Notes
The school website (see References) provides the extra detail. The school's document 'The Lost Boys' (see Attachments) adds: ' George Frederick Hodson was born in 1899 and had four siblings. He was educated at the Haberdashers’ School in Acton from the summer term 1904 to July 1907 and then he followed his older brother, John, to Haberdashers’ Boys School in Hampstead with a view to following him to Cambridge. However, this dream was dashed by the outbreak of War and he put his recruitment papers in on his 18th birthday on 8th February 1917.
He applied to join the Royal National Air Service and he went to Crystal Palace as a probationer flight‐officer where he got his pilot certificate after a short course. A very able pilot, he was allowed to spend seven weeks at Vendome to gain experience of flying under war conditions. After this, he went on to Cranwell, in Lincolnshire for training in the engineering side of flying. Then, he was transferred to another station, where he had several narrow escapes. Despite choosing the most dangerous branch of service he said to his father, “I’m perfectly happy, and mean to carry on with what I’m doing till the end.”
Hodson’s most thrilling experience was planing down 4,000 feet in a burning aeroplane. A few days earlier, another pilot lost his life in the same situation. Hodson stuck to his machine, turning off the petrol, disconnecting the magneto and managed to flatten out the aircraft only 200 feet from the sea. He borrowed a camera to take a snapshot of the wreckage, highlighting his bravado. On another occasion, he fell into the sea because his engine failed, but that time he was also rescued by a patrol boat.
On the 7th August 1918, the Air Council announced that he had been reported missing, and it was his older brother, who was also his commanding officer, who had to inform their parents that he was missing. He is commemorated on the World War I Roll of Honour in the boys’ school as FG Hodson. Contact with his great niece, who now lives in Australia, revealed that he was known as ‘Fred’ in the family which may explain the confusion over the order of his initials.
George’s two sisters, Mary and Alice, also attended the school in Acton. He is commemorated on the war memorial at Southampton.'