Conversation with Jo Lancaster. Part one
Title
Conversation with Jo Lancaster. Part one
Description
Steve Bond explains the purpose of the interiew, that he is gathering information from personnel involved with the Wellington with a view to producing a book on the "Wimpy". Jo starts by talking about his training and Wellington flying. He starts by describing his training at EFTS and OTU and includes details of crewing up. He was posted to 40 Squadron at RAF Wyton & RAF Alconbury on Wellingtons. Jo recalls details of a memborable operation to Berlin where they were attacked by Me 110. He continues with a description of a daylight operation to Brest with fighter escort, during which hesaw Me 109 shot down and talks of squadron losses. Jo describes a long trip to Stettin and gives a detailed description of aircraft icing up on operation to Cologne, when they we also hit by anti-aircraft fire. He comments on why he enjoyed flying the Wimpy (Wellington). Jo recalls subsequent instructor tours and describes one "Bullseye" sortie with pupil crew, when he came home early due to equipment unserviceability and icing but was carpeted by chief instructor. He goes on to talk about conversion to Lancaster on the squadron and mentions an operation to La Spezia when they almost ran out of fuel. Comments on activities on completion of second tour. He recalls seeing a flight of 617 Lancaster with unusual configuration. His eventual posting was to RAF Boscombe Down for test pilot training and he provides some anecdotes of his time as a test pilot. Includes contemporary colour photograph of Jo Lancaster.
Temporal Coverage
Spatial Coverage
Language
Type
Format
00:57:53 audio recording
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Rights
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
SBondS-LancasterJv10016, SBondS-LancasterJv10015
Transcription
SB: Well, the mission is as I mentioned on the phone I’m doing a book on the Wimpy. I’ve done several books in the past and what I always want to do, always on historical aviation but I always want to do is to get the views and the stories of the people that were there. And what I won’t do is use, do that second hand because there’s I think you mentioned when we spoke on the phone there’s been some stuff attributed to you which you never said and all this sort of thing. So what I’m doing currently is going around finding chaps like yourself who’ve had an association with the Wimpy, having a, just having a chat.
JL: You’re talking about to counter my objection are you?
SB: Well, yes.
JL: Rubbish [laughs]
SB: The reason for doing the Wimpy is it has not really been served very well in print until now. There are a couple of books. There was one in the ‘80s, one in the ‘90s which are ok but I just felt that and so did my publisher I’m glad to say that there’s been everything, infinite books about the Spitfire and the Lancaster and the Mosquito and all this kind of stuff. I thought now is the time to do one on the Wimpy and I put an appeal in on PPRuNe a while ago and the number of responses I’ve had has been amazing. Really very very pleasing. So that’s why I’m sitting here now just to chat about, well your career generally but obviously with a bit of focus on the Wimpy and then when I, when I leave you I’m seeing Harry Hacker if you know him.
JL: No.
SB: He, well, he’s at Lingfield’s so I’m going up —
JL: Lingfield’s [unclear] Hayward’s Heath.
SB: Yeah. One more stop.
JL: Yeah.
SB: And he was, he was a pilot on 40.
JL: I’m surprised I don’t know him.
SB: Well —
JL: He was in the —
SB: And then I’m going to see a chap, a Dave Fellowes. I don’t know if you know that name.
JL: Oh, I know him.
SB: Ah right. Ok. A gunner.
JL: I [unclear] I’ve got a list of the active members.
SB: Oh right.
JL: This. I found it. You have to—
SB: Harry Hacker.
JL: I’m sure he must be one of us but I —
SB: Well, he phoned me out of the blue about three weeks ago and said he’d heard about my —
JL: It’s relatively recently I got involved with the local branch.
SB: Right.
JL: Hansford. Hanson. Hitchin. That’s all. Those are the —
SB: Oh.
JL: Those are the only H’s.
SB: Oh, ok.
JL: But of course as I say this is a RAFA Association.
SB: Right.
JL: He’s not necessarily a member of that but more than ever we have quite an active group of ex-Bomber Command people and all that. We’ve been going around doing signings and book signings and things.
SB: Oh sure. Yeah.
JL: Raising money for the Memorial.
SB: Absolutely.
JL: And we’re still at it because we’ve got to pay for the upkeep of it.
SB: I know. Well, we’ll come on to that later on. I’ve got something I’m going to ask you to sign for exactly that purpose. So really what I want to do today Jo just for an hour or so is to chat through your career. You know, basically just get the skeleton of the career. When you joined and when you left and all the rest of it and then focus a bit on the Wellington side. So when did you join up?
JL: Well, shall I start at the beginning?
SB: Sure. Please do. Yeah.
JL: Well, when I left school I hunted around. I didn’t want to go to university. I couldn’t have done so anyway because there wasn’t any money left in the family and I don’t know quite how I did it but I found a company which took apprentices without a premium. Most of them wanted a premium. Quite a big one in some cases like De Havilland’s and I found Armstrong Whitley at Coventry.
SB: Oh yes. Yes.
JL: So my father and I went down there. I had an interview and I was accepted. And then it would be October 1935 I went down there as a sixteen year old to find myself some digs and start my apprenticeship and I was mad, mad to learn to fly but there was no chance of that.
SB: Right.
JL: At the time I had eyes on joining the RAF Reserve which was called the [TASF] in those days which is a bit like the Territorial Army.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: They didn’t do much except have a fortnightly camp and then in 1937 they started the RAF Volunteer Reserve.
SB: Yeah.
JL: Starting age eighteen and I was eighteen in 1937.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: So I joined and went to London. I had an interview and well obviously settled. I had the option of starting training at weekends and evenings at the Reserve Centres. Our local one at Coventry was Ansty. Or there was an option of doing a full time ab-initio course first.
SB: Right.
JL: And I got permission from my employers. I was rather put through a very helpful to have six, I don’t know six or seven weeks off and I went to Sywell and did fifty hours on the Tiger Moth.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: That over I went back to work and was doing flying at weekends at Ansty which was just outside Coventry which was actually operated by Air Service Training which was another member of the Hawker Siddeley Group of which Armstrong Whitworth was one.
SB: Sure.
JL: And I graduated on to Harts. Hawker Harts. I absolutely loved those. I was mad about them.
SB: Yeah. Everybody says that. Funnily enough, just interjecting I was talking to a chap yesterday who said exactly the same thing. He did his training at that point on Harts and Audaxes and he thought they were wonderful.
JL: Yeah. Oh, they were beautiful to fly. I was, I was thinking I was in heaven and I was still eighteen years old. And then one calamitous Sunday morning in April 1938 I went tearing, there had been a spell of bad weather and this Sunday dawned very good. I tore out of Ansty because it was for a bit of competition to get there to get an aeroplane. You know the detail. I managed to get, so the other the elementary aircraft they had there as well as the Hart was the Avro Cadet.
SB: Yes.
JL: Funny little thing with a —
SB: Yeah.
JL: Was it a five or seven cylinder Genet engine? I can’t, seven, seven cylinder I think and it was one of those. My instructor sort of gave me an authorised to fly. Kept telling me what to practice which included aerobatics and off I went but I hit a snag with the aircraft because when you opened the throttle it tended to choke and obviously should have been put u/s but —
SB: Yes.
JL: I wasn’t going to do that. But you know I’d have missed the, missed all the flying probably. So I very gingerly went off and I did some well I think aerobatics. I was mad on aerobatics.
SB: Right.
JL: And in [pause] that’s where I started going mad. I did a slow roll and on the final [pause] final half turn with a full top rudder a fire extinguisher stowed underneath the instrument panel fell down and as I straightened up it blocked the rudder so I was flying with a lot of skid on. I managed to control it with, you know some bank. I should have gone back to Ansty but being totally mad I landed at Whitley which was the home of Armstrong Whitworths.
SB: Right.
JL: This being a Sunday morning it wasn’t working and the groundsman sort of came out [unclear] and I sort of kept the engine running. I got out and managed to get this fire extinguisher out of jammed behind the rudder pedal, gave it to the guy and took off again [laughs] And one of the time expired apprentices there you know who I shared digs with and he had bought a, they wanted the RAF VR wouldn’t have him because he was colour blind but he’d bought something called a Dart Flittermouse. A motorised glider.
SB: Oh yes. Yes.
JL: And he was, it wouldn’t fly. It wouldn’t take off because it was rather stupidly designed. This chap was Tony Carpenter and he had this Flittermouse in a field not far away outside Coventry near Kenilworth and he, he’d gone out to fiddle with his Flittermouse. I must say that the Flittermouse had a [unclear] in the undercarriage, a sort of nacelle with a high wing and but just two little booms to the tail and it was twin engine, two stroke engine hollowed to the undercarriage and an ash skid at the back of the nacelle.
SB: Right.
JL: Well, obviously there was far too much movement on the skid. Too much [pause] too much friction. It never got up to speed.
SB: Right.
JL: So Tony, he swapped the undercarriage leads around. That put the centre of gravity forward.
SB: Right.
JL: And he went to the scrapyard and bought a motorcycle fork and made a nosewheel for it and it flew. Anyway, that’s beside the point. He was a, and I saw him in this field that he used and I did a few aerobatics for his benefit.
SB: Right.
JL: And then I did what what in effect was a legitimate exercise of simulated false landing. Throttle back.
SB: Yes and look for suitable field.
JL: The last place you open up. Well, I opened up and nothing happened.
SB: Ah.
JL: The engine choked and it went through a hedge. Well, unfortunately, a director of Armstrong Siddeley which is also a member of the Hawker Siddeley Group was playing golf on Kenilworth Golf Course and he’d seen all this. A chap called Tom Chapman. And so all my, all my explanations came to nought.
SB: I thought you were going to say when you went through the hedge the aircraft caught fire. You couldn’t put it out because you’d left the extinguisher behind.
JL: Not quite. The engine was far too cold for that.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: So, that was, that was curtains for me.
SB: Ah.
JL: I tried, I tried to lie myself out of it but it was hopeless. I must have been completely insane that morning. So that was a terrible blow and I wrote to the, I wrote to all sorts of people. I wrote to the Air Minister who was, at that time was Sir Kingsley Wood and I got a very nice letter back from his aide. I’ve still got the letter actually but they were saying that I was being, had to be, they had to make an example of me. They couldn’t make an exception.
SB: Oh dear.
JL: And I tried all sorts of other things. I kept a sort of not exactly a barrage but regular letters to I don’t know anybody I could think of in the Air Ministry and the Air Force. Didn’t do any good of course until the beginning of 1939. In about May of ’39 they introduced what they politely called the Militia which was conscription and I was bullseye for the first group.
SB: Right.
JL: Age group.
SB: Right.
JL: And I had to go to have an interview with an Army major. A typical little Army major complete with moustache and brusque attitude and I, I wasn’t very polite to him. I told him I didn’t want to join his rotten little Army and I was a trained engineer and a trained pilot and [laughs] and he said, ‘Oh well, I think you’ll be a certainty for the Royal Army Ordnance Corps.’ Why the Ordnance Corps and not the Engineers I don’t know but anyway then the war started and I was down, they requisitioned a skating, there was a Swiss skating rink in Coventry and turned it into a Joint Recruitment Centre.
SB: Right.
JL: And the RAF desk was run by Flying Officer Sparrow and he was no help at all. I wasn’t interested in the Army obviously and the Navy chap was a Chief Petty Officer Smith I think. He was much more affable to that I wasn’t particularly interested. Anyway, not long after the war started I got a letter with a, enclosing a postal order for four shillings and a travelling warrant to Budbrooke Barracks which was the home of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment.
SB: Ah.
JL: So I shot off down to the Recruiting Centre again [laughs] said, ‘Help. Help. Help.’ and I get —
[phone ringing]
JL: Excuse me.
[recording paused]
SB: You were pleading.
JL: That’s right. Sparrow was no help at all. Oh, Brown. Chief Petty Officer Brown. That was it. He said, ‘Well, I’ll fix this for you,’ and he put me on deferred service, unspecified deferred service with the Navy.
SB: Ah.
JL: And —
SB: Ok.
JL: So, I then got a letter saying that I’d been accepted. Accepted for the Royal Navy and I need not now report to Budbrooke Barracks. Please return the travel warrant and postal order for four shillings in advance of pay which I was delighted to do. Phew. And then in January of ’40, 1940 I got a letter from the Air Ministry saying they’d have me back.
SB: Oh right.
JL: What triggered that I don’t know where that came from but anyway I I went down to Cardington and I don’t know quite what happened there. Anyway, I was sent back again on deferred service until about June and then I was called up properly then and I again went to Cardington and we were jabbed full of every inoculation there is which was very painful. Given uniforms and well [unclear] there actually because [laughs] shortly before I left one of, one of the fellas, of the apprentices who worked in the drawing office said, gave me a general, general arrangement drawing of the Albemarle which was a top-secret bomber at that time.
SB: Yes. Yes. Yes.
JL: And I’d already packed and sent all of my stuff home and he gave me this thing. I just put it on the top of my suitcase and went down to Cardington. In the guardroom of course everything had to be checked out and he opened the suitcase [laughs] and there was this thing. Well, fortunately he just lifted it up and looked underneath it.
SB: That was a narrow squeak.
JL: I would have had a job to —
SB: Explain that one away.
JL: To talk myself out of that.
SB: Oh dear.
JL: Anyway, we were eventually, we were never told what was happening we were put on a train and turned up at Bexhill. And well we’d only been there about two days and we were put on a train again and turned up at Paignton on ITW.
SB: Yeah.
JL: Initial Training Wing.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I thoroughly enjoyed that. We were there for six weeks and then we all dispersed to various EFTSs. I went to Desford.
SB: Oh yes.
JL: Near Leicester which was rather handy because I was in easy reach of all my old friends in Coventry. And I had an instructor called Flight Lieutenant Hall and he was a very decent chap and I explained my previous problems and he sort of checked me out and you know I could still fly reasonably well.
SB: Right.
JL: So we spent most of that time doing aerobatics and low flying. There was a [unclear] low flying area.
SB: Oh right.
JL: Something Park, north of Leicester. West of Leicester. So we, he enjoyed that sort of thing and so, so we had a jolly good time .
SB: It was Tigers again was it?
JL: Yes.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: Tiger Moths again. Yes. Sorry.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I, the Battle of Britain was on at this time and I think I suppose we all wanted to be fighter pilots. I did and I was recommended for training as a fighter pilot.
SB: Right.
JL: Because some went to Oxford you know for bombers and things.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And I went to Sealands. The home of 5 FTS. We had Miles Masters.
SB: Ah right. Right.
JL: And this was a big course. There were about fifty of us on that course and Neville Duke was on the same course. Gordon Brettell who was one of the kingpins on the Big Escape, the Big Escape who was shot he was on it.
SB: Yeah.
JL: Sorry [coughs] and David Barnwell who was, he was just, just another chap. A cheerful chap. I only learned after, after the war that his father was an ex-Royal Flying Corps pilot. He became chief designer for Bristol aircraft.
SB: Oh.
JL: He was killed in a flying accident in 1938.
SB: Right.
JL: And this, at this time in 1940 David Barnwell’s two elder brothers had both already been killed in the Air Force.
SB: Good grief.
JL: So, he was there. He’d lost his father and two brothers.
SB: Gosh.
JL: And never mentioned it.
SB: Good lord.
JL: Anyway, we were divided into four flights and we in December I think we moved to Tern Hill. [coughs] sorry about this.
SB: That’s alright.
JL: That’s Tern Hill down in Shropshire.
SB: Shrewsbury. Yeah.
JL: And it was a pretty awful winter and flying was held up a lot and night flying just local circuits and bumps was on the syllabus but our flight was the only one who got it in. You know, just never never did any night flying.
SB: This was the Kestrel-engined Master wasn’t it?
JL: Yes.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And then at the end of the course instead of being sent to a fighter unit our our group, our flight complete, I think, I think there were eleven of us.
SB: Right.
JL: Were all sent off to bomber OTUs.
SB: Oh.
JL: [coughs] oh dear, sorry about this.
SB: That’s ok.
JL: I’ll have to get something to drink in a minute.
SB: Yes. Yes, you should.
JL: Anyway, I’ll try a bit further.
SB: So what bomber OTU did you go to?
JL: I went to Lossiemouth. Wellingtons. Well, right next door was Kinloss.
SB: Yes.
JL: Which had Whitleys. I went to the group captain. What was his name? He had a funny name [pause] and suggested that I trained there but he wasn’t having any of that.
SB: Oh.
JL: So I was stuck with the Wellington and we were crewed up there. It was very strange. You know, all the pilots kept together and there were other places in the OTU there there were the navigators.
SB: Yeah.
JL: We didn’t mix at all at that stage.
SB: Oh.
JL: And then came the day where we saw a, saw a recipe for a crew. We were all, we were all put in a hangar, quite literally in a hangar all loose and then they said, Make yourselves into a crew.
SB: Into a crew. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: We just wandered around. I didn’t know anybody. And anyway I finished up with a Canadian navigator Dan Leitch. A Canadian front gunner wireless operator Bill Harris. A Welsh wireless operator Jack Crowther and a New Zealand rear gunner Keith [Culivant].
SB: Right. Quite a, quite a mixture then.
JL: It was and we all arranged to meet at the Grand Hotel. Pubs were a bit short in Scotland at that time. We met in the bar of the Grand Hotel which was about the only place in Lossiemouth and we, we enjoyed ourselves very well. Got to know each other very well and were as thick as thieves for the rest of our lives.
SB: Oh, very good. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And then we were [pause] we were, are you alright?
SB: Yes. No. I’m looking at my notes. I’m not looking at the time. No.
JL: We were posted to 40 Squadron at Wyton.
SB: Right. Ok.
JL: Well, and we were given a date and so we all turned up at Wyton and found out we shouldn’t be there. We should be at Alconbury.
SB: Ah.
JL: So we got the service bus around to Alconbury and were immediately put on a charge for turning up late which we, you know we only did what we’d been told.
SB: Well, yes.
JL: We’d been told something else so. So that wasn’t a very good start.
SB: So these were Wimpy 2s, Wimpy 3s?
JL: No, they were 1Cs.
SB: 1Cs. Ok. Right.
JL: And 1C all the time and well I think there were one or two 1s at Lossiemouth. Yes. And we were given a skipper called Jim Taylor. A Scot. He’d been, he was a professional swimming instructor. And we did eight trips with him and then we were off on our own, the five of us and we of course we were given a second pilot then. [coughs] Sorry, I’ll have to —
[recording paused]
JL: We proceeded on our tour successfully. And then we finished our tour in the October ’41.
SB: Right.
JL: And, oh dear [coughs] oh dear and went our separate ways.
SB: Well, if we just stick with that tour for a minute does anything particularly stand out? Any particular ops stand out on that tour? Anything that was particularly memorable?
JL: Have you seen Chas Bowyer’s book, “Wellington at War.’?
SB: Yes.
JL: Well, I did quite a, quite a thing for him in that. The ones that stand out [pause] I can’t put them in chronological order.
SB: No. No. That doesn’t matter.
JL: We went to Berlin and had our only night fighter attack on the way back. That was because we were all diverted. We’d been over cloud and been shot at for hours in the cloud and we suddenly saw [coughs] through a gap in the cloud the causeway across the Zuiderzee and we were all looking at that and this bloody 101, 110 turned up. He missed us fortunately and as soon as I saw that I went into a very steep spiral dive and he tried, he did a turnaround and tried to follow us and apparently he showed his belly to Keith in the rear turret and Keith reckoned he got a good score.
SB: Oh right.
JL: And anyway we both eventually disappeared into cloud and we never knew what happened to him. We survived unscathed and I think we were well over the limiting speed of the Wellington because it was a new one which was rather good.
SB: Oh right.
JL: We did a daylight raid on Brest. The 24th of June, July that was. I remember the date. That was a bit of an experience. We weren’t, they were supposed to be [pause] there were supposed to be a fighter escort but it, we never saw a British fighter at all but they were probably down below keeping the rest on the ground. I don’t know.
SB: Right. Right. Yeah.
JL: We saw one or two 109s and one went through right past behind our formation and all the Wimpies were shooting at him and he he pulled up and baled out. So —
SB: Right.
JL: So who shot him down nobody knows. There were a lot of people shooting at him I think. Anyway, our squadron, 40 Squadron sent six aircraft, two, two [Vics] 3s and the other [Vic] was led by [pause] I forget his name. They lost one shot down but we came through. Our three came through unscathed.
SB: Right.
JL: And we were very short of fuel and landed at St Eval.
SB: Oh, ok.
JL: So did a lot of others. So it was pretty, pretty chaotic there.
SB: But did you enjoy flying the Wimpy? What, what did you think of it?
JL: Yeah. Well, actually it was grossly, for one thing it was grossly underpowered and of course it didn’t have feathering propellers which was a big drawback.
SB: Oh right.
JL: And if you lost an engine you just had a windmill there and [tailing] back. And so I did something over seven hundred hours in Wellingtons and only had two engine failures and fortunately both of them were in good light and easy reach of an airfield. So —
SB: Oh right.
JL: I’ve got it down in both cases without problem.
SB: I read somewhere just recently that because of the geodetic construction it flexed rather a lot.
JL: Did it?
SB: You could get the control column had a mind of its own if you weren’t hands on. Is that, does that ring a bell?
JL: Oh it was a rather, not that bad but you know if you did this [laughs] a bit like that. But it wasn’t frightening at all.
SB: No. No. No.
JL: And the seat was exceedingly comfortable in one particular aspect. There was a [pause] there was a hinged gadget under your knees which were two pads which you could bring up so as it supported your knees.
SB: Oh.
JL: It made such a difference.
SB: Oh. Oh, ok.
JL: It never appeared in any other aircraft I ever flew.
SB: Oh right. Oh, that’s interesting.
JL: So from that point of view yeah I liked it. I get to like everything. Most people got to like the aircraft they had.
SB: Sure. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: We went to Stettin which was a long drag. Over Berlin. We got iced up and lost both engines coming back from Cologne one night.
SB: Right.
JL: That was we got to Cologne and on the way back I got out of the seat and I let the, let the second pilot have a go and I went back to the astrodome and we promptly flew into cloud [coughs] ruddy hell. Sorry.
SB: It’s alright.
JL: I’m not usually as bad as this.
SB: We’ll blame the cold. Flew into cloud.
JL: Perhaps it will go in a minute. Anyway, it turned out to be an electrical storm. I told Gordon to do a one eighty and fly out of it and to put it, put the carburettors into the hot air. And then we got St Elmos Fire starting so I thought I’d go forward and take over and as I went past, squeezed past the navigator the wireless operator Jack Crowther was standing up in his [laughs] standing up with all his, all his equipment. All his equipment was glowing. I think he’d possibly left his trailing aerial out.
SB: Really?
JL: And he was standing up looking at all this. I went and changed places with Gordon and I found that he hadn’t put it into hot air and he hadn’t done a one eighty.
SB: Oh gosh.
JL: Which is uncharacteristic. And so by this time it was rather too late for the hot air because the starboard engine started doing a bit of surging and then it petered out and not long after the other one did the same.
SB: Oh, crumbs.
JL: I’d stayed on the same course because you know by that time I decided well we’d carry straight on. That was it. Routinely if you went into a cumin you got out of it as soon as possible. You didn’t fly through them.
SB: Sure.
JL: Anyway, then there the theme was you know very, flying very heavily obviously loaded with ice and then there was an enormous bang and a flash and obviously lightning.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I had to turn the cockpit lights up. We had a little rear stat. We normally had it minimum. Had to turn that right up and you imagine as well while before I could see the instruments properly and there was a huge bang and I got the crew, we got Bill out of his front turret because he couldn’t do it very easily on his own.
SB: Right.
JL: And he and the other three got all their parachute packs on and were standing there. We opened the hatch under the nose. You could do that in flight. You didn’t get an awful draft in there at all.
SB: Oh right. Right. What sort of height would you have been at this time?
JL: Well, I’ll tell you we were down to about five thousand feet or lower I think when we got the parachutes on.
SB: Right.
JL: And then we could, we could see sort of search lights were playing on the bottom of the clouds and we heard the occasional crump of a shell but then the [coughs] one of the engines picked up again and then the other one did and we actually didn’t break cloud. I mean the engines recovered before we got out and —
SB: Wow.
JL: And we climbed over. We were able to climb away. So we —
SB: Gosh.
JL: Shut the door and took the parachutes off.
SB: Parachutes off.
JL: And we called Keith in the rear turret and there was silence.
SB: Oh.
JL: We thought he’s gone. And, and he was down there. He did, he did the same. He called us [laughs] but he had an oxygen regulator visible and they had a little mini altimeter on.
SB: Right.
JL: And he was sitting there ready to go but he said, well four thousand feet we seemed to be stable, then he heard the engines going again.
SB: Right.
JL: And he sort of looked around and just as Jack Crowther got there, I’d sent him back to see what had happened just as he got there Keith discovered that he’d pulled his intercom plug out.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: While putting his parachute on. So we hadn’t lost him after all. So that was —
SB: That was that.
JL: That was quite a notable event.
SB: A scary moment. Yes. So that –
JL: I suppose that sort of thing happened fairly frequently.
SB: Yes, a friend of mine actually who was a similar, not for the same reason but a similar story he was a Boston observer in Italy right at the end of the war and they had some drama when the aircraft was damaged and they were getting down to quite a low level and the gunner at the back thought well I’ve had enough of this and he just jumped out [laughs] When the aircraft subsequently was you know recovered ok and I forget now whether he said well they checked if everybody was alright or not but the, when they landed they sort of found oh he’s not here [laughs] But he was ok. He actually came down in sort of friendly territory and a couple of days later walked back into the squadron. ‘Where the bloody hell have you been?’ So —
JL: Yeah. That did happen.
SB: Yeah. So that was the end of the tour on 40. And what came after that then, Jo?
JL: Well, I was posted to Wellesbourne Mountfield. A Wellington OTU.
SB: Right.
JL: And I wasn’t, I didn’t enjoy it very much at all. There was no way you could call it a rest and I was on the conversion flights there doing circuits and bumps. In the winter you did night flying and it was divided into four three hour sessions and of course eventually you came around to do twelve to three and three ‘til six.
SB: Oh gosh. Yeah.
JL: Which was —
SB: Yeah.
JL: Which was soul destroying. I wasn’t at all happy. I did an OTU instructor’s course at [pause] oh dear. CFS. North of, north of Salisbury.
SB: Little Rissington?
JL: No.
SB: No. South Cerney?
JL: No.
SB: No.
JL: It’s up on the hill. Up on the hill.
SB: Oh, Old Sarum. Upavon.
JL: Upavon.
SB: Upavon.
JL: Upavon. I did a month’s instructors course on Oxfords. I didn’t enjoy that either. Then they opened another OTU at Wymeswold, north of Leicester.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I was posted into that and we sort of started it up from scratch and then one night, one day I went off on a [pause] it was in October, October ’42. I might say that whilst we were at OTU we, we got lumbered with the thousand bomber raids.
SB: Oh right.
JL: I was on the first two and I was, I was going to be on the third one to Essen. Sorry. To Bremen.
SB: Right.
JL: But the aircraft went u/s so I only did the first two.
SB: Now, it’s interesting you say that in your case on those raids were your crews all staff instructor crews or did you have students in the crew as well?
JL: I had, in my case it was variable. In my case I had a screened navigator Joe Hart and a screened wireless op which turned out to be very fortuitous and two pupil Canadian gunners.
SB: Right.
JL: Canadians.
SB: Right.
JL: And over the top of Cologne which was a sea of fire well one of the Canadians got very excited and asked me if he could spray his guns about.
SB: But how much were you aware that that was a, that was a big effort? Were you aware at the time?
JL: Oh yes.
SB: Or thought it was because of you being —
JL: Yes. All the stations were blocked up you know. You couldn’t go off station.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: We didn’t find out what it was though until, until briefing. Anyway, as I say I didn’t enjoy OTU at all. My role was a bit better but not much and one day I went off on a cross country with a pupil crew. We had a five mile cross country and came back and it was five or 6 o’clockish and I found I was detailed for a bullseye that same night.
SB: Right.
JL: Do you know what a bullseye is?
SB: Yes, I do. I do. Yes. Yeah.
JL: And there was no food in the Mess Hall for me.
SB: No?
JL: Nobody had got any food and anyway off I went on this bullseye. At that time I had a completely sprog crew.
SB: Right.
JL: And I discovered that the wireless op had his, all his equipment in pieces on the floor.
SB: Oh God.
JL: He was going to be no help at all. Well, flying around this country at night without a wireless op and a sprog wasn’t very, a very good idea I thought. Anyway, I persevered. We got into ice again over the Solway Firth. We went to Carnarvon, Solway Firth and then we were going to an island off the Welsh coast there. I forget what its name is.
SB: Anglesey.
JL: Well, south of Anglesey. Just south of Anglesey. Just a popular aiming point.
SB: Oh right.
JL: They had an ultraviolet.
SB: Right.
JL: Ultraviolet target there or something.
SB: Oh ok. Ok.
JL: Anyway, we got into icing and the ice was bashing on the side of the fuselage and I decided I’d get this and packed it in and we had to find our way back under cloud again which we succeeded doing with a navigator and myself between us. And the next day I was on the carpet in front of this chief instructor who was [pause] his name was Fforde spelled with two small Fs.
SB: Oh ok.
JL: And he hadn’t done anything towards the war effort as far as we could see so how he got to there I don’t know. He was a wing commander and he was, he was telling me off for having turned back on this bullseye and he wanted to see my logbook. Well, I gave him this logbook and in the logbook I’d stuck a little cartoon which came out of “Flight,” I think once. At one time. Anyway, it was only a silly little thing. An engine with a chap sitting astride it and as I say there was a caption, “All the way from Hamburg on one engine.” And he said, ‘Did you come back from Hamburg on one engine?’ [laughs] Yeah. And I started to get bloody rude to him you know. I didn’t care anyway and really you know I was fed up with this OTU. It was just as dangerous as being on a squadron without the esprit.
SB: Sure. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And so I was quite insubordinate to him. I don’t know what I said but he told me to take that cartoon out of my logbook. I think I said I wasn’t going to. Anyway, so very quickly I, well then after a couple of days I was posted.
SB: Oh Right. Right.
JL: Yeah. I was originally posted to 150 Squadron at Snaith.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And the wing commander there said, ‘Well, what have you come for?’ And I said, ‘I don’t know, sir.’ [laughs] He said, ‘Well, we’ll do something about that. What do you want to do?’ And I said, ‘I’d like to go on a Lancaster squadron and I want, I want to have Gee.’ Yeah. And so again within a couple of days I was posted to 12 Squadron as a wireless role.
SB: Oh right.
JL: They still had Wellingtons but what they had was 3s and 10s and 2s. I think they had one of the 2s left and that was my introduction to the Wellington 3 which was a different aeroplane altogether.
SB: Right. Right. Yes.
JL: You know. So lots of power and I had a crew already waiting for me there because the B-Flight Commander Dougie [Haye] had gone sick. He was going to have some surgery and left his crew without a pilot so —
SB: Right.
JL: I took over his crew ready made.
SB: Ok. Ok.
JL: And we did, I think we did three ops in the Wellingtons and then we were stood down for six weeks to convert onto Lancasters.
SB: Right. Right. So did you, did you convert on the squadron or did you go to Lancaster Finishing School or —
JL: On the squadron.
SB: On the squadron. Yeah.
JL: Yes. two Australians came in from 460 Squadron. Shorty [Faye] and somebody Graham.
SB: Oh right. Right.
JL: Names. Yes. We all converted and there were quite a number of other second tour chaps came in and then at six weeks you know we got them through really good, we’d got a really good set up and which, which lasted.
SB: Right. Right. So did you complete the second tour then?
JL: Yes.
SB: Yeah.
JL: That was a strange thing. We came, we came back from we went to La Spezia in Italy and came back from there. We were nearly out of fuel. I landed at [pause] oh dear. This is my brain. RAF college. Cranwell.
SB: Cranwell. Yeah.
JL: And they had the landing lights on. I landed there. It wasn’t very far to Wickenby but I’d have felt very sick if it had run out of juice. It was our first chance to get down.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: And [coughs] So anyway went back the next morning and then when we sort of got back to normal the wingco called me in. I thought what have I done now? I’d say he was very good wingco and he said, ‘A new decree has come through that a second tour is now no longer thirty operations it’s twenty and as you are on twenty three you’re finished.’
SB: Oh. Well.
JL: And anyway a posting came through for me to Harwell. Wellington 1Cs OTU.
SB: [laughs] Oh, I bet you were pleased.
JL: So I went to the wing commander and told him what I thought of this [laughs] and being a very decent chap he said, ‘Well, we’ll get out of that for now.’ And he kept me on at the squadron. At that time some lunatic somewhere decided that they would no longer do pilots on second pilot trips. They’d just, new crews would just go. Do it. And of course morale hit the deck.
SB: Yeah.
JL: But it only lasted a day or two I think but during that time I got new crews and took them up. They gave me an aircraft. I took them up and demonstrated various things and talked to them.
SB: What period are we at now? Where are we in the calendar?
JL: April May ’43.
SB: Right. Ok.
JL: I finished in the April. Actually the Dambusters had just come around. That was, that was May wasn’t it?
SB: It was. Yes.
JL: I was out on the airfield that night. I’d finished my tour and I was doing something out on the airfield and four Lancasters in a sort of ragged formation flew low over Wickenby and they’d got peculiar things underneath.
SB: Oh wow.
JL: And I when I went back to the Mess. I said they looked like Anderson shelters underneath. That was, that was them or four of them.
SB: Well, indeed. Wow. Goodness.
JL: Anyway, during this I was kept on the squadron about two months doing odd jobs. You know, trying to train them as well. And during that time another second tour pilot finished. Ray [Kitteny] and he had recently got married and his wife lived in Oxfordshire so he took that posting to Harwell.
SB: Ah, right.
JL: And within I don’t know four or five weeks he was dead.
SB: A training accident?
JL: Engine. An engine caught fire.
SB: Yeah. Oh dear.
JL: And wiped the lot out but —
SB: Awful.
JL: I did a lot better because eventually I was posted to the Group. Number 1 Group Gunnery Flight 1481. Which was at Binbrook. Well, the Australian Squadron 460.
SB: Indeed. Yes.
JL: And that was a sinecure for me. I was in charge of the Wellington flight. We had Wellington 3s and 10s and a very good CO called, what was his name? Was it Brown? No. Murphy. Had an Australian wireless op who was acting as adjutant. We became good buddies. And during this time well right from the beginning we when I finished my second tour I requested a posting to an OT, a Maintenance Unit as a test pilot.
SB: Oh right.
JL: And I kept, I kept that up. But anyway, I was at Binbrook until I think it was September, October. October. At Binbrook and a posting came through for me to Boscombe Down.
SB: Gosh.
JL: A&AE.
SB: Gosh.
JL: Yeah. That frightened me a bit [laughs] Anyway, I apparently just acquitted myself fairly well when I got there because the OC Flying asked if I could tell him of anybody else who would like to come there. So, similar to myself.
SB: Well, marvellous.
JL: So he must have approved.
SB: So you got to fly a fairly motley collection of aeroplanes there did you?
JL: Yes. I then, I got on to Number 3 Course EFTS.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: What am I talking about?
SB: That’s ETPS.
JL: ETPS [laughs]
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And that’s about it.
SB: Right. And then, then your sort of industry test flying started after that I assume did it? When did you leave the Air Force?
JL: When I finished the ETPS course I was, I was posted back to Boscombe Down to B Squadron and then I got an offer to go to be [pause] I forget the word now. I’m very sorry but I’m —
SB: That’s alright.
JL: Attached to Boulton Paul.
SB: Oh right.
JL: What’s the word?
SB: Seconded?
JL: Seconded. Thank you. And I was, I had the chief test pilot was Cyril Feather and I met him and he said, ‘I’m retiring and the other pilot is leaving. There will just be you so when you’ve, when you’re demobbed you could stay on.’
SB: Yeah.
JL: Well, when I got there the other pilot, a chap called Lindsay Neale was still there and he didn’t know I was coming.
SB: Ah. Ok.
JL: Which was a strange, rather a strange beginning. But anyway as it transpired there was very little to do and I got fed up with that so I went to the ETPS and I suppose at the end of, the end of a four Course dinner at Cranfield this time and I think it was a group captain [unclear] the CO asked me how I was getting on. I said I wasn’t very happy. He said, ‘Well, [unclear] are looking for somebody. How about that?’ So I said, ‘Thank you.’ And I went down there and joined them.
SB: That was the SRA1 I guess, was it?
JL: Yes, but I was with Geoffrey Tyson.
SB: Yes.
JL: I respected Geoffrey Tyson but I’m afraid we didn’t get on very well. We were very different characters and I [laughs] I cooked my goose finally because at that time you know the Princess was coming along. A big aircraft and controls of big aircraft was very very much the subject and they were worried about turbulence in big span aircraft. They were having sort of ideas about ailerons that went up and down automatically.
SB: Right.
JL: Sort of relievers. Relieve the stress. And we were, we had a rather pompous managing director. He called himself Captain [Clark]
SB: Right.
JL: The Isle of Wight is full of captains. Royal Navy captains.
SB: Quite.
JL: But, but he was a captain in the Royal Flying Corps.
SB: Oh right.
JL: Which is a flight lieutenant.
SB: Indeed. Yeah.
JL: Yeah. Anyway, he was rather pompous and he would, he would decide who was going to dine there you see. So one day Geoffrey sat there and I sat there and he, he was there and we were talking. We were talking about this gust alleviation they called it.
SB: Right. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And Geoffrey said, ‘I think a good pilot can anticipate turbulence. Don’t you think so, Jo?’ And I said, ‘No.’ And there was a deathly hush [laughs] and I think from that day my goose was cooked. And so in 1949, January 1949 I went back and joined Armstrong Whitworths.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I served my, served my apprenticeship.
SB: So —
JL: The chief test pilot there already was Eric Franklin.
SB: Yes.
JL: Who had also been an apprentice there.
SB: Yes.
JL: We knew each other.
SB: Yeah. Yeah. Sure.
JL: So that’s it.
SB: Right. Can we pause here?
JL: Yes.
JL: You’re talking about to counter my objection are you?
SB: Well, yes.
JL: Rubbish [laughs]
SB: The reason for doing the Wimpy is it has not really been served very well in print until now. There are a couple of books. There was one in the ‘80s, one in the ‘90s which are ok but I just felt that and so did my publisher I’m glad to say that there’s been everything, infinite books about the Spitfire and the Lancaster and the Mosquito and all this kind of stuff. I thought now is the time to do one on the Wimpy and I put an appeal in on PPRuNe a while ago and the number of responses I’ve had has been amazing. Really very very pleasing. So that’s why I’m sitting here now just to chat about, well your career generally but obviously with a bit of focus on the Wimpy and then when I, when I leave you I’m seeing Harry Hacker if you know him.
JL: No.
SB: He, well, he’s at Lingfield’s so I’m going up —
JL: Lingfield’s [unclear] Hayward’s Heath.
SB: Yeah. One more stop.
JL: Yeah.
SB: And he was, he was a pilot on 40.
JL: I’m surprised I don’t know him.
SB: Well —
JL: He was in the —
SB: And then I’m going to see a chap, a Dave Fellowes. I don’t know if you know that name.
JL: Oh, I know him.
SB: Ah right. Ok. A gunner.
JL: I [unclear] I’ve got a list of the active members.
SB: Oh right.
JL: This. I found it. You have to—
SB: Harry Hacker.
JL: I’m sure he must be one of us but I —
SB: Well, he phoned me out of the blue about three weeks ago and said he’d heard about my —
JL: It’s relatively recently I got involved with the local branch.
SB: Right.
JL: Hansford. Hanson. Hitchin. That’s all. Those are the —
SB: Oh.
JL: Those are the only H’s.
SB: Oh, ok.
JL: But of course as I say this is a RAFA Association.
SB: Right.
JL: He’s not necessarily a member of that but more than ever we have quite an active group of ex-Bomber Command people and all that. We’ve been going around doing signings and book signings and things.
SB: Oh sure. Yeah.
JL: Raising money for the Memorial.
SB: Absolutely.
JL: And we’re still at it because we’ve got to pay for the upkeep of it.
SB: I know. Well, we’ll come on to that later on. I’ve got something I’m going to ask you to sign for exactly that purpose. So really what I want to do today Jo just for an hour or so is to chat through your career. You know, basically just get the skeleton of the career. When you joined and when you left and all the rest of it and then focus a bit on the Wellington side. So when did you join up?
JL: Well, shall I start at the beginning?
SB: Sure. Please do. Yeah.
JL: Well, when I left school I hunted around. I didn’t want to go to university. I couldn’t have done so anyway because there wasn’t any money left in the family and I don’t know quite how I did it but I found a company which took apprentices without a premium. Most of them wanted a premium. Quite a big one in some cases like De Havilland’s and I found Armstrong Whitley at Coventry.
SB: Oh yes. Yes.
JL: So my father and I went down there. I had an interview and I was accepted. And then it would be October 1935 I went down there as a sixteen year old to find myself some digs and start my apprenticeship and I was mad, mad to learn to fly but there was no chance of that.
SB: Right.
JL: At the time I had eyes on joining the RAF Reserve which was called the [TASF] in those days which is a bit like the Territorial Army.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: They didn’t do much except have a fortnightly camp and then in 1937 they started the RAF Volunteer Reserve.
SB: Yeah.
JL: Starting age eighteen and I was eighteen in 1937.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: So I joined and went to London. I had an interview and well obviously settled. I had the option of starting training at weekends and evenings at the Reserve Centres. Our local one at Coventry was Ansty. Or there was an option of doing a full time ab-initio course first.
SB: Right.
JL: And I got permission from my employers. I was rather put through a very helpful to have six, I don’t know six or seven weeks off and I went to Sywell and did fifty hours on the Tiger Moth.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: That over I went back to work and was doing flying at weekends at Ansty which was just outside Coventry which was actually operated by Air Service Training which was another member of the Hawker Siddeley Group of which Armstrong Whitworth was one.
SB: Sure.
JL: And I graduated on to Harts. Hawker Harts. I absolutely loved those. I was mad about them.
SB: Yeah. Everybody says that. Funnily enough, just interjecting I was talking to a chap yesterday who said exactly the same thing. He did his training at that point on Harts and Audaxes and he thought they were wonderful.
JL: Yeah. Oh, they were beautiful to fly. I was, I was thinking I was in heaven and I was still eighteen years old. And then one calamitous Sunday morning in April 1938 I went tearing, there had been a spell of bad weather and this Sunday dawned very good. I tore out of Ansty because it was for a bit of competition to get there to get an aeroplane. You know the detail. I managed to get, so the other the elementary aircraft they had there as well as the Hart was the Avro Cadet.
SB: Yes.
JL: Funny little thing with a —
SB: Yeah.
JL: Was it a five or seven cylinder Genet engine? I can’t, seven, seven cylinder I think and it was one of those. My instructor sort of gave me an authorised to fly. Kept telling me what to practice which included aerobatics and off I went but I hit a snag with the aircraft because when you opened the throttle it tended to choke and obviously should have been put u/s but —
SB: Yes.
JL: I wasn’t going to do that. But you know I’d have missed the, missed all the flying probably. So I very gingerly went off and I did some well I think aerobatics. I was mad on aerobatics.
SB: Right.
JL: And in [pause] that’s where I started going mad. I did a slow roll and on the final [pause] final half turn with a full top rudder a fire extinguisher stowed underneath the instrument panel fell down and as I straightened up it blocked the rudder so I was flying with a lot of skid on. I managed to control it with, you know some bank. I should have gone back to Ansty but being totally mad I landed at Whitley which was the home of Armstrong Whitworths.
SB: Right.
JL: This being a Sunday morning it wasn’t working and the groundsman sort of came out [unclear] and I sort of kept the engine running. I got out and managed to get this fire extinguisher out of jammed behind the rudder pedal, gave it to the guy and took off again [laughs] And one of the time expired apprentices there you know who I shared digs with and he had bought a, they wanted the RAF VR wouldn’t have him because he was colour blind but he’d bought something called a Dart Flittermouse. A motorised glider.
SB: Oh yes. Yes.
JL: And he was, it wouldn’t fly. It wouldn’t take off because it was rather stupidly designed. This chap was Tony Carpenter and he had this Flittermouse in a field not far away outside Coventry near Kenilworth and he, he’d gone out to fiddle with his Flittermouse. I must say that the Flittermouse had a [unclear] in the undercarriage, a sort of nacelle with a high wing and but just two little booms to the tail and it was twin engine, two stroke engine hollowed to the undercarriage and an ash skid at the back of the nacelle.
SB: Right.
JL: Well, obviously there was far too much movement on the skid. Too much [pause] too much friction. It never got up to speed.
SB: Right.
JL: So Tony, he swapped the undercarriage leads around. That put the centre of gravity forward.
SB: Right.
JL: And he went to the scrapyard and bought a motorcycle fork and made a nosewheel for it and it flew. Anyway, that’s beside the point. He was a, and I saw him in this field that he used and I did a few aerobatics for his benefit.
SB: Right.
JL: And then I did what what in effect was a legitimate exercise of simulated false landing. Throttle back.
SB: Yes and look for suitable field.
JL: The last place you open up. Well, I opened up and nothing happened.
SB: Ah.
JL: The engine choked and it went through a hedge. Well, unfortunately, a director of Armstrong Siddeley which is also a member of the Hawker Siddeley Group was playing golf on Kenilworth Golf Course and he’d seen all this. A chap called Tom Chapman. And so all my, all my explanations came to nought.
SB: I thought you were going to say when you went through the hedge the aircraft caught fire. You couldn’t put it out because you’d left the extinguisher behind.
JL: Not quite. The engine was far too cold for that.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: So, that was, that was curtains for me.
SB: Ah.
JL: I tried, I tried to lie myself out of it but it was hopeless. I must have been completely insane that morning. So that was a terrible blow and I wrote to the, I wrote to all sorts of people. I wrote to the Air Minister who was, at that time was Sir Kingsley Wood and I got a very nice letter back from his aide. I’ve still got the letter actually but they were saying that I was being, had to be, they had to make an example of me. They couldn’t make an exception.
SB: Oh dear.
JL: And I tried all sorts of other things. I kept a sort of not exactly a barrage but regular letters to I don’t know anybody I could think of in the Air Ministry and the Air Force. Didn’t do any good of course until the beginning of 1939. In about May of ’39 they introduced what they politely called the Militia which was conscription and I was bullseye for the first group.
SB: Right.
JL: Age group.
SB: Right.
JL: And I had to go to have an interview with an Army major. A typical little Army major complete with moustache and brusque attitude and I, I wasn’t very polite to him. I told him I didn’t want to join his rotten little Army and I was a trained engineer and a trained pilot and [laughs] and he said, ‘Oh well, I think you’ll be a certainty for the Royal Army Ordnance Corps.’ Why the Ordnance Corps and not the Engineers I don’t know but anyway then the war started and I was down, they requisitioned a skating, there was a Swiss skating rink in Coventry and turned it into a Joint Recruitment Centre.
SB: Right.
JL: And the RAF desk was run by Flying Officer Sparrow and he was no help at all. I wasn’t interested in the Army obviously and the Navy chap was a Chief Petty Officer Smith I think. He was much more affable to that I wasn’t particularly interested. Anyway, not long after the war started I got a letter with a, enclosing a postal order for four shillings and a travelling warrant to Budbrooke Barracks which was the home of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment.
SB: Ah.
JL: So I shot off down to the Recruiting Centre again [laughs] said, ‘Help. Help. Help.’ and I get —
[phone ringing]
JL: Excuse me.
[recording paused]
SB: You were pleading.
JL: That’s right. Sparrow was no help at all. Oh, Brown. Chief Petty Officer Brown. That was it. He said, ‘Well, I’ll fix this for you,’ and he put me on deferred service, unspecified deferred service with the Navy.
SB: Ah.
JL: And —
SB: Ok.
JL: So, I then got a letter saying that I’d been accepted. Accepted for the Royal Navy and I need not now report to Budbrooke Barracks. Please return the travel warrant and postal order for four shillings in advance of pay which I was delighted to do. Phew. And then in January of ’40, 1940 I got a letter from the Air Ministry saying they’d have me back.
SB: Oh right.
JL: What triggered that I don’t know where that came from but anyway I I went down to Cardington and I don’t know quite what happened there. Anyway, I was sent back again on deferred service until about June and then I was called up properly then and I again went to Cardington and we were jabbed full of every inoculation there is which was very painful. Given uniforms and well [unclear] there actually because [laughs] shortly before I left one of, one of the fellas, of the apprentices who worked in the drawing office said, gave me a general, general arrangement drawing of the Albemarle which was a top-secret bomber at that time.
SB: Yes. Yes. Yes.
JL: And I’d already packed and sent all of my stuff home and he gave me this thing. I just put it on the top of my suitcase and went down to Cardington. In the guardroom of course everything had to be checked out and he opened the suitcase [laughs] and there was this thing. Well, fortunately he just lifted it up and looked underneath it.
SB: That was a narrow squeak.
JL: I would have had a job to —
SB: Explain that one away.
JL: To talk myself out of that.
SB: Oh dear.
JL: Anyway, we were eventually, we were never told what was happening we were put on a train and turned up at Bexhill. And well we’d only been there about two days and we were put on a train again and turned up at Paignton on ITW.
SB: Yeah.
JL: Initial Training Wing.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I thoroughly enjoyed that. We were there for six weeks and then we all dispersed to various EFTSs. I went to Desford.
SB: Oh yes.
JL: Near Leicester which was rather handy because I was in easy reach of all my old friends in Coventry. And I had an instructor called Flight Lieutenant Hall and he was a very decent chap and I explained my previous problems and he sort of checked me out and you know I could still fly reasonably well.
SB: Right.
JL: So we spent most of that time doing aerobatics and low flying. There was a [unclear] low flying area.
SB: Oh right.
JL: Something Park, north of Leicester. West of Leicester. So we, he enjoyed that sort of thing and so, so we had a jolly good time .
SB: It was Tigers again was it?
JL: Yes.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: Tiger Moths again. Yes. Sorry.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I, the Battle of Britain was on at this time and I think I suppose we all wanted to be fighter pilots. I did and I was recommended for training as a fighter pilot.
SB: Right.
JL: Because some went to Oxford you know for bombers and things.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And I went to Sealands. The home of 5 FTS. We had Miles Masters.
SB: Ah right. Right.
JL: And this was a big course. There were about fifty of us on that course and Neville Duke was on the same course. Gordon Brettell who was one of the kingpins on the Big Escape, the Big Escape who was shot he was on it.
SB: Yeah.
JL: Sorry [coughs] and David Barnwell who was, he was just, just another chap. A cheerful chap. I only learned after, after the war that his father was an ex-Royal Flying Corps pilot. He became chief designer for Bristol aircraft.
SB: Oh.
JL: He was killed in a flying accident in 1938.
SB: Right.
JL: And this, at this time in 1940 David Barnwell’s two elder brothers had both already been killed in the Air Force.
SB: Good grief.
JL: So, he was there. He’d lost his father and two brothers.
SB: Gosh.
JL: And never mentioned it.
SB: Good lord.
JL: Anyway, we were divided into four flights and we in December I think we moved to Tern Hill. [coughs] sorry about this.
SB: That’s alright.
JL: That’s Tern Hill down in Shropshire.
SB: Shrewsbury. Yeah.
JL: And it was a pretty awful winter and flying was held up a lot and night flying just local circuits and bumps was on the syllabus but our flight was the only one who got it in. You know, just never never did any night flying.
SB: This was the Kestrel-engined Master wasn’t it?
JL: Yes.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And then at the end of the course instead of being sent to a fighter unit our our group, our flight complete, I think, I think there were eleven of us.
SB: Right.
JL: Were all sent off to bomber OTUs.
SB: Oh.
JL: [coughs] oh dear, sorry about this.
SB: That’s ok.
JL: I’ll have to get something to drink in a minute.
SB: Yes. Yes, you should.
JL: Anyway, I’ll try a bit further.
SB: So what bomber OTU did you go to?
JL: I went to Lossiemouth. Wellingtons. Well, right next door was Kinloss.
SB: Yes.
JL: Which had Whitleys. I went to the group captain. What was his name? He had a funny name [pause] and suggested that I trained there but he wasn’t having any of that.
SB: Oh.
JL: So I was stuck with the Wellington and we were crewed up there. It was very strange. You know, all the pilots kept together and there were other places in the OTU there there were the navigators.
SB: Yeah.
JL: We didn’t mix at all at that stage.
SB: Oh.
JL: And then came the day where we saw a, saw a recipe for a crew. We were all, we were all put in a hangar, quite literally in a hangar all loose and then they said, Make yourselves into a crew.
SB: Into a crew. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: We just wandered around. I didn’t know anybody. And anyway I finished up with a Canadian navigator Dan Leitch. A Canadian front gunner wireless operator Bill Harris. A Welsh wireless operator Jack Crowther and a New Zealand rear gunner Keith [Culivant].
SB: Right. Quite a, quite a mixture then.
JL: It was and we all arranged to meet at the Grand Hotel. Pubs were a bit short in Scotland at that time. We met in the bar of the Grand Hotel which was about the only place in Lossiemouth and we, we enjoyed ourselves very well. Got to know each other very well and were as thick as thieves for the rest of our lives.
SB: Oh, very good. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And then we were [pause] we were, are you alright?
SB: Yes. No. I’m looking at my notes. I’m not looking at the time. No.
JL: We were posted to 40 Squadron at Wyton.
SB: Right. Ok.
JL: Well, and we were given a date and so we all turned up at Wyton and found out we shouldn’t be there. We should be at Alconbury.
SB: Ah.
JL: So we got the service bus around to Alconbury and were immediately put on a charge for turning up late which we, you know we only did what we’d been told.
SB: Well, yes.
JL: We’d been told something else so. So that wasn’t a very good start.
SB: So these were Wimpy 2s, Wimpy 3s?
JL: No, they were 1Cs.
SB: 1Cs. Ok. Right.
JL: And 1C all the time and well I think there were one or two 1s at Lossiemouth. Yes. And we were given a skipper called Jim Taylor. A Scot. He’d been, he was a professional swimming instructor. And we did eight trips with him and then we were off on our own, the five of us and we of course we were given a second pilot then. [coughs] Sorry, I’ll have to —
[recording paused]
JL: We proceeded on our tour successfully. And then we finished our tour in the October ’41.
SB: Right.
JL: And, oh dear [coughs] oh dear and went our separate ways.
SB: Well, if we just stick with that tour for a minute does anything particularly stand out? Any particular ops stand out on that tour? Anything that was particularly memorable?
JL: Have you seen Chas Bowyer’s book, “Wellington at War.’?
SB: Yes.
JL: Well, I did quite a, quite a thing for him in that. The ones that stand out [pause] I can’t put them in chronological order.
SB: No. No. That doesn’t matter.
JL: We went to Berlin and had our only night fighter attack on the way back. That was because we were all diverted. We’d been over cloud and been shot at for hours in the cloud and we suddenly saw [coughs] through a gap in the cloud the causeway across the Zuiderzee and we were all looking at that and this bloody 101, 110 turned up. He missed us fortunately and as soon as I saw that I went into a very steep spiral dive and he tried, he did a turnaround and tried to follow us and apparently he showed his belly to Keith in the rear turret and Keith reckoned he got a good score.
SB: Oh right.
JL: And anyway we both eventually disappeared into cloud and we never knew what happened to him. We survived unscathed and I think we were well over the limiting speed of the Wellington because it was a new one which was rather good.
SB: Oh right.
JL: We did a daylight raid on Brest. The 24th of June, July that was. I remember the date. That was a bit of an experience. We weren’t, they were supposed to be [pause] there were supposed to be a fighter escort but it, we never saw a British fighter at all but they were probably down below keeping the rest on the ground. I don’t know.
SB: Right. Right. Yeah.
JL: We saw one or two 109s and one went through right past behind our formation and all the Wimpies were shooting at him and he he pulled up and baled out. So —
SB: Right.
JL: So who shot him down nobody knows. There were a lot of people shooting at him I think. Anyway, our squadron, 40 Squadron sent six aircraft, two, two [Vics] 3s and the other [Vic] was led by [pause] I forget his name. They lost one shot down but we came through. Our three came through unscathed.
SB: Right.
JL: And we were very short of fuel and landed at St Eval.
SB: Oh, ok.
JL: So did a lot of others. So it was pretty, pretty chaotic there.
SB: But did you enjoy flying the Wimpy? What, what did you think of it?
JL: Yeah. Well, actually it was grossly, for one thing it was grossly underpowered and of course it didn’t have feathering propellers which was a big drawback.
SB: Oh right.
JL: And if you lost an engine you just had a windmill there and [tailing] back. And so I did something over seven hundred hours in Wellingtons and only had two engine failures and fortunately both of them were in good light and easy reach of an airfield. So —
SB: Oh right.
JL: I’ve got it down in both cases without problem.
SB: I read somewhere just recently that because of the geodetic construction it flexed rather a lot.
JL: Did it?
SB: You could get the control column had a mind of its own if you weren’t hands on. Is that, does that ring a bell?
JL: Oh it was a rather, not that bad but you know if you did this [laughs] a bit like that. But it wasn’t frightening at all.
SB: No. No. No.
JL: And the seat was exceedingly comfortable in one particular aspect. There was a [pause] there was a hinged gadget under your knees which were two pads which you could bring up so as it supported your knees.
SB: Oh.
JL: It made such a difference.
SB: Oh. Oh, ok.
JL: It never appeared in any other aircraft I ever flew.
SB: Oh right. Oh, that’s interesting.
JL: So from that point of view yeah I liked it. I get to like everything. Most people got to like the aircraft they had.
SB: Sure. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: We went to Stettin which was a long drag. Over Berlin. We got iced up and lost both engines coming back from Cologne one night.
SB: Right.
JL: That was we got to Cologne and on the way back I got out of the seat and I let the, let the second pilot have a go and I went back to the astrodome and we promptly flew into cloud [coughs] ruddy hell. Sorry.
SB: It’s alright.
JL: I’m not usually as bad as this.
SB: We’ll blame the cold. Flew into cloud.
JL: Perhaps it will go in a minute. Anyway, it turned out to be an electrical storm. I told Gordon to do a one eighty and fly out of it and to put it, put the carburettors into the hot air. And then we got St Elmos Fire starting so I thought I’d go forward and take over and as I went past, squeezed past the navigator the wireless operator Jack Crowther was standing up in his [laughs] standing up with all his, all his equipment. All his equipment was glowing. I think he’d possibly left his trailing aerial out.
SB: Really?
JL: And he was standing up looking at all this. I went and changed places with Gordon and I found that he hadn’t put it into hot air and he hadn’t done a one eighty.
SB: Oh gosh.
JL: Which is uncharacteristic. And so by this time it was rather too late for the hot air because the starboard engine started doing a bit of surging and then it petered out and not long after the other one did the same.
SB: Oh, crumbs.
JL: I’d stayed on the same course because you know by that time I decided well we’d carry straight on. That was it. Routinely if you went into a cumin you got out of it as soon as possible. You didn’t fly through them.
SB: Sure.
JL: Anyway, then there the theme was you know very, flying very heavily obviously loaded with ice and then there was an enormous bang and a flash and obviously lightning.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I had to turn the cockpit lights up. We had a little rear stat. We normally had it minimum. Had to turn that right up and you imagine as well while before I could see the instruments properly and there was a huge bang and I got the crew, we got Bill out of his front turret because he couldn’t do it very easily on his own.
SB: Right.
JL: And he and the other three got all their parachute packs on and were standing there. We opened the hatch under the nose. You could do that in flight. You didn’t get an awful draft in there at all.
SB: Oh right. Right. What sort of height would you have been at this time?
JL: Well, I’ll tell you we were down to about five thousand feet or lower I think when we got the parachutes on.
SB: Right.
JL: And then we could, we could see sort of search lights were playing on the bottom of the clouds and we heard the occasional crump of a shell but then the [coughs] one of the engines picked up again and then the other one did and we actually didn’t break cloud. I mean the engines recovered before we got out and —
SB: Wow.
JL: And we climbed over. We were able to climb away. So we —
SB: Gosh.
JL: Shut the door and took the parachutes off.
SB: Parachutes off.
JL: And we called Keith in the rear turret and there was silence.
SB: Oh.
JL: We thought he’s gone. And, and he was down there. He did, he did the same. He called us [laughs] but he had an oxygen regulator visible and they had a little mini altimeter on.
SB: Right.
JL: And he was sitting there ready to go but he said, well four thousand feet we seemed to be stable, then he heard the engines going again.
SB: Right.
JL: And he sort of looked around and just as Jack Crowther got there, I’d sent him back to see what had happened just as he got there Keith discovered that he’d pulled his intercom plug out.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: While putting his parachute on. So we hadn’t lost him after all. So that was —
SB: That was that.
JL: That was quite a notable event.
SB: A scary moment. Yes. So that –
JL: I suppose that sort of thing happened fairly frequently.
SB: Yes, a friend of mine actually who was a similar, not for the same reason but a similar story he was a Boston observer in Italy right at the end of the war and they had some drama when the aircraft was damaged and they were getting down to quite a low level and the gunner at the back thought well I’ve had enough of this and he just jumped out [laughs] When the aircraft subsequently was you know recovered ok and I forget now whether he said well they checked if everybody was alright or not but the, when they landed they sort of found oh he’s not here [laughs] But he was ok. He actually came down in sort of friendly territory and a couple of days later walked back into the squadron. ‘Where the bloody hell have you been?’ So —
JL: Yeah. That did happen.
SB: Yeah. So that was the end of the tour on 40. And what came after that then, Jo?
JL: Well, I was posted to Wellesbourne Mountfield. A Wellington OTU.
SB: Right.
JL: And I wasn’t, I didn’t enjoy it very much at all. There was no way you could call it a rest and I was on the conversion flights there doing circuits and bumps. In the winter you did night flying and it was divided into four three hour sessions and of course eventually you came around to do twelve to three and three ‘til six.
SB: Oh gosh. Yeah.
JL: Which was —
SB: Yeah.
JL: Which was soul destroying. I wasn’t at all happy. I did an OTU instructor’s course at [pause] oh dear. CFS. North of, north of Salisbury.
SB: Little Rissington?
JL: No.
SB: No. South Cerney?
JL: No.
SB: No.
JL: It’s up on the hill. Up on the hill.
SB: Oh, Old Sarum. Upavon.
JL: Upavon.
SB: Upavon.
JL: Upavon. I did a month’s instructors course on Oxfords. I didn’t enjoy that either. Then they opened another OTU at Wymeswold, north of Leicester.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I was posted into that and we sort of started it up from scratch and then one night, one day I went off on a [pause] it was in October, October ’42. I might say that whilst we were at OTU we, we got lumbered with the thousand bomber raids.
SB: Oh right.
JL: I was on the first two and I was, I was going to be on the third one to Essen. Sorry. To Bremen.
SB: Right.
JL: But the aircraft went u/s so I only did the first two.
SB: Now, it’s interesting you say that in your case on those raids were your crews all staff instructor crews or did you have students in the crew as well?
JL: I had, in my case it was variable. In my case I had a screened navigator Joe Hart and a screened wireless op which turned out to be very fortuitous and two pupil Canadian gunners.
SB: Right.
JL: Canadians.
SB: Right.
JL: And over the top of Cologne which was a sea of fire well one of the Canadians got very excited and asked me if he could spray his guns about.
SB: But how much were you aware that that was a, that was a big effort? Were you aware at the time?
JL: Oh yes.
SB: Or thought it was because of you being —
JL: Yes. All the stations were blocked up you know. You couldn’t go off station.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: We didn’t find out what it was though until, until briefing. Anyway, as I say I didn’t enjoy OTU at all. My role was a bit better but not much and one day I went off on a cross country with a pupil crew. We had a five mile cross country and came back and it was five or 6 o’clockish and I found I was detailed for a bullseye that same night.
SB: Right.
JL: Do you know what a bullseye is?
SB: Yes, I do. I do. Yes. Yeah.
JL: And there was no food in the Mess Hall for me.
SB: No?
JL: Nobody had got any food and anyway off I went on this bullseye. At that time I had a completely sprog crew.
SB: Right.
JL: And I discovered that the wireless op had his, all his equipment in pieces on the floor.
SB: Oh God.
JL: He was going to be no help at all. Well, flying around this country at night without a wireless op and a sprog wasn’t very, a very good idea I thought. Anyway, I persevered. We got into ice again over the Solway Firth. We went to Carnarvon, Solway Firth and then we were going to an island off the Welsh coast there. I forget what its name is.
SB: Anglesey.
JL: Well, south of Anglesey. Just south of Anglesey. Just a popular aiming point.
SB: Oh right.
JL: They had an ultraviolet.
SB: Right.
JL: Ultraviolet target there or something.
SB: Oh ok. Ok.
JL: Anyway, we got into icing and the ice was bashing on the side of the fuselage and I decided I’d get this and packed it in and we had to find our way back under cloud again which we succeeded doing with a navigator and myself between us. And the next day I was on the carpet in front of this chief instructor who was [pause] his name was Fforde spelled with two small Fs.
SB: Oh ok.
JL: And he hadn’t done anything towards the war effort as far as we could see so how he got to there I don’t know. He was a wing commander and he was, he was telling me off for having turned back on this bullseye and he wanted to see my logbook. Well, I gave him this logbook and in the logbook I’d stuck a little cartoon which came out of “Flight,” I think once. At one time. Anyway, it was only a silly little thing. An engine with a chap sitting astride it and as I say there was a caption, “All the way from Hamburg on one engine.” And he said, ‘Did you come back from Hamburg on one engine?’ [laughs] Yeah. And I started to get bloody rude to him you know. I didn’t care anyway and really you know I was fed up with this OTU. It was just as dangerous as being on a squadron without the esprit.
SB: Sure. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And so I was quite insubordinate to him. I don’t know what I said but he told me to take that cartoon out of my logbook. I think I said I wasn’t going to. Anyway, so very quickly I, well then after a couple of days I was posted.
SB: Oh Right. Right.
JL: Yeah. I was originally posted to 150 Squadron at Snaith.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And the wing commander there said, ‘Well, what have you come for?’ And I said, ‘I don’t know, sir.’ [laughs] He said, ‘Well, we’ll do something about that. What do you want to do?’ And I said, ‘I’d like to go on a Lancaster squadron and I want, I want to have Gee.’ Yeah. And so again within a couple of days I was posted to 12 Squadron as a wireless role.
SB: Oh right.
JL: They still had Wellingtons but what they had was 3s and 10s and 2s. I think they had one of the 2s left and that was my introduction to the Wellington 3 which was a different aeroplane altogether.
SB: Right. Right. Yes.
JL: You know. So lots of power and I had a crew already waiting for me there because the B-Flight Commander Dougie [Haye] had gone sick. He was going to have some surgery and left his crew without a pilot so —
SB: Right.
JL: I took over his crew ready made.
SB: Ok. Ok.
JL: And we did, I think we did three ops in the Wellingtons and then we were stood down for six weeks to convert onto Lancasters.
SB: Right. Right. So did you, did you convert on the squadron or did you go to Lancaster Finishing School or —
JL: On the squadron.
SB: On the squadron. Yeah.
JL: Yes. two Australians came in from 460 Squadron. Shorty [Faye] and somebody Graham.
SB: Oh right. Right.
JL: Names. Yes. We all converted and there were quite a number of other second tour chaps came in and then at six weeks you know we got them through really good, we’d got a really good set up and which, which lasted.
SB: Right. Right. So did you complete the second tour then?
JL: Yes.
SB: Yeah.
JL: That was a strange thing. We came, we came back from we went to La Spezia in Italy and came back from there. We were nearly out of fuel. I landed at [pause] oh dear. This is my brain. RAF college. Cranwell.
SB: Cranwell. Yeah.
JL: And they had the landing lights on. I landed there. It wasn’t very far to Wickenby but I’d have felt very sick if it had run out of juice. It was our first chance to get down.
SB: Right. Right.
JL: And [coughs] So anyway went back the next morning and then when we sort of got back to normal the wingco called me in. I thought what have I done now? I’d say he was very good wingco and he said, ‘A new decree has come through that a second tour is now no longer thirty operations it’s twenty and as you are on twenty three you’re finished.’
SB: Oh. Well.
JL: And anyway a posting came through for me to Harwell. Wellington 1Cs OTU.
SB: [laughs] Oh, I bet you were pleased.
JL: So I went to the wing commander and told him what I thought of this [laughs] and being a very decent chap he said, ‘Well, we’ll get out of that for now.’ And he kept me on at the squadron. At that time some lunatic somewhere decided that they would no longer do pilots on second pilot trips. They’d just, new crews would just go. Do it. And of course morale hit the deck.
SB: Yeah.
JL: But it only lasted a day or two I think but during that time I got new crews and took them up. They gave me an aircraft. I took them up and demonstrated various things and talked to them.
SB: What period are we at now? Where are we in the calendar?
JL: April May ’43.
SB: Right. Ok.
JL: I finished in the April. Actually the Dambusters had just come around. That was, that was May wasn’t it?
SB: It was. Yes.
JL: I was out on the airfield that night. I’d finished my tour and I was doing something out on the airfield and four Lancasters in a sort of ragged formation flew low over Wickenby and they’d got peculiar things underneath.
SB: Oh wow.
JL: And I when I went back to the Mess. I said they looked like Anderson shelters underneath. That was, that was them or four of them.
SB: Well, indeed. Wow. Goodness.
JL: Anyway, during this I was kept on the squadron about two months doing odd jobs. You know, trying to train them as well. And during that time another second tour pilot finished. Ray [Kitteny] and he had recently got married and his wife lived in Oxfordshire so he took that posting to Harwell.
SB: Ah, right.
JL: And within I don’t know four or five weeks he was dead.
SB: A training accident?
JL: Engine. An engine caught fire.
SB: Yeah. Oh dear.
JL: And wiped the lot out but —
SB: Awful.
JL: I did a lot better because eventually I was posted to the Group. Number 1 Group Gunnery Flight 1481. Which was at Binbrook. Well, the Australian Squadron 460.
SB: Indeed. Yes.
JL: And that was a sinecure for me. I was in charge of the Wellington flight. We had Wellington 3s and 10s and a very good CO called, what was his name? Was it Brown? No. Murphy. Had an Australian wireless op who was acting as adjutant. We became good buddies. And during this time well right from the beginning we when I finished my second tour I requested a posting to an OT, a Maintenance Unit as a test pilot.
SB: Oh right.
JL: And I kept, I kept that up. But anyway, I was at Binbrook until I think it was September, October. October. At Binbrook and a posting came through for me to Boscombe Down.
SB: Gosh.
JL: A&AE.
SB: Gosh.
JL: Yeah. That frightened me a bit [laughs] Anyway, I apparently just acquitted myself fairly well when I got there because the OC Flying asked if I could tell him of anybody else who would like to come there. So, similar to myself.
SB: Well, marvellous.
JL: So he must have approved.
SB: So you got to fly a fairly motley collection of aeroplanes there did you?
JL: Yes. I then, I got on to Number 3 Course EFTS.
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: What am I talking about?
SB: That’s ETPS.
JL: ETPS [laughs]
SB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And that’s about it.
SB: Right. And then, then your sort of industry test flying started after that I assume did it? When did you leave the Air Force?
JL: When I finished the ETPS course I was, I was posted back to Boscombe Down to B Squadron and then I got an offer to go to be [pause] I forget the word now. I’m very sorry but I’m —
SB: That’s alright.
JL: Attached to Boulton Paul.
SB: Oh right.
JL: What’s the word?
SB: Seconded?
JL: Seconded. Thank you. And I was, I had the chief test pilot was Cyril Feather and I met him and he said, ‘I’m retiring and the other pilot is leaving. There will just be you so when you’ve, when you’re demobbed you could stay on.’
SB: Yeah.
JL: Well, when I got there the other pilot, a chap called Lindsay Neale was still there and he didn’t know I was coming.
SB: Ah. Ok.
JL: Which was a strange, rather a strange beginning. But anyway as it transpired there was very little to do and I got fed up with that so I went to the ETPS and I suppose at the end of, the end of a four Course dinner at Cranfield this time and I think it was a group captain [unclear] the CO asked me how I was getting on. I said I wasn’t very happy. He said, ‘Well, [unclear] are looking for somebody. How about that?’ So I said, ‘Thank you.’ And I went down there and joined them.
SB: That was the SRA1 I guess, was it?
JL: Yes, but I was with Geoffrey Tyson.
SB: Yes.
JL: I respected Geoffrey Tyson but I’m afraid we didn’t get on very well. We were very different characters and I [laughs] I cooked my goose finally because at that time you know the Princess was coming along. A big aircraft and controls of big aircraft was very very much the subject and they were worried about turbulence in big span aircraft. They were having sort of ideas about ailerons that went up and down automatically.
SB: Right.
JL: Sort of relievers. Relieve the stress. And we were, we had a rather pompous managing director. He called himself Captain [Clark]
SB: Right.
JL: The Isle of Wight is full of captains. Royal Navy captains.
SB: Quite.
JL: But, but he was a captain in the Royal Flying Corps.
SB: Oh right.
JL: Which is a flight lieutenant.
SB: Indeed. Yeah.
JL: Yeah. Anyway, he was rather pompous and he would, he would decide who was going to dine there you see. So one day Geoffrey sat there and I sat there and he, he was there and we were talking. We were talking about this gust alleviation they called it.
SB: Right. Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And Geoffrey said, ‘I think a good pilot can anticipate turbulence. Don’t you think so, Jo?’ And I said, ‘No.’ And there was a deathly hush [laughs] and I think from that day my goose was cooked. And so in 1949, January 1949 I went back and joined Armstrong Whitworths.
SB: Yeah.
JL: And I served my, served my apprenticeship.
SB: So —
JL: The chief test pilot there already was Eric Franklin.
SB: Yes.
JL: Who had also been an apprentice there.
SB: Yes.
JL: We knew each other.
SB: Yeah. Yeah. Sure.
JL: So that’s it.
SB: Right. Can we pause here?
JL: Yes.
Collection
Citation
S Bond and J O Lancaster, “Conversation with Jo Lancaster. Part one,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed May 16, 2025, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/49857.
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