RAF Transport Command Route Book No. 1 - UK to Cairo (1944)

A rare original RAF Transport Command Route Book, produced by the headquarters of 216 Group RAF, Middle East in April 1944, and amended several times in 1945. It covers the air routes from the UK to Cairo in Egypt. With details of flight path, course, route and radio information, signals, major airfields and RAF bases, supplementary airfields, emergency procedures, and landing grounds along the route. The route book is very well illustrated with numerous coloured maps, fold-outs, photographs and plans, including route maps, radio beacon maps, marine lights chart, emergency airfield maps, and maps and layouts of the airfields on the route, including RAF stations in the UK, and airfields in France, Italy, Sardinia, Sicily, Malta, Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt.

This handbook would have been an essential item for Transport Command aircrews embarking on the hazardous trip from the UK to Egypt in 1944-5. It was a confidential document, with significant potential value to the enemy, the introduction stating that 'Every effort must be made to destroy the route book in the event of force-landing in enemy territory'.

RAF Transport Command: controlled all transport aircraft of the RAF. It was established on 25 March 1943 by the renaming of RAF Ferry Command. 216 Group RAF was established on 21 May 1942. The group was renamed No. 216 (Air Transport and Ferry) Group on 9 September 1942 and placed under the command of Air Commodore Whitney Straight. 216 Group became a major sub-command of the Mediterranean Air Command that was created at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943. On 25 March 1943, No. 216 Group also became a sub-command of the newly created Transport Command, an umbrella organization of all British transport units worldwide under the command of Air Chief Marshal Sir Frederick Bowhill. The group was sometimes aided by BOAC in the receiving, preparing, and dispatching of aircraft reinforcements into the North African and Mediterranean Theatres.

Khaki card cover with lace binding and Red/black titling