263 Squadron ORB Website (URL Updated 2016)

[RecklessRat]

Dear all,

I am proud (and not a little relieved!) to announce the completion of a project to transcribe AIR 27/1548 Operations Record Book, No. 263 Squadron R.A.F, January 1942 - May 1945.

<a href="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/laurieburley/jeff/index.html" target="_blank">Link here</a>

The ORB is accompanied by a selection of documents taken from the Appendices, as well as some supporting information from WO 208 and WO 344.

This project, which started off as a way of sending information to my Dad on the other side of the world, has taken many hundreds of hours. Having done all the hard work, I thought it might be useful if it was available to other researchers with an interest in the Squadron.

Happy reading!

Jeff Beaumont.

[brewerjerry]

Hi Jeff,
Excellent stuff.
I will browse thro' and see if there is anything I have that I can send you, do you intend adding photos later? if so i will sort out a few, may take a few weeks thou'
If there is anything in particular you are after let me know, I have research stuff, mainly whirlwind's and 263Sq at harrowbeer/bolt head.
cheers
Jerry

[CZ_RAF]

Hi Jeff, very nice stuff, thanks for sharing it!

Pavel

[dfuller52]

Well done Jeff, a painstaking task to be sure. Thanks to your efforts, I now have a ton of new information on Edgar Brearley, a 263 pilot lost on 16 Apr 1943. He turns up in dozens of entries and the descriptions are quite excellent. Thanks again.

[Mikkel Plannthin]

Jeff,
Anyone having taken on the task of transcribing parts of ORBs know what a tremendous job you have done. Even if 263S is out of scope for me, let me take the chance to congratulate you on a job well done.

Mikkel

[HughAHalliday]

This is awesome - not just for the sheer work of transcription but the site organization and searchability. Thanks - congratulations - marvellous !

[Steve Brew]

Hi Jeff

Excellent job, well done!

Your Flt Sgt/WO John Irvine (9 Nov 1944-at least 5 May 1945) and Flt Sgt/WO Donald F. J. Tebbit (17 Feb-13 Aug 1941 and 7 Oct 1942-20 Jan 1944) were also both 41 Squadron pilots, Irvine briefly prior to 263 Sqn and Tebbit afterwards.

Tebbit was shot down and captured on 22 Feb 1945. I have his POW Repat Report, if you'd like it.

Regards
Steve

[RecklessRat]

Thank you, everyone, I'm glad to see it's useful to others. To answer some of the questions above:

Jerry:- The website probably will remain text-only, partially to do with copyright and mostly due to a near-total lack of photographic material from within the family. What photos I have gathered have been very generously passed on by others; they allowed me to send Dad some framed photos of his father for his Christmas prezzie last year - which is a pretty awesome thing to be able to do for someone!

David:- The loss of Edgar Brearley is an odd one. Not so much for the manner of his loss, but the appearance of his body in the sea at Swanage over a month later. I have a photo of his headstone in Warmwell Churchyard somewhere if you'd like it.

Hugh:- I'm rather pleased at how the site has turned out. Obviously, someone else had done most of the hard work with the template, but I do like the appearance of the end result. One difficulty will be making new documents easily identifiable for return visitors, but I have a cunning plan for that...

Steve:- Thanks for the offer, I will add that to my list next time I go to Kew (WO 344/405/1 ?). I am thinking vaguely about adding a collection of mini biographies from public sources (The ORB, Gazette, CWGC, etc.) as I already have something of the sort for around 70 pilots, but I think others better qualified and resourced than I are in the middle of a similar project. The problem is, every one has a story and it would be a mighty task to do each of them justice.


You may well have noticed that a lot of the stuff from the Appendices has the name "Beaumont" on it somewhere. The reason for that is fairly obvious, but I will be going back and adding more information in the future, particularly from 1944 and 45. In the mean time I plan to take a break for a a few months and catch up on some other projects (Not to mention building up brownie points with the other half, who tolerates all this with surprising patience!), but I'm sure I will return to it on those long, grim English winter nights!

Regards,

Jeff

[zwingli]

Hi Jeff
What a wonderful accomplishment. I am currently involved in a similar project for 101 Squadron as a sister site to 156 Squadron PFF. I know the amount of work involved in transcribing this information and the difficulties in reading some of the entries on the ORBs.
Kudos to you for a great piece of work.
Leslie

[Alex Crawford]

Hi Jeff,

Excellent work, well done. I have a keen interest in 263 Sqn, mainly with it's Gladiator operations over Norway, but also with the Whirlwind as well.

Alex