Georges Guynemer

[svandamme]

100 years ago he went down over Poelkapelle, not the French ace with the most kills (That's Fonck) but to the French he's still the more popular Ace of WW1. In part due Fonck's reputation of arrogance and some suggestions of collaboration of Fonck during WW2, as he was linked to Petain.
He once had the upper hand over Ernst Udet when Udet's guns had jammed. But in those days they still had some notions of chivalry and he did not kill him.

Tomorrow they will fly over town with the Belgian AF, Patrouille de France and Escadrilles de Cigognes (The Storks), his old squadron.

I expect the French AF to go above and beyond for this event, it's the rememberance of their biggest hero.

Every year the French AF has a ceremony in every one of their bases where they read read Guynemer's inscription in the Panthéon in Paris.

"Dead on the field of honor, September 11, 1917. A legendary hero fallen in glory from the sky after three years of hard and incessant struggle, he will remain the purest symbol of national ideals for his indomitable tenacity of purpose, his ferocious verve and sublime gallantry. Animated by an invincible faith in victory, he has bequeathed to the French soldier an imperishable heritage which consecrates the spirit of sacrifice and will surely inspire the noblest emulation."














His old squadron currently flies one of their Mirages in rememberance colors:




This is the Guynemer monument :


My distant uncles are in running the local Guynemer comité, and i'm helping out coming night, they needed help for security of the static F16 that the Belgian AF will put on the town square..

[kach22i]

I watched the video, amazing to think the footage is about 100 years old and we can watch it with a click of a button.

Georges Guynemer looked a little bit like Sylvester Stallone?

https://www.pinterest.com/antonreinders/spad-vii-en-xiii-en-zn-piloten/


Sylvester Stallone Childhood Photos ~ jiah khan unseen childhood pictures and death mystery


Maybe Ryan Gosling-ish?

https://bananaroad.com/products/ryan-gosling-black-and-white-portrait-11x17-poster


They better get a French guy to play him if they make a major motion picture about him.

We Americans don't want to upset the French.

I like the squadron logo turned into a statue - very cool.

[svandamme]

in some pics, i guess you're right

[svandamme]

There is also a monument for him in France
Art Deco ish, it's different , bit weird
but i kinda like it too

[svandamme]

It was a long and boring, uneventful watch

[Seahawk]

I had the pleasure of flying a French Navy Alouette III during the first Persian Gulf War in 1990.

We traded flights when we were shore based in Manama.

The embarrassing part is that we traded souvenirs later that night on his ship, which was parked next to mine..I gave him a flight suit patch, he gave me a silver ashtray with his squadrons emblem raised in the bottom.

I'll see if I can find it and take a picture. I felt like a putz.

[svandamme]

Because i had spent 6 hours guarding the F16, i was allowed to enter the box where it was parked, so i was front and center to the ceremony, no civvies allowed in there..

Before the ceremony a chap starts talking to us.. turns out his name is Fonck.
Direct Relative of Réné Fonck the top French WW1 ace.



I took him to the church where there was a replica Morane Saulnier L Parasol and a statis, non working Fokker DR1 .. All kinds of military brass starts shaking hands to mr Fonck, they all knew him and i got handshakes from all of them because they thought i was with him. Nucking futs really.


Weather was terrible, lots of wind and rain
Flyby's got cancelled due to the **** weather and the Seaking was supposed to drop poppies over the memorial, but they did not come down, they just went sideways.. Seaking was flying crab, almost sideways into the wind.

Still, great event to bad about the weather.

[svandamme]

It was pissing rain, and wind chill
The French honor guard stood there in summer uniform.
Did not move a muscle , drenched, they must have been real cold..
I had full wet gear and could feel the chill (need to get me some greenland wax stat).

[kach22i]

Originally Posted by svandamme

It was a long and boring, uneventful watch

A good cigar would have made the time fly, but I imagine that to be a non-smoking area.

Maybe the weather will be better next time.

Stay dry.

[svandamme]

i quit smoking 7 years ago, so that is the limiting factor

[svandamme]

Seahawk, speaking of patches..
Seeing this was a fighter pilot event, and i was doing night duty.. figured i'de put an appropriate patch on my backpack for the occasion.

I collect Tomcat patches, sorta, basically i drunk buy em on ebay, it's cheaper then other stuff i could drunk by, it actually saves me money.
Got loads of Tomcat stuff, coolest plane ever built and all that..And i like cats in general, got 3 of the furry kind here at home.

[Seahawk]

I found the ashtrays. They have been sitting in a drawer for 20 years!

The first is B.S. M. Loire the ship the helicopter was flying off of. I went to a few mess nights aboard and they were great.



The second from Escadrille 23 S, the guys I exchanged flights with.



Here is their website.

ESCADRILLE 23 S

Thanks for the memories!

[svandamme]

Originally Posted by Seahawk

I found the ashtrays. They have been sitting in a drawer for 20 years!

Very cool!

[kach22i]

Unused ashtrays.

They need some cigar ash in them, poor virgins.

[tabs]

Kites with motors is what the WW1 men were flying. One bullet in the gas tank and you went down in flames..it took a lot of courage to go up in one of those planes. No armor protection, no self sealing gas tanks and NO PARACHUTES to get out alive.

Richthofen was credited with 80, Fonck was no 2 with 75 credited, but by his own count 137. All in all Fonck was probably the best of them all. The reason is that he flew from 1915 through 1918 when the average life span of a pilot on the Western Front was 2 weeks. Also he rarely ever got any bullet holes in his plane, which means he was a very careful hunter who did not make mistakes.

"I put my bullets into the target as if I placed them there by hand."..Rene Fonck

When are successful in air combat it really does not matter what your score is. You are just good at what you do...you have a knack for killing.