$Unique_ID{how04641}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{True Stories Of The Great War
XII - Story Of Rockwell's Last Fight}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{McConnell, James R.}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{rockwell
lines
brought
german
field
machine
rockwell's
air
death
enemy}
$Date{1917}
$Log{}
Title:       True Stories Of The Great War
Book:        "Flying For France" - Hero Tales Of Battles In The Air
Author:      McConnell, James R.
Date:        1917
Translation: Yeomans, Betty

XII - Story Of Rockwell's Last Fight

     Kiffin Rockwell and Lufbery were the first to get their new machines
ready and on the 23rd of September went out for the first flight since the
escadrille had arrived at Luxeuil.  They became separated in the air but each
flew on alone, which was a dangerous thing to do in the Alsace sector. . .
.

     Just before Kiffin Rockwell reached the lines he spied a German machine
under him flying at 11,000 feet.  I can imagine the satisfaction he felt in
at last catching an enemy plane in our lines.  Rockwell had fought more
combats than the rest of us put together, and had shot down many German
machines that had fallen in their lines, but this was the first time he had
had an opportunity of bringing down a Boche in our territory.

     A captain, the commandant of an Alsatian village, watched the aerial
battle through his field glasses.  He said that Rockwell approached so close
to the enemy that he thought there would be a collision.  The German craft,
which carried two machine guns, had opened a rapid fire when Rockwell started
his dive.  He plunged through the stream of lead and only when very close to
his enemy did he begin shooting.  For a second it looked as though the German
was falling, so the captain said, but then he saw the French machine turn
rapidly nose down, the wings of one side broke off and fluttered in the wake
of the airplane, which hurtled earthward in a rapid drop.  It crashed into
the ground in a small field - a field of flowers - a few hundred yards back
of the trenches.  It was not more than two and a half miles from the spot
where Rockwell, in the month of May, brought down his first enemy machine.
The Germans immediately opened up on the wreck with artillery fire.  In spite
of the bursting shrapnel, gunners from a near-by battery rushed out and
recovered poor Rockwell's broken body.  There was a hideous wound in his
breast where an explosive bullet had torn through.  A surgeon who examined
the body, testified that if it had been an ordinary bullet Rockwell would
have had an even chance of landing with only a bad wound.  As it was he was
killed the instant the unlawful missile exploded.

     Lufbery engaged a German craft but before he could get to close range
two Fokkers swooped down from behind and filled his aeroplane full of holes.
Exhausting his ammunition he landed at Fontaine, an aviation field near the
lines.  There he learned of Rockwell's death and was told that two other
French machines had been brought down within the hour.  He ordered his
gasolene tank filled, procured a full band of cartridges and soared up into
the air to avenge his comrade.  He sped up and down the lines, and made a
wide detour to Habsheim where the Germans have an aviation field, but all to
no avail.  Not a Boche was in the air.

     The news of Rockwell's death was telephoned to the escadrille.  The
captain, lieutenant, and a couple of men jumped in a staff car and hastened
to where he had fallen.  On their return the American pilots were convened
in a room of the hotel and the news broken to them.  With tears in his eyes
the captain said: "The best and bravest of us all is no more."

     No greater blow could have befallen the escadrille.  Kiffin was its
soul.  He was loved and looked up to by not only every man in our flying
corps but by every one who knew him.  Kiffin was imbued with the spirit of
the cause for which he fought and gave his heart and soul to the performance
of his duty.  He said: "I pay my part for Lafayette and Rochambeau," and he
gave the fullest measure.  The old flame of chivalry burned brightly in this
boy's fine and sensitive being.  With his death France lost one of her most
valuable pilots.  When he was over the lines the Germans did not pass - and
he was over them most of the time.  He brought down four enemy planes that
were credited to him officially, and Lieutenant de Laage, who was his
fighting partner, says he is convinced that Rockwell accounted for many
others which fell too far within the German lines to be observed.  Rockwell
had been given the Medaille Militaire and the Croix de Guerre, on the ribbon
of which he wore four palms, representing the four magnificent citations he
had received in the order of the army.  As a further reward for his excellent
work he had been proposed for promotion from the grade of sergeant to that
of second lieutenant.  Unfortunately the official order did not arrive until
a few days following his death.

     The night before Rockwell was killed he had stated that if he were
brought down he would like to be buried where he fell.  It was impossible,
however, to place him in a grave so near the trenches.  His body was draped
in a French flag and brought back to Luxeuil.  He was given a funeral worthy
of a general.  His brother, Paul, who had fought in the Legion with him, and
who had been rendered unfit for service by a wound, was granted permission
to attend the obsequies.  Pilots from all nearby camps flew over to render
homage to Rockwell's remains.  Every Frenchman in the aviation at Luxeuil
marched behind the bier.  The British pilots, followed by a detachment of
five hundred of their men, were in line, and a battalion of French troops
brought up the rear.  As the slow moving procession of blue and khakiclad men
passed from the church to the graveyard, airplanes circled at a feeble height
above and showered down myriads of flowers.

     Rockwell's death urged the rest of the men to greater action, and the
few who had machines were constantly after the Boches.  Prince brought one
down.  Lufbery, the most skillful and successful fighter in the escadrille,
would venture far into the enemy's lines and spiral down over a German
aviation camp, daring the pilots to venture forth.  One day he stirred them
up, but as he was short of fuel he had to make for home before they took to
the air.  Prince was out in search of a combat at this time.  He got it.  He
ran into the crowd Lufbery had aroused.  Bullets cut into his machine and one
exploding on the front edge of a lower wing broke it.  Another shattered a
supporting mast.  It was a miracle that the machine did not give way.  As
badly battered as it was Prince succeeded in bringing it back from over
Mulhouse, where the fight occurred, to his field at Luxeuil.