GERMAN IN TEARS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 February 1940, Page 5

GERMAN IN TEARS

OVERWHELMED BY FEELINGS. GUEST OF BRITISH AIRMEN. A German pilot dined in the mess of a Royal Air Force squadron among the pilots who had brought him down, writes Ronald Walker, a special representative in France of the "News Chronicle," London. The story is one of the most remarkable of the war, and was told to me when 1 visited the squadron after driving through a violent rainstorm along a road made by the Romans through conquered Gaul. The German was pilot of the Dornier which landed near Chalons. He had been engaged on a long reconnaissance over France, when the fighter boys of this little village spoiled him. Three Hurricanes went after him and attacked one after the other. After the Nazi gunner badly wounded, and observer had jumped with their parachutes, the pilot remained with his machine making a long approach to bring it down in a field. One of the Hurricane pilots flew alongside, and seeing that the pilot was drooping over his wheel, thought that he was probably wounded. The German pilot by this ingenious trick encouraged the British pilot to fly on. As he got ahead the German, now sole occupant of his crippled machine, got out of his seat, and standing in the nose managed to keep one hand on the controls and operate the forward gun with the other. The German’s aim was good. Ho got in a long burst, shattering the cockpit covering, smashing through instruments on the dashboard, and stopping the engine. The pilot escaped injury and brought his machine down safely, while the Dornier was making a crippled landing some miles away. The pilots of this squadron, which, has now many enemy machines to its credit, were so filled with admiration for the resource of the German pilot that they brought him to the squadron mess in the town hall of the village, where a special dinner had been prepared. He is a man of 31, a former fly mg instructor and now a sergeant-pilot. Back in Germany are his wife and six months old child. He drank with h : £ hosts and then sat down to dinner. Suddenly, to the embarrassment of the hosts, their guest broke down and burst into into tears. Two officers of the squadron who speak German led him into another room. They tiied to comfort him. Eventually he returned to the dinner tables and apologised for his behaviour. He explained that while ho used to think that the English wore good people the Gorman authorities had told him and his colleagues that the English would shoot or torture any German they caught. He had fully expected to be treated in that manner. Instead he had received kindness, and now he had boon taken to dinner and treated as an honoured guest. Hisi feelings had overwhelmed him.