WW2 Original Photograph Collection of The Aircraft Carrier HMS Formidable's Aircraft

Original WW2 photos removed from Album, 12 different ones in total showing the Corsair and other aircraft carried, the compliment of the British Royal Navy Carrier, HMS Formidable. Some are taken in flight, others on the flight deck and a few of bombs being dropped on their targets, on both land and against enemy shipping. All in black and white, original and in good condition. A Corsair pilot of HMS Formidable was to earn the posthumous award of the Victoria Cross. See the account below.

Three dozen Corsairs provided the core striking power of HMS Formidable, flagship of the 1st Aircraft Carrier Squadron. Formidable had survived kamikaze strikes off Okinawa in May, but been forced to head to Sydney for repairs, before re-entering the fray. She did so with a vengeance. Her aircraft struck at airfields around Tokyo, merchant shipping, seaplane bases and one destroyer.

The latter was dispatched by 27-year-old Canadian Lieutenant Robert Hampton Gray, known as Hammy, a man with boyish good looks and captivating smile – but ruthless and fearless in the cockpit.
At 8.35 on the morning of August 9, Gray climbed into the cockpit of his Corsair for another strike mission; the attack against an airbase at Matsushima had been cancelled – Gray was to seek targets in Onagawa Wan where enemy shipping had been sighted. He had been told not to take unnecessary risks – there was a possibility that war with Japan might end, the Soviet Union had that morning attacked Japanese forces in Manchuria to compound the empire’s misery – but when he sighted five enemy ships in harbour, Gray pressed home the attack with vigour.

Coming in as low as 50ft and leading the attack, Gray drew the bulk of enemy fire – so ferocious was it that it shot away one of his 500lb bombs. The second however he hurled into the coastal defence ship Amakusa, which exploded in the engine room and detonated the magazine. But as Gray’s Corsair passed over his crippled foe, it was engulfed in flame and corkscrewed into the sea.

From attacks against Hitler’s flagship Tirpitz in the Norwegian fjords to strikes against Japan, Robert Hampton Gray had “consistently shown a brilliant fighting spirit and most inspiring leadership”. His final act, sinking the Amakusa, earned him the Victoria Cross.

It was the final VC of 182 awarded in World War 2 and to date, the last earned by the Fleet Air Arm and Royal Navy.

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Code: 69831