Question: Alfred Shepherd was posted to the squadron that was a unit of what part of the Royal Air Force?
Context: Royal Air Force Benson or RAF Benson (IATA: BEX, ICAO: EGUB) is a Royal Air Force station near Benson in South Oxfordshire, England.  It is home to the Royal Air Force's fleet of Westland Puma HC2 support helicopters, comprising No. 33 Squadron and No. 230 Squadron.  Other flying units comprise No. 28 Squadron which is the combined Puma and Boeing Chinook HC4 operational conversion unit, Oxford University Air Squadron and No. 6 Air Experience Flight. No. 22 Squadron of the Royal Air Force operated the Westland Sea King HAR.3 and HAR.3A at three stations in the southern United Kingdom.  The squadron was originally formed in 1915 as an aerial reconnaissance unit of the Royal Flying Corps serving on the Western Front during First World War.  Becoming part of the Royal Air Force on its formation in 1918, it was disbanded the following year as part of the post-First World War scaling back of the RAF.  During the Second World War the squadron operated in the torpedo bomber role over the North Sea and then in the Mediterranean and the Far East.  Between 1955 and 2015 the squadron provided military search and rescue over the United Kingdom. Alfred Seymour Shepherd, DSO, MC (13 April 1893 – 13 July 1917) was an Australian fighter ace of World War I.  He was credited with ten aerial victories.  A civil engineer by profession, he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in 1915, and served with infantry battalions in France.  He transferred to the Royal Flying Corps in 1916 and was posted to No. 29 Squadron, operating Nieuport fighters.  After barely two months at the front, during which his victories earned him the Military Cross and the Distinguished Service Order, he was shot down and killed by a German ace in July 1917.  He was buried in France. Western Air Command was the part of the Royal Canadian Air Force's Home War Establishment responsible for air operations on the Pacific coast of Canada during the Second World War.  When Canada declared war against Germany in September 1939 the command consisted of only five squadrons.  Four of them equipped with obsolete aircraft including a bomber squadron with aircraft from the Great War and there were no fighter aircraft at all for its only fighter squadron (113 Fighter Squadron was thus disbanded).  With the Japanese threat after Pearl Harbor it grew rapidly and played a critical role in fighter and anti-submarine operations in Canadian and American waters during the Aleutian Islands Campaign.  It was there that Squadron Leader K.A. Boomer of No. 111 Squadron shot down a Rufe fighter, the RCAF's only kill in the Pacific Theatre.  On 7 July 1942 a Bristol Bolingbroke pressed home an attack on the Japanese Submarine Ro 32 the pilot F/Sgt.  P.M.G. Thomas of No. 115 Squadron RCAF then led American Destroyers to sink the damaged submarine.  By January 1943 Western Air Command had expanded to include many bomber, fighter and operational units under its control.  By the end of the war the command would involve some twenty squadrons when the last units to join were added in 1943.  These were the 163 Army Cooperation Squadron in March flying Bristol Bolingbrokes and Hawker Hurricanes, in May the 160 Bomber-Reconnaissance Squadron was added flying Cansos from Sea Island BC (before moving to Yarmouth NS in July) and the 166 Communication Squadron formed in September flying various types.  In addition to the new squadrons, new aircraft types came on line replacing the command's remaining Supermarine Stranraers and Blackburn Sharks with Canso's and the Bolingbrokes and Beauforts with the Lockheed Ventura.  Countless training missions and operational patrols bolstered the air activity over the coastal areas but there was not much action until RCAF Western Command was on the look out for General Kusaba's Fire Balloons that the Japanese called the Fūsen Bakudan Campaign.  In February and March 1945, P-40 fighter pilots from 133 Squadron, Royal Canadian Air Force operating out of RCAF Patricia Bay (Victoria, British Columbia), intercepted and destroyed two fire balloons, On 21 February, Pilot Officer E. E. Maxwell While shot down a balloon, which landed on Sumas Mountain, in Washington State.  On 10 March, Pilot Officer J. O. Patten destroyed a balloon near Saltspring Island, British Columbia.  During another interception a Canso forced down a fire balloon which was examined at the army headquarters.  Patrol activity was joined by the Operational Training Schools (OTS) operated by Number 4 Training Command of the BCATP.  They were the No. 3 OTS flying the Canso and Catalina and No. 32 OTS with Ansons, Beauforts and Swordfish at Patricia Bay.  In April, 1944 the No. 5 OTS Heavy Conversion unit stood up at Boundary Bay when 16 B-24 Liberators arrived fresh from American factories.  By the end of September 1944 RCAF 5 O.T.U. had grown to sizeable force of some 87 aircraft including 38 B-24 Liberators, 35 B-25 Mitchells, 5 Bolingbrokes, 8 P-40 Kittyhawks and a single Norseman.  With the end of the war in Europe these aircraft were joined by a number of Victory Aircraft Lancaster X bombers which were to be used to train the British Commonwealth's Very Long Range Bomber Tiger Force that would soon be sent to bomb the Japanese mainland from Okinawa.  With the unconditional surrender of Japan the RCAF's Tiger Force bomber squadrons were disbanded before they flew overseas and the total draw down of the Western Air Command was suddenly undertaken.  Within several months almost all the flying squadrons would be completely stood down. An Operational Evaluation Unit is a type of "reserve" squadron of the Royal Air Force.  OEU squadrons are tasked with evaluating an aircraft's weapons, systems and performance.  This is to either assist in bringing the aircraft to an operational capability, or to continually assess how to best utilize the aircraft's capability once its in service.  An example of such a squadron is No. 17 Squadron of the RAF.  The Squadron's role as the F-35B Operation Evaluation Unit is being tasked with introducing the JSF aircraft into service with the Royal Air Force.  It is equipped with four F35Bs and currently operates from Edwards Air Force Base in the United States. No. 7644 (VR) Public Relations Squadron, Royal Auxiliary Air Force is a unit of the British Royal Air Force.  The VR designation indicates the unit's history as part of the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve (RAFVR).  The squadron's role is to provide Media Operations (military speak for public relations) support for RAF and NATO forces world-wide in times of peace and war.  The unit is based at RAF Halton in Buckinghamshire. No. 453 Squadron is an air traffic control unit of the Royal Australian Air Force.  It was established at Bankstown, New South Wales, in 1941 as a fighter squadron, in accordance with Article XV of the Empire Air Training Scheme for overseas service with the Royal Air Force during World War II.  No. 453 Squadron saw combat first in the Malayan and Singapore campaigns of 1941–42.  Severe aircraft losses effectively destroyed the squadron and it was disbanded in March 1942.  A successor unit by the same name was raised in Britain from mid-1942, to take part in fighting against Nazi Germany in Europe until 1945.  The squadron was disanded in 1946.  It was re-formed in its current role in 2011. No. 7010 (VR) Photographic Interpretation Squadron, Royal Auxiliary Air Force is a unit of the British Royal Air Force.  It was founded in April 1953 as No. 7010 Flight, Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, to provide strategic imagery analysis support to the Royal Air Force.  In 1965 the flight expanded its role to include tactical imagery analysis.  In August 1982, Her Majesty The Queen approved the issue of a badge to the flight.  In allusion to the unit's role, the emblem of a human eye is portrayed with a wing embellishment and set in front of a roundel.  The motto "Vocati Veniemus" may be freely translated as "when summoned we shall be there".  The collapse of the Warsaw Pact resulted in a large reduction of NATO forces in central Europe.  In turn this has led to a major reduction in, and reorganisation of, the United Kingdom's regular and reserve forces.  Within this overall plan for defence, No. 7010 Flight became No. 7010 (VR) Photographic Interpretation Squadron. No. 29 Squadron of the Royal Air Force was first raised as a unit of the Royal Flying Corps in 1915, and is one of the world's oldest fighter squadrons.  The second British squadron to receive the Eurofighter Typhoon, it is currently the Operational Conversion Unit (OCU) for the Typhoon. Ernest Russell Lyon (19 December 1922 – 27 July 1944) was a Flying Officer in 234 Squadron of the Royal Air Force during part of World War II.  He was known as Russell.  Volunteering to join the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve shortly after his 18th birthday he undertook pilot training in the USA, after which he became a pilot instructor in the USA and Canada.  He later asked to be posted to an operational squadron and was posted to RAF 234 Squadron, joining them in autumn 1943, where he acquired the nickname "Ben" after the American TV and radio personality Ben Lyon.  Russell undertook a variety of missions with the Squadron, flying from various airfields in the UK.  At the time of D-Day the Squadron was based at RAF Deanland.  Soon afterwards 234 Squadron was moved to RAF Predannack, on the Lizard Peninsula, where they flew further missions over northern and western France.  At 19.00hrs on the evening of Thursday 27 July 1944 Russell piloted Supermarine Spitfire MkVb AR343, flying with seven other Spitfires, on a mission over Lorient in southern Brittany.  At about 19.54 hrs.  his Spitfire was hit by flak at 6000 ft. over the Lorient area and was seen to crash in flames near Ploemeur.
Answer: Royal Flying Corps