Jane Trefusis Forbes
Air Chief Commandant Dame Katherine Jane Trefusis Forbes, Lady Watson-Watt, DBE (21 March 1899 – 18 June 1971), known as Jane Trefusis Forbes, was the first Director of the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) from 1939-43.
Career
Jane Trefusis Forbes had been Chief Instructor, ATS School of Instruction in 1938. On 1 July 1939, three months before the beginning of World War II, she was appointed as Director of the WAAF in order "to advise the Air Member for Personnel on questions concerning the WAAF".
By 1943 there were 175,000 women in the ranks of the WAAF. In October 1943, she toured Canada to assess the Women's Division of the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF). She also toured India to investigate the possibility of employing women in the South East Asia Command. She retired in August 1944.
Honours
In January 1944, she was made Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE).
Personal life
The daughter of Edmund Batten Forbes and Charlotte Agnes Wauchope, she remained unmarried until 1966, when she and Sir Robert Alexander Watson-Watt, who is credited with inventing radar, wed.
Death
She died at Pitlochry, Perthshire in 1971, aged 72. Her husband died two years later. Both are interred in the churchyard at Pitlochry.
References
- Dates of birth and death as per www.thepeerage.com
- Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
- RAF Museum website
- RAF Museum website, ibid
- Katherine Jane Trefusis Forbes retires in August 1944
- The Observatory, Pitlochry
External links
Retrieved from : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Trefusis_Forbes
