Fighter Pilots of World War I by Robert Jackson

Author:Robert Jackson [Jackson, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Pioneering Press
Published: 2017-07-23T04:00:00+00:00

8. Barker’s Last Battle

It was one of those magic mornings when the war seemed a million miles away. High above the frost-rimed fields of northern France, Major W. G. Barker felt a profound sense of peace as he watched the clear sunlight glitter on the struts and bracing wires of his little Sopwith Snipe biplane, his senses lulled by the drone of the engine.

It was 27 October 1918, and Bill Barker was leaving the war-torn skies of the western front for good. Just a few minutes earlier, he had said goodbye to his fellow pilots of No. 201 Squadron, RAF, and performed a meticulous slow roll over La Targette aerodrome before setting course westwards towards the English Channel. The nightmare-torn sleep, the cold clutch of fear as one sighted theFokkcrs sweeping over the horizon in their deadly fan-shaped formations, the horror of seeing one’s comrades spinning to the earth engulfed in flames, unable to save themselves because they had no parachutes — all that was behind him now. Ahead lay a few days’ leave, and afterwards a posting as co of a flying school at Hounslow, Middlesex.

The carnage of the western front was a far cry from the broad prairies of Barker’s native Canada. Joining the Army on the outbreak of war, he had arrived in France in 1915 with the Canadian Mounted Rifles and spent his twenty-first birthday shivering in the mud of Flanders.

One day, wistfully observing two silvery aircraft tangling in combat far above, he decided that he had had enough; within twenty-four hours he had applied for a transfer to the Royal Flying Corps.

He was accepted as an air gunner and was posted to No. 9 Squadron RFC at Allonville with the lowly rank of Air Mechanic — the equivalent of an army private. At this time, during the closing months of 1915, the RFC was having a hard time at the hands of the deadly Fokker monoplanes, with their forward-firing machine-guns, and Barker’s squadron-equipped with slow, ageing BE2C biplanes - was no exception. Survival usually meant the ability to shoot straight and hit the enemy first time, and Barker-who had hunted elk from horseback as a boy — soon proved his worth in that respect. One morning, his aircraft was attacked by a Fokker behind the German lines; Barker swung round his Lewis gun, aimed and fired a burst all in one swift movement. The enemy immediately plummeted down, leaving a trail of smoke and debris.

Soon after this, Barker was granted a commission and posted to No. 4 Squadron as an observer in the early part of 1916. Life during the months that followed was hectic enough; Barker’s new squadron was among those taking part in the tragic Battle of the Somme that summer, and he himself was slightly wounded in a brush with an enemy fighter. Barker, however, was not content to fight his war from the rear cockpit, and in the autumn of 1916 he applied for pilot training. The following January he was

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