Churchill's Ace (Epic War Series Book 1) (19 page)

That’s three
, thought Hans as he looked out of his canopy to see if any RAF fighters had a track on them. The pilot from the Hurricane bailed out of his plane from 2000 feet and floated to safety on the Allied side of the river.

Captain Randolph Ashton saw Zigfried shoot the downed crew member in the parachute. Randolph looped toward Zigfried but instead latched onto Wilhelm’s plane. Wilhelm was late to react and soon, Randolph and his Hawker Hurricane was on his tail. Randolph fired a burst. It wasn’t until Wilhelm felt his plane slightly shutter from the bullets that he panicked.

The training at the Luftwaffe Flight School had been precise and calculating and was designed to give every pilot confidence in all situations. There was always a plan or maneuver to be performed to get you out of harm’s way. There wasn’t however, any maneuver or fancy barrel roll that could save a pilot who panicked in the midst of a dogfight.

Pilots who panicked did crazy things. Most froze at the controls, with the deer in the headlight syndrome. They simply weren’t sure what to do, or in many cases, had no clue where the danger was coming from. Of course, the prudent thing was to play into the strengths of your fighter plane.

If you were in a Spitfire, you might go into a torrid right turn, because there wasn’t a propeller driven plane that the Germans had in the skies that could catch you. That maneuver might buy you some precious time to clear your head. Then you would be able to rejoin the battle if you had the stomach for it.

As for Wilhelm, his hands were glued to the yoke of his Me 109. He didn’t know what to do. He was breathing so hard; he was close to hyperventilating. It was more than natural to be excited and for a pilot’s blood pressure to go up in the midst of a pitched battle that would decide if you would live or die. But hyperventilating, masked sound judgment in a dogfight.

Randolph closed in with his Hurricane and centered on the Me 109, through his plane’s gun reflector gun sight. He fired a two-second burst from his eight machine guns. That was more than enough. The slugs tore into the rear of the pilot’s compartment. Wilhelm’s head was protected by the armor plating behind his seat, but the fuel tank was ruptured in two places. Worse yet oil was leaking at the feet of Wilhelm.

It didn’t take much for Wilhelm’s Me 109 to catch on fire. The gasoline poured from twin holes in the non-self-sealing fuel tank. The Me 109’s fuel tanks in later variants would be self-sealing, preventing enemy bullets from destroying the integrity of the metal fuel tank. That, however, was down the line.

Flames licked at the feet of Wilhelm and soon his cockpit was turned into a hellish inferno. He tried to open his canopy but it was stuck fast, and his hands were now on fire. The cockpit was lit up like a flaming torch and Wilhelm let out a blood curtailing scream into his radio before it went out.

Wilhelm brought his hands to his face as the flames burned first the bottom of the neck. The sickening sizzle of skin burning was overwhelmed by the rumbling of the Me 109’s failing engine. Seconds later Wilhelm’s entire head was burning. He was still conscious when his right ear was turned into a stump, and his right eye seemed to explode from the heat.

Finally, his head dropped to his chest, and the Me 109 rolled over on its side and dropped from the sky. Zigfried was without a wingman, and he climbed. Randolph and his Hurricane came up from down below. Randolph fired a deflection shot. Zigfried’s plane jerked to the left and bullets passed by his canopy.

Zigfried rolled and banked trying to shake the Hurricane. Wolf reentered the fray from the port side, and he pushed his Me 109 to full throttle. He came at Randolph’s Hurricane from the side and fired. He severely damaged the rudder of Randolph’s Hurricane.

Randolph felt the controls on his plane go spongy. That was more than a sign that he was in trouble. It was the all clear to bail out, especially if you wanted to live. Captain Randolph Ashton’s Hurricane was on the wrong side of the river. The German Army was below him pouring troops over the ever enlarging bridgehead, at the once picturesque mountain town of Sedan.

Randolph flew further into enemy territory. He didn’t have any choice in the matter as his rudder was now gone and twirling toward the waters of the Sedan River. Randolph opened the plane’s canopy, rolled the plane over and left the cockpit. He let himself drop for what seemed for the longest time. He deployed his parachute and aimed for a tiny clearing.

Hans saw Randolph bail out of the Hurricane. He said on the radio to Wolf, “That’s four. What are you doing trying to win the war by yourself?”

“Back to base,” was all that Wolf said.

“That makes you an ace…”

Below them, Randolph yanked on the parachute lines, but the chute clipped the edge of a Douglas fir tree. The canopy of the parachute ripped in a jagged line and Randolph hit the trunk of the tree. Seconds later the chute gave way, and he fell the last ten feet to the ground. The fall jammed his ankle. The parachute was too high to pull down and hide. Randolph had no choice but to limp away from the site before the Germans came looking for him.

He knew once they found his parachute, there would be little hope of getting away. But he had to try. Captain Ashton disappeared into the forest, and it was only then that he realized that a bloody Nazi had shot him down. He wasn’t happy about that... not in the least.

* * *

By noon, the air battle for supremacy of the Sedan bridgehead was over. The Allied Air Force was mauled, and what was left of it, limped away. The defeat was predictable in many ways. First, the force followed the river valley on its way to Sedan, only to run into well placed German ground fire.

The German anti-aircraft batteries destroyed or severely damaged a quarter of the planes before they reached their target. Then the slow moving medium bombers, which were supposed to drop their payloads on the hastily built bridge, which was a wooden causeway, had no room to maneuver. They came straight for the bridgehead, and the German fighters, who were on patrol above the bridge, swarmed over the slow moving bombers.

Few if any bombs found their target. Instead, they created great splashes as they detonated in the river. The RAF fighter cover did their best, but they were outnumbered, and most importantly the Luftwaffe had the superior position to deploy their fighters high above the bridge.

The French ground troops trying to hold the outer works of the bridgehead saw that the air battle was lost. When the Luftwaffe’s nimble Stuka bombers reared their ugly heads above the battlefield and commenced to pulverize the French positions...it was over. The French retreated from their defensive positions. Soon the retreat turned into a rout, and the Battle of France was inexorably lost.

It would be but a matter of days until the German Panzers reached the French coast, thereby cutting the Allied ground force in two. But the fall of France was sealed and delivered on May 14, 1940, at the Sedan Bridgehead.

* * *

The sun was slipping behind a ridge by late afternoon, as Randolph worked his way through the tree line. His limp had disappeared as he walked in silence. The only noise he made was the constant crunching of twigs and broken branches under his feet.

Randolph didn’t have much in his flight pockets which would be useful in helping him for a “long stroll” back to his lines. He was in the business of flying, and not hunkering down in the forest trying to strike two stones together to make a fire.

Some pilots carried a pistol, but what good would that be against soldiers with rifles? Plus the more paraphernalia you had on your person while flying complicated things. A loose knife or extra things in your flight suit might get in your way when you bailed out.

When Randolph came to the top of a short ridge, he saw a single dirt track road. He took out his tiny compass, wiped the sweat from his forehead and read it. If he continued on to the southwest, he would eventually reach the Sedan River. But then what? How was he going to cross it? He could swim, but he would have to pick a spot that wasn’t moving too fast. He wasn’t sure that made good sense. He’d have to take off his flight boots and then somehow swim across the river.

Randolph put away his compass and hurried down the slope. He crossed the dirt road. It was then he heard the clicking of a bullet being chambered in a rifle. The sound was accompanied by the word, “Halt!” A platoon of German soldiers came out of the underbrush.

An officer with a Luger pistol in his hand approached Randolph. He motioned for the downed pilot to put up his hands. Randolph reluctantly did just that. The officer smirked, “Captain, the war is over for you.”

“I don’t speak German you dip shit.”

A German soldier searched Captain Ashton and found nothing of any significance. “You are a prisoner of the Luftwaffe. At least you British fight. The French, they run away.” The rest of the soldiers laughed, and Randolph was marched up the road and away from the Sedan River.

The fighter planes of JAG 23 landed after their first sortie over the Sedan Bridgehead. They had been gone for only 90 minutes, but it seemed like a lifetime. The pilots exited their Me 109s and expected that the planes would be refueled and rearmed for another sortie.

Instead, Colonel Dunkel met them on the tarmac. The pilots gathered around him, and he saw that three of the twelve pilots from the JAG 23 were gone. “And the others?”

Hans took off his flight head cap. “I saw Wilhelm get shot down. He didn’t make it. But Wolf shot the bastard who killed Wilhelm.”

Colonel Dunkel’s face tightened. “Men, we are standing down for right now. JAG 25 will be on patrol for the next couple of hours. It seems the enemy has been routed in the air and on the ground.”

Zigfried proudly said, “I got one. Blew him out of the sky.”

Hans whispered, “My hero.” He then loudly said, “Wolf got four. I should know I was protecting his ass.”

Colonel Dunkel smiled broadly, “Captain Kruger, if all this checks out then you are the first ace of the war. I will then notify Berlin. Hermann Goering himself will decorate you.”

“Sir,” said Wolf.

Hans directed his next comment to Zigfried. “Wolf got that Hurricane off your tail. You almost bought it.”

“That would have made you happy.”

Hans smirked. Colonel Dunkel said, “That’s enough. Captain Bockler you’ll have a new wingman assigned to you in the morning.”

Hans whispered, “Try not to get this one killed.”

Wolf said, “There is one more matter Colonel.”

“Go on.”

“Captain Kruger shot an RAF flyer while he was in a parachute.”

The other Me 109 pilots became quiet. There was an unwritten rule that a man in a parachute was off limits. He was out of the battle and a danger to no one. Two could play the same game, and so shooting anyone dangling from a parachute was strictly forbidden. After all, the next time, it might be you twisting and turning in the wind, with only a silk canopy above your head, between life and death. And then you’d be target practice for an enemy plane.

Colonel Dunkel turned serious. “Did anyone else witness this?” The rest of the pilots shook their heads. “Let me make this abundantly clear. The Luftwaffe doesn’t condone the barbaric practice of shooting pilots who are in a parachute. We are not fighting the Russians, who don’t even know how to use a latrine! I detest the French and how they have punished our country. But the worm has turned.

“As for the British, I have been to London. The food lacks texture, and who wants to drink warm beer?” The pilots stirred in their ranks and laughed. Colonel Dunkel turned serious again. “They may think they are morally superior and better fliers than us. But that has not proven to be the case. You have the training and the weapons to rest the air from the RAF.

“But I must warn all of you that the Luftwaffe as is its history, will adhere to the basic principles of chivalry. Is that understood? Captain Bockler, I will hear no more of this. The next inkling of something like this going on will result in an immediate court martial. Or better yet, I will see if the culprit can jump from a bomber without a parachute.”

* * *

JAG 23 stood down for the rest of the day as the fight for the Sedan was over. The French were in full retreat. The German armored divisions were pouring into the massive gap in the French lines and pushing toward the coast. The Luftwaffe Air Base at Trier was becoming more and more the rear area.

Colonel Dunkel was informed late in the afternoon that the squadron would soon be moving to another airfield. More than likely that would be somewhere in northern France. But the Wehrmacht was advancing so swiftly, everything was subject to change. France was collapsing faster than anyone could have imagined.

The makeshift officer’s club at the Trier Air Base was packed with pilots and commissioned officers after word spread that the squadron was going offline for a couple of days. Soon the bar was open, and the drinks flowed. Everyone was enjoying themselves, except for Zigfried. He sat by himself in the back of the room and looked at his fellow pilots with disgust.

As was the tradition in the Luftwaffe, drinks were hoisted into the air and toasts were given to the pilots who didn’t make it back that day. That was three stiff drinks for the same number of pilots who bit the dust that morning. A piano lit up a tune, and the pilots sang off key. “Dead Luftwaffe pilot. His spirit lives on. His plane returns to base. Half his face is gone!”

They repeated the chorus time and time again until the room was full of drunks, who were in no condition to fly a plane much less walk back to their quarters. Hans then proposed a toast to Wolf, who was still quite sober. “To our friend and now big shot, Wolf, the ace of JAG 23. You are now famous and have been ordered to Berlin to meet Hermann Goering himself. I feel sorry for you!” The pilots laughed, and some were drinking straight from the bottle. And why not, they might die and soon.

Wolf smiled and held up his hand. “I will put in a good word for all of you. But I will not lie and say you are good pilots!”