Sir – Your readers may have seen recent TV documentaries on BBC and Channel 4 which were also of great interest to me.
The Channel 4 documentary was about a Spitfire Mk1 which crashed in 1944 and was recently refurbished. The test flight at Duxford by a Spitfire test pilot passed with flying colours and the issue of a Certificate of Airworthiness. This was followed by the latest BBC documentary Night Must Fall, only now released after many years of work on it in time for Holocaust Day.
It was clear from this film using authentic wartime photography and kept secret until now, that the presence of six of these forced labour and mass extermination of Jews concentration camps by Nazi Germany in the Second World War, was known to Russian, British and American intelligence by August 1944 and that Winston Churchill himself had considered the possibility of having them bombed, but the Allies decided against this.
With the 50th anniversary of Winston’s death, I understand there will be maximum TV and radio coverage of the State Funeral which followed his death in 1965.
For many who were not alive then, these reflections may help them to understand why so many people worldwide considered him to have been worthy of that most unusual national event, in spite of his known faults.
One of these must surely be that on VE Day 1945 he omitted any reference to Bomber Command. This surprising omission enabled Prime Minister Clement Attlee in 1946 to avoid bestowing any deserved honours to Commanders Harris and Bennett, or a campaign medal to Bomber Command air and essential ground personnel for their effort and sacrifice.
That situation remains today and a campaign medal is still outstanding.
Jim Wright, Abingdon
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