A P-51 Named February
Via Maggie’s Farm, soaring vid and some soaring fighter pilot poetry from doomed American RCAF Spitfire pilot John Gillespie Magee Jr. Brings to mind another flier’s verse, another end of that equation, “The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner.” WWII fighter pilots were hunters, and if love isn’t necessarily the word for how they felt about what they did, it was very different from the bomber crews, on a deadly production line, who seem to have uniformly hated it.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:51 am Comments (4) on Saturday, January 24, 2009
4 Responses to “A P-51 Named February”
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January 24th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
I’d read the fighter pilot poem long ago, but I’d forgotten about it. As my father was a WWII fighter pilot (P-38s), it was a very pleasant re-read. Thanks for that link!
January 25th, 2009 at 9:53 am
Jules:
Great Stuff!
January 25th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Anyone old enough to remember 1950s television (and young enough to fool the parents into thinking you were in your bed asleep), will remember High Flight as being recited every night when the station signed off, with planes and the flag flying, and an Indian Head test pattern afterwards. I’ve always loved that poem.
My own father was a tail gunner in one of those bombers over Italy. He would never speak of the war either.
January 26th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Jules: First a post on Antietam (we call it Sharpsburg), where several of my ancestors fought on the Secesh side, and now one of my top ten poems (and one of the few poems I’ve ever committed to memory). The karma is thick; I think I’ll keep coming back.