St. Louis man retraces his father's steps to freedom

ST. LOUIS -- Sixty years ago, Clayton David's plane went down over Holland, forcing the World War II airman to rely on civilians to escort him across Europe to the relative safety of Spain, and ultimately home.

His memories of that journey still fresh, he often shared them with his wife and children, both in the United States and on family jaunts to Europe. Now the Hannibal resident and one of his sons share a special connection to that experience. This spring, Lynn David of St. Louis retraced some of his father's steps.

"Not too many sons are willing to do that," the elder David, now 84, said. "It's a real compliment. It shows interest in what I did and appreciation for the people who helped me."

Clayton David said as far as he knows, no one has duplicated such a journey. He says he's in contact with hundreds of families of World War II airmen who evaded the enemy and escaped to freedom.

He's a member of the Air Force Escape and Evasion Society, consisting of airmen who successfully evaded capture after bailing out of their aircraft over Europe in World War II and some of the European civilians who helped them.

Lynn David, 55, said retracing his father's steps in April was both physically challenging and emotional, but that he'd like to go back one more time.

An experienced mountain climber and owner of a management consulting firm in St. Louis, Lynn David said he'd ventured into his father's journey in years past. But this time, he wanted to tackle the most challenging and last leg of his father's trip, crossing the Pyrenees Mountains in April, the same time of year his father had climbed them to safety.

He said he made the trip "to honor my father for what he did, and honor the people who helped him."

On Jan. 11, 1944, a young Clayton David was co-pilot of a B-17 when it went down over Amsterdam. That day, 109 men in 11 planes in his bomb group went down. He was the only one to escape capture or death.

With the help of European civilians involved in the Underground or Resistance, he walked, took trains and traversed through mountains across Holland, Belgium and France into the relatively safe harbor of Spain.

"Spain was supposed to be neutral but (Francisco) Franco had won the civil war with the help of Hitler and his equipment and tanks," Clayton David said. "Franco owed Hitler so when we arrived in Spain we were arrested and not automatically released."

When he parachuted into Holland, the locals escorted him through Belgium, safe house to safe house, and into Paris.

From there he walked to southern France, where he stayed with a couple in the Underground for three weeks before connecting with a Resistance group fighting the Germans. The group then turned him over to a French Basque guide who escorted him and a handful of others across the magnificent and treacherous Pyrenees Mountains, which run along the border between France and Spain.

David and his fellow travelers -- another U.S. airman, a Spaniard, a Frenchman and their guide -- hiked the foothills and mountains under cover of darkness and clouds to avoid detection. Only mountain residents were permitted to travel the so-called Forbidden Zone. They hiked three days and three nights along treacherous paths and often in waist-deep snow at an extreme altitude -- 12,000 feet.

"We were not dressed for that," he said. "My GI shoes were cut into pieces and I threw them away. That's how rough the crossing was."

He said travel at night was so dark, "the lead person hung onto the guide, and the rest of us hung onto each other's coattails."

They crossed a swinging bridge, 300 feet long, 600 feet above a canyon. As the group approached Spain, one of them stopped to rest and waved the others to go on without him. "He was completely fatigued, but I couldn't see leaving him there," David said. "I gave him one of my (military-supplied) pep pills with snow and got him up in a few minutes."

The group dispersed upon reaching Spain, where local police arrested the two airmen and detained them for several weeks. They eventually were returned to their bases in England, debriefed and sent home to the states.

Lynn David crossed the Pyrenees 30 years older than his father had been on his trip. He said he worked out a "hard three weeks beforehand" with weights and aerobic machines, and by lugging around a 40-pound pack in his suburban St. Louis neighborhood.

He said the trip was physically challenging, even though he keeps in shape and was part of a rope team climb up Mount Rainier in Washington years ago.

His small group did not travel at night -- their guide declared it too dangerous. The swinging bridge had been fortified over the years and wasn't as scary. He was surprised by the amount of ice and snow the group encountered.

Lynn David said he used "pressure breathing," which concentrates on exhaling and mimics the "choo-choo" sound. He and the group developed a rhythm, climbing 50 minutes, resting 10, using poles to assist them.

He was far better outfitted than his father, complete with cold-weather clothes and climbing boots, walking poles, and a French beret to keep his head warm. He said he wasn't willing to copy his father's poor clothing and shoes.

"I wasn't going to be that real," he said. "It was freezing out there."