 The two pilots were reputed friends, and staged a mock pistol battle in the sky often labeled the first dogfight in history.Lamb purportedly joined the British military in World War I and transferred to the Royal Flying Corps as a sergeant pilot, supposedly becoming an ace with either five or eight victories.Lamb was interviewed by Arthur Howden Smith of the "New York Evening Post" about his claimed downing of a German Gotha bomber over Hainault Forest, in which his gunner was killed and he himself was shot.