Geoffrey Allard

Flight Lieutenant Geoffrey ‘Sammy’ Allard was born in York on 12 August 1912 and joined the RAF as an aircraft apprentice in 1929, becoming a sergeant pilot before the war. Flying Hawker Hurricanes with No. 85 Squadron, he was one of the outstanding fighter pilots of 1940: he scored heavily during the Battle of France in May and again through the Battle of Britain, and was credited with at least nineteen enemy aircraft destroyed, earning the Distinguished Flying Medal and Bar and the Distinguished Flying Cross. He survived the great air battles only to be killed on 13 March 1941, when the twin-engined Douglas Havoc he was flying from RAF Debden suffered a structural failure shortly after take-off and crashed, killing him and two other Battle of Britain veterans on board.