Fateful Morn IV
St. Omer Aerodrome, 05:45 hours, 26th July 1918.
As ‘rosy-fingered Dawn’ paints the Eastern sky with cliché, two S. E. 5a of No. 85 Squadron, illuminated by the light spilling from the open hangar behind them, are readied for a trip across the Lines.
The nearer machine is to be flown by Lt. Donald Inglis, a New Zealander and new member of the squadron, who has yet to open any score. The farther S. E. 5a, in which the armourer is double-checking the Lewis drum, is the mount of No. 85 Squadron’s Commanding Officer, Major Edward Corringham ‘Mick’ Mannock, DSO and two bars, MC and bar. Mannock is a superb leader and tactician and at this juncture a 60-victory ace.
Mannock has offered to take the newcomer up to the Front in order for Inglis to ‘bag a Hun’. This they will do, bringing down an Albatros near Lestrem, but it will prove to be Mannock’s last.
Shot down in flames - a fate that haunted his nightmares - by intense ground fire, Mannock’s body is found (it is said) 250 yards from the wreck of his machine. Inglis’ machine is also badly shot about and his fuel tank punctured, but he manages to bring his S. E. down safely on the Allied side of the Lines.
Buried by German troops close to where he fell, Mannock’s body was never formally recovered and has never been convincingly identified.
Mannock was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross in 1919, after intense lobbying by former comrades.