Death Notes

Sqn Ldr Ian Joll's mum had received the devastating telegram telling her he was dead just 10 minutes before he arrived on her doorstep
The incredible story of an RAF pilot who turned up at his mum’s home 10 minutes after she got a telegram saying he had been killed has come to light after 75 years. Mabel Joll promptly fainted as she answered the door, thinking she was looking at a ghost. Sqn Ldr Ian Joll was thought to have died when he crashed on a Dutch beach on May 10, 1940.
But he got on a ship to Harwich with the help of the Dutch resistance. And once there went to see his parents in Gravesend.
Oliver Pepys, of Spinks auctioneers which is selling Sqn Ldr Joll’s medals, said: “She must have thought that she was looking at his ghost". Not 10 minutes before she had received a telegram from the Air Ministry saying he was missing, believed killed.”
Sqn Ldr Joll cheated death again later when his Blenheim iced up and went into a spin and once more after his Beaufighter was shot up by a Heinkel.
He went on to become a fighter ace with “five kills” and won the Distinguished Flying Cross. He died aged 57 in 1977 and his widow last year. His medals will be sold in London on April 23.