Middletown transcript., 1918-10-26

and the early part of 1915 pilots and observers
carried rifles and the pilots, at that time sat
behind. There were machine guns air.
planes. Men undoubtedly fought in the air, but
these scraps generally resulted in two machines
maneuvering around each other and occasionally
getting in shot Sometimes one machine or
the other was forced to land for lack of gasoline.
1t was extremely lucky if you could put in shot
that would either disable the pilot knock out
the machine. Not until the advent Of the Lewis
gun did aerial gunnery really begin to make itself
felt. These handy little weapons were mounted
on swivelpins each side of the machine and cut
down to decrease weight. This, however. though
the beginning, was never satisfactory, and the
stoppages in the machine gun were frequent. In
the middle Of 1915. the German aviatik had a sim
gle movable gun in the rear cockpit which caused
quite lot of trouble to the allies This was
followed by the French Newport machine, which
had Lewis gun mounted over the top plane and
at the same time developed q ring mounting
in the observers cockpit 1t thus became Il race
not only in machines but also in gunnery as to
who could bring the most effective fire to bear
the adversary. In the autumn Of 1918 expert
ments were made with the Vickers gun firing
through the propeller. The blades were protected
by steel plates called refectors, which were so
placed that when bullet struck the blade it
glanced off. No form Of synchronizer gear had
been evolved, but it was the beginning of sys-
tenn which is now universal. Late in 1915 the
Fokker made its appearance This machine had
not great speed but it did have a synchronizing
gear |. e., gear which enabled the machine gun
to fire through the blades of the propeller with
out hitting the blades and without any loss Of
efficiency. It had quite success for time until
the French got out the Spad gear and the British
the Vickers gear. The latter was used by us
quite extensively over the lines, but owing to the
difficulty OF training mechanics in its and the
it left quite a lot to be desired. This was fol-
lowed by the Constantinesco gear which proved
very satisfactory Here, then, was definite
progress In aerial gunnery, and today have on
every machine two three or four machine guns
two firing through the propeller and two being
used by the observer behind. In the case of a
two-seater, if you consider the amount of rounds
which can be fired on the enemy from a machine
you will understand what a menace it is You
can fire 600 rounds per minute from each gun
hence the pilot can fire 1900 rounds per minute
and the observer can reach the same figure with
his two guns
Machines. of course, specialized. There are
single-seater machines, which depend entirely on
their power Of maneuver and gunire. There are
two-seater fighters, where the pilot and the Oh
server have to work together the whole time.
There are machines designed for cooperation
with artillery which carry observer and wire
less There are large machines for day bombing
and still larger machines designed for night bomb
Ing Owing to the pace at which machines !,
maneuver the sighting of machine guns becomes I
a very important factor. To hit an object in a |
vital spot going 12O miles hour, when your |
own machine is travelling at the same pace re-
qures vast amount Of training for pilots and !
observers, who practice gunnery continuously |
from the time they go the ground school until !
they 20 overseas.
An extremely interesting form of flying has
been perfected recently-cloud formation flying.
In the olden days, and until most recently,
pilots have been chary about going into clouds
except a means of defense. Actual cloud fly
ing has been regarded with a certain amount of
skeptcism. But cloud flying today is a necessity
Every day is not fine day. and cloud flying has
become the fashion. 1t is possible for ma
chimes to go in formation through the clouds and !
meet above them and continue that formation
on a compass bearing to their objective. come
down through the clouds, bomb their objective,
go up again and come home That sounds simple,
but it is simple only if pilots properly trained
for it. and have the right instruments.
ng-distance air raids into Germany are now
quite common. An Independent force of the r. A.
F. has been formed for this purpose alone. It is
Independent Of the army and carries out bomb
raids only from its headquarters in France.
would like to write something about aerial
photography, that most useful adjunct of the
work of the general staff but considerations of
space forbid. I have endeavored to show the
vital importance of the air force, both offensive
and defensive My message can be summarized
in very few words. Send over your Liberty en-.
gines in thousands. Send over your bright young
American flyers in tens of thousands and the
end of both the and the Hun will be in
sight.