Manifould Ken 1941

Pilot Officer William Kenneth Manifould RAFVR. 1918 – 1941
William Kenneth Manifould known to family and friends as Ken was born in Ilfracombe Devon on 28th June 1918 to William & Ethel Manifould. Ilfracombe was the home of his grandmother’s family the Comers who were Innkeepers and mariners for generations. Ken’s actual home and early years were spent in Eaton near Macclesfield Cheshire where his father was a chauffeur. In the late twenties the family moved south to Wokingham and lived at Clare Court Cottage, Glebelands Rd where his father was chauffeur to Clare Court. Ken went to at Ranelagh School in Bracknell and then worked for Wokingham Rural District Council as a Sanitary Inspector, it was during his latter school years that he developed an interest in flying and started to learn at Woodley Aerodrome.

With the coming of war Ken enlisted in the RAF Volunteer Reserve in 1938 as AC2 pilot doing annual training at Woodley that year and in 1939, that same year in September he was called up and entered the RAF as a Sergeant Pilot doing his initial training at No3 ITW Hastings and then to No9 SFTS at Hullavington in 1940. He was granted a commission as Pilot Officer in the general duties branch RAFVR in June 1940 and then went to No1(C) OTU Silloth.

He became operational at the end of November 1940 joining (c) Flight, Photographic Reconnaissance Unit RAF at Wick, moving down to Benson at the beginning of 1941. His first operational flight flying spitfires was made on 2nd February 1941 from Benson to Calais and Cap Gris Nez to photograph enemy activities. The longest sortie that he flew was in a long range spitfire from Benson to photograph Marseilles and Toulon on the French Mediterranean coast which lasted nearly 6 hours. On 22nd February 1941 he was ordered to fly a sortie to the Cap de la Hague area where he was to photograph a possible radar installation near the town of Auderville. He completed the mission bringing back a close up photo of a German Freya radar site, for this he was Mentioned in Despatches.

On the 10th April 1941 Ken took off from St Eval in Cornwall on his 18th sortie with the objective to photograph ships in the harbour at Brest but failed to return.

He was one of two spitfires from St Eval shot down that day by Ltn Horst Ulenberg of 2/ JG 26, it would appear that Ken’s spitfire came down off the coast of Brittany near Plouescat but his body was never recovered.

Operational sortie information provided by Andy Fletcher.
German combat claims provided by Tony Wood.

MANIFOULD, WILLIAM KENNETH
Rank: Pilot Officer Service No: 81658
Date of Death: 10/04/1941
Regiment/Service: Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve. 1 Photographic Reconnaissance Unit. Sqdn
Panel Reference Panel 33.
Memorial RUNNYMEDE MEMORIAL
Additional Information: Son of William and Ethel Daisy May Manifould, of Wokingham.

Clare Court Cottage, Glebelands Rd Wokingham Berks
Ranelagh school