Secret Warriors

by Taylor Downing

  In January 1915 the RFC established its first experimental aerial photographic unit. In the earliest cameras they used, the lens was extended by a form of bellows, but these devices proved hopelessly impractical in the air. Other, more portable cameras were tried although there was always the risk that the vibration of the aircraft would blur the image, or that the intense cold at altitude would fog the glass plate and spoil the picture. One of the principal problems was that Zeiss, a German firm based at Jena in Bavaria, had produced most European optical lenses before the war. There was naturally now a huge increase in demand from the army for specialist products such as binoculars and range finders as well as for aerial cameras, yet bizarrely, this had not been anticipated. And with the coming of war, all exports from Zeiss to Allied countries had ceased. So, on 6 January 1915, the War Office wrote to the Royal Society to ask if any of the scientists on their War Committee could advise on how to improve the optical effectiveness of British-made lenses. Noting ruefully, ‘It appears that the best British optical glass is inferior to the German,’ a War Office official asked the distinguished scientists of the War Committee, ‘Can any means be suggested for improving the process of manufacture?’13 It was one of the first instances in which the British Army appealed directly to the scientific community to help solve a military problem. An historic watershed had been crossed.

  The consequence of the War Office appeal was that one company, Woods in Derby, began work on improving British optics and developing the glass coating that was so vital to the production of a high-quality lens. But this would take time and in the interim a French company, Para Mantois, started to produce the priceless lenses. Using these optics initially, Brabazon and his team went on to design and introduce a new generation of cameras. The first, known as the ‘A-type’, was a fragile device that the pilot or observer had to hold by hand over the side of the plane. The A-type used 5 in × 4 in glass plate negatives, and the observer had to separately load and unload each plate. It was a cumbersome process that required skill and patience, but the quality of the photographs taken was excellent.

  The British commanders began to plan an offensive for March 1915 in the area around Neuve-Chapelle, a town in the Artois region of north-east France. General Sir Douglas Haig was to command the assault and his chief intelligence officer was Brigadier John Charteris. In the weeks before the attack, aerial observers comprehensively photographed the German trench defences for up to a mile behind their front line; when pieced together, the photographs formed composite photo-mosaics covering a wide area. From these, the planners were able to make a detailed map of the German trench positions. Charteris wrote in his diary on 24 February, ‘My table is covered with photographs taken from aeroplanes. We have just started this method of reconnaissance, which will I think develop into something very important … Photographs cannot lie.’14 The photographic maps helped Charteris and Haig understand the extent of the German defences and on the first day of the offensive, British soldiers succeeded in breaking through the German line.

  However, there were insufficient reserves to follow up this initial success, and the Germans were quick to reinforce their positions. After three days there was stalemate once again. Nevertheless, the photographs had greatly aided those planning the attack, and it became standard practice for trench maps marking the German dispositions based on aerial photos to be made and distributed to the assaulting infantry. Tens of thousands of photo maps would be produced during the war and sometimes hundreds of copies of each map were needed. As soon as a new unit took up a stretch of front line, the intelligence officers were given detailed maps of the enemy positions in front of them. And infantry officers in every unit from battalion upwards would study these maps before making any sort of raid or assault on the enemy trenches.

  The technology and the procedures advanced rapidly under the demands of war, which as ever proved to be a ‘mother of invention’. Most aerial photographs were taken vertically downwards, but pilots soon learned the value of taking photos at an oblique angle which allowed the ‘eyes in the air’, as the reconnaissance aircraft were called, to see further behind German lines.15 New techniques emerged to improve the role of aerial observers in spotting for the artillery. Gunners experienced a major shortage of shells in 1915 and therefore could not afford to waste ammunition, but firing over such long range made it impossible for even forward ground observers to get a clear fix on where shells were landing. Aerial observation from 3000-4000 feet had a huge advantage over spotting from the ground.

  At first aerial observers marked German artillery positions on a map before dropping it to the ground near the gunners in a leather bag. Soon lightweight telegraphic radios were fitted to aircraft, enabling far more efficient communication with ground controllers by Morse code. Technicians devised a ‘clock-code’ system whereby concentric circles, each given a letter and representing the distance from an enemy target, were drawn on a celluloid disc radiating out from the point on a map where the target was located. Outside the circles the numbers of a clock face were drawn, with 12 o’clock representing due north. The observer plotted where each of his own side’s shells were landing in relation to the target, and communicated the letter and number back to the gunners on the ground. So, with a scale of say, 100 yards for each concentric circle, if the observer sent back the signal ‘B3’ it would signify that their shells were landing approximately 300 yards due east of the target. The gunners were then able to correct their aim and hopefully score a bullseye.

  To replace the awkward hand-held models, Brabazon and his team came up with the ‘C-type’, a new camera that was fixed to the aircraft fuselage. The pilot activated the C-type as he flew across enemy lines. This further improved the quality and range of aerial photography. With warfare achieving a new intensity, there were by now no longer any officers left who felt it was ‘un-gentlemanly’ to photograph from the air what the other side were up to, and photo intelligence developed rapidly.

  In August 1915, Hugh Trenchard became commander of the RFC. Immediately he began to plan for a massive expansion in the size of the corps from just a few squadrons to several dozen. He pushed for the development of faster aircraft with more powerful engines, equipped with better weapons along with the widespread use of radios. And, in an expansion of aerial warfare, he promoted the development of larger aircraft with an improved capability to carry bombs. All of this was in addition to the continued development of aerial reconnaissance both for the artillery and with the use of photography. By now Trenchard was pushing on an open door as there was no longer any serious opposition to the growth of the air corps. When Lord Kitchener, the Minister for War, was presented with a plan to add fifty more squadrons to the RFC, he simply wrote on the memo, ‘Double this.’16

  The Germans of course were also rapidly developing their own aerial observation techniques. Drachen or ‘sausage balloons’ usually flew at a height of about 6000 feet and were placed two or three miles behind the German lines. From this height a well-trained observer equipped with a good telescope could report back in detail on movements behind the Allied lines. In the gaps between the Drachen were two-seater observation aircraft flying figures-of-eight and reporting on any activity in the Allied trenches. As the RFC and the French aviators tried to prevent German observation flights from crossing Allied lines, so an air war developed with each side trying to protect its own airspace.

  In the first examples of aerial combat, pilots would lean out the side of their cockpits and fire at enemy planes with revolvers or rifles. From the spring of 1915 the observer in the standard British observation aircraft, the BE2c biplane, was issued with a portable Lewis machine gun, but in firing it he had to avoid hitting his own propeller, wings or rigging – no easy task when trying to shoot at a fast-moving enemy target. The Vickers FB5, a ‘pusher’ aircraft with the propeller behind the cockpit, allowed the observer a clearer field of fire from the front seat. But the real breakthrough came in late 1915 when the German Fokker E2 E
indecker monoplane appeared. Its forward-firing machine gun was synchronised to fire through the plane’s propellers without hitting them. This ingenious invention enabled the E2, cruising at high altitude, to dive steeply down on Allied aircraft, aiming and firing from the front. Lieutenant Oswald Boelcke soon mastered the tactic of diving with the sun behind him to launch a surprise attack on the slower British or French observation aircraft, darting away quickly before other Allied planes could respond. The Fokker Eindecker was the first modern fighter aircraft, and thus a new branch of warfare – aerial combat – was born.

  During 1915, Boelcke’s number of ‘kills’ grew dramatically. So, in early 1916, RFC headquarters ruled that every reconnaissance aircraft must be accompanied by at least three fighter escorts. The BE2c had a maximum speed of about 72 mph, and soon picked up the unfortunate nickname of ‘Fokker fodder’ as it could not match the performance of the faster German fighters diving out of the sky to attack. This revived earlier criticisms about the limitation of British military aircraft design. In a debate in the House of Commons in March 1916, Noel Pemberton Billing accused the RFC of ‘murdering’ their own airmen by sending them into combat in inferior aircraft to those of the Germans. This accusation profoundly shocked many people, coming as it did from a man who had served very ably in the Royal Naval Air Service before leaving to enter politics. A judicial inquiry following Pemberton Billing’s accusations exonerated the RFC but blamed the Royal Aircraft Factory at Farnborough where the BE2 range, which made up about 70–80 per cent of all aircraft acquired by the RFC until the middle of 1916, had been designed and produced.

  The result of this public row was to open the market to manufacturers like the Sopwith company that had new ideas about design and performance. The fact was that the air war had progressed rapidly in directions no one had anticipated in 1912. When de Havilland had designed the BE2 series, the principal demand was for aircraft to provide a stable platform for observation. No one had foreseen aerial combat. By 1916, new types of aircraft with far greater manoeuvrability were needed, and their design and production began.17 And in the following year the Ministry of Munitions took over all aircraft procurement.18

  By the summer of 1916 a new generation of better armed, faster British reconnaissance and fighter aircraft had appeared, restoring the balance and keeping German attackers away from the slower observation aircraft. The Nieuport Scout, the FE2b, the DH2 and the Sopwith Strutter were able at times to outfly the German fighters. As the RFC grew dramatically in size, ‘dog fights’ between groups of Allied and German fighters became a common sight in the skies above the trenches. In the see-saw air war of 1914–18 aerial supremacy was to tip from one side to the other as new aircraft were produced, and better aircraft and weapons were then designed to defeat them. But by the middle of 1916 the pendulum had swung back from the Fokkers so that aerial supremacy over much of the Western Front lay with the British and the French.

  As fighter planes proved their superiority over observation aircraft, so the reconnaissance planes flew higher to avoid interception. And the higher the observers flew, the greater the need for better cameras with longer lenses. Moreover, the lower temperatures experienced at higher altitudes caused moisture to condense in the cameras, fogging lenses and cracking glass plates.19 The need to train dozens and then hundreds of support staff for the aerial observers was a top priority. Promoted to second lieutenant, Victor Laws became head of the new RFC School of Photography at Farnborough. Officers and NCOs were trained here in all aspects of developing and printing glass plates, making enlargements, maintaining aerial cameras, and preparing maps from photographs. Speed was of the essence in developing and distributing the photographs. Before long every front-line squadron had its own small unit of one officer, an NCO and five men to process aerial photos, a task often performed in army trucks fitted out as mobile darkrooms. The men were known as ‘stickybacks’, as the photos were often still wet and sticky when they were handed out.

  Developing and processing aerial photos was only half of the operation. The photos remained useless unless effectively analysed by skilled interpreters. A new class of photo interpreters learned techniques of using shadows to measure the scale of objects on the ground, and studied how to find and identify machine gun positions, artillery posts, the location of unit headquarters and to analyse the tracks and movement of troops. They were soon able to assess enemy strongpoints and to recognise passages through the wire as well as trench dugouts.20 First the French and then the British produced manuals on photographic interpretation, listing the key German targets to be identified in the trenches and methods for measuring the size of objects on the ground. Building up a reference library of aerial photos was a key element of photo interpretation; by comparing present cover with previous coverage of the same area, the interpreters could easily identify the construction of new defensive positions or the location of new gun emplacements. So the method of labelling and storing aerial photographs had to be standardised to make retrieval of previous aerial imagery possible.21

  Meanwhile Brabazon and his team continued to advance the development of aerial cameras. He applied a strictly scientific approach to the solving of problems, like finding better mounts to reduce vibration and blurring, and the use of flares to open up the prospect of night photography. A new wide-angle camera was produced with a lOin lens that could photograph an area of three miles by two from up to 20,000 feet with good, clear results. In early 1916 the team came up with a new ‘E-type’ camera made of metal instead of wood, with an improved remote control facility for the pilot. Later, as anti-aircraft defences forced aircraft to fly at ever greater heights, Brabazon developed the ‘L-type’, which had a long 20in lens and improved mechanisms for feeding the plates through the camera gate.

  By the time the Battle of the Somme began in July 1916, the RFC had grown to 27 squadrons with a front-line strength of 421 aircraft. And new aircraft were continuously rolling off the production lines in Britain. Observers were able to photograph the German trenches extensively from the air and produce detailed, accurate aerial maps. Photo interpreters identified a new, third German defensive line from the photographs, spotted major clusters of barbed wire and gun positions and marked them up on the maps. The battle raged throughout the summer and autumn. When it was finally called off in the mud of November the Allied lines had advanced only a few miles despite the months of killing. Reconnaissance aircraft had taken some 19,000 photos and 430,000 prints had been made of these.22 Along with the terrible casualties on the ground, almost 800 aircraft had been shot down, including many photo reconnaissance planes, and 252 RFC pilots had been killed.23

  However, by now it was the dog fights between Allied and German fighters that captured the public imagination. In the popular press at least, aerial reconnaissance had taken a back seat in the new air war. As the war on the ground became mired in mud and barbed wire, the press lauded the new breed of war heroes, depicting them as modern knights of the air, brave, daring and chivalrous. The French press was the first to use the term ‘ace’ to describe a fighter pilot who had shot down five enemy aircraft. Later the Germans, the British and the Americans used the same term, although each nation defined it slightly differently.

  Captain Albert Ball was the first British ace to find fame. A skilled pilot with fast reflexes, good eyesight and excellent marksmanship, he shot down three enemy planes in a day on five separate occasions. His total of ‘kills’ stood at forty-four when in May 1917, during a routine patrol, he flew into a cloud and appears to have become disoriented before crashing to his death. Among the many other British aces, both Edward Mannock (sixty-one kills) and James McCudden (fifty-seven) were awarded the VC. Becoming a flying ace involved more than just mastering the science of aeronautics. As well as being a supremely good pilot who was totally at home in his aircraft, an ace had to have several special qualities. He usually only attacked when he knew he had the upper hand, either through a superiority in numbers or in appro
aching the enemy unseen. And he needed to have an obsession with attacking enemy aircraft, a quality that was more than an aggressive impulse but verged on a sort of addictive compulsion. One pilot, Cecil Lewis, later reflected, ‘The fighting aces of World War One as I remember them were young men of high fettle and great energy. They seemed to burn. Perhaps their metabolic rate was greater.’24

  The most legendary flyer of the war was the German pilot Manfred von Richthofen, a Prussian aristocrat and huntsman who commanded a squadron of bright red Fokker triplanes. His unit became known as the ‘Flying Circus’ and the British press dubbed von Richthofen the ‘Red Baron’. Richthofen had trained as a cavalry officer before the war, and fought on both the Eastern and Western Fronts in 1914. But after static trench warfare set in he transferred to a flying unit in 1915. With Boelcke’s death in an accident in October 1916, Richthofen became the leading German ace and took command of his own squadron. Like Boelcke and other aces that had preceded him, Richthofen was calculated and ruthless about tracking down enemy aircraft and going in for the kill when he and his squadron felt they had an advantage. Having clocked up a tally of eighty kills, he was finally shot down in April 1918 far behind British lines. A British pilot flew over his home airbase to drop a message informing the Germans of his death, and British officers gave him a funeral with full military honours.