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Aviation History
1932
1932 - 0517.PDF
FLIGHT, MAY 27, 1932 THE RGYAJfiMR FORCE London Gazette, May 17, 1932. General Duties Branch The following Pilot Officers are promoted to rank of Flying Officer :— C. L. Monckton (Jan. 12) ; H. R. A. Edwards, J. M. Freeman, A. L. Holland (April 24) ; K. R. Warton (April 28). Sqdn. Ldr. A. Rowan is placed on half-pay list, Scale A (May 14) ; Air Commodore J. L. Forbes, C.B.E., is placed on retired list at his own request (May 13) ; Wing Commander W. R. Read, M.C., D.F.C., A.F.C., is placed on retired list at his own request (May 17) ; F./O. C. P. F. Alderson relinquishes his short service commn. on account of ill-health (May 16) ; F./O. G. Calvert is dismissed the Service by sentence of General Court Martial (May 13). Stores Branch. Flt.-Lt. N. Dainty is placed on retired list (May 16). ROYAL AIR FORCE RESERVE RESERVE OF AIR FORCE OFFICERS General Duties Branch Pilot Officer H. B. G. Michelmore is promoted to rank of Flying Officer (May 18) ; F./O. R. H. Giles relinquishes his commn. on completion of service (May 14). The commns. of the following Pilot Officers on probation are terminated on cessation of duty (April 22) :—J. R. McCready, T. G.'F. Mathers. SPECIAL RESERVE. Medical Branch. R, H. Vartan is granted a commn. as Flying Officer (April 19). ROYAL AIR FORCE INTELLIGENCE Appointments.—The following appointments in the Royal Air Force are notified :— General Duties Branch Squadron Leaders : F. J. Vincent, D.F.C , to H Q., Air Defence of Gt. Britain, Uxbridge, 14.5.32, for Personnel Staff duties vice Flt.-Lt H. J. Collins. D. W. Clappen, to School of Tech. Training (Men), Manston, 13.5.32, for Engi neer duties vice Sqd.-Ldr E. J. Cuckney, D.S.C. Flight Lieutenants : R. R. Nash, to R.A.F. Training Base, Leuchars, 26.4 32. G. Bartholomew, to R.A.F. Depot, Uxbridge, 9.5.32. R. B. Sutherland, D.F.C., to No. 10 (B) Sqdn., Boscombe Down, 5.5.32. J. F. Clark, to Central Flying School, Wittering, 30.4.32. E. E. Arnold, D.F.C., to No. 84 (B) Sqdn., Shaibah, Iraq, 6.5.32. H. Thomas, to No. 13 (A.C.) Sqdn., Netheravon, 5.5.32. G. N. J. Stanley-Turner, to R.A.F. Depot, Uxbridge, 5.5.32. L. R. W. Tillard, to No. 26 (A.C.) Sqdn., Catterick, 25.4.32. W. G. Woolliams, to No. 501 (B) Sqdn., Filton, 9.5.32. Flying Officers: A. J. Tunnard, to Central Flying School, Wittering, 18.4.32. G. F. Humphries, to No. 58 (B) Sqdn., Worthy Down, 3.5.32. D. G. Morris, to R.A.F. Base, Gosport, 5.5.32. E. J. Grade, to R.A.F. Base, Gos- port, 5.5.32. G. Francis (since promoted Flt.-Lt.), to H.Q., Coastal Area, Lee-on-the-Solent, 21.3.32. L. E. Chiswell, to School of Army Co-operation, Old Sarum, 2.5.32. Pilot Officer R. C. Gaskell, to R.A.F. Base, Gosport, 5.5.32, Medical Branch Flight Lieutenant E. K. Pritchard, to Station H.Q., Duxford, 9.5.32. Dental Branch Flight Lieutenant G. A. Ballantyne, D.F.C., to No. 1 School of Tech. Train ing (Apprentices), Halton, 12.5.32. Flying Officers : F. B. Sumerling, to H.Q., Coastal Area, Lee-on-Solent, 18.1.32. P. J. C. Keane, to R.A.F. Depot, Uxbridge, 12.5 32 Chaplains Branch Revd. H. F. Daniels, to H.Q., R.A.F., Middle East, Cairo, 6.5.32, for duty as Chaplain (Wesleyan). NAVAL APPOINTMENTS The following appointments have been made by the Admiralty :— PROMOTIONS LIEUTENANTS.—J. G. Farrant, W. S. Lea (F/O., R.A.F.), to rank of Lt.-Com. (seny. May 15). ROYAL AIR FORCE FLIGHT LIEUTENANTS : N. S. Allinson, to R.A.F. Depot (March 26) ; and G. R. M. Clifford, to R.A.F. Base, Gosport (April 27). FLYING OFFICERS : A. le R. S. Upton, to R.A.F. Depot (April 27) ; and W. K. Beisiegel, to Central Flying School (May 16). The Royal Air Force Memorial Fund The second meeting of the newly constituted Council of the above Fund was held at Iddesleigh House on May 18. Owing to R.A.F. Sports being held at various Headquarter Stations throughout the Kingdom, there was a small attendance of members of the Council. At the commencement of the proceed ings the Chairman welcomed to the Council the Revd. S. L. Clarke, M.A., Chaplain-in-Chief to the Royal Air Force. After the usual financial resolutions had been approved, the Chairman announced the resignation from the Council of Air Vice-Marshal C. A. H. Longcroft, C.B., and this resignation was accepted with very great regret, the Vice-Marshal having been practically a continuous member of the late Executive Committee since the Fund was started in 1919. The attention of the Council was drawn to the recent cleaning operations which took place at the R.A.F. War Memorial on the Victoria Embankment, and which work was carried out very excellently by Messrs. Vigor & Co., Ltd., of Poplar, EX. The Secretary informed the Council that 1,500 copies of the Annual Report of the Fund for 1931 were issued to all concerned in the early part of April last. The attention of the Council was also drawn to the fact that the R.A.F. Thirteenth Display would be held at Hendon on Saturday, June 25, next, and that tickets for boxes and the 10s. and 5s. enclosures could be purchased at the offices of the Fund, as well as at Hendon and through all Theatre Agencies. The next Meeting of the Council, as already fixed, will be held at the offices of the Fund on Wednesday, July 6, at 3 o'clock. R.A.F. Dinner Club THE 10th Annual Dinner of the R.A.F. Dinner Club will be held at 8.30 p.m., on Friday, June 24, at the Connaught Rooms. Membership of the club is open to all serving R.A.F. officers, and past officers of the R.A.F., R.F.C., or R.N.A.S. The Honorary Secretary is Flight-Lieut. W. M. Yool, Air Ministry, Kingsway, W.C.2, from whom particulars and forms of applica tion for membership can be obtained. FLIGHT LIEUTENANT F. G. GIBBONS THE tragic loss of Fit. Lt. Frank George Gibbons during the race organised by the Morning Post on Satur day, May 21, was one which came as a shock to his many friends. It would appear fairly certain that his death was due to his colliding with a tree while looking at his maps inside the cockpit, and was in no way caused by any defect in the " Spartan " three-seater he was flying at the time. He was a particularly likeable character, be sides being an outstanding expert as a pilot. He was one of those people about whom one never heard any gossip, and his likeable character is shown by the fact that although he was the best of companions at the kind of party which usually finishes an air meeting, he was equally at home spending an afternoon playing with young children. He first joined the R.F.C. in June, 1917, as an air mechanic (cadet), and gained his commission in Novem ber of the same year. He was gazetted as a Fit. Lt. on June 1, 1926, and won the D.F.C. for services in the field. Not only was he a very fine pilot of land aircraft, but also of flying boats. On January 5, 1931, he went to Calshot, and from there he was posted to No. 204 Flying Boat Squadron at Mountbatten, Plymouth, of which he was a member at the time of his death. He was a brilliant navi gator, and this form of race was one in which he was particularly interested. It is perhaps, therefore, some con solation to feel that if he himself could have had the choice, he would have undoubtedly have chosen to die when flying " flat-out " during such a race, in the manner he did. The funeral took place at Ipswich on Wednesday, May 25. He was 33 years of age and unmarried. MAJOR I. N. C. CLARKE WHEN returning from Londonderry on Sunday last, May 22, Maj. Irwin Napier Colin Clarke was killed when the " Desoutter " monoplane he was flying hit a rocky gorse-covered hillside at Stranraer ; his passenger, Mr. Ernest Victor Barton, a photographer on the staff of the Daily Sketch, also lost his life. It would appear that he lost his way in a dense fog and that the machine struck a knoll which caused it to somersault down the hillside for some distance. Both Maj. Clarke and Mr. Barton were thrown out of the machine some 40 yd. beyond it. Maj. Clarke was a director and the chief pilot of Personal Flying Services, Ltd., an independent air-taxi business which has been doing particularly well ferrying passengers to Le Touquet and all over Europe. While flying during the war he was awarded the D.F.C. " for conspicuous good work " as pilot of bombing planes, and later earned a Bar to the D.F.C. and was several times mentioned in dispatches. " Nobby " Clarke was a very fine pilot, and when doing Press work in his " Junkers " monoplane had often made some spectacular flights. It will be remem bered that he had extremely bad luck when returning from Abyssinia with Press photographs of the coronation of the King. He was well ahead of all the other aircraft, but was only beaten in the end by a severe bout of influenza. He had that great asset of being able to take things as they came and never being pessimistic, and we well re member one occasion when we went to Southampton with him to take delivery of a new " Sikorsky " amphibian for his business ; on arrival we found it at the bottom of the river owing to a severe gale the previous night. Most people would have taken this setback somewhat hardly, but not so " Nobby," and by the evening of the same day that machine was on the slipway ready to go into the works for overhaul on the following morning. His loss will be felt most keenly by that wide circle of society which used his aircraft for their trips to France, as his reputation for safe and careful pilotage under most diffi cult conditions was responsible for their conversion to aerial travel. The funeral will take place on Friday, May 27, a± 12 p.m., at Westminster Cemetery, Han well. 477
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