2nd Lt William McIntosh was born in Dundee in 1899 and joined the RFC as a Flight Cadet in 1917. Posted to Netheravon and Yatesbury to train, he gained his Aviator’s Certificate on 24 February 1918, and was posted to the Western Front. There he flew Corps Reconnaissance on RE8 and Bristol Fighter aircraft, taking aerial photos of the German lines and spotting for the artillery. During these sorties his aircraft was protected from enemy fighters by squadrons of single-seat Sopwith Camel or SE5a scouts, and when the enemy attacked the classic ‘dogfight’ would develop. It was during these skirmishes that he and his rear gunner shot down one enemy aircraft apiece, and on one occasion he fired at a white Fokker that flew in front of him, without any apparent effect. The famous German pilot and later leader of the Luftwaffe, Herman Goering, flew a white Fokker. Injured by shell fire on 24 March 1918 trying to take off in a Bristol Fighter during the German advance, his wounds meant that he was posted back to Britain, and became Adjutant of 56 Training Depot Squadron at the new RAF Cranwell, which had been a Naval Air Station until the merging of the Naval and Army air arms which formed the new Royal Air Force. It was during his time in England that he met the ‘Aces’ of the RAF such as James McCudden and Albert Ball. Leaving the RAF in 1919 he became a motor mechanic until he joined the Post Office as an engineer in 1926. It was while working as a linesman that he was posted to Arbroath and then Montrose during the Second World War; although along with other ex RFC pilots he had tried to join up again in 1939, but it was decided his trade in keeping communications open was more important to the war effort. He retired from the Post Office in Montrose in 1963.