René Mouchotte

Commandant René Mouchotte DFC (21 August 1914 – 27 August 1943) was a World War II pilot of the French Air Force, who escaped from Vichy French–controlled Oran to join the Free French forces. Serving with RAF Fighter Command, he rose to command a fighter wing before being shot down and killed on 27 August 1943. His diaries were published in 1949 and later translated into English.

French Air Force Born into a wealthy family on 21 August 1914 in Paris, Mouchotte began his military service in October 1935 with the French Air Force at Istres, where he was promoted to corporal (April 1936), master corporal (March 1937), and sergeant (April 1937); he qualified as a pilot in February 1937. In January 1939, he transferred to the reserve and resumed civilian life. Recalled in September 1939, he was posted to training establishments at Salon-de-Provence and Avord as a flying instructor. Despite several requests to join a fighter squadron, he was transferred to Oran in May 1940 for a conversion course to twin-engined aircraft. After the Armistice, the pilots on the base were ordered not to escape to join the Free French and the aircraft were placed under armed guard. Despite this, Mouchotte and five comrades (including Henry Lafont) escaped in a twin-engined Caudron Goéland aircraft, only to find that the controls for the variable-pitch propellers had been disabled, making the take-off hazardous. However they did manage to land in Gibraltar and later transferred to the Free French armed trawler, Président Houduce and sailed to England. On 31 August, he was appointed squadron leader of No. 65 Squadron RAF, the first RAF squadron to be commanded by a non-Commonwealth officer. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on 1 September 1942.

Finally, he took command of No. 341 Squadron RAF (Groupe de Chasse n° 3/2 "Alsace") with the Biggin Hill Wing. On 15 May 1943, S/L 'Jack' Charles (611 squadron) and Mouchotte both destroyed an Fw 190 of I./JG 2, as the Biggin Hill Wing's 999th and 1,000th kill claim.

In Paris, a street Rue du Commandant Rene Mouchotte in the 14th Arrondissement of Paris and a nearby footbridge over the River Seine are named after him. There are two plaques in his memory at Eperlecques. At the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle in London on 18 June 2013 a vitrine by Ian Reed (Allied Forces Heritage Group) was unveiled in honour of Commandant René Mouchotte and the Forces Aériennes Françaises Libres. The RAF headquarters in Gibraltar was renamed the Mouchotte Building on the weekend of the Battle of Britain Commemorations on 14–15 September 2013.

Mouchotte was the subject of a BBC One television programme shown in the United Kingdom on Inside Out on 28 January 2013 and another version filmed at Elvington with Ian Reed and Jan Leeming in February 2013. Mouchotte's British campaign medals, including the Battle of Britain Clasp, were not presented to his family after the war and were obtained by Ian Reed (AFHG) and Vladimir Touplin (Musée de Ordre de Liberation) who presented them to his sister along with recently discovered footage of her brother taken in 1943, before she died in June 2012. Later they were officially presented to family members along with the medals of Mouchotte's friend Henry Lafont, in the British Ambassador's Residence in Paris on 13 July 2012.