Up, up and away
As we celebrate its centenary, MARION McMULLEN looks at some of the famous names who have served with the RAF
WINSTON CHURCHILL famously paid tribute to the RAF in the Second World War saying “never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few”.
The Royal Air Force played a key role during the war including fighting the German Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain.
The service began 100 years ago in 1918 when the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service merged to counter German air raids over the Western Front during the First World War.
Many well-known names have served with the RAF over the years, including children’s author Roald Dahl of Charlie And The Chocolate Factory and The BFG fame.
The Welsh-born writer was a flying ace who rose to the rank of Wing Commander.
“I was a fighter pilot, flying Hurricanes all round the Mediterranean. I flew in the Western Desert of Libya, in Greece, in Syria, in Iraq and in Egypt,” he once explained.
He enlisted when he was 23 and suffered severe injuries in September, 1940, when his Gladiator plane crash-landed in the Western Desert. It took him six months to recover and he later returned to action to take part The Battle of Athens.
Roald later said: “I shot down some German planes and I got shot down myself, crashing in a burst of flames and crawling out, getting rescued by brave soldiers.”
Actor and director Richard Attenborough also joined the RAF during the Second World War and served in the newly formed film unit. He took part in several bombing missions over Europe filming the raids, but sustained permanent ear damage as a result. The Gandhi and Chaplin director once said: “I believe we need heroes, I believe we need certain people who we can measure our own shortcomings by.”
Comedian Tony Hancock also served with the RAF during the Second World War and Tomorrow’s World presenter Raymond Baxter trained as a fighter pilot in Canada and flew Supermarine Spitfires with No. 65 Squadron RAF in Britain. He was mentioned in dispatches when he later flew over Sicily with the No. 93 Squadron RAF and reached the rank of flight lieutenant by the time he was demobbed in 1946.
My Fair Lady film star Rex Harrison was also a flight lieutenant, as was Lord Of The Rings actor Christopher Lee. He trained on de Havilland Tiger Moths but his flying career was cut short when he began suffering from headaches and blurred vision and he applied to join RAF Intelligence. He later said: “I wasn’t a spy. I’d have been spotted in five seconds. Yes, I was in intelligence, but that covered a multitude of things.”
Peter Sellers also wanted to be a pilot, but poor eyesight meant he was restricted to ground duties and T E Lawrence, who found fame as Lawrence of Arabia, first enlisted as Aircraftman J.H. Ross and later as Aircraftman T E Shaw.
An Englishman Abroad and Women In Love actor Alan Bates did his National Service with the RAF as did entertainer Bruce Forsyth and photographer David Bailey, who bought his first camera while in Singapore. Brucie’s older brother John was a RAF pilot who was killed during a training exercise during the Second World War.
Welsh-born actor Richard Burton was a cadet in the Port Talbot Squadron 499 of the Air Training Corps section of the Royal Air Force and had plans to train as a pilot, but his eyesight was discovered to be too poor and he served as a navigator for three years instead.
Pam Ayres worked with the Women’s Royal Air Force before her poems brought her national fame and she won TV talent show Opportunity Knocks.
British film director Lewis Gilbert, responsible for movies such as Shirley Valentine, Alfie and James Bond movies such as You Only Live Twice, The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker, joined the RAF when the Second World War started and became friends with American director William Keighley, who made him his assistant director. Together they made Target For Today and other documentaries.
Keighley was also keen to take him back to Hollywood, but he refused as it was still wartime.
Lewis, who died earlier this year at the age of 97, went on to make several war films in the 1950s including Reach For the Sky, Carve Her Name With Pride, Sink the Bismarck and HMS Defiant.
The Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service each had around 100 aircraft, balloons and airships at the beginning of the First World War in 1914.
By the end of the four-year conflict, the first in which aviation played a major role, the RAF had 27,000 officers and 260,000 other personnel operating more than 22,000 aircraft, but had seen high casualty rates.
Heritage Minister Michael Ellis recently said: “From the pioneering pilots of the First World War, to the heroism of the Battle of Britain, the Royal Air Force has a proud and distinguished wartime history.
“As we mark its centenary, it is right that we remember the stories of the brave pilots and staff who served in defence of Britain.”