Antis the Flying Dog

The German Shepherd and the Czech gunner who flew missions for Britain

There were many ship’s dogs and ship’s cats in World War II, mascots that accompanied a vessel on its voyages. Airplane’s dogs, however, are not something you normally hear about. And yet, there was one: a German shepherd originally named Ant, later Antis, who first met his future best friend and master in a farmhouse between the front lines, and who went on to fly some 30 missions with him. This article, written on the occasion of National K-9 Veterans Day on March 13, pays tribute to this amazing canine companion and warrior, and all other dogs that served or are currently serving in the military or police forces. If you would like to learn more about America’s use of war dogs in World War II, you can read about it in one of our other articles. (“Let slip the dogs of war”)
 
The story of Antis begins with Czech air gunner Václav Robert Bozděch. Bozděch fled to France and joined the French air force after Nazi Germany annexed much of Czechoslovakia shortly before World War II. One night during the winter of 1939-40, the so-called “Phoney War,” when there was little actual fighting on the Western Front, Bozděch and pilot Pierre Duval were flying a recon mission. Their plane was hit by German anti-aircraft fire and crashed in no man’s land between the French and German lines. The men sought shelter in a locked and abandoned farmhouse, wherein they found a hungry German Shepherd puppy who happily accepted their chocolate and the water they melted for him from the snow.
 
The men decided to make for the French lines under the cover of night. They left the puppy behind, re-locked the door and got underway. Shortly after they departed, however, the sky was lit up by flares from a German search party looking for them, and the puppy started to howl. Afraid that the howling might give away their presence, they agreed to kill the dog. Bozděch went back to the house, but he found himself unable to do it, and instead picked up the puppy and hid it under his flight jacket. They were discovered by a French rescue party, and the dog, named Ant after the Russian Antonov bomber, became a favorite with the men of the unit.

The defeat of France was inevitable, and Bozděch’s unit was disbanded on June 17, 1940. The Dunkirk Evacuation (The “Miracle of Dunkirk”) had already happened, and the Czech airmen decided to make their own way to Britain. They stole a trap (a light carriage) in a village from a pro-Nazi party celebrating the German invasion by distracting the guard with Ant and subduing him. Heading south toward Gibraltar, they reached a train at Montpellier in Southern France, but the train was already packed full. Ant suddenly started running toward the back of the train, and stopped in front of a cattle wagon with a shut and locked door. Bozděch banged on the door, and was let in by the wagon’s occupants, a woman and two small girls. One of the girls was eating chocolate, the smell of which was what attracted Ant to the car.
 
Ant and Bozděch made it to Gibraltar, but the ferry ship carrying evacuees to their transport waiting offshore refused to take on dogs. Having no better idea, Bozděch left Ant behind, boarded the ferry, and transferred to the transport. Once there, he climbed down a ladder to an outboard platform and called for the dog. Ant swam 100 yards (90 m) to be reunited with his friend, who hid him in his greatcoat and took him into the hold.

The convoy was attacked by the Luftwaffe, and while Bozděch’s transport was not hit, it suffered an engine fault after steaming too fast for too long. The passengers had to be transferred to a Royal Navy cruiser, which was happy to take on the canine stowaway, though Ant still had to be smuggled into Britain to avoid quarantine. Bozděch also decided to change the name of his four-legged friend, since whenever he said “Ant” in his Czech accent, people always thought he was talking about his aunt. He changed the name to Antis to make it easier to understand without confusing the dog with a major change.
 
Bozděch signed up with the Royal Air Force and was posted to RAF Speke near Liverpool. Walking back to base with friends after a night in the city, he found himself in the middle of a Luftwaffe raid. He threw himself on the ground and covered the dog with his body to protect him from shrapnel. Once the bombers passed, Antis, who was never trained to be a rescue dog, instinctively started helping rescuers by sniffing out people trapped under rubble. Both Antis and Bozděch suffered many cuts and bruises during the ordeal, and Bozděch had to pick up the dog and carry him over the last stretch on the way back to base. Both needed medical attention, but Bozděch refused to accept treatment until Antis was seen to.

The airbase itself became the target of another German bombing raid soon after. This time, Antis was buried under rubble for several days before he could be rescued and nursed back to health.
 
In early 1941, Bozděch started flying as a gunner on bombing raids out of RAF East Wretham with 311 (Czech) Squadron, which was flying Wellington medium bombers. Every time his plane took off, Antis would stay in the dispersal area and refuse to leave until he came back.
 
One morning, Bozděch’s plane didn’t come back with the rest. Antis stayed in his spot all day, refusing to budge even for a roast liver. When it started raining, the men erected a shelter around him as he still wouldn’t move.

News eventually arrived that the plane made an emergency landing at another air base, and Bozděch was rushed to hospital with a bad head injury. Of course, there was no way to communicate this to Antis, and Bozděch was allowed to leave the hospital and be driven to East Wretham to pick Antis up. By the time he arrived, Antis was too exhausted from hunger and his constant vigil to climb into the car, so Bozděch had to lift him in.
 
Bozděch’s first mission after recovery was a thousand bomber raid over Bremen. When their bomber took off, Antis was nowhere to be seen. They were getting close to the German coast when Bozděch realized Antis’s absence at takeoff: the dog, insistent to never be separated from him again, had climbed into the bomber and was hiding inside. By this time, however, Antis was heaving heavily, unable to breathe the rare atmosphere at high altitude. For the rest of the mission, Bozděch shared his oxygen mask with Antis, only taking it back for a quick sip when he started to feel lightheaded.

Once they landed back at base, Bozděch and Antis, the latter prancing happily and sprinting laps around the plane, were busted by the wing commander. Dogs were not allowed on the bombers, but the Czech commander smiled and taught Bozděch an English saying: “what the eye doesn’t see the heart doesn’t grieve over.” As long as it was kept out of the paperwork, he was willing to ignore the violation.
 
Antis started flying with the crew on every mission, wearing a custom-made oxygen mask. One night, they were returning home from a raid and found both East Wretham and all other nearby stations covered by heavy fog. Ground control advised them to bail out of the plane and parachute to safety rather than try a perilous landing. There was, of course, an obvious problem: Antis didn’t have a parachute. Bozděch would have had to jump while holding Antis in his arms; had the dog panicked during descent, both of them could have easily died. The crew unanimously decided to try crash-landing instead. Flying in zero visibility and on fumes, they ended up making a solid landing at a nearby base.

Bozděch and Antis survived several perilous situations together, but the war was far from over and more danger was over the horizon. On one mission, a flak shell exploded directly under their bomber, blasting it with shrapnel and almost flipping it over. The Wellington was crippled and turned home, raked by a stream of machine gun fire as they hit a searchlight beam. Antis was hit and suffered a worse injury than ever before. Bozděch held the dog’s head in his arms on the way home, and was the first out of the aircraft, rushing Antis to the ambulance car.
 
Antis had gone on some 30 missions, but Bozděch decided he could not expose his companion to any more danger. Instead, he found his four-legged friend something else to keep busy with. A four-year-old girl called Jacqueline lived near the base. Her father was killed during the Dunkirk evacuation, and her mother and grandmother were away at work all day. With the family’s permission, Antis became Jacqueline’s babysitter and guardian, keeping her safe wherever she went during the day.

Bozděch’s tour of duty came to an end a few missions later, and he was sent on a gunnery leader’s course, after which he was to move to Scotland and take a post at a gunnery training school. The course only took a few days, and rather than filling out a lot of paperwork to bring Antis along, Bozděch left him with a friend for the duration.
 
Antis, however, got in trouble when he started chasing a sheep and was shot by a farmer. He recovered from the injury, but there was to be a police hearing, and the police wanted to put the dog down. Bozděch couldn’t leave the course, so he wrote letters to his superiors, asking for their help. They were happy to step in, and their testimonies (especially the one coming from the wing commander who originally agreed to overlook the case of the flying dog) swayed the judge. Not only did Antis get to live, but the sworn court documents proved the existence of the flying dog (already rumored) to the press, and Antis ended up on the front pages.
 
Bozděch rejoined 311 (Czech) Squadron in the fall of 1943, this time flying Liberators, hunting German U-boats for RAF Coastal Command. Bozděch was retrained as a radio and radar operator, which meant he was flying in the cockpit. Unlike the tail section of a Wellington, the cockpit of a Liberator was just too cramped to accommodate a dog, so Antis had to be left behind on base, where he would sometimes wait 12 hours for his master’s return.

Bozděch returned to his home country of Czechoslovakia and a hero’s welcome in the summer of 1945, naturally with Antis in tow. The warm welcome, however, didn’t last long. Czechoslovakia fell under Communist control, and the new regime wanted to eliminate everyone with connections to the West. Bozděch had to flee his home once more, accompanied by several other refugees and, of course, Antis. Antis warned the group of approaching patrols, scared off a group of soldiers on one occasion, and guided the men around searchlights and a machine gun position until they reached the West German border.
 
Bozděch and Antis eventually made their way to Britain and rejoined the RAF. Antis was given the Dickin Medal, a British decoration specifically issued to animals who served in World War II. (It was revived in 2000 and is in use today.)

Antis passed away in 1953, after 13 years spent at Bozděch’s side. He is buried at the Animal Cemetery in Ilford, and the gravestone bears this inscription:

There is an old belief
That on some solemn shore,
Beyond the sphere of grief,
Dear friends shall meet once more.

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