Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Victory Medal 1914-19 (Lieut. F. R. Gollop, R.F.C.) very fine £80-100

Frank Renton Gollop, who was born in June 1893, enlisted as a Trooper in the 2/Welsh Horse in January 1915, having earlier completed five years in the 8th Battalion, Lancashire Fusiliers (T.F.). Discharged from the former unit to a commission as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 5th Battalion, Manchester Regiment, in November 1915, shortly after having been confined to barracks for a week after making an ‘improper reply to an N.C.O.’, Gollop next transferred to the Royal Flying Corps as a student pilot in October 1916, no doubt having tired of his most recent appointment with the 45th Provisional Battalion of the Manchesters.

Having gained his “Wings” at Reading and attended two home-based training squadrons, he was embarked for active service out in France with No. 40 Squadron, in which unit he flew regularly until returning home in March 1918 - among fellow pilots was Captain “Mick” Mannock, who destroyed six enemy aircraft while on No. 40’s strength. Gollop, too, experienced several combats, as evidenced by squadron records and combat reports of the period, the first of them on 16 September 1917, in a scrap east of La Bassee at 7,000 feet. A few days later he was in another fight south of Armentieres, and on the 25th he engaged an enemy ‘2-seater with white crosses’:

‘Observed 2-seater enemy aircraft N.E. of Lens, flying northwards at about 1,000 feet below Nieuport. Dived on enemy aircraft and got under its tail engaging it at a range of about 200 yards and firing about 50 rounds. Observer of enemy aircraft replied immediately and enemy aircraft turned off eastwards, the hostile Observer meanwhile firing continuously until out of range. Pilot of the Nieuport is unable to say definitely whether he hit the enemy aircraft or not.’

On 22 December 1917, Gollop engaged another enemy 2-seater over Gavrelle, the latter being seen to go down in a spin but whether out of control or not he was unable to say. He also fired 100 rounds at an enemy trench to the east of Lens on the same day. New Year’s Day 1918 found him attending “Mick” Mannock’s farewell party, at which he signed the departing ace’s menu, and three days later he was back in combat east of Lens, when he fired another 50 rounds into an enemy aircraft, in addition to strafing an enemy trench, a repeat of the latter exercise being carried on enemy positions on the 13th. Then on 3 February he fought another indecisive combat with an enemy scout, one of eight to engage No. 40’s patrol. In between all of this activity, he had also emerged unscathed from two “prangs”, one of which resulted in his aircraft being written-off.

Returning home in March 1918, Gollop next joined the Experimental Station at Orfordness, where, among other duties, he carried out hazardous flights testing wind-driven gyros. He was finally demobilised in the rank of Lieutenant in March 1919.