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Flying Officer Robert Patrick Skene DAVIDSON (70161)
No. 2 Service Flying Training School, Royal Air Force Date of birth: 16th March 1900 Date of death: 6th November 1939 Killed on active service aged 39 Buried at Christchurch Cemetery in Hampshire Section GG Grave 16
Robert Patrick Skene Davidson was born at Paddington in London on the 16th of March 1900 the eldest son of Robert Davidson, a Member of the Stock Exchange, and Florence Davidson of 6 Southwick Street, Paddington and of Bogie in Fife. He was christened at St Peter's Church, Westminster on the 30th of April 1900. He was educated at Lancing College where he was in Fields House from September 1914 to December 1917. He was commissioned as a Temporary Flying Officer in the Royal Naval Air Service at Greenwich on the 17th of March 1918 and was recommended for service by the Reverend H.T. Bowlby, Head Master of Lancing College. On leaving the Navy after the war he became an assistant master at St Anselm’s School in Croydon where he taught from 1919 to 1926 after which he went on to teach at St David’s School, Reigate in Surrey. He lived at "The Dingle" in Reigate. He obtained his Aero Club Certificate at the Airwork School of Flying on the 9th of March 1930 flying a De Havilland Moth with an 85 horsepower Gypsy engine. He was commissioned as a Pilot Officer on probation in the Royal Air Force Reserve of Officers on the 19th of July 1930 and was confirmed in that rank on the 25th of April 1931. He was promoted to Flying Officer on the 19th of January 1932 and later resigned his commission and passed into the Royal Air Force Reserve of Officers. In 1934 he was appointed as Head Master of Field Place School at Worthing in Sussex and in early 1939 he was married in Hampshire to Marguerite Dorothy (nee Sloman) and they lived at Field Place, New Milton, Hampshire. Immediately prior to the outbreak of war he was mobilised on the 2nd of September 1939 and was posted as a flying instructor to No. 2 Service Flying Training School based at RAF Brize Norton. At 9.15pm on the 6th of November 1939 Peter Davidson and his student, Sergeant Richard Watkin Adcock, took off from RAF Brize Norton in Oxford Mk I L4547 for a night flying exercise. At the time he had accumulated 208.10 hours of total flying time of which 55.10 were dual and 34.35 were on Oxford aircraft. The weather was clear, starlit and with a few scattered clouds down to 200 feet. The aircraft took off and climbed straight out normally before beginning a gentle right turn at a height of about two hundred feet. It then began to lose height at right angles to the flare path and disappeared from view. Shortly after this a heavy shower of rain passed over the airfield. The aircraft crashed at a flat angle on Mr Jenkinson’s farm at Black Bourton, to the south of the airfield and was destroyed. Dr. T.L. Craig, a doctor from an Oxford Hospital, was called to the scene of the crash where he found the dead body of Richard Adcock and Peter Davidson lying unconscious some 20 yards from the wreckage of the aircraft. He was suffering from a fractured skull and a fracture to his left arm. He was taken to the sick quarters at RAF Brize Norton before being placed in an ambulance to be taken to the John Radcliffe Hospital at Witney. He died in the ambulance at 11.55pm without regaining consciousness. The Station Medical Officer wrote: - “6/11/39. Patient was unconscious when picked up and was dangerously ill. His condition improved a little after Coramine and oxygen and after getting on touch with Mr Cairns Honorary Surgeon, The Radcliffe, the patient was put in an ambulance to go to the Radcliffe for possible surgical treatment but he died on the way.” His wife received the following telegram dated the 7th of November 1939: - “Deeply regret to inform you that your husband Flying Officer Patrick Skene Davidson is reported as having lost his life and the result of an aircraft accident on 6 Nov 1939. Letter follows. The Air Council express their profound sympathy.” His funeral took place on the 10th of November 1939. A court of inquiry into the accident began at Brize Norton at 10.30am on the 8th of November 1939 under the chairmanship of Group Captain W.B. Farrington of No. 1 Flying Training School, Netheravon. It concluded that the accident was probably caused by the aircraft running into the heavy rain shower at four hundred feet and that Davidson failed to rely on his instruments to maintain height and direction. The enquiry also established that Peter Davidson had flown thirty eight hours in Oxfords and it was considered that his experience in instrument flying had not been tested before he was permitted to fly at night He was the first OL to lose his life in the Second World War. At the time of his death his address was given as Field Place, New Milton in Hampshire.

Fields House