Roger Fiske Chapin. By Camille Arbogast
Roger Fiske Chapin was born at 6 Arundel Park (now known as Rundel Park) in the Ashmont neighborhood of Dorchester on August 23, 1892, to Charles Taft and Annie Mary (Wood) Chapin. Charles was the owner of the Chapin Coal Company, “dealers in hard and soft coal and wood,” based at Liverpool Wharf on Atlantic Avenue in Boston. He had been born in Dorchester; Annie was originally from Newburgh, New York. They married in Newburgh in 1882. They had five other children: Aida born in 1883, Arthur in 1885, Gerard in 1888, Marjorie in 1890, and Constance (also known as Christine) in 1895. Roger’s great aunt, Harriet Fiske, also lived with the family. During Roger’s childhood, there were also live-in servants at 6 Arundel Park; in 1900 the Chapins employed two maids and in 1910, one.
In 1907, Roger graduated from the Henry L. Pierce School, located on Washington Street and Welles Avenue. At Dorchester High School, he was a lieutenant in the First Battalion, Company A, of the Boston School Cadets. He also played on the football team for two years. Roger graduated from Dorchester High in June 1911. From 1911 to 1914, he served in 1st Squadron Massachusetts Cavalry of the Massachusetts National Guard. He also worked in the wholesale lumber industry, employed by the Pope Lumber Company of Dorchester. In 1915, his father died of prostate cancer.
On May 14, 1917, Roger enlisted at the Officers’ Training Camp in Plattsburg, New York. He was transferred to the Air Service in June and attended ground school at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He then was sent to Mineola, New York, on Long Island, for preliminary flying. Roger entered the Enlisted Reserve Corps on August 14, and was assigned to the Air Service detachment at Mineola. On September 27, he was transferred to Cadet Detachment, Garden City, Long Island, New York.
Roger sailed for France on November 14, 1917, departing from New York on the RMS Aurania. He received further pilot training at the 3d Aviation Instruction Centre in Issoudun. On February 1, 1918 he was commissioned as first lieutenant and called into active service. In March 1918, he began two month’s study of day bombardment in Clermont-Ferrand. He then served with a French Bombing Squadron, Escadrille Breguet Number 127 (Groupe de Bombardment 5), based at Plessis Bellville, where he first teamed with his observer, Clair Laird, of Algona, Iowa. They participated in the Chateau-Thierry offensive in July and at the Fismes-Soissons-Mondidier Front in August, making several flights over enemy lines. A fellow pilot, Charles Peck wrote of these flights, “‘Chap’ had had a number of nasty combats in which he showed fine skill and a cool head to have escaped what seemed inevitable to be shot down.” For his service with Escadrille Breguet 127, Roger was awarded the Croix de Guerre; his citation noted that he was an “excellent pilot, always volunteering for dangerous missions,” and that his bombings “caused considerable losses to the enemy.” In mid-August, Roger was transferred to Headquarters, Air Service, in Milan, Italy.
On September 2, Roger and Clair were assigned to the American Day Bombing Squadron Number 11, which flew Liberty-engine de Havilland DH4 planes. With Squadron 11, they participated in the Saint-Mihiel offensive. On September 18, their targets were in La Chaussee. On the return from their mission, the squadron was spotted by German planes and attacked. Six men were killed, and four, including Roger and Clair, were taken prisoner.
Clair recounted their ordeal for a newspaper article which ran in February 1919. “Roger Chapin and I were in the lead. … We did our bombing and had started home when we were attacked by about fifteen Fokkers from the front. … One machine got right under our plane and the rattling of their guns sounded like the explosion of a bunch of firecrackers. … Our tank was shot to pieces and it is a miracle that the explosive bullets did not set the gasoline on fire. Our motor, getting little gas, was practically useless and Chapin was forced to leave formation … We had lost a great deal of altitude. Anti air craft guns opened on us from the ground and continued shooting at us until we crashed. Our motor was giving us little aid and Chapin was forced to keep it in a continual glide. … Getting closer to the ground ‘Chape’ attempted to pull up over some telegraph wires but the motor failed again and crashed into the wires. … The plane was lying upside down with Chapin hanging from a leg hooked under the rudder bar. I thought he was dead but after unfastening his clothing and rubbing his face and hands he began moaning and finally came to. … He is a big man and it was some job to get him down.” As Clair was extracting Roger from the wreckage, they were surrounded by Germans. Clair estimated “There must have been two or three hundred about by this time and they were all laughing as though they considered it a great joke.”
Roger and Clair had come down about an hour’s walk behind enemy lines. They were marched to a village where they were questioned by a German officer who had lived for a time in the United States and spoke English. Locked in a cellar overnight, the next morning they were fed “black coffee, made out of chestnuts, no milk or sugar, some black, sour, soggy bread and a jam, which they told us was a coal tar product, although it did not taste bad then.” They were taken to Joeuf, near Metz, where they were held for five days of questioning. Then they were moved to Karlsruhe, then to Landshut, in Bavaria, and finally to Villingen, near the Swiss border. In another newspaper interview given in 1938, Clair spoke about their experience in the prison, remembering, “’I think we were well treated— all the aviators were well treated. Of course, if we’d have had to eat the German food, we’d probably have starved, but the Red Cross had headquarters at Berne, Switzerland, and they made arrangements to give us food, under German supervision … It was a three-section camp and our only recreation was volley ball or walking. … The barracks were of wood and pretty cold.”
Roger and Clair were released on November 28, 1918, and exchanged through Switzerland. Roger returned to the United States on the USS Kroonland, sailing from Saint Nazaire, France, on March 12, 1919, and arriving in Newport News, Virginia, on March 24. Roger was discharged on April 11, 1919, in Mineola. On his service record, he was reported five percent disabled.
In 1920, Roger was again living at 6 Arundel Park, with his mother, great aunt, and siblings Aida, Arthur, and Christine. His great aunt died in April 1920. Roger resumed working in the wholesale lumber industry, employed by Carlyle Patterson and Company, 170 Summer Street, Boston. He was active with the Aero Club of Massachusetts.
In 1927, Roger married Frances L. Glover in Boston. Frances had grown up around the corner from Roger, at 79 Beaumont Street. In April 1930, Roger, Frances, and their 8-month-old son, Roger, Jr., were renting part of 6 Arundel Park from his mother, who also lived in the house. The next year, they moved to 44 Beaumont Street. That August, Frances died suddenly. After Frances’s death, Roger moved back to 6 Arundel Park.
Roger remarried in 1938, wedding Eva Jeanette (Vanderburgh) Shaw on June 10. In 1940, Roger, Eva, and Roger, Jr., lived at 34 West Main Street in Niantic, Connecticut. Residing with them was a lodger, Joseph Schmidt, a German immigrant who had a landscaping business. Roger worked for Holbrook Lumber Company of Springfield. Every year, on September 18, he wrote to Clair Laird.
Roger died on June 19, 1968, in New London, Connecticut. A few months later, the surviving members of his squadron met in Philadelphia to commemorate the 50th anniversary of their September 18 capture.
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