Back in the ‘70s Pilot Magazine in the UK ran a couple of great series of articles (think I’ve still got them all up in my loft somewhere). One was by (forgive me if I get it wrong – trying to give up Google) – E Nesbit Dufort – all about passenger flying in the years after WWII. The other (memory triggered by your pic Slash) was by a Polish Count (Zichy?) about the Areo Club scene in the ‘30s and I’m sure the Great God PC wouldn’t let them publish the articles now! Basically, the guys with a private income would fly to a different airfield each day, get totally smashed in the bar and then re-group by their Moths to decide who was the least inebriated. Using the Colonial patois of the time, the soberest chap became the ‘Wallah’ and the rest of them played ‘Foller The Wallah Back Home’.
Spirit than won the Battle of Britain or just a bunch of rich reprobates?