1
25
4
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2180/38351/S102SqnRAF19170809v30003-0001.2.jpg
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2180/38351/S102SqnRAF19170809v30003-0002.2.jpg
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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
102 Squadron Collection
Description
An account of the resource
Thirty-one items.
The collection concerns material from the 102 Squadron Association and contains part of a Tee Emm magazine, documents, photographs, accounts of Ceylonese in the RAF, a biography, poems, a log book, cartoons, intelligence and operational reports, an operations order and an account by a United States Army Air Force officers secret trip to Great Britain to arrange facilities for American forces.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Harry Bartlett and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2019-05-23
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
102 Squadron Association
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[inserted] 14/2920 [/inserted]
[underlined] MOST SECRET [/underlined]
[underlined] SERRATE [/underlined].
[underlined] Patrols [/underlined] (a) Beacon “B”
(b) Target area after bombing
(c) Beacon “S”
(d) Beacon “Q” and Sylt area.
14 A/C took off 5 returned early.
1 A/C 169 Squadron Missing (W/Cdr. Gracie & F/lt. Wylton-Todd)
[underlined] Claims [/underlined] 1 He 177 claimed destroyed over target
1 Ju 88 claimed damaged in Beacon “B” area
(Note: 1 Ju 88 claimed damaged by Wellington of 192 Squadron)
(a) [underlined] Patrol at Beacon “B” [/underlined]
[inserted] 141/R [/inserted]
2020 hours – 52.30 N. 0920 E 23,000 ft. back A.I. contact which was lost in interference.
141/R – 2055 hours patrol area 23,000 ft. 5 A.I. contacts obtained together. Rear contact singled out and A.I. dog-fight followed for 15 minutes. Visual obtained at 1,000 feet and at 300 ft.
A/C identified as Ju.88. 141/R fired two bursts, strikes observed and stream of sparks came from E/A’s port engine. It peeled off to starboard as went down very steeply with sparks still coming from port engine. A thired [sic] burst fired with unobserved results before E/A disappeared into cloud.
Claimed as damaged.
2110 hours at patrol area, 17,000 ft. back A.I. blip obtained. Held on A.I. though violent evasive action. Some fleeting visuals obtained but no identification. A.I. contact lost after 10 minutes.
2123 hours at patrol area, back A.I. blip. Gave chase but at 2124 hours A.I. Mk. IV. failed.
No Serrate reported except a fleeting contact at the end of the patrol.
169/C Returned early with engine trouble.
169/B Missing
141/M From 0700 ° E to patrol area numerous weak Serrate contacts to North.
At 2044 hours, at patrol area, Serrate contact chased and brief A.I. contact obtained, but enemy aircraft dived away and both A.I. and Serrate contacts lost.
(b) [underlined] Patrol in Target Area after bombing [/underlined]
141/Z Three very weak Serrate contacts on way in, not chased. Arrived target area [inserted] (a few [/inserted] mins. before planned end of bombing). Numerous A.I. contacts caused confusion on A.I. tube. Window added to confusion on A.I. tube but enabled friendlies to be identified. Same Serrate contacts in target area, from various directions, but too weak to chase. At 2135 hours 23,000 ft. visual obtained on white tail light. Range closed aircraft identified as He 117, which was weaving slightly. 141/Z fired [deleted] five [/deleted] [inserted] two [/inserted] bursts and starboard engine and fuselage seen to catch on fire, and enemy aircraft spiralled down in flames.
Claimed as destroyed.
/ continued . . . . . Page 2.
[page break]
[inserted] 142920 [/inserted]
-2- [underlined] MOST SECRET [/underlined]
Cont’d
141/Z Two Serrate contacts observed on way home, one too weak and one too brief to chase. Numerous A.I. contacts on Bomber Stream.
239/A 2059 hours. 5240 N 0640 E, 23, 000 ft. Weak Serrate contact to port. Not chased, though it continued distantly to port until 30 miles West of Berlin.
Arrived target area 2027 hours. No serrate, but numerous A.I. contacts, no chases resulted in a visual A.I. Mark IV reported U/S for last part of patrol in target area.
On way back a brief Serrate contact when E. of BREMEN.
At 2259 hours, 5240 N 0850 E Serrate contact obtained and chased East for 20 minutes. E/A diving and climbing as if under ground control. Chase abandoned owing to lack of fuel. Serrate reported U/S after this chase.
169/P No Serrate contacts at all reported. No A.I. contacts obtained until target area was reachd [sic] at 2140 hours. In target area A.I. tube swamped by large number of contacts.
On way home many A.I. blips from the bomber stream.
(c) [underlined] Beacon “S” [/underlined] (patrolling from Beacon S in a South-Easterly direction)
141/N Four brief and weak Serrate contacts at patrol area. None could be chased for more than a minute or so. Number of A.I. contacts on bombers.
141/U Returned early with engine trouble.
239/M No Serrate contacts at all reported. Several A.I. contacts followed in patrol area, but none turned to visual. At 2150 hours, 5225 N, 1200 E, 23, 000 ft. fighter flares seen to be dropped. Flew an estimated cut-off vector, and 3 A.I. contacts obtained at 11, 000 ft., but they were lost after closing to 6, 000 feet.
On way back on two occasions, two back A.I. blips received. Attempted to come round behind them, but they were lost, in one case due to interference.
169/H Two very weak Serrate contacts reported on way in, one weak contact when in the patrol area, and another on the way home over the Frisian Islands. No chases reported. Many A.I. contacts on bomber stream when in patrol area.
169/N Returned early owing to trouble with the Oxygen system.
(d) [underlined] Patrol to Beacon “Q” and Sylt area [/underlined].
239/B Returned early with engine trouble.
169/D Returned early with A.I. and intercomm. [sic] trouble.
[underlined] Interference [/underlined].
Of the eight A/C completing their patrols, all reported a certain amount of interference on A.I. Mk.IV when over enemy territory. It appeared to be most severe N. of the Ruhr and the HANNOVER area. Most of the reports suggested that it could be worked through except at long range.
Serrate interference was reported by two of the aircraft, which they ascribed to Grocer.
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
Serrate operation report
Description
An account of the resource
Marked most Secret. Lists patrol areas. Aircraft in operation (14 took off, 5 returned early and 1 missing). Claims 1 He 177 and one Ju 88.
Detailed description of patrol activity at Beacon "B". Followed by detailed description of patrol activity in target area after bombing. Detailed description of patrol activity a Beacon "S". Finally short description of patrol activity to Beacon "Q" and Sylt area.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Sylt
Germany--Bremen
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
Format
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Two page typewritten document
Identifier
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S102SqnRAF19170809v30003
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Paul Ross
169 Squadron
192 Squadron
Ju 88
missing in action
radar
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/934/36538/MLovattP1821369-190903-74-01.1.pdf
fb8bdc0a3359bad330631a99725ecf91
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/934/36538/MLovattP1821369-190903-74-02.1.2.pdf
518e2b514f18dba39e9302770bce90ba
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
Lovatt, Peter
Dr Peter Lovatt
P Lovatt
Description
An account of the resource
117 items. An oral history interview with Peter Lovatt (b.1924, 1821369 Royal Air Force), his log book, documents, and photographs. The collection also contains two photograph albums. He flew 42 operations as an air gunner on 223 Squadron flying B-24s. <br /><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1338">Album One</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/2135">Album Two</a><br /><br />The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Nina and Peter Lovatt 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
2017-09-27
2019-09-03
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Lovatt, P
Dublin Core
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Title
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The Offensive Phase
Volume Two of Two
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Peter Lovatt
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Norway--Trondheim
France--Brest
Russia (Federation)
England--Hartland
England--Beer Head
Europe--Elbe River
England--Dover
England--Folkestone
England--London
France--Bruneval
France--Pas-de-Calais
Germany--Lübeck
Germany--Rostock
England--Norwich
England--Cheadle (Staffordshire)
England--Salcombe
England--Sidmouth
France--Cherbourg
France--Boulogne-sur-Mer
France--Dunkerque
France--Cassel
England--Salisbury
Russia (Federation)--Kola Peninsula
Russia (Federation)--Arkhangelʹskai︠a︡ oblastʹ
Germany--Berlin
Poland--Szczecin
France--Desvres
France--Arcachon
France--Nantes
France--Chartres
France--Reims
England--Swanage
England--Malvern
England--Plymouth
France--Lorient
England--Lincoln
Scotland--Edinburgh
England--Hull
England--London
England--Bristol
France--Montdidier (Hauts-de-France)
England--Guildford
France--Poix-du-Nord
Germany--Mannheim
Czech Republic--Pilsen Basin
England--Harpenden
France--Morlaix
Spain--Lugo
Spain--Seville
England--Radlett (Hertfordshire)
Germany--Cologne
France--Boulogne-Billancourt
Germany--Rostock
Germany--Essen
Germany--Schleswig-Holstein
Belgium--Liège
Germany--Bremen
England--High Wycombe
Germany--Osnabrück
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Wilhelmshaven
England--Sizewell
Germany--Peenemünde
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Munich
Germany--Kassel
England--Crowborough
England--Huddersfield
Netherlands--Den Helder
England--Mundesley
Germany--Schweinfurt
Europe--Baltic Sea Region
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
Germany--Braunschweig
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Wolfenbüttel
Germany--Magdeburg
France--Limoges
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Munich
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Augsburg
France--Yvelines
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Kiel
Poland--Poznań
France--Dieppe
Turkey--Gallipoli
Egypt--Alamayn
Egypt--Cairo
Morocco
Algeria
Italy--Sicily
England--Ventnor
England--Beachy Head
France--Abbeville
France--Somme
France--Seine River
England--Southampton
England--Portsmouth
Scotland--Firth of Forth
Iceland
England--Brighton
France--Normandy
France--Cherbourg
England--Littlehampton
England--Portland Harbour
France--Amiens
Netherlands--Arnhem
France--Normandy
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
France--Le Havre
France--Arromanches-les-Bains
France--Bayeux
Belgium--Wenduine
France--Beauvais
England--Ditchling
England--Henfield (West Sussex)
England--Canterbury
England--Crowborough
England--Dover
England--Chiswick
Netherlands--Hague
Sweden
Belgium--Antwerp
Germany--Aachen
Germany--Trier
Germany--Siegfried Line
Netherlands--New Maas River
Netherlands--Waal River
Russia (Federation)--Kaliningrad (Kaliningradskai︠a︡ oblastʹ)
Germany--Darmstadt
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Braunschweig
Netherlands--Walcheren
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Bochum
Germany--Cologne
Europe--Ardennes
Belgium--Bastogne
Germany--Leuna
Germany--Essen
Germany--Ludwigshafen am Rhein
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Ulm
Rhine River Valley
Germany--Mittelland Canal
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Castrop-Rauxel
Germany--Hannover
Belgium--Houffalize
Germany--Neuss
Germany--Grevenbroich
Germany--Dülmen
Germany--Dresden
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Magdeburg
Germany--Bonn
Germany--Kamen
Germany--Dortmund-Ems Canal
Germany--Chemnitz
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Kiel
England--Coventry
Italy
Poland
France
Great Britain
Egypt
North Africa
Germany
Belgium
Czech Republic
Netherlands
Norway
Russia (Federation)
Spain
Turkey
Europe--Frisian Islands
England--Milton Keynes
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
England--Devon
England--Dorset
England--Gloucestershire
England--Hampshire
England--Herefordshire
England--Kent
England--Middlesex
England--Norfolk
England--Staffordshire
England--Suffolk
England--Surrey
England--Sussex
England--Wiltshire
England--Worcestershire
England--Yorkshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Warwickshire
Russia (Federation)--Poli︠a︡rnyĭ (Murmanskai︠a︡ oblastʹ)
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. Coastal Command
Royal Navy
United States Army Air Force
Wehrmacht. Luftwaffe
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
178 printed pages
Description
An account of the resource
A continuation of Peter's thesis on electronic warfare during the war.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
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
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IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MLovattP1821369-190903-74-01
1 Group
100 Group
101 Squadron
109 Squadron
141 Squadron
169 Squadron
171 Squadron
192 Squadron
199 Squadron
214 Squadron
218 Squadron
223 Squadron
239 Squadron
3 Group
4 Group
462 Squadron
5 Group
617 Squadron
8 Group
aircrew
B-17
B-24
Beaufighter
Bennett, Donald Clifford Tyndall (1910-1986)
Chamberlain, Neville (1869-1940)
crash
Defiant
Do 217
Fw 190
Gee
Gneisenau
Goering, Hermann (1893-1946)
H2S
Halifax
Halifax Mk 3
Hampden
Harris, Arthur Travers (1892-1984)
He 111
Hitler, Adolf (1889-1945)
Hudson
Ju 88
Lancaster
Me 110
Me 410
mine laying
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Mosquito
navigator
Oboe
Operational Training Unit
P-51
Pathfinders
radar
RAF Defford
RAF Downham Market
RAF Farnborough
RAF Foulsham
RAF Little Snoring
RAF North Creake
RAF Northolt
RAF Oulton
RAF Prestwick
RAF Sculthorpe
RAF St Athan
RAF Swannington
RAF Tempsford
RAF Upper Heyford
RAF Uxbridge
RAF West Raynham
RAF Wittering
Scharnhorst
Stalin, Joseph (1878-1953)
Stirling
Tirpitz
training
Typhoon
V-1
V-2
V-weapon
Wellington
Window
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1194/11767/AWhiteKWJ170807.1.mp3
27ebcbfd617915ef32874b6005938d36
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
White, Kenneth
Kenneth William John White
K W J White
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Sergeant Ken White (b. 1925, 1852517 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as an air gunner with 214 flying B-17s.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-08-07
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
White, KWJ
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
IL: Ian locker interviewing Mr Kenneth White at his home in Hayling Island. It’s the 7th of August and it’s about 2.15. So, Ken, how did you get involved with Bomber Command?
KW: Well, it’s a bit of a tale actually. I enlisted in the RAF on the — I’ve got the date here actually. [unclear] [pause — pages turning] On the 8th of March 1943 when I was seventeen and a half. I was accepted for training as a navigator, bomb aimer or pilot and was then put on deferred service because the training programmes at that time were quite full. I was informed about a year later that because of the delay I could no longer be considered for those classifications but I could either remain in the RAF and take another trade or I could transfer to the Navy or Army or I could go to work down the mines. I didn’t choose the mines [laughs] I stayed and I elected to stay in the RAF and I was called up for service on the 27th of May ’44. So, I was over a year waiting really and then took more aptitude tests and was selected for training as an air gunner. I went through the training programme and it was ground. Well, I enlisted at RAF Scarborough. The Aircrew Receiving Centre at that time. And then went to RAF Bridgnorth which was the ground gunner training side of it. And from there to RAF Dalcross where [pause — pages turning] which was, I must have joined about the 20th of October ’44 according to this. And I passed out as an air gunner on the 12th of January ’44.
IL: Right.
KW: And was then promoted to sergeant. At the completion of the course I had leave and then we went, we had to go on, I think it was about six weeks, a senior NCOs course at Whitley Bay. From there we were due to go on leave before going to OTU. Operational Training Unit. As we were parading for our leave passes a few of us were called out and told that we weren’t going on leave. We were going to join a station at RAF Oulton.
IL: Right.
KW: I didn’t know for what. We knew we were going as gunners but we didn’t know for what purpose or what RAF Oulton was. And we arrived there —
IL: Can we just take a step back? What did — you say you were at Gunnery School.
KW: Yeah.
IL: What did that actually involve?
KW: Air Gunnery School.
IL: Air Gunnery School. Sorry.
KW: Yeah. That was the first. RAF Bridgnorth was gunnery courses on land, equipping yourself with —
IL: But using, using the same sort of things that you would be using.
KW: Using 303 —
IL: Yeah.
KW: Brownings. And the Air Gunnery School was the same. We used 303 but were flying with them as well.
IL: Right.
KW: As well as doing in the hangars and still ground, you know. Training there.
IL: How did they — when you’re flying how did they simulate, you know being attacked by aircraft? Or was there no —
KW: Well, at that point —
IL: Was there just —
KW: There was a single-engine plane drawing a drogue.
IL: Right.
KW: And you opened fire at the drogue.
IL: Ok.
KW: Really. That’s what it was like there. And if you, if you managed to get a shot near the end of the drogue it broke it all to pieces so you got a good score.
IL: Right. Ok.
KW: So, I twigged that [laughs] And came out with above average there.
IL: Right.
KW: I think that’s probably why I was dragged away from leave but —
IL: Ok. Ok.
KW: Anyway, I believe we went to [pause] 169 Flight at Oulton. RAF Oulton. That was for joining the crews. Would have joined us there with the six from — I’ve got all the names somewhere, who had been to OTU. To operational training, you know. And four of us who had never been to OTU. That was myself, the starboard waist gunner, the flight engineer and a special operator as we called him who’d come straight from university actually.
IL: Right.
KW: And we didn’t know at the time but he could speak Russian fluently.
IL: Oh right.
KW: And we were crewed up as ten. And on the flight we then had to become accustomed to .5 Browning.
IL: Right.
KW: Weapons which were completely different in, in ways that you handled them and the way the rounds were kept before firing. The Browning, the round was away from the breech. The 303 Browning. With the .5 the Browning was already in the breech.
IL: Right.
KW: And by the heat, if it had been firing could explode and fire another shot.
IL: Right.
KW: I’ll tell you about that later on.
IL: Yeah.
KW: And then.
IL: So, had you, when you went there had you, had you ever seen the sort of B-17s or —
KW: No.
IL: Had you had, you’d never had any —
KW: No. The first —
IL: Because these were American built planes.
KW: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. They were American.
IL: So, were they modified in any way to sort of — for the RAF? Or were they just —
KW: Yes. The belly turret. The Americans flew with a turret underneath as well which was taken off of ours. And we didn’t carry bombs. We carried special equipment. One part of which was a tall cylinder like thing which wouldn’t fit in to the —
IL: Right.
KW: Bomb bays of Lancasters or Halifaxes. But it would stand upright in, in a Fortress and a Liberator bomb bay. So, that’s, that was part of the reasons for —
IL: Right.
KW: Having that particular aircraft.
IL: Right. Ok.
KW: We [pause — pages turning] I’ve got the date. The week. At the beginning of April we passed from the training into the squadron. 214 Squadron itself. Until the first two flights I had there were [pause] on the 18th of April and the 19th of April. One was a night fighter affiliation and the second was —
IL: So, what, sorry what does that mean, Ken? Night fighter affiliation.
KW: Exercise with a night fighter attack.
IL: Oh. So, ok —
KW: Yeah.
IL: So, it was an exercise rather than an actual mission.
KW: It was an exercise. Yeah. It wasn’t a mission.
IL: Right.
KW: I had to get used to the —
IL: Yeah.
KW: The other things and we had longer flights to become accustomed to — and an air test. And in fact I did my first operation on the 19th of April when looking at this I had forty seven and a half hours day flying experience and nineteen hours and forty minutes night flying experience when I went on my first op.
IL: And this was a night, night op.
KW: It was a night op. Yes. They were all nights ops.
IL: Right. Ok.
KW: While we were experienced as a crew the first one we had Murray Peden, you may have heard of, he wrote a couple of books. He’s Canadian.
IL: Right.
KW: But he was a, carried as an extra pilot. They took an experienced pilot to keep an eye on what Ken Kennett, our pilot was doing.
IL: Right.
KW: But that was the only time. Then from the other two I was on my own.
IL: Right.
KW: But we, as well as being air gunners in, in the waist we were responsible when told by the navigator or the special operator as to dropping Window. Window, you’re well aware of I expect.
IL: Yeah.
KW: But a lot of people don’t realise there were different types and had to be dropped at different heights and at different speeds of the dropping. And we had, we had to obey what, what instructions we were given and [pause]
IL: Because presumably when you’re bombing you’re probably at your most vulnerable and so —
KW: Well, no.
IL: That would be the time when you would need to be.
KW: We didn’t bomb. We didn’t carry any bombs.
IL: Oh sorry. Ok. So, what were you actually —
KW: It was actually the first electronic —
Other: Countermeasures.
Other 2: Countermeasures. Yeah.
IL: Oh right.
KW: Yeah
IL: Ok.
Other: They would call it chaff these days.
IL: Right.
KW: Yeah. There’s a book which has recently come out. That’s a good point that is.
IL: So it was sort of like a jamming. Some sort of thing to jam.
KW: Well, we had two, two sections. We dropped, we, we used the Window to jam radar as well but also to give the effect that a heavy raid was going to take place on a certain area. And therefore their fighters were then away from the main stream.
IL: Yeah.
KW: Who were attacking somewhere else. So, that was what we called diversions.
IL: Yeah.
KW: We were diverting the enemy. And the special operator was able to tune in to the German Fighter Control and on occasions break into it and put them off.
IL: Right.
KW: As well, on other occasions jamming. And the bomb aimer — we had no bombs as I said.
IL: Yeah.
KW: But he had equipment as well which followed the same thing.
IL: Right.
KW: So, and I did three ops altogether. That — the last one being the last one of the European war.
IL: So, what was that? What was the last operation of the European war?
KW: Well, it was in the Kiel area.
IL: Right.
KW: We were Window dropping then, in summary. I’ve got it here [pause — pages turning] The three. The three operations that I did. In red. That’s the first one. The second one. They were mainly all in that area because they were back up in Schleswig. The Germans were back up in that area.
IL: Right.
KW: At that time in the war.
IL: So, what, the people who were bombing were they actually they were bombing ground troops presumably or were they bombing —
KW: Well, they were bombing Kiel at night.
IL: Kiel, yeah.
KW: Yeah. And we were protecting them on that occasion and, as much as we could but in the, we lost nothing. I’ve got — I don’t know whether this is of any interest to you or not [pause — pages turning] That’s from the operation record book of the squadron at that time.
IL: So, on those, on your obviously three missions over Germany, how operational were the sort of, you know both fighters and defences?
KW: Well, that’s a hard question. I —
[pause]
KW: I’ve wrote that article.
IL: Oh right.
KW: With respect of Alan Mercer, the navigator, when he die. But he was, he was the ninth to pass away which left only myself still alive now. If you read through that you’ve got the history there.
IL: Right. But, as I say, did they, were there, you know was there still a lot of sort of anti-aircraft fire and was there still a lot of — were there still — you know?
KW: Yeah. Yeah, there were still fighters.
IL: There were still fighters.
KW: If you read that you’ll see we saw what we thought were rocket type things but in fact it was confirmed later that they were jet fighters.
IL: Right.
KW: German jet fighters.
IL: Right. Gosh.
KW: But we lost no —
IL: Because —
KW: No aircraft — well, it shows on, we lost no aircraft from our squadron. But on that very last raid 262, which was in the same group I think they were Halifaxes. They were in the same area and they lost two aircraft. The second was a tragedy really because the first apparently, I’ve read since was hit and out of control and crashed into another of the same squadron.
IL: Gosh.
KW: And they were both lost. They were both lost.
IL: How did — how did it feel? Because presumably coming up to that point I think — I don’t know I don’t know but I would imagine most people felt the war was coming to an end.
KW: Coming to a close. Coming to an end. Yeah.
IL: And to — did you, did you, were you just sort of this is what I’m going to do? This is what I’m doing. Or did you feel somehow well is this not a little bit of, you know putting people into a you know difficult position when they, you know, when it’s, when things are almost, things are almost over?
KW: No. You just felt it was your duty.
IL: Yeah.
KW: You joined to do that particular job. You volunteered for it and you just got on and did what the job was.
IL: Ok. Ok. So —
KW: You didn’t realise, we didn’t realise all that was happening. Especially with the special operator. He was very secretive. Even to the crew. The rest of the crew. But he was a nice chap, but he was the first to pass away after the war. He got killed. He took a flight. He went on to air traffic control. Was out in Poona and grabbed a chance of a free flight and the aircraft went in to the ground and he was killed.
IL: Gosh.
KW: And as I say, he’d had no, no life.
IL: So, was he — presumably your special operator was, he, he was presumably RAF?
KW: Yes.
IL: He wasn’t sort of —
KW: No. No he wasn’t —
IL: Military intelligence or —
KW: No. That’s, that’s our crew that I flew with.
IL: Oh right.
KW: That’s Ken. There was only one who had any previous operational service and that was Steve, the wireless, the actual wireless, normal wireless operator.
IL: Yeah.
KW: Who had flown on either a Hudson or Ventura squadron in the Middle East. He’d done a tour out there. He was the oldest. Oldest of us. Then a warrant officer. He remained in the RAF after.
IL: So what did you do after? You know, once you finished. Once you’d done your couple of operations. You know, your three operations and you said that—
KW: Well, we remained on the squadron. Flying. Still flying on pre-arranged things. We also took ground crew to flights over Germany and France to show what had been happening with the damage and all that sort of thing.
IL: Right.
KW: And, well, and still practiced gunnery.
IL: Yeah.
KW: And still fighter affiliation because we didn’t, we didn’t know at that stage what the next move would be.
IL: Right.
KW: You know. The, the war in the Far East was still going on and we could have well been posted. But then they disbanded the squadron and we were all torn —
IL: Because obviously.
KW: Seriously.
IL: With you being, you know your squadron being designated Malayan Squadron presumably you’d have thought that you’d be highly likely to get sent out.
KW: Well, I think that’s, there were a number of squadrons that had designations of some sort. I think that’s because they’d been funded in the first instance.
IL: Right. Oh right. Ok. Yeah, I’ve spoken to people who were in — I think one of the Lincolnshire squadrons was a Kenya Squadron and they’ve — so when did you, so when did, when did you, when did you — when was the squadron disbanded?
KW: I think that might be in [pause] where’s the one that [unclear] [pause] I turn these out for 100 Group. Something like that. What did I do with that? [pause] You’ve got two books there.
IL: I’ve got, I’ve got your Spring 2010 and Winter 2014. Shall I just put this off for a second?
[recording paused]
IL: So, we’re still talking about when the squadron was disbanded, Ken.
KW: Yes. Yeah. That was mid ’45.
IL: Right.
KW: New Zealand crew members returned home and the remaining crew were posted as I said earlier on to various other duties and trades, you know.
IL: Yeah.
KW: I was a clerk for a bit. I was selected as a clerk. I passed the course as an LAC but I still remained a sergeant and I was posted out to India.
IL: Right.
KW: And — at air headquarters. I was promoted to corporal in that trade and then to acting sergeant paid in that trade before I returned home but I still was a sergeant all the while because of my aircrew rank.
IL: So, how long did you stay in the RAF after?
KW: I —
Other: You put it down again.
KW: I had a letter somewhere. Oh. It’s in the logbook.
Other: Yeah. I think so. I didn’t see it in the book.
KW: I’m getting a little bit. Well, I’ve still got a few marbles but I think some of them have out of time.
IL: Some of them rolled away. I think we all, I think we’re all a bit like that sometimes.
[pause]
KW: I had a little letter.
Other 2: Yeah. You had an envelope.
KW: An envelope. Yeah. It’s in there. The date I —
Other 2: You put the letter back in the envelope. I saw you doing it.
KW: Now, where did I put it then?
IL: So, was it 1945 or was it much later?
KW: No. No. It was 1947.
IL: Oh right. Ok. So you were in India for a couple of years.
KW: A couple of years. Well, almost two years. Yeah.
IL: Right. [pause] So, how did you find India? Was this sort of — was it the time of —
KW: Terrible place. Well, it was just —
IL: Unease and partition coming up.
KW: It was just coming up to partition. It wasn’t too bad when we first got there but [pause] What did I do with that? [pause] It gives the exact date on that letter. That’s why.
IL: Don’t, don’t worry, Ken. So what did you do after? After you came out of the RAF what did you do in your later life?
KW: I — well, before I joined the RAF I left school at fourteen. I became an apprentice grocer at the International Tea Company. You won’t remember that I suppose.
IL: Not quite.
KW: And I did a three year apprenticeship.
Other: Carry on.
KW: The first year it was ten shillings a week. Second year fifteen shillings a week. And the third year a pound a week. And then I became assistant and got an increase. Then I went in the RAF. I came back and I remained. I came back to them for a while as an apprentice and started studying grocers [unclear] and then, oh thank you — and then, and then I changed to the Home Colonial Stores.
IL: Right.
KW: Where I was called a first hand which now they would term as an assistant manager.
IL: Right.
KW: Because the manager was the way I ran the shop. And you wouldn’t believe this but every week on a Saturday we took stock of the whole, you had in the store and you worked out the cost to make sure that you hadn’t lost any money. Each shop did that.
IL: Gosh.
KW: So, Saturday you didn’t get off very early in the evening. But —
IL: So, was that, was that back in Oulton? Or was that back in —
KW: That was back in Oulton.
IL: Right.
KW: And then I joined the Hampshire Constabulary as a policeman. After, in fact I was posted back to Oulton on, after my training at the Police Training School because while I was away my wife had managed to get a little cottage. Two up two down across the yard from [laughs] and share a washhouse. That was our home. And then in, that was in ’49 I joined the police. Then I was posted to Christchurch which was then in Hampshire and I did — I was there until February ’52. And during that time I was a bit lucky with — there was a very good detective constable there who and I had a few lucky arrests and things like that. He took me under his wing and I came back then to Fareham as a detective constable after less than three years’ service which was unheard of in those days.
IL: Right.
KW: But we were at Fareham. Then from Fareham I was posted to Havant. And [unclear] used to move every two years and they provided a house for you. For Havant. And I remained there until 1957. And Havant, then Leigh Park was I don’t know if you know about, you don’t know the area.
IL: I don’t know the area. I’m sorry.
KW: Terrific estate. Built for Portsmouth people really.
IL: Right.
Other: It was, when it was built it was the biggest council estate in Europe.
KW: Yeah.
IL: Oh gosh.
KW: And that was being built up and I was a DC covering Havant, Hayling Island, Emsworth, Purbrook and Waterlooville. That one DC then and I I then got an aid. Dick Barton.
Other: Good name.
IL: He was a good man. A good man. He was. He wouldn’t take his exams for a long long time. Mainly because he, he didn’t, he’d found the bungalow over here because his wife had [pause] what was it she had?
Other 2: I think I’ve got [pause] I don’t know.
Other: She was disabled wasn’t she?
KW: She was disabled.
IL: Right. Ok.
KW: So, they, they were able to rent a bungalow for her so he didn’t, but he did eventually take his sergeant’s exam and he later became a sergeant. We were friends until, well his wife passed away and then he could visit. We came down here and he would visit Pam and myself every week for a meal.
IL: Oh lovely.
KW: So, and he was a good man. Anyway, where had I got to.
Other: You were in Havant. You were a DC in Havant.
KW: A DC. And then I was promoted to detective sergeant. They made a detective sergeant at Havant with six constables. They had two of us were running it at that stage. But all hours. All hours. I enjoyed them but and then I went over to Winchester in ’57 as a detective sergeant. And I passed my inspector’s exams and in 1960 I was the first one actually attached from Hampshire to New Scotland Yard and on a branch they set up with half Metropolitan and half from mainly the Home Counties. But ours was not a true Home County but I was the first for them.
IL: Fantastic.
KW: And I was supposed to have been there for two years as a detective inspector but in fact they kept me there for four years. During that time we lived at Aldershot, didn’t we? And I travelled up. Well, I took my our own car which caused some problems with some of the metropolitan officers because they provided me with a, that was when the Yard was on the Embankment there.
IL: Yeah.
KW: With a parking place for my car as they did with all the other county officers who were attached. And of course that left the police with nowhere [laughs] to park. But no it was it was good, good unit.
IL: Yeah.
KW: It was a good unit and worked hard. And then I came back to Gosport. That was ’64. I was detective inspector there. And during that time I took a team across to Jersey to assist with a murder out there.
IL: Gosh.
KW: And then in, it was ’64 or ’67 the amalgamation of Portsmouth, Southampton and Hampshire took place and I was promoted to detective chief inspector and posted to Aldershot where I remained until ’69. Then I was promoted detective chief superintendent, detective superintendent sorry. Not chief. Covering the whole of the north of Hampshire. It was divided by three and one, one headquarters and then — when have I got to? ’69 an that was the north, then but ’71 I came in to headquarters as a deputy head of CID in the county.
IL: Gosh.
KW: And I eventually retired December 1974. And I started in January immediately with the MOD as an investigating officer there.
IL: Yeah.
KW: And, well, during which time when I was at headquarters as detective superintendent in the job I took then. We had quite a, we were talking about MI5.
IL: Yeah.
KW: With them because I had special branch in the county and we had good liaison with them. With MI5. Also, once or twice a year they threw a party up there where drink flowed freely.
IL: Yes. It was a good party.
KW: Anyway, and then I got a promotion. I went then to Grade 1 and was then attached to the RAF security.
IL: Right. It came full circle almost.
KW: Yeah.
Other: Yeah.
KW: And then I was responsible for the south of the county to the other.
Other: South of the country.
KW: South of the country. From North Wales across to Essex.
IL: Right.
KW: And so, and I was rather amazed after having been a sergeant in the RAF but the first function I was invited to with Pam was, I went to the mess. They said accommodation in the mess. I got there and I found that the accommodation I had was a wing commander’s [laughs] because my grade —
IL: Yes.
KW: In the civil service was equivalent to a wing commander’s. So we took a rapid rise from sergeant to —
IL: Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, you know.
KW: At the time. There we are. Eventually I did ten years at that and things were getting a bit much for me because of my heart really. And so, that’s when I had the triple bypass.
IL: Fantastic. So you had, so you had two very successful careers. Well, three actually. As a grocer as well.
KW: Yeah [laughs] So, but, better than all that I had three good sons. There’s two of them here now.
IL: I’ll just flick this off again.
[recording paused]
IL: So, restarting.
KW: Right. Do you want the names of them all?
IL: No. But I think it’s quite interesting, you know how you kept in touch and kept contact after the war.
KW: Kept in touch. As I say we weren’t all that long together but we became a family. And I have, we kept in touch after the war and a couple of the New Zealanders, we had three New Zealanders in the crew and two of them came over with their wives and with their families. And even the great grandchildren of one of the New Zealanders had been. And there was one picture in one of those books. I’ve got some somewhere where we had, while they were over here we had meetings with all of us who were still about. And, you know it’s wonderful. And when I lost her, Pam it was family flowers only and the New Zealanders ignored it. They sent a wreath, ‘”From your New Zealand family.”
IL: That is wonderful.
KW: But we became very very close. You know.
IL: When did you first, when did you first start? Or did you just continue to always meet up? Or was there a sort of time when you had your first reunion? Or —
KW: Well, the 100 Group, those of us who were alive or still in England which was with mainly Smithy, Alan Mercer and myself we, we joined the 100 Group Association and we three went up to the Memorial they, they put up at Oulton.
IL: Right.
KW: That was erected there for all that had flown from Oulton. It’s still there. They meet every night, every year.
IL: Right.
KW: Pam and I and Alan and Smithy have been up various time but the New Zealanders they’ve never been over when as I say unfortunately through the years they’ve gradually all —
IL: Right.
KW: Passed away.
IL: But was this, as I say did you, did you meet as a group and join the Association immediately after the war?
KW: No.
IL: Or was this much much later? So, when was the Association formed? Just roughly. It doesn’t have to be an exact day. Was this the 60s or earlier? Or —
KW: Yeah. Later that that I think.
IL: Oh right. Ok.
KW: ’94 I think the Memorial stone was put up.
IL: Right.
KW: And —
IL: So, was that, was that the first time you got together after the war?
KW: No. No. No. We’d been together.
IL: Or were you continuing to sort of see each other on a fairly regular basis.
KW: Yeah. Yeah. As soon as someone from abroad, from New Zealand they were the ones that came. As soon as we knew we got in touch with the other and those who were available.
IL: Yeah.
KW: We’d meet up with them. We’d arrange where we’d meet. You know, the New Zealanders stayed here during their visit and so we were able to get together somewhere and that sort of carried on from there. And Christmas exchanges and things like that a couple of times a year.
Other: Was the squadron quite, quite typical — or your aircraft quite typical of most others with the number of Commonwealth airmen?
KW: Well, yeah, they were, it was fairly well mixed because —
Other: You had three New Zealanders.
KW: Well, in our crew.
Other: Yeah.
KW: Some of the others are Canadians.
Other: Yeah.
KW: And Australians. Altogether.
Other: Yeah. Yeah.
KW: The Australians. Some of them lost their pay as soon as they got it [laughs]
IL: Yeah. The crew. You said that there was six of them and you guys joined. Were the six a transfer as a crew or had they been —
KW: No. They transferred in. They’d done their operational training.
IL: Right.
KW: As a crew.
IL: Right.
KW: But —
IL: So, had they done their operational training on B-17s or had they done their operational training on Lancasters?
KW: I’m not sure exactly.
IL: Oh, ok. Ok.
KW: Alan went on. The navigator. When we were redundant he was transferred to another squadron. A Stirling squadron taking stuff over to Germany and Holland. You know we were dropping supplies at that point.
IL: Oh yes. Operation Manna which was —
KW: But I had nothing — no part of that.
IL: Because it’s interesting that you know we hear stories of people who you know, twenty pilots, twenty flight engineers, twenty gunners, sorry twenty, you know mid-gunners, twenty rear gunners just put in and they’d go around. And, you know they’d choose who they want and it sort of smacked to me a little bit of, you know being the kid nobody wanted in the football team. You know, it was a sort of, it sounded like a pretty horrendous sort of thing to have to go through.
KW: I think you do find your place in it really I suppose. But with our crew it certainly worked out anyway. Well Freddie, the main one. The other waist gunner he’d been the same with me at Dalcross and then the Senior NCO School afterwards and we were two that were called out so. But his son is still in touch with me. And —
Other: Didn’t Freddie blame poor health, back problems on rough landings?
KW: Well, rough landing. Yeah. Yeah.
IL: Well, I can imagine. I can imagine. How did.
KW: I mentioned early on about the difference between the —
IL: Oh yes.
KW: The 303 and the .5. Well, Curly, that’s Herlihy, Herlihy was his name but he was also often also known as Curly and Duke. His name was Maddox. Curly was the mid-upper gunner who had a turret. Curly had, you know Duke was the rear gunner who sat on virtually a motorcycle saddle with a gun position. Of course ours, there were no turrets in the waist. They were just gunner positions. And Curly one day after a firing exercise did what he shouldn’t have done. Swung the gun around and it was pointed at the rear and fired. Fired a round which went through about a foot above Duke’s head. So, they weren’t very friendly for a little while [laughs] Luckily it did no damage.
IL: Did anything happen to him?
KW: Pardon?
IL: Did anything happen? Or any formal action or anything.
KW: No. No. It was just —
Other: Nobody said anything.
KW: Just, it was just the repair was —
IL: Goodness me.
KW: But, and then on another occasion we had a fire, or there was a report of a fire in the bomb bay where this electrical equipment was. But all it was was that one of the junctions had caught fire and managed to carry on, out. But on that occasion because it was just an air test. Two of them hadn’t taken their parachutes with them.
IL: Right.
KW: So, they were a little bit anxious.
IL: I’m not surprised. I’m not surprised.
KW: Yes, well we used to go out as a group regardless of rank and that, and certainly the special observer never, never joined in that sort of thing. The special operator. And on one occasion we were coming back from the village and some of us had station bikes and some didn’t. And I had Alan Mercer, the navigator on my crossbar. And we came out and Curly again took a wide range and there was a couple of WAAFs coming back the opposite way and of course one collided with me and Alan went and Alan in fact had a small fracture of the skull. All I had was water on the knee. The WAAF had a cut across her head, and I got, appeared before the CO for causing injury to a warrant officer and a WAAF. But they took no action.
IL: I can imagine. I can imagine. Just put that down again.
[recording paused]
KW: Well, it was nothing to do with me but we got picked up by a searchlight and we knew we had to get out of it quickly. The skipper decided he was going to corkscrew a Fortress. It was a corkscrew procedure, but God did it shake you all up. But we managed to get out of the lights anyway because at that time they had some lights which automatically fixed on you and would remain on you. Sort of radar controlled I suppose. We missed it so we then resumed our flight.
IL: Right.
KW: It was a little bit, and that was the only time the navigator had ever been sick in the air. He made a mess over his mask but luckily he had a spare.
IL: But this was, this was what I was saying a little bit earlier you know that I, you know, obviously this is your, you know this is what you trained for but it‘s sort of it’s interesting isn’t it that you know that Germany was, it was only, it was a matter of few days you almost you know.
KW: Yeah. Yeah.
IL: Probably. Was VE day something like the 11th of May. 7th or 8th of May.
KW: 8th yeah.
IL: Six days before and you know a country that is almost on its knees. Obviously we didn’t know at the time but with hindsight you know we’re still as you say seeing jet fighters. Were still operating a coherent air defence.
KW: Yes.
IL: You know. It doesn’t, I think that’s the fascinating thing about the fact that so late on.
KW: Yeah.
IL: You know they were still such a coherent organisation.
KW: Yeah.
IL: I think that’s the fascinating, you know a particular fascination —
KW: Yeah.
IL: Of talking to yourself. That, you know you were a part, they were a very — I don’t know, certainly Peter was, Peter Jones was very keen to sort of get some information about the, you know the later part of the war. I think this is the fascination as I say that the Germans were still able to put up a coherent air defence.
KW: Yeah. Yeah.
IL: At a time when you expect them to be on their knees and it would be a walkover almost.
KW: Yeah.
Other 2: Yeah.
Other: But the, the jet was Messerschmitt 262s weren’t they? I think they were twin, twin-engine jets. I think we were just about starting on the Meteor, weren’t we? Which I think was a single engine jet at the time. So, they were well advanced with the jet aircraft.
KW: Yeah.
Other: The Germans.
KW: Yeah. Well, I think the whole idea was if they could was to get across to Denmark.
IL: Right.
KW: That’s where they were pulling for. To sort of resume the battle from there. But I don’t know. But the other thing that I am a little disappointed in the RAF that I only did three ops. I know that. Nothing compared with some but I haven’t got the aircrew medal. The clasp.
IL: Right.
Other: Bomber. Bomber Command clasp.
KW: Bomber Command clasp. Yeah. Because they say, the person who drew up the plans for it said it should be worn on the ’39 ’45 Star and you had to do sixty days on the squadron to get that, and one operation. But although I’ve done three I didn’t do sixty days so they —well Ken and I’ve written all over the place and Ken wrote to the local MP and things like that but they said no. That was the ruling.
IL: Right.
KW: I’ve got the France and Germany for it but why couldn’t that be —
IL: Absolutely.
KW: Fitted on that and they just ignore that and so there we are.
IL: It’s just one example of a lot of the sort of inequities of the — you know. It’s a personal one but obviously Bomber Command itself had you know. —
KW: Well —
IL: Didn’t get, didn’t get it’s recognition.
KW: No. No. No.
IL: Did you or your friends have any particular feelings about that?
KW: Well, not only myself and my friends but numbers of others have certainly had.
IL: Absolutely.
KW: But it wasn’t recognised. There we are.
Other: Well, when you look at the death rates.
KW: Yeah.
Other: You know. The casualty rates were huge, weren’t they?
KW: Yeah.
KW: They certainly were.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Kenneth White
Creator
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Ian Locker
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-08-07
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AWhiteKWJ170807
Conforms To
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Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
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00:54:43 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Kenneth White trained as an air gunner. He was not sent to an Operational Training Unit but was sent straight to a squadron at RAF Oulton. He flew in B-17s with a special operator on board. On one occasion during an air test there was a fire on board which led to particular tension because two members of the crew who had not taken their parachutes with them. After the war Kenneth joined the police and rose through the ranks in CID. After retirement from the police he joined RAF security.
Contributor
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Julie Williams
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Norfolk
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-03-08
1944-05-27
169 Squadron
214 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
B-17
bombing
memorial
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Oulton
training
Window
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/703/10103/ABeechingJB180118.1.mp3
47d4231ede11edc693eeebb6482fe40a
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Title
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Beeching, John Benjamin
J B Beeching
Description
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An oral history interview with John Beeching (b. 1923, 1339821 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a pilot with 169 and 627 Squadrons.
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2018-01-18
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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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Beeching, JB
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Transcription
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GT: This is Thursday, 18th January 2018 and I am with Mr John Benjamin Beeching at his place of work, The Cawthron Institute, in Nelson, New Zealand. John was born 19 October 1923 in London, England and joined the RAF in August 1941, his service number 1339821, and as an aircrew pilot to be gained the nickname Curly. John’s flying career was from 1942 to 1946 and he flew more than twelve different aircraft types. John, thank you for inviting me to have a talk about your career today.
JB: I have to say [Indecipherable.]
GT: Great John. So how about you give me a bit of your history about a - where did you grow up and then why did you join the RAF and how, and so on, please.
JB: Well, needless to say I grew up in that time when, at the age of fifteen, sixteen, I was in the Blitz so I received bombing from both ends, [chuckle] not only receiving them but also delivered them! This was in 1939, when the war broke out, and at that stage I was working in an engineering workshop which axiomatically of course went from making arms and we were making bullet dies and things like that. After a year that got pretty boring and a good friend of mine, Billy Campbell said we’ve had enough of this, let’s go and join the Army and do some real war work. So we went to the Recruiting Office in Romford, which is also in Essex, and we had a very brief and cursory medical examination and a very dapper little sergeant said okay son, he said to Bill, we’ll tell you when we need you, and he said to me I’m sorry lad, your feet are flat for the Army, we can’t take you so go back to your engineering job, I’m sure you’ll be doing some useful war work. So, I thought no, rats to this and right across the alleyway there was the, you okay there? So I walked across this alleyway where the Air Force recruiting place was, and I said I’d like to join the RAF, and they said oh yes, what do you do son? I said well at the moment I’m an engineer, he said ah, that’s very good, we need engineers in the Air Force. He says don’t want to fly do you, with a very crafty look on his face. Now don’t forget this was 1941 when aircrew at a premium and we were losing lots, so I said yes I can, I’d love to do that, so he gave us another quick medical, he didn’t look at my feet in this particular case and he said we’ll let you know when we need you. So I think it was about a month later and I was sent to Weston Super Mare where we had a two day medical, a very, very strict medical and I was given my number, 1339821, and they said you are now in the Volunteer Reserve and will be called up in due course, which we were in actual fact, on April the 20th April 1942, which by a great coincidence, happened to be Hitler’s birthday. I was recruited at St Johns Wood where all aircrew were, Aircrew Receiving Centre, otherwise known as ACRC, and billeted in a very palatial hotel which was no longer palatial after we’d been in touch with it and we were there oh, a couple of weeks I suppose, and then sent off to a holding unit at Ludlow in Shropshire under canvas, which was a holiday, because they didn’t know what to do with us so we were building roads which went nowhere and all sorts of stuff. Anyway I think it was, must have been the spring of 1942, late spring, maybe June, I went to my Initial Training Wing at Stratford upon Avon, lovely place, where we did our square bashing at the front of the new Shakespeare Theatre there, which is a lovely place. We used to go punting on the Avon in the evening, it was really nice. And at the end of our ITW we did a ten hour grading course on Tiger Moths and I didn’t know how I’d come out of that one because I didn’t think I’d do too well, but apparently they must have thought it was sufficient to carry me on to, carry on training as a pilot. And from there we were given a couple of weeks’ leave and then from our leave we went to the massive [emphasis] holding camp at Heaton Park in Manchester, where all crew went, I think there were about thirty odd thousand went there, and some went to Southern Rhodesia to train as pilots and navigators and the rest of us went to Canada. And we went to Canada in December 1942, which was a bad year for u-boats, we were in a large liner called the Andes, which has been here to New Zealand a couple of times during the war, and we were way up among the icebergs we went, [swishing sound effect] due north for a couple of days I think, away from submarines or whatever, [cough] and we landed at Halifax, Nova Scotia on Christmas Day 1942. On the way to Monckton in this massive train, in the snow, we hit a car on the level crossing with seven Mounties in it and killed the lot. They was splattered all over, the blood, it was blood and guts all over the place: it was a lovely introduction to Canada. Anyway we went to Monckton, we weren’t there very long and then we were sent to the Prairies. I went to a place called Virden, Manitoba, Number 19 EFTS, and where we did our training on winter-clad Tiger Moths. In other words they were fitted with skis and a canopy and a very rudimentary heater which didn’t work very well, and did sixty hours on those although that was interrupted in my case because I had a punctured ear drum flying with a cold, and spent the whole month in hospital. [Cough] And at the end of that, that would be the spring of 1943 I suppose, I went to my Service Flying Training School at Brandon, Manitoba, which was east of Virden, about eighty miles down the road I suppose, and continued my training on Cessna Bobcats, which the Canadians called Cranes, well they were otherwise AT12a’s and finally wound up getting my wings in August 1943, it must have been. And [telephone] then from Brandon, sporting our pilot’s wings, which made us all as happy as Larry and very proud of course, and promoted to sergeant in my case, some were commissioned but they obviously divined that I wasn’t going to make very good officer material, which was probably quite the case, but I never was anyway, and went back to Monckton. We were there very briefly, and then back across the Atlantic, this time on the Queen Elizabeth! Which wasn’t exactly a luxury cruise because there was twenty one thousand others on board on the same sailing! Which is a lot of people, in fact it was half the population of Nelson, in numbers. And it only took us what, bit under five days to cross the Atlantic. Wound back up at Gourock and then back and then all the aircrew that went back from Canada, they went to Harrogate in Yorkshire, where we went for a selection board and they said John Beeching you are, been selected to be an elementary flying instructor. I thought oh my god, that’s the last thing on this earth I wanted to be, you know! So I had nothing to argue with of course, so we were pushed to Marshalls Flying Field in Cambridge, I forget the number of the Flying School it was, but I think it was number four I think. I hated it, absolutely, I’ve got to tell you, hate Tiger Moths, I still hate the rotten things. They were cold and draughty, I didn’t like aerobatics very much anyway, so. Anyway, short of becoming a real dyed in the wool malingerer, [laugh] I managed to get myself thrown off and they said don’t you tell anybody, you know, that you’ve been scrubbed off of an instructor’s course! Blah, blah, blah. And I got a below average rating for and so this is very close to Christmas 1943 and I got successfully scrubbed off this awful, awful instructor’s course. Back to Harrogate [cough] spent a few weeks there, had nothing to do with us for a while, so they sent us on these strange assault courses and so forth, and they made a mistake of issuing us with thunderflashes, which we all secreted and used to put under people’s beds and things, which was all good fun. Don’t forget we were only what, nineteen, twenty years old, so we were only kids anyway, so it was a small part of it. And another selection board and they said well, we’ve noticed that your night vision is acceptable so you’ll be selected for night fighter pilot training so thought that’s more my thing, [cough] so from there I spent about, oh, a month I think, at the, at Cranwell which in peacetime is an Officers’ Training College, but in the wartime it was just another flying field. And now I was introduced to the Blenheim I, which was a lovely old aeroplane to fly, very safe, very easy, and after an introduction on those I went to Spittalgate at Grantham, which was an advanced flying unit where we flew Blenheim Is and Ansons and Oxfords. Flew Ansons and Oxfords on beam approach training, things like that, so we did quite a few hours there. Following which, we went to Cranfield and did a conversion course from Blenheims via the Bristol Beaufort which is a terrible, terrible aeroplane cause the ones we had were the early ones with Bristol Pegasus engines. Don’t know if they were, but mostly underpowered, terrible aeroplanes, but we only had to do ten hours on those and then they graduated us on to Beaufighters which were lovely aeroplanes, I loved the Beaufighters, you know. They’ve got me sitting in the front with these two enormous great Hercules engines, one on either side with about sixteen hundred horsepower each side, and they were lovely and there I crewed up with my navigator, Fred Herbert, who flew with me for the next few years. He was the only navigator I had [cough] and it got so he refused to fly with anybody else. Whether that’s a recommendation or not, I don’t know, but that’s the way it was. If I went sick he went sick [laugh] and we flew together right through there and then at Cranfield we spent a fair bit of time at the satellite field which was a place called Twinwoods Farm, which received notoriety because it was where Glen Miller took off from and Fred and I were the last people to ever see Glen Miller alive. We saw him climb into that Norseman, in December 1943 and, no ’44, yeah, ’44, yeah, December 1944 and he vanished and was never seen again. He had a civilian pilot and there’s been all kinds of speculation and stories of what might have happened to Glen Miller, but nobody ever really knows about that. So he joins just another one of the thousands that we lost in the North Sea. So from there we went back to Cranfield and then we were given leave and I was going to enjoy leave over Christmas, but we got called to join 169 Squadron at Great Massingham in December and that’s where I started my operational flying, from there, on Bomber Support with 100 Group, which is 100 Group Bomber Command.
GT: And your aircraft type for there was?
JB: Hey?
GT: And your aircraft type, that you moved to, from the Beaufighter to?
JB: Oh to the Mossie, yes. Yes well my transit to the Mosquito was pretty quick, I had thirty five minutes dual on the Mosquito. That was all. I kid you, didn’t even solo the same day because the weather closed in and it was another day and a half before I got my hands on a Mosquito to fly, so, and we, they only had two Mark III dual Mosquitos there at Cranfield, so nobody got much dual anyway. But anyway, they were, after a Beaufighter I found an easier plane to fly and had to watch some of the swinging on take off and landing that’s all, like all tailwheel aircraft are, but okay, and so I flew, like I say, in my log book I’ve got the serial numbers of fifty seven different Mossies and I never scrapped one, so that’s something of a record. [Cough]
GT: It is. You brought them all home, that was the main.
JB: Yes, and anyway, at the end of the war ended up with sixteen operations over Germany and at the end of the war we thought oh well, we’ll have a nice rest now and they said no you’re not, you’re going to Okinawa. And so they transferred us from there to, being Mosquito people, to Woodhall Spa, 627 Squadron, where 617 [emphasis] Squadron was stationed at that time because the old Dambuster Lancasters was still parked there, at Woodhall Spa. Did you ever Woodhall Spa? And the Bell pub, you know and er, you know the old Bell there, lovely place.
GT: So, can we just, go back John, for you, much better about your sorties and your operations you did. What’s the targets, what did they give you as a role to do?
JB: We were very individual, we didn’t take off, all together, we were classified as bomber support, and it was bomber support, we’d normally take off after [emphasis] the bomber stream left, cause we were much, we were a hundred miles an hour faster than Lancasters, and our intention and purpose was to get to the target before them and keep and sweep the sky clear of German nightfighters really, which was very successful. The Germans were absolutely terrified of us because we had the legs on them and we had the radar on them so, and you know, we were really good. But 100 Group, they were loaded up with electronic gear, mainly to jam German transmissions, that’s, you know, German transmissions, which they did and if you read that book, ‘100 Group - the Birth of Electronic Warfare’, you’ll read, it’s really worthwhile, and it takes you through that much more precisely than I could ever do anyway, but the, they had the main, apart from the Mosquitos that were in about five different stations they had Halifaxes, and 100 Group, and B17s. Two of the B17 crew people they lived right here in Nelson, both dead now, bless ‘em, just died of old age. Though Doug was a prisoner of war, he did a whole tour then was shot down on his second tour. He was a gunner, tail gunner and he um, survived the war and lived here until about three years ago, when he died.
GT: So the Mosquitos you were flying and your operational sorties, what armament did you have?
JB: All right, the Mosquitos we had, initially they were converted Mark Vis with Mark IV radar in the nose, like a sort of spearhead, you might have seen pictures of them, and then we graduated to Mark 10s, was British designed, American built and we had a big bulbous nose on the Mosquitos - remember those - with the scanner, about the size of that fan over there I suppose, and they was really good because pick up aircraft twenty miles away, it was really superb radar probably as good as they’ve got today almost, I would say.
GT: So what guns did you have?
JB: We had, well we didn’t have the machine guns because we had the radar in the nose, but we had four 20 millimetre cannon, they could do an awful lot of damage, they would demolish a house you know, [laugh] they were big guns, twenty millimetre.
GT: In the nose or [indecipherable]
JB: Underneath. If you look at a picture of a Mosquito, you’ll see that, you know, they were clear of the propellors so they didn’t have to re-synchronise so when you fired them they all started together, then they’d all sort of break up the noise and swing the nose and plane about, it was quite a thing: but they’re good things.
GT: How many rounds a gun did you have?
JB: I think we carried about, I think we carried about four hundred rounds altogether, about a hundred rounds a gun, I think.
GT: And you knew how long you had, I suppose.
JB: I think the rate of fire was about nine hundred and something rounds a minute, so it wasn’t a very long burst. We never fired on Dutch people, we never had the chance to be quite honest with you, we used to strafe people on bicycles.
GT: So your sorties, you were strafing more than you were trying to shoot down aircraft?
JB: Oh no, we did low levels as well as the high stuff, we’d fly anywhere from thirty thousand feet right down to ground level almost, you know. And of course we also did a lot of spoof raiding which carried target indicators, and we’d drop those at a place where the raid wasn’t going to be, but it was, the idea was to get the Germans to think that’s where the main raid was going to be, so we dropped couple of tons of target indicators to get the Germans going and of course the main stream would turn off and go somewhere else, which was all part and parcel of the deceit, you know.
GT: Did you use Window at all?
JB: We didn’t. 100 Group, thousands of tons, the Liberator would carry about seven ton of the stuff., you know, they’d chuck it out in great bundles which was good , it certainly dumbfounded the Germans much of the time, although towards the end of the war they did sort of overcome it to some extent, [lighter noise] they did overcome it to a great extent, but it worked good and then we had, then they used, ringer operators, you know, to come up cause we were using operators who could speak German giving phoney instructions to German nightfighters. Course but they, the German nightfighters were active right till the end of the war. In March I think it was, ‘45, the Germans did a big night raid on England, in East Anglia, and it was called Operation Gisela and they clobbered quite a few of our blokes, some of our blokes were killed, right on the circuit, you know, so it was quite, so they didn’t give up. As you know, the Germans fought almost to the last day.
GT: So their fighters were a mixture of what, Messerschmitt 210s, 410s, Junkers.
JB: Operation Gisela they had were Me109s and Fw190s, which apparently were a difficult aeroplane to fly, and even harder to fly at night and their accident rate was much, was, better than ours, they killed themselves better than we could, and they had, of course, towards, right near the end they had these wonderful Henschel night fighters and stuff which was really, really good and also Messerschmitt 262s, which they used as night fighters and in fact the Me262s squadrons were shooting down Mosquitos, they shot down about thirty all together, so they were quite active right up to the few last days of the war.
GT: So did you know that when you were flying?
JB: No. Didn’t even know of the existence of an Me262 until after the war.
GT: You never saw one flash by and whatnot?
JB: Oh no, never saw. No, no.
GT: So they never gave you that kind of intel?
JB: Whatever intelligence I’ve been, by and large, we were kept right up with stuff like Me163s and that sort of thing that shot straight up in the air. But no, they never mentioned Me262s, whether they were keeping it from us on purpose, I’ve got no idea, but I don’t recall ever being told about the Me262, or it would certainly have stuck in my memory. I would think, anyway.
GT: So did you have the chance of using your guns in an aerial battle at all?
JB: No, only on ground stuff, factories and so forth on bright moonlight nights.
GT: I’m interested that Mosquito-wise, okay, you had the weaponry, did you actually do any training to do aerial combat as opposed to strafing?
JB: Oh yes. Yes, we did air to air gunnery. We had a range over the Wash, and they had these yellow painted Martinets on the squadron. I remember that because landed one on a foggy morning, he landed and floated into the side of the hangar. He wasn’t killed but the man in the hangar was. So that’s how I remember how we were, how the target was, load carrying [indecipherable]. We didn’t have enough practice on air to air shooting, or the ground shooting really for that matter.
GT: Did you shoot the banner at all? Did you get shots on?
JB: Oh yes, I good quite good at it, but it was, my percentage was very good.
GT: And you had a high percentage, sorry, did you say?
JB: Yeah, I was good at it, quite good. It was good fun. Course you had to turn, you know, deflection was the thing of course, that was the thing with, most of the time everybody wanted to get right behind somebody, up the bum didn’t they, and shoot them, which is what happened at night, because we could get right in, close, with our radar and we could see our prey, quarry, invariably a Lancaster or something, and they could never see us, but they were looking down against the dark ground, we were looking up, we could see the stars and we could see their blur exhaust stumps all glowing in the dark and you think if we’d been Germans. Of course the Germans had the Shräge musik, you know, the upfiring cannons, which we never knew about, and that was very, very bad news, because we lost a lot of Lancasters solely because of Shräge musik. And they, as I say, that, we often, we get so, we used to do what was, I used to like it actually, it was called night fighter affiliation and they’d take a Halifax off from Swanton Morley or somewhere and we’d meet them over Norfolk somewhere and go do runs on them to let the gunners see and often we’d get from here to that cross just about and they still hadn’t seen us. Cause I remember one night we got up close behind this Halifax and he was sitting there waiting, waiting for it to go into a corkscrew and he called up, he says hello Kaolin 26, he said, I think we’ve lost you so I turned on the landing lights from about fifty yards behind him! I bet that gunner still wakes up at night, two million candle power! [Laughter] So that was things we used to do, but it just meant how vulnerable our blokes were, cause we really were close and he knew that we were coming, and he still didn’t see us at all. So there we are.
GT: That’s something. Were your Mosquitos also able to carry bombs at all, and rockets?
JB: Yes.
GT: So you always took off with bombs and rockets?
JB: Not always, but sometimes. Some duty, if we wanted to do a spoof with bombs, we carried two five hundred pound bombs, or target indicators, one or the other. We didn’t carry anything big till we got to Woodhall Spa when we carried, when we had the Mosquito, the Mark IVs [indecipherable] the pregnant tadpole, you know, d’you see pictures of those? They would carry the four thousand pound bombs, but we weren’t allowed to, apparently the Mossies we [emphasis] had weren’t made to carry, although we had the bulging bomb bays, they couldn’t carry the four thousand pound bomb. To me, I don’t know why, we had a notice up in the cockpit: ‘Even PO Prune would not carry a four thousand bomb in this aircraft’. So whatever the reason was I never found out.
GT: I don’t expect the airframe could hold it. So something that’s always been touted was that the use of the Mosquito to bomb Berlin. Now if, for instance, the RAF managed to only produce Mosquitos instead of their four engined bombers, would they have done the business? What’s your position on that?
JB: Oh yes, absolutely. I mean don’t forget the Americans, those piddling little bombs they carried, they were only five hundred pound bombs: they were next to useless. I mean until they carried big bombs, those five hundred pound bombs, they just dug little holes in the ground. Incendiaries were the thing of course. What we carried was a great big blast bomb, blow a lot of buildings down then set fire to ‘em, and that was the point, after all, what we were trying to do was finish the war, you know, and Mosquito carrying two ton bomb, they would make two trips in a night. It was only what, about two hours to Berlin, two hours back, four hours, refuel, another bomb and go away again, you know, another crew and so that was good. There was only two men in a Mosquito, there was ten men in a B17, and they both carried the same bomb load.
GT: So, do you think perhaps that Bomber Command could have changed their philosophy to go to?
JB: I do now [emphasis]. Of course you didn’t know at the time.
GT: May have been better to switch strategies.
JB: We argued about what Bomber Command did and how valuable it was, it’s never going to be resolved. Harris said you could finish the war with bombers, but you couldn’t, without men on the ground, I think that was proved in the war anyway.
GT: Set fire.
JB: We certainly aided towards the quickness of it, with all of the stuff we did to railways and transport and goodness knows what we done. We were allowed, after the war, to fly over Germany and have a look and see what was done; it was awful, it really was, war. I don’t know, the whole thing was pretty bad I suppose, when you think about it. But it was, to me it was pretty distressing to see that, acres, square miles all these houses just the walls standing, you know, all scurrying about like ants, clearing up the mess, you know. Terrible, absolutely terrible. Your whole thinking was in those days, like I say, obviously in London during the Blitz I saw houses demolished then, so getting a bit of own back didn’t seem to be helping a lot. Which it wasn’t.
GT: It was the means of surviving and shortening the thing.
JB: Yes. Anyway come what may, the war’s end, they said you’re going, when we went there, we were going to go to Okinawa, on the Tiger Force. What I didn’t realise that the Americans didn’t really want us there because they had enormous [emphasis] Air Force on Okinawa. It was really [emphasis] enormous. They had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of B29s and Mustangs by the hundreds and they didn’t want the RAF there at all. It was their war and they wanted to keep it. Anyway, they dropped the atomic bomb so we didn’t go. So we thought ah! Finished! We’ve finished our flying! They said no you’re not, you’re going instructing, you’re going now and I was instructing on blind landing approach for the next twelve months almost. On Oxfords, on a mobile flight, 1552 BABS Flight: Beam BABS Beam Approach Beacon System. They evolved a very efficient and cheap beam landing system called BABS which used Eureka Rebecca system, beacon and homing and beacons and they just, yes, instead of killing everybody. Yes. [interference] Well BABS, it was, we had this mobile flight, of four Oxfords, which was very handy, cause they were all over England and we went to, we were teaching Transport Command pilots on how to land, on bad weather landings and as I say, it was a very efficient system, it just involved a little pickup Austin with a kind of shed on the back, and they ran it two little metal grooves at the end of the runway and shot it up and we could pick up the signal. Because, why we were chosen that job, it was the ideal job suited for night fighter crews because the navigator was at the back twiddling his knobs and he could tell you left, left, right, right, whatever, and that worked fine and so we were sort of involved with that for nearly twelve months, and we flew every day apart from bad wind. That’s how good it was. So fog didn’t stop us at all, in fact it took us longer to taxi out to find the runway than it did to fly and it was really that good. It was excellent, I thought, we had no shaky dos there. Like I say I flew nearly a thousand hours and never had an accident. The only thing ever went wrong was on an old Blenheim I, when one wheel wouldn’t come down, had to land on one wheel, but that wasn’t too bad, pretty harmless.
GT: And then you didn’t catch the [indecipherable].
JB: No, no. They said land on the grass, don’t land on the runway, you’ll score it up something, it was on Somerfield Track anyway, and landed on one wheel on two points, so one wheel and the wings slowly dropped down and then I was looking at the propeller with the ends all curled up, the wing had a [indecipherable] great big slow ground loop and just stopped and that was it. Plane was flying two days later, on the flat. That was about the only bad thing ever happened.
GT: So what aircraft were you doing all of this BABS training in?
JB: Oxfords. Which they, they were a good aeroplane for a trainer I think, ideal anyway. But Ansons were probably easier to fly, was Ansons. The queen of the sky as far as I was concerned. You could do no wrong in an Anson. They were just delightful.
GT: You and Fred [indecipherable] were friends with the gentleman who’s created the only Anson I still flying in the world.
JB: Oh, I don’t say I’m a friend, but I’ve spoken to him, in fact I loaned him my Anson pilots’ notes, I’ve still got them at home by the way, my pilots notes for the Anson. But I’ve got pilots notes on most of the aeroplanes I flew, Beaufighters, Mosquitos, even got one for Lancaster. You know, you collect these things and keep them. Seventy years later.
GT: Fair. So once you’d done your instructing piece there for these transport pilots, what happened to you then?
JB: Oh that was, I got out in about August 1946 I think.
GT: Did you want to go? Did you need to go?
JB: Yes, I’d had enough. Yeah, I thought, well, I was a mug in a way, I should have stayed I suppose, you know, the Air Force was no longer like it was during the war, you know. During the week you do what you like [cough], dress how you like, don’t care [indecipherable] the week, but they don’t like that in peacetime and so I wasn’t sorry to get out.
GT: Did you commission?
JB: No.
GT: So what did you retire as, rank-wise?
JB: Warrant Officer. Which was a good rank. Pay was the same as a Flight Lieutenant, without the mess fees, you know. You only paid six shillings a month, they were paying about six pounds a month, so that was good.
GT: So what was the last station you served at? Can you?
JB: Um, Fort Sutton. No, Melbourne, East Yorkshire. Either Melbourne or Fort Sutton – they’re both in East Yorkshire, I’m not sure which one, but I think it must have been Melbourne we went from there to discharge Wembley. They gave us a suit and money.
GT: What was your last Mosquito trips then? When was that?
JB: Well that was, actually the last one the squadron flew on I was on leave, so I didn’t go and that was the last raid of the war full stop. It was on May the 7th it was, and that was on Kiel and two of our blokes were shot down on that one. My mate Doug Waite and his navigator, Doug’s still alive. He lives in Somerset. There’s only him and another chap in Cromer, they were the last two surviving pilots for that squadron, who I know, are still alive, I don’t think there’s any others. And that was my last trip must been, what, March, April, be April 1945 I suppose. Can’t even remember where it was. The longest trip we made was on [indecipherable] which was six hours and ten minutes which is a long time. We carried a lot of fuel. We carried seven hundred and sixteen gallons, which is what, about three thousand litres.
GT: So what’s the total flying time in a Mosquito?
JB: Well, we carried seven hundred and sixteen gallons, and each Merlin burns a gallon a minute, so that goes seven hours and I say, we had six hours and ten minutes and we still didn’t run short of fuel. They were good on fuel, you had to be stupid run out of gas. We carried one hundred gallon drop tanks.
GT: Your concentration for that long in a very cold aircraft?
JB: Oh no! They weren’t, they were never cold. The Mosquito was made of wood and were well insulated cause they were made of wood, and had a nice heater and was quite comfortable. I flew in a battledress, I never flew in a flying suit, nor did Fred, it was really good. No, no there was no problem there, but it was, often you were flying in cloud for four or five hours and that was very taxing because you got this awful effect where you thought you were flying straight and level but in fact you were turning.
GT: So your navigator, where did he sit? Next to you or down below?
JB: Sat in the Beaufighter behind, in the Mosquito, to the side.
GT: And he was doing all of your navigating through the scopes?
JB: No, no, did that on his knee on the back of an envelope [laughter], well he had all this radar gear in front of him which sort of eased out, he had no room, had this great big visor like this, and used to go to sleep in there and stuff, I knew when he was going to sleep, I could hear his breathing getting slower. But I didn’t mind, I could find my way home all right, you know. We had very good navigational aid - Gee, which was excellent, Gee was really good and we had a very good VHS system and they would home you from England, if you were high enough, they would give you a course for home right from the UK, it was a piece of cake. Navigation was never a problem for us. Never.
GT: Thousands of aircraft in the air at once, that’s phenomenal to keep you all on track!
JB: Yes, it was good. You know, when you think the sheer logistics of that was absolutely mind-boggling, you know.
GT: And Fred was saying to you left, right, left, right, or was he giving a heading?
JB: No, no, he was just saying alter course to oh nine two, make three hundred on the way home, you know, and there was no problem, because had a nice big sort of compass thing, you know, electric gyro. No we never had any, the only time we did have a couple of, I remember we, coming back from Germany and we come over this, we come across the land and I said to Fred where’s that, and he said oh, that’ll be the East Anglian coast and all of a sudden we were over the sea again, I said that must be the fastest crossing of England you’ve ever seen. In in actual fact, it was the strong wind, it was the Friesian Islands, in Holland, so it took us another half an hour to get across there, you know. I said we’re lost! He said we’re not lost, he says, I’m just a little uncertain of our whereabouts. [Chuckle] So I said in that case, I said how high is Ben Nevis. He says four thousand four hundred feet, I said then we’ll fly at five thousand four hundred feet. Which I did. Flying into the high ground was not difficult being in the UK. The Mossie was pretty fast, and it would get lost pretty fast too [indecipherable].
GT: That was an achievement getting every one of your Mosquito aircraft back without scratching one. Pretty awesome achievement. So when did you last see Fred, when you?
JB: Ah well Fred, when, after the war, I went back to Canada. I lived there seven years actually. Fred followed me, but he joined the RCMP, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and rose to the rank of sergeant, and actually was Pierre Trudeau’s chauffeur for about three years, and we lost track of each other then and in actual fact we, Wendy and I, my wife, we have visited Fred a couple of times, in Canada, but he died about four years ago now. That was the last I saw of dear old Fred. He was from South Shields, he was, up in Newcastle, you know. He was two weeks older than me. His birthday was on October 5th.
GT: It was pretty awesome for you to team up with somebody that you trusted and trusted his life with you too. So once you’d done some work in Canada, how come you’ve ended up in New Zealand after all this time?
JB: Well, I was a keen motorcycle man, I was, incidentally that’s my dad there in that picture, believe it or not, and yeah, I went back to Canada, and there for seven years and I was a very keen motorcyclist and I was the national organiser for the Vincent Owners Club. You’ve heard of the Vincent, motor bike, I was the national organiser for the Vincent Owners Club for the whole of the United States and Canada. Towards the end of that time this chap Oscar van Dogen wrote to me from New Zealand, he said he wanted make a, do a working holiday in Canada, could I give him somebody to write to? I said yeah, write to me, and we corresponded with each other for the next sixty years! And he died about two years ago. [Laugh] So if you want the stories, I’ve got them, man!
GT: And that’s what you did when you come to New Zealand?
JB: Ah, when I came to New Zealand, this was in 1953, I landed the same day as the Queen did, on Christmas 1953. She was on the Gothic, I was on the Wanganella from Australia, and then, there was a dearth of people, of tradesmen particularly in New Zealand, you could do anything you liked and work where you liked, so I got this job in engineering place in Christchurch, A. R. Harris and they made washing machines, the Simplicity washing machines, and I worked there for a couple of years and then I got sick of that and went and got a job with the government. I was a weights and measures inspector, which was another little escapade you see.
GT: Whereabouts was that? In Wellington?
JB: No. In Christchurch. I was transferred to Wellington and then from Wellington I was transferred to Nelson, and from Nelson they was going to transfer me to Auckland and I said I don’t want to go to Auckland and they said you’ve got to go to Auckland and I said no I don’t – I resign! So I did and that was in, what, 1960 something, so I went to an engineering place in, down at Port Nelson, and I was there for sixteen years. So, one thing and another.
GT: Now you’re, there’s been in Nelson, New Zealand there, a very strong on Bomber Command group of people that used to get together.
JB: We had about twenty here when I first started with the local branch of the New Zealand Bomber Command Association, and we’ve got what three or four or something: natural attrition shall we call it.
GT: And only a matter of months ago, your group, you’ve decided just to have your last lunch together, and there’s been a bit of publicity about that.
JB: Yes. [indecipherable]
GT: Which is, I think really across the country, many Brevet Clubs are down to several chaps only.
JB: Yeah, well I fell out, we have no Brevet Club. We did have one and it closed and people joined the Christchurch one, but I fell out with the Brevet Club in Christchurch. Well we, I’m the patron of the local RSA Branch and we, also we have a Trust Fund and we also give the cadets a thousand bucks or two thousand dollars a year each, all the cadet units, and Christchurch are sitting on nearly a million dollars and they didn’t dispense any money to the cadet units at all, so I wrote and said you know, get off your backsides and give them some money and they came back all guns loaded - don’t you tell us how to spend our money blah, blah, blah! So I said stuff that and gave it away.
GT: Yeah, so.
JB: I don’t know, are they active? Did they have a Bomber Command Association in Christchurch? I don’t recall any of them going to the unveiling at Green Park.
GT: It’s the National Bomber Command Centre that’s based, sorry Association based out of Auckland and there is barely five Brevet Bomber Command chaps in Christchurch left, so.
JB: No Association as such.
GT: No, they’re part of the national, New Zealand one. They do have a Brevet Club however, that’s out at Wigram air base.
JB: I know they do. But I don’t belong to it. I resigned.
GT: No. It’s very small now.
JB: Well I hope they doing something useful with their money cause that really got up my snorter that did. Really did. I thought well what they going to do with all that money? Cause they wound up with about half a million and they had about a hundred and seventy members I think, and I thought well, for goodness’ sake, you know, put it to some use, where it’s going to do some good, what better use than the cadet units, you know, I thought. That was my thinking. [indecipherable]
GT: Now, before, recently, well 2012 I guess, where the Bomber Command Memorial in London there was something that for us, the New Zealand Bomber Command Association, were planning on moving everybody over there that could go, but the New Zealand took it away from us and planned their own trip and took their own thirty odd gentlemen that they deemed could go and they looked after them very well and their decision was only New Zealanders could go.
JB: We stayed in the same hotel.
GT: And then I understand that there were several of you RAF chaps that emigrated here that were.
JB: I was the only RAF chap on that particular trip.
GT: So you managed to get over there though.
JB: Oh well, the lovely people of Nelson, they raised twenty two thousand dollars. G J Gardner gave us ten grand, towards it. There were people all over the world sent money, so we said my wife Wendy could go too So Wendy and I went, with Air New Zealand stayed at the Acorn Hotel, at the, in London, in the same hotel as the people there, having said that.
GT: I helped a little bit with the organisation for 75 Squadron sort of thing, the chaps, and I was in the Green Park at the back. So I understand you managed to get a seat at the front!
JB: Wasn’t quite at the front, well was about two rows back. I didn’t quite shake hands with Queenie, but gave her the nod, you know.
GT: Definitely.
JB: Got quite, took a lot of pictures, wonderful pictures of the occasion.
GT: Fascinating day. My RAF colleague and I were at the pub and waited till about seven pm, then we went down to the Memorial after they’d had opening and we had throngs of people, cause we were in uniform, asking.
JB: We went to that pub called The Three Tuns, was just down the road, a really nice pub, people there. Lovely hotel, the breakfasts were marvellous!
GT: I’m pleased you got to go over there to see that because many had not that opportunity from New Zealand.
JB: Definity a must to see, gorgeous place for sure.
GT: For sure, and all credit to those folk who organised and got that there and to look up at the statues of the chaps.
JB: That, well to me it’s a shame that the people who actually cast those never got any credit at all. It should have said where that was, where the foundry was or something, because it’s some of the finest casting I’ve ever seen in my life: everything was perfect. It was really, really good. I thought well, what a shame, they’ve given the name of the bloke who designed it but they didn’t give any credit to the people who actually made it, you know. Anyway.
GT: You, on this recording have now just given them the kudos.
JB: Well I reckon, well they needed, they should get some kudos, because it’s so, there was things on that which people would never pick up. For example, I noticed in the, down the flying boot of one of the gunners was the toggle from the cord for cocking a Browning and I bet very few people would see that, you know, the wooden handle with the loop on the end for pulling back the breech, you know. I thought I wonder how many people will spot that? So whoever did it was very, very good on the design.
GT: I understand that they, each individual airman of that trade, or job, they had veterans model. Marvellous. That’s great to hear. Thank you very much for that.
JB: No, I was absolutely chuffed with that.
GT: Now I also note that you have been in some way been involved, or been able to see at least, the Mosquitos that have been created in here New Zealand for flying.
JB: Yes, I have. I’ve been close to them but unfortunately I thought they might have given me a trip round the circuit or something, but no luck, maybe the next one anyway. I think I’ve earned it, but they didn’t, wouldn’t ended up, wouldn’t say John you can sit in the right hand seat and we’ll give you a turn, no. Least they’d have done, but it wasn’t, they, oh we’ve got insurance problems, we can’t do this and can’t, but I notice that people like um, what’s his name, the 617 bloke who was here, his granddaughter worked the airport before, they gave him a ride in one of those.
GT: Les Munro. That is special.
JB: Yes, Les Munro. He got a ride in one, I didn’t. Anyway. A lot of the blokes, we, there’s a picture over there in my little corner there, all the blokes who’d flown the Mossie and supposedly people who’d flew Mosquitos and a lot of them never did fly Mosquitos: they were Lancaster people. Which a lot of them were 75 Squadron people and 75 Squadron didn’t have any Lancs, have any Mosquitos, so I know that they were sort of just getting in on the action.
GT: However, 75 Squadron RNZAF [emphasis] did fly Mosquitos from 1947 to 53 at Ohakea. That might have come from, I think -
JB: Oh yeah, they were talking about Second World War veterans here, so they couldn’t have done. Anyway.
GT: Well I think they, a lot of them did fly Lancasters World War Two and post war, when New Zealand then was given 75 number plate and then we, they flew seventy five Mosquitos from England to New Zealand, and I think those guys went on to carry on flying those then. So that’s might have been where it was.
JB: Anyway, doesn’t matter now.
GT: It’s a huge thing, only a couple left out of those whole seventy, they cut them up. But look John. Just one last little thing then. Where are we now? You’ve obviously got a morning job, and it’s now roughly approaching 1pm in the afternoon so I’ve intruded on your day, but it’s been fascinating talking to you, but please tell a little about where we are and what this Institute does, because it’s a very important job that New Zealand does.
JB: Well, the reason we’re here is many years ago, when they shipped wood to export to Japan, there was a team of all oldies that we used to do these eight hour shifts because we did a quality test every fifteen minutes when they were loading the ship, and they had to have people who didn’t rely on a full time job, we were called when we were needed, which was very good and when we had a midnight till eight, the morning, or no, I think it was eleven till seven and seven till three I think, and this carried on until the port got smaller cause the ships got bigger and they couldn’t load ships and also the MDF plants opened up in Richmond, so they didn’t need to send it away from Nelson any more, it could all be done from other places and they found out that old JB was still handy with his fingers, so can you fix this John, yes I can and so thirty years ago and I’ve been here ever since, [indecipherable] fixing things and I like them and they like me, you know, and it’s good, it's been lovely and that’s how I came to be with Cawthron Institute. Not because of my scientific knowledge I might tell you!
GT: So what do they specifically look after and look out for here? What is their main role?
JB: Well, they do scientific research of any kind. They test food, they do a lot of marine work here, there’s, you know, if you look at the history of the Cawthron in recent years you’ll see a lot of it’s tied up in marine work: fresh water, salt water, mussels, we do all the salmon testing, king salmon, you know, make sure there’s not too much mercury in the fish and goodness knows what, and all this sort of stuff. They do a lot of pure research as well, as I told [indecipherable] they inspect all the spats for mussels, so by and large I think it’s a good place. They’ve got the most, we’ve got the most diverse number of people you’ve ever seen. We’ve got Germans, we’ve got French, we’ve got Russians, we’ve got Chinese, we’ve got Japanese, we’ve got Lithuanians, we’ve got French, we’ve got Dutchmen, we’ve got Englishmen, everybody [emphasis] here and everybody gets on. It’s a wonderful place, the Cawthron, it really is.
GT: And you’re the go-to fix-it man of the building.
JB: Yes. Mr Fix-it, that’s me!
GT: Mr Fixit. And you are how old now?
JB: Be ninety five in October.
GT: There you go! There’s hope for all of us to know that we can get a great old age and still be working.
JB: I don’t know! I hope you sided going in the lift!
GT: Well John, it’s been such a pleasure to first meet you, but second to talk to you today because the International Bomber Command Centre, I know, is looking for the beautiful stories of you men that made some huge sacrifices for us, some the ultimate, and yourself, obviously, you fought for our freedom and I thank you very much for that and I think that we’ve kind of come to it.
JB: I suppose it’ll be okay. I didn’t tell you too much about my flying career when I think about it, you know.
GT: I hope you’ve written a book. [Laugh]
JB: It’s okay, whatever keeps them happy.
GT: I’ve been in worse. Thank you sir, and I certainly appreciate your time with me today and is there one last word you’d like to give? One last word on the recording you’d like to give me?
JB One last word. Well what do I say? It’s been nice meeting you, and certainly a surprise. I had a similar interview as this about three weeks ago from a man who is doing exactly what you’re doing for 100 Group because they have a reunion every year in England, in Norfolk, and he did exactly what you’re doing now, almost word for word what we’ve just said. If you can’t get that then, and also, I’ve also made a DVD of this same thing, just like you’re doing, about five years ago, which is on a DVD somewhere. if I can find it you can have that too if you want.
GT: See [indecipherable].
JB: Better leave me a card so I can get in touch with you.
GT: Okay John, well, thank you. We’ll end our interview there. That’s fifty three minutes that we’ve had a chat here, so. It’s been a pleasure.
JB: Chop it about, cut bits out you don’t like, or whatever.
GT: I’m sure they’ll like all of it, okay. So, thank you John, I appreciate your time. Thank you. Bye bye.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with John Benjamin Beeching
Creator
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Glen Turner
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-01-18
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
ABeechingJB180118
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
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00:53:28 audio recording
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Language
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eng
Description
An account of the resource
John Beeching was born in London and joined the RAF in 1941. His initial training was in Canada. After several escapades John joined 169 Squadron as a night fighter pilot and worked in electronic countermeasures as well as training crews in air gunnery. Post-war he saw damage in Germany and moved on to instruct in blind landings. John left the RAF and went to Canada then emigrated to New Zealand, working in a number of engineering based jobs. John came over to the unveiling of the Green Park Memorial and was active in the New Zealand Bomber Command Association. He gives his strongly felt views on these and other matters.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Canada
Great Britain
New Zealand
England--Bedfordshire
England--Lincolnshire
Manitoba--Winnipeg
New Brunswick--Moncton
New Zealand--Christchurch
New Brunswick
Manitoba
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Anne-Marie Watson
100 Group
169 Squadron
627 Squadron
aircrew
Anson
B-29
Beaufighter
bombing
Gee
Mosquito
Oxford
P-51
pilot
radar
RAF Twinwood Farm
RAF Woodhall Spa
Tiger Moth
training