The Wartime Memories Project

- No. 219 Squadron Royal Air Force during the Second World War -


Air Force Index
skip to content


This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this site you agree to accept cookies.


If you enjoy this site

please consider making a donation.




    Site Home

    WW2 Home

    Add Stories

    WW2 Search

    Library

    Help & FAQs


 WW2 Features

    Airfields

    Allied Army

    Allied Air Forces

    Allied Navy

    Axis Forces

    Home Front

    Battles

    Prisoners of War

    Allied Ships

    Women at War

    Those Who Served

    Day-by-Day

    Library

    The Great War

 Submissions

    Add Stories

    Time Capsule

    TWMP on Facebook



    Childrens Bookshop

 FAQ's

    Help & FAQs

    Glossary

    Volunteering

    Contact us

    News

    Bookshop

    About


Advertisements











World War 2 Two II WW2 WWII 1939 1945

No. 219 Squadron Royal Air Force



   

No. 219 Squadron were formed at Catterick in October 1939 flying Blenheims. They converted to Beaufighters in October 1940 and from February 1944 flew Mosquitos.

Airfields at which No. 219 Squadron were based:

  • Catterick. 4th Oct 1939 to 12 Oct 1940 & 25 Apr 1943 14 May 1945
  • Redhill 12 Oct 1940 to 12 Dec 1940.
  • Tangmere. 12 Dec 1940 to 23 June 1942.
  • Acklington. 23 June 1942 to 21 Oct 1942
  • Scorton 21 Oct 1942 to 25 Apr 1943
  • Bone 14 May 1945 to ?
  • Sidi Amor. ? to 27 Feb 1944
  • Woodvale 27 Feb 1944 to 15 Mar 1944
  • Honiley 15 Mar 1944 to 1 Apr 1944
  • Bradwell Bay. 1 Apr 1944 to 29 Aug 1944
  • Hunsdon. 29 Aug 1944 to 10 Oct 1944
  • Amiens, B48. from 10 Oct 1944


 

15th Aug 1940 Eagle Day

15th August 1940 Yorkshire bombed

12th October 1940 Bombers attacked in fog

19th December 1940 Night fighters

8th December 1942 Postings

30th June 1943 Medical report

2nd December 1943 Mid-air collision

9th July 1944 Flying Bombs


If you can provide any additional information, please add it here.



Logbooks



Do you have a WW2 Flying Log Book in your possession?

If so it would be a huge help if you could add logbook entries to our new database. Thank you.

View Logbook entries



Those known to have served with

No. 219 Squadron Royal Air Force

during the Second World War 1939-1945.

  • Holtrop Hilbrand Gerrit . F/O. (d.10th Jun 1944)
  • Meade John Edward. AC.
  • Mills DFC Kenneth Freeman. F/Lt.
  • Pegler Thomas. Sgt.
  • Reynolds Frederick Thomas. F/Lt. (d.6th Mar 1945)
  • Smee James. (d.8th May 1942)

The names on this list have been submitted by relatives, friends, neighbours and others who wish to remember them, if you have any names to add or any recollections or photos of those listed, please Add a Name to this List

Records of No. 219 Squadron Royal Air Force from other sources.



The Wartime Memories Project is the original WW1 and WW2 commemoration website.

Announcements



  • The Wartime Memories Project has been running for 24 years. If you would like to support us, a donation, no matter how small, would be much appreciated, annually we need to raise enough funds to pay for our web hosting and admin or this site will vanish from the web.
  • 28th March 2024 - Please note we currently have a huge backlog of submitted material, our volunteers are working through this as quickly as possible and all names, stories and photos will be added to the site. If you have already submitted a story to the site and your UID reference number is higher than 263784 your information is still in the queue, please do not resubmit, we are working through them as quickly as possible.
  • Looking for help with Family History Research?   Please read our Family History FAQ's
  • The free to access section of The Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers and funded by donations from our visitors. If the information here has been helpful or you have enjoyed reaching the stories please conside making a donation, no matter how small, would be much appreciated, annually we need to raise enough funds to pay for our web hosting or this site will vanish from the web.
    If you enjoy this site

    please consider making a donation.


Want to find out more about your relative's service? Want to know what life was like during the War? Our Library contains an ever growing number diary entries, personal letters and other documents, most transcribed into plain text.



We are now on Facebook. Like this page to receive our updates.

If you have a general question please post it on our Facebook page.


Wanted: Digital copies of Group photographs, Scrapbooks, Autograph books, photo albums, newspaper clippings, letters, postcards and ephemera relating to WW2. We would like to obtain digital copies of any documents or photographs relating to WW2 you may have at home.

If you have any unwanted photographs, documents or items from the First or Second World War, please do not destroy them. The Wartime Memories Project will give them a good home and ensure that they are used for educational purposes. Please get in touch for the postal address, do not sent them to our PO Box as packages are not accepted. World War 1 One ww1 wwII second 1939 1945 battalion
Did you know? We also have a section on The Great War. and a Timecapsule to preserve stories from other conflicts for future generations.





Want to know more about No. 219 Squadron Royal Air Force?


There are:2007 items tagged No. 219 Squadron Royal Air Force available in our Library

  These include information on officers, regimental histories, letters, diary entries, personal accounts and information about actions during the Second World War.


Sgt. Thomas Pegler 219 Squadron

Dad, Tom Pegler was the navigator of Mosquito FK-E piloted by Jack Bremner, who was from the London area. He would never tell anyone what they were detailed to do, other than theirs was a Night Fighter Squadron. He did tell me, however, one summer morning retuning to Acklington over the North Sea, the tops of the clouds were perfectly flat, so being the 'good airmen' they were, they did several practice landings on the top of the clouds until they realised the rest of the section had disappeared. When they landed, everyone else had been back safely for several minutes and concern was shown for them. When he and Jack got to the briefing room, they were asked why they were late. 'Port engine, sir, got a bit hot so I shut it down' was the reply. After debrefing, they got their flying kit off and hit the sack. They hadn't been in bed long when the tannoy went, 'Will the crew of E for Easy report to the boss at once' (I use the word 'boss' because he never stated the rank of the man to whom they were answerable). They had to get their flying kit on again before they they went, but duly arrived. 'I've had that port engine run up - there's **** all wrong with it- now what were you actually doing?' '.'Practising landing on the clouds, sir.' I cannot repeat what was said, suffice it to say he went ballistic and their proverbial cards were marked. I believe they didn't do it again!

John Pegler



AC. John Edward Meade 219 Squadron

John Meade is my father. He was with 219 Squadron until their deployment to Bone in Algeria when he joined British Intelligence in Egypt for the rest of the war. He was demobbed in 1945.

Clive Meade



James Smee 219 Sqdn. (d.8th May 1942)

My uncle was killed in air crash at Tangmere while in 219 Sqdn. in 1942 any information or photos around that time would be appreciated.

Update: The only fatal crash between the dates 7-8 May 1942 was: Beaufighter R2267. Pilot 1380996 Sergeant James Kenneth Smee, age 20. Son of Mr John Smee and Mrs Valetta Smee of Mayfield, New South Wales, Australia. Buried in Hayes and Harlington Cemetery. AI Operator 926261 Sergeant Claude Stanley Bassett, age 22. Son of Mr Arthur Henry Cash Bassett and Mrs Gertrude Alice Bassett of Ropley, Hampshire, England. Buried in Hillingdon and Uxbridge Cemetery. They were flying Night Fighter Duty on Search Light co-operation and took-off from Tangmere 8 May 1942 0005 hrs and crashed 0359 hrs.

Ken Smee



F/Lt. Kenneth Freeman Mills DFC 219 Squadron

Goggles worn to maintain night vision whilst in the messroom.

Successful combat as depicted in the

Beaufighter details

K. F. Mills in 264 Squadron

Kenneth Freeman Mills DFC served in Bristol Blenheims, later converting to Bristol Beaufighters in 219 Squadron based at RAF Tangmere. He flew over 36 sorties and was involved in destroying a Heinkel He III. He then moved on to 264 Squadron flying Mosquitos from RAF Colerne, Wiltshire and RAF Predannack, Cornwall.

Peter H Mills



F/Lt. Frederick Thomas "Eric" Reynolds 65 Squadron (d.6th Mar 1945)

Flight Lieutenant Frederick Thomas Reynolds joined the R.A.F.V.R. in 1938, his original Service Number was 742592, This changed to 86373 on or around 29th September 1940 when he was promoted to 'Pilot Officer' (on probation) Ref 'London Gazette No 34986 Tuesday 5th November 1940'. He served in RAF No 65 Squadron and we know from a letter to his family he was stationed in with them at RAF Turnhouse near Edinburgh in the period August-November 1940. We also know from another letter he was with RAF Squadron 256 stationed February - March 1941 at Colerne near Chippenham, he flew Hurricanes at this time, and that he was involved in the defence of Liverpool. His sister (my mother) says she knew he destroyed a German aircraft in this period but we have no details, she also recalls he crashed his aircraft on Rhyl Beach but again we have no details.

In 1944/45 he was with 219 Squadron flying Mosquito NF30's under Wing Commander Peter Green based at Amiens-Glisy in France and he is recorded as destroying a Messerschmitt Me110 on night of 1-2 January 1945. He was killed when his Mosquito crashed in flames in the town of Amiens (eye witness account) on 6th March 1945. This was officially recorded as an Aircraft Accident but we do not know the cause or any details.

Peter L. Young



F/O. Hilbrand Gerrit Holtrop 219 Squadron (d.10th Jun 1944)

Hilbrand Holtrop was a Dutch airman serving with 219 Squadron based at RAf Bradwell Bay.








Recomended Reading.

Available at discounted prices.









Links


    Suggest a link
















    The free section of the Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers. We have been helping people find out more about their relatives wartime experiences since 1999 by recording and preserving recollections, documents, photographs and small items.

    The website is paid for out of our own pockets, library subscriptions and from donations made by visitors. The popularity of the site means that it is far exceeding available resources and we currently have a huge backlog of submissions.

    If you are enjoying the site, please consider making a donation, however small to help with the costs of keeping the site running.



    Hosted by:

    The Wartime Memories Project Website

    is archived for preservation by the British Library





    Copyright MCMXCIX - MMXXIV
    - All Rights Reserved

    We do not permit the use of any content from this website for the training of LLMs or for use in Generative AI, it also may not be scraped for the purpose of creating other websites.