The Story of Canada's forgotten Spitfire ace...

Discussion in 'The War In The Air' started by Adam Cotton, Jul 20, 2020.

  1. Adam Cotton

    Adam Cotton Member

    17thDYRCH likes this.
  2. Adam Cotton

    Adam Cotton Member

    As anyone with more than a passing interest in the air war over Europe during the Second World War will know, May 1943 saw the media spotlight turned on the RAF’s premier fighter station at Biggin Hill, in Kent. The press and radio, representatives of which had been hovering around the airfield for days, eagerly anticipated the shooting down of the one thousandth enemy aircraft to fall to the guns of Biggin based squadrons since the start of the war. The short, sharp combats that allowed them to finally report that the milestone had been achieved occurred on the 15th of that month and briefly turned the two Biggin based Spitfire pilots responsible into minor celebrities.
    There is a series of oft reproduced propaganda photographs showing these two men (ostensibly in the immediate aftermath of the action), one of them a Free French pilot, the other a Canadian, heartily shaking hands in mutual congratulations in front of a parked Spitfire. They were 29-year-old Cmdte. Rene Mouchotte of the Free French Air Force, and 24-year-old Sqn/Ldr Jack Charles of the RAF. The latter had shot down a pair of Focke-Wulf 190s in rapid succession that afternoon, while Mouchotte was simultaneously despatching his single victim. Such was the propinquity of the combats, however, that it was impossible to determine who had actually destroyed the thousandth, so the pilots amicably agreed to share the honour and divide the hefty raffle purse of £300 between them.
    But the tale of those combats has been recounted many times before. Almost as common in the telling is the story of Mouchotte himself, which first came to the public’s attention with the posthumous publication of the Frenchman’s wartime diaries in the 1950s and which is, arguably, the stuff of legends. Conversely, his Canadian counterpart in the action of May 15, 1943, kept no written journal of his wartime exploits, and has received relatively little attention from historians. The reasons for this are debatable, though it may in part be that, at a time when Britain was famished for encouraging war news, the whole drama and his principal role in it was simply eclipsed in public consciousness by the even greater success of the “Dambusters” raid just 48 hours later. Even so, here was a pilot for whom this escapade was merely incidental in a career characterised by spectacular and determined successes, both prior to and subsequent to the event. Equally, his is a story of a tragic metamorphosis as much as it is one of Spartan heroism in the air.
    It is, unquestionably, a story that needs to be told.

    Anyone who wants to read more, please follow this link -
    https://www.amazon.co.uk/Jack-Edwar...d+Edward&qid=1595250508&s=digital-text&sr=1-2
     
  3. SMF144

    SMF144 Member

    Hi Adam, I am intrigued by your statement that he is largely unknown. In what context?

    Stephen
     
  4. Adam Cotton

    Adam Cotton Member

    Hi Stephen,

    He is largely unknown in the sense that most members of the public haven't heard of him, whereas they HAVE heard of people like Bader and Tuck and other leading aces, even though their operational careers were, in many cases, shorter.

    Jack Charles will be known to anyone with an interest in RAF day fighter operations in WW2, but that's about it. Much as I say in my intro, above...

    Adam
     
  5. 17thDYRCH

    17thDYRCH Senior Member

    Adam
    I am a Canadian.
    I see the amazon edition is only via Kindle. Where can I order a paper book?
    Thanks in Advance.
     
  6. Adam Cotton

    Adam Cotton Member

    Hi

    Thank you for your interest.

    Unfortunately, the book is available only as an eBook or as an audiobook at present.

    Adam
     

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