Walter Ronald Farley

Walter Ronald Farley was born on 24 June 1909 in Cold Norton, Essex, the son of Thomas Alfred and Sarah Ann Farley, and was educated at Simon Langton School in Canterbury. He joined the Royal Air Force on a short service commission in December 1930, serving with 13 Squadron at Netheravon and 2 Squadron at Manston through the mid-1930s before passing to the Reserve in late 1938 and being recalled to active duty on 1 September 1939. In August 1940 he was appointed Commanding Officer of No. 419 (Special Duties) Flight at North Weald, a newly formed unit tasked with inserting and recovering MI6 and SOE agents in occupied Europe; on the night of 19/20 October 1940 he flew the Flight’s first operational sortie, landing in France to retrieve SIS agent Philip Schneidau in a Lysander, and on 8 November 1940 was attacked by a Messerschmitt Bf 109 over England, sustaining a broken leg when he baled out. His work with 419 Flight earned him the Distinguished Flying Cross, gazetted on 7 March 1941. When the Flight was expanded and redesignated No. 138 (Special Duties) Squadron in August 1941, Farley continued as its Commanding Officer, flying Halifax bombers on clandestine operations from RAF Tempsford; he was killed on 21 April 1942, aged 32, when Halifax V9976 crashed against a hillside near Kreuth, south of the Tegernsee in Bavaria, on a secret operation. He is buried at Durnbach War Cemetery in Germany and is also commemorated on the Battle of Britain London Monument; he was survived by his wife, Maisie Selina Peta Farley, of Knightsbridge, London.