OMG! This is the story I read about at the Champlin Air Museum out in Phoenix!
What’s the chance I would see someone post about it? Because outside that one time 25 years ago, I hadn’t heard it since!
As it is, this chalks up there with the 1914 Christmas! Germans really aren’t all bad, are they?
(When you're a government spending a fortune on propaganda, a story that demonstrates the humanity of the enemy could do considerable damage to your efforts.)
After the 1914 Christmas truce, both the Germans and the British troops had to be rotated out of their respective places on the front lines; neither side was willing to fire at the other.
Yeah, aside from that whole waging war against everybody..twice...and the Holocaust, they were pretty well behaved during the 20th Century. Only came in third on the total body count. Guess they didn't try hard enough.
My folks, from great grandparents aunts and uncles onward, instilled in each of us a sense of honor and right and wrong. In this instance, the German pilot displayed an amount of honor. You don't kill for no reason. The bomber crew was, essentially, defenseless.