This was my mums 1st husband he died later during WW2.
His tiny pocket diary remained with me for 40+ years but I could not grasp much of the faint pencil cursive writing.
So I sent it to AWM Australian War Memorial in 2004,, well they called me last week to say had deciphered it.
In a few days will be 80th anniversary of this story to tell.
Transcript of collection relating to Pilot Officer David Taylor Galt DFC. Collection Number: PR03274 Transcriber: Erin McKnight, 2021
full transcript
https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/awm-media/collection/PR03274/document/8891235.PDF
diary pictures
https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C2682342
Description
Diary relating to the Second World War service of 400976 Pilot Officer David Taylor Galt DFC, 460 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force.
In his diary, Galt recounts his experiences as the pilot of an Avro Lancaster bomber that was hit, caught on fire, and crash landed in France in late November 1942 with no fatalities. He describes the details of his return to England, including his evasion of German soldiers, travelling through fields and woods and avoiding roads, seeking help from French villagers, taking several train trips, making friends, forging identity papers, walking through the Pyrenees Mountains, being stopped by Spanish Carabineros, and finally returning to England via Madrid. The last three pages of the diary have a list of “Observations” about his successful escape. Galt later lost his life in a flying battle over the Bay of Biscay on 13 August 1943.
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