First Light: Original Edition (Penguin World War II Collection)

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By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. It is the record of humanity staring into the great unknown that awaits and asking, 'Did I live in vain? Regardless of whether or not you have an interest in WWII itself, or the life of a fighter pilot, this is one of the greatest human stories you will read. These men, as young as 18, flew one of the fastest and deadliest aircraft at the time and many didn't make it through the campaign or even their first mission. Thinking I might be allowed in very quickly, under close escort, out comes the man himself, almost bounding over as much as any man his age can do.

A battle-hardened ace by the winter of 1941, though still not out of his teens, 'Boy' Wellum flew scores of missions as fighter escort on bombing missions over France. It explains exactly what it was like: the camaraderie, the fear, the emotions, how he was recruited, what it’s like to fly a Spitfire. In three years I flew more than 200 hours on the Harvard, mainly taking passengers for experience trips. The achievement is all the greater in that the other occupiers of that list were books I read when I was much younger, unmarked, and could receive deeper and more lasting impressions from the books I read.Published for the first time more than fifty years after the war, First Lightis Geoffrey Wellum's gripping memoir of his experiences as a fighter pilot.

Wellum left the Royal Air Force in 1961, [and went to work] with a firm of commodity brokers in the City of London, set up his own business, and then retired to Mullion, Cornwall. Geoffrey Wellum left school at 17 to join the RAF, before being launched into the Battle of Britain as a Spitfire pilot at the age of 19.Having read other books by and about the famous RAF aces (Bader, Tuck, and Paul Richey), I recommend this book very highly. Here in 2010, being the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, Geoffrey Wellum was featured on a t. Loosely inserted are two SIGNED letters from the author's private residence in Cornwall replying to the vendor requesting his signature.