The Walberswick village website provided a vital link for Brazilian aeronautical historian, Adriano Silva Baumgartner, in his quest to recognise Second Lieutenant Oscar Lennox McMaking as Brazil’s first flying Ace (of only three Brazilians that achieved Acedom).
Oscar McMaking was born in Fortaleza, Ceará State, Brazil, in 1894, where his father was working as a civil engineer constructing the railways, and the McMaking family returned to England in the late 1890s. Soon after the outbreak of the Great War, Oscar enlisted with the Queen’s Own Yorkshire Dragoons and served with them in France, early in 1914. He was gazetted to the Lincolnshire Yeomanry as a 2nd Lieutenant, in February 1916, and later that year transferred to the Royal Flying Corps.
Serving with 45 Squadron, Oscar initially flew Sopwith 1½ Strutters, obtaining 4 victories with his Observers/Air Gunners; but later the Squadron was equipped with the modern single pilot fighter, the Sopwith Camel. With that machine he was credited with two additional victories, all of them against German fighters, Albatros D.III, therefore achieving Ace status. On the 11th September 1917, during an offensive patrol, he engaged and was shot down in flames, fighting the legendary Leutnant Werner Voss (considered by many Historians the most successful German Ace after the Red Baron himself), over Langemarck, Belgium. His body was never recovered and he is remembered at the Arras Memorial, in France.
Oscar was Andrew, Robert and Emma Webb’s great uncle from their mother’s side of the family. A photographic portrait of Oscar in his Royal Flying Corps uniform still hangs in the family home.
As part of the events commemorating the centenary of the outbreak of World War I, Emma dedicated one of the ceramic poppies at the Tower of London to Oscar’s memory. This dedication was recorded on the Royal British Legion website and provided Adriano, with the name of one of Oscar’s relatives. Searching the internet for entries relating to Emma Webb led Adriano to the Walberswick village website and the announcement of the birth of Emma’s first child, fittingly also named Oscar. Following correspondence with Katherine Ungless, Adriano was finally in touch with the Webb family.
Adriano’s dedication to honouring and remembering Brazilian heroes of the R.F.C. and R.A.F. resulted in Second Lieutenant Oscar Lennox McMaking being awarded the Brazilian Order of Aeronautical Merit (Ordem do Mérito Aeronáutico). He sent to the Brazilian Air Force a petition on the 1st February, to Honour both 2nd/Lt McMacking and the late Wing Commander Cosme Lockwood Gomm, D.S.O., D.F.C. (RAFO 34123), another Brazilian Hero of the R.A.F. who flew and died in WW2. The medal was presented to Robert at a ceremony at the Brazilian Embassy, on Brazilian Aviator’s day. The blue and white enameled medal will sit proudly alongside Oscar’s other campaign medals; the Mons Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal.
The Webb family would like to express their gratitude firstly to the Brazilian Air Force (F.A.B.); and Adriano Silva Baumgartner for their devotion and tenacity in recognising the sacrifice made by Oscar and his generation culminating in this posthumous medal award. Of course a big thank you is also due to the Walberswick village website for its part in this piece of history.