Reginald Eric Lovett

Reginald Eric Lovett was born on 20 October 1913 in Hendon, north London, and educated at Christ’s College, Finchley. He joined the Royal Air Force on a short service commission in November 1935, trained at No. 8 Flying Training School at Montrose, and joined No. 66 Squadron at Duxford in August 1936 before becoming a flight commander with No. 73 Squadron by the outbreak of war. Flying Hawker Hurricanes with 73 Squadron during the Battle of France, he accumulated a record of confirmed kills — a Messerschmitt Bf 109 in March 1940, a Dornier Do 17 days later, and a Messerschmitt Bf 110 in April — before being shot down and badly burned on 10 May 1940, the opening day of the German western offensive. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, gazetted on 16 July 1940 (London Gazette, Issue 34898), for gallantry and devotion to duty in air operations. Returning to frontline flying by August 1940, Lovett rejoined 73 Squadron as it moved south to reinforce No. 11 Group; on 5 September he was shot down once more and baled out safely near Wickford, but two days later, on 7 September 1940 — the day the Luftwaffe turned its full weight on London — his Hurricane P3234 was brought down over Essex and crashed near Fritze Farm at Stock, south of Billericay. Acting Flight Lieutenant Reginald Eric Lovett DFC was twenty-six years old; he is buried at Hendon Cemetery and Crematorium, close to the north London suburb where he was born.