Once They Were Eagles (21 page)

Ed Harper

“When you first went out in combat, were you scared?”

“I was scared all the time.” Begert said.

“What kind of scared? Like your anticipation before a football game? Or like going into a dark alley with some muggers?”

“I would say more like an athletic contest, the big game. I think our psychology was completely different. We went in there after Joe Foss and Marion Carl, and I think all of us secretly wanted to make a record for ourselves. It was a combination of fright and opportunity. I think your analogy to a football game is good. When you go into a game like that, you're scared you're going to get hurt, and you want to be a hero.”

“Were the guys you went out with your closest friends?”

“Yes, Bourgeois in particular, but only in the rear areas. I think we were each afraid something would happen to the other in combat, and we didn't want to be that close.

“I'll never forget one night after a mission. I got into my cot, and there was an empty cot on my left and on my right, and an empty cot across the way from me.

“Case was missing, once, and they gave away all his clothes. When he showed up again, they were quite embarrassed and had to start getting it all back.”

“Let's jump ahead. Where'd you go after you had your home leave?” I asked.

“I was sent to the First Marine Division in China, after the war, as Air Officer to General Peck.”

Begert has a couple of citations: one, dated 15 April 1946 expressed the appreciation of the Tientsin Chief of Police for his excellent service and cooperation in apprehending two people engaged in smuggling $100,000 in Japanese currency out of China.

The other is from General K.E. Rockey, Commanding, Third Amphibious Corps, for “excellent service in connection with operations to effect the formal surrender of the enemy in the Tientsin area.” Begert assisted the Provost Marshal in the investigation of an international narcotics smuggling ring by volunteering to join the criminal organization, “fully aware of the desperate character of the individuals, and the personal danger involved.” He successfully accomplished his mission.

“I resigned my regular commission after I left China; Case and Bourgeois stayed in. My dad wasn't well and needed me at home. At
that time, we had three farms, this one; one 400 acres about a mile and a half from here; and another, 160 acres, about 15 miles away. We also had the major interest in an overall factory in Atchison.

“I came home and built a duplex. Dad died about ten years before my mother, and Betty and I have taken care of things ever since. We've sold off all our property except one acre around the house.

“I'm a stockbroker with Paine Weber, and I don't work any more than I have to. I listen to the Wall Street doings and it sounds like a funny farm. One week this, and the next week just the opposite. It all goes back to judgment.”

“Back to the Black Sheep, who were the best?”

“Bourgeois had the best eyesight. He'd call ‘bogie' and it'd be five or six seconds before I could pick them up. Boyington was far ahead in mechanical knowledge. He could lean out the mixture and stay in the air longer than we could. As a farm boy, I didn't miss even though I didn't get too many shots.”

“Do you think the singing helped mold the squadron?”

“Yes, that was very important. I remember they tried to teach me to sing. In the Russell Islands, remember that outhouse built on a dock? The seats were rough-hewn mahogany and full of splinters, and the rule was that when you went, you were supposed to take your knife and do some whittling to smooth it off. Mullen and Sims and I happened to go together every morning, me in the middle, and they tried to teach me harmony. The song was ‘Genevieve,' and I'd be fine until we got to the second ‘Genevieve.' I was the baritone. Those guys got so mad at me because I'd miss one note, and we'd do it again.”

“Looking back, what would you change if you could?”

“I might have stayed in if I had been allowed to stay with the squadron instead of being shipped to China. But as far as experiences are concerned, I wouldn't change a thing. I did try for one more tour of combat duty, but Doc Reames said he'd give me a Section 8 if I put in for it. I weighed only 125 pounds when I left the Black Sheep.”

I visited Ed Harper at McDonnell Aircraft Company's building at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport. Security at the entrance was tight. Signs warned that no photographic or recording equipment was allowed in the building and that all briefcases were to be left at the security desk.

Had my briefcase been inspected, the two cameras and two tape recorders would have caused instant panic among the security people. Fortunately, Ed Harper had enough clout to assure them that I would be under his constant surveillance, and the guards reluctantly issued me a pass without opening the case.

Harper is vice-president, and a program manager for McDonnell Aircraft Company Division of McDonnell Douglas Corporation. Compact, alert, incisive, he was a model of the company executive as he sat behind the huge desk in his office. We talked about the way the Black Sheep Squadron was formed and how it got its name, and then about more personal things.

“Were you scared on your first combat mission, being new?”

“As I recall, I was anxious to get about it, and a bit shocked when I saw the first Zero. It got very serious very fast. It's hard to prepare anybody for the real thing.

“I give Boyington a little credit for the kind of spirit the Black Sheep had. He conducted himself well in the air; his strongest virtue was that he helped me lose any fear I had in the air. His behavior on the ground wasn't always exemplary; a few times, I wasn't exactly pleased how things went. I liked the fact that he had few rules, all of which had to do with flight safety, and tried to enforce them. When I had a squadron of my own, I tried to emulate some of that: not too many rules, but enforce those you have. The longer I flew, the safer I felt. I've always thought flying and playing basketball are similar. You've got to get to the point where you can hit the basket, comfortable and relaxed, not uptight when someone crowds you; always under control and using peripheral vision. Good coordination and good eyes.”

I asked, “After the Black Sheep, you were sent to Green Island and were wounded there. How'd that happen?”

“It was the last flight of my last day of my last tour of duty. We had strafed a dozen trucks. I had only one gun firing and I decided to make
one last pass. As I pulled out, I got hit. The doc said it was a 50-caliber AP [armor-piercing] clean hole so it didn't spread out as it went through me, under the arm, through the lung; it clipped my spine, and came out in the middle of my back.

“Immediately after I got hit, I couldn't move my legs. They were hanging down in the bottom of the cockpit. At first, I told the guys I'd have to go down offshore, but by the time I'd jettisoned the canopy, I decided if I didn't get home, I wasn't going to make it. I told the guys I was going home. I started having fainting spells and threw away my helmet; it had been going dark on me. The spells cleared up, and I relaxed and trimmed the airplane up, put on power. The fear was completely gone. That statement that fear brings more pain than pain brings fear is really true. I could barely breathe, and when I got to Green Island, my legs weren't working right. I got them up on the pedals with my arms helping and made a normal landing, then rolled off the runway, but I did get stopped.

“The doc was looking at me in the cockpit, wanting a crane to get me out. I told him, I got this airplane home and I'm not going to sit here and bleed to death. Pick me up and get me out of here!' I passed out as they did and came to about two days later.

“The G.P. type doc there, I owe my life to him. He was pumping plasma but I wasn't responding. He went out of the tent and hollered to a Seabee, looked at his dogtag for the right type of blood. He laid him down beside me, started pumping whole blood directly into me, and I began to respond.

“Back at the Russells, I was running a high fever. They thought they'd have to operate for a bone infection. That evening, a corpsman came by and asked if they'd checked me for malaria. I told him I didn't know. On his own, he stuck my thumb, got a slide, came back and said: ‘You got malaria.' They canceled the operation and fed me quinine.

“I was there six weeks, then floated home on a hospital ship. I was in a hospital in San Francisco for a while, then in Farragut, Idaho—near home—for two months, and started a series of physicals. I was back on limited duty six months after I was shot.

“By the time the war was over, I was a Captain. I liked the Marine Corps, aviation, and what I was doing.”

Harper went on to a fine Marine Corps career: Project Engineer at the Bureau of Aeronautics; Executive Officer of Marine Attack Squadrons; Air Group Operations Officer and Squadron Commander of a jet squadron; Chief of the Command Center, U.S. European Command in Paris; Senior Marine Corps Liaison Officer to MACV Staff in Vietnam.
He retired in 1969 as a colonel and is well into his new career at McDonnell.

“I'm happy with what I'm doing,” he said. “I was promoted recently. I have a fascinating program. I could talk about it for hours. I intend to stay for several more years. I work, read a lot, jog, play bridge. I've had a hell of a lot of fun and worked with a lot of good people.

“I thought the Black Sheep were in combat at the right time, and we had an aggressive guy leading us. The aggressiveness is what I liked and carried forward. I learned a few lessons out there. Living and dealing with people. And, I guess, always aspiring to do better.

“I remember that organizationally, you held the squadron together. Someone had to get us where we had to go and back, where to eat and sleep, and you did it. I don't keep in touch regularly, and I appreciate your efforts in getting the Black Sheep back together. Give them my regards when you see them.”

Henry “Notebook” Miller drove over to meet me at the hotel at Philadelphia's International Airport. I recognized his tall, square figure at once. As he strode toward the door, briefcase under his arm, he resembled a Harvard professor on the way to a lecture. True to his nickname, he brought with him an extensive file of data concerning missions, flight hours, aircraft numbers, and dates.

Miller came to us as flight officer, moved up to executive officer, and took over as squadron commander after Boyington was shot down.

“In your first aerial combat, were you scared?”

“No, I don't think so. I'd had much more training than the average, and I liked the idea of aviation because I really enjoyed flying.

“If anything, flight pay should have been
deducted
from the base pay because it was so much fun; the fact that you were shooting and
being shot at didn't really mean as much as the fun of flying. And I've always believed that the more you flew the safer you were, so I welcomed test hops.”

Henry Miller