Squadron Leader – RCAF – Pilot

Educated CIC, Volunteered in Canada July 1941. Flight Instructor and Staff Pilot RCAF Baird Rivers, Manitoba. Died April 1991

[Source: CMHA]

1394902 – A.S. Kelshall – Trinidad – F/O – Pilot – attested 12.8.41
133424 – commissioned 6.11.42 – P/War 26.4.44

[Source: NA AIR 2/6876 – Nominal Roll of Coloured Candidates, October 1944]

Flight Lieutenant – Pilot – 254 Sqn, Coastal Command – Beaufighter – POW

Educated QRC, Volunteer Trinidad ETS, trained at Piarco 60hrs Tiger Moth; UK training 60hrs Peterborough; Canada training Harvard a/c, Prince Edward Island. Shot down and wounded when flying a beaufighter against a German convoy off the Dutch coast. Sent to Stalag Luft 3, transferred to Ludenvalde, POW # 433427. Eventually escaped from Russian custody at the end of the war.

[Source: CMHA]

245 Squadron, 1940. A.S. Kelshall  front row, 3rd from right. [Foto: RAF]

Top right: A.S. Kelshall; Bottom left: John Shirley

[Courtesy: Family of F/O John Shirley & Aircrew Remembrance Society]

“A family group photo which includes my uncle, Arnold Sinclair Kelshall (on the right). Arnold was coastal command on Beaufighters and was shot down and  held in Stalag Luft 3 for about 1 year. This photo would have been taken right after my uncle and his brother Philip Walter Kelshall (my father, on the left) were demobilised, as I am the young lad in the photo, and I was born June 1944. I was born whilst Arnold was missing in action, and that’s why my initials are A.S.B. Kelshall in his honour. Both my uncle Arnold and my dad were at Cambridge university studying law when the war broke out. They joined the Cambridge University Air Squadron initially. My dad went on to be an instructor at RAF Cranwell before joining the Mosquito squadron. Arnold turned up later in a German prison camp, having been shot down in the North Sea off the coast of Holland, and been “rescued” by a German U-boat that luckily surfaced a few hundred yards away! Uncle Arnold went back to practice law with the family law firm in Port-of-Spain, TM Kelshall & co.”

[Courtesy: Anthony Simon Kelshall, son of Flight Lieutenant P.W. Kelshall]

Squadron Leader – Chaplain

[Source: CMHA]

Pilot Officer

[Source: CMHA]

1399240 – Edward Warburton Jardine – Trinidad –

(not sure he was a Pilot Officer – not found a date he was commissioned.  He transferred to the RNVR)

[Courtesy AD]

Flying Officer

[Source: CMHA]

605471 – W.H.M. Ironside – Trinidad – attested 28.7.42 – Sgt. Pilot UK 5.1.43
seriously injured 8.5.43

[Source: NA AIR 2/6876]

[Source: CMHA]

605472 – T.M. Ironside – Trinidad – attested 28.7.42 – P/O – Pilot UK 31.5.43
136417 – F/L – commissioned 4.12.42

[Source: NA AIR 2/6876]

Flying Officer

[Source: CMHA]

Flying Officer

[Source: CMHA]

Flight Lieutenant – pilot – 19 Sqn – Mustang – POW

Shot down by flak over a V1 site. Taken POW. Retired 1945

[Source: CMHA]

605483 – T.M. Harries – Trinidad -attested 28.7.42 – P/O Pilot UK 5.1.43
136418 – F/L – commissioned 4.12.42 – POW 28.2.44

[Source: NA AIR 2/6876]

Flight Lieutenant – Navigator – 100 Group, 429 Sqn, 608 Sqn – Halifax, Whitley, Mosquito – born 1920

Enlisted Dec 1941; 4th son of Michael Hamel-Smith; Awarded DFC 1944; completed 1 tour with 429 Sqn – Halifax; 1 tour training Navigators on Whitley; post war 1 tour with 608 Sqn Mosquitoes. Bailed out of a Mosquito after engine fire. Forgot to disconnect radio cables, which caught on parachute lines, nearly choking him. Enjoyed parachute descent so much paid little attention to where he was landing, when he saw a church, managed to turn and hit a pub, where he lay unconcious in the snow until carried inside where he recovered. Bases No 608 Sqn Downham Mailet/Thornaby

[Source: CMHA]

This photo was taken during the weekly dance at RAF Leeming Bar in either late 1943 or early 1944. Tony Hamel-Smith is the officer on the right of the photograph with the distinct black moustache.

The picture features all the members of the crew of Halifax, V for Victor it bar the pilot (Ralph Hunt, DFC): Tony Hamel-Smith (navigator), Bob Grenfell (wireless operator), Danny McCaffrey (rear gunner), ‘Titch’ Nelson (Canadian bomb aimer), Joe Dawson (flight engineer), Alf Hunt (mid upper gunner).

The small dark lady standing at the front left with a cigarette in her hand is the later Mrs. Grenfell. Next to her Danny McCaffrey, the rear gunner. Bob Grenfell is standing behind them.

Ensign of the Royal Canadian Air Force

Badge of 429 (Bison) Squadron RCAF

Distinguished Flying Cross

The Handley Page Halifax heavy bomber

[Pictures courtesy Stephen Grenfell]

42 Sqn Research Site