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We made a sort of compact

that if war came, we
should go into aviation.

That was the life.

It is
certainly great up there,

and you own the world
when you get up alone

and can do whatever you want.

Have you ever had
your wildest dreams come true?

In the summer of 1916,
two college juniors from Yale

started an air
militia in preparation

for America and
entering World War I.

They were there first.

They were there in the beginning
and everything that follows

flows from their early efforts.

As sons of some of the
wealthiest and most prominent

families in the
country, their exploits

were noticed by the press who
dubbed them The Millionaires

Unit.

This
was a group well-educated,

affluent young men who
voluntarily took up

the challenge.

They didn't have to.

The men
of the Yale Flying Club

had a sense of duty,
honor, country.

They felt they were privileged
and had an obligation to lead.

They
determined to learn

to fly when aviation was
still in its infancy,

and they aimed to convince
the Navy of their fortitude

and resolve.

Through their initiative,
these daring young aviators

became the first to fly for the
United States in World War I.

Some of them making
the ultimate sacrifice.

The gates of honor

opened to us, those lucky
ones of us who are over here.

We need not fear that we're not
prepared to die for no matter

what we have been in the
last glorious moments,

we can die not as
the ordinary man,

but fighting for the
ideals we hold so sacred.

We were still pretty young

as I was 18, my brother, 16.

We went to Alaska and had
some very good mountain

sheep and caribou hunting.

When we went into the
interior by pack train,

the world was at peace.

We met on the trail
one day a prospector,

and he told us the
world was at war.

He was a little mixed up
about who was fighting who,

but he knew there was a war on.

When we heard about
that, we decided

to cut short our trip short
and go home, which we did.

It was quite a
shocking experience

to have it come at you that way.

There was just peace and
then war, as far as we knew.

Frederick Trubee Davison.

Most of America was
as unawares as Trubee Davison

of the tensions
that threw Europe

into the most cataclysmic
event yet known to mankind.

Trickling across
the Atlantic came

news of the horrors of the
first war of the Industrial Age,

fought with new technologies.

The machine gun, the
tank, the airplane.

World War I would mark the
end of the Age of Empire

and the destruction of decades
of peaceful productivity

and cultural exchange.

The United States
would eventually

be drawn in to the great war
across the ocean, spearheaded

by the new field
of naval aviation.

The courage and enterprise
shown by these pioneer pilots

forever changed the
character of the Navy

and the ways in which
wars would be fought

and peace would be won.

A small group of
college students

affected a large
part of that change.

They were known as
the First Yale Unit.

They formed the founding
squadron of the Naval Air

Reserve, and in the
years that followed

they helped lead military
aviation through two world

wars, the Cold War, and played
major roles in America's

ascendancy as the dominant
power on the world

stage in the 20th century.

The sinking of the British liner
Lusitania by a German u-boat,

taking the lives
of 128 Americans,

was a shocking reminder
to the United States

of the war on the other
side of the Atlantic.

For young Frederick
Trubee Davison,

it was a harbinger of what
would consume his life

for the next four years--

stopping the German u-boat.

In the summer of 1915,
after his freshman year

at Yale University,
he accompanied

his father, Henry P. Davison, on
an eye opening trip to Europe.

H.P. Davidson was
the senior partner

of JP Morgan and Company.

As the most powerful
bank in America,

Morgan and Company was
in the unique position

to lead the sales
of securities that

helped finance the British
and French war effort.

This business trip entails
some high stakes bargaining

as America was officially
neutral when the war started,

and President Woodrow Wilson
was up for re-election.

That
was, indeed, in 1916.

He ran on a platform
of, with the slogan,

he kept us out of war.

And he intended to continue
to keep the US out of war.

So
Trubee joined his father

on one of those trips, in
part to see how his father was

working and to learn the ropes.

The young man
accompanied his father

on a whirlwind of
meetings and dinners

with the British prime minister
and other senior officials.

He couldn't
help but start thinking

that there was no
way that Americans

would be able to ride it out.

That they would get involved
and be drawn into the war.

Trubee
saw an opportunity

where a young man could
help with the war effort

and gain some experience.

He spent the rest of the
summer driving ambulances

from the Paris train stations
to the American hospital

and got a good hard look
at the effects of war.

When
Trubee Davidson

was returning after that
summer of ambulance driving,

he was on a ship with Robert
Bacon, one of the organizers

and financiers of the squadron
of the aviators called

the Escadrille Lafayette.

And he discussed that effort
to create an all-American Air

Force with the French.

And that implanted the
idea in Trubee's mind

that maybe what he'd like to
do is create his own little Air

Force in the event that the
US should get into the war.

FREDERICK TRUBEE
- In 1915, I

at least saw enough of
the fellows over there

to know that if we ever got
into the war, where I personally

wanted to be was
in the air service.

That put the bug in my Bonnet.

When I was back to
college in the fall,

I picked up Bob Lovett
and poured it in his ear.

We made a sort of
compact that if war came,

we should go into aviation.

That was the life.

Perhaps the
epitome of the Yale gentleman

was Trubee's classmate,
Robert Lovett.

Composed and aloof,
Lovett was voted

as the most brilliant, hardest
working, and most thorough

gentleman at Yale.

But while Trubee had
been driving ambulances

near the front, Bob
had spent the summer

driving sports cars and
motorcycles in the Swiss Alps.

When I look back

and I read about my
grandfather and his Yale years,

it paints a picture of a very
different man than I knew.

To read that he was
the head of the prom,

that he was involved in
the acting program at Yale,

these were surprising to me
because these would indicate

to me that my grandfather was
an extrovert and charming,

lively fellow who went
out for a good time,

and this was not the
grandfather I knew.

After their
eventful summers,

both Trubee and Bob returned to
Yale for their sophomore year,

and each set about to prove they
had sand, grit, and spirit that

made them popular on campus.

I think there's

a certain amount of
truth to the statement

that Yale was heavily social
before the First World War.

Everybody at
Yale wanted to be in a club,

wanted to be in a
team, wanted to be

in one kind of
organization or another.

And Trubee Davidson was one
of the kind of people that

thrived at a place like Yale.

While still
reflecting on his experience

with the victims
of trench warfare,

Trubee found it difficult
to focus on school,

and his thoughts turned
repeatedly to aviation.

At the beginning of
the war, airplanes

were still seen as the
dominion of aristocrats

and wealthy sportsmen
looking for adventure.

As aerial combat
evolved, there was

romance in the idea of
warrior knights of the air.

Jousting one on one.

A romance completely
lacking in the trenches

of mechanized warfare.

But Trubee and his
generation of friends

were also motivated
by a sense of duty.

The idea that of those to
whom much is given, much

is expected.

If the United States was going
to war, they want to take part

and they wanted to fly.

They were highfalutin.

They aimed beyond
their human capacity

to fulfill as any
good rule should.

And they were based a lot
on ethics and religion.

What a man did and did not do.

And it formed a kind
of a behavioral code,

far more than it does now.

Yale had a
obligatorily chapel attendance

every day of the
week except Saturday.

This is a time
when what has become almost

the Yale anthem became popular.

It's called "Bright
College Years."

And the final lines
in that are, so

let us strive that
ever we may let

these words our watch cry be.

Where 'er upon life
sea we sail, for God,

for country, and for Yale.

For God,
for country, and for Yale.

When the First
World War broke out in Europe

in 1914, there was a tremendous
amount of patriotic militarism

that swept over this campus and
over much of the United States.

Trubee and Bob
Lovett were also swept up.

But noble and lofty as
their aerial ambitions were,

they still needed to get
permission from their parents

to learn to fly.

Mr. And Mrs. Davison
were both opposed

to their son's grand scheme
until a family friend

with the Aero Club of America
convinced them that flying

was safe if properly done.

Mrs. Davison took a ride
herself and became a convert.

The Aero Club of
America was developing

a plan with Rear
Admiral Robert E. Perry

for a string of aerial
coastal defense stations

to defend the Atlantic seaboard
against possible attack

from German warships.

Trubee and Lovett were sent
to meet with the admiral,

and plans were hatched for
the group of Yale students,

students who had never flown
before, to be the prototype

civilian squadron.

Aerial Coast Patrol Unit
Number One, or as they became

known, The First Yale Unit.

Trubee now leapt into gear,
spending a sleepless night

composing a telegram which
he sent to 11 of his friends

asking them to join him at
Peacock Point, his family's

estate on the North Shore of
Long Island for the summer

to learn to fly.

Have for several days

been making very careful
investigation of merits

of organizing First Unit
of Aero Coast Defense.

Regard matter of such importance
that have no hesitation urging

you coming to see me at once.

Training will be at my place
and will take all summer.

F. Trubee Davison.

John Vorys, a member
of the football and debate

teams, recalled
receiving a telegram

and a phone call
from Trubee as he

was recovering from
pneumonia and a tonsillectomy

in Columbus, Ohio.

Trubee
telephoned to my home

and explained the idea of which
I remember only that we were

not to fly very high, and that
because we flew over water,

we wouldn't get hurt if
we did fall occasionally.

It was an awful job

to make the thing clear.

Di Gates came and said he
didn't come to join the outfit,

but to be convinced.

Artemus Di Gates,
all his friends called him Di,

was a big man.

He was darker skin,
black hair, so much so

that some people
nicknamed him the Indian.

Maybe a little bit derogatorily.

Di gates was a shy
man and a modest man.

Even though he was
very quiet, there

was a forceful
personality to him

that you knew that
he was in the room

even if he was not speaking.

He became a celebrity by
becoming part of the football

team, and later went on
to be its captain in 1917.

Along with
Bob Lovett, Trubee

corralled his younger brother,
Harry, football players John

Vorys and Di Gates, crew heeler
Alphie Ames, hockey player Erl

Gould, track and
fielder John Farwell,

and recent Yale grads Al
Sturtevant and Charles Wiman.

Welles Brown and Al
Ditman, junior associates

at Morgan and Company,
completed the roster

of the 12 aspiring aviators.

Fortunately, there
was a flying school

nearby at Port Washington with
an experienced and diligent

instructor named Dave McCulloch,
and a small, single engine

Curtiss Flying Boat
named the Mary Ann.

This was a group
of young men learning

to fly just 13 years after
the Wright brothers had flown.

They knew they were off on to
something great and something

dangerous too, but they believed
that nothing worth achieving

is without risk.

The group
of young adventurers

expected recognition
from the Navy imminently.

In the meantime, they would
organize as a private militia.

In every war prior
to World War I,

much of the US
Army and Navy have

been composed of privately
funded and raised militia

forces.

Teddy Roosevelt's Rough
Riders were a private militia

that was enlisted into the
regular army as a unit.

And the notion
that wealthy people

would use their resources
to provide funds

to raise a militia was
very much in keeping

with national traditions
up to that point.

H.P. Davison initially
spearheaded their fund raising

and JP Morgan and
Company provided

the first donation, $100,000.

The dozen college kids spend
an invigorating summer living

at the large Davison estate.

They rolled up their
sleeves and dug

into the mechanics
of the airplane,

learning how to break down
and rebuild the Mary Ann.

Flying progress was slow.

There was only one
plane, few spare parts,

and the wind was often too
strong for the delicate Mary

Ann.

But they countered the drawbacks
with youthful enthusiasm.

We went into this thing

with a sort of
missionary spirit.

We had one machine, we had
this old floating hangar that

wouldn't float, and no runway.

We had some kind of jumpers.

Bob Lovett bought them.

They were terrible looking
and they were light lavender.

We bought a lot
of airplane books

and got into the swing of it.

The big thing

that they were having
to deal with was

an under-powered airplane.

That planes were heavy,
they were made of wood.

The engines were not powerful.

And it's difficult to
fly an airplane that is

under-powered and overweight.

July 31, 1916.

Dear mother, I've just
taken my first lesson.

I was in the air 33 minutes
and made every mistake aviators

have made in 10
years, theoretically

breaking my neck 1,072 times.

I handed the rudder fairly
well, but keeping her level

with the ailerons were
absolutely beyond me.

And if I'd gone where I
aimed with the elevator,

I'd have looped the loop.

When you're
learning, you haven't

time to think of
danger or anything

but what a boob you are.

It's fascinating, though,
and you hate to stop.

Love to pop, John.

I
think that the big issue

is a pilot was just
making sure that you

didn't stall the plane.

A plane will tell you
when it's about to stall.

It shudders.

And you have to react
very, very quickly in order

to get your air speed back
up and, and be able to stay,

stay aloft.

Otherwise, you just fall
out of the sky like a rock.

The young
men also found time

to record some of the
local North Shore girls.

As part of the
preparedness movement,

the Red Cross was training
young women as nurses.

Trubee's sister,
Alice, was a student,

as was Robert Lovett's neighbor,
the regal beauty, Adele Brown.

Di Gates was seen walking
on the beach with Alice,

and Lovett was known
to have long talks

in the evening with Adele.

While the unit was
still taking shape,

the enterprising captain
decided to approach

the Navy for support.

Trubee took a trip
to Washington.

But being the son
of one of the most powerful men

in the world, went in to see the
Secretary of the Navy, Josephus

Daniels.

And the boys went in to see
him in his august office

and they'd said, we'd like to
create a Navy air reserve out

of our small group
of fledgling pilots.

They hadn't all even
soloed at this point.

And Josephus Daniels said,
well, you boys are great.

I love your patriotism
and your idealism,

but we don't need you.

As Trubee later
recalled of his meeting,

the government was
asleep at the switch.

But if he was bothered,
he was also undaunted.

If the Navy couldn't
yet see their value,

the unit would simply have
to work harder and prove

their worth.

Trubee recalled their
first summer's progress

learning to fly.

Bob
Lovett learned very quickly.

Di Gates was very earnest, but
slower to get the hang of it.

Finally, Bob and I
soloed, along in August.

I think we had about 600
minutes or 10 hours in the air.

We began to feel
worried because it

looked as though the others
were not going to solo before we

went back to college.

Dave McCullough told us
to keep our shirts on.

He'd seen this sort
of thing happen before

and he knew what he was doing.

Di finally did
his solo before he

had to report at New Haven
for football practice.

So that made only three of us to
qualify as flyers during summer

at Port Washington.

The eager aviators
got the Navy's attention

in early September when the
Aerial Coast Patrol Unit Number

One was invited to join
in training exercises

with the local Naval
Reserve volunteers.

Flying the Mary
Ann, unit members

searched for dummy mines in New
York's Lower Bay off Sandy Hook

and spotted them easily.

The stunt was ballyhooed
by the Aero Club of America

and in the aviation press.

The Navy was also
impressed, and Trubee

decided to increase the unit's
roster with an additional 18

members, including the
youngest member, Dave Ingalls,

an aggressive hockey
player just turned 18

and would soon gain a reputation
in the air as the Baby

Daredevil.

Then suddenly, all
of Trubee's activity

seemed quite prescient.

In
the winter of 1917,

the German government
and the German Navy

implemented a program that was
to change things dramatically.

The war in Europe had
reached a bloody stalemate

by the fall of 1916.

Neither side could
really move the other out

of its trench system.

The only weapon that
seemed available to Germany

to defeat the allies
was by basically sinking

any ship going to Britain.

On
February 1st, Germany

resumed unrestricted warfare
with their submarines.

And in February and
then in March of 1917,

a large number of American
ships began to go down.

The previous
August, President Wilson

signed a Naval Appropriations
Bill providing for a Naval

Reserve Flying Corps.

The Navy and Congress finally
came to grips with the fact

that they needed
pilots, and pilots

who already knew how to fly.

In World War I, there
was a call to arms.

There were no cadres of
regular Navy aviators.

And so the Navy was smart
enough to find the people

with the talents,
and the capabilities,

and the experience
wherever they were.

Whether they were Annapolis
graduates or, or not.

Late that
winter, Trubee Davison

was again maneuvering to get the
Yale Unit placed with the Navy.

He meant one of the Navy's
original flyers, now

the head of Naval aviation,
Lieutenant John Towers.

Towers was so impressed with
the college junior's enthusiasm,

he arranged through
the Assistant Secretary

of the Navy, Franklin
Roosevelt, for the unit

to enlist in New
London, Connecticut.

Trubee rushed a telegram to
Bob Lovett at Yale, we're off!

Lovett cleared the unit
members to leave school

while Trubee arranged to
move to an air station

in Palm Beach, Florida.

On March 24, 1917 in New
London, the First Yale Unit

enlisted as a body into the
Naval Reserve Flying Corps.

All 29 members.

After all his hard work,
Trubee Davison's mission

to enlist the First
Yale Unit in the Navy

had finally succeeded,
and not a moment too soon.

Four days after enlistment
the First Yale Unit

left the New England
winter for Palm Beach.

14 days later, on April 6th,
the United States was at war.

Entering the World War
was a defining moment

for the Yale underclassman
and the United States,

both coming of age in a modern
and unprecedented world.

Two million American
troops and millions

of tons of war materiel
would eventually

cross the Atlantic Ocean in
the next year and a half.

But when America entered the
war to help turn the tide,

the United States Navy had only
54 obsolete planes and some 40

qualified pilots, and
the Navy was suddenly

very interested in
the First Yale Unit.

By the time the
spring came around, they

were ensigns in the Navy.

And they packed up
the Mary Ann and they

packed up all the
rest of their gear

and took a special train
down to Palm Beach.

They were put up in the
Breakers for a while

and lived a pretty high life.

March 30, 1917.

Dear Mrs. Davison, we arrived
here safely this morning

and found the weather perfect.

Ideal flying conditions.

Trubee has taken entire charge
and is doing wonderfully.

Everybody has absolute
confidence in his leadership.

Sincerely, Di Gates.

And
of course, the weather

was beautiful.

They were flying an
open cockpit aircraft.

They flew hard and they played
hard, and it was just a hoot.

They couldn't have
had a better time.

And there they did some
more advanced training,

and they started to understand
a little bit about what it would

be like to be in the Navy.

Even though
they were now Navy men,

Yale still held out the
prospect of acceptance

to one of Yale's senior
secret societies.

Skull and Bones, Wolf's
Head, or Scroll and Key.

Clubs that met in
windowless tombs

and engaged in
secretive initiation

rites that kept its members
bound together for life.

At the time
of the First World War,

the secret societies
were extremely important,

marking success at Yale.

If you
were tapped to Bones,

I mean, you were just
ascended to heaven.

It was very serious
stuff back then.

The method of getting

into these senior
societies of Yale

was to have someone
slap you on the shoulder

and ask you if you accept.

Tap day, as
the ritual was called,

occurred in the spring
and was the big moment

for which underclassman had
been waiting for three years.

On April 19, all of the eligible
juniors of the First Yale Unit

were tapped, except one.

Kenneth MacLeish was an
earnest and passionate boy

from a wealthy Chicago family.

His best friend and fellow
Midwesterner, Di Gates,

brought him into the unit and
he took to flying right away.

Kenny's older brother,
Archibald MacLeish,

had been the golden boy
at Yale two years earlier.

Footballer, captain of
the water polo team,

voted most brilliant, the
class poet, and a member

of Skull and Bones.

Kenny strove mightily to
follow in Archie's footsteps,

but he was of a different metal.

One who
had anticipated his tap,

longed for a tap,
and perhaps felt

deserved a tap was Kenneth
MacLeish, and it didn't come.

But he wasn't tapped,
and he was crushed.

Said he went off
and cried about it.

As MacLeish
confided in a letter--

You'll never
know how terribly disappointed

I was in not making
a senior society.

I know why I didn't,
and it almost kills me.

I want to get to France
and forget the whole thing

and start over again.

At that point,
something happened in him.

Something that almost
amounted to a rebirth

of a new and more
serious Kenney MacLeish.

Basically, the kind of
light hearted person

that he had been seemed
to have taken flight

and there was somebody there
who came in and basically

was intent on making
something of his life.

By the end of May,
most of the unit members

had soloed and began
to find their place

in the hierarchy of the group.

Young Dave Ingalls
was muscling his way

to the front of the pack.

Dear dad, as
soon as I got out alone,

I went up high.

About 3,500 feet, as
I never went before.

Always been practicing landings.

It is certainly great
up there, and your

own the world when
you get up alone

and can do whatever you want.

I never enjoyed anything
as much as going up there,

and guess I'll have
to do it again soon.

Lots of love, Dave.

To a man,
their first solo flight

was an extraordinary
event in their lives.

Kenney MacLeish wrote a
letter to his parents.

I made
my first landing alone,

a thing I will never
forget in all my life.

I didn't realize
how very dependent

I had been on the instructor
until I was about to level off

above the water.

Then something
seemed to say, here's

where you show
yourself you can fly,

or here's where
you bust something.

I chose the former and made the
most perfect landing ever made.

And
by the time they

left Palm Beach as the
weather got too hot down there

and moved back up to their
next official training base,

a mansion up in Huntington
on the Long Island Sound,

they had all except
for one soloed.

One washed out, but they
were really moving forward.

Back on
the North Shore,

the unit quickly got
settled in their new base.

The Navy supplied three
Curtiss training planes.

There were now enough machines
that all the flyers could get

some time in the air each day.

They also resumed courting
the North Shore girls.

One of them, Priscilla Murdoch,
attended boarding school

with Kenney MacLeish's
younger sister,

and her family had a summer
cottage on Peacock Point.

Kenney had many occasions to
see Priscilla that summer,

and their relationship soon
blossomed into a romance.

By mid-July, after
racking up flying times

on a variety of aircraft, the
young men had bonded as a unit.

A bond born of
friendship, and trust,

and commitment to
a common cause.

A bond that seemed unbreakable.

But the First Yale Unit
had one more hurdle

to jump before they could
be naval aviators, the test

for their wings of gold.

For these young men

to get their wings to be
designated naval aviators,

the final test was a flight
test, and it was done solo.

This took
place in Huntington

on the Long Island Sound with
yachts out to observe them.

Trubee Davison's parents were
out on one of the yachts.

Trubee Davison had been sick
for a few days beforehand.

He even seemed to pass out at
some point prior to his exam.

Trubee had worked
relentlessly.

I think he had gotten maybe
two or three hours of sleep

that night, and he was first up.

And they
had to take off from the water

and climb to about
6,000 or 7,000 feet,

and they had to go
through some maneuvers.

And then coming back down,
they had to cut their engine

and come in and glide and
land at a particular buoy

or close enough to this
boy that it would show they

had control over the aircraft.

He was performing
is required maneuvers,

but he overextended his glide.

He cut his engine

and was heading for
this buoy and he

saw that he was going
to fall short of it

and he lifted his
nose of the plane.

And
I think he tried to push

and just didn't feel in his--
literally-- in his hands

and in his mind, didn't
feel the stall coming on.

And
as Trubee came down,

the plane rolled a little
bit and then yawed.

And the
plane stalled and fell

into the water.

Trubee was hit in the
back by the engine mount

and it broke his back.

His legs were
entangled in the wires.

FREDERICK TRUBEE
- All I knew

was I couldn't feel a thing from
my hips down, and my back hurt.

I got tangled up in the mess.

I can remember so well
looking up and seeing

the surface of the water
above me, perfectly conscious.

He was
really lucky to be alive.

He was lucky to be even
pulled out of the boat

and not drowned.

Their leader was badly injured,
and yet the rest of them,

they got in the
airplanes, they went up,

and they did what they had to
do, and they came back down.

And all of the First Yale Unit,
except Trubee, got their wings.

His
spinal cord was injured

and he was basically disabled
for the rest of his life, which

was 60 years.

The person
who brought together

this group of young men in such
a life changing experience,

he was gone.

His classmates,

the members of the
First Yale Unit,

they all went off to
France right away.

But they didn't suffer as
a result of his absence.

In fact, I would say
that they blossomed.

They all stepped up to the plate
in the absence of their leader

and they each became
leaders themselves.

That, I think, is the greatest
example of leadership in men.

Two weeks after
witnessing Trubee's crash

and receiving their wings,
Bob Lovett and Di Gates

shipped out aboard the SS
St. Paul bound for Liverpool.

It was a nerve jangling voyage.

Passengers were on constant
lookout for the German u-boats.

John Vorys left for England a
month later with Al Sturtevant

and recorded his
anxiety in his diary.

We looked on
the trip as a glorious lark

before the real thing began.

Once aboard, Al and I
paced the deck and thought

about not only how little
chance there was to come back,

but also how little chance
there was of getting over.

And about leaving home and all
home ties and risking all this,

and about what we
were risking it for.

Well, we went to bed exalted,
but very, very mournful.

What the unit members
found in London and Paris

when they reported for duty
in the late summer of 1917

was not the stuff of romance
on which they had fed

for the last year and a half.

Bob Lovett wrote to
Trubee from Paris.

Dear Trubee,
first, the condition of France.

You must have remembered it
as you saw it two years ago.

You would be heartbroken now.

She's staggering with the
weight of the war's toll.

Her people are fed up with
war and its suffering.

They would never have been
able to face the future

if we had not brought
hope just in time.

And why, by all that's
powerful, didn't we

come in a year earlier?

It's ironic that it was naval
aviation that was the first US

military force to set foot
in France because if you look

at what naval aviation
compassed in April 1917,

it is not a very impressive
force whatsoever.

The members
of the First Yale Unit

had expected to go to the
front and fly together

doing their bit,
putting in the punch,

and winning honor and glory.

But being the reserve
squadron with the most flying

experience, their services
were needed everywhere.

Before there was to be glory
in the air, a lot of groundwork

had to be laid.

If you're going

to build 15 flight
facilities, you

need cadres of
officers at every one.

If you're going to
train thousands of men,

you need people to
train every one.

Because the Yale Unit
had started first,

they were literally the
only available group

of young, qualified
officers that the Navy could

plug into the various slots.

They were split up
between different assignments.

Some were sent overseas
to get the lay of the land

and train on the more
sophisticated planes,

others stayed
stateside, assigned

the mammoth task of getting
US naval aviation on its feet.

They turned
them into training officers.

They turned them
into staff officers.

They turned them into Naval
Air Station commanders.

Squadron commanders.

Every place you looked, if there
wasn't a regular Navy officer,

you were going to find
somebody from the Yale Unit.

A second
wave of flyers

was sent overseas in September,
including Dave Ingalls.

Kenney MacLeish actually missed
the boat because of a date

with Priscilla.

Here's this
guy so eager to get over there,

then he misses his ship.

Well, you know, that's
an old kind of lovely.

Kenney was able
to hop the next one over,

with the satisfaction that
she was now his fiancee.

Eventually, all but four
of the nine unit members

would make it overseas.

The young flyers made
another shocking discovery

when they arrived.

And suddenly,
these young men, almost as soon

as they walked out
into the street,

were accosted by women
offering them a good time.

And this, too, was an
extraordinary experience.

And Paris.

Oh, it's far better than even
the wildest tales picture it.

It's as much as your life is
worth to go out to dinner here.

There are literally
thousands of girls

who say they will
show you around Paris,

and it's a two fisted
fight to shake them off.

On his first
evening in Paris,

young Dave Ingalls, all
of 18, got a surprise.

While
waiting for a ride,

observing not in my
innocence, a sweet

faced little girl passed by,
but stopped and returned to say,

will sleep with me?

Probably all she knew.

I had learned
something in London

but realized I would
learn more in Paris.

For many of
them, it was a real shock.

These were young men who
had never really been

exposed to this sort of
thing, and there it was.

And reading their diaries
and letters, some of them

got what David Ingalls
called a Parisian education.

And others of them learned
to, as Kenney MacLeish did,

who was engaged to
his beloved back home,

learned to fight
off the temptations.

The first
members of the Yale Unit

departed for Europe
in August of 1917.

They were sent to existing
French flying schools.

They were trained for very
specific set of missions.

And those missions were
to conduct offshore patrol

searching for submarines.

As the unit members
reached their assignments

and began to get settled,
they reported back

to command central, Trubee
Davison's hospital bed.

St. Rafael.

October 1, 1970.

Dear Trubee, this spending part
of one winter at Palm Beach

and starting off
another on the Riviera

is quite an unusual
way of going to war.

When the real thing does come, I
probably won't know how to act.

After I finish here, I'm not
sure where I will be ordered.

Of all the bases,
Dunkirk is, of course,

the most preferable
and exciting place

to be because there one comes in
constant contact with the Huns.

Yours, Di.

September 24, 1917.

Paris, France.

Dear old Trubs, I'm to see
the real stuff in one month.

And so we come to the
purpose of this letter

since I may not have a
chance to see you again.

You yourself know how
hard it is to express

real feeling in a letter, but
make allowances and hear me.

I had hoped to come over
here under your leadership

and inspiration,
for I have never

ceased to admire the splendid
manner in which you managed us.

But fate stepped in
and kept you at home,

and sent me as a pretty
rotten substitute.

Bob
Lovett was still

a young man who was noted
for his wit, his charm.

But this was not somebody that
you would have necessarily

said, this is a future leader of
men in service to their nation.

Time
and time again, I

have thought of the manly way
you have met your big trial.

And I only pray I can look
any misfortune in the face

in the same way you have done.

He
was somebody who

had grasped through his
experience of working

with Trubee the idea that
you could serve by leading.

And he made sure
to tell Trubee--

I take
off my hat to you.

As ever, Bob Lovett.

Bob
Lovett was sent

to Moutchic in southern France
to build the first US Naval Air

Station on the French coast.

And he literally helped
to build it by hand.

He literally pulled the first
US aircraft overseas out

of a crate, bolted it together
himself, and flew it himself.

These were
the FBA, Franco-British aviation

flying boats, that were commonly
used for training at that time.

Lovett put the plane together.

And in late September of
1917, made the first flight

at Moutchic.

The training for
the unit at the French bases

was piecemeal and
sporadic, held up

by faulty equipment and a
regular delivery of parts.

Not having bought
their own machines,

the Americans had to make
do with the leftovers.

The training that developed in
World War I was not very safety

conscious.

They want to get the pilots out.

If it took losing
a lot of young men

to get a well-qualified pilot,
that was an acceptable trade

off at that point.

The casualty rate

of World War I flyers was
much higher in training

than it was in combat.

The pilots had very low time.

There were young
guys with maybe three

or four hours in an airplane.

Probably very limited
ground school.

The British
approach to training

in the first few years of
the war had been pathetic.

Through 1916, the life
expectancy of British pilots

was three weeks.

Of the 14,000 deaths in British
aviation during the Great War,

8,000 deaths occurred
during training.

By late fall, the Navy moved to
operate a patrol in a bombing

station at Dunkirk,
coveted by flyers

as the most exciting
assignment because it

was close to the German lines.

The station would test
any pilot's skill,

and the British Navy offered
three of the unit's most

promising pilots, Robert Lovett,
Di Gates, and Dave Ingalls.

Advanced training in
single-seater fighters.

A big jump from the
Curtiss flying boats.

But Lovett was promoted
to a staff position,

and Di Gates too big
to fit into the cockpit

of the available
French Hanriot scouts,

was sent to Dunkirk
as chief pilot.

Kenney MacLeish and Ken Smith's
brother, Edward Shorty Smith,

from the Second Yale
Unit took their places.

In December, the
three flyers were

sent to the Experimental
School of Special Flying

at Gosport, England.

If there
were any two flyers that

were twinned together throughout
their wartime experience,

it was David Ingalls
and Kenneth MacLeish.

You couldn't have picked
two people more different

in outlook and personalities.

David Ingalls was only 18
years old when he enlisted.

He was a schoolboy athlete star.

He had remarkable
hand-eye coordination.

He had a bright,
effervescent personality.

He liked a good time.

He liked the girls.

He liked fun.

The war was the greatest
adventure of his life.

Ken MacLeish was much older.

He was 23.

He was much more serious.

He was not an athlete.

He saw the war, in many
ways, as a higher calling.

He was much more deliberate
in his activities.

And yet, the two of them
were paired together almost

from the first day that
they met in the Yale Unit.

Dave Ingalls,
always a sharp observer,

described the realistic
training at Gosport,

which focused on building
confidence, aerial acrobatics,

and forced landings.

Here the
finishing touches are put on.

Every stunt is taught.

Side slip landings, perfectly
balanced turns, et cetera.

There are no rules
or regulations, only

an unwritten law to do
your flying and do it well.

A paradise for a flyer.

The top pilots
in the First Yale Unit

were finally getting
what they trained for.

MacLeish estimated
he learned to fly

12 different types of planes.

They all agreed,
flying land machines

was the best idea ever
invented, and they would never

fly a water machine
in preference to land.

Kenney was elated.

As he wrote home to Priscilla--

I'm getting
to feel quite at home now.

I used to get lost in
vertical banks and spins,

but I know just where
I am all the time now.

Lord, there is no game
like this in all the world.

You're always taking
such wonderful chances,

and it's a grand feeling to
get away with them because you

gain self confidence.

But their enthusiasm
reached delirious heights

after they were introduced
to the Sopwith Camel.

Cam

Ken MacLeish
and David Ingalls first

met the Camel in
early January of 1918

while they were training
at the British flying

school at Gosport, England.

They were absolutely overjoyed.

Whether dangerous or not,
they loved this thing.

I finally
took a ride in the Camel.

A scout, single-seater
fighting machine.

It's so touchy, it
just seems to jump

if you shiver, and
goes into a spin

every time you take a turn
unless you do it perfectly.

I was full of pride that I
got back into the same world a

when I started.

It is a very
aggressive airplane

with a huge amount of power.

The difficulty was the engine.

The whole engine spins
with the propeller

and you have a tremendous amount
of gyroscopic force, which

means that that rotating mass
forces the airplane to dive

when you're turning to
the right and climb when

you're turning to the left
because of that rotating mass.

They
wrote home to their parents

describing the antics they
engaged in in these aircraft.

Fighting each other
in mock battles.

They also carried
out an activity

they called bush bouncing, which
was to take your airplane down

to about 25 or 50 feet off the
ground, race at full speed,

approach a house, a tree,
a herd of cows, a farmer,

and then jump up
in the air over him

and then come right
back down to earth.

They absolutely were in
love with this machine.

The
Camel, I think,

probably was more
or less the same

as all other fighters
at that time accepting

that it was the slowest
of the better fighters,

and without a doubt, the most
maneuverable of the fighters

that the Allies had.

It, as I recall, landed
perhaps 45 or 50 miles an hour

with a top speed
of about 120 miles.

Of
course, most people

know it got its
name for that hump

over the guns, hence a camel.

But that area is where all
the weight is concentrated.

The pilot, the fuel
tank, guns, and engine

are all very compact.

It makes it quite maneuverable.

The
byproduct of that

is that the airplane gets
extremely difficult to fly.

Especially for a novice
when the airplane

is trying to divert from
what you want it to do.

All that instability, you
use it for your own benefit,

and then you become
invincible in the sky.

Dave
Ingalls, at one point,

takes it up and
forces it into a spin.

Something, of course, they
were warned not to do.

He then corkscrewed
practically to the ground,

pulled out, went up,
and did it again.

And did it over, and
over, and over, and then

wrote home about how
sick to his stomach

he was for the
next several hours.

And the machine guns were one
of our greatest difficulties

because either due to the
timing mechanism or something,

they would shoot only at the
most seven or eight times

before there would be a misfire.

And the pilot would have to
hit the handle of the loading

apparatus and reload,
and then his gun

would shoot again for
five to seven times.

Flying these
planes was a good deal simpler

in combat.

An actual fight was usually
developed into a dogfight

between two planes.

One on each side in a
number of different groups.

And they would fly
around and around

trying to get on the other
man's tail and shoot him down.

Even when you
start with a large squadron,

as soon as the fighting starts,
it isolates immediately.

So people concentrate on one
enemy, they chase that enemy.

That was where the
Camel had the decided advantage

because it would turn inside of
any airplane that I ever saw.

Couldn't run away from
a fight, so once you

were actively involved,
you stayed until something

happened one way or the other.

But at least you
had an aircraft that

would turn inside
the other plane

and give you a chance
that I thought was better

than simply speed, which would
enable you to dive safely away.

Not only were the
top American flyers getting

to know the aircraft,
they were also

getting to know each other as
pilots, as brothers in arms,

as brash young man full of
gusto in a foreign land.

Dave is
almost surely off somewhere.

He has a girl in every port.

He drives me and Shorty crazy.

You know what a spoiled
kid he is anyway.

Well, on top of that, he's lost
all the manners he ever had,

and now he makes the
most disgusting noises

you ever heard.

He's so darn nervous and
fidgety that we're gradually

going crazy.

Shorty
cabled his girl

that he was well and lonesome.

Ken asks almost nightly for
some message from Priscilla.

And I, this old
bachelor, am again

stuck to a bunch
of foreign lovers.

I foresee a hell of a
time in one respect.

These two are going to waste
a lot of our time writing

and talking about
their fiancees.

Sometimes I thank God
I am still unshackled.

But during their
advanced training at Gosport,

the two pilots also gained a
mutual respect for each other.

Ingalls weighed
his flying skills

against MacLeish's in his diary.

Ken generally
puts it all over me.

He has acquired a damn
fine reputation here

and is considered
one of the best

pupils the schools has had.

However, I can still
hold my own with Shorty,

and there's time to practice
before we get to the front.

After
MacLeish and Ingalls

were ordered to Dunkirk, Ken
wrote a letter to Priscilla

on the eve of their first
flight to the front.

Crock and I
are in the same flight, which

is perfectly wonderful
for both of us

as I have absolute
confidence in his flying,

and he feels somewhat
the same way about mine.

We've done nothing
but fight each other

in the air for months.

Consequently, I know
exactly what tactics he uses

and just what he'll do in
every possible position

so that I can plan my
tactics accordingly.

He knows mine from
A to Z, and he also

knows just what I'll
do if a Hun gets

a dangerous advantage over me.

We're both full out
for it, and we only

pray that we get
the chances we want.

Hey, Fritz,
we're going to give you fits.

With a million Yankee hits,
we'll blow you into bits.

Hey, Fritz--

Already on assignment
at their new base and soon

to be under fire, John
Vorys and Al Sturtevant

were among the first
American fighters

to be mixed in
with foreign units.

John Vorys
and Albert Sturtevant

were sent over to be sort of
ambassadors of United States

Naval Air Service.

And they were
immediately attached,

after some additional training,
to the British submarine patrol

fleet flying out of Felixstowe.

The missions
out of Felixstowe

were the baptism of
fire for the unit.

Planes from the base hunted
for the German u-boats

over the North Sea and
near the English Channel.

John Vorys described
the situation.

A
system of search was

devised called the spider web.

It swept an area
4,000 square miles.

The tables were turned
on Fritz, the hunter,

for here he was the
hunted, the quarry,

the fly that had to pass through
one or more sectors of the web.

The flying boat was the spider.

The two Americans
were popular at the British base

and the local hotel where
they attended dances.

So popular, in
fact, that it became

necessary to give them a
polite warning regarding

the fascinating Mrs. Dowson.

Her
father was an Irishman

and her mother came
from the Argentine.

She had an ivory skin
and dark blue eyes

and was very, very lovely.

A lady with a past,
but still a lady.

Al and I both took
a shine to her.

In short, we were smitten.

Arriving for their
next rendezvous with her

at the hotel bar,
the Yankee flyboys

were approached by a polite
district official who

informed them that
Mrs. Dowson was

suspected by British
intelligence of being

a German spy.

Though the flyers
remained cordial,

Mrs. Dowson now intrigued them,
noted Vorys, about as much

as a case of smallpox.

She was
clever enough to be a spy.

She could certainly find
out everything you knew.

And with a little
persuasion, you

would tell her a great many
things you didn't know.

The other mission
for the Felixstowe flyers,

besides hunting for subs,
was escorting the Beef

Trip, a convoy of merchant
ships sailing two or three times

a month between England
and the Hook of Holland

carrying Dutch beef to England
and English beer to the Dutch.

Escort planes flew great
loops some five to ten miles

in front of the convoy,
searching for u-boats

before they could submerge
and fire on their prey.

Vorys and Sturtevant were each
supposed to fly three times

a week, but in February, the
rain and wind of the cold North

Sea kept the pilots at bay.

Albert Sturtevant
missed several patrols

because of bad weather.

He insisted to John Vorys
that Vorys allow him

to take his place on patrol.

And when this
particular flight came up,

apparently Al turned
to Vorys and said,

how about switching
places with me?

You know, you, you've got,
you've got the chance to go,

but I, I haven't had as
many chances because it's

been in such bad weather.

Sturtevant went
out on that patrol.

They came under attack by a
squadron of German fighter

planes.

His plane was shot down.

Appeared to survive on
the water, but later

on when the Germans came back to
look for them, they were gone.

Albert Sturtevant
became the first US

naval aviator killed in combat.

The lead pilot and commander
of the German air station

at Zeebrugge was Oberleutnant
Friedrich Christiansen,

the only seaplane pilot to
receive the coveted Blue Max.

Christiansen was contacted by
Sturtevant's distraught father

after the war for news of
the last sighting of his son.

Christiansen
reported that he had

returned to the downed aircraft
and seen three of the four

aviators clinging to the
wreckage in heavy seas,

but the danger was too
great to land in the water

and save them.

A month after his son's
death, Sturtevant's father

wrote a letter to his daughter.

I don't
think I will ever

get over Albert's death.

I was so proud of him.

Of his looks, his ability, his
earnestness, his athletics,

and I am proud of his
death, only it is so hard.

And suddenly, the
members of the First Yale Unit

realized that for
the first time,

they had lost one of their
own, and everything came home.

They understood that this
was war and this was real.

Dear
folks, old Al's gone.

He went out on patrol and
the last we knew about him,

he was seen being
attacked by Huns.

We hoped against hope
for a week that he

had been interned
or made prisoner,

but Hun reports confirmed
our apprehensions, that he'd

been shot down, and along with
the others in the machine,

had gone to swell that
awesome, awful role of honor.

It's all right to say you don't
hate your enemies when you're

just getting ready to begin, but
when you've lost your nearest

and dearest, you, well, at least
would like an eye for an eye.

Love, John.

The news
of Sturtevant's death

quickly made the rounds to
the unit members stateside.

John Vorys carried
the tragic news home

as he was reassigned to
instruct at Hampton Roads.

Erl Gould had been transferred
to Key West where he would soon

become the youngest commander
of a Naval Air Station

in charge of all
operations and 1,300 men

at the tender age of 22.

On February 27, two weeks
after Sturtevant's death,

Gould was writing a
letter to Trubee Davison.

Dear old Trub,
come on down here to Key West.

We really have a
fine little station.

I try to run things just as much
like you did as I possibly can.

You don't know how much
every man in the unit

admires you, Trub, nor how
grateful they all are to you.

Then, in the
middle of the letter,

more tragic news arrived.

Gould broke off writing.

My god, Trub, your
telegram has just arrived.

My heart is too full and I feel
too sick to tell you any more.

Dear old Curt.

Curt Read was
a well-loved classmate

who played Yale baseball
and could trace his roots

to the Puritans at Plymouth.

His father, a prominent
banker, had died in 1916,

and Curt's mother kept him out
of the unit that first summer.

But Curt joined when
the unit was enlarged.

He became everyone's
preferred comrade

in arms for his dependability,
generosity, and enthusiasm.

Everybody liked him.

There was no reason not to
be a pal of Curt Read's.

On February 25, having
arrived at his assigned base,

Dunkirk, he wrote
a reassuring letter

to his mother who had given four
of her sons to naval aviation,

including young Bart, who
was also with the unit.

Dearest
mother, everything

is going finely here, and Bart
was very well when I left him.

And I never felt
better in my life.

Don't, for goodness sake,
worry about us, for we

are both as safe as can be.

Lots of love to you, Curt.

But Curt had never
taken very well to flying.

Unit member and
friend John Farwell

said, he never got
the hang of it.

Read had started a diary while
he was training overseas,

in which he recorded his
anxiety in a kind of shorthand.

General
nervous tension.

Wish I were off, even if
I'm not thoroughly trained.

Can learn at the front.

Feeling of fatalism about April.

Odd.

Feel that it could
really be a climax

now if I were to have the
privilege giving the greatest

sacrifice.

Feeling that there is
absolutely no other way.

Di Gates
was chief pilot soon

to be in command at Dunkirk, and
the day after Curt's arrival,

he took his friend
up for a quick hop

to get the lay of
the tricky harbor.

Dunkirk
was a very difficult place

to operate from.

It is a very congested harbor.

It contains numerous channels,
numerous bends and turns.

The actual open water
is relatively narrow,

and that's usually filled with
warships and merchant ships

that were coming and going.

Gates
gave the flying boat

over to Curt, who took
off with his observer,

circled over the city,
and headed out to sea.

He had been flying
around for 15 or 20 minutes

and was making a
normal glide, evidently

with the intention of
practicing a landing.

It was very tight.

And to land there, you had to
come out of the sky pretty fast

and then hit the water
in the right place.

All of a
sudden, the plane

pitched forward and dove nose
first 120 feet into the water

and flipped over.

Curt was picked up
by a patrol boat.

He had a fractured skull
and died within the hour.

His observer could not be found.

There is no
need of telling you

what a blow we have
had in the last two

weeks with the news of Al's loss
and Curt's terrible accident

soon after.

It really seems impossible
and unbelievable.

As was
his mother's wish,

Curt Read was buried at
Dunkirk among, as she said,

the fellowship of the
war's heroic dead.

He was the first US
naval aviation officer

to be killed in France.

His body now rests in the
American Somme Cemetery

on a gentle slope in the
rolling countryside of Picardy.

Erl Gould had been
Read's roommate at Yale.

They served on the
yearbook committee

together, were members of Scroll
and Key, and were best friends.

Dear
Trubee, thank you

for your telegram and letter.

You know that Curt was the
truest friend and noblest

influence of my life,
so you can understand

why I feel as though a knife
were sticking in my heart.

Curt loved you truly
and admired you more

than any young man I know.

Because you reciprocated
his feelings,

I understand what a
blow it was to you

and sympathize with you and
all our unit for the loss.

With love and sympathy
to you all, Erl.

Late that
spring, Trubee Davison

served as best man for
Erl Gould at his wedding,

making his way to the altar
without crutches or assistance

for the first time.

For God,
for country, and for Yale.

After the deaths of two of
their own, the rest the unit

went about their business.

As Alphie Ames described it,
behind the smile and carry on,

everyone is tightening his jaw.

Bob Lovett kept
a stiff upper lip

in the face of the unit's
losses as he ended a letter

to his beloved Adele.

Our number
is slowly dwindling,

but our spirit is
still the same.

And I believe that, in
the end, is what counts.

In
Bob Lovett, the Navy

realized early on that they had
an extraordinary young officer.

He was intelligent, energetic,
organized, insightful, detail

oriented.

He could write reports
and draft plans.

And based on these
qualities, which

would make any senior Naval
officer giddy with delight,

he was put to work as one
of the chief troubleshooters

for naval aviation in Europe.

His most
exciting assignment

came in February, to which he
hinted in an ecstatic letter

to Adele.

Dearest Little
Professor, my colossal luck

took a turn yesterday
that has left

me gasping in astonishment.

It's a deep secret, of
course, but it is really

what I was called over here for.

I am so blamed excited,
I can hardly breathe.

I get all cold at
night thinking about it

because it is rather scary,
and then I get my nerve back

and revel in dreams.

Five months into naval
aviation's overseas operation,

Lovett was taking a hard
look at the Navy's commitment

to the seaplane.

The spider web patrols
were proving a deterrent

to the u-boats, but searching
for subs over the North Sea

was tedious work akin to looking
for a needle in a haystack,

with little chance of
finding, not to mention,

bombing or hitting a u-boat.

Bob Lovett would

look at the logs of the aviators
as they went out on patrol

and realized that
they were spending

a lot of hours in the air
without finding anything.

And
he began to think

that this was a
very inefficient way

to try to stop the u-boat risk.

Seaplanes
really were the bread and butter

of naval aviation, really,
from the beginning.

But as the war progresses,
there is an effort

to integrate land planes
into naval operations

and take advantage
of land aircraft

and really hit the German
submarines at their source.

And that was the genesis behind
the Northern Bombing Group

was really to carry
out raids against some

of the submarine bases
in northern Europe

and really strike the
u-boat before they even

went out to sea.

In one of
his detailed memos

to the commander of the
US Naval Aviation Forces,

Lovett recorded
the lessons learned

from British naval aviators.

He was now convinced
that the key

to defeating the
submarine menace

was to fly heavy land
bombers against their bases.

And Lovett got himself
assigned to a squadron

of Handley-Page bombers,
behemoth four passenger planes

with twin Rolls-Royce engines
and great, floppy wings.

The objectives of the
Northern Bombing Group

was the combination of German
submarine bases in Belgium.

These consisted of Ostend
and Zeebrugge, which

are located on the
coast, and Bruges,

which is located inland but
is connected to the coast

by canals.

This was one of the most
heavily fortified spots

on the western front.

These submarines were
protected by concrete submarine

pens in Bruges.

They were ringed with all sorts
of anti-aircraft artillery.

Robert Lovett,
as part of his general exposure

to air operations,
decided that he

needed to learn how heavy
bombers flew and experienced

flying over enemy lines.

Dearest
Little Partner, I'm

going to the front in 10
days on a wonderful stunt

upon the success of which
hangs our future program.

The importance of
it truly makes me

burst with pride and happiness.

Have you ever had your
wildest dreams come true?

Lovett left
Paris by motorcycle

to report for duty at
Dunkirk on March 21, 1918.

The next night, he
served as a gunner

with Canadian Captain John Roy
Allan of the Royal Naval Air

Service in a Handley-Page
bomber named The Evening Star.

They attacked the submarine
pens in Bruges harbor.

As Lovett recorded
in a letter to Adele,

the experience of flying through
arching and flaming phosphorus

was both alarming
and revelatory.

My Dearest
Little Partner,

I have just returned
from the front where

I have been attached
to the seven squadron,

fifth wing of the Royal
Naval Air Service.

It has been the most gratifying
and greatest experience

I have ever had.

Exciting?

Ye gods!

No sooner had we
crossed the lines

and the Huns started
to strafe us.

Archie bursts were seen
to the right and left,

but Roy held us straight.

Presently, the
motors were throttled

and we were gliding
in for our mark.

It was curiously quiet.

I had the three guns
ready and then, good god,

the earth seemed to open.

17 searchlights sprang
out and swept about.

The ack-ack made a wall
and floor ahead of us.

The deadly high
explosions crumped

about and the green
balls swayed and spiraled

as they sought to
get us on fire.

Roy kept straight on,
never a waver or turn.

There was a sudden crash
and I thought we were hit,

but we kept on straight into
the intense wall of bursting

shells ahead and below us.

Suddenly, one light
got us and the whole 17

hit us with a slap.

We felt like little kids
caught stealing jam.

Then I got the guns going.

The tracers darted down the
beams toward the gun crews

and two lights went out.

The tip of the gun got red and
the glow crept up the barrel,

and we were hit time and again.

Why we weren't literally blown
out of the air, I don't know.

I saw a tear in the fuselage
side and holes in the wings,

and Roy's face grinning at me in
front, and I could have cried.

I felt so lucky to have
been through it all

and come out safely.

Lovett ended
his letter to the woman

he planned to marry--

I wonder if you
know the dreams I dream,

the thoughts I think,
and the hopes I cherish.

Someday you will,
my dearest one,

and I'm telling you now,
though I can't see you,

as I gain in experience, as I
see life with the primal laws

still reigning, I hold you more
and more closely in my heart

and long for the days that
I will be with you again.

It is a strange thought to
consider that the more one has

to live for, the more readily
one is willing to die for it.

With his new
friend Captain Allan,

Robert Lovett flew a series
of successive, sustained night

bombing missions
over three weeks.

Kenney MacLeish saw
Lovett one morning

and said he has the
wind up so badly

that he can't stand still.

Lovett's idea was

that the force should
be employed solely

to attack the submarine bases.

That it should
operate day and night

using at least two
different types of aircraft.

That it should carry out
missions consecutively

and continuously on one target.

As each night progressed, he
would find that the artillery

fire was abating.

As they
ran low on ammunition,

the airborne bombers
could then come

in lower, and lower,
and lower, and thus bomb

more and more accurately.

And he realized there
that strategic bombing

was going to be the future.

It is no stretch
of the imagination

to see the raids over German
cities in 1943 and 1944

see their origins
in this analysis.

Lovett's
experience was

the confirmation he needed to
write his report for the Navy.

He was called to headquarters
for a conference.

And as he packed his
bags on April 11,

word arrived that the
big stunt over Zeebrugge

was to be flown that night.

Roy Allan asked his
friend to fly one more

mission in The Evening Star.

John Roy
Allen thought of Lovett

as kind of a good luck charm.

When he flew with Lovett, Allan
said, we always came through.

Well, Lovett was called
back to headquarters.

Allan pleaded for him to
stay, but he couldn't.

He had to leave.

That night,
on the only mission

of Allan's on which
Lovett did not fly,

The Evening Star was shot
down over the North Sea

and Roy Allan was drowned.

Lovett wrote to Adele--

Isn't it ghastly?

What luck and what
misfortune on my part.

I wish to God I'd been along.

Maybe I could have saved
him, or at least tried.

Well, the best of us
go first, again proved.

By
the winter of 1918,

German headquarters realized
that they had backed themselves

into quite a corner.

The United States was pouring
manpower into Europe at a rate

that they had believed
to be impossible.

In addition, the
submarine offensive,

which had begun with such
promise in the spring of 1917,

while still sinking a
large number of ships,

had been completely unable
to stem the flow of men,

munitions, and supplies.

Germany threw
all they had into Operation

Michael in late March 1918.

The attack was
directed at the British

and it took them by surprise.

Immediately,
all the British flying units

along the front
jumped into action

and began to sustain
high casualties.

A shortage of combat pilots
very quickly emerged.

The
commander at Dunkirk

volunteered the station's top
pilots, Ingalls, MacLeish,

and Shorty Smith, to
fill the vacancies

in number 213 squadron RAF
patrolling the coast of France

and Belgium.

For the unit members, this
was their moment at last.

The moment for which
they'd left school,

for which they had trained,
and for which they had said

goodbye to their
friends and families.

The young Yale
flyers had been waiting

for a year for exactly
this opportunity.

They couldn't wait to
get at the Germans.

They couldn't wait to
get out over lines.

In their diaries and
their letters home,

they talked about
the excitement,

they talked about
the danger, they

talked about the fear,
the nerves of meeting

the enemy for the first time.

An American pilot in the
spring of 1918 would be joining

a well-developed air force,
a well-developed fighter

technique, and he would
be, unfortunately,

fighting some of the very best
pilots that the Germans had

in their best airplanes.

Though none
of the Yale flyers

shot a plane out of the
sky that April, all of them

were under fire.

Dave Ingalls told me

that the way that you
identified somebody on your tail

was the fact that you suddenly
saw tracers coming out

on either side of the airplane.

And that's got to be,
get your attention

in a fairly significant way.

Tracers also got
Kenney MacLeish's attention

in his Sopwith Camel during
an attack on Zeebrugge.

It was MacLeish's
first major sortie.

I'm so happy
I can't even see straight.

I'm actually on
fighting patrols,

and I actually
fly over Hun land.

You should have seen
me on my first patrol.

I'll never forget it.

I never knew what
excitement was until I

got into some hot Archie
fire the other day

and then had to
scrap with some Huns.

It gives one a real
thrill to realize

that they're shooting honest
to goodness bullets at you.

But it's simply
glorious, and I wouldn't

have it changed for
any job on earth,

in spite of the torture
from cold on high patrol.

I'll write more when I thaw out.

As the plans for the
Northern Bombing Group

began to come together,
the US decided

that it wasn't going
to devote resources

that were going to Dunkirk,
a very exposed spot

where it was very difficult
to carry out operations.

The US decided that
it was going to devote

all means it could to
create the strategic bomber

force under Bob Lovett.

In the meanwhile,
it was quite clear

that Di Gates was going to
lose his command at Dunkirk.

But Bob Lovett, fellow
Bonesman, classmate, friend,

Yale unit member,
but also a rival.

There was always this
tension between them.

Bob Lovett the savvy
one, the fashionable one,

the socially suave man.

Di Gates the football
player, the quiet one,

withdrawn, a little bit shy.

So Di Gates wrote a letter
home saying that Bob Lovett,

he's conceited.

He makes his plans and then
he just carries them out

and leaves us out of them.

Dear Trubee,
I wish you could see Bob

under these conditions.

He is absolutely
incomprehensible.

He almost refuses to
associate with us.

And when he does, he is so aloof
that it makes me very sick.

He is about 10 times worse
than he ever was in college.

Lovett was faced
with bigger problems than hurt

feelings over his secrecy.

If he was going to
help mount the largest

aerial mission in
history, he needed

to find planes and pilots now.

The delivery, as
promised, of American

built Liberty engines
and DH-4 and H-16 bombers

was months behind schedule,
and the British Handley-Pages

were overtaxed.

Lovett would have to
look further afield.

As the Germans spring offensive
was slowly beaten back,

he traveled to Italy where
he met manufacturer Gianni

Caproni.

Lovett was impressed
with his Caproni Ca.3.

The original model
of the aircraft were excellent.

They were very
effective heavy bombers.

Signor Caproni quickly
built a larger model, the Ca.5,

with almost double
the horsepower

and double the bomb
carrying capacity.

The US Army and Navy
send a number of pilots,

including members of
the First Yale Unit,

to ferry them over
the Alps to France.

It was the Northern Bombing
Group's first aerial operation

with its own
personnel, and it would

be the closest the unit would
come to uniting for a mission.

Harry Davison,
Trubee's brother, Reg Coombe,

Sam Walker all went to begin
this process of ferrying

the Capronis.

Even before they managed to take
off, a number of those planes

broke down.

After weeks of delays,
they made their first hop

from Milan to Turin, and
every one of the motors

had serious trouble.

Enough so, sabotage
was suspected.

In truth, the engines had
been rushed through production

and not up to wartime demands.

After many aborted
take-offs, Sam Walker

reached the mountains
only to crash his Caproni

in an alpine pass.

And
they weren't really

set up for high altitude.

They had to get across the Alps.

And just getting
up to 18,000 feet,

it would have been
freezing cold.

The engines would have
been misbehaving terribly.

Reg Coombe saw two
pilots fall to their deaths,

and he tried to
rescue two more when

their plane tipped over
and caught on fire,

and they burned alive.

Coombe finally managed to get
his plane through the mountain

passes, barely
limping into France.

Of 17 Capronis, only eight
made it to the Northern Bombing

Group base.

I think there were
two bombing missions in total

that they were
able to carry out.

I think one or both
of the aircraft

crashed on their return.

The Caproni program
was, in short, a fiasco.

But despite all the
setbacks, Lovett's spirit

was still buoyed by his old
friends and he plowed ahead.

I
confess, I have never

had to face so many
problems or troubles.

But the satisfaction of
winning through and of seeing

the loyalty of your men is
the greatest satisfaction

in the world.

In spite of lack of
essentials, in spite

of the failure of
machines, the whole crowd

are magnificent in
their energy and spirit.

We have not reached
our strength yet,

but the goal is within sight
and the labor, thought,

and planning will
someday bear fruit.

Lovett had
particular praise for Di Gates,

as he told Trubee--

Di has always
played the man's part,

and all his friends
over here accord him

every honor and all
esteem, and no one

deserves it more than he.

Before the end
of his tour at Dunkirk,

Gates proved himself
in the face of battle.

A report came in that a
Handley-Page bomber had

gone down offshore
and within range

of German gun emplacements.

Without waiting for
an escort, Gates

jumped in a Donnet-Denhaut
flying boat and took off.

He found the downed aircraft
with the flyers hanging

on either wing, landed
his plane in heavy seas,

and managed to rescue both
men and take off again.

For his heroism,
Gates was awarded

the Distinguished Service Medal
and the Distinguished Flying

Cross.

That same month, a second
Distinguished Flying Cross

was awarded to another
Yale unit member.

Between
early August and the first week

of October 1918,
David Ingalls spent

56 or 58 days with the
RAF flying Camel missions.

He flew bombing missions,
he flew escort missions,

he flew ground
strafing missions,

he flew air to air combat.

And on September
15, returning home

after a daring raid
on a German airbase,

he flew to his third kill.

I could see
four or five Camels far ahead.

One turned back and joined me.

Smith.

So we tooted along
easily at 7,000 feet.

Just then I saw five
Huns over Zeebrugge,

but didn't think that
they could see us.

Some people would

have a kind of sixth
sense for how to hunt,

and I think he had
that sixth sense.

Stay behind the clouds.

Stay high at important times.

And dive down on your target
as quickly and efficiently as

you can, and not to
spend a lot of time

down low where it's sort of
fun, but maybe a little more

dangerous.

Anyway,
I started to climb

and just then saw apparently a
scout climbing out of Ostend,

perhaps to pick off the last
Camel which was visible.

I waved at Smithy and
headed in a bit, climbing.

In about four minutes, he saw us
and turned east toward Ostend,

gliding.

We dived, firing at long
range, but I got to about 100

yards before he hit the
clouds at 2,000 feet

and got into good burst.

So did Smith.

He went through clouds at
Ostend pier, sort of wallowing.

I dived through and came
out just behind him.

He was driving steeply,
so I opened at 50 yards

and saw flames and
smoke come out.

Then I saw a lot of tracers from
shore and beat it like hell,

meeting Smith above the clouds.

And then we went home.

And along the way,

David Ingalls
managed to shoot down

at least four German airplanes
and a couple of kite balloons,

earning the title of
the Navy's only Ace

from the First World War.

For fighter
pilots, the title of Ace

is just one of the
most coveted titles

you can get because
it means you've

shot down five or more enemy
aircraft in air to air combat.

And so David S. Ingalls holds a
place in naval aviation history

forever because he was
the first naval aviator

to become an Ace in combat
over the western front.

In awarding Ingalls
the Distinguished Flying Cross,

a major of the British
air staff wrote,

has helped to destroy
two enemy airplanes

and once, single-handed,
attacked six enemy machines,

driving one down damaged.

His keenness, courage, and
utter disregard of danger

are exceptional and
are an example to all.

He is one of the finest
men this squadron ever had.

Finally, in
early October 1918,

he was called back
from the British

and he was assigned
to be the chief flight

officer at Eastleigh.

MacLeish was then sent to
take Ingalls' spot with 213

squadron.

But before the
exchange of assignments

could take place, the unit
received unsettling news.

In the
very short period

that the members of the First
Yale Unit who reached the front

were there, three members
were killed very quickly.

Al Sturtevant, Curtis Read,
and there was to be one more.

Di Gates and
several others managed

to get themselves assigned
to a French Escadrille that

was operating right nearby.

And it was flying with this
Escadrille, the Escadrille St.

Pol, that he was
out on a mission,

I believe on the 4th of October.

Got involved with superior
numbers of German aircraft.

He suffered engine
failure and was

forced to land in a field
in occupied Belgium.

Telegrams
and letters quickly

made the rounds of
the unit members

with updates by the day.

Dear Trubs, I
cannot believe that one so full

of life as Di
could have lost it,

so we are stretching every
effort to get word of him

in the prison camps.

Kenney
MacLeish thought

of Di Gates, as he said, the one
man I love other than Archie.

Di was somebody
he'd grown up with.

Di was the one who had brought
him into the First Yale

Unit where he really discovered
both his manhood as a pilot

and the woman he loved.

Dearest old pal,

I haven't dared write
for the last few days

because I've just been
hoping against hope

that poor old Di would
show up, but I guess

that the chances are slim.

Oh, pal, of all the men on
earth that it's hard to lose,

I'm just crushed.

I've never, never taken
anything so badly.

So much of who
he was was tied to Di Gates,

and he went to the
front intent on revenge.

On October 9, he
wrote a letter to Trubee.

I still
feel sure he's all right,

although I'm weakening
as time passes.

He's too dear a friend to lose.

Some of those dirty
bastards will pay me.

I'm going out to the
front in a day or so,

and I'll get even with somebody.

Underneath
his roiling emotions,

MacLeish was philosophical,
and he'd often

shared his thoughts
in his letters

to his family and
friends back home.

I'm going
to the front tomorrow.

I don't think anything
will happen to me.

If it should be my lot to
make the supreme sacrifice,

you'll know that I did
it gladly and that I

bought life's most
marvelous reward,

honor at a dirt cheap price.

And that I was
happy, ever so happy,

that it was granted
to me, unworthy

as I am, to give up my life for
my friends who, fundamentally,

are my ideals.

His very
first day there, he

went out for a mission
in the morning,

shot down a German plane, got
his first taste of revenge.

It was his first kill.

He came back to
the base, refueled,

went out on another mission.

He promptly found himself
caught up in a dogfight.

He was flying with several
others of his squadron.

And they were going along and
all of a sudden off to one

side, a group of several
German fighters showed up.

And Ken peeled off
and went after them.

This has always been a mystery.

Why would he have done that?

He was outgunned, no
question about it,

and he just took off after them.

Maybe he was mad that morning.

I don't know.

Maybe he just did
figured, this is my time

to knock down a couple
of these things.

Obviously, he was not
thinking about his own safety.

He was
last seen facing off

one man against seven Germans.

When Kenney MacLeish

went missing on the
14th of October,

there was a great
deal of mystery

surrounding his ultimate fate.

There were reports coming
back from the front

that American Navy
pilots had been captured.

There was the possibility that
he had been taken prisoner.

Letters and telegrams
passed back and forth

in which everyone
tried to reassure

each other that hope remained.

But weeks passed and then months
passed, and there was no news.

But unbeknownst
to the devastated unit,

Di Gates was still alive.

His engine had been shot
up by three Fokker DVIIs

and he found an
open field in which

to land after pushing
his Spad into what

he called a screaming dive.

The Spad,
nose down, bounced hard

on the starboard wheel and
then flipped over on its back.

The next thing I remember
was the smell of gasoline

and a moist feeling
on my shirt and back.

A shot rang out and brought
me back to the present.

A flood of enemy
soldiers appeared

from the corner
of the field, so I

reached into my pocket
for a box of matches

that I kept to light
a favorite cigar.

I touched the flame
to the canvas,

and the flame quickly
became engulfed in flames.

I turned my back on the
bonfire and walked away slowly.

Gates was
captured and wined

and dined by German intelligence
at a house in Ghent, Belgium.

But after three days of not
giving up any information,

he was loaded onto a train
car bound for a prison camp.

He was
being transported back

to a prisoner of war
camp and he found himself

in the lavatory of the train.

And he found that on the
wall was a train map with all

the stations that
the train was going

to and the different
railroad lines,

and he managed to get
that off the wall.

And he determined that at
that particular moment in time,

he might be closest
to the Swiss border.

So he made an escape.

Going through a
tunnel, escaped out

of the toilet window
which, somehow,

he managed to squeeze through.

He
jumped out of the train

with the scrap of
the map with him

and made his way towards the
border, traveling at night

so he wouldn't be seen.

I made 20
miles the first night,

but I didn't have
enough food or water

and I could only manage
half that distance

the following night.

I would hide during the
day, but it was cold

and I was only able
to sleep sporadically.

I would wait until night to
check my progress by climbing

the signposts along
the roadway and feel

the impression of the
letters with my fingertips

as if I was reading Braille.

Unfortunately,
in climbing these poles,

he got a lot of splinters
in his inside leg

and he got a blood infection
and got quite sick.

I took a wrong
turn at a fork in the tracks.

At first, light was
breaking over the roofs

of the houses in the next town.

I was unsure I could withstand
another night out in the cold.

I decided to take a chance
that no one would be awake

this early and made my way
through the center of town

rather than circling around it.

Hurrying past the station,
I found a burst of energy

as I rounded a corner and ran
into the path of a sentry who

had just come on duty.

He just came around the
corner at the wrong time

that a sentry had
just come on duty,

also was coming
around the corner.

He could then see that
there was actually

a break in the barbed wire
fence only three yards away,

and the other side
was Switzerland.

Gates was taken
to the American officers POW

camp at Villingen on November
7th and sentenced to 21 days

solitary confinement.

He would not have
to stay that long.

On the morning of November 11,
1918, the armistice was signed.

After four long years,
Germany and Austria-Hungary

were defeated.

A virtual surrender
that ended hostilities

between the warring nations.

Fairly quickly, the
unit received word

that, indeed, Di Gates had
been a prisoner of war.

Di Gates,
shortly after the armistice,

one of the first
things he did was

send off a postcard to Trubee
Davison saying, I'm fine.

Will you be my
roommate in New Haven?

So finally, they
knew he was alive.

The word went out
among all the members.

There was elation among them.

No word came from Kenney.

The longer they waited, the
gloomier the outlook became.

They went searching
for his aircraft.

No sign of it still.

At
some point early in 1919,

after the armistice,
a Belgian farmer

decided it was now safe
to get back to his farm.

Walked back and there, lying in
the barnyard, was uncle Kenny.

Not a very pretty sight.

The rats had taken his face.

But his papers were with him
and it was perfectly clear

that he was who he was.

Because of the
irregularity of the mails,

word of MacLeish's remains
did not reach the states

until late January.

Di Gates learned of the
discovery while in London

waiting for passage home.

He sent a telegram to Priscilla.

30 January, 1919.

Archie just told me a
very sad, definite news

concerning Kenney.

My own grief helps me
to appreciate yours

to some extent.

Will return to New
York in morning Friday

and am looking
forward to seeing you.

My deepest sympathies.

When I
heard my grandfather speak

about World War I,
which wasn't frequently,

but it would always be in the
presence of another survivor

usually, they often spoke
about Kenney MacLeish.

Somehow, he was an idol, a star.

And his loss in World War
I, they all took very hard.

He was able to channel the
anger and the disappointment,

the loss, into something that
would propel them forward

in a positive way.

A year after
MacLeish's disappearance,

Lovett wrote a letter to
Ken's brother, Archibald,

describing Kenney's reaction
to Lovett's offer of a plum

position as squadron commander.

Dear Archie, he
said he was tickled stiff

and that he would, of
course, come over and do

the best he could but,
honest, Bob, it won't fit me.

He said that he appreciated
the honor and all that sort

of thing, and that removal
from active flying duty

looked pretty good when he
thought of the end of the war.

But unless I asked it
as a very special favor,

he'd rather not take it.

He wanted to fight.

Couldn't stand not being
in it every minute.

Would curl up and blow away if
they kept him behind the lines.

And that a single-seater
was his idea of a holiday,

and all he wanted.

I believe he was the best we
had in the line of a pilot,

and I don't want a
finer pal than a man who

can give up everything for his
ideal of service and honor.

Over 19
months in Europe,

US naval aviation flew
22,000 sorties patrolling

over a million nautical
miles, dropping over

100 tons of high explosives
on enemy targets.

Though the full weight of
the Northern Bombing Group

was not brought to bear by
the time of the armistice,

its pilots were busy serving
with Navy, Marine, and RAF

units while its code and
tactics would live on

through the century.

Among the Yale Unit members
were a medal of honor nominee,

two recipients of the
Distinguished Flying Cross,

three recipients of the
Distinguished Service Medal,

and 11 recipients
of the Navy Cross.

And really,
the legacy of the Yale Unit

is not only in that performance
in combat, the flying aces,

and the ones that sacrificed
their lives for their nation,

it's the ones that
returned from World War I

and just really maintain that
commitment to their nation

because they serve at the
highest levels of government

and in the war department,
in the Navy department,

and then, eventually, in
the Department of Defense.

So they are the ones that really
drive US naval aviation, really

US military policy.

I mean, from the lowest level
when they are junior pilots

all the way to the
highest levels of command

into the Cold War era.

So it's really an amazing
journey of a truly unique group

of individuals.

David Ingalls became
assistant secretary of the Navy

for Air.

During World War II, he
surveyed the Pacific Islands

for possible bases and supply
routes and commanded Pearl

Harbor NAS, achieving
the rank of Rear Admiral.

Trubee Davison became the first
assistant secretary of War

for Air, went on to
serve as president

of the Museum of Natural
History for two decades,

and was the first personnel
director for the CIA.

John Vorys became a
10 term congressman

from Ohio, and during
World War II, again,

flew submarine patrols, this
time over the Gulf of Mexico.

Erl Gould was re-activated
into the Navy for World War II,

and during the Battle of Tarawa
established a fully operational

airfield for which he was
awarded the Legion of Merit.

Di Gates became president
of New York Trust.

Gates served as under
secretary of the Navy

for Air during the Second
War, dividing his time

between Washington
and the Pacific.

Robert Lovett was made
assistant secretary of War

for Air, becoming one of the
architects of strategic bombing

in World War II.

He went on to serve as President
Harry Truman's acting secretary

of state during
the Berlin airlift

and secretary of defense
during the Korean War.

As one of the so-called wise
men of governmental advisors,

Lovett would influence
military and foreign policy

for most of the 20th century.

The men of
the Yale Flying Club had

a sense of duty, honor,
country, and they, they,

they felt they were privileged
and had an obligation

to lead and take on the
dangers inherent particularly

in a new technology
and going to war.

They wanted to go
fight for their country

because they felt, an their
cultural background was,

there was a duty of service
to, to one's country.

And those who were given
much in privilege, much more

was expected.

50 years after the
formation of the First Yale

Unit, in a ceremony at
Peacock Point in 1966,

Trubee Davidson was finally
honored with his Navy wings.

That was wonderful.

See, the Navy took us in as
a group of younger brothers.

We weren't soldiers,
or sailors, or airmen.

We had plenty of
things to fight for.

And you could have the
satisfaction of loyalty,

service, and doing
something that you

believed in with
a group of people

that you loved and respected.

That's what kept us going.

There's not a question about it.

The unit members
left an inspirational legacy

as well.

Defined by their notion
of service, their response

to the call to arms,
dedication to their cause,

and undying loyalty
to one another.

As Robert Lovett said
of Kenneth MacLeish,

for sheer singleness of
purpose, for real idealism

and for rare spirit, nothing I
have ever heard can equal it.