Hero of the Angry Sky. David S. Ingalls
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Hero of the Angry Sky
The World War I Diary and Letters of David S. Ingalls,
America’s First Naval Ace
Edited by Geoffrey L. Rossano
Foreword by William F. Trimble
Ohio University Press Athens
Contents
Contents v
Illustrations vii
Foreword xi
Series Editors’ Preface xiii
Acknowledgments xv
A Note on the Text xvii
Abbreviations xix
Introduction 1
Training with the First Yale Unit 21
Early Days in Europe 44
With the RFC at Gosport, Turnberry, and Ayr 88
On Patrol—At NAS Dunkirk and with the RAF in Flanders 143
The Navy’s Big Show—The Northern Bombing Group 185
Hero of the Angry Sky—Serving with 217
No.213 Squadron 217
Eastleigh and Home 288
A Glance Back 316
Afterword 330
Appendix 1 340
Appendix 2 342
Bibliography 366
Illustrations
Following page 32
Lt. David Ingalls
The First Yale Unit in Florida for training, spring 1917
F. Trubee Davison, founder of the First Yale Unit
Artemus “Di” Gates of the Yale Unit, with Curtiss F Boat
Members of the First Yale Unit relaxing in Florida 000
Di Gates’s Number 7 crew with Curtiss F Boat in Florida
Crew readying Curtiss F Boat training aircraft
Lt. Eddie McDonnell and Col. Lewis Thompson in Florida
The Yale Unit gathered for muster in Florida
The Yale Unit in Huntington, New York, June 1917
F Boats and a twin-float R-6 at Huntington Bay
Members of the Yale Unit hauling a Curtiss R-6 trainer/scout aircraft out of the water
Ensign Ingalls in his new uniform, early September 1917
The SS Philadelphia (former City of Paris)
Navy gun crews drilling aboard Philadelphia, summer 1917
Following page 134
Ingalls shortly after landing in England
U.S. Navy facility at Moutchic
FBA flying boat
Robert “Bob” Lovett of the First Yale Unit
Capt. Hutch I. Cone, director of naval aviation activities in Europe
Avro 504 trainer
Two Avro 504 trainers after a collision, winter 1917–18
Ken MacLeish
Sopwith Camel
Upended Camel after a training accident
Following page 178
Hand-drawn map of Dunkirk harbor by Lt. Kenneth Whiting
Lt. Godfrey Chevalier, CO at NAS Dunkirk
George Moseley
Yale Unit veteran Samuel Walker on a visit to Dunkirk, with Di Gates
Hanriot-Dupont scout being lowered into the water by derrick at Dunkirk
U.S. Navy station at Dunkirk after a German raid in late April 1918
Seawall at NAS Dunkirk with Hanriot-Dupont scouts
Ingalls, Ken MacLeish, and “Shorty” Smith at the Bergues aerodrome, April 1918
Following page 278
Ingalls with John T. “Skinny” Lawrence and acquaintance in Paris, May 1918
Breguet 14B.2 at Clermont-Ferrand
Observer/machine gunner Randall R. Browne of the First Aeronautic Detachment
DH9 day bomber
Aerial reconnaissance photograph of the dockyards and submarine pens at Bruges
Capt. David Hanrahan, Northern Bombing Group commander, with officers
Chateau at St. Inglevert, a point of rendezvous for members of the Yale Unit
Ingalls in Flanders, possibly during duty with Northern Bombing Group, July–August 1918
Ingalls with 213 Squadron mates, August 1918
Following page 308
U.S. Navy’s Flight Department at Eastleigh
Warrant Officers Einar “Dep” Boydler and William “Bill” Miller at Eastleigh
Warrant Officer William “Bill” Miller with Liberty motor–powered DH-9a day bomber
Randall Browne and crew members at Eastleigh
Ingalls with fellow officer at Eastleigh
Members of senior officer corps of Eastleigh at armistice
Ingalls with enlisted personnel of the Flight Department of Eastleigh at the end of the war
RMS Mauretania
Following page 334
Ingalls with Admiral H. V. Butler in San Diego, 1929
Foreword
Curiously, given the scale and drama of the U.S. Navy’s World War I aviation effort, there are no published biographies of navy combat aviators. Now, thanks to Geoffrey Rossano, a skilled and knowledgeable historian whose recent works include a comprehensive study of the navy’s air arm in Europe, we have a fine-grained, up close and personal glimpse into the wartime career of David Sinton Ingalls, as told in his own words. The navy’s first and only World War I “ace,” credited with six victories while attached to an RAF pursuit squadron, Ingalls was still a teenager when he dropped out of Yale and volunteered for aviation training and service as a naval reserve officer. Like many members of the famed First Yale Unit, Ingalls came from the country’s privileged elite, and like his comrades in arms, he dreamed of the excitement, honor, and glory that modern air warfare seemed to herald. Of course, as Ingalls himself related, the reality was often much different. He endured days and sometimes weeks of tedium on the ground, underwent seemingly endless training, and flew innumerable fruitless patrols over “Hunland” behind the front lines. What to the public appeared to be romantic, chivalrous aerial jousting was in fact a deadly industrial age war of attrition in which men and machines were consumed as appallingly as they were by the artillery and machine guns on the ground.
Using a veritable treasure trove of Ingalls’s letters and diaries, Rossano brings the air war to life with informative and unobtrusive editing skill. The result is that readers will have the rare opportunity to see World War I in the air firsthand. In Ingalls’s remarkably clear voice, we hear the range of emotions that often overwhelmed young men separated from their families and exposed to the dangers of flight and combat. We share Ingalls’s exhilaration in the sheer intoxicating sensation of flight and the satisfaction he experienced in successfully completing a mission. We see how he carefully worded his letters home to his mother and father to mask the dangers he faced. And we see how his nearly daily diary entries paint another, more realistic picture, vividly showing that