Air Chief Marshal Air chief marshal (Air Chf Mshl or ACM) is a high-ranking air officer originating from the Royal Air Force. The rank is used by air forces of many countries that have historical British influence. An air chief marshal is equivalent to an Admir ...

Sir Peter Carteret Fletcher, (7 October 1916 – 2 January 1999) was a senior

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

officer who served as Vice-Chief of the Air Staff from 1967 to 1970.

RAF career

Educated at St George's College and

Rhodes University Rhodes University is a public university, public research university located in Makhanda, Eastern Cape, Makhanda (Grahamstown) in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. It is one of four universities in the province. Established in 1904, ...

in South Africa, Fletcher joined the

Royal Rhodesian Air Force The Rhodesian Air Force (RhAF) was an air force based in Salisbury (now Harare) which represented several entities under various names between 1935 and 1980: originally serving the British self-governing colony of Southern Rhodesia, it was the ...

in 1939 and then transferred to the Royal Air Force.Air of Authority – A History of RAF Organisation – Air Chief Marshal Sir Peter Fletcher
/ref> He served in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

as Officer Commanding No. 258 Squadron and as Station Commander at RAF Belvedere in

Southern Rhodesia Southern Rhodesia was a landlocked self-governing British Crown colony in southern Africa, established in 1923 and consisting of British South Africa Company (BSAC) territories lying south of the Zambezi River. The region was informally kn ...

before joining the Directing Staff RAF Staff College (Overseas) in

Haifa Haifa ( he, חֵיפָה ' ; ar, حَيْفَا ') is the third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropol ...

. After the war he joined the Directing Staff at the Joint Services Staff College and then became a member of the Joint Planning Staff at the

Air Ministry The Air Ministry was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom with the responsibility of managing the affairs of the Royal Air Force, that existed from 1918 to 1964. It was under the political authority of the Secretary of State ...

. He was appointed Air

Attaché In diplomacy, an attaché is a person who is assigned ("to be attached") to the diplomatic or administrative staff of a higher placed person or another service or agency. Although a loanword from French, in English the word is not modified accor ...

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

in 1953, a member of the Directing Staff at the

Imperial Defence College The Royal College of Defence Studies (RCDS) instructs the most promising senior officers of the British Armed Forces, His Majesty's Diplomatic Service and Civil Service in national defence and international security matters at the highest level ...

in 1956 and Station Commander at

RAF Abingdon Royal Air Force Abingdon or more simply RAF Abingdon was a Royal Air Force station near Abingdon, Oxfordshire. It is now known as Dalton Barracks and is used by the Royal Logistic Corps. History The airfield was opened in 1932, initially as ...

in 1958. He went on to be Deputy Director of the Joint Planning Staff in 1960, Director of Operational Requirements in 1961 and Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Policy) in 1964. His last appointments were as Air Officer Commanding No. 38 Group in 1966, Vice-Chief of the Air Staff in 1967 and Controller of Aircraft in 1970 before retiring in 1973. In retirement he was a Director of

Hawker Siddeley Hawker Siddeley was a group of British manufacturing companies engaged in aircraft production. Hawker Siddeley combined the legacies of several British aircraft manufacturers, emerging through a series of mergers and acquisitions as one of onl ...

, Director of Corporate Strategy and Planning at

British Aerospace British Aerospace plc (BAe) was a British aircraft, munitions and defence-systems manufacturer. Its head office was at Warwick House in the Farnborough Aerospace Centre in Farnborough, Hampshire. Formed in 1977, in 1999 it purchased Marconi ...

and then a Member of the Airbus Industry Supervisory Board.Obituary: Air Chief Marshal Sir Peter Carteret Fletcher
The Independent, 15 January 1999

Family

In 1940 he married Marjorie Kotze; they had two daughters.

References

, - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Fletcher, Peter 1916 births 1999 deaths Fellows of the Royal Aeronautical Society Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath Officers of the Order of the British Empire Recipients of the Air Force Cross (United Kingdom) Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United Kingdom) Royal Air Force air marshals Royal Air Force personnel of World War II British air attachés