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RAF Operations Record Books

mikejee

mikejee

Super Moderator
Staff member
These are now available to search on The Genealogist website:
New RAF Operations Book Records
In a release of over half a million records, this is the first batch of RAF Operations Records Books (ORBs) to join our ever-expanding military records collection. This is the first time that these RAF records are fully searchable by name, aircraft, location and many other fields, making it easier to find your aviation ancestors.

These documents tell the stories of the brave aircrew who battled against the odds and give insights into their everyday lives. You can use the collection to follow an airman's war time experiences from these fully searchable Air Ministry operations record books which cover various Royal Air Force, dominion and Allied Air Force squadrons that came under British Command. They allow the family history researcher a fascinating insight into their relatives serving in a number of wartime air force units.


Use these records to:

Add colour to an aircrewman's story
Read the war movements of personnel in air force units
Discover if a pilot, navigator, radio operator or gunner is mentioned in the action
Find if an airman is listed for receiving an Honour or an Award
Note the names of squadron members wounded, killed, or did not return
Easily search these National Archives records and images
 
Thanks Mike. Shall definitely be having a look at these. Very useful. Do you know if they include RFC records too ? Viv.
 
A wartime friend of my father decided to research and write a kind of history of the squadron that he served as an aircraftman. He must have spent a fortune as he had a copy of every page and had them bound into three volumes, about nine inches high.

After he died I spent ages editing and verifying his findings. One thing that I did note was that as the ORB is a transcription of forms filled in by the aircrew the ranks and aircraft serials contain errors that sometimes can be corrected by looking at other entries or lists of aircraft production that enthusiasts have posted online.
I did find that one page was missing from the copy of the ORB, it might have fallen out, but I managed to download a replacement from Kew for which I believe I paid a fee.

Wandering slightly off-topic, my dad's friend had several issues of magazines produced by members of the squadron association's 'wing'. These contained many first-person accounts of WW2. I did try to get the secretary of the wing association to get them preserved online but he said he would consider that but only after he had (self) published his book.

Well he certainly published his book but I don't know what happened to all the magazines. I am hoping that a museum set up by ex-Belgian air force personnel might hold copies. I made sure that my edited digital version of the history was deposited with them. The wider point is that if one's relatives served abroad some material might be held there too, in my case at Melsbroek.
 
As the RFC did not become the RAF until April 1918, as was part of the Army until then, maybe that is where RFC information may be found or will be found?
 
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