Interview with Jeff Brown. Two

Interview with Jeff Brown. Two

Jeff Brown took part in the Operation Manna flights and was honoured by the Dutch people many years afterwards. The low flying over the drop-zones left a lasting impression on Jeff. He also describes metal falling off his aircraft during an impromptu flight with other aircraft to beat up the airfield.

2016

00:09:08 audio recording

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JB: There’s a book written in the early ‘90s written by a schoolteacher Hans Onderwater and I’m in it.
Interviewer: You’re in the book.
JB: That’s my picture.
Interviewer: So you should be, “Memories of a Miracle.”
JB: This is the beginning of my write up. It’s in English on this side and Dutch on this side.
Interviewer: Yes. So I see. You’ve given me a copy here. Yeah. This is all about this Operation Manna.
JB: The whole story of it. How it was organised and carried out.
Interviewer: I wish our listeners out there could see some of these photographs.
JB: Yeah.
Interviewer: Some of them, I mean it’s a glorious achievement but there are some —
JB: These are pages from a book that was published by Ashton Library some years ago. “A Potted History of Manna,” and my little story about that aeroplane crashing.
Interviewer: So you’re a well-known person around Thameside already.
JB: To some people [laughs] yeah.
Interviewer: You know, sometimes I go skating on by in life and you don’t realise what’s actually going, been going on the same time as you do you?
JB: Just to give you an idea of how we were welcomed in Holland. On one of the trips in 1995 we were taken on a tour through the streets of Rotterdam in Second World War vehicles. Look at the crowds.
Interviewer: Oh wow.
JB: It went on for mile after mile.
Interviewer: 1995.
JB: There were thousands and thousands of people all clapping and cheering and oh it was fantastic.
Interviewer: How many of you went on this, Jeff?
JB: There would be, well we were British and American and wives if they were able to go. There was a couple of hundred or so of us. There was a huge parade of vehicles. These enthusiasts that run these old Second World War vehicles carted us all around.
Interviewer: There are thousands. I’m looking here at pictures of, is this in Amsterdam did you say?
JB: Rotterdam.
Interviewer: Rotterdam.
JB: And at the end we were entertained to lunch by the Mayor in the Town Hall.
Interviewer: There are absolutely thousands upon thousands of people here.
JB: Oh yes. The whole city.
Interviewer: The streets are full of it, people aren’t they? All to welcome you guys. Just staggering. That’s all, you know 1995.
JB: They presented us all with a sort of commemorative medal at the end of the lunch.
Interviewer: Wow.
JB: It had been suggested after the war that we be given a medal for doing this Operation Manna but in true style the British government said, ‘Oh no. No. You’re not having that.’ You’re entitled to what were called campaign stars. We got the France and German Star etcetera for flying over enemy occupied territory. So the Dutch people were aware of this and when we got there they said, ‘We know that your government wouldn’t give you a medal,’ they said , ‘But you’re not in the forces now. We can do what we like. We are giving you one.’ And they gave us a special medal with a ribbon and everything.
Interviewer: Fantastic stuff. It says here, this is a comment of yours back in I’m not sure what year this was actually about Operation Manna.
JB: Yes. Yeah.
Interviewer: Where you say that the Allied forces flew over five thousand sorties.
JB: Yes.
Interviewer: And dropped nearly twelve thousand tonnes of food.
JB: Oh, it was a massive operation.
Interviewer: In ten days of operations.
JB: The sky was full of aeroplanes. You can’t imagine it jockeying for position to get in and do the drop.
Interviewer: A picture of a very smart looking gentleman here with an a/g badge on his uniform breast.
JB: My dad took that. My father at that time was photographer for the “Ashton Reporter.”
Interviewer: That counts for a lot then. That’s why I’ve commented on the photographs. It’s good. Its sharp as anything that. My goodness gracious me.
JB: This, this was a booklet they gave us in Holland. It shows you pictures of the people collecting the food and so on.
Interviewer: There is a picture here of a Mosquito.
JB: Yes.
Interviewer: Is that the sort of plane that you, you wouldn’t be dropping stuff with those would you?
JB: They used those for what they called target marking. At these dropping zones the Pathfinders went in first.
Interviewer: Yeah.
JB: And marked it with what we called target indicators like big fireworks.
Interviewer: Right.
JB: That burned red and gave off volumes of smoke. You see it on one of those pictures. One place where we did the drop there was a single house. This huge open area and a house right at the end of it and a target indicator had hit it and it set the house on fire. They were massive things you know.
Interviewer: Wow.
JB: And the house was burning and on this side there was a huge area of green glasshouses like some market garden place and it looked all white. We thought what’s wrong with that as we flew over. There was a massive hole in the roof and the target indicator had gone in and there was an old guy with a big shovel throwing dirt on it trying to put it out. We were that low you know we were at rooftop height. We could see all this.
Interviewer: I’ve just read as you were saying that Jeff then for ten days the bombers roared over dropping food often at a height less than a hundred and fifty feet.
JB: Oh yes. And on VE-Day we [laughs] there were three aircraft from our squadron. The pilots had arranged secretly to rendezvous over Cambridge on the way back and fly to our base and do a low level beat up. So we joined them. To identify each other he fired off coloured what we called verey cartridges. So these aircraft milling around we fired ours off and then we all joined up. We had a rather old clapped-out Lancaster and we couldn’t keep up with the other two. They were struggling. We were dropping slowly back, slowly back. Suddenly there was an almighty bang and a huge sheet of aluminium fell off from underneath the starboard wing and went floating down into the fields. But I told the pilot. He said, ‘Well, it’s not affecting flying.’ So we carried on but we let these other two go on their own. When we got down we found the whole of the metal what they called the nacelles the shape at the back of the engine under the wing fastened on with what were called Zeus fasteners. A sort of spring clip. You pushed it in, turned it to lock and they used with the vibration because we were on full power must have unlocked and of course the airflow ripped the whole thing off. Our pilot, he just said, ‘It fell off in flight.’ He didn’t say what we’d been doing. That was ok. We got away with that one. So that is the Manna story of my Air Force time leading up to it.