Lest We Forget: Remembering George Eades

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On 11^th November 2025 Archives and Special Collections hosted a visit from Steve and Sheron Wilkinson. Steve and Sheron travelled down from Cheshire in order to attend the Remembrance Day service at Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth College (WQE) and lay a wreath at the school’s war memorial. They then crossed over to the University campus and into the Library, where Steve presented a copies of his great uncle’s books Thy Muse Hath Wings and Operation by Night for inclusion among the Special Collections rare books.

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Steve is the great-nephew of George Hadley Templeton Eades, who – Leicester born and bred – studied at both Wyggeston Boys’ School (as WQE was then) and what was then University College Leicester. Eades joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserves in 1940 and qualified as a pilot, flying Lancasters with Bomber Command. He had attained the rank of Flight Lieutenant when, on the night of 26^th/27^th March 1943, his plane failed to return from a bombing raid over Germany. The entire crew was listed as missing, presumed killed. Only one body, that of the wireless operator, was ever found.

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Eades was twenty-seven years old at the time of his death. His short life held promise of literary talent, early evidence of which survives in the form of the hand-written school magazine Renown. From school Eades entered Pembroke College at the University of Cambridge; he graduated in 1937 with a BA in English (second class first division). He joined University College Leicester in the autumn of the same year; his student record card, held in the archives, shows that he was studying English, French and German part-time, apparently in preparation for the Foreign Office’s Consular Service examination. However, by the time he left Leicester in 1940 he had switched to studying for a Teacher’s Education Certificate.

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During his time at the University College Eades was a member of the Dramatic Society, writing and staging two plays. Only the names of these survive: Helen and the Undergraduate and a comedy, All the Men and Women. But one of his early poems, “The Poet,” was printed in a 1939 issue of the student magazine, the Luciad, which is held today in the university archives.

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Eades’ time in the RAF was a time of danger, daring and poetry. He published two volumes in the same year, 1942: Operation By Night and Thy Muse Hath Wings. Thanks to his great-nephew, we now have copies of both in Special Collections. Operation By Night is a long narrative poem. Written in 122 stanzas, it describes the preparations for a bombing raid, the rush of adrenaline during the sortie, and the sudden anticlimatic hush after the aircraft safely returns:

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A whistle of propellers,

After the engines die,

Then silence. “Nice work, fellers!”

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Thy Muse Hath Wings is a collection of shorter poems, mostly describing the experience of flight. Some of the loveliest poems describe the natural beauty of Nova Scotia, where Eades was stationed between 1940 and 1941. The first poem in the collection, “The Airman,” is perhaps the most prescient and the most poignant:

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If I should die, don’t think of me at all
unless world-weary, you prefer like me
to waste your life against life’s ocean-wall
and spend your freedom crying to be free.
Think then, this May, how many building whitethroats call
in England’s woods, and how from every tree
blanched blossom dangles, and young girls are all
in love, and green corn slants above the sea.

I never asked for life, nor thanked who gave
me unconsulted to the angry years
in sacrifice. My Soul, not framed a slave
climbed to the clouds and with those other brave
welcomed the bullets that belied all fears
the last long dive to death, and this, our grave.

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During their visit we were able to show Steve and Sheron material held in the archives relating to Eades’ time here, including his hand-written student record card with a ‘Missing, presumed killed’ notice pasted on the back. We would like to thank Steve and Sheron for the donation of the books and for visiting the archive.

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Referring to the donation of his Great Uncle’s poetry to the University Library, Steve said:

“I’m pleased and proud that my Great Uncle’s poetry and memory is being preserved for future generations by such esteemed and caring institutions as the University of Leicester and Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth College, thank you to everyone involved.”

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Simon Dixon, Associate Director for Community and Heritage, added:

“George Eades was one of six former students of University College Leicester who made the ultimate sacrifice during the Second World War. We are proud to honour his memory by accepting the generous gift of his poetry from Steve and Sheron.”

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Photographs, L-R: Sheron and Steve (wearing his great-uncle’s wartime medals) sitting on the memorial bench dedicated to the memory of students of Leicester University College who died during WWII; Steve presenting Thy Muse Hath Wings to Steve Williams, University Librarian; Steve and Sheron with staff from Archives and Special Collections and Martina Higgins, Learning Resource Centre Manager at WQE