Gilbert Nicholetts

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Air Marshal Sir Gilbert Edward Nicholetts, KBE, CB, AFC & Bar (9 November 1902 – 7 September 1983) was a senior Royal Air Force officer in the 1950s. He studied at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth, and joined the RAF in 1921, serving in flying boat units and with the Fleet Air Arm. In the late 1920s he was posted to the Far East, flying the Short Singapore. In 1933 he helped set a long-distance flight record from Cranwell to Walvis Bay as navigator on the Fairey Long-Range Monoplane, continuing to Cape Town, and was awarded the Air Force Cross.

At the start of World War II he became Officer Commanding No. 228 Squadron, based at Alexandria and flying the Short Sunderland; he personally commanded the reconnaissance flight before the Fleet Air Arm Taranto raid in November 1940. He later served as Station Commander at RAF Haifa and then RAF Shallufa, before being taken prisoner by the Japanese in 1942 in the Dutch East Indies.

After the war Nicholetts held a series of senior posts: Senior Air Service Officer at HQ No. 25 (Armament) Group; Air Officer Commanding the Central Photographic Establishment (1946–48); Director of Organisation at the Air Ministry (1948); Senior Air Service Officer at HQ RAF Coastal Command (1951); Air Officer Commanding No. 21 Group (1953–55); Air Officer Commanding AHQ Malta (1956–57); and Inspector-General of the RAF (1958–59). He also headed RAF Flying Training Command in 1955. His decorations included Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, Companion of the Bath, Air Force Cross with a Bar, and two mentions in despatches. Nicholetts died on 7 September 1983 at the age of 80.