Following on from our recent feature on Christmas 1944 in a POW Camp, here is the Archive’s farewell to 2022 and welcome to 2023, with another item from Albert East’s time in Stalag IVb: New …
Category: 97 Squadron
97 Squadron, heavy bombers
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New Year’s Eve, Stalag IVb, 1944/45
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Remembrance on Texel, Xmas Eve
Jan Nieuwenhuis sent the following message late yesterday: “Today late this afternoon, we again placed candle lights in front of all the war graves at the Texel War Cemetery…” With grateful thanks to Jan Nieuwenhuis …
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Season’s Greetings
See our new Feature Page: Christmas 1944 in a POW Camp To all our supporters and to everyone who has kindly donated information, documents, photographs and artefacts related to the Pathfinders this year, we wish …
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Remembrance: Black Thursday
This detail from a photograph shows part of the funeral procession for 405 Squadron members, mostly Canadians, who were buried on 22 December 1943 at Cambridge City Cemetery. At the rear are Bill Bessent (nearest …
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The Pathfinder Badge, post-war
When checking through the pages of our old website, in search of images of Pathfinders wearing their PFF badges post-war, I found one of Charles Owen, an outstanding pilot and captain with 97 Squadron in …
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Remembrance Day 2022
Remembering all the Pathfinders lost in the war, and those who survived but suffered from terrible memories in after-years, and all their friends and families. Image above: Remembrance scroll, sadly issued in many thousands, this …
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Princess Elizabeth and Ralph Saunders
We have just received this wonderful photograph, taken in 1945, after Ralph Saunders’ return from prisoner of war camp. Ralph was shot down on the Leipzig operation of 20/21 October 1943 when flying with the …
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PFF Squadrons in 5 Group
A question which comes up perennially about the Pathfinders is why some of them were flying with 5 Group as opposed to 8 Group (as the Pathfinders had become in early 1943) and why they …
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Princess Elizabeth and the Navigator
As one of our two contributions to the Jubilee celebrations, here is a picture of the Queen when she was still Princess Elizabeth. The RAF navigator who is fourth from her left is Flying Officer …
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Hit by Incendiaries over the Target: the true story of Brock Robertson’s DFC
Brock Robertson won his Distinguished Flying Cross for an operation to Hamburg on 24/25 July 1943, just over a month before his death. What the official citation for the award deliberately omitted to say was …