No. 46 Squadron formed at Wyton on 19 April 1916 from a nucleus supplied by 2 Reserve Squadron. It trained as a reconnaissance unit by the Second World War, it was a fighter squadron.

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For the first months of the war, the squadron flew defensive patrols, covering vulnerable naval convoys off the East Coast. On October 21, while on one of these patrols, they stumbled upon eight or nine He115 seaplanes near a British convoy. Going in with guns blazing, the squadron shot down three and so severely damaged a fourth that it landed in the sea. The tenor of operations changed with the German invasion of Norway in April 1940. The squadron soon found itself preparing for deployment to northern Norway to back a handful of British Gladiators operating from ad hoc airfields. Consequently, on 14 May, No 46 departed from Clyde onboard HMS Glorious for an airfield near the Norwegian town of Harstad. Action seemed close at hand, but the landing ground at Harstad was found to be unsuitable, so the squadron returned to the naval base at Scapa Flow with Glorious.

A second attempt, this time on May 26, involved ten aircraft flying off for Skaanland. Soft ground caused two crashes and forced the rest of the flight to divert to Bardufoss, sixty miles north. In action two days later, the squadron attempted to provided cover for township of Narvik and the surrounding area. In the course of these duties, they shot down a marauding Ju88 (credited to Flying Officer Lydall), adding two Dornier Do26’s before night descended. More action seemed set to follow but in view of the allied debacle in France, the squadron made preparations to leave Norway.

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On 7 June, the squadron, after having shot down 14 enemy aircraft over Norway, flew onto Glorious, landing intact, despite the lack of arrestor hooks on their Hurricanes. Ground crews, meantime, having embarked on HMS Vindictive and the SS Monarch of Bermuda, sailed to England where they regrouped at Digby days later. The air element, however, never arrived. Glorious and her destroyer escort had encountered German battlecruisers on the 9th had been sunk. Of the eight squadron pilots to survive Norway, only two survived the sinking: Squadron Leader Kenneth B.B. ‘Bing’ Cross and Flight Lt (later Air Commodore) Patrick ‘Jamie’ Jameson.

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Rebuilt in England, the unit became operational at the end of June, and in early September moved south to 11 Group to relieve another squadron badly depleted by continuous action in the first stages of the Battle of Britain. Equipped with a special Hurricane V7360, armed with four 20mm cannons in place of the machine guns, this aircraft was meant for trails only. Nevertheless, on September 5, Flight Lt Sandy Rabagliati took it upon a scramble and demonstrated the value of the cannons by blowing a Messerschmitt Me109 out of the skies near Sheppey. Using it on several subsequent occasions, he damaged an additional four planes during interceptions. The battles continued past September and into November. On the 11th, Italian Fiat BR20s and Fiat CR42s appeared, satisfying Italy’s late decision to enter the campaign.

Attacking, No 46 shot down three CR42s and two Br20s, aside from other British squadrons who shot down two more CR42s and nine Br20s – losses which contributed to the premature termination of the Regia Aeronautica’s participation in the battle, which dropped significantly before ending altogether in December. Altogether, the squadron’s scorecard read 27½ confirmed victories during the Battle of Britain, but its air combat days were far from over even though action over Western Europe dropped significantly as the Luftwaffe deployed for the invasion of Russia.

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Declared non-operational in April 1941 to transfer to the Mediterranean, the squadron’s ground personnel boarded SS Almanzora on May 1 to sail for Egypt. Meantime, the unit’s pilots and fighters had flown to Malta to reinforce the hard-pressed 126 Squadron already based there. On Malta, the squadron initially fought as 46 Squadron, but then became 126 Squadron. Malta operations saw the squadron shoot down 40 enemy aircraft (ten of them German). Meantime, the squadron’s ground crews had arrived in Egypt in July and began operating from Kilo 17 on Fayoum Road with several maintenance, salvage and repair teams already there. With no aircraft or pilots it could do little else for almost a year and was used at one point to form 108 Maintenance Unit. Finally in May 1942, the squadron appropriated a flight from 89 Squadron stationed at Idku and with the flight’s Beaufighters and crews became a night-fighter squadron assigned to the defense of the Canal Zone.

On June 16, Flight Lt Charles Clegg and Sergeant Taylor in Beaufighter X7746 shot an enemy plane into the sea in what was the squadron’s first night kill. In July, nine more planes with three other credited to Clegg and Taylor. Enemy contacts dropped off after the allied victory at El Alamein in November and No 46 then accompanied the British 8th Army in its advance west, hammering retreating enemy columns, transforming later that same month into a coastal command squadron.

Once again, it returned to its old task of convoy escort. Operating detachments from Bengazi and Malta, the squadron covered the convoys but also struck at targets in enemy-held Tunisia, Sicily and Libya. In January 1943, the squadron resumed its night-fighting role, and on September 1944 achieved something remarkable that paid dues to its nocturnal fighting skills. Guided by the Ground-Control ship Ulster Queen, a flight operating out of Gambut intercepted and shot down eleven planes in five days over the Aegean. Following this, enemy air activity over the Aegean dwindled. With the squadron encountering little "trade," it received orders to return to England.

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Assembled at Stoney Cross, No 46 now became something it could have scarcely conceived for itself – that of a transport squadron equipped with Shorts Stirling C.5 cargo planes. Its time as a fighter and attack squadron had been profitable, resulting in the destruction of more than 150 enemy planes in air combat. With Transport Command, the squadron operated a service between Stoney Cross and Pune and Dum Dum in India. Flying this route until the end of the war, the squadron eventually disbanded on 20 February 1950 at Oakington.