Name: John S. Bryson
Born: 1913
Joined 92: 10 Oct 1939
Died: 24 Sept 1940









Pilot Officer John Samuel Bryson, called "Butch", was the son John T. Bryson and Marion Elphinstone Bryson. He born in Westmount, an enclave of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Prior to the war he was a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police but bought his way out in order to serve in defense of Britain.

 

In January 1939 he joined the Royal Air Force on a short service commission. Upon completion of his flying training at No. 13 Flying Training school at RAF Drem, he was posted to No. 92 Squadron RAF. He joined the squadron at RAF Tangmere on 10 October 1939.

 

Bryson claimed a Bf109 on 23rd May and he had one 'kill', an He111 over Dunkirk on 2 June 1940, and shared a kill on 24 July 1940 of a Junkers Ju88 which was bombing shipping in the Bristol Channel. It crashed on Martinhoe Common, near Lynton.

 

Flying with 92 Sqn out of Biggin Hill, joining two other squadrons in a Big Wing group, on 24 September 1940, in response to a ten Ju88 medium bomber attack, defended by over one-hundred 109s, Bryson was "last seen making a solo attack on a large formation ofMe109s". He was shot down and killed by Hauptmann Herbert Ihlefeld's Bf109s of I. (J)/Lehrgeschwader 2, his Spitfire, X4037, crashing and burning out near North Weald. Butch Bryson was 27 years old. He was buried in St Andrew's Church, North Weald Bassett, Essex, Row 1, Grave 4.