Post by chris387 on May 8, 2020 4:53:54 GMT
Remembering VE Day, one of so many forgotten Heroes
Marmaduke ‘Pat’ Pattle, have you heard of him?
On this day in history, 20 April 1941, the most successful fighter pilot in RAF history was killed. And yet, you may not have heard of him. We don’t even know exactly how many enemy aircraft he shot down, but it may well be over 50. He did not participate in the Battle of Britain, as his battle was fought far away, in Egypt and in Greece.
His name was Marmaduke ‘Pat’ Pattle. Born in South Africa, he travelled to Britain to join the RAF. In 1937, Pattle received his wings and was soon posted to No. 80 Squadron based in Egypt. They did not fly the flashy state-of-the-art Supermarine Spitfire. That was reserved for home defence duties in Britain. Squadrons stationed in the Empire were often equipped with older material, bordering on obsolescence.
Pattle’s Squadron flew the Gloster Gladiator, a biplane fighter aircraft, resembling those of the First World War. Beside the double set of wings connected by struts and braces, it also had a non-retractable landing gear. This created a lot of drag which restricted its maximum speed to 250 mph (400 km/h), more than 100 mph slower than the Spitfire. It carried only four machine guns, half of the armament of the Spitfire or Hawker Hurricane. The only modern design feature was its enclosed cockpit, although this had little use in the warm Mediterranean.
For all its faults, the Gladiator was easy to fly and very manoeuvrable. It could turn and roll very fast. In the hands of a capable pilot, it could prove a worthy opponent to anyone daring to contest it in a dogfight. And capable is exactly what ‘Pat’ Pattle was. He shot his first aircraft down on 4 August 1940. The opponent was the Italian Royal Air Force of Benito Mussolini. Their main fighter aircraft was a biplane quite like the Gladiator, the Fiat CR.42. Pattle’s superior flying capabilities, aggressive manoeuvres, refined tactics and excellent marksmanship resulted in many victories over his Italian opponents. By February 1941, after half a year flying the Gladiator, he had shot down 15 Italian aircraft, possibly more though unconfirmed.
No. 80 Squadron had since November been stationed in Greece to stop the Italian invasion there, converted to the Hawker Hurricane, a modern monoplane fighter. As the Spitfire was still restricted to Home Defence, the Hurricane was gradually sent to the operational squadrons elsewhere.
It is also around this time that famous writer Roald Dahl (Yes the writer) arrived in Greece. He was a new pilot and was immediately impressed by his Squadron Leader. ‘Pat Pattle was a legend in the RAF. He was far and away the greatest fighter ace the Middle East was ever to see, with an astronomical number of victories to his credit. He was a very small man and very soft-spoken, and he possessed the deeply wrinkled doleful face of a cat who knew that all nine of its lives had already been used up’
And yet Dahl knew that things in Greece were coming to a head. ‘To some extent I was aware of the military mess I had flown in to. I knew that a small British Expeditionary Force, backed up by an equally small air force, had been sent to Greece from Egypt a few months earlier to hold back the Italian invaders, and so long as it was only the Italians they were up against, they had been able to cope. But once the Germans decided to take over, the situation immediately became hopeless.’
Indeed, the German Luftwaffe soon came to the aid of the struggling Italians. While their Panzers moved into Greece, modern German fighter and bomber aircraft entered the fray from the air. Pattle was not deterred. On 6 April 1941, the day of the German invasion, he shot down two Messerschmitt Me 109s, the best fighter aircraft of the Axis. Over the next two weeks he brought down as astounding number of enemy aircraft. At least further 24 are confirmed, but sadly most records were destroyed during the war, so the number may have been even higher.
But things were to come to a crashing end. All remaining Hurricanes were ordered to take off and fly a patrol over Athens. Roald Dahl wrote about this day in his book ‘Going Solo’. ‘On that morning of 20 April 1941, Flight-Lieutenant Marmaduke Pattle, the ace of aces, who was leading our formation of twelve Hurricanes over Athens, was evidently assuming that we could all fly as brilliantly as he could, and he led us one hell of a dance around the skies above the city.
Suddenly the whole sky around us seemed to explode with German fighters. They came down on us from high above, not only 109s but also the twin-engine 110s. Watchers on the ground say that there cannot have been fewer than 200 of them around us that morning. They got five of our twelve Hurricanes in that battle. Among the dead was the great Pat Pattle, all his lucky lives used up at last.”
It is only now recognised (70 plus years after the end of WW2) that Marmaduke ‘Pat’ Pattle was the number one RAF fighter ace of all time with 50 to 70 confirmed and unconfirmed victories, why was he forgotten? and why was his highest medal award the DFC? This British / Commonwealth, Royal Air Force Ace of Aces had a short career as a fighter pilot (8 months from his first to his last kill) and paid the highest price a person could pay for his country and has remained forgotten for far to long......lest we forget.
Marmaduke ‘Pat’ Pattle, have you heard of him?On this day in history, 20 April 1941, the most successful fighter pilot in RAF history was killed. And yet, you may not have heard of him. We don’t even know exactly how many enemy aircraft he shot down, but it may well be over 50. He did not participate in the Battle of Britain, as his battle was fought far away, in Egypt and in Greece.
His name was Marmaduke ‘Pat’ Pattle. Born in South Africa, he travelled to Britain to join the RAF. In 1937, Pattle received his wings and was soon posted to No. 80 Squadron based in Egypt. They did not fly the flashy state-of-the-art Supermarine Spitfire. That was reserved for home defence duties in Britain. Squadrons stationed in the Empire were often equipped with older material, bordering on obsolescence.
Pattle’s Squadron flew the Gloster Gladiator, a biplane fighter aircraft, resembling those of the First World War. Beside the double set of wings connected by struts and braces, it also had a non-retractable landing gear. This created a lot of drag which restricted its maximum speed to 250 mph (400 km/h), more than 100 mph slower than the Spitfire. It carried only four machine guns, half of the armament of the Spitfire or Hawker Hurricane. The only modern design feature was its enclosed cockpit, although this had little use in the warm Mediterranean.For all its faults, the Gladiator was easy to fly and very manoeuvrable. It could turn and roll very fast. In the hands of a capable pilot, it could prove a worthy opponent to anyone daring to contest it in a dogfight. And capable is exactly what ‘Pat’ Pattle was. He shot his first aircraft down on 4 August 1940. The opponent was the Italian Royal Air Force of Benito Mussolini. Their main fighter aircraft was a biplane quite like the Gladiator, the Fiat CR.42. Pattle’s superior flying capabilities, aggressive manoeuvres, refined tactics and excellent marksmanship resulted in many victories over his Italian opponents. By February 1941, after half a year flying the Gladiator, he had shot down 15 Italian aircraft, possibly more though unconfirmed.
No. 80 Squadron had since November been stationed in Greece to stop the Italian invasion there, converted to the Hawker Hurricane, a modern monoplane fighter. As the Spitfire was still restricted to Home Defence, the Hurricane was gradually sent to the operational squadrons elsewhere.It is also around this time that famous writer Roald Dahl (Yes the writer) arrived in Greece. He was a new pilot and was immediately impressed by his Squadron Leader. ‘Pat Pattle was a legend in the RAF. He was far and away the greatest fighter ace the Middle East was ever to see, with an astronomical number of victories to his credit. He was a very small man and very soft-spoken, and he possessed the deeply wrinkled doleful face of a cat who knew that all nine of its lives had already been used up’
And yet Dahl knew that things in Greece were coming to a head. ‘To some extent I was aware of the military mess I had flown in to. I knew that a small British Expeditionary Force, backed up by an equally small air force, had been sent to Greece from Egypt a few months earlier to hold back the Italian invaders, and so long as it was only the Italians they were up against, they had been able to cope. But once the Germans decided to take over, the situation immediately became hopeless.’
Indeed, the German Luftwaffe soon came to the aid of the struggling Italians. While their Panzers moved into Greece, modern German fighter and bomber aircraft entered the fray from the air. Pattle was not deterred. On 6 April 1941, the day of the German invasion, he shot down two Messerschmitt Me 109s, the best fighter aircraft of the Axis. Over the next two weeks he brought down as astounding number of enemy aircraft. At least further 24 are confirmed, but sadly most records were destroyed during the war, so the number may have been even higher.
But things were to come to a crashing end. All remaining Hurricanes were ordered to take off and fly a patrol over Athens. Roald Dahl wrote about this day in his book ‘Going Solo’. ‘On that morning of 20 April 1941, Flight-Lieutenant Marmaduke Pattle, the ace of aces, who was leading our formation of twelve Hurricanes over Athens, was evidently assuming that we could all fly as brilliantly as he could, and he led us one hell of a dance around the skies above the city.
Suddenly the whole sky around us seemed to explode with German fighters. They came down on us from high above, not only 109s but also the twin-engine 110s. Watchers on the ground say that there cannot have been fewer than 200 of them around us that morning. They got five of our twelve Hurricanes in that battle. Among the dead was the great Pat Pattle, all his lucky lives used up at last.”
It is only now recognised (70 plus years after the end of WW2) that Marmaduke ‘Pat’ Pattle was the number one RAF fighter ace of all time with 50 to 70 confirmed and unconfirmed victories, why was he forgotten? and why was his highest medal award the DFC? This British / Commonwealth, Royal Air Force Ace of Aces had a short career as a fighter pilot (8 months from his first to his last kill) and paid the highest price a person could pay for his country and has remained forgotten for far to long......lest we forget.
