Toul Sector, France; May 11th, 1918
From the letters and personal journal of 2nd LT Ryan 'Dutch' Van Horn
It had been almost 2 weeks since Fitz and I had encountered that Rumpler and our squadron hadn't seen or heard a German plane in the skies since. We HAD been hearing rumors of a German ace flying a red-painted Fokker tri-plane and ambushing American and French pilots all along the front in an obvious attempt to use the ghost of the recently shot-down Red Baron against the Allies; but so far, nobody in the 194th had seen him OR any of his buddies in over 10 days. On the mid-morning patrol of the 11th of May though, I went up with Lucas 'the Alaskan Assassin' Frank flying the '10' plane and obnoxious snob Henry 'Richie' Dorchester flying the '12' plane and me once again flying the lucky '16' plane; and we promptly ran into a trio of Albatros scouts that made up for all the inaction in a BIG way....
-The situation; 3 American Nieuport 28s flown by veteran 2nd LT Ryan Van Horn (flying the '16' plane) and green 2nd LT Henry Dorchester (flying the '12' plane) and led by veteran 1st LT Lucas Frank encounter 3 Albatros DVa fighters flown by veteran German pilots
As we had practiced, Richie broke left while I broke right and Lucas continued straight at the Hun trio; the plan being for us to encircle them and catch them in a withering cross-fire; but the Germans were wily and while one of them went head-to-head with LT Frank; the others broke my way at first...and I must admit, having a pair of twin-machinegun armed fighters coming straight for you is certainly a vision that tends to freeze the blood a bit...
That first flurry of shots between our flights of aircraft was quite intense, but once again somebody up in the sky must have been looking out for me as the Albatros that had me in range and in his sights missed while my own fire tore into his plane pretty good and by the way the pilot flinched, I think I must have wounded him as well. When I glanced over to the left, I could see that LT Frank had been wounded himself by the Albatros going nose-to-nose with him while his own fire had managed to shred a bit of the Hun's left rudder, but didn't so much more than that. Poor Richie was out of position and range to get into the furball at that point, but that would soon change...
At that point, the crazy, unpredictable nature of the dog-fight began as one of the Germans pointing at me suddenly flipped up and rolled over in an Immelman turn while the crate I had just shot zipped past me, almost close enough to touch. Lucas had to duck down under the suddenly flying-the-other-way Albatros while the one that had just wounded him banked right and went straight at Dorchester! The two exchanged fire and this time the Hun missed while Richie managed to shred a bit of wood and canvas from the German kite...
A pattern then developed where many of our planes and the enemies' would come together in a terrifyingly short-range scrum of blazing weapon and then suddenly shoot out to empty sky in all directions and wheel around to do it again. During this time I fired and missed at the mostly green-and-yellow Albatros while Richie ducked under the Albatros he had just shot and came nose to nose with the Hun I had just missed and the two drilled each other with some very solid blows. Dorchester's machine seemed to take some engine damage as his kite would stall and sputter in a most atypical fashion for the rest of the fight while the Enemy just seemed to lose more bits and pieces of its fuselage...
I don't much care for the stuck-up New Yorker; but I must say that Richie Dorchester stuck with is opponent pretty good, pulling an Immelmann and doggedly trying to shoot him down when some bad luck came his way in the form of jammed Vickers machineguns. Lucas was wheeling around to chase after the mostly blue Albatros whose pilot I had wounded while I yanked the stick over in a hard left turn to try and get in position to help out Dorchester....
Soon, we were all wheeling all around in the sky; sometimes coming close enough for shots, sometimes almost running into each other AND/OR the enemy! At one point LT Lucas Frank came nose-to-nose with the green-and-yellow Albatros and while he managed to cause it to start coughing smoke; his own Nieuport got pretty-well shredded in return. It's a WONDER he was able to get that plane home at all....and WOUNDED to boot! He is one tough sonuva-gun let me tell you!
Well, they say everyone's luck has to run out at some point and my days of magically repelling lead came to an end when the yellow-and-green Albatros landed a burst that jammed my right rudder. However, his time on my tail was short as Richie Dorchester chased him off with a burst that tore a bit more out of that resilient Hun kite. I never thought I'd be happy to have that richie-rich prig as one of my wingmen; but I certainly was that day!
The feisty Hun flying that yellow-and-green Albatros flipped over in another Immelmann and went guns blazing nose-to-nose with Henry Dorchester and while both landed shots; neither was telling and poor Richie managed to jam his guns yet AGAIN! Meanwhile, I closed in on the Albatros with checkerboard patterns on the wings and managed to land a couple of long bursts into its right side which must have caught his fuel tank as the kite suddenly turned into a million bits of kindling as an explosion lit up the sky! My second victory of the war!
After that, LT Lucas Frank managed to get into excellent position on the mostly Blue Albatros whose pilot I had wounded with my first burst and he steadily poured lead into that crate until it nosed over and plummeted into the French countryside far below. Meanwhile, Richie Dorchester and the yellow-and-green Albatros kept nicking each other in passing attacks and then when the Hun realized he was the last German in this section of sky, he tried to race for the German lines while I raced in to try and beat him to the 'finish line' and poor Henry wheeled his engine-damaged Nieuport around in a vain attempt to catch up....
I managed to get in one last burst before the last Hun could duck into the clouds over the German lines and lo-and-behold; his Albatros finally gave up the ghost as it fell apart in mid-air. Even though I INSISTED upon the victory being a shared on between Henry Dorchester and myself; good ol' Richie still seemed to treat me with disgust upon landing back at the Aerodrome. Oh well....you just can't please some people I guess. On a more important note; LT Frank managed to land in good order and then promptly passed out due to blood loss from the bullet hole in his shoulder. He was quickly helped out of his plane and taken to the hospital, where the Docs say he should be okay to fly again in a month or so. His fourth victory; a bucket of blood left in his Nieuport's cockpit and even passed out in a hospital; his legend grows and grows...
-The Butcher's Bill:
Green-and-Yellow Albatros DVa: Total Damage: 16 (FIVE zero damage cards! Talk about tough-to-bring-down!)
Blue (and Red and Green) Albatros DVa: Total Damage: 18
Checkerboard wings Albatros DVa: Total Damage: 12 and the Boom card
2nd LT Henry 'Richie' Dorchester's Number 12 Nieuport 28: Total Damage: 10 (Jammed guns TWICE!)
2nd LT Ryan 'Dutch' Van Horn's Number 16 Nieuport 28: Total Damage: 5
1st LT Lucas 'Alaskan Assassin' Frank's Number 10 Nieuport 28: Total Damage: 10 (Pilot wounded; will miss next 2 missions)
Game Notes: I went out and got 2 more of the cheap 'sky' pieces of poster board for a larger playing area but I'm thinking I might go back to 2 as this fight was LLLLOOOOONNNNGGGG! The crazy random moves the A.I. Germans kept making didn't help either....though it certainly made the fight ANYTHING but predictable. Although all 3 USAS planes came back; two of them were down to 4 hit points; so this fight was a lot tougher than it may have seemed. All in all though; I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. Please note that I didn't include ALL of the pictures of the fighting as it was a LOT of pictures....hopefully the flow is captured above pretty well though.
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