John Fraser Drummond

John Fraser Drummond was born on 19 October 1918 in West Derby, Lancashire, and grew up in Blundellsands, Liverpool, the son of William Hastings Drummond and Nellie Drummond. He received a short service commission in April 1938 and joined No. 46 Squadron at RAF Digby in January 1939, initially flying the Gloster Gauntlet before the squadron re-equipped with Hurricanes. When the squadron deployed to Norway in May and June 1940, Drummond distinguished himself in the air: he shot down two enemy aircraft and seriously damaged three more, on one occasion pressing home an attack against a formation of Heinkel He 111s despite heavy return fire, silencing the rear gunners of two bombers and forcing them to break off. For this service he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, gazetted on 26 July 1940. Following the Norwegian campaign he was posted to No. 92 Squadron in September 1940, now flying Spitfires during the closing weeks of the Battle of Britain. On the morning of 10 October 1940, during a patrol near Tangmere, Drummond’s Spitfire (R6616) collided with that of a fellow pilot while the pair attempted converging beam attacks on an enemy aircraft; he bailed out but was too low for his parachute to deploy fully and was killed — four days short of his twenty-second birthday. He is buried in Thornton Garden of Rest, Lancashire.