Page 138 - They Also Served

so he was grounded. His method of attack became the norm, and further Zeppelins were downed on 23rd September and 1st October, marking the beginning of the end for the lighter-than-air behemoths.
After pestering the authorities to allow him to return to combat flying, Robinson was posted to 48 Squadron in France, flying the new Bristol Fighter. However, on 5th April 1917, on his first patrol, his formation of six aircraft encountered aircraft of Manfred von Richthofen’s Jasta 11 and four British machines were downed, Robinson’s by twelve victory ace Sebastian Festner. Spending the last 18 months of the war in prison camps, Robinson attempted several escapes, resulting in lengthy spells in solitary confinement, where the Germans badly treated their celebrity prisoner. Finally repatriated in early December 1918 in a weakened state, he spent Christmas with his family before succumbing to the Spanish flu epidemic on 31st December. His funeral in Harrow was attended by thousands, and a wreath from the newly formed RAF was dropped from a fly-past of aircraft. William Leefe Robinson VC’s name lives on in the Royal Memorial Chapel at Sandhurst, in a memorial at the site of the Zeppelin crash, and in the name of the Miller & Carter steakhouse next door to the cemetery where he is buried.
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