Battle of the Somme

In all my life I have never known a more beautiful hunting ground than in the days of the Battle of the Somme. When you got up in the morning, the first Englishmen were already arriving, and the last ones disappeared long after the sun had set. ‘A paradise for fighter pilots,’ Boelcke once said. It was the time when Boelcke's kills had risen from twenty to forty in two months. We beginners didn't have the experience of our master at that time and were quite content if we didn't get our own sails. But it was nice! No take-off without a dogfight. Often big air battles of forty to sixty Englishmen against unfortunately not always so many Germans. For them it's quantity and for us it's quality. But the Englishman is a dashing chap, I'll give him that. From time to time he came at very low altitude and visited Boelcke on his pitch with bombs. He literally challenged us to a fight and always accepted. I hardly ever met an Englishman who refused to fight, whereas the Frenchman preferred to scrupulously avoid any contact with the enemy in the air. Those were good times in our fighter squadron. The spirit of the leader was passed on to his pupils. We could blindly entrust ourselves to his leadership. There was no chance of anyone being let down. The thought never crossed our minds. And so we briskly and cheerfully cleared up among our enemies. On the day Boelcke fell, the squadron already had forty. Now it has well over a hundred. Boelcke's spirit lives on among his capable successors.