44AD artspace and The Royal Commonwealth Society, Bath and District Branch (RCS Bath) have collaborated with 12 local primary schools to produce an exhibition honouring World War II “Heroes of the Commonwealth”.

Local schools were invited to ‘adopt’ one of these twelve heroes to research and to create a piece of art which represents and celebrates their chosen hero. As part of Remembrance Sunday commemorations, twelve artworks, to include installation, film and painting by participating schools, will be on display at 44AD artspace.

With special thanks to:
St. Andrews School celebrating John Jellicoe Blair
Rode & Norton School celebrating Nancy Wake
North Cadbury School celebrating Naik Nand Singh
Bruton School School celebrating Amelia King
Trinity Church School celebrating Mary Ellis
King Edwards School celebrating Lilian Bader
St. Mary’s School, Writhlington celebrating Noor Inayat Khan
St Mary’s School, Bath celebrating Tan Kay Hai
East Coker Community School celebrating Samuel Beaver King
St Philips School celebrating Dorothy Taylor
Hazlegrove School celebrating Archibald McIndoe
Bishop Henderson School celebrating Bhanbhagta Gurung

Bath Abbey will hold a commemorative service especially for those involved with the project and the heroes families.
If you would like to attend the service at Bath Abbey on 11th November at 3pm followed by a reception at 44AD artspace, please email studio44ad@gmail.com

John Jellicoe Blair
1919 - 2004

Flight Lt. John Jellicoe Blair DFC was born in St Elizabeth, Jamaica in 1919.

At the age of 17, he started training as a teacher but war soon broke out. He volunteered for service in 1941 at the age of 22, and would become one of almost 500 Black Caribbean air crew in the RAF during the Second World War. Blair was accepted by the RAF as aircrew and after brief training in Jamaica, he was shipped to New Orleans, then onward to Canada. He trained as a Navigator and after crew selection at Kinloss, training on Whitleys, he was sent to Yorkshire.

Blair was assigned to 102 Squadron. He became a navigator in Halifax Bombers flying from Yorkshire, and was involved in many important bombing raids. His squadron suffered the third heaviest casualties in the RAF and these missions were extremely dangerous.

He flew 33 operational missions over Europe during the war and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) for valiant service. He was selected to join the Pathfinder Force. At the end of the war, Blair was transferred to Transport Command and flew Hastings and Comets around the world. He was a successful athlete for the RAF and remained in service until 1965.

Historian Mark John remembers his great-uncle fondly: “My great-uncle was a hero. The story of John Blair and others like him is important because what it says is that we can integrate. Even in 1941 we could overcome far more entrenched barriers then we face today. Everyone could take part and everyone was able to be part of a team when facing a crisis. This is a lesson for the youth today, the barriers are there but they can be overcome and people can adapt and society can change.”

Watch on YouTube:
John Jellicoe Blair and the Black RAF
Pilots of the Caribbean

Nancy Wake
1912 - 2011

Born in New Zealand, Wake moved to Sydney in Australia as a child, and then to Paris in the 1930s. Wake was living in Marseille with her French husband when the war broke out. After the fall of France to Nazi Germany in 1940, Wake became a member of an escape network, helping Allied airmen evade capture by the Germans and escape to neutral Spain.

In 1943, when the Germans became aware of her, she escaped to Spain and then to the United Kingdom. Her husband was captured and executed. After reaching Britain, Wake joined the Special Operations Executive (SOE) under the code name "Hélène".

In April 1944 as a member of a three-person SOE team code-named "Freelance", Wake parachuted into the Allier department of occupied France to liaise between the SOE and several Maquis groups in the Auvergne region, which were loosely overseen by Émile Coulaudon (code name "Gaspard").

She participated in a fierce battle between the Maquis and a large German force in June 1944. In the aftermath of the battle, a defeat for the maquis, she claimed to have bicycled 500 km over 71 hours to send a situation report to SOE in London.

Wake was known as a deadly fighter. During one raid she reportedly killed an SS guard with her bare hands to prevent him raising the alarm. "She is the most feminine woman I know until the fighting starts. Then she is like five men," one of her French colleagues recalled.

Wake was awarded the George Medal (UK), the Medal of Freedom (US), the Légion d'honneur (France), and medals from Australia and New Zealand. In 1985, she published her autobiography, “The White Mouse”, the title derived from what the Germans called her. A decade before her death she recalled "Somebody once asked me: 'Have you ever been afraid?' Hah! I've never been afraid in my life”.

Watch on YouTube:
Nancy Wake Timeline documentary

Naik Nand Singh
1914 - 1947

Naik Nand Singh VC was born in Punjab, northern India in 1914.

At just 29 years old, he was awarded the Victoria Cross (VC), the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.

Nand Singh saw intense action in Burma and Maungdaw, a district of Rakhine State, where he was wounded in the thigh. He received his VC due to his heroic actions on the Maungdaw-Buthidaung Road: “A short time later when all his section had been either killed or wounded, Naik Nand Singh dragged himself out of the trench and captured a third trench, killing all the occupants with his bayonet…owing to his determination, outstanding dash and magnificent courage, the important position was won back from the enemy”.

The 11th Sikh Regiment was an infantry regiment in the British India Army. These forces played a major role in both World Wars, where over 1,700,000 men and women of the Commonwealth died. The Royal India Army Service Corps took part in the evacuation of Dunkirk. They also fought in the Western Desert, Middle East, Ethiopia and Italy.

Nand Singh rose to the rank of Jemadar in the post-independence Indian Army. In December 1947 he helped extricate his battalion from a Pakistani ambush in the hills south east of Uri in Kashmir. He was killed in this action and posthumously awarded the Maha Vir Chakra (MVC), the second-highest Indian decoration for battlefield gallantry.

Watch on YouTube:
Short clip by King’s College, The Indian Soldier’s Experience of WWII

Amelia King
1917 - 1995

Amelia King was born in Limehouse in London, 1917.

Her father, Henry King, born in Georgetown, British Guiana, worked as a firefighter in the Merchant Navy, and her brother served in the Royal Navy. King worked as a box maker before the Second World War and she volunteered to join the Women's Land Army in September 1943.

King was refused entry into the Women's Land Army during the Second World War because she was black. Her case was debated in the House of Commons and was covered in many international newspapers. The decision would eventually be reversed.

King was able to formally join the Women's Land Army in October 1943. She worked at Frith Farm in Fareham, Hampshire for A. E. Roberts until 1944. Roberts’ grandchildren remarked he was a ‘’can do’ person and had no time for petty prejudices. He would have given anyone a chance if they were straightforward and hardworking”.

King later reflected: “I said to them, if I'm not good enough to work on the land, then I am not good enough to make munitions. No one has ever suggested that my father and brother were not good enough to fight for the freedom of England”.

Read an article - Museum of English Rural Life:
Breaking the Colour Bar

Additional note about “Land Girls” – The Women's Land Army (WLA) made a significant contribution to boosting Britain's food production during the Second World War. Before the Second World War, Britain had imported much of its food. When war broke out, it was necessary to grow more food at home and increase the amount of land for cultivation. With many male agricultural workers joining the armed forces, women were needed to provide a new rural workforce. The WLA had originally been set up in 1917 but disbanded at the end of the First World War. It reformed in June 1939. Women were initially asked to volunteer to serve in the Land Army and, from December 1941, could also be conscripted into land work. At its peak in 1944, there were more than 80,000 women – often known as 'land girls' – in the WLA. Land girls did a wide variety of jobs on the land. They worked in all weathers and conditions and could be directed to work anywhere in the country.

Tan Kay Hai
1914 - 1991

Tan Kay Hai DFC was born in Singapore in 1914. As conflict erupted in Europe, Tan decided to join the war effort. In August 1941, he became the first Chinese man to join the RAF training school in Singapore. As a member of the Royal Singapore Flying Club, Tan had already experienced flying, so he was commissioned as a Pilot Officer. After training in Canada, Tan was transferred to England and then onto combat in North Africa and Europe.

Tan flew bombers and fighters, including the legendary Spitfire and Mosquito, and was later awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC). As one of the few Chinese pilots in the RAF, he gained a fearsome reputation for bravery and fearlessness in the field of combat.

In 1944 he took part in the D Day landings, the only Singaporean to do so. He undertook dangerous reconnaissance missions, blasting German machine and cannon posts built along the coast. His lucky streak in aerial combat didn’t last – a few days later he was caught up in a dog fight with German fighters. With his wing blasted off, he plunged from the sky just 200 feet from the ground.

Having survived a record breaking low altitude parachute jump, Tan was captured by German troops and taken to Stalag Luft III – a POW camp for Allied airmen made famous by the Great Escape.

Having survived six months of hardship, Tan was transferred in January 1945 to another camp in Bavaria. Mid-journey, he managed a daring escape by jumping off a transport train. After three days of brutal sub-zero temperatures in a forest, Tan was rescued by US troops.

After the war, Tan helped set up the Malayan Auxiliary Air Force (MAAF) and was promoted to Wing Commander. In 1960, following the disbandment of the MAAF, he worked for the Department of Social Welfare.

Watch on YouTube:
Tan Kay Hai’s wartime story is told in Forgotten Heroes

Noor Inayat Khan
1914 - 1944

Noor Inayat Khan was born in Moscow in 1914 to an Indian father and an American mother. She was a direct descendant of Tipu Sultan, the 18th century Muslim ruler of Mysore. Khan's father was a musician and Sufi teacher. He moved his family first to London and then to Paris, where Khan was educated and later worked writing children’s stories.

Khan escaped to England after the fall of France and in November 1940 she joined the WAAF (Women's Auxiliary Air Force). In late 1942, she was recruited to join Special Operations Executive (SOE) as a radio operator. Although some of those who trained her were unsure about her suitability, in June 1943 she was flown to France to become the radio operator for the 'Prosper' resistance network in Paris, with the codename 'Madeleine'. Many members of the network were arrested shortly afterwards but she chose to remain in France and spent the summer moving from place to place, trying to send messages back to London while avoiding capture.

In October, Khan was betrayed by a Frenchwoman and arrested by the Gestapo. She had unwisely kept copies of all her secret signals and the Germans were able to use her radio to trick London into sending new agents - straight into the hands of the waiting Gestapo. Khan escaped from prison but was recaptured a few hours later.

In November 1943, she was sent to Pforzheim prison in Germany where she was kept in chains and in solitary confinement. Despite repeated torture, she refused to reveal any information. In September 1944, Khan and three other female SOE agents were transferred to Dachau concentration camp where on 13 September they were shot. For her courage, Noor Khan was posthumously awarded the George Cross in 1949.

Watch on YouTube:
WWII’s Surprising Secret Agent (cartoon)

Archibald McIndoe
1900 - 1960

Archibald McIndoe was born on 4th May 1900 in Dunedin, New Zealand.

His father was a printer and his mother was an artist, and he had three brothers and one sister. McIndoe studied at Otago Boys' High School and later medicine at the University of Otago. After his graduation he became a house surgeon at Waikato Hospital. In 1930 he moved to London and worked at several hospitals as a plastic surgeon.

In September 1939 McIndoe, now a civilian plastic surgeon to the RAF, arrived at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, East Grinstead to run a new centre for plastic and jaw surgery. Between 1939 and 1945, he and his team treated thousands of men, women and children who suffered serious burns.

McIndoe pioneered ground breaking new techniques to treat his patients. He dealt with multiple cases of deep burns and horrific disfigurations, especially in RAF pilots, and he ensured there was a careful psychological and social rehabilitation, often being personally involved in each case. This was especially import for the hundreds of Allied aircrew who went on to form The Guinea Pig Club which is still in existence to this day.

McIndoe was known to The Guinea Pig Club as “The Boss”. Lancaster pilot Robert 'Mac' Mathieson recalls: “He was a very nice man and would often come into the ward and the play the piano for us for 45 minutes to an hour at a time. He did change my life, he made life worth living”.

McIndoe was awarded a CBE and knighted for his pioneering work in 1947.

Watch on Vimeo:
BBC documentary The Guinea Pig Club

Mary Ellis
1917 - 2018

Mary Ellis was born on 2 February 1917, in Leafield, Oxfordshire. Ellis developed a fascination with aviation from a young age, as her family home was located near RAF bases at Bicester Airfield and Port Meadow. When she was 16, Ellis started having lessons at a flying club in Witney. She gained a private pilot's licence and flew for pleasure until the start of the Second World War in 1939, when all civilian flying was banned.

In October 1941, Ellis joined the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA), and was posted to a pool of women flyers based in Hamble in Hampshire. The ATA involved dangerous work and the weather was the greatest hazard. The contribution of the ATA women cannot be overestimated – they kept the RAF and Fleet Air Arm supplied with enough aircraft to ensure victory.

Over the course of the war Ellis flew over 1,000 planes of 76 different types, including Harvards, Hurricanes, Spitfires and Wellington bombers. Some of her flights were to relocate planes from Royal Air Force airfields to the frontline, and others were to ferry new planes from factories to airfields.

Ellis said the Spitfire had always been her favourite aircraft. "I love it, it's everybody's favourite...I think it's a symbol of freedom. The day I stepped into a Spitfire was a complete joy and it was the most natural thing in the world for me”.

Ellis was known as “The Fog Flyer” because of her incredible skill at operating in bad weather. After the war, she married fellow pilot Don Ellis and lived next to the runway at Sandown Airport which she managed for twenty years.

Read in The Guardian:
Mary Ellis obituary in The Guardian

Bhanbhagta Gurung
1921 - 2008

Bhanbhagta Gurung VC was born in western Nepal in September 1921. At the age of 18, he enlisted in the British Indian Army during the Second World War, joining 3rd Battalion, 2nd King Edward VII's Own Gurkha Rifles (The Sirmoor Rifles).

Promoted to Lance Naik (Lance Corporal), Bhanubhakta served in the Chindit expedition led by Brigadier Orde Wingate into northern Burma in March 1943. He was serving in Number 4 Column, deep behind Japanese lines across the Chindwin, when the column was ambushed by the Japanese 33rd Division and ordered to disperse. His battalion was withdrawn from the line after the expedition for several months of training and refitting, and redeployed in March 1944.

In February 1945, the 25th Indian Division landed at Ru-ywa, as a diversion from the offensive by General Sir William Slim's 14th Army towards Mandalay, and advanced to the Irrawaddy through the An pass, held by the Japanese 54th Division from a number of hills. The Gurkhas held two hills, code-named "Snowdon" and "Snowdon East", but were attacked by the Japanese and pushed back. They were ordered to retake the hills. Bhanubhakta’s company were pinned down by an enemy sniper and were suffering casualties. Rifleman Bhanbhagta Gurung, being unable to fire from the lying position, stood up fully exposed to the heavy fire and calmly killed the enemy sniper with his rifle, saving his section from suffering further casualties. Bhanubhakta then single-handedly took out five entrenched Japanese positions under heavy fire. To cap it off, he assaulted the last position with only his kukri and a couple of smoke grenades, having run out of ammunition for his gun.

Bhanubhakta later received a Victoria Cross (VC) from King George VI at Buckingham Palace. It was noted he “showed outstanding bravery and a complete disregard for his own safety. His courageous clearing of five enemy positions single-handed was in itself decisive in capturing the objective and his inspiring example to the rest of the Company contributed to the speedy consolidation of this success”.

Watch on YouTube:
Havildar Bhanbhagta Gurung's Knife Wielding WWII Assault

Dorothy Taylor
1928 - n/a

Dorothy Taylor was born in Carcroft, near Doncaster. Taylor’s father was moved to Stevenage in 1939 to work for ICI, and the family moved to Letchworth, and then to Hitchin. Taylor left school at 14 and initially worked for the Country Gentleman’s Association.

Taylor joined the Women’s Land Army in 1944 aged 16 and she learned to milk up to 40 cows, collect the milk, deliver the milk, collect and wash the empties with caustic soda.

“You were meant to be 17 to join up and I was only 16, but the local milkman and dairy farmer Mr Mansfield asked my mother if she knew of anyone who could take over from the previous Land Girl he’d had, as she had been living with us. I didn’t know a thing about farming or cows. For the first week I just looked after his milk round and helped a little in the dairy, but then one day he gave me a stool and a bucket and asked me to try milking a cow. Well I was there pulling away for a long time and I had about six little drops in my bucket when he came back. He told me not to get upset as everyone had to start somewhere, then he showed me how to stroke the teat”.

Milk was rationed to 2 ½ pints per person, per week. Talyor would fill over 400 third pint bottles for school children every week. She met her future husband during her time as a land girl. Taylor later started the East Yorkshire Branch of the Women’s Land Army Association which meets socially and formally for Remembrance Day parades and other events.

Samuel Beaver King
1926 - 2016

Samuel Beaver King MBE was born in Portland, Jamaica into a strong Christian family.

King worked on the family farm and intended to take over after his father retired. When the Second World War was declared, King was a schoolboy interested in everything that was going on in Britain and Europe.

In 1939 King volunteered for the RAF. Having passed a series of tests, he and other volunteers received intensive training in Kingston before travelling to England. Sailing along the American coastline, past Newfoundland and then cutting across to the British Isles, they evaded prowling German submarines.

After three months of training in Filey, Yorkshire, the men were split up into categories for ground crew training. King was posted to the fighter station RAF Hawking near Folkestone where he worked as an engineer.

After the war ended, he returned to Jamacia in 1947 but struggle to settle down, so he took the opportunity of travelling back to England on the Empire Windrush. He rejoined the RAF, and later worked for the Royal Mail where he was employed for 34 years.

King was heavily involved in the London West Indian community and in 1983 was elected Mayor of the London Borough of Southwark. In 1996, King established Windrush Foundation with Arthur Torrington, the first charitable organisation whose objectives are to keep alive the memories of the young men and women who were among the first wave of post war settlers in England. In 1998, King was appointed an MBE and published his autobiography, “Climbing up the Rough Side of the Mountain”.

Read and watch on Windrush Foundation:
Sam King MBE Windrush Foundation

LilIan Bader
1918 - 2015

Lilian Bader was born in Liverpool in 1918. Her father was Barbadian who served in the First World War (Merchant Seaman) and her mother was British born Irish. In 1927, Bader and her two brothers were orphaned when their father died. At the age of 9, she was separated from her brothers and placed in a convent, where she remained until she was 20 because nobody was willing to hire her for work.

In 1939, Bader enlisted in the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes (NAAFI) at Catterick Camp, Yorkshire. She was dismissed after seven weeks when it was discovered that her father was not born in the United Kingdom.

On 28 March 1941 she enlisted in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF), after she heard that the RAF were taking citizens of West Indian descent: “I heard some West Indians being interviewed on the radio. They’d been turned down by the Army and accepted by the RAF.” Bader trained in instrument repair, a trade newly opened to women. She then became a Leading Aircraft Woman and was eventually promoted to the rank of corporal.

The influence of Lilian and her crew is difficult to fathom. As servicewomen, their role may have been limited to running routine repairs and replacing sensitive equipment. However, the simplicity of their work does not negate its great importance to winning the war.

As one of the first black women in the RAF, Bader had a positive experience but she faced discrimination when she left the forces and tried to find a job. She studied for O-Levels and A-levels in evening classes in the 1960s, then studied at London University where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree. Bader would later have a career as a teacher.

Read on Black History Month:
Black History Month