Beschreibung:

Royal Flying Corps. A casualty group to 2nd Lieutenant D.P Cox, 27 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps 1914-15 Star (30372 Cpl. D.P. Cox, R.E.), British War and Victory Medals (2 Lieut. D.P. Cox.), extremely fine, with Great War bronze memorial plaque (Derek Percy Cox) with card envelope, together with a WWII group of four attributed to the recipients son Lieutenant D.P.Z. Cox, Fleet Air Arm, comprising 1939-1945 Star, Atlantic Star, Africa Star, War Medal plus a book relating to Major-General Sir Percy Cox titled ‘The Life of Percy Cox’ by Philip Graves, 350 printed pages, numerous illustrations bound in black cloth (Qty: 8) 2nd Lieutenant Derek Percy Cox was born in Peterborough and was the only son of Major-General Sir Percy and Lady Cox. He was educated at Harrow, Woolwich and Sandhurst. In 1915 Cox joined the Machine Gun Corps and in 1916 he transferred to the Royal Flying Corps as 2nd Lieutenant. He completed his first operational sortie on 20 July and flew 13 further sorties there after which were mostly bombing raids. Cox was killed in action on 21 August 1917, whilst on a bombing operation in a Martinsyde ‘Flying Elephant’. His aircraft collided in combat east of Seclin with another Martinsyde flown by Captain G.K. Smith M.C. (who was also killed), and was driven down by the German air ace Hans Bethge of Jasta 30, claiming Cox as his 14 out of 20 aerial victories. Cox is buried at Cabaret-Rouge Cemetery, France, the large folder of research included with this lot includes an original black and white photograph of the crashed aircraft Cox was flying plus a copy of the Squadron Record Book. His C.O. wrote after his death ‘Your husband was a splendid pilot and had done extremely good work. He is a very great loss to the squadron, both on account of his capabilities and his personality which endeared him to everybody’. Lieutenant Derek Percy Zacariah Cox was born in February 1918, he was educated at Harrow and brought up by his grandfather Major-General Sir Percy Cox. He joined the Royal Navy in 1935 and served in HMS Exeter and Impulse. He then transferred to the Fleet Air Arm and trained as a pilot. He served with 760 Squadron on HMS Grebe flying Sea Hurricanes. In April 1942 he served with 759 Squadron in HMS Heron and a few months later HMS Avenger, the ship was en route to the Mediterranean in November 1942 when the ship was torpedoed by U-155 with the loss of 600 crew including Cox. Cox is commemorated on the Lee-on-Solent, Memorial, Hampshire.