Pilot's Psalm, The

DESCRIPTION: "The BE 2C is my bus; therefore shall I want. He maketh me to come down in green pastures. He leadeth me where I will not go." The singer must fly into enemy space, and needs help, "else I shall dwell in the House of Colney Hatch forever"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1917 (Nettleingham-TommysTunes)
KEYWORDS: soldier derivative pilot | plane
FOUND IN: Britain
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Nettleingham-TommysTunes, #63, "The Pilot's Psalm" (1 text)
Ward-Jackson/Lucas-AirmansSongBook, p. 14, "The Pilot's Psalm" (1 text)
Roud #10766
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. Psalm 23 (form)
NOTES [479 words]: Pope/Wheal, p. 61, entry "BE-2": "British biplane developed in 1912 and immediately put into production by the Royal Aircraft Factory to become the standard military aircraft employed by the RFC in August 1914. Ponderous but stable, valuable qualities in its planned reconnaissance role, the design was used in five main wartime versions.... The first BE-2c models, up-engined and modified for greater stability, reached France in January 1915, but were outclassed by German Fokker E-types despite the later addition of an observer's machine gun.... [These and later versions were] thoroughly disliked by British crews....
"Brief data (BE-2a): Type: two-seat reconnaissance; Engine: 70hp Renault; Max speed: 70mph (112 kph); Ceiling: 3,000m; Armament: observer's pistol, rifle, or hand-thrown bombs."
Munson, p. 55, gives the slightly different top speed of 72 mph, but that is probably just the difference between individual machines. Either way, it's low. So is the rate of climb listed on p. 133, it took 45 minutes to reach its ceiling of just 10,000 feet! All in all, a miserable performer. The British pilots themselves called it "Fokker fodder."
Munsom, pp. 132-133, explains why: The designers wanted an extremely stable plane, which would be easy and safe to fly. It would also be very good for aerial observation. All this was true, but the very fact that it was so stable meant that it was almost impossible to do high-speed maneuvers. So it was a sitting duck even if you ignore its pitiful speed.
Later models were modified to carry bombs, but if those again cost it speed, and if it took more than about 100 pounds of bombs, it had to fly without the observer. Even with just the pilot, the limit was about 200 pounds of bombs. Hardly a major danger to the enemy. The one modest success it had was as a night fighter.
In other words, it was slow, low-flying, and had little in the way of ability to defend itself. This seems to be confirmed by the photos I've seen of it: a rather potbellied craft, looking more like a boat than a plane. Britain until World War II seemed to have two schools of aircraft design. One produced brilliant planes like the Spitfire and the Mosquito; the other produced clunks like the Skua, the Albacore, the Defiant. The BE-2 looks like it came from the Clunk School. Little wonder the crews disliked it! Despite this, Munson, p. 134, estimates that some 1300 BE 2C and BE 2D models were manufactured -- though some of the last ones were used only as trainers, where its docility was a virtue rather than a disaster.
It seems to have inspired a lot of songs, though; it's also the subject of "Napoo -- Fini," and probably "Hurrah for the Bounding Air" and "They Called Them RAF 2Cs," and Lt. Robinson's plane in "They Were So Happy, Oh! So Happy" was a BE 2C (and the song itself is about the plane's night fighting success). - RBW
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