Soldier of Misfortune

Harold Dahl was an air-age soldier of fortune with a quiet, ingratiating manner, the face of an unappreciated minor poet--and an astonishing talent for oscillating rapidly between the frying pan and the fire, meanwhile eating well and never getting badly burned. He was also a good pilot--and a very lucky one.

Born in 1909, in Sidney, Ill., "Whitey" Dahl learned to fly as a U.S. Army cadet, later dropped out of the Air Corps. and by 1937 was ready to launch his flamboyant, horsepower-opera career by marching off to the Spanish civil war with a $1,500-a-month contract to fly and fight for the Republican side. On a bombing mission over the Madrid front, he was shot down, captured and sentenced to death before a Franco firing squad.

Black-Market Deals. Before the sentence was carried out, a shapely blonde show girl who signed herself Mrs. Edith Dahl wrote a poignant letter to General Francisco Franco, pleading for her husband's pardon and thoughtfully enclosed a fetching photograph of herself. Although it was later denied that Franco ever saw Edith's picture, a letter came back bearing the rebel leader's signature, with the courtly, old-fashioned Spanish salutation q.b.s.p. ("I kiss your feet"), and promising to spare Dahl's life.

Back in the U.S. in 1940, Whitey soon was in another jam, arrested for passing bad checks. He was freed next morning when the judge turned out to be a sympathetic fellow member of the Quiet Birdmen, an aviators' club.

Like many another U.S. flyer, Dahl headed for Canada early in World War II to enlist in the Royal Canadian Air Force. He became a squadron leader (equals U.S. major) and married a Canadian girl, belatedly explaining that his marriage to wife Edith had never been exactly solemnized, from a legal point of view. Before the war ended, Whitey was in trouble again, charged with selling government pistols, compasses, lamps and radios on the black market while in command of a station in Brazil. He got off with no penalty but a discharge.

Stolen Bullion. Never at a loss for work, Pilot Dahl barnstormed around South America after the war until he landed a good spot with Swissair on the run from Geneva to Paris. That lasted until one night in 1953, when Dahl was seen leaving his plane with a heavy package--and $35,000 in gold bullion was missing from the baggage hold. Whitey was found guilty, sentenced to two years in prison, but was freed pending appeal.

While waiting for the new hearing, Dahl went back to Canada and got a job with a Quebec bush airline, flying supplies to the Arctic radar sites. At Frobisher Bay on Baffin Island last week, the owner of a beat-up DC-3 propositioned him to ferry the plane with two passengers to the mainland. The aircraft had no operational radio equipment, but it was flyable--and bush pilots earn their extra dollars by taking risks. Dahl took the job and was only minutes away from his destination when the old bucket gave up the battle and went down in the Quebec wilderness. One man survived the crash, but Whitey Dahl, all luck spent at last, was found dead at the controls.

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