Did Pigeons Carry Messages in War? Famous War Pigeons

How war pigeons worked

War pigeons relied on the natural homing ability of pigeons, which can fly back to their own loft from places they have never seen (see how homing pigeons find their way home). The key limitation was that pigeons only fly one way: to their home. So the birds had to be carried to the front line, on ships or aboard aircraft in baskets, ready to be released when needed.

A message was written on very thin paper, often in several copies, rolled tightly and put into a small capsule attached to the pigeon’s leg. When the bird landed at its loft, it passed through a trap that rang a bell or buzzer. A signaler then took the message and sent it on by telephone, telegraph or messenger. To make sure important news got through, the same message was often sent with two or three birds.

Armies built mobile lofts, including converted buses and trucks, so pigeons could be based close to a moving front.

Why pigeons mattered before reliable radio

In the early 20th century, field radios were heavy, unreliable and easy for the enemy to overhear or locate. Telephone wires laid across battlefields were constantly cut by shellfire. Human runners were slow and often killed.

Pigeons had real advantages:

• They were fast, often averaging well over 60 km/h (37 mph) over good distances.
• They were small, hard to hit, and needed no wires or batteries.
• They could fly over ground that people could not cross, including the sea.
• Their messages could not be intercepted by listening to radio traffic.

Reported success rates for message delivery were high, with figures of around 95% often quoted for World War I.

Pigeons before the world wars

People used homing pigeons as messengers long before modern warfare. Ancient writers, including the Roman author Pliny the Elder, described pigeons carrying military messages. In the 19th century, pigeons carried news and financial information for businesses and early news agencies.

The most dramatic use came in the Siege of Paris in 1870–1871 during the Franco-Prussian War. With the city surrounded, pigeons were flown out of Paris by balloon and then released to fly back in with messages. The messages were shrunk onto tiny photographic film, so one bird could carry many thousands of them. The Prussians reportedly used hawks to try to stop them.

Cher Ami: the most famous pigeon of World War I

Cher Ami, French for “dear friend,” was a homing pigeon bred in England and serving with the US Army Signal Corps’ Pigeon Service in France in 1918. According to the famous story, on October 4, 1918, he carried the last message from the “Lost Battalion,” a force of American soldiers trapped in the Argonne Forest and being shelled by their own artillery. The note asked for the shelling to stop. Despite being shot through the breast and losing a leg, the bird reached his loft about 40 km (25 miles) away, and the surviving men were later rescued.

Historians have since questioned parts of this story. Frank Blazich, a curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, concluded that there is no firm evidence linking Cher Ami to the Lost Battalion message. Army records show that Cher Ami really was badly wounded while delivering a message, but probably later in October 1918 and on a different flight.

Either way, Cher Ami was treated as a hero. He was awarded the French Croix de Guerre, was shipped home to the United States in 1919, and died that year from his wounds. His preserved body is on display at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. A DNA test in 2021 confirmed that Cher Ami was male.

World War II: hundreds of thousands of pigeons

Pigeons were used on a far larger scale in World War II. The United Kingdom used around 250,000 homing pigeons, and the US Army trained about 54,000. Royal Air Force bombers and patrol aircraft carried pigeons in watertight containers so that crews forced down at sea could send their position home.

Winkie. In February 1942, a damaged RAF Beaufort bomber ditched in the North Sea. The crew released their pigeon, Winkie, who flew about 190 km (120 miles) home to Broughty Ferry in Scotland. From the time of her arrival and the wind, the RAF worked out where the plane had come down, and the crew was rescued.

G.I. Joe. In October 1943, in Italy, British troops captured the village of Calvi Vecchia ahead of schedule, but an Allied air attack on the village was already planned. With radio unable to get through, the pigeon G.I. Joe flew about 32 km (20 miles) in around 20 minutes and arrived just as the planes were preparing to take off. The raid was called off, saving the soldiers and villagers. He later became the first non-British animal to receive the Dickin Medal.

Paddy. An Irish pigeon serving with the RAF, Paddy was the fastest of the birds sent back from Normandy with news of the D-Day landings in June 1944.

The British also ran a secret scheme, later known as Operation Columba, in which more than 16,000 pigeons in boxes were parachuted into occupied France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Local people could use them to send back information about German forces.

The Dickin Medal: honors for animal heroes

The PDSA Dickin Medal was created in 1943 by Maria Dickin, founder of the British veterinary charity PDSA, to honor animals serving in war. It is often called the animals’ Victoria Cross. The first three medals, in December 1943, all went to pigeons, including Winkie.

Between 1943 and 1949 the medal was awarded 54 times: to 32 pigeons, 18 dogs, 3 horses and one ship’s cat. Pigeons remain the largest group of recipients. Memorials to war pigeons stand in several places, including the Warrior Bird memorial in Worthing, England, unveiled in 1951, and London’s Animals in War Memorial.

The end of pigeon warfare

As radio became smaller and more reliable, pigeons lost their military role. The US Army’s Pigeon Service was used in the Korean War but was discontinued in 1957, and other armies followed. Today, the descendants of war pigeons live on mainly in the sport of pigeon racing.