1917 Albatros DV Jasta 12 Ulrich Neckel - Don Greer....
1916 Von Richthofen's 14th victory - Thomas La Padula....
It was fine flying weather on Wednesday December 20, 1916, when Richthofen and 4 planes of his Staffel encountered an English squadron. of encountered. At a quarter to 2 in the afternoon over Moreuil, MvR zeroed in and attacked the last plane. According to Richthofen's combat report the British plane was an FE.2b No., A5446 piloted by a Lt Darcy and the observer was unknown due to the lack of an identification disc. At three thousand meters Richthofen began his attack and after his first pass the motor of the FE2b began to smoke and the observer was wounded. "The plane went down in large curves. I followed and fired at the closest range. I had also killed, as was ascertained later on the pilot. Finally, the plane crashed on the ground." The pilot of the ill-fated FE. 2b was Lieutenant Lionel George D'Arcy, who had only been with the squadron for a little over two weeks. His plane was a gift of the Matalan People and it had written in block letters Malaya No.11 on its nacelle. D'Arcy's unknown observer was identified as Sub-Lieutenant Reginald Cuthbert Whiteside, a volunteer reserve of the Nelson Battalion, Royal Naval Division. Neither graves nor the bodies of D'Arcy or Whiteside were ever found, and both are commemorated on the Memorial to the Missing in Arras, France.
1916 Von Richthofen's 15th victory - Thomas La Padula....
Richthofen received credit for downing the DH.2n No, 5985 as his 15th victim. This victory was collaborated by artillery men on the ground. According to Richthofen in a head-on firing pass he went head-to-head with the British plane. The DH.2 flown by James Thomas Byford McCudden did not crash behind British lines, as Richthofen noted in the day's Combat Report. McCudden observed the German Squadron and attacked. The German combat version states that the enemy was pushed back. The British combat version is very different. McCudden notes, "I fired around 15 shots and drove him (MvR) off. He turned and came towards me, firing. I opened fire at 100 yards and after about 8 shots my gun stopped due to cross feed. As the hostile machine was engaging me at close range. I turned on my back and dived vertically in a slow spin and in this way regained our lines." McCudden cleared his jammed guns and renewed the chase but due to the Barons superior aircraft the British pilot was already outdistanced. Richthofen under the assumption that McCudden had crashed, renewed his squadron, by rejoining his patrol that then withdrew.Richthofen learned from his mentor Oswald Boelke not to pursue an enemy too low over unfriendly lines. Ground fire and antiaircraft fire were not the airman's friends. A heavy presence of British AA batteries gave MvR the reason to leave the area and resume his Staffel; having seen McCudden dive, Richthofen could only assume he had shot the British pilot down.Sergeant McCudden who would live to fight another day survived aerial combat and achieved 57 aerial victories. He was decorated with the Victoria Cross, the DSO and Bar, the MC and Bar and was awarded the Croix de Guerre by the French. In the last summer of the war McCudden died in a flying accident when his plane had an engine stoppage and he side slipped into the ground. He was 21 years old.
1917 Von Richthofen's 16th victory - Thomas La Padula....
Richthofen's 16th Victory.
The First Canadian pilot to fall under the guns of the Red Baron was Flight Lieutenant Allan Switzer Todd. As part of the Royal Naval Air Services, 8th Squadron, Todd was flying a Sopwith Pup, No. 5193 on January 4, 1917. Todd and his Squadron were sent to the Somme Front to counter the aggressive activity of the German Albatros aircraft. The British pilots attacked aggressively when Richthofen's Jasta arrived on the scene. So much so that Todd \pilot \out the Red Baron and began his attack. Unfortunately, as Richthofen puts it," the enemy plane was superior to ours. Only because we were three against one, we detected the enemy's week points. I managed to get behind him and shoot him down."
Todd's plane fell apart while falling through the sky, landing in the vicinity of Metz-en-Couture. Cause of death was either from gunshot wounds or crash trauma. Some valuables of Todd were collected by the Germans and returned. Over time his gravesite became lost due to the turmoil of war. Todd's name is on the Arras Memorial to the Missing.
Two days after shooting down Todd, Richthofen received a telegram from the Kaiser. It read simply: 'His Majesty, the Kaiser, has awarded the Orden Pur le Merite to Leutnant von Richthofen'. The Orden Pur le Merite could be awarded to any military officer regardless of his branch of service, however its most famous recipients were German Pilots during the Great War. The medal was to be worn whenever the recipient was in uniform. Informally known as the Blue Max, it was supposedly given that name in honor of the German ace Max Immelman, who awarded the medal on the same day in 1916 as Otto Boelcke, Richthofen's mentor. Originally given for 8 Aerial Victories the number was later raised to 16 in early 2017.It was awarded to Richthofen on January 12, 1917. It was Prussia's highest Military award, and it was awarded to MvR for the successful confirmation of shooting down 16 enemy planes.
1917 SE5 Ball vs Rumpler - Graham Turner....
While No. 56 Squadron was equipped with S.E.5s, Britain's top ace, flight commander Captain Albert Ball (with 30 aerial victories, mostly in a Nieuport), was sceptical about the new machine and was given permission to continue tofly his Nieuport 23 on lone patrols. On 23 April 1917, No. 56 Squadron began patrols with the S.E.5s. Because his Nieuport had been damaged in an early-morning encounter, Ball took up an S.E.5 (no. A4850) at 1130hrs and soonran into a flight of Albatros D.IIIs. He downed one and managed to break contact with the rest using the S.E.5's superior speed. While returning to his airfield at 1230hrs, Ball encountered a lone Albatros C.III observation planefrom Flieger Abt 7 near the front lines north of Cambrai. In a diving attack Captain Ball put 40 rounds into the German machine, disabling it and wounding the observer. With a smoking engine, the German aircraft dived to the ground and managed to land. The German pilot and observer survived. Captain Ball now saw the worth of the S.E.5. Not only did the two machine guns give him extra firepower, but the speed advantage of the S.E.5 gave the pilot the initiative to initiate or break contact with enemy aircraft. Captain Ball would go on to shoot down 11 more German aircraft before his death in combat in May 1917.