Eighty three years ago this week — on April 21, 1918 — the “Red Baron,” Manfred von Richthofen, was shot down and killed over the skies of France. With 80 air combat victories to his credit, Richthofen was the highest-ranking fighter ace of the war. Coming down behind enemy lines, the Australian troops that found him afforded the Red Baron a military funeral with full honors. A hero had died, and a legend was born.
In a war of such devastating carnage and apparent inhumanity, the public — on both sides of the conflict — saw the fighter pilot as the last bastion of heroism and chivalry — the aerial knight locked in honorable one-on-one combat in a clear blue sky high above the mud and trenches. Charles Lindberg remarked that the WWI pilots “represented chivalry and daring in my own [boyhood days] as did King Arthur's knights in childhood stories.”
Such fanciful imagery masked the grim reality of the high mortality rates among fighter pilots, and the fact that air combat had little effect on WWI's outcome. But often it was the aces themselves, in memoirs and newspaper articles, that fed the illusion. In Martin Gilbert's The First World War: A Complete History, we find the Red Baron's own description of the first of his 80 victories.
My Englishman twisted and turned, flying in zigzags. I was animated by a single thought: “The man in front of me must come down, whatever happens.” At last a favorable moment arrived. My opponent had apparently lost sight of me. Instead of twisting and turning he flew straight along. In a fraction of a second I was at his back with my excellent machine. I gave a short burst of shots with my machine-gun. I had gone so close that I was afraid I might dash into the Englishman.
Suddenly I nearly yelled with joy, for the propeller of the enemy machine had stopped turning. Hurrah! I had shot his engine to pieces; the enemy was compelled to land, for it was impossible for him to reach his own lines.
The English machine was swinging curiously to and fro. Probably something had happened to the pilot. The observer was no longer visible. His machine-gun was apparently deserted. Obviously I had hit the observer, and he had fallen from his seat. The Englishman landed close to the flying ground of one of our squadrons. I was so excited that I landed also, and my eagerness was so great that I nearly smashed up my machine.
The English flying machine and my own stood close together. I rushed to the English machine and saw that a lot of soldiers were running towards my enemy. When I arrived I discovered that my assumption had been correct. I had shot the engine to pieces, and both the pilot and observer were severely wounded. The observer died at once, and the pilot while being transported to the nearest dressing station. I honored the fallen enemy by placing a stone on his beautiful grave.
(This article can also be found on National Review Online.)
