In the Battle of Britain Lovell had served as a Flight Lieutenant with No 41 Squadron flying Spitfires.
Wing Commander Stanislaw Brzezina lived only a little longer into the post-war world. He had flown with the Polish Air Force against the Luftwaffe in September 1939 before escaping to Britain via Rumania. He also flew Spitfires as a Flight Lieutenant in the Battle of Britain, but with No 74 Squadron.
On 13 February 1946, Brzezina was a passenger in a Dakota of No 435 squadron, flying from the RAF base at Bückeburg in Lower Saxony, Germany, to Croydon. In bad weather, while attempting to land at its destination, the aircraft struck high ground and skidded for some distance, with the wreckage finishing on farm land at Warlingham, Surrey.
Brzezina was killed, along with the skipper, Squadron Leader R G Joyce, RCAF, Flight Lieutenant A H Clark, RCAF, Wing Commander S Grodzicki, LAC D Palmer, LAC G A Doxey, Driver D I Glover, Royal Engineers, and Dr John Brittain, a civilian rocket scientist working for the Ministry of Supply. Most of the survivors were seriously injured.
Stanislaw Brzezina was buried in St Mary Cray cemetery, Orpington, Kent and is remembered on the Polish Air Force Memorial at Northolt. He was 41 when he died.
Geoff Simpson FRHistS
