The Rittmeister’s Attack. on Lieutenant May

Von Richthofen saw an easy interception and dived to the attack: this required some rapid menu, trigonometry. In order to finish his dive in a g firing position behind May’s Camel, he had to airr. for a point well ahead of it. Several ground witnesses, mainly those looking east rather than south-east and therefore not into the sun. saw : ; aircraft and then another dive out of the figh: Although there is no evidence whatsoever of th. it is safe, on the basis of combat airmanship ale ne to assume that von Richthofen curved his d: . around to the south so as to have the sun behind him in his approach to the Camel. A11 ‘old hand on either side, would not have done otherwise unless he had lost interest in surviving the war.

According to the Combat Reports and the squadron Record Book entries for Capm: Brown’s fight, map references 62D. Q.2 and 62D. Q.3 (Cerisy) appear. These locations arc : the south-east of where Brown later attacked von Richthofen. Brown initially believed that May, whom he had last seen over the River Somme a short distance to his south, had successfully disengaged. A few seconds later, he noticed that a second aeroplane had also disengaged. It resolved into a Triplane which appeared to be taking an unhealthy interest in Mays Camel.

For a reason which will never be known, von Richthofen failed to make a good interception; lie came out of his dive too fir behind Mays Camel, which gave May the advantage as his machine was the faster of the two.

Tiking Mays later testimony as a basis, it may be concluded that von Richthofen came into maximum firing range of May somewhere between Saillv-le-Sec and Welcome Wood. From the Camel’s flight path von Richthofen had probably suspected that its pilot was new to the game and decided to find out for certain. Even with the occasional defective round of ammunition in his belts that morning, he could safely tackle an inexperienced enemy. If the Camel pilot turned out to be otherwise, a Fokker Dr. I Triplane could out climb a Camel any day. He opened fire to see what would happen. An experienced pilot upon hearing the Rak-ak-ak sound of bullets passing close by or seeing the smoke of the tracer, would, without any hesitation whatsoever turn his machine to face his attacker. A novice would spend vital moments looking around to find his attacker who, if close by, was using those same vital moments to correct his aim! If the novice survived the second and more accurate burst of fire, he would probably begin to zig-zag. The urgency with which Brown regarded the situation may be deduced from the airmanship which he now displayed.

A third aeroplane was seen by ground witnesses to leave the ‘dog fight’ high up over Cerisy and start downwards heading south-west; it was Brown. An ‘old hand’ like him instinctively knew that in an attack from this direction – ie: into the sun with a layer of haze ahead of it – the dice would be loaded against himself. He would be heading into haze made opaque by the sun’s rays, whereas his opponent’s clearest view would be towards him. On the way down there would be time to remedy this and thereby gain the tactical advantage of surprise.

Having detached himself from the fight which was now down to 5,000 feet, Brown performed his own mental trigonometry. A dive from that altitude to ground level required that he start levelling out at 1,000 feet and then stabilise his aeroplane on the final intercepting course. This required about 7,500 feet of forward motion and a lot of good judgement. To use the sun and haze to his advantage, he would need to attack the Triplane from above, behind and on its left. Brown stated in his Combat Report that he was fighting in 62D. Q.2 which would have placed him in a good position relative to the sun and the ground haze to observe the members of his Flight. Starting from 62D. Q.2 it would not be difficult to adjust his course on the way down so as to approach the aircraft from the south-east. Vincent Emery, in his trench at Sainte Colette, saw him do this. If he were then to pass to the south of Vaux-sur – Somme, the mist would help to hide him. After that, on his attack path, he would have the sun behind him. There was a good chance that the

German pilot just might not see him_________

Fundamental to any fighter pilot in any war. it has been estimated that 50% of pilots shot down, never saw the aircraft that attacked them. This is good tactics, giving the maximum result with the minimum risk.

Brown eased his Camel into a 45° dive, adjusted his engine power to obtain 180 mph, which was the maximum safe airspeed, so as not to separate his wings from the fuselage. LeBoutillier later confirmed this angle of dive by saying ‘… I saw him coming in from the right [of Boot’s position) in a steep 45° dive.’

Von Richthofen’s impression that the Camel pilot ahead of him might be a novice had been confirmed. Upon realising that someone was firing at him, May swerved his aeroplane and began to zig-zag. The aerodynamic drag of the turns reduced his speed. The Triplane, which was actually the slower aeroplane of the two, now held the advantage and the distance between them began to diminish. May descended lower and lower until he was, in his own words: ‘Just skimming the surface of the water.’