The Roy Bartlett Collection of Awards to the R.N.A.S., R.F.C. and R.A.F.

Pair: Lieutenant G. S. Day, Royal Air Force, late Royal Flying Corps, who was killed in action while piloting an R.E. 8 of No. 52 Squadron on the Western Front in October 1918

British War and Victory Medals (Lieut.), edge nicks, otherwise good very fine (2) £250-300

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Roy Bartlett Collection of Awards to the R.N.A.S., R.F.C. and R.A.F..

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George Samuel Day, a native of Hornsey, London who was born in June 1895, was originally commissioned into the 1/12th London Regiment as a 2nd Lieutenant direct from the Inns of Court Training Corps in August 1916. Advanced to Lieutenant in June 1917, he transferred to the Royal Flying Corps in the following month and initially qualified as an Observer. But in April 1918, he graduated as a pilot from No. 15 F.T.S. and was posted to No. 52 Squadron out in France that summer.

Thereafter, until his death in action, he regularly piloted R.E. 8s on bombing and reconnaissance missions, a case in point being a strike against Monchy on 22 August - ‘Successful. Six 25lbs. bombs dropped at 11.40 a.m. from 4,500 feet. Bombs dropped in S.E. corner of village’. A few days later, Day reported having seen an R.E. 8 brought down in flames over Jigsaw Wood, after it had been jumped by three enemy scouts, and in company with his Observer, 2nd Lieutenant F. S. Occamore, D.F.C., on 1 October 1918, he shared a similar fate, official records noting that their aircraft was shot down in flames at 10.30 a.m. while out on photographic reconnaissance.

George Day is buried in the Duisans British Cemetery at Etrun, France. He was 23 years old.