Alternate Biggles History
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Alternate Biggles History: If Any Other Member Of 666 Had Joined The Biggles Team

I know we've gone over all the "why Bertie" topics, and I'm not disparaging Bertie in any way here, but I was just interested as to which other member of 666 do you think had the potential to join Biggles' team? Which do you think would have been the most interesting addition?

Frankly, I can't help but feel that Tug would have been the most natural choice, after "slightly posh" Biggles and the "Honorable" Algy. Tug was put into the squadron to show that people from different backgrounds and classes were joining in to fight the war (and how this sometimes caused conflict--note how Tug tries to pick a fight with Bertie the first time he walks into the mess), so it would make sense to put someone like him into the team. In fact, with Bertie being a Lord, Algy an Honorable, and Biggles related to Algy and possibly having other titled relations, Ginger is the only member of the team to represent the working classes (a lot of whom bought and read Biggles books).

Angus is a bit too much like Algy--rebellious and impulsive. The same goes for Taffy, who seems a bit too accident-prone to be true. Tex and Ferocity are such good friends that no doubt they went off and did their own thing after the war. Henry in the later WWII books feels a lot like a mini-Ginger....

Alternate Biggles History: If Biggles Did Not Become A Policeman

Remember how Biggles and his friends were sitting around in their empty squadron office discussing what they should do and how life will be boring if they fly for fun and can’t shoot anything? And then remember how Raymond showed up and offered Biggles a job as an air policeman? And then remember how Biggles went on to go on loads of adventures and made Algy stay home and man the phones and guard the planes?

But what if Raymond hadn’t come along to offer Biggles a job? Would Biggles have been happy doing some sort of civil flying gig, sort of modern day Charter Pilot? Would he be doing some of those aerial display shows? Is there such a thing as professional plane racing?

(Oddly, it’s just occurred to me to wonder what Biggles was doing post-WWI when all those trans-Atlantic flights were going on? Being a pilot and with Algy at his side, surely he would have at least attempted such a flight? *new fic idea lightbulb*)

What do you think Biggles and the others would have done post-WWII if they hadn’t become policemen? 

Alternate Biggles History: If Ginger Had Done The Married Thing

We have to remember that Biggles and Marie are not the only great romance of the Biggles series. Another, almost as famous couple, are Ginger and Jeanette.

It is Jeanette who nurses Ginger back to health, and it is also Jeanette that Ginger goes on and on about  for the latter half of the book Fails to Return. Algy is inclined to be good-naturedly amused by the whole thing, but Bertie is somewhat annoyed. "Is this a romance or a rescue?" he demands of Ginger. And later, "I don't hold with all these women in the party," he declares, before sharing a story of a fellow pilot who walked into an airscrew because he was looking at a girl. (Really, Bertie! You're letting all your fangirls down!)

The book ends with Ginger and Jeanette spending some time together "walking and swimming" (at least there are no stone benches!), and after that--nothing. Jeanette is never heard of again. Did the two have a falling out? Did they find they had nothing in common and simply drift apart? Or perhaps something along the lines of "Ginger Married" happened?

What would have happened had Ginger married Jeanette?  The war was still on, so it is unlikely that Ginger would have left the squadron to start a family or anything like that. After the war ended, he wouldn't be hanging around waiting to become an air policeman--he would have gone home to be with Jeanette. Would Biggles and Algy be the godparents of his children? What kind of job would Ginger work in to support his family?

I see multiple fics brewing....

Alternate Biggles History: Charles Bigglesworth

We know so little about Biggles’ older brother that it’s a wonder Johns decided to give him one in the first place! Charles appears to be roughly three years older than James, had already left school to join the army when James went to school, and died in 1917.

Would things have been different for Biggles had his older brother survived the war?

For starters, I don’t know that James was all that close with Charles. There is no mention of him in Biggles the Boy, so presumably when Biggles was in India getting recurring bouts of fever his brother was in England attending school. Once Biggles got to school, Charles of course was no longer there, having left to join the army. Any communication between the two would have been through letters (and we all know how much young boys like to write letters!) Certainly it seems unlikely that Biggles and his brother would have the close relationship of the Fortymore brothers from The Rescue Flight.

However, upon his return to London in Pioneer Air Fighter Biggles’ first move is to attempt to find out where his father and brother are, so one would suppose that they did at least get on.

Did Biggles idolize his older brother? (If he did, why did he choose to become a pilot rather than join his brother?) Would they have gone on adventures together, with or without Algy? Was Johns worried that the presence of an older sibling would detract from Biggles’ greatness?

Alternate Biggles History: If Biggles Had Never Found Out

It pains me to write this one, but here goes: how would history have been altered if Biggles had never found out that Marie was a German spy?

Biggles Looks Back
Image from Yet Another Biggles Site
Well, to begin with, Algy and the rest of 266 would be buried under the weight of several bombs, so it would be unlikely that any of them would have been best man at Biggles’ wedding.

Would Biggles and Marie have eloped? Possibly. I don’t see Biggles leaving the RFC for her (although with Algy and the rest of his friends gone he might feel so heartbroken that it’s possible. Evil woman!! Bet that was her plan all along!!)

Let’s go a little deeper. What if Biggles had never offered to deliver the fatal letter to Marie’s “father”? Would she have lost interest in him and found some excuse to break it off? Or was she as infatuated with him as he was with her? I personally find it unlikely that a woman in love would have asked her beloved to deliver a death-trap letter, but then again, people have strange ways of showing their affection. She did write that letter asking him to meet her, however, so maybe she did kind of like him (or liked having someone to wrap around her little finger).

If Biggles had not delivered the letter and 266 had remained intact, I feel that Biggles would have remained completely and utterly in love with Marie. (Because she was basically the first girl he’d ever really seen in his entire life, and also because, as we all know, Biggles can be an idiot where women are concerned.) Would he have secretly married her? I’m not sure about this one, because on the one hand I feel like Biggles would want to seize the moment, but on the other hand he knew the risks of being a war pilot and would feel uncomfortable with marrying a woman who might at any second become a widow.

And what on earth was Algy doing when Biggles was hanging around moonlit courtyards and stone benches?!! Why didn’t he recognize Marie for the evil monster she was and just hit her with something extremely lethal and hard? 

Alternate Biggles History: Who Would Be The Best Friend?

This really isn’t the best topic for an Algy blog, but who do you think would have ended up as Biggles’ best friend if Algy had never been posted to 266? (I know, I know, it really doesn’t bear thinking about, but this is Alternate Biggles History, where we speculate on the things that might have been.)

Image from algylacey.0catch.com
To begin with, I think there’s no doubt that Smyth would have joined Biggles on many of his inter-war adventures, anyway, as Biggles needed a mechanic. But I don’t see Smyth and Biggles as best friends. I get the feeling that Biggles didn’t really think as Smyth as an equal.

Mahoney, Mac, and Wilks are all close friends of Biggles’ in WWI, but I doubt that they would have won the best friend award either. Mahoney and Mac are clearly older and more experienced than Biggles in the matter of flying. And Wilks, though an equal, would never put himself in the position of quietly taking orders from Biggles—he baulks at the way Biggles runs his station in Sergeant Bigglesworth, CID, and complains that it has taken him twenty years to reach his current rank in the RAF. Similarly, in Biggles Flies North, he doesn’t write to Biggles until he has lost all his men and things get really desperate. He was probably embarrassed that he had to ask for help! (Incidentally, didn’t Wilks have any friends in 287 who could have flown to his rescue in that book? Odd.)

Mark Way would have made a great best friend, but sadly it would have been hard for him to become a pilot with his injuries (*sniff sniff* I’m a big Mark fan; sorry). Although, again, he is somewhat more experienced in war flying than Biggles is, so I don’t see him as someone who would stand by and take orders from Biggles. In fact, in Biggles Learns to Fly, Biggles finds himself following a lot of Mark’s orders in order to stay alive.

Still love you though, Mark. ♥

If we’re looking for someone who learned to fly from Biggles, the Professor sounds like a good fit, except he, um, died…Thirty and Rip from Rescue Flight would also be ideal, but they seem to have their own Biggles-Algy type relationship there, so it’s hard to say how they would react to adventuring around the world with Biggles.

Would Biggles have been all right knocking around the world with only Smyth and no best friend until Ginger came along in Black Peril? (Yes, yes, Algy fans. Put your machine guns down. We’re only speculating here.)

Even assuming that Biggles had the best luck in the world and managed to stay alive through all of the dogfights, and the post-Marie drinking, and the post-Marie I’m-looking-for-trouble dogfights (come on, did you really think that Algy was staying behind all those times that Biggles went looking for trouble?), it’s hard to imagine that he could have survived through the entire Flies Again era, the Cruise of the Condor, and all the other countless untold stories without someone to help him.

So, yes. Biggles needed a best friend to get him through WWI, and all the times after that. And there is no one more perfect for the position than Algy, who is forever loyal, good-humored, and steadfast. 

Alternate Biggles History: What Would Have Happened To Ginger?

What would have happened to Ginger if he had never run into Biggles and Algy in The Black Peril?

Well, to begin with, he would have been walking for a long, long time (especially if he actually did set out from Yorkshire and was trying to walk to London through Newcastle). Having little or no money on him, he would have no doubt done quite a lot more "food finding" along the way, which would likely have resulted in an arrest sooner or later.

Wearing rags he would have been unlikely to get commissioned into the Royal Air Force, which I believe was his first port of call:
"'What are you going to London for?'
'To join the Royal Air Force. If they won't have me, I'm going to Heath Row to watch the air-liners.'"
--Biggles and the Black Peril

Is "watch" another Ginger-word for "steal"? I wouldn't put it past him!

Either way, I don't see any way that Ginger's life would have been better for not meeting Biggles and Algy. I can think of dozens of scenarios where the inevitable ending is Ginger getting arrested and thrown into jail for being too clever for his own good.
© The Algy Chronicles
Maira Gall