Robert Voase Jeff

Robert Voase Jeff was born on 31 March 1913 in Kuala Lumpur, in the Federated Malay States, and came from a Yorkshire family with roots at Kelleythorpe, near Bridlington; he was the son of Ernest and Madge Jeff, who by the time of his death were living in Tenby, Pembrokeshire. He accepted a short service commission in the Royal Air Force in October 1936, trained at No. 3 Flying Training School at Grantham, and by August 1937 had joined No. 87 Squadron — a Hurricane fighter unit that deployed to France with the Air Component of the British Expeditionary Force in 1939. Jeff opened his scoring on 2 November 1939, destroying a Heinkel He 111 over France, and his aggressive leadership through the winter campaign earned him the Croix de Guerre from the French government in early 1940 and the Distinguished Flying Cross, gazetted on 8 March 1940, with a citation crediting him as a first-class flight leader who inspired those under him with an offensive spirit and who had himself destroyed five enemy aircraft. A Bar to the DFC followed on 4 June 1940, recognising further service as the fighting in France approached its desperate close. On 11 August 1940, by then an Acting Flight Lieutenant, Jeff took off from Exeter with seven Hurricanes of 87 Squadron’s B Flight to intercept a Luftwaffe formation over the Channel south of Portland Bill; he was last seen diving to engage the enemy at around half past ten in the morning and did not return, his Hurricane V7231 being lost with no trace of him ever recovered. He is commemorated on Panel 4 of the Runnymede Memorial, Surrey, which records the names of the RAF’s missing dead who have no known grave.