AGE OF ACES will be back at PulpFest again this year where we will be debuting our two new titles!

We’re taking a break from Donald Keyhoe whose stories we’ve been reprinting religiously practically every year since 2011—for just this year to start up two new series character collections. Have no fear, Keyhoe’s Devildog Squadron will return next year.

If you were here at Christmas, then you’re familiar with Arch Whitehouse’s Casket Crew. We uploaded the six stories Whitehouse ran in the British version of Air Stories featuring the crew over the holidays. Here we bring you the first volume of their run in Aces magazine.

The Casket Crew
by ARCH WHITEHOUSE

One-Oh-Nine Squadron of the Independent Air Force was the craziest bomber squadron on the Western Front and Handley Page No.11 was the reason why. It was flown by The Casket Crew: Lieutenant Graham Townsend, the mad Englishman, pilot of No.11; Lieutenant Phil Armitage, equally crazy American, the reserve pilot and bombing officer; Corporal Andy McGregor, wearing his Black Watch kilts, aerial gunner; with Sergeant Michael Ryan, silent fighting Irishman on the toggle board and Corporal Harry Marks, dizzy Australian, manning the rear gun-turret. There was enough insanity scrawled across the log book of No.11 to make the wildest fiction seem tame in comparison!

The extraordinarily prolific Arch Whitehouse drew upon his own experiences as a tail-gunner in the Royal Air Force to bring to life the colorful aces that flew through his stories. His characters for Flying Aces and Sky Birds were extremely popular with readers of the 1930’s and ’40s. The Casket Crew was his only series outside those magazines, running in the pages of Aces and Wings. This exciting collection features five crazy exploits from Aces Magazine: Lost Wings (8/31), Terror Turret (2/32), Handley Hate (5/32), The Flying Fortress (6/32), and Thunder Patrol (9/32).

Paired with this is the first volume of Alexis Rossoff’s Hell-Cat Squadron! We’ve posted a couple Hell-Cat stories from War Birds, but the series was rebooted when it moved to Flying Aces so that seemed like a good place to start.

The Hell-Cat Squadron: Cyclops of the Skies
by Alexis Rossoff

The order came direct from G.H.Q.: “Send one undesirable pilot of your organization to Alons. Arrange pilot’s departure from your drome so that he will reach destination not earlier than second hour nor later than third hour after noon, twenty-eighth day this month.” Never was an order complied with more promptly as thirty cursing, rebelious undesirables found themselves thrown together in the doomed, scorched region known by all as Hell’s Half Acre. There, under the command of “Iron” Mike Hilton, himself ostrasized for questioning his superiors, they became the Hell-Cats!

Siberian-born, Russian war veteran Alexis Rossoff started writing air and war fiction stories in the late 1920’s as his eyesight slowly faded away. The adventures in this volume are from 1931 to 1932. After a successful operation to restore his vision in the mid thirties, Rossoff, a self-professed boxing nut, switched from primarily writing air war fiction to writing sports stories. This action-packed tome compiles six thrilling adventures from the pages of Flying Aces Magazine: Hell-Cat Harvest (1/31), The Old Man’s Whiskers (2/31), The Hell-Cat’s Kittens (3/31), The Cyclops of the Skies (6/31), Rusty Rides the Thunderbolt (12/31), and The Black Moth (1/32).

In addition to these new books, we’ll have all of our other titles on hand as well as our previous convention exclusive—Arch Whitehouse’s Coffin Kirk, and 2022’s two book set of Steve Fisher’s Sheridan Doome! So if you’re planning on coming to Pittsburgh for PulpFest this year, stop by our table and say hi and pick up our latest releases!

We hope we see you there!

THIS week we have another exciting adventure in those Hell-skies with Alexis Rossoff’s Hell-Cat Squadron! The adventures of the Hell-Cat Brood ran in War Birds, War Stories and Flying Aces. The Seventy-Seventh Squadron had a reputation of being short on technique and long on defying every regulation in the book. The squadron was the cause of many gray hairs on the pates of the star-spangled ones back in G.H.Q. They flew their merry way like nobody’s business, and played hell with any Jerry who tried to dispute their intention of going places. This bunch of cloud-hopping war birds were known from one end of the Western front to the other as the “Hell-cats”—and sometimes the “Unholy Dozen!”

There was one man responsible for “Silent” Peters’ warped outlook on life. One man who turned a brilliant engineer into a man who hates the world, God and life itself. An Ace who was tall, gaunt and taciturn with the eyes of a saint—and the face of a devil with nothing but hate in his heart! And Silent Peters believed he would find this man in the death-torn Hell skies over Germany and settle the score once and for all! From the pages of the August 30th, 1928 issue of War Stories, it’s Alexis Rossoff’s “Silent Peters—Hell-cat!”

He was lean and tall and firm-jawad, this Yank of the Seventy-Seventh Squadron. That was the bunch of cloud-hopping war birds they called the “Hell-cats,” and sometimes the “Unholy Dozen.” But “Silent” Peters was a lone eagle without a buddie in the squadron. He had a reason for his war—a reason that meant more than life.

• Download “Silent Peters—Hell-cat” (August 30, 1928, War Stories)

THIS week we have a fun tale of the Hell-Cat Squadron from the prolific pen of Alexis Rossoff. The adventures of the Hell-Cat Brood ran in War Birds, War Stories and Flying Aces. The Seventy-Seventh Squadron had a reputation of being short on technique and long on defying every regulation in the book. The squadron was the cause of many gray hairs on the pates of the star-spangled ones back in G.H.Q. They flew their merry way like nobody’s business, and played hell with any Jerry who tried to dispute their intention of going places. This bunch of cloud-hopping war birds were known from one end of the Western front to the other as the “Hell-cats”—and sometimes the “Unholy Dozen!”

A pair of the Hell-cats are inmates in a prisoner of war camp deep within Germany. Although one is very sick, they try a daring escape to get back to the Seventy-Seventh and their brood. It’s “Deuces Wild” by Alexis Rossoff from the pages of the May 1928 War Birds!

They belonged to the Hell-cat brood, this pair—but they had been brought down by overwhelming odds, and we find them in a German prison camp, far behind the lines. Caged birds—watching, waiting—to escape—to get back somehow to the brood—and ride the clouds—with avenging guns spitting!

• Download “Deuces Wild” (May 1928, War Birds)