Lt RS Bostock
Robert Southey Bostock
- Rank
- Lt
- Honours
- MiD (twice)
- School
- King Edward VII School
- Fate
- Killed in action
From the book
The First Ten Months
The raid involved three South Africans. Lt Robert Southey Bostock lost his life, Lt Cecil Howard Filmer was shot down and became a “POW” while Lt Guy Warwick Brokensha was one of seven pilots who managed to fly their battered Skuas back to HMS “Ark Royal”. Thirty-year-old Bostock and twenty-four-year-old Filmer were educated at King Edwards in Johannesburg while twenty-two-year-old Brokensha finished his schooling at DHS in Durban.
The First Ten Months
Bostock ’s service details have not been sourced but he and Filmer were “Mentioned in Dispatches” on May 9th with Bostock receiving a second mention on June 25th. Filmer, a “South African Training Ship General Botha” graduate served as a battleship sub-lieutenant before becoming a Fleet Air Arm pilot in 1938 and was involved in the “Königsberg”, the first air attack sinking of the Second World War.
The Dreaded Telegram
The 88 SAAF losses include several RAF secondments, Rosofsky and Lewis were two of the 22 RAF airmen, 21-year-old Denis Masur was an RCAF Air Gunner serving on an RAF Bomber squadron and 29-year-old Robert Bostock was a Fleet Air Arm pilot.