highlights from Rusty's flying log book

The memorable events of Rusty's flying war are told in his official Flying Log Book. The book is still in the Leith family's possession.1. The log book begins with Rusty's first flight in a Tiger Moth aircraft at the Narrandera initial training airbase in New South Wales.2. At Camp Borden, north of Toronto in Canada, Rusty flew Harvard and Yale training aircraft, and earned his wings.3. On 20 May 1982, at Aston Down Operational Training Unit in the UK, he flew a Spitfire Mk1 for the first time.4. Then in July, he was posted to the Australian Spitfire squadron, No. 453, which was then based in Drem, Scotland. Within weeks, two of his mates were dead in flying accidents.5. Rusty achieved his first victory in aerial combat in October 1943, downing two Me-110 Luftwaffe planes in a single engagement.6. By July 1944, his squadron was operating in Normandy. His was the only Australian fighting unit to participate in Operational Overlord, the Allied invasion of France. In a notable incident written into the log book, Rusty and four other Australians gatecrashed Churchill's ship.7. Two days later, Rusty shared in the downing of an Me-109, but was then forced to crash-land when he ran out of fuel. Evading the enemy, he was sheltered by the French Resistance before being liberated six weeks later.8. Back with his squadron, Rusty was flying in support of Operation Market-Garden (the Battle of Arnhem) when he scored his last combat victory of the war.9. As the war in Europe was coming towards victory, the squadron took delivery of its last new Spitfire, a Mk XVI. It had the squadron letters FU-P. Rusty flew this plane principally as a dive-bomber against German V2 rocket launch sites. That aeroplane is still flying.10. The war over and four years since his first Tiger Moth flight, Rusty boarded a P&O liner to return from Britain to Australia.