26 August, 2005: With the presence of Hans-Guenter Ploes comes the orderly organization and placement of the found parts. This morning enough parts to recognize the bulk of two engines was arranged neatly at the edge of the crater. A cowling piece from the outside left of the plane was scraped and prodded from the dirt later in the morning. HG showed me a diagram of the cowling from his P-38 parts catalogue and compared the diagram to the found piece. They are an abstract match to my untrained eye but he is the God of Parts and who am I to disagree? A picture will be included in the next post depending upon the kindness of the guy who allows me to connect to his computer. The same guy, Ulf, has promised to put ALL the photos taken by anyone he knows who has visited the site on one big DVD so I will have them. I will spare you the full complement of pictures or slide shows except by special request.

The part of the crater that contained most of these engine parts is nearly exhausted and the next move will be in the presumed direction of the cockpit. I overheard Dr. Fox tell a reporter today that he expects to wrap this up in five to seven days! As I understand things, once the cockpit area is defined and excavated, there should be enough of what JPAC needs to consider this a successful mission. The focus remains on finding my father and his personal effects.

Even though that’s the obvious goal, I love the little pieces that are possible to identify and if not by anyone else, HG knows what they are and then they are even more cool and amazing. There are these little aqua corroded pieces attached to delicate wiring that was used throughout the complicated electrical system of the P-38 that survived still braided together. I also watch for the black bakelite pieces that were the front of his instrument panel and I am a complete sucker for switches and dials. We found one today that very clearly reads: A U D I O. See what I mean about wunderbar?

Doc Fox decided to abandoned the screening this afternoon in favor of filling in the trenches that would not be used. Everyone shoveled the dirt off the blue tarp into the nearest trench. The sky was an astonishing clear blue with massive white clouds and the sun was brilliant but it was cool. Can’t beat that for a collaborative moment in time. Fortunately, all the shovels were in use, so I took pictures and looked at the parts in the screens. At the end of the trench refilling, everyone gathered IN a trench for a group photo. They invided me to join them and then included the helpful and well-versed Germans (Wally, Hans Guenther, Ernst) These, too, will be uploaded for your viewing pleasure.

After the photo op, I noticed Herr Bormann the formerly unhappy farmer who owns the field, walking onto the site. I notified Ernst and Capt. Emmons that we had an esteemed visitor. We all held our collective breath for a minute. I had invited him to come to the field after our meeting on Saturday but he said then that he didn’t expect to have time. Apparently, he finds our work interesting (I thought “hmmm, bygones”) and he stood with me while our picture was taken. He has also invited any of the hunters in the group to join him for an early morning or evening hunting expedition for the boars that are runining his sunflower crop. That won’t be moi, but if it saves the excavation, gimme a gun. I still vote for love vs. war.

In between the engine unearthing and the trench filling detail, Dr. Fox and photographer, Linda Miller mapped a 3-D diagram of the site. Lots of careful measuring with string hung with a tiny level. Measuring, moving the string, saying numbers, shifting the level and voila! a diagram that I also photographed but cannot post because it is part of the official report. Sorry.

Have you all gotten the idea that I am enjoying this despite the fact that it is a mission of great love and deep feelings? I expect that the cockpit excavation and what emerges from there may up the emotional ante just a bit. I notice that I spend most of my time now sitting at the edge of the crater just watching the laborious scraping and smoothing. I am drawn to the heart of the crash site for obvious reasons. I feel as though I am in attendance to my father’s honor and his essence. I am his escort back to us if only in spirit and tiny earthly remains. Nonetheless important than it would have been if the team sent in the 1940’s to find him had succeeded. The only difference would have been the Estill present at the site. Knowing my grandfather as I did, he would have found a way to be here. I am just doing my daughter-thing which is one of the only direct things I can do for my father and nothing compared to what he has done for me.

By the way, this is the best way to get into shape. We can call it the trench digging, part sorting, and dirt hauling diet. Too bad the Germans are so good at bread and beer. Til next time, probably tomorrow.

Sunday 28 August, 2005: Today we were joined by Kay (pronounced Kai) Siering and his team from Der Spiegel TV. Three years ago Kay contacted me to see if I was interested in having Der Spiegel make a documentary film about my father’s last flight. This excavation is key to the creation of the film. Kay and his team came on a monumental day in our world of searching and finding.

At 11:15 a.m., Dr. Fox was laboriously scraping at the side of the crater between the engine crater and what he hopes will prove to be the cockpit crater. He slipped a small flat irregular rectangular piece from the dirt, tapped it a few times, and jumped to his feet calling for Hans-Guenther (God of Aircraft Parts). He had retrieved the one piece of evidence that unequivocally identifies the crash site as that of my father. He found the Main Engine Data Plate. What makes this a magnificent discovery is that the numbers visible on the plate (considering fire, destruction, and a 60-year hiatus in the dirt) exactly matches the numbers in the Missing Air Crew Report (MACR). It was a great moment which, like winning at the slots, caused everyone to gather around and wonder if we would win again.

The fates continue to bless us today. Shortly after finding the Main Engine Data Plate, the bottom frame of the left canopy window emerged with shards of glazing still attached. The shards, like so many of the pieces we are finding, are charred but recognizable. Due to fortuitous materials choices by Lockeed, the frame is made of stainless steel. I see its indestructibility in the shine of this twisted remnant.

Despite the return of summer heat, we worked all day, bouyed by our good fortune. Dr. Fox was our leading man of documentary interviews with Hans-Guenther as his knowledgeable co-star. I was able to take some notes as Dr. Fox explained the excavation process to Kay Siering. What I heard is included here for your contextual reference. I won’t swear to my stenography skills or that this is a sequential or comprehensive report.:

1. The crash materials are spread out over approximately 80 meters
2. The dig started with survey trenches which I described in an earlier entry
3. Each trench was one meter wide and trench sites were chosen according to eye-witness testimony
4. Fortunately, the first trench hit where one of the engines was found. The other engine and one wing fell across the field.
5. The engine crater was excavated first and the trench was expanded outward
6. It is possible that a wing or tail boom also fell into this crater. The engine went straight down into what is now the pit. (Intertia at work)
7. Throughout this crater, 20 mm incendiary explosive rounds are found which probably “gang fired” at the point of impact causing this widespread catastrophic result. Even the protective armor plating that was just in front of the pilot below the instrument panel, was broken into pieces.
8. The excavation will continue in one meter wide segments and work will cease in each square only when sterile soil is reached.
9. Even after the entire area of the engine and cockpit craters are excavated, digging will continue around the edges for remains, personal effects, and material evidence that may have been taken away by the plow.
10. All soil will be replaced, seeding done if the farmer requests it, and the land will be restored to its original condition. Meanwhile, the field is being treated as if it were our own.

I have more stuff about soil colors and integrity which I can not decipher but one of the standards by which the soil is judged is checking for color, consistency, and compactness. The soil is evaluated in descending layers: natural sand, burned soil, and turquoise decomposed aluminum. The P-38 was fully loaded with aluminum.

I am growing quite fond of my personal ACS collection to which I have added, the gun camera with film still intact around the edges of the lens opening. Even the small gears that make it a camera rather than a lug nut are visible on both sides. I also have the entire mechanism that was part of the instrument panel that allowed my father to see that oxygen was flowing into his mask - cleverly named The Oxygen Flow Indicator. I now own a large piece of the windscreen in which three shades of varying shades of blue glass are still discernable. There are about a million pieces of broken glass associated with this piece which I will contemplate with my dear glass artist friend and Sister-Mermaid, Dr. Pat Weyer.

If the devil is in the details, I have probably missed a few, but you get the picture. It was a great way to spend a Sunday. We have gathered enough evidence to ascertain that we are bringing home the right guy. I never doubted it based on the exhaustive research, expertise, and intuition of Hans-Guenther Ploes, but hard evidence beats conjecture, wishin’ and hopin’. I close with a quote from Hans-Guenther upon discovery of the Main Engine Data Plate: “A wish is the father of the thought.” Yup, this was our wish, now granted.

(I will impose upon the nice man wth the computer and ethernet cable tomorrow night at 8 p.m. to upload the photos I have selected and prepared for this purpose. I will include photos of the above events as well as one of Herr Boormann’s dog)

Engine parts

With Frau Thiel

Main engine data plate

JPAC & German team

Window frame from canopy

Strut for front landing gear

Kay Siering & Der Spiegel TV team

Crash dragon

>Armor piercing ammunition box

Hotel Central, Torgau

Belly rub

Herr Bormann & Ernst with dog

Herr Bormann’s hunting dog

ACS on tarp

Monday, 29 August, 2005: But for the final restoration of the field, the excavation is complete. Our work today was significant and conclusive. After finding the main data plate yesterday and with it the certainty that this was my father’s crash site, all that remained was to complete the excavation of the two engine craters and the cockpit crater. The imprint of the plane, how it fell, and to what extent it was buried and in all probability, dug up for its valued metal after the war, was clearly evident today in the soil. I want to devote some thought and careful attention to this final post so I will gather my thoughts tonight and tomorrow and make a post promptly at 4 p.m. tomorrow when the Internet Cafe opens for business. It seems I will have plenty of time to attend to this as well as to meet with Hans-Guenther in order to identify and label the parts I am bringing home. Let us pray that customs is disinterested in the precious metal in my suitcase. The end of this story, wherein the smallest little part is the most important, is yet to be determined.

Wednesday, August 31, 2005 - Yesterday was the first day without a reason to go to the field. JPAC was there to deconstruct the screening equipment, to sweep and photograph the crash feature, and to arrange for it to be refilled with its own dirt minus the treasure we have claimed. I expected the day to contain a bittersweet center surrounded by an elusive sense of accomplishment wrapped in the absence of action. It was the latter I dreaded most.

As usual, Ernst took me to the field around 9 a.m. for one last look at the crater that contained so much, but in the end, offered only a small measure of its worth. As I stood there for the last time, I wanted to fly above it and see it as I knew it must look from above - just like a P-38. My father’s fighter group uses such an image on their newsletter. It is indelible for me now in its symbolic and concrete message. If you knew it was a P-38 that had an unfortunate landing here, you could be shown the lines in the dirt below the surface of the working field. Simply amazing.

There I was, feeling at “sixes and sevens” and somewhat startled at this sudden-after-60-years ending of this quest, WHEN, Hans-Guenther, God of Airplane Parts, invited me to accompany him to Dresden and Meissen. Meissen has, among other things, the oldest pottery manufacturing plant in Germany. I had, in fact, discovered a shard of pottery stamped with the crossed swords mark of Meissen in one of the screens. I agreed to go because I enjoy HG’s company, we are seasoned traveling companions, and it seemed like a great way to avoid certain malaise. I realized, too, that a good many questions remained unanswered and a day trip with this particular expert was fortuitous, indeed.

As Dr. Fox and I held our last meeting at the crater’s edge late Monday afternoon, he told me about another possible place in the field, along the boundary fence, wherein it was rumored that airplane parts and possibly remains had been buried two weeks after the crash. He considered it possible, he said, but improbable. A decision was made not to explore that area because enough had been gathered from the existing site to prove, beyond a doubt, that this was the place where my father’s plane crashed the afternoon of Friday, April 13, 1945. The amount of material taken from the site is estimated at one-half ton give or take a few kilograms.

This is where my day with HG gets interesting. Inspired by the final moments of seeing the crater as no one would ever see it again (but for future archeologists who will unearth it differently, if at all), we left for our overland excursion. We began with the question, “What went away from the plane as it crashed?” HG’s reply was that the plane was probably spinning toward the earth. Spinning can be, as one might imagine, described in infinite ways. As it applies in this case, it was at an unknown speed at a steep or flat angle. The plane was most likely hit by anti-aircraft fire just over where the crash occured. It looks to the trained eye (not mine) like the speed of the spin determined the shallow depth of the crater. Most of the damage happened at the point of impact and as a result of the subsequent fire due to stored ammunition and fuel supply.

The sheared off front landing gear was found between the engine and cockpit craters and was not moved after the crash. This MAY mean that the airplane landed right side up. If it were the other way, the front wheel landing gear would have been on top and probably salvaged for its valuable steel.

The question of what fell away from the plane remains a mystery. HG believes that there is possibly another 6 x 4 meter hole containing these items along with another hole said to be located at the other end of the field near the adjacent road. This was where one of the engines was supposedly found but the crater we excavated shows evidence of both engines landing there. A part of one or both engines which measured 1.5 meters would have protruded from the ground. This calculation is based on the depth of the crater and the known circumference of the engines. Those parts were taken away by the farmer so he could continue his plowing.

Both ailerons were found in the crater plus the counterbalance weights that were attached to the wing tips. No main landing gear was found which logically should have been present along with the rest of the plane, nor were the superchargers, and most of the cockpit along with what it contained.

The above mentioned 4 x 6 hole may have served as a field grave which would have included anything that didn’t bury itself in the crash or was deemed valuable. If this field grave exists, no remaining eye-witness to the event has come forward.
HG believes that nothing was thrown back into the main crater after the crater was filled with whatever was found there and has been left undisturbed, except for occasional relic hunters, over the past 60 years. One variation on this theme is that both machine guns from the plane were dug up in the late 1940’s and handed over to unknown American officials. He assured me that speculation and rumor always swirls around crash sites and that facts are only determined through excavation. He feels that a full and complete job was done in the found crater. He also said he would bring his best deep penetration detector to the scene “just for a look.”

There may be more than 100 P-38 crash sites still left to be found in Germany. Only a few are associated with MIA pilots. Many of the pilots bailed out and were either rescued or forever lost but are no longer with their plane.

You may notice the number of times I use the words “possible” and “may be” in this brief report of loss. That is because everyone is involved in the practice of highly educated deduction along with intuitive guessing, in conjunction with sorting and filing of accounts that may POSSIBLY be skewed after six decades of recollection and telling. The crater evidence is irrefutable.

My feelings are this (sínce every reporter in Germany seems to ask):
If my father’s crash site alowed people of this area to forage for metals and materials (including my father’s possessions), he would have wanted something useful to come of this catastrophe. He would have encouraged them to take what they needed to sustain themselves in their country that was without economy at the end of the war. I like to think that the pieces of the aircraft were recycled and made valuable again in some way we cannot imagine. Even if his watch and ring were taken by someone who found them irresistable, my father would want that.

I didn’t know my father from seeing his face, by touching his hand, looking into his eyes, or hearing him laugh, but I know from the letters, from his constant presence in my life, through my children - his grandchildren and great grandchildren, his parents, his sister and brother and their children, through my mother. He would have handed out every part of himself and his plane in order to ease the suffering of others and to do the next right thing. That’s the truth of it.

Am I sad because it is over? If it is as HG suspects, a possible second or third site may remain but the major work is done. The inventory of found parts accounts for my father. If there is more, it doesn’t discount the inherent value of what the JPAC team brought up for me and for my father. A few parts that miraculously appeared in the dirt (the exact color of the dirt making the parts even more miraculous), will accompany him on his trip home. They are: a single green folded over button, a swatch of parachute silk, a tiny section of parachute line, a few boot eyelets with a lace piece still attached to one, and a few things yet to be determined. Am I satisfied? Yes. Does this change anything for me? It inspires me to fully consider things and people as even more fascinating and complex. My father’s field taught me that what we see on the surface is nothing compared to what lies beneath. And then, it is up to us to determine how what you find is valued. I value every tiny fragment of this grand challenge and I have a precious little folded green button and a handful of boot eyelets and parachute silk to prove it.

From here, I fly to Frankfurt and on to Cologne to Ernst and his wife, Helga’s, home in the Eifel Mountains. Our plan is to visit the American Cemetery in Margraten, Holland where my father’s name is engraved on the Wall of the Missing. I will begin the process of placing a gold star added in front of his inscription, indicating that he has been found. Then we will go to Belgium to search again for the former site of the chateau where my father’s squadron lived. HG and I attempted to find it a few years ago but we only found the Abbey where my father attended Mass.

My father’s remains and anything considered personal effects, will be taken to Landstuhl, Germany for certification and examination and then to Hawaii. Once the Central Identification Lab conducts the necessary tests and writes the reports, I will be notified. My hope is to go to Hawaii and escort my father home myself. In the interim I will be making arrangements with Arlington National Cemetery for a full military funeral complete with a missing man formation fly-by. You know by now that I believe in possibility. Just takes good planning.

I will have access to room service and in-room Internet connection by Friday! I am hopful about having picture uploading under my own control once again. Also, more may be revealed. It’s only been sixty years……….

Thursday, 01 September 05 - This was the headline of the last article about the excavation written by Korrespondent Bischoff for Morgen Post. The Bomber with the Babyshoe. Even if a P-38 was less bomber than fighter, I was reminded of the baby shoe my father wore on his helmet while he was flying. Lost forever now but, for a moment, I wondered why, if a scrap of parchute silk survived, why not a baby shoe? I hoped for that but will be content (if that is the word in this case) to hold onto the notion of my father attaching my baby shoe to his helmet and flying into the clouds while considering his pending fatherhood.

www.staurohr.de is Hans-Guenther Ploes (God of Airplane Parts) website. Photos of the parts we found in 2003 are included along with photos and reports of the other crash sites he has discovered.

Tomorrow on our way to the Leipzig Airport enroute to Frankfurt, I will stop by the field one last time. The team tells me it looks as if it has never been disturbed. I intend to leave the cross there and perhaps have a metal plate attached so that whoever wonders about it will know that an American pilot died there. I was thinking about that cross and wondering how long it will withstand the elements. I know dear Frau Thiel takes care of it but time will affect its beauty. That’s the point, I suppose. If it were forever new, who could measure the passage of time. It is where part of me will always remain here with my father. The rest of both of us is coming Home!

Some guy yelled at me this morning for taking pictures of the intricate wrought iron fences and gates around the grander Torgau residences. He said something that ended with, “verboten.” I smiled my best American girl smile at him and considered myself officially scolded by a stranger. Won’t be the first or the last time. The fence photos I continued to take are great, by the way.

On to Frankfurt and the last leg of this journey. When I planned this, I knew I would want to visit my father’s name on the wall in Margraten, Holland. There is always one more thing to do, to see, to be sure of, and to experience. The next time I write here will be from the Frankfurt Arabella Sheraton in the heart of downtown Frankfurt. As I recover from culture shock, I will post the last of the excavation photos. Til then, I remain, your humble Korrespondent of the Babyschuh.

Hans-Guenther cleaning the data plate
Another Linda photo of Torgau roofs
Last time at the crater
Rick the barbeque expert
Front of the button
Signed team flag
Parachute silk
Last conference with Dr. Fox
Boot eyelet
Old Elsnig train station
Herr Bohrmann, one of our favorite visitors

Restoring the field


Overview of engines, cockpit and wing impression

The field restored

Last time I stood there 01 Sept.

With Petra & Peggy,the gracious women of Hotel Central

The Internet Cafe

Heidelberg Monkey with mirror

200 steps above Heidelberg

Leaving Heidelberg

A last walk on the field of my father, 02 September 2005: Now that it’s over, the field has been restored, and I am once again an ordinary tourist, I am ready to take the next steps. Hans-Guenther took me to the field one last time yesterday on our way to Liepzig-Halle Airport. I wasn’t there when the the field tenant’s sons came with the big green farm equipment and piled the dirt over the crater and into the remaining trenches. I tossed a handful of dirt into the crater when I last stood there on Monday. There are just so many things I can do to express my willingness to consider this finished and to walk away from this place of such meaning to my family. I will always look back and see that field in action with the screens, the trenches, and the JPAC team doing their excellent and incomparable work. Oh, and I’ll hear the music, too. I now know more about rap music than I ever expected and I have grown to love Rascal Flats thanks to Craig Daniels!

As HG and I walked in the dirt and marveled at the lack of evidence of all that transpired there over the past weeks, I asked him to show me the place where it is believed that more parts may be buried. It looks as it always did - a few meters to the left of the bushes that grow along the fence. The question, “what lies beneath?” may forever be unanswered or maybe in the Spring, when HG is in the former East Germany for another dig, he will come by Butterstrasse Road and wave his deep penetrating metal detector over that unexplored place in the field.

In microcosm, I am like an inquisitive explorer who has tasted a bit of this curious and compelling kind of sucessful quest, and I am determined to find more. In order not to cause anxiety among my family and friends, the truth is, I will wonder a little about that unexplored place but I am charged now with doing something with what we have found and writing about all of this.By the time I am summoned to Hawaii to collect my father’s remains, I will know what the procedure is at Arlington for his memorial service. I’ve already spoken with a few people about a missing man formation fly-by at the time of the service. This falls into the semi-difficult, but not impossible category.

I believe in setting my intentions and when I do it in a thoughtful and meaninful way, the most amazing things happen. There is always a little of being careful for what you wish for woven into that process, but I’ll take the risk that whatever I get is exactly what I need.

A day trip to Heidelberg on the Underground and the train from Frankfurt Main, yielded some interesting photos, a few of which I have included here. I paid .50 to climb 200 steps to the top of the highest and most curving tower stairs in a Catholic church to gain a 360-degree view of the ancient city. At the entrance to the city through the gates at the Nekar River bridge is a sculpture of a bizarre looking monkey (with a baboon-like face) and a high imposing tail. He is holding a mirror which is supposed to represent the similarity of all people. “We are all monkeys in the same world,” the woman in the art shop told me. Makes sense to me.

Navigating Europe is just a matter of asking questions and realizing that no matter how it turns out, it’s ok. For instance, while feeling confused about which bus to take to Heidelburg Castle, I made friends with a nice Japanese couple. They approached me because they thought I might speak English but he is a linguist who has taught in several American universities including the University of Illinois. He noticed my Team Estill hat and wanted to hear the story. The world is small and surprising.

Another realization crossed my weary brain last night and that is that even though we won the war and Germany did not, their cultural integrity is still very much in tact and thriving. They did not become Americanized or like the Brits,though Russia had a deep and profound influence on the former East Germany, in ways that remain evident today. I know this because, in my experience, this isn’t a country where everyone automatically speaks English. I like that and it keeps me conscious of where I am and of my status as visitor. I will forever be grateful for the gracious way we were all treated by the people of Elsnig and Torgau.

Next stop: The American Cemetery in Margraten and a little search for the chateau site. If I have access to a high speed connection before I am in London on 11 September, I’ll post some pictures of the cemetery and the Wall of the Missing. Til then………………..

What lies beneath?
Rick & Greg presenting Frau Jansch with JPAC Appreciation
Capt. Emmons and Frau Jansch, field tenant farmer
Butterstrasse Road

Just a few photos that wouldn’t attach to the last posting.

[The excellent photos of the finished crash crater, the tractors restoring the field, and awarding Frau Jansch the certificate, were taken Linda Miller, queen of all Air Force photographers]

The Eifel, Margraten, Falaen, Florennes, Aach
en and beyond, September
4-10, 2005: In the week since I’ve been in West Germany, I have gathered new threads
into the fabric of my father’s story. I knew when I planned this hopeful
itinerary that I would want to collect the last missing impressions of my
father’s life before his fateful flight in April, 1945. That included a visit
to the American War Cemetery in Margraten, Holland, and a last attempt of
three to find the elusive, now-demolished, Chateau le Beauchene. Enfolded in
those plans, was my primary agenda which was to learn the procedure to have a
bronze rosette placed next to my father’s name on the Wall of the Missing in
the American Cemetery in Margraten. I remembered noticing the rosettes on my
last trip with Hans-Guenther and feeling a twinge of envy and wonder for those
whose knowing families. There is no cachet inherent in living without answers
– the rosettes placed beside those names designate a solemn resolution of
doubt. I wanted that resolution.

It was a very different visit this time to Margraten. First, I knew to
purchase flowers in Aachen enroute to Holland. For my father’s place at the
bottom of the Wall of the Missing in the section where all the names begin
with the letter “E,” I chose two cream and peach roses with pink petal tips –
from my mother and me. For my friend’s uncle’s grave, I chose a bouquet of
unusual fragrance. I looked very purposeful with my bundles of blumen wrapped
in yellow paper – a woman on a mission.

For me, war cemeteries evoke conflicting feelings. It is impossible not to be
impressed with the sheer symmetry of the place. The geometric possibilities,
to say nothing of the advanced planning, plotting, and planting necessary to
achieve this result, are endless and astonishing. The Wall with the A-Z names
of the unfound souls is, much like the Viet Nam Wall in its cause for humility
in the shadow of these simple names and home states. Each inscription is
individual but identical. The first time, I made a rubbing on paper as I’ve
seen people do at the Viet Nam wall, and hoped to one day know what happened
to my father. This time, as I placed the two roses beneath his name, I
realized my father was no longer missing. It was there, in that orderly place
– everything in a line and suspended in black marble, that I sensed the sacred
passage of time and the accomplishment at Elsnig.

I ventured into the field of endless crosses to put the other bouquet at the
site of a friend’s uncle. I stopped at the gravesites of the others from my
father’s squadron and fighter group. Hans-Guenther kindly provided a list of
each man from the group and found our way to the crosses. I recognized some of
the names from my father’s letters. He flew and died with friends.

Amidst my conflicting feelings lay a paradox in that Margraten experience.
Though a sense of extreme order and beauty exists in the place – everything
is, by design, perfectly symmetrical – I recognized the contradiction. The
evidence found in the dirt of the humble Elsnig field belied this sense of
perfection and peace. It told, if you will, the back story to what I saw at
Margraten. Elsnig was the reality, the event, the coming apart of a life with
the concurrent ripple across time for all generations who follow. The field in
Elsnig held the evidence of a catastrophic violent event wherein everything
was destroyed beyond ordinary recognition. Everything was obliterated or
reduced to its most common denominator – pieces, rubble, and melt. It was a
shocking and horrific event, as all war deaths are, even the single sniper’s
accurate shot in the middle of the day that finds its mark.

As I stood entranced by the variations of the patterns in the planned order of
the Margraten Cemetery, flashes of Elsnig intruded. I saw it all as if I were
watching a split screen: on one side the measured order of Margraten’s endless
crosses and on the other the shattered intrusive reality of each person buried
there. Perhaps because I had just come from the other side of the screen, I
felt a twinge of anger at the injustice of it all. Why, I wondered, are we
still going to war? Haven’t we learned that this is the inevitable outcome?
Why is this still acceptable? I grieved more at that realization than any one
before it. The names of the people who are buried there and those who are not,
all became as important to me as my father’s name listed among them. As if I
heard a collective sigh, I told them they were not forgotten. The sad truth of
it is that I didn’t know (nor did my mother or my father’s parents or
siblings) that my father’s name was even ON the wall at Margraten until I met
the men of his squadron a little more than a decade ago. [My soapbox is
officially re-folded and back in the corner]
All of this happened on
September 5. On September 7, my thoughts were divided between two young men,
close to the same age and of certain kindred spirit. One was celebrating his
28th birthday and walks on the cusp of his own success as an emerging and
important artist. The other was killed in Iraq last year on this day as he
stood by his jeep with the people he held in his care and command. Both of
these brilliant and shining souls bring light and hope to our world. One just
gets to do it on this level for a while longer and the other has moved ahead
of us but is missed and loved by many people including me, who attended his
memorial service and gained a precious friend in the process. Here’s to Justin
and Tim on this auspicious day! A German beer is raised in your honor on
September 7 now and forever!

From Margraten, we made another day-trip to Belgium in search of the chateau,
the Abby and the airfield. Chateau le Beauchene was located just a few
kilometers (within walking distance according to my father’s letters) from the
village of Falaen. Falaen was the home of Louis’ Pub in which my father’s
squadron (known locally as the “wild boys”) spent endless hours and Belgian
francs. Haircuts were also available.
We arrived in Falaen and one of two
men on the street knew exactly where the chateau was located, when it existed.
He immediately led us there (a long walk by anyone’s standards so we drove)
and escorted us into the woods asking us to imagine (in French, translation
courtesy of the ever-talented & multi-lingual, Ernst) that the entry was
just beyond this half of the gate still remaining and that the chateau sat
just “here” to the left and overlooked a field that is just behind all those
60-year old trees. You get the picture. I walked down the road that was
certainly the same road my father and his squadron mates walked a million
times to come and go to Louie’s or to the Abby or just for a walk. Certainly,
their transport trucks took them to their airfield from that same road. I felt
the collision of recognition and familiarity as if my father was walking with
me. I strongly sensed his presence again at the Abby later that day. We made
our way from the chateau site deep in discussion about the validity of the
accommodating Belgian man’s information. His directions were validated by an
excellent detailed map prepared for me several years ago by one of my honorary
fathers, Jack Zaverl, for just this occasion. His diagrams and descriptions
are artful and exact.

Our next stop was the Abby de Maredret where my father attended Mass and
befriended the nuns-in-residence throughout his stay at the chateau. He wrote
often of his trips to the Abby and of buying my mother and his mother a St.
Theresa medal, the patron of flyers, identical to his own. As odd luck would
have it, we couldn’t actually enter the church, though I had visited it with
HG on a prior visit. I did manage to find a St. Theresa medal, however, which
now occupies the same chain as my tiny silver P-38.
Louie’s has been sold
to a new owner who may or may not remember the Geyser Gang of the 428th
Fighter Squadron. Though the façade of the place has changed, there is a small
garage to the right of the entrance that reads, Garage Louis, in pale blue
 letters.

The surprise excursion of the day was at the suggestion of Hans-Guenther who
had a Spitfire Museum in mind. We wound our way from the Abby to Florennes
Airfield (known as, A78 in my father’s time) to see what remained of the
airfield from which my father and his squadron flew their missions. It remains
a viable air base today with F-16s constantly flying into and out of the very
active field. We managed with the help again of Ernst’s French, to get onto
the base as long as we only visited the Spitfire Museum. The surprise was
within. The display cases surrounding an actual Spitfire, contained
photographs and acknowledgement of the presence in the late 1940’s of the
474th USAAC Fighter Group. The Disney squadron insignia and the group insignia
were all there along with photos (identified in French, of course) of anyone
who had contributed to the display. I presented a photo of my father to the
museum curator and asked that it be placed in the display. They offered to
make an entire page about my father in the memory books they keep there. It
was a good day made better by unexpected gifts.

I was enchanted by a brief, but relaxing, respite in the Eifel Mountains near
Ernst and wife, Helga’s, meticulously restored (the hard way: brick by brick)
farmhouse. From there, we made the trips to Holland and Belgium and from there
that I traveled to Frankfurt, to London, and next week, home. My next trip is
the 474th Reunion in Salt Lake City the weekend after I return home. Der
Spiegel TV is coming to film the event and interview the guys who flew with my
father. They also intend to film my presentation on Friday night which will
hopefully be finished in pristine Power Point format by the time I touch down
in Phoenix. One of my Estill cousins will meet me at the reunion and I have
Team Estill hats to distribute that are sewn on the back with the inscription,
Honorary Dad. This reunion is dedicated to the families of the squadron
members. As always, when I attend these reunions, I am conscious of the
gathering of angels just at the edges of the crowd – watching us thoughtfully
and knowing all the answers to the things about which we can only wonder. This
will be the first reunion without my most honorary dad, Bill Capron. I’ll save
you a place at my table, Bill, and tell you the story myself.

I don’t know if I included this correction in the last post, but the correct
address for Hans-Guenther’s website is:
http://www.cablecutter.de/ The other
one is the site for his aircraft parts collection.