Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Understanding The Civil War More Clearly

I have long sympathized with the plight of those young men recruited from the trenches to become Observers in the Royal Flying Corps, escaping the mud and horrors of trench warfare only to find they were in a position where their life expectancy was even less than that of a pilot. The more fortunate among those lost were killed outright by machine gun fire at the start.

A pretty good discussion of the same can be found here....

http://www.oocities.org/bloodhound66btinternet.com/HarryTatham.htm

In reviewing the contribution of the RFC observer, it is perhaps best summarised by two quotations from Barker’s history of the Royal Flying Corps. He starts his consideration of the role of the observer by quoting Captain Leslie Horridge of No 7 Squadron who commented that ‘ the observers out here are very plucky chaps’ and ends with his own reflection that ‘what is remarkable is that so many of those who survived stuck it for so long’ . Little more needs to be said.

Birdwatcher