HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
BASED ON OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS
BY DIRECTION OF THE HISTORICAL SECTION OF
THE COMMITTEE OF IMPERIAL DEFENCE
Being the Story of
The part played in the Great War
by the Royal Air Force
VOL. I
BY
OXFORD
THE CLARENDON PRESS
1922
Oxford University Press
London Edinburgh Glasgow Copenhagen
New York Toronto Melbourne Cape Town
Bombay Calcutta Madras Shanghai
Humphrey Milford Publisher to the University
The History of which this is the first volume is, in the main, thehistory of the part played in the war by British air forces. It isbased chiefly on the records of the Air Ministry collected andpreserved at the Historical Section. The staff of the Section havespared no trouble to collect an immense amount of material and arrangeit for use, to consult living witnesses, to verify facts down to theminutest details, and to correct any errors that may have crept intothe narrative. Their main purpose has been to secure that anystatement of fact made in this book shall be true and demonstrable. Ifin any particular instances they have failed in this purpose, it hasnot been for lack of pains and care.
Official records do not in themselves make history. They arecolourless and bare. In the business of interpreting and supplementingthem we have been much helped by the kindness of many military andnaval officers and of many civilian experts. Their help, most of whichis acknowledged in the text, has supplied us with the liveliest thingsin this book. We could wish that we had more of it. Naval and military(p. vi) officers do not advertise, and are reluctant to speakpublicly of the part that they played in the war. They are silent onall that may seem to tell to their own credit or to the discredit ofothers, and this silence easily develops into a fixed habit ofreticence. We are the more grateful to those who have helped us to atrue account by telling of what they saw. The best part of the book isyet to come; if the theme is to be worthily treated, it must be by thehelp of those who remember and of those who know.
The writer of this history has endeavoured to make his narrativeintelligible to those who, like himself, are outsiders, and, with thatend in view, he has avoided, as far as possible, the masonic dialectof the services. For the few and cautious opinions that he hasexpressed he alone is responsible. In controverted questions, thoughhe has not always been careful to conceal his own opinion, he hasalways tried so to state the grounds for other opinions that those whohold these other opinions may think his statement not unfair. If hisown opinion is wrong, the corrective will usually be found near athand. The position of an outsider has grave disabilities; if a measureof compensation for these disabilities is anywhere to be found, itmust be sought in freedom from the heat of partisan zeal and from thenarrowness of corporate loyalty.
(p. vii) Some of the men who early took thought for their country'sneed, and quietly laboured to prepare her against the day of trial,are here celebrated, and their names, we h