Leckie Private is dedicated to Air Marshall Robert Leckie CB, DSO, DSC, DFC, CD.
Robert Leckie was born in April 1890 at Glasgow, Scotland. He joined the Royal Naval Air Service in 1915, flying anti-submarine patrols over the North Sea. While flying a Curtiss H12 flying boat, Leckie downed a German zeppelin near Terschelling in May 1917 and downed a second zeppelin during a nighttime raid, thus becoming the only airman to be credited with downing 2 zeppelins. By the end of the war, Leckie was a Wing Commander in the RAF.
Between the wars, he was seconded to the Canadian Air Board, and oversaw the creation of air service throughout Canada. He later returned to the RAF, and by 1940 commanded the British Air Forces in the Mediterranean Sea. As the war expanded later that year, Leckie returned to Canada as Air Member for Training, the officer in charge of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan (BCATP). He transferred to the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1942. Promoted to Air Marshal in 1944, he was appointed Chief of the Air Staff, a position he held until 1947.
After his retirement from the RCAF, Leckie played an active role in the Air Cadet Movement. He died in Ottawa in March 1975.
