Royal Air Force officer and recipient of the Victoria Cross
Lionel Wilmot Brabazon Rees
Lionel Rees c.1918
Born
(1884-07-31)31 July 1884 Caernarfon, Carnarvonshire, Wales
Died
28 September 1955(1955-09-28) (aged 71) Nassau, Bahamas
Buried
Nassau War Cemetery, Bahamas
Allegiance
United Kingdom
Service/branch
British Army Royal Air Force
Years of service
1902–1931 c.1939–1942
Rank
Group Captain
Unit
Royal Garrison Artillery Royal Flying Corps
Commands held
No. 11 Squadron RFC No. 32 Squadron RFC
Battles/wars
First World War
Western Front
Battle of the Somme
Second World War
Awards
Victoria Cross Officer of the Order of the British Empire Military Cross Air Force Cross Mentioned in Despatches
Group Captain Lionel Wilmot Brabazon Rees, VC, OBE, MC, AFC (31 July 1884 – 28 September 1955) was a Welsh aviator, flying ace, and a recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces. He was credited with eight confirmed aerial victories, comprising one enemy aircraft captured, one destroyed, one "forced to land" and five "driven down".[1] Rees and his gunner, Flight Sergeant James McKinley Hargreaves, were the only two airmen to become aces flying the earliest purpose-built British fighter aeroplane, the Vickers Gunbus.[2]
Rees also had a keen interest in archaeology. While flying from Cairo to Baghdad in the 1920s, he took some of the earliest archaeological aerial photographs of sites in eastern Transjordan (now Jordan), and published several articles in Antiquity and the journal of the Palestine Exploration Fund. He is considered a father of the archaeological studies of this remote area, and a pioneer of aerial archaeology.[3] He was also an accomplished sailor.
^Above the Trenches, p. 316
^Pusher Aces of World War 1. p. 91.
^"Aerial Archaeology in Jordan", David Kennedy and Robert Bewley, Antiquity 83, no 319, pp. 69–81
Group Captain Lionel Wilmot Brabazon Rees, VC, OBE, MC, AFC (31 July 1884 – 28 September 1955) was a Welsh aviator, flying ace, and a recipient of the...
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Gwilym Edwards (1881–1963), Presbyterian minister, writer and academic LionelRees (1884–1955), aviator, flying ace and recipient of the Victoria Cross...
Singleton Pennell (Tirah Campaign, India) and Royal Air Force Group Captain LionelRees (World War I). Aleister Crowley, occultist and mystic attended Eastbourne...
William O'Toole Eric Pashley Arthur Peck Philip B. Prothero John Quested LionelRees Charles Robson William Rooper Alexander Roulstone William J. Rutherford...
competed in the first America's Cup (then known as the 100 Guineas Cup). LionelRees, who in 1933 sailed single-handedly across the Atlantic from Wales to...
1894) 16 September – Leo Amery, politician (born 1873) 28 September – LionelRees, Welsh airman, Victoria Cross recipient (born 1884) 11 October – Hector...
Captain (later Major) Stephen Price; one of the victories was shared with LionelRees. He became an ace on 25 August 1916, and by 20 October 1916 he was a...
Royal Field Artillery 15 December 1899 Second Anglo-Boer War Colenso LionelRees Royal Garrison Artillery 1 July 1916 First World War Double Crassieurs...
August – Sir Lewis Lougher, businessman and politician, 83 28 September – LionelRees, airman, Victoria Cross recipient, 71 14 October – Harry Parr Davies...
John Dyke, Wales international rugby union player (died 1960) 31 July – LionelRees, aviator, recipient of the Victoria Cross (died 1955) 15 August – Ivor...
Quested United Kingdom Royal Flying Corps, Royal Air Force 8[page needed] LionelRees United Kingdom Royal Flying Corps 8[page needed] Wolfram Freiherr von...
Rees later obtained an MBA in International Business from the University of Miami. Nicholas Rees is also the grandson of Lionel Wilmot Brabazon Rees,...
Redpath 1886 1937 poet, short stories Drawn Shutters, White Lilac Roberta Rees 1954 novelist, poet, short stories Eyes Like Pigeons, Beneath the Faceless...
where over 18 months in 1665, Newton deduced the laws of physics; Sir Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal; vicar John Michell of Thornhill, West Yorkshire; physicist...
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