AVIATORS are conscious of an antagonistic feeling towards them in the minds of the infantrymen in the trenches who, covered with mud and trench insects, frequently overworked and underslept and always facing imminent death from enemy's bullets, find an ironic pleasure in contrasting their hard lot with the life of ease and excitement led by the young officers of the flying corps.
To see an aeroplane cavorting about over their heads fills them with bitterness at the thought that these well dressed men are getting paid for that pleasant sport, while they are forced to work like beasts of burden in the rain. Infantry officers have told me that rarely have they seen an American aeroplane over them when it was needed to chase away enemy machines, and that Huns repeatedly came over them at low altitudes strafing the troops with machine-gun fire, to their great injury and demoralization.
It is not difficult to understand this bitterness under the circumstances. Much of this feeling might be cleared away, however, if the infantrymen realized that while enemy machines are strafing them, our airmen are retaliating probably twofold upon the enemy troops beyond the lines. Every day our machines were engaged in this hazardous work of trench strafing. Much of the success of our infantry advances was due to the cooperation of our air forces behind the front and beyond the vision of our doughboys in the trenches. Admitting as they do the disastrous effect of aeroplane attacks upon their own lines, they can easily imagine how terrified their enemy infantrymen became at the daily appearance of our fighting planes in their midst.
As to the comparative risks of injury in these two arms of warfare, I believe even the most skeptical doughboy would admit after reflection that an airman's daily duties surround him every moment with the possibilities of death. Comfort and dress, entertainments and good food are all in our favor, of course. But I have yet to meet a pilot of any nation at war who does not try to balance this advantage with a whole-souled admiration and praise of his less fortunate brother-in-arms, who does so much more than his share of the "dirty work."
Much of this jealousy and misunderstanding is due to the fact that the man on the ground can never see and never know anything of the things the airman is doing for him. It is a pity that such must be the case, for, while rivalry between different branches of the Army may be beneficial, bitterness is not.
While sitting at dinner about sundown on the evening of September 30th, discussing the latest victory claimed that afternoon by Lieutenant Kaye and Lieutenant Reed Chambers who had destroyed a Fokker aeroplane over Romaigne, an orderly brought me a note from the C.O. of the Group, requesting me to select two volunteers for a most important mission and report at Headquarters with them forthwith. It was then 6:30 and quite dark.
We were naturally excited at this sudden summons and I wondered what extraordinary necessity called for aeroplanes at this late hour. I selected Ham Coolidge and Wierd Cook out of the men who volunteered for this unknown mission, and setting off with our flying kit in our hands we hastened over to Major Hartney's office.
There to our great surprise we found General Mitchell impatiently pacing the floor while awaiting our coming. He immediately welcomed us and began at once to explain the object of our hurried summons.
Our troops were at that time engaged in the attack on Montfaucon and were advancing up the ten-mile valley that runs between the edge of the Argonne Forest and the Meuse River. Montfaucon occupied the crest of the loftiest hill in this valley and was situated almost in its exact center. From this favorable spot the Crown Prince of Germany had viewed the battles for Verdun and the country to the south during those fierce days of 1916. Later I visited the massive headquarters of the Crown Prince and marveled at the extensive view of the surrounding landscape one obtained from this site.