Donald MacLaren. Canada
Donald MacLaren grew up in western Canada, where he learned to speak Cree and helped run a family owned and operated fur trading post. Both Donald and his brother responded to Canadian mobilization by enlisting, with Donald joining the Royal Flying Corps in 1916. After flight training in Canada and England, Donald first entered combat in 46 Squadron, scoring his first victory in February 1918. By September of that year he held the Distinguished Flying Cross, awarded for his growing success conducting bombing missions and for his growing total of enemy kills.
All of Donald’s victories, which grew to total 54, came in the final nine months of the war. By then the tactics of air to air combat were well defined, with the use of a wing man to provide cover and support when attacking or evading enemy attack. Like earlier flyers, MacLaren helped to force a German plane to land behind allied lines, leading to its capture, a feat he shared with other members of his squadron.
The speed with which he amassed his victory total speaks to the changing nature of the air war, which by the summer of 1918 was clearly going in favor of the Allies, bolstered by superior production of aircraft and fresh American pilots. By October 1918 MacLaren was in command of his squadron, despite having less than one year in theater, and his total of kills continued to grow.
In October, less than one month before the armistice stopped the fighting on the western front in Europe, MacLaren fell victim to the friendly horseplay common among the Allied pilots throughout the war. He broke his leg in a wrestling match and was returned to England in early November. He was convalescing there when the war ended.
After the war he remained for a time in the service, helping to establish the Royal Canadian Air Force. In 1920 he resigned from the RCAF and later helped to establish Pacific Airways. A novel of the air war in Europe was published by Victor Maslin Yeates in 1934. A character in the novel, which contains vivid and accurate descriptions of the air to air combat of the day, is known as Mac, the commanding officer of the novel’s protagonist. He is believed to have been based on MacLaren. MacLaren destroyed 54 enemy aircraft in just under 270 days of combat duty.