DAYS OF TRIAL AND TRIUMPH

Escape and Evasion: April and May 1942

The sixty-four haggard, muddy Raiders who avoided death, capture or internment struggled toward Chungking, the Nationalist capital. Many were walking wounded, suffering wrenched backs, cracked ribs, burned legs and bloody noses. The sudden appearance of barbarians in brown leather jackets and torn trousers, trudging through rocky terrain and around fields, amazed rural Chinese, who regarded the intruders not only with curiosity but fear and suspicion. The alien aviators viewed the locals with similar circumspection, since Japanese and puppet government forces could be almost anywhere.

Yet Raiders sought and received aid from peasants and woodcutters, many of whom had never seen an American. Guerrillas led them from one village to another. Missionaries, like American Baptist John Birch, guided them or offered refuge. Tung-sheng Liu, an English-speaking aeronautical engineering student running from the Japanese, acted as interpreter and saved many lives.

The strange visitors became popular attractions. Navigator Lieutenant Frank Kappeler, from Captain Greening's Plane Number Eleven, "Hari Carrier," recalled that as he "walked through villages, heading west, friendly Chinese followed me. Before long, my caravan was two hundred strong. I felt like Lawrence of Arabia."

Villagers carried Ted Lawson and his other seriously injured comrades to a small hospital on April 20, where Dr. White's crew luckily joined them. Gangrene set into Lawson's shredded leg, so on May 3, with enemy aircraft overhead, White and a Chinese colleague amputated. "Doc" then transfused his own blood into the patient with a syringe.

Afoot, astride shaggy ponies, aboard riverboats, charcoal-burning trucks, rickshaws and sedan chairs borne by field hands, the fliers escaped by devious routes toward the heartland. For three weeks, groups of Raiders, including Lawson, straggled into Chungking, where grateful Chinese leaders threw them a banquet and awarded them medals.