Inside the incredible life of Brit war hero who 'made James Bond look like a slacker'… and secret he took to the grave

HE was Britain's greatest ever pilot, described as a "war hero who makes James Bond seem like a bit of a slacker".

But Eric "Winkle" Brown — who fought in 1939's Battle of the Atlantic, survived a night in the sea after his ship sank, lived with shrapnel in his jaw and kept flying while knocked unconscious and under fire — took a secret to his grave that makes his story all the more remarkable.

A new book, which he only wanted written after his 2016 death, reveals he was a foundling, born in Hackney, East London, in 1919 and given up for adoption by his impoverished mother.

When no foster parents could be found in the capital he was sent on a train to Edinburgh, where he was given a home by self-declared First World War RAF hero Robert Brown, 43, and his wife Euphemia 42.

From such humble beginnings, Eric, nicknamed Winkle due to his small stature, went on to become a record-breaking Naval test and fighter pilot, flying 487 ­different planes and helicopters, a feat unlikely to be beaten.

He was awarded so many medals that King George VI was heard to say as he presented another: "What, you again?"

Eric tested jet aircraft that James Bond author and Naval intelligence officer Ian Fleming had helped to create following a raid on a ­German dockyard which saw the seizure of experimental rocket motors.

Among those he counted as friends were spy chief David Cornwell — ­better known as thriller writer John Le Carré — and the first man on the moon, astronaut Neil Armstrong.

He also played drums with Glenn Miller's orchestra just before the band leader died in a plane crash in 1944.

And he turned down an invitation to become a US citizen and train as an astronaut because he didn't want to give up his British citizenship.

The comparison to James Bond was from presenter Kirsty Young when he appeared on Desert Island Discs in 2014, aged 95.

Historian Paul Beaver, to whom Eric handed a treasure trove of 20 chests of documents, flight records and letters, writes: "Despite this incredible start to life, this is a story that Eric took to the grave.

"It was never discussed in his ­autobiography. Not even his late wife Lynn or his only son Glenn were aware of it.

"He spent his whole life as a proud Scot, even though he was born in England.

"He even kept a forged birth certificate in his papers to hide the true story of his origins."

In his autobiography, Eric wrote about his dad Robert's wartime heroics and how he first flew perched on his father's knee, adding: "Somehow I felt flying was in my blood."

Paul's new book reveals Robert embellished his war records, perhaps trying to make his uneventful life more exciting, and far from being a "flight lieutenant" or "squadron leader", was more likely a support worker laying phone lines near battlefields.

Paul discovered Eric had also embellished some of his heroics.

He became a flyer after joining the Civil Air Guard pilot training scheme in 1938 and saw that year's Spanish Civil War later as his first chance to take part in combat.

Paul writes: "He claimed to have shot down two Italian-made Fiat bombers.

"If Eric's notes are to be believed, he would have accounted for 50 per cent of the Fiat casualties during the whole Spanish Civil War."

He adds: "Most damningly, there is no record of an Eric Brown on the official Scottish listing of volunteers who went to fight Franco's Nationalists.

"So when and where did his air combats take place? We may never know the full truth."

What cannot be denied is Eric's World War Two record.

He fought in the Battle of the Atlantic and, while protecting vital supply convoys, he helped to sink a German U-boat.

He joined the Navy because it was short of pilots and first saw action in Norway, when he was shot in the arm by an enemy fighter plane.

Eric said: "It was a long haul back across the North Sea and although my arm wound ached, it was not bothering me as much as my concern for my observer (also wounded), and the fact that I could not see any of the other Skuas (British bombers)."

Eric began to gain a reputation as a fearless test pilot after he ditched his US-made Martlet fighter into a reservoir when the engine caught fire.

Then, in front of Winston Churchill, who had travelled to Scotland to watch the new fighter planes, Eric again crashed a Martlet, into the Firth of Forth, breaking his nose and bruising his arm.

He said: "This was when I realised that to survive, I had to practise underwater escape from a confined place and do it in the dark.

"I would do that by hanging upside down in a garage, at night, with the lights out."

Even though Eric had written off a valuable plane, Churchill sent him condolences.

Paul adds: "In later life, Eric would sometimes claim Churchill came to his bedside, but there is no record of this happening."

In a battle with German Condor fighters, Eric was momentarily knocked out.

Paul writes: "Eric's Martlet was hit, with Plexiglas shredding his mouth, and he was rendered unconscious.

"With blood in his eyes he couldn't see where he was going, let alone land on the carrier's violently moving deck.

"Battling against losing consciousness, he managed to keep the Martlet on the right approach track.

"He kept a souvenir for the rest of his life — a piece of the armoured glass remained lodged between his jaw and palate, as it was too difficult to remove."

When Eric's aircraft carrier, HMS Audacity, was torpedoed in December 1941 near Gibraltar he had to jump 20ft into the freezing Atlantic.

When he was eventually rescued he had temporarily lost the use of his legs.

Eric recalled: "We were supposed to climb that wet heaving cliff (the ship's side).

"My legs were too weak and I got badly skinned going up."

He was very lucky. Out of 250 men, 14 officers and 90 ratings died.Adrenalin and drama

In 1942 Eric received a Distinguished Service Cross from George VI for "bravery and skill in action against enemy aircraft and in protection of a convoy against heavy and ­sustained enemy attacks".

In 1944 he went on a mission to capture Italian aircraft, to assist the fight in the Mediterranean.

Then he became the first person in the world to land a jet on an aircraft carrier.

The King, who was ill, wrote Eric a letter of regret for not being there to see it.

As the war neared its end, Eric was among the first Brits to witness the horrors of the Nazi death camps at Bergen-Belsen, Germany, where Anne Frank died months earlier.

He recalled: "There were mounds of dead bodies, most female, all bulldozed grotesquely into pits.

"There were long huts . . .  which held 250 dying women in indescribable filth.

"The stench of these huts has never left my nostrils."

For the rest of his life he often woke in the night soaked in sweat after suffering vivid nightmares.

When the popular US band leader Glenn Miller arrived in the UK in 1944 to perform, Lynn, a celebrity as a BBC radio singer, arranged for the couple to meet him before the show.

Miller invited Lynn to sing with the band and Eric, a huge fan, to play the drums.

The next day Miller took off for Paris but his plane vanished over the Channel in bad weather, with all on board lost.

The cause of the crash remains a mystery, but Eric always maintained the flight shouldn't have taken place.

Eric continued with test flights, once nearly dying when his plane jolted wildly, jerking Eric up and down in his seat and causing him to smash his head into the roof of the cockpit. It was only his small ­stature that saved his life.

Then, while on an unauthorised flight, he took a prototype Saro fighter to Mach 0.82 in a dive but crashed the plane into the Solent, only surviving when the chief test pilot pulled him from the water.

When operating in Germany in the 1960s, Eric suspected he was being spied on by the Russians, but after his wife Lynn's death in 1998 it was ­suggested she might have been a British spy, gleaning information from German contacts.

When the Queen and Prince Philip visited West Germany in 1965, Eric, a fluent German speaker, befriended the royal couple.

Among his other friends was Neil Armstrong, in whose footsteps Eric might have followed as an ­astronaut had he not been required to become a US citizen first.

In January 2016, friends organised a lunch for Eric's 97th birthday at Buck's Club in London, where a letter from the then Prime Minister David Cameron was read aloud.

It was Eric's last public outing. On February 21, 2016, he died peacefully — "a quiet and uneventful end to a life that had thrived on adrenalin and drama".

Paul writes: "It is his immense bravery as a test pilot, during and after the war, that will always be remembered.

"Not only did he help to develop aeroplanes and aircraft carriers that proved crucial to winning the war, but his escapades in Germany . . . proved vital in revolutionising the British and US aviation industries for the next 50 years.

"He is still a national treasure and an aviator with a unique, unparalleled and unrepeatable story.

"There will never be another like Winkle — in so many ways our greatest pilot."