The WRU Patron, The Duke of Cambridge, served in the RAF as did many Welsh rugby players at all levels. The centrepiece of RAF100 will take place on 10 July, with a centenary service in Westminster Abbey, followed by a parade in The Mall and spectacular flypast over Buckingham Palace.
As the nation reflects on the huge debt owed to the RAF, here are a few examples of those Welsh rugby men who served during the two World Wars.
TAFFY IRA JONES DFC & BAR, MC, DSO, MM
Born in St Clear’s, Ira Jones was brought up on a farm and attended Carmarthen Grammar School, where it was claimed he failed all his examinations because he wasted all his time fighting and playing rugby. Although only 5ft 5in tall, he went on to play rugby for the RAF in the King’s Cup.
He first enlisted in the Territorial Army in 1913, studying telegraphy, and by the outbreak of war he transferred to the Royal Flying Corps. There he made his way up through the ranks, going from wireless ‘mechanic’ to observer in two-seater planes in 1915, before flying his own deadly solo combat missions in 1918, and becoming flight commander.
In the skies he was one of the most feared combat pilots in the British squadrons. He was credited with 41 air victories (29 aeroplanes, 3 kite balloons and 10 ‘probables’) and in the last four months of 1917 he made 38 kills in four months – at a time when British pilots weren’t able to use parachutes.
He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and Bar, the Military Cross, Distinguished Service Order and the Military Medal. He also received the Order of St George Medal from the Russians.
He is reputed to have come through 29 crashes relatively unscathed. In fact, he never received a scratch during his flying career at a time when a pilot’s life-expectancy was measured in months. On return from one sortie he found seven bullets lodged in his seat.
WING COMMANDER KEN REES
A Welsh pilot who was born in Rhosneigr, Anglesey, Ken Rees captained London Welsh and had a final Welsh trial. But he is better known as the inspiration for Steve McQueen’s character in the film, The Great Escape.
Rees, who died aged 93 in 2014, was the last surviving member of the team that tried to tunnel their way out of Stalag Luft III – as immortalised in McQueen’s portrayal of “Cooler King”, Hilts, in the blockbuster movie.
The pilot of a Wellington bomber shot down in flames over Norway during a mine-laying operation in October, 1942, he managed to crash-land into a lake and scramble ashore where he and two of his colleagues were soon captured — the other two members of his crew lost their lives. After interrogation, Rees soon found himself at Stalag Luft III at Sagan in Silesia, a camp specially built for captured airmen.
Having seen his pilot brother-in-law machine-gunned by a German aircraft after bailing out of a burning Hurricane, Rees had good reason to feel hostile to the Germans. His brother, Brian, flew Spitfires during the war.
Rees was 21 at the time of his capture and became a restless and troublesome prisoner, always baiting his captors. It meant he spent lengthy periods in the “cooler” — the punishment block. “We would do anything to disrupt the Germans. We were capable, well-trained … we felt almost invincible,” recalled Rees.
When Hollywood filmed the escape from Stalag Luft III many drew parallels between Rees and the character of Hilts, the “Cooler King” played by Steve McQueen. “It’s always said that he was based on me,” said Rees late in life, “apart from him being a 6ft tall American and me a Welshman of about 4ft 3in who can’t ride a motorbike.”
Rees was recruited to dig one of the three tunnels, “Tom,” “Dick” and, finally, “Harry”, that were to be used to create a major escape. On the night of the breakout from the prison camp Rees was supposed to be the last man out. By this time the Germans had been alerted to the escape attempt and shots rang out around the British airmen as they attempted to escape.
Rees rushed back along the tunnel on all fours to the camp after the Germans opened fire. Only three of the 76 who escaped reached Britain – the remainder were recaptured, with 50 killed.
Liberated by the advancing British Army on 2 May, 1945, Rees was reunited with his wife, Mary. They had married just a few days before he was shot down.
His time in Stalag Luft came after he had flown 56 missions, said his abiding memories of his time as a prisoner of war revolved round constant boredom, hunger and visits to solitary.
He enjoyed a top flight rugby union career representing London Welsh, Birkenhead Park and Cheshire County as a flanker. He won the County Championship with Cheshire, played for the RAF and also represented the Combined Services. He became the first North Walian to captain London Welsh and had a trial for Wales that saw him fail to make the breakthrough with an injured thumb.
His playing style is said to have embodied the defiance and aggression that made him such a thorn in the side of the Germans.
After the war Rees went back into the RAF with a V-bomber squadron at RAF Marham, in Norfolk. . In 1967, he commanded the RAF’s island staging post at Gan in the Indian Ocean before retiring a year later. With his wife, Mary, he took over a small post office in Bangor-on-Dee, Wrexham.
LES MANFIELD DFC
Les Manfield was one of the few players to represent his country on either side of the Second World War. He won the first of his seven caps in a victory against Scotland at the Arms Park, Cardiff, in February 1939, before heading out to Egypt to serve as a navigator in fighter planes.
He had the WW1 fighter pilot Ira “Taffy” Jones to thank for getting him into the air. In 1939, Manfield became a PT instructor at RAF St Athan after giving up his job as a schoolteacher, but wanted to get into the thick of the action. Invited to play for an Ira Jones XV in a special rugby game at Richmond, Manfield greatly impressed his fellow countryman. “Is there anything I can do for you?” asked Jones after the game. “Get me into a bloody plane,” said Manfield.
His 6ft 3in frame was more suited to playing at No 8 for Cardiff and Wales than to fitting into the cockpit of a fighter plane. So large was the man mountain from Mountain Ash that in training he had to put his parachute on his knees. His first assignment as a navigator was in Egypt with 104 Squadron. The crews stopped on the way at Malta and he got his briefing under the wing of the plane on the landing strip. “When you get to Cairo, turn right at the pyramids and the base is just in front of you.” That base was the airstrip being built for the El Alamein push.
Manfield’s time in Egypt was a mixture of bombing raids and special operations, flying secret agents behind enemy lines. There was also a bit of time for rugby. Just to prove the war had not blunted his playing skills, Manfield captained Cairo Welsh to a 22-3 St David’s Day win over England in 1945 and a month later a 6-3 triumph over a Rest of the Empire XV at Alexandria.
Manfield hated the heat and the flies in Egypt and regularly resorted to reading from the Bible his mother had given him. On a raid over Tobruk on 5 October 1942, Manfield’s plane had to turn back because the flak was so heavy. They weren’t hit, but their second engine failed and they had to ditch into the Mediterranean. “It was like hitting a brick wall,” recalled Manfield. All bar the rear-gunner emerged safely from the crash landing.
The four survivors found themselves in a dinghy in pouring rain and 15ft seas. To make matters worse, the fumes from the fuel made them violently sick and they found that the rations in the life-raft had been stolen. They were adrift for two days before being found by an MTB boat. Manfield was flying again within a couple of days. In a six-week period 104 Squadron lost 126 men.
His work with the Special Operations Unit earned Manfield the DFC in 1943, for his pinpoint accuracy in leading his pilots to the exact marks for the drops. Less than a year after he had led Cairo Welsh to their victory over the Rest of the Empire, Manfield was facing the New Zealand Army side – for Wales at the Arms Park – although the 6-3 margin was reversed on this occasion. He also figured in five uncapped wartime internationals between 1940 and 1942 and seven “Victory Internationals” in 1946.
A schoolboy international from Mountain Ash Grammar School, Manfield had declined a trial for England to play for Wales. A hugely powerful player, he figured in the last two games Wales played before war was declared and then in the wins over the touring Australians for both club and country in the 1947/48 season. He played throughout Wales’s 1948 championship campaign.
Manfield returned to teaching after the war, first at Cowbridge Grammar School, then at Mountain Ash Grammar School, where he ended as deputy headmaster. He died in 2006 seven days short of his 91st birthday.
THE WATSON BROTHERS OF CARMARTHEN
Dick and Arthur Watson were both superb athletes and played rugby at Carmarthen Grammar School and for Carmarthen Quins. They both became ‘flyers’ in WW1, Dick serving in the Royal Naval Air Service and Arthur in the Royal Flying Corps.
He was 22. On 25 April, 1917, Leading Mechanic (Gunlayer) Richard (Dick) Henry Watson was in a force of Handley-Page bombers that took off from Coudekerke for a daylight raid on Ostend. The aircraft strayed and was shot down by a German seaplane near Nieuport.
In a dramatic rescue bid, two French seaplanes tried to help. One took off with a survivor aboard, but the other was captured by enemy speedboats, together with the remaining RNAS survivor, who died of wounds some months later.
It is claimed that Dick Watson, a great all-round athlete and strong swimmer, started to swim for the shore, but the Germans machine gunned him in the sea. Less than two weeks earlier Arthur was shot down over German lines and taken as a prisoner of war on 14 April, 1917.
He was on a sortie in a group of Avro RE8’s detailed to photograph German lines. The fighters, which should have escorted them, never arrived and, when they were attacked by German fighters, all six aircrafts were shot down.
Arthur received four machine gun bullets in his left shoulder and was taken out of his aircraft by some German nuns. He was the only one of the 12 crew to survive and spent 18 months as a POW.
He was repatriated just before the war finished and, when he looked back at his bank account he could hardly believe the balance. While he was in France and Germany his pay had gone into his account and he decided to use the funds to study medicine at St. Mary’s in Paddington and went on to become a doctor in Scarborough.
BLEDDYN WILLIAMS
Bleddyn Williams became known as the ‘Prince of Wales Centres’ for his performances for Cardiff, Wales and the British & Irish Lions. He led both club and country to victory over the 1953 All Blacks and captained the Lions during the 1950 tour to New Zealand and Australia.
He also played his part in WW2 with the RAF, training as a fighter pilot in Arizona before being switched to gliders as the big push in Europe got under way. Having crash-landed his cargo of medical and radio supplies for the Rhine crossing, he spent a week sleeping in ditches, using his parachute to keep warm.
He then bumped into his commanding officer, Hugh Bartlett, DFC (the dashing Sussex batsman) one Friday morning. “Williams, aren’t you meant to be at Welford Road [Leicester] tomorrow playing for Great Britain against the Dominions? They need you. Go now!”
Williams was driven from the front line to catch the last supply plane to Brize Norton that night. He then completed a Boys’ Own tale by scoring a match-winning try.
