Arthur Gerald Donahue

Arthur Gerald Donahue was born on 29 January 1913 at St. Charles, Minnesota, the son of Frank and Ada Donahue. A keen American flyer, he travelled to Canada in mid-1940 and enlisted by claiming Canadian nationality, reaching Liverpool that July and joining the RAF Volunteer Reserve as service number 81624. Flying Spitfires with No. 64 Squadron from August 1940, he took part in the Battle of Britain and was wounded and burned in his opening weeks of combat. Late in 1941 he was posted east to No. 258 Squadron, fighting over Singapore and Sumatra during the desperate Far East campaign of early 1942. Returning to Britain, he became a flight commander with No. 91 Squadron, reputedly the first American to lead an all-British RAF squadron, and was awarded the DFC in March 1942 for low-level reconnaissance and attacks on enemy shipping. On 11 September 1942 he was lost intercepting a Junkers Ju 88 over the Channel; his body was never found, and he is commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial.