From: mongo@bitme.com   
      
   https://apnews.com/article/battle-of-britain-raf-pilot-   
   dies-9f0b9e5c4a837dfc61c0bef3c98b33ea   
      
   Last surviving pilot from the Battle of Britain, John ‘Paddy’ Hemingway,   
   dies at 105   
      
   Updated 11:33 PM EDT, March 18, 2025   
   LONDON (AP) — The last surviving pilot of the Battle of Britain has died,   
   severing the last living link to the few thousand young men who fought the   
   Nazi air force to a standstill amid fears that Britain might be forced to   
   capitulate during the early months of World War II.   
      
   John “Paddy’’ Hemingway, an Irish national who enlisted in the Royal Air   
   Force before the war began, died Monday at his home in Dublin, the RAF   
   said. He was 105.   
      
   Hemingway was just 20 years old when he and his comrades in the Royal Air   
   Force took to the skies to fight off wave after wave of Nazi aircraft that   
   sought to pound Britain into submission during the summer and autumn of   
   1940.   
      
   In August of that year, when German bombers were relentlessly targeting   
   airfields in southern England and the outcome of the battle was still in   
   doubt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill famously stood before the House of   
   Commons to pay tribute to the young pilots who were defending Britain.   
      
   “The gratitude of every home in our island, in our empire, and indeed   
   throughout the world, except in the abodes of the guilty, goes out to the   
   British airmen who, undaunted by odds, unwearied in their constant   
   challenge and mortal danger, are turning the tide of the world war by   
   their prowess and by their devotion,” Churchill said. “Never in the field   
   of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”   
      
   Britain has ever since revered “the few” for saving the country during its   
   moment of peril. The Battle of Britain Memorial on the English Channel   
   coast lists the names 2,941 Allied airmen who took part in the battle.   
      
      
   During dogfights with German aircraft in August of 1940, Hemingway was   
   twice forced to bail out of his Hurricane fighter, once landing in the sea   
   off the east coast of England before returning to his squadron to resume   
   the fight, the RAF said. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for   
   gallantry in 1941.   
      
   But Hemingway dismissed suggestions of bravery and heroism, saying he was   
   a pilot and had a job to do.   
      
   “The world was at war, and you couldn’t go somewhere and say, ‘I’m at   
   peace and I don’t fight wars,’” he said in a 2020 interview with the BBC.   
      
   “The main skill was luck. You had to be lucky, no matter how good you   
   were. For instance, my boss, Dickie Lee, was the best pilot I’ve every   
   seen, but he was shot down and killed. So he had no luck. I had bags of   
   luck.”   
      
   Born July 17, 1919, in the Rathmines area of Dublin, Hemingway enlisted in   
   the RAF in 1938.   
      
   He first saw action during the Nazi invasion of France, when he flew   
   fighter cover for retreating British forces.   
      
   Following the Battle of Britain he worked as a controller, helping to   
   direct the RAF’s response to German attacks. At the end of the war,   
   Hemingway served as commander of No. 43 Squadron, which flew Spitfires in   
   northern Italy.   
      
   Hemingway remained in the RAF after the war and retired in 1969 after more   
   than 30 years of service.   
      
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