1934 saw the release of ‘Winged Victory’ by Victor Maslin Yeates, a fighter pilot who had been left both physically and mentally broken by the war. Persuaded to write of his experiences, Yeates, a dying man, declared that he was only interested in ‘writing the truth as I feel it’ about the brutal reality of early aerial combat.

Michael Terry is the 2023 RAF Museum Doctoral Bursary winner for his work on the Representation of First World War Aerial Combat in Literature