Bernard Arthur was born 24th December 1891 in Luton to Charles & Kate Smart.

Bernard was working as a straw hat manufacturer in 1911 & living at Charlton House, 183 Castle Street  with his mother & father, who was a straw plait merchant & his sisters Muriel & Margery.

Bernard qualified as a pilot 24 July 1916 aged 24  becoming a Captain in the Royal Naval Air Service and was noted as a celebrated pilot in WW1.

On the 19th July 1918 he led the second wave of Sopwith camels in a raid on the German Zeppelin hangars at Tondern in Denmark. This was remarkable for being the first time a bombing raid had been possible from the deck of a Royal Naval Ship, the HMS Furious. Seven Sopwith Camels sailed over to within striking distance of the Zeppelin sheds that were destroyed, earning him his second DSO.