The next day, Billy and I participated in our first dawn patrol. Four of us went up while it was still dark, one after the other taking to the skies. It was terrifying in those first few minutes before the grey light of dawn appeared. I kept my nose aimed at the elusive shadow of our leader, Williams, a gruff British officer. We knew that the main reason for our turn on dawn patrol was to practise formation, and Williams was the man to teach us. Not long into the patrol we spotted a Zeppelin. It was out of range for us, yet the very sight of that giant airship with its black Iron Cross set my heart racing.
“Make note of when and where we saw it,” Williams said sternly when we were back on the ground.
Writing reports was part of our daily work. Time, altitude, speed, towns — all had to be recorded in logbooks. It was tedious, unfulfilling work, especially when absolutely nothing happened on most of our sorties. Yet after our brief encounter with the Zeppelin, I realized the importance of the logbooks. Our report put the coast on high alert. Lives were at stake: not only those in the air but civilians on the ground. I thought of Nellie and her family. What could they do against bombs dropped from high above? A warning allowed them to find some protection in the cellar. And what about Robert, hunkered down in some trench with bombs landing all around him? I was angry just thinking about it. It made me want to go straight back up and hunt the Zeppelin down.
That afternoon the mail arrived and I gave a whoop of joy when the carrier held up two letters for me. One was from my mother with a note and a letter from Robert folded inside. The other was from Nellie. I didn’t know where to start!
I opened Robert’s crinkled letter. The seal was in place — that meant that my mother had not opened it. Whatever my brother said to me was for my eyes only. I began to read.
He had seen action. A lot of it. I read on. As pilots, we all heard stories of the harsh life at the Front. Billy had chosen flying instead of infantry for that very reason. And what Robert described was horrible. Three of his friends had been lost in a single charge, shot down like a row of pigeons on a fence. Gone was his excitement. Gone was his enthusiasm. Small wonder, when Canadian casualties had been so high recently at the Somme, in particular at the village of Courcelette.
Between the lines of his words I sensed a creeping despair. But then I smiled grimly. His courage was still there. His last lines read: We’ll get them yet. Be safe, little brother.
In my mother’s note she mentioned that Robert had received news of my enlistment and pilot training from Sarah. She said he honoured my choice and that, God willing, we would meet in France. I set the letter down, allowing my mind to drift back to our farm, my parents and Sarah.
“All’s well?” Billy sat down beside me.
“It’s rough going at the Front,” I said. I didn’t want to say too much, knowing what had happened to his brother.
“That it is,” he murmured.
I held up Nellie’s letter. He tried to snatch it from me. “You dog!” he cried with a grin. I wanted privacy to read it and without another word Billy wandered off.
Her writing was neat and simple like Sarah’s, which suddenly made me wonder about her schooling. Her family was well. She had received my letter and was delighted with my drawings. To my surprise she included her own drawing: a small sketch of a biplane, so high it looked almost like a bird, and of an arm and hand just entering the frame and waving from the ground. She had drawn something floating between the hand and the plane and I realized that it was a kiss. I tucked Nellie’s letter into my jacket pocket, right next to my maps.
Over the next few days we practised target shooting more than usual and discussed how to attack a Zeppelin. We also received a short stint of training on how to escort Strutter bombers.
* * *
Williams came to our hut one night after supper. “Be on the ready, lads,” he said. “Word has it we might be flying tonight. An unconfirmed sighting of an airship off Whitby. Looks like the Hun is back.”
Twenty minutes later he returned. “To your planes!” he commanded. I scrambled off my bunk and into my gear. Two of the lads who weren’t flying tonight jumped up and helped us with zippers and gloves. It was the first time we had been called to a sortie from the ground with an actual enemy in sight, and everyone was excited.
It was an unusually cold night. Billy clapped my shoulder as we ran to our planes. “Good luck, Paul. I’ve got your back.”
“And same for you,” I said.
We took off in staggered intervals, a few minutes between each plane to avoid collisions once we were up there. The first few minutes in the air were more terrifying than dawn patrol, for the darkness never left. There were moments when I was completely blind, relying solely on hearing. I strained to see ahead. I sang a hymn to keep my heart from pounding so hard.
The moon crept out from the clouds and the world changed. It was a little like entering a room with a candle: directly ahead was silver and clear, while beside and below remained in darkness. Clouds floated past us like elusive shadows — blimp-like shapes appearing and disappearing in the sky.
I reached forward and touched my Vickers gun nervously. If it jammed, I had no defence other than my flying skills. My hand trembled as I touched the gun handle. I didn’t touch the trigger, having learned my lesson from my first flight in a Strutter.
I found the Zeppelin just north of Whitby. The towns were blacked out — all their lights extinguished so the airships could not find targets on the ground. However, I knew from my speed and flying time that Whitby was close.
It was a larger airship than the one I’d followed previously. The sight of it made me shiver. The Zeppelin had not yet spotted me, for it maintained its course rather than increasing altitude. They would hear us soon enough.
Over the next 10 minutes I slowly climbed higher, searching for my companions. The sky was bright enough for me to catch glints here and there, and I realized I was not alone. One or two others had also spotted the Zeppelin. Our objective, as determined back at the base, was to rise above the dirigible and fire down on it. The moon illuminated the giant cylindrical shape enough that I could see the forward and aft gondolas clearly. It was from these compartments that our greatest challenge would come.
There were at least two other Strutters with me. The moonlight glinted from time to time off their wings. My heart pounded as we drew closer.
We pulled even with the airship at about 9000 feet and were still climbing to get above it when the crew spotted us. The ceiling was low and we soon pulled clear of the clouds and into the full moonlit sky. Their guns opened up. Red flames suddenly appeared from the aft gondola as their gunners fired. Bullets whined through the air around me and a small hole appeared in my top wing. I banked sharply away from the airship.
For a brief moment I felt the urge to keep on going, to head straight back to the aerodrome. Then I heard Robert’s words in my mind: Move towards the fear. I cleared the castor oil from my goggles and took a breath. “Okay,” I said. “Here we go.”
When I came around again, the Zeppelin’s nose was angled upward as it tried to gain altitude and escape our attack. The moment I was within 1000 feet of it, bullets whizzed around me again. I fired a burst and then stopped immediately as Billy’s plane shot by my nose. “Billy!” I screamed. “I almost shot you!” The tracer bullets continued to follow his plane like hellish fireflies in the night.
Suddenly the giant sides of the airship were right in front of me. I pulled back hard on the stick. The engine strained and my poor Strutter shook like a rag doll. “Come on, come on!” I muttered. A second later I was clear of the Zeppelin and headed for open sky. I hoped that none of my companions was above me, for it was still difficult to see.
Instead of pulling out from the stall, I kept my nose up and performed a loop. Once again the Strutter shook and shimmied. At the end of the manoeuvre I maintained a dive and saw the enormous top of the airship some 700 feet in front of me. At 500 feet I opened fire. Orange and blue flame erupted from my guns as the red streaks of my incendiary bullets headed for the airship’s top.
As I pulled away and got ready for another loop, I caught sight of a streaking flame off the starboard side of the Zeppelin. Another Strutter. The plane’s nose turned towards the earth and it began to spiral, with billows of white smoke filling its wake.
“No!” I cried. I levelled my Strutter and leaned out, straining to see the burning plane. There was no way of telling whose it was. Suddenly I was furious at the Zeppelin. I pulled hard on the stick and ignored the pressure and buffeting wind. I hardly even noticed when I turned upside down this time. All I could think of was seeing the top of the airship again.
I managed to fire two bursts into the top of the Zeppelin. Ahead of me was another plane, strafing its aft portion. I pulled up just as an orange glow appeared at the airship’s midsection. Its gunners had stopped firing. I gained some distance and then turned around. A blast of flame roared out from the top as the Zeppelin exploded. I watched, fascinated, until the hot air struck my Strutter. My wings were buffeted so fiercely I was afraid they would be torn off. There was nothing I could do to break free. All I could do was fight to keep her steady and wait for the buffeting to pass.
When the blast ended I regained control and turned back. The dark night revealed a hideous sight. The frame of the dying Zeppelin stood out starkly in the yellow and orange flames, like the skeleton of a giant beast as it fell through the skies. Small figures, like sparks, fell off from the burning mass and blazed tiny trails to the ground. With horror I realized that they were men.
“Lord have mercy,” I murmured. I felt sick to my stomach.
The remaining Strutters were ahead of me. I caught up quickly, suddenly remembering the burning plane I had seen earlier. Billy waved at me in the bright moonlight and I leaned back heavily in my seat, whispering thanks. On closer inspection it appeared that Williams was the one who had gone down. I thought for a moment that I was going to vomit into my mask. Billy suddenly dipped his wings and took the lead, heading towards the ground and not our aerodrome. We followed him as best we could, keeping a safe distance, making our way home.
Here and there along the ground we saw burning pieces of the Zeppelin. The main body had fallen into the sea only a hundred yards from shore.
I scanned the ground as best I could, still trying to spot Williams, but it was difficult to see anything. When we finally touched down, I sat in the cockpit for several minutes after the engine stopped.
“Sir?” a ground crewman ventured.
“It’s all right,” I heard Billy say. “I’ve got him.” He climbed onto the wing and sat on the edge of the cockpit. “I don’t think Williams is dead, Paul,” he said. “I saw him level out. The light was tricky, but I swear he gained control. And then the flames went out and I couldn’t see him anymore. That’s why I brought us so close to the ground.”
I couldn’t believe my ears. “You’re sure?”
“I’ve already informed ground crew,” Billy said. “They’ll send a wire to Whitby and the search will be on.”
We were silent for a moment and then I said, “Billy, what have we done? Those men … those burning men.”
He gripped my shoulder. “You listen to me, Paul Townend! The men in that Zeppelin were about to drop bombs on women and children! On girls like your Nellie. You remember that!” He pushed me roughly and started to leave.
“Billy, wait!” I released my safety belt and stood up. “We blew the Zeppelin wide open. I’ve never killed anything other than a chicken. And these were men. I don’t know what to feel.”
“Feel nothing,” he said gruffly. “It’s easier that way.”
* * *
They brought Williams back the next morning. He was dead. They found his plane at the edge of a field outside of Whitby. He must have managed to bring the plane down under control, only to strike a tree in the darkness. The commander asked Billy to write a letter informing Williams’s parents, as Billy was the last to see him go down.
“You’re better with words, Paul,” he said, and pushed the paper towards me.
I nodded. It was the most difficult thing I had ever written. My hand shook when I picked up the pen. Williams was twenty-one years old and their only son.
That night at supper Billy stood up at the table in the mess hall. He raised his glass and all conversation stopped. “To Williams,” he said simply. There was a murmur of assent and all raised their glasses. After a pause Billy added, “Grieve, but don’t weep. You can’t shoot the Hun with tears in your eyes.”
Later, when I reached the end of my letter, my hand finally stopped shaking.