Cavalry of the Clouds Read online

  Whatever its size, every aviation business suffered from lack of government backing, and often had to fund the design and construction of its machines in the hope of securing a contract from one of the services. Firms built machines according to designs produced by the Royal Aircraft Factory (RAF) – the former Army Aircraft Factory renamed in 1911 – at Farnborough, like Armstrong Whitworth in the case of the BE2a, or their own staff in a private venture (pv). Orders for three machines at a time proved an exception, and design practices had yet to be refined. Aeroplanes were constructed by hand without standard drawings, so the last machine of a batch might vary substantially from the first. Without the aid of draughtsmen or technical drawings, Tommy Sopwith issued verbal instructions to six mechanics to build his first machine. Fortunately, the Admiralty was impressed, which allowed him to move from a rickety shed, lacking water and lit by paraffin lamps, to more substantial premises at Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey. Vickers co-operated briefly but unsuccessfully with the Frenchman Robert Esnault-Pelterie before exhibiting its own pv two-seater FB (fighting biplane) 1 at the Olympia Air Show in 1913. Prior to the outbreak of war, Vickers, one of the larger manufacturers, completed just twenty-six aeroplanes. Avro, formed in 1910 and renting a shed at Brooklands, struggled to finance the production of its 504 biplane, which would prove invaluable in training and operational roles during the coming conflict.

  At Farnborough, the RAF held a watching brief over all British aeroplane manufacturers. Initially, with a staff of 100 and responsible for aeroplane design, the RAF’s role was defined as research and development together with supervision of, and advice to, private firms. Through a legal loophole, officially only authorised to repair damaged aeroplanes, the RAF contrived to transform wrecks into virtually new aeroplanes. In 1911, for example, a Voisin pusher (its engine behind the wing) emerged as a BE (Blériot Experimental) tractor (the engine at the front of the fuselage). On another occasion, a damaged monoplane came out as a biplane. Effectively, the RAF had become another manufacturer by stealth. Its output, however, was not extensive, and overall British aeroplane production remained sparse. A post-war Air Ministry publication recalled these early days: ‘When aeroplanes were first put to military use, they could be kept in working order by a motor mechanic, a sail-maker (for the canvas) and a carpenter’. The First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, took lessons in one of these dubious constructions:

  I noticed on several occasions defects in the machine in which we had been flying – a broken wire, a singed wing, a cracked strut – which were the subject of mutual congratulation between my pilot and myself once we had safely returned to terra firma.

  Despite equipment deficiencies – No 3 Sqn had ten machines of different types and two motor vehicles for transport, one an officer’s Mercedes – within months of its formation the RFC began to prove its worth. During army manoeuvres in September 1912, seven machines were allocated to each of the opposing formations, the commanders of which lauded their achievements. The following year, crews managed to identify troop movements from 6,000ft, but over the four day exercise five of the twelve aeroplanes involved either crashed or force-landed.

  Apart from this mechanical unreliability, the relay of information posed a major problem. With no air-to-ground communication system, machines had to land at headquarters, which in turn passed on the reconnaissance data to individual units. By the time that process had been completed, the cavalry and often infantry had vanished over the horizon. Attempts to drop messages in weighted bags to forward units had scant success.

  Various other ideas were tested. No 3 Sqn used cameras owned by its officers to photograph the defences of the Isle of Wight from 5,000ft. At Hythe, Kent, trials were carried out on the feasibility of arming aeroplanes with machine-guns; weight and an adequate field of fire being primary concerns. On 13 April 1913, the first RFC night flight took place on Salisbury Plain, a perilous undertaking with inadequate instruments. Lighting of petrol flares on the ground to assist night landings together with illumination in the cockpit to show up the compass and tachometer only marginally reduced the danger. In May 1913, Captain (Capt) C.A.H. Longcroft flew 420 miles from Farnborough to Montrose, Scotland, in three stages. Six months afterwards, he managed a 500-mile reverse trip via Portsmouth non-stop, using a long-range tank of his own design.

  The War Office soon recognised a need to co-ordinate the efforts to improve a military aeroplane’s capability and performance. Royal Engineer Capt Herbert Musgrave witnessed Blériot’s landing in 1909 and three years afterwards qualified as a pilot at the Bristol Flying School on Salisbury Plain, while on leave. In 1913, he was promoted temporary major in command of an RFC experimental unit at Larkhill. Musgrave’s remit was extensive: research connected with balloons, kites, bomb dropping, photography, artillery co-operation and wireless telegraphy. As back-up, Musgrave could call on the National Physical Laboratory for scientific work and squadron commanders for practical trials. On 1 September 1913, Brig Gen David Henderson was appointed head of a new War Office department (the Directorate of Military Aeronautics) signifying recognition of the importance of aviation in warfare. Until then the Master-General of the Ordnance (MGO), as head of the Royal Engineers, had officially retained control of army aviation.

  This all seemed promising, but the RFC still had to rely heavily on other countries for aero engines (principally France) and magnetos used for ignition of an internal-combustion engine (Germany). Advances in Britain were further hampered by the effective creation of separate air arms for the two services. In 1909, an air enthusiast Frank McClean, bought a level tract of land at Eastchurch on the Isle of Sheppey, off the north Kent coast, and persuaded the Admiralty to allow four officers to receive flying tuition, which like the aeroplanes they used came free of charge. Henceforth, Eastchurch became the principal training centre for Royal Navy aviators. During Autumn 1912 an Air Department of the Admiralty was fashioned with Capt Murray Sueter RN as director, responsible ‘in regard to all matters connected with the Naval Air Service’. On 1 July 1914, the Admiralty went even further in declaring uni-lateral independence by renaming the Naval Wing of the RFC the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). Apart from complicating strategic co-operation with the Army, this heralded four years of inter-service rivalry and fierce competition for manufacturing resources. However, one area of potential conflict was removed in 1913, when Army airships, their equipment and personnel passed to the Royal Navy, which would henceforth be ‘solely responsible for the development of lighter-than-air craft’ on the assumption that airships were more suited to fleet support than battlefield activity.

  Against this background of bureaucratic manoeuvring and production shortcomings, war became increasingly likely and ultimately inevitable. Britain’s convention with Russia to solve their territorial disputes signed in 1907, had effectively divided Europe into two armed camps: the so-called triple Entente (bilateral agreements involving Britain, France and Russia) and the firm treaty commitments of the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy). A series of disputes in the opening years of the twentieth century, heightened by a dangerous naval race between Germany and Britain revolving round the construction of modern battleships or ‘dreadnoughts’, had made the political and military atmosphere poisonous. Britain was formally committed neither to France nor Russia should war break out, but from 1839 had been a guarantor of Belgian independence. More recently, staff officers had held exploratory military and naval talks with France. These exchanges were not legally binding, but it would be difficult to remain aloof in the event of hostilities.

  Ever since Austria-Hungary’s annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908, her relations with Serbia had smouldered and not been eased by that country’s active involvement in the 1912–13 Balkan Wars with Turkey. The assassination of the Austrian heir, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and his wife in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914 began a train of ominous reactions. It saw Austria-Hungary issuing a swingeing ultimatum to Serbia on the basis of a
shadowy connection with the assassins, Germany mobilising in support of Austria-Hungary, Russia backing Serbia and France honouring her treaty obligations to Russia. On 3 August 1914, Germany invaded Belgium, and the following day Britain entered the First World War.

  As the countdown to conflict quickened, even before Sarajevo the Army Estimates for 1914 provided £1 million for the RFC – double that for the previous year and a far cry from the £5,000 set aside by the War Office for military aeronautics five years previously. British firms now received orders for up to a dozen machines at a time. In June Lt Col F.H. Sykes, its commander, gathered the military wing at Netheravon, Wiltshire, for a month’s intensive training, and steps were taken to publicise the RFC’s proficiency. On 22 June, twelve machines flew past the saluting base at the King’s Birthday Parade in Aldershot. Four days later, the Prime Minister reviewed the military wing at RFC headquarters at Netheravon. Five squadrons were on parade, a sixth (No 1) in the process of converting to aeroplanes from airships, and a seventh squadron was being formed at Farnborough. Ready to support the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) across the Channel, the RFC, in essence its Military Wing since the RNAS’s defection, formally mobilised on 3 August; a week after the RNAS had been put on a war footing.

  When asked by Major-General (Maj Gen) Henry Wilson, Director of Military Operations at the War Office, on 25 July ‘Are you ready for war?’, Maj Sefton Brancker, a qualified pilot in the Directorate of Military Aeronautics, exclaimed: ‘Good God, no!’ Hostilities were ten days away.

  2

  Baptism of Fire, August–October 1914

  ‘A corps of adventurous young men’

  Nominally, the RFC possessed 179 aeroplanes, the RNAS (including seaplanes) 93, but many counted on paper had not yet left the factory. An official post-war summary revealed that in reality, the RNAS could muster ‘about 50 … usable’ machines, the RFC only 90, of which 64 initially went to France, four more having crashed before leaving England.

  In August 1914, the French Army possessed 317 front line machines; the German 245. Russia could reputedly field 244 (including four-engine machines designed by Igor Sikorsky). However, France had an extensive eastern frontier abutting Germany to protect. Facing war on two fronts, Germany opposed France and Russia, Russia had to deal with Austria-Hungary as well as Germany. The RFC’s role, to provide support for the BEF of four infantry divisions and one cavalry division, was altogether less demanding.

  Aware that Germany might encounter opponents to her east and west, Field Marshal Alfred Count von Schlieffen, Chief of the German General Staff, had devised a plan which thereafter bore his name, based on the assumption that Russia would be unable to mobilise for six weeks. By then, German armies would have swept through the Low Countries, descended on Paris and forced France into submission.

  Schlieffen died before the outbreak of the First World War, and his successor Helmuth von Moltke, afraid of Germany being cut off from overseas supplies by a naval blockade, excluded The Netherlands from the Schlieffen Plan to leave an ‘air hole’ for maritime trade. He would advance only through Belgium and Luxembourg. Moreover, Moltke deployed more troops than Schlieffen intended along the French border thus ignoring his predecessor’s alleged dying breath: ‘Keep the right wing strong.’ The French, meanwhile, had not read the script. They crafted their own Plan 17 rapidly to attack eastwards to recover their provinces of Alsace and Lorraine lost to Germany after the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1). Nor did the Russians intend to play ball, being poised to attack Austria-Hungary in Galicia and Germany in East Prussia.

  After a declaration of war, the BEF would deploy in support of the French left wing. Traditionally, protection of the national shores was the responsibility of the Royal Navy, with the War Office guarding against invasion and physical occupation of the homeland. The advent of air power blurred these divisions. Although the War Office did not formally surrender its historical role, a de facto agreement was reached between the two services. The RFC would support the BEF in the field, the RNAS look after home defence as well as serving the needs of the fleet, taking ‘action against Zeppelins’ and ‘bombing enemy places of military importance’. In August 1914, the RNAS had grenades or 20lb bombs with which to attack hostile airships, together with two aeroplanes and one airship equipped with machine-guns. Anticipating only a reconnaissance role, the RFC had provided its aeroplanes neither with machine-guns nor bombs.

  On 9 August the BEF began to cross the Channel, protected by sixteen seaplanes and two airships of the RNAS, prior to deploying in an arc from Maubeuge to Le Cateau in north-east France on the left of French formations. In support, four squadrons of the RFC had been ordered to concentrate at Dover on 7 August and two days later cross the Channel. Their horses, vehicles and ground staff personnel would travel independently to designated embarkation ports. From ‘Southampton Docks’, two brothers ‘Willie and Jim’ with No 3 Sqn’s non-flying contingent wrote ‘just a line to say goodbye’ to their mother, adding: ‘We leave for somewhere in France, probably tonight’. William Thomas James and James Thomas Byford McCudden were the sons of a retired Royal Engineers’ sergeant major and both had joined that Corps as buglers. When living in Sheerness, they were enthralled by the antics of primitive machines from Eastchurch and both transferred to the infant RFC. William qualified as an NCO pilot, but due to a shortage of aeroplanes took charge of the non-flying contingent for the Channel crossing. His younger brother, James, was an Air Mechanic 1st Class and a specialised engine fitter. But he too was intent on flying and had already been aloft as a passenger, sometimes with his brother. In August 1914, though, a glittering career as a decorated pilot appeared highly unlikely.

  His brother thought otherwise, making an extraordinary forecast in a letter to his father on 3 August 1914, the day before the declaration of war:

  Jim and myself are very much in it at present, for we form part of the ‘expeditionary force’ and for the past week we have been busily fixing up everything, aeroplanes, motors, lorries and stores and we have everything ready.

  William expected them to go to France on the following Tuesday or Wednesday. He protested that he could not reveal ‘much, but I must say that everything had been planned very cleverly. Half of our machines are already at Dover and Eastchurch.’ William enclosed £1 for his mother, ‘for I hear that food is going up already’. He promised to let his parents know as soon as they moved off, ‘and you can bet your boots that the McCudden Syndicate will not be missing when there is something doing’. He predicted: ‘I can see Jim coming home with a V.C. or something of the sort.’

  In keeping with contemporary optimism, at Montrose in Scotland, No 2 Sqn aircrew locked their rooms and pinned notices on the doors stating that nothing must be touched; they would be back after Christmas. Each squadron decided what would be carried in its aeroplanes. No 2 Sqn opted for revolvers for the crew, binoculars, a spare set of goggles, repair tools, a water bottle filled with boiled water, a small stove, a haversack full of biscuits, cold meat, a piece of chocolate and packet of ‘soup-making material’. Setting out over the Channel was a precarious business. In No 3 Sqn Lt Philip Joubert de la Ferté was issued with a motor tyre inner tube to wear round his waist for inflation prior to an emergency descent onto water.

  Passage of the squadrons did not go smoothly. Nos 2, 3 and 4 duly converged on Dover; though one No 3 Sqn machine crashed on take-off from Netheravon on Salisbury Plain, killing its crew. At Dover the squadrons were delayed four days beyond their scheduled departure, before which pilots were issued with six miles to one inch maps of France and Belgium in readiness for a dawn take-off. At 0820 on 13 August, Lt Hubert Harvey-Kelly of No 2 Sqn (according to another squadron member, a ‘noted individualist’ with ‘a lighthearted and gay approach’) was the first pilot to land a BE2a in France. Shortly after crossing the French coast some of No 4 Squadron mistakenly landed in a rough field causing damage to their machines. The fourth squadron, No 5, did not leave Gosport, Hampshire, u
ntil 14 August, and three of its machines came down on the way to Dover. Fortunately, their pilots were unharmed and later flew replacement aeroplanes to France. In the words of Duncan Le Geyt Pitcher, an observer at the time and later senior RFC officer, ‘a few BE2s and Avros … staggered across the Channel to co-operate with the Army in France’.

  The RFC field headquarters (RFC HQ) under Brig Gen Sir David Henderson left Farnborough on 11 August to establish itself at Amiens two days later. On 15 August the Aircraft Park (the RFC’s supply and maintenance base in the field) went from Farnborough to its embarkation port, Avonmouth near Bristol, with only four crated Sopwith Tabloids. Of the other sixteen aeroplanes on strength, half had joined the front-line squadrons, the balance being flown directly to Amiens, which the main body reached on 21 August to co-locate with RFC HQ. Not without alarms. Its disembarkation at Boulogne caused army authorities to signal: ‘An unnumbered unit without aeroplanes which calls itself an Aircraft Park has arrived, what shall we do with it?’ The four operational squadrons had already settled at Maubeuge on 16 August in close contact with the BEF.

  Despite the popular belief that the war would be short-lived, positive steps were made to train newcomers for an expanded force in England. On 7 August Maj (temporary Lt Col) H.M. Trenchard was moved from assistant commandant at the CFS to command the RFC (Military Wing) and depot at Farnborough. He found a sparse assembly of aeroplanes, ‘many being taken from the Central Flying School, others being bought from private collectors and makers’. With this unpromising collection, he was expected to build up new squadrons and train recruits, including non-flying personnel. Strenuous efforts were made to persuade ‘traded men’ in the Army to volunteer for the RFC. An applicant’s conditions of service would be modified to permit four years in the colours from the date of transfer. After undergoing a period of special instruction, the recruit would be required ‘to perform duties in connection with the management and navigation of all forms of aircraft’.