The First Great Air War

by Richard Townsend Bickers

  In his autobiography Fonck wrote that to obtain good results a fighter pilot must know how to control his nerves, how to have absolute self-mastery and how to think coolly in difficult situations. “I always believed that it is indispensable to maintain absolute confidence in ultimate success, along with the most complete disdain for danger.” That last holds the secret of what separates the supreme champion from the also-rans; even the closest of his contenders. The other three precepts are mere glimpses of the obvious. To maintain absolute certainty of victory, to refuse to contemplate failure: there lies the touchstone in any field of endeavour. In air fighting there is an added element which makes it different from any other: it is one’s life that is at stake, not fame or wealth.

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  The second crisis of 1917 was the confrontation of the RFC by the first of the newly formed Jagdgeschwader, commanded by Richthofen and comprising Jastas 4, 6, 10 and 11. Each of these had two flights of six aircraft. Operating much the same as a RFC Wing, the Jagdgeschwader were differently used in one significant way: they were tactically mobile and frequently moved about the Front at short notice.

  General von Höppner recorded: “Because of their number and their sporting audacity, the English continued to be our most dangerous adversaries and, as before, the major part of the German air strength was concentrated against them.” The Jagdgeschwader were also a considerable menace to the French. Nos 2, 3 and 4 Jagdgeschwader were not formed until 1918, but the threat posed by No. 1 was especially unsettling because the RFC was still reeling under the effects of April.

  With the birth of the Jagdgeschwader, and putting it in the hands of Richthofen, came a display typical of primitive tribal mentality. Having first had his own aircraft painted scarlet all over, he now ordained a vulgar miscellany of colours for the whole Geschwader. This was, psychologically, equivalent to the behaviour of savages who painted their faces and bodies to terrify their enemies. To the RFC it was a mere display of boastful arrogance in the worst taste. They dismissed No. 1 Geschwader with derision as “the Flying Circus”.

  One of Richthofen’s pilots was Ernst Udet, who was to amass a score of sixty-two kills, but in 1917 was a novice fighter pilot who met Guynemer in combat. He was airborne at 5000 metres when from the west an aircraft approached. “It quickly grew in size and I recognised it as a Spad.” They met at the same altitude. “I saw the other man’s machine was painted light brown. Soon we were circling round each other playing for an opening. The first man to go behind the other’s back was the winner. Sometimes we passed so near to each other that I could see every detail of my opponent’s face: that is, all that was visible of it below his helmet.” On the Spad’s side were a stork and two words painted in white: “Vieux Charles”. He knew now whom his adversary was.

  “I knew that I was in for the fight of my life.” After several minutes’ manoeuvring, “for a moment I had him in my sights. I pressed the trigger … there was no response … my guns had jammed!” Holding the stick with his left hand he pounded the guns with his right fist. It was unavailing. He considered diving away, but knew that Guynemer would be on his tail in a flash. They continued circling. “It was a wonderful flying experience; if one could forget that one’s life was at stake. For a while I completely forgot that he was Guynemer, my enemy. Rather it seemed that I was having some practice with an old friend.” Suddenly Guynemer looped and flew on his back over Udet’s head. Udet hammered again at his guns. Guynemer saw this and “knew I was his helpless victim”.

  Guynemer again passed close overhead. “And then to my great surprise, he raised his arm and waved to me. Immediately afterwards he dived away towards the west. I flew back home, stupefied.” And lived to kill many more Frenchmen and Britons. Richthofen would never have spared an enemy; which was acceptable, even if his guns jammed. Guynemer’s action was one of genuine chivalry. Udet was a likeable man and, in later years, no admirer of Nazism. He was a pilots’ pilot, brilliant in all aspects of his craft. At heart he was always a dashing, roistering fighter boy. He said, after his encounter with Guynemer, that many of his comrades attributed the Frenchman’s restraint to the jamming of his own guns; but he himself insisted that it was pure chivalry that had prompted Guynemer to spare his life. Udet was plainly no cynic.

  Richthofen, inaccurately known to the British as “The Red Baron”, was more fittingly dubbed by his own countrymen “The Red Devil”. The spring and summer of this year gave him some easy pickings; but he came within a millimetre of being cut off in his prime when on 6th July he led Jasta 11 in an attack on twelve FE2s and RE8s, escorted by Collishaw’s flight of Triplanes. He himself, naturally, went for a Fee — the Tripes would have been far too lethal — and got a bullet across his scalp for his pains. The wound knocked him out, he recovered his senses, made a hasty landing, fainted again, then spent a month in hospital.

  Voss, who was then second to Richthofen in victories, commanded Jasta 10. Despite his quiet modest nature, even he was infected by the Flying Circus’s ostentation. His Fokker Triplane was light green, with a white ring. The wing under surfaces and wheel discs were pale blue. A threatening face was painted on the prow, with the engine air intakes as eyes.

  This aeroplane was first seen at the Front in July. Like the first Fokker fighter, it was not the product of its designer’s own ingenuity. This time it was not a copy of the Sopwith, but inspired by it. The Sopwith Triplane had astounded the Germans. In one skirmish, a solitary Tripehound had out-manoeuvred eleven Albatros DIIIs. The German Air Ministry asked industry to produce a triplane. Anthony Fokker frequently visited the Jastas, so had heard all about the Sopwith from Richthofen, and his Chief Designer, Platz, was already at work on a design. Two of the first to go into service lost their wings in a dive. All were grounded until modifications were made. The best speed was 102 m.p.h. — 15 slower than the Sopwith — at 13,000 feet and the armament was two synchronised guns.

  The Schlachtstaffeln — Schlastas — were being equipped with purpose-built ground-strafing types whose crews were better protected than the Allies who had to do this work. The Hannover CLIIIa two-seater weighed 2378 pounds, was armour-plated underneath, armed with a Spandau for the pilot and a Parabellum for the observer, and capable of 103 m.p.h. The Junkers JI was similarly armoured and had a corrugated metal skin. It carried two Spandaus and a Parabellum. It weighed 4787 pounds, so its 200-h.p. engine gave it only 97 m.p.h.; but its strength and firepower were what mattered, not speed. The Halberstadt CLII was another machine with an armoured belly and a speed of 97 m.p.h. It had one Spandau and one Parabellum. Weighing 2532 pounds, it was most manoeuvrable and able to evade ground fire.

  Fritz Ritter von Röth, who had been so gravely wounded in 1914 that he was nearly invalided from the Army when discharged from hospital in 1915, but managed to get himself to pilots’ school, had been flying in a reconnaissance Staffel. On 31st March 1916 his aeroplane had plunged into the ground from 150 metres when its engine cut. The archives’ bland comment is: “It was a wonder that he emerged unscathed from the wreckage.” Feeling that he had no more bad luck to come after what had happened to him in the first weeks of the war and early in his flying career, he did not relinquish his hopes of a posting to a fighter Staffel. His wish was fulfilled in February 1917, but he found that not all fighter pilots were given the opportunity to shine as brightly as the ornaments of Jasta 2 or Jasta 11. He had to wait a long time before success came to him. It was not until 26th January 1918 that he was mentioned in despatches, when he scored his third victory in combat. But it was as a destroyer of balloons that he won fame later in the war.

  His peer as a balloon-buster, Heini Gontermann, made a first unexpected encounter with the enemy while still under training. He was in the final stage of his course and flying a twin-boom Ago when he unexpectedly met a French Caudron. Closing to seventy-five metres, he “let his machinegun speak for him”, according to the records, and surprised the Frenchman, who took evasive action; but too late. Gontermann joined
a unit equipped with the Roland Walfisch — Whale — described as “that clumsy but good aeroplane”, a reconnaissance two-seater with only a Parabellum for the observer. Gontermann praised it: “It climbs like a monkey, flies like the Devil and is very manoeuvrable.” He had it painted in many-coloured stripes, green predominating, and the troops at the Front far and wide used to talk of this “coat of many colours”.

  In spring 1916 he was sent to a single-engine fighter school. Speaking of the tensions that awaited him as a fighter pilot, he wrote in a letter home: “My body is in my hands, my soul in the hands of God. That gives courage. And always to keep this undaunted will be my ideal.” Posted to Jasta 5, he shot down his first opponent, “an Englishman”, five days later, in flames, on his first patrol.

  On Good Friday 1917 he brought down his seventh, another Briton. In a dogfight, the whole Jasta against an RFC squadron, the CO collided with another Albatros and was killed. Gontermann was given command. On Easter Sunday afternoon he was on patrol with three companions. Observation balloons were aloft. Gontermann himself described this first balloon attack and it is interesting that it set the pattern for his subsequent success as balloon-buster.

  “Wind and cloud were favourable. I waited a while for the most opportune moment. There was no enemy in the vicinity. I was 3000 metres over our lines. In a quarter of a minute I reached the balloon and attacked it four times with incendiary bullets. It caught fire on the fourth, as I was about to abandon hope. Anti-aircraft fire opened up at me as I made for home. The same afternoon at about six o’clock I took off for another attack. On my third run my guns jammed. The job seemed too risky. Anti-aircraft shells were bursting. The balloon observer made a parachute jump. I returned home through flak but unharmed. Unfortunately the balloon did not burn. I think both balloons were made of some special flame-resistant material. I will try with a home-made incendiary dart. I hope that will be quicker and more certain.”

  On 30th April he was transferred to command Jasta 15, where he received a letter from the General Commanding the Luftstreitkräfte on 5th May, confirming his fifteenth victory — both balloons and aircraft — at 11.50 a.m. on 26th April, near Arras. “By his attacks against balloons and opponents he has demonstrated outstanding keenness, perseverance and intrepidity in most difficult circumstances. I send Leutnant Gontermann my very special appreciation. Von Höppner.”

  Between 6th April and 11th May he raised his total from five to twenty-one. On 15th May he was decorated with the Pour le Mérite.

  After a long leave he returned to the Front refreshed, “to embellish his successful and victorious career”. On 18th August he brought down four balloons and an enemy aircraft, and by the next day he had accounted for seventeen balloons and seventeen aeroplanes in all.

  Jasta 15 had acquired the Fokker Triplane and Gontermann flew it at every possible moment. He said he hoped that “with these we shall have greater success than the Richthofen Staffel”.

  He took off to practise one day and quickly climbed high above the watchers on and near the airfield. “It was for us all a huge enjoyment,” wrote one eyewitness, “to see him gliding about in the bright sunlight and follow his manoeuvres with our eyes. Suddenly we saw him loop and dive steeply. As a layman, it seemed to me at first sight that he was carrying out one of the stunts that the most outstanding flyers perform. A cry of terror from members of the Staffel standing near me told me it was something more serious.” The machine crashed to the ground. The onlookers rushed to it and found Gontermann unconscious and covered in blood. The Medical Officer gave him first aid. He was rushed to hospital for an operation. He died that evening: twenty-one years old with forty victories to his name.

  Carl Degelow, when he joined Jasta 36 in August 1917, found them equipped with Albatros DIIIs which were being replaced by Fokker Triplanes. The CO was absent and his deputy, a haughty Prussian, was in command. He sent Degelow up to practise air-to-ground firing.

  Degelow learned later — too late — that he had been told to make a low pass and line up the targets, without firing, then to come in for a second run, shooting. Engine noise prevented him from hearing these instructions. On the first pass he had the targets perfectly lined up, so thought to impress his new comrades and opened fire. Climbing away, turning, he saw a great commotion on the ground: men running about on the range, others shooting off flares, signalling him to hold his fire. He made a low, slow pass and saw someone being carried away on a stretcher. He thought he had killed him. When he landed, he found an officer who had been behind one of the targets lying on the grass pale and still while a medical orderly bandaged one of his feet, wounded by Degelow.

  The Second-in-Command made a summary decision. “Pack your bags, Herr Leutnant, you’re finished here.” No use arguing. “Befehl ist befehl … Orders are orders, the Prussians’ holy words,” was Degelow’s observation. He had to linger for three embarrassing days while his posting was arranged. On a Friday he departed in the Mercedes that had delivered him the previous Monday. He felt that he was finished as a pilot: “Who would want such an impetuous fool in his unit?” But he was merely sent back to the single-seater school.

  Thence he went to fly Pfalz DIIIs for Jasta 7, whose CO was the popular Leutnant Josef Jacobs, who said: “We will discuss the incident at Jasta 36 just once. Agreed?” Only too readily, thought Degelow, relieved.

  On 2nd September he took off with seven others. The Pfalz was a pretty aeroplane, with a slimmer and more tapered torpedo-shaped fuselage than the Albatros, carrying two synchronised Spandaus and capable of 102 m.p.h. At 3000 metres they saw 25 British aeroplanes on their way to bomb the main arsenal at Ghent. Degelow described them as Bristol Fighters, but they might have been DH4s. He attacked the rearmost one, used all his ammunition, but did not fetch it down. He could hit brother officers on the ground, but apparently found moving aircraft a bit too much. The Brisfits turned to fight and one of them punctured Degelow’s oil tank. He had to break off because his goggles were covered in oil.

  The next day the Jasta went up to intercept a formation of Brisfits, Camels and Spads. Five of the German pilots, including Degelow, each took out a Camel. That was a considerable tribute to their skill as much as to their aeroplane. One of the Bristols was flown by a New Zealander, Captain Keith Park.[16]

  No. 3 Squadron RNAS, commanded by Flight Commander F. C. Armstrong, DSO, often met Jasta 7, who called it “The Armstrong Boarding School”, because to gain experience it was “assigned to various sectors of the Front and indoctrinated in the manner of an English boarding school. They were always welcome adversaries: their lack of experience made them easy prey,” Degelow gloated. This is sheer calumny: Naval Three never comprised only novices.

  When Degelow forced down one of them, a twenty-year-old Canadian, Flight Sub-Lieutenant H. S. G. Youens, the Jasta entertained him in the mess, which was customary. After a bibulous dinner, Youens mentioned that he was a violinist. A fiddle was borrowed from a mechanic, but had no A string. Youens produced two complete sets of strings and, accompanied by a piano, played for his captors. Degelow recalled: “As the opening piece we played ‘Deutschland über Alles’ and to the delight of all present Youens played the song with as much intensity of feeling as though it were ‘God Save The King’. The whole evening he gave us great pleasure. We eventually did play the British national anthem and every German stood at respectful attention as a sign of comradeship beyond the bounds of national or political affiliation. Thus a defeat was transformed into a victory.” But they put their prisoner to bed in a room with boarded windows and took away his boots and braces.

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  On 23rd May 1917, after ten hours’ intense artillery bombardment, shortly before the Italian infantry sprang from their trenches, a wave of thirty-four Caproni with fighter escort dropped tons of high explosive on the Austrian front line and reinforcement assembly area. A second wave followed, consisting of forty-two assorted smaller bombers and thirty Nieuports. This first mass participation at lo
w level in support of the ground troops, within artillery range, was greatly extolled. Material results were, however, limited by inaccuracy and wide dissemination of the bombing; but the effect on both the Italians’ and the enemy’s morale was considerable.

  The Italians claimed that the event “enraptured the souls” of their troops, and terrified the Austrians “all the more because the unexpected incursion found their spirit unprepared to endure it”.

  D’Annunzio had done his bit by writing an exhortation to the airmen before the battle. It opened: “Italian aviators, winged guardians of our sky, aerial precursors of our armies on the ground …” and went on to praise their achievements to date “in bringing constant travail to the foe, in providing with obstinate audacity for the paucity of equipment and the reverses of fortune”. It was skilfully couched in terms to which his countrymen would respond.

  The General Staff, however, declared the first aerial operation by large numbers praiseworthy in intention but confused in execution: the sum of too many individual actions rather than a harmonious integration of them all.

  D’Annunzio did more than try to incite the Air Corps to maximum endeavour, he flew on the massed bombing raid on 23rd May. For this he was awarded his third Silver Medal for “his vibrant and convincing words, his ardent example”. On 29th September he was promoted to major.

  On l0th June, in another big attack, 32 Caproni, 56 reconnaissance types and 53 fighters took off. On account of very bad weather, 20 bombers returned without having reached their targets. The rest dropped their loads blindly through cloud. On the 19th 145 aeroplanes took part in the battle.