This week Sabine’s battlefield guide Saturday is going back in the air as promised two Black pilots this week who both fought for france and since i kind of love this subject next week will be an Italian pilot.
Pierre Réjon
On August 22, 1914, Réjon volunteered in the 33rd Infantry Battalion in the French army. He was immediately sent to Istres, a city in the south of France, for training, and was promoted to second lieutenant in 1915. In July 1917, he became a student in the French military air academy. After few months of training, he obtained his degree on September 26, 1917, and became a military pilot on December 1917.
Assigned to squadron N 160, then N 84, where he flew a Nieuport, he joined the squadron of Roosters, the SPA 62 in June 1918, where he flew in a Spad VII that he had given the name Zaza, it was to give himself courage and to keep luck on his side. Why Zaza?Well it was after his little sister Isadie Réjon, whom he adored. He was shot down three times, but each time he survived, hit 11 German planes and shot down 4 of them in aerial combat. Demobilized, he was killed in a plane crash in French Guiana at the age of 25 on the 15th of August 1920
Eugene Jaques Bullard
He was born in Georgia in 1895 son of William Bullard, a black man from Martinique, and Josephine Thomas, a Creek Indian. His ancestors had been slaves in Haiti and left the Caribbean to seek refuge with the Creek Indians in America.
in the summer of 1914, Bullard enlisted in the French Foreign Legion. While serving with the 170th Infantry Regiment, Bullard fought in the the Battle of Verdun (February to December 1916), where he was wounded seriously. He was taken from the battlefield and sent to Lyon to recuperate. While on leave in Paris, Bullard bet a friend $2,000 that despite his color he could enlist in the French flying service. Bullard’s determination paid off, and in November 1916 he entered the Aéronautique Militaire and received his wings in May 1917. He was first assigned to Escadrille Spa 93, and then to Escadrille Spa 85 in September 1917, where he remained until he left the Aéronautique Militaire. In November 1917, Bullard claimed two aerial victories, a Fokker Triplane and a Pfalz D.III, but neither could be confirmed. (Some accounts say that one victory was confirmed.) During his flying days, Bullard is said to have had an insignia on his Spad 7 C.1 that portrayed a heart with a dagger running through it and the slogan “All Blood Runs Red.” Bullard flew with a mascot, a Rhesus Monkey named “Jimmy.”
sources :
une- autre- histoire . org
azmartinique.com