The REAL RED BARON
 

amazing footage-

sent to me by a friend - just posted recently

At the end they appear to be examining a British plane that was forced down and then joking with the British pilot. It would be interesting to discover who he was and what became of him.

'the Baron was shot down on 21 April 1918 by Roy Brown of the Royal Naval Air Services, a prelude of the RAF'
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't the RAF formed on 1 April 1918?

Buggah.

Buggah, buggah.

Buggah, buggah, buggah.

Is that Goering in the middle of the group standing along side the aircraft?

It's generally accepted that the fatal shot came from the ground.

Great find CONSO thanks for posting it.

The two guys holding the tail down while he did his engine run-up were apparently Scottish POWs - when he was ready to take-off he would shout 'Jocks away'.;)

Megan, I think you might be right. About 2:45 in. The facial structure looks like him.

Fascinating. I reckon that's Goering on the left about 3.11 in.

Also the first known film of German Squippers assisting an aircrew member to don his flying clothing (AEA)

Probable Goering at 2:19, far left, as well.

Here, I'll pass you your coat, Crab. :)

Lt Algernon Frederick Bird, 46 Sqn.

From 'Under the Guns of the Red Baron', p159 which has the matching still.

You sound like Hettie in 'NCIS Los Angeles'.

Might not be that hard to find out.
There is a list of The Red Baron's victories on Wiki (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...von_Richthofen)

Also the shot-down aircraft looks like a sopwith 1 1/2 strutter (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sopwith_1%C2%BD_Strutter)

Captions say filmed in 1917
so a bit of digging and a few leaps of faith might get someone onto the right lines.

And I agree it would be interesting to find out more about him and what happened to him. :ok:

That bell at the start is way over modelled, at least by WW2 miniaturization had set in :)

Post edited as realised I'd posted Bird's squadron as 43 instead of 46.

Thanks GeeRam, sorry I did not see your post for some strange reason.

The Red Baron list then has him in there as being shot-down 3 Sept 1917 (Sopwith Pup and not the 1 1/2 strutter I thought)(close but no ceeeeegarrr)

The autopsy report that I've seen says that the fatal shot entered below his right armpit and exited next to the left nipple, passing through his heart on the way. That being the case it would have been impossible for him to continue controlled flight between being fired at by Brown and subsequently by the Australian machine gunners. The conclusion is that he was hit by a machine gun fired from the ground at which point the aircraft "wobbled" then spiralled into the ground.

He didn't 'spiral into the ground', he was able to land his machine behind the Allied lines, his last words as recorded by the first troops to reach him were something like 'is kaput'. No small achievement given the nature of his wound.
Souvenir hunters subsequently stripped him and his aircraft of everything until there was only a heap of wreckage and his naked body left. There are a number of items in museums in Australia I believe such as his flying boots. What was left was recovered by the RAF to Bertangles airfield. Richthofen was buried in the churchyard there with full military honours but removed after the armistice at the request of the locals to the German cemetery at, I think, Fricourts. He was later moved again back to Germany, to Berlin, before finally being laid to rest in his family plot in East Prussia.
As to exactly who shot him down the truth will never be known but Brown was closer than the gunner on the ground & had twin machine guns so I would give the kill to the RAF over the army!!

The triplane ,with a dying pilot, landed roughly and after running a short distance then flipped up on its nose. Richtofen's body jackknifed (only lap straps at that time)and his face hit the gun butts, smashing it up nastily, as is evident in the post -mortem photographs . I think these were published in Dale Titler's "The Day the Red Baron Died". For a number of reasons I do not think he survived the landing post the nose hitting the ground.
As to how much of his body was actually re-interred to Germany is another matter that was investigated by Titler with surprising results. Read the book!

Shoulder straps used for this very very well known film. Perhaps not normally used by him without cameras pointing.

Rob

PPRuNe. Absolutely agreed from the film that he obviously is strapping in with shoulder straps.

Anybody have some more info on this?

P.S. In 1978 Haraka and H.Snr. spent some time around Corbie researching the circumstances of Richthofen's final flight. We were within 100 yds of his final demise near the crossroads , bearing in mind that many before were unaware of local road modification . Sgt Popkin's (2nd Australian Machine Gun Corps) claim would seem to have some merit ,analyzing the local terrain ,including their high commanding position over the River,a fact not considered by many who have not actually physically ground checked the terrain.
Also remember that Roy Brown never initially claimed the kill. It was very much a political push from those on high.

Whether he did it all the time is a moot point. He seems to be checking that he can operate the gun cocking levers whilst strapped in.

I'm don't think it is Herman Goring in this film.

At the time of the film being made in Sept 1917 Goring was still serving with Jasta 27, and wasn't awarded his Pour le Merite until June 1918, and didn't join the Richthofen Circus until the following month in July 1918.

It looks like an oil can to me (I have a similar one which I inherited from my father in law). The engine had exposed valve gear so oiling by hand would be a routine thing.

To me it looked like he was opening one of the valves and squirting a little fuel in, if he was lubricating the valve gear then surely he would do two per cylinder? We did rotary on my mechs course so long ago lol.

Modern film of them doing it

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C6xX0zSvp7w

Possibly in the exhaust valve?

http://thevintageaviator.co.nz/proje...erursel-engine

Rotary Nutloose?
How old are you?
Radial I might believe.


http://www.cams.net.nz/Gnome%20Remanufacture.html
Good shots of a Gnome here, the Oberursel in the Fokker was similar

http://thevintageaviator.co.nz/proje...-build-history

Agreed, It doesn't seem to fit.

NOTE the clear plastic line on the "oil" can remains cleasr as he pumps it. Most oils of the time and nowdays are NOT clear. by comparison many gasoline compounds can be clear

I vote for gas primer. :cool:

It's definately priming with fuel.Nieuport 11 Bebe | The Vintage Aviator

The above link is most interesting, these guys build relica WWI aircraft, including the engines from scratch. The engine in the Fokker Dr.I was a German copy of the Le Rhône 9J, as used in the Sopwith Camel, though made of inferior materials. The Vintage Aviator group found various parts interchangable.

Richthofen's funeral.



Analysis by some has said that Brown was never in a position to be able to fire the fatal bullet on the trajectory found. As said previously, at no time did Brown ever claim that it was he who was responsible.

The exact wording from Browns combat report is as follows.


"Went back again and dived on a pure red triplane which was firing on Lieut May. I got a long burst into him and he went down vertical and was observed to crash by Lieut Mellersh and Lieut May."

The artillery report says

"German shot down by 53 Battery AFA this morning was famous Baron Von Richthofen."

On the subject of shoulder straps I would suggest that they might not worn in combat as they would restrict the pilots ability to turn to look over the shoulder. They appear to be very wide.

On the subject of the crash his facial injuries were described as superficial by the examining medical officers so a heavy crash is unlikely. This is supported by there being no damage to the recovered machine guns and the wings being intact. It was a collision with a wurzel heap that brought about a sudden stop.

On the return to Germany of his body he was buried in the Invaliden Cemetery Berlin.
The intention had been to bury him in Schweidnitz Silesia but this did not happen.


The life of Von Richthofen was my school project in 1971 so I have always had an interest.

Reports were that the aircraft suffered very little damage, undercarriage and fuel tank being mentioned.

On April 22, 1918, the consulting surgeon and the consulting physician of the British 4th Army examined the body, finding the fatal wound, a compound fracture of the lower jaw on the left side, and also some minor bruising of the head and face.

Richthofen had been shot in the head during action on 6 July 1917, which required surgery, and stayed at field hospital No 76 in Kortrik, Belgium, until 26 July. He had been diagnosed as having a concussion and cerebral haemorrhage. The skull wound had not closed, and it is probable that bare bone may still have been visible upon death, though post mortem makes no mention. The change in his demeanour following the head wound suggested he may have suffered a neurological disorder as a result, though his Mother thought it a result of action seen during the war generally.


http://www.anzacs.net/MvR-MedicalExam.htm

Wreckage after the souvenir hunters had their fill.

http://pierreswesternfront.punt.nl/media/o_614.jpg

As Richthofen suffered a head wound in July 1917, it appears to have healed remarkably fast, as if that clip is September, he has no difficulty with jerky head movement, whipping off his cap and donning flying helmet and securely checking his goggles.
Patch 'em up and send them back....

I believe nut is old enough to have it correct. If referring to the Dr1, the engine was "rotary".

I was referring to Nutloose claim to have trained on a rotary not on engine type fitted to MvR's aircraft which was clearly a rotary not a radial.

Nutloose cant be that old surely.
The rotaries other than a few in historical aircraft bid the dust in the 1920's.

Maybe it was a Wankel rotary.

Thanks for the amazing video.
My first thoughts were, at 2:17 when he's briefing his Sqn, how many were putting on a brave face for the camera? As it must have been petrifying and a real test of nerve to be a ww1 pilot.
From what I've read only the Germans experimented with parachutes in 1918 and even then they didn't have a good success rate. I believe Ernst Udet, the highest scoring German fighter pilot to survive that war, the second-highest scoring after Manfred von Richthofen and later WW2 Luftwaffe General, had a lucky escape using a parachute. Ernst Udet has an interesting life story on Wikipedia!
At the end of the video, the Royal Flying Corps (looking at the pips on his sleeves) Prisoner of War must have felt lucky, it could have been worse.

Interesting post on the flypast forums quoted in full

Eric,

1970's, surprisingly we covered Rotary as well as Radial, we were one of the last engine courses at St Athans to do pistons, ( 4 SofTT ) it was all part of the introduction to piston engine design... strange as it may seem today .
The shed was full of piston engines including cut away sleeve engines etc.... fast forward to the modern times and I was looking over a Spitfire being worked on and I commented oooohh it has a hot pot in it, I have never seen that in real life.. and they were dumbfounded and didn't know what one was lol.....
Don't forget, at the time the RAF were still operating piston aircraft, Hastings etc were on their last legs but still in service, and also the likes of the Pembroke, so they needed to train you for any future possible type and to do that they had to go through design and differences in thereof.
We were even taught prop swinging which I thought was a mugs game and have never done it since, the opportunity has come up and I have declined LOL. We even had various aircraft on the station such as a Pup I think...
Heck I even got roped into being on a running team when they ran the ME410, Focke Wulf 190 and Kawasaki Ki-100-1b "Tony" etc for the BBC to record the engine sounds...all sadly now silent at Cosford.. fascinating times and was I was glad to have been apart of what will never probable be repeated.


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If you look at the video at the 1:48 point you can see what appears to be a chin strap for his cap. Removal of the cap shows it not to be a chin strap, but I'm guessing retention for a dressing on his head wound.