On Monday 6th May 2024 at 12pm, James Fortuna will explore the evolution of the famous Eagles Squadrons. This talk will be hosted in-person at the RAF Museum's London site and virtually via Crowdcast.

This lecture will trace the evolution of the famed Eagle Squadrons of the Royal Air Force from their origins in the summer of 1940 to their ultimate amalgamation into the U.S. Army’s Eighth Air Force in the autumn of 1942. After revisiting the role played by these American fliers throughout the darkest hours of the Battle of Britain, this lecture will turn its attention to the ways in which the Eagle Squadrons have been commemorated over time on both sides of the Atlantic. Through careful consideration of various physical memorials, Hollywood films, music, and the archival record, popular treatment of the Eagle Squadrons will be explored in order to assess their overall cultural legacy. As we approach the 85th anniversary of their inception, the time is right to reconsider the significance of a moment where the transatlantic ‘special relationship’ between Westminster and Washington relied more on personal sacrifice than government negotiation.

James is an associate of St Leonard’s College at the University of St Andrews. Before coming to Scotland, he completed master’s degree in history and classics at the University of Cambridge and Trinity College Dublin, respectively. Since his undergraduate years in West Virginia, his research interests have laid in the cultural, social, and diplomatic history of twentieth-century Europe and the United States, with a particular focus on the politically inflected architectural production of the interwar period and its relationship to the construction of national identity. He is especially interested in instances of creative or ideological transfer between states and the spaces or places in which this might have occurred. He also explores the extent to which various interpretations of cultural heritage came to influence the reimagined built environments of Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, and the New Deal USA. He has been fortunate enough to lecture publicly at various state parks across the United States, the Institute of Historical Research in London, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Lyon.

Lunchtime Lecture (London): Americans in the RAF: The Cultural Legacy of 1940-42 Eagle Squadrons