American bomber pilot Charlie Brown was flying his B‑17, Ye Olde Pub, back from a mission over Bremen in December 1943 when his aircraft was nearly destroyed by flak and fighters. The crew were wounded, one gunner was dead, and the tail section was shredded so badly that the bomber could barely stay in the air. As Brown struggled to keep the plane level, a German fighter flown by Luftwaffe ace Franz (Hanz) Stigler pulled up alongside. Stigler was moments away from firing, but when he saw the bomber’s condition and the injured crew inside, he realized shooting them down would be an execution, not combat. Bound by a personal code of honor taught by his commander, that a pilot should never kill an enemy who could no longer defend himself, Stigler refused to fire. Instead, Stigler flew in formation beside the crippled B‑17, shielding it from German anti‑aircraft guns and escorting it safely toward the North Sea. Before turning back, he looked at Brown, raised his hand in a salute, and peeled away. Brown and his crew made it home, but he kept the encounter secret for decades, fearing he might get Stigler in trouble. In the late 1980s, Brown began searching for the mysterious German pilot, eventually finding Stigler in 1990. The two men reunited, became close friends, and remained so until they died months apart in 2008, a story of wartime mercy that became one of the most famous acts of chivalry in aviation history.
