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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46441/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v100002.mp3
bd2cba896fc3856e1f16a03dac6b8486
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-06-19
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
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Interviewer: Right. Ok. So here we are then, George just beginning to talk about your career etcetera and I’d like you just to take you back to the start really of your military service.
GT: Yeah.
Interviewer: If you could just talk us through how all that panned out.
GT: Well, I joined up in I think it was April 1940. 1940 volunteered. Volunteered in 1940 as I was seventeen and three quarters. I wanted to join what I thought was, I knew I’d be called up so I thought I’d better join what I want to join and I joined the RAF as a VR. I went to, I was called up for service in ’41. I went to Penarth, had a medical and I finished up in Skegness on my square bashing. I went from Skegness to RAF Credenhill to train as an armourer and I was the first civvy lad to pass LAC eighty two and a half percent on a course straightaway. They’d never had a civvy do it over sixty percent. I was the first one to pass that amount. Then I went to Long Marston in Warwickshire on a training where the aircrew finished the lot. They did their first ops from there. It was generally what they called a paperchase. You know, dropping leaflets in, on Whitleys and Hampdens. And from then I went to West Kirby on draft. But I didn’t go. I didn’t go overseas. I, well I passed out on the square actually dressed as, dressed for Russia. I was destined for Russia. I got an overcoat on with about eight linings on it [laughs] Lord knows what in it and a temperature of eighty odd and I keeled over and they refused to take me on the boat. So I was sent back and I then went to the Belgian Squadron, 349 Belgian Squadron. I was posted to them but it took us five weeks travelling around Britain, two of us, to find them. But nobody wanted them. They wanted to go on ops and they were anxious to be on ops they were. They had just been re, remade up. They hadn’t had, they’d got armourers but they, they weren’t efficient so they’d got, well another chap called Percy Redding and he was the chap with me. We were just the two and we travelled from, well from West Kirby to Wittering. From Wittering everywhere else. All around Digby, Wellingore, Digby [laughs] Wittering back to Digby, back to somewhere else. I don’t know where we didn’t go. We went to loads of places and finished up in Newcastle and then we found out they were, this squadron was supposed to be at Acklington. RAF Acklington. So we went, we got put there to go to Morpeth and we went to Morpeth. We got to Morpeth and got to Acklington RAF station. They didn’t know anything about them and so we were three weeks in RAF Acklington as strays [laughs] proper strays doing anything. Mainly armoury work and I was attached to a Polish squadron. They were the laziest blokes I’d ever met. Not like they are today. They were lazy then and I tipped a tray of oil over them. They wouldn’t work. All they did was play cards all day long.
Interviewer: Right.
GT: One of them shot at me with a revolver. I was locked up in the guardroom for my own safety [laughs] And well, I then went, still at Acklington I started doing a gas course and we, we had an episode on one Saturday morning and we had to, we were laying gas because of the staff, well the crews were not using the gas masks properly so the CO decided to lay smoke and gas. You know, just ordinary make you sick and tear gas really and we laid this on a Saturday morning and the wind changed and the miners coming up from [Redrow] Colliery were the poor buggers that got it. They were the victims. And in relation to that two year ago I met a chap on Newark Air Showground from Acklington way, well Washington. [unclear] and he was with the lifeboat people and he he said they still talk about when they were gassed [laughs] And I said, ‘Well, you’ve met the bloke who did it.’ And he was quite excited with it but as I say after that I, we went to RAF Friston near, on top of Beachy Head and we were on ops then and of course we got a lot, we were a reception from the Germans as you may guess because they didn’t like us and we, I mean we were Belgian and I used to have Belgium on my shoulder and that’s where I had my photograph taken to go on leaflets. I was on leaflets dropped over the other side with the CO. My CO which was the Count Du Monceau de Bergendal. He was the CO of the squadron. He was a son of the royal family and as I say I got on well there. Did very well. Met several people, influential people in that way. But I then got posted to RAF Blackbushe, or RAF Hartford Bridge where I joined 2nd Tactical Air Force and I was attached to the French squadron then. 342 French Squadron. That’s where I met De Gaulle and the King. Well, the King came first and he did a, he did a investiture to the French Squadron and of all the squadron there there were three big squadrons on the ‘drome and well we, before he came I mean I was six foot like and so I was you know always one of the big lads in the reception. The parade party as they called them and I was the marker. Well, this drill sergeant, he got on my nerves so much. He used to come along. ‘I’m the King. Now I will sort you —’ blah blah blah. We used to think oh piss off [laughs] you know. That was our attitude. We’d got the work to do and I used to give him some funny answers [laughs] My sense of humour got me into trouble all my life. He knew. He knew what sort of got as I gave him.
Interviewer: Can I just ask you, I mean this is all, this is wonderful stuff George what I want you to do really is just to give me just for the tape so we can —
GT: Yeah.
Interviewer: Cut it in is that obviously your service number. Can you remember your service number?
GT: Yeah. 0160, 1650535.
Interviewer: And your full rank was?
GT: LAC.
Interviewer: And your full name was?
GT: George William Taplin.
Interviewer: Yeah. And what year were you born in?
GT: 1922.
Interviewer: 1922. So as you say you were just eighteen then.
GT: Yeah, I was just eighteen you see.
Interviewer: You were coming up for service—
GT: Then I, well we [pause] the King came first. He came for this investiture and I was banned from the parade. I was banned from the parade. I didn’t want to go on the parade. I thought bah but I always said I joined up to fight Hitler. Not to, not to have a lot of bullshit and that was me. And I was in the armoury cleaning barrels and straight, I was straightening gun barrels actually. That’s the job I was doing because I was, I was a top armourer and it was one of, one of the few jobs, I was one of the few. I was one of the few people who could do that job. And well, at the investiture the armoury was not on the King’s tour but he made it. He came straight in the door. First it was just outside the armoury on my lawn here where the parade had been and the investiture had taken place and he came straight in the armoury door with two [pause] well gentlemen in gold braid. That’s all you could call them. Short fat men. I was just about to go with air marshall or something. I don’t know. I didn’t know the rank. And he spoke to me and I spoke to him. Well, I was called up to attention. I was smoking my pipe. Illegal [laughs] you know I shouldn’t be smoking in the armoury. I’d got my pipe on, we’d got a big four foot cleaning rod because we were on .5 Brownings you see. This attention. I thought bloody hell. I grabbed my [unclear] and stood there with it to attention and I got this steel rod pointing at the King [laughs] it looked like a bayonet. Well, a spear sticking towards him and I sort of corrected that and he came over. He said, he stuttered like he said, ‘What are you doing?’ I said, ‘I’m straightening barrels, sir.’ So he said, ‘What, what do you use for that?’ Well, we use a rubber hammer and I thought oh bloody hell if I say a rubber hammer I’m in trouble here. As I said that I held this rubber hammer up like that. That’s all. I was alert enough to realise if I said a rubber hammer it’s like an insult isn’t it? It’s the last thing people think but that’s a thing we used because you vibrated them straight.
Interviewer: Were these Brownings off aircraft then?
GT: Oh yeah.
Interviewer: So what aircraft? What —
GT: The machine guns out the, out the turrets.
Interviewer: So what aircraft were you servicing at the time?
GT: Bostons.
Interviewer: The Bostons. Oh, because that was the Belgians were flying the Bostons?
GT: No, the French. The French.
Interviewer: The French were buying the Bostons.
GT: We were on Spits with the Belgians.
Interviewer: Right.
GT: On Spitfires and as I say he [pause] he asked me what I was doing and I said, ‘I’m straightening barrels.’ And he said, ‘Oh yes? How do you do it?’ And I showed him. I didn’t answer I just showed him it and it finished up he said, ‘Can I help?’ So [laughs] so we were back to being like me and you. ‘Clout it there,’ sort of style, you know. Well, his hits were little taps they were. I said, ‘No. Harder. Harder. Harder.’ And he belted it as hard as he could and he knocked the thing out of my hand and after about five or six throws this barrel was straight and I said, ‘Got it.’ And he, you know these white gloves that he wore? His white kid gloves. He grabbed this barrel which was full of all [carbide] and all the bloody muck and oil and everything and he grabbed that in his white glove. Well, his gloves looked like your trousers. Oh dear. And he held them up and, ‘Oh dear,’ because you put, you put a mark on a window and you held a barrel and you could see by the curve how, where you had to hit it. It was simple. A simple thing but it worked and he grabbed this bloody barrel. I said, ‘Oh God,’ I said, ‘Look at your gloves.’
Interviewer: So the King spent some time with you then.
GT: Oh, twenty five minutes he was with me.
Interviewer: Really? That’s, that’s quite something.
GT: A full twenty five minutes. He wasn’t supposed to be there but he had two minutes but he spent and these two blokes didn’t dare alter him because he was the boss. He was the boss wasn’t he? He was so interested and I finished up I took his gloves and I washed them in wood alcohol. Brought them back out, they, they were not black but they were grey looking but they were passable and I said to him, ‘You don’t smoke do you, sir?’ ‘Yes,’ he said in his stuttering way. I said, ‘Oh God, I said, ‘For Christ’s sake don’t. Don’t light them up, use them, have them on when you light up.’ He said, ‘Why?’ I said, ‘Well, they —’ I said, ‘We shall have a cooked King.’ He said, ‘I wonder what I’d taste like?’ He had a sense of humour. He said, ‘I wonder what I’d taste like as cooked.’ He said [laughs] and that was the end of that. Anyway, he went out. I saluted him. I put my hat on and saluted him and that and they went. Well, the next thing is I’ve got the warrant officer who’s in charge of the armoury and all everybody, every all the big bloody paraphernalia, ‘What did he say then?’ [laughs] ‘I’m not telling you.’
Interviewer: Can you remember the date when this took place or the month?
GT: I can’t quite remember the date but it was around about April time.
Interviewer: Right.
GT: ’43.
Interviewer: Nineteen, right.
GT: And ’43. No. ’44.
Interviewer: ’44.
GT: No. No.
Interviewer: So leading up to D-Day then.
GT: Yeah, ’44. That’s right. It would be ’44.
Interviewer: Ok.
GT: I was with the Belgians in ’43 and, and so I just refused to tell them. I told my warrant officer because Warrant Officer, Warrant Officer not Bridal. What was his [pause] Powers was his air gunner in India before the war in 1936. So he knew the King and he’d had a long service medal. He was fifty five and he was retiring from the RAF then and as I say he had his long service medal given him and he took it from the King. And the King he, when the King was flying as a pilot in India in ’36 or before he was his air gunner. And that’s how they knew each other.
Interviewer: Right.
GT: I told, told the warrant officer what had happened and he said, ‘Oh,’ he said, he said, ‘Yes. I knew he had a sense of humour.’ And that was it. And then what a month later we had De Gaulle then because I was still with the French squadron and we were just changing over then from Bostons to Mitchells then. The Mitchell aircraft, the bigger one and we were just changing over and De Gaulle came. Well, no one liked him. None of the French wanted him. They didn’t like him at all and he was an utter pig of a man you know. Six foot seven, four inch heels, two inch soles, a nine inch hat. It was like looking up at the bloody ceiling when [unclear] And we were on parade but when we were on parade with the French the admiral in charge of us used to as a courtesy to the English he’d call the French up to attention in French then he’d turn smartly and call us up in English and as he said that that was a courtesy to us. He accepted the work we did was important and it was only in the armoury where we were, the English were. They weren’t in any other part of the French, the fitters and riggers and that. They’d got them but they had no armourers and there were about thirty seven of us armourers and so in respect he sort of respected us like. We, we thought that was good and he was a nice gentleman. And De Gaulle came. Well, De Gaulle took a parade. Snapped up in French. Well, we didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. Hadn’t a clue. Of course, we still stood to at ease and he came across and he started. He picked on me and I was the right marker and the, but he, because when he got excited he spit and I was covered in spit and I told him where to go. That was my end. My last day in the French squadron. I was put up before the admiral and he said, he apologised to me. He said, ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘I’m sorry for what you —’ I mean, I was straight in to the admiral looking spit all over me. All on my face and that. And oh, But with de Gaulle he was a pig of a man. He wasn’t, he wasn’t what they printed him in history as —
Interviewer: [unclear]
GT: He was a pig of a bloke. No one liked him.
Interviewer: The admiral then was he French or was he English?
GT: French. Everyone else was French there. Oh, it was a Cross of Lorraine Squadron. 342 Cross of Lorraine Squadron I was with and they were part of the 226 echelon. We were preparing. We were 2nd Tactical Air Force then and there was 342, 88 and 226 Squadrons. Three big squadrons on in this echelon. About four thousand five hundred men. And I got then sent to, well I had a couple of days with 88 and then I got sent to 226 which was just further up the ‘drome and that’s where I stayed, with 226 Squadron as an armourer and I stayed with them right through. All the way ‘til I got demobbed.
Interviewer: What were they flying at the time?
GT: The same. Mitchells.
Interviewer: The same aircraft. The same.
GT: Mitchells.
Interviewer: Ok.
GT: We were all on Mitchells then and as I say it was a, well one of those things. I I used to do a lot of, I used to be recruited by the our CO, Group Captain [unclear]. He was a South African German and he was with us. He was in charge of the, this 226 echelon. We were the biggest. The biggest unit of all in the whole of the Second Front set up of one unit and we were, we didn’t do bombing like night bombing. We did day bombing to the Army and we bombed at Caen on seventy foot.
Interviewer: Wow.
GT: That’s close. In other words, the width of the bloody road more or less.
Interviewer: So you travelled over to France then.
GT: No, I landed in France in Day 17 and I came out, back out in Day 17 but that was the day when, when the Americans bombed the wrong hillside. They blew the bloody Canadians away and the Germans just came back and retook the hillside and then we were back in range of the 88s you see and they see us coming and they gave us a right reception and we took off straightaway and came back to England. Then I finished up at RAF, well RAF I suppose RAF [Vitry] in France. That was where we went to and went from [Vitry] then to [unclear].
Interviewer: So this would have been the summer of ’44.
GT: ’44 yeah. When half the second front —
Interviewer: Yeah.
GT: Went to [unclear] and we that was our six miles off of so we were right on the front line because the first time we took off the Jerries gave us a reception and we went back and gave them a reception. I don’t know whether you know much about bombing but we used to have clusters of anti-personnel bombs. Forty eight in a cluster, six clusters to a plane and we loaded up with them and went back and opened the bomb doors and let them take the lot. They didn’t, after that they never, when we took off they never shot at us.
Interviewer: Yes.
GT: They learned their lesson. Yeah, we were on the second front all that time.
Interviewer: So coming towards the end then obviously getting into late 1944.
GT: Yeah. Late 1944.
Interviewer: Did you move up towards the German border then?
GT: ’45 this was as well.
Interviewer: Yeah.
GT: Well, we were up there, we were in [unclear] at that [pause] ’45. Early ’45 and I’ll say well it was one of those things I I suppose I got I’d been when I passed out I was offered a commission. I turned it down. And I know on my record it said no ambition [laughs] When we were at [unclear] we were preparing to go to Burma to fight the Japs. We were close Army Support Unit so therefore that was our next job. And I I sort of well I didn’t fancy going to Burma. Not for the Japs. The snakes. Because if I see a snake I’m paralysed. I can do nothing. I can’t. I can’t run. I can’t walk. I can’t shout. I’m stuck.
Interviewer: Well, whilst you were up at Germany then you bumped into another famous personality didn’t you?
GT: Yeah.
Interviewer: Would you like to talk about him?
GT: Who was that then?
Interviewer: You met Mr Goering.
GT: What?
Interviewer: Goering.
GT: Oh. Yeah. Oh well, yes. Well, when what happened because we were so close to the front line where we were, we were in a big drome they flew all these just after the war. They captured and they flew them back to us because they wouldn’t keep them in Germany because they were frightened because people would get at that them because the Germans were ready to shoot them you see. And they were going to put them on trial so they brought them back into our place and we had a ring of RAF Regiment around this little set of huts in the middle of the ‘drome. That’s actually where they let the V bombs off from, V-1s from and there was two looking out and only one looking in over the ring. Three rings of them. But it was one of those things and I see him with the CO. I was his, one of his personal bodyguards and you know what Victor Stallone looked like in the films that’s how I used to look. I wasn’t allowed to speak. I wasn’t allowed to touch them. But I’d got stun grenades, smoke grenades, real grenades, two rifles, two revolvers and umpteen guys all around me. I was that way to set up. Everything I could do if my job was to say save the CO and he was a nice gentleman he was. A real nice gentleman. And that was my job. And he said he didn’t fancy the chief, the sergeant, the police he said, ‘He’s a coward. He’d run.’ He said, ‘I don’t think you’ll run.’ I said, ‘I can’t.’ I got on well with my CO until I got when we were lined up to go to Burma and he was going to make me his armament officer then. He was going to put me on the field of battle as they described it and that’s a rank they can’t take away from you when it’s made in the field of battle and make me his armament officer. And I’d already volunteered to only a week before to join the, come back home to rebuild Britain on a B Class release and did I get a rollicking. Oh, he really sorted me out. That was the only time he took to me. Really sorted me out and he really hammered me.
Interviewer: So I take it by then then the war was finished obviously.
GT: Oh, the war was over.
Interviewer: You were coming back to the, to England.
GT: The fact, before I got I volunteered for this B Class release and then the Japs packed in just after. So we were going then to Burma but it was one of those things. It’s just how coincidence took it. I, I thought well I was a bricklayer by profession. I was trained as an apprentice bricklayer and so when the Ministry came out they recruited people like me and they taught me and they more or less talked me into joining, to come back home and rebuild Britain which I did. And —
Interviewer: Right. So that brings us really to the end of your story.
GT: Yeah.
Interviewer: Doesn’t it George? It’s been absolutely fascinating to understand how you started off just going in as an armourer.
GT: Yeah.
Interviewer: And then your experiences through working with foreign Air Forces really.
GT: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah.
Interviewer: Which is something that a lot of RAF personnel didn’t get the opportunity to do.
GT: Oh, I was in three Air Forces. The Belgian Air Force, Free French and The Royal Air Force and I’m the only one. I know that. I’m the only one that was in the three.
Interviewer: That’s quite a record to hold, isn’t it?
GT: Yeah. But I’ve never sent for my medals. I don’t believe in medals.
Interviewer: Well, thank you very much George.
GT: Well, that’s about —
Interviewer: Absolutely —
GT: That’s about my story. There’s lots of other bits I could tell you but [laughs] —
Interviewer: We’ll leave those for another day.
GT: Then in the day.
Interviewer: Right. Thank you ever so much. Thank you, George Taplin.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with George William Taplin
1004-Taplin, George William
Identifier
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SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v10
Creator
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Dave Harrigan
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
Format
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00:27:24 audio recording
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
George Taplin volunteered for the RAF in 1940 and trained as an armourer. He served with 349, 342 and 226 Squadrons.
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
England--Hampshire
England--Northumberland
Contributor
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Julie Williams
226 Squadron
342 Squadron
349 Squadron
ground personnel
RAF Acklington
RAF Hartford Bridge
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46440/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v090002.mp3
8598a787d9cade4d126b750d930ea0c2
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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
2017-06-19
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Interviewer: This is an interview with Mr Richard Moore at his home in Lincoln talking about his wartime career as ground crew in the Lincoln area.
RM: Ok. We’ll go from there. Well, I joined up when I was eighteen and my first port of call was Weston Super Mare which as you know is not very far from home and I did six weeks square bashing there. We lived in private houses and we were well looked after. When that six weeks was up I was posted to Locking which is just outside of Weston and I was there for seven months learning my course. After we passed out, some of us passed out, some didn’t and my first squadron was Squires Gate at Blackpool. Boulton Paul Defiants they were. Something new to the Germans because not only did they have a pilot they had a mid-upper turret as well, a gunner so it could fire front and back. But Jerry soon got, soon got wise to it. A very clever race the Germans. I went on leave and when I came back we’d moved to Woodvale in Southport and those planes were call Beaufighters. They were twin engine light bomber. And one day our chief came to us and said, ‘I’ve got to post six of you to a place called Swinderby.’ Oh, we were going to Sicily. The squadron was going to Sicily. I said, ‘Well, I know where Sicily is but where’s Swinderby?’ He said, ‘I believe it’s in Lincolnshire.’ ‘Alright,’ I said, ‘I’ll be one to go to Swinderby then.’ Good job I did. They took a pasting in Sicily. And we get to Swinderby and it was, ‘Oh, we don’t want you here. You’ve got to go to Wigsley.’ So we go to Wigsley. ‘Oh, we don’t want you here.’ Back to Swinderby. In the end, in the finish we were at Wigsley and we were working with AV Roe men doing crossed aircraft and our chiefy turns up and says, ‘Drop everything. Get all your toolboxes and kit. We’ve got a bit of a job on.’ He didn’t say where but he took us back to Scampton and I see these Lancs. There was one in a hangar. No bomb doors just two arms down you see. I thought these are queer Lancasters.
Interviewer: This would be early 1943.
RM: Yes. Yes. And so, a chap and I worked all night on one of them. God, it was damned cold in that hangar. It was in May, wasn’t it? It was May time and all of them had been flying low over the water and all the plates underneath towards the rear gunner were all mashed in. We had to change all them. And I lived in Saxilby at the time. I could live out because my wife in Saxilby and I wasn’t far away and as I was cycling down Tillbridge Lane they were taking off on this raid. Didn’t know anything about it. I know the chap’s dog had got killed. Nigger. It was killed the day before they went and Gibson said, ‘Bury it at 12 o’clock. That’s when we’ll be over the target.’
Interviewer: Did you see anything of Guy Gibson or —
RM: Oh, I saw him in the distance. I’ve met Micky Martin.
Interviewer: Oh yes.
RM: He was a nice bloke. Australian he was. He was a good pilot. So and off I went home and the next day we knew all about it.
Interviewer: So you saw these aircraft obviously different to the normal Lancasters.
RM: There were no bomb doors you see.
Interviewer: Did you wonder what was, you know happening?
RM: No. Nobody said anything. I said, ‘Well their just two arms now. Then we realised it was for the swimming, the swimming bomb you see. Yeah. And we lost what seven did we? Or was their eight I think we lost.
Interviewer: Yes. It was eight. Yes.
RM: Fifty six men. And Martin and Gibson, they kept flying each side of the dam to give the other chaps to get in and draw the flak off. But it took the last bomber to break the dam.
Interviewer: That’s right. Les Knight.
RM: And then they went to the other one but they couldn’t get to the third one. That was impossible I think. They’d run out of time. Yes, it was quite a great occasion. But as I say within a few days we were off. We went to Bardney.
Interviewer: How many of you were there working on the —
RM: Well, there would be about maybe a group of us. About fourteen I should think because there was fitters, engine men, riggers. There were air frames, wireless operators, electricians and what else did we have? We wouldn’t have the bomb people because people, special people put the bombs on the planes. But you know —
Interviewer: Did you actually see the bombs that were going to be put on these?
RM: No. I did not see them.
Interviewer: They were all —
RM: No. Because once we finished at night we went to bed. Us two, then the rest took over in the morning. And then they said, ‘You can’t go out of camp.’ And I wanted to go home you see. Anyway, they let me out. I got on my bike and I said I was going down Tillbridge Lane as they were taking off. A wonderful sight.
Interviewer: Three of them together in waves weren’t there?
RM: Yeah. Yeah. Yes. A bit of a noise but it was great.
Interviewer: And you saw the bombs. The different bombs.
RM: No.
Interviewer: Rather than the —
RM: Yes.
Interviewer: The usual. Hanging below —
RM: That’s right.
Interviewer: Below the –
RM: These sort of bombs and then of course the next thing was the Tallboys. weren’t they?
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: Terrific they were sized. Yeah, so when I came back the next day he said. ‘We’re off again.’ So we went to Bardney. M for Mother had crashed and we wanted to get it up in the air again.
Interviewer: So you were repairing the crashed aircraft.
RM: Yes. Yes.
Interviewer: And getting them ready for —
RM: Yeah.
Interviewer: Flying again.
RM: That’s right. Got them in the air because we were losing a lot of planes you see.
Interviewer: Right.
RM: And also, when a plane had done a big, we had to do a major inspection on them and when they had done so many flying hours just to make sure they were alright for because I mean it’s like a car isn’t it you do so many miles and you have an MOT or whatever they call it. And so we worked on M for Mother. First night on ops she never came back.
Interviewer: Oh dear.
RM: That was a bad job that was. Then blimey the lorry rolls up again. ‘Come on. Get in.’ Syerston in Nottingham. Just at the border that was and we had twelve major inspections to do on Lancs there. And after that then we were disbanded because the war was nearly over.
Interviewer: Right.
RM: So, 5 Group, Bomber Command was disbanded and we ended up, some of us on a BABs flight testing this new radar on a Oxford, Airspeed Oxfords two engine planes. Sent down somewhere in the south. I can’t tell you the name of the place and I met Micky Martin. We had a good old chat about the old days and —
Interviewer: Did he talk about the Dams raid?
RM: Yeah. He didn’t say a lot. He just, you know sort of, ‘Lucky to be alive,’ sort of thing. But he was a good pilot.
Interviewer: He was a bit on the eccentric side, wasn’t he?
RM: Oh yes. Yes. He didn’t say a lot I don’t think. But Australians are either or. You know. Got plenty to say for themselves.
Interviewer: They usually have. Yes.
RM: But yes. It was, it was good years. We, oh we went off. We went, before that I missed something out. We went to East Kirkby to do some jobs there and as our bombers came into land one, early one morning the German fighters followed them in and shot the camp up. There were cannon shells all over the place. We were diving for cover everywhere. One poor WAAF got killed.
Interviewer: Oh dear.
RM: But I don’t know what was the matter with our radar to let the Jerries get in so close to our bombers as they were landing. And there was one took off one night when they were going on a raid and it blew up. Went down the runway and the only man who survived was the rear gunner. He was blown out so he survived. He was lucky. I don’t know why it blew up like that.
Interviewer: No. What were your feelings during this time? I mean, did you, did you realise you know the important job you were doing?
RM: Oh yes. Yes.
Interviewer: And —
RM: It was a really worthwhile job. I mean I know we were only ground crew but they couldn’t have done without us could they?
Interviewer: Couldn’t have got off the ground without you.
RM: No.
Interviewer: Literally.
RM: I mean sometimes we had to refuel the planes you know. It was good.
Interviewer: And it was good camaraderie between you.
RM: Yes. Yes.
Interviewer: You all.
RM: Oh yes. We never —
Interviewer: Did you get to know many of the aircrew?
RM: Not a lot. No. Because I mean I didn’t [pause] when we did an inspection every morning, you’d do a DI every morning on the planes, a Daily Inspection in other words that was about all you saw of them. It was you know the only time perhaps you saw them, when they got an eye on you and you pulled the chocs away. That was it you know. They didn’t sort of mix a lot with ground crew.
Interviewer: No. Did you, you worked on Lancasters?
RM: Oh, I started off as I told you on Boulton Paul Defiants.
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: Beaufighters.
Interviewer: Manchesters.
RM: Yes, I —
Interviewer: Did you work on those?
RM: To be honest, yeah. I flew a Manchester.
Interviewer: Oh really.
RM: Not very far mind you.
Interviewer: No. No. I think —
RM: I was —
Interviewer: That was the trouble with them.
RM: We were at Swinderby and I went up with this pilot and he said, ‘Would you like to fly it?’ I said, ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ He said, ‘Go on. Take the controls but I’ll keep my feet on the rudders. But don’t turn it left or that way or we’ll flip over and we’ll be gonners.’ I didn’t do it for long but it was, it was an experience.
Interviewer: How fantastic.
RM: Yeah.
Interviewer: They were.
RM: Oh, those engines were too big for those planes. Vulcan engines. I knew one crossed up near the tree in Saxilby village one day. My misses said, ‘I thought you might have been on that.’ I said, ‘No. I wasn’t.’ But she did play hell with me one day because when we were at, when I was at Swinderby before all this we [pause] I was picked to go with this group we had a little section as you turn off the Newark Road to go to Swinderby camp there’s a bit of a corner of a field. We had a little section in there we had a Spitfire in. We were working on an Halifax bomber and all that sort of thing and one day chiefy said, ‘I want a rigger and an engine man to go down to the Percival Gull works in Luton. I said, ‘Oh, I’ll go.’ Daft like. And my friend, a chap called Saul he said, ‘I’ll go as well.’ So we gets on this Airspeed Oxford and off we set off and we were going over London and nearly run into a barrage balloon because we were flying into the sun. He saw it at the last minute and we got down there. Landed in a field and came back safely. When I told her about it she went bananas. She said, ‘You stupid idiot.’ Sort of thing. ‘Because you have a daughter,’ she said, ‘Remember.’ I said, ‘Well, there you are.’
Interviewer: You’re here to tell the tale anyway.
RM: Yeah. Yes. And then as I say we got on this radar business at [unclear] and then well we kept flying different places. Dakotas we used a lot to fly about in. And then we went down to St Mawgan in Newquay and worked a bit on there. Different planes because a lot of them were obsolete then, weren’t they? The Wellington and the Hampden and the Stirling they’d all got, well they weren’t much cop really were they? To be honest. They did their job but they were very vulnerable.
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: Especially the Wellington because it was only fabric. And I was going to be a flight engineer but my wife said, ‘No, you’re not.’ Because they used to get their head shot off you know, the poor old flight engineers because they stood beside the pilot watching all the dials.
Interviewer: That’s right.
RM: So I didn’t do that. I said, ‘Well, I survived the war so I should have been alright.’ Anyway, as I said as we went down and we stayed down at Newquay for a bit at St Mawgan and then they come to me one day and said, ‘You’re going to Leconfield.’ I said, ‘Leconfield? Where’s that?’ he said, ‘In Yorkshire.’ I said, ‘That’s a hell of a long way to go to be demobbed.’ I was going to get demobbed you see and so I get to Leconfield and we stopped there working on Wellingtons of all things. And then a load of RAF, these young ATC cadets turned up and were going for a flight on one of these Wellies. That crashed.
Interviewer: Oh dear.
RM: Terrible. Lost. Lost all these kids. Just couldn’t understand it because I mean they were, we all thought they were in tip top condition. Anyway, I got on a charge there because what was he called? He was a mad man our engineering officer. He came around and he found some water on the bed in the, in the Wellington and he asked me, ‘Why didn’t you see that?’ I said, ‘Well, it wasn’t there when I did the DI.’ But he wouldn’t have it so he put me on a charge.
Interviewer: And what was the outcome of that?
RM: Oh, I got seven days, I think. Confined to barracks. That’s all.
Interviewer: Right.
RM: Nothing, it wasn’t serious.
Interviewer: And what, what had been the problem?
RM: Well, there was —
Interviewer: Did you find out? Was there a leak.
RM: Well, there was a hatch.
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: There was a leak and it must have rained or something and dropped through on to the bed.
Interviewer: Right.
RM: Because it wasn’t there when I did it or I’d have mopped it up. But these things happen, don’t they?
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: Got to find a scapegoat you know for some, some of these jobs. Yes. So when I was at Leconfield and then we were on the bus next morning to Uxbridge getting your demob suit and then home.
Interviewer: Right.
RM: My daughter didn’t, didn’t want nothing to do with me. Didn’t know who I was.
Interviewer: What do you feel about your war years?
RM: Very good. Very good. A lot of camaraderie. Whatever you call that word. Camaraderie is it? I can’t remember.
Interviewer: Camaraderie.
RM: That’s the word. Yeah. Yes. Everybody looking our for each other. That was one thing about it. And the NAAFI were good. They came around every morning. Tea and a wad you know. Great.
Interviewer: You didn’t get a chance to have a flight in a Lancaster.
RM: No.
Interviewer: No. Would you have liked one?
RM: Yes. I could have done but I don’t know why I turned it down. I don’t know why. And I wish I had now. I missed that. You never know. I might get a chance.
Interviewer: Yes, indeed.
RM: Go to Coningsby and say, ‘I want to come up with you, mate.’ Yeah. So there we are. But very good years. Good crowd. I don’t think we had many troublemakers you know. You do get some but not a lot. I only ended up LAC so I was nothing. Leading aircraftsman. That’s all. I didn’t get my stripes.
Interviewer: Well, you were doing a wonderful job like all the ground crew.
RM: Yeah. All these different aircraft. I can’t believe how they started from a Boulton Paul Defiant and ended up on a Lancaster. The Halifax wasn’t a bad bomber either.
Interviewer: No.
RM: That was quite good. The Halifax.
Interviewer: I think each crew was very fond of its own aircraft.
RM: Oh yes. Oh yes. Yes.
Interviewer: Anybody who flew in the Halifax.
RM: With this Just Jane. Who was that? Which was that? Was that a Lancaster?
Interviewer: That’s a Lancaster.
RM: Yeah.
Interviewer: That’s the Lanc well it’s a Lancaster that’s at —
RM: Coningsby.
Interviewer: East Kirkby now.
RM: East Kirkby. That goes up and down.
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: Up and down the runways.
Interviewer: That’s right.
RM: You can taxi in it. Yeah.
Interviewer: Yes.
RM: Well that that did a lot of raids didn’t it? A lot of raids, Just Jane, I think. They’ve all got their bombs on the side of the cockpit.
Interviewer: That’s right. Yes.
RM: Yeah. Happy days. But really. Was it worthwhile?
Interviewer: I think, I think we’ve got to think that it was.
RM: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: We don’t want to think that fifty five thousand lost.
RM: Men plus.
Interviewer: Died for nothing. I mean.
RM: No. That’s what I think. Sometimes I wonder was it worth it and then I think well we had to keep them away, didn’t we?
Interviewer: We did indeed. Yes.
RM: We were alone, weren’t we? I mean the Americans wouldn’t have come into it if it hadn’t been for Pearl Harbour.
Interviewer: No. No.
RM: They were selling fuel to the Japs. Then the Japs go and bomb Pearl Harbour just to say thank you. Oh dear. Oh dear. I don’t know. It’s [pause] I don’t know what to make of this. What’s going to happen, do you?
Interviewer: I don’t. It’s been absolutely fascinating, Mr Moore.
RM: Was that alright?
Interviewer: That’s fine.
RM: That’s about as much as I can tell you.
Interviewer: Yes, that’s —
RM: There’s bits I’ve missed out because I lost my memory a bit you know.
Interviewer: No, it’s been really interesting. Thank you very much.
Dublin Core
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Title
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Interview with Richard Moore
1004-Moore, Richard
Identifier
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SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v09
Creator
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Claire Bennett
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Format
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00:16:49 audio recording
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
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IBCC Digital Archive
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Somerset
England--Yorkshire
Description
An account of the resource
Richard Moore served as ground crew at RAF Locking, RAF Squires Gate and RAF Wickenby.
Beaufighter
crash
Defiant
ground crew
ground personnel
Lancaster
RAF East Kirkby
RAF Leconfield
RAF Locking
RAF Swinderby
RAF Wickenby
strafing
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46438/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v070002-0002.mp3
5fa6f78c70bdc7d65611eb16871b5784
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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
2017-06-19
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Interviewer: Ken, good afternoon. I’d like first of all could you please give us your full name and your date of birth.
KN: Kenneth Edgar Neve, and that’s N E V E. I was born on the 30th September 1925.
Interviewer: Ok. Thanks very much. And what I’d like to do to start talking about your military career really we’ll go right back to the very beginning and talk about the time that you were involved with the LDV and you were a runner I believe.
KN: I was a runner for my father who was made captain of the Home Guard. He worked with a big factory making aircraft instruments and when war was declared they said well you have, we’ve got four or five hundred people working in the factory and we’re going to give, the LDV will be that unit there. That was the first one in Basingstoke and so he would, because he retired from the, from the Army in 1936 so when was [pause] war was declared 1939. So, war was declared and they said, ‘Well, crikey you’re the guy to do the job ex-colour sergeant major, you know.’ He was retired. So they employed him as captain of the LDV which became the Home Guard of course. And because I was brought up in the Army obviously and he said, ‘Well, look —’ he said, I said, ‘Can I join dad?’ He said, ‘Well, we’ll have to call you the captain’s runner.’ They gave me little khaki things and I used to be in there throwing grenades and all this stuff [laughs] And so anyway after, after a while I decided to join the Cadet Force so they made me a sergeant believe it or not. And then eventually I thought well it’s time now to decide whether I’m going to wait until eighteen to be called up or should I do it on the, on my seventeenth. So I did that and I don’t know how far you want me to go but when I went to Reading to say yes I’m fourteen and the guy says, ‘Well, what service do you want to go?’ Army, Navy, Air Force whatever. I said, ‘Well, I really wanted something with, with ships. I thought, I thought that would be rather nice.’ He said, ‘Well, do you mean the Royal Navy? I said, ‘No. No.’ I said, ‘It’s to do with aircraft as well.’ ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘You mean the Fleet Air Arm?’ So I said, ‘Yes, that’s fine.’ So anyway, I went to RAF Henlow for six months and qualified as an engineer and I just came back to my first unit which was, which is now the, which is now the first unit of the Fleet Air Arm was where the Southampton Airport is now and we had Walruses and all sorts of things, you know.
Interviewer: That was at HMS Raven.
KN: That was my first one there look.
Interviewer: Ok. Yeah.
KN: And so anyway, so I suppose I’d only, I was not far from Basingstoke you see and so I used to get home every other weekend. That was fine. So all of a sudden I was just going to breakfast one morning and there was a notice board which said I had to go and report and they said, ‘Oh,’ He said, ‘Yes. Well, they’ve got problems with the RAF. They haven’t got enough people with your qualifications and, —' and he said, ‘We’re going to loan you to them.’ The next thing I know 190 Squadron’s Stirlings. Can you imagine looking at Stirlings after one of those bloody things?
Interviewer: Must have been massive. Was it? Yeah.
KN: I mean the main wheels were over six, six foot six high they were.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: And so because I used to wander around there and nobody said, ‘Who are you and what are you doing?’ You know. I’ve got a Navy uniform by the way you see. So eventually I joined one of the units there and, and of course then I was there until after D-Day. I stayed with them all that time.
Interviewer: So, what did, what were your duties then on the squadron?
KN: Just aeronautical engineer. That’s all.
Interviewer: Ground or air?
KN: Ground. Ground. Yeah.
Interviewer: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But you just, so it was general servicing and —
KN: Yeah. Well, because I’d done quite a big study and I was, I used to do the electrics, instruments, oxygen all those sorts of things. So that was my job.
Interviewer: Yeah. Did you find it a good aircraft to work on?
KN: Fantastic aeroplane. Yeah. Whenever I could get a ride in it I did you know. I’d had probably dozens of rides. We were testing after major work in the, you know. I’m not saying the right word.
Interviewer: Servicing.
KN: Yeah. Yeah. When they did ground, the servicing up to a certain degree you ought to have a test flight afterwards and I was always on that you see and so any way one, and I enjoyed it. It was wonderful life and, and then of course we painted all the white lines and three whites on each on the fuselage all ready for and there was all these soldiers coming on the day that we left with all the parachutists and —
Interviewer: This was ready for the D-Day invasion.
KN: Gliders and everything like that. Yeah.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: On the day it happened and there were people were killing themselves. I don’t know whether you know this but all these Army guys here they couldn’t face it and I think there were two or three committed suicide.
Interviewer: Really?
KN: Waiting to be boarding on to the aircraft which I just couldn’t —
Interviewer: The fear of the unknown.
KN: Couldn’t take it. I was only a young lad really still you know.
Interviewer: Yeah. That’s incredible.
KN: It was.
Interviewer: That’s the first I’ve ever heard of that.
KN: Yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: That’s amazing. I mean obviously then the Stirling had been employed on bomber duties but obviously when you saw it it was towing the gliders etcetera. Is that –
KN: Well, that was just before D-Day.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: Oh no. We were, we were doing normal bombing runs.
Interviewer: Normal bombing runs.
KN: And all sorts of things you know. Yes.
Interviewer: So did the squadron lose a lot of aircraft? Or –
KN: Well, fortunately not. I had two aircraft to look after and, with 190 and we never had any problems at all. We had the odd person who was shot up, the navigator or gunner you see and we used to have, well I didn’t have to do it but it was horrible inside, you know.
Interviewer: Clearing the mess. Yeah.
KN: And my, my job also was on the bomb release down in the front there you see. So I used to make sure everything when it was all loaded that it was ready for dropping you know.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: I just loved it.
Interviewer: From what I hear you know I mean you must have had a great affinity with the air crew then. The planes you were on.
KN: Oh yeah. Oh, yes.
Interviewer: Were they a young happy bunch?
KN: Yeah. Well, I was sort of left alone because I was this old man out you know. Who is this guy? You know. He must be something special the job he’s doing here you know. He’s dressed different and, oh yeah.
Interviewer: Did you live in a billet then on the station?
KN: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: How was that then? The after hours. What did you do in the NAAFI etcetera?
KN: Not a lot. Generally just a NAAFI you know and then of course the old wagons used to come around with the coffee and tea and —
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: Various things. Yeah. It was fantastic. And, and of course after that once D-Day took place we carried on. We were dropping people all over left, right and centre. And then eventually the senior, well from Daedalus in Lee on Solent was their headquarters.
Interviewer: Right.
KN: For the Fleet Air Arm. And this guy used to come up every so often. He was a flight lieutenant sort of type you know and he said to me, he said, ‘I think you’ve had enough here haven’t you?’ I said, ‘Well, I’ve enjoyed it.’ If you know what I mean. So he said, ‘I want you, we’ve now got a Technical College.’ The Fleet Air Arm. Which we never had before. That’s why I had to do my initial training at RAF Henlow in Bedfordshire. Six months was the first one I did. So they wanted me so I did extra, a lot of extra study and don’t forget I left school at fourteen.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: And so I went to the new college and I did ever so well and so when I, it was time for me to go I joined BOAC which was at Aldermaston. What was an aircraft unit. And so I worked for them and then they sent me to America and Canada to study the new aircraft that was going to come over for London Airport when it was made. It wasn’t even made then you see.
Interviewer: Right. What was the name of this aircraft?
KN: Well, there were, there were two or three kinds but they were all American. All American. Nothing English at all. I’m sorry I can’t remember that now.
Interviewer: That’s ok.
KN: I mean, so after, after that I decided, I went to Montreal for a year to study. When I came back we were at Bristol and our aircraft was in in Bristol and they said I’d done such a good job over there and we were going to do this. Well, it never happened because there were seniors coming in from all over the place to Bristol getting ready to go to London Airport. So I didn’t have quite the seniority that they’d got and eventually, so I said well to heck with this because I said, ‘Look, this guy in Montreal said I’m going to send you a good report. You’ve done ever so well.’ He said, ‘Well we can’t because there’s people been in longer than you have and yet you are expecting me to teach them what to do, you know with these new American aircraft.’ So, one thing led, so I happened to go home at the weekend and I went and got “Flight” magazine and there was a firm wanted somebody like me, aeronautical engineer at Blackbushe near Camberley. And I did about four or five years there. They made me, I was in charge of five units there you know. Radio, electrics, this, that, and the other thing and they said, and all of a sudden somebody said to me, ‘The Canadian Air Force are looking for people you know.’ So it was in West London so I wrote to them and I got an interview and all the rest of it. I mean the thing that we, they couldn’t believe was because I did have all these wonderful things. I’d done it. Studied well and I got. So this, what was it? He was quite a senior officer and he sat down. He said, ‘Right, Mr Neve,’ he said, ‘We’re quite amazed at how much you’ve done in the aeronautical world.’ I said, ‘Well, I’ve had the opportunities and I’ve enjoyed it.’ So he said, ‘Right, let’s just take some, I’ve got to send all this off to Ottawa before to say yes we’d like to have you and, of course [laughs] I’d like to tell you this story if you don’t mind. He said, he said to me, ‘Ok. Right. Now, let’s talk about education, shall we? University?’ I said, ‘No.’ ‘What? Technical College or – ?’ ‘No. No.’ He said, ‘Well, where did you finish up?’ I said, ‘At Fairfield School, Basingstoke. Fourteen.’ He said, ‘You’re having a joke, aren’t you?’ You know. Sort of thing. I said, ‘No. I left 1939 at Basingstoke.’ And so he said, ‘No. I can’t, I can’t send this to Ottawa. It’s ridiculous. They might think oh he’s done ever so well and he left school when he was fourteen.’ That is grade five or something in Canada. You know whatever it was you know. So, he said, so he said to me, he said, ‘Is there any way you can get somebody to write from your school to say that, ‘Yes, you did attend,’ at least, you know. So, Mr Pill, I was in the top grade when I left at fourteen and his name was Mr Pill. He was a Yorkshireman and he was brilliant with bits of chalk. Right between the eyes if you were nodding off you know. So, I wrote a letter to Fairfield School and he’d left there and he’d gone to another big school. But eventually I had a letter to say, “To whom it may concern. Yes, I would like to confirm —” Da da da and all the rest of it. So I sent it off. It went to Ottawa and they accepted it. The next thing I know I’m four years with Sabre aircraft in Germany.
Interviewer: Wow.
KN: Without getting to —
Interviewer: They posted you straight to Germany on a fighter squadron.
KN: Yeah.
Interviewer: Yeah. That must have been marvellous because the Sabre obviously was just for the enemy —
KN: Well, we had more prangs than whatever.
Interviewer: Really? A lot of crashes.
KN: Terrible. Their engines used to suck out you know.
Interviewer: Big problem.
KN: If you went down too low. If you didn’t keep up a certain speed when they, if they went off looking for people or looking for an object or all the rest of it and they used to get and then the engines just used to go, ‘pfft’ like that. And we lost so many.
Interviewer: Really?
KN: Believe me. So after, after four years they sent me to Prince Edward Island, Summerside and had a wonderful time there, you know. I enjoyed every bit. That was my aircraft there.
Interviewer: That’s a, is that some sort of an Electra or [pause] it looks like an Electra.
KN: No. It’s an Argus that one is.
Interviewer: Oh, is it Argus we’re looking at? We’re looking at a photograph now of a Canadian four piston engine —
KN: Yeah.
Interviewer: Obviously, a Maritimes because it’s got a boom tail on it.
KN: Yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: Well, what, you see this what our job was it was equipped in the front there with looking for submarines which we should have had during the war. We used to fly six foot over the water. I used to go on all the crews because I used to, well there were various reasons I did and because I was crew chief. They made me crew chief you see. So we used to leave, we used to leave Summerside, go right down the east coast of America right down to the bottom then we’d cross over and we were working with the RAF. They had submarines and we had to find them and if the weather was right we were only so many, thirty feet above the water and this was a fantastic machine. Anything within twenty miles it would pick it up. Anything metal. So then we’d go across to South Africa and we would play. We’d do the same thing for other units and we’d go all the way up through Europe and we ended up in Iceland and that sort of thing. It had thirty five flying hours. We had double crews.
Interviewer: Amazing. I mean that, it’s such a story that’s not been told really about what, what fledgling Air Forces after the war did. I mean the Canadian Air Force obviously as you know was quite small at the outbreak of war and was a huge Air Force when they finished.
KN: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah.
Interviewer: And yeah. That’s wonderful to recount those stories. I mean I’d just like to think of you, looking back really just to go back to we talked about you ended up working on world breaking machines really but you started off there working on what was affectionately known as the old Stringbags when you first started.
KN: Oh yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: Did you feel working on that aircraft you had a particular affinity for working with such an old aircraft? Was it something special?
KN: If I tell you something it can be taken off of there? So, I’m working on one of the old Swordfish you see and I’m right down and I’m looking at all the instrument panels behind the flying panel alright. There was something wrong with this one. It wasn’t working. So I worked on that and got it right. So I’m there laying down here and I’m doing all this with just a torch you know. And the next thing I [laughs] a pair of legs come in the cockpit and all I’m looking at is a pair of legs and some knickers. [laughs] So, I said, ‘Who the hell is that?’ You know, and she says, ‘Oh, it’s me.’ Because they were having girls then in the Fleet Air Arm, you know learning instruments and various other things. So I thought that was rather different.
Interviewer: Well, that will always stay with you won’t it forever. Yeah. A lovely little story. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Ken thank you ever so much for just recounting some of the tales there. I mean, I think you can honestly say that your time in the military was certainly and working with the military was certainly varied. To think that you started off before the war really and finished up as part of a NATO operation in Germany.
KN: I’d like you, when you, when you decide you’ve had enough I’ve got something I’d like to show you up behind you. Let me just —
Interviewer: Ok. Alright. Well, you know that’s that done but thank you ever so much as I say and we look forward to putting this on to our Archive and thank you very much, Ken.
KN: I had a wonderful war and you know I, everything just I never worried. I mean the house next door at Beaconsfield Road in Basingstoke you know all those flare bombs they used to drop there? Well, they burned out next door to me. There was a bomber, a bomb, a bomb had dropped, a German bomb had dropped one three hundred mile, three hundred yards away and that was a sort of a hospital thing for women you know I think it was and all. And I used to I mean at fourteen I used to go out at night with all the lads because all the big [pause] you know when there was a, when the siren went we knew there were aircraft coming over from the coast and that and of course we used to have all the big lights, the searchlights and we used to go up by the church if not the school where I went was not far up the road and I’d go and I would be with all the men all the time. It was just something to do you know.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: And we’d pick it up. Not we but where they were doing it they’d pick it up and then of course then would drop and they would release sort of bombs going left, right and centre and it didn’t bother me one little bit.
Interviewer: You’ve no fear at that age.
KN: No.
Interviewer: Yeah. It’s amazing.
KN: It was excitement.
Interviewer: Yeah.
KN: It was lovely.
Interviewer: Well, thank you so much for recounting that.
KN: Well —
Interviewer: And I hope you’ve enjoyed telling the story to us.
KN: Yeah. Ok.
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 Kenneth Edgar Neve
1004,1005-Neve, Kenneth Edgar
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v07
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 Navy
Royal Air Force
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Format
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00:19:49 audio recording
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
Creator
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Dave Harrigan
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Ken Neve served as a runner with the Home Guard before joining the Fleet Air Arm. He was posted to RAF Henlow as an engineer.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Bedfordshire
England-Hampshire
Atlantic Ocean
Atlantic Ocean--Solent Channel
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
ground personnel
Home Guard
Swordfish
Walrus
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46437/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v060002.mp3
95a3efd792af504735b87718d6ad5bbf
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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
2017-06-19
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Interviewer: Today is the 12th of May. I’m talking to Mary Blood about RAF Kirton Lindsey. Hello Mary.
AB: Hello love.
Interviewer: Could I start off by asking what time, what date you were at Kirton in Lindsey and what was your role there?
AB: Well, it was between either the end of ’42 or the beginning of 1943 and I was a junior NCO in charge of the airmen’s Mess. Running rotas, fixing the mealtimes and making sure the place was clean before mealtimes and the normal —
Interviewer: And you were a member of permanent staff there weren’t you?
AB: Yes.
Interviewer: You weren’t associated with a squadron or Group.
AB: Oh yes. It was 12 Group. Yeah. 12 Group RAF.
Interviewer: Oh right. Brilliant.
AB: Which came across the middle of the country as you know that the RAF is divided into Commands and what not and then you come in Groups. Of course, you get to stations and so on.
Interviewer: [coughs] Excuse me. So we’ve got here in your notes that you were at Number 53 OTU arriving at Kirton.
AB: Oh yes. Before that it was, it had been an operational fighter station and the squadrons used to come from RAF Coltishall which is only eight miles from the coast and the first line of defence. And then the squadrons used to come after six weeks and Kirton was the second line. So they were supposed to get a rest here.
Interviewer: Right.
AB: But then they went back again. They went back you see. So that was before. Towards the end of the war of course it became a training station in which case 53 OTU and finally other types of training. The flight sergeant in the Mess took a field kitchen course and the RAF Regiment came and trained at Kirton so that’s what it became towards the end.
Interviewer: What were your main memories of Kirton during wartime?
AB: Well, it’s very difficult. I mean there’s so, I mean we didn’t get a great deal of bombing at Kirton. We had had at Coltishall but at Kirton no. So it was just a normal sort of job. You got forty eight hours leave. I came home to Lincoln because that’s where my family were and we obviously any dancing and dancing was the main thing we did in our spare time. We had [unclear] in the morning. We went and had the same features twice a week. They changed the projection on a, from Monday to Wednesday and again changed on Thursday morning. You had Thursday, Friday Saturday another film. And then you had of course the various ENSA ones and various visiting. Then we had our own camp dances. We had our own camp orchestra and our own camp people who were in amateur dramatics. Had their own concert party and so you made your own entertainment because basically the stations were stuck in the middle of nowhere sort of thing. So it was really by then and then of course it came on Group notes that we could, the WAAFs could now apply to go overseas. Well, I was quite comfortable here but I thought it sounded a bit of change with being overseas and such like so I then had to have an interview with a group officer who came and she said, ‘Well, we can’t send anybody. You know you will be an ambassador for the country.’ The only time I’d ever been told that in my life. But and then I, after Christmas I got my things and I went to [pause] I was posted on seven days embarkation leave and I was posted eventually to Brussels and then to Bückeburg in Northern Germany.
Interviewer: What did you do when you were in Brussels?
AB: Pardon?
Interviewer: What did you do when you were in Brussels?
AB: Well, in Brussels before, when after D-Day when everybody had moved everything that anybody wanted on the continent had to be flown which became an impossible thing to do. So once they’d cleared Amsterdam and were able to clear the harbour we could get boats in and then you could. So we were opened as what they called an Air Published Ocean Distribution Unit and we were part of the 2nd Tactical, called the 2nd Tactical Air Force and we then were able to issue all the forms and oversee to everybody in Northern Europe which of course made life easier. And also, in 1945 when they, we had the election, the first election everybody, anybody had had for years and we were either given, or were able to give somebody a proxy vote or you could have a postal vote. And we sent out all the voting papers and everything to all the RAF personnel in Northern Europe.
Interviewer: That must have been a big job.
AB: Oh well, I mean sometimes you’d work late. Sometimes, and of course Brussels was a leave centre so we had, that could be quite fun. So I mean after all it was only eighteens to twenty threes so you did what teen, except of course you didn’t get drunk like they do now otherwise you’d have been on a charge but never mind. So we just, you played. You definitely played hard. You worked hard. And you saw the best of people and you saw the worst of people so, so —
Interviewer: How long did you spend in Europe?
AB: I was there from February and then I was demobbed in October.
Interviewer: Oh right.
AB: And while I was there I met my future husband.
Interviewer: Oh [laughs]
AB: I was working late and I went to the tram stop at the end and he’d just arrived in Brussels. He’d come up through [unclear] and across into [Portugal] and he had, he went to a dance and there was not many ladies there and his mates hadn’t gone with him so he, and he had to change at my transfer and he said afterwards he wondered if that WAAF speaks English and the rest is history.
Interviewer: What was he? Was he an airman or –
AB: He was in the 8th Army.
Interviewer: Oh right.
AB: Yeah. He was in the Royal Army Service Corps but he had been attached to the Desert Rats. The 7th Army Division.
Interviewer: And what did you do when you came back home?
AB: Well, basically we got married [laughs]
Interviewer: Lovely.
AB: So we came. Came home and we arranged the wedding and got houses and tried to furnish like everybody else.
Interviewer: Was the, after the war was the country quite different, you know? Different?
AB: Oh yes.
Interviewer: Was there lots to recover?
AB: Well, I think we were different. You see Churchill lost heavily but he lost heavily partly through the Service vote but because he said, ‘Oh, he’ll put the country back to what it was.’ Well, of course we’d changed. We didn’t want the country back to what it was. You see, before the war people of my age you went in service and that was it. Well, we were determined if anybody was going to ring a bell we were gong to be the one that rang it. We didn’t answer it. We were, I’m afraid we all came out of it a bit bolshy you know.
Interviewer: Well, it would have changed you wouldn’t it as an experience.
AB: Well, I mean you’d, you’d met people from the highest to the lowest and you realised that nobody, that they were no different to you. What they could do you’d done and in many many places during the war you’d taken on quite a lot of responsibility even though you were quite young. I mean on one occasion I, and I mean I flew during the war. I flew in the old Dakotas from Croydon to [unclear] which was Brussels. And I came home with forty eight hour leaves and I’d gone to pick up some papers which were basically the railway warrants, ration cards which would have, you’d have made a bomb on the Black Market. I had to stay overnight before I could catch a plane back and I went in and said could I leave some official papers and he said, ‘Good God, what are you doing with that lot?’ Which I showed the authorisation but I mean I was only twenty two and I had fifty thousand railway warrants and fifty thousand of which I was responsible for. You see so you did some odd things in, in your time but I mean we all, we always, they always say well we struggle through don’t we? You know I mean there was nothing really well organised. Some parts were a shambles like they still are. Yeah.
Interviewer: Great. Well, thank you very much for talking to me. Thank you for sharing your memories.
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 Annie Mary Blood
1003-Blood, Annie Mary-N Lincolnshire Disc 1
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v060002
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
Germany
Great Britain
Belgium--Brussels
England--Lincolnshire
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
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
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Sound
Format
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00:11:47 audio recording
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
Creator
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Dawn Oakley
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Anne Blood served as a WAAF at RAF Kirton in Lindsey and in Europe post war.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
ground personnel
RAF Kirton in Lindsey
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46436/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v050002.mp3
e9728327c043e8bc37697bf6ed020027
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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
2017-06-19
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Interviewer: Good morning. Would you like to just give me your name please and your date of birth.
DB: Dennis Windsor Brader [unclear]
Interviewer: And your date of birth was?
DB: 20th of July 1927.
Interviewer: 1927. Right. Thanks very much Dennis. Right. We’re here this morning obviously to talk about your experiences as a young schoolboy when war broke out but also as well your time as the, one of the groundsmen at Wickenby. I’d like to start please do you have any memories then when you were at school of when war broke out and what the feeling was at school?
DB: Well just the same. Didn’t seem to bother anybody.
Interviewer: No.
DB: No.
Interviewer: There was no –
DB: I can’t remember being frightened or anything like that.
Interviewer: Did you have any practices for air raids?
DB: No, I can’t remember that. No. I could have had but I can’t remember. We had air raid shelters but I can’t, never remember going into it.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: Sorry about my voice.
Interviewer: Yeah. What, what was the village that you lived in at the time then?
DB: I lived here at East Barkwith.
Interviewer: So you’ve always lived here all your life.
DB: Yeah. Oh, I’ve been around a bit.
Interviewer: Yeah. Ok. So by the time then you got to the age of sixteen obviously it was time to find a job and so where did you first go?
DB: Yeah. I left school at fourteen.
Interviewer: So you left school at fourteen.
DB: Yes.
Interviewer: Where did you go looking for a job then?
DB: I went to Holmes Woodyard.
Interviewer: Which is in the village.
DB: No, it was at Wragby.
Interviewer: Ok.
DB: They’ve all gone. Woodyard’s are gone. There was a plastics factory there and it’s gone. I started working in the woodyard and finished working at the plastics factory in 1986. Something like that.
Interviewer: Ok. Right. So from there then obviously by 1943 you were looking then for another job.
DB: That’s correct.
Interviewer: And so how did you end up working then at Wickenby?
DB: Well, I’ll tell you. This [Elwick] company interviewed. Got me there and I got my job straightaway.
Interviewer: Ok. So when you arrived at Wickenby then what did you have to do?
DB: Well, I was often cutting. Cutting all the site, cutting the grass and all that. Sometimes with a hook and sometimes with a [hammer] and scythe.
Interviewer: Ok. Yeah.
DB: I can’t remember. Oh, I cleaned the dykes out. I can remember one night and in one of our offices there was more oil than water in it. They’d been, the ground crew had been dumping oil in the dyke.
Interviewer: Yeah. Were there a lot of aircraft at Wickenby then? What?
DB: There were two squadrons. 12 Squadron, 606.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: But I couldn’t tell you. When they were in the air they made a lot of noise.
Interviewer: What were the aircraft they had there?
DB: And there was one what special [bod] just to get to our offices like. Three each end. N for Nanna. Oh, we used to watch that nose but then as soon as it disappeared oh it’s gone. Anyway, it later came back and all needed refurbishing. All the bombs on it.
Interviewer: Right. And these were all Lancaster aircraft were they?
DB: Yes, that’s right.
Interviewer: Yeah. Ok. So when you were cutting the grass then obviously you must have been near to the aircrew as they were getting on and off the aircraft.
DB: Oh no. No. When I went around there were more ground crew than air crew and the same with the WAAFs. Didn’t see much of the aircrew. Only when they went to the breifing room and all that business.
Interviewer: Ok. Yeah. So do you have any memories of watching the crew get on to their aircraft then?
DB: Not, I see them going around in the bus. I saw the bus. I can’t say I could see them but when they were doing circuits and some bumps and that. They used to change crews at the end of the runway. Coming around [unclear] training like with that.
Interviewer: Oh, is it?
DB: Yeah.
Interviewer: Ok. Right.
DB: Called it circuits [pause]
Interviewer: Been, were things like aircraft returning from raids. Did you manage to see those in the morning? Were they badly damaged?
DB: No. no. They’d be back before we got there because I wonder how the fog and then aeroplanes were all over. Aircraft all over the place. And I arranged it and went to hospital site. It’s in a valley the hospital, [unclear] and outside the morgue I saw what looked like a dead sheep and of course I knew what it was later. It was flying aircrew that had been killed in their plane. I came back. Did I see that or didn’t I because they’d gone.
Interviewer: Right. Yeah.
DB: It wasn’t a very pretty sight.
Interviewer: No. No. I mean that’s, that’s really what we were looking for. Something, I mean we talk here about when you’re watching the Lancaster crash, well it nearly crashed didn’t it on take-off?
DB: That’s right. Oh yes. I remember that well.
Interviewer: Yeah. So what was that?
DB: Because we were at the end of the runway waiting for it to go past and I must have been near there helping arrangements myself. Peeked out and have a look and it just made it port if you see like and this [unclear] out there is the runway. Well, they shot. These people shot out like a lot of rats out of this runway. They had a warning. But it cleared it and its still standing today.
Interviewer: Really.
DB: Yeah. But it nearly got burned down because somebody what do you call it [pause] There’s a firm at Rasen. Race something. They’ve got lorries and all at Wickenby now. It got on fire one day when I was there and they still lived to tell the tale.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: But I can’t tell you what year that was.
Interviewer: Yeah. There was a famous Lancaster at Wickenby. It did a hundred missions.
DB: Yes. PH N. N for Nan. Of course, [unclear] I always thought it was N for Norman maybe but no. It was N for Nan.
Interviewer: N for Nan. Yeah. So you saw this aircraft.
DB: Oh, I definitely. It was like that house there except for when it went missing. I thought oh its gone. And it came back all refurbished. She wasn’t what do you call it?
Interviewer: Yeah.
DB: Looking like a brand new one.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: It finished the war and of course they broke it up.
Interviewer: They did. That’s right. It was a shame really.
DB: Yeah.
Interviewer: It was a famous aircraft. Yeah. Right. What I would then like to talk about is that it was time for you to join the Royal Air Force and would you like to tell me when you joined and —
DB: September the 3rd 1945.
Interviewer: Right. And what, you were conscripted into the Air Force.
DB: Oh aye. Yeah. Definitely.
Interviewer: Yeah. And what —
DB: Aye.
Interviewer: What trade did they put you into?
DB: Eight weeks training to start with. Square bashing at Padgate.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: And I remember that one. The first night out bed and the next night I was sleeping on three biscuits and lying on the floor but it was cold.
Interviewer: Yeah. So when you finished there then you went and did your training where?
DB: That’s right. At Padgate. Padgate. Yes.
Interviewer: You did all your training at Padgate?
DB: That’s correct. Yeah.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: Eight weeks training.
Interviewer: Yeah. And then where were you posted to?
DB: That was ‘42. I just said then the number. Locking at Weston Super Mare.
Interviewer: Right. Ok.
DB: ACAC [unclear]
Interviewer: Right.
DB: [unclear]
Interviewer: So what did you there then when you were at Locking?
DB: I was in the cookhouse peeling potatoes and all them sort of things. I used to see the aircrew. ‘Who are them.’ But I didn’t have a conversation with them.
Interviewer: Ok. Right. And then when were finally demobbed then? When did they finally let you leave the Air Force.
DB: May 1948.
Interviewer: Oh, so you were in for quite some time after the war.
DB: I had a couple with sick leave. I got a patch on my lungs. I don’t know whether it was smoking or what. I don’t know.
Interviewer: Right. Obviously, you were poorly for some time then.
DB: Yeah. Only a couple, I came home for a couple of weeks and had my treatments. Went back and I was alright.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: They did x-rays on me like.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: The first time I’d had an x-ray.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: 1948.
Interviewer: Yeah. Yeah. Ok. So, when we look back then on your time at Wickenby did you feel then that, could you feel what it was like? The urgency that was there with the ground crew and the —
DB: Oh yeah.
Interviewer: And the bomber crews. Did, did you see how they reacted with each other? You know, did you ever —
DB: You know, the ground crews were all about and they must have had a oh like a briefing because all of a sudden they come two of them on pushbikes wanting jobs doing. They wouldn’t go, they must have known where they were going wouldn’t they?
Interviewer: Right.
DB: Always on bikes.
Interviewer: Yeah.
DB: But how come then at the end of the war they were marching. Or sort of —
Interviewer: Right. Yeah. Ok. Well, that’s, that’s great thanks very much Dennis. A wonderful small view of what your particular bit of the war was like there. Especially at Wickenby and thank you very much for helping us along.
DB: Very good.
[recording paused]
Interviewer: When it came to cutting the grass obviously we’ll talk about the type of equipment you’d got but it must have been a huge area.
DB: Yes.
Interviewer: Would you like to talk about that?
DB: It was definitely. Definitely a big area. I remember half an hour or three quarters cutting it like. I was better on my feet then than I am now. And then when I finished I’d go to another site but the rest of your gang had gone. [ ] and a chap for one he’s giving me a hand. [unclear] that’s the word I’m looking for and I’ve got a few of them myself.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: And while I was going the Americans were going over in formation. I couldn’t tell you whether they were Fortresses, Flying Fortresses or Liberators. It was obvious that someone was there like.
Interviewer: Yeah. We’ll just —
DB: Especially when you get to [unclear]
Interviewer: And what type of equipment was the lawn mower, was the mower then? What, what was it? A push one or did you sit on it?
DB: Oh different every. No. It was what’s the word, propelled drove you could get on and push it on.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: It was just van drived.
Interviewer: Right.
DB: If that’s the word. Self-propelled.
Interviewer: Self-propelled. Ok. Right. Thank you.
DB: Is all that lot on there?
Interviewer: So how many of you were there at the start?
DB: Oh, I can’t really tell you now.
[pause]
Interviewer: At least a dozen.
DB: There was Harry Vaughan and Henry. Henry Hunter and I can’t remember his name.
Interviewer: Yeah. That’s ok.
DB: Harold [unclear] that’s five isn’t it?
Interviewer: So there was five of you anyway. Yeah.
DB: That’s right and of course there’s Tom, Tom Greenfield was our head groundsman.
Interviewer: Okey dokey. Right. Ok, that’s great. I mean thanks very much. That’s to be added to serial Number 1001 previous to this recording. That’s for your information Neil. Thanks 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 Dennis Brader
1002,1003-Brader, Dennis
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v05
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Dave Harrigan
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
Format
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00:10:35 audio recording
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Dennis Brader worked at the site of RAF Wickenby where he did ground maintenance.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
childhood in wartime
RAF Wickenby
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46435/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v040002.mp3
eb88e8d56b277387d0be4dff5f7547f4
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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
2017-06-19
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Interviewer: Good morning, I’m Dawn Oakley recording Mr Les Stedman for our project “Shouting the Odds.” Hello Les, thanks for doing this.
LS: Good morning, Dawn. It’s a pleasure to meet you again. Date of birth 20th of January 1923 and I was born in London. In Hammersmith in West London. My father had built Sopwith Camels in the First World War. My mother came from Ireland and my grandmother came from America and my grandmother treated me as her son. She was the most wonderful lady, took me all around and showed me everything that was going on. Now, in 1938 I was aged fifteen and I I, normally, they normally left school at fourteen in those days but because I wanted to join the Royal Air Force the headmaster said, ‘Les, you’ve got to do one more year at school and three evenings Night School. To get the necessary qualifications. So on the 27th of October 1938 I reported to Eastchurch on the Isle of Sheppey to train as an armourer and I finished the course in August 1939. On the 3rd of September ’39 came the Second World War. I was posted from Eastchurch to Cosford. And then from Cosford I went to Abingdon in Oxfordshire for four weeks and then on to Benson in Oxfordshire where I stayed for over a year. An aircraft I worked on was an aircraft called a Fairey Battle and one of the men I taught the service revolver to was none other than Pilot Officer Richard Shuttleworth who sadly was killed flying in a Fairey Battle a month later.
[recording paused]
Interviewer: Ok. Right. We’ll just continue then, Les.
LS: We got to Shuttleworth?
Interviewer: Ahum.
LS: Ok. Well, after the Fairey Battle we became Number 12 Operational Training Unit and we then converted to the Mark 1, Wellington which I flew in on one occasion around Oxfordshire. Now, after that I was posted to Chivenor in North Devon in 1941. The aircraft then were the Bristol Beaufort. And after a spell there I was posted overseas to Sierra Leone and I sailed from Liverpool at the end of the 1941 and went to an airfield near Freetown called Hastings. The aircraft there were Hawker Hurricanes of Number 128 Squadron commanded by Squadron Leader Billy Drake who appeared on TV last year at the age of ninety four. The only enemy in west, in Sierra Leone were the Vichy French and they flew American bombers I believe called a Maryland. And eventually the commanding officer and chief of the Vichys flew over in an aircraft to look at Freetown and one of the Hurricanes shot him down and after that the Vichy French capitulated. I then was posted to an airfield called Waterloo where we flew Wellingtons on anti-submarine patrols. I flew all around Sierra Leone in a Wellington. Then I returned to England and was posted to Wickenby in Lincolnshire to Number 12 Squadron that were flying Lancasters. I on one occasion flew from Cranwell into the [pause] I beg your pardon, Wickenby into Cranwell because in those days the Rauceby Hospital treated burnt airmen. We flew down at one hundred feet and returned to Wickenby at fifty feet. I was sitting in the rear turret at the time and it was quite an experience. After Wickenby I got posted to Lindholme to a Conversion Unit. And from there I was posted to Number 502 Ulster Squadron at Holmsley South who were flying Halifax anti-submarine aircraft and we had a man called Flying Officer Van Rossum, a Dutchman who actually sunk a U-boat when I was on the squadron. We then moved from Holmsley South to St David’s in South Wales and then from there I went to Perranporth in North Cornwall around about the time of D-Day. And then after that I was posted to Limavady in Northern Ireland, again with the Wellington aircraft and they flew anti-submarine patrols from Limavady, Northern Ireland and we were there at the end of World War Two and the Germans had twenty eight days to surrender their U-boats. As a result of that the Irish port ended up with about twenty U-boats and I actually went in one of those U-boats to have a look around. And after that I got posted up to Scotland to a Sunderland unit at Alness near Invergordon. On from there I was posted to Egypt for two and a half years to work on an explosive dump near Suez. And in 1949 I returned back to the UK and was posted to RAF Tangmere which was my last RAF station and the aircraft there were the Gloster Meteor and the Vampires. I then retired from the RAF. In civilian life I spent four years making shotguns for a company called Cogswell and Harrison’s in London.
Interviewer: What year was that, Les? That you retired.
LS: 1949.
Interviewer: Alright.
LS: 1950. I spent four years about 1954 ’55 then I saw an advert for Farnborough asking for armament personnel. So I went to Farnborough in 1956 and my aircraft there were the Vulcan, Valiant and Victor bombers and also, the Hawker Hunter fighter. I was then posted to another unit within Farnborough and I worked on nuclear weapons which I’ve never told, talked about. But later on in, many years later I found a magazine with all the details of all those in there. And I worked at Farnborough until I was aged sixty on armament. Then after that I spent five years as a messenger at Farnborough and the aircraft that I flew in was a Dakota that now flies in the Battle of Britain Flight. My retirement present unofficially was that I was allowed to fly that Dakota and that was my retirement present. I then retired at the age of sixty five and relaxed as a civilian. And in nineteen, somewhere in the 1990s I came across an advert about this Heritage Centre. I came along here as a volunteer and I’ve been working here two days a week ever since. And that’s my story. Thank you.
[recording paused]
Interviewer: Ok. I’m talking to Les Stedman again. “Shouting the Odds” – Part three.
LS: Now, I have a memory of the Battle of Britain. When I was at Benson in 1940 a Hawker Hurricane flew into Benson and landed and the pilot got out and said, ‘Rearm and refill me. I want to get back at those German —’ so and so’s. The whole of the tail was full of bullet, had been lots of bullet holes in the fabric. So the riggers came along with dope and fabric and filled in all the bullet holes. We rearmed the Hurricane and off he went. Now, a week or two later I went on leave to Kent where I lived, where my parents lived and I was quite amazed one morning when a man marched up to me and he said, ‘You are the Royal Air Force?’ ‘Yes.’ I said, ‘Who are you?’ he said, ‘I’m Gunter [unclear] Schulz of the Luftwaffe.’ I said, ‘Schultz, how did you get here?’ He said, ‘I was shot down by one of your Hurricanes.’ And he bowed and marched off. Now, what had happened all the German prisoners were employed to work on the farms to help the farmers. And that’s what the German prisoners were doing. That’s the only time I met the enemy until after the war and when I was in Egypt. All the, we had lots of German prisoners in Egypt and I got on very well with them because there were no Nazis among them at all. They were professional fighting men. Ok.
Interviewer: Ok.
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 Les Stedman
1002,1003,1004-Stedman, Les-Cranwell Aviation
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v04
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Dawn Oakley
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
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
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
00:09:33 audio recording
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
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.
Description
An account of the resource
Les Stedman served as an armourer.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Devon
England--Lincolnshire
England--Hampshire
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
12 Squadron
128 Squadron
Battle
ground personnel
Hurricane
RAF Chivenor
RAF Holmsley South
RAF Wickenby
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46434/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v030002.MP3
3c775849a6ea16bffcf1f3136d1c9dd9
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
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
2017-06-19
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
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
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Interviewer: Hello. Hello. Hello. This is a recording made at the house of Anthony Edward Mason. We’re here to record his childhood memories as he remembers them whilst living in the neighbourhood of RAF Waddington during the war. So then, Tony, really what can you recollect from your earliest years?
AM: Well, I can [pause] just these big planes coming in. Coming in to land and taking off at night and coming in to land and, and going up to, yeah we were very near to the edge of the dispersal point. To going up to the dispersal point on a nice day I suppose to look at the planes and, and occasionally being lifted over the, over the fence and put into the planes and shown around. And you know the thing I really remember is the, is the wing. You know where the wings came across the fuselage it was like a big mountain to me to climb over and, and that, that was a bit that stuck in my mind. And yeah, we got shown around the cockpits and the gunnery parts and things like that.
Interviewer: How old were you at this time?
AM: I was, I would be about seven then. I was five I think when the war started. I’d be about seven. Seven or eight then I think and, oh, here’s the boss coming and you know we didn’t go every day or anything like that but we had —
Interviewer: Oh, yeah. You were looking in the cockpit.
AM: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know we just, you know we just, we [pause] I don’t know what. What, whether they were British personnel or not. I can’t remember whether they were British personnel. I understand that they were Australian but I’m not sure and and that was, you know that was part of what we used to do. And then there was another incident when a plane coming in to land and I seem to remember had been damaged in bombing and coming in to land and damaged and crashed in a field just short of the runway and, and caught fire and burned out. And later on when it was all cold and cleared up and what have you my brother went up with some friends of his to see the crash site and found, found some coins, burned coins and brought those home and he was showing them to my father. And he just said, ‘Oh, give them to me and I’ll put them in my pocket and shine them up for you,’ like really. And that was just that’s always been a standard joke that really.
Interviewer: I know you were young then. Did you find the war exciting as a child? Was there a lot of activity?
AM: I don’t think we did. There was a lot of activity. A lot of air activity but I don’t, I can’t remember ever finding it exciting. It was we were there in among it and, and you know it was that. It was mostly in the, you know latish on in the evening or you know early evening or later in the evening when they were taking off and they were coming back in in sort of breakfast time. In the morning seemed to be when they were coming back in to land and the rest of the, in the daytime it always was quite quiet rightly. And this is what we found out when we went to, to look at these planes at the dispersal point was that there was a lot of work going on doing repairs, patching repairs and you know bomb loading and things like that which we saw like those and, but I can’t ever remember it you know being excited about it. It was. And then there wasn’t so much news about. We didn’t know what was, we didn’t know where they were going or what was happening or whatever like. There wasn’t like there is now. You know, television news before it happens basically. There was, there was no news. There was very little news. We had a newspaper but there was very little news in the papers. And so actually we didn’t know unless something happened quite close to us. We didn’t know really what was happening like really.
Interviewer: Your parents, did you ever notice them being anxious at any time? Or were they concerned?
AM: Well, they were. They were always concerned when the planes were coming in because they were coming over the house. You know, it was like, you know when I went out to see this this German, well I assume it was a German plane coming over in the morning and my mother’s first instinct was to throw me under the kitchen table basically because I mean they knew. They knew a lot more than I knew what was likely to happen like really. And —
Interviewer: Yeah. Do you want to tell us a bit more about the German aircraft then?
AM: Well, you know that, that, you know, it really has stuck in my memory about it because I must have been, I must have gone outside to get my cycle out to go to school or whatever and, and it came. I looked up. It came. I heard this plane overhead and looked up and it was quite low. It was only just above the house I thought and it was, it was firing shots. They looked to me they looked like pretty lights coming out of the thing like really and, and then I just said to my mum, ‘Come and look at it. Come and look at this like.’ And she just put me under the table basically and —
Interviewer: Head for cover.
AM: Yeah. That’s it. And but you know we didn’t hear anything about that at all like really and oh, we didn’t, we didn’t hear anything about the plane that had crashed at the time. We knew it had crashed because we, we must have seen the fire, I think.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: But, but that was, that was sort of late. That was quite early morning I think when that came in and crashed like really.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: So we didn’t hear it.
Interviewer: Right. Your father, he worked up at —
AM: He worked at Dean’s Farm. Dean’s. He was, Patrick Dean he was, he was a gentleman really. I mean, it was, the Mere Hall was, was the absolute bees knees like really. It was the only big place anywhere near, you know. There was Branston, Bracebridge Heath but it was only, and everything went off there. They used to have little concerts in the, in the concert room and the concert room I think was above the garage. And the church, yeah we used to go to church and the church was in the Hall in this concert room. I think it was all one room and everything, everything that happened at the Mere was there like really and my dad was the groom. He was a groom. You know, he’d been through the First World War and I think [pause] I never found a lot about that but we, we formed the opinion since that he was taking horses to the Front and things like that. Nothing was ever said about that. Not at any time. And he was a groom for Patrick Dean.
Interviewer: I understand also he joined the Home Guard, didn’t he?
AM: Yeah. He was in the Home Guard. Yeah. We had quite a few laughs with the Home Guard like from what I can remember really because they used to, at Branston. I think the Home Guard branch was at Branston and he I mean he used to cycle down there on a Saturday morning. They used to have a, have a, you know a bit of a mock battle and things like that. A training scheme. And sometimes we we all used to go down and watch if it was a nice day and we did have a few laughs with that. He was, he was, he was just a member of the Home Guard, I think.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: I don’t think he was anything special like really.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: But I don’t think they had rifles or anything. I can’t remember seeing rifles or anything like that. They never had anything to fire like.
Interviewer: Using pitchforks.
AM: Yeah. Probably so. Yeah.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: But in the, you know during the war he was, he had to work on the farm like. He was, he wasn’t mechanical at all and I think he, they taught him to drive a tractor to do the ploughing and things like that and, and at the end of the war I think you know at the end of the war he just threw the licence away like.
Interviewer: Brilliant.
AM: He wasn’t, he wasn’t mechanically minded at all and he was a groom all of his life. Right up to he died. He died in 1956. I did my National Service in 1954 to ’56 and, you know then I came back.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: From, I was in Libya for fourteen months. And I came back from Libya and he was ill then like and he died.
Interviewer: Oh dear.
AM: In that year. Yeah.
Interviewer: One of the things that obviously a lot of children remember is your thoughts about the rationing.
AM: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: How did that affect you?
AM: Well, I mean it did. Well, it did affect us in many ways, you know and we’ve said this many times that it didn’t affect us as much as it affected other people because from, from right from my early memories we always kept a pig every year and killed the pig and so we had a lot of pig meat and things like that. If they’d got, a lot off it had got to be eaten in a fortnight or at the most three weeks because there was no freezer or anything like that so a lot of, you know they used to salt, we used to salt a lot of the meat down. But the sort of you know the pork pies and sausages and we always made pork pies, sausages. Pigs fries. All sorts of things like that. But they had got to be eaten fresh basically like. So we always had, we always did have meat and we always, certainly in private houses that I’d lived in with my dad, my parents we always had a big garden and and basically we were self-sufficient in vegetables and everything. We always kept a few chickens at home and things like that.
Interviewer: That’s the bit your mum told me.
[pause]
AM: Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. My mum stopped having sugar. Having sugar in her tea like and things like that you know. That, that made the difference. I don’t think it made a difference to us but it did to her and I suppose to my dad really.
Interviewer: You didn’t miss sweets or anything like that then.
AM: No. Well, I think, well I mean when we, you know we were nowhere. There was, there was, yeah there was we were nowhere near shops anyway you know. I’d just you know we used to get odd coppers. I used to go to school at Branston and we got, we used to get, you know coppers for sweets I think at Branston because I can remember once going to the Post Office at Branston which was the other side of the road from the school and I went. I must have got some money from somewhere to go and get some sweets. I went and bought a pot of sweets and went straight across the road into school and left my bike in the Post Office yard. Came out of school and thought I’d lost my bike. So we had a big search around then to find the bike like really. But you know so we must have. But we didn’t, I mean we didn’t have, it wasn’t the amount of sweets there is now you know to get anyway like really.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: And same with crisps and things like that. I mean we, we used to have bags of broken crisps. I think they were a penny. A halfpenny or a penny I think they were but they were all the really broken bits like really. I mean we, it was, it was a hard life for my family really. For my parents anyway because you know they weren’t very well paid in those jobs like really. But it was a job he liked and you know he never, I mean he never had, I can’t ever remember him ever going anywhere for a holiday and you know but that was his life. The horses were his life like really. And I, I mean I worked with him. Later on a I worked with him. I finished up. We’ll stop a bit. Yeah.
[recording paused]
AM: At the end of the war, at the end of the war you know we sort of, once, once the restrictions had been removed and things like that my dad decided that he would, he would like a move like really and he moved to Welbourn. Just nicely outside of Lincoln really. To another groom’s job there but he only stayed there for about a year and then he moved to Aisthorpe to, they were both doctors we worked for at Aisthorpe and he had about seven or eight years there I think and and taught me a lot. Taught me a lot of all my, I mean was, I did all my, I was did a lot riding. In fact, I worked in a racing stable for a short time up here at Waltham. Just up the road here to Waltham. And he taught me to ride and —
Interviewer: Right. So I mean obviously when the war finished and it was very difficult for society to get back into what it was before the war did you notice then that things happened like the social events at the Hall etcetera?
AM: No. We didn’t.
Interviewer: The hunting.
AM: No. There was very little social. Yeah. There was very little social events at the Hall. If they had a concert, if they got somebody to come and do a concert, you know it was very very rare like really. And the only, you know I mean my dad didn’t go to church. My mum used to take us to church on a Sunday. I think it was Sunday afternoons we used to go but some, some of the family was expected to go I think when they were in private service. Things like really you had to do as you were told when you were in private service. Moreso than other work like really but, but I didn’t, I can’t think that I noticed any real difference but I mean it was a totally different world. We got to Welbourn there was more social life at Welbourn that we’d ever known like really. And —
Interviewer: So you got back to school. You were going to school.
AM: Yeah. Yeah. I went to —
Interviewer: And —
AM: I went to school at Welbourn.
Interviewer: That must have been routine was it during your time there really?
AM: Yeah. Yeah.
Interviewer: Just the everyday sort of thing.
AM: Yeah. Yeah. That’s it. I mean you know there was yeah there were shops. There were was shops in Welbourn and things like that you know. A baker’s shop and there was a [pause] during the, during the war when we were at the Mere most of our provisions came either through a visiting Co-op or something like that coming and taking an order one week and bringing it the next week. Or the paper. We used to have our paper delivered and he would you know if we wanted something out of Lincoln he came from Bracebridge Heath I think but he would get. I can remember wanting a pocket knife and it must have been my birthday or something like that and he brought this pocket knife. You know, my mum was giving him the money and he brought the pocket knife and that, you know. There wasn’t the ease to get things in those days that there is now like really. Everything had got to be organized and for quite a long while after the war finished it was like that really. When we lived at Aisthorpe I think they used to come around taking orders like really.
AM: Well, thanks very much.
Interviewer: Ok.
AM: That’s been absolutely wonderful.
Interviewer: Are you sure? Yeah. Yeah.
AM: Just to reminisce back.
Interviewer: Yeah. Yeah.
AM: To the childhood in the war.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: If you wanted all that you could have asked —
Interviewer: We’d like to thank you for that anyway. Right. Thank you very much.
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Title
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Interview with Anthony Edward Mason
1001-Mason, Anthony Edward-World War II
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SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v03
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
Coverage
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Civilian
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eng
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Sound
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00:16:48 audio recording
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
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Dave Harrigan
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
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IBCC Digital Archive
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Anthony Mason grew up in the area around RAF Waddington and recalls some of the activity there during the war.
Contributor
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Julie Williams
childhood in wartime
crash
RAF Waddington
strafing
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1875/46432/SHarriganD[Ser -DoB]v020002.MP3
8f0b4d650c7579e6eb36621529f41c9b
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-06-19
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire
Description
An account of the resource
34 items. Interviews with veterans recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.<br /><br />Interview with Bertie Salvage <br />Three part interview with Dougie Marsh <br />Interview with Terry Hodson <br />Interview with Stan Waite Interview with John Langston<br />Interview with Nelson Nix <br />Two part interview with Bob Panton <br />Interview with Basil Fish <br />Interview with Ernest Groeger <br />Interview with Wilf Keyte <br />Interview with Reginald John Herring <br />Interview with Kathleen Reid <br />Interview with Allan Holmes <br />Interview with John Tomlinson <br />Interview with Cliff Thorpe and Roy Smith <br />Interview with Peter Scoley <br />Interview with Kenneth Ivan Duddell <br />Interview with Christopher Francis Allison <br />Interview with Bernard Bell <br />Interview with George Arthur Bell <br />Interview with George William Taplin <br />Interview with Richard Moore <br />Interview with Kenneth Edgar Neve <br />Interview with Annie Mary Blood <br />Interview with Dennis Brader <br />Interview with Les Stedman <br />Interview with Anthony Edward Mason <br />Interview with Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe<br />
<p>The following interviews have been moved to the relevant collections.<br /><span>Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46454">Kathleen Reid</a></span><br />Interview with Wing Commander <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46467">Kenneth Cook DFC</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46456">Colin Cole</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/46464">Charles Avey</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46470">John Bell</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46459">Les Rutherford</a><br />Interview with <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/items/show/46460">James Douglas Hudson</a></p>
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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Interviewer: Good morning. I’m Dawn Oakley. Today is the 20th of April 2011. I have with me Anne Harcombe who is going to chat to us for our project, “Shouting the Odds.” Welcome, Anne. Thanks for coming.
AM: Thank you very much. My name is Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe. The Rose was from my first marriage and the Harcombe from my second. I was born in Middlesex in London on the 17th of July 1938. My mother was Welsh and my father English. My father was George Albert Phillips and was born in 1915 in Finchley in London and my mother was Muriel Morgan and was born in Glynneath in South Wales in 1914. She came up to London as a house parlour maid arranged by the local chapel and was put into a household in Highgate and that’s where she met my father who was the fish boy delivering the fish. And he had to be vetted by the lady of the house before he was actually allowed to take my mother out so they were very well looked after. 1938 was not an auspicious year to be born because then we were immediately evacuated when I was six months old down to my grandparents in South Wales because of the threat of the war. I lived in South Wales until I was nine and went to school there but I lived with my grandparents who was Margaret Morgan and my grandfather who was Isaac Morgan and we lived in Glynneath which is a small village between Merthyr Tydfil and Swansea. I went to school there and in my formative years Welsh was spoken in the house and only Welsh. We only spoke English when we had visitors that couldn’t speak Welsh. Going to school we did Welsh and English and because I was an evacuee, in brackets, I had to learn English and Welsh. We had a great time in school and it really was. We were very well looked after. My father went into the Army and he was in the Rifle Brigade and my mother who was with me in South Wales went into a munitions factory in a place called Rhigos which is at the top of the Neath Valley and she made, helped to make shells and bombs and all sorts of things. And one of my aunts, my Auntie Mari she worked with her. I had a younger aunt who was still at school because she was just ten years older than me. My grandfather was a miner and three of my uncles and they were in what was called a Reserved Occupation so they couldn’t join the Army albeit three of them, three of them all tried. They tried the Air Force, the Navy and the Army and were all sent back much to their chagrin. They, they really did want to join up and do their bit but they were told digging coal was their bit and my, as I say my grandfather was a miner as well. Two of my uncles also were in the National Fire Service. So they were called out as volunteers and at the bottom of the road where we lived they had built a brick garage which we had the fire engine was housed there and a man used to sit at the back of the garage in a little room with a telephone. And if they were needed the message used to come to him and then he used to get on his bike and ride all around the village trying to shake up enough to make a crew because a lot of them were working and they worked three shifts. I’ve known my uncles come home from work and go to bed only to be called out again. And in the hall standing of my grandmother’s house their kit used to hang. Their boots with their trousers rolled down over them and all their bits and pieces hanging so that they just stepped into everything and it was pain of death if you touched anything [laughs] But they did a very good job and were called out to Swansea mostly because of bombing the docks there. Where am I? My grandfather had a very large garden so I was always out there with him. He made me a small wooden wheelbarrow and I had my own spade and I used to go and help him dig so that we could plant vegetables. He also used to garden the next door but one garden because the lady there was a widow so he put that down to vegetables as well. So we never went short of vegetables and we were very fortunate because my grandfather had a great friend who had a farm and we used to go up and help with the haymaking and everything else.
Interviewer: How old were you when you were helping [unclear]
AM: Oh, I was about what? Four. Something like that. Three or four. And we used to go up to the farm and help with the haymaking. Any of us who that not working or anything like that because most of the men had gone off or were miners and they were just short of labour. So we used to go up and help on the farm and of course if anything was slaughtered we always used to get our little bit. Our little bit of meat or something like that. So I can’t honestly say that I remember really going without.
Interviewer: No.
AM: As a child, you know we were well fed. Two of my aunts knitted so we were always well clothed. And I think all in all I had a very very happy childhood.
Interviewer: I don’t blame you.
AM: I had one of my uncles, my eldest, no the youngest uncle, my Uncle Ensor on a Monday I used to brush his Sunday suit off and clean his Sunday shoes and put those away and I used to earn sixpence for doing that. And my other uncle, Vivien he smoked a pipe and all his tobacco came as a plug. So, on a Wednesday the newspaper was put on the table and I used to rub all his tobacco and fill his pouch and fill the jar and I used to get sixpence for that. And that was my Saturday morning picture money. It was sixpence to go into the pictures and I had sixpence for sweets and my grandmother used to cut the sweet coupon out of the ration book and give it to me. Well, if you think a sweet coupon was about the size of your thumbnail so I used to have that between my thumb and finger and run across the road to the shop which was called Dick Williams and all the sweets were in jars up on the shelf and you could have whatever you liked. You know, you could have an ounce of this or an ounce of that and you always said when you went in, ‘I’ve got sixpence to spend, Dick,’ and then he used to say, ‘Right, well you can have—', you know [pause] ‘Right. You’ve spent your sixpence.’ And we used to have a mixture of all sorts of things in a triangular bag with a twist on the top of it.
Interviewer: Oh. Yeah.
AM: For us to go to the pictures.
Interviewer: I was going to say did you have a favourite sweetie back then?
AM: I liked Jelly Babies and they used to do a very wicked line in Dolly Mixtures so you know we used to have a mixture of all sorts of things and perhaps a couple of mints thrown in and those little chocolate buttons with the hundreds and thousands on the top of them. We used to have those as well.
Interviewer: Pick and mix.
AM: But, it was. It was early pick and mix.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: It really was. And we used to go to Saturday morning pictures where we used to cheer Roy Rogers and all the others and nail biting serial which used to end up with and you had to wait ‘til the following week to find what was going to happen because somebody had just fallen off their horse and was hanging on to the edge of a canyon. But it was, it was great fun and that was Saturday mornings and we used to do that. My grandfather being a miner used to have his coal delivered and they used to get a certain amount of coal a year free. But when it came it used to come in a big lorry and it was just tipped on the pavement so we used to have to take it in. So my grandfather as I say had made me this little wheelbarrow. So from about the age of four I helped fetch the coal in because I used to go out with my wheelbarrow. He used to load it up and then I used to take it down to the coalhouse and tip it on one side because I had the smaller pieces. Then he would bring the bigger pieces in and would make like a wall in the coalhouse and then the smaller pieces were tipped inside it so that it was all kept nice and tidy.
Interviewer: Was that one of your usual chores or did you get paid for –
AM: No. I didn’t get paid for that.
Interviewer: Right.
AM: No. That was just something that had to be done.
Interviewer: You had to.
AM: Yes. I used to help my grandmother on washing day and I can remember she had a dolly which was put into the bath, a tin bath and she, we used to dolly the clothes and then they were put on to the line. And I used to go down and help her and hand the pegs to her while she put the washing out and then when we brought it in then I used to help her to fold it and usually when either my aunt or my mother came home from work whichever shift they were working they would do the ironing. But we all helped at home. We were not allowed to do nothing. We were always found jobs to do no matter how small they were. But my grandmother used to say to me, ‘Go and pick peas.’ And I used to go down to the garden and I knew when I was about five or six I knew how many peas we would need. How many pods of peas we would need to feed us all because my grandparents had seven children. My mother was the second eldest. And of course, when we moved down there my youngest aunt was only ten years older than me and my Uncle Ensor was only thirteen years older than me so they were more like a brother and sister to me than they were aunts and uncles. As I say I went to school there. And when we moved back to London when I was nine and we, I went to Poplar Road School in Morden because my father had come out of the Army and my uncle had a greengrocer’s shop in Middlesex, in Queensbury where I was born and he sold that and bought a shop in Morden and my father went to help him to run it. And then my uncle became paralysed so my father took over and my Uncle Bill stayed at home and did the books and we moved in with him. So we lived with him then albeit he’d had a housekeeper before, Auntie Hilda and she still used to come and do the cleaning. And we moved in with him then and we were there for four, nine, ten, eleven. We were there for three years when my Uncle Bill died. He left the shop to my father but the house had been left to Auntie Hilda so we had to move out. My father by then had found somebody else so he went waltzing off with them and left my mother and I destitute really. We had nowhere to live. She went to the council and they said that the housing was very short supply at that time and we were put into what was called a Rest Centre which was a big church hall that had been divided up in rooms by just plyboard. We were not allowed to take any furniture or anything with us. We had two camp beds and a deal cupboard to put our clothes in. It had a kitchen but no bathroom but it had one of these very large shallow butler sinks which they said the children could be sat in to wash. When we lived in Morden my mother had made a very good friend at the top of the road and she was appalled to think that we were living in such conditions so after school which I was near their house, after school I used to go there and my mother used to come straight because she was a school meals caterer then. She used to come from school to Auntie Claire’s. Auntie Claire was an English teacher. She couldn’t cook to save her life so my mother used to take on all the cooking and a bit of the cleaning and Auntie Claire used to do all the sewing. So we were never short of clothes or anything. We used to buy a piece of material and she would make us a dress.
Interviewer: Brilliant. So did you move in with Auntie Claire?
AM: We didn’t. We stayed at the Rest Centre until they, because they hadn’t got room. They’d got two girls. So we used to go there and we used to leave there by about 7 o’clock.
Interviewer: Right.
AM: At night and get on the bus and go back to Raynes Park where we were then living. And then the council found us a flat which was a house which they had requisitioned because there was just one lady living in it and we had the upstairs of this house as a flat. And then later on they rehoused us in a council flat at South Wimbledon. But it was pretty tough I can tell you at that particular time and my mother felt very guilty that she hadn’t got a home to offer me.
Interviewer: Was she still working?
AM: She was still working. She was working full time and my father gave us three pounds a week housing allowance. Housekeeping allowance which I used to go to the shop to collect when I left school. Then I went and worked for him on a Saturday, Saturday morning and I used to go and work in the shop. On a Friday night we used to take down the old shows of all the vegetables and fruit that had been up on the wall and they would be put then to be sold off cheaply. And we used to put new shows up on a Friday night and then work all day Saturday. And on a Friday straight from school we had a big tank at the back of the shop, a big old tank that had come out of somebody’s house which had running water in it. I used to have to, I think my father was the first people, person that ever washed vegetables and salad before it was sold because he insisted that all the celery was to be scrubbed. So we didn’t sell dirty celery. We sold washed celery. And everything had to be dipped. The lettuces and everything. The tomatoes used to come in in boats and I used to have to sort the tomatoes because we used to have frying, small, medium, and best quality. So four lots of tomatoes used to come out of one boat of tomatoes and I used to have to sort those as well. So my job was the salad really and I used to have to keep that going and we had a chap that had worked for my uncle in Middlesex and he used to come every Saturday to manage the salad part because we used to sell quite a lot. And old Fred, I don’t know how old he was. He must have been quite ancient and he had dreadful arthritis and he used to walk like a penguin really and he used to come on the train. On the tube to Morden and he used to walk down then to the shop and he used to, and he always wanted a cup of tea as soon as he got there. And then I used to make tea for him and take it out to him and he always used to say to me, he used to just drink it straight down, I think he had a cast iron gullet because he always used to say to me, ‘Make it a bit hotter next time, girl.’ But I used to keep him supplied with salad then during the during, during the day and at lunchtime I used to have to go across the road and we had an ABC restaurant across the road and I used to have to go over and find out what was on the menu and come back and tell him because my father used to buy him lunch. So I used to have to run across the road then. Tell him what was on the menu and I used to have to go and do it and every week he had steak and kidney pudding but I still had to go over to see what was on the menu. So I used to go over and get his steak and kidney pudding and I had to cross two roads and bring it back on a tray and he used to sit out the back and eat that and then I used to take the dishes back and come back with either apple pie and custard or something like that for him for his pudding.
Interviewer: How old were you then?
AM: I was about thirteen.
Interviewer: Right. A teenager.
AM: And then, so that was sort of the shop really there. Then when I left school at fifteen I wanted to be a florist. I’d always wanted to be a florist. I always wanted to be a lady that worked in a flower shop. So my grandmother had a dresser and I used to keep it full of wildflowers and she had paste pots and jam jars and everything and I always used to keep that filled from when I was quite a small, small child really. So I always wanted to be a florist and we had careers officers that come into the school by then and they were not terribly helpful because all they wanted to do was to push all the girls into office work and I said, ‘No. I want to be a florist. So we, we tried and they were not helpful so I thought right I’m going to go out and get my own job. So, I went out and tried various places and then I went with my mother one day to Victoria. On the train to Victoria Street and there was a lovely catering shop there and she’d got a special wedding on and she wanted to go and get some cutters. So as we came out of the station I saw Moyses Stevens Florist which had water all running down the inside of the window and I said to her, ‘Oh, I wonder if they’ve got a job.’ So I went in and she went down to her shop and I went in there. I was sort of about I suppose about four foot six. Pulled myself up to my full height and this lady came and said, ‘May I help you?’ And I said, ‘I’d like to see the manager please.’ And she said, ‘Oh. What is it about?’ And I said, ‘Well, I wondered if you needed an apprentice.’ So, this gentleman duly arrived in his striped trousers and frock coat. He was the manager of the shop and spoke to me for a little while and then said, ‘Are you on your own?’ And I said, ‘No. My mother is just down the road.’ So he said, ‘Well when she comes back,’ he said, ‘I’ll interview you.’ So he interviewed me and he said yes. He would give me a job as an apprentice but we would have to pay. Well, as my mother said that was totally out of the question because she was the only breadwinner and there was no way that we could pay for an apprenticeship. So he said, ‘Well, leave it with me and I’ll see what I can do.’ So a week later we got a letter from him to say that I had got my apprenticeship and the date I was to start and that it was being paid by the Worshipful Company of Gardeners from the City of London and they were sponsoring me. So I had my five year apprenticeship. I had two years as a junior and three years as an improver and then when I finished there I went to the West End of London an I did contract work and I did shops and hotels and offices. We used to do the arrangements on a Saturday in the shop because we could get market on a Saturday morning and then they were all taken out on a Monday morning on the van and deposited in various places. I used to do Dolcis in Oxford Street which was on three floors and there were fourteen arrangements there. Then I used to go around the back to Stratford Court Hotel and I had six arrangements to do there. And then I used to go to Burroughs Adding Machine and there was one large arrangement there and that was on one of these seats. I don’t know if you remember them that were completely round and padded in velvet and the arrangement was on the top in the middle and I used to take my shoes off. But the lady who we nicknamed the dragon used to come rushing out with a piece of newspaper to put on the seat for us to stand on in case we had dirty stockings. But I used to do that and then go back to the shop and we used to write up what was in each arrangement and what colouring it was so that we knew what spares we had to take and what colour. And I had a trug basket which was about three foot long and about a foot and a half, about a foot and a half wide which was made of wood that I used to have to carry around with all my flowers in. I had a metal watering can as well that I used to have to take plus my scissors and secateurs and I used to have to walk and I did that for two years. I used to have when I finished at Burroughs’s I used to go back to the shop and have my cup of coffee but at the Stratford Court Hotel I was always, I used to work just off the kitchen and I was always given breakfast and the chef always used to say, ‘What would you like, Anne? And I used to say oh whatever.’ And he used to say, ‘Oh, the smoked salmon and scrambled egg is a bit slow today.’ And I used to say, ‘Oh well, I’ll have that.’ You know. As if it was –
Interviewer: Brilliant.
AM: You know. Such a hardship.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: But I used to have breakfast there and I used to have to work underneath the staircase with a table which was a flap that used to come down and I used to have to tuck myself underneath this staircase to work. But and then I used to have my, fill my basket again and I used to go out and I used to do Cinephone which was the cinema opposite Selfridges and I’d do three arrangements there. One of them was in the manager’s office and I hated doing that because he was a bottom pincher and at that time you know we didn’t have equal rights and all this sort of thing and so I used to say to the young man when I went in, ‘Is he in?’ If he wasn’t in I would dash in and do that one first and then do the two upstairs. But if he was in I’d just had to run the gauntlet you know. And I used to sort of move around the room so that he couldn’t get but invariably he used to pinch my bottom before I left. And I can remember saying to my boss who was a German about this thinking that he would do something about it and all he said to me was, ‘Well, I’m sorry. I can’t do anything about it because he pays his bills.’ So I just had to put up with it.
Interviewer: Yeah. Put up –
AM: I used to have my lunch then and then in the afternoon I used to go and decorate in the American Embassy and then I used to do Marcelles the furrier which was in Bond Street.
Interviewer: Oh.
AM: And then I used to go back to the shop. I used to start at half past seven in the morning and I’d go back to the shop when I’d finished and if it was before half past four I used to have to work in the workroom until it was half past four. Then I could go home. So in actual fact it worked out quite well because I was in front and, of the rush hour going to work and coming home and I used to, we lived at Morden and I used to get the tube from Morden then to Tottenham Court Road and change then to Bond Street. But I did that for two years and got a bit fed up with it. And then I was offered a job in the same company but working in the on the Exhibition Team. So then I went and did venues outside. We used to decorate places like the Albert Hall, Farnborough Air Show. We used to go every year to the British Industries Fair in Birmingham. We used to go twice a year to France to decorate for Ford’s. We used to do the Covent Garden when the Queen was going to be there. I’ve made wedding, I’ve made bouquets for all the royal family. All the royal ladies.
Interviewer: Oh.
AM: At one time or another. And I did that for two years and my partner because we worked in twos was a young man and then when I married my husband didn’t really appreciate me [recketing] around the country with an unmarried man. So I packed the job up and came local again and managed a shop. Then I had my son so I didn’t work for a year and then I got him into a nursery because we lived in a flat. I got him into a nursery school and I went back to work part time.
Interviewer: What did your husband do?
AM: He was an engineer. He worked for Osram’s as it was then.
Interviewer: Oh right.
AM: And he used to cut the big gears that were used in large pieces of machinery like dams and things like that. Very precision work. And so then I went back to work again then and then after we’d, I’d had worked there for a few years I opened my own business in Roehampton which was near Putney. Between Putney and Kingston and I opened my own florist business there and which I had for sixteen years. My husband had a heart attack. He was older than me. He was fifteen years older than me and he had a heart attack and died when I was forty.
Interviewer: Oh dear.
AM: And I was left with the business and everything else.
Interviewer: How old was your son at this time?
AM: He was eighteen. And then we, we struggled on. We carried on.
Interviewer: As you do.
AM: As you do. But I had a very great friend who was my Interflora field officer and he used to visit the shop every couple, every three months to make sure we were alright and everything and I was on the committee for Interflora District 1 and Chris used to pick me up because he was passing to take me up to the meetings in London and take me home again. He was divorced from his wife and we got together.
Interviewer: Oh, how lovely.
AM: I’d know Chris for twelve years so it was like an old, like marrying an old friend.
Interviewer: Yeah.
AM: It was really.
Interviewer: Oh, that’s nice.
AM: It really was. It was wonderful. Then Interflora offered him a job in Lincolnshire, in Sleaford so we moved up then and he took over and managed the Training Department there. I sold the business and we moved up and I was at a loose end and had nothing to do so I started tutoring for Interflora. We used to do schools. Weekend schools. And I used to go off to Scotland or Ireland or we used to have one at Knutsford. We had one at, near Beamish Hall. We used to go to Bobby Shaftoe’s house there.
Interviewer: Oh.
AM: Which had been turned into a school and we used to go there and we used to tutor girls and we did different courses. We used to have girls that would, or boys who had just come into the business. So we used to take them so that by the time they went back to their shops they could address a customer, take a cheque, take money, give change, make a cellophane gift wrap, make a buttonhole. So they were becoming a useful member of staff. So we used to have a three day school then. Then we did sympathy work for funerals. We did wedding courses. We did all sorts of things. Gift courses and everything. And then I became an assessor for, for Interflora as well when people did examinations. And then I decided that I was away a lot and really didn’t want to be away that much so I decided I would go to Riseholme College near Lincoln and see if they wanted someone to teach in their Floristry Department. And of course, the first thing I was asked was have you got a piece of paper? And I said, ‘No. I’m sorry I haven’t got a piece of paper. But I have forty two years experience.’ But I was told that no I couldn’t have a job because I hadn’t got a piece of paper. I hadn’t got a teaching degree. I hadn’t got a piece of paper to say that I was a florist. So I came back and I said to Chris, I said, ‘I’m really miffed about this.’ So he said, ‘Well, go and do a course.’ So he found out for me and I went to Monks Road and I did a Teacher Training Course which was hilarious in itself because there were about twenty of us in this room all from different backgrounds. We all did different jobs. We had hairdressers, firemen, we had all sorts of people and the lady that I palled up with she came from Lincoln Hospital and she was an incontinence nurse. So we were all very diverse and we had two tutors and the first day we were there we just fell about because we had this lady to teach us and she was a psychologist. And she came and she said, ‘Right, today’s lesson is going to be communication. How to communicate with people.’ So she started off and all we had were all these abbreviated letters for things. Well, we didn’t know what she was talking about, you know. Instead of saying the Royal Air Force she would say the RAF. Well, you know in other contexts we didn’t know what she was talking about. Well, this went on for about a quarter of an hour and we were all looking at each other and all shrugging our shoulders and I said to Joan, this lady from Lincoln hospital, ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ So, I put my hand up and she said, ‘Yes.’ And I said, ‘Are we supposed to be communicating?’ And she said, ‘Well, yes.’ And I said, ‘Well, I’m afraid we’re not.’ And she was quite shocked and I said to her, ‘You’re using all these abbreviations. We haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about.’ I said, ‘Had you written them all down on a piece of paper and we’d had that given to us.’ I said, ‘Well then, we could look it up and find out what you were talking about. But as it is now we have no idea what you’re talking about.’ And she said, ‘Oh, dear.’ She said, ‘I haven’t prepared this very well, have I?’ And I said, ‘No. I’m afraid you haven’t.’ So that was the end of that lesson. But we muddled through and I did get my Teacher Training Certificate and I went back to Riseholme and I said, ‘I’ve got my piece of paper.’ And they said, ‘Oh, well we can offer you one morning a week.’ So I said, ‘Oh, I don’t think so.’ So I said –
Interviewer: A long way to go, isn’t it?
AM: I said to Chris, ‘I need something to do.’ So I bought another shop. I bought a shop in Ruskington and it was a florist shop and I revamped it. My son and Chris stood inside the door and they said, ‘What do you want to do?’ And I said, ‘Gut it.’ So we gutted it all out. We redecorated it. We revamped it and we opened and I had that for nine years.
Interviewer: As a florist.
AM: As a florist. Yes. Chris retired and said, ‘Are you retiring?’ And I said, ‘No, I’ll give it another year.’ And then I retired, and unfortunately in 2000 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer and I’m afraid I lost him in 2011. No. Sorry 2009. So, I’m now moving on with my life. I belong to a Flower Club. Woodhall Spa Flower Club. And I did when I twenty five years ago I joined Sleaford Flower Club and I became a demonstrator for Flower Clubs and I used to travel all around the place. Our area covered from Sheffield down to Stamford and from the coast into the Peak District to Matlock.
Interviewer: Oh.
AM: And I used to visit all the different Clubs and do floral demonstrations and, and that was great. I used to thoroughly enjoy that and when Chris retired he used to drive me and we used to have a great time. But I did it for fifteen years and then decided that, that I’d had enough and I really didn’t, didn’t want to do any more. So having done fifteen years for them I retired. But I’m still working. I still do weddings for people. People that, I had a lady ring me up a couple, last well a couple of weeks ago and she has got four daughters and the fourth one is now getting married and, ‘Will you do the flowers because you’ve done the other three.’ So at seventy two I’m still battling on.
Interviewer: That’s lovely.
AM: I’m still working. The body is weakening but the mind is only thirty and I have to keep telling myself now slow down a little bit because you’re not thirty. But I do go and on a Monday morning I do a Zumba class. I’m trying to lose some weight with Weight Watchers and all in all I lead a very active life. My son lives in Louth. He moved up and lives in Louth. I have a grandson, Joshua. He lives in Sleaford with his mum and he is just preparing now and trying to get himself in to the RAF. He’s been an Air Cadet for three years and he’s just gone up for promotion. He’s got his masters, he’s a Master Cadet so he’s got his lanyard and he’s had an interview last Monday now to try and get promotion. So I’m hoping that he will get it because he desperately wants to go into the RAF as an aircraft mechanic. So I think I filled you in quite a bit with my bits and pieces.
Interviewer: That’s very interesting.
AM: I go to Cranwell to church who are a brilliant lot there and I thoroughly enjoy going to church because we have such an hilarious time and as I say I have lots of friends and I do live a very active life. I hope this will be interesting to somebody.
Interviewer: Well, I found it very interesting.
AM: Good.
Interviewer: Thank you very much, Anne.
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 Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe
1001-Harcombe, Anne Morgan Rose-Cranwell Aviation
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHarriganD[Ser#-DoB]v02
Creator
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Dawn Oakley
This Interview was recorded by Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire.
Date
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2011-04-20
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Format
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00:38:47 audio recording
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary. Allocated C Campbell
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Anne Morgan Rose Harcombe was born in London in 1938 and was evacuated with her mother at the start of the war to live with her mother’s family in South Wales
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--London
Wales
Contributor
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Julie Williams
childhood in wartime
evacuation
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46417/BRobinsonS20240219.1.pdf
f73dc37f2c271f8d92265a28e59b5e2e
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
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2018-03-21
Identifier
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Robinson, S
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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
Septimus Robinson service history
Description
An account of the resource
A brief history of Septimus Robinson's RAF career.
Identifier
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BRobinsonS20240219
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Creator
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David Robinson
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Photograph
Format
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One page document with photographs
11 OTU
75 Squadron
aircrew
bomb aimer
Operational Training Unit
RAF Bassingbourn
RAF Kirkham
RAF Mepal
training
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46416/SRobinsonS190538v10007.2.jpg
6f6dfd7f0825beb82f3cf9f85c208917
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Second World War Medals Awarded to Septimus Robinson
Septimus Robinson's decorations
Description
An account of the resource
A page with images of the Defence Medal (obverse and reverse) and the War Medal 1939-45 (obverse and reverse). Text gives details of the qualifying service.
Identifier
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SRobinsonS190538v10007
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.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One page document
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46415/SRobinsonS190538v10006.1.jpg
74affbd09b48ff2c4b129f7a69b3de97
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Second World War Medals Awarded to Septimus Robinson
Septimus Robinson's decorations
Description
An account of the resource
A page with images of the 1939-45 Star (obverse and reverse), the Bomber Command clasp and of the France and Germany Star (obverse only). Text gives details of the qualifying service. At the top is handwritten: "Received medals and Bar on 3/4/17".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SRobinsonS190538v10006
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
2017-04-03
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One page document with photographs
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46413/PRobinsonS18010010.1.jpg
e2c9873a136fc510150568022ab8146e
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46413/PRobinsonS18010011.1.jpg
c74ea9a85ae04d9ace9555d0cc5ad774
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Osterfeld
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Osterfeld (Oberhausen-Sterkrade). Roads and buildings are visible as are the Rhine-Herne Canal and railway running from centre left to upper right. Smoke can be seen in the lower left quadrant of the image and there is some glare at the top centre and bottom right.
It is annotated "4B"and captioned: "3010 MEP. 22.2.45//7" 18,500 110º 1601 OSTERFELD. D 1 HC4000IN. 10ANM64DT. 2GP250DT. C36 SECS. F/O O'MALLEY.F.75"
Also a handwritten note: "OSTERFELD:- GENERAL INDUSTRIAL ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT”
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010010, PRobinsonS18010011
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-02-22
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-02-22
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Osterfeld
Germany--Rhine-Herne Canal
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph and one page handwritten note
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46412/PRobinsonS18010013.2.jpg
2be50a2c2e0e1124c09ebbf7c54f4e8e
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46412/PRobinsonS18010014.2.jpg
f3104f028240d56231d25c99156a9a84
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46412/PRobinsonS18010015.2.jpg
dfa7f559242259232f61145fc736eb0e
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Wesel
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Wesel. Some roads and railway tracks can be seen in the upper half while at the centre there are several plumes of smoke. The whole area is covered by thin cloud.
It is captioned: "2952 MEP. 16.2.45//7" 19,000' 112º 1600 WESEL. D. 1HC4000,9ANM64DT,2GP250IT,1MC500DT. C5 SECS8 F/O O'MALLEY. F.75."
The reverse of the photograph is annotated: "[unclear] Robinson" and " No 8 [unclear]".
Also a handwritten note: "WESEL:- BOMBING THROUGH CLOUD. LANCASTER WITH ROBINSON - AIR BOMBER FIRST OVER TARGET AND ON TARGET ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010013, PRobinsonS18010014, PRobinsonS18010015
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-02-16
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-02-16
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph, one page handwritten note
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocated
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46411/PRobinsonS18010008.2.jpg
c8d95d249d2496037325baf888affab3
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46411/PRobinsonS18010009.2.jpg
52f8224c1146059914ff01c07d156879
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Dresden
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Dresden. No ground details are visible but the glare from fires on the ground are visible through the smoke. There are some bright spots and trails of light on the right. It is annotated "5B" and captioned: "2914. MEP. 13/14.2.45/NT(C)8 19,000' 049º 0130. DRESDEN. D 1 HC 4000IN. 3CP15 1CP17 31 SECS F/O O'MALLEY. F 75".
Also, a handwritten note: "DRESDEN:- FIRE RAID ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT.".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010008, PRobinsonS18010009
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-02-13
1945-02-14
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-02-13
1945-02-14
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Dresden
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
bombing of Dresden (13 - 15 February 1945)
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46410/PRobinsonS18010006.2.jpg
fd453e7f735e47e697675ff2ae0874a2
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46410/PRobinsonS18010007.2.jpg
f2d70a7a7a9ad75cf4c4e4fe1d80751a
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Koln-Gremberg
Description
An account of the resource
A target photograph of snow covered Koln-Gremberg. In the upper, right quadrant are some marshalling yards and the River Rhine, partially obscured by cloud. In the upper and lower left quadrants is a main railway line. At upper centre is an area of housing arranged in an oval. There are many explosions visible.
It is annotated "4B" and captioned: "2822 MEP. 28.1.45// 7" 20,000' 035 1413 KOLN-GREMBERG D 1HC4000IN, 9ANM64IN, 4GP250DT C 37SECS P/O O'MALLEY F.75".
Also a handwritten note: "KOLN-GREMBERG:- ATTACK ON RAILWAYS ETC. RAILWAYS MIDDLE RIGHT-TOP. ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010006, PRobinsonS18010007
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-01-28
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-01-28
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Cologne
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
One page handwritten note
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46408/PRobinsonS18010003.1.jpg
d95e05199d98dd8bc8bec58f1aecef16
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46408/PRobinsonS18010004.1.jpg
da0f4e51213268849210dcd1fcc2dcc1
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46408/PRobinsonS18010005.1.jpg
0c6f9bd205fc94bfbd505e4ade7a39a5
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Duisberg
Description
An account of the resource
A target photograph of Duisburg. Cloud or smoke obscures the ground and there are several light trails in the centre of the photograph.
It is annotated "5B" and captioned: "2809 MEP. 22/23.1.45//NT(C)8" 19,000' 112º 2009 DUISBERG [sic]. Z 1HC4000IN, 2GP500LD. 5ANM58DT. 2GP250DT. 31 SECS P/O O'MALLEY. A.75".
The reverse of the target photograph is annotated "Robinson".
Also a handwritten note: "DUISBERG [sic]:- ZIG-ZAG FLASH CAUSED BY THE AIRCRAFT TAKING EVASIVE ACTION WHILE UNDER ATTACK BY NIGHT-FIGHTER. ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010003, PRobinsonS18010004, PRobinsonS18010005
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-01-22
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-01-22
1945-01-23
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Duisburg
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph, one page handwritten note
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46407/PRobinsonS18010019.1.jpg
6c81df4328aa5147f746fe20d276dc67
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46407/PRobinsonS18010020.1.jpg
21171cc8c8bd4994501cf9d25e693ada
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Krefeld
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Krefeld. Cloud, smoke and glare obscures all ground detail.
It is annotated: "3B" and captioned: "2735 MEP. 11.1.45//7" 20,000' 130º 1514 KREFELD A 1HC4000IN, 12MC500DT, 4GP250DT. C.37SECS F/S O'MALLEY K.75.".
Also a handwritten note: "KREFELD:- RADAR BOMBING THROUGH CLOUD ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010019, PRobinsonS18010020
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-01-11
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-01-11
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Krefeld
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph; one page handwritten note
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46406/PRobinsonS18010021.1.jpg
0367746368e713bf5d8f08927b789072
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Neuss
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Neuss. Glare and cloud obscures all ground detail. It is annotated "5B" and captioned: "2720 MEP.6/7.1.45//NT(C) 7" 20,000' 029º 1853. NEUSS E 1HC4000IN, 13ANM64DT. 31 SECS. F/S. O'MALLEY C.75".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010021
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-01-07
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-01-06
1945-01-07
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Neuss
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46405/PRobinsonS18010018.1.jpg
69ae1cc697618e7259914cf892d21dd6
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Vohwinkel
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Vohwinkel. Smoke and glare obscures most of the ground and only the vague outlines of some ground features are visible.
It is annotated: "5B" and captioned: "2659 MEP 1/2.1.45//NT(C)7' 19,500. 360º 1944 VOHWINKEL K 1HC4000IN. 12GP500DT. 2MC500DT. 31 SECS. F/S O'MALLEY. G 75".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010018
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-01-02
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-01-01
1945-01-02
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Wuppertal
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46402/PRobinsonS18010016.2.jpg
f45a3342e10155ca9678412534fb6352
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46402/PRobinsonS18010017.2.jpg
ec507a88e3822331a8d73ba70fe99157
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Vohwinkel
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Vohwinkel. In the lower right quadrant rail tracks and sidings are visible, alongside which is a distinctive complex of roads and buildings. The buildings and streets of Gräfrath can be seen at the centre left of the image while at the right, just above centre right is the small settlement of Haan. Field boundaries and roads can be seen over the whole area though flak bursts obscure some of the central part of the image.
It is annotated "3B" and captioned: "2652 MEP 31.12.44//7' 19,500 090º 1444 VOHWINKEL K 1HC4000IN. 14ANM64DT. C 37SECS. F/S O'MALLEY. G. 75".
Also a handwritten note: "VOHWINKEL:- FACTORY - RAIL SITE. NOTE RAILWAYS BOTTOM RIGHT HAND CORNER. FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010016, PRobinsonS18010017
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-12-31
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-12-31
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Wuppertal
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph; one page handwritten note
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocated
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46401/PRobinsonS18010012.1.jpg
bd51f9952380e7d0d467761e93ab2ed6
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Sigen
Description
An account of the resource
Target photograph of Siegen. Cloud or smoke obscures all ground detail. It is annotated "3B" and captioned: "2547 MEP. 16.12.44//7" 17,500. 027º 1500 SIGEN [sic]. F 1HC4000IN. 5MC1000DT. 4ANM64DT. C34 SECS. F/S O'MALLEY. J.75
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010012
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-12-16
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-12-16
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Siegen
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46400/PRobinsonS18010001.2.jpg
566072c5944fe2349e18059def46b788
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46400/PRobinsonS18010002.2.jpg
f14447f335e75318ffb800bfe022df9b
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Oberhausen
Description
An account of the resource
A target photograph of Oberhausen. Cloud or smoke obscures the ground. There are some small smoke trails at centre left.
It is annotated "5B" and captioned: "2445. MEP. 4.12.44 //8 19,600. 109º 1412 OBERHAUSEN,YI 1 HC4000IN. 6ANM 50DT. 6GP500DT. C.36SECS. F/O O'Malley. E.75"
Also a handwritten note: "OBERHAUSEN:- WHITE SHADE CLOUD. DARK SHADE SMOKE FROM FIRES STARTED BY FIRST WAVE OF BOMBERS. ← FLIGHT OF AIRCRAFT."
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS18010001, PRobinsonS18010002
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-12-04
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-12-04
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Germany--Oberhausen (Düsseldorf)
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph; one page handwritten note
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Geolocation impractical
75 Squadron
aerial photograph
bombing
RAF Mepal
target photograph
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46399/PRobinsonS1805.1.jpg
3410637ff190fb1be0a273fa42549a00
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Mulberry Harbour
Description
An account of the resource
An oblique aerial photograph, taken looking west, of Mulberry B (Port Winston) and the coastline at Gold Beach.
At centre left is the town of Arromanches-les-Bains from which three floating piers lead to their pier heads. At lower centre is the settlement of Saint-Côme-de-Fresné, from which a fourth floating pier leads to its pier head. To the west and seaward of the piers are lines of breakwaters, comprising scuttled ships and concrete caissons.
At bottom right is the westernmost part of the town of Asnelles.
It is a scene of activity with several ships and smaller vessels moving about.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS1805
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
France--Arromanches-les-Bains
France--Saint-Côme-de-Fresné
France--Asnelles
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-09
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.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-09
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
aerial photograph
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46398/LRobinsonS190538v10001.1.jpg
75321ff8a21c9d154c8ef0777a603468
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46398/LRobinsonS190538v10002.1.jpg
2dcfa23d18b072eba907da9cfe5a7211
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46398/LRobinsonS190538v10003.1.jpg
96cac5ceb3744f382fb2f1a284d80c4c
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46398/SRobinsonS190538v10004.1.jpg
65cf3c8d159e5944096b0712a28f05f4
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
Septimus Robinson observer's and air gunner's flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Log book with a pasted certificate summarising Robinson's air bomber training at 11 Operational Training Unit. The log book pages are missing.
Also a page with images of the log book front cover and the summary of training. Above the images it is annotated: "Below is all that's entered in his bomb aimers training log book, (Observers and Air Gunners Flying Log Book) the rest of the pages are blank."
Below the images is the statement: "I have also included my fathers and my own birth certificates."
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LRobinsonS190538v10001, LRobinsonS190538v10002, LRobinsonS190538v10003, SRobinsonS190538v10004
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Buckinghamshire
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
One log book; two colour photographs on a page
11 OTU
aircrew
bomb aimer
Operational Training Unit
RAF Westcott
training
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2657/46397/PRobinsonS1811.1.jpg
6a67fdc384e5b176987792b7d7fa1019
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
Robinson, Septimus
Description
An account of the resource
21 items. The collection concerns Septimus Robinson (1915 - 1986) and contains his birth certificates, log book and several personal and target photographs. Septimus Robinson flew as a bomb aimer with 75 Squadron to targets in the Ruhr and further east, including Dresden on Operation Thunderclap.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Robinson and catalogued by Andy Fitter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-03-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Robinson, S
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.
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
75 Squadron personnel
Description
An account of the resource
A group of some 350 RAF personnel standing and sitting, on and in front of, a Lancaster. The photograph is mounted on a page, which is captioned: "SQUADRON 75 NEW ZEALAND".
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PRobinsonS1811
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.
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photocopy
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
75 Squadron
aircrew
ground crew
ground personnel
Lancaster