Robert Hammond, Bomber Command veteran

Robert Hammond, who has died in his 97th year, was a Second World War veteran who joined the RAF in 1940 at 18 and served in Bomber Command throughout the hostilities.

He was one of its last surviving members, and attended the commemoration to the unit in Lincoln in 2015, at which a 102ft statue, representing the wing span of a Lancaster, was unveiled.

It was on such aircraft that he had trained as a wireless operator. He was commissioned as an officer in 1944.

He came out of the RAF at the end of the war and began a long career in printing, working for Ackrill Newspapers in Harrogate for nearly 40 years.

He married Catherine “Kitty” Bland in 1943 and they had three daughters, Roberta, Rosalyn and Merilyn. Kitty died in 2018 and his daughters survive him, along with grandchildren and great grandchildren.