9th August 1941

[antarmike]

British Fighter pilot (and Duxford big wing commander) Douglas Bader is shot down.

You either love him or hate him, (I have him down as an egotististical big head, who wasn't a particularly good Pilot, hated by most of the ground crew, but tht's just my opinion.)

 

Bader's pride prevents him admitting that he was shot down by an allied Spitfire in a friendly fire incident and chooses to invent a story of a Me109 Chewing his tail off!

 

He goes into German captivity, and is entertained for a day by German fighter pilots and Surprise Surprise, doesn't ask to me the pilot who shot him down (probably because Bader himself knows that pilot is safely back at his British airfield!)

Edited August 9, 2008 by antarmike

[Tony B]

I was lucky enough to meet him in the early seventies. He came over to one of the Jersey Aero Club displays. He was very patient with a couple of hero worshipping teenagers

[antarmike]

He was also a bit of a fibber...when the RAF took him back to fly in WW2 Bader claimed to have lost his flight log book but declared his hours flown at a high enough figure to allow him Officer status and associated privelidges.

 

Some time after the war his first log book came to light and it showed he did not have the flying hours he claimed when he was taken back and he wasn't eligible

[Tony B]

Mind you how many other people pulled stunts at that time? And how many oficial blind eyes were turned? To get through what he did, you can't nessecarilly be 'nice'. Yes, he got himself into problems with ego, but I must say I liked the man.

[antarmike]

He certainly had courage too.