Leetham, Horace Arthur Harbord, Captain RAF Service Nbr 37654. Born June 9; baptized July 7, 1898 in Winchester, Hampshire.
Military records show a birth date of June 9, 1894.
It seems unlikely a practising Catholic family would defer their child’s baptism by four years. Horace attended Ratcliffe College near Leicester by the age of 11. He was admitted to the University of London but joined the RNAS on January 2nd 1916
He started his training at Wormwood Scrubs airship station as a Flight Sub-Lieutenant. On March 6 he was sent to the Clement Talbot Works for a “G” course (Ground training?) where it was said he “works excellent”. He was then transferred to “C Palace” (Crystal Palace?) where he stayed from May 12 until May 24 (nature of work or training not known).
He was next sent to what appears to be written as “Kingsworth” but is almost certainly a misspelling for “Kingsnorth”, the primary design testing base for airships during WWI in the UK). He was then posted to Longside airship base in Scotland on Aug. 26, 1916 where he served until Feb. 14, 1917. At that point he was sent down to Pembroke airship station, remaining there until June 28 at which point he was sent back to Longside.
By this time, he was a Flight Lieutenant. On April 1st 1918, at the age, he was promoted to Captain. Although he does not appear to have been officially posted to East Fortune, Scotland, he did serve as Third Officer on R29.
Official records list him (and many other officers) as unemployed as of Oct. 1919. On Dec. 23, 1919 at the age of 21, Leetham boarded the City of Marseilles at Liverpool, bound for Colombo, Sri Lanka via Port Said, with the intent of becoming a tea planter. The paper trail ends, and it is not known how he faired overseas or when he passed away.