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The Grave of Pilot Officer Magee, writer of "High Flight" in the Military section of the graveyard at Scopwick, Lincolnshire.

After the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster of January 1986, The then US President Ronald Reagan read from this poem, leading the American Tribute to the seven astronauts.

Magee was the son of an American father and English mother, both missionaries in China where it is thought he was born. He trained as a pilot in Ottawa with the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1941, and was transferred to a Spitfire operational training unit in Llandow, South Wales later that year. He died in a mid-air collision over Lincolnshire while on active service on 11th December 1941.

Air Vice-Marshall M.H. Le Bas trained with him in 1941 and recalled:

During our acquaintanceship, he had always maintained that his first love was poetry, although he had discovered that flying was not far behind. He was thus able to imbue his flying with a sense of lyricism.
br> I happened to run into him shortly after his first flight in a Spitfire about which he was waxing lyrical. I urged him, though not very seriously, that since he had always wanted to be a poet he should put his feelings down in words.

He thereupon sat down in the mess and composed, in a very short time, the first draft of "High Flight" written, literally, "on the back of an envelope".

I must have been the first person to read it, but cannot claim that I foresaw its eventual fame. It was some years later that I heard of Magee's fate.

High Flight was originally written on September 3, 1941, by Pilot Officer John Gillespie Magee, Jr., just months prior to his being killed in a practice flight over England on December 11, 1941, at the age of 19 years. The poem was received by his parents in Washington D.C. on the back of one of the pages of a letter he sent to them. The original letter is in the Library of Congress.

Here's the full story as told by Dwayne Linton, the pilot flying behind Magee. It is excerpted from the January 1993 issue of Flying Magazine.

"I'll never forget that cold November day in 1941. We were stringing down in fours, line astern, from 20,000 feet. We were whip cracking. I was flying in the number-four position, directly behind Magee, who was in the number-three position.

It was difficult to hold in close since I was on the swing-out of each turn. We entered a hole in the cloud base at about 2000 feet and lined out just under the clouds at 1500 feet doing 350 mph.

"It was hard to see any great distance due to the haze. I caught a glimpse of an Oxford twin-engine bomber-pilot trainer approaching just under the clouds to my right and directly at right angles in front of our section leader. I pushed my radio switch "ON" and yelled to the leader to miss that airplane! He immediately pulled up into a steep climb with his number two right behind him. Number three was so close that there was no possibility of avoiding an air-to-air collision. Pilot Officer Magee crashed right into the middle of the bomber-trainer's fuselage.

There was a momentary explosion of fire and flaming aircraft parts were everywhere. My evasive action was a screaming turn to the right and down. I pulled out into level flight less than a hundred feet from the ground. I saw a stringing parachute near the vicinity of the crash. Magee had managed to get out of his aircraft but he was too low for his chute to open and he was killed instantly. The Oxford's crew was also killed."

Of his former squadron buddy, Linton says, "His one great masterpiece will not be forgotten soon."

Sam,

This is so interesting, He thereupon sat down in the mess and composed, in a very short time, the first draft of "High Flight" written, literally, "on the back of an envelope".

I too, have written on the back of an envelope or any scrap of paper handy, when the muse wants one to write, you do!

I really appreciate this Sam. It's so thoughtful of you to post this!