James ‘Stocky’ Edwards
Canadian fighter pilot ace who applied his duck-shooting skills to destroying enemy aircraft
WING COMMANDER JAMES “STOCKY” EDWARDS, who has died aged 100, is thought to be Canada’s last surviving fighter ace of the Second World War, having been credited with the destruction of at least 19 enemy aircraft, the third highest by a Canadian.
Edwards was posted to the Middle East in late 1941 and the following January he joined 94 Squadron as a flight sergeant. The squadron was exchanging its Hurricanes for the Us-built P-40 Kittyhawk, a heavy fighter that performed better than the early Hurricanes but worse than the Messerschmitt Bf 109. That Edwards was able to get round the Kittyhawk’s shortcomings was a measure of his skill.
On March 2 he was escorting Boston light bombers to the well-defended airfield at Martuba in eastern Libya when enemy fighters appeared. He attacked them and shot down a Messerschmitt Bf 109. This was his first operational mission – a sign of his rare natural ability. Two weeks later he downed another Bf 109.
Reflecting on what made a fighter pilot, Edwards later said: “Not everyone is aggressive enough. You had to be a certain type.” But those qualities might only become clear in the air: “You had to go up on a flight with him and see.”
Edwards had first honed his marksman skills as a youngster shooting duck with his father on the Canadian prairie. He used to tell his friend Dave Mellin that “he was very fortunate as a fighter pilot because he understood to lead his target – not shoot at it, but lead the target.”
In May 1942, having suffered very heavy losses, the squadron was withdrawn to regroup; Edwards was one of four pilots transferred to 260 Squadron. Throughout 1942 he saw a great deal of action in the Western Desert.
On June 17, during heavy fighting at the Battle of Gazala around Tobruk, Edwards was in a fighter force escorting Boston bombers to attack German positions when they were attacked by Bf 109s. After a fierce fight, Edwards shot one down and it crashed.
As he was leaving the scene, he spotted a lone Bf 109 at low level. It turned out to be the Luftwaffe Experten (“ace”) Oberleutnant Otto Schulz, who had just shot a Hurricane down and was strafing the wreckage. As Schulz took the risk of making a second pass, Edwards closed in, got the deflection for his shooting right (leading the target, in other words) and opened fire, sending the Bf 109 crashing into the desert.
On returning to base, Edwards, a modest man, was concerned at the reception such a story, related without witnesses, would receive, so he claimed a “probably” destroyed. In the event, the Hurricane pilot, who had survived his crash landing, could confirm the attack: he had noted the letters on the side of Edwards’s Kittyhawk as it departed.
By November Edwards had shot down six enemy fighters, eight others probably destroyed and a number damaged. Although still a flight sergeant, he led the squadron into action several times. By the end of the year he had been commissioned, and a few weeks later it was announced that he also had been awarded the DFM for “his outstanding coolness and courage.”
Four days later it was announced that he had been awarded the DFC, by which time he had been credited with destroying eight aircraft.
Just as the publication of Edwards’s decorations had been slow catching up with the pace of his successes in the air, so his promotions had also been slow to be announced. He was promoted from flight sergeant to flight lieutenant in a matter of weeks.
During a visit to 260 Squadron in the desert, an RCAF air vice-marshal commented: “Edwards is a grand little fellow with a broad smile.” He went on to say: “His score is all the more remarkable because he had piled it up in a Kittyhawk, a slower machine than the Messerschmitts he was up against.”
Edwards was finally rested on May 20 1943, the day the Germans were defeated in Tunisia. He had by now shot down 13 fighters in the air and destroyed another nine aircraft on the ground during strafing attacks. He often underclaimed – he always had to be absolutely sure. Postwar records suggest that he may have destroyed more. He was undoubtedly Canada’s most successful pilot in the Western Desert campaign.
James Francis Edwards was born in June 5 1921 in Nokomis, Saskatchewan, and grew up in Battleford, where he was educated at St Thomas College. On leaving school he immediately volunteered for the Royal Canadian Air Force and in October 1940 he started training to be a pilot. He earned the nickname “Stocky” for his toughness in difficult moments despite his small stature, and the name stuck.
After completing his tour with 260 Squadron in May 1943, Edwards became a gunnery instructor until November, when he joined 417 Squadron RCAF, flying the latest Spitfire type on the Italian front. A month later he was appointed as a flight commander on 92 Squadron. He gained further successes over the Anzio beachhead in February 1944.
On the 16th, when the fighting reaching a climax as the Germans launched a counterattack against the Allied landings, he shot down a Focke-wulf 19. Three days later he destroyed two more and damaged a third during a day which saw an upsurge in Luftwaffe activity.
In March 1944 he took command of 274 Squadron and a month later the squadron returned to England to re-equip with the Spitfire IX. He began operations in May and led bomber escort missions during the build-up to the D-day landings.
On the day the Allied forces went ashore in Normandy, he made three patrols over the beachhead without meeting any opposition. In August the squadron started operations with the Hawker Tempest, and he flew seven missions chasing V-1 flying bombs at low level before he left for Canada on leave. In October he was awarded a Bar to his DFC, for “inspiring and courageous leadership.”
Edwards returned to Europe in March 1945, when he was promoted to wing commander and appointed to lead 127 Wing, part of the Second Tactical Air Force, operating from airfields in the Netherlands.
Flying a Spitfire XVI, with the American Packard Merlin engine, he had time to make three more claims, which included damaging one of the Luftwaffe’s formidable new jet fighters (the world’s first), the Messerschmitt 262. Two days before the end of the war, he shared in the destruction of a Junkers Ju 88 bomber. He was Mentioned in Despatches.
By the end of the war he had flown 373 operational sorties without being shot down by the enemy. He returned to Canada in August 1945 and decided to remain in the RCAF, reverting to the rank of flight lieutenant.
Postwar, Edwards became a flying instructor on the Vampire jet and served in RCAF search and rescue organisation, flying Lancasters and the Canso flying boat. In November 1951 he was posted to North Bay to form and command 430 Squadron, the first RCAF squadron to be equipped with the North American Sabre jet fighter.
In October 1952, he was promoted to wing commander in command of No2 RCAF (Fighter) Wing flying Sabres from Grostenquin in France. After returning to Canada and attending the Staff College, he served in the USAF Air Defences HQ in Colorado Springs.
This heralded a series of appointments associated with the air defence of North America. He flew the CF-100 all-weather fighter, and served as deputy operations officer of the 41st Air Division. In 1966 he returned to Colorado Springs to take over as plans officer.
Under the Canadian Forces unification program he became Lieutenant-colonel Edwards, and his final posting was in command of Canadian Forces Station, Baldy Hughes, an air-defence early-warning radar station in central British Columbia. He retired in 1972 and took up residence on Vancouver Island.
Edwards dedicated much of his spare time to conservation projects, including wetlands preservation. In collaboration with Michel Lavigne, he published his autobiography, Kittyhawk Pilot, in 1983.
He was a Member of the Order of Canada and, in 2014, the French government appointed him to the Legion of Honour. In 2009 he was named as one of the 100 most influential Canadians in aviation.
In a tribute in 2012, the Canadian historian Dave O’malley said that during the war, Wing Commander Edwards “went from greenhorn to respected commander, from prairie boy to legend”.
Stocky Edwards’s first wife, Norma, and a daughter predeceased him; he is survived by his second wife, Toni, a son and two daughters.
“Stocky” Edwards, born June 5 1921, died May 14 2022