From the Canadian Air Force:
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10:15 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.Canada Aviation and Space Museum
Aviation and Rockliffe Parkways
Ottawa, Ontario
70th Anniversary Battle of Britain Ceremony
» Poster (JPG 170KB)
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Canada’s Air Force in association with the Air Force Association of Canada, Canada Aviation and Space Museum, Vintage Wings Canada and Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum, invites the people of Ottawa to show their appreciation to veterans and especially the Canadians who participated in the Battle of Britain, by attending this stirring and highly visual event.Features
This year’s Battle of Britain Ceremony will feature:
- Fly-pasts* by Vintage Wings of Canada and Spitfires and Hurricanes, Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum’s Avro Lancaster and by Canadian Forces aircraft such as the CF-18 Hornet fighter jet, CC-130 Hercules, and CC-177 Globemaster III
- The Central Band of the Canadian Forces, Air Command Pipes and Drums
- Canadian Forces and Air Cadet members on parade alongside veterans
* Fly-pasts are dependant on weather and aircraft availability. This is not an air show.
Weather Conditions
- Weather permitting; the ceremony will proceed as planned with fly-pasts. Should it rain, the ceremony will be held inside the Museum without fly-pasts. If weather conditions are in question, recorded updates will be provided at 613-945-7701.
Admission and Seating
- Admission to the ceremony is free.
- Please note that lawn chairs are not permitted and seating is limited and will be available on a first come first serve basis. Spectators should be seated by 10:15 a.m.
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Parking info and directions follow at link.
History of the battle here, lot’s more on the ceremony including, photo and video galleries, at left on main link.
RAF Battle of Britain 70th Anniversary site here.
More on Canadians in the battle here, and here featuring the “Canadian” RAF 242 Squadron, which flew Hawker Hurricanes and was commanded by Douglas Bader (a particular hero of mine). Stan Turner, much more here, was one of the squadron’s leading Canadian pilots; I knew him when he was Canadian Air Attaché in Moscow in the mid-50s and I was eight and nine–he kindly gave me copies of some Jane’s All the World’s Aircraft and Jane’s Fighting Ships from the 40s and 50s, which I still have:
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RAF & RCAF G/C - DSO, DFC & Bar,
War Cross (Cz) & Medal for Bravery (Cz)
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Battle-hardened pilots of No.242 (Canadian) Fighter Squadron pose in front of the Commanding Officer’s Hawker Hurricane Mk.I at RAF Station Duxford. (L- R) D.W. Crowley-Milling (RAF), P/O Hugh Norman Tamblyn from Yorkton, Saskatchewan-killed in action 3 April 1941, F/L Stan Turner from Toronto, Ontario, P/O Norman Neil Campbell from St.Thomas, Ontario-killed in action 17 October 1940. P/O William ‘Willie’ Lidstone McKnight from Edmonton, Alberta-killed in action 12 January 1941, S/L D.R.S ‘Douglas’ Bader-Commanding Officer of No. 242 (Canadian) Fighter Squadron, F/L G.E. Ball (RAF)-killed in action after Battle of Britain, P/O M.G. Homer (RAF)-killed in action 27 September 1940, P/O M.K. Brown of Kincardine, Ontario – killed in flying accident on 21 February, 1941.
Earlier on the Blitz that continued, with a Noel Coward music video, “London Pride” (do listen), from Publius.
Update thought: Note the fatalities amongst those in the photo immediately above. This is Duxford today: a truly great aviation museum which I’ve visited with our son, thanks to my English brother-in-law:
IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUM DUXFORD
WAR SHAPES LIVES
From its Battle of Britain webpage:
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“Never was so much owed by so many to so few” The Prime Minister
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Mark
Ottawa
Willie McKnight (pictured above, immediately behind Bader’s shoulder) was Canada’s first ace in the war, with 17 kills I believe at the time of his death.
At 13, I got Bader to autograph Quentin Reynolds’ book The Battle of Britain on 19 September 1976, at a screening of The Battle of Britain at the Calgary Planitarium. Heady stuff for a kid to meet a Genuine Hero. Bader honoured McKnight during his remarks before the film (Calgary’s McKnight Boulevard was named after him).
Entre nous: Two of the first adult books I read, when eight and nine, were the Bader biography “Reach for the Sky”
http://books.google.ca/books?id=PL23oPAWJeQC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22Reach+for+the+Sky%22&source=bl&ots=FiO9IUC2JA&sig=8USdE0hLh89oqvzsAHfS0TxXcZk&hl=en&ei=qAuVTPL2FsG88gbypIiNDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CFkQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q&f=false
and Adolf Galland’s (he fought on the other side in the Battle but became well-respected by the Brits and a friend of Bader’s) “The First and the Last”:
http://www.amazon.com/First-Last-Adolph-Galland/dp/0553117092
Bader/Galland:
http://www.historynet.com/interview-with-world-war-ii-luftwaffe-general-and-ace-pilot-adolf-galland.htm
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WWII: Tell us the story of your friendship with the legless British ace, Wing Commander Douglas Bader.
Galland: He was shot down during a dogfight on August 9 [1941]. One of his artificial legs was left in the Spitfire when he bailed out, and the other was smashed after he landed. I made a request through the International Red Cross, and the British were offered safe passage for the plane to drop replacement artificial legs. Well, they dropped them after they bombed my air base. Bader was fitted and sent to a prison camp. We remained friends until his death a few years ago…”
More:
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Adolf_Galland
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Well, if it hadn’t been for chaps like him…we wouldn’t have had a bloody Commonwealth Air Training Scheme.
* Event organizer to Sir Douglas Bader, on Galland’s being invited to a reunion of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan veterans…”
Mark
Ottawa
One of my mom’s brothers flew HE 111′s in Poland and over England during that fateful summer.
His squadron was pretty well finished by the end of August with just 2 original crews remaining of the some 36 at the beginning..
He flew one of the last bombing missions of the war against the Soviets in Czechoslovakia and flew cargo planes for Lufthansa until he was well into his 60′s..