Aircraft in Colour the First World War, and Hence Tbe BOMBERS Bomber May Claim to Ante-Date the Fighter Aeroplane As a Weapon of War
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Bombs were dropped from an aeroplane at least as early as November 1911, nearly three years before the outbreak of The Pocket Encyclopaedia of World Aircraft in Colour the First World War, and hence tbe BOMBERS bomber may claim to ante-date the fighter aeroplane as a weapon of war. At PATROL AND ll!CONNADSANCZ AlllCR..UT any rate, while there were no crue 19 1~-1919 fighters in existence in August 1914, there were bombers - from the frail Voisins of France to the giant four engined Russian llya Mouromeu. The ensuing four years of war provided a testing-ground for such outstanding and varied bomber designs as the Gotha Grossflugzeuge, the Breguet 14 and the Handley Page 0 /400. In addition, throughout the war the evolution of reconnaissance aircraft progressed to the extent that, to succeed the frail, defenceless Taube and Albatros machines of 1914, armed 2-scaters were evolved that in 1918 could out-fly and out-climb some of the ablest fighters in service.• The 67 aircraft in this volume reflect the development of such aircraft throughout the first truly formative period in mili tary aviation history. The period 1914- 19 is selected so as to include cenain important types designed during the war, but which arrived too late for combat service. First published in 1968, this new edition of a now firmly established favourite amongst aircraft enthusiastS contains some necessary texrual corrections and clarification as well as amendments to minor illustration detail in cwo of the colour plates. Four types of aircraft which were not in the earlier edition have been added; to make room for these, a number of flying-boats and floatplancs have been transferred to the companion volume Flying Boats and Seaplanes Since 1910. 2nd (REVISED) EDITION £J.20 net The Pocket Encyclopaedia of World Aircraft in Colour BOMBERS PATROL AND RECONNAISSANCE AIRCRAFr 1914-1919 by KENNETH MUNSON, Associate R.Ae.S. Illustrated by JOHN W. WOOD Norman Dinnagc Brian Hiley William Hobson Alan Holliday I Tony Mitchell Allen Randall Additional notes by IAN D. HUNTLEY, A.M.R.Ac.S. I ' BLANDFORD PRESS POOLE DORSET Copyright C 1g68 Blandford Press Ltd, I.ink House, West Street, Poole, Dorset BH15 1LL Fint published 1g68 Reprinted 1971 P REFACE Second (Revised) Edition 1977 So far as the colour plates in this volume are concerned, we owe an incalculable debt of gratitude to Ian D. Huntley, A.M.R.Ae.S., whose extensive researches have provided the basis for all of the colour \vork in this volume. A short account of Ian Huntley's researches - and a few of the results that they have yielded - appear in the Appendices. These, if read in conjunction \vith the notes on page 15, should obviate a number of misconceptions which ap parently confused some readers of the first edition. For help or reference material of other kinds, I am indebted to All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced material published by the American journal Air Progress, by Harley or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or ford Publications Ltd. and by Profile Publications Ltd. Individual mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any assistance with the original edition, also much appreciated, was infomuition storage and retrieval system, without per- mission in writing fro.m the publisher. given by Messrs. Charles F. Andrews of BAC, Bo Widfelt of the Swedish Aviation Historical Society and Lt. Col. N. Kindberg of the Royal Swedish Air Force; this revised edition has benefited in no small measure from material kindly made available subsequently by Chaz Bowyer, Jack Bruce, Roland Eichenberger and Douglas Pardee. To them all I am delighted to express again my thanks, both for their kindness and for the helpful spirit in which their assist ance was offered. t ISBN o 7137 o632 8 May 1976 Colour printed by The Ysel Press, Devcnter, Holland Printed and bound in England by Richard Clay (The Chaucer Press) Ltd, Bungay, Suffolk I INTRODUCTION It is difficult to establish with certainty when bombs were first dropped from an aeroplane in the furtherance of a military cam prugn, but the earliest recorded occasion was on 1 November 1911, when Giulio Gavotti of the Squadriglia di Tripoli, fiying a Rumpler Taube of the Italian Air Service, released four small bombs over the North African townships of Tagiura and Ain Zara. At any rate it is certain that, as a type, the use of the aeroplane as a bomber ante dated the fighter by several years, for machines capable of such activity were in service or being designed some time before the outbreak of World War 1. One of the leading types at this time was the French Voisin, and the first bombing attack of the \Var was made by Voisins of the Aviation Militaire which bombed the Zeppelin hangars at Metz-Frascaty on 14 August 1914. During the early part of the war Germany and Austro-Hungary relied almost exclusively upon the Zeppelin airship as their main vehicle for bombing raids, and many of the first offensive sorties made by the Allies were directed at the factories or airfield sites \Vhere these 'monsters of the purple twilight' were built or housed. Before the end of 1914 a few successful bombing raids were also carried out by aircraft of the Royal Naval Air Service. It is probably fair to say that their morale value \Vas higher than that of the actual de struction caused, for they were made mostly by small aircraft carrying only a modest load of the lightest bombs. The Voisin was almost the only aeroplane in service with any of the warring nations that really deserved to be regarded as a bomber, and in September 1914 this was recognised by the Aviation Militaire, which began to reorganise its Voisin squadrons specifically to carry out bombing activities. (It was, incidentally, a French Voisin that scored the first air-to-air combat victory of the war, when its observer shot down a German Aviatik 2-seater on 5 October 1914.) France's first steps towards the creation of a bombing force were soon followed by the formation, in the Imperial Russian Air Service, of Tsar Nicholas II's 'Squadron of Flying Ships' (or 7 I E.V.K.), equipped with the giant Sikorsky Ilya Mouromeu. The first obliged to attack only by night and finally to abandon the Ilya Mouromeu \Vas the first (and, at that time, still the only) raids altogether in May 1918. four-engined bomber in the \vorld. This enormous machine, which The Gothas typified the German bombers of the period and were had Bown for the fint time in January 1914, was a development of the principal types to be used, but they \Vere abetted by smaller the record-setting IA Grand, also designed by Igor Sikorsky early in numben of the similar Friedrichshafen G types and, in the later 1913. The E.V.K. made its first bombing raid with these machines stages, by the bigger Zeppelin (Staaken) R types. Allied bomben of on 15 February 1915 from its base atJablonna in Poland. the later war years included later and improved models of the Two months before this, Commodore Murray F. Suetcr of the Caproni series and the Ilya Mouromets, together with such excellent British Admiralty's Air Department had set the wheels in motion new types as the Breguet 14. D.H.4 and Handley Page 0/400. to produce what he called a 'bloody paralyser of an aeroplane' to Some other bomber types, notably the D.H.9 and the R.E.8, were bomb targets in Germany, although the bomber that resulted from produced in far g1eater numbers which their combat value did not this specification, the Handley Page 0 / 100, was not to enter service merit. In June 1918 Britain established the Independent Force in until nearly the end of 1916. Europe, a strategic bombing force equipped in the main with In the meantime, in May 1915 the Aviation Militaire began a Handley Page bombers, to undertake the bombing of targets in the sustained bombing campaign using its squadrons of Voisin air German homeland. The United States ofAmerica had come into the craft, the strength of which \vas eventually built up to a total of war on 6 April 1917, and for most of 1918 the American Expedition some six hundred aircraft. Both Britain and Italy bought Voisin ary Force, equipped predominantly \vith fighters and bombers of and Brcguet bombing types from France and began to build them French origin, made an important contribution to the bombing under licence as well. Russia, too, essayed the licence production of offensive which \vas sustained until the end of the war. the Voisin, ,vith local modifications, but \vith unfortunate result!. The load-carrying abilities of the bomber aeroplane had in On 24 May 1915 another protagonist joined the confilct on the creased to such an extent by the end of World War 1 that, from the side of the Allies. Italy's combined total of military and naval little 20-lb. or 10-kg. weapons that had been the norm in 1914, high aeroplanes at this time \vas little more than a hundred, and a explosive 'block-busters' weighing 1,650 lb. (nearly 750 kg.) had high proportion of these were of French origin. They did include, been developed and used. The weapons in most general use were ho\vever, a number of examples of the excellent Caproni Ca 2 those weighing around 100 kg. - 250 lb., but the Handley Page bomben with the range and reliability to undertake the long, V/1500, \vhich was all ready to go into action when the Armistice hazardous Bight across the Alps to target! in Au.strl>Hungary, was signed, was able to carry two bombs each weighing 3,300 lb.