On this Day (WWI aviation news), Vol. 3

[PJ Fisher]

Mysterious Madman
(from the Wheeling Intelligencer, 24 July 1919):

[PJ Fisher]

Bid For Supremacy
Here's a great photo story of American-owned Nieuports, officially cited, "Twenty-six aeroplanes in line for inspection, aviation field, Issoudon (sic), France; 4/1918".
(from the Auckland Weekly News, 25 July 1918):



Check out forum member rhallinger's amazing build or he 1/32-scale Roden Nieuport 27 with markings for the USAS, 3rd Aviation Instruction Center, Issoudun, https://forum.ww1aircraftmodels.com/index.php?topic=2490.msg40420#msg40420

[PJ Fisher]

Death of an Airman
(from the Sydney Mail, 26 July 1916):

[PJ Fisher]

Brave Aucklander
"Flight Sub-Lieutenant Norman Reginald Davenport was one of 60 New Zealanders and two Collegians known to have served in the Royal Navy Air Service (RNAS) during the First World War.  Davenport gained his pilot or aviator’s certificate on 25 November 1915, and was transferred to the Naval Flying School at Eastchurch in Kent to fine-tune his flying skills. There Davenport met fellow New Zealander Donald Harkness {who}... mentions Davenport a number of times in his wartime diary."

These entries (the latter pertaining to today's news) reveal the "trials of cross-country flights in fragile planes with limited navigational equipment":

"-29 December 1915- ‘Davenport did not return last night as he had lost his way and come down near Canterbury.  Today he left there, but owing to engine trouble came down again near Chatham.  He turned up here again tonight, but without his machine.  He landed near a camp, where a crowd of soldiers gathered round, the great majority of whom he said had never seen an aeroplane before and just gaped open-mouthed’.

- June {1916}, off the coast of Belgium, Davenport’s plane engine failed not long after take-off and his plane fell some 150-200 feet into the sea.  Luckily, neither the bombs Davenport was carrying nor his plane exploded and he was found alive but suffering from exposure, shock and severe bruising.  He was taken to Alexandria Hospital, Dunkirk and then to Netley Hospital, Southampton for a lengthy convalescence.

Davenport never returned to active duty after his accident; instead he was put on home service testing aircraft engines for the Aeronautical Inspection Department of the Ministry of Munitions.  He was invalided home to New Zealand in August 1917 and arrived in Auckland in the October" (via specialcollections.auckland.ac.nz)

Read more on this aviator's story here: https://www.specialcollections.auckland.ac.nz/ww1-centenary/collegians-at-war/their-stories/norman-davenport
(from the Auckland Weekly News, 27 July 1916):

[PJ Fisher]

Gallant Lad's Final Flight
No name is noted in this one-paragraph post on the purported last mission of an unidentified British aviator.  Might anyone know the identity of this anonymous airman?
(from the Cambria Daily Leader, 28 July 1917):

[PJ Fisher]

Nieuport Stalks Seaplane
(from the Cambria Daily Leader, 31 July 1916):

[PJ Fisher]

Romanians Rout German Interloper
Here's an interesting snippet on an aerial interception by the little-reported Romanian Air Corps, which at this stage of the war was still neutral and was equipped with only thirty-four airplanes.  No machine types are mentioned, but the RAC was equipped with Blériots, Bristols, Farmans Morane-Saulniers, Voisin III/V, a Caudron and an Aviatik.
(from the Cambria Daily Leader, 30 July 1915):



Read more about the RAC here: https://amnr.defense.ro/webroot/fileslib/upload/files/Revista_Document/Revista_061_2013.pdf

[PJ Fisher]

German Engineering
Here's a comparatively deep dive into mid-war aero design developments.
(from Aviation and Aeronautical Engineering, 1 August 1916):

[PJ Fisher]

NC-4 Ashore
The beautifully streamlined (at least the hull) Curtiss NC-4 makes a seaside postwar appearance.   This aircraft last headlined here in December 2022 (https://forum.ww1aircraftmodels.com/index.php?topic=12930.msg250981#msg250981)
(from the Adelaide Observer, 2 August 1919):

[PJ Fisher]

Kablooey
A sad incident on the British home front is reported today.  Shocking that such 'souvenirs' would be allowed to enter private possession...particularly during wartime!
(from the Cambria Daily Leader, 3 August 1915):

[PJ Fisher]

Flying Sub Gun
"The Davis gun was the first true recoilless gun developed and taken into service. It was developed by Commander Cleland Davis of the United States Navy in 1910, just prior to World War I.  Davis' design connected two guns back to back, with the backwards-facing gun loaded with lead balls and grease of the same weight as the shell in the other gun, acting as a counter. His idea was used experimentally by the British and Americans as an anti-Zeppelin and anti-submarine weapon mounted on the British Handley Page O/100 and O/400 bombers and the American Curtiss Twin JN[1] and Curtiss HS-2L and H-16 flying boats." (via wikipedia)
(from the Norwich Bulletin, 4 August 1917):

[PJ Fisher]

Italian Triumph
Here's a report boasting of Italy's development of their heavy bombing campaign, along with mention of U.S. Colonel Raynal Bolling and his diplomatic mission to study their achievements. Though the article mostly discusses the Italians activity, it also announces that the US Army has finally decided to take aviation seriously enough to cath up with Europe.  Bolling was "...appointed to the advisory Aircraft Production Board of the Council of National Defense to head an aeronautical commission to Europe known as "the Bolling Mission," to represent Secretary of War Newton D. Baker and the Board. His commission consisted of himself, two Army pilots trained in aeronautical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, two naval officers, seven civilian industrial experts, and 93 civilian manufacturing technicians. The commission was charged with studying the types of military aircraft being used by the Allied Powers, recommend types to be put into production in the United States, and determine what types should be purchased directly from European sources. Bolling was chosen for his business and legal skills in negotiating prices and royalties. The commission left for Europe on June 17, 1917, and arrived in Liverpool on June 26. After a week in London, where its members fanned out to English airfields and aircraft factories, the commission repeated the process in Paris for two weeks, Italy for ten days, and then returned to Paris. Bolling took advantage of his mission's "quasi-diplomatic" status and his brother-in-law's authority as an Assistant Secretary of State to communicate with Washington using the State Department's transatlantic telegraph cable." (via wikipedia)
(from L'Illustrazione Della Guerra e La Stampa Sportiva, 5 August 1917):

[PJ Fisher]

MidNight Melodrama
The Great War only weeks old when this unknown artist offered their interpretation of 'things to come' with their depiction of a nocturnal engagement between a battleship ablaze and multiple bombarding biplanes.
(from the Auckland Weekly News, 6 August 1914):

[PJ Fisher]

Voisons Victorious
A trio of French-made bombers in Italian service has attacked a railway station along the coast northwest of Trieste.  The exact type of Voisin is not disclosed, but I wonder if these aircraft belonged to La 25ª Squadriglia del Servizio Aeronautico del Regio Esercito, which was equipped with the Type III and which, less than two months from today's headline, will conduct the first Italian night reconnaissance flight over Trieste.
(from the Cambria Daily Leader, 7 August 1916):

[PJ Fisher]

The Belgian Balloon Buster is Back
(from the Washington Times, 8 August 1918):



Coppens first headlined here back in July 2022:  https://forum.ww1aircraftmodels.com/index.php?topic=12930.msg246494#msg246494