The late Alex Henshaw MBE. During WWII, Alex Henshaw was the Chief Spitfire Test Pilot at the Vickers Armstrong Castle Bromwich Works in Birmingham. He test flew over 2000 Spitfires, Seafires and 300 Lancasters, and is the only pilot known to have successfully barrel rolled a Lancaster !

Alex and I met during his visit to Australia some years ago on behalf of the Spitfire Association, where he presented the Spitfire Memorial Defence Fellowship in Canberra. We corresponded often thereafter, and I was fort