A Great War ace’s D.S.C. attributed to Flight Commander F. D. Casey, Royal Naval Air Service

Distinguished Service Cross, G.V.R., hallmarks for London 1916, the reverse privately engraved, ‘Francis K.(sic) Casey, Killed 10th August 1917’, in its Garrard & Co. case of issue, extremely fine £600-800

D.S.C. London Gazette 22 June 1917:

‘For conspicuous bravery and skill in attacking hostile aircraft on numerous occasions. On 21 April 1917, he attacked a hostile two-seater machine at a range varying from 40 to 100 yards and brought it down completely out of control. On 23 April 1917, on four different occasions during one flight, he attacked hostile machines, one of which was driven down in a spinning nose dive, and another turning over on its side, went down completely out of control. This officer had driven down four machines completely out of control, and forced many others down.’

Francis Dominik Casey, an Irishman who was born in August 1890, was commissioned as a Sub. Lieutenant in the Royal Naval Air Service in May 1915, in which month he joined No. 1 Wing at St. Pol as an Observer. Remaining similarly employed until May 1916, he flew numerous coastal reconnaissance and photographic sorties, and fighter patrols, one of the latter leading to a combat with an enemy aircraft off Blankenberghe on 23 October 1915 - ‘tracer bullets were observed going round the enemy machine which got low down over the water towards shore and could not be further attacked.’

Returning to the U.K. for pilot training, Casey was next posted to No. 3 (Naval) Squadron, and quickly gained a string of victories in the period March to May 1917, the first of them on 28 March in a combat north-east of Bapaume. In April, he downed six Albatross Scouts and a DFW. C, two of the former being claimed on the 21st, and in May another Albatross Scout over Moeuvres - he was appointed Acting Flight Commander in early June, the same month in which he was gazetted for his D.S.C.

Following some leave, Casey returned to his unit on 10 August 1917 and, being a keen “stuntman”, took up an aircraft for a test flight - ‘he began to spin, but failed to recover in time and crashed, receiving fatal injuries’ (Above the Trenches refers).

The son of Maurice and Agnes Casey of Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, he was 25 years of age, and was buried in Adinkerke Military Cemetery, Belgium.