down eighteen enemy balloons before his death in September 1918.
“The petrol and oil fumes [from the engine] make me very sick,” he complained to his diary, adding that he had made a “bum landing” first time around. But he was not going to give in. “I want to try and make good here for all the fellows are real boys.…I only hope I will feel better and can learn to fly this soon without any accidents.”
Springs and Callahan came to Ralston’s rescue, the former giving him some intensive instruction, while Callahan and the young Nebraskan went for a walk. “We have a good talk over things in general and I decide to fly them and stick it out at all hazards,” Ralston wrote in his diary of the man-to-man parley with Callahan.
Imbued with the faith of the Two Musketeers Ralston had soon mastered his Camel. On September 15, he and Springs pounced on an enemy two-seater, both taking a share of the credit in destroying the Halberstadt.
By now the Allied ground offensive was gaining momentum and the Germans were falling back east. On September 20, 148th Aero squadron moved twenty miles southeast from Remaisnil to Baizieux. Four days later, Springs led Ralston, Callahan, and the rest of C Flight on an early morning offensive patrol over the enemy line together with A and B Flights, commanded by Henry Clay and Field Kindley. They encountered a large patrol of Germans flying at 12,000 feet, the “pilots exceptionally good,” as Springs wrote in his combat report. At first the odds were even, fifteen versus fifteen, but “more Fokkers kept coming up.”38
Springs managed to shoot down one Fokker for his fifteenth victory, but “three E.A.s got hits on my plane.” The Germans’ incendiary bullets scorched his propeller, pierced two of his spars and came so close to the cockpit Springs “could smell the phosphorous.”
Springs escaped, but, on returning to base, discovered “nineteen holes in my machine.” One by one the rest of the squadron returned, all except Callahan. Someone had seen him go down in a spin. Springs paced up and down outside the mess, willing his friend to return. Then at midday the phone rang. It wasn’t Callahan, but it was news of him. One of his spars had been shot out in the dogfight, causing his right wing to buckle. He’d gone into a spin but managed to pull out and side slipped back over the line before crashing in no man’s land upside down. How bad were his injuries, Springs enquired. No injuries. He was having a spot of lunch and would be back with the squadron in time for dinner.
Lieutenant John Todd was a Scottish ace whose eighteen victories in 1918 were all achieved in a Sopwith Camel.
On September 26, it was Orville Ralston’s turn to experience that heady concoction of thrill and fear. Forced to leave the formation because of a defective engine, Ralston was heading back to base when he spotted five Fokkers driving down three Camels. He evened up the odds by latching on to the tail of an enemy aircraft, firing a burst, but then could only curse silently as his target fled into a thick cloud. He hesitated. Ralston knew that the unwritten rules of aerial combat stated pilots should never follow their enemy into the clouds because of the risk of collision. “However,” wrote Ralston in his diary. “I knew old ‘Mick’, Major Mannock, used to do it so I thought I would try.” He plunged into the cloud, heart thumping loud beneath the roar of his rotary engine, then emerged on the other side. He saw his prey but “there were also four Fokkers not far off, coming in my direction.” Ralston fired a long burst into the lone Fokker, sending him spiraling to earth, and then turned back into the cloud just as the quartet of Fokkers opened up.
In the company of his ground crew and Springs, Ralston examined his engine upon his return. A cylinder was cracked so there had been no compression. Springs whistled appreciatively, and told Ralston he was some pilot to have weighed into a fight with a bad engine. Later he submitted a recommendation that Ralston be awarded the DSC for his “act of unusual daring and courage.”
The next day Springs, together with Henry Clay, spotted five enemy aircraft approaching Allied lines near Cambrai. The pair “although hopelessly outnumbered, immediately attacked” and between them sent five hundred rounds into a two-seater. Then they fled home, Springs laughing that none of the Germans had managed to put a single bullet through his machine.
A short while later Springs suffered a breakdown. He couldn’t remember the exact date; it was either the end of September or the beginning of October. He was transported to Paris and for several days lay in a hospital bed a “total nervous wreck.” On October 8, he felt strong enough to write home, but he no longer cared about concealing the truth from his father. “I’m a chattering idiot they tell me and I’m expecting my hair to turn gray daily.”
Major Leslie MacDill, the officer who had been in command of the Italian detachment a year earlier, had visited Springs and was trying to arrange a posting for him as an instructor to the U.S. aerial gunnery school at St. Jean de Monts on the west coast of France. Springs, however, recently promoted to major and now the recipient of both the DFC and DSC, was adamant he would return to lead his flight into battle once more.
However, the doctors laughed at Springs’s suggestion he was fit enough to return to the front. Absolutely no way. Springs resigned himself to his plight. Anyway, there were worse places to be than the Hotel Continental, the plush establishment in 3 Rue de Castiglione that had been converted into a military hospital. His days were spent in “pleasant and philosophic contemplation of life in general.” His spirits were buoyed by the news that “three of the men I lost have been reported as prisoners,” and he was delighted that his old friend Bill Tipton was safe and well if also in German hands. “If only Mac [Grider] would show up,” he wrote to his stepmother. “But that’s beyond the realms of possibility now.”
