A Short Story -
Inspired by Red Baron 3D with OvS's Hell's Angels Gold Mod.
Story by Polovski (c)2003
Oberleutnant Max von Polo, was one of Germany's up and coming aces. Now he
had an incredible 25 kills in 6 weeks
of flying even after spending a spell in hospital
after a crash landing. With that
total achieved in just over 21 combat flying hours
people were starting to take notice. He had already been awarded 2 medals. The
first the Eisernes Kreuz I came soon after his first mission when he shot down
2 enemy Spad VII aircraft. The second award, the Eisernes Kreuz II, given for
the
hair-raising mission when he had to
crash land causing his hospitalisation - his Pfalz
was badly damaged and low on
ammunition, and he had helped to save a friendly 2
seater under attack by 2 enemy
scouts. There was talk of something special being
awarded soon.
This day he took off with 4 others for a barrage patrol on one morning in late
November 1917. The air was crisp and
the ground was hard frozen. The
ground staff had trouble starting several of the waiting Pfalz DIII aircraft.
After 20 minutes everyone standing around was very cold, apart from some of the
ground crew who were hot with activity trying to start engines.
Max's Pfalz DIII always had started well, even though she had been repaired
often already due to many scrapes, flak damage, tough landings and bullet holes.
This Pfalz started without too much effort but today was to be her last flight.
Eventually all were lined up with engines running and they finally took off as a
few warm rays of early morning sunshine crept over the horizon and hit their
backs. After forming up, the group climbed to around 2500 meters and after
another 15 minutes approached the front. Max von Polo looked down, the German
trenches were eerily quiet. He couldn't quite make out what, but he saw
something
was moving down there.
It was troop movement from the trench
relief who had just arrived. The jaded front line
troops, crouching and nervous, made
their way down the narrow connecting relief trenches.
Suddenly the silence was shattered by an accurate artillery barrage
which opened up shelling around the relief trenches. A few moments later as
quickly as it had started, the barrage stopped.
Then Max's attention was drawn upwards as the crisp sunshine caught a
nearby barrage balloon. He could now see this was one of the assigned objectives
they were to protect, it was ahead and below and he signalled this to his
flight.
As they closed on the position the new silence was again broken - tracer fire
cracked through the ground mist, up from several of the ground positions and met
as a hectic crossfire on 5 fast low-level Spad VII's! The Spads, from 23 RFC,
were hurtling towards the balloon in a spread V-formation, using some of the
morning mist as cover. Rockets and gunfire burst from them towards the balloon
and the ground units - their response to the ground fire.
Just as Max raised his hand to signal everyone to dive to engage, he
stopped. Glancing along the trenches to his right, to north, he saw a second
German barrage position. He noted this was also assigned to them to be
protected. Immediately he noticed more aircraft from the direction of the
English trenches! They were heading towards this second, more northerly,
balloon. He cursed to himself, "damn, more Spad VII's - which ones to stop?" He
quickly counted, and made it a count of 4 - these were probably from Esc 5. He
signalled for his wingman, Gunter, to follow him down and the rest to go onto
defend the 2nd balloon. He thought the balloon below was likely already a
flamer.
Almost vertical they dived, the Spads came around for another attack, then von
Polo saw - the Balloon below was still intact! Rockets fired again, Max
brought the Pfalz screaming down onto a Spad - the young British pilot was
concentrating on the balloon. Max came from above and from the Spad 7's
o'clock . He opened up with the twin Spandaus. The burst tore through the Spad,
which veered and lurched to the side, then dived and headed for his own lines.
Max continued and chased it down not caring for the other Spads who all
seemed to be heading for home too. Just 2 more long bursts the Spad spouted
flames! A few seconds later as it approached the ground the Spad pilot jumped,
his scream cutting through the noise of Max's engine. The hapless
pilotless Spad spun slowly and gracefully down towards no-mans land, carving an
oddly
beautiful spiral of smoke and flame. The pilot twisting, smoke trailing from
his jacket, also fell in a spiral towards a water filled shell crater below.
Max thought maybe he would be lucky and hit the water or maybe it was iced over?
Just then Max checked over his shoulder, his saw his wingman had peeled
away to chase after a sand coloured Spad that was coming in from behind,
threatening to get on Max's tail. Tracer rang out from the wingman and the
Spad for several seconds, bullets peppered each other in a head on pass. The
Pfalz ducked under and away but it turned and slid sideways towards the British
lines the pilot was fighting with the controls, smoke was coming from the
engine. The sand coloured Spad peeled off too and headed for home, struggling
with wounds to his arms and left hand the Spad pilot could hold on no longer.
It rolled upside down, and curved down moments later the pilot somehow managed
to get it almost level as it hit the thick mud, and slid for 25 meters before
tipping upside down. Moments later the pilot somehow crawled out alive.
Max turned his head looking around for other enemy, his eyes stopped for a
moment on the balloon, amazed to see it still intact. The balloon observer
hadn't jumped. Unknown to Max the observer could not jump anyway, to do so
would have been certain death as there had been no parachutes available for
days. The winch had not taken him down as the operators had fled under direct
fire from the Spads and were only just running back to the winch.
The balloon observer waved rapidly, signalling across to Max who quickly
realised this not a wave of thanks but one of warning. The observer had seen
yet another Spad had turned back to attack. Max spun the Pfalz around
quickly. Within seconds the Spad had veered towards Max and was already
close and firing - it banked sharply and within a few seconds the two pilots
were each breaking to avoid each other. Max, using all his skill and speed,
threw the Pfalz sideways to port but felt a sickening thud, and a jolt in the
flight stick, which was almost knocked from his hand - they had had collided!
He thought that was it - he must prepare for a crash. The Pfalz was sturdy, but
the collision had momentarily caused the Pfalz's engine to cough and splutter.
Suddenly it burst back into life just in time to avoid a stall.
Quickly checking around him, Max could see no major damage, just some minor
tearing of the fuselage as far as he could tell - amazing! He hoped that there
wasn't a more serious problem yet unseen. He them remembered the enemy -
looking back and down he saw the Spad flying erratically and then recover,
apparently fine and also seemingly undamaged.
'Damn it!' he cursed again, the stories of those Spads also being exceptionally
tough were true. He tapped the outside of the fuselage of his Pfalz in
acknowledgement at standing up to the knock, before pulling it around again for
attack.
For 2 minutes Max closed on the Spad who was trying to head for friendlier
skies, as it dived and climbed again and again to try to outrun Max. But
each burst of accurate fire from Max meant the pilot struggled with damaged
wing surfaces, and a dying engine. Finally after several longer bursts the Spad
dived one last time, clipping the ground and exploding. The pilot was dead
before it hit the ground, from 3 hits to his shoulders and back. Max flew
through the ball of flame and came through unscathed. This was a fine day he
felt unstoppable! Now he was on 27 kills, and he thought this time his friend in
the balloon could surely be a witness to confirm this kill.
He allowed himself a smile, the balloon seemed safe, the other Spads had fled
for home. No doubt their decision influenced by Max's all black painted
Pfalz with a bright yellow tail, standing out against the paler colours of his
squad members. They were mainly using brand new grey/white painted Pfalz in the
squadron default colours. One look at him peeling off from the German Jasta must
have shook them - maybe they recognised his Pfalz.
Now Max remembered his wingman and his flight, he saluted to the observer
and then looked around for his wingman. He was not to be seen.
Unknown to Max - after being hit by bullets from the Spad he had fought
bravely for several minutes trying to keep the Pfalz DIII flying. As he
struggled it had strayed over enemy lines, drawn too near to ground fire. The
withering ground fire had torn so many holes that his Pfalz had started to lose
height rapidly and to spray oil. In the confusion the Pfalz collided with
cables supporting a British barrage balloon. The German pilot had somehow
managed to crash land close to enemy trenches and was now hiding in freezing
water filled crater. The chances of him surviving until night when the weather
got even colder or escaping now were slight, especially as the tail of his plane
was sticking up acting like a marker of his position.
Max looked across to the 2nd balloon for a sight of the remainder of his
flight. He could not see anything there, no Spads and no-one from his flight,
just black smoke trails and a balloon in the distance
Then looking up he could see action, tracers, smoke. Looked like British 2
seaters being engaged by a DR.I. He flew up and towards the northern barrage
balloon and the action. When he got there all he could see where 4 RE8s in a
staggered formation, about 30 meters apart vertically, and about the same
horizontally - quite spread but trying to close up and reform. They were forming
a line. The DR.I had broken off. He guessed his squad had followed the Spads
across the lines and protected the balloon well.
He didn't pick the lowest RE8 as it seemed to be damaged - although this was
against his normal way of dealing with enemies, not his normal ruthless self.
Maybe he thought he would give that pilot a chance or maybe he would change his
mind and go for him last. He picked the next highest RE8 as it wasn't much
higher than him, and flew slightly up on an intercept course. Number 28
beckoned he thought.
As he closed, he realised the lowest RE8 had veered below him, either from
handling problems or from design, and the observer was about to open up with the
Lewis gun. So he quickly switched his thoughts to this damaged RE8, and dived
at it, jinking left and right as he came at it. Tracer came up at him, hitting
the fuselage and wings, again his flight stick shuddered.
No time to look at the holes now, he dived down below the slow RE8, then came
around and up sharply firing as he closed on it.
He was now very close to the RE8 and came up to the rear he slightly cut the
throttle back, and could see the gunner fighting with a gun jam. Closing and
with just meters now from the tail of the RE8 he pressed fire. He was greeted
with a 'click'. "What? Jammed too?" he said to himself. He tried to clear the
guns, at that moment the RE8 pilot also cut the engine hoping Max would overshoot
or have to take evasive action.
With nothing left and a RE8 gunner just turning the now unjammed gun onto him,
there was nothing else to do - Polo pushed forward on the stick hoping to duck
under the bomber. At that moment the RE8 pilot also made his crate drop too, he
had decided to dive to pick up speed and banked left to maybe give the gunner a
better view. The Slow moving RE8 dropped height - but the speed of the Pfalz
and Max's anger at his misfortune caused him to miscalculate. The Pfalz
clipped the tail of the enemy bomber with its prop, shards of wood splinters
flew from both planes. In that moment Max remembered odd things, stories
of pilots deliberately doing this when all was lost or as a last resort. Was
all lost for him? Is that how far he had come?
He cut the power off immediately but not in time, the plane surged forward still
more cutting further into the RE8s tail! A large part of the rudder came away,
pieces flying everywhere. The Pfalz's prop snapped - loud splintering sounds
pierced the air. The prop exploded in pieces showering Max with shards and
chunks of wood hitting him cutting through flying jacket, skin, the ribbon on
his Iron Cross, goggles, flying cap, Max let go of the stick, and he faded,
blackness filled his eyes, the last thing he saw was large holes torn through
his wings, and he heard the engine fade.
The RE8 spun violently down the pilot and observer jumped from the spinning
wreck too high to survive.
Some moments later, Max came round, opening his eyes suddenly. He could
see nothing but he could feel the air flowing around him, he could hear no
engine noise. His instincts took over and he reached for the stick in the
apparent darkness.
By feel alone at first, and then with blurred darkened vision he managed to get control of
the sick airplane as it fell. He thought was about 50-100 meters from the
ground and moving fast but luckily not in a complete spin. His instinct took
over again, still going down he tried to keep the speed up to avoid the stall as
he now had no power. He used all control he could to force the Pfalz towards a
flatter area.
He thought he saw a flat green area close to the lines and somehow steered the
sick plane towards it as it fell.
Later that day, the 2nd balloon observer noted in his report: "...the black
Pfalz then dived out of control then a few moments later it seemed to partially
recover for a short while before coming down skidding across a tented area and
colliding with several, luckily empty, tents and crates."
The soldiers cheered when they saw he was still alive and many rushed to get him
clear of the crash.
2 days later Max von Polo one of Germany's top aces, so nearly another victim
of the war, was awarded the Ritterkreuz das Hausorden von Hohenzollern in a
ceremony held in hospital. Badly wounded he spent several weeks in hospital.
During that time he asked that medal be placed temporarily in the officers' mess
by his comrades as a tribute to those who had died. 3 others from his flight
had crashed, 2 of those had died and Gunter had somehow managed to make it back
to friendly lines, frost bitten and wounded. Gunter was awarded the Eisernes
Kreuz II for his kill and for his daring escape against the odds shooting 2
enemy soldiers with his pistol before crawling for hours back to the lines.
That fatefull day 3 Spads from RFC 23, all the 4 Spads from Esc 5, and 2 RE8s
had
been shot down and knocked out of the
sky. Only 1 pilot from the downed 'planes had
survived.
All the pilots from the Jasta's flight had taken at least 1 kill, Max had
taken 3
including the RE8. The balloons had kept in the air, mission accomplished but
at a heavy price. He looked forward to meeting up with Gunter and to shake
his hand for
covering him well that day.
He also wished to get back to the squadron as soon as physically
possible.
For certain the ruthless fire inside
Max would burn on - he would have more adventures
and gain more victories.
--
Polovski (c) 2003