Ted Morgan (1923-1989). Royal Air Force. Neyland/Whitland/Pendine

Disgrifiad

This account illustrates the contribution made by one family in West Wales during WW2 focusing on one member of the family, Ted Morgan. The account which follows captures places and events including Pendine, Whitland and even Oklahoma in the USA. It includes people who met only because the war.

Ted was born in 1923 in Neyland, Pembrokeshire before moving to Whitland. He became an architectural student in Cardiff University in 1941 and a member of the Cardiff University Air Squadron, enlisting for service in the RAF at the Recruiting office in nearby Penarth. His older brother, Kemys, was serving in the RAF and by this point had already completed one operational tour in Bomber Command during the Battle for France, Battle of Britain and then daylight attacks on the invasion ports in Northern France.

Placed initially on deferred entry, Ted was eventually selected for training as a Pilot and was posted to the No. 6 British Flying Training School, in Ponca City, Oklahoma, USA. Commissioned as a Pilot Officer in late 1943 he returned to the UK and then flew single and multi-engine aircraft. Ted was a 22yrs old Flt Lt by VE Day in May 1945 at No. 5 GTS RAF Shobdon in Herefordshire. Ted was then preparing to go out to the Far East as a member of a new Hawker Tempest fighter Squadron who would be operating in “Tiger Force” when the Atom bomb was dropped by the Americans, and Japan surrendered.

Ted returned to his studies at Cardiff University but continued to fly at weekends and during college holidays in the RAFVR. In the early 1950s he became one of the first Educational Psychologists appointed to the still very new NHS and eventually retired as Head of Applied Social Studies at Ruskin College, Oxford in 1981.

Ted lost his two wives at young ages and effectively brought up his four children on his own. He spent his final years in a small village close to the border of Herefordshire and Worcestershire and died in 1989 aged 66yrs.