gekkogecko
12-10-2019, 05:18 AM
One of Churchill's 'few':
Flight Lieutenant Maurice "Mark" Hewlett Mounsdon (11 February 1918 – 6 December 2019) was a pilot who flew with the Royal Air Force in World War II. He started training on 24 August 1939 and joined 56 Squadron on 3 June 1940 during the Battle of Britain. He flew a Hurricane and shot down or damaged about seven German aircraft before he was himself shot down by German fighters over Colchester on 31 August 1940. He survived but was badly burned and so spent nine months in hospitals including Black Notley and the Queen Victoria Hospital – famous for its specialist work on burns and Guinea Pig Club.
While recovering, he served at the HQ at RAF North Weald. After the reconstructive surgery was complete, he was still rated below A1B "fit full flying" and so was posted as an instructor at RAF Bottisham and then as a flight commander at RAF Booker. When the war ended, he was posted to 8303 Disarmament Wing, searching Germany for advanced weaponry such as jets and rockets. After demobilisation in 1946, he returned to the engineering profession which he had started at the General Electric Company, specialising in inventions and patents such US 4029297 – "winches for use with high masts". When he retired in the 1970s, he went to live in Menorca with his wife Mary. The RAF display team, Red Arrows, came to the island in 2018 and performed a fly-past in honour of his 100th birthday.
Mounsdon died on 6 December 2019.
...and now the few have become one last vic:
Flt Lt William Clark, 100, Wing Commander Paul Farnes, 101, and Flying Officer John Hemingway, 100.
Flight Lieutenant Maurice "Mark" Hewlett Mounsdon (11 February 1918 – 6 December 2019) was a pilot who flew with the Royal Air Force in World War II. He started training on 24 August 1939 and joined 56 Squadron on 3 June 1940 during the Battle of Britain. He flew a Hurricane and shot down or damaged about seven German aircraft before he was himself shot down by German fighters over Colchester on 31 August 1940. He survived but was badly burned and so spent nine months in hospitals including Black Notley and the Queen Victoria Hospital – famous for its specialist work on burns and Guinea Pig Club.
While recovering, he served at the HQ at RAF North Weald. After the reconstructive surgery was complete, he was still rated below A1B "fit full flying" and so was posted as an instructor at RAF Bottisham and then as a flight commander at RAF Booker. When the war ended, he was posted to 8303 Disarmament Wing, searching Germany for advanced weaponry such as jets and rockets. After demobilisation in 1946, he returned to the engineering profession which he had started at the General Electric Company, specialising in inventions and patents such US 4029297 – "winches for use with high masts". When he retired in the 1970s, he went to live in Menorca with his wife Mary. The RAF display team, Red Arrows, came to the island in 2018 and performed a fly-past in honour of his 100th birthday.
Mounsdon died on 6 December 2019.
...and now the few have become one last vic:
Flt Lt William Clark, 100, Wing Commander Paul Farnes, 101, and Flying Officer John Hemingway, 100.