Originally Posted by
Monarch Man
Interesting point ORAC, my grandfather flew hurricanes in the battle France and later on after recovering from his wounds went on to fly typhoons and eventually tempests, he always said the same thing as well.
His favourite story, if memory serves correctly, revolved around either an NZ or Oz pilot who displayed all the aptitude of your average Vicky Pollard, he was however when in sight of the enemy utter fearless and ruthless and was a dead shot when it came to deflection shooting, I think I'm right that he was shot down by ground fire during an intruder mission and ended up making it to Switzerland and marrying a local maiden!
Ralph 'kid' Hofer is worth looking up. U.S. citizen, amateur boxer, joined the RCAF, flew fighters as a sergeant, joined the USAAF as a Flight Officer and was credited with a 109 on his first mission and in his short career he went on to become credited with 30 or so aircraft destroyed. Yet he wouldn't have achieved any of this as he wasn't a college graduate, so had the RCAF not taken him on, he couldn't have been a USAAF pilot. He gained a reputation as a bit of a maverick and his navigation was none too good. My favourite story about him was when his P47 formated on James Goodson and all Goodson could see in the cockpit, was Hofers Alsatian dog!