F/Lt Jan Tadeusz Zablocki (Jan Baxter)
Flight Lieutenant Jan Baxter, who has died aged 100, was one of the last surviving Polish pilots who flew with the RAF during the Second World War.
After flying the Wellington bomber, Baxter converted to the four-engine Halifax and was posted in February 1944 to No 1586 (Special Duties) Flight at Brindisi in Italy. To join the unit, he and his crew delivered a Halifax via Rabat, Algiers and Tunis. The role of the Flight was to airdrop supplies to the partisans. He began operations in March and over the next three months completed 27 operational flights, all conducted at night. These included 11 to his native Poland and others to Yugoslavia, Greece and northern Italy. In addition to the threat from German night fighters, Baxter and his crew had to battle with the weather. They had to cross the Carpathian Mountains, and on other occasions the Tatra Mountains, before descending to lower levels to identify the signals of reception parties waiting on the ground. Flying at heights below 500 feet at night, the crews sometimes had to make several runs before the full load of supplies – and sometimes personnel – had been dropped. He described one drop to the Polish Home Army: "Flying low over the DZ during the drop, I opened the side window and felt a rush of clear Polish air. The flights to Poland were exhilarating and, if the missions were accomplished, they gave a lot of satisfaction to the crew and myself. More than once I had the moving experience of seeing the lights of my home town, Krakow, in the distance." Baxter's last flight to Poland was on May 30 1944. By that time of the year, the nights were short; take off for the 10-hour flights was in daylight, and the return over Hungary and Yugoslavia at dawn carried the risk of meeting German fighters. He completed a few more drops over Yugoslavia before returning to England to become an instructor.
He was born Jan Tadeusz Zablocki on April 3 1920 at Krakow. He was selected for pilot training in Poland in 1939 but, after the German invasion he escaped through Hungary and Central Europe to France, where he enlisted in the Polish Air Force under French command and began pilot training at Lyon. He arrived in England in March 1940. On the formation of the Polish Air Force under British command in September he was sent to 300 Squadron in a ground trade. Eventually, he commenced his training as a pilot, which he completed in Canada.
After completing his operational training at a bomber unit based near Doncaster, he returned to 300 Squadron in October 1943. By this time the Wellington was coming to the end of its time as a bomber and was used almost exclusively to drop sea mines in the approaches to enemy-held ports and in main sea transit areas.
Baxter flew his first operation at the end of October when he dropped mines off the German port of Emden. During his time on 300 Squadron, most of his missions were against the U-boat bases at the French ports of Brest, St Nazaire, and La Pallice, when two large mines were dropped by parachute from 1,500 feet. After 12 operations, Baxter left to convert to the Halifax. On his return from Italy in June 1944 he became an instructor on the Halifax. At the end of the war he spent a few months on 304 Polish Bomber Squadron before going to the HQ of Transport Command. On the dissolution of the Polish Air Force under British command he elected to remain in Britain and enlisted in the Polish Resettlement Corps in December 1946. After two years he was discharged.
For his wartime service he was twice awarded the Polish Cross for Valour as well as the Air Force Medal and two Bars.
In the late 1940s, Baxter started operating commercial aircraft. For a year he flew converted Halifax bombers on the Berlin Airlift, completing 242 re-supply flights, mostly with Eagle Aviation. In July 1951 he rejoined the RAF and held a number of flying appointments in Britain and overseas. From 1958 to 1960 he was with 84 Squadron based in Aden flying the Valetta on supply missions to troops patrolling in the Protectorate, in addition to transport flights throughout the Middle East. In 1963 he left for Butterworth, near Penang, to join 52 Squadron, which also operated the Valetta transport aircraft, flying in support of security forces in the jungle. After two years he returned to the UK and finally left the RAF in August 1967 to spend 10 years working in the MoD as a linguist and translator. Modest and unassuming, he retired to Devon for 10 years of beekeeping and skiing holidays in Europe. In 1990 he started flying the Tiger Moth again and took up sailing.
In 1966 he was able to bring his mother to Britain from Poland. In 1998 he visited his homeland for the first time to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the Polish Air Force and to visit his childhood haunts.
Jan Baxter's second wife and two sons from his first marriage survive him.
Jan Baxter, born April 3 1920, died March 12 2021
source: The Telegraph