Answering a Higher Call

Author Lewis Toland

Our Digital Age prizes immediacy and sensationalism because they elevate emotion over reason, a boon to Leftists who trade in abstractions and generalities.  Conservatives, though, prefer principles and particularity. Leftists assume their own purity and the vileness of differing views – functioning as the new Puritans of some utopia that has never existed despite the smiling promises of New York City’s mayor.  Their tiresome playbook inescapably divides people into categories: the oppressors versus the oppressed.  We can do better.

We who respect history and tradition know that life cannot be so simplistic as our Leftist opponents assume.  Yes, the absolutes of good and evil undeniably exist.  Our Judeo-Christian faith identifies the origin of evil in Eden (Genesis 3).  Implicitly affirming our Founders’ “checks and balances” principle in the Constitution, Lord Acton noted the inherent threat of a strong government: “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”  In The Gulag Archipelago, Alexandr Solzhenitsyn enrages Leftists: “The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart […] And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained.”

Of course, we conservatives sometimes speak in generalities, but we seek to respect individuals rather than rush to categorize individuals, only to dismiss them.  For example, we repudiate Hitler’s National Socialists, but a fascinating tale about a crippled B-17 struggling to return to England shows that one German heart indeed has a “small bridgehead of good.”

On December 20, 1943, 2LT Charlie Brown piloted a B-17 Ye Olde Pub with a crew of ten to bomb Bremen, Germany.  A rookie pilot was expendable, so he flies “the Purple Heart Corner” at the edge of the formation, the point at which German fighters would attack because neighboring American bombers could offer little fire support.  250 flack guns fire, shattering his plexiglass cockpit, exposing him to subzero temperature.  A dozen fighters attack, knocking out the number two engine, destroying the hydraulic system, and killing the tail gunner.  His plane drops from 27,000 feet, robbing him of oxygen and consciousness.

Ye Olde Pub after its harrowing mission — a testament to courage and mercy in the skies over Europe. Image source: DuckDuckGo search results. Copyright belongs to the respective owner.

Miraculously, he awakens at 1,000 feet in time to pull the plane above the tree line.  He flies over a German airfield, where combat veteran Franz Stigler spots an irresistible target, which he pursues, eager to shoot down his third bomber of the day and to avenge the death of his brother.

Oddly, the bomber does not fire at him, so Franz closes in, seeing the frozen corpse of the tail gunner.  The continued absence of fire pricks his curiosity, so he flies alongside and sees six wounded crewmen inside, not that they could have fired their machine guns because the lubricating oil had frozen.  Before shooting down the easiest of kills, the threat from Gustav Rödel, his own instructor, changes his mind and his life.  The number of kills matters far less than how an honorable combat pilot makes them.  A pilot in a parachute is defenseless.  It is murder and has no place in combat: “If ever I hear of you shooting a man in a parachute, I will shoot you myself.”   The veteran pilot cannot forget his principles: the American pilot is no different than a pilot in a parachute.

Franz Stigler gestures to the American plane to land or to fly to neutral Sweden, but Charlie misunderstands the hand gestures.  Choosing to risk court-martial and execution, Franz flies his plane so close that the two aircraft almost touch, perplexing the terrified Charlie even more.  Knowing that the Germans have a few captured B-17s that the Luftwaffe use for training if closely accompanied by a fighter plane, Fritz correctly gambles that the anti-aircraft crews along the coastline would allow them to pass over unmolested.  Once over the North Sea, Fritz salutes the American pilot and flies toward Germany, not merely sparing him but saving him.

Charlie struggles to keep his plane moving faster than 140 m.p.h. to prevent a stall and crash into the frigid sea.  Rejoicing to see land, he soon crash lands at Kimbolton Airfield, saving eight crewmen.  His stunned debriefers order him to keep the incident secret to prevent any sympathy for the Germans.  Fritz wonders whether the Americans survived.  Charlie similarly wonders for over forty decades whom he should thank for the gift of life.

Desperate to thank his former enemy, Charlie, a retired lieutenant colonel, begins asking the U.S. Air Force and the German military about his benefactor, a three-year search yielding nothing.  As a last chance, in 1990 he writes to a German journal for former military pilots, describing the situation.  A letter from Stigler arrives: “I was the one.”  Charlie phones Fritz.  Both men cry and talk for hours, agreeing to meet in Miami.  Charlie shows his Christian brother photos of three generations who owe their lives to a man who “answered a higher call,” Fritz’s reason for granting mercy to the defenseless.

Franz Stigler escorts Charlie Brown’s crippled B17, Ye Olde Pub, across the North Sea — a moment of honor amid war. Image source: DuckDuckGo search results. Copyright belongs to the respective owner.

In September 1990, the reunion of the 379^th Bomb Group invited Franz Stigler to join them.  Ball turret gunner Sam Blackford and radio operator Dick Pechout meet Franz for the first time, and the four survivors embrace in grateful tears.  Accompanying the veterans, twenty-five descendants emerge from the darkness of the hangar to thank the former enemy who gave them life itself: mercy’s consequences in heeding “a higher call.”

Fritz Stigler died at age 92 in on March 22, 2008; his “brother” Charlie died at age 87 on November 24 of the same year.  Charlie saw himself as only a character in the story whose hero is Franz Stigler.  War wreaks misery upon mankind, but sometimes mercy revises our priorities.  Such morality comes through disciplined, often costly, commitment to a higher call.  Will we conservatives copy John Adams to live as moral people obedient to a higher call or yield to Rousseau to live by impulse?

Lt. Charlie Brown and his battered B17, Ye Olde Pub — the moment mercy triumphed over vengeance. Image source: DuckDuckGo search results. Copyright belongs to the respective owner.

Suggested Resources

Makos, Adam with Larry Alexander.  A Higher Call.  New York: Berkley Caliber, 2012.

When This German Ace Saved 9 Americans — One Became His Brother for Life

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbmzgEK5KdI

Join Us as We Continue….. Answering a Higher Call

If this story stirred your heart — if it reminded you that courage, mercy, and moral clarity still matter — then we warmly invite you to join us for our next History: Then & Now feature in our Reel Series, showing on August 18^th, Tuesday from 2-4 pm in the Lone Star Legacy room. We will be showing Unbroken, the powerful true story of Louis Zamperini, whose endurance and faith echo the very virtues celebrated in Lewis Toland’s article.

Come share an afternoon with neighbors who value character, sacrifice, and the lessons our forebears left for us. Let’s gather together to reflect, to learn, and to honor the men who answered a higher call when the world needed them most.

We hope to see you there as we continue to keep history alive — and relevant — for our community.