John Slessor

Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir John Cotesworth Slessor, (3 June 1897 – 12 July 1979) was a senior commander in the Royal Air Force (RAF), serving as Chief of the Air Staff from 1950 to 1952. As a pilot in the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War, he saw action with No. 17 Squadron in the Middle East, earning the Military Cross, and with No. 5 Squadron on the Western Front, where he was awarded the Belgian Croix de Guerre. Between the wars he commanded No. 4 Squadron in England, and No. 3 (Indian) Wing, and was appointed a Companion of the Distinguished Service Order for operations with the latter in Waziristan. In 1936, he published Air Power and Armies, which examined the use of air power against targets on and behind the battlefield.

Slessor held several operational commands in the Second World War. As Air Officer Commanding Coastal Command in 1943 and 1944, he was credited with doing much to turn the tide of the Battle of the Atlantic through his use of long-range bombers against German U-boats. He was knighted in June 1943. In the closing stages of the war he became Commander-in-Chief RAF Mediterranean and Middle East and deputy to Lieutenant General Ira Eaker as Commander-in-Chief Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, conducting operations in the Italian Campaign and Yugoslavia. Slessor went on to serve in the RAF's most senior post, Chief of the Air Staff, in the early 1950s, and was considered a strong proponent of strategic bombing and the nuclear deterrent. In retirement he published two more books, including an autobiography, and held ceremonial appointments in Somerset.