Nancy T Hatfield – best known as a medical author. Works include, Broadribb's Introductory Pediatric Nursing; and Introductory Maternity and Pediatric Nursing: Basis of Human Movement in Health and Disease (co-written with N Jayne Klossner).
Paul Gerhart Hatfield (1928-2000) – US senator for Montana in 1978 (appointed following the death of fellow Democrat and incumbent Lee Metcalff). Before, he had followed a career in law (after leaving the US Army), and eventually returned to it – as a US Federal Judge for the District of Montana – after resigning from the Senate.
Percy Robert Hatfield – Wing Commander P R Hatfield DFC, AFC(33315) was born in 1916. He was listed as having won a cadetship prize in January 1936. He graduated as a pilot officer from Cranwell the following year, and was promoted to flying officer in September 1940. He flew with Schneider Trophy team pilot Air Commodore D'Arcy Grieg who mentioned him in his autobiography as the first to spot the German battleship Bismarck, a u-boat destroyer and a flying boat test pilot(however, Ludovic Kennedy's book on the Bismarck indicates he was the third Catalina pilot to sight her in the fateful hours before she was sunk in May 1941 – but was the first to sight her after she had already been crippled by a Swordfish torpedo attack). His medals were auctioned off in 1996 and the auction house entry indicates he bombed a u-boat on 18 October 1940, which surfaced and surrendered to the destroyer he guided to the scene, and that he served as a test pilot with the Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment at Helensburgh. In March 1941 he was given command of 204 Squadron (flying Sunderlands), and later that year 95 Squadron. He completed 240 operational missions and was awarded the DFC in 1944. He served with the RAF post war, was promoted to wing commander in 1949, and was awarded the Air Force Cross the following year. He is believed to have left the service in 1958. He died in 1965 aged 49.
Back to: Features on Hatfield27 August 2012