Brothers in Arms

Airmen of Poland and Czechoslovakia in the Battle of Britain & Beyond.

During the Battle of Britain one fifth of Fighter Command’s aircrew came from overseas with 16 nations represented in its squadrons. Arguably the RAF’s most prolific and successful pilots of this campaign and beyond were the dispossessed Polish and Czechoslovakian pilots who had escaped from their homelands to fight, as brothers in arms, against a tyranny that had occupied Continental Europe.

In this multimedia exhibition, curated in association with the Polish Institute of National Remembrance, the Museum will explore through drawings, archive film footage and sculpture the bravery of men such as Czech fighter pilot Josef Frantisek and the men of 303 Squadron; and the fate of those Polish & Czechoslovakian RAF pilots who returned back to their homelands only to be deemed criminals and outcasts by Communist regimes desperate to ‘clip the wings’ of any ‘dangerous elements’ who could become powerful totems around which potential resistance groups could form.

Linked to this exhibition, the museum has also created an online exhibition and podcast about Poles in the Battle of Britain where families and friends of Polish, Czech and Slovak veterans are welcome to post their stories to be read by our world-wide online audience.