Browse Items (4469 total)

  • Tags: bombing

BHazeldenePVHazeldenePVv10001.jpg
Peter's RAF service with 57 Squadron is detailed. This was his second tour and he lists his new crew:
Flt Lt J B P 'Tuesday' Spencer, 20 years, Pilot from Greenside, Co Durham
Sgt W D E West, 21 years, Mid Upper Gunner, from Barking, Essex
Sgt H…

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A list of targets and sorties undertaken by aircraft from 5,4, 8, 6, 3, 1 and 100 Groups.

This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.

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Vic Farmer volunteered for the Royal Air Force at 18 and trained, in South Africa, as a navigator. He describes his experiences of crewing up and serving in 550 squadron, RAF North Killingholme. He saw action on D-Day and participated in further…

AWoodhouseRM151001.mp3
Robert Woodhouse was living in Pembroke Dock when the bombing of the town began. The family relocated to Cardiff when they lost their home in the bombing. In Cardiff Robert joined the Air Training Corps. He had a cousin who had already joined the RAF…

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Eddy Smythe reminisces about his father, John Henry Smythe, who was from Sierra Leone and served in Bomber Command during the Second World War. John flew as a navigator until his aircraft was shot down in November 1943. He became a prisoner of war in…

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Bob Frost flew on a night operation on 16/17 September 1942 as a rear gunner on Wellington BJ877, 150 Squadron, from RAF Snaith. Before reaching the target at Essen, the aircraft was hit by anti-aircraft fire and the port engine was damaged. He…

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Helga Wynne was born into a family of twelve in 1926 in Kiel, Germany. She describes her childhood and her father working as a shipbuilder in the dockyards. She left school at 14 and went to work on a farm. She fell through the hayloft opening,…

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Bettie was born in Wakefield. The family moved to Doncaster when she was eleven and at 21 she joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service. While in Doncaster she helped at the YMCA café as part of the war effort and that is where she met and married…

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Vera was born in the Myrtha Tydfil area of Wales. Vera went to the grammar school at Chepstow before getting work in the cashier’s office at the Royal Navy Propellant Factory. After joining the Women's Auxilliary Air Force, Vera was posted to…

AHydeON170830-01.mp3
Oluwole Hyde’s father was Adesanya Hyde, who served as a navigator with 640 Squadron. He was badly injured but continued to navigate the aeroplane on operation. It was only when they were over the UK that he accepted the morphine for the pain.…

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Eddy Smyth’s father was John Smythe. John left Sierra Leone to join the RAF during the Second World War. He was shot down over Germany and spent two years as a prisoner of war. After the war he trained as a barrister and returned to Sierra Leone…

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Helga (00:00-34:00) was born in Kiel in 1926. Her father was a sailor, who then worked at Krupp shipbuilding yard; her mother was a tram driver during the war. None of her brothers were called up, either because of age or disability. She mentions…

Relates how they met and courted and continues with description of work and life in wartime while in Deptford in London. Mentions being bombed out and going to shelters. Continues with their marriage in Sidcup and details of life and family after the…

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Hazel Carby discusses her father Carl's early life in Jamaica, his experiences training in Canada and serving as aircrew in the RAF, and how he and his family were treated in London in the post war period.

She also discusses her research into her…

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Hector's stories about growing up in wartime Edgcott. His family moved there in 1941 when he was 10. He covers his school life, working on his father's farm, mock fighting, playing on a bombing range, working as a cowman, tractor work, working in a…

YMadgettHR1330340v4.pdf
Entries start at home and then cover posting to RAF Waddington and Winthorpe, medical boards and leaves. Posted to 61 Squadron at RAF Syerston on 10 March 1942. Covers first 18 operations starting 22 March and ending 12 June 1943. Targets include…

Joyce Clayton was born in Lincoln and served with the Women's Auxiliary Air Force, where she was first assigned to barrage balloons before becoming an equipment officer at various stations. Whilst based at RAF Sutton-on-Hull she witnessed the bombing…

AGivensM180723.mp3
Margaret Givens grew up in Coventry and witnessed the bombing of the city. She and other children sat on the bricks of the destroyed cathedral to attend a service. Her house was bombed and while she and her brother was staying with her grandmother…

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Kenneth Lindley was born in Hillsborough, Sheffield in 1926. Before joining the RAF Kenneth was an engineer’s apprentice, and often helped the Air Raid Warden by acting as a messenger. He reminisces joining the Air Training Corps as a teenager.…

APickwellBW170317.mp3
Beryl Pickwell lived in Lincoln during the war. The youngest in a family with three brothers and two sisters, she remembers the day war was declared. Her father and two brothers worked in war factories, Clarke’s Crank and Ruston and Hornsby. She…

APriceF170522.mp3
Fay Price was nine at the outbreak of the Second World War living in Grimsby. A twin, they were the youngest of six siblings. Her memory of the start of the war was the ending of birthday parties. Her father was a fish merchant and was able to…

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12 charts, four log sheets.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.

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Map and logs for operation on 10 Sept 1944 to Le Havre.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.

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Map and three log sheets.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.

MAdamsHG424504-170215-020009.jpg
One map and two log sheets.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.
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