Mannock's Mercy - Sources

PD: Mannock's phrase :"Swinnes are better death, not prisioners" says it all.

[Ginger.]

Listen Sonny,
Being this Forum's Idiot is men's work.:
Dive for the lines before the SE with the big G on it gets you bang in the middle of it's Aldis.:

[Ginger.]

Meanwhile back at the war.:
I have perused "The Personal Diary of 'Mick' Mannock V.C.,D.S.O. (2 bars), M.C. (1 bar)." Just our luck that the first entry for July 1917 is on Friday the 20th it reads:-
"After a month of negligence and laziness I again turn to the diary."
Not once in the period of July or August is the incident mentioned,the entries for these two months are a bit sparse all round.The diary's last entry is in the first week of September.
Sorry chaps,not much use at all really.???

[Dave_Kent]

Hello Ginger:

Thank you for checking the diary. I've often thought of getting a copy of it, but have not as yet. Do you recommend it ?

Dave

[NeilE]

Hi All;

Oh dear! More "Knights of the Air" mythology! Throughout most of the air war it seems to me there was very little chivalry. The idea after all was to kill or disable the enemy as often as possible. Even the 'revered' MVR wasn't above going after the odd lame duck when the opportunity presented itself ( Wop May being a good example of this). Combat was too deadly for the luxury of chivalry most times, and a kill or be killed mentality seems to have largely prevailed.

Witness also the number of two seater ambushes where solo pilots were bounced by the opposition with superior numbers with the sole aim of shooting them done and killing them. This was hardly chivalrous was it?

Mannock was there to do a job and maybe his social position vis a vis his comrades, allowed him to see it for what it really was - a rotten job like all frontline jobs in war.

Overall, I believe all sides saw the combat largely the same way - Germans, Brits, French, American, Australian etc., saw the combat as about the end result - not how the game was played.

Just a few thoughts...

All the Best

Neil

I have never liked Mannock,either
take your best shot Ginger old sport!

[Vigilant]

I put Mannock's 'Hun hating' talk down to two factors.

First, he was a socialist and he believed a German victory would put that cause back by decades due to the reactionary / undemocratic nature of the German leadership. Therefore he was committed to fighting the war.

Second, he was scared of air fighting and didn't like killing people. (He had been in a Field Ambulance Company at the start of the war and was by most accounts highly strung.)

Because of his belief that the war had to be fought, he was able to overcome his fear and disgust with the killing. But his public utterances show he was over-compensating wildly and was taking the logic of killing the enemy to its furthest extent to mask his own internal uneasiness.

"Flamerinoes!" - who was he kidding.

Vig.

[Old_Nick]

Thanks for the input!

Like Baron T. when I was much younger I too did not care for Mannock. Went against the grain of the idealist type pilot I wanted to believe in.

BUT the more I read the more I admired the man. He over came a lot to be the fighter pilot he was. He also took the time to train, instruct and care for the men under his command. He did not have to, he could have gone through the motions. But he did not.

Never been much on officers but here was one I would follow.

There were a lot of brave young men who survived the war thanks to Mick Mannock. For that and more he is OK in my book and I am lifting a cold one to him.

Old Nick

[Old_Nick]

BTW Baron von T., do be too hard on all the Brits. At the battle of the Thames while their commander fled the 41st Regiment of Foot stood firm with their native allies. Ordered to take open order, in the order against a cavalry charge they one and all stood their ground and were ridden down.

Old Nick

Two miles down river from my house
is Old Ft. Miamis,where after the Bloody
Brits allies, the native Americans,were
beat by Mad Anthony Wayne,,the
Natives retreated to the Fort,
But they couldn't get in,because their
Bloody allies,the Brits locked them out.