Memorial Day was rather special for me this year. My good friend, Hal McNicol, a WWII Navy airman and eventual Panagra pilot based in Lima, invited me to his weekly breakfast with “The Old Bold Pilots” not far from San Diego. Talk about an experience! There were pilots stemming from WWII all the way up through Viet Nam, helicopter jockeys, and former commanders of aircraft carriers. One enthusiastic member, almost 90, appeared in his wheelchair with a bottle of oxygen and a breather tube so he wouldn't miss a word nor a bit of his scrambled eggs and bacon. The veterans I shared breakfast with that morning left me awestruck with their tales, especially one in particular.

It was just prior to Christmas Eve in 1943 when a young American pilot called Charlie Brown lined up on a runway in Britain with his crew for his first combat mission over Germany. They named their B-17 bomber “Ye Olde Pub”. The objective was to take out a factory producing fighter planes in Bremen. Just as the squadron entered the critical area, they were attacked by German fighter planes and badly hit by anti-aircraft fire. The 21 yr. old rookie´s plane was hit so badly it was forced to leave formation and fend on it`s own. The tail gunner was killed, and all but one of his crewmen in the rear was incapacitated by wounds and severe cold reaching minus 60ºF outside. Even Lt. Brown received a bullet fragment in his left shoulder. His windshield shattered, the instruments became useless, and in a semi conscious state, he found himself flying upside down looking “up” at the ground.

When he finally recovered his senses, he had lost one of his engines and descended from an original altitude of 27,300 ft. to 1,000 ft. and was cruising over a well prepared German Luftwaffe airbase. He refused to abandon his ship and parachute to safety, and decided to attempt to return home.
Down below, observing the limping U.S. bomber flying overhead, the commanding officer ordered fighter pilot Franz Steigler up immediately in his ME-109 to shoot down the intruder. Franz was a veteran Luftwaffe ace with more than 28 kills with his ME 109 fighter, and had also downed 5 enemy bombers. This was to be a routine assignment for him, but with one important difference. He only needed one more enemy plane to be awarded the distinguished Iron Cross.

When Franz Stiegler pulled alongside Charlie Brown´s “Ye Olde Pub”, he couldn`t believe that this plane and crew was still flying. The hull had holes blasted in various areas; the turret gunman was dead, one engine gone, and the pilot barely holding the wheel. To top it off, Lt. Brown was flying east when he should have been flying west towards Britain. It was a moment of great decision mixed with compassion. The highly disciplined warrior, the obvious candidate for the Iron Cross, took a closer look at his wounded enemy and crew and felt they presented no threat to him, his base, or the Third Reich. Charlie Brown had no idea as to where he was heading, so he followed Stiegler´s signals to turn around and head east toward the North Sea, where he escorted him until he was headed home.

Charlie Brown made it back miraculously and he and some of his crew survived. Franz Stiegler returned to his base and reported that the bomber had crashed due to it's disastrous condition. Had he told the truth, he would have been a dead war hero. Charlie Brown was also sworn to secrecy, and it wasn't until 40 years later that Brown crossed back over the North Sea, spent years researching files to discover who the German pilot that had saved his life was, and they finally met in the U.S. at the 379th Bombers Reunion. As it turned out, 25 men survived as a result of the generosity of Franz Stiegler who settled in Vancouver after the War. Charlie Brown settled in Seattle, Washington, only 200 miles away. Fifty years later, two warriors, supposed arch enemies, finally met and have become two good friends. Now that's a war story!