Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Blake, Geoffrey Alan Stanford, 1922-1941
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1922-1941
History
Blake, Geoffrey Alan Stanford, son of Henry Edward Blake MRCS, and Gwendoline May, d. of Stanley Stanford of Edgbaston, Warks; b. 18 July 1922; adm. Sept. 1935 (H); left Dec. 1939; RAF (LAC), killed on active service 6 April 1941.
Geoffrey Alan Stanford Blake was born at Lambeth, South London on the 22nd of April 1922 the only son of Dr Henry Edward Blake MRCS and Gwendoline May (nee Stanford) Blake of Edgbaston in Warwickshire and of 98, Gloucester Place, Hyde Park in London. He was educated at Westminster School where he was up Homeboarders from September 1935 to December 1939. He played at goalkeeper for the Football XI in 1939. He was a member of the Officer Training Corps and achieved Certificate A in March 1939.
He enlisted in the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve and was posted to No. 5 Service Flying Training School based at RAF Tern Hill for pilot training.
At 3.10am on the 6th of April 1941, Geoffrey Blake took off for a solo night training flight in Master Mk I T8569. At the time he had accumulated a total of 45.55 hours of total solo flying time of which 17 hours were on Master aircraft. As the aircraft lifted off it collided with the roof of a hangar, causing the aircraft to crash and burn out, killing him.
His funeral took place on the 10th of April 1941.
The Elizabethan wrote of him: - “Most members of the School will remember well his consistent cheerfulness and the grace and agility with which he kept goal for the School during his last term.”
He is buried at St Peter’s Church, Stoke-Upon-Tern Row F Grave 212.
Places
Legal status
Functions, occupations and activities
Leading Aircraftman 1259650 No. 5 Service Flying Training School, Royal Air Force
Mandates/sources of authority
Internal structures/genealogy
General context
Relationships area
Access points area
Subject access points
Place access points
Occupations
Control area
Authority record identifier
Institution identifier
GB 2014
Rules and/or conventions used
International Standard Archival Authority Record for Corporate Bodies, Persons and Families - ISAAR(CPF) 2nd edition
Status
Final
Level of detail
Full
Dates of creation, revision and deletion
Prepared for import into AtoM by Westminster School Archive staff, 2019-2020. Updated by Bethany Duck, Archives Assistant, September 2022.
Language(s)
Script(s)
Sources
The Record of Old Westminsters: A biographical list of all those who are known to have been educated at Westminster School from Play 1919 to Election 1989, Volume 4, compiled by F.E. Pagan and H.E. Pagan, Padstow, 1992
Westminster School Second World War Memorial by John C. Hamblin, 2022.