The Maltese falcons
How three outdated, volunteer-piloted biplanes named “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity” took on the Italian Air Force— and soared into legend.
The fuselage of “Faith” in the National Wa Museum, Valletta, Malta.
In one of the World War II rooms in Valletta’s National War Museum, pride of place is given to the fuselage of a British Gloster Gladiator biplane. Few wartime artifacts are as deserving of being honored. For this small aircraft, and its two sister Gladiators, played the starring roles in one of the most stirring episodes in World War II: The tale of “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity.”
On June 10, 1940, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini declared war on France and Great Britain. At 6:50 a.m. the next day, the air raid siren in Valletta sounded. A few minutes later, 10 Italian Savoia Marchetti 87 bombers of the Regia Aeronautica began bombing Malta’s Grand Harbour—the first air attack ever launched against the British empire. One bomb landed on Ft. St. Elmo at the tip of Valletta (where the War Museum is now located), killing six Maltese soldiers. But most of the bombs landed in the densely populated Three Cities area across the harbor, located next to the dockyards.
One of the Three Cities, Cospicua (also known as Bormla), was hardest hit. As the explosions ripped through the town, people ran out of their homes in panic and rushed through the streets, trying to make it to a highway tunnel half a mile away. As Charles A. Jellison writes in Besieged: The World War II Ordeal of Malta 1940-1942, “By now the raid had ended, but the frenzied flight continued. As they passed by scenes of death and devastation and the acrid odor of cordite tore at their lung, a people unaccustomed to violence became terror-stricken and began stampeding mindlessly toward the tunnel. When old people fell or fainted, it was imagined they had been machine-gunned by the enemy and they were stepped over and left to fend for themselves.”
The bombers kept coming. There were eight raids that day. 36 people were killed and 200 buildings destroyed.
The bombing devastated the Maltese. A conservative, hard-working, devoutly religious people whose lives revolved around their faith and their families, they had never known anything but peace. And although the threat of war had been looming over their tiny country for years, their British colonial rulers had done next to nothing to prepare them for it.
By nightfall the Three Cities were almost deserted. In the next two days, 60,000-80,000 people fled the Three Cities for the interior of the island.
The raid was a ringing success for the Italians. It stopped virtually all activity around the harbor and severely demoralized the Maltese people. But, as Jellison writes, “There was only one discordant note: returning from the first raid, the trail bomber was ripped through the fuselage by a surprise burst of machine-gun fire—which is how the Italians came to discover that Malta had an air force.”
That burst of bullets, fired by an outdated plane flown by a pilot who had no experience in fighters, was the opening salvo in one of the great tales of heroism in the war.
Malta at the outbreak of the war was ready to fall into enemy hands. It was so weakly defended that that after Mussolini is said to have boasted that he would be walking the streets of Valletta in two weeks after the war began. As Jellison writes, “With the curtain about to go up in the late spring of 1940, Malta offered the strange spectacle of a naval base without a fleet, airports without planes, a pitifully small garrison of ill-equipped troops, virtually no anti-aircraft protection, and coastal guns that were too few and pointed probably in the wrong direction.”
According to Jellison, Britain’s failure to devote resources to fortify Malta was by design. Whitehall had decided that if Italy invaded Malta, it would not offer more than a token defense. The island was strategically located in the center of the Mediterranean, but the top brass had deemed it unnecessary to hold it because if it fell Britain could fight equally effectively from French ports in Corsica and North Africa, and Mussolini would not gain much by winning it. In any case, it was reasonably believed to be indefensible. Valletta’s Grand Harbor was only 20 minutes’ flight away from Italian airbases in Sicily and the large Italian navy was nearby. Britain’s two Mediterranean bases, in Gibraltar (1100 miles away) and Alexandria (900 miles) were so distant as to make combat and supply operations highly risky. So the British had simply written Malta off. London even considered handing it over to Mussolini as a bribe to keep him out of the war. Any resistance would be nominal, just to put up a good show.
Winston Churchill never agreed with this strategy. After Neville Chamberlain resigned in ignominy on May 10 and Churchill became prime minister, he insisted that everything be done to defend Malta. And with the precipitous collapse of France in April, holding onto the British Empire’s base in the central Mediterranean became of vital importance. But this reversal of policy came too late. If Mussolini had invaded Malta immediately after declaring war, he would almost certainly have taken it.
Nor had the British done anything to protect Malta’s people. “As the war drew perilously near, the Maltese people still had no casualty centers, no first-aid stations, no emergency medical plans, no effective plan for evacuating the principal target areas, no special provisions for the safety of their children while in school, and, finally, no rock shelters to repair to in case of high-explosive attacks,” Jellison writes. The British failure to take even rudimentary measures to protect the Maltese people was due either to “callous intent or unthinking negligence (or perhaps both),” Jellison writes. “It was…consistent with Britain’s plan for an early and inexpensive surrender of the island, and like the absence of a proper military force, made a good deal of sense. It was not, however, a very nice way to treat old friends.”
Despite their less than stellar treatment at the hands of their colonial rulers, these “old friends” were to prove more than faithful.
Air Commodore F.H. Maynard was appointed to head Malta’s air defenses in January 1940. He soon learned just how empty the island’s military cupboard was. As recounted in a web site by Hakon Gustavsson, “Gloster Gladiators and Fiat CR.42s Over Malta 1940-1942,” in March 1940 Maynard was charged with creating a fighter squadron, but discovered that apart from a few Swordfish torpedo bombers, which were mostly used to tow anti-aircraft targets, and a single de Havilland Queen Bee, there was not a single aircraft on the island! (The Queen Bee could be said to sum up the entire British air defense effort on Malta: It was a low-cost drone, a radio-controlled biplane designed to be used for anti-aircraft target practice. As noted on the de Havilland Aircraft Museum web site, “if it survived the shooting (as intended by offset aiming), its controller would attempt to recover it for reuse.”)
However, Maynard learned that the British carrier Glorious had delivered 24 Gloster Sea Gladiator biplane fighters to Malta for storage the year before. They had been disassembled and were in crates. Maynard asked if the RAF could “borrow” six of Gladiators. The commander of the Royal Navy’s Mediterranean fleet, Fleet Admiral Andrew Cunningham, approved the loan, and the aircraft were assembled and delivered to Hal Far airfield by early March.
The next question was: who would fly the planes? There was not a single trained fighter pilot on Malta. However, there were a few pilots, and as soon as word got out that a fighter squadron was being formed, a number of volunteers came forward. The first was Flight Lieutenant George Burges, who had been Maynard’s personal assistant. Joining him were Alan C. “Jock” Martin (who would become the squadron leader), Flying Officer William J. “Timber” Woods, Flight Lieutenant Peter G. Keeble, Flying Officer John L. Waters, Flying Officer Peter W. Hartley, and Flying Officer Peter Alexander, who had been serving with an Experimental Flight operating the de Havilland drones. The only one of these seven men who had any experience flying Gladiators was Waters, who had received all of one week of fighter training aboard the Glorious in March.
On April 19 the Hal Far Fighter Flight was created, consisting of the four Gladiators and seven pilots. The unit was supplemented by two more Gladiators in May after an accident damaged a plane. (Ironically, considering the Fighter Flight’s boxed-up origins, Squadron Leader Martin hit a large wooden packing crate while landing at Hal Far, flipping his Gladiator on its side.) On April 23, the pilots tested the six planes with live ammunition. But then, on April 28, orders came down that the planes were to be shipped to the Middle East. The small unit was demoralized. The fighters were disassembled, and on April 29 the Hal Far Fighter Flight was disbanded. But then on May 3, the orders were countermanded. The six planes were once again reassembled (the ground crews deserved special commendation). Only three of the planes could be operational at any one time; the three others would be used as spares. The aircraft of the Hal Far Fighter Flight and their pilots were ready for action.
In a little more than a month, they would see it.
The Glocester Gladiator was not a top-line fighter. Biplanes were still used in World War II, particularly by the British, but they were slower than the newer monoplane fighters, not as maneuverable, and generally unarmored. Italy’s front-line fighter at the time, the Macchi 200, was much faster, and even the Italian medium bomber the Gladiators engaged above Malta, the Savoia-Marchetti 87, could outrun it. In “The Real Story Behind Malta’s Gloster Gladiators,” a 2022 article on the aviation web site key.aero, author Matthew Willis quotes pilot George Burges, who after first engaging SM-87 bombers reported to his superior, “As soon as I opened up, the Italians poured on the coal and the Gladiator just could not catch up with them.”
But the Gladiator was not a negligible fighting machine, either. As Jellison writes, “[T]he old reliable Gloster (or Gloucester) Gladiators [was] the last and best of the British biplanes. Although then being phased out of service in favor of faster and more maneuverable craft, such as Hurricanes, the Glads were still excellent equipment, capable of giving a good account of themselves in any fight—provided they managed to get there on time. There is no denying they were slow, with a top speed of less than 240 miles an hour. They were also rather clumsy. But with their all-steel fuselage and powerful 840 horsepower Bristol Mercury engine, they were exceptionally rugged. Furthermore, their four Browning .303 machine guns, two of them synchronized through the propeller and two of them mounted under the wings, gave them a wide and effective field of fire. The men who flew them likened them to flying tanks. The Maltese called them ‘carts,’ because from the ground their silhouettes looked more like donkey carts than planes.”
The biggest problem was that only three Gladiators were available to engage the enemy at any one time, and after the first few engagements usually only one or two. And they were taking on flights of Italian bombers and fighters that could outnumber them by as much as 50 to one.
When the air raid siren sounded on June 11, the Hal Far Fighter Unit was scrambled and three Glocesters took off—N5531, piloted by George Burges, N5520, piloted by “Timber” Woods, and N5519, piloted by Squadron Leader “Jock” Martin. There were so many enemy planes in the sky that the Glocesters split up. Burges saw nine bombers turning in a wide circle south of the island, preparing to return to Sicily. He and another pilot, probably Martin, gave chase. Burges opened fire, hitting one SM-87 bomber in the fuselage, as noted above. The Glocesters succeeded in driving a reconnaissance bomber away, but did no other damage to the Italian attackers that day.
But that was not what mattered. What mattered was that on Malta’s darkest day, when Italian bombers were raining death and destruction down upon the little island with seeming impunity, three little British planes had appeared in the skies and, against overwhelming odds, taken the fight to the enemy.
Word of the three little planes that were challenging what seemed like the entire Italian air force spread like wildfire across Malta. People rushed to their rooftops in cities across the island to cheer on the stubby little planes as they raced to the attack. Eleven days later, they got something significant to cheer about. On June 22, Burges and Woods intercepted a single SM-87 on a reconnaissance mission in the skies above Valletta and Sliema. Burges got on the Italian bomber’s tail and shot off its port engine, causing it to crash into the sea. The Maltese people watching from below celebrated wildly at this first victory. Malta might be down, but it was not out.
At some point, the three planes became known as “Faith,” “Hope,” and “Charity.”
No one knows how the Gladiators got these nicknames. According to an article in the Journal of Maltese History, there are five different theories, including that British pilot John Waters named them (after his fellow pilots rejected “Pip,” “Squeak” and “Wilfred,” the name of a British cartoon strip), that an RAF corporal named them, that a Maltese newspaper was responsible, that a publicist dreamed up the names, and that the people of Malta collectively came up with them.
Whatever the truth is, “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity” could not have been more appropriate names. For Christians, the names “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity” have a special meaning: According to St. Paul, they are the three highest Christian virtues. And for the Maltese, they had an even more special meaning. St. Paul, who according to the Bible was shipwrecked on Malta, was the island’s most important saint.
And the Maltese people were extraordinarily devout Christians. A story Jellison tells illustrates this. When the six soldiers were killed at Ft. St. Elmo during the first bombing, a priest rushed out to give the men extreme unction, only to discover they had all been killed instantly. When the Maltese people learned about this, they were so fearful for their souls that church authorities had to issue a statement that people who died without receiving extreme unction would still be saved as long as they died in a state of grace. As a result, Jellison writes, everyone began behaving well: “Good-for-nothing types who had previously idled their time away at the Marsa racetrack could now be seen sitting at home on their doorsteps, whittling likenesses of the Madonna.”
The trio of fighter planes bearing the names of the three theological Christian virtues had a huge impact on the Maltese people. “[T]heir effect upon the islanders’ morale was incalculable,” Jellison writes. “‘They made us feel that we were fighting back,” a Maltese businessman later explained, ‘and that was terribly important to us during those early days of the war when everything seemed so dark. They gave us something to cheer about.’”
A painting in the museum of ground crews working on a Glad.
Jellison offers a memorable account of the Gladiators in action. “Day after day for weeks running, at least one of the three Gladiators would be in the air for every raid, challenging an enemy force of sometimes 50 planes or more. At first between raids the on-duty pilots stayed in a shack by the side of the runway, but so much time was lost getting to their aircraft that they soon took to remaining in their cockpits. Here they would sit, often for hours at a time, with parasols shielding them from the blistering sun, while they leafed through magazines or wrote letters home, while crewmen worked around them replenishing the planes with fuel and ammunition and patching them up as best they could. When the siren sounded, the Glad would be off in no time, climbing to as high as 20,000 feet, from where they could help compensate for their lack of speed by diving upon the enemy raiders. For the pilots there were no rules, save one: bring the plane back. And somehow they did, for longer than anyone would have thought possible. With their fuselages riddled with holes, their wing staves shot off, and large pieces missing from their rudders, the stubby little planes would come fluttering home for a few hours’ respite, and then fly off to do battle again with the cream of the Italian air force.
“This was sheer madness, of course, but all the same it was tremendously stirring to see those brave men go aloft time and again against such impossible odds. After the first few days, thousands of Maltese in the outlying cities would rush to their rooftops at the first sound of the siren to watch their heroes in action and cheer them on. The little planes became objects of great affection and pride, while the men who flew them were lionized with an almost religious veneration. Wherever they went, they were mobbed by an adoring public, hoping to get near enough to touch them or hear them speak. In hundreds of homes newspaper pictures of one or more of them hung on the wall beside those of Jesus and Mary. And when after five incredible weeks the first sparrow fell, all Malts wept.”
The first squadron member to fall was Flight Lieutenant Peter Keeble—ironically, flying not a Gladiator but one of the newer Hurricanes that had begun arriving on Malta 10 days after the war started. On the morning of July 16, he and Burges scrambled and attacked a dozen Italian CR. 42 fighters—-also, ironically, biplanes. Keeble chased one of the CR. 42s, but was himself attacked by two more. Keeble managed to elude the Italian fighters for a long time, but in the end they caught up with him and riddled his plane with bullets. The Hurricane crashed into the ground and exploded, killing Keeble instantly. A few seconds later one of the Italian biplanes crashed into the ground 100 yards away from Keeble’s plane, mortally wounding its pilot, Mario Benedetti. Keeble may have shot down Benedetti before being shot down himself. He was the first of Malta’s fighter pilots to be killed in action.
Two weeks later, Flying Officer Peter Hartley, piloting N5519, “Charity,” was shot down in a dogfight between the unit’s three Gladiators and nine Italian fighters. Faith’s fuel tanks exploded and she crashed into the sea. Hartley bailed out and was rescued by a Royal Navy boat, but was severely burned on his knees, arms and face. He recuperated and returned to flying duties, but was eventually assigned to ground duty because of continuing problems with his injuries. “Charity” was the only one of the Gladiators to be shot down.
The other five original members of Hal Far Fighter Unit survived their Maltese tour of duty. Here is what happened to them afterwards:
Squadron Leader A.C. “Jock” Martin was killed in action over Belgium in 1941.
Flying Officer W.J. “Timber” Woods was killed in action over Greece in 1941.
Flying Officer Peter Alexander, a Canadian, was killed in action flying out of Gibraltar in 1942.
Flight Lieutenant George Burges and Flying Officer J.L. Waters survived the war.
“Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity” fought the Italians alone for 18 days, until the newer Hawker Hurricanes began to arrive. The tough old biplanes continued to be used in combat long after the Hurricanes arrived. Incredibly, they shot down five enemy planes while losing only one.
The Gladiators became the stuff of legend almost immediately. And as is often the case, legends inspired untruths: Some early stories incorrectly claimed that they shot down as many as 40 enemy planes. In fact, as Jellison notes, “[T]he Glads were seldom able to break though the curtain of Macchi fighters that accompanied the bombers after the initial raid. In fact, it is unlikely that in a strictly military sense the Gladiators made any appreciable difference.”
But battles—and wars—are not won only on the battlefield. The Maltese people had been traumatized by the first Italian bombing raid. Admiral Cunningham feared that a breakdown of civilian morale would threaten the defense of the island: On June 5, 5 days before war broke out, he wrote to the Admiralty, “I am …of the opinion that if Malta was heavily bombed and then invaded from the air while Garrison was engaged in dealing with panic and disorder caused among civil population it might well fall without fleet being able to lift a finger to prevent it.” And the Maltese were about to be subjected to a far worse ordeal: a brutal siege, including the most intense bombing campaign in World War II, that would last more than two years. They would have to endure shortages of food and supplies so severe that the island’s entire population was in imminent danger of starvation. Their mettle was about to be tested.
The Maltese people passed the test, showing the “heroism and devotion” that famously led King George VI in 1942 to award the entire population of the island the George Cross, the Commonwealth’s highest civilian award for courage. But in the dark months of June and July 1940, they desperately needed something to keep their spirits up. And “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity,” and the men who flew them, gave it to them.
By 1943, when the siege of Malta had finally been broken, three years of fighting had taken its toll on the Hal Far Fighter Unit. “Charity” had been shot down, “Hope” was destroyed in a 1941 air raid, and all traces of the other three Gladiators that collectively made up “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity” (the aircraft were cannibalized so many times that each of the six deserve to be considered part of the famous trinity) had disappeared. But then the skeletal, wingless remains of “Faith” were exhumed from an abandoned quarry near an airfield where it had been dumped. In September 1943, British Air Vice Marshall Keith Park presented “Faith’s” skeleton to the people of Malta in a formal ceremony at Valletta’s central square, St. George’s Square. Today, “Faith” is the centerpiece of Valletta’s National War Museum.
When he briefly visited Malta in 1943, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave a speech in which he recalled the times when “Malta stood alone in the center of the sea, one tiny bright flame in the darkness—a beacon of hope for the clearer days that have come.” The president concluded, “Malta’s bright story of human fortitude and courage will be read by posterity with wonder and with gratitude throughout all the ages. What was done on this island maintained the highest traditions of gallant men and women who from the beginning of time have lived and died to preserve civilization for all mankind.”
Everyone who endured the siege of Malta helped keep that “flame in the darkness” burning. But none carried the torch as high, and with such enduring incandescence, as the men who flew “Faith,” “Hope” and “Charity.”
One word - Wow! Fabulous commentary - loved every word of it.