I might have been flying into Germany for all I knew! After I’d flown straight to get my bearings, and got sprayed every time, I was getting more and more desperate … Suddenly the racket stopped and there was absolute silence. The engine had quit, and for the moment nobody was firing at me. I looked down at the ground. We were only about 300 feet high at that time because I had to keep my nose down to get speed to fight those fast Fokkers. [After we crashed, my observer] Perring stuck his head out of his cockpit… He called, “Where are we?” I thought, “That’s your job. You are supposed to know and keep track of where we are.” But instead I said, “We’re back of the lines somewhere, Perring, and I’ve been hit!” … We stood there, looking foolish. We had never been taken prisoner before and didn’t know what to do in that predicament.
[Once the Germans had taken us to their command post] I told Perring, “I think I’ll have to lie down” … Very soon a little old Belgian civilian doctor, a white-haired fellow, came in, and the Belgians brought him some hot water. He sponged off my wound and, pulling out parts of the explosive bullet that was imbedded in it, handed these to me and said, “Souvenir de la guerre!”
