Leefe Robinson

William Leefe Robinson VC (July 14 1895–December 31 1918) was the first British pilot to shoot down a German airship over Britain during the First World War. For this he was awarded the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces. He was the first person to be awarded the VC for action in the UK.

Background
Robinson attended the Dragon School, Oxford, and St Bees School, Cumbria. He became a lieutenant in the Worcestershire Regiment and No. 39 Squadron RFC (Royal Flying Corps).

Action
On the night of 2/3 September 1916 over Cuffley, Hertfordshire, Lieutenant Robinson, flying a converted B.E.2c night fighter, sighted a German airship – one of 16 which had left bases in Germany on a mass raid over England. (The airship was actually the wooden-framed Schütte-Lanz SL11, not as is sometimes assumed a Zeppelin.) The lieutenant made an attack at a height of 11,500 ft approaching from below and, closing to within 500 ft, raked the airship with gunfire. As he was preparing for another attack, it burst into flames and crashed in a field behind the Plough Inn at Cuffley, killing Commander Wilhelm Schramm and his 15 man crew.

This action was witnessed by thousands of Londoners, who, as they saw the airship descend in flames, cheered and sang the national anthem, and one even played the bagpipes. This showed that the German airships were not invincible, and when he was awarded the VC by the King at Windsor Castle a large crowd of admirers turned up.

Some RFC pilots thought that shooting down an airship was easier than shooting down an aeroplane over the Western Front. (source: Gilbert). However, it needs to be remembered that this action was at night, in an open-cockpit aircraft with minimal instrumentation and lighting, at 11500 feet with no oxygen, and a very good chance of crashing on landing, assuming he could find an airfield. He was at the BE2c's maximum ceiling, at which any aircraft is difficult to control, having to be flown at a particular speed and attitude from which any deviation could have sent him spinning earthwards. He would have remembered the action in which Reginald Alexander John Warneford had brought down LZ37 the previous year: the blast from the airship catching fire had blown him upside down and out of control; this could easily have been fatal to either man. And the airship would have been carrying machine-guns, which could have opened fire at any moment.

Captured
In April 1917, Robinson was posted to France as a Flight Commander with 48 Squadron, flying the then new Bristol F.2 Fighter. On the first patrol over the lines, Robinson's formation of six aircraft encountered the Albatros DIII fighters of Jasta 11, led by Manfred von Richthofen, and four were shot down. Robinson, shot down by Vizefeldwebel Sebastian Festner (12 claims) was wounded and captured by the Germans. He was not well treated by the Germans, and he made several attempts to escape but all failed, and his health was badly affected during his time as a prisoner. He died on December 31, 1918 at Stanmore, a London suburb, from the effects of the influenza pandemic which was at that time spreading around the globe.

He is buried at All Saints' Churchyard Extension, Harrow Weald, Middlesex, England (S.E. Section). Later, a memorial to him was erected near the spot where the airship crashed. As of September 2006 there is a financial appeal by the parish council for it to be renovated.

He is commemorated by the name of the local Beefeater restaurant just south of the cemetery, the "Leefe Robinson", and by a monument erected in East Ridgeway in 1986.