Richard Jordan (General)

Richard Jordan (1949)

Sir Richard Bowen Jordan , KCB , DFC (born February 7, 1902 in Pershore , Worcestershire , † April 24, 1994 in Royal Tunbridge Wells , Kent ) was a British Air Force officer in the Royal Air Force , most recently in the rank of Lieutenant General ( Air Marshal ) from 1956 to 1958 Commanding General of the Air Force Maintenance Command ( RAF Maintenance Command ) was.

Life

Air force officer training and World War II

Jordan began his training as a flight cadet of the A-Squadron at the Royal Air Force College Cranwell after attending the Marlborough College as one of the first officer candidates in 1921 . During his training there, he was a member of the cricket and rugby teams and was most recently a flight cadet sergeant . After completing his training, he was accepted into the Royal Air Force as a lieutenant (pilot officer) as a professional soldier (permanent commission) on December 22, 1922 , and was initially employed as a pilot in No 2 Squadron RAF . On June 20, 1924 he was promoted to first lieutenant (Flying Officer) and on February 12, 1926 transferred as a pilot to No 28 Squadron RAF . There he was the last responsible navigation officer of the squadron and was promoted to captain (flight lieutenant) on December 12, 1928 . Almost six weeks later, on January 21, 1929, he was transferred to the No 2 (Indian Wing) RAF staff in Risalpur and then on January 8, 1931, initially to an air force depot, before he became a pilot of the The testing department of the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) was the research and development institution of the Air Force.

On August 1, 1936 Jordan was promoted to Major (Squadron Leader) and as such on January 15, 1938 as a staff officer to the Directorate of the Peace Organization (Peace Organization) . Promoted to Lieutenant Colonel (Wing Commander) on 1 July 1939, he was on 21 August 1939, shortly before the start of the Second World War commander ( Commanding Officer ) of No 83 Squadron RAF . At the beginning of the Battle of Britain in May 1940, he initially took over the post of commander of the RAF Manston military airfield and was then commander of No 214 Squadron RAF from August 1940 to July 1944 . As such, he was first mentioned in the war report on January 1, 1941 ( Mentioned in dispatches ) and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) on August 22, 1941 . On the night of 2/3 June 1941 he flew from the air base RAF Stradishall with a fighter aircraft of type Vickers Wellington with his unit to an air operation against Berlin . After successfully attacking the target, he flew over the British mainland at 6 a.m. before crashing southwest of Bury St Edmunds . However, the machine did not catch fire, so that all but one of the crew members survived the crash unharmed. On June 11, 1942, January 1, 1943 and June 2, 1943, he was mentioned again in the war report and on September 24, 1943 was appointed commander of the Polish order Polonia Restituta . Most recently, during the war, in July 1944, he was head of the department for transports in overseas operations in the Air Staff .

Post-war period and promotion to Air Marshal

After the war ended, Jordan was promoted to Colonel (Group Captain) on January 1, 1946 and Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) on June 12, 1947 . After his promotion to Brigadier General ( Air Commodore ) on July 1, 1947, he took over the post of AOC (Air Officer Commanding) in command of the British Air Forces in India and Pakistan and on October 31, 1947 also received the title of Commander of the Dutch Order of Orange -Nassau . On February 1, 1949 he became Commander of the Air Force in Gibraltar (RAF Gibraltar) and then in 1949 as the successor to Air Commodore Percy Bernard, 5th Earl of Bandon in command of the Royal Observer Corps (ROC), a civil defense organization , and remained on this post until his replacement by Air Commodore Gordon Herbert Vasse on March 20, 1951. At the same time, on April 26, 1949, he became the aide-de-camp of King George VI. appointed. On March 20, 1951, he again succeeded Air Commodore Gordon Herbert Vasse as commander of No 25 Group RAF and held this post until February 16, 1953, after which Air Commodore Hugh Hamilton Brookes was his successor there. During this time he was on July 1, 1951 Major General (Air Vice Marshal) promoted and served on 16 February 1953 to 16 January 1956 as head of the Organization Department of the Air Ministry ( Air Ministry ) .

Jordan most recently replaced Air Marshal Leslie Harvey on January 16, 1956 as Commanding General AOC-in-C (Air Officer Commander-in-Chief) of the Air Force Maintenance Command ( RAF Maintenance Command ) . In this application he was promoted to Lieutenant General ( Air Marshal ) on May 1, 1956 . In addition, he was beaten May 31, 1956 to Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) and then carried the suffix "Sir". On May 5, 1958, he was replaced by Air Vice Marshal Douglas Jackman as Commanding General of the Air Force Maintenance Command and retired on June 2, 1958.

Web links

• Biography on Air of Authority - A History of RAF Organization