The end of August 1917 saw the arrival of new Fokker F.I triplanes at Courtrai. Richthofen and Voss were among the first to take them into combat. Trading in the Albatros D.V for what would become his most famous mount, Richthofen shot down his 60th plane, an RE-8, on September 1, 1917. It was the last victory he could commemorate with a trophy cup. Silver was becoming scarce in Germany, and Richthofen was forced to discontinue this practice.

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The victories he scored after his return to duty failed to inspire Richthofen. After his head wound, he lost much of his zest for combat, and his friends noticed a distinct change in his personality. Already a loner, he became even more withdrawn. Killing was no longer the sport it once had been for him. On September 6, still troubled by his head wound, Richthofen took a period of convalescence to recover more fully. In his absence, his first triplane mount was shot down on September 15, as Kurt Wolff piloted it against a squadron of Sopwith Camels. Voss also met his end in another Fokker F.I during an epic battle on the day of his 48th victory, September 23, outnumbered by a swarm of S.E.5a fighters of No. 56 Squadron led by Major James TB. McCudden. But Richthofen was back at JG.1 on October 23, after visiting home, hunting, recuperating, and finishing writing about air combat in his autobiography.

He shot down a couple more planes on his return, once again flying an Albatros D.V. He then continued inspecting and testing other aircraft that might fare better than the Fokker triplane — whose safety and suitability in the face of new Allied fighters was already being questioned. Because of official noncombat duties and leave, Richthofen was not able to add to his score again until March 12, 1918, once more flying the Dr. 1, as the Fokker triplane was now designated. Between then and April 20, Richthofen downed his last 16 planes, mostly fighters. The final two victories, Sopwith Camels of No. 3 Squadron, came after the Flying Circus was moved to desolate Cappy.

Richthofen led his flight of triplanes to search for British observation aircraft on the morning of Sunday, April 21, 1918. Four triplanes from Jasta 5 were fired on from the ground around 10:30 a.m., after attacking two R.E.8s from No. 3 Squadron, Australian Flying Corps. The antiaircraft fire drew the attention of a flight of Sopwith Camels led by Canadian Royal Air Force pilot Captain Arthur Roy Brown from No. 209 Squadron. Soon after the Camels intercepted and shot down one of the Jasta 5 planes, Richthofen’s flight joined in the battle.

On the fringe of the fight was Roy Brown’s friend Lieutenant Wilfred R. May, a fellow Canadian. May was a novice pilot, and this was his first offensive patrol. He had been ordered to keep out of combat, but he could not resist going after an enemy triplane that passed close by. He jammed his Vickers guns after firing them too long, and, defenseless, headed away from the battle toward the Somme Valley.

Richthofen, from above, spotted the lone plane breaking off and chose it for his next victim. Brown, seeing this chase unfolding a few thousand feet below him, dove to help his fellow airman. He realized that the lone Camel stood little chance with the red triplane hot on its tail. May, panicking and losing altitude, tried every wild maneuver he could think of to stay out of the Baron’s sights. It was only the unpredictability of the inexperienced pilot’s maneuvers that kept Richthofen from picking him off quickly with his probing bursts.

‘Richthofen was giving me burst after burst from his Spandau machine guns. The only thing that saved me was my awful flying. I didn’t know what I was doing,’ May would say later.

It was then, with Brown closing from behind, that Richthofen, usually a meticulous and disciplined fighter pilot, made a mistake and broke one of his own rules by following May too long, too far and too low into enemy territory. Two miles behind the Allied lines, as Brown caught up with Richthofen and fired, the chase passed over the machine-gun nests of the 53rd Battery, Australian Field Artillery. Sergeant C.D. Popkin opened fire with his Vickers, followed by gunners William Evans and Robert Buie, plus a number of riflemen.

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