Georges Guynemer

because he had not been on the watch. He would have been glad to mount a Nieuport, but, after all, he had had his Bo

in five days, and naturally went to parade himself over Compiègne. Wit

er-exhausted their ingenuity to amuse him. This home he loved so much, which he left so recently, and returned to so happily, bringing with him his young fame, no longer sufficed him. Though he was so comfortable there, yet on cl

you miss h

Or rather, yes, you can give

it will make

the happie

granted i

ng you must examine the weather. If

f it i

ne, you will

se a fine day. As she was silent, he pretended to pout with that

uld not stay home: c'e

I pr

the young girl opened her window every morning and inspected t

of the horizon, what are you waiting for? Will you st

le at the transparent sky, and soon reached Vauciennes by automobile, where he called for hi

at?" remonstrated his mother.

t to leave is a

el

he effort

ess she detested the sun. What a strange Romeo this boy would have made! Without the least doubt he would have charge

ent when the enemy pilot turned round his head, sent him seven cartridges from his machine-gun: "Result: one ball in the ear, and another through the middle of his chest. You can imagine whether the fall of the machine was instantaneous or not. There was nothing left of the pilot but one chin, one ear, one mouth, a torso and material enough to reconstitute two arms. As to t

of liberty, the freedom from all the usual material bonds, the feeling of coming into possession of these deserts of space or ice where the traveler covers leagues without meeting anybody, the forgetfulness of all that interferes with one's own personal object? Such solitaries do not easily accommo

t as the countermand arrived owing to the unfavorable weather. When he descended, volplaning, at daybreak, with slackened, noiseless motor, and landed on our invaded territory, his heart beat fast. Some peasants going to their work in the fields saw him as he ascended again, and recognizing the tricolor, showed much surprise, and then extended their hands to him. This mission won for Sergeant Guynem

3000 meters above Chaulnes, he waged an epic combat with an L.V.G. (Luft-Verkehr-Gesellschaft), 150 H.P. Having succeeded in placing himself three meters under his enemy, he almost laughed with the surety he felt of forcing him down, when his machine-gun jammed. He immediately banked, but he was so near the enemy that the machines interlocked. Would he fall? A bit of his canvas was torn off, but the airplane held its own. As he drew away he saw the enormous enemy machine-gun aimed

he carefully examined every part of this delicate weapon, taking it apart and putting it together, and increasing his practice. He became a gunsmith. And there lies the secret of his genius: he never gave up anything, nor ever acknowledged himself beaten. If he failed, he began all over again, but after having sought the cause of his failure in order to remedy it. Wh

a tail spin, north of Bailly over against the Bois Carré. Guynemer was sure he had forced him down; but the other airplane was still there. He tacked in order to chase and attack him, but in vain, for his second adversary had fled. And when he tried to discover the spot where the first must have fallen,

have lost

lost you

d down. I must return to my escadri

can

him. He ought to be near Bai

is found in a field of lucerne. The military authority kindly lent its aid, and in fact th

; and in fact he got one four days later, on December 8. This is the report in his notebook: "Discovering the strategic line Royne-Nesle. While descending, saw a German airplane high, and far within its own lines. As it passed the lines at Beuvraigne, I cut off its retreat and chased it. I caught up to it i

he enemy's body, rushed upon and surrounded Guynemer. But the commander, Captain Allain Launay, mustered his men, ordered a salute to Guynemer, made a speech to his command, and said: "We shall now fire a

e, too!" cried the

ripped the captain's stripes from his cap, and

them when you are

" Guynemer had observed angrily, "I am not too young to be hit by the enemy's shells." This time another objection arose: If he receives the "cross" for this victory, what can be given him for succeeding ones? The proud little Roland rebe

ect manner, without a superfluous word: "Combat with two Fokkers. The first, trapped, and his passenger killed, dived upon me without having seen me. Result: 35 bullets at close quarters and 'couic' [his finish]! The fall was seen by four other airplanes (

ver him-his head must have passed within fifty centimeters of my wheels. That disgusted him; he went away and let me go. I came back with an intake pipe burst, one rocker torn away: t

ky, more than nine thousand feet above the earth, in which the two antagonists are isolated in a duel to the death, scarcely to be seen from the land, alone in empty space, in which every second lost, every shot lost, may cause defeat-and what a defeat! falling, burning, into the abyss beneath-in which they fight sometimes so near together, with short, unsteady thrusts, that they see each other like knights in the lists, while the machines graze and clash toge

of which ended in the enemy airplanes falling in flames." This mention was already behindhand, having been based upon the report dated December 8. To the two victories therein mentioned should be added those of the 5th and the 14th of December. Decorated at the age of twenty-one, the enlisted mechanician of Pau continued to progress at breakneck speed. T

gain and lost sight of it. (This airplane had wings of the usual yellow color, its body was blue like the N., and its outlines seemed similar to that of the monococques.) At 11.50 attacked an L.V.G., which immediately dived into the clouds and disappeared. Landed at Amiens." He cleared the sky of every Boche: one fallen and two put to flight is not a bad record. He always attacked. With his accurate eyes he tracked out the enemy in the mystery of space, and placing himself higher, tried to surprise him. On the 5th, near Frise, he closed the road to another L.V.G. whi

e wood of the Fosses, the Le Chaume wood and Ornes, and finally, on February 25, the attack on Louvemont and Douaumont. The escadrilles, little by little, headed in the same direction, and Guynemer was about to leave the Sixth Army. He would dart no more above the paternal mansion, announcing his victories by his caracoles in

ly Benz and Argus), and two stationary machine-guns firing through the propeller. These chasing escadrilles (Jagdstaffeln) are essentially fighting units. Each Jagdstaffel comprises eighteen airplanes, and sometimes twenty-two, four of which are reserves. These airplanes do not generally travel alone, at least when they have to leave their lines,

e prejudice. They were not, it is true, so promptly brought to perfection as our army corps airplanes, which proved so useful in the Champagne campaign of September, 1915; but it was admitted that the a?rial combat should not be regarded as a result of mere chance, but as inevitable, and that it constituted, first, a protection, and afterwards an effecti

nging its character. General Pétain, who took command on February 26, restored the order which had been compromised by the bending of the front, and established the new front against which the Germans hurled their forces. It was also necessary for him to reconquer the mastery of the air. He asked for and obtained a rapid concentration of all the available escadrilles, and demanded of them vigorous offensive tactics. To economize and co?rdinate

om a distance of ten meters. But the adversary answered his fire, and Guynemer's machine was hit: the right-hand rear longitudinal spar was cut, the cable injured, the right forward strut also cut, and the wind-shield shattered. The airman himself was wounded in the face by fragments of aluminum and iron, one lodging in the jaw, from which it could never be extracted, one in the right cheek, one in the left eyelid, miraculously leaving the eye unhurt, while smaller fragments peppered him generally, causing hemorrhages which clogged his mask and made it adhere to the flesh. In addition, h