LIEUTENANT D.C. TOWNLEY, ROYAL FLYING CORPS AND ROYAL AIR FORCE (FORMERLY GUNNER, MOTOR MA

LIEUTENANT D.C. TOWNLEY, ROYAL FLYING CORPS AND ROYAL AIR FORCE (FORMERLY GUNNER, MOTOR MACHINE-GUN CORPS). British War Medal (Lieutenant, Royal Air Force). Extremely Fine and virtually as struck.

With photocopied Medal Index Card and 4 pages RFC and RAF service papers.

After service with the Motor Machine-Gun Corps, Duncan Campbell Townley was commissioned in to the Royal Flying Corps, being appointed 2nd Lieutenant, 26/7/1917. He was promoted Lieutenant on the same day that the Royal Air Force came into being, 1/4/1918. After completing his flying training Townley was posted for service with the No. 2 Aircraft Supply Depot on 18/11/1917. Still serving with the 2nd Aircraft Supply Depot, Townley was posted missing on 31/7/1918. He was subsequently confirmed to be a prisoner of war at Karlsruhe, Germany. Townley was repatriated on 13/12/1918 and transferred to the Unemployed List on 27/4/1919.

Medal also accompanied by photocopy of relevant extract from “The Sky Their Battlefield”. Townley was captured whilst in the process of ferrying a DH9 from the 2nd Aircraft Supply Depot to IX Brigade Area. It would appear that Townley came down on the German side of the front line, where both he and his aircraft were captured. ¨¨The DH9, a WW1 bomber, was a notoriously unreliable airplane. Weak, it offered poor performance, which may have been the reason Townleys plane came down on the wrong side of the lines.

The Motor Machine-Gun Corps was established by Army Order 480 of 12/11/1914, which approved the addition to each Division of a Motor Machine-Gun Battery. Each battery comprised 18 motorcycle/sidecar combinations that carried six Vickers machine-guns, along with ammunition and spare parts. When the Machine-Gun Corps was established in October 1915 the Motor Machine-Gun Corps was incorporated into it. From late 1916 many men from the Motor Machine-Gun Corps transferred to the Heavy Section, Machine-Gun Corps, this latter unit later to be known as the Tank Corps.

Medal Index Card gives home address as 97 Wake Green Road, Mosley (which I assume is the Mosley in Liverpool).