Little is known of Lt. Watson at this time. He was a pilot of one of five 59 Sqn RE.8's shotdown on 13/04/1917.

"When researching the history of Christ Church, Carmarthen I found that the elder brother, ARTHUR WATSON, was a Lieutenant (Pilot) in 59 Squadron RFC. On 13 April six of its RE8 fighters were surprised by Richthofen's Jagdstaffel 11 squadron and all shot down. Watson's plane was the only one from which survivors emerged (badly injured). Arthur was taken POW and held at Aachen, but was repatriated by May 1918 and was photographed with the Church Choir (both brothers had been choristers). I don't know his subsequent history, but his sister was still living in Carmarthen in about 1987."

- This is probably stale news to you, but the victory over RE 8 A3199, flown by 2/Lts A Watson and E R Lane, credited to Vizefeldwebel Sebastian Festner was the 9th of the 12 he was credited with before he was killed in action on 25 April 1917.

- I was delighted to find this posting as Arthur Watson is my grandfather and in 1914 my he trained as a pilot in the Royal Flying Corps. On April 13th 1917 they were sent in Avro RE8’s to photograph German lines. The fighters, which should have escorted them never arrived, and when they were attacked by German fighters all six aircrafts were shot down.

My grandfather got four machine gun bullets in his left shoulder. He was taken out of his aircraft by some German nuns, and was the only one of the twelve crew to survive. My father’s brother Dick, was a mechanic in The Royal Naval Air Service, and was shot down in the sea, off Ostend, in the same week. Being a strong swimmer he started to swim for the shore, but the Germans machine gunned him in the sea.

My grandfather was a prisoner of war for eighteen months and repatriated just before the war finished. When he looked back at his bank account he could hardly believe the balance ; for when he was in France and Germany his pay had gone into his account. So he decided to study medicine at St. Mary’s in Paddington.

He became a doctor Scarborough and married my grandmother, also a doctor and had two children the youngest being my father. If anyone has anymore information about him or his brother I would be delighted know. "

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