Until the RFC are [sic] in possession of a machine as good as the German Fokker … It must be laid down as a hard and fast rule that a machine on reconnaissance must be escorted by at least three other fighting machines … This should apply to both short and distant reconnaissances.
The escorts were to fly in close formation and if any were detached the operation must be immediately aborted. Effectively this reduced the capability of the RFC by detailing four machines for a single reconnaissance, but the exposure of British aeroplanes to the Fokker monoplane gave Trenchard no option. ‘Flying in close formation must be practised by all pilots’, he enjoined.
An unidentified friend serving with No 4 Sqn underlined his personal qualms about the Fokker threat on 13 January 1916 to Harold Wyllie in England:
I tell you Wyllie poking your nose over the Deutcher [sic] lines these days is no light hearted amusement, but quite ‘split arse’ and hot as Hell … Come and join us for our own benefit, but if you have any ties or inclination to live to a ripe old age stay in our tight little island, as you have done your share twice over. ‘Archie’ is no better or no worse since you left, which is to say that it is quite bloody awful – curiously enough I don’t think I funk him more than I did before. What I do funk is the Fokker – I was attacked by one single handed and he had me served up hot as my gun was fixed for low in front [firing] and he just did anything he liked – my sole weapon was two fingers pointed heavenwards.
The enemy machine did not get close enough for the kill. Nevertheless, its bullets were ‘on and around me all the time and I thought I was done for’ until close to the trenches Wyllie’s correspondent safely managed ‘a vol pique [dive] with the oil coming out of the breathers and got in’.
The anonymous pilot revealed that even before Trenchard’s order about escorts, ‘long reconnaissances’ had been protected by three or four Vickers Gunbus fighters or four BEs ‘close together’ if no Vickers were available. ‘Some great big raids’ had been carried out ‘combined with the French’. ‘The last show’ had been in close formation ‘like a flight of ducks and the escort of fighters all around’. At times the force had to ‘grope through a fog of Archie’ and the density of the formation made it ‘a picnic’ for the German gunners: ‘One hit left a draughty hole in my top plane just above my head’.
The letter did end on an upbeat note. On Christmas Day 1915 he, ‘went and dropped greetings to the old Hun and he had the cheek to send four Archies [sic] with evil intent – however I spoilt his aim by looping to each shot and cheered up the men in the trenches who sent in a message of thanks to the Wing.’ No carols, football matches nor truces over this Festive Season.
Back in England, on 15 February 1916, a Joint War Air Committee (JWAC), chaired by Lord Derby, was created to resolve the manufacturing muddle, which Lloyd George had condemned as involving ‘haphazard, leisurely, go-as-you-please methods’. Grandiosely, and quite unrealistically given its inability to force through reforms, the JWAC was ‘to ensure that the manufacture, supply and distribution of materiel required is in accordance with the policy of aerial warfare laid down by His Majesty’s Government’. The statistics made sorry reading. In August 1914, only ten contractors were involved in building airframes; by 31 May 1915 that figure was thirty-one. But lack of aero-engine production presented a serious drawback to the whole manufacturing process. At the end of May 1915, 2,953 were ‘on order’ in Britain of which just 141 had been delivered. The competition for resources between the RFC and RNAS, in particular, required urgent attention. In January 1916, Henderson emphasised the ‘grave possibility of duplication and consequent waste’, highlighting a recent Admiralty invitation to fourteen manufacturers to compete for contracts, three of which were already committed to the War Office: ‘Competition of this kind is bound to delay our progress seriously’. The JWAC, with representatives of both services as members, thus faced a difficult task round the conference table. It duly descended into acrimony and ended in failure after just six weeks.
As threats from Zeppelins further inland and shorter-range aeroplanes in coastal areas multiplied, efforts continued to improve aerial defence in England. While waiting to go to France, Douglas Joy emphasised once more the inability of defenders to catch attackers even in day-light. On 24 January 1916, he explained to his mother that recently two raiders had caused casualties in the port area. As duty pilot he had taken off, but been far too late to intercept. The very next day, a similar raid took place and ‘in a very short time two hornets’ nests … [were] buzzing hard’, as both the RFC and RNAS aerodromes put up machines – to no avail.
At the Channel port, as had already been apparent in London, there was little or no co-ordination of effort between the two air arms, something which clearly needed to be tackled. On 18 June 1915 the Admiralty had requested the War Office (and thus the RFC) to assume full responsibility for the aerial defence of Britain. At the end of the year, nothing had been resolved, which perhaps explains Kitchener’s irritation with Henderson. Not until 16 February 1916 did Field Marshal Lord French, now C-in-C Home Forces, accept responsibility for London and soon afterwards for the rest of the country. Inevitably, this placed an added burden on the RFC at the very time it was coming under renewed pressure in the field. A Home Defence wing was separated from the Training Brigade comprising seven squadrons equipped with BE pushers, armed with Lewis guns, 20lb Hales bombs and Ranken darts (an incendiary device invented by a naval officer) with which to attack Zeppelins.
In France, the RFC formed into brigades (of two wings) with their own dedicated Aircraft Park, each to support an army. The first came into being on 30 January 1916, the second on 10 February, ready to participate in Allied plans to wear down enemy reserve formations once the weather improved. On 21 February those hopes were painfully and severely dashed. That day the Germans launched a major assault on Verdun, which would pin back the French for eleven months.
As Spring 1916 approached, with its new set-up the RFC therefore had to cope not only with the growing aerial threat from the Fokker, but a major change in Allied strategy which would involve British commitment to actions hitherto unforeseen and designed to relieve the pressure at Verdun. However, whatever the clashes in the corridors of Whitehall and the board-rooms of manufacturers, the two British air arms were set to co-operate more closely in France.
6
Hope and Despair, 1916
‘Chivalry had to take a back seat’
With the approach of Spring 1916 rising losses in the air caused intensification of the political furore in Britain already mentioned by Max Immelmann. In vain, the Under Secretary of State for War (H.J. Tennant) claimed that ‘we have machines quite equal in efficiency and speed to the Fokker aeroplanes’.
Noel Pemberton-Billing was one persistent critic, who addressed several of the mass meetings packed with anxious citizens, which took place in London and throughout the country. ‘Tall, monocled and debonair’, he had founded the Supermarine Aircraft Company and been winner of the bet with Geoffrey de Havilland that he would learn to fly in a day. Pemberton-Billing had resigned his commission in the RNAS, during which he was involved in planning the raid on the Friedrichshafen Zeppelin works, to enter the House of Commons and castigate the Government for its perceived neglect of aerial needs. With characteristic lack of modesty, in his maiden speech on 14 March 1916 he claimed to be the only MP qualified to speak with authority on air subjects.
Eight days later Pemberton-Billing was on his feet once more, this time to devastating effect. Focusing on ‘inertia’ and ‘blunders’ concerning aeroplane construction, he condemned ‘the hundreds, nay thousands’ of machines ordered ‘which have been referred to by our pilots at the front as “Fokker fodder” … I do not wish to touch a dramatic note, but if I do, I would suggest that quite a number of our gallant officers in the Royal Flying Corps had been murdered rather than killed’.
Of the long catalogue of mishaps, which Pemberton-Billing attributed to faulty design
and construction, at least some were caused by poor weather or pilot error. However, in an effort to quell the political and public unrest stirred up by Pemberton-Billing’s allegations, the Government established a body chaired by Mr Justice Bailhache ‘to enquire into the administration and command of the RFC with particular reference to the charges made in Parliament and elsewhere’. The Bailhache Committee would not report for another ten months.
Meanwhile, to help counter the enemy’s aerial menace, early in March No 25 Sqn flying the FE2b had moved from St Omer to Auchel, 30 miles (48km) south-west of German-held Lille, and Ranald Reid, the former Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders’ officer, went with it. On the new station, he found that ‘uniforms were motley. County regiments, Scottish regiments and many “maternity jackets”, that is double breasted – indicating direct entry to the RFC’. A sweepstake was organised for the first pilot to shoot down a Fokker, which was allegedly claimed by Lt Lord F.D. Doune of the Scottish Horse Yeomanry even though his victim was rumoured to be a German nobleman with a wooden leg.
Reid disliked dawn patrols against Fokkers intent on ‘seriously interfering’ with artillery-spotting British machines. Flying a fighter gave
… a strange, other-worldly feeling. There, high above the battle front, perhaps a lovely, cold spring morning, peaceful and sunny, and away on the distant ground, marvellously clear trails of smoke from the trains. Then far below, one spots a light grey shape moving between the clouds: an Albatros or Taube glides across the green-brown earth. One dives to strafe it; the Boche pilot is alerted and dives away earthwards. But suddenly there is an unpleasant crackling behind: the Albatros had been a decoy, or is being escorted, and two or three nasty spitting little monoplanes come whizzing in to attack: a fierce turn or two but the odds are too great. Despite the known danger of diving away, one plunges earthwards like a stone, to luckily live and fight again. Or it may be a single combat with a lone Fokker on the prowl.
Another duty, Reid discovered, was ‘guard pilot’, on stand-by to get airborne in a Bristol Scout:
This was a tricky little biplane and in my hurry to take off one day, I swung slightly off the star-shaped runway, breaking the prop and crashing upside down over the ten-foot drop at the end of the runway. Not amusing, but we had had no proper instruction on Scouts.
After some time mainly carrying out reconnaissance and ‘light bombing raids’, Reid found himself appointed flight commander to a squadron flying the DH2, ‘a nasty little rotary-engine “pusher”’; a posting he managed to talk his way out of.
As Reid settled in at Auchel, on 16 March Harold Wyllie returned to France with No 23 Sqn. The first flight left Dover at 11am. All machines flew at 7,000ft to land safely at St Omer, the following day advancing to their operational station at Le Hameaux, 35 miles (56km) north-east of Amiens. Until 28 March, the Squadron experienced ‘extraordinarily bad weather’, with ‘hard gales, snow and rain’, but on 29 March some pilots did manage a ‘tactical reconnaissance’ with unpleasant consequences. In the process, one machine was ‘much damaged, two main spars shot through and the fuselage pierced just in front of the observer’. Wyllie’s aeroplane was hit in the left elevator and wing, and the cold was so ‘intense’ that in several machines the compass froze.
The following day, Wyllie went up again. ‘My face feels like one big bruise after the cold yesterday’, and on 30 March another pilot was ‘rather badly frost bitten’. In the first week of April, low cloud frustrated attempts to take photographs, and a newly-arrived commanding officer was distinctly unsympathetic. ‘He has’, Wyllie wrote, ‘the worst eye for weather I have ever come across. He cannot tell whether clouds are at 500ft or 120ft’, and he would criticise crews for not taking photographs ‘in foul weather’.
Wyllie added his voice to those who condemned inadequate pilot training. On 4 May, an ‘area reconnaissance’ had to be abandoned ‘because the formation was bad … One of the BE pilots had not the foggiest notion of finding his way. It is a disgrace that young pilots should be sent out on service absolutely ignorant of the most elementary precautions to be taken on cross-country flying.’
After the irritating delay during February, on 1 March No 27 Sqn aeroplanes finally left Dover to reinforce the RFC. Shortly after his arrival in France, Douglas Joy wrote to his mother:
Cross Channel flying is most exciting. It was a cloudy day but the sun was shining through the clouds and the clouds were in a series of layers with clear spaces between them. I came over at 7,000ft and for a part of the time had the ‘wind up’ most horribly as I could not see the sea. As a matter of fact I was only out of sight of any landmark for about fifteen minutes, but that means a long distance in an aeroplane. Arriving at Calais, I thought I was quite happy but as I continued I found that the country was a mass of canals and ditches and little ditches and little baby ditches. When I arrived at Headquarters I was so glad to see a real aerodrome that I forgot our machines required a lot of care and skill to land so I crashed the undercarriage.
From the Squadron’s complement of twelve, two had crashed on take-off, and now Joy watched the other nine fly on to the Squadron’s operational station while he waited for his machine to be repaired.
When Joy rejoined the Squadron, he found that its Martinsyde G100 Scouts, each with a single 100hp Rhône engine and nicknamed ‘The Elephant’, were part of Lt Col Hugh Dowding’s Ninth Wing attached to RFC HQ. He decided that ‘elephant’ was ‘an extremely good suggestion’. The Martinsyde had also been compared to a locomotive, because after flying the pilot found himself ‘smothered in soot’. Joy was thinking of fitting his machine with ‘a dummy chimney in front and a stoking door in the rear’. When in the air, ‘I had my right elbow over the side and my head poked out to the right to see where I am going.’
Joy was orderly officer on 12 March with the task of squadron censor. To his mother, he wrote that it was ‘rather tragic reading all these men’s letters to their families and sweet-hearts. It brings war very close to you to realise the huge numbers of families that have been separated, and widely so’. He also had his eyes opened in another way – to human frailty. ‘A number of men are awful liars. From their letters you would imagine that they were in imminent danger of being killed day and night’, which was ‘ridiculously ludicrous’. Only the sound of distant guns, which sometimes shook the buildings, could be heard and occasionally a German aeroplane would drop bombs ‘around us … [in] rather an absurd performance’.
Albert Ball, destined to attain lasting fame in the ensuing year, also reached the front early in 1916, although his arrival at No 13 Sqn during February was hardly auspicious. Keen to be an engineer, he left Trent College, Staffordshire, according to his head master ‘an undistinguished pupil’. At the outbreak of war, he joined The Sherwood Foresters and was quickly commissioned, then became interested in flying and determined to be a pilot. Ball was so keen that he would motorcycle from Luton to Hendon to take lessons early in the morning at his own expense before his unit’s first parade of the day. He was seconded to the RFC on 29 January 1916, exactly one week after qualifying as a pilot. Unimpressed by his lukewarm training reports, his commanding officer in France, Maj A.C.E. Marsh, effectively put him on probation by threatening to send him back for further training.
Ball soon overcame Marsh’s doubts. On a reconnaissance flight in a BE2c, he was in a group attacked by enemy aeroplanes including three Fokkers. After escaping their attentions, on the way back a troublesome engine forced him to land prematurely. Overnight, he carried out repairs, took off but was again obliged to land in a snowstorm. When it cleared, Ball got airborne once more and eventually reached Marieux airfield the day after setting out. Marsh was suitably impressed.
Not content with reconnaissance duties, Ball relished aerial combat which proved difficult in a slow two-seater, so he persuaded Marsh to let him fly one of the Squadron’s two single-seat machines; though only after he had proved his ability to cope with a similar aeroplane at St Omer. Ball w
ould make his name as a fighter pilot. Without his determination in those first two months in France he would not have been given the opportunity.
A fellow pilot remarked that he ‘used to spend most of his time when on the ground looking after his machine or his gun … by no means an exceptionally good pilot at first, but he was always practising and improving himself’. There remained something of the adolescent about this modest God-fearing man, who wrote: ‘I always sing when up in the clouds; it is very nice … It makes me laugh when you say it is dangerous to fly. I felt just ripping.’ On another occasion, he recalled that he and his opponent ran out of ammunition after a lengthy dog fight. So ‘we flew side by side, laughing at one each other for a few seconds, and then waved adieu to each other and went off. He was a real sport, was that Hun.’ By nature withdrawn and quiet, on the ground Ball could often be found munching slices of his mother’s homemade cake.
On 7 May, Ball transferred to No 11 Squadron, which had two single-seat Bristol Scouts and one single-seat Nieuport to protect its Vickers Gun Bus two-seaters on operations, with a prophetic recommendation from Maj Marsh: ‘He is a conscientious and keen young man and should do well.’ Eight days after arrival, flying a single-seater at 12,000ft over the German lines, Ball spotted an Albatros well below him. He dived, caught the enemy completely by surprise and fired 120 rounds into him at close range until, in Ball’s words, he ‘turned over and was completely done in’; the first of many victims. Ball was one of a new breed of fighter pilots produced by the single-seat machine, who began to hunt independently when not assigned to escort duties.
On the ground, Ball opted for a tent on the aerodrome, rather than accommodation in the nearby village, so that he could respond rapidly in an emergency. He surrounded his canvas haven with a small vegetable and floral garden, a practice he continued when he went to No 56 Sqn. There he wrote home for seeds to plant in the garden he was cultivating: ‘You will think this idea strange, but, you see, it will be a good thing to take my mind off my work; also I shall like it’. As Ball showed promise at the Front, another pilot who would have a more lasting impact on British military aviation was qualifying at the CFS. Not content with an observer’s role, Charles Portal had returned to England for pilot training and on 27 April 1916 graduated with twenty-nine hours dual and solo time in his log-book. In May, Portal went to No 60 Sqn at Vert Galand in France, where he flew a single-seat Morane Saulnier N monoplane fighter with metal deflectors fitted to its wooden propeller and nicknamed ‘The Bullet’.
Cavalry of the Clouds Page 11