von Richtofen, Bohme and the Death of Boelcke...

[Hauksbee 103]

I found this account of Boelcke's death over at ROF:

 

"A six-man Jasta 2 flight including Boelcke,  Manfred von Richthofen and Erwin Böhme engaged their usual adversaries, D.H.2s from No.24 squadron. During the fight, Böhme dived after Boelcke after same target, perhaps trying to shoulder-shoot, and when Boelcke pulled up his top wing hit Böhmes' wheel, damaging fabric. Boelcke lost part of the top wing (accounts vary) but supposedly managed to ditch the plane... then died in impact because he has not strapped himself to the cockpit. What is sure is that he died immediately on impact."

 

From other readings, my impression of the event is slightly different: Boelcke, von Richtofen, Bohme (I know there should be an umlaut in Bohme, but I can't find it) and three others happened upon two DH-2's. Boelcke and Bohme pounced on one, von Richtofen on the other. In some tellings, it was von Richtofen who cut across Boelcke's flight path; in others it was von Richtofen's intended victim that caused Boelcke to pull up sharply and caused his upper wing to briefly touch Bohme's landing gear. The impact, brief as it was, cracked the main spar in Boelcke's top wing. He tried to nurse his plane down by flying large gentle circles but to no avail. Near the ground, the wing failed. He was not wearing a seat belt, and upon impact he was pitched forward; his head struck the butts of his machine guns and he died a few hours later that day.

 

Can anyone else throw any additional light on this?

Edited April 29, 2017 by Hauksbee

[JFM 18]

I'm going to opine nobody was "shoulder shooting." These were trained combat pilots, not online flight-sim wannabes. You're going to "shoulder shoot" your commander Boelcke's adversary? Have fun back at the airfield as he tears your ass to shreds! Fortunately, the word "perhaps" was used, so that indicates the writer's conjecture, which is fine. 

 

Here is what I wrote in my book DH2 vs Albatros DI/DII, Western Front 1916, Osprey Duel #42.  

 

     On Saturday 28 October, Boelcke and Staffelkamerad and personal friend Böhme had just sat down to enjoy a game of chess when Jasta 2 ‘were called shortly after four o’clock during an infantry attack on the front.’ Boelcke had flown several sorties already that day but led his Staffel of Albatros D Is and D IIs aloft again into the cloudy, stormy skies. Ltn Richthofen recalled that eventually, while flying at about 10,000 feet between Pozières and Flers, ‘from a great distance we saw two imprudent Englishmen over the Front, apparently having fun in the bad weather.’ These two aeroplanes were No. 24 Sqn ‘C’ Flight DH 2s flown by six-victory ace Ltn Arthur Gerald Knight (DH 2 A2594) and Ltn Alfred Edwin McKay (DH2 A2554) flying a NE—SW defensive patrol between Pozières and Bapaume. At 8500 feet Knight was about 1500 feet higher than McKay, whose departure from Bertangles had been delayed ‘on account of [a] dud engine,’ forcing him to take a second machine aloft that he noted ‘would not climb;’ typical examples of the engine woes often faced by No. 24 Sqn. At about 1640 the pair spotted Jasta 2’s Albatrosses and identified them as ‘Halberstadters and small Aviatic [sic] Scouts’ who stalked them for five minutes until one ‘did a side-slipping dive under the top D.H., but Lieut. Knight did not attack as he was suspicious of this manoeuvre.’

 

     As the leader, it is likely that this attacking aeroplane was Boelcke, who according Richthofen ‘went after one and I the other.’ Knight wrote that he was initially attacked by six of the twelve aeroplanes and immediately commenced evasive spiraling before the other six attacked, some of whom went down below him and attacked McKay as well. Outnumbered six-to-one, the DH 2s could do little amidst the swirling cloud of German fighters. ‘It would have been fatal to concentrate on any one machine as four or five [others] were ready to close in,’ wrote Knight, ‘so I merely spiraled and fired when a HA [Hostile Aircraft] came across my sights.’

 

     The same opinion was had by Böhme, who in a letter to his fiancé wrote that ‘the English aircraft, fast single-seaters, skillfully defended themselves’ during a ‘wildly gyrating melee in which we could always only get into range for brief moments.’ No doubt the sheer number of German aeroplanes chasing the same two targets crowded the airspace, aiding the British and threatening to violate Boelcke’s eighth dictum that cautioned against several fighters pursuing the same opponent; although perhaps there was little choice in so lopsided a battle. Regardless, the threat proved all too real. After ‘about five minutes of strenuous fighting’ during which Jasta 2 ‘attempted to force our opponents downward by alternately blocking their path, as we had previously so often done with success,’ Boelcke and Böhme were pursuing McKay when Knight, under attack by Richthofen, turned hard left to evade and cut in front of McKay’s pursuers. Both Germans manoeuvered to avoid colliding with the DH 2 but tragically collided with each other instead, each Albatros having been in the blind spot of the other. Böhme’s undercarriage struck Boelcke’s upper port wing; the impact was described as a ‘light touch’ but Böhme lost a portion of his undercarriage and the outboard section of Boelcke’s wing was torn away. ‘How can I describe my feelings from that moment on,’ Böhme later wrote, ‘when Boelcke suddenly appeared just a few metres to my right, how he dove, how I jerked upward [after each had become aware of their too-close proximity], and how we nevertheless grazed each other, and both plummeted downward!’  

 

     Böhme fell a couple hundred metres but recovered to follow Boelcke’s crippled D II, gliding left-wing-low ‘in great spiraling curves’ toward the clouds. His description of this descent suggests that Boelcke had also lost his port aileron, which would reduce or eliminate use of the starboard aileron; or if the starboard aileron still functioned it was not enough to fully arrest the roll caused by the now asymmetrical lift created by the partly missing wing. Richthofen wrote that he followed Boelcke as well, at least initially, and his account agreed with Böhme’s that Boelcke descended from the fight while under some control. Knight and McKay also saw Boelcke’s initial decent and concurred his Albatros was under control. However, he entered a lower layer of clouds (in which one encounters increased turbulence) and thence according to Richthofen lost his entire upper wing. Böhme observed that Boelcke ‘went into an ever steepening glide, and I saw before the landing how he could no longer keep his plane facing straightforward, and how he struck the ground near a gun battery.’

 

     Böhme attempted to land near the crash sight but was thwarted by the surrounding shell holes and trenches and he was forced to return to Jasta 2’s base at Lagnicourt. His damaged Albatros undercarriage caused him to nose over on landing; unhurt, he and several others drove back to the crash site with stolen hopes of Boelcke’s survival but these were dashed by the grim reality of Boelcke’s corpse that the adjacent gun crew had extricated from the wreckage. Böhme opined the crash might have been survivable had Boelcke worn a crash helmet (something not usually done by Jagdstaffelpiloten) and had strapped himself firmly into his D II, which might have better protected him from blunt-force trauma that fractured his skull and killed him. In any event, the great 40-victory ace was dead. That night, Boelcke’s brother Wilhelm sent a telegram to their sister: ‘Prepare parents: Oswald mortally injured to-day over German lines.’

 

     Meanwhile, McKay and Knight continued their swirling battle above against the rest of Jasta 2 for another 15 minutes after the collision, each DH 2 having descended to 5000 feet and drifting east of Bapaume. Finally, the Albatrosses disengaged to the east and the DH 2s returned to Bertangles, where they landed safely at 1740. By the time Jasta 2 returned en masse to Lagnicourt, word of Boelcke’s death had already reached the aerodrome. Naturally, the pilots—indeed, soon the entire Luftstreitkräfte—were shocked. ‘One could hardly conceive of it,’ recalled Richthofen.

 

     On 31 October Boelcke’s body was born to Cambrai Cathedral for an elaborate funeral service. Afterwards the coffin was taken via gun carriage to the train station and transported back to Boelcke’s home town of Dessau, Germany, where he was buried 2 November after a funeral attended by family, high-ranking generals and royalty. A photograph of him lying in state under a blanket of autumn oak leaves and flowers reveals little head trauma, save for cranial disfigurement near his left temple and eye, perhaps lending some credence to Böhme’s opinion of the survivability of Boelcke’s crash. However, a purported witness to the crash claimed Boelcke’s D II overturned on landing and caused a mortal wound to the back of his head, which would likely require the complete collapse of the center section struts. In the absence of photographs or descriptions of the wreck, such detail is speculative at best.

For those interested in other similarly detailed accounts: https://www.amazon.com/DH-Albatros-II-Western-Front/dp/1849087040/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1493562996&sr=8-2&keywords=jim+miller+osprey+duel

[Hauksbee 103]

Ah, the joy of well-informed Forum mates! Thanks Jim. I'll archive this thread.

[JFM 18]

My pleasure!

 

I checked Lance's Blue Max Airman Boelcke/Immelmann for further info. He wrote (on page 28):

 

A lesser-known [than MvR's] eyewitness account from a soldier on the ground clears the matter up: "Thus he lost lateral steering control, which was instantly noticeable because he immediately began to go into spiraling turns and with great skill came down to about 500 meters altitude. He wanted to land near Bapaume, but a side gust denied him the ability to select his own landing place because the damaged machine could barely obey its pilot. So he had to set down in soggy clay soil where he could not let his plane taxi and the machine turned vertically on its head, whereby Boelcke sustained a mortal injury to the back of his head. The resolute calm that was otherwise on his features was disturbed only a little." We now know then that the wheels of Boelcke's Albatros had dug into the muddy ground and flipped the plane over, fracturing the back of his skull.

 

Lots to that. That account would indicate the upper wing did not come off. But, turning over would not automatically lead to a crushed skull. Many, many pilots turned over and survived without a scratch. Did he fall out of the cockpit upon overturning and some part of the plane landed on him? (If loosely strapped in, or not using shoulder harnesses, the Albatros lap belt didn't actually secure you to the seat in an inverted attitude.) Etc. I've never seen a photo of the wreck--I've seen claims of such a thing, but they were disproved--so no idea what shape it was in. So, as so often is the case, we're not exactly sure. 

 

Link to Lance's excellent book: https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Max-Airmen-German-Awarded/dp/1935881051/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1493667473&sr=8-7&keywords=blue+max+airmen

Edited May 1, 2017 by JFM

[Hasse Wind 46]

Great stuff, JFM!

 

I presume the medical documents regarding Boelcke's cause of death have been lost?

 

Unfortunately the official news film about his funeral ceremony has also disappeared into the mists of history. It was called Wie das deutsche Heer seinen gefallenen Lufthelden Hauptmann Boelcke ehrte (How the German Army honoured its fallen aviator hero Captain Boelcke).

 

Here's a picture of Boelcke's tomb at the military cemetary of Dessau (his hometown):

 

[JFM 18]

Great photo, Hasse! Here is the one of him deceased.

 

[Hauksbee 103]

 

...and the machine turned vertically on its head, whereby Boelcke sustained a mortal injury to the back of his head.

 

Lots to that. That account would indicate the upper wing did not come off. But, turning over would not automatically lead to a crushed skull.

'Seems to raise more questions than answers. It appears that the cracked spar did not fail. (if it was ever cracked to begin with)  I had always heard that he was thrown forward into the machine guns. ( Anyone know, off-hand, if the guns extended back into the D.III cockpit far enough?) Even if that is not so, the lack of a seat belt would have him being pitched forward. What might have struck the back of his head?  A pity that no photo of the wreck exists.

[JFM 18]

You stated what I was going to say, Hauksbee: How do we know the spar was cracked? I've never seen that detail anywhere. Doesn't mean it wasn't said, I've just never seen it anywhere. What's the source for that?

 

There is a supposed photo of Boelcke lying dead next to the shattered wreck of an Albatros. But the cross on the tail has a white border; it's not black on a square crossfield, like on Boelcke's plane. It's not him.

 

You know, that's a good question about the guns! Boelcke was flying an Albatros D.II (for clarity, D 2) when killed. I've talked about hitting the guns, too, so let's take a look at a D.II cockpit to check it out. (Something I should have already done! ) 

 

 

 

These guys were very close to the guns but the the back of the guns were attached to the cross support up under the forward lip of the cockpit. I guess it depends on stature, but seems you'd most likely either hit that padded cockpit coaming or the crossbar underneath it, more than the actual gun butts. It's possible that if not securely strapped in one could be thrown right out of the cockpit and forward. But what would crush someone's head? An overturned Alb's center section struts were more than strong enough to support an airplane's weight. He's a famous example:

 

 

That's a D.V, not a D.II, but illustrative nevertheless. IMO, no reason why the back of anyone's head would be "crushed" by such turnover. Of course, we don't know the exact nature of Boelcke's impact, how badly damaged his plane was after the crash/crash landing as compared to this photographed D.V, how securely he was strapped into the cockpit, etc. But if it just turned over, one (certainly I) wonders what would have crushed the back of his skull? 

Edited May 2, 2017 by JFM

[Hasse Wind 46]

Looking at Boelcke's body, it seems he has some injuries on his face: a cut above the left eye and the nose seems bruised. Possible a cut on the upper lip too? A recent unhealed injury is also clearly visible on his right hand.

 

I think it's obvious that he must have hit his head, and he reflexively tried to soften the blow with his right hand. Maybe if had been wearing a crash helmet (which at least some German pilots used, based on photographic evidence) he would have walked away from the wreck.

[JFM 18]

It's tricky with heads, too. I knew a guy in his early twenties who fell off the back of a parked pickup truck, hit his head on the curb, flat-lined and died. He had absolutely no external injury at all. 

[Hauksbee 103]

I checked Lance's Blue Max Airman Boelcke/Immelmann for further info. He wrote (on page 28):

German witness: "So he had to set down in soggy clay soil where he could not let his plane taxi and the machine turned vertically on its head, whereby Boelcke sustained a mortal injury to the back of his head."

We now know then that the wheels of Boelcke's Albatros had dug into the muddy ground and flipped the plane over, fracturing the back of his skull.

Jim: The report of the cracked spar, and being thrown forward onto the guns, came from a coffee-table book on WWI aircraft that I owned years ago (and no longer do)  Given the info gleaned from current reading on-line sources, and the discussion here, I conclude my previous informant's scholarly credentials to be much in doubt. I think the pictures you posted make it unlikely that he was pitched into the guns.

 

If the wreck happened as the German eyewitness says, (the plane came to an abrupt stop and stood on its nose) Boelcke could have been hurled out of the cockpit and sustained his injury upon hitting the ground. If, as the Lance author goes on to say, subsequent sources say the plane flipped over, then an unsecured pilot would have been thrown out & downward, striking the underside of the top wing.

 

It would appear that speculation will forever dog this subject due to the lack of clear evidence.

[JFM 18]

You're right, Hauksbee. We're just never going to know. Unless a photo of the wreck surfaces, then we might know a bit more. But then, if so, how much had the wreck been manipulated/changed before the cameras arrived? That possibility introduces even more questions. Definitely maddening for nosy guys like us trying to figure out what really happened!

[sowercrowd 0]

Thanks Gentlemen, never thought i could find that detailed information. Great photos. Very impressive. Now i'll reread "Der rote Kampfflieger" and "An Aviators Field Diary" again...

[Olham 164]

Hard to imagine that the main spar of an Albatros would break under such an impact from a wheel, that is still intact enough for Böhme to land the aircraft.

Would a lost port aileron be enough damage to make the landing so hard for Boelcke?

 

For an injury at the back of the skull I have only 2 ideas.

1. Seeing the heavy wet clay ground, Boelcke might have ducked all the way down, 'till his head was on his knees, expecting a terrible impact.

    So there would have been the chance, that the back of his head hit the machine guns ends.

 

2. When the plane headed over, he might have got hurled out of the cockpit, hitting a field stone. Such (often rounded) stones are left overs

    from the last ice age. You find them in northern Germany, Belgium, and northern France. The farmers removed the larger stones from

    the fields, but stones small enough to not threaten the ploughing (up to the size of a human head) were often left in the fields.

 

Not sure, if a third way could be possible: the hitting of the metal radiator.

Edited May 5, 2017 by Olham

[Hauksbee 103]

Hard to imagine that the main spar of an Albatros would break under such an impact from a wheel, that is still intact enough for Böhme to land the aircraft.

2. When the plane headed over, he might have got hurled out of the cockpit, hitting a field stone.

 

Not sure, if a third way could be possible: the hitting of the metal radiator.

Impact on main spar: There's "impact", and there's "IMPACT". I can imagine contact sufficient to crack a spar but not break it in two. Rather like a "green stick" fracture in human bone.

 

The stone in the field. This is what I thought of when I read of the Alb. standing on its nose: he could have struck a rock if he had been flung clear.

 

Hitting a metal radiator: Didn't the D.II have its radiators on each side of the fuselage and well forward of the cockpit?

 

Edited May 5, 2017 by Hauksbee

[JFM 18]

Albatros D.IIs had both the fuselage and airfoil radiators. They started out with the former and slowly eased into the latter. Although Boelcke's D.II was actually the prototype D.II, it had an airfoil radiator. 

 

 

Here is Boelcke's Albatros D.II. You can see the radiator in the upper wing. 

[Olham 164]

Impact on main spar: There's "impact", and there's "IMPACT". I can imagine contact sufficient to crack a spar but not break it in two. Rather like a "green stick" fracture in human bone.

 

The main spar of a fighter craft (or actually of ANY aircraft) is one of those parts which have to stand and "survive"

the major G-forces on an aircraft. In flight, not only the weight of the whole aircraft including the engine, tank, amo

and the pilot are hanging on them, but the weight even mulitplies by 3, 4 or even more, in a tight turn.

 

I just can't imagine that the short kick by an undercarriage could break this spar.

After all the tire was an airfilled rubber tire, and Boelcke's wing was not stiffly fixed - it could "evade" the push by bouncing downwards.

So I think the most damage on the wing itself would be either a hole in the fabric, or one or more cracked wing rib(s) - or both.

But would that make the Albatros so hard to control?

 

On the other hand: how would it be, if this damage (a hole in fabric plus one or more broken ribs) would multiply with a ripped-off aileron?

 

JFM said, that aileron damage might even make the other aileron stuck, if I got that right.

Now, with one aileron missing, and the other stuck (in which - maybe unfavourable - position?)

it could be hard even for an aviator like Boelcke to land the aircraft safely.

Still he might have survived it unharmed, had the ground been flat, firm and dry.

 

The impact in soggy clay soil is a different matter.

I guess the undercarriage would sink in enough to stop the aircaft quite suddenly.

Now the only movement left would be a quick nose-over, until the slamming-in spinner and nose would cause the final halt.

 

In such a sudden, violent stop and forward-bending move, Boelcke could have been slammed even only against

the wooden brim of the upper wing cut-out, and died from that. That curved wooden brim itself was perhaps not

very strong, but in build-photos from TVAL it looks like the brim was connected to the wing's main spar - something

you would not want to collide with. Maybe JFM can clear this up a bit more?)

 

I wonder, if the doctors checked if his neck spine was intact - maybe someone decided not to tell the full truth?

"Head injury" sounds more heroic somehow, than "broken neck" does...

Edited May 6, 2017 by Olham

[JFM 18]

Even more baffling to me is the damage to Loewenhardt's plane that led to his death. It was his landing gear that hit Alfred Wentz's upper right wing. Wentz bailed out because a piece of fabric "the size of a tablecloth" ripped off his wing, obviously destroying lift enough to keep his plane aloft and controllable. But why did Loewenhardt bail out if just his wheels hit Wentz's wing? I've only ever seen Wentz's brief account, and Loewenhardt's parachute failed to open, so we'll never know. 

 

BTW, you guys think we'll ever get the ability to use parachutes (as historically employed) in WOFF? I don't, but it'd be nice! I could use them.    

[Olham 164]

Knew nothing about Loewenhardt's death yet - is there any good book from him or another Jasta 10 member?

 

Yeah, parachutes would be nice to have.

They could even be impleneted rather easily in WOOF, I guess, since the original engine had them.

[JFM 18]

Offhand I don't know of any books about him specifically. But eventually there will be one! He'll be covered in a future volume of Lance Bronnenkant's Blue Max Airmen.