Brereton Greenhous, "The Making of Billy Bishop" (2002)

Greenhous has written a fascinating analysis of Bishop's war record, comparing the Canadian First World War aviator's claims about his battle successes against available Allied and German war records, personal correspondence by Bishop, his friends, and his military peers and superiors, to propose a significant falsification has become rooted into Canadian history.

Greenhous presents a compelling case to indicate that much of Bishop's record of kills may have been fabricated. To his credit, Greenhous establishes the compelling reasons which may have led many within the military to seek to create a 'hero', leading to the inflation or exaggeration of Bishop's exploits, as a propagandistic necessity. He supports this analysis with a careful and thorough assessment of documents that might be used to understand or clarify Bishop's claims. His work reveals many holes in Bishop's stories, as well as those offered by superiors to explain their recommendations for Bishop to be provided with honours, as well as occasional falsehoods.

I highly-recommended this book that will leave most readers shaking their heads at how our understanding of the history of almost century-old events can be so fundamentally shaken.