The ‘Balloon Buster’ Painting


The following is an extract from the book ‘Robert Taylor Air Combat Paintings Volume IV’ by Charles Walker and Robert Taylor, published in 2000, in which Robert Taylor describes his own painting ‘Balloon Buster’.


The opportunities to get first-hand information from pilots who flew in World War I are all but gone, the Great War having ended over eighty years ago. Even the youngest of pilots to survive were born around the turn of the last century and, sadly, I suspect that Balloon Buster is likely to be the last picture I am able to paint with the benefit of a living World War I pilot to give me the plot.


Born in 1896, Flight Lieutenant Henry J L Botterell was recruited by the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) in Canada and, not yet twenty years old, he arrived in England in 1916 to train as a fighter pilot. Within a year he joined an operational squadron in France on the Western Front, but an engine failure on his second take-off resulted in a monumental crash, and this brought his short flying career to an abrupt end.


Henry Botterell was sent back to England, where he spent several months recovering in hospital; following convalescing he was demobilised. A chance meeting with pilots on leave in England with whom he had trained persuaded Henry that there was still plenty of fight left him and the idea of rejoining his friends on the Front became all too tempting. He rejoined, requalified as a fighter pilot, and early in 1918 returned to operational flying with RFC Squadron 208 in France. Flying the Sopwith Camel, Henry Botterell saw active service for the remainder of the War until the Armistice in November.


At the time of my painting, completed in 1997, Henry was in great shape for someone born over a century earlier, and his active memory, together with his meticulously preserved flying log book, provided all I needed to paint the scene I had chosen.


Just before 8:00am on the morning of 29 August 1918, Flight Lieutenant Henry Botterell climbed his 208 Squadron Sopwith Camel out of a forward airfield at Tramecourt in northern France. Carrying four bombs , he headed west-south-west towards his target at Vitry, a little more than 50 miles distant. Some 35 minutes into the mission, flying at around 12,000 feet, he noticed a German observation balloon as he passed over Arras. Aware of the valuable information gathered by the enemy balloon spotters, and the need to pick them off at every opportunity, Henry made a mental note to give this particilar

‘Balloon Buster’ - 01

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‘Balloon Buster’ The Painting Page  1  2


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