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Author: Ralph Barker
Publisher: Constable
Published: 2002
Total Pages: 507
ISBN-13: 9781841194707
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This text tells the story of the Royal Flying Corps, and its part in all the major battles of World War I, from Bloody April 1917 through Third Ypres and Passchendaele to the chaotic retreat from Ludendorff's offensive.
Author: James Pugh
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2017-05-12
Total Pages: 222
ISBN-13: 1317016890
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →By the middle of 1918 the British Army had successfully mastered the concept of ’all arms’ warfare on the Western Front. This doctrine, integrating infantry, artillery, armoured vehicles and - crucially - air power, was to prove highly effective and formed the basis of major military operations for the next hundred years. Yet, whilst much has been written on the utilisation of ground forces, the air element still tends to be studied in isolation from the army as a whole. In order to move beyond the usual 'aircraft and aces' approach, this book explores the conceptual origins of the control of the air and the role of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) within the British army. In so doing it addresses four key themes. First, it explores and defines the most fundamental air power concept - the control of the air - by examining its conceptual origins before and during the First World War. Second, it moves beyond the popular history of air power during the First World War to reveal the complexity of the topic. Third, it reintegrates the study of air power during the First World War, specifically that of the RFC, into the strategic, operational, organisational, and intellectual contexts of the era, as well as embedding the study within the respective scholarly literatures of these contexts. Fourth, the book reinvigorates an entrenched historiography by challenging the usually critical interpretation of the RFC’s approach to the control of the air, providing new perspectives on air power during the First World War. This includes an exploration of the creation of the RAF and its impact on the development of air power concepts.
Author: Edward Bujak
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2015-09-25
Total Pages: 224
ISBN-13: 0857726099
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →The Royal Flying Corps, later the Royal Air Force, was formed in 1912 and went to war in 1914 where it played a vital role in reconnaissance, supporting the British Expeditionary Force as 'air cavalry' and also in combat, establishing air superiority over the Imperial German Air Force. Edward Bujak here combines the history of the air war, including details of strategy, tactics, technical issues and combat, with a social and cultural history. The RFC was originally dominated by the landed elite, in Lloyd George's phrase 'from the stateliest houses in England', and its pilots were regarded as 'knights of the air'. Harlaxton Manor in Lincolnshire, seat of landed gentry, became their major training base. Bujak shows how, within the circle of the RFC, the class divide and unconscious superiority of Edwardian Britain disappeared - absorbed by common purpose, technical expertise and by an influx of pilots from Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. He thus provides an original and unusual take on the air war in World War I, combining military, social and cultural history.
Author: James Thomas Byford McCudden
Publisher:
Published: 2000
Total Pages: 316
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →James McCudden was an outstanding British fighter ace of World War I, whose daring exploits earned him a tremendous reputation and, ultimately, an untimely end. Here, in this unique and gripping first-hand account, he brings to life some of aviation history? most dramatic episodes in a memoir completed at the age of twenty-three, just days before his tragic death. During his time in France with the Royal Flying Corps from 1914 to 1918, McCudden rose from mechanic to pilot and flight commander. Following his first kill in September 1916, McCudden shot down a total of fifty-seven enemy planes, including a remarkable three in a single minute in January 1918. A dashing patrol leader, he combined courage, loyalty and judgement, studying the habits and psychology of enemy pilots and stalking them with patience and outstanding success. Written with modesty and frankness, yet acutely perceptive, Flying Fury is both a valuable insight into the world of early aviation and a powerful account of courage and survival above the mud and trenches of Flanders. Fighter ace James McCudden died in July 1918, after engine failure caused his plane to crash just four months before the end of World War I. His success as one of Britain's deadliest pilots earned him the Victoria Cross.
Author: I. McInnes
Publisher: Andrews UK Limited
Published: 2012-03-30
Total Pages: 518
ISBN-13: 1781502897
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Many books have been written about pilots of the Royal Flying Corps but the men on the ground, who kept the planes in the air and the guns firing, have been sadly neglected - and yet their role was a vital one. This truly remarkable book, the production of which must have seemed an impossible task, has more than remedied the situation. The authors have managed to locate all the non-commissioned airmen who enlisted in the RFC prior to the outbreak of war in August 1914, and for each one they have provided a mini-biography. The length of each entry varies, available records being what they are, but detail is provided for over 1,400 men. For those who became pilots, details of their certificates are given. Statistics include the establishment of the Corps at various times and there is a list of non-commissioned ranks as well as notes on uniforms, badges etc. There is a full record of works consulted at the Public Record Office and an excellent bibliography.
Author: Great Britain. Royal Flying Corps
Publisher:
Published: 1998
Total Pages: 272
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This volume contains comprehensive coverage of WWI by the men who fought in the air.
Author: Peter G. Cooksley
Publisher: The History Press
Published: 2007-05-24
Total Pages: 239
ISBN-13: 0752496239
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Explores the contributions made by the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service during World War I. This work also covers aircraft, an array of other subjects including organization, pay, rank, uniforms, motor vehicles, the womens branches, attitudes, and even songs popular in the mess.
Author: Alistair Smith
Publisher: Casemate Publishers
Published: 2012-09-19
Total Pages: 164
ISBN-13: 1783408952
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This book contains selected images from three different Royal Flying Corps albums. Photographs include training in Canada and at Tangmere. There is a large variety of different aircraft featured, as well as images of pilots and officers. Also included are a number of photographs from the collection of the late Lieutenant William Shorter, who was shot down over German lines in 1918 at the age of twenty.
Author: Wilfrid Theodore Blake
Publisher:
Published: 1918
Total Pages: 142
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →"Of all the tales and sketches which go to make up the present work, some have been actual experiences of the writer, more of other members of the Royal Flying Corps, whilst one or two are purely imaginative, but none the less possible. In cases where the writer may seem to be inaccurate or out of date, he begs to remind his readers that sketches were written in the autumn of 1916 in most instances, and portray events that happened to him and his contemporaries in the R.F.C., mostly in 1915 and the beginnng of 1916. After that date the writer ceased to fly himself, owing to a period of eight months in the hospital, and became a "Wing Adjutant." The details of the R.F.C. in the East were obtained whilst he was actually there during the greater part of 1917."--Preface.
