1
25
11
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2635/46206/LKeelingRV82689v1.1.pdf
614702122603a1a6bac8c0c911c28346
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
Keeling, Robert Victor
Description
An account of the resource
48 items. The collection concerns Robert Victor Keeling, DFC (b. 1916, 82689 Royal Air Force) and contains his log books, correspondence, decorations and a <a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/2655">Scrapbook</a>. He flew operations as a pilot with 51 Squadron. Following his retirement from the Royal Air Force with the rank of Squadron leader he became a civilian pilot. <br /><br />The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Keeling and catalogued by Lynn Corrigan.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2023-06-01
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
Keeling, RV
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
Robert Victor Keeling's pilot's flying log book. One
Description
An account of the resource
Pilot's flying log book for Robert 'Bob' Victor Keeling covering the period 15 June 1939 to 30 June 1943. Details his training and operational duties. Bob flew 27 night operations, 15 as second pilot to Pilot Officer Deacon, Sergeant Prior and Squadron Leader Hollrick and 12 as pilot with 51 Squadron. Operations, all flown in Whitley aircraft, were to Antwerp, Berlin, Bordeaux, Boulogne, Bremen, Brest, Chemnitz, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Gelsenkirchen, Hamburg, Kiel, Leipzig, Le Havre, Leona, Lorient, Magdeburg, Mannheim, Pilsner, St. Naazare and Turin. The log book continues with details of Bob's time as a flying instructor with the School of Navigation, 7 Squadron and Royal Aircraft Establishment.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940-09-11
1940-09-12
1940-09-14
1940-09-15
1940-09-17
1940-09-18
1940-09-21
1940-09-22
1940-09-23
1940-09-24
1940-09-25
1940-09-26
1940-10-11
1940-11-12
1940-10-15
1940-10-16
1940-10-27
1940-10-28
1940-10-30
1940-10-31
1940-11-01
1940-11-02
1940-11-08
1940-11-09
1040-11-13
1940-11-14
1940-11-15
1940-11-16
1940-11-17
1940-11-18
1940-11-27
1940-11-28
1940-12-08
1940-12-09
1940-12-13
1940-12-14
1940-12-17
1940-12-18
1941-01-09
1941-01-10
1941-02-11
1941-02-12
1941-03-01
1941-03-02
1941-03-10
1941-03-11
1941-03-13
1941-03-14
1941-03-15
1941-03-16
1941-04-10
1941-04-11
1941-04-12
1941-04-13
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
Czech Republic
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Belgium--Antwerp
Belgium--Zeebrugge
Czech Republic--Plzeň
France--Bordeaux (Nouvelle-Aquitaine)
France--Boulogne-sur-Mer
France--Brest
France--Le Havre
France--Lorient
France--Saint-Nazaire
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Chemnitz
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Leuna
Germany--Magdeburg
Germany--Mannheim
England--Bedfordshire
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Cheshire
England--Derbyshire
England--Gloucestershire
England--Hampshire
England--Oxfordshire
England--Warwickshire
England--Wiltshire
England--Wiltshire
Italy--Turin
Germany--Düsseldorf
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LKeelingRV82689v1
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
David Leitch
10 OTU
21 OTU
22 OTU
51 Squadron
7 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
Battle
Blenheim
Flying Training School
Hampden
Hudson
Hurricane
Lancaster
Magister
pilot
RAF Abingdon
RAF Burnaston
RAF Cranage
RAF Dishforth
RAF Farnborough
RAF Hullavington
RAF Kemble
RAF Moreton in the Marsh
RAF Oakington
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
Spitfire
Stirling
training
Wellington
Whitley
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1746/35753/LRouseHC911641v1.2.pdf
b8a5f2a879f413a257063866e9f621b2
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
Rouse, Harold C
H C Rouse
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2020-10-17
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Rouse, HC
Description
An account of the resource
One item. The collection concerns Harold Rouse (b. 1921, 911641, 172888 Royal Air Force) and contains his log book. He flew operations with 97 Squadron as a wireless operator / air gunner.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Matthew Williams and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
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
Harold C Rouse’s flying log book for observer’s and air gunner’s
Description
An account of the resource
Wireless Operator/Air Gunner’s log book for H C Rouse covering the period from 11 October, 1940 to 16 December, 1945. Detailing his flying training and operations flown, also includes Gunnery Course results, mine laying operations, bomb loads, a crash landing. He was stationed at RAF Yatesbury (2 E&WS), RAF Jurby (5 AOS), RAF Wellesbourne Mountford (22 OTU), RAF Coningsby, RAF Tattershall Thorpe/RAF Woodhall Spa (97 Squadron), RAF Scampton (GTF). Aircraft flown in were Dominie, Proctor, Blenheim, Anson, Wellington, Manchester, Lancaster. He flew 26 night time operations with 97 Squadron. Targets were Hamburg, Heligoland, Trondheim, Stuttgart, Kiel, Warnemunde, Copenhagen, Mannheim, Kassel, Nurnberg, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf, Wismar, Krefeld, Genoa, Bordeaux, Turin, Danzig. This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available. His pilots on operations were Pilot Officer Maltby and Pilot Officer Lancey.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike French
Terry Hancock
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LRouseHC911641v1
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940
1941
1942-01-15
1942-01-16
1942-04-08
1942-04-09
1942-04-27
1942-04-28
1942-04-29
1942-05-04
1942-05-05
1942-05-07
1942-05-08
1942-05-09
1942-05-16
1942-05-17
1942-05-19
1942-05-20
1942-05-22
1942-05-23
1942-05-27
1942-05-28
1942-08-27
1942-08-28
1942-08-29
1942-09-08
1942-09-09
1942-09-10
1942-09-11
1942-09-23
1942-09-24
1942-10-02
1942-10-03
1942-10-12
1942-10-13
1942-10-14
1942-10-22
1942-10-23
1942-11-07
1942-11-08
1942-11-10
1942-11-11
1942-11-22
1942-11-23
1942-11-28
1942-11-29
1942-12-04
1942-12-05
1942-12-08
1942-12-09
1943
1944
1945
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Denmark
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Norway
Poland
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Denmark--Copenhagen
Great Britain Miscellaneous Island Dependencies--Isle of Man
England--Lincolnshire
England--Warwickshire
England--Wiltshire
France--Bordeaux (Nouvelle-Aquitaine)
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Helgoland
Germany--Kassel
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Krefeld
Germany--Mannheim
Germany--Rostock
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Wismar
Italy--Genoa
Italy--Turin
Poland--Gdańsk
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
22 OTU
97 Squadron
air gunner
Air Observers School
aircrew
Anson
Blenheim
bombing
crash
Dominie
Lancaster
Manchester
mine laying
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Coningsby
RAF Jurby
RAF Scampton
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
RAF Woodhall Spa
RAF Yatesbury
Tirpitz
training
Wellington
wireless operator
wireless operator / air gunner
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2084/34478/SWeirG19660703v050001.2.pdf
d145f2e96df2ca6c739b9222cbb3b0b7
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
Weir, Greg. Thiele, Keith
Description
An account of the resource
Eight items. Collection concerns Squadron Leader Keith Thiele DSO and DFC and two bars (1921 - 2016, Royal New Zealand Air Force). After training in New Zealand came to Great Britain and completed operations of 405 Squadron flying Wellington and Halifax and subsequently on Lancaster with 467 Squadron. He then converted to fighters flying Spitfire, Tempest and Typhoon over Europe. The collection contains his log books, combat reports and a letter reporting his missing.
The collection was catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-04-26
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Weir, G
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
Keith Thiele - Royal New Zealand Air Force pilot's flying log book
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal New Zealand Air Force
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One photocopied booklet
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SWeirG19660703v050001
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
Description
An account of the resource
Pilots flying log book for Keith F Thiele, covering the period from 20 January 1941 to 18 February 1946. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and instructor duties including his conversion to single seat fighters with operations over Europe claiming 2 Me 109s and one Ju 52. He was stationed at RNZAF Harewood, RNZAF Woodbourne, RAF Wellesbourne, RAF Pocklington, RAF Marston Moor, RAF Abingdon, RAF Hullavington, RAF Waddington, RAF Bottesford, RAF Hendon, RAF Dorval, RAF Eshott, RAF Bulmer, RAF Tangmere, RAF Friston, RAF Bolt Head, RAF West Malling, RAF Wigram, RAF Lympne, RAF Swanton Morley, RAF Bognor, RAF Thorney Island and RAF Vokel. Aircraft flown in were Tiger Moth, Oxford, Wellington, Magister, Halifax, Whitley, Tutor, Anson, Lancaster, Ventura, Dakota, Hudson, Norseman, Mariner, Liberator, Spitfire, Dominie, Typhoon, Auster, Tempest and Harvard. He flew a total of 56 operations, 32 with 405 Squadron and 24 with 467 Squadron. He also flew fighter operations with 41 and 486 Squadrons. Targets were Dunkirk, Berlin, Wilhelmshaven, Cherbourg, Emden, Bremen, Brest, Mannheim, Kiel, Paris, St Nazaire, Essen, Cologne, Hamburg, Dortmund, Dusseldorf, Duisburg, Bayonne, Turin, Nuremburg, Stuttgart, and La Spezia. His first or second pilots on operations were Pilot Officer Robson, Sergeant Field, Flight Sergeant Weakly, Sergeant Howe, Pilot Officer Desmond, Sergeant Claxton, Sergeant Heavery, Pilot Officer Manifold, Sergeant Rodgers, Sergeant Stuart, Sergeant Byers, Sergeant Wallace, Sergeant Wilson, Flight Lieutenant Sinclair and Sergeant Gillman, and Sergeant Carrington. This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941-10-31
1941-11-01
1941-11-04
1941-11-05
1941-11-07
1941-11-08
1941-12-16
1941-12-17
1941-12-22
1941-12-23
1942-01-06
1942-01-07
1942-01-15
1942-01-16
1942-01-21
1942-01-22
1942-01-31
1942-02-01
1942-02-12
1942-02-13
1942-02-14
1942-02-15
1942-02-26
1942-02-27
1942-03-03
1942-03-04
1942-03-08
1942-03-09
1942-03-10
1942-03-11
1942-03-26
1942-03-27
1942-04-05
1942-04-06
1942-04-08
1942-04-09
1942-04-10
1942-04-11
1942-04-15
1942-04-16
1942-04-17
1942-04-18
1942-05-30
1942-06-01
1942-06-02
1942-06-06
1942-06-07
1942-06-08
1942-06-09
1942-06-25
1942-06-26
1942-07-02
1942-07-03
1942-07-08
1942-07-09
1942-07-26
1942-07-27
1942-07-31
1942-08-01
1942-08-03
1942-08-06
1942-08-07
1943-01-02
1943-01-03
1943-01-07
1943-01-08
1943-01-12
1943-01-13
1943-01-16
1943-01-17
1943-01-18
1943-01-23
1943-01-24
1943-01-27
1943-01-28
1943-01-30
1943-01-31
1943-02-04
1943-02-05
1943-02-18
1943-02-19
1943-02-21
1943-02-22
1943-02-25
1943-02-26
1943-03-01
1943-03-02
1943-03-03
1943-03-04
1943-03-05
1943-03-06
1943-03-08
1943-03-09
1943-03-11
1943-03-12
1943-03-13
1943-03-22
1943-03-23
1943-03-29
1943-03-30
1943-04-14
1943-04-15
1943-04-18
1943-04-19
1943-05-04
1943-05-05
1943-05-12
1943-05-13
1944
1945
1946
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Canada
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Netherlands
New Zealand
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Devon
England--East Sussex
England--Kent
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
England--London
England--Norfolk
England--Northumberland
England--Oxfordshire
England--Warwickshire
England--Wiltshire
England--Yorkshire
France--Bayonne
France--Brest
France--Cherbourg
France--Dunkerque
France--Paris
France--Saint-Nazaire
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Emden (Lower Saxony)
Germany--Essen
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Mannheim
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Wilhelmshaven
Italy--La Spezia
Italy--Turin
Netherlands--North Brabant
New Zealand--Christchurch
New Zealand--Marlborough
Québec--Montréal
Québec
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
England--Sussex
England--Sussex
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
10 OTU
1661 HCU
22 OTU
405 Squadron
467 Squadron
aircrew
Anson
B-24
bombing of Cologne (30/31 May 1942)
C-47
Dominie
Flying Training School
forced landing
Gneisenau
Halifax
Halifax Mk 2
Harvard
Heavy Conversion Unit
Hudson
Ju 52
Lancaster
Magister
Me 109
Me 262
mine laying
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
RAF Abingdon
RAF Bottesford
RAF Hendon
RAF Hullavington
RAF Lympne
RAF Marston Moor
RAF Pocklington
RAF Swanton Morley
RAF Tangmere
RAF Thorney Island
RAF Waddington
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
Scharnhorst
Spitfire
Tiger Moth
training
Typhoon
V-1
V-2
V-weapon
Ventura
Wellington
Whitley
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1471/28163/LFertichF[Ser -DoB]v1.pdf
8ef6cb97a789b4d133327468c0820168
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
Fertich, Frank
F Fertich
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-11-14
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Fertich, F
Description
An account of the resource
One item. Frank Fertich's log book. He flew operations as an air gunner with 428 Squadron.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Ernest Smith and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
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
Frank Fertich's Royal Canadian Air Force flying log book for aircrew other than pilot
Description
An account of the resource
Frank Fertich’s Flying Log book as air gunner covering the period from 24 January 1944 to 17 April 1945. Detailing his flying training and operations flown as air gunner. He was stationed at RCAF Mont Joli (9 B&GS), RAF Wellesbourne Mountford (22 OTU), RAF Croft (1664 HCU) and RAF Middleton St George (428 Squadron). Aircraft flown in were Battle, Wellington, Halifax, Lancaster, Oxford and Anson.Targets were Essen, Cologne, Oberhausen, Ludwigshaven, Duisburg, Scholven, Wurzsburg, Hannover, Hanau, Merseburg, Zeitz, Wiesbaden, Bonn, Goch. Pforzheim, Mainz, Dortmund, Zweibrucken, Hagen, Neuss, Chemnitz, Dessau, Hemmingstedt and Hildesheim. He flew 22 night and 8 daytime operations with 428 Squadron, a total of 30. The log book also contains a poem and hand drawn illustrations including a woman with a horse and a naked woman captioned '428 Ghost'. His pilot on operations was Flying officer Anderson.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Terry Hancock
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One photocopied booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Artwork
Text. Poetry
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LFertichF[Ser#DoB]v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Canadian Air Force
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
1944-10-25
1944-10-28
1944-10-30
1944-11-01
1944-12-15
1944-12-18
1944-12-29
1944-12-30
1944-12-31
1945-01-01
1945-01-02
1945-01-05
1945-01-06
1945-01-07
1945-01-14
1945-01-15
1945-01-16
1945-01-17
1945-01-28
1945-01-29
1945-02-01
1945-02-02
1945-02-03
1945-02-04
1945-02-07
1945-02-08
1945-02-23
1945-02-24
1945-02-27
1945-02-28
1945-03-02
1945-03-05
1945-03-06
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-11
1945-03-12
1945-03-14
1945-03-15
1945-03-20
1945-03-21
1945-03-22
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Canada
Great Britain
Germany
England--Yorkshire
England--Durham (County)
England--Warwickshire
Germany--Neuss
Germany--Bonn
Germany--Chemnitz
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Essen
Germany--Goch
Germany--Hagen (Arnsberg)
Germany--Hanau
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Ludwigshafen am Rhein
Germany--Mainz (Rhineland-Palatinate)
Germany--Merseburg
Germany--Oberhausen (Düsseldorf)
Germany--Pforzheim
Germany--Zeitz
Germany--Zweibrücken
Germany--Hildesheim
Germany--Wiesbaden
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
1664 HCU
22 OTU
428 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
animal
Anson
arts and crafts
Battle
bombing
Bombing and Gunnery School
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
RAF Croft
RAF Middleton St George
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1615/24748/PCothliffKB15030114.1.jpg
eadadf2ad742f4a630ab2ad1405a7890
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
Cothliff, Ken 427 and 429 Squadrons
Description
An account of the resource
151 items. The collection contains photographs of personnel from 427 and 429 Squadrons.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Ken Cothliff and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
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. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Cothliff, K
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
SQDN. 427 DATE OF ARRIVAL
[a] POSN [b] RANK [c] NAME [d] NUMBER [e] HOME [f] AGE
[inserted] 2 yrs AFU.(0) 4 [indecipherable] 82 O.T.U. Banston [/inserted] [a] CAPT [b] F/L [c] Sherlock A.A. D.F.C. [d] J15488 [e] Toronto [f] 28
[inserted] 11 1/2 months. 23 OTU. [/inserted] [a] NAV [b] F/O [c] McBurney R.W. [d] J18046 [e] Woodstock [f] 22
[inserted] 5 months 81 OTU 5 months AFU(0) [/inserted] [a] AB [b] F/O [c] Hunt H.S. [d] J18053 [e] Kinstino Stock [f] 22
[inserted] 12 months 27 OT.U. 8 months 82 OTU. [/inserted][symbol] [a] WOP [b] F/O [c] Ray F.L. [d] J13589 [e] London [f] 27
[a] FE [b] Sgt. [c] Prior H.H. [d] 2209544 [e] Wigin [sic] Lanc. [f] 30
[inserted] 1 yr 22 OT.U. Wells. [/inserted] [a] MU/AG [b] W/O [c] McCoy D.J. [d] R98555 [e] [indecipherable] [f] 24
[inserted] 6 months 71AOS. 5. Months 10 AGS. [/inserted] [a] R/AG [b] F/O [c] Monty C.E. [d] J18935 [e] Montreal. [f] 28.
1659 C.U.
[photograph]
LMG.174. F/L. SHERLOCK A.A. 427.
[inserted] PHOTO NO [/inserted]
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Flight Lieutenant AA Sherlock DFC and Crew
Description
An account of the resource
Seven airmen arranged in a row. Their names are listed in a caption above. On the image is annotated 'LMG. 174. F/L Sherlock A.A. 427'
The wireless operator's listing is annotated with his training record.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PCothliffKB15030114
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Canadian Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Canada
Ontario--Toronto
Ontario--Woodstock
Saskatchewan
Ontario--London
Great Britain
England--Wigan
Québec--Montréal
Ontario
Québec
England--Lancashire
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Steve Baldwin
1659 HCU
22 OTU
23 OTU
27 OTU
427 Squadron
81 OTU
82 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
air gunner
Air Observers School
aircrew
bomb aimer
flight engineer
Heavy Conversion Unit
navigator
Operational Training Unit
pilot
training
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1615/24724/PCothliffKB15030088.1.jpg
093fa5fb64fccc05d7c5e615f29df7a2
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
Cothliff, Ken 427 and 429 Squadrons
Description
An account of the resource
151 items. The collection contains photographs of personnel from 427 and 429 Squadrons.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Ken Cothliff and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
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. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Cothliff, K
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[a] POSN [b] RANK [c] NAME [d] NUMBER [e] HOME [f] AGE
[a] CAPT [b] F/O [c] Mulholland J.V. [d] J36985 [e] Mitchell [f] 22
[a] NAV [b] F/O [c] Isakcovitch N. [d] J38327 [e] Toronto [f] 21
[a] AB [b] F/O [c] Horton R.G. [d] J36226 [e] Humbolt, Sask [f] 20
[a] WOP [b] Sgt. [c] Leaver T.F. [d] R198017 [e] Toronto [f] 21
[a] FE [b] Sgt. [c] Brinkley D.B. [d] 1868724 [e] London, Eng. [f] 19
[a] MU/AG [b] [deleted] Sgt. [/deleted][inserted] P/O [/inserted] [c] [deleted] McCarthy D.B. [/deleted][inserted] Tribe J.C. [/inserted] [d] [deleted] R217888 [/deleted][inserted] C91012 [/inserted] [e] [deleted] St. John, N.B. [/[deleted] [f] [deleted] 18 [/deleted]
[a] R/AG [b] Sgt. [c] Lossing B.E. [d] R221305 [e] Windsor, Ont. [f] 19
1666 C.U. F/O MacDonald – 22 O.T.U. Wellsbourne
[photograph]
194LMG F/O MULHOLLAND 427
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
Flying Officer JV Mulholland and Crew
Description
An account of the resource
Seven airmen arranged in a row. Their names are listed in a caption above. On the image is annotated '194LMG. F/O Mulholland. 427'
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PCothliffKB15030088
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Canadian Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Canada
Ontario--Mitchell
Ontario--Toronto
Saskatchewan--Humboldt
Ontario--Windsor
Great Britain
England--London
Ontario
Saskatchewan
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Steve Baldwin
1666 HCU
22 OTU
427 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
bomb aimer
flight engineer
Heavy Conversion Unit
navigator
Operational Training Unit
pilot
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
training
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/551/23213/LLancasterJO103509v1.2.pdf
56bf3c9cc310d03cf9f44312ba2ba698
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
Lancaster, Jo
John Oliver Lancaster
J O Lancaster
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Lancaster, JO
Description
An account of the resource
17 items. Two oral history interviews with John Oliver 'Jo' Lancaster DFC (1919 - 2019, 948392, 103509 Royal Air Force), photographs and six of his log books. Jo Lancaster completed 54 operations as a pilot with in Wellingtons with 40 Squadron, and after a period of instructing, in Lancasters with 12 Squadron from RAF Wickenby. He became test pilot after the war and was the first person to use a Martin-Baker ejection seat in an emergency.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Jo Lancaster and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-08-18
2017-03-08
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Jo Lancaster’s pilots flying log book. One
Description
An account of the resource
Pilots flying log book for J O Lancaster covering the period from 6 July 1937 to 15 September 1943. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and instructor duties. He was stationed at RAF Sywell, RAF Ansty, RAF Desford, RAF Sealand, RAF Ternhill, RAF Lossiemouth, RAF Wyton, RAF Wellesbourne Mountford, RAF Upavon, RAF Wymeswold, RAF Kirmington, RAF Wickenby and RAF Binbrook. Aircraft flown were Tiger Moth, Cadet, Hart, Audax, Master, Wellington, Bombay, Oxford, Stirling, Magister, Lancaster, Whitley, Halifax, Martinet, Skua and Spitfire. He flew a total of 54 operations, 31 with 40 squadron 1 daylight and 30 night, 2 night operations with 22 Operational Training Unit and 21 night operations with 12 Squadron. Targets were Calais, Hamburg, Hannover, Atlantic, Dusseldorf, Cologne, Cherbourg, Brest, Munster, Osnabruck, Mannheim, Duisburg, Frankfurt, Berlin, Turin, Stettin, Rotterdam, Emden, Nurnberg, Essen, St Nazaire, Terschelling, Haugesund Fijord, Lorient, Wilhelmshaven, Bremen, Munich and Spezia. His pilot for his first 'second dickie' operations was Sergeant Taylor.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LLancasterJO103509v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Netherlands
Norway
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
Atlantic Ocean--North Sea
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Northamptonshire
England--Shropshire
England--Warwickshire
England--Wiltshire
England--Worcestershire
France--Brest
France--Calais
France--Cherbourg
France--Lorient
France--Saint-Nazaire
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Emden (Lower Saxony)
Germany--Essen
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Mannheim
Germany--Munich
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Osnabrück
Germany--Wilhelmshaven
Italy--La Spezia
Italy--Turin
Netherlands--Rotterdam
Netherlands--Terschelling
Norway--Haugesund
Poland--Szczecin
Scotland--Moray
Wales--Flintshire
Germany--Münster in Westfalen
Poland
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1937
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
1943
1941-05-09
1941-05-10
1941-05-11
1941-05-12
1941-05-15
1941-05-16
1941-05-27
1941-06-02
1941-06-03
1941-06-11
1941-06-12
1941-06-23
1941-06-24
1941-06-26
1941-06-27
1941-07-02
1941-07-03
1941-07-04
1941-07-05
1941-07-06
1941-07-07
1941-07-09
1941-07-10
1941-07-22
1941-07-23
1941-07-24
1941-07-30
1941-07-31
1941-08-12
1941-08-13
1941-08-16
1941-08-17
1941-08-18
1941-08-19
1941-08-25
1941-08-28
1941-08-29
1941-08-31
1941-09-01
1941-09-02
1941-09-03
1941-09-07
1941-09-08
1941-09-10
1941-09-11
1941-09-12
1941-09-13
1941-09-15
1941-09-16
1941-09-29
1941-09-30
1941-10-03
1941-10-04
1941-10-11
1941-10-12
1941-10-14
1941-10-15
1941-10-16
1941-10-17
1942-06-01
1942-06-02
1942-11-03
1942-11-04
1942-11-07
1942-11-08
1942-11-09
1942-11-10
1943-01-04
1943-01-05
1943-01-08
1943-01-09
1943-01-23
1943-01-24
1943-01-30
1943-01-31
1943-02-02
1943-02-03
1943-02-07
1943-02-08
1943-02-11
1943-02-12
1943-02-13
1943-02-14
1943-02-15
1943-02-16
1943-02-17
1943-02-18
1943-02-19
1943-02-21
1943-02-22
1943-03-03
1943-03-04
1943-03-05
1943-03-06
1943-03-08
1943-03-09
1943-03-10
1943-03-12
1943-03-13
1943-03-22
1943-03-23
1943-03-27
1943-03-28
1943-04-03
1943-04-04
1943-04-05
1943-04-18
1943-04-19
12 Squadron
20 OTU
22 OTU
28 OTU
40 Squadron
aircrew
bombing
bombing of Cologne (30/31 May 1942)
Flying Training School
Halifax
Lancaster
Magister
Martinet
mine laying
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
RAF Ansty
RAF Binbrook
RAF Desford
RAF Kirmington
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Sealand
RAF Sywell
RAF Ternhill
RAF Upavon
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
RAF Wickenby
RAF Wymeswold
RAF Wyton
Spitfire
Stirling
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
Whitley
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/826/22951/LFranklinRH178702v1.1.pdf
ed8f5bd3c7bd6417da67d59f66c5abb8
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
Franklin, Richard
R Franklin
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview with Flight Lieutenant Richard Franklin (b. 1923, 1319873, 178702 Royal Air Force) and his log book. He flew a tour of operations as a wireless operator / air gunner and later retrained as a navigator.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Richard Franklin and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-15
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. 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
Franklin, RH
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Richard Franklin’s navigators, air bombers, air gunners and flight engineers flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Wireless operators flying log book for Richard Franklin covering the period from 17th February 1943 to 19th July 1946. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and instructor duties. He was stationed at RAF Madely (4 Radio School), RAF Wigtown (1(O)AFU), RAF Honeybourne (24 OTU), RAF Topcliffe (1659 HCU), RAF Leeming (427 Squadron), RAF Atherstone, RAF Wellesbourne Mountford (22 OTU), RAF Wymeswold (108 OTU), RAF Membury (525 Squadron), RAF Stoney Cross (46 Squadron). Aircraft flown in were, Dominie, Proctor, Botha, Anson, Whitley, Halifax, Wellington, Dakota. He flew a total 30 operations (all night-time) with 427 squadron. His aircraft was attacked by an Me 109. the aircraft was damaged and crash landed at RAF Lakenheath. Targets were Hanover, Kassel, Dusseldorf, Berlin, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Leipzig, Essen, Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, Le Bourget, Lens, Saint-Valery-en-Caux, Ghent, Boulogne, Louvain, Le Clipit, Aachen, Bourg Leopold, Au Fevre, Merville, Conde-Sur-Noireau, Archeres, Arras. His pilot on operations was Flying Officer Weldon DFC. The log book also lists his post war RAF flights.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike French
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LFranklin RH178702v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
France
Germany
Great Britain
Belgium--Ghent
Belgium--Louvain
England--Berkshire
England--Hampshire
England--Hertfordshire
England--Leicestershire
England--Warwickshire
France--Arras
France--Condé-sur-Noireau
France--Le Bourget
France--Lens
France--Merville (Nord)
France--Paris
France--Saint-Valery-en-Caux
France--Paris
Germany--Aachen
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Essen
Germany--Kassel
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Stuttgart
Scotland--Dumfries and Galloway
Belgium--Leopoldsburg
France--Boulogne-sur-Mer
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Hannover
England--Yorkshire
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1946
1943-10-08
1943-10-22
1943-11-03
1943-11-22
1943-11-23
1943-11-25
1943-11-26
1943-12-03
1943-12-20
1943-12-21
1943-12-29
1943-12-30
1944-01-20
1944-03-15
1944-03-16
1944-03-18
1944-03-19
1944-03-22
1944-03-23
1944-03-25
1944-03-26
1944-03-27
1944-04-09
1944-04-18
1944-04-19
1944-04-20
1944-04-21
1944-04-22
1944-04-23
1944-04-24
1944-04-25
1944-04-26
1944-04-27
1944-05-07
1944-05-08
1944-05-10
1944-05-11
1944-05-12
1944-05-13
1944-05-19
1944-05-20
1944-05-24
1944-05-25
1944-05-27
1944-05-28
1944-05-31
1944-06-01
1944-06-05
1944-06-06
1944-06-07
1944-06-08
1944-06-12
1944-06-13
1659 HCU
22 OTU
24 OTU
427 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
bombing of the Juvisy, Noisy-le-Sec and Le Bourget railways (18/19 April 1944)
bombing of the Normandy coastal batteries (5/6 June 1944)
Botha
C-47
Dominie
forced landing
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
Me 109
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Atherstone
RAF Castle Donington
RAF Honeybourne
RAF Lakenheath
RAF Leeming
RAF Madley
RAF Stoney Cross
RAF Topcliffe
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
RAF Wigtown
RAF Wymeswold
Stirling
training
Wellington
Whitley
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/501/22489/LCurnockRM1815605v1.1.pdf
60b475a690f46c15e635316b08f0efa7
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
Curnock, Richard
Richard Murdock Curnock
R M Curnock
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Curnock, RM
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-04-18
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
92 items. An oral history interview with Warrant Officer Richard Curnock (1924, 1915605 Royal Air Force), his log book, letters, photographs and prisoner of war magazines. He flew operations with 425 Squadron before being shot down and becoming a prisoner of war.
The collection has been licenced to the IBCC Digital Archive by Richard Curnock and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Richard Curnock’s navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book
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IBCC Digital Archive
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book for R M Curnock, covering the period from 28 July 1943 to 25 February 1944 and from 18 September 1946 to 26 October 1946. He was shot down on 25 February 1944 and became a prisoner of war until flying again after his release. It details his flying training and operations flown. He was stationed at RAF Dalcross, RAF Wellesbourne Mountford, RAF Dishforth and RAF Tholthorpe. Aircraft flown in were, Anson, Wellington, Halifax and Dakota. He flew 2 operations with 425 Squadron before being shot down on his second operation. Targets were Schweinfurt and Augsburg. <span>His pilot on operations was</span> Flight Sergeant Stowell.
Creator
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Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Format
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One booklet
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
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LCurnockRM1815605v1
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
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Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Malta
England--Warwickshire
England--Yorkshire
Germany--Augsburg
Germany--Schweinfurt
Italy--Rome
Scotland--Inverness
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1946
1944-02-24
1944-02-25
Contributor
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Mike Connock
1664 HCU
22 OTU
425 Squadron
air gunner
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
C-47
Halifax
Halifax Mk 3
Heavy Conversion Unit
Operational Training Unit
prisoner of war
RAF Dalcross
RAF Dishforth
RAF Tholthorpe
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
shot down
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/501/22419/BCurnockRMCurnockRMv1.2.pdf
dd6c1f8bb85b78fcd0c5a2ab7464a67a
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
Curnock, Richard
Richard Murdock Curnock
R M Curnock
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
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Curnock, RM
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-04-18
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
92 items. An oral history interview with Warrant Officer Richard Curnock (1924, 1915605 Royal Air Force), his log book, letters, photographs and prisoner of war magazines. He flew operations with 425 Squadron before being shot down and becoming a prisoner of war.
The collection has been licenced to the IBCC Digital Archive by Richard Curnock and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[photograph]
Richard Montague Curnock
My War Story
[page break]
[underlined] CONTENTS [/underlined]
Page Number
Foreword 4
World War II begins 5
Samuel William Curnock 7
Dick's War Begins 10
Dalcross 10
Wellesbourne- Warwickshire 11
Heavy Conversion Unit - Dishforth (York's) the crew is completed 13
Tolthorpe - Squadron station 14
Our First Mission 15
The Second and Final Mission 16
Prisoner of War-number 2108 17
Stalag Luft VI - Heydekrug 18
Kriegies 10 commandments 20
Torun Stalag Luft 357 25
Oerbke near Fallingsbostel 27
The Long March 27
19th April 1945 28
The end of the War nears 31
Military Transport Training 33
Horsham 34
Egypt??? 35
To Italy 36
On the Road to Bari 39
Mercy Mission to Egypt 43
Dakota back to Italy - Treviso 46
2
[page break]
Reunions 49
Appendix 1- RAF flying log book 52
i) Gunnery course results 52
ii) Gunnery training 53
iii) - vi) 22 O.T.U 54-57
vii) - viii) 1664 Conversion Unit 58 - 59
ix) 425 Squadron 60
x) Flights to visit Bob in Egypt 61
Appendix 2 - Berlin cemetery plan 62
Appendix 3 - The March 63
Appendix 4 Red Cross map of prisoner of war camps
i) Long march route and map correction information 65
ii) Long march route 66
iii) Blue cross in circle marks where Dick was shot down. Red
cross near Frankfurt where he was moved to 67
iv) Red line shows route taken by Dick. Torun (Thorn camp) 68
v) Poznan - Stalag Luft XXI D 69
vi) Stalag Luft VI - Lithuania 70
3
[page break]
Foreword
The following writings are a combination of Dick's recollections as he remembers them in 2013/14. Also within are additions (in blue) from earlier recordings by Barbara, and information taken from his Wartime log (given to him by the Red Cross when in his first POW camp). And from his RAF navigator's; air bomber's and air gunner's flying log book.
Richard Montague Curnock (in his own words January 2014)
I was speaking just recently to Shirley and Steph about the anniversary of the shooting of the 50 POW's that attempted the escape from Stalag Luft 3, as I was at that time also a prisoner in another camp and was recounting how we took the news of this wholesale murder of our fellow airmen, also what the Germans retaliated with was an excuse for their prisoners over in North Africa having to sleep in tents (which anybody knows most troops lived that way in the desert) they took all our mattresses off the bunk beds, which left us with about five or six bed boards only and one blanket too sleep on, also we had two tables and a few chairs to each room, these they also removed.
All this happened whilst we were herded out of huts on to the parade ground where we were surrounded by hundreds of the German army in lorries with mounted machine guns, also the troops were on the ground with machine guns also lying on the roofs of the huts were virtually surrounded and all you could see guns pointing your way.
4
[page break]
[underlined] World War II begins [/underlined]
Guess it is time for me to start this saga of my war time story, which started when it was announced that Hitler had not replied to our letter stating of no reply had been heard from them by 11am on 3rd September 1939 then we would be at war with them, no reply so we were at war again.
I was a fifteen year old and had been working for a year and half, the first twelve months in a piano shop on Belgrave Road, was sacked for not dusting the violins and bows that hung on the walls "enough times".
My day started at 8.45 washing the front of the shop which was on a corner, so had two large windows and tiles along under the window, then dust all the pianos and they needed polishing regularly, sweeping regularly, attending to customers who wanted to pay for the their [sic] pianos which they paid for weekly. Pianos were priced at the lower being 12 pounds for an upright and 15 pound for an over strung, we had a special made for a customer a baby grand, the wood used was walnut and cost 35 pounds was on show for a week.
[photograph]
Dick, Sam, Bob and Mary, Minehead Street. 1940-1
Next job was making boot polish and paint that was used in the boot and shoe industry. My job was delivering the product to a lot of factories in Leicester and as far as Wigston and Oadby on a bike with a large basket over the front wheel, which held quite a lot of cans, they weighed nearly as much as I did that's another story.
5
[page break]
[photograph] [photograph]
Dick in ATC uniform 1941 Bob, Dick, Sam and Mary (1941)
6
[page break]
[underlined] Samuel William Curnock [/underlined]
[photograph]
Samuel William Curnock RAFVR: newly qualified sergeant pilot 1942
Brother Sam was already in the RAF and over in Canada training to be a pilot and I had then joined the Air Training Corps on third September 1941 as an aircrew cadet, brother Bob I believe was waiting to go into the RAF as a trainee pilot, I believe that during his tour over there Sam was killed in a flying accident at Gibraltar in 1942 (26th September 1942).
7
[page break]
[photograph]
Our flying crews have their recreation room at the United Kingdom landplane base
Sam (second from left) in a recreation room
There was nothing to how the accident happened but that the aircraft crashed into the sea at Gibraltar with no survivors. The pilot was a senior captain, Sam was a second pilot officer and they had an officer wireless operator. We were led to believe it could have been sabotage but no one knew.
It was then I decided I would get in the RAF quicker if I re-mustered as an air gunner instead of waiting for my pilot navigator course to come through.
In 2009 Peter and Jayne received a phone call from Jonathan Falconer who was researching Sam Curnock, the extract below gives more information on the circumstances of Sam's death than the family had ever known before.
Extract from "Names in Stone"-Jonathan Falconer.
Sam had volunteered to join the RAF in October 1940 on his eighteenth birthday, just as the fortunes of the RAF seemed to be swinging in its favour after the desperate air battles of the Battle of Britain in the summer months. He learnt to fly on Tiger Moths at 7 Elementary Flying Training School, Desford; Leicestershire. Before sailing to Canada; for further flying training at 73 Service Flying Training School; north Battleford, Saskatcheqan [sic] .
Sam qualified as a pilot and returned to England. With a shortage of flight crews for civil aircraft he was transferred in May 1942 to fly transport aircraft with Britain's national airline; BOAC.
in September 1942, Sam was Second Officer in the four-man crew of Whitley MK V, G-AGCI, which was operated by BOAC on its route between the UK and Gibraltar. Thirty-three year old Capt Charles Browne was in command of "Charlie-India".
8
[page break]
Charlie-India had flown into Gibraltar from England on 10th September 1942 and the aircraft's Master had stated in his Voyage Report that the aircraft was tail-heavy for the landing. The aircraft left again for England on 13th September, but her Master decided to turn back after only 25 minutes, reporting that Charlie India was now flying nose heavy.
Not long before his death, Sam was second pilot in a BOAC Whitley that crashed in England on take-off due to engine failure. He was uninjured and managed to walk away from the wreckage. In the fortnight that remained before her fatal crash, Charlie-India was the subject of several engineering inspections and three test flights after report by several pilots of nose and tail heaviness during flight. These problems appeared cured, but on 19th September the Master reported that Charlie-India was underpowered during take off and the initial climb, and unstable in flight. A further detailed inspection was carried out and another test flight was arranged.
To add to Charlie-India's woes, on 24th September the twin Bristol Hercules engines of an RAF Beaufighter was run up on Gibraltar's tarmac, tail on to the BOAC Whitley. The powerful propeller wash from the two radial engines caused damage to the trailing edge of the Whitley's elevators and the rudder trim tabs. Engineers made temporary repairs to the elevators, the damaged trim tab mechanisms were replaced, and a test flight was arranged for 3.56pm on 26th September.
With Charles Browne in command and Sam and the rest of the crew, Charlie-India took off normally from Gibraltar's east-west runway at 3.56pm and climbed out over the Bay of Gibraltar to about 300 feet, whereupon Browne eased the Whitley into a left-hand turn. Then something went badly wrong because the aircraft assumed a power glide attitude and continued in a shallow dive until it struck the sea at 3.59pm, sinking almost immediately in more than 900 feet of water.
Naval vessels were on the scene within minutes. Apart from a few small items of wreckage floating on the surface, the aircraft was not recovered. There were no survivors from her crew of four, and no bodies were ever recovered.
BOAC's technical investigators launched an immediate inquiry into the crash and on 29th October 1942 they made their report. Its conclusion was based more on informed speculation than hard fact, but in the absence of any wreckage or survivors this was the best that could be hoped for: "The precise cause of the accident cannot be determined, but a possible cause was an uncontrollable elevator trimmer tab due to a fracture in some part of the actuating mechanism .... There exists a possibility that subsequent to the take off one or both of the elevator trimmer tab mechanisms fractured, with the result that the Master was unable to maintain longitudinal control of the aircraft."
9
[page break]
[underlined] Dick's war begins [/underlined]
22nd March 1943; When l was 18 and 11 months I was called up (RAF (V.R) volunteer Reserve) and was sent a rail warrant for travel to London and Lord's cricket ground which was the Aircrew Receiving Centre (A.C.R.C) for al! aircrew candidates were we were kitted out and billeted in hotels all around the St Johns Wood area, loads of marching around going from one lecture to another with lots of marching exercises around the hotels, and in between times you were taken to a medical centre for inoculation, stand in line both arms bared, left arm two injections one inoculation right arm then out to the street, where there were bodies al! over the place, some bodies flat out other holding their arms and moaning. When they managed to get all of us in some semblance of order, we marched back to our hotels, but swinging of arms was painful and was not done with any energy.
After our initiation into RAF life we were on a train to Bridlington to learn navigation, armaments mathematics- aircraft recognition plus as always plenty of marching from one lecture to another, one other pastime was Morse code and the Aldis lamp, this was done with someone being sent to the end of the breakwater with an instructor with an Aldis lamp and they sent signals to the rest of us on the beach in twos, one reading the signal being sent and your friend writing it down, we used got some very weird messages at end of a session.
My next stage of training after Bridlington was Bridgnorth where unfortunately there was an outbreak of scarlet fever and German measles and unfortunately I happened to catch German measles and was put into an isolation hut, one of many for the recruits who had caught one of the diseases. I was put into a room of my own and had two weeks being looked after very well by a WAAF nurse during the day, and my night nurse who looked after me exceptionally well and was a lovely young lady. And as my condition improved she brought a radio into my room and we managed to have a dance and then she would tuck me up for the night with a cuddle and kiss goodnight.
After two weeks it was back to work where we did have a lot of lectures about armaments - aircraft recognition - Morse code with mathematics also but mainly armaments, how to dismantle a machine gun and also put it back and hope it worked alright.
Aircraft recognition was a priority knowing which the enemy was and which ours. My time spent with aircraft recognition at home kept me getting top marks in every exam we did, we had night vision exams where pictures were shown on a screen as if you were in a turret and had to identify the aircraft shown, my trouble was the fellows around me were always asking me what the aircraft was, the instructor stopped me helping them, he said that they would not be any use unless they got to know themselves. From then on I was removed from my seat and had to sit by the light switches turning them on and off as required. After finishing this course my instructors gave me a very good report and should get on well.
[underlined] Dalcross [/underlined]
Dick RAF flying log book information can be seen in appendix 1
My section was then sent on leave for a week after which we had to board a train to Scotland, destination was a place called Dalcross (near Inverness, Moray Firth) which turned out to be our Initial Flying Training course on Avro Ansons.
10
[page break]
Pilots converting on to twin engine Airspeed Oxford after training in Canada. This was now 17.7.43 and my course here lasted until 28.8.43 (appendix i) and ii)). The training consisted of being taken up in Avro Ansons six training gunners and an instructor we took it in turns to sit in the turret which had one gun in it attached was a camera which we had to train on a fighter aircraft which made a dummy attack on you, all exciting stuff, except when the fighter was late arriving and you had to fly round and round a church steeple, that was when my last coffee and biscuit decided to reappear, this happened three times, each time I was sent to the sick bay and gave an explanation of what was happening, I was given a glass of horrible liquid and told to report back for more flying. This occurred twice more by that time my stomach stopped playing around and settled down to the rigours of flying.
We also had firing with the one gun at a drone towed behind another aircraft and our bullets had colours on the tips so that they could record the number of hits. Our results were pathetic as the guns would only fire two bullets at a time and then jam so you then had to rearm it; we also used camera guns with which we had more success.
It also happened to be a training camp for pilots on night flying on airspeed oxfords.
Bob had by this time gained his pilots wings in Canada and was back in England and was posted to Dalcross near Inverness. I think this was during July 1943 and August 1943 to train on twin engine Airspeed Oxfords. Neither of us knew we were there until one evening we were going into Inverness and just happened to be walking down the road to catch the bus into town when I spotted Bob who was as surprised as I was; from then on we spent a bit of time together until he was posted elsewhere.
I continued at Dalcross to become a Sergeant air gunner had quite a good report from all the training staff and was given above average report from most of the tutors, not that it helped much as the ammunition we were using had a wide flange on the bullet casing as it was American and caused it to stick, you could only fire a couple of rounds and then you had to re-cock it again, life was hard on us.
[underlined] Wellesbourne- Warwickshire - meet the crew [/underlined]
18.9.1943. (Appendix iii) t [sic] vi)) My next posting was to Wellesbourne (Warwickshire) the Operational Training Unit to start being crewed up with members of a crew. The procedure was for the pilots to have a chat with the navigators, wireless operators, bomb aimers and air gunners and then ask the ones he wished to be his crew if they would join him Charlie (Chuck) Stowell, the pilot picked Bob Friskey as navigator then Eugene Fullum our wireless operator, the next was our bomb aimer Gordon Dinsmore, which left the rear gunner, which I believe was unanimous decision by them all that was me. We then spent our time getting to know each other; that is we went out at night doing a spot of drinking and rather a lot of talking or the other way round.
11
[page break]
[photograph]
Bob Friskey, Eugene Fullom and Chuck Stowell
[photograph]
A copy of the only photo of the crew: Back row: Bob Friskey, Gordon Dinsmore
Front row: Eugene Fullom, Dick Curnock, Chuck Stowell
This was at Gaydon the satellite airfield to Wellsbourne, here we started flying as a crew in the Wellington bomber, doing practice bombing at targets on the coast and various places also we had
12
[page break]
fighter aircraft doing dummy attacks during which I had a camera gun and it recorded my success against these attacks we also did firing at a draught [sic] towed behind another aircraft, with our bullets being painted different colours so they could count the number of hits we scored. This proved to be very hap hazard as the ammunition we were using was American and every second round got stuck in the breech and had to be manually ejected so our scores were very low. We did quite a lot of cross country flying for the navigators to gain experience a lot of it at night time.
We also did a lot of circuit flying at night so that the pilot could manage to get us back to the airfield safely. Some nights were a bit bumpy as he misjudged his height, my head used to get a lot of knocks on these occasions and the skippers name was anything but "Chuck".
[drawing]
Picture drawn by Dick whilst a prisoner of war
[underlined] Heavy Conversion Unit - Dishforth (Yorks) - the crew is completed [/underlined]
14.1.1944. ( appendix vii and viii) We moved on next to a conversion unit which meant going onto four engine aircraft this was at Dishforth (near Ripon, Yorks) 1664 Heavy conversion unit. The aircraft was a four engine Halifax bomber for which we needed two extra crew; a mid upper gunner and a flight engineer. These we met and we all moved into a hut so that we would could get know each other. The mid upper gunner was a Canadian from a farming background a rather slow on the uptake but we got on well together. The engineer was from Salford a tall lad and red haired. The mid upper gunner was Wesley (Wes) Skerick and the engineer was Ginger Wheadon.
13
[page break]
[photograph] [photograph]
Ginger Wheadon Wes Skerick
At this stage we were beginning to get to know each other and in the evenings we were usually down in mess having some light refreshments, Bob Friskey didn't very often come, as he had not been married very long and took to writing to his wife almost every evening, so the rest of us went into Burroughbridge [sic] the nearest town to have a few beers, this we managed quite well with a another couple of Canadians from another crew who Chuck knew, and we each bought a round of drinks which lasted us most of the evening.
[underlined] Tolthorpe - Squadron station [/underlined]
7.2.1944. (Appendix ix) We then moved from Dishforth on to our squadron station which was at Tolthorpe near Easingwold still up in Yorkshire. It was the only French Canadian squadron from Canada, although all spoke English there was a lot of French spoken between most of the other crews, also most of the senior officers were from French ancestors. They could get very aggressive to each other as happened one evening later on.
Here there were four squadrons of Halifax bombers with around 60 planes. The squadrons with mainly Canadian or French/Canadian crews were:
[picture of 425 Squadron crest]
420 Snowy Owl
425 Alouette (the Lark- Dick's squadron)
431 Iroquois
434 Blue Nose
14
[page break]
We did lots of night cross country to various parts of the England to give the navigator, targets to find and which would be our target to bomb later on, also we had a bombing range which we had to find and drop practice smoke bombs on and from a certain height, some pilots tried to drop from a lower height so that they were getting better results and a higher percentage of hits. Not our pilot he said we would go as high as the aircraft could climb and then drop our bombs, which we did, only to be told on our return we were still too low, to which the skipper said that the Wellington couldn't climb any higher, and the rear gunner had a tin of drink in his flying suit pocket that was frozen no more was said on the subject.
We as a crew were sent to a camp which was to improve our fitness, which we didn't think was necessary as we all felt fit and well, we were allocated a hut and promptly forgot, we went for meals regularly and were not called on to do anything apart from eat and sleep, Eugene Gordon and myself walked around the fields and found where they were growing swedes, carrots, turnips, so we borrowed a few and cooked them on our stove in the hut and with other bits from the cookhouse and had some good meals in the evenings. Fortunately we were only there for about 10 days, and then were sent to squadron.
The squadron was from Canada and had only been in England a short while and we joined it at the end of January 1944 in which time we got to know the aircraft we to fly in, it was a Halifax MK3 K.W.U for Uncle. Unfortunately for us we only did about 14 hours training on our aircraft.
[photograph of Halifax bomber]
Halifax Bomber
[underlined] Our First Mission [/underlined]
February 24th/25th we were called for a briefing and found we were due to fly a bombing trip to a place called Swinefurt [sic] , a long trip to the south of Germany which would be an eight hour round trip but unfortunately the port outer engine decided to cause a problem and stopped altogether, we couldn't climb to our bombing height due to lack of power and could not carry on at this low height, so the skipper decided we had best abort and return to base dropping our bomb load at sea. Which we did, and landed back at air station about three hours after take off. Not a good start at all, but the fault was found to be a blockage in the fuel pipe to the engine.
15
[page break]
[underlined] The Second and Final Mission [/underlined]
February 25th/26th we were on our second trip which was a bombing raid on Augsburg (North West of Munich) to bomb a factory making ball bearings for tanks, from which we failed to return. Our aircraft was hit by anti aircraft fire and both the engines on our left side were put out of action and caught fire. The noise it made when the shell hit our left side was like a firework being let off inside a dustbin. Then the next thing was flames coming past my turret Chuck our skipper came over our intercom asking if we were all uninjured which he did by calling each one by name. Then he said that we were not going to keep going, so had to bale out, each one of us saying we understood, good luck and made ready to bale out. What to do first I thought, disconnect my intercom, then the oxygen tube, think we were flying at a height of around twenty four thousand feet so would I have enough oxygen to keep going to get my parachute which was in a rack in the fuselage and then get the panel open in the fuselage floor for myself and mid upper - which was Wes to jump out. We shook hands and shouted good luck and looked down through the hatch to see the flames from the engines flying by so put my leg out and flow of air pulled the rest of me out!!
Suddenly everywhere is quiet, you are supposed to count to ten before pulling the ripcord to your parachute by the time I counted up to four I didn't hear any noise so pulled my ripcord and was instantly jerked upright, with my flying suit collar up round my ears and it was very quiet.
My thoughts whilst drifting down were varied and very worrying to say the least, it had my thoughts in turmoil.
Below was a patchwork due to snow and could have been fields, but from a height of 20000 feet there was no telling what it was going to be. My thoughts of a church spire came to mind or there was an industrial town down there with factories with tall chimneys also electric power cables, or a town with tall house and me hanging from the roof. The later [sic] was near to it as I came down between two poplar trees and I landed in a town house garden in an apple tree. I had my parachute hanging up in the tree, which I decided to pull down but it must have snagged and a piece ripped off and was left hanging in the tree what I had pulled down and bundled up and slipped under some buses [sic] . I then decided to find a way out of the garden; so removed my flying kit as I would be very conspicuous walking around in it. At that time I was just in my battle dress getting very cold, I then found a road running alongside the garden, so jumped over the wall onto a road started walking past some large houses all about five stories high, I had landed in a large residential area of a town. Then the siren for what I presumed was an air raid starting, so I walked up another road to miss people around that area, then the siren started again and people started running around (I discovered later that they had two sirens at the start of a raid and also two all clears) by which time I was back to where I had landed in the garden. So I hopped back over the wall and decided to put my flying suit back on as I was feeling very cold.
What to do now I thought; sleep seemed the best option or wake someone up and tell them who I was and call the police. I ended up curling up and sleeping and was woken by a squirrel running around me and then two elderly ladies coming our of the house next door and saw a piece of my parachute stuck up the tree, they shouted and ran back indoors and about 10 minutes later a policeman came down the garden path with a little pistol pointing at me and said hands up or words to that effect. Which I obliged, he then told me to take off my flying suit and go in front of him where
16
[page break]
he had left his cycle, and for me to put my clothes on his bike and we walked into the town to a police station. There were lots of people in the police station a lot were ex army with battle scars but quite polite, except one old boy who should have been in a home for the elderly along time ago, saying we would never win the war by sending us over to spy on them.
[underlined] Prisoner of War -number 2108 [/underlined] (Appendix 4 - iii) -Red Cross Map of prisoner of war camps)
I was then escorted to the Gestapo headquarters in the town which I discovered was Darmstadt (South East of Frankfurt) (on this journey Dick cut up his parachute with his penknife so that it couldn't be used by the Germans), and there met up with Wes, Eugene and Gordon whilst waiting there a rather irate man came in and picked up a chair and was going to hit Eugene with it, but fortunately I was able to stop the blow hitting Eugene with my flying suit, we found out later that Eugene had fractured his spine, releasing himself from his parachute harness whilst still hanging along way from the ground, which meant he had to go to a hospital so we didn't have any further contact with him.
Wes, Gordon and self were then taken by two armed guards to a building being used by the Police and handed over to Dulagluft Interrogation HQ on a tramcar with civilians on board who looked at us rather hostile, good job we had a couple of Luftwaffe guards with us, on the way through the streets there were a number of bodies hanging from lampposts turned out to be American airmen shot down on an earlier raid, quite a jolt to the system.
At the Interrogation HQ all our belongings were taken from us and we were then put into a cell with only a bed and a chair in it, no windows and an electric light on all the time, so you didn't know what part of the day or night it was. Dick became prisoner of war number 2108.
Then every so often an officer came in and said he was from the Red Cross and he would make sure that my parents would be notified where I was and was alright, but was being held in Germany as a prisoner of war and would be able to write once we had been sent to a POW camp. This treatment went on for quite a time you didn't know what day it was or time of day, we were fed soup and black bread and had brown water which they said was coffee, two or three times I was taken out and interviewed by an officer who told me who our commanding officer was and he had a daughter, had I met her, and then proceeded to tell me about the Halifax bomber but it wasn't doing much damage and we were losing them at a fare [sic] rate every night. When after a few days we were taken into the camp and given an American plastic suitcase in which was all manner of toiletries and clothes -a pair of slip on slippers, a towel, a face flannel, soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, comb, pyjamas, packet of pipe tobacco and a pipe, packet of twenty cigarettes, some vest and pants, a bar of chocolate a meal can opener, also an American army shirt.
We stayed there for a short while until they had enough bodies to fill up a lot of cattle trucks to take us to our next camp. I was then issued with our name and prisoner of war number, mine being 2108 and made of metal, we still had only our battledress uniforms and it was February so felt the cold. (Appendix 4 - iv)
Then one morning we were paraded on the square with our cases and marched off to the railway yard where our train awaited, there was no difference between first and third class, you were just herded along and pushed up into a cattle truck 20 prisoners into each end of the wagon (The wagons had written on the side - 40 hommes or 8 cheveaux, this became part of the POW insignia after the war),
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with the centre section for the guards, so each wagon was divided into compartments by a wire netting wall. There were no toilets so you had to wait until we had been shunted off the mainline and were then allowed to do your do's sitting on a log which was alongside the railway line, at first it was very embarrassing but after three or four days you didn't bother just got on with it.
We had a stop each day for a bowl of soup and drink of so called coffee. Forgot to mention that each truck had a guard sitting on top of the wagon and must have been covered in smoke from the engines. Sleeping was almost impossible with twenty people in a small space, but you managed you might have had feet by your head or a bottom, because the only pillow you had was your plastic suitcase.
I didn't keep a record of how long the train trip was but was told it was ten to twelve days, we passed through a couple of large stations but could only see out through the gaps in the sides of the trucks as the guards closed the doors, were surprised at one station when we went slowly past a train of open trucks packed with people they were either Jews or displaced persons being taken to places of forced labour, we couldn't pass them anything so had to just let them pass without being able to speak to them.
[underlined] Stalag Luft VI - Heydekrug [/underlined] (Appendix 4 - vi)
We finally arrived at our destination Heydekrug (in Lithuania) and Stalaf Luft 6 which meant in German prison camp for airmen. This was in East Prussia on the Baltic coast and was built on sand, so that tunnels couldn't be dug in the sandy soil, that didn't stop some of the hot heads from trying. Only one was tried and the Germans had some idea this was happening and brought a motor roller in to run up and down between the huts, it found a tunnel starting out between two huts and it sank into the sand about six feet and was stuck for two days, when they finally tried to move it, they couldn't start it as a lot of the parts had somehow gone missing, the Germans never did the same trick again.
All the crew members met up again here, except for Eugene, who was in hospital. The camp was divided into 3 compounds, two of which contained 2,000 men, the third being smaller held 1,000 men. Dick was in one of the larger compounds, with 60 men to a room. Dick and Ginger were in the same hut, the other crew members elsewhere.
We had some good men who cold [sic] turn their hands to anything and make things out of bits and pieces, one being a clock which went backwards made from an old gramophone. Also we had radios I think there were two, both were built inside Dixie's which was an eating and cooking pot.
We had some well educated lads with as a lot of early aircrew were from college undergraduates who were in the call up age range, so they started up classes in the camp on a variety of subjects, and you could qualify for a degree as the Red Cross got permission from the Germans for this to happen. One of the POWs that made use of the books was Peter Thomas, who became a Welsh MP after the war and later Lord Thomas.
My only inroad into anything like this was to draw in our POW book, we were issued with, like a diary was the drawing of the aircraft they flew in and the air force inscription over the top; and I charged one cigarette for each drawing, not a lot but helped out. I believe a number of people at home sent me cigarettes through the Red Cross but only two tins of tobacco got through to me, these were St
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Bruno and they lasted me some time. They would have lasted longer but I used to roll some into cigarettes and fellows used to drop by for a couple of puffs.
[drawing of book]
One of Dick's drawings
Dick also found a talent for needlework. He unpicked the silk lining from his flying boots, and made a cravat, with the RAF crest embroidered on it.
Cigarettes were used as currency for buying food, if and when the Red Cross food parcels arrived, they were divided up and were allocated, as 1 parcel between seven or ten men, not a lot, but as some kriegies didn't want some of the item they sold them for cigarettes. (Kriegies was short for Kriegesgefangenen which is the German word for prisoner of war)
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[underlined] Kriegies 10 commandments [/underlined]
[drawing of scroll]
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We had radios which were hidden in various places. In our hut we had the men who looked after the radios. One evening after being shut in, lookouts kept watch whilst repairs were being done. Suddenly someone shouted Goons up. An officer with three men plus an Alsatian dog walked in, the tables were cleared very quickly, everything dropped into a carton and passed down the lower bunks, it arrived at my bunk and I had nowhere to pass it to so I hid it under my knees under a blanket and picked up a book to read. The dog came sniffing around but kept on going by, when I sort of came too I found my book which I was supposedly reading was upside down. Good job the dog didn't notice it.
[drawing of hut interior]
Inside one of the huts in a camp
Mornings started with the overnight latrine bucket having to be emptied, not a nice job we had a rota in the hut and two of us had to take a 30 to 40 litre container almost full and take it and empty it at the toilet block you invariably finished up rather damp and needed a good wash.
Next it was the guards shouting "RAUS!" get out the parade ground for morning head count and anything that the Germans thought we should know, like how well they were doing in the war but didn't say where.
After the head count which could take quite some time, they couldn't agree on the figures and had to do it again sometimes it was our own faults [sic] for moving around whilst they tried to count us.
Finally all was right so off for breakfast the German rations were not very plentiful. It started with what they said was coffee, first in the morning, but what it was made with didn't question, but it was hot and with adding powered milk you drank it, it had to be fetched from the cookhouse in metal jugs.
Dinner was usually a soup of some sort could just be potato or sauerkraut and on a good day you were given corned beef which was send to the camp from Argentina, another soup was swede with potatoes, we were also issued with a fish cheese which was not very palatable but you ate it.
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Bread, black was issued per day, it varied in the amount which was either 6 or 10 persons sharing a loaf which was about 8 or 9 inches long about 4 inches wide and could be 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 inches deep that is they were thicker one end than the other, so one can imagine trying to share it out to either a combination of three or twelve.
Then to the cookhouse for our very large cans of ertzats [sic] coffee I still don't know what it was made of but it was wet and warm and washed down your breakfast if you ever had any. You were dreaming about eggs and bacon and toast and marmalade but didn't make a habit of it.
The next part of the morning was spent washing and shaving or not then cleaning up your space and making it tidy, then any washing you had to do for which you had to boil water which meant finding some material to burn, bed boards were used but there was a limit to how many you could sleep without and still have a straight back. As I previously mentioned classes were being held in huts all around the camp during the day also we had the parade ground on which was played sports, football, rugby, rounder's and also they had physical exercises for those who wanted it, we had a stream running through a part of the camp which was used to see who could jump it in one go! If not you had a free foot wash and legs and shorts!!
During the evenings one of our newsreaders would come in the hut, with days news that had been listened to on one of the radios (Daily Express reporter Cyril Aynsley was one who took it down in shorthand), some of us would keep watch at the door and be ready to stop the reader if any Germans happened to be about.
Most nights it was a nightly ritual to have a walk, around your section of the camp and have a chat with anyone and everyone. Then back to your hut for a late evening drink of tea or coffee which entailed lighting up your blower to boil the water. When we then had to either get to bed or light a candle and try and read but not for long.
[cartoon drawing of brew up]
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[photograph of washing facilities]
Washing facilities of Stalag 357 Fallingbostel
Our washing and shaving facilities were very limited, with some of the camps having the washing troughs in the open, ours were inside, just a trough with cold water running along it with holes in it about 18 inches in between to allow the water to run out into another trough below. If you wanted hot water it meant you had to get the blower out find some paper - cardboard or wood to burn to get some hot water. Wood was hard to come by unless you used your bed boards, which left you with another bend in your back. So it was usually a cold water shave and not everyday.
There was a shower room but this was situated about half a mile from the camp and we were taken there under guard once in about six weeks, why it was so far from the camp no one knew.
We were searched on leaving the camp and again when we returned, what they thought we would steal from room which only had showers and all in one large room. The water was switched on for about 10 minutes so you had to be quick.
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[letter confirming POW status]
Letter received by Dick’s Father, from the Chaplain at Tolthorpe
We were allowed to write home one letter and two postcards each month, which I think most of us took the opportunity, although it took quite a long time for the first ones to come from home. My first on arrived on August 14th having been sent from home on May 28th in all I think my mail total for my stay in Germany was a total of 42. 34 from Mum and Dad and a further 8 from friends and the caterpillar club confirming I had become a member.
[photograph of family] [reverse of photograph]
Family photo Dick received, the reverse shows the German censor’s mark
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There was a lot of aircrew arriving in the camp that they had to get two large tents and add them on to the rows of huts, each one held a further hundred men which didn't help our food rations. Not long after this we were told that we were to be moved into Germany.
[underlined] Torun Stalag Luft 357 [/underlined] (Appendix 4 - iv)
The place was actually in a part of Poland which had been the Polish Corridor and was Thorn or Torun Stalag 357. So we had to get packed up and ready to go in two days as the Russians were headed our way, so it was take the essentials, our pots and pans and the blower which was used for heating water mostly; any food plus your blanket and toiletries any spare clothes, some of the Canadian families had sent things over which were ice skates and baseball bats, most of which were left behind.
A wind up gramophone was smashed up plus all the records, and on the walk to where we had to board our cattle trucks which was about two miles away the road or more like a country track for carts was littered with discarded equipment people decided they could do without.
Once we were at the train which was waiting us at the trackside, no station. We were herded into the cattle trucks, 40 persons per truck; 20 bodies in each end of the truck. The centre used for the guards. They also had a guard sitting on top of each wagon wearing goggles and had a machine gun.
This trip took us about five days and nights on a slow train to Torun (on the river Vistula), and one wasn't very clean and tidy upon arrival.
The others at Heydekrug that were being shipped by boat from the port of Memel had a very bad time on the boat as they were herded into the hold of a boat and spent between five and seven days on board in horrible conditions on the way to a camp in Germany.
Our trip by train took about five days of shake rattle and very uncomfortable and one stop a day for the toilet, and sad to say we had to use a corner of the truck to relieve ones self.
We arrived at Thorun, which was a large camp mainly army prisoners and we were crowded into huts about 120-140 per hut and the meals we had were very poor in quality and quantity. We were only there for 6 weeks and once again were on our cooks tour again, back into our 40 hommes or 6 cheveaux carriages with a small amount of straw spread across the floor which had large gaps between the floor boards and no central heating, and again another train journey of six days to our next camp which was Fallingshostel [sic] which was about 80 miles north of Hanover. This again was an army camp but now accommodated American air force as well as us British and was split into three separate camps which also included a Russian compound. (Appendix 4 - i) and ii)
Also around this time I wanted some shoes as mine were about paper thin and I managed to get a brown pair of American army boots which was just what was needed if we were going for a long walk.
The huts were the usual having two tier bunks down each side of the room and a further rows [sic] up the centre of the room, with a large stove in the centre which wasn't used as there was no fuel for it.
The cookhouse supplied us with what was called coffee and made from what we really never found out what, but we called it coffee because it was brown. The food from the cookhouse was mainly
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some sort of soup, mainly potatoes with some sauerkraut like cabbage added. Sometimes we would have a ration of corned beef which the Argentineans sent over in bulk for us and very good too. We did also had what the Germans called cheese, but it tasted very fishy but never quite found out what its origin was our supplies of Red Cross parcels were getting few and far between with so much disruption on the railway.
Where they originally intended to have one parcel person per week, we were now having to make do with one parcel for ten men and had to last them a week or longer until more arrived.
Being closer to some large towns we now had the sounds of bombers targeting them at nights, we also had some low flying Mosquitoes shooting up the railway not far from us.
We all stood outside the hut watching when one of the guards shouted at us to get inside; of course no one moved so he took his rifle off his shoulder and put a bullet in the chamber. But forgot there was one already in, so it sent a round flying out onto the ground. The old fellow looked at us shrugged his shoulders picked up the bullet and left us to watch.
[photograph of prisoners]
Prisoners of war watching allied aircraft - inside Fallingbostel
Life here was not very good as there were too many of us cramped into huts, we did have an unusual game some evenings - because as it got dusk we had some large flying insects around, about an inch to inch and half long with a hard shell body. We used to wait them and then hit them with a wooden stick, scoring two points for a certain hit and one point for a probable; you had to produce a body for the two points. But there wasn't any prizes for a high score only a mess of squashed bodies.
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[underlined] Oerbke near Fallingbostel [/underlined]
The news we had from the Germans was that during the next couple of weeks we would be leaving camp and would be marching north to a holding area somewhere near Hamburg.
Our last camp at Oerbke near Fallingbostel was very large and housed British soldiers - some Russians also American airmen, the war was drawing to a close and the Russians were approaching us from the East and the Allies from the South so the beginning of April 1945 we going to be made to leave the camp in sections and carrying all our possessions. (Appendix 4 – i) and ii)
[underlined] The Long March [/underlined]
There is more information on the Long March in appendix 3
Whatever a holding area was meant to be for and why they would want us there was never discovered. There was a lot of speculation that they were going to drive us into the Baltic and drown us or otherwise just put us in barbed wire enclosure and leave us, but they didn't.
Instead we were marched out of the camp early April to begin a long trek northwards. The first lot we were marched out of camp April 6th in parties of about 500, everybody loaded with bags and blankets a box of food, a water bottle and all your clothes which didn't amount to much. I was glad that I had been given a new pair of army boots, also an overcoat, French army blue but very thin and not very waterproof but better than nothing. We covered varying distances each day, the weather varied from wet and windy to very cold, and we were not sure where would be sleeping the next evening.
It turned out that first night which was rather wet with rain, our accommodation was a field, no trees or high hedges to shelter us so it was rather a nasty start to our walk, which was on rough tracks through farmland and we managed to collect some vegetables from fields we passed although the guards were told to shoot anyone found doing it, which meant just about everybody.
Our second night was under the stars in a field.
It was on our third day we arrived in a village and were taken in to the church for our nights lodging sleeping anywhere you could lay out on the pews and under them and in the aisles. We had to boil water outside for our tea, on our blowers.
As we progressed each day through the county we saw American aircraft by their vapour trails going on some bombing mission.
There were some days after marching or should say walking, or hobbling, that we would finish up in a farmyard, this was welcome as we soon found eggs about. Some lucky lads found barns that were not in use as the cattle were in the fields; this allowed chicken and sometimes a small pig to enter the barn which was quickly turned into a meal.
One occasion was a nice bit of garden behind a barn that was full of ripe rhubarb, must have been about 10 feet wide and 14 feet long, within a very short time it was clear, the farmer was furious, he got an officer who said he would punish any prisoner found with stewed rhubarb. He walked around
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with the farmer looking in every saucepan or a fire, in which lo and behold they were full of stewing rhubarb, he just shrugged his shoulders and that was it.
Later in the month we had to cross the river Elbe by a railway bridge, but as we approached it there was a column of tiger tanks coming over and their tracks were breaking up the road as they passed. Our guards suddenly vanished into air raid shelters and circling over the bridge was one Spitfire. With the Germans firing at him with machine guns mounted on the ends of the towers at the ends of the railway bridge, but they were nowhere near hitting him as they fired miles behind him. They were useless.
When it quietened down and the tanks had all gone our guards came out of their air raid shelter and herded us across the bridge.
We must have covered a fare [sic] distance as we have been walking every day from the 6th April and it is now midway through April and the weather is improving, but our lodgings don't improve, the villages we go through gave us drinks of water and now the guards turn a blind eye.
It must have been mid April that was about the 18th April that we stayed at a farm that was rather run down and neglected. Cow sheds were filthy and hadn't been cleared so no one could sleep in them so we were in the open up against walls. I was itching around my waist and found that it was lice, so I needed a good wash, but where so had a look around and discovered a duck pond covered in greed [sic] weed, there had to be water under the weed, so clothes off make a hole ain [sic] the weed and lower myself into about 8 inches of water and a foot of mud, it was wonderful and I got rid of a lot of the lice.
We stayed one night in a farm where the farmer had a stable for a couple of horse, on a walk round with another chap, I found this stable and it had a water tank on top, so we had a look and found a pipe leading down from the roof with a large tap at the base, we hurried back for our toiletries and towels. I said you sit in front of the tap which was about 4 inches across and I will turn it on, which I did, and oh dear the water came out with such force he shot backwards across the cobbled floor on his bottom. He said you wait until it is your turn. It was a wonderful feeling to get your self refreshed.
[underlined] 19th April 1945 [/underlined]
Still moving North on about the 19th April we were informed that at our next stopping place we were going to get a Red Cross food parcel, one parcel per man at a place named Gresse, this was very good news as it was about three weeks since we last had one.
We were walking through a rather large forest for quite some miles now and were informed that on the other side we would be issued with our parcels.
We had been living on soup some overnight stops and now and again ertzats [sic] coffee reputedly made from acorns.
So to be handed a parcel for your self was out of this world and very much needed. So we came out of the forest along a track which was about 18 feet wide and had about another 6 or 8 feet either side which was about a foot lower and then a few trees sort of along the edge after them were fields and quite a lot more trees.
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At this time we were having a rest on the track starting to open up our parcels, when we heard some aircraft flying parallel to us about half a mile away. They sounded like Hurricanes so could be ours so kept sorting our parcels, when we heard these load explosions coming down the road towards us. The aircraft turned out to be our own Typhoons equipped with rockets and cannons plus machine guns and anti personnel rockets.
I flung myself down and into the ditch which was only shallow and behind a plant which was about a foot high and about eight inches wide. it was just something to hang onto. The guard who had been sitting by a tree had been wounded and next to me an Aussie Sergeant wireless operator had been shot through his head and chest, my nearest bullet hit my boot heel, as I felt it but it just left a line across the heel.
The two others I shared everything with were Ginger Wheadon and Alec Laing, who were no where to be seen. So I decided to walk back and found Alec not far away but very shaky. So told him to stay put and I would look for Ginger, on my way back up the track, I was giving drinks of water to people who had been wounded and were waiting for treatment either shock or wounds, but couldn't find Ginger.
There were people calling out for their friends, I came across one fellow sitting by a tree with the lower part of his body a mess, although he asked me for a drink as if nothing was wrong. Just as I had given him a drink a couple of his pals came and took over whilst I carried on my search for Ginger.
At one hedge I passed there were legs sticking through so I hopefully looked on the other side, but hastily moved on as they were all there was.
There were quite a few bodies lying about on the track but not Ginger, someone suggested I looked in the fields near where we had been; a lot of men had run across them, so I did and found him but he had been hit in the chest whilst running and was dead.
He must have left his belongings in his haste as I never found them.
In Dick's Wartime log book he wrote on April 20th 1945 - "to our engineer Ginger Wheadon. Ging was killed by a bullet from a Typhoon whilst we were resting during a march on April 19th 1945, he was killed instantly. We are trying to get some of his personal kit to bring home for his Mother and Mary his girl. He was buried at a village of Heydekrug, 4km from Gresse where we had just drawn food parcels. He was buried by our Padre and a parson. The time of his death was about 12 noon.
Having looked after one or two other badly wounded lads, l went back to Ginger only to find that all his kit had been taken and his pockets empty. Some thieving B……. had pinched everything he had on him.
I only hope the food choked them and all the other things brought them the worst luck possible."
The count was 35 POW were killed also 6 of the German guards.
I searched around and found one of our seniors who I gave him Gingers name which apparently someone else had already done so after finding his name and number on his dog tags. So I returned to where I had left Alec and we moved on down the road to the next village where we stayed for the
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night in field with a couple of barns in it but some good thick hedges to bed down under and found a barn with some straw in which we used as bedding.
Dixie Deans our camp commandant spoke to the officer who was in command of the Germans guarding us to let him go through the German lines accompanied by a German officer with a safe conduct note, to then contact the Americans, and let them know that there were 20,000 allied prisoners on the line of their advance and to advise them to let their airbase know of this situation. This was done and Dixie Dean and his accompanying German officer cycled back through the lines and after sorting out the burial of our lads in the churchyard at Gresse.
They were buried in a mass grave and the German priest held a service for our lads and also the guards that were killed. (After the war the RAF personnel killed in this attack were reburied in a new Commonwealth War grave cemetery outside Berlin see appendix 2).
The injured where taken to a hospital at Boizenburg for treatment, and no doubt sent home for further treatment.
Our English Padre was to march on with the others as he would not attend the church service as it was not his parish.
That was April 19th 1945 which will always be remembered as it was just a few days before my 21st birthday which I very nearly could have missed, that was a dream that haunted me for quite some time.
We constantly saw American aircraft around but they were mainly bombers heading Hamburg way we did pass an airfield that had JU88's on it but it had been bombed and most of its aircraft destroyed.
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[War Graves Commission citation]
Ginger's burial place, to the right of the building in the distance (see Appendix 2 for cemetery map)
[underlined] The end of the War nears [/underlined]
We carried on Northwards and the farms that we stayed in were larger and did have some decent barns, but were rather a lot bodies and not everyone got in a barn. Alec and my self usually found a well and stayed out with the weather now being quite good. My birthday on the 26th April was nothing special I think maybe I had an extra piece of chocolate and maybe made a cigarette with my pipe tobacco and smoked it all myself, otherwise we usually passed them around.
It's now the beginning of May the weather is quite good and there are lots of American aircraft leaving vapour trails, we think Hamburg or ports in the North were their targets.
We settled down on the 2nd May in a small outhouse with no windows or doors just three walls and a roof that would have let in more rain than it kept out and wondering what tomorrow would bring.
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When we woke to a fine morning and made a drink someone said look all our guards have gone during the night, so we then went to find what our next move was.
We were told not to go out on the roads running North as there were German panzer troops still in that area, this information we got from an officer in jeep which came on ahead of the English and American troops who pushing the Germans back in this area.
We were then informed by Dixie Deans that we were to find some means of transport and make our own way South to Luneburg where our troops had built a pontoon bridge over the river Elbe and from there proceed to a German airfield situated near Luneburg, which had been turned into a reception area for POWs.
The area around the airfield became littered with vehicles we had acquired including a fire engine, a few tractors some civilian cars, horse and carts, motor cycles and a couple of buses.
My mode of transport was in one of the buses so had a comfortable ride to the reception centre.
May 8th 1945. The road we had to use to get the river crossing was littered on both sides with German and English military vehicles which had been bulldozed off the road so that others could get through to the pontoon bridge at Luneburg.
We spent a couple of days here being subject to a delousing period that incurred someone with a spray gun putting it down your back and front and also each trouser leg.
After which they took your particulars and you were given an identity card with your name, number, rank, and squadron number and told to find a bed in one of the huts and report back in the morning. If we had anything which we didn't need there was a bonfire on which we could get rid of old clothes not that we had much. But some of the prisoners had picked up guns and ammunition on the way which they decided to get rid of, there was a lot of exploding ammunition going off all night and the next day.
We had a breakfast of coffee and a slice of toast and then had to go on a parade ground and form up into groups of around 40 to await the arrival of aircraft for our homeward flight to England and a POW reception centre at RAF Cosford in a Dakota, used as transport and troop carrier the workhorse of the air force.
Here we were met by nurses and WAFs and again given the treatment of delousing, then a check over by doctors and lots of questions as to how you felt. Then it was a sit down meal, but our stomachs would only take a small amount, l can't remember what was on the menu but I know I could only manage a little, and a nice young WAAF sat with me and talked me into eating a little more. I really couldn't eat anymore, but had more tea so I could keep her talking with me.
We were then subject to being kitted out with new uniforms and glad to be out of the old stuff. The only [sic] I kept was my American army boots which had walked many miles or should say kilometres over German countryside, they lasted a good many years as my gardening boots. They still have the mark on the heel where a bullet from a typhoon clipped it when we were shot up.
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We only stayed at Cosford long enough to be kitted out and given some idea of how would carry on until our number for demob came up.
I had still about a year to do so was given a choice of ground trades which was, clerk in accounts, pigeon keeper or store keeper. What a choice is that it I asked and said that I didn't like any of these and wanted to be assigned to the transport division either as a driver or in admin. The Officer said he would put my choice forward but didn't think I would be lucky as so many had chosen transport as an option. So it was then we had to collect our travel warrants and any pay we had coming plus identity cards and ration book.
It was now late May and a start of long awaited leave which was for about four weeks to get me back into being fit again, I arrived from Cosford at London Road station and a neighbour who was a taxi driver happened to be at the stand and so he shouted over to me to get in his car. After putting my bags in and much hand shaking from other people I was on my way home. Mr Shuker talked all the way and got me up to date with what had been happening in Minehead Street, and upon arriving there he slowed down and hooted so people could know that he had arrived with a neighbour. There was quite a lot came out and gave me a cheer, and upon arrival at home I [sic] most of our neighbours were there with Mum, Dad and Mary. It was quite a homecoming with lots of hugs and kisses from all the close neighbours, it was something I’II never forget.
It took a while to get used to a normal bed and home routine but it was good to be home.
My two pals Ken and Derek who were both in the air force Ken was an engine maintenance engineer at fighter station, while Derek was a Corporal in the RAF police service. They managed a spot of leave whilst I was home so we spent a few days together.
The first evening they took me down to our local pub which was the Blue Moon. This was the first time for me to go out for pint.
Ken and Derek ordered pints, but I said that mine had better just be a half, which was just as well as when I got up to go the bar to order another round my legs gave way so I didn't have any more. So Ken and Derek took me home, I could manage to walk but not very steady, I guess that my system hadn't had any booze for quite some time but would get around that problem in time.
[underlined] Military Transport Training [/underlined]
My leave seemed to pass very quickly and very soon a travel warrant arrived to say that I was being posted to Melksham, and it turned out to be a course for Drivers-motor transport, I was told previously that there was no chance for this as so many had tried but were told they had no chance. Lucky me as my Aunts and Uncles all lived around this area at the village of Wingfield, so I would have some place to go at weekends.
So up one morning and off to catch the train for Melksham and becoming a driver for the air force in what sort of vehicles one wondered.
It turned out to be initial training was on vehicle maintenance as you had to be able to keep your vehicle in road worthy conditions at all times.
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We had a very rigorous course on engines and ensuring they were in good running order with oil and water checked daily, there were lectures every day on subjects such as Highway Code road traffic signs and use of hand signals and being courteous to other road users.
Our first driving lessons were with British School of Motoring civilian instructors driving mainly Austin cars, each car had three learners with tutor and took it in turns at the driving. I had some goes at driving but this was a trifle different as you had to double de clutch as if you were driving a vehicle without synchromesh gears. One instructor was very strict and if you didn't get it right he had a wooden mallet with which he used to clout your knee with, it worked well, my leg went up and down like a yoyo, after just one tap.
If you passed you then passed on to RAF instructors to learn the different types of vehicles you would encounter, these were classified as Hillman Minx used a lot by junior officers, then on to 15 cwt hundred weight [sic] for light loads, then three ton vehicles used for ration collection and general work. Progressing then to the lorries, eight ton and ten ton lorries and the five and seven ton cranes, last of all came the sixty foot long trailers for carrying aircraft when dismantled for repairs.
Having mustered [sic] this little lot you had to pass a driving test on a three ton vehicle and one of the other larger vehicles. After passing all this you had a written test on all subjects and if all was well you were given a driving certificate and were now an MT driver.
What was nice about this posting that every weekend I could spend on the farm with my Aunt and Uncle it was called Sparrow nest farm and they kept cattle for milking, and I was not at all good at milking but helped out fetching the animals in for milking and taking the milk churns on a tractor and trailer to a platform on the roadside ready for the lorry to collect which was twice a day.
Alternate weekends were spent in Wingfield village with Aunt Hilda and Uncle Bill and Granddad who was Aunt Hilda's Uncle, he and I used to play cards in the evenings and he used to beat me at cribbage quite often even though he was missing a lot of his fingers on both hands due to wounds in the First World War.
One morning I awoke and on looking out my bedroom window overlooking a field there was a white object there in a corner, so when l got up I said to my Aunt I'm just going to see what's in the field, and when I got there it was a mushroom the size of a dinner plate, yes I had it for breakfast.
Another time Granddad and I were walking down a lane when a rabbit ran out from the hedge, I had a walking stick which I threw towards it and it stopped running because I had killed it, broke its neck and so we took it home and Auntie skinned it and it made us a dinner.
I used to catch a bus from camp to Wingfield but Uncle Bill always took me back to camp on his motorbike and no crash helmet.
[underlined] Horsham [/underlined]
When I finished at Melksham I was posted to Faygate near to Horsham, it was a maintenance unit, where we were sent out to dismantle aircraft that were not required anymore.
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My vehicle that I was allocated turned out to be a six wheeled lorry a left over from the last war, a
1918 model it would not start on the starter motor so had to be towed.
I got up into the drivers seat to which there was no door only canvas panels which just hooked across also the whole cab was just canvas. The steering wheel was about 2 feet in diameter like a bus, the gear lever was about three foot tall and the handbrake was on the right side and about four feet tall, I wondered what I had let myself in for.
They towed me out of the gates with a three ton Bedford lorry on to a main road and I managed to get it started. They then left me and said over to you and don't forget that this vehicle has not got synchromesh gear so you have to double declutch on all gear changing.
After about two hours and 15 miles later I had mastered it all and found my way back to the unit.
There were no facilities for accommodation on the camp so we had to be billeted at Horsham and commute every day by train. But we were away quite often for three or four days, we spent two days at Monston [sic] airport dismantling an Avro Anson that had overshot the runway and went through a small plantation of trees, which left it a write off, so my band of lads reduced it down to a scrap heap. We had to stay there awaiting the vehicle to collect the parts so had an extra day there.
Over [sic] next trip was down to Boscombe near to Bournemouth and we were told we would be there for four or five days as we had to dismantle quite a lot of spitfires which had been made redundant at Christchurch airfield. So we had to look for accommodation in Boscombe, which we found in a Salvation Army hostel and had five days there.
I parked my lorry in the railway goods yard as there would be someone with a vehicle there to give you a tow in the morning. The old lady surprised me one morning and started first time on the starter motor but that was the only time.
That was my only trip with her as t was assigned to a brand new three ton Bedford lorry. It was the same that we trained on at Melksham and I was to use it to collect all the supplies for the officers mess also all the others so had quite a decent job, also whenever we had rations to collect I was
accompanied by a WAAF which was a nice change from a load of lads.
I was checking tyre pressures and as these vehicles were equipped with its own air pump driven by the motor it was quite simple, but as I was checking one of the front tyres the wind blew the drivers door open and I stood up and hit my head on a corner and finished up flat out, not very long though but decided I had better go to sick quarters and get patched up as it was bleeding a lot. I passed a few people who asked if I was okay but I just said yes and they carried on. At sick bay they patched me up and I went back to finish the job and the motor was still running. So switched off, locked up and retired to the mess prior to catching the train.
[underlined] Egypt??? [/underlined]
Next day I was back into camp and was informed that I was moving on. It was that I was being posted to Egypt, l made a request to see our commanding officer who was an ex aircrew Squadron Leader, saying that I wasn't happy being posted abroad and that I had done my bit for the country and thought it most unfair as there were lots of people who hadn't left England.
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He listened to me and yes, he saw my complaint but he didn't think he could alter the decision and if I gave it a bit of thought, look at it as a holiday paid for by the Government for what you went through. So, yes that sounds reasonable and I'll go along with that, and thanked him. He said he wished me well and try to enjoy your cruise. He would have liked to have joined me, he said.
Went home for a spot of leave and got ready for my next forage into the unknown.
I was then sent a travel warrant for an air force camp situated at Newhaven to be kitted out with my overseas uniform, two khaki shirts and shorts plus long trousers and socks, then some inoculations for tropical diseases then were claimed ready for travel.
We were then told we would be travelling by the Medlock route that is from Newhaven to Dieppe in France by boat and thence by train down to Marseilles where we would be shipped across the Mediterranean to Egypt.
After the trip across to France at night we then continued through Switzerland and snow, it was very cold, but the villages on the mountainsides looked like the one on postcards very romantic amongst the snow. The French trains were not the cleanest but must have moved a lot of British service men since the war had ended over here.
At Marseilles we left the trains at the docks and boarded an American Liberty boat for the next part of the journey. We were shown into the first deck which was fitted out with beds in tiers of three the whole width of the ship and about forty or fifty foot in length. I managed to get one of the lower ones. When we settled in I was told and shown to the bakery, and was put in charge of 6 airmen which was very good as we had very new bread at our meal times. The six airmen worked well and we got along very well with the American crew.
We set sail in the evening and had a quiet evening up on deck, the weather was calm so after supper decided to turn in but couldn't sleep, the motion of the ship wasn't helping me and it took ages for me to eventually nod off.
Our second day went well and my lads and I ate well, but this next night we had a storm and Liberty boats are welded together not riveted and creaks in every joint. I wasn't very happy but just kept lifting the bows up after it went down in a trough. Didn't get much sleep and was glad to reach Alexandria and then taken to a camp at Damunbur and it was very hot and our accommodation was in tents that were built over three foot deep dugouts which gave you a bit more head room than just a tent. We stayed here for about three weeks.
[underlined] To Italy [/underlined]
But apparently there was nothing for us in our line of work required here so we were shipped back across the Mediterranean to Naples in Italy, where we stayed for a couple of days. We made the most of it seeing a part of the world and some of the Roman era, also there were plenty of young and very beautiful senoritas.
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[photograph]
Stanco, Dick's dog
We stayed in Naples for two days and were then told that we would be moving on to any [sic] airfield a few miles outside of Udine in a northern village of Potsuolo, which was the desert air force headquarters known as D.A.F.H.Q. Here were 3 squadrons which flew Mustang fighters. We were attached to DAF headquarters transport section and did all the movement of materials and stuff. This was very good as it entailed collecting the rations from stores which was about twenty miles away, but the roads in places was awful and stony. One item was an open top tin of jam which an Italian was carrying in the back, unfortunately a back tyre exploded like a bomb going off, my poor Italian thought he had been shot as he was covered in jam. After changing the wheel we continued back to camp.
[photograph]
Potsuolo
Another job we had was taking personnel up to our leave hotel up in the mountains for a week at a time and the driver stayed with them and drove them to scenic places, one of which was a lake about thirty miles trip, but was well worth seeing. It was but the road was very rough running along the side of the mountains our wheels were on the very edge of a few thousand foot drop and were running on
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a log which had been built into the road where the edge had fallen away, very bad for the nerves. Other places were when crossing over the bridges from one side of the mountain to the other. These were just planks of wood about three inches thick and about ten or twelve inches wide about fourteen feet long spaced about six inches apart on wooden beams. There was just enough room to get the vehicle around the ends onto the bridge, I only bent the tool box that was on the chassis when we were going.
[photograph]
Dead Slow Ahead!
It was a wonderful place called Cortina quite scenic we stayed for lunch and then I decided to return knowing it was a long way back and I would be on the outside looking down into the valley.
I said to the chap sitting next to me when we get to the logs set into the road edge, tell me how much room I've got your side, his remark was that my side mirror was about two inches from the rock wall which meant when I looked out that my wheels were running on the top of the logs, my legs shook a bit but I thought we came through this way so should be okay going back hopefully.
[photograph]
Dick's leave hotel in Forni Avolti, to the left of the church with a cross marked on the roof
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The hotel was very good and there were quite a few locals and there was a lady there with her daughter, the mother worked in the hotel and her daughter who was about 10 or 12 decided that when a few of the locals and us went for walks she would come and hold my hand and look after me, her name was Tina. We walked across one field and the melting snow had made a three or four foot wide stream down the grass, there was about twelve in the group and it was decided to jump instead of finding a place to cross. We all decided it was no problem just a short jump should do it, but it didn't. I think we all had very wet legs far the rest of our walk, but we all enjoyed it.
[photograph]
Tina and Friends
Most evenings there were four musicians who would play for us, sometimes a good old sing song of tunes of the times, and that led into dance music which was very tiring, as the girls that worked there kept going most of the evening and made sure we kept up with them. Lana the Austrian girl if she got hold of you your feet hardly touched the ground. But they were all good fun. The week passed very quickly and it was drive them back to camp and back to work.
Every other week we were duty driver for a day, which meant servicing the commanding officers vehicles; that he wanted to use that day. You had to knock on his caravan door and go in and ask him which of his three vehicles he required that day. From a jumble of blankets a voice would say either Merc or Jep or Util, which interpreted was either Mercedes or Jeep or his Utility, so you checked all three to make sure you got it right. You were busy taking officers to meetings and also running them into town to various places sometimes just so they could do some shopping.
[underlined] On the Road to Bari [/underlined]
Some days I was office boy handing out jobs to the drivers, this I didn't like as I would rather be out driving, and I was very lucky, our M.T officer who was also ex aircrew said he had a job for three vehicles to go down to Bari, where they were closing down an airfield and we had to bring back the furniture from the officers mess. Would I like to be one of the drivers? Of course that would be very nice, he then said and I shall be going as well to make sure we bring back the right things. So my friend another ex aircrew now a driver and the third driver was a corporal who had spent quite some time in Italy and knew his way around. We also had three airmen armed with rifles as guards, on to each vehicle so we had all the bodies required for the trip.
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[photograph]
On the Road to Bari
So it was up early one morning, pack the essentials for the trip which we had no idea how long we would be, so we took a change of clothes for it [sic] we went out in the evening at some stage of the journey.
Out [sic] first stop was at Rimini which was a holiday resort on the coast and there was an air force station there where we could find a bed for the night.
We left Udine and passed by Venice into Padova then for Ferrari, the roads were quite good but the towns and villages had been taken quite a bit of damage. From here we headed for Ravenna on the Adriatic coast. It again was a holiday resort; like most places took a lot of damage, then on to Rimini and a well earned rest. Out [sic] mileage for this leg of our journey was approximately 432 kilometres.
Some of the vehicles we passed on the way were rather weary, the loads they carried were unreal some were the width of the lorry but finished up twice the width at the top. The tyres were smooth and the engines were held together with bits of wire. The Italians were noted for have good mechanics, we had one of them in our section who could just listen to an engine running and get to the cause of the trouble straight away.
Back to our trip, we left Rimini the next morning after checking our vehicles and filling up with petrol heading for our next stop which was to be Rome. Our next road was heading inland across Italy into the more agricultural part of Italy, the traffic was very mainly bullock carts with four of them in the shafts pulling very large loads which hung over the sides and took up a lot of road space. Also we kept passing a lot of women and children carrying canes on their heads and shoulders, l thought that if one turned to chat with another it would cause chaos down the line if we hit them.
One thing that we noticed was the lack of bridges crossing the roads, mostly the countryside was very flat and were either agricultural or cattle. The towns and villages we passed through were a bit showing the signs of war damage and were trying to get back to normal. In the villages there were always lots of children on the streets and all were begging for chocolate, no doubt remembering the times the Americans were there.
We reached Rome in the evening and found the army barracks were we to stay the night, we all decided we would have an early night as tomorrow was a shorter trip and we could spend a little more time in Naples which we did. The road from Rome was fairly good although there was plenty of damaged buildings everywhere and not much building taking place although it was mainly getting the
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places ready for residents to return to repair jobs mostly. Although in Naples we found that the night life was very much alive, and we spent a few hours around the night clubs, and the officer and we two warrant officers were quite happy after consuming numerous bottles of wine with some very good food. And so to bed quite happy, not looking forward the next day's trip which was going to be a long one.
Up early the next morning and had a good breakfast and refuelled our vehicles and away on the road to Bari which is situated on the North coast of Italy, known as the heel of Italy. The road out of Naples was very busy with most vehicles having enormous loads and engulfed in a fog which we were glad to leave behind and over to our right was Mount Vesuvius but only a trickle of smoke from it. We were then heading North East and the road was less busy, and was pretty rough, villages we passed through had been very heavily damaged. We stopped for a meal or I should say a sandwich, and a family in a nearby house were having their spaghetti, there was an old lady with a plate full which was devoured in a very few minutes, guess she was hungry.
[photograph]
Still on the Road to Bari
We pressed on as it was starting to look like we were going to head into some rather wet weather, we did, and finding the place we wanted was not easy. The leading lorry with our officer and corporal driving, found what they thought was the right track to the airfield which turned out to be a very narrow road just wide enough for one lorry. After about a mile the road finished and we were left with the prospect of reversing all the way back to the main road in the pouring rain. There was no where we could have turned round as the fields had been ploughed on both sides. So about half an hour later three very wet headed drivers, a very wet officer and a guard who had walked back along the track with torches to guide us. We found the right road and got to our destination, and a good hot meal was very welcome.
I seem to remember that we didn't need much rocking to sleep.
We found out the next morning after breakfast that what we were collecting was a lot of electrical equipment which was too valuable to leave and could be useful elsewhere along with quite a lot of furniture from the officers quarters some of which turned out to be large mirrors about 5 foot high by 3 foot wide with a very ornate surround, and I don't recollect whether they survived the journey, it would have been very lucky if they had. Our three young guards did alright and had an armchair for the ride back. After we had packed everything into the lorries it was dinner time, so we had a very
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good meal and washed down with some very nice wine, and decided to stay the night here and start at 8am the next morning, so we had a look round Bari which had a good port for ferries to Yugoslavia across the Adriatic. Retired to our beds ready for the start back.
The trip back to Naples was uneventful but in Naples our guards had their hands full keeping loads of youngsters from climbing up the sides of the Lorries and stealing anything. Most of what we had was furniture which was stacked on top of the wireless equipment so they left empty handled.
It was evening time when we finally arrived in Naples so didn't go very far around the town just had a drink or two and then retired to bed.
Next morning it is up and away on our next leg to Rome where we hoped to spend a little time looking around the place as there is plenty to see, and walked around the centre of the Coliseum where the gladiators did their acts, and I was glad that I wasn't acting in it, and I think the lions that did an act had already eaten that day.
[photograph]
Coliseum Rome
Later on we found a good restaurant where we had a good meal washed down with a very good Italian wine, and walked back to our billets in an army barracks and so to bed.
Not looking forward to our next trip as it is a long run and not very scenic from Rome up to Rimini, mainly farming country and only a couple of towns on the way, the one consolation was that it stayed fine all the way.
Rimini was an army controlled town so there were lots of tanks and all types of weaponry around and we stayed in army barracks that night and we were up early the next morning as it was a long trip back to Udine.
We took the road out of Rimini for Rarenna along the coast, hence our next town was Venice where we stopped for a short rest and found a restaurant for a meal which was steak mushrooms and tomatoes washed down with a red wine, very nice too.
We were then only a couple of hours from our destination and our own beds. The whole trip had taken us about ten days, but that said the items we brought back was it worth it.
Overall we had a good look at how the Italians lived and were good mechanics, as they managed to keep their Lorries on. the road tied together with lots of wire and a lot more faith.
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We had a football team made up of NCOs and we played against teams from other ranks and also from the squadron that was stationed here. I was given the position of right wing and was usually up against a six foot left back of the opposing team, I don't think we won many of our matches, but it was a bit of good fun.
[photograph]
Military Transport Football Team
It is now getting into September and we are still living in tents, and have had a lot of rain recently and the camp was rather badly flooded, my other occupant and I were lucky our tent survived the storm, we had a lot of tents blown down and the roads were flooded and it took quite a while for everywhere to dry out.
Our leave hotel in Grado on the coast was popular and we ran an evening bus most nights, and it was one of my jobs as a driver to take the bus down to the town at 5pm and collect them again at 10pm from the town square. Most made it in time and on my trips we seemed lucky and didn't have any missing bodies, most of them were quite happy. I had four days leave and stayed in our leave hotel, very nice food and comfortable beds also there were grapevines where we had breakfast, so grapes were on the menu every morning. First thing after breakfast I went down the road and at the store shop used to buy a melon and take back to the hotel and have a waiter cut a square hole in it and put in a good portion of wine then put it in the fridge and have it with our evening meal, very nice finished the meal with it.
[underlined] Mercy Mission to Egypt [/underlined]
it was around September 15th that I had a call from the office of the Adjutant to tell me that I had been given ten days leave to go to a hospital in Egypt where my brother Bob was ill, and it would help him return to good health if he had a relative to see him. I was staggered and amazed as I had no idea of his whereabouts and that he was ill.
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18.9.1946. So I had to sort my kit out what I would require and managed to pack it in my small side pack. I then had to collect the pass and papers needed and so to Udine airport, arrived there at an early hour as flight was at 9.00am in a Dakota aircraft next stop Rome. Had a hotel for my overnight stay and very nice too, good food and bed and a very good night sleep.
My flight next morning which was to be about nine hours leaving Rome at ten past seven in the morning and we landed in Malta at 9.45 to refuel the aircraft had a drink there then left for our next stop which was El Adam in North Africa. Only stayed fifty minutes again to refuel and left at 4pm for our next stop at Almaza which we arrived at 6.30pm which was my stopping off place for Cairo.
I was driven to the Heliopolis hotel and shown to my room and then taken to the dining room and had a good meal.
I was very hot after being quite cool in Italy so changed into my shorts, but it was still very sticky hot, so decided to have an early night see what tomorrow brings.
! was up early as the night was very hot and I didn't get much sleep. I had a good breakfast and had to sit around and await my transport to the hospital.
20th September a car arrived and I was driven to the Helmieh hospital, where I was taken to meet the colonel of the hospital, who welcomed me and hoped my presence would help in Bob's recovery. He then told me I was to be accommodated at the Sergeants mess of the main hospital. There were numerous sections to the hospital, a fracture unit, dental unit, isolation unit which Bob was in eye and ear unit, it was quite a large place.
I was issued with a pass the [sic] to the isolation ward in which Bob was in with note to say the above named warrant officer was permitted to visit his brother signalman Curnock in isolation ward 1 and full preventative measures should be taken.
The sister I gave the note to just laughed gave me back the note, took me by the arm and gave me a hug, and said how lovely it was that I was able to have leave to go there, and then she took me to see Bob. He was surprised as he had no idea where I was, but he was very thin, white, and I looked like an Indian next to him as in a photo of us together.
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[photograph] [photograph]
Dick and Bob at Helmieh hospital, Egypt
My time at the hospital was spent on visits to Bob every day, having a game of snooker with some of the other members of the mess, or at other times some of the nurses and sister would ask me to escort them into Cairo to do a spot of shopping which I did quite willingly.
My ten days leave passed rather quickly, but when I rang the air booking centre in Cairo, I wasn't on any of the flights so had to wait another week. In fact it was the 25th October before my flight for Italy was finally here, so I had about 6 weeks of a 10 day leave.
Each unit had its own Sergeants mess and most evenings there was entertainment in one of them. Once or twice a week there was horse racing in one of them, and in the dental mess one night they had a Derby meeting, the horses were bid for at the start and I bought number two for two pounds after bidding against the colonel. And it won the race and I was twenty two pounds richer for a while, but lost a bit on the following races, good fun though.
The other entertainment was a quiz night which was quite hilarious, with answers to some questions quite ridiculous but funny. Others had classes which were well attended by all, as we had lots of nurses and sisters to make a good evening of it.
At another sergeants mess they held a bingo night with some other entertainment as bingo wasn't very popular.
In the sergeants mess some of them had nicknames, one was known as bash he was a boxer in Civvy Street; we also had a slash as he was always cutting himself when shaving, so I had to have one and was known as the parachute kid.
We had a snooker table in the mess and I had plenty of practice on it as I had quite a lot of time to fill in.
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Time passed and I finally had my seat booked for my return to Italy. So then I had to say my farewells to all the friends that I had made during my stay and to Bob of course and also I went to see the colonel and thanks him for all they had done for Bob and also making my stay a pleasant one.
[underlined] Dakota back to Italy – Treviso [/underlined]
So on the 26th October my flight was at 6.30am so was up early for the return journey. One of the sergeants had said the night before that he would take me to the airport as he was duty driver for that day. So once again I joined up with a Dakota of the South African Air force at Almaja airport stopping at El Adam to refuel then on to Malta where we stayed the night. The next day we were away at seven am on the last leg to Rome.
At Rome airport I was informed that the personnel of the 239 Wing Desert Air Force; had been moved to a place called Treviso so that where I was being sent. They said my kit had been transferred already so I had to get to this place, but found out that I was booked on a flight to an aerodrome just outside of Treviso.
[photograph]
Sergeants Mess Treviso 1945, Dick and friend
There was transport at the aerodrome and I was taken to our sergeant mess which was a town villa in Treviso and was shown to my room and where I was reunited with my kit bag.
This was luxury after living in tents for a long period with wash basins and baths and there were ladies to do your laundry and any repairs to your clothes.
I certainly enjoyed having a nice hot bath and retiring to a good bed and hoped that I wasn't to be moved again, as I had had enough of travelling for a while.
At Treviso it was usual routine doing runs into town and around the airfield, towing petrol trailers around to the aircraft for refuelling. Also fetching blocks of ice for the bars of the officers and sergeants also messes of other ranks. By the time you got back to camp there was a lot of water in the back of the truck and you had to lift blocks of wet ice into the various messes, a cold job.
From Treviso it was only a few miles into Venice and we spent a few weekends there, and got to do a lot of walking, you could have a gondola ride but they charged the earth, so we usually walked.
St Marco's square was very popular with lots of shops and cafes around. There was an abundant supply of jewellery shops and also the square had hundreds of pigeons, making it quite messy.
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There was a bell tower in one corner which had a large bell on the top. Apparently an Italian gent decided to inspect it too close and his head flattened by the bell hammer, very nasty.
There were lots of bridges over the canals and as you went into the centre where they had warehouses it was a rather different place, the canals were not so dean, and people living alongside them just threw rubbish out of the windows, not a good healthy environment to live in.
We found a very good restaurant in Treviso down a back street a very smart little place, who did beef steaks, which you could pick from a large selection and then you could see them being cooked and you then selected what you wanted with it.
Time passed very quickly at Treviso and was January before we realised suddenly that our demob numbers would be coming up soon. And it was January when we were told that some of us were going home and that we could be going to Villach in Austria to catch a train for the trip across Austria, Switzerland and France and home.
The day arrived when we were notified that we had reached the final week in Italy and would travel by train to Villach, and thence start our journey home. We cleared with all the necessary forms as was needed, paid any mess bills and said our farewells to rest of the transport department and was then taken to the station.
It was an uneventful journey to Villach where we had to stay overnight and there was thick snow there and rather cold with long icicles from roves [sic] of our huts.
[photograph]
Villach - with icicles
I met up with some of the other lads who had travelled with me on our trip out earlier, when we were leaving; waiting on the road for transport to the station a whole lot of youngsters arrived with sledges, so all we had to carry was our small kit, the kit bags were loaded on the sledges and so on to the station.
Our train was in and so we went aboard with kit bags on the corridors and rest of our kit on the racks, it was then that we all got into the spirit of finally going home. The trains were French so the toilets had no seat, just two places for your feet and a hole in the middle, not very comfortable.
With it being January everywhere was very white with snow and I took some pictures of the mountains as we passed into Switzerland which was wonderful. Coming out of a tunnel on the
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mountainside and there was a village and it appeared to just be hanging on. It went on like this from many miles as we went through Switzerland and into France.
[photograph]
Switzerland from the train
We stopped in Paris station for a hot drink and a sandwich and managed to have a wash and brush up before our next stop which was to be Dieppe and a channel crossing to Newhaven.
The trip over was uneventful but the sea was rather rough and there were one or two heaving stomachs to prove it, and we arrived in the dock, and then when we had sorted out our kit bags from a very large heap, the train was waiting in the station to take us to the demob centre, which was at No 101 Dispersal centre at Kirkham in Lancashire.
This was the place where you returned to civilian life once again. It is now the 21st January 1947 about to sort out from a large selection of shirts, underwear and suits and find some that is a reasonable fit. After which you went and tried on the items you had selected and handed in your uniform, well most of it, l remember that there was a shirt, a pair of shorts and some desert socks along with the boots that I wore during our sight seeing tour of Germany. Then you had to see numerous sections who dealt with your pay due to you and the amount of leave which turned out to be eighty days from the 21st January 1947.
You then had to collect your travel warrant, your pay also was entered in the back of your service release book and you had to collect it from the post office when it was due, and they would date stamp it in the back of your pay book.
My return home was a wonderful feeling after all my travels. At the station the neighbour of ours who had a taxi cab saw me and had me in his cab very quickly.
Upon arriving at Minehead Street the first thing I saw was the street still decorated with flags and bunting after the end of the war in Japan and not for me.
Mr Shuker sounded his horn and slowed down and there were a lot of people came out to welcome me home and of course Mum, Dad and Mary and our close neighbours were all waiting and I was smothered with their welcome.
And so I looked forward to a nice long holiday and getting used to civilian life once more.
48
[page break]
[underlined] Reunions [/underlined]
Dick's mother (Arabella Curnock) had welcomed several of the Canadian crew members into her home, and had corresponded with members of their families back home in Canada during the war.
Bob Friskey's wife Isabella in Abbotsford also wrote to Dick and Barbara after their marriage, as well as continuing to correspond with Dick's mother. It was from them that the news came that "Chuck" committed suicide some time after returning home.
Rob died sometime after, but Isabella continued to write to Dick.
Wes and his (Scottish) wife Mae made contact again sometime in the 1970s, when Dick received a phone call at the Thurmaston plant of Thorpe and Porter where he worked. The call was from the railway station in Leicester where Wes and Mae were - accompanied by the youngest of their five sons!
Dick went to pick them up, and they stayed overnight with [sic] at Queniborough before carrying on their journey to Scotland. Wes and Mae paid a short visit to Dick's mother, as Wes had stayed with her during the war when on leave.
In 1984 a lady who lived on Upperton Road (Mrs Tobin) was clearing out a house on Minehead Street (no 59) which was formally the Curnock family home. Amongst the papers was an unopened letter from Eugene Fullum in Montreal. She looked in the phone book and found a R Curnock and rang and this got Dick and Eugene back in touch.
[photograph]
Eugene and Dick 1985 (Leicester Mercury photo)
Eugene came over the UK in 1985, and when Dick and he met it was the first time they had seen each other since the police station in Germany the day after they had been shot down.
49
[page break]
[photograph]
RAF Prisoner of War insignia
[photograph]
Gordon, Eugene, Dick, Wes, 1987 Reunion
50
[page break]
[photograph]
Dick in the rear gunner position of a Halifax bomber; at Elvington, Yorks. 2004
[photograph]
Dick exiting the Halifax, the last time he did this, the Halifax was on fire and he was about to parachute into enemy territory
51
[page break]
Appendix 1 – Dick’s RAF flying log book – 17.7.1943 to 25.8.1947
i) Gunnery course results
[document]
52
[page break]
Appendix 1 - ii) gunnery training
[flight log book document]
53
[page break]
Appendix 1 – iii) 22 O.T.U.
[flight log book document]
54
[page break]
Appendix 1 – iv) 22 O.T.U.
[flight log book document]
55
[page break]
Appendix 1 – v) 22 O.T.U.
[flight log book document]
56
[page break]
Appendix 1 – vi) 22 O.T.U.
[flight log book document]
57
[page break]
Appendix 1 – vii) 1664 Conversion Unit
[flight log book document]
58
[page break]
Appendix 1 – viii) 1664 Conversion Unit
[flight log book document]
59
[page break]
Appendix 1 – ix) 425 Squadron – shows the last mission Dick flew to Augsburg
[flight log book document]
60
[page break]
Appendix 1 – x) Flights to and from Egypt to visit Bob
[flight log book document]
61
[page break]
Appendix 2
[drawing of Berlin War Cemetery]
Ginger Wheadon is buried in 6.B.19
62
[page break]
Appendix 3 -The March - source Wikipedia
"The March" refers to a series of forced marches during the final stages of the Second World War in Europe. From a total of 257,000 western Allied prisoners of war held in German military prison camps, over 80,000 POWs were forced to march westward across Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Germany in extreme winter conditions, over about four months between January and April 1945. This series of events has been called various names: "The Great March West", "The Long March", "The Long Walk", "The Long Trek", "The Black March", "The Bread March", and "Death March Across Germany", but most survivors just called it "The March".
As the Soviet Army was advancing, German authorities decided to evacuate POW camps, to delay liberation of the prisoners. January and February 1945 were among the coldest winter months of the 20th century in Europe, with blizzards and temperatures as low as -25 O C and even until the middle of March, temperatures were well below 0 O C Most of the POWs were ill-prepared for the evacuation, having suffered years of poor rations and wearing clothing ill-suited to the appalling winter conditions.
In most camps, the POWs were broken up in groups of 250 to 300 men and because of the inadequate roads and the flow of battle, not all the prisoners followed the same route. The groups would march 20 to 40 kilometers a day - resting in factories, churches, barns and even in the open. Soon long columns of POWs were wandering over the northern part of Germany with little or nothing in the way of food, clothing, shelter or medical care.
Prisoners from different camps had different experiences: sometimes the Germans provided farm wagons for those unable to walk. There seldom were horses available, so teams of POWs pulled the wagons through the snow. Sometimes the guards and prisoners became dependent on each other, other times the guards became increasingly hostile. Those with intact boots had the dilemma of whether to remove them at night - if they left them on, trench foot could result; if they removed them, they may not get their swollen feet back into their boots in the morning or, worse, the boots may freeze or be stolen.
With so little food they were reduced to scavenging to survive. Some were reduced to eating dogs and cats and grass-anything they could lay their hands on. Already underweight from years of prison rations, some were at half their pre-war body weight by the end.
Because of the unsanitary conditions and a near starvation diet, hundreds of POWs died of disease along the way and many more were ill. Dysentery was common; sufferers had the indignity of soiling themselves whilst having to continue to march, and being further weakened by the debilitating effects of illness. This disease was easily spread from one group to another when they followed the same route and rested in the same places. Many POWs suffered from frostbite which could lead to gangrene. Typhus, spread by body lice, was a risk for all POWs, but was now increased by using overnight shelter previously occupied by infected groups. Some men simply froze to death in their sleep.
In addition to these conditions were the dangers from air attack by Allied forces mistaking the POWs for retreating columns of German troops. On April 19, 1945, at a village called Gresse, 30 Allied POWs died and 30 were seriously injured (possibly fatally) in a "friendly-fire" situation when strafed by a flight of RAF Typhoons.
63
[page break]
As winter drew to a close, suffering from the cold abated and some of the German guards became less harsh in their treatment of POWs. But the thaw rendered useless the sledges made by many POWs to carry spare clothing, carefully preserved food supplies and other items. So, the route became littered with items that could not be carried. Some even discarded their greatcoats, hoping that the weather did not turn cold again. As the columns reached the western side of Germany they ran into the advancing western Allied armies. For some, this brought liberation. Others were not so lucky. They were marched towards the Baltic Sea, where Nazis were said to be using POWs as human shields and hostages. It was later estimated that a large number of POWs had marched over five hundred miles by the time they were liberated, and some had walked nearly a thousand miles.
64
[page break]
Appendix 4 – i) Stalag Luft 357 – long march route, and camp numbering correction information
Red Cross map of prisoner of war camps
[map]
65
[page break]
Appendix 4 – ii) Stalag Luft 357 and long march route
[map]
66
[page break]
Appendix 4 – iii) Blue cross in circle marks where Dick was shot down. Red Cross near Frankfurt where he was moved to
[map]
67
[page break]
Appendix 4 – iv) Red line shows routes taken by Dick. Torun (Thorn) camp shown
[map]
68
[page break]
Appendix 4 – v) Poznan – Stalag XXI
[map]
69
[page break]
Appendix 4 – vi) Stalag Luft VI – Lithuania
[map]
70
[page break]
26th April 2014
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
My War Story
Description
An account of the resource
A memoir written by Dick Curnock. It covers his wartime service and also his service after the war for the RAF. It covers his brother Sam and his accident as a pilot. Dick started his training at Lords in London, Bridlington then Bridgnorth and Dalcross. Next move was to Wellesbourne where he crewed up and practised bombing from a Wellington, then Dishforth for conversion on to Halifaxes. His squadron was 425 at Tholthorpe and he undertook night flying training. On his second operation he was shot down near Augsburg. He was taken prisoner and interrogated before being transferred to Stalag Luft VI. He describes his life there. As the Russians got nearer they were transferred by cattle truck to Stalag Luft 357 at Torun. Next they were subjected to the Long March in April 1945. During this the flight engineer, Ginger Wheadon was shot by an RAF Typhoon. After being liberated and returning to the UK he served briefly in Egypt then Italy as an RAF transport driver. During this time he went to Egypt to visit his brother, Bob who was ill in Cairo. Eventually he was demobbed from Italy via Austria and Paris.
Creator
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Dick Curnock
Date
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2014-04-26
Format
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71 printed sheets
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
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BCurnockRMCurnockRMv1
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
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Austria
Austria--Villach
Canada
British Columbia--Abbotsford
Québec--Montréal
Egypt
Egypt--Cairo
France
France--Paris
Gibraltar
Germany
Germany--Augsburg
Germany--Darmstadt
Germany--Schweinfurt
Great Britain
England--Bridlington
England--Horsham
England--Leicester
England--London
England--Melksham
Italy
Italy--Bari
Italy--Cortina d'Ampezzo
Italy--Naples
Italy--Padua
Italy--Ravenna
Italy--Rimini
Italy--Rome
Italy--Udine
Italy--Venice
Malta
North Africa
Poland--Toruń
Germany--Lüneburg
Poland
Lithuania
Poland--Żagań
Lithuania--Šilutė
Germany--Bad Fallingbostel
England--Christchurch (Dorset)
Québec
England--Dorset
England--Leicestershire
England--Yorkshire
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
Contributor
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Peter Bradbury
22 OTU
420 Squadron
425 Squadron
431 Squadron
434 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
animal
Anson
anti-aircraft fire
arts and crafts
bale out
bomb aimer
C-47
Caterpillar Club
crash
crewing up
Dulag Luft
final resting place
flight engineer
ground personnel
Halifax
Halifax Mk 3
Heavy Conversion Unit
Hitler, Adolf (1889-1945)
Hurricane
Ju 88
lynching
mess
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
navigator
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
P-51
pilot
prisoner of war
RAF Boscombe Down
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Bridlington
RAF Cosford
RAF Dishforth
RAF Elvington
RAF Gaydon
RAF Inverness
RAF Manston
RAF Tholthorpe
RAF Wellesbourne Mountford
Red Cross
sanitation
service vehicle
sport
Stalag Luft 3
Stalag Luft 6
strafing
the long march
training
Typhoon
Wellington
Whitley
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/551/8815/PLancasterJ1501.2.jpg
794d475655253509adf90821a41de268
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/551/8815/ALancasterJO170308.1.mp3
0854aad26e9a380b5f2a5cc40af42a9a
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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Lancaster, Jo
John Oliver Lancaster
J O Lancaster
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Lancaster, JO
Description
An account of the resource
17 items. Two oral history interviews with John Oliver 'Jo' Lancaster DFC (1919 - 2019, 948392, 103509 Royal Air Force), photographs and six of his log books. Jo Lancaster completed 54 operations as a pilot with in Wellingtons with 40 Squadron, and after a period of instructing, in Lancasters with 12 Squadron from RAF Wickenby. He became test pilot after the war and was the first person to use a Martin-Baker ejection seat in an emergency.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Jo Lancaster and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-08-18
2017-03-08
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB: My name is Chris Brockbank and today is the 8th of March 2017 and I’m in Hassocks with John Lancaster. Jo Lancaster. To talk about his long career in the RAF and as a test pilot afterwards. So, Jo, what are the earliest recollections of life that you have in the family?
JL: I was born in Penrith in Cumberland. In the Lake District. I was very lucky really. I didn’t realise it much at the time. And my first ideas of aeroplanes were drawn entirely from, from books. They were very rarely seen over Cumberland. If they were they were just a spot in the sky making a humming noise but I became very interested in aeroplanes and made models out of the rough materials I could find to hand. I eventually had a flying model with an elastic band which gave me great, great fun but I never actually saw an aeroplane close to until I was about aged sixteen when a Gypsy Moth made a landing due to bad weather in the, in the area. I left school in 1935 aged sixteen and it was during that summer that Alan Cobham’s Flying Circus visited Penrith and I had my first flight in an Avro 504. I remember that well. There was a bench seat going forward and aft of the rear cockpit on which you sat astride and a young lady who I didn’t know was my co-passenger and she just put her head down in the cockpit and screamed throughout the whole flight. [laughs] But I thoroughly enjoyed it. I could see the engine with the tapits, with the bells going up and down. The exposed bells. And it was on that flight that the pilot had a piece of piano wire on the wing tip and picked up bits of cloth from the ground with it. I was completely bitten by flying then but there was little chance of it in the, in the near future. I left school at sixteen and I didn’t want to go to university. In point of fact I couldn’t really because my father’s business had a bad time during the recession and there wasn’t any money left in the kitty but I didn’t mind that. I didn’t want to go to university. I wanted to go out and get amongst mechanical things and an aircraft apprenticeship seemed to be the answer. We considered the RAF apprenticeship scheme, I forget where now. Henlow. Not Henlow.
CB: Halton.
JL: Halton. Considered the RAF apprenticeship scheme at Halton but I wanted to be in the start of the aeroplane flight and not, not the sort of maintenance of it and so I, somehow or other, got a list of aircraft manufacturers in Britain who were offering apprenticeships. Some of them wanted premiums so that put them out but Armstrong Whitworth sounded the best and in due course my father accompanied me down to Coventry for an interview. And I was accepted and joined Armstrong Whitworth in October 1935 starting a five year apprenticeship. The apprenticeship was very good. We had pay and we had one morning and one afternoon off paid time for, to attend the local technical college. [Cough] Can we have a pause?
CB: Yeah.
[Recording paused]
CB: So you’re at Coventry.
JL: The apprenticeship.
CB: And you’re just on the apprenticeship.
JL: Yes. When I — I went down to Coventry to take up my apprenticeship having negotiated some digs through the local paper. I didn’t like the digs we had, I had but [pause - interference] but when I first started there [I feel sure?] it was at the airfield at Wheatley, an old World War One airfield with still the original hangars. I first of all went to, as a stop-gap to the final assembly unit where they were building Hawker Hart trainers. I found everybody very very friendly and one of the almost time expired apprentices, expired apprentices asked me about my digs and I said I didn’t like them and he said there was a vacancy at his digs so I was very glad to go there and I, I was there for over three years. Nearly four years in fact. In, in the original interview it was, it was stressed that there would be no flying involved in the apprenticeship but I had ideas that I would join the, what was then the RAF Class F Reserve which operated very similarly to the Territorial Army. Consisted mostly of a two week summer camp. But on reaching the age of eighteen that coincided with the start of the RAF Volunteer Reserve and I joined straight away and followed that up with the full time ab initio training course at Sywell in July of 1937. Having done that I went back to, to my apprenticeship of course and attended the local RAF, [pause] oh dear. Elementary Reserve Training School at Ansty. That was local to Coventry. During the day, during the weekdays the instructors there were instructing a course of short service, short service commission pilots and at evenings or other times when convenient as at weekends they were training the volunteer reservists. There instead of Tiger Moths as at Sywell we had Avro Cadets with Armstrong Siddeley Genet engines and I converted on to Cadets and then converted on to Hawker Harts. When I was still eighteen I was flying solo on Hawker Harts which was a beautiful aeroplane.
[pause]
JL: I don’t know how to continue.
CB: We’ll stop just for a mo.
[Recording paused]
CB: You mentioned digs. People don’t seem to have digs now so what were they and how did it work?
JL: Well my first digs, which were arranged through the local, by post through the local paper, when I got there I didn’t know the people. I didn’t care for them very much. I was there for really just over a week I think and I was happy to leave when my new acquaintance apprentice, Tony Carpenter suggested I join him in his digs. There I was with a family, or we were with a family. Mrs Hinder who was a widow, widow of a parson and her two children Ruby and Percy. So there were five of us in the house and Mrs Hinder provided us with breakfast, a packed lunch, an evening meal five days a week and breakfast and all the other meals during the weekend at the princely sum of twenty five shillings a week.
CB: Brilliant. Yes. And what about your washing?
JL: I can’t remember. I didn’t do it. They must. It probably went to, I don’t know. I don’t suppose she did it. I don’t remember.
CB: What sort of hours did you work in those days?
JL: We had to be there at 8 o’clock in the morning. We had a half hour’s break for lunch and left at 5 o’clock four days of the week and half past five on Thursdays. And Saturday morning it was 8 o’clock till twelve [cough] I shall have to go and get another drink.
CB: Ok.
[Recording paused]
CB: That’s really useful so when we have the time to talk about the apprenticeship how did the apprenticeship work?
JL: Well as I said I actually started in final assembly but I was only there a couple of weeks. That was a stop-gap and then I was moved to what they called a detailed fitting shop where all the various parts of the aircraft were made using hand tools. And I was there for probably nine months and then I moved to the milling machine shop. Learned how to work a milling machine and then moved on from that to working a, working on a lathe. Learned all about lathe work. Then I went to sub-assembly where units of the aircraft were assembled. The aircraft going through at this time was the Whitley. And then eventually I went on to, moved up to Baginton. The new airfield and the new factory on final assembly and I was there until the — when the war started. I was, I was held back until I joined the — the RAF decided to have me back in January 1940. But I wasn’t actually called up until June of 1940. Incidentally there was a rather amusing episode in May of 1939. Shortly before the war. Everybody knew the war was coming. They had to re-introduce conscription and I was a bullseye for the first age group and I had to go and have an interview with a little [petrie?] army major so I lost no time in telling him I didn’t want to join his army and I was a trained engineer and a trained pilot and he said, ‘Well you’ll be, you’ll be a dead cert for the Royal Army Ordinance Corps.’ And why he said that and not the Royal Engineers I don’t know. But anyway the war started and in no time at all I received a letter containing a traveling warrant to Budbrooke Barracks and a postal order for the four shillings in advance of pay to join the Royal Warwickshire Regiment.
CB: Oh.
JL: So I dashed down to, and by this time they had a combined recruiting centre in Coventry. They’d taken over a skating rink, a roller skating rink. And the air force recruiting officer was no help at all but the naval recruiting officer was a Chief Petty Officer Brown and I went and told him my problem and he said, ‘Well we’ll get you out of that,’ and he took me on for the navy on, on deferred service. So I then got a letter saying please return the travelling warrant and postal order. You need not now apply, attend Budbrooke Barracks. So whilst, whilst I was on deferred service for the navy the RAF changed their mind and decided to have me back and, but I didn’t actually re-join until about June of 1940 starting with a six weeks course at ITW Initial Training Wing at Paignton in Devon. And then we were all disbursed to [pause] God. [pause] Sorry, this is my brain. [pause]
CB: From ITW you went to Initial Training Wing.
JL: Well it was Flying Training School.
CB: Yes but at Sywell again.
JL: The first one was Sywell.
CB: Yes.
JL: But this time, after the war started it was Desford near Leicester
CB: Oh yes.
WT: Yes. Desford. Yes.
JO: Yes. Yes. We were, we were all divided up. I went, I went to Desford with some others. During the, during this ab initio course the Battle of Britain was in full swing and of course we all wanted to be fighter pilots and I was in fact selected to be a fighter pilot and sent to number five elementary flying, 5 Flying Training School at Sealand which had Miles Masters and there I was going to be a fighter pilot. I trained on Miles Masters. Later — later in the — we were down, we moved from Sealand down to Ternhill in Shropshire and continued training there but the, during the winter ‘40/41 it was very bad. The training — some of us got well behind and I was on a course of about forty eight divided into four flights of twelve and our flight was the only one, was the only one who succeeded in doing the night flying part of the syllabus on Masters and at the end of the course the whole flight was posted to bomber OTUs whilst the rest went to fighters. And I went to Lossiemouth, 20 OTU as I remember and was converted on to Wellingtons. I was very cross about this at the time but in the event I think it was the right thing to do. When I got to Lossiemouth we were next door to [pause] oh dear [pause] sorry. A Whitley OTU.
WT: Wycombe?
JL: Hmmn?
WT: Wycombe
JL: No. A Whitley OTU up in Scotland. Oh God. I’m sorry.
CB: Was it on, was it a coastal OTU or was it a Bomber Command OTU?
JL: It was a bombing.
CB: Whitleys. Yes.
JL: I was at Lossiemouth converting on to Wellingtons.
CB: Yes.
JL: At 20 OTU.
CB: Yes.
JL: And there was another OTU only about ten miles away with Whitleys. It was well known. It’s still open.
CB: Yes. Kinloss.
JL: Kinloss. Yes.
CB: Yes. Yeah.
JL: Sorry. Thank you.
CB: It’s ok.
JL: I got an interview with the group captain of Lossiemouth called Group Captain Smyth-Piggott and told him that I had been building Whitleys and knew all about them and that I’d like to convert. To transfer to Whitleys. And he wouldn’t have it so I was stuck with Wellingtons. And so we were paired off as pilots with first and second pilot. I was the first pilot and my second pilot was Derek Townsend and having done our conversion training we then had to be crewed up and we were all ushered into a hangar with the right proportions of pilots, navigators, wireless operators and air gunners. And Derek and I wandered around looking at people we’d never seen before and we eventually finished up with a Canadian navigator Glen Leach, a very Welsh wireless operator called Jack Crowther, another Canadian front gunner and a New Zealand rear gunner. Now, at that time I’d never met a Canadian before and I was just, I was surprised they spoke like people we saw in the cinema. But I hardly knew where New Zealand was. Anyway, we went down to that, to the pub in Lossiemouth that night and we were blood brothers from then for the rest of our lives.
[pause]
CB: Right. Stop there for a mo.
[Recording paused]
JL: What had happened.
CB: At Desford. Yeah.
JL: At Desford. We did a — went off and did a flight. When we landed he said, ‘You haven’t forgotten how to fly.’
CB: But you still had to go through.
JL: I still had to do the whole thing through.
CB: The whole thing.
JL: Yes.
CB: Because that’s the way the process ran. Can we just go back to your VR time because you might have continued with that but how long were you in the VR, flying and what caused you to cease?
JL: Well I as I say I was being converted on to — [pause] Oh God.
CB: On to the Hart. Yeah.
JL: Cadets.
CB: Oh the Cadet. Yes.
JL: And Harts. I was flying Harts at a very tender age and I was the ace. I thought I was the ace of the base. And one Sunday after a very bad period of weather where there was no flying we had a very fine Sunday morning in April 1938 and I dashed out to Ansty. There were no Harts available but I was given a, alloted a Cadet to go and do aerobatics and off I went. There was something wrong with the engine actually. It tended to choke and had to be re-started. I wasn’t even bothered with that. I went off and I did some aerobatics. I got doing a slow roll. There was a fire extinguisher under the dashboard and the instrument panel and on the final turn with full top rudder the fire extinguisher fell out and got behind the rudder bar so when I got right way up I got a whole lot of left rudder on. I managed to sort of kick it halfway through the fabric so that I could get steering rudder and instead of going back to Ansty as I should have done I became insane and landed at Wheatley. Well it was a Sunday so there was only a sort of a maintenance man there. When he walked up I gave him the fire extinguisher and took off again. And then, then I, my fellow digs chap, Tony Carpenter, he couldn’t join the VR because of his eyesight but he bought all sort of what we would call a microlight called a dart splitter mouse and he had it at a field near Kenilworth and I then went over to him and did a few aerobatics there. Then I did what was actually a perfectly legal exercise. A simulated forced landing where you from two thousand feet or whatever you throttle the engine back and did an approach on to a suitable field, opened it up and go around again at the end. I did what the, I opened up and the engines stopped and I went through a hedge so that’s rather spoiled things and I was thrown out. You’ll find it in there.
WT: Gosh.
JL: I wasn’t thrown out for going through the hedge. I was thrown out for doing low level aerobatics.
CB: Ah
JL: That was because very very close by was Kenilworth Golf Club and playing golf that morning was a chap called Tom Chapman who was a director of Armstrong Siddeley’s who was hand in glove with Armstrong Whitworth’s and he, he reported it. [laughs] Tom Chapman. Bless his heart.
CB: You never became friends.
JL: I never met him.
[pause]
CB: Right. So we’ve got to the stage that you’re at Lossiemouth and you’ve crewed up. This crewing up — could you just explain how it actually happened? The process.
JL: Well Derek and I just wandered around looking at people’s brevets and we got together a navigator. We found this Canadian with a, he had the O brevet.
CB: Yeah.
JL: He was very proud of that. The Observer. Asked him and he came along and we continued the process till we got the full crew. And we all, we all agreed to meet in the pub that night and we were thick as thieves from that time on.
CB: So how long were you together for?
JL: Well from Lossiemouth, when we were crewed up we did a number of cross country exercises [cough] oh dear. To finish the course. Air firing and practice bombing and then we were posted as a crew to 40 Squadron at Wyton. So we all went off on leave and we all arrived at Wyton on the appointed day only to be told that we weren’t supposed to be at Wyton. We were supposed to be at Alconbury. The satellite. And so we got a service bus from Wyton to Alconbury and signed in there and we were promptly all put on a charge for arriving late. And we were, what are the — ? [pause] I forget the expression was. The lowest. The lowest telling off. So that wasn’t a very good start because we didn’t like the WingCo much anyway. He wasn’t a very popular chap. A [jock?]. Wing Commander Davey. Anyway, we were, then Derek, Derek left us to join another crew and we were given a captain in the form of a Jim Taylor who — he’d already done a lot of ops and he took us on our first eight ops and then he left us. He was, he was screened and I took over as captain and we were given a series of second pilots from then on. And we succeeded in surviving thirty operations including a daylight on Brest. And then we, then we all split up.
CB: So this is in a Wellington.
JL: Yes. And I was posted to a Wellington OTU as a, as an instructor [coughs] oh dear. I’m sorry about this.
CB: Ok. Would you like to stop for a mo?
[Recording paused]
CB: So can we just talk about the tour? The aircraft was a Wellington. Which model?
JL: Yes. Throughout this period all my flying was on Wellington 1Cs which was powered by Bristol Pegasus Mark xviii and with these it was very very underpowered. It was supposed to be able to fly on one engine but in fact it couldn’t because it had non-feathering propellers.
CB: Oh.
JL: Fortunately the engines were fairly reliable. The most common problem would be that one of the rocker boxes would break loose from the cylinder head which introduced, which put that cylinder out of use and caused it to be, to vibrate rather a lot. That happened from time to time. But at least you had the use of most of the engine.
CB: So you couldn’t really feather. You couldn’t feather the prop.
JL: No. No.
CB: So you kept it running did you or you stopped it? The drag was huge.
JL: Well if you lost the engine it just, just windmilled.
CB: Yeah. Right.
JL: Caused a lot of drag.
CB: So of the ops, one of them was to Brest. What was that like?
JL: There was one occasion when we went off. Actually it was fortunately in daylight and when we got up to about seventeen hundred feet and the oil, the oil pressure on one engine dropped to zero. I looked out and there was oil all over the engine but fortunately we were just within a mile or so of Wyton and I was able to drop straight down and land in Wyton complete with a full load of petrol and bombs. But had, had it been dark the situation would have been very different. It was too late to bale out and we had a full load of bombs and it was dark.
CB: In circumstances where you’re still, you’ve still got your full load of bombs what was the proper procedure?
JL: Sorry?
CB: In the circumstances where there was difficulty with the aircraft and you had a full load of bombs what was the proper procedure as far as the bomb load was concerned? Were you supposed to jettison or keep them?
JL: Well normally only jettison over the sea.
CB: Right.
JL: But of course you had to be in full control of the aircraft. If you lost an engine and you weren’t able to, to maintain flight you’d probably leave them where they were.
CB: So thinking of the rest of the tour how did the ops go on that? You had a bit of variety. They were all at night were they?
JL: All except one. The 24th of July 1941 there was a major daylight operation on Brest in which we were involved. The squadron sent six aircraft in two lots of three. The other three lost, lost one aircraft in a direct hit but our three all survived. Knocked about but still working.
CB: So the other one was lost to flak.
JL: Yes.
CB: What operating height were you using then?
JL: Twelve and a half thousand feet.
CB: And what bomb load were you carrying?
JL: Probably five. I can’t tell you. I didn’t record these. Probably five hundred pound armour piercing but it was all a waste of time as I discovered later. Much later. I visited Lorient after the war and went and saw the U-boat pens there and none of our bombs would ever do anything to them. They had a huge roof about two metres thick and then a false roof on top of that. You could see where bombs had hit it. There was just a little pock mark. That’s all. We were all wasting our time. I don’t know what our intelligence people were doing. Thinking about.
CB: So for the other ops then. These were at night. Where? Where were they going? Where were the targets?
JL: Mostly in Germany but we did one to [pause] oh Christ, I’m sorry.
CB: Was it a port?
JL: On the Baltic.
CB: Right. Kiel or Wilhelmshaven. Bremen.
JL: Further east.
CB: Ah.
JL: Poland.
CB: Oh. Danzig.
JL: Oh God. I’m sorry. My brain’s going on strike.
CB: Stettin.
JL: Stettin. Thank you.
CB: Right. So that was a port. And what were you after there? The shipping. Were you?
JL: The port. Yes. That was a long one. That’s well over nine hours. We had overload tanks.
CB: The overload tanks were jettisonable or were they inside the aircraft?
JL: Oh no. They were, they were in the bomb bay.
CB: Oh right.
JL: So we had a reduced bomb load.
CB: And this is the early part of the war so how were you getting on in terms of navigation and pinpointing the target?
JL: There was very little to help us with navigation. We had a choice of dead reckoning and any pinpointing we could get. At night, providing there was no cloud, water could usually be seen. The River Rhine. We used to get quite a bit of haze over the Ruhr but you could usually pick out the Rhine. All the coastlines and harbours. We did have Hamburg two or three times. Bremen. Wilhelmshaven. Berlin. Most of them were to the Ruhr though. I think we did [pause], oh God my brain.
CB: So there was flak all the time but to what extent were there —?
JL: Nearly all the time. Yes.
CB: What about night fighters? Were they?
JL: We were attacked. Yes. On the way back from Berlin actually. We were. Berlin was clear but there was, on the way back we encountered cloud and we were being shot at through the cloud pretty well continuously. And we couldn’t understand this because we shouldn’t have been but what had happened was that the forecast wind which was all we had had changed and they’d taken us north and we were actually going down via Hamburg, Bremen, Emden but eventually there was a break in the clouds and as I looked down I could see the causeway across the mouth of the Zuiderzee and as I reported this and obviously everybody, including the rear gunner, was looking down and it was just at that moment that a burst of fire went right over the top of us followed by an ME110. And we didn’t see it. We were lucky. But anyway, anyway we went down a very steep spiral and this 110 tried to follow us and Keith Coleman, our New Zealand rear gunner got a good shot at it and we both went into cloud and we never knew what happened to it but after the war some people checked up on it and there were no night fighters shot down that night but one inexplicably crashed on landing and it’s just possible it might have been the one.
CB: Because you’d damaged it. Yeah. Now, in those days had the corkscrew evasion system operated or did you make up your own technique for avoiding a fighter?
JL: Well, only, only did corkscrewing if you were, if you were attacked. In my second tour actually it was different. It was my own idea. I kept changing course and height. Five hundred feet up. Five hundred feet up. Turned left, then right. Pretty well all the time because the eighty eight millimetre guns were radar controlled and they were bloody good. So by doing that we were never actually seriously shot at. Not enroute.
CB: You mentioned that you had various co-pilots. Why was that? Were they being prepared for captaincy themselves or what?
JL: Yes. They were doing their training before taking over their own crew. I’m very sorry.
[Recording paused]
JL: That was the daylight raid on, on Brest I think.
CB: Oh. We talked about the 110 just now but what, on what other occasion were you attacked by a fighter?
JL: On the daylight raid on Brest in July there were several 110s about. Sorry. Correction. 109s about.
CB: Yes.
JL: But there were a lot of Wellingtons about and they were all, they were all firing at these 109s and one went, certainly went down because the pilot baled out but all the others tend to claim it. [laughs]
CB: Right. Is that your —
JL: In retrospect it’s impossible to say who hit it.
CB: Yeah. Ok.
JL: We had, we had beam guns but both my gunners, front and rear were blasting away and we had two beam gunners with Vickers, Vickers VJOs fitted up and the second, our second pilot and the wireless op were blasting away with theirs as well and of course all the Wellingtons were probably doing the same thing so the sky was absolutely full of CO3.
CB: Right. So in your flying training at Ternhill what sort of people were there?
JL: We had two American air force officers. Sam Morinello and the other one was called Galbraith. But of course they left us to join their Eagle Squadrons. We also had Neville Duke.
CB: Oh right.
JL: And we had David. Oh God, here we go again [pause] oh I’m sorry. My brain’s —
CB: It’s alright. That’s interesting Neville Duke because he took the world speed record in the Hunter.
JL: Yes.
CB: Didn’t he? In the fifties.
JL: He was also on the same course at ITW.
CB: Was he? Yeah. What about these Americans then. What were they like? Because they weren’t in the war and they’d volunteered to join?
JL: Yes. Well most Americans joined the Royal Canadian Air Force but these two didn’t. Sam Morinello had done a lot of parachute jumps. Just what he’d, they’d been doing. I think they both had pilot training. Why they didn’t join the Canadian Air Force I don’t know but I suppose this was the — they wanted to be certain to get to the American squadrons.
CB: So they were posted to the Eagle Squadrons.
JL: Yes.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Yes. They were. I think they distinguished themselves fairly well later on.
CB: And how did they fit into the general way of things because they were a different culture?
JL: Oh well. Very well. I’m trying to think of the name of this. His father was chief. Well his father was a pre-war, a World War One pilot. He became a chief designer at Bristol and he had four sons. He was killed in 1938 flying one of his own design and the [pause] and the three sons, I think it was three sons. Might have been more. So, anyway, two of them were killed early in the war and this David. He was just one of the boys. Happy. We knew nothing at all about his background at all.
CB: Oh dear.
JL: But he, unfortunately he was killed as well. Oh God. The name, name, name. [I must have written it?] I bet it’s in there.
CB: Ok. Right. We’ll stop just for a mo.
[Recording paused]
CB: So going back to the time when you finished at 40 Squadron. Where were posted and why?
JL: I was posted to Wellesbourne Mountford for instructional duties. Wellesbourne Mountford being Number 22 OTU. Operational Training Unit. Still with Wellington 1Cs. I was attached to the conversion flight. I was converting them to fly the Wellington after which they did their navigational exercises. I didn’t like the job at all. I’m not born, I wasn’t born to be an instructor and I was very unhappy about it. Not only that but it involved night flying details and in the winter the night flying practice was divided up into four sessions being 6 till 9, 9 till 12, 12 till 3 and 3 till 6 and if you were on a late show you know you had to be out at 3 o’clock on a cold, miserable morning and go and do three hours circuits and landings and that was not very funny. I discovered that there was, at Central Flying School, they ran a course for OTU instructors so I asked to go on that which I did but it didn’t help. It didn’t help me much. When I went back to Wellesbourne I was still doing conversion training. Then in July another OTU opened at what is now East Midlands Airport.
CB: Castle Donington.
JL: Castle Donington. That had just opened and I was posted there. When I got there there were four or five other people there and no aeroplanes. So we had a nice time for a while. Then we collected some aeroplanes and started training. Right. Now we start. Originally I was on conversion training but then I went on to the navigation side and I was sent on a cross country with a, a five hour cross country, with a pupil crew and when I got — this was in October ‘42 and when I got back I found I was rostered to go on what they called a bullseye that night which is an exercise cooperating with the Observer Corps and the ground defences. I went to the mess and there was no food and there was no option but to go back down to the flight and took over yet another pupil crew I’d never met before. We went off on this bullseye. We got, we got over the Solway Firth, we were actually going to North Wales but via the Solway Firth and we hit icy conditions. Ice was [cough] ice was banging away on the side. I discovered that the wireless operator had declared his apparatus unserviceable. I’d no idea what the navigator was like. I was frozen stiff so I decided to go home. We were over ten tenths cloud as they called it and so I flew east for a long long long way before letting down safely and then found my way back to, to the airfield. The next day I was on the carpet for abandoning the bullseye. I explained everything but it didn’t cut any ice. This wing commander who hadn’t done a thing I think for himself demanded to see my logbook and in my logbook I’d cut out a little comic thing from a flight magazine where the caption was, “All the way from Hamburg on one engine,” and of course it was a chap sitting astride just an engine and this wing commander took exception to this and told me to take it off. By this time I told him I didn’t want to take it out. And we departed. We departed the worst of friends and very shortly after that a posting came through for me to 150 Squadron at Snaith which I quite welcomed because I was absolutely sick of OTUs. When I got to Snaith the wing commander said, ‘Who are you and what have you come for?’ So I said, ‘I don’t know why I’ve come, sir. [laughs] I’ve just been posted.’ And he said, ‘Well what do you want to do?’ I said, ‘I want to go on a Lancaster squadron.’ And so I did about three flights in their aircraft. 150 Squadron’s. They had Wellingtons 3s by then with a Hercules. And then I was posted to, [cough] oh dear. I’m sorry. 12 Squadron at Wickenby. Just outside Lincoln. When I got to Wickenby they still had Wellingtons but they were scheduled to train on to Lancs. I did three operations with Wellingtons. Then we were stood down for six weeks to transfer. Convert on to Lancasters.
CB: We’ll stop there just for a mo.
[Recording paused]
JL: And I think a couple of squadrons in 5 Group. That’s all there were at that time.
CB: So how did the conversion process operate? Bearing in mind there were no HCUs.
JL: Conversion on to Lancasters? Well we had a couple of pilots seconded to us. [coughs] I’m so sorry. Let me take a cough pill.
CB: Yeah.
[Recording paused]
JL: Between the Frisian Islands and the mainland.
CB: We’re just talking about your ops on the Wellington before you moved to Lancaster. So one was Hamburg.
JL: Not many on 40 Squadron.
CB: No.
JL: Nor at the OTU.
CB: No.
JL: But when I went back to 12 Squadron as I say we still had Wellingtons and I took over the flight commander’s crew as a going concern. We did one mining operation between Terschelling Island and the mainland and one on the approach to St Nazaire. In the estuary. That was a timed run for an island. I think in between was Hamburg. Bombing.
CB: And with mines you couldn’t drop from too great a height because it would shatter the mine so what height did you go?
JL: I think it was five hundred feet and a hundred and sixty miles an hour.
[pause]
CB: And you operated in miles an hour rather than knots did you?
JL: Yes. Incidentally on that run when I went to St Nazaire I decided to go across Brittany. Low down. It was dark but it was clear enough to fly at two or three hundred feet and I saw quite clearly somebody on the ground with a lantern and they swung it around in a circle as we went past.
CB: Exhilarating at low level at night was it?
JL: Well I think I probably thought it was safer than going higher because the guns couldn’t get at you.
CB: So that was a lone sortie. You weren’t going out as a squadron at the same time.
JL: Oh no. They were all lone sorties.
CB: Right.
JL: Except the, except the daylight on Brest.
CB: Right. So after those three then you do the conversion on to the Lancasters. So what was the process there?
JL: We spent quite a little time learning about the Lancaster on the ground and then we had two pilots from 460 Squadron attached to us and they quite quickly converted us. It didn’t take very long. A Lancaster was quite easy to fly and then we took over our crews and spent some time.
CB: So when you moved to Lancasters the four engines all had an engineer. How did that selection work? Did you have all the crew with you?
JL: Well we had, oh a suitable number of mid-upper gunners and engineers arrived and we didn’t choose them. They were just allocated.
CB: So —
JL: And with a full crew then we started doing navigation exercises, a lot of which, much to our concern, were low level formation.
CB: Daylight or night?
JL: Daylight. We didn’t like the idea very much. In the end we didn’t do any daylights.
CB: So what time are we talking about now? 1942.
JL: 1942. Yes.
CB: Yeah.
JL: My first operation on Lancs was a mining operation. To Norway. Haugesundfjord fjord
[pause]
CB: What was the, that was just in the fjord. Just in the entrance was it? Or close to the shipping?
JL: It was more or less parallel to the coast as I remember.
CB: Right.
JL: It wasn’t, it wasn’t very well defended at all. Searchlights came up and a bit of light flak and my gunners responded quickly and, and they put the lights out again.
CB: What sort of height were you doing your mining?
JL: Five hundred feet.
CB: That was also five hundred was it? Right. Ok. And then the rest of the ops. On that tour how many did you do? With 12 squadron?
JL: I think I did twenty two [pause] on Lancasters. Did thirty on Wellingtons. I did the two thousand bomber raids. And then another twenty two [coughs], another twenty two on Lancs which made fifty four I think.
CB: So that normal tour would be thirty. So why did you stop at twenty two?
JL: Oh well I’d done, I did the fifty fourth operation which was to La Spezia in Italy. And the next morning I was called in by the wing commander. And wondering what I’d done wrong, and he said that a new edict had come through that a second tour was now twenty operations. Not twenty. And as I’d done twenty I was finished as of then.
CB: Right. Not thirty. Yeah.
JL: So I finished very suddenly at fifty four.
CB: So what was the next move from there?
JL: Well I wanted to be a test pilot and I thought the best way of starting was getting a posting to a maintenance unit. The wing commander. Wing commander. [pause] Oh dear. Wood. Wing Commander Wood was very very helpful because my first posting after having finished the second tour was back to Wellington 1Cs at Harwell.
CB: Oh right.
JL: And I complained very very loudly about that so WinCo Wood took me off that and made me sort of supernumerary on the squadron. I was talking to new crews and doing odd jobs and then I couldn’t go on forever so they gave me a posting to the Group Gunnery Flight at Binbrook. 1481 flight. I was, they had a Wellington flight and a Martinet flight — the target towers. I was in charge of the Wellington flight and I had a right royal time there. I was my own boss and we did as we liked. But then a posting came through for me to Boscombe Down. A&AEE which I was rather frightened about that. I wasn’t sure if I was up to it. In the end it was fine. Incidentally, the posting to Harwell, another second tour pilot finished shortly after me [pause] Once again his name’s gone. But he took it because his wife lived near Harwell and within about six weeks he was dead. The engine caught fire and the thing folded. What was his name? All these names are in there.
CB: Yeah.
JL: In ten minutes time I can tell you.
CB: Ok. We can pick it up. So now you’re on the way to Boscombe Down.
JL: Yes. I went to Boscombe Down. I was posted to, there was an armament flight and a performance testing flight. I went to the armament flight and the flight commander gave me a ride in a B, oh dear, B25.
CB: Mitchell.
JL: Mitchell. Mitchell. And that was it. I didn’t have any dual. You just got in to an aeroplane and flew it.
CB: Right.
JL: And that’s just, just what happened. And I amassed a total of, I think eventually a hundred and forty four types.
CB: Really. So what formal process did they have for introducing you to test flying?
JL: None at all then. I was just posted in, as I said given a ride in a Mitchell because I’d never been in an American aircraft before. And that was it. I flew them all. Liberators, Fortresses. What was the, was it a B26?
CB: Marauder.
JL: Marauder. That was a bit of a handful.
CB: Was it?
JL: Very high wing loading.
CB: And when you were doing the flying did you have people with you on instruments? Who were monitoring instruments? What was actually happening at Boscombe Down?
JL: Most of my flying was done for armament purposes and we had armament technical officers. Sort of bombing and gunning and we were supervising the tests. We were just drivers really.
CB: Yeah.
JL: My first job, my very first job when I got down there was to drop a four thousand pounder from fifteen hundred feet. Well in the, in Bomber Command the quoted safety height for dropping a four thousand pounder is six thousand feet. Really it was nothing. You felt, well you heard and felt just a little bump. And all this was, they were doing a lot of tests in preparation for what they called second TAF. Second Technical Airforce for the invasion.
CB: So this is army support effectively. So the four thousand pounder’s the cookie which is just a barrel.
JL: Oh yes.
CB: And did you feel there was some danger in doing that? Or did you prove there wasn’t?
JL: Well as I say we’d been told the safety height was six thousand feet and we were sent off to do it at fifteen hundred but I had no problem.
CB: Which was what they wanted to know.
JL: They were measuring it.
CB: Where would you, where was the range where you dropped those?
JL: Lyme Bay. Just off Lyme Regis.
CB: Yeah. What other things were you dropping? Or was there a lot of gunnery involved as well with the fifty seven millimetre.
JL: A bit of both. I had another job with a Mosquito. Oh incidentally. Mosquito. This was typical Boscombe at the time. There was quite a lot of social drinking went on in the evenings and one of the chaps who was, I was very fond of as an armament officer called Shepherd. He was a school master in civil life but he was involved with the rocket. RPs rocket projectiles which was flown by the [pause] oh God.
CB: The Mosquitos and the Beaufighters.
JL: Yes.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Anyway, one night he said, ’Would you like to fly a Mosquito?’ So I said, ‘Yes please.’ And the next day we just walked out to this Mosquito. Let’s say 8RPs. Four under each wing. And I got in. He got in behind me and we went off. That was literally true.
CB: And you’d never flown a two engine.
JL: I’d never flown a Mosquito before.
CB: No.
JL: And I’d certainly never fired rockets but there was quite an art in that because he was telling me what to do all the time. And then another job I had with the Mosquito was — I think they were probably four thousand pound casings filled with [pause] oh dear my brain. Flammable stuff.
CB: Oh yes. Napalm.
JL: What?
CB: Napalm.
JL: Napalm. Yes and this was, this was done we had a range at Crichel Down which, which was, I guess, sometime after the war and low level and so I went off and dropped one of these things at low level. Went back and landed and they phoned up and said, ‘You’re too high.’ So I had another one. I think we did this four times. Eventually I was flying just as low as I possibly dare.
CB: Was this in a Mosquito again?
JL: Yes. And then I saw some cine film of it afterwards but to see this Mosquito scuttling along just above the treetops and a great flame drops the, a great flame went up like a clutching hand way up above the Mosquito. Came down just missing its tail. It was quite frightening to watch and I did that four times.
CB: Blimey. This is using the four thousand pounder casing.
JL: That’s what it looked like. Yes.
CB: When you were doing your four thousand pounder at fifteen hundred feet what plane were you using to drop?
JL: The Lanc.
CB: That was the Lanc. Right. Ok. What other exciting planes? Did you fly single seaters at Boscombe Down?
JL: Oh yes. You could fly anything you wanted. Just go along and say, ‘Please can I have a go at this.’ And you did. There were, well I’d already flown Spitfires. I don’t know where they got that from but I pinched a Spitfire.
CB: Oh did you?
JL: At Binbrook.
CB: You felt it needed exercising.
JL: Yes. You haven’t, you haven’t got on to this one.
CB: No. Go on.
JL: Well —
CB: Right.
JL: 1 Group. They had a, I think he was a New Zealander with a Spitfire. He used to go around all the squadrons doing fighter affiliation. He came. He used to come to Binbrook about once a week I should think. Every time he came I used to say, ‘Give us a go in your Spitfire.’ And eventually he said, ‘Well I’m going to lunch. I know nothing about it.’ So I took that as a have a go.
CB: Have a go.
JL: Yeah. So I went off and did fifteen minutes in this Spitfire and the station commander was Hughie Edwards.
CB: Oh right. [laughs]
JL: Well actually I got on well with him and just a couple of days later, I can’t remember what he said but it was just a very few words just to let me know that he knew about it and having done that I thought well I’ll have another go. So the next time this chap came in I had another go. And then at Kirton Lindsey, not very far away there was a Spitfire OTU. So I went off in — Hughie Edwards used to have a Tiger Moth. He used to let me fly that and I just introduced an Aussie, Aussie wireless op of 460 Squadron. So we went over to Kirton Lindsey and said we wanted to fly Spitfires and they said, ‘Well you’ll have to use Hibaldstow. Our satellite.’ So I went over to Hibaldstow. Now. I can’t for the life of me think how this ever happened but I walked in there and said, ‘Please sir, I have flown a Spitfire before. Can I have another go?’ And then he gave me a Spitfire and I went off for forty five minutes. They’d never seen me before. I’d never seen them before. But this is true. It’s true.
CB: Was this the OTU for the Eagle Squadron?
JL: No. I don’t think so.
CB: No.
JL: I don’t know what it was. It was just a Spitfire OTU.
CB: Yeah. Right. Amazing.
JL: I mean authorising. Who the hell would authorise a flight in a Spitfire from somebody they’d never seen before?
CB: What rank were you at that time?
JL: Flight lieutenant. [pause] Yeah. Lots of things like that happened to me. It’s hard to believe them now.
CB: Yeah.
JL: I guarantee it. I don’t know how you would ever prove it now but [poor old Max Kiddie?] the Aussies. He died. Well most Aussies seem to die young. Most of the ones I knew did.
CB: Yeah. Back at —
JL: Hughie Edwards only made sixty eight.
CB: Yes. Back at Boscombe Down you’ve got all these variety of planes and you’re in the armament flight. So on the single engine planes what are you testing?
JL: Mostly guns. Things like the Avenger I remember, which was quite a nice aeroplane. We didn’t have many single engines. Only for our own test purposes but I used to go around and fly other people’s.
CB: So the Grumman Avenger was — you were doing that for the navy were you?
JL: Yes.
CB: Right.
JL: Yes I remember the Avenger. The Avenger, I think, yes. I can’t remember what. We did anything. And we were all much the same. We were entitled to one day off a week but nobody ever took it. All that happened when there was a non-flying day we all went into Salisbury. Otherwise every day was the same.
CB: Yeah. What other twin-engined aircraft did you fly at Boscombe Down?
JL: I don’t know.
CB: Did you have a Whirlwind for instance?
JL: No. No. Unfortunately not. I liked the look of a Whirlwind. They had the, they had the Wyvern there but it never went into production. It was a sort of larger, uglier looking one.
CB: Wellington.
JL: I’ve made a list somewhere of what I’ve flown.
CB: Ok. So after Boscombe Down. Then what? We’re now getting to what? What time of the war?
JL: Well the Empire Test Pilot School had started and had number one course for only about eight or ten people on that. And they had number two course. That was going on during the time I was there. They were based at Boscombe. I applied for number three course which began on the 13th March 1945 and actually I’d been, I was scheduled to drop the, I can’t remember whether it was the Tallboy or the Grand Slam but the weather had been duff and the 13th of March came up and that was the date of DPDS started so I had to give up that and a chap called Steve Dawson did the dropping of it. But of course 514. Oh my brain. Come on. The Dambusters.
CB: Yeah. 617.
JL: 617. That’s better. They already had them of course.
CB: So talking about Tallboy and Grand Slam. How were you testing those and where?
JL: Dropping them on Ashley Walk in the New Forest.
CB: So did they, they were looking for penetration were they? Or accuracy of flight? What were they looking at?
JL: I can’t remember.
CB: Because they were pinpoint delivery bombs.
JL: Probably the mechanics of dropping it. Yes that would be it. No point in dropping it on Ashley Walk except to make a big hole.
CB: Were they testing the ability of the two bombs to penetrate concrete?
JL: I don’t think so. I think 617 squadron were already doing that. They did the Tirpitz and that thing in France.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Coupole or whatever they called it.
CB: Coupole. Yes. They did a good job on that.
JL: Did a good job of the Tirpitz too.
CB: Yeah. And V3. Tallboys. The guns. The guns in the hillside. So did you, after doing your dropping did they ask you to look at the result of what you’d done?
JL: I can’t remember that. No.
[pause]
JL: I had a wonderful time at Boscombe. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
CB: I bet. So you talked about ETPS the Test Pilot School so what happened there. Number three course.
JL: I was on number three course. Yes. And of course the end of the war came. Chief test pilots round the industry had a habit of coming down and taking lunch with the senior officers and Cyril Feather who was the chief test pilot at Boulton Paul wanted a pilot and somebody suggested me. And I was a bit flattered and thought it would be a good idea so I accepted. And at the end of the course actually we were all being, getting the future sorted out. I had applied for a permanent commission. In the event they didn’t issue permanent commissions immediately. They did what amounted to short service. They didn’t call it short service. Four year contracts.
CB: Yeah. Just Short Service Commissions.
JL: It was a short service commission but they called it something else.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Extended Service Commission
CB: Oh right.
JL: In the event they only issued Extended Service Commissions and I took this offer of Boulton Paul’s but when I got there the chief test pilot engineer was there. He didn’t know I was coming. He was a bit put out understandably. Anyway, we got on alright but there was nothing to do there and I went to ETPS course dinner and we had a number four course I suppose which at this time it was [pause] oh dear [pause] somewhere near Milton Keynes
CB: Oh Cranfield.
JL: Cranfield. Thank you. I’m sorry about this.
CB: That’s alright.
JL: And the Groupie — I can’t think of his name now. A little chap. Said, ‘Are you happy where you are?’ I said, ‘No sir.’ He said, ‘Well, Saunders Roe are looking for somebody. Well, Saunders Roe suited me very well because apart from being on the Isle of Wight my wife lived near Winchester and so I I left Baulton Paul and went to Saunders Roe and [cough] oh dear. I don’t know why my throat’s doing this.
CB: Do you want a break? We’ll just stop for a mo?
[Recording paused]
CB: Now, one thing I didn’t ask you about the Boscombe Down range was you were actually testing American aircraft as well as British.
JL: Oh yes.
CB: One of the night fighters, American night fighters was called Black Widow.
JL: Yes. Flew that.
CB: What was that like?
JL: It was not a very pleasant aircraft to fly really. I think it had remote controlled guns for even firing. It was alright but not a, not a very brilliant aircraft. Yes. The P51.
[pause]
CB: Right. Thank you. So we’re now at Saunders Roe. So what was the task there?
JL: Well they didn’t have a proper pilot there but chief designers [unclear] had been at the fleet air arm. He was doing a little bit. There were, at the time they were building Sea Otters and refurbishing Walruses, the jet flying boat fighter was on the docks. The SRA1. And in the distance was the Princess.
CB: Right.
JL: And so I just joined in flying the Walruses and the Sea Otters and then they, they sent me on a Sunderland conversion course to Pembroke Dock which was very nice. So I had the full OTU course on the Sunderland. Now what had happened at Saunders Roe was that Short Brothers — where did they used to be? On the Thames.
CB: At Chatham. Rochester.
JL: Rochester. Stafford Cripps, who was a trade minister or something, nationalised Short’s and sent them to Belfast. They never did like that including the chairman Sir Arthur Gouge. So he carried these down to Saunders Roe and he was, he was followed by a whole lot of other people including a general manager, Browning and a whole lot and they just didn’t want to be at Belfast. And whilst I was away at Pembroke Dock I got a letter from the managing director [laughs] Captain Clark saying that Geoffrey Tyson would be joining the company as chief test pilot. Well he was one of the Short’s. Well he was chief test pilot at Short’s. I thought well that’s fair enough. He knows his stuff. I don’t. And so I wrote back and said, “Yes, that’s fine by me sir.” And when I got back I met Geoffrey. He was the most peculiar chap. He wasn’t the least interested in me, my background. He didn’t want to see my logbooks. Nothing. He knew nothing about me. And I found it very hard to get on with him. He hadn’t any sense of humour, he didn’t drink, he didn’t smoke. But we staggered along and he did the first few flights on the SRA1 and then he let me have a go. Well then, well we, we didn’t get on at all. Face it. We shared the same birthday but he was twelve years older than me.
CB: Right.
JL: And —
CB: In flying boat terms he was a cold fish.
JL: Then he, he told me one day that John Booth, who was another Short pilot was going to join as his number two so obviously that was my invitation to leave. So I rang up Eric Franklin at Armstrong Whitworth and got a job back there straight away and that was, that was the end of the things. I flew the SRA1 at Farnborough along with several other do’s.
CB: Just to put this —
JL: He was a most peculiar fellow.
CB: To put this into a context if I may. The SRA1 was the first jet powered Flying Boat.
JL: Yes.
CB: So what was the concept and what was it like?
JL: I think the idea was it would be handy in the Pacific area where they wouldn’t have to have a runway. It was quite a powerful machine with four twenty millimetre cannon.
CB: It was a fighter.
JL: It was a fighter. Yes. And although it was a bit bulky for a fighter it was quite lively but of course the Pacific war ended and there was no more call for it. Three were completed and two were crashed. One by Winkle Brown and one by a [Pete Major?] at Felixstowe. Another one is at Southampton.
CB: So you did the course on the Sunderland at Pembroke. That set you up.
JL: Pembroke Dock.
CB: Pembroke dock. That set you up in anticipation of flying the SRA1 did it? Was that the idea?
JL: Yes. That was the Flying Boats in general.
CB: And you were flying the Walruses and the Otters
JL: Yes. The Walruses and the Sea Otter you could taxi on the slipway.
CB: Yeah.
JL: The others needed mooring.
CB: So, what, how did it feel flying a jet flying boat? Because compared with flying a piston engine it was quite different.
JL: Well I had flown jets before. I flew the Vampire and the Meteor.
CB: At Boscombe Down.
JL: Yeah. [pause] I don’t know. Didn’t feel particularly different.
CB: Did you have to have particularly unusual handling techniques because of being a jet engine and getting water in it?
JL: Well they had designed in an extended snout but it was never necessary. It was never used because the spray was always well clear of the intake. I’ve got to have another.
CB: That’s alright.
[Recording pause]
JL: At that time the Isle of Wight was bristling with retired naval captains.
CB: Oh.
JL: Actually I thought he was one of those.
CB: Right.
JL: It turned out to be a captain in the Royal Flying Corps and equivalent of a flight lieutenant.
CB: But he called himself Captain Clark.
JL: Oh he was very fussy about the captain bit.
CB: Yeah. How interesting. What was he like as a personality? As the chairman.
JL: He was a bit peculiar. He had very little technical knowledge. How he came to be managing director I don’t know.
CB: Of an aviation company.
JL: Finance I suppose. But he was a bit of an oddball.
CB: Now after the Saunders Roe situation changing you went back to Armstrong Whitworth.
JL: Yes.
CB: So how did that come about? You just made direct contact or how did it work?
JL: Well when Geoffrey told me John Booth was joining as his number two that was obviously my cue to go so I immediately phoned Eric Franklin who — he’d been an apprentice with me at Armstrong Whitworth and he was then chief test pilot and he offered me a job straight away. So I was on my way within a very few days.
CB: So what was Armstrong Whitworth working on then? We’re talking about 1946 now are we?
JL: ‘49
CB: ‘49. Right.
JL: When I, when went back there the bread and butter was the production of Mark iv Meteors which became Mark viii Meteors. Simultaneously we had the Apollo which was a heap of rubbish.
CB: An airliner.
JL: Yes.
CB: An imitation air liner.
JL: It was supposed to be in competition with the Vickers Viscount. That was because it had to have Armstrong Siddeley engines, which were rubbish so it was never made anywhere. They were very [pause] well, a child of ten could have designed it.
CB: Oh.
JL: We had the 52. The 52 glider.
CB: So how, the AW52 was a flying wing.
JL: Yes.
CB: So could you just explain what the concept there was and the use of the glider first?
JL: Well, one of the purposes of it was to try to develop laminar flow over the wing.
CB: Right.
JL: But it wasn’t very successful because it’s impossible to keep the wind surface clear of squashed flies and things but actually it was a very experimental aircraft. I suppose they had ideas of building a massive passenger aircraft in that form but in this case it was just a two seater but they, it only had twenty six degrees of sweepback which was not nearly enough. And on controls they had several choices. What they chose was an elavon — a combined elevator and aileron. They could have split them and had separate ailerons and elevators or power controls were coming along although they hadn’t reached it yet. Well they wrongly decided on the elavons which meant that fore and aft was a very short lever balance, was very vert sensitive fore and aft, very very heavy laterally and they had a compromise and the compromise was through a spring tab. Are you familiar with a spring tab?
CB: Yeah.
JL: On a spring tab the spring had to be very very weak so that your controls are connected to a very floppy spring and my problem was exceeding the [pause] exploring the higher speed range before flutter set in. I was completely disorientated and I believe that I would have passed out very quickly so instead of that I pulled the blind down. I didn’t do anything properly in the ejection. You were supposed to put your heels on the footrest. I didn’t do that. I just didn’t do it. That’s all. And it had spectacle controls. Somehow or other my knees missed that. They were bruised but otherwise, otherwise ok. So once again I was very very very lucky.
CB: What height were you flying?
JL: About three thousand feet.
CB: And what speed?
JL: Three hundred. About three hundred and fifty. The limiting speed had just been increased and that’s what I was doing.
CB: So it’s the —
JL: Exploring that.
CB: Right. And theoretically what was the maximum speed? Fairly low was it?
JL: Oh I expect so. Yes. Yes not much performance testing was done. It was all sort of handling. Trying to get the controls right.
CB: So you’re at three thousand. Three thousand feet. What sort of speed were you actually flying at at that moment?
JL: Well the last I remember was about three fifty.
CB: It was at three fifty. Right.
JL: We were still at miles an hour.
CB: Yeah. Yeah.
JL: And —
CB: The parachute automatically deployed.
JL: No. No.
CB: You had to do it.
JL: I had to do the whole thing.
CB: Yeah.
JL: I had to release the Sutton harness and pull the rip cord.
CB: Right.
JL: I made a very bad landing and hurt my shoulder a bit. Still hurts.
CB: Where? Where did this take place?
JL: A place called little Long Itchington.
CB: I know it. Yes.
JL: Do you know it? South of Coventry.
CB: Yes. Good pub there.
JL: Yes. I’ve been there.
CB: The Blue Light.
JL: The Blue Light.
CB: Yes.
JL: Used to kept by Wing Commander Sandy Powell.
CB: Oh.
JL: Who had been at Boscombe Down. In charge of C flight.
CB: And he he became a Comet test pilot and that blew his mind.
JL: Hmmn?
CB: He had been a Comet test pilot as well hadn’t he?
JL: Sandy?
CB: Yeah.
JL: Well he’d flown all sorts of things.
CB: Yeah. Right. So that’s where you came down. And the plane came down somewhere. Where?
JL: About two miles further on.
CB: Yeah. What? How did you start off with the gliders? The Glider. How did that handle? You were towed up by something and then —
JL: [laughs]. Not exactly. They had, they had a Whitley to tow it off first of all but when I got there they’d just been allocated a Lancaster. That Whitley was the last off the production line and they took it away and broke it up. There was no Whitley any more. But we had a Lancaster which was much better getting the glider up to a decent height. Used to take it up and then do tests on the way down.
CB: So how manoeuvrable was the glider?
JL: Well it was much better. It was two thirds the size of a big one and it was not metal? It was plywood construction which made it much more rigid and the controls were much better. Still a bit odd.
CB: And what sort of test envelope would you be exploring in that?
JL: Oh I don’t know. I don’t remember.
CB: Then you moved to the AW52.
JL: Yes. I only did two and a half flights in the AW52.
CB: Right.
JL: And the other one was grounded. Then they did some vibration tests with it at very slow speeds. When they sent it to Farnborough where it was regarded as a curiosity. I think they tried to resurrect the laminar flow test but it was no good and it finished up as a curiosity and was eventually broken up.
CB: What was the engine power on that? Was it twin engine?
JL: Yes. Two Nenes. Yes. One had two Nenes. One had two Derwents.
CB: Right. So this was a government contract.
JL: Yes.
CB: To examine laminar flows.
JL: A research. A government supported.
CB: So after that you get out. You’re the first person to use an ejector seat in serious operation.
JL: Yes. The Germans had got on of course during the war. They weren’t as good of course. I think they were operated by compressed air. But I think there were a quite a lot of German ejections.
CB: Were there?
JL: And I was the first of the allied side shall we say.
CB: In peacetime. So you injured your shoulder. What did you do after that?
JL: I was off flying for about a month and then I went to central, CME Central Medical Establishment in London and they gave me a going over and sent me home with a little piece of paper which said, “Fits, fits civilian MOS pilot but not to be exposed to the hazards of the Martin-Baker ejection seat.” And so shrieks of laughter at that. Still are. [laughs]
CB: An interesting point though in practical terms the seat is operated by a cartridge. What was the affect? The seat is operated by an explosive cartridge so what did the ejection itself do to your spine?
JL: Well I had already gone up to [Denham?] and got on the test rig and following that I had a little bit of pain in my tail. I mentioned this to my GP and explained what had happened. He said, ‘Well, I expect you bruised it a bit.’ But the pain didn’t go away. It wasn’t constant and so I ignored it. Then when I ejected they x-rayed me and they said that I’d suffered a compression fracture of the first and second vertebrae and what’s more this was the second time this has happened. So the same thing happened both times.
CB: Right.
JL: I think it’s quite common actually.
CB: Yes. It’s just the modern seats are rocket and they still have a sharp acceleration don’t they?
JL: Yes.
CB: So, ok. What did you do next then? Did you return to flying?
JL: Oh yes. I went to Armstrong Whitworth and started again. And well we went through a lot of productions the Sea Hawk, the Hunter 2 and 5, Hunter 7. We had [pause] God. Come on brain. Javelin.
CB: Oh yes. ‘Cause they were building all of these. Some contractors were they?
JL: Yes. I mean we took over. We took over the Sea Hawk complete. Design and everything.
CB: Oh right.
JL: But the others were just sub-contracts. The Hunter 2 and the 5 had Sapphire engines. We built all those.
CB: How long did all that go on?
JL: Well the Argosy came along 1959. And I participated in that for a while which wasn’t a very good aircraft at all. Didn’t have enough range for the RAF to start with. But Glosters closed down. Who else closed down? Avro. Avro’s closed down [pause] No they didn’t. Glosters closed down. Somebody else closed down and the Hawker Siddeley Group was sort of imploding rapidly and so I thought it time to go rather than just sit about and wait to be picked to be sacked. And so I went to the managing director and said I’d be happy to leave and that I had a suggestion that they see me through the necessary, considerable training to obtain an airline transport pilot’s licence and they happily agreed to that. They paid all my expenses. In all for about three months. I got that licence and they gave me a year’s salary and said thank you very much. And unfortunately I was, met another chap who’d got into crop spraying in Africa. Made a lot of money. And he talked me into joining him in the business but unfortunately he had a wife too many and he bought a house out of the business and things were going very wrong and I lost a lot of money and pulled out. And I needed a job and there was a job down here at Shoreham regional air maps. Doing air survey photography and map making. So I took that job to give me, keep me sane while I looked around for an airline job but the only airline job that came my way was flying a Dakota to Dusseldorf at night with the papers. I didn’t fancy that at all. I was well placed because the crewing manager at British United was a chap who’d been at Boscombe Down, Charles Moss and he was looking out for me. And nothing came along. This was in 1964. So I took this job and I got engrossed in the air survey business anyway and passed the point of no return age wise I think and I stayed there until I was sixty five.
CB: So looking back on your RAF career what was the most memorable point, would you say, of your activities?
JL: I think my first tour with that motley crew I had.
CB: In what way?
JL: Well we went everywhere together. Did everything together.
CB: Yeah.
JL: It was rather different with the second tour. We didn’t sort of mix socially so much.
CB: Didn’t you?
JL: Well I had good happy times but —
CB: When were you commissioned? In the first tour.
JL: In my first tour. Yeah. August 1941.
CB: Right.
JL: This was another little story. I was down in the dispersal one day and an airman came down and said, ‘Here. You’ve got to fill this in.’ [laughs] And it was an application form for a commission. So I thought I’d better fill it in which I did and I had to go to London for an interview and my crew, I went down by train late at night. My crew duly saw my off via the George Hotel and I was in a pretty fair state when I got on the train. Got to London in the blackouts. There was an air raid warning on. I had nowhere to go. I eventually found a dim light which was the Church Army or Salvation Army or something. A little hostel. So I went in there and they gave me a bed for the night. In the morning I never saw the proper toilet facilities. I just got, I just got dressed. I had a terrible hangover and went for my interview. I think it was actually Adastral House in Kingsway. Then went back to the squadron and carried on. And then we went on leave and I still had my car. If you had a car and you went on leave you had petrol coupons for the place you were going so obviously the best thing is to have a destination as far away as possible to get the most petrol. So I had the address of a friend in Shrewsbury and I just gave that as my address whilst on leave. Whilst I was on leave they sent a telegram to this address saying commission granted and never to return as pilot officer so I turned up not knowing a thing about this so I had to rush into Cambridge and get myself fitted for a uniform and rushed in again to put it on and went in as a sergeant and came back as a pilot officer. And my crew all came with me as usual and they marched in front demanding that everybody saluted me. [laughs]
CB: Sounds like a riot.
JL: Yeah.
CB: Didn’t work the same way with the Lancaster crew. Is that because you had two people join later?
JL: Well I had a ready-made crew. The commanding officer had gone off sick. He needed some surgery and I took over his crew which was a Wellington crew. And the navigator was a ex-Exeter prison jailer and he had, he had funny ideas. He used to take a .38 revolver with him on ops. Yeah. The wireless operator was, came from Dublin and surprisingly he was a teetotal. The original wireless op and the rear gunner both changed quite quickly having finished whatever they were on and so I had a sort of a scratch crew to start with and when we changed we changed on to Lancs we had two new members and we were all on happy good terms but we didn’t sort of go down the the pub as a gang as we did on the first tour.
CB: How many other officers in your crew? In that case. On the Lancasters.
JL: There were no officers except me in the first crew. The second crew [pause] I had two changes of navigator and they were both commissioned. The rear gunner in both cases both were commissioned. Just in the last legs I had a commissioned wireless op. A Canadian. Gordon Fisher. The rest were all sergeants.
CB: You had an unusually broad experience because you started early and did various other things. To what extent did you come across LMF?
JL: On 40 Squadron we had a chap. I can tell you his name can I?
CB: Ahum.
JL: [Hesketh?]
CB: Yeah.
JL: And all sorts of things kept going wrong with him. He did a lot of second pilot trips. I had my [unclear] [serves me right?] one time prior to going out on ops he retracted the undercarriage. Almost anything to stop him and he was eventually flying second pilot with the flight commander and that aircraft was seen circling on a point on the East Anglian coast well north off the point where we were supposed to stage through and it spun in and crashed and they were all killed including the flight commander. Creegan was it? And this chap Hesketh. You can’t help but think that Hesketh had something to do with that but why they were, they were about fifty miles north of where they should have been. The other one I only know by hearsay which was 12 Squadron. A crew ditched in the North Sea. The dinghy was upside down and they had to sit on the upturned dinghy for three days and they were rescued and of course they were hospital cases. Apparently for days afterwards when they squeezed [the flesh?] water came out. The wireless op I believe, this was all hearsay Flight Sergeant Rose and he was put back on ops far too soon. He wasn’t ready for it and he was whisked off. Presumably pronounced LMF. Which was very very very unkind. My experience of the RAF was that they were always very kind and compassionate to me.
CB: Well.
JL: Particularly Wing Commander Wood.
CB: Jo thank you very much indeed for a fascinating interview.
JL: I don’t think it was very good.
[Recording paused]
JL: One incident at 12 Squadron again. Lancs. We were right over the top of Hamburg a Junkers 88 went. We heard his engines.
CB: Did you?
JL: Straight over the top of us. Missed us by about ten feet I think.
CB: In the dark.
JL: In the dark.
CB: Yeah.
JL: Well in the dark but you could see quite a lot.
CB: Yeah. Yeah. Quite a shock.
JL: Yes [laughs] if he’s close enough to hear the engines he’s too bloody near.
CB: Yeah. And you thanked your lucky stars.
JL: I had another one. I had a very good Australian navigator on 12 Squadron. Anyway, he had to miss an op for some reason or other and we were given a Canadian. A chap called Abrahamson. I’d never sort of met him till we got in the aircraft and the target was Essen. And we went off and by the time we got to the Dutch coast he wasn’t making any sense at all but fortunately the PFF were putting down markers at a couple of turning points and the night was absolutely gin clear. You could see everything. You could see the coast and rivers and I didn’t want to take issue with this Mr Abrahamson so I just carried on and we duly, I made the markers that PFF had put down. You couldn’t miss the target because they were marking that as well. Some duly did deliver the bombs and just flew home. Didn’t need any help flying home. We could see everything and of course when we got back we had to report everything to the squadron navigation officer. Mr Abrahamson was never seen again. By the time we got up in the morning he wasn’t there.
CB: Was he —
JL: Off the station. Where he went? Don’t know.
CB: Did you put that down to stress or just as an incompetent navigator?
JL: I’ve no idea. I’ve no idea. I didn’t know the chap. I hadn’t spoken to him.
CB: Right. Thank you.
[Recording paused]
CB: Wife died.
JL: Well [unclear]
CB: Right.
JL: Very sad. That’s right. We had a legal separation and she wanted to marry again so we did the divorce and then she died 1977.
CB: Right.
JL: I remarried and this wife went a bit berserk. I think she was almost certainly she was got onto drugs. She had her own car. Used to disappear into Brighton for days but she had her father who was a mouse living there and looked after my daughter Jenny and eventually she, well I divorced her and the next thing I knew she’d developed cirrhosis of the liver.
CB: Oh.
JL: And due to her very very peculiar behaviour she hadn’t any friends left at all. She was a very very sad case and she committed suicide.
CB: Right.
JL: In 1964. I’d just retired.
CB: A big strain.
JL: I was left with a daughter sixteen. Just doing her O Levels.
CB: Oh were you really.
JL: Fortunately she’s turned out absolute trumps.
WT: Good. Good.
CB: Excellent.
JL: And the son is fine too. So I have a son of seventy and a daughter forty nine and a loving and loyal family.
CB: Is Jenny married?
JL: She should be.
CB: Oh.
JL: I said, ‘Why don’t you get married?’ ‘What’s the point?’
CB: Oh right.
JL: One of those.
Dublin Core
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Title
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Interview with Jo Lancaster. Two
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Chris Brockbank
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2017-03-08
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Sound
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ALancasterJO170308
PLancasterJO1501
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Pending review
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Jo Lancaster grew up in Cumbria and joined the Air Force as soon as he was able. After training as a pilot he flew a tour of operations with 40 Squadron from RAF Alconbury. He then became an instructor before his second tour flying Lancasters with 12 Squadron from RAF Wickenby. He then became a test pilot at RAF Boscombe Down. He continued to be a test pilot after the war and was the first person to eject from an aircraft in danger using a Martin-Baker ejector seat. In all he flew a total of more than 144 aircraft types.
Contributor
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Julie Williams
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Germany
Great Britain
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Coventry
France--Brest
France--Saint-Nazaire
Germany--Hamburg
Scotland--Lossiemouth
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
England--Warwickshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940
1941
1942
1945
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
02:00:18 audio recording
12 Squadron
150 Squadron
20 OTU
22 OTU
40 Squadron
aircrew
B-25
B-26
bombing
bombing of Cologne (30/31 May 1942)
crewing up
Grand Slam
Lancaster
Me 109
Me 110
Meteor
mine laying
Mosquito
Operational Training Unit
pilot
RAF Alconbury
RAF Boscombe Down
RAF Castle Donington
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Wickenby
RAF Wyton
recruitment
Spitfire
Tallboy
training
Walrus
Wellington
Whitley