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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Didwell, Robert Norman William
R N W Didwell
Norman Didwell
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Didwell, RNW
Description
An account of the resource
5 items. Two oral history interviews with Leading Aircraftsman Robert Norman William Didwell (b. 1920, 637410 Royal Air Force) and three photographs . He joined the RAF in 1938 and after training as a rigger served on 99 Squadron equipped with Wellingtons at RAF Newmarket . Subsequently he served at RAF Boscombe Down before going overseas to the middle and far east with Transport Command.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Robert Norman William Didwell and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB: My name is Chris Brockbank and today is the nineteenth of July two thousand and twelve, and I’m in Leighton Buzzard with Robert Norman William Didwell, known as ‘Young Did’, and er, we’re going to talk about his experiences as a man on the ground, keeping those valiant people flying. So, what is your first recollection of life with the family Norman?
RD: With the family?
CB: Yeh
RD: Oh, we had a happy old family
CB: Right
RD: I had an elder brother, who was older than me, he was a regular soldier before the war
CB: Right
RD: Erm, and I had a happy childhood, I was well fed which a lot of them in the nineteen twenties were not, erm, and a lot of people were starving but I was very lucky. My Mother was a, started off as a kitchen maid in with Sir Henry and Lady Campbell-Bannerman who was the Prime Minister of England for the old Liberal party, they had a big er, castle at outside of [inaudible] and er, they had a big townhouse at 137 Cromwell Road, and next door, to that building, in Cromwell Road, was 139, and who do you know lived there?
CB: [inaudible]
RD: Lady Scott, widow of Scott of the Antarctic, but she married Sir Arthur Kennet who was a liberal MP. So, at the time of when Scott, as you know [inaudible] a great nationalist, and a Lieutenant Commander in the Royal Navy got the distinguished service cross, he would be about twelve when I was in my first three or four years growing up, so, go back with a long way, and er, as I say, I left school and got a job with a local grocers, as an errand boy and then I went to the post office as a telegram boy, then I decided to join the air force [laughs] I joined up at the end of thirty-eight [pause] there you are
CB: Ok, so where did you join the RAF?
RD: Where did I join?
CB: Yes
RD: I used to go to join up you went to Kingsbury, which was the Air Ministry, then you went to either Uxbridge or Halton, if you were clever enough, er, you could join when you were fifteen at Halton as a boy apprentice, and you did three years at Halton. Did you know that, did you know?
CB: Yes
RD: Yep, erm, and most of the entries at Halton were very clever blokes and some of them rose right up the top. You go to Halton camp, there’s photographs of those who started as boy entrants, boy apprentices and right up the top of the ladder, air rank
CB: So, the top six in any pass out went to Cranwell?
RD: Yeh
CB: Right
RD: Thirty, thirty-two and thirty-one entries, were two very good entries, they did both trades, engine and air frame
CB: Which one were you in?
RD: Er?
CB: Which one were you in?
RD: I wasn’t, I never went to Halton
CB: Where did you go?
RD: I did my training at Uxbridge, your [inaudible] training you all do it, if you joined straight in at the age of eighteen or seventeen, then you do [inaudible] the technical bit you do it at Henlow which is an old RAF station, its only down the road from here, Henlow
CB: Absolutely, yeh
RD: You did a few weeks at Henlow telling you the theory of flight, what an aircraft does etcetera, etcetera, and then from then on, you go on, then, after I had been, when the war broke out, the second or third day, we moved from Mildenhall on the second of August nineteen thirty-nine, to Rowley Mile heath and Rowley Mile racecourse, and took over the Rowley Mile stadium, where we all slept, and eat and everything else, and er, so, we were in it from the start, right. Now, we hadn’t been there three or four days and er, ‘sticky glue’ said, ‘any of you guys got a driving licence?’ Well, fortunately, I passed a driving test because my Dad I don’t know [inaudible] I passed in nineteen thirty-eight and got a driving licence and er, he, we’d only been there a couple of days at Newmarket, and he said, ‘anybody here got a driving licence?’ So, there was, Dick Pike, who came from Leighton Buzzard, and myself, he said, right, he said, Flight Lieutenant Stanley is going over to Mildenhall, he’ll pick you up for the flight, he said, and you’ve got to try and do a test on a tractor [doorbell ringing]
[unknown] Hello
CB: So, just as we
RD: [inaudible]
CB: Yeh, from
Transcription stopped at 6.16. Sound quality too poor
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Robert Norman William Didwell
Description
An account of the resource
Interview has intermittent noise and is available only at the International Bomber Command Centre / University of Lincoln.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Chris Brockbank
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-07-19
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
ADidwellRNW160719, PDidwellRNW1601
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
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
01:30:18 audio recording
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Distinguished Service Cross
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Royal Air Force ex-Prisoner of War Association
Description
An account of the resource
97 items. The collection concerns Royal Air Force ex-Prisoner of War Association and contains items including drawings by the artist Ley Kenyon.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Robert Ankerson and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-01-29
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RAF ex POW As Collection
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
The Great Escape from Stalag Luft III
Description
An account of the resource
An account of the Great Escape with maps, sketches and photographs. Details of the three tunnels are set out and the night of the escape. The tunnel construction is detailed as is the team of organisers, engineers, escape kit manufacturers and forgers. Finally there is a poster warning prisoners of war not to try escaping.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
FS Kev Hannaford "Dick" Head
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-03-24
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
United States Army Air Force
Wehrmacht. Luftwaffe
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Artwork
Text. Personal research
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Five printed sheets
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MAnkersonR[Ser#-DoB]-180129-630001, MAnkersonR[Ser#-DoB]-180129-630002, MAnkersonR[Ser#-DoB]-180129-630003, MAnkersonR[Ser#-DoB]-180129-630004, MAnkersonR[Ser#-DoB]-180129-630005
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Poland
Poland--Żagań
aircrew
Distinguished Service Cross
Distinguished Service Order
escaping
evading
Goering, Hermann (1893-1946)
Hitler, Adolf (1889-1945)
Military Cross
prisoner of war
Red Cross
Stalag Luft 3