German pilot Kleim with his observer, ground crew, and LVG bi-plane. Kleim is marked with an 'x' above his head, standing, outer coat open, hands on his hips. The plane may be an early model C.II introduced in late 1915. It has wire wheels of the earlier B.I, and what may be an early exhaust pipe. The more typical C.II positions the exhaust at the midpoint of the engine.
[Trans:] My AircraftKleim L.V.G.
"On November 27 seven Zeppelins raided England, dropping more than two hundred bombs. Two of the raiders were shot down: in one of them, hit by the incendiary bullets fired by a British pilot, all twenty crewmen were killed. On the following day a single German seaplane flew over London, dropping six bombs on Kensington. 'I heard the explosions from the Foreign Office and thought they were practising with rifles at Wellington Barracks,' one senior diplomat, Lord Harding, later recalled. No one was killed, but six civilians were wounded. The raid marked the first aircraft as opposed to Zeppelin attack in the capital."
Eight Zeppelins set out to bomb industrial targets in the British Midlands on November 27, 1916, a stormy night in which the airships were visible in the glare from the cities and the aurora borealis. One of the eight turned back before crossing the North Sea. LZ 34 was picked up by searchlights and shot down by British pilot Ian Pyott shortly before midnight. A second Zeppelin, LZ 21, was shot down by airplanes 10 miles east of Lowestoft and fell into the sea with no survivors early on the 28th. The loss of the two Zeppelins followed those of loss of two others in September and one in October and marked the beginning of the end of the Zeppelin raids on England. The bombing by the L.V.G. presaged the air raids of 1917 and 1918.
The First World War, a Complete History by Martin Gilbert, page 302, copyright © 1994 by Martin Gilbert, publisher: Henry Holt and Company, publication date: 1994
1916-11-28, 1916, November, Zeppelin, air raid, bombing, seaplane, L.V.G. C.II, LVG, LVG CII
