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Describes the formation of the L.F.C. following the successes of the Escadrille Lafayette. Includes biographical sketches of L.F.C. members who served in various French escadrilles until after the U.S. entered the war in 1917.
Volume one of a two volume history of the famous American volunteer squadron of the First World War There can be few who have heard of the Lafayette Flying Corps who are unaware of its history. It was, of course, comprised of the American pilots who volunteered to fight for France in the air and it included the famous Lafayette Escadrille. More than 200 American pilots completed French aviation training and 180 flew in combat. Sixty three brave Americans gave their lives for the French cause and the corps was credited with nearly 160 enemy aircraft shot down. Lafayette flyers included eleven flying aces and four winners of the Legion d' Honneur. This two volume history of the services of the Lafayette Flying Corps includes contributions by many of it members and is an essential source work on the subject for all those interested in the early history of military aviation. Volume one is a history of the corps from its formation, and includes details of the origin of the Escadrille Américaine, the Escadrille Lafayette at the front, the Lafayette Flying Corps, enlistment and early training, adventures in action, life on the front, combats and prisoners of war. Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their spines and fabric head and tail bands.
Includes 29 Illustrations The advent of an American squadron, or “escadrille,” within the French air force, the Service Aeronautique, had been far from a simple process. French leaders initially held the belief, common at the time, that the war begun in 1914 would be a short one. The potential value of American volunteers fighting for France both for propaganda purposes and for helping bring the power of the New World into the war on the side of the Allies was thus irrelevant at first. By early 1915, however, the French began to accept American volunteers and assign them to escadrilles. In early 1916, the Service Aeronautique united several of these men in an elite chasse unit, which quickly earned an enviable reputation for audacity, bravery, and élan. Success of this unit, the Lafayette Escadrille, had three consequences. First, its existence encouraged a large number of Americans, far more than needed in one escadrille, to volunteer for French aviation. These individuals, identified unofficially as members of a “Lafayette Flying Corps,” served in numerous French air units. Second, the publicity surrounding the Lafayette Escadrille contributed favorable press for the Allied cause, strengthened ties between France and the U.S., and ultimately helped prepare the U.S. to participate on the Allied side of the conflict. Third, the existence of a large body of experienced American pilots provided combat veterans for the Air Service of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) in France when the U.S. ultimately entered the war. These veterans helped instill in the U.S. Air Service the attitudes and practices of the Service Aeronautique, an infusion especially reflected in two U.S. pursuit squadrons, the 103rd Aero Squadron, made up of Lafayette Escadrille pilots, and the 94th Aero Squadron, the most famous American combat squadron of the war.
This new book contains not only a history of the legendary Lafayette Flying Corps, but also detailed biographies of the 269 volunteer American airmen and gunners of France's Service Aeronautique who flew in sixty-six pursuit and twenty-seven bomber/observation squadrons over the Western Front - also included are the thirty-eight pilots of the Escadrille Lafayette. It is an accurate and absorbing account of the lives and combat experiences of the men who later formed the nucleus of the American Expeditionary Force squadrons. This ground breaking work contains comprehensive research, including details of war casualties and survivors, and many unpublished photographs.
The most complete account of America's first volunteer participants in the Great War yet written, lavishly illustrated with both period photos and color then-and-now shots for a new generation of readers . .
High Adventure: A Narrative of Air Fighting in France is a gripping memoir by James Norman Hall. The book recounts Hall's experiences as an airman during World War I, offering a thrilling and candid account of aerial combat and the realities of war. His vivid storytelling and firsthand perspective make this an engaging and insightful read for those interested in aviation and military history.
Early in 1916, a year before the United States entered World War I, a handful of valiant Americans banded together as the Lafayette Escadrille to forge their mark in history in the skies over France. Be it for fame, adventure or patriotism, they stepped forward to meet the common enemy long before their own nation realized the true extent of the threat to world freedom. During their days with the Escadrille, some of these men met death, while others lived out the war; but each, in his own way, earned immortality for himself and the Escadrille. As long as there remains a man with a love for flying in his heart, or one who has experienced the indescribable thrill of passing along through the tranquil solitude of the firmament, the memory of the Lafayette Escadrille and of those who served it so nobly will endure. This is the chronicle of an elite group of men, written by one of their own who survived the holocaust. The vivid account of battles in the air, the flush of success over a fallen foe, the sorrow from the loss of a comrade—all of these carry the reader back across the decades to that exciting period of so long ago. In essence, one does not read this book—he lives it.
Spring 1916, and three great armies - French, British and, on the other side of the wire, German - are locked in a stalemate of mud and blood on Europe's Western Front. On the ground, young British soldiers lose their innocence in the hell that is No Man's Land, while in the skies above the trenches a new breed of warrior, armed with a devastating new weapon, comes of age. As the conflict stretches into its third year, a neutral but woefully unprepared and ill-equipped America is slowly goaded into war. It falls to General John Pershing to galvanise his country's army into readiness and as the first American troops reach the front in 1917, the world waits to see if the tide of a war that has already cost millions of lives can at last be turned. Combining an historian's eye for detail with a novelist's understanding of man's hopes and fears, Shaara carries the reader into the hearts and minds of some of the war's most memorable characters, from the heroic to the infamous, and vividly brings to life one of the greatest conflagrations in human history.