The Scottish D-Day hero who survived fire from both sides in daring mission
Two of the aircraft on the mission were lost but Leslie Valentine got his plane back to his squadron’s base in Hampshire unharmed
The medals of a Scottish pilot who pulled off an astonishing D-Day feat, flying just 50 feet above the Normandy landing beaches laying smoke to cover the invading forces, are to go under the hammer.
The big gun crossfire between the Allied battleships offshore and the German coastal fortifications onshore was just one of the problems facing 24-year-old Flying Officer Leslie Valentine. His Boston bomber was so low that even ground troops could join in - and it got shot at by everyone, including UK forces who didn’t realise it was on their side.
Two of the aircraft on the mission were lost but Leslie Valentine got his plane back to his squadron’s base in Hampshire unharmed.
He recorded the mission in one laconic sentence in his logbook adding the observation “Was fired on by HMS Warspite”.
Interviewed many years later he said: “The noise of the shells was deafening. I was flying at 250mph and I had to hold it steady, very steady. At that speed and height if I’d even sneezed that would have been it.”
Flying Officer Valentine’s medals and other memorabilia have been entered in the auction by his son Dudley Valentine. Himself a former bomber crewman - a navigator in Vulcans - Dudley said that, now in his 80s and with no-one to pass things on to, he wanted his father’s collection to go to someone who will treasure and preserve it.
Jessica Tarver, a specialist with Scarborough auctioneers David Duggleby, said: “We were honoured to be invited to handle such a fascinating collection relating to the astonishing story of a remarkable World War Two hero.
“Though Glasgow-born Leslie Valentine was just 24 when he flew that D-Day mission he had already been in the war for four years, quitting medical school on the outbreak of the conflict in 1939 and volunteering, joining the Highland Light Infantry, a regiment that was involved in heavy fighting during the retreat to Dunkirk and the evacuation.
“Back at the Maryhill Barracks in Glasgow a note in the NAAFI asked if anyone was interested in flight training. Almost the whole battalion put their names down but Leslie was one of just two who were accepted.”
Having survived the D-Day mission, Flying Officer Valentine would go on to complete two back to back tours, 60 operations, involving daylight attacks on bridges, rail yards, enemy supply lines, submarine pens and V1 rocket launching sites among other things.
After the war, he returned to the Glasgow Medical School to complete his studies, later working as a physiotherapist in Scotland for a number of years before switching to a career in the pharmaceutical industry, moving south of the border and eventually becoming a sales manager with a leading national company. He died at the age of 95 in 2014.
Mr. Valentine’s medals and other memorabilia are being sold as a single lot in David Duggleby’s Militaria, Medals & Sporting Guns Auction next Thursday.
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