NOTABLE SERVICE

WELLINGTON AIRMAN

DEATH IN ACCIDENT

Recently the death was reported of Acting Wing Commander Gordon L. M. Schrader, who, was killed in a motor accident in India, on May 31. Had he lived one week longer, he would have completed seven years in the R.A.F. Wing Commander Schrader received nearly all his schooling at Scots College, Wellington, where he was a pupil from 1924 to 1932. His school career foreshadowed the success which later came to him in the R.A.F. He was top of the fifth form in his final year, a school prefect, a member of the college fifteen in 1931 and 1932 and of the eleven in 1932. He is remembered by his contemporaries as quiet, conscientious and determined; a boy who did not court popularity but won it on his merits. COMMISSIONED IN R.A.F. Leaving school in 1932, he was one of the army of youths who caught by the depression years, was unable to find the position for which he looked. Eventually he made, up his mind to join the R.A.F. and, if necessary, to work his passage to England. However, he was given the opportunity of training at Rongotai, where he obtained his "A" licence. He was then accepted for a short-term commission with the R.A.F. which he joined on June 8, 19361 In addition to a successful flying career, he was prominent in Rugby circles in the years before the war and for one season captained v second XV of the R.A.F. For six months in 1938 he was stationed in Irak, where he flew large 25-seater transport planes. With war clouds gathering, 300 airmen were withdrawn from the Middle Eastj and Flying Officer Schrader was in command of this detachment, which he brought from Irak to Malta. Early in 1939 he was involved in a serious motor accident in Britain in which he broke his neck but miraculously lived. Getting his neck out of plaster three weeks before the outbreak of war, he was posted to the Air Ministry at Whitehall for confidential duties, which he continued after the evacuation from London. When France collapsed Acting Flight' Lieutenant Schrader, in an adventurous flight, successfully escaped with his machine and crew in a 1000-mile non-stop flight from the South of France to Britain. "ONE OF THE FEW." Although Mr. Churchill's famous aphorism was applied especially to the , fighter, pilots of the Battle of Britain, it could also truthfully include those of the Bomber Command who, during the breathless days of Dunkirk, held back from the beaches and the waiting British Army the advancing German hordes. Acting Flight Lieutenant Schrader was one of these dauntless few. For five days he bombed the German army before Dunkirk. He was a member of the n first squadron to bomb Italy after Dunkirk, and on that flight was frost-bitten on both hands during the crossing of the Alps. Later he also flew in the first bomber squadron from Britain to Egypt after the fall of Dunkirk. Owing to his natural reserve—in his letters home it was never "I," always "we," and all the thrills of going over the target were condensed simply to reaching the target, "dropping our load," and then "Home, James and don't spare the horses" —because of this reserve, little can be gleaned from his letters of the connected story of those hectic days. But it is known that, operating from Greece, his bomber was one of the first aircraft over Brindisi, then recognised as one of the toughest of Axis targets. This was the opinion expressed by Flight Lieutenant Schrader t- a reporter, representing the American arid Australian Press, who was his passenger on that occasion, and later reported in the New Zealand Press, after an interview given by the newspaper-, man in Auckland. During the first break-through by Rommel, the young New Zealander was in charge of operations from one of the advanced desert aerodromes in Libya. Then followed a period of six months when he disappeared "into the blue" on some mission of which nothing is yet known. He turned up one day in India, where he had been for several months befdre his tragic death. His work there had been rriainly in the operations room. In his death the R.A.F. and New Zealand have lost one of the ablest of the young airmen of this generation. By the loss of her son, Mrs. Schrader has suffered a double blow. It will be remembered that the late Mr. L. M. Schrader, well known and respected among the business community of Wellington, died suddenly about eighteen months ago. The only other member of the family is Flying Officer Warren Schrader, R.N.Z.A.F.,, who is a fighter pilot based on Malta.