That would make for a good story kamehouse, hopefully you can find out more information!
Good one, that must have been before Göring discovered national-socialism and morphine for himself.
In June 1917, after a lengthy dogfight, Göring shot down an Australian pilot named Frank Slee. The battle is recounted in The Rise and Fall of Hermann Goering. Göring landed and met the Australian, and presented Slee with his Iron Cross. Years after, Slee gave Göring’s Iron Cross to a friend, who later died on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. Also during the war Göring had through his generous treatment made a friend of his prisoner of war Captain Frank Beaumont, a Royal Flying Corps pilot. “It was part of Goering’s creed to admire a good enemy, and he did his best to keep Captain Beaumont from being taken over by the Army.”
From Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Göring
So not American but Australian.Sorry my memory seems to get worse.
http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Goering
Thanks kamehouse!
June 26, 1943. France. Robert S. Johnson is flying a P-47 and jumped by a ton of FW-190s and is shot down. He’s hit by a couple MG bullets and his P-47 spins down in flames. He can’t bail out because his canopy is jammed.
He miraculously manages to pull out of the spin…and the flames go out. He tries to take his badly damaged plane back to England when ANOTHER FW-190 pulls up on him. This time, his opponent is an ace with 66 kills, Meyer.
Meyer moves onto his 6, and pummels him with MG rounds. Johnson hides behind the armor plate as the MG rounds slam all around him. But the P-47 takes the abuse.
The ace pulls up on his wing and looks Johnson over and waves…before returning to his 6 and firing again, raking the plane from wing to wing. Still, the p-47 holds up.
Again the ace pulls up and looks…and returns again to his 6 for another go. The ace empties his guns into the badly damaged P-47, slamming it heavily as Johnson helplessly hides behind the rear armour plate. And STILL the plane keeps flying.
Finally, the ace pulls up beside Johnson, out of ammo and salutes before peeling off.
Johnson’s plane, nicknamed the Flying Tank, lands back in England. Without leaving his cockpit, Johnson counts 267 bullet holes on one side of his plane…before he stops counting.
The fact that a plane could be shot down, spinning in flames, recover, and take every round from an ace with 66 kills and stll land??? Unreal.
I hadn’t heard the Goering Iron Cross story before, so I’ve searched the Australian War Memorial site and, finding nothing there, done the Google thing.
It’s not mentioned in this radio program about Slee, which otherwise is fairly detailed.
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2003/hc14.htm
However there is a version here which mentions it during, but not on, the Normandy beaches.
http://boards.history.com/thread.jspa?threadID=800009465&tstart=60&mod=1151479991491
What are the sources of the story?
Thank you for sharing, Beam, however this is a WW1 thread.
You want to post WW2 stories e.g. here:
http://ww2incolor.com/forum/showthread.php?p=142944#post142944
So it is…and I prefer WWI anyway. OK, an unusal WWI event. Give me a moment. How about from a much respected vet of the war --a story from Will Byrd’s WWI memoirs:
On the battlefield of Vimy, Will Byrd was in the 42nd battalian, sleeping in a dugout in a reserve trench. He was awakened by another soldier by overcame his anger when he realized it was his brother, who was listed as “missing” two years ealier. When he made an exclaimation, his brother put his warm hand on his mouth, told him to grab his gear and follow him.
Will was amazed to see his bro and quickly tried to catch up to him as he was moving quickly down a communication trench. Stumbling in the dark, he brother wouldn’t slow down and he finally lost him when he rounded a corner. Exhausted from the fighting on Vimy and crushed from losing his brother again, he fell asleep in a funk hole.
The next morning, his mates woke him and questioned Will as to why he was sleeping in such an odd spot. He told them the story. And then his mates told him that the dugout he was in was hit by a massive shell and they had assumed he was amongst the spongy red mess – they had even incorrectly identified a leg as him.
When an officer questioned Byrd about leaving his dugout, he recounted the stroy truthfully and both agreed that this apparition of his brother had saved his life.
The title of his memoirs? Ghosts Have Warm Hands
Thanks for posting Beam! Great story, I liked your other post also.(#25)