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RUSTY LEITH AM DFC


AN AUSTRALIAN SPITFIRE PILOT’S WARTIME MEMORABILIA AND PHOTOS.

 * Home
 * About Rusty
 * "Duty Done"
 * Photos
 * Memorabilia 
    * Wartime memorabilia
    * Bag the Hun
    * Gunnery school instructions
    * Embarrassing incidents
    * Gatecrashing Churchill
    * On the run in France
    * Log Book

 * More info


 *  
   
   
   SERVICE AS A SPITFIRE PILOT
   
   Colin Russell Leith (1922 – 2010) was a Spitfire Pilot with No. 453 Squadron
   RAAF. With 453 Squadron he flew Ramrod, Rhubarb and Circus sorties out of
   England during 1942-1943 channel offensives. After fufilling a required 6
   months of operational rest as a gunnery instructor, he rejoined the squadron
   soon after the D-Day landings.
   
    
   
   Now part of the 2nd Tactical Air Force, he flew with the squadron as they
   supported allied ground forces fighting their way out of Normandy. He was an
   "evader", helped by the French Resistance he spent 4 weeks sheltering behind
   German-occupied lines. Re-joining the squadron, he took part in Operation
   Market Garden before 125 wing was pulled back to England to start a new tour.
   From England, he particpated in dive bombing sorties, attacking German V2
   Rocket launch sites as part of Operation Big Ben.
   
    
   
   After the war he was honoured for his community work in Australia. Among his
   flying mates, he was known as "Rusty".
   
    
   
   This website contains a collection of rare and historic material that
   illuminate the wartime experiences of Rusty, starting from his enlistment in
   the Royal Australian Air Force in May 1941 to his last flight as a fighter
   pilot on 1 June 1945. In total, he served four years and five months in the
   RAAF and was away from Australia on war service for 1415 days.
   
    
   
   
   INFORMATION FOR RESEARCHERS
   
   Researchers and authors are encouraged to explore these pages, and make use
   of the resources. Any use of the material should carry a credit to the "Leith
   Family" and provide a hyperlink to this website.
   
   


 * RUSTY'S BIOGRAPHY - DUTY DONE
   
   Further information about this material and Rusty can be found in his
   biography Duty Done, available as a Kindle edition on Amazon.com
   
    
   
   Purchase Duty Done
   
   
   AN EXTRAORDINARY LIFE
   
   Russell Leith lived through extraordinary times, and he experienced
   extraordinary events. All of which experiences he had a remarkable skill in
   turning to positive benefit to himself and those around him, and in this way
   become an extraordinary person. Even the experiences which must have been
   unbearably painful.
   
    
   
   Born in a sugar-growing village in the far-off island in the middle of the
   Pacific, he was packed off to boarding school across the ocean at the age of
   just 8. Seeing his parents three or fewer times a year, he remained in
   boarding schools in Fiji and then Australia till he was 15 when he was
   required to leave school to help support his family. Still only 15, he
   endured the experience of his mother collapsing and dying in front of him.
   
   He went off to a horrifying war in distant Europe. He watched his mates die
   in flaming Spitfires.
   
    
   
   He gained a step-mother. He was confined in a tuberculosis sanitorium for a
   year and a half. And later, he endured the loss of the woman of his life, his
   wife Meg, followed by 27 years of faithful widowhood.
   
    
   
   Those close to him know that these experiences took their toll on him, but at
   the same time made him stronger, kinder and wiser. In his unique brave way,
   he treated them as challenges he could overcome.
   
    
   
   Learn more about Rusty
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© 2021 The Leith Family








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