Frandsen - Hat in the ring: the birth of American air power in the Great War

2003, 2010 by the Smithsonian Institution
All rights reserved

Copy editor: Katherine Kimball
Designer: Brian Barth

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Frandsen, Bert.
Hat in the ring : the birth of American air power in the Great War / Bert Frandsen.
p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.
eISBN: 978-1-58834-458-8
1. United States. Army Air Forces. Pursuit Group, 1stHistory. 2. World
War, 19141918Aerial operations, American. 3. World War, 19141918
Regimental historiesUnited States. 4. World War, 19141918Campaigns
Western Front. I. Title.
D606.F73 2003
940.44973dc21

2003041449

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data available

An ebook edition of the original cloth edition.

For permission to reproduce illustrations appearing in this book, please correspond directly with the owners of the works, as listed in the individual captions. Smithsonian Books does not retain reproduction rights for these illustrations individually, or maintain a file of addresses for photo sources.

v3.1

To Dad and Gloria

This book is an adaptation of a dissertation completed while I was a doctoral student in the history of technology at Auburn University. Readers who are interested in greater detail, especially on the material covered in and the procurement of the Nieuport 28 and SPAD 13, may want to consult the dissertation, which is available at the Ralph B. Draughon Library at Auburn University. I want to thank my colleagues at Auburn, especially W. David Lewis, the chair of my committee, for his inspirational leadership and guidance throughout this project. William Trimble and James Hansen, who also served on my committee, provided helpful suggestions. Thanks are also owed to Guy Beckwith, who acquainted me with the insider-outsider paradigm used in this study.

James J. Cooke, Robert P. White, and Dik Alan Daso reviewed the dissertation and provided helpful recommendations for a more concise presentation and livelier narration, which I have tried to achieve in this book. Walter Boyne reviewed the revised manuscript and also provided several helpful suggestions. I especially want to thank Mark Gatlin, of Smithsonian Books, who has been my guide and mentor throughout the project of revising the dissertation into a book. He knew just when to encourage, when to nudge, and when to hit me with a sledgehammer. I also want to thank Katherine Kimball for her attention to detail in editing the manuscript.

My study of the 1st Pursuit Group led me to the descendants of two of the units founders. Bert Atkinson Jr., now deceased, allowed me access to his fathers papers and shared memories of his father. Philip J. Roosevelt II and his family were also most gracious hosts and shared the family lore while I consulted their grandfathers letters.

I also want to thank Dr. James J. Parks, now deceased, and his son Andy Parks for allowing me access to the documents in their excellent collection, the Lafayette Foundation, at Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum in Denver, Colorado. Mitchell Yockelson, archivist at the National Archives at College Park Maryland, was especially helpful in finding pertinent records of the American Expeditionary Forces Air Service. Peter Jakab, curator at the National Air and Space Museum (NASM), served as my point of contact there during the early stages of the project and provided valuable assistance with my research on the Nieuport 28, as did Theodore Hamedy, an NASM volunteer research historian. Jeremy Kinney, propulsion curator at NASM, was especially helpful on the relation between motors and propellers. I also want to acknowledge Dan Hagedorn, who heads the NASM archives, and his staff for their assistance.

Dennis Case and Joseph Caver, archivists at the United States Air Force Historical Research Agency, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, were especially helpful in providing me access to official records of the units of the 1st Pursuit Group as well as oral history transcripts from several of its members. I am most grateful for the help of Colonel John Moody, retired, of the United States Army Military History Institute for the assistance provided during my research at that facility. My colleagues at the United States Air Force Air Command and Staff continued to provide encouragement during the final phase of finishing the book.

Alan Towle, a member of the League of World War I Aviation Historians, provided helpful advice and assistance in locating unpublished primary sources that were particularly important to this study. I want to acknowledge the League of World War I Aviation Historians, in general, for their excellent work in documenting World War I aviation in their journals, Over the Front and Cross and Cockade.

I want to thank a supportive family, especially my brothers. Richard Frandsen helped me with reproduction of the manuscript. Charles Frandsen and Chad Smith, of Frandsen Architects, developed several drawings for this book. Finally, I could not have completed this project without the support and encouragement of my wife, Gloria.

Everyone expected a fight. Lt. Joseph Eastman, a veteran pilot of the 94th Aero Squadron, admitted in his diary that the mission briefing before takeoff had scared him to death.

This afternoons massive attack had no such finesse. It was brute force with all the elegance of kicking down the front doorhey diddle diddle, straight up the middle. It began to unravel even before the raiders crossed no-mans-land. The Germans saw them coming.

The raiders flew with noses down to gather extra speed, gradually descending from thirty-two hundred to two thousand feet for their low-level attack. Antiaircraft shells burst around them as they crossed the lines. Lt. Reed Chambers, a twenty-four-year-old Kansan, flew ahead of the rest. Uncle Sams hat in the ring, painted on each side of his airplanes fuselage, identified Chambers as part of the 94th Squadron. Thirteen similarly marked SPADs, single-seat biplane fighters equipped with two machine guns synchronized to fire through the arc of the propeller, followed thirty seconds behind him. Chambers was the balloon buster. The protective formation behind covered his attack.

Two more units from the 1st Pursuit Group flew on either side of the 94th Squadron. The seven SPADs covering the right wing belonged to the 27th Aero Squadron. Lt. William Brotherton, the second balloon buster, led the eight planes on the left from the 147th Aero Squadron. Brotherton anxiously strained his eyes, searching for the raids objective. The balloon was supposed to be floating tranquilly in the sky near the town of Doulcon, a French village on the left bank of the Meuse River. By now, Brotherton thought, he should have been able to see it.

A lone SPAD, also sporting the hat in the ring, trailed the raiders at an altitude several thousand feet above them. Lt. Eddie Rickenbacker, Americas top-scoring ace, checked his watched. It was 3:40 P.M . on the tenth of October, 1918six minutes before the groups planes were supposed to converge on Doulcon. The sky was clear, though hazy at low altitudes. Glancing down at the formation, Rickenbacker was reminded of a huge crawling beetleChambers and Brotherton were the stingers. Rickenbacker commanded the 94th Squadron, but this afternoon he had charge of the entire three-squadron mission to destroy the troublesome observation balloon.