Fokker Fok. E III scale model kit in 1/4 scale

The history of the first Eindecker aircraft (Fokker factory number 216), which was used for Fokker's initial synchronizer trials, is closely associated with Leutnant Otto Parschau, who was allotted this aircraft, then a Fokker A-series unarmed scout with the serial number A.16/15, at the beginning of World War I. This aircraft had been bought in 1913 by Oberleutnant Waldemar von Buttlar,^[3] and requisitioned by the Fliegertruppe along with his commissioning as an officer in the Prussian Army at the outbreak of hostilities, and had been painted a shade of green, the color of von Buttlar's previous Jäger regiment.^[4] Parschau had served^[5] with the same surreptitiously named Brieftauben-Abteilung Ostende (BAO), in Belgium as Oberleutnant von Buttlar in November 1914, where the two German officers could have first made contact. Parschau eventually spent most of the first year of the war with this aircraft, flying it on both the Eastern and Western fronts. At some stage he had the words "Lt. Parschau" painted on the right upper side (and possibly both sides) of the fuselage behind the cockpit. This aircraft had its main fuel tank located behind the cockpit.

Near the end of May 1915, while it was based at Douai with Feldflieger Abteilung 62, the Fokker factory fitted Parschau's aircraft with the first trial version of the Fokker Stangensteuerung synchronizer and a Parabellum MG14 light machine gun, leaving the wing panels in the stock A.III airframe's shoulder-winged location while armed and in Parschau's use in May and June 1915. Parschau made several attempts at aerial combat during June 1915, but at this stage the gear proved very unreliable, the Parabellum gun repeatedly jamming. As no photos exist verifying any change in wing-panel anchorage location for Parschau's A.16/15 aircraft before its return to the Fokker factory a second time to serve as the "prototype" Eindecker airframe, the belief that it had been modified to have the standard mid-fuselage location used on the later production E.I airframes before its second return to the Fokker factory has not yet been proven, as it was lowered some time after the Fokker factory had received it back to be retained there, following Parschau's final use of it. The mid-fuselage wing mount modification was not fitted to the initial batch of five M.5K/MG production prototypes as originally built,^[6] with Otto Parschau's second Eindecker, the first M.5K/MG built bearing IdFlieg serial E.1/15 (bearing Fokker factory airframe number 191, accepted by IdFlieg on 26 May 1915 with shipping date of 15 June 1915)^[7] uniquely getting it sometime later, while in service. Production E.Is, and all further Fokker Eindeckers, were also fitted with the definitive version of the Stangensteuerung gear, with a large cam wheel replacing the early drive taken from the oil pump drive shaft.

One distinctive feature of the appearance of all the sheet metal panelling on the Eindeckers was a special form of "dragged" engine turning performed on all their surfaces, both exposed and internal parts. This distinctive appearance on the sheet metal components of the Eindecker fuselage was also used on the earliest Fokker biplane fighters, like the Fokker D.I but had ceased to be used by the Fokker factory on its designs by the end of 1916.

Operational history

The first Eindecker victory, though unconfirmed, was achieved by Leutnant Wintgens in the late afternoon of 1 July 1915^[9] when, while flying one of the five M.5K/MG production prototype/"service test" aircraft, numbered 'E.5/15' near Lunéville, he forced down a French Morane-Saulnier L two seat "parasol" monoplane. By this time the first E.Is were arriving as supplementary equipment, one per unit as "attached" aircraft, for the ordinary Feldflieger Abteilung - initially to provide escort protection for their usual quantity of six two-seat reconnaissance biplanes per unit.

Three days after his unconfirmed"victory, Wintgens downed another "Morane Parasol" with the same aircraft, and a fortnight after his initial engagement, on 15 July 1915, he became the first Eindecker pilot to be credited with an official victory.

The two most famous Eindecker pilots, both of Feldflieger Abteilung 62, were Oswald Boelcke (initially flying M.5K/MG service test aircraft E.3/15) and Max Immelmann, - who received his first production E.I Eindecker (serial number E.13/15)( just before July 1915's end. Both scored their first kills in E.Is in August 1915, just after Boelcke became the sole pilot flying the E.3/15 service test aircraft. Leutnant Otto Parschau,flew the M.5K/MG aircraft numbered E.1/15 after the Fokker factory took back his now worn-out A.16/15 aircraft a second time, Immelmann's first Eindecker survived the war.

Oswald Boelcke scored the most Eindecker victories - 19 out of his final tally of 40. His last victory in an Eindecker occurred on 27 June 1916. Max Immelmann had the second-highest Eindecker score. He achieved all of his 15 victories in the type before being killed when his E.III broke up in June 1916, possibly after the synchronisation mechanism failed during an attack on British F.E.2bs, causing at least 7 bullets to shoot through one propeller blade, which subsequently broke off. This likely resulted in vibrations so severe that the loads exceeded the structural limits of the aircraft. (Allied accounts credit Corporal J. H. Waller, gunner/observer of a RFC F.E.2b piloted by 2nd Lt G. R. McCubbin, with firing the fatal shots at Immelmann during his attack on their aircraft and was credited by the British with shooting him down.) Eleven pilots scored five or more victories in the Eindecker. Boelcke, Immelmann, Parschau, Hans Berr, and Wintgens all received Germany's highest military decoration, the Pour le Mérite or "Blue Max", while flying the Eindecker, after each pilot passed the then-required eight victory total for each aviator.

The arrival in early 1916 of the French Nieuport 11 and the British Airco DH.2 brought the dominance of the Eindecker to an end, and with it, the "Fokker Scourge". Wintgens flew the E.IV version of the Eindecker long enough to have been confronted by the much more advanced SPAD S.VII fighter of French flying ace Alfred Heurteaux on 25 September 1916, which resulted in Heurteaux fatally bringing down Wintgens, as Huerteaux's victory number eight.