Australian Flying Corps
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The Australian Flying Corps was founded on October 22, 1912 with five aircraft. This military division was the forerunner of today's Air Force , the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) of the Australian Confederation and the second air force in the British Commonwealth .
The military aviation began in Australia already on 7 and 8 January 1901 the Royal Engineer Balloon Section (balloon) unit in Sydney , but it was not until the year 1910, when the plans for military flying machines were concrete and the Australian Flying Corps on October 22, 1912 with five aircraft as Australia's new military division was established. It was subordinate to the Army .
On March 7, 1913, the military gave the order to build a flight school at Point Cook in Victoria , which began training on August 17, 1914 with two flight instructors and four flight students.
On February 8, 1915, the government of India called the Australian government for assistance in the Mesopotamia conflict (Iraq). The Australian government was only able to deploy flight personnel in this conflict, but none of the rare flying machines. The Farman machines provided by India were only partially suitable for the desert climate and needed favorable winds to be able to return to the starting point. This is why this mission is called the “Mesopotamian Half-Flight” in Australia. The half-flight command was to carry out reconnaissance and sabotage missions. By 1916, four of the five machines had fallen into German hands, and the half-flight operation was canceled. The commander of the operation, Henry Petre, was assigned to the 1st Squadron in Egypt.
For Australia, four squadrons took part in the First World War, with the 1st Squadron being used against the Turks and Germans in the Middle East , while the other squadrons on the Western Front took part in aerial combat from September 1917 to November 1918. The Australians used different types of aircraft for enemy reconnaissance, fighting artillery, bombing and air battles.
Australian Air Force soldiers served not only with the AFC, but also with the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service. Even after the First World War, there was a lively exchange between the British and Australian air forces.
Lieutenant FH McNamara of the 1st Squadron received the highest military award among Australian pilots, the Victorian War Cross. Robert A. Little and Roderic Dallas won most dogfights with 47 and 39 victories respectively, both of which died in action. The best surviving pilot was 24 year old Captain AH Cobby of the 4th Squadron, who recorded 29 aerial victories. The Australian Richard Williams commanded the Royal Air Force Wing and drove the development of the RAAF after the war. He commanded the Australian Air Force from 1920 to 1937, most recently as Air Marshal. His successors, Vice Air Marshal Stanley Goble (in command from 1937 to 1940) and Air Marshal George Jones (in command from 1942 to 1952) had also served in the AFC.
Numerous other aviation pioneers emerged from the AFC and RFC, including Charles Kingsford Smith , Hudson Fysh and the brothers Ross and Keith Smith , who carried out first flights in the Middle East and the first flight from London to Darwin . Even Henry Wrigley and Arthur Murphy, who conducted from Point Cook in Brisbane to Darwin to welcome Ross and Keith Smith the first transcontinental flight in Australia, are among them.
Web links
- Australian Military Aviation and World War One ( Memento from June 23, 2010 in the Internet Archive )