'The man who fell from the sky'

A tour of a B-17 fighter plane brought back memories for Paul Gordon, shown beside the same type of "ball turret" he occupied during missions over enemy territory in World War II.

(Paul Gordon of Coudersport was a featured speaker during a Veterans Day program held on Monday at Coudersport High School. He discussed his experiences with journalist Paul W. Heimel.)

The horror of the 1942 bombing raid over the Germanoccupied French city of Lille came back to him with a jarring clarity.

German fighter pilots riddled his B-17 with gunfire as Paul Gordon huddled helplessly in the ball turret. His gun was jammed; Gordon had no choice but to bury his head and shoulders behind the weapon's sight and say a quiet prayer as streams of bullets tore into the belly of the disabled aircraft.

He took a hit in the foot and another round next to his elbow.

Fire began to sweep through the vessel. Its tail section broke free and the remainder of the plane started to turn in a circle, more than 20,000 feet above the ground.

Staff Sergeant Paul R. Gordon was reported missing in action in October 1942. The Tamaqua native, now a resident of Coudersport, survived a plane crash and was rescued by a French family. He was later held by the Germans as a prisoner of war and released when World War II ended.

"So this is what it's like to die," Gordon recalled saying to himself.

He struggled with his parachute, freeing himself from the falling plane at about 3,000 feet and drifting toward the great unknown. Moments later, he crashed hard to the ground, battered and bleeding.

Drifting in and out of consciousness, Gordon found himself huddled in a wheel barrow, being rushed down a road by a Frenchman who had witnessed this horror in the sky.

"Where am I?" Gordon inquired.

His rescuer, Renee Blervaque, was able to explain to Gordon that he would be cared for in the nearby village of Mouchin until the German military police arrived to take him into custody.

Dozens of curious citizens flocked to Blervaque's home, anxious to help the disabled American soldier and eager to learn of his condition. Some of the women kissed him softly on the cheek, offering words of encouragement.

A teenaged boy arrived moments later with the shreds of his parachute and an ammunition belt, pulled from the wreckage of the downed bomber.

With the German MPs nearing, Gordon quickly handed his dog tags to one of the Mouchin villagers.

"If there's any way to do it, could you get word back to my mother?" Gordon pleaded. "Tell her I'm okay."

Fifty years later...

Paul Gordon made his daily trip to the mailbox in Coudersport to retrieve the usual pile of bills and sales circulars. Buried in the stack was an air mail letter, bearing a postmark from Leers, France.

Its author was Alain Durier, a French researcher studying his nation's military history. Durier was particularly interested in the "Flying Fortress" bombing raid of the rail facilities at Lille, where German military supplies had been stored. Gordon's plane was the only one that had been shot down.

Gordon sent an account of his experiences and assumed that his involvement was over. However, Durier's curiosity was piqued.

He tracked down Renee Blervaque's survivors, who still possessed Gordon's flying scarf and a section from his parachute.

Huguette Blervaque was nine years old when the American B-17 was blown apart over Mouchin. She remembered, in vivid detail, the day her father ran out into the field to rescue "the man who fell from the sky."

Huguette couldn't contain her excitement to learn that Gordon had recovered from his injuries and -- after years of captivity in German prison camps -- had been liberated and returned to the United States.

She composed a long letter, pleading with Gordon to return to the area of his rescue, where he remained the subject of local folklore.

Within a matter of months, Gordon and his wife were bound for what they assumed would be a quiet reunion.

After exchanging pleasantries, Gordon, with a heavy heart, informed Huguette and her husband that he was ready to visit the field where he lay helplessly 50 years ago.

Tears welled in Gordon's eyes as the memories flooded back to him: the lifeless bodies of five crewmates slumped over their weapons; the helplessness of being unable to return gunfire; the pain and shock of being wounded; and the searing realization that he would not live to enjoy the freedoms he had fought to protect.

Huguette presented Gordon with his flying scarf and a 50- caliber gun cartridge retrieved from the B-17 wreckage. Huguette said her father had often worn the scarf, in honor of Americans who sacrificed their lives in World War II.

The following day, as Gordon returned to the site of the crash, he was greeted by hundreds of townspeople.

The American and French flags were raised as a small brass band played "The Star Spangled Banner" and the National Anthem of France. Gordon was then escorted to the precise spot where Renee Blervaque had located him.

There, town officials unveiled a granite memorial containing the names of the five crew members who were killed.

One-by-one, the townspeople filed past Paul Gordon, many of them embracing him and sharing their memories from that fateful day in 1942. Children asked for his autograph and reached out to touch the man about whom their parents and grandparents had often spoke.

Later, Mr. and Mrs. Gordon boarded a restored 1942 military vehicle to lead a procession toward the village. Sirens wailed, trumpets sounded and drums pounded as he was escorted down the same road he had last traveled as a wounded soldier, curled into a wheel barrow.

Final stop on Gordon's odyssey was a local schoolhouse where, through an interpreter, he described his experiences to the students and answered their questions.

The children presented him with drawings depicting their own impressions of the 1942 episode.

"You'd have thought I was the President or something," Gordon said of the reception. "I only wish that the rest of my crew could have been there, but maybe they were . . . maybe they were."