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 BY CORNELIUS RYAN
A BRIDGE TOO FAR - 1974
THE LAST BATTLE - 1966
THE LONGEST DAY - 1959
Cornelius Ryan
 THE LAST BATTLE

SIMON & SCHUSTER PAPERBACKS

New York London Toronto Sydney
SIMON & SCHUSTER PAPERBACKS
Rockefeller Center
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com
Copyright © 1966 by Cornelius Ryan
Copyright renewed © 1994 by Victoria Ryan Bida and Geoffrey J. M. Ryan
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
SIMON & SCHUSTER PAPERBACKS and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon &
Schuster Inc.
Manufactured in the United States of America
11 13 15 17 19 20 18 16 14 12
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 65-18654
ISBN-13: 978-0-684-80329-6
eISBN-13: 978-1-439-12701-8
ISBN-10: 0-684-80329-1
 CONTENTS

Foreword: A-DAY, MONDAY, APRIL 16, 1945

Part One: THE CITY

photographs

Part Two: THE GENERAL

photographs

Part Three: THE OBJECTIVE

photographs

Part Four: THE DECISION

photographs

Part Five: THE BATTLE

photographs
A Note on Casualties
The Soldiers and Civilians: What They Do Today

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

Index
 “Of the events of war, I have not ventured to speak from
any chance information, nor according to any notion of my
own; I have described nothing but what I saw myself, or
learned from others of whom I made the most careful and
particular inquiry. The task was a laborious one because
eyewitnesses of the same occurrence gave different accounts
of them as they remembered, or were interested in the
actions of one side or the other. And very likely the strictly
historical character of my narrative may be disappointing to
the ear. But if he who desires to have before his eyes a true
picture of the events which have happened … shall pronounce
what I have written to be useful, then I shall be satisfied.”
—THUCYDIDES, Peloponnesian War, Volume 1, 400 B.C.
 THIS BOOK IS FOR THE MEMORY OF A BOY WHO WAS BORN IN
BERLIN DURING THE LAST MONTHS OF THE WAR. HIS NAME WAS
PETER FECHTER. IN 1962 HE WAS MACHINE-GUNNED BY HIS OWN
PEOPLE AND LEFT TO BLEED TO DEATH BY THE SIDE OF THE
MOST TRAGIC MEMORIAL TO THE ALLIED VICTORY—THE BERLIN
WALL.
 Foreword

A-Day, Monday, April 16, 1945

The battle for Berlin, the last offensive against Hitler’s Third Reich,
began at precisely 4 A.M., Monday, April 16, 1945—or A-Day as it
was called by the Western Allies. At that moment, less than thirty-
eight miles east of the capital, red flares burst in the night skies
above the swollen river Oder, triggering a stupefying artillery barrage
and the opening of the Russian assault on the city.
At about that same time, elements of the U.S. Ninth Army were
turning away from Berlin—heading back to the west to take up new
positions along the river Elbe between Tangermünde and Barby. On
April 14 General Eisenhower had decided to halt the Anglo-American
drive across Germany. “Berlin,” he said, “is no longer a military
objective.” When U.S. troops got the word, Berlin, for some of them,
was only forty-five miles away.
As the attack began, Berliners waited in the bombed rubble of
their city, numb and terrified, clinging to the only politics that now
counted—the politics of survival. To eat had become more important
than to love, to burrow more dignified than to fight, to endure more
militarily correct than to win.
What follows is the story of the last battle—the assault and
capture of Berlin. Although this book includes accounts of the
fighting, it is not a military report. Rather, it is the story of ordinary
people, both soldiers and civilians, who were caught up in the
despair, frustration, terror and rape of the defeat and the victory.
Part One

THE CITY
 1

IN THE NORTHERN LATITUDES the dawn comes early. Even as the bombers
were turning away from the city, the first rays of light were coming
up in the east. In the stillness of the morning, great pillars of black
smoke towered over the districts of Pankow, Weissensee and
Lichtenberg. On the low clouds it was difficult to separate the soft
glow of daylight from the reflections of the fires that blazed in bomb-
battered Berlin.
As the smoke drifted slowly across the ruins, Germany’s most
bombed city stood out in stark, macabre splendor. It was blackened
by soot, pockmarked by thousands of craters and laced by the
twisted girders of ruined buildings. Whole blocks of apartment
houses were gone, and in the very heart of the capital entire
neighborhoods had vanished. In these wastelands what had once
been broad roads and streets were now pitted trails that snaked
through mountains of rubble. Everywhere, covering acre after acre,
gutted, windowless, roofless buildings gaped up at the sky.
In the aftermath of the raid, a fine residue of soot and ash rained
down, powdering the wreckage, and in the great canyons of
smashed brick and tortured steel nothing moved but the eddying
dust. It swirled along the broad expanse of the Unter den Linden,
the famous trees bare now, the leaf buds seared on the branches.
Few of the banks, libraries and elegant shops lining the renowned
boulevard were undamaged. But at the western end of the avenue,
Berlin’s most famous landmark, the eight-story-high Brandenburg
Gate, though gashed and chipped, still straddled the via triumphalis
on its twelve massive Doric columns.
 On the nearby Wilhelmstrasse, lined by government buildings and
former palaces, shards of glass from thousands of windows glittered
in the debris. At No. 73, the beautiful little palace that had been the
official residence of German presidents in the days before the Third
Reich had been gutted by a raging fire. Once it had been described
as a miniature Versailles; now sea nymphs from the ornate fountain
in the forecourt lay shattered against the colonnaded front entrance,
and along the roof line, chipped and gouged by flying fragments, the
twin statues of Rhine maidens leaned headless over the littered
courtyard.
A block away, No. 77 was scarred but intact. Piles of rubble lay all
around the three-story, L-shaped building. Its yellowish-brown
exterior was scabrous, and the garish golden eagles above each
entrance, garlanded swastikas in their claws, were pitted and deeply
scored. Jutting out above was the imposing balcony from which the
world had been harangued with many a frenzied speech. The
Reichskanzlei, Chancellery of Adolf Hitler, still remained.
At the top of the battered Kurfürstendamm, Berlin’s Fifth Avenue,
bulked the deformed skeleton of the once fashionable Kaiser-
Wilhelm Memorial Church. The hands on the charred clock face were
stopped at exactly 7:30; they had been that way since 1943 when
bombs wiped out one thousand acres of the city on a single
November evening.
One hundred yards away was the jungle of wreckage that had
been the internationally famed Berlin Zoo. The aquarium was
completely destroyed. The reptile, hippopotamus, kangaroo, tiger
and elephant houses, along with scores of other buildings, were
severely damaged. The surrounding Tiergarten, the renowned 630-
acre park, was a no man’s land of room-sized craters, rubble-filled
lakes and partly demolished embassy buildings. Once the park had
been a natural forest of luxuriant trees. Now most of them were
burned and ugly stumps.
In the northeast corner of the Tiergarten stood Berlin’s most
spectacular ruin, destroyed not by Allied bombs but by German
politics. The huge Reichstag, seat of parliament, had been
deliberately set ablaze by the Nazis in 1933—and the fire had been
blamed on the Communists, thus providing Hitler with an excuse to
seize full dictatorial power. On the crumbling portico above its six-
columned entrance, overlooking the sea of wreckage that almost
engulfed the building, were the chiseled, blackened words, “DEM
DEUTSCHEN VOLKE”—To the German People.
A complex of statuary had once stood before the Reichstag. All
had been destroyed except one piece—a 200-foot-high, dark red
granite-and-bronze column on a massive colonnaded base. After the
1933 burning Hitler had ordered it moved. Now it stood a mile away
on the Charlottenburger Chaussée, close to the center of the East-
West Axis—the series of linked highways running across the city
roughly from the river Havel on the west to the end of the Unter den
Linden on the east. As the sun rose on this March morning its rays
caught the golden figure at the top of the column: a winged statue
bearing a laurel wreath in one hand, a standard adorned with the
Iron Cross in the other. Rising up out of the wasteland, untouched
by the bombing, was Berlin’s slender, graceful memorial—the Victory
Column.

Across the tormented city sirens began wailing the All Clear. The
314th Allied raid on Berlin was over. In the first years of the war the
attacks had been sporadic, but now the capital was under almost
continuous bombardment—the Americans bombed by day, the R.A.F.
by night. The statistics of destruction had increased almost hourly;
by now they were staggering. Explosives had laid waste more than
ten square miles of built-up districts—ten times the area destroyed
in London by the Luftwaffe. Three billion cubic feet of debris lay in
the streets—enough rubble for a mountain more than a thousand
feet high. Almost half of Berlin’s 1,562,000 dwellings had sustained
some kind of damage, and every third house was either completely
destroyed or uninhabitable. Casualties were so high that a true
accounting would never be possible, but at least 52,000 were dead
and twice that number seriously injured—five times the number
killed and seriously injured in the bombing of London. Berlin had
become a second Carthage—and the final agony was still to come.
In this wilderness of devastation it was remarkable that people
could survive at all—but life went on with a kind of lunatic normality
amid the ruins. Twelve thousand policemen were still on duty.
Postmen delivered the mail; newspapers came out daily; telephone
and telegraphic services continued. Garbage was collected. Some
cinemas, theaters and even a part of the wrecked zoo were open.
The Berlin Philharmonic was finishing its season. Department stores
ran special sales. Food and bakery shops opened each morning, and
laundries, dry-cleaning establishments and beauty salons did a brisk
business. The underground and elevated railways functioned; the
few fashionable bars and restaurants still intact drew capacity
crowds. And on almost every street the strident calls of Berlin’s
famous flower vendors echoed as in the days of peace.
Perhaps most remarkable, more than 65 per cent of Berlin’s great
factories were in some kind of working condition. Almost 600,000
people had jobs—but getting to them now was a major problem. It
often took hours. Traffic was clogged, there were detours,
slowdowns and breakdowns. As a consequence, Berliners had taken
to rising early. Everyone wanted to get to work on time because the
Americans, early risers themselves, were often at work over the city
by 9 A.M.
On this bright morning in the city’s sprawling twenty districts,
Berliners came forth like neolithic cave dwellers. They emerged from
the bowels of subways, from shelters beneath public buildings, from
the cellars and basements of their shattered homes. Whatever their
hopes or fears, whatever their loyalties or political beliefs, this much
Berliners had in common: those who had survived another night
were determined to live another day.
The same could be said for the nation itself. In this sixth year of
World War II, Hitler’s Germany was fighting desperately for survival.
The Reich that was to last a millennium had been invaded from west
and east. The Anglo-American forces were sweeping down on the
great river Rhine, had breached it at Remagen, and were racing for
Berlin. They were only three hundred miles to the west. On the
eastern banks of the Oder a far more urgent, and infinitely more
fearful, threat had materialized. There stood the Russian armies, less
than fifty miles away.
It was Wednesday, March 21, 1945—the first day of spring. On
radios all over the city this morning, Berliners heard the latest hit
tune: “This Will Be a Spring Without End.”
 2

TO THE DANGERS that threatened them, Berliners reacted each in his

own way. Some stubbornly disregarded the peril, hoping it would go
away. Some courted it. Others reacted with anger or fear—and
some, with the grim logic of those whose backs are to the wall,
prepared bravely to meet their fate head on.
In the southwestern district of Zehlendorf, milkman Richard
Poganowska was, as usual, up with the dawn. In years past his daily
routine had often seemed monotonous. Now he was grateful for it.
He worked for the 300-year-old Domäne Dahlem farm in
Zehlendorf’s fashionable suburb of Dahlem, only a few miles from
the center of the huge capital. In any other city the dairy’s location
would have been considered an oddity, but not in Berlin. One fifth of
the city’s total area lay in parks and woodlands, along lakes, canals
and streams. Still, Poganowska, like many other Domäne employees,
wished the farm were somewhere else—far outside the city, away
from the danger and the constant bombing.
Poganowska, his wife Lisbeth and their three children had spent
the night once again in the cellar of the main building on the
Königin-Luise Strasse. Sleep had been almost impossible because of
the hammering of anti-aircraft guns and the bursting of bombs. Like
everyone else in Berlin, the big 39-year-old milkman was constantly
tired these days.
He had no idea where bombs had dropped during the night, but
he knew none had fallen near the Domäne’s big cow barns. The
precious milk herd was safe. Nothing seemed to bother those two
hundred cows. Amid the explosion of bombs and the thunder of anti-
aircraft fire, they stood patiently, placidly chewing their cuds, and in
block, Goebbels had begun to switch from terror-mongering to
reassurance; now the people were told that victory was just around
the corner. About all Goebbels succeeded in doing was to generate
among cosmopolitan Berliners a grotesque, macabre kind of humor.
It took the form of a large, collective raspberry which the population
derisively directed at themselves, their leaders and the world.
Berliners quickly changed Goebbels’ motto, “The Führer Commands,
We Follow,” to “The Führer Commands, We Bear What Follows.” As
for the propaganda chief’s promises of ultimate victory, the
irreverent solemnly urged all to “Enjoy the war, the peace will be
terrible.”
In the atmosphere of near-panic created by the refugees’ reports,
facts and reason became distorted as rumor took over. All sorts of
atrocity stories spread throughout the city. Russians were described
as slant-eyed Mongols who butchered women and children on sight.
Clergymen were said to have been burned to death with
flamethrowers; the stories told of nuns raped and then forced to
walk naked through the streets; of how women were made camp
followers and all males marched off to servitude in Siberia. There
was even a radio report that the Russians had nailed victims’
tongues to tables. The less impressionable found the tales too
fantastic to believe.
Others were grimly aware of what was to come. In her private
clinic in Schöneberg, Dr. Anne-Marie Durand-Wever, a graduate of
the University of Chicago and one of Europe’s most famous
gynecologists, knew the truth. The 55-year-old doctor, well known
for her anti-Nazi views (she was the author of many books
championing women’s rights, equality of the sexes and birth control
—all banned by the Nazis ), was urging her patients to leave Berlin.
She had examined numerous refugee women and had reached the
conclusion that, if anything, the accounts of assault understated the
facts.
Dr. Durand-Wever intended to remain in Berlin herself but now
she carried a small, fast-acting cyanide capsule everywhere she
went. After all her years as a doctor, she was not sure that she
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of Aircraft in war
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Title: Aircraft in war

Author: Eric Stuart Bruce

Release date: September 27, 2023 [eBook #71736]

Language: English

Original publication: London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1914

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AIRCRAFT IN

WAR ***
 Transcriber’s Note
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The Daily Telegraph
WAR BOOKS
AIRCRAFT IN WAR
 [Topical Press.
A FARMAN ARMED SCOUTING BIPLANE,
showing gun mounted in position, Gnome motor, ailerons on upper plane, rudders
at rear (see Chapter VII.).
 AIRCRAFT in WAR
By

ERIC STUART BRUCE, M.A. Oxon.

Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society; late Honorary Secretary
and Member of Council Aëronautical Society of Great Britain;
Vice-President of the Aërial League of the British Empire;
Membre d’Honneur of the Aëro Club of France

I l l u s t r at e d

HODDER AND STOUGHTON

LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO
MCMXIV
 TO MY WIFE,
who during the eight years of my Honorary
Secretaryship of the Aëronautical Society of Great
Britain incessantly and most materially aided me in my
efforts to secure the united interest of the British nation
in the mastery of the air, I dedicate this little volume.
 CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE

Introduction ix
I. The Earlier Aërial Scouts 1
II. The Development of the Airship 11
III. Types of Modern Airships: British, French, German,
Italian, Russian, Austrian, and Belgian 18
IV. The German Airship Fleet 37
V. Advantages and Disadvantages of Airships 50
VI. The Advent of the Aëroplane 78
VII. Types of Aëroplanes: British, French, Italian,
Russian, Austrian, Belgian, and Bulgarian 91
VIII. Germany’s Aëroplane Equipment 123
IX. The First Use of the Aëroplane in War—Tripoli—
the Balkans 137
X. The New Arm in Armageddon 144
XI. Present Deficiencies and Future Possibilities of the
Military Aëroplane 166
 INTRODUCTION
When years ago we read in Tennyson’s “Locksley Hall” the following
lines:—

Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rained a

ghastly dew
From the nations’ airy navies grappling in the central blue—

we little dreamt that not very far from the beginning of the twentieth
century the fancy of the poet would become the fact of reality; that in
the great European war in which the nation is so strenuously
engaged, “the wonder that would be” would come to pass.
Though happily, at present, in these isles the din of war is
unheard, yet a semi-darkened London and bright searchlights
playing on the skies tell the tale of prudent foresight against the
advent of the enemy’s airfleet. From the battlefields there daily come
the reports of actual battles in the air, sometimes betwixt aëroplane
and aëroplane, sometimes between the lighter and heavier than air
craft. Often such encounters are death-grip duels. Such conflicts of
the air are the direct consequence of the great and important use of
both airship and aëroplane as aërial scouts. These are the eyes of
encountering armies. To destroy as far as possible this penetrating
vision of the enemy and restore to him the fog of war is the untiring
aim of either side.
During those first anxious days of the present war the public
anxiously awaited news of the doings of the Royal Flying Corps, as
well as those of the aviators of our Allies. Expectation was satisfied
in the reading of Sir John French’s report to Lord Kitchener, dated
September 7th, 1914. Speaking of the use of the aëroplane in the
war he says:—

I wish particularly to bring to your Lordship’s notice the

admirable work done by the Royal Flying Corps under Sir
David Henderson. Their skill, energy, and perseverance have
been beyond all praise. They have furnished me with the
most complete and accurate information, which has been of
inestimable value in the conduct of the operations. Fired at
constantly both by friend and foe, and not hesitating to fly in
every kind of weather, they have remained undaunted
throughout.
Further, by actually fighting in the air, they have
succeeded in destroying five of the enemy’s machines.

For those brave heroes of the air our hearts beat with fervid
admiration. In accomplishing their all-important tasks they have not
only to fear disaster from shot and shell of the enemy, but from the
mistaken fire of their comrades and the very forces of nature. These
latter, owing to the imperfections of the flying machines, do not
entirely spare them; the Royal Flying Corps, in order to become
competent to perform the work it is now doing for King and country,
has had in manœuvres at home to pay a high price in the sacrifice of
human life.
It may, indeed, be reasonably thought that the knowledge of the
vast utility of aircraft in the present conflict will dispel the last
remnant of prejudice in this country against the development of
aërial navigation, and the grudging of a liberal national expenditure
on the service of the air. It was, perhaps, this ignoring of practical
utility, so vigorously combated by the pioneers in this country, that
caused Great Britain to be the last of the Great Powers to seriously
take up aircraft for military and naval use. Our delay had been a
wonder to many, since theoretically in the past this nation had been
to the fore. Nearly half a century ago it led the way of the air by being
the first country in the world to found a society for the
encouragement of aërial navigation—the Aëronautical Society of
Great Britain. It is no exaggeration to say that many of the great
principles of human flight were formulated and discussed at the
earlier meetings of that society. The late Mr. Wilbur Wright, when he
came to this country to receive the gold medal of the society, in his
speech testified to the substantial help he had received from the
study of the transactions of the oldest aëronautical society in the
world. As the pioneer in laying the foundations of aërial science, this
country is not without honour amongst the nations.
 CHAPTER I
THE EARLIER AËRIAL SCOUTS

Patriotism has been the most powerful factor in developing aërial

navigation. Montgolfier experimented with his paper balloons filled
with heated air in the desire that his invention might be of use to
France in her wars, and throughout the history of both balloons and
flying machines we find that it has been the desire to employ them
as instruments of war that has most fostered their progress.
Very soon after Charles invented the gas balloon the latter was
pressed into military service for the very same purpose of
reconnaissance for which airships and aëroplanes are now being
used. At the time of the French revolutionary war an aëronautical
school was founded at Meudon under the control of Guyton de
Morveau, Coutelle, and Conté, and a company was formed called
Aërostiers.
Captive balloons were used by the armies of the Sambre and
Meuse, of the Rhine and Moselle. Just before the battle of Fleurus,
1794, two ascents were made, and the victory of the French was
attributed to observations made by Coutelle. At that time several
ascents were made from Liége with a spherical balloon and one of
cylindrical shape. This latter appears to have anticipated the well-
known German kite-balloon.
There is a tradition that in those early days of the balloon the
French were possessed of a varnish which satisfactorily held the
hydrogen gas, but that the secret was lost—a grave loss indeed, if
the tradition has truth in it. The secret was never refound. A really
gas-proof varnish is unknown.
 In the course of the American Civil War of 1861 captive balloons
were again employed with important results.
During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 three captive balloons
were installed in Paris, the “Nadar” on the Place St. Pierre; the
“Neptune,” manned by Wilfred de Fonvielle, at the gasworks at
Vaugirard; and the “Celeste” on the Boulevard des Italiens.
Thus long before the advent of airships and flying machines the
use of altitude for military reconnaissance was realised. A great
disadvantage of the captive balloon was its stationary nature. It was
not prudent to ascend in it very close to the enemy, as there was not
the same chance of escape as when the aërial observer is in mobile
aircraft.
Though rifle fire has over and over again failed to bring down a
captive balloon owing to the upward pressure of the hydrogen gas,
still, artillery fire has been known to have very destructive effect.
Undoubtedly, the best use that has been made of the captive
balloon was in the Boer War. The British observation balloon
equipment, which under the unceasing labours of Colonel Templer
had reached a state of considerable perfection, then proved to be
highly efficient. But in the light of modern aëronautical progress its
doings were merely the foreshadowings of the achievements the
aviators in the present war are daily carrying out.
Perhaps the most important feature of the balloons in the South
African War was the material of which they were made—gold-
beaters’ skin. We are all more or less familiar with this substance, for
we use it as a plaster when we cut our fingers. We should scarcely
think that so apparently fragile a substance was strong enough to
form the envelope of a balloon. It is, however, an admirable
substance for the purpose on account of its lightness and capacity of
holding the gas, and the desideratum of strength can be obtained by
combining layer and layer of the substance to any desired thickness.
By the use of gold-beaters’ skin it became possible to have much
smaller balloons for a given lifting power than when varnished
cambric or silk was employed. If made of the latter materials a
captive observation balloon had to be at least 18,000 cubic feet to be
of any service. Gold-beaters’ skin reduced the volume to 10,000
cubic feet, or even less.
The only disadvantage of gold-beaters’ skin for the envelope of
balloons and airships appears to be its very great expense. This, in
the case of a large airship, is formidable. It should be mentioned,
however, that it has sometimes been used for the separate gas
compartments which, as will be seen, are a feature of the Zeppelin
airship.
As regards the actual achievements of the balloon in South
Africa, one section did excellent work at Ladysmith. In the words of
Colonel Templer, “it not only located all the Boer guns and their
positions, but it also withdrew all the Boer fire on to the balloon.
Several balloons were absolutely destroyed by shell fire.”
One of the balloons was burst at a height of 1,600 feet, and
came down with a very quick run, but the staff officer in the car was
unhurt. At Ladysmith, by means of the balloon, the British artillery fire
was made decisive and accurate.
With General Buller at Colenso, and up the Tugela River,
Captain Philips’ balloon section was very useful. Splendid work was
done at Spion Kop. There the whole position was located and made
out to be impregnable. It has been said that the British Army was
then saved from falling into a death trap by the aërial
reconnaissance. Captain Jones’ section went up with Lord Methuen
on Modder River. His observations continued every day. It was
considered there was not a single day that they were not of the
utmost importance.
Again, Lord Kitchener and Lord Roberts used balloons. From the
information they obtained from them they were enabled to march on
to Paardeburg. At the latter place itself they were able to locate the
whole position. Another section went to Kimberley and on to
Mafeking. A very important observation was made at Fourteen
Streams. There a balloon was used continuously for thirteen days
without the gas being replenished. By its means the Boers were
prevented from relieving Fourteen Streams.
 It has been pointed out by Colonel Templer that one of the great
difficulties connected with the use of the comparatively small
balloons in the South African War was the heights the armies went
over.

On the march to Pretoria there were hills 6,000 feet above

the sea, and to make an observation from these hills it was
necessary to go up 1,500 or 2,000 feet, so that the
barometrical height was hard work on the buoyancy of the
balloon, because the barometrical height then became 8,000
feet—the 6,000 feet altitude above the sea-level, and the
2,000 feet it was necessary to go over the hills—that was
about all our balloons would do.

That was a disadvantage of the captive balloons which would not

have been felt if the observers had been on aëroplanes!
Certainly, the excellent gas retaining power of gold-beaters’ skin
was well put to the test in the South African War. The thirteen days’
work with one charge of gas mentioned above was a fair trial for a
balloon of such comparatively small size; but Captain H. B. Jones
gave a still more striking experience of the value of gold-beaters’
skin as a gas-holder. Speaking of the Bristol war balloon of 11,500
cubic feet capacity, he says:—

It was used at the engagements at Vet River and Land

River, and arrived at Kroonstad on May 12th. The balloon was
kept in a sheltered place near the river till we marched again,
on May 22nd, and was not emptied till after we had crossed
into the Transvaal at Vereeniging on May 27th. To keep a
balloon going for thirteen days at one station is a good test;
but in our case the Bristol was filled for twenty-two days, and
did a march of 165 miles with the division.

The system of filling the balloons from steel cylinders in which

the hydrogen gas had been compressed, so well exemplified in the
Boer War, was a great improvement on the older methods of
manufacturing the gas on the spot. Speed in filling balloons is a
desideratum for their use in war. By the cylinder method, owing to
the great pressure under which the gas escapes from the cylinder,
the inflation of the observation balloons became a question of
minutes instead of hours. The necessity of speed applies to the
inflation of airships also.
Although the present volume is designed rather to speak of the
aëronautical appliances of the present than those of the past, the
above-mentioned facts concerning aërial reconnaissance in the Boer
War have been included, as the value of the air scouts at the time
was hardly known and appreciated by the general public, whose
mind in those days was not constantly being directed to aërial
matters as it is at the present time. The knowledge of what just a few
well-contrived and well-utilised balloons could then do in the way of
aërial scouting must lead to the thought how the Boer War might
have been shortened had we then possessed the squadrons of fast-
flying aëroplanes that are taking part in the present war. To know,
indeed, what a very few aërial observers could do may enhance our
estimation of the possibilities of the squadrons of the flying machines
of the British and allied armies in the present war as they dart in
search of information over the lines of the enemy.
In the course of some articles on the subject of the new arm of
war, which contain many apt statements, Mr. F. W. Lanchester gives
the opinion that the number of aërial machines engaged in the war is
a negligible quantity. We might, indeed, well say the more the better,
provided they are on the Allies’ side; but no aëronaut or aviator will
allow the number is negligible. The writer compares the supposed
number of aëroplanes the Germans possess with the cost equivalent
of scouting cavalry. The comparison is not a happy one, on account
of the tremendous advantage of altitude and, consequently, long
range of vision possessed by the aërial scout. We have seen that in
the Boer War one observer at Spion Kop from his height and super-
sight saved the situation, and rescued our army from possible
crushing disaster.
 What might not even one shrewd British observer in a swift-
moving modern aërial craft accomplish at a critical moment in the
present conflict?