1
25
66
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/39/282/BWilliamsonGRWilliamsonGRv10001.1.jpg
444d53e78e457f02779d065b22409b59
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/39/282/BWilliamsonGRWilliamsonGRv10002.1.jpg
b20df7bba150a07bc3d6aefd6d9cbd4b
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
Williamson, George Reid
George Reid Williamson
G R Williamson
Description
An account of the resource
Seven items. The collection consists of documents and photographs related to Sergeant George Reid Williamson being shot down over occupied France on 3/4 May 1944, during an operation to Mailly-le-Camp. Items include a memoir of his escape as well as photographs and names of helpers in the French resistance. The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Don Hillier and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Subject
The topic of the resource
World War (1939-1945)
Bombing, Aerial
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
2016-07-01
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Williamson, GR
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.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[underlined] THE DAY I REVIEWED THE GERMAN ARMY. [/underlined]
On the morning on the 7th May 1944 I was hiding in a wood outside Chateau-Thierry, half starved and desperate and almost dying of exhaustion. Three nights previously I had jumped from a Lancaster bomber shot to pieces by German night fighters during the successful bombing of the Panzer Training School at Maille le Campe [Mailly-le-Camp]. Since then I had been constantly harried by German patrols, sleeping in ditches by day and moving by night. Today I knew I [underlined] must [/underlined] get help.
The farmer working in his field looked up without surprise as I approached him. Dourly he listened as I read from my French phrase book, then with a gesture turned and led the way to the farm-house.
An hour or so later, a little less hungry and with an old three quarter length coat covering my uniform jacket, I was walking towards the town railway station muttering to myself the phrase the farmers wife had drilled into me.
“Un billet simple pour Paris”
“Un billet simple pour Paris”
There was quite a queue at the ticket office and I place myself diffidently at the end trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, but as the ticket window drew nearer and nearer my confidence deserted me and when I caught a glimpse of a german [sic] uniform on the platform I panicked completely and retreated quickly into the street. By this time the sun was blazing fiercely and as I was still wearing my long flying drawers and white polo-neck sweater under my battledress I was in a truly sorry condition. A row of benches against a shady wall offered me temporary respite and I sank gratefully on to one of them. A seven foot wall ran the length of the street on the other side broken only by a large solid wooden gate opposite where I was sitting. And then it happened! A sharp word of command sounded from beyond the wall, the gate swung open and out marched a considerable proportion of the German army – column after column jackbooted and goose-stepping making straight towards me, then wheeling at the last moment and marching on towards the station.
I could have reached out and touched them but I sat there petrified waiting for what seemed the inevitable moment when an eagle eye would notice the Air Force blue of my trousers or the fine fleece-lined shoes
[page break]
I was wearing, but no! to these troops I was no Lili Marlene waiting outside the barracks gate but a nondescript French peasant, too insignificant for them to notice.
For some minutes after the gate was again closed and the last man gone I sat there stunned. Then quickly I got myself out of that town. But some eyes keener than the Germans must have noticed my departure for a mile or so on the road to Paris a youth on a bicycle caught up with me, and from that moment I was under the protection of the French Underground.
A hundred times in the next few months I had narrow escapes in Paris and elsewhere but never one that left me with the same feeling of shock as the day I reviewed the German army.
GEORGE REID WILLIAMSON
30 BRAIDFAULD ST.
[underlined] GLASGOW. E2. [/underlined]
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
The day I reviewed the German army
Subject
The topic of the resource
World War (1939-1945)
Description
An account of the resource
The memoir details the events after Sergeant George Reid Williamson baled out of his Lancaster over Chateau-Thierry. After hiding in a wood for a few days, he met a local farmer who took him back to the farmhouse for food and a large overcoat. While trying to reach Paris by train pretending to be a French peasant he narrowly escaped capture while hiding close to a German unit. He quickly left the town and encountered a French boy riding a bicycle, who put him under the protection of the Resistance.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text. Memoir
Text
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France--Château-Thierry
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-07
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BWilliamsonGRWilliamsonGRv1
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
George Reid Williamson
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
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page typewritten memoir
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cathie Hewitt
50 Squadron
bale out
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
evading
Lancaster
Resistance
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/142/1358/AYoungF160720.2.mp3
f72baecf6c3b846bc283a66409b06707
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
Young, Fred
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview and a photograph of Fred Young DFM (1583354 Royal Air Force).
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Fred Young and catalogued by by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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
Young, F
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AS: Okay, we’ll start. This is Andrew Sadler interviewing Fred Young in his home in Offenham in Worcestershire on Wednesday, July 20th, 2016. Fred thank you very much for allowing me to interview on behalf of the Lincolnshire Bomber Command Archive this morning.
FY: Right.
AS: Can I start by asking you about your early life where you were born and when?
FY: Yes, I was born in Birmingham, I spent most of my life down in London, and I’ve been all round the place, continent, everywhere.
AS: Did you have, did you have any of your family involved in World War One, was your father for example?
FY: No my father wasn’t but his brothers were.
AS: And did have any bearing on you becoming going into the RAF in the Second World War.
FY: No, when the, when the war started in ’39 my Uncle Ern who I’ve got a photograph of in there was on The Somme. Anyway he lived in London he rushed over to my father and said, ‘Don’t ever let Freddie get in the army’. [laughs] So I went in the Air Force.
AS: So you volunteered for the Air Force?
FY: Oh yes, yeah VER yeah.
AS: And can you tell me about how you enlisted in the Air Force?
FY: Well I, I [sneezes] I was in a protected job at the time so the only thing I could get into to get into the services was air aircrew.
AS: What job were you in?
FY: I was an accountant in, in the railway up in Somers it’s in Birmingham anyway.
AS: And how old were you then?
FY: I was seventeen, I went in at seventeen put my age on a year and called up in ’41, up to Warrington. I, I was a frail person I couldn’t carry a kit bag to save my life and we had to march from Padigate Recruiting Centre in, in Warrington to the railway station I had a job carrying it so did many others because we weren’t used to manual work like that. And then, then after that was pure training I was posted to Blackpool to do foot slogging and that was I think it was eight weeks there and I stayed in Blackpool ‘cos I went down to Padgate the engineering side of the business and that’s where I learnt my trade in engineering. You can’t better the RAF for training you up, wonderful. We were there quite a long time and then suddenly they cleared Blackpool, because um they sealed Blackpool off because the army were going, had a free town, and they were going out to the Middle East to Al Conlek [?] So we had to get out and we went down to Melksham. We went to a camp in Melksham where the everyone had turned it down the Americans, the Army, the Navy ‘cos it was a Navy area, but the RAF accepted it. We were up to our ankles in water most of the time in the huts. And then we came back again to Blackpool and I remember it well because we were all on parade in the Blackpool football pitch in their stadium, and they were calling out the names of those who were going to go on, ‘cos we were all mixed up, and those who were going to the Far East, and there was quite a lot going to the Far East, but all those in aircrew training carried on down on to the engineering side and they moved down to South Wales to, to finish off aircraft. I, I was down there tuning in the engineering side ‘cos it was not only engines it was air frames, electrics and everything else, it was very good training area. And then we came, we had exams every week and I failed the electrics, I could never get my head round electrics, everything else I was perfect on so I had to drop out and have another week, and all my friends then all went on. I passed the next week now all my friends went on to Halifaxes and instinctually they were all shot down. I went on the Lancasters, so I carried on, on my training on the Lancasters there. That was quite a thing we were pretty well exhausted mentally after all that period of training, ‘cos we never had leave you were constant all the while and eventually they sent us to a training centre keep fit area and they put us through keep fit to get us back to normal if you like, yes. And that was good ‘cos it did got rid of all the fuzziness and then I was a flight engineer. So then we went to stations in 5 Group, am, am trying to remember where it was now, but we went to the, oh Winthorpe, we went to Winthorpe that’s right and there we picked up a crew now the crew had been together on Wellingtons most of the time and I joined them there. So it was getting to know each other and I was the youngest and obviously called “Youngster” it was my nickname right the way through service. So from there we, we did training on Stirlings, and then we did training on Lancasters. I found out that was the worst period of the time really, well I don’t know if you know Newark there’s a church there got a red light on the top because it’s quite near the main runway and we are doing a night final exam flying and we are going up to Hel, Heligoland, and we took off but we didn’t take off, we were going down the runway we had a flight lieutenant who’d just come from America he was an instructor in America, Pilot, and we were two thirds of the way down the runway and we were just going to lift off and he cut all the, all the switches so we crashed to the other end of the runway. We went in the nose, the nose went in the whole distance up to the cockpit. I don’t know what happened to him he was reported obviously, we got away with that one, which was a good sign. Now we had our problems with the navigator, on the next trip we found ourselves over Hull in an air raid at night when we should have been down in Devon, he’d taken reciprocal courses so he was dumped straight away and we got a new one, Hugh. Now Hugh was a British BOAC, Overseas Airways yeah on the Pacific Airline, and he was a navigator there, so he was a good navigator, because they didn’t have radar or anything and he navigated across the Pacific, and he was brilliant, anyway that was Hugh and he joined us. Off we went to 57 Squadron and East Kirkby, they just moved from Scampton where 617 were and they moved there. We then went to, we were there about a week, and then we were called up with as battle stations is on battle and they just put a notice up and there was all the names of the people who were going. And went to the briefing and it was Berlin, which is quite shaky for the first op but we did eleven of them so we got away with it. [laughs] But we were a good crew, we were all rehearsed we did practice an awful lot, we never used Christian names in the air we were always referred to navigator or bomb aimer or so on. And after, we did quite a few initially of the Berlin raids and then we went to Magdeburg. From Magdeburg we went to Hanover and we were working our way round Northern Europe I suppose. ‘Cos you know, I mean they probably told you, we did, you never went straight to a target you went all round the Baltic or down over Switzerland and up, and then we went down to Leipzig and we were held at Leipzig because the pathfinders hadn’t arrived they were shot down and the back-up hadn’t arrived so we were there twenty minutes going round and round Leipzig, and of course people were getting shot down by their fighters. [interference on recording] And then anyway we went through that okay and carried on, we were it was quite a flat tour really. And then we went to oh, trying to think, it was on the Baltic coast, and that was where we had a near mid-air collision. Normally you come out of the target area and you turn to port this chap turned to starboard and came straight at us, because of the angles he obviously climbed out of the way, we went the other way but we got his slipstream and he blew us down into a spin. We spun round going down from twenty three thousand feet and we finally pulled out at three thousand feet we were fighting it. The bomb aimer was complaining ‘cos he was, he was wedged onto the roof of his cabin at the font [laughs] with gravity holding him in there. But we were spinning down we got it straight, ‘cos engineers sat in the Lancaster were always sat next to him, and I, he always let me fly over the seas you know so obviously I’d get a feel of the aircraft, so we were fighting it together, I was on one side of the control column and he was pulling it back and I was pushing it forward like, and so eventually it came up. I asked the navigator what speed we were doing, he said, ‘You went off the clock I couldn’t tell’ [laughs] so we don’t know what it was.’ Anyway Hugh was navigator leader and when we got back to East Kirkby he went to navigation centre, checked all the logs and he found that it was one of our aircraft squadron that nearly hit us, and he of course the language was quite out of this world apparently, I don’t know but they didn’t speak to each other again much. [laughs] Because he, I mean he came out and you know could have caused two fatals, our own and his, and he could have gone down as well. But that was um, there we got, then we had the of course Nuremburg, this is where our navigator was brilliant he, he navigated there and he, there were two targets they’d built a dummy town, did you know that?
AS: No.
FY: They built another town on the other side and people were bombing that because it was the first one they were coming to, and Hugh said, ‘No you’re wrong’, there was a bit of a thing going backwards and forwards and in the end we, we accepted Hugh ‘cos he was unbelievable. We bombed the other one which was the target that was why we lost so many people, they were being shot down on the way across the coast going in and on the way back they were shooting them down over the aerodromes they didn’t count those. The, the JU88’s were coming at the back following the crew that the teams in and shooting them down on the approach. That was something that was kept quiet. But anyway we had that, we had, going, going back again to the, to Berlins they introduced the new flying boot, it was a boot that you could, you could cut the top off it had a knife inside, you cut the top off so you could walk if you got shot down, and the rear gunner always wanted to keep up to date with things and he had them you see, but when you got in your, well I call them his huge outfit, looks like the Pirelli man you know, all balled up. He forced his feet into the boot forgetting he hadn’t got the electrics in his boots because they were ordinary boots for other, other members. He got on the way to Berlin, he got frostbite in his feet and he was, he was crying out, but we said to the nav you know, ‘Where are we?’ and he said ‘We were two thirds from the target there’s no point in turning round and going back there.’ So we continued to the target and all the way back [coughs] and when we landed the medical team were waiting for us and they took him and I think he lost both feet all because he wanted those boots on. Then we got another rear gunner who, who was, his crew was shot down, he was ill and he and somebody else went in his place and they got shot down, so he was spare as they say so we had him, a bit disjointed this but I say as I am remembering it. We went through I say after Nuremburg we got back and we thought you know ninety-six aircraft that’s quite a lot of men and we well thought it’ll be an easy one next then and Mr. Butcher we called him and he sent us to Essen of all places which is in the middle of the Ruhr which is highly defended, so we thought that’s a good one you know you’ve sent us into the slaughterhouse and then back again into another one. So we had that and we went through that all right obviously ‘cos I’m here. We went down to Munich and the route took us down south and Hugh said, ‘Shall we go across Switzerland on the way in?’ ‘cos we aim there and come up and yeah so we did that unfortunately we were so, what’s the word, taken aback by the snow and the twinkling lights of the, of the chalets in the mountains in there a J88 came up and took a piece out of us [laughs] ‘cos we weren’t concentrating and then we found out that it happens to be the J88 training pupils there it was just lucky we had a pupil and not a, not a professional [laughs] otherwise he would have taken us out completely no doubt about it, but they came right across the top and opened the canon [?] and that woke us up again so then we went straight up to Munich. The other one is the Frankfurt we, we, we did Frankfurt run that wasn’t too bad really it’s just a long haul. And then we had the Navy in one day they came and they wanted the RAF to drop mines in the Baltic, and when they told us where it was it was up in Konigsberg right up on the Russian side. Apparently there was a lot of German transport and things in the bay in Konigsberg Bay, Dancing Bay, and they wanted us to mine across the whole lot to stop them getting out until the Navy got there, that was a twelve hour flight so we had overload tanks on in the fuselage and that was quite a long haul that, we did it we dropped all the mines on the drop there was only two squadrons on that there was 57 and 630 the rest of 5 Group weren’t in on it. Then finished the first tour on Maligny Camp, I don’t know if you’ve read anything about Maligny Camp, it’s where it was a big French camp, tank and the Germans took it over obviously and this is where they serviced all the tanks coming back from Russia. And they were building up a division there hundreds of tanks, and repairing them, preparing them for the second front, repel the second front. And we were called in to bomb, we had to bomb at five thousand feet because it was moonlight, we had to, it was, it was quite complicated action really. We were the first to bomb we bombed two minutes past midnight and we got through, unfortunately because 57 squadron went first the Yorkshire squadrons who followed us got caught with all the fighters and the Ack Ack so they took quite a hammering, crashing, but after the war when I went to Maligny the people there had no resentment to us because not one bomb fell outside of the camp. There was a lot of French people killed but they were killed through falling aircraft, and if those tanks, Panzers, had been released on the second front there wouldn’t have been one because it was an absolute division, hundreds, and we did wipe them out completely so, that was the last one of my first tour. And then I went on to training command instructor [coughs] which I found very worrying [coughs] [laughs] you’ve got to have a lot of nerve, a lot of nerve.
AS: So you did one tour and then went into training?
FY: Yeah, I went in as an instructor. And then I got, I said look, I was on Stirlings and Lancasters instructing, which was the pilots used to you know like circuits and bumps, the pilot, the instructor pilot he’d leave the aircraft and leave me with the other pilot so I was in charge sort of thing we did all sorts of funny things. We got I had a Stirling and I was in the second pilot’s seat [coughs] and we were coming in to land at night and he was way off and I kept kicking the rudder to get him back on to get the lights, the green lights, but what I was getting amber and red [coughing] which meant we were all over the place. When we landed and we were told to report because they obviously saw it from the control tower just switching back like this, and, and I had to report and tell them what I saw, made and they sent this pilot for a medical and he was colour blind, can you believe it? Colour blind he was from America, he’d been instructing in America, well being all lit up in America they didn’t have any problems with lights with colours, but anyway I don’t know what happened to him he disappeared. And it was getting, it was getting a bit dicey and then we had at Winthorpe this was, the two main runways at Winthorpe and the other aerodrome were parallel, on to each other, there were two aircraft two Stirlings on night fighter exercise and about twenty odd air gunners in each one, and the one aircraft was taking off and the other one got into trouble and landed on top of the other one so it was absolute mess. It’s in my book all this, and he said I rushed up to the station and the WAFS there, I just don’t understand the WAFS, the medical WAFS, they were going to each one and they’re all charred you know getting their documents off them, but I don’t know how they did it, I still don’t understand it because the smell was terrible, I mean it was like pork, horrible smell all these poor lads they were all young gunners, air gunners. So anyway just after that I was posted back on to ops, ‘cos I asked for it, and they put me on to 8 Group Pathfinders down at Oakington in Cambridgeshire. Now they, that was good I enjoyed that, second tour. I can’t, I was, first op on pathfinders you’re, you’re, you’re supporters you go in first and drop flares and then the master bomber would follow you in and pick the spots. Now we don’t carry a bomb aimer on that op, and the engineer does it I had to go down and I did that dropping on the target area so that it lit up then we went round we came round again and went through again, always went through the target twice, and then we came back. And then the next one we were visual markers VM, now that new bomb by visual on a bomb site, and you did so many of those if you were any good then they moved you up to primary visual, primary er you, you bombed by radar anyway, the navigator did the bombing, he, he pressed the buttons and everything and he had the target on his screen and that’s when we marked that, used to go through right the way round and then go through again and keep doing that until the target finished. Then we had nothing really happened after that of any consequence, I was at, I finished I was a warrant officer, I turned a commission, all commissioned crew except me I was a warrant officer, and I refused a commission, but when I went back to squadron when the war ended, well just a couple of days before the war ended, a station commander asked me to, would I fly with him and we were going down to Africa, so I said, ‘Yeah, I’ll go down with you.’ So as an engineer to go down to Castel Benito like Tripoli so he was away two days I don’t know where he went and then we flew back. After that I was his engineer I always flew with the station commander, and he had put me in for a commission and I said, ‘No, I’m nearly demobbed, I shall, I shall be going out.’ I mean I’ve got to sign on you know, I mean I’d done five years I think it was like everything else you think oh I’ve got to get out of this now I’ve had enough, which I did. And I was demobbed, I went to Birmingham, back to Birmingham, incidentally I don’t like Birmingham [laughs] and I got an engineering job obviously ‘cos I’m an engineer, and they opened sales and I went into the sales side. The, one of the directors called me in, in Aston it was, called me in and he said, ‘We’re opening an office in London on sales, would you like to go back?’ I said, ‘Yes please.’ So I went back to London and while I was down there that’s when I got married to my wife and she was Birmingham so she had to make a change. She came down and I was mishmashing around, I hadn’t, mentally I didn’t know what I wanted really, I kept getting letters from the Air Ministry, I’ve still got them somewhere, asking me to go back in with the, with the rank I had left, and I, I, I said, I wrote back in the end saying no I don’t want to go back now I’m just getting used to being out. However, they sent me three letters from the Air Ministry wanting me back but on a short term you know, I wish I’d have taken it now obviously but I didn’t. The other one was I had applied to British Airways, British European Airways, yeah the European side [coughs] and they sent me forms which I filled in, they said, ‘Yes you’re what we want, you’ll have to come down and have an exam.’ Now you’ve got to bear in mind this is 1945 so I sent in the requisition and then they sent back and they said, ‘Well send us the cheque for seventy-six pound to pay for your exam’, I hadn’t got seven let along seventy-six pounds in those days so I had to turn it down because you know I mean there was no guarantee I was going to pass, ‘cos don’t know what the exams going to be like. So that was a game, ‘cos years later out with Hugh, the navigator, he was a British Airways navigator, a pilot, captain, and he said he always looked for me, he said ‘I was sure you were going to come in, sure’ he said, ‘But we never saw you.’ He emigrated to Nova Scotia, and I used to go over there ooh about two or three times a year and stay with him, my wife and I did, and we used to talk it out, we used to go into his den and go into all the various charts he’d got and yeah it was quite interesting. But anyway from there I was in engineering I didn’t know what I was any good at really apart from flying, and then I got a job with a sales company who got a contract to sell spring pressing, I hadn’t a clue on me, I went straight away to night school and checked it all out, it was a Yorkshire firm [coughs] and I found out that they were for some reason, they were halfway to bankruptcy. I used to go up there and it was a small factory and it clicked that was it I, I, I found my knew everything about spring pressing I could sell it and this, that, and the other and I stayed there, stayed there for forty odd years. Then I semi-retired, I did, I was in London based in London, I, I wouldn’t go to Yorkshire but I was based in London, and er, I used to go up there once a month for about a week or two days but then I was usually on the Continent flying out to the Continent, to the, to the French office, the German office and don’t forget there was East Germany then in those days, we had the Communists. I used to go down to Leipzig regularly a Communist area, Warsaw, I used to go all over the Eastern Bloc, it’s you get to know people, different types, I met a woman in a Keller in Berlin, East Berlin and on the, ‘cos you know they opened like a door, and we went in sitting down at the table and anyway she, she said in her English [unclear] and she said, ‘Oh I was from Berlin, I came from Berlin, West Berlin, I got stuck over here we should have never gone to war’, she said. [laughs] Which I thought was yeah, she said, ‘I said we’re all Saxons’, she said, ‘We’re Saxons.’ [laughs] So there wasn’t any animosity there at all. The same with Holland, we did food dropping in Holland, we had to mark the fields out where they were going to drop the food, so we were in first, we was on Pathfinders. The German Army Station there were all in the square all on parade, I can’t remember which one, which place it was now. Anyway we flew across there and our rear gunner said, ‘Can I have one burst?’ [laughs] ‘’Cos they were all lined up for me’, he said. [laughs] I said, ‘No we are on a peace, they’ve given us peace.’ So we followed on and then the light, the thing came on, [interference on recording] there was a chap on a bike and he was waving to us madly as we were coming towards him and of course the bomb doors opened with the marker which is like a bomb and he just fell off his bike you see he thought it was a bomb. Anyway we did all that properly and then we went down to the canals and there was a Dutch boat, you know sail boat and we went right down in front of him and slipstreamed and trailed all the way back [laughs] and they were shaking their fist at us, yeah that’s a bit of humour in it. That was, that was, that one it’s strange on the Second Front they left Holland they didn’t you know free Holland till later, because they flooded all the dykes had been opened, but they were starving [coughs], eating, they were eating rats and all sorts. So it was a mishmash really. So I say when I came out I went into engineering and from there when I semi-retired I moved to Ledbury. So I got a phone call from a competitor I, I used to deal with and he was a, he was the managing director of Solfis [?] and he’d retired and he said ‘I’ve got a company down in Sussex, now I’m gonna retire properly’ he said, ‘But my son’s going to take over, I want you to come down and look after him.’ I said, ‘No you know I’ve had enough.’ And he said, ‘I’ll give you “x” thousand pounds in cash’, and I did the main contract, he said, ‘Come down for six months.’ So I did I went down, I drove down from Ledbury every week and I, they made me a director there I finished up Solfis [?] as managing director and then I was there twenty years nearly. I was seventy when I retired from there, yeah. So you know, jolly good, I was I tell you I had a good life, you see I had my big arguments see with my wife it’s always money, the jobs you do but you don’t get paid for them, because I liked work I didn’t like money came secondary when a load of contracts came up I wasn’t bothered as long as we got the contracts and I signed it. And but that backfired on me when I was seventy you did sign a contract when you retire at seventy so I had to that was in April I remember that. So we, we’d already moved to Sussex from Ledbury so my wife wanted to go back to the Midlands and so we got up here. Now I’m not a gardener, I don’t like gardening, the only reason we had gardeners down in Sussex [background noise] and my wife loves sitting in the garden so I thought as long as we’ve got a green patch to sit in we’d be all right, so I got the stamp type of garden here, which is, even now I can’t look after it ‘cos I’m not interested in gardening doesn’t interest me one bit. [coughs] And from there I went in to Trevor, I met Trevor down the road, the British Legion, he was the chairman of the branch here and he got me involved in the British Legion. I did quite a lot in the British Legion here and then I went into County, I was County Treasurer, I was County Treasurer for about seven or eight years, and then my wife was very ill I just couldn’t spend the time going round to all the different branches and that. And so I retired from there but I kept up the branch here, but then again Trevor and I, he’s ninety on Thursday, we’re going to lunch on Thursday, he’s ninety, I’m ninety-two, he’s a youngster to me so we’re going to dinner. [laughs]
AS: So when you were offered a commission and you refused it that was because you’d have had to sign in to stay for a longer period?
FY: Yeah, yeah, oh yes. I mean you gotta sign in for a period, because then of course you got to remember people were being demobbed left, right and centre, you know particularly the officers side and they, they wanted a stopgap they wanted people in between for ten years just until they got the new people coming through.
AS: So when you did, you did one tour, am I right in thinking that if you did one tour you were then like exempt from doing any further combat?
FY: Oh yes, yes that was the end but I carried on.
AS: So why did you want to go back?
FY: Because I was nervous of being an instructor. [laughs]
AS: You thought that was more dangerous than being shot down by the Germans?
FY: Yes, yes definitely. [laughs] And, I, I thoroughly enjoyed it, I mean I wasn’t, I never, you know on Dresden people, I was talking about Dresden, they want to read the book on Dresden. It was the, it was the centre of the Nazi in Southern Germany, they had two concentration camps on the outskirts of Dresden, they had prisoner of war camps, they were manufacturing Messerschmitt parts for canopies in one instance. So there was quite a lot in Dresden, and though it was the near the end of the war but the Russians were knocking on the door and they wanted you know an easy way in which is what we had to do for them. But it’s, it’s I went to Chemnitz that night which is about oh a hundred miles north of Dresden and we bombed Chemnitz, no nobody said a word about that we were unopposed all the way [laughs] so not a word about that. There’s one or two like that we went to Beirut in Germany that was the only time I felt not sad. I had a South African captain pilot he was South African Army and he wanted to go do an op, so my, my pilot said, ‘Here take my place then you’ve got a team here you’re all right.’ So we were master bomber that night ‘cos the bomb aimer goes, er, there was six hundred aircraft, he called the first three hundred in, it was undefended we almost wiped it off the map, then he called the other three hundred, which he needn’t have done ‘cos we’d already done it, then you know I thought that was wrong, that was the only time I thought it was wrong, the rest of it I’d, I’d no pity. I mean on the first tour [coughs], I’m gonna use some bad language now, [laughs] on the first tour Smithy the pilot the moment I locked the wheels up he said, ‘Right you bastards here we come.’ And he always said that except for once and that was time we nearly crashed. [laughs] So he kept on saying it [laughs], the crew said, ‘You didn’t say it, you didn’t say it’ you see so we did, ‘cos we were only young [laughs], I mean I was twenty when I came out.
AS: So when you were flight engineer on the Lancaster what was your duties when the plane was up?
FY: Oh well I, responsible for everything really up front, the bomb sight, all the fuel make sure the fuel was being used correctly, the throttles right, you know rev counter, the whole bag of tricks really, the I mean the pilot was only a chauffeur [laughs] all he did was point it in the right direction and that’s it, that’s what the navigator used to say. [laughs] [coughs] And the bomb aimer usually was asleep I used to have to kick Alf and wake him up at the target he always used to nod off on the front nothing for him to see in the dark is there [laughs] till we got to the target. Yeah he was good the bomb aimer. But we, I thought I’d go in Transport Command and so I applied at the end of the war and I was sent up to York training but I wasn’t there long because the station commander sent for me to go back he wouldn’t, wouldn’t let me finish that course, laughs] ‘cos he wanted me to stay with him down down at Oakington but we’d moved upward by then. I think the only reason he liked me was because I used to run the football team and he always wanted to play football [laughs], yeah he was, I liked him he was nice.
AS: Did you say you trained on Halifaxes as well?
FY: No, I on Holtons [?], that was when I went to go on Transport Command, it was a Holton [?] they were a converted Halifax, but apart from that I was on Stirlings and Lancasters. I did a small tour on at the time rather on Manchesters which is a deathmell they was, twin engine Lancaster, that had terrible engines kept failing on people all sorts that’s when they dropped them and brought in the Lancaster with four engines yeah. Then it went on to Lincolns, never flew a Lincoln but I went on a course for Lincolns I never, I never flew one [coughs] it’s only a blown up Lancaster.
AS: And what was the chief advantage of the Lancaster?
FY: Oh its, its bomb bay, I mean the amount, we, we take to Berlin twenty thousand, twenty-three thousand pounds, a Mosquito would take four thousand pound bomber, the Americans would take three and a half thousand on a, on a Fortress, they didn’t carry much, they looked rather good on the films when you see all these but they were only five hundred pounders coming out. We had four thousand pound cookie, thousand pounders, we had banks of incendiaries, and sometimes we had two thousand pounders although one stuck it wouldn’t go we had to try and shake it off. It, it, to me it was, it was using the word it was a darling, it, it you were in love with it. It’s the only place if you go up to East Kirkby on their, their anniversary day when they have dinners, I’ve given those up now, but they, the Battle of Britain Lanc always came over and everybody there was taking photos and the men were crying, I was so moved it, it, it’s an aircraft you can’t explain. I mean it would fly on one engine you lose eight hundred feet a minute on one engine, it definitely fly on two I mean ‘cos we, we demonstrated that to America when the Americans came over the hierarchy wanted to go into a Lanc we took them up and he said this American whoever he was I don’t know who he was, and he said, ‘Will it fly on three?’, so we feathered one, ‘Fly on two’, so we feathered one, he said, ‘You can’t fly without an engine?’ I said, ‘No we’re losing eight hundred feet a minute so we better make up our minds about what you want to do next?’ [laughs] So we upped air and got them, got them all working again. But er yeah it was, there was always an amusing part was we used to have a lot of American aircraft land at East Kirkby and Oakington, mainly Oakington, and they were lost they wouldn’t know where the aerodrome was they got lost, there was Whirlwinds, Fortresses, all sorts really used to land there. We used to oh here we go again, but they used to always ask us to go to their aerodrome you see for a, for a drink yeah. So coming back from a daylight trip once and this Mustang pulled up alongside us and he flashed ‘Can I join you?’ And then we Morse Coded back to him ‘Yes’ and he followed us all the way to the UK, then he waggled his wings and he went away. And then we got a phone call to the mess asked us over to his place for a drink [laughs], he said he was completely lost [laughs] but it I mean they’d no navigation you know, it was a fighter with overload tanks. Are you all right?
Other: Yes I’m fine.
AS: So did you find it easy or difficult when you actually were demobbed, when you came back to civilian life?
FY: Yes.
AS: ‘Cos you said you were only twenty at that point.
FY: Yes difficult because you haven’t got a youth, my book is “Where Did My Youth Go?” it’s, it’s finished now it’s on sale. But it was the gap you came out, your suits were up here right, you’d grown so much, you couldn’t believe you’d grown so much. We were allowed after the second front we could have civilian clothes if we wanted so I sent for my suit I couldn’t get in to it, you don’t realise the difference between you know a seventeen year old and a twenty year old. But apart from that yes, it’s, it’s a muddled, muddled world, ‘cos the, quite an upheaval of course because of the you know Atlee was in power in those days, and then I’ve forgotten who followed him oh Churchill, and then somebody else followed him. But I know I’ve still got my passport when I used to go over to East Germany and all I could take was twenty-five pound, I always had to arrange with the German customer to pay for my hotel out there then I’d pay his hotel at this side when he came over. So like the Poles, just the same for the Poles from Warsaw, they used to come over every six months sign the contracts and I’d fly out to Warsaw and sign the contracts that side for the next six months, [coughs], we did an awful lot of business with them. The beauty of that was like East Germany and Poland in particular factories don’t order through people like us they go to a central purchasing bureau and they order the stuff from us, so the orders were absolutely huge without having to go round to the factories you see, we we, we spent two or three million pound each time we go over and we’d have to do that we’d have to go all round the different factories to get it but in Poland they did it themselves for you, it’s different now they’re all split up again now you see. The same in Berlin, East Berlin it was the same there, that was on the it was in a broken down old house on the second floor and the bottom part was derelict didn’t looked like it was going to stand, but on the next floor was the whole of purchasing for East, East Berlin, for East Germany. Amazing things that went on over the, you all thought we had a wonderful time travelling here, there and everywhere, but we didn’t. [laughs]
AS: What’s your feeling of the way the Bomber Command were treated and after the war?
FY: Terrible. Churchill put us on one side, I mean I was decorated, I got a DFM in that time, which was whitewashed you know, nobody, nobody bothered. That is why I think you see Bomber Command is so connected now and joined together because we were so badly abused, everybody else got, Churchill never mentioned Bomber Command once in his speeches, he mentioned the Army, the Navy, everybody except Bomber Command. ‘Cos he, he, he’s the one that sent us there, he got Harris, Air Marshall Harris to do these jobs, and then the moment we did the Dresden job [interference on recording] he pulled out, and yet he was the one who sent us to Dresden, Harris didn’t want to do it. If you read Harris’ book he said it was the worst decision he ever made.
AS: Yeah I have read it actually. Well thank you very much Fred, is there anything else that you want to add?
FY: Ah, memory now isn’t it [laughs] it’s thinking.
AS: Can you tell me about your book?
FY: Yeah, I mean it’s called “Where Did My Youth Go?” And it starts off before the war, not before the war when the war started, I think I was fourteen year old, I left school at fourteen. I was a messenger on ARP and I was a messenger all the way through during the Blitz in ’40 in 1940, we were bombed out there in London, we were told we had to find accommodation with relatives, of course all my father’s brothers and sisters they all lived in Birmingham so we got on to them and they found accommodation for my mother. We couldn’t go because we had to get, in those days you couldn’t change your job just like that you had to get permission from the Government, so we were waiting for that to come through so we couldn’t go up to Birmingham, and we were transferred to a company in the same situation as you. Well like I was on the railways at the time at St. Pancras in the accounts so naturally I was sent back to Moore Street Station [coughs] in Birmingham. So anyway we were, while we were waiting all this the air raids were still going off and my mother sent a telegram, ‘I’ve got a house, I’m trying to get furniture together’ ‘cos we lost all the furniture when we were bombed. Then we got, two days later we got another telegram saying, ‘Don’t come it’s been bombed.’ [laughs] So my mother was an absolute [unclear] she was, she made me go in the Air Force really, I mean I got my revenge there, but she, I, she was in a terrible state when we got there, her nerves, she was pale, oh terrible. Anyway then we got the Birmingham Blitz started when we got back, when we got there. And so I joined the the First Aid and Rescue Squad down in Walsall Heath. Went to the BSA and they were flooded you know all those people were killed in the floods with the bomb. We had the cinema where everybody was sitting there looking at the screen and they were all dead from the blast, all sorts of things that we dealt with on that. Birmingham took quite a hammering it did really, you know. I was, some of the lads there they rescue people, I mean they’d go into you know all sorts of situations and not think about the danger of it they’d do it. So that was, then obviously when the Blitz stopped, things didn’t get back to normal but you got back a bit more of your life you know. It’s you know that’s when it develops from there Moore Street, but I had carbuncles on my neck through no sleep because I was on rescue all night and in the day I was at work, never slept. That’s a lie I did sleep for you know about quarter of an hour or so but during the day I nod off but then you get called out yes, but that’s what kept you going. But it’s, it’s you know terrible and that was because I was run down, I mean the doctor obviously said that, he said, ‘You were absolutely wrung out there was nothing left, and that’s what your body’s doing it’s getting its own back on you’, I said, ‘Thanks very much.’ [laughs] But apart from that, as I say you can’t actually answer that, the question about the reaction after, now I can’t tell you that’s a difficult one really. I used to like dancing, I used to do a lot of dancing, ballroom dancing of course. I used to see all my relatives I’d never seen in Birmingham, meet them all. I had, oh yeah, I was at a wedding. Yeah my cousin down in London, Margaret, she married a Canadian airman, and I never got on with my aunt she always, always talked me down because her daughter was brilliant, and she was good, but I had it stuffed down my throat for about twenty years, I should think how good she was. Anyway it came to the situation where the wedding, and the chap who she married, the Canadian, brought his best man another Canadian and he kept calling me sir you see, and my aunt said, ‘No, no that’s Fred, Freddie, call him Freddie.’ So he said, ‘Oh can’t do that he’s an officer.’ So I got my own back on her, ’cos it took the wind out of her sails. [laughs].
AS: Right well we’ll switch the machine off then and then get you to sign the form if that’s all right.
FY: That’s okay yes. Was it two hours? Oh my.
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 Fred Young
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Andrew Sadler
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-07-20
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
01:07:42 audio recording
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AYoungF160720
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
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Description
An account of the resource
Fred Young volunteered for the Royal Air Force at seventeen and flew operations as a flight engineer with 57 Squadron from RAF East Kirkby. He recounts his experiences on several operations including Berlin, Magdeburg, Leipzig, Essen, Munich, Dresden, and Mailly le Camp. After his first tour he became an instructor before returning to operations, with 8 Group Pathfinders at RAF Oakington. After the war he returned to Birmingham and took up an engineering position before moving into sales and settling in London. He retired at 70 and returned to the Midlands taking up an active role in the British Legion, and writing a book “Where Did My Youth Go?” recounting his experiences during the war years.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Lincolnshire
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Dresden
Germany--Essen
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Magdeburg
Germany--Munich
France
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Jackie Simpson
5 Group
57 Squadron
8 Group
aircrew
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
Churchill, Winston (1874-1965)
demobilisation
Distinguished Flying Medal
flight engineer
Lancaster
Pathfinders
perception of bombing war
RAF East Kirkby
RAF Melksham
RAF Oakington
RAF Padgate
RAF Winthorpe
Stirling
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/187/2467/SMarshallS1594781v10031.1.jpg
127f75d875563164a3ceb15110f8de91
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
Marshall, Syd. Album
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Marshall, S
Description
An account of the resource
77 items. The album contains wartime and post-war photographs, newspaper cuttings, and memorabilia assembled by Warrant Officer Sidney Charles Marshall (1924 - 2017, 1594781 Royal Air Force). Syd Marshall was a flight engineer with 103 Squadron and flew operations from RAF Elsham Wolds.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Syd Marshall and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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
2015-05-08
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
ELSHAM WOLDS’ GREAT PART IN BOMBING CAMPAIGN
Four Years of Magnificent Effort
ELSHAM Wolds began to operate with R.A.F. Bomber Command in July, 1941. The airfield was not quite completed when No. 103 Squadron arrived from Newton on July 11, but the Squadron soon settled in and has remained there ever since.
In nearly four years Elsham has built up a high reputation in the Royal Air Force. There was little delay before the airfield was placed on an operational basis and the Wellingtons were out on July 24, from 11 a.m. to 6.45 pm., attacking the battle cruiser “Gneisenau” at Brest.
Before long the Germans knew of the new bomber station, and in August, 1941, enemy aircraft attacked it. They did no serious damage. They tried again several times in later years, though never in strength.
The “Wimpeys” held the fort while the factories got busy with the production of the new four-engined bombers.
On September 10, 1941, Wellingtons flew to Turin for the loss of only one aircraft. By the end of December, Elsham was able to record as many as 17 Wellingtons airborne on a single night.
On one occasion two sergeants brought back their aircraft after four of the crew had baled out; a flare had caught alight in the rear fuselage.
AMONG THE 1,000
After taking part in the May and June 1,000 bomber raids in 1942, there was a lull.
Halifaxes began to arrive and in August made their first sorties from the station, against Dusseldorf. Hardly had the engineering staff accustomed themselves to these aircraft when there was another change, this time to Lancasters. By November 21 the Lancasters had replaced the Halifaxes and were doing excellently.
On the night of May 23-24, 1943, No. 103 Squadron put up 27 Lancasters, which at that time was a Command record.
The Commander-in-Chief, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris, G.C.B., O.B.E., A.F.C., visited the station in September and addressed the crews.
One of the flights of No. 103 Squadron was transferred to No. 576 Squadron, which was being formed at Elsham. This left 103 a two-flight squadron. The two squadrons were together in close association and friendly rivalry until October, 1944.
OVER BERLIN
No. 103 Squadron had 30 aircraft over Berlin on the night of November 26-27. Elsham became a base station from December 1 and controlled the airfields at Kirmington and North Killingholme.
The wild weather of January, 1944, made life at Elsham what the R.A.F. call “pretty raw,” but the ground staff worked wonders in clearing blocked roads, and runways.
During the spring the Base Commander, Air Commodore Ivelaw Chapman, O.B.E., D.F.C., A.F.C., was shot down over France and taken prisoner. He has recently returned to this country. Air Commodore F.R.D. Swain, O.B.E., A.F.C., who broke the altitude record some years ago, took over from Air Commodore Chapman.
In June both squadrons at Elsham dropped a thousand tons in a month for the first time, and kept this up for some time. In the summer people in the neighbourhood were able to realise the full power of Bomber Command. Daylight operations against V sites, railway centres, and in close support of the Army enabled them to see the sky full of four-engined aircraft day after day.
In October, No. 103 Squadron dropped 1,277 tons, and 86 aircraft of both squadrons operated against Duisburg within 24 hours. On October 31, No. 576 Squadron left Elsham for Fiskerton. With 103 Squadron they had dropped 5,748 tons in the previous five months.
BOMBER COMMAND’S PRIDE
Elsham was the home of Lancaster “M.2,” the pride of Bomber Command. Its long life showed what a high standard of maintenance had been kept up. “M.2.” first flew on operations on May 4, 1943, to Dortmund, with 103 Squadron. It was later transferred to 576 Squadron, and had been on 103 operations by the beginning of 1944. It was retired with 144 trips to its credit, 97 of them to Germany and 15 to Berlin.
During the last winter everyone at Elsham was working at full stretch, and the Lancasters were fully employed on targets like the Ruhr, Ludwigshafen, Nuremburg, Munich, Chemnitz, and Dresden. Many mines were laid in enemy waters.
For the last month of operations No. 103 Squadron was joined by No. 100 Squadron from Waltham (Grimsby), and both were in the attack on Berchtesgaden on April 25.
When there was no more bombing to be done, large convoys of Army vehicles began to drive up to the station. They carried food for the Lancasters to take to Holland. Another task was to bring back hundreds of freed prisoners of war from the Continent.
Many Elsham names will go down in history for acts of heroism. On May 4, 1944, an aircraft of No. 576 Squadron, captained by Pilot-Officer Reed, of Wellingborough, Northants, landed with the flight engineer helping Reed to hold the control column and the air bomber clinging to the rudder pedals. The Lancaster looked a total wreck. It had been shot up by a fighter over Mailly-le-Camp; it had caught fire, a large hole was knocked in the floor, electrical and navigational instruments were smashed, the rudders and elevators were damaged, and the rear-turret was hanging by a threat.
Two Lancaster from 103 Squadron were each attacked by two fighters on July 29, 1944, when bombing Stuttgart. All four of the enemy were destroyed in a couple of minutes.
Another 103 crew shot down a Ju. 88 over Karlsruhe on April 25, 1944, but sustained serious damage. The pilot had to ditch, and the crew were on the Goodwin Sands for seven hours before being picked up.
Just before the end of the war one of Elsham’s aircraft came back with a 250lb. bomb embedded in a wing. The pilot told the crew to bale out, and the baled out himself near base.
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
Elsham Wolds' Great Part in Bombing Campaign
Four years of Magnificent Effort
Description
An account of the resource
A history of 103 Squadron's operations at RAF Elsham Wolds.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One newspaper cutting on an album page
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SMarshallS1594781v10031
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France--Brest
Italy--Turin
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Ludwigshafen am Rhein
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Munich
Germany--Chemnitz
Germany--Dresden
Netherlands
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Karlsruhe
France
Italy
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Govert J. van Lienden
100 Squadron
103 Squadron
576 Squadron
bombing of Cologne (30/31 May 1942)
bombing of Dresden (13 - 15 February 1945)
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
ditching
Gneisenau
Halifax
Harris, Arthur Travers (1892-1984)
Ju 88
Lancaster
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
RAF Elsham Wolds
RAF Fiskerton
RAF Kirmington
RAF North Killingholme
rivalry
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/263/3411/AGrayCJ151017.2.mp3
d77b2a53b586aa10835d976fe3601a19
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
Gray, Jeff
Jeff Gray
J Gray
Description
An account of the resource
One oral history interview with Jeff Gray.
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
2015-10-17
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
Gray, CJ
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
DK: Right. This is David Kavanagh for the International Bomber Command Centre interviewing Jeff Gray at his home on the 17th of October 2015. I’ll just leave that there and if you want to -
JG: Yes.
DK: Go through your pictures.
JG: I -
DK: If I can, one thing. If I keep looking down it’s just to check that the -
JG: Yeah. Yes. Running -
DK: Old machine’s working.
JG: I was very fortunate in my choice when I joined the RAF. I was packed off to Texas. To America. And -
DK: If I just take you back a little bit.
JG: Yes.
DK: What made you want to join the RAF? Did you have any -
JG: I was -
DK: Choice in the matter or –
JG: I was in the Home Guard. LDV which became the Home Guard and I decided that I would like to join up and so I asked the farm manager I was working for if I could have a day off.
DK: So you were working on the farms -
JG: Yes.
DK: At the time then.
JG: I’m a farm boy.
DK: Oh right. Ok.
JG: Still. And he said, ‘You want a day off?’ He said, ‘But you’ve got a day off. You’ve got New Year’s Day.’ So I said, ‘I think, I think I need more than that,’ so he let me go. I went to the recruiting centre, the combined recruiting centre in Aberdeen.
DK: Yeah.
JG: The army and the navy guys weren’t there. The RAF man was and I think he thought it would be fun if he stole the would-be Gordon Highlander away who had come to see if he could get a kilt and joined the RAF. He said, ‘You’d like the RAF better. They sleep between sheets at night.’ ‘Oh,’ I said, ‘I’d love to try that.’ But he didn’t realise that I was, anyway that led to another station in Edinburgh a few weeks later and I went to that two days so I had to say to Jake, the farm grieve, ‘I need a week off.’ He said, ‘You can’t go doing that,’ he said, ‘I’ve signed. You’re producing food and I’ve signed all the documents and you’re exempt from military service.’
DK: Was it considered a reserved occupation?
JG: Yes it was.
DK: What you were doing.
JG: It was reserved.
DK: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
JG: And I said, ‘Well growing food isn’t going to be enough to stop this Hitler guy, I don’t think,’ so I went off. He gave me the week off. What defeated him was he said, he said, ‘I’ll have to take a week’s wages off you.’ My annual wage was ten pounds. I said, ‘Can you do the mathematics of that Jake?’ He said, ‘No. I can’t.’ So, so off I went and once again fortune smiled upon me. I was able to make a reasonable impression on the board but I failed the mathematics. The mathematics were truly, I hadn’t covered at my school. They said, can you retake this if we give you, if we postpone your date of joining till September can you take the, and I said, ‘I can, yes’. And so I came back and thought now how do I do this so I asked the headmaster, a chap I’d always liked, the domini and he said, ‘Well you can’t go into Aberdeen. You can’t do any of that. You’re going to join the classes here, you’re going to sit at the back,’ he said, ‘And I’ll teach you mathematics till it’s coming out of your ears.’ So that’s what I did and when eventually I was up to snuff took the exam and that was it but they had already set my date to go and so I was stuck with that and I had to earn a living for a little while and I found that there were more ways of earning a living as a farm labourer than I’d realised. It was harvest time. If I went south I could go to harvest and they would pay me five pounds. Come back to Aberdeenshire and get another five pounds for the next month and go north into the wilds -
DK: Nice one –
JG: And get another.
DK: Excellent.
JG: So in three months I’d got fifteen pounds and my annual wages was only ten. I said, ‘Jeff. I think you’ve made a discovery.’ I was never able to really put it into practice and when I reported to the Lord’s Cricket Ground they went through the training there and assembled us eventually and decided where we were going to go and they shipped us off across the Atlantic on a ship called the Banfora in a little convoy and although it was a horrible ship and I didn’t care much for it it was very useful because we had a destroyer on each side sending messages to each other so we spent the time taking down their messages, you know, from the Aldiss lamps and when we got there they assembled us in a hangar and told us where we were going. Texas.
DK: Oh.
JG: Well like every school boy of the time I’d read everything I had about you know adventure comics, all that stuff and what a wonderful thing that was. So here we are in Texas.
DK: Oh right.
JG: A photograph, and there’s Jeff Gray there.
DK: Ah.
JG: Yeah.
DK: So at this point, by the time you got to Texas there had been no flying at all. All your basic flying was done -
JG: I had to do a grading course on the Tiger Moth.
DK: Right. And that was in the UK.
JG: And that was in the UK.
DK: Right.
JG: And if you passed the grading course you could go.
DK: And then straight out -
JG: Failed that and -
DK: To America.
JG: You didn’t get anywhere.
DK: Ok.
JG: And so -
DK: So this was your class at the time then.
JG: It is yes. Here’s the full class all fortunately named Number One British Flying Training.
DK: So just, just for the recording so it’s Number One British Flying Training School.
JG: Yes. That’s -
DK: Number nine course.
JG: You will find the G men in a row here.
DK: Right.
JG: Gordon and Gray.
DK: Oh I see.
JG: And Guttridge.
DK: Yes. Yeah.
JG: And -
DK: All alphabetically -
JG: We were the G men. Eventually, they, I was the only one who survived the course.
DK: Really.
JG: Which was, but they all had a career. Gordon for instance had been a policeman. He, I forget what he did in the RAF but he went back to his native Glasgow and became chief of police there.
DK: Really.
JG: Had a splendid career and Guttridge who never got over failing the course went and did something. A replica trip of Shackleton when they sailed across that ocean and across -
DK: Oh.
JG: And so he wasn’t lacking in courage.
DK: No.
JG: So there we are. So there are a number of pictures of aeroplanes. The Wellington.
DK: Wellington.
JG: Which, of course, I spent a lot of time on the Wellington as an instructor and a picture of the -
DK: Manchester.
JG: The Manchester.
DK: Manchester. Yes. Yes.
JG: You will recognise the Manchester was the most deadly of aeroplanes. It had these unreliable engines.
DK: Yes.
JG: It was simply awful.
DK: So how long were actually in America for?
JG: I think it took nearly a year altogether you know as a journey time and what have you.
DK: Ok.
JG: Yes. And when I came back of course they said we’ve got to knock you guys into shape again you know and you’re not allowed to wear shoes because you’re not commissioned and only commissioned officers can wear shoes and these lovely shoes we’d brought back with us from the States had to be scrapped.
DK: Oh no.
JG: Very foolish but anyway this aeroplane, the Manchester, you can see from the tail unit that it became the Lancaster.
DK: Yes.
JG: Just as it was. It is in fact a Lanc with new wings and new engines.
DK: The four, four engines.
JG: And so became a, I’ve got a picture here. I don’t think anyone recognises who she is. She was one of my childhood, school heroines.
DK: Oh it’s not Amy Johnson.
JG: Amy Johnson.
DK: It is Amy Johnson yes. Yeah
JG: Yes. Yeah. And at that -
DK: Did you, did you -
JG: Meeting in Lincoln I passed that around the table and -
DK: Did you ever -
JG: So much for fame. No one recognised her.
DK: Did you ever, did you ever meet her?
JG: I never did get to met her.
DK: You never met her.
JG: No. No.
DK: No.
JG: Our paths did cross at some time when she, I arrived in a Comet, flying a Comet to Australia down to Melbourne and, by chance on the date when she had done her flight.
DK: Right.
JG: Now there’s always this rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne. Melbourne said Sydney doesn’t count. She finished here. And she was carried ashore, down the street by the staff of the Menzies Hotel and when I got there the street was crowded and there was a guy who’d been a nobody on that occasion, now he’s the chief porter and he said, ‘We’re going to make you re-enact this. You’re going to be carried.’
DK: Did, did people like Amy Johnson influence you in to sort of a career in aviation? Is it -
JG: I think it was one of those things that yes you form these impressions.
DK: Yeah.
JG: And yeah. So -
DK: So when you got back from America, from your training there and you, what happened then? Did you join, go straight to a squadron or was there further training?
JG: No. No. There was a lot of training. We’d only flown single-engined aeroplanes. We had to be checked out on, on Ansons and the like to -
DK: Right.
JG: To multi-engined aeroplanes and then we wound up at an Operational Training Unit at Cottesmore. Number 14 OTU and where we flew the Wellington.
DK: Right.
JG: And when we’d done that we had to be converted to the four engine Lancasters and there was a -
DK: Did you, did you have to –
JG: Conversion Unit at Wigsley which we did that.
DK: Wigsley. Yes.
JG: And we flew Halifaxes and Lancasters because they were running low on the Lancasters and they still had a few Halifaxes so -
DK: So that was the Heavy Conversion Unit at Wigsley.
JG: That was the Heavy -
DK: Yeah.
JG: Conversion Unit. Yes.
DK: Did you ever get to fly the Manchester?
JG: No. No.
DK: No.
JG: No. I just, someone sent me some pictures of it and I kept them because it seemed to me to be such an intriguing tale of this very unsuccessful, unreliable aeroplane.
DK: Such a successful -
JG: Which turned into the most successful ever.
DK: Can you, can you remember much about the Wellingtons and Halifaxes? What they were like as aircraft to fly.
JG: I loved the Wellington. Oh yes. A great aeroplane really. It had no vices at all except maybe one thing. It had an automatic trim that when you put down the flap the automatic trim readjusted the attitude.
DK: Yeah.
JG: And if that didn’t work you had to be the automatic trim, [laughs] if it didn’t work and you had to catch on quickly but apart from that as a defect I thought it was a great aeroplane to be able to fly and it was robust, and Barnes Wallis, of course, again. Yeah.
DK: What about the Halifax? Was that -
JG: Well I don’t have much impression of the Halifax except it was very similar and the instructor pretended that it was a Lancaster.
DK: Right.
JG: And you called for the power settings you would call on a Lancaster and he set the power for the Halifax.
DK: Right.
JG: So this was very confusing [laughs] I found.
DK: I can imagine.
JG: I’m not sure I cared a lot for it.
DK: So, so although your training was on the Halifax. They were really preparing you for the Lancaster.
JG: Yes. Yes. It was just they had run out of Lancasters and they’d substituted Halifaxes which at the time they seemed to have plenty of them. Yeah.
DK: So, from, from heavy conversion unit then was it straight to your squadron.
JG: Yes. They said, they took us, they put us in a hangar and we were assembled there and told to choose our crew and we were handed a list. When that had been done that would be your crew and if you couldn’t do it they would make up your mind. They would give you a list.
DK: I’ve often heard about this where you were put in to a hangar. I find it very unusual because -
JG: Absolutely weird. Yeah.
DK: Because the military is normally you do this, you do that.
JG: It was.
DK: And this is very different to sort of the military thinking where you got -
JG: I thought it was a very clever move indeed.
DK: Really.
JG: And I stood there like an idiot. I didn’t know where to start and this scruffy Yorkshireman came up. An aggressive, little, scruffy Yorkshireman come. He said, ‘Have you got a navigator yet?’ ‘No,’ I said. He said, ‘Well you have now. Let’s go and find the rest of them.’ [laughs] So that was my first impression of Jeff Ward the Yorkshireman and we were buddies from then on.
DK: So this, this forming your own crew in a hangar, you think it was a good idea then. It seemed to, it seemed to work.
JG: It was a very smart move. Yes. It meant there was no objection. It was your choice. You’d done the rounds there and you’d picked them all and that was it. If you couldn’t decide they decided for you but mostly people were able to pick guys they liked the look of or whatever. Yeah.
DK: So after that it was then the posting to 61 squadron.
JG: No. I think, I think we did the OTU after that but -
DK: Alright. Ok.
JG: I’m not quite sure. Yes. And the 61 squadron, I don’t know, was the luck of the draw I suppose. Yes. And that’s what brought me into contact with Lincoln and the cathedral.
DK: So where were you based with 61?
JG: We started at Syerston.
DK: Syerston.
JG: In Nottingham and we were very displeased to be moved because we were just getting to know all the pubs there and [laughs] all the Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem and all those and suddenly we were shifted off to Lincoln and that seemed, and then and then from Skellingthorpe they sent us to Coningsby and that I liked. Coningsby was a great place to be.
DK: So you went to Coningsby next then.
JG: Yeah.
DK: Right.
JG: And then back to Skellingthorpe.
DK: Skellingthorpe.
JG: And Skelly was a cold and sad place in a way because it was very basic where the others, Syerston and Coningsby were regular accommodation and a good style.
DK: It’s a housing estate now.
JG: Yeah but I think if, if you’re in a group and you’re living in the same nissen hut and you’re eating in the same mess and everything you all become pals.
DK: Sure.
JG: It pulls you all together. Yes. Yes. So and I was interviewed just before I went there for a commission and I was interviewed by a chap called Bonham Carter and I took a very poor, I have a very poor opinion of Bonham Carter because my school in Scotland was [Raine?] North Public School. To his mind I had defrauded someone. It was not a public school. So I had to explain to him that the Scottish educational system was better and greater than the English and when we said it was a public school the public could attend. I said, ‘When you talk about a public school -
DK: Yeah.
JG: The public may not attend.’ And he put down on my documents, “Not officer material.” Quite right too. [laughs]
DK: Oh dear.
JG: He got that right but he did me a great favour in fact in that I went as an NCO and we were a crew of NCOs and were all mucking in together as it were.
DK: Did you find on a squadron a bit difficult though that some of the pilots were obviously officers?
JG: Yes.
DK: And some of them weren’t so you didn’t necessarily mix with all of the pilots.
JG: No.
DK: Was that an issue or –
JG: I don’t think it was really.
DK: No.
JG: People seemed able to cope with that. I think I felt sorry for chaps who were allocated to senior officers because that sort of changed the relationship altogether.
DK: So the dynamics of the crew sort of –
JG: Yes. Yes.
DK: Yeah
JG: But they seemed to be able to bond quite well but I think it took them a little bit longer and we had, I always felt that this Bonham Carter had done me a favour.
DK: Yeah.
JG: Because we bonded straight away and shared everything.
DK: So your crew were all sergeants.
JG: Yeah.
DK: Yeah. Yeah.
JG: As in that -
DK: A picture here. Yeah.
JG: [?] I showed you.
DK: Oh.
JG: Yeah, that one. Yes. There we are. Yes. So – and I’ve kept a number of things that impressed me. There’s a plot of, there’s a bomb plot for Stettin which seemed to me to be self-evident that all this scatter coming in from this direction that what they needed to do was to, instead of picking the target they should have -
DK: Yeah. Yeah.
JG: Moved the target a bit beyond it and then they would have got most of the bombs falling where –
DK: Yeah.
JG: They wanted instead of wasted out here.
DK: It was known as creep back wasn’t it?
JG: Creep back. Yes.
DK: Creep back. Yeah.
JG: And it seemed to me there was a very simple solution to that rather than master bombers and that nonsense but, so I think that was why I kept that because no one paid any attention to it really [laughs].
DK: So you put the aiming point about there.
JG: Yeah. Put the aiming point -
DK: And then that would move –
JG: About a mile further on. Yes.
DK: Yeah.
JG: Yeah. An imaginary point the Pathfinder guys could find the area and identify it but then move the pretend and you would get a lot more of these bombs where you wanted them.
DK: Was it at 61 squadron then the first time that you saw the Lancaster and flew the Lancaster?
JG: Well yes. Yes that’s right. Yes.
DK: So -
JG: We had the Conversion Unit.
DK: Right. Ok. So what were your, after the Wellington and the Halifax what were your feelings about the Lancaster?
JG: I liked it from the beginning. Yeah. I thought it was a great aeroplane. It was a natural aeroplane. It didn’t have any defects that I, except getting in and out of it was a bit of a squeeze but it was a very bad aeroplane to escape from but otherwise it seemed robust and it, yeah I liked it. I thought it was great. And the sad thing is that it’s only recently that it’s sort of come into its own. Up till just recently and perhaps that Memorial it was the fighter boys, the Battle of Britain boys, they were the glamour boys. Bomber Command were nowhere and they’d rather blotted their copy books towards the end with that bombing raid on Dresden but then that Memorial seemed to change something quiet subtly in the minds of the British people and so the Lancaster has now become the aeroplane to have been on [laughs]. So -
DK: Strange that isn’t it?
JG: Yeah. I feel -
DK: So, can, can you recall your, your first mission then? Where that was to?
JG: Modane was the first one we did.
DK: That was the first one, to -
JG: And then the next one was Dusseldorf when Bill Reid got his, his Victoria Cross.
DK: So did you know Bill Reid then?
JG: Oh yes. Yes.
DK: Yeah.
JG: I knew Bill Reid fairly well because we were fellow countrymen, you see.
DK: Sure. Sure.
JG: I met him. He’d just got his medal ribbon up and he was out celebrating with his crew in Boston and we’d been to the Assembly Rooms to a dance and he wasn’t the sort of guy who danced. He was one of the guys who just looked on from the doorway and I was often one of the guys who missed the transport back to camp but I’d found a lady who would give me bed and breakfast so I’m on my way there when I come across [Ellis] and it was his radio officer [both?] looking for somewhere to sleep the night. I said, ‘Come with me to this lodging house,’ and the landlady answered the door, ‘Oh Jeff,’ she said, ‘Come in. Not him,’ she said, ‘He’s drunk. He will make a mess of my beds.’ ‘Oh dear,’ I said, ‘Mrs. You will be the only landlady in Lincolnshire, perhaps in the country who has turned away a man who has just won a Victoria Cross.’
DK: Oh no.
JG: ‘Get off,’ she said, ‘I don’t believe you.’ But it was true and he behaved himself. I said, ‘He’ll pay for any damage anyway.’
DK: She let him in then did she?
JG: So she let him in. So every time I met him I would tease him a little bit about his days when he was dancing and so on and his wife really never quite followed it. He doesn’t dance, he can’t dance, he thinks it’s a route march.
DK: I’ve always heard the story, I don’t know how true it was that when he met his wife it was some years before he mentioned that he’d been awarded the Victoria Cross.
JG: Oh I don’t know about that but quite possible yes. He had quite a career after that. The MacRobert’s family took him up and sent him through university.
DK: Right.
JG: And where he got a degree which and the MacRobert’s family they’d bought a Spitfire and I think they spent money on a Stirling -
DK: Stirling.
JG: Of all things. And he was given employment with them on their fertiliser division.
DK: Right.
JG: And so every time I met him at these get-togethers I said, ‘You’re still are pushing the bull shit then.’ [laughs]. ‘You’re selling horse shit.’ [laughs] I think I’ve kept some -
DK: Yes.
JG: I think I’ve kept. There he is, a piece of information there.
DK: I did meet him actually about fifteen years ago.
JG: Yeah. Yeah that’s -
DK: Because he ended up a prisoner of war didn’t he? I believe he was shot down later on.
JG: Yes. Yes. Yes. There. What else have we got here? I went from Bomber Command to Transport Command and that’s a BOAC York. That’s a York which was a development of the Lancaster.
DK: So you flew, you flew the York as well.
JG: Yeah. I, I flew the guys back from the Far East.
DK: Right.
JG: Who had been prisoners at Changi jail and all that dreadful railway and the guys who couldn’t be shipped back were flown back and I had to sign up to do that. My demob was cancelled until we’d finished this particular project. What I didn’t realise because I was enjoying myself I told the other guys around me pick me up the best of the jobs.] [laughs] So -
DK: So how many, just stepping back a little bit, how many operations did you actually do with Bomber Command?
JG: Thirty.
DK: Thirty.
JG: Yes.
DK: So one tour.
JG: We were, we were pulled off after that dreadful Nuremberg trip.
DK: Right.
JG: And I think Bomber Command decided, I think, at that stage they weren’t going to be able to bomb the Germans into submission and that start the preparation, preparing for the invasion.
DK: Were you actually on the Nuremberg -
JG: Yes. I was.
DK: You was.
JG: Yes. It was, it was a beautiful clear night. It was going to be cloudy all the way until we got to the target when it would be clear but the reverse was true. They’d picked a southerly route. It was moonlight. It was like clear as day and I think we were in real difficulty with the, with the routing and on that occasion we quickly found ourselves with an enemy on each side. Now that is the trap. You can’t beat these two if they’re working together ‘cause you turn towards one and you’ve given the other a non-deflection shot. You’re dead men really if you try and corkscrew your way out of that one and I thought we’ll try and outrun them. I put on full power. Well of course that was useless and I knew it would be ‘cause they had twenty knots faster than we were. They could catch us at any time so they just kept position and kept signalling each other and so I then pulled off the power, put down some flap which was illegal and said, ‘You’re not going to enjoy this bit guys because we are going to see the,’ our stalling speed will be lower than theirs. ‘They’re not going to enjoy following us now,’ and sure as hell they didn’t. Their stalling speed was much higher. They daren’t risk it and I was just on this, but anyway once I’d seen them off we straightened up, put on the power and climbed back up again and, got it, ‘Done it Jeff,’ I said the other Jeff and blow me down, there they were again and I said, ‘Well I’m going to pick this guy on the left. He’s the leader I think. I’m going to ram him so stand by. We’ll hit him with the nose. We might lose a bit of the aeroplane but he will lose his starboard wing.’ ‘Yes,’ they said and we headed for him and I think the guy realised it. He shot off. He disappeared. They both did. And my navigator said, ‘I haven’t been able to follow that,’ he said, ‘I think we’re lost.’ ‘No, no, Jeff we’re never lost. We’re uncertain of our position.’ ‘So what will you do?’ I said, ‘We will add ten minutes to the eta,’ and I goofed. I should have added ten minutes to the end of that route because the last leg was down to the southeast but I added it to the run so I turned on eta and of course we were well short and we were getting to the end of this ten minutes when some searchlights came on looking for us. ‘Davvy.’ I said, ‘We’re going to give them a surprise. Bomb doors open. Let them have it.’ So we bombed that bloody searchlight battery and the lights went out but there were a lot of guys in the same position. I didn’t know until afterwards who saw the incendiaries burning and they started bombing and in fact we’d hit Schweinfurt.
DK: No.
JG: And we didn’t know until it was back plotted the next day but at that stage by the end of it I could see sixty, seventy, eighty miles away in the distance the show was beginning and we’d missed it. They’re going to be, blotted our copy book. We’ve bombed the wrong bloody target. We’ve made a horse. When I got back I was astonished. They greeted us with open arms there were so few coming back [laughs]
DK: So you -
JG: And they were trying to keep the number below the magic hundred. Yeah. They were cheating. They weren’t including the guys who crashed.
DK: Ok.
JG: [who never came back]
DK: ‘Cause it was over a hundred wasn’t it?
JG: It was over a hundred. No doubt about that.
DK: Did you see many of the aircraft go down at –
JG: No. I don’t think I did. No. We, it was only very occasionally that you saw someone being blown up. We had what were known as scarecrews which was something that we’d invented that didn’t bloody exist. We thought it was some German pyrotechnic. No it wasn’t. It was some guy, usually a pathfinder carrying all the coloured flares.
DK: I’ve heard, I’ve heard the stories of the scarecrows.
JG: Yeah.
DK: So you’re saying they were actually -
JG: They were.
DK: Pathfinder aircraft going up.
JG: Yeah. They were but we believed at the time that it was a pyrotechnic that the Germans were using.
DK: Was that a story that was purposefully put around do you think?
JG: I think it was a story that the Bomber Command guys like myself invented and the bosses decided to keep quiet about it. I think they knew but they didn’t deceive us. They just let us go on thinking what we already thought.
DK: So you weren’t in any trouble then for hitting the wrong town.
JG: There was no question, there was no question of it. No. They were just so bloody pleased to see us they didn’t give a monkey about where we’d been -
DK: No.
JG: Or what we’d done.
DK: How did you feel knowing that there was those losses and the way the route had been drawn that you were going in a long straight line for several hundred miles in, in full, it was full moonlight wasn’t it?
JG: Yeah I think the winds were a nonsense, the weather forecast was completely the opposite. When they said it was going to be cloudy all the way, we’d have cloud cover, it was clear all the way except the target was cloudy and so I think the actual attack on the target was not very clever but in a way it’s helped the end of an era. They switched us to the French targets and the French targets were such a piece of duff they were only going to count as a third of a trip but it turned out that that was not correct because to bomb a French target we could not bomb a French target while there were French workers there in the marshalling yard or the factory and we had to wait for some system of someone in the resistance would send a signal to the UK who would send a signal to us to tell us when we could start bombing so we were circling around you know with nothing to do except wait and the Luftwaffe -
DK: While you were being shot at.
JG: Began to take an interest in us and come up and shoot people down and on one of the worst of those Mailly le Camp in Belgium they shot down I think it was forty two aeroplanes.
DK: Were you on that operation?
JG: I was on that one, yes. Yes. I claimed to be the guy who put out the spot fires. I may be mistaken. It was disputed by everybody except I continued to say it and I can still to say it now the others have gone [laughs]
DK: So the spot fire?
JG: It was being marked by Cheshire.
DK: Right.
JG: And he had developed this idea of low level marking and of using these red spot fires and he had everybody waiting with the flares that his colleagues had circled this and I took one look at that and said to Jeff Ward, ‘We are not joining that. We’re heading into the darkest place we can find and then we’ll come back now and again and see what’s happening.’ And just as it happened, as we got back he had it marked and we went in and when we pulled away my rear gunner Jock [Haye] said, ‘We put the bloody red spot fires out.’ I said, ‘Jock, I don’t care we’re on our way home,’ and we could hear these arguments going on. I think it was either a Canadian or an Australian and they were giving him a hard time because he wanted to remark the target, ‘Stop bombing, stop bombing,’ and they wouldn’t because -
DK: Wanted to go.
JG: They could see what we’d done and I think it was forty two aeroplanes lost and we killed one German. They’d left an NCO to guard the camp and that was their only casualty. Our chaps busy with the crosswords and whatever, some of their intelligence was a bit duff. They thought there was a whole army there at this tank training school but they’d left the week before. So -
DK: Yeah.
JG: So it was a sad tale that one and there was nothing happy about it.
DK: What was your opinions of Cheshire at that time was he well known throughout Bomber Command or -
JG: Yes he was and I got to know him after that because when he left and he inherited this property he set up these Cheshire Homes.
DK: Yeah.
JG: Some guy that, you know, had nowhere to go he took with him and he said anyone who came along would be taken in provided they could do something useful. There was no charge. He paid for it. Yeah. And I thought he’s taken leave of his senses but then I realised afterwards that he was the first to come to his senses and I was flying this time in BOAC and on a VC10 and he was a passenger on one occasion and I talked to him at Heathrow in the VIP lounge and he was grumbling about the coffee and I said, ‘Put a shot of this in with it,’ and of course he was teetotal [laughs] Poisonous you see. And I said, ‘Do you remember a place called Mailly le Camp?’ And he said, ‘Shall I ever forget?’ So I chatted to him on this trip and I found, yeah he was the first guy to come to his senses and we became not exactly friends but I got to know him afterwards though I didn’t know him at the time. Yeah.
DK: Interesting. So is he someone you’ve got the respect for of that post war [chain of who was?]?
JG: Oh yes. I think what he did he went around after that every year visiting places where they had been bombed and delivering the cross of nails which I think I’ve got a picture here of one of the German newspaper. There I am with the chairman and that’s the cross of nails. The Coventry.
DK: Ok.
JG: [?] whatever.
DK: Yes.
JG: And every year and he visited Nagasaki and Hiroshima.
DK: Yes. Yes because he was-
JG: Check that they’d got them there.
DK: He was actually on the Nagasaki raid wasn’t he?
JG: Yeah.
DK: He was the British observer.
JG: Yeah so that’s, that’s in Germany that’s the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church that we destroyed.
DK: That’s Berlin isn’t it? I have seen that.
JG: Yes.
DK: Well not that. I’ve seen the church.
JG: Yeah. Yes. [pause] So that’s my favourite aeroplane.
DK: Ah the VC10.
JG: The VC10. I liked that beast. I liked the Comet as well but I like the beast. Yeah.
DK: The first aeroplane I ever flew on was a VC10.
JG: What?
DK: The first aeroplane I ever flew on was a VC10.
JG: Oh was it really? Yes.
DK: 1981. British Airways.
JG: Yeah. Yeah. That’s one. Yes.
DK: So, you, you were in Transport Command then.
JG: I was in Transport Command. Missed this lot.
DK: Right.
JG: You know. I struggled to get a job. When we were on 61 I did have an offer from Bennett to join the Pathfinders.
DK: Right.
JG: And I called a get-together with the crew where we would vote on the issue as to whether we stayed with 61 or if we went to the Pathfinders and it was a bit of a set up because I had got this, with this DFM I’d got twenty five quid and it was the only twenty five quid that I had at the time.
DK: Yeah.
JG: I spent it all in Leagate public house and of course it snowballed on me. Not just my crew but the ground crew and the girls from the parachute, they all came and anyone who came in the pub the bartender was saying, ‘Are you with Jeff Gray’s crew?’ And they said, ‘No. Why?’ ‘Well there’s free beer if you are.’ ‘Oh, yes, good old Jeff.’ [laughs] And so the vote was stay 61.
DK: Ok.
JG: It could hardly have been anything else but I don’t know if he forgave me or, ‘cause I didn’t ever meet him personally but after the war when I came out I missed this lot. The one guy who offered me a job was Bennett and, but he said, ‘You won’t be flying as a pilot. We’re taking off all the navigators on this British/South American route we’re starting and you will be acting as navigator.’ And I said, ‘Oh God. Never. I think it’s a dreadful mistake. A recipe for disaster.’ And it was of course.
DK: He lost a couple of aircraft didn’t he, in South America?
JG: He did and he did try to take the top off the Pyrenees.
DK: Yeah.
JG: And they cancelled the airline. Put him out of business.
DK: And it was at the point you joined BOAC then.
JG: Yes. Yes. That was about all that was left. [laughs] I looked at Quantas and I foolishly turned that down because they were the worst paid in the business but today the top but, and I knew that I couldn’t join any of the continentals because I was hopeless at language but so the BOAC as a very humble first officer was where I got to.
DK: So what did you start flying on with BOAC then at the beginning?
JG: Oh dear. I’m hopeless on dates. I don’t have that.
DK: Or the type of aircraft.
JG: On the, on the Yorks to start with.
DK: Avro Yorks.
JG: And then we moved up to the Comets and the VC10s and then one day I wound up when I didn’t go on the Jumbo which I really should have done as everybody else did but what I had in mind I knew that the Concorde was coming along and I thought that’s for me and, but when it came to it and I was interviewed for that they said you have to have three years clear service before you can repay the cost of the training and you haven’t got three years clear so there I was on this bloody tripwire that they’d set for me. I couldn’t get on the Concorde.
DK: That was a shame.
JG: And, however, as one door shuts another one opens. The Gulf Aviation in Bahrain were buying some of these VC10s and I was offered a job straightaway to train their guys because at this stage I was an instructor, an examiner and all the rest of the stuff so I went to Bahrain for two years and stayed for six.
DK: Ah.
JG: Yeah.
DK: So did you actually fly the Gulf Air VC10s or were you just training?
JG: Yes I flew the Gulf Air VC10s and then when they got the Tristar
DK: Tristars. Yeah.
JG: I flew that. And it was at that stage that I had to, I’d promised myself with the old Atlantic boys that I met on the Atlantic you mustn’t stay too long. There comes a time when you begin to lose it and don’t stay till then. Go just before. Always leave the party when it’s at its height and I thought this aeroplane can do everything I can do except it does it better. It flies, the autopilot flies better than I can. It does the navigation which was always my weak point, it’ll do the communication. What the hell am I doing here? Time to go. So I quit. Yeah.
DK: So what year would that have been?
JG: That was -
DK: That you stopped flying?
JG: ’74. I came back from Bahrain. It was 1980 I think. Yes.
DK: 1980
JG: Yeah. Came back in time for Christmas and I’ve stayed away from aviation ever since. From that time I had staff travel but they then brought me out of that.
DK: Did you ever get to fly on Concorde?
JG: No.
DK: You didn’t. Oh.
JG: No. Sadly. When I was in Bahrain one of the first flights I did was to Bahrain. I was able to see it and talk to some of the guys that were on it but I really didn’t want to know. I was really very, I was still very huffy about it. [laughs]
DK: So what did you think about the VC10? What was, what was that as an aircraft?
JG: Yes the VC10 was a lovely aeroplane, yes. Really. A winner. It was a shame that they didn’t continue the development but they didn’t. They went all American. So, yes. I was involved very briefly in the saga of the material that Rolls invented. This new, what do you call it? The new -
DK: The engine. The alloys. The -
JG: Yes. Yes.
DK: Yeah.
JG: They were making the blades of this new –
DK: Alloys yeah, yeah.
JG: And we had number four engine was fitted with that on the VC10 with these new turbine blades and they were looking for a favourable report on it and we went down to Lagos. The weather was bad and we diverted to Akra. We ran through some thunder storms and heavy rain and we had to shut the engine down. This number four. And as I walked ashore a guy at the aeroplane was shouting at me to come back. It was the engineer. ‘Come and look at this,’ he said, ‘skipper.’ And it was hanging like knitting. It had shredded. The material was no damned good.
DK: Wasn’t any good.
JG: And I did myself no good by sending in a voidance report saying, ‘Any of you guys with Rolls Royce shares, sell today.’ [laughs] The Americans took up the material and perfected it.
DK: It’s the old story isn’t it?
JG: The old story and they’ve been scoring on it ever since. Yes. And now the whole aeroplane’s made in America.
DK: Yes. So looking back on your time in the RAF particularly your time on Bomber Command how do you look back on it now all these years later? Is it -
JG: I regret to say that I have some misgivings. I had at the time, I think it was Lincoln Cathedral did it for me when I first saw that and I thought armies of men came here and built this thing and what do we do? We try and knock them all down.
DK: Destroy them.
JG: It seemed all wrong to me but that’s the business we were in and I think I kept that idea in mind and I got involved with, let me look and see what I’ve got on that. Oh I think that the, that church there is the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. My wife and I set about that to see if we could do something about it and I thought I’d go down there what else have I got? Have I got anything on it?
DK: It’s not it there is it?
JG: Oh that’s it. Thanks very much.
DK: Ok.
JG: Yes. I decided that this is the -
DK: Yes I recognise that from my trips to Berlin.
JG: That is the church which we destroyed that but the bell tower is still stood and they kept it as a symbol of defiance. They’d defied the bombing, they’d defied the Russians, they’d defied, defied the partition of the city. Everything. And the bell tower stood and, but it will have to be demolished because bits were falling off it and people were objecting and the council said it would have to be demolished or rebuilt but they had no money so I wrote to them and said why not set up a fund and ask the guys who did the damage to pay for it and I think I’ve got all that here. [London Times?] of your dilemma. You should try to save it. Why not ask the guys who did the damage to make a contribution to a restoration fund and so on and I took part in a number of raids against Berlin starting on the 2nd of December 1943 and on their behalf I would like to make a contribution to the fund of five hundred pounds to start the ball rolling. To my astonishment they took it up. There is the reply from the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church and so the fund was successful. We raised quite a lot of money by giving the sole story to the Berlin newspaper chain that, there we are being interviewed for that. That’s the picture -
DK: Yeah.
JG: Being copied here and so they did it and there we are. That’s myself, my wife and my grand-daughter, my son’s wife Gerlinde. And ‘English bomber pilot triggers off fund raising’ and I’ve, there’s the, it stalled for a bit and then the, raising funds. The guys in this country didn’t want to join in I’m afraid.
DK: No.
JG: They were all raising money for the Bomber Command Memorial here and didn’t want to know about this one. Then, but the National Lottery came in with money and then Angela Merkel -
DK: Oh yeah.
JG: Moved in.
DK: Yes. Yes.
JG: Topped the fund out so -
DK: Yeah.
JG: The restoration started and I think it’s complete as far as I know and I would like to think there might be a big ceremony of some kind but nothing has happened.
DK: No.
JG: It should have been ready last year but then they were celebrating the Berlin wall taken, took everything. I should think if they do it it will be the 26th of November when we destroyed it so -
DK: So, how, how do you feel this is the, you obviously do, it might sound a silly question, is this an important part of your, your life and in some ways a response to your time in Bomber Command?
JG: Yes I think it was. Yes. I think it was. These are a number of smaller shots.
DK: Yeah.
JG: I had made if you want to and, yeah I think it was a reaction to that, a guilty conscience I don’t know.
DK: Did you –
JG: But anyway I’m very pleased that it succeeded.
DK: Yeah. Did you manage to get many more, any more RAF -
JG: No.
DK: Guys.
JG: Very few.
DK: Very few.
JG: I was very fortunate in that the ones I knew and I was able to ring up and talk to them or to their widow they would say, ‘Sorry Jeff. I think you’re a bit off your trolley. It’s not going to work.’ And they were quite right so I said, ‘Ok. I’ll have to do it without,’ and we did get, my wife and I did get invited to the, when they got the glockenspiel working and ringing mid-day but she wasn’t well enough to go.
DK: No.
JG: And so I didn’t get to that.
DK: Ok.
JG: But I have lost touch with them a bit since then. Yes.
DK: Ok.
JG: I’m really hopeful that this crazy Scotswoman who has appeared, Nicola Sturgeon.
DK: Sturgeon. Yes. Yes.
JG: Is moving in everywhere she can. I’ve been in touch with her because I think she’s got some good ideas and she’s one of the people who gets things done. You may not like her or like what she’s doing.
DK: No well. Yeah. Yeah.
JG: As a fellow Scot and she wrote in very sympathetic vein and so I think that I will be in touch with her again to see if there is anything is happening. If there’s going to be a ceremony could she get in touch with Angela Merkel and see if we could arrange a ceremony because having separated Scotland -
DK: Having got that far
JG: She might like to make a fuss of it.
DK: Yeah. Definitely.
JG: So wait and see.
DK: Hope something comes about.
JG: Some of these pictures I’ve got that have been made up are for her attention.
DK: Right.
JG: Because if you hit people with pictures like that they pay attention.
DK: Yeah. Definitely. So how many raids on Berlin did you actually -
JG: Nine.
DK: Actually do. Nine.
JG: Yeah. I met people who did ten and I met people who did dozens more but not of the big sixteen you see. Yeah. And that first one that they did in November which destroyed the church did a lot of damage, you know. It destroyed the zoo and there were wild animals rushing about everywhere and had to be rounded up and that. I think that rather misled the guys in Bomber Command into thinking this was going to be easy but it wasn’t and I think we set off with the wrong kit. The stuff they’d done on the short range, the Cologne and the like, medieval cities, wooden frames, narrow streets.
DK: Burnt.
JG: You set up a fire storm with a bomb that shatters the tiles and the windows and the incendiaries, you know, get into the building and people die in the fire. Lack of, suffocate. But none of us had been to Berlin. It’s not like that. Great wide boulevards and the tall buildings made of stone and brick and steel with sloping roofs and we had the wrong kit. We were never going to set that on fire. Ruined the plane trees in the street, they all burned, you know but the nature of the buildings they were sheltering in they had made passages through from one to the other so if that one caught fire they went -
DK: Yeah.
JG: Into the next one. Yeah. And in the morning they cleared up the rubbish and tidied the street and went back to work and I think the real thing that defeated us was the fact that in the blitz in the UK in Coventry and London it produced a spirit of defiance. And I think if you produce that in people you can’t defeat them.
DK: No. No.
JG: So -
DK: No.
JG: Anyway, so -
DK: And what’s, what’s the German, the Germans you’ve met there, what’s their, been their reaction to this? Has it been favourable?
JG: I think they quite like the idea of their symbol of defiance being turned into a symbol of reconciliation.
DK: Reconciliation.
JG: That’s the theme I pedal. A symbol of reconciliation and I think of late we’ve had programmes showing us Germany and some of the bombing and some of the damage that was done and showing us the places and the people who were affected and being told their stories and, yeah. And I think they’ve been doing a lot on the Dambusters of course who were, became famous because of the wonderful film they made you know and playing with those bombs and it wasn’t until recently that I realised that Churchill was worried about the bombs that hadn’t gone off and that the Germans were able to examine and began making a list of the dams in the -
DK: UK.
JG: In the UK that they could bomb. Yes. Yes. So you learn these things eventually that you didn’t know at the time but I do think that if you get that spirit going among the public that they will not, they will defy you, you’ve lost it. Yeah. You’ve lost it.
DK: Yeah.
JG: Yes.
DK: And did you meet many Germans who were there at the time, when you went out there?
JG: No. I haven’t. No.
DK: Ok.
JG: No. Of course I rely on Gerlinde as my interpreter because I’ve only got a few words -
DK: Oh right.
JG: In German.
DK: So scrape by on -
JG: She can speak German then.
DK: Yes. She’s a Bavarian. Yes.
JG: Oh I see. Right. She’s, right, ok. She’s German.
DK: So -
JG: Or Bavarian I should say.
DK: Yes she would say she’s a Bavarian.
JG: Bavarian.
DK: Yes. Quite right. She’s not German. She’s Bavarian. I’ve made that mistake before.
JG: Yeah. So -
DK: Ok. I think I’ll stop there.
JG: Yes.
DK: It seems a sensible place to stop so thanks very much for that. We’ve been talking for nearly an hour.
JG: It’s been a pleasure anyway. Yes. Yes.
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AGrayCJ151017
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Jeff Gray
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
00:57:16 audio recording
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending OH summary
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
David Kavanagh
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-10-17
Description
An account of the resource
Jeff Gray was a farm labourer in Aberdeenshire when he volunteered for the Royal Air Force. He trained to fly in Texas and completed 30 operations as a pilot with 61 Squadron. After leaving the RAF he worked for BOAC flying Yorks and VC10s.
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
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Great Britain
United States
France--Mailly-le-Camp
England--Lincolnshire
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
61 Squadron
aircrew
Bennett, Donald Clifford Tyndall (1910-1986)
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
Cheshire, Geoffrey Leonard (1917-1992)
civil defence
crewing up
Halifax
Home Guard
Lancaster
memorial
pilot
RAF Coningsby
RAF Cottesmore
RAF Skellingthorpe
RAF Syerston
RAF Wigsley
Scarecrow
searchlight
training
Wellington
York
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/339/3504/ATaylorJ150916.2.mp3
f76e00dfb7d0f9819f6a843d7b85b955
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
Taylor, John
J Taylor
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Flight Lieutenant John Taylor DFC (1923 -2021). He flew operations as a navigator with 50 Squadron.
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
2015-09-16
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
Taylor, J
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
MY: This interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is Malcolm Young and the interviewee is John Taylor. The interview is taking place at Mr Taylor’s house in Sale in Cheshire and the date is the 16th of September 2015. John, if we could start. How did you come to join the Royal Air Force?
JT: Well, at the, when I was young I’d got two sisters closest to me. I was the eldest of seven. And I’d got a, I had a scholarship to the Grammar School and reached the fifth year in 1939 and so I was about to go into the sixth form when the school was evacuated into Lincolnshire. No. Gainsborough. North Nottinghamshire. I didn’t want to go. They were doing half time, you in somebody else’s house. So, I left and went to work.
MY: Yes.
JT: And I went to work as an assistant analytical chemist at Boot’s factory on Island Street in Nottingham. And I was sixteen at the time. I joined the air raid, ARP — the Air Raid Precaution people as a first aid party. I had training and days when we — mock incidents and things. Every time the sirens went I had to put my overall on, put my tin hat on and cycle to the warden’s post. And, and I got sick of this. But I found out that working as an analytical chemist — it was a reserved occupation and one day, cycling home I saw a poster “Reserved men. You can volunteer for flying duties with the RAF.” So, I thought, that’s for me. I was seventeen then and I went around to the recruiting office and they seemed delighted to see me [laughs] and signed up. And then I went home and told my parents who were not overly pleased. Proud perhaps. But not overly pleased. Then of course, I had to go through all the medicals and especially the eyesight things. It was rather funny when it came to the eyesight thing because you know, they closed one eye and you had to read the letters. And when I’d finished the examiner said, ‘Now let’s see what a mess you make of your other eye.’ The other eye 6/6. Perfect. So, right, both eyes 6/6 [laughs] Obviously, they wanted people. And then of course I was sent home to wait. And it was, nineteen four — all this happened in 1941. And in 1942 just six days, three days after my nineteenth birthday I was called up. They’d sent me a list. Razor, shaving brush. I’d never shaved at that time because I was very fair and smooth. And all the rest of the clobber. And I got it all together in the suitcase and off I went to report to St John’s, London. No. Lord’s Cricket Ground. Cricket ground. And on the train down there was a chappie sitting opposite me. Dark, a rather big nose, suitcase and he said, ‘Are you going to Lord’s Cricket Ground?’ ‘Yes.’ And so, I met Vic Page who became quite a friend. So, it wasn’t too bad. The two of us together. We got to Lord’s Cricket Ground. They formed us into uneven lines and then, to my horror told us to strip naked. We were under the stands. Where the stands go up there’s a space underneath. Of course I was brought up with two sisters and so, a virgin of course, anyway.
[that’s my son in law to collect the — ]
[pause]
JT: That was my first FFI.
MY: Yes.
JT: Free from infection. After that we shambled around somewhere else. They were decking out uniforms. And then we went to a block of flats in St Johns Wood. They were very posh apartments but of course, everything had been stripped out. But we were in a, a room for three. And although we got the iron beds and the biscuits — those were square [pause] I don’t know what they were filled with. Horsehair or something. And, to my surprise — sheets. I didn’t expect to have sheets with I joined the forces. And we also had our own ensuite. But we were told by the corporal that we’d got to keep that clean and we weren’t given any cleaning materials. It was up to us to keep the bath and basin and everything clean. And we spent three weeks there at the Initial Receiving Centre or whatever they called it. My first time in London but it wasn’t Vic’s first time.
Other: Sorry to just interrupt. I can’t see —
[recording paused]
JT: Yes. In London. We were allowed, after the first week when we’d had drill every morning and been shouted at more than I’d ever been shouted at in my life. And the corporal in charge of our flight of thirty of us and it was the, I think they must have all been taught from the same script, ‘If you play ball with me, I’ll play ball with you.’ But they weren’t bad. They weren’t bad. And everywhere in London they marched us around and we saw other flights being marched around. All to the different places. And every morning stopped for break at some sort of café and we could get a scone with butter and a cup of tea for about a penny ha’penny. And you could see the corporal sitting at a table at the side. They got theirs free I think [laughs] for the perks of taking us to this café. And [pause] but quite early in the afternoon we were let off, especially in the evenings and weekends and so we went to the Opera House. And they’d taken all the seats out and boarded over at a level with the boxes that went around. Covent Garden Opera House. And there were dances.
MY: Oh.
JT: So, we went to dances there. And another time we went to travel by tube because it was convenient and cheap. Went to Max Miller to see Max Miller perform. And I thought it isn’t all bad being [laughs] in the forces. Because you feel, you know you’ve got such anticipation. Another time they took us to the Rudolph Steiner Hall by coach and showed us some training films. Horrendous things that can happen to you if you don’t take protection [laughs] when you have sex. I’d never had sex anyway. And then [pause] that must be a difference from today’s nineteen year olds. And then they put on a lot of little filler films. So, I was sitting in the warmth of the cinema, in the upper circle there and I think there were orchestral rites, “The Rustle of Spring.” And I thought [laughs] I didn’t think being in the air force was like this. But of course, the other side of it was parade every morning. Inspection. And the sergeant would come down and the old script, as I say, I think they were all taught, ‘Am I standing on your hair?’ ‘Am I,’ no, ‘Am I hurting you?’ ‘No sir.’ ‘I should be. I’m standing on your hair. Get it cut.’ You had to go off to the station barber, pay sixpence and they took nothing more than an inch. No hair on your head more than an inch. Two days later, on parade again, ‘Haircut.’ ‘But sergeant I had it cut.’ ‘Never mind. Get your hair cut.’ You’re really being taught that you don’t question orders. You just do what you’re told without thinking. Totally opposite from Bomber Command. But we went through this initial training but at the same time we had classes on Morse. We had to reach twelve words a minute in Morse which I found fairly easy because you got the rhythms of it. As long as you didn’t concentrate and just let it flow you could, because it was all blocks of letters or numbers. And they taught the Aldis lamp. Now, that was difficult. When we saw that light flashing from the Aldis lamp I found it very hard to distinguish between the long and the short flashes. But I struggled and reached the five words a minute which was the minimum to pass. And then having had three weeks of being knocked into shape and beginning to look like airmen although we were AC2s [laughs] and we were allowed a weeks’ leave. Made a big fuss of at home. And then we were posted down to Torquay for the Initial Training Wing. I think it was Number 1 Initial Training Wing, Torquay. And there again we were in a hotel. The Hotel Regina which overlooked the inner harbour at Torquay. Very nice big room, stripped bare. With just four beds in it, I think. Or five. And a very nice crowd. Very nice crowd. And you know, talk about the rude and licentious soldiering. We got an Irish guy there from Southern Ireland. Got a beautiful lilting voice and he could sing. And we used to ask him to sing for us and he’d sing all these Irish songs like “Mother Machree” and all. And again, not what you’d, not how you see soldiers or — [pause] Our regime there was to run in PE kit up to the top of Rockend which is at one end of Tor Bay. Do an hour’s PE, run down again and then do an hours drill. Change and do an hours drill and then go to lessons. And at the end of that time I was as fit as I’ve ever been before or since because I wasn’t a games player at school. I lived, you know, over a furniture shop. My father was a furniture dealer. With sisters. So, games were not my forte. But that was probably why I wasn’t commissioned until much later. Because I didn’t fit their idea of an officer. Any rate, we quite enjoyed, I quite enjoyed it but I mean one weekend we invited my sister and her friend down. I was very popular then with the boys wanting, and they stayed in a boarding house near and so that was rather nice. I had a girlfriend I later married. Much later. Now, at the end of ITW we had a riotous party at a hotel where I was drunk for the first time in my life and felt awful the next day because I’d only just started drinking beer. The next stage was then off to [pause] Eastbourne. The Grand Hotel. And there we were again in a room with a ensuite but the usual beds and you had to put the sheets, the blankets just exactly three inches and then the sheets exactly one inch and then — so you’d got a sandwich of blanket, sheet, blanket, sheet, blanket. And the corporals would come around and look at them. Throw them all on the floor and say, ‘Do it again,’ if they weren’t exactly right. And you’re, we all had gas capes. The only time we ever used them was when they were testing us by going into a gas filled room. But you had to hang them up exactly where the seams were flat and the bit where your back went you had to pull it out so it was standing out straight. All that sort of thing. Looking back, I realise the whole idea is to take away your civilian identity and make you service. But of course, among the lectures not only did we get lectures on navigation but lectures on the history of the Royal Air Force. And we went on route marches. The discipline at Eastbourne was not as harsh as before because our sergeant was a ex-flyer, an air gunner who’d done his tour of ops so, we were a bit in awe of him and he was very easy going. We’d march out of camp and a bit down the road he’d say, ‘All right. Fall out for a smoke.’ Which I didn’t. I didn’t smoke. But we’d rest and then he’d say, ‘Alright, we’re marching back. Bags of swank as you go in,’ [laughs] We’ll do our route tomorrow. Although as route marches sometimes they got quite, quite pleasant. The rhythm of swinging along and somebody would start singing and then others would pick it up and they were the most raucous and rude songs I’d ever heard. But we were all singing with gusto when we were out of sight of the camp. So, I think they [pause] after we went overseas. That’s right. Because they’d started the Empire Air Training where they were training aircrew in Canada, South Africa and America. Although at that time in America they just wore grey suits. Everybody knew who they were of course. They were all in grey. Identical grey suits. Because America wasn’t in the war at that time. And I was posted to New Zealand err to South Africa. Yes. I was just looking to see where it started.
[pause]
JT: Looking in my logbook at the moment.
[pause]
JT: About November 1942. 41 Air School, South Africa. But before that, of course we’d been, had a horrendous sea journey from Liverpool on a converted cargo ship where they’d put extra decks in and three thousand troops on the ship. And it was a big convoy with an aircraft carrier and two cruisers and about four destroyers and there were several troop ships like ours. Some of them were going to Singapore. You know, we were going to South Africa. And you were sleeping — some slept under the tables, the mess tables. Some slept on the mess tables. And some slept in hammocks above the mess tables. They were advantages and disadvantages in all because if you slept on, in the hammock you would either have cockroaches falling on your face if it’s something over the ceiling and you had to stow it up ship shape every morning. And of course, if you slept on the bottom tiers you were liable to have people being sick on you because of all the seasickness. Terrible. But after the first three days I felt ok. I got my sea legs and, but the ship was crowded. You were allowed one pint of beer a day and you had to queue right around the ship deck to get it and it was warm. And you had to sit with your back against the, I don’t know what you call it, some rails at the side of the ship, to drink it. They asked for volunteers to serve in the sergeant’s mess. Now, I know they tell you never volunteer for anything but I thought this might be alright. So, my pal and I, we volunteered and enjoyed it very much. Our job was to collect the food from the galley, carry it. Two plates on each arm to the sergeant’s mess and then we’d wait on the sergeants if there was anything else they wanted and everything. And then when they went back to duty, we produced the food. The food we kept to one side.
[recording paused. Phone ringing]
JT: Aircrew people.
MY: Oh.
JT: He calls himself Ivor the Engine and he does all the research and I put it in the air newsletter I produce every month that goes — send these out to all the people who are in the Aircrew Association but can’t get to meetings.
MY: Yes.
JT: So that keeps them in touch. So, oh have we started again?
MY: Yes.
JT: Oh, I didn’t realise [laughs] I was saying about after the sergeant’s had gone to duties I and my friend, we produced the food we’d put on one side. Which was the food for the sergeants. Much better quality than what we were getting in our mess and we sat down in the sergeant’s mess and had it. And then we were free until lunchtime and of course we’d missed all the drills and parades that they had so, we thought it was a good number. And this went on for two weeks. Perhaps three weeks. And suddenly we were called before the colonel in charge who said, ‘I’m afraid you can’t do this.’ ‘Why sir? Why sir?’ ‘It’s because you’re potential officers and you can’t wait on the NCOs.’ And so that skive finished and they got squaddies from the army to do the job we’d been doing. I was sorry about that because the trip took twelve weeks because we had to go right down into the South Atlantic to be out of the reach of the U-boats. Almost to the coast of Brazil before we swung around, came down below Cape Good Hope. Landed at Durban. And on the way, I think, I don’t know whether we’d got dysentery on board and we were queuing up for the toilets and they’d got no doors on. Just cubicles. And as the ship rolled all the water on the floor rolled towards us and we lifted our feet up as it rolled back. Oh dear. Oh dear.
[telephone ringing recording paused]
JT: I’ll talk about, we’d got this dysentery and so you queued because you knew that you had to go to the back of the queue because by the time you got to the front you’d need to go again. But we survived all that and landed in Durban and it was paradise. Lights were on. No blackout. You could go into the Red Shield Club or the NAAFI but the Red Shield Club was very good. The Salvation Army ran it and you could get egg and chips and things like that and plenty of it. And the attitude towards us was very good from the English that lived in Durban. Cars would pull up with a couple of girls in the back and the father in the front. He’d say, ‘Boys. Are you going anywhere? Would you like to come for lunch?’ And we’d hop in and go for lunch. We were entertained. And then after an initial time in Durban where we were in tents for the first time in my life we moved to [pause] I’m lost for words sometimes. East London. We were stationed at East London which was the, oh like I said that was 41 Air School. From there we did dead reckoning theory, dead reckoning plotting, compasses, meteorology, maps and charts, instruments, reconnaissance photography, ship recognition, aircraft recognition, signals, astro navigation and it was interesting. I was very interested. We were flown. It was the first time we’d flown because this was the first time we’d actually come in contact with an aeroplane. And they were the Avro Anson. They called them, “The flying classroom.” And three navigators came up with a South African pilot. We had the first navigator who actually did the navigating. The second one, I forget quite what he did. And the third one, there was no seat for him so he sat on the parachutes at the back and it was his job to wind the undercarriage down. It was quite an arduous task. And then we rotated. And I quite enjoyed that. I remember we did a square search. And that’s where you, if you’re searching for something. Let’s say a ship that’s been reported in distress. So that you don’t go over the same ground twice or miss it there’s a pattern of going out there and then turning at certain ways and making squares. Ever increasing. So, you covered the whole thing. And then at the end of that time and you were over the sea with nothing in sight you have to plot a course back to base. And so, it was all dead reckoning. But you, you could look at the waves and turn an instrument around until it was aligned with the wave caps and then you got the wind which was at right angles. And of course, it was important to find the correct wind because otherwise your calculations didn’t amount to much. At any rate, as we set off for base we passed right over the town and the South African pilot said, ‘Well done. You’re spot on.’ And I felt very chuffed about that. And East London was equally fascinating. It got dark at 8 o’clock but that didn’t matter because it was warm. Although we wore khaki during the day, we wore our blues in the evening. And quite early on somebody had come to the camp and offered to put us up — two servicemen for the weekend. So, I volunteered for this. And it was Mrs Butler. Her husband had a farm at a little village called Berlin [laughs] About twenty miles from East London. And she’d got three daughters and a son and I was quite fascinated. And in fact, I was so fascinated I went back every weekend. Caught the train from there and became one of the family as it were. And she was like a mother to me. And then in the evening we’d sit on the stoop, as they called the veranda. Drank pink gin. And sometimes they’d have, the native workers on the farm would have a bonfire, sit round drinking kaffir beer and we would join in and sit around on the outside drinking pink gins and it was very enjoyable. But one weekend we got a shock because they said we were going to have a church parade. Of course, that would kibosh your chances of going to Berlin for the weekend. So, Jimmy Elliot and I who were pals, both trainee navigators, we set off for a walk after lunch on the Saturday and after a little while we had a terrific thunderstorm. The rain poured down and we thumbed a lift from a passing lorry. The only lorry we’d seen in ages. And he gave us a lift and we travelled through the rain until it stopped and we said we’ll have to get off there because we’d got to get back. So, we got off and he left us. We said, well we seem to have come around in a semi-circle in a way. There was a bend. If we cut across it would be the shortest distance back to camp. So, we set off marching across the veld. Quite an experience because the grasses were above our heads almost and you got queer insect noises buzzing at you and a bit of trepidation there. And it was getting dark and we came to a river. And we thought well what do we do now? Do we go all the way back to the road? It’s taken us all this time. Or do we try and get across it? We decided to try and cross it. So, shoes and socks off, tied around our necks. Shorts pulled up as high as they could go and we started off wading across this river. The river came up to our thighs but luckily no further. And we managed to get to the other side of the river but we were confronted with a quora. A village of beehive huts and the women sitting outside pounding maze and things. And there were natives standing there on one leg, the other leg against it. Holding spears. What do we do? Well, we’ve got no choice. Just go straight ahead up that track and don’t look at them. So, we set off up this track. The women picked up their babies and hurried inside the huts. And then another black girl came down the track, a blanket wrapped around her. ‘Oh, master John.’ ‘Oh,; I said, [unclear] Missy farm?’ I didn’t know what to say. And Missy Butler, ah. And she pointed back up the track. It was the house girl at, who had looked after us while we were — so we went up there, and of course Mrs Butler was very pleased and surprised to see us because we’d said we couldn’t go. But we were made very welcome. And of course, Jimmy Elliot, he’d never been in so we introduced him to the Butler household. And nobody to this day ever believes it wasn’t deliberate. And yet it was pure coincidence. Pure accident. Some of the things I remember about going to Berlin is that you could go down into the village, which was about two miles away and you could buy sherry. And the best sherry cost a half a crown a bottle. So, we could make a contribution to the parties. Mrs Butler used to play the piano. Used to roll the carpet up, invite neighbours in and they’d have parties and dance and sing. I learned the Afrikaans songs of course. The family next door, well when I say next door, next farm, were Afrikaans and so and they were living amicably together. And then they used to have auctions for — to raise money for warships and warplanes and the boys up north. Fighting in North Africa. And it was a Dutch auction they used to have where they started high and came down until somebody bid. And they asked me to be the auctioneer. Mrs Butler said afterwards that when I left they still asked where the little auctioneer had got to. When we left, when we finished our course, done all our flying and had the exams we were posted to Cape Town. Ready to go home. We went by train and we were very touched because Mrs Butler and the two, two of the three girls walked the two miles down and stood at the railway track. As we passed the farm — waving like made to us. Further on there were black girls that waved like mad too. Pulled their jackets up to show their breasts which met with whoops from the troops. Now, Cape Town of course we were just waiting. And on the way out on the boat I told you the sergeants had their own mess and the officers had the upper deck to themselves and the nurses. And so we saw how the other half lived. Every gangway was out of bounds to other ranks. So, we thought well we’re sergeants now. We’ve had a passing out parade. We’ll go home in style. Not a bit of it. We went home on an American ship where they didn’t recognise ranks as such. You ate at long tables and they gave you tin, metal plates with indentations for the bacon and the eggs and porridge. All slopped in. And you ate it standing up at these tables. They were standing up height. The Americans mixed everything up and then took a fork and they did a rotary movement with the fork to shoot the food in to their mouths. And the whole meal was over in five minutes, and we were given guard duties. We were given to guard the Poles who were also on this ship. And we had to stand guard to stop them going. Leaving their quarters. Never knew why because they were supposed to be on our side. And so, we came back to England.
[pause]
JT: What’s the time? Crikey. You’ve got me talking.
MY: If you move forward to when you were being streamed into Bomber Command. How did, what, how did that selection process work?
JT: Well, we went through OTU, which was. I can’t think of what it stands for now.
MY: Operational Training Unit.
JT: Operational Training Unit. Yes. And the first thing they did was to put us all in a big hangar and say, ‘Find yourself a crew.’ Pilot, navigator, wireless operator, engineer. We didn’t know anything about any of the others. It was pure luck. But a little Australian air gunner came up to me with a New Zealand pilot officer in tow and said, ‘This is Jack. Would you like to be our navigator?’ And I thought Jack looks a pretty dependable guy so I said yes. So, he said, ‘This is John but John said to me, ‘Well we can’t have two Johns in the crew. You’d better call me Jack.’ I thought that was very magnanimous of him [laughs] because he’s the skipper. And then Butch had made friends with an Irish wireless operator. And so we assembled the crew like that. And it was amazing how well we got on with each other. And of course, the [pause] I was driving a car by that time because in 1942 we’d had a mid-upper gunner who’d been a car, used car dealer and the pilot didn’t like him and got rid of him. But before that happened, he’d sold me a car. A 1938 Hillman Minx. Black with red seats. And so, I was very popular because I could take people into town and that sort of thing. I remember when I, I lived in Nottingham. I was born and bred in Nottingham. When I went to record everything and do my insurance and I said I only want fire and theft, ‘What happens if it catches fire next week? What do I get?’ And they said, ‘About two years in jail,’ [laughs] But the beauty of these airfields in Lincolnshire was that they were all within about forty miles of Nottingham where I lived and where my girlfriend lived. And so, every chance I got I went down the Fosseway to Nottingham. And of course, they got used to seeing me. But then I took members of the crew with me because coming from New Zealand and Canada and Ireland they couldn’t get home.
MY: No.
JT: So, they came home with me. Mother put mattresses on the floor. And I don’t know how she made the rations stretch. We helped because Butch and Paddy always made friends with the ugliest girl in the cookhouse and flattered her and everything. And they’d go around to the back door and get extra supplies of butter and stuff, bacon which we’d take with us to help my mother feed the crew. And we all went down to the local where my father used to, where my father and mother used to go. So, we became their crew.
MY: Which OTU were you at?
JT: I’ll tell you in a minute.
[pause]
JT: You forget the numbers and things.
[pause]
JT: That’s AFU. AFU came after OTU didn’t it? Because that’s Advanced Flying Unit.
[pause]
JT: And then EFTS — Elementary Flying Training School.
[pause]
JT: Well, do you know, I can’t remember.
MY: Which airfield was it on?
[pause]
JT: Names escape me. Names escape me.
MY: Well it’s not that important. We can look at that later. How long was it before you actually got on your first squadron?
JT: Do you know, nearly two years. Two years of training.
MY: Right.
JT: Because after we came back from South Africa we were posted to Harrogate. And they didn’t know what to do with us, you know. Whatever. Just holding while another course moved out. Put us on flying Tiger Moths around the Lake District which was very good. Anyway, get back to ops. We, you finish, we went on to Stirlings. We went on to Stirlings for the final stage of our training. Four-engined. We did Wellingtons at OTU and they were very comfortable. Very good aircraft, the Wellingtons. And then the pilot of course wanted to go on to, had to go on to four engines so we went on Stirlings which were the height of luxury with all the controls, beautifully coloured enamels, everything. But they couldn’t get above twelve thousand feet which was their downfall. And then we finished up at Advanced Flying Unit at Syerston which is near Nottingham and that was where you were introduced to the Lancaster. We lost a Lancaster there on training because he flew into a cumulonimbus cloud. You got whirled right up and broke to pieces which gave us a very stern lesson on not to fly into cumulonimbus clouds. And then because at the end of my training some people were selected to be commissioned. I wasn’t, although I was a good navigator because my background didn’t fit. Son of a furniture dealer. Went to Grammar School. Didn’t play games. Not officer type at all. So, we were posted to Skellingthorpe which is two miles from Lincoln. Waddington, I think was the base station. We were satellite. Although at one time in our training we had been to Scampton for a few weeks. I remember that because we missed the last bus one night and had to walk all the way back from Lincoln to Scampton. Now, Skellingthorpe. We shared an airfield with 61 Squadron. We were one side. They were the other. We had the record of dropping the most bombs and they had the record for flying the most sorties. It was sort of friendly rivalry across the airfield. Now, one or two things. The first trip we went on was to a target right in the south of France and we had to fly right down through the coast. Avoid, and then fly inland and find, find the target. And our bombs hung up. We had to return and we’d already fused the J type canisters. Do you know about those there?
MY: Yeah.
JT: Incendiaries set to go off at a thousand feet. So, our dilemma was if we landed, tried to land, with these on they’d go off when we got down to a thousand feet. So, we tried every manoeuvre. The wireless op and the mid-upper gunner had come down and were trying to open the floor and get at the bombs and dislodge them. And then the pilot was doing a lot of jinking about. Anyway, we managed to drop them in the sea and we saw this big flame as they went down and think thank goodness. But as it happened that operation was a failure anyway because what they thought was a German troop camp was a refugee camp which they’d bombed by mistake. So, we all had to go back the next night. This time we got, they weren’t expecting us I think the second night. So, we were [pause] I can’t go through all the ops and things but one or two stand out. First of all, there’s the people say, ‘Were you frightened?’ I say, I don’t think so. You grew with this knowledge that you might be living on borrowed time so you made the most of every moment. The girls and the beer and everything. And me being an imaginative type, as I walked across the fields in the June evening every blade of grass, every leaf on the tree seemed bright and vivid.
MY: Yes.
JT: Because it might be the last time you saw it. But you didn’t show any fear even if you felt it because you’d be letting down the other members of the crew. And you were worried about what they might think. They were the ones. Your crew were like your family and we worked very well together and played very well together. About the fourth trip we went to, I think it was that one, we went to Mailly-le-Camp where they’d German troops or something. And something went wrong with the communication between the master bomber and us. So, the first wave that went in bombed successfully. Came home. But we were in the second wave and we couldn’t hear any instructions from the master bomber. So, we had to circle and as we circled it gave time for the fighters from the Ruhr to arrive. Oh, and a massacre. You could see Lancaster, fighter, Lancaster, fighter, Lancaster, fighter. And we lost forty three aircraft and seven people in each aircraft. And the rear gunner Butch who’d been a plantation manager in New Guinea, he was yelling and yelling because he’d got a grandstand seat. I wasn’t so bad because I was in a cabin with a curtain I could draw. I could see out by standing up and putting my head in to the astrodome.
MY: Yes.
JT: And you could see from there. What I saw I didn’t like so I went back in again. Now, Butch didn’t fly with us on the next trip because of the experience he’d had. But the next trip was to Brest where the battleship in the harbour or something and we were coned over the target. Now, that means that the master searchlight has caught you and then all the other searchlights that are automatically linked to it all latch on to you at once. Can you imagine what it’s like to have seven or eight searchlights all focused on you? It was brighter than daylight inside the cabin. In fact, it was so bright you could hardly think. And you knew that the next thing to happen were the guns that were automatically aligned to these searchlights.
MY: Yes.
JT: Would open up. Sitting target. So, Jack just dived. Pushed everything forward. Dived almost vertically. Screaming down. I sat in my cabin watching the altimeter go around and around, down and down. Then I saw we’d dodged the searchlights and then the pilot and the engineer who sat next to him they were pulling back on the stick for all their worth. And we thought this is it. And we levelled out at two hundred feet and came back at two hundred feet over the Channel. And Butch never flew again. He [pause] was determined. He had a mental breakdown. If he’d been in the RAF they’d have said lack of moral fibre and they would have stripped him of his stripes, put him down to AC2 and put him to clean the latrines. Because he was in the Australian Air Force he was invalided home. He was sick, you know. Which is, you know, a much kinder way of dealing with this. On the other hand, I can see the reasoning behind the RAF because if people had been able to say I don’t like this after they’d done twelve ops they wouldn’t have an air force.
MY: No.
JT: So, they had to have something very worse than this to make you keep flying. I was thinking we went on, D-day was the next, next thing. We didn’t know it was D-day because — we went to briefing. They hadn’t said this is the invasion but they said you must keep from that part of the Channel because there are American warships and they will shoot at anything. We knew that from experience. Now, keep away from this area because there’ll be gliders being towed. And after he’d gone through all this list of dos and don’ts we realised that it was something big. And our job was to fly at dawn and bomb the naval guns at Cherbourg on the Cherbourg peninsula. And they’d given us a cine camera as well. But we flew and there wasn’t all that much flak although there was a lot of things going on all around us. So, it was a fairly easy trip until we got there and of course the coastal guns and everything go up at you. But we bombed. We couldn’t take a picture because it wasn’t light enough. You took your usual picture with your own flash. But as we turned around dawn had broken, the sky was getting lighter and there was scattered cloud and I looked down onto the sea and I saw all these little boats. All coming up to the beach. And that’s when I realised there was an invasion going on. We got home. Because we’d been flying two nights consecutively, we were given the night off and went to Nottingham. In the pub, in the pub they got the radio, ‘Tonight our troops landed in Normandy.’ And they said, ‘What about you lot?’ ‘We were there this morning,’ [laughs] Which got us a lot of beer.
MY: I bet.
JT: Now, after, after we’d finished our ops which were more or less the same. Those were some of the highlights. None of us got scratched. Although our most exciting trip perhaps was, we were going to the, is it the Saint Cyr Military Academy near Paris? Where they’d got troops, German troops being trained there. Officers. And we were going on daylight because it was so near to Paris. We were not used to going daylight. And so, as we set off some fighters, German fighters got among the stream and you saw them breaking, sliding all over the place. Dodging. They should have kept a light on the gunners. And I saw one aircraft, one Lancaster just slide down, slantingly and take the tail off another one. Which was quite awful to see. We passed the zone like that. I was navigating and trying to keep midway between the two zones that told us where the ack-ack was worst. And the fighters went away of course. You know, they only had about a twelve minutes and had to go back to refuel. Beautiful June evening. The sun was out still and all of a sudden I stood up in the astrodome to have a look. A stream of white smoke coming out of the starboard outer engine. And as I looked suddenly that smoke turned to flame and the whole engine went up in flames because we had been hit several times by flak on the way in.
MY: Yes.
JT: And of course, the engineer and pilot pushed the fire extinguisher button and the fire went out. But it meant we were only on three engines. The port inner engine, the engineer reported was running rough so we were losing power. Anyway, we went on and bombed. All, as I say on the run into the bombing run as we were swinging around I saw the Eiffel tower and realised that was Paris under there. I’d never been but there it was. And [pause] am I taking too long?
MY: No. I’m at your service, sir.
JT: So, we’ve got to [pause] yes when we’d finished our ops. Now, I’d been called up to the group captain at Waddington some weeks before for —recommended for a commission.
MY: Yes.
JT: And asked a few question. He said, ‘Well, these people say quite nice things about you. Who am I to disagree,’ [laughs] Right? And that was it? But it didn’t come through until the actual end of the tour, it coincided. I’d already gone to the training as a lecturer when it came through. It would have been nicer if it had come through while I was still back at the squadron. 50 Squadron. And of course, nobody really knew me there. They just took it for granted. But of course, I was moved because they move you straightaway.
MY: Yeah.
JT: So, I was moved to Chipping Warden as a course shepherd. That’s where they put you in charge of a course and men to make sure of their welfare and everything. No training. No training at all for an officer. No teaching how to use your knife and fork or anything like that. But they must have thought I was [pause] and, and then to my surprise they announced that I’d been awarded the DFC.
MY: Oh no.
JT: And that came as a great surprise to me. And so had my pilot and the bomb aimer. In those days you only had the one ribbon. So they made a great fuss of me at home and in the local newspaper. But then I went home [pause] but after a while of course you were between tours. Just because you’d done the tour of ops doesn’t mean that’s it. So, they posted me to Transport Command for my second tour. We were on Dakotas and we were going to bomb the Burma Railway in Burma. Not to bomb them. To push out supplies. So, I was posted to Baroda in India and that again was a culture shock. But looking back, to think that a nineteen, twenty year old bloke had all these experiences. We’d, the Maharajah of Baroda. They’d taken over, or he’d given us his cricket ground and so we were stationed — myself, my pilot and the other crews in what were the dressing rooms. All around veranda in front and then the open space of the cricket ground. And we didn’t have Indian food. We had a caterer and we had an officer’s mess and we could have anything as long as it was eggs. You could have scrambled eggs, boiled eggs, eggs on toast. Then some funny vegetables. And there was no drink. It was a dry state. The high point of my time really was when we were picked to go to Lahore to collect beer. Supplies of beer for the mess because you could drink it in the mess if you could get it. So it was put down as a training flight. And that was about the only time I’d really been treated as a proper officer. Because we flew to Lahore. Put up at the Faletti’s Hotel in Lahore and my pilot and I were waited on by six waiters with big turbans and cummerbunds. White everything. Before you could think of anything, they’d thought of it for you. We had a meal there and the next morning while we were waiting for news that our plane had been loaded up, sitting on the terrace and there were a lot of civilian ladies and gentlemen all doing the Times of India crossword puzzle – ‘What did you get for number eighty across?’ ‘Number eight across?’ ‘Oh, good show.’ I thought this is the life. We could stay here [laughs] We could stay here. But unfortunately, we couldn’t. And you know we went back to the mess. Took it back. And it was all gone in two days. But in Baroda we did flying from the Maharajah’s own airfield. We did trips around. My pilot, who was a Scotsman from Kirkaldy, he’d been a slaughterman in a slaughterhouse. He had been an officer before but he’d flown under a bridge and been broken down to PE. Corporal PE. And then he’d come back when the shortage of pilots — come back and worked his way up to flying officer again. And he’d got the DFC. Which is probably why he picked me when we were crewing. He was a mad so and so. You know, if he saw somebody with a flock of cows below, he’d swoop down and then laughed like mad when they all scattered. I thought, I’m going on ops with him. Heaven help me. But we never got to that stage because the Japanese war finished.
MY: Right. What to ask?
JT: Yes. You know [pause] we were getting to the stage where they were demobbing.
MY: Yes.
JT: Because VE day had passed so we weren’t fighting the Germans anymore. And my pilot’s demob number came up because he’d been in before me and so they brought the whole crew, a crew of three on a Dakota, back to England. And I’d still got six months to go before my number came up.
MY: Right.
JT: So, they sent me to Wheaton Aston. In Shropshire as well isn’t it?
MY: Yes.
JT: And I know it’s near Stoke [pause] as a flying control officer. Now, a flying control officer needs six month training course which seems a pretty waste to me if you are going to leave in six months’ time. So, I used to say to the flying control office, ‘You don’t need me, do you?’ ‘No.’ ‘Ok.’ Hitchhiked to Nottingham. And when it came to be demobbed you had to last of all go to the CO to get him to sign after you’d been to all the departments. He didn’t even know me and I’d been on his station six months. Oh dear. You couldn’t get away with it now. Or perhaps you could. Perhaps you could. But then of course I got demobbed and I got married in 1945 at the end of my tour of ops. So, I was married all the time I’d been in India.
MY: Yes.
JT: And then I got home and we started the house. At my mother in law’s I had a room at my mother in law’s house. And Boots had promised me the job back so, I went back to Boots. Yes, they gave me my job back — at the same rate of pay I’d left it at. Four pound fifteen a week. I’d been spending six pound a week in the mess alone on drinks and stuff. So, I thought this is not going to be right for me. And people I’d trained to use the instruments in the lab were now seniors and I’d still gone back as an assistant analytical chemist. So again, I saw an advert for teacher training. Emergency teacher training. And I thought that’s for me. So, I applied. Went to a centre and given maths tests. Wrote an essay. And was accepted for training at Danesthorp College, Ranskill. Near Ranskill and it was like being back in the service. All these people were ex-service. They still talked about their [unclear] and things and the cutlery. And the teachers were very good I thought. And we did a whole course sandwiched into thirteen months. Of course, you didn’t have the long holidays.
MY: No.
JT: In thirteen months, three teaching practices and they let us loose. And my, my job, I applied to Nottingham and to Nottingham County because they were separate. Nottingham City offered me a job. And their practice was to have a pool of teachers and then they sent them to the appropriate schools.
MY: Yes.
JT: So, I didn’t know what school I was going to until I was told to report to this Secondary School. The name’s gone for a moment. Now, in my education I’d done all the sciences as separate subjects so I’d done biology, physics, chemistry. I’d been interested in science. I’d done navigation which is a lot to do with science. Theory of triangles and things. So, I thought I’d be a science teacher but no. Headmaster said, ‘We’ve got a science teacher. I’d like you to take over the history.’ I dropped history at third year. At any rate I said I was always one for thinking things from first principles. And I think I must have done quite well because [pause] searching for the name of the school it was originally built as a primary school. At a time when everything was [affluent?] and the classrooms were built in a semi-circle with the windows that went right back to expose it to the open air, facing south and a terrace outside. And then there was a woodwork room and a music room. There was no staff room so the staff used to meet in what was a storeroom that they’d emptied and put a table and chairs in for the staff. I don’t know what the designers were thinking of but it was very nice. I got interested in theatre and especially marionettes. I’d made marionettes at college and we’d gone around giving marionette shows. So, I started a marionette club. And the very sympathetic woodwork master made us a beautiful stage with a bar that about four children could lean on and we’d put shows on. I wrote the script and then got the teachers to read the parts. Had great fun reading different parts and then the children manipulated the marionettes and of course they recognised the teacher’s voices in these marionette characters and it was quite a hoot. I enjoyed that. And from that I was given Head of English post. And I had been up for Deputy Head at another school but when the Headmaster wanted me in, I’d had a good recommendation he discussed all he wanted to do but the Director of Education said, ‘Mr Taylor can’t be appointed as Deputy Head. He has no degree.’ So, I settled for Head of English at another school. A bit resentful. And I found it also involved being head of the library. In charge of the library and in charge of drama.
MY: Yeah.
JT: And expected to put on a production every year. I borrowed costumes from the playhouse theatre that had just opened in Nottingham. They were for the two little cats that were the centre piece of this play, “The Magic Tinder Box.” And we put that on for three nights and that was a great success. And all the time of course I was applying for Deputy Headships at this time. Time I moved on. And I applied to Cheshire. There was a job came up. And so I drove up there. No. I went on the train, that’s right. And walked. I was interviewed and apparently the post had been earmarked by the Head for his Head of English department so it had been careful. It had been written for him. English. They wanted English. They wanted knowledge of using recorders. Tape recorders. Because he had a tape recorder. School hadn’t got one but he had. And after the interviews apparently, I found this afterwards, they were tied. So, it was a dead heat and it was left to the casting vote of the chairman. Now, the chairman had taken a dislike to the Head because he was, old man Cunliffe was a true blue Tory. And the head had stood as a Liberal candidate in the autumn. And so, when it came to the casting vote, I got it. I was called back in. And the chairman said, ‘And by the way Mr Taylor, congratulations on your DFC.’ I thought perhaps that might have been a little bit of a weight.
MY: Possibly.
JT: So, I came up here in 1964 and was the Deputy at the school down the road which was Sale Moors Secondary Modern. The head was a very dynamic bloke, John Hartley. And he said, ‘John,’ he said, ‘Usually I keep my people several years before I give them promotion but in your case, you know, you’re a bit older. I’ll have to do it more quickly.’ At any rate I was rung up one weekend to say Mr Hartley had died. This was within a year of joining. He’d had a stroke in his car over the weekend. I went to see his widow and she asked me to arrange the funeral and everything. And I did this, went to school the next morning, called a staff meeting. Told them. We made arrangements for certain sections of the pupils to attend. And order of service and everything. And then I found myself sitting in front of this big polished desk and the feeling that struck you [laughs] I’m in charge. There’s nobody to tell me what to do. I’ve got to tell them. And I wasn’t altogether pleased with the way things were arranged because there were, at that time it was six form entry. Sixth forms came in every year and they tried to bluff by calling them A upper, A lower, B upper, B lower, C upper, C lower. Everybody knew that C lowers were really ABCDEF.
MY: Yes.
JT: It didn’t fool anybody. And I was given four C lower as a penalty. Probably by that Head for because he wanted [delete] to be head. Although [delete] was a very nice man and we got on well. And I made some changes. I divided the school into two halves so there were only three tiers in each half. A bit of timetabling of course you could put one half against another. But the staff accepted this. And then I decided that the important maths and English — you might be good at maths and poor at English. Or vice versa. So, let’s have them set so you could be in a top set for maths and a bottom set for English.
MY: Yes.
JT: Or vice versa. So, I introduced that. And we had a governors meeting three times a year at the end of every term. And they still hadn’t advertised the job. And so, I got to know the governors very well. When they arrived for governors meetings I offered them sherry all around. My secretary was very good and made them feel very much at home. And my wife was very good at supporting me and getting to know the governors and telling me, ask him about — he keeps rabbits. He’s very interested, ‘Oh hello [delete] I hear you’re interested in rabbits.’ Anyway, it was two years before, before they advertised the job and they’d got six candidates. Three were existing heads. And three were deputies like myself. And the existing heads of smaller schools because of course this was a big school with sixth form entry. And at the end of the interview, now let’s, I’ve gone back a bit. At the same day as my interview I’d got an interview as Head of Sale West which was a new school recently opened. But it was group six. This was a group 8. And it was in the morning. So had the interviews, it went very well but they appointed somebody else. I drove home for lunch and said to my wife it’s no good if I can’t get a group C school, no hope of getting group A. In the afternoon they had interviews again. Same governors. Same people. And I got the job. And the chairman of governors said to me afterwards, ‘We wanted you to be head,’ because they’d known me for two years.
MY: Yeah.
JT: But we were a bit worried in the morning about giving you the headship of Sale West because somebody might have come along in the afternoon so blinded us with science. We had to take the risk of not appointing you to Sale West. And that’s how I got the job as Head of the school I’d been deputy at. In fact, it was a school I stayed at as Head because it grew under me. It grew to eight form entry and had new buildings. A very good drama studio. Good music studio. I was very happy there and I’d got a very happy staff. And we had parties after school in the evening. And the cook was very co-operative. Chintz tablecloths on the tables in the hall that we sat around. Brought our own drinks. I always said staff that drinks together stays together. You know they’re not allowed to have drink in school now.
MY: No.
JT: Not allowed.
MY: No.
JT: Lots of things are not allowed. So, I was at that school for about twenty three years because there was no point in applying anywhere else because a Group 8, six, twelve hundred pupils was in the top five percent of headships. And so short of going to Eton College or somewhere I couldn’t see, but it must have got a good reputation.
MY: Yeah.
JT: Because when the High Master of Manchester Grammar — he was made a governor of a Secondary Modern school and he asked the Director of Education, he said, ‘I know nothing about Secondary Moderns. What shall I do?’ And the Director of Education said, ‘Go to John Taylor’s and have a look at his school.’ So, he spent the day with me and no doubt learned something about running a school. Anyways, I’ve talked long enough haven’t I?
MY: Well we’ve actually managed to —
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
ATaylorJ150916
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with John Taylor
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
01:52:13 audio recording
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Malcom Young
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-09-16
Description
An account of the resource
John Taylor grew up in Nottingham and was evacuated before he went into sixth form. He left school and started working as an analytical chemist at Boots and although this was a reserved occupation he volunteered for aircrew. After his initial training he went to South Africa to complete his training as a navigator. On his returned to the UK he flew operations as a navigator with 50 Squadron from RAF Skellingthorpe. On one operation the incendiaries had not dropped and they feared carrying them back to base but it took several attempts before they dislodge them before finally succeeding. On an operation to Mailly-le-Camp the rear gunner was devastated at the losses he was seeing around him and it was his last operation. He suffered a breakdown and was invalided home to Australia. On another operation the aircraft was coned and in order to escape the pilot went into a steep dive. The pilot and engineer fought to bring the aircraft back under control a matter of a hundred feet from the ground. After the war he became a teacher.
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1939
1941
1942
1945
50 Squadron
aircrew
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
C-47
crewing up
demobilisation
entertainment
incendiary device
Initial Training Wing
lack of moral fibre
Lancaster
navigator
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
physical training
RAF Skellingthorpe
RAF Syerston
RAF Torquay
recruitment
rivalry
searchlight
Stirling
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/345/3513/PWarmingtonI1603.1.jpg
d2f9c16f7159dbcf0cb6826089545d2e
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/345/3513/AWarmingtonI161029.2.mp3
f839f6c4791721e8c02cac9b1f3db1cc
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
Warmington, Ivon
I Warmington
Description
An account of the resource
Four items. One oral history interview with Ivon Warmington (b. 1922, 150280 Royal Air Force) and his flying log books.
The collection was 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
2016-10-29
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
Warmington, I
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
MS: This is Miriam Sharland and I’m interviewing Ivon Warmington today for the International Bomber Command Centre’s Digital Archive. We’re at, at Ivon’s home in Wanganui and it is Saturday the 29th of October 2016. Thank you, Ivon for agreeing to talk to me today. Also present at the interview are Glenn Turner of 75 Squadron Association, Wayne Wolfspar and Ivan’s granddaughter, Sandra. So, Ivon can you please tell me about your early life, growing up, before you joined the air force.
IW: I was a cadet in the Post Office. You know, the village Post Office. Doing everything. The counter work, the mail, the telephone, listening to telephone conversations [laughs] and all that sort of stuff and would have aspired to the part of the Post Office career that I enjoyed was the mail department. It was a time if you mentioned any village in England I could tell you what county it was in because of sorting letters. And the epic career of that would have been on the railways where the mail trains would have used to have an arm suspended to collect the mailbags as they went through stations and another arm at another level that delivered mailbags as they went through stations. But the war interfered with that of course. So where are we? [pause] In those days we didn’t have girlfriend boyfriend but if you had someone special we were called sweethearts. I rather liked that. So my teenage sweetheart was sixteen when I went off to war with the Royal Air Force at age eighteen. And I was about a year on ground crew duties before I could re-muster to pilot training. And then I got my wings on Flying Boats. Came back to England. The Flying Boats were having a long salty war and did not need replacements but Bomber Command was both expanding and suffering heavy losses because it was real front line stuff. So we all got retrained and that was to my advantage because I was double trained in a way and the average pilot captain arriving at a Lancaster squadron about two hundred hours but I had four hundred hours by then. Maybe that’s why I’m still here [laughs] Another thing that I count as a survival tactic was the, there was a manoeuvre called a corkscrew. Have you heard about the corkscrew? The idea was not to go straight and level but to always be changing your heading and changing your height so that whatever detection devices the enemy had they couldn’t sort of latch on to you. But I was not only a good captain, a good pilot, I was a good captain and I said to the crew, ‘What do you think about this corkscrew thing?’ The navigator wasn’t very impressed with his pencil and other material rolling off the table onto the floor all the time. But the gunners had the last word. Theirs was punch line stuff. They said, ‘We’re told to scan the sky from left to right and top to bottom and if the aeroplane is on the move all the time we’ve no idea which bit of sky we’ve been looking at. So that was it. I said, ‘Right. I’ll fly straight and level on the auto pilot. Save myself up for emergencies,’ because I flew with my hand on the autopilot. And if they said, Corkscrew,’ if the gunners shouted, ‘Corkscrew left,’ or, ‘Corkscrew right,’ I was disconnected and gone already you see. It was that quick to take over manual control. So there we are. But the authorities thought so much of this corkscrew business they had it as an auto pilot function. If you set a height for the autopilot it would hunt up and down a thousand feet. Up and down from that. And the heading on the autopilot it would hunt thirty degrees left and right of that. And as a captain I thought well that’s going to take us longer to get there and get back. So I flew on the autopilot with my hand on the knock out lever so I could take over in a moment’s notice if the gunner’s shouted so. Because theirs was the punch line you know. When they said, we scan the sky left to right, top to bottom and if an aeroplane’s on the move all the time they’d no idea which bit of sky they’d looked at. So there you are.
MS: What made you decide to join the air force?
IW: Well, aeroplanes were up and coming thing. And, and I can remember the recruiting officer now. When I went and said I wanted to be a pilot. He said well you haven’t got what they, you know a peacetime pilot for the Royal Air Force was a university degree which I didn’t have. I left school at fourteen like all other village boys did. And the recruiting officer said, ‘Before this war is over they’ll want all the pilots they can get. So join the air force now and re-muster to pilot training when you can.’ That’s what I did. It took me about a year of ground crew service before I got on to pilot training. And then I was sent to, we had all our training grounds overseas. Whereas the Nazis had to train in the battle sky. But we were privileged in that our authorities considered it wasn’t fair to be shot down before you’d learned how to fly. So we had training schemes all over the world. And the training scheme in America had been through commercial pilot schools until Pearl Harbour and then when the Yanks were suddenly hijacked into the war whether they liked it or not the American US Army Air Force, they didn’t have an air force, it was an United States Army Air Force so they were subject to general’s attitude of how you should use aeroplanes. The United States Naval Air Squadrons. So they were subject to battleship admirals which is worse still [laughs]. The United States Air Force as an independent force wasn’t until about the 1950s when they finally caught up with the Royal Air Force [laughs] Sorry, I’m being critical [laughs] Where are we now?
MS: So can you tell me a bit about what squadrons you were in and what rank you held and the different roles that you did?
IW: Oh yes. Well, at the time I was, I got a commission with my wings which was the top four. Four of us got commissioned. All the rest were sergeant pilots. So that was a good start. And the first tour of operations was on the Lancaster which was the, to quote Butch Harris, Bomber Harris was the commander of Bomber Command, he said, ‘The Lancaster is useless for anything else but as a bomber it’s supreme.’ In other words there was nothing else like it. See, many of the early war bombers and some of them all the war were designed for little pre-war a hundred pound bangers. And when it became a real war and the bombs were a thousand pounds they wouldn’t fit anybody’s bomb racks except the Lancaster which could carry ten tons of smaller bombs or a ten ton bomb if that’s what you wanted. Your turn.
MS: So, can you tell us where you were located and what life was like on the base?
IW: Well, our life was organised twenty four hours a day. You know. Wake up time, sleep time, feeding time, briefing time, operational time. So that every minute of our day was, was planned like that. Where else? Where are we now?
MS: Where were you based?
IW: Where was I based? Lincolnshire. Half of Lincolnshire was 1 Group of Bomber Command. The other half was 5 Group of Bomber Command. So I was in North Lincolnshire at a place called Kirmington. That was the local village but it is still functioning as Humberside Airport in UK.
MS: Which squadron were you with?
IW: That was 166 Squadron and 1 Group. There were ten, ten bomber groups. 1 was North Lincolnshire. 2 was operating light bombers so they became the Second Tactical Air Force as a separate entity. Closely allied with the army and working in the field with the army. 3 Group was Stirlings down in East Anglia. 4 Group was started as Canadian squadrons and eventually became the Canadian Group because they contributed enough pilots and squadrons to run a whole Group. So where are we now?
MS: Can you tell me what it was like in Kirmington? Coming to a new country. Did you get to know local people? Did you spend much time in the village? Did you go out and about and see much of what life was like?
IW: No. Not really. But out and about there was one time when we were stood down and my navigator and I said, ‘Shall we go to the local town?’ And we went to Grimsby in, which was the nearest, sort of city and we had an afternoon off. And there was strawberry ice cream on the, on the — we had, we had tea and toast as an afternoon tea thing. And I sprinkled salt on the buttered toast to show him how we do it at Cornwall [laughs] You know, good old salty farmhouse butter. And there was strawberry ice cream on the menu so we thought well we might as well have a treat while we’re out having a treat. But when it turned up it was pink ice crystals. All ice and no cream. And we thought well fancy us thinking we were going to get real ice cream. But the lady who served us came out. She went back into the kitchen. Then she came out and looked left and right to make sure nobody could see what she was doing. She had a paper, a brown paper bag and she took out two big strawberries and put them on our dish [laughs] Doing her bit for the boys in blue.
MS: What other kinds of things did you get up to in the mess and during your leave time?
IW: Well, there’s lots of stories about that sort of stuff but we didn’t have much mess time really. Our life was programmed twenty four hours a day like I said already. And when we’d done our thirty, tour of thirty operations we were then removed from the scene to secondary flying duties. I did an instructors course and been a flying instructor for the rest of my life. Including here in New Zealand.
MS: So can you tell me about your crew? How did you get together with your crew and —
IW: Oh right. Well, that’s an interesting story because we arrived at the crew training place with ten pilots, ten navigators, ten everything. And all the trades were assembled in a big crew room and the pilots were taken off to the wing commander’s office and said, ‘You’re no longer just pilots, you’re captains of the crew. So you’ve got to see that they’re on parade at the right place at the right time and the right uniform. And all their discipline and all their personal problems. You sort them out. If you need help go see the chaplain. Don’t see me,’ the wing commander, ‘I’m going to busy enough doing operational things.’ So eventually we ten pilots, now labelled captains went into a room full of all the other aircrew trades you see. And the bright lights. We stood there like a row of stunned rabbits I suppose. And two men, a navigator and a bomb aimer came up to me and said, ‘We’re crewing together can we crew, be your bomb aimer and navigator?’ ‘Oh hello Jack. Hello John. Hello.’ One was Jack Gissing from Australia. The other was John Clark from RAF. And while we were chatting two others at a polite distance were hovering around and they said, ‘We’re going to fly together. Can we fly with you?’ So that was me selecting my crew [laughs] I was selected again. Well, where are we by now?
MS: Did you have any personal mascots or did your crew have any personal mascots? Did they play any kind of role?
IW: No. I’ll say this for the Royal Air Force. If they wanted you to do a job they put you through a course of training and said this is how we do it and we didn’t rely on a fetish of mascots or that sort of thing. We did, we did go in for nose art. And probably got my nose art here somewhere but I don’t know where it is. These [pause] Perhaps it’s not there. No. It’s not there is it?
Other: I’ll go and get some.
IW: In here perhaps.
[pause]
IW: Yeah. That’s the one. There it is. Thank you, Sandra. Yes, they, our aeroplanes weren’t numbered. They were alphabetical. And ours was I for Item so that was our nose art. There was a bit of thumbing your nose at the inevitable I for — the aeroplanes weren’t numbered, they were alphabetic and I for Imp was the current alphabetic phonetics. I learned the Post Office phonetics when I was in the Post Office and I learned the RAF phonetics when I was in the RAF. Then I went to the US Navy for training and learned the US Navy phonetic alphabet. But I for Imp. We’ve got her dressed up like a saucy girl and that’s the record of operations done. Including the one where my gunner shot a night fighter off our back. That’s the nose art. That’s that on there look. See.
MS: So can you tell me what kind of planes you flew in and how they compared to each other?
IW: Well, first tour on Lancaster. Air Chief Marshall Harris said that it was the only real bomber because it could carry ten tons of little bombs or a ten ton big bomb if that’s what you wanted. Whereas most bombers of the day were designed for little pre-war hundred pound bangers and when a real fighting war came on and the standard bomb was a thousand pounder it wouldn’t fit anybody’s bomb rack. Well, correction, the only bomb rack it would fit was the Lancaster.
Other: You also trained on Flying Boats.
IW: Well, I trained on, we were all sent overseas for flight training. I went to the US Navy. Came back as a Flying Boat captain which was to my advantage because no landmarks at sea. Flying Boat captains did a full navigator’s course as well. So an average bomber pilot turning up at a bomber squadron had two hundred hours but I had four hundred by then having done a full navigator’s course as well.
Other: And much later on you flew Mosquitoes.
IW: Second tour on Mosquitoes which was the fastest thing we had in our armoury at that time. Four hundred miles an hour. Like when the war was over we were put on as a courier service between the Nuremberg war trials and London. Carrying daily, you know there was two of us, one at each end and we used to fly, fly one day and have the next day off. Carrying official mail, newsreels for the cinemas and soldier’s military mail, private mail. Occasionally a passenger that had to go one way or the other. And they would just sit in the nose of the aeroplane where the navigator went down to aim bombs through the bombsight. But we didn’t have a passenger seat so he just had to sit down there and make the best of it.
Other: Shall we start with your paintings now Grandad?
IW: Yes. Alright.
Other: As a sort of —
IW: Some people write books. I did oil paintings. And that was the first.
Other: Describe the painting first. The name.
IW: Oh yeah. Just lay it on the floor perhaps.
MS: For the recorder this is Mailly le Camp. Is that? See properly.
IW: Fine. Yes. Yes. Mailly le Camp was a big army base at Paris but now taken over by Nazi Germany of course. And 5 Group had their own little Pathfinder force and they said it was, they got permission from the boss to have their own little Pathfinder squadron. The idea being that if they put a yellow marker on the ground it was only twenty miles from there to the target. So with a small target if everybody went into the target over the one yellow marker on the ground it was only twenty miles to go. The bomb spread couldn’t spread very far then. But as happens in these things 5 Group, who had their own private little yellow marker approach to a target said this is a bit bigger target then usual. Can we have support from 1 Group as well? So 5 Group went in first and the smoke and dust from their bombing raid was, was target blinding. We, they couldn’t see it. They had — so they called a delay to re-mark the target and we were supposed to circle the one yellow marker on the ground which was our approach point. When I got there, this was my first flight, when I got there there were yellow markers all over the place. Enough to light up the sky like daylight. And here were the Lancasters circling around the yellow marker on the ground like taxi cabs going around Piccadilly Circus in the middle of London. So I thought there’s no good staying there where it’s lit up like daylight. I circled the yellow marker as I was told but about twenty miles out in outer darkness. And later on I found out these yellow markers on the ground, only one of them was the target, was the assembly marker. All the rest were Lancasters burning on the ground. And on that flight I saw fourteen battles in the sky. That’s tracer bullets going both ways, you know. We lost forty two. So fourteen into forty three goes three. And I had a magic number that saw me through my tour. If I saw ten battles we’d lost thirty aeroplanes that night. So I had a measure of three that was the magic number as far as I was concerned.
Other: And when you got back to base that day?
IW: Well, we, we put up, during my tour I was the eleventh crew to survive thirty tour. They called it a tour of operations. That’s your duty span. Thirty operational trips. Then you went on secondary flying duties somewhere. And being the eleventh one at my squadron to retire we’d lost thirty three in that time. Which is what? A seventy five percent loss rate. That was front line battle for you. And I had a picture somewhere. Or logbooks. A thick logbook. Yeah. I prepared a little bit for this because if I can find it that one there there’s a crew, a picture of ten pilots and up ‘til then we were just pilot trained you know. Pilots among pilots. And then when we arrived at a crew training place we crewed up with the navigator, bomb aimer, radio operator and a gunner. And they, they were all in a crew room waiting for us and we pilots were ushered into the wing commander’s office where he said, ‘You’re no longer just pilots. You’re captains of aircrew and the crew members are waiting for you in the crew room. You’ve got a half an hour to select a crew and if you haven’t done so by then I’ll come and tell you who you’re going to fly with.’ So, alright we pilots went off to this big crew assembly room brilliantly lit and full of all the other trades and we must have stood there like a row of stunned rabbits I suppose. And two people came up to me and said, ‘We’ve crewed up. Can we fly with you?’ So I’d been selected already. And as long as it was polite there were two others who hovered around and they said the same. ‘We’ve crewed. Can we fly with you?’ So that was me selecting my crew. They’d selected me [laughs]
Other: Grandad, I’ll take you back to the Mailly le Camp painting. Can you tell them about the debriefing afterwards?
IW: What’s the suggestion Sandra? The debriefing?
Other: The debriefing afterwards. I know when you came in the group captain spoke to you.
IW: Oh yes. Yes. It was my first operation and when we came back the station commander, a group captain that’s, what’s that? Colonel in army language? But anyway, he was at the door greeting us all as we came back into the briefing room which was now the debriefing room and asking everybody the same question I suppose. But he said to me, ‘What did you think of it tonight, Warmington?’ And I said, ‘It was my first operation, sir.’ I, you know, had no real conception of what it was like except that everything that could go wrong did go wrong with that first flight and we lost forty two out of six hundred. Which was as heavy a loss as the RAF had except some of the totals in torpedo bombing was a bit fatal.
Other: But prior to this operation grandad you said that the French and German targets were treated differently.
IW: Oh yes. From the 1st of May 1944, after the Battle of Berlin they called it, you know the long trips to Berlin had been done and finished and Berlin was feeding its population out of army soup kitchens in the main streets. So it then was edicted that from the 1st of May 1944 on you had to do three targets to France to equal one to Germany. This was a danger assessment that somebody made and the very first one, on the 3rd of May, wasn’t it, that this one that anything that could go wrong did go wrong and we had the heaviest losses on that one as the RAF suffered anywhere. So they soon abandoned that three for one idea. And while we were at that, from the 1st of May 1944 on General Eisenhower was given first option to any military service with a view to what was required to launch the final invasion of Germany. Good choice of general apart from the fact that when the Americans take part in anything they want to be the boss. Any Americans present? [laughs] Anyway, pretty good choice Eisenhower wasn’t it? In German that means Iron Heart. So that was our, our commander from the 1st of May 1944 on and my first bomber operation was on the 3rd of May.
Other: Nineteen forty —
IW: ‘44.
Other: 1944. Is this the next painting?
IW: Yes. Well, that, that’s a classical big city bombing picture. You might sit there either in cloud all the way or certainly in the dark all the way and see nothing but an instrument panel for three hours. And then fifteen or thirty minutes of hell fire and then three hours of instrument panel on the way back again. So, that, that’s a target in full roar you might say. And the Pathfinders used to drop green flares or red flares and the master bomber flitting around the bottom in his high speed Mosquito would be looking at where the targets went down. If the greens weren’t in the right place he’d get the Pathfinders to drop reds. Direct them where, where the reds needed to go and had to have it all sorted out by the time the main force got there and then he’d put out an order, ‘Ignore the greens and bomb the reds.’ Or something like that. But that’s, that’s a city, a Nazi city in full roar. And this is what you call a box barrage and they soon sort out what height you’re at. The top level. Bottom level. And one like that, one of the first ones I did we were supposed to bomb from anywhere, you know. Go in at twenty thousand feet. Way above the wet weather in Europe. And that was also above the gunfire of the day too which was more advantageous and then descend to a lower target, a lower level to, especially in French targets. To be more accurate. Because it’s all an angular thing of course, and the higher you are the wider the angle on the ground. So this one we were told to bomb between twelve thousand and ten thousand. And when I got there as a beginner the experienced crews were always up the front and the beginners were at the back. When I got there this was twelve to ten thousand feet. Just like the briefing. So I thought, gosh it didn’t take them long to figure out what height we were going to be at. So I went from twelve down to ten and then underneath clear of all the gunfire. And when I came out the other side I thought gosh I was down here where all the RAF bombs were going down, all the flak going up and all the flak shrapnel coming back down again which was about the worst place you could be. Never mind. It was all over by now wasn’t it? What, while we’re at it my rear gunner used to praise me up. Well, for about three of these sort of operations he praised me up. He said, ‘Oh we got through just in time. Oh,’ he said, ‘The flak and the searchlights coming up back there now.’ And about three doses of that and he suddenly realised that what was he seeing as we went out of the target was what I’d been seeing on the way in. Right. Well, that’s, that’s a big target at full roar. They had rocket fuel.
Other: Which painting is this grandad? Does it have a name? Here’s one, “The oil refinery of the Ruhr Valley.”
IW: Yes. Well the Ruhr Valley was, was their armaments centre. The cities there were all sort of arsenals and they had rocket fuel for the rockets that were being launched to Britain. And they had rocket fuel for a little delta wing fighter aeroplane as well. But we didn’t know where it was and at different briefings they said well maybe it’s this target. This was an oil refinery but one of their oil refineries was probably where they were producing the rocket fuel. Now, I’m going into the target now at H + 4. H hours the first time that the first bombs go down and usually the experienced crews are at H H+1 H+2 and that. And the beginner crews are towards the end. So I’m a beginner crew. By the time I get there at twenty thousand feet the target has been hit and the heat bubble is, is above me at twenty thousand feet. That’s what? What’s that? Five miles up in the sky. Four miles up in the sky. So I reckon that must have been the rocket fuel that we were after. For a heat bubble to get that high that quick it had to be a hot one didn’t it? And the searchlights were, were in batteries. And there was always one that the gunners used to, if you got coned in a searchlight like that one over there the gunners would just fire down the searchlight beam. And some of them got lucky and they’d get one. One gun that’s, one searchlight that’s out of action. Looks broken and lame duck.
Other: “Oil painting.”
IW: Yeah. Yes. Some people write books. I did paintings. That’s me on the way in to a target. The Pathfinder target markers are going. The first Pathfinders put parachute flares. Tremendous candle power. Light the ground up. And then the lower level markers go in and pinpoint the target. And about twenty miles to go. That must have been a Pathfinder exploding with all the, they had all the colour bombs on board and all of a sudden all the colours that they carried — the yellows, the greens, the reds, one great big explosion. Probably a collision because I nearly had two collisions. So yeah. Junkers 88 night fighter in the bomber stream and twice one went over the top of my cabin so close if I’d reached up I could have touched it. Which was damn near a head on collision wasn’t it? But it’s always so reassuring if somebody is in the night fighter in the bomber stream going the wrong way.
Other: This one shall we do next?
IW: This one.
Other: Yeah. Fifth painting.
IW: Yes. See, here’s me heading into the target minding my own business and then the night sky suddenly lights up. A Lancaster right beside me has had his fuel tanks shot out of his wing. They used to, the night fighter gunnery was aimed at our wings. They wouldn’t aim at the aeroplane, the fuselage because they were afraid they might explode the bomb load. And you know that would have been such an explosion it would have involved the fighter itself as well.
Other: [unclear]
IW: That’s one of ours going down. Here’s one of theirs going down.
Other: Sixth painting.
IW: My [pause] I think I’ve said already didn’t I that the corkscrew method the navigator wasn’t keen on it but the gunners had the punch line. They said, ‘If the aeroplane’s on the move all the time we’ve no idea which bit of sky we’d looked at.’ The rear gunner had seen that aeroplane pacing us, you know. But another aeroplane keeping pace with the bomber stream might be another Lancaster until it dived down and came up underneath. And by the time it dived down he’d focused his four machine guns down like that and the first tracer bullets to come this way he sent his guns the, fired his guns the other way. The first thing I saw of the night fighter he’d nearly collided with my wing tip but he was already on fire and just rolled over on his back and went down with a bumph on the ground.
Other: Seventh painting. This is for the benefit of the machine.
IW: Well, that was the breakout from Normandy. We, we missed the Normandy invasion by half an hour because there were twelve gun batteries along the fifty miles of invasion, intended invasion coast. A gun battery is the command battery right out on the coast. Clear of the guns because the gunners who fired the guns don’t see the target they’re firing at and they can’t see whether they hit or not because they’re surrounded in the gunsmoke from the blast they’ve just fired off. So part of the invasion of Normandy, you see here all the ships off shore and the landing barges going to and fro. We had, there were twelve gun batteries along that fifty miles of coast and we had a hundred Lancasters on each gun battery. Twelve hundred aeroplanes to open the Normandy invasion. And the briefing said, ‘There’s a lot of cloud over France. You might be called upon to go in below the cloud.’ Because we were up at twenty thousand feet which is clear of the European weather and also above the gun fire of the day. But the master bomber was very late in, in saying the obvious. That we had to go below the cloud. So all of a sudden all the aeroplanes just closed all four motors, stuck out the drag machinery like the undercarriage down full flap and circling down in great circles to go from our twenty thousand feet height down to two thousand feet and under the cloud. So Lancasters all over the place with all the drag machinery out. Thank you, Sandra.
Other: Eighth painting.
IW: Well, that’s St Elmo’s Fire. Static electricity in cloud. Motorcyclists will tell you they get it in the front spokes of their motorbike on suitable occasions. Have you done motorbikes?
Other 2: Yeah.
IW: Well, that, that’s going straight into static electric cloud. The whole lot lights up. See the wing tip vortex off the, any of the disturbed air from propellers and wing tip vortex or just the passage of the aeroplane stirs up the static electric in the raindrops. Fine, fine cloud raindrops. If they’re big raindrops they get a high enough charge to discharge flashes of lightning. But the static electricity is fine rain drops which are mini electric batteries and they show up if you disturb them by any motion like that and an aeroplane is classic isn’t it?
Other: Ninth painting.
IW: Well, that’s a training flight. But July in England is thunderstorm time and when we, this is my second tour training on the Mosquito, De Havilland Mosquito. When we flew out, took off from England and flew half way to Normandy err to Norway and turned around and come back to simulate a bomber operation. By the time we came back July, thunderstorm month in England was in full roar. And it was a grand flight really because we all came down like a slalom through the gaps between the clouds except one idiot who, who he said he’d got mixed up in the cloud but we think that he deliberately just came down through all that lot. But you don’t fly through thunderstorms of that intensity and by the time he, he did have enough sense in the end after a hammering from hailstones as big as your fist. He determined that his stalling speed was much higher than usual. Not surprising was it? So when he landed on the runway he landed long and went off the end and crashed the aeroplane in to the radio aerials that were on the end of the runway. So that wasn’t very clever. That’s my interpretation of —
Other: Tenth painting.
IW: Where there is a black thunderstorm brewing it’s going up with no activity. There’s one that’s energised enough electricity to discharge in lightning flashes in to the sea of the Bay of Bengal on this occasion. That is what people call fork lightning. It’s lesser voltage than that. And the voltage there can only discharge by running down its own rainstorm. And there’s one brewing. Here’s one where the lightning is flashing from cell to cell within the cloud and you don’t actually see the flashes you just see the illumination. And at this stage of the game it was Cold War stuff and I was based in Singapore. And what we used to do on a night like that was the captain would lower his seat and just look at the instrument panel and the co-pilot would wear day sunglasses because instead of lightning being a blinding flash, you know a blinding light and then when it’s dark its blinding dark. Wearing daylight sunglasses they could see the differences and say you’d better alter course by about thirty degrees and go between the gaps. That’s the story of that painting. Thank you Sandra.
MS: Can you tell me how you ended up in the Pathfinder force and what that meant to you?
IW: Well, I didn’t operate as Pathfinders really because by the time I got there on my second tour it was the end of the war in Europe. And the De Havilland Mosquito was one of the fastest aeroplanes we had at the time so we got seconded to the Nuremberg war trials between Nuremberg and London. And with a day off at each end. When we were in Nuremberg we got to get into the war trials and see the Nazis all lined up. Or what was left of them. The prisoner of war camp in Treblinka, Poland was the Polish, was the Russian war camp. But there were no Russian soldiers to go home at the end of the war because it was just another death camp. Another of the Nazi death camps. So with the Russians the first to get to Berlin because Berlin was far east in Germany so the Russians got there first and that’s why Hitler in his, in his command bunker in Berlin bit the suicide canal err suicide capsule. You know they all had their cyanide capsules. And Joseph Goebbels, his propaganda man was with him so Joseph and his wife killed their two children and then bit their cyanide capsules. And the two chiefs of the Luftwaffe bit their cyanide capsule, capsules. So it was a fine collapse towards the end of everybody suiciding. Old Göring was lined up at the Nuremberg war trials and he said that, ‘In twenty years’ time there will be statues of me all over Germany.’ There never was. In fact since I’ve been here watching Sky Television History there was a woman, a German woman. She said she was a little girl she knew her grandad, Herman Göring was an important man because he was number two to Hitler. And then when she grew up as a full blown lady and realised the full inhumanity of the Nazi dealings she had herself sterilised so that she wouldn’t propagate the Göring monster genes as she called them. Which was terrible really wasn’t it?
MS: You, you were awarded a DFC I believe.
IW: Yes.
MS: Can you tell us about that please?
IW: Well, that, that was a normal award when you’d finished thirty operations in a Lancaster. They sent us home on leave after the first three operations which was [laughs] tell you how long they expected you to last. So if you lasted all thirty you got the Distinguished Flying Cross. Have you ever seen one? Oh you have. Good. I had a young squadron leader from Ohakea who was over here for Anzac Day one year and he squinted at my medals and he said, ‘That, that one at the end looks important.’ I said, ‘It’s a decoration. The others are medals.’ And ‘decoration’ didn’t seem to mean anything to him so I said, ‘It’s a Distinguished Flying Cross.’ That meant nothing to him. He’d obviously never seen one before. It appeared that he’d probably never even heard of one before. And I thought, goodness me, a modern day chaplain doesn’t know air force history. Later on in the Cold War I was on Transport Command and we dropped paratroops into the Suez Canal Zone when [pause] well that’s a long story but anyway what I was getting around to was when we dropped the paratroops we dropped the chaplain in [laughs] and the chaplain went down with the troops.
MS: Were you asked to do Operation Manna flights or prisoner evacuation?
IW: No. At that stage I was on the De Havilland Mosquito which was the fastest aeroplane we had, and doing the Nuremberg communication courier service to and from. Like eight hundred miles. Two hour trips each way. That was pretty fast in those days. Two big Merlins in a balsa wood aeroplane.
MS: What did you do after the war?
IW: I did market gardening for four years. That achieved two things. My brother had been a prisoner of war for the last year of the war and he, when he came back his boss had kept his office job for him and he went to, went back to his office job. But the confines of an office didn’t free him from his confined complex of a year in a prisoner of war camp. So by the time I came out he was, he was quite fretful really and I said, ‘Well, let’s borrow money and run a flower farm,’ which is one of Cornwall’s industries. Because like Northland pokes up into the north end of New Zealand Cornwall is down in the warm end of UK and we can grow flowers and early vegetables there in the outdoors when the rest of England has got to use glass houses. So the four years grovelling in the mother earth achieved two things. One, it freed my brother from his prisoner of war confined attitude and he went back to an office job because he was an office boy really. Or an office manager later. Like when he was in charge of a fleet of trucks, the company fleet of trucks he equipped them all with a radio telephone which was a pretty substantial device before you get to cell phones these days. Mini everything. And he turned a ninety percent of the return loads and he made the truck drivers phone in before they came back. So he turned ninety percent of the return loads in to payloads. Pick. Go to somewhere and pick up a load on the way back. Which must have been good for the coffers of the company.
MS: What happened at the end of that four years?
IW: Well, the Cold War was hotting up and the RAF was calling for veterans to return. And I went back in to the air force for another fourteen years. So in total I did twenty years for the Royal Air Force.
MS: How did you feel about the way Bomber Command was treated after the war?
IW: Oh, badly. Yes. Our commander Air Chief Marshall Harris was the only one that didn’t get an earldom which is the top civil rank in UK. So Bomber Command was always a bit sore about that. And Bomber Harris went back to his home country of Rhodesia and was a farmer there of some sorts I think. But the air force did him right. There’s a statue at St Clement Danes. It was a burned out wreck at the end of the war and it was the closest Anglican church to the RAF headquarters in London so the RAF said, ‘Give us St Clement Danes. We’ll refurbish it in air force style,’ and you probably know it’s the main RAF chaplain’s church. Although originally St Clement Danes was when the Danish were rampaging. You know, with their two horns and all the rest of it. They finished up they they went through Iceland didn’t they? And Greenland and they had a go at England and came a bit short there but a lot of them stayed in England. And the London, London authorities said that the Danish soldiers who stayed in England, married English girls could live outside the city limits. So hence the St Clements Danes Church. You probably know all about that. No. You can look it up and find out when you get back.
MS: Do you think that the bomber boys should have had a campaign medal?
IW: Well, they did in a way. If we’re going to talk medals. Where are my medals? Thank you. You spied them already. [pause] Yeah. Well, my brother had the Aircrew Europe medal which was a long term medal up to the 1st of May 1944. And the 1st of May 1944 all the UK forces and the American forces and the Polish and everybody else that was in, ganged up in Britain at that time were put under, you know if the Americans if they joined anything where they wanted to be the boss. But never mind it was a pretty good selection with a name like Eisenhower which in German means Iron Heart as the, the boss man for the invasion of Europe and the final demise of the Nazi government. So that one there is called the France Germany Star which was a campaign medal after the 1st of May 1944. And prior to that it was an all blue, pale blue, sky blue sort of ribbon which was called Aircrew Europe which was the long term bombing. And Bomber Command was the only force that took the war to the German homeland all the war. The navy could only attack ships at sea or coastal targets. The army couldn’t do anything until we put them ashore in Normandy. Sorry about that. Where were we? That’s the Defence Medal which is twelve months ground service in UK. That’s a war medal if you were in, if you were in the war, one day in it and the war stopped the next day you would have got that. One day in any, any uniform. You know, Home Guards and everybody got that one. That one was twelve months in UK. That one was after the 1st of May 1944. That one was any battle, front line battle unit. Army, navy, air force. See the three colours. That’s a decoration which went with completing thirty bomber operations with a Lancaster. And, oh no that’s just the brooch that holds the medal on.
MS: Now, you told me on the phone what it was like the first time you went in a Lancaster. Can you remember what it felt like flying a Lancaster compared to planes you’d been on before?
IW: Oh yes. Well, it was like learning to fly on a three ton truck and then they gave you a Jaguar to drive [laughs] because it was a beautiful aeroplane. And one of the stunts, I don’t think it was in the training syllabus but one of the stunts you know we did the training on lesser aeroplanes. Including thirty hours on four-engined bombers that was downgraded by then. The Halifax. And only ten hours on the Lancaster which was little more than a type rating really but it was like, I said that didn’t I, like learning to fly on a three ton truck and then being given a Jaguar to go to war with.
MS: And can you tell us a bit about the Meteor 6? Did you fly?
IW: Meteor. The jet. You’re talking the jet.
MS: Yes. Yes. There’s a photo of it in your book.
IW: Yes. The Gloster Meteor was a twin jet. When I went back in the war, well during the war I did a one months’ instructor rating course. When I went back into the war, back into the air force during the Cold War I did the full instructor’s course which by then was a six months course. And at the end of it there was what they called a type rating course. There was a Lancaster, a Wellington, the twin jet Meteor. All these sort of things that as a bonus at the end of the instructor rating you got to fly all these different types. The only thing we didn’t get was a Flying Boat. You can’t fly that off an aerodrome but I’d been trained on Flying Boats anyway. So I had a pretty wide of experience of flying which was the aim of the object until the accountants get hold of it and say Why are we spending all this money on that. So then they cancelled that type rating down to the twin-engined Gloster Meteor because the future of air forces was all going to be all jets. So the one aeroplane that I hadn’t flown was the one that was left over. So I got four, four hours in a Gloster Meteor. Then that that made flying very easy. Instead of like four engines working real hard it was two jet engines that just greased you through the sky. The speed was fantastic really. And on the solo flight from it I went up through the clouds and got up there and did all the aerobatics I could think of and then I thought, we were supposed to land with forty forty. That’s forty gallons in each wing tank. Supposed to be in the circuit by then because you had enough for a landing and enough for a second landing if the first one was failed. So high up, all the aerobatics I could think of, I looked at my tanks. Forty forty. I thought oh gosh it’s time I went down. I was above a sheet of cloud you see but there was a gap over there. So I just stuffed the nose down and at jet speed I went to that gap and came down. When I broke cloud down below I thought gosh I’m miles from where I should be. But with jet speed sort of free for nothing I went all the rest of the way back to the aerodrome I was supposed to be landing at and my tanks were still at forty forty [laughs] That was jet speed for you. It made ordinary propeller flying like hard work.
MS: And you carried on flying after you left the RAF didn’t you?
IW: Well, I did four hours of market gardening with my brother.
MS: Four years.
IW: Four years. Yeah. And that freed him of his prisoner of war complex and the Cold War had hotted up and they were calling for veterans so I went back into the air force for another fourteen years.
MS: What postings did you have?
IW: Well, mostly instructor. The RAF used to say once an instructor always an instructor. So that was about it. Including when I came to New Zealand. That’s what I did here. Flying instructing.
MS: Can you tell us about your posting to Singapore?
IW: Yes. Well [pause] first of all there was a posting required in Singapore for a Hastings pilot and three of us were put up for the job. The other two didn’t want it so I got it. How about that? And it was flying a VIP aeroplane. In, in England the commanders had all their stations within the aircraft carrier of Britain and it was like an aircraft carrier by the end of the war. Aerodromes everywhere. So all the commanders had just a small twin engine aeroplane as their runabout. But the commander in the Far East had an aerodrome two thousand miles west and another one two thousand miles north and liaising with Japan and America where ever they were stationed. The Philippines and all the rest of it. So the commander’s runabout was the four engine trans, long range transport aeroplane and we had, it was my aeroplane for four years and my crew. And nobody else flew it. We had full catering kitchen on board. And the, the middle section was two tables for four. Four each. So there was an eight seat diner and when they went to the lounge at the rear for after dinner drinks we could convert to four engine, the eight seat diner into eight bunk room. You know, pull a few levers and draw a few curtains and it was converted from a dining room into an overnight sleeper so that we could, we could take the commander on board from a days’ parades in Hong Kong say and sleep them overnight and deliver them bright and cheery next morning back in Singapore.
MS: Can you tell us about your most important VIP?
IW: Oh, well, as the official title was Personal Pilot to the Commander in Chief of the Far East Air Force but that meant we got to fly any top level visitors that were there. Members of parliament on overseas perks you know and foreign dignitaries. Going to visit the Americans one time I had fourteen stars on board. That’s one star brigadiers and two stars and three and four. There were fourteen stars on board. Delivered them to Okinawa. And they went on board an aircraft carrier and saw the Yanks doing all their naval stuff and then I picked them up again at Clark Air Base in the Philippines. That’s what we were doing for four years when I was based in Singapore.
MS: Which princess did you take to Vietnam?
IW: Cambodia.
MS: Cambodia.
IW: Yes. Princess Alexandra of Kent came out from England. Came out by BOAC VIP transport. But when she came there and we had to take her up to Cambodia which was a potential war zone we, the military VIP transport took her up there. Handed her over to the British ambassador and the Cambodian government. Got her back into England just in time before Pol Pot did his thing. You know about Pol Pot? It was use of British royalty at it [laughs] at its best you know. Trying to pretend that if it was alright for British royalty to go to Cambodia that it was alright to — a tourists attraction for everybody else to go. But it all collapsed into the Khmer Rouge disaster wasn’t it? About four million people and he killed a million of them. Speak French language. Foreign. Foreign language. Christians. Foreign religion. Clean hands. Never done a job of work. You know. All the city workers were put out in to the rice paddies. Wading around in the wet muddy rice paddies because they never, in his terms they’d never done a job of work in their lives. But that all ended in disaster as you know.
MS: Now, another important visitor, VIP, was your wife. The captain’s wife. Can you tell us about your trips with the captain’s wife?
IW: Yes. Well, occasionally I got her on board. And when I’d come back from one trip I’d have to go to the briefing room for a debriefing report on the flight we’d just done and get a briefing for the next one we were supposed to be doing which was a three weeks tour of Australia and New Zealand. So I said, ‘Any empty seats?’ ‘What have you got in mind?’ I said, ‘My wife’s got two brothers in New Zealand. It would be nice if she could be a passenger on that one.’ So I got Mrs Captain on board as a passenger. And we had a, for a favour of the Royal Air Force we had a look at New Zealand before we finally came out here. And the end of military service a lot of people usually stay in the town where they finished their service. And we were back at a nice little Wiltshire town. An aerodrome, one each side of it. And I’d been at this one for a tour and now I was at that one and we had the same little Wiltshire country town. We could have stayed there quite well but we had two nasty rebuffs which, you know twenty years in the Royal Air Force I didn’t expect any special treatment but I did expect, expect to get treated like anybody else. And one rebuff was the, I didn’t belong to the AA I belonged to the Royal, the RAC, the Royal Automobile Club and they wrote to all their members and said, we’re doing life insurance. Mates rates for members. So I enquired as to what that was like and they said, ‘Oh, we don’t cover military people.’ So that was the first rebuff. The other one was like the end of military service people usually think well this is a nice place. We’ll, we’ll buy a house here, find a job here and the land agent wouldn’t even show me you know. We said we were interested in a certain house and he wouldn’t even show it to me because I was in the air force. And I thought goodness me. You know. What gives? And my wife and I had a chuckle about this because homosexuality was a hot topic at the time and we had a giggle over it and said perhaps we’d better go to New Zealand before England makes it compulsory [laughs] Oh well. Here we are.
MS: Ivon did you fly any bombing ops to France on D-Day or leading up to D-Day?
IW: We did indeed. The, the fifty miles of intended invasion frontage had twelve gun batteries on it and a gun battery was a command post out on the post, out on the coast and the guns were further inland because the gunners can’t see what they’re aiming at. They do what the command post tells them. And they can’t see where their shells hit because they’re surrounded in smoke from the big blast that, that launched a thousand foot, a thousand pound shell from here to there. So the invasion of Normandy started with twelve hundred Lancasters. A hundred on each of the twelve gun batteries along the fifty miles of intended Normandy invasion. So a thousand bomber raid was only one for a sample really. The city of Cologne. And Bomber Harris was demonstrating that saturation bombing, that is putting as many aeroplanes as possible on the target depending on the size of the target and they chose Cologne as a big city. It was an ideal target really because it was hard up against the River Rhine and it had a semi-circle which was the city business area. And all the target stuff was in there. Then it had a green belt which was city gardens and car parks and sport grounds and all that and then the outer circle was the residential. So the city of Cologne was an ideal target for Bomber Harris to put on his thousand bomber demo that, he said that, ‘Wars had not been won by bomber aircraft yet but it’s never been tried.’ So he said look out for this. The Nazis bombed us small time. We’re going to bomb them big time. And you know all about that. You’re sure.
MS: Have you been inside a Lancaster since the war? Maybe at, at MOTAT?
IW: Yes.
MS: Yeah. How did that feel?
IW: Yes. Aye. Pretty good. And I had a lady friend here in Wanganui that, her father had flown Lancasters and when she visited MOTAT they let her climb up in the aeroplane and sit in the pilot’s seat.
MS: Are you a member of any Squadron Associations or the Bomber Command Association?
IW: Not now. No. I was Bomber Command UK. Or UK Bomber Command Association for a long time but by the time you’re ninety four you’ve given up most things.
MS: Ok. The New Zealand Bomber Command Association.
IW: Oh yes. Well, they, they wrote to me and said you don’t belong. Well, I said I’m a member of the Bomber Command, the UK Bomber Command Association. But they made me an honorary member anyway so I get their newsletters.
MS: Oh, so you were in some squadron associations in the past were you?
IW: Yes.
MS: So which ones were you in?
IW: Well, Bomber Command. UK Bomber Command Association.
MS: Yeah.
IW: And the 166 Squadron.
MS: Yes.
IW: That’s a Lancaster squadron. They had an annual reunion. Well they had an organiser who organised a reunion and at the end of it all they said, ‘Are we going to do this again next year?’ And he was saddled with it for the next fifty years [laughs] But it became interesting. For instance boys in, in Holland, well Holland is you know the Zieder Zee is lower than the North Sea and they’re, forever windmills are pumping the water out. And when they pump it down, they call them polders don’t they? They’ll build a dam around, pump all the water out and they’ve got another few hundred acres to add to the country’s surface. And they found a Lancaster there with all the crew in it so they reported to the RAF and the RAF said, ‘We’ll come and recover the bodies if there are any bodies in it. After that you can do what you like with the wreckage.’ And a lot of them will take the propellers and stick it up as a memorial in their town or something. But out of that we, we had a Belgian boy that found a Lancaster and he came every, he came over one year to our squadron reunion so we made him an honorary member and he came back every year. For the next several years anyway.
MS: So, I’ve asked all the questions that Glen and I have. Is there anything else you can think of that you want to tell us about your time in Bomber Command?
IW: Well, I’ve got a painting there of a Pathfinder that exploded with all its colours. Bombs are lethal things but they’re totally safe until they leave the aeroplane. The safety pin is attached to the aeroplane so when the bomb leaves the bomb rack it’s primed. But prior to that you could hit it with a hammer and it wouldn’t, wouldn’t explode. And yet a Pathfinder exploded in front of me. About twenty miles from me to the explosion and then the target so that could only have been a collision. And I nearly had two head on collisions. A Junkers 88 night fighter passed over my cabin going in the bomber stream but going the wrong way. Which is alright because he’s, he’s left you alone. Somebody else, it’s their problem. But twice, in fact I had three head ons but a Messerschmitt 110 was off to one side but the, twice a Junkers 88 if I’d reached up I could have touched it as it went over the top of my cabin. In the bomber stream but going the wrong way.
MS: Ok. Well that concludes our interview, Ivon. Thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate you taking the time to talk with us today. Thank you very much. That’s the end of our interview.
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AWarmingtonI161029, PWarmingtonI1603
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Ivon Warmington
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
01:23:50 audio recording
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Miriam Sharland
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-10-29
Description
An account of the resource
Ivon Warmington was working for the Post Office in his native Cornwall before he volunteered for the RAF. After pilot training he flew a tour of operations with 166 Squadron from RAF Kirmington. His first operation was to Mailly le Camp where the yellow ‘flares’ on the ground turned out to be burning Lancasters. He discusses the corkscrew manoeuvre. He had several near misses on operations when he felt he could just reach up and touch the other aircraft. After his first tour he went on to flying Mosquitos and ferrying passengers to and from the Nuremberg War Trials. He then became Personal Pilot to the Commander in Chief of the Far East Air Force. He emigrated to New Zealand where he continued to train other pilots.
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
Royal New Zealand Air Force
Royal Air Force. Coastal Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Germany
Great Britain
New Zealand
England--Lincolnshire
Germany--Nuremberg
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-01
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
1945
1946
128 Squadron
166 Squadron
aircrew
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
crewing up
Distinguished Flying Cross
Ju 88
Lancaster
Master Bomber
Meteor
Mosquito
Pathfinders
pilot
RAF Kirmington
searchlight
target indicator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3550/POHaraHF16010018.1.jpg
90bf2095f9d622a148db397297500e9f
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Vertical aerial photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. Street patterns are visible but most of the image is obscured. Captioned ‘4B 4B’ and ‘831 WKY 3/4.5.44 // NT 8” 9000’ [arrow] 208° 0030 Mailly-le-Camp P 1 x 4000 16 x 500 17secs P/O Pollard S12’.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16010018
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
O’Hara, Paddy. Folder POHaraHF1601
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
aerial photograph
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Wickenby
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3551/POHaraHF16010019.2.jpg
8b0e169144a6d87ecb3f61db0019f48d
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Vertical aerial photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. Most of the image is obscured by clouds and smoke. Captioned ‘4B 4B’ and '841 WKY 3/4.5.44 // NT 8” 7000’ [arrow] 220° 0030 1/2 Mailly-le-Camp Y 1 x 4000 16 x 500 17secs P/O Rollin M12’.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16010019
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
O’Hara, Paddy. Folder POHaraHF1601
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1945-05-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
aerial photograph
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Wickenby
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3558/POHaraHF16010028.1.jpg
4c5caf36aa6e995a67880d127d7f8929
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Vertical aerial photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. All of the image is obscured by bombs and smoke. Captioned ‘4B 4B’ and 'WKY 3/4.5.44 // NT 8” 7500’ [arrow] 228° 0028 Mailly-le-Camp X 1 x 4000 16 x 500 17secs P/O Farfan K12’.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16010028
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
O’Hara, Paddy. Folder POHaraHF1601
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
aerial photograph
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Wickenby
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3562/POHaraHF16010032.1.jpg
3e9e01f5689382fabfba45fa68113fad
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Vertical aerial photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. Most of the image is obscured by bombs and smoke. Some roads and the camp can be seen. Captioned ‘4B 4B’ and '835 WKY 3/4.5.44 // NT 8” 8000’ [arrow] 208° 0028 Mailly-le-Camp X 1 x 4000 16 x 500 17secs P/O Carroll B12’.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16010032
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
O’Hara, Paddy. Folder POHaraHF1601
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
aerial photograph
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Wickenby
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3563/POHaraHF16010033.2.jpg
3a2b0d5777486c6763e2fdfe986b7b16
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Vertical aerial photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. Most of the image is obscured by anti-aircraft fire. Some roads and fields can be seen. Captioned at top right ‘4B 4B’. Captioned along the bottom ‘‘848 WKY 3/4.5.44 // NT 8” 8000’ [arrow] 220° 0029 Mailly-le-Camp X 1 x 4000 16 x 500 17secs P/O Black C12’.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16010033
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
O’Hara, Paddy. Folder POHaraHF1601
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
aerial photograph
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Wickenby
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3565/POHaraHF16010035.2.jpg
71975cb0b566732fbc363ac47042a136
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Vertical aerial photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. Nothing on the image is very clear, on the left cloud or smoke. Fields and bomb burst elsewhere. Captioned ‘4B 4B’ and '840 WKY 3/4.5.44 // NT 8” 6000’ [arrow] 195° 0036 Mailly-le-Camp X 1 x 4000 16 x 500 17secs P/O Guilfoyle E12’
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16010035
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
O’Hara, Paddy. Folder POHaraHF1601
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Wickenby
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3577/EEvansCOHaraHF440510-0001.1.jpg
7d15c5f832498ffa4d5596d0adac3d1d
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3577/EEvansCOHaraHF440510-0002.1.jpg
2bc6e018bc81eb9865c014c0e38676f8
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[AIR MINISTRY (Casualty Branch letterhead)
P.416750/4/P.4.A.2
10 May, 1944.
Madam,
I am commanded by Air Council to express to you their great regret on learning that your son, Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O’Hara, Royal Air Force, is missing as the result of air operations on the night of 3rd/4th May, 1944, when a Lancaster aircraft in which he was flying as air bomber set out to bomb a target at Mailly-Le-Camp, France, and was not heard from again.
This does not necessarily mean that he is killed or wounded, and if he is a prisoner of war he should be able to communicate with you in due course. Meanwhile enquiries are being made through the International Red Cross Committee, and as soon as any definite news is received you will be at once informed.
/If any
Mrs. A. O’Hara,
10, Springcroft Avenue,
N.2.
[page break]
If any information regarding your son is received by you from any source you are requested to be kind enough to communicate it immediately to the Air Ministry.
The Air Council desire me to convey to you their sympathy in your present anxiety.
I am, Madam,
Your obedient Servant,
[inserted] Charles Evans [/inserted]
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
Letter from the Air ministry casualty branch to Herbert O’Hara’s mother
Description
An account of the resource
States that Herbert O’Hara was missing following an operation against Mailly-Le-Camp on 3/4 May 1944, and informing her that efforts were being made to ascertain his condition through the International Red Cross.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Air Ministry
Charles Evans
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-10
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page typewritten letter
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EEvansCOHaraHF440510
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Steve Baldwin
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
missing in action
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3586/POHaraHF16020001.1.jpg
59c5c11389071443308eb0be8147da72
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3586/POHaraHF16020002.1.jpg
a7e8d3e98c0098d7965fed42d3c4162f
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Description
An account of the resource
Aerial photograph of large military camp, showing it before and after bombing. A railway line runs in from the right centre of the photograph and terminates in upper centre, having split into three lines. There is a train in situ on the main line. There are visible 32 separate, identical buildings, laid out in a grid pattern in the lower part of the photograph, with the edge of what could be another set of 16 just visible in the lower right corner. The remainder of the photograph shows larger buildings and yards.
After the bombing, all of the larger buildings have been completely destroyed, except one in the upper right corner, though this has suffered considerable damage. All but three of the 32 buildings in the grid pattern have been reduced to rubble, and the three remaining appear to have suffered damage. The railway line has minor crater damage, though there is no sign of the train. There are craters visible all over the photograph, but these are mostly concentrated in the lower third.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two b/w photographs
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
POHaraHF16020001, POHaraHF16020002
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
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocated
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
aerial photograph
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
reconnaissance photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/191/3591/LOHaraHF655736v1.1.pdf
557abec419df40658803dece8c9dfd75
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
O'Hara, Herbert
Paddy O'Hara
H F O'Hara
Description
An account of the resource
59 items. The collection concerns the wartime career of Flight Sergeant Herbert Frederick O'Hara (1917 – 1968, 655736, 195482 Royal Air Force). Herbert O'Hara served on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby between February and May 1944. His aircraft was shot down over France in May 1944 and he evaded until he was liberated in September 1944. He was then commissioned. The collection contains service records and two logbooks, notification of him missing as well as correspondence from and photographs of French people who helped him evade. In addition there is an account of travelling across the Atlantic for flying training in Florida as well as notes from his aircrew officers course at RAF Credenhill. Finally there are a number of target and reconnaissance photographs and six paintings.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Brian O'Hara and catalogued by Nigel Huckins and IBCC 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
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
O'Hara, HF
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Permission granted for commercial projects
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/.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
France
Germany
Poland
Wales
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
England--Lincolnshire
England--Staffordshire
England--Suffolk
France--Nord-Pas-de-Calais
France--Lyon
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Germany--Augsburg
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Essen
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Friedrichshafen
Germany--Karlsruhe
Germany--Stuttgart
Poland--Gdynia
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Title
A name given to the resource
Herbert O'Hara's South African Air Force observers or air gunners log book
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LOHaraHF655736v1
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
South African Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942
1943
1944
1945
1944-02-25
1944-02-26
1944-03-01
1944-03-02
1944-03-15
1944-03-16
1944-03-18
1944-03-19
1944-04-09
1944-04-10
1944-04-11
1944-04-20
1944-04-21
1944-04-22
1944-04-23
1944-04-24
1944-04-25
1944-04-26
1944-04-27
1944-04-28
1944-04-30
1944-05-01
1944-05-02
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Description
An account of the resource
Log book for Sergeant Herbert O'Hara from 7 November 1942 to 9 September 1962. He was stationed with 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby, where he flew Lancasters as navigator. The log book shows 14 night operations over France and Germany, with one to Poland. Targets were: Augsburg, Aulnoye, Berlin, Cologne, Dusseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt, Friedrichshafen, Gdynia, Karlsruhe, Lyon, Mailly-le-Camp, Mantenon, Stuttgart. His pilot on operations was Flying Officer Maxwell. The log book is noted DID NOT RETURN beside the last operational flight. It is subsequently noted in Sgt O'Hara's hand that his aircraft was shot down leaving the vicinity of Mailley-le-Camp on 3 May 1944, abandoned by the crew, and that he was in France for 4 months before being liberated and flown home by the Air Transport Auxillary on 3 September 1944. He was subsequently posted to Advanced Flying Units and Flying Schools until finishing in 1962.
12 Squadron
1657 HCU
26 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
C-47
Dominie
evading
Heavy Conversion Unit
killed in action
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Lancaster Mk 3
Lincoln
missing in action
navigator
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
prisoner of war
RAF Binbrook
RAF Feltwell
RAF Halfpenny Green
RAF Llandwrog
RAF Penrhos
RAF St Mawgan
RAF Stradishall
RAF Wickenby
RAF Wing
shot down
Stirling
training
Wellington
-
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/.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Title
A name given to the resource
Mailly-le-Camp [place]
Description
An account of the resource
This page is an entry point for a place. Please use the links below to see all relevant documents available in the Archive.
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/376/7042/PHouriganM18030107.2.jpg
0a4c61412d5eb4f79e0ffe8af1545fa5
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/376/7042/PHouriganM18030108.2.jpg
74544280dc9797b3e87df70769df72d7
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
Hourigan, Margaret
Margaret Hourigan
M Hourigan
Description
An account of the resource
158 items. An oral history interview with Margaret Hourigan (1922 - 2023, 889775 Royal Air Force) and 156 target photographs taken by 50 and 61 Squadron aircraft during 1944. Margaret Hourigan served in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force as a plotter with Fighter Command before being posted to RAF Waddington and RAF Skellingthorpe with Bomber Command.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Margaret Hourigan and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
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
2019-04-16
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
Hourigan,M
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
Mailly le Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PHouriganM18030107, PHouriganM18030108
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocated
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Mailly-le-Camp. Rural area, centre obscured by smoke, dust and light streaks, field patterns and roads visible. Captioned '7B', '691 SKELL.3/4.5.44//NT.8" 8000' [arrow] 165° 0010 MAILLEY le CAMP.RD.Z.1X4000.16X500.19secs.F/S.LAIDLAW C.50.' On the reverse ' [underlined] F/S LAIDLAW 3/4.5.44 MAILLEY-le-CAMP [/underlined]'. '320yds 329° AP.'.
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
Hourigan, Margaret. Folder PHouriganM1803
50 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Skellingthorpe
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/408/7154/SChattertonJ159568v10080.2.jpg
454ac6cea09dbef967c0f7757492d015
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/408/7154/SChattertonJ159568v10081.2.jpg
97f42ed8a148b13ccab0fbd09254468a
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
Chatterton, John. 44 Squadron operations order book
Description
An account of the resource
Collection consists of 521 items which are mostly Operations orders, aircraft load and weight tables and bomb aimers briefings for 44 Squadron operations between January 1944 and April 1945. <br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by M J Chatterton and catalogued by Nigel Huckins. <br /><br />This collection also contains items concerning Dewhurst Graaf and his crew, and Donald Neil McKechnie and his crew. Additional information on <a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/109020/">Dewhurst Graaf</a> and <a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/115642/">Donald Neil McKechnie</a> is available via the IBCC Losses Database.
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
2016-03-14
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
Chatterton, J
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
MAILLY-LE-CAMP.
DATE 3/5/44
J.L.M.K.G.S.T.Q. | Y.U.P.O.A.
[Table of bomb loads]
T.V. [Circled] 1400 [/circled] & 1000
Dist. [Deleted] .125. [/deleted] .100
[Table of bomb weights and all up weights]
[Table of Preselect] FLASH – 6500FT – 16 seconds
ZERO. 0001.
WINDOWS. 18 C.G.C. NICKELS NIL. EFFORT 150-150-30
TIME TO TARGET. 2hrs – 1st A/C. 2 1/2 hrs. TARGET HEIGHT. 400’
EFFORT. Wave 1 0006-9 Wave 2 0009-12.
ROUTE - Base – A Reading – B Beachy Hd. – C 5000 X 0115 – Datum Pt.-
D 4854 x 0408 - Target – [deleted] 484 [/deleted] 4825 x 0415 (E) – 4818 x 0200E. (F)
4835 x 0020W (G) – 4922 x 0050W (H) – Selsey Bill (J) - A - Base.
METHOD:-
No Flares – Flares only if necessary.
[Underlined] Marked at Z – Z+5. 160° - 210° HDGS [/underlined]
No a/c is to bomb
[Page break]
K-G – 1st Wave.
A-T – 2nd wave.
Crater – Spacing 20 yds.
[Underlined] Method Datum Point [/underlined] Marked by a long burning cascading Yellow T.I.
[Deleted] PFF [/deleted] Mosq. will drop Red Spot on A.P.
The Red Spot Fires on both targets will be backed up by further Red Spot fires, but if the controller considers that these are not effective cascading Green TI’s could be dropped on APts.
[Page break]
K-G – 1st Wave.
A-T – 2nd wave.
Crater – Spacing 20 yds.
[Underlined] Method Datum Point [/underlined] Marked by a long burning cascading Yellow T.I.
[Deleted] PFF [/deleted] Mosq. will drop Red Spot on A.P.
The Red Spot Fires on both targets will be backed up by further Red Spot fires, but if the controller considers that these are not effective cascading Green TI’s could be dropped on APts.
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
Bomb aimers briefing 3 May 1944
Description
An account of the resource
Indicates two bomb loads for squadron. Includes preselection settings, Window, timings, route and method. Annotated 'Mailly Le Camp'. On the reverse bombing notes. including marking and that Mosquito will drop red spot on aiming point.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two sides of one page form document partially filled in
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Service material
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SChattertonJ159568v10080, SChattertonJ159568v10081
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-07
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Anne-Marie Watson
aircrew
bomb aimer
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
briefing
Master Bomber
Mosquito
target indicator
Window
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/376/7223/PHouriganM18030177.2.jpg
1f48a861c0d2f45f5b6e5caec144e403
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/376/7223/PHouriganM18030178.2.jpg
a5665f2a1384bf073bbd9edee489c79c
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
Hourigan, Margaret
Margaret Hourigan
M Hourigan
Description
An account of the resource
158 items. An oral history interview with Margaret Hourigan (1922 - 2023, 889775 Royal Air Force) and 156 target photographs taken by 50 and 61 Squadron aircraft during 1944. Margaret Hourigan served in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force as a plotter with Fighter Command before being posted to RAF Waddington and RAF Skellingthorpe with Bomber Command.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Margaret Hourigan and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
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
2019-04-16
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
Hourigan,M
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
Mailly-le-Camp
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PHouriganM18030177, PHouriganM18030178
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocated
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
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
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Mailly le Camp. Partially obscured by smoke and dust, no clear detail visible. Captioned '7B', '694 SKELL.3/4.5.44//NT.8" 7000' [arrow] 179° 0033 MAILLY le CAMP.RD.N.1X4000.16X500.17secs.P/O CREED.O.50.'. On the reverse '[underlined] P/O CREED 3/4.5.44 MAILLY - le - CAMP [/underlined]'. '1800yds 092°'.
Is Part Of
A related resource in which the described resource is physically or logically included.
Hourigan, Margaret. Folder PHouriganM1803
50 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
RAF Skellingthorpe
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/83/7965/MCochraneDH1395422-160412-04.1.pdf
639705f6040b7f91cbae1a96a04c85c1
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
Cochrane, Donald Harvin
Donald Harvin Cochrane
D H Cochrane
Subject
The topic of the resource
World War (1939-1945)
Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
13 Items. The collections concerns Donald Harvin Cochrane DFM (1926 - 2010, 1395422, Royal Air Force) and consists of his log book, letters, service material, photographs and a memoir. Donald Cochrane completed 29 operations as a wireless operator with 460 Squadron <br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Pamela Ann Staffel and catalogued by Barry Hunter.<br />
<p>This collection also contains items concerning Colin Farrant. Additional information on Colin Farrant is available via the <a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/107397/">IBCC Losses Database</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
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
2016-04-12
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. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Cochrane, DH
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
1st operation to Schweinfurt with F/O Leggitt and crew, on their 4th operation. Very good trip huge explosions and fires in the target area. 1 JU 88 seen, but were not attacked. 32 missing
2nd operation to Stuttgart with own crew. Good prang, no fighters seen. 40 missing
3rd operation to Frankfurt with own crew. Quiet trip except for target area, where there was a lot of flak, and a few fighters, but none attacked us. 23 missing
4th operation to Frankfurt with own crew, nothing seen until [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] about 70 miles from target. Then without anyone seeing the fighter we were raked stem to stern, with cannon and machine gun fire, the pilot on seeing tracers [inserted] pass [/inserted] under the port wing immediately went into a cork screw. Midd [sic] upper baled out, rear gunner badly wounded (see notes) 29 miss
5th operation to Essen with own crew. Lot of cloud over the target, so could not see the results of the attack. Just as we were leaving the target, another Lancaster came out of the clouds and missed us by a few feet. 9 aircraft lost
6th operation to Nurnburg with own crew. Still very shaky from when we were shot up. There was a lot of activity all across the continent, the whole way across it was lit up with all kinds of lights on the ground, and there seemed to be a lot of fighters around, as fighter flares were going down all over the place. The target was covered with cloud and there was quite a bit of flak, but the boys made a good job of it. We lost 96 aircraft.
7th operation to Cologne with own crew. Another trip slap happy valley or flak happy valley, as they call it on this squadron. Very quiet [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] trip and again target was covered with cloud, but results were very good. 31 missing
8th operation to Dusseldorf with own crew. Flak happy valley again. No cloud at all at the target, and there seemed to be thousands of searchlights and fighter flares, with quite a bit of [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] flak going up. The target was pranged very well. Lost 29 aircraft
[page break]
9th operation to Karlsruhe with own crew. Very quiet trip indeed saw nothing worth mentioning the whole way there and back, good prang on target. 30 aircraft lost
10th operation to Essen with own crew. This time no cloud over target, bombing was very concentrated, but P.F.F. had dropped their flares slightly off the aiming point and the prang was not as good as it could have been. Halifax was running up to bomb the same T.I. as we were and there was nearly a collision. 29 missing
11th operation to Friedrichafen [sic] with own crew. Longest trip of my tour as far as I have gone, took 8 hours 50 minutes, a whole days [sic] work in an aircraft. Came up on a lot of cloud just after the French coast, in which there was some very bad electrical storms, while we were in [deleted] it [/deleted] the cloud a Halifax came up from [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] under our nose, and nearly took it away with its tail plane. No cloud over the target and it was a very good prang, indeed the whole town was wiped out. We were lost all the way to the target and only found it with a bit of luck, and after leaving we were lost again until [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] back in Gee range. That night we were first home. Lost 36 aircraft
12th operation to Maintenon with own crew. Ammunition dump in [deleted] f [/deleted] France, a marvellous prang, wiped the whole thing out, there were still explosions going off there a week later, it burnt for 10 days. Saw some wizard explosions while [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] over the target area, and could still see it after crossing the English coast coming back. Lost 9 aircraft
13th operation to Lyons [sic] with own crew. Target was two factories [deleted] at [/deleted] on the south east side of Lyons. [sic] Was not a very good prang P.F.F. were out and most of the bombs hit the railway junction close by the factories.
14th operation to Mailly with own crew. An army barracks east of Paris. Quiet trip until we reached the target. Saw the most flak there I have ever seen, they were putting up all kinds of stuff, the tracer consisted of all the colours [deleted] under [/deleted] [inserted] in [/inserted] the rainbow. Saw about 12 aircraft shot down by fighters and flak. 49 aircraft were lost
[page break]
[map]
[inserted] 9 drawn bomb symbols and 9 target names [/inserted]
[page break]
[map]
[inserted] 17 drawn bomb symbols, 1 drawn parachute mine symbol, 16 target names and drawn circle showing base in England [/inserted]
[page break]
15th operation to Rennes with own crew. Target was the marshalling yards [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] in the town there, bombing was very concentrated, and it was a good prang. First home again.
16th operation to Hasselt with own crew. Target was again marshalling yards. P.F.F. could not find the target so we were told to go home with our bombs, but the crew did not like the idea, so we went over to another target, and asked if we could bomb that, we were told we could, so [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] in we went [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] and got a photo of the aiming point. The crew was congratulated by the Group Captain for a very good show.
17th operation [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] to Heligoland Bight mine laying with own crew. Was just like a cross country, sew nothing at all. Droped [sic] our mines first in the right spot.
18th operation to LE CLIPTON with own crew. A gun battery on the French coast just by Dunkirk, our bombs were the only ones that dropped on the target. Very quiet trip.
19th operation to Eu with own crew. Gun battery on the French coast south of Calais. Very good prang site wiped out. Very little flak or searchlight. [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] Poor show on the part of P.F.F., markers were very poor. Was just sheer luck that they nearly all hit the target
20th operation to TERGNIER with own crew. Took off with the rain pouring down, thunder rolling and lightning flashing, was expecting to be recalled at any moment, but [deleted] it [/deleted] we did not get it. Carried on to target which was north of [deleted] f [/deleted] Paris, railway marshalling yards, arrived early and had to do a dummy run over the target, our bombs fell on the target after a split second run up, fairly good prang. Was caught in Electrical storms again after leaving Reading on the way back to base.
21st operation to Dieppe with own crew. Very easy trip P.F.F. markers were down when we got there and were bang on, bombing very concentrated, right in amongst the flares, very good prang. Last trip for our midd-upper [sic] gunner. First home again.
22nd operation St Martin with own crew. Another gun site on the coast of France, quiet trip saw some flak coming up from the channel islands, but no where [sic] near
[page break]
us. Thick cloud over the target so could not see results of attack. The second front started about [deleted] indecipherable word [/deleted] [inserted] 7 mins [/inserted] after we bombed.
23rd operation to Vire with own crew. Took off in very bad weather, cloud down to about 1000 feet. Slight flak [deleted] at [/deleted] over target, 3 aircraft seen shot down, photo flashes were causing more trouble than flak. We were on the Western target. On the way back to base cloud was down to 800 feet, and at base [deleted] , [/deleted] at 200 feet we were still in cloud, but managed to land quite safely.
24th operation to Caen with own crew. Target a road junction and ammunition dump, just behind the front line of the second front. We were the only crew to get anywhere near the target,[deleted] on the [/deleted] [inserted] from our [/inserted] squadron, our photo was 500 yds away and our bombs straddled the target. First home again.
25th operation to Paris with own crew. Target a railway junction, fairly good prang but PFF markers were nearly out when we got there. One of the first home.
26th operation to EVREUX with own crew. Target a railway junction, about 40 miles west of Paris. Very good prang, had to break cloud to bomb and bombed at 2000 feet, saw our bombs go right along the railway track. First home again.
27th operation to Gelsenkirchen with own crew. Target, synthetic oil plant 5 miles north of Essen. Flak happy valley. There was thousands of searchlights, and quite a lot of heavy flak. Rather shook the new crews that are only used to French targets. Home second. Bob White on his last trip, was home first.
28th operation to LE HAVRE with own crew. The harbours were very well pranged. Daylight operation, could pick out every detail in the docks, really enjoyed the trip. Bit of flak over target, but nothing to worry about.
29th operation to BOULOGNE with own crew. Again the harbours. Not such a good prang as the last, the target [inserted] was [/inserted] covered with cloud, so could not see results but should have been fairly good. First home again, Last trip of first tour.
[underlined] B. G. SHOW [/underlined]
[underlined] END OF FIRST TOUR [/underlined]
[page break]
[map]
[inserted] 1 drawn bomb symbol and 1 target name [/inserted]
[page break]
[map]
[inserted] 1 drawn bomb symbol and 1 target name [/inserted]
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
Donald Cochrane's operations
Description
An account of the resource
A handwritten list of Don Cochrane's first tour. It comprises a short paragraph for each of the 29 operations he undertook. Included are four maps with bombs indicating his targets.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Donald Cochrane
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Four handwritten sheets and four annotated printed maps.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LCochraneDH1395422v1
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Germany
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
France--Dunkerque
France--Boulogne-sur-Mer
France--Caen
France--Calais
France--Dieppe
France--Evreux
France--Le Havre
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France--Maintenon
France--Paris
France--Rennes
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Essen
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Friedrichshafen
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Helgoland
Germany--Karlsruhe
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Nuremberg
France--Lyon
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Hasselberg (Bavaria)
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Jeremy Patton
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-03-30
1944-03-31
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
1944-06-05
1944-06-06
1944-06-14
1944-06-15
1944-06-16
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
bombing of the Boulogne E-boats (15/16 June 1944)
bombing of the Le Havre E-boat pens (14/15 June 1944)
bombing of the Normandy coastal batteries (5/6 June 1944)
Halifax
Ju 88
Lancaster
mine laying
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Pathfinders
searchlight
target indicator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/83/8020/LCochraneDH1395422v1.1.pdf
9067cdb8a316f66065fb65cd58bfafb2
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
Cochrane, Donald Harvin
Donald Harvin Cochrane
D H Cochrane
Subject
The topic of the resource
World War (1939-1945)
Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
13 Items. The collections concerns Donald Harvin Cochrane DFM (1926 - 2010, 1395422, Royal Air Force) and consists of his log book, letters, service material, photographs and a memoir. Donald Cochrane completed 29 operations as a wireless operator with 460 Squadron <br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Pamela Ann Staffel and catalogued by Barry Hunter.<br />
<p>This collection also contains items concerning Colin Farrant. Additional information on Colin Farrant is available via the <a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/107397/">IBCC Losses Database</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
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
2016-04-12
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. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Cochrane, DH
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
Donald Cochrane’s observer's and air gunner's flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Observer's and air gunner's flying log book for Donald Cochrane from 10 January 1944 to 31 August 1944. Detailing training schedule, instructional duties and operations flown. Served at RAF Stradishall, RAF Feltwell, RAF Binbrook and RAF Seighford. Aircraft flown were Dominie, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Stirling and Lancaster. He carried out a total of 29 operations, including two day light operations as a wireless operator with 460 Squadron to the following targets in Belgium, France, and Germany: Schweinfurt, Stuttgart, Frankfurt, Essen, Nuremburg, Cologne, Dusseldorf, Karlsruhe, Friedrichshafen, Maintenon, Lyons, Mailly, Rennes, Hasselt, Heligoland Bight, Le Clipton, EU Field Battery, Ternier, Bern-Eval-Legrand, St Martin, Vire Railway Bridge, Cerisy Road Junction, Paris, Evreux, Gelsenkirchen, Le Havre and Boulogne. His pilots on operations were Flying Officer Legget and Pilot Officer Mullins. The log book is well annotated and also contains cuttings of pictures of aircraft.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LCochraneDH1395422v1
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
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1944-02-24
1944-02-25
1944-03-15
1944-03-16
1944-03-18
1944-03-19
1944-03-22
1944-03-23
1944-03-26
1944-03-27
1944-03-30
1944-03-31
1944-04-20
1944-04-21
1944-04-22
1944-04-23
1944-04-24
1944-04-25
1944-04-26
1944-04-27
1944-04-28
1944-04-30
1944-05-01
1944-05-02
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
1944-05-07
1944-05-08
1944-05-11
1944-05-12
1944-05-13
1944-05-24
1944-05-25
1944-05-28
1944-05-29
1944-05-31
1944-06-01
1944-06-02
1944-06-03
1944-06-05
1944-06-06
1944-06-07
1944-06-10
1944-06-11
1944-06-12
1944-06-13
1944-06-14
1944-06-15
1944-06-16
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
France
Germany
Great Britain
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Lincolnshire
England--Norfolk
England--Staffordshire
England--Suffolk
Atlantic Ocean--Helgoland Bight
Belgium--Hasselt
France--Boulogne-sur-Mer
France--Evreux
France--Le Havre
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France--Maintenon
France--Paris
France--Rennes
France--Vire (Calvados)
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Essen
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Friedrichshafen
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Karlsruhe
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Stuttgart
France--Lyon
Germany--Düsseldorf
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
1657 HCU
30 OTU
460 Squadron
aircrew
Anson
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
bombing of the Boulogne E-boats (15/16 June 1944)
bombing of the Le Havre E-boat pens (14/15 June 1944)
bombing of the Normandy coastal batteries (5/6 June 1944)
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
mine laying
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Binbrook
RAF Feltwell
RAF Seighford
RAF Stradishall
Stirling
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/524/8758/AAn00202-150907.2.mp3
3a51154e9d6d6fcbea96557bce0d714b
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
A Navigator from 101 Squadron
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
An00202
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with a leader navigator from 101 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB: So it’s rolling now and my name is Chris Brockbank and I’m conducting an interview with [name redacted] and he wishes to remain anonymous when the recording is lodged, and we are at his home which is near Scunthorpe and we’re going to talk about his career in general but specifically the wartime activities and today is the 7th of September 2015. [redacted] could you start by saying where you come from and what your early life was and how you came to join the RAF, and then your history from there please?
AN: I was born in London and after education I spent a time in the city of London as a clerk cum secretary initially to a Lloyds underwriter, and after that to a shipping company and from there I volunteered for the RAF. Didn’t like the idea of the army or the navy but as a Londoner I wanted to get into the war having experienced the Blitz. I was taken on, on the PNB scheme and went first of all to America for pilot training with the United States Air Force, which I failed as many people did, and I was given the option to re-muster to navigator. I went to Portage La Prairie west of Winnipeg and when we started there we were told the important thing for a navigator was to remain on track and we were also told that one important aim, rather one important aid, was astro-navigation using a sextant. I did the course at Portage La Prairie which I passed, came back to England having done a little astro-navigation in the air but on the ground we were required to take hundreds of shots and plot them out for the instructors to check to make sure we hadn’t cooked them and then after that I came back to England, went to RAF Melham? where I did more flying once again no astro-navigation because as newcomers to this aid we had to be precise and this took time, and if you’re flying around the UK it’s short legs, it’s short legs and you haven’t got time to do astro-navigation and so I had my course at Melham? and then with a lot of other newly qualified aircrew I went to Wymeswold where one important thing we were told was that a good aircrew was a good team and we then went into a big room where we were told ‘crew up’ and so we stood around whilst the pilots picked us out and Rusty picked me and then together we picked our bomb aimer, our wireless operator and a gunner. We did our flying from Wymeswold and Castle Donington and then after that we [loud crackling noise].
CB: Just dropped it, we’re okay.
AN: After this we proceeded to Blyton where we converted from the Wellington which we’d trained on at Wymeswold to the Lancaster, at the same time we also picked up an engineer and a second gunner so we were now a crew of seven. Having done our course, once again including night flying but very little navigation we were then posted to 101 Squadron. We knew nothing about the squadron and we arrived to find that instead of getting H2S, a map reading radar to help with the navigation, instead we’d picked up an eighth crew member who spoke German and so was able to jam the German instructions to their night fighters. Also, once again it was stressed to us about staying on track, there being safety in numbers, also the question of timing. Bomber Harris didn’t want aids to be, the bombing to be in bits he wanted a complete termination of the target if you like and so we had to keep to timing that we were given and at the same time this meant that we had, we were spaced throughout the attack and this gave coverage to every, the whole Bomber Force against the night fighters or so it was thought. The other thing we found was that while we were at Wymeswold and Blyton we were introduced to a lovely aid called Gee, where you counted blips on a screen and converted this on special charts to latitude and longitude, but when we got to 101 Squadron we found the Germans had found Gee equipment on crashed aircraft and they were jamming the signals so our last Gee signal, our last reliable fix, was going to be round about the French coast, so we needed to get to height as soon as possible so we got a chance of getting a reliable wind because when we went to briefing, the navigation briefing for an operation we were given the forecast weather, the forecast winds, but bear in mind the forecast winds were based on what the meteorologists knew about the weather in the UK plus information sent back by Coastal Command from the North Atlantic patrols which [laughs] didn’t give you much. So it meant that once we got flying and got past the Gee stage where we had long legs we had time to practise, to use astro- navigation. If there was cloud cover and we couldn’t use astro then the next fix we were going to get would be when the bomb aimer said ‘Bombs gone’ so we needed if possible to get a fix in between to get some idea most importantly of whether we were on track and secondly that things were, we were also on time. So it meant that when we got into the bombing area and the bomb aimer said ‘Bombs gone’ I had to work quick to reset my equipment to get an accurate wind to use on the way back. Now there is a funny story goes with this. As I say I was kept busy but on our first trip the skipper asked me to come up front to have a look at the target to see, and so I saw all these bomb flashes and the flak and everything and my comment was ‘Bloody hell’ and I went back into my office and I never came out to look at a bombing, as a target, until my last trip. The other job I also had to do was that the captain would report to me when he saw an aircraft being shot down which I recorded, and I think that all these reports were combined after the war to ascertain as far as possible where aircraft were lost. I’ll have to stop and think for a minute, yes, I’ve already said to you I don’t look upon myself as a hero, I was doing a job. These are my thoughts, also why did we survive a tour when other crews didn’t? Well I like to think my navigation helped but in all honesty we got through because of luck. We had an in-flight collision, we survived the other crew didn’t. Also we lost an engine on one occasion and Rusty had to decide whether or not we should go on. This is where we had a bit of a hiccup, at Blyton we picked up an engineer. When we flew round the UK he seemed okay, but he couldn’t cope with operational flying and on the occasion when we lost an engine instead of being able to give Rusty advice on whether we could carry on to the target or not he was lying on the floor and it was a case we had to get rid of him, and in his place we got a very good engineer which also helped. In the same way we survived fighter attacks, we had good gunners, the thing is we were a crew but we were a team. We relied on each other and we trusted each other. In the year that I flew with Rusty never once did he ever query a heading I gave him or a change of speed I gave him, he trusted me implicitly and this is how our crew operated, we relied on each other and this plus luck is why we were able to finish a tour. Right, after I finished my tour I went instructing back at Wymeswold and whilst I was there Wymeswold was taken over by Transport Command and I spent a lot of my years until I retired in Transport Command. I became an A category navigator which meant that I was qualified for up to royalty. I carried, in my capacity as a navigator, various persons like Field Marshal Montgomery, I was part of a back-up crew when the Duke of Edinburgh visited Borneo, this was it, I enjoyed Transport Command, it was hard work you did a lot of flying but you saw a lot of the world in bits. I say in bits because if you went somewhere you were allowed twelve hours on the ground which included sleeping, eating, briefing. Didn’t have time to see anywhere but when on Britannias we slipped crews so therefore you had about a twenty-four hour gap between legs so then if you wanted to you could go into the local area. Apart from my transport work I obviously had ground appointments like adjutants and things like that and also I finished up at Scampton where I was involved in the training of radar navigators for the Vulcan and also for, oh dear, the coastal fighter. Anyway can’t think what it was but we were training radar navigators and that’s where I finished my RAF career.
CB: Did you fly in the Nimrod?
AN: No, no, no it was the Buccaneer.
CB: The Buccaneer yes right, okay, we’ll pause for a moment.
AN: After the air force I spent six months playing golf then I got bored then I became a civil servant for ten years.
CB: Doing what?
AN: Clerical work and then I retired again. I think I’ve covered everything in a nutshell.
CB: You’ve covered it really well thank you. So shall we cover one or two other bits?
AN: Yes certainly.
CB: This business of LMF.
AN: Um hum.
CB: And the navigator, what happened to people, well first of all in the case of the navigator, what happened to him? I didn’t mean the navigator, I meant the flight engineer, your flight engineer what happened to him as a result of that?
AN: We never saw him again. He was off the station very quickly. I mean we don’t think he was LMF we think it was medical.
CB: Right.
AN: Now because if he’d been LMF, now I was, it was after I left the squadron, my wife told me about it the LMF parade where the person concerned is, marches on and his stripes are torn off his uniform and then he’s off the station. LMF, were they LMF? Who can tell? I mean that in all honesty I don’t think I ever worried about what would happen to us until I started going out with my wife. Then I had a reason for wanting to survive but until then, I can’t, I can’t speak for other crew members because that’s something you keep to yourself. We all, well I say all, we had little mascots, I had a little doll I had in my inside pocket of my battledress, you got, you got very, very, very how can I explain it, you, you, you things had to happen, people might fly in a silk scarf, these things went on. Now our Canadian rear gunner he always took two beer bottles with him so he could bomb the target himself. Now one night, the station commander used to come round and wish us all luck and the Canadian rear gunner told him he hadn’t got his beer bottles so the station commander went back to the mess and brought him two beer bottles so he went on the raid happy that he could bomb Germany.
CB: These little snippets are classic aren’t they but people were handling stress in different ways?
AN: Um.
CB: I think that the LMF bit one doesn’t want to overstate at the same time it is important to understand it and some people as you say perhaps had, weren’t feeling very well, and would react in a particular way and it wasn’t actually lacking moral fibre.
AN: Yes. You see, I mean in my case as a navigator, I was busy, I was busy all the time. I mean if I was in the middle of taking, I mean it was three astro sights to a fix. If I was in the middle of that and we hit bumpy weather or we were attacked by a fighter that was wasted time, had to start all over again so I was kept pretty busy, then had, I mean I hoped that when I took my three shots it would meet exactly in the middle, never happened you got a cocked hat. Provided this cocked hat wasn’t too large you could say ‘Right I’ll go for the middle of that cocked hat and I can trust that’ but I mean you had to take each case on its merits.
CB: But occasionally there would be a very high cloud top cover so what did you do then?
AN: Oh yes true, then all you could do was just hope.
CB: Um.
AN: You couldn’t do anything, and because I had no aids.
CB: But you were clearly skilled at using the equipment.
AN: Dead reckoning.
CB: Yes.
AN: But that was based on the winds the met office, the met can’t forecast weather now so. And of course one other thing when we talk about luck we were on the Nuremberg raid, the ninety-three aircraft.
CB: Yes.
AN: Well we lost a quarter of the squadron on that and amongst us the quarter of the squadron we lost was our most senior crew on their twenty-ninth or thirtieth trip. And how were they lost? They were shot down by a gunner in a Halifax aircraft who mistook the Lancaster for a night fighter.
CB: Crikey.
AN: Now the thing is.
CB: Savage irony.
AN: We were taught, right from the word go, that if the night fighter, if you saw a night fighter, if he wasn’t attacking you, ignore him, because if you fire on him you’re giving away your position.
CB: Yes.
AN: This is another bit of luck.
CB: Um, um. What happened to the crew in that case?
AN: They were all, one escaped, one evaded but the rest were killed.
CB: Um. Okay, now as I understand it from Rusty you had a curious experience of an explosion beneath the aircraft?
AN: Oh this was at Mailly-le-Camp.
CB: Yes. So that put you inverted?
AN: Well, I think Rusty is a little bit incorrect there.
CB: Right.
AN: Because if we had been upside down, or doing a slow roll I think he terms it, he tells everybody this, and I keep quiet. If we had inverted my sextant in its box would have been at the side of me. If he’d inverted the box would have gone up in the air and come down and clobbered me. I don’t recall a sextant clobbering me.
CB: Okay.
AN: That’s all I can say.
CB: Yes, okay. Now fighters chase you and the rear gunner says ‘Corkscrew’.
AN: Yes.
CB: How did you manage that situation as a navigator?
AN: Well as navigator I mean i just sat there and waited for all clear. I mean the thing is we had a, we had a number of attacks but only one where it persisted and we felt that the normal night fighter pilot he could have been new and if we took the correct action he’d go and find somebody else who was asleep. This particular one continued the attack and our gunner shot him down. [Chuckling] luck.
CB: Um. So you’re a special ops squadron, what was going on with your German speaker crew member?
AN: In what way?
CB: Well he sitting in the back?
AN: Yes.
CB: What was he actually doing and did you link in with it?
AN: Well the, as I say, our operators, who were ABC operators were spaced throughout the attack and I think they were given certain frequencies each to monitor. We didn’t know much about this because we only saw our special at briefing, he didn’t live with the rest of us, they were kept away from us in case they said if they talked in their sleep.
CB: Yes.
AN: And gave away secrets.
CB: Yes.
AN: So we knew nothing really of what he did, but he like me was lucky when we talk about being afraid. He, like me, was kept busy. The wireless operator was kept busy but all the rest were spending all their time looking out for fighters and seeing people shot down. I didn’t experience that, our special didn’t, the wireless operator didn’t ‘cause we were all kept busy doing our jobs and we were fortunate in that respect.
CB: And what was the wireless operator doing linking in with you?
AN: Well that he couldn’t help me as such but he was, he was listening out for, there were broadcasts at certain times, we had a classic case where it was, well Rusty was in London getting his uniform and we went to Berlin with the squadron commander, and this particular one we were going, we were coming in to Berlin from the north, from Denmark. The forecast wind was something like sixty-five miles an hour. They’d started then, certain aircraft were given the job of giving broadcast winds, which they were giving to us and so we were given something like eighty-five when I got a pinpoint on the Danish coast I reckoned it was a hundred and thirty, and we were coming into Berlin with the wind right behind us, and I had to say to the wing commander, ‘Do an orbit’, he did an orbit, I said ‘Flaps down, undercarriage down’, now normally speaking we had a system, when the bomber aimer said ‘Bombs gone’ the bomb doors were closed, Rusty put the nose down and we got the hell out of there. I had planned, I planned that, I loved that because it was a short run out of the target before you turned west. Too far, too short and you’re off track. In this instance the wing commander he was sitting down in his cockpit on instruments and we’re going through with nothing on the clock and I said to people afterwards, ‘How do I say to a wing commander for Pete’s sake let’s get the hell out of here?’ A bit of, looking back on it funny.
CB: Yes.
AN: But not at the time.
CB: No quite, because there’s a strict hierarchy?
AN: Um.
CB: So bombs have gone, then there’s the delay while you wait for the picture to be taken?
AN: For the picture to be taken yes.
CB: What was that like?
AN: It seemed a lot longer than it was but the thing is we had this short distance to run which took that into account, as I say and then we turned and by then hopefully I would have worked out a wind and the first thing I do, no sooner turned on a course, I’d give Rusty a new one to allow for where we were and what the wind was, or what I thought it was.
CB: So you’re over the target, you’ve dropped the bombs, the flash has gone and you’ve taken the picture. There are lots of planes around you so how do you take a new heading when there are so many, so close, how long before you change heading?
AN: Well, we wouldn’t change, we’d change heading when we got to the end of that particular leg out of the target.
CB: Right.
AN: It was a case in the same way we had our collision, it happened. Who’s to say how many aircraft collided with each other, and why did they? I mean the thing is this, that at night you can’t see much, this is what we relied on for our safety, the fact we were in the dark.
CB: Sure. Now you went on ops to do your thirty?
AN: Um.
CB: But you didn’t fly every night, so what did you do on the nights when you weren’t on operations?
AN: Well.
CB: And in the days?
AN: Well, the thing is first of all I mean we’d flown by night and we’ve come back at dawn, we’re ready for sleeping. It would all depend, I mean it might well be we were down for fighter affiliation or an air test or something, it could vary in the same way we might get back and they’d say ‘You’re on ops again tonight’ because being the special squadron we sometimes flew not with, we were 1 Group, but we might be flying with 5 Group, covering 5 Group from the fighters.
CB: So the attrition rate on your squadron was higher than the average of others?
AN: Yes, because I mean the thing is that we did our first op in November and finished our last op 4th June and in that we did thirty trips.
CB: Um. So in then extending, so when you were flying with the others then you’re doing a higher rate of ops?
AN: Yes.
CB: How did that go down with the aircrew?
AN: I don’t think we ever, we ever talked about it really. I mean we had a spell where the Bomber Command in its wisdom said ‘Oh, getting ready for the invasion we’re doing the French targets’ and because they’re French targets they’ll be a third of an op which would have taken us longer, but after Mailly-le-Camp where we lost a lot of aircraft they changed their minds. So all of a sudden we suddenly found we’d done more ops than we thought.
CB: [Laughter] Right.
AN: But once again my attitude changed when I started going out with my wife. Before then, before then it was the case that if there were no ops then right it was down to the village pub with our ground crew. We were very fortunate with our ground crew, we had a corporal in charge of our aircraft, he’s dead now unfortunately, but he lived in Scotland just near Perth, and if any of us were up in Perth area we’d always pop and see him and his wife, and he was a corporal he stayed a corporal he wouldn’t take promotion ‘cause he would be going away from his aircraft. He had a radio at dispersal and he heard us coming back, he was ready for us, and if we were going on an op I’d get in the aircraft and I’d unpack my stuff ready, my chart, and if one of the ground crew was coming up front he’d say ‘I’m coming up front cover your chart up’. Never asked us until we got back then they’d ask us where we’d been. In the same way that after we’d had our collision and the aircraft was a write off we came in the next day, not only did we have a new aircraft we had a new insignia, the insignia that’s on that picture there, ‘Our Willy’.
CB: So there was, in your case there was a very close liaison with the ground crew, what about other aircrew when their?
AN: Well this is the thing that the loss rate was so high you didn’t get to know people. I mean you knew the odd people for different reasons, I mean I didn’t even know all the navigators because I mean you go into briefing, you see we had a nav briefing then there was the crew briefing when we could see peoples’ faces when they saw what the target was, we’d already had that shock we’d got over it but it was the briefing and then after I’d finished, I’d finished doing my calculations I’m back as a crew member again, I’ve ceased to be an individual.
CB: Yeah.
AN: And so you did, I mean I’ve had people say to me ‘Did you remember so-and-so?’ I’d say ‘No, never heard of him’ whereas on the other, yesterday I was able to say to Rusty ‘Yes the aircraft next to us was x squared and the captain was McKenna’ why I don’t know I remember that but it’s, people change so much.
CB: When you took off you had to form up?
AN: Well.
CB: How place?
AN: Well not, no not necessarily, what we had, we had a beam and we would fly up and down the beam climbing and then once we reached a certain height we would then set off bearing in mind I wanted us to get to operating height so I had time to calculate a wind.
CB: Was the beam radio or was it a searchlight?
AN: No it was a radio.
CB: Right, and anyway you were interspersed in the stream?
AN: Oh yes, yes.
CB: So actually you didn’t go as a squadron?
AN: The ones going, the ones in our area would be from Knutford?
CB: Yeah.
AN: Wickenby would have their own system I assume.
CB: Right, okay. Now in the day time and you’re not sleeping after an op what are you doing?
AN: Well, it might be fighter affiliation.
CB: Could you just describe what fighter affiliation involved?
AN: Well fighter affiliation.
CB: How it works?
AN: It would be arranged that we would go to a certain point somewhere and a fighter would suddenly arrive and our job was to take evasive action the way we would have done if it were a German night fighter. It was just to make sure that the two gunners were on the ball and the reaction by the pilot was okay.
CB: Okay. Going back to crew and operations, the air bomber is up front doing in the run-in, how did you link with him?
AN: Well, the link with him is as we were getting near the coast I’d say to him ‘Can you give me a pin point?’ and I got the same answer every time, ‘I can’t give you a pin point but we’re dead on track.’ That was my link with him. His job before we got to the target was throwing out Window strips but you see the thing is that, as I said to you, we were told ‘A crew is a team.’ Now think of the composition of our crew. Pilot a Geordie, engineer Lancashire, bomb aimer Birmingham, I’m from London, wireless operator from Wales, mid upper gunner from Lancashire, special operator from Norfolk, rear gunner from Canada, there’s a mixture for you, but we clicked as a team in the same way that if we go back that when the squadron association was formed in 1977 for about two or three years we were unique we had eight crew members at the reunion, as time went on some of them didn’t make it but at the moment we still have five out of eight.
CB: Um. Your special ops man was Ted Manners?
AN: Ted Manners yes.
CB: After the war he could meet with you could he and tell you what he was doing? Or did you not get into that conversation?
AN: I met Ted in northern Italy when he was an intelligence officer.
CB: Still in the RAF, he was?
AN: Still in the RAF, yes.
CB: Right.
AN: I met Rusty at Cranwell in 1951 when he had taken some Canadian cadets to the graduation at Cranwell when Princess Elizabeth was the, the⸻
CB: Reviewing?
AN: Reviewing officer.
CB: Yes.
AN: Talking of that incidentally who is coming on the 2nd of October to bless the?
CB: Can I come back to that in a mo?
AN: Yeah.
CB: Yes, thank you, thank you. Now on the, there are some things that are less palatable to discuss but they were, they were the reality of life and it still is today in a different way but with aircrew there was a contentious different approach perhaps and that’s the sexually transmitted diseases challenge, how did you see that?
AN: I, I would say it would depend on the individual. I mean on the book about our crew they talk about Norman Westby, our bomb aimer, being taken to Grimsby by some of our crew where he met Luscious Lil [chuckling]. But, but, but we, apart from the nights when we went drinking to a degree we went our own ways. I mean if you weren’t going to the pub it was the case you got the bus into Louth you could go to the pictures, come out of the pictures, get your fish ‘n’ chips and get the bus back.
CB: Um. I was thinking of other crews and just in the RAF in general because you, it’s the sort of thing that isn’t a secret so.
AN: Well see once again we didn’t mix with other crews.
CB: No?
AN: We were our own little environment.
CB: Right, and I think that’s the point, yeah.
AN: But you see I mean the thing is that, that we have got this, I have got this connection with the rest of the crew. I, after the war I flew with many crews.
CB: Yeah.
AN: With many units but I never went to the associations, to other squadron’s associations meetings, it’s only 101. I spent the least time on 101 but it was the time when we were fighting for our lives.
CB: Um.
AN: And I think it’s a different attitude in the same way as I say that Rusty never once queried a heading. Now I had a case where I was flying with a flight sergeant and I was what’s known as the wing navigator, I was an examiner, and I was flying in the Middle East and I gave him an alteration of heading and he queried it. When eventually the beacon came up and we were dead ahead. Did he apologise? Not bloody likely, and that’s the difference. I mean I don’t know what was going through Rusty’s mind, he may have told you when I gave him an alteration, we had the joke in that I would tell him off for being one degree off, because if you’re going at sixty miles an hour every sixty miles you’re one mile off for a degree, but I mean this was it, it was a joke. Certain things we treated as a joke.
CB: Just going to pause there for a moment.
AN: Yes sure.
CB: Thank you.
AN: Now can I offer you⸻
CB: We’re on again now and just going to recap on one point which was the raid in France on the tank training school so what was the background to that then Jumbo?
AN: Well, the school was in two parts, the accommodation and the technical side. I can’t remember which was which but 5 Group went in first and we were told to orbit until we got permission to bomb and while this was going on aircraft were being shot down while they were orbiting, and Rusty said ‘Oh we’re not having any more of this’ and he moved away from the orbiting until we got permission to bomb, then we went in. But we had this flash and the tail went up in the air, the nose went down, what it was I don’t know but it put us into a steep dive and as far as I recall it was Rusty and the engineer were pulling at the control column to get the aircraft back on an even keel.
CB: Um.
AN: As far as I can recall.
CB: Um.
AN: Because the thing is things were going on but you see the great thing with our crew, Rusty maintained that only people who needed to talk on the intercom talked, and if for example we were being attacked then anybody else talking shuts up. On the bombing run Norman’s in charge.
CB: Um.
AN: And this seemed to work very well, I mean most of the time our intercom was quiet, now compare that with the intercom on the American aircraft.
CB: Um, V17?
AN: Yeah, on the film.
CB: Memphis Belle?
AN: Memphis Belle. The noise on that intercom, the yakking going on.
CB: Um.
AN: I mean you can only listen to one person and that didn’t happen in the Memphis Belle at all.
CB: Um. Now part of the challenge with the raid you’ve just talked about was interference, radio interference so what was that?
AN: Well it was an American forces network, dance music, which seemed to be on the same frequency. I don’t know the technicalities of it at all, how it happened, why it happened, but this was the case that er, and it’s responsible. I mean we lost four or five crews on that which is a lot.
CB: Um.
AN: Not as bad as Nuremberg but still enough.
CB: Um. Was the high attrition rate due to the fact that the Germans were able to lock onto your special ops operator?
AN: Well, well, all I know is what I’ve read is the fact that the Germans developed a new system in that they had pockets where the fighters would patrol and they covered certain areas and that way they cut down the amount of fuel that was being used and so I think to a large degree the ABC became superfluous.
CB: Okay.
AN: Only an opinion.
CB: Yeah. Now what about Scarecrow?
AN: Scarecrow, well you see once again, Scarecrow was a form of flak. I mean in fact on the Mailly one I put in my logbook ‘a scarecrow up the flare shoot.’ I don’t know.
CB: Because the notion is, or was, that Scarecrow was actually a spoof to overcome the fact that the RAF could do nothing about the upward firing guns in the night fighters.
AN: Well do you know?
CB: Causing blow-up.
AN: We never knew about the upward firing guns.
CB: Oh really.
AN: And I mean I read about it somewhere and I said to Rusty ‘Did you know about it?’ and he said ‘No’. So we were flying in blissful ignorance.
CB: Um, ‘cause the notion was that the explosion wasn’t a special type of shell called Scarecrow but was the explosion as a result of the Schrage Musik.
AN: You wouldn’t be able to tell unless you were close to the explosion.
CB: Quite.
AN: Because I mean, the thing is that it was, the flak was going on all around you.
CB: Yeah.
AN: I mean, the thing is that, I remember on one trip we did we went to Aachen two nights running. The first night we did at normal altitude, the second night we descended and dropped the bombs in the descent as I recall and our special said afterwards that he heard the Germans giving our height just as we passed it, so the stuff was going off above us not below us. But that’s only what I was told at the time.
CB: Yeah sure. Now after the war, the war comes, you finish your tour, you then go to instruction. What were you instructing on then?
AN: Well it was navigating, either self-navigation equipment or DR, dead reckoning navigation or flying as a screen with them.
CB: In what type of aeroplane?
AN: Well it was a Wellington.
CB: So this is OTU?
AN: At the OTU at Wymeswold. I went back to Wymeswold.
CB: Um.
AN: And as I say Wymeswold was taken over by Transport Command and I suddenly found myself navigating Dakotas.
CB: Oh right. So when did that start?
AN: Well that would be have been at the end of, at the end of, probably about the end of ’44.
CB: Right.
AN: Then at the end of the war I went overseas on ground appointments and then I came back and eventually I came back onto Transport Command again.
CB: What did you do overseas?
AN: I was a briefing officer or an adjutant. I was an adjutant at Treviso, unit adjutant Treviso, station adjutant at Udine and a wing adjutant at [indistinct]. Then I came home and did the staff navigation course.
CB: Right. What was the OTU number that you were at when you were training at Wymeswold?
AN: I think it was either 93 or 108.
CB: And then when you went back again same people were there were they?
AN: It had a different number then I think. That may be why I’m thinking of two numbers. Well I mean actually what happened was I was there at Wymeswold some people were posted out, new people posted in and I had to do the course that a trainee would do, because it was my first time I learnt about trigonometry.
CB: Which was important for Dakotas?
AN: [Laughter] Well it’s like the same thing that people say you’ve got to be a mathematician to be a navigator, that’s a load of rubbish. As long as you can get two and two makes four.
CB: What was the ACU number at Blyton?
AN: Dear me, now you’re asking something.
CB: Doesn’t matter. Okay so then after the war and you’ve finished your adjt job, what happened then as a sequence until when you gave up flying?
AN: Oh no, I didn’t give up. No, I came back from Austria and then I then went onto a reserve centre, teaching reservists’ navigation and then I went onto Hastings and did a few years at Hastings, then I spent a spell as an examiner of navigators, and then, that included tour in Singapore, then I came home from Singapore, um let me think, oh I did more examining and then after that I went to training command for a spell and then I went out to Borneo with the army, I was at the brigade headquarters. And I came home from that and I was on Britannia’s. After Britannia’s I was station navigation officer at Manby and then I went onto training radar navigators at Lindholme and then at Scampton.
CB: And those two were Vulcans or did you do Victors as well?
AN: No, no I did Vulcans because we were at a Vulcan station. But before then I did the navy, the navy, the Buccaneers.
CB: And why nav radar rather than the navigator?
AN: Well because the, the navigators used nav radar and it was a case that, it’s difficult to explain, if you can imagine that you’re flying along and you’ve got a hill coming towards you, you can get the, you can see that as a hill, but as you get closer to it the picture changes, and I don’t know what instruction they had because what happened was that we would take off in the Hastings with the radar navigator at the back with an instructor and they, the trainee, he would do the navigating but we were the safety crew, and I mean it was very interesting flying at five hundred feet.
CB: In a Hastings?
AN: In a Hastings. [Laughs]. And of course while we were doing that we also had a spell where we used to go round the, fly round the, oil-rigs to make sure they were okay. We then relieved the Nimrods periodically to do the Cold War patrols, so it was very interesting one way and another.
CB: Yeah. In the V Bombers there are three people at the back, so one’s the navigator, the other’s the nav radar and the third one’s the AEO?
AN: Yes.
CB: So how was the division of labour organised?
AN: I don’t know because I never flew in, I never flew in the Vulcan. The Vulcan chap flew with us because we had the equipment.
CB: So it’s purely dealing with the radar aspects of navigation?
AN: Yes, yes.
CB: Because he was also the air bomber?
AN: Yes.
CB: So then you give up doing that, then what?
AN: Well that was when I retired from the RAF in 1977.
CB: Aged 55? Close? Then what did you do? You did your time off?
AN: I played golf for six months.
CB: And how did you then get into a new career?
AN: Well I saw, well when before I retired from the RAF I went on a course and became associate member of the Institute of Administrative Management. I also took the Civil Service entrance exam and after six months of playing golf and getting bored I saw an advertisement in the paper that they were looking for people, civil servants. So I applied and I spent ten years, most of it at Kirton Lindsay.
CB: Oh right. On things we can’t talk about?
AN: Oh no, no. This was the Environment Ministry but we looked after military and public buildings and married quarters. And then after that when that, they then moved me from Kirton Lindsay to Scampton back where I used to be.
CB: And then you retired?
AN: I retired yes completely.
CB: Okay good, thank you very much. [Pause]. So how did, you were shut away in your office as you said how did you feel about the effect of what you were doing with your bombing, the effect on the ground?
AN: Well I mean we were told, no we were given bits of information about trips we’d done, about whether it was a success or not, um but to me bombing in Germany we were bombing the enemy. I was a Londoner, I lost relatives, not close relatives but I lost relatives. As far as I was concerned I, I had no feelings really about the poor Germans, to me at that time the Germans were our enemy. Now as far as I’m concerned that I could meet someone today and he’s a German, so what the war’s over. I mean the price has been paid and this is the way I think it should be but I mean I didn’t have any feelings about poor Germans at all because it’s no different, we were doing the same as two armies fighting each other. This was, we were one army and the civilians were the other army. Unfortunately reading books since the war a lot of the people who got lost achieved nothing, their lives were wasted.
CB: Um, um.
AN: In case of, as in the Nuremberg raid, I mean as Rusty would say ‘On the Nuremberg raid, we lost more people than the whole of the Battle of Britain’.
CB: We did, yeah.
AN: And I’m afraid I for one, I mean they did a wonderful job in the Battle of Britain, but I for one feel it’s about time we had our turn. I mean every time an aircraft was lost it was seven or eight people.
CB: Yeah, absolutely.
AN: But then that’s life.
CB: You’d given up operations by the, towards the end of the war so did the Dresden raid, were you aware of that?
AN: Well as far as I’m concerned the result of the Dresden raid made me have second thoughts about Winston Churchill because I feel that he did the dirty on us, that on what I’ve read about the Dresden raid it was asked for by the Russians because the troops were passing through Dresden. That is what I have read other people say it’s a lie but to me it was spite in particular that Bomber Harris didn’t get the decoration that the other service chiefs got, and that was small minded I feel.
CB: Um.
AN: But once again Dresden was in the war area. It was unfortunate.
CB: As was Chemnitz down the road? Okay thank you very much.
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 a navigator from 101 Squadron
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Chris Brockbank
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
2015-09-07
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AAn00202-150907
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.
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
Royal Air Force. Transport Command
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
01:00:24 audio recording
Description
An account of the resource
He was born in London and worked for some time as a clerk until joined up the Royal Air Force. He did not like the idea of serving in the Army or in the Navy but - as a Londoner - he was keen to take part in the war having experienced the Blitz. He trained in America as pilot, but failed and re-mustered as a navigator at Portage la Prairie, west of Winnipeg (Manitoba, Canada) where he learned astro navigation. Back in England, he crewed up RAF Wymeswold, then trained on Lancasters at RAF Blyton before being posted to 101 Squadron. They were joined by an additional crew member who spoke German and could disrupt night fighters radio communication. During his first operation he saw the target with all bomb flashes and exclaimed: 'bloody hell' - he never left his post to see the effects of a bombing until his last trip. One of his tasks was to note every aircraft shot down, as communicated by the pilot: these pieces of intelligence were then combined as to ascertain where the aircraft were lost. He remembered how they survived a mid-air collision, but the other crew did not; and another incident in which they lost an engine and his pilot, had to decide whether or not they should go on. Retells how the Germans salvaged Gee equipment from crashed aircraft and were able to jam it; the last reliable Gee signal was picked up near the French coast. He recollects that a flight engineer couldn’t cope with pressure when they lost the engine: he panicked and laid on the floor for the whole time. They had to replace him with another one. He ascribed survival to both camaraderie and sheer luck, which includes mascots. He had a little doll inside his battledress, and their Canadian rear gunner used to bring two beer bottles so that he could ‘bomb’ the target himself. One time, since he did not have the beer bottles, the station commander himself went back to the mess so that he could have his beer bottles with him, and he was happy that he could bomb Germany. He said that some reacted in different ways to operations: even if the opertions took a heavy toll on them, this did not automatically equate to lack of moral fibre. Their flight engineer wasn’t a case of that, if he was, he would have had his stripes torn off his uniform while being marched away. He himself, the German speaker special operator, and the wireless operator felt less stressed, being busy all the time inside the aircraft. On the contrary, the rest of the crew could see the operation unfold in front of their eyes. He mentioned an operation to Nuremberg in which they lost a quarter of the squadron. They lost the most experienced crews, who were at their twenty-ninth or thirtieth trip, because of friendly fire. He recollects a corporal serving as ground crew: he was very close to him and to the rest of the crew. He never wanted to be promoted as this would have meant being separated from ‘his’ aircraft. Losses were so high that he could not afford the luxury of befriending other crews. He stressed that he was ‘an individual only when he was attending briefings’, then he became part of his crew. While not on operational flights he took part in fighter affiliation exercises in which they simulate combat situations. He points out the sense of belonging despite individual differences: the pilot a ‘Geordie’, the engineer from Lancashire, the bomb aimer from Birmingham, he himself from London, the wireless operator from Wales, the mid upper gunner from Lancashire, the special operator from Norfolk and the rear gunner from Canada. He did not consider himself a hero, but merely did his job in an impersonal way - bombing Germany was bombing the enemy. Despite having lost relatives during the Blitz, he did not have hatred: that was war. In a total war, the distinction between civilians and combatants fades. After the war, he realised how many people achieved nothing and wasted their lives.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
Scotland--Perth and Kinross
England--London
Canada
Manitoba
Manitoba--Portage la Prairie
Germany
Germany--Nuremberg
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Adalberto Di Corato
Carolyn Emery
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
101 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
bomb aimer
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
briefing
C-47
coping mechanism
flight engineer
Gee
ground crew
ground personnel
lack of moral fibre
Lancaster
mid-air collision
military ethos
navigator
Operational Training Unit
perception of bombing war
pilot
RAF Blyton
RAF Wymeswold
Scarecrow
shot down
superstition
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/577/8846/AGregoryN150724.1.mp3
68369faff1465dab9c9367181bffe473
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
Gregory, Norman
Norman Ellis Gregory
N E Gregory
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Gregory, N
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview with Warrant Officer Norman Gregory (-2022, 1473815) and his medals. He served as a bomb aimer on 101 Squadron. He flew five operations before his aircraft was shot down on 22 May 1944 over Dortmund.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
NG: Good afternoon my name is Norman Ellis Gregory, I served with Bomber Command during the war and my service number is 1473815. I finished my service in February 1946 with the rank of Warrant Officer. I joined the Air Force in 194unclear). I came on active service in the Air Force in 1942, going first of all to Regent’s Park. But at the time I joined up I had volunteered about a year before for air crew in York where I was at St John’s College, York. So the Air Force took a group of us who had volunteered and, er, spent all the available weekends and some evenings training us, er, through the course what would have been ITW, so that when we went to Regent’s Park we were all, all of us were LAC’s and that meant, you know, an increase in pay from half a crown up to seven and six a day, which was very nice thank you. But anyway, from Regent’s Park we went down to, erm, Brighton for what reason I can’t remember. But anyway from Brighton we, some reason we were dispersed all over the country and I was sent to Anstey which was just on the north side of Leicester. It was, erm, a flying school and I did twelve hours in Tiger Moths at, Anstey and at that place I was recommended for multi-engined aircraft. From there (pause) I eventually gravitated to Heaton Park at Manchester and from Heaton Park at Manchester in the latter part of 1942 I was sent to Greenwich on the Clyde, and I sailed to New York on the Queen Elizabeth the first time and we sailed into New York. And, er, from New York we went up to Halifax, Nova Scotia and from there me in particular, erm, I was handed over to the Canadian Air Force and I served for the next six months doing flying training, navigation courses and so on with the Canadian Air Force, not the Royal Air Force which had stations all over the place in North America. Anyway, six months later, er, the back end of June beginning of July 1943, by a strange quirk of fate I came back in reverse order, went back from Canada down to New York and I went back across the Atlantic onto Queen Elizabeth again. This time when I went up the gangway struggling with my kitbags, the officer at the top said brutally to me, I was by myself I wasn’t with a troop or whatever, he said “can you sleep in a hammock” I said “yes sir” he said “well you go far into the focus of the crew” and that’s how I crossed the Atlantic the second time swaying in a hammock with the crew. I came back to the United Kingdom, erm, I was then in posted to, erm, (pause) to Harrogate and from Harrogate we were dispersed to the various OUT’s over the country and, erm, I ended up at 28 OUT. But before that, I can’t remember the name off hand, erm, it was just outside Shepshed in Leicestershire and that’s where we crewed up. Having crewed up we went to Castle Donnington and for the next four or five months we were flying Wellingtons day and night and on one occasion we’d hardly taken off when the skipper called down to me in the nose and said “Greg Greg come up here I’m crook” he said and he was slumped over the controls. Now fortunately this went and we dual controlled and so I had to jump up into the co-pilot’s seat and I flew that Lancaster all night and we eventually came back to Castle Donnington and I had made my first run in to land the aircraft at night. I hastily add that I had landed a Wellington during daylight but not at night and I was going round for another circuit on to attempt to land the aircraft when the skipper came out of his coma and said “what are you doing”, “where are we” and I explained that we were on the circuit and he says “I’ll take over” and he landed it. And, erm, I expect everyone was very happy (laughs) to get their feet back on the ground again that night. Well from Castle Donnington we went to Hemswell, er, that was a heavy conversion unit and we were going to change or go up the ladder from two engines to four and they sent us from Hemswell to a brand new satellite and there were, I don’t know how many, possibly about twenty, very antique Halifax’s and in the first fortnight there we lost six aircraft and all the crews due to, erm, the Halifax mark. It had some sort of fault in the tail unit and all the aircraft after those six losses, all the craft were grounded and men came out of the Halifax factory and put the mark II tail unit on. From there we went to, erm, squadron. There was a time where you went to Lancaster flying school flying training school, but by then the squadrons preferred to run their own flying training school so it was, erm, end of March early April. We went to 101 squadron and for the next six weeks we were just learning to fly the Lancaster and I am proud to say that, erm, the skipper allowed me to sit in the pilot seat and fly the Lancaster and when we had completed night time, day time flying we would go on, the fighters would come along side and we’d shoot at the droves. You know from the Lancaster and we’d do daytime bombing with practice bombs and night time bombings with practice bombs and so on and when they were satisfied that we could fly the Lancaster then we were put on the rota for bombing operations and the night of the 3rd 4th of May 1944, erm, we went on our first op to a place called Milaca, it’s about a hundred miles east of Paris. And the aircraft, all Lancaster’s, came from One group and Six group, all in the Lincolnshire area, and goodness knows what happened that night. There’s all sorts of stories, but we were circling the (pause) turning point for twenty minutes and unfortunately there was a German night fighter station a matter of a few minutes away from where we are and so there was a Turkey shoot. There were out of the 350 Lancs on that target and incidentally it was a low level attack on a pre-war French barracks which was supposed to have an (unclear) edition there and so we were bombing at seven thousand feet instead of the normal twenty thousand feet. I’ve got photographs there, that, er, possible to see, there was not two bricks on top of each other, it was literally flattened without doing any damage to the local French community. Unfortunately we lost over forty aircraft and they scattered over say a ten mile radius from there. They’re all buried in church yards in that vicinity and I’ve been back at least five times over the last you know thirty years or so to visit the different burial places of these crews. Two years ago I went there with my daughter and we went to a village that I had never been to before and we were told that there was a crew buried in the church yard at this village and when I got there we had a service in the church yard in memory of this particular crew. Then the local people said that the aircraft in question came down in the forest, you know, over there sort of thing, and they were going to take us up into the forest to the exact spot, because in the previous year the local community had got a big lump of rock at to mark the exact place where this aircraft came down. It was all chiselled with the name of the aircraft and the names of the crew and everything, and when we went up in the forest I was the only man there who had actually been on that raid. I was literally gobsmacked because, erm, I’d known all these years that there were 350 Lancs on the target and what a loss there was, not only from my own squadron, but from many other squadrons. The local people told me that the aircraft in the forest was a Halifax and I’d never heard of this it’s (unclear), now this links up with the fact that during the time of circling the marker point before turning into bombing, I heard the master bomber over the RT say “this is your master bomber going down take over number two” and that was the Halifax that you know I visited in the woods. It turns out that this Halifax had belonged to the PFF and it had been vastly modified. It carried a crew of eight, they had removed all the Bombay’s and put long range tanks in, but he was shot down along with the other forty aircraft and they were all killed, very sad. When the local Mayoress unveiled this, er, memorial up in the forest, er, a little boy with a velvet cushion and a special pair of scissors went up to the Lady Mayoress and bowed to her, she took these pair of scissors and she cut the tricolour tape that went round. It’s customary apparently in those places that they chop up this ribbon and give it to all the important people. The first piece that was chopped off was presented to me, which I still have. Well unfortunately for me and for my crew I suppose, and a lot of other people too, we only completed five raids when we were shot down over Dortmand in the Ruhr on the night of the 22nd of May 1944. We were shot down from underneath and we were on our way literally within minutes of dropping the bomb load on Dortmund, and so the, er, shells of the enemy aircraft set the insentry load on the Bombay on fire and of course I was in the nose and there was the wireless operator, the navigator, the flight engineer and the skipper on the flight deck and none knew that the aircraft was on fire until something alerted the er the radio man that there was something wrong. He opened the door, and from there to the after the aircraft and the whole thing was a raging inferno, I mean it was a case of if the shells had been ten feet forward they’d have shot everyone in the flight deck you see. So the tail gunner was killed, the special wireless operator was killed and the mid upper gunner was killed there and then in this raging inferno in the aircraft, so the skipper decided in the next few minutes I had dropped the bomb load on (unclear) and the skipper said that we’ll have to abandon the aircraft. But of course I’m lying on the escape hatch and so I, I removed the hatch and you have to disconnect your (unclear) you have to disconnect your power supply to your, I had a power, erm, (unclear) heated chute and you have to, and your intercom, so it’s quite a, and then you’ve got to get your parachute and clip it on. And then you literally dive into the open shoot as if you’re diving into the water and captain and pull the ripcord, and in my case, and I’m afraid in lots of other cases, when I’ve compared notes years afterwards, that when this, erm, pack on my chest was pulled upwards when the parachute was displayed it caught me under the chin and knocked me out. Mind you in twenty three thousand feet there’s a remarkable lack of oxygen so, erm, that may or may not have played part, but anyway it knocked me out. And when I came to there was a deathly hush, there wasn’t an aircraft in the sky, they’d all gone home and I’m floating in this parachute, but I’m combed by a searchlight that I’ve never heard of anybody else, but obviously it could have happened many times, and the searchlight followed me all the way down to the ground. I thought that I would get a belly full of lead but I didn’t, my boots had fallen off and when I landed I was exceptionally lucky, I just happened to land in a small clearing in an area of forest or a lot of trees anyway, but unfortunately I didn’t see the land, the ground coming up, and I damaged my right knee. I could stand on my left leg but I couldn’t walk and so I crawled and crawled and crawled and crawled until I came to a little row of, er, small houses and just the nearest one I knocked on the door and a young woman a woman of about twenty came to the door she took me and in. Unfortunately for me that night in my navigation bag I had left my cigarette case, er, it was just something I’d never done before I usually kept the cigarette case about my person and so I said, I tried to, I couldn’t speak German at that time and I said to the made signs to this young lady that I would like a, had she got a cigarette and she disappeared out into the night. She came back ten or fifteen minutes later and handed me two gold flake (laughs) where she got them from I have no idea and she was accompanied by the village policeman and he started to speak to me in German. When I implied I couldn’t understand what was going on he started to speak to me in French and so my schoolboy French came into good use and, er, he was a POW for the French in World War I so there was a certain amount of empathy between the two of us. I still have a little giggle all these years later, that because I couldn’t walk he put me on the cross bar of his bicycle and I was wheeled into captivity (laughs). Well from there in the local lock up sort of a place, like a large village, I was picked up the next morning by a young under officer, a corporal I suppose in the Luftwaffe and he had come from the airfield at Dortmund and so I don’t know how far out of Dortmund I was, but a mile or two. He took me on the local train into Dortmund and of course that is what I’d had been bombing the night before so all these people milling about the railway station in Dortmund thought it would be a good idea to get hold of me. And so this corporal pulled his revolver and told me to get behind him and he threatened and he said “if you lay hands or try to lay hands on me” that he would fire his revolver so that was a good plus mark for me. So for the next few days I was in the sails of this airfield just outside Dortmund, the only aircraft I could see was a single engine (unclear) so there weren’t any night fighters or day fighters anything there. To my great surprise my skipper and navigator were already prisoners there and it turns out the information they gave me that after I’d bailed out seconds later the controls were within a shot away or burnt away and the aircraft went over. The skipper and navigator were literally thrown up through the canopy and the others, the wireless operator and the flight engineer, they didn’t manage to get out, you can’t if you’ve got that amount of negative to you you’re just pinned down. And so unfortunately that added two more deaths to the three already and the skipper and navigator. When we came back to Blighty a year later, they went their different ways. But they both died about thirty years ago of cancer, I presume from smoking, but they were literally in their sort of, well the navigator would only be about fifty-five when he died of liver cancer and the skipper died about ten years later exactly, it was cancer I know. Getting back to Germany the three of us went back down to Frankfurt to the interrogation centre and from there we went to, erm, a little village, a little town called Wetzler which is the home of Zeiss. They were in a newly made little camp and it was tents, bell tents, that they’d captured I suppose at Dunkirk. Every time it rained, the water ran through the tent and we got very wet at night, and subsequent to that we were sent down the skipper was commissioned by that time. He went to Luft 8 where they had that famous escape and the navigator and myself went to Luft 7, which was a new camp alleged in Silesia and (pause) it’s a change from the tents. This, this camp in Bancow was, erm, I don’t know how many hundred, but an awful lot of chicken huts, and we were six to a chicken hut instead of a tent and this was an improvement. But it was summer time and by late September early October, erm, nearby presumably Russian labour was used to build a permanent camp because the Germans were fed up of the RAF escaping or attempting to escape. They built all the barracks on stilts and at nine 0 clock each night, not only were we locked in, but they set all these Alsatian dogs out in the compounds. So trundling because you were on stilts was out of the question but (pause) we were only in that permanent camp for a matter of months, four months at the most I would think. Because it was towards the end of January 1945 that the Germans were being attacked, er, by the Russians on their own border. The Russians were breaking through in our direction from Warsaw and the Germans decided to evacuate us, as they did all the other POW camps you know. Some up on the (unclear) some in the South of Germany and so on and we were on the march for three weeks. There was a metre of snow on the ground and (pause) mostly in the first week we were only marching at night, turning if the roads opened from the German troop movements and tank movements during the day. Eventually after three weeks we got to a place called Luckenwalde about twenty or so miles or so south of Berlin and that was a huge er camp. I I, I couldn’t even dream of a POW camp of between twenty and twenty-five thousand men in it. And this camp, it wasn’t initially anything to do with the Airforce. Normally in the POW camps the German Luftwaffe made prison camps for Airforce people and the German (unclear) made their prison camps for the army and the Luftmarine. No, no not the Luftmarine but the German navy looked after their own kind, but in this place at, erm, camp in Luckenwalde they had separate compounds for the French, the Dutch the Norwegians, every nationality that they’d conquered had compounds there. But the predominant ones were the French because they were using the French, not only the French army and Airforce no doubt, but the French civilian males as forced labour in Germany. And anyway, I was part of a troop of RAF lads on this march, there were seven of us, and initially on march the first night we all slept by ourselves. The next night we slept in twos for warmth and eventually the seven of us, if there was any chance of kipping down in barns or whatever, we were seven in the bed, and bitter were the complaints “I was on the outside last night” (laughs). Incidentally the first month that I was in Germany I never had my clothes off or had a shower and it was a repeat run on this so called death march, nobody had their clothes off and so you know it was just do as best you could. But I had, I was exceptionally lucky, I don’t know where I got them from but I had four pairs of socks and on that death march I wore two pairs of socks by day and I had a strong pair of boots and the other two pairs were tucked inside my shirt next to my skin so that they were warm and dry. And so each night or day if the case was that we were going to stop marching for twelve hours or so, that the first thing I could do was to take my boots off, take my socks off put warm dry socks onto my cold feet and put the two pairs of socks that I’d taken off back to get warm and dry next to my skin. Well it seems curious to say this, but it’s perfectly true that when we got back to Luckenwalde, the barracks that were given were simply large empty sheds with a roof and windows that were closed and a concrete floor and we were just, you know, assumed to find a patch on the concrete floor where we could lie down, but it was actually wonderful to have (laughs) somewhere out of the weather, out of the rain and out of the snow just to lie on a bit of concrete. But there it was, it, we were only there oh two or three weeks when we managed to get into a different block where we had probably a room no more than fifteen foot square with bunks in it so the seven of us were in that room. And on one occasion, and the next compound was a Russian compound, and we managed to smuggle a Russian out of the Russian compound into our room, I don’t know how this, this was organised, but this man was allegedly a tailor to trade and he was doing all our mending. Whilst he was sitting there with his needle and thread and doing his mending for us, a Russian, a German officer came in and he would have been shot just where he was sitting if he’d known he was a Russian, but fortunately he wasn’t dressed like a Russian and so he just carried on doing sewing and, er, the German officer cleared off and what not. But anyway subsequent to that, we were all very hungry and short of rations, at that particular place one of the daily rounds was a German with a paler full of potatoes who came round and HE put his hand in the bucket and gave YOU a potato, if you were jolly lucky it might be a as big as a tennis ball, but believe me they were a lot smaller than that. So, erm, because I could speak French and nobody in that group of seven could, two or three of us including me were smuggled into the French compound so we could do barter to get some food for them because they were going out of the camp every day and could get access to food that we obviously couldn’t and it is a bit of a matter of some amusement that I changed my RAF uniform for a French uniform so it gave me freedom of movement about in that camp and the Germans didn’t, weren’t aware that I was anything other than what I looked like and, er, so I could you know move freely about trading for food on our behalf. Well in the latter part of our stay in Luckenwalde, the Russians were getting closer and closer to their attack on Berlin and it is still is a matter of amazement that the Russian guns were powerful enough to send shells ten or fifteen miles and so we didn’t hear the artillery firing, but we did hear the shells screaming overhead and we didn’t hear the shell exploding in Berlin but it was going on, you know day after day. Eventually we woke up one morning and all the German guards had disappeared and the same day the Russians arrived and the Russians were very keen to re-patriate us back to the UK via Odessa and the Black Sea, but we weren’t very keen on that idea so, erm, we heard on our secret radio, got in touch with the Yankee forces on the other side of the (pause) I can’t remember the name, but anyway we got in touch with these Americans and when they tried to reach the camp the Russians turned them back. However, they didn’t go all the way back where the Russians hoped they would go, they retreated about three miles the other side of a forest and we were left a note that if we could get back to these lorries by a certain time that we would be taken to the American lines. And so it was we escaped from Luckenwalde and we got, we drove for a long long time and we got to Hildesheim in Germany and we were in a pre-war German barracks and to this day I am gobsmacked that it was completely untouched, it hadn’t been shelled or bombed or anything like that, it was lovely accommodation and the British Red Cross were waiting for us and gave us, er, you know, fresh underwear, socks, toothbrushes, shaving kit and that sort of thing. We were only there the one night as far as I can remember and we were flown out by Dakota down to La Halle in France. We flew over La Ruhr and it was an eye opener to see the havoc that the RAF had made for the German cities in La Ruhr. We got to La Halle, and as I say I was in a French uniform and I traded that for a Yankee uniform and within twenty-four hours the Royal Navy had shipped us across to Southampton and back to the United Kingdom. Incidentally, VE Day we spent in Ludkenwalde, we didn’t get away from Luckenwalde until three or four days after the Russians arrived so we missed all the joy and fun of VE Day. We were all posted up to RAF Cosford near Wolverhampton and given fresh kit and given excellent food and sent on six weeks leave. After that, before and after, we had medicals and the following August the Japanese gave up and we thought all these thousands and thousands of air crew were redundant and we said please can we go home, can we finish, “no you can’t leave here the Air Force until you put back the weight that you were when you joined up” (laughs), well I was only about seven and half stone when I came back from Germany so it wasn’t until you know six months later that I recovered my previous weight and I was discharged. So there we are in a nutshell this is my experiences. When we got to La Halle it was a matter of amazement to me, I mean it was a tented camp, we all had a shower and a change of clothing if we wanted it and I did, and of course there was plenty of food and I had never been in an American Mess before, in the Sergeant’s Mess in the UK for that matter. You sat down at a table to, for your food, you know, for your breakfast, your midday meal and your evening meal and in this Yankee thing, I can see, it’s a tented encampment. The tables were about a foot higher than normal tables so you had to stand at the tables, there was no sitting down, you queued up and you were given a big metal tray and they put the food on your metal tray with you know a knife, fork and spoon and you went to these very high tables and you stood there and you ate what was on your tray, handed your stuff in, so there was an endless trail of people, instead of sitting down and talking you see, they were getting rid of you as quickly as possible so that was an eye opener. I could go back to Luckenwalde, the time between that elapsed between the Russians arriving and us escaping, we went into the local village and I can remember I saw a que of women outside a bakers and so I joined the que and I got a loaf of bread you know. I was highly delighted, ver, very delighted that I’d got a loaf of bread and a day or two later, erm, one of my friends who was called by the unusual name of Robert Burns, but unfortunately he was nothing to do with the Scottish poet, he was a regular in the Air Force and he was a Sergeant fitter, an engine fitter, and he was sent out on the empire training school system to South Africa. Now he was what do you call it, he was at Holten, and these Holten Bratts, it was, er, I don’t know whether it was actually written into the contract or not, but it was a clearly understood thing what a Holten Bratt was, whether you was an earphone fitter, an engine fitter or an instrument basher or whatever trade it was that he had the right to be re-mastered to air crew. I don’t know what he got fed up about, but I mean he was a Sergeant fitter in South Africa and I suppose living like a lord, but something upset him, I never knew what, and he remastered and became air crew and he became a pilot. .He was flying out of North Africa in Wellingtons and mostly he was flying across the Mediterranean and sewing mines in the, the airports of the Northern side of the Mediterranean, and this particular night he was sewing mines in a Greek port called Milos and they were shot at, sewing mines flying low over the water and he was shot out of the water and he was the only one to get out of the aircraft alive. He was fished out of the drink by a German launch or boat of some sort. It was the middle of winter in Europe and he was flying out of North Africa with shorts and a shirt, nothing else, I mean boots, but nothing else, and he was thrown by the Germans into a barbwire compound, no hat, no tent just a nice layer of snow on the ground and that really was incarcerated. And he, for some reason I’ve never found out, nobody else could find out I suppose, that he was never directly sent to a German POW camp, he was sent for several months from one civilian jail to another all through the Southern part of Europe. Eventually he was in the same POW camp as me, and getting back to Luckenwalde when you know a lot of POWs start scowering round the countryside looking for food, the food quickly disappears, and I said to him one day, look there’s no good us going looking for food in this locality lets go for a long walk and of course being me we went for five or six miles and we came to this German farm. That area, the German farm were always built in a square, one side was the farmhouse, two sides were barns one side the wall with a big double gate and we walked round this farmhouse and everything was shuttered, you couldn’t hear any cattle, couldn’t hear any human beings and we banged on the shutters and walked round like Joshua going round the walls of Jericho. Suddenly we just turned the corner and this corner was the front of the house part of the farm, the farmhouse, and a shutter opened towards us like that and from behind the shutter there came a fist with a big knife dripping blood, and his arm came out, then the shutter was moved a bit further then the head came out, and this Robert Burns looked at this head with the man with the blood dripping knife and he said “Milanovich” and then this man, with the bloody knife, said “Robert Burns”, and they’d both been down in Bulgaria (laughs) in a civilian prison, how this Milanovich got there, goodness knows, but anyway we got a little bit of a peak out of it. That was a wonderful day for us. That’ll do.
MJ: On behalf of the International Bomber Command, I would like to thank Norman Gregory, erm, bomb aimer, warrant officer for his interview at his home address on the 24th July 2015. Thank 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 Norman Gregory
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Mick Jeffery
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
2015-07-24
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AGregoryN150724
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.
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
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
00:45:23 audio recording
Description
An account of the resource
Having volunteered for aircrew in 1941 in York, Norman came into active service in 1942. He flew Tiger Moths at RAF Ansty and was recommended for multi-engine aircraft. After RAF Heaton Park, he went to Halifax, Nova Scotia. He spent six months training with the Canadian Air Force before being posted to RAF Harrogate and sent to No. 28 Operational Training Unit. Before that, he flew Wellingtons at RAF Castle Donington. Norman went to a Heavy Conversion Unit at RAF Hemswell and a new satellite with Halifax Mark I aircraft, grounded after six aircraft were lost.
Norman went to 101 Squadron and learnt to fly Lancasters, serving as a bomb aimer. He describes his first operation to Mailly-Le-Camp where over 40 Lancasters, out of 350, were lost.
Norman’s aircraft was shot down over Dortmund with the death of five crew members. He was captured, as were the pilot and navigator. After the Frankfurt Interrogation Centre, they went to a camp in Wetzlar. Norman then went to Stalag Luft 7 at Bankau in Silesia, followed by four months in another camp. The Germans evacuated prisoner of war camps in January 1945 following Russian attacks. Norman marched on a “death march” for three weeks in snow to Luckenwalde, a camp with 20-25,000 men.
Norman escaped with the Americans via Hildesheim and Le Havre before returning to Britain. He was posted to RAF Cosford but could only leave when he had regained weight, which took six months. He finished in February 1946 with the rank of warrant officer.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Leicestershire
England--Yorkshire
Canada
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia--Halifax
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Luckenwalde
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1945-01
1946
1946-02
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Sally Coulter
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending revision of OH transcription
101 Squadron
28 OTU
aircrew
bale out
bomb aimer
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
Dulag Luft
final resting place
Halifax
Halifax Mk 1
Lancaster
Master Bomber
memorial
Operational Training Unit
prisoner of war
RAF Ansty
RAF Castle Donington
RAF Cosford
RAF Heaton Park
RAF Hemswell
shot down
Stalag 3A
Stalag Luft 7
the long march
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/947/10642/LMathersRW55201v1.1.pdf
24e0c69ee38451e3fab05ad8f99499e3
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
Mathers, Ronald
R W Mathers
Description
An account of the resource
20 items. The collection concerns Wing Commander Ronald Mathers DFC (55201 Royal Air Force) and consists of his log books, photographs, correspondence, his decorations, and copies of two letters from Dwight Eisenhower to Sir Arthur Harris. Ronald Mathers completed a tour of operations as a pilot with 9 Squadron from RAF Bardney. After the war he took part in victory flypasts and a Goodwill tour of the United States with 35 Squadron. The collection also contains a scrapbook of the Goodwill Tour to the United States.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Heidi Peace and Ingrid Peters, 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
2017-07-17
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. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Mathers, RW
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[Partial transcription]
[Underlined] ADDITONAL DETAILS RELEVANT TO BERLIN OPERATIONS RECORDED ON THIS AND OTHER ADDED PAGES ARE TAKEN FROM ALAN W. COOPERS’ BOOK “BOMBERS OVER BERLIN” FIRST PUBLISHED IN 1985 AND SUB TITLED “THE RAF OFFENSIVE NOV 43 – MAR ’44. [/underlined]
[Underlined] 16/17th DEC (The 6th raid of the offensive). [/underlined] Total of 418 Lancs & 9 Mosquitoes on a direct route from Ijmuiden on Dutch coast, due East to target with return north over Denmark. Fuel load normally 1750 galls. T.O.T. 2100hrs 10/10th Cloud. Wanganui marking. 25 a/c lost including two from 9 Sqn. P/O Black & crew + P/O Blayden & crew (all killed). Another 31 crashed on return due to adverse weather (low cloud & poor visibility).
[Underlined] 23/24th DEC (7th raid). [/underlined] 326 lancs, 6 Halifax, 6 Mosquitoes on a southern route (Ijmuiden, Aachen skirting Frankfurt, Leipzig + NNE to Δ) with return roughly due west skirting Osnabrϋck. [Inserted] TOT approx. 4.30. [/inserted] Attack was scattered due mainly to H2S U/S. and a total of 1281 tons of bombs were dropped for a loss of 15 a/c (4%) with another 32 damaged.
[Underlined] 29/30th Dec (8th raid). [/underlined] 457 Lancs, 252 Halifax, 3 Mosquito on a direct route from Hornsea to just north of Leipzig (approx. 110°) then NNE to Berlin and roughly due west back from north of the city. Weather over Δ expected to be 10/10th cloud tops at 4000’ & winds of 80mph at 25,000’. Diversionary attacks made on Magdeburg & Leipzig. 9 Lancs & 9 Halifax lost (2.8% of total) & 104 damaged (most losses by fighters). (This attack was the 94th raid on Berlin since 1940). Total bombs dropped = 1099 tons HE + 1215 tons Incendiary making a total for the “Battle of Berlin” of 14074 tons and involving 3646 a/c dispatched to Δ.
[Page break]
[Underlined] DETAILS FROM “BOMBERS OVER BERLIN” CONTINUED. (Added in December 1985) [/underlined]
[Underlined]1/2nd JAN (9th Raid). [/underlined] 421 Lancs involved. T/O delayed over 4 hours unril after 23.00hrs by deteriorating weather which gave variable layered cloud increasing to 10/10th over Berlin. Marking sparse & widespread but 9 Sqn thought it good. Route out almost due east and back well south on Cologne via Le Tréport to English south coast. 28 Lancs lost (6.7%) inc P/O Ward of 9 Sqn for total tonnage 1400. Heavy snow fell during and after return.
[Underlined] 2/3rd Jan (10th Raid) [/underlined] All available on snow clearing prior to T/O. 383 a/c but 72 returned early due to mistaken recall signal. Route out over Southwold to north of Δ and back slightly south of outward route. Heavy flak over Berlin. 27 lost.
[Underlined] 20/21 Jan (11th Raid and heaviest so far). [/underlined] 769 a/c. on northerly route out over Kiel canal, then between Hamburg and Lϋbeck and landfall over Schleswig-Holstein heading south for Berlin. Weather similar to forecast of 10/10th cloud over Δ and fine on return. 2400 tons dropped causing widespread damage, over 700 casualties and 10,000 homeless. 35 a/c lost (13 Lancs, 22 Halifax), 18 known due to fighter attack and 8 to flak damage.
[Underlined] 27/28th Jan (12th Raid) [/underlined] I was not on this operation in which 9 Sqn lost F/L James (aged 19) and 4 crew, with 3 becoming POW. Total losses were 32a/c.
[Underlined] 28/29th Jan (13th Raid [/underlined] & slightly unlucky for us although we didn’t realise it at the time). Total of 682 a/c inc 432 Lancs. T/o around midnight. Route out past Heligoland & over Denmark, then SE to Δ and return same way. Considerable Flak reported & losses 43. Considered a most effective raid with fires & explosions seen from beyond Baltic coast.
[Underlined] 30/31st Jan (14th Raid) [/underlined] 540 a/c on route over Denmark & approaching Berlin from NW, then out southwest for short leg before turning west & returning over Holland. TOT 20.15-20.30. 26 fighter combats recorded over Δ. 32 a/c lost plus 5 crashed or ditched on return.
[Page break]
[Underlined] 15/16th Feb(15th Raid) [/underlined] Total of 891 a/c (including 561 Lancs, 314 Halifax & 16 Mosquitoes), the largest force ever despatched to the ‘Big City’, plus 24 Lancs to Frankfurt and Mosquito attacks on 7 night fighter airfields. T/O between 5 & 6pm with return about midnight for a northerly route out over Denmark. Heavy flak experienced, particularly over enemy coast and the target. 42 a/c lost plus 4 crashed on return. 2642 tons dropped in 39 minutes.
19/20 Feb. LEIPZIG. [underlined] 78 [/underlined] lost (out of 800 – the second highest loss of the whole “Battle of Berlin”)
[Page break]
Frankfurt – The Raid on 22/23 March ‘44
816 aircraft took part – 620 Lancasters, 184 Halifaxes and 12 Mosquitoes. An indirect routes [sic] was used crossing the Dutch coast north of the Zuider Zee and then due south to Frankfurt. This, and a minelaying diversion at Kiel, confused the Germans for quite some time. Hannover being forecast as the main target. A few fighters eventually found the Bombers.
The marking and bombing was accurate and damage being more severe than in the raid 4 nights previous. There was severe damage to the industrial areas along the main road to Mainz. All parts of the city were hit but the full force of the attack fell in the districts to the west.
33 aircraft were lost on this raid – 26 Lancasters and 7 Halifaxes. 4.0% of force lost.
Further interesting facts:-
162 B-17s of the Eighth Air Force used Frankfurt as a secondary target when they could not reach Schweinfurt 36 hours after this RAF raid, further damage was caused.
The three raids of the 18th, 22nd and 24th March were carried out by a combined plan of the British and American air forces and their combined effect was to deal the worst and most fateful blow of the war to Frankfurt.
[Page break]
[Obscured text] concentrated between 10.25 and 10.43pm, but it started early and spread over an hour and many early aircraft (including mine) overshot the target on the first run and had to go round again, while others, even earlier, had to orbit & await the TI’s. The scatter caused by the wind broadened the stream from the planned few miles to 180 miles at the Baltic coast & resulted in many aircraft flying over defended areas. Losses were high at 72 (8.9%), of which at least 45 were due to flak, plus 5 crashed on return.
[Underlined] SUMMARY: [/underlined] The Battle of Berlin between 18 Nov ’43 & 24/25 March ’44 totalled 16 raids involving over 9000 sorties (1/3rd of total BC sorties in the period) with a tonnage of 30,800 bombs dropped and achieved the devastation of 5500 acres of the city at a cost of 569 a/c lost or crashed and 2938 aircrew killed. This compares with a total of 255 raids, 20407 sorties, 45515 tons of bombs and 870 a/c missing during the entire war against Berlin 1940-45 inc.
[Page break]
[Underlined] 24/25th March (16th + final raid [/underlined] of the “Battle of Berlin” and the last large scale attack by BC.) This raid was delayed from 21st Mar by unsuitable weather. 811 a/c took part with 147 other from OUT’s on diversions. Weather was forecast as variable medium cloud with clear skies above and light northerly winds. In fact, winds were over 100mph from the north and this was not appreciated until late on, if at all with the result that navigation went hay-wire and aircraft were, literally, as newspaper headlines recorded the next day, but with a different meaning, “out all over Germany”. The route ran down to Berlin from the NW and the attack was planned to be concentrated between 10.25 and 10.43pm, but it started early and spread over an hour and many early aircraft (including mine) overshot the target on the first run and had to go round again, while others, even earlier, had to orbit & await the TI’s. The scatter caused by the wind broadened the stream from the planned few miles to 180 miles at the Baltic coast & resulted in many aircraft flying over defended areas. Losses were high at 72 (8.9%), of which at least 45 were due to flak, plus 5 crashed on return.
[Underlined] SUMMARY: [/underlined] The Battle of Berlin between 18 Nov ’43 & 24/25 March ’44 totalled 16 raids involving over 9000 sorties (1/3rd of total BC sorties in the period) with a tonnage of 30,800 bombs dropped and achieved the devastation of 5500 acres of the city at a cost of 569 a/c lost or crashed and 2938 aircrew killed. This compares with a total of 255 raids, 20407 sorties, 45515 tons of bombs and 870 a/c missing during the entire war against Berlin 1940-45 inc.
[Page break]
The aircraft was then put on disposal until ATA pilot [obscured] it to deliver to the squadron. The Erks got a shock when [obscured] women collected these planes and flew them as good as any male pilot.
Then one day, we were all hauled out to put the black and white stripes on our aircraft. We were all half asleep slapping the paint on the wings and tail ends, ready for the invasion of France.
We were allowed knitting wool without coupons in air force blue – good job mum was a good knitter as she knitted me stockings to wear under the battle dress, jumpers and gloves which I could wear whilst filling the aircraft. Also a balaclava to keep my cars [sic] warm.
Aircraft in disposal were often covered in snow when ATA come to collect, which meant you used a rope one each side of the wing and tired [sic] to pull it to the win [sic] tip. It makes me shiver now to think how we coped with the winters in Scotland.
Having to fly with the aircraft you signed for and serviced. We lost 3 airmen from our site which were shot down over the North Sea. Thank god us girls all survived flying.
Leaving – Innes House
Getting back from the airfield one day we had a notice telling us we were being moved again. We gathered all our gear and
[Page break]
BERLIN – 24/25th March 1944
811 Aircraft – 577 Lancasters, 216 Halifaxes and 18 Mosquitoes. 72 Aircraft – 44 Lancaster and 28 Halifaxes lost. 8.9& of force.
The night became known in Bomber Command as ‘the night of the strong winds’. At every stage of the flight a powerful wind from the north carried Bombers south. This wind was not forecast accurately and it was so strong that various methods available to warn crews of wind change during the flight failed to detect the full strength of it. The Bomber stream became very scattered, particularly on the home flight and Radar-predicted Flak batteries at many places were able to score successes. Some of the Bomber force even strayed over the Ruhr defences on the return flight. Approximately 50 of the 72 aircraft lost were destroyed by Flak, most of the remainder being victims of night fighters. A Berlin report says that 14 Bombers were shot down by fighters in the target area.
The strong winds caused difficulties in the marking at Berlin with markers being carried beyond the target to the south west of the city. 126 small towns and villages outside Berlin recorded bombs. The majority of the damage in Berlin was in south western districts.
No industrial concerns were classed as destroyed but several important ones damaged. 5 military establishments were hit badly including the depot on the Waffen-SS. Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler Division in Lichterfelde.
This was the last major RAF raid on Berlin during the war, but the city was to be bombed many times by small forces of Mosquitoes.
Details of the Berlin Raid from the Bomber Command War Diaries by Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everitt.
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
Ronald Mathers pilots flying log book. One
Description
An account of the resource
Pilots flying log book for Ronald Mathers covering the period from 8 May 1942 to 30 September 1944. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and instructor duties. He was stationed at RAF Sywell, RAF De Winton, RAF Swift Current, RAF Harrogate, RAF Shawbury, RAF Castle Donington, RAF Turweston, RAF Silverstone, RAF Morton Hall, RAF Winthorpe, RAF Bardney, RAF Lulsgate Bottom and RAF Swinderby. Aircraft flown were, Tiger Moth (DH82), Stearman, Oxford, Anson Wellington, Lancaster and Stirling. He flew a total of 30 night operations with 9 squadron. Targets were, Berlin, Frankfurt, Braunschweig, Leipzig, Stuttgart, Marignane, Essen, Nuremburg, Schweinfurt, St, Medard en Jalles, Toulouse, Mailly le Camp, Brest, Lille, Bourg Leopold, Tours, Duisburg and Brunswick. His first or second pilots on operations were Pilot Officer Turnbull, Sergeant Ryan, Flying Officer Reeve, Flight Sergeant Redfern and Pilot Officer Campbell. The log book also contains hand written and typed printed notes of the 11 operations carried out to Berlin. Also contains four photographs of crew members, bomb aimer ‘Doc’ Brown, navigator ‘Tom Cave, wireless operator ‘Jock’ Donaldson and rear gunner ‘Nobby’ Bartlett.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Anne-Marie Watson
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.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LMathersRW55201v1
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
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
Canada
France
Germany
Great Britain
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
Alberta--De Winton
Belgium--Leopoldsburg
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Northamptonshire
England--Shropshire
England--Somerset
England--Yorkshire
France--Brest
France--Lille
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France--Marignane
France--Saint-Médard-en-Jalles
France--Toulouse
France--Tours
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Braunschweig
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Essen
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Stuttgart
Saskatchewan--Swift Current
Saskatchewan
Alberta
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942
1943
1944
1943-12-16
1943-12-17
1943-12-20
1943-12-21
1943-12-23
1943-12-24
1943-12-29
1943-12-30
1944-01-01
1944-01-02
1944-01-03
1944-01-14
1944-01-15
1944-01-20
1944-01-21
1944-01-28
1944-01-29
1944-01-30
1944-01-31
1944-02-15
1944-02-16
1944-02-19
1944-02-20
1944-02-21
1944-03-10
1944-03-11
1944-03-15
1944-03-16
1944-03-22
1944-03-23
1944-03-24
1944-03-25
1944-03-26
1944-03-27
1944-03-30
1944-03-31
1944-04-26
1944-04-27
1944-04-28
1944-04-29
1944-04-30
1944-05-01
1944-05-02
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
1944-05-08
1944-05-09
1944-05-10
1944-05-11
1944-05-12
1944-05-19
1944-05-20
1944-05-21
1944-05-22
1944-05-23
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
1660 HCU
1661 HCU
17 OTU
9 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
bomb aimer
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
Flying Training School
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
navigator
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
RAF Bardney
RAF Castle Donington
RAF Morton Hall
RAF Shawbury
RAF Silverstone
RAF Swinderby
RAF Sywell
RAF Turweston
RAF Winthorpe
Stearman
Stirling
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1020/11364/LMacArthurDA[Ser 20-DoB]v1.pdf
2911ac50590fb924e84769519374d1a4
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
Staves, Malcom Ely. MacArthur, DA
Description
An account of the resource
Four items concerning Flight Lieutenant DA MacArthur including an extract from his log book.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-02-26
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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
MacArthur, DA
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
D A MacArthur's log book extracts
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.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LMacArthurDA[Ser%20-DoB]v1
Description
An account of the resource
Flying log book for D A MacArthur, navigator, covering the period from 24 April 1944 to 2 August 1944. Detailing his flying training and operations flown. He was stationed at RAF Hemswell and RAF Kirmington. Aircraft flown in was Lancaster. He flew a total of 30 operations with 166 squadron, 11 Daylight and 19 night operations. His pilot on operations was flying officer Petty. Targets were Mailly, Rennes, Aachen, Calais, Wimereux, Crisbecq, Acheres, Le Havre, Sterkrade, Aulnoye, Mimoyecque, Saintes, Fleres, Chateau Bernapre, Domleger, Neuville aux Bois, Orleans, Foret Du Croc, Caen, Revigny, Sannerville, Stuttgart, Heligoland Bight, Cahagnes and Croix de Bruyeres.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cara Walmsley
Mike Connock
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-05-03
1944-05-04
1944-05-07
1944-05-08
1944-05-27
1944-05-28
1944-06-02
1944-06-03
1944-06-04
1944-06-05
1944-06-06
1944-06-07
1944-06-08
1944-06-10
1944-06-11
1944-06-14
1944-06-16
1944-06-17
1944-06-18
1944-06-22
1944-06-23
1944-06-24
1944-06-25
1944-06-26
1944-06-28
1944-06-29
1944-06-30
1944-07-02
1944-07-04
1944-07-05
1944-07-06
1944-07-07
1944-07-12
1944-07-13
1944-07-16
1944-07-17
1944-07-25
1944-07-26
1944-07-27
1944-07-30
1944-07-31
1944-08-01
1944-08-02
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Germany
Great Britain
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
Atlantic Ocean--Helgoland Bight
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Lincolnshire
France--Ain
France--Amiens Region
France--Avesnes Region (Nord)
France--Caen
France--Caen Region
France--Calais
France--Flers-de-l'Orne
France--Le Havre
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France--Mimoyecques
France--Montebourg
France--Neuville-aux-Bois
France--Normandy
France--Oisemont (Canton)
France--Orléans
France--Orne
France--Pas-de-Calais
France--Rennes
France--Revigny-sur-Ornain
France--Saintes
France--Wimereux
France--Yvelines
Germany--Aachen
Germany--Oberhausen (Düsseldorf)
Germany--Stuttgart
France--Forêt du Croc
France--Domléger-Longvillers
France--Bermesnil
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
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Six photocopied sheets
166 Squadron
aircrew
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of the Le Havre E-boat pens (14/15 June 1944)
bombing of the Normandy coastal batteries (5/6 June 1944)
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
mine laying
navigator
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
RAF Hemswell
RAF Kirmington
tactical support for Normandy troops
training
V-1
V-3
V-weapon