Flt-Lieut. HR Junor, DFC

[NigelS]

I recently came across a local newspaper report on the death, in a flying accident in 1927, of Flt-Lieut. Hugh Robert Junor, DFC. At that time he had been attached to the RAF Experimental station at Farnborough for the previous 4 years and died when he was unsuccessful in an attempt to parachute from a Gloster 'Gamecock' (J7906) which had failed when he was test flying it at Hucclecote, Gloucestershire, after some modifications had been made by the manufacturers. A witness at the inquest said that something had been seen to break off the plane after it had dived steeply from height, with another giving that he'd seen Junor attempting to escape by parachute but his body was found on the ground covered by his parachute. (The major part of the wreckage had burst into flames on hitting the ground and set fire to a garden outhouse in which two unfortunate men, who suffered burns and shock, had been eating their dinner.) Junor was given a full military funeral at St Mary's Church Byfleet where, less than a year previously, he had married Elsie Tarrant the daughter of prominent local building company owner WG Tarrant who had been responsible for 'Tarrant' Huts during the GW and the ill-fated 'Tabor' triplane.

Initially Junor had been with the RHA(T) as a Bombadier for which, from his MIC, he qualified for the Territorial Forces War Medal, but having been appointed as a temp. 2nd Lieut on the General list in October 1917 he was appointed as an FO with the RFC later the same month. The London Gazette of 12th December '19 gives the grant of a short service commission (converted to permanent with the RAF General Duties Branch in December 1922) but before this in September '18 he had taken part in an action which resulted in the award of the DFC with the following citation (Supp. to the London Gazette 8th Feb '19):-

Lieut. Hugh Robert Junor. (EGYPT)

On 17th September this officer performed an act of conspicuous merit and gallantry. Single-handed, he engaged five enemy machines, and so protected the Arab force from aerial attack at a most critical time when they were engaged in destroying an important railway. Lieut. Junor continued the combat till he was driven down by force of numbers, his petrol supply being practically exhausted.

The London Gazette of 3rd August '20 gives that he was also MID 'during the operations against Afghanistan' in General Sir CC Monro's despatch of the 1st November '19

A bit of poking around on the www revealed that the DFC action had been witnessed by non other than TE Lawrence who wrote the following account of it in The Seven Pillars of Wisdom (previously Lawrence had mentioned, on the 10th September, the arrival of two planes from Akaba piloted by Murphy & Junor):-

…Six hundred such charges would take the Turks a fair week to mend. This would be a generous reading of Allenby's 'three men and a boy with pistols'. I turned to go back to the troops, and at that moment two things happened. Peake fired his first charge, like a poplar-tree of black smoke, with a low following report; and the first Turkish machine got up and came for us. Nuri Said and I fitted admirably under an outcrop of rock, fissured into deep natural trenches, on the hill's southern face. There we waited coolly for the bomb: but it was only a reconnaissance machine, a Pfalz, which studied us, and returned to Deraa with its news.

Bad news it must have been, for three two-seaters, and four scouts and an old yellow-bellied Albatros got up in quick succession, and circled over us, dropping bombs, or diving at us with machine-gun fire. Nuri put his Hotchkiss gunners in the rock cracks, and rattled back at them. Pisani cocked up his four mountain guns, and let fly some optimistic shrapnel. This disturbed the enemy, who circled off, and came back much higher. Their aim became uncertain.

We scattered out the troops and camels, while the irregulars scattered themselves. To open into the thinnest target was our only hope of safety, as the plain had not overhead cover for a rabbit; and our hearts misgave us when we saw what thousands of men we had, dotted out below. It was strange to stand on the hill-top looking at these two rolling square miles, liberally spread with men and animals, and bursting out irregularly with lazy silent bulbs of smoke where bombs dropped (seemingly quite apart from their thunder) or with sprays of dust where machine-gun groups lashed down.

Things looked and sounded hot, but the Egyptians went on working as methodically as they had eaten. Four parties dug in tulips, while Peake and one of his officers lit each series as it was laid. The two slabs of gun-cotton in a tulip-charge were not enough to make a showy explosion, and the aeroplanes seemed not to see what was going on: at least they did not wash them particularly with bombs; and as the demolition proceeded, the party drew gradually out of the danger-area into the quiet landscape to the north. We traced their progress by the degradation of the telegraph. In virgin parts its poles stood trimly, drilled by the taut wire: but behind Peake they leaned and tottered anyhow, or fell.

Nuri Said, Joyce and myself met in council, and pondered how to get at the Yarmuk section of the Palestine line to top off our cutting of the Damascus and Hejaz Railways. In view of the reported opposition there we must take nearly all our men, which seemed hardly wise under such constant air observation. For one thing, the bombs might hurt us badly on the march across the open plain; and, for another, Peake's demolition party would be at the mercy of Deraa if the Turks plucked up the courage to sally. For the moment they were fearful: but time might make them brave.

While we hesitated, things were marvellously solved. Junor, the pilot of the B.E.12 machine, now alone at Azrak, had heard from the disabled Murphy of the enemy machines about Deraa, and in his own mind decided to take the Bristol Fighter's place, and carry out the air programme. So when things were at their thickest with us he suddenly sailed into the circus.

We watched with mixed feelings, for his hopelessly old-fashioned machine made him cold meat for any one of the enemy scouts or two-seaters: but at first he astonished them, as he rattled in with his two guns. They scattered for a careful look at this unexpected opponent. He flew westward across the line, and they went after in pursuit, with that amiable weakness of aircraft for a hostile machine, however important the ground target. we were left in perfect peace. Nuri caught at the lull to collect three hundred and fifty regulars, with two of Pisani's guns; and hurried them over the saddle behind Tell Arar, on the first stage of their march to Mezerib. If the aeroplane gave us a half-hour's law, they would probably notice neither the lessened numbers by the mound, nor the scattered groups making along every slope and hollow across the stubble westward. This cultivated land had a quilt work appearance from the air: also the ground was tall with maize stalks, and thistles grew saddle-high about it in great fields.

We sent the peasantry after the soldiers, and half an hour later I was calling up my bodyguard that we might get to Mezerib before the others, when again we heard the drone of engines; and, to our astonishment, Junor reappeared, still alive, though attended on three sides by enemy machines, spitting bullets. He was twisting and slipping splendidly, firing back. Their very numbers hindered them but of course the affair could have only one ending.

In the faint hope that he might get down intact we rushed towards the railway where was a strip of ground, not too boulder-strewn. Everyone helped to clear it at speed, while Junor was being driven lower. He threw us a message to say his petrol was finished. We worked feverishly for five minutes,

and then put out a landing-signal. He dived at it, but as he did so the wind flawed and blew across at a sharp angle. The cleared strip was too little in any case. He took ground beautifully, but the wind puffed across once more. His under-carriage went, and the plane turned over in the rough.

We rushed up to rescue, but Junor was out, with no more hurt than a cut on the chin. He took off his Lewis gun, and the Vickers, and the drums of tracer ammunition for them. We threw everything into Young's Ford, and fled, as one of the Turkish two-seaters dived viciously and dropped a bomb by the wreck.

Junor five minutes later was asking for another job. Joyce gave him a Ford for himself, and he ran boldly down the line till near Deraa, and blew a gap in the rails there, before the Turks saw him. They found such zeal excessive, and opened on him with their guns: but he rattled away again in his Ford, unhurt for the third time.

The account continues with descriptions of attacks made by Lawrence & the now plane-less Junor on an airfield, and a car mounted shoot-up of a train a few days later.

This link shows a picture said to be of Junor's crashed plane at Mezarib with, unless he crashed twice in the same area which seems unlikely, an incorrect date of 16th November '18 Click (In the 'Seven Pillars' Lawrence gives, in the chapter (109) summary, the dates for the above events as the 16th September not the 17th as given in the DFC Citation)

Junor's, now damaged, grave in St. Mary's graveyard at Byfleet

The inscription on the base reads:

SACRED

TO THE PROUD AND LOVING

MEMORY OF MY HUSBAND

FLIGHT LIEUT HUGH ROBERT JUNOR D.F.C., R.A.F.

WHO WAS KILLED WHILST ON DUTY AUGUST 19TH 1926

HE SERVED THROUGHOUT THE GREAT WAR

NigelS

[Stebie9173]

Lieutenant Junor is mentioned regularly in "Lawrence of Arabia's Secret Air Force" by James Patrick Hynes, M.A. (28 entries in the Index), and includes a picture of his downed plane. It is a different picture to the link but has the same damage to the wheels.

Steve.

[NigelS]

Thanks Steve, some biographical notes, written by a descendant, appeared in the TE Lawrence Society Journal in spring, 2000 (Click), although I've yet to see a copy.

NigelS