Background
Tony Bartley was born in Dacca, India, the son of Sir Charles Bartley, an Irish barrister who served as a judge in the Calcutta High Court.
Tony Bartley was born in Dacca, India, the son of Sir Charles Bartley, an Irish barrister who served as a judge in the Calcutta High Court.
He was educated at Stowe School.
As an Royal Air Force Spitfire fighter ace, he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross after scoring eight victories against enemy aircraft in the Battle of Britain. In 1938 Bartley learned to fly. He joined the Royal Air Force in 1939 on a short service commission, and was posted to Number.
92 (East India) Squadron in November 1939 as it was forming in Tangmere, Sussex with the fighter version of the twin engine Bristol Blenheim.
After the Blenheims were replaced by Spitfires, he fought over Dunkirk during the fall of France and evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force. In March 1941 he was posted as a flight commander to Number.
74 Squadron Royal Air Force at Manston in Kent. In May 1941 he served as a flying instructor at Number.
53 Operational Training Unit and Number.
56 Operational Training Unit (OTUs), before moving in July 1941 to Vickers-Supermarine as a production test pilot, and made a significant contribution to the further development of the Spitfire. During this time he performed the aerobatics for the film "The First of the Few", which chronicled the life of the Spitfire"s designer R. J. Mitchell, as played by Leslie Howard. In August 1942 Bartley was posted to command of Number.
111 Squadron Royal Air Force and led it to North Africa for the November Operation Torch landings.
He shot down several enemy fighters over Tunisia, including at least three Bf-109s. His tour ended in January 1943 and was awarded a bar to his Distinguished Flying Cross the following month.
He then served on the staff of Number. 83 Group Royal Air Force, before departing in October 1944 for the United States of America to attend the Command and General Staff College.
In October 1944 he joined Royal Air Force Transport Command in the Far East.
At the end of the war his combat total included 12 (and 1 shared) destroyed, 1 unconfirmed destroyed, 5 "probables" and 8 "damaged". Following his demobilisation, he returned to Vickers-Armstrong as test pilot and sales executive. After studying film production with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he formed European-American Productions, and wrote and produced television films for Fireside Theatre, Master of Computer Applications and Douglas Fairbanks, Junior., Presents.
He later joined Columbia Broadcasting System Films where he was responsible for European sales and production.
He then joined Associated-Rediffusion, serving as head of the international division and assistant general manager until 1965, when he moved to Canada to represent Global Television and he wrote a history of Canada for the Canadian Broadcasting Company. In the late 1960s Bartley was appointed a director of the Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation in Barbados and in 1971 he moved to Ireland, where he formed Intercontinental Telefilms and continued to write and develop television programmes.