Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A good Second World War D.F.M. group of five awarded to Flight Lieutenant P. M. P. Hall, Royal Air Force, who was decorated for his gallantry as a Wireless Operator in Hampdens of No. 106 Squadron in 1941-42

Distinguished Flying Medal, G.VI.R. (643103 Sgt. P. M. P. Hall, R.A.F.); 1939-45 Star; Air Crew Europe Star; Defence and War Medals 1939-45, minor contact wear, generally good very fine (5) £1600-1800

D.F.M. London Gazette 26 May 1942. The original recommendation states:

‘Sergeant Hall has taken part in 30 operational sorties and his technical ability is proved by the fact that not once has his aircraft abandoned its mission through wireless failure. He has participated in attacks upon all the heavily defended targets and in mining sorties and five times on daylight raids. One of these latter was the raid on the Gneisenau at Brest and another the attack on a French power station. Sergeant Hall has been a great success throughout his operational tour, performing always his duties with courage and consistent reliability.’

Philip Myers Peel Hall commenced his operational career as a Wireless Operator with No. 106 Squadron, a Hampden unit based at Coningsby, in late May 1941, and he remained in Hampdens for the duration of his tour of duty, an aircraft with striking deficiencies that have been summed up by Max Hastings in Bomber Command:

‘The Hampden was the most urgent candidate for replacement: cruising at only 155 m.p.h., 10 m.p.h. slower than the other two [the Wellington and Whitley], this grotesque-looking flying glasshouse could stand little punishment, lacked power-operated turrets, and could only carry a 4000-lb. maximum bomb load.’

Notwithstanding such deficiencies, Hall went on to complete 30 sorties in the period leading up to March 1942, five of them of a daylight nature, not least the Squadron’s attack against the Gneisenau at Brest on 24 July 1941, when he flew in Wing Commander R. S. Allen’s aircraft - despite intense and accurate heavy flak a box of six 106 Hampdens led in the attacking force, all of them being damaged by shrapnel. Allen was awarded the D.S.O., and Hall accompanied him on the unit’s second daylight raid - against the power station at Gosnay, France - in August.

Otherwise employed on ‘gardening’ and regular bombing operations, Hall’s targets included Aachen, Bremen, Cologne, Duisburg, Dusseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt and Kiel, some of them on more than one occasion. Awarded the D.F.M. on completing his operational tour in March 1942, about the time Guy Gibson arrived to take over command of 106 from Wing Commander Allen, he was commissioned as a Pilot Officer in February 1944 and advanced to Flight Lieutenant in early 1946; sold with a complete run of copied O.R.B. entries in respect of his time in No. 106 Squadron.