The Old Front Line
Walk the battlefields of the First World War with Military Historian, Paul Reed. In these podcasts, Paul brings together over 40 years of studying the Great War, from the stories of veterans he interviewed, to when he spent more than a decade living on the Old Front Line in the heart of the Somme battlefields.
The Old Front Line
The Search for Mick Mannock with Andy Saunders
For our 250th episode of the podcast, and as part of our continuing Air War series, we are joined by aviation historian and author Andy Saunders to look at the life, and death, of Edward 'Mick' Mannock VC DSO & Two Bars, MC & Bar and the search for his potential burial place on the Western Front. Is the grave of an Unknown Aviator at Laventie British Cemetery Mick Mannock's final resting place?
Andy's book: Mannock: The Life and Death of Major Edward Mannock VC, DSO, MC, RAF by Frank, Norman and Saunders, Andy. (Grub Street 2008)
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Mick Mannock was one of the great aviators of the First World War and one of Britain's top scoring aces. In this episode of the special Air War series of the Old Front Line, we speak to Andy Saunders about Mick's life and death above the battlefields of the Western Front. Welcome to this episode of the special Air War Month on the Old Front Line, where we're looking at the experience of the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Air Force over the Western Front. And I'm really pleased to be joined by Andy Saunders. Andy is an aviation and military historian, author of numerous books, former editor of Britain at War and Iron Cross magazines, and a regular broadcaster. Many years ago Andy and I worked on a BBC time watch called Aces Falling where Andy spoke about his work on the death and burial of First World War air ace Edward Mick Manick and later wrote a book on the subject. In this episode we return to Mick to look at his life and death in the Great War. So welcome Andy thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_01:Hello Paul and thank you for having me on.
SPEAKER_00:Now You're more known for your work on the Second World War, particularly things like the Battle of Britain and subjects like that. You don't often venture into the First World War. So how did that start with Mick?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. No, you're completely right. I mean, I suppose I would have to say that the First World War and the air war in the First World War is somewhat outside of my comfort zone, as it were. I mean, it's not a subject that I'm entirely unfamiliar with, obviously, but it's It's not the area that I normally work in. Obviously, the story of McManach is known to anyone and everyone who has any interest in military aviation in any case. But how it was sparked for me was actually quite an extraordinary story in that one Sunday many years ago, I don't know, 2014, plus years ago. I just happened to be at a local boot fair. And, you know, sometimes when the stallholders turn up, it's like sort of bees around a honeypot, you know, as people are crowded around to see what goodies are coming out of the car. And my attention was drawn to this particular car, which had a lot of people gathering around it. And strapped to the roof of this Volvo was a clearly a very old wooden two-bladed propeller. So I made my way over to try and get it, got there too late, but I ended up in conversation, just randomly in conversation with a chap who was also trying to get hold of this propeller. And he sort of turned to me and he said, oh, are you, you know, are you interested in this sort of thing? So I said, well, yes, you know, it's, you know, but I said, mainly second motor bore. And he said, oh, that's a shame. He said, you probably won't have heard of my great uncle then so I said oh well try me who was your great uncle and he said well his name was Mannock so I said what Mick Mannock and he said yeah yeah he said um he said you know he's my great uncle and this chap Peter Burden um it just turned out I mean he lived in the next street to me at the time I mean it was just incredible and I went around to see him that afternoon and And lo and behold, he got a load of original letters, all in a little wooden chest, marked, it was actually marked Captain Mannock. And there were letters that he'd sent to his sister and to his mother. And there was his commission document. I think there was, well, there was just a mass of stuff, original photographs. And yeah, I just couldn't believe it. You know, it was just astonishing. he'd got a Peter had a brother and his brother, his first name was actually Mannock. So it was Mannock Burden. And he looked absolutely exactly like Mick Mannock. And this was just, to me, this was just the most remarkable thing. And that just drew me into the story. And I started to look at the background of what had happened to Mannock. You know, I didn't know the full story of his disappearance. And, you know, I cannot claim to be the first person who's researched and looked at and come to the conclusion as to where he was buried which we're going to come on to later I know but I thought well you know I'll get a little deeper into this and you know the rest as they say is history. I
SPEAKER_00:mean what a remarkable kind of coincidence to meet someone who lives so close to you connected to one of the most famous air races of the Great
SPEAKER_01:War. I know I mean you know it just doesn't happen does it you know but you know it It happened, and it was just astonishing. And initially, at the time, I was involved with the Aviation Museum at Tangmere, and Peter Burden actually loaned the museum all of the artefacts for a while, but eventually the family decided to put them up for auction, but that's another story.
SPEAKER_00:So, I mean, Mick is an unusual pilot in so many different ways, in particular that he doesn't kind of fit that standard idea of a Royal Flying Corps pilot observer in that he didn't come from a public school kind of officey, posh background, that he was from quite a humble background, wasn't he?
SPEAKER_01:He was from a very, very humble background. And as you say, he just didn't fit in. He was of Irish descent and he wasn't public school. There were so many things about him that were just not your typical, he wasn't exactly the epitome of what we all imagined a Royal Flying Corps pilot or observer to be. In fact, just the opposite. And his route into the Royal Flying Corps was sort of a slightly unusual one. And, you know, you also have this man who actually had, you know, poor eyesight, you know. So, you know, you've got a chap who doesn't fit the mould, he's got poor eyesight, and yet he ends up becoming, you know, almost certainly the highest scoring fighter pilot of the Royal Flying Corps slash RAF ever. It's an incredible story.
SPEAKER_00:And is there even some debate about where he was actually born? I mean, I remember someone saying to me he was born in Brighton, but...
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, there's a lot of dispute as to where he was actually born and when he was born. I mean, there's different years that have been given. I mean, I think we've got 14th of May, 1887 seems to be the most likely. But interestingly, the MOD a few years ago, and I presume that was the... historical branch, I can't remember now, said, no, no, it was 1888. And another source says 1889. And then we've got different birth locations because nobody, to my knowledge, has ever tracked down a birth certificate. So we've got Brighton, Canterbury, Aldershot, India, somewhere in India, or Cork. And so, you know, there's a mystery here. as to where he was born. So there's so many mysteries about this man.
SPEAKER_00:I get what I was going to say. They kind of start with his very birth, these mysteries.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, yeah. We end up with a mystery about his death, but it starts off with his birth being mysterious.
SPEAKER_00:And when the war broke out in 1914, he wasn't serving in any form of military service. I think he was a telephone engineer.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's right. He was a telephone engineer. Yeah. And so he wasn't a military man as such. Yeah, just a very, very strange background and route into what he became.
SPEAKER_00:And out in Turkey, I think, where they interned him for a little while once Turkey entered the war.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he was interned in Turkey and eventually was released and came back. And he had served for a time, I believe, in the Royal Army Medical Corps. But, you know, once he'd... joined up and actually his, and started, eventually started flying training. I mean, he, he, how he actually made it through the training is a bit of a miracle. I mean, he, he was not exactly a promising pilot to say the very, very least, you know, so he wasn't a promising pilot. He's got poor eyesight. You know, there's not, And he doesn't come from the right school or any school. You know, this chap is, you know, hopeless case. You know, he's never going to make fighter pilot, let alone fighter race. You know, that's the general feeling about him.
SPEAKER_00:But I guess for ordinary men like him, the route to this was through technical knowledge. Yes. Yeah. Rather than what their background was, it was what they knew.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's absolutely right. And I mean, there are others, you know, not exactly identical background, but, you know, you have McCudden, you know, and various others who were very good technically and as engineers and what have you. So, yes, that is true. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But he gets that opportunity to do flying training and gets put into, is it 40 Squadron?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, he started off with 40 Squadron and his record there was not exactly stellar. And gradually, he's one of these, he was a bit of a, to say the very least, a slow starter. But once he got going and once he had sort of established himself Although, you know, he was very definitely looked down upon and frowned upon by fellow officers. And, you know, indeed, I've sort of read somewhere, and I was trying to remember before... We started talking where I'd read this and I'm sure it's only, you know, it's a secondary source and it's reliability I'm not sure about. But I did read that actually he wasn't exactly highly, necessarily highly regarded by the ground crews and mechanics and what have you, simply because they couldn't quite get their head around the fact that, you know, To them, it was like, no, this isn't how it works. But I don't know about the truth of that, but it's an interesting story nevertheless.
SPEAKER_00:a bit of the manic magic going on there again, maybe something like that.
SPEAKER_01:Well, yes, absolutely. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah. So 40 squadron, I think they were, they balloon busters. So they were firing at observation. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. I mean his, his tally, you know, of, of kills, which would come on later. I mean, you know, there were, there were a good few, um, balloons about, uh, around them. I think, uh, no, I, I tell a lie. No, I think he actually only got one balloon in total. I may be wrong about that. Um, But yes, but, you know, of the squadrons that he served with, he later went on to 74 and 85 squadron. And without putting 40 squadron down in any way, you know, the two squadrons that are famous still today, although I think they're both squadrons that are now stood down, but 74 and 85 squadron have been consistently, you know, very famous squadrons with famous leaders, you know, 74 squadron in the Second World War, you know, You had Sailor Milan, 85 Squadron, you had Peter Townsend. So they've been the kind of top-drawer fighter squadrons, if you like, from the very outset.
SPEAKER_00:And along the way in his career, having come from that kind of unusual background and not looked upon well in terms of officers or even the ground crew, as you said, he picked up a mighty string of decorations. So he must have been doing something right. Was it DSO and two bars, MC and bar?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think, well, it was... So he gets his first MC in September 17. He gets a bar to that in October 17. And... DSO was recommended in May 1918. But of course, he died in that summer anyway. And then it gets a bar to the DSO also in September. So, I mean, it's just an astonishing tally of decorations. And And then, of course, ultimately, posthumously, he's awarded the Victoria Cross. So not only is he the highest scoring fighter pilot, I mean, he's almost certainly, I believe, the best. most decorated.
SPEAKER_00:And when we look at that kind of string of decorations and the tally that you had of victories over the battlefield there's a kind of another side to it I guess for pilots like him because the longer they survive I guess the more stressful potentially it becomes for them thinking about what their eventual fate might be.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah well that's interesting because one of the letters in which fortunately I kept copies of all the letters that the family had and some other letters of his had been published over the years in different publications, but these letters hadn't been seen before. And he writes a letter not that long before his death to his sister, who I think was Julia from memory. Sorry, I'm not absolutely sure. I know his mother was Julia, I believe, but I think he had a sister, Julia. And he wrote to his sister to say, oh... I've been awarded the DSO. I understand I'm going to be awarded the DSO. And it's a pretty little white cross. And then he says, however, you know, the way things are going, I'm pretty sure that I'll get another type of white cross before very long. You know, and it's just, you know, it's quite an astonishing thing to say to his sister. But, you know, he must have realised that I guess that he was quite probably living on borrowed time
SPEAKER_00:yeah I mean I guess when you you see the kind of casualties that the RFC and the RAF had particularly at certain periods of the war and you somehow survive you must wonder how am I going to continue to survive like that
SPEAKER_01:absolutely yeah absolutely but you know he'd established you know his own tactics and sort of routines and you know things that undoubtedly kept him I guess alive up until that point a degree of luck has come into it as well I'm sure. But, you know, he ends up getting killed, basically breaking one of his own golden rules, you know, which was don't follow your quarry down. But anyway, I'm sure we'll come on to that in a bit. But I mean, so I might be jumping ahead here a bit. But yeah, it was, it must have been, you know, a desperate kind of existence, really. You know, there's this perception of it being, you know, glamorous and, you know, far removed from the muck and the filth of the trenches and all that stuff. But actually, you know, your survivability is, I don't know, statistically, I'm sure it's been looked at, but, you know, I'm sure that he probably would have been safer in the trenches. I don't know.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean, I guess the survival rate, you know, in terms of percentage must have been on the low side when you look at these kind of casualties. Yeah. And when you read the kind of literature of that period, there's a lot of reference to quite heavy drinking amongst pilots in there to cope with it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not sure. I'm not sure that I don't. I'm not sure, actually. I don't think that. that Mick Manick was a drinker. But anyway, I may be wrong on that. So I stand to be corrected.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, maybe it was smoking because that was kind of the other vice of the day, wasn't it? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah,
SPEAKER_01:yeah. I think, you know, if I'd have been there, I think I almost certainly would have been a drinker and definitely a chain smoker. And I definitely don't smoke.
SPEAKER_00:Well, it's incredible how they kind of stood it for so long when we see not just the war in the air, but kind of any aspect of the First World War, isn't it really?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. Incredible, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So, I mean, you mentioned that last flight of Mick Mannock, and he wasn't up alone, was he?
SPEAKER_01:No, he was with a chap called Lieutenant Inglis. And, you know, they spotted a German... scout over a place called Le Strem. And the thing was shot down. You know, Inglis had a go at it. And Mannock then followed the aircraft down inexplicably, really, and was hit by ground fire. You know, his aircraft was seen to catch fire. And we do know that one of the things that that Mannock was especially fearful of. And I'm sure that, well, it wasn't just Mannock, but he spoke about the fear of burning alive because of course, you know, they had no means of escape, no parachute. And, you know, he dies just, you know, it just seems so incredibly pointless and stupid really that he ends up getting killed in that way.
SPEAKER_00:Do you think it was a kind of momentary lapse in concentration or distraction maybe? Or had he got to a point where he couldn't carry on?
SPEAKER_01:Who knows? I mean, it's one of these things that, you know, there's all sorts of possibilities, aren't there? You know, I suppose we can't even rule out the possibility that, you know, the reason that he went down low, you know, was he actually following the aircraft down or had he himself got some problems? You know, there's so many possibilities. unknowns to this. And, you know, we can put all sorts of constructions on it, really. I think from everything that we know, it does seem, and from Inglis's testimony, it does in fact seem that he did follow his victim down. Yeah. Or the victim, shall I say.
SPEAKER_00:So he gets shot down there, and how do you reckon kind of Inglis must have felt about that, coming back to base to report that Mannock had been shot down and most likely killed?
SPEAKER_01:Well, that's right. You know, Inglis himself ends up sort of force landing, you know, inside British lines. And as I recall, what I think his first words were, they got my major. You know, he must have been, you know, because he was a sort of, you know, a newbie, as it were. Yeah, he must have been distraught as well. Bearing in mind that he's sort of new to the game, suddenly he's seen somebody who's an old hand, got all those kills, get shot down and killed in front of his eyes. That's not exactly going to put you in a very good frame of mind for continuing on, is it?
SPEAKER_00:No, and not the kind of news you want to go back to as a fairly young and inexperienced pilot back to headquarters to relay that to the fellow officers in your squadron.
SPEAKER_01:No, exactly so, exactly, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But Manit was gone. I mean, I guess there would have been a degree of looking to see what might have happened at the time, but not a kind of a proper court of inquiry or anything like that.
SPEAKER_01:No, I mean, you know, those sort of things, as far as I'm aware, didn't really happen, you know. It was just another incident in the war, wasn't it? You know, okay, you know, he was a significant player in terms of his fame and popularity and all that sort of stuff. But really, you know, he was just another casualty. And, you know, sadly, you know, he was just one of... you know, countless casualties that, so, you know, holding sort of inquiries into what had happened would have been pretty futile. I'm sure that, you know, when pilots were shot down or when things went wrong, there would have been perhaps a, you know, an inquiry and inverted commas within the unit, you know, to say, well, what went wrong there? What can we do better? How can we make sure things like this don't happen again? But in terms of any other inquiry, then no.
SPEAKER_00:So I guess his name is just another name in the long list of the role of honour for the air services in the Great War at that time. But there is this kind of move towards him being awarded a Victoria Cross posthumously following his death.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, yeah. I mean, that was not until 1919. And, you know, there was a... There was a lot of pressure also being put on the authorities at the time by one of Mannock's friends to actually find where Mannock was actually buried because that is the big mystery of this whole story really.
SPEAKER_00:And I guess at the time probably they had a rough idea of where his aircraft crashed and possibly thought that at some point a grave registration unit would... come across that ground, find a body, see it was an aviator, you know, did he have something in his pocket to say who he was, identity disc, whatever. They probably assumed that he would be recovered, but he wasn't.
SPEAKER_01:Well, he was recovered. The Germans did, he came down, you know, inside the German lines. And we know that the Germans did find him because, you know, his identity discs were sent back to the family. He was definitely found and identified. There's no question about that. The question mark really is exactly where was he buried? And that's where the confusion lies. And also, you know, moving on from there, where is he buried now? it's one of those stories that actually it's quite difficult to get your head round and it's very difficult to get all the details across in a chat like this. But when you sit down and look at all the paperwork, it's very, very clear that A, the Germans buried him, but where they reported him, they buried him was actually an impossibility because the map reference seemed to indicate that it was in no man's land. Well, nobody's going to be going out in no man's land to bury anybody, whether they're yours or theirs. And the most likely scenario is that he was buried alongside a a little lane which the British, it was at a place called La Pierre Aubert. And there's a lane there which the British knew as Butter Lane. And he was almost certainly buried alongside Butter Lane. And In fact, you and I, many years ago, of course, when we did the documentary, we met in Butter Lane and we... In fact, you took me with your... I think it was the linesman. It was, yeah. And we actually sort of walked exactly to the spot where, you know, we believe he was originally buried, which corresponds, you know, fairly... closely to where a body was found by the grave registration service. But because that body, because there was no grave marker left, and because that body was not where the Germans said they buried him or where the British thought the Germans said they buried him, and that's another issue altogether, he was just buried as an unknown airman. They assumed him, couldn't find any identification um that's possibly because any identification on him had been removed by the germans and and sent back to say hey you know we've got we've buried uh major manic so it you know it's just one of those unfortunate things really that proving that um that he was found at that location and then reburied at what's now the Commonwealth War Grave Cemetery at Laventie, it's an uphill struggle. I don't hold out much hope that we will ever prove it or at least satisfy the authorities that this is the grave of Manak. And there's lots of reasons for that. Interestingly, many years ago, there was a chap called Edwin Gibson who worked for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, and he actually wrote a book called Courage Remembered. I'm sure it's probably on your bookshelves, Paul. It is. Yeah. Now, Edwin Gibson, I was in touch with him once I got sort of into this whole thing, into this particular subject. And he wrote a report which said, this has got to be major manic. The report says, wasn't acted on and was buried somewhere in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission archives, and they cannot find it, unfortunately. So we don't really know exactly what he said. He has since deceased, obviously, some years ago. But one of the things that was really very interesting and came about as a result of my accidental contact with Peter Burden was that I encourage Peter Burden to write to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to ask for a copy of what I believe the War Graves Commission called their EE file, which is an inquiry file. because I'd asked for this before and they said no no you know you can't have that it's closed etc etc and wouldn't even let anyone view it at that time. Well lo and behold they initially told Peter Burden that no he couldn't have it. He then went through his MP and within about a week this large parcel had arrived with Peter which he then passed to me and it included all the correspondence, all the reports, unfortunately not the one from Edwin Gibson, but all of the historic stuff, going back to Mannock's loss, the war graves service, you know, graves registration service, trying to work out what on earth had happened, trying to make sense of these different map references. There was piles of correspondence, you know, I mean, there was even... bizarre correspondence from you know some rather sort of crazy people in I can't remember where they were now who said oh no Mick Mannock's alive and well and he's living with me but he doesn't want to be disturbed you know it was the most fascinating file of correspondence but there was one correspondent who stood out and there's a chap called Jim Isles and he was he was just insistent that you know that the grave was found and he kept on and on and on and tantalising me there's two or three people documents in that file. And they came so, so close to saying, yeah, this is manic. But then somebody at a stroke of a pen said, no, it's not enough evidence. He must remain missing. And the case was closed. Now, where he's buried in that cemetery has also been the subject of some, I don't know, debate, if you like, because people have said, well, hang on, you know, he's buried in this row of soldiers as an unknown airman. But if you look at the date of his death, it doesn't tally with the people that are buried either side of him. Well, that argument simply doesn't stack up because if you walk around that cemetery, they're all muddled up. They're all, you know, all sorts of dates, you know, 1916. Then you get a 1917 and then a 1915. And the reason for that, I believe, and I'm sure you'd be able to confirm this is the case, Paul, is that these are largely battlefield dates. burials that were brought in and concentrated in that cemetery. So they're buried as they're brought in, not by date order as they've died. So therefore, his position in terms of the date of his death is not relevant.
SPEAKER_00:No, no, I'd agree. I think that the other burials there are complete red herrings in terms of where or where he may not have come from and who he may or may not be. Because, you know, you mentioned Busser Lane where he crashed. That had been an area, as you know, behind the British lines for a big chunk of the war until the German offensive in what the British called the Battle of the Lease in April 18 happened. And really, there probably weren't that many candidates for recovery in that area because there had not been as intense fighting that resulted in lots of missing. So I guess that what's in that plot where he's buried is a much wider sweep of recovered casualties from a much wider area, not just from Butter Lane.
SPEAKER_01:No, no, I'm sure you're absolutely right. And in fact, when the case was looked at in 19... 1919, 1920, and up to 1921, they did actually start to ask the question, well, are there any other possible candidates? And the answer that they came up with, well, there were three that may possibly be, that were shot down in that general area. But I think they were all, from memory, I think they were all discounted. So we again come back to it almost certainly being manic, but being unable to prove it.
SPEAKER_00:So there's all this circumstantial evidence, and obviously a lot of people have kind of put their two pennies in over the years to try and get that grave properly identified, but still there's no kind of movement on that.
SPEAKER_01:No. In fact, the book that you mentioned that I did some years ago, I wrote it with Norman Franks, the late Norman Franks, who's a great friend of mine and sort of near neighbour at the time. And the First World War aviation was his big thing. And Norman and I, after the book came out, we put together a very detailed argument which we sent to the historical branch to say, you know, we think that this is... you know, there's a good case for this being Mannock's grave. And to be fair to them, you know, they looked at it, they dissected it. And since we did the book, we came up with some other interesting German reports, which sort of indicated that, well, sorry, not German reports, a British report, a war diary, which talked about the, a party of Germans being seen to go to the wreck, which can only be Mannocks, and actually removing things from the wreck site. They'd been observed doing that. And they disappeared behind some or near some buildings, which actually were the buildings, Paul, that you and I looked at on that linesman thing. And I remember we sort of crashed about in the undergrowth there. And that's pretty much exactly... the map reference where the Germans were seen disappearing. Well, you know, begs the question, were they disappearing around the corner of that building to bury, you know, poor old Mick? But as you say, you know, it's circumstantial. All of it's circumstantial. But, you know, one of these days when I get the time, I'm going to try to put together the case again to say, look, you know, could this possibly be looked at again. One thing actually that so many people say to me, and I know that you'll corroborate this, people say, well, you know, surely could we not, could the Commonwealth War Graves Commission not exhume him and do DNA testing? The answer to that is absolutely a firm no. As you know, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission are implacably and quite rightly opposed to any exhumations of existing burials, unless there are overriding reasons to do so. And I can't think what they might be. But in actual fact, I mean, the other thing which, you know, it's slightly sort of sensitive, I suppose, but you get these, you know, very ordered Commonwealth war graves, cemeteries, which don't necessarily bear much relationship in terms in terms of, well, that's not entirely true, but if you compare the photographs of these wonderful rows of white stones with the almost higgledy-piggledy rows of crosses, the War Grows Commission themselves has sort of pointed out that there was scope for those crosses to have got muddled and put in the wrong place. And also, particularly if you had a whole series of burials very close together, it doesn't necessarily follow that that headstone is absolutely directly right over that person's grave. You know, that's the reality. So if anyone were to be exhumed from there, and they're not going to be, you know, you couldn't be sure that you've got manic anyway.
SPEAKER_00:No, no, no. I mean, you're absolutely right. You see a lot of anomalies with these war cemeteries and pictures of them during the Second World War taken by Germans in some cases show the headstones pointing in a completely different direction in some cemeteries to what we know them as now so there's been all kinds of remedial work and additions to it but I mean going back to what remains could be recovered even if that was possible which as you've said is not War Graves Commission policy and I think that's probably the right decision because once you start disturbing graves kind of where does that where does that end and I think that's But the reality is, what would they find underneath? Even if that was definitely the grave that it had come from, the cemeteries belie the reality of death on a First World War battlefield, don't they really? Because they look incredibly beautiful and the white stone, but the reality is often there's very little left of someone who's buried underneath some of those stones.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's absolutely the case, yeah. But, you know, I think it's worth another shot to try and get an official decision, you know, I won't say overturned. I mean, I looked at it again. One of the things that attracted my attention when I was at a cemetery recently in France was a stone, and I'm sure you'll be familiar with these, and it actually said, believe to be, right? And, you know, that got me thinking, well, you know, with all the evidence that we've got, you know, could they not just move to that level and say, you know, believe to be? I don't know.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, that's certainly something that was done. There's quite a few cemeteries which have got headstones that believe to be all buried near this spot and there's kind of variations on that. But I think in the 90s when John Kipling's grave was looked at and then a headstone was buried Yes, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, exactly. And you could say, I suppose, rightly so. But in actual fact, you mentioned the case of Kipling. And my understanding is that largely due to the controversy that was stirred up after that and the question marks that were placed over the decision, up until that point, it was, if you like, within the gift of the Commonwealth War Grows Commission to decide on the naming of headstones of casualties who, quotes, were in their care. But after that episode, it soon became, and that's how things are now, the norm that the Air Historical Branch or the Army Historical Branch, Naval Historical Branch, they would be the final arbiters. They would look at any case that was presented to them to say, you know, we've got this headstone to this unknown airman, soldier, sailor, whatever. And it would be they alone who would make that decision and actually, you know, then instruct the War Graves Commission to replace the headstone. It's a bit of a shame, really, that Well, no, I think that is the right decision. But in a way, it's a shame that whatever it was that Edwin Gibson, who was, I think, the records officer for the War Graves Commission, you know, he put this in his report. And I think I think I'm right in saying it's in his book that this has to be the grave of Manuk. So if they were operating under the rules that they were operating under there at that time, in other words, pre Kipling, then, you know, he could well have ended up with a headstone with his name on it. I think anyway.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. I mean... Just so people listening to this are clear, Mick is commemorated, he's on the air services memorial at Arras, but I think that your research and the research of those who've put forward the case of getting that grave identified and changed, I think is also an important part of the continuing remembrance of the First World War, because history doesn't stand still, does it?
SPEAKER_01:No, absolutely, and you know, I guess this chat with you has kind of sparked my interest again, and I think I'll get the files out and you know we'll have another look at it I think you know it's not beyond the realms of possibility that someone will look at it and say yeah actually the evidence is pretty overwhelming who knows and but as you say he is commemorated as indeed anyone who is missing is commemorated somewhere by the War Graves Commission and his name is on the Flying Services Memorial at Arras but yeah you know it would be it would be nice to see his name on that headstone. Because, you know, personally, I'm convinced it has to be him. And it's, you know, I know there's a danger of when you get so involved in this, you know, of wanting it to be that person. But, you know, I've stood back and looked at it and I've looked at all the evidence and I'm thinking, well, you know, it's got to be him. Because, you know, there are so many elements to this story where... that don't make sense in terms of where they thought they'd exhumed this body from, or rather where they thought the Germans had buried him. You know, when you start to, you know, add up all the dots, as it were, and you get a picture, which is, I think, pretty convincing.
SPEAKER_00:Well, if it's not Mick, who is it? I mean, that's, I guess, is one of the big questions involved in that. And I certainly hope that you do kind of return to your research and put this forward again, because... Well,
SPEAKER_01:I think so. But I mean, I think it's also just to say, you know, I mean, this research, if you like, isn't uniquely mine. I came into it after other people had looked at it and come to the same conclusion, but they'd come to the same conclusion without the weight of evidence that I then uncovered through the Wargraves e-files, if you like, which just, you know, made the case stronger. I
SPEAKER_00:mean, that's the bit I think most people haven't seen. I remember Tony Spagnoli actually in the kind of 90s was working on the idea of a book about Manak and he wanted to try and prove this as well. And he went all over the country and visited places where Manak had been. He went to a house actually, I think at Hendon, where Manak had been for a short while and he asked to see Manak's room. He knocked on this door of this family house house and they showed him inside and he said I want to see the the room at the front on the left they took him up there when he opened the door the walls were covered in wallpaper that showed the the sky and the clouds and hanging from the ceiling were model aircraft and uh and he kind of looked at surprised at this and then the mother said to him yes ever since we've moved here you know our son has been absolutely obsessed with aircraft and this was the son's room so yeah yeah the ghost of Mick was kind of still hanging around in
SPEAKER_01:there. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. A fascinating story. But there is a danger, though, you know, when you do get close to a subject, and I know that you'll bear this out, you need somebody to look at it objectively from outside to say, look, here's the evidence, you know, because... I wouldn't deny that, yes, I kind of do want it to be manic, but I only want it to be manic if it is him. Do you know what I mean? I just need somebody to objectively and forensically go through it all and just tell me that I'm not completely crazy and that, yeah. it's him.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I mean, I think it's because the stories of these men and women who were in these two great conflicts of the 20th century that, you know, we've spent our lifetimes kind of researching are so powerful that we get so kind of connected to them. And like you say, you want it to be that person. And I think that's why it's good that there is a check, which is the way the War Graves Commission and the MOD war detectives and all the others are involved in this now kind of operate because it means that someone can take a step back and, and look at it out. outside of our eyes, as it were.
SPEAKER_01:That's exactly the case. And, you know, really, it perhaps would have been, you know, I say that he could have perhaps had a name stone had things been taken forward by Edwin Gibson. But on the other hand, you know, would we then have been in a situation you know, like the Kipling case where, you know, somebody then afterwards, you know, said, well, hang on a minute, you know, could it, so it does need an objective assessment by somebody who, you know, doesn't have a particular angle, if you like.
SPEAKER_00:And just kind of coming back to a kind of aspect of Mick's life, he comes from this humble background. He's not a traditional kind of candidate for entry into the Royal Flying Corps. Despite all these problems, he flies, he becomes an incredible ace. and then gets shot down and there's this total mystery about what actually happened to him. But there's also the element of he's awarded the Victoria Cross and how long that took to be awarded.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that is possibly one of the more unusual elements of the story, the fact that it was posthumous and so long after the event. Yeah. And
SPEAKER_00:do you think there were people in the Air Force? Because, I mean, the Air Force was now emerging from a victorious war, which had played a major part and had gone from being bits of the Army, bits of the Navy, into becoming an Air Force. And it proved its worth, and warfare had changed forever as a consequence of it. Do you think that there were perhaps people within the Air Force at that time that thought the recognition of a man like Manet, working class, I mean, I've read that he was a socialist even. I mean, you know, did he fit into their idea of what a new Air Force could be? Do you think that was an element in it? No,
SPEAKER_01:it could have been. Although I don't know, I'd be a bit sceptical about that because I mean, really, you know, the Air Force and the officer elite, if you want to call it that, you know, continued, you know, well on into the, at least the opening era, the opening sort of period of the Second World War, really. So I don't know really that that would have played into it. You could be right. It's an interesting possibility. But, you know, you mentioned that, yes, he was a socialist. And so, again, you know, there's another reason why he wouldn't have particularly fitted in in the mess. And there's a lot of speculation about, you know, had he survived, would he have been an Irish nationalist? You know, who knows? I don't know. I think putting those sort of interpretations on people. what may have been, is a bit of a dangerous path to go down, really.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean, that kind of history, you could endlessly speculate about things. But in terms of his legacy, I mean, you being a Second World War aviation historian, What is the legacy of pilots like Mannock to that generation that went on to fly in the Second World War?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, it was huge. You know, there are so many Battle of Britain pilots who, you know, I was fortunate enough to know, you know, I knew dozens, scores and scores of them, just as you did, you know, with First World War veterans back in the day. But And also a lot of the biographies and autobiographies of Second Marlborough pilots make reference to people like Mannock, McCudden, Albert Ball. These were all people that, you know, they grew up as teenagers, you know, young boys, idolising these people. And they were, you know, so... they had a huge, huge impact on the generation that came along after them.
SPEAKER_00:And Manick and McCudden and Albert Ball and Billy Bishop and so many others kind of created this culture of knights of the air, of aces, that went on, I guess, to be repeated again in the finest hour in 1940 with this idea of defending Britain from the skies.
SPEAKER_01:You're right, it did. I mean, for want of a better word, the cult of the fighter ace was born in the First World War and it's never gone away. And, you know, it was people like Mannock who created that.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, I think this is a fascinating subject, Andy, and I really do hope that you kind of return to your research and maybe see what can be done. If nothing else, I think it brings Mick's name and his story and everything that he did and all of those pilots of the Great War kind of back into public focus.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, I... I think so. I hope so. And, you know, I know that the Mannock family, I haven't had contact with them for a long while now, but the Burden family, you know, were delighted at the interest that was suddenly shown in him. And, you know, in fact, I took Peter out and he laid a wreath on the grave of who, you know, that might be his great uncle. So, yeah, it's... It's important that they're remembered.
SPEAKER_00:And all part of the ever-turning pages of history.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely so,
SPEAKER_00:yeah. Thanks, Andy. That's a great chat about McMannock, and I really appreciate you taking the time to join us for this special run of programmes that we're doing on The War in the Air.
SPEAKER_01:It's been an absolute pleasure, Paul. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks, Andy. Speak soon. www.oldfrontline.co.uk patreon.com slash old front line or support us on buy me a coffee at buymeacoffee.com slash old front line links to all of these are on our website thanks for listening and we'll see you again soon
