Welcome to RAF-in-Combat.com, the site dedicated to RAF and Commonwealth air forces during WW2. From 1940 onwards the RAF became the world’s first International Air Force with an increasing number of volunteers coming from the Dominions, the Colonies and from occupied European countries and neutral countries who wanted to fight against tyranny. During WW2, the RAF played a major role in the air war over most of the continents and seas.
Many of its aircraft were manned by mixed crews coming from all around the world. In June 1944, nearly 490 Squadrons were active under RAF command with the RAAF, RCAF, RIAF, RNZAF and SAAF providing for 100 of them. The other nationalities, Belgian, Czechoslovakian, Dutch, French, Greek, Norwegian, Polish and Yugoslavian, formed another fifty. Notes on the " Squadron " series
The aim of this series is to give an overview of each unit’s contribution to the war. Each booklet contains three parts :
1. A summary of its history which means that the reader will not find complete details of what the unit did during the war, but will still get a good account of the unit’s activities.
2. Appendices with a full list of all combat claims, operational and accidental losses (aircrew and aircraft), operational diary, maps and other useful information.
3. Full pilot (or aircrew) roster. As far as possible a list of all aircrew is included and their individual service is shown as far as such information is available. In so many publications, past and present, only those who distinguished themselves against the enemy, or because they became a casualty (killed or PoW), have been cited in the narrative history. However many thousands of pilots performed at least one full tour without being involved in any reportable incidents and we must keep in mind that they risked their lives almost every day, like any others, and were lucky to survive but were not able to demonstrate their skills against the enemy for a variety of reasons. It became clear to the team of authors that the least they could do was to list all known aircrew in the squadron concerned. |
