Charlie Parsons, DSM(G), cfs, RAF : Memoirs of a Colonial Childhood and My Flying Days

Peggy Louise Andrews was widowed early in WWII with a very young child, Graham. Later in the war she met an RAF officer, Gerry Parsons, who was a navigator and bomb aimer in bomber command. They married and had a son, Richard, in 1947. Gerry''s mother asked them to move to Northern Rhodesia to manage a family farm shortly after.

Charlie was born soon after in 1949. His mother, Peggy, caught polio just after his birth and was unable to hold him for many months. In 1958 Gerry was diagnosed with cancer and died in early 1959. This left Peggy to raise three boys, but some years later she married Basil Allies.

The country became Zambia, after British colonial rule, in October 1964. In late 1965 Peggy and Basil retired to Malta with Charlie in tow. He left in 1966 to join the RAF, and was commissioned as an officer in 1967, just before he was 18. He was trained as a pilot and flew helicopters in many roles, in many countries, for 12 years. Whilst operating in the Omani Dhofar War in 1972 and 1973 he was decorated for gallantry for a night evacuation of three wounded soldiers in bad weather in the jebel.

After his RAF time, he went on to fly airliners followed by successfully owning and running The Sandymount Club in Rhosneigr on The Isle of Anglesey. After 20 years out of flying he returned to working as a search and rescue instructor in Wales at RAF Valley. He then instructed in the Sea King simulator and the Texan fixed-wing trainer simulator before finally retiring in 2019.