Remembering the ‘Knights of the Sky’

Recreating an historical aerial battle in modern times has been the mission of two World War One Aviation Heritage Trust pilots. Darren Harbar meets them and looks into the scenarios they have moulded into an airshow act…

In 1914, they were Europe’s ‘next generation’ – countless young men, some barely in their teens, were asked to march to war… the majority of them before they had experienced the true joys and sorrows of life. And while most were sent to the trenches, some – said to be ‘cut from a special cloth’ – were singled out to do a job that demanded the attributes of intelligence, tenacity, co-ordination, and composure of the highest order. Chosen to fly, they went on to duel in the war-torn skies of what was dubbed the ‘Great War’ in delicately unstable machines. To those fighting in the skies and on the ground they were fighter pilots, to the public, they were the ‘knights of the air’…

Beware the ‘Hun’! Attacking a B.E.2 from behind would have been easy pickings for the Albatros due to the British machine’s lack of rear defence
Beware the ‘Hun’! Attacking a B.E.2 from behind would have been easy pickings for the Albatros due to the British machine’s lack of rear defence DARREN HARBAR PHOTOGRAPHY

 

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