304 SQUADRON (HASTINGS) ATC

The 304 Squadron (Hastings) Air Training Corps have shown me a mock up of their projected new Squadron Badge which is intended to honour the men of the original Squadron and I think it does that very nicely.  The original Flying Bomb emblem was designed by one of the Squadron's fitters and won him a prize of £7, which was a small fortune in those days.

 

Although the badge was adopted it was never official but it was worn with pride and merited great honour by the time the Squadron was disbanded after the War.  It will be nice, and a fitting tribute, to see it revived.  Please let me know what you think.

 

The motto, which I translate as High Flying or Flying High, is also a fitting tribute to keep their memory alive for many years to come.

A CHALLENGE

These three members of the Polish forces escaped from Poland and made their way to Britain, via France, arriving on the Arandora Star from St Jean de Luz on its last trip before it was sunk.

 

Can anyone please put names to the faces?  Can anyone also explain the numbers on one of the photographs?  These were not POW numbers but may have been Hungarian internment numbers.

 

Please contact me on the email address nevillebougourd@gmail.com if you are able to help.  Please do not respond on the normal anonymous answering system as I will not be able to come back to you.

 

Here are the pictures:

 

I am seriously hoping that someone can add names to the pictures.

 

MARIAN STANISLAW PLONCZYNSKI

He was a pilot, born on 2nd February 1900 in Warsaw.  From 1918, he served in the Polish Army but wanted to transfer to the Air Force.  In 1921 he succeeded and went to the flying school at Bydgoszcz where he qualified as a pilot in spite of crashing a Caudron GIII trainer biplane.  In 1922 he was posted to the school at Grudziadz and remained there until 1923 when he joined a fighter squadron attached to 7 Air Regiment in Warsaw, later becoming an instructor  with 1st Aviation Regiment until his demobilisation at the end of 1924

Soon after that he went to work for Aerolloyd and Aerolot the forerunners of Lufthansa and LOT Polish airlines respectively.  He then went on to work for LOT on its formation in 1929.  He was also successfully involved in sport flying.

On the outbreak of war, he flew a Junkers Ju52 airliner to Romania and made his way to France via Jugoslavia and Greece where he joined L’Armee de l’Air as an instructor and worked to create Polish fighting units.  After the fall of France he made his way to England and eventually joined 304 Squadron.  His name does not appear on the list of active pilots in the Squadron ORB and it appears that he was there in a training capacity - perhaps due to his age.  After this he went on to become an instructor and by November 1941 he was serving in Ferry Command delivering aircraft from Canada to Europe, Africa and Asia.  In this capacity he made 38 unarmed flights across the Atlantic.

During the course of his military career he was awarded the Order of Polonia Restituta, the Cross of Merit with Swords, the Greek Gold Cross of the Order of the Phoenix and British campaign medals.

He survived the war and was demobilised in 1947.  He returned to Poland and resumed working for LOT until his retirement in 1964.  He died on 8th March 1974 in Warsaw in a road accident involving a tram.

As a footnote, the Junkers airliner was handed over to Imperial Airways (allegedly sold to them) and went into service under the British registration G-AGAE.