but drove up full tilt and straight for the four dots in the sky. They
climbed as they went, and since the Trichord type is rather famous
for its climbing powers they made pretty good height as they went.
"Mel," in the lead, was in a desperate hurry to interrupt the enemy's
artillery-spotting work, so gave away the advantage of height and
sacrificed the greater climb they could attain with a lesser speed to
the urgent haste and need of getting in touch with the enemy. They were
still a good couple of thousand feet below when they came to within
half a mile of the Huns, and the "Kangaroo," with the others following
close, tilted steeply up and began to show what a Trichord really
could do if it were asked of her. They were gaining height so rapidly
that the Huns evidently did not like it, and two of them turned out
and drove over to a position above the Trichords. The three paid no
attention to them, but climbed steeply, swinging in towards the other
two machines which, since they still continued their circling, were
probably continuing their "shoot" and signalling back to their guns.
But the Trichords were too threatening to be left longer alone. The two
turned and flew east, with the Trichords in hot pursuit, slanted round,
and presently were joined by their friends. Then the four plunged on
the three in an almost vertical dive. Because the fighting scout only
shoots straight forward out of a fixed gun, its bows must be pointing
straight at a target before it can fire, and the Huns' straight-down
dive was meant to catch the Trichords at a disadvantage, since it was
hardly to be expected they could stand on their tails to shoot straight
up in the air. But this is almost what they did. All three, going "full
out," turned their noses abruptly up and opened fire. The Huns turned
their dive off into an upward "zoom" and a circling bank which allowed
their observers to point their guns over and down at the Trichords, and
fire a number of rounds.
But because it was now perfectly obvious that the Trichords had
attained their first and most urgent object, the breaking-off of the
Huns' "shoot" and spotting for their guns, they could now proceed to
the next desirable part of the programme--the destruction of the four
Huns by methods which would level up the fighting chances a little. The
"Kangaroo" shot out eastward and began to climb steeply, Mel expecting
that the other two would follow his tactics, get between the enemy and
their lines, and climb to or above their height. But the "'Un-settler"
was in trouble of some sort, and after firing a coloured light as a
signal to the leader meaning "Out of action; am returning home," slid
off west in a long glide with her engine shut off. Rip Winkle, on the
"Minnenwerfer," followed the "Kangaroo" east a few hundred yards and
began to climb. The four Huns at first tried to keep above the level of
the two, but it was quickly evident that the Trichords were outclimbing
them hand over fist, were going up in a most amazing lift, in "a
spiral about as steep as a Tube stair." The Huns didn't like the look
of things and suddenly turned for their lines, dropped their noses,
and went off at full speed. The two Trichords cut slanting across to
connect with them, and in half a minute were close enough to open fire.
Two against four, they fought a fierce running fight for a minute or
two. Then the "Kangaroo" swept in astern of a Hun, dived and zoomed
up under him and poured in a point-blank burst of fire. Mel saw his
bullets hailing into and splintering the woodwork of the underbody, was
just in time to throttle down and check the "Kangaroo" as the Hun's
tail flicked up and he went sweeping down in a spinning nose dive. But
a hard-pressed pilot will sometimes adopt that manœuvre deliberately to
throw a pursuer out of position, and, knowing this, Mel followed him
down to make sure he was finished, followed him watching the spin grow
wilder and wilder, and finish in a splintering crash on the ground. Mel
lifted the "Kangaroo" and drove off full pelt after the others. Two of
the Huns had dived and were skimming the ground--they were well over
Hunland by now--and the other one and the "Minnenwerfer" were wheeling
and circling and darting in and out about each other exactly like two
boxers sparring for an opening, their machine-guns rattling rapidly as
either pilot or gunner got his sights on the target. Then when he was
almost close enough to join in, Mel saw a spurt of flame and a gust
of smoke lick out from the fuselage of the Hun. The machine lurched,
recovered, and dipped over to dive down; the "Minnenwerfer" leaped in
to give her the death-blow, and under the fresh hail of bullets the Hun
plunged steeply, with smoke and flame pouring up from the machine's
body. The wind drove the flames aft, and in two seconds she was
enveloped in them, became a roaring bonfire, a live torch hurtling to
the ground. The Trichords saw her observer scramble from his cockpit,
balance an instant on the flaming body, throw his hands up and leap out
into the empty air, and go twisting and whirling down to earth.
A Hun Archie shell screamed up past the hovering Trichords and burst
over their heads, and others followed in quick succession as the two
turned and began to climb in twisting and erratic curves designed to
upset the gunners' aim. They worked east as they rose and were almost
over the lines when Mel, in one of his circlings, caught sight of
a big formation flying towards them from the west. He steadied his
machine and took another long look, and in a moment saw they were Huns,
counted them and found fourteen, most of them scouts, some of them
two-seaters of a type that Mel knew as one commonly used by the Huns on
the infrequent occasions they get a chance to do artillery-observing
work on our lines. Both Mel and Rip worked out the situation on much
the same lines, that the Huns had some important "shoot" on, were
specially keen to do some observing for their guns, had sent the four
two-seaters first and were following them up with other two-seater
observing-machines protected by a strong escort of fighters. Mel looked
round for any sight of a formation of ours that might be ready to
interrupt the game, saw none, and selecting the correct coloured light,
fired a signal to Rip saying, "I am going to attack." Rip, as a matter
of fact, was so certain he would do so that he had already commenced
to climb his machine to gain a favourable position. The fourteen were
at some 17,000 feet, several thousand above the Trichords, but here
the great climbing power of the Trichords stood to them, and they went
up and up, in swift turn on turn that brought them almost to a level
with the enemy before the Huns were within shooting distance. They
came on with the scouts flying in a wedge-shaped formation, and the
observing-machines protected and covered inside the wedge.
The odds were so hugely in their favour that it was clear they never
dreamed the two would attack their fourteen, and they drove straight
forward to cross above the lines. But the Trichords wakened them
quickly and rudely. Each wheeled out wide and clear of the formation,
closed in astern of it to either side, lifted sharply to pick up an
extra bit of useful height, dived, and came hurtling, engines going
full out and guns shooting their hardest, arrow-straight at the
two-seaters in the centre of the formation below them. Owing to the
direction of their attack, only the observers' guns on the two-seaters
had any chance to bring an effective fire to bear. It is true that the
few scouts in the rear of the wedge did fire a few scattering shots.
But scouts, you will remember, having only fixed guns shooting forward,
can only fire dead ahead in the direction the machine is travelling,
must aim the machine to hit with the gun. This means that the target
presented to them of the Trichords flashing down across their bows made
it almost impossible for them to keep a Trichord in their sights for
more than an instant, if indeed they were quick enough to get an aim at
all. Their fire went wide and harmless. The two-seaters did better, and
both Trichords had jets of flaming and smoking tracer bullets spitting
past them as they came, had several hits through their wings. But they,
because they held their machines steady and plunged down straight
as bullets themselves on to their marks, were able to keep longer,
steadier and better aim. Mel, as he drove down close to his target, saw
the gaping rents his bullets were slashing in the fuselage near the
observer, saw in the flashing instant as he turned and hoicked up and
away, the observer collapse and fall forward with his hands hanging
over the edge of his cockpit. Rip saw no visible signs of his bullets,
but saw the visible result a moment after he also had swirled up,
made a long fast climbing turn, and steadied his machine for another
dive. His Hun dropped out of the formation and down in long twisting
curves, apparently out of control. He had no time to watch her down,
because half a dozen of the Hun scouts, deciding evidently that this
couple of enemies deserved serious consideration, swung out and began
to climb after the Trichords. Mel promptly dived down past them, under
the two-seaters and up again under one. The instant he had her in the
gun-sights he let drive and saw his bullets breaking and tearing into
her. She side-slipped wildly, rolled over, and Mel watched for no more,
but turned his attention and his gun to another target.
By now the half-dozen Hun scouts had obtained height enough to allow
them to copy the Trichords' dive-and-shoot tactics, and down they came
to the long clattering fire of their machine-guns. Both Trichords had
a score of rents in wings and fuselage and tail planes, but by a mercy
no shot touched a vital part. But they could hardly afford to risk such
chances often, so went back to their plan of outclimbing and diving on
their enemies. Over and over again they did this, and because of their
far superior climb were able to keep on doing it despite every effort
of the Huns. Machine after machine they sent driving down, some being
uncertain "crashes" or "out-of-controls," but most of them being at
least definitely "driven down" since they did not rejoin the fight, and
were forced to drop to such landing-places as they could find. There
were some definite "crashes," one which fell wrapped in roaring flame
from stem to stern; another on which Rip saw his bullets slashing in
long tears across the starboard wing, the splinters fly from a couple
of the wing struts as the bullets sheared them through in splitting
ragged fragments. In an instant the whole upper wing flared upward
and back and tore off, the lower folded back to the body, flapped and
wrenched fiercely as the machine rolled over and fell, gave and ripped
loose; the port wings followed, breaking short off and away, leaving
the machine to drop like a plummet to the ground. The third certain
crash was in the later stages of the fight. The constant dive-and-zoom
of the Trichords had the desired effect of driving the Huns lower and
lower each time in their endeavour to gain speed and avoid the fierce
rushes from above. Strive as they would, they could not gain an upper
position. Some of them tried to fly wide and climb while the Trichords
were busy with the remainder; but one or other of the two leaped out
after them, hoicked up above them, drove them lower, or shot them down,
in repeated dives.
The fight that had started a good 17,000 feet up and close over the
trenches, finished at about 1,000 feet and six to seven miles behind
the German lines. At that height, the pilot of one Hun driven into a
side-slip was not able to recover in time and smashed at full speed
into the ground; another was forced so low that he tried to land, hit
a hedge and turned over; a third landed twisting sideways and at least
tore a wing away.
Then the two Trichords, splintered and rent and gaping with
explosive-bullet wounds, with their ammunition completely expended,
their oil and petrol tanks running dry, turned for home, leaving
their fourteen enemies scattered wide and low in the air, or piled
in splintered smoking wreckage along the ground below the line of
their flight. The fight with the fourteen had run without a break for
three-quarters of an hour.
They never knew exactly how many victims they had "sunk, burned or
destroyed." As they stated apologetically in the official "Combat
Report" that night: "Owing to the close presence of other active
E.A.[4] driven-down machines could not be watched to the ground."
[4] E.A.=enemy aircraft.
"Frankie" was almost more annoyed over this than he was over having
had to pull out of the action with a dud machine. "If we could have
confirmed all your crashes," he remarked regretfully, "it would have
been such a jolly boost-up to the Squadron's tally--to say nothing of
my wager."
VIII
"THE ATTACK WAS BROKEN"
The infantry who watched from their trenches one afternoon a Flight
of our machines droning over high above their heads had no inkling of
the effect that Flight was going to have on their, the infantry's,
well-being. If they had known that the work of this Flight, the
successful carrying out of its mission, was going to make all the
difference of life and death to them they might have been more
interested in it. But they did not know then, and do not know now,
and what is perhaps more surprising, the Flight itself never fully
learned the result of their patrol, because air work, so divided up and
apparently disconnected, is really a systematic whole, and only those
whose work it is to collect the threads and twist them together know
properly how much one means to the other.
This Flight was out on a photographic patrol. They had been ordered to
proceed to a certain spot over Hunland and take a series of pictures
there, and they did so and returned in due course with nothing more
unusual about the performance than rather a high average of attentions
paid to them by the Hun Archies. The photos were developed and printed
as usual within a few minutes of the machines touching the ground, and
were rushed off to their normal destinations. The photographers went to
their afternoon tea and forgot the matter.
But in a Nissen hut some miles from the photographers' 'drome afternoon
tea was held up, while several people pored over the photos with
magnifying glasses, consulted the many maps which hung round the
walls and covered the tables, spoke earnestly into telephones, and
dictated urgent notes. One result of all this activity was that Captain
Washburn, or "Washie," and his Observer Lieutenant "Pip" Smith, to
their no slight annoyance, were dragged from their tea and pushed off
on an urgent reconnaissance, and two Flights of two fighting scout
Squadrons received orders to make their patrol half an hour before the
time ordered. Washie and his Observer were both rather specialists
in reconnaissance work, and they received sufficient of a hint from
their Squadron Commander of the urgency of their job to wipe out their
regrets of a lost tea and set them bustling aboard their 'bus "Pan" and
up into the air.
It may be mentioned briefly here that three other machines went out
on the same reconnaissance. One was shot down before she was well over
the lines; another struggled home with serious engine trouble; the
third was so harried and harassed by enemy scouts that she was lucky
to be able to fight them off and get home, with many bullet holes--and
no information. Washie and Pip did better, although they too had a
lively trip. To make sure of their information they had to fly rather
low, and as soon as they began to near the ground which they wanted
to examine the Hun Archies became most unpleasantly active. A shell
fragment came up through the fuselage with an ugly _rip_, and another
smacked bursting through both right planes. Later, in a swift dive
down to about a thousand feet, "Pan" collected another assortment of
souvenirs from machine-guns and rifles, but Washie climbed her steeply
out of range, while Pip busied himself jotting down some notes of the
exceedingly useful information the low dive had brought them.
Then six Hun fighting scouts arrived at speed, and set about the
"Pan" in an earnest endeavour to crash her and her information
together. Pilot and Observer had a moment's doubt whether to fight or
run. They had already seen enough to make it urgent that they should
get their information back, and yet they were both sure there was more
to see and that they ought to see it. Their doubts were settled by the
Huns diving on them one after another, with machine-guns going their
hardest. The first went down past them spattering a few bullets through
"Pan's" tail planes as he passed. The second Pip caught fairly with a
short burst as he came past, and the Hun continued his dive, fell off
in a spin, and ended in a violent crash below. The third and fourth
dived on "Pan" from the right side and the fifth and sixth on her left.
Pip managed to wing one on the right, and sent him fluttering down
out of the fight more or less under control, and Washie stalled the
"Pan" violently, wrenched her round in an Immelman turn, and plunged
straight at another Hun, pumping a stream of bullets into him from his
bow gun. The Hun went down with a torrent of black smoke gushing from
his fuselage. Washie brought "Pan" hard round on her heel again, opened
his engine full out and ran for it, with the scattered Huns circling
and following in hard pursuit. Now "Pan" could travel to some tune when
she was really asked--and Washie was asking her now. She was a good
machine with a good engine; her pilot knew every stitch and stay, every
rod, bolt, and bearing in her (and his rigger and fitter knew that he
knew and treated him and her accordingly), every little whim in her
that it paid him to humour, every little trick that would get an extra
inch of speed out of her. A first-class pilot on a first-class scout
ought to overhaul a first-class pilot and two-seater; but either the
"Pan" or her pilot was a shade more first-class than the pursuers, and
Washie managed to keep far enough ahead to be out of accurate shooting
range and allow Pip to scrutinise the ground carefully as they flew.
For Washie was running it is true, but was running east and further out
over Hunland and the area he wanted to reconnoitre, and Pip was still
picking up the very information they had been sent to find.
When they swung north the three pursuing scouts by cutting the corner
came up on them again, and Pip left his notes to stand by his gun.
There was some brisk shooting in the next minute, but "Pan" broke clear
with another series of holes spattered through her planes and fuselage,
and Pip with the calf of his leg badly holed by an explosive bullet,
but with his gun still rapping out short bursts over the tail. They
were heading for home now, and Washie signalled Pip to speak to him.
The "Pan" is one of those comfortably designed machines with pilot's
and observer's cockpits so close together that the two men can shout
in each other's ear. Pip leaned over and Washie yelled at him. "Seen
enough? Got all you want?" "Yes." Pip nodded and tapped his note-block.
"All I want," he yelled, "and then some----" and he wiped his hand
across his wound, showed Washie the red blood, and shouted "Leg hit."
That settled it. Washie lifted the "Pan" and drove her, all out, for
home, taking the risk of some bullet-holed portion of her frame failing
to stand the strain of excessive speed rather than the risk of going
easy and letting the pursuers close for another fight with a wounded
observer to protect his tail.
"They've dropped off," shouted Pip a few minutes later. Washie swung
and began to lift the "Pan" in climbing turn on turn. "Look out," he
shouted back, "look out," and stabbed a finger out to point a group of
Huns ahead of them and cutting them off from the lines. Next minute
Pip in his turn pointed to another group coming up from the south well
above them and heading to cut them off. Washie swept round, dipped
his nose slightly, and drove at the first group. The next few minutes
were unpleasantly hot. The Huns strove to turn them, to hold them from
breaking through or past, or drive them lower and lower, while Washie
twisted and dived and zoomed and tried to dodge through or under them,
with his gun spitting short bursts every time he caught a target in
his sights; and Pip, weakening and faint from pain and loss of blood,
seconded him as best he could with rather erratic shooting.
Affairs were looking bad for them, even when "Pan" ran out and west
with no enemy ahead but with four of them clinging to her flanks and
tail and pumping quick bursts at her; but just here came in those two
Flights of our fighting scout Squadrons--quite accidentally so far as
they knew, actually of set design and as part of the ordered scheme.
Six streaking shapes came flashing down into the fight with their
machine-guns pouring long bursts of fire ahead of them, and the four
close-pursuing Huns left the "Pan" and turned to join up with their
scattered companions. Washie left them to fight it out, and turned
directly, and very thankfully, for his 'drome.
This ends the tale of "Pan," but not by any means of the result of her
work. That work, in the shape of jerky but significant reports, was
being dissected in the map-hung Nissen hut even before Pip had reached
the Casualty Clearing Station; and "Pan's" work (confirming those
suspicious photographs) again bred other work, more urgent telephone
talks, and Immediate orders. The stir spread, circle by circle, during
the night, and before daybreak the orders had borne their fruit, and
Flights--Artillery-Observing, reconnoitring and fighting-scout--were
lined up on their grounds waiting the moment to go; the Night Bombers
were circling in from their second and third trips of destruction on
lines of communication, railways and roads, junctions and bridges,
enemy troops and transport in rest or on the march, ammunition dumps
and stores; in the front lines the infantry were "standing to" with
everything ready and prepared to meet an attack; the support lines were
filling with reinforcements, which again were being strengthened by
battalions tramping up the roads from the rear; in the gun lines the
lean hungry muzzles of the long-range guns were poking and peering up
and out from pit and emplacement, and the squat howitzers were lifting
or lowering to carefully worked out angles.
Before daybreak was more than a mere doubtful smudge of lighter colour
in the east, the waiting Flights were up and away to their appointed
beats, and the first guns began to drop their shells, shooting "by the
map" (maps made or corrected from air photographs), or on previously
"registered" lines.
The infantry up in front heard the machines hum and drone overhead,
heard the rush and howl of the passing shells, the thud of the guns'
reports, the thump of the high-explosive's burst. That, for a time,
was all. For a good half-hour there was nothing more, no sign of the
heavy attack they had been warned was coming. Then the gunfire began to
grow heavier, and as the light strengthened, little dots could be seen
circling and wheeling against the sky and now and again a faint and
far-off _tat-tat-tat-tat_ came from the upper air. For if it was quiet
and inactive on the ground, it was very much the other way in the air.
Our reconnoitring and gun-spotting machines were quartering the ground
in search of targets, the scout machines sweeping to and fro above them
ready to drop on any hostiles which tried to interrupt them in their
work. The hostiles tried quickly enough. They were out in strength, and
they did their best to drive off or sink our machines, prevent them
spying out the land, or directing our guns on the massing battalions.
But they were given little chance to interrupt. Let any of their
formations dive on our gun-spotters, and before they had well come
into action down plunged our scouts after them, engaged them fiercely,
drove them off, or drew them away in desperate defensive fighting.
Gradually the light grew until the reconnoitring machines could see and
mark the points of concentration, the masses moving into position, the
filled and filling trenches; until the gun-spotters could mark down
the same targets and the observers place their positions on the map.
Then their wireless began to whisper back their messages from the air
to the little huts and shanties back at Headquarters and the battery
positions; and then....
It was the turn of the guns to speak. Up in the trenches the infantry
heard the separate thuds and thumps quicken and close and run into one
long tremendous roar, heard the shells whistle and shriek and howl
and moan over their heads, saw the ground far out in front of them
veil in twisting smoke wreaths, spout and leap in volcanoes of smoke,
earth, and fire. Battery by battery, gun by gun, the artillery picked
up and swelled the chorus. The enemy machines did little gun-spotting
over our positions. If one or two sneaked over high above the line, it
needed no more than the first few puffs about them from our watching
Archies to bring some of our scouts plunging on them, turning them and
driving after them in headlong pursuit. On the ground men knew little
or nothing of all this, of the moves and counter-moves, the dodging
and fighting high over their heads. Their attention was taken up by
the ferocious fire of our artillery, and in waiting, waiting, for the
attack which never came.