Veteran Spitfire pilot Ron Gould

Header image: Ron Gould photographed during his visit to the BBMF in March 2017 (here with Spitfire P7350) and inset in wartime.

Regular readers of our email newsletters may recall an item in the April 2017 issue about a visit to the BBMF in March 2017 by a World War Two veteran Spitfire pilot, Ron Gould, to be reunited with a Spitfire he had flown 72 years before.

We are sad to report that Ron passed away on 28th January, aged 94.

Ron had actually flown BBMF Spitfire Mk Vb AB910 on three occasions during his Spitfire conversion course at No 53 Operational Training Unit at Hibaldstow in early 1945. He witnessed Leading Aircraft Woman Margaret Horton’s flight on the tail of ‘AB’ on 14th February 1945 with Flight Lieutenant Neill Cox at the controls. He gave Margaret a cup of tea at the ‘Sally Ann’ tea wagon after she had landed and climbed off, saying she seemed unfazed by it all.

The BBMF only discovered and met Ron in the last year of his life and it was a privilege and pleasure to have done so.