RYLANDS Geoffrey Paul

Awarded Distinguished Flying Medal.  His brother Harry Glazebrookl Rylands also fell.

Additional information on the memorial: D.F.M.

The following information is courtesy and copyright of Bromsgrove School Archive:
The Bromsgrovian, July 1943:
FLIGHT SERGT. GEOFFREY PAUL RYLANDS, D.F.M.
b. 31st Jan., 1920 d. 1942
School 1933-1936.
Paul Rylands left Bromsgrove in 1936 shortly after passing his sixteenth birthday, to work as a clerk in a Bank at Altrincham. He joined the R.A.F. as Wireless Air-Gunner early in 1940, and went to the Middle East in 1941. He was reported missing in April, 1942, and shortly afterwards it was officially announced that he had been awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal. The citation said: €œAs wireless-operator air gunner, this airman has completed forty-five operational sorties. His outstanding coolness, reliability and skill made him an invaluable member of the Squadron. On many occasions his clear and accurate instructions have enabled his pilot to evade attacking airfighters.€
His contemporaries will remember him as a happy, gentle fellow, a staunch friend and a capable, intelligent boy. His letters written while on Active Service showed how this experience had transformed the immature boy into the €œfull-grown man,€ wise beyond his years, serene and unafraid despite the strain and hazards of his duties as air-gunner, because he never lost his hold on another world above the smoke and din of battle. He found time, in the intervals between periods of Operations, to travel widely both in Egypt and in Syria, and to write about his experiences of places and of people with a grace and humour which delighted his friends. They will cherish his memory with pride and abiding affection.