The Harvard Volunteers in Europe
Description:... This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1916 edition. Excerpt: ... "LE ROI DE L'AIR EST ROYALE-MENT MORT" IN these words a Parisian journalist brought to an end his tribute to the life and death of Victor Chapman.1 This young graduate of Harvard, of the class of 1913, a son of John Jay Chapman, '84, was in Paris, studying architecture, when the War broke out. He enlisted at once in the Foreign Legion of the French Army, and rendered courageous, cheerful service in its ranks. When the FrancoAmerican Aviation Squadron was formed in the spring of 1915, Chapman attached himself to it, the youngest of the five Harvard men in the corps--Frazier Curtis, '98, Norman Prince, '08, Laurence Rumsey, '08, and E. C. Cowdin, 2d, '09, being the others. Chapman's skill and intrepidity won him, among the French, the title of " le roi de l'air." The sheer joy of the perilous game he was playing, with all the devotion of a nature quickened by a deep sense of righteousness, imparts a color of its own to the pages of the following letter written to his younger brother in the month before that of his death. 1 See L'Opinion, Paris, July i, 1916. May 3, 1916 Dear Conrad: Ha! A snooze and a warm bath at the cure house. Now, let's see--yesterday my machine not being ready, I took an old baby, sent for the M. F.'s to practise on: nice engine, climbs fine, just the thing to practise 'virages' with, and make one at home in an aeroplane turning unusual positions. 'Kerage' verticale; to the right, to the left; renverssemenl a 'loopine'; up, up, upside down, motor cut waiting, waiting--I forgot to keep the broomstick on my stomach, so it did not finish, but began to corkscrew down, nose first. "What the deuce?" I thought, " ah, yes, the famous vrille one hears so much about." Whee, but she spins round! Here's where I apply the...
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