On Silver Wings

In July 1940, Desmond Ibbotson joined the RAF Volunteer Reserve hoping to fly Spitfires. He achieved his dream aged just 19, eventually completing 650 flying hours in seven types of Spitfire. He did two tours of operations with three of the RAF’s elite squadrons in the skies over France, North Africa and Italy, was credited with eleven confirmed victories and awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and Bar.

After a dramatic active service that saw him shot down during the Battle of El Alamein, captured by Rommel’s forces and making a daring escape, in 1944 he was promoted and moved to instructor duties at Perugia, Italy, where he trained experienced pilots returning to the front line or converting to a new fighter type.

Tragically, just over three months later, Desmond was killed during a routine test flight that November. He was buried in a military cemetery, but serious questions would remain about his death. How had such an experienced pilot crashed while undertaking such a simple flight? And, given that he had a marked grave, when a Spitfire was excavated from an Italian field sixty-two years later, why were Desmond’s remains still inside?

The product of over twenty years of meticulous research, On Silver Wings is a detailed study that respectfully relays the events of Desmond’s short but eventful life, investigating what happened on his tragic final flight and exactly how he came to have two graves.