Calton Younger - obituary

Calton Younger was an airman who found his own great escape from Stalag Luft III by writing.

Calton Younger, who has died aged 92, spent three years as a prisoner of war, a period that influenced and shaped much of his later life.

Younger was the observer of a No 460 (RAAF) Squadron Wellington bomber shot down during an attack on an aero-engine plant west of Paris on the night of May 29-30 1942. He and another crew member parachuted to safety. After a week on the run, 20-year old Younger was captured and sent to a PoW camp near Konigsberg before being transferred to Stalag Luft III, the scene of the Great Escape.

With a flair for writing and drawing, Younger recorded his experiences and later wrote No Flight from a Cage (1956). The book is a raw tale about existing with others in close quarters and harsh conditions. With characteristic humility, however, Younger is almost a minor character in his own memoir .

During the harsh winter of January 1945, he and his fellow prisoners were forced to march west as Soviet forces advanced from the east. The “Long March” took a heavy toll on the ill-equipped prisoners before Younger and his colleagues reached Fallingbostel, where they were liberated in April.

Calton Hearn Younger was born on November 27 1921 in Berwick, Victoria, and educated at Melbourne High School. Keen to be a journalist, his hopes were disrupted by the war and he trained as an observer in the RAAF.

He sailed to England in May 1941 to complete his training on bombers before being posted to the newly-formed No 460 Squadron.

After his release from the RAAF as a warrant officer, Younger remained in England. His abhorrence of oppression, his understanding of freedom, his unsentimental compassion for those in difficulties, his general love of the arts and appreciation of beauty all underpinned his family and professional life.

His early promise in writing and drawing blossomed into an easy accuracy with words and pencil – the latter produced a constant flow of cartoons. But he was a serious author and historian. An expanded edition of No Flight from the Cage was published in 2013, when he introduced another 18,000 words in addition to caricatures and sketches created during his internment. His other published works include two books on Irish history (Ireland’s Civil War in 1968 and, in 1972, A State of Division) in addition to a biography of Arthur Griffiths (1981) and one novel, Less than an Angel (1960). In addition he edited The Kreigie, the quarterly journal of the RAF ex-POW Association.

In charitable foundations, Younger worked tirelessly in pursuing his commitment to freeing those oppressed by circumstance. As secretary or trustee, he worked with the Lankelly Chase Foundation, supporting those facing severe disadvantage, and with Norman House, supporting ex-prisoners. He was a trustee of the Association in Deaf Education and a founding trustee of the Swan Mountain Trust, which aims to improve mental health and criminal justice. His love of the arts led him to provide strong support to the Kirckman Concert Society, which provides platform experience to young professional musicians. He was an early trustee of two RAF ex-PoW Association charities and remained so until his death.

His final, unfinished, work, in collaboration with two other authors, was to commemorate the Great Escape.

He had been commissioned to write an introduction and an epilogue to a book containing brief biographies of the 50 men shot after the escape from Stalag Luft III in 1944, as well as biographies for the seven Australians involved.

Calton Younger married Dee in 1963. She died in 2005 and their son and daughter survive him.

Calton Younger, born November 27 1921, died January 1 2014