The Cannibal Queen (44 page)

Ruston only has one north-south runway with a parallel taxi-way on the eastern side of it, but coming in I keep hearing people talking on Unicom about runway 34 Right and 34 Left. As I make the left downwind I am searching without success for the second runway.

Have I got the right town? Appears so. The right airport? Well, this one is where the map says Ruston’s airport is and it has just the one runway depicted on the sectional chart. So what the devil is this right and left stuff?

On the ground I find out when a Cessna comes floating in and lands on the taxiway.
That’s
34 Right, fella!

Airborne again, I level the
Queen
at 1,500 feet and head northeast for Arkansas. My route takes me northwest of Monroe, across Bayou D’Arbonne and the town of Farmerville. (Yes, Farmerville! And no, I have no idea what possessed these people to name it that. Maybe there was a banker or merchant named Guido McGillicuddy Farmer that they wanted to honor. Maybe they were tired of farmer and salesmen jokes. Good Lord, who can say?) Somewhere past Farmerville I cross the route that David and I used in June to get to Monroe.

But the clouds are coming down. Now they’re just above my head. Visibility still pretty good though.

But I am descending to stay out of the clouds. I’m flying a compass course, 040, and the way ahead looks gloomy. Oh well, the tank is full of gasoline—why not give it a try?

The land below me is swamp with large trees growing here and there. Looks like miserable country for a forced landing, but the worst of it is that there are no landmarks or highways.

When I pass over a river I look left and can make out a lake to the northwest. Good. That’s the reservoir at Felsenthal. I’m on course for Crossett. But I’m down to 500 feet. Visibility down to two or three miles. Where in the heck is this town? If I miss it by much I’ll never see it.

But I hit it dead on. The first thing I see is a road leading north. I follow that until I catch sight of the pulp mill. Whew, that smell! But the land looks firm enough under all those trees. I seem to have cleared the swamp.

But is this Crossett? And how low does this fog go? Should I turn around?

There’s an airport just east of here. I’ll land there and call Flight Service. That’s a good plan. I turn and follow the highway leading true east. Minutes pass. It’s misting rain and the stuff collects and flows along the windscreens.

But the airport isn’t there!

Either I’m on the wrong road or that town wasn’t Crossett. It might have been Hamburg, ten miles away. But I was on course. Or was I?

When I hit a decently wide two-lane highway running north and south, I swing the
Queen
north. Wrong choice. The fog ahead goes all the way to the ground. I lower the left wing to turn her and glance out the right side—at absolutely nothing. Momentarily disoriented, I look left. The ground is still there, but I’m too high. I drop her some and roll out heading south. I’m going to fly south out of this stuff.

Just south of the Arkansas line the clouds lift. I am back at a thousand feet when I sight the town of Bastrop. If it is Bastrop. It should be, but what if it isn’t?

I fly around the water tower of the pulp mill and look for a name. A forest products company! Whatever happened to civic pride?

But there’s an airport where Bastrop’s is depicted. Okay. I give them a call.

No answer. Terrific! But they have the name of the town painted on the runway. “Bastrop.” If I ever manage an airport, I’m going to do that.

I fly over and can’t find the wind sock. When it goes bad, it all goes bad. I set up for the northern runway, 34, just like at Ruston. On final I have the power at idle and I’m floating. The wind’s behind me.

I go around and come in on runway 16. The wind is out of the south. Tiny crosswind.

The line boy motions me over to a pump on the side of the mat. “We’re about out of gas,” he tells me. “The truck is supposed to be here this afternoon but he hasn’t showed up yet.”

“Got any left?”

“Maybe a little.”

“Well, let’s put it in and see if it’s enough.”

We drain the tank into the Queen. She could hold another gallon or two, but that’ll do.

I go inside and call Flight Service.

“Go east,” the man on the phone says. “You won’t have any problems. Scattered showers maybe, but the ceiling at Greenville, Mississippi, is fourteen thousand feet. Ten thousand at Greenwood. Memphis has scattered showers around, ceiling at ten. Should be okay.”

“I had a little trouble flying through Arkansas.”

“Yeah, well, they’ve had rain and fog this afternoon. That stuff is moving southeast at ten knots. Shouldn’t be a factor.”

It isn’t. I cross the Mississippi River at 1,500 feet just north of Lake Providence and angle a little north of Rolling Fork. Then I point more north and fly across Belzoni. A rain shower dampens the
Queen
but the clouds are high, at least 10,000 feet. Below is the Mississippi bottomland, flat as a pancake and intensely cultivated, cut up by meandering rivers that occasionally looped back on themselves and made crescent lakes. Spotted here and there are ponds in series, catfish farms.

I land at Greenwood, Mississippi, because they have a Flight Service Station on the field and I want a look at the prognosis charts. Before I can shut down the man in the nonfederal tower asks, “We have a new man here in the tower. You have time to give him a ride?”

The request is unexpected. I’m tired and it’s after 5
P.M.
, and I do want to get to Savannah tonight. But what the hell is the rush? Why not? Wasn’t fun the object of this whole trip? “Send him out.”

His name is Ed Pitcock. “It’s like cockpit,” he informs me, “but reversed.”

“You ever been up in an open cockpit plane, Ed?”

“No.”

“This’ll be the most fun you ever had with your clothes on. We won’t do any aerobatics, just fly around a little and give you a taste of it.”

And that is what we do. Gentle turns and pirouettes in the afternoon sky. I let Ed fly some. He experiments while I sit back and relax. I’ve been in this seat almost eight hours already today, but having someone up front who has never seen it makes it all fresh and beautiful.

The air is dead calm. I set the power and let the
Queen
descend at exactly 80 MPH. The flare works out perfectly and we squeak on all three wheels.

Amen!

Savannah, Tennessee, is not on the Mississippi bottomland. It’s on the drainage of the Tennessee River, a heavily wooded area of low, rolling hills. Nearby is the Shiloh battlefield, which I have come to visit.

I arrive just as the sun is setting. No one answers on Unicom. No doubt they’ve locked up for the night. I fly over the runway and look for the wind sock. Looks like a light breeze out of the northwest.

I swing out for a left downwind and set the power at twelve inches. The air is so smooth that the
Queen
comes around the turn like she was on rails, which I confess delights me. After 9.4 hours of flying today, I want one more good landing and then I will be content.

The saint in charge of landings happens to be a former U.S. naval aviator named Roger Ball. He smacked the back end of the ship one bad Navy night and ended up in the spud locker, but they saved his bones and a couple miracles are attributed to them. So he got promoted to saint. That’s why every U.S. Navy landing Signal Officer says “Roger Ball” when you tell him who you are and how much fuel you have. He’s really praying.

Tonight Saint Roger grants my wish. He gives me a bona fide greaser.

A Cessna Citation, a twin-engine business jet, sat on the ramp in front of the FBO. The crew watched me taxi in and maneuver myself into a tiedown spot. When I came strolling over they assured me the place was indeed locked up tighter than John Sununu’s hatband.

“Watched you come in,” one of them told me. “Boy, that Stearman was pretty against the dark sky with the last rays of the sun on it.”

“She’s a good ol’ gal.’

They broke out the catered food that their client today didn’t eat and beer all around. We ate it using the Citation’s wing as a table. Stale ham-and-cheese sandwiches and potato chips. I’ve never eaten better.

And they gave me news. (A) Savannah didn’t have a taxi service. (B) Every motel in town was full. (C) The coup in the Soviet Union was over. Gorby’s back.

“Over?”

“Yeah. They say they caught some of those commie clowns on the way to the airport. Guess they were taking the first flight to Mexico. One of them shot himself.”

How about that!

Their names were Bill Greenwald and Chuck Davis. We got acquainted over beer as the twilight faded to darkness. They’ve read my books. They’re truly great guys.

And they called their office in Columbus, Ohio, and the duty dog there got them rooms at the Pickwick Inn, a hotel run by the State of Tennessee at the Pickwick Dam 15 miles south of town. The inn sent a van. Bill and Chuck invited me to ride along.

When we got there the Pickwick had an extra room for me.

The morning papers were full of the collapse of the attempted coup in the Soviet Union. In a twist straight from a fairy tale, freedom and democracy triumphed over the forces of darkness, forces led by the most inept group of would-be dictators that has ranted and postured on the world stage in many a year.

Communism is as dead as Vladimir Lenin. Like him, it will probably be mummified and displayed in a Moscow mausoleum as a reminder of the bad old days. Lenin they’ll probably just bury. He richly deserves it.

So today around the globe people are euphoric. The stock market’s up, nuclear war looks more and more inconceivable, the human race’s chances of surviving on this lonely pebble in space look better and better.

Of course, the bloom will soon be off the rose as people in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union come to realize that democracy is no panacea, that free elections don’t create jobs, food, housing, clothing or meaningful lives. All democracy does is place power in the hands of people who are accountable. Those with power can still misuse it, still make grievous errors. Democracy is a thing worth dying for, but I don’t think that the people of the Soviet Union yet realize it. For them, now, democracy is simply the promise of a better life.

After reading the paper this morning I rented a car and drove out to the Shiloh National Military Park, which is run by the National Park Service. This was my first visit to Shiloh, long delayed and long anticipated.

Perhaps I should fill you in on the battle that was fought around the little log Shiloh Church above Pittsburg Landing on April 6 and 7, 1862. Forty thousand Union troops under Major General U. S. Grant had ascended the Tennessee River and disembarked at Pittsburg Landing on the west side of the river. They were awaiting the arrival of an additional 25,000 men under Major General Don Carlos Buell, and when assembled, would march the 24 miles southwest to Corinth, Mississippi, where 44,000 Confederate soldiers under General P. G. T. Beauregard were guarding the railroad junction of the Memphis & Charleston and the Mobile & Ohio. Beauregard knew Grant’s army was coming, so he suggested to his superior officer, Albert Sidney Johnston, that the Confederates march to Pittsburg Landing and smite the Yankees before the entire Federal host assembled.

General Johnston came to Corinth, looked the situation over, and concluded Beauregard’s advice was sound. Indeed, it was the only course open to the Confederate defenders. Outnumbered and ill-equipped, the Confederates were doomed if they waited for the Federals to assemble and march to Corinth for an assault.

For the first and only time in his military career, U. S. Grant was caught by a surprise attack. He had underestimated his opponent. That was a mistake he would never repeat.

After a sloppy march and a two-day delay in front of the Federal army that Beauregard thought must now be on full alert, the Confederates hit the Yankees with a clumsy attack just before dawn on Sunday, April 6. The soldiers on both sides were green as grass, but while they lacked experience they had ardor aplenty. The Confederates hit hard, repeatedly, driven by Johnston, Beauregard and Braxton Bragg, three of the most determined warriors who ever fought on this continent.

They came oh so close, but in the end they just didn’t have enough to deliver the knockout punch. And the Confederates hadn’t counted on the steel in Ulysses S. Grant. Some of his officers counseled retreat that Sunday night. According to Bruce Catton, Grant snapped, “Retreat? No. I propose to attack at daylight and whip them.”

Catton added that William T. Sherman found Grant standing under a tree in the rain late that night—his headquarters had been converted into a hospital—and said, “Well, Grant, we’ve had the devil’s own day, haven’t we?”

“Yes,” Grant said, and puffed on his cigar. “Yes. Lick ’em tomorrow, though.”

That night the remainder of Buell’s men arrived. Deducting the previous day’s casualties, Grant’s army now numbered 55,000. The next day Grant drove them forward and recaptured the ground he had lost. Fought out, with Albert Sidney Johnston dead and 15,000 other men dead, wounded or missing, the Confederates retreated to Corinth Monday night. Grant tried to follow, but he had no cavalry and his troops were fought out too.

The Federals had 3,500 men killed and another 6,600 wounded. In addition, the Confederates captured about 2,500 Union soldiers. At the time this was the bloodiest battle ever fought on this continent and the long casualty lists stunned people north and south who had thought this would be a short, easy war.

Amazingly, the battle was fought by raw troops, some of whom had never even fired their muskets before. Some of the inexperienced volunteers cut and ran at the first volley, but most dug in their heels and fought savagely. A lot of them fought to the death.

The irony of the battle was the aftermath, which presented the Union with a golden opportunity. With the whipped Confederate Army camped at Corinth, the more numerous Federals could have bagged the whole lot if they had moved fast and decisively. The entire Confederate military situation in the west had come unhinged.