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Sir Keith Park

On Monday I walked from Victoria Station to my club The Reform in Pall Mall.

As a London park I prefer Regents Park, not just because of its greater amenities (the boating lake, Rose Garden, Open Air Theatre and Zoo), but because you can get lost there – whereas at St James, you are more or less forced to walk by the lake, which admittedly is a nature reserve, and has fine views of Buckingham Palace and the Cenotaph and Horse Guards Parade.

Leaving the park at the Mall, you climb some steps and then pass the memorial grave of the dog of German Ambassador Leopold van Herbst – appointed during the Weimar Republic – but who died in 1936 under the Nazi regime to be replaced by Joachim von Ribbentrop.

Ribbentrop was a snob and not known for his tact or intelligence. He was sentenced to death at the Nuremberg Tribunal.

You then pass a square (Carlton House Gardens) which is used by three adjoining clubs – The Athenaeum, The Travellers (of which von Ribbentrop was a member) and The Reform.

Here on the Garden’s railings there is is a statue to Sir Keith Park and I always stop there to pay him my respects.

He was the Air Chief of Group 11, mandated during 1940’s Battle of Britain to defend London and the South East from Herman Goering’s Luftwaffe.

Park was a career RAF man.

A New Zealander, he had served in World War One as a fighter ace. Sir Hugh Dowding, the RAF supremo, appointed him to command Group 11.

It was a difficult job as the RAF had a deficiency in aircraft and pilots compared to the Luftwaffe.

Sir Trafford Leigh Mallory – in charge of a Group 22 which numbered the courageous but egotistical Douglas Bader amongst its senior officers – advocated the ‘Big Wing’ strategy, but Dowding and Park preferred to intercept rather than mobilise in big numbers. Leigh Mallory and Park became fierce rivals.

Park was an ‘airman’s airman’, often flying solo in his Hurricane to do reconnaissance.

Sir Arthur Tedder, Air Vice Marshall attributes the success  of the Battle of Britain to Park.

After the Battle of Britain, Park organised the air defence of Malta and post-War became the sales rep for Hawker Siddeley (whose production of fighter planes should never he underestimated) in his native New Zealand.

My late father was conscripted into the RAF at Uxbridge where Park had his command centre. He told me that “the boys” could not speak too highly of Park.

Sir Keith Park, we salute you.

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About Henry Elkins

A keen researcher of family ancestors, Henry will be reporting on the centenary of World War One. More Posts