So who really shot the Red Baron down?

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Happily for all who respect the chivalry of those magnificent men in their World War One flying

machines, 21 April 2018 is the one hundredth anniversary of the day Baron Manfred von Richthofen,

alias the Red Baron, made history, but unhappily with events surrounding the shooting down of his

Fokker DR1 triplane on 21 April 1918, which caused the death of this 25 year old ace who had 80 kills

of British allied aircraft to his credit, still being debated by many 100 years later.

The unanswered controversial question still fascinating many is: “was the Red Baron shot down by

Canadian pilot, Captain Roy Brown, flying a Camel fighter pursuing the Red Baron, who was in fact

chasing and shooting at another Canadian, a novice flyer Lieutenant Wilfred May, or was he brought

down by ground fire from below … and if so who fired the bullet that killed him”.

The scene that day may have looked much like this, with Australian soldiers on the ground firing

their .303 rifles and even hand held machine guns upwards at their red target:

By the time the Baron’s triplane was brought down in what was ‘no-mans-land’ near the Bray-Corbie

Road, near Sailly-le-Sec in France, it looked like this:

The words written at bottom right in this picture: “Very like the scene as I remember it” is first-hand

testimony of Lieutenant James Lee Smith, a pilot of an RE8 aircraft with 3 Squadron Australian Flying

Corp who was later to be awarded a WWI Distinguished Flying Cross after being wounded and

crashlanding in August 1918, after flying 108 reconnaissance missions since late 1917.

So who really shot the Red Baron down?

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Lieutenant Smith wasn’t flying on the evening the Red Baron was brought down, so he was ordered

to lead a small salvage crew to bring back both the aircraft and the Red Baron’s body still inside his

Fokker triplane to 3 Squadron’s headquarters at Poulainville.

Even though the crashed aircraft lay between the German and the allied lines, it didn’t stop a few

Australian soldiers sneaking out after dark to souvenir what they could of the Red Baron’s

possessions and parts stripped from his well known aircraft.

Lieutenant Smith later wrote the following recollections of events:

So who really shot the Red Baron down?

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When the 3 Squadron crew returned with aircraft and body, even more souveniring of the Red

Baron’s possessions and parts of his aircraft continued. Lieutenant Smith’s own piece of ply he

souvenired on 22 April 1918 was taken from the lead section of one of the wings:

So who really shot the Red Baron down?

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3 Squadron’s senior officers then conducted an official post mortem on his body, photographed at

the time:

The 3 Squadron official report clearly established that the entry and exit points of the single bullet

which killed the Baron could only have been fired from below but not from the height Captain May

was positioned whilst firing his aircraft’s guns at the Fokker.

3 Squadron later buried the Baron’s body providing a respectful guard of honour. One of the Baron’s

fellow pilots from his own squadron, Jasta 11, also flew over the aerodrome to drop a wreath - a

truly cavalier gesture accepted unchallenged by his enemies.

But the question still remained: which Australian soldier on the ground had fired the bullet?

Investigations followed a variety of claims. They lead to a more or less official opinion that either

Sergeant Cedric Popkin or Gunner Robert Buie were in the right place at the right time, with both

evidenced to be firing accurately at the same red target.

For those who must have a definitive answer, a walk through the Cemetery at Brooklyn, NSW, near

the Mooney Mooney Bridge, will reveal this inscription on Buie’s own grave:

So who really shot the Red Baron down?

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Neil L Smith

16 April 2018

So who really shot the Red Baron down?

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Additional evidence written by JLS: