We turned and as we did the Germans realized that we had found ourselves and the battle royal ensued. The leader came first and behind him the three others in good formation, throwing two singing streams of fire from each plane, for in attacking balloons they used incendiary bullets. The leader, to my mind, was the only one that seemed to have had experience—he was, indeed, good—but the rest of them I thought were boobs—they did not seem to have the least bit of initiative, always waiting for the leader and doing exactly whatever he did first. Then they tried a formation I had never seen before. Climbing about two hundred feet above and on all sides of us, they kept making a series of short dives, each plane firing about twenty-five rounds at each dive. The object of this was undoubtedly to get our morale and if possible force us down without taking a chance on coming close where machine gun fire could become effective. This was to our advantage for we were making time toward home and I only had one full magazine of ammunition left and it was all in my right gun. Upon seeing that we were not falling for their cunning ruse the leader became unusually bully and came directly upon us. I let him have it for a burst of about forty rounds which I knew went into his plane and at the end of which he had gone under my tail in a dive. It looked as if I had gotten him. With typical precision the other three came on. I deliberately aimed my gun upon the nearest, greatly encouraged in the belief that I had gotten the leader. Their bullets of fire were going into my plane, but with a most deliberate aim I again pulled the trigger. It would not fire. At most I had only sixty rounds left, but even in sixty rounds there was hope. The gun was jammed and I could not get the magazine off to put it on the other gun. I was desperate. How close the three came I do not know, but seeing my predicament they realized my helplessness and pounced upon me like a toy target. Frantically I worked at the gun, my hands bruised and bleeding, hopelessly trying to unlock the jam for a last chance with life. If I only had something to fit in the cocking piece to give me enough leverage to clear that jam. In my mad desperation and hopelessness I looked around for something to hurl—anything to get them away. There was nothing to be done—it was all up with us. By chance I glanced into the bottom of the cockpit and on the floor my eyes caught sight of a Very pistol which had been left in the plane by the observer on the previous mission whose duty it had been to find the front line of our advanced troops.