The Fairey Campania was a British ship-borne,

patrol A patrol is commonly a group of personnel, such as law enforcement officers, military personnel, or security personnel, that are assigned to monitor or secure a specific geographic area. Etymology From French ''patrouiller'', from Old Fren ...

and

reconnaissance In military operations, reconnaissance or scouting is the exploration of an area by military forces to obtain information about enemy forces, terrain, and other activities. Examples of reconnaissance include patrolling by troops ( skirmishe ...

aircraft of the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

and

Russian Civil War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Russian Civil War , partof = the Russian Revolution and the aftermath of World War I , image = , caption = Clockwise from top left: {{flatlist, *Soldiers ...

. It was a single-engine, two-seat

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While a ...

with twin main floats and backward-

folding wing A folding wing is a wing configuration design feature of aircraft to save space and is typical of carrier-based aircraft that operate from the limited deck space of aircraft carriers. The folding allows the aircraft to occupy less space in a con ...

s. The Campania was the first aeroplane ever designed specifically for carrier operations.

Development

The

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against Fr ...

was an early leader in carrier aviation and in the autumn of 1914, purchased the

liner A low-ionization nuclear emission-line region (LINER) is a type of galactic nucleus that is defined by its spectral line emission. The spectra typically include line emission from weakly ionized or neutral atoms, such as O, O+, N+, and S+. ...

for conversion into a seaplane carrier. Operating

seaplane A seaplane is a powered fixed-wing aircraft capable of taking off and landing (alighting) on water.Gunston, "The Cambridge Aerospace Dictionary", 2009. Seaplanes are usually divided into two categories based on their technological characteri ...

s required the carrier to stop to hoist the aircraft out- and in-board by crane, leaving the ship exceedingly vulnerable to

U-boat U-boats were naval submarines operated by Germany, particularly in the First and Second World Wars. Although at times they were efficient fleet weapons against enemy naval warships, they were most effectively used in an economic warfare ro ...

attacks and the

Admiralty Admiralty most often refers to: *Admiralty, Hong Kong *Admiralty (United Kingdom), military department in command of the Royal Navy from 1707 to 1964 *The rank of admiral *Admiralty law Admiralty can also refer to: Buildings * Admiralty, Traf ...

began to seek alternatives.Taylor 1988, p.56 By the middle of 1916, ''Campania'' had been fitted with a

flight deck The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is the surface from which its aircraft take off and land, essentially a miniature airfield at sea. On smaller naval ships which do not have aviation as a primary mission, the landing area for helicopte ...

forward on which, experiments were being carried out in launching aircraft. The Admiralty issued a specification for a purpose-built, two-seat patrol and reconnaissance aircraft. Fairey Aviation designed a single-engined

tractor A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or construction. Most commo ...

biplane of fabric-covered wooden construction, which first flew on 16 February 1917. The two-bay wings folded rearwards for storage, the crew of two sat in separate cockpits, the observer being provided with a Lewis gun on a

Scarff ring The Scarff ring was a type of machine gun mounting developed during the First World War by Warrant Officer (Gunner) F. W. Scarff of the Admiralty Air Department for use on two-seater aircraft. The mount incorporated bungee cord suspension in elev ...

.Bruce 1963, pp. 142–143. The first of two prototypes, F.16, was powered by a 250 hp (190 kW) Rolls-Royce Eagle IV and the second prototype, powered by an Eagle V of 275 hp (205 kW), was named F.17. Both prototypes were later flown operationally from

Scapa Flow Scapa Flow viewed from its eastern end in June 2009 Scapa Flow (; ) is a body of water in the Orkney Islands, Scotland, sheltered by the islands of Mainland, Graemsay, Burray,S. C. George, ''Jutland to Junkyard'', 1973. South Ronaldsay a ...

Operational history

Trials proving satisfactory, the type went into production and service. Most of the F.17s shipped aboard the carriers HMS ''Campania'', and ; the first aircraft joined ''Campania'' and the type took its name from her. Only ''Campania'' possessed a

; Campanias operated from this using jettisonable, wheeled bogies fitted to the floats. The aircraft in the other ships took off from the water in the normal way. The 27 F.22s operated from

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 ...

air stations. The Campania had an undistinguished career, but performed useful work as a spotter aeroplane. On 1 August 1918, during the

North Russia Campaign The North Russia intervention, also known as the Northern Russian expedition, the Archangel campaign, and the Murman deployment, was part of the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War after the October Revolution. The intervention brought ...

in support of the British intervention in the

, Campanias from ''Nairana'' participated in what was probably the first fully combined air, sea, and land military operation in history, joining Allied ground forces and ships in driving

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

s out of their fortifications on Modyugski Island at the mouth of the Northern Dvina River in

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-ei ...

, then scouting ahead of the Allied force as it proceeded up the channel to

Arkhangelsk Arkhangelsk (, ; rus, Арха́нгельск, p=ɐrˈxanɡʲɪlʲsk), also known in English as Archangel and Archangelsk, is a city and the administrative center of Arkhangelsk Oblast, Russia. It lies on both banks of the Northern Dvina near ...

. The appearance of one of the Campanias over Arkhangelsk induced the Bolshevik leaders there to panic and flee. Campanias from ''Nairana'' then operated against the

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

from Arkhangelsk, as well as against the White Finnish defensive positions in Uhtua in the autumn of 1918 from Kem.Baron, Nick, ''The King of Karelia: Col. P.J. Woods and the British Intervention in North Russia 1918–1919: A History and Memoir'', London, 2007. p. 185. The Campania was declared obsolete in August 1919.

Variants

* F.16 – 250 hp (190 kW) Rolls-Royce Eagle IV * F.17 – 275 hp (205 kW) Rolls-Royce Eagle V or 345 hp (257 kW) Eagle III * F.22 – 260 hp (194 kW)

Sunbeam Maori The Sunbeam Afridi was an aero-engine produced by Sunbeam during the First World War. Design and development Conceived to replace the Crusader/Zulu on the production lines, Louis Coatalen designed a companion engine for the V-12 Cossack, givi ...

Operators

; *

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) an ...

** No. 240 Squadron RAF ** No. 241 Squadron RAF **

No. 253 Squadron RAF No. 253 (Hyderabad State) Squadron was a flying squadron of the Royal Air Force between 1918 and 1947. Originally formed in 1918, it served in WW1 flying coastal reconnaissance and anti-submarine patrols. Later in WW2 it took part in the Battle ...

Specifications (F.22)

References

Notes

Bibliography

*Bruce, J.M. "Fairey Campania". ''Air Pictorial'', May 1963. pp. 142–145. *Taylor, H.A. ''Fairey Aircraft since 1915''. London:Putnam, 1988. .

External links

Fairey Campania Carrierborne Reconnaissance and Patrol Aircraft
– Military Factory {{Fairey aircraft 1910s British patrol aircraft Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War Floatplanes

Campania (man), it, Campana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demog ...

Single-engined tractor aircraft Biplanes Aircraft first flown in 1917