Flying ace Jack has died aged 103 (Image: PA)
Tributes were paid to RAF hero Jack Hemmings – one of Britain’s oldest Second World War veterans – after his death at 103.
The highly-decorated flying ace was Squadron Leader of 353 RAF Sqn, based in Calcutta between 1942 and 1946, and later launched the Mission Aviation Fellowship [MAF], which has grown to become the world’s largest humanitarian air service.
His lifetime of sacrifice, service and devotion to duty was due to be recognised at an audience with King Charles in April, ahead of the following month’s VE Day celebrations which will mark the 80th anniversary of the end of Second World War.
In August last year Jack, who lives in Horam, East Sussex, was guest of honour at the Eastbourne International Airshow with the Red Arrows laying on a birthday flypast.
He joked: “For a very brief moment, I knew how the King must feel. It was a marvellous spectacle.”
During the war, Jack was charged with protecting the Bay of Bengal using Lockheed Hudson and Dakota aircraft.
RAF hero Jack was honoured with a Red Arrows flypast for his 103rd birthday (Image: Jonathan Buckmaster)
His flying career included performing the first British humanitarian survey of Central Africa in 1948 where, alongside D-Day RAF hero Stuart King, he flew a wooden Miles Gemini aircraft from Croydon to Nairobi.
The result of the pair’s pioneering sortie was to set up the MAF charity which today operates 118 aircraft in more than 25 low-income countries to deliver aid, medical care and emergency evacuations in isolated locations.
His wife Helen Ellis, with whom he had two children, Adrian and Elizabeth, died in 1993. Elizabeth died in Canada in 2010 with early onset Alzheimer’s.
He married Kate Roy in 2003 who survives him.
Speaking to the Express in August Jack said: “Watching the Red Arrows is not just a spectacle, but it’s the skill of the pilots that I really admire. It’s just wonderful.
“When I first joined the RAF in 1940, I thought, ‘If I am going to fight in a war, I may as well do it sitting down.’ Getting into an aeroplane gives a sense of pleasant expectation – I’ve never got into one and regretted it. I love flying because it gives a feeling of detachment from all the problems in the world – and there are a lot of problems.
“During wartime, aircraft were used for destruction; but it has always been my desire that they be used for good. That is what MAF does today, it is more than a bright idea that stayed in someone’s head, it has grown exponentially to become the Good Samaritan of the air.”
In 2022, Jack returned to the controls of a wooden Miles Gemini aircraft – the same model he flew to launch MAF almost 80-years ago with engineer Mr King, who died in August 2020, at 98.
Dad-of-two Jack, who continued flying well into his centenary, was awarded the Air Force Cross for “exemplary gallantry while flying” and last year became the oldest Briton to fly in a Spitfire when he took to the skies above Biggin Hill, the famous old Battle of Britain fighter station in Kent.
Air Vice-Marshal Giles Leslie Legood, the RAF padre, said: “What a life of devotion and service to others Jack has given. As a wartime RAF pilot and peacetime supporter of MAF, he has helped establish peace and improve the lives of many. My grateful prayers and thanks are offered for his remarkable life.”
Red Arrow Sqn Ldr Graeme Muscat added: “When you hear stories like Jack’s you think – ‘how wonderful to fly in that era’. It’s really heartwarming.”