Royal Flying Corps
The 1901 Census has a man of this name down as being born at Gosport, Hampshire in 1889 and at the time of the census he was a scholar at Christ’s Hospital School, Newgate, London. It cannot be certain that this is the same man.
His name does not appear to be present in the 1911 Census but interestingly a passenger of this name sailed from Liverpool to Philadelphia on 5 January 1910: the occupation stated was ‘bookkeeper’, so possibly Cathie spent some time in the USA prior to the Great War.
His Medal Index Card shows that originally he joined the Army Service Corps and was given the number M2/053858.
On 10 April 1915 he was posted to France and a commission into the Royal Flying Corps followed on 12 July 1916 and he was wounded, in France, on 19 September. The National Archives File AIR 76/80 indicates he was a Second Lieutenant on 1 April 1917.
Archibald died in an aero accident in the Cirencester area on 11 July 1917, aged 28. Reports in the Gloucester Journal and Cheltenham Chronicle of 14 July give some detail. Cathie, in the company of Second Lieutenant Henry William Knowlson Williams, took off early on the morning of Wednesday 11 July in an aircraft which had been checked the night before and that morning and was in apparent perfect order. Cathie was considered an experienced pilot and he was familiar with the aircraft and was regarded as a most reliable pilot; he has spent seven months as an observer in France.
According to a witness at the Inquest the aircraft was trying to make too flat a turn at too low an altitude, when it fell from about 150 feet, crashing into the ground and catching fire. Cathie suffered a fatal concussion and two broken legs, whilst his companion died of a broken neck. The Inquest jury returned a verdict of accidental death. According to Airmen Died in the Great War he had been flying a Bristol F2A (serial number A3310), whilst with 38 Training Squadron, which was based at Rendcomb aerodrome in Gloucestershire.
Second Lieutenant Archibald James Cathie’s grave in Cirencester Cemetery is marked by a stone cross, which notes that he was the eldest and dearly loved son of Commander R A and Mrs Cathie of Corrig House, Dalkey which is a coastal resort about eight miles south east of Dublin.
This Irish connection ties in with the fact that his medals were sent to 41 Rathmines Road, Rathmines, Co Dublin and the connection is emphasised by the fact that there is an entry for Second Lieutenant A J Cathie in the volumes of Irish Casualties of World War One 1914-18, which only notes that he was accidentally killed while flying on 11 July 1917.