From Canada to Malta: The Story of the Falcon of Malta
If you are Canadian and visiting Malta, you may be surprised to discover just how much of your own country’s history is hidden across these tiny Mediterranean islands.
Malta is usually associated with the Knights of St John, magnificent fortified cities, the Great Siege of 1565 and more than 7,000 years of history.
But during the Second World War, another extraordinary chapter was written here. And Canadians were right in the middle of it.
Among them was a skinny, fiercely independent twenty-year-old from Verdun, Quebec, who arrived on Malta in June 1942 and became one of the most celebrated fighter pilots ever to defend the island.
His name was George Frederick “Buzz” Beurling. His fellow pilots also knew him as “Screwball.” Malta would remember him by a rather more impressive title:
The Falcon of Malta and also The Knight of Malta
And his story remains one of the most fascinating connections between Canada and Malta.
Malta in 1942: An Island Fighting for Survival
To understand George Beurling, you first have to understand the Malta into which he arrived.
This was not the Malta of beaches, restaurants and Mediterranean holidays.
By 1942, Malta was under siege.
Its position between Europe and North Africa made the island enormously important to Allied operations in the Mediterranean. Axis forces were equally determined to neutralise it.
Bombing became relentless. Food and fuel were desperately scarce. Airfields were repeatedly attacked and civilians spent countless hours sheltering underground while entire streets disappeared beneath rubble. A Pilot’s average life span was 3 weeks!
Canadian airmen were already playing a surprisingly important role in the island’s defence.
According to Veterans Affairs Canada, although no Royal Canadian Air Force squadron was actually based on Malta, approximately 25% of the pilots serving in Malta’s RAF fighter and bomber squadrons were Canadians. Among them were Robert Wendell “Buck” McNair. Then, on 9 June 1942, another group of Canadian pilots arrived including a young George Beurling. Malta was about to discover just what the latter could do.
George Beurling Wanted to Fly Whatever It Took
Beurling had been born in Verdun, Quebec, on 6 December 1921.
From an early age, flying appears to have consumed him. There was only one problem.
When war came, the Royal Canadian Air Force rejected him because he did not meet its educational requirements.
For most people, that might have been the end of the story. Beurling was not most people.
He attempted to find his way into other air forces and eventually crossed the submarine-infested Atlantic aboard an ammunition freighter in an effort to join Britain’s Royal Air Force.
The RAF rejected him too. This time, the problem was paperwork. He didn’t have the required documents.
So Beurling crossed the Atlantic again, obtained what he needed, returned to Britain and finally secured the opportunity he had been chasing. His determination to become a fighter pilot was already remarkable before he had even entered combat.
That stubbornness would become one of the defining characteristics of his life.
George Beurling Arrives in Malta
In June 1942, Beurling was posted to No. 249 Squadron RAF at Ta’ Qali.
Today, visitors can explore the Malta Aviation Museum at Ta’ Qali, on the site associated with part of the former wartime airfield, and stand astonishingly close to aircraft from the era in which Beurling fought.
During the war, however, Ta’ Qali was no peaceful museum.
It was one of Malta’s principal fighter airfields and an obvious target for enemy bombing.
Beurling flew his first operation with No. 249 Squadron shortly after joining it. His first Malta victories followed on 6 July 1942, when he engaged enemy aircraft during major raids against the island.
What happened over the following months transformed him from an unconventional young pilot into a legend.
17 Victories in 14 Days and 27 Over Malta
Beurling possessed exceptional eyesight, extraordinary marksmanship and an almost obsessive interest in aerial gunnery.
He was devastatingly effective.
Veterans Affairs Canada records that during one extraordinary period he shot down 17 enemy aircraft in just 14 days, ultimately achieving 27 victories over Malta, the highest total by an RAF pilot over the island.
The Malta Aviation Museum similarly credits him with more than 27 victories while serving with No. 249 Squadron at Ta’ Qali, making him the highest-scoring Allied fighter pilot on Malta.
His opponents included both German and Italian aircraft.
He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal and Bar, Distinguished Flying Cross and Distinguished Service Order for his wartime service.
But statistics alone don’t explain the fascination surrounding Beurling. Because “Buzz” was not exactly the model military man
Why Was George Beurling Called/nicknamed “Screwball”?
Beurling was brilliant.
He was also unconventional, intensely independent and famously uncomfortable with military discipline.
His comrades nicknamed him “Screwball”, reportedly because of an expression he frequently used when the adrenaline was flowing during combat or an intense momeny.
Beurling was fascinated by the science of aerial combat.
Rather than simply firing wildly at an aircraft, a fighter pilot had to master deflection shooting… firing not where an enemy aircraft currently was, but where it was going to be by the time the bullets reached it.
Geometry, speed, distance and angles suddenly became matters of life and death.
And this is where one of the strangest stories associated with George Beurling and Malta enters the legend.
The Canadian Ace and the Maltese Lizards
According to accounts connected with his time on the island, Beurling practised his extraordinary marksmanship by firing at the small lizards that darted across Malta’s rocks and limestone.
A rather unfortunate chapter in Maltese reptilian history. But it illustrates the almost obsessive way Beurling approached shooting.
Ammunition aboard a Second World War fighter was not unlimited. Long, dramatic Hollywood-style bursts of gunfire could quickly leave a pilot with nothing.
Accuracy mattered. Beurling developed the ability to calculate deflection with remarkable precision and use short, controlled bursts.
It helped turn him into one of the most dangerous fighter pilots in Malta’s skies.
Shot Down Over Malta
Beurling’s skill did not make him invulnerable.
During one of his final major battles over Malta, he attacked enemy aircraft despite already being wounded. After destroying additional opponents, his own Spitfire was so badly damaged that he was forced to abandon it.
He parachuted into the Mediterranean near St Paul’s Bay and was rescued.
The Malta Aviation Museum records that he was subsequently taken to the Mtarfa Military Hospital.
Beurling’s Malta combat tour was effectively over.
He left the island in November 1942.
Remarkably, even his journey away from Malta nearly killed him: the aircraft carrying him towards Britain crashed into the sea near Gibraltar.
Beurling survived that too.
Beurling Wasn’t Malta’s Only Canadian Hero
It would be easy to tell the Canadian story of wartime Malta entirely through George Beurling.
But that would miss something important.
He was one remarkable man among a much larger Canadian contribution.
Pilots such as Robert Wendell “Buck” McNair, Wally McLeod, Pat Bing, R.C. Fumerton, Stan Turner and many others served in and around Malta during the struggle for the Mediterranean.
McNair’s own Malta story is extraordinary.
On 21 March 1942, a massive bomb exploded outside the Point de Vue building in Rabat, which was being used to billet RAF personnel. McNair survived the explosion despite being thrown from the ground floor to the level above.
Six RAF personnel were killed.
It is one of countless personal stories that reveal just how dangerous everyday life could be for the pilots defending Malta.
Canadians Visiting Malta Should See the Malta Memorial
There is another Canada–Malta connection that many Canadian visitors walk straight past without ever knowing what it represents.
Just outside Valletta, in Floriana, stands the Malta Memorial.
It is easily recognisable by the great gilded bronze eagle surmounting its tall stone column.
The memorial commemorates 2,297 Commonwealth airmen who lost their lives during operations across the Mediterranean region and have no known grave.
Among them are 285 members of the Royal Canadian Air Force.
Two hundred and eighty-five Canadians.
Their names remain here, thousands of kilometres from home.
For Canadian visitors to Malta, it is one of the island’s most poignant and overlooked historical connections with Canada.
The memorial also overlooks the Grand Harbour…The same magnificent natural harbour whose strategic importance helped make Malta so fiercely contested throughout its history.
Visit the Malta Aviation Museum at Ta’ Qali
Anyone interested in George Beurling, Canadian military history or Malta during the Second World War should also consider visiting the Malta Aviation Museum at Ta’ Qali.
Its setting makes the visit particularly powerful.
This peaceful part of Malta was once associated with an RAF airfield from which pilots climbed into their fighters knowing that an enemy raid might already be approaching.
The museum today preserves aircraft and stories connected to Malta’s remarkable aviation history, including a restored Supermarine Spitfire and a Hawker Hurricane, both are actual aircraft that saw actual combat in Malta during WW2
Beurling himself remains an important figure in the museum’s interpretation of Malta’s wartime aviation story, described by the museum as a rebel, superb fighter pilot and ultimately “a legend on Malta.”
For Canadians, this isn’t simply British or Maltese military history.
It is Canadian history too.
What Happened to George Beurling After Malta?
Beurling continued flying after leaving Malta and eventually transferred to the Royal Canadian Air Force.
But the same fiercely independent personality that had helped make him so formidable in combat made conventional military life difficult.
He left military service in 1944.
Yet Beurling never entirely managed to leave combat aviation behind.
In 1948, he was preparing to fly for the newly established Israeli air force when the aircraft he was flying crashed shortly after take-off in Rome.
George Beurling was killed on 20 May 1948.
He was only 26 years old.
Decades later, his place in Canadian aviation history was formally recognised when he was inducted into Canada’s Aviation Hall of Fame in 1974
A Canadian Legend in Malta’s Skies
More than eighty years after George Beurling climbed into a Spitfire above a battered Mediterranean island, Malta still remembers him.
Not because he was perfect.
Far from it.
Beurling was rebellious, difficult, fiercely independent and apparently much happier calculating firing angles than obeying military protocol.
But when Malta desperately needed fighter pilots capable of facing overwhelming odds, the twenty-year-old Canadian from Quebec proved extraordinarily good at the one thing he had spent most of his young life trying to do.
Fly.
And fight.
George “Buzz” Beurling arrived in Malta during one of the darkest chapters in the island’s history.
He left as the Falcon of Malta.
Yet perhaps the greater story is what his presence represents.
Malta was not defended by Maltese people alone.
Britons, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Poles, Americans and men and women of many other nationalities became part of the island’s wartime story.
Some returned home.
Many did not.
And for Canadians visiting Malta today, their history is still here — engraved on memorials, preserved inside museums and hidden among places that thousands of visitors pass every day without knowing the extraordinary events that once happened there.
Different flags. One island. One fight.
Because Malta’s history has never belonged to Malta alone.
At Malta Themed Tours, we believe the best way to discover Malta is through the people, mysteries, battles and extraordinary true stories hidden behind its streets.
Whether your interests lie in the Knights of St John, medieval Malta, the Great Siege, wartime history or the characters who helped shape these islands, Malta has far more stories to tell than most visitors ever discover.
And to all our Canadian friends visiting Malta:
Welcome to our little island. 🇨🇦🇲🇹
You may be surprised by just how much of your history you find waiting here.
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