Journal Entry: October 27, 1915
St. Pol-sur-Mer

I'm beginning to really like Roderic, he remimds me so much of Jimmy. Today for instance, we were supposed to just fly around the area while we continue to get accustomed to our new kites, but Roderic had other ideas. While we were walking out to our machines he said, "Why don't we scoot up to the front and get accustomed to our kites there instead of flying some boring circuits around the aerodrome?", of course I agreed. We took off, and when out of sight of the aerodrome, we turned towards the front. We arrived and began flying along just enjoying the simple pleasure of flying, there didn't seem to be anybody but us up there. After we had flown back and forth for quite I while, I was beginning to grow antsy and it was then that I spotted the Hun gasbag below. I had always wanted to have a go at one those things, but I could never figure out quite how to attack them in a Morane. I looked over at Roderic, got his attention and pointed down. He looked down, got a big smile on his face and immediately knew what I was thinking. I gave him a big thumbs up and began to lose altitude so that I could attack the sausage. Our new kites are wonderful, but just like real butterflies their wings are very fragile and one doesn't just dive if one wants to live a while longer. After floating down about 2000 ft, I was finally able to begin my attack run on the balloon. Since I hadn't put a lot of thought into this attack, I just bore in with my gun blazing. After about a drum of ammo, I noticed some wispy smoke appear, which grew darker and before I knew it, it just exploded. Of course, the Huns on the ground were not pleased with our activities and were shooting everything they possessed at us. We danced away and turned towards home, laughing all the way.



Member and provider of banjo music for the Illustrious BOC