N.Z. SPITFIRE UNIT
Ex-Farmer Personnel (Received January 24, 11 p.m.) LONDON, January 23. ■ The Fighter Command's leading New Zealand Spitfire squadron has nine exfarmer pilots. The leader is Squadron Leader R. J. C. Grant, who has destroyed seven enemy planes, besides probably destroyed and damaged planes. The squadron includes only one nonNew Zealander, an Australian. One exfanner, a sergeant, from AVaikaka A alley, L. S. McQueen White, claims the world’s record for sheep shearing, having sheared 432 sheep in eight and a half hours. Not all the nine'farmers came from the land to join the R.A.F. Some had already forsaken agriculture. One became an electrical engineer at a gold mine, another was a gold miner, a farmer, a teacher and a commercial artist, and was preparing for his bachelor of arts degree when the war interrupted his studies. After joining tlie R.A.F. he served in Rhodesia, where he won tlie Rhodesian Midlands lightweight boxing, title. , Two sheepfarnters are from Hawkes Bav, othfrs are from the Canterbury Planes. The squadron’ has destroyed 32 planes. The average age of the squadron's personnel is 24.
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Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 102, 25 January 1943, Page 4
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182N.Z. SPITFIRE UNIT Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 102, 25 January 1943, Page 4
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