Stuka Pilot

15. BATTLE FOR HUNGARY

It is one of our last days at Farmos. A message has just been received that Ivan had infiltrated with a strong armored spearhead in the direction of the Matra Mountains and has reached the outskirts of Göngjes. Our troops, which have been outflanked, are anxious if possible to restore the situation and close the gap. The weather is bad, and we find this particularly trying because this part of the country is very hilly and the cloud cover is even lower than elsewhere. We leave Budapest to port and soon see the Matra Mountains ahead, and shortly afterwards the town of Göngjes. Fires are burning some miles to the south; it is apparent that something is going on there. Sure enough, tanks are traveling along the road, and they are certainly not German. As I make a wide sweep in that direction to obtain a general picture of the enemy’s strength I am met by intense light and medium flak fire. We circle round the advance guard at low level. Right out in front of the T 34s and Stalins is a type of tank I have never seen before; nor have I yet come across it as an American model. I deal with this stranger first, and then turn my attention to the others. When five tanks are in flames I have used up all my ammunition. The anti-tank flight has also done an excellent job and it has been a bad morning for Ivan. We reform and head for home, being engaged for part of the way by Soviet Yak 9 fighters which have appeared on the scene but do us no harm.

We are within ten minutes of our base and well be hind our own lines when it suddenly strikes me: how am I to describe the first tank I shot up when making out my report? Will my automatic camera have taken a good enough photograph for me to be able to say for certain what type of tank it was? It is very important that the general staff should be informed whether and what new types are appearing on any sector of the front; such information is an indication that new weapons are being put into production, or delivered from other countries. I must know what model that first tank was. So I tell the 3rd Squadron leader to take the formation home while I turn round and fly back to the tanks.

I throttle back a little and circle four or five times at 12-15 feet in a narrow radius round the mysterious steel monster and give it a leisurely examination from the closest proximity. To one side of it stands a Stalin, which has apparently just driven up from the rear of the party to see what has happened here. The strange tank is still burning. As I circle round it for the last time I see some Ivans crouching under the projecting chain guard of the Stalin behind a 13 mm. A.A. machine gun mounted on a tripod. Squeezed close against the tank with their heads down they look up at me and, seeing smoke come out of the muzzle of their machine gun, I perceive that they are busy firing at me. I am within about fifty, at the very most sixty yards range, but the variations caused by the wide arc I am describing are too great for them to make sure of hitting me, unless they are experienced gunners and have learnt just the right thing to do. I am still speculating in this fashion when two hammer blows strike my aircraft and I feel a searing pain in my left thigh. I struggle hard to overcome the blackness in front of my eyes and become aware that a wet, warm flow of blood is running down my leg. Gadermann sits behind me; I tell him, but he cannot do anything for me because it is impossible for him to get forward. I have no bandages with me. The country we are flying over is only thinly inhabited, the terrain not specially suitable for a forced landing. If we come down here goodness knows how long it will take to get proper medical aid, and I shall bleed to death. So I must try to reach Budapest twenty-five minutes away.

I can see that my strength is failing fast. The blood is still flowing freely… I have a queer feeling in my head… a sort of trance… but I keep on flying and feel that I still have control of my senses. I switch on the intercom, and ask Gadermann:

“Do you think I will pass out suddenly… or will my strength go on ebbing gradually?”

“You’ll never reach Budapest… in all probability… but you won’t faint suddenly.”

The last words are a quick addition, presumably so as not to upset me.

“Then I’ll go on flying… and chance it.”

The throttle is forward as far as it will go… minutes of anxious tension…. I won’t give in… I won’t… there is the fighter airfield, Budapest… flaps down… throttle back… I am down… it’s all over!…

I come to on an operating table in a private hospital. The nurses gathered round me are watching me with a peculiar look on their faces. Behind the surgeon, Professor Fick, stands Gadermann; he is wagging his head. He tells me afterwards that while I was under the anesthetic I had just said some very curious things which did not seem to have exactly delighted the nurses. What can one do in a situation like that? Professor Fick explains that he has extracted a 13 mm. machine gun bullet which had entered my leg at an angle, another having passed clean through the flesh. He tells me I have lost a great deal of blood and that as soon as he has set my leg in plaster of Paris I must go into a nursing home on Lake Balaton to recuperate as quickly as possible under the best medical care and to give my wounds a chance to heal in peace and quiet.

Fridolin has meanwhile arrived as well and curses me for having let my curiosity land me in this mess, but although he does not admit it he is glad it was no worse. He reports that we are to move back into the Stuhlweissenburg area, we ourselves will be at Börgoend. Now they hoist me onto a Storch ambulance plane and fly me to Hevis on Lake Balaton where I am admitted to Dr. Peter’s sanatorium. I have already asked Professor Fick how long it will be before I am able to walk, or at least fly. His answer was ambiguous, presumably because he had been tipped off by Gadermann who has sufficient reason to know my impatient nature. I insist on Dr. Peter immediately taking off my bandage and telling me how long he thinks I shall have to remain here. He refuses to disturb the dressing, then after a good deal of argument he examines the wound and says:

“If there are no complications you will be on your back for six weeks.”

Up till this moment I had not been depressed because of my wound, but now I feel that I am again out of everything, condemned to inactivity at a time when every able bodied man is needed. I could play merry hell I am so mad. That’s a good one when my leg is in plaster of Paris and I can hardly move. But one thing I am sure off: I shall never stand it that long. No matter how good the nursing and the bodily rest may be for me, I shall never have any rest until I am back with the Wing and able to fly with it. Fridolin comes over from Börgoend and visits me every other day with a briefcase full of papers for me to sign and keeps me posted about the unit’s operations, its worries and requirements. Between Farmos and our present airfield the Wing was temporarily stationed, for a few days only, one the aerodrome at Veces, a suburb of Budapest. Latterly bad November weather condit ions have often prevailed, and despite the critical situation only very few sorties could be carried out. On the eighth day he visits me again with the news that the Soviets are attacking Budapest with strong forces, and have already established bridgeheads on this side of the Danube; worse still, a fresh offensive from the South towards Lake Balaton is aimed at thrusting a wedge between our lines. He is not a little astonished when I tell him that I have had enough of lying in bed and am going to get up and drive back with him to the wing.

“But…” He does not finish his sentence. He knows my obstinacy. The sister hears Fridolin packing my things and cannot believe her eyes when she puts her head in at the door to see what is going on. By the time Dr. Peter has been fetched he finds me ready to leave. I am well aware that he cannot accept the responsibility, I do not ask him to. He shakes his head as he watches the departure of our car which will bring us to our station in an hour.

We are billeted in the village, as at Farmos. The people are more than friendly, which is only to be expected seeing that they look to us to halt the Russians and to liberate their already partly occupied country. Dahlmann, my batman, has already prepared and heated a room in a tiny cottage, doubtless believing that it will at first be needed as a sickroom. A few days, and then the spell of bad weather ends. From the first day I am back in harness after my plaster of Paris bandage has been given some extra support. Locomotion is not exactly easy, but I manage. In the middle of December our airfield becomes more and more of a bog owing to heavy rain and snow, and we move again to Varpalota. This airfield is well situated on high ground and we are able to take off at any time.

My 3rd Squadron is eventually to be re-equipped with Focke Wulf 190s; in view of the situation I should not like to have it withdrawn from operations for any time because of this change of aircraft. Therefore one or two pilots in rotation are temporarily attached to the Wing staff, and between sorties I introduce them to the new type and teach them how to handle it. Each of them flies a number of circuits, varying according to his airmanship, and then I take him with me as No. 2 on operations. After fifteen to twenty sorties their initiation to the unfamiliar aircraft may be considered satisfactorily concluded, and other crews have their turn. In this way the 3rd Squadron is able to remain in action without interruption.

On their first operational flights the crews generally have to learn the hard way, for the defense is everywhere strong and, besides, they are still a bit scared of the new type, especially as they have no rear gunner to insure them against enemy fighter interference from behind. One his first sortie in a FW 190 Flg./Off. Stahler is hit in the engine by flak so that he has to come down at once. He succeeds in making a neat forced landing within our lines. Everything goes wrong on that day. I am just about to take off on a sortie with Flt./Lt. M., who is also having a course of instruction with me, when a strong formation of IL It with fighter escort flies past on the horizon at 1800 feet. It is a cold December day and it would take me some time to warm up the engine so as to get it running properly, but meanwhile Ivan is sure to have disappeared Then it occurs to me that during the last few really cold days the mechanics have again been making use of the warming up apparatus which enables us to take off at once without having to let the engine run for a longer time than is usual. This apparatus depends on a special fuel preparation. I make a sign to M. to waste no time in filling up and to take off with me. Our bomb load is under our aircraft for the mission which has been planned, I do not want to leave the bombs behind for we have a mission to fulfill. Perhaps even with this load we can still overtake the IL II formation. M. is apparently flying a slow aircraft and Lags behind, I gradually gain on the Iron Gustavs which cross their own lines when I am still eight hundred yards away. But I am pigheaded and determined to have a go at them, even though I am alone. With my FW 190 I am not afraid of the skill of the fighter pilots flying Lag 5s and Yak 9s. There is a sudden noise in my engine, a spurt of oil gums up everything so that I can no longer see out; in a twinkling all the cockpit windows are opaque. In the first instant I think that my engine has been hit by flak or a Russian fighter, but then I realize that it is a defect in the engine, causing a piston seizure. The engine is puttering and rumbling horribly, it may cut out altogether at any moment. The second I heard the noise I had put my nose down by a kind of reflex action and headed for our own lines. Now I must be over them. To bail out is out of the question with my plaster of Paris splint, quite apart from the fact that I am flying much too low. This aircraft will never be able to climb another foot. I throw off the hood in order at least to be able to see out at the side and to the rear. I am flying at 150 feet; there is still no terrain below me suitable for a forced landing; besides which I am anxious to come as near as possible to the airfield so as not to lose time in getting back to my unit. A church steeple whizzes past me very close; lucky it was not in my path. Obliquely ahead I see a road embankment; any second now I can expect the propeller to stop. I can only hope the aircraft will clear the embankment. I pull the stick and wait. Will she make it or not? She makes it! Now I touch down on the ground. Skidding and crunching over the hard-frozen earth the aircraft slides parallel with a broad ditch and comes to a standstill. Nothing has happened to my leg, my chief anxiety. I look out over a silent, peaceful winter landscape, only the distant rumble of artillery reminds me that it is not yet peace although Christmas is on the doorstep. I hoist myself out of my seat with a glance at the smoking engine, and sit down on the fuselage. A car with two soldiers is coming along the road. They first look me over carefully to make sure I am not a Russian, for they come down more often than we do on our side of the line, and mostly shot down at that. The men lay a small plank across the ditch and carry me to their car. An hour later I am back on the airfield and ready for another sortie.

Our billets are in a barracks a few miles below the airfield on the outskirts of Varpalota. The next day between sorties I am lying on my bed for a little rest when I hear a roar of aircraft: those are no German planes. At an angle through the open window I catch sight of a Russian Boston formation flying at 1200 feet. They are coming straight towards us. Now they are already screaming down, the bombs. Even with sound legs I could not have been more quickly on the floor. A heavy bomb bursts fifteen yards in front of my window and blows to bits my B.M.W. car, which was waiting there for me. Dahlmann, who comes in at the door opposite the window at that very moment to warn me of the alert, suddenly finds the window frame round his neck. He gets off with a shock but no further damage. Ever since he has taken to crawling about with bent shoulders and a crab-apple face like a little old man. Evidently he no longer thinks much of war and we laugh every time we see this youngster in his new role.

Presently, with our support from the air, there is a lull in the Lake Balaton area, but to the East the Soviets have bypassed Budapest and reached the Gran River north of the Danube. South of Budapest they have pushed out of their bridgeheads, and co-operating with forces thrusting N.W. from the south have gone over to the offensive. The spearheads of their advance are on the eastern edge of the Vecec mountains north of Stuhlweissenburg, so that Budapest is encircled. Some of our sorties are flown in this area or even further eastward. We try to disrupt their communications far behind the front in the Hadvan area, where Soviet supply trains are already running. In this rush of events we soon become maids of all work: we are dive bombers, attack planes, fighters, and reconnaissance aircraft.