Flight Lt A Fry “Tony”

More than a “Few” South Africans

Edwards was involved in the war from the start, others joined once age allowed but a high percentage did not survive the war including Flight Lt Anthony Fry DFC and Pilot Officer SG Collier who lost their lives when four No 59 Squadron Blenheim’s were shot down off the Dutch coast on April 28th, 1941.

The Dreaded Telegram

Denis Norman McCarthy and Anthony Ellerton Fry left Bishops in 1934. McCarthy’s post school activities are unknown. Fry, completed an Engineering degree at London University with Honours, a member of the University Air Squadron with PHV Wells and CW Goldsmith, he and Goldsmith were appointed Flying Officers in December 1939. Denis McCarthy commissioned as a “Pilot Officer on probation” on June 18th 1940, a few days before Flying Officer “Tony” Fry joined No 59 Squadron. Fry had flown more than 40 operational sorties when “The London Gazette” announced his and another former Bishops pupil Laurence Hull’s “Distinguished Flying Cross” awards on December 24th.

The Dreaded Telegram

Pilot Officer DN McCarthy, an “Elementary Flying Training School” instructor and his pupil lost their lives in a flying accident on April 20th. McCarthy’s wife and parents lived in England but news of his death had not reached his school contemporaries when William and Janetta Fry received a telegram at their Somerset West on April 30th advising their son Flight Lt Anthony Fry DFC had been posted “missing”.

The Dreaded Telegram

Sidney Collier and Anthony Fry were initially entitled to the “Battle of Britain” Clasp, eligibility which had inexplicably bypassed the 1945 Air Ministry Order, “..The clasp is not available for personnel who flew in aircraft other than fighters, notwithstanding that they may have been engaged with the enemy in the air during the qualifying period ”. Coastal Command recipients were controversially requested to return their Clasps 15 years later!