Orders, Decorations and Medals

Three: Pilot Officer W. A. Saunders, Royal Air Force, who was killed in action during a strike against the enemy airfield at Merville in June 1940, while piloting a Blenheim of No. 21 Squadron

1939-45 Star; Air Crew Europe Star; War Medal 1939-45, all with privately impressed naming, ‘P./O. W. A. Saunders, R.A.F.’, together with Air Council condolence slip in the name of ‘Pilot Officer W. A. Saunders’, minor correction to surname on the last, extremely fine (3) £250-300

William Anthony Saunders commenced his operational career as a pilot with No. 21 Squadron, a Blenheim unit operating out of Bodney, Norfolk in March 1940, when assigned to attack German patrol vessels off the German-Danish coast on the 31st. In the following month he flew three further missions against enemy shipping, including an attack on capital ships at Wilhelmshaven on the 5th.

With the commencement of the German invasion of the Low Countries in May, the Squadron’s operational agenda quickly gained pace, Saunders undertaking no less than nine sorties in the same month, largely against enemy armour and troop concentrations; June proved to be a similar story but on the 14th, in a strike against the airfield at Merville, he was killed in action, his Blenheim being seen to take flak damage prior to being pursued - and shot down - by an enemy fighter. His fellow crew members - Sergeants Eden and Webb - managed to bale out and were taken P.O.W., likely as a result of Saunders having remained at his controls to enable their escape from the stricken aircraft.

He was 20 years of age and the son of Stanley and Margaret Saunders of Reading, Berkshire; he has no known grave and his name is commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial; sold with copied O.R.B. entries.