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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/335/3498/ASzuwalskaW150910.2.mp3
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Title
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Szuwalska, Wanda
W Szuwalska
Wanda Gawel
Description
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Five items. An oral history interview with Wanda Szuwalska (- 2020, 2793043 Royal Air Force). She travelled to Great Britain from Poland and served as a clerk and a driver with 300 Squadron.
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-09-10
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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
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Szuwalska, W
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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SC: Make sure that that’s — This is now recording. So, I’ll start this by just introducing both of us. We’re conducting this interview for the International Bomber Command Centre Archive. The interviewer is myself, Steve Cooke. The interviewee is Mrs Wanda Szuwalska.
WS: Szuwalska.
SC: Yep. And we are at your home in [redacted] West Bridgford on the 10th of September 2015. Can I ask you then to start wherever you want to, even before the war started and tell us what your memories are of going into the RAF.
WS: Yes. Poland was, until the Occupation, four hundred and twenty-three years and when the first war started, in 1914, which we celebrated in this country, hundred year anniversary of this war. Poland become, in 1920, a free country. And there was a lot of lands left, not used, whilst Poland was under the Occupation because the people did not want [unclear] lands, went out from Poland and live in France. So what happened when Poland became a free country, descendants of those people came back and tried to obtain their land and sell it. And my grandfather with his six brothers and one sister, bought land, a lot of land and divided it before — because all of us. And we built a little village. There were seventeen houses because there was somebody else and we lived at a farm. I’ve been born on the farm. And we’ve been working on the farm. The life was wonderful. School was [unclear], to got to school, [unclear] and happy – we were very, very happy there. And in September 1939. 1st of September. From ‒ suddenly the worries. You see, the communication wasn’t at that time like it is now. Internet, telephones, anything. We had a paper and some had a telephone. And not telephone only, radio which — a little one. Not the sort of thing that you can hear, only, but — The war started. Hitler attacked Poland and completly ruined [unclear] little town. And then, all our army moved from west to east because we had a pact with Russia that they will not invade us. And all the Polish Army went to the East. I shall never forget — seventeen of September 1939, about three o’clock in the morning, we heard a lot of something noise. We woke up. Looked through the window and there was Russian tanks. Going on the road, because we lived very close to the main road there. And we found out that Sovietin, which was Stalin, dictator, invaded, invaded the Poland. Just made the pact with Germany. Invaded Poland. So. All our army was taken by Russia. By the Russian soldiers. And they’d been taking to prison, to Russia, Katyn and there was hundred and — I believe, there was hundred and twenty thousand Polish Army killed in mass grave in Russia. Now. On the 10th of February 1940, suddenly two o’clock at night, knock to the door, Russian soldiers come, and say, ‘You’ve got a half an hour to get ready and we are taking you somewhere that you have better life.’ And there was a sledge outside with the horses and we had to — The officer told us what we have to do and two young soldiers, not more than probably eighteen, nineteen, left in the house to, that we don’t escape, that we —. And I was [unclear] and these two young men told us what to take with us. They knew better that where we’re going that we knew. There was five of us. I was the oldest at sixteen. My youngest brother was only seven or eight. My mother completely lost it. Think she didn’t know what to do, but father kept it calm. So these two young men say, ‘Take the flour. Take some meat what we had preserved. Take blankets.’ Take, you know, everything like that. ‘Warm clothes because you’re going somewhere that’s —.’ If it wasn’t because of them, I don’t know how we will back. Anyhow, they took us to the station and put us in a wagon. A cattle wagon that was separated and eight people into one. Sort of like a platform and another one. And we started — we left our station on the 13th of February and we travelled for about four or six weeks, north, to Russia and we came to Kotlas, River Vychegda, and there, there was Arkhangelsk. Right to the North Sea. And then when we get from the train, we get into the sledges driven by horses and for three days we were going through frozen river and so many people were left in some barrack on the riverside. It was a barrack built and we’d been left in the barrack. In those barracks then, twice as long as my home and my room here. And they had only about half a metre for each person. And there was built, like a platform, so much away from the, from the ground. And we didn’t know why we’d been left so many in each place. But what happened. When they — April — spring came — start coming. All the, all the side of the — there were plenty of woods. They’d been chopping woods and putting them down the river and they were going to a place where they cut them and make the — something of this wood, sort of — So what happened, when the winter came very quickly, some of those big pieces of wood, you know, old trunk, were frozen into the river, so we had to dig them out from the ice because if they move with the ice, they would do a lot of damage to the riverbank. So that’s what we work. We all had to work. I was sixteen, already seventeen because I was born on the 18th of January 1923, so I was already seventeen and I had to work. And when we work, we got one rouble and a pound, one, one kilogram of bread, who works. But only twenty grams when the people, they don’t work. So my father work and I work so that was we could get some bread. And we get a little money to buy some soup. [sighs] The soup usually be made with the dry fish, which you never know what it was. [laughs] But it was very good, very salty and very tasty, so my mother could put more water to it so we could share for everybody else. And we just lived there. We didn’t know what’s happening in the world but we got sometimes some news from the boat that was travelling up and down the river. And of course I was young and flirt with everybody and see the boat and see somebody. We found some news. And then we got news that there are some Polish soldiers in Katowice, into one city. And then I was, well I was the oldest one and I had to do everything because my mother wouldn’t let my father to go in case he disappears or he lost his way, so I was — It doesn’t matter if something happened to me. So I, I went there, with one friend of mine, a young boy, my age, quite clever and we find out that we, that war started between Germany and Russia and officers came a few days later to our barrack and say, ‘You are free. And you can go wherever you are.’ So going the other way, we had a convoy, we had — We be looked after. But then we’d been left there on our own. You’re free. No money. Nothing. Not knowing that at all. We have to make our way. Find out that in south of Russia, Uzbakistan, the Polish army is being formed by General Wladyslaw Anders, and we have to go there because there is a big camp for all the people who came from Siberia down to south. We’d been travelling wherever we could walk. That’s why I see some people on the television now, how we walk, how we got on to some train. How we had to sleep on the station. And you sell everything what we had. Or simply begging for some bread. But I must say that the Russian people themselves, just people on the street, they were very good. They were sympathetic with us. And we travelled thus. So we found out, then, when Hitler advanced on Russia, Stalin wasn’t prepared for it. So he asked Mr Churchill to help. So Mr — Our diplomats here in, in London, the diplomats who escaped from Poland when the war started, said to Mr Churchill, ‘Tell Stalin to release all those Polish people from the prison camp and they’ll be the best fighter for Hitler.’ And Stalin went for it. That’s why we’d been released. Free to join the Polish Army so we can fight. Fight Hitler. Which which Polish Army proved that they could be — That they fight. So we went all this to this, to this, travel. Some people got lost. One lady lost her arm trying to get onto the train. Fell. It was tragic. It was always like you see in the war story. But now it’s better organised I think. And we got — I managed to get to the Army because I was already nearly eighteen. So it was. My youngest brother went to little Cadets, also. And we got into British uniform, and we serve and Russia wanted that we fight from the East together with the Russian. But General Anders was — He was in a Russian prison camp. He knew exactly what the Russia is. So he insisted that we travel to the Middle East, join the British, and American, and we were in a British uniform, because British — Britain gave us uniform and food. So. So we travelled. So of course he managed to get us and we travelled to the Caspian Sea to Pahlavi , to Persia. Which is Iran now. And then from there we travelled to Tehran and there were camps and we prepare, all the drills and things like that to get into the war. Now. I can remember very well, we’d been approaching on the 1st of April, to the Pahlavi, to the Persia, and we’d been so happy singing all hymns and different patriotic song, that, that we are free now. That we’re out of Russia. And somebody — We stood there — Because looking — Getting into the port, and somebody said, ‘Look. What are you singing for? This is the 1st of April. April’s Fool.’ And everybody went so quiet. We were frightened. And maybe it is April Fool. We don’t know where we were approaching. Where we were going. Maybe we were going to another prison or something. And then somebody started laughing, ‘No, no. We are going in the right place but it is April Fool.’ 1st of April 1942.
SC: Three.
WS: No. Two.
SC: Two. That’s fine.
WS: I joined the army in ‘42. And we train. All we do in the Middle East, we train to be prepared. There was different courses of everything and driving for the women and all sorts of special learning. English. Many languages. And in 1943, suddenly appeal came from Royal Air Force to, to our — Everywhere. If anybody would like to join air force because Battle of Britain which absolutely, now as you know, even — Then. So many forces, air force was damaged. So my cousin, who was there in Polish Army, advised me, ‘You go to Britain because there is quicker from England to Poland, than wherever we will be when the war finish.’ And I joined. And I came to England. Straight away I started to learn, language, and of course all advice. I must say this, this is a bit funny but I must say it. We learned, what, that Britain is very intelligent, well-educated country. Industry. Everything like that. You know Britain was always on top of the world. And we’d been told that all the British ladies are slim, tall, sophisticated. Always hair done. And we came from Russia. We ate everything. We’d all been a little bit podgy, you know, so, ‘Don’t eat too much.’ All the time. And you know what? We even got a lipstick, free. In forces, we got a lipstick, so we must use lipstick because that is how this English ladies look like and so we haven’t got to look any different. Okay. We just arrived to, in the port, into Liverpool. Liverpool. Five o’clock in the morning. So we all went ready. All lipstick. All saying, ‘How does English ladies look very, very sophisticated?’ [laughs] And suddenly, you wouldn’t believe it, we saw the normal ladies, going in overalls, having the curlers in the hair and with a bucket and mop, because they were coming to clean the ship, where we arrived to. And we laughed and laughed and laughed because, because that’s what we were told was completely different. [laughs] But it wasn’t different. It was just like normal. We travelled to so many countries, we knew all people that were sophisticated, well-bred, in the yard there were working people. I mean for us, it was normal how the world is. Anyhow, that is by-the-way how it is. And then we came from Liverpool to North Berwick near Edinburgh to be there before they allocate us. Naturally while we’d been staying here and there, always learn English or some typing or whatever. And then we were sending to Wilmslow near Manchester. There was a big camp. That we changed our khaki uniform to blue uniform. And, on several, on some interview, somebody asked me, ‘Why did you wanted to change khaki uniform to blue uniform?’ And I say, ‘Because it’s nicest. Better thing.’ I didn’t mean only because I wanted to be in air force, I was just saying, as a woman that it’s nicer, nicer to wear blue than khaki. And that was a laugh and I got a lot of applause because that interview was with a lot of people. I think it was in Faldingworth. And then after Wilmslow course I was allocated to 300 Bomber Squadron. That was a Polish Squadron. Ziemi Mazowieckiej. And I was there as the Clerk GD, Clerk General Duty. And I work on the flying control but not talking to the planes that they were going away. There was [unclear], a lady who spoke, but my duty was to get information about weather, because on every aerodrome there was a caravan standing there and getting every hour, a weather. Because the planes, the Lancaster were there. The biggest plane. The nicest plane there is, Lancaster. And it was very important. Yes I forgot to mention. Yes. And then you see, because they had to know. Usually, usually six or seven people in that plane. And I usually do General Duty there. Getting the information about the weather. When they came down, then it was take-over by me. ‘You go to dispersal.’ So and so. And what the section was advised to go to their dispersal because after a plane landed, they usually, drivers were going, usually women doing this work. Going to dispersal. Got airmen into car, well it was a little sort of lorry, and took them to the Briefing Room and that was my duty. And I was there serving ‘till the end of the war. Meanwhile my, I met a young man who actually I knew from Poland, and he was trained to be a radio operator on Lancaster, my husband, Jan Gawel. He flew seventeen operational flight, bombing, bombing Germany and two, another — I don’t even know how to say the other place. Well he done nineteen flights altogether. He was — The Gawel family, they all had a heart problem, that is the Gawels got a heart problem. He is a Gawel, yes. And he died very young, just as I say. Not even aged sixty. We got married in Faldingworth in a chapel. The air force chapel. Faldingworth is in Lincolnshire and there is something going on and I will be there in Faldingworth on the 26th of, 26th of this month. I’m going there, I’ve got an invitation to be there. And, I’ve been several times to Faldingworth. That is my station. So, then we had to — Now. We’d been demobbed and also we’d been left almost on our own. And there was no such a lot of organisation like it is now, they help. You can go somewhere. There’s a service centre here, here, here. Nothing. And we were left. So what are you going to do? Where are you going to live? English people were very, very good. When you walk in and say, ‘Have you got a room to let?’ I remember my husband was still flying in Thirsk and we walked to one house and it was a council house. Mr and Mrs Heal and with a son, and we say, ’Have we got a room?’ I had already a little girl, Jadwiga. And she looked at us and you know, I cannot I cannot believe to — Now, they had a two bedroom and one room downstairs and a very big kitchen-diner and they let us to have a bedroom and a room downstairs and they, two of them with the son, lived in that kitchen and the son had put a small sort of, like a settee-bed, so he slept in this kitchen. At that time, it didn’t mean anything to me, but when I think now, how those people was helping us, I just can’t believe — I’ve got quite a big house for me and I live here alone and a lot of people are coming to this country and there is [unclear] to take them, as you know.
SC: Yeah.
WS: Would I do anything like that? You know, it’s terrible how the church — How the world change. Anyhow, then we had to move. So every airman who was de-mobbed, got a suit and a raincoat, something like that for the civil life and fifty pound. Well fifty pound was lots and lots of money, because my husband had three more friends and they all put this fifty pounds together. For two hundred pounds and paid deposit for a house. 120 Blue Bell Hill Road in the district here in Nottingham and they lived — And they all moved. We had a three-bedroomed house. Three bedrooms. So. We lived in a small bedroom with a child and then in one big bedroom, two gentlemen and one attic bedroom, one room. And they lived — And the agreement was, at that time, I’m telling you, accommodation and food for one week was two pound. Two pounds. [laughs] Best we stop and sell up. So they agreed that instead of — They were paying me. Asked one pound a week. And I should, they should live there and I should cook and feed them for one pound and that another pound, a cheaper way. So after a year, they get their fifty pound back. That was all agreed. Well to earn a little bit more money, instead of them taking, the kitchen was very small, there was no washing machine, like it is now. Then they were taking to the laundry, good money to small house like that, and they had the socks to, to darn, so I darned each hole for tuppence and I used to say, ‘I will wash for you. And dry and press.’ And they’d be, instead of paying to the laundry, taking, that’s what I earned the money to keep this going. And that was our life. Then my daughters went to school, I had two daughters, Jadwiga and Alicja, and they went to school in that very poor district and what happened, at that school, they got the lice. You know what the lice are? In their hair and I just couldn’t, I just couldn’t believe it because we had these lice in Russia and everywhere. And that was terrible. So I used to sort of save money as I could. I can cook very well. Not like my sister, like his mother. As, very good. I cook sort of very cheaply and I fed those people, those men. They didn’t mind because two — For whatever we went through, anything was good enough. A little bit better, it was something. And I managed to send them to private school. It was two pound. I think it was two pound a month, two pound a week. I forgot. Something to this private school, because of these lice. I couldn’t bear any more lice, what they went through in Russia, things like that. And, but that is, that is my story. There is nothing more to say because life in England was completely different. We got the job [unclear]. When I wanted the job, somebody advised me, ‘Go to the factory where they make clothes.’ And there was this small factory. A private — And Mr Davis ran this factory and I came to this factory but of course there wasn’t like this you have so much weeks to learn. You had to know. And I said to this manageress who gave me a job, that I can machine. Never never seen an electric machine in my life but I knew how to — [laughs] I knew how to use the lockstitch machine but that was probably with the treadle and things like that. So when I put my foot on this treadle on the electric machine, even if it was moving, I would be miles away [laughs] really, but again, in a factory, the girls was marvellous. They help. You know. Especially when they see there is a foreign girl, they help. In no time, I was earning quite a good money. Piecework. Everything was piecework, which I agree, piecework absolutely. And, at the end of the day, I worked there thirty-three years, so, at the end of the day —
SC: What’s the name of the factory?
WS: Davisella. And it’s still building there, on the, Davisella Ltd. Mr Davis was the owner. That was a small place. We didn’t have more than about two hundred people. And we had all department. We had the design room, samples and machine room, finishing room, dispatch and all this they used. An absolutely marvellous business man, I must say. The only thing is, he didn’t have the private pension scheme and at the beginning I didn’t know why, but then I found out that the private pension scheme run like this, if I declare that I want to put two pound a week for my private pension scheme, the firm had to put the same amount of money and he was such a — He didn’t want to do this private thing because he didn’t want to pay the money. Which of course. I don’t know how else could have done. Anyhow, at the end of this, my career there, I was the factory manager and Head of Production and the funny thing is, we had a manager before me, Mr Fiat. He was well-educated, he was also Jewish. Speak very nice. And the girls on the floor, they understand me better although my English probably weren’t. And I remember Mr Fiat said, ‘Girls, if you’ve got a surplus of shuttles, give them back to Wanda because you should allow, only have six, no more.’ When he spoke, ‘Wanda, what he mean surplus? What does —‘ There were some girls couldn’t — didn’t know what surplus [unclear] ‘If you’ve got too many. If you’ve got more than six.’ ‘Okay.’ They understood me better with my broken English than that man, but that was, that was very funny. You know, I loved, I loved my girls. And I’m still in touch with those girls after we finished work. How many years ago?
Other 1: Twenty.
WS: Yes. And I — On the telephone. And sometimes we meet here. We are trying to meet here again, that I cannot manage very well, so here is my nephew. They can help me, you know, and bring something to give [unclear] or something like that. [laughs]
SC: Right.
WS: So, because I’m not, as you know, I’m ninety-two, be ninety-three in January, so for me it’s a bit difficult, you know, to get running around. I think I have told you everything. At the end of the day.
SC: You’ve certainly taught me a lot. You’re a very, very good communicator.
WS: I don’t know what else to say. That’s all.
SC: Did you go back to Poland very often?
WS: Oh yes. I went to Poland, I — We couldn’t go, we couldn’t go to Poland because Poland wasn’t a free country after the war finished, without an agreement in 1943, Poland was — that was Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin, they sold Poland. Yes. To Stalin. Churchill believed Stalin, whatever Stalin said, he believed Stalin. He never found out what Stalin was anyhow. So, to go back to Poland, you have to take the British Nationality. And, I took it, of course we had to pay for it. I took the British passport and I went to Poland first time with my daughter, it was in 1962, I believe.
Other 1: Two daughters.
WS: Pardon? With my two daughters. 1962. I had some problem on the border. They didn’t like us who lives abroad. They didn’t like us. On the board things. Polish part. And say, ‘Why did you come from, to Poland?’ So I said, ‘I came to show my daughters beautiful country, my part of the country.’ And then I done something, I don’t know what I’ve done wrong. Oh, I went in car and I — We had to buy the vouchers for petrol, and I didn’t know anything about it and I, I run out of the petrol and stood near the petrol where people were very good — they go, brought me some petrol, so I get to Vrotslav. And then I bought a lot of, enough vouchers to last me for this petrol. And when I’m leaving Poland, they stopped me because I had too many vouchers and I say, ‘Oh you wouldn’t believe it.’ I said, ‘Well I — why I’d done it. I cannot take it.’ I say, ‘Well then I will rip it.’ ‘You cannot rip it.’ And I say, ‘What do you do?’ ‘You shouldn’t have them.’ He wrote a — Silly question. And I, I was thinking, ‘What am I going to do with them? How am I going to do it?’ So I just, I remember the bribe, yes, bribe you say. I just had some dollars and as I put some dollars inside this voucher and I say, ‘Well you get rid of it.’ And so he see there are dollars and he took this. And he said something to me. ‘Didn’t your government advise you of everything, that when you go to Poland, how you have to behave, what you have to do? ‘ And I remember, I was so, it was terrible, I was absolutely — I say, ‘You mean my government, no, my, British government, because my government should be here, free government in Poland.’ I don’t know, but they didn’t arrest me because what do they want with the women? I mean they — the men didn’t go to Poland for a long time. They were frightened because one of very good pilot of 303 Squadron, of the Battle of Britain, Skalski, Stanisław Skalski, he is famous. He is everywhere in things like that about this fighter. And he went to Poland for his mother’s funeral and he was arrested and he was kept for six years in prison because he flew here, for the Battle of Britain. Oh there is, there is books about it, I mean he is famous. So, but I was so mad, but they didn’t do anything wrong to women. They didn’t want a woman to keep in the prison. What women are. And that’s what I, going to Poland, to Krynica [?], I’ve got a lot of family in Poland, about, all together about thirty-three people. But I’m forgetting now all the younger, but I’m still in touch with my cousins in Krynica [?] and in Nowy Sącz.
SC: Whereabouts in Poland is that? North?
WS: Krynica, [?] Górska, is in a Polish mountain. Right on the east, er, south of Poland. Krynica [?].
SC: Okay. South-east.
WS: It’s very famous. At the moment something is going on there. And then Nowy Sącz is not very far from there but — and very close, there is a Polish, there is a salt mine in Poland, that is, the salt mine is on the register of UNESCO. Yes, I’m saying right thing?
Other 2: Yes.
WS: I must say this one. Now. One King of Poland married the Hungarian Princess. And her name was Kinga and when she came to Poland, she, she bought to Poland her dowry. Her dowry was, so she took her ring and wrote to the mine and say, ‘I bought you a salt. Dig there and you’ll have a salt.’ And that is the salt which you which you dig and you have got to think, ‘I’ve got even [unclear]’ [speaks in Polish] And salt. And what happened, when my great-granddaughter was born, that I have got four picture there, I have only one great-granddaughter, and when she, when my granddaughter told her husband, he’s German, and my granddaughter is living in Germany, she’s — she said, ‘What name?’ And she was telling her husband this little story about Kinga giving Poland this salt mine, this village [unclear] and my granddaughter’s husband says, ‘Kinga. We name her Kinga.’ And I was over the moon. You know, that he just brought this name from the little — is it a story or, sort of, I don’t know how you call. You know I’m forgetting some. I don’t —
[Wanda speaks with other people]
WS: So, you see that’s a little, again what I’m adding to my life. My life is —
SC: Yes.
WS: So full and I’m working and I’ve got a lot of medals and a lot of things like that, because I work in social, in every organisation, Scouts and whatever it is, you know. Always doing something. Is there anything else? I think I told you everything.
SC: So you’re working in lots of organisations now.
WS: Oh yes, I mean there is — you see, again, we had a lot of organisation. By being taken to Russian prison, coming and being together, service being together. We like to be together. So when we came to the civil life and started, we got all, and we started to have organisation. There was Scouts, there was all the military, there was Polish Air Force Association, there was Combat — you know, Combat Association. There was a lot of — and we’d be always together. But what happened, our children never join us. Now they could be two story. We didn’t encourage our children to opt to join us because we were full of spirit, we are doing everything, but I think we started from nothing and we’d been about twenty-five, thirty, and we manage. Or even forty, sixty. We managed to get together. I don’t know why our children cannot do it. I’m doing everything in my power to sort of say, ‘Join us. Join us. And see what we’re doing.’ But I’m afraid, the life is everybody is very well-off. They can manage to go for a holidays. They can have car, caravans. They can they can go all over the place. Even my grandson, he goes to, first, three weeks to America. We didn’t. We didn’t have any money. So we were happy to be together. We build a Centre. We bought two very good house to share with the [unclear] and we didn’t get any help. We build a church from all our money. And we’ve been very — for instance, I can give you [unclear]. We built the church, and I was earning that time, twenty pound a week. I give hundred pound to build a church. So that was my five weeks’ wages. Can you imagine anybody who earned at least two hundred and fifty pound a week, that is approximate, can you imagine anybody giving one thousand two hundred and fifty pound for any donation. Nobody. They’d rather go for a holiday. You see this is the difference. And nothing can be done about this so we haven’t got any organisation at all. There is only Scouts and Girl Guides, but also not, we had a very, very, very big jamboree about four weeks ago. There was five hundred and forty-seven Scouts and Girl Guides there. And believe me or not, but I was the only one there with this generation.
SC: Gosh.
WS: I managed to get a lady who had the children there and I said, ‘Look, I give you so much money, take me there and bring me back.’ And she did. And it was unforgivable. Unforgivable to see those people, young people there in uniform, marching and things like that. And about a thousand visitors came here, so we had fifteen hundred people in that place, near Northampton. I forgot the place. That was a British Legion place. They rent it us for three weeks for this camp. So I go everywhere. And I’m going to be in Faldingworth next weekend. And then Air Bridge. Saturday Faldingworth, Sunday Air Bridge.
SC: Yep.
WS: In York.
SC: And in October, you’re definitely coming to the —
WS: Yes. At the end of October, we also have a ceremony in York cemetery. There is a Polish war cemetery in York, as you know. And I’m going everywhere, wherever I can. And even if I have to pay, I save somewhere else. But even if I have to pay the full money for somebody to take me there. Sometimes it could be fifty pound.
SC: Yep.
WS: Sometimes they say, ‘I take you for thirty pounds.’
SC: Yeah.
WS: Some say, some more, then I get somebody else or something like that. I have to pay a lot of money. I can’t have a car. They took my car away. They took my licence away. And —
Other 2: Last year.
WS: Pardon?
Other 1: Only last year.
Other 2: Last year. She has —
WS: I mean, went to hospital —
SC: Let’s not go there. Right.
WS: Nothing happened. They told me that my heart condition doesn’t let me to drive and I feel the same. As you know. Am I different since last year?
Other 1: No, but you can’t see it. It’s there, but you can’t see it.
WS: Oh, I, I —
Other 1: It’s an aneurysm.
WS: I, still it’s a year and I still — I cannot. I cannot forget it. I haven’t got a car. Since I had a car, since 1956. And now suddenly I haven’t got a car.
Other 1: It was before ’56.
WS: No I think I bought it —
Other 1: Oh no, no. Pascha was eighteen months. Yes, ’56.
WS: I bought my car in 1956 and I remember it very, very well.
SC: It was when I was born.
Other 1: 375 Consul. Black.
WS: Yes.
Other 1: I remember it well.
WS: Yes. That was my first car.
Other 1: Red seats. Bench seats. Column change. Yeah. I was four. I was five.
WS: I don’t know, but since then, but that was something to have a car over — but since then, I had a Morris 1,000. I had a Mini. I never had —
Other 1: A Morris 1,000 Convertible.
WS: Convertible.
Other 1: They went to Poland in it. Two, three women.
WS: Oh yes.
SC: Wow.
Other 1: In 1963.
WS: The, the, the boot was open and I had some cushions there and my youngest daughter was lying there keeping her legs on my, on our seats. Older daughter was — Oh what have you been doing? And some boys, little boys going on the pavement and we’re going, ‘Daddy. Are they going to build like that in Poland?’ You know, there was something for everyone. [laughs] Alicja was sitting there with her legs up on our seat.
Other 2: You had a Volkswagen.
WS: I also had a Volkswagen. Everybody said Volkswagen is a very good car. I went to Poland in my Convertible. I didn’t think if I went in Mini, I can’t remember.
SC: No.
WS: I go to Poland. And my Convertible, Morris 1,000 Convertible, was alright. Everybody —
Other 1: 558RMU
WS: Yep.
SC: Gosh.
WS: And milkman is coming. Milkman is coming. And say, ‘Have a nice holiday. Where are you going?’ I say, ‘To Poland.’ ‘With this thing? Aren’t you frightened? My goodness.’ I don’t know. We went to Holland and they say, ‘Welcome to Holland. Where are you going to stay?’ ‘We’re going to Poland.’ With this, you know, they called it because it was Morris 1,000 Convertible. And you know, we went there and came back and nothing happened. We were going to Poland in my Volkswagen 1,300. And my, what do you call, [Polish word]?
Other 1: J563011
WS: Oh [speaks in Polish]. So. I managed to get to Poland, to Vrotslav and I say, ‘Can you repair this?’ And they say, ‘Yes.’ But I knew how much it cost because I asked somebody there. But they didn’t charge me. Only about, how they charge Polish people. They charged me the same as I would pay here in England. And I say, ‘Why?’ And I quoted the name of the gentleman who has got the same thing. And he said, ‘Now look. If you went to the hotel and you waste of two days’ holiday and it cost you much more. So if that happened in England, you pay this hundred pounds so you have to pay hundred pounds.’ And they will say, ‘We’re going to work all night to get it ready for you, so tomorrow morning, and you can sleep in our house and tomorrow morning you have a car ready.’ And it was ready. When I came back, even you told me that they’d done a very good job.
Other 1: They re-wound it.
WS: They re-wound it.
Other 1: Completely.
WS: They done a very better job than [unclear]. So you see there’s such a lot, a lot of things. Oh.
Other 1: It — No, you had the Morris 1,000, then you had the grey Mini C567BR8, ‘cause I had it afterwards. Right. Then you had the Volkswagen. Then you had the blue Mini. But I don’t remember the registration.
WS: [laughs] The funny thing is my daughter from Germany say, I say, ‘I’ve got a new car.’ ‘What car?’ I say, ‘Blue. Blue.’ And Jadwiga, again. ‘I want to know what car.’ ‘I told you I’ve got a blue car.’ And she said, ‘Mama. I never believed that you could say silly things.’ And I say, ‘Ah, I got it blue because I wear blue suits.’ I was talking about everything I wear. Always hat. Blue hat, blue car and that’s nice.
Other 1: All she wanted was the name.
WS: She wanted — and I didn’t, I didn’t think it matters, as long as it’s a blue car. [laughs]
SC: Blue. Yes. These, these journeys must have been easy compared to the journey you’d made from Poland that you’d described all the way through to Iran and —
WS: Yes, that was a pleasure journey where I was going. I mean I enjoyed every minute. Even something gone wrong, I never was — I never even worry when something gone wrong. I remember, in East Germany, there was still East Germany, Communist, and my car gone, that was a Volkswagen. And I stopped. ‘You can’t stop here.’ I say, ‘Well I can’t go, I haven’t got — My car doesn’t go. Something wrong.’ And this soldier. German soldier. ‘You can’t stop here.’ And I say, ‘Well what can I do? I just, just had a drink of water and I can’t move.’ So, because I had a rack, roof-rack, yes, because that was not very, not very big thing. So. I was thinking, ‘My goodness. Somebody can come and steal something.’ But no. I had about three or four soldiers round the car. All mad. Standing there and I never been so safe in my life, in East Germany because they thought I may be a spy.
SC: Gosh.
WS: So they guarded me. And that was good for me. I say. [laughs] You know it’s such a — and I never was frightened of anything at all. I don’t know how I got through it. I just don’t know.
SC: You have some inspirational stories and you’re obviously very resilient and resourceful.
WS: I never thought anything can happen to me, you know.
Other 2: I don’t think you do when you’re younger.
SC: No.
Other 2: You don’t have any fear really. As you get older you see things. Dangers.
SC: Yes.
WS: Yes and you know, I don’t know how it’s going now. I don’t think it’s the same. For instance, my nephew. You know, since he was about fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, he knew everything about, about motorbike, Lambretta. How to put it together. How to take all — into the pieces. A lot of round here and I sometimes looked at him and say, ‘How do you know where to put them?’ And he knew everything. You know. He knew better when he was younger than he knows now, I think. [laughs]
SC: Yes.
WS: Wasn’t it like that?
Other 1: [laughs] Yes.
SC: I’ll stop the machine now.
WS: Okay.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
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ASzuwalskaW150910, PSzuwalskaW1510
Title
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Interview with Wanda Szuwalska
Rights
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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.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Type
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Sound
Language
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eng
Format
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00:48:43 audio recording
Creator
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Steve Cooke
Date
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2015-09-10
Description
An account of the resource
Wanda Szuwalska was sixteen years old when Germany invaded Poland. The family was deported to Siberia by the Russian army. They travelled for several weeks to the Arkhangelsk region where Wanda then worked as a logger. When war intensified between Russia and Germany, they were freed and she went to Uzbekistan where General Anders was forming a Polish Army. She joined up and travelled to Pahlavi, Persia, now Iran, and then on to Tehran where she trained in an Army camp. She then joined the Royal Air Force, came to England and was allocated to 300 Squadron where she served as a clerk, directing aircraft on the ground and was a driver. Wanda married Jan Gawel who was also in the Royal Air Force and they had a family. After the war, she worked in a clothing factory in Nottingham. After her husband died, she married again. She is a member of the Polish Air Force Association and has been awarded medals and honours for her involvement in Scouts, Girl Guides and social organisations.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Polskie Siły Powietrzne
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Poland
England--Lincolnshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1939
1940
1942
1943
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cathy Brearley
Carolyn Emery
300 Squadron
dispersal
displaced person
ground personnel
love and romance
RAF Faldingworth
round-up
service vehicle
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/530/8764/PShawSR1604 copy.2.1.jpg
6ef757ed0517a8dee79afa1e17d1d6e6
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/530/8764/AShawS160114.2.mp3
dcd6df4d27938dea630da3984b0221a7
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Shaw, Stanley R
S R Shaw
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Shaw, SR
Description
An account of the resource
37 items. An oral history interview with Stanley Shaw (3002545 Royal Air Force) Photographs, documents and his log book. He served with a Repair and Salvage Unit and attended many crashes. He later served in North Africa and the Middle East.
The collection also contains two photograph albums; one of his RAF service and one of his time in a cycle club.
The collection has been licenced to the IBCC Digital Archive by Stanley Shaw and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-01-14
2016-02-11
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SC: Now that should be recording so we’ll put that just there.
SS: Lovely.
SC: I’ll stand it up if it will stay up. Yeah. So, we’re doing the interview today with Mr Stanley Shaw at your home address — XXXXXX, Derby.
SS: Yes.
SC: I’m Steve Cooke, I’m doing the interview today. Thank you very much for inviting me into your house as well Stanley, to do the interview, I really appreciate it.
SS: Oh, it’s a pleasure. It’s a pleasure. [Peter]
SC: What I wanted to do was start in the early years, and just ask you, were you born and bred in Derby? And, why you wanted to join the RAF and the ATC?
SS: Yes, I was born at a very early age. 1926, not a very good year. There was a general strike on.
SC: Oh yeah.
SS: Churchill sent the troops to kill the miners but we lived in a slum in Derby. Two, two room, two up, two down as we used to call it. No hot, no hot water, no gas. Copper, the dolly pegs and all that caper. And, well there was no fat kids running about in them days I can assure you.
SC: Yes.
SS: Because we lived practically on a diet of bread and, bread and jam, or bread and dripping, whatever was handy. But I was a sickly child and the doctor said, ‘If you can raise him till he’s seven, he might pull through’.
SC: Gosh.
SS: But I was a regular attender at the Temple House Clinic for sunray treatment, instead of going to the seaside. My dad said Skegness was Russian propaganda, no such place. So, I had that and I wore teen glasses for a bit, and an operational twitch, and I succumbed. I was alright at school, loved history, loved history. And as I went on, about, I think I’d be about five or six, Alan Cobham and his Flying Circus came to Derby, and my dad had a bike in them days with a basket on the front, and he used to take me everywhere. And I can remember, well and truly, going to this place, called it Sentry Meadows in Derby, and lo and behold, these ex-1914/18 aircraft — patched up, fabric jobs, Biplanes. The stunts they performed and you could have a trip up for five shillings.
SC: Wow.
SS: The problem was five shillings was a lot of money in those days.
SC: Yeah.
SS: So, there wasn’t much chance of that, and as I went on through the years, I was very interested, very interested in aircraft. Always. That was the days of the Frog Models, you could buy a little one for five shilling in a box, and you used to stick the wings on and increase the revs on the handle, and it didn’t fly very well, but at five bob, good value for five bob. And took the Modern Wonder, that was another magazine at that time. Very, very descriptive on aircraft — the Modern Wonder. And I had an uncle, now, not many people had cars in those days. You were either a doctor or some exquisite person, a businessman, if you had a car and he had a, the old Flying Standard. And I think it was 1937, he took me and my father up to Hucknall, which was the home of the Nottingham, the Nottingham Air Squadron Defence. And they flew, I just forget - Hawker Hinds, Hawker Hind biplanes, all silver and polished. They were beautiful they were. And then, that was in 1937, that’s, that’s when I saw the first Wellington. This black fabric covered job in the corner. A bit secret at that time. And then in 1938, he took me again and, lo and behold, we’d got Battles, and they were the be all and end all. They could beat any fighter and all that, which were a load of twaddle really, but very, very interesting that was. And I said then, in 1938/’39, and I left school, I left school in Easter 1940 because my birthday is on January the 10th, and in those days, if you was born in the new year, you didn’t qualify to leave at Christmas, so I had to go till Easter.
SC: Yeah.
SS: That was a body blow that was. And I left school on the Friday, and I started work on the Monday. No — plenty of jobs around in them days because the war was on, and I worked at a garage. One interesting point, in the garage, when Dunkirk happened, we had a complete battalion of squaddies got straight off the boat from Dunkirk, shipped them up to Spondon village, and they hadn’t got a rifle between them.
SC: Right.
SS: They’d got absolutely nothing. They’d come up here by train I should imagine, and they had their headquarters in Spondon village, and they kept their petrol supply at our garage, and it was brown. No chance of nicking any because it was brown in colour [laughs], and I can remember in those days, the military could acquire any vehicle. Civilian. They just walked up and say, ‘Thank you very much, that’s ours’. And this battalion, the despatch rider was only about five foot tall and he’d got this twin, twin cylinder Matchless 1000.
SC: Right.
SS: Well, he used to bring it down to the garage and we used to fill his tank for him, and then somebody had to kick it started for him because he wasn’t strong enough to kick it. But I remember one morning, I was filling a customer’s car and it was a bit misty, and I heard this roar, and we got, we got an anti-aircraft battery up in the village by this time up, on the rise there, and they’d got a Bofors gun, and I heard this bang, bang, bang. I looked up and there was this German aircraft which is well known, this German aircraft flying, which bombed Royce’s that morning.
SC: Gosh.
SS: He flew all the way down from, came in from Hull, came down here and he bombed. He bombed Royce’s.
SC: Royce’s.
SS: And people say, ‘You didn’t see that did you?’ Well, just one of them things.
SC: Yeah.
SS: You saw it but I know one thing. The traverse of the gun was that low, it was nearly knocking the chimney pots off because as it flew —
SC: Gosh.
SS: It was that low.
SC: Yeah.
SS: That they followed it and of course, the lower it got, the worse the firing got. I saw that, and then also, while I worked at the garage, one day I looked up and there was an aeroplane with black crosses on it. I think it was a Junkers 88 reconnaissance flying, flying over and that was shot down at Lincoln on it’s, on its way back. A Spitfire shot that down. That was, and then Saturday lunchtime. I can remember it was a Saturday lunchtime, when I was fourteen and a half and listening, listening to the — well you did listen to the news, because it was all war, and this chap from the Air Ministry got on and said, ‘We’re going to form a new arm of Air Force’. Pre-training for the Air Force because we’ve lost that many, you know, to Dunkirk and in France, the Battle of France, that we’re short. We need recruits urgently and we want them partially trained.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Which was a good deal for the RAF, it took a lot of weight off them. And I thought, right, and it said apply at your local councillor. Well, a councillor, I knew about councillors in them days but didn’t used to bother. Somebody said, ‘Mr Fred West at Borrowash’, which is where we are, so I jumped on my old Vindec bike, scooters up there, hammers on his door. ‘What do you want?’ I said, ‘I’d like to join the Air Training Corps’. He said, ‘I’ve not had the papers through yet’. I was a bit pre you see, and then I went to the first, I went to the first, well it wasn’t a parade, it was just the lads that were interested and I can remember it as plain as day. We went up to the Wilmot Arms at Borrowash and there was four of us. There was a chap called Austin Shaw that lived in Spondon, he became a pilot later on. There was a lad called George Wood and the lad called Bancroft and myself. We were the first four to get there and out of our four, George Wood was shot down in 1944 on a Lanc, a Lancaster rear gunner, and he was shot down and he’s buried in Bergen Op Zoom, Holland. I’ve never had occasion to go, I’ve been to Holland a couple times, I’d love to go and see because he got married and he had a baby and he never saw the baby. He never saw it. Very tragic. And from the four we blossomed, we blossomed. Everybody in Spondon and surrounding wanted to fly. Oh, they all wanted to fly. And we formed 1117 Squadron, and we got that big, we got that big, we formed four flights — A, B, C and D.
SC: Wow.
SS: Which were Spondon, Territory Hill — Chaddesden, the racecourse and Chester Green. All the four flights. In all, we were well over two hundred cadets.
SC: Gosh.
SS: Well over. And we had a civilian, he was an engineer at the Celanese at the time, and he’d got a big house in Spondon with a big loft. And we had a ground staff, we had aircrew. They were studying navigation and everything appertaining, Morse code and everything, and we were, well I was already an apprentice fitter so they made me a corporal, because I’d got a bit more knowledge than they had. And, yeah, and then came the days of visits to aerodromes. I think I’ve already mentioned about Burnaston, managed to get a flip. We went to Burnaston for a week, week’s camp. Roughed it a little bit as we thought, and they’d got Tiger Moths and Magisters, Miles Magisters, and they were 16 AFTS Flight Training School. And from there we went to better things, we went to Ashbourne Aerodrome for a week, which flew Whitleys and Ansons and Blenheims.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Well we had one officer, Mr Rigby, a rather nice chap, they took him up for a flight. They didn’t tell him where they were going, and when he came back, he told about these little black puffs of smoke behind the aeroplane. ‘Yes. That was flak, sir. We’ve been across to northern France, having a shufty around and come back again’. Didn’t tell him where he was going, joy trip it was. Well, Ansons were the name of the game, because you trained the pilot, navigator, wireless operator, bombardier all in the same aeroplane. So, we used to fly down to North Wales on the Brecon Beacons dropping these white, little white twenty five pounder bombs.
SC: Yeah.
SS: If you hit anything — I don’t think so, not very often. And as I say, then the last camp I went to was a bomber, it was a proper bomber station, at Hixon near Staffordshire. And Wellingtons, that was my first encounter with a Wellington and well, I mean, the ATC were smart. I kid you not they were very smart, and I was the right marker. So, I mean, this is an operational, this is an operational ‘drome with the erks wandering around, with their knives and forks dangling on their belt. Dead scruffy because they’d probably been working all night, caps on at fitter 2 angle, and we were there and we just paraded on the ground [unclear], all these lads used to stand there laughing. Smirking as well. ‘Bloody different when you get in mate’, and we managed to get a trip there. But you see, OTUs are a bit different. Every OTU operation is a little bit different, so the — our officer, he was the last, he was a World War One, First World War pilot and he, he was in charge of us, and he said, ‘I’ve got you a trip’. I thought, well I’m not really bothered really, ‘cause I’m not into flying. ‘I’ve managed to get you a trip’, you see, and it was this Wellington and we went down to the flight. They give you a mask and, you know oxygen bag, helmet and whatnot, parachute, and we got on the truck that was taking the crew out on this test flight. Just come out the hangar. Apparently it had had a new wing fitted, and there was us sitting there, our lads. Two lads sitting there, these hardened types sitting there, they said, ‘Have you got a date tonight?’ I don’t know what — ‘Have you got a date tonight?’ I said, ‘Yeah’. He said, ‘You can scrub around that’, he said, ‘I expect the flaming wings are gonna fall off’. This is just as we were starting trying. I was sitting there, I don’t want nothing to do with this sort of thing, and we went and sat in it, and the lad that I was with, he’d never been up before. We went up and he started throwing it about and we looked out, and there was a Mark I Mustang, and we were on a little bit of aircraft fighter affiliation in which case you were, you know, you were swinging it about a bit. And we came, we finished that, came away from there and then, as I say, I volunteered. I did volunteer, I always meant going in and I was still working at Celanese, Apprentice fitter, which meant I had to break my, I had to break my apprenticeship, and well that was it. I mean I told them, I said, ‘I’ve been in the Air Training Corps all this time’.
SC: Yeah.
SS: ‘I don’t want to miss out’, And — yes, I went from there, and at that time, we’d moved to Spondon. We lived in Spondon and we had six soldiers billeted with us. If you’d got a three-bedroom house —
SC: Right.
SS: And you got one room to spare, you got, you got six squaddies because the British Celanese was a huge depot for armaments, lorries and anything. So all these lads were in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Working down there in civvy billets you see, and how my mum used to feed them six, I do not know.
SC: Yeah.
SS: ‘Cause they used to come in, you know, barely enough to keep them.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And you’d got to find food and rationing and whatnot, queuing, and they were from all over the country. You know, different places they came from, different accents and of course, I was about seventeen, yeah, seventeen and a half, seventeen and three quarter. And I got my, I got my papers on the day before Christmas day, and they were all, you know, ‘You’ll be alright’, kind of thing. And yes, I was eighteen. I was eighteen on the one day and I went in the next.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Went in the next. Dad took me down to the station and well, I was, you see, it wasn’t as if you had just been plucked out of civvy street like a lot of, a lot of lads were.
SC: Yeah.
SS: I mean these lads that were conscripted, they didn’t have the, they didn’t have the luxury of being pre-trained.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Now, when you, when you, as soon as you got on to Cardington, which was a recruiting centre which did all the training and everything, you was half qualified you know.
SC: Yeah
SS: I mean, the RAF, you know. Thank God somebody knows what they’re doing.
SC: Yeah.
SS: But the Air Training Corps were prefixed with the numbers 300, so they just looked at your number and, 3002545, they knew straight away you were ex, ex-Training Corps and I was pretty fit, I was pretty fit in them days. And on the second day, no, the second week we were there, we got this contingent, a contingent of West Indians come, the black lads from West Indies, and January was cold.
SC: Right.
SS: I can assure you, it was cold and they had a cross-country run. A cross country run. Starting out, I think there was a hundred and forty four altogether, we were all in flights, sections, you know. I think there was about nine flights altogether with about, what? Thirty lads in each. And you’d got an drill instructor, corporal and a sergeant, and they had this cross country. Everybody had got to be in it, it didn’t matter if you could run or not. And there were, there’s two big hangars at Cardington where they used to store the airships, R101, two big hangars, and there was a narrow gap, like a road, down there. Well it was a cross country, so I set off amongst the pack. Saw these big athletic West Indian lads, I don’t stand a cat in hell’s chance here, and I was running along and saw this chap with “Polytechnic Harriers” written on it. I thought that looks a bit interesting, he’ll be the right lad to follow.
SC: Yeah.
SS: So I get behind and as we ran through these hangars, there was a bit of a wind blowing, so luckily I was, I’ve tucked in behind and then when we got outside — about two hundred yards — that was the finishing line. So he’d had it when he got to the end of the road and I chuffed in and managed to get first. And this officer type came across — he give me, what was it? He gave me a thirty-shilling postal order.
SC: Wow.
SS: And gave me a leave, a leave pass for the weekend. Never been done before, you see because I mean until you could march and look decent, they didn’t let you out of Cardington.
SC: Yeah.
SS: You know, and I went home. And these soldiers, ‘What are you doing home then? Have they kicked you out already?’ I said, ‘No’.
SC: For coming first
SS: And when I got back again of course, it was steam trains then, you know, and always full.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Always. Derby station. And always this smoke used to hang about, acrid smoke there was. If you went through a tunnel, made sure all the windows were shut.
SC: Yeah.
SS: It used to puther in, and you’re like a —
SC: Yeah.
SS: And you come out the other side. And when I got back, they were all lying in their bunks moaning and whatnot, and I said, ‘What’s up?’ ‘We’ve had the inoculations today. Oh you know, we’ve had jabs and this, that and the other’, and I thought, well I’ve not had it. They said, ‘No, but you’ll get it tomorrow though’. Yeah, I enjoyed that cross country running, twenty two mile march with half pack and rifle, and the chap that was in charge, a warrant officer, he was sixty-five odd and he marched at the front.
SC: Wow.
SS: He marched at the front and we went out. Had soup, hot soup out of the kitchen, and the jam butty sandwich and we marched eleven miles back. We got just outside Bedford, and he said, ‘Now, you buggers, lift your eyes up. Don’t tell these civilians you’re sagging. Get yourself’, and we did. Looked as if we’d just come up and started the march. But very, very good. Did grenade throwing, rifle, firing the sten, the — what was it? The Browning machine gun. We fired that.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And very, very, very interesting that was. It was to get you fit.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Now the food was rough, I would say, the food was adequate. You got the calories and after six weeks training, if they’d have said, ‘Stanley, run through that brick wall’, I would have done. You’re like, you’re like butcher’s dogs you know.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And then that was all finished you see, and then we got posted for training, so they got me down, they got me down as air frames so, at Halton this was, a beautiful place. It was on the Rothschild estate.
SC: Gosh.
SS: Near Halton.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Buckinghamshire. Nearest village was Wendover which had a Church Army little tea place where you could have a shine and a wad, and we did six, tem weeks intensive, intensive, riggers course.
SC: Yeah.
SS: We did the basic, basic fitting. Now, I’d already been fitting and all this caper.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And they threw a great big piece of steel at you and said, ‘We want you to make something that is square and file it so that fits in there’. Well, I thought, this is going to take weeks this is, so I looked — I had a look around. It was a big workshop and all the machinery was belt driven in them days, a great big grindstone, so I thought — right. So, I sneaks down there with this and of course, if you press down hard enough, you get a great big shower of sparks.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And have you ever had that notice, feeling, that somebody is standing behind watching you? So, I thought, and it was a sergeant. ‘Oh’, he said, ‘Hello. What are you doing then?’ I said, ‘I’m fetching, I’m fetching some of this metal’, I said, ‘There’s a heck of a lot to file off’. He said, ‘That’s the idea’, he said, ‘You’ll use a hacksaw and then you’ll file it into shape. No — no grinding mate. Here’s another piece of metal’. Bigger than that one [laughs], but we did rigging. Very interesting that was, rigging, but you see, we didn’t rig the Tiger Moth, which is a biplane, which we spent two days with the dihedral boards, angles — this kind of — all the measurements and we couldn’t — it was a degree out. Couldn’t possibly get it, couldn’t possibly get the dihedral on the wings and we told the instructor, ‘We’ve tried everything’. ‘Well’, he said, ‘You won’t’, he said. ‘That’s why Brooklands Flying Club threw it out. It was no good’. They didn’t tell you that before you started. And we went out on the grass airfield, we swung the propeller, that was an art. That was a Tiger Moth and you had to swing a propeller, and then they got a clapped-out Spitfire, and the idea was that the engine people, we were divided, airframes and engines, the engine people used to sit in the cockpit and the airframe bods used to lean across the tail plane at the back. Of course when you revved the Spitfire, the natural tendency was to tip up on its nose.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Or belt across the airfield — so — off the brake. So, we all lodged, lodged on the, on the, across the tail to hold the tail down, so if your cap blew off, which it did mostly, about three fields away before you found it. But that was very interesting. And one incident, it was midsummer and we’re talking 1944 now, and no water on the camp, run out of water so they sent us home, sent us home for a week but just before we went, the Americans were here by this time.
SC: Right.
SS: And the air was full of Forts and Liberators, and this Fort come steaming around, of course, we’d only got a grass airfield at Halton, come steaming around and lowered his undercarriage. By the way, already on the camp was two hundred WAAFs. By this name of the game, the girls were coming in and taking, and taking the place of the blokes, doing the same job, mechanics.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And of course, they trained in one part, we trained in the other. And this Fort landed and the doors opened and these lads fell out, with all their fur lined clobber and the you know, Mae Wests, yellow Mae Wests and smoking cigars. Of course, these girls descended on them [laughs], I think they survived to go, to take off again. They said they’d lost their way, they’d lost their way. And yeah, we came back off leave, and then it was posting time then. Then you were fully trained, or thought you were, and then life began in earnest then, life really began. And we formed up outside for the postings and, ‘You go there’. ‘You go there’. ‘You go there’. Oh, by the way does anyone, anyone here like to volunteer for flight engineers. Well, at this time the chop rate was very, very high, in some cases you were probably losing two out of four, you know, which was bad really. So, air crew, they was at a premium. They weren’t training them fast enough but they got these lads overseas in Canada and south, so they were beginning to filter through, but until then the flight engineer’s course, it was different of course. When they took the four engine bombers over, they did away with the second pilot. They had to look after the four engines, they had the flight engineer who used to look after a;; the fuel and the revs and all that caper, and the workings of the aircraft, and they were the second, more or less the second dickie.
SC: Yeah.
SS: I think they were trained how to fly straight and level, not to land it.
SC: No.
SS: Not to land the thing, but, ‘Any volunteers?’ And if there was, you got a white flash on your cap, you know, that was for going on to aircrew, and this chap came up and he said, ‘Right’, he said, ‘Salvage’. I said, ‘Eh?’ He said, ‘Salvage’. I said, ‘Have I spent flaming all this time training in all this and I’m going on salvage?’ He said, ‘Not the salvage you mean’, he said, ‘You’ll be posted to 54 Maintenance, Repair And Salvage Unit, at Cambridge’, he said, ‘On Trumpington Road’. He said, ‘That is where all the stuff is kept. The slings and the cranes and the low loaders. All the tools appertaining’, he says, ‘and you will all be part of a salvage party’, which, there was nine, there was nine salvage parties and it were your job that if any aircraft crashes, whether it American, Free French, RAF, anything — you will go out and you will bring it back. If it’s a CatE1, that’ll be a sweep up, you’ll just take your dustpan out and your brush and that’ll be it. It’s completely scrap.
SC: Gosh.
SS: Or you catch a CatB. Now a CatB has belly flopped or he’s had a slight landing accident, and it was stripped down carefully, quickly but carefully. And that, in the case of the Lancaster, which was seven low loaders, Queen Mary’s, which was stripped it off in to different parts. All the engines came out on one loader, the wings, the tail, the fins and everything. And then the wings, they took the wings off and they were leant on sideways. So, and some were wide loads, you know, I mean there was no danger of [laughs], they just went through a town and demolished everything that was on the sides. And yes it was quite, quite an interesting job and we got, we were billeted in Jesus College, Cambridge.
SC: Gosh.
SS: Among the graduates you see.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And the pokey hole. I don’t know, no wonder them graduates used to hang themselves, you know. You used to go up these little winding stairs, all the paintwork was dark green wood or dark brown and we got four metal beds and three biscuits and a couple of blankets, and of course, next door to the camp, and if you hadn’t got a bicycle, everybody got a bicycle but if you hadn’t got a mortar board and a gown, they didn’t take much different but we used to dine in the great dining hall.
SC: Wow.
SS: And we had three long tables and then one across the top. The one on the top, the professors and top people sat, and just here, we had the officers and the warrant officers for our lot, and then we had the bods in the middle. And then on this one we had the undergrads. And we had our own, own mess, cookery, the WAAFs. We had some lovely meals. The other lads going to theirs, coming back with a half a tomato and a lettuce and you know, we were fed pretty well, and we were there for quite a time and then we went to Newmarket. Now, Newmarket was a grass ‘drome and it was on the, on the racecourse itself.
SC: Right.
SS: And — but whilst we were at Cambridge, I’ll start there, while we was at Cambridge, I think nearly every week we had a crash, every week. It didn’t matter where they landed, where they landed. If they landed in water, trees, open land — and just give you a couple of incidents, I can’t give you them all because I can remember them all, but you’ll be here ‘til [laughs]. The first one we went to was a Lancaster at a place called Mepal. Now, that was a Bomber Command station, and we went up there and that was the first one I’d been on, and there was a little lad — he was called an ACHGD. That means Aircraft Hand General Duties. So, they put him with us to keep him out the road I think, and this sergeant, a Sergeant Donovan, he was brilliant on the makeup, the weight-up of the human body to counterbalance, he was very good sticking bods up to balance the thing up, if we hadn’t got the right tackle. And this Lanc was in the hangar, so we were fetching the nose section off and we got the slings, what we thought were the proper ones, and when we lifted it, it was slightly nose heavy, which means we couldn’t lower it down on to the low loader in the right position. So, we said to this little lad, ‘Climb up there and sit in the end there to balance it’. Well, the next thing, it dipped and this lad fell out, bust his arm, and the sergeant said, very sympathetic, he said, ‘Get off up to the sick station, sick quarters’, and this little lad went up and he said he just nose-dived in a Halifax, and they said, ‘Well where was this?’ He said, ‘Well, in the hangar —‘ and of course it wasn’t a Halifax, it was a Lancaster.
SC: A Lancaster.
SS: But he didn’t go out with us again because he’d broken his arm, but that was one of the easy ones, but then you started on the really bad ones. We went to a place called Chedburgh, which is quite near Newmarket. That was a, that was a Heavy Conversion Unit using the four engine Stirling bomber which the pilot was twenty two foot of the ground before you, before you took off or anything. Of course, the angle and the wing, it had a huge undercarriage and what they’d done to get it in the hangar which was, the wingspan was too long to get it in the hangar, they’d taken some off the wings which made it. If you got up to seventeen thousand foot in a Stirling, you was very lucky. Very, very lucky, they’d no altitude at all, and we went, we went on this one and he said, ‘There’s a Stirling. It’s still on the runway with a canopy missing, and then there’s another one just to the side that’s crashed.. So, we went, we went up to this place, Chedburgh, and there was the Stirling, sitting on the end of runway, still on its legs and the canopy had gone. What had happened, it was standing on the runway waiting to take off, the other Stirling — it was night — the other Stirling was coming on and I don’t know what happened, but one of his undercarriage wheels, which was huge, huge tyre, had struck the top of the canopy, knocked it off. And the pilot who was sitting up there he was, he was on the dashboard. He was a goner. He was on the board, what was left of him.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And it were hot, It was quite warm and of course, the first thing they did was climbed up in to the cockpit. You got that for a start. I was only eighteen at the time so, you know, it was just a little bit unnerving, and we got that and then we had to strip the other Stirling down, but they towed that one into a hangar, stuck a new canopy on it and that was ready for off again.
SC: Gosh.
SS: The worst one we did was a Liberator, this was in 1945, a Liberator. In those days, in 1945, Norfolk, Suffolk and all the eastern counties, the ground and the air throbbed because you’d got a thousand American four engine bombers climbing out, because they’d got to get altitude and they had these special planes called Judas. They called them Judas because they went back to the ‘drome, the other ones didn’t. It had all coloured in stripes and balls and flash colours and they used to fly alongside the other aircraft, firing verey cartridges like a shepherd and his sheep, getting them all into form because they’d all got to be stacked in the correct formation, which was better to defend their selves before they set out. And you could just imagine these going around and around, the air was alive.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And we got this message. We went to Ely, just outside Ely. We took a road from Ely to Downham Market, the main road, a place called Black Horse Fen. Well in the fen district, the soil, you could thrust your arm and up to your elbow — it was black, beautiful black soil, right for agriculture, and we went to pick up a Liberator and the first thing — when we got there, it was still smoking. Still smoke coming out of it and dogs running about, that was a bad sign. And here was the back end, the fin and rudder and the rear turret and the two waist gunners.
SC: Yeah.
SS: It had gone like that. It had blown up at sixteen thousand foot with the one — I don’t, they don’t know what happened, but I think American crews tended to get, have a fag you know.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And the Liberator, as soon as you climbed, you could smell hundred octane petrol and this thing, this thing had blown up with a full bomb load on board.
SC: Gosh.
SS: And it had spread about three miles. You’d got this tail end here with the two waist gunners in, you’d got like a depression in the ground, that was where one of them had got blown out and his chute hadn’t opened so that was how he landed. The nose section — there was five in there, that had really gone in. That’s what was burning and nothing smells worse than a burning aircraft. The wing was missing. The four engines — they might, you might have placed them like that, in four, and the bombs were underneath the engines.
SC: Wow.
SS: So, they called the bomb disposal squad, they came out, they said, ‘Well we couldn’t actually get the bombs until you get the engines out’. So, oh. Well in them days, you didn’t have the, we had cranes, the Coles crane, and then there was one with a long, long gib what — didn’t use, didn’t use that so very often. But if the ground was soft, you was bogged down pretty well and had to use the steel mattings, and of course, you had to get the engines up first. ‘Don’t touch that’ [laughs] ‘Be careful lad’, [laughs]. And we didn’t get the nose out at all, we just filled it back in because I mean, it was sitting there and what looked like a flying suit, pulled this arm, arm you see, so we just covered it in. But the farmers were, and the Air Ministry were very, very careful about the ammunition, because Americans used a .5 which is rather bigger than a 303.
SC: Yeah.
SS: I mean the 303s were like peashooters, and these .5s, they’d huge belts with them. I mean some of the Fortresses carried thirteen guns, thirteen .5s. That is a lot of ammunition. Well, I don’t think the Liberator carried quite as much as that, but you see, when an aircraft crashed, everything went all ways and it was nothing for a farmer with his tractor —
SC: Yeah.
SS: To run over a belt of .5s and frighten himself to death.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Of course, there used to, used to be explosive. What’s them? Tracer bullets and all the lot. So, you made sure that it was pretty clear and for some reason, there’s a farmer. He said, ‘There’s a wing’, there’s a wing gone in his farmyard, so, we thought, well it must be this one. Well the Liberator’s a Davis wing, which is about a hundred and four wing span I think, very, very thin camber, not as good as a Fortress in formation because they tend to wander around a little bit. But we went there and he said, ‘Since this thing crashed’, he says, ‘My fowls have stopped laying’, he said, ‘No eggs and they’ve stopped laying’. So, we thought, ‘Oh it must have been the shock so’, and he said, ‘I’ve got a wireless set as well’. So, we thought — wireless set, good, we’ve got one for the truck. We haven’t got one for the truck and he brings it out and it’s a big yellow box like that, with a handle on it and he said, ‘And you might as well have this as well’. It was like a big cardboard tube, and it was a emergency transmitter. When they landed in a dinghy, they used to crank the handle and they needed a kite with the aerial on in this to — there was a great big aluminium and silk kite. Six foot.
SC: Wow.
SS: So, moi had that, I had that - a trophy. And of course, this thing was no good, it could only send out a signal. That’s all.
SC: Ah.
SS: And anyway, with the [unclear] crane with the big jib, we got to, we managed to get it out into the yard and the wing, unless you’ve got the correct lifting tackle it balanced, but if there’s some knocked off the end, it unbalanced it. Well, as we lifted this wing, the flaps lowered and we was knee deep in eggs. These fowls had got inside the flaps laying their eggs, they’d not gone under the hedge, and it was caps and what’s the name, jackets at the ready. I think we lived on eggs for a month after that. But you see that, that was one of the lighter sides and one of the dead sides. Went to a place just outside Cambridge called Bourn, Bourn, that was a PFF station, Pathfinder unit, Mosquitoes, and they called us out to this one. They said, ‘It’s crashed in a field adjacent to the airfield’. So, we buggered off there, on the way up there, we gazed at the side of the road and there was a Catalina. Now a Catalina, in anybody’s language, is a flying boat.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Well I don’t know what had had happened to this thing, but it was perched up on the grass there, on a bit of a hill, so of course we had to stop and have a look at it, see what was happening. And then we went on to Bourn and went into this field, and there was two big gouges right up the field, right up the field, like two big [unclear], and as you walked up —one engine, half a wing, another engine, well, bits practically until we got to the end, and there was the cockpit and there was the cockpit floor. No canopy. The control column. That was it. You wouldn’t stand a dog’s chance in that. No way. And of course, partial amount of balsawood, the Mosquito. All the bomb bay — it was balsa planks. Ideal if you were an aero modeller, beautiful, but the rest were plywood, you see, and spruce, and we thought, right. Well we started work and looked down the field, and this couple, one holding on to the other’s shoulders come crawling up and jeez, that was the crew, that was the crew, and they’d belly flopped it and ran it. And the reason the navigator had jiggered his ankle - couldn’t get out what was left of the cockpit fast enough and he’d jiggered his ankle up. But —
SC: But they’d survived.
SS: That was them, that was them. Oh dear. You know, some, some were lucky, some were not. We went, we were called out to Tempsford. Now Tempsford is near Duxford, and it was a squadron for special duties, dropping spies and arms to the, you know, the Maquis and whatnot. They had numerous kind of aircraft. They’d Hudsons, Stirlings, they operated Halifaxes and — a real special job. Nobody said anything about Tempsford. And one of their aircraft had crashed. The tail had broke off and the tail, the fin and the rudder — where the entrance door was, looked as if the ring of rivets around there had sheared off, so the tail and the turret had fallen into a school playground.
SC: Oh gosh.
SS: With the, of course, the rear gunner was still in it, and then the other thing was a right mess, it was a right mess, and it crashed into somebody’s garden and the family that lived there, they’d lost their son over Germany a couple of weeks before, so they, they got it on their doorstep. But that were, some, but I want to finish up on a lighter note, a lighter note. New Year’s Day. I can remember it, the day before New Year’s Day 1944/45, we were sitting and it was cold, and it had snowed, the weather was a bit naughty, and they came in. We were squatting around the stove and they said, ‘There’s a Mitchell at Swanton Morley they want stripped for spares’. Lovely. So off we go, pile all the stuff in the wagon, off to Swanton Morley. Not a long run from Newmarket and we gets there, signed in at the station. We’ve come for so and so — that’s the number of the aircraft. It’s over there. Anyway, we gets over there and it’s on the airfield, and this thing — it glinted. It was sun, it was bright snow, piled high on either side and this aircraft glinting in the sun. You needed sunglasses to get near it. Is it? Is it? That’s the number.
SC: Yeah.
SS: That’s the number. ‘Right lads. Axes out, shear the brake line’. Out of the blue, this little jeep come howling around the peri track at four thousand mile an hour, like this. ‘Whoa. Whoa’, and this officer got out. He said, ‘This aircraft is flying on operations in thirty minutes time’, and our sergeant looked at him. He said, ‘This aircraft will never fly again’ [laughs]. So, they’d got the wrong number. Their fault, not ours.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And they said, our sergeant said, ‘Well where’s ours then?’ He said, ‘Well down this slope, in to the hangar’, and in the early days, the Americans used to paint their aircraft olive green, and this one had got a 75 millimetre canon stuffed up the nose and the big rack to put the shells in, because they used to go ship busting from there, used to fly low level and these 75 mill — the shell would go straight through a ship.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And that was its job. And there it was, all forlorn, battle weary, like this. And, well, we had to get this thing off the airfield, down this slope, into the hangar. Well, there was about three foot of snow on either side and the slope down was like a ski run.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Just like [unclear] like this, ice, so, we thought how are we going to do this. Well of course the brakes had gone, we’d had to chop the brake lines, so, how are we going to do? Well, it was a three wheeler, no steering job. Well there was a hole through the wheel, I thought, well if we get a crowbar and stick through that hole, we should be able to steer it and get the party truck with two ropes around, and they said, ‘We’ll do it that way’. We tried towing it down first and that didn’t work very well, so they said, right, we’ll put the truck behind and we’ll go slowly and let it go, and it didn’t work, and I was on the front, on the crowbar and I thought, and I looked and this wheel, and we’d lost all control and it just swung around and lodged itself on the top of the snowdrift. But I mean it was a laugh that was, a sheer laugh, but I’ll never forget that officer’s face when he said, ‘It’ll never fly again’. And well that was, and then the war came to pretty near the end and they said, ‘Right. What we’re going to do— we’re going up to Brize Norton. All the German aircraft are up there that we captured — and they’re going to take them down to Hyde Park, London. There’s also a Lancaster at Kemble near Gloucester and this Lancaster has got to be stripped down. You use the low loaders and you’re going to take it to Hyde Park and assemble it. Take it from Hyde park to Chelmsford. Colchester’. Army, a hundred percent Army. ‘And put it up in a kid’s playground and then you’re going to take it to Chelmsford’. This is to show the public —
SC: Yeah.
SS: What did the damage. Now, the aircraft were complete, what they were at Kemble, I’ve got a picture. They lined up, they’d flown from Manchester. Built, built on contract, finished off, short hop to Kemble.
SC: Yeah.
SS: For scrap.
SC: Yeah.
SS: All that much money. So, they selected this aircraft, I’ve got a picture of it there, and took it down to Hyde Park, and we stayed at the Grand Central Hotel. It was a transit camp, bare boards, four steel beds and three biscuits and a blanket. That was it. And we put this aircraft up along with the Messerschmitt 109. I’ve actually sat in a Heinkel 163 rocket plane.
SC: Gosh.
SS: The Arado. Tell my lads, I tell my lads and, ‘You were a lucky bugger you are’, and I said, ‘Well you were just there at the time’.
SC: Yeah
SS: And we were assembling this Lancaster, and this chap came up and he said, ‘Are you alright lads?’ We said, ‘Yes’, and he said, ‘What do you do for entertainment?’ ‘Course, RAF weren’t paid, ground crew, they weren’t paid. I mean two pound , what was it? Two pound a fortnight, you know, you couldn’t make headway with that and he said, he said, ‘Would you — would you care for two tickets?’ He said, ‘The Marble Arch Pavilion’, he said, ‘Showing Henry V. The premier of Henry V’. He said, ‘Would you like to go along this afternoon. Free ice cream when you got there’, and that was nice.
SC: That’s —
SS: He just came and said, ‘Would you like to go?’
SC: Yeah.
SS: So we saw Henry V.
SC: Wow.
SS: And that — that was smashing. Now, we took it to Colchester, Army, and we had our meals at the Army barracks. We were the only, they left two of us behind to look, and of course, being keen on aircraft, we showed hundreds of visitors through, you know. Letting them, letting the kids sit in the gun turrets and explained everything to them, and we used to go for meals and the cooks used to sit, you know, in the morning.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Used to go for breakfast, and we had these great big trays of bacon that had been soaking for about an hour, you know. ‘Help yourself lads’. Oh, it was Shangri La that was.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Shangri La. And then we took it to — from Colchester, this kiddies playground. It had got about a twelve foot fence all the way around, and this little old lady came up, she said, ‘He must have been a very clever pilot’. We said, ‘Well, why’s that?’ ‘To land it in here’. We were just putting it together, and then we went to Chelmsford and we were putting it up on some waste ground outside a pub. Ideal. Ideal. We’d just got it there a couple of days and this low loader pulled in from Newmarket, he said, ‘What’s your last three’. I said, ‘545’. ‘Right’, he said, ‘They want you back at Newmarket. You’ve been posted’. Oh very nice indeed. So, I went back and give me leave, and I went to Heaton Park, Manchester. Cold again, freezing, January. December this one, it was freezing. Everywhere was froze up, there was no water, this was on the camp, no water, and we lived in Nissen huts. There was no thermal, nothing, just got a, just got a stove in the middle with a pipe up and we couldn’t burn coal because there was no coal to burn. The coal was outside behind a barbed wire fence and we were guarding it, guarding the coal, couldn’t use it. To stop the civilians from pinching it. And came home on leave and went back again and we were posted Medlock, the Medlock route to Egypt, Medlock. That means across France by locomotive.
SC: Ah.
SS: Yes, so, 4 o’clock in the morning, we caught a train from Manchester down to Newhaven, we spent the night at Newhaven. We caught the tide the next morning, early tide, on the Empire Daffodil which was a paddle steamer which had taken part in the Dunkirk evacuation.
SC: Wow.
SS: Across to Dunkirk — Dieppe. Dieppe had had a rough time and we went to this transit camp that had got duck boards over the mud to stop you from dropping off and disappearing. Got these French ladies with the fur coats and whatnot dishing out the food, another bloke giving you French currency and you were going across France in thirty six hours from Dieppe, from Dieppe via Paris. On the outskirts, French rolling stock. The RAF had used it as a target for nearly four years.
SC: Yeah.
SS: There was holes in it. I think it was air conditioned, they call it air conditioning. Steam engine locomotive and we went from Dieppe, Bram, Neuvy-Pailloux, Limoges, and the scenery. I mean it was early morning, it was January, early morning, beautiful, and I remember there was no corridor on the train, no corridor. They were all departments, eight bods in a compartment, wooden seats, and the only place to sleep — you know the racks you used to have with the nets.
SC: Oh yeah. I know. Yeah.
SS: We took it in turns to have a kip in there, couldn’t sleep on wooden seats. And they said, ‘You’ll have a hot meal at Bram’. Oh, we thought, well so, we got off. I think we had a jam buttie. Got back on the train, didn’t get no hot meal, unless well, how are they going to do it or are they going to go along the roof and tip it through the top. Never got a hot meal. Landed at Toulon. Southern France. Thirty six hours it took, right the way through France, and the first thing we saw in the harbour was the French pride — The Richelieu battleship with the two guns poked out the water. Scuttled.
SC: Gosh.
SS: That was it. Two ladies in bikinis, ‘cause it was on the Riviera, you see. Two ladies from the Salvation Army with buns and a cuppa. Salvation Army, I always give to them, they’re the — anywhere — they’re there. Then we thought — right, a bit of a rest now. No, ‘Your ship is out there.’ The SS Orbita, the SS Orbita, so, we went across there and they give you a ticket. You got your kit bag and all your belongings and you started going down and down and down. EC two deck. EC two deck. Where’s that? Two decks lower than the rats [laughs]. Three days across to, across to Portshead through Corsica, Sardinia and then through the straits between Sicily and Italy. The Palermo. Well the Luftwaffe had bombed the hell out of us from that base.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Down to the happy land of egg white. Egypt.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Transit camp for fourteen days at Kasfareet. We travelled from Portshead down to Kasfareet on the Canal Zone by Egyptian State Railway with wooden shutters, no glass, wooden shutters, and we said, ‘Well, what have you got wooden shutters for?’ Well, you’ll see. Well the first native village we passed we were bombarded with brick ends stands. They didn’t like us then you know.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Welcome back filthy British and we stayed at the transit camp at Kasfareet and then back up to Portshead, and caught the SS Cape Town Castle. Oh luxury, luxury. They had a band on board. They’d got all these blokes going back to India, they’d been to Blighty on leave and they were going back. All brown, all nut brown. There was us, Khaki drill. Just left you two inches white to get a tan. Red eagles. And we got on there. And on the Orbita we’d had hammocks, forty four to a mess deck and they were that close, when you turned over everybody like sardines. Like that.
SC: Yeah.
SS: The trouble was if you didn’t know how to tie a knot during the night, many a crash where the bloody hammock had collapsed and bods was on the floor. This was lowered down, you know, lowered down. Very nice, but we was only on it for three days down the Red Sea and I think they must have taken wind that, ‘Where are you going lad?’ ‘Aden’. They took great pity on us, great pity, and we landed at Aden and it was about a hundred, over a hundred degrees. The humidity, shocking, and we all piled there on the quayside with our bags and it was amazing. The water. They used to bring fresh water up you know, and these Arabs would sell you anything.
SC: Yeah.
SS: They would sell you anything, and one came up and they also have a good shufty around, to see if anybody of any importance, ‘Would you like to buy a diamond?’ And they’d bring this diamond out. You’ve never seen anything like it, stolen from Farouk’s palace last night. And you’d say, ‘Does it cut glass?’ and it had a porthole, it had a porthole [unclear], It hadn’t cut anything like this, but they’d sell you anything. The finest, the finest salesmen in the world, Arabs. We got on the quayside, boiling, sweltering, this chap came out, a warrant officer. Oh dear, he looked as if he’d just fell out of a [unclear] window. The creases in his trousers, beautiful. Nut brown, bright blue eyes. Been in Aden about two years. Dark, he was mahogany, got desert boots on. They weren’t issued, you know, they weren’t, desert boots were never issued but I think you could wear, if you were officers, you could wear them. He said, ‘Right, chaps. You’re now in Aden. British protectorate of the colony’, he said, ‘And as you know. Ladies.’ He said, ‘Well Khormaksar’, he said, ‘Is the RAF’s camp’, he said, ‘Just outside — a couple of miles’, he said, ‘There’s a native village and’, he said, ‘And there are girls in there’, he said, ‘Well, it’s completely out of bounds’. He said, ‘That place has been shut since Lady Astor, Lady Astor’s daughter had problems with somebody and she shut it’. Oh. He said , ‘And in any case’, he said, ‘The girls here’, he says, ‘They’ve all got disease’, he said, ‘There’s eighty percent, eighty percent got gonorrhoea’. Oh. He said, ‘And there’s fifteen percent got syphilis’. The lad’s said five percent, that’s five percent, and he said, ‘The other five percent have got both’, [laughs] so that was it.
SC: Yeah.
SS: That was it as regards and if you wanted a monk’s existence that was, that was the place but from there we settled in.
[Phone ringing]
SS: There’s your phone.
SC: Oh sorry. Let me just turn that off.
[Recording paused]
SC: Yeah, that’s going again.
SS: Oh yes. After a week settling in, now, Aden had got barrack blocks, beautiful, lemon tiles [unclear]. That was the air conditioning and they said, ‘Right. You’ll be attached to the communication flight’. I thought very jolly that. They’d got Wellingtons, they’d been converted from bombers into passenger carrying aircraft, that’s a, that’s a tale that is, and we’ve also got two Albacore’s with the wings. Airborne. I think the Navy dropped them off because they didn’t want them, they stand very high, and so we reported, reported to the communication flight. He said, ‘Right. Rigger’. Well the Wellington is a rigger’s nightmare because it’s covered in fabric, and fabric in a hot climate comes off regularly, regularly, and we’d got six Wellingtons and another one was the AOCs aircraft, Air Officer Commanding. Very posh. MF455 and mine was HC968. Well, I think the lads that we took over from had been there two years, and they actually had a march in Aden. Never been done before in the Air Force. It wasn’t a riot, it was a march past the governor’s office because they’d been there two years. Now, two years in a climate like that is a bit naughty.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Used to lie on the bed staring into space, they’d got the ten mile stare. You know, like this. You could tell how long they’d been there the way they looked. Of course, they thought the world of us, you know, where we could go down and take them and they took us down and just gave us a quick look around. ‘Right. It’s yours’, and they said, ‘Well, yeah’, they said, ‘But it’s your aeroplane. You’ll look after that. Where that goes you go’. I said, ‘Yeah well’, I said, ‘I’m not aircrew actually’. ‘Well if you look in your paperwork, you agree to sign on any of His Majesty’s aircraft or boat’. So they’d got you by the short and curlies you see, and that was it. So, they said, ‘Right. Well, yours is going pilot familiarisation. There’s a warrant officer coming up in charge of it, Pilot Officer Parrott. He’s instructor and you’ll go up and get a bit of familiarisation what it’s like’. So, right, got there, got the KD on, sitting there. I thought, sniff, sniff, sniff — smell of smoke. That’s funny. I looked out and pft, pft, pft, — the propeller had feathered. I thought, oh it looks like we’ve got a fire in the engine. Well that would be the first flight and the last flight then because when these things hit, you’ve got a forty gallon tank, a hundred octane tank, above the nacelle, which they start on and switch off and go on to mains and they land on them. And if a Wimpy touches that like, that they erupt straight over. So then the cockpit filled with smoke, I thought, ‘Deary me’. We’d got parachutes on but I didn’t want to use them. And this Pilot Parrott, he got the warrant officer out of the seat who was flying it and flew an asymmetric — made a perfect landing, perfect, on one engine. So that’s a good start, I thought, that’s a good start. And then I got quite, we went all over the place. Different flights. Went u/s mainly but the trouble was where we went to it was an RAF station. You got [unclear] in East Africa, down to Mogadishu, Nairobi, Djibouti, REAN, Solala, Misera, Eritrea and we used to go u/s a lot. Of course, the aircraft were old, you see, so you had to look after them and all these RAF stations, they called them stations, it was just like an airstrip with an officer and six bods showing the flag of the Union Jack.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Showing the flag. And they’d all got well stocked with beer, and for us it was a night stop. For them it was a bit of company, so all the aircrew and ground crew we all got absolutely —
SC: Yeah.
SS: We’d got to get up next morning. Well, the Wellington isn’t pressurised, you can open the windows in flight, so, the pilot said, ‘We’ll be alright because if you lead me up the ladder and put my hands on the column and when we get to — ’ and we never flew over six thousand feet — got no oxygen. Yeah. ‘We’ll get up there and open the windows and a bit of fresh air around. Soon blow away’. Now these things, they’d got eighteen passenger seats in, eighteen passengers seats, and the one on car seats, car seat, whicker seats, any seat, screwed into the floor. It was a plywood floor. Screwed into the floor. Every passenger had got a Mae West and a parachute, they’d have never got out that door, they’d never have got out that door. Never in a million years. And they didn’t tell them that, we didn’t think about that. The dinghy in the back — they’d taken the turret out, left the doors on and there was a ten man dinghy in there. Well if you count six crew and eighteen passengers, that don’t go into a ten man dinghy. But you didn’t —
SC: Yeah.
SS: And we used to fly across the shark infested Indian ocean, you know, it was all by the board. But I didn’t like flying but I never got accustomed. Never got paid, you know.
SC: No.
SS: I think the RAF owe me. If it was a shilling a day, they owe me a bit of money.
SC: Yeah.
SS: But I never enquired into it but we — and we did a year there, did a year there. I started cycling there. I formed the — the Cycling Club was already there but it was a bit of a shed, so the word in the RAF is scrounging stuff. Very good at scrounging and we built an old, an English replica bar with a black and white ceiling and built the bar, and the seats went round and got a, we got an arrangement with the NAAFI manager to get stuff a bit cheaper. So, whisky was twelve and six a bottle, gin was eight and six a bottle, and all the beer was Canadian. Dows. And we acquired a big fridge, an American fridge. It was broke but we’d also got an arrangement with the chiefy in the cookhouse for the ice.
SC: Yeah.
SS: So we kept it and we had our own bar, and unfortunately, well, fortunately the prices was much cheaper than the officer’s mess. Well, we had, the cycling, we had eight bicycles and thirty eight members which means periodically you got a ride out.
SC: Yeah.
SS: But a large amount of officers joined us because the drinks were only half the price of what they were paying in the mess, until groupie cottoned on to it. Of course, Friday night is dressing night, you know, and they’d hardly got anybody in the mess. But, yeah, I got a certificate of service which, I’d never seen one before. I’ve asked my lad. He said, ‘No. Not a certificate’, signed by the Air Commanding Officer Middle East thanking me for my devotion to duty. But on one occasion we were flying to Djibouti with six Army blokes on board and Djibouti was a French place just across the sea there, and just sitting back enjoying the flip there and bang. A bit ominous. And on the Wellington, you’ve got an astrodome like that, which you can stand on the lid like that and have a look around, and looked up and I this chap’s head and shoulder through the front cockpit. I thought, ‘Oh, dear that’s rather strange’, and the hatch, the hatch had blown open at the front.
SC: Right.
SS: You can’t land a Wimpy without a hatch because as soon as you put the nose down, the airflow fills the aircraft and won’t balance. So this chap was mucking about, so it was my job to close the hatches, but it was that hot in Aden, we left them open to let a bit of air, cool air in otherwise —
SC: Yeah.
SS: You burned yourself, and it’s the pilot’s job to lock it. Well I hadn’t closed them and he hadn’t locked it so they were open like that, and one closes like that, the other closes like that. Lip there and then a handle. Well he wasn’t doing very well — this second dicky. I said, ‘I’ll have a go’. So I wrapped the parachute harness behind me, I said, ‘You hold on to this because if I get blown out I want someone at the end of it’, and I climbed up there, and after about three attempts, you get this shut, and when it come to do that, you trap your fingers, ‘cause you’ve got to get them on the [unclear]. They blew open a couple of times and all the rivets was coming out. I thought, if they come off, that’s it. But I managed to close them, locked it and got all black nails, you know, getting them trapped. But as I say just, little glimpse. Flying down to Nairobi, made a very bad landing at Mogadishu, ‘cause Mogadishu, you might have heard of that on the news. Mogadishu. As you’re flying, there’s only one single runway because the Italians captured it when they captured East Africa and it was one of the main Italian airbases. Regia Aeronautica. And it had got two Minarets on one end. This side was sea, and here was the edge of the cliffs.
SC: Gosh.
SS: So, you’d only got one chance. If it was a crosswind, well it was a bit dickie but we’d got full of passengers. The brigadier was taking the family and the kids down to Nairobi, where it was a bit cooler, and we came in we got this crosswind. So Mr Parrott, our saviour on the first trip, was flying it with a Flight Lieutenant Mac Williams, an excellent pilot. But Mr Parrott was flying it and we came in and got it slightly wrong. Really it was a controlled crash, and when you hear women and kids screaming in the back end there and we came in and they had to swing it around like that and try and get it like that. It didn’t happen like that. We landed on one wheel and then we went down a bit more and a bit more. Well after about the sixth time, you lose airspeed and it’s a complete — come to a shuddering halt. Well, I don’t think, I don’t think the passengers were very happy about it but there again —
SC: Yeah.
SS: They’re not flying it. Mr Mac Williams took Mr Parrott around the back end of the machine and said. ‘You’ll never land another, not with me mate. Where did you do your flying?’ [unclear]. I was doing my checks and the elevator, the operator, the elevator spar which operates the elevator — it’s controlled by a series of little wheels which are made out of cast iron. Three wheels. The bar’s there and the three wheels accuate it and you couldn’t put oil on. We used to put [pause] oh you used to put it on bike chains as well, like black.
SC: Graphite
SS: Graphite.
SC: Yeah.
SS: That’s the stuff. The problem was, you see, Khormaksar and all these airfields, they were sand and salt, they weren’t, they weren’t proper concrete, so when you, when you opened up the throttles up, you opened the throttles, you held your stick back which brought the elevators up, which caught the dust.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Which dropped it down into the rollers, which wore flat you see. Well you could adjust these rollers, you used to unscrew and just ratchet it around a little bit, but there comes a point when you can’t adjust any more, and I was doing my checks, and I said to Mac, I said, ‘We’ve got a problem here Mac’. He said, ‘What’s that?’ I said, ‘Well you should only have a maximum — at maximum a sixty fourth of an inch plate. At maximum’. I said, ‘We’ve got a little bit more than that’. He said, ‘How much more?’ He said, ‘Well;. ‘What do you think?’ I said, ‘Well there’s no accommodation here for these women and kids and whatnot’, and I said, ‘I’ll adjust as best I can’, I said, ‘But that’s it. I’ll sign for it if you’ll fly it’. So it was a — what’s the name? A Catch 22. So, anyway I adjusted them and got them all back on again next morning. On the way down to Nairobi, Mount Kenya with the snow on the top, we were there with our shorts on and bloody khaki drill and we couldn’t get up any higher. Six thousand, six thousand foot, ‘cause we’d got no oxygen you see. I think Mount Kenya is about eleven thousand or something like that and — vibration back end. It was down there. This torsionbar goes straight through with the elevators on. That was bouncing up and down, so I went to the control column, the control column was going like this. I said, I didn’t say, ‘Houston we’ve got a problem’, because there was no Houston then, I said, ‘I think we’ve got a little problem down the back end. I know what I’ll do, I’ll sit, I’ll sit on the spar’. So, the elsan bucket, it hadn’t got a proper toilet, it was just a chemical hole and a little plywood door. That was to stop prying eyes you see. So there was the elsan, there was the bar, so, I sat on the bar like this [laughs], and Mac rings Nairobi. Fire engines and ambulances and the station warrant officer. Engineering. So, we comes in and made a nice approach, nice landing, and as we come in, saw this line of ambulances and line of fire engines, waiting for it. Oh dear. I stayed behind locking things and whatnot and I heard this voice, ‘Where’s the rigger?’ Poked my head around the door, Station warrant officer. He said, ‘Did you know this aircraft was like this?’ I said, ‘Have you asked the pilot yet? Have you spoken to him?’ I said, ‘It was a [pause] it was a choice between stopping there and waiting for spares, which might have taken days or taking the risk’. ‘Oh’, he said, and they wheeled it straight into the hangar. Didn’t see it for seven days. They had to use their own lathes and whatnot to turn because they’d got not spares and they were cast iron, they weren’t, they weren’t steel. And we had a little trip, Nairobi, If you hadn’t got a lot of money — very upper class, and then came the magic day. It’s fit so they rolls it out. Air test. And on a RAF ‘drome, you had what you called a duty crew. They serviced any aircraft that comes in, it was their job to service it and get it out and they were all sitting around. And he asked, ‘Would you like a pleasure flip?’ Pleasure flip. Well, I think we had six of them on board, plenty of room, and just outside Nairobi, there’s this game park. I’ve since been talking to a lady, a coloured lady from Nairobi and I was telling her about this episode. I said, ‘’We flew across to Ngong Hills’. She said, ‘No. Not Ngong’. She said, ‘No N. No N. Pronounced Ngong but no N’. Like magic K in [unclear] isn’t it?
SC: Yeah.
SS: And down on the deck, chasing the game and then, looking out, the ground staff had re-fuelled it and the cover which covers the petrol tank, it’s got a metal clip on it. Well they forgot to do that, and this flap is on line with the lift line on the wing, and it was coming up. Lifting and spoiling the airflow, so we had to land just a little bit quicker than normal, you know, to stop the wing from stalling then, you know.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And little incidences. And then the last flip of all before we came away. We’d been to Mogadishu to pick this spare aircraft up, we’d repaired it and we were coming back in formation and we were coming back about 4 o’clock in the afternoon and selected undercarriage down. No lights, no lights — you don’t know whether it’s down or not. Now if it’s, if it’s not down, you’ve got problems, if one wheel’s down, you’ve got problems still, but we’d got thirteen on board and we’d got — thirteen on board — we’d got six parachutes. I got one ‘cause I was part of the and oh, we’d got a problem so he rung up, rung up the tower and said, ‘We’ve got no undercarriage lights. Warning lights’. Oh. Groupie, got groupie down, Group Captain Snaith. He said, ‘Right’, he said, told the skipper, ‘Fly past slowly as if you’re landing and drop your flaps. Drop your wheels and I’ll have a shufty if they’re down’. So, he throttled right back, put the flap down, dropped the wheels. Well we thought they were alright [unclear], and he said, ‘Well everything seems to be ok’, he said, ‘But of course, I’m in the control tower and you’re out there’. So, he said, ‘Well try flying over, [unclear] and get up to six thousand’, he said, ‘And come down in a steep dive and pull up sharply and you’ll lock them down’.
SC: Lock.
SS: Very nice. And anyway, we did that, but the chap that had done the daily inspection and should have checked all this, he was on board.
SC: Right.
SS: So, we said, ‘What are you going to do about this?’ He said it might be a ball cock, it could be. Anyway, we come in, perfect landing, so that was the last trip. So the first trip in it and the last trip — they were a bit naughty, but just before we came away Number 8 Squadron was stationed permanently at Aden. Khormaksar. Don’t know why. Since 1926 they were stationed there permanently, something had gone wrong. They put up a black I think and they were there permanently. Now, they’d got Mosquitoes, silver, lovely jobs. Did a lot of reconnaissance work and one officer, the boat was in, he’d got his boat packed, he’d got his bag packed and everything and there was a young lad that used to drive, I think only about nineteen, used to drive the towing tractor. Virgil his name was. And there was a lot, there was more killed on last flights, you know, ‘We’ll just go up and have go’, more killed. Cobber Kain in, during the French — he killed himself in a Hurricane, inverted flight, and he said, ‘I’m just taking the kite up for a trip’, but this lad hadn’t flown before. So he packed him in, puts him in, put a ‘chute on him and whatnot and took off, and they’d got a bombing range just outside the airfield, and they did a couple of, a couple of runs. Third run, big bang, cloud of smoke. Gone in. That was about 10 o’clock in the morning. We buried him at two.
SC: Gosh.
SS: ‘Cause you had to do out there, it was that hot. So that was I mean ready for boating and everything but there was more on these last, last trips. But, yeah, and then we came home, and my group number had come up. Fifty eight, my demob number. And I should have stopped in. Oh I wish now I would have stopped in and made a career of it, but came the shiny jobs and the buttons and the painting of the white lines, and the white belts and [unclear], I didn’t care for that. And the Air Force had really — well it had to do because it was no longer a fighting force. And back to Heaton Park.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Not Heaton Park, just outside, just outside Preston, Warton. Kitted out, beautiful suit, pinstripe suit, trilby, mac. I’ve never been so well dressed in my life. There were lads, the spivs outside on the station giving you five pounds. Shoes, socks, suit, shirt, underwear. Giving the lads five quid to take it off your hands, I mean five quid in them days.
SC: A lot of money.
SS: Was more than a week’s wage wasn’t it? But then I did that and I went back to Celanese, finished my apprenticeship off and on to Royces. Ten years building jet engines. Chilwell — working on Rolls Royce engines for the Comet tank, went on engine test and then back to Royce’s. I went to Royce’s then building the oil engine. I went on experimental fuel injection which was a lovely job ‘till they bought Sentinals at Shrewsbury and I was down to go and then they didn’t take me. They said, ‘We’ll give you a good job on Aero’. I thought, beautiful, and I went from fuel injection pump that big to a Comet engine. An Avon.
SC: Wow.
SS: One for the Lightning and went right through Avon, Nene, the one that the Viscount used. The nice little one, just forget the name of that. On to the RCO 42, Conway. The Spey and the dreaded Tyne, the dreaded Tyne. Then the money wasn’t — I’d got a family of three then and the money wasn’t awfully good.
SC: Right.
SS: Not for the job you were doing, and only two of you built an engine in them days.
SC: Gosh.
SS: None of these you can walk around and have a look, none of that, and of course, they were all built by hand. And I went back. My dad said Celanese — or Courtaulds — they’re were building a new nylon plant and they want fitters desperately, so there weren’t much doing at the time and engine build at Royce’s you was built, the more you did you built on a bonus. Well if there’s no parts to put on the engine.
SC: Yeah.
SS: So I asked the foreman. I said, ‘There’s not much doing here. I’m going to slip up to Courtaulds’, which I did and I went up. I was thirty eight at the time and I went in, and the engineer was a racing cyclist from the Derby Mercury. He said, ‘What are you doing here?’ I said, ‘I’ve come for a job’. So, he said, ‘I desperately need fitters’. He said, ‘Can you work overtime?’ I said, ‘I can do as much as you want’. He said, ‘Right. What can I —?’ I said, ‘I’ll hand my notice in when I get back’, I said ‘And then I’ll join you on Monday’. ‘Right’. So, I went back, handed my notice in and they brought it back. They said, ‘You can’t leave’. I said, ‘You’re joking’. He said, ‘No. You can’t leave’, he said, ‘Oh no’, he said, ‘You’re contracted here’. I said, ‘I don’t think so’. So, I had to go and see the superintendent, so he said, ‘Well, what’s the exact trouble’. I said, ‘Well put it like this Walter’. Walter Hampton this is. I said, ‘Have you got your own house?’ He said, ‘Yes’. I said, ‘Have you got a car?’ He said, ‘Yes’. I said, ‘Do you go on foreign holidays?’ ‘Yes’. I said, ‘Well I don’t. I’ve got none of them things’. I said, ‘I’m on rather what you call a job that is very valuable’. I mean, jet engines. You couldn’t make any mistakes on them you know, and he said, ‘Well you’re getting seven and six an hour’. I said, ‘Of course I am’, I said, ‘An inspector’s getting twelve and six an hour and he’s only looking at it. I’m doing the work, he’s looking at it. And if it’s wrong, it’s me, not him’. I said, I said, ‘He’s a wicket keeper’, I said, ‘And he lets stuff through and all’. And he kicked me out, and then a couple of days later, this chap arrived from main works with his bowler hat and his briefcase. He said, ‘Right. You want to leave’. I said, ‘Yeah’. ‘Right’,‘ he said, ‘Six weeks. You’ll work six weeks’ notice’. I thought oh dearie me. Jumped on the little Bantam, went flying back up to Courtaulds. I said, and I saw Ted, he said, ‘You’re having a spot of trouble’. I said, ‘Yes’, I said, ‘Yes, I am’. He said, ‘Well, right, how long have you got to work?’ I said, ‘Six weeks’. ‘Right’, he said, ‘May the 8th which is Whit Monday’, he said, ‘You start on May the 8th, Whit Monday’, he said, ‘You’ll get treble time and a day off in lieu’. He said, ‘How much overtime can you work?’ He said, ‘You can work till 10 o’clock every night if you want’, he said, ‘We want all these machines in. You know. Installing’. And he said every Saturday and Sunday’, [laughs] every Saturday and Sunday. Well, in a month, I got my first car. The Ford Pop, sixty five pound, ten pound down and the rest when you get it from [unclear] garage.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And as I said I worked there and I finished. I worked a little bit extra because I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t feel like leaving. And I did a lot of experimental work and a lot of — made, made Courtaulds a lot of money, because on this nylon, you had to do what you could with it. Twist it, stretch it and all that caper, and it was purely development work and I enjoyed that. And then they shut, they shut the plant down, seven hundred and eighty, bang, just like that. So, I stayed on a little bit to sort the machines out and sell stuff and they promised me a job. So, when, when we finished finally, I went up to the office, the labour bloke said, ‘Right’, he said, ‘I’ve got all your redundancy papers ready’. I said, ‘Well you know what you can do with them’, I said, ‘They promised us a job’. ‘Oh’. he said, ‘Well’, he said, ‘Things have altered’, he said, ‘The two chaps that you were going to replace’, he said,’ they have gone up to the worst plant on the firm. CA Department, where all the chemicals is and acids’, he said, ‘They left spinning’, he said, ‘Now if you contact them and ask them if they want to go back to spinning, or do they want to stop on CA. They’ll stop on CA because it’s thruppence an hour more, because it’s dirt money. Danger money more or less’, and he said, ‘And you’ll go back on to spinning’. I said, ‘That’s alright’, I said, ‘I were building, when I came back out the RAF, I was building spinning machines on that where you’re going to send me. So, roll back the years’.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And he said, ‘Can you fit a spinning pump?’ I said, ‘Well put it this way, we put these machines in in 1947, so I think I’m a bit qualified’. And then I did — I worked longer there and I went to the twenty five years dinner, and I sat next to one of the directors. He said, ‘How old are you?’ I said. He said, ‘You never are’. I said, ‘I am’. He says, ‘Well do you feel like, do you feel like packing up?’ I said, ‘No, I don’t feel like packing up’. He said, ‘Do you think you could still —?’ ‘Of course I could still do the job’. He said, ‘Well you needn’t leave, you know’. Well, when I went back, my foreman was doing his nut. ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do without you’. So, when I went back, they were queuing up for my job, the lads, so, I went back and I said, ‘Well I’m staying’. ‘You can’t do that. You can’t stay’. I said, ‘Well go and ask Mr White, the director, I’ve had a word with him’. And I saw the engineer, he said, ‘Right’, he said, ‘It’s like this’, he said, ‘Things aren’t very well at the moment, things aren’t doing well’, he said, ‘What we’ll do is — a three monthly basis’, he said. ‘After three months, if you want to pack up, you pack up. After three months, if things run into a —?’ I said, ‘That’s fair enough, that’s fair enough’. And they give me a marvellous party coming away, they said, how many, how many, well by now the firm was, you know, they lost big. They said, ‘How many people do you know on the firm?’ I said, ‘About all of them’. He said, ‘You’re not having that lot, he said, ‘You can have a hundred’. I said, ‘That fair enough’. So the wife picked us up in a taxi, and — a marvellous meal, and the engineer, he said ‘I don’t know what to say about this lad’, he said, he said, ‘He’s had rather — he’s had rather an interesting —' so he gets like a toilet, have you seen these things. Paper that goes like that’. So, he picks it up, he said, ‘Right’, he said, ‘You started here’. I said, ‘I didn’t’, He said, I said, ‘No. I didn’t. I started at [unclear]’ ‘Oh, and then you moved on’, I said, ‘No, I didn’t move on to there’. So, he let this paper go and it went like this, and he said, ‘Well I’m not going to say anymore’, he said, ‘Because what I’m going to tell you will be wrong in any case’. But, and never once in my life, never once have I got up in the morning and said, ‘I don’t want to go today’, because work is your life really. I mean that is it, and if and the problem is if a person’s not happy in the job he’s doing, it does more damage.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Because he goes, knowing very well that he’s not going to have a very good day, and that in itself and, and it rubs off, because when he gets home from a day’s work, his wife, he makes his wife have it because — it’s not her fault.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And the kids, it’s not the kids fault.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And that’s why, when I lost, I nursed the wife for about seven years from here. So we did eighteen years up at the aero park every Sunday.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Fetching the aircraft in, because there was only moi who knew how to go about it. Hunter from Alconbury, the Lightning from Warton, a Saudi Lightning from Warton, the Canberra from Cosford. All these different places.
SC: Yeah.
SS: I thoroughly enjoyed it. I helped to build it, helped to move it across, and then of course, when Jan used to go up every Sunday, you know, make stuff. A buffet, and really get involved there. I was the vice chairman.
SC: And just, just for the recording.
SS: Yeah.
SC: That’s the aero park at East Midlands Airport.
SS: Yeah.
SC: Yes.
SS: It started in 1984.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And we’d only got one aircraft. Graham Vale’s Varsity, which is still there, and he’s still the chairman, because if he goes, the Varsity goes. But we used to run the Varsity because the Varsity is a tin Wellington.
SC: Right.
SS: It’s exactly the same as a Wellington but its metal, exactly the same. Apart from the turrets, which don’t [unclear]. And yeah. The flying club used to give us eighty quids worth of hundred octane petrol, it wouldn’t run on eighty, a hundred octane. So the old bowsers used to come round and squeeze in and we had a twenty minute run. Used to run port starboard in the cockpit. [unclear] for the public.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Run it for the public, and for us, and it would have flown, that thing. I would, it would have flown because we’d got the revs and everything on it. And yes, I did eighteen years there. British Legion. All by the side is we ran a discotheque club 1969 ‘til ’83, up at the Celanese club here. Every Sunday night, teenagers disco, we had the finest disco light display stereo in Derby. All done free. Did it all for the firm, you know because it was for the firm, and then we did ballroom dancing. Strictly tempo, sequence dancing. Then I became a — I’d always been in the British Legion at Spondon, and I became entertainments officer, and I used to do — I did the VE dance, the VJ dance. Did numerous charities for Gurkha regiments, FIPO, all these different. Every farthing went to charity, did a lot of charity work and of course, when Jannie was really poorly, we couldn’t do it anymore. And I hope I’m a Christian, I hope I’m a Christian, and I used to go to chapel and of course the last few days, I couldn’t go because she was poorly, and finally, after three trips to the hospital they’d been treating her for [pause], what’s the name — shingles, and it was aggressive leukaemia. And so, I nursed her all through that, and they had her in for two days and decided — for you, it’s the Liverpool pathway. So, you get no choice, you don’t get any choice at all. Just withdraw medication, food, liquid.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Everything. And that was nearly six years ago which was, when you’ve been married fifty eight years.
SC: Gosh
SS: Where I’m working now, I met her at the Angler’s Arms. Used to call it the Stranglers Arms. And when I was cycling, I had one or two crashes, and I remember one August had a right crash and busted my collar bone, and we used to go there to the little dances that used to be on a Friday night and that’s where I met her. It wasn’t love at first sight. No, I had my twenty four inch bottoms, yellow socks, brothel creepers, suit shoulders out here, draped shape. Looked more like a gangster when I put it on. And she was a clippy on the Derby Corporation. She’d been a nurse but she caught everything that was going and was advised to get an outdoor job. There’s nothing more outdoor than an open double decker.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And then yeah, we got three. Three. I’ve got two sons. One’s — what is he now? I’ve got a daughter fifty nine, the son is fifty seven and then the younger one is fifty this year. Numerous grandchildren, and I think to myself sheer luck, sheer luck. If I walk — I had bronchial pneumonia a couple of years ago and that knocked me for six, if I walk about fifty yards now, I’m jiggered, absolutely jiggered. Can’t get my —. Considering, I smoked for over twenty years. Seventy years, sorry. Smoked for seventy years. I started with a clay pipe and a packet of tuppeny sage with no onion, and the old pipe used to glow, the bowl used to glow red hot. And then of course, when you’re fourteen, you automatically become a man and you start on the old Park Drive Woodbine. You graduate to the full Capstan, and overseas, they used to throw them at you by the hundred, you know. They used to throw them by the hundred, but they never said anything.
SC: No. No.
SS: And I worked in blue Asbestos at Courtaulds for over thirty years.
SC: Gosh.
SS: And as I say — this dance. I tried to get in touch with them I worked with. There’s only two, the rest I worked with in engineering have gone.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
SS: Just —
SC: Yeah.
SS: But there again — pure luck. Pure luck. And they say, ‘Oh you do look well. Oh, you do look well’, but you do.
SC: And you do.
SS: I get up in the morning sometimes, you know, and I think, no, but I used to work five days a week, sometimes six.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Looking after these, a lot of them younger myself, and I found out I could sit and talk to them.
SC: Yeah.
SS: We were on the same wavelength.
SC: Yeah.
SS: If you’re ninety, and they’re around about that age, you can talk about the old times, the bad old days and you can work your way through the wireless set, the television.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And you can have — always wind up laughing.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And I loved music. I can go, I’ve got three hundred LPs, singles. I love music. I play music like a therapy. But when we’re not playing music and you’re sitting in the lounge, and one of them suddenly starts singing and they all join in and they’re the old music hall songs that Florrie Forde used to sing and it is. I’ve worked in a lot of places, and this is the most happiest place I’ve ever worked because there’s somebody worse than you.
SC: Yeah.
SS: But the only trouble Is, you make friends with them, you sit and talk for hours and then one morning you go in, and they say [unclear] passed away in the night.
SC: Yeah.
SS: And I’ve been there getting on for five years and we’ve lost forty.
SC: Yeah.
SS: Which is about, you know, it’s about par for the course.
SC: Yeah.
SS: But I don’t grieve. I don’t grieve for them because in fact, they’re going to a better place because half of them they can’t see, they can’t walk. They can’t. And really you wouldn’t treat a dog like that.
SC: Yeah.
SS: You wouldn’t treat a dog like that.
SC: I’m going to switch this off now.
SS: Lovely.
SC: ‘Cause I think —
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Stanley Shaw
Creator
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Steve Cooke
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-01-14
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AShawS160114, PShawSR1604
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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.
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eng
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Royal Air Force
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01:45:54 audio recording
Description
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Stanley Shaw was born in 1926 in Derby and left school at Easter 1940 where he worked in a garage looking after fuel for the nearby camp at Spondon. He saw some soldiers who had returned from Dunkirk, who were reporting to their headquarters.
Stanley joined the Air Training Corp after hearing a broadcast from the Air Ministry asking for volunteers. He tells the stories of the other 3 who joined up with him. He was an apprentice fitter with Celanese and had to break that apprenticeship to sign up for the Royal Air Force at the age of 18.
On joining up, he helped form 1117 Squadron, before moving to Burnaston where they had Tiger Moths and Miles Magisters and then moving on to 16 AFTS Flight Training School. He also flew Whitleys, Avro Ansons and Bristol Blenheims from Ashbourne Aerodrome. He also tells of his experiences with the Vickers Wellingtons and the Avro Lancasters.
Stanley was posted to 54 Maintenance, Repair and Salvage unit at Cambridge and was tasked with salvaging aircraft that crash, no matter whose aircraft they were. He tells of his experiences in his line of work, some good and some bad.
After the war, Stanley returned to Celanese and finished his apprenticeship before moving to Royces, where he spent 10 years building jet engines, before working at Chilwell, working on the Rolls Royce engines for the Comet tank. He returned to work at Celanese until he retired.
Contributor
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Vivienne Tincombe
B-24
B-25
Catalina
final resting place
fitter airframe
ground crew
Ju 88
Lancaster
Me 109
Me 163
military living conditions
Mosquito
Nissen hut
Stirling
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/628/8898/APollockHAJ161011.1.mp3
04220061b1e2afaf2bd3a64bd3baf43c
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Pollock, Henry
Henry Pollock
H A J Pollock
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
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Pollock, HAJ
Description
An account of the resource
49 items. An oral history interview with Henry Albert James Pollock (b. 1924, 2220546, 187029 Royal Air Force) his log book, documents and photographs. Henry Pollock completed 36 operations as a rear gunner with 78 squadron from RAF Breighton. After the war, he served in the Far East.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Henry Albert James Pollock and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Date
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2016-10-11
Rights
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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.
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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SC: Testing for level. Interview with Mr Harry Pollock at his home at xxxx Castle Donington. Also present Mr John Pollock, Harry Pollock’s son and Steve Cook interviewer for International Bomber Command. OK, I think we’re ready to go. Harry thank you very much for inviting me along and John thank you for coming all the way down from York to go through this interview. What we really want to try and capture now are your memories, your experiences, not just from being in Bomber Command but going right back to before the war and why you joined the RAF and why you came to be in Derby. So if you can cast your mind back to what you were telling me earlier perhaps about where you lived originally in the East End of London and share some of those early experiences.
HP: Well, I was born in 1924 of course. Originated in Woolwich, my father was a long distance lorry driver. I was the only one, the only son and at one time we were in Star Lane across in Canning Town. I went to Star Lane School and we lived at 121 Ling Road, Canning Town. I started work at fourteen as an apprentice joiner, well not a joiner but a floor layer. I worked for the Hackney Flooring and Paving Company in Barking, which meant a bit of a bus ride and that sort of thing from home and after a little while as an apprentice we had to go out on, er on jobs as it were, hospitals, dance halls, and on. My first out job was at a hospital near Epsom in Surrey which meant as a fourteen year old, sort of leaving home very early in the morning, going there, travelling on the train, coming back at night, even on a Saturday, 48 hours. For which, I was, as an apprentice, I was paid the princely sum of eight shillings a week.
SC: Gosh.
HP: Anyway, that continued and on the second year I got twelve shillings a week. Of course the war started in 1939, I was still working but at the time the Blitz was, didn’t start ‘til 1940 and that’s when it really all started for me in a way. I was working up at, in the West End of London at the time when the Blitz started. And, um, we had an Andersen shelter in the back garden which we shared with other tenants. Anyway one morning we came down after a pretty heavy raid and the house was a bit, not dilapidated, but it had been struck, the roof was and, we were evacuated to somewhere in Oxfordshire near Thame. I remember the name of the village now it’s called Kingston Blount. We were there for a little while with other people that had been sent there. But at the time I had an uncle in Derby, a retired soldier who was in the Sherwood Forest, but he worked for the Trent Motor Traction Company and he said ‘oh come up here and stay with us’. At the time my dad was still working in London on his job so it was just a case of my mother and I going to Derby and staying with my uncle in Chaddesden in Derby. Ahh, after a short spell in one job I ended up being a railway fireman on the railways, the London Midland Scottish Railway and, um, anyway that went on for a couple of years but I think we went back in 40, I forget the actual date we went up there but time went on, we got to 1943 and, um, I decided that things, you know, I wasn’t too happy with the situation on the railway but I decided, I might, I volunteered for the Services. The only way I could leave the railway, which was a occupation that you had to get permission from, and the only way I could leave was either aircrew or submarines and I wasn’t very keen on submarines so I ended up volunteering for the Royal Air Force which meant Bomber Command at the time, Volunteer Reserve. That would be in the, round about my nineteenth birthday, the April. I got the call up papers and um, set off for St John’s Wood in London, in actual fact the Lord’s Cricket Ground in the August 1943. And of course joined many others, we were shunted around all day and we finally had a meal in the zoo in Regent’s Park. We were billeted in, old, well flats people had been evacuated from those flats and we were occupying these flats and of course for the next couple of weeks it was hectic you know, sort of marching here, marching there, uniforms, inoculations, get your hair cut, and all that sort of thing. Once you got, how to fit a webbing, how to fit pack your kit bag and all that sort of thing. Eventually, of course you couldn’t go home, we were on the train to Bridlington, we went to Bridlington.
SC: Yep.
HP: Initially, I think it was initially a training unit of some sort. Um, more lectures, more this more that, more marching, more learning things. I ended up at one time we were throwing grenades on the beach just in case we were called in, you know. Most, it was quite, it was quite all right. One incident I can remember we had to do dinghy drill which meant that one time jumping off the end of the pier into Bridlington Harbour. It wasn’t too bad, the only trouble was there was some barbed wire at the bottom, you had to make sure you dropped that far out that you missed the barbed wire.
SC: Hmm.
HP: And then from Bridlington, I think we spent about five or six weeks there. From Bridlington we went to Bridgnorth, yeah in the Midlands there. And from there we started using, doing the gunnery and, um, so we were marched once again, learn all about the guns, how to strip it down, how to put it back again, how to shoot, all those things how to become an air gunner.
SC: Yep.
HP: I think it was about six weeks and postings came through to go to the Gunnery School and the Gunnery School I was sent to was Andreas on the Isle of Man. So the detail went off and off we went and caught the ship from upstream, it was from near Blackpool, Fleetwood across to the Isle of Man and that’s when the flying started of course. Flying on Ansons, more lectures, but the training, the flying training was actually in Ansons. Um, you had to don all this flying gear and if you were unlucky you sat next to the pilot which meant your job was to wind up the undercarriage which was quite an effort. Anway, that’s beside the point. But to get into the turret which was half way along the fuselage of the Anson it was rather a tricky position. You had to elevate the guns, climb on the seat, depress the guns, stand up and there you were, you were in the whirl. Alongside would come these martinets, whatever, dragging a trogue, ah, a drogue. And the idea was to shoot at that drogue, see how many times, and of course there were four or five of us, so what they did, you had your allocation of bullets, your ammunition and each one was a different colour so when they got it down they counted which holes had the colour so they knew how good you were. That was alright until one day, we had a chap who was a bit, err, well he was a bit wayward in a way, a bit, suddenly this chap just sort of veered off somewhere dragging the tow and he wasn’t aiming at the drogue too much he was getting too close to the aeroplane. [laughter] Anyway, of course we ended it , we were there for a little while, we used to go across to Jurby, which another RAF station and they had all these turrets with guns fitted, a lot of firing went on, things like that and, um, from there we were posted to, err, a heavy unit, in, near Cambridge, near Oxford, it was Abingdon, no not Abingdon, Stanton Harcourt.
SC: Hmm.
HP: That’s when we ended up on Whitleys. We started flying as a crew, um, we went to Abingdon, that’s it we went to Abingdon, we crewed up and that’s where I met my crew, except the engineer which we picked up later. Stanton Harcourt was a satellite of Abingdon and we were flying on the Whitleys and we were there training, the usual cross countries and all sorts of [unclear].
SC: How did you actually get together with the crew?
HP: That’s the first time we joined. We, um, I forget the actual procedure but I think quite a few people sort of arrived at this hangar or whatever and they said ‘well there you are, there’s pilots, navigators, bomb aimers, air gunners, signallers, sort yourselves out, get yourselves into a crew’. And the crew I ended up with, the captain he was a New Zealander, a chap called Eric Selby, nice, nice fellow. The navigator was a Scotsman, a very tall Scotsman, a very well educated Scotsman and turned out to be an excellent navigator. The bomb aimer was a chap called Tommy Noton who is still alive, down in Kent. The signaller was a chap called, um, I’ll have to think of his name again, and the other gunner was a chap from Leicester called Wilmott, Alan Wilmott and so we crewed up, got together, got to know each other and there we were, we started flying on the Whitleys, doing all the usual things cross countries and circuits and all that sort of thing. And then towards the end you had to, well you were, you did what they called them, nickel and the nickel was meant, you had to fly that was really your very first, your baptism if you like, of flying over enemy territory and that was that you had to load up all these leaflets and go over and drop ‘em over wherever they were sent, France. Our particular nickel was we had to drop, it’s in there, we had to drop leaflets over Compiegne which was near Paris. And, completely on our own and there we were. The only thing was they, the other gunner couldn’t come, there was only one place for a gunner on those sort of things.
SC: Hmm.
HP: On training details we used to share the details, share the time. Anyway, we set off and I can remember it quite well, it was a decent night, I don’t remember a great deal about it but it seemed very strange going over, thinking that you were there [emphasis], sort of thing, you know. Even then you sort of flitted around and it was, I can remember it reasonably well actually, you suddenly looked down and could see these little outlets and the odd spittle of light perhaps, imagine somebody shouting out ‘put that light out’ either in German or French or whatever [laughter] you know. Anyway we got over there, we got over where we were, I didn’t know one place from another, it was the navigator. The wireless operator and the bomb aimer, it was their job to drop these leaflets, they put them down the flare shoot, there was a, you know just drop flares. That was fine. It was done I can gather. I didn’t know this was going on I was stuck at the back, but apparently a lot of them blew back [laughter] you know so, anyway they got rid of them and off, we came back. Pretty uneventful you know, there was anti-aircraft fire and things like that you know but fortunately no fighters and we came back quite intact. So that was our first time.
SC: Yes
HP: I felt a bit, I think we felt quite, quite relieved in the end, we got the first one over in a way. And, um, so that was that. So after Abingdon, we, we went to Rufforth, RAF Rufforth near York. It was a heavy conversion unit, and Halifaxes and that’s where we picked up the engineer. Now this chap, Knight, Stan Knight his name was. He was a bit more — older than most of us, [unclear], he was quite grey in a way. Anyway, very enthusiastic this chap and we picked him up. And the usual thing you know, sort of training, cross countries things like that and, um, did all that was necessary and when we got, this is where I had to find out about this space from the bombers, and when we got to the end of the course on the — coming up for a posting on to a squadron by that time, you know it was squadron ready, getting towards the end, this navigator, he was a very brilliant chap the Scotsman, he suddenly, for some reason, I can’t remember the exact details, but we didn’t have him anymore and so they gave us a, I don’t know, the last two or three flights, I can’t remember the exact details of it but we were given, all this time we’d been flying with a Scotsman, we end up with a Canadian his name was Beer, a nice chap. Anyway we did these flights and they came along and said ‘got your postings through’ and in actual fact we were posted to 35 Squadron PFF down at Graveley, not Graveley, wherever it is, um, back onto Lancasters. I just confirmed that with the bomb aimer down there. Anyway, while this is all going on our new navigator went sick, he had to have an operation, so they took him off the crew and they said ‘well, we haven’t got another navigator for you, you’ll have to wait for him to get better’. I think he’d got appendicitis or something like that you know, so we lost, we didn’t go to 35 Squadron, we stayed on and anyway, he came fit, they passed him fit, and that’s how we came to go to Breighton, 78 Squadron. But if he hadn’t been sick we would have been down at 35 Squadron, I don’t know, it might have been the end, I don’t know.
SC: Yes.
HP: [unclear] Pathfinder. So we didn’t make that, we ended up staying on Halifaxes and posted to, um, Breighton, 78 Squadron and that’s where we did it. We did the tour of operations, did thirty odd and that was it. Finished the tour in the November I think it was. Thirty six operations.
SC: And how much of that tour do you remember?
HP: Pardon?
SC: How much of the tour do you remember? How many of the trips?
HP: Well as I say we used to go up and we had one or two brushes, I mean your main defence, really, you didn’t have the speed but the, it was a matter of what they called a corkscrew. You know, you had to judge it from the back, where we were coming and you had to corkscrew right, starboard or left or port or dodge into the nearest cloud or whatever. Had a couple like that but nothing really, fired at a couple of times you know, saw the odd spark but nothing dramatic really and we got through the tour quite reasonably. It was a mixed tour, you know daylight, the, um, — By that time of course it got to June and of course the invasion and that was the part I was a bit, I thought we were flying but we weren’t. I had a word with Tom and we didn’t start until about ten days after the June 6th I think it was, and then we did, bombed some of the V Bomber sites and things like that, Doodlebugs, the Borkum Islands, we bombed those a couple of, one or two, it’s difficult to sort of realise you know, can’t remember mostly, they merge a little bit, they do merge a little bit, yes.
SC: Yes.
HP: And that was that, that was the end of tour.
SC: And that was in, towards the end of?
HP: I think the last flight, the last op was round about November ’44.
SC: Yep
HP: Yep. I think it was thirty five or thirty six.
SC: Gosh.
HP: But that included daylights and things like that, and there was, we used to do mine laying up at Kattegat.
SC: Yep.
HP: And we did some mine laying in the inner harbour in Brest and things like that you know, at the end of the tour. The officers that was the pilot, the bomb aimer, the navigator who was a Warrant Officer, they got the DFC.
SC: Right yes.
HP: The sergeants they, they got commissioned in the end but they got the DFC. It was fair enough.
SC: So you finished as a?
HP: I finished as ah, I’m still a sergeant and at the end of the tour got a [unclear] they had said they’d commission me and I got my commission in the November 1944.
SC: Right.
HP: Hmm, and that’s it.
SC: Right and then you moved on to other things.
HP: Yes, um, I moved on and said — I had to go, there was a course up at Scotland, I was posted up for a course, two courses.
SC: Yep.
HP: On up in Scotland, the north of Scotland and another one down in Cornwall.
SC: Yep.
HP: Umm. It was to do with, more or less handling the, err, they started to [pause] load aeroplanes and things like that you know. It was a passenger and freight sort of carry on you know.
SC: Yep.
HP: Anyway, at the end of it I ended up at, in the 1945, that would be round about February, March time, something like that, it might have been a bit later, um I was sent out to Burma, well India, we started off with a Dakota, [unclear] Dakota and I was ended up after a series of flights and stops and whatever at Chittagong in what is now Bangladesh in the Bay of Bengal and there, there was some, an American squadron also two RAF squadrons which I think was 31 bombers, and they were supply dropping the troops you know, a full team and that was part of my job, like a staging post kind of thing we used to, it was my job to, in the evenings we decided what the troops wanted they were slowly advancing by the time we got there.
SC: Yeah.
HP: We used to meet up with the Army and they used to, all these aeroplanes were lined up and there was the decision which aeroplane had to carry which load and where they were going and I used to have to get there and get the list of the aeroplanes and the loads and I had, um, BOR, that’s British Other Ranks, Indian Other Ranks and things like that and we used to allocate and, err, get them all loaded and ready to jump. We used to do the odd trip, help drop them over the drop zones onto the DZs and things like that and of course that went and then as they slowly advanced the squadrons slowly advanced with them. They went down to Ramree Island and round there and about but we stayed back in Chittagong and we ended up at the — accepting stuff from, from the docks, ready for the invasion of Japan, so we found out after. So all this gear was being loaded ready at Chittagong, ready but of course anyway the war ended so that was that. And then after that I went back to, to Calcutta, I was sent back to Calcutta. Um, I worked in the air booking centre there for a while and then I went out, they started opening up the transport links.
SC: Uhuh.
HP: That was from, first of all I went back there to Alipur that was it, I went back to Alipur and um, there was one or two flights coming through with prisoners of war, with the Dakotas. They were bringing them in on the flights and they’d got some, if I can remember, I think they’d got some ships there that put them on the shore, put them on flights, flying them home things like that at Alipur. And then, um, they also had a base in, at a place called Kunming in China, a staging post there. Anyway they were being evacuated, the Chinese wanted them out. It was a massive airfield. A lot of Americans there. I’ve got some photographs but I can’t remember where they are. And, well I was sent there to help this chap clear up this end and bring people back [unclear] there was a staging post and they used to use it, Kunming when Hong Kong was liberated they flew [unclear] but of course they used it during the war [mobile phone sounds}
??: Sorry
HP: when they were supplying Chiang Kai-shek with goods. They were flying with arms and things you know and, um, that was, that was alright in the end, we sorted that out , got the lads back from there which meant flying the 52 Squadron over the Himalayas to Kumbi —
SC: Gosh.
HP: and back again, we all came back, and after that we started to open up the routes down to, well they were opened up to Hong Kong, Singapore, round Saigon and what have you.
SC: Hmm.
HP: And first of all we went down to Penang, that was near Butterworth, with jumpers on about, and we opened up a base there, they started to fly in the Dakotas, from 52 Squadron, like a passenger flight and things like that and then ended up at Saigon and I was there for a while, well I was there for about six months doing a similar thing, setting up the booking centres, how they used to take money and started to take civilian passengers as well.
SC: Yeah
HP: Things like that and I was based in the hotel Majestic, Majestic Hotel in Saigon and John happened to be passing through there, was it last year John?
JP: Couple of years ago.
HP: Whenever it was, on a cruise. He sent me this photograph, the Majestic.
SC: Wow.
HP: So I said ‘look up my old billet’, you know. And he said ‘where is it?’ I said ‘Majestic Hotel’, he said ‘well this is where this photograph’s been taken’ [laughter].
SC: Small world.
JP: Yeah.
HP: Can you stop a minute, I’ll just go and get a, I think I’ve got some photographs of that. Can we stop this or not?
SC: Yes of course we can, yep, I’ll pause this for a moment.
Pause in recording
SC: OK, we’ll resume the conversation. I think we were in Saigon.
HP: Oh that’s right.
SC: Yes
HP: The idea was, when we first arrived, there was a bit of uneasy feeling in the city because um, the Japanese, there was still some Japanese troops there and we utilised them a little bit for sentry, guard duties because we were a bit short. It was French, very French, obviously French Indo-Chino you know, and the French Army was there and things like that. And apart from us they were also using French, err, Japanese soldiers for sentry duty, guards and things like that.
SC: Right.
HP: Didn’t arm them or anything like that obviously, but they were what we used to call choki dahs [?].
SC: Yes.
HP: Guards, you know.
HP: Yes.
SC: So we utilised them until they went back home. They were quite alright, no problem at all. So there we were setting up this centre for, um, the 52 Squadron, other squadrons followed a bit later, I don’t know, flying the routes opening up from Calcutta, Bangkok, Penang, um, Singapore, Saigon and eventually to Hong Kong.
HP: Hmm.
HP: Of course the Chinese were very keen to get all their, a lot of people, Chinese in Saigon, it’s a very cosmopolitan place, a lovely city, beautiful city. And of course it got quite good, there was a lot of different nationalities started coming and opening up. It hadn’t been damaged at all by the war it was a beautiful city. We were setting it up and that was it. I got a posting, I was in the Majestic hotel all the time, my office was there. It was right by the water front. The only thing I can remember there was the poor old CO used to live in the hotel as well. He was bitten by a dog and they took no chances there the French, um, rabies so no chance. So the poor old chap he used to have to go down to the hospital or wherever and have an injection in his stomach every morning.
SC: Hmm.
HP: and, err, he said they don’t know if I’ve got rabies or not, they want to see the dog. So I said, ‘I’m sorry sir we’ve just thrown it in the river’, [laughter], or ‘they’ve just thrown it in the river’. We couldn’t find it so he had to keep having these injections, just in case he’d got rabies. Anyway that was that. Anyway the posting came through was to go back to Rangoon and set up Searcher Teams, teams going round looking for aircraft that they couldn’t pinpoint or find during the war, had been shot down or whatever. I think there were about six or seven, well I was Number 7 Searcher Team and we all met up together and it was under the auspices of the Royal RAF Regiment in Rangoon itself in the headquarters. Mingaladon, that was the airfield. And we were given some training by them and the team consisted of myself, there was a Warrant Officer who was a wireless operator and he was in charge of a radio, a wireless vehicle with shortwave RT and then we also had a Jeep and we had a sergeant who looked after all the necessary arrangements and two drivers. So, that was the team, myself, a Warrant Officer who was the wireless operator, and off we went. Our route was up through the middle of Burma, after quite a bit training, there’s some photographs here. We did a bit of guard duty while down there as well, and we got down. Anyway, we set off and off we went and our route as far as I can remember we ended up through places like Myitkyina, Mandalay, Meiktila and they issued us with a complete dossier of all these aircraft, the last when they heard of them, pinpointed, lat and long that sort of thing, type of aircraft, engines, quite a lot of information that they could get. When they were last seen going down or whatever. And I’d find these spots, one or two reasonably fine and the idea was we had to get some confirmation, you know sort of engine numbers or anything that was left. And um, it took us up right through Mandalay, Myitkyina and all round there. And also down to, across to Ledo where the Chinese, the road, you know the Americans used for supplies. the Ledo. Um, we ended up there. It took us up we, well we went on quite a few surprises and this is us. That’s where we actually found an aeroplane
SC: Aha.
HP: We were, I had an imprest account of so many rupees that I could buy all my goods and things like that. I had a letter of introduction as well which gave me quite a bit of authority and I could go into an army barracks or wherever up there. Mainly, the Cochin Rifles were up there at that time and there was a little bit of tension on the borders but not a lot. I think they were based at Myitkyina the Cochins and we’d find these places and get petrol or goods. We also stayed with the Army Intelligence Corps, they were based all around the different places you know. And we used to stay with them the odd time you know, get a bit of accommodation. Otherwise we were out in the area but this is one of the villages we went to. We used to go [unclear] the villages and we were very welcome at times in Burma and they always had a hut there, I’ve forgotten what they called it now but you could go and sleep in the hut, you were a visitor, that was the lodging house it was. And that’s one of them, (sounds of photographs being sorted).
SC: Gosh yeah. So that’s a photograph of — are you on this photograph?
HP: Ahh, I think so, let me, I think so yes, yes somewhere. Aah, yes that, that’s me there.
SC: There? Yep, right in the front.
HP: Hmm.
SC: With a number of other people.
HP: We had to make daily contact — All right John?
JP: Yes, [unclear]
HP: make daily contact with base back at Mingaladon as to what we were up to and that sort of thing,
SC: Yep.
HP: The other, the other search teams were over at the other side towards the coast or down to the Thai border or something like that but I was right up through the middle of Mandalay and, um, one of the things, when we got to [unclear] we started off with some petrol. We’d been into the barracks at Kutching, got this petrol and at that time we were staying with one of the army intelligence people, they had a place there, they put us up. We’d got this Jeep, we’d got quite a few jerry cans of petrol and they had what they called the choki dahs [?], the guards and when we got up in the morning all the petrol had gone —
SC: It had gone.
HP: plus the choki dah [?]. So we had, we had to stay behind for a court of enquiry.
SC: Hmm.
HP: Anyway we set off and one of the trips we set off from there, we had to catch a train and it went right up through where there was some fighting with the troops and things and I’m unloading the Jeep onto the low loader on the train and that’s what happened. [laughter]
SC: Harry’s now showing me a photograph of a Jeep that has, looks like it has either fallen off the back of the low loader or not quite made it onto the back of the low loader. Gosh.
HP: We eventually got it on. [muttering]
SC: Yep.
HP: Yeah. There’s another one there, another one of it.
SC: And another photograph of Harry with some of the rest of the team in the accommodation hut.
HP: [laughter]
SC: So how long did this —
HP: This went on, we ended up actually up at, um, I think it was called Pattaya, it was right up near the, the up by the Tibetan border, up that way somewhere, it was called Pattaya.
SC: Yep.
HP: And the District Commissioners were slowly making their way back of course, after the war and this chap had got there, and we went up there and we had to find one nearby. Before we got there we went to a place and ended up not far from, err, what I can remember, where we — and I had to leave behind the, it was a three, a three day trek. I had to leave behind the wireless vehicle and the Warrant Officer and I took the Sergeant and one of the drivers and we set off across, right along the border with China to find this particular aeroplane and it was quite a trek. We were, we got to a river, we picked up an interpreter, an Indian chap. We ended up crossing the river, we’d got mules carrying stuff and these mules, we used to sleep on these camp beds, we used to put them together like at night and, these mules that, I think there were two of them, we used to have to go on a raft, we went up the side of this, it was rather fast flowing this river I can remember. We had to get it, we had to cross it anyway and they put a bit of a priority on some of these finds that we had to you know. They were particularly keen on this one, so we got down there by the side of the river and we met this raft chap there so he had to take the mules over and then he used to take and we got to the other side by which time we were completely exhausted and we spent the night there in a clearing and all we could hear all night was the mules eating all the trees and whatever, bushes. [laughter] Anyway, we pressed on. We found this spot once we got the details and what have you, we made the return journey. So it took us about three or four days actually to do that, got back. And then we set off and I think that was the after, prior to the Jeep falling off the thing. Um, we got off to the pier, when we got up there we found that probably due to this thing the Jeep had a broken spring.
SC: Uhuh.
HP: So it meant driving all the way back down to — so I took the Jeep. It was rather tortuous all round these hills all the way down to Myitkyina. We had to make contact with Mingaladon, our base to get authority, and the money no doubt to put a new spring on.
SC: Hmm.
HP: So we had to, we were there a couple of days and got the spring, went back up there and all the way back and that was it and eventually ended up back at Mingaladon at Rangoon and that was it, that was. So that would be from oh about three or four months I suppose, three, I don’t know, three months.
SC: And how many planes did you find?
HP: I can’t remember actually. I can remember this big sort of thing we had. [unclear] I’ve got a letter upstairs actually from the, from the C in C down there, ‘thank you for your efforts in finding these aeroplanes’. I think it was about, I can’t remember actually. I think we found probably about half a dozen or a dozen or whatever, I can’t remember, ten or whatever.
SC: Yeah.
HP: Some that were pretty difficult you know.
SC: Yeah.
HP: The lats and longs or positions were a bit out of date we couldn’t find them, or whatever you know.
SC: Yeah.
HP: We did find a few which we had, that was the idea of the signal band really to keep in touch and also say that we’d found out some details and things like that so. The Warrant Officer was on that thing every day you know. I think, I can’t remember actually. My memory is quite, they gave me quite a bit of money, what they called an imprest account.
SC: Yeah.
HP: I think we spent most of it I’m not sure. Of course you had to buy goods and interpreters and things like that you know and I think we ended up in, I don’t know, probably. Well I was err, we were — my demob date was coming up ended up back at Mingaladon. Had to wait for a ship to bring us back and I think we set sail round about the April/May something like that you know.
SC: Yep.
HP: Took us some months to get home.
SC: Did you sail directly from —
HP: From Mingaladon calling at, I think we called at Gibraltar, something like that and err. Eventually we docked at Liverpool and I was demobbed at one of the demob centres there, 1947.
SC: And then made your way home?
HP: Then I made my way home yeah.
SC: Yeah.
HP: Yeah.
SC: And how did you get home from there? Did they provide transport or —
HP: Oh yes you got your demob suit, you got your railway warrant, you know. Just go home. And that was it, that was goodbye.
SC: Yes.
HP: I can’t, I don’t know what I’ve done with this letter, your mum had it at one time. But it was from the Big Cheese down in Rangoon thanking me for my efforts in finding these aeroplanes and that, you know.
SC: Yes. And had you sailed out to —
HP: No we flew out.
SC: You’d flown.
HP: Originally, yeah. The Dakota yeah.
SC: Yep
HP: We’d flew out. We stopped at places on the way and ended up at Karachi and from Karachi we went up to Delhi [unclear] went to Kamila, Kamila down to Calcutta and then Calcutta down to um, to –
SC: Mingaladon?
HP: No, no to
SC: To um —
HP: Chittagong.
SC: Chittagong.
HP: Chittagong, sorry memory’s going again. Yes Chittagong. The airfield was called Hathazari.
SC: Right.
HP: Yeah
SC: Yeah.
HP: So that’s about it.
SC: Oh, well that’s fascinating thank you very much for sharing that with us. I’ll switch this off now and let’s have a look at.
HP: I rejoined after.
SC: We’ll resume recording. You’ve just reminded me that you rejoined in —
HP: Yes I rejoined in er, in 51.
SC: Yep.
HP: From the railway. By which time we had Steve who is my eldest son and we lived with the parents which wasn’t ideal um, [unclear] rejoined, had to leave my wife at home get to know what the situation, went down the London. I applied for aircrew again but they said they didn’t want me, not particularly, but they offered me a commission in air traffic control. We had a big talk over about it with my parents and my parents and it wasn’t an ideal situation really so I did, I rejoined on a short service commission, five years. I did the courses at Shorebury. When it got towards the end of the five years they gave me a permanent commission and we had John by that time and Sandra my daughter, and my mission after the courses and things just felt well in Norfolk and then went to Luffenham didn’t we? The Night Fighter, Luffenham we went to Aden, had a couple of years in Aden and err, that was alright wasn’t it?
JP: Oh yeah.
HP: And we came back, went to Valley in, then went to Northern Ireland and I got my civil licence and I ended up as a civil controller after I came out, after I packed it up in — I didn’t want, by that time the lads were getting, [unclear]. There was nothing for them. We used to see lads their age overseas with their parents and there was no roots for them so I retired, not retired, I gave up in 1965.
SC: Right
HP: And um, it was a job at East Midlands Airport as a civilian air traffic controller. I was there for twenty odd years.
SC: Wow?
JP: Day one.
HP: Pardon?
JP: On day one of the airport.
HP: Day one. Opened up the airport, yeah, yeah.
SC: Gosh
HP: 65, yeah.
SC: And you stayed there until —
HP: I retired, had trouble with my eyes at the time and so I didn’t get the full medical at the time and other things and I came out in and er. Well I did twenty years anyway, ‘85.
SC: 85. Yep.
HP: And that was it.
SC: Well that’s fascinating. Right well I’ll now turn this o —
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Henry Pollock
Creator
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Steve Cooke
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-10-11
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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APollockHAJ161011
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Pending review
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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.
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
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Bangladesh
Great Britain
Burma
India
Vietnam
Bangladesh--Chittagong
Burma--Rangoon
England--Yorkshire
Vietnam--Ho Chi Minh City
Description
An account of the resource
Harry Pollock grew up in London and worked as an apprentice floor layer and as a fireman on the London Midland Scottish Railway before he joined the RAF in 1943. After training, he completed 36 operations as an air gunner with 78 Squadron from RAF Breighton. He was commissioned in November 1944 at the end of his tour and was posted to India in 1945. He also served in Saigon, Rangoon and Burma. A few years after being demobbed, Harry rejoined the Air Force and was offered a Commission as an Air Traffic Controller. After leaving the RAF again in 1965 Harry became a Civil Air Traffic Controller at East Midlands Airport.
Contributor
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Tina James
Temporal Coverage
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1943
1944
1945
Format
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00:42:35 audio recording
78 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
bombing
C-47
crewing up
demobilisation
Halifax
RAF Abingdon
RAF Breighton
RAF Rufforth
training
Whitley
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/671/10077/AAn01137-170710.1.mp3
5891ad598147a2d8741af4ff73476bab
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
An01137
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with an anonymous member of Bomber Command ground personnel. He served as an electrician at RAF Topcliffe and RAF Dishforth.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-07-10
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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
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An01137
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SC: So, if I do the introduction. I’m with Mr [redacted] sorry [redacted] I’ve got that — I’ve got that wrong right from the beginning.
Other: That’s a good start that is.
SC: I do apologise. That’s —
Other: Don’t worry.
SC: It was, it was wrong on the email that I got. But —
Anon: Oh.
SC: So we’ve corrected that. I’m here at your home at [redacted] and it is the 10th of July, I think today at 10am. And you were a of member of, you were a ground crew electrician.
Anon: Yes.
SC: I believe. So, if you want to start with your earliest memories of contact.
Anon: Well, my first contact with Bomber Command was when I was in the Air Training Corps at Scarborough. I, I was 313 Squadron. I was in that from the beginning of it and, in 1941, I think. And we went on a week’s camp to Driffield. RAF Driffield. And there were two squadrons there. If I remember rightly there was Blenheims, Bristol Blenheims and Handley Page Hampdens. And they, whilst we were there in May it was the first thousand bomber raid. I think it was on Cologne. And that was the first one that Harris put out as more or less I would have said a PR —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Exercise. But as far as I know they all came back. And whilst we were there also, that was with Bomber Command. But also it was the first time I went in the air. That was in an Airspeed Oxford. A trainer.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And that was interesting from the point of view we flew over Scarborough which was my home town. And the pilot quickly came back from the sea because there was a convoy there. He said to us after, he said, ‘I came back inland quickly because,’ he said, ‘They start shooting at anything these days.’ [laughs] So, and that was the first introduction into the Air Force proper. And then at seventeen and a half I tried to get into the Fleet Air Arm as a pilot but I’m only five foot two now. I don’t think I was much less than that then. The first thing they do is sit you on the floor with your back to the wall and there’s a white line. If your feet don’t reach that white line then my chances of being a pilot were [pause] Anyway, they offered me to come in as a telegraphist air gunner or an observer. No. They said, ‘What are you going to do?’ This is a lieutenant commander. He played up with me because I was trying to shuffle [laughs] to get my feet to reach the white line. But yeah, I said, ‘Oh. I’ll try the Air Force.’ And I went to Hull, to the centre there. Recruiting Centre. And a flight sergeant interviewed me. He says, ‘Well, you’ll never make pilot. You’re far too small.’ He says, ‘But I see you’re an apprentice electrician.’ He says, ‘Well, you’re in a reserved occupation.’ I said, ‘Yes. But I’ve got permission to break my apprenticeship and join up as long as it’s aircrew or submarines.’ He says, ‘Well,’ he says, ‘Come in as aircrew. But you’re an apprentice electrician,’ he says, ‘Why don’t you come in as an electrician and then re-muster when you’re tall enough and become a pilot.’
SC: Yeah.
Anon: So, I didn’t take any talking into it. That’s what happened. Well, I never was tall enough. I’m still only five foot two [laughs] Anyway, the outcome was that I went to Hull and then got a railway ticket from there down to Cardington on my eighteenth birthday actually. Handy because they wouldn’t let me in before then. And I got my King’s Shilling I think it was then and fitted out. Kitted out. And then went to Blackpool for six weeks square bashing and, well you learned to use a rifle and throw a grenade and that sort of thing.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And didn’t have to be taught drill although I had to do it. And get your hair cut several times.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But went from, after six weeks there went to RAF Henlow which was in two halves as an operational station there and a training centre for electricians. And I was there for four and a half months and then you get a weeks’ leave. But before you go on leave you’re given a form to fill in. ‘If,’ that’s a big word, ‘If you had the choice where would you wish to serve?’ So I put three months at RAF Driffield then anywhere overseas. Well [laughs] I never got out of Yorkshire. I went to RAF Topcliffe which was used by the Royal Canadian Air Force. 424 Squadron. And that was on Wellingtons which, rather amusing in a way because at the training school at Henlow the sergeant who took us for bomb gear, he says, ‘Well, I’m supposed to have three days on Wellingtons but,’ he says, ‘You’ll never see one.’ So, he says, ‘All I’ll tell you is it’s an unusual connection. Unusual things for connecting to the bomb release.’ So there was five, a five pin plug. He says, ‘And I’ll tell you something now so that you’ll never forget the rotation. The order of connecting it,’ he says. From the lip, the little pin thing that sticks up. ‘Going clockwise,’ he says, ‘It’s red, yellow, blue, green, white or white green. But,’ he says, ‘I’ll tell you how you’ll never forget it’, he says, ‘Now, I’ve have to modify this because we’ve got WRNS coming err WAAFs coming through,’ he says, ‘But it’s — Rub Your Belly With Grease.’ [laughs] You can still, even now, seventy, well seventy odd years isn’t it? More than that now. You just don’t forget.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But that was just amusing in a way.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Because you’d got to Wellingtons and that was all there was for 424 Squadron and you’d never been taught anything about them so you’re there with [laughs] they’ve given you a manual and you’re having to read from it —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: As you worked. But they moved then [pause] well, we went to Linton on Ouse and then back again to [pause] Linton on Ouse back to —
SC: You’ve got Skipton is the next one.
Anon: No.
SC: Oh sorry. Back. Yeah.
Anon: I’ve got to read from this thing. ATC, Blackpool, Henlow, Topcliffe, Linton Ouse. It was Skipton on Swale but that didn’t come in that order.
SC: Right.
Anon: My memories. Although I’ve got all the places I was stationed at I haven’t got them in the right order.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Went back, and still on Wellingtons. And then 424 were going to be posted to North Africa and this was in ’43. And we went, we were kitted out with a whole new squadron of Wellingtons in tropical paintwork.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Very light sandy colour. And we worked for, well I worked for thirty two hours without any break.
SC: Gosh.
Anon: Except for meals. Bringing the aircraft which were brand new up to scratch and that was when the first Gee was put in. That was the electronic stuff. Although we, the electricians only put the supply there.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But the machine itself, the screen was covered up in a shroud so as we’d no idea what it was we were putting in the supply there for.
SC: Right. Yeah.
Anon: For — but anyway the outcome was that we were — got all those done. Then they sent us to — it was Dishforth where that was done.
SC: Right.
Anon: And then they sent us up to Catterick airfield where they kitted us out for Africa. We got all the gear and gave us the injections. Then decided that the English ground crew weren’t going.
SC: Ah.
Anon: So [laughs] then, I think I went to Skipton on Swale I think it was. And it was Halifaxes. No. Tholthorpe.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Halifaxes. 425 Squadron. French Canadians. And it, they were Halifaxes and they weren’t very — how can I put it? They weren’t electrically well fit out.
SC: Right.
Anon: It struck me afterwards that the electrical stuff was an afterthought. See —
SC: Gosh.
Anon: The difference between that and the Lancasters that come on later was where you’ve got the main panel all the conduits coming in, in the Halifax there was one screw connection in front of another one. So if you wanted the back one you had to undo the front one to get to it. Umpteen wires in these air conduits. Plastic things. But in the Lancaster they were staggered so that you could do the one you wanted.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: A nightmare as an electrician on the Halifaxes. A pleasure on Lancasters.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But then, oh I finished up in that squadron, 425 maintaining the link flight simulator thing. Nothing like the simulators of today but they actually got in it. A little laid out thing like an aircraft cockpit. And it was operated by pneumatics and electric and on the port side of the [pause] Just down the side there was a lever you could operate to regulate the turbulence.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And you could nearly make yourself sick. [laughs]
SC: Gosh.
Anon: I know. But you used to have fun with that. It wasn’t used much by the pilots funnily enough. That was the French Canadians. So it was a sort of a lazy time that. A bit on the boring side. But posted then back to Linton on Ouse where I think it was 426 Squadron then and they were Lancasters and they were lovely aircraft to work on. Seven miles of wiring I believe and used to, for the DI, Daily Inspections there used to be two electricians and one went around the outside while the other one was inside operating the switches to put the various things on.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: The landing lights. The wing lights and the tail lights that you going around seeing if they work. And then the chap that’s outside gets in and does the rear turret. Checking the gun solenoids and the lighting. And the, the lighting on the gun sight.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But also the one outside checks the micro switches on the landing gear.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And the chap up in the cockpit makes sure that the lights, the green or red lights operate as they should.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And the [pause] there was a plug for an external accumulator. Trolley acc as they are called. But you only used that for when they’re trying the engines out. Now, the engine fitters were the bane of our lives because if you weren’t around they would sneakily run the engines up without having put the trolley acc in and they were running your internal batteries down.
SC: Right.
Anon: So, if [pause] if the battery was flat when you came to do an inspection you had to change the batteries.
SC: Oh.
Anon: And that was a heavy job. You had to trail to the battery room. Get a transport. That wasn’t always easy either. Sometimes you had to push them on a trolley all the way back to the aircraft.
SC: All the way back.
Anon: Another thing about the aircraft which might sound amusing now but if you’d any soldering to do there was nothing like electric soldering irons of course.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: You had what they called a mox iron, M O X, and it was a white tablet. Quite a large one that burned like fury. And it had, well to me a whacking big soldering iron, the old one with the wooden handle.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And a big chunk of copper at the end of it.
SC: At the end of it.
Anon: And you put that over the flame you’d got but you had to be fifty yards away from the aircraft. And you had to run like made after it got to the heat. When the flames died down it run like mad. You got a hot iron and get in to the Lancaster and run up to the fuselage to get to where the batteries are because the lugs occasionally needed replacing. But that was — oh, I’d better say where I’ve been. That’s the easiest way I think. We got to Henlow, Topcliffe, Linton on Ouse, Skipton on Swale, Sutton on Forest, Tholthorpe, Dishforth, Catterick, Linton on Ouse again, Lindholme. Ah, this was when I finished at the Canadians but whilst I was with the Canadians the discipline was far slacker than in the RAF. Whilst I was at East Moor the, occasionally they had what they called a backers up course for ground crew. It was [pause] well earlier on when the RAF regiment weren’t as prominent. The, you’re doing the protection of the airfield really but you’re taught how to use a rifle again and bayonet and what was it? Throw a grenade.
SC: Throw a grenade. Yeah.
Anon: That sort of thing.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And unarmed combat.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And really infantry work. And you had this to do for a week which we all detested. We were supposed to be craftsmen. Anyway, the outcome was that whilst the last day of our week a Halifax unfortunately crashed in our area. And I have the impression that whichever the area it crashed in the nearest airfield had the job of guarding the wreck that crashed. And unfortunately, although all the crew except the pilot got out the pilot stayed in and he was burned. And horrible really. But the backing up course that week was only about, if I remember rightly about eight or ten of you. You were given the job of guarding the crash.
SC: Yes.
Anon: And you were fitted you up with sandwiches and food for the night sort of thing and a bell tent and some slept but there was always one on guard. When it came to my turn it was the middle of the night and and then it was bitterly cold. And I got inside the back end of the Halifax to get out of the cold. While I’m in there I heard something moving. And so I got out and still listened and still could hear walking. So, ‘Halt. Who goes there?’ Frightened to death [laughs] The rifle and — and got no reply. ‘Halt and be recognised.’ Mooooo moooo [laughs] A cow in the next field. But but that only lasted, you had to stay there until they cleared the crash and we were there a few days actually. And, but you get seventy two hours leave after that weeks’ training.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: I’m all togged up, best blues and just walking towards the main gate when from the office, SWO’s office, the SWO, Station Warrant Officer that is —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Shouts, ‘Airman.’ Beckoned to me of course. Says, ‘I want you as an escort.’ ‘I’m going on leave, sir.’ ‘Not until you’ve been on this.’
SC: An escort.
Anon: And it was escort for a couple of Canadian airmen that had been caught in Thirsk with their caps off. And the Redcaps, RAF police had caught them and reported them. And anyway that’s, ‘Escort and accused, quick march. Caps off.’ And you’re there in front of the Wing Co. And this is the Wing Co who I said how good he was. He, ‘Read the charge out, SWO.’ And this, ‘Whilst on active duty,’ and the date and so on, ‘The airmen seen without their caps on going from the Red Lion to the Black Bull at Thirsk.’ ‘Anything to say?’ — CO. ‘No sir, but actually we were going from the Black Bull to the Red Lion.’ ‘Case dismissed. Incorrect evidence’. You should have seen that station warrant officer’s face. He was an RAF — a lot of the admin staff were RAF. I missed my train but [laughs] it was worth it to see his face.
SC: It was worth it. Yeah.
Anon: But that’s just amusing. But that was with 426 if I remember rightly. 432 that, aye. Thurlby I think his name was. Wing co. But he used to have parties in the mess for the morale and that. Thought the world of him, everybody. But then I went back finally whilst I was with the RAF, RCAF. Went back to Linton on Ouse and 432 were there with Lancasters. And one of my old friends was an air gunner. Flight sergeant air gunner, Freddie Frith and I was talking to him the night before he took off and of course we’d been pals back in Scarborough and lived in the same street actually. And —
SC: Gosh.
Anon: Played football and cricket and that sort of thing as lads. And he never came back. And he was the one I was telling you about. That unknown grave. And he’s at Runnymede. The Memorial there. But went then, went back to the RAF proper. Talk about bringing you down to earth. You had to have your buttons cleaned and really be professional I suppose.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But it was very relaxed on the Canadian side. But back there and this wasn’t an operational squadron. The first time I hadn’t been on an operational squadron and it was [pause] well to us it was stricter than the rest had been on the ops. But we, I was there almost a year and there you had the job of, well apart from looking after Lancasters you did the battery charging. And they also had the airfield runway lights to keep and check and for that you had to have transport. Well, one day it was my turn to do this. We did it in turns and when I went for transport the one that was available they says, ‘Have you got a licence?’ I says. ‘Only one for civvy street. I haven’t had one—’ ‘Oh, well if you’ve one for civvy street you must be able to drive.’ He says, ‘That’s the only car available,’ and it was the CO’s Humber.
SC: Oh gosh.
Anon: I’d never been in a posh car like that before. And I got it on the runway up to ninety miles an hour [laughs]
SC: Wow.
Anon: I really, really enjoyed that but —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Then of course you had to go back slowly to make sure all the lights were on.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: On the — but that was [pause] that was by 1945 now. And I may be right [pause] yes it would be. Anyway, the oh the other thing we had to do which I mentioned earlier to you was at Metheringham we had a lighthouse to let planes know where they were. Those that had lost their way and didn’t know where they were. This flashing talked from the parent station which was Lindholme, by telephone. It told to put the aerial lighthouse on and it flashed two Morse letters which the aircrew all recognised as where it was. A bit like a lighthouse at sea flashing.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Certain letters. But that was an amusing that was. Being young and silly in those days. It was the middle of summer this time I’m thinking of. We used to go out before the, well the aircraft weren’t going out really ‘til dark time so during the day we went into the nearby town. I can’t think of the name of it now. It wouldn’t be Scunthorpe would it? Anyway, and on a pushbike.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Which I’d biked from the airfield on and I finished up that night with my bike on top of a haystack. Stuck. So [laughs] Young and silly. But when the phone went you had to get out there and get that flashing light going. That shows. And there’s a motor mechanic, a corporal general duties chap in charge of you and yourself, an electrician and you had a caravan. And it was a change from being on the airfield.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And the farmer or his wife used to keep you well fed as well.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But that was the end of the RAF. I was at Lindholme which is now a prison. Raise a few eyebrows when you say, ‘Oh, I’ve been in Lindholme.’ [laughs] But anyway, I was there when VE day came. And shortly after that there was a notice went up asking for volunteers for the Fleet Air Arm for going out to see the Japs off.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: That finished my RAF lot. But I did volunteer for the Fleet Air Arm and went there as an electrician. Well, for two minutes at, I think it was RAF Warrington but it was a mixed camp. Half the camp was Air Force, the other half Navy and you were kitted out when you got to the other side of the camp. You were, for two minutes — a minute to twelve and a minute after twelve you were a civilian. You’d been discharged from the Air Force.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But hadn’t been accepted into the Navy. And then you, you were kitted out on the Naval side. And they’d pipe in the morning dress of the day. And but number, you were given [number 9?] now, I forget. But they — nobody had a clue how to dress. You stood on your beds trying to look out these Nissen hut’s window to see what other people were wearing.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But from there you went to transit camp which was at the HMS Daedalus II. Daedalus III rather. The shore base. And you just got kitted there waiting to go somewhere but they get all sorts of things. And don’t let anybody tell them Nelson’s dead. He’s not.
SC: Right.
Anon: The air force, went and got at Melksham. This was an RAF base but it was Navy training for American electric switches which are different to our RAF wiring. We had two wire system. They had one wire and earth. And what, you were given the month on that. But two weeks of that were trying to learn what all the initials were because everything’s done by initials in the Navy.
SC: Right.
Anon: We were always in trouble with the master at arms for various things. Two of us, I was one of them walking across what we called the parade ground and somebody bawled out to us, and we were, ‘At the double,’ because we had started walking towards him. It turned out he was the master at arms and he wanted to know why we were walking across the quarter deck instead of doubling. And this is the sort of thing.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And I think the Navy was about fifty years behind the Air Force but it was still enjoyable. But whilst I was on that course they dropped the atom bombs and they didn’t know what to do with us. They — I finished up instead of hoping to have got overseas as my original intention had always been was, I was posted up to Scotland. To Royal Naval Air Station Dunino. And I was on Fairey Barracudas.
SC: Gosh.
Anon: Which were torpedo bombers and they’re like toys compared to Lancasters.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But all we were doing was getting them up to front line state to be flown down to — I think it was Speke in Lancaster. Lancashire. Where they were dumped. Scrapped.
SC: Right.
Anon: But they wouldn’t let us, them go if there was anything wrong at all.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But, I don’t think [pause] I hope I haven’t wasted your time.
SC: No. Gosh, no. No. It’s been a fascinating journey.
Other: That was the first time I’ve heard it.
Anon: The very first time.
Other: Thank you.
SC: Oh gosh.
Anon: The very first time I realised how ignorant I was, was I was still eighteen. First time on night duty at Topcliffe. Wellingtons. And you were underneath the Wellington because you’ve got trolley acc lead plugged in.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And they start the engines up. They start the port, port one up first and flames shoot out of the exhaust.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: I’d never seen one at night. I saw flames and I shouted up through the hatch, which is the hatch where they went in up the ladder. Baled out at height. I shouted, ‘You’re on fire.’ It wasn’t on fire at all just the [laughs] Fortunately because of the engine noise he couldn’t hear me so —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But you learn as you go along.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: In that case. And how on earth we won the war.
Other: You must be dry after all that. You’ve got it. Would you like some pineapple juice?
SC: I’d love. Yes, please.
Anon: But I — no, I enjoyed it.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And I’ll be honest here. I’d have stayed in the Navy. In the Fleet Air Arm. But my mother was a widow.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: My father died when I was twelve and I went back more or less to support her but —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: But on the demob leave that’s when I met Jean.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And we’ve been married just over seventy years now.
SC: Oh gosh. Congratulations.
Anon: Thank you.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Commiserations I think you said [laughs]
SC: You said that. Not me [laughs] Thank you very much.
Other: Right.
Anon: I don’t think I’ve been much use to you. What I’ve said.
SC: Oh, it has been. It has been a tremendous valuable story. I’ll switch this off now.
Anon: The worst thing I think I had to do was change an alternator in the middle of the night. Well, I say it was the middle of the night. It was pitch dark.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And it was snowing. And it was out on the airfield. It wasn’t in the hangar. And I stood on the engine stand there. Your fingers, you could hardly feel them.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And you’d wires to connect.
SC: Yeah.
Anon: And bolts to, well the fitters I suppose were supposed to do that but you weren’t going to get a fitter out of the Nissen hut to come and —
SC: Yeah.
Anon: Do something you could do yourself. Put the nuts and bolts to hold it in place. But —
SC: It must have been really difficult.
Anon: But I managed to go through the lot and never get charged.
SC: That’s good. That’s an achievement.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with an anonymous interviewee (An01137)
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Steve Cooke
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-07-10
Rights
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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.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AAn01137-170710
Format
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00:38:15 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Canadian Air Force
Royal Navy
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Yorkshire
Description
An account of the resource
Anon, from Scarborough was keen to join the Fleet Air Arm as a pilot. Disappointed that he didn’t meet the height requirement he joined the RAF and began training as an electrician. His aim was to travel abroad with the service but to his disappointment he never left Yorkshire. His first posting was with 424 Squadron. The squadron was kitted out to transfer to North Africa and although they prepared the aircraft for the journey the British ground crew didn’t make the move and he was posted to 425 Squadron. Among his duties other than the electrical work was to provide guard duty for crash sites and he was also called on as an escort to airmen who were accused of misdemeanours. On the squadron he met a childhood friend from Scarborough who was an air gunner. He was killed on operations. He volunteered to transfer to the Fleet Air Arm and joined that service until he was demobbed.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Carolyn Emery
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941
1943
1945
424 Squadron
425 Squadron
426 Squadron
432 Squadron
ground personnel
Halifax
Lancaster
memorial
military discipline
military ethos
military service conditions
RAF Dishforth
RAF Linton on Ouse
RAF Skipton on Swale
RAF Tholthorpe
RAF Topcliffe
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/892/11131/AHuttonGR160526.2.mp3
51510d8237e4a58d69f66108eba68226
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Hutton, George
G Hutton
Description
An account of the resource
35 items. An oral history interview with George Hutton (b. 1921, 1586014 Royal Air Force), his log book, photographs and documents. He flew operations as a mid upper gunner in 199 and 514 squadrons. The collection also contains an album of photographs of George Hutton's service and telegrams about his wedding.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by George Hutton and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-05-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Hutton, GR
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SC: So, my name’s Steve Cooke from the International Bomber Command Project.
GH: Yeah.
SC: And we’re here today with Mr George Hutton at your home in Little Eaton, Derbyshire.
GH: Yes.
SC: To record this interview. Also present is Barbara Hutton, George’s wife. And Cynthia Sherborne, George’s daughter. I’ve got that correct?
CS: Yeah.
SC: So, it’s really over to you now, George.
GH: Yeah.
SC: To tell me everything and anything you want about your memories of joining the RAF and before joining the RAF. Because you were first of all working on Mosquitoes, I think.
GH: Yeah. Well, I was, I was [unclear]
SC: Right.
GH: And, and then I joined the RAF you know. And I can’t say really.
SC: You were building Mosquitoes and —
GH: Yeah.
CS: Wasn’t that a —
GH: And I won, I won ten pounds prize for a motto I said in a competition.
SC: Yes.
GH: And I had, “Turn off the heaters and build more Mosquitoes.” And it won the award.
SC: Very good.
GH: Something. So, I was very pleased with that.
SC: Yes.
GH: Of course, ten pounds was quite a bit of money in those days.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
SC: And then what happened?
GH: Well, I joined up. And joined the RAF and then I finally went through to Bomber Command. And —
CS: Didn’t you start out trying to be a pilot?
GH: Beg your pardon?
CS: Did you start out trying to be a pilot?
BH: Yes.
GH: Yeah. I didn’t do very well. And [pause] what were you saying?
SC: You went to St John’s Wood I think for training, didn’t you?
GH: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
SC: And what was that like?
GH: Well, it was quite funny really.
SC: Yeah.
GH: I wasn’t very good at it and —
SC: I’m sure you were.
GH: And I can’t really remember.
CS: Yeah.
CS: When — why did you decide to go in the RAF?
GH: I don’t know. It seemed, seemed a better job than standing in the mud in the trenches.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
GH: So, it was, it was quite good really.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And —
CS: So, how did you come to be on, get on to being a gunner?
GH: I don’t know really. I just, just took the job up.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And I was quite good at it really.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
SC: And you were posted first to 199 Squadron.
GH: Yeah. Yeah. 199.
BH: And then it was 514 wasn’t it?
GH: Yeah that was, that was on the second tour. That.
SC: Yeah. How did things go on the first tour?
GH: Well, I did, I did the full tour and —
BH: You had to bale out once didn’t you?
GH: Yeah.
BH: Had to bale out.
CS: Yeah. With what kind of aircraft were those then? For that squadron.
GH: Well, I started off on Stirlings.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Well, Ansons really for training.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And then Stirlings. And then from Stirlings to the Lancasters.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Then on the second tour I was on Mitchells. And —
CS: Yeah.
SC: Now, do, do you do you remember some of your operations on that first tour? I think you went to Bordeaux on the very first operation.
GH: I don’t know where. Where it was now but I, I remember — I can’t think really.
CS: You do usually tell your stories well.
GH: Eh?
CS: You do usually tell your stories well.
GH: Yeah.
SC: I think you were mine laying on the, was it the mine laying on the first? The first operation.
GH: I don’t think so.
SC: No.
CS: Yeah. Look there.
GH: Oh yeah.
CS: Mines. Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah.
GH: Yeah. The worst, worst episode was we got coned.
SC: Cold?
GH: And that was the worst. I didn’t, I didn’t think, I didn’t think I’d get out of that.
SC: Yeah.
CS: Which? Which raid was that? Where you got coned.
SC: I don’t know whether I wrote it down or not.
CS: No. You can’t remember which one it was.
GH: But I know there was bits pinging off the aircraft.
SC: Yeah.
GH: At the time, you know.
SC: So what happened? You were caught in the searchlights.
GH: Yeah. And of course you dived to get out the searchlights and come up again and of course you never reach the height that you were before.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And then of course you dive again to get out of the lights and you’re gradually driven down.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And anyway we managed alright.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Despite. And then we flew over the sea and examined the aircraft with torches over the sea to see whether the tyres were alright.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Or the flaps came down.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And see all the necessary bits and pieces were working, you know.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah. Very lucky really.
SC: Yeah. But you landed safely.
GH: Yeah. Yeah.
CS: What did the, what did the, was it the pilot say to the navigator on that thing?
GH: Oh, he said, the pilot says, ‘Just give us a course home,’ he says, ‘And I’ll get you out of this.’ And the navigator says, ‘Get us out of this.’ he says, ‘You got us into it.’ [laughs] And, yeah, and anyway we got home alright.
SC: Yeah.
CS: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah. It must have been very frightening though. You must have been —
GH: Oh, well yeah. I didn’t think we’d get out actually.
SC: Yeah.
BH: Then you had to bale out didn’t you?
CS: Another time you baled out didn’t you?
BH: Baled out.
CS: That was another time.
BH: You had to bale out
GH: Yeah.
BH: On your way to the house.
GH: That was only because we ran out of fuel.
BH: Yeah.
SC: Gosh.
CS: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah.
SC: We’d been to — I think we’d been to Italy, I think.
CS: Yeah.
GH: And, yeah, and it was a headwind and we weren’t making much progress home and the fuel ran out so the pilot said, ‘Well,’ he said, ‘You’d better get out,’ he says.
BH: Get out.
GH: So we all baled out and sort of gathered. Gathered.
BH: Actually landed the plane. Didn’t he? He landed the plane. He landed the plane.
GH: Oh yeah. He landed.
BH: And he hit a hedge unfortunately. If the hedge had been gone he’d have just come down. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
BH: Yeah. But he hit the hedge.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah. And where did you land?
GH: Saffron Walden. And we went [pause] we went to a house in the village and said where was the nearest police station?
SC: Yeah.
GH: And the, a bloke said, ‘Up the town,’ So, we said well where’s so and so? ‘Upper,’ so and so, you know.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And he wasn’t giving any information away. And he sort of [pause] so I set off. I thought well there’s a telephone line there. There’s bound to be a telephone at the end of it somewhere.
SC: Yeah.
GH: So, I followed. Followed followed that you see.
BH: It was about 5 in the morning wasn’t it? Was it about 5 o’clock?
GH: Oh it was early in the morning.
BH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah.
GH: And I knocked on a door of this big house and a maid came to the door and she gave a squeak and rushed off and came back with a —
BH: A doctor somebody.
GH: With the mistress, you see. So I said, ‘Could I use your telephone?’ ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘You sit there,’ she said, ‘I’ll telephone.’
BH: They knew. They knew there were a lot down they said.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah.
GH: So, anyway she got us some breakfast and then there was a knock at the door and a bloke came in. A soldier. He said, ‘There you are, you bugger,’ he said. He said, ‘I’ve been looking all over for you.’ So, that was alright. So, we got, got some breakfast and then what happened? I can’t think of what happened now.
BH: One of them he was with landed over the top of a cottage.
GH: Oh yeah.
BH: Yeah.
GH: Yeah. And of course a WAAF came around in a car to collect us.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And she took us into Saffron Walden. And a bloke said —
BH: Come on. Come on. Hurry up.
GH: She, she took us in to Saffron Walden and got us some breakfast and he [pause] I can’t think of it.
CS: Well, didn’t one of, one of the other people in your plane he landed on a house.
GH: Oh yeah.
CS: That was it.
GH: He landed on, on the house you see and the window opened and a bloke stuck his head out and said, ‘What are you doing up there?’ So, he said, ‘I’m birds nesting.’ So, anyway and he said the bloke’s wife was sitting up in bed with the bedclothes up to her chin. And —
CS: Yeah.
GH: That was rather quite humorous really.
SC: And you all survived.
GH: All survived. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah. You remember one of the, one of the things you said when you went, I think it was to Italy. There was a raid on a railyard where you had to, the instructions were to turn around and come back the other way.
GH: Oh. Boomerang you mean? Yes.
CS: No. No. You had to go, you were going to a railyard and the instructions — down a valley.
GH: Oh yeah. I don’t know where that was but I know we were all flying along this valley and had instructions to turn back. And of course we were at the front of the queue.
SC: Yeah —
GH: And —
CS: Carry on with your story.
GH: And all, they were coming down this valley and of course they turned around and of course the other lot were coming this way. And there was aircraft dodging all over the place. So, you know.
CS: So the pilot said, ‘I’m not doing that.’ Didn’t he?
GH: Yeah. Something like that. Oh yeah. He said, my pilot said, ‘I’m not doing that,’ he said and he climbed.
SC: Yeah.
GH: It was in the Alps wasn’t it?
CS: Yeah.
GH: He climbed and he was, we were clearing the peak by a few feet. Of course it was a Stirling.
SC: A Stirling. Yeah.
GH: And it wasn’t very good at climbing and flying, you see. And anyway we scraped over the top of it you know.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah.
SC: And you survived again.
GH: Yeah.
CS: And you told me that you looked down and the snow was just a few feet below.
GH: Yeah, oh yeah. The snow was just a few feet below us.
SC: Gosh.
GH: And we were over the top.
SC: Wow.
GH: The Alps.
CS: Yeah.
GH: Yeah. But anyway.
SC: Ahh the Caterpillar Club.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yes.
SC: Yeah. You’re one of— it’s quite unique. You are one of only a few people in the Caterpillar Club.
GH: Yeah.
CS: Yeah. Not many of them.
SC: No.
CS: Oh right. Yeah.
SC: No. And tell me about, you had another pilot that you weren’t so happy with.
GH: I beg your pardon?
SC: I think you had a pilot that you weren’t so happy with.
GH: Oh yeah. Yeah. We had this, this chap. He was, he probably was a good pilot you know. But he was always telling people what to do. Doing other people’s jobs.
SC: Right.
GH: In, you know. And he was really, you had a job to get on with him.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And anyway he finally left.
CS: Didn’t you say you went on a flight with him when, when he came in to land he forgot to put the wheels down.
GH: Oh yeah. Well, forgot to put the wheels down. We were flying between the hangars. He was, he wasn’t on the runway and we had a heck of a job there.
SC: Gosh.
GH: But [pause] but I don’t think he lasted. Poor chap.
SC: No. Yeah.
CS: Do you want to have a rest dad while we have a coffee?
GH: Alright.
SC: That’s a good idea.
CS: Okay. Just give you a —
[recording paused]
SC: You did very well completing forty missions.
GH: Yeah.
SC: And you flew on Stirlings and Lancasters.
GH: Yeah. And Mitchells.
SC: And Mitchells.
GH: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Which plane did you like the most?
GH: Oh the Lancaster.
SC: Yeah.
GH: It was amazing. When you were on a Stirling you were twenty two foot off the ground. It stood like that.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And then when it was taking off if there were a crosswind or anything like that it would be on this high undercarriage and it would start to swing.
SC: Gosh.
GH: Like that.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And you’d have a hell of a job to control it in a crosswind, you know. And there was a, on the Stirling you had a hell of a job to keep control of it in a crosswind.
SC: Yeah.
GH: And it was amazing really.
SC: Yeah. But the Lancaster was better.
GH: The Lancaster was off.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Yeah. Yeah. It was remarkable.
SC: Yeah. It could fly higher?
GH: It could fly higher. Faster.
SC: Faster.
GH: And we were on the, on the Lanc 2 —
SC: Yeah.
GH: Which had radial engines. And it could, I think it was, I think it could fly further but not faster.
SC: Yeah.
GH: There was a, there was a difference. I don’t know what it was now.
SC: Yeah.
GH: But —
SC: And you were mid-upper turret.
GH: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
GH: Thank you.
SC: Were you ever attacked?
GH: Oh yeah. Yeah. I don’t think I, I don’t — well I don’t know whether I hit him or not but you know but they were very sneaky. Yeah. Yeah. And we, you know we dodged about a bit.
SC: Yeah. Yeah. And —
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with George Hutton
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Steve Cooke
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-05-26
Rights
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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.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AHuttonGR160526
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
00:21:15 audio recording
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
George Hutton won ten pounds for composing a motto regarding the manufacture of Mosquitos. In time he volunteered as aircrew and trained as a gunner. He was posted to 199 Squadron for his first tour. His second tour was with 514 Squadron. The crew baled out when the aircraft ran out of fuel and George was enjoying breakfast before he was collected and returned to the squadron. His crewmate landed on a roof and the householder flung open the windows to demand to know what he was doing on his roof. On another occasion they were coned on an operation and George was amazed they managed to survive the encounter.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Carolyn Emery
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Alps
199 Squadron
514 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
bale out
Caterpillar Club
Lancaster
Mosquito
Stirling
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1079/11537/APopikaR180806.1.mp3
a31c72321680486a97fccbb762c58367
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Popika, Ruta
R Popika
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Ruta Popika (b. 1928). She was born in Lithuania with dual German nationality. She lived through the Russian occupation and emigrated to Germany during the war before making her way to England in 1947.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-08-06
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Popika, R
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SC: So, this is Steve Cooke uhm, interviewing Mrs Ruta Popika for the International Bomber Command Centre Digital Archive. We're at Chaddesden, Derby and the time is 10.45 on the 6th of August 2018. So Ruta if I can ask you to start telling us your memories from that early time and just tell me everything that you want to tell me.
RP: Now the memories really start I think from, I was born in what then was Lithuania the, on the banks of the river Nemunas. Now the river Nemunas is the major river between what then was Germany and Lithuania and it starts in Russia somewhere, I never remember where it starts and it goes into the Curonian, they call it now I think the Curonian Bay or something
SC: Aha
RP: Anyway I lived, we lived there until I was seven. My father's work was customs officer and he did that all the time we were in Lithuania and from there we sort of, it's a long story, we were all born, there were six children, at that time we were only five children when we left there. From there we moved to several places and the first place we went to was Nida and that is on the Curonian Spit, I think they call it now and it's an absolutely gorgeous place, it's on a peninsula that starts from what is Russia now but then was Germany, half of it was German half of it was Lithuanian. So since my father was a customs officer we always lived on the border. We stayed there for three years and we moved to a place called Panemune, now that is again on the river Nemunas and on the other side of the river was a town called Tilsit in German, Tilze in Lithuanian and I can't remember what it is in Russian now, they've changed it completely and we lived there for a couple of years until Hitler started being a little bit greedy, I think, he wanted to take Poland so he said to Stalin now if you don't mind us occupying Poland you can have Lithuania, not Lithuania but the Baltic states and just overnight. First of all Hitler, Hitler also wanted a part of Lithuania minor that is where we lived. This was actually before I think I don't suppose we can go back
SC: Okay it's okay, you come back
RP: It is, that is, what happened first of all when we lived in Panemune, the Germans decided they wanted to have that part of Lithuania, Lithuania minor, so they just moved in overnight and we just saw our father disappear. And what had happened is: because he was a customs officer he had to move straight away to the new border which was now Lithuania and Germany it became, so of course a few days later he sent for the family and we all moved, he had to find somewhere for us to live there so we all moved to Lithuania major and we lived there until the war started actually. shortly and before the war that was when the Russians decided, decided they wanted access to the Baltic sea and they, they just marched in and took it all because the three Baltic states were not prepared for a war or anything like that, which is whether there was any, what happened politically I don't know. And uhm all at once we were under the Russians and the Lithuanian no longer, our ruler was, the president was Smetona at that time, I can't really remember what happened but he I think he'd gone, he left because he must have known that something was happening. We lived there under the Russians which meant we had to go to uhm we, had to learn Russian at school, so I learned some Russian for a while but then the Russians started deporting a lot of Lithuanians into Siberia and with the sort of job my father had, we would have been in line for it as well. So at that time then anybody, any of the Lith, Germans living in Lithuania and because we were born in a part that had gone from Lithuania to Germany and it sort of altered even the French had occupied it at one time years ago, many years ago
SC: Yeah
RP: And the Germans said we want the Germans to come out of Lithuania and into Germany so with my father having six children, six children by then, they felt it would be much safer for us to be in Germany so we registered as Germans because we were entitled, we could do that because that part of where we were born we could be either
SC: Yeah
RP: So we emigrated into Germany and when the war started and the Russians were moved out of Rus, out of the Baltic states and as you know the, the Germans went a lot further than just through the Lithu, through the Baltic states then after, because in Germany we were in a sort of a transit camp, spent a lot of my years in camps
SC: Yeah
RP: Because my father had bought a farm in the way when the Russians came and he had to move away from the border, he bought a farm so we could go back when the Germans chased the Russians out, they sent us back to Lithuania. But they sent us back then as Germans so when the war started actually, no it hadn't started but when the war started going badly for the Russians and the Russians of, badly for the Germans not the Russians and the Russians were sort of oppressing the Germans and the Ger, they were winning over the Germans because the Germans they’d spread themselves a little bit too, too wide
SC: Yeah
RP: And they started losing so of course as the Russians were coming nearer, we felt it was, well my parents felt it was safer for them to pack everything up and move into Germany
SC: Yeah
RP: And we were in a wagon and we travelled in, stopped in several places where we could sort of stay for a few nights. We stayed in Poland in one place for a few months I think even
SC: Yeah
RP: And I can remember while we were there, this is something that I seem to keep on remembering, and there were Jews there in a camp and I know a lot of people went to have a look they were hanging, they were hanging 10 Jews. I don't know what they were supposed to have done but if one did something, they just would hang them
SC: Yeah
RP: But no way would I go so, so many people went to watch it and I thought no. I was, what was I at that age? About 4, 13, 14 I think, maybe a little bit older but I just couldn't do that
SC: Yeah
RP: And from, when the, as the Russians, as you know the Russians kept coming further and further so we kept fleeing further and further from the Russians all the time because we knew what our fate would be if the Russians overtook us, we end up in Siberia. So we gradually moved from one place to another place every time the Russians came nearer and we settled in one place when the war started getting, the Russians and English, they were getting closer to each other and where we were, on one side the Russians were about thirty kilometres, the Americans and English or English and Americans were about five kilometres, so we thought well we are safer to stay where we are because they are nearer. But now this, the English stayed there and allowed the Russians to move on
SC: Yeah
RP: So we were overtaken by the Russians again. Now as far as any, the war itself, the bombardment and that, we avoided most of that because we were always in villages somewhere you could hear bombardment going in the distance, but never sort of very close. So of course, once the Russians and the English and Americans got together, we were under the Russians. So we, my father still, I don't know how it happened that he'd still got a wagon and horses and our belongings, we didn't have that many belongings by then because how much can you, you've got six children and
SC: Yeah
RP: So I don't think we had any furniture but we had clothes and whatever we needed mostly
SC: Yeah
RP: Uh we dec, my father decided that we can't stay under the Russians so we started to travel a bit walked a lot and the wagon, not very far but until we came, we stayed overnight underneath the wagon sleeping there and the Russia, there are some Russian soldiers came there and my father could speak Russian and he sort of started saying we are trying to find our way back to Lithuania, well we were not, we were trying to go the other way
SC: Yeah
RP: And fortunately they believed us, but what was happening a lot at that time as the Russian soldiers were raping women left, right, left, right and centre and my sister and myself we were sleeping under the wagon and they started sort of looking around and the man in charge says, leave them alone they're Lithuanians. So, once they left instead of going, they told us which way to go, well we knew which, which way Russia was. Uhm we went the other way and there was a field there which I think there were American soldiers there and I’d already, I went to grammar school and I had learned some English so my mother said to me go and talk to them. I couldn't speak a lot, but I could speak a bit of English and they let us go in, they let us through the border and that is of course how we got to be on the English side then. How my, my, how my parents arranged all these I don't know, it's really when I think about it I can't imagine how they coped, they found somewhere for us to live they, they found food when we could but while, I found while we were fleeing from the Russians there was this one place where we stayed there were some German women there. Well, we went through Germany that time and there were women there baking bread night and day so that all, because there was a line of nothing but wagons refugees and they were baking night and day to give to the people who were fleeing from the Russians instead of them fleeing from them. They just stayed there and baked, and we found, well, the Germans they were very good to us. I can't, can't say anything really bad but the only thing that they did is they kept my uhm, first of all they kept my oldest brother because he was 16 they took him in the army whether they liked it or not then when we were fleeing from Lithuania, they had stopped my father and my second brother but because my father had got rheumatism they allowed him to go but they kept my other brother and we've never seen them since
SC: Gosh!
RP: So once we were in the British zone they were just my father and mother, my sister, myself and my youngest brother. Yes, only my youngest brother, the other one had, the second youngest he had been killed by a, in a road accident by a bus. It was about a bus going about every week I think but he was killed by one of them
SC: Gosh!
RP: Because they were, they were hanging on to a wagon, you know how children do, they hang on
SC: Yeah
RP: And he jump, one jumped towards the ditch and my brother jumped the other way and there just happened to be a bus coming
SC: Gosh!
RP: On an empty road there's a bus coming. Anyway, this is why we sort of, our family we were just my youngest brother, my sister, myself, my father and and myself. And once we were on the British zone then, uhm this is something we were sort of in account, we kept on sleeping wherever there was any uhm space and this one night I know we were sleeping in a school room with straw, used to be straw just covered up with blankets and we slept there and some American soldiers came in and they were as bad as the Russians raping women and they raped several women there and one of them came up to me that age I don't know whether I was 15 yet, I was about 15. But I started talking in a little bit in English, all at once I became human to him and you know he, we just stood there and talked until some military policemen came in and he just jumped out through the window but he had not, if I hadn't been able to speak English it would have been the most traumatic thing for me
SC: Yeah
RP: I mean at that age
SC: Yeah
RP: And from there on we, oh we were overrun by the Russians again. Because the English and the, well the Allies really, they allowed the Russians to go further so we were under the Russians again and from there we said we got relatives, we got an address in West Germany that we wanted to go there and we were allowed through we had to go on to delousing and all sorts of things but eventually we ended up in a camp not very far from Hamburg. From there I went to a school, there was a Lithuanian grammar school that had opened so I’d rather had to go through Hamburg to the Lithuanian school. During the holidays they started recruiting people to work in England, first just in England my sister came to England then to work in a hospital. Then the following year they were recruiting again, I was too young at that time to go anywhere I was also at school, but the following year they recruited people who wanted to go to Australia, America, England and this, the grammar school I was on we were I think five pupils and everybody was at that age, the men they were about 32 then and I was about 17, 18. And a lot of them were going abroad, the teachers were leaving so the school was closing and I decided I was just old enough, I was 18 by then I’d come to England to work for one year, stretched a bit and that was in 1947
SC: Gosh!
RP: And of course, since then I’ve settled here, got married, married a Lithuanian
SC: Yep
RP: Brought up two children, got a granddaughter
SC: Ah, yeah
RP: And I’ve got, I’m happy here. Sometimes people say, would you like to go back to live in Lithuania? I’ve always said no because my family by then I was married, when Lithuania became independent, my husband had already died by the time Lithuania became independent
SC: Yes
RP: He would have loved to know it to be
SC: Cause that wasn't until 1990
RP: 93
SC: 93
RP: yes
SC: Yeah
RP: 92-93, yes
SC: Yeah
RP: And I know I went as soon as Lithuania became independent, I decided I’d love to meet my in-laws because my husband had got three sisters in Lithuania. His sis and all them, there were three brothers and three sisters and the brothers got away, the sisters were overrun by the Russians. So they were there and I wanted to meet them. So I went to Lithuania but it's just a pity my husband,
SC: Yeah
RP: Couldn't live to see that
SC: Yes
RP: Because my husband died in ‘86.
SC: Yeah, gosh!
RP: So I mean, several years after he died Lithuania became independent
SC: Yes. What about your father?
RP: Oh, my father stayed, my mother died, she, they both stayed in a camp in Hamburg
SC: Yeah
RP: And they spent their life in in a camp because they got nowhere that they were I think getting a little bit too old to work, no they weren't really because my mother was 53 when she died. She got cancer
SC: Yes
RP: We wanted them to come to England and they were in a transit camp actually to come to England and it was discovered that my mother got cancer
SC: Yes, you said
RP: And they wouldn't let them in and she eventually died in hospital there and my father he stayed in a, I think the camps would have had reduced to but it was still in sort of camp conditions until he died, he died 75
SC: Gosh! So, he was there all of that time?
RP: Yes, and my father was nine years older than my mother, so you'd have to work it out
SC: Yeah, yeah
RP: And I’ve settled in England and I’ve got a family
SC: Yeah. But from really quite an early age you were travelling
RP: Yes
SC: All the time
RP: From really I was, where I was born on the banks of the river, oh, that was beautiful for children that was ideal because the house was on the banks
SC: Yeah
RP: And we used to just go down the, down to the river and play and used to be steamships going past with passengers and used to wave to them. I had a lovely childhood there and then even when we went to Nida which still is the border town now between Germany, between Russia and Lithuania and there used to be a lot of holiday makers coming there because this was a lovely holiday resort. But from the age of seven, three years in Nida, then we got to Panemune and then we were there only about six months when the Germans decided they wanted it, we fled into Lithuania and that is
SC: Yeah
RP: Never sort of had settled life till I came to England.
SC: Yes
RP: And then I lived in the hospital for one year, one and a half years I think at the isolate, was the Isolation hospital then and turned to the Derwent Hospital then I worked at the Manor Hospital as in nursing there
SC: Yeah
RP: And worked at the co-op, got married [laughs] and that is how life carried on
SC: Yeah. Well, that's wonderful, thank you so much. I’ll pause this now for a moment.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Ruta Popika
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Steve Cooke
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-08-06
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
APopikaR180806
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
00:25:18 audio recording
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Lithuania
Russia (Federation)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942
1945
1947
Description
An account of the resource
Ruta Popika was born near the river Nemunas, in what was Lithuania before the war. She remembers her family being forced to move eastwards and westwards from Lithuania according to the changing tides of war. Remembers the occupation of the Baltic States by the Russians. Mentions various episodes of her life as a refugee: German women baking bread and handing it out to the refugees fleeing from the Russians; the hanging of Jews; Russian soldiers raping women and being spared because she was Lithuanian. Tells of her 16-year-old brother being taken into the army by the Germans. Tells of American soldiers raping women and being spared because she spoke English. She spent many years in a German transit camp and then moved to Hamburg, where she attended a Lithuanian grammar school. Her parents spent the rest of their lives in German transit camps. Explains how she never had a settled life before she moved to England for work in 1947.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Peter Schulze
anti-Semitism
childhood in wartime
displaced person
evacuation
Holocaust
home front
round-up
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1100/11559/PRobsonJ1601.2.jpg
19e258c9684c390b15fb2ac64bac2a12
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1100/11559/ARobsonJ161121.1.mp3
75e8aed1b35d8fc10b572554cedd1c2d
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Robson, Jack
J Robson
Description
An account of the resource
11 items. An oral history interview with Jack Robson (b. 1923, 10589943 Royal Air Force) and his training notebooks. He was a searchlight and radar specialist.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Jack Robson and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-11-21
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robson, J
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SC: So that should now be recording. So, I can see that the levels are ok. So, we’re here on the, it’s the 21st of November today.
JR: Is it?
SC: It is.
JR: Oh dear.
SC: It’s the 21st of November. I’m with Jack Robson in your home with your daughter Marion. And I’m the interviewer, Steve Cooke, today. So, thank you first of all for inviting me into your house to hear your story. And you just tell me anything you can about first of all where you grew up and what you did as a —
JR: I’m a local fella.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I was born in born in Bulwell actually.
SC: Right.
JR: And then I lived much of my life in Netherfield. Married a Gedling girl. Lived in Gedling. And we moved here in ’54 and been here every since. And my wife died. How long? Its fourteen years now isn’t it? Coming up.
Other: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: St Valentine’s Day. Yes.
SC: Right. Yeah.
JR: Yeah. And I’ve been here sort of ever since.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And where am I?
SC: Did you have an interest in searchlight radar? Or —
JR: No. No. No.
SC: No
JR: I was called up and I —
SC: When? When were you called up?
JR: ’41.
SC: ’41. So quite early in the —
JR: Yeah. Well —
SC: Yeah. Fairly early.
JR: And, and I, I went in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps. I, I finished in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps and I asked to go into radar. It was called radio location then.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And, and we’d heard about it. Of course we knew nothing about it. What’s this? Of course the Germans would know about it so.
SC: Yeah.
JR: They — and I had to listen and I got, I went on a course and I learned radio work. And then radar as it became. Called radar.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And what I, I did several but the one I was particularly on because I worked on it was searchlight control. SLC. Or as they called it, ‘the girlfriend. Elsie.’
SC: Oh right. Yeah.
JR: Elsie. SLC — Searchlight Control. And, and it was a radar that controlled, well, used it for the searchlights.
SC: Yes.
JR: And it was one of these amazing things. You see you’d be following an aeroplane with searchlights, with the radar and for instance it may be low down and when it comes above — I can’t remember now what the figure was but probably fourteen degrees or something like that.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Above. Above level number five. There was, there were five switches on. It got the —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Big switch on the right hand side the searchlight.
SC: Yes.
JR: And he sees the pointer going around. Pointing at them. Also the elevation. It’s above angle and number one, the commander of the —
[knock on door. Recording paused]
JR: Well, we’ll say exposed and like pull the lever like you’d expect.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And invariably the radar’s been following it. Invariably the aeroplane’s in the beam.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Beautiful. Perfect.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And of course they, they used it actually for, one time they needed to expose to sight aeroplanes with searchlights for the gunners to fire. But the guns had radar themselves so they didn’t need it. But the searchlights were used for, used with aeroplanes.
SC: Right.
JR: Fighter aircraft. And so you, you, as I say you exposed on to enemy aircraft and lit them up and then they were attacked by, you hoped by —
SC: Yes.
JR: By fighters. Yeah. I never saw it happen but that’s what it’s supposed to.
SC: Yes. Did you train locally?
JR: No. No. No. Where did I go? I did my basic radar work in, radio work in Glasgow. And then I went to Bury where I learned the radar.
SC: Right.
JR: And —
SC: How long did that take?
JR: Oh. Five months.
SC: Five months.
JR: I think I was five months in Glasgow learning the basics. And then I had two months in Bury doing searchlight control. LW Light Warning. You know. Various radar systems.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But searchlight control and, and as I say I was on searchlights. I, I was in Devon. Clovelly was the troop headquarters of A troop of the 469 Battery of the regiment was raised in searchlights. But, well the reason they were Royal Engineers but they became part of Royal Artillery and they were, they were mostly Territorials.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Territorial Army.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And so the local Territorial battalion or whatever would be. Some of them would be searchlight.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I think number [pause] the local ones, the Sherwood Foresters. I think the Robin Hoods are the 5th. Is it the 5th? The Sherwood Foresters was the, was the Territorial —
SC: Yes.
JR: Battalion of the regiment.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they were searchlights too.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. At, where was — I was —
SC: You’d done your training first in Glasgow. And then in Bury.
JR: And then in Bury. Yeah. And then I was posted to — well actually to the 2nd ack ack Workshops at Callington in Cornwall.
SC: Right.
JR: And I went down there and straight away I was posted to the 469 Battery which was, the headquarters were at Holsworthy in Devon. And I went with, off to the A Troop. The headquarters was at Clovelly.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Right.
SC: You know.
JR: Just on the coast.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. And I was at Clovelly but I had sites at, oh God places dotted over.
SC: Yeah.
JR: About a half a dozen sites with A Troop.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I used to look after the radar on there you see. And quite interesting. I —
SC: So what was your day to day life like?
JR: Well —
SC: Operating the —
JR: I would go around and do maintenance on the sets and things like that. Then there was, I remember, I remember — oh right, here’s one. I remember I was having my hair cut.
SC: Right.
JR: One of the lads was cutting my hair.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And of course it’s in daylight and still daylight but getting evenings. They stand to you see.
SC: Yeah.
JR: In other words they, they parade and, and they go through the motions and work the searchlight and all the rest of it ready for any action and apparently something got, went wrong because they found this out at a site and they rang up. I think, I think it was telephone. There was a wireless or there was telephone connections.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they rang up and I with half my hair done answered the telephone and to-ing and fro-ing with this and sorted what the trouble out. I actually sorted it out over the telephone.
SC: Over the telephone.
JR: Yeah. They, and they, they told me the symptons of what was wrong and I said, ‘Oh. Has the drill sergeant been out today?’ Pause. ‘Yes as a matter of fact’ I said, ‘Did he take the cover off the receiver?’ Pause. Because we’re not supposed to. ‘Yes.’ And this, this thing is, it’s in a steel box and there’s a, well a primary sleeve comes out. You put your hand in —
SC: Yeah.
JR: And you can operate the gate control and the what not on the, in the set.
SC: Yes.
JR: But that’s all you can do.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But you can take the box off and get at it you see.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I said, ‘has the drill sergeant been? And he’s opened it?’ ‘Yeah. Yes.’ Reluctantly it came out. I said, ‘Well, if you look in you’ll find that a plug marked DR will not be in properly.’
SC: Right.
JR: And, and of course the set was a distance away. And he come back and he said, ‘You’re a blooming marvel,’ He said, ‘This thing wasn’t pushed it in. He put it and everything worked perfectly.
SC: Wow.
JR: And they thought I was marvellous.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And it was one of the simplest forms that you could imagine.
SC: Yeah.
JR: You know. But they, but my, my fame — not fame. My —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Soared you know. They thought I was great.
SC: Yes. Your status. Yeah.
JR: Oh yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yes. But I think I was the first to see Window.
SC: Oh right.
JR: I may. I may be kidding myself here.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But we’d heard about it.
SC: Yeah.
JR: We got the name Window.
SC: Yeah.
JR: You know what I’m talking about.
SC: I do. The chaff. I’m just going to put that down like that.
JR: Yes. That’s what they called it. Yes.
SC: Yes.
JR: Well, we’d heard about it and I was stationed at the time. I was stationed in Norfolk.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I’ll tell you where. I was stationed with, funnily enough I was with the 469 Battery in, in Devon.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they were raised in East Ham. And in Norfolk I was with the 47 Battery. 470 Battery. Raised in West Ham. And it contained practically the whole of West Ham football team.
SC: Wow.
JR: Oh they were football mad. Oh. And oh yes it was. They called me out. I was, I was sleeping actually. They woke me up. They were working and they said, ‘We’ve got — something’s daft.’ And I went and had a look at it and the radar was just one mass of [unclear] You know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Just a green. I said, ‘You know what this is don’t you? You’ve trained it. You’re all —’ ‘What is it?’ ‘It’s Window.’ And I think it was the first occasion that the Germans used it.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I think probably I was the first person to see it.
SC: Wow.
JR: And that was in Norfolk actually. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And it was Window. And they went into the action the, how you deal with Window and all the rest of it.
SC: And how do you deal with it?
JR: Well, you can’t actually because the radar is just picking up all these little bits.
SC: All the, yeah
JR: You just can’t. You, there are various things one can do. I mean, for instance the original jamming what they did is they picked up the radar signals and they broadcast on the same frequency from a set. The same frequency as the previous, so instead of getting the beep on your radar set you got just a mass of —
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: But we worked out a system. Pressed the switch and JL it was. Anti-jamming. And actually you got a better signal. You only got that one signal.
SC: Right.
JR: From, from that that particular aeroplane.
SC: Wow.
JR: So, it didn’t work really did it? Really.
SC: No.
JR: But with Window what can you do with that?
SC: Yeah.
JR: Little bits of metal. Aluminium foil and there were just aeroplanes all over the show.
SC: Yeah. Yes.
JR: And I said, ‘It’s Window. Do you know what you do now?’ ‘Ah,’ but it, I think it was the first time they’d done anything.
SC: They’d seen —
JR: The first time I’d seen. And I think it was probably the first time it was used in this country.
SC: Right.
JR: And I was probably the first to spot it. I don’t know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I may be kidding myself there.
SC: And that would have been 1941 or 1942.
JR: Oh no. It would be ’43.
SC: ’43.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: So how long were you at Clovelly?
JR: Only months. And then I went, I went on a course and when I got back I found my, my company was in Callington but they’d provided these various batteries with people.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I was one. So when I got back I’d been replaced of course. And I got, went to another Battery. 335 Battery at [pause] where was 335 Battery?
SC: Was it still in Devon?
JR: Yeah. But South Molton.
SC: South Molton.
JR: That was it. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Oh yeah. South Molton. Yeah.
Other: Dad you started as a, as a Home Guard.
JR: Oh, I was a Home Guard for a year before I went in the army. Yeah.
SC: Right. Tell us a little bit about that.
JR: Oh. Well, 1940 I was [pause] no I was seventeen in ‘40, I was seventeen and late May came. And we got all the tools and the Germans ran over us in France. Belgium and France and whatnot. And Holland. And, and Dunkirk happened and all the rest of it. Oh dear. And I’ll tell you this. I don’t know what it’s worth but we were in dire trouble. We’d been beaten. Kicked out of the continent. Dunkirk had happened and all the rest of it. But people still thought we’d win the war.
SC: Yes.
JR: You know. I can’t. There was no [pause] yeah. Yeah.
SC: No question.
JR: No. No. No. It was we’d go on and win the war.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And anyway where was I?
SC: Joining the Home Guard.
JR: Oh yes. The, the, there was all the troubles and what not and Anthony Eden broadcast on the wireless broadcast and he said we’re forming this. Calling it the Local Defence Volunteers.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And he said we want men between the ages of seventeen and sixty to apply at the police stations and join. So I rushed up to the police station and there was a crowd of other people there and the policeman comes in, ‘What’s going on?’ He had no idea of course. So he said ‘Well, I’ll get your names.’ Got a sheet of paper out and got the names. We became the Local Defence Volunteers. Later called the Home Guard. And we were, I think we could be quite be effective. We were obviously, people don’t realise that they’d, we’d be mopped up by a determined enemy. I mean a disciplined force would soon sort us out. But of course you’d delay them.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And in a war delay is dangerous.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: And so it did matter. But anyway —
SC: That was local was it?
JR: Oh yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. And I was in that for a year before I went in the army myself then.
SC: And did you train quite regularly?
JR: Oh yes. Yeah. Oh yes. And uniformed and all the rest of it. Yes.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And my first uniform was an armband [laughs]
SC: Yeah.
JR: But then we got, we did get uniform then proper.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And armed too. We got armed with American rifles.
SC: Right.
JR: .303. Three hundred. .300 rifles.
SC: Right.
JR: Similar to British P-14s. They were called P-17s and they fired, as I say .300 rimless cartridges. Yeah. So we had those and we [pause] well we’d have delayed the enemy. That said we would have done the job. And then I got called into the army.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I was, I finished up in the Ordnance Corps and trained to be a radar man. Which we didn’t call it radar then. It was radio location.
SC: Yes.
JR: But [pause] and, and I particularly did searchlight control and light warning in [pause] where did we do that? That was in Bury.
SC: Yeah.
JR: In Lancashire.
JR: And I was, I was posted to the second. The 2nd Anti-aircraft Workshop at Callington in Cornwall. And when I got there I was only there hours and I was packed off to be the resident at the 469 Battery. ‘A’ troop headquarters at Clovelly.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: And I was there for some while. Some months. Saw a bit of action there and whatnot. But —
SC: Tell me about the action that you saw there.
JR: Well, one of the actions was there was a dinghy. Aircraft in the, from an aircraft in the sea off Hartland and they, they had the searchlight on it all through the night.
SC: Right.
JR: Until they could be rescued. And, and I know that the searchlight at Hartland it wasn’t on the point exactly but it was near there. The searchlight. And it, it lit up the dingy until they could be rescued.
SC: Right.
JR: And I know that they ran out of [pause] you know searchlights is it’s an arc lamp.
SC: It’s an arc. Yeah.
JR: And I think, is it the negative pole burns down?
SC: Yes. One of them does.
JR: You have to wind it up.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And actually there’s an automatic one. It, you know feeds up.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But they ran out of carbons to burn them out. So they had to fetch a fresh lot, you know.
SC: A fresh lot of —
JR: Yeah.
SC: Rush them out to them because they were using them up.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Keeping these people illuminated.
SC: Because they would last about two hours I read somewhere.
JR: I don’t know how long they’d last now.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But, but they get used up.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they had to send some out especially, you know. There was no emergency because they said, ‘We’re running out of carbons, send some more,’ you know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And someone would go out. No bother. But because they were using them up because they were illuminating these people.
SC: All night.
JR: All night. Yeah.
SC: Did they rescue them?
JR: Oh they rescued them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: It took a while.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And, yeah I remember that happening. Yeah.
SC: And was it in Clovelly that you, you did the, you were telling me earlier about the lights of the day and the verey lights. And you —
JR: Oh yes. That’s everywhere you see.
SC: You did that everywhere.
JR: What happens is they — every day a searchlight detachment. A dispatch rider would come by motorbike and give you the slip of paper which was the letters of the day and each hour they changed. The combination changes you know. Red, yellow, blue, green, white.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And no black [laughs]
SC: No.
JR: And these these these would be fired out of the aeroplane.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they’d let you know they wanted help with the homing beam. And your homing beam was your, your searchlight was always pointing at the — you’d leave it so that the searchlight is pointing at some special place.
SC: Yeah.
JR: As I say when I was at Devon it was Chivenor which was the local aerodrome.
SC: Aerodrome.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And what happens is the man on the lug arm which was, as you know a number four. He [pause] three times like that.
SC: Make it go up and down. Yeah.
JR: Then lays it not, not horizontal but close to horizontal.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Pointing for then, you know after a half minute does it again.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And of course the others are doing it so the aircraft knows he’s got to go there.
SC: Yeah.
JR: There would be help there. You know.
SC: Yes.
JR: But and I remember the first thousand bomber raid and apparently they sent everything over and stuff coming back had got no navigation equipment and all the rest of it.
SC: Yeah.
JR: There was no end of appeals for homing beams.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And the RAF always insisted that pilots who have asked for help must go around and thank the —
SC: The searchlight crew.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And the searchlight crews obviously entertained them. Gave them tea.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And of course as one was, as one crew was, aircrew was going out another one was coming in because there were so many that had been helped and they ran out of tea, I know. But the army rose to the occasion and there was extra tea ration.
SC: More tea.
JR: And all was well but that’s how things were you know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And of course because the RAF insisted every aeroplane that is, that is helped the crew goes around and thanks.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: The result that the men on the ground know that this is vital.
SC: Yes.
JR: And we used to be in competition. If, see the letters of the day come down. Then the sentry on duty at night he hammers on the hut which wakes the Number 5 been designated and he’s still dressed. He’s asleep in bed.
SC: But dressed.
JR: But dressed.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And number 9. The sentry then hammers on the hut, wakes him up and rushes off to the Lister or whatever it is. The Lister generator.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And Swings it. Gets it going.
SC: Yeah.
JR: It’s a hundred yards away. And number 5 gets out. Whoever’s been designated number 5 gets up and he’s dressed. And he goes out to the Lister’s working, switches on and it’s always pointing. Left pointing at the —
SC: At the aerodrome.
JR: And so it gives the homing beam.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And the aeroplane said thank you very much and off he goes, you see.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And it works.
SC: It works.
JR: Oh yeah. Yeah. And of course it works because the crew come around. They say, ‘Thank you ever so —'
SC: Yeah.
JR: ‘You were a great help.’
SC: Yeah.
JR: And —
SC: I’m sure that saved many lives.
JR: Oh yeah. I’m sure it did.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I’m sure. Yeah. Yeah. Because apparently the thousand bomber raids were, I won’t say we were particularly but going out in to the Atlantic having flown over Britain you know, didn’t know where they were.
SC: Really.
JR: Because Britain was black.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I mean everywhere. People won’t realise this but there was black out and —
SC: It really meant completely black.
JR: It was dark. Oh God. You could get lost.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Oh you could.
Other: Did you fetch them back out of the Atlantic then?
JR: Beg your pardon?
Other: Did you fetch them back from —
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Apparently they were going, flying over Britain, ‘Come on back here. This is the way.’ And it worked. Simple system but it worked.
SC: Yeah. Simple but it worked.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: So how many were there in a searchlight — do you call it a team or a battery? Or a —
JR: It’s a detachment.
SC: A detachment.
JR: And the detachment, a searchlight detachment is usually twelve men. It varies. And of course everybody could do everybody’s job.
SC: Yeah.
JR: You know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But they have a normal operation. They, they had the specified job.
SC: Yeah.
JR: So number was the detachment commander. What’s number two? God. Two and three. Four. What’s number four? Number four’s on the lug arm —
SC: Right.
JR: This is on the left of the searchlight.
SC: Yeah.
JR: See, I met two kinds of searchlight. The ninety centimetre and the hundred and fifty. And the hundred and fifty was mounted on. And was usually mobile.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Funny story about that [pause] I was — the searchlight it’s, you know it’s got to move up and down like that.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And it turns around. Now, there is a device on it. It’s a piece that’s loose. It’s fastened but loosely to the chassis. And it comes up and it fits. Fits around the pin on the searchlight. Put a pin in. And it holds the searchlight. I forgot to put it in and climbed on top of the searchlight and it tilted. Push it in, it’s a hell of a height. And I, and I hung on to the radar aerials. The radio aerials.
SC: Yeah.
JR: The jagis and hung on and she tipped up completely. And I found myself hanging there and on the end about eighteen inches off the ground and I just dropped off.
SC: Right. Just dropped down.
JR: But it’s quite a height. It’s — but when it swung over I was alright because I was hanging on. But I never did that mistake again.
SC: Yeah. No.
JR: Make sure you’ve —
SC: You’ve put the pin in.
JR: The pin in. Yeah. Yeah. And —
SC: So did you have a specialist job in that team? What number were you?
JR: I wasn’t in it. No.
SC: No. You were —
JR: I was just the radar mechanic.
SC: You were the radar mechanic.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Right.
JR: And I had —
SC: Yeah.
JR: I was with the, usually in the back with the troop headquarters.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I went out to them.
SC: Oh you went to lots of different ones.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I’m trying to think of things that, that happened there. Yes. I remember as I say once we got trouble. As I was having my hair cut. I remember I was having my hair cut. I got half way through it and I’d got to go on the telephone. A the field telephone it was.
Other: I think you’ve already had that story.
JR: Have I told it? Oh God. I get like that.
SC: That’s, that’s when you thought you were a superstar.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Because you got that. You knew how to fix it.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. It worked very well that did.
SC: Yeah.
JR: My reputation soared.
SC: Yes.
Other: Dad. Dad. You know you went to Glasgow. You were telling me a bit of a story about the landladies there.
JR: Landladies?
Other: Yeah. And how you got kicked out of a, out of a boarding house because some others would pay more money.
JR: Oh yeah. Yeah. That was it. We were in civvy digs in Glasgow. Me and another. Actually a Nottingham fellow.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Excuse me.
SC: Do you remember whereabouts in Glasgow?
JR: Yeah. Because many years later we went on holiday in Scotland and we were on a bus trip and we went down and I said, ‘We’re on Great Western Road.’ And we came down. I said, ‘I lived there. In that,’ and I pointed at the window of the room that I was in.
SC: Yeah. And what road was that?
JR: We were coming down Great Western Road.
SC: Great Western Road.
JR: And the street we were on was Rupert Street and we were number 5 so it was at the end. Of course all apartments you know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I said, ‘There’s my window. My bedroom window,’ as we went by.
SC: And then what happened? You got —
JR: Oh yeah.
SC: You were in civvy.
JR: Well what happened is that we used to go [pause] we were, were as I say in civvy digs and we’d got training at [pause] actually it was in the Electrical Trades Institute where were going to lectures. But we were being trained and we used, we used to go back. Me and Ken. He was a Nottingham lad. Came from off Derby Road. He [pause] he and I used to go back to our digs for a mid-day meal.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Very good it was. They were good digs they were. But when we were having them there was also a couple of sergeants came and had their meal as well. And our landlady found that these sergeants were in digs with a friend of hers which is why she had them for the mid-day meal.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And the sergeants would give the landlady a few shillings out of their own pocket. Apart from what the army paid.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And of course we didn’t. And she thought she’d rather have these sergeants. So, I don’t know what happened but, but we were hustled out and, and in trouble for it. I don’t know why. But we were in trouble for it.
SC: Right.
JR: Oh no. It didn’t matter much. I mean nothing, nothing untoward but —
SC: Yeah.
JR: But we went into, well compared with them they were terrible digs actually but it just shows you how it can be.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But you survive.
SC: And what kind of training did you do in Glasgow?
JR: Well, we did the basic. It was the basic. Teaching people. First of all they had to teach some arithmetic and stuff like that. And mathematics.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And there was, and then there was electrical stuff. All manner of electrical stuff.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But it was basically electrical stuff and you had civilian lecturers and what not. And then we went to an army school and I went to one in Bury. In Lowercroft Camp, Bury and we learned the radar there.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I did searchlight control and light warning.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And with the result that when I was posted from there I went to a search, to an ack ack company that dealt with searchlights.
SC: Yeah.
JR: So I was on searchlights.
SC: Yes.
JR: And I was [pause] I was with the 469 Battery and then I went. I went to Leicester on a course. When I got back I found I’d been transferred to the 335 Battery which was near South Molton.
SC: Yeah.
JR: In Devon.
SC: Yeah.
JR: The same regiment actually. And then I went on, went on another course and back to Bury and had a course there. And found out I’d been transferred from the 2nd ack ack company at Cannington to one at Norwich.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And when I went there I was posted out to a site at East Walton in Norfolk. On the King’s Estate in Sandringham.
SC: Oh right. Yeah.
JR: And it, well. Sorry. No, that’s not. No. No. And that was a troop headquarters again and one of my sites that I had was on the King’s Estate.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Sandringham.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I looked after searchlights there, you see. For a while. And that was interesting because the site I was on was actually American. American equipment, Sperry.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Quite different. And all the instructions were in French.
SC: Right. Why would it be in French?
JR: Because it had been ordered by the Americans err by the French from America.
SC: From America.
JR: But of course it had been intercepted when France fell.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And, and we took it on, you see.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But as I say everything, what was it, the petrol was l’essence. You know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: When you had to put petrol in and all the rest of it. But —
SC: Petrol in the generator. Yeah.
JR: Yeah. When it worked.
SC: Yeah.
Other: Is that where you lived in a stable?
JR: No. No. No. We lived in a Nissen hut.
Other: But you did live in a place where there was —
JR: Well, yes. I was at Chepstow. In this, on the racecourse there.
SC: Right.
JR: Used to run around the racecourse and beat any horse [laughs] Yeah.
SC: So you did proper army fatigues.
JR: Oh yeah. Yeah.
SC: And training.
JR: Really fit.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah. And that was at Chepstow and you were actually in more or less stable.
JR: Oh. In the stables.
SC: In the stables.
JR: Billeted in the stables. It was interesting because the stables had wooden partitions when we started but they finished because we had stoves but we ripped the wooden partitions out to burn them.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. It was winter. It was cold. But yeah.
SC: And do, do you remember any other incidents with the radar? Because it was a lot of American bases in East Anglia.
JR: Well, as I say I was in East Anglia [pause] And then I, and then I was posted to Hucknall wasn’t I? Yeah.
SC: So how long did you stay around Norwich and in Norfolk?
JR: Oh only months.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I remember going on [pause] I didn’t have the same leave as the, as the Royal Artillery members you see.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And because I, I mean I had to be replaced by another person before I wanted leave.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And so I remember going. Having a weekend leave. Just a weekend. And I got back on Sunday night and I had to walk from King’s Lynn to East Walton where my headquarter — I don’t know. About fifteen miles I think it was.
SC: Gosh.
JR: Something like that. And I remember it so well because something’s going on. I stopped. Somebody, somebody following me.
SC: Right. Yeah.
JR: And when I got to, back to the head, to the troop headquarters where I was stationed it was a local bobby. And he’s followed me. And he said, and I’d been handed over by another and the bobbies were in the background. I didn’t know. I got the, there was somebody there. Someone following. But it was a bobby.
SC: Just checking up on you.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: What am I up to?
SC: Yeah.
JR: At, you know, I think it was about two or something like that in the morning.
SC: Yeah.
JR: What am I up to?
SC: Yeah.
JR: They didn’t interfere but they —
SC: No.
JR: But they were there.
SC: Yes.
JR: You know, you think to yourself my God. Because some of them. I remember at that place there was a local bobby came and told one of them off. He’d been, he’d spotted a wounded pheasant and he was after it. But the local land owner had also known about it and he was, and they came face to face. So he said, ‘What’s your name,’ and all the — and the local bobby came. He said, ‘He’ll be delighted that you’d told him the truth of where you were and all the rest of it, and I’ll go back and report to him. He’d be delighted that you’d done so.’
SC: Yeah.
JR: And he said, ‘Now look. If you’re doing poaching this is how you do it,’ [laughs] and he gave him a lecture in how to poach.
SC: How to poach.
JR: [laughs] The local bobby. Oh dear.
SC: Yeah.
JR: That was at East, I was stationed at East Walton then.
SC: Yeah.
Other: You weren’t always in this country though were you?
JR: Beg your pardon?
Other: You weren’t always in this country were you?
JR: Oh no. No. No. I went to India.
SC: How did that come about?
JR: Well, I said can I serve abroad?
SC: Yeah.
JR: I don’t know how they deal with it but eventually, I was stationed at Hemel Hempstead at the time and eventually I was posted back to my [pause] I was temporarily attached to the 24th or was it the 15th Workshop in Northampton. And then they moved to Hemel Hempstead. I was at Hemel Hempstead. In the workshops there. We were opposite Brocks Fireworks. The little huts where, you know trenches and huts.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Everything was very separate, you know. You were —
SC: Yeah.
JR: If you had an explosion they’d just blow.
SC: One small —
JR: One small place and only one person.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they were opposite. And they were always banging and there was fireworks going off all the time and they were working with fireworks that we used in the services you know.
SC: Yes.
JR: Things like that. But they were banging and shouting all the time with them. Rather — when we were in Northampton we were next door to a factory that made Sten guns.
SC: Right.
JR: So we’d always hear Sten guns firing all the time.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Oh dear.
SC: So you went from Hemel Hempstead and that’s when you went over to India.
JR: Yeah. Yeah, well I was posted back to my Workshop which was at Arminghall in [pause] next to Norwich and then I found several of us had been posted to Hucknall actually of all places. Hucknall.
SC: Just up the road.
JR: And we were in a unit that were destined for overseas. And we, we got together. Formed a new unit. 469 ABS. Advanced Base Workshops. And we, we were in, in Hucknall for some weeks. You know, messing about. Playing about.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And then we were all loaded on to a train. We finished up at Gourock. On board a ship. And then the next thing we — oh God. Cold. Back up to the Arctic Circle and away in the mid-Atlantic. You know. In a convoy.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And then we sailed. Went to India.
SC: So what route did you take to get to India? You went on a troop ship was it? Or a —
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah. So you went out into the Atlantic.
JR: Yeah.
SC: And then down.
JR: And we went to Gibraltar.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Got in to Gibraltar. I think we took oil on at Gibraltar. And then we went down to Africa, around Africa and over to India.
SC: Oh you went all the way down.
JR: Oh, the Med would be out of the question at that time.
SC: Of course.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Although, I think they did clear it finally.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But we and we went, sailed to India. Called in at Bombay. “Welcome to India but mum’s the word.” You know, six foot high letters on the big warehouse. “Welcome to India but mum’s the word.”
SC: “Mum’s the word.” Wow.
JR: Yeah. You know. You remember that.
SC: So you got to Bombay. And then where did you go from there?
JR: We went to a place called [unclear] That was a, I suppose a transit camp of some kind. And that was interesting. Talk about futility. I was, I was given a duty. There were four of us. We were taken by lorry out into a desert. And there was a basha which is, it’s just pillars with a roof. No, no walls. And on it was a, and it was an iron stove. And alongside there was this tower, wooden tower about thirty feet high I should imagine with a ladder. And it was a top and six eight foot square. Like a boxing ring. And you climbed it and you were there and you were a fire guard. But we had no communication. We had, didn’t even have a flag let alone telephone or wireless or anything. And no transport. We were taken out there by a lorry. Dropped. And there was a man cooked food on the stove and then got on his bike and went somewhere. [unclear] And you could see lights in the far distance from some arrangement or other. But there was nothing. And how we got in touch with people I don’t know. It was just one of those futile, futile things.
SC: And what was your job?
JR: Just to look. See there were no fires about.
SC: Right.
JR: Well what was on fire in the desert I don’t know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: We could see tents in the defence. And — [laughs]
SC: Yeah. And how long did you do that for?
JR: That was just a night.
SC: Just a night.
JR: That was.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But we were there before we went to, we went to, Bangalore was our station then. That was nice in Bangalore.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Camped on the polo ground.
SC: Right. Wow. And what did you do there?
JR: Nothing really. It was just, we were just there. It’s the old, old business that sometimes there’s nothing doing but the fact that you’re there.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I always remember a friend of mine was [pause] he was called up and he did his training in the air force and then they kept him on for about an extra six months.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But it was the [pause] was it the Suez Crisis or something? About 1950 or something like that.
SC: The early ‘50s. Yeah.
JR: And he said, he said, ‘We were there doing nothing.’ Like this. I said, ‘You were there.’
SC: Yeah.
JR: Which is better than being at home and all the rest of it. You’re —
SC: Yeah.
JR: You’re mobilised ready.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Whatever may come, you know. But I mean he was there languishing. Doing nothing. What he thought.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But of course he’s, he’s mustered ready.
SC: Yeah.
JR: You know. He’s available.
SC: Yes.
JR: When you’re at home you’re hardly available are you?
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. But yeah.
SC: So how did you get on with the food in India? In Bangalore.
JR: Oh we had, we had British food mostly.
SC: Right. And did you have, have your own charwallah?
JR: Oh yeah. We — when we were in India there was four of us in a tent. Big tent. Four, four charpoys. Charpoys are beds.
SC: Yeah.
JR: They’re just this wooden frame on wooden legs and rope. Criss cross rope. You know. Diamonds. Criss cross across.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And then some up to form a pillow kind of thing. And four of these in the tent and we were the, on the end line, second from the top and it was a bit of a hill. And I remember the rain came. We’d got to dig trenches. Oh that was hard going. It was hard. Bit of a job. Gave it up, you know. We were lying on the bed. A bit of a rain. And then we were lying on the bed in the afternoon and hearing shouts and curses. Looked out and we were at the top. We were second row down. The end one. And the ground sloped away. And down below there were men working like mad digging trenches because the place was flooded.
SC: Because it was flooded.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: So they tried to divert the rainwater.
JR: I, and I remember, I tell people and we were in a little tent. Two of us. And we’d got a double charpoy and the top bunk was only about this high. The bottom one down there. You know. Just room.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And both men lying on top of the, with all their kit because the tent was underwater. Well, the water was, when you looked out you see just see nothing but water. No land at all. You see people could, I know it’s only about eighteen inches deep but they’re you know in dips. People could easily get drowned, you know.
SC: Yeah. So this must have been during the monsoon.
JR: Monsoon. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. But — yeah.
SC: Do you remember anything else that happened whilst you were in Bangalore?
JR: Not really. I remember taking part in a, in a cross country run.
SC: Yeah.
JR: About three or four miles. I did quite well in it. We left the Americans standing. They were fat.
SC: Well, that’s [laughs] stayed the same then.
JR: Yeah. But the Nigerians beat us.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Oh God, they could run.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I had great fun.
SC: Yeah. And did you actually do a radar mechanic job whilst you were there?
JR: No.
SC: No.
JR: It’s the old old business. The army has a schedule. A unit has this. And one of them is to have two radar mechanics for this and you make up the numbers. And you find out there’s no equipment like that. There’s no equipment like that in India. The whole of India.
SC: Right.
JR: So what job have you got?
SC: Yeah.
JR: And eventually I found myself running the workshop control.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Because not knowing the job and I I found myself in this job running the workshop. Well, when I say running the workshop I mean the control of work through it.
SC: Yeah. So what did that, what did you do for that?
JR: Well, people would come in. Want this job doing.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And you know, someone, the Royal Engineer’s would have a pump and it’s you know the bearings shot or something like that so we would fix it up with bearings.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And give that back to them. And then I would see, they’d come to me first and, just to do the — and I don’t know. So it gets —
SC: Completed.
JR: Completed properly.
SC: And fixed.
JR: And you’re in control —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Of it you know. You know what’s happening.
SC: Yeah.
[Doorbell. Recording paused]
SC: Anywhere from Bangalore in India or did you stay there?
JR: Well, I went to Madras.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And places, villages, you know between Bangalore and Madras. And then the war ended.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we found ourselves off to Singapore.
SC: Right.
JR: So I finished up in Singapore.
SC: So this was when the war ended.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Against — in Europe.
JR: Yeah. But then ended some months later against Japan.
SC: Against Japan.
JR: Yeah. And we were, we were preparing for the war like invasion of Malaya.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we were water-proofing everything to make a landing in Malaya. I presume it was Malaya anyway.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we did actually make a landing in Malaya. More or less as planned.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I think. And I finished up at Singapore in Malaya. I was there for about a year actually.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I worked out the [pause] I did actually. Yes. Worked out the workshop arrangements and did, did well like that.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah.
SC: And you were there for a year in Singapore.
JR: Yeah. That’s right. Yeah. Just about a year we were there.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Then I came home. I came home to —
SC: How did you get back home? Also on a ship?
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: We were, we were on the, sorry we were on the ship called the Andes. The south, it was the Royal Mail Line down to normally between Southampton and South America. But it was a hired trooper you know. We were, we were on the, on the Andes. And she made a splendid trip back from — about sixteen days back from Singapore when we were coming home. Quite quick.
SC: And did you come back through the Mediterranean?
JR: Yeah. Yes.
SC: You did.
JR: By that time —
SC: Through the Suez Canal.
JR: [unclear]
SC: Yeah.
JR: And whatnot. Yeah. Yeah. We came up. I remember the Med. It was a terrible storm. You could see, actually see the ship twisting.
SC: Gosh.
JR: A dreadful storm. And people were sick all over. The new people who had come on at Port Said. RAF. There was a big contingent of RAF joined us at Port Said. They were being sick all over the place. We were accustomed to the motion.
SC: Yeah.
JR: It was dreadful that was. It was terrible storm it was. I mean you could see the ship twisting.
Other: Is that where they, where was it where they turned the ship around?
JR: Oh that was, that was going to India. And I don’t know, we were in the middle of the ocean and it was stifling. And the captain turned the ship around and sailed the other way for half an hour to get some air into the ship.
SC: Wow.
JR: Dreadful it was.
SC: It was a very long route that you took.
JR: Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Around the Horn of Africa.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Around the —
JR: Well the Med wasn’t safe.
SC: Safe. Yeah.
JR: But I remember coming home. It was Christmas Eve at, in Aden and the RAF came out in launches and went around the boat singing carols.
SC: Wow.
JR: Aden. And now it’s a free country isn’t it?
SC: Yes.
JR: Yeah.
Other: Have you mentioned Burma?
JR: Eh?
Other: Have you mentioned Burma?
JR: Well I was only there for a short while. That was all. It was visiting. That was all.
SC: Was that before Singapore?
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Right.
JR: But —
SC: So you went from Bangalore.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: To Burma.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: And what part of Burma were you?
JR: Oh only, only in the [pause] I’m not sure whether its India actually. Chittagong.
SC: Chittagong.
JR: I’m not sure whether it’s in Burma or not. It’s there anyway.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah. And then you went from Chittagong to —
JR: Back to [pause] back to — no. We weren’t at Bangalore. Back to — near, it was somewhere near — what’s that port? Madras. Near Madras.
SC: Near Madras.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And went there and my unit split up into what was called SMP Ship’s Maintenance Parties. And there would be parties of two or four people on landing ships and what not.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Going out all over the place.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And funny enough because many years later we were on holiday in Sutton on Sea and a fella comes with a family there and he’s friendly with the people who are in digs next to us. Anyway, and I said to this fella ‘Your friend’s a Scotsman’. He said, ‘Yeah.’ I said, ‘I know him.’ He was a Scotsman. We chatted and he, he, I said, ‘I know. I remember. You came back from a Ship’s Maintenance Party.’ I said, ‘I debriefed you.’
SC: Gosh.
JR: ‘Yes. You did. Yes. Yes. Yes.’ And oh yes. Yes. So we, you know it’s interesting. As I say you meet these people and many years later you recognise them and oh.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I’ve met one, two, three, four, five. I’ve met half a dozen people that I was in that unit with.
SC: Wow.
JR: Strange. A unit of about six hundred men from all over the country and I’ve met about six of them since.
SC: Since. Yeah.
JR: Yeah. In funny places.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: I was, immediately the first year I was demobbed it would be forty — it would be ’47 and I went to the Isle of Man on a holiday. And it was, I went on the night boat and it was bitterly cold so I went down in the bar to warm up. And the bar was one of these rectangular ones. Came out and around you know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I sat in a corner here and I looked across and in the identical corner was the old sergeant major. And he said he couldn’t make do in Civvy Street. He was going to join up again.
SC: Really.
JR: Yeah. He said, he said, ‘If I do it quickly,’ he said, ‘They’ll post me back to the old unit.’
SC: Right.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Small world.
JR: Yeah.
Other: Where did you have the POWs working in the workshop dad?
JR: India. We had a lot of Italian prisoners of war.
SC: Italian. Right.
JR: But when [pause] when Italy joined the, joined with us they become not prisoners of war. They became Surrendered Personnel.
SC: Right.
JR: That was a change of name.
SC: Right. I didn’t know that.
JR: From POWs to SPs.
SC: Right.
JR: Surrendered personnel.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we had a number of them working. Vechi was the one I remember most. And he’d been captured in North Africa and he’d never been home since 1935.
SC: Gosh.
JR: He’d been in the invasion of Malaya err of [pause] what’s the place? Abyssinia.
SC: Abyssinia.
JR: In 1935. And he’d never been home. And this was 1945 would it be? Yeah. It would be ’45. He’d never been home. Never seen his girlfriend for ten years.
SC: Ten years. Gosh.
JR: And, Vechi his name was. I remember him. Spoke very good English. They had a very good canteen they did. Making their own drinks.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Their grappa and —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Oh yeah.
SC: And were there many of these surrendered personnel?
JR: Oh yes. There was quite a crowd of them there and we used them you see. And we were friends with them.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And this Vechi was a particular one. And we [pause] he was a particular friend. And it was so funny that was. We worked in, me and another fellow went from the unit which was on, camped on the polo ground. We went down to the 515 Command Workshop, Indian army and did some work there you see. And there was quite a number of these surrendered personnel in that place. And every now and again you’d suddenly hear someone singing opera. Italian you know.
SC: Wow.
JR: Aye. And beautiful singing too it was. Yeah. They were very good. And yeah. 515 Command Workshop. It was so funny because years later my [pause] I got my station superintendent and his wife were talking and they said something about it. I said, ‘Oh 515 Command Workshop.’ And they both were there you see.
SC: Wow.
JR: They said, ‘Well, I know it. On Brigade Road. Yeah. Yeah. I know it’. Yeah. I said, ‘I worked there for a while. Yeah.’ They were there for quite some time, you know. Met there and married. Yeah. Small world.
SC: It is. Yeah.
JR: I met half a dozen people that I knew in the army and my units I met in Nottingham sometimes.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Not necessarily from Nottingham but met a half a dozen which, you know considering the millions.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: Is quite good.
SC: How long did it take you to get back home from Singapore?
JR: Sixteen days.
SC: Sixteen days.
JR: It was, it was a record run by the Andes.
SC: Right.
JR: She was a fast ship. Belonged to the Royal Mail Lines down to South America.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And she was fast. And she, she made a very quick passage in sixteen days from Singapore to [pause] to — and I arrived home.
SC: Did you come back to Liverpool or Southampton?
JR: Pardon?
SC: Liverpool or Southampton.
JR: Southampton.
SC: Southampton.
JR: We got, we got, we arrived in Southampton and we stayed on the ship that night. We got off in the morning. Crossed. Crossed the dock and there was a train. And get in the train and we were off up to Farnborough was it? Somewhere like that.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I went into a room. They made me a book that I’d filled in. A book. And they were tearing pages out. Went around it and came out. Went in as a soldier, came out a civilian.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Still in uniform.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Then into a lorry to a clothing depot. Picked me clothes. I was allowed a suit, a raincoat, a hat, a tie, two shirts, two pairs of socks, a pair of shoes. I got them in a cardboard box.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And then I was put on the train. Came home. And I arrived home at quarter to midnight on the 31st of December.
SC: 1947?
JR: ‘6.
SC: ‘6. Yeah.
JR: And I saw the New Year in at home. Just.
SC: Wow. Just. Yeah.
JR: Yeah.
SC: And home was up here.
JR: Netherfield then I think. Yeah.
SC: Netherfield. Yeah.
JR: Yeah.
Other: Dad. Where —
JR: Yeah.
Other: Where did you get your injury?
JR: Oh. That was in Netherfield. Riding a bike in the blackout. You couldn’t see a thing and I ran into, they built brick air raid shelters, surface ones, on the road. And I was riding on this road and just went straight into, on a bike into the side of the wall.
SC: Into the side. Gosh.
JR: This piece of nose hanging out and whatnot.
SC: Gosh. Why did they build it there?
JR: All the doctor did was stick it back. Put some sticking plaster on.
SC: Really.
Other: I was just thinking that was your only war wound.
SC: Yeah.
Other: Cycling into an air raid shelter.
SC: Yeah.
Other: You’d think that they’d be a bit vulnerable stuck in the middle of a road.
SC: Yeah. It doesn’t seem a sensible place to put an air raid shelter but —
JR: Well, where did you put them?
SC: I don’t know. I suppose it’s the most obvious.
JR: Do you know the first air raid where we lived at Netherfield. I only found this out fairly recently. But do you remember where we lived there was that open space wasn’t there?
Other: Well, I can’t —
JR: On the corner of the street, the street there, one Cross street and this open corner.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I’d only learned recently that was full of houses. And they were all blown up in The Great War by, from, with a zeppelin.
SC: Gosh.
JR: Dropping bombs.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And I only learned that quite recently. I always wondered why is that open there?
SC: Yeah.
Other: Yeah.
JR: I mean in this as it were you know normal densely —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Housed place.
SC: Yeah.
JR: It used to be houses there but they were blown up.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: And as I say I only learned that quite recently.
SC: Yeah. Do you, since you left the army do you go to any reunions?
JR: No. I don’t.
SC: Or —
JR: I joined nothing and I’ve done no, no reunions or anything like that.
SC: But you’ve met a number of people over the years that you’ve —
JR: Yes. I’ve said I’ve met a number. I met two on Colliery Road in Nottingham. And they were both in my unit. Two different fellas. And then I was, I was on a trolley bus going down to Trent Bridge and I climbed up, up to the top deck and dropped to the seat and just there was the old armament sergeant major.
SC: Gosh.
JR: Fanny. His name was Adams. Nicknamed Fanny of course.
SC: Of course. Yeah.
JR: And, ‘Fanny. Hello.’ We had a few minutes. You know, swinging the lamp.
SC: Yeah.
JR: As it were. Yeah. Yeah. He lived in West Bridgford and he was going home and I was going to Trent Bridge on the trolley bus. He was going home.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Walked over Trent Bridge into West Bridgford and so ran into him. Yeah.
SC: And what did you do after the war? What job did you —
JR: Oh, I went to the power station. Became, finally became station chemist at the power station.
SC: Gosh. At, at one of the local power stations.
JR: Yeah. Nottingham.
SC: Nottingham.
JR: Yeah. It’s not there.
SC: Right.
JR: It’s been knocked down.
SC: Yeah.
JR: These thirty years back.
SC: I was just thinking of Normanton on Soar as the only power station I could think of. But —
JR: Normanton. That’s, that’s —
SC: That’s way over to —
JR: Ratcliffe.
SC: Ratcliffe. Ratcliffe on Soar. Sorry. Yes.
JR: Well, there was one at Nottingham.
SC: Was there?
JR: Yeah. And next door to the colliery on Colliery Road.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Which of course is now part of the ring road isn’t it?
SC: Right.
JR: Yeah.
SC: And you worked there.
JR: And there is a, is a, it’s called Electricity Road or something like that. I don’t know but —
SC: Yeah.
JR: There was a power station there. Yeah.
SC: Right.
JR: And I was there.
SC: Right. Burning coal. Burning presumably coal. Local coal.
JR: Coal burning. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: In fact we took, we had the colliery next door. We took all their output apart from twenty five tons of coal a week which used to go down to Coventry, I think. I think some place in Coventry wanted that particular coal.
SC: Really.
JR: It suited them and they had twenty five tons a week.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But we had all the rest.
SC: Yeah.
JR: We had our own coal waggons that were filled in in the colliery. Came around on to our side and sent empty. And back again. And some of them made two or three trips a day.
SC: Yeah.
JR: You know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we had all their output. What would it be? About twenty thousand tonnes of coal a week. Something like that.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. I think it was. Yeah.
SC: And what did you start at the power station as?
JR: Chemist.
SC: As a chemist. You started as a chemist.
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: Yeah. And you stayed working there.
JR: Yeah. I started as assistant chemist. I finished up as the station chemist.
SC: The station chemist.
JR: Yeah.
Other: Dad were you in the power station before the war though?
JR: Oh yeah. Yeah.
Other: So, in actual fact you went —
JR: The station was built in 1925.
Other: Yeah. So you went back to the power station.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yes. The power station was there. You could see it and see it was a power station. In fact at the Festival of Britain they brought out a catalogue for the Festival of Britain 1951.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Anniversary centenary of the [pause] of the London, of the —
Other: Great Exhibition.
JR: Great Exhibition.
SC: The Great Exhibition. Yes.
JR: 1951. And they brought out a book and the chapter on power was headed by a picture of Nottingham Power Station.
SC: Nottingham.
JR: Because it looked like a power station then.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. Now power stations look as though they are just a box.
SC: Yes.
JR: With a chimney.
SC: Proper chimneys.
JR: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But that looked like a power station actually.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And so I was there. Yes. Finished up as station chemist.
SC: Yeah. And you retired. Do you remember what year? Or roughly.
JR: Yeah. ’81.
SC: ’81. Yeah.
JR: It was the 31st of May 1981.
SC: So you’ve been retired for —
JR: Yeah.
SC: Thirty.
JR: I’ve got used to it now.
SC: You got used to it.
JR: Well, actually I got used to it by coffee time on the Monday after the Friday. Yeah.
SC: Good for you.
JR: I was made redundant.
SC: Right.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Yes. In effect I was made redundant. I didn’t need to have been but [pause] I would have likely to have been seconded off to somewhere else.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And travelling in the winter. I thought no. So, make me, you know. So they gave me a nice package to finish with and —
SC: Yeah.
JR: And made me redundant.
SC: Yeah.
JR: How old was I? Fifty seven when I retired. So, you know, it’s not bad.
SC: That’s great. Yeah.
JR: And the earlier you retire the longer you live.
SC: Yeah.
JR: So what am I now?
Other: You’re ninety three, Dad.
JR: Ninety three.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I think I’ll last till ninety four.
SC: Yeah. When will that be? When will you be —
JR: February. Yeah. February.
SC: Oh right. Yeah.
Other: When did you see the, from Hucknall the plane flying over and you had a word with your friend? You know. About the [pause] you queried what was going on.
JR: I know what you mean. I had a good friend who lived in Watnall Road in Hucknall and he was, worked for Rolls Royce. Aero engines. You know.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And there used to be an aeroplane. It was a wartime business.
SC: Yeah.
JR: 1941. And I’ve seen it on the internet actually. I don’t know whether you could drag it up and look. 1941. And there used to be a [pause] a Wellington. That’s it. A Wellington. And it used to be going around the, circling around, around well home. Around here. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Doing big circles.
SC: Yes.
JR: Coming over. And it was funny because it got something, instead of a gun turret at the back it had got some funny contraption and sometimes you could see smoke coming from it. And I saw my friend Bill Allen who as I say was worked for Rolls Royce. He was apprenticed at Rolls Royce in Hucknall and I said to him, rather interesting, I said to him, ‘I’ve seen this funny thing.’ ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘Oh that,’ he said, ‘That one is fitted with a Whittle engine.’ That’s the first time I heard the name Whittle.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: And he said, ‘That’s a Whittle engine,’ he said, ‘It’ll, it’ll revolutionise air transport.’
SC: Gosh.
JR: And of course it was a jet engine stuck on the back of a —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Of a Wellington aeroplane.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we saw it at the time. you saw it and the propellers weren’t turning so it was just going along by the jet.
SC: Powered by the jet.
JR: Yeah. It was quite interesting.
SC: Because there was the test, there was a test bed and a test centre at Hucknall wasn’t there?
JR: Yeah. Yeah.
SC: For Rolls Royce.
JR: That’s where it was from. Yeah.
SC: So you saw the first jet propelled aeroplane.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Before they actually built the one that they really tested it in.
SC: Yeah.
JR: They built the special one didn’t they?
SC: Yes.
JR: A Gloster or something like that.
SC: The Gloster Meteor I think it was wasn’t it?
JR: Well yeah. Yeah. But anyway —
SC: Yeah.
JR: We saw this aeroplane. It was a, as I say a —
Other: Wellington.
JR: Wellington.
SC: A Wellington. Yeah.
JR: I was going to say not a Lancaster. A Wellington.
SC: Wellington.
JR: Two engine one.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But we saw them without the engines. Propellers not turning but still going.
SC: It must have seemed very strange.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. With this funny contraption on the back. You could see it. It was shaped.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And that. What’s that? Going like the clappers.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. That would be 1941 I should imagine. Before I went in the army anyway. Yeah. Still experimenting.
SC: Yeah.
Other: You wouldn’t see it over here though. Would it have be while you were at Bulwell, dad?
JR: No. Netherfield.
Other: Netherfield.
SC: Netherfield.
JR: Yeah. You’d see them about.
SC: Yeah. Well, that’s all been absolutely fascinating. If there’s anything you can, can you think of anything else that —
Other: I was trying to think of some of the stories —
SC: Yeah.
Other: That dad’s told me from time to time.
SC: Yeah.
Other: Just to prompt him.
SC: Yeah. I think we’ve captured a lot. A lot of things.
JR: I remember we knew that flying bombs would come over.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And we knew that there would be rockets too. Long before they came.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Long years before. Well years. Yeah. I remember going — I was stationed at Hemel Hempstead and I went to [pause] we were a party to Anti-Aircraft Command Headquarters in, near Watford. And we were fixing up a radar assembly. Very special. It was based on on the carriage from a GL. That’s a gun laying equipment.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Which had huge yagis and I remember they pulled them up with a rope and they moved up and down like that. And you know turned on —
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they were yagis which are [pause] a yagi. Do you know what a yagi is?
SC: I’ve seen the pictures of them. Yeah.
JR: Yeah, well they’re —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Well they’re, you know cross members.
SC: Yeah. The flight, yeah. Yeah.
JR: And they’re directional aerials.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they’d got this. What’s this one? And he said, oh a Royal Artillery officer he said they’re going to send rockets up and we were using these to detect them.
SC: Wow. Yeah.
JR: I don’t know how far they went but, and I know that in the field opposite us was — what’s the name of them? The fireworks people.
Other: What? Who you mentioned earlier on?
JR: Yeah.
SC: Was it Brocks that you mentioned?
JR: Not Brocks.
SC: Brocks. The —
Other: I thought it was Brocks.
JR: Oh, was it Brocks? Oh it was a fireworks factory.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And they were firing maroons up into the sky and they were apparently parachutes and there was a bottle of air blowing a whistle. And you got [unclear] as they were dropping.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And apparently, we heard that there was going to be one of these on every building. Fire station, police station and whatnot in the areas where they expected a rocket to fall. Predict a rocket to fall. They would press a button and all these things would go off in that area.
SC: Gosh.
JR: To give you warning. Give you a few minutes warning before the rocket.
SC: Before the rocket arrived.
JR: I don’t know if this worked or not. This is what we were told anyway.
SC: There were all sorts of different ideas.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Some of them mad and —
SC: Never heard of that one. Yeah.
JR: Some adopted and some not.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. I don’t think anything was adopted. Just had to sit and take it.
SC: Trying, yeah. Different things.
JR: Yeah. But this was long before they ever came.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
JR: You know, nothing’s secret.
SC: No. They must have known that —
JR: Oh yeah. They knew something was coming and they were preparing something.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah. I don’t know. You see. You see a little bit of it.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And you’re just a little thing in the middle.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And you see a little bit of it
SC: Yes.
JR: But you see a bit and then you only realise it long afterwards when —
SC: Yeah.
JR: You’ve seen the whole picture.
SC: Yes.
JR: When you’re allowed to see the whole picture you say, ‘Oh. I saw a little bit of it. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Yeah.
SC: I’ll probably stop the tape now because I think that —
JR: About to run out —
[recording paused]
JR: James took me to, somewhere up north. Nottinghamshire. To a 1940s do. Was it Rufford? Rufford Abbey. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: That was it. And there was a fella dressed in a battledress. He said, ‘What do you think?’ He knew I was — I said, ‘Well, that’s wrong there.’ ‘What?’ And he’d got on his pocket here. And he’d got a button on it. I said, ‘There’s no button on that.’ He said, ‘Well, I put it on because —' I said, ‘No. That’s your, that’s your field dressing pocket.
SC: Yeah.
JR: ‘Oh. What’s that?’ I said, ‘Well, the top of the pocket, it’s an open pocket. The top is, has got a zigzag on it and it’s sewn on so it becomes tight. You can slip your field dressing in but you can’t get it out until you break that and —
SC: Yeah.
JR: Pull it out. And that’s your field dressing when you’re wounded. All it is is a big triangular bandage.
SC: Bandage. Yeah.
JR: And, ‘Oh,’ he said, he says, ‘I’ve learned something.’
SC: Yeah.
JR: He thought it was just a pocket and he put a button on it.
SC: Yeah.
JR: But no. It’s a specialised button for, specialised pocket.
SC: Pocket for bandage.
JR: For your field dressing. Yeah. Yours. No one else’s.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
Other: You did have a lot of your friends killed during the war.
JR: Oh yes. Lots of friends killed.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Goes through them. And I remember going to some years ago now going to a Remembrance service at Mapperley Methodist Church. And the lady there said, ‘Are there any names you want me to remember?’ I said, ‘Where do we start? Have you got a bit of paper?’ ‘Oh. Go on.’ Georgie. Georgie Rose. Pete Robinson. Roy Edge. Gordon Davis. Slick Hayes. Nobby Burton. Nobby [pause] Oh dear. I’m forgetting names now but there’s no end of them.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Georgie Morgan. Albert Swain. You know. Ernie Webster. All these people. And you know the funny thing is I can’t see them as old.
SC: No.
JR: Mauled or white haired old men. I can only see them as young twenty year old lads.
SC: Yeah.
JR: As I knew them when they were killed.
SC: Yeah.
JR: Oh dear. What a waste.
SC: Yes.
JR: What a waste. George. George Rose was my particular pal. And when I used, when I came home and I saw his mother in the, on the village street she’d weep at the sight of me.
SC: Yeah.
JR: I’m not being funny there.
SC: Yeah. No.
JR: But she saw me and it hurt. George. Her only boy. Oh dear. And he was my great pal was George. And who was the first one on the street to be killed? Dennis Swain. He was the first one. He was killed in 1940. And then there was a great stream of them. Jackie Baldwin. Grace Girdleston’s brother. What was his name? Girdlestone. Billy Steele. Wilf Underhill, Jackie Baldwin. Oh dear. You know, these were your pals.
SC: Yeah.
JR: That you played with and what not. They were your pals and they got killed. No end of them. Gordon Davis. George Rose. Pete Robinson. Roy Edge. He was a nice lad. Little Joe. Never knew his name. He was always little Joe.
SC: He was little Joe, yeah.
JR: He was a little fella but he was a splendid chap. A Scotsman. He carried a, what do we call it? A chanter. It was a, it was a pipe off a —
SC: A pipe from the bagpipe. A chanter.
JR: A bit. You play it. yeah.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And you know —
SC: Yes.
JR: You get a sound. You know —
SC: Yeah.
JR: It was alright. It was fun. But he had that. I remember little Joe. As I say, I never knew his name but just little Joe.
SC: Yeah.
JR: And a nice fella he was. Killed.
SC: And this were mainly people you served with in the army. Yeah.
JR: Yeah. Yeah. Oh dear. Little Joe.
SC: Yeah.
JR: As I say I remember them as young lads rather than as they would be old men if they’d have lived.
SC: Yes. Of course.
JR: I wonder what they’d be like. Crotchety old men like me I suppose.
Other: They might not be crotchety. Who says you are? [laughs]
JR: Oh dear. Oh dear.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Jack Robson
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Steve Cooke
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-11-21
Rights
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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.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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ARobsonJ161121, PRobsonJ1601
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
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01:26:40 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Civilian
Description
An account of the resource
Jack spent a year in the Local Defence Volunteers before he was called up in 1941. He joined the Royal Army Ordnance Corps and became a radar mechanic. He trained in Glasgow on radio for five months and a further two months in Bury on Searchlight Control (SLC), named “Elsie”, Light Warning (LW) and on various radar systems.
Jack was posted to the Second Anti-Aircraft Workshop at Callington and then the 469 Searchlight Battery ‘A’ Troop headquarters at Clovelly. Jack also went to 335 Battery at South Molton. Describes a homing beam system to guide aircraft back to the airfield noting that many pilots came to thank the searchlight crew after the first thousand bomber raid. A searchlight detachment normally comprised 12 men with specific roles, but each could do the other’s job. The searchlights were 90cm or 150cm and the latter were normally mounted and mobile.
Jack was also stationed with the 470 Battery in Norfolk where he believes he was one of the first to see Window’s effect on radar. He was posted to East Walton and one site was on the Sandringham estate.
Jack was then stationed at Hemel Hepmstead, was posted back to Arminghall and subsequently Hucknall. He became part of a new unit, 469 Advanced Base Workshops, and went to India and Singapore. His return home was on the record breaking run on the Andes and was demobilised in 1947.
Jack then worked as a power station chemist in Nottingham. He recalls seeing the first jet propelled engine in 1941 in Hucknall where there was a test centre.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Sally Coulter
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Burma
Great Britain
India
Singapore
England--Nottinghamshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
civil defence
home front
Home Guard
radar
RAF Hucknall
searchlight
training
Window
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1169/11738/ATurnerP170529.2.mp3
73d2287852145aa1989b5e640fc81de9
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Turner, John
Albion John Turner
A J Turner
Description
An account of the resource
<a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/228620/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"></a>116 items. Concerns Flight Sergeant Albion John Turner (1911 - 1939, 561939 Royal Air Force) who joined the RAF as an apprentice in 1927. After service as a fitter he re-mustered as a pilot in 1935 and after training served on 216 Squadron flying Vickers Victoria and Valentia before moving to 9 Squadron on Handley Page Heyfords in 1936. He converted to Wellingtons February 1939 and was killed when his aircraft was shot down on 4 September 1939 during operations against shipping at Brunsbüttel. Collection consists of an oral history interview with Penny Turner his daughter (b. 1938), correspondence, official documents, his logbook and photographs. <br /><br />Additional information on Albion John Turner <span>is available via the </span><a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/228620/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IBCC Losses Database</a><br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Penny Turner and catalogued by Nigel Huckins
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-05-29
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Turner, J
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SC: I think that’s now. So, I’m with Mrs Penny Turner at your house at [Buzz] Lowdham.
PT: Yes.
SC: Nottinghamshire. It’s 11 o’clock, the 29th of May 2017 and your father was Albion John Turner who was a flight sergeant pilot of a Wellington bomber on one of, if not the first bombing raid and was killed on the 4th of September 1939. So if you perhaps want to start now and explain anything about how you first —
PT: Yes. Well —
SC: Found out —
PT: The first time I found out I was a small child sitting on, in the gutter actually under the gas lamp.
SC: Yeah.
PT: With a load of friends in the street and we were playing Snobs. We’d throw them up and catch the stems on the back of your hand.
SC: Yes.
PT: And we were all playing and one of the boys said, ‘Where’s your father, Penny?’ I said, ‘I haven’t got one.’ He said, ‘Of course you have. We’ve all got a father.’ ‘No. No. I haven’t got one.’ So I ran in along the passage to my mother. I said, ‘Mother. Where’s our father?’ ‘He was killed in the war, Penny.’ I turned around and ran straight back and said to the boy, ‘He was killed in the war.’ And carried on playing Snobs. I knew nothing of that you should have a father.
SC: Yes.
PT: So I felt nothing.
SC: Yeah.
PT: But since then of course it’s slowly got in here and —
SC: Do you know what age you were at that? Or roughly.
PT: Probably around five I would say.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yeah. Because we were sort of, we had quite a life. We didn’t have televisions. We weren’t very worldly.
SC: Yeah.
PT: We were children. We played on the Common.
SC: Yes.
PT: All day and only came home when it was nearly dark you know.
SC: Yes.
PT: We were free to run wild and play. So I played. Spent my childhood on the West Common.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And the ornamental ponds and Whitton Park.
SC: And where was this at this stage?
PT: All around Lincoln.
SC: Yeah.
PT: In fact, I’ve looked in the history books and they used to have lots of things for the war. The First World War was parked on the West Common. It’s the next street to where I lived you see. The Common.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
PT: In Lincoln. And so that’s the first time I found out and then November the 11th we would all stand around the War Memorial in the middle of Lincoln High Street and all the ladies were crying. It was miserable and we used to all get upset and I used to hate it because everybody was upset. You see as children we’d never really been told anything.
SC: Yeah.
PT: I was only one when my father was killed so I didn’t know anything.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And it was war days and you looked out the bedroom window you can see the bombers coming over and bombing around. It was a very unhappy childhood. Very unhappy childhood. Lonely. Hungry and cold.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Different to the children’s lives nowadays.
SC: Indeed. Yes.
PT: With an unhappy mother —
SC: Yeah.
PT: That cried a lot.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Because she was eight months pregnant with my sister you see.
SC: Yes.
PT: So she was born a few weeks after my father had been killed. So naturally she was very unhappy. That’s the first time I found out about it.
SC: And how did that then develop? How did you feel about it as time went by?
PT: Well, as time goes by you put it on the back burner. You sort of got on with your life and didn’t think about it until different things would crop up in life and you’d hear families that had got fathers.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And you saw the different ways you know. Different life they had.
PT: Yes.
SC: It was very much different. Yes.
SC: Yeah. And how much of a relationship with the RAF did you have as a child then?
PT: Well, none really afterwards because all I knew was that my mother, she was with her friends on the [pause] on the first night it was my mother. They were comforting her. And the second night my mother and her friends were comforting this other friend that she’d got two boys and her husband had been killed. And those two boys I have to say were paid for by the RAF to go to a better school and everything. And mother always felt that that was a bit [pause] because we were girls.
SC: Yeah.
PT: We didn’t get any help at all.
SC: Yes.
PT: But the boys did. Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And mother thought that was a bit.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yeah. But times have changed.
SC: Yes.
PT: There’s even a young lady pilot in the Red Arrows now.
SC: Of course, yeah.
PT: I follow the Red Arrows all the time.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And, and, but yes, there’s a lady Red Arrow. Whereas today that wouldn’t discriminate between a lady and a man.
SC: Yes.
PT: Yeah.
SC: And what were your memories of RAF Scampton or —
PT: Well, you see being as I was one and a, just eighteen months after I haven’t really got any.
SC: No.
PT: But I’ve always sort of hovered around and wanted to know things, you know
SC: Yeah.
PT: But because it was too painful I put it all at the back but I can see it’s all in that box there.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And I’m glad for them to have it at the museum.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yes.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yes.
SC: Good. Yeah.
PT: I can’t think of anything else.
SC: Well, if there are any other —
PT: Yeah.
SC: Memories or thoughts of how it affected you.
PT: Just the thing. The Red Cross. The Red Cross would every now and then which delighted us we could go along and choose some clothes from the Red Cross.
SC: Gosh.
PT: Which was nice. And that was nice and [pause] and dried milk. And I think it was powdered egg.
SC: Gosh.
PT: Powdered egg we got.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yes.
SC: Yeah.
PT: So, but no it was very, it was very, we didn’t get any handouts like you get today.
SC: Yeah.
PT: You know.
SC: Yeah.
PT: There were no handouts at all but, yes.
SC: Yeah. And how did you come to research your father’s history in the RAF? You’ve obviously got all the photographs.
PT: Well, no. It’s all that my mother had got in this box.
SC: She’d gathered it.
PT: Because I’m the eldest and I’ve got it.
SC: Yeah.
PT: One thing that’s really brought it home to me which I won’t mention any names but on Facebook I got friendly with someone that we knew. She lived down near the river and they’ve got, they had about ten children and I spoke to her and I said, ‘Yes. It was very poor in our days. It was —’ mentioned different things. She said, ‘Oh yes, but we had a wonderful childhood. And she said they had a barge. I think the father used to go up and down on the barge and I really envied her now. I’ve looked back and saw what a wonderful childhood they had.
SC: Yeah.
PT: They had nothing as money but they had togetherness and they had a father.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And they had a home life and a mother that was happy apparently and she pulled me up on what I’d said. And I realised that I’d had a lonely childhood.
SC: Yes.
PT: Always on my own. Mother was at work. Don’t mind if I —
SC: No. No. No. You, yeah. Yeah.
PT: Always on my own and always lonely waiting for her to come home from work.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And it would be dark and we would waiting under the gaslamp to see her coming. And wait for her to cook something and soon as the fire got a bit of heat we had to go to bed.
SC: Yeah. Yeah.
PT: It was a lonely, unhappy childhood.
SC: Yes.
PT: And this girl that had come from a big family that we thought would not have ended up she’d had a wonderful childhood she said.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And all that.
SC: Yeah
PT: And of course, she’d got her father and the things that they got up to.
SC: Yeah.
PT: She played in all the places I did but she had the happy childhood and we didn’t.
SC: Yes.
PT: And it wasn’t ‘til I got all this out and you hear other people’s stories that you realise you didn’t really have a childhood.
SC: Yeah.
PT: You were unhappy.
SC: Yes. And part of that is because —
PT: Yeah.
SC: It wasn’t explained.
PT: I never spoke, never spoke to her about it, to anybody else
SC: Yeah.
PT: Because if I said this to my family or my husband as was they wouldn’t understand.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And they said, ‘Pull yourself together. Stiff upper lip.’ Which I’ve always done.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And never talked about it.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And so that going and asking my mother where my father was, that was the only time that I think it was ever mentioned.
SC: Right.
PT: So that’s why I’m like a —
SC: Yeah
PT: And that’s why when we went to the Spire day in September when I came back from that I nearly had a breakdown.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yeah. I insisted that my son came. Both sons and grandson and I drove them there. We got through it but leaving that field, I’ve got a photo of leaving that field where all the people had something to do with the same thing that I’d held inside me —
SC: Yes.
PT: All my life. I didn’t want to leave that field and it really made me, I felt raw and I came home.
SC: Yeah.
PT: You know, I really wanted to cry and scream out loud like perhaps I should have done if I’d known.
SC: Yeah.
PT: When I was one a half that my father had just been killed.
SC: Yeah.
PT: You know and, and that’s why I didn’t go last week because I thought no you’re going to get yourself in a mess again. But it was nice because my niece went.
SC: Yeah.
PT: And found out from the photo there wasn’t the one but as I say it doesn’t matter. It’s just putting a poppy in to say that was for him.
SC: Yeah.
PT: You know.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Yeah.
SC: So —
PT: So I don’t know what other people’s feelings are and I’ve never been able to talk to Carol, my sister.
SC: Yeah.
PT: Because I know it hurt her the same.
SC: Yes.
PT: So we haven’t spoke about it.
SC: Gosh. Yeah.
PT: You know.
SC: Yeah.
PT: It’s just something you carry on with your life and we’re lucky to be alive.
SC: Yeah.
PT: But, and then when that happened last week, all this and you realise that mans never learned anything. We are still at war because they said —
SC: Yeah.
PT: That that war was going to be the war to end all wars you know and —
SC: Yeah.
PT: It’s not. It will never stop will it?
SC: Yeah.
PT: You know.
SC: Unfortunately, not.
PT: No. No. But yes, there should be, you know a place where people can go and see what happened.
SC: Yes.
PT: And hopefully learn from it.
SC: Yeah.
PT: But —
SC: If we can learn the lessons that would be —
PT: Yeah.
SC: Yeah.
PT: But I’ve just read a book.
SC: Yeah.
PT: I can get it up on here. And if I’d read that because I believe in nothing now since I’ve read this book. What was it? Something else.
SC: I’ll turn this off next to you.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Penny Turner
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Steve Cooke
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-05-29
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
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.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
ATurnerP170529
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
00:12:28 audio recording
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Second generation
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Lincoln
Description
An account of the resource
Penny Turner’s father, Flight Sergeant Albin John Turner, pilot of a Wellington bomber was killed in action during the first bombing operation on the 4th September 1939. Years later, when she was five years old, her mother told her that her father was killed in the war. She explains that her mother received no help from the Royal Air Force, which she claims aided widows with sons rather than daughters. She has no memory of her father and realises that she had a lonely and unhappy childhood. She also describes her emotions upon visiting the International Bomber Command Centre and hopes that people will learn a lesson about the atrocity of war.
Temporal Coverage
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1939-09-04
Contributor
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Adalberto Di Corato
Julie Williams
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
bombing
childhood in wartime
grief
killed in action
memorial
perception of bombing war