VRC MEMBER LAURIE LARMER: SURVIVOR OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR
Retired Royal Air Force (RAF) pilot Lawrence Larmer is the recipient of the highest French military decoration, the Legion of Honour. Born in Moonee Ponds, Lawrence (Laurie) Larmer and his family moved to Ballarat when he was 12, where his father managed a pub. Upon completing his schooling at St Patrick’s College in Ballarat in 1940, he got a job at the Department of Aircraft Production at Fisherman’s Bend where they were building the Beaufort bomber. Although he worked in the pay office and not in the technical area, he was exposed to aircraft. A year later in 1941 at the age of 18 he was called up to the army. “To avoid going into the army you could volunteer for the navy or the air force. I didn’t fancy the army, I didn’t fancy the navy, so I volunteered for the air force crew.” After passing a strict medical, and continuing to work at Fishermans Bend until he was called up in 1942, he completed basic training in Victoria, learning how to fly light aircraft, navigation and meteorology. Mr Larmer was sent to Manitoba in Canada to continue training in flying different sizes of aeroplanes, including the Cessna Crane. He graduated as a sergeant-pilot, and was transferred to England. “We went all around England and Scotland flying all different types of airfcraft, and getting used to the conditions.” Mr Larmer was sent to a ‘heavy conversion unit’ to prepare for operations flying either Lancaster or Halifax bombers. He was just 20 and did not even have a motor vehicle licence by the time he was responsible for a crew of six other men and the heavy four-engine aircraft filled with high explosive. “The silly part of it was, in 1945, I turned 22 after the war finished, I’d flown six different types of aircraft, but I had never driven a motor car.” Attached to an English squadron, Mr Larmer was with Bomber Command and completed nine missions over Germany in the final three months of the war.
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