Posted by John Wilson on March 29, 2001 at 12:22:26 from 202.154.130.217:
In Reply to: Re: Names of ships, ranks of office - a veritable mine of information posted by Prue Eckett on March 29, 2001 at 04:15:14:
Many of the WWII combatants were in their early twenties; eg Edgar “Cobber” Kain the New Zealander who was the first Allied air ace, 21 when he died doing farewell aerobatics after flying Hawker Hurricane fighters in France in 1940. He had 12 or 14 confirmed “kills”; an ace had to have at least 5.
Sq. Ldr. Lewis Brandon says in “Night Flyer” that he was one of the oldest members of 141 Squadron RAF when he joined in 1941, just before his thirtieth birthday. He found then and later that he was considerably junior in rank to men much younger than he was, which made him feel as if he was still in his teens - perhaps, he says, the secret of eternal youth!