Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The original grant of the squadron badge for ‘No. 86 Squadron’, hand-illuminated badge and motto, as painted by an artist of the College of Arms, dated March 1944, and signed by the Chester Herald and Inspector of Royal Air Force Badges, J. Heaton-Armstrong, and H.M. King George VI, in excellent condition £100-£150

Provenance: Dix Noonan Webb, December 2009.

No. 86 Squadron was formed at Shoreham in September 1917 but saw no action in the Great War, being disbanded in July 1918. Reformed at Gosport in December 1940, and equipped with Blenheims, it commenced convoy escort duties off East Anglia in March 1941. Re-equipped with Beauforts that summer, the Squadron carried out anti-shipping strikes, similar operations continuing on 86’s move to Scotland, this time against targets off the Norwegian coast. Re-equipped with Liberators at St. Eval in early 1943, the Squadron subsequently moved to Northern Ireland for anti-submarine operations, thence to Iceland and finally back to Scotland in the summer of 1944, where it remained actively employed until the War’s end. No. 86 was disbanded in 1946.