Posted on 11/12/2004 1:53:46 PM PST by Lukasz
General Stanislaw Skalski, Poland’s top fighter ace from the Second World War and a participant in the Battle of Britain, died today in a Warsaw military hospital, a military spokesman said. He was 89.
Serving in the Polish air force, Skalski shot down a German reconnaissance plane on September 1, 1939, the day Nazi Germany started the war by invading Poland. Some historians credit him with the first aerial victory against the Germans, although another pilot also scored one at around the same time.
Poland was soon overwhelmed, and Skalski fled for Britain and joined the Royal Air Force’s No 501 Squadron. He shot down six German planes in 1940 during the Battle of Britain, Germany’s unsuccessful attempt to destroy the RAF.
Skalski suffered serious burns and had to parachute to safety when his Hurricane fighter was shot down on September 5, 1940, but he returned to the air six weeks later.
He subsequently commanded the Polish Fighting Team, which earned the nickname the “Skalski Circus” flying over Britain, Malta and Tunisia. In Tunisia, Skalski and his fellow Poles shot down 25 Nazi planes while losing only three of their own. Skalski ended the war with 24 downed enemy planes to his credit.
“He was the ace of Poland’s Air Force, a hero of the Battle of Britain,” military spokesman Major Maciej Wozniak said.
Skalski was born on October 27, 1915, in the village of Kodyma, Poland, and graduated from Polish pilot training school in 1938.
After the war, Skalski returned to Poland, where he was jailed and sentenced to death by the communist authorities on allegations he was a Western spy. He spent eight years on death row, before being cleared and released in 1956.
He earned Poland’s highest military honour for bravery, the Virtuti Militari.
Beginning in the 1980s he tried with little success to enter politics, joining several left-wing parties.
I had an uncle who was a Polish fighter pilot in the RAF; he liked vodka a lot and died quite a while ago.
Godspeed to one of the few.
thanks great photo, these crosses tell us everything what is necessary...
Poland is a tremendous ally.
bump
Lukasz:
Thank you for posting this. It was a really nice addition to our homeschool history lesson today!
I send my heartfelt condolences to this brave man's family - and our family's thanks to him...
- Michelle Konieczny
Did I get it right...???
And Skalski himself would be "Odwazny Polski"?
ping
After the war, Skalski returned to Poland, where he was jailed and sentenced to death by the communist authorities on allegations he was a Western spy. He spent eight years on death row
Hell of a reward for him and many other Polish soldiers. He earned several Distinguished Flying Crosses for his service with the RAF. Rest In Peace.
It's about Robert Stanford Tuck, Britain's leading ace. He gets shot down and escapes from a prison camp to the Russians with a Polish pilot. Then they both have to escape from the Russians.
Kochamy Polske
A really excellent BoB film is "Dark Blue World".
It's about two Czech pilots who fled Czechoslovakia to fight with the RAF (and one gets imprisoned on his return, story very similar to Skalski.)
Different but good is a British miniseries "Piece of Cake" also about the Battle of Britain, told as an ensemble character study of "Hornet Squadron." Very well done and also occasionally brutally funny.
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