Our card today was selected simply for the time frame. World War Two, however it also represents the entire air force and the civilian workers, whose place of employment was not only a huge target, but they were often caught up in the chaos when a landing or take off went awry. And most of all it celebrates two of those commemorated on the new stamp issue -
- Squadron Leader Mohinder Singh Pujji DFC, born on the 14th of August, 1918, in Simla, India, one of the first Sikhs to volunteer, who flew primarily Hurricanes but also Spitfires for the Royal Air Force and the Royal Indian Air Force between 1940 and 1946. However, before the war he was a pilot with Himalayan Airways. He died aged 92, in Kent. He is shown wearing his Sikh headwear, which he wore throughout his flying career, despite the fact that it prevented him wearing his oxygen mask, and that would later lead to lung damage. He died, of a stroke, aged ninety-two.
- Lilian Bader was born Lilian Bailey on the 18th of February 1918, in Toxteth, Liverpool, England. Her father was from Barbados, and he was a merchant seaman. Her mother was Irish. Their father died when she was just nine, and she was put in a convent. It is not clear whether she ever saw her two brothers again. She enlisted right at the start of the Second World War, but faced prejudice from the authorities, and was dismissed. It took her until 1941 to join up again, in the Women`s Auxiliary Air Force. Though they were not allowed to fly Spitfires, they were charged with maintaining them. They were also, oddly, allowed to train new pilots, before they went in the air. Miss Bailey was also trained in instrument repair, becoming a Leading Aircraftwoman, and then a Corporal. She also got married, in 1943, to Mr. Ramsay Bader, who was a tank driver in the Royal Artillery. She had her first child in February 1944. and two subsequently. She died at the age of ninety-seven.
This set, and all the Trucards issues, appear in our original British Trade Index volume III, and we do have a homepage for this issuer, with our Card of the Day for the 28th of June 2023 - where all the other sets are listed, with links out and in to see them.
The full listing of this set reads :
TRUCARDS, Thornton Heath, Surrey.
Cards Issued 1972
- World War II. 69 x 45. “Series No.5”. Nd. (30) ... TRWM-8
Now sadly this issuer does not appear in the updated British Trade Index, because the cards are commercial. That was one of the (sadly necessary) exclusions that was decided to keep the book small enough to handle.