The Royal Flying Corps

[Kemp]

hey, since i was in the armed forces my nephew asked me some help with his uni project. he's looking for some history about the Royal Flying Corps from the beginning to World War 1. he is actually looking for one bloke who died in 1917, an airman 2nd class named Arthur Coulter Laycock. i know there are some lads on here that are/have been in the military and i was wondering if you have any guides or tips or help to give the kid. since i'm Canadian i don't have much connections with the UK stuff.

thanks,
Kemp.

[Gannex]

When the Royal Flying Corps needed funding, sceptics asked what the RFC was good for, what threat they could possibly neutralise? Nobody in Parliament had an adequate answer, but a few, far-sighted individuals argued that control of the air would be important in the twentieth century. Arthur Coulter Laycock was probably one of the men who understood this, otherwise he wouldn't have signed up for the Royal Flying Corps; it was universally understood to be extremely dangerous work.

[oily oaf]

When the Royal Flying Corps needed funding, sceptics asked what the RFC was good for, what threat they could possibly neutralise? Nobody in Parliament had an adequate answer, but a few, far-sighted individuals argued that control of the air would be important in the twentieth century. Arthur Coulter Laycock was probably one of the men who understood this, otherwise he wouldn't have signed up for the Royal Flying Corps; it was universally understood to be extremely dangerous work.

You're not wrong my learned fiend. Didn't they have an expectation of life gauged in seconds or something?

In actual fact my paternal greatgrandfather Biggles (Ginger) Oaf was an inaugral volounteer member of the corps and was shot down and killed instantly before he could take off by an American ack ack gun just outside Cleethorpes.
Fair play to the old geezer though. Not once did he try to sell his story to a tabloid newspaper for a shedload of dosh

Stand by your beds men!

[CarlMetro]

Have you tried looking on something like wikipedia?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Flying_Corps

Lots of useful links on the bottom of the page too.

[AndyRAC]

Along with the RFC was the Royal Naval Air Service(RNAS), as has already been said, weren't taken seriously by Navy and Army. Became the RAF on the 1st April 1918.

[Mark in Oshawa]

All I know is the RFC was full of brave young guys who had a life expectancy as fighter pilots that was about 4 weeks long, but they loved to fly and fight if they had to fight at all.

I hope you hit the library Kemp, for I am sure most libraries will have either the books you need or the access to them. Not everything is on the net, and when it comes to history, books are the way to go.

Take note also Kemp, the little known fact that 5 out of the top 10 aces in the RFC/RNAS were Canadians. Billy Bishop was the top surviving ace and second to only "Mick" Mannock. Also, as you do your research, you will come across the RNAS's history as well, and you might want to include that. The idea of the Triplane fighter that we think of as the Red Baron's famous plane was originally from the Sopwith Tripes that the RNAS flew. Ray Collishaw, a Canadian flew with his countrymates in all black Tripes and terrorized the German's. He and Donald McLaren were two of those five Canadian aces that the poltically correct anti-Canadian history fools we have in our society didn't want you to learn about in high school. It was this unit that got Fokker into building a Tripe and the Red Baron adopted the whole "elite" squadron idea for his "Flying Circus".

Best flying stories of any war come from the brave young men of the RFC and RNAS.....just cant name one book off the top of my head to recommend. They are out there though. I think the net is not best source however...it just will point you in some directions. Gotta find the books man.....

[Gannex]

Interesting stuff, Mark, and I like the lick of patriotism that you throw in to the story. Your advice to read books, rather than screens, is good advice, I think, but I doubt many will follow it.

Thinking about those poor *******s, dying, scared out of their minds every day. . . No one should have to go through that. Another reminder that war is hell.

[Gannex]

The idea of the [Fokker] Triplane fighter that we think of as the Red Baron's famous plane was originally from the Sopwith Tripes that the RNAS flew.

Was the Fokker a big improvement on the Sopwith, do you know?

[Gannex]

In actual fact my paternal greatgrandfather Biggles (Ginger) Oaf was an inaugral volounteer member of the corps and was shot down and killed instantly before he could take off by an American ack ack gun just outside Cleethorpes.

Ah yes, The Cleethorpes Affair. The less said about your great-grandad's behaviour in that little escapade, the better, don't you think, Oily? I'm surprised that you'd be bringing that up, frankly.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Was the Fokker a big improvement on the Sopwith, do you know?

The Fokker really wasn't an improvement at all, and what is more in some ways was a liability. The Fokker was a reaction to the Tripe, but the Brits figured out was that while the Tripe climbed faster than any other fighter at the time, ( and this was the advantage the Germans sought ), it was not very fast, and had visibility issues with the extra wing. Also, it was becoming clearer as the war went on that firepower and speed also mattered, and while you could put more guns on a triplane, that extra wing cut the visibility and limited the speed.

We saw what Sopwith felt was the best solution, the Camel, arguably one of the best fighters of the war, to be followed by the heavily armed Dolphin, which was less manoeverable, and was not a success only because the war ended. The SE5a was also a superior plane as well. The Germans figured it out eventually too, and the Fokker D7 was probably the best plane of the war, with two powerful guns, good speed and very good ability in dogfights while being strudy and providing good visability.

When you compare these planes to what was flying in 1914, it is scary to think what would have happened if the war continued to 1920 or so? Would all metal monoplanes been out of the question?

Oh boy...lol...I got sidetracked, but I always love a chance to talk about old fighters...