Royal Air Force Centenary - Reflecting on a life taken.
- HIGHCROFT WRITING
- Oct 12, 2018
- 3 min read
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is 100 years old. As the Air Force marks its centenary, some thoughts about family members who served in the RAF and those affected by that service.
Trigger Warning: The piece describes familial loss during active military service and times of war. Please consider your personal well being and safety before continuing further.
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I had a great uncle that I never had the chance to meet. A young milkman who became a flight sergeant because of the Second World War. A proud smiling face on my mantelpiece and a life shot down over the Netherlands aged just twenty. He left behind a new young wife and a devastated family. His war grave was, and still is, tended by a family in the Netherlands who has no connection to ours. It is a responsibility that family elected to take as a tribute to his service and sacrifice. A responsibility passed on through the generations.
On a trip to visit friends in the Netherlands, more than ten years ago now, I was seated in the back of a car, staring idly out of the window, when I spotted a sign for the town where his war grave rests. It was a name I’d only previously heard in reference to my great uncle’s grave and to see it, on a road sign on a bright sunny day, was a strange feeling. I relayed the context of the name for me, we discussed it briefly and we moved on with our day, but something had been shaken inside me. On my return, I wanted to find out more about my uncle and his story. My mother is the family history expert and she had snippets of information, but it was the more factual data. I felt I needed the meat of who he was. She might have the date of his marriage and the name of his wife, but I wanted to see pictures, to read letters. When presented with the information of his death and that of the plane that took responsibility for taking down his, I wanted to know about the German pilot. I wanted to understand the man. An afternoon on the internet told me so much about him, so much more it seemed than I would ever know about my great uncle. He was a semi-famous pilot in the Luftwaffe - well known for his prowess in the air and the number of planes he brought down. He and his family had been interviewed in the press on a number of occasions. As I scanned through each article, I was building a picture of who he seemed to be and how he lived. It painted a picture of a popular family man - well-loved and much respected. A gifted pilot who was skilled at bringing down enemy combatants.
My stomach was churning inside. My brain was trying to reconcile the image of a much loved, much respected, ‘good’ person who deliberately went out every day in his plane to end lives. The rational side of my brain understood war, but the depth of my heart just remembered the pain in the eyes of those who loved a young man with so much promise who was never given the opportunity to show it.
I showed the details to my mother and asked whether we should, or should not, show it to my granddad – the only one then left in that generation. It was her father and I would leave that decision to her. She elected to.
He read everything quietly, with real interest, then put them down and to one side. I asked whether we had done the right thing in showing him and, as ever, he impressed my heart with his answer.
“It was war. You can be a good man and do bad things in times of war. You do what you have to do. You did what you were told to do - even if you didn’t want to. People were shot in them days for not doing what they were told to. Maybe he thought he was on the right side. Maybe he thought he was doing the right thing to protect his country and his family, just like our boys did. We all lost people… War’s never a good thing. He was born on the wrong side of that war, that’s for certain, but it could so easily have been us. It’s not my place to forgive him… but if it was, I do.”
He picked up the articles again and started to re-read them.
“I’m not sure your grandma would have said the same thing, mind.”
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As always, if you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this piece, please consider whether you would benefit from accessing relevant support.
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