Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Five: Flight Lieutenant A. L. Davis, Royal Air Force, who survived a ditching off the North African coast after his Wellington was hit by A.A. fire in December 1941

1939-45 Star; Africa Star; France and Germany Star; Defence and War Medals, mounted as worn, nearly extremely fine (5) £300-400

Davis commenced pilot training at No. 6 E.F.T.S. at Sywell in March 1940 and first flew solo in the following month. Transferring to an advanced training squadron at Montrose that May, he next moved to No. 1 School of Army Co-operation at Old Sarum to gain experience in Lysanders, prior to being posted to No. 239 Squadron in September 1940.

Then in March 1941 Davis was posted to No. 15 O.T.U. at Harwell where he gained experience in Wellingtons before joining his first operational unit, No. 37 Squadron, out in the Middle East. During the period October to December 1941, he piloted his aircraft on ten sorties, either to Benghazi or Derna, but on the 13 December his operational career came to a grinding halt when his Wellington was hit by A.A. fire and crashed in the sea between Sidi Barean and Mersa Matruh - two crew members died.

Davis was subsequently posted to A.H.Q. Western Desert (Communication Flight), where he flew a captured Me. 108, and returned home in July 1942 to take up an appointment with 41 Group Station. Shortly afterwards, he moved to No. 12 M.U. at Kirkbride where he became a Chief Test Pilot and flew a variety of aircraft, including Spitfires and Mustangs, until the end of the War.

Sold with the recipient’s original Flying Log Books (2), covering the periods March 1940 to March 1944, and March 1944 to October 1945; together with wartime portrait photograph and another of an upturned Lysander.