Who really shot the Red Baron

[PeterL]

Michael: " Roy Brown was given the seat from Richthofen's plane as a trophy. Today, it is displayed at the Royal Military Institute, Toronto. You can put your finger through the bullet hole."

Michael, it has since been established that the holes in the back of the seat were once occupied by rivets which probably went west when it was torn from the wreckage.

This episode still envokes hot debate, as I keep hearing new concepts on how MvR was killed. Does anybody still feel that Roy Browm brought him down? Could he have been shotdown by Brown, and then killed by ground troops? I'll try to get a copy of the book mentioned above. Any other interesting takes on the Baron's demise?

[PeterL]

It generates no heat for me. If I can be so presumptious, most of us here accept that ground fire is most likely to have done for the Baron. Whether it is possible to say exactly who fired the fatal shot is *another matter; I think not. For my own part I don't think it makes a ha'pennyworth of difference. It won't change the fact that Brown is credited with the victory, whether rightfully his or not, and on that basis the question is accademic. I am content that here at least is one victory confirmed by German records.

[StephenLawson]

It generates no heat for me. If I can be so prosumptious, most of us here accept that ground fire is most likely to have done for the Baron. Whether it is possible to say exactly who fired the fatal shot is *another matter; I think not. For my own part I don't think it makes a ha'pennyworth of difference. It won't change the fact that Brown is credited with the victory, whether rightfully his or not, and on that basis the question is accademic. I am content that here at least is one victory confirmed by German records.

I'll raise my cup o tea to you Peter and to Brown and the Baron. Their worries are over and you are at relative peace.

[PeterL]

Okay Michael, you got me. It was me wot done it

[NeilE]

Thank You Peter, I just choked on my coffee!

I wonder that if the Jastas saw that image, I bet they would have flown to the nearest Allied airfield and surrendered en masse!

Scary!

All the Best

Neil

[StephenLawson]

Oh great Peter has gone from a pink grass skirt to black leather. Is there a therapist out there?

[PeterL]

Michael: "The RAF should never have given up pith helmets!"

Stop taking the pith Michael. I'm off back there in two weeks. Beleive me, as I sit under the mother-in-law's grapevine, sipping her brandy, I won't give you a second thought *

[WFS]

I think Peter spent too long in the sun during one of his UNFICYP tours. *The RAF should never have given up pith helmets!

But Michael, isn't it better to be pithed off than pithed on? ???

[Graeme]

A while back I downloaded some information on the examination of von Richthofen's body and have just stumbled across it. *It covers 5 pages of A4 so I'll have to post it in chunks (I can't find details of the hyperlink). *I found it interesting, hope you do too.

A Re-examination of the Medical Evidence by Dr. M. Geoffrey Miller

First published in "Sabretache", the Journal and Proceedings of the Military History Society of Australia, Vol. XXXIX, No. 2, June 1998, and © 1998, M. Geoffrey Miller

It is now eighty years since Baron Manfred von Richthofen, Germany’s greatest WW1 fighter pilot, was shot down and killed over the Australian lines in the Western Front in France on 21 April 1918. Captain Brown, a Canadian pilot in the Royal Flying Corps, flying a Sopwith Camel single seat fighter, was known to have attacked von Richthofen and he was officially credited with shooting him down, eventually receiving a bar to his DSC for the feat. Brown’s claim to have shot down von Richthofen was immediately contested by the Australians because von Richthofen had flown at a very low height directly over their lines and had been fired on by Australian anti-aircraft machine gunners, as well as by many Australian soldiers.
* * *
The controversy as to who was responsible for shooting down von Richthofen has continued over the years. C E W Bean, the author of the Official History of Australia in the War of 1914 to 1918, carried out considerable research into the death and devoted an Appendix, in Volume V of the Official History, published in 1935, to describe the circumstances in detail (1). Bean was of the opinion that Sergeant Popkin, an Australian Vickers machine gunner, was responsible for shooting down von Richthofen and that Captain Brown had not fired the fatal shot.

There have been many books and articles published since then on the subject of who was responsible for shooting down von Richthofen. Most authors agree that it was an Australian, but disagree as to his identity, however Markham, (2) as late as 1993, did not consider that any Australian was responsible and wrote an article re-attributing the death of von Richthofen to Captain Brown.

This present paper will refer in particular to two books. Dale Titler (3) published a book agreeing that Australian machine gunners were responsible but considered that Gunner Robert Buie, firing a Lewis gun, shot down the German triplane. Carisella and Ryan (4) disagreed with Titler, and supported Bean’s opinion that it was Sergeant Popkin who was responsible.

Although the various authors have drawn different conclusions about who was responsible for Richthofen’s death, it is apparent that all previous accounts of the post mortem examinations made on Manfred von Richthofen have been taken from Bean’s account in Volume V of his Official History. It must be emphasised that Bean did not quote the reports in their entirety but left out some of the original text of the reports. The original complete reports are in the Richthofen section of the Bean Papers (the Bean Papers) held in the research section of the Australian War Memorial (AWM) in Canberra (5) and a consideration of these throws important new light on the controversy. There is also an unpublished letter from Popkin to Bean in the papers, clarifying an original newspaper report about Popkin that has been used by Titler and Carisella and Ryan in their books and by Markham in his article.

Using these primary sources in the Australian War Memorial, wherever possible, a critical analysis of the post mortem examination and a reconstruction of the probable events of 21 April 1918 has been made.

The Post Mortem Examination. *The details of the post mortem examinations of von Richthofen’s body are more than a little confused. Referring to the contradictory medical examinations made on the body of von Richthofen, Newton (6), in 1986, wrote:

The different conclusions reached in the two medical reports were to start a controversy which, to date, has never been unquestionably resolved. Who fired the fatal shot? Did it come from the air or the ground? However a careful assessment of the documents in the Bean Papers seems to clarify the confusion. It is accepted that Manfred von Richthofen was flying an all red Fokker triplane when he crashed in the Somme Valley near Corbie on the 21 April 1918. His body was taken to a hangar belonging to the No. 3 Squadron, Australian Flying Corps at Poulainville, where an examination of the body was held. The body was washed by an orderly and the first superficial post mortem examination was made by a panel of doctors. According to Bean (7), the panel consisted of Colonel T Sinclair, consulting surgeon to the Fourth army, Captain G C Graham, RAMC and Lieutenant G E Downs, RAMC, attached to the Air Force. Newton, however, refers to the presence also of Colonel J A Dixon, consulting physician to the British Fourth Army.