Raoul Lufbery

Gervais Raoul Lufbery (March 14, 1885 – May 19, 1918) was a
French-American fighter pilot and flying ace in World War I. Because he served in both the French and later the United States Army Air Service in World War I, he is sometimes listed as a French ace and sometimes as an American ace, though all but one of his 17 combat victories came while flying in French units.

Early life

Raoul Lufbery was born in Chamalières, France to an American father and a French mother. When Raoul was an infant, his father returned to America, forcing Raoul to be raised by his grandmother. He later came to America settling in Wallingford, Connecticut. He enlisted in the United States Army to gain American citizenship and saw service during the Philippine-American War. Later, he traveled to French Indochina, where he took a job as a mechanic for French aviation pioneer Marc Pourpe.

Early French service

When World War I broke out in 1914, Lufbery enlisted in the French Foreign Legion. Originally trained as an infantryman, he was later transferred to an aviation squadron, where he was reunited with his old mentor, Marc Pourpe, who had become a French aviator.

Late in 1914, Lufbery was accepted into the pilot training program and was assigned to fly reconnaissance missions with Escadrille VB 106. He later applied for a transfer to fighter planes and was trained on Nieuports. Despite his future success, Lufbery was not considered a naturally gifted pilot. His success was largely due to his preseverance and attention to mechanical detail. He was often harassed by his fellow pilots for working with the aerodrome's mechanics on his plane. He also inspected and polished each bullet in his guns drum to help avoid gun jams, a frequent problem of the Lewis gun.

Lafayette Escadrille

In 1916, a group of American volunteers formed the "Escadrille Américaine" (shortly to berenamed the "Escadrille Lafayette") to aid France’s war effort against the Germans. The squadron was renamed at the request of the American Secretary of War after heavy protest from Germany that an American squadron was a violation of the United States' neutrality. The squadron was largely made up of upper-class Americans with little flight experience. Lufbery, as an American citizen with aeronautics experience, was recruited to join the unit. He joined the unit on May 24, 1916 and was assigned a Nieuport fighter.

His first encounters with his unit did not go smoothly. Lufbery spoke English with a thick French accent and had little in common with his comrades, most of whom were from wealthy families and were Ivy League educated. Once in combat, though, his dogged determination and success earned him the respect and admiration of his peers. One night while the squadron was resting in Paris, his fellow pilots adopted a lion cub from a circus, which Lufbery raised for several years. The cub's name was Whiskey.

His first two victories came on July 30, 1916 over Verdun. By
October 12, 1916, he had downed five enemy planes, making him an ace and the squadron’s leading aviator.

It was during this time that the "Lufbery circle" maneuver became named for him, although most aviation scholars agree that Lufbery did not actually invent it, just popularized it among Allied flyers.

American service

He was commissioned in the United States Army Air Service in late 1917, having by this date become CO of the Lafayette Escadrille with the rank of Major. He had claimed 17 air kills by this time.In the spring of 1918, Lufbery was chosen to become an officer in the yet-unformed 94th Aero Squadron with the rank of Major. Lufbery’s principal job was to instruct the new pilots such as Eddie Rickenbacker in combat techniques. The United States Army Air Service was equipped with Nieuport 28 fighters, but due to supply problems, many lacked armament. The 94th’s first combat patrol on March 6, 1918, saw Lufbery leading Rickenbacker and fellow flyer Doug Campbell in unarmed airplanes.

Death

On May 19, 1918, Lufbery took off in his Nieuport 28 in an attempt to intercept a German Rumpler reconnaissance machine near to the 94th's home airfield. Closing in to attack, the German gunner's fire hit the Nieuport, setting the machine on fire.

What happened next has been a matter of considerable debate. At an altitude variously estimated between 200 and 600 feet, Lufbery either jumped out of the plane (to avoid a fiery death) or was thrown from the cockpit after it flipped over above the village of Maron. Some, however, claim Lufbery jumped from the plane in an attempt to land in a nearby river. His falling body struck a metal garden picket fence, and so the ace perished. (Allied aviators of World War I were not issued parachutes, and Germans wore them only very late in the war.)

On a somewhat ironic note, Lufbery was killed on the same day Oswald Boelcke was born (Boelcke was born in 1891 and killed in 1916 in a mid-air collision with Erwin Bohme) and shared the same date of death with Colonel T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence was killed in a motorcycle wreck in 1935).

He was buried with full military honors at the Aviators Cemetery at Sebastapol, France. His remains were later removed to a place of honor at the "Lafayette Memorial du Parc de Garches" in Paris. Although he received credit for only 17 victories in his career, his fellow pilots related many instances when he shot down German planes that he was not credited for. His actual number of victories has been variously estimated at anywhere between 25 and 60.

A sculpture of Lufbery and an airplane form the Harmon International Trophy, an award given annually beginning in 1926 to honor achievements in aviation. In 1998, Lufbery was enshrined in the National Aviation Hall of Fame.

Pop culture references

Lufbery is one of the main characters in Jeffrey Shaara's book, "To the Last Man".

In Eddie Rickenbacker's book, "Fighting the Flying Circus",Raul Lufbery is attributed with inventing the precursor to the modern airport flight pattern. Planes would fly in and land in any direction on the field, based on their needs and wind direction -- causing no end to the amount of confusion, near misses, and collisions. Lufbery, commander of the 94th APS, directed that all approaching aircraft would circle the field at least twice before landing, watching for others taking off or landing. This was quickly dubbed the "Lufbery Circle" and eventually became the "Down Wind, Base, and Final" standard airport pattern that pilots use every day in VFR flight

The character of Reed Cassidy in the 2006 film "Flyboys" (played by Martin Henderson) is roughly based on Lufbery.

Features prominently in the "Young Indiana Jones Chronicles" episode "Attack of the Hawkmen"

He and his lion cub, Whiskey, are depicted on card number 10 of the Scholastic book/online-game/treasure-hunt The 39 Clues.

References

* Franks & Bailey- 'Over the Front' (Grub Street) 1992.

External links

* [http://www.wwiaviation.com/aces/ace_Lufbery.shtml A brief biography with citations]
* [http://usfighter.tripod.com/raoul_lufbery.htm Another Biography]
* [http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/luf.htm An account of Lufbery’s death by Eddie Rickenbacker]