Squadron Leader Marmaduke Thomas St. John "Pat" Pattle, DFC & bar, (3 July 1914 – 20 April 1941) was a South African born World War II Flying ace for the RAF.
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His final "score" will probably never be known, as official squadron combat reports and RAF documents for the time were lost in the retreat from Greece and Crete. Existing records up to early April 1941 list Pattle as claiming at least 34 confirmed kills, and many more probables. Aviation historian Christopher Shores, in his book of Commonwealth fighter pilots, Aces High, claims his final score as 50 individual and two shared victories by cross-checking squadron diaries, Pattle's aircraft rigger's personal journal and the Luftwaffe and Regia Aeronautica loss records. Andrew Thomas reports the same score in Osprey Aircraft of Aces 57: Hurricane Aces 1941–1945.
Recent research of his 50 claims has shown that some 27 can be directly linked to actual Italian and German losses, with only six claims discounted as no losses occurred. This suggests Pattle's true total could be at least 27–44 kills, making him the highest scoring RAF biplane ace, one of the top Hurricane pilots of the conflict, and possibly the top RAF ace of the war if the number is greater than the 34 scored by Johnnie Johnson.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmaduke_Pattle
The best on-line biography of Pattle:
http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/commonwealth_pattle.htm