Roll of Honour 2023

P AGE 134

W ORLD W AR II

S T . E DWARD ’ S S CHOOL , O XFORD R OLL OF H ONOUR

Name GEORGE FRANCIS BARKER-BENFIELD (Sgt)

Set / House D

Lef SES 1940

Roll Number 3091 Died 19:09:1941

Arrive SES 1936

Where BRIZE NORTON AIRFIELD Serving with R.A.F.V.R.

Age 19

Buried Brookfield Military Cemetery, Pirbright Remembered Brookfield Memorial, Pirbright and The St. Edward’s WW2 Memorial

Born in March, near Abingdon in 1925 of a Berkshire family, he held a School Scholarship. He was a House Prefect, a Mathematical Scholar, the 2nd Cricket XI, Senior Sacristan, School Choir, School Play, Librarian, Sub-Editor of the ‘Chronicle’ in the Maths Upper VIth Form. He joined the RAFVR soon after leaving St. Edward’s and was killed during his flying instruction a few months later in a mid-air collision over Brize Norton Airfield , Pirbright, Oxon. Whitley Operational Training Unit. All four crew members killed. ‘He will be remembered by friends for his singular balance of his character and for his attractive gifts. He passed through the School quite and unobtrusively and he always placed his many promising qualities at the service of others, the members of his House will like to remember him for the unassuming keenness he pout into everything he did, his deep sense of duty and his Christian example’ (Chronicle).