Douglas Daily Dispatch

a lower altitude and started home on zig-zag course to observe both sides of the railroad.

Near Leon I saw three men walking along the road. Two hundred yards ahead I noted three others.

Ahead another 200 yards were two more groups of 15 or 20 each. I glanced at my gasoline gauge—and the groups disappeared.

I circled and looked over again. Of all surprises! There, breaking out of the brush, came some 600 riflemen.

Each had his weapon pointed at me.

And suddenly the zip-zip-zip of several machine guns stung the air while hundreds of rifles began to pop.

Several bullets struck the machine.

I was helpless, caught heading into the wind. The band was directly beneath me and I could not get my guns on them. We had no bombs, so my only hope was to get out of their range before a bullet struck some vital spot.

Immediately I gave her "full gun" as we speak of full throttle. Shots continued to hit the plane, one bullet carrying away part of the rudder bar, another nearly severing one control wire and a third striking my seat. In all, the plane was hit 15 times.

And here comes the thrill. I climbed to 2500 feet and prepared to return the attack, according to our orders. Having reached the altitude I dived straight at the "600 of Nicaragua." I lined my sights on them while we picked up speed in that vertical rush until we were dropping at the rate of 150 miles an hour.

I opened up with a fixed gun and fired a full belt of 150 rounds. Once the bullets began to pour into the group it melted as its members scrambled out of there. I pulled up barely 50 feet above the tree tops and, strangely, only a few men could be seen. All the others had completely disappeared.