Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria. To coincide with the OMRS Convention

A good Second World War D.F.C. group of eight awarded to Squadron Leader R. E. Hewlett, Royal Air Force, a two-tour Navigator who completed many sorties with No. 161 (S.O.E.) Squadron

Distinguished Flying Cross, G.VI.R., the reverse officially dated 1943; 1939-45 Star; Air Crew Europe Star; Defence and War Medals; General Service 1918-62, 1 clasp, Arabian Peninsula (Flt. Lt., R.A.F.); General Service 1962, 1 clasp, Borneo (Flt. Lt., R.A.F.); Air Efficiency Award, G.VI.R., 1st issue (Fg. Off., R.A.F.V.R.) good very fine or better (8) £1200-1500

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Awards to the Royal Air Force from the estate of the late Eric Campion.

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D.F.C. London Gazette 9 July 1943. The recommendation states:

‘This Officer has carried out a total of 40 operational sorties; 24 of these sorties were bombing operations carried out during his first tour. Since joining this unit [No. 161 Squadron], Flying Officer Hewlett has carried out 16 sorties of a special nature, demanding a high standard of low level navigation at night. He has shown great determination and keenness.’

Ronald Ernest Hewlett, who was born in October 1917 and joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve on the eve of the outbreak of hostilities, commenced training as an Air Observer / Navigator in January 1940.

Posted to No. 78 Squadron, a Whitley unit operating out of Dishforth, Yorkshire in November of the same year, he flew on his first operational sortie, against Leuna, on the night of the 3rd. Hamburg and Dusseldorf made up the rest of the month’s agenda, and in December he completed another five sorties, among them Kiel, Mannheim and two trips to Lorient. The early New Year period witnessed further outings to Bremen, Emden and Wesel, and between February and March 1941, he participated in strikes against Rotterdam, Calais (‘Crashed at Digby’), Hamburg and Kiel.

In April 1941, Hewlett was transferred to No. 35 Squadron, a Halifax unit operating out of Linton-on-Ouse, Yorkshire, returning to Kiel on the night of the 4th. Then following two months non-operational experience on the Squadron’s Halifaxes, he went on to complete his tour with outings to Cologne, Duisberg, Hanover and Kiel, the latter place being visited by him for a fifth time on the night of 19-20 August. No doubt, too, he heard about the already extraordinary exploits of one of the Squadron’s pilots, one Flying Officer Leonard Cheshire.


Subsequently posted to No. 10 O.T.U. for a period of ‘rest’, Hewlett found himself among those called upon to partake in the first of the 1000 Bomber Raids, flying in a Whitley to Cologne on 30 May 1942 and against Essen two nights later.

Commissioned in September 1942, he commenced his second operational tour with No. 161 Squadron, the S.O.E. support unit based at Tempsford, in September 1942. Hewlett actually flew his first clandestine mission in a Whitley under the command of a Flight Lieutenant Marriott, on the night of 26-27 September, and by late June 1943 he had completed a successful tour of 26 sorties, five of them by day in Albemarles. For part of this period he operated out of St. Eval and from March 1943 he flew in Halifaxes under a Flight Sergeant Wilkinson. One of the missions flown with Wilkinson on the night of 10-11 June was actually an S.I.S. operation, code-name “General”. Hewlett was awarded the D.F.C. on the recommendation of Wing Commander Lewis Hodges, an award seconded by Group Captain “Mouse” Fielden.

For the remainder of the War Hewlett served as an Instructor, largely in South Africa, and qualified as a Staff Navigator in August 1944.

Having been advanced to Flight Lieutenant in January 1945, he transferred to Transport Command in the following year and flew regularly in the Berlin Airlift with No. 238 Squadron between July 1948 and the Spring of 1949. His final flying appointment was to No. 109 Squadron at Coningsby in February 1950 and he was ‘grounded’ at the end of the following year. Hewlett, however, remained a Regular Officer and went on to serve in the Arabian Peninsula and in Borneo before his retirement in the rank of Squadron Leader in October 1972.

Sold with the recipient’s original Flying Log Books (3), covering the periods January 1940 to September 1947, October 1947 to June 1951 and July to October 1951.