Almaden Resident
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Photograph courtesy of M. Herschel Higgins
Flight Lessons: M. Herschel Higgins (second from the left) and his peers prepare to fly during flight training school in Texas in 1942. The Almaden Valley resident's plane was shot down in Germany during WWII.
Pilot who survived free fall, POW camp honored
By Eli Segall
Sixty-one years after being released from a war camp, Almaden Valley resident M. Herschel Higgins is being honored. The San Jose City Council this month commemorated the local man for his service in World War II and his experience as a prisoner of war.
Higgins served as an Army Air Corps fighter pilot with the 351st Bomber Group. On Oct. 14, 1943, at age 21, Higgins was bombing German factories when he was shot down behind enemy lines, captured and transferred to a German POW camp. He was freed April 29, 1945, when U.S. Gen. George S. Patton's 3rd Armor Division liberated his camp.
Councilwoman Nancy Pyle presented a proclamation to Higgins for his service in honor of Veterans Day, which was Nov. 11. He received a standing ovation from council members and the general public in attendance at the Nov. 14 city council meeting.
"I accept this remembering all the guys I fought with," said Higgins, 85. "We had a job to do. It was not something we felt forced on us."
Pyle met Higgins and his wife, Bebe, at a St. Patrick's Day lunch earlier this year, during which time she learned his story.
"He started telling me his story, and I just thought, 'Wow, this is really something,'" Pyle said.
Higgins, an Oklahoma native who moved to Almaden Valley 40 years ago, volunteered for service in June 1941, six months before the Pearl Harbor attacks. He quickly became an officer and served as a flight instructor for B-17 bombers.
His unit was based in England during the war, and it was during his fifth raid that Higgins was hit; the mere fact he survived the fall from his plane is a miracle itself. Higgins, shot at an altitude of 25,000 feet, was under orders--as were other pilots--to free-fall until reaching an altitude of 10,000 feet before releasing their parachutes, giving Germans snipers as little opportunity as possible to pick them out of the air. Higgins' ripcord, however, didn't work, so he reached into his parachute pack and threw it out.
Higgins was immediately captured and sent to Stulag Luft III, a POW camp known for its fair treatment of captured allied soldiers.
"We were a showplace," Higgins said. "When the Red Cross came from Switzerland to inspect POW conditions, the Germans always brought them to our compound."
Higgins said Stulag Luft III housed several nationalities of soldiers, including Americans, Poles, French, British and Canadians, but it was the camp's British soldiers that immortalized the compound. The British dug a series of tunnels in a failed escape attempt, highlighted in the 1963 movie The Great Escape.
Higgins did not help dig the tunnels but was asked to distract the guards.
"There were escape attempts all the time," Higgins said. "If we just kept the Germans stirred up, we did our job."
By January 1945, the tide of the war was shifting against Nazi Germany. The Russians were advancing, so Higgins and his fellow prisoners were marched out of camp in a 36-hour hike in the middle of a snowstorm.
The conditions at his new camp were the polar opposite of Stulag Luft III. Higgins estimated prisoners were allowed to shower every four to six months; he lived on 300 calories per day and lost nearly 25 pounds in the four months he spent there. Food consisted of meager Red Cross parcels, potatoes and dehydrated sauerkraut.
"If you haven't eaten that, you haven't lived," Higgins said jokingly. "It wasn't any good at all."
After the war, Higgins returned to Oklahoma and, within three weeks of coming home, married Bebe, his high school sweetheart. He earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the University of Nebraska and took a job with IBM in Oklahoma. In 1966, Higgins was transferred to IBM's San Jose office, where he worked until his retirement in 1987.
He and Bebe live near the Almaden Country Club, in the same home they purchased after moving to the area. They have three children and a slew of grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
A group of Higgins' friends came to the city council meeting to watch him be honored, including Bob and Pat Jones. Bob Jones worked with Higgins at IBM, and the couple has been friends with the Higginses since the late 1960s.
"I grew up admiring his generation," said Jones, who is five years younger than Higgins. "Every time I hear his stories, they get a little more awesome."
