2023 RAF Museum Pilot Bear

Eighty years ago on the night of 16-17 May 1943, nineteen Lancasters of the specially formed 617 Squadron successfully attacked the Möhne, Eder and Sorpe dams in Germany with their famous ‘bouncing bombs’. The crews of this unique raid, codenamed Operation Chastise, are better known as the Dam Busters. They were skilfully led by Wing Commander Guy Gibson VC.

This year’s teddy appears as Guy Gibson, as seen in the summer of 1943 after the famous raid. He wears the typical bomber crew uniform of peaked Service Dress cap, War Service Dress jacket emblazoned with the distinctive medal ribbons of the Victoria Cross, Distinguished Service Order (and Bar) and Distinguished Flying Cross (and Bar).

As well as preparing for and leading the raid, Gibson flew 179 wartime sorties over Germany, the last which he did not survive. Winston Churchill said of him, ‘His name will not be forgotten; it will for ever be enshrined in the most wonderful records of our country’.

Sits approx. 9 ½” high.