The Battle Of Britain | Spitfire Ace Group Captain Sir Douglas Bader | Callsign: Dogsbody

Captain Sir Douglas Bader, a successful fighter pilot with the Royal Air Force in the Second World War.
He is upheld as an inspirational leader and hero not least because he fought despite having lost both legs in a pre-war flying accident. His brutally forthright, dogmatic and often highly opinionated views (especially against authority) coupled with his boundless energy and enthusiasm inspired adoration and frustration in equal measures with both his subordinates and peers.
Bader joined the RAF as a Cranwel cadet in 1928. He was an above-average pilot and an outstanding sportsman, coming close to national team selection in rugby. Commissioned as a pilot officer in 1930.
As the Battle of Britain progressed, Bader often found himself at the head of a composite wing of fighters consisting of up to five squadrons. Achievements of the Big Wing were hard to quantify, as the large formations often over claimed aircraft shot down.
In 1941 Bader was promoted to Wing Commander and become one of the first ‘Wing Leaders'. Stationed at Tangmere, Bader led his wing of Spitfires on sweeps and "circus' operations over northwestern Europe throughout the summer campaign. These were missions combining bombers and fighters designed to lure out and tie down German Luftwaffe fighter units that might otherwise serve on the Russian front.
One of the Wing Leader's ‘perks' was permission to have their initials marked on their aircraft as personal identification, thus ‘ D-B ‘ was painted on the side of Bader's Spitfire. These letters gave rise to his radio call sign "Dogsbody."
By August 1941, Bader had claimed 22 German planes shot down, the fifth highest total in the RAF. On 19 August, 1941 Bader was shot down and taken prisoner. As he tried to bail out, one of his prosthetic legs became trapped in the aircraft, and he only escaped when the leg's retaining straps broke.
Bader was captured by German forces, who treated him with great respect. General Adolf Galland, a German flying ace, notified the British of his damaged leg and offered them safe passage to drop off a replacement. The British responded on 19 August, 1941 with the ‘Leg Operation'- an RAF bomber was allowed to drop a new prosthetic leg by parachute. The Germans were less impressed when, task done, the bombers proceeded onto their bombing mission to Gosnay power station near Bethune, although bad weather prevented the target being attacked.
Bader tried to escape from the hospital where he was recovering, and over the next few years proved as big a thorn in the side of the Germans as he had been to the RAF establishment.
He made so many attempts at escape that the Germans threatened to take away his legs. Initially held at, his ‘goon-baiting' of the camp guards reached such heights that he was finally dispatched to the "escape-proof" Colditz Castle, where he remained until the spring of 1945 when it was relieved by the 1st US Army. When Bader subsequently arrived in Paris, true to form, he requested a Spitfire so that he could rejoin the fighting before the war was over, only to be refused.
After returning to England, Bader stayed in the Air Force until February 1946. In June 1945, he was given the honour of leading a victory fly-past of 300 aircraft over London. He left to take a job at Royal Dutch/Shell resumed playing golf, an enthusiasm developed after his amputation, achieving a handicap in the low single figures.
In 1976 Bader was knighted for his services to amputees and his public work for the disabled. His workload was exhausting for a legless man with a worsening heart condition, and Bader died of a heart attack on 5 September 1982 at the age of 72, after a London Guildhall dinner honouring the 90th birthday of the Marshal of the Royal Air Force, Sir Arthur "Bomber" Harris.
Bader's artificial legs are on display at the RAF Museum at Stafford, although this is not a museum that is open to the public.
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[@JimWalsh-rl5dj]

Well, he did not do much in the BoB but, he was good at self marketing! In fact he was instrumenatl in getting Dowding and Kirth Park sacked. he was insubordinate, and the apocrypha tells us he was shot down by one of his own for leading them into impossible odds regularly. he disobeyed and order, wrote off an aircraft, lost his legs and was not Court Martialled. Oh And I met him on 3 occassions, rude, pompous and arrogant

[@kentl7228]

Agreed 1000000%. Never met him but many things agree with this. From what I understand, he shafted Keith Park and Hugh Dowding behind their backs but then spoke at Park's funeral speaking about Park with admiration, which made some raise their eyebrows... Dowding and Park were far smarter with their tactics than "Big Wing"