THE centenary of an Oxford man's inaugural air mail flight is being commemorated today.

On March 1, 1919, Lieutenant Leslie Pearce-Gervis helped fly 23 bags of letters from Folkestone, Kent, to British troops stationed in Cologne.

It was the first time the post had taken to the skies, cutting the time it took to travel the distance from five days to ten hours.

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Mr Pearce-Gervis' daughter Jacquie, who is also chairman of Oxfordshire's Patient Voice health group, visited RAF Brize Norton on Wednesday to meet those carrying on the tradition her father started.

Oxford Mail:

She said: "He had signed up for the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War but lied about his age and was soon found out.

"They didn't know what to do with him so he was sent to Lincoln College in Oxford to study.

"He would pass the time by flying and performing stunts over Port Meadow.

"He loved his time in Oxford so he brought the whole family back in the 1950s and I've lived in Botley ever since."

A member of 120 squadron, Lt Pearce-Gervis flew various missions between March and August of 1919 before he left the RAF, the victim of large cutbacks in the service.

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As well as flying the first flight, he had the dubious distinction of one of the first crashes - into a field filled with dung, which he blamed on the farmer for leaving a 'displaced heap' lying around.

In his notes from the flight he is recorded as writing: "Engine cut out at about twenty feet when taking off.

"Dropping nose of bus saw the field in front covered with dung heaps.

"Managed to land between two rows, but ran into one displaced heap.

"Bus tipped gently up on her nose. Only damage - broken prop."

He crashed again on June 30 while returning to Britain having dropped off the mail in Marquise, northern France.

He'd just started to cross the channel when there was a 'deuce of a row' from the engine and a terrifying vibration.

He tried to turn back for the coast and had to switch off his engine.

Losing height rapidly, he aimed for a patch of sand but came down on the rocks 'like a hen on eggs', writing off the plane. He himself escaped with a few bruises and a stiff leg.

Following his departure from service, Mr Pearce-Gervis became a printer and then a chicken farmer before returning to the RAF to serve in Bomber Command in the Second World War.

He died in 1965.