Changes Wrought: A Black Albatros

By Michael MacMurdy

France, 1917. Three years of stalemate. Of mud and rats and lice. Of artillery and barbed wire and machine guns.

In the skies above the trenches, the men and machines of Britain's Royal Flying Corps:

Pete Newin--a regular bloke trying to hang on.

Harry Booth--a Liverpudlian fabric-store kid turned RFC observer.

Drew Harris--who thinks Britain should look to the Spartans and the Romans to deal with problems on the home front.

Ian Crosse--who spends most of his time planning a run for Parliament.

Modern knights of the air, fearlessly battling the Hun in a fight to the death? Or reluctant malcontents, not knowing if the Germans or their own generals are the real enemy?

Michael MacMurdy uses his experience as a T-37 instructor pilot, as a flight lead/instructor pilot in the A-10 Warthog, and flying tail-dragger aircraft to take us into the cockpits above France in 1917. The inflexible leadership and the inferior aircraft. The politics of the Royal Flying Corps and the home front. Romance. Vengeance. All wrapped into an immersive read that is both poignant and tragic, humorous and irreverent. Highly recommended.

--Maj. Gen. [Ret.] Steven Berryhill, USAF

• Language: English
• Publisher: Newman Springs Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9781684986965

Book preview

Table of Contents

Title

Copyright

All by Oneself

Triplanes and the Department Senior Secretary

Messines Ridge

The Wildflowers Café

The Royal Navy in France

A Welcome to Flanders

Jousting

Second Lieutenant Phillip Newin

Trees

A Dinner Party

The Spartans

A Black Albatros

A Liberal Party MP?

The Menin Road

Home Defense Duty

Mutiny

Horizontal Relaxation

A Story to Tell

The Lady in Black

Pete Catches a Break

The RE8

Point-Blank Range

Lutz

England

Glossary

Author's Notes

About the Author

cover.jpg

Changes Wrought

A Black Albatros

Michael MacMurdy

Copyright © 2023 Michael MacMurdy

All rights reserved

First Edition

NEWMAN SPRINGS PUBLISHING

320 Broad Street

Red Bank, NJ 07701

First originally published by Newman Springs Publishing 2023

ISBN 978-1-68498-695-8 (Paperback)

ISBN 979-8-89061-818-4 (Hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-68498-696-5 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Changes Wrought is dedicated to the eighteen children who died in the Upper North Street School in Poplar, London, on June 13, 1917—and to all the other children, women, and men whose lives were destroyed by that senseless tragedy that we know today as World War I.

All by Oneself

66 Squadron Royal Flying Corps, Sopwith Scout Fighter Aircraft

Liettres Aerodrome, Northern France

July 31, 1917, 0315 hours

The clouds and rain had closed in again, reducing Pete Newin's world to the hum of the rotary engine, the dim flight instruments, the water sliding across tight fabric as the Sopwith pushed through the wet darkness. A diffuse bubble of life in the dead gray of a Flanders morning. He checked the altimeter and eased the control column forward, brought the throttle back a notch, and tweaked the petrol lever for low-altitude cruise. Sat straight up and held his body still…the pressure on his backside, the wind across his face, the little bubble of the inclinometer centered. The airplane was in straight and level flight.

His leather jacket swept the wind and rain aside, but the water had soaked through his scarf and was working its way down his back. At least he was awake, although he could have used another cup of coffee. The clouds thinned, the drumming of the rain on the taut fabric lessened, and the dark ground came into view again through the gray haze. He blinked twice and wiped his goggles, but there wasn't much to see: the sky pitch-black to his left and only a little lighter to his right. A silver line in front of him cut the gray-black murk—the Dunkirk canal.

He studied the ground to his right…and…there—the highway he was looking for. Swung left to track it, which should take him to Hazebrouck. He leveled the wings and checked his magnetic compass, which was bouncing around in the general direction of north. Ran through the sequence again, like an acolyte reciting his Sunday chant:

Hazebrouck.

Bailleul.

Messines.

Twenty degrees right to cross the front line.

Follow the river to Menin.

Thirty degrees left to avoid the other aerodromes; hold that heading for three and a half minutes.

And if he got that far—a last turn southeast for the run in. To attack heavily defended Heule aerodrome. All by himself, in a single-gunned Sopwith Pup.

He didn't have much more to do than hold the wings level, and the uncomfortable numbers came back to him. At least a 60 percent chance he'd be dead an hour from then. If he lived through the attack, fifty-fifty he'd end up as a prisoner of war. His chances of making it back to the British side without serious injury…pretty damn small.

Supposed he should be thinking about the significance of life. Thinking about God, or his mother or late father. But all he could think about right then was how shitty he felt after three hours of sleep, soaked and sitting on a wooden seat in an eighty-mile-per-hour wind, his face and mouth coated with castor oil courtesy of his Le Rhône rotary engine.

He wiped his goggles and caught a glimpse of another Pup out in front of him, before the mist swallowed it up. Five little Sopwith Pups spaced one minute apart, to avoid hitting each other in the darkness. Five little lemmings marching to the cliff. Five experienced pilots, but no flight commanders in the group. Orders from above. Couldn't imagine why.

He spotted the town four minutes after crossing the canal. It was still dark, but the small canal and the rail lines showed up and he'd seen them enough times before—Hazebrouck. He swung the Pup to the east. Shifted back and forth in his seat, trying to ease the stress on his back, and fired a few rounds from his Vickers .303. Do something other than sit, and wait, and think. Juliette? Would he ever look into those beautiful blue eyes again?

The rotary engine hummed along, pulling the Pup through the wet darkness. Would be a perfect time for the engine to let go, but the chaps had it tuned to perfection. Too bad. Bailleul aerodrome on his left. Lots of activity down there; busy day coming up for the reconnaissance chaps. He turned ten degrees left and looked for the highway into Messines; a little lighter to the east as he came out of the rain showers.

Some colonel from 9th Wing had come down to brief them on the operation. He'd taken the podium and swept the room with his eyes, paused, and began speaking slowly. "During the last two weeks, over three thousand British and French guns have fired over three million shells into the Hun positions in Flanders—a barrage unprecedented in the history of mankind." The colonel paused again, presumably for effect.

The day after tomorrow, the thirty-first of July 1917, the British Expeditionary Force will launch a major offensive in Flanders. Spearheaded by our newest Mark IV tanks, the army will break through the Hun defenses and capture the Belgian ports of Zeebrugge and Ostende and the enemy's bomber bases at Ghent. This will deprive the Hun of his most important U-boat bases and the ability to hit London with his Gotha bombers. The colonel paused a third time before bringing his tempo up.

The victory achieved by the British Expeditionary Force, with the untiring support of the Royal Flying Corps, will be the first real nail in the coffin of the German Army. With control of the Belgian ports and the Flanders high ground, with the Americans on the way, there will be no stopping the British Army and the Royal Flying Corps. Berlin by October, and home in England for Christmas.

The colonel finished on that high note and looked out expectantly at them…and twenty-odd pilots had stared back. But the best news was yet to come—five lucky pilots were to make single-ship attacks on five German aerodromes. The silence from the pilots had been deafening as they took that bit in.

Messines. Less than a mile to go to the line. He swung the Pup twenty degrees right, and the airplane mushed its way into and out of the turn, letting him know it wasn't happy about the hundred extra pounds of bombs and release mechanism on board. He glanced at his oil and fuel quantities and checked the time: 03:29. In twenty-one minutes the chaps would go over the top. To push through the mud and the waterlogged shell holes and the barbed wire. Through the Hun machine-gun fire and the shrapnel shells bursting a few feet above their heads, the lead balls sweeping across the ground like broom through dust.

He eased the Pup up into the safety of the gray mist. Started the clock and focused on holding the wings level. Listened to the hum of the rotary, watched the water stream off the wings. Took a last look at the black line he'd plotted on his map: four thousand yards to the river on this heading. About eighty seconds, if the forecast winds were close.

The butterflies were back, flapping about his stomach as he watched the second hand make its little circle. At sixty seconds he swallowed hard and eased the column forward. He felt the Pup descend, and the dark terrain came into view as the Pup slid out of the clouds. Not quite dawn, but light enough to see the shine of the river. He swung left to parallel it; steadied up and studied the ground in front of him. The silver line of the Ypres Canal cut through the dark haze. He made out the outline of Comines at his one o'clock; Wervicq would be a few miles beyond. Still no ground fire from the Huns. Too dark. Too early. Just another lovely morning in Flanders for them—for another twenty minutes. From Wervicq, 150 seconds to Menin, 210 seconds northeast, then hard right for the run-in. Attack and disrupt. Besides the single Vickers, the Pup was carrying four twenty-pound Coopers. He'd drop those in a string on the first pass. Get the extra weight off.

He eased the Pup up into the patchy bottoms of the clouds. Staring into gray nothingness was like closing his eyes at night when he wasn't sleepy; guaranteed to get the wheels turning. He came back to the dilemma that had been dogging him ever since Captain Fleming told him he was one of the lucky five. Could he get away with three passes? Cause plenty of disruption while having some chance of surviving? Stay above two hundred feet? Hitting a target with a machine gun—and conversely being hit—was all about proper aim and bullet dispersion. The greater the range, the greater the dispersion. He drummed his gloved fingers on the throttle lever and gave a little shake of the head. No, that wouldn't do. The chaps on the ground didn't get to decide when to stop advancing. He'd press the attack as long as he could. Maybe the Huns would shoot the Pup to pieces; he'd crash-land and live through the war. That would be ironic—on this mission, the closest to an RFC suicide mission he'd ever heard of. But more likely, this would be his day to die. By a Hun machine-gun bullet in the gut, or in the head. Or worse, by fire from the Pup's unprotected twenty-five-gallon fuel and oil tank two feet in front of his knees. The Huns would throw some mud over his mangled body and go to breakfast.

He spotted Menin railway station through some breaks in the clouds. All quiet down there, but the bomber chaps would be along soon enough. He turned northeast and started the clock. Squirmed in his seat. Mouth dry. Stomach tight. Took a last drink of oily-tasting water; turned his head and spat it out. Tapped the trigger button with his thumb, and found the unfamiliar bomb release with his left hand. They'd rigged it for single release: four pulls, one after the other. He needed to find the aerodrome without overflying it, without letting the Huns know he was there.

The second hand completed its third circuit: 180 seconds. He slid the Pup out of the clouds and wiped his goggles. Looked out front, to his left, to his right. Didn't see aerodrome or a large town, so he might be in the right place. Checked the second hand again. On the two…on the three. When it pointed straight down, he'd turn. Nice poetic touch—he hadn't picked up on that in his preflight planning. Last stop—straight down… He rolled hard right and pulled the Pup around to southeast. Leveled the wings and restarted the clock, his heart pounding. Breathe, Pete. Nice and easy.

Forty-five seconds. Should be able to see it now…fields, roads, rain. Fifty seconds. Sixty seconds. Had he missed it somehow? Closed his eyes for a couple of seconds; looked again… There. At his one o'clock, something was out of place. Hangars. Three of them. But nothing that looked like a landing field or airplanes, which meant he was on the backside. Lucky. But he needed maneuvering room; eased the Pup back into clouds and held the wings level. Tried a little prayer as the airplane motored along, unconcerned, but his heart wasn't in it. Took a last deep breath and pushed the Pup out of the clouds. Rolled into a left turn. The hardest part was over.

He rolled out of the turn and the overburdened Pup wobbled under its unaccustomed bomb load, like a farmer's wagon with hay bales stacked fifteen feet high. The armaments officer had told him to porpoise the airplane up and down if the bombs hung up. That he might be able to shake them off. Great. He pointed the Pup just outside the first hanger, judging the angle…picked up a line of light-colored airplanes. He pushed the nose down and made one last turn to get lined up; spotted some ground crew moving around the airplanes like ants in the semidarkness. Smiled for the first time that day. It's wake-up time, Fritz.

The first little flash from the ground. Someone had seen him, but only rifle fire. He was drifting right of the line of airplanes and made a quick left turn to compensate. Held the release handle with his left hand. Don't jerk it and break the damn thing, Pete. He'd never dropped a bomb in his life but knew if he flew his butt over the target, the bombs would be on line. They said judging long-short was more difficult than left-right, especially without a bombsight, but he had a nice long line of airplanes to work with.

He focused on the middle airplane: a single-seat Albatros fighter. Looked like he'd found the right aerodrome. His gunsight tracked through the line of airplanes, reached the Albatros and he pulled the release handle. The Pup twitched as the bomb came off. He pulled it three more times; felt each bomb come off. Rolled and pulled up, looking back over his shoulder. Blinked as three yellow white flashes, one after the other, pierced the semidarkness. Not bad. The first bomb hit short, but the next two blasted the tail sections of a pair of Albatros fighters. But only three explosions—the fourth must have been a dud. He pulled into the clouds, brought the nose down and tried to level the wings; at least the bombs were off and he had a normal Sopwith Pup to work with. Allowed himself to drone through the clouds for twenty seconds—breathing, hoping the pounding of his heart would ease. Pushed the column forward and the Pup responded like a loyal hound—follow its master anywhere. He made a one-eighty back toward the aerodrome, and no doubt the Huns were wide awake.

He was tight to the aerodrome and swung left to get some turning room. Winced as a searchlight caught him; looked away from it and found the line of airplanes. The two damaged ones stood out—knocked out of place in the otherwise straight and ordered line; smoke wafting above them. He focused on the nearest airplane. Walking bullets from a single Vickers down a line of airplanes would be a waste of time—time he didn't have. Better to put one more Albatros out of the fight. He rolled right and steepened the dive as the first stream of tracers reached toward him.

A second stream. He came back left and pulled the gunsight to the parked Hun; steadied to fire, sensing a third and fourth stream of tracers. Bullets were passing above him, below him, and out in front. He pushed the trigger button and got the familiar pop, pop, pop from his pathetically slow-firing Vickers. But the bullets were on target and the Albatros twitched from the impacts.

Ting. Ting. Crack.

Sparks flew in front of him, a bullet cracked the windscreen a foot in front of his nose and the Vickers stopped firing, even though he had the trigger button down. He hunkered down in the seat and pulled straight up as hard as he dared; sensed the wing spars groaning under the load. The telltale tap tapping of bullets punching through straining fabric as the Pup rose; a metallic twang next to his right ear as a bullet cut a support wire. Hell—he'd overdone the pull and the Pup's nose was almost in the vertical. He pushed over as he approached the clouds, tracers still crisscrossing in front of him, and kept the push going for another two seconds as the safety of the gray closed around the Pup. Neutralized the control column. Were the wings level? No—he felt a left-turning motion. Rolled right for two seconds and brought the column back to neutral. He felt light in the seat…the airplane was descending. Came aft with the column for two seconds and back to neutral. This didn't feel right. Christ—which way was up?

The Pup came out of the clouds, nose low, in a left turn directly over the aerodrome. So much for seat of the pants flying. Flashes from the ground as he rolled and pulled for the clouds. The tracers wrapped around him again and he cringed as three bullets ricocheted off the front left side of the airplane. Engine or fuel tank, most likely. More bullets tore into the upper-wing fabric just to his right, and something whacked the side of his head as the Pup made it back into the gray.

Nice and easy, Pete. Get the nose down and level the wings. His head was throbbing. Did he just take a bullet and his body hadn't caught on? He'd heard stories of infantry chaps trying to carry on with half their brain shot away.

He held the Pup at what felt like straight and level. Flexed his fingers. Counted out loud: one, two, three, four, five. Looked like his central nervous system was intact. Felt around his helmet with his left hand while holding the airplane steady with his right. The leather wasn't torn and his head was still in one piece. Ricochet or a splinter. He took a few seconds and looked over the Pup. Besides whacking him in the head, the Huns had broken his windscreen, hit the Vickers, and punched God only knew how many holes in the fabric. They'd gotten the engine, too—the Le Rhône was coughing every few seconds. Other than that, everything was just fine.

He eased the throttle lever back, but it barely moved before hanging up. He leaned down and looked at the throttle quadrant—no damage to the linkage that he could see. Must have been hit further forward. But he still had the petrol lever to…and before he finished that thought the Le Rhône coughed harder and shut down. Puzzled, he looked at the quadrant again. The throttle was at 60 percent and the petrol lever at 35. The engine should be running. But what should be obviously didn't much matter right about then.

He set the engine problem aside and focused on the airplane, on the wind on his face, and the pressure on his backside… The airplane was banked to the right. He made a quick, left-and-back-to-neutral motion with the control column. That felt better.

Checked the airspeed: seventy-five. He held back pressure on the column to maintain altitude. Once he got down to fifty, he'd let the Pup descend. Turned his attention back to the engine and closed the petrol lever. The throttle didn't want to come back so he left it where it was. Counted off ten long seconds. Plenty of time for the fuel to clear if the mixture was too lean. If it was too rich…

He pushed the nose down to hold fifty miles per hour and brought the petrol lever forward to 40 percent. The Le Rhône coughed. Coughed again and began to wind up. Died. A faint smell of fuel, although that could mean anything in an airplane full of holes. He closed the petrol lever again. If the mixture was too rich it would need about thirty seconds to clear…in an undamaged airplane…with the throttle closed.

He looked up. The sun was peeking through the mist and the Huns would start shooting as soon as he came into view. He held the airspeed at fifty; the only noise the chugging of the windmilling propeller. Watched the altimeter wind down. The gray thinned out and he saw green below him. If the engine wouldn't start, he'd dive for the ground. Get down before they shot him to pieces. With luck, the Huns who grabbed him wouldn't be the mates of the blokes he'd just blown up.

He set 90 percent throttle; the lever went forward without any problem. Pushed the petrol to fifty, and the Le Rhône coughed. Coughed again. Making up its mind. He came out of the clouds in a gentle descent. A couple of flashes from the ground, but only rifle fire. The Le Rhône went quiet as a stream of tracers reached toward him, fortunately from long range. Shook his head as he closed the petrol lever again. Maybe not your day, Pete. But you're still breathing.

Trees in front of him and he swung right toward an open field. Be a bit silly to get killed by a tree at that point. Frowned as the gunner shifted his aim and the stream of tracers slid back toward him. He pushed the nose down to get under the tracers, and further down as the bullets passed a foot above his head. He'd get on the ground and shoot a flare into the fuel tank. Standing orders. Don't let the Huns get their hands on RFC airplanes—not even a Sopwith Pup.

The airplane picked up speed in the dive and the propeller turned faster. A group of Huns at the far end of the field were popping off with their rifles. Great sport, no doubt. But he wouldn't have time for flare shooting once he got down. He'd have to semicrash the airplane, but that'd be easy enough.

Fifty feet. For lack of a better idea, he pushed the petrol lever to 15 percent and left the throttle at ninety. A rather nonstandard configuration for engine start, but it couldn't be any worse than the others he'd tried. He flinched as a bullet glanced off the cowling in front of him. Hope they're enjoying themselves.

Twenty feet. He reached for the ignition switch. At five feet he'd come forward with the column for the controlled crash.

Ten feet. The Le Rhône gave a little cough, and he stopped his hand a couple of inches short of the switch. Held it there, afraid to move. The Le Rhône coughed again…and roared to life. He'd about given up on that, but it took him less than a second to react. To pull the Pup into a climb and turn to put the sun behind him. The Le Rhône was coughing every few seconds, but he didn't touch the throttle or the petrol. It was putting out something near full power, and that would be good enough…if it held.

Triplanes and the Department Senior Secretary

National Physical Laboratory, Southwest London

May 1917

Ten weeks before his younger brother attacked Heule aerodrome, Mark Newin was finishing off a second blueberry scone in his office at the National Physical Laboratory. He slid his hand across the desk to his cup, sipped his tea, and slid the cup back into its spill-prevention spot—the corner made by his wooden pencil box and an engineering reference book. As usual, he ate and drank without looking away from his reading.

What's so interesting, Mark?

He looked up from MIT wind tunnel data at the director of the lab's Engineering Department. He hadn't heard Professor Stanton come in. Oh, it's the Sopwith Triplane report. I still don't get it.

The Sopwith Triplane report? Little late for that, isn't it? Last I heard, the navy ordered a hundred and fifty of them.

I suppose you're right. Would you like me to put it aside?

Before I answer that, is anything in particular bothering you?

As a matter of fact, there is. The test pilot reports imply high stability, and as you know, nothing is free in airplane design. The BE2 is wonderfully stable, but I haven't heard anyone say it gets in and out of turns quickly.

The professor nodded. And from what I gather, it takes some muscle to hold it in a dive, which rules myself out as a potential BE2 pilot. But the field reports on the triplane were generally positive.

Mark gave a little sigh. I know. But can adding a third wing somehow improve both stability and maneuverability? Or at least improve stability without a corresponding loss of maneuverability—in other words, be some sort of aerodynamic elixir that we don't understand? I don't see why that would be so—how it could be so.

Go on. You have my attention.

Clearly, a third wing means more weight and drag. More wing-to-wing interference. Our own report is generally consistent with the MIT report. One can tinker with the wing intervals and the stagger, but there's no getting around the inefficiency of the middle wing.

The professor was looking at Mark's bookcase. Scratched his beard. If Mark hadn't known him better, he would have thought the professor wasn't listening. So why do the pilots like it? the professor asked the bookcase. Why do they like the triplane?

I've been asking myself that same question. I'm wondering if the answer is less about the number of wings, and more about power. The Pup has the eighty-horsepower Le Rhône. They started the triplane at one-ten, and now the Clerget one-thirty is standard. That's eighty to eighty-five horsepower per thousand pounds. The Pup is down around sixty to sixty-five. What if we put a bigger engine on the Pup—say a Le Rhône one-ten? Might we have a real fighting machine, even better than the triplane? Mark gave a little smile. Although my brother Pete would tell you the Pup is badly in need of a second Vickers.

If we add weight to the nose of the airplane, we'd have to make some adjustments to the tail surface, the professor pointed out. Maybe lengthen the fuselage. If we're doing all that, we'd want to keep your brother happy and add a second Vickers. That starts to sound like a new airplane, Mark. The professor shifted some books from a chair and sat down. Adjusted his suspenders absently. Had little bits of his breakfast stuck in his thick black beard.

I know. Nothing is simple.

If it makes you feel better, I was at a meeting at the War Office last week and Tom Sopwith told us they're testing a one-hundred-horsepower Gnome on the Pup, but the initial pilot reports weren't favorable. And they're concerned about the structure…if it can handle the additional weight and torque.

The professor was looking at the wooden Pup that rested in a corner of the bookcase as he spoke, and Mark had seen that glassy look before. The professor was running through the structural issues associated with a heavier engine on the lightly-built Sopwith Pup. Mark waited, and the professor gave a little shake of his head. My guess is the Pup isn't up to it, Mark. The frame is too light.

He turned back to Mark. Regardless, we're past that point. The triplane is here and the Camel is on the way, if they really call it that. Seems an odd name for a fighter airplane.

The professor stopped talking and stared at the books on the desk. This time, he picked up again after a few seconds. For what it's worth, Mark, some people at the Admiralty and the War Office may share your concerns. One hundred and fifty is a small order these days, and the RFC hasn't ordered any. Rumor is they're looking at several thousands each of the SE5 and the new Sopwith.

Mark didn't reply at first. He and the professor were both uneasy with the extreme maneuverability (and lack of stability) of the new Sopwith biplane. Dare I say it? I still wonder if we gave up on the monoplane too soon.

Blasphemy. The professor took his glasses off, looked at them, and put them back on. The accidents they had in testing…and the structural issues are difficult.

They are. But a single wing appears best in terms of efficiency, and would save weight. I wish we had time to take another look.

Unfortunately, young man, we do not. That ship has sailed. As for your triplane report, I'll meet you halfway. Take the rest of today, but starting tomorrow I need you to look at the Training Brigade's proposed gunnery program. There are some troublesome issues involved and we need to get it right.

Will do. I'll start first thing in the morning.

Mark went back to triplane aerodynamics. Sometime later—perhaps thirty minutes, perhaps two hours—he heard a familiar female voice. Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.

Mark chuckled and kept his eyes down. After a few seconds, he shook his head. Literary. But I don't know it.

Cervantes. Don Quixote.

Mark looked up into the pleasant face of Rachel Brooks, the one person he was always happy to have interrupt him.

I didn't know you went in for Spanish literature.

I don't. But I always liked that one, and it seems especially applicable around here.

Rachel gave him her standard office smile, and Mark regarded the department's senior secretary. Tall and thin, fair skin, black hair. Widowed, and likely a few years older than himself. It took a little doing, but here's the appendix to the MIT Triplane Report you asked for.

He admired her long fingers and nicely trimmed nails as she handed him a folder; knew better than to check his own nails by way of comparison.

"Also, the professor asked me to get in touch with the Training Brigade for any additional data on their gunnery manual.