1
25
11
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/105/9434/LAmbroseBG1604870v1.1.pdf
1a5e8468db59f1bd1c383f4c6c486278
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
Ambrose, Basil
B G Ambrose
Basil G Ambrose
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-06-29
Description
An account of the resource
18 items. The collection consists of an oral history interview with Basil George Ambrose (1923 – 2016, 1604870 Royal Air Force), his log book, a page from his service book and 15 photographs. Basil Ambrose was a flight engineer flying Lancasters with 467 Squadron Royal Australian Air Force from RAF Waddington between September 1944 and March 1945 and with 617 Squadron from RAF Woodhall Spa.
The collection was been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Basil Ambrose and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Ambrose, BG
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Requires
A related resource that is required by the described resource to support its function, delivery, or coherence.
6 March 1942: Joined RAF as a trainee turner
Posted to RAF Sealand, qualified turner
Posted to RAF St Athan, Flight Engineer training
5 July – 8 September 1944: RAF Swinderby, 1660 HBCU, flying Stirling aircraft
8 September 1944: Promoted to Sergeant
22 – 26 September 1944: RAF Syerston, Lancaster Finishing School, flying Lancaster aircraft
29 September 1944 – 23 March 1945: RAF Waddington, 467 (RAAF) Squadron, flying Lancaster aircraft
Commissioned, promoted to Pilot Officer
November 1945 Promoted to Flying Officer
22 April 1945 – 9 January 1946: RAF Woodhall Spa, 617 Squadron, flying Lancaster aircraft
11 January 1946 – 15 April 1946: Detached with 617 Sqn to Digri, India Command
28 May – 1 July 1946: 617 Squadron RAF Binbrook
October 1946: 1604870 Flying Officer B.G. Ambrose released from Service
<p>Basil George Ambrose was born on 24<sup>th</sup> June 1923 in Derby Street, Reading, the youngest of five children. He attended Wilson Road School near Reading’s football Ground. In 1937, when he was just 14 years old, he left school and took up employment as an apprentice turner at the Pulsometer. He was paid five shillings a week, half of which he had to give back to pay for his indenture training.</p>
<p>Although engineering was a reserve occupation, on 6<sup>th</sup> March 1942, he was able to join the RAF as a trainee turner. On completion of training, he passed out as a Leading Aircraftsman and was posted to RAF Sealand. Whilst there, he applied, and was accepted, for Flight Engineer training at St Athan.</p>
<p>His first ever flight was memorable in that he took the opportunity to join an old family friend (a test pilot at St Athan) who was taking a Beaufighter up for an air test. While airbourne over the Bristol Channel he witnessed a long line of merchant ships, all nose to tail as far as the eye could see, the ships were readying for the for the D Day landings.</p>
<p>On 7the June 1944, he completed his Flight Engineer training and joined the HBCU at RAF Swinderby, before moving on to the Lancaster Finishing School at RAF Syerston. In September 1944, Sergeant Ambrose and his crew, now fully trained, joined 467 Squadron (RAAF) at RAF Waddington. </p>
<p>On just his second operational flight, tasked with destroying enemy field guns in Holland, his aircraft had to drop below the cloud base at just 4000 feet. Almost immediately, the aircraft alongside them was hit by ack-ack and went down in flames. Basil’s aircraft returned safely, but the mission ended in failure.</p>
<p>Just over a fortnight later, his first ever night operation proved even more eventful, one they were all very fortunate to survive. En-route to Brunswick, a fire in the cabin set alight the blackout curtains surrounding the pilot and navigator. Basil had to use two extinguishers to put out the fire. The events caused significant delay and at their estimated time of arrival on target, they were still approximately 40 miles away. By the time they got there all the other aircraft had gone through and were on their way home. Basil’s aircraft was now completely alone over the target and although they were able to drop their bombs successfully, the aircraft was illuminated by a whole cone of search lights from the ground, plus an enemy fighter aircraft was fast coming in from the port side. The skipper took evasive action by immediately putting the aircraft into a 5000 feet dive and Basil found himself pinned to the cabin ceiling by the ‘G’ force; conversely when the aircraft pulled out of the dive, he was forced down to the cabin floor. The evasive manoeuvre was repeated one more time before they managed to lose the searchlights and the fighter. The trip home was conducted at low level without further alarm. In all, Basil and his crew went on to record thirty operations together. </p>
<p>After 467 Squadron, Basil was commissioned as a Pilot Officer and was posted to 617 Squadron in April 1945. He was never to fly operationally again although with 617 Squadron he served for a brief period in Digri, India. Basil reached the rank of Flying Officer and was demobbed in 1948.</p>
<p>Basil returned to the Pulsometer and finally qualified as a turner. After a short period working in Birmingham, he settled in Reading with his wife Jean and two children. He continued to work in engineering, eventually moving into the engineering safety field. He retired from his final position of Chief Safety Advisor for Greater London Council in 1981.<a href="https://www.getreading.co.uk/news/local-news/war-veteran-still-swing-90-4802178"></a></p>
Chris Cann
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
Basil Ambrose’s flying log book for navigators, air bombers, air gunners, flight engineers
Description
An account of the resource
Navigators, air bombers, air gunners and flight engineers flying log book for Basil Ambrose, flight engineer, covering the period from 5 July 1944 to 11 July 1946. Detailing engineers training, flying training and operations flown and post war operations. He was stationed at RAF St Athan, RAF Swinderby, RAF Syerston, RAF Waddington, RAF Woodhall Spa, RAF Binbrook and Digri India. Aircraft flown in were Stirling, Lancaster, Lincoln and Oxford. He flew a total of 30 Operations, seven day and 23 night with 467 squadron. He then flew Operation Exodus to Juvincourt and Reine, Operation Dodge to Bari and Operation Spasm to Berlin with 617 squadron, Targets were, Walcheren, Brunswick, Nuremberg, Flushing, Harburg, Duren, Dortmund-Ems Canal, Trondheim, Munich, Ems-Weser Canal, Wurzburg, Wesel, Heilbronn, Giessen, Urft dam, Houffalaize, Baux, Siegen, Karlsruhe and Bohlen. His pilot on operations was Flight Lieutenant Sheridan.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
37 colour prints
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LAmbroseBG1604870v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
1946
1944-10-14
1944-10-15
1944-10-19
1944-10-20
1944-10-23
1944-11-11
1944-11-16
1944-11-21
1944-11-22
1944-11-23
1944-11-26
1944-11-27
1944-12-04
1944-12-05
1944-12-06
1944-12-07
1944-12-09
1944-12-11
1944-12-17
1944-12-18
1945-01-04
1945-01-05
1945-01-07
1945-01-08
1945-01-13
1945-01-14
1945-01-15
1945-01-16
1945-01-17
1945-02-01
1945-02-02
1945-02-03
1945-02-04
1945-02-07
1945-02-08
1945-02-19
1945-02-20
1945-02-21
1945-02-22
1945-02-24
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-16
1945-03-17
1945-03-20
1945-03-21
1945-03-23
1945-03-24
1945-05-09
1945-05-10
1945-05-11
1945-10-05
1945-11-05
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Netherlands
Norway
Pakistan
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Lincolnshire
England--Nottinghamshire
Belgium--Houffalize
France--Les Baux-de-Provence
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Dortmund-Ems Canal
Germany--Düren (Cologne)
Germany--Giessen (Hesse)
Germany--Harburg (Landkreis)
Germany--Heilbronn
Germany--Karlsruhe
Germany--Munich
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Siegen
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Würzburg
Italy--Bari
Netherlands--Vlissingen
Netherlands--Walcheren
Norway--Trondheim
Pakistan--Digri
Wales--Glamorgan
Germany--Braunschweig
Germany--Urft Dam
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
France--Juvincourt-et-Damary
1660 HCU
467 Squadron
617 Squadron
aircrew
bombing
flight engineer
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Lincoln
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operation Exodus (1945)
Oxford
RAF Binbrook
RAF St Athan
RAF Swinderby
RAF Syerston
RAF Waddington
RAF Woodhall Spa
Stirling
training
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1743/30233/LMillsGA1445361v1.1.pdf
aa31d8bf52eba92e2abce6ffe01f9373
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
Mills, Gordon Albert
Albert Gordon Mills
G A Mills
A G Mills
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
2020-10-28
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
Mills, GA
Description
An account of the resource
25 items. The collection concerns Flight Lieutenant Gordon Albert Mills (b. 1921, 1448361, 196610 Royal Air Force). He volunteered for aircrew as air gunner and completed operations on 149, 218 and 75 NZ Squadrons on Lancaster and Stirling in 1944/45 and stayed in the RAF after the war. The collection contains his log book, documents, photographs and decorations.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by L A Barker and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
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
Gordon Mills observer's and air gunner's log book
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LMillsGA1445361v1
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
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
Description
An account of the resource
G A Mills’ RAF Observer’s and Air Gunner’s Flying Log Book, from 18th October 1943 to 24th May 1952, detailing training, operations and instructional duties as an air gunner, and post-war duties including Operation Sunray. Based at RAF Penrhos (No.9 (O)AFU), RAF Little Horwood and RAF Wing (26 OTU), RAF Stradishall (1657 Conversion Unit), RAF Methwold (149 and 218 Squadrons), RAF Feltwell (No.3 Lancaster Finishing School), RAF Wratting Common (1651 Conversion Unit), RAF Mepal (75 (NZ) Squadron and 44 (Rhodesia) Squadron), RAF Mildenhall (44 (Rhodesia) Squadron), RAF Leconfield (Central Gunnery School), RAF North Luffenham (1653 Heavy Conversion Unit), RAF Lindholme (230 Operational Conversion Unit), RAF Waddington and RAF Binbrook (50 Squadron), RAF Shallufa and RAF Hemswell (83 Squadron). Aircraft in which flown: Anson, Wellington, Stirling, Lancaster, Lincoln. Also Meteor and Dakota as a passenger. Records a total of 33 operations, sometimes only as “Special Op” with no target named. Recorded targets in France, Germany, Netherlands and Norway are: Alençon, Brest, Cologne, Dessau, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Gladbach, Hamm, Kiel, Krefeld, La Rochelle, Langendreer, Morlaix, Oslo, Regensburg, The Hague and Wesel. His pilots on operations were Squadron Leader Hutchins, Flight Sergeant Holmes, Flying Officer Murley, Flying Officer Martin, Flying Officer Baker and Squadron Leader McKenna DFC. Proficiency assessments include: “Above average in all gunnery subjects”, “A most sound and able gunner, manner, bearing and discipline unquestionable”
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
David Leitch
Callum Davies
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Egypt
France
Germany
Great Britain
Netherlands
Norway
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
Egypt--Suez
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Norfolk
England--Rutland
England--Suffolk
England--Yorkshire
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
France--Alençon
France--Brest
France--La Rochelle
France--Morlaix
Germany--Bochum
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Essen
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Krefeld
Germany--Mönchengladbach
Germany--Regensburg
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Netherlands--Hague
Norway--Oslo
Wales--Gwynedd
North Africa
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944-05-27
1944-05-28
1944-05-29
1944-05-30
1944-05-31
1944-06-02
1944-06-03
1944-06-06
1944-06-07
1944-08-26
1944-08-27
1944-10-31
1944-11-01
1944-11-05
1945-01-14
1945-01-28
1945-01-29
1945-02-01
1945-02-16
1945-02-18
1945-02-19
1945-02-23
1945-02-24
1945-02-25
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-11
1945-03-18
1945-03-27
1945-04-09
1945-04-10
1945-04-13
1945-04-14
1945-04-20
1945-04-29
1945-05-01
1945-05-09
1945-05-12
1945-06-17
1946
1947
1948
1949
1950
1951
1952
149 Squadron
1651 HCU
1653 HCU
1657 HCU
218 Squadron
26 OTU
44 Squadron
50 Squadron
75 Squadron
83 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
bombing
Cook’s tour
crash
Heavy Conversion Unit
incendiary device
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Lincoln
Martinet
mine laying
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
RAF Binbrook
RAF Feltwell
RAF Hemswell
RAF Leconfield
RAF Lindholme
RAF Little Horwood
RAF Mepal
RAF Methwold
RAF Mildenhall
RAF North Luffenham
RAF Penrhos
RAF Shallufa
RAF Stradishall
RAF Waddington
RAF Wing
RAF Wratting Common
Stirling
take-off crash
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1743/30227/MMillsGA1445361-201003-050001.2.jpg
aa2bda3ac213fad2d0f91521c9adcf65
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1743/30227/MMillsGA1445361-201003-050002.2.jpg
9f4a0e15ded0a9081e90f51f57c7cf37
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
Mills, Gordon Albert
Albert Gordon Mills
G A Mills
A G Mills
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
2020-10-28
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
Mills, GA
Description
An account of the resource
25 items. The collection concerns Flight Lieutenant Gordon Albert Mills (b. 1921, 1448361, 196610 Royal Air Force). He volunteered for aircrew as air gunner and completed operations on 149, 218 and 75 NZ Squadrons on Lancaster and Stirling in 1944/45 and stayed in the RAF after the war. The collection contains his log book, documents, photographs and decorations.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by L A Barker and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
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
Gordon Mills sortie record sheet number 2
Description
An account of the resource
Lists thirteen sorties 16-28 on Lancaster of 75 Squadron as air gunner. Records eight wartime operations and five after the end of hostilities.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
G A Mills
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two sided printed document handwritten filled out
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Service material
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MMillsGA1445361-201003-05
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal New Zealand Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Essen
Germany--Bochum
Germany--Hamm (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Regensburg
Netherlands
Netherlands--Hague
France--Reims
Belgium
Belgium--Brussels
France
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-03-11
1945-03-18
1945-03-27
1945-04-09
1945-04-13
1945-04-20
1945-04-29
1945-05-01
1945-05-09
1945-05-12
1945-05-16
1945-05-28
1945-05-29
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.
75 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
Lancaster
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/937/11294/ALyonJK180202.1.mp3
741ac5d555a5640deb1186b8e219f3a1
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
Lyon, Jack Kenneth
J K Lyon
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Pilot Officer Jack Lyon (1917 - 2019. 903044, 62667 Royal Air Force). He flew three operations with 58 Squadron before being shot down and becoming a prisoner of war.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-02-02
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
Lyon, JK
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB; My name is Chris Brockbank and today is the 2nd of February 2018, and I am here in Bexhill with Jack Lyon, to talk about his life and times, now he’s aged a hundred. So Jack what is your, what were your first recollections of life?
JB: Well I think a baby in a pram, and I remember going past a hoarding in Sydenham and I must have dropped something, yeah that’s my first, I was only about five years old I suppose then, apart from that I-
CB: What did your parents do?
JL: Sorry?
CB: What did your parents do?
JL: My father worked in the Smithfield Market, connected with the wholesale bacon trade, that sort of thing. He was a clerk in, George Bowles Nichols was the name of the firm. It had a, you know, a stake in Smithfield Market but they didn’t deal much in meat, mainly in products like ham and that sort of thing. George Bowles Nichols it was, he was a clerk in there. And he was a, oh right from a young child he had a, he was, had a bad health, in fact he had three brothers and they all did except one: they had a hereditary disease which gave them this hump back sort of thing. He nevertheless managed to work, to travel up to London every day, until in 1932 he had a, well he had a, and he died in 1932, anyway, of this, it was while we were on holiday my memory, in this town of Cleve. He didn’t die there, but he was in a very bad way and we only got home, a few days later he died. Well that was, what did I do then.
CB: And you lived in Sydenham then.
JB: I, we was living in Sydenham, and I attended Brockley County School. I’d passed what was the equivalent of the eleven plus from a, I began my school at five years old, in a, they call a church school I think it cost me, cost my mother about a shilling a week to get to, for this, a good education though, very good. I was going to say I passed this, the equivalent of the 11-plus and I went to this Brockley County until, well, I left school at sixteen and I went to work with a London gas company, the South Suburban Gas Company, which had an area extending from Lewisham right down to Tonbridge. I worked in their admin department. At the same time I was studying night school and, let me see that takes us up to, oh yes the, I left, I passed that what’s called the 11-plus and I was at the school and then the South Suburban Gas Company, I joined that in February 1934, and at the same time I tell you I was night school at a place in Knights Hill and I remember on the 30th, sorry on the 30th November 1936, somebody rushed in and said the Crystal Palace is on fire and of course that was the end: we watched that happen. Great pity because it, well it had, anyway I continued to work. In 1939 when I was still working for the South Suburban, I was studying night school as well - accountancy and that sort of thing - I passed stage one of the Royal Society of Arts bookkeeping, and the tutor was, worked for Shell and he poached me. He said, ‘you’re, you have quite good knowledge of accountancy and that sort of thing, would you be interested in transferring from the gas, from the gas company to Shell?’ Well I thought about it, and financially it didn’t, in fact it was slightly worse off I had to pay my train fare to London, but I thought well, it’s a good thing to be a small fish in a very large puddle and you couldn’t get much larger than Shell, could you? It was world wide then, Royal Dutch Shell, and I agreed. In fact I joined Shall about the 1st August 1939. I remember Shell opened an account for me with Lloyds Bank, 39 Threadneedle Street, where they banked themselves; they opened this account for me. But as I say, at that time we were working in St Helen’s Court and there was another famous RAF person also working there, Douglas Bader. He, when he lost his legs in a flying accident, he was invalided out of the service and he joined Shell as a management trainee, I remember that. Well, as I say on the 1st of September, Shell began, operated their wartime programme and that involved closing the London office. So they said well Mr Lyon we shan’t require your services during this present emergency, but in the meantime we will bring your salary up to parity with, what until it’s parity with what you’re earning now, and [emphasis] at the end of the emergency you will be free to rejoin the company if you so desire. Well that’s what, on 5th, war was declared on the 3rd of September, wasn’t it?
CB: Yes.
JL: That was a Sunday, wasn’t it.
CB: It was.
JL: On the 4th of September, I and a friend of mine, we made an effort to join the army because we had a connection with the Royal West Kents. They used to invite us to their annual, the Aldershot Tattoo, and we used to be entertained in their sergeants mess so we decided to join the army, but when we got to Parish Lane, Penge where their office had been, it was closed! [laugh] I suppose part of the war, we said well that’s a funny way to run a war but still, that’s it, there’s nothing we could do about that. And the next day, the 5th of September, somebody said oh they’re opening an RAF recruiting office at, in the Yorkshire Grey pub so we took a 75 bus from Sydenham High Street to there. We were examined and my friend was rejected because he had flat feet. I said he would have been more apt if he’d been joining the army, but still, that’s the way they work. I was accepted and I was told to go home, get overnight things and come back and I would be taken to RAF Uxbridge. I did that and, as I say, I was examined and accepted for, in the air force. They asked me then what trade I would like to be in and I said well what can you offer me and they said well cook and butcher well that didn’t ring any bells with me so I said hmm what else, and they said you could join the secretarial branch. Well I’d been pushing a pen for the last five years and in those days I think I want a change. They said well what about aircrew? I said well what about it? They said well if you complete your training satisfactorily you’ll be automatically promoted to the rank of sergeant, receive twelve and sixpence a day I think it was, plus so much flying pay, so there was really no contest was there. And that’s how, I passed the medical for flying and I was given a uniform which I must, was told to wear at all times because I was still actually in the air force. I was given two books to study. One was called mathematics for engineers and the other one was practical mechanics. Neither of them had much bearing on flying training, but there it was. Now this was the phoney war. I went back to my house, we were living in, oh, we had a little flat, my mother and I had a little flat in, just near the Sydenham Road, well as I say the phoney war dragged on until the 30th of December 1939. I had a telegram, “proceed to number one initial training wing, Downing College, Cambridge,” and that is where I went. Now the course was supposed to last for six weeks. In fact it dragged on to nearly four months. The reason was there were still no training facilities available. It had its up side. We were billeted in the, well what used to be the students home in, when they were there because when they were students there in Downing College, some of the colleges did have students as well, but we didn’t have that, we were permitted to use the clubs, that the College’s silver, yes, and we took turns at serving and washing up. So as I say, that relieved the monotony a bit. But this dragged on until as it were, what they say the nemesis, on the 10th of June, 10th of May 1940 the Germans invaded the Low Countries, Holland and Belgium, yes. I was, I was on fire picquet that night and the admin had been headed by a, well I must go back a bit. Before the second world war, Brigadier Critchley, his name was, was chairman of the Greyhound Racing Commission. Now when the war started he was given the rank of Air Commodore and he recruited quite of his old associates for various posts. Our adjutant was a name of Shaffey and I believe in peacetime was a tennis coach, he came and he was in a terrible state, he said LAC – we’d been promoted to LAC by the way after a number of weeks, which meant our pay was a bit better, Leading Aircraftman - what do I do with this LAC Lyon? I said well you must call, as soon as it’s light you must have a general, a roll call of all the students, all the would-be airmen, check for deficiencies in kit and that sort of thing, and the instructions were: ten recruits and each, name, not by name but by number, to various RAF stations, not necessarily air training stations and I and nine others were posted to RAF Kinloss which was not, at that time it was called 45 MU I believe, there was no flying directly from there, because as I say it was mainly material. Well we made the journey up, I had to stay, we stayed overnight I remember in the YMCA in Edinburgh, we managed to get a billet there. We travelled on the next day and we arrived at RAF Kinloss to be viewed with a certain suspicion because at that time it was stories of nuns in parachutes, coming down by parachute and all the rest of it, we were not exactly given a heroes welcome. However, they found us a billet where we could lie our heads for the night and after a day or so they received some sort of confirmation of our status and we were trained in air station defence. I think we, they, the weapon we had was interesting: it was a 20mm Hispano-Suiza cannon which had to be what they called “cocked” before it could be fired, the great thing is not so much the strength, dexterity because the story was if you lingered a bit you could lose a few fingertips, however we were trained in the use of it. And we were going to have a read out, two read outs, five of us in each, in each one, but the cannon was, overnight was requisitioned for service in the south of England where it was thought would be far more useful in the event of an invasion. It was replaced with a, I recall it was a 1912 Lewis, Lewis gun with a pan for ammunition.
CB: A drum.
JL: And even then it was a bit of a situation. We were told we must not open fire under any circumstances without consulting the Station Defence Officer. Well first of all we didn’t know who the Station Defence Officer was and even if we did we had no means of contacting him. So therefore, as I say it was perhaps a good thing that our skills were not called into account. This went on for a few weeks and the only outstanding thing I can remember is that one night, or one morning, we woke up to find on a stretch of uncultivated area in the camp were prone figures. They were guarded by normally armoured personnel and we were instructed not to attempt to approach these people in any [emphasis] circumstances. Well, they were in fact refugees from the evacuation of Dunkirk: they were up there because they were spread all around the country, they didn’t want too many in the same place, bad for morale. They stayed there, one night they disappeared and that was that. Not long after this, I was, we, yes, I and one or two others were posted to RAF Elementary Flying Training School at a place just outside, where the beer, Burton. Burton, that’s right, you know, there’s a sign he’s gone for a Burton, well that’s there. Burton on Trent. I was trained as a, in those days all aircrew were first of all trained to be pilots. I failed the pilot’s course – so the failure rate was quite high, something like thirty per cent - and then I was asked what I wanted to do, they said well the only question is becoming a navigator bomb aimer. The senior, the officer in charge of training there, tested my knowledge of mathematics, it was not a big test, it was comparatively simple, just sort of fourth fifth form geometry and that sort of thing. I satisfied him I was intellectually capable of becoming a useful navigator and bomb aimer and then I was then posted to RAF Manby, Number 1 Air Armament School, at a place near Louth in Lincolnshire, where we went through, wait a minute, no, no, one of them, sorry I’m jumping the gun, I was posted to RAF Prestwick, in Scotland for a navigation course. That went on until, that’s right, we completed the course in I think it was September 1940, and I was then posted to, wait a minute, that’s right, I was posted from Prestwick to this one, this Number 1 Air Armament School in Louth in Lincolnshire, that’s right. I satisfactorily completed that course and I was called to the Station Commander, or Training Commander in charge of aircrew training. He said, ‘LAC Lyon, in view of your passing out at the top of the class and your past service record you have been awarded a commission,’ pending what they used to call well, you know, gazetting, whichever, whatever the wartime equivalent of that was, where I would be promoted to sergeant, and I was posted then to, oddly enough, RAF Kinloss! But by that time it had become Number 19 Operational Training Unit, well, it gives you, it tells you, the name tells you what it did. That’s right, this, this was in, this would be about November 1940. I completed the course in early January and let’s see, I went to, oh yes, that’s right. Nothing particularly, well, you cut all the bits and pieces short. The course was completed in, oh yes, in about, I think it was, March of 1941 I was called to the admin office in Kinloss and said that your commission has been confirmed. I was given a week’s leave to get myself a uniform and that sort of thing and then I would return for operational training. I bought my uniform, I managed to stay with a family I knew, their name was Truss, I think it was, and he was an engineer and he was working actually I didn’t know turned out it was the largest, there was an article about it the BBC Channel 4 some time, it was the largest armaments factory in the whole of the country. I didn’t know the extent of it then, but he was employed there. I got my uniform and whatnot and returned to RAF Kinloss and after, in a few days, I was posted to RAF Linton on Ouse which at that time was, it had, it was unusual, a brick building very good accommodation. It was built in the intermediate war years. It also had the other squadron was, they had Halifax, they were being converted to Halifaxes but they were not operational. So that’s right, I stayed with them and returned. Right, well I completed at RAF, at RAF Linton on Ouse I remember I was taken a very bad cough and cold and I remember the medical officer said, ‘Oh, Pilot Officer you have a nasty sounding bit of congestion there.’ And within half an hour or so I was ensconced in this local nursing home to be treated for this congestion. After about ten days there I think, I was released and my training continued. Right. Now, here we come to our, first of all I was to join with a man named, was it Flight Lieutenant Walker, who I think he had the nickname Johnnie, well he would wouldn’t they, that name, but then that order was countermanded for some reason unknown to me, the rumour had it that he was getting a little too fond of his namesake, sort of rumours that are rife in war time. I was then teamed up with a crew the first pilot was Sergeant Roberts. I was the only commissioned member of a crew. Now I don’t know what you know about, can you see any particular reason that that would cause difficulty, you probably don’t now, but it did then. As I was commissioned and they were not I could only converse with them socially or otherwise, in two places: either in a crew room or of course in the aircraft itself, otherwise it was actually forbidden to associate with me as commissioned officer to associate with non-commissioned personnel on the camp area, so it did make things a little awkward, didn’t it. Very unusual situation, that. Anyway, on the, was it on the let me see there, the 1st, of, was that, would be May 1941 we were allocated a new aircraft and told that the, in the crew room, we were told that the target was marshalling yards and adjoining railway station in Dusseldorf, Germany. Right, and we were going to do a pre-flight air test, as you were operations rules insisted. We were in the aircraft waiting to start and well, Roberts, the captain, started the engines but calamity intervened: there were no chocks in the wheels, under the wheels and the aircraft rolled forward and collided with what I think was called a Huck starter.
CB: Oh dear.
JL: No one weas injured but the propeller blades of one engine the Whitley, they were, it was a Whitley 5 was the actual classification of the aeroplane. Well, there is, chaos reigned and it just about did because, I didn’t mention, but shortly after my arrival early at RAF Linton on Ouse, one night there was an air raid. Now I looked around and there were no instructions of what to do in the event of an air raid, I thought well, what do I do? I thought it was a question of Jack you’ll have to play it by ear and wait and see what happens. Suddenly there was an almighty bang! My bed lifted off its, it seemed about lifted about a foot in the air and came down well what do I do? If I rush out to find a shelter I may be going the wrong way. I thought no, I’d better stay put, so I did. The next morning I got up and I went into the Officers Mess and there was no hot water, well that was not unusual, what I didn’t know, overnight a shelter had received a direct hit and quite a large, I think about twenty airmen were killed, including the Station Commander, so that was not a very auspicious beginning to my stay at Linton, was it? Anyway, I did, I, well nothing I could do there then, just hold on. We, I, the station was in a really, a terrible, the pilot was confined to quarters, told he would face a charge of gross negligence and we were told that we would not be flying that night, so we returned to, the rest of the crew, returned to our quarters. Not two hours later there was a change once more. Group, you see it was Headquarters at 4 Group, Group wanted a full number of aircraft involved, no exceptions. They said you, we have allocated you another aeroplane. You must be ready within two hours for take off and your pilot will be Sergeant Roberts. Now there’s a volte face isn’t it, one day he’s considered not fit to fly and next moment it’s all over and he’s fully qualified to fly as captain again. Well, that aeroplane that they gave us should never, in my opinion, should never have been used. We’d only, we took off with the rest of the squadron, but after about only an hour and a half flying, the port engine began to overheat and the, Roberts could do nothing about that, we had to reduce speed, it meant we cut our speed by about ten knots. That in itself was not particularly of great concern, but what was far more important was that we couldn’t get above ten thousand feet. Now the previous briefing the recommended height had been fourteen thousand so theoretically we could have been knocked out with one of our own bombs, but I don’t think that that’s very likely. There was no, well there wouldn’t be any fighter aircraft, they were also using anti aircraft fire, in any case, I think all the fighter squadrons in that part of Germany had been withdrawn and were sent to the, what would be the east front in Poland and regroup and practice for the, what the plan, what was it called - Operation Barbarossa – which was due to and took place on the 21st of June, yes 21st of June 1941 so there were no. Well we, I, we flew on this and almost immediately [emphasis] we were caught in that blue light which locks on to you and it is so dazzling you cannot see your own instruments, it’s so, it’s, you’re virtually as good as blind. We, I released the bombs at what I considered, though I had no idea really where it was, but I knew we’d got to get rid of them, they went down, and we immediately turned and I gave, I gave Roberts a course for home, although we never had any time to check the variation from magnetic to compass course, but let’s hope it was alright. But not long after we turned on for home, the port engine caught fire! The extinguisher didn’t work so therefore we flew on. Now, then the pilot said to me, ‘look Jack I can’t contact the rear gunner. Do you think you could crawl along the fuselage and see whether he’s all right?’ I said, ‘yes I’ll try.’ I opened the door behind the wireless operator and I was immediately assailed by a cloud of fume and flame. I really thought my, my time was up. I didn’t feel particularly frightened, I don’t know why, but then of course the adrenalin snaps in, doesn’t it. I seized an oxygen mask, took a few gulps of it, and Rob looked around, and he said, ‘oh my gawd, abandon aircraft.’ Now, it so happens that the exit is, in that particular aeroplane, was right beneath where I was sitting, so I had to be the first one out otherwise I’d block the exit for the remainder of the crew. I opened the hatch, I jumped, I don’t actually remember pulling the cord, the release, parachute release cord, I obviously did otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here, would I? I came to and I could see by that time the aeroplane below me and it was like an enormous [emphasis] torch in the sky, the entire plane was burning. Now how this happened, I don’t really know, but that was a fact. I saw it hit the ground with one tremendous kind of smoke and flame. I landed, and it was a windless night, so much so that the canopy covered me. I looked, I got it off and I looked around. Now I’d either landed in what was a probably a recreation ground, or what might have been a sports field, but I think it was a recreation ground. I know in the escape books they scurry around and bury their, bury their parachute. Well, you needed a power, power digger to make any impression on that soil: it was hard as a rock! But within less than a minute a German soldier turned up and well he didn’t, although he didn’t say it, had he done so I’d have been inclined to agree with him. “For you the war is over.” Well I wouldn’t have got far in the old fashioned fleece lined flying boot with no proper heel to it and in British battle dress, so there was little I could do but accept it. Now, this one, I could have walked in front of him and he could have walked holding on one hand on his rifle and the other hand his bicycle, so we accepted that the only other alternative: I sat on the cross bar and he did, we proceeded on a bicycle. Now either way, he stopped. Now it was, I wasn’t quite sure at the time, but depending on whether Germany had double summer British, double summer time, but it was well past midnight, he knocked on the door of this house, at that time I could understand a fair amount of German because I’d been studying German at night school, but that’s another, that’s another. He said I have a wounded British officer here, I’d like you to give him a little help. The lady produced some warm water. Head wounds always bleed a lot although they’re really only superficial and this was only a superficial cut, she bathed all the dried blood away, and believe it or not, she also made a cup of tea. Tea not coffee. I thought that was very impressive and I knew enough German to say vielen danke, kneidiger frau: thank you dear lady for your kindness. We then proceeded on for the rest of the journey to a town called Goch, G-o-c- h, not far from the Dutch border. Now for some reason that I never discovered, I did not end up, oh, first of all the policeman, he said give me your pistol, I said ich habe keine pistol, I have no pistol, which I didn’t, the sort of thing I didn’t want to be lumbered with that. He thought maybe a bit odd but he accepted it and that was it. I didn’t spend that night in the cells, he put me in the telephone exchange of all places. And all night, it was a manual exchange in those days, you hear the thing going up and down to finding its correct slot to go in to, anyway I can’t say I slept much but still, that was, I was dry and I’d saved my life so I couldn’t really grumble. The next day the, a Luftwaffe officer turned up and he said would you please come with me, and together with, at some stage or other, we picked up the rest of the crew so I must have had, I think, a slight case of concussion, but anyway, we ended up, he took us to the Luftwaffe base at Duisburg, and he said, ‘oh by the way, your comrade, the rear gunner is quite safe, but when he landed he broke his ankle and he is receiving treatment in a clinic near here, but he is otherwise he’s safe and well.’ And now believe it or not, these, they were extremely polite these Luftwaffe officers, very high standard of education I’d say, in fact some of them could speak English; some of them had spent time in England. We were entertained in the officers mess. There was no attempt made to extract information from us. We talked about cricket or the weather or something like that, and then they said, well we now have to hand you over to a representative of the German Air Force POW body and we went, we, they duly took us in hand and we went by I think it must have been a sort of a mini bus I think, yes it must have been. It wasn’t a, wasn’t a truck, it had seats in it, I know. Well, where do you think they took us? Believe it or not they took us to Dusseldorf and we got out of the thing there, and we stood on the platform. There was absolutely no sign of any damage whatsoever. [Emphasis] We were not the object of any kind of well, abusive attention from the Germans. They looked us up and down and took no, virtually no notice, in fact we had, it was a corporal with us, and he came back with some sticky buns for us. Well, so that was the, from we entrained at Dusseldorf and we travelled to Frankfurt, that is Frankfurt on the Main, the river Main, which at that time was the prison, the Luftwaffe prisoner of war body as what they called the Dulag dursrstadtlager’s transit camp. Now we, when we reached this transit camp, this is where we, they put me in the, I suppose they did with the other, rest of the crew as well, in the interrogation cell, which was really not much different from a second or third rate boarding house the only thing is there were bars over the window. Now before we’d had no instructions to what to do in event of being taken prisoner, of course they do it now, but they didn’t in those days, in 1941. But anyway, a Luftwaffe major came in and he gave me a form to sign and he said if you complete this, your details will be sent immediately to the Red Cross in Geneva and your relatives or whoever you’ve asked to be notified, will know within forty eight hours that you are safe and well. Now, we had [emphasis] oddly enough, been briefed about this. It wasn’t anything to do with the Red Cross in Geneva, it was actually prepared by the German Intelligence Service. I read it and I said, ‘I regret, Herr Major, I am not allowed to divulge some of the information that you require.’ And he accepted this without argument: that was that. And the next day I was released into the compound there. Well of course they had got far more on their hands to worry about than a rather insignificant crew. The last Sunday I think it was, in May, which used to be called Whit Sunday, there was a break out, there was a tunnel, the permanent staff at the gulag had been building this tunnel which they broke on I say, on the Whit Sunday. All were subsequently recaptured except for Roger Bushell, and that’s another story. So you might well say that I wasn’t the only failed bomb aimer, was I? We know that now. Anyway we travelled by normal train from Frankfurt, after Frankfurt. There were some guards there, but they were, they didn’t make themselves too obtrusive. We arrived at a place called Barth, which was the site of Stalag Luft I. Stanlager all that means is it’s a permanent camp, Stan means permanent, as opposed to Durst means transit. So that’s all. That was Stalag Luft I we found ourselves in. Now at the entrance to that I went one way because I was a commissioned officer and the rest of the crew went the other because they were not, because at Stalag Luft I there was an NCOs compound as well as an officers compound and that was in fact the last I ever saw of any of them. Any of them. Peculiar isn’t it, never mind. We were only there, well I stayed there until about April of 1942 and that was when Stalag Luft III was opened. The journey there was uneventful. We got to Stalag Luft III and I was allotted a, well a billet obviously, a room, [sigh] how much more of this do you want from me?
CB: Just keep going. We’ll stop for a break. I think you deserve it. So, you said you were shot down on the 3rd of June 1941.
JL: Correct. Yes.
CB: You had been in the squadron since, for a couple of months, by then.
JL: Oh, no.
CB: Three months was it?
JL: I think it was.
CB: April.
JL: So much happened, air raid and whatnot. I think it was about the mid April when I got to Linton on Ouse, yes.
CB: And you talked about the crew, but in the air, what was the cohesion like?
JL: Well, we could fraternise.
CB: Were you all on christian name terms in the aircraft on operations? When you were flying?
JL: Well, the only one I knew quite well was Robbie, that’s all, the pilot. I don’t remember. If they told me I, it didn’t sink in.
CB: No. Then you already mentioned, that in, outside the flying period, if you were, time, if you were going out and socialising, that was different.
JL: Some of the better class, you know the real, the nice hotels in Linton on Ouse, didn’t like too many non-commissioned ranks in there, they were fussy.
CB: They only wanted the officers in.
JL: They only wanted officers, yes.
CB: Yes. I suspect times changed quite radically later.
JL: Oh, they must have done.
CB: When the heavies came. Yes.
J: They must. But in the early days it was a, it was strict, I was given, no doubt about, I was given strict instructions I was not to fraternise.
CB: Yeah, that was the early part of the war.
JL: They were very particular about it in those days, the air force.
CB: Right. And because you were shot down so soon into your tour, you didn’t have a lot of time to get to know your crew well, did you.
JL: I had very little time, Robbie was about the only one I knew.
CB: Yeah. Fast forward again into Sagan, Stalag Luft III. How was that organised? You had the officers and NCOs. But in the officers’ side.
JL: There was an officers’ compound, and an NCOs compound.
CB: And in the officers compound, how did that work?
JL: Actually I went in to a the, they were quite small huts, and there were only two more in the room that I was in. I was billeted with a man with, a chap named Jules Silverstone, who was in fact Jewish and also this chap Pop Green, who in fact had served in the first world war. He was a, interesting history, at the beginning of the first world war he held a commission in the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry.
CB: Right. We were in that. We were in that.
JL: Really. Yes well, he had a commission in that but he later transferred to the Machine Gun Corps because the Germans hopelessly outclassed us in that, in those, in weaponry. He survived the war, but he was told that he was only allowed to fly on training missions, but being that sort of man he probably got himself on an operation and he was flying in a Hampden and they were shot down, and he survived, without, he wasn’t injured, and as I say I was billeted with him. He said that Passchendaele was the worst he had ever [emphasis] encountered. People died there not in action, but in a mass of filth and slime. He said it was, it was appalling. What happened was, he said the Germans withdrew to higher ground and left us in these swamped trenches. He said, as I say, he hated it. And of course, well he, [laugh] he was the only man who was rather sorry when the war ended. The reason was he’d have to go home and rejoin his wife whom he hated the sight of, [laughter] and last I heard of him he was running a taxi service in Bray.
CB: Any reason why he hated his wife?
JL: I don’t know, but he did. He didn’t go into that. [Chuckling]
CB: Yes. What, you said there were three others. So you had Jules Silverstone, Pop Green, who was the other?
JL: Jules Silverstone. His father was a solicitor in Birmingham, but he didn’t follow in this father’s footsteps, he moved heaven and earth to join the RAF. Now I think he was, at age, I think he was thirty four. He was too old to join as pilot or navigator, he had to be classed as a gunner. So, that was it, he was a -
CB: Was an air gunner.
JL: Pilot Officer Silverstone, gunner. Interesting him, because he knew all about this stuff they used to call window, the one that, when they released it, it had black, black on one side and a sort of reflective surface on the other. It played hell with the tech -
CB: With the radar.
JL: With the radar, yeah. And it wasn’t, he said they won’t use it, he knew this, he said but they won’t use it till they’ve found a reason to overcome it. And it was in fact, it wasn’t used until that raid on Hamburg, that firestorm they created.
CB: On Hamburg.
JL: Hamburg. In 1943. Yeah.
CB: Who was the third person with you?
JL: Sorry?
CB: Who, you mentioned two people, who’s the third one?
JL: There was only Pop Green and Silverstone. Three in the room.
CB: And you. Oh, just three in the room, sorry. Yeah, okay.
JL: They were quite small huts. There were only, I think there were only four, only four huts in the officer’s compound, certainly not many. I tell you what we, did happen one day, do you remember that story of the one who got away?
CB: The German.
JL: The German, yeah. Well he turned up, he was in, dressed in ordinary German uniform, he was a major, major, and I remember seeing he was on the doorstep to one of the huts chatting to a man named talking to Squadron Leader Mac Dunnell [?]. Of course he was, actually, the German, he was shot down during the Battle of Britain wasn’t he.
CB: Yes. Yes.
JL: That’s right. And of course Mac Donald [?] was part, flew a Spitfire I think. They were chatting quite friendly, and he was not accompanied by any other German personnel. he just wandered around chatting to people.
CB: Amazing.
JL: He had a sad ending, he was killed in a flying accident. He was testing new fighter apparatus I think, but he had engine trouble or something, he was lost at sea, never found, they never recovered his body, in November 19, oh, 1940 41. That was the one that got away.
CB: Off the Dutch coast.
JL: Yeah. He was there.
CB: Well. he escaped in Canada.
JL: There was obviously, you know, a bond in the, between the two air forces at that time, later on they didn’t, but there was in the early days.
CB: A Chivalry.
JL: Yeah. Chivalry. That’s it, chivalry of the air.
CB: Extraordinary really.
JL: So well that’s my story. Long before, Douglas Bader, who was, he was taken prisoner wasn’t he.
CB: Yes.
JL: When, something, either his plane collided with another one, anyway but he was taken prisoner.
CB: He was shot down.
JL: Whether he was shot down or not.
CB: By one of his own people, he was shot down by one of his own people it turned out.
JL: Ah well that’s. By one of his own people?
CB: Yeah. They met in prison and the chap had to own up.
JL: Oh, I met him personally.
CB: But he didn’t admit.
JL: Because he was also Shell.
CB: Yes, he was.
JL: Well anyway, That was a. When he was in the camp he used to play golf, he would try to. And because of his, he lost his legs you see, I mean his prosthetic legs,
CB: Yes.
JL: I think they replaced them, they threw them out or something like that. He would sometimes fall over but god help you if you went to assist him, you know he would swear at you, he was determined to get on his feet unaided. Anyway, he had a bit of a falling out with the powers that be there. Because he didn’t like the way they were treating the guards and whatnot as if they were friends not enemies. it was decided he would be better off in another camp and the last I saw of him, well not the last, the last in the prisoner of war camp I saw him, he was being escorted out, he turned it into his own advantage inspecting as if these as a company.
CB: Oh you saw hm doing the inspection did you? Of the guard.
JL: He was inspecting the, yeah. That’s typical Bader, isn’t it. Now! I retired, I left the air force in something like well, October 1945 but I remained on as a, I was paid by the air force till I think it was January ’46 and very soon after going to, where did we work to? Very shortly we, I was asked if I wanted to go to Venezuela because Venezuela still had most of its wells, oil wells and I agreed, and I was, I went out to, we didn’t go out on a ship I went out on a tanker SS Luscia, Luscia I think she was. She was imbalast so she rocked about a bit I’ve never been seasick or any other sick in an aeroplane. We finally docked at Aruba, in, which belonged to, was a Dutch possession then, Aruba, in the West Indies and I was only there for a night and then we got a, I was flown to Maiquetia, which was the airport for Caracas. Caracas itself is about five hundred feet above sea level, the capital of Venezuela. I was, from Maiquetia I travelled by a bus on a road which they say was built by convicts in the Gomez, when Gomez was a dictator of Venezuela, you could sometimes look down and see where you’d been ten fifteen minutes before. I reached Caracas, or I might say that they charged me, I had to have what was called a certificate of identity, and I had to pay for it in the local currency. They took a, all I had, was a, I had an English, I had a five pound note I think, they gave a stamp and it was probably worth about one tenth of that in the local currency, the so-and-sos. That’s how it happened. When I got to Caracas, I found a billet in the Hotel Majestic and I knew enough Spanish, I’d, interesting while I was in the prisoner of war camp I had lessons from of all people Tom Kirby Green, why he should be a good Spanish speaker, mind he served with the Republicans, didn’t he, in the war in Spain.
CB: In the Spanish Civil War.
JL: Lord Haw Haw announced it, didn’t he, yeah. So that was that, yes. I had enough Spanish to say I’m in the employ of Shell, they were called the Caribbean Petroleum Company then, they didn’t, Shell, enter into the name although they used the, what it is, the, oh it’s a scallop isn’t it, that’s the Shell sign isn’t it, the scallop, and oh I think it was the afternoon of Christmas Day, a chap named Swinson turned up, he said, ‘Oh Lyon, I’m glad to find you,’ he said, ‘I know you, we were advised you were on your way but then we sort of lost track of you.’ But then of course I served in the, on what they called internal audit, that is not, not, as opposed to the exterior audit, was actually Price Waterhouse in those days. They did the proper auditing of Shell’s possessions there, I went round to these depots making sure their equipment and whatnot was properly registered and that sort of thing. It was quite interesting work. Well, while I was there, who should, that was having travelled down to the fields the main producer in the Maracaibo, while I was there on this what they call internal audit, who should turn up but Douglas Bader. Now he was on a, well they say he was just, reviewing his position, he was visiting, but what he was really was doing he was trying to push the company to try to use British aero, aircraft rather than all American, and I was introduced to him as: ‘oh this is Mr Lyon from our head office in Caracas.’ And he said, ‘oh, hello there.’ I said, ‘but sir, we’ve met before haven’t we. He looked, I said, ‘last time I saw you, you were acting as a kind of inspector of a -.’ ‘Oh my gawd yes!’ And we kept in touch quite a lot afterwards, I’ve known him for quite.
CB: Did you?
JL: Yes. Bader, so.
CB: How did you find him, outside Stalag Luft III?
JL: I got on with him very well. He certainly wasn’t everybody’s cup of tea, but he had a, he was shrewd. One of the airfields in the concession area, was at a place called Mushi de Suleman [?]. It’s at five thousand feet and in the hot season the pilots were having great difficulty in taking off because of the rarefied air. Now in those, this was the days before computers, I didn’t get a, I got a file across my desk one day, and this was, Bader had seen this problem that they had and he had written in the margin, “let them take off with half tanks”, and he knew that in emergency they would still have enough to reach wherever necessary to safety and yet still travel with only half a tank. He did very well as a, in Shell. He finished as the President of Shell Aviation with a private jet to fly. So he did very well there. But he certainly, he had this, being able to see the, you know little bit further through a brick wall than most people. I had great admiration for him. But I agree he wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but I always got on with him quite well. Yeah.
CB: Where did you go from there?
JL: Sorry?
CB: Where did you go from there?
JL: After I returned home by 1950, April 19. By the way, I flew the Atlantic in, at a time when there weren’t many transatlantic flights. I was staying in Montreal at the time, I had some relatives there and I was booked on this, it was little more than a souped up DC4, the aircraft we flew in. We were due to call only at one place: Halifax, but I remember the pilot made a special landing somewhere, he wanted to pick up, I think they were Catholic priests I believe, the look of ‘em, there was snow on the ground, I think we were lucky to take off again, but anyway we did. But flying at that, of course in those days you only flew at probably about twelve thousand feet, something like that, looking on down this unbroken mass of well pine trees I suppose, you wouldn’t have stood a dog’s chance of anything if you’d had to make a forced landing in a plane in there. Anyway we did we, I got home and 1950, in April 1950 and I, [pause] I met my future wife. Now, now I had known her as a schoolgirl because I was friendly with [chuckle] her half uncle, it sounds like carbuncle, doesn’t it [laugh] but he was a half uncle because they’d been, the father grandfather [unclear] had married twice, but that’s all I, we met again and well we decided to get married, Hazel and I. Our, our union, we didn’t do too bad: sixty three years exactly because she died on our wedding anniversary.
CB: Did she really.
JL: In 19, sorry, 2013. So we’re not bad was it.
CB: Fantastic!
JL: So , and then I, well I continued with working. I had the opportunity to leave about the end of. You see they formed what they called Iranian Oil Participants which was agreement hammered out with the Shah as he was then and when they kicked out Masadic [?], he agreed that concessions could be opened by this consortium of oil companies, and there was the BP had a forty per cent interest in it, the major oil, American companies had another forty, Shell had fourteen percent and the Company Francaise de Petroleum the remaining six per cent. That was how Iranian Oil Participants, and I was senior financial, financial assistant in, seconded to Iranian Oil Participants and I held that post for seventeen years. At the end of it I was getting a bit tired of it. I had a man that I’d no respect for: a man named Hoppen. Let’s say he shafted me once, he fed me to the, he tried to feed me to the lions that’s it; fortunately I was set, I had no respect for him after that. He said, ‘I’m not going to make you redundant, Lyon.’ I said, ‘thanks very much, I don’t want to be called redundant, I think I’ve done a pretty good job for seventeen years. Thank you.’ All I asked was that they brought forward the, at Shell you retired at sixty, that was before, and then there was also a reduction made for overseas service which I had, so it would only mean bringing forward my pension date by three or four years, not too much to ask, but that served me well because you see it’s an index linked pension.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Now, my monthly salary is worth, worth much more that I was actually paid when I retired.
CB: Yeah.
JL: So I made the right decision there.
CB: You did, yes.
JL: Staying with, staying with Shell. So I have some things to worry about but money is certainly not one of them.
CB: What made, what brought you down to Bexhill?
JL: Ah! Shortly before I retired, I’d lived in St Leonards. We had a, I had, we had a small bungalow in what they called the Links. It was actually originally it was a golf course, because I, it wasn’t being used as a golf course then but nothing else. I used to walk across this links to West St Leonards where I picked up the train for, used to take me to Cannon Street. But so, that brings it well, I’ve been with them ever since.
CB: But you decided to leave St Leonards and come to Bexhill.
JL: Oh yes, well, I made the right decision there.
CB: What made you do that then?
JL: There wasn’t much there for me in the air force: a failed navigator. I mean. They don’t even have them now anyway do they?
CB: Well, It’s different.
JL: No, no I made the right decision there. I knew I would. No, I couldn’t go wrong.
CB: You mentioned air force again. Going back to your flying times in the Whitley.
JL: Yeah.
CB: What navigation aids did you have in those days? We are talking about 1941.
JL: Well you had a thing called a CFC, whicb you set your, you set your, the course you would want to follow, and then you fed in what the, the wind direction, and you fiddle around with it and that gave you your course to fly. They did have, you could have, some of the Whitleys, not the one I was shot down, didn’t have one, they had an astrodome.
CB: Oh yes.
JL: So if you’d been trained in the use of the [unclear] mill, polar, star charts you could theoretically fix your position by air, star sight, but certainly the one we flew in, the old one they trundled out, that didn’t have one, didn’t have a - there was only one exit there, and that was downwards.
CB: Oh right.
JL: So that was the only navigation instrument we used to rely on, and dead reckoning as they called it.
CB: So in the daylight you could more easily see where you were, but flying at night, what did you do there?
JL: Oh yes it was. I did in fact, have use of, while I was waiting for this, at Cambridge, Downing Cambridge, Downing College Cambridge, I used to read Air Publication 1 2 3 4 and this was the navigational training of a pilot,
CB: Right.
JL: Because we were all supposed to be trained as pilots to start with in those days, they didn’t have different courses then. I was able to use it one day because I know we took off and the mist came down, I was pretty certain we were drifting off course, well it did tell you what to do. You flew halfway to your, half the distance that you’d previously calculated and then [emphasis] you gave the pilot orders to fly twice the distance that you were, you think you’d been going off course, twice that distance and that should give you a course to your original. It really, all you’re doing is flying the two sides of an isosceles triangle, and I tried it and we did, and out of the water, out of the thing, saw this, it was just an island.
CB: You’d got it right.
JL: So it certainly, it worked, I know.
CB: This is doing the maximum drift calculator isn’t it.
JL: Sorry?
CB: This is the maximum drift calculation.
JL: Yes, it’s for, they call it pilot navigation.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Yeah, oh yes. Because he couldn’t take bearings and all that sort of thing could he. As I say, it’s a simple, simple, it’s just geometry really, that’s all you’re doing, flying the two sides of an isosceles triangle. Yeah.
CB: So how many ops did you do before you were shot down?
JL: Only a couple, that’s all.
C: Right.
JL: We had to, they call them nurseries, they were using them to bomb an occupied port like Calais or somewhere like that. How they arranged it so that the, you weren’t dropping bombs on German and French civilians I suppose they had some means of contact in, I didn’t know what it was but that was all, a couple of those and this was just our third trip, that’s all.
CB: How many aircraft were there in the squadron?
JL: That I don’t really know. It was not public information anyway.
CB: And when you went out on a raid, on an operation, did you go with other aircraft or did you go as individuals, as singletons?
JL: Each one took off, you got the, from the Control Tower you get the take off clear, that’s it, one by one.
CB: But you weren’t in any kind of formation or cohesive?
JL: Oh no, it was only Americans that did that, formation flying. Oh no, quite impossible at night.
CB: Yeah. And before you went on the op how did the briefing go?
JL: Well as I say, it was quite clear. The marshalling yards, and the adjoining station: Dusseldorf. That was in the briefing, that was the target.
CB: But they got you all together in a room where everybody was briefed together did they?
JL: That was, yes, well not the second time, we were only given about a couple of hours’ notice to, there was no second briefing, we were just told to fly the original course. Yeah.
CB: Were, when you went off on the ops were all the crew together or were the briefing only for the pilot and navigator?
JL: Well, the pilot and navigator, myself, or bomb aimer I was acting as, we were there and the second pilot, and of course, but the rear gunner was at, well where he should be, the rear gunner. What he, you see he was getting, he was getting fried, there’s no doubt, because the whole aeroplane was on fire and we didn’t know it.
CB: Ah!
JL: So he, what he did, he just rotates his, rotates his, turret, pulls the ripcord, and the airstream takes him out, clear of the, the Whitley was built so that you were clear of the tail, the rear gunner was clear of the tail, twin tail, it just pulls him off and that’s it, that’s what he did, yeah, but as I say he broke his ankle, that’s all.
CB: So all the crew survived.
JL: All the crew survived, yes.
CB: And all of them were captured.
JL: All of them were taken prisoner, yes.
CB: Taken prisoner. What about after the war, first of all how did you get back? Were you flown back or did you come on a ship? Or what happened?
JL: Well at the end of the war, I was here wasn’t I.
CB: No, but you were flown back were you? Or did you come back by ship?
JL: Oh I see what you mean! Well, we by the I think it was the 1st of May 1945, we heard a bombardment and we guessed that was to cover the crossing of the Elbe by the British forces. The next day, the 2nd into the, we were billeted in a farmyard, well we were told that it belonged to a German, well he was in the tobacco business we heard, I don’t know how true that it was, but anyway, the accommodation was fine, we managed to get, it was good weather then, quite warm, no problem there. Into this compound the, came a, there was a British light armoured vehicle. There was a Captain I think, and a corporal. He didn’t say it to me but apparently he said to somebody, I believe there are quite a number of POWs here, and they said yeah, about six hundred if you look around. And that was the end of the war. What we didn’t know was, that as of the 30th of April all German forces in North West Germany surrendered to the British. Well they obviously, they’d rather surrender to the British than the bloody Russians wouldn’t they, that’s what they did. So actually the war ended in that part of the world a week before the main alliance. So, I remember the guards, they neatly piled their arms as you should do and that and they went off to what was called the cage, which was, that was the name the British gave to it, where they, and then they’d be taken ordinary prisoners of war. We’d only been there a short while and a convoy of American Mac trucks turned up and we were loaded on to these and this convoy set off. We got to a place called Rheiner, where we exchanged the American transport for British, well they were only yes, British RSC vehicles and we finally, we crossed the Elbe, I know. They had, well they had one of these revolving things and all the searchlights on, the idea because the war was still on theoretically, as protection as we crossed the Elbe. We, that’s right, we stopped at Luneburg, which was the place a week later the official German surrender took place, and they flew us on, then they drove us on next day to this Rheiner, this airfield at Rheiner. And we waited and we, I was flown home, most of them were, in the, it was a Douglas DC3.
[Other]: Dakota.
JL: They called it a Dakota. And we landed at Dunsfold in Surrey I think it was, where they gave us tea and biscuits you know, the Women’s VS, and we were really then rushed high, as quick as possible up to RAF Cosford which was the gathering centre for POWs, and there we were stripped bare, I don’t think, I never had any, they were thinking of lice. Actually, interesting thing I never saw a louse all the time I was in Germany, let alone getting infected with them, lice so that was. We used to get showers occasionally, but that was, that was certainly not getting rid of lice, it was merely to get a bit of, clean ourselves. We had a quick turn around. I was given fresh clothing, battle dress only with an officer’s stripe on it and I was home on the 9th of May 1945. We were living, my mother was living in Wallington. She had a flat which was a house owned by a relative. Wallington it was, yes.
CB: In Surrey.
[Other]: Surrey.
JL: Yeah, in Surrey, yeah. That was it, that’s my war story.
CB: So how did you actually get to the Elbe? Were you in the Long March?
JL: Oh, I, you look at my book, I never called it a march, it was a, I called it the long walk home.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Yeah well, in those days the incurable optimists thought that when the Russians turn up: oh they’ll be brothers in arms and we’ll celebrate their victory with liberal tots of vodka. [Laugh] We didn’t think that! We refused to countenance the story that Hitler, and he did actually give this order, all, all commissioned personnel, ex-prisoners of war to be shot. But fortunately in those days his writ didn’t extend much beyond his bunker. So we refused to accept that. The one that we thought would happen and in fact it did that we would be put on the road and have to leg it to wherever we were supposed to be going. That is why I used to do at least five circuits a day on foot.
CB: In the camp.
JL: In the camp, yeah, in preparation for this, and of course it paid off. It wasn’t, the Germans never pushed the pace. The only thing is, our first night I couldn’t find any covered accommodation. Everywhere I went I was politely told to shove off [laughter]. No room at the inn. So I crawled into a great pile of hay, or straw I suppose it was really, covered myself entirely and I went to sleep and next morning I got up and I was all right. From then it was really dead easy, because a thaw had set in. These people who had built themselves sleighs – they were useless. Similarly those people that had got trollies, they were useless because they didn’t have any hard wood for a bearing, it went through and that was their trollies and their sleighs were useless. I went, I just plodded on. I had a little suitcase I remember, made of fibre. The first, the second night, after the, when I settled down to the straw or hay, or whatever it was, we were billeted in the stable. I believe it was actually, the stable was owned by General von Arnim. The man who replaced Rommel when he was repatriated on grounds of ill health, wasn’t he. I don’t know, that’s the story, it belonged to General von Arnim. Anyway, I was bad enough to get a dry place to sleep. I admit I was a bit close to the horses, but I don’t think they’re any particular menace. I was awakened by a terrific bang! I thought oh my goodness that’s a shot first of all, isn’t it. I thought no, not a shot. I looked, I was using my little fibre suitcase as a pillow, and there was a bloody great hole in it, it was the hoof of a, it must have been within inches of my head! [Laughter] But from then on it was dead easy because the, we stopped at a place called Spremburg. Now there was a glass factory operating and it was still working. We managed to get a, I did manage to get a bit of a wash down and the girls were decent enough to look the other way. I managed to get myself a bit of a clean up. From there we went on to a place called Spremburg, which was a rail head. Now here our column was split in two, why, I don’t know. One, we were loaded on to, on to, they weren’t cattle trucks, they were the old fashioned you know, these Eschable carourdon [?] variety from the first world war, we were loaded in to one of these. The others they went to a place called Luckenwalde, I think was, actually that was liberated by the, by the Russians, and from all accounts they weren’t too well treated to start with by the Russians until they found, were sure who they were. But we were lucky, we were loaded into this. Well, it was crowded, yes I grant you, but the real reason was that we were in pitch dark, everybody wanted, for some unearthly reason to sit as near the door they could. I don’t know if they think it was suddenly going to open and they were going to be wafted away to safety, but they wouldn’t move. When daylight came we were able to sort ourselves out. Now I grant you the toilet facilities were not all that good, but no worse than a ordinary soldier in the field in action has to cope with, a sort of open latrine, and above all, I’ve virtually I’ve experienced worse crowding in London’s underground. So it wasn’t all that bad. We trundled along, we, I remember we did a very slow stop-start circuit of Berlin, course there was a raid going on at the time. We arrived then at a place called, what was it, oh it was a little village, small settlement, not far from Bremen. We, it was, I remember we stopped outside this camp, and look up at it and miserable rain was coming down, there was this thing over the door, well it didn’t, we used to always used to say it was a “Work Makes You Free”, and we used to say “work yourself to death”, but it looked a pretty dreary and unuttering place and we went in to this. It was called Marlag and Milag Nord and it was designed, by the name you could tell, for Royal Marine and Merchant Navy officers: Marlag and Milag. And there were, we were a little concerned because we thought this camp is empty. Where have all these Marine, Naval and Marine officers gone? And we got a horrible thought they might be in some mass grave or other. However, it wasn’t true, they had been moved, when, where and why I’m not actually sure. But when we got inside, well if we had any clothing, warm clothing we were lucky, or dry clothing we put it on. It was a nothing, not a camp I’d recommend but it was, at least it was dry and there was, we had adequate food. There was a certain thing, belief that we were short of food, well I can assure you we never were, we had more than we could do with because the Red Cross parcels were being delivered by since the rail system was on the blink they were coming in by truck and they were, they were dumping parcels by the side of the road by us. Well I couldn’t carry, well most of us did, took out things like chocolate and tea and coffee and things like that, the rest of it. We offered them to the guards but they wouldn’t, neither would the civilians, I suppose they still might be pounced upon by die-hard SS, SS army, the army SS not the civilian SS. In fact one, one night we were billeted with these SS Waffen, Waffen SS, they, weaponed I mean, armed SS and we did, well always had a low profile but these chaps were very willing to chat to us. They got somehow idea that it wouldn’t be long before we joined forces with them and then finally put the bloody Russians -
CB: Out of Germany.
JL: Where they should be. Well it was, well, actually the second, as I say, if the first leg of the, our all expenses tour of north Germany was bearable, the second was a doddle. It was fine weather. Warm enough to sleep outside, in fact sometimes we walked through orchards white with blossom, not with snow with blossoms and we, there was no attempt to force the pace, but what did happen on the way, we stopped, in all the, four, nearly four years I was a prisoner of war I never suffered not even verbal abuse, let alone physical, never, but this particular, we did have a bit of trouble there, it was more directed at personal about us, in general. In fact the civilian population we got, they tried to you know, reach our ranks, the Germans just turned bayonet and rifle, pointed and don’t you dare come any closer. Well we moved on and then we thought we heard an explosion and we saw smoke arising from this. We thought it was the town that had been attacked, and we, you know as they say well it couldn’t have happened to nicer people. I’m afraid it wasn’t that, it was our column [emphasis] that had been attacked! By a, I think it was a Canadian Squadron Leader flying a Typhoon. He, he must have been blind, because this, it couldn’t possibly been a, it wasn’t a, looked like a German unit of any description but anyway I’m afraid he did and there were quite a few people killed on there. And that to my mind I think was the only, some, I’ve read in terms of hundreds something, hundreds killed on this so called long march, it’s just not true. The only other fatal casualty was a chap named Large I think it was, he had a ruptured appendix but there’s no reason to say he wouldn’t have had it anyway, it wasn’t caused by the conditions and that was that. We reached, we reached the place called Stade, was the southern side of the Elbe, and oh one thing I did see while we were at Marlag and Milag Nord, I saw a V2 fired, not many people have seen that. There was a bit of a rising ground and I happened to be on it and then suddenly I saw this, this thing, this great rocket, with this great burst of flame as it rised slowly and slowly and slowly, and it appeared, of course that was as much an optical illusion, it held itself out and it turned to get its bearing and by that time it couldn’t reach Britain, so probably the target was Antwerp, but that’s I saw a V2 fired and not many people have seen that. Anyway, we got to this Stade place and the Elbe ferry if you please, was still not operating normally, it was, and there was a, there was a boot repairer there, some people’s boots needed a bit of attention, mine were all right, but anyway he did what he could. We crossed the Elbe and we arrived at a place called, oh, just outside Hamburg. You come up a cobbled street, which we had, quite steep and we were then met by what, I, was the most horrible thing I’ve ever come across, a migration of slugs! Can you believe this, they were marching up on a broad front. There was absolutely no way of avoiding them. Blankenese, was the name of this little town, that’s the name of it: Blankenese. We tried to pick our way, very, very carefully and thank god I managed to keep on my feet, otherwise if I’d fallen can you imagine the state I’d been in. Well from then on it was, it was easy going and as I say, we got to this, this open, this tobacco man’s, well he was, farm and from then on it was the journey home. But I’ll never forget, oddly enough we saw a reverse, I mean a thing so beautiful. I’d never seen it before. It was a, I didn’t tell you, hadn’t told you that in September of 1942, I and a number of others were for some reason which the Germans had and they didn’t bother to give us the details, we were transferred to a place called Offlag 21B. Now Offlag meant it was an officer’s camp, that’s all. 21B. And we stayed there through a rather dreary time, the winter, until we moved in April, but I came back and I didn’t go in to the north compound I went back to the east compound for some reason or other. Why I don’t know, and actually I didn’t move into the north compound where the tunnel was being dug until September of 1943. How are we doing?
CB: You’re doing well. One final question. What happened to the guards after you’d walked all this way? Did they just surrender or did they leg it or what did they do?
JL: Oh yes. Well they were only part of this. They’d realised, they heard they were all German forces had surrendered and they were only too pleased, they just neatly piled their arms and that was that. They knew all right. And they went off to go, to be taken in what we called the cages to a British prisoner of war camp. Some of them actually, when I lived in Salcombe in South Devon many years later, there was a chap there used to run a driving tuition, he’d been one of these there and he’d stayed in England.
CB: Funny.
JL: So he didn’t have too bad a time.
CB: Well Jack Lyon, thank you for a very interesting conversation.
JL: My pleasure.
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Interview with Jack Kenneth Lyon
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Chris Brockbank
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2018-02-02
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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02:03:03 audio recording
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eng
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Jack Lyon was a navigator/ bomb aimer and a prisoner of war for almost four years. Born in 1918, he was employed with the London Gas Company as a bookkeeper until August 1939 when he transferred to Shell. At the outbreak of the war, Shell closed their London office and Jack enlisted in the RAF on the 5th September. He was attracted to the extra privileges that aircrew received. Initial training commenced in late 1939 and elementary flying training in June 1940. Being unsuccessful with pilot training, Jack completed navigator training at RAF Prestwick, followed by armament training at RAF Manby, and operational training at RAF Kinloss. On completion of training, Jack was awarded his commission and posted to RAF Linton-on-Ouse. Being the only commissioned member of the crew, Jack found the opportunities to socialise restricted. Having only completed a few operations, Jack and his crew had to abandon their stricken aircraft. Separated from his crew, Jack was arrested by a German soldier cycling past who, faced with a long walk, decided the easiest way was for Jack to ride on the crossbar. Stopping at the first house they came to, the soldier arranged for Jack’s wounds to be attended to, and he was given tea and cake. Initially billeted in Stalag Luft 1, before being transferred to Stalag Luft 3 in April 1942, where he remained until early 1945. Douglas Bader was also billeted there, and Jack witnessed the famous incident when Bader inspected the German guards before being transferred. Early in 1945 with the advancing Russian army getting near, Jack participated in what became known as “The Long March”. Following the German surrender, Jack returned home, and following demob, returned to continue his career with Shell.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Ian Whapplington
Anne-Marie Watson
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
Poland
England--Lincolnshire
England--Yorkshire
Germany--Barth
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Düsseldorf
Poland--Żagań
Scotland--Moray
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941-05-01
1941-06-21
1941-06-03
1942-09
1943
1945-05-01
1945-05-09
aircrew
bomb aimer
navigator
prisoner of war
RAF Kinloss
RAF Linton on Ouse
RAF Manby
RAF Prestwick
Red Cross
shot down
Stalag Luft 1
Stalag Luft 3
the long march
V-2
V-weapon
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1765/30842/YLayneAJ[Ser -DoB]v1.pdf
431b8287366017324d483a85e57b41ba
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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Layne, Wally
Walter Henry Layne
W H Layne
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-06-07
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
Layne, WH
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. The collection concerns Walter 'Wally' Layne (b. 1916, 963012, 40348 Royal Air Force) and contains his log book, prisoner of war diary, personal and official correspondence and photographs. He flew operations as a wireless operator with 97 Squadron and became a prisoner of war after being shot down.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by D Layne and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
TUESDAY. NOVEMBER 9 TH 1943.
My dear husband – Today I received your postcard stating that you are a prisoner of war. I cant tell you just how I do feel – after the agony of the last forty six days I can really begin to live again. God has answered my prayers and He knows how grateful I am.
The news that you were missing came as a dreadful shock. I got the wire at 1.15p.m. At the shop, Friday September 24th. I had listened to the 1-0 pm. news, heard that our 'planes had raided Mannheim and that thirty two were missing, but not for a second did I think that yours could be one of them. Never for a moment even at my blackest hours did I believe that you were gone from me – there were times when I had to fight hard – but thank God my faith remained unbroken.
You would be surprised at the sympathy I was shown, it helped such a lot. I have kept all the letters
[page break]
for you, they will explain themselves.
On Thursday October 21st, the news came via Frank, through the press, that you had been awarded the D.F.C. I was, and of course am terribly proud. I am wondering if I have to go to receive the 'gong', or if it will be left until you can fetch it yourself.
I shall keep a diary day by day for you darling – there will be so much that I shall be unable to tell you in the letters I can send.
I haven't been to the pictures since August, so tomorrow, by way of celebration for my grand news I am going to see your favourite – Betty Grable in 'Springtime in the Rockies'
I have written fifteen letters today – does my arm ache? I know I shan't sleep tonight, but who cares. I think I must be one of the happiest beings in the world.
Wrote my first P.O.W. Letter.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY. NOVEMBER 10th 1943.
I feel awfully sick today dear, I think its re-action. I haven't done much work – Ive had a series of 'phone calls and visitors all day. I didnt realise we had so very many friends. Its just grand.
No particular war news today.
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 11th 43.
Heard from Lois – wrote her and Chalky White, still feeling hilarious. Had a hair set, and saw Betty Grable in 'Springtime in the Rockies'. Have been stopped countless times by people who have heard the good news. Bought a wizard maternity dress.
FRIDAY NOVEMBER 12th 1943
Awfully cold today. Heard from numerous folk. Wrote to the McGregors. RAF depository wrote regarding your personal effects. Hope to get them before long.
[page break]
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 13th 43.
Received a letter and cheque to the value of £6-2-6 from the club of the Earl of Derby. Cannot tell you how touched I was by this truly grand gesture. One of my customers brought in a cyclamen plant – feel as if I'm married to public hero No 1. Have been feted and congratulated until I feel in a whirl.
SUNDAY NOVEMBER 14th 43.
A really dreadful day with snow, wind and rain. Had a celebration at the report centre in thanksgiving for your safety. Mary took a bottle of port – I took jelly, blancmange and cake. Comforted in a sense by peoples good wishes etc. but, my own boy, my heart is so full when I think of you. I miss you terribly – miss your letters 'phone calls – everything. May God help us both to endure the separation until you return.
Wrote to you.
[page break]
MONDAY NOVEMBER 15th 43.
Heard from Betty Caygill. Stan Packard has been repatriated. I am writing this at Stoneleigh, and know that I shall never be happy here again. I think I should have finished altogether – it was a mistake to come back. Its almost more than I can bear when I think of the joy we have known here together. I must think hard tonight, definitely shant stay.
TUESDAY. NOVEMBER 16th 43.
Received a very much less frightening priority telegram confirming that you are a P.O.W. Horribly cold. Feel a little less miserable than yesterday. Packed up a large amount of glass and linen, and tidied drawers in anticipation of leaving here before long. Americans are at Bottesford, St Vincents, and numerous other camps. See more going around than our own boys. No mail today.
WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 17th 43
Heard from Air Ministry Casualty Branch confirming telegram of yesterday, also from Bib Brocklesby and Mrs McKinan she is still without news of her husband and I feel reluctant to tell her of my good news. Very little to tell you dear. Shall be so glad when I hear from you again. I do think of you. Came across Tom Pullen’s home address and wrote telling him of your whereabouts.
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 18th 43.
News came from the squadron that you were commissioned to the rank of Pilot Officer with effect from September 13th 43. Feel terribly proud, you have done so well. Heard from Chalky and Mrs Nelson. Wrote to you, also Air Ministry Accounts regarding pay. Our bombers raided Ludwigshafen – lost one. There have been very few large scale raids of late. Finished reading of all books ‘Night life of the Gods’ don’t know whether I liked it or not.
[page break]
FRIDAY NOVEMBER 19th 43.
Heard from the McGregors and Lois. Our planes bombed Berlin and Ludwigshafen – we lost thirty two. According to radio the biggest force ever sent. I am really awfully glad about you having a commission. Have read the letter over and over again.
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 20th 43.
Very busy day in the shop, I get tired easily now. Our bombers raided Leverkusen north of Cologne – lost five. Went to the report centre, slept at Harlaxton Road. Romany died.
SUNDAY NOVEMBER 21st 43.
Spent the day at Harlaxton Road. Did not turn out, horrible fog and rain. Wrote to you, also Mrs McKinna. Am reading ‘Pilots Wife’s Tale’ by Esther Terry Wright. No particular war news.
[page break]
MONDAY NOVEMBER 22nd 43
Have an awful crop of chilblains. No mail today, in fact an altogether very uneventful day. Nothing happened worth recording. Might mention that Mr Apps called to see me and make the usual remarks about my good news.
TUESDAY NOVEMBER 23rd 43.
Berlin received its heaviest raid of the war last night – we lost twenty six air craft. No mail. Wrote to Lois, Bib Brocklesby, Miss Elliott and Cecil Franklin. Stuffed the teddy bear nightdress case you gave me for junior. Reading ‘Late and Soon’ by E.M. Delafield.
WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 24th 43.
Berlin raided again – twenty aircraft lost. Dreadful windy day, turned to rain. Mrs Ford gone to London to buy. [sic] Had a letter from Bill Bridgewater. Shall be glad to leave Stoneleigh. Wrote to you.
[page break]
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 25th 43
Received a letter from Mrs McKinna to tell me that she and Mrs Foster have received a wire stating that from information received their husbands are believed to have lost their lives. Feel very very sorry. Wrote her and Chalky. Mosquitoes attacked Berlin – one lost.
FRIDAY NOVEMBER 26th
Our bombers attacked Frankfort – thirteen lost. Went to the report centre, slept at Harlaxton Road.
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 27th
All Lancaster force bombed Berlin – Halifaxes bombed Stuttgart. Thirty two aircraft lost. Dorothy and I went to see Tyrone Power in ‘The Black Swan’.
[page break]
SUNDAY NOVEMBER 28th
Spent a very lazy day. Great fuss going on owing to the release of Mosley. Wrote to you.
MONDAY NOVEMBER 29th
Felling off colour. Nothing of particular importance to relate. Spent the evening at Thorneydene. Very cold and windy.
TUESDAY NOVEMBER 30th
Heard from RAF at Slough who are releasing a parcel of your clothing. Spent the evening and night with Aileen and George Challard, who have been surprisingly kind to me during the past weeks.
WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 1st
Told them at Stoneleigh that I am leaving – they were very kind and quite understood my position. Shirley paid me a visit. Still feeling rotten.
[page break]
THURSDAY DECEMBER 2nd 43.
Simply awful news today. Vic was killed in an aircraft accident, on 1st Dec. Went to see poor little Shirley – she is heart broken. Feel absolutely terrible about it.
FRIDAY DECEMBER 2nd 43.
Vic would have been thirty three today. Went along to Shirley again. I’m afraid she will be many years getting over the shock. Our planes raided Berlin forty one lost – more sorrow for someone.
SATURDAY DECEMBER 4th 43.
Packed up a lot of my things at Stoneleigh. I received a parcel of your clothing from the central depository yesterday. Our bombers raided Leipzig – twenty three lost.
[page break]
SUNDAY YOUR BIRTHDAY 1943
Wore a new dress in your honour. Mother and I went to see Shirley. Started packing up at Stoneleigh.
MONDAY 6-12-43
An uneventful day. Did a great deal of packing. Mick visited us.
TUESDAY 7-12-43
Had my first letter from you – did me a lot of good too. Wrote to you, also Robbie, whose mother sent me a letter. Went along to see Shirley. Your letter dated 25th Oct.
WEDNESDAY 8-12-43.
Sent you 200 cigarettes. Preparing a red cross parcel. Received a P.O.W. magazine. Spent my last night at Stoneleigh. Horrible foggy weather. Vic was buried today.
[page break]
THURSDAY 9-12-43
Moved from Stoneleigh. Feel awfully weary – a very tiring business.
FRIDAY 10-12-43.
Despatched your red cross parcel. Faired very well at the red + centre. Not feeling too good.
SATURDAY 11-12-43.
Have to return my allotment book until you make necessary arrangements regarding my allowance. Horribly cold. Still feeling rotten. Purchased a few Christmas gifts.
SUNDAY 12-12-43.
Stayed in all day – wrote to you, and various RAF departments, also Charlie, the McGregors and Percy.
[page break]
MONDAY 13th DEC 43.
Had a letter and postcard from you, dated 14th October. Awful cold weather. Went to report centre.
TUESDAY 14th DEC 43.
Fog all day. Went to bed at 7-45 pm. No mail. Nothing to report.
WEDNESDAY 15th DEC 43.
No mail. Wrote to numerous people – also yourself.
THURSDAY 16th DEC 43.
Heard from Mrs Pugh – Mrs McGregor and Helen, also Lloyds regarding your RAF pay.
FRIDAY 17th DEC 43.
An uneventful day. Nothing worth recording. Very serious ‘flu epidemic sweeping the country. Our planes raided Berlin. Thirty missing.
[page break]
SATURDAY 18th DEC 43.
A very busy day at the shop. Mr Churchill is in Africa suffering from pneumonia, but is recovering.
SUNDAY 19th DEC 43.
Awfully cold. Wrote to you – also Mrs McGregor – Helen and Lois. Made Derek some dungarees.
MONDAY 20th DEC 43.
This is becoming a boring narrative. ‘Fraid I lead a very uneventful life.
TUESDAY 21st DEC 43.
Our bombers raided Frankfurt and Mannheim we lost forty two. Awful Christmas for some poor things.
WEDNESDAY 22nd DEC 43.
Very busy at the shop. Mrs F. not well. Sent you 200 cigarettes.
[page break]
THURSDAY DEC. 23rd 43.
Had a hair set. Open all day at the shop. Not feeling too good. Raided Berlin Seventeen planes lost.
FRIDAY DEC 24th 43.
Queer day. I can’t work up an interest in Christmas. Mrs Howard left after an argument regarding time off with her husband. Phil & Fred came at night – toasted your health and consequently almost finished myself off. Listened to Scrooge on the wireless. Missing you terribly Dorothy and I attended midnight communion.
SATURDAY CHRISTMAS DAY 1943.
The quietest Christmas day I have ever experienced. Didn’t get dressed at all. Lazed around in my housecoat. Still feeling not so good. Dorothy and I went to bed at 9 -30 p.m. Thought of you all day and wondered what you were doing. Very mild weather.
[page break]
SUNDAY 26th DEC. 43.
Wrote to you – Had a most unexpected visit from Chalky white and his girl friend. Thought it grand of them to come. Had a bit of a party. The folks from Newark came also Mr & Mrs Christopher and Shirley.
MONDAY 27th DEC. 43.
Spent the afternoon and evening at Thorneydene, enjoyed it very much. Mr F. suggests chartering a plane to fetch you home after the war. Is also saving some cigars for you.
TUESDAY 28th DEC. 43.
Had a letter from Mrs Silver. Mooched around during the morning. Dorothy and I had a walk during the afternoon. Went to bed early. Very glad Christmas is over. Must report that the home fleet sank the Scharnhorst on Saturday night, sorry Sunday the 26th. Wrote to you.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY DEC 29th. 43.
Went back to work. Wrote to Mrs Pugh and Bib Brocklesby. Coastal command and naval forces sank three axis destroyers and a blockade runner in the Bay of Biscay. Considerably colder.
THURSDAY DEC 30th 43.
Our bombers raided Berlin, we lost twenty aircraft. The staff were guests of Mr & Mrs Forth at a tea given at the Picture House, and afterwards to the cinema show, which was Leslie Howard in ‘Stand In’ and a supporting film ‘The fugitive lady’ which I liked best. Altogether very enjoyable.
FRIDAY DEC 31st 43.
Very cold. Started stock taking. The last day of a very sad year on the whole. Dorothy’s trouble, Shirley’s loss, and my anxiety. As I write this, I wonder dear one if I shall see you in 1944 – pray God that I do.
[page break]
SATURDAY JANUARY 1st 44
Sent your letters and cards to Frank. A mild uneventful day. Reading ‘Polonaise’ by Doris Leslie. Received ‘Captain Moonlight’ by Ethel Mannin from the book club.
SUNDAY JANUARY 2nd 44
Didn’t turn out all day. Our planes raided Berlin and Hamburg, twenty eight lost. Wrote to you, also Chalky.
MONDAY JANUARY 3rd 44.
Not feeling so good. Our planes raided Berlin again, twenty seven lost. Got your personal belongings back from Air Ministry.
TUESDAY JANUARY 4th 44
Came back from work in the middle of the morning. Have a rotten cold, Dorothy too. Heard from Mrs McGregor yesterday.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY JAN 5th 44.
Still off work. Heard from Tom Pullen – he is now a P/O just about to start a second tour.
THURSDAY JAN 6th 44.
Went to see the doctor for an examination. Still feeling rather seedy but went to the shop. Our bombers raided Stettin – fifteen lost. Mr & Mrs Forth gone to Brigg. Mr Hyslop left money for 200 cigarettes for you. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY JAN 7th 44.
Wrote to Mr Hyslop, Tom Pullen and Betty Caygill. Received my second P. of W. magazine. Sent you 200 cigarettes. Russians fighting ten miles inside Poland. Eva Johnson tells me that young Prouten is missing.
[page break]
SATURDAY JAN 8th 44.
Paid income tax totalling £10-6-0. Heard from Ruth.
SUNDAY JAN 9th 44.
A Horrible wet day. Went to tea at Shirley’s.
MONDAY JAN 10th 44.
Still feeling not so good. Went to bed early. Busy taking stock.
TUESDAY JAN 11th 44.
Germans shot Ciano. Bern Twilley called in the shop to see me. Is now F/O. Wrote to Ruth. Feel rotten. Heard from Mrs Bowley.
WEDNESDAY JAN 12th 44.
A very uneventful day. Feel I shall go mad if I don’t soon have news of you. I am missing you terribly - wrote to you.
[page break]
THURSDAY JAN 13th 44.
Feeling simply awful. Went to bed after dinner. Missing you horribly.
FRIDAY JAN 14th 44.
Feel a bit better. Our bombers went out for the first time for ages. Americans doing a lot of day raiding.
SATURDAY JAN 15th 44.
We raided Brunswick – lost thirty eight Bombers. Heard from Chalky. Bill came to spend leave. Shirley brought two of Vic’s friends down. I went to bed at 7.0 P.M.
SUNDAY JAN 16th 44.
Got up at 9.15 AM. A lovely rest – feel much better. Spent a pleasant day. Took D.J. for a walk in the afternoon. Played cards, read, and wrote to you at night. A lovely frosty sunny day.
[page break]
MONDAY JAN 17th 44.
Feeling much more cheerful – received letters from you dated Nov 7th and 20th. Wrote to Lois. Damp, dirty weather.
TUESDAY JAN 18th 44.
Shirley’s birthday – Mum, Dorothy and Bill went along at night. Feeling not so good again. Wrote to Mrs McGregor.
WEDNESDAY JAN 19th 44.
Had the doctor to see me – advised me to give up my work. Had a letter and a pink matinee coat from Bib Brocklesby. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY JAN 20th 44.
A day in bed – feeling weak, fed up, and missing you terribly.
FRIDAY JAN 21st 44.
Our bombers raided Berlin – thirty five missing. Still taking things quietly. Joan McKelvey had a son.
[page break]
SATURDAY JAN 22/44.
Our bombers raided Magdeburg and Berlin – 55 missing. Had a walk to the shop in the afternoon. Mum and I went to see Bob Hope, Dorothy Lamour in ‘They got me covered’. A grand film. 9-0 pm news revealed that 52 planes were lost.
SUNDAY JAN 23/44
Wrote to you dear. Four months ago today you went missing. Shirley came at night.
MONDAY JAN 24/44
Finished altogether at the shop – glad of the rest. Miserable day, rain etc. No particular news.
TUESDAY JAN 25/44
Had a good rest. Took Derek out. Bill went back. Beginning to feel very tired.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY JAN 26/44.
Wrote to you. Heard from Effie. Leading an uneventful life.
THURSDAY JAN 27/44.
Took D.J. out morning and afternoon, tired myself out. A rotten nights rest despite that.
FRIDAY JAN 28/44.
Went to Thorneydene to clear out your chest of drawers. Lancaster force raided Berlin – 34 lost. Phil & Fred came.
SATURDAY JAN 29/44.
Berlin again raided – 47 bombers lost. Strong American daylight force raided Frankfurt. Called at the shop.
SUNDAY JAN 30/44
A glorious day. Took D.J. out in the morning. Rested during the afternoon. Wrote to you.
[page break]
MONDAY JAN31/44.
Received a P.C. from you dated Nov 15th. Betty Scothern had a baby boy. Wrote to Robbie. Called at the report centre at night to collect local gossip. Our planes raided Berlin again – 33 lost.
TUESDAY FEB 1st 44.
Took D.J. out during the morning and afternoon – otherwise a very uneventful day. No mail – no particular war news.
WEDNESDAY FEB 2nd 44
Wrote to you. Took D.J. out.
THURSDAY FEB 3rd 44.
A horrible day – rain and wind. Had a hair set.
FRIDAY FEB 4th 44.
Mrs F. ill. Did some shopping. Very rough weather.
[page break]
SATURDAY FEB 5th 44.
Had a P.C. from Dal dated 7th Nov. Spent a few hours at the shop during the afternoon. Bill arrived unexpectedly – his 21st today.
SUNDAY FEB 6th 44.
Wrote to you, also Dal. Feeling not so good. Had tea at Shirley’s.
MONDAY FEB 7th 44.
Heard from Lois – feeling awful, have a bad chill on the stomach – most painful
TUESDAY FEB 8th 44.
Still feeling awful – Little to relate. Wrote to Frank - made out a list for your second red cross parcel.
WEDNESDAY FEB 9th 44.
Mrs F. went to hospital. The Mitchells, Shirley & Reg came at night. Wrote to you. Saw the doctor for final examination.
[page break]
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 10th 44.
A horrible cold day. Did not go out. Very uneventful day.
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 11th 44.
Went to the hospital to see Mrs. F.
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 12th 44.
Went out during the afternoon. Heard from Pop she had a baby boy on Feb 6th.
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 13th 44.
Wrote to you, also Lois. Didn’t go out all day. No particular news.
MONDAY FEBRUARY 14 h 44.
Alice and I went to see Mrs F. She looks much improved. Sent you 200 cigarettes. Wrote to Frank and Pop. Dick Campling’s [inserted] Pa [/inserted] paid us a short visit.
[page break]
TUESDAY FEBRUARY 15th 44.
Our day darling – my thoughts have been all of you. Mrs Silver sent me a cot cover, toy rabbit and 10/- for cigarettes. Heard from Bib Brocklesby. Took D.J. out. A lovely sunny day with a fullness of treasured memories.
WEDNESDY FEBRUARY 16th 44.
Went to see Mrs. F. again with Alice. Large raid on Berlin- 43 planes lost.
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 17th 44.
A horrible wet day, did not turn out at all. Heard from Chalky.
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 18th 44.
Went to see Mrs F. again. Bib sent me a copy of ‘The Briggensian’ Wrote to Chalky.
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 19th 44.
No particular news. Went to see the doctor. Horribly cold. Reading ‘Bombers fly East’ by Bruce Sanders.
[page break]
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 20th 44.
Our planes raided Leipzig in great strength. 79 missing. A very cold day did not go out. Wrote to you also Bib.
MONDAY FEBRUARY 21st 44.
Received a letter from you dated 5th December. Mr Campling wrote. Dick went missing on last Berlin raid. Our planes raided Stuttgart, lost 10. Went to see Mrs F. Wrote to you.
TUESDAY FEBRUARY 22nd 44.
Frank sent £2 – towards your next parcel. Hopkins moved your chest of drawers.
WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 23rd 44.
Cleaned and rearranged my bedroom. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 24th 44.
No particular news. Took D.J. out in the morning. Reading ‘Rain on her face’ by John Paddy Carstairs.
[page break]
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 25th 44.
Mum and Dorothy went to Nottingham to see Derrick. Prepared your red cross parcel sending vests, trunks, pullover, gloves, sox, tie shaving tackle etc. Our planes raided Sikeinfurt – 35 lost.
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 26th 44.
Recorded 29th February. Taken to hospital at 8-0 P.M.
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 27th 44
A terrible day – full of pain.
MONDAY FEBRUARY 28th 44.
Simply awful until baby was born at approx. 5-45 P.M.
TUESDAY FEBRUARY 29th 44
Haven’t been allowed to see our baby yet. Dorothy brought a card from you dated 26th October. Auntie Josie sent David Ian £4.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY MARCH 1st 44
Saw David Ian for the first time at 6-15 P.M. In a sense it was a bitter sweet meeting – he is so ridiculously like you darling. I am missing you more than I dare admit.
THURSDAY MARCH 2nd 44
Saw our son five times today - am trying to feed him. He is cute, looks just like Grand Pa Layne. Miss Johnson gave him a token for 15/- Mum, Alice and Shirley came to see me. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY MARCH 3rd 44
Return of kidney disorder. They are giving me M&B 693 and some medicine.
SATURDAY MARCH 4th 44
Not feeling very good. Mrs F. came in to see me.
[page break]
SUNDAY MARCH 5th 44
Mum and Dorothy came.
MONDAY MARCH 6th 44
Another not so good day.
TUESDAY MARCH 7th 44
Not much change.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 8th
Feeling a little better.
THURSDAY MARCH 9th 44
Heard from Caterpillar Club you are awarded certificate and badge. Red Cross are sending a cable advising you of David Ian’s birth.
FRIDAY MARCH 10th 44
Uneventful day. Feeling rather better. Missing you terribly. David Ian doing well, and getting very pretty.
[page break]
SATURDAY MARCH 11th 44
Usual routine. My leg giving me trouble – very maddening.
SUNDAY MARCH 12th 44
Allowed out of bed. Enjoyed a good hot bath. Mother and Dorothy came to see me. Wrote to you.
MONDAY MARCH 13th 44
Another ‘off’ day, and a dreadful longing for you.
TUESDAY MARCH 14th 44
Feeling much better.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 15th 44
Left hospital at 3.30 P.M. Feel decidedly weak, and wished so much that I was going home to you. Mrs F. left too.
THURSDAY MARCH 16th 44
Not very good. David Ian not feeding very well. Our planes raided Stuttgart – 40 lost.
[page break]
FRIDAY MARCH 17th 44
Things better today. Dr Gray came to see me had a good talk with her and feel less worried.
SATURDAY MARCH 18th 44
Went to St Johns for churching. Sent red cross parcel.
SUNDAY MARCH 19th 44
Took David out. Went as far as Mrs Christopher’s. Felt awfully tired. Bill turned up. Planes raided Frankfurt – 22 lost. The sirens went, but nothing doing.
MONDAY MARCH 20th 44
Feel horribly miserable – missing you terribly. Wrote to you.
TUESDAY MARCH 21st 44
Another not so good day. So wish I could hear from you. Registered David Ian’s birth.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY MARCH 22nd 44
Got a taxi and took David to Thorneydene, spent a most enjoyable afternoon and evening.
THURSDAY MARCH 23rd 44
Our planes raided Frankfurt. 33 lost. Took David to the welfare centre, he weighs 7 lbs – 12 ozs. Wrote to you. Heard from Mrs M Kinna.
FRIDAY MARCH 24th 44
Just six months since you were reported missing my darling. Took our son out in the afternoon Feeling much better.
SATURDAY MARCH 25th 44
Berlin – 73 planes lost. Tony and Paul came for the day. Bill and Jack also here. Went with Shirley to see ‘Dubarry was a lady.’ A shall be so glad when I hear from you. Sent red cross 5/- and have received acknowledgement.
[page break]
SUNDAY MARCH 26th 44
Margaret turned up unexpectedly. Went to Thorneydene. Glorious weather.
MONDAY MARCH 27th 44
Disappointed no letter from you. Took David out in the afternoon. Wrote to you. Essen raided – 9 lost.
TUESDAY MARCH 28th 44
Still no letter. Went to Mrs Christopher’s and stayed tea. Glorious weather.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 29th 44
Much cooler. Stayed in all day.
THURSDAY MARCH 30th 44
David weighs 8 lbs – 7 ozs. Took him for a short walk. Awfully cold.
FRIDAY MARCH 31st 44
Nuremberg – 96 lost. Do wish I could hear from you. Went to the doctor – disappointed at her verdict. Went to see ‘Watch on the Rhine’ with Mum.
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SATURDAY APRIL 1st 44
Went out with Joan Greetham. Still no word from you darling. Went to bed early. Yesterdays losses corrected on radio to 94.
SUNDAY APRIL 2nd 44
Our baby is adorable. Mum stayed in bed until 6 – 0 P.M. Rained all day. Dorothy and I busy. Wrote to you.
MONDAY APRIL 3rd 44
The Warings came. Went out in the morning and afternoon.
TUESDAY APRIL 4th 44
At last, had a P.C. from you dated January 16th. Heard also from RAF accounts who are making over part of your money to me. Miserable showery day. David just wonderful. Received P.O.W. magazine. Bought from Boots for 3/- each ‘Mad dogs and Englishmen’ by Erick Berry. ‘Escape to fight again’ A.P. Luscombe Whyte.
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WEDNESDAY APRIL 5th 44
Heard from Betty Caygill. Showery day. Went for a short walk in the afternoon
THURSDAY APRIL 6th 44
Another P.C. dated January 11th. Roger came over. Took David to the Welfare Centre now weights 8 lb
14 ozs. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY APRIL 7th 44
Worked hard all day, didn’t go out.
SATURDAY APRIL 8th 44
A lovely day. Took David out in the afternoon.
EASTER SUNDAY APRIL 9th 44
Chalky White and Margaret visited us, and stayed overnight. Enjoyable days. Had a drink at Macs.
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MONDAY APRIL 10th 44
Went out in the morning with Chalky, Margaret and David. They went back at 12 – 39 P.M. Dorothy and I went out during the afternoon. Took David to see his Auntie at Miss Ellis’s.
TUESDAY APRIL 11th 44
Paid my hospital bill £7-1-0. Shirley came at night. French rail road targets attacked by strong force. 22 missing.
WEDNESDAY APRIL 12th 44
11 planes missing from attack on targets in France. Dorothy and I had a lovely walk during the afternoon. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY APRIL 13th 44
Heard from Frank – he has made you a member of the old boy’s association. Took David to the welfare centre – he now weighs 9 lbs. 7 ozs.
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FRIDAY APRIL 14th 44
Heard from Air Ministry they are paying me £3-18-0 a week with effect from March 1st. Took David out. Wrote to Frank.
SATURDAY APRIL 15th 44
A really glorious day. Took David out, accompanied by Joan Greetham.
SUNDAY APRIL 16th 44
Had tea with Aileen and George Challand. Wrote to you.
MONDAY APRIL 17th 44
Much cooler. Mum and I went to see Betty Grable in ‘Coney Island’ it was wizard. Called down the report centre at night.
TUESDAY APRIL 18th 44
Went for a walk with Betty Sprawson. A lovely day again.
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WEDNESDAY APRIL 19th 44
Received cheque for £10.17.0 from A.M. Awfully rough wind. 13 aircraft lost from raid on rail targets in France.
THURSDAY APRIL 20th 44
Received cheque for £6.8.5 from C. & K’s. Had tea with Mrs Christopher. David weighs 9 lbs 11 ozs. Mrs MKinna sent him two bibs.
FRIDAY APRIL 21st 44
Wrote to Mrs Mkinna and Lois. Took David to the doctor, he has heat rash for which I am giving him medicine and ointment. Miserable weather.
SATURDAY APRIL 22nd 44
Went to Hougham to look at a sewing machine – turned it down. Lovely day. Joan Greetham stayed at night until 10-0 P.m.
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SUNDAY APRIL 23rd 44
Took David up to Thorneydene – called to see the Lee’s and Mrs Kenny. Very enjoyable. 42 aircraft lost after raid on Dusseldorf. Wrote to you.
MONDAY APRIL 24th 44
Received a P.C. from you dated January 22. Bought a blouse.
TUESDAY APRIL 25th 44
29 aircraft lost after raid on Munich and Karlsruhe. Went out during the afternoon with Betty Sprawson. Wrote to Frank.
WEDNESDAY APRIL 26th 44
Essen 29 aircraft lost.
THURSDAY APRIL 27th 44
Received two postcards from you dated Dec 11th & 31st. Windy today. David weighs 10 lbs 6 ozs.
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FRIDAY APRIL 28th 44
Friedrichshafen – 36 planes lost.
A letter I wrote you returned from censor.
SATURDAY APRIL 29th 44
Went for a walk in the afternoon with Joan Greetham. Received parcel from America.
SUNDAY APRIL 30th 44
Took David out in the evening. No particular news. 10 planes lost from raid on French rail targets.
MONDAY MAY 1st 44
Had David photographed. Saw Mr Hyslop.
TUESDAY MAY 2nd 44
Went for a walk with Betty Sprawson. Another letter returned from censor.
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WEDNESDAY MAY 3rd 44
Received cheque for £10.10.0. Had tea with Mrs Christopher.
THURSDAY MAY 4th 44
Military target at Mailly attacked 49 aircraft lost. Received cheque for £8.15.7. David weighs 10 lbs 14 ozs.
FRIDAY MAY 5th 44
Went to a Red Cross next of kin meeting. Purchased some things for your next parcel. Braces, pipe, hair brush, tooth brush, comb, 2 pairs sox, hussif shaving brush.
SATURDAY MAY 6th 44
Start of ‘Salute the Soldier’ week. Bought David a 30/- certificate. Went out with Joan Greetham. Wrote to you.
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SUNDAY MAY 7th 44
Shirley, Dorothy and I took the children down the park. French rail targets attacked, five planes lost.
MONDAY MAY 8th 44
Saw Joan Johnson, she tells me young Prouten is believed killed. Was going to Thorneydene but found Mrs F. at the shop. French rail targets attacked – nine lost.
TUESDAY MAY 9th 44
Went to Thorneydene – a very enjoyable day.
WEDNESDAY MAY 10th 44
Saw a RAF exhibition particularly interested in parachute packing and releasing.
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THURSDAY MAY 11th 44
David weighs 11 lbs 7 ozs. Mum and Dorothy went to Belvoir. Wrote to Chalky. Lovely weather. French rail targets attacked.
FRIDAY MAY 12th 44
French rail targets attacked – 15 lost. David and I photographed at Walter Lee’s. Mum and I went to see ‘King’s Row’ a very good film.
SATURDAY MAY 13th 44
14 planes missing from attacks on French rail targets. Received a letter from you dated 15th February. Am glad to know mail is reaching you okay. Wrote to you.
SUNDAY MAY 14th 44
Took David out during the afternoon. Wrote to Mrs McGregor and Lois.
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MONDAY MAY 15th 44
Had a very nice letter from Mrs Kempshall. Awfully dull weather.
TUESDAY MAY 16th 44
Heard from Lois. Another dull day. Feeling rather fed up with myself.
WEDNESDAY MAY 17th 44
Very dull and wet. Did not get out at all.
THURSDAY MAY 18th 44
David weighs 11 lbs 12 ozs.
FRIDAY MAY 19th 44
Went to Carlton Scroop to stay with Joan Franklin.
SATURDAY MAY 20th 44
Very enjoyable day. Went out in the village. A pleasant change.
SUNDAY MAY 21st 44
Rather cold. Spent another pleasant day. Reports that 47 RAF officers were shot during March at Luft 3 announced.
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MONDAY MAY 22nd 44
Returned home to find 2 letters from you dated February 22nd March 9th and a P.C. dated Feb 1st. Very thrilled. Heard also from Bib Brocklesby and Margaret King. Wrote to you and sent a photograph of David. Dick’s father called still no news, Dick awarded D.S.O. Raid on Duisburg – 30 planes lost.
TUESDAY MAY 23rd 44
Raid on Dortmund – 35 planes lost. Wrote several letters.
WEDNESDAY MAY 24th 44
Lovely weather. Took David out during the afternoon. Called in at the report centre at night. Heard from Mrs McGregor.
THURSDAY MAY 25th 44
Received a P.C. from you dated 10th Feb. 25 planes missing from raid on Aachen. Wrote to you and sent photographs of David and myself. He weighs 12 lbs 3 ozs.
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FRIDAY MAY 26th 44
Went to Babette Land’s home to fetch David’s smock which is exquisite. Phil & Fred came.
SATURDAY MAY 27th 44
a lovely day. Took David out in the afternoon. Knitting him vests.
SUNDAY MAY 28th 44
Antwerp & French rail targets. 27 planes missing from 1,000 force. Had an enjoyable afternoon & evening at Thorneydene. David is wizard & getting very tanned.
MONDY MAY 29th 44
Very hot. A fair in Wyndham fields. Went out in the morning and evening.
TUESDAY MAY 30th 44
Another hot day. David beautifully tanned. Wrote to you.
WEDNESDAY MAY 31st 44
Much cooler. Strong force raided rail targets in France. 8 lost.
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THURSDAY JUNE 1st 44
David weighs 12 lbs 10 ozs. Auntie Emmie & Roger came. Had my fortune told.
FRIDAY JUNE 2nd 44
Received cheques for £10.17.0 and £8.0.11 from A.M. Discover you are a F/O.
SATURDAY JUNE 3rd 44
Heard from Lois & Red Cross. Have to send your football things in a next of kin parcel. Went out in the afternoon with Joan G.
SUNDAY JUNE 4th 44
Miserable weather – did not turn out. Wrote to you. Raid on Leverkusen. 17 planes lost. Sent you enlargement of David.
MONDAY JUNE 5th 44
The allies entered Rome. Osnabruck raided without loss. Wrote and sent photographs to your Pa. Frank, Aunt Ida and Mrs McGregor.
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TUESDAY JUNE 6th 44
[underlined] We invaded Northern France. [/underlined]. News bulletins all day, and everyone on edge. Thinking of you so much. Mum and I went to see ‘The man in Grey’ a very excellent film.
Wednesday June 7th 44
Progressing satisfactorily in France. Preparing your Red Cross parcel.
THURSDAY JUNE 8th 44
Had 3 postcards dated March 17th, 23rd, 30th and a letter April 7th. David weighs 13 lbs. Had tea with Pop Close.
FRIDAY JUNE 9th 44
Had my hair permed. Wrote to you. Miserable weather.
SATURDAY JUNE 10th 44
Doing okay in Normandy. 289 planes lost in air battles and numerous sorties. Had my photograph taken.
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SUNDAY JUNE 11th 44
20 bombers lost over French rail targets. Called down the report centre at night.
MONDAY JUNE 12th 44
Uneventful day. Took David out.
TUESDAY JUNE 13th 44
Miserable weather, did not go out. Lancasters very busy attacking targets in France.
WEDNESDAY JUNE 14th 44
Weather still very cool. No particular news. Aunt Ida sent David 10/-. Wrote you.
THURSDAY JUNE 15th 44
Your father came. Went to Thorneydene and had a very enjoyable time.
FRIDAY JUNE 16th 44
Took David to the car park to see your father off. Cold wet weather.
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SATURDAY JUNE 17th 44
Went out in the afternoon with Joan Greetham. Wrote to you.
SUNDAY JUNE 18th 44
Reading a wonderful book by Axel Munthe called ‘The story of San Michele’. Went out in the afternoon.
MONDAY JUNE 19th 44
The papers full of accounts of pilot less planes used on the south coast and London area.
TUESDAY JUNE 20th 44
Went out with Betty Scothern.
WEDNESDAY JUNE 21st 44
Wrote to you and sent a photograph of myself.
THURSDAY JUNE 22nd 44
Went out with Pop Close.
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FRIDAY JUNE 23rd 44
Phil & Fred came in the evening. Thinking so much of you. 9 months since you went.
SATURDAY JUNE 24th 44
Went to Thorneydene and had a pleasant time. A lovely day. Eva & Joan Johnson, two Americans & Phil & Fred came at night.
SUNDAY JUNE 25th 44
Dull and chilly. Did not go out. Wrote to you.
MONDAY JUNE 26th 44
Went to see Bing Crosby and Dorothy Lamour in ‘Dixie’. Your father sent David a cheque for £10.
TUESDAY JUNE 27th 44
Received postcards dated April 14th, 29th and am glad to know you know of David’s arrival.
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WEDNESDAY JUNE 28th 44
Wrote to you – also to Bib, Lois, and your father.
THURSDAY JUNE 29th 44
Had tea with Mrs Christopher. David weighs 14 lbs 2 ozs.
FRIDAY JUN 30th 44
Spent the afternoon and evening at Thorneydene. Phil & Fred came at night.
SATURDAY July 1st 44
A dull day. Wrote to you at night.
SUNDAY JULY 2nd 44
Went to see Aileen Cornish whose brother was posted missing June 23. Poured with rain at night. Went to bed early. Dorothy has taken up voluntary help at the American Red Cross.
MONDY JULY 3rd 44
Rained without ceasing. Went to the pictures to see ‘Candle light in Algeria’. Very enjoyable.
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TUESDAY JULY 4th 44
Heard from Bib and Ruth. Received word from Lloyds Bank stating that £17.3.7 had been paid to your account. Have written A.M. as there does not appear to be any payment of family allowance. Have been issued with cheque book from Lloyds. Saw Betty Sprawson in the afternoon. Your pay is 18/2 per day, from which P.O.W. deductions income tax etc. is taken. Cashed cheque for £3 paid Mum £5.
WEDNESDAY JULY 5th 44
Nothing unusual to relate. Am watching the Russian news – they are 100 miles from East Prussia.
THRSDAY JULY 6th 44
Went to tea at Stoneleigh and thoroughly enjoyed it. Called at Thorneydene.
FRIDAY JULY 7th 44
Miserable weather. Phil & Fred came.
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SATURDAY JULY 8th 1944
Miserable weather again. Wrote to you.
SUNDAY JULY 9th 44
Derrick visited us – did not go out. Wet weather.
MONDAY JULY 10th 44
I am getting very interested in the Russian news they are only 60 miles from East Prussia. Did some shopping during the afternoon.
TUESDAY JULY 11th 44
An uneventful day. Knitted at night. Horrible cold showery weather.
WEDNESDAY JULY 12th 44
Bought a set of book shelves for 35/- from Everitt and Barrell’s sale. Took David and Derek out.
THURSDAY JULY 13th 44
David weighs 14 lbs 5 ozs. Horrible weather. Claud Hart missing from raid over France 12 planes lost.
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FRIDAY JULY 14th 44
Took David out in the Afternoon. Air mail service to P.O.W. resumed. Called to see Mr & Mrs Hart, they are taking it badly.
SATURDAY JULY 15th 44
Hear that P.O.W. in East Prussia have been moved. Went to see Carmen Miranda and Alice Faye in ‘The girls he left behind’. Wrote to you. Weaning David.
SUNDAY JULY 16th 44
A really lovely day. Joan Greetham and I took the boys out.
MONDAY JULY 17th 44
Received two letters dated May and a P.C. dated May. Very happy.
TUESDAY JULY 18th 44
Went to see Noel Coward’s ‘This Happy Breed’ an excellent film. Fully weaning David.
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WEDNESDAY JULY 19th 44
Nothing outstanding to report. War news very good from all fronts. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY JULY 20th 44
Hear that Frank Catlin has died in Normandy. Feeling rotten did not go out.
FRIDAY JULY 21st 44
Took David out in the afternoon. Phil & Fred came at night. News of revolt in Germany and an attempt on Hitler’s life reported. So long to see you darling.
SATURDAY JULY 22nd 44
Shopped in the morning. stayed home the rest of the day. Played our records and made myself thoroughly miserable. Wrote to you.
SUNDAY JULY 23rd 44
Ten months darling. Went for a walk with Shirley.
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MONDAY JULY 24th 44
Dorothy friendly with Michael Burn have chummed up with W.O. Workman and his wife Marie. went to Thorneydene. Practically an impossibility to give you reports of air activities as bomber command carries out both day and night offensives. Chief targets at present are the flying bomb sites.
TUESDAY JULY 25th 44
Went for a walk with Betty Scothen and to the pictures at night to see Cary Grant Irenne Dunne in ‘My favourite wife’ with Marie. A rotten film. Heard from Bib.
WEDNESDAY JULY 26th 44
Went to RAF Regiment sports at Belton Park. Heard from Mrs Kemshall. Am hoping to visit her next week.
THURSDAY JULY 27th 44
Did not go out. Wrote to you. Read that East Prussian P.O.W. camps have been moved.
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FRIDAY JULY 28th 44
Called to see Pop. Paddy, Marie, Larry & Mac came at night. Larry a wonderful pianist. Phil & Fred came.
SATURDAY JULY 29th 44
Went out with Joan Greetham.
SUNDAY JULY 30th 44
Wrote to you. Took David and Derek out. Went to see ‘Bombs over Burma’ and ‘Uncensored’ with Marie & Paddy.
MONDAY JULY 31st 44
Had tea with Mrs Kenny and visited Thorneydene. Had a most interesting letter from Ken Twilley.
TUESDAY AUG 1st 44
David weighs 15 lbs 3 ozs.
WEDNESDAY AUG 2 44
Spent a very enjoyable day at Lincoln with the Kemshalls. Saw the Caygills too.
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THURSDAY AUG 3rd 44
Went out in the morning also afternoon. Little of interest to tell you.
FRIDAY AUG 4th 44
Nothing worth recording except David vaccinated. Very Hot.
SATURDAY AUG 5th 44
Went out in the afternoon. Lovely weather.
SUNDAY AUG 6th 44
Went for a walk with Shirley in the afternoon. Marie, Paddy, Laurie & Mac came for tea.
MONDAY AUG 7th 44
Received a letter from you dated April 21st. Had tea at Joan Greethams. A glorious day – altogether very pleasant. Wrote to you
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TUESDAY AUG 8th 44
Nothing of interest to report.
WEDNESDAY AUG 9th 44
Went to see ‘Chinese Bungalow’. Marie went back.
THURSDAY AUG 10th 44
David not well due to vaccination, weighs 15 lbs 6 ozs.
FRIDAY AUG 11th 44
Nothing to say.
SATURDAY AUG 12th 44
Really miserable day. David quite sick.
SUNDAY AUG 13th 44
David’s arm terribly swollen. Took him out in the evening and had a better night. Mum spent the weekend at Newark.
MONDAY AUG 14th 44
David much better. Went to see ‘Now Voyager’ a wizard film, Bette Davis
[page break]
Paul Herreid. Very Hot. (weather)
TUESDAY AUG 15th 44
Wrote to you. Went for a walk in the afternoon. Allied landing at south of France between Nice and Marseille.
WEDNESDAY AUG 16th 44
Air sorties are so numerous I cannot possibly keep an account of losses etc. Lancasters bombing day and night. Pat (Laurie’s wife) came to get a rest from flying bombs.
THURSDAY AUG 17th 44
Shopped in the morning with Pat washed in the afternoon. Wrote to Molly and Frank. Heard from Molly this morning and am going there to stay on Tuesday next. Received a P.C. from you dated June 11th 44.
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FRIDAY AUG 18th
Went to Thorneydene.
SATURDAY AUG 19/44
Rained all day. Went shopping in the afternoon. Margaret came.
SUNDAY AUG 20/44
More rain. Didn’t go out all day. Wrote to you.
MONDAY AUG 21st 44
Heard from Mr Campling. Dick is buried at Hoppenrad Cemetery 27 miles N.W. of Berlin. Busy Packing.
TUESDAY AUG 22/44
Took the 8.0 am train to St Neots arrived 9.33. Received a terrific welcome.
WEDNESDAY AUG 23/44
A thoroughly enjoyable day. Paris liberated. Wrote to you. Thinking of you darling.
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THURSDAY AUG 24/44
Went to Sandon with Molly and Helen. Rained - but very enjoyable day.
FRIDAY AUG 25/44
Lazed around. Went to St Neots to send off your gun, and collect box. Bus didn’t pick us up so hitch hiked back
SATURDAY AUG 26/44
Another enjoyable day. Help collect eggs and pick tomatoes. 27 planes missing from 1400 engaged on various sorties.
SUNDAY AUG 27/44
Konigsberg raided. 29 missing. Mrs Bowman and her daughter came. Wrote to you.
MONDAY AUG 28/44
Received a letter from you dated 21st July giving new camp address. Collected box from St Neots.
[page break]
TUESDAY AUG 29th
Went to Cambridge for a few hours. Made myself known to Mrs Pugh – she was awfully pleased to see me. Dorothy wired, Claud Hart alive and well. Mrs Human died about January time.
WEDNESDAY AUG 30/44
41 planes missing from raids on Stettin and Konigsberg. Thorough enjoying my stay here.
THURSDAY AUG 31/44
A year since I lost my watch and it hurts like anything to think of it.
FRIDAY SEP 1st
Went into Cambridge to see the Pughs. Met various customers who made a terrific fuss of David.
SATURDAY SEP 2nd 44
Five years ago I came to Cambridge. Mrs Pugh sold me [indecipherable words] for £1 yesterday. Allies doing very well in France. Rained all day did not go out.
[page break]
SUNDAY SEP 3/44
Allies in Belgium. Awful weather did not turn out all day. Mrs Bowman and Joan came over. Wrote to you.
MONDAY SEP/4/44
Brussels liberated. Received letters from Mr F (Gun arrived safely) and Shirley. Dull weather. Helen and I had a walk after tea.
TUESDY SEP 5th 44
Antwerp reached. Sirens went during the night. Heard a ‘doodle bug’ explode. Still very dull. Didn’t move far.
WEDNESDAY SEP 6th
Helen and I cleaned in the afternoon. Collected eggs and tomatoes at night. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY SEP 7th 44
Rained practically all day. Went for a short walk at night with Helen Read true accounts of murders. Black out to be relaxed.
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FRIDAY SEP 8/44
Another dull day. Picked pears. Heard from Dorothy. A.B. in trouble.
SATURDAY SEP 9/44
Went into Cambridge in the morning with Helen. A lovely day. Heard from Shirley.
SUNDAY SEP 9/44
Mrs and Miss Bowman came. Glorious weather. Wrote to you.
MONDAY SEP 11/44
Cleaned in the afternoon. Matron came and has invited me to tea tomorrow.
TUESDAY SEP 12/44
A year today you came on what was to be your last leave for a while. Had tea at Girton College with the matron. Thoroughly enjoyed the visit.
WEDNESDAY SEP 13/44
Went for a walk in the afternoon. Wrote to you.
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THURSDAY SEP 14/44
Went to Sandon. Lovely weather.
FRIDAY SEP 15/44
Did some shopping in Cambridge with Molly and Helen. Allies Nearing Aachen.
SATURDAY SEP 16/44
Spent most of the day out of doors.
SUNDAY SEP 17/44
Mrs Bowman and her daughter came. Packing to leave and feeling very depressed about it. Holland invaded by the allies.
MONDAY SEP 18/44
Left at 5-49 P.M. after a grand holiday.
TUESDAY SEP 19/44
Thoroughly miserable. Missing you badly. Rang Thorneydene.
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WEDNESDAY SEP 20/44
A year today since you went back from leave. Went to the pictures to see Rita Hayworth in ‘Cover Girl’.
THURSDAY SEP 21/44
David weighs 17 lbs 14 ozs. Shopped in the morning.
FRIDAY SEP 22/44
Spent an enjoyable afternoon at Thorneydene.
SATURDAY SEP 23/44
Shirley took photographs of David and I in the park. A year darling. Shirley had P.C. from Robbie.
SUNDAY SEP 24/44
Thinking of you so much. Tony cycled over. Did not go out. David has a bad cold.
MONDAY SEP 25/44
David quite sick. Feel miserable and unsettled.
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TUESDAY SEP 26/44
David a little better. Received a letter from you dated 4th June. Feel in the way here – do wish I could get a house. Peter K. came over. Did not go out.
WEDNESDAY SEP 27/44
Went out in the afternoon. Heard from W/O E.L. Morris who was with you at Luft 6.
THURSDAY SEP 28/44
David weighs 18 lb 3 ozs.
FRIDAY SEP 29/44
Took David out.
SATURDAY SEP 30/44
Derek two. Went out with Shirley. Helen came, returning tomorrow.
SUNDAY OCT 1/44
Shirley came for tea. She Helen and I went for a walk. Wrote to you.
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MONDAY 2nd OCT 44
Stayed in miserable weather.
TUESDAY 3rd OCT 44
Had a tooth out
WEDNESDAY 4th OCT 44
Wrote to you. Had my hair set.
THURSDAY 5 OCT
Went to see Jennifer Jones in ‘Song of Bernadette’ a beautiful film.
FRIDAY 6 OCT 44
Poured my troubles out at Thorneydene.
SATURDAY 7 OCT 44
Miserable weather. Heard from Chalky.
SUNDAY 8 OCT 44
Dull weather did not go out. Reading Angela Thirkells ‘Growing Up’ have now had of hers ‘Northbridge Rectory’ ‘Cheerfulness breaks in’ ‘Marling Hall’
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MONDAY 9 OCT 44
Went to see ‘For whom the bell tolls’ thought it disappointing. Rotten weather. Wrote Molly re. cottage.
TUESDAY 10 OCT 44
Went out in the afternoon.
WEDNESDAY 11 OCT 44
Wrote to you
THURSDAY 12 OCT 44
Horrible weather David weighs 18 lbs 10 ozs.
FRIDAY 13 OCT 44
Went to the shop and had a talk with Mrs F. Flying bomb at North Witham.
SATURDAY 14 OCT 44
Went out with Joan G.
SUNDAY 15 OCT 44
Had tea with Shirley. Phil & Fred came at night. Wrote to you.
[page break]
MONDAY OCT 16/44
Went for a walk with Betty Sprawson.
TUESDAY OCT 17/44
Went to see ‘The Lodger’ Knitting David a beret. ‘Cop’s’ boyfriend missing.
WEDNESDAY OCT 18/44
Received an invitation to Betty Broughton’s wedding. Shopped in the morning. Rainy day. Wrote to Pop. W/O Morris & Chalky.
THURSDAY OCT 19/44
David weighs 19 lbs. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY OCT 20/44
Wet, horrible day.
SATURDAY OCT 21/44
Betty Broughton married Jack Phillips – USAAF. A pretty wedding. I enjoyed it.
[page break]
SUNDAY OCT 22nd 44
Took David out in the afternoon
MONDAY OCT 23rd
Wrote to you. Am miserable waiting for letter from you. Heard from Ken Twilley.
TUESDAY OCT 24/44
Heard from Molly. Went to Belton with Betty S. to get chestnuts.
WEDNESDAY OCT 25/44
Bought David a new blue cloth coat. Met Percy Kemshall unexpectedly in High Street. Still no news from you.
THURSDAY OCT 26/44
Bill came. Went out in the afternoon with Madge Hales and her baby daughter.
FRIDAY OCT 27/44
David had his first haircut.
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SATURDAY OCT 28/44
Went to see ‘Four Jills in a Jeep’ with Shirley. Mrs Pacey told me her P.O.W. son has passed his final auctioneer’s exam with honours. Still no news.
SUNDAY OCT 29/44
Stayed in all day. Wrote to you.
MONDAY OCT 30/44
David cut a tooth. Went out with Betty S.
TUESDAY OCT 31/44
Heard from Mrs McKinna. Took David out in the afternoon.
WEDNESDAY NOV 1st 44
Had David photographed at Boaz.
THURSDAY NOV 2nd 44
Had tea with Miss Kitchen and enjoyed myself. Bell went back.
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FRIDAY NOV 3rd 44
Took David out. Went to B.M.A.R Co. fun fair at night with Dorothy.
SATURDAY NOV 4th 44
Went shopping in the afternoon.
SUNDAY NOV 5th 44
Stayed in all day Wrote to you.
MONDAY NOV 6th 44
Took David out in the afternoon.
TUESDAY NOV 7th 44
Margaret and Derrick came. Stayed up gossiping until the small hours.
WEDNESDAY NOW 8th 44
Dorothy heard from A.M. Andy commissioned.
THURSDAY NOV 9th 44
A year since I received your first P.O.W. card. Wish I could hear again. M. & D. went back. Dorothy went to Whickford.
[page break]
FRIDAY NOV 10th 44
Spent an enjoyable afternoon at Thorneydene.
SATURDAY NOV 11th 44
Went to see ‘Fanny by Gaslight’ and enjoyed it thoroughly. Shirley took David out.
SUNDAY NOW 12th 44
Dorothy and I took the ‘boys’ out in the morning. Wrote to you also Mrs Kemshall and your Pa. Ben Twilley called – has done 11 trips.
MONDAY NOV 13th 44
Still no news of you. Went for a walk with Betty Sprawson.
TUESDAY NOV 14th 44
Took David out. He is teething and consequently rather fretful.
WEDNESDAY NOV 15th 44
Feel I shall go mad if I don’t soon hear from you. Missing you terribly.
[page break]
Bought David a high chair. Heard from Mrs Layne and Molly.
THURSDAY NOV 16th 44
At last, a letter dated August 6th. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY NOV 17th 44
Horrible weather. Did some shopping. Marie came for tea.
SATURDAY NOV 18th 44
Very dull – went out in the afternoon
SUNDAY NOV 19th 44
Finished a suit for David. Wrote to you. Marie came for tea.
MONDAY NOV 20th 44
Horrible wet day – did not go out. David said ‘Teddy’
TUESDAY 21st 44
Received a P.C. in your writing signed R. Colbeck dated September 26th.
[page break]
Took David out. Started second suit.
WEDNESDAY NOV 22nd 44
Wrote to you.
THURSDAY NOV 23rd 44
Received a letter dated 28th July
FRIDAY NOV 24th 44
Went to Thorneydene
SATURDAY NOV 25th 44
Saw Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman in ‘Murder in Thornton Square’
SUNDAY NOV 27th 44
Did not turn out. Miserable day – wrote to you.
MONDAY NOV 27th 44
Did some Christmas shopping with Dorothy.
TUESDAY NOV 29/44
More Christmas shopping.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY NOV 29/44
Busy all day didn’t get out. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY NOV 30/44
Received a letter dated August 20/44. David weighs 20 lbs 9 ozs.
FRIDAY DEC 1/44
Did some shopping. Terribly cold.
SATURDAY DEC 2/44
Went out in the afternoon.
SUNDAY DEC 3/44
Didn’t get out. Miserable day. Fed up. Wrote to you.
MONDAY DEC 4/44
A letter dated August 30th. Feel very miserable and fed up. Do wish I could get a house.
TUESDAY DEC 5/44
Thinking of you. Had my hair permed.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY DEC 6th 44
Received a letter dated 21st September. Visited the Kemshalls at Lincoln and enjoyable day.
THURSDAY DEC 7 TH 44
Bought a folding pram for David. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY DEC 8th 44
Horrible day – foggy.
SATURDAY DEC 9th 44
Another letter dated 23rd September. Saw Joan G. in the afternoon.
SUNDAY DEC 10/44
Did not go out. Wrote to you.
MONDAY DEC 11/44
Went to see Bing Crosby in Sing you sinners.
[page break]
TUESDAY DEC 12/44
Did some shopping.
WEDNESDAY DEC 13/44
Not much to report. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY DEC 14/44
Very cold – Should have visited Hilda Waring but did not go.
FRIDAY DEC 15/44
Went to Thorneydene. David developed a cold.
SATURDAY DEC 16th
Horrible day. No news.
SUNDAY DEC 17/44
Had tea with Aileen Challand. Wrote to you.
MONDAY DEC 18/44
An unexpected visit from Bib Brocklesby. Went out in the afternoon.
[page break]
TUESDAY DEC 19/44
Bernard Twilley reported missing yesterday. Called to see his mother. David’s cold very bad – war news pretty serious.
WEDNESDAY DEC 20/44
Went out in the morning. David quite a lot better. Wrote to you. Missing you.
THURSDAY DEC 21/44
David not very well. Did not go out.
FRIDAY DEC 22nd 44
David only fair.
SATURDAY DEC 23rd 44
Marie came for Christmas. I went to bed at 6.45. Fed up and miserable.
SUNDAY DEC 24th
Derrick came. We stayed in. M&D went to RAF Reg. Party. Wrote to you. Missing you.
[page break]
MONDAY DEC 25th 44
Little David had quite a number of gifts. I am missing you badly. Very glad of Derrick’s company. Awful fog.
TUESDAY DEC 26th 44
Went to Thorneydene for tea. Auntie Emmie, Uncle Harry, Roger came over. Marie went back.
WEDNESDAY DEC 27th 44
David developed sickness etc. Did not go out. Cold.
THURSDAY DEC 28th 44
David still ill, feel worried and miserable. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY DEC 29th
Took David out but his condition is much the same.
SATURDAY DEC 30/44
Took David to the doctor. He has a chill, gave him medicine.
[page break]
SUNDAY DEC 31/44
David quite a lot better. A harassing day. Please let next year bring you home, and find us a house.
MONDAY JAN 1st 45
A letter from you dated October 15th & a parcel from America containing sleeping suits, bath sachets & soap.
TUESDAY JAN 2/45
Awful damp day. David quite better. Did some shopping. Reading ‘Calamity House’ Ellery Queen. Dispatched parcel containing pyjamas, 4 prs sox, plimsolls, blades, soap, choc, toothbrush etc. also H/chiefs.
WEDNESDAY JAN 3/45
Had a hair set. Knitting David a suit. Dirty weather. Had a letter from Margaret Kemshall.
[page break]
THURSDAY JAN 4th 45
Nothing of much interest
FRIDAY JAN 5th 45
Phil & Fred came at night.
SATURDAY JAN 6th 45
I bought a suit at the shop. Bill came.
SUNDAY JAN 7th 45
I wrote to you – busy knitting for David.
MONDAY JAN 8th 45
Quite a fall of snow.
TUESDAY JAN 9th 45
Took David out – awfully cold.
WEDNESDAY JAN 10th 45
Did not go out. Finished a pullover for David.
THURSDAY JAN 11th 45
David attended his first party. Jennifer Deane aged one.
[page break]
FRIDAY JAN 12/45
Saw ‘Adam had four sons’ awfully good . Phil & Fred Came, Bill here.
SATURDAY JAN 13/45
Derrick came – glad to see him.
SUNDAY JAN 14/45
Feeling not so good. Derrick went back.
MONDAY JAN 15/45
Wrote to you, have a rotten cold, and missing you horribly.
TUESDAY JAN 16/45
Feel ghastly. Stayed in all day miserable with self and everyone else.
WEDNESDAY JAN 17/45
Feel only fair.
[page break]
THURSDAY JAN 18/45
Had my hair set. Sent you tobacco. Wrote to you.
FRIDAY JAN 19/45
Phil & Fred came. Rotten day in every way.
SATURDAY JAN 20/45
News came Bernard Twilley killed 18 Dec 44. Saw ‘Love Story’ Margaret Lockwood- Stewart Grainger. Snowed heavily.
SUNDAY JAN 21/45
Feel awful Wrote to you. Took David out in the afternoon.
MONDAY JAN 22/45
Rotten cold. Awful weather. Rang Mrs F. Bought a wardrobe & chair.
[page break]
TUESDAY JAN 23rd 45
Horribly cold – short of coal too. Letter from you dated 9th Oct 44.
WEDNESDAY JAN 24th 45
Wrote to you. Went to Thorneydene but did not take David who has a cold.
THURSDAY JAN 25th 45
Weather simply artic – Saw Bing Crosby in ‘Going my Way’
FRIDAY JAN 26/45
Terribly cold. Worst for years & years. Did some shopping in the morning.
SATURDAY JAN 27/45
Still icy / Tony & his girlfriend called at night. Did not go out.
SUNDAY JAN 28/45
Watched skating on the canal. Wrote to you also Ken Twilley. Not quite so cold.
[page break]
MONDAY JAN 29th 45
Went to look at a house in Dudley Road – Turned it down.
TUESDAY JAN 30/45
Did not go out Awfully cold.
WEDNESDAY JAN 31/45
Had my hair set. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY FEB 1/45
Weather improving. Did some shopping.
FRIDAY FEB 2/45
Phil & Fred came quite an enjoyable evening. Russian news marvellous.
SATURDAY FEB 3/45
A lovely day. Took David out met Betty Scothern – her husband in India.
SUNDAY FEB 4/45
Took Derek and David out. Wrote to you.
[page break]
MONDAY FEB 5/45
Received letter dated 30 October P. C’s October 18, Nov 24th. Went out in the afternoon with Betty S. Lovely day.
TUESDAY FEB 6/45
Took David out, weather lovely.
WEDNESDAY FEB 7/45
P.C. dated 20 Dec. Wrote to you. Saw ‘Hotel Reserve’ James Mason – very good.
THURSDAY FEB 8/45
David weighs 22 lbs 9 ozs.
FRIDAY FEB 9/45
Took David to Thorneydene where he crawled across the room and pulled himself up by the settee. A lovely Day. Phil & Fred came.
[page break]
SATURDAY FEB 10/45
Took David out. Rather cold. Wrote to you.
SUNDAY FEB 11/45
Stayed in all day. Knitted read etc. David lovely.
MONDAY FEB 12/45
Heard today Barbara Parr drowned on Friday last. Heard from Ken Twilley. Horrible weather.
TUESDAY FEB 13/45
Wireless announcement numerous camps including Luft 3 over run by the Russians or moved. Feel rather worried and depressed. Hate this suspense.
WEDNES DAY FEB 14/45
Stayed in all day – wrote to you. Spent an hour with Pop Munson at night.
[page break]
THURSDAY FEB 15/45
Our day again. Took David out. News still very good.
FRIDAY FEB 16/45
Phil & Fred came down. Busy knitting David a beret.
SATURDAY FEB 17/45
Did some shopping during the morning. Phil & Fred came again.
SUNDAY FEB 18/45
Took David and Derek out. Andy turned up unexpectedly. He is at Ossington. Wrote to you.
MONDAY FEB 19/45
Saw Betty Scothern and had a lovely walk. Parcels are off again.
TUESDAY FEB 20/45
Took David out. He has a cold.
[page break]
WEDNESDAY FEB 21/45
Took David and Derek up the road. Lovely day. Wrote to you. Feel awfully worried and unsettled.
THURSDAY FEB 22/45
Lovely weather. Took David out. Wireless report 2661 P.O.W.s liberated by the Russians.
FRIDAY FEB 23/45
Rained, so did not get to Thorneydene. Phil & Fred came – Andy also.
SATURDAY FEB 24/45
Andy went back. I took David out – he has a cold.
SUNDAY FEB 25/45
Very dull – cycled to Thorneydene in the A.M. Wrote to you. Reading ‘For them that Trespass’ by R. Raymond.
[page break]
MONDAY FEB 26/45
Took David and Derek out. Uneventful day.
TUESDAY FEB 27/45
Received a P.C. dated 25 October – Did some shopping but did not take David.
WEDNESDAY FEB 28/45
David had quite a number of gifts and eleven birthday cards. Had photographs taken. Shirley came round. Wrote to you.
THURSDAY MAR 1st 45
Monchengladbach captured.
FRIDAY MAR 2/45
Took David for a walk.
SATURDAY MAR 3/45
Ada Parker sent a cardigan and helmet for David. Andy came. Reconciliation.
[page break]
SUNDAY MAR 4/45
Dull day – did not go out. Wrote numerous letters.
MONDAY MAR 5/45
Went for a long walk with Betty Sprawson. Knitting myself a pullover.
TUESDAY MAR 6/45
Andy at Ossington – failed B.O.A. awaiting posting.
WEDNESDAY MAR 7/45
Went to see Phyl Mitchell. Wrote to you. Cologne has fallen.
THURSDAY MAR 8/45
Busy day, did not go out.
FRIDAY MAR 9/45
Margaret and Derrick came – Andy here also.
[page break]
SATURDAY MAR 10/45
Went to the doctor, trouble with eye etc. Awful Cold.
SUNDAY MAR 11/45
David has troublesome cough. Did not go out, still feeling ‘not so good’
MONDAY MAR 12/45
M. & D. returned. Went for a walk with Betty Sprawson. Had a letter from Effie. Saw ‘Fantasia’
TUESDAY MAR 13/45
David not well – took him out during the morning.
WEDNESDAY MAR 14/45
Took David to the doctor – got medicine but already he is much better. Had my hair set. Andy still her.
[page break]
THURSDAY MAR 15/45
David greatly improved. Took he and Derek out in the afternoon. Went to see Pop at night.
FRIDAY MAR 16/45
Uneventful day. David fine.
SATURDAY MAR 17/45
Did not go out. Received parcel from Effie. Rompers – building blocks – H/chiefs etc.
SUNDAY MAR 18/45
Same as yesterday.
MONDAY MAR 19/45
Took David out – the fair here.
TUESDAYMAR 20/45
A cold day. Wrote to Effie.
WEDNESDAY MAR 21/45
Heard from Lois & Constance. Saw a wonderful film – Madonna of Seven Moons’ Stewart Grainger, Phyllis Calvert.
[page break]
THURSDAY MAR 22/45
Your father and Mrs L. here. Took David to Thorneydene and spent a very pleasant afternoon.
FRIDAY MAR 23/45
Dorothy, D.J. and I went to Leicester express purpose of buying shoes. Glorious weather.
SATURDAY MAR 24/45
Letter dated 22 Jan 45. Saw your people off on the bus. Big Allied air - bourne landing beyond the Rhine.
SUNDAY MAR 25/45
Lovely day – took David out. Derek and Dorothy came too. Spent the evening with Pop.
MONDAY MAR 26/45
Went for a walk with Betty. A lovely day.
[page break]
TUESDAY MAR 27/45
Our armies well beyond the Rhine. Surely the war must end soon. Do worry about you and wonder where you are. Took David out. Lovely weather.
WEDNESDAY MAR 28th 45
Feeling rather flat. Wish I knew more about you.
THURSDAY MAR 29/45
Took Derek and David to have tea at Pop’s.
FRIDAY MAR 30/45
Wrote to you. Went to see ‘The Man in the Iron Mask’.
Saturday mar 31/45
Saw Joan Johnson married. Horribly windy.
[page break]
EASTER SUNDAY APRIL 1/45
Still cold and windy. Margaret and Derrick came, returning tomorrow.
MONDAY APRIL 2/45
Took David to Thorneydene.
TUESDAY APRIL 3/45
News of liberated P.O.Ws keeps coming through. I feel so unsettled.
WEDNESDAY APRIL 4/45
Took David out. Cold weather.
THURSDAY APRIL 5/45
Went to Madge Broughton’s wedding – she married Pat Arsanault an American.
FRIDAY APRIL 6/45
The allies doing remarkably well. Keeping my fingers crossed.
[page break]
SATURDAY APRIL 7/45
Went out in the afternoon with Dorothy.
SUNDAY APRIL 8/45
Had an enjoyable walk after tea, all of us. Eat a big supper and went to bed early. Sent you photographs.
MONDAY APRIL 9/45
Had a walk with Betty Sprawson. Konigsberg fallen.
TUESDAY APRIL 10/45
Took Derek and David out. Wrote to your Pa and Ada Parker.
WEDNESDAY APRIL 11/45
Vienna, Hanover various other places fallen. Took Derek & David out. Lovely day.
[page break]
THURSDAY APRIL 12/45
60 miles from Berlin. Took David for a walk – lovely day. Wrote to Lois, Constance, Mrs MKinna & Chalky. Wish I could hear from you.
FRIDAY APRIL 13/45
Brunswick, Magdeburg threatened fallen. Lovely day. David had his first injections against diphtheria and whooping cough. Took him to Thorneydene, Aunt Ida sent lovely toys. [underlined] President Roosevelt died last night. [/underlined]
SATURDAY APRIL 14/45
Received toy bear from America. Oflag 79 liberated – so anxious about you. Spent the evening with Pop.
SUNDAY APRIL 15/45
Busy all day did not go out. Gorgeous weather.
[page break]
MONDAY APRIL 16/45
Stalag 357 11B liberated. Cannot rest – no sleep – just wondering. Took David down the park with Betty and John.
TUESDAY APRIL 17/45
Nuremberg entered.
WEDNESDAY APRIL 18/45
A lovely day. Magdeburg fallen. Thinking of you – very worried.
THURSDAY APRIL 19/45
Took Derek and David out in the morning. Leipzig fallen.
FRIDAY APRIL 20/45
My last red cross parcel returned. Took David to Thorneydene. Anxious for news.
SATURDAY APRIL 21/45
Russians shelling Berlin. Feel miserable. Cold today. Nuremberg fallen.
[page break]
SUNDAY 22 APRIL 45
15,000 P.O.Ws liberated, anxious about you. Went over to see Pop at night.
MONDAY 23-4-45
Shirley’s cousin home from 357. Had David photographed. Cold.
TUESDAY 24-4-45
Russians attacking immediate outskirts of Berlin. David not well.
WEDNESDAY 25-4-45
Took David out but he is only fair. Met Ken Twilley home from overseas.
THURSDAY 26-4-45
Took David to Thorneydene. Walter Lee took snaps. Berlin cut off. Bremen fallen.
[page break]
FRIDAY 27-4-45
Ken Twilley came in. I went to see ‘A song to remember’
SATURDAY 28-4-45
Marlag Milag Nord released. Hitler reported ill and Himmler offered unconditional surrender to ourselves and America – not Russia.
SUNDAY 29-4-45
27,000 P.O.Ws liberated at Moosburg. Munich captured. Terribly cold weather – snow etc.
MONDAY 30-4-45
V.E. day expected at any time. Saw ‘Sunday dinner for soldier’
TUESDAY 1-5-45
Hitler reported killed in Berlin. Admiral Doenitz taken his place.
WEDNESDAY 2-5-45
Unconditional surrender of Germans in Italy. Berlin captured by the Russians
[page break]
THURSDAY MAY 3/45
Andy came on leave. Goebbels reported to have committed suicide. Anxiously awaiting news.
FRIDAY MAY 4/45
Unconditional surrender of North Germany, Holland and Denmark signed at 6-20 p.m. With effect from 8-0 am DB summer time tomorrow – Camps 3A and 4B. liberated.
SATURDAY MAY 5/45
I keep wondering about you, do wish I could get some news.
SUNDAY MAY 6/45
V.E. day imminent.
MONDAY MAY 7/45
The prime minister to broadcast tomorrow. 1800 P.O.W’s brought home.
[page break]
TUESDAY MAY 8th 45
[underlined] V. E. Day. [/underlined] Unconditional surrender of Germany to ourselves, America & Russia. Prime Minister (Winston Churchill) spoke at 3.0 p.m. the king at 9.0 p.m. Lancasters landed in Germany – brought back 4,500 P.O.W’s. Everywhere decorated and looking very gay and festive.
WEDNESDAY MAY 9/45
Tonight J & W. came to tell me [underlined] you are in England [/underlined] Won’t attempt to express what it means.
[page break]
[list of finances and recipes]
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
Joan Layne's diary covering the period her husband Wally was a prisoner of war
Description
An account of the resource
Starts with a letter to him after she finds out he is a prisoner telling how she felt when he was missing and how happy she was with the news that he was a prisoner. After a day by day diary of her feelings, activities, news of friends and acquaintances, correspondence. Dairy goes from 9 November 1943 until 9 May 1945 when she hears that he is in England, Includes some war news and comments on VE day.
Additional information about this item was kindly provided by the donor.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
J Layne
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1943-11-09
1944
1945-01
1945-02
1945-03
1945-04
1945-05
1945-05-09
1943-11
1943-12
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Multipage handwritten document
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Diary
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
YLayneAJ[Ser#-DoB]v1
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
Royal Air Force
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-11-09
1943-11
1943-12
1944
1945-01
1945-02
1945-03
1945-04
1945-05
1945-05-09
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Mannheim
Germany--Ludwigshafen am Rhein
Germany--Leverkusen
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Essen
France
France--Mailly-le-Camp
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Aachen
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Jan Waller
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
bombing
Caterpillar Club
Distinguished Flying Cross
home front
Lancaster
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
prisoner of war
promotion
Red Cross
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1500/30467/LKellJA[Ser -DoB]v1.pdf
345e22b83ddaea79e512fc2a2aa96761
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
Kell, John
J A Kell
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-04-23
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
Kell, JA
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. The collection concerns John Kell and contains his log book and a photograph. He served in the Royal Canadian Air Force and completed his training in the USA. He flew operations as a pilot with 101 Squadron.
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
John A Kell’s Royal Canadian Air Force flying log book for pilots
Description
An account of the resource
Pilot’s log book for J A Kell covering the period from 4 May 1942 to 2 October 1946. Detailing his flying training and operations flown, including assessment certificates and course syllabus. Notes include references to a 1000 bomber operation, sight of a Lancaster being shot down, repatriating POWs. He was stationed at Belfast (Queens University Air Sqdn), RAF Cambridge (22 EFTS), Miami, Oklahoma, USA (3 BFTS), RAF Wolverhampton (28 EFTS), RAF Dallachy (14 (P)AFU), RAF Errol (1544 BAT Flt), RAF Lossiemouth (20 OTU), RAF Blyton (1662 HCU), RAF Ludford Magna (101 Sqdn), RAF Shawbury (EANS). Aircraft flown in were Tutor, DH 82, PT19, Harvard, Oxford, Wellington, Lancaster, York, Halifax. He flew 9 operations (two night-time, seven daylight) with 101 Squadron. Targets were Dessau, Kassel, Essen, Dortmund, Paderborn, Hamburg, Heligoland, Bremen, Berchtesgaden. He also flew Operation Manna, described as 'Spam dropping', Operation Exodus and Operation Dodge flights. One Cook's Tour flight was made, described as Continental SS XC (sight seeing cross country).
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike French
Callum Davies
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LKellJA[Ser%23-DoB]v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
United States
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--West Midlands
Germany--Berchtesgaden
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Essen
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Helgoland
Germany--Kassel
Germany--Paderborn
Scotland--Grampian
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942
1943
1944
1945
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-11
1945-03-12
1945-03-27
1945-03-31
1945-04-18
1945-04-22
1945-04-25
1945-05-01
1945-05-02
1945-05-07
1945-05-09
1945-07-03
1945-07-05
1945-08-02
1945-08-04
1945-09-07
1945-09-10
1945-09-21
1945-09-27
1946
101 Squadron
1662 HCU
20 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
bombing
bombing of Helgoland (18 April 1945)
Cook’s tour
Flying Training School
Halifax
Harvard
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
RAF Blyton
RAF Dallachy
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Ludford Magna
RAF Shawbury
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
York
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1406/36694/LRosserLV745193v2.2.pdf
8eb2a783ab8e318b77eddf3a3c483a16
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
Rosser, Lewis Victor
L V Rosser
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2019-05-17
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Rosser, LV
Description
An account of the resource
154 items. The collection concerns Flight Lieutenant Lewis Victor Rosser (b. 1919, 745193 Royal Air Force) and contains his log books, a diary of his operations, notebooks, documents, correspondence and an album. He flew operations as a pilot with 35, 58, 51 and 115 Squadrons. <br /><br />The collection includes a <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/2133">Photograph album</a> with photographs of people and aircraft, artwork cards, newspaper cuttings and documents. <br /><br /><br />The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Ann Godard and Joy Shirley and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
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
L V Rosser’s pilots flying log book. Two
Description
An account of the resource
Pilots flying log book 2 for L V Rosser, covering the period from 22 July 1943 to 6 August 1945. Detailing his instructor duties, flying training and operations flown. He was stationed at RAF Edgehill (aka RAF Shenington), RAF Wing, RAF Little Horwood, RAF Gamston, RAF Bottesford, RAF Witchford, RAF Blyton and RAF Abingdon. Aircraft flown were Wellington, Martinet, Hurricane and Lancaster. He flew a total of 14 operations with 115 Squadron, 10 Daylight and 4 night. Targets were Gelsenkirchen, Saltzbergen, Dessau, Datteln, Dortmund, Heinrichshutt, Huls, Hamm, Munster, Hallendorf, Merseburg, Kiel, Bremen and Bad Oldesloe. He also flew 4 Operation Manna to Rotterdam and The Hague, plus 6 Operation Exodus to Juvincourt and Brussells and one Operation Dodge trip. His pilots on his first ‘second dickie’ operations were Flight Lieutenant Dowling and Flight Lieutenant Sherwood.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1945-03-05
1945-03-06
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-09
1945-03-12
1945-03-14
1945-03-17
1945-03-20
1945-03-21
1945-03-29
1945-04-04
1945-04-09
1945-04-22
1945-04-24
1945-04-30
1945-05-01
1945-05-03
1945-05-07
1945-05-09
1945-05-10
1945-05-12
1945-05-15
1945-05-16
1945-05-18
1945-06-05
1945-06-10
1945-06-25
1945-07-29
1945-08-04
1945-08-06
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Belgium
Germany
Great Britain
Netherlands
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
Belgium--Brussels
England--Berkshire
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Nottinghamshire
England--Oxfordshire
France--Aisne
Germany--Bad Oldesloe
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hamm (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Merseburg
Germany--Münster in Westfalen
Germany--Recklinghausen (Kreis)
Germany--Salzbergen
Germany--Salzgitter Region
Netherlands--Hague
Netherlands--Hulst (Zeeland)
Netherlands--Rotterdam
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
France--Juvincourt-et-Damary
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 booklet
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LRosserLV745193v2
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending temporal coverage. Allocated
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
10 OTU
115 Squadron
12 OTU
1668 HCU
19 OTU
26 OTU
35 Squadron
58 Squadron
77 Squadron
aircrew
bombing
Cook’s tour
Flying Training School
Heavy Conversion Unit
Hurricane
Initial Training Wing
Lancaster
Lancaster Mk 2
Lancaster Mk 3
Martinet
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
pilot
RAF Abingdon
RAF Blyton
RAF Bottesford
RAF Chipping Warden
RAF Gamston
RAF Little Horwood
RAF Shenington
RAF Shepherds Grove
RAF Wing
RAF Witchford
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1953/36958/PHitchcockJS1708.2.jpg
359b12ada6d28e743838348af756ebc7
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1953/36958/PHitchcockJS1709.2.jpg
6509a8d708454a01274b7147c26159f6
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
Hitchcock, John Samuel
J S Hitchcock
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
2017-09-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Hitchcock, JS
Description
An account of the resource
87 items. The collection concerns Flight Lieutenant John Samuel Hitchcock (740899, 106813 Royal Air Force) and contains his decorations, log books, uniform jacket, sunglasses, parachute logbook, documents and photographs. He flew operations as a pilot with 37, 57 and 78 Squadrons. <br /><br />The collection also contains <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/2142">an album</a><span> from his training in North Africa.<br /></span><br />The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by P J Hitchcock and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
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
Model Horse Race
Description
An account of the resource
An officer bent over a horse silhouette, part of a model horse race. He is watched by many airmen. All are in khaki and shorts. On the reverse 'RAF Shallufah MEF. Victory Celebrations VE+1 day 9-5-45'.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-05-09
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Egypt
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
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PHitchcockJS1708, PHitchcockJS1709
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-05-09
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
aircrew
entertainment
ground personnel
RAF Shallufa
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/467/20275/LBantingP1399810v1.2.pdf
f5a5a755a7d32eb0bb82a7c58f575f42
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
Banting, Peter
P Banting
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Banting, P
Description
An account of the resource
Three items. An oral history interview with Peter Banting (b. 1923, 1399810 Royal Air Force) his log book and a a piece of material containing signatures.
He flew operations as a bomb aimer with 75 and 7 Squadrons.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-03-15
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
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
Peter Banting’s Royal Canadian Air Force flying log book for aircrew other than pilot
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LBantingP1399810v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Canada
France
Germany
Great Britain
Netherlands
Alberta--Edmonton
Alberta--Lethbridge
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Norfolk
England--Suffolk
England--Wolverhampton
France--Aisne
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Essen
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Kamen
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Krefeld
Germany--Lübeck
Germany--Mönchengladbach
Germany--Nordhausen (Thuringia)
Germany--Plauen
Germany--Potsdam
Germany--Salzbergen
Germany--Wanne-Eickel
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Wiesbaden
Netherlands--Rotterdam
Alberta
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
England--Staffordshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1946
1945-01-22
1945-01-28
1945-01-29
1945-02-01
1945-02-02
1945-02-03
1945-02-18
1945-02-20
1945-02-21
1945-02-23
1945-02-25
1945-02-27
1945-03-01
1945-03-04
1945-03-06
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-10
1945-03-11
1945-04-03
1945-04-04
1945-04-08
1945-04-09
1945-04-10
1945-04-13
1945-04-14
1945-04-15
1945-04-22
1945-05-04
1945-05-09
1945-05-23
Description
An account of the resource
Royal Canadian Air Force flying log book for aircrew other than pilot for Peter Banting, bomb aimer, covering the period from 5 October 1943 to 11 July 1946. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and post war flying. He was stationed at RCAF Lethbridge, RCAF Edmonton, RAF Halfpenny Green, RAF Oakley, RAF Westcott, RAF Chedburgh, RAF Feltwell, RAF Mepal, RAF Warboys and RAF Oakington. Aircraft flown in were, Anson, Bolingbroke, Wellington, Stirling, Lancaster and Oxford. He flew a total of 25 Operations, 12 Daylight and 5 night operations with 75 Squadron and 2 Daylight and 6 night operations with 7 Squadron Pathfinders. Targets were Duisberg, Cologne, Krefeld, Mönchengladbach, Wiesbaden, Dortmund, Wesel, Gelsenkirchen, Kamen, Wanne Eickel, Salzbergen, Dessau, Essen, Nordhausen, Hamburg, Kiel, Plauen, Potsdam and Bremen. His pilots on operations were <span data-ccp-props="{"201341983":0,"335559739":200,"335559740":276}">Wing Commander Baigent and Flying Officer Rothwell. </span>He also flew Operation Manna to Rotterdam, and Operation Exodus to Lubeck and Juvencourt.
11 OTU
1653 HCU
7 Squadron
75 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
Air Observers School
aircrew
Anson
Bolingbroke
bomb aimer
bombing
Bombing and Gunnery School
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
Pathfinders
RAF Chedburgh
RAF Feltwell
RAF Halfpenny Green
RAF Mepal
RAF Oakington
RAF Oakley
RAF Warboys
RAF Westcott
Stirling
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1282/35618/LWannopRE176129v3.1.pdf
b9b22682b2e0a0b1248b59e8d710a0fd
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
Wannop, Robert Eric
R E Wannop
Description
An account of the resource
Nine items. The collection concerns Flying Officer Robert Wannop DFC and contains his log books, documents and photographs. He flew operations as a pilot with 90 Squadron.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Judy Wannop and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-06-10
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Wannop, RE
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
R E Wannop's pilot's flying log book. Three
Description
An account of the resource
Pilot's flying log book number three for R E Wannop, covering the period from 1 March 1945 to 9 November 1945. Detailing his operations flown and post was flying duties. He was stationed at RAF Tuddenham and RAF Feltwell. Aircraft flown was Lancaster. He flew 11 operations, bringing his total to 22 operations with 90 Squadron. Targets were, Kamen, Wanne-Eickel, Gelsenkirchen, Hattingen, Munster, Wesel, Hollendorf, Berlin, Heligoland, Munich and Regensburg. He also flew 2 Operation Manna operations to The Hague, and 7 Operations Exodus operations to Juvincourt. Several Cook's Tour flights are recorded. The log book also contains a newspaper clipping referring to the award of his DFC.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-03-01
1945-03-04
1945-03-05
1945-03-14
1945-03-21
1945-03-23
1945-03-29
1945-04-14
1945-04-15
1945-04-18
1945-04-19
1945-04-20
1945-05-02
1945-05-08
1945-05-09
1945-05-11
1945-05-12
1945-05-13
1945-05-14
1945-05-19
1945-05-23
1945-06-08
1945-06-12
1945-07-24
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
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 booklet
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LWannopRE176129v3
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Norfolk
England--Suffolk
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Braunschweig Region
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hattingen
Germany--Helgoland
Germany--Kamen
Germany--Munich
Germany--Münster in Westfalen
Germany--Regensburg
Germany--Wanne-Eickel
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
France--Juvincourt-et-Damary
90 Squadron
aircrew
bombing of Helgoland (18 April 1945)
Cook’s tour
Distinguished Flying Cross
Lancaster
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
pilot
prisoner of war
RAF Feltwell
RAF Tuddenham
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/946/10121/LVipondR3040603v1.2.pdf
c247b4809193000c047f5b29916993b4
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
Vipond, Richard
R Vipond
Description
An account of the resource
Six items. The collection concerns Richard Vipond (3040603, Royal Air Force) and consists of his log book, service documents and photographs. He flew operations as an air gunner with 514 Squadron from RAF Waterbeach.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Pauline Ponsford and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-04-23
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Vipond, R
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
Richard Vipond’s flying log book for navigators, air bombers, air gunners and flight engineers
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LVipondR3040603v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
Egypt
France
Germany
Great Britain
Netherlands
Singapore
Egypt--Suez Canal
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Cumbria
Great Britain Miscellaneous Island Dependencies--Isle of Man
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Yorkshire
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Essen
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hattingen
Germany--Kamen
Germany--Munich
Germany--Schleswig-Holstein
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Netherlands--Hague
North Africa
Malaysia
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
1946
1947
1948
1949
1950
1951
1952
1953
1945-01-07
1945-01-08
1945-02-19
1945-02-20
1945-02-21
1945-02-23
1945-02-26
1945-02-28
1945-03-02
1945-03-11
1945-03-14
1945-05-07
1945-05-09
1945-05-11
1945-05-12
1945-05-16
1945-05-18
1945-05-19
1945-05-20
1945-05-26
1945-07-05
Description
An account of the resource
Navigators, air bombers, air gunners and flight engineers flying log book for Richard Vipond, covering the period from 29 May 1944 to 18 November 1953. Detailing his flying training, operations flown, instructor duties and post war duties with 514, 288, 61 and 88 Squadrons. He was stationed at RAF Barrow, RAF Husbands Bosworth, RAF Bottesford, RAF Waterbeach, RAF Hutton Cranswick, RAF Jurby, RAF Lindholme, RAF Waddington, RAF Shallufa, RAF Tengah, RAF Scampton and RAF Seletar. Aircraft flown in were, Anson, Wellington, Lancaster, Vengeance, Lincoln and Sunderland. He flew a total of 9 operations with 514 squadron, 7 daylight and 2 night operations. He also flew on Operation Manna to The Hague and Operation Exodus to France and Belgium. He also carried out 35 Strike operations with 61 squadron during the Malayan emergency in 1950. Targets were, Munich, Wesel, Dortmund, Gelsenkirchen, Kamen Dortmund, Nornstedt, Cologne, Essen and Hattingen. His pilot on operations was Flight Lieutenant Marks.
1668 HCU
514 Squadron
61 Squadron
85 OTU
88 Squadron
air gunner
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
bombing
Cook’s tour
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Mk 2
Lancaster Mk 3
Lincoln
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
RAF Barrow in Furness
RAF Bottesford
RAF Husbands Bosworth
RAF Jurby
RAF Lindholme
RAF Scampton
RAF Shallufa
RAF Waddington
RAF Waterbeach
Sunderland
training
Wellington