The #52Ancestors prompt of 'Planes' put me in mind of my uncle David Pummeroy, who served in World War 2 as a pilot. While I had previously looked for his Air Force record on the Australian National Archives website, until recently they had not yet been digitised.
To my joy, his record is now available. It contains a total of 52 pages and I plan to examine it in more detail this weekend.
William David Russell Pummeroy was born in Brighton on 6 September 1925, the eldest son of Gladys Daisy (Clark) and William Henry Pummeroy. He was always known as David, probably to distinguish himself from his father. David enlisted in the RAAF on 8 October 1943 in Melbourne, just a month after his 18th birthday, having previously worked as an apprentice Gas Fitter.
David started his RAAF career as an Aircraftman Class 2 (Aircrew), rising to the rank of Sergeant (Airman Pilot) in 1944 and finally Flight Sergeant (Airman Pilot) in 1945. He would be discharged from the RAAF on 28 March 1946.
As a civilian David would go on to work as a pilot for first TAA and then Qantas, flying planes all over the world, and eventually retiring as a Senior Flight Instructor.
Interestingly, despite his long career as a civilian pilot, his parents were not great travellers. His father William Henry Pummeroy never flew with his son, and his mother only flew with him once. In the 1970s David's mother, my grandmother Gladys Daisy Pummeroy, flew from Melbourne to Townsville to visit her youngest son. She was in her early 70s at the time, and it was the only time she ever boarded a plane.
