A Higher Call

There is a wonderful book called "A Higher Call" about this TRUE story below.

The 21-year old American B-17 pilot glanced outside his cockpit and froze.  He blinked hard and looked again, hoping it was just a mirage. But his Co-Pilot stared at the same horrible vision.  "My God, this is a nightmare," the Co-Pilot said.

"He's going to destroy us," the Pilot agreed.

The men were looking at a gray German Messerschmitt fighter hovering just three feet off their wingtip.  It was five days before Christmas 1943, and the fighter had closed in on their crippled American B-17 bomber for the kill.

Brown's Crippled B-17 Stalked by Stigler's ME-109

The B-17 Pilot, Charles Brown, was a 21-year-old West Virginia farm boy on his first combat mission.  His bomber had been shot to pieces by swarming fighters, and his plane was alone, struggling to stay in the skies above Germany. Half his crew was wounded, and the tail gunner was dead, his blood frozen in icicles over the machine guns.

But when Brown and his Co-Pilot, Spencer "Pinky" Luke, looked at the Fighter Pilot again, something odd happened. The German didn't pull the trigger. He stared back at the bomber in amazement and respect. Instead of pressing the attack, he nodded at Brown and saluted. What happened next was one of the most remarkable acts of chivalry recorded during World War Il.   

      

Luftwaffe Major Franz Stigler 

 Stigler pressed his hand over the rosary he kept in his flight jacket.  He eased his index finger off the trigger.  He couldn't shoot.  It would be murder.  Stigler wasn't just motivated by vengeance that day. He also lived by a code.  He could trace his Family's Ancestry to Knights in 16th Century Europe.  He had once studied to be a Priest.  A German Pilot who spared the enemy, though, risked death in Nazi Germany.  If someone reported him, he would be executed.

Yet, Stigler could also hear the voice of his commanding officer, who once told him:  "You follow the rules of war for you -- not your enemy. You fight by rules to keep your humanity."

Alone with the crippled bomber, Stigler changed his mission. He nodded at the American Pilot and began flying in formation so German anti-aircraft gunners on the ground wouldn't shoot down the slow-moving bomber. (The Luftwaffe had B-17's of its own, shot down and rebuilt for secret missions and training.)  Stigler escorted the bomber over the North Sea and took one last look at the American Pilot.  Then he saluted him, peeled his fighter away and returned to Germany.

"Good luck," Stigler said to himself.  "You're in God's hands now..."  Franz Stigler didn't think the big B-17 could make it back to England and wondered for years what happened to the American Pilot and crew he encountered in combat   

Charles Brown, with his wife, Jackie (left), with Franz Stigler, with his wife, Hiya.

As he watched the German fighter peel away that December day, 2nd Lt. Charles Brown wasn't thinking of the philosophical connection between enemies.  He was thinking of survival.  He flew his crippled plan, filled with wounded, back to his base in England and landed with one of four engines knocked out, one failing and barely any fuel left.  After his bomber came to a stop, he leaned back in his chair and put a hand over a pocket Bible he kept in his flight jacket. Then he sat in silence.

Brown flew more missions before the war ended. Life moved on.  He got married, had two Daughters, supervised foreign aid for the U.S. State Department during the Vietnam War and eventually retired to Florida.

Late in life, though, the encounter with the German Pilot began to gnaw at him.  He started having nightmares, but in his dream there would be no act of mercy.  He would awaken just before his bomber crashed.

Brown took on a new mission.  He had to find that German Pilot.  Who was he?  Why did he save my life?  He scoured Military Archives in the U.S. and England.  He attended a Pilots' Reunion and shared his story.  He finally placed an ad in a German Newsletter for former Luftwaffe Pilots, retelling the story and asking if anyone knew the Pilot.

On January 18, 1990, Brown received a letter. He opened it and read:  "Dear Charles, All these years I wondered what happened to that B-17, did she make it home?  Did her crew survive their wounds?  To hear of your survival has filled me with indescribable joy..."

It was Stigler.

He had had left Germany after the war and moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1953.  He became a prosperous Businessman.  Now retired, Stigler told Brown that he would be in Florida come summer and "it sure would be nice to talk about our encounter."  Brown was so excited, though, that he couldn't wait to see Stigler.  He called Directory Assistance for Vancouver and asked whether there was a number for a Franz Stigler.  He dialed the number, and Stigler picked up.

"My God, it's you!"  Brown shouted as tears ran down his cheeks.

Brown had to do more. He wrote a letter to Stigler in which he said: "To say THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU on behalf of my surviving crew members and their families appears totally inadequate."

The two Pilots would meet again, but this time in person, in the lobby of a Florida hotel.  One of Brown's Friends was there to record the Summer Reunion.  Both men looked like retired businessmen:  they were plump, sporting neat ties and formal shirts. They fell into each other' arms and wept and laughed.  They talked about their encounter in a light, jovial tone.

The mood then changed.  Someone asked Stigler what he thought about Brown.  Stigler sighed and his square jaw tightened.  He began to fight back tears before he said in heavily accented English: "I love you, Charlie."

Stigler had lost his Brother, his Friends and his Country.  He was virtually exiled by his Countrymen after the war.  There were 28,000 Pilots who fought for the German Air Force. Only 1,200 survived.  

The war cost him everything.  Charlie Brown was the only good thing that came out of World War II for Franz.  It was the one thing he could be proud of.  The meeting helped Brown as well, says his oldest daughter, Dawn Warner.

They met as enemies but Franz Stigler, on left, and Charles Brown, ended up as fishing buddies.

Brown and Stigler became pals. They would take fishing trips together. They would fly cross-country to each other homes and take road trips together to share their story at schools and Veterans' Reunions. Their Wives, Jackie Brown and Hiya Stigler, became Friends.

Brown's Daughter says her Father would worry about Stigler's health and constantly check in on him.

"It wasn't just for show," she says. "They really did feel for each other. They talked about once a week."  As his friendship with Stigler deepened, something else happened to her father, Warner says "The nightmares went away."

Brown had written a letter of thanks to Stigler, but one day, he showed the extent of his gratitude.  He organized a reunion of his surviving crew members, along with their extended families.  He invited Stigler as a Guest of Honor.  During the Reunion, a video was played showing all the faces of the people that now lived -- Children, Grandchildren, Relatives -- because of Stigler's act of Chivalry.  Stigler watched the film from his Seat of Honor.

"Everybody was crying, not just him," Warner says.

Stigler and Brown died within months of each other in 2008.  Stigler was 92, and Brown was 87.  They had started off as Enemies, became Friends, and then something more.

After he died, Warner was searching through Brown's library when she came across a book on German fighter jets. Stigler had given the book to Brown. Both were country boys who loved to read about planes.

Warner opened the book and saw an inscription Stigler had written to Brown: 
 
In 1940, I lost my only brother as a night fighter. On the 20th of December,   4 days before Christmas, I had the chance to save a

B-17 from her destruction, a plane so badly damaged, it was a

wonder that she was still flying. 

The Pilot, Charlie Brown, is for me as precious as my Brother was.
                                                                        
Thanks Charlie.
Your Brother, Franz 

Co. B, 8th Ohio Volunteer Infantry (Hibernian Guards) in the American Civil War

"The Valiant Hours" a semi book review

A tribute to James K. O'Reilly, Thomas Francis Galwey, James Butler

 and the men of the Hibernian Guards in the 8th Ohio Volunteer Infantry

by JC Sullivan

 James K. O'Reilly was returning from Sunday Mass at Cleveland, Ohio’s St. Edward Church on Woodland Avenue when news posters announced the assault on Ft. Sumter, South Carolina. America's Civil War began on that April day. O'Reilly, born on the Market Square, Longford Town, County Longford in 1838, came to Cleveland in 1858 via New York City. He and his Irish friends James Butler and Thomas Francis Galwey were anxious to join Union forces before the fight was over. They hurried to the armory of the Hibernian Guards and enlisted for three months, officially becoming Co. B, 8th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. When it was all over, almost five years later, the 8th Ohio would have 97 men present for muster-out out of a total 990 that began the unit.

     Kenneth R. Callahan, an attorney with the Cleveland law firm of Buckley King and most recently a Common Pleas Court Judge in Cuyahoga County, is a direct descendent of Captain O'Reilly, his maternal great-grandfather. He honors the spirit of his colorful and gallant forebear by insuring Americans don't forget the deeds and valor of the 8th Ohio, a unit that fought fiercely in most of the major battles of the Potomac Army. He also wants to insure that history accurately reflects the role they played in turning the famous 'Pickett's Charge' at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania in July of 1863.

     By June, 1863, Confederate General Robert E. Lee's rag-tag forces had moved into the farmlands of Pennsylvania, rich in the much-needed resources of food, material and steed.   The march to Gettysburg was brutally hot. Unlike modern armies, neither side at Gettysburg had winter and summer uniforms - only ones made of heavy wool. Some were lucky to have shoes. During the march to Gettysburg it was frightfully hot. O'Reilly suffered sunstroke and went by horse-drawn ambulance there. "When he found out the 8th was positioned outside the Emmitsburg Road," said Callahan, "he left the hospital and ran out and joined the company there."  

     O'Reilly, deathly ill, arrived at Gettysburg after the first day of battle. Colonel Samuel Springs Carroll (of the Maryland Carrolls) ordered the Hibernians immediately into a cornfield between the Union lines on Cemetery Ridge and Confederate lines on Seminary Ridge, with orders were to push rebel sharpshooters back. With this advanced picket line established, O'Reilly's Hibernians spent the night there while the rest of the brigade was pulled out by General Hancock to support other areas. Confederate sharpshooters reminded them of their closeness throughout the evening by shooting at them.

     On the morning of the 4th, General Lee, believing the center of the Union line to be weakened, opened up his attack with a two-hour artillery barrage. "Nothing more terrific than this story of artillery can be imagined," said Colonel Franklyn Sawyer. "The missiles of both armies passed over our heads. The roar of the guns was deafening, the air was soon clouded with smoke, and the shrieks and the startling crack of the exploding shells above, a round and in our midst; the blowing up of our caissons in our rear; the driving through the air of the fence rails, posts and limbs of trees; the groans of dying men, the neighing of frantic and wounded horses, created a scene of absolute horror."

  General Lee followed this up by sending fifteen thousand gray backs into the fray. The 15O - 18O men of the 8th Ohio poured rifle fire into the left flank of James J. Pettigrew's division. "They moved up splendidly," Sawyer wrote, "deploying into column as they crossed the long, sloping interval between us and their base. At first it looked like they would sweep our position, but as they advanced, their direction lay to our left." 

  "A moan went up from the battlefield distinctly to be heard amid the storm of battle," related survivor Galwey. The surprised Southerners, led by gallant officers on horseback, broke and retreated. "...the first sign of faltering came from Colonel J.M. Brockenbrough's brigade of Virginians who, under Pettigrew, were stationed in the extreme left of the advance, that is, directly in front of the 8th Ohio," Callahan related.

     With Sawyer admitting their 'blood was up', he then turned his men ninety degrees and fired into the flank of Joseph Davis' brigade. When Union commanders saw this development, they sent reinforcements down to turn the attack. The 8th advanced, cutting off three regiments, capturing their colors and many soldiers. Afterwards, an attempt was made to discharge Colonel Sawyer from the service for it was believed he was drunk...they thought no commander in his right mind would attempt such a maneuver with such a small force.    

                                                                           

      Later that summer, after the battle of Gettysburg, the 8th Ohio was sent to New York City for riot duty. When the draft was instituted, provisions were made for purchasing one's way out through the process of buying a substitute. Naturally, many Irish and other immigrants could not afford to do so and objected to the practice.         

      While there, O'Reilly met his future bride, Susan O'Brien. "The whole thing was a drinking expedition," Callahan said. "Commander Sawyer was telling everybody not to get drunk but about an hour later he was arrested for drunkenness. I think they had a good time in New York City."

     In August, 1865, at the war's end, O'Reilly returned to New York City and married Susan O'Brien at St. Stephen's Parish Church. The couple came to Cleveland and resided at 189 Quincy Ave., where they raised seven children. Part of the time he worked for Thomas Jones & Sons Monument Co., which was located at E. 28th & Prospect Ave. Because of his disability from his Gettysburg sunstroke, however, he was never able to work for long periods of time. He tried to get a pension the rest of his life in a protracted struggle with the War Department, not unlike modern American veterans of other conflicts. His widow Susan was finally awarded one in 1930, thirty years after his death. In 1900, after a funeral Mass at St. Edward's Church, O'Reilly was laid to rest in St. John's cemetery, next to the church.His stone, erected by his daughter, says simply, "Captain J.K. O'Reilly."                               

     Callahan met Captain O'Reilly's daughter, Isabelle, in 1952. She blamed her father for the fact that she never married. "She claimed every time somebody came over to see her he pulled them into the parlor and kept them up until midnight telling stories about the Civil War."

   Callahan is a graduate of Cleveland's St. Ignatius High School and received his undergraduate degree from Cleveland's John Carroll University. He received his law degree from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. Additionally, he studied art, history, anthropology and literature at both Trinity and University Colleges, Dublin. Callahan is a published author and a military historian. He and his spouse Martha are parents of Casey and Eoin.

   The following letter is Comrade Galwey’s tribute to his friend and Captain, as printed in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

New York, May 22nd, 1900

Editor of the Sunday Cleveland Plain Dealer

Sir:

     I desire as a comrade officer of the 8th Ohio Volunteer Infantry to say through the Plain Dealer (sic) a few words upon the military career of the late Captain J.K. O’Reilly, the news of whose recent death at 189 Quincy Street, Cleveland, has just reached us.

    

  During the twenty campaigns and more than sixty engagements in which the 8th Infantry gained its fame in the Civil War, O’Reilly’s influence and example, first among its non-commissioned officers and afterwards among its commissioned officers, contributed greatly to its fighting spirit, conduct and methods. He was fearless and quick-witted in the moment of danger or other emergency.

         The two bravest and most brilliant among the many brave and brilliant acts of that regiment were its bayonet charge across the Sunken or Bloody Lane at Antietam at the end of five hours close fighting, and its wheel to the left at Gettysburg, by which it struck the left flank of Pickett’s confederate column, and put it into disorder at that point, at the very moment when the front of that column had crossed the Emmittsburg Road and was shaking its battle flags at the “high water mark of the rebellion.”

            In both of those splendid manoeuvres O’Reilly was very conspicuous, if he was not to some extent the real author of each. He was at first a man of fine physique, and like many others who constantly exposed themselves, escaped almost unharmed by the enemy, but he suffered to the last from a sunstroke that befell him during fearful hot day on the march to Gettysburg, and I understand that this was the chief cause of his death.

     Cleveland is not today the quiet little city it was on the 16th of April, 1861, when, in defence of the Union, O’Reilly enlisted as a private in the Hibernian Guards, which became Company B of the 8th Ohio Infantry. But big and bustling as Cleveland has become, it will not, I imagine, forget the honor done to its name in the Civil War by such a man as O’Reilly.

Respectfully,

Thos. F. Galwey

15 West 123rd St.,

New York City

-30-

Author’s Note: Both Butler and Galwey relocated to New York City. Butler became keeper of General Grant’s Tomb. It is believed Galwey is also buried in St. John's Cemetery, Cleveland but as of this writing it has not been determined, nor will it possibly. He is NOT shown to rest in any New York City Catholic Cemeteries.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

GALWEY, THOMAS FRANCIS,The_Valiant_Hours,_Narrative_of_"Captain Brevet,"_an_Irish-American_in_the_Army_of_the_Potomac. Harrisburg PA., Stackpole Co., 1961. Col. William S. Nye, Editor            

DOWNES, CAPTAIN THOMAS M.F., Co. B. 8th Ohio Infantry (Reenactment)from_a_speech_to_the_Ancient_Order_of Hibernians,_Boland-Berry

Division, Cleveland, Ohio 1989.

CALLAHAN, KENNETH, conversations, 1993 - 2009.

Unbroken. by Laura Hillenbrand - a book review

UNBROKEN- A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption

a book review by JC Sullivan

I first learned of Louis Silvie Zamperini in early July when I read of his passing in the Plain Dealer. It referenced the bUnbroken, his true life experiences. I saved the obituary to make sure I read the book. When I did read it I learned his incredible story of a troubled childhood, competing in the U.S. Olympics, surviving a World War U.S. Army Air Force Pacific Ocean air crash, being adrift in a life raft for forty seven days, capture by the enemy, beatings, torture, freedom, alcoholism and eventual redemption. Now that I’ve read it I can only say his life story moved me deeply. Author Laura Hillenbrand, who wrote Seabiscuit, spent seven years researching, interviewing and writing his story. She, like Zamperini, is also an amazing human being.
ook  

Louie, as he was called, was born in Olean, New York to Italian immigrant parents Anthony and Louise.  Because he contracted pneumonia when two years old, Louie’s physician recommended a warmer climate. West went the family, all the way to the Torrance, California of 1919.

Like many other irascible young boys, his childhood was marred by continuous troubles he created for himself. The police knew him by name from the numerous situations he found himself in. His older brother Peter tried to be his mentor by encouraging him to compete in school sports, especially track events. With his attention and energy finally diverted to positive activities, Peter’s support of his younger brother paved the way for Louie to develop into a world-class runner, leading to winning a spot on the 1936 U.S. Olympic Team. The nineteen year old “Torrance Tornado” ran in the 5,000 meter race in Hitler’s Berlin, finishing 8^th.

With Germany’s military rampaging in Europe, he saw war clouds drifting towards the U.S. By then he was a student at the University of Southern California. Although he was focused on the entering the 1940 Olympics in Japan, he had learned that learned that anyone who enlisted before being drafted could choose their branch of service. Early in 1941 Louie went for the Army Air Corps. Events, however, interceded. The Olympics in Japan were cancelled when America was attacked later that year at Pearl Harbor, drawing us into World War Two.

Training as a bombardier, Louis was commissioned a Second Lieutenant. Author Laura Hillenbrand takes the reader through his training and assignments in Iowa, California, and Hawaii.  He was assigned to the 372^nd Bomb Squadron of the 307^th Bomb Group, Seventh Air Force. He had hoped to be assigned to a B-17 but instead he found himself in the bomber nobody wanted, Consolidated’s B-24 Liberator, nicknamed “the Flying Boxcar,”  a plane plagued with mechanical problems.

 On May 17, 1943 a rescue mission was formed to hunt for a lost B-24. The only plane available for Louie and a scraped-together crew was an unreliable B-24 nicknamed the  “Green Hornet.” Although it had “passed inspection”, they were wary to fly it. On that mission it failed its crew and crashed in the Pacific. Only two others survived, Indiana native and pilot Russell A. Phillips (“Phil”) and Ohio tail gunner  Sergeant Francis P. (Mac) McNamara. After Louie secured the two rafts that floated free from the plane, Mac began wailing “We’re gonna die,” words that later, unfortunately for him, proved prophetic. However, Mac emerged from his semi-comatose state of shock and redeemed himself by using one of the raft’s oars to fight the sharks that attempted to leap aboard the tiny raft and pull them into the sea. Forty seven days later, after having been strafed by a Japanese fighter and using his ingenuity to survive, survivors Louie and Phil were captured by the Japanese. That began an torture ordeal that few could survive and only ended in August, 1945 when the war ended.

Unbroken’s story doesn’t end there though. Upon his return home he descends into alcoholism to deal with his despair, anger and other spiritual demons. He has constantly recurring nightmares of the torture and beatings by his Japanese nemesis Watanabe. After his wife and friends persisted in getting him to go hear a Christian evangelist named Billy Graham preaching the word of God in Los Angeles, he eventually is able to discard his anger and negative lifestyle. Only then did his nightmares disappear, as did the murderous hatred he had for his tormentor.

As I read through this book I discerned parallel stories woven between the covers by its author, Laura Hillenbrand. Her storytelling gifts are numerous, beginning with her attention to the myriad technical details about life in the Army Air Corps of the Pacific wartime era. She tells of its men and equipment, their suffering, joy and remembrance, all of which puts the reader inside their flight jackets, living quarters, aircraft and their lives, before, during and after captivity. She contributes the real-life experiences of courageous men who went through it all and lived to tell her about it. And she manages to also tell the story of the hundreds of thousands lost at sea and on land.

The movie version of “Unbroken” is being released on Christmas Day, 2014, directed by Angelina Jolie. I plan on seeing it. Movies, through my eye, can never do a good book justice. In this case I hope I’m wrong. After you see it make sure you pick up the book as well. It will, I’m sure, complement the movie.

For information on where to purchase the book go to:  http://laurahillenbrandbooks.com/