William G."Benny" Bennetts
William Bennetts (1917-2007) known as Benny (and sometimes Billy) to his fellow pilots, joined the RAF from the Territorial Army . He had signed up for pilot training and was one of the few army pilots at the beginning of the war
William Bennetts signed up for whole-time service on Saturday 27th August 1939, exactly one week before war was declared on Germany.
He began pilot training seven months later at White Waltham airfield with No. 13 Elementary Flying training School
He then continued flight training at No. 9 Service Flying Training School at Hullavington until September 1940 before moving to Old Sarum airfield.
Billy trained as an Army Cooperation pilot and as losses mounted in the Battle of Britain the shortage of fighter pilots became so desperate that a number of army cooperation trainees, including Billy, were selected at Old Sarum and immediately sent to Hurricane and Spitfire training units. From here Billy was posted to 239 squadron at Hatfield
I am grateful to Stephen Bennetts, William’s son, for providing this source material and giving permission for it to be included in this website. If you also have any information about other members of 239 squadron and would like to have their story told, please contact the web developer at arafpilotsstory@gmail.com
War Record
W.G Bennetts’ service record showing dates of training and postings to fighter squadrons and eventually to RAF Maintenance Units in India
An unusual flying visit
One of William’s more unusual sortees was the visit he paid to his home town, Penzance, in a Lysander. On the 18th June 1940 flew from RAF Portreath and, in his own words from his logbook ..
“Low flying at PZ. [Penzance] dropped a note on Pauline. When I returned 19 group wanted to know whether I was flying at PZ. I said yes. Result A.V.M. Maltby ordered a court martial. A.M. Barrett gave me a wigging instead and docked me 100 names in the Air Force List, equal to 12 days.”
His son, Stephen, provides the following addition information :-
“Pauline” was Pauline Simpson, the fiancée of my father. She was working at a house in Alexandra Road at the time as a Red Cross nurse, looking after evacuees (one of them being Tommy Steele). Another note was dropped in the garden of “Foys”, opposite the top of Alexandra Road, the home of dad’s mother and father.
Because the Lysander was able to fly so slowly, the two drops were made accurately.
A few days later dad visited Penzance to apologise personally to those who had complained. Only one person did not accept his apology (the wife of a local solicitor, whom he called “that common little woman” whenever she was mentioned thereafter!).
The Lysander
William later told his family that the British designed and bulit Westland Lysander was his favourite plane to fly and you can get a feeling of what this must have been like in this video of a Lysander flown in Quebec, North America, by Dave Hadfield.
Flying experience
By the end of the war William Bennetts had amassed a wealth of flying experience in some of WW2’s iconic aircraft. He flew fighters and bombers during his RAF career
His record of Aircraft Flown ranges from Tiger Moth trainers to the superlative Supermarine Spitfire
