Maurice Happe

totoroman · 2 February 2007, 10:24 PM

so, I can't read French... I'm intrigued since I started reading the "French Tactical and Strategic bombing" translated from Rene Martell... does anybody know how long he lived, if he survived the war, what unit's he served with?

vb136 · 4 February 2007, 06:54 AM

Happe did survive the war. I have read somewhere that he died in an air-crash in 1930, but I do not remember the source for this, so I can not guarantee that this is true.
He belonged to escadrille 29 from 4 June 1915 to 3 December 1915, as the CO of this unit. He took command of GB 4 on 4 December 1915, until ?.
The service record above is not complete.

gilles · 4 February 2007, 03:36 PM

Hello

Happe was dismissed from GB4 command on the 6 may 1917. His independence was not accepted by some generals and maybe the bombing of a swiss city (Porrentruy april 24th) by a Farman was the pretext.
Happe spend 3 months as Schools Inspector then requested to be send in the infantry. He joined the 50° regiment d'infantrie and fought in Italy in 1918.
At the end of war, he went to Poland in 1919 to fight the bolsheviks (another french officer there was Capitaine Charles de Gaulle).
He came back to aviation in 1922. He died the 20th october 1930 in the crash of his Breguet 19.

Gilles