First to Fly: The Story of the Lafayette Escadrille, The American Heroes Who Flew for France in World War I by Charles Bracelen Flood
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First to Fly: The Story of the Lafayette Escadrille, The American Heroes Who Flew for France in World War I by Charles Bracelen Flood
If the Wright Brothers' 1903 flights in Kitty Hawk marked the birth of aviation, World War I can be called its violent adolescence -- a brief but bloody era that completely changed the way planes were designed, fabricated, and flown. In First to Fly, lauded historian Charles Bracelen Flood tells the story of a remarkable group of men who were at the forefront of that revolution: the daredevil Americans of the Lafayette Escadrille. These men, who flew in French planes and wore French uniforms, showed the world an American brand of heroism before the United States entered the Great War.
As citizens of a nation that was neutral from 1914 to early 1917, Americans were officially prohibited from serving in a foreign army, but many brave young souls soon made their way into European battle zones as ambulance drivers, nurses, and, more dangerously, soldiers of the French Foreign Legion. It was partly from the ranks of the latter group, and with the sponsorship of a Vanderbilt and an expat American surgeon, that the Lafayette Escadrille was formed in 1916 as the first and only all-American squadron in the French Air Service. Flying rudimentary planes, with one-in-three odds of being killed, these fearless young men gathered reconnaissance and shot down enemy aircraft, participated in the Battle of Verdun, and faced off with the Red Baron, dueling across the war-torn skies like modern knights on horseback.
Drawing on rarely seen primary sources, First to Fly chronicles the startling success of that intrepid band and gives a compelling look at the rise of aviation and a new era of warfare.
Atlantic Monthly Press, Hardcover, 2015
THIS IS A BRAND NEW BOOK
If the Wright Brothers' 1903 flights in Kitty Hawk marked the birth of aviation, World War I can be called its violent adolescence -- a brief but bloody era that completely changed the way planes were designed, fabricated, and flown. In First to Fly, lauded historian Charles Bracelen Flood tells the story of a remarkable group of men who were at the forefront of that revolution: the daredevil Americans of the Lafayette Escadrille. These men, who flew in French planes and wore French uniforms, showed the world an American brand of heroism before the United States entered the Great War.
As citizens of a nation that was neutral from 1914 to early 1917, Americans were officially prohibited from serving in a foreign army, but many brave young souls soon made their way into European battle zones as ambulance drivers, nurses, and, more dangerously, soldiers of the French Foreign Legion. It was partly from the ranks of the latter group, and with the sponsorship of a Vanderbilt and an expat American surgeon, that the Lafayette Escadrille was formed in 1916 as the first and only all-American squadron in the French Air Service. Flying rudimentary planes, with one-in-three odds of being killed, these fearless young men gathered reconnaissance and shot down enemy aircraft, participated in the Battle of Verdun, and faced off with the Red Baron, dueling across the war-torn skies like modern knights on horseback.
Drawing on rarely seen primary sources, First to Fly chronicles the startling success of that intrepid band and gives a compelling look at the rise of aviation and a new era of warfare.
Atlantic Monthly Press, Hardcover, 2015
THIS IS A BRAND NEW BOOK
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