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About Me

Dr Victoria Taylor, BA (Hons), MRes, AFHEA is an award-winning aviation historian who completed her PhD thesis on the Luftwaffe and National Socialism in the Third Reich at the University of Hull and Sheffield Hallam University. Her main historical focus is on the Royal Air Force and the Luftwaffe during the interwar period and the Second World War. In recognition of her PhD research, she was awarded the 2020 Royal Air Force Museum Doctoral Academic Prize in 2021.

She also completed her Masters in Historical Research (MRes) on Britain’s wartime and post-war mythologization of Operation CHASTISE – better known as the ‘Dambusters raid’ – at Hull, for which she was awarded the Royal Air Force Museum’s RAF Centenary Master’s Academic Prize in 2019. Her first book, Eagle Days, will be published by Head of Zeus.

In 2020, Victoria served as narrator, co-writer, and historical consultant on ‘Inside the Battle of Britain’: the second series of the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund podcast series ‘All Stations’. This five-part series was nominated for a Best Independent Podcast award by the Radio Academy in 2021. She has contributed to popular history magazines such as BBC History Extra, Iron Cross Magazine and Britain at War, along with publishing in academic journals and volumes.

Since 2018, she has widely featured as an onscreen expert in history documentaries made for BBC Two, Channel 5, the Smithsonian Channel, History Hit, and SBS Australia. In 2020, she presented and co-wrote a programme on Supermarine’s development of the Spitfire for BBC Radio 4 (‘Spitfire: From The Ashes’), in addition to serving as an expert contributor alongside Diane Morgan and Matthew Parris for the ‘Great Lives’ episode on Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding.

More recently, she served as an assistant producer, historical consultant, and on-screen expert for Series 11 of the Smithsonian Channel’s flagship aviation programme ‘Air Warriors’. Victoria sits on the Advisory Board for the cross-party Spitfire AA810 restoration project in the House of Lords and is an Assistant Editor for the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Journal of Aeronautical History. She delivers teaching on air power to junior RAF officers as part of the Joint Services Command and Staff College courses at the Defence Academy, Shrivenham.

She is an Ambassador for both the National Spitfire Project and the Royal Air Force Charitable Trust. Her expertise is also channelled via consultancy work, from serving as an Historical Consultant for the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund’s ‘Back On The Radar’ installation piece and WAAF infographics in 2020, to researching for BBC One’s ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’.

Victoria is available to take on media and public appearances, journalism and print commissions, consultancy work and archival research. For all consultancy and archival work, please contact her directly using the ‘Contact’ tab at the top of the page or DM her on Twitter at @SpitfireFilly. For all press and media enquiries, she is represented by the esteemed London-based agency Georgina Capel Associates – please follow this link to find their contact details: https://georginacapel.com/authors/victoria-taylor

Recent Publications

Academic Qualifications

• PhD in History, University of Hull: ‘Any technical education and flying skills are worthless to us if they are not grounded in the National Socialist worldview’ : National Socialism and the Politicisation of the Luftwaffe. Fully funded by a North of England Consortium for Arts and Humanities scholarship. Winner of the Royal Air Force Museum Doctoral Academic Prize in 2020. Completed in August 2022.
• Masters in Historical Research (MRes thesis), University of Hull: ‘Après moi, le déluge: Redressing the Wartime and Postwar Mythologization of Operation CHASTISE in Britain (September 2017). Awarded with Distinction, Winner of the Royal Air Force Museum RAF Centenary Master’s Academic Prize in 2018.
• BA (Hons) in History, University of Hull: ‘Hellfire at the hands of man’: To what extent does the Allied bombing of Dresden constitute a war crime? Awarded 76% (Distinction)

Academic Publications

• V. Taylor, ‘Winston Churchill’s Bombing Policy’, in A. Packwood (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Winston Churchill (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023), pp 316-341. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-companion-to-winston-churchill/95D9CEE1B99C6C4F2366E4AE93D6DDE9
• V. Taylor, ‘Showing Our Wings: RAF and Luftwaffe Tensions at the July 1939 Brussels International Air Salon’, Oranges & Lemons (Royal Air Force publication), Autumn 2022, 13 – 23. Available online: https://www.raf.mod.uk/our-organisation/units/st-clement-danes-church/documents/o-l-issue-54/
• V. Taylor, ‘Fledglings of the Third Reich: The National Socialist Flyers Corps’, Journal of Aeronautical History, 01/2022 (April 2022), 1 – 28. Available online: https://www.aerosociety.com/media/18220/2022-01-fledglings-of-the-third-reich-taylor.pdf [Royal Aeronautical Society]
• Journal article on European aviation diplomacy in the interwar period, 2021 [publisher contractually withheld]
• V. Taylor, ‘Book Review: Fascism, Aviation & Mythical Modernity by Fernando Esposito’, Journal of Transport History: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022526621992026

Media Experience

TV 

• ‘Air Warriors’, Smithsonian Channel (June 2023)
• ‘Warplane Workshop’, Channel 4 (November 2022)
• ‘World War II: Secrets From Above’, National Geographic (September 2022)
• ‘Dunkirk: Mission Impossible’, Channel 5 (February 2022)
• ‘Secret History of World War II’, Channel 5 (May 2021)
• ‘How The Nazis Lost The War’, Sky History/Netflix (April 2021)
• ‘World War II From Above’, Yesterday/Smithsonian Channel (February 2021)
• ‘The Dambusters’, Channel 5 (December 2020)
• ‘The Night The War Came Home: Operation Moonlight Sonata’, History Hit TV (November 2020)
• ‘The Air War’, History Hit TV (February 2020)
• ‘Strategic Bombing in World War Two with Victoria Taylor’, History Hit TV (February 2020)
• ‘RAF 100: Into the Blue’ with Sophie Raworth & Robert Hall on the Royal Flying Corps, BBC World Service/BBC Two (July 2018)

Radio

• Expert Contributor, ‘The Hardest Day in the Battle of Britain’, Times Radio Breakfast (August 2022)
• Expert Contributor, ‘Great Lives: Hugh Dowding’ with Diane Morgan, BBC Radio 4 (December 2020)
• Narrator & co-writer, ‘Spitfire: From The Ashes’, BBC Radio 4 (September 2020); later rebroadcast as ‘Spitfire Stories’ on ‘The Documentary’, BBC Radio 4
• Guest Expert, ‘Spitfire: The People’s Plane’ (May 2020)

Podcasts

• V. Taylor, ‘Everything You Wanted to Know About the Battle of Britain’, BBC History Extra Podcast (September 2023)
• Scriptwriter, historical advisor & narrator on the podcast series, ‘The Guinea Pig Club’, produced with the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund’s ‘All Stations’ series (November 2021) https://www.rafbf.org/all-stations-podcast/series-three
• Interviewee, ‘Nazis in the Air’, We Have Ways Of Making You Talk with James Holland and Al Murray (October 2021) https://play.acast.com/s/wehaveways/379.nazisintheair
• Scriptwriter, historical advisor & narrator of a five-episode podcast series, ‘Inside the Battle of Britain’, produced with the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund’s ‘All Stations’ series (July 2020) https://www.rafbf.org/news-blogs/all-stations-podcast/series-two
• ‘101 – Operation CHASTISE: The Dambusters’ interview with Angus Wallace, the WW2 Podcast. URL: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/101-operationchastise-
  the-dambusters/id982003188?i=1000451863175

YouTube 

• Expert Contributor, ‘Real Fake History’ with Dan Snow, Timelines (September 2020) https://youtu.be/OaH2-g04cIA
• Livestream interview with Dan Snow, ‘The Blitz and the War At Home with Victoria Taylor’, Timeline – World History Documentaries (4 May 2020) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSd8tdvhmZs&t=1117s

Most Recent Talks 

• Victoria Taylor, ‘Keynote Address’, British Commission for Military History Annual New Researchers Conference (October 2023)
• Victoria Taylor w/ Dan Ellin, ‘Operation Gomorrah: The Bombing of Hamburg’, We Have Ways Fest (September 2023)
• Victoria Taylor w/ Allen Packwood & Professor Gaynor Johnson, ‘Opening Event – Who Was Winston Churchill?’, Chartwell Literary Festival (September 2023)
• Victoria Taylor, ‘Paper Victories: the Battle of Britain in Nazi Propaganda’, Battle of Britain Bunker (August 2023)
• Victoria Taylor, ‘The Spitfire Through German Eyes’, Imperial War Museum Duxford (August 2023)
• Victoria Taylor with James Holland, ‘Defence of the Reich 1943’, Chalke Valley History Festival (June 2023)
• Victoria Taylor, ‘Éclat’: Conserving the Past, Present, and Posterity of RAF Scampton’, All-Party Parliamentary War Heritage Group, House of Lords (April 2023)
• ‘The Führer’s Hammer: National Socialism and the Luftwaffe,’ Society for Military Historians Annual Conference, San Diego, California (March 2023)
• Victoria Taylor, ‘What Is Man Against It?: Combat Motivation, Experience, and Morale across the Luftwaffe in the Second World War’, Royal Air Force Museum Cosford (December 2022) – https://www.crowdcast.io/e/c-mtv-luft

Mainstream Publications 

• V. Taylor, ‘The Star of Africa: Hans-Joachim Marseille’, main feature article for History at War Magazine (August 2023)
• V. Taylor, ‘A Clean Luftwaffe?’, Iron Cross Magazine (December 2021), 102 – 107
• V. Taylor, ‘Female Eagles: Women and the Luftwaffe in the Second World War’, Iron Cross Magazine (December 2021), 80 – 85
• V. Taylor, ‘The Making and Breaking of the Luftwaffe’,  ‘Great Battles of World War Two’, BBC History Extra Magazine (October 2020)
• V. Taylor, ‘Fledglings of the Third Reich: The National Socialist Flyers Corps’, Guest Post for Defence-In-Depth, King’s College London (July 2019)
• V. Taylor, ‘Operation Chastise and British Folklore’, Britain at War Magazine (April 2018), 62 – 66
• V. Taylor, ‘Blitzmädels an die Front: A Lesser Known Female War Film’, Women’s History Network  (December 2018) https://womenshistorynetwork.org/blitzmadels-an-die-front-a-lesser-known-female-war-film/ [Blog Post]

Historical Researcher Experience

• Historical Consultant, Researcher & Assistant Producer for Season 11 of Air Warriors, Smithsonian Channel (October 2022 – February 2023, 5 months).
• Historical Consultant on project for Royal Mail, September 2021.
• Historical Consultant for the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund, ‘Back On The Radar’ installation piece and WAAF infographics, September 2020
• Historical Researcher & Advisor for BBC One’s ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’, May 2020/August 2021
• Researcher for Greig Watson’s BBC Article ‘Operation Gomorrah: Firestorm created ‘Germany’s Nagasaki’, BBC News, 2 August 2018: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-43546839

Media Coverage

BBC Two and Radio 4, Channel 5, Smithsonian Channel, History Hit, SBS

Twitter

@SpitfireFilly

Country Focus

Germany, Britain

Expertise by Geography

England, Germany, United Kingdom

Expertise by Chronology

7, 8

Expertise by Topic

Diplomacy, Government, Holocaust & Nazi Persecution, Military, Public History, Technology, World War II