- The Shepherd
infobox Book |
name = The Shepherd
title_orig =
translator =
author =Frederick Forsyth
cover_artist =Lou Peck
country =United Kingdom
language = English
series =
genre =Novel
publisher =Viking Press
release_date = September 30, 1976
media_type = Print (Hardback &Paperback )
pages = 123 pp
isbn = ISBN 0-670-63969-9
preceded_by =
followed_by ="The Shepherd" is a 1976 novel by
Frederick Forsyth , but is actually a well-knownRoyal Air Force story from considerably earlier."The Shepherd" relates the story of a
De Havilland Vampire pilot, going home on Christmas Eve1957 , whose aircraft suffers a complete electrical failure over the North Sea en route fromRAF Celle in northernGermany toRAF Lakenheath in Suffolk. Lost in fog and low on fuel, he is shepherded to a disused RAF dispersal field by the pilot of aDe Havilland Mosquito fighter/bomber ofWorld War II vintage, who has apparently been sent up to guide him in.However, some time after he lands at the airfield - the fictional RAF Minton - he learns that his saviour was Johnny Kavanagh, a wartime RAF pilot who had been stationed at Minton and who had guided crippled bombers home; he disappeared over the North Sea in his Mosquito on his last mission, on Christmas Eve fourteen years before.
The story is broadcast each year on Christmas eve on the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) Radio programme "As It Happens ", read by the lateAlan Maitland .
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