STAN BOOKER – OBITUARY
It is my sad duty to report that our dear Life Friend and Veteran, Squadron Leader Stanley (Stan) Booker RAF (Rtd) MBE, Légion D’honneur, died peacefully yesterday, Sunday 26th January 2025, aged 102.
Stan was a wartime Halifax navigator serving with the RAF when he was shot down in France in June 1944. Picked up by the French Resistance, but betrayed, Stanley followed captured SOE agents to Buchenwald concentration camp and was fortunate to survive the horrors of that infamous establishment. Postwar he continued in the RAF, served in RAF Intelligence and with SIS/MI6.
For many years Stanley campaigned for recognition and commemoration of the British personnel and agents who had been imprisoned at Buchenwald. He and his wife visited the camp when it was still in East Germany and maintained a positive correspondence with leading politicians of the day, including Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Foreign Secretary Lord Howe.
It is a fitting tribute to Stanley’s early and persistent efforts that two memorial plaques, listing the British and French agents murdered in the camp, were eventually placed in the cellar at Buchenwald where many of the agents were hanged.
By way of our own tribute to Stan, we repeat below his thoughts when he put pen to paper shortly before his 100th birthday which he celebrated on Monday, 25th April 2022.
‘As I approach my 100th birthday, I pause and reflect on the events, experiences and the people who have influenced me during the years that span my long life.
I have experienced the best and worst of mankind; the generosity of a loving wife and family; the comradeship of fellow airmen during combat and imprisonment; the small kindnesses given by fellow prisoners incarcerated with me in the notorious Buchenwald concentration camp. I remember the bravery of members of the French resistance who sheltered me after my Halifax bomber was shot down in June 1944 and the skills of my pilot and wireless operator, who were killed as they steadied the burning aircraft, enabling the rest of the crew to parachute to safety.
I was inspired by the leadership of Squadron Leader Phil Lamason RNZAF, who motivated 168 captured Allied airmen to find an inner strength to withstand the horrors and brutality of everyday life in KZ Buchenwald in 1944. He was a true hero and role model.
The bravery displayed by the SOE and other Allied special agents, who were murdered at Buchenwald in September and October 1944, has haunted me – it was a death sentence that I managed to escape by just two days. The discreet support by Captain Christopher Burney, of F Section SOE during our incarceration and his key role in our rescue by the Luftwaffe enabled 166 Allied airmen to survive and be moved to Stalag Luft III.
I have been betrayed by two double agents, the Belgium Jean-Jacque Desoubrie, who worked for the Gestapo in Paris (July 1944) and the Cold War Soviet agent George Blake whose treachery compromised our military intelligence work in Berlin. (1962).
I have known fear, pain and abandonment during Gestapo interrogations and solitary confinement in Fresnes prison. This contrasts with my positive experiences during the Berlin Airlift where the Allied air forces worked as a coordinated team to supply essential food and humanitarian aid to a starving German population.
The Cold War provided interesting and dangerous challenges and when I was working in Gibraltar, the Cuba Crisis brought us to the brink of WW3. In 1965, I was honoured to be awarded an MBE by Her Majesty the Queen and in 2021, Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur was bestowed on me by the Government of France.
In 1984, I returned with my wife to Buchenwald concentration camp to seek evidence which could prove that I had been a prisoner of the SS. The British Government had denied that I had been in Fresnes prison and Buchenwald. Thanks to the archivist at the Camp Museum, the original Gestapo records were found which detailed the arrival of 168 Allied Airmen on 20th August 1944 and further documents provided the factual evidence that I had been seeking since 1945. We were invited to attend the 40th Anniversary of the liberation of Buchenwald which was very special.
My life has been full of contrasts and memories of family, friends and colleagues have sustained me over the years. I have been privileged to live a comfortable retirement where everyday things are valued; good food; clean sheets; warmth; my independence and the peace of my garden.
These days I am supported by an excellent team of carers and medical staff, who enable me to live in my own home and I am enriched by memories of my late wife, Marjorie whose love and affection provided comfort for 78 years.
My belief and actions echo the words on the KZ Buchenwald memorial:
‘It is the duty of the living, to honour the dead’.
Stanley Booker, 17th April 2022
SECRET WW2 Chair Louisa Russell, Executive Trustee Paul McCue and Information Officer Carol Browne visited Stanley on the weekend before his birthday and made two presentations to him: a floral tribute from SECRET WW2 in the form of an RAF roundel and a framed photograph with words of appreciation for Stanley’s efforts in honouring the Allied agents executed at Buchenwald.
Other visitors over the next few days included an equerry of HRH Prince Charles, with a handwritten letter and a bottle of champagne, and personnel of 10 Squadron, RAF – Stanley’s wartime unit.
Stanley subsequently moved into the Avon Reach Care Home where he was near his daughter Pat, a Friend of SECRET WW2 and herself an RAF veteran. At Avon Reach he was able to receive the best care possible and he loved talking to the staff about his photos and pictures. His room was like an art gallery and admired by all his visitors. Pat tells us that he was especially proud of the SECRET WW2 plaque that we presented to him.
A writer is working on Stan’s memoirs, using all the research materials that he and his family amassed over the years and the audio recordings that he made. The anticipated book will now be another tribute to Stan.
To the very end, Stan never forgot the SOE and other agents who were murdered at Buchenwald and we will do our best to keep his mantra, adopted from that of the memorial site at Buchenwald, that “It is the duty of the living to honour the dead”.
An interview with Stan by SSAFA, can be viewed here: (4) Video | Facebook
Our condolences go to Pat and other members of Stan’s family.
Paul McCue
Executive Director
SECRET WW2
The Secret WW2 Learning Network
Photographs by Louisa Russell, Carol Browne and Pat Vinycomb.
