22 FRONT ROW FINISHER - Wilkinson Barnes M I D - AN INCREDIBLE RUGBY RELATED STORY

Wilkinson Barnes was born in Sunderland in 1913 and died here in 1980. He played for the club mainly as hooker. He was educated at Tunstall School and Durham School and in 1937 joined the well-known family firm of chartered surveyors and auctioneers. The family home was in Holmlands Park. During the following year he joined 607 squadron AAF at Usworth. On the commencement of hostilities, he was called up and sent for further training. Initially he was initially In France with 504 squadron but had to retreat and he made it back to the U K on a boat. His squadron of fighter planes was heavily involved in the Battle of Britain in 1940. His record shows him going up on dozens of patrols and interception flights during this period. After service as a flight commander, he moved into training others at Crosby on Eden near Carlisle. Here he was mentioned in despatches and in April 1942 made commander of the RAF station at Brunton in Northumberland. He crashed in an experimental flight from RAF Wittering in the same year and received life-changing injuries. He was invalided out in 1944 and retired from Charles Bell and Barnes in 1978.

   While researching Wilkinson Barnes I made a remarkable discovery. As I have access to the Genealogist  website I was able to look at digitised copies of RAF records from the war. As noted above he Joined 504 squadron just before the Battle of Britain. This was on 17 March 1940. On that day the record notes that two pilot officers joined the squadron from elsewhere. One was Wilkinson Barnes – the other was the legendary rugby player Prince Obolensky. On 23 March Obolensky went on a trial run in a hurricane at Duxford. Two days later Wilkinson Barnes did the same. On 28  March Obolensky heard that he had been selected to play for England in a wartime international. On the following day the Prince crashed on take-off and was killed. The details of his death and the  initial flights by the two pilot officers appear on the same page in the record. Obolensky played at Ashbrooke for a side put together to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Durham County in 1936. There is an excellent photograph of him in the team in the club archives.

Obolensky is in white standing behind the Durham County player with striped socks - 1936 County celebration - SRFC's Alan Spence (see back) is three places to Obolensky's left

On Battle of Britain Monument – google ‘Wilkinson Barnes’. Battle of Britain London Monument - F/O W Barnes. For Obolensky simply google ‘Prince Obolensky Rugby’.