America’s First Combat Pilots

On May 13, 1916, the Lafayette Escadrille, an American air force unit under French command comprised of volunteers to fight for France, saw its first combat at the Battle of Verdun. A short excerpt:

"To form the Lafayette squadron, Thaw and Prince had to combat the resistance of U.S. isolationists as well as French military officers fearful of German spies. After unsuccessful individual efforts, the two joined forces and, aided by influential Americans in Paris and sympathetic French officials, managed to convince the French war department that an all-American squadron would generate U.S. sympathy and support for France against Germany. Squadron 124 of the French army air service was officially commissioned on April 16, 1916. It was known informally as the Escadrille Americaine, but after a German diplomatic protest that the national character of the unit violated U.S. neutrality, the French assigned it an official name: the Lafayette Escadrille, in honor of the French aristocrat who joined the Americans against the British in 1777."