Billy Fiske Blog

To begin, let us say, “Thank you!” 2020 was quite a year to kick off the Billy Fiske Foundation.

US Pentagon, Washington, DC

Last week, my good friend Admiral Jim Stavridis wrote a very thoughtful piece in the Washington Post, “Don’t Brand Everyone Who Served Trump with a Scarlet T.”

#GivingTuesday Please consider a financial gift to the Billy Fiske Foundation today and make this important monument a reality. Make a contribution at https://billyfiskefoundation.org/get-involved.

Air Commodore James Linter, Air Attaché at the British Embassy in Washington, DC and Honorary Group Captain Kevin Billings, President of the Billy Fiske Foundation present a limited edition lithograph of Philip West’s painting ‘Comrades in Arms’ to US Air Force Chief of Staff, General CQ Brown on 17 August, the 80th Anniversary of the day Billy Fiske died. The painting depicts Pilot Officer Billy Fiske and 601 Squadron Officer Commanding, Squadron Leader Max Aitken flying a patrol near RAF Tangmere 13 July 1940.

Eighty years ago, a young Royal Air Force fighter pilot called Billy Fiske was buried at Boxgrove Priory church in Sussex, one of the prettiest corners of southern England. He’d died of wounds sustained flying a Hawker Hurricane in the Battle of Britain. Nothing especially unusual about that — sadly, some 1,500 RAF aircrew perished in that epic struggle against the Luftwaffe. But if you had been in that medieval church that day, you would have noticed something rather unusual about this funeral. For Fiske’s coffin was draped with two flags — the Union Jack and the Stars and Stripes.