Paterson Clarence Hughes

Flight Lieutenant Paterson Clarence ‘Pat’ Hughes was born in Cooma, New South Wales, on 19 September 1917 and joined the Royal Australian Air Force in 1936 before taking a commission in the RAF. As a flight commander with No. 234 Squadron he flew Supermarine Spitfires through the summer of 1940 and was credited with as many as seventeen victories — the highest-scoring Australian of the Battle of Britain. He was killed on 7 September 1940 attacking a Dornier Do 17 over Kent; his Spitfire is thought to have collided with the bomber or its falling debris, and he was unable to bail out successfully. He had married only five weeks earlier. Hughes is buried in the churchyard at Sutton-on-Hull.