Search Results

In April 1919, the commanding officer of 6 Squadron, Major George Pirie, received orders to move his squadron from Gerpinnes in Belgium to Mesopotamia where it would support 30 Squadron in its peace-keeping duties over that region. Photographs recently came to light (courtesy of Mark Kent, grandson of Lt Ernest Kent who served with 6 Squadron and took the photographs) that were taken during the redeployment. The photographs give a rare pictorial insight into the processes and risks involved in moving a Royal Air Force squadron from one country to another. Pictured below is a photograph of a 6 Squadron Bristol Fb2 Fighter, taken in present day Iraq around 1920, after the squadron replaced its ageing RE8s with Bristol Fighters. For the full story and more photographs, select the Mesopotamia tab on the 6 Squadron menu.

A photo album taken by a photographer serving with 6 Squadron during WW1 has recently come to light after it was donated to Bungay Museum in Suffolk. Though I have yet to view the album, the Museum's curator, Chris Reeves, has permitted me to use any of the photographs contained in the album, so long as I acknowledge Bungay Museum as holding copyright. I have included her just two photos, the first being part of the front page and the second a rare photograph of a mobile photographic laboratory, used by 6 Squadron to process the plates taken by various aircrew members and print photographs of the targets to be used in artillery observation missions.

As part of the research process for my next book, I have come across a 6 Squadron observer who was wounded in action during WW1 but died from his injuries a year after the Armistice was signed. Because he died in a military hospital, his link to 6 Squadron was lost until now. Here is the story of what happened to 2nd Lt Frederick Charles Cook. On the afternoon of 30th August 1918, 2nd Lt B J McDonald and his observer 2nd Lt Frederick Charles Cook (a 2nd Lt in the Bedfordshire Regiment before transferring into the Royal Flying Corps, training as an observer and then being granted a temporary commission as 2nd Lieutenant Obs in the RAF on the 5th August 1918) set out from 6 Squadron’s base at Acq to conduct a Contact Patrol in RE8 Serial E8. The patrol that day was over an area between Gavel and Fontaine-les-Croisilles, a few miles to the west of Cambrai. At some point in the mission McDonald and Cook's RE8 came under attack from an enemy aircraft and they were shot down, with Lt McDonald killed and Lt Cook severely wounded in the back and head. Both men were listed as ‘Missing in Action’, believed dead, but Lt Cook was taken alive and made a prisoner of war by the Germans. After the Armistice (I have been unable to determine the date), Lt Cook was repatriated and shipped back home to the London Hospital for assessment and then transferred to the Empire Hospital in Westminster, a War Office hospital dedicated to the treatment of officers suffering from traumatic paraplegia and brain injuries caused by bullet and shrapnel wounds. There Frederick Cook remained without any improvement to his condition, until he died of Paraplegic Hepatitis on the 9th October 1919, just twenty-one years of age. His death occurred shortly before the Empire Hospital was closed down and transformed into the Grange Rochester Hotel, which exists to this day. Lieutenant Cook was laid to rest in the Luton General Cemetery, only two miles from his parents' home. Though Fredrick Cook's name is recorded on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission database as a Royal Air Force officer who gave his life for his country, there is no mention that he was serving with 6 Squadron at the time he suffered the injuries that eventually killed him.

One of my recent WW1 queries involved determining the exact location of Deimlingseck, where on the 31st July 1917 (the first day of the Battle for Passchendaele) a British RE8 crashed, killing both the pilot and observer. The bodies of the two men were never recovered as their aircraft came down behind the lines where the area was constantly bombarded by allied guns. Thanks to the help of Trevor Henshaw in England and Jerome Grosse in Belgium, the exact location of Deimlingseck is the intersection of Wervikstraat (N303) and Menenstraat (N8). close to the Belgian village of Gheluvelt. I have attached two images, one showing the WW1 map grid reference for the location - 28.J.30.c.01.80 - and the other the present day overhead satellite image courtesy of Google. For the story of why this location was named Deimlingseck by the German army during WW1, a good account can be found on the Aerodrome website.

I have completed the digitisation of 86 aerial photographs taken by 6 Squadron aircrew prior to the preliminary bombardment at Messines, after the bombardment and also subsequent to the Battle of Messines. In many cases, the location of specific enemy targets are marked on the photograph and I have added the GPS coordinates of these targets for anyone wishing to visit the locations in Belgium. Reproduced below is a typical example, showing the damage suffered by the village of Hollebeke as a result of the fighting at Messines.

This rare photograph of RE1 no: 608, assigned to 6 Squadron Royal Air Force in early 1914, came to light a couple of months ago and to my knowledge is the only photograph in existence that shows the complete aircraft as well as its serial number