On the 26th he waged five combats with enemy groups
consisting of from five to eleven airplanes. On the 27th he fought three
L.V.G.'s, and then groups of from three to ten machines. On the 28th he
successively attacked two airplanes within their own lines, then a
drachen which was obliged to land, then a group of four airplanes one of
which was forced down, and then a second group of four which were
dispersed, Guynemer pursuing one of the fugitives and bringing him down.
One blade of his own propeller was riddled with bullets, and he was
compelled to land. Such was his work for three days, taken at random
from the notebook.
Open his journal at any page, and it reads the same. On August 7
Guynemer got back with seven shell fragments in his machine: he had been
cannonaded from the ground while in chase of four enemy airplanes. On
the same day he started off again, piloting Heurtaux, who attacked the
German trenches north of Clery and fired on some machine-guns. From its
place up in the air the airplane encouraged the infantry, and shared in
their assaults. The recital of events became, however, more and more
brief: the fighting pilot had not time enough to write details; nobody
had any time in the Storks Escadrille, constantly engaged as it was in
its triumphant flights.
Pages:
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166