Flying Flea, the Ideal Motorcycle

The Dispatch Riders of the Home Guard were the last line of communications if there was an invasion of Britain in World War II. In a discussion on the ideal Home Guard motor cycle held by the Syx Don R M.C.C. in Surrey the Royal Enfield Flying Flea was chosen as the Ideal Home Guard Motorcycle, The beginning of the article, from December 1943, reads, "SURPRISING as it may seem to some, nearly every speaker at the Syx Don R M.C.C.'s discussion on the most suitable motor cycle for Home Guard use strongly urged the adoption of a small ultra-light two-stroke on the lines of the W.D. 125 c.c. Royal Enfield and James described in The Motor Cycle of October 28th, 1943. The fact is, of course, that nearly all the D.R.s in question know the Flying Fleas well—have seen them in use and in certain cases have ridden them. The Don R Sergeant can even claim to have ridden one of them, the Royal Enfield, over a typical railway footbridge—up one flight of steps and down the other, albeit with a certain amount of use of his long legs plus lifting the front wheel round by the handlebars at the right-angle corners on the bridge. The views of a number, therefore, were based upon definite knowledge."