"War in the air", trumpeted a poster for Britain's Royal Flying Corps, "recalls the olden times, when knights rode forth to battle and won honour and glory by their deeds of personal heroism". The fledgling military air services of World War I had no trouble finding volunteers for a life that promised "romance, action, adventure, and opportunities for glorious achievement". Many recruits were cavalrymen who had seen their traditional role as the swashbucklers of war usurped almost overnight by the airmen in their outlandish but far-ranging new flying machines.
