Customer Reviews

The Price of Honor: The World War One Letters of Naval Aviator Kenneth MacLeish

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This WWI war diary of an American aviator from Yale University is an honest account of an aviator's dedication to the cause of freedom. Kenneth was in love with a woman back in the states, a distraction all in itself besides training on Sopwith Camels and other planes of dubious destinction..Always itching to get into action, which eventually leads to his death in no mans land, a treeless, barren, muddy and inhospitable area of loneliness where he succumbs to his wounds. Kenny was found a month or so later after the armistice, November 1918 by a farmer returning to his property.
The unique aspect of this dairy is following Kenny from Yale, crossing the Atlantic with his fellow classmates, all in Naval Aviation to a death in which life slowly drains away in the closing moments of the war. You get a sense of his romaticism for his fiancee, his devotion to his friends, his dedication to duty and his love for his family. And along the way you get to meet characters like Eddie Rickenbacker, Quentin Roosevelt, David Ingalls, Trubee Davison, Robert Lovett and his brother poet Archibald MacLeish. This is a time in our history when the elite and the rich felt it their duty and responsiblility to be involved as leaders in the military. Men who didn't mind doing the dirty work. You'll learn how a small cadre of fliers from Yale University help to organize and develope the branch of Naval aviation.
We get to experience a different aspect of flying other than the statistics of kills and near misses, medals won and a heros welcome. Instead there is the human element of fatal crashes during training, the tedious delays in training due to foul weather, the day and day out routine of barracks living and waking up in the morning with a roommate who doesn't come back after the morning or late evening patrol. Who do you think packed his belongings?
This and much more....No, this isn't like reading about the killer instincts of a Billy Bishop or the seclusive personality of an Albert Ball, this is about an American caught up in the fever of war, bound to the duty of his upbringing to "get in there" and do his part.
Hope you enjoy it as much as I did!