- Feb 5, 2002
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A German pilot lived to be thankful for his act of chivalry 50 years earlier.
Just before Christmas 1943, Charles Brown, an American bomber pilot in World War II, was sure he was about to die.
Brown was a 21-year-old West Virginia farm boy on his first combat mission, and it was going about as badly as you could imagine. Enemy fire had riddled his bomber with holes and nearly destroyed it. The men on board were in even worse shape than the plane: Half his crew was severely wounded, while the tail gunner was dead, his blood frozen in icicles over the machine guns.
Severely damaged, the plane couldn’t keep up and soon fell behind to fly alone. Somewhere over Germany, trying to make it home against all odds, Brown spotted the one thing that could make the desperate situation worse. A German Messerschmitt fighter plane was closing in on their crippled craft.
“My God, this is a nightmare,” gasped his co-pilot, Spencer “Pinky” Luke.
“He’s going to destroy us,” Brown said. The situation seemed hopeless.
Continued below.
aleteia.org
Just before Christmas 1943, Charles Brown, an American bomber pilot in World War II, was sure he was about to die.
Brown was a 21-year-old West Virginia farm boy on his first combat mission, and it was going about as badly as you could imagine. Enemy fire had riddled his bomber with holes and nearly destroyed it. The men on board were in even worse shape than the plane: Half his crew was severely wounded, while the tail gunner was dead, his blood frozen in icicles over the machine guns.
Severely damaged, the plane couldn’t keep up and soon fell behind to fly alone. Somewhere over Germany, trying to make it home against all odds, Brown spotted the one thing that could make the desperate situation worse. A German Messerschmitt fighter plane was closing in on their crippled craft.
“My God, this is a nightmare,” gasped his co-pilot, Spencer “Pinky” Luke.
“He’s going to destroy us,” Brown said. The situation seemed hopeless.
The decisive moment
Continued below.
The act of mercy in WWII that made former enemies “brothers”
A German pilot lived to be thankful for his act of chivalry 50 years earlier.
aleteia.org
