About Dr Victoria Taylor

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 British and German aviation 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.

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