Description

This is a comprehensive history of No. 40 Squadron, from its foundation as a Royal Flying Corps squadron in 1916 to its disbandment in 1956.

During World War I it was one of the foremost scout squadrons and numbered amongst its members some of that conflict’s greatest aces, Mick Mannock, George McElroy and Roderic Dallas. Disbanded in 1919, it was reformed in 1931 as a bomber squadron and served in that role throughout World War II, flying Battles, Blenheims, Wellingtons and Liberators. The unit operated initially as part of Bomber Command and then, from late 1941, in the Mediterranean theatre. Disbanded again in 1947, it was reborn as a transport squadron, flying Avro Yorks during the Berlin Airlift, transferring once more into Bomber Command, equipped with Canberras, from 1953 to 1956.

David Gunby has meticulously researched the history of No. 40 Squadron, deriving material from documentary sources at the Public Record Office / National Archives, RAF Museum, the Air Historical Branch of the Ministry of Defence, and the Imperial War Museum, as well as from Canadian, Australian and New Zealand archives. What makes this work so valuable is the very large amount or survivor narrative that forms the core of the book. Complete with comprehensive loss and casualty lists, and a wealth of photographs and maps, Sweeping the Skies is a work as scholarly as its is vividly evocative of squadron life over a forty-year period