Art News

RAF Book of Heroes Llisting 107 Signatures of Battle of Britain Pilots Makes 33,600 at Bonhams

OXFORD.- A small leather-bound book that powerfully evokes ‘The Few’ of WWII Battle of Britain, listing 107 signatures of RAF flying officers, sold at Bonhams Militaria Sale in Oxford yesterday, August 2nd, for £33,600. The pre-sale estimate was just £6,000 to £8,000. It went to a private British buyer. Collected by Norman Phillips, a mess steward at RAF Marklesham Heath in 1941, the little book’s leather cover was apparently cut from a mess chair by Group Captain Douglas Bader CBE, DSO & Bar,DFC, whose remarkable story – flying again after losing both his legs – was the basis of the film ‘Reach for the Sky’. Winston Churchill, in a conversation with Douglas Bader, referred to the book as “not a book of names, but a book of heroes. God forbid it should ever be lost.” The book contains the signatures of the following, as well as many others. Squadron Leader D. R. S. Bader D.S.O., D.F.C. and