Lt. Clifford McElvain was one of six pilots from the 27th who were lost in one disastrous flight on Aug. 1, 1918. His loss would have been deeply felt: he was the leader of A Flight. This two-part account of that day was provided by Lt. McElvain’s son, Dave McElvain, and the editor’s notes are his. Besides being a great story, these excerpts from Clifford McElvain’s speech to some aero historians also shed new light on some misconceptions about the worst day in the squadron’s history.
Dave was kind enough to write a biographical sketch of his father, which I’ve included as a preface to the war account. You can contact Dave via e-mail at damac19@earthlink.net
Biographical Sketch of Clifford A. McElvain
By Dave McElvain
Born in Albany, Missouri, a town of about 2,000 in northwest Missouri on June 5, 1894, Clifford was the only child of Joseph and Viola McElvain. His ancestry is predominately Scotch and German. His parents lived on the edge of town and owned a small farm, and it is believed that young McElvain contributed his full share to duties that would fall to a farm boy. It is also likely that he didn't like it very much, as he chose a career pretty far removed from that life-style.
In 1917, when WW1 was declared, he volunteered for officer training in the U.S. Army, expecting to become an Infantry officer. An opportunity arose to enter flight training in the Signal Corps, and though he knew nothing about airplanes, he volunteered and was accepted. He was probably motivated strongly by a desire not to be a foot soldier, even as an officer.
Upon completion of flight training, he again volunteered and was accepted into the 27th Aero Squadron, which was being formed by Major Harold Hartney. They were to deploy to France and become part of the 1st Pursuit Group in early 1918. By May of 1918 the war was heating up and the Group moved to the Chateau Thierry front. McElvain flew numerous combat missions and on August 1, 1918 he was taken captive after a dogfight over Germany. He spent the rest of the war as a POW, and in a fascinating sequel to this experience, he became acquainted with his dogfight adversary, Fred Fleischer, and ultimately sponsored his emigration with his family to the U.S. after WW2.
After the armistice, McElvain returned to Albany and married his hometown sweetheart, Grace O'Malley, and their first two children were born there; Mary Viola in 1920 and Joseph Edward in 1922. Soon thereafter he moved his family to Chicago where he embarked upon a banking career. A third child, David Alan, was born in 1931.
His interest in aviation remained strong, and when the Illinois National Guard formed an air unit, he was among the first to join. As a parallel career to banking, he spent considerable time with the Guard unit, and rose to the rank of Colonel and Commanding Officer of the Chicago Midway based Air National Guard 108th Observation Squadron. Soon after Pearl Harbor, his unit was activated, although all personnel were reassigned to various duties. He spent the war years in various military intelligence assignments, including duty in Panama, Guatemala and Okinawa, returning home after VJ day and resuming his civilian career.
He had been on military leave from his position as Manager of the Chicago office of the Mortgage Division of the Western & Southern Life Insurance Company of Cincinnati. In 1950 the company decided to outsource its mortgage origination and servicing operations, and McElvain was offered the opportunity to form his own company and function as an agent for Western & Southern, as well as other mortgage investment firms with which he formed relationships.
In an ironic and somber note, McElvain's elder son Joseph, was killed in Korea. He had been activated from his Air National Guard unit in Minneapolis to active duty as an F-86 Sabre Jet pilot, and after completing 63 combat missions died in a non-combat accident in November 1952. McElvain subsequently funded a modest foundation in his son's name, to assist young Air National Guard members with college tuition, and inner-city youth with orthodontia treatment.
McElvain was still active in his business and with his aviation interests, when he passed away of a heart attack in 1968 at the age of 73. He was attending a reunion of WW1 aviators with his wife Grace, at Selfridge Field in Mount Clemens, Michigan at the time of his death.
Part One: Escort mission
This narrative, which relates to the worst day of WWI aerial warfare for the 27th Squadron, 1st Pursuit Group, is excerpted from a speech my father, Clifford McElvain, was invited to present at a meeting of the Chicago Chapter, Society of World War I Aero Historians. The date of the address would have been the late 1950s.
On the morning of Aug. 1, 1918, we started the day with 11 aircraft available out of the normal complement of 24. A story in Cross and Cockade titled “The 27th Squadron’s Black Day” listed 17 pilots who flew on that day. Receipt of replacement planes later in the day could have made that possible, but I know that we started the day with 11, because on our morning mission to escort two photographic planes from the First Observation Squadron on mosaic mapping missions, Jerry Vasconcells took one Flight with five aircraft and I took the “A” Flight with six. My memory runs that those 11 were all the airplanes that the 27th Squadron had that morning. The Cross and Cockade story listed Al Grant as one of the pilots in “A” Flight, but he did not go, and Joe Dawson aborted that morning.
As we got out of the truck, Jerry and I agreed that if one of us was attacked, the other would come to his aid, if free to do so. Then we took off.
There were no wide-angle lenses in those days. The cameras could shoot a strip about a mile wide, so the observation plane had to fly back and forth, in and out, for many trips in order to map an area of any size. I joined our escort, a Salmson, over its field at the scheduled time and climbed with it to its mission altitude, around 18,000 feet. Things can happen so very fast in the air; one minute the sky will be empty, then , with vigilance relaxed for just an instant, you can be surrounded by the enemy. It was standard practice to fly with necks swiveling constantly, systematically – scanning the sky – under, above, behind, below, on one side then the other – never stopping. I suppose you know that is why silk scarves came to be worn inside shirt collars. Necks would wear raw without them.
At mission altitude the pilot and observer, whose names I have never known, started taking their pictures. The area being photographed was well inside enemy territory and they flew in and out, back and forth; it seemed they would never get through. I could see Jerry and his flight in the distance and somewhat lower than we, flying back and forth the same as we. Below us I could see German formations rising to the attack. I would see them, then lose them, then see them again, each time a little nearer. It was a long climb for them. I kept hoping that the Salmson would finish its picture-taking before they reached us, but they kept coming and we kept going back and forth.
Two German formations reached over level some distance away and climbed on above us. A few minutes later I saw that Jerry was engaged in combat. Now I was faced with a hard, hard decision. If I didn’t go to Jerry’s aid and the Germans left me alone I would never forgive myself. On the other hand, if I left my Salmson to help Jerry and the Germans then picked it off I could never forgive myself. It was an agonizing moment of indecision. I couldn’t tell for sure whether both German squadrons had ganged up on Jerry or not. A lot of them were there. My neck was still swiveling and suddenly the indecision ended. Toward the glare fo the sun I could see the glint of wings. I couldn’t count them for the glare but they were coming! I waggled my wings in warning (that was the only means of communication that we had). Then the fight was on. After that all was confusion as it always was for me in combat. There are some who can describe every turn – everything that everybody did – in a dogfight. I never could.
On escort missions you don’t chase targets but try to stay with your escort. You take every chance to fire a burst but you try to keep together. You keep your course in the direction your escort is going the best you can. You evade the airplane trying to shoot at you, but you try to keep them from shooting at your escort. You just do the best you can.
At the start of this fight our Salmson nosed down and headed for home. At that altitude he was about as fast as the Fokkers and in the confusion that we kicked up, he shortly seemed to get away from them. I have heard that their plane was shot up and one or both of the men in it injured, but that they got back to our side of the lines with their film, their mission accomplished. I would like to know if that is true.
Well, even after they were gone the fight went on. One by one there were fewer Nieuports in the air; also fewer Germans. As I have said, the Nieuports 28s were more maneuverable than the German planes and so were hard to hit, but we could not readily break off combat because in a straightaway dive the Germans were faster than we. Finally, there was no other Nieuport around. “A” Flight was wiped out. I was alone with what was left of the German squadron. Being outnumbered by them was not the disadvantage it might sound, because they got in the way of each other as two or three at a time would try to aim at me. I could see whenever one was getting close to firing position, and then by a tighter turn than he could make, evade his aim and often get in a burst at another as I came out of my turn. There was a certain amount of exhilaration in being able to out-fly them, but there wasn’t any future in it because how was I ever going to get away from them? All of a sudden I found myself free. Apparently the Germans had lost track of me in a turn. The observation plane was gone; my flight was gone. I had had enough for one day and I headed for home, but still not quite able to believe that they wouldn’t be on me again and so watched apprehensively behind me.
Part Two: A strange way of making friends
This account of WWI aerial combat is excerpted from an address given by my father, Clifford McElvain, before the Chicago Chapter of WWI Aero Historians, circa late 1950s. He was a pilot in the 1st Pursuit Group, 27th Aero Squadron under the command of Major Harold Hartney. This event took place on Aug. 1, 1918. The story begins as McElvain is heading home solo from a mission of escorting photo reconnaissance aircraft, being the only remaining Allied aircraft after having been jumped by a squadron of German Fokkers (The German pilot in the episode, Fred Fliescher, became know to him as explained at the end of the account).
As I flew, looking behind me, forgetting to keep swiveling my neck, I discovered too late that I was on a collision course with a flight of five Fokker D-7s, coming at them out of the sun and they apparently did not see me. Here may have been another mistake. Maybe I could have avoided them entirely, but at the moment it seemed to me that it was too late for me to do anything but open fire, and my first burst went into the leader. I couldn't watch to see what happened to him., but I learned later from Fleischer that he was wounded and crashed but survived.
This outfit didn't perform as the other squadron had, i.e., confusing each other by all trying to fire at once. The three others simply got out of the way and circled, leaving one man to deal with me by himself. This was the kind of combat that you trained for and read about but which seldom happened - a duel in the sky between two men armed with machine guns, alone and on their own, playing for keeps.
I was very light in both fuel and ammunition by now, so my Nieuport was especially agile. Fleischer's Fokker D-7 was faster and could out-climb me. It was only this summer that I learned from Fleischer that his Fokker was supercharged. We met at about 13,000 feet and at that altitude his supercharger gave him considerable advantage in climb and speed, but even so our planes were pretty well matched. Each had its own superior characteristics; he could out-climb and out-dive, I could make tighter turns. It was a fair match, I think. It seemed that the fight would never end because we and our airplanes were so evenly matched that it was very hard for either of us to get a chance at a shot and any such chance was fleeting. Fred said that I got a few holes in his plane and he scattered some splinters over me when one of his bullets hit a wooden longeron in my fuselage, but no real damage was done to either.
Then without any warning my engine suddenly blooped and died and there I was - in combat without power, losing altitude fast. All I could do was maneuver the best I could, trading altitude for speed, the pulling up and trying to fire back at Fred. The Nieuport was a low-compression engine, so my propeller continued to windmill and my guns would still fire, so Fred had no way to know that the fight was over. All I could do was spar as best I could as he chased me right to the ground. Finally when the time came that I had to straighten out for a crash landing, Fleischer moved behind me and there I sat waiting for the crash ahead and at the same time expecting the bullets from behind that would keep me from feeling it. It was only when I slowed down for the crash that my propeller slowed and then stopped, and at the last instant the Fokker dived past me, and the pilot waved. He had seen my propeller stop and he knew I was through.
Seconds later I was upside down among small trees in a mess of twisted wreckage, struggling to get out before the fire started. But no fire started. I recalled later that no gasoline spilled. I thought at the moment that Fred had shot me down and I still give him credit for it, but I believe I was simply out of gas. I tore myself loose and as I scrambled out, heavy boots were running toward me and I found myself surrounded by a ring of saw-toothed bayonets in the hands of unfriendly Germans. W had been taught to expect every kind of strocity if we were captured. I stood there waiting for the atrocities to begin - but nothing happened. The Germans just stood there; I stood there. Then and officer came running up, and it was Fleischer!
He took charge, bayonets withdrew, and there, face to face, were two men who had been trying so hard just a few minutes before to kill each other. Through an English-speaking soldier who turned up we talked very briefly. Fleischer asked no military questions at all, and he cheered me up a little by telling me that I was his third victory and ours had been the toughest fight he had ever been in, and that he believed he and I could be good friends if we should ever meet again.
He had left his engine running in the little field nearby where he had landed, and with the interpreter he took me over to show me his airplane, of which he was very proud. What a chance this was! All I had to do was disarm the soldier, kill Fleischer, jump in his plane, fly away and prove myself a hero. You can be sure that the idea ran through my mind, but I didn't try it. Fleischer scribbled his name on a piece of paper and gave it to me, repeating that he wished we could meet again after the war, and the he flew away. Little did I expect that his wish would come true. This was the end of WWI for me.
Editor's note: McElvain was confined to a German prison camp until the armistice in November 1918 and was not mistreated by his captors. Years later, after WWII, he became reacquainted with Fleischer through a friend who was traveling in Germany, and by sheer coincidence met up with him in Berlin. As events unfolded, Fleischer and his family were experiencing very difficult times in post-WWII Germany, and appealed for help in emigrating to the U.S. McElvain subsequently sponsored Fleischer, his wife Lisa and son Gunter in their move to the U.S. and they did indeed become the fast friends Flescher had spoken of on that August day in 1918.