Folks,

Consulting my HWH Chronometer-Compass-Swiss army knife and electric shoehorn, that I assembled from spare model airplane parts using a set of plans from volume 30, page 20,003 of the 900,000 page HWH Handbook second unabridged leather bound edition; I can see that it is at least a quarter past time that someone (usually me) treaded down those 3,000 crumbly steps into the dank and dark archives to retrieve a story and then return more or less alive to post same.

Just moments ago I have chanced the loss of life and limb by doing just that. Such a trip is even more risky these days. The man-sized vampire bats down there are always a surly lot and now that their tunnel into the base blood bank has been discovered and welded shut they are positively crotchety. They have been whiling the dark hours tormenting the remaining beaver-sized rats by biting off their tails and then feeding them to them. As a result, the sadistic bats have caught a debilitating rat disease causing a vile and runny stomach disorder. Although the biting and feeding has stopped, the rats are complaining loudly about the stench.

Here is the pitiful results from my dangerous visit far below. Reading this junk will show you how little I value my life and possibly even earn you a Junior Woodchuck merit badge for bravery on your part.

A Confirmed Kill
By: JRT
HWH Cont. Page 5
2/14/02


A large brown bird soars high in the summer sky over a sleepy British town, a town that is located quite near a RAF fighter base. He remains aloft by intermittently flapping his strong wings. Still higher he effortlessly glides above the steamy patchwork fields of England. This happy bird of prey rides rising afternoon thermals as he easily circles higher and higher. His sharp eyes slowly scan the fields below for rodents. Spreading his warming wings in a perfect glide, he probably notices a low line of cloud is drifting in from the Channel.

Our feathered friend will not fly blindly into this cloud; he just swoops down under it searching for another friendly thermal. Frumpp, frumpp, frumpp, his mighty wings make a rhythmic sound as he surveys the fields below. Suddenly, a small movement catches his undivided. Only a moment later the unsuspecting bird nearly has the pinfeathers scared right out of him. His prey is forgotten as he performs an instantaneous barrel roll and a dive that would be the envy of the best fighter pilot. Good as it is, it only narrowly saves his life.

Through this lowering cloud base come deep rumblings as many large, dark shapes suddenly drift into sight, sunlight glinting on their Perspex noses and the bright red hubs on their spinning props.

This is a small but powerful gruppe of He 111 bombers, the H variant of Fliegerkorps 1 now flying out of Rosieres-en-Santerre under the overall command of Gen. Oberst Ulrich Grauert. Their respected and competent commanding officer is Obstlt. Exass.

The target for today is the RAF airfield lying just ahead. And although this flight is unescorted, confidence is very high. Shafts of bright sunlight filter through the mists as, one by one, the ominous, bullet-like shapes exit the cloud and into the clear, robins egg blue sky beyond. A good omen perhaps. Perhaps not.

Higher and into the sun, other sharp eyes have seen the bombers leave the relative safety of the cumulus. Forty goggled eyes turn in unison as the pitiless minds that control them coldly calculate range, speed and altitude. No sooner has the last black bomber’s tail plane left the cloud than they are mercilessly struck from above by a flight of twenty Spitfires. The bomber’s perfect formation and most of the confidence of those trapped within their steel bulkheads is instantly shattered.

Another flight of angry RAF fighters has now joined the melee. These brave lads are flying jolly Hurricanes. Their humped backs easily distinguish these deadly little craft. Already two lead bombers are falling in flames and several others are streaming white glycol or long, twisting curls of greasy black smoke. Like whales with their guts ripped open, sticks of black bombs issue from open bomber bellies to begin their long irreversible fall toward an undeserving population below. They are jettisoned now without thought of target or consequence. Pilots simply strive to lighten their fleeing craft in a desperate attempt to save the lives of their crew and themselves. Cut to pieces, most will not even make it back into the dissipating cloud.

One bomber actually reaches the relative safety of the cloud. Desperate to return his four-man crew alive to France the pilot expertly holds his craft within the sheltering cloud and as raindrops pelt his windscreen he calmly charts a magnetic course across the Channel. The 111’s powerful twelve cylinder Junkers Juno 211D-1 engines drone on encouragingly. The pilot now adjusts power and trim, he can easily imagine his crew’s eyes are just beginning to un-dilate somewhat as hope of survival returns. If only this cloud will hold across the Channel they will make it back. He takes in a deep breath. Before the man can exhale that hopeful breath he is almost blinded as they break out into startling, bright sunlight.

The dorsal gunner wildly swivels around in his cradle seat and screams into the R/T, “Achtung! Spitfires!” Already, and before the pilot can even react to the shouts he hears the dorsal 7.92 mm MG 15 bark into action. It is not enough. The bomber attempts to return to the cloud in a long curve to port. It is thwarted by a deadly head-on attack by a hard pressing Spitfire. The nose mounted 7.92 machine gun in it’s little Ikaria ball-and-socket gun mounting that is offset slightly to starboard was manned but could not ward off the determined attack. Bullets sprayed across the starboard wing spar, in across the outboard 220 gallon wing tank, across the engine oil cooler intake, onto the inverted v, liquid cooled engine and on into gleaming Perspex nose.

The supercharger air intake blew away from the starboard engine as flames belched out from the exhaust manifold and the nose disintegrated from the repeater compass and control yoke forward. The last thing the pilot ever saw was the bomb aimer’s folding seat and his retractable, auxiliary windscreen shatter. Just then the second and third Spitfires made their first passes. More shells poured in across the port tail plane bursting the fin’s front spar, rolling along the rear fuselage frames and stringers. Bullets ricocheted throughout the crew compartments. Not one man escaped a wound. One is mutilated beyond even his dear mother’s recognition. The remotely controlled machine gun in the bomber’s tail cone breaks loose from its mounting and falls into space.

For the terrified crew the end was near. Flames sprouted from the tangled wing above the starboard fuel tank. The metal there begins to glow a bright, cherry red. The starboard three-blade VDM propeller simply windmills for that engine is now dead and trailing thick black smoke that swirls and twirls in lengthening vortices behind them. In fact, this dense smoke is about all that hinders the aim of the three closing Spitfires that are now lining up astern of the stricken He111. One at a time they will each have a go as they mercilessly, slowly, calculatedly chew the fatally wounded behemoth to pieces.

By now, the pilotless craft begins a slow turn to port. Just as what is left of the stricken crew begins to shuffle toward their only exit with their parachutes tightly strapped on, the falling bomber is struck by hundreds of .303 shells just across the port wing root near the ventral gunner’s prone pad. Bullets strike the rear spar carry through the oil cooler and main compass. As the bomber began to roll over, the port wing begins to sag upward. As it beaks, flame envelopes the doomed craft.

Inside, before the smoke fire or fall mercifully ends their torment, the three remaining crewmembers are pressed hard against a blistering hot bulkhead. They are totally immobilized by the unimaginable centrifugal forces of the steep terminal dive. The youngest man is 18 and the eldest 24 years of age. Each man in his own way makes his peace with his maker. That is about all they have time for.

Circling just below the thinning cloud, a large bird flaps his wings alone in the sky. He sails into and then out of the long smoke trail left by the death throes of the falling bomber. Gliding for a moment, he looks down as what is left of the bomber and five young lives breaks up into a fiery tangle of burning scrap metal. He alone will witnesses the crash as it plows into the mud of a riverbank over a mile below.

Back home the Spitfire pilots, smiling breathlessly, make their reports. The result is that one more kill, a He111, is confirmed.


Originally Registered January,2001 Member Number 3044

"Blessed are they who expect nothing, for they shall not be disappointed" - Edmond Gwenn, "The Trouble With Harry"

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