The RAF is commemorating this year’s 75th anniversary of the Battle of Britain with a fetching makeover for one of its Eurofighter Typhoons, repainted with the markings of 249 Squadron’s Flight Lieutenant James Brindley Nicolson VC DFC.
Nicolson won the only WWII Victoria Cross awarded to Fighter Command on 16 August 1940, when he was shot down over Southampton by Luftwaffe fighters. His citation reads: “Flight Lieutenant Nicolson’s aircraft was hit by four cannon shells, two of which wounded him whilst another set fire to the gravity tank. When about to abandon his aircraft owing to flames in the cockpit he sighted an enemy fighter. This he attacked and shot down, although as a result of staying in his burning aircraft he sustained serious burns to his hands, face, neck and legs.”
