Georges Guynemer: Knight of the Air Part 11

His new decoration was given him at four o'clock on a beautiful summer afternoon. Guynemer's comrades were present, of course, and as pleased as if the function had concerned themselves. The 11th Company of the 82d Regiment of Infantry took its station opposite the imposing row of squadron machines, sixty in number, which stood there like race horses as if to take part in the fete. Guynemer's well-known airplane, the _Vieux-Charles_, was the fifth to the left, its master having required its presence, though it had been injured that very day. In front of the aviation and regimental flags the young aviator stood by himself in his black _vareuse_, looking slight and pale, but upright, with eyes sparkling. At a little distance a few civilians--his own people, whom the general had invited--watched the proceedings.

General Franchet d'Esperey appeared, a robust, energetic man, and the following scene, described by one of the trench papers--the _Brise d'entonnoirs_ of the 82d Infantry--took place: "The general stopped before the young hero and eyed him with evident pleasure; then he proclaimed him a gallant soldier, touched his two shoulders with his sword, as they did to champions of past ages, pinned the _rosette_ on his coat, and embraced him. Then to the stirring tune of '_Sambre-et-Meuse_' the band and the soldiers marched in front of the new officer who, the ceremony now being over, joined his relatives some distance away."

General d'Esperey, looking over Guynemer's _Vieux-Charles_, noticed the damaged parts.

"How comes it that your foot was not injured?" he asked, pointing to one of the bullet-holes.

"I had just removed it, _mon general_," said Guynemer, with his usual simplicity.

None of the airmen with whom Guynemer shared his joy ever forgot that afternoon of July 5, 1917. The summer sun, the serene beauty of the hills bordering the Aisne, the distant ba.s.s of the battle, lent to the scene an enchanting but solemn interest. Tragic memories were in the minds of all the bystanders, and great names were on their lips--the names of retiring, n.o.ble, hard-working Dorme, reported missing on May 25, and of Captain Lecour-Grandmaison, creator of the three-seaters, who, on one of these machines, brought down five Germans, but was killed in a combat on May 10 and brought back to camp dead by a surviving comrade. Guynemer's red _rosette_ meant glory to the great chasers, to wounded Heurtaux, to Menard and Deullin, to Auger, Fonck, Jailler, Guerin, Baudouin, and all their comrades! And it meant glory to the pilots and observers who, always together in the discharge of duty, are not infrequently together in meeting death: to Lieutenant Fressagues, pilot, and sous-lieutenant Bouvard, observer, who once fought seven Germans and managed to bring one down; to Lieutenant Floret and Lieutenant h.o.m.o, who, placed in similar circ.u.mstances, set two machines on fire; to Lieutenant Viguier who, on April 18, had the pluck to come down to twenty-five meters above the enemy's lines and calmly make his observations; and to so many others who did their duty with the same daring, intelligence, and conscientiousness, to the hundreds of more humble airmen who, while the infantry says the sanguinary ma.s.s, throw down from above, like the chorister boys in the _corpus Christi_ procession, the red roses of epics!

The whole Storks Escadrille had received from General d.u.c.h.ene the following _citation_: "Escadrille No. 3. Commander: Captain Heurtaux. A brilliant chasing escadrille which for the past two years has fought in every sector of the front with wonderful spirit and admirable self-sacrifice. The squadron has just taken part in the Lorraine and Champagne operations, and during this period its members have destroyed fifty-three German machines which, added to others previously brought down, makes a total of one hundred and twenty-eight certainly demolished, and one hundred and thirty-two partly disabled."

This battle on the Aisne, with its famous climax at the Chemin des Dames, began to slacken in July; and it was decided that the chasing squadrons, including the Storks, should be transferred to one of the British sectors where another offensive was being prepared. But before leaving the Fismes or Rheims district, Guynemer was active. He had not been given his new rank in the Legion of Honor to be idle: that was not his way. On the contrary, his habit was to show, after receiving a distinction as well as before, that he was worthy of it. On July 6 he engaged five two-seaters, and brought down one in flames. The next day his notebook records two more victories:

"Attacked with Adjutant Bozon-Verduraz, four Albatros one-seaters, above Brimont. Downed one in flames north of Villers-Franqueux, in our own lines. Attacked a D.F.W. which spun down in our lines at Moussy."

These victories, his forty-sixth, forty-seventh, and forty-eighth, were his farewell to the Aisne. But these excessive exertions brought on nervous fatigue. The escadrille had only just reached its new station, when Guynemer had to go into hospital, whence he wrote his father on July 18 as follows:

Dear Father:

Knocked out again. Hospital. But this time I'm flourishing. No more wooden barracks, but a farmhouse right in the fields. I have a room all to myself. Quite correct: I downed three Fritzes, one ablaze, and the next day again great sport: mistook four Boches for Frenchmen. At first fought three of them, then one alone at 3200 to 800 meters. He took fire. They will have to wait till the earth dries so they can dig him out. An hour later a two-seater turned up at 5500. He blundered, and fell straight down on a 75, which died of the shock. But so did the pa.s.senger. The pilot was simply a bit excited, for which he couldn't be blamed. His machine had not plunged, but came down slowly, with its nose twirling, and I got his two guns intact....

The _toubib_ (doctor) says I shall be on my feet in three or four days. Don't see many Boches just now, but that won't last. I read in a newspaper that I had been mobbed in a friendly manner in Paris. I must be ubiquitous without knowing it. Modern science brings about marvels, modern journalism also.

Raymond has two strings (officer's stripes) and the cross of the Legion. Please congratulate him.

Good night, father.

Georges.

P.S. I, who get seasick over nothing at all, have just been out to sea for the first time. The water was very rough, especially for a little motor-boat, but I smiled serenely through it all. Wasn't I proud!...

In fact, some newspaper had announced that Guynemer would carry the aviation flag in the Parade of the Fourteenth of July in Paris, and this was enough to persuade the crowd that some other airman was Guynemer.

Indeed, there had been talk of sending him to Paris on that solemn occasion, but he had declined. He loved glory, but hated show, and he had followed his squadron to Flanders, where he had taken to his bed.

The foregoing letter bears Guynemer's mark unmistakably. The son of rich parents rejoicing over having a room to himself, after having renounced all comfort from the very first day of his enlistment, and willing to begin as _garcon d'aerodrome_; the joke about the German airplane sunk so deep in the wet ground that it would have to be dug out, and the surprise of the pilot; the delight over Raymond's promotion; the amusing allusion to sea-sickness by the man who had no equal in air navigation, are all characteristic details.

Sheik Jabias thus sums up his impressions after visiting the Cid in his camp:

Vous dominiez tout, grand, sans chef, sans joug, sans digue, Absolu, lance au poing, panache, au front....

And that Cid had never fought up in the air.

IV. GUYNEMER IN HIS FATHER'S HOUSE

To quote him once more, Sheik Jabias, after being dazzled by the Cid in his camp, is supposed to see him in his father's castle at Bivar, doing more humble work.

...Que s'est-il donc pa.s.se? Quel est cet equipage?

J'arrive, et je vous trouve en veste, comme un page, Dehors, bras nus, nu-tete, et si pet.i.t garcon Que vous avez en main l'auge et le cavecon, Et faisant ce qu'il sied aux ecuyers de faire, --Cheick, dit le Cid, je suis maintenant chez mon pere.

Those who never saw Guynemer at his father's at Compiegne cannot know him well. Of course, even in camp he was the best of comrades, full of his work, but always ready to enjoy somebody else's success, and speaking about his own as if it were billiards or bridge. His renown had not intoxicated him, and he would have been quite unconscious of it had he not sometimes felt that unresponsiveness on the part of others which is the price of glory: anything like jealousy hurt him as if it had been his first discovery of evil. In Kipling's _Jungle Book_, Mowgli, the man cub, noticing that the Jungle hates him, feels his eyes and is frightened at finding them wet. "What is this, Bagheera?" he asks of his friend the panther. "Oh, nothing; only tears," answers Bagheera, who had lived among men.

One who, on occasion, told Guynemer _not to mind_ knows how deep was his sensitiveness, not to the presence of real hostility, which he fortunately never encountered, but even to an obscure germ of jealousy.

The moment he felt this he shrank into himself. His native exuberance only displayed itself under the influence of sympathy.

Friendship among airmen is manly and almost rough, not caring for formulas or appearances, but proving itself by deeds. To these men the games of war are astonishingly like school games, and are spoken of as if they were nothing else. When a comrade has not come back, and dinner has to begin without him, no show of sorrow is tolerated: only these young men's hearts feel the absence of a friend, and the casual visitor, not knowing, might take them for sporting men, lively and jolly.

Guynemer was living his life in perfect confidence, feeling no personal ambition, not inclined to enjoy honors more than work, ignoring all affectation or att.i.tudinizing, never politic, and naturally unconscious of his own simplicity. Yet he loved and adored what we call glory, and would tell anybody of his successes, even of his decorations, with a childlike cert.i.tude that these things must delight others as much as himself. His French honors were of course his great pride, but he highly appreciated those which he had received from allied governments, too: the Distinguished Service order, the Cross of St. George, the Cross of Leopold, the Belgian war medal, Serbian and Montenegrin orders, etc. All these ribbons made a bright show, and although he generally wore only the _rosette_ of the Legion of Honor, he would sometimes deck himself out in them all, or carry them in his pocket and occasionally empty them out on a table, as at school he used to tumble out the untidy contents of his desk in search of his task.

When he went to Paris to see to his machines, he first secured a room at the Hotel Edouard VII, and immediately posted to the Buc works. When he had time he would invite himself to dinner at the house of his schoolmate at the College Stanislas, Lieutenant Constantin. "Every time he came," this officer writes, "some new exploit or a new decoration had been added to his list. He never wore all his medals, his 'village-band banner,' as he amusingly called them; but when people asked to see them, he immediately searched his pockets and produced the whole disorderly lot. When he became officer in the Legion, he appeared at my mother's quite radiant, so that she asked him the reason of this unusual joy.

'Regardez bien, madame, there is something new.' The new thing which my mother discovered was a tiny _rosette_ ornamenting his red ribbon."

This _rosette_ was so very small that n.o.body noticed it, and Guynemer felt that he must complain to the shopman at the Palais Royal who had sold it to him.

"Give me a larger one, a huge one," he said; "n.o.body sees this."

The tradesman spread a number of _rosettes_ on his counter, but Guynemer only took back again the one of which he had complained, and went out laughing as if the whole thing had been a good joke.

His officer's stripes gave him as much pleasure as his decorations.

Every time he was promoted, he wanted his stripes sewn on, not in a day or an hour, or even five minutes, but immediately. He received his captain's commission the same day he had been given the Distinguished Service order, and he promptly went to see his friend, Captain de la Tour, who was wounded in the hospital at Nancy. This officer had lost three brothers in action, and loved Guynemer as if he had been another younger brother. Indeed, Guynemer said later that La Tour loved him more than any other did.

"Don't you see any change in me?" Guynemer asked.

"No, you're just as usual."

"No, there's a change!"

"Oh, I see; you mean your English order; it does look well."

"There's something else. Look closer."

La Tour at last discovered the three stripes on the cap and sleeves.

"What! Are you a captain?"

"Yes, a captain," and Guynemer laughed his boyish laugh.--This kid a captain! So I am not an impressive captain, then? I haven't run risks enough to be a captain, probably!--His laugh said all this.

Lieutenant Constantin also says in his notes: "Guynemer disliked walking about Paris, because people recognized him. When he saw them turn to look at him, he would grumble at the curse of having a face that was public property. So he preferred waiting for evening, and then drove his little white car up the Champs Elysees to the Bois. He enjoyed this peaceful recreation thoroughly, and forgot the excitement of his life at the front. Memories of our boyhood days came back to him, and he dwelt on them with delight: 'Do you remember one day in _seconde_ when we quarreled and fought like madmen? You made such a mark on my arm that it is there yet.' He did not mind, but I was ashamed of having been such a young brute. Another day, in May, 1917, coming home on leave I met Georges just as he stepped out of his hotel, and as I had just been mentioned in dispatches I told him about it. Immediately he dragged me into a shop, bought a _croix de guerre_, pinned it on my _vareuse_, and hugged me before everybody."

Guynemer had a genius for graciousness, and his imagination was inexhaustible when he wished to please, but his temper was hot and quick. One day he had left his motor at the door of the hotel, and some practical joker thought it clever to leave a note in the car with this inscription in large letters: AVIATORS TO THE FRONT! Guynemer did not take the joke at all, and was boiling with rage.

His complete freedom from conceit has often been remarked. At a luncheon given in his honor by the well-known deputy, Captain Lasies, he would not say a word about himself, but extolled his comrades until somebody said: "You are really modesty itself."

Whereupon another guest asked: "Could you imagine him bragging?"