Fantastic Documentary on James McCudden

[CaptSopwith]

I was randomly searching things on YouTube - James McCudden being one of them (Jimmy is far and away my favorite pilot of WWI). And lo and behold, I find a 45 minute documentary on World War I. Here's the link. Enjoy!

 

Edited November 18, 2011 by _CaptSopwith

[+Polovski]

BBC documentary broadcast a year or so ago (?) and again recently, pretty good as those sort of things go.

[33LIMA]

Yes nice one there. 'Mac' is my hero too.

 

If anyone here has never read this passage from 'Flying fury' before, you should read it now. If you have already read it, you should read it again (rom Wikipedia):

 

The Hun triplane was practically underneath our formation now, and so down we dived at a colossal speed. I went to the right, Rhys-Davids to the left, and we got behind the triplane together. The German pilot saw us and turned in a most disconcertingly quick manner, not a climbing nor Immelmann turn, but a sort of flat half spin. By now the German triplane was in the middle of our formation, and its handling was wonderful to behold. The pilot seemed to be firing at all of us simultaneously, and although I got behind him a second time, I could hardly stay there for a second. His movements were so quick and uncertain that none of us could hold him in sight at all for any decisive time

 

The triplane was still circling round in the midst of six S.E.'s, who were all firing at it as opportunity offered, and at one time I noted the triplane in the apex of a cone of tracer bullets from at least five machines simultaneously, and each machine had two guns. By now the fighting was very low and the red-nosed Albatros had gone down and out, but the triplane still remained. I had temporarily lost sight of the triplane whilst changing a drum of my Lewis gun, and when I next saw him he was very low, still being engaged by an S.E. marked I, the pilot being Rhys-Davids. I noticed that the triplane's movements were very erratic, and then I saw him go into a fairly steep dive and so I continued to watch, and then saw the triplane hit the ground and disappear into a thousand fragments, for it seemed to me that it literally went to powder ” “ As long as I live I shall never forget my admiration for that German pilot, who single-handed fought seven of us for ten minutes, and also put some bullets through all of our machines. His flying was wonderful, his courage magnificent, and in my opinion he is the bravest German airman whom it has been my privilege to see fight

Edited November 18, 2011 by 33LIMA

[Von Paulus]

One more for James McCudden.

[Shiloh]

This was very enjoyable to watch. Thanks for posting Capt!