John Edgcumbe Doyle (18 April 1895 – 24 November 1974) was a British First World War
flying ace
A flying ace, fighter ace or air ace is a military aviator credited with shooting down five or more enemy aircraft during aerial combat. The exact number of aerial victories required to officially qualify as an ace is varied, but is usually co ...
credited with nine confirmed victories. He was shot down on 6 September 1918 and taken prisoner and his right leg was amputated. He was repatriated on 20 December 1918 and invalided out of the RAF.
Early life
John Doyle was born in Cape Colony where his father was the chaplain to the Governor of
Cape Province
The Province of the Cape of Good Hope ( af, Provinsie Kaap die Goeie Hoop), commonly referred to as the Cape Province ( af, Kaapprovinsie) and colloquially as The Cape ( af, Die Kaap), was a province in the Union of South Africa and subsequen ...
. He was employed at the
Bank of South Africa for two years but left in mid-1914 because he saw a recruiting advertisement for the
Royal Naval Air Service
The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy, under the direction of the Admiralty's Air Department, and existed formally from 1 July 1914 to 1 April 1918, when it was merged with the British Army's Royal Flying Corps t ...
. He was not taken due to a lack of trigonometry and then, since the war had started on 4 August, he applied to the
Royal Flying Corps
"Through Adversity to the Stars"
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where he was told the war would be over by Christmas and anyway they had plenty of applicants. He then joined the
Inns of Court
The Inns of Court in London are the professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. There are four Inns of Court – Gray's Inn, Lincoln's Inn, Inner Temple and Middle Temple.
All barristers must belong to one of them. They have ...
Officers' Training Corps
The Officers' Training Corps (OTC), more fully called the University Officers' Training Corps (UOTC), are military leadership training units operated by the British Army. Their focus is to develop the leadership abilities of their members whilst ...
as a cavalry officer candidate. He was commissioned as a temporary second lieutenant in the
Army Service Corps on 24 May 1915.
First World War
![56 and 60 squadron](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/56_and_60_squadron.jpg)
Once in France in mid-1915, Doyle frequently applied to join the RFC, but was always told by his commanding officer that he was essential to the ASC. By 1916, when the RFC was very short of candidates and commanding officers were no longer allowed to stop transfers, he joined the RFC in England.
Doyle was appointed a flying officer on 22 February 1917 and transferred to the General List. Training was haphazard at
RAF Doncaster
Royal Air Force Doncaster or more simply RAF Doncaster, also referred to as Doncaster Aerodrome, is a former Royal Air Force station near Doncaster, South Yorkshire, England.
The first Aviation meeting in England
In 1909, Doncaster and specif ...
and he flew the
Maurice Farman Shorthorn
The Maurice Farman MF.11 ''Shorthorn'' is a French aircraft developed before World War I by the Farman Aviation Works. It was used as a reconnaissance and light bomber during the early part of World War I, later being relegated to training duti ...
,
Avro 504
The Avro 504 was a First World War biplane aircraft made by the Avro aircraft company and under licence by others. Production during the war totalled 8,970 and continued for almost 20 years, making it the most-produced aircraft of any kind tha ...
,
B.E.2c
The Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.2 was a British single-engine tractor two-seat biplane designed and developed at the Royal Aircraft Factory. Most of the roughly 3,500 built were constructed under contract by private companies, including establish ...
,
B.E.12
The Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12 was a British single-seat aeroplane of The First World War designed at the Royal Aircraft Factory. It was essentially a single-seat version of the B.E.2.
Intended for use as a long-range reconnaissance and bomb ...
and
Armstrong Whitworth F.K.8
The Armstrong Whitworth F.K.8 was a British two-seat general-purpose biplane built by Armstrong Whitworth during the First World War. The type served alongside the better known R.E.8 until the end of the war, at which point 694 F.K.8s remained ...
. The "Wings" test had four components; a climb to 10,000 feet then an engine out descent to landing, a cross-country with landings at two other airfields, two airborne photos of navigational landmarks and two night landings. Having passed, he was asked to fetch a new type of aircraft from the Daimler Works at Coventry, an
R.E.8
The Royal Aircraft Factory R.E.8 was a British two-seat biplane reconnaissance and bomber aircraft of the First World War designed and produced at the Royal Aircraft Factory. It was also built under contract by Austin Motors, Daimler, Standard ...
. He crashed on takeoff, as all previous 12 aircraft had done, since there was not enough yaw control to counter the
P-factor
P-factor, also known as asymmetric blade effect and asymmetric disc effect, is an aerodynamic phenomenon experienced by a moving propeller,) where the propeller's center of thrust moves off-center when the aircraft is at a high angle of attack. ...
and keep the aircraft with its powerful V-12 engine straight. He was badly concussed and the aircraft withdrawn for redesign of the vertical stabiliser and rudder. After recovery and convalescence at Osborne, he was sent to 40 Squadron at
Port Meadow
Port Meadow is a large meadow of open common land beside the River Thames to the north and west of Oxford, England.
Overview
The meadow is an ancient area of grazing land, still used for horses and cattle, and according to legend has never bee ...
, Oxford, to fly Nieuports but was soon sent to a medical board that classified him as "Light Duty – No Flying" (LD).
Doyle was promoted to lieutenant on 1 July 1917.
After waiting at Oxford with several other LD officers, they were all sent to Hounslow where one "booked in" by writing one's classification in a book on arrival. He found that his medical records had not preceded him and booked in as "General Service" (GS) and so could fly. After 11 hours flying, a new medical board again classified him as LD, but he was soon transferred to
Harling Road where he again signed in as GS and was made an instructor, eventually being certified by Gosport. He was called before another medical board and was asked what he was complaining of, he said "nothing" and was at last classed GS.
He finally reached a fighter squadron in March 1918, 18 months after joining the RFC and Major Balcomb-Brown noticing his very unusual many hours of flying picked him for
No. 56 Squadron where he joined 'B' Flight commanded by Captain
Cyril Crowe
Wing Commander Cyril Marconi Crowe (6 January 1894 – 31 May 1974) was a World War I flying ace credited with 15 victories.
Early life
Crowe was the only child of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Crowe of Saltburn-by-the-Sea, Yorkshire, He was educated at ...
. He had no confirmed victories with 56 Squadron, but must have done well since, after two weeks, he was leading patrols and before long was promoted to captain.
After Major McCudden, commanding officer of
No. 60 Squadron, was killed, Crowe became CO of the squadron on 9 July and asked Doyle to join him as 'A' Flight commander. On 30 July, Crowe was in a car crash that killed Captain
Owen Scholte
Captain Owen John Frederick Scholte (22 June 1896 – 30 July 1918) was a British flying ace of the First World War, credited with eight aerial victories before his death in an automobile accident.
Early life and background
Scholte was born in ...
, the senior flight commander of 60 Squadron, and so Doyle became acting commander of the squadron. After a few weeks, Major Clarke, from Harling Road, arrived as CO although he had never been seen to fly there nor at the squadron; he was, however, an Old Etonian.
In the few weeks that he was in combat in 60 Squadron (he was not allowed to cross the lines while CO), he had nine confirmed victories and two balloons that are not recorded for some reason. He was shot down on 5 September after destroying two
Albatros D.VIIs himself. His last flight was just before he was to go on home leave, by the end of which the war would be over. He was taken prisoner and his right leg, which had become gangrenous from a bullet wound in his ankle, was amputated at the upper thigh. He was repatriated on 20 December 1918 to the Prince of Wales Hospital for Officers in Marylebone. He received the
Distinguished Flying Cross from King George V in May 1919. Doyle was eventually invalided out of the RAF, being transferred to unemployed list on 12 November 1919.
After the war
As a one-legged ex-pilot with minimal formal education, the post-war years were extremely difficult and he had many different low-paying jobs including driving a tour bus from Exeter, where he met his wife, Grace Burd, daughter of an
Okehampton
Okehampton ( ) is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in West Devon in the English county of Devon. It is situated at the northern edge of Dartmoor, and had a population of 5,922 at the 2011 census. Two electoral wards are based i ...
doctor. In the mid-1930s, he wrote 31 flying adventure stories for such magazines as ''Air Stories'', ''The Scout'', ''Popular Flying'', ''The Aeroplane'', ''Flying'', ''Boys' Ace Library'', ''Mine'', ''
Modern Wonder
''Modern Wonder'' was a largely factual magazine aimed at boys and young men. It had many articles and pictures on science, engineering and warfare etc. In some of the magazines, the Flash Gordon comic strip is printed in colour on the back cov ...
'' and ''War Stories'', and technical articles for ''Popular Flying''. Never having lost his love of aircraft and flying, he regained his pilot's licence, #3236, in 1930 able to fly "all types of landplanes".
In addition to his autobiography, published privately, he wrote two books. ''Skies Unknown'' was published by Wright & Brown in 1939 but most copies were burned in a warehouse fire caused by a German bombing raid on London. The second, ''Castle Cumulus'', a children's book concerned with flying and meteorology, never received interest from a publisher but 20 copies were printed for family members.
His distinguished service to the Crown enabled him to gain a place for his son at Christ's Hospital under the Clause 100 programme.
In 1940, he was hired as a civilian
Link Trainer
The term Link Trainer, also known as the "Blue box" and "Pilot Trainer" is commonly used to refer to a series of flight simulators produced between the early 1930s and early 1950s by Link Aviation Devices, founded and headed by Ed Link
Edwin ...
instructor and wrote most of the instructor's manual for the device. He joined the
Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve
The Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve (RAFVR) was established in 1936 to support the preparedness of the U.K. Royal Air Force in the event of another war. The Air Ministry intended it to form a supplement to the Royal Auxiliary Air Force (RAuxAF ...
on 12 August 1941; his first CO remarked that he must be the only acting
pilot officer
Pilot officer (Plt Off officially in the RAF; in the RAAF and RNZAF; formerly P/O in all services, and still often used in the RAF) is the lowest commissioned rank in the Royal Air Force and the air forces of many other Commonwealth countri ...
on probation with a DFC in the RAF. He was promoted to
flying officer on 1 October 1942, and was a Chief Ground Instructor at bomber stations throughout the UK. He wrote in his autobiography that "on becoming a Link instructor my financial state ceased to be a source of constant worry ... and I was never again financially embarrassed to any serious extent".
Doyle resigned his commission on 21 April 1943, retaining the rank of flight lieutenant,
and kept two pubs in England before retiring to
Kyrenia
Kyrenia ( el, Κερύνεια ; tr, Girne ) is a city on the northern coast of Cyprus, noted for its historic harbour and castle. It is under the ''de facto'' control of Northern Cyprus.
While there is evidence showing that the wider region ...
, Cyprus, in 1953. There he took up painting and had a well-received one-man show in 1959. As the
Greek-Turkish conflict intensified, he and his wife returned to England, finally living in the home of her mother-in-law in Devon with one of their daughters. Doyle painted and wrote his autobiography and died in 1974, three weeks after his wife's death.
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Doyle, John
1895 births
1974 deaths
South African people of Irish descent
Cape Colony people
Royal Army Service Corps officers
Royal Flying Corps officers
British World War I flying aces
Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United Kingdom)
British amputees
Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve personnel of World War II
Royal Air Force officers
British Army personnel of World War I