Patrick Gifford was a lawyer from the south west of Scotland. Born in 1910, he was educated at St Mary’s School in Melrose and Sedbergh School in Yorkshire. He trained as a solicitor in Edinburgh and joined 603 (City of Edinburgh) Squadron and was commissioned in June 1931. By the outbreak of war in 1939, he was a Flight Lieutenant and ‘A’ Flight Commander.
On 16 October 1939, 12 Luftwaffe Junkers Ju88 dive bombers based at Sylt flew across the North Sea and attempted to bomb Royal Navy ships anchored to the east of the Forth Rail Bridge. They were intercepted by Spitfires of both 603 and 602 (City of Glasgow) Squadron and two were shot down into sea – one by each squadron. Gifford’s section was credited with the destruction of the first which was also the first German aircraft to be shot down in British air space since the First World War. For this he was awarded the DFC.
Twelve days later on 28 October 1939, both squadrons and both pilots were involved in the shooting down of a Heinkel He111 which crashed in East Lothian near the village of Humbie. This was the first German aircraft of the war to be brought down on British soil
In November 1939, Gifford was promoted to Squadron Leader and given command of 3(F) Squadron at the time flying Hurricanes based in the south of England. He was one of the first Auxiliaries to be given command of a regular squadron.
When the Germans invaded the Low Countries and France on 10 May 1940, 3(F) Squadron was ordered to France where it operated from several primitive airfields and under difficult conditions. The speed of the German ‘Blitzkrieg’ meant that the squadron was moving at short notice from one airfield to another – sometimes taking off from one and landing at another.
In the early evening of 16 May, Gifford and another pilot took off to cover a withdrawal of the British Army southeast of Brussels. The two were attacked by German aircraft and Gifford was shot down in flames by a Messerschmitt 110. His fate was unknown. In 1945, RAF authorities in Germany were sent Gifford’s flying log book by a German soldier who said that he had found it in a crashed Hurricane with the request that it be returned to the Squadron Leader, which was not possible.
The mystery of Gifford’s disappearance has endured. A dedicated team of British and Belgian researchers believe that his body was buried in a local churchyard but moved to the Commonwealth War Grave at Heverlee in Belgium where it is buried as ‘an unknown airman’. However, the absolute proof of this still has to be established. His name appears on the Runnymede Memorial and on the War Memorial of his home town in Castle Douglas.
Bill Simpson