For the type and marque numbers of British aircraft I have used the format favoured by J. M. Bruce in his authoritative British Aeroplanes 1914–1918. Thus the Airco (de Havilland) 4 appears as the D.H.4, the Royal Aircraft Factory’s Blériot Experimental 2c as the B.E.2c.
The original Superintendent of the Royal Aircraft Factory, Mervyn O’Gorman, devised his own system for classifying the designs produced at Farnborough. The earliest nomenclature he used was based on pre-war foreign aircraft types, which at least made it clear that at that time Britain was not yet in the forefront of powered flight. It also showed that any design at the time could be considered experimental. According to this system ‘F.E.’ stood for Farman Experimental, after the ‘pusher’ type favoured by France’s Farman brothers, Maurice and Henri, which placed the engine behind the pilot. Thus any aircraft from Farnborough designated ‘F.E.’ would be a pusher type. Similarly, ‘tractor’ aircraft with the engine at the front would duly become ‘B.E.’ for Blériot Experimental, after the monoplane that had first flown the Channel. Any ‘canard’ types with the tail mounted at the front, such as the Wright brothers’ ‘Flyer’ or Santos Dumont’s aeroplane, would be named after Santos as ‘S.E.’. However, these early canard aircraft soon vanished from the skies and thereafter ‘S.E.’ came to stand for Scout Experimental. Eventually Farnborough would also come up with other denominations including ‘R.E.’ for Reconnaissance Experimental.
The German system of classification also used prefix letters to denote an aircraft’s type and function. B machines were unarmed observation aircraft; C machines were two-seaters for reconnaissance and escort duties with the observer/gunner in the rear seat; D were single-seat multi-winged scouts/fighters; E were single-seat monoplane fighters; G denoted bombers; and so on. The numerals used were Roman. Examples of the German style would therefore be Rumpler C.IV or Albatros D.III.
French aircraft, like most British aircraft from private companies, simply had their own type number, letter or name in any combination according to each manufacturer’s whim or system. Thus from the way they were styled it is impossible to guess the roles filled by the Hanriot HD.3, the Nieuport 28 or the Sopwith 3.F.2. Hippo.
In addition, most aircraft that saw service naturally acquired nicknames, whether derogatory, affectionate or just whimsical. This was true in every air force and has remained so ever since. Sopwith’s Biplane F.1 became known as the Camel from its earliest prototype days on account of the ‘hump’ caused by the breeches of its twin Vickers guns. Martinsyde’s G.102 was known to all in the RFC as the Elephant, probably because for a single-seat fighter it was an unusually large machine. On all sides there was no lack of aircraft with even less flattering names such as ‘Killer’, ‘Flaming Coffin’, ‘Spinning Doom’ or ‘Corkscrew’, partly in acknowledgement of an aircraft’s known tendency but also perhaps as a superstitious way of taming it by making light of it. ‘Flying Coffin’ (Fliegender Sarg, bara volante, etc.) has been a popular nickname for countless aircraft from WWI onwards. To both the Luftwaffe and the German press in the 1960s Lockheed’s F-104G Starfighter was known as the ‘Widowmaker’, whereas the Canadians knew it more wittily as the ‘Lawn Dart’. The more the danger increases, the blacker aircrew humour becomes.