How I Finally Became a Flight Lieutenant

Heroes Remember

How I Finally Became a Flight Lieutenant

Transcript

About the time we had the Americans there, I was leading the squadron as a sergeant pilot near the Alamein and I shot down an air plane and when we got back to base, the AOC was around visiting, Cunningham. And when he wanted to see the leader of the formation, the one that was a sergeant pilot, see, jeez he made an issue of this. He said, “Sargent pilots don’t lead RAF squadrons.” So, he wasn’t derogatory towards me I don’t think. But the next day, myself and my friend Cundy, who is still a sergeant too, went to have an interview for our commissions. And the Aussies had a house in Cairo, so it was quite simple: in a few days he got his commission, you know. He was commissioned and made a flight lieut, just like that, and he was a flight commander official, see. And I’m still sergeant pilot. Well, my commission, they were having trouble getting this through the Canadians. So, about, this would be September, about November/December, we’re now, we had advanced and we were up this place about Al Uqaylah see. Ajdabiya or one of those, south of Benghazi, and our CO who had been with us through the spring and the summer had gone back to have a rest you see. We had other CO’s. Another CO had returned to the squadron and he thought it would be a good idea to have, you know, two officers, two flight lieutenants. Cundy, Cundy has retired, you know, he’s finished his tour, so he’s out, you know. And they had these two Canadians there that were flight lieuts. They had a little experience, but not much. He thought it would be nice for them to be his flight commanders. Well, that’s the first time that I got upset with my CO and I said “Sir, well, it’s all very well. If you make them the flight commanders, then I would like to get posted cause,” I said, “there’s a Spitfire wing over there and I’d sure love to fly those Spitfires.” He didn’t like this much because I was sort of talking back to him, you know. But it worked, you see, the next day, the RAF commissioned me. And wait for the Canadian paper to come and made me a flight lieut. Same, well, the next day. So I got mine in the field too, like Cundy did.

Description

Mr. Edwards explains how he exerted some gentle pressure in order to be promoted to the rank of Flight Lieutenant, even though he was commanding squadrons.

James Francis Edwards

Mr. Edwards was born on a farm near Lockwood, Saskatchewan on June 5th 1921. His father, a First World War Veteran, kept horses until the depression forced him to move the family to Battleford where he became an insurance salesman. His mother had been a nurse during the First World War. In June 1940, Mr. Edwards enlisted in the Air Force. He was sent to the Brandon, Manitoba to do his Initial Training, then to Edmonton, Alberta for Flying School. After completing Flying School, Mr. Edwards was sent to overseas. He was assigned to 55 Operational Training Unit in Osworth, England where he flew Hurricanes. From there he was posted to Africa to take part in the Desert Campaign. Among many battles and operations, he took part in the El Alamein Battle (Egypt) and the Tunisian Campaign. In Egypt, he was promoted to Flight Lieutenant. After a period in Cairo running a gunnery school, he was called back to combat in Italy. There he fought in the Battle of Ortona and Anzio and he was given his own squadron, the RAF 274. He was shot down on his first flight as squadron commander. Surviving, he and his crew were sent back to England to take part in D-Day. He would also fight in Holland and Germany. In total, Mr. Edwards served two tours of duty, flying over 360 missions. He had more than 19 confirmed kills. After the war was over he returned to Canada and continued service with the air force retiring as a wing commander.

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