Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria including the collection to Naval Artificers formed by JH Deacon

A Second World War night fighter operations D.F.C. group of five awarded to Flight Lieutenant G. A. Waller, Royal Air Force, whose skills as a Radio Operator resulted in the destruction of three enemy aircraft

Distinguished Flying Cross, G.VI.R., the reverse dated 1944; 1939-45 Star, copy clasp, Battle of Britain; Air Crew Europe Star, clasp, France and Germany; Defence and War Medals, generally good very fine (5) £900-1100

D.F.C. London Gazette 20 October 1944. The recommendation states:

‘This Officer joined No. 601 Squadron as an Air Gunner in May 1939. From the outbreak of war until May 1940, he flew operationally in this Squadron, including the raid on Borkum in November 1939. He was posted to No. 29 Squadron and was with them as an Air Gunner, and later Radio Operator, until July 1941. In this period he did 118 operational hours and destroyed one enemy aircraft and probably destroyed another. He then went to No. 1451 Turbine Flight and later to Northolt in a Defiant Radar jamming unit. After a short period in No. 488 Squadron he went to No. 54 O.T.U. in October 1942. In the following January he was posted to No. 604 Squadron. This Officer has shown great keenness throughout his seventeen months in the Squadron. He is a first class Navigator / Radio Operator and a useful instructor. The above will show that he has been operating against the enemy, excluding a three month break due to an accident, almost continuously for just under five years. I strongly recommend the award of the D.F.C.’

George Alfred Waller was born in East Plumstead, London in October 1906 and was employed as a planning engineer prior to joining the Auxiliary Air Force in February 1939. Subsequently posted as an Air Gunner to No. 601 “Millionaire’s” Squadron, he participated in a number of operations during the period of the “Phoney War”, among them the daylight strike on Borkum on 25 November 1939, in which six of the Squadron’s Blenheims carried out a low-level attack on the local enemy airfield.

Transferring to No. 29 Squadron at Digby in July 1940, Waller flew in Blenheims throughout the Battle of Britain, his aircraft being hit in the starboard wing by British A.A. fire during an evening patrol on 28 September 1940. Converting to Beaufighters at the end of the year, he became a successful Radio Operator, he and his pilot claiming an H.E. 111 destroyed on the night of 4-5 February 1941 and a J.U. 87 ‘probable’ at the end of May. By the time he departed the Squadron in July 1941, he had notched up a total of 118 operational hours flying time.

But his greatest period of success was with No. 604 Squadron in the course of 1943, when with the backing of much-improved A1 equipment in his Beaufighter, he was directly involved in the destruction of a Do. 217 on the night of 10 July and a J.U. 88 on the night of 23 July. In the following month, on the night of the 15th, he and his pilot also claimed a J.U. 88 damaged.

Having been commissioned from Warrant Officer back in June 1943, Waller was awarded the D.F.C. in October 1944 and finished the War flying as a Navigator in Mosquitoes with 2nd Tactical Air Force over Europe. He retired from the R.A.F. as a Flight Lieutenant in 1950 and died in 1983.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including Buckingham Palace forwarding letter for the D.F.C.; Officer’s Medical Record Card; two wartime photographs and a local newspaper cutting announcing the award of his D.F.C.; a ‘Most Secret’ beacon reference card; and a ‘Firing Programme’ dating from the recipient’s time with No. 601 Squadron in October 1939.