From the Royal Flying Corps to the Race to Circumnavigate the Globe

Squadron Leader Archibald Stuart-MacLaren OBE MC DFC AFC fell in love with flying when the very possibility of it seemed miraculous. It was a new frontier, exhilarating beyond comparison, and fraught with danger: everything a young man of Stuart-MacLaren’s disposition could wish for. He joined the Royal Flying Corps in 1914, serving with distinction as a bomber pilot in the Middle East, and was among the first to be commissioned into the Royal Air Force in 1918. With long-distance multi-stage flights to Egypt and India already under his belt, the decision in 1924 to attempt the first flight around the world was in some ways a natural progression. This biography, written by his granddaughter, is the subject of many years’ research: a reach across time to discover the man she never met but grew up hearing so much about. It is a story of indomitable courage and adventure set in a post-war era, when almost any degree of risk was considered acceptable in the pursuit of greatness. Like the mountaineer George Mallory who died climbing Everest that same year, Stuart-MacLaren was a man driven by a need to accomplish something never done before, something unique, and thereby give his healing nation a triumph worth celebrating.