William Bishop And Raymond Collishaw – The Best And Deadliest Pilots In The First World War
For a country with a little amount of people, Canada had some of the best and deadliest pilots in the First World War. The most famous are William (Billy) Bishop and Raymond Collishaw.
Roy Brown was known for possibly shooting down Manfred von Richthofen. These aces were mostly around the 20s Billy Bishop achieved 72 victories making him the best pilot in Canada and the 3rd best in the world in WW1. He was described by many pilots including Americas best, Eddie Rickenbacker, that he had no fear and was always courageous. He was also known as the Lone hawk because of him like to go on solo missions. Because of all this, he was awarded with the Victoria Cross at the end of the war and has many books, plays and films based on him. Another reason for this award is because of how on June 2, 1917 he solely, single handedly challenged and fought on a German airfield on.
To his family, Bishop was a fun, friendly and entertaining guy. His son Author Bishop was also a fighter pilot in WW2. He was in the Royal Canadian air force and became a journalist and author as well. Bishop’s granddaughter, Diana was 3 years old when he died but she says that he still here as a “wonderful, friendly ghost that haunts our house”. Diana says that to most people, he was a courageous and frightening guy but really he was a fun guy who tried to make everyone happy. Examples include: he hosted a dinner party backwards where all the servants walked backwards and where all the meals were eaten backwards. He also brought blocks of ice and soap for the family to carve and he got everyone to play instruments with him.
The second Canadian ace is Raymond Collishaw. This pilot had 60 victories and is the first to shoot down and kill 6 people in one day. He was part of the royal naval air service and was the leader of the black flight squadron.
In 1916 He was a part of a strategic bombing action on a German factory. This was the allies first attempt doing this with planes. He also had many near death experiences while flying many of them were caused by engine failures but he survived all of them which proved his bravery and skill and possibly luck.
Donald McLaren shot down 54 planes. He joined the RFC in 1917 which makes it quite impressive since he shot down so many in just a year. However a month before the war ended, he broke his leg wrestling a friend so he had to end his flying career for the First World War.
William George Barker, Canada’s most decorated war hero became a hero in a fight on October 1918. It was him against 15 German fighters. He shot down 3, passed out twice, received 3 wounds, flew past the rest and crash landed but somehow he still survived.
In total he had 50 kills victories in the last two years of WW1. 46 of the kills were in his Sopwith Camel plane. After the war he joined the RCAF for two years and resigned in 1924. He also became the first president of the Toronto Maple leafs however he died at the age of 35 in a plane crash from a plane demonstration.
