Jack McCleery was born in Belfast in 1898, the son of a mill owning family. He joined the RNAS in 1916 as a Probationary Flight Officer. During the next ten months he completed his training at Crystal Palace, Eastchurch, Cranwell, Frieston, Calshot and Isle of Grain, flying more than a dozen landplanes, seaplanes and flying boats, gaining his wings as a Flight Sub-Lieutenant. In July 1917 he was posted to the newly commissioning aircraft carrier HMS Furious, which would be based at Scapa Flow and Rosyth. He served in this ship until February 1919, flying Short 184 seaplanes and then Sopwith 1 Strutters off the deck. He also flew a large number of other types during this time from shore stations at Turnhouse, East Fortune and Donibristle.He served with important and well-known naval airmen including Dunning, Rutland (of Jutland) and Bell Davies VC. He witnessed Dunnings first successful landing on a carrier flying a Sopwith Pup in 1917 and his tragic death a few days later. He also witnessed the Tondern raid in 1918, the worlds first carrier strike mission. He took part in more than a dozen sweeps into the North Sea by elements of the Grand Fleet and Battle Cruiser Fleet. He carried out reconnaissance missions off the coast of Denmark, landing in the sea to be picked up by waiting destroyers. He witnessed the surrender of the High Seas Fleet. Promoted to Captain, he acted as temporary CO of F Squadron for a time postwar.
Jack McCleery was born in Belfast in 1898, the son of a mill owning family. He joined the RNAS in 1916 as a Probationary Flight Officer. During the next ten months he completed his training at Crystal Palace, Eastchurch, Cranwell, Frieston, Calshot and Isle of Grain, flying more than a dozen landplanes, seaplanes and flying boats, gaining his wings as a Flight Sub-Lieutenant. In July 1917 he was posted to the newly commissioning aircraft carrier HMS Furious, which would be based at Scapa Flow and Rosyth. He served in this ship until February 1919, flying Short 184 seaplanes and then Sopwith 1½ Strutters off the deck. He also flew a large number of other types during this time from shore stations at Turnhouse, East Fortune and Donibristle. He served with important and well-known naval airmen including Dunning, Rutland (of Jutland) and Bell Davies VC. He witnessed Dunnings first successful landing on a carrier flying a Sopwith Pup in 1917 and his tragic death a few days later. He also witnessed the Tondern raid in 1918, the worlds first carrier strike mission. He took part in more than a dozen sweeps into the North Sea by elements of the Grand Fleet and Battle Cruiser Fleet. He carried out reconnaissance missions off the coast of Denmark, landing in the sea to be picked up by waiting destroyers. He witnessed the surrender of the High Seas Fleet. Promoted to Captain, he acted as temporary CO of F Squadron for a time postwar.
The Imperial Japanese Navy was a pioneer in naval aviation, having commissioned the world's first built-from-the-keel-up carrier, the Hosho. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, it experimented with its carriers, perfecting their design and construction. As a result, by the time Japan entered World War II and attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor in 1941, it possessed a fantastically effective naval aviation force. This book covers the design, development and operation of IJN aircraft carriers built prior to and during World War II. Pearl Harbor, Midway and the first carrier vs carrier battle, the battle of the Coral Sea, are all discussed.
In a few short years after 1914 the Royal Navy practically invented naval air warfare, not only producing the first effective aircraft carriers, but also pioneering most of the techniques and tactics that made naval air power a reality. By 1918 the RN was so far ahead of other navies that a US Navy observer sent to study the British use of aircraft at sea concluded that any discussion of the subject must first consider their methods. Indeed, by the time the war ended the RN was training for a carrier-borne attack by torpedo-bombers on the German fleet in its bases over two decades before the first successful employment of this tactic, against the Italians at Taranto.Following two previously well-received histories of British naval aviation, David Hobbs here turns his attention to the operational and technical achievements of the Royal Naval Air Service, both at sea and ashore, from 1914 to 1918. Detailed explanations of operations, the technology that underpinned them and the people who carried them out bring into sharp focus a revolutionary period of development that changed naval warfare forever. Controversially, the RNAS was subsumed into the newly created Royal Air Force in 1918, so as the centenary of its extinction approaches, this book is a timely reminder of its true significance.
The only comparative analysis available of the great navies of World War I, this work studies the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom, the German Kaiserliche Marine, the United States Navy, the French Marine Nationale, the Italian Regia Marina, the Austro-Hungarian Kaiserliche und Königliche Kriegsmarine, and the Imperial Russian Navy to demonstrate why the war was won, not in the trenches, but upon the waves. It explains why these seven fleets fought the way they did and why the war at sea did not develop as the admiralties and politicians of 1914 expected. After discussing each navy’s goals and circumstances and how their individual characteristics impacted the way they fought, the authors deliver a side-by-side analysis of the conflict’s fleets, with each chapter covering a single navy. Parallel chapter structures assure consistent coverage of each fleet—history, training, organization, doctrine, materiel, and operations—and allow readers to easily compare information among the various navies. The book clearly demonstrates how the naval war was a collision of 19th century concepts with 20th century weapons that fostered unprecedented development within each navy and sparked the evolution of the submarine and aircraft carrier. The work is free from the national bias that infects so many other books on World War I navies. As they pioneer new ways of viewing the conflict, the authors provide insights and material that would otherwise require a massive library and mastery of multiple languages. Such a study has special relevance today as 20th-century navies struggle to adapt to 21st-century technologies.
What defended the U.S. after the attack on Pearl Harbor, defeated the Soviet Union in the Cold War, and is an essential tool in the fight against terror? Aircraft Carriers. For seventy years, these ships remained a little understood cornerstone of American power. In his latest book, On Wave and Wing , Barrett Tillman sheds light on the history of these floating leviathans and offers a nuanced analysis of the largest man-made vessel in the history of the world.
Dixie Kiefer’s reputation for durability began at the U.S. Naval Academy, where he broke an ankle and shattered a kneecap while playing football. After anti-submarine duty in World War I, he became a pioneer of naval aviation and had an elbow shattered by a plane that buzzed him as a joke. Kiefer’s first World War II assignment was executive officer of the carrier Yorktown. He earned the Distinguished Service Medal at the Coral Sea and the Navy Cross at Midway, where—as his ship was sinking—he suffered severe burns to his hands and a compound fracture of his foot. After recuperating, Kiefer took command of the Ticonderoga. In January 1945, Japanese kamikazes struck the carrier, killing and wounding hundreds. Kiefer broke his arm and was struck by more than sixty pieces of shrapnel—but remained on the bridge for twelve hours, earning the Silver Star. Victim of ten wounds in two wars, veteran of some of the U.S. Navy’s most celebrated carriers and battles, a naval aviation pioneer, Dixie Kiefer died in a stateside plane crash two months after the war ended.
The story of the British Eastern Fleet, which operated in the Indian Ocean against Japan, has rarely been told. Although it was the largest fleet deployed by the Royal Navy prior to 1945 and played a vital part in the theater it was sent to protect, it has no place in the popular consciousness of the naval history of the Second World War. So Charles Stephenson’s deeply researched and absorbing narrative gives this forgotten fleet the recognition it deserves. British prewar naval planning for the Far East is part of the story, as is the disastrous loss of the battleship Prince of Wales and battlecruiser Repulse in 1941, but the body of the book focuses on the new fleet, commanded by Admiral Sir James Somerville, and its operations against the Japanese navy and aircraft as well as Japanese and German submarines. Later in the war, once the fleet had been reinforced with an American aircraft carrier, it was strong enough to take more aggressive actions against the Japanese, and these are described in vivid detail. Charles Stephenson’s authoritative study should appeal to readers who have a special interest in the war with Japan, in naval history more generally and Royal Navy in particular.
From Ammo to Zig-Zag, many of the words we use today were invented in World War 1. They provide a unique insight into the experience of the war, and the inventiveness and humour of ordinary soldiers.
The IJN was a pioneer in naval aviation, having commissioned the world's first carrier, which was used against the US fleet at Pearl Harbor. The Americans followed suit, initiating a huge aircraft carrier development program. As the War in the Pacific escalated into the largest naval conflict in history, the role of the carrier became the linchpin of American and Japanese naval strategy as these rival vessels found themselves locked in a struggle for dominance of this critical theater. This book provides an analysis of the variety of weaponry available to the rival carriers, in particular the embarked aircraft as well as the powerful ship-borne guns. Study the design and development of these revolutionary ships and 'live' the experiences of the rival airmen and gun crews as they battled for victory in a duel of skill, tenacity and guts.
This book examines the British and German approach to naval air power, describing the creation and development of the two naval air service organizations and doctrine. This work provides new insights as to how two naval air services were influenced by internal and political interventions, and how each was integrated into the organizational structures of the Royal Navy and the Kaiserlichemarine (KM). Both the Admiralty and the KM made substantial alterations to their organizations and doctrine in the process. Principal air doctrines employed are examined chronologically and the application of operational doctrine is described. While they adopted similar air doctrines, there were differences in operational doctrine, which they addressed according to their different requirements. This book is a comparative study about the development of organization and air power doctrine in the RNAS (Royal Naval Air Service) and the IGNAS (Imperial German Naval Air Service). It investigates public and political interventions and early concepts of air power, placing into context the factors which contributed to how naval theorists came to think about the best means of controlling its working medium, air space. Ultimately, it examines the similarities, and differences, between the RNAS and IGNAS understanding of naval air power, within the broader strategic and theoretical framework of their parent organizations. This book will be of great interest to students of air power, naval power, military history, strategic studies and IR in general.
ÿLeslie Colquhoun was a man who flew high in more ways than one. Enlisting with the RAF at the start of World War 2, he had no sooner got his ?wings? than he was plunged into the thick of battle after being effectively kidnapped by a Malta-based squadron to help fight off German attackers during the notorious siege of the island. After the war, having received a Distinguished Flying Medal, Leslie became a test pilot, taking part in attempts to break the air speed record. He then turned his skills to a new invention, the hovercraft, testing early prototypes and taking charge of the world?s first regular passenger service in 1962. During Les? relatively brief periods on the ground he helped his wife Katie to raise four daughters, one of whom, Jane, has written this affectionate portrait of her ?modest, gentle? father, a man who was also exceptionally courageous and skilled.
