A Valuable Acquisition 

Peter Tracey (SVC 1942-52) has donated two books to Centenary History Centre - Prince of Navigators, a biography of Harold Gatty by Bruce Brown and a publication by Harold Gatty himself entitled The Raft Book.

Harold Gatty was born in Campbell Town and attended St Virgil’s College in 1916 and in 1917 joined the Naval College in Jarvis Bay. Three years later he joined the Merchant Marines and worked on freighters plying their trade between Australia New Zealand and the west coast of the USA. He moved to the USA and in 1927 opened a laboratory in California to repair navigation instruments.

Gatty learnt to fly and because of his navigational skills in 1931 became chief research and training navigational officer for the US Air Force. Gatty’s reputation was enhanced during the War, especially with his manual The Raft Book, on survival techniques for airmen lost at sea. This publication was issued to pilots during the Second World War to assist them in how to survive and navigate if they had the misfortune to ditch at sea.

Harold Gatty was the first foreigner to be awarded the US equivalent of the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) – it was presented to him at the White by President Herbert Hoover in 1932 

In 2009 he was a posthumous inductee onto St Virgil’s College Heritage Roll of Honour. 

More details of Harold’s extraordinary life were related in the March 2020 edition of OVAtions which can be viewed on the Old Virgilians Association website.