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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/668/10072/AAllenWH170331.2.mp3
b7e86ee136f31e0cba975ebbd6344a9b
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Title
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Allen, William Hubert
W H Allen
Bill Allen
Description
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An oral history interview with Sergeant William Allen (b. 1923, 1585749, 197351 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator with 76 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-03-31
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Allen, WH
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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MH: Ok. Good afternoon everybody. My name is Mark. I am a volunteer with the International Bomber Command Centre which is going to be located on Canwick Hill in Lincoln. I’m one of their volunteers that has the pleasure of coming to carry out interviews with veterans of Bomber Command. Today I have the great pleasure on the 31st of March 2017 of interviewing flight sergeant, as he was during his campaign time, Mr William Allen who resides in the fair country of Wales. And I have the pleasure in interviewing him this afternoon regarding his recollections both prior to the war and during it and then afterwards as well. But first of all we’ve managed to find out and to elicit from Bill some additional information from him regarding the service that his father undertook during the Great War ’14 to ’18. And I’ll get him to give us a brief resume of what he understands that his father’s service was in the Royal Naval Air Service. And then of a very romantic thing that his father got one of the personnel from the seaplane carrier the Ark Royal to do for him as a momento of his romancing what would have been Bill’s mother. So, good afternoon Bill. Thank you very much first of all for making yourself available for interview today. It’s greatly appreciated. So, I understand from your daughter, Wendy who’s given me a bit of insight into her grandfather and your father about where he served during the Great War. If you’d like to tell us about that first off.
WA: Right. As far as I know it his wartime service on the Ark Royal — 1914 he sailed from Lincolnshire to the Dardanelles. The Mediterranean. And the Ark Royal stayed there until she came back into home waters in 1918. During that time dad was courting a young lady from Surrey where he lived, or had lived at the time. And an engineer on the Ark Royal said to father to be, ‘What are you going to do with those letters?’ And father to be said, ‘Well, I suppose I’ll have to get rid of them.’ So this engineer said, ‘Let me have them and I’ll do something with them.’ And he made a walking stick which I’ve now still got. Which will be a hundred years old next year.
MH: Just for the people listening Bill has very kindly allowed me to see this lovely momento and to describe it for you. The best way to describe it Bill — would you just say it looks or it reminds me of a tree and the rings of a tree. It’s like somebody has done a cross carving across the plain of a tree trunk and you’ve got all the individual pages of the letters that you can see, and it’s a fabulous item. And it’s got a beautiful handle on top of it. And it’s such a fine momento of the Great War and of your parents courting, of course.
WA: Yeah.
MH: Of which you were then produced. So, tell us a bit more about yourself Bill. When were you born? Where were you born? A bit about your childhood. A bit about your interests before you saw service in the Royal Air Force.
WA: Well, I was born in Surrey, a place called Lingfield, on the 22nd of September 1923. Of course, I didn’t know much until about well four or five when you sort of realise things were going on. Dad was a head gardener on the estate in Dormans Park just outside Lingfield racecourse, but what shall we say? Nothing happened really. School was just normal. But in about 1937 things started going wrong. We thought well although I wasn’t, I was only what seventeen or sixteen. You think, well there’s a war coming. You could feel it. And I thought, well what am I going to do? And I thought well I know radio and I know Morse code so I think I’ll go in to Abingdon and volunteer for aircrew. So, I went to Abingdon, to the RAF Recruitment Centre and I said, ‘I wish to join up as aircrew.’ They said, ‘What as?’ So I said, ‘Well, radio. He said, ‘Well, go back. We’ve got your address. We’ll contact you when we can take you into the air force.’ So I went back, worked with dad on the estate until I got this call to go to aircrew selection. So I went to aircrew selection at Weston super Mare. I was passed as a wireless operator/air gunner, given a service number and they said, ‘The Army or the Navy won’t call you up. But,’ they said, ‘You’re a bit late getting here. What happened?’ I said, ‘Well, I left Abingdon this morning. Got a train to Oxford where there was an Aircrew Selection Board. I got a train to Didcot where there was another aircrew selection board. Another train to Bristol where there’s an aircrew selection board. And then on to Weston super Mare where I am now. And at the interview, and they said, ‘Right, you’re, you’re ok for wireless op/air gunner.’ And of course I found out afterwards the senior was a wing commander and he said, ‘Why did you go, why were you late getting here?’ So I told him why. All these stations. And he said, ‘Well, you’re not travelling back tonight. You’ll stay in a hotel tonight.’ So the next day I travelled back to Abingdon. The reverse direction. [laughs’] Stops all the way.
MH: So, you returned home having been selected. How long a period then between your selection at the aircrew selection and your eventual call up? How long a period do you think that was?
WA: So, as I, when I went for aircrew station I was sixteen and a half. I was finally called up just before my eighteenth birthday and I went to Padgate for initial kitting. From Padgate I went to RAF Yatesbury where it was the Number 1 Radio School. Of which there were funny tales about Yatesbury but never mind. We passed out at Yatesbury. I then went to North Wales for my gunnery. Passed out as an air gunner. Then I was posted back to Abingdon to crew up as, for a crew. Where I was crewed with a pilot, a bomb aimer, two gunners, and a navigator. But at the time because Whitleys only had two engines there was no [pause] excuse me my voice is going. There was no —
MH: Flight engineer.
WA: Flight engineer.
MH: Yeah. Yeah.
WA: We passed out at Abingdon. Then we went to Heavy Conversion Unit, Riccall in Yorkshire where we converted on to four engine Halies, or Halifaxes I should say. We passed out there. We were posted to 77 Squadron, Riccall in Yorkshire. We were there, well by the week because our skipper had to go as a second pilot on a raid in Germany. He never came back. So, we were a crew at 77 Squadron without a skipper. But at 102 Squadron, Pocklington was a squadron leader who wanted a crew. So we were posted to Pocklington. Crewed up with a squadron leader who was an excellent pilot because he he got shot in the tummy but he was an ex-Spitfire pilot. So he knew how to fly a Hali. And so we teamed up there. Got on well. And often we used to say on raids if it wasn’t for our skipper who knew how to treat the Germans we wouldn’t have got back. But of course sometimes we were damaged but the thing was coming back if the skipper, if the tail end, Tail End Charlie said, ‘Skipper, there’s a Mossie coming,’ We knew we were safe because the Mosquitoes had cannons and the Germans didn’t like that. But after we’d done about twenty one ops at 102 we, our skipper was made up to a wing commander so, we were then posted to Holme on Spalding Moor. 76 Squadron. And there we remained until the end of the war. And after of course 102 was then converted to Transport Command, onto the old Dakotas.
MH: Ok. Right. I’ve got a few questions for you Bill regarding your service. Ok. Going to take you all the way back then to your wireless operator training when you said there were a few tales that occurred at Wireless Training School. Are they repeatable, these tales? Or are they too naughty for the listener?
WA: Well, they’re a bit naughty.
MH: What happened? What did you get up to?
WA: Well, because on the, between Calne and Yatesbury on the big hillside there was carved a big horse. A white horse. And one day the boys, the RAF got blamed because the White Horse was a big stallion.
MH: Ah. Right.
WA: So, they were sent to grass it over a bit [laughs]
MH: Ok. Ok. And were you involved in that additional?
WA: No.
MH: No. Right. Ok. We’ll save the confession. So, basically they’d put an additional leg to the horse.
WA: Correct.
MH: Ok. So, you started your training on Whitleys. It’s not an aircraft people are very familiar with because not a lot of people know about the Whitley in all honesty. Can you give our listeners your impressions of the aircraft? How you found it. How you found it for the specific tasks that you had to carry out.
WA: Ok. She was a twin-engine. She was a main bomber before the Halies and the Lancs came in. Or the Lancaster was a Manchester before it was a Lancaster. But the dear old Whitley was, was always for us, a flying coffin. A job to get out of if there was any trouble.
MH: Right.
WA: She was slow. We did our first op from Abingdon to — on a leaflet raid into Germany but [pause] well we got back. The thing was that because my father, mum we lived at a place call Sutton Courtenay which was just outside Abingdon and of course I was back at Abingdon and I said, ‘Well, I won’t be able to see you tomorrow. I might be away.’ And all the aircraft, fourteen Whitleys went over our bungalow and dad said mum wouldn’t sleep until she counted fourteen back.
MH: Right. Ok.
WA: But [pause] well she was a, well I suppose what you’d call a medium bomber. Not much. But when we left Abingdon and got on to the Heavy Conversion on to Halies — a different aircraft. Four engines. But the Mark 1s and Mark 2s were a bit slow. But because the Hali was designed for Bristol radial engines she had to go, the Mark 1 and 2s had Rolls Royce and she wasn’t designed for those. But because the Hali couldn’t have the radial engines, the Bristols until the Battle of Britain was over because they were all wanted for the Hurricanes. But once the Hali got the radial engines Butch Harris, the boss of Bomber Command said, ‘Ah the Hali is now a better bomber than the Lancaster,’ and she was. She was a damned good aircraft. So, the only thing was with the Hali she was fast. She was faster than the Lanc. When the Tail End Charlie used to say, ‘Ah, there’s a Mossie coming up.’ A Mossie, for the listeners is a Mosquito. And that Mosquito aircraft was wooden but she had cannons and if we were coming, if we were damaged and the Mossie came beside us no German fighter would come within fifty miles of us because he could, that Mossie could blow him out the sky. And coming back the skipper always used to say to the mid-upper, ‘Make a note of the two, the marks, the letters on the aircraft so I can phone up the squadron when we get back.’
MH: So, thinking about when you did your first operation on the Whitley. It was a sort of postal run for leaflets. How did you feel about that? Instead of taking cargo that would have been of more use should we say.
WA: Well, we didn’t know. It’s a line of duty and that’s it. It was. As I say you put all these leaflets down the flare ‘chutes and that’s it.
MH: So, none of the crew had thoughts of — I’m putting my life on the line basically to be postie.
WA: No. No.
MH: Right.
WA: I can tell you about that later but it’s on. No. You didn’t.
MH: Didn’t think about that.
WA: No.
MH: Just saw it as part of service.
WA: I mean, we’re going on our first op so big deal. Big day. But when we got to our first, what we called our first operation with 102 with the new squadron leader, it was different, you see. Well, we did our first op over Germany. Come back ok. So, the next op one or two of us used to have a cigarette. So, we sat down and had a cigarette and we’d say, ‘Well, there’s ops tonight. Some are not coming back. But we are coming back.’ That’s the way you looked at it. You were coming back. You gave your packet of cigarettes to the ground crew. The old sergeant there and say who looked after our aircraft, ‘Here’s the cigarettes. If we don’t come back smoke them. Think of us.’
MH: So [pause] Now, I did some background reading in to Halifax Mark 3s. It’s not an aircraft that I’m very familiar or I wasn’t very familiar with but I am now. It quite surprised me I must admit that the wireless operator found themselves tucked beneath the pilot’s feet. How, how was that for you? Because they were above you. The flight engineer was above you. You had two other crew members technically behind you with the mid-upper and the tail gunner but there was yourself, the navigator and the bomb aimer all stuck in the front altogether. How did you find that because of being bulky, bulky aircrew kit and all the rest of it? How did you find that?
WA: We didn’t notice it because we thought this is, this is my cabin, here’s my wireless, that was it. You didn’t think about, well the skipper’s above us. The bomb aimer, as you say was sat at the second dickie until we were over the target and went up front to take the bomb aimer’s position. But the navigator was almost alongside of me. So, we didn’t bother.
MH: I was quite surprised also to find out, Bill that at the point where you sat in the wireless operation desk etcetera and where the pilot was, the aircraft was in fact nine foot tall at that point. So that’s quite an expanse when you think about it. A nine foot tall, you know at the side of the fuselage as such. I was quite surprised by that. But it was all comfortable for you at that time.
WA: Oh yes. Because from where the pilot was you went down steps. A couple of steps, and as you were going down the steps you hung your parachute because you each had a place to put your parachute. So you didn’t think about much about the cramp. You put your parachute on the clamp and got into your position.
MH: And in your position as well the way the radio set was set up was slightly different to other heavy bombers, I believe. In that the receiver set stood on its end. And then you had the main transmitter in front of you and then your Morse key was clamped normally on the right hand side.
WA: Correct. Yes.
MH: And then you had a small desk for keeping your radio log and everything.
WA: And of course you had a trailing aerial by the side of you.
MH: Right.
WA: If I was to unwind it.
MH: Right. How did you find, did you find that — was that a good set up for yourself being the, the receiver set being there to having a — are you a right handed gentleman? Were you having to reach across or, to change the various wavelengths as such?
WA: No, it was a — because I’ll show you the photographs later. Up there.
MH: Right.
WA: Of the wireless operator’s position.
MH: Right. Ok.
WA: The only lights you had for eight hours if you were on a night raid was the lights from the radio.
MH: Right.
WA: There weren’t no other light because the Germans could pick it up.
MH: And the operational ceiling I believe of a Mark 3 Halifax was about twenty thousand feet. How did you deal with the cold?
WA: Oh. We had three pairs of gloves on. And, but they were so soft. Silk gloves, a very nice woollen and then a leather. Soft leather that you could always, you could bend your fingers and you didn’t realise they were on. But most of the trips were ok over Germany. But if we were sent on mine laying up in the Baltic then it was mighty cold.
MH: Because the difference or I understand with the Lancaster the same sort of position for the radio op in the Lancaster. They were fortunate in having the heater by them. Did the Halifax not have any heating as such? And if so where would it have been? Was it by yourself or was it elsewhere in the aircraft?
WA: Well there was a little bit of heating coming through. So as long as you didn’t get iced up.
MH: Ok. When you went to Holme on Spalding Moor it’s not a station that I am familiar with. What can you tell us about it? How was it when you got there?
WA: Well, we got there because our skipper had been made up to wing commander. He was the CO then of the, of 76 Squadron flying. So everybody at [unclear] and at briefing, our first briefing it was funny because we were at our briefing table without a skipper. And some of the crews looked as us as to say, ‘Where’s your skipper?’ And of course the skipper did a briefing and said, ‘This is our target for tonight.’ And of course when he finished the briefing he came down and sat with us. And of course some of the crew looked at us, ‘Oh, you’ve got the wing commander have you?’
MH: Did that give you any privileges at all? Were you treated differently? Or —
WA: No. The one bad privilege. We could only do one op a month.
MH: So —
WA: So, we were slowed down.
MH: Right. Due to, due to your pilot’s rank. They didn’t want to lose him as such.
WA: Yeah. But the thing was that the AOC, God he was a rugby player for England before the war. He used to have to do a monthly flight to get his flying pay. And he always used to come to the wing commander and say, ‘I want your wireless operator.’ He didn’t want a navigator, nobody. He only wanted the wireless op.
MH: So, you found yourself with the AOC for 4 Group. Doing his monthly pay flight.
WA: Yeah [laughs]
MH: And that was just you.
WA: Yeah.
MH: When you went up. So, it was just you.
WA: And the, and the pilot, you know. He was —
MH: What aircraft did you do that on? When the AOC had to go up.
WA: That was the Mark 6s. They were good aircraft.
MH: Right. So he was, he was, the AOC was still —
WA: Yeah.
MH: Keeping up to the date on the, on the aircraft type as such.
WA: Yeah. That was the CO. Not me. Gus Walker.
MH: Gus Walker. Right.
WA: Everybody knows Gus. One night he’d had, because he went out to two aircraft. What they tried on one squadron where he was they decided to, to use two runways. So that one aircraft went that way. The other one went that way. And of course this time the two hit in the centre.
MH: Yeah.
WA: And he went from flying control to see what was happening and when he got there one of the bombs went off and blew his arm off.
MH: Oh crikey.
WA: His right arm.
MH: Oh dear.
WA: So, every time you saw him you always shook left handed.
MH: Right. Crikey. Oh poor chap.
WA: But his — but the first time, well no. The second time he said, ‘Do you mind flying with me?’ When he did his flying test. I said, ‘Sir, you are safer than some of the pilots I’ve flown with.
MH: With the one arm.
WA: Yeah.
MH: We’ll leave those. We’ll leave those dodgy pilots out of this interview then, just in case they happen. We’ll leave the names of the dodgy pilots out of the interview just in case.
WA: That was, well we had posts.
MH: So, you’ve now gone and you’ve reached into your cupboard. What have you brought out for us? What have you brought out from your cupboard? What have you got there? Ah. Right. Bill’s just bought out his form 1767 which for those of us in the know is his flying logbook. So we’re going to use this as a bit of a reference with you listeners as Bill’s going to take us into his logbook now. And we appreciate you can’t see it but in Bill’s neatest handwriting I’m looking at a page which is headed up Yatesbury. The 21st of May ’43 and he was flying on X7517.
WA: Dominie.
MH: And that was a Dominie. And that was up for air experience by the looks of things. I suppose, what was that? To check and make sure that you weren’t going to be sick.
WA: Yes.
MH: And that sort of thing. Ok.
WA: Then we went on to radio then. Direction finding loop, homing training, calibre training.
MH: But I look then, Bill. I look at the time that you were up and the actual flying times that Bill’s referring to during his training. They’re not very long are they? They’re only about an hour or so.
WA: Yes.
MH: And during that that allowed you time to go through thoroughly the training that you had to go through.
WA: That’s right.
MH: Or do you feel that it was rushed?
WA: No. No.
MH: To get, to get you through.
WA: No. It was ok. There was, you still carried on. This is when then they go to Mona, North Wales for my air gunnery.
MH: Right. Yeah.
WA: That’s my hits [laughs]
MH: And Bill’s now got in September sort of time 1943 he was at the Air Gunnery Course Centre and firing off approximately two hundred rounds at a time on his training. And that was, ah the aircraft type listed that Bill was flying in then was an Avro Anson during his training for air gunnery. With all different pilots by the looks of things. Yeah. But so how much training? What sort of weapon were you taught to fire? What was it?
WA: The 303s and the drogue which was being dragged behind the aircraft.
MH: So that was, would that have been a single 303 or would that have been a pair or —?
WA: No. A pair.
MH: A pair.
WA: That was on the old —
MH: Ah. Now, this is going to bring recollections to me. Halfpenny Green.
WA: Yes. That’s right.
MH: Yeah. Now, for listeners if you ever get the chance there’s a John Mills film that basically shows him in Bomber Command and then eventually this particular place called Halfpenny Field gets handed over to the American 8th Air Force. And it’s called, the film is called, “The Way to the Stars.” So, if you get the chance have a look at it because the gentleman I am sitting with actually served at a place called Halfpenny Green. So, this, this is where you did more wireless operation training. Yeah?
WA: That’s right. The training.
MH: And we’ve got cross country exercises and navigations and you were the second wireless operator. And again on Avro Ansons. How did you find that aircraft Bill to be in? Was it good?
WA: It was a good aircraft. The old Aggie as they called her. Aggie Anson.
MH: Was it a good training aircraft then?
WA: Yes.
MH: Yeah. Ok.
WA: This was Abingdon or satellite Stanton Harcourt.
MH: Right. Ok.
WA: Yeah. She was number 10 OTU.
MH: So, on Bill’s page now we’re up to the period now in his logbook and right at the top of the page is the 25th of January 1944. Bill was on wireless op duty and flying with Flying Officer Ford in a Whitley T4131. And on that particular occasion out of 10 OTU he was doing circuits and landings for an hour and a half. And then this was at Stanton Harcourt where Bill looks like he’s done a mixture of, he’s done the odd bit on an Avro Anson but the majority of it has been on the two engine Whitley. However, he has been the wireless operator duty for the whole of those. That’s lovely Bill. That’s a lovely book. And then we continue. And then I’ve got — you’ve got fighter affiliation there. Which is quite interesting because I found out later when you were with, when you were at Holme on Spalding Moor you had 1689 Bomber Defence Training which were Hawker Hurricanes doing fighter affiliation on the same, the same airfield. So you’ve continued that there. And that’s March ’44. And — right, here’s something I’m going to question. What’s Bullseye, Bill? What does that mean when you see that?
WA: A Bullseye was a six hour from Abingdon. We went through London. And then to another Birmingham. So it was across country. But the thing was at London they hadn’t informed, they hadn’t been informed that we were coming. So they thought we were Germans and we were fired at [laughs] So I had to flashback the Morse at them.
MH: Right. Ok. So, was that a specific? Is that why you’ve noted it as Bullseye? Or was Bullseye for a specific target?
WA: No. It was called a Bullseye.
MH: It was called a Bullseye. So —
WA: So, if you completed a Bullseye you were ok.
MH: You were ok. Ok. But on that particular occasion the anti-aircraft decided to fire on you. Ok.
WA: Because they didn’t know. But they, I think afterwards it was a bit better then.
MH: Ok.
WA: As a nickel operation.
MH: Right. So Bill’s showing me here, on the 14th of February which for us gentleman we all know is a rather painful day in pockets-wise, being Valentine’s Day. Back in 1944 Bill was doing a nickel operation to Laval which was a four and a quarter hour night operation. And then the following month looks like that’s when Squadron Leader Legatt, you did some fighter affiliation with him and the flight commander’s check. So that was good. Ok. Then you go to 1658 Heavy Conversion Unit.
WA: Riccall, in Yorkshire.
MH: Riccall, in Yorkshire. And that’s on a Halifax Mark 2. And Bill’s started in his logbook, he’s got that noted on the 10th of May 1944. And his first flight was at 0900 in the morning. The pilot was Flight Lieutenant Warren. And that was familiarisation for the Halifax Mark 2 of two hours and five minutes. And that was a daytime familiarisation flight.
WA: We were on three engines.
MH: Was that because the aircraft had a fault, Bill?
WA: No. Had to do it.
MH: Oh, you had to do it. Right. Ok. So that was a test of skill as such for the pilot. As Bill’s pointed out there whilst at 1658 HCU in his logbook he’s noted on the 18th and 19th of May ’44 that they did a three engine test on both of those days. And as you heard him say that was a requirement at those times. I see there you did another Bullseye operation as well. Down the bottom of your page. But one engine wasn’t working.
WA: No.
MH: So that made it even harder than. So, yeah. Crikey. Circuits and — yeah.
WA: That’s when it was.
MH: And then on the 1st line of Bill’s book for the 15th of June ’44 Halifax Mark 3. Circuits and landings with 77 Squadron at Full Sutton. And then —
WA: We lost our pilot.
MH: Was that Mr Ford?
WA: Yes.
MH: Mr Ford went so —
WA: Flying Officer Ford.
MH: At this time listeners we would like to note the tragic events that at this point we lost Flying Officer Ford. And he was your first pilot that went as a second dickie on an operation.
WA: So when he didn’t come back we were a crew without a pilot.
MH: A crew without a pilot. Yeah. Then you got your new pilot.
WA: So we went to 102 Squadron, Pocklington with a Squadron Leader White.
MH: Squadron Leader White. And your first operation with him was eighteen thousand feet. Foret de Nieppe. NE — sorry. N I E P P E and your bombing height was eighteen thousand feet. It was a day operation of three hours and forty minutes. And then your very next operation being routed but written over your shoulder you were hit by flak and that was — oh you were, oh V-1 launch site. But you were quite down low then.
WA: Yeah.
MH: At ten thousand feet. So, Bill’s next op was on the 8th of August. A Halifax Mark 3. Again, the pilot was Squadron Leader White. His new pilot. Bill was the wireless operator and that was [unclear] where the aircraft was hit by flak. And they were bombing a V-1 launch site. You seem to have quite a few trying to tackle the buzz bomb problem.
WA: Yes.
MH: Yeah.
WA: Still carried on.
MH: Still carried on. So, for those in the know or those that are new to this regarding knowledge to Bomber Command Bill with Squadron Leader White then carried out an operation on the 7th of September. Again in a Halifax Mark 3. On this occasion it was gardening to the Frisian Islands from fifteen thousand feet. Now, for those in the know the gardening sorties were to be mine laying. So, in and around the Frisian Islands Bill and Squadron Leader White and the rest of the crew would have been laying, doing mine laying around the Frisian islands. And you did some more then. You went off to Mecklenburg Bay in the Baltic. That would have been very cold.
WA: Yeah.
MH: That would have been a bit raw. Especially in September. Even in September wouldn’t it? So Bill then did one on the 15th of September as well. Gardening to the Mecklenburg Bay. And then you did some ferry flights.
WA: No. September ’44 the army was held up on going into Germany. So 76 Squadron was loaded up with 22 Jerry cans which, one Jerry can is mighty heavy but when you get twenty two. But the thing was that get to my position we had to crawl across all these petrol tank things to get. But we, what I can’t make out, we were given a parachute but we could never have get out if anything had happened. And if Germany knew that we were full of petrol they would have been after us. But the thing was we used more petrol in our engines than we were carrying.
MH: Carrying. Yeah.
WA: But they wanted, the army wanted this petrol so we had to do it.
MH: Now —
WA: It was quite a few.
MH: So, you were ferrying fuel at the time of Arnhem. But burning up more fuel in doing it.
WA: Yeah. That’s the, that’s the way it went.
MH: And then you went to Kleve in the October. Bochum on the Ruhr in November of ’44. And then again back to the Ruhr. Sterkrade.
WA: They had a —
MH: Oil plant.
WA: Box barrage, and you flew, they set their guns from ten thousand feet to twenty thousand feet and you flew through it.
MH: How did you feel about that because —
WA: Well, we didn’t know until later. But there you are. We knew it was somewhere close because you could smell cordite in the, in the aircraft and golly, that was through the oxygen masks.
MH: So, you were picking up the vapours.
WA: Yeah.
MH: From the exploding rounds. Then you went to Zoest. The marshalling yards. In the December. That would have been cold as well, Bill.
WA: Yeah.
MH: And then, just for fun in the January of ’45 they sent you back to the Baltic. They obviously didn’t think you’d been cold enough before. But —
WA: That’s where we went to.
MH: Holme on Spalding Moor. So, Bill —
WA: The wing commander there.
MH: Bill’s just showing me in his logbook now that Squadron Leader White had been made up to wing commander and they went to Holme on Spalding Moor. And the first noted operation come practice on that was the 3rd of February ’45 on a Halifax Mark 3 where you had a practice bombing session before going off and you were going to — is that Goch.
WA: Yeah.
MH: Yeah.
WA: In the Ruhr.
MH: Goch in the Ruhr on the 7th of February ’45. However, it does look like was that operation scrubbed by the master bomber at that time. And you were at twelve thousand feet and that was due to come in to contact —
WA: Heavy cloud. You couldn’t see the target.
MH: With the chemical plant. Oh, and then in March ’45 Bill, with Wing Commander White went to one of the big ones — Cologne where you were bombing from twenty thousand feet. So you were up. With the Halifax that’s towards its upper operational ceiling isn’t it? The twenty thousand. So, that’s quite high. And then Wuppertal in the March. And then practice bombing in the March as well. And then I’m going to pronounce, I’m going to pronounce this wrong, Bill. I’ll tell you now.
WA: Wangerooge.
MH: Wangerooge Island, from eight thousand feet on the 25th of April ’45. Again with Wing Commander White. And that was to assist in taking out a gun emplacement.
WA: And that was the last raid of the war.
MH: The very last one.
WA: Yes.
MH: Right. Ok. And that was for a gun emplacement causing problems. And that was a daylight operation on those occasions. On that occasion.
WA: Eight thousand feet.
MH: Eight thousand feet. That’s nothing. Eight thousand feet.
WA: And on that one was twenty four aircraft from our squadron. As we were going in two of our Halies collided. One [pause] one went straight down and with all the seven killed. The other one went down in the sea but only the skipper got out. The rest of the crew were killed. But he came, he was only a prisoner of war for a few days because the war was virtually ended. But when he got back to our squadron before we transferred to Transport Command he said when he came out the, out of the sea a German officer was waiting for him. And, but while he was marching him up to, to their office I suppose, to interrogate him a farmer came rushing up with a pitchfork and he was going to stab the RAF pilot. And the German pulled out his revolver and pointed it at this farmer. Told him to shoo off.
MH: Because you do hear don’t you of a lot of, a lot of parachuted aircrew that were turned on by the civilians. You do hear quite a bit of that having occurred which is very sad. But again fortunately then, we can actually say fortunately there was a German officer there to save him.
WA: That’s right.
[pause]
WA: That was the last one. The ops we did. Different pilots. Bombs had gone. Dropping bombs in the North Sea to get rid of them.
MH: What’s interesting, I’ve got to point this out to you, Bill. What’s interesting, Bill’s just pointing out to me a couple of entries in relation to May 1945 in his logbook. Now, you were in then the up to date Halifax Mark 6. Flying Officer Thrussel. It’s got here duty rear gunner. Did you go on that one there with the ferry flight because there was no other option? That was the only seat available or what took you to the rear turret on that occasion?
WA: It was just, you know because we lost all the air gunners because we didn’t need them. War was finished. So, when the Halifax went off and they said, ‘Well look, If you want to fly as a rear gunner, see what is happening,’ because when you’re a wireless op you couldn’t see much. So, you jumped in.
MH: Having changed your seat then for that particular time were you able to gain any sort of thoughts about what it would have been like to have been a Tail End Charlie as such?
WA: No. No.
MH: During your ops.
WA: No. You got Wingco, look [pause]
MH: Ah. So here, June, 5th of June 1945 in a Halifax Mark 6. The wing commander. Cook’s Tour. Ah, I’ve heard about these. Is that where ground personnel —
WA: Correct. We took them on.
MH: And they got to see the great, you know the work that you’d done. And the work that you’d carried out because they were unaware of it other than —
WA: That’s right.
MH: Movietone News etcetera. So, in August 1945 we appear to have an aircraft change.
WA: Transport Command.
MH: Transport Command. What, what made them— any ideas what made them change at that point? Was there more of a necessity for transport aircraft? I mean —
WA: Well, we didn’t need bombers. War was finished.
MH: The European one. But the war against Japan was, you know —
WA: Actually, what we were [unclear] we were flying to go to India to meet aircraft coming from Japan with Prisoners of War. And at Poona, India. And from that, the ones from Japan landed at Poona. The aircraft then flew from Poona to Cairo where they were put on York aircraft with a medical officer and a nurse. And from there they were transported back to England. And the pilots used to say, ‘Boys, we’re back in England.’ And I think they stopped it because some of the POW got so excited they expired. And we did hear afterwards that their, well their legs were like your arms. You know. Nothing.
MH: Yeah. I think, I think, I’d like to think that we’ve all, we’ve all seen the horrific photographs.
WA: Yeah. They used to come in to Hullavington which is now upgraded isn’t it? It’s Royal Hullavington. Is it?
MH: So, did you actually take part in any of those repatriation flights, Bill? Back to the UK?
WA: No. Because this is where I got this typhoid in Cairo. And also I found out that I’d been flying with a perforated ear drum.
MH: Oh dear. Oh —
WA: That’s why I’m completely deaf in my left ear.
MH: So, how long, how long did they think you’d had the perforated ear drum?
WA: Don’t know.
MH: Don’t know. Oh right. Ok.
WA: But that’s when they found out as I said. No more flying.
MH: So, that might have happened way way way way way back. Possibly on your first or second operation.
WA: Yeah.
MH: You’d gone all the way flying to the Ruhr and back with one ear drum.
WA: Well —
MH: Wow. That’s, that’s quite extraordinary. That, you know. That’s, you know. Because you managed to, you managed to hold down, you know the career that you had then. So what, when, what happened to you when you did your service Bill? What did you do post-service? What did you do after? What did you do after your service?
WA: I still carried on because I kept doing that, because when I came back to England up to Air Ministry, flying officer, he said, ‘Ah, Yatesbury. What do you know about medical?’ So, I said, ‘Not a lot. Nothing.’ They said, Right. You’ll go to RAF Yatesbury as a [pause] looking after transfers.’ Right. So, I goes down to Yatesbury for the third time. First of all as an airman. And later on. But I had quite a nice time at Yatesbury. Got into the football team. Got an injury. And one of the nurses looked after me who later became my wife. After a while they said, ‘Well, because you can’t fly and you’re only for a home,’ or they used to call it, France and Germany, ‘But you can’t go Far East because of your eardrum. We’ll have to transfer you to the MOD Air Force Department. But you won’t be in uniform. But they said we’ll help you out. We’ll count your service.’ So, that’s why when I retired at sixty I had a service commission, err pension.
MH: So, if I’m recollecting this correctly for our listeners you joined, you first of all went for air crew selection at the age of sixteen and a half. Got selected. And you retired from the Air Force technically at the age of sixty. Forty four long years of service to this country, Bill. That’s a long time.
WA: Yeah. But I enjoyed my time with the Royal Air Force. No regrets. My only regret is I had a perforated eardrum and I couldn’t carry on flying.
MH: What’s your, I’ve got to ask you an opinion, Bill. What’s your opinion on the way that Bomber Command have been treated?
WA: Grim.
MH: Grim. What makes you say grim?
WA: Because there was no medal for Bomber Command. The other services had something. I don’t think even Fighter Command had any much, you know. They saved us. The same as Bomber Command. They always said that Bomber Command was the only one of the three services that was operational. The poor old Navy couldn’t do much. Only look after home waters.
MH: Yeah. Yeah. How do you feel about the way that the young people of today view Bomber Command? With what we’re trying to achieve to bring it to their attention.
WA: I don’t think a lot of modern realise.
MH: Right.
WA: Because this what they’re building at Lincoln. The height of a, wingspan of a Hali or a Lanc. They had to ask for extra money but I don’t think they got much response from that. To me, a lot of people, well from once the war was ended things went quiet. It was forgotten.
MH: Ok. Right. I’ve got to ask you, going back to my list of questions. Your dad was in what would have been known during World War Two as the Fleet Air Arm. Why didn’t you choose the Fleet Air Arm, Bill over — what was it that turned you off the Navy and on to the Air Force as such?
WA: I don’t know. Aircrew to me was RAF.
MH: Right.
WA: That’s why.
MH: And you’d always wanted to fly. Where did that passion come from?
WA: Because I knew Morse. And I thought well there’s always a radio on bombers or aircraft.
MH: So was it your interest in radio at that time?
WA: Well, because Morse code was radio wasn’t? That was it.
MH: Leading on from that then I was reading about a particular aircraft the other day where they had a problem with the intercom on the aircraft. Got shot through during the war on a mission and they were using some sort of signal like Morse code tapping through the airframe so the rest of the crew knew what was going on. Because the pilot had designed a system where they knew that three taps mean bale out and all the rest of it. Did you have anything like that?
WA: No. No.
MH: So, when you went off you were basically reliant on the intercom system working all the time. Right. Right.
WA: And we, we knew what, alright we took off. Twenty four aircraft, we knew some of them wouldn’t be coming back but we were coming back. So that’s the way you looked at it. I’d think I know where my parachute is. I can soon grab it. And that’s it.
MH: Do you count yourselves as brave?
WA: No. Lucky.
MH: Lucky. Right. Ok. Alright. Because there would be a lot of us that would say what you did and your colleagues etcetera what you did and the young age that you were when you did it —
WA: That’s right.
MH: Was very brave.
WA: Twenty, twenty one, twenty two. That was it. And most of the names on that what they’re building at Lincoln opposite Lincoln Cathedral. They were all twenty, twenty one, twenty twos.
MH: People in the prime of their youth. Yeah. But it never worried you.
WA: No.
MH: Never scared.
WA: No. [unclear] that’s it.
MH: Positivity.
WA: Well.
MH: And you had a good pilot.
WA: Well, you’ve got, well yes. We had a damned good pilot. And it was the job. We had to do it. Someone had to do it.
MH: No, you’re right. Someone had to do it. Ok. Did you ever run across or come across Group Captain Pelly-Fry?
WA: No. I’ve heard about him.
MH: What can you tell us about him?
WA: Hi de hi Pelly-Fry.
MH: What can you tell us?
WA: Is that right?
MH: Yeah. What can you tell us about him?
WA: He was 76 Squadron before we got there. So, I don’t know. All I know that is he was known as Pelly-Fry. Wing commander.
MH: So, he then eventually went up Group Command didn’t he? Up to 4 Group.
WA: Yes.
MH: So, out of all the aircraft then that you served on and in, in what order would you put them as favourite to least favourite?
WA: My favourite. Well, it’s got to be the Hali. Damned good aircraft. She could take punishment and if she crashed she broke in to six pieces so you had more chance of getting out. Whereas the Lanc didn’t because the Lanc was an old aircraft. A twin-engined Manchester. Put two engines on it and called it a Lancaster. But it still had a thin fuselage and useless to get out of.
MH: Right.
WA: I suppose the worst aircraft was the old Proctor. With the single engine.
MH: Why? I’ve got to ask why.
WA: I don’t know [laughs] to me, so I say it didn’t have the guts like a Lanc, or a Hali I should say.
MH: Right. Yeah. So in all your time with Bomber Command you’d have seen sights that a lot of us wouldn’t want to see and would have lost friends, colleagues that sort of thing. But you were stoical throughout in your approach and you feel that you were lucky.
WA: Yes. Because often we used to say if it wasn’t for our skipper being an ex-fighter pilot he got us out of a lot of problems.
MH: After the war did you stay in touch with your crew or with your pilot or did you all go your separate ways?
WA: No. We all drifted away and that was it.
MH: Right.
WA: I met, the person who I kept meeting was Gus Walker, Air Commodore, who, he said, ‘I saw your old skipper in London last week,’ when he used to come on the station to the annual AOC. He’d say, ‘I met your old skipper in London. He’s still ok. Yeah.’
MH: Ok. That’s fabulous. Is there anything else, Bill that you’d like to add about your recollections?
WA: No. Just [pause] No. It was one thing I went through. No regrets.
MH: No regrets. Good. Lucky charms? Did you have any lucky charms that you carried about your person? Because I know a lot of aircrew used to have a teddy.
WA: A rabbit’s foot.
MH: And a rabbit’s foot.
WA: That’s right.
MH: And all that. Yeah. That sort of thing. Or a lucky coin, didn’t they? And that sort of thing. Clover leaf and what not. But no. What I’d like to do Bill is thank you very much for your time today.
WA: That’s nice. Thank you, Mark.
MH: I’m sure that people will thoroughly enjoy listening to this.
WA: I’ve got a bit of a throat, perhaps my voice doesn’t sound good today. It’s a bit throaty.
MH: It’ll be fine. It will be fine. But thank you very much for this afternoon. And I will be turning the tape recorder off.
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 William Hubert Allen
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Mark Hunt
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-03-31
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
AAllenWH170331
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
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01:08:00 audio recording
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
Description
An account of the resource
William Allen’s father had served with the Fleet Air Arm during the First World War. William also wanted to fly and so volunteered for the RAF at the earliest opportunity. He trained as a wireless operator. The crew arrived on the squadron and the pilot went as second dickie on a flight but was killed on the operation. William and his crewmates were now without a pilot and were transferred to 102 Squadron to continue operations. William and his crew were very conscious of the statistical chances that they would not come back but over cigarettes they would say that they would be coming back. However, they also left their cigarettes with the ground crew with the instruction that if they did not return to smoke them and remember them.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
England--Wiltshire
England--Yorkshire
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
10 OTU
102 Squadron
1658 HCU
76 Squadron
77 Squadron
aircrew
Anson
Cook’s tour
Dominie
Halifax
Halifax Mk 1
Halifax Mk 2
Halifax Mk 3
Heavy Conversion Unit
mid-air collision
mine laying
Operational Training Unit
RAF Abingdon
RAF Holme-on-Spalding Moor
RAF Pocklington
RAF Riccall
RAF Yatesbury
training
Whitley
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/871/10141/LHobbsFJ1262633v1.1.pdf
1dff61c483e52807f46cfaa115ab1d44
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
Hobbs, Frank
Frank James Hobbs
F J Hobbs
Description
An account of the resource
69 items. The collection concerns 1262633 Flight Sergeant Frank James Hobbs a wireless operator with 630 Squadron, RAF East Kirkby, who was killed while on operations in a Lancaster on 16 March 1944. The collection contains his log book, official and family correspondence, official and personal documents, photographs of aircrew, family and his grave and some items of memorabilia. It also includes correspondence from a French gentleman who was witness to his aircraft crash and who returns recovered personal items belonging to Frank Hobbs. <br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Barbara Storer and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.<br /><br />Additional information on Frank Hobbs is available via the <a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/110858/">IBCC Losses Database</a>.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-06-04
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
Hobbs, FJ
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 Hobbs’ observer’s and air gunner’s flying log book
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.
Description
An account of the resource
Observers and air gunners flying log book for Frank Hobbs, wireless operator, covering the period from 15 March 1941 to 16 March 1943 when he was killed in action. Detailing his flying training and operations flown. He was stationed at RAF Pembrey, RAF Penrhos, RAF North Luffenham, RAF Swinderby, RAF Skellingthorpe and RAF East Kirkby. Aircraft flown in were, Dominie, Proctor, Blenheim, Anson, Wellington, Manchester and Lancaster. He completed a total of 9 operations, 4 with 50 squadron and 5 with 630 squadron. Targets were, Hamburg, Mannheim, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Berlin, Leipzig, Schweinfurt and Augsburg. <span>His pilots on operations were </span><span data-ccp-props="{"201341983":0,"335559739":200,"335559740":276}">Sergeant Clark, Flight Sergeant Banks, Pilot Officer Medley and Pilot Officer Rodbourne. </span>He was killed on his tenth operation, to Stuttgart. At the end of the book there is a photo of the grave site with six headstones.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
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
LHobbsFJ1262633v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Rutland
Germany--Augsburg
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Mannheim
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Stuttgart
Wales--Carmarthenshire
Wales--Gwynedd
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941
1942
1943
1943-07-27
1943-07-28
1943-07-29
1943-09-05
1943-09-06
1943-10-02
1943-10-03
1943-10-07
1943-10-08
1944-02-15
1944-02-16
1944-02-19
1944-02-20
1944-02-21
1944-02-24
1944-02-25
1944-02-26
1944-03-15
1944-03-16
1660 HCU
29 OTU
50 Squadron
630 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
Blenheim
bombing
bombing of Hamburg (24-31 July 1943)
crash
Dominie
final resting place
Heavy Conversion Unit
killed in action
Lancaster
Manchester
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF East Kirkby
RAF North Luffenham
RAF Pembrey
RAF Penrhos
RAF Skellingthorpe
RAF Swinderby
RAF Yatesbury
superstition
take-off crash
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/622/10612/BPayneRPayneRv1.1.pdf
4be42d107ed7b8f0a042057052d00c0f
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
Payne, Reg
R Payne
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Payne, R
Description
An account of the resource
14 items. Two oral history interviews with Reg Payne (1923 - 2022, 1435510 Royal Air Force), his memoirs and photographs. Reg Payne completed a tour of operations as a wireless operator with 50 Squadron from RAF Skellingthorpe. His pilot on operations was Michael Beetham. <br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Reg Payne and catalogued by Barry Hunter.<br /><br />
<p>This collection also contains items concerning Fred Ball. Additional information on Fred Ball is available via the <a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/100970/">IBCC Losses Database</a>.<a href="https://internationalbcc.co.uk/losses/ball-fc/"></a></p>
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-07-03
2017-08-25
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 document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AVIATION MEMORY.
[Page break]
18
RAF BASES WHERE REG SERVED
[Underlined] 5 YRS [/underlined]
PADGATE
BLACKPOOL
YATESBURY
NORTH COATS
SOUTH KENSINGTON
MADELY
STORMY DOWN
WIGTOWN
SALTBY
COTTESMORE
MARKET HARBOROUGH
WIGSLEY
SKELLINGTHORPE
SILVERSTONE
TURWESTON
NORTH WEALD
KIRKHAM
RANGOON BURMA
[Page break]
[Underlined] Reg Payne [/underlined]
[Underlined] 1939 SEPT. WAR DECLARED [/underlined]
[Underlined] 16 YEARS OF AGE [/underlined]
Home Guard at 16 yrs (1939)
If you waited to be called up at 18yrs you could be sent to work in any of the coal mines, miles away from home
i volunteerd at 17 yrs RAF [underlined] 1940 [/underlined]
Took inteligence exams Moreton Hall Northampton then to RAF Cardington for more tests.
Training as a Wireless Operator.
My training would cost the Government twice as much as sending a pupil thro a university. Period.
2 years training before operations
[Underlined] 1 year to learn morse code 4 hrs per [/underlined] day
Only fighter pilots had long range radio speech.
Bomber pilots had only 10 miles range “Hello Darky” [Underlined] Give Details [/underlined].
[Page break]
[Underlined] JOINING THE RAF OCT 1941 [/underlined]
16 yrs old War Declared
Always keen on RAF.
Joined Home Guard (then L.D.V.) Cransley reservoir & Pytchley Bridge
At 17 yrs volunteer’d RAF
Selection testS Dover Hall Northampton
later on Cardington
Selected as Wireless OP/AG. Training with ATC. Morse code
Short hand typing exam (Cacelled) and call up papers
Advised to get very short haircut ready for RAF
Train to Padgate with Sandwich’s
Poring rain ladies umbrella
Sore eye until Derbyshire
Soaking wet at Padgate hut to hut
[Page break]
After issue of uniform next day parcel up wet cloth’s to send home to mum. Then train to Blackpool P.D.C. Personel Disp Centre
[Underlined] King St. Blackpool [/underlined]
One week only learning about
RAF regulations etc
Care of uniform
Told to get haircut and had one next day (thought I told you to get haircut
Corporal took four of us to nearby hairdressers lost most of our hair
Landlady taught us to polish boots Candle and spoon (hot)
First letter from home (over breakfast) after reading it the landlady said
[underlined] your mother still loves you [/underlined] (tears)
Then move to start our training in the tram sheds every day. Our instructors were ex naval wireless ops, 2hrs morning & 2 hrs afternoon
Morse code Morse code Morse code
[Page break]
[Underlined] OCT 1941 [/underlined]
Mrs Clegg 4 Charnley Rd Blackpool
10 RAF young lads posted there
2 in each bedroom. 2 single beds 3 beds in our bedroom
No food in bedrooms. Ron Boydon Arthur Bromich
Electric lights out in bedrooms after 7pm.
We were detailed in turn washing up. If you didn’t eat all your meals she contacted the RAF Billeting Officer and had you moved
We got over this by flushing it all down the toilet.
Gym slippers had to be worn all the time 10 pairs of gym slippers in the hall always a job to find your own
[Underlined] RAF men had to be in by 10pm. [/underlined]
Mrs Clegg locked the door promp at ten
We could not see the end of film at Christmaas Day, for a small piece of chicken and a small glass of ale
We [underlined] were charged 2 and 6 pence [/underlined]
Ron Boydon & Arthur Browich
The two boys who shared my bedroom were both killed in the war
[Page break]
All your personal clothing and items had to have your name and RAF number printed on it.
[Underlined] No bath or shower at Mrs Cleggs [/underlined]
Showers were allowed for us.
Sat mornings [underlined] Derby Baths Blackpool [/underlined]
We could swim in the baths but had no swiming trunks etc
We [underlined] could [/underlined] swim without costumes etc.
The medical plasters on our arms came off in the waters and floted on the surface on the swimming pool.
A pool atendant collected them with a shrimp net.
Female workers in a large building across the road could’nt take their eyes off us, and waved their arms to us
Morse code Morse code Morse code
[Page break]
Reg’s close RAF friend.
[Underlined] RON BOYDON [/underlined]
Junior Ket Evening Tel reporter
[Underlined] Cover’d in Corby today [/underlined]
Shared my room at Blackpool
Tall young fellow
Ron carried the white parafin lamp at front of our squad, on dark mornings when we all had to march across
Blackpool, to the tram sheds for morse practice, or Stanley Park early morning for P.T. or drill.
On dark mornings & evenings
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Morse code speed tests were carried out in a room above Woolworths (Fridays) as your morse speed increast. We only went up to 10 words per minute
If you failed three times you would be taken off corse and be trained as Gunner (Air)
At further training at Yatesbury your morse speed reached 18 words per min
We didn’nt get our own laundry back from RAF Laundry (sizes) sent my laundry home to mum. Food also in parcel when returned Told to put food in cabinet Other boys ate it.
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Must be in doors by 10pm.
Home from pictures food not in cabinet! Next time put food in bedroom draw wrapped in underwear.
Later food not in draw contact Mrs Clegg.
Arrive back clock striking 10 oclock just in time we say
Ron Boydon late on parade oil lantern
Trim wick
Lights go out whilst shaving. 7pm.
Turn water off on landing.
Eat up food or will inform Billeting Officer Yellow Peril & hard cheese.
Food down toilet and down back of piano
Ron’s pygamas on landing
Drill with gym shoes on Tower Ballroom also lectures Ena Bagnor organ
Derby Baths shower and swim once per week
Vaccination scabs Office girls
PTO
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[Underlined] CHRISTMAS 1941. [/underlined]
No extra Christmas meal, we had to pay 2/6d for some chicken and Christmas Pud
Found out later my mother wrote Mrs Clegg nasty letter.
Of the three in bedroom I was the only one to survive
I recently returned to Blackpool where I visited Charnley Rd,
Our biller much enlarged (2 floors higher
Found my old room So small coul’nt believe 3 beds in a room.
Posted to Yatesbury, P.T. long distance runs over the Downs. P.T.I. ran behind the last boys Took his belt off and made the last boys run fast
Sunday bus ride to Swindon Drinking cider.
Ladies behind bar, kissing us before we got bus home
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[Underlined] YATESBURY WILTS [/underlined]
Morse code and wireless valves
Valves}
Triodes
Tetroes
Pentrose
Diodes
Aerials & Accululators
Morse Keys
Accumulators
Stormy Down south coast.
Air Gunnery Cause
Browning machine guns
Armstrong Whitworth [underlined] Whitley’s. [/underlined]
[Underlined] NO 1 A.F.U. SCOTLAND [/underlined] Advanced Flying [underlined] Unit [/underlined]
Ansons & Botha’s
[Underlined] Night flying 34 hours [/underlined]
Pilot suspected engine trouble daylight flight. Landed over in England mid day. Nice dinner in Sgts Mess
Were told later nothing wrong with engine but all had a lovely meal
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RADIO WORK & TRAINING
JAN 42 Yatesbury Wireless study
MAY 42 North Coates Ops Duties, Coastal, Com
OCT 42 Radio Maintenance Kensington
JAN 43 Madely Flying Proctors & Dominies
APR 43 Gunnery Course Whitley’s Stormy Down
MAY 43 AFU Wigtown Scotland Ansons Bothas
JUNE 43 14 OUT Cottesmore Saltby Market-Harb
SEP 43 H.C.U. Wigsley Halifax Lancaaster
OCT 43 Ops Skellingthorpe
Now crew of 5 at Cottesmore
Heavy Conversion Unit Wigsley
At RAF Wigsley (Notts) we collected two new crew members
1/ Jock Higgins Mid Upper Gunner
2/ Don Moore Flight Engineer
We were lucky because Don had done a lot of work as an engine fitter before joining as air crew.
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MORSE CODE
[Table of Morse Code]
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[Underlined] 14 OTU COTTESMORE [/underlined]
[Underlined] JUNE 1943. [/underlined]
Pilots
Navigators
Bomb Aimers
Wireless Operators
Air Gunners
All taken to an empty hangar and told to sort themselves out into [underlined] crews of five [/underlined]
Later each crew would get a Bomb Aimer and [underlined] another Gunner [/underlined]
[Underlined] OPERATIONS [/underlined]
[Underlined] Take Wakey Wakey tablets on leaving English coast for Germany [/underlined]
[Underlined
I IDENTITY
F FRIEND
OR
F FOE [/underlined]
I.F.F. transmitter sends out a signal which recognises you as an RAF aircraft
and not an enemy aircraft.
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1 [Underlined] EVERY MORNING [/underlined] change intercom lead ACI batteries. Sign Form 700. Return used batteries to the Accumulator Section
2. [Underlined] Inspect all external aerials [/underlined] for any damage
3. During air test flight, [underlined] check all radio equip [/underlined]
4 [Underlined] Attend the WOPS briefing. D/F stations and frequencies etc. Attend the main briefing [/underlined]
5. [Underlined] Collect the colour of the, day charts, bomber codes, M/F D/F groups to use. Broadcast spare helmet W/T challenge chart [/underlined]
[Underlined] Check ground flight switch. Check voltage switch on A 1134 amplifier for inter com Check radio whilst engines are running Tidy up bundles of window on floor Oxygen mask on before take off Once air born pencil in ranges on Monica Screen IFF switched on Keep watch on Monica screen Listen for half hourly broadcast from Base Leaving the cost wind out trailing aerial
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At RAF Wigsley our pilot was given training on 4 engines, training starting with flying Halifax bombers, then changing to Lancasters
Luckily most the wireless equipment that I had was the same that I used in Wellingtons
We did a number of flights by night
Long distance flights which always ended up dropping bombs on a distant bombing range.
At last we were posted to our bomber squadron, which was 50 Sqdn only 3 miles from Lincoln city. Skellingthorpe airfield
The first thing we had to do when arriving was to contact the orderly room and give the name and address of our next of kin.
We were then taken to our sleeping quarters a hut alongside others in a field off the main road leading to Lincoln
Toilets were provided close by, but there were no washing or shower equipment on the site, this only in the Sgts Mess, some distance away a good ten minutes walk.
Rather than take our washing towel, and shaving kit backwards and forwards each day they were hung on pegs in the Sgts Mess where we did all our ablutions. The towels had to be folded back in our haversacks each day and they were always damp.
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It was after we had our evening meal in the Sgts Mess, and were returing to our hut, that we spoke to a group of chaps on our camp site. After telling them what a “terrible” place we had ended up in, they smiled at us and said, “terrible” it’s a lovely place, Lincoln is only 10 mins bike ride down the road, loads of pubs, and all of them have plenty of girls there that love meeting us RAF chaps, you will see when you go there.
Fred Ball our rear gunner and myself both had bikes and said we would give it a try. Biking into the centre of Lincoln we spotted a small pub called “The Unity? Finding a place for our bikes we entered the building, there was music in there and we found a table & two chairs to relax on
Sitting there enjoying a glass bitter we could’nt help notice two ATS girls also enjoying their drinks, we could’nt speak to them as they were the other side of a busy room. Before 10 oclock the two girls got up and started to walk out.
Fred said to them and where are you two off now, and they said we have to be in by 10 oclock, and our billet is near the Cathedral. Fred said do you mind if we walk with you, they said not at all.
We arrived at the large house near the Cathedral now the ATS Headquarters. We chatted for a short time and agreed to meet again the same time tomorrow. I didn’t know at that time I had just met
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[Underlined] SQDN CALLSIGN CODES [/underlined]
50 SQDN A/C Pilgrim (B. Baker etc.
Skellingthorpe airfield C/S Black Swan
MORSE CALL SIGNS.
50 Sqdn STB
5 Group A8X
STBB V A8X Radio call from 5 Group
STBB V STB. Radio call from our Sqdn
[Underlined] V means from [/underlined]
my first wife
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[Underlined] WAKEY WAKEY TABLETS [/underlined]
Not usually taken until getting airborn.
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ITEMS CARRIED IN OUR POCKETS BATTLE DRESS AND BOOTS
French and Dutch money etc.
Emergency high protane food. Ovaltine tablets Water purification tablets
Knife and torch in our boots
The knife to off the tops of our boots
Map of the area (on a silk scarf) more like a large hankerchief
Dead mans rope at rear door
Amputation saw and morphia tablets in first aid cabinet
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[Underlined] OCT 1943 [/underlined]
Posted to 50 Sqdn Skellingthorpe Lincoln
Crew not up to operation standard
More training needed
Give name of next of kin and address to the orderly room.
[Underlined] NOV 3RD [/underlined] 1943
BEETHAMS SECOND DICKY
TARGET DUSSELDORF
18 Aircraft lost (One of them my brother)
Telegram brother Arthur missing on operation
Mother asking me to come home
Making a promise to our Wing/Co to keep flying
Hoping for an easy operation for our first one
My first wife
[Page break]
1943.
OPERATIONAL FLYING
14 OTU COTTESMORE & MARKET HARBOROUGH
JUNE 1943
Crewing up in hangar Cottesmore
CREW MEMBERS
P/O BEETHAM PILOT
P/O SWINYARD NAV
SGT BARTLETT BOMB AIMER
SGT PAYNE WIRELESS OP.
SGT BALL REAR GUNNER
SGT HIGGINS MID UPPER GUNNER
SGT MOORE FLIGHT ENGINEER
WIRELESS OPS JOB
Change accumulators every morning.
Keep in contact with Base
Care of the inter/comm system.
Assist nav with bearings and fixes
Able to move about aircraft whilst in flight
Astro shots using the sextant
Check all aerials before all flights
Watching Monica screen Pilot had only [word missing] radio communication 10 miles
Jamming enemy radio messages
Demonstrate morse code.
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1
22.1.43. LANC JA899 F/O BEETHAM
7.15 [Underlined] OPS BERLIN [/underlined]
764 Aircraft – 469 Lancs, 234 Halifax’s 50 Stirlings, 11 Mosquitoes. This was the greatest force sent to Berlin so far. But it was also the last raid in which Stirlings were sent to Germany. Bad weather again kept most of the German fighters on the ground and the bomber force was able to take a relatively “straight in” “strait out” route to the target without suffering undue losses. 11 Lancs 10 Halifaxe’s 5 Stirlings 3.4 per cent of the force. Berlin was again completely cloud covered and returning crews could only estimate that the marking and bombing were believed to be accurate, in fact this was the most effective raid on Berlin of the war. A vast area of destruction. The mainly residential areas of Tiergarten and Charlottenburg, the dry weather conditions, several “firestorm” areas were reported and a German plane next day measured the height of the smoke cloud as 6,000 metres nearly 19,00 ft.
It is impossible to give anything like the full details of the damage or to separate completely details from this raid and a smaller one on the next night at least 3,000 houses and 23 industrial premises were completely destroyd, with several thousands of other buildings damaged. It is estimated that 175,000 people were bombed out, more than 50,000 soldiers were brought in to help. From garrisons up to 100KM distance, these were equivalent to nearly three
[Page break]
Army divisions taken from their normal duties.
Interesting entries among the list of buildings destroyed or severely damaged are. The Kaiser Wilhelm Gedachtwiskirche (The Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, which is now half ruined, half restored, (a major attraction in West Berlin)
The Charlottenburg Castle, the Berlin Zoo, much of the Unter den Linden, the British, French, Italian and Japanese embassies, the Ministry of Weopons and Munitions, the Waffen S.S. Admin College the Barracks of the Imperial Guard at Spandau and, among many industrial premises, 5 factories of the Siemens Group and the Alkett tank works which had recently moved from the Ruhr. It is difficult to give exact casualty figures, an estimated 2,000 people were killed, including 500 in a large shelter in Wilmersdorf which received a direct hit, and 105 people killed in another shelter in Wilmersdorf which was next to the Neukoln gas works where there was a huge explosion.
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23.11.43 2
17.05 LANC JA899 F/O BEETHAM
17.05
[Underlined] OPS BERLIN LANDED WITTERING FLAPS U/S. [/underlined]
383 aircraft 365 Lancs 8 Mosquitoes to continue the attack on Berlin. The bombers used the same direct route as had been employed on the previous night. The German controllers made an early identification of Berlin as the probable target. Their single engined fighters were gathered over the city by zero hour and other fighters arrived a few minutes later
Fake instructions broadcast from England caused much annoyance to the German who was giving the running commentary. The Germans started a female commentator but this was mostly counered by a female voice from England ordering the German pilots to land because of fog at their bases. Spoof fighter flares were dropped by Mosquitoes north of the bomber stream also caused some diversions of German effort. Bomber crews noticed that flak over the target was unusually restrained with the German fighters obviously being given priority [Underlined] 20 aircraft all Lancasters were lost 5.2 per cent of the bomber force [/underlined]
The target was again cloud covered and the Pathfinders carried out sky-marking, but many of the main force crews aimed their bombs thro the cloud at the glow of 11 major fires still burning from the previous night. Much further destruction was caused to Berlin but because many of the details of the 2 raids were recorded to-gether by the Germans, it is only possible to say that more than 2,000 further houses 94 wooden barrack buildings and 8 industrial premises and 1 military establishment were destroyed, with many other buildings damaged
Approx 1,400 – 1.500 people were killed on this night.
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26.11.43 LANC JA376 F/O BEETHAM
[Underlined] OPS BERLIN DIVERTED MELBOURNE (YORKS) [/underlined]
443 Lancasters 7 Mosquitoes
The Berlin force and the Stuttgart force diversionary flew a common route over Northern France and on nearly to Frankfurt (diversionary) flew a common route over norther France and on nearly to Frankfurt before diverging
The German controllers thought that Frankfurt was the main target until a late stage and several bombers were shot down as they flew past Frankfurt. Only a few fighters appeard over Berlin where flak was the main danger. But the scattered condition of the bomber stream at Berlin meant that bombers were caught by fighters off track on the return flight and the casualties mounted [Underlined] 28 Lancasters were lost 6.2 per cent [/underlined] of the force, and 14 more Lancasters crashed in England. The weather was clear over Berlin, but after their long approach flight from the south, the Pathfinders marked an area 6-7 miles from the city centre (north west) and most aircraft bombed there. Because of Berlins size however most of the bombing fell in the centre and in the Siemen Sstadt (with many electrical factories) and Tegel districts. 38 war industry factories were destroyed, and many more damaged. The now routine destruction of housing and public buildings also took place, but not on such a great scale as on the previous raids to Berlin
The Berlin zoo was heavily bombed on this night many of the animals had been evacuated to zoo’s in other parts of Germany, but the bombing killed most of the remainder, several large and dangerous animals leopards, panthers, jaguars apes – escaped had to be hunted and shot in the streets
[Page break]
Because of the confusion caused by so many raids in a short period, it was only possible for the Germans to record an approximate number of people killed on this night, of about 700-800. The local officials however produce a report in Jan 1944 giving details of combined casualties of the three raids of 22/23 23/24 26/27 November 4,330 were killed of whome the bodies of 574 were never recovered. The districts with the most deaths were Tiergarten 793 Charlottenburg 735 and Wedding 548. The dead were foreign workers and 26 were prisoners of war.
The property damage was extensive with 8,701 dwelling buildings destroyed and several times that number damaged
417,665 lost their homes for more than a month and 36,391 for up to a month
Reaching [underlined] Melbourne [/underlined] Yorks
Still heavy fog Diverted to [underline] Pocklington [/underlined] Yorkshire
We managed to land in heavy fog still,
All aircraft had little fuel left and could not find the runway
They were told to (head your A/C out to sea and bale out
[Boxed] 1 Lancaster ran out of fuel and crashed on a farm house. Killing the farmer & wife only the Lancaster R.G. survived
[Page break]
One night we had to do a very deep dive when another Lancaster that had not seen us came across our path, Mike put our Lancaster into a steep dive to prevent us hitting each other.
After we had settled down and were flying a steady course again, we found that our inter com was not working and we could not speak to each other.
Using my torch I soon found the problem, the inter com battery was not in its place, and the inter com leads were where the battery had left. With a torch I searched along the aircraft and found the battery some distance away. I think the Navigators feet had released the clamp that held the battery in position, and the battery in the steep dive that we did ended up some distance away. Luckily I was able to replace it, and make sure it was clamped down in position.
[Underlined] OPS LEIPZIG [/underlined]
A relative successful raid on Leipzig during the war
24 Aircraft 15 Halifaxes 9 Lancasters were lost 4.6 per cent of the force
The largest building being taken over by the Junkers aircraft company the former world fair exhibition site whose spacious buildings had been converted to become war factories
[This text in the corner appears in following page text] were severely damaged One place that was hit by a exhibition site, whose spaciou [see following page]
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[Underlined] OPS LEIPZIG [/underlined]
[Underlined] LANDED WITTERING DAMAGED BY JU88 [/underlined]
3.12.43
Our crew were told to collect a Lancaster from RAF Waddington. We must take all our flying kit along with us. After arrival at Waddington we found we had to bomb Leipzig with it first then return the Lancaster to Skellingthorpe.
We thought what a strange way to deliver a Lancaster bomber 4 miles to its new airfield
[Second part of page missing – copy shows text from page beneath transcribed below]
A German nightfighter hit us in the port wing I reported that the wing was on fire. Our FL/t Eng came and looked and said, no its just petrol escaping from the wing tanks.
All the engines were then run from that one tank to save petrol being wasted
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[Underlined] OPS LEIPZIG [/underlined]
[Underlined] LANDED WITTERING DAMAGED BY JU88 [/underlined]
[Underlined] 3.12.43 SHORT OF FUEL. (TANKS SHOT UP) [/underlined]
527 Aircraft. 307 Lancasters 220 Halifax’s
Despite the loss of two press men on the previous night the well known American broadcaster Ed Morrow flew on the raid with 619 Sqdn Lancaster crew, he returned safely. The bomber force took another direct route towards Berlin before turning off to bomb Leipzig
German fighters were in the bomber stream and scoring successes befor the turn was made but most of them were then directed to Berlin when the Mosquito diversion opened there.
There were few fighters over Leipzig and only 3 bombers are believed to have been lost in the target area 2 of them being shot down by flak
A relative sucessful raid from the point of view of bomber casualties, was spoiled when many aircraft flew by mistake into th Frankfurt defended area on the long southern withdrawal route and more than half of the bombers shot down this night were lost 4.6 per cent of the force
The Pathfinders found and marked this distant inland target accurately and the bombing was very effective This was the most sucsessful raid on Leipzig during the war a large area of housing and many industrial premises were severely damaged One place that was hit by a large number of bombs was the former world fair exhibition site whose spacious buildings had been conserved to become war factories
[Page break]
The Wehrmacht suffered damage to 4 flak positions, a clothing store, a veterinary depot and the Army Music School. 64 people were killed and 111 were missing or still covered by wreckage. 23,000 were bombed out. A train standing six miles south of Frankfurt was hit by a 4,000lb bomb and 13 people in it were killed.
Part of the bombing some how fell on Mainz 17 miles to the west and many houses along the Rhine water front and in southern suburbs were hit. 14 people were killed
We circled arround Wittering with little or no fuel left in our tanks, the Wittering phone R/T operator repeated saying the landing lights will soon be on, we waited an waited
Eventually the landing lights did come on and we were able to land with almost empty fuel tanks.
When we entered the Wittering mess we could see what the delay had been to get the landing lights on, as no one was on duty at their watch office, they were all attending the party.
A few years ago, giving our landing date and time to a serving RAF officer, he contacted me and said there was no mention in their flying control log book of our landing that night
Myself and two other crew members stood near the open back door with parachutes on as soon as the engines cut we would jump.
[Page break]
20.12.43 LANCASTER G ED588.
[Underlined] OPERATIONS FRANKFURT [/underlined]
650 Aircraft 390 Lancasters 257 Halifax’s
14 Lancasters lost
The German control room were able to plot the bomber force as soon as it left the English coast and were able to continue plotting it all the way to Frankfurt. There were many combats on the route to the target. The Mannheim diversion did not draw fighters away from the main attack until after the raid was over. But the return flight was quieter
41 aircraft – [underlined] 27 Halifax’s 14 Lancasters lost 6.3 per cent of the force [/underlined]
The bombing of Frankfurt did no go according to plan. The Pathfinders had prepared a ground marking plan on the basis of a forcast giving clear weather but they found up to 8/10 cloud. The Germans lit decoy fires 5 miles south east of the city and also used dummy target indicators. Some of the bombing fell arround the decoy, but part of the creepback fell on Frankfurt causing more damage than bomber command realized at the time. 466 houses were completely distroyd and 1,948 seriously damaged. In Frankfurt and in the outlying townships of Sachsenhausen and Offenbach 117 bombs hit various industrial premises but no important factories are mentioned. The report stresses the large number of cultural, historical, and public buildings hit, including the cathedral, the city library, the city hospital and no fewer than 69 schools.
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[Underlined] JU88 SHOT DOWN [/underlined]
One night I felt the aircraft start to rise as the engines were open’d up I heard Les our bomb aimer on the inter com say to our mid upper gunner (Jock Higgins) not yet Jock I’ll say when.
He then said OK Jock [underlined] NOW. [/underlined]
By that time I was standing in the astro dome and looking above and in front of our aircraft I could see a German J.U.88 night fighter, flying in front of us, and a little above us.
Our bombaimer Les Bartlett suddenly said Jock now, with that they both open’d fire on the night fighter Ju88.
I noticed that Les seem’d to be spraying the nightfighter from side to side with his twin browning machine guns, but Jock Higgins with the same two machine guns was sending a constant stream of bullets up in the area of the nightfighter where the two crew members would be seated. The German night fighter flew for some time being riddled with bullets until it turned over and started to go down
I would think that it was Sgt Higgins that killed the two German crew members and caused the J.U.88 to crash with continuous firing in the cockpit area. As Les Bartlett was an office, he received ta medal for his efforts, but I still think it was Jock Higgins that brought the aircraft down.
Jock Higgins rec’d nothing
[Page break]
29.12.43
[Underlined] 7.25 [/underlined]
1707 LM428.
[Underlined] OPS BERLIN INCENDIARY THROUGH STARBOARD OUTBOARD TANK [/underlined]
712 Aircraft, 457 Lancasters, 252 Halifaxes 3 Mosquitoes.
A long approach route from the south, passing south of the Ruhr and then within 20 miles of Leipzig. Together with Mosquito diversions at Dusseldorf, Leipzig and Magdeburg causes the German controller great difficulties and there were few fighters over Berlin. Bad weather on the outward route also kept down the number of German fighters finding the bomber stream
[Underlined] 20 Aircraft 11 Lancasters 9 Halifaxes 2.8 per cent [/underlined] of the force lost
Berlin was again cloud covered, the bomber command report claiming a concentrated attack on skymarkers is not confirmed by the local report. The heaviest bombing was in the southern and south eastern districts but many bombs also fell to the east of the city
388 houses and other mixed property were destroyed but no item of major interest is mentioned.
182 people were killed, more than 600 were injured and over 10,000 were bombed out
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REAR DOOR OPEN
The rear end of the Lancaster near the rear gunners position is one of the coldest parts of the aircraft, but one night our rear gunner said he was freezing in his position at the rear of the aircraft.
I soon found the problem when I got to the rear of the aircraft, the main entrance door was open, and the freezing cold air was coming straight in.
With gloves on I tried to close the the door, but with a two hundred mile wind rushing thro the door way it would’nt close. The Flight Eng came down to help me, but even the two of us could not close it.
We managed to get it partly closed leaving a small gap and tying it back with the dead mans rope The dead mans rope is a long length of rope near the rear door, should one of our crew be unlucky to have one of his legs or arms chopped off the rope was to tie a torch or a lamp on him, and with a parachute on push him out of this back door and hope people will see him coming down and rush him to hospital before he dies.
With the rope we still could nt close the door properly and had to push some heavy clothing into the door cracks to keep out the biting cold wind coming in the aircraft.
Whilst doing this work at the rear of the aircraft we had porable oxygen bottles round our necks all the time, or we would have passed out threw lack of oxygen.
Gloves on hands or you would loose the skin if you touched the bare metal
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1.1.44 OPS BERLIN
23.44
LANCASTER
M/ME 567 [Underlined] 421 LANCASTERS [/underlined] 8.15
German fighters were directed to the bomber stream at an early stage and were particularly active between 2. Route markers on the way to Berlin
The German controller was not deceived by the Mosquito feint at Hamburg. But his fighters were not effective over Berlin. Only 2 bombers being shot down by fighters there, and the local flak was probably restricted to the height at which it could fire and the guns only shot down 2 bombers over the target.
[Underlined] 28 Bombers were lost 6.7 per cent of the force. [/underlined]
The target area was covered in cloud and the accuracy of the sky marking soon deteriorated
The Berlin report says that there was scattered bombing mainly in the southern parts of the city.
A large number of bombs fell in the Grunewald, an extensive wooded area in the south west of Berlin only 21 houses and 1 industrial building were destroyed with 79 people being killed. A high explosive bomb hit a lock on an important canal and stopped shipping at that area for several days
14.1.44 LANCASTER B.LL744
[Underlined] F/O BEETHAM OPS BRUNSWICK [/underlined]
496 Lancasters and 2 Halifaxes on the first major
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We always took of with us a thousand or 2 [underlined] thousand pound overload [/underlined]
As we left the runway the long flames from the exhausts rose over the leading edge of the wings burning the [inserted] paint [/inserted] off the wings I knew there was 2,000 gallons of high grade petrol in tanks under all those flames
[Page break]
Raid to [underlined] Brunswick [/underlined] of the war [underlined] 38 Lancasters were lost [/underlined] 7.6 per cent of the force.
The German running commentary was heard following the progress of the bomber force from a position only 40 miles from the English coast, and many German fighters entered the bomber stream soon after the German frontier was crossed near Bremen. The German fighters scored steadily until the Dutch coast was crossed on the return flight. 11 of the lost aircraft were Pathfinders. Brunswick was smaller than bomber commands usual targets and this raid was not a success. The city report describes this only as a “light raid” with bombs in the south of the city which had only 10 houses destroyed and 14 people killed. Most of the attack fell either in the countryside or in Wolfenbuttel and other small towns and villages well to the south of Brunswick.
20.1.44 LANCASTER B/LL744
F/O BEETHAM [/underlined] OPS BERLIN [/underlined]
[Underlined] 769 Aircraft. 495 Lancasters [/underlined] 264 Halifax’s [underlined] 10 Mosquito’s. [/underlined]
35 Aircraft 22 Halifax’s 13 Lancasters were lost 4.6 per cent of the force
102 Sqdn from Pocklington lost 5 of its 16 Halifaxes on this raid, 2 more crashed in England ->
[Page break]
A CLEAR NIGHT OVER BERLIN
I think my first clear night over Berlin made me realize the terrible bombing coditions that the German folk were having to face
Looking down on Berlin from 3 or 4 miles high, I could see thousands of incendiary bombs burning on the ground. The large wide roads of Berlin showed like a large map
Every few minutes a huge explosion would take place along one of the roads wiping out part of the road plan.
These large explosions were the 4,000lb blast bombs which all the Lancasters carried (known by the RAF men as cookies)
I could see a wide road thro the streets of Berlin, quite clearly with the houses on fire on both sides, then a 4,000lb cookie would drop on the road, and a dark patch would appear where it had left no buildings standing.
Red and green incendiary bombs were still raining down and the RAF Pathfinder men were telling the bomber crews which ones they were to aim at.
I could look at a long wide road thro Berlin, houses on both sides alive with incendiary bombs buring, then a 4,000pb cookie hits the area and leaves a black space.
The master bomber above is shouting out to the aircraft aim at the reds not the greens.
We were expected to sleep when we got to out huts
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-> and the squadron would lose 4 more aircraft in the next nights raid
The bomber approach route took a wide swing to the north but once again the German controller manage to feed his fighters into the bomber stream early and the fighters scored steadily until the force was well on the way home. The diversions were not large enough to deceive the Germans
The Berlin areas was, as son often completely cloud covered and what happened to the bombing is a mystery. The Pathfinder sky marking appeared to go according to plan and the crews who were scanning the ground with their H2S sets believed that the attack fell on the eastern districts of Berlin. No major navigational problems were experienced.
No photographic reconnaissance was possible until after a further 4 raids on Berlin were carried out but the various sources from which the Berlin reports are normally drawn all show a complete blank for this night. It is not known whether this is because of some order issued by the German authorities to conceal the extent of the damage, or whether the entire raid missed Berlin
[Page break]
[Underlined] 1,000lb BOMB IN BOMB BAY [/underlined]
One early morning after we had been on an operation we taxied the Lancaster back to our usual dispersal point at Skellingthorpe
The engines were shut down and all was quiet as we started collecting our loose flying kit together.
Suddenly we heard a large thud and at first we though a van had bumped into us. Then there was the sound of something rolling along the side of the aircraft.
Our bomb aimer Les Bartlett opened his bomb bay inspection door and was shocked at what he saw.
A thousand pound bomb had fell from from its station on to the bomb bay doors and it had rolled down the sloping bomb bay and had crashed at the rear of the bomb bay.
We did’nt know if it was still live and had to warn the ground crews, unless they opened to bomb bay doors where it would fall out.
We never did know how they made it all safe.
[Page break]
[Underlined] OPS BERLIN SPOOF ATTACK [/underlined]
27.1.44
[Underlined] F/LT BEETHAM [/underlined]
[Underlined] OPS BERLIN [/underlined]
515 Lancasters and 15 Mosquitoes
The German fighters were committed to action earlier than normal, some being sent out 75 miles over the North Sea from the Dutch coast. But the elaborate feints and diversions had some effect. Half of the German fighters were lured north by the Heligoland mining diversion and action in the main bomber stream was less intense than on recent nights.
33 Lancasters lost 6.4 per cent.
The target was cloud covered again and sky marking had to be used again. Bomber command was not able to make any assessment of the raid except to state that the bombing appeared to have been spread over a wide area, although many bombs fell in the southern half of the city, less in the north but 61 small towns and villages outside the city limits were also hit. With 28 people being killed in these places. Details of houses in Berlin are not available but it is known that nearly 20,000 people were bombed out. 50 industrial premises were hit and several important war industries suffered serious damage.
567 people were killed including 132 foreign workers.
[Page break]
[Underlined] FOG OVER AIRFIELD ON RETURN [/underlined]
All with little fuel left
Most sqdns sent up 20 A/C to target
2 Sqdns on each airfield (approx.) 36 A/C Each A/C had little more than 20 mins fuel left [underlined] No 1 [/underlined] would ask permision to land.
He was told to orbit at 3,000ft and as he circled he had to shout his position on the circuit such as (railway bridge) (cross roads) (Thompson’s farm) (reservoir)
As he circled he was called to decen’d to 2,000ft but still had to shout his number and position as he circled the airfield
Finally he was called down to 1,00 F shouting his position on the circuit No 1 down wind, then No 1 funnels No 1 touching down, then No 1 clear
No 2 would follow behind shouting out their positions on the circuit. Followed by No 3 doing the same
By shouting out their number and position and height the controller called them down
All crew’s had then to go to de-briefing
[Page break]
[Underlined] INSTRUCTING W/OPS [/underlined]
[Underlined] SILVERSTONE & TURWESTON [/underlined]
JUNE 1944 TILL END OF WAR
Of the 4319 men in the A/C shot downn attacking only [underlined] 992 [/underlined] survived 22.9 per cent.
On take off with 2,000lb overload
100 miles per hour were needed for take off
A gate stopped the throttle.
If the speed was not fast enough the pilot would say to the enineer [underlined] thro the gate [/underlined] and the gate was open’d to give more power
[Page break]
[Underlined] INTERNATIONAL DISTRESS [/underlined] SIGNAL.
[Underlined] SOS [/underlined]
ˑˑˑ / --- / ˑˑˑ
You would be told to divert to another airfield if there was fog over Lincolnshire where our airfield is. And stay there with the aircraft
[Underlined] DIVERSIONS F.I.D.O [/underlined]
[Underlined] FOG INTENSIVE DISPERSAL OF [/underlined]
[Underlined] FISKERTON 49 [/underlined] SQDN.
[Underlined] ASTRO DOME (FOR NAVIGATOR [/underlined] degrees & minutes
[Underlined] USING A SEXTANT. [/underlined]
Taking astro shots of the stars.
[Underlined] Polaris Bennet Nash Dubhi [/underlined]
[Page break]
2
Switch off IFF (Identity Friend or Foe)
Continuous watch on Monica screen
Listen out on given wave band for German speech
Tune my transmitter and jamb any speech
Wind in trailing aerial when over the cost [underlined] German [/underlined]
Pass bundles of window down to Flight Engineer
Transmit height and wind speed back to base. Details from Navigator.
Keep watching Monica screen whilst listening for German speech on given wave band
Obtain bearing from given [inserted] radio [/inserted] beacon for Nav, using loop aerial
Take hot coffee to the two Gunners
On clear nights, obtain sextant shots of given stars asked for by Navigator
On run up to target get in astro dome and watch for any bombers above us
Receive messages from base. Decode them & pass to pilot
Send more winds back to base. Our Nav is a wind finder
Shout out [underlined] contact [/underlined when a blip comes on Monica screen
Keep searching for German R/T speech.
After leaving enemy coast, let out trailing aerial
Switch on IFF when near English coast
Place colours of the day cartridges in Very pistol
[Page break]
3
Wind in trailing aerial crossing the English coast
If a diversion message is received on reachin the English coast, contact the diversion airfield and obtain a [underlined] QDM [/underlined] for the Navigator.
A QDM, is a coarse to steer to take you to the airfield.
You have to stay there with the aircraft. No washing or shaving equip. money or pygamas etc. Some times for two or three days if our aircraft needs work on it to be carried out
After landing you have to attend debriefing where you are asked a lot of questions before getting any sleep.
[Underlined] WHEN LOST. DARKY WATCH [/underlined]
“Hello” Darky”
Hello Darky
[Page break]
4
[Underlined] SKELLINGTHORPE SITE [/underlined]
No washing arrangements were available on our living quarters site. Just toilet & sleeping quarters All shaving & showers etc were in the Seargeans Mess. All toilet items kept in small haversack hanging on peg’s. After a few weeks we were told to remove our toilet haversacks for one day only.
The ones still on the pegs were the property of the men missing
[Page break]
[Underlined] CANADIAN AIRMEN. [/underlined]
Three NCO members of our crew were housed in a tin hut at Skellingthorpe
We had the hut to ourselves.
Arriving back after our leave, three extra beds were in the hut occupies by three Canadians
They were very generous, and told us to help ourselves from all the boxes of food arround the hut. Tins and packages all arround us.
The S.W.O. Station Warrant Officer came in and looking at it all said, I will be in this hut ever night at 7 oclock and if it is [inserted] not [/inserted] clean and tidy you wont be allowed out until it is. We had to wait for his insection every evening before we could visit Ena and Joan in Lincoln
A short time after the Canadians were shot down over Germany, all their contents were taken away and the hut was tidy again
The S.W.O. then said we could go out in our own time he would not visit us again. It probably took the death of three nice Canadians to allow Fred and myself to take Ena & Joan for an early meal.
And they were taken away
[Page break]
Whilst flying over Germany I would search a wave band on my radio.
I would listen for German speech sounding like giving orders to people.
I would tune my transmitter to that frequency and prese my morse key.
This would transmit the noise of one of our aircraft engines on that frequency as there was a microphone in that engine
On one long German operation, bad weather was forecast for our return over Lincoln and we were told to land St. Eval, Cornwall Some hours later I received another message which said cancel the previous message return to base.
Our Wing Commanders wireless operator did’nt get this message and he landed in Cornwall. On his return to Skellingthorpe, crowds of aircrew members line’d the runway to cheer him in.
At our next briefing, the Wing Co. said Wireless Operators make sure you get all the messages from Group, not like some clot that dos’nt get them. Jagger his Wireless Op got up and said, if that’s what you think of me you can get someone else to fly with you[inserted] tonight sir [/inserted] and with that he then left the room to go,
[Page break]
28.1.44
LANCASTER B/LL744 [Underlined] OPS BERLIN [/underlined]
677 Aircraft [Underlined] 432 Lancasters 241 Halifaxes 4 Mosquito’s [/underlined]
Part of the German fighter force was drawn up by the early diversions and the bomber approach route over northern Denmark proved too distant for some of the other German fighters. The German controller was however able to concentrate his fighters over the target and many aircraft were shot down there [underlined] 46 aircraft 26 Halifax’s 20 Lancasters [/underlined] lost 6.8 per cent of the force
The cloud over Berlin was broken and some ground marking was possible, but the bomber command claim that this was the most concentrated attack of this period is not quite fully confirmed by German records.
The western and southern districts were hit but so too were 77 places out side the city. The Berlin recording system was now showing an increasing deterioration no overall figure for property damage was recorded Approximately 180,000 people were bombed out on this night. Although many industrial firms were again hit the feature of the night is the unusually high proportion of administrative and public buildings appearing in the list of buildings hit. The new Chancellery, 4 theatres, the French Cathedral, 6 hospitals, 5 embassies, the state patent office etc, the report concludes with the entry the casualties are still not known
RAF Police came forward to stop him and the Wing Co. said let him go.
[Page break]
28.1.44
LANCASTER B/LL744 [Underlined] OPS BERLIN [/underlined]
677 Aircraft [Underlined] 432 Lancasters 241 Halifaxes 4 Mosqioto’s [/underlined]
Part of the German fighter force was drawn up by the early diversions and the bomber approach route over northern Denmark proved too distant for some of the other German fighters. The German controller was however able to concentrate his fighters over the target and many aircraft were shot down there [underlined] 46 aircraft 26 Halifax’s 20 Lancasters [/underlined] lost 6.8 per cent of the force
The cloud over Berlin was broken and some ground marking was possible, but the bomber command claim that this was the most concentrated attack of this period is not quite fully confirmed by German records.
The western and southern districts were hit but so too were 77 places outside the city. The Berlin recording system was now showing an increasing deterioration no overall figure for property damage was recorded Approximately 180,000 people were bombed out on this night. Although many industrial firms were again hit the feature of the night is the unusually high proportion of administrative and public buildings appearing in the list of buildings hit. The new Chancellery, 4 theatres, the French Cathedral, 6 hospitals, 5 embassies, the state patent office etc, the report concludes with the entry the casualties are still not known but they are bound to be considerable. It is reported that a vast amount of wreckage must still be clearid. Rescue workers are among the mountains of it. *Report os Technischen Nothilfe Gau 111-Berlin Berlin and Brandenburg. In Berlin City Archives
[Page break]
Reg Payne flew with 91 different pilots during his service in the RAF
Flew with Sir Michael Beetham as pilot 108 times
362 official flights were made during his RAF service, plus a lot of unofficial flights not recorded in his log book
After one operation after returning to our dispersal, and switching everything off a 1,000lb bomb came detatched from its moring in the bomb bay, luckily the bomb bay doors were closed. It rolled down the bomb bay and made a clonk as it reached the bottom. We don’t know how the ground crew delt with it.
During one operation the gunners complained how cold it was, I was asked to look into this. Going to the rear of the A/C I saw that the rear door was open. It could not be closed agains the slip stream but we tied it up as close as we could, and then pushed spare heavy flying clothing in the small gaps.
[Page break]
[Underlined] KENSINGTON ALBERT HALL [/underlined]
Wireless instruction in Science Museum.
Meals in Victoria & Albert Museum
Bedrooms in Albert Court next to Hall
“P.T.” in Albert Hall (boxing) etc.
Football in Kensington Gardens
[Underlined] BOXING ALBERT HALL [/underlined]
P.T. instructor sort us out in pairs boxing gloves on.
Instructor shouts Get stuck into each other or I’ll get stuck in to the pair of you
[Page break]
[Underlined] FIRST OPERATION BERLIN [/underlined]
[Underlined] 16.45 hrs [/underlined]
2,000lb overload Beetham spared this
NOV 22ND 764 A/C 7HRS 15MINS
26 A/C Lost 169 killed
Dispersal 1 hour before take off
Check all aerials/W/T./Monica./SBA/IFF/Trailing/Gee/Loop
[Underlined] Gunners getting ready [/underlined]
[Underlined] 17.05hrs BERLIN AGAIN [/underlined] Trailing aerial out [underlined] over the [/underlined] sea
NOV 23rd. [Underlined] IFF switched on [/underlined]
383 A/C 7hrs 45 mins
Navigator reading airspeeds at take off flames from exhausts 20 A/C lost [underlined] while taking off [/underlined]
130 killed
[Underlined] ON LANDING [/underlined]
Flaps frozen up, [Underlined] Refused landing [/underlined] Diverted to RAF Wittering
Bath ready in the morning
[Page break]
[Underlined] 3RD OPERATION [/underlined]
NOV 26TH [Underlined] BERLIN [/underlined]
17.20HRS
443 A/C 8HRS 5MINS
28 A/C lost 202 killed
[Underlined] Fog over Lincoln [/underlined] 14 damaged beyond repair
Diverted to Melbourne (Yorks)
[Underlined] Fog also over Melbourne [/underlined]
5 A/C crashed landing
Head your A/C out to sea and B.O.
Back to Skellingthorpe 2 days later
K King hit farm house. Farmer and wife killed
Only rear gunner survived
No cash or shaving kit on operation toothe brush etc.
[Page break]
3 times to Berlin in 5 nights
Cold bed at nights thinking about it.
EXTRACT FROM OFFICIAL GERMAN RECORDS ABOUT BERLIN RAID NOV 22ND
The most effective raid of the war on Berlin 3,000 houses and 23 industrial premises were completely destroyed with several thousands of other buildings damaged
175,000 people were bombed out
More than 50,000 soldiers were brought in to help from garrisons up to 100KM distance. Equivalent to three army divisions taken from their normal duties
Buildings destroyed or severely damaged are the Kaiser Wilhelm, Memorial Church (now a memorial) the Charlottenburg Castle, the Berlin Zoo, much of the Unter den Linden, the British, French, Italian, and Japanese embassies. The Ministry of Weapons and Munitions, the Waffen SS. admin college. The barracks of the Imperial Guard at Spandau, and many industrial premises inc. 5 factories of the Siemens Group, and the Alkett tank works, recently removed from the Ruhr. 2,000 people killed inc 500 in a large shelter which received a direct hit, and 105 people in another shelter near the gas works, where there was a huge explosion.
[Page break]
[Underlined] DEC 3rd [/underlined] 0023 HRS 527 A/C
[Underlined] LEIPZIG [/underlined 7HRS 50MINS
24 A/C lost 120 killed
Damaged by JU88 Fuel tanks ruptured short of fuel
Landed at Wittering
Officers Mess party no landing lights
Bath in the morning (much better conditions than at Skellingthorpe)
DEC 20TH 17.26 HRS 41 A/C Lost 193 killed
[Underlined] FRANKFURT [/underlined] 5HRS 40MINS
A/C G ED588 Did over 100 operations
DEC 29TH 17.07 HRS
[Underlined] BERLIN [/underlined] 20 A/C lost 79 killed
30lb phosphorous incendiary thro stbrd outer fuel tank.
We didn’t know about it.
Wing/Co took Beetham out to A/C after breakfast to show him hole in wing
[Page break]
[Underlined] JAN 1ST 1944 [/underlined] 23.44HRS NEW YEARS DAY 421 A/C.
BERLIN 8HRS 15MINS
28 A/C lost
Had to take the mid upper an axe spare mid upper smashes Perspex of turret Turret perspex frozen over
JAN 5TH 0005HRS STETTIN (TOUCHING SWEDEN)
358 A/C 8HRS 40MINS 16 A/C lost
Lancaster was fired on from another Lancaster
JAN 14TH 17.15HRS BRUNSWICK
498 A/C 5HRS 10MIN 38 A/C lost
Freda and Joans Lincoln Imps
Fred R/G forgot Lincoln Imp whilst on peri track.
Van driver collected it before take off
[Page break]
JAN 20TH [Underlined] BERLIN [/underlined]
16.35HRS
769 A/C 7HRS 35 A/C lost
Coned by searchlights Inter.comm battery became loose
No sound on inter com
2,400 tons of bombs dropped
Collected the HT battery from rear of A/C and re connected it
JAN 21st 19.51 HRS
22 A/C [Underlined] berlin [/underlined] spoof attack → 1 A/C lost
Main operation Magdeburg → 66 A/C lo
7 HRS 25MINS
Back door open. [Underlined] Tie up with rope Would not close. Slipstream [/underlined]
Dead mans rope at the rear door
Torch and knife in boots
[Page break]
FEB 25TH 18.35 HRS
[Underlined] AUGSBURG [/underlined]
594 A/C 8HRS 21 A/C lost.
Oil temperature much too high on one engine
Returned on 3 engines
Oil temp guage U/S
Nothing wrong with engine
Mike Beetham flying Lancasters promoted to Flight [inserted] LTD [/inserted] Commander
Could not drive car
Help from WAAFs.
1ST MARCH 23.19 HRS
[Underlined] STUTTGART [/underlined]
594 A/C 8HRS 10MINS 4 A/C lost
Thick cloud on route and over target
Night fighters unable to locate bomber stream
Much damage to Stuttgart
[Underlined] On the bomb run left left etc. [/underlined]
[Underlined] Bomb doors open Very cold draught when open. [/underlined]
[Page break]
JAN 27TH 17.17 HRS
[Underlined] BERLIN [/underlined
530 A/C 8.55 MINS 33 A/C lost
Off inter comm. High engine rev’s
Les and Jock attack Ju88
Of Les gets DFM, Jock goth nothing
JAN 28TH 0021 HRS
[Underlined] BERLIN [/underlined
677 A/C 7HRS 55MINS 46 A/C lost
Washing & shaving items
Haversacks collected from Sgts mess from airmen missing
19TH FEB 23.55 HRS
[Underlined] LEIPZIG [/underlined
823 A/C 7HRS 78 A/C lost
Returning home over North Sea (dawn reduce hight to stay in the dark
[Page break]
12.2.44
[Underlined] FIGHTER AFFILIATION [/underlined]
12.2.44 We were detailed to fly a short distance up into Yorkshire and to meet up with a Spitfire, who would contact us and when ready would continue to dive on us and give us advice on our defensive moves. In our Lancaster we had our full crew of seven personel, plus another pilot and his two gunners.
Our pilot Sir Michael Beetham decided that he and our two gunners would do the exercise first. With our two gunners in the turrets and Michael in the pilots seat, the attacks began all of them ending in the Lancaster doing cork screws to prevent the Spitfire from shooting him down. After 10 or 15 mins, the other pilot took over from Michael, and his gunners made for the turrets.
When all was ready the Spitfire came in for it first attack, the Lancaster went into a steep dive. I don’t think I have ever dived so steep before in a Lancaster, and so fast. On pulling out of the dive I noticed smoke round the port outer engine, and then there were flames.
Michael shouted a warning on the inter com and to our flight eng to use the fire extinwishes
[Page break]
With the extinuish’s working the flames vanished, with just smoke and steam, however once the extinguisher was empty the flames came back again, and seemed to be spreading down the wing. From the port outer engine the wing was on fire, and as the fire extinguisher was now finished and the fire spreading down the wing Michael gave the order to abandon the aircraft.
With ten crew members on board there was a move to the two exits, my pilot and navigator baled out at the nose exit, followed by the other pilot.
The rear door was open and Jock Higgins our M.U.G. baled out there, Les Bartlett our B.A. also left from there, when I arrived at the rear door they made way for me to go next. I had just left looking at the large fire in the port wing and I knew it was about to break off. I baled out.
Looking down I could only see 10 tenth cloud 3,000ft below me and I did’nt know if we were still over the Humber Estury
As I was falling to earth I found I was pulling one of the canvas handles and not the metal release handle. With the correct handle my chute opened, and looking up I saw part of the port wing following me down Also I could see the coast and I was drifting towards it. At the same time I heard the crash as the Lancaster crashed a few miles in land. I was drifting towards the Lincoln
[Page break]
shore, and I could see all the smoke drifting up in the sky from where it crashed
I made a soft landing in a field quite near East Kirkby airfield, quite close to where the Lancaster crashed. I was told that four of the crew were still in the aircraft when it went down. And I was asked if I would help them decide which body was who. As they were so badly crushed I did’nt want to go near them
[Underlined] REG [/underlined]
The four airmen killed were the other pilots 2 gunners.
Also our rear gunner Fred Ball our flight eng Don Moore
Fred Ball and Joan
Reg and Ena
The two ATS girls
Fred Ball was due to take Joan home to his house in [missing word] on their next leave together. But that was no longer possible
But Reg & Ena found it drew them closer together
[Underlined] Reg was made a member of the Caterpillar Club. [/underlined] Irving parachute.
[Pgae break]
19.2.44
[Underlined] OPERATIONS LEIPZIG [/underlined]
19.2.44 823 Aircraft 561 Lancaster 255 Halifax’s 7 Mosquitoes,
44 Lancasters and 34 Halifax’s lost 9.5 per cent of the force. The Halifax loss rate was 13.3 per cent of those dispatched and 14.9 per cent of those Halifaxes which reached the enemy coast after early returns had turned back. The Halifax 2’sand 5’s were permanently withdrawn from operations to Germany after this raid.
This was an unhappy raid for bomber command.
The German controllers only sent part of their force of fighters to te Kiel minelaying diversion. When the main bomber force crossed the Dutch coast they were met by a further part of the German fighter force and those German fighters which had been sent north to Kiel hurriedly returned. The bomber stream was this under attack all the way to the target. There were further difficulties at the target because winds were not as forcast and many aircraft reached the Leipzig area too early and had to orbit and await the Pathfinders. 4 aircraft were lost by collision and approximately 20 were shot down by flak.
Leipzig was cloud covered and the Pathfinders had to use sky marking. The raid appeared to be concentrated in its early stages but scattered later. There are few details of the effects of the bombing. No report is available from Germany and there was no immediate post raid reconnaissance flight. When photographs were eventually taken they included the results of an American raid which took place on the following day.
[Page break]
Reg Payne flew with 91 different pilots during his RAF service
Flew with Sir Michael Beetham his pilot 108 times
362 official flights made during his RAF service. Plus a large no of unofficial flights not recorded in his log book
After my operational flying at Skellingthorpe as a rest period I was sent to RAF Silverstone No 14 OTU, an Operational Training Unit
This made it rather difficult for me to see my ATS sweetheart in Lincoln.
I always visited her on my days off in Lincoln. Arriving back in the train one evening, I left the railway station at Brackley quite close to my airfield at Turweston. My bike was left chained to the station railings ready for me to ride back to Turweston a short distance away. A WAAF was in the same rail coach as me, she also was based with me, and worked in our Sgts mess. I asked her how she was getting to our airfield a couple of miles away. She said walk I suppose. I had my bike with me & she was please when I offered her a ride on my cross bar. All went well until near the airfield down a dark unlit lane, the pedals of my bike dug into the grass and we both ended up in the ditch. Luckily we were both not hurt, but decided we would walk the rest of the way, and I left her at the gates of the WAAFs site
[Page break]
Having all my meals in the Sgts mess, I thought I would see her again, and finally I asked one of the WAAFs if she was working there still. She smiled at me and said not any more, I then said why not, she then shook me and said, she’s had a dishonourable discharge, I asked what ever for, and she replied, she has had a mis-carriage and is in hospital. I could only think our bike accident was the cause of it. I never met her again.
[Page break]
[Underlined] OPS. AUGSBURG. RETURNED ON 3 ENGINES [/underlined]
25.2.44 23.55 Lancaster B LL744
F/Lt Beetham W.OP.
[Underlined] OPS LEIPZIG [/underlined 7.0PM
823 Aircraft – 561 Lancasters 255 Halifax’s 7 Mosquito’s 44 Lancaster and 34 Halifaxes lost 9.5 per cent of the force The Halifax loss rate was 13.3 per cent of those dispatched and 14.9 per cent of those Halifaxes which reached the enemy coast after early returns had turned back. The Halifax IIs and Vs were permanently withdrawn from operations to Germany after this raid
This was an unhappy raid for bomber command, the German controllers only sent part of their force of fighters to the Kiel minelaying diversion. When the main bomber force crossed the Dutch coast they were met by a further part of the German fighter force and those German fighter which had been sent north to Kiel hurriedly returned.
The bomber stream was thus under attack all the way to the target. There were further difficulties at the target because winds were not as forecast and many aircraft reached the Leipzig area too early and had to orbit and await the Pathfinders. 4 aircraft were lost by collision and approximately 20 were shot down by flak
Leipzig was cloud covered and the Pathfinders had to use sky marking. The raid appeared to be concentrated in its early stages but scattered later. There are few details of the effects of the bombing. No report is available from Germany and there was no immediate post raid reconnaissance flight, when photographs were eventually taken they included the results
[Page break]
BALING OUT OF THE LANCASTER
In a short time the whole port wing had flames along it, and Michael Beetham gave the order for us to bale out
With ten members of the crew in the aircraft we all had to move swiftly
Les Bartlett our bomb aimer left the astro dome where he had been filming the spitfire and baled out of the rear door followed by Jock Higgins. My pilot and navigator baled out of the front escape hatch
I made my way to the rear exit and baled out, below me all I could see was cloud, we were at 6,000ft, I did’nt know if we were over the Humber Estury or over land. We did not have Mae Wests on
As I was floating down on my chute, part of the port wing was above, luckily it passed by me.
Unfortunately the Australians two gunners didn’t bale out and were both killed
Worst of all our flight eng did not bring his chute because he told it was only a local flight
I think our rear gunner waited to late to jump.
Don our flight eng didn’t stand a chance He said he had not taken his parachute because it was only a training flight
Some time later after I had left the RAF, a friend of mine from East Kirkby took me to the crash side. We dug up a human pelvis and lots of metal that I had melted down and made into small Lancasters
[Page break]
9TH MARCH 20.42 HRS
[Underlined] MARSEILLES FRANCE [/underlined]
No A/C lost.
44 A/C of 5. Group. 8hrs 55mins
AIRCRAFT FACTORY BOMBED 10,000FT.
Practice flight before op with Air/Comm Hesketh Flew over target to get French workers clear before bombing
24TH MAR. [Underlined] BERLIN [/underlined]
811 a/c 7hrs 20mins 72 A/C lost
FOG OVER LINCOLNSHIRE LANDED FOULSHAM (NORFOLK
Tea with rum Massive searchlight & birds 2.30am.
[Underlined] EXPLAIN DARKY PROCEDURE [/underlined]
26TH MARCH 44 19.50HRS
[Underlined] ESSEN [/underlined]
705 A/C 5hrs 5mins 9 A/C lost
Jock pinching coal from compound
Bombs make a metalic jolt as each one leaves
[Page break]
30TH MARCH 19.50HRS
[Underlined] NUREMBURG [/underlined]
[Underlined] BELGUIM [/underlined]
795 A/C 7hrs 45mins 95 A/C lost
5 Northants airmen killed on this op.
Kettering man Arthur Johnson killed with all his crew
4 of our Sqdn were missing
Trevor Roper Gibsons R/G on the dams raid was killed
60 miles of burning A/C across Belgium
Aircraft flying in bright moonlight
200 mile strait leg to north of the target leaving large contrails behind
60 A/C lost
5TH APRILX 20.31 [underlined] TOULOUSE [/underlined] 6HRS 55 MINS
144 A/C of 5 Group [underlined] AIRCRAFT FACTORY [/underlined]
One aircraft exploded over the target.
The factory was severely damaged but 22 people killed in houses near by
[Page break]
[Underlined] HUMBER ESTUARY [/underlined]
12TH FEB [underlined] FIGHTER AFFILIATION [/underlined]
Baled out at 6,00ft
Pilot P.O. Jennings RAAF & two gunners
Les and his camera
Don [inserted] Moore [/inserted] No parachute
Jock on the tail
Me pulling wrong handle
Over the sea or over the land Baling out watching Don Moore (no parachute)
Large reservoir
P/O Jennings in the trees
Tablets from M.O.
Ena ringing Sgts mess
Looking over at Freds bed that night
Freds Lincoln Imp on tunic (not wearing it.
[Underlined] 1979 VISIT CRASH SITE PELVIS FOUND [/underlined]
Explain landing procedure at airfield after [underlined] returning to base Black Swan from Pilgrim B. Baker [/underlined] etc
[Page break]
2252HRS
28TH APRIL [underlined] ST MEDARD BORDEAUX [/underlined]
88 A/C 8HRS No A/C lost
Explosive factory
Markers set woods on fire
Unable to see target
Bombs returned to base
22.35HRS
29TH APRIL [underlined] ST MEDARD BORDEAUX [/underlined]
68 A/C 7HRS 20MINS No A/C lost
Explosive factory destroyed
Message (master bomber) do not bomb below “4,000FT
Blast lifted up our A/C
21.35HRS
1ST MAY 44 [underlined] TOULOUSE [/underlined]
131 A/C 5HRS 35MINS No A/C lost
Aircraft factory & Explosives factory
Both targets hit.
[Page break]
23.21HRS
[Underlined] 22ND APRIL BRUNSWICH [/underlined]
238 A/C 6HRS 4 A/C lost
617 Sqdn Mosquito’s marked target
Thin could over target hampered the bombing
[Underlined] 1,000lb bomb still in bomb bay after [/underlined] landing
Rolled down bomb bay after landing
[Underlined] 21.35 HRS SCHWEINFURT [/underlined
[Underlined] 26TH April [/underlined]
206 A/C 8HRS 50 MINS 21 A/C lost
Unexpected strong winds
Raid not a success
F/St Jackson Flt/Eng Awarded V.C. for climbing out on wing of A/C to put out fire in engine
FW 190 below Lanc. But didn’t fire at it.
[Page break]
11 TH APRIL 20.30
[Underlined] AACHEN [/underlined] 4 HRS
341 A/C 9 A/C lost
Always wanted to bomb Aachen
They gave us so much AA when it was used as a turning point
German civilian population all prepared for RAF raids. All their cellars were joined together with tunnels
The roof attic timbers coated with lime
18TH APRIL 44 [underlined] JUVISEY PARIS [/underlined] 4.25HRS
202 A/C RAILWAY TERMINAL 1 A/C lost
5 Group effort with master bomber Red spot marking
20TH APRIL 44 [underlined LA CHAPELLE [/underlined] (PARIS) 4HRS 30MINS
270 A/C 6 A/C lost
[Underlined] Rail target north of Paris [/underlined]
[Underlined] Washing & shaving equipment [/underlined]
[Underlined] Haversacks in Sgts mess. [/underlined]
Collected from hooks after approx. 6 weeks
[Page break]
Although operations were detailed one night our crew were not detailed.
I needed a few items for myself from the shops in Lincoln and went there on my own to purchase them.
Lincoln city was very quiet. Not an aircraft in the sky and you could hear all the traffic noises.
Suddenly the crackling noise of a heavily laden Lancaster bomber climbed over the roof tops from one airfield, then followed by another from another airfield. This was followed by dozens of Lancasters circling round the city, heavily laden with tons of bombs. The people of Lincoln were used to this, as they knew that once on their way to Germany it would be quiet until they returned some hours later
[Page break]
[Underlined] WE HAD TO BURY REAR GUNNER AT BIRMING [/underlined]
End of tour operations.
Returning after 7 days leave
5 – 50 Sqdn crews missing from raids whilst away
4 on Mailly le Camp.
15 Lancs flown whilst with 50 Sqdn 14 lost soon after.
[Underlined] No interest in football what so ever [/underlined]
[Underlined] DURING MY 30 OPERATIONS [/underlined]
691 aircraft lost
3967 aircrew killed
1111 P.O.W.’s
209 hrs over Germany (all at night) over 8 days.
Of the 4319 men in the A/C attacking Berlin who were shot down in the 18 raids only 992 survived 22.9 per cent.
[Page break]
Fred and Reg Ena Goodrich and Joan Brighty
[Underlined] THE LINCOLN IMP [/underlined]
Ena & Joan our two ATS girl friends gave us both a little Lincoln Imp badge to wear on our clothing when flying. They were known as very lucky items. Fred liked to pin his to his blazor when he went out in the evening, and pin it to his flying jacket when flying.
One evening when we were on operations being taken to our aircraft, Fred said to the driver of our transport, I have’nt got my Lincoln Imp (I never fly without it) Fred told him our hut number, 1st bed on left, Lincoln Imp on blazor hanging above bed.
The driver after dropping us at our A/C sped off to our hut, in ten minutes he was back with Freds Lincoln Imp. We all felt much better.
It was some time after, during a local parachute jumping afternoon, we had ten men in the Lancaster and only six of us managed to bale out before the Lancaster crashed. The other four men were killed Fred our rear gunner was one of them.
As I lay’d in my bed the next morning with Fred’s bed next to mine, his uniform jacket hung in the sun light: something on the pocket lapel caught the sunlight. It was Freds Lincoln Imp
[Page break]
AIRCRAFT & AIRCREW LOSSES DURING REG’S 30 OPERATIONS
[Table of aircraft with losses and details of crews]
Total number of A/C lost on these operations [underlined] 562. [/underlined]
Total number of aircrew killed [underlined] 4,300. 1206 POW’s
Average number of A/C on each operation 425.
Of the 4319 men in the A/C shot down attacking Berlin only 992 survived 22.9 per cent
[Page break]
BOMBER COMMAND LOSSES 8,325 AIRCRAFT.
1 in every 7 aircrew were killed in training
[Underlined] 1942 [/underlined] Only 3 in every 10 crews would finish a tour
3 groups od U.S. P40’s had sweepd German airfields in the afternoon prior to Nuremburg
Many say after pilots releasing their brakes and getting close to 105mph. was the moment of greatest fear. Sitting between 12 tons of petrol and explosives
6 nights before the Nuremburg raid 72 bombers were lost over Berlin
[Page break]
Killed on the Nuremburg raid
545 RAF crew
129 German civilian and military inc 11 Luftwaffe
[Underlined] 5 airmen from Northants killed [/underlined]
F/Sgt T J Hirst Weedon
F/O H C Frost Northampton
Sgt A J Johnson Kettering
Sgt J.P G Binder Moulton
Sgt G.W. Walker Geddington
In all during WWII 14,000 tons of bombs were dropped on Nuremburg. 6,369 Germans killed
A crew member had 1 in 4 chance when shot down
In the 5 month period known as the Battle of Berlin, it cost bomber command 1,123 A/C missing over enemy territory and crashes in England More than the entire strength of bomber command
Cyril Barton was the only Halifax pilot to gain V.C.
After Nuremburg, Mosquitoes went out with the bombers using the latest Mark X radar. Before this it was never allowed over enemy territory
[Page break]
[Underlined] NUREMBURG [/underlined]
41 Second Dicky’s took part in raid 9 killed 2 POW’s
9 Flight Commanders lost all killed
Half missing crews had done less than 10 ops.
30 missing had done less than 5 ops.
9 crews missing on their first op.
Out of 64 Lancs shot down only 4 rear gunners survived
101 Sqdn lost 7 A/C
51 Sqdn lost 6
Sgt Brinkhurst was the only crew member to get back to England after being shot down by a Halifax mid/upper gunner
Most men after being shot down in Germany, after taking off their parachutes, felt a sense of relief and were glad to be alive
No Mosquito carrying Oboe was ever shot down
[Page break]
Finally the moon set 1.48am, 3 hrs flight home against head winds
Martin Becker had shot down 6 bombers, he landed and re fuelled then shot down another Halifax. The rear gunner never saw him
50 men in Beckers 7 A/C 34 died
Major Heinz Wolfgang Schnaufer had shot down 121 bombers
The spread of bombers was 160 miles wide when crossing the coast home at 4am.
F/Lt Snell PFF pilot over Nuremburg 0107, landed base Downham Market 0410by direct route home 25 mins before the next A/C landed
Some crews 100 miles off track
Our crew crossed coast at Calais instead of 80 miles further south
P/O Barton crossed Durham coast 200 miles off track and crash landed. 3 crew survived.
Cyril Barton died – VC.
14 A/C crashed in this country.
[Underlined] East Kirkby [/underlined] 5 crews had there leave stopped to go on this operation 2 aborted 2 shot down.
[Page break]
NUREMBERG
Sgt Handley 50 Sqdn crashed RAF Winth [missing rest of word] All crew okay.
But all crew killed 5 weeks later Mailey le Camp.
When we were interrogated we were asked, How many did you think we have lost. Our M/U said about 100 and they said “Come off it Sgt. ” and poo pooed it.
Bennett was angry when he heard of the losses
One third of bombers shot down by 8 pilots
Nav F L Chipperfield 619 Sqdn Coningsby composed the Warsaw Concerto was on this raid
Our crew were No 1 airborne at Skellingthorpe at 2200 later Flt.Sgt Bucknall burst a tyre on take off and came off the runway “Wing & engine ripped out”
52 A/C Boomerang’d
4.7% Lancs
14.2 Halifaxs.
1.8 PFF.
2,600 tons of bombs carried all together
[Page break]
NUREMBURG
The forecast winds the bombers were using were not accurate & blew crews to the north
German night fighters still had navigation lights on when they first saw the bombers
The SN-2 improved radar could locate bomber even if they were using window.
Walter Heidenreich switched on radar and saw unusual blip. It was two Lancs flying together for company (it was so bright) He shot them both down with (slanting music)
Helmut Schuite shot down 4 A/C with 56 cannon shells
P/O Cyril Barton’s A/C on fire.
Nav, W/OP & B/A bale out
After fires are put out he still carried on with 3 engines loosing 400 gals fuel
Aircraft burning on ground lit up the sky
Our nav told crew not to report any more A/C being shot down
[Page break]
NUREMBURG
9 out of 10 pilots would always corkscrew port. The German pilots would allow for this
50 Mosquito night/fighters were in bomber stream, their radar could not pick up the signals from the German night fighters
The RAF radio station at Kingsdown could hear the claims of bombers being shot down and knew bomber command was in trouble
The long leg 200 miles 1 hr flying. 60 aircraft shot down one every 3 1/2 miles one per minute
In only 1 A/C did the whole crew survive
One crew in three were all killed
After the long leg bombers turned south for Nuremburg. Owing to strong wind, lots were too far [missing word] and east. 75 miles 20 mins flying.
PFF found that Nuremburg was covered by dense cloud 2 miles deep. Had to use sky markers
[Page break]
German single engine fighters all sent north to Berlin.
The bombers turn to the south wasn’t predicted
Chris Panton, brother of Panton Bros East Kirkby was shot down and killed on southern leg
PFF target indicators were widely scattered
Within 7 mins of bombers turning south, all German night fighters were told of new course
18 more bombers were lost on short south leg
In one Lanc Trevor Roper was killed Gibsons R/G
After target marking A/C should be bombing 47 A/C per min. or 160 tons per min
But they were late being too far north at turning point.
2 groups of markers could be seen several miles apart
Backers up dropped their sky markers near Lauf too far east. There was no master bomber to tell main force
[Page break]
NUREMBURG
It was usual practice for some PFF crews to scatter bombs over target area to keep the defences under cover whilst the aiming point was located and marked accurately.
Sky markers dropped over Lauf drew most of the bombing
One Path finder had a clear view of industrial town. Thought it must be Nuremburg and dropped large green TI on it
The town was Schweinfurt.
All the ball bearing factories were hit with incendiaries but no HE bombs.
Of all the A/C shot down on the outward flight only one full crew survived
German fire fighters working in -15 degrees- ce [missing end of word]
Village of Schonberg was destroyed by incendiaries 11 miles from aiming point
After leaving Nuremburg Some pilots flew into cloud after losing height still being blown north
[Page break]
[Underlined] 30TH MARCH 1944 [/underlined]
[Underlined] OPS NUREMBERG SAME SIZE AS BRISTOL [/underlined]
Harris
Severe icing in northern Europe, raid had to be more south
Harris chose Nuremburg.
Beginning of moon period
Early forecast cloud cover on way to target but clear over target
Straight leg 200 miles over Germany
Bennett PFF was against this
Halifax groups were in favour save fuel
Bombers in 5 waves 17 mins over target.
795 aircraft 572 Lancs 214 Halifax’s 9 Mosquito
In 7 months up to this date bomber command had lost 1047 A/C
6 days before 73/AC lost on Berlin
Halifax’s would carry only incendiaries one third of Lancasters weight.
162 aircraft involved in diversion raids (Baltic)
[Page break]
[Underlined] NUREMBERG [/underlined]
Some U.S. Mustangs and Lightnings were flying as night fighters RAF crews not told
20 Stirlings
10 Albemarles
8 Wellingtons
6 Fortress’s
110 Mosquitoes
I all 6,493 airmen over Germany that night.
In 103 Sqdn no one had completed a tour for 7 months
Photo rec’I’ aircraft flew over area in late afternoon and reported clear skys and no cloud cover.
But Harris did not cancel the raid
The German controllers ignored the mining diversion towards Baltic
German radar picked up signals from our H2S headsets soon after leaving our bases
By midnight, 200 German night fighters were making their way to orbit beacons “Ida” and “Otto” In the path of the bombers
Bombers were leaving contrails in bright moon
[Page break]
Because of the failure to find and mark Nuremberg Harris gave Cochrane (5 Group) the all clear to mark targets from low level. Using 617 Sqdn and Mosquitoes W/Co Cheshire obtained his V.C. for all his low level marking
Cheshire marked an A/C factory from 1,000ft over Toulouse and 5 Group destroyed it.
This was the last time the bombers all went in one stream to a single target.
[Page break]
[Underlined] REG’S TOTAL RAF TRAINING [/underlined]
Oct/41 Blackpool Basic RAF training Morse Code etc
Jan/42 Yatesbury. Wireless study. Morse procedure
May/42 “North Coates”. Wireless ops duties costal command
Oct/42 Radio Maintenance “South Kensington” London
Jan/43 Radio training “Madely” Proctors & Dominies
Apr/43 Air gunners course Stormy Down Whitleys
May 43 “AFU” Wigtown Scotland Ansons & Bothas
June 43 14 OTU Cottesmore Saltby & Market Harborough
Sept 43 H.C.U. Wigsley Halifax & Lancaster
Oct 43 50 Sqdn Lancasters 10 Berlin ops and Nuremburg Pilot Sir Michael Beetham
May 44 RAF Silverston 14 OTU.
June 44 RAF Turweston 14 OTU
June 45 Voluntarily taken off flying duties
July 45 Trained as receipts & issues stores officer at RAF Kirkham
Dec 45 Flown to Rangoon 56 FRU Forward Repair Unit 39 Flying hours reclaiming RAF equipment
July 46 Return home by boat. Demob RAF Kirkham 30 days not leaving the boat
In Burma. Reclaiming RAF equipment left arround after the Japanese were defeated
Based in Rangoon
Bringing it on charge or turning it to scrap
[Page break]
[Symbol] Lost on ops whilst F/O Beetham was at 50 Sqdn.
[Symbol] Missing POW’s.
[Underlined] No.50 Squadron Battle Order – 22nd November, 1943 [/underlined] BERLIN
[Underlined] A/C Pilot F/Eng. Nav. A/B. WO/AG. MU/G.
“A” P/O Toovey Sgt. Smith F/O. Pagett Sgt. Bedingham Sgt. Olsson Sgt. Kelbrick
“B” F/Lt. Bolton Sgt. Brown P/O. Watson F/Sgt. Forrester Sgt. McCall Sgt. Moody
“C” P/O. Heckendorf Sgt. Henderson P/O. Dale Sgt. Kewlay Sgt. Hope Sgt. Hall
“D” F/O. Beetham Sgt. Moore P/O. Swinyard Sgt. Bartlett Sgt. Payne Sgt. Higgins
“E” F/Sgt. Leader Sgt. Rosenburg F/O Candy P/O. Stevens F/Sgt. Lewis Sgt. Tupman
“F” P/O. Litherland Sgt. Green F/O. Chilcott Sgt. Hartley Sgt. Harris F/O Crawford
“G” F/O. Wilson Sgt. Felton P/O. Billam F/O. Newman Sgt. Gunn F/Sgt Harring
“H” Sgt. Lloyd Sgt. Avenell Sgt. Richardson SGt. Dewhirst F/Sgt. Hewson Sgt. McCarthy
“J” F/Sgt Erritt Sgt. Jones F/Sgt. Delaynn Sgt. Gleeson F/Sgt. Taylor F/Sgt. William
“K” F/Sgt. Thompson Sgt. Laws F/Sgt. Chapman Sgt. Conlon Sgt. Corbett Sgt. Spiers
Front Gunner – F/Sgt. Bolton
“L” F/Lt. Burtt Sgt. Taylor F/o. Presland F/O. Daynes F/O. Betty Sgt. Parkman
“M” F/O. Keith Sgt. Mitchell F/O. Guthrie Sgt. Bendix Sgt. Morrey Sgt. Brown
“N” F/Sgt Cole Sgt. Cammish F/Sgt. Burton Sgt. Wasterman F/Sgt. Stanwix Sgt. Sockett
“O” P/O Dobbyn Sgt. Cave F/Sgt. Palmer Sgt. Jackson Sgt. Ridyard Sgt. Duncom
“P” P/O. Lundy Sgt. Stevens F/Sgt. Jordan P/O Bignell Sgt. Green Sgt. Rundle
“R” W/O. Saxton Sgt. Fryer F/Sgt. Jowett F/Sgt Rees Sgt. Watson F/Sgt. Zunti
2nd Navigator F/Sgt Crerar
“S” P/O. Adams Sgt. Midgeley Sgt. Rawcliffe Sgt. Ward F/Sgt. Crawford Sgt. Hastie
“T” F/O Herbert Sgt. Russell Sgt. Rae F/O. Bacon Sgt. Poole P/O. Hughes
“X” P/O. Weatherstone Sgt. Gregory F/Sgt. Thompson Sgt. Lane Sgt. Spruce Sgt. Linehan
O.C. Night Flying S/Ldr. W.F. Parks, DFC.
Duty Engineer Sgt. Brown
R.McFarlane
Wing Commander, Commanding,
[Underlined] 50 Squadron, Skellingthorpe [/underlined]
[Page break]
[Photograph]
[Page break]
[RAF Challenge Chart]
[Page break]
Early DI’s change LT. accumulators Sign Form 700
Airtest check equip whilst flying
Attend W/Ops briefing D/F stations & freq’s etc. codes
Attend main briefing.
Collect. Colour of day charts
Main bomber codes
Beacon freq’s
M/F D/F groups to use
Broadcast times
Spare helmet
W/T challenge chart
Most of these are on rice paper and can be eaten before landing
Operate ground flight switch check voltage main acc’s
Switch on A1134? Amplifier for inter com.
Check radio whilst engines being run up.
Tidy up bundles of window on floor
Oxygen mask on before take off
Once airborne pencil in ranges on vis Monica screen
IFF switched on
Listen out for half hourly broadcast from base
Leaving coast wind out trailing aerial
Switch off IFF.
Keep continuous watch on Monica screen
Listen out on given wave band for German speech and tune transmitter to jamb the speech
Wind in trailing aerial when crossing enemy coast
Pass bundles of window down to F/Lt engineer
Transmit wind speed and height back to base. Details from nav
Keeping watch on Monica screen whilst listening for German speech on given wave length
Obtain bearing from beacon for nav. using loop aerial
On clear sky nights, obtain shots of given stars as asked for by navigator
On run up to target get in astro dome and look for A/C above you on bombing run
Receive any messages from base, decode them and pass to Pilot or nav
Send more winds back to base
Shout “contact” each time a blip comes on Monica screen
Keep searching for German R/T speech
Let trailing aerial out after leaving enemy coast.
Switch on IFF when near English coast
Place colours of day cartridges in very pistol
Wind in trailing aerial (crossing English coast)
If diversion message is rec’d before reaching English coast. Contact the diversion airfield and obtain QDM. Coarse to steer to get you to the airfield
[Page break]
[Photograph]
[Page break]
Alfred East Gallery Aircraft Paintings.
Grafton Underwood Oil Painting . Raffle for funds re Americans returning
Later Exhib Grafton Village Hall
Village scenes & aircraft.
Lady bought two church paintings
Vicars wife spitfire painting
Forest Green village bridge painting
Thank you letter.
Comission Lysander dessert painting
Kept. It.
Aircraft Paintings for guest speakers Air Gunners Ass
Chairman got praise
Lancaster Sqdn painting Lincoln £1,600 Memorial
Comission B24 Liberator painting Harrington Memorial unveiling
[Missing word] B17 over Grafton Underwood Dr Wildgoose
[Missing word] of friends deceased wife
Rothwell family mother father & wife all deceased
[Missing word] Ship painting for Malta.
[Page break]
Exhibiting Paintings in Rothwell Antique Shop.
2 Exhibitions in Rothwell library
Lancaster painting bought by friend donated to Bishop Stopford School.
Trevor Hopkins and talk to children
Photograph’s taken of paintings & made into cards
Started painting local scenes in water colours to produce greetings cards
Now visit all villages in this area taking photographs to use in producing more cards.
County library services use my Manor House painting to produce 4,000 cards.
Still have to go back to Lanc painting in oils
In 1999 exhibited 16 paintings All sold
[Page break]
[Underlined] PAINTING [/underlined]
Started 1970
Picture framing out of hand
Framing for art exhibitions & weddings
Nude lady painting in shed
Some of them not worth framing.
To Doctor [inserted] Walker [/inserted] with chest pains, pack up framing first do some for us
Calendars from drug firms.
Clear up back log framing
Try painting for change
Started copying calendars – water colours sold first one to neighbour
College told me change to oils
Did my first aircraft painting sketching model oils
Later photos of models at required angles
Started taking photo’s of local scenes to copy
Exhibited in Kettering P.O & Lloyds Bank
Commissioned paint bank for manager
Changed it to holiday painting
[Page break]
[Underlined] BROUGHTON ART EXHIBITION JUNE 2000 [/underlined]
Paintings hung 3 sold
1 painting took 2nd place in favourite painting vote.
Oct and November Exhibitions in-:
Alfred East Gallery Kettering
Kettering Library
Rothwell Holy Trinity
31 paintings sold during year 2000
Jan 2001, completed painting of Rothwell Church school building for use on letter heading note paper
Selection of greeting’s cards including A/C cards
Total over 100
Donate paintings-: Westside Community Group
Rowell Fair Soc
Rothwell Church
Painting of Rothwell Sunday School Bdls’
Broughton Flower Festival Poster
[Page break]
Intelligence Exams. Dover Hall? Northampton. RAF Cardington over night.
Fitness Exams [Underlined] DETAILS OF W/OP TRAINING [/underlined]
MAY
25.5.41 RAF Reserve
OCT
9-10-41 8 Recruit Centre Padgate.
OCT
16.10.41 10 Signals School [underlined] Blackpool [/underlined]
FEB
5.2.42 2 Signals School [underlined] Yatesbury [/underlined]
MAY
7.5.42 W/OP [underlined] North Coates [/underlined] Coastal Comm
SEP
16.9.42 7 Signals School [underlined] South Kensington [/underlined]
JAN
6.1.43 4 Signals School [underlined] Madeley [/underlined]
APR
6.4.43 7 A.G.S. Stormy Down
APR
27.4.43 1 A.F.U. Wigtown
JUNE
1.6.43 14 OTU Cottesmore, Saltby Market Harborough
SEPT
8.9.43 1654 Conversion Unit Wigsley. NOTS
OCT
22.10.43 50 Sqdn Skellingthorpe Lincs.
10.6.44 14 OTU Silverstone
1.8.44? 14 O.T.U. Turweston
[Page break]
RAF SERVICE OVERSEAS 1945/46.
[Underlined] OCT 1943 [/underlined]
Met my future 1st wife whilst serving in RAF Lincoln
She was an ATS girl also based in Lincoln
[Missing word] [Underlined] 1944 [/underlined]
After completing my operational flying 50 Sqdn Skellingthorpe posted to 17 OTU Silverstone as an instructor where I stayed until VE. Day May 1945.
By that time I was engaged to my ATS girlfriend but agreed not to get married whilst still flying
Large surplus of aircrew after VE Day.
Given choice to give up flying and take ground job.
After training were promised posting near home
1st 2nd and 3rd choice Desborough Market Harbor’o Silverstone
After courting 2 years decided to get married
Posted to RAF Kirkham 8 week course Receipts & Issues Officer
Fixed date of wedding 5th Oct 45
After finish of course posted to Blackpool P.D.C.
Then to North Pier to be told of our postings
My posting 56 FRU S.E.A.C.
Told to go to Karachi to find where 56 FRU was.
Home on leave for wedding & back to Blackpool
Trainload of us to Northweald Essex to fly over seas
[Page break]
NORTHWEALD LATE OCT. 1945
Parade 8am each morning hundreds on parade
Call for 50 personel 2 Liberators departing
Kept hanging back wifes parents living nearby.
5 weeks later not many of us left, all transported to [underlined] RAF Tempsford [/underlined] spy’s airfield [underlined] Bedfordshire [/underlined]
Now very cold snow on ground [underlined] no heating. [/underlined]
[Underlined] 11TH DEC [/underlined] 26 off us taken with kit, to waiting Lib
Given ‘K’ rations [underlined] no drinks no seats [/underlined]
1300 hrs took off for North Africa
Landed North Africa [underlined] Castel Benito Tripoli [/underlined] Mussolini’s airfield 7hrs 5mins
Canteen for cup tea Barrel of oranges
Slept in tent [underlined] cold [/underlined] Out door wash etc
Servicemen going home have preferance of A/C
Dock & harbour Tripoli full of sunken ships
Airfield littered with Axis A/C
[Page break]
[Underlined] 13TH DEC [/underlined] 4pm took off for [underlined] Cairo [/underlined] Landed [underlined] Almaza 6hrs 40mins [/underlined]
Taken to Helioplis Palace Hotel
Civil aviation hotel Very posh.
Cool bath in morning (Lady cleaner)
Trip to Pyramids in afternoon
Collect Roman coin [underlined] Diaclesus 300BC [/underlined]
Trouble with young Egyptian shoe shines
[Underlined] 15TH DEC 0630hrs [/underlined] Took off [underlined] Persia, [/underlined] Landed [underlined] Shaibah 5hrs [/underlined]
Very hot sunstroke centre near A/C
[Underlined] 15TH DEC 1500hrs [/underlined] Took off for India landed at [underlined] Mauripur Karachi 7hrs 20mins [/underlined] 10.20pm.
Given bunk beds in large hangar 3 high.
Spent 13 days at Mauripur including Christmas
Changed into Khaki clothing
Plenty of fruit and bananas and drink
Christmas day in shorts & hat only
Swimming in Arabian Gulf with dolphins
Hot sands Camel rides messy smells
[Page break]
[Underlined] 28 DEC 45 6 AM [/underlined]
Boarded Dakota to [underlined] Palam Delhi 4hrs 40mins [/underlined]
[Underlined] View of Everest during flight [/underlined]
28th DEC [underlined] 12.35PM Palam to Chakula 4hrs 15mins [/underlined]
[Underlined] 100 miles? From Calcutta [/underlined]
At Chakula for 2 or three days
Stayed on camp site all the time
Lived in bamboo huts on stilts [underlined] 4ft [/underlined]
Wild country all arround, jackals howling at nights
Primitive toilets on raised stairways
All personel were armed mostly Sten guns
All had firing practice on firing range
1ST JAN 46
We all boarded Indian train, no window panes no corridors
As Warrant Officer was I/C the train
Airmen firing from train at wildlife during journey
[Page break]
Thought I was in for rocket when we pulled into Calcutta station
Spent next few days in transit camp near Calcutta
Not allowed to leave camp over local Indians pushing for their independance
Whilst there played football against African black, they wiled the floor with us, playing with bare feet
Ice cream under shade of tree monkey’s dropping
Eating ice cream
5TH JAN 46.
[Underlined] TRANSPORTED TO DUM DUM AIRPORT CALCUTTA [/underlined]
12.30pm Boarded Dakota to Mingladon Airfield near Rangoon 4.30hrs
Total flying hours Tempsford England to [underlined] Mingladon Rangoon 39hrs 30mins [/underlined]
We were all taken by lorry transport (now 12 off us)
To Rangoon where we found 56 F.R.U.
F.R.U. = Forward Repair Unit.
[Page break]
We were taken to our separate mess’s
After a meal in the Sgts mess we were taken to a neaby bombed building nearby
Given timber & tools to make beds
Mosquito nets
[Underlined] No windows electrics water [/underlined]
After breakfast taken to 56 FRU stores
[Underlined] 56 FORWARD REPAIR UNIT. [/underlined]
Capable of repairing anything used in R.A.F.
Aircraft Vehicles Radio’s Parachutes etc
Stores in large [inserted] ex [/inserted] printing works
[Underlined] Job Detail As a W/O I was given the jobs [/underlined]
As, I/C our Sgts billet
Anti malaria officer
Fire officer
Petrol receipts & issues officer
As well as working in stores & Orderly Officer
[Page break]
[Underlined] Japanese POW’s working for us. Petrol drums [/underlined]
[Underlined] Very hot & sticky [/underlined] Atmosphere 110°
Green mould on shoes
[Underlined] Khaki shorts [/underlined] changed 3 times a day.
[Underlined] Dark [/underlined] soon after 5pm, thousands large bats
[Underlined] Fire fly’s [/underlined] lighting up tress
[Underlined] Canoe building [/underlined]
[Underlined] Victoria Lakes Sunday’s Me organising [/underlined]
[Underlined] Transport Food Bookings Snakes [/underlined] in lake
[Underlined] Hot sands [/underlined]
[Underlined] Petrol for Unit dance [/underlined]
[Underlined] Drains and sewers in Rangoon [/underlined] flooding in monsoon
Units closing down disposing of their equipment.
[Underlined] Orderly Officer Parachutes and Army Depot fire [/underlined]
[Underlined] Duty Free labels [/underlined] F/Lt. Adjutant
[Underlined] Rangoon toilets [/underlined] Squash dog on road
Water Festival
[Page break]
[Underlined] Monsoon rain [/underlined] Deluge on flat roof
Open sewers full
W/shops flooded testing canoes
We each bought a black steel trunk to store all our presents in to take home called a [underlined] deep sea trunk [/underlined]
[Underlined] One thing remains in my memory [/underlined]
Anglo Burmese ladies in office
11am Thursday’s shooting Jap war criminals
Listening to rifle shots ladies smiling.
[Underlined] EARLY JUNE 1946 [/underlined]
My demob group No 42 has come up
Transferred to a disposal centre on the outskirts of Rangoon
Sleeping 2 persons small tent
Were instructed to keep our arms in our beds, [underlined] “Dakoits” [/underlined] Burmese bandits from surrounding countryside
After a few days we were taken out by boat where our ship to take us home was moored [Underlined] The “Orduna” [/underlined]
[Page break]
REG PAYNE
WIRELESS OPERATOR
SGT RON BOYDON W/OP 207 SQDN
21/22 JAN 1944 OPS MAGDEBURG
ALL CREW BURIED IN BERLIN
1939-45 CEMETARY
“Bomber Harris and the Strategic Bombing Offensive 1939-1945
By the time war in Europe had ended more than 8,000 bombers had been lost during operational sorties, and by night alone nearly 14,000 were damaged, of which some 1,200 were totally wrecked. In terms of human casualties no fewer than 46,268 had lost their lives during or as a result of operations, and a further 4,200 had been wounded. In addition on non-operational flights 8,090 had been killed or wounded. Put another way, out of every 100 aircrew who joined an Operational Training Unit, on average 51 would be killed on operations, 9 would be killed flying in England, 3 would be seriously injured in crashes, 12 would become POW’s of whom some would be injured, 1 would be shot down but evade capture, and 24 would survive unharmed. No other branch of the fighting services faced quite these awesome odds.
[Page break]
1943/44
REG PAYNE
1435510 WIRELESS OPERATOR
50 SQUADRON
SKELLINGTHORPE
LINCOLN
PILOT SIR MICHAEL BEETHAM
NAV FRANK SWINYARD
BOMB AIMER LES BARTLETT
WIRELESS OPERATOR REG PAYNE
FLIGHT ENG. DON MOORE
MID UPPER GUNNER JOCK HIGGINS
REAR GUNNER FRED BALL
[Page break]
[Table of Aircraft & Aircrew Losses During Reg’s 30 Operations]
Total number of A/C lost on these operations 562.
Total number of aircrew killed 4,300. 1206 POW’s
Average number of A/C on each operation 425.
Of the 4319 men in the A/C shot down attacking Berlin only 992 survived 22.9 per cent.
[Page break]
[Underlined] BOAT TRIP HOME FROM BURMA RANGOON [/underlined]
As a W/O was given a berth in centre of ship
The ship terribly overcrowded
The only drinks water and tea
No canteen or such No books or library
30 day journey
Tried sleeping below deck first night
Slept on deck (crowded) after that
Quizz on how many miles the ship did each day
Went thro monsoon period
Attacked by swarm of locus
Hung dirty washing out of port hole
Noticed Army personel had ringworms
Nothing to do all day
Biggest event watching one chap having his boils squeezed each morning.
Called in at Ceylon, Alexandra Suez Gibralta
No one allowed off ship.
Went below to sleep just before we reached England
Docked in Liverpool mid July.
[Page break]
[Underlined] DEMOBBED AT RAF KIRKHAM 17TH JULY 1946 [/underlined]
W/O’s were told to leave their kit bags on deck and they will be taken to demob centre
All khaki clothing burned on parade ground
Our deep sea trunks were brought to us.
My kit bag had not turned up.
Had to pay 19/6d for missing overcoat (in kit bag)
Revolver & 40 rounds also in kitbag.
Told some of you W/O’s would loose your bloody head if it was’nt fixed on.
That’s all that was said
With that trundled my deep sea trunk to the railway station and home
[Page break]
[Underlined] SGT RON BOYDON [/underlined]
WIRELESS OPERATOR /AIR GUNNER 207 SQDN
LOST WITH ALL HIS CREW
WHILST BOMBING MAGDEBURG
21/22ND JAN 1944
YOU ARE NOT FORGOTTEN RON
REG PAYNE AND TUBBY MELHUISH
YOUR TWO EX RAF CHUMS.
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
Aviation Memory
Description
An account of the resource
A detailed account of Reg Payne's service in the RAF. He starts with a list of 18 RAF bases where he served in his 5 years of service. He was 16 when war was declared but volunteered for the RAF at 17. After tests he was selected for training as a wireless operator ending up at Blackpool. Morse had to be 10 words a minute or retraining as a gunner. Moved to RAF Yatesbury and speed increased to 18 words per minutes. Then RAF Stormy Down for air gunnery followed by #1 AFU Wigtown for training in flight.
By June 1943 Reg is at RAF Cottesmore, 14 Operational Training Unit.
He details his daily tasks before operations.
Next he is moved to RAF Wigsley Heavy Conversion Unit for conversion to Halifaxes then Lancasters then ended up at RAF Skellingthorpe.
The social life at Skellingthorpe is popular and he met his first wife.
November 1943 his brother is missing over Dusseldorf.
Each operation he was involved in is described in detail.
Later in his memoir he details where and when he trained.
There is a list of prisoners of war from his squadron and a colour photograph of Reg and two colleagues at the tail of Lancaster 'Just Jane'.
There is a list of Reg's paintings.
He details his post war service via Libya, Cairo, Iran, India and Karachi, ending up at 56 Forward Repair Unit in Rangoon.
In June 1946 he returned to the UK by ship.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Reg Payne
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
120 handwritten sheets
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BPayneRPayneRv1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
British Army
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.
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending review
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Belgium
Burma
France
Germany
Great Britain
Burma--Rangoon
England--Lancashire
England--Lincolnshire
England--London
France--Paris
France--Toulouse
Germany--Aachen
Germany--Augsburg
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Essen
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Magdeburg
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Braunschweig
France--Marseille
Poland--Szczecin
France--Bordeaux (Nouvelle-Aquitaine)
Germany--Wolfenbüttel
Poland
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1941
1942
1943
1944
1944-03-30
1944-03-31
1944-04-05
1944-04-06
1944-04-18
1944-04-19
1945
1946
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Anne-Marie Watson
102 Squadron
14 OTU
17 OTU
49 Squadron
5 Group
50 Squadron
619 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Albemarle
Anson
arts and crafts
bale out
Bennett, Donald Clifford Tyndall (1910-1986)
bomb aimer
bomb struck
bombing
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
bombing of the Juvisy, Noisy-le-Sec and Le Bourget railways (18/19 April 1944)
bombing of Toulouse (5/6 April 1944)
Botha
Caterpillar Club
crewing up
Dominie
FIDO
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
Home Guard
incendiary device
Ju 88
Lancaster
Master Bomber
military living conditions
military service conditions
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Mosquito
navigator
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
Pathfinders
prisoner of war
Proctor
RAF Cottesmore
RAF East Kirkby
RAF Fiskerton
RAF Kirkham
RAF Madley
RAF Market Harborough
RAF Melbourne
RAF North Coates
RAF North Weald
RAF Padgate
RAF Pocklington
RAF Saltby
RAF Silverstone
RAF Skellingthorpe
RAF St Eval
RAF Stormy Down
RAF Tempsford
RAF Turweston
RAF Waddington
RAF Wigsley
RAF Wigtown
RAF Wittering
RAF Yatesbury
Stirling
superstition
training
Wellington
Whitley
Window
wireless operator
wireless operator / air gunner
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/583/10639/LHolmesGH1579658v1.1.pdf
bf036945795cfbfa29a4383912ff5c45
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
Holmes, George
George Henry Holmes
G H Holmes
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Holmes, GH
Description
An account of the resource
Nine items. An oral history interview with Pilot Officer George Holmes (b. 1922, 1579658, 187788 Royal Air Force) his log book, records of operation, newspaper cuttings and photographs of personnel. He flew operations as a wireless operator / air gunner with 9, 50 and 83 Squadrons.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by George Holmes and catalogued by Nigel Huckins
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-10-21
2017-01-14
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.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[Partial transcription of page 60 - 61]
LUCKY ESCAPE – iii
One night on return – on the circuit we collided with another A/C on opposite direction – losing about 4-5 foot of the tip of main plane and nearly spun upside down – but recovered level flying – and landed – OK!!
On the night of July 24th in Lancaster VN-O. 50 Sqdn Skellingthorpe we were on route to Stuttgart when we were attacked by a german night fighter. Which shot away our bomb bay door. Damaged the starboard landing gear Fractured the main spar and put 5-6 cannon shells in the fuel tanks, on a 2nd attack the gunners shot the attacker down. We all agreed to carry on to the target, on arriving back at Base we were told to orbit until all the other A/C were down – On inspection we found that the cannon shells were still there. They were removed and were emptied. They were found to contain SAND instead of explosive – which saved all our lives. A very lucky escape. After a Belly Landing our first big escape.
15/3/2016 – G Holmes (aged 93)
[Page break]
RAF Coningsby 83 Sqdn 1945
Between Feb 1 to 18 March 1945 I flew with an Aussie pilot F/O Cassidy
His A/C was named –
“Hopalong Cassidy’s Flying Circus”!!
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
George Holmes' navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book
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
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Mike Connock
Anne-Marie Watson
Format
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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
LHolmesGH1579658v1
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.
Chile
Czech Republic
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Netherlands
Norway
Poland
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Atlantic Ocean--Bay of Biscay
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
Czech Republic--Plzeň
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Northamptonshire
England--Nottinghamshire
England--Wiltshire
France--Argentan
France--Beauvoir-sur-Mer
France--Brest
France--La Pallice
France--Le Havre
France--Limoges
France--Normandy
France--Orléans
France--Rennes
France--Saint-Pierre-du-Mont (Landes)
Germany--Bremerhaven
Germany--Dortmund-Ems Canal
Germany--Dresden
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Karlsruhe
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Mönchengladbach
Germany--Siegen
Germany--Stuttgart
Netherlands--Vlissingen
Norway--Horten
Poland--Police (Województwo Zachodniopomorskie)
Scotland--Ross and Cromarty
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1946
1947
1944-06-03
1944-06-04
1944-06-05
1944-06-06
1944-06-07
1944-06-08
1944-06-09
1944-06-10
1944-06-11
1944-06-21
1944-06-22
1944-06-23
1944-06-24
1944-06-29
1944-07-23
1944-07-24
1944-07-25
1944-07-30
1944-08-01
1944-08-02
1944-08-05
1944-08-14
1944-08-19
1944-09-10
1944-09-18
1944-09-19
1944-09-20
1944-10-23
1945-01-13
1945-01-14
1945-02-01
1945-02-02
1945-02-03
1945-02-07
1945-02-08
1945-02-09
1945-02-13
1945-02-14
1945-02-15
1945-02-24
1945-03-21
1945-04-08
1945-04-09
1945-04-17
1945-09-10
1945-09-29
1945-10-02
Description
An account of the resource
Navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book for G H Holmes, covering the period from 7 June 1943 to 23 May 1947. Detailing his flying training and operations flown. He was stationed at RAF Yatesbury, RAF Evanton, RAF Turweston, RAF Silverstone, RAF Swinderby, RAF Syerston, RAF Bardney, RAF Skellingthorpe, RAF Coningsby and RAF Hemswell. Aircraft flown in were, Dominie, Procter, Botha, Wellington, Stirling, Lancaster, Lincoln and Oxford. He flew a total of 31 Operations, 7 night with 9 squadron, 9 daylight and 4 night with 50 squadron and 11 night with 83 squadron. Targets were, Ferme D’urville, St Peirre du Mond, Argentan, Rennes, Orlean, Gelsenkirchen, Limoges, Beauvoir, Kiel, Stuttgart, Cahagnes, Mont Cadon, Bois de Cassau, St Leu D’esserent, Brest, La Pallice, Le Havre, Bremerhaven, Mönchengladbach, Flushing, Politz, Siegen, Karlsruhe, Ladbergen, Dresden, Rositz, Horton Fjord, Hamburg, Lutzkendorf, Pilsen. <span>His pilots on operations were </span>Squadron Leader Stubbs, Flying Officer Inniss, Flying Officer Cassidy, Flight Lieutenant Siddle, Wing Commander Osbourne and Flight Lieutenant Weber. He survived a fighter attack and a mid air collision. He also flew on a Cook's Tour, Operation Dodge to Bari and a goodwill tour to Chile. The log book has been annotated and also contains various pictures of the aircraft flown in, the squadron badges and a photo of himself in uniform.
1660 HCU
17 OTU
50 Squadron
83 Squadron
9 Squadron
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
bombing
bombing of Dresden (13 - 15 February 1945)
bombing of the Normandy coastal batteries (5/6 June 1944)
Botha
Cook’s tour
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Lancaster Mk 1
Lancaster Mk 3
Lincoln
mid-air collision
military service conditions
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
Pathfinders
Proctor
RAF Bardney
RAF Coningsby
RAF Evanton
RAF Hemswell
RAF Silverstone
RAF Skellingthorpe
RAF Swinderby
RAF Syerston
RAF Turweston
RAF Yatesbury
Stirling
tactical support for Normandy troops
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/749/10748/ACookJ150709.2.mp3
e546cf9f2a3e4cbc2c2ae8d537348675
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
Cook, Jack
J Cook
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Jack Cook (- 2023, Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator with 100 and 104 Squadrons.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-07-09
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Cook, J
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
DK: David Kavannagh interviewing Jack Cook for the International Bomber Command Centre 9th of July 2015. They’ll edit this at some point so don’t worry about a thing. So, if I could just ask you your background. Where you came from from before the war? What you were doing?
JC: I was born, I was born a few miles from Doncaster. A small market town called Mexborough. Actually, it’s between Rotherham and Doncaster. And at eighteen years of age, which was August the 20th 1943 I volunteered for aircrew. All aircrew were volunteers. A lot of people don’t realise that.
DK: So just before that. Had you come straight from school?
JC: No.
DK: Oh.
JC: No. I left school at fourteen and I worked in a [pause] what can I call it? Well, actually they were pawnbrokers but they were outfitters. Gent’s outfitters. They sold everything kind of thing. Until I was sixteen I worked there and then I went on the footplate which was the old LNER. I worked, I worked there. I worked there until I was eighteen and then I joined the RAF. I went to the attestation board at Doncaster and I wanted to become a rear gunner. But after the interview there was a squadron leader said to me, ‘Would you like to become a wireless operator/air gunner instead of just the air gunner.’ I said, ‘Well I don’t know the Morse code and I know nothing about wireless or anything like that.’ ‘Well,’ he says, ‘You’ve came out very well out in the attestation board.’ He said, ‘Would you like to?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I’ll have a go.’ So that’s it. That’s how I became training for a wireless op. And anyhow the course was a lot longer, the gunner’s course because I only arrived at the squadron a fortnight before the, or three weeks before the war finished. So actually I didn’t take part in any actively dropping bombs at all. I should imagine I was one of the youngest at that time of the war because I was only nineteen when we did a drop the food to the Dutch in Operation Manna.
DK: So you were nineteen in 1945.
JC: Yeah. I was. I was twenty in ‘45. But I was only nineteen actually when the drop took place in the April. And in [pause] we were on standby for the last raid of the war. Berchtesgaden, which was Hitler’s hide out up in the mountains. We used to call it his retreat. But we weren’t required because I expect we were just on standby if somebody fell sick you know and they put another crew in. Which they did.
DK: So which squadron was this?
JC: This was 100 Squadron at Elsham Wolds, Lincolnshire. And, and then in February 1946 we took the Lancaster. Oh just prior to that we were all in the briefing room and a squadron leader stood up and said, ‘There are quite a number of crews that are here today. Well,’ he says, ‘Three. We want three. Three crews. And it’s for being out in the Middle East. Taking the Lancs out to a place called Abu Sueir, not far from Cairo.’ And he said, ‘You’ll be there until your date of mobilisation is finished.’ So one lad, he said, ’ And what happens if we refuse to go?’ So he said, ‘Well, you’ll be up for mutiny.’ And Jack’s hand went up, I said, ‘When do we go sir?’ [laughs] Anyhow, we took the Lancs out there to Abu Sueir and it was a peacetime airfield that. And we were only there for a few weeks when we had to move down to Shallufa, in the Canal Zone. Right at the bottom near Suez. And that would be about the March of ’46 and I was there until ’47. The squadron, oh this would have been when this was when on 104 Squadron was formed out there. 104 Squadron. And we disbanded and I, the wireless ops at that stage, there was only one group every three months going, get back to England. Which, I was out there quite a while. We lost all the gunners. They didn’t want those. They didn’t want the bomb aimers. They went. And I finished up on Ansons. VIP run. And, and what’s the other thing. VIPs runs and mail runs. All over the Middle East we went in the, in the Ansons. And then my time for demob came up and I knew they’d made a mistake with my group. I knew I was 57 group and they’d got it down as 56. We were already packed up to go to the old transit camp waiting for a boat home. And we had prisoners of war in the mess. Damned good they were as well. Mind you they, they were very helpful. They couldn’t do, you know they were prisoners of war but they were damned good. And one of them came because our billets weren’t far from the, from the sergeant’s mess. Well, they spoke good English the three of them that were there. We weren’t a flight in the mess. A telephone. A telephone? I’ll bet they’ve found out the mistake they’d made. Anyhow, I went there and it was a squadron leader, somewhere from group there. He said, ‘I understand that your waiting to go.’ I expect the sergeant in charge of the mess had told him that I was waiting because he was a big friend, a big pal of mine. And he said, ‘I’m awfully sorry,’ he says, ‘But there’s been a mistake been made with your release group number.’ ‘Never,’ I said [laughs] so he said, ‘Yeah, but,’ he said, ‘I’ll promise you this though. Instead of when your time comes up in about three months’ time that you won’t be going with transport. You’ll be flying home.’ I thought ‘Yeah. I know.’ But he kept to his word and I was packed up again waiting for the garrie to take me to the transit where we had to wait until we got a boat. One of the Jerries came across and said, ‘You’re wanted on the phone. It’s someone from Group the sergeant says.’ So, anyhow I went there and yeah, ‘Well,’ he said ‘I’ve kept my promise,’ he said, ‘And there’s an aircraft coming. A Lancaster coming down from Palestine tomorrow.’ He said, ‘Are you ok for going on it?’ Well, I thought, well I thought to myself I’ve never been on a ship kind of that because we flew out there and he said, ‘I can’t wait much longer. The flight. I’m very very busy.’ I said, ‘Yeah’ I said, ‘Ok. I’ll take it.’ ‘Oh by the way,’ he says, ‘You’ll have to work your own way home.’ He says, ‘The wireless operator will be getting out and you’ll be getting in.’ And I was demobbed in forty eight hours. Amazing.
DK: So where did you come back in the UK?
JC: I came back to — where we landed the aircraft?
DK: Yeah. Where did you land?
JC: Silloth. Carlisle.
DK: Right. Ok.
JC: That was there, I don’t know whether it’s still going or not. And then I was dropped down there. Then I got a pass to Kirkham, Blackpool way, where I was demobbed. And then I was back. And when I — I forget how much leave I had to come but I went back on the footplate until 1961. And my wife had been in hospital. She’d had, for seven years she’d had mastoid operations all over the place and she went convalescing to Bridlington. And she was, she was a sister at Mexborough Hospital then. Where we lived of course. And she went there for a fortnight and towards the end of the fortnight the matron got on the phone. The matron at the convalescent home phoned me up and said, ‘I know all about your Jack.’ She said, ‘Connie’s been very, very helpful here. Although she’s convalescing she’s been doing a lot of help,’ she said, and my sister — that’s her sister, the matron’s sister, who was the assistant matron was leaving there to get married. And she said, ‘Would you come and take her place, Connie.’ So, Connie said, ‘Well, what about Jack?’ And she said, ‘Oh I’ll get him a job here,’ she said. Which eventually she did and I was manager of a fancy goods shop. A large one. One, two, three, four — about nine large windows. And I had a staff of eleven or twelve girls during the busy — only for about three or four months but I used to keep two of them on, the best two, all the years that I were there. And, you know they kept the shop clean and it was [pause] And then one day I was talking to the wife and we had two kiddies at this time then. In 1961 one would be, one would be still a baby in the pram. The other was four year old because there was four years difference. And I went for an interview at Sheffield because the shop was called Spalls and they had various. There’s one in Leicester. A Spalls in Leicester. The same family. There was this chap at Sheffield — he was in charge of the five northern branches. And I got the job and went to, and that’s how we came to Brid. Now this would be 19 no we hadn’t any kids then. No children then. ’51 we were married. I lost my wife seventeen years ago by the way, she was seventy three. ’61. ’51 I was married. ’51. So it would be fifty, fifty [pause]now you see how when you get old how you —
DK: I have trouble with dates [laughs] yeah. Late 50s.
JC: Yeah but it would be probably ’57.
DK: Right.
JC: Probably ’57 when we went to Brid. That would be it. No. No. No. I’m wrong on dates because my eldest lad was born in ’57 and the youngest one was born in ’61. He only lives at Bourne.
DK: Oh right.
JC: I think he knows — Is it Sue? She works at —
DK: Yes. Yes.
JC: I think she lives at Bourne.
DK: Yes she does. Yeah.
JC: And he’s the manager of the large estate there.
DK: Oh right.
JC: He’s three or four staff. That’s all, it’s not. And it’s a very, very good job. They started him at thirty thousand a couple of years back. He worked for Vodaphone.
DK: Yeah.
JC: For a few years. Because he did twenty five years in the RAF. And his wife, his wife — let’s see. She works at [pause] well it used to be RAF Cottesmore.
DK: Right. Yes.
JC: Where Maurice used to be as an engineer.
DK: Yeah. It’s the army, it’s the army barracks now isn’t it?
JC: It’s army barracks now. That’s it. Well she’s in the medical department there.
DK: Yeah.
JC: Now then where have we got to now?
DK: If I could just take you back a bit.
JC: Yeah.
DK: If I could just take you back to the Manna drops. How many Manna food drops did you actually do?
JC: I did two.
DK: Two.
JC: Yeah. At the racecourse. Both at the racecourse.
DK: Right.
JC: But Bill Birch mentioned it, that it was The Hague but I’m sure it was this, this racecourse where we dropped was at Rotterdam. But there again I might be wrong again. Or Bill could be wrong.
DK: Do you remember much about the reaction of the people on the ground?
JC: Oh yeah. Well it’s hard to be — you see we were flying at four or five hundred feet and they were stood on buildings and waving flags. Anything that they was picking up they were waving. And as I mentioned there we were that low I saw a couple of Jerries, of course, they’d be short of food as well. And they’d got their helmets off and were waving them on top, on the top of the buildings them as plain as — I can see them now. Yeah. And what else can I say about — well very little. Although we were very, we were low down and as I mentioned just a while ago that everywhere you could see water. Because with Montgomery coming up from the south the Germans blew the dykes up and flooded the whole area. So as soon as we were over the course kind of thing that was it. There was water behind us that we flew over and water in front of us. And then of course we did the drop.
DK: And perhaps if I could take you back just a stage further. After your training as a wireless operator did you go straight into the squadron or was there any —?
JC: No. What happened —?
DK: Was there a Conversion Unit you went to?
JC: No. What happened, what happens was you meet you meet your crew. You’re all in the mess and there were pilots and navigators. The whole lot you know. The crew members. Crews. And then you’re picked. You’re talking to one another. And my skipper he was a W/O to start with and they all got commissioned there later on as P/O’s. And I think he’d got the bomb aimer who did his training in Canada. He married a girl in Canada and they moved. They’re in America now. I hear from his quite regular. But I lost my mid-upper gunner two years ago. And they called him Chaplin. Warrant Officer Chaplin. His name was Dickie but we, Dickie Chaplin but of course he got Charlie. Charlie Chaplin you see. And he said, ‘Right,’ he said, ‘I want,’ you know, talking, he said, ‘Right I’m looking for a wireless op. Anybody interested?’ ‘Yeah. ‘Yeah.’ I put my hand up. ‘Come on, let’s have a look at you.’ You know, that’s how we got a crew in five or ten minutes.
DK: Do you think, do you think that worked well because you basically made up your own crews? You weren’t ordered in to a crew. You just —
JC: Oh no. They didn’t force you in. That’s how you, that’s how you met your family.
DK: And do you think that way worked well?
JC: Oh yeah. I should imagine there couldn’t have been a better way actually.
DK: Because it’s quite unusual in, sort of the armed forces to be able to do something like that by yourself [unclear]
JC: Yeah. It was far better than.
DK: Being ordered.
JC: You were in this group. You were going to. Yeah. Yeah. Far better. And you mixed together straightaway. And the comradeship. It’s hard to believe.
DK: So how —
JC: And actually had I, had I been a rear gunner or mid-upper gunner I’d have been on the squadron six or eight months before but it was such a long course at — well I did at Market Harborough. I did OTU at Market Harborough which is only about twenty five miles from here.
DK: So you were you at the OTU before joining the crew or —
JC: No. That’s where we, that’s where we met the crew.
DK: Oh right. Ok. So that was where, which OTU?
JC: I think it was 14. I think I’ve got, I’ve got, I’ll just get my, I’ll just get my logbook down. Thank you.
DK: Ok.
JC: And then I’ve got dates in where I — can you manage? Can you manage?
DK: That’s ok.
[pause]
JC: The only thing wrong with this place. There isn’t enough room David.
[pause]
JC: I think it’s in here.
[pause]
JC: It’s like going into Fort Knox is this [laughs]
[pause]
JC: Oh it works. I haven’t forgotten the number. It’s ages since I —
[pause]
DK: Are you ok now?
JC: Yeah. Thank you. These are the aircraft I flew in.
DK: Are they?
JC: Domini, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Lancaster, Dakota as a passenger, Liberator as a passenger and a Boa Carlton as a passenger.
DK: Yeah.
JC: When we went out to India and did a few, three weeks in India. Right. Number 1 Radio School February ’44. What happened before that? Oh I was at ITW. Bridgnorth.
DK: Right.
JC: Then Radio School at Yatesbury in Wiltshire. Number 6 Advanced Flying Unit. Staverton, Gloucester. There’s the dates. 14 OTU Market Harborough October ’44 to February ’45. Then to 1156 Heavy Conversion Unit at Lindholme, Doncaster. Then to 100 Squadron. You see March ’45 so the war was nearly over wasn’t it? So I was, I was still only nineteen then. I wasn’t twenty until the August. Then 16 Ferry Unit Dunkeswell in Devon where we flew the Lancs out to the, out to the Middle East. Then 104 Squadron there. At Abu Sueir. Middle East Forces. April until July’46 squadron moved to Shallufa. That’s at the Canal Zone. Squadron disbanded 31st of March ’47. Then MENME ferry unit and MENME Comm Squadron and then demobbed in September ’47. Now, this logbook isn’t the original one. When we were at Dunkeswell to fly out to the Middle East once a month all the flying logbooks had to be signed by the CO. Wherever you were. And there were all in the flight office kind of thing and there was a fire. And the only thing [pause] of all the things were burned down although the actual number of hours were in and that’s what we had to do there. Now that [pause] number 16TH RAF Ferry Unit, RAF Dunkeswell. Number one logbook destroyed by fire January ’46. And we got that we had to put the number of flying hours in and then he’s checked it and signed it.
DK: And that’s taken from the burnt one.
JC: That was taken from the burnt one.
DK: That’s —
JC: And it was all checked. It was checked by the squadron leader.
DK: That a real shame it was burnt and lost.
JC: It is.
DK: That’s a shame.
JC: It is. Yeah.
DK: So, that only shows from ’46 onwards.
JC: This actually shows from, this shows from 11th of December ’45. Collection at Silloth. That’s Carlisle and —
DK: In a Lancaster.
JC: That was Lancs yeah.
DK: All Lancasters.
JC: Yeah. That was it. Lancasters. And each one, the logbook is signed by the squadron leader or somebody for the — yes it was a flying officer then. Charlie, Charlie Chaplin. And you know there’s all trips. Bombing. Greece, Italy. We had some good runs. [unclear] Pomigliano, that’s Naples. Bari’s on the east coast, way up in Italy. Back to Cairo, away from base. Bombing. Gunnery. Lydda, that’s Palestine. And there’s all kinds of trips, [unclear] Greece. Pomigliano and Cairo. Lydda transport flying. Flying a lot of troop in we did.
DK: Mostly with the Lancaster Mark 7s isn’t it?
JC: That’s a 7. Yeah. Yeah. I’ve got a book and every Lancaster that was made, manufactured kind of thing and the number of it. I’ve got it. What happened to it?
DK: No idea. Mostly scrapped I would imagine.
JC: Most of them were yeah.
DK: Yeah.
JC: Kasfareet, Campo Formio, Italy again. Almarza. Bombing. Shallufa base. Lydda. Squadron moved from Abu Sueir as I said, down to the Canal Zone.
DK: Quite a few flights.
JC: Yeah. Where are we now? Abu Suier. Nicosia, Cyprus trooping twenty passengers. We’ve got Rome again, Ciampino. Some are quite a number of hours in August. You see a lot of , a lot of people, well all the aircrew when the war was over, the senior NCOs, I don’t know about the officers but they became LACs again. We were only given stripes for if we were shot down and you were treated as senior NCOs prisoners of war. Palestine, Almarza, Lyneham, Luqa, Malta. [unclear] Southern France. Diverted. Twelve passengers. Toulouse. That’s down near Marseille.
DK: Yeah.
JC: Ferry St Mawgan. Abingdon. Transport Luqa, Cairo, Fayid, Palestine. Khartoum. Almarza, Ciampino, Rome. Air sea rescue search — nine hours forty five minutes. That’s the longest.
DK: Do you remember much about that incident?
JC: Oh I do. Yeah.
DK: Was that —
JC: What you’ve got to —
DK: Is it the 21st of November 1946.
JC: What we had to do was do a box search instructions to the pilots like that but we did that and we were unsuccessful. So what he did then — he did [pause] and when we landed he got a real rollicking off the CO. Ten minutes fuel we’d left. He said, ‘Think about your crew.’ Anyhow we got, he apologised did Charlie.
DK: So you never found who was —
JC: No. We never found, never found them. No.
DK: And was, and can you remember was that you were looking for crew from a ship or from another aircraft.
JC: It was an aircraft. It was a York aircraft that came from — it was flying, now then, I don’t know where it had come from and where it was going. That’s beyond me now I just can’t get it. Aden, Khartoum, Eritrea, [unclear] Aden again, Almarza, Rhodes Island, Rhodes. Kalata was the airfield. Nicosia. From Nicosia to Kalata. The, the [pause] now what was he? He was security police. British. Well, a Scotsman actually and he lived in this castle and he invited us. I don’t know how long we were there. Landed the 4th and left on the 7th so we were there for three days. Something like that. And he invited us out, he invited us to his place for dinner. And what an evening. Anyhow, he said when you leave the next day, he said, or this was the following day that we were leaving, he said, ‘Fly down the main street if you will.’ To Charlie he said, ‘And let them know we’ve got an air force.’ And we did. Just over [laughs] just over the house tops. Oh it was amazing.
DK: So that was, that was in Nicosia in Cyprus.
JC: That was, no, that was from, we were in Almarza. We went to Kasfareet.
DK: Which is in Greece.
JC: No. Kasfareeet. That’s in Egypt.
DK: Yes. Yes. Yeah.
JC: Yes. Kasfareet. Then we went from Nicosia in Cyprus.
DK: So your low fly past was over Egypt.
JC: No. No. It was here at Rhodes. It was Rhodes.
DK: Oh very well. I’m with you.
JC: And then we went from Nicosia to Kalata in Rhodes.
DK: Yeah.
JC: And then we went from Kalata to [unclear] Then then back to Kasfareet.
DK: So your low fly past was over Rhodes.
JC: Over Rhodes.
DK: And this, this one is another date there on the 13th of February ’47 base to Habbabiya in Iraq. Almarza. Kasfareet. Base. Plenty of trips here. Khormaksar, Aden again. Luqa – Palestine. We were in Palestine. We’d not been out in Egypt only a few weeks when Charlie said, ‘Shall we go up to Palestine?’ He says, ‘I’ll get the wing commander flying to see if he’ll put a training trip on, drop us there and then collect us a week later.’ Which he did. And we went up there and that was the ruddy night in Jerusalem that they — I forget now what hotel we were at but that’s when the — was it the Stern Gang?
DK: The Stern Gang, yeah.
JC: Yeah. The Stern. That’s when they attacked. I think they blew the —
DK: The King David Hotel.
JC: The King David Hotel in Jerusalem and murdered a few paratroops that were in tents. Do you remember? Well, you will have read about that.
DK: Yes. I’m know of the incident.
JC: Yeah. Yeah. And he got on the blower the next day, he said, ‘I think you’d better fetch us back,’ and they put a kite on. And then it died down and about six or seven weeks later we went again and we saw all the biblical places. It was marvellous. I mean the places I’ve been. I think before I was, before I was demobbed I think I’d been in to twenty one countries.
DK: Yeah. And you would see these places before the mass tourism.
JC: Oh yeah. Yeah. yeah. It would have cost me thousands to have been. Mind you the only thing is I can remember very little about them. I can remember, I can remember Jerusalem and all the places where, where Jesus stopped with the cross. The twelve stops wherever it was. And the Church of the Nativity where He was supposed to be born.
DK: So what were your duties actually as the wireless operator? Just sort of explain. Sitting there.
JC: Well we used to well the main thing was if you’re going to be aborted somebody’s got to know the plane. That was it.
DK: So the messages were sent to you in Morse code.
JC: Oh yeah. And what other were — and every hour the people back here used to send out, and this was after the war of course ever hour we answered it. I used to get a report from the navigator to say where we were. You know degrees latitude, longitude and all like that. So we were in contact all the time.
DK: So this every hour message you got had to co — be the same as what the navigator said as to your position.
JC: That’s right. Yeah. And I sent it back then you see. Yeah.
DK: Looking back now how do you see your time in the Air Force?
JC: Well if I was in the Air Force again I wouldn’t like to be in this country. I would like to be abroad. That’s for the simple reason that life was easier out there. I mean we never, never did parades out in — unless it was something special. I always remember in this country before we, when we were in training Queen Mary, old Queen Mary, she was visiting the station. And for two or three weeks there was that much bull, you know, on the station. And the morning she came I think we were there a couple of hours before and we were lining all the way up to the officers mess where they were meeting and greeting her. And she went straight past in the car. And there we were. Absolutely soaked we were. We had the old capes on, you know. Oh yeah. Still that’s things like that.
DK: And the bull in the air force you didn’t, you didn’t like. The parades and —
JC: Well, I wouldn’t say I disliked them because they were a necessity because you can’t beat discipline.
DK: No.
JC: I mean our crew — I should imagine we were one of the best crews. Nobody was called Charlie, Dick or Brian or Trevor or Taffy. Not like we did on the ground. It was, ‘Hello skipper. Wireless op here.’ Blah, blah, blah, blah. And rear gunner, you know. A few days after the war we ran what we called Cook’s Tours and we flew the ground staff low over Germany to let them see the damage. And I said to, I went down to the elsan, it was just this forward of the rear gunner, and I said to the rear gunner, I said — I knocked on his and he opened his thing back you see. And I didn’t let anybody hear. I switched the intercom off and I said, ‘Is it going to be ok if I swap seats with you? You come and sit up, you know.’ I said, ‘I’ll ask the skip.’ ‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘Yeah.’ So when I got back I got on the intercom and mentioned and he said, ‘Yeah that’s alright.’ And just as I sat down in the rear turret we were going over Cologne Cathedral. Everything was devastated. It was just like St Paul’s when they missed that. Everything was devastated and there was the cathedral not touched. Another act of God. I used to think of it like that. Yeah.
DK: How did that make you feel to seeing the devastated cities?
JC: Oh, well [pause] I looked at it this way. A lot wouldn’t be leaving that strategic bombing that Bomber Harris did but he tried to win the war with bombing and it nearly succeeded. But what did him and he never, he was never made a lord or anything like that which the majority of them were was the Dresden do. They said it shouldn’t have been but it was war and they proved it afterwards. After the war was well over that there were troops there. So that you see, I mean, I mean you look at, you look at the Americans when they dropped the two bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. That was shocking when you come to think about it but it saved millions of lives after. They’d had enough hadn’t they?
DK: Yeah.
JC: They’d had enough when that happened. Yeah.
DK: How many Cook’s Tours did you do over Germany?
JC: I think we went on two days. We only did two trips. Took them over and came back because we weren’t the only squadron that were doing it. There were other squadrons doing it as well. In fact I’ve got some photographs somewhere of the, of the places that the we must have had a photographer, a RAF photographer in our plane because [pause] are you alright for time?
DK: Yeah. I’m fine. Yeah.
JC: I’ll just I’ll just one of my albums. I do believe it’s in here.
[pause]
JC: Ahh here we are. I think it’s in here. Aye it is. Look it’s on the first.
DK: Yes.
JC: That’s the date. That’s it.
DK: So that’s the pilot. Chaplin isn’t it?
JC: 17th of the 7th ’45.
JC: Is that a seven?
DK: I think. It looks like possibly. Yeah.
JC: Yeah. This might interest you. Just to look at. That was one of them.
DK: Yeah.
JC: I think there’s another couple somewhere. Oh there we are. That was Essen. That was Emmerich. And what was this one? Wessel.
DK: Wessel.
JC: Yeah. Yeah. There. Look at the devastation there.
DK: And they’re photos from the Cook’s Tours.
JC: Yeah. Cook’s Tours. That was it. Yeah. They are official photographs there.
DK: Yeah.
JC: And these, this is at one of the 100, my squadrons, one of the reunions.
DK: That was Wyton.
JC: October ’85. That’s the year I retired because I retired at sixty. Haven’t a clue where I am there.
DK: 100 Squadron is still going isn’t it?
JC: Oh yes. It’s at Leeming.
DK: Leeming.
JC: I haven’t been this year. I went last year.
DK: Ok. What’s I’ll do, I’ll just stop the recording. Ok. I’ll say thank you for that.
JC: You’re welcome.
DK: Thank you. Ok.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Jack Cook
Creator
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David Kavanagh
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-07-09
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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ACookJ150709
Format
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00:38:11 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Jack Cook was born in Mexborough. He left school at 14 and went to work at a Gentlemen’s Outfitters. At 16 he worked on the footplate for LNER. At the age of 18 he volunteered for aircrew and trained as a wireless operator/air gunner; joined 100 Squadron at RAF Elsham Wolds two or three weeks before the end of the war. Consequently, Jack did not take part in bombing but was involved in Operation Manna, doing two drops.
In February 1946 three of the crews took Lancasters to RAF Abu Sueir in Egypt. After a few weeks they moved to RAF Shallufa, in the Canal Zone, when 104 Squadron was formed. Jack finished up on Ansons doing VIP and mail runs. He flew back in a Lancaster to RAF Kirkham via RAF Silloth, where he was demobbed. Jack flown in Domine, Proctor, Anson, Wellington and a Lancaster.
Jack married in 1951 and had two children, went back to the footplate until 1961. After that he worked as a manager of a fancy goods shop and eventually moved to Bridlington.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Lancashire
England--Cumbria
Egypt
Egypt--Suez Canal
North Africa
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-04
1946-02
Contributor
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Sue Smith
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
100 Squadron
104 Squadron
14 OTU
air sea rescue
aircrew
Anson
Cook’s tour
demobilisation
Dominie
Lancaster
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Abu Sueir
RAF Dunkeswell
RAF Elsham Wolds
RAF Kirkham
RAF Market Harborough
RAF Shallufa
RAF Silloth
RAF Yatesbury
training
Wellington
wireless operator / air gunner
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/884/11123/AHoughWJ160905.2.mp3
1c6ad66a90fcf551165724a6609e3bda
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
Hough, William
William John Hough
W J Hough
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Flying Officer Bill Hough (1924 - 2019, 2203740, 197350 Royal Air Force). He few operations as a wireless operator with 582 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-09-05
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
Hough, WJ
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
JM: This interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is Julian Maslin. The interviewee is Mr Bill Hough. The interview is taking place at Mr Hough’s home near Warrington in Cheshire on the 5th of September 2016. Mr Hough, you’ve asked me, you’ve invited me to call you Bill. Bill, I wonder if I could ask you just to tell us please a little about your life before you joined the Royal Air Force and your reasons for signing up.
BH: Well, I’d come from a farming background really but I didn’t myself go in to farming. After I’d left grammar school, I attended grammar school in locally, Northwich. And for a period, I think I was sixteen when I left grammar school but I knew eventually I was going to have to go in the forces. But in the meantime I had a temporary job with ICI which was a pretty big employer in this area, and then when the time come to join up I volunteered rather than be recruited. Mainly so I could go in to the air force rather than be recruited in to say the army or the navy which I wouldn’t have liked. So I volunteered for the air force as soon as I was able. What’s that? Eighteen and a quarter I believe it was when you were able to. So it was in 1943. Spring of 1943 when I joined up.
JM: Would you say that your experience of the Second World War was a factor in you choosing the Royal Air Force?
BH: My experience of the —?
JM: Well you must have seen some of the blitz bombing of Liverpool and Manchester.
BH: Oh certainly. Certainly. I was always attracted to aeroplanes I suppose. I remember going to air shows locally. I was in the cadets.
JM: The ATC.
BH: ATC yeah. For a while. So, and you know I got into various things by doing Morse code and that type of thing so, you know, I’d got a background in aviation and it was natural that if I had a choice I would go into the air force. And well that’s what I did. I was accepted. I was accepted as air crew as well.
JM: Where did you go to enrol?
BH: When I first joined up you mean?
JM: Yes.
BH: I went to Lord’s Cricket Ground. The nursery end actually [laughs] Yeah, I joined at Lord’s Cricket Ground. I don’t know why it was there. It was just a place that was used by the air force I suppose. And we were billeted in St John’s Wood in, there were some very posh apartments there and they were requisitioned. And that’s where we were. We didn’t stay there long because we, you were moved on pretty — you did some drill there but you quickly moved on to ITW. Initial Training Wing.
JM: And where was that please?
BH: Bridgnorth.
JM: So that was the West Midlands.
BH: Yes. Bridgnorth. Yeah.
JM: Do you have any memories of your time at ITW?
BH: I remember arriving at ITW. I don’t know if you know Bridgnorth at all.
JM: Slightly.
BH: Well it’s in two sections — an upper and a lower. And we arrived by rail and the station is at the lower end. The camp was at the top end. We were met by an officer there, a flight lieutenant I remember. And he made, we carried kit of course, and he made us jog all the way with full kit up this hill. It was quite a, quite a difference in height and, you know, we weren’t that fit then [laughs] and he jogged us right up this hill to the camp. I can remember that distinctly. And that’s what? A six weeks course or something isn’t it? ITW. Something like that. Which was pretty well all drill.
JM: Basic airmanship in that sense.
BH: I suppose so. Yes. I can only remember the drill part of it, you know. The parade ground stuff. I suppose to get you fit in a way. Everybody coming in was probably very unfit.
JM: And where did you go to after ITW?
BH: Well, by then I’d opted — I think you had a choice of where you went. Well not, not a choice but you couldn’t be a pilot or a navigator because they were trained overseas pretty well. But I opted for a wireless operator/air gunner. And, you know, which was going to be in two parts and eventually I was sent to the Number 2 Radio School at Yatesbury, Wiltshire. That was a pretty isolated place that was but that was, that was where I went. And that’s where we learned the basics of radio communication. And also did our first flying. Initially in Dominies.
JM: Yes.
BH: And then in Proctors.
JM: Proctors.
BH: Yeah. Well that, I think that was, I don’t know, it was quite a, quite a long course. Probably it might have been six months. It was quite an intensive course. You learned aircraft recognition. Morse code. You had to pass at a certain level and as I say you had to do this stuff in the air as well. First in groups in a Dominie and then on your own. Just with the pilot in the Proctor.
JM: Did your experiences as a cadet help you learning Morse code?
BH: I suppose that’s perhaps in a way why I opted to be a W/op air gunner. I suppose that did contribute. Yes. Yes.
JM: What sort of speeds did you reach?
BH: You had to be able to read twenty. Twenty words per minute. That was the pass out speed. Twenty words per minute. Yeah.
JM: And were you trained in the technology of wireless as it was at that time or was it merely a matter of sending and receiving?
BH: No, there was some technical stuff as well. It was all pretty basic. You weren’t a mechanic or anything, you know. You were an operator. Not a mechanic. Not a radio mechanic. You were an operator. So, but obviously you had to learn some basic stuff to know what went on behind the sets and so on.
JM: And when you’d finished at Yatesbury, at Number 2 Wireless School, where did you go after that?
BH: Well, I went to gunnery school which was at Castle Kennedy, Scotland. Of course I trained as an air gunner because at that time the position was W/op air gunner. It was sort of harking back to the smaller planes where you did two jobs. Whereas when the four engine bombers came in they were quite separate and I never did operate as an air gunner. I trained as an air gunner but I never operated as an air gunner. But I went to Castle Kennedy in Scotland. We did some ground firing initially with a turret on the ground. And then of course you got in to the air and I think we mainly flew Ansons then. You fired from the mid-upper turret at a drogue which was being towed by another aircraft. And as I say I trained there but never used the skill. If it is a skill [laughs]
JM: Well it is deflection shooting.
BH: Yeah.
JM: Did you find that difficult to master?
BH: No. But that’s the basis of it obviously. Deflection shooting. But I don’t know you’ve got to score. They used to score you on what, how close you were. That sort of thing. You got a certificate. It’s in my logbook actually. But you got a certificate when you passed out saying you know, I don’t know, gave you some kind of pass mark I suppose.
JM: So you’re now qualified as a wireless operator/air gunner.
BH: Yes.
JM: And what happened to you next, Bill?
BH: Well, it was [pause] it was OUT, I suppose it was called.
JM: Operational training.
BH: Operational Training Unit.
JM: Yes.
BH: And that was at [pause] Worksop wasn’t it? Yeah. Yeah.
JM: So you were at Worksop near Nottingham.
BH: Yes.
JM: On number, Number 8 OTU.
BH: Yes. Number 8 OTU while we flew in Wellingtons. I had that period before that. Number 6 AFU. That’s —
JM: Advanced airborne fighting unit?
BH: Flying Unit. I can’t remember doing any flying there. I remember being at Staverton but I don’t know what we did there exactly. It was a very short period. We soon passed on to the OTU where we flew in Wellingtons and I’m trying to remember when we crewed up but I think that was later. Yeah. It was. Yeah. We did the OTU at Worksop.
JM: Do you have any memories of flying in Wellingtons?
BH: Not a lot really. The positions were quite different there I think. I remember, I think I remember, the wireless operator’s position was down in the nose somehow, whereas later on it was all up on one level, you know. But I think that was down in the nose there.
JM: And did you fly on any missions as part of your OTU training? Did you do leaflet raids or anything of that sort?
BH: No. I think that was a lot of that was done wasn’t it? And when they first did these thousand bomber raids, you know, they included some people from OTUs just to make the numbers up. But they were mainly instructors I think. I don’t think it was in-training people. It was the instructors that went on those. And then after that we went to HCU which is a Heavy Conversion Unit and that was at Lindholme, which is near to Doncaster isn’t it? 1656 HCU. Now, I think that’s where we crewed up. We were then flying Halifaxes actually. That was the training aircraft at that time. For four engine bombers. And I remember the crewing up process was, I don’t know, a bit of a shambles somehow. I mean, I eventually got with a Canadian crew. Now, I can’t remember whether — I remember being in this big room and people going around saying, ‘Have you crewed up yet?’ ‘Have you?’ ‘We’re looking for a wireless operator,’ or, ‘We’re looking for an engineer.’ This type of thing. People just walking around. And, you know, not any system at all. Just leaving it up to, I suppose, the pilots, the captain of the prospective crew. But you see I think five out of the seven of our crew were Canadians and I have a feeling that they were already together. The only two English people were myself who was the wireless operator and the flight engineer. So, I remember, you know, Art Green, who was the skipper, coming up to me and saying me, ‘Are you crewed up yet,’ and sort of giving me a few questions [laughs] and so on. But eventually —
JM: Yeah.
BH: You know, accepted me and that was how you got crewed up and then you started flying in Halifaxes and started to get serious, you know, some serious training.
JM: What did you think about a Halifax as an aeroplane to operate?
BH: I can’t remember a great deal but it obviously didn’t have a great reputation. Not as good as the Lancaster obviously but you know it had its points and was a good training aircraft I suppose. But operationally it wasn’t a success was it? Well, not as successful as some others. That and the Stirling of course were not as successful.
JM: And was it when you were on Heavy Conversion Unit — was that the first time you did operations at all?
BH: No. I didn’t do any operations from there at all. The Lancaster was coming in at that. Well, it had probably been in for a while but it was coming in in big numbers and the Halifaxes were being phased out in favour of Lancasters. So the next step was, for us was to go to an LFU. Oh, what was it called? It was an LFS. Lancaster —
JM: Finishing.
BH: Finishing School. Yeah. In other words converting you from Halifaxes to Lancasters. Mainly for the captain’s purpose I suppose. I mean he was the one that would find the biggest change. I mean the wireless operator was, you know, was operating the same equipment and the gunners were operating the same guns and that kind of thing so it was mainly for the, for the pilot. But that was, you know, quite a short period that LFS. Only a matter of two or three weeks I think, something like that. And then from then you were posted to an Operational Unit.
JM: And where were you posted to?
BH: Firstly to Elsham Wolds. That’s where’s that near? I don’t know.
JM: Elsham Wolds is North Lincolnshire.
BH: Yeah.
JM: Not far from the Humber Bridge now.
BH: I think that’s near to Worksop as well actually.
JM: Not far.
BH: I seem to remember Worksop from there. And that was to 576 Squadron. There were actually two squadrons there you know. 576, and I think it was 103. Both Lancaster squadrons. And from there, we are getting now to September ’44. I mean I’d been training for over a year at that point. It was a long process. And from Elsham Wolds I did ten operations from there.
JM: Do you remember those operations at all? Do you remember how you felt on your first one?
BH: Scared to death I suppose [laughs] well, as you were on most operations for that matter. You just were a bit more familiar after a while. You knew what was coming. But on a first operation obviously you don’t. And I forget where it was too but it was there. I did ten from there and we also — there was a satellite base at Fiskerton which is near to there. And I think we were based there for part of the time for some reason. I don’t know why. But it was a satellite of Elsham Wolds. I did one operation from there. I did ten operations from Elsham and one from Fiskerton. And at that time we were recommended for Pathfinders. The crew was recommended for Pathfinders. So we had to go on another training conversion course and that was at Warboys. We went from Fiskerton to Warboys for the NTU. What does that mean? Training. What’s N mean? Anyway, it was sort of conversion from main stream squadron to, to Pathfinder. We were still flying the same aircraft of course. On Lancasters. And that was only actually three days I see. Just three days for this conversion. And then we were posted to 582 Pathfinder Squadron which was at Little Staughton which was near to Bedford, St Neots. And at little Staughton — it was formerly an American base but when Pathfinders were formed I believe they took it over. I mean Pathfinders hadn’t been in existence for, I don’t know, about a year or eighteen months. And the Yanks gave it up and the Pathfinders took it over. 582 Squadron was based there, that’s a Lancaster squadron. But there was a further squadron — 109 Squadron which flew Mosquitoes. So there were two Pathfinder squadron operating from there.
JM: And how many operations did you do with 582?
BH: Well I did eleven. I did thirty four altogether so that leaves twenty three from there. I did thirty four. Yeah. Fourteen to thirty four.
JM: Was your selection as a Pathfinder crew — was that based on a good record of bombing when you were at Elsham?
BH: Yes. It obviously was but it was mainly to do with the proficiency of the pilot and the navigator I think. I mean the navigator was the key man or was the key man in Pathfinders because, you know, they had to be bang on. Find the target, and mark the target for the Main Force who may not have been as efficient as our navigator. They would have had trouble finding the target if we hadn’t marked it so I think that was the criteria. That you had a good pilot. We had a very experienced pilot. He was [pause] he was a peacetime man, pilot. He was in his thirties actually. He was a flight lieutenant. Later squadron leader. But, I mean, some of the pilots were quite raw. In Main Force particularly. You know, twenty, twenty one, twenty two. And the only flying experience they had was in their training whereas Art Green he had flied before the war and then of course volunteered into the war. So he was a very experienced pilot. Very level headed and, you know. A man you knew you could rely on. Trust.
JM: Just for the tape you said Art Green. Is that short for Arthur Green?
BH: I suppose it is [laughs] I never, we always called him Art actually but [laughs] yeah. We always called him Art. I suppose it was Arthur.
JM: Yeah. Yeah. And was it a collective decision to transfer to Pathfinders or did the captain make it and you had to go along?
BH: I suppose he was invited or selected and we had to go along with him. I don’t think he had a choice. No.
JM: Because it was a longer tour of operations wasn’t it?
BH: Oh yeah. You had — a normal tour in Main Force was thirty ops but in Pathfinders because you’d done so much training you were more, sort of, valuable. And a tour there was, was it thirty five, I think? I think it was thirty five. Yeah. Whereas in Main Force it was thirty.
JM: And was there a special badge that you got to show that you were in the Pathfinder force?
BH: Yes. You had a thing on your breast pocket.
JM: A brevet.
BH: Which we were very very proud of it. It was a golden eagle, ss it? I suppose. Yeah.
JM: Yes.
BH: The air force eagle. Yes. You wore it on the left breast pocket.
JM: And your job with Pathfinders was to illuminate the target with flares.
BH: Yes.
JM: Could you say a bit more about that please?
BH: Well, to me it didn’t [pause] sort of affect my job, anyway, you know. It, it was, I suppose the navigator and bomb aimer that would. And the pilot I suppose. But as far as I was concerned I was just a wireless operator in an aircraft. Obviously, you were going in first and you were, you were in a more dangerous situation because you were first in and sometimes you had to go around and go back in if you missed the target. That sort of thing, so — but apart from that as I say it didn’t really affect me.
JM: Did your aeroplane just carry flares or did it have a mixed load of flares and bombs?
BH: Well, often it was mixed. Yeah. You had a mixture quite often. Depends what you were. You sort of category. Sky markers, and blind markers and all that kind of stuff. So depending what you were you carried a mixed load normally.
JM: Do any of those operations particularly stand out in your mind?
BH: Well, I was shot down on one of them [laughs]
JM: That was —
BH: That stands out in my mind. Yes.
JM: Tell us about that please. If you would.
BH: And this was operation number thirteen [laughs] which might have been our worst. It was a daylight operation actually to a place called Heimbach Dam which was [pause] it was in Northern Germany anyway. But at that time we were — allied forces were advancing through Belgium and there. And just into Germany possibly and we were on this daylight raid bombing just ahead of our forces. In the American sector actually. And this was a dam that was just inside Germany. Heimbach. It was a daylight operation. We took off pretty early. Eight. Eight something I think. It wasn’t deep into Germany so it was only probably a two or three hour trip to there. The weather wasn’t forecast to be marvellous and I remember going. Flying in over Belgium and we were nearing the target. Flying over ten tenths cloud. The forecast just wasn’t good. The weather wasn’t good and we were flying in a stream obviously as we usually did. And we were on the outer starboard side of the stream on the right hand side which was not a good place to be. And then the, our gunner, Major Campbell. He wasn’t a major really. We used to call him major. He was a warrant officer but his nickname was major. Major Campbell. Rear gunner. He reported a plane on the starboard quarter and but he couldn’t identify it, he said. At the moment. It was quite a way off. Two or three miles away but I sort of fancied myself at aircraft recognition. I was always very good at aircraft recognition actually. And I stood up in the astrodome which was near to my position and I immediately identified it as a Messerschmitt 262. Now, that had not been in service very long at that time. It had been operated mainly as a fighter bomber actually. And I don’t think it had been encountered as a fighter but that’s what it was.
JM: And this is important because this was the first operational jet fighter in the world.
BH: Yes.
JM: And this attacked your aeroplane.
BH: Yes. It [pause] he reported this and I identified it as that and I thought he was keeping his eye on it when all of a sudden another one came directly behind us. And he reported that one quickly and said, ‘Corkscrew starboard.’ Which was the procedure when you had, you were being attacked but before we could really get into the corkscrew we were hit. The plane behind was the one that had fired. They carried cannon of course. They were pretty lethal these. And they were fast of course compared with a Lancaster. And it hit us in the port outer. Hit the port outer engine and we were immediately set on fire. Whether it was the fuel or the engine itself I suppose. There’s fuel tanks in that area. So that immediately took fire and we operated the fire extinguishers which didn’t make any difference. So the immediate outcome was for the skipper to say, ‘Abandon aircraft.’ And he ordered myself and the two gunners to go out the back entrance. The rest were at the front. So I clipped my parachute on. You didn’t wear it normally. You had it by your side. You had to clip it on to your harness at the front, and made my way down the fuselage. And the mid-upper gunner, the turret where he was located his feet protruded into the fuselage. You could see the bottom part of his body. There was only the upper part that was in the turret. So I remember going past him and giving him a bang on the legs to sort of tell him to get out in case he hadn’t heard or something like that and made my way down to the rear exit. And Johnny Campbell, the rear gunner was just getting out of his. He’d centred his turret, just getting out of his turret and by the time I got there he’d opened the door. The rear door where we got out. And he indicated to me to go first. And as I stood there my parachute came out. I never have known to this day what happened but my parachute came out through the door and deployed outside the aircraft. You know, pulling me as well and — sort of Johnny Campbell sized the situation up pretty quickly and got hold of me bodily and sort of pushed me out of the door. And going out I banged my head on the door and was lifted up. You know, normally have a parachute you should go down [laughs] initially anyway. But I was lifted up over the tail plane of the Lancaster. Banging my ankle on, on the elevator as I went out. But I eventually got free and after all the chaos that was going on in the plane and the noise everything seemed quiet. You know, just the plane had gone. I couldn’t see it anymore. I couldn’t hear anything. And the only problem was that my harness which you wear all the time in the aircraft. That you sometimes would slacken it off because it was a bit uncomfortable, you know between your legs. You would slacken it off a bit to make it more comfortable. And I omitted to tighten it up when I went out [laughs] and I was half out of the harness and I had hung on with two hands to hold on to the straps of the parachute. And otherwise I might have fallen out of it. But I eventually got down. I could see I was going to land in a field outside of a village. And as I got further down I noticed that there were people coming out of the village there. They must have seen the aircraft and seen me. They were running out of the village and I landed in this field which was, as I say, just outside the village. Not a very good landing obviously because I wasn’t able to do the standard roll because I was hanging on because of this loose harness. And it was quite windy as well as I remember. But I didn’t do any harm to myself and I was quickly grabbed by the villagers who grabbed the parachute and everything. Stopped me from being pulled along and there I was. It was a place called [pause] Tongeren I think it was, near to a place called Juprelle. It was in, it’s in northern, north western Belgium actually. And after about a quarter of an hour the Yanks came. I told you before it was in their sector and they arrived in a jeep and took me to hospital. Now, the outcome was that this gunner — I told you I banged the gunner on the way out. The outcome was that he didn’t get out. Everybody else got out but he didn’t. We always assumed that he was in the line of fire from the plane shooting over the top of the aircraft. Hitting an engine on the port side. He was probably shot, because he never got out. And he was, he was a replacement. That was the ironic part. Our own gunner — Ken McKeown, or Mac as we called him. He was called Mac. Mac McKeown. He was Canadian as well. Ken McKeown. The night before the operation he’d been, I was in the hut with him, we were both sergeants so we were in the same area there. He was cleaning his pistol. We carried a pistol on operations which was stuck in to your flying boot usually. But he was cleaning his and he put it in to the palm of his hand like that and pulled the trigger. And there was one up the spout and it went right through his hand. Clean through his hand. He was taken to hospital. He survived alright. It wasn’t serious I suppose in a way but he survived alright. But the consequence was he couldn’t take his position the next day. And I suppose the fellow that took his place was actually the gunnery leader. He was the Squadron leader. Gunnery leader. He didn’t normally fly. But I suppose he figured it was a pretty easy operation. Just over northern Europe. And he, he went in his place and he didn’t come back.
JM: Very sad.
BH: Yeah. It was very sad.
JM: Let’s have a break shall we?
[recording paused]
JM: Bill, we got to the point in the story where you were telling us about being shot down. I wonder if I could ask you to tell us a little bit more about that event.
BH: Well, I can tell you about what happened afterwards. I told you we were taken to hospital which was in a place called Hasselt which is in Belgium. It was a hospital. A very stark place I remember. It was operated by nuns. I was kept in for three or four days. I’d nothing serious. Just bumps mainly. No cuts or anything like that. After that I was taken to an American camp nearby where I stayed for one night and I recall having some very fine American food while I was there. Something that we didn’t get in the RAF. The Yanks were much better fed then we were. And then they took me to Brussels airport where I hitched a lift. There was no sort of formal arrangements. I hitched a lift on a Dakota back to the UK. First went to Down Ampney and then to [pause] where did I go to?
[pause]
BH: Well it doesn’t matter but it was Down Ampney. And then I went to somewhere much nearer the camp anyway. And then I took a train to St Neots where I phoned up the camp and said I was there. And they came and picked me up. I was still wearing my, all my old flying still, flying boots and my flying kit and everything. Got back to the station and all the other people had arrived before me. They probably hadn’t been in hospital. I don’t think anybody was hurt. Only me. And it was then that I learned that the mid-upper gunner hadn’t survived. And as for the flight engineer — we never saw him again. I don’t know what, we never knew what happened to him. I think he had, this was Denny Naylor who was the other British person, on the, in the crew. Flight engineer. And I think he had some kind of mental breakdown. I think it affected him and he never came back. So we had to have another flight engineer after that. And after that we were given a rest period I think. Probably, intentionally I suppose for people to recover. And I didn’t do another operation for probably six weeks or something like that. This was December the 3rd ’44 that we were shot down. And I think the next operation was February. Early February.
JM: Did you experience any reaction to your events? To your adventures?
BH: I’m sure I did as I say. I didn’t sleep for a long time. We used to come back in your mind, you know. You would see an engine on fire and all this kind of thing. It’s forgotten now but I’m sure at the time it did have a great affect on most people. All the crew. I’m sure.
JM: But there wasn’t any sort of support measures. Counselling or anything.
BH: No. We’d never heard of counsellors in those day [laughs] I don’t think. No. I don’t recall any of that. I mean if you had any problems like that you were soon shipped off. LMF. Lack of moral fibre. That was the term for it wasn’t it? I don’t know whether that happened to our engineer. Whether he just had some kind of mental problem. I don’t know. But as I say I never saw him again.
JM: Did you talk about it within the crew?
BH: About?
JM: What had happened?
BH: I suppose we did but not a great deal I don’t think. I don’t know what the correct approach was. Whether you talk about it or whether you forget it but I don’t recall talking to the crew about it and analysing and saying what we didn’t do properly and this kind of thing. Or what we should have done. I don’t recall anything like that to tell you the truth. It might be on my mind but I really don’t recall anything like that. No.
JM: That’s very helpful.
BH: But, you know, we operated as a crew afterwards again and did quite a few operations again with a new engineer and just got back to normality. If you can call it that.
JM: So you never thought well lightning can’t strike twice.
BH: No. I don’t think so because it does. I knew it had hit. With various, not with us obviously but with other people it could. Yes.
JM: And you completed quite a number of missions in early ’45. Right up to the war’s end.
BH: Yes. Yes. We went right up to the war. We [pause] the last one was — it wasn’t an operation. It was what we called a Manna. Where we took [pause] I don’t know how it was loaded. It was loaded in sacks I suppose — food. The Dutch people had had a very tough time during the war and a lot of them were all starving. And I think this Operation Manna, we only did one but it was before the war actually ended. I think it was the day before. May the 8th the Armistice was signed but this Operation Manna to take food to the Dutch people was on May the 6th or 7th probably. And we were required to load up the stuff in the bomb bay where the bombs would normally be and fly at a very low altitude over this park outside Amsterdam. Release the, open the bomb doors and release this stuff. And I do recall going in. There was, there was still there, a German anti-aircraft post that was still manned. And we could all see the look on these German soldiers you know. I think they thought we were going to bomb them. But that’s the last sort of operation we did.
JM: Now, I’d like to take you back a little way if I may. Could you tell us please, a little more of what it was like to be a wireless operator on a Lancaster raid?
BH: Well, as I say there was a lot of inactivity because your function was to listen. And what you might expect to hear was further instructions from the base. I mean, there was no sort of satellite communication and things like that. The only way you could get into contact with an aircraft that was quite a way from base was through medium wave / long wave radio which we had access to. In the vicinity of the airfield the pilot had contact with the airfield through the short frequency stuff. So as I say the the function of the operator was to listen mainly. And the messages you might get was, you know to change target. To change. Recall you. Something like that. If the weather was deemed to be too bad you might be recalled. And in an emergency you could transmit if you were going to ditch or something like that say. I mean in our instance we didn’t have time to do anything so, but if you were making a gradual descent and you had time to do something like that you could transmit. You were advised actually to lock the key down sometimes. You just locked the key down. It sent a continuous signal instead of being an interrupted signal which Morse code is. It just sent a continuous signal which would be picked up and it would indicate you were having problems. But otherwise as I say it was not a lot to do. I used to spend time in the astrodome which was nearby to have a lookout and see what was happening or say, identify something like I told you in the [pause] when we were shot down I was able to assist with the aircraft identification.
JM: So you will have seen, perhaps approaching the target you’ll have seen the searchlights and the anti-aircraft fire.
BH: Yes. Yes. Well, tracers and everything. It’s like a firework display when you’re going in I’m afraid.
JM: Did any of the anti-aircraft ever get close to your aircraft?
BH: Oh yeah. We had damage often, you know. You could hear it banging in the fuselage. And when you got back you might be peppered with holes. Oh yes. You got, and of course, you know if it was very, if a shell burst very close to you it upset the balance of the aircraft so — but you also got shrapnel from those shells. That was what did the damage but unless you got a direct hit I suppose you got away with it. But it was quite a sight going in. And plus all the stuff that was on the ground. The flares were there that we, that had been dropped. Yellow, green, red flares. And of course the fires. Often there was huge fires. So it was a spectacular sight in a way.
JM: Now, 582 Squadron was an important squadron in many ways but it had, as a member, the South African Captain Swales VC.
BH: Yeah.
JM: Could you tell us a little bit about that? Did you know that officer? And can you tell us a little about it?
BH: I only [pause] knew him, sort of to speak to. I wasn’t friendly with him or anything like that because most of the time I was a sergeant. He was an officer obviously. So we were in different messes. But after I got shot down early in ’45 I was promoted to flying officer but he’d been lost by then I think. So I didn’t really have close contact with him but I mean I was very familiar, quite familiar with him because he was a bit different. He wore an army uniform and he had a bit of a reputation. He acted as Master Bomber on various occasions. But apart from that, as I say, I couldn’t give any sort of personal assessment of him at all. But he was well — I know he was well liked. I used to know somebody from his crew. They were, you know were very fond of him. Trusted him. In fact I think when he was shot down there was only one crew member got out and that was the rear gunner who I did know quite well. I can’t recall his name now but I remember I used to speak to him at these reunions and things like that. But he was the sole survivor of that when Swales was shot down.
JM: He wasn’t the only VC winner on that squadron.
BH: No. There was one to Squadron Leader Palmer. Now, he was actually a member of 109 Squadron. Another Pathfinder Squadron. They did what was referred to as oboe marking. It was a beam that was sent out from [pause] from this country over the target and they would bomb on the end of that. They did a similar job to us but they only dropped flares mainly. But this particular operation, I don’t know, it must have been something special. He, Palmer who was a pilot with 109 was assigned to fly a Lancaster instead of a Mosquito and he was also acting as Master Bomber. So I don’t recall why it was this way but he was in a 582 plane at the time and when he was awarded that there was some debate of whether it should be credited to 582 Squadron or 109 Squadron. I suppose in fairness its 109 Squadron but he was flying with 582 Squadron and in a 582 aircraft at the time.
JM: Can we go back to your story because you’ve taken us very clearly to the end of the war. I understand you did a Cook’s Tour operation. Could you tell us about that?
BH: Well this was one of the things that we did after, after May the 8th. After the Armistice. There were various aircraft were consigned to do this so-called Cook’s Tour and it was to take ground crew mainly who, you know, had done a great job during the war. We relied on them for all the servicing and so and we got to know them very well. We normally had the same ground crew and we were allowed to put in [pause] I don’t know how many you could get in a Lancaster. Probably five or six. And take them of a tour of Germany to see what damage had been done with their assistance. And mainly, a tour was mainly down the Ruhr Valley. Where we flew down the Ruhr Valley, down the course of the Rhine at fairly low level. Sort of a sightseeing tour. That’s why it was called a Cook’s Tour. But, you know, on the way down you saw all the damage that had been done to places like Cologne and Ruddesheim and places like that. Mannheim. All the way down the valley. I often wondered what they could see because there was, there was really no viewing point in a Lancaster. No windows apart from the turrets. So they must have taken it in turns looking out of the turrets I think. Or going forward. The pilot might have let them in the flight engineer’s position. Something like that. But this, this, I think we did a couple of those. Just sort of appreciation of the work that they’d done really. And then after that we did trips to Italy. This, there was a great rush after the war to bring prisoners of war back. It was obviously going to take a long time to get them all back. So to, you know get some back as quickly as possible whole squadrons were sent to Italy to bring back prisoners of war. We flew to Bari, which was on the opposite side from Naples on the east side. And, yeah we usually stayed a night and then flew back with a compliment of prisoners of war. Now, I don’t know how many we packed in there but we packed them in quite a few. I mean a Lancaster is not, it’s not very roomy inside. There’s nowhere to sit. Must have sit on the floor. They must have sat on the floor and must have been very uncomfortable but I suppose it’s only a three hour trip so they were probably glad to, to, to suffer the conditions. But I often wondered that, you know, it must have been extremely uncomfortable. Particularly if they weren’t feeling too well with air sickness and that kind of thing, you know. But that’s what we usually did. We usually had a night, as I say, in Italy and I recall we were probably going to Naples. We had some few adventures in Naples with various [unclear] I don’t know what I was thinking about there but [pause] I remember going into a shop to buy something and with a few other people and somebody stole a knife. Had picked the knife up and must have taken it out. One of the people I was with. And this shopkeeper noticed it. And he got really upset. I thought oh we’re in trouble here. You know, we got out pretty quick. He didn’t follow us God he was annoyed. And I remember on one occasion we went to the opera. The Opera House in Naples. What’s it called? I don’t know. But we went to the opera which was a new experience for me. I’d never been to the opera before.
BH: I wanted to ask you really about your social life. That’s the wrong word. Non-operational life when you were operating with 582. What did you do when you were off duty?
BH: Well, you would normally, when you sort of started your day you would check in each mess. When there was an operation on there was a notice posted in the officer’s mess and the sergeant’s mess. If there was an operation on that day they would give you all the details. First of all they would give you the crews that were on there. The time of take-off, time of the meal, the flying meal that is before the thing and briefing. Time of briefing. All that kind of information. If you weren’t on it well that was the signal usually to go in to Bedford or St Neots. They were the places that we frequented most. Bedford moreso I think. Drinking or dancing. Plenty of dancing going on in Bedford I remember. Our skipper had a car actually which we normally all packed in. We went out as a crew mostly. Johnny Campbell had a motorbike also but if we were going into Bedford we’d probably go in the skipper’s car. You know. Seven of us in it. A bit overloaded but not everybody went every time I suppose but he had this car so that was the usual thing. To Bedford. St Neots was not a bad place. There was only pubs there but that was about it. Drinking weak beer in St Neots or Bedford. Or dancing as I say. There was quite a lot of dancing.
JM: And you must have had the experience of hearing of the loss of friends of yours.
BH: Yes. I lost [pause] well I lost a very dear friend in training actually. I think it was at OTU. No. Not OTU. Yeah, I guess it must have been OTU. We were flying in the, yeah it was a training exercise. It was in the St Ives area. That’s the St Ives near to Huntingdon. Not the one in Cornwall. We did a lot in that area. And his name was Hopkins. He was a wireless operator as well. He came from South Wales. And he was on the same operations as I was. Flying in Ansons. And he just didn’t, he crashed somewhere in that area and didn’t come back. But you know operationally you were losing friends all the time. You never got really to know anybody that well because you know you weren’t together that long. You had a lot of acquaintances but not a lot of friends. I mean, your closest friends were your crew.
JM: So we’re now up to the summer of 1945. Did you stay with the RAF?
BH: Well, I only stayed because I had to. Right after the war Canadians were back to Canada just like that. They were back the same month almost. So all my crew left right away, you know. Probably during May even and so we were transferred to various things. I remember going to Graveley [pause] yeah. To Graveley. Was posted from Little Staughton to Graveley and I think we did a couple of these trips to [pause] to Italy from there. With a different crew of course. But then later on — well before that we were actually, the buzz was that we were going to go to the Far East. The Japanese war was still going on obviously and crews were being trained to go out to the Far East. But in the meantime there was a tour of Brazil being arranged and this was — during the war Brazil was very helpful to the United Kingdom. They opened their ports to our ships. Particularly for repairs and stuff like that. Air Chief Marshall Harris decided that he would make a goodwill tour of Brazil and crews were selected. One was, there were three crews to go with him. With Harris. I think one was from 5 Group, one was from 8 Group which was Pathfinders and one was from 1 Group. So there were various criteria for this. I don’t quite know what they were. But one of the criteria I do remember was that we had some civilian clothes and I happened to have some and I sort of volunteered this and I was selected as the wireless operator from Pathfinder Force. And we had a pilot from 582 Squadron as well I suppose. Now, this was, nobody was quite sure what was going to happen but in the end it turned out to be quite a trip. We were to fly in three adapted Lancasters which had been painted white actually. And the interiors had been fitted to accommodate various people. They put some seating in of some kind. I don’t know how they did it exactly but, you know, I can’t imagine Harris sort of [laughs] sitting on the main spar or something like that but obviously they did rig up some kind of seating. Because there was Harris and he had quite a lot of aides obviously and we had to carry our own ground staff with us because during the flight out we had to service. Do our own servicing. So there was a lot of ground crew as well. But I recall we were there more or less when the Olympic Games were on. This year. That period. Their winter actually. Winter in the southern hemisphere. The end of July beginning of August. But it was quite a route and quite an experience really because for one thing we had to fly across the South Atlantic which had never been done before. The route we took was down [pause] we took off from St Mawgan in Cornwall. Flew down the [pause] we had to be careful where we were flying. The military weren’t allowed to fly over certain countries, you know. I think Portugal in particular. So we had to skirt Spain and Portugal and fly down the — we landed first in Morocco. I remember spending the night in Morocco and then the next one was down in Bathurst. I think it’s changed its name now. Bathurst in West Africa which was the westernmost point of Africa. That being chosen to make it as short as possible the crossing. And I do remember there we had great difficulty in finding the airport because it’s jungle there and if you’re flying over what looks like trees all the time trying to find a place where there’s a clearing which would be the airport. But we got there eventually and from Bathurst we flew across the South Atlantic but they made special arrangements for that I remember. The Brazilians spaced three destroyers at intervals across the South Atlantic in case there was any problems. I think we flew from Bathurst to [pause] was it Natal or Recif? Natal I think it was. Which was in Northern Brazil. And from there down to Rio de Janeiro where we were to stay while we were feted. Well, sort of followed Harris around. He was feted and we sort of hung on to his coat tails and got all the festivities and so on that went on. One thing I do recall about Rio. The airport there, it was more or less inside Rio. Still there I think. I remember seeing it on the map of the Olympics this year. It’s called Santos Dumont, after the pioneer. But it had water at both ends and quite a short runway. So, you know, it was tricky landing but we landed there because we wanted to keep the aircraft there because later, at later dates we were going to give access to people. To show, to show the aircraft to the people in that area. But that was quite a thing. We stayed there. We had all kinds of dinners and visits and this kind of thing. Entertained at barbecues. We flew down to Sao Paulo. To Port Alegre. We were assigned a Brazilian Air Force Captain, he was. Captain Umberto I remember his name was. He had a plane that he flew us around in. A twin engine Beechcraft. And we were flown around various functions. As I say to Sao Paulo and Port Alegre. But that was a marvellous time really. We stayed, I think the visit lasted about four weeks. But when the time came to leave one of the Lancasters became unserviceable and needed an engine change. And we were selected to stay behind with it which [laughs] was no great imposition really, I suppose. So we were there for another couple of weeks because they had to fly this engine in from Canada. So we had to wait for the engine to be flown down from Canada and then put in by the ground staff of course before we were able to leave. So we had another couple of weeks. I mean all the official stuff had finished by then so we were given a daily allowance I think it was to sort of feed ourselves and so on because before everything had been on the Brazilian government and that kind of thing. But when we took off to leave you couldn’t take off from Santos Dumont with a full load of petrol because the runway was too short. You had to have a minimum and we flew to another airport outside of Brazil which I think is now the international airport. And, you know, to refuel there before we flew on. Flew back. Flew — where did we go? To Recife again I think. And then to the Bahamas. We missed America. We went straight to Montreal. We never landed in America. Went from Bahamas to Montreal. Goose Bay. Reykjavik and then back to this country.
JM: What an adventure.
BH: It was an adventure. I wrote an account of it at the time. All the journey times and mileage and all that kind of thing but it was quite an adventure.
JM: I must ask you did you form any views of Harris because you travelled with him? What was he like?
BH: I don’t know that I ever really met him. He wasn’t in our aircraft. He flew with a Wing Commander, Swann was his name I think. He flew in the 5 Group aircraft from Wyton. No. I can’t form an opinion of him but he hasn’t had a very good press I don’t think. But I can’t recall speaking to him, say. Something like that or even — we were in his company all the time obviously because we were going to night clubs and that kind of thing and going to ceremonies but we never came in direct contact with him.
JM: So when you got back to Britain after this remarkable journey did you leave the Royal Air Force at that point?
BH: No. I was kept in. I was sent to — the trip to the Far East was gone by then of course because the atomic bomb had been dropped and the Japanese war had finished while we were in Brazil. On August the 8th. We were in Brazil then when the Japanese war ended. No. After that I was posted back to Finningley in Yorkshire where I, I was an instructor. I instructed on various wireless things you know for [pause] well I didn’t come out of the air force ‘til March ’47. So I was at Finningley for possibly six months on these instruction duties.
JM: I think you told us that you were a member of the 582 Association. Did you, did you maintain contact with your crew?
BH: I did because after the war I migrated. I went to Canada because of the influence of this Canadian crew and everything. You know, things after the war were not good. I was discharged, as I say, in the spring of ’47. I stayed at home for about six months working on the family farm but I thought this is not for me and we decided to go to Canada. So I stayed in Canada for about fourteen years. From ’47 to ’61. And during that time I didn’t actually meet with the crew. Only one of the crew. Johnny Campbell the rear gunner was the only one I met with. The rest of them lived out in the west actually. Campbell lived in New Brunswick but the remainder lived in Winnipeg, Vancouver. So I never got out there so I was in contact with, you know it was letters or cards or whatever. But the only one I met personally was Johnny Campbell that saved my life. I saw him a few times. He came. Well he came to, I was in Toronto and he came to work in Toronto actually although he was from New Brunswick. But for a while he came to work for one of the oil companies in Toronto so I saw quite a bit of him then. After I came back I gradually lost contact. I’m not in contact anymore. Probably nobody’s alive anymore I suppose but —
JM: When you look back on that incredible period of your life how do you see things now?
BH: Well, it’s something that you can look back with a certain amount of pleasure and satisfaction I suppose. But whether you’d want to repeat it I don’t know. But I often think that, you know — there was I, nineteen, twenty. With a lot of people all of similar age, you know. Pilots, perhaps a bit older than us because they had a longer training. But pilots of a four engine bomber with responsibility for seven crew. You know, people, people twenty two say. Twenty one, twenty two, twenty three like that. It was certainly an experience, but I think of my own grandson at times and I think when he was nineteen. When I was his age he didn’t, would he have been fit to go and do what I did. Would people nowadays at nineteen, twenty go and do what I did. It’s remarkable really how young we were and the responsibilities that we had at that age. Which, I’m sure, you know whether people would take to it today the same I really don’t know. But it’s an experience you wouldn’t have missed. But whether you’d, as I say, you’d volunteer for it again I don’t know. It’s certainly something that, you know has [pause] given me a lot of friends over the period. A lot of contacts and events to attend and that kind of thing. You know, I’ve always felt part of the RAF family since and I’ve always been going to any events that were planned via the squadron basis or whatever. Bomber Command basis. I belonged to Bomber Command. They had their own Association as well. So I used to belong to that as well. They used to have functions at Hendon and places like that. So, you know, it’s been life enhancing. There’s no doubt about it.
JM: Did you get your clasp?
BH: Yes. Yeah.
JM: Was that presented to you or —?
BH: No. I wrote off. I had to write off for it but I’ve got it.
JM: How do you feel about the way that Bomber Command was treated?
BH: I think we were treated fairly shabbily but I think it made some part reconciliation but not as we felt it should be. I felt we should have got some kind of campaign medal. And to his credit Harris always, I think he was the problem. He had disagreements with so many people. If you’ve ever read his biography or any biographies of the campaign that he was a difficult man to deal with and fell out with a lot of people. And a lot of people didn’t agree with what he did. The type of, you know this area bombing which, you know rather than strategic bombing. All the blame was put on him which I’m sure it wasn’t. It was further up. I don’t think he decided policy. He carried it out but he didn’t decide the policy. But I think he was treated pretty shabbily too. But —
JM: Bill, I think this would be a good place to finish. Thank you so much. You’ve given us a very full, thorough, detailed and very moving account of your service with Bomber Command. Thank you indeed.
Dublin Core
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Title
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Interview with William Hough
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Julian Maslin
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-09-05
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AHoughWJ160905
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Pending review
Format
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01:26:24 audio recording
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eng
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
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Great Britain
Temporal Coverage
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1943
1944
1945
Description
An account of the resource
Bill Hough came from a farming background, went to a local grammar school in Northwich and was a member of the Air Training Corps. He joined the RAF in 1943. He describes his initial training at Bridgnorth. Bill then goes into the continuation training then going to wireless school where he became a wireless operator and air gunner. Bill was then part of 8 OTU (Operational Training Unit) where they flew Wellington’s, then the HCU (Heavy Conversion Unit) flying Halifaxes. Bill then went to Finishing School and flew Lancaster’s. A part of the Pathfinders, Bill flew with 582 squadron. Bill then reminisces his operations, one of which where his aircraft was attacked by a Messerschmitt 262. Bill then details being shot down and his experiences of getting back to Britain through Belgium, where he stayed with American forces and recalled that they were much better fed. Bill took part in Operation Manna and details the experiences of anti-aircraft fire. Bill also recollects his squadron and the Victoria Cross recipient, South African Captain Swales, Bill did not have close contact with him but knew he was well liked. Bill also remembers another Victoria Cross recipient, Squadron Leader Palmer, who was a pilot in 109 Squadron but was flying with 582 Squadron and a 582 aircraft at the time. He also describes his experiences when he was off-duty and often went to Bedford and St. Neots to drink and dance. Bill later details his experiences after the war and being selected to go on a goodwill tour to Brazil with Air Marshall Sir Arthur Harris and was in Brazil when the war in Asia ended. After instruction duties, Bill emigrated to Canada and stayed for fourteen years, and met Air Gunner Johnny Campbell who saved his life. Bill’s interview finishes with the legacy of Bomber Command and receiving his medal clasp.
Contributor
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Benjamin Turner
1656 HCU
576 Squadron
582 Squadron
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
bale out
bombing
Cook’s tour
Dominie
Halifax
Harris, Arthur Travers (1892-1984)
Heavy Conversion Unit
Initial Training Wing
lack of moral fibre
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Me 262
military service conditions
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Pathfinders
Proctor
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Castle Kennedy
RAF Elsham Wolds
RAF Fiskerton
RAF Lindholme
RAF Little Staughton
RAF Worksop
RAF Yatesbury
shot down
training
Wellington
wireless operator
wireless operator / air gunner
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/925/11168/ALenthallG160401.2.mp3
cec8de68d3c369542e86beed2c99b46b
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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Lenthall, Geoffrey
G Lenthall
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Sergeant Geoffrey Lenthall (1925 - 2018, 3040138, Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-04-01
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Lenthall, G
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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AH: This interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is Anna Hoyles. The interviewee is Geoff Lenthall. The interview is taking place in Mr Lenthall’s home in Cleethorpes on the 1st April 2016. Could you tell me a bit about your background?
GL: Yes. I was, I was born in Langold in Nottinghamshire. Not many people have heard of that. Then moved to Brigg. And finished up at Scunthorpe where my father was a linotype operator. I went to school at the Henderson Avenue and then the Scunthorpe Grammar School. And I still in fact go to reunions there. They have them every two years and I am the oldest member there. And I still have my old school cap which is in great demand. People want to have their photographs taken in it. And we also have a get together at the Kingsway Hotel. Just a few of us of the local school boys or ex-schoolboys. I then, from the school I left when I was about sixteen as a, to get a job in a bank. I happened to know through my uncle who knew the bank manager said, ‘Oh, there’s a vacancy for a junior.’ So I went along there and they took me on but they said, ‘If you fail your school certificate you’re out.’ Well, fortunately I passed. And my uncle by the way was, he was the father of Joan Plowright who is now Lady Olivier. I did try to get her to come to the reunions because she was at the grammar school. But anyway I I worked in the bank for a while doing the usual boring jobs of answering the phone and fetching stamps from the post office and joined the Air Training Corps and I became sergeant there. We were doing continuity drill and studying aircraft recognition, Morse code, principle of flight. All the usual things. We were all eager to get in and have a go at the enemy and I volunteered around about seventeen and a quarter and, but unfortunately went on deferred service and I was gone eighteen by the time I joined up in July ’44. Went down to London, my first visit, to be greeted by bombs and flying bombs. Doodlebugs. V2s. And that was the Aircrew Receiving Centre and we lost quite a few casualties and so moved to Torquay which was much more peaceful. And from there I went to the Initial Training Wing of Bridlington. Another seaside resort where we did all sorts of continuity drill and exercises to toughen us up. Getting up early and all the rest of it. And from there I was misemployed unfortunately as a — in the pay accounts at Kirton Lindsey working on officer’s allowances. The funny thing was there I had a desk and the airmen used to come in and salute me thinking I was an officer but I was just a plain erk. Anyway, I then thought well I shall get on aircrew training soon. And I was then sent to Blackpool to learn to drive. They obviously thought that was a good idea. Anyway, I learned to drive in Blackpool and moved down to Melksham in Wiltshire to finish off the course and got my licence down there. And I was getting a bit fed up by this time. Frustrated. Disappointed at not getting in on to do aircrew training. And having read the papers and all this and seen all the raids that were taking place and thinking I should be up there instead of down here. But anyway I was sent to Sango which was way up in Scotland. At the top left hand corner and pretty isolated. I used to, to drive the mountain rescue people. And I remember seeing a German submarine which had been captured. It came in and we saw it in the bay down below. That was my first glimpse of anything of the enemy. And I was then, I volunteered to go overseas but they classified overseas as Northern Ireland which I suppose it was over a sea but [pause] there I was, I was billeted with an Irish family. He was a teacher. She was an excellent cook his wife. And they had two attractive daughters and there were two of us staying there with them. And we used to stay up into the early hours talking about religion. They were Catholics. And the father was very strict and you know there was, there was no hanky panky with the daughters or anything like that. He wouldn’t have that. But we got on very well. She was an excellent cook and we were living the life of Riley really. And it irked us a bit the fact that we were enjoying life while people were out there fighting. And anyway we duly carried on. I was driving the men to a radar camp about seven miles away. And this continued for a while and we got on well. I got to know, this was a bit of romance came then. I met a girl called Bernadette who was an Irish girl. Very attractive. We kept in touch even when I was sent, transferred to Manchester which was a transit camp. And that’s when things started to move and I actually moved from transit camp to radio school in Madley, near Hereford. From there we flew in Proctors which were just the pilot and radio operator doing these radio bearings etcetera. The usual stuff. And then we went into the De Havilland Dominies where they were, they were fitted with four or five positions for different radio operators. And eventually passed out and got my sergeant’s stripes as a qualified radio operator and then went to to Topcliffe in Yorkshire where, which was an air navigation school. Then the cadets, they were training to be navigators and the, most of the pilots were veteran. Polish veteran pilots. A lot of them were, were quite mad. I remember one. He, he had an excellent singing voice and he, he taught us a Polish song and he got us singing this and I got on well with him. Another one was [Zachiorski?] He was, he’d got a handlebar moustache and I went up with him for the first time. And on the way back there there was a Polish resettlement camp just near the airfield and he had a lot of friends there and he liked to do a bit of showing off. And so, I hadn’t realised this. Anyway, he got back to base and we got all the instructions for landing etcetera and then he put the, this was an Anson, put it in a steep climb and eventually the left wing dropped and it stalled. And this was deliberate apparently. Then it went spiralling down to near this Polish resettlement camp and eventually he landed at the airfield. Anyway, we got out, he said, ‘Did you enjoy that?’ I said, ‘Well, it was unexpected but I shall know next time.’ He did it every time apparently. He was an expert pilot. But I spent about four years, three or four years at Topcliffe and I know we lost a couple of planes. Wellingtons then. And one of them it stalled on take-off. And anyway the pilot — and he managed to survive. He baled out. The rest were killed. And the other one disappeared over the North Sea somewhere. Never found any wreckage anywhere. It even got in the local papers. And they never did find out what happened to it. So, and then we got to, I was then occasionally called on when there was no flying to drive the ambulance as I’d taken this MT course. And you had to be on call there and everything was timed to the minute. You had to get to, if there was an emergency you had to get there in a certain number of minutes. And I also had to drive a [pause] some airman had gone mad. We had to take him into a mental institution in York and this was quite interesting. He was in the back with with two other, two men. He was in handcuffs because he was quite violent. So, they got rid of him anyway. And we used to have nights out in York and I then, I became very friendly with with a Scotsman, Jock Campbell and a chap from Bournemouth. Bish we called him. He looked like a, he used to put a collar on back to front to look like a minister. We were great buddies and anyway they said, ‘Let’s, let’s go,’ he said, ‘I know a WAAF,’ he said, ‘Let’s meet up in York and get her to bring two friends.’ So off we went to York and I couldn’t believe that the one of the friends was one I’d met in York where, the transit centre there. Another Irish girl who lived in London. In Crouch End. And we became very friendly and retained that friendship until after I came out the RAF because she came to Cranwell and I went to see her down there. Anyway, I’m rambling on a bit am I? Anyway, from [pause] it became time for demob and we’d gone out on a usual demob party as we did, in Ripon. And we’d, we’d had a few drinks of course. A bit of a singsong. And on the way back to the station my friend Bish who was a bit mad, a very quiet man normally but if he had drink inside him he was a changed character, Jekyll and Hyde and he started to climb over a railway bridge on the way back to the station. Anyway, we managed to drag him down and then we got to the station. Got in the train. And it, as it was about to move off they [pause] Bish decided he wanted, he was going to get out on the wrong side. On the off side. So he climbed out. We yelled at him. I climbed out after him to bring him back. And he was trying of all things to try and unhitch the train so that it would go off with one carriage missing at the end. Anyway, he couldn’t unfasten it of course and so I dragged him out. Then the whistle went. Train started moving. There was my friend Jock peering out of the window shouting at us. We ran but we couldn’t get in and so the train went off. Left us on the track. And the, the guard, he was there, he was shouting at us so we set off walking down the track. It was only probably three or four miles to the station we wanted to be off at near the camp so we walked along the track. It’s a stupid thing to do but fortunately at that time of night there were no no trains. And we arrived exhausted back at this station getting on for midnight and there were celebrations going in the mess even at that time. Anyway, we found Jock and he said, ‘Oh, thank goodness you’re back. We wondered what had happened to you. We were going to send out a search party.’ Anyway, that was partly Bish was, was a strange man. He was a very good friend but he got this idea that one evening he he had this idea of getting on the phone because we had a station warrant officer who wasn’t very popular and anyway Bish got on the phone. He rang the fire brigade and he said, ‘Oh, the SWO’s house is on fire. Can you come immediately.’ We, anyway, put the phone down. We went off up to bed and we heard the fire engine going and the following morning two pilots had been arrested for ringing up the Fire Brigade. And anyway, we being gentlemen we confessed and said it wasn’t them it was us. And I was, I suppose aiding and abetting and so we finished up on a fizzer and went in jail for the weekend. We were escorted to the dining room by guards and of course all the other lads thought it great fun. You know. We, we, in fact I still have a card which they’d all signed and there was a fire on the front of it and it made some comment from all the lads there. And anyway we were, we were both duly not court martialled but we we had a good ticking off from the CO and said, ‘Don’t do it again.’ And so that went on our record. But on the final night of demob we decided to fly when we get back on that to base and for some reason we managed to persuade the three radio ops to take their places. And this would be about eleven or twelve in the evening and so I’m surprised that we were let on. We must have been reeking of beer. And we went in for briefing and we got all our gear and we went off. There were about a half a dozen planes went off and so my friends Bish and Jock they were in separate planes as they were both radio operators. And we went off on a six hour navigation trip somewhere over the North Sea and back again and with turning points. And eventually got back in the early hours. Back to Topcliffe. And there was thick fog. We couldn’t land. So we were redirected to Linton on Ouse and had a Polish pilot as most of them were. Anyway, we were heading for Yorkshire, this other aerodrome and all of a sudden I heard on the intercom, ‘Christ,’ or some, it might have been a Polish equivalent. The plane shot up like a lift. He pulled the stick back and apparently it was a place called Stanage Edge which was like an escarpment and he had been flying low and he had just spotted this. So he pulled the stick back and zoomed up. And anyway we were then redirected. Of course fog had come down at Linton on Ouse. We went down to Lakenheath in Suffolk and by then we were running short of fuel but anyway we made it to Lakenheath and fortunately there was no fog. We landed there and they found us accommodation in the hospital actually. Comfortable beds. And the following morning we woke up and would you believe it there was fog. So we couldn’t take off. And this, this we should have been at Demobilisaton Centre by this time. Anyway, we were detained there because of the weather for a week before we got back. So they weren’t very happy and they had to rearrange our demob. And we got another ticking off for that. And so we had about another three months where they seemed to punish us by making us fly every day but we didn’t mind that because we enjoyed it. And so eventually we we were properly demobbed and three of us we went down to London. Decided to celebrate and have a week there before we went back home. And we went, we’d had a few drinks as we’d normally do, went round the night clubs and did the usual things and we decided to visit the American Embassy and volunteered to join the US Army Air Force to fly in Korea. We thought we didn’t want to go back to Civvy Street, you know, it’s too boring. Anyway, we got all the information and forms to fill in. Went back home and all three of us decided we wouldn’t do that. We went back. I went back to banking. Jock went back on the railway. And Bish went back to the estate agent office. And I thought that was the end of that but poor old Bish. He [pause] he suffered from, he was a bit [pause] what shall I say? When he’d, I know when he’d had a few drinks he was a changed character. But the Morse code was affecting his mind and he eventually suffered from Morse Madness and which, which — you know the continuous noise on the brain of the dit dit dot and all this sort of thing. And anyway he, he had, he finished up in a mental institution and he died before he was thirty which, you know was very sad. We were great buddies and we’d been down to Bournemouth. Met his, met his family as well. And anyway, we [pause] we kept in touch for a while and we used to have reunions back at Topcliffe. Jock and I. And we managed to get a bed you know in the sergeant’s mess no problem. Meet the lads who were still there. And then as things happen we drifted apart. He went back, stayed with his job. I went back to banking. And it was only about three years ago that I I had a message. An email on Facebook saying, “Are you the Geoff Lenthall who was flying from Topcliffe in Wellingtons?” And I wrote back. I sent him an email. I said yes. And it was, it was my old friend Jock. And so we decided we got together and we, he came down. It didn’t cost him a penny because of his special rates on the railway, as he worked there. He came down to York and I travelled up there and we found a pub and we had a meal and well we had a few drinks but I couldn’t have many. I was driving. It was alright for him. He was on the train [laughs] He could have a dram or two on it. So it was good. You know. We talked. We had a lot to talk about of course and we met each year. But last year I had problems driving and so we didn’t meet up. But we’re still in touch. Which is great. So that was more or less the — oh I did join the Volunteer Reserve for five years. And this, it was, we used to get paid for it. And it didn’t go down very well with the bank because it took a fortnight. I’d still got my allowance from the bank for the holidays but I had to have two weeks at an RAF station. And that was when I went to Binbrook and flew in Avro Lincolns. Operation Bullseye I think they called it. Went out to practice bombing in Heligoland. And that was one of the trips. And other times, other times we went to Doncaster which is now a civil airport and we used to fly to Jersey. Went down for the Battle of the Flowers and things like that. We had a weekend in Germany. All on the RAF of course. And this was at a time when one of the English planes was shot down near the Russian border and I know there were emails flashing around saying, ‘Are you ok?’ You know. They thought it was that we were over there we’d been shot down. But anyway we, we were ok. And so five years with the Volunteer Reserve. And then, so I met my wife. So I was transferred to, from Scunthorpe to Grimsby and we, I know I joined this tennis club and there was this girl in bright red shorts. And anyway I got talking to her and we became friendly and I walked her home. And in due course we were married. And as I say she died nine years ago. We had a very happy marriage and when I retired we were able to do a bit of travelling around. And we went to Australia because the sort of friends who lived near us they decided to emigrate to Australia and said keep in touch. And so we went two or three times to stay in Melbourne and we were very fortunate really. And they had a big five bedroom house. They have four daughters. And anyway the daughters married out there and one went to live in Sydney so we called on the way down in Sydney to see them. And then we drove down in his car to Melbourne. And we had a great time because they had friends who had a boat on an island off the coast and we went down there and went on this boat around the islands. And they were, I know that they used to call us poms but we got on very well with the, with the Australians. And they tried to persuade us to go and live out there. And he said, oh, he said because I then was working on a magazine, Lincolnshire Life and they said, ‘You can start, start a magazine up out here. No problem. Come and join us.’ We never actually did but we went to see them. But I joined Lincolnshire Life after leaving the bank because I was getting nowhere. I finished up at Loughborough. I went to Leicester branch. Then they moved me to Loughborough. And I was getting a bit bored with banking. It didn’t seem to satisfy my yearnings at all and so I resigned. And I went of all places on the fish docks because my father had a fishing business. My father in law. And anyway, he said he could get me a job so I went back to Grimsby from Leicester and finished up at this this company owned by one of the trawler companies and I was going around visiting customers and getting new business for the company. It was a complete change from banking to fishing and I had to go down to the docks at seven in the morning to be amongst all the fish there to see what went on. And it was a real eye opener. And so I had to learn a bit about it before I went on my travels. And they gave me a car allowance and so it became, I used to leave Monday morning and come back Friday. My wife got used to it in due course and I worked, I did it for about two years. But I used to have a talk with the MD every Friday and he, I said to him, ‘Things are not really working out.’ He said — I said, ‘You know that there’s a resentment.’ Of course they’d made me a director of the company and this didn’t go down very well with the staff. They’d been in it probably from leaving school. Working their way up you know, and this this chap comes in, ex-banker, white collar worker and he’s there you know eighteen months they make him a director, you know it just wasn’t on. I could tell there was a resentment and I said this to the MD. And so I resigned. So at about forty then out of a job and so I looked around and saw this job advertised in Lincolnshire Life. Do you know Lincolnshire Life? And they wanted a sales representative or advertisement manager. Anyway, I applied and I got the job and I had one week with the previous ad man. And he said, ‘I don’t know whether you realise or not but not only will you be doing this but you’ll be also the motoring correspondent. And,’ he said, ‘I’ve got a car test lined up next week for you in Lincoln. An Alfa Romeo.’ I thought this sounds interesting. Anyway, he went off and I took over and I was given a car to run around the county in. I went to Lincoln. Picked up this Alfa Romeo and they just let me loose for a couple of hours on the roads. And that was fine. I enjoyed that. But then of course I had to write about it in the magazine which I’d never done before. So, this was a labour of love and I eventually got into it and enjoyed it. And from then on I got other motoring tests to do as well. But we were in, in Brewery Street I think it was there and we moved to Dudley Street. The magazine. And the owner Roy Faiers, he lived in Cheltenham and he’d started This England magazine which is a very worldwide and he would fly up from time to time. He had learned to fly in his forties and got his own plane and took me for a flight in it from Humberside. And anyway, this went on for a while and there were quite a few perks with working for a magazine and I I used to get invitations to [pause] I went to Sweden for the opening of a golf course by an Englishman and things like that. And I met a few celebrities. I don’t know whether you remember Crossroads. It was a television programme and two of the people on it, Meg and Benny, they were at this hotel that was newly opened and they were guests. So I met them. Had photographs taken. All the rest of it. But it was a totally different life from banking and fishing. And there was an end product every month when they, you looked at the magazine and you know you felt well we’ve helped to do something towards this. I used to go down with the editor at the end of every month to the printers to put it to bed so to speak. Do the proof reading. And it worked very well and I I was able to, I met a lot of interesting people and part of the driving part I mean I wasn’t an official motoring correspondent. I wasn’t even a member of the journalist’s Union. But they used to send me these invitations and we used to go to a place called, in Yorkshire called Sherburn in Elmet which was a testing ground for the Mintex people of the brake linings and things. And they had a track there on an old aerodrome circuit. And each year I used to go there and I used to take a friend of mine Brian Hammond who was in the choir. And we used to spend the night there in a hotel and then on the Sunday morning we’d go around the track. It was all very well organised. We had a pep talk before-hand saying, ‘This isn’t a racetrack,’ you know and all the rest of it. We had name tags with our photograph and all the rest of it. And so we used to drive around there. Test the cars and we, a second time I had a Rolls Royce and that was great fun because it wasn’t allowed on the track. There was a special ten mile course outside. And so we took the Rolls Royce. They briefly said this does that, that does that you know. The controls. So Brian and I used to drive this Rolls Royce waving to people you know like royalty and that was great fun. We got to test a lot of cars. The, the BMW, Mercedes and anything from Minis and things like that. That was an interesting part of the job. And I eventually decided to [pause] I’d had an offer. No. That’s right we took over because he wasn’t paying very well and I thought well am I going to leave again? Find another job. And I I mentioned about a rise but there was nothing forthcoming so I had a talk with my wife and my father in law and my banker. And in the end I made an offer to buy the magazine from, from him. And he accepted it. He wanted more than we wanted to pay but anyway we settled on a figure and got the first loan to organise and finished up as owning a magazine. And Joan used to do subscriptions. My father in law did the accounts. And I took on ladies in different parts of the county to sell advertising. You know, on a bonus basis part time, as I wasn’t able to get out and do it myself and I had a part time editor. David Rawlinson. He lived in Louth and he used to come in about two days a week and between us we put the magazine together and I’d get all the ads together and he would bring the editorial. And so we did that for a few years. And then I had an offer from one of the big companies. They owned Yorkshire Life and Lancashire Life and they wanted to buy Lincolnshire life. So they came up to Grimsby and took me out. Wined and dined me as they do. Made an offer. And I thought well I’m enjoying life really. I don’t want, I don’t want to give it up yet. So in the end I was reaching I think I was about sixty two when I had an offer from LSG. Lincolnshire Standard Group. And they made an offer and we decided to sell out and retire. And so we, we did that and that’s when we were able to travel around a bit more and enjoy life. I joined the Male Voice Choir. My father in law was in it. He was the one that persuaded me and so I had an audition and we [pause] a great bunch of lads. We had, at one time nearly seventy members and we travelled around. We went in various festivals and we also organised trips abroad. We went to Holland. Germany. Sweden. France. And they were very good. We had a week with the people. You know. The Swedes or Germans looked after us very well. Then they came back the following year and stayed with us. Then we’d have a joint concert and I’m still in touch with some of them which is good you know. We exchange cards at Christmas time and it worked out very well. And there was a tremendous spirit between singers of all nationalities because they organised at Cardiff Arms Park, a huge concert. Ten thousand male voices. There were about nine hundred and something in the end but actually there were choirs from all over and we were invited. It was a tremendous success and the feeling there singing at Cardiff Arms Park which is huge. We were alright. We were in the sheltered area. And I’ve got a video of it actually. And one year we had Tom Jones as the guest singer and the following year Shirley Bassey. And so I was able to put on my CV I have sung with Tom Jones and Shirley Bassey. And they were great occasions and there is a tremendous comradeship in the male voice of choirs. Of course there were people from all walks of life but you all get on well. They’ve all got this love of singing. And in due course I took over the, I’d started a newsletter for the choir and did that for about fifteen years and but I was finding I was having to write most of it as the contributions weren’t coming in very quickly. People seemed a bit reluctant to do this but I managed to get one or two in the choir to twist a few arms and I got some contributions coming in. And this used to come out once a quarter. And so I did this for a while and I enjoyed it. I was just paid the expenses of the, you know I used to do it on the computer and print it out. And had great fun. And then it got to the stage where I wasn’t getting enough in really to make a go of it. So by then I was getting on in years and I said well if no one else will take it over you know I’m calling it a day. And there weren’t any volunteers so it just stopped like that. Which was a pity. One man a year later said he’d take it over but he said, ‘I’ll come round to the house and we’ll talk about it.’ But that was it. No more was said. And I’m still in touch with the choir and still go to some of the concerts but unfortunately they’re down to oh about thirty from, you know. They’ve lost half their members. Old age. This is the, or they move away. I mean the average age must be well over sixty. Probably seventy. But you just can’t get youngsters to come and join. They don’t want, they don’t want to be with a lot of old fogeys you know. They’d rather be out enjoying themselves. It’s understandable. And so I gave that up and I joined the, or Joan and we both joined the U3A and I I decided to — she was interested in gardening, flower arranging. I went on a computing course and there are about thirty odd different groups in the U3A and you can choose whichever one appeals to you. It’s either a hobby or an educational thing. I went in computers and then learning German because I’d taken it at school and we’d had a refresher course when we went with the choir. And so I, there were only about a half dozen of us used to go every week to this house. She was a German. She’d come from near Cologne and lived in this country for many years. But then she, she’d done it for twenty odd years and she gave that up. And I joined armchair travel which was, we used to meet up and show films of where people had been and talked about the different places. Quite interesting. And, and there was a, I became interested in, we had our own website and anyway when the person who was doing it was retiring I offered my services. So, I took over the website which meant I had to join the committee as well which I wasn’t very happy about but I used to go to the meetings as well. I did that for a while. Are we ok? And —
[recording paused]
AH: So why did you want to join the RAF?
GL: Why? I always had a love of aircraft and obviously as a lad you know I’d read about the, and about the exploits not only of Bomber Command but fighter pilots as well. And its, I thought well this this is the one for me. I didn’t really fancy the army or the navy. The air force really was the only place and we all joined. All the friends of us. We got ourselves very fit. We used to go for morning runs at the Air Training Corps. And we had, went every week to classes for — well learning all about flying really. About the various navigation, Morse code, air craft recognition. I could recognise any of the German planes I thought at that time when our memories were good. And to me it was the only thing that I wanted to do was to get up and fly. And I did later on take a gliding course in Norfolk which was a great thrill but that was later on in life. But it was, I knew one by one we we either volunteered or were called up. All the aircrew were volunteers. And one of my friends he he went to the Fleet Air Arm and he got in before me. And also I met an air gunner who, about the same age as me and and he’d done about twelve operations and I thought how was that? Anyway, we talked about this and he said, ‘Well, I volunteered as tail gunner. Said I wanted to be in straight away.’ And had I known I would probably have done the same because as I say being the same age he got in quite quickly. They were short of air gunners because they were very vulnerable at the back end of the plane of course and so he he couldn’t understand this. He said, ‘Why don’t you do operations?’ he said. Of course that was so disappointing for me. I thought well had I known would I have done the same thing? Volunteered as a tail gunner? Probably not have even come back. I mean he was lucky. He managed to survive but I know there were fifty five thousand more than that who who never came back. Who just died. Which was a, you know was a tremendous casualty list. But even so you know it was the thought of getting up there and it’s, and the thing is, I know that people when they say when they bombed at Dresden. There was a lot of talk about that. And there were so many casualties but after all it was war. They were bombing us the same way as we were bombing them. They bombed Hull and London and all the big cities and so it was. I don’t know whether any, there was any Christianity came into that. I mean there were some people who’d say, ‘How could you possibly go up there and drop bombs on innocent people?’ But you were just, just doing your job. You thought no more about it than that. You couldn’t really do anything else. If, if you didn’t, I mean there was some on the training who, who refused to, to do the training. This was at Bridlington where they had to jump into this, off the edge into the quayside, about twenty foot and with a Mae West on. And they refused to do it. And so they, they wouldn’t do it so they, they were taken off aircrew training. That was all part of it. You had to jump down, swim to a dinghy and climb aboard. All part of the training. But you just had to do this if you wanted to be in aircrew and it was an ambition of mine. And I mean when I wrote the book eventually that was my — I wanted to be a pilot. I think which most youngsters did anyway. I did actually get behind the controls of a Wellington bomber with a pilot by my side. Dual control. And he said, ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘You can take over now,’ he said, ‘Piece of cake,’ he said, ‘Just get a compass bearing and hold the stick and keep it steady,’ and he said, ‘I will land it though when we get there.’ But he said, he said to me afterwards, ‘You can take off if you like.’ He said, ‘I’ll watch you.’ We managed to get off eventually. Not very, not an ideal take off but then he said, ‘Fly it up to Yorkshire and I’ll take over.’ But it was a great thrill and, and then the flying in the gliding course as well. And I did think when I retired that was another thing I will do. I will, I’ll learn to fly at the local flying school. But so many other things to do I never got around to it. So it was sad really. It was disappointing. I mean I’ve watched many films. I’ve read lots of books. And of course when Dambusters I mean which was a tremendous thing there. Incidentally, I’m having the Dambusters theme at my funeral. I’ve already got it planned and I’ve written all this out for my daughters and I said, ‘Play that when people are coming in and then we’ll have the hymns etcetera and then at the end I’m going to have Perry Como singing, “For the Good Times.” Which was one of my favourites. And it was one my wife’s as well. Anyway, I’m getting off the beaten track aren’t I?
AH: Could you tell me a bit more about the training? What you did.
GL: About the —?
AH: The training. The training.
GL: Trailer.
AH: The training.
GL: Training.
AH: Yeah.
GL: Oh yes. Well, most of that was well in London of course we were just avoiding the [pause] the V-1s. That was more or less Reception Centre but Bridlington was where we did the training. Where we, this was where we had to jump into the sea and swim to the dinghy. And you were, I think the expression was LMF. Lack of moral fibre if you refused to jump. But we had assault courses and things like that and of course we used to go into was it the, one of the big concert halls there to do the Morse training. And we had to pass out at eighteen words a minute. And at the radio school which was at Madley I remember there. This was when we first got into aircraft, you know. Until then I’d never seen an aircraft. And we, I know that several of us went to work at Hartleys Jam Factory which was quite nearby. We used to get paid for that. But I digress. The actual flying and learning the Morse code I I didn’t really have any great difficulty with. At the, as I say we passed out at eighteen words a minute and I still look back and if I’d go on short wave I’d try to take any Morse messages but some of them were very fast. But I remember we [pause] I got to know a chap who lived in Essex and he was a married man. One of the older ones. And he, I sort of, I looked I looked up to him because he’d been around and he was an older man and anyway sort of looked after the younger ones. But there were some who found out that when they went up flying they suffered from air sickness. That was another thing. Just unfortunate. They just couldn’t cope with it so they had to find a ground job then. But the, I was just trying to think of the [pause] from the Isle of Man when we were in Jurby we were on Ansons then and the wing commander he he lived in [pause] near Grimsby actually. And anyway I had a talk to him and I managed to get a flight. A flight back from Jurby to — we landed at Binbrook in this Anson and I got home from there. He went to his home and we had a weekend at home. I know my parents couldn’t believe it. But yeah there were perks like that in flying but I think, you know the sheer joy of being up there. I know that it wasn’t, it wasn’t so pleasant you know, having seen all these films. You know when you were on the air raids on Germany and the cities etcetera with all the flak coming up and anti-aircraft and the fighters attacking you it wasn’t a piece of cake at all, you know. They really went through it. I admire the — I look up to them. They were always my heroes really. I mean people like Alec whom you’ve met, you know. I mean he, he was flying a Spitfire with no armament at all. Just took photographs. But I mean people like that I’ve always looked up to. And in a way I suppose I thought well why wasn’t I one of them? You know. A sort of feeling of not inferiority but disappointment in the fact that I never made it there. But I know there were several of my own age who were, who were in the same position. You know they, because I have met them and they say, oh yeah, they felt the same way. It was just one of those things. So, so the next war I shall probably volunteer as a tail gunner to start with if there is such a thing. Of course times will have changed. They’ll all be jets now. And I mean this is one of the joys the reunions. I was an associate member of 9 Squadron because I’d met someone in Lincolnshire Life who came. We used to sell books. Aircraft books. That’s how I got an interest in it as well and he was a rear gunner and he put me on to the Aircrew Association in the first instance. And in fact he was a local man. I used to see him at Tesco. He’s gone now unfortunately. And this is it with, well they’re not all old aircrew at Aircrew Association. There are some younger ones that came in after the war of course. You know, the jet men. A different school. But we used to meet up at these 9 Squadron reunions. The older ones and the younger ones. It was interesting you know to have talks with the young jet men, you know. To see how different it was. But I’m just trying to think of anything else of interest which [pause] No. Better switch off now. I’ll have to have a think.
[recording paused]
AH: What was it like coming to London from Lincolnshire?
GL: It was quite different. I’d never been to London before and to be uprooted from the wilds of Lincolnshire to the big city was quite something and I remember going down on the train. And there were several servicemen there and I remember one saying to me, ‘Why aren’t you in the forces?’ I said, ‘I’m on the way to join.’ ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘Good for you mate.’ And I said I would join the RAF. And but approaching the city you could see all the ruined houses and everything there. I thought they’ve really, they’ve really had it pretty hard. And it was, it was so different. I mean in Lincolnshire we’d had the odd, the odd raid and I remember a Heinkel 111 shot down near the steel works and we went to see it as boys do. But in London the — everything was so different. And when we got out of the train the first thing I heard was an explosion. I thought well that’s the first one. And we had to, we had to be on every so often we’d be on duty to warn people of a coming raid or an approaching doodlebug. We used to have to go up on the roof. We were on St Johns Wood and we’d taken over a lot of the luxury flats and anyway if we saw a doodlebug coming we’d got a whistle with us and we used to go in. We were in pairs and anyway as soon as the engines stopped that’s when of course that’s when it went down. So we blew the whistle and run like mad to try to get down in the basement and all the others were there by then. But we used to march and we used to wear steel helmets when we went from place to place. Once we, we went to the zoo. We used to go to the zoo and I remember we, if we night watching, if we were watching the, we’d sleep on tables and the reason for that was when you got down you put your foot down you could hear the crunch of the beetles you know. Oh they were awful. There were so many of them there. And apart from that I mean we had raids pretty well every night. And we got used to the idea but we knew that you know eventually we’d have to move and this is why we went out to Torquay. But life in London was so much different. Rural Lincolnshire we, I suppose we were spoiled up here. We don’t, we don’t see a lot of it. we used to see the odd doodlebug. They used to launch them from planes apparently from the North Sea. But we never actually had any in Lincolnshire at all. As I say the, Hull used to get most of the bombing. We could tell. If we saw a red glow in the sky, ‘Hull’s getting it tonight.’ But considering we had two steelworks in Scunthorpe I’m surprised we didn’t get more raids really. My father was a warden, sector leader, and he used to come and see us you know in the shelter from time to time there. We had great fun building those. The old Anderson shelter with grass sods all over it and a stirrup pump if it got flooded and so cold we had these oil heaters. But we spent quite a bit of time in the shelters. And you could, there were Morrison shelters as well which were in the house. They were reinforced tables. Quite strong actually. Which I suppose were better than going out into a cold damp Anderson shelter. But it all seems such a long time ago now and you just wonder when the next one will be. I mean they’re talking World War Three with the Russians and all the rest of it, but it would be people like you and the grandchildren who are around. We shan’t be around that much longer. Well, I’m optimistic. I mean I hope to reach ninety one. We shall see. But yes I would, I tend to I say to my grandsons, you know ‘Whatever you do if the time comes, if you have to join up, join the RAF,’ I said, ‘It’s the only one.’ The Brylcreem boys as they used to call them. I know we did get a few comments about that. But it was a good life. I really was fortunate. I had about four years and I enjoyed my time which is more than a lot of people who’d been in the RAF. I mean they had a pretty tough time a lot of them. Some never came back. But I was very grateful for the fact that I, you know had served my country to some extent. Little though it was. But it was an enjoyable time and a good experience. And it broadens your mind certainly because you meet up with people from all walks of life and they all have different views etcetera. And I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. Anything else you want to ask? No?
AH: What do you think about the way Bomber Command was treated after the war?
GL: Well, that was pretty awful I think. I mean Bomber Harris he took a lot of the brunt. I mean, partly because of Dresden. But they were only doing really what they had to do. They said they were, they were bombing civilians rather than bombing targets but I mean what happened in London or Birmingham or Hull? They weren’t just bombing targets. They were just indiscriminate. And I don’t really see why they was so much criticism of them. I mean after all they, they joined the air force. They joined Bomber Command to to go, take part in raids over Germany or wherever. Italy. And they, I know that the bomb aimer was the person responsible for dropping the bombs but I’m sure they didn’t have any, any feelings about what they were doing or what was happening down below. They had a job to do and it was, ‘Left. Left. Steady. Right a bit. Bombs gone.’ And that was it. They were just doing their job and I don’t really see how, how they can criticise. I know that they made a lot of Fighter Command. You know. Saving the country which, yeah but Bomber Command they certainly did their part and Bomber Harris was was respected by all the people who were in Bomber Command. Although he was heavily criticised afterwards but you’ll always find this. There will always be someone to criticise when its all happened. You know. Especially if they weren’t there and they don’t know what it was like. I mean it must be terrible when when you read of say ten thousand people killed in a raid on Dresden. Innocent people. You know, women, children. But that was war. And they were doing just the same to us and I see, I feel very strongly that there should be no criticism. What’s war is war and you do what you’re told to do and this is what they did. So [pause]
AH: What was your friend Bish’s name? Your friend Bish. What was his name?
GL: It was John Bartlett. Yes. We all called him Bish. He was always known as Bish but the poor devil he got the doolally tap I think they called it. Which was Morse Madness. But he was a great friend and as I say very quiet. Being a southerner I think you know we got on very well. He was rather reserved but he’d have a drink or two and he’d just be a changed character. He’d come back and he’d throw people out of their beds, you know. Tip the bed over. Things like that. I couldn’t believe the things he got up to but he got away with it because he’d got this smile and [pause] strange really. But it got to him in the end. You know. The Morse madness and it was so sad that he lived through the war and then just died like that. In such a way. But it did happen to quite a few people apparently. It didn’t affect me at all but I know some were badly affected. And one of these days I’m going to buy myself a Morse key and see if I haven’t lost the touch. No. I know that Jock he he was being a Scotsman he admitted to me once, he said, ‘I can get, I get a bit aggressive when I’ve had a drink or two.’ You know. Och aye tha noo and all that. And we did have one or two skirmishes I remember in London but he said, he apologised afterwards, you know. He said, oh he said, ‘We’re buddies,’ he said, ‘Don’t mind me. This is me. That’s how I am.’ Anyway, he’s now happily married with four, four sons. He’s way ahead of me. And he married the girl he was, he wasn’t a Catholic then but he took conversion lessons to be a Catholic and that’s what he wanted. We used to pull his leg about it of course as you do. When you’re out with the lads. Because I’d met this Irish girl and I said it’s love at first sight. Red hair and blue eyes. A beautiful girl and well I put in the book there you know we went on the balcony of this hotel we were in and I went to kiss her and would you believe it I asked her permission? You know. Would you find this these days? It’s straight in you know. But I was so naïve with, with girls particularly and it was so [pause] Anyway she put me at my ease and we had a kiss and that was it. But we did we did keep in touch. But she married her boyfriend. One she’d known from the Catholic from early days. Are you recording this as well? Oh dear. [laughs] I wonder if I’ve said anything I shouldn’t have said. Anyway, I haven’t sworn. But do you find this of interest really? Is this all going in the permanent thing at Lincoln? Is it? So who will listen to this then I wonder.
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 Geoffrey Lenthall
Creator
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Anna Hoyles
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-04-01
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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ALenthallG160401
Conforms To
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Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Pending OH summary
Format
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01:19:10 audio recording
Language
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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
Description
An account of the resource
Geoffrey Lenthall was born in Nottinghamshire but spent most of his youth in Scunthorpe. He happily volunteered for aircrew but found himself working as ground personnel. He eventually trained as a wireless operator and was posted to 9 Squadron. He had a friend who suffered eventually from 'Morse madness' which led ultimately to a mental institution and an early death. After the war Geoffrey returned to banking and then to the fish markets and finally to the Lincolnshire Life magazine.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Julie Williams
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--London
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-07
9 Squadron
aircrew
demobilisation
Dominie
entertainment
ground personnel
military discipline
military service conditions
Proctor
RAF Madley
training
V-1
V-weapon
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/177/11356/LBattyPH220759v1.2.pdf
14a45ff205dd3cf87ee5b5b106fa8586
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
Batty, Philip
Phil Batty
P Batty
Description
An account of the resource
19 Items. The collection consists of one oral history interview with Philip Batty (b. 1925). He discusses the death of his older brother Dennis early in the Second World War, his wartime service with 50 Squadron at RAF Sturgate as a wireless operator/ air gunner, and his long post war career. The collection also includes a number of group photographs of airmen after training, photographs of aircraft in southern Africa, his log book and propaganda material.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-10-14
Identifier
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Batty, P
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
Philip Batty's flying log book for navigators, air bombers, air gunners and flight engineers
Description
An account of the resource
Flying log book for navigator’s, air bomber’s, air gunner’s, flight engineer’s for Philip Batty, wireless operator, covering the period from 7 February 1944 to 31 October 1949. Detailing his flying training, post war flying and instructor duties. He was stationed at RAF Madley, RAF Staverton, RAF Dumfries, RAF Husbands Bosworth, RAF Winthorpe, RAF Sturgate, RAF Linton, RAF Weathersfield, RAF Tarrant Rushton, RAF Silverstone, RAF Heany and RAF Thornhill. Aircraft flown in were, Dominie, Anson, Proctor, Wellington, Lancaster, Halifax and C-47. He flew 4 Dodge operations to Pomigliano and Bari with 50 squadron. He also carried out paratrooper, supply drops and glider towing with 297 squadron.
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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LBattyPH220759v1
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.
Great Britain
Italy
Zimbabwe
England--Essex
England--Gloucestershire
England--Herefordshire
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Northamptonshire
England--Nottinghamshire
England--Yorkshire
Italy--Bari
Italy--Pomigliano d'Arco
Scotland--Dumfries
Zimbabwe--Bulawayo
Zimbabwe--Gweru
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
1946
1947
1948
1949
1945-08-21
1945-08-25
1945-09-07
1945-09-10
1945-09-13
1945-09-15
1945-10-02
1945-10-04
1945-10-08
1945-10-10
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
1661 HCU
1665 HCU
297 Squadron
50 Squadron
85 OTU
97 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
C-47
Dominie
Flying Training School
Halifax
Halifax Mk 5
Halifax Mk 7
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Dumfries
RAF Husbands Bosworth
RAF Linton on Ouse
RAF Madley
RAF Silverstone
RAF Staverton
RAF Sturgate
RAF Tarrant Rushton
RAF Weathersfield
RAF Winthorpe
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/177/11367/MBattyPH220759-161014-15.1.jpg
4a0f8f07534df25152bf8301d9d09ac4
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
Batty, Philip
Phil Batty
P Batty
Description
An account of the resource
19 Items. The collection consists of one oral history interview with Philip Batty (b. 1925). He discusses the death of his older brother Dennis early in the Second World War, his wartime service with 50 Squadron at RAF Sturgate as a wireless operator/ air gunner, and his long post war career. The collection also includes a number of group photographs of airmen after training, photographs of aircraft in southern Africa, his log book and propaganda material.
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
2016-10-14
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Batty, P
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
A summary of Philip Batty's flying hours by aircraft type
Description
An account of the resource
Sixteen aircraft listed (Domine, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Lancaster, Lincoln, B-29, Halifax, C-47, Neptune, Shackleton, Hastings, Varsity, Argosy, Victor, Vulcan) for a total of approximately 11,000 flying hours.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One typewritten note
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MBattyPH270759-161014-15
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
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
Anson
B-29
C-47
Dominie
Halifax
Lancaster
Lincoln
Proctor
Shackleton
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1056/11435/AOwenA150603.2.mp3
c12ac4f6e9a9a8007ac138b17d654e1f
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
Owen, Taff
Aneurin Owen
A Owen
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Aneurin 'Taff' Owen (Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator / air gunner with 12 and 153 Squadrons.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-06-03
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Owen, A
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
DK: Right, so, this interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is David Kavanagh, myself. The interviewee is Mr Owen. The interview is taking place at his home on the 3rd of June 2015. So, if you’d like to just describe your early life.
AO: Yes, well, my very early life started, of course, in Wales, as you might imagine with a name like Aneurin Owen.
DK: I was going to say. [slight laugh]
AO: And, um, it was near Dolgellau near a little village called Penmaenpool, that was our nearest point, near the farm. I was a farmer’s son and we farmed there in them days. And I can recall going to, walking about three miles to school, each way that was in those days with — in all weathers, but the thing was then, most children did in that part of the world in them days. Also, um, I was very lucky, I always thought, in them days. I had a wonderful teacher, er, a primary school teacher. We used to get to school wet through sometimes and she used to slip all our clothes off and get them dried for us with one of these old fashioned stoves, you know, the old tortoise stoves we called them and, er, she was brilliant with our — with us, certainly with me, and some of the other farm children. But I suppose looking back as well in that time — I left there about ten years of age or nine years of age, nine and a half — and, um, just before a year or two before I left, I came across my very first sight of an aeroplane which was flown in the very early days. I don’t know whose it was but he used to travel from Dolgellau to Barmouth on the Mawddach estuary to — all along the river there, and he used to look down from the cockpit, an aircraft flying with, along there, with an open cockpit. I assume it was a Percival Gull type of aircraft, something like that but I don’t know, of course, now what it was. I don’t know, even know, who it belonged to. But that, er, was my very first experience of seeing an aeroplane close too, I suppose. The very first one. Then we left there after Depression, the Great Depression, 1929 and ‘30, early 30s. I came to this farm in about 1934, nine years of age, took a farm in Husbands Bosworth and, er, we started dairy farming from there, from then onwards, because obviously dairy farming was an important event after the Milk Marketing Board just came into being in those days and gave us a monthly income. But, er, one of the jobs I had to do before going to school, of course, here, going to, to the school at Lutterworth, was to milk two cows in the morning and two when I got home from school, and most of the time it was my own [slight laugh] but, er, it wasn’t a very pleasant job, actually, to do either before going to school, I found, because it was a dirty job. The cows were dirty and you had a job to get yourself cleaned up again in time for catching the school bus you got in those days. But, er, it was a job I didn’t care much for, like, because me and my father didn’t get on terribly well, er, in those days. Well, er, one, if you didn’t do your job properly then you got a thick ear for it [slight laugh], for not been doing what you were told. But going back to the flying, the first aircraft I saw, of all things, I saw in about 1936 here, flying up above the valley was an autogyro. That was the first time I ever saw one and I think he was on his trials run. I think it about 1936, no later than 1937 anyway, and he used to come along the valley from Market Harborough to Rugby and then follow the line but the autogyro — I can’t remember now who designed it. It was wing commander somebody, wasn’t it? I can’t think who it was exactly but going from — and then, that period as well, what really fascinated me was being able to see Amy Johnson. She used to come with the, with the, their flying circus team to do, well, flying demonstrations and flying trips for people, I think, which were about ten shillings a time, something like that but it doesn’t sound much money today but it was lots of money in those days. And I used to go an watch them at an airfield just near Husbands Bosworth and, er, I’m trying to think, Alan —.
DK: Cobham.
AO: Cobham. It was his flying circus. It became an annual event, and of course one of the people who came was Amy Johnson with him.
DK: Oh right.
AO: And, er, I got to see them flying their aircraft. I assume he used to do these events for financial reasons, to help them go on their world tours, they used to do probably as well. To get enough money for that. But it fascinated me to watch these aircraft taking off and I thought that’s the life for me, sort of thing, at the end of the day but that was only around about 1936. Yeah, 1936 the Tomahawk, would have been and then onwards, as I say, I didn’t get on terribly well with my father. My father was a strict parent I suppose, er, in lots of ways and, um, so I decided, I thought well I won’t stick it with farming, I’m going to do something else in life. And of course the Air Force, at that time, wasn’t in my mind as such but I wanted to do something different to farming so I thought I’d go — I was friendly with a guy named George Briggs from Bradford, who were wool merchants, and I decided to go there as an apprentice in the wool trade but, of course, by 1938, ’39 time, you could see the war clouds are looming and the expansion of the military forces as well, so things looked a bit different altogether at that time, and anyway, by 1940, my father died all of a sudden in — he had a heart attack and he was only thirty-seven years of age. But I’d still made my mind up, I wasn’t going to stick to farming but I think that was probably a mistake in some ways, as far as my mother was concerned, but, er, I made my mind up and that was it, and once I was old enough, I volunteered for the Air Force, you know. That’s what — and then by the time I was about seventeen and a half [cough], excuse me, er, I volunteered for — well, I was in a reserved occupation, of course, being in the farming side, so I could only go into air crew or submarines. But, er, submarines I didn’t fancy, didn’t — I wasn’t any good at swimming anyway [slight laugh].
DK: Yes. I can understand. [slight laugh]
AO: But at the back of my mind, I just wanted to go — flying was in my mind, you know, as far as that goes, so off I went to — I was supposed to volunteer. It was on a Sunday and I went to Leicester, I think it was to start with, and found the recruiting office was closed but I’d cycled to Leicester from here but there was a notice there saying the Hinckley office would be open, so I cycled to Hinckley and volunteered from there and, in the meantime, I also joined the Air Cadets in Lutterworth, yeah, Lutterworth branch that was, and we were able to go from there to, um, to an ITW to fly in a Tiger Moth on one or two occasions. That was at Desford, that was, which is a ITW, Initial Training Wing for — at that time and, within a short period of time anyway, I got my call-up papers come through and I had to go to Cardington for an interview there and do medical tests and so forth, to see if I was suitable for air crew and I passed that alright but unfortunately they found out I was under age. I was only, I was about seventeen and three quarters.
DK: Did you have to be eighteen then?
AO: Yes. I had to be 18, yep, so I came — they sent me back home from there until I was eighteen in November. And, anyway, I had Christmas at home that year, 1942 that was, and they called me up in, um, [inaudible] my papers came before Christmas, to report to Air Crew Receiving Centre in London, at St Johns Wood, of course, Regents Park, so that’s where I went to have further tests, be kitted out there, and also to have more exams and medicals there and, unfortunately, they found out that I had a lazy eye, so that restricted me to some parts of the air crew section, so that’s why I went out a wireless operator in the end. WOPAG they called them as well. And from there, of course, I can’t remember how long exactly, three or four weeks there, I suppose, by the time I was kitted out and initial square bashing you might describe it, and discipline, and Air Force law and that sort of thing. And we went on to, um, Bridgnorth, into ITW, Initial Training Wing, where we did quite a lot of square bashing in there and also Morse code and, er, radio equipment, basic equipment that was really. The Morse code was the most important thing there because you had get to, to be assessed at eight words a minute to pass there fairly quickly and then, er from then we had to do eighteen words a minute, but you only got one chance. If you failed you were out, sort of thing, you know, so that was it. You didn’t get a second chance. I don’t remember many having a second chance anyway at all. About three months there, it was altogether, in early 1943 and, er, we moved then to, to the Radio School in Yatesbury in Wiltshire. I think it was Number 2 Radio School, yeah, Number 2 Radio School, I think it was. That was quite a big unit that was there and, of course, we had to learn all the theory of radio and everything else there and also continue, of course, with our Morse code and, er, coding system, plus the procedure of Morse code as well, which was important of course. And then we had quite a long time there at Yatesbury, unfortunately, because the, um, this course was about a year-long altogether, after the theory part and then the practical part of it. We did a bit of flying then, eventually in Dominie aircraft bi-planes. That was our first part of flying in there and then we continued then as we progressed further, we went on to Proctors. And they had three different airfields there at Yatesbury. They had the main one for the Dominies on the main airfield, then another one which was called Town End, the Proctors used to fly from there, and then another one on occasion we had to go, which was miles away, was at Alton Barnes in the, in the Wolds, in the Downs, the Wiltshire Downs. Three airfields operated from there, actually, altogether and we used to be able to take a cook with us to Alton Barnes, because the local crowd [inaudible] there. We took a cook from the cookhouse with some meat and potatoes and they used to cook it for us, you know, in there, out in the open field with all mud [inaudible] early type of bake house, sort of thing, they had in there. And then after I finished, after Radio School — unfortunately, I did catch chicken pox in there and that set me back quite a bit. I was about nineteen, I suppose, eighteen or nineteen there. Again it was ‘43, late ‘43, that was, and I caught chicken pox and that put me on the sick list for quite a few weeks, you know. I’d be in the isolation hospital for a while as well so that when I came back from leave after sickness, sick leave, I had to go back and do another the course. Because I’d missed so much when I was sick, so I had to go back on another course then. But eventually I travelled from there to, of all things, from Calne in Wiltshire up to Scotland, at West Freugh, which is near Stranraer, which is an initial flying unit and gunnery school as well there. I was still doing gunnery, of course, at that stage, as well, in those days.
DK: Was the idea then, as a wireless operator, you were also an air gunner?
AO: Yes, there was, yeah. WOPAG, yes. Although there was a signaller’s course, but I think they did drop the air gunnery bit eventually but we were still doing it then, air gunnery course, yep. Yes, um, we travelled from Calne. I always remember that journey really well because, well, I’ll go back and tell you one thing I should have mentioned to you in London. I got fed up in London because of the air raids, I had to go in the shelter every night I was there so I was glad to see the back of that and, of all things, when I left Yatesbury, er, we caught the train in Calne and there was a carriage of us, of, of us, travelling up to Scotland. I can’t remember the number, actually, but the carriage was pretty full anyway and, er, we got as far as Bristol and got caught in an air raid there, so got stuck there for two or three hours in the, in an air raid. And so, we eventually moved to the next stop was Crewe where we had refreshments and then carried on to Carlisle, further refreshments there, then on to Stranraer where they picked us up. We didn’t get there until about twenty-seven hours later, it was, the journey took us altogether. And, er, we were rather late getting back into camp, to West Freugh, and there was police there. There was transport for us there that picked us up at the station. Then from West Freugh, I suppose — I’m trying the think how long we were there for, er, about two months I suppose it’d be, roughly, there, yeah. And I finished the — I think I did more gunnery there, probably, than anything else. We did do quite a bit of wireless work, flying out over the Atlantic, over Northern Ireland on the radio, in the Ansons there. And, er, one situation was, we had an engine failure with, with no land in sight anywhere so we had to go back to the nearest airfield there was and it happened to be Tiree. We was, we was stuck there for about five days whilst they flew another engine out that had gone US with us, you know. And, er, then after then we finished there and I went to my first OTU, on to Wellingtons at Peplow, in Shropshire. That would be around about 1945, August, early August in ‘44 that would have been. Yeah, we were in Peplow for — we started training then, more or less, straight away in Peplow and, um, unfortunately I’d been there a week or two and my sister got killed in an accident, you know, so I had some leave at that time to come home for a few days and then I returned to Peplow, but not long afterwards — let’s see — the airfield was rather, one of the boggiest sort of places, very — and it wasn’t very suitable for the aircraft or they didn’t seem to be and they decided to close it down and they moved us to, well, to various OTUs all over the place and ours was the one to, our group went to, er, Lichfield, which was 27 OTU, that was. And as a matter of fact, that was a very good base to get to because they were mostly Canadians and Australians there and, of course, the food was a lot better than what we’d been used to. Obviously they were getting a lot more imported food from somewhere, anyway, for them particularly, the Canadians there. And it was a very good base to work, and my flight commander was an Australian as well, Squadron Leader McIntyre. I’ll always remember him. And that’s where we finished our OTU with him. Not long after being in Lichfield, I was having problems, or we were having a bit of problem with the navigator a little bit, because my fixes and bearings that I was getting on the radio weren’t, tying, tying up completely with the position the navigator was getting on his, on his Gee chart and I thought it must be me. I kept double checking everything I was doing and couldn’t find what I was going, doing wrong but, anyway, one morning coming back after a training flight — quite a long flight it was, about 4.30 in the morning we got back — and, er, the navigation officer was waiting outside the aircraft for us and he said, ‘I want you all in my office.’ he said, ‘Before you have your breakfast.’ And, er, he said to the navigator, he said to go through his chart again, with his fixes and that, and what he was getting on this Gee, Gee reading. You had to get two readings and you got different coloured lines [inaudible] on the Gee chart and he was going along each one with a pencil and then coming back again, taking quite some considerable time really, whereas he should, should be able to do it a few seconds but he was taking quite a long time doing it. He said, ‘What are you doing that for?’ He said, ‘I can’t see the different coloured lines.’ And that was the answer to his problem, you see.
DK: I’m assuming he was colour blind or —
AO: He was colour blind, yep. Yeah, he was colour blind, yeah, and —
DK: I mean it should have been identified earlier, in his medicals?
AO: Yeah. In fact they checked his records, the, the, er, navigation leader checked his records and, of all things, it was recorded in his medicals and he was only to be trained as a navigator but, of course, when he, when he joined up it didn’t matter. I suppose that he was colour blind but, of course, when Gee came out, it did and he just couldn’t tell the difference. The reds and greens, I think he was confused completely you know.
DK: Yes. Colour blind is reds and greens.
AO: And he just could not — and that’s why it was taking such long a long time then, of course, to get his fixes. By, by the time he got his fix sorted out, we’d travelled probably another ten or twelve miles or more, yeah. So we had another, er, a spare navigator then. He, he had come from Pep— yeah, from Peplow with us actually, he had been, and he was the sole survivor of a mid-air crash in Wellingtons. He was a fly— flying officer and he was a very, very — well, probably one of the best navigators I ever flew with. He was a very good navigator. He was a maths teacher, I think, before the war and, er, Flying Officer Junior, Jock Junior his name was, and he only flew a few trips but his nerves broke down again with him on, er, one very bad night, we had on a cross country trip and it was very wet, gale force winds were blowing, and we had a bit of trouble really getting back to base because we were facing a head wind of over a hundred miles an hour, sort of thing, in this gale, you know, at that height and unfortunately he cracked up completely after that. So, so we had to get another navigator then, that was our third one, to start all over again and this — we’d already been in OTU, how long now? I’m trying to think back now, probably, er, six weeks probably, another month or two, yeah, we’d been in OTU nearly three months at that stage. We should have been finishing it nearly. We got an Australian navigator then and that seemed fine but, of course, had to go through the whole course again with the navigator and, er, it was the end of the year or early January before we finished our OUT, then, at Huddersfield. Early January ‘45 that would have been. And we went from there then, at that period, into a Conversion Unit, Heavy Conversion Unit. He wants the name there.
DK: OK. OK.
AO: Heavy Conversion Unit at Lindholme, onto Lancasters, and that was a different aircraft altogether, you know, a different world completely from the Wellington. I wasn’t all that keen on the Wellington because we’d had so many problems and so many losses at OTU, [inaudible] the casualty rate was horrendous sometimes.
DK: Was that your first close-up of a Lancaster then, was it?
AO: Yeah, in Lindholme, yes it was.
DK: What was your first impressions when you saw it?
AO: Yes because it was a very big aircraft too. Your first impression as you walk up to it, you know, a massive thing. And the first flight or two I had — it was a different thing altogether. It was a beautiful aircraft to fly in, comfortable and —
DK: Did you feel more confident?
AO: Oh, far more confident. A lot more, yes. The Wellington had been, been troublesome. We’d had lots of problems with them, you know, maintenance-wise, where probably the aircraft were worn out, most of them, as well but there was a lot of problems with them. And as soon as you got in a Lancaster — I remember one of the first flights I had to do very early on, was with another pilot who was taking another trainee pilot with him. For some reason they got me as a wireless operator because he couldn’t fly multi-engine aircraft. They had a wireless operator, of course, in them days. That was one of the [inaudible] you had to be, so they got me out of the office somehow and I went off with them on this flight and I always remember the, the feathering engines in turn for practicing and it was still a stable aircraft, you know, altogether and they feathered, I think it was, it was three engines eventually, and then the very first one that they started, failed to start so they had to get the other two started quickly —
DK: At one point you were flying on one engine?
AO: On one engine, yes. But it was still, it was still manageable that was, that aircraft, yes. You would, er, you would probably have travelled, according to the instructor, quite a distance but losing height gradually, it would have gone quite a long way on the one engine. But, anyway, they got the other two engines going and we made a landing on three engines with no problem at all. And I heard them saying that the balance was — wasn’t a lot different to the full engines from losing one engine there on the one side and, possibly, if you lost both, both engines on one side I think it wouldn’t, I think the aircraft would still be manageable but you’d trim it, you know, to being able to fly it reasonably straight and level, yeah, but it was such a big improvement, you know, from the Wellington. It was a very big step, it was. And then, eventually, from Lindholme, we went then to — how long were we there, at Lindholme? I’m trying to think now, um, probably about a month or so I should think, at Lindholme. Yeah, it might have been longer, might have been six weeks, I should think, there at Lindholme altogether, because it was January, or late January, when we got there to start the training. And then at that stage, of course, there seemed to be a lot of air crew coming through the training system at that stage as well. There was a lot of us about and, er, I suppose they were looking for a base to send us to and they sent us to Sturgate for a short period, and it was a holding unit for air, for air crew. We were there only a few days. It didn’t seem many days before we were posted to Scampton, to 153 Squadron. But we settled in there very, very quickly, there was no — well, going from Lancaster to Lancaster, there was no problem. It was a good base, Scampton. Well it was one of the pre-war bases. A good building, good accommodation there, the food was excellent as well there and we were well looked after. And we had a Canadian wing commander, squadron commander there, er, Wing Commander Powley and, er, he met us, introduced himself to us as soon as we got there. But a lot of new crews came in, in March that — and I think it was the worst, probably the worst period in the history of the squadron, March and early April. We lost, in March alone, we lost seven Lancasters and the crews and there were two more Lancasters that were struck off charge. They were so badly damaged they weren’t worth repairing. As a matter of fact, my, a friend of mine, a Flight Lieutenant Wheeler (he was a pilot), I remember him saying — I think it was about that period when he had a third, very bad mishap. He was shot at by night fighters and I think the third one, I think he had to leave it. He had to make a forced landing back of the lines in Belgium and got back about three days later. And I remember, what was his name? Flight, Flight Lieutenant Baxter, the engineering officer, er, going out the mess one morning and having breakfast where Wheeler was, and his crew members with him, or two or three of them were, having breakfast there and he tapped, and Baxter tapped him on the shoulder just as he was going out and said, ‘Wheeler, if you’re going to carry on like this I’m going to start charging you.’ He said. [laugh] I always remember that bit. And then, of course, our very, our first raid — well, I’ll go back to where we were losing these aircraft and Powley then decided to put his name down on the next battle order and, er, I think he felt morale probably getting — people were getting a bit jumpy, all these losses in, in one month. And, unfortunately for Powley, he took John Gees crew and he was shot down, well, a few days later. Early April that was, in, er, on a mining trip. And on another aircraft, Flight Lieutenant Winder was with him, a deputy flight commander. He — they were both lost. Two out of five aircraft went and two were lost and he was one of them and then, a few days later, we, er, I went on a Kiel raid then, that was our first trip out that was on —
DK: That, that was your first operation?
AO: Our very first trip, yep.
DK: How, how did you feel before that as your first operation? Can you remember your sort of feelings of —
AO: Yes, I was just feeling anxious to get on with the job as much as anything, get the war over with, sort of thing because we could see the war was coming to an end, at that stage, and we’d just started as well having, er, lectures on survival. And the Tiger Force were planning to go out there, to the Far East, of course, at that time. It would have been just about that period it would have been, early April time, I suppose when we —
DK: So, um, Tiger Force was actually mentioned quite early on then, before the defeat of Germany?
AO: Well, before the defeat of Germany, definitely, yes it was. Yes, we were having it on — the plan was once Americans, I think if I remember rightly, it was a long time ago now, but once Okinawa was cleared, you know, of Japanese that was, sort of, one of the nearest islands we’d get to get near Japan. That was the idea of it, I think, initially. We wouldn’t have very far to travel from Okinawa.
DK: So, you were always expecting, after Germany, you’d go out to the Far East?
AO: Yeah, within a short period of time we thought, you see, yeah, within —
DK: Sorry, I’m interrupting there, but back to Kiel as your first raid and after that —
AO: Yes, after that. Yeah, the first raid, as I say, we went to Kiel and, um, I always remember that, because obviously, the first one very well and we were carrying, I think, twelve or fourteen five hundred pounders and a four thousand pounder and then it might have been four two fifties, I think it was, two fifty pounders. They were armour piercing bombs. The idea was, we were after the submarine pens ideally [cough] and then I remember the approach of it very well. We hadn’t met much ak-ak fire on the way, one or two, particularly as you turned. We turned different legs, zig zag course, of course. We didn’t go direct to Kiel but did a zig-zag course to it, of course, and we did come across ak-ak fire in one or two places we weren’t pleased with, but getting to Kiel seemed very quiet and I could see the time was, zero time was coming up for our target time, and there was no sign of the master bomber and there was nothing at all, and I could see pretty well in the dark, but there were no markers or anything going down and there was the one searchlight, a stationary searchlight, immediately in front of us. I always remember it was a master searchlight which has a bluish tinge to it and, um, I thought, ‘I don’t like the looks of that at all.’ It was directly in front of us, in our flight, and a few miles ahead and before we got to it, it went off, switched off, and blow me, immediately we got over it, it switched itself back on again and we were caught right in the middle of the beam and, of course, the other searchlights came on to us and we were caught in the beam. But at that stage we’d started our bomb run from the Kiel canal and we were going up to the submarine pens, but still no markers going down. But just at that point, as well, everything seemed to happen at once. The master, master, bomber’s voice came over to bomb the centre of the greens. We saw the markers going down and he said immediately bomb, bomb the centre of the greens, so we carried on with our, er, bombing run, got it completed and, of course, once the bombs had gone, been released, from the Lanc, I felt the four thousand bomber go because that was under my feet because I was standing on my — on the seat above me. I felt that actually go because the aircraft just went.
DK: Could you feel the aircraft go?
AO: Yeah. We had several probably, and two or three under my feet and then, um, we went to corkscrew immediately after. We didn’t have time to take a photograph of the actual — from a photoflash and, er, we corkscrewed out of that one and we dropped about two or three thousand feet and, for some reason, all the searchlights went off all of a sudden. The master searchlight went off. Whether the power plant had been hit, that’s the only thing I can think of, but why would a power plant supply all the other different searchlights as well? I don’t know why they went off but they did.
DK: You’d think there’d be a separate supply, wouldn’t you?
AO: Yeah. You’d thought so but I don’t know, never did find out. But I was just glad to get out of the master searchlight. That was the main thing because he’d locked on to us, you see, with a radar controlled searchlight. And then from, as I say, once that had gone off we gradually pulled out of the, er, pulled out of this corkscrew and gradually climbed back on to course again to fly, to fly over sort of Denmark, to the North Sea. And while pulling out, oddly enough, we were flying back over Denmark, over Kattegat, and it was just where our squadron commander was shot down a few nights before. I didn’t know that at the time, I found that out afterwards. And then we got back, you know, and no aircraft were lost, not in our squadron, anyway, that night, but there was a few, quite a few others got shot down but we all got back safely. And then, er, I eventually carried on from there to — I was going to say, on the Tiger Force but, er, we were still having these lectures, not many, just a few. I can’t even remember how many we had now but there were a few of them. And mainly if you were shot down in the jungle, what to eat, what not to eat, jungle survival, in other words. And then, on the, around the 21st the April, I’m pretty sure that was about the right date, when Lord Trenchard came to visit the base, you know, to give us a pep talk, supposedly. Well, at that period we were still doing some practice dropping of food supplies for Holland, you know, for the Manna drops. We, we were certainly doing them at that stage. We’d just about got it sorted out by then because there was some mistakes made. One of them was, a week or two before Lord Trenchard came — I’m trying to think of the guy’s name, Flight Lieutenant — oh dear, dear. He only died two or three years ago. His name will come to me in a minute. Langford, his name was. He went off to do a demonstration at an airfield to show some top brass how it was done, and he went badly wrong, unfortunately.
DK: Was that dropping food?
AO: Dropping the food supplies that was, yep. I don’t know what sort of containers he was dropping because I wasn’t there at that point, but I know it went badly wrong. I don’t know what happened but, er, he nearly dropped it all on the staff car and all the brass had to run for their lives [laugh] and get out the way. But anyway, by the time Lord Trenchard came, about 21st of April we’d got it and we gave a demonstration for him in the morning, er, and I’m trying — now I can’t remember whether we had our parade before then or after. Oh, I think it was after then, we did this demonstration for the food dropping for him, the Manna drop, when Lord Trenchard came for that bit for the day and I remember we had to put our best uniforms on, of course, you know, all these buttons and brass, badge and everything else, all of us to greet him on the parade ground and he inspected us on, on the parade ground. Late in the morning that was, and we gave a demonstration for him which went very well, on food dropping, to give him some idea how it would work. Then, after lunch that day, he, um, he give us this talk in the station cinema. He had, he had — by then there was another squadron at Scampton, 625 had arrived, only, not many days, or a week or two before. So there was two squadrons based there and we all had to pile into the station cinema and he, um, gave us this pep talk to congratulate us on the work that we’d been doing and so forth, and then he said, ‘Anybody think [inaudible] time on Tiger Force, I’m afraid you won’t be going off, not, not immediately’ he said, ‘because if the Russians don’t stop in Berlin, Bomber Command will be the first line of defence, you know, as a reserve there, so we’re holding you back into reserve for that period.’ So, I thought, ‘Blow me. That’s my Far East trip has gone to pot now then.’ That’s the first thing I thought straight away.
DK: Was there a, a genuine worry, then, that the, the Russians would have kept going west?
AO: Well, there was, there was quite a bit of talk in the mess about it which — and there was, there was a fear of it, that the Russians would not stop there. They’d keep going west. And, er, I think Patton had got that idea as well and I think he was prepared for it, General Patton. I think he was —
DK: How did that make you feel then, that there could have been a continuing war, not just the Germans but the Russians and then the Japanese?
AO: Yes, we thought the European war would never be done because I could see the Russians would have taken some beating, although at least by that stage we had a lot American fighters for protection at that stage as well, which was quite good, er, and in quite large numbers as well and also the latest Spitfires, of course, with the Griffin engines and that in them. They were a better aircraft altogether for defence and escort and that’s why I thought going to the Far East, I thought it would have been fine going to the Far East because, obviously, the defence of Japan was nothing like the Germans had and also the Americans had a very good escort, a fighter escort there. But anyway, that had to go to pot, that idea, out of our heads anyway. And we didn’t have a lot more lectures after that regarding the, the Tiger Force. It went very quiet around I remember. I don’t remember having many after because that put the tin hat on it, I suppose you might say.
DK: Obviously Tiger Force never came about because of the dropping of atomic bombs, did that make you sort of feel — how, how did that make you feel that the war wasn’t going to continue in the Far East?
AO: Well, you see, we were still hoping to go to the Far East, of course, until the atomic bomb was dropped but, er, when things settled down in Europe as it — much better than they anticipated I think, at the time, because if the Russians still kept going it would have been a huge problem obviously. But, er, of course, at that stage the, military-wise, we were pretty strong and the Americans were, of course, at that stage so that we just couldn’t see the Russians making much of an advance with the opposition that we’d got in front of them, particularly the air power as well on our side at that stage, and anyway we were still hoping to be able to go to the Far East, oh, right until probably end of, end July, early August. When was the atomic bomb? Middle of August, something like that.
DK: Early August the bomb was dropped.
AO: Once they dropped the atomic bomb and that was it. I thought, ‘That’s it, the war’s finished now.’ That’s —
DK: How did you feel at that point, relief?
AO: Yes, I suppose. I don’t know the feeling I had about that because we were quite happy, I certainly was, I was quite happy with the Air Force life. I hoped to stop in it for quite a while.
DK: How many operations did you actually do over Europe?
AO: I only did seven all together, yep.
DK: And were Manna drops —
AO: Manna drops as well, but the Manna drops, the very last one actually was on May the 8th , and if you look on, on the internet you can find out through Pathe News records there’s a Lancaster flying over St Paul’s cathedral on VE Day morning and, oddly enough, it’s got to be us going over St Paul’s because when — after briefing that morning, I remember my pilot said, ‘I’ve just had a word with the squadron commander,’ he said, ‘and I’ve asked him for permission to fly over London this morning to see if there’s any celebrations going on.’ And he said, ‘Yes, no problem at all, so long as you behave yourselves, you know.’ And, er, we flew down over London that morning, early morning, and you can find out on, on the internet these days and it’s got to be Lancaster ‘C’ Charlie from 153 Squadron. I’m pretty sure it’s that one and we were on our last journey to Holland, on our very last trip on VE Day morning, and of course the end of the war came back and I don’t remember —
DK: Just going back to the Manna drops do you remember, um, seeing the Dutch people?
AO: Oh yes, the Manna trip, very much so, yes, particularly on the — well, the first one was a race course in, um, in the Hague was the very first one, and then, yes, the last one wasn’t — and then the rear gunner said next time I’m going to take my camera and take some shots, you see, because we were flew very, very low level at that stage. You can read the time on the church clock as we went by, you know. We were low enough for that.
DK: The only reason I say that because I met, a few years ago, a Dutch lady, who was a girl at that time, and she was in awe of the RAF coming over dropping the food. She was only eight or nine at the time and she said she was reduced to eating tulip bulbs and daffodil bulbs and said, you know, seeing the planes come over and the Germans who were still there not firing on you. That was a huge relief to her.
AO: Yes. Yes, they had the ak-ak guns silenced. You can see the guns traversing round following us, you see, but they didn’t fire and, um, I saw several Germans of course, with their rifles on their shoulders, you know, bicycling about on the roads and that. I saw two or three of those about and, er, as I said, but the Dutch people there, how they didn’t get injured I’m sure. They were running on the fields, picking food sometimes, and the food was dropping round them, some of them, particularly in Rotterdam that was, more than the Hague I think, if I remember rightly, because the next three drops was at, at Rotterdam it was and the last one of the war was on VE Day morning was at, er, at the Hague, that was the racecourse at the Hague, yeah. But there was, they were waving to us, you know, and cheering like mad, the Dutch people were, and rushing on the field, on the edge of the food, picking this food up and it was still dropping from the air.
DK: It must have been a marvellous sight, seeing you come over, dropping the food?
AO: Yeah, it must have been for them to see all these aircraft coming close together, you know, and very, very low level, about two hundred feet or —
DK: What she said to me, she said that what, what really gave them confidence was looking, seeing the Germans not firing on your aircraft and knowing it would all be over soon.
AO: Yeah, but the biggest shock I had really, on looking back on that, was how much of Holland was under water, been flooded and it was dreadful, it really was. Why the Germans did that, at that stage of the war, when the war was more or less lost, and then to breach the dykes like they did. It looked to me as if half of Holland was under water, you know, but you could see vast areas of it, just farm houses, you know sticking up, and that’s where they were. Yeah.
DK: So the war’s ended now, um, how, how did your RAF career go on after that? Were you in the RAF for much longer?
AO: I stayed in till the following year. We, we were fortunate because we were — they picked several crews out. I think it was, how many? Eight or ten crews, to do field trials, or user trials, on H2S Mark 4. Yeah, we went, started on that, just about when the atom bomb was dropped there. Once the end of the war came then we were transferred under that, more or less straight away, to do that work and then the Squadron, 153 Squadron and 46 was disbanded in September, I think it was, September ’45 and I don’t know what happened to a lot of the crews but we were, the ones that had been chosen to do the field trails on H2S Mark 4, we were transferred to 12 Squadron at Binbrook.
DK: And was this your entire crew that moved over so they were all the same guys?
AO: Yeah, Ted Miles our navigator, was an Australian and —
DK: So you got yet another navigator [slight laugh]?
AO: Yeah, we had to get another navigator at that stage, yep, and Mark Bass, he went but, oddly enough, I think just before the end of war, as I understood it from [inaudible] I had been recommended for a commission, and also my navigator had as well, and he was — but, of course, the end of the war came and the Air Force more or less put everything on hold regarding, er, any promotions at that stage because, obviously, there was a lot of surplus crews about all over the place, all over the world virtually, and then the Australians and Canadians, the bulk of those would be going home. Well, Mark, my navigator, he went to, to pick his commission up. His was, er, carried through. He had to go to London, I suppose, to the, to the Australian — what do you call the —
DK: The embassy?
AO: Well, yeah. Not the embassy, you called them. Well, I’m trying to think what they called them in them days, but anyway, he picked up his, um, commission up and he, he didn’t come back to squadron again. He, you know, more or less went straight back to Australia on the next boat home I think, so he didn’t stay here long at all. So, unfortunately, we didn’t see him to — see him before he went, you know. We assumed he was coming back from London but that wasn’t the case, unfortunately, and then we had another navigator, of course, from then onwards, and another spare one, because all, as I say, nearly all the Canadians and Australians went back. But our signals leader, who I was very friendly with, was a New Zealander but he stayed on to the end, until the squadron disbanded. But what happened to him after that I don’t know because we went off to Binbrook and he went in another direction somewhere and, er, we stayed there at Binbrook then until ’46 before the trials had finished, all these H2S trials.
DK: Where were the trials done then? The H2S Mark 4 trials?
AO: Yeah this was, this — we finished the trials. Most of them were — well, we went all over the country doing the trials, all over the place, in all weather conditions as well. Also taking a lot of photographs of the screen itself to record the various towns and cities all over the country as well.
DK: Just in the UK?
AO: Mostly in the UK, yeah. And, er, when that was finished some — I came out then. I was under, under Class B, because they wanted me back home, unfortunately. Class B was a reserved occupational status again. I should have came back and agriculture came back very early compared with some of the other crew and they stayed on. They were on Lincolns then, flew on Lincolns.
DK: How did you feel about leaving the RAF at that point?
AO: I wasn’t very happy, no. No, well, I was quite happy where I was. I was doing a flying job there, which I thoroughly enjoyed, flying quite often, not every day but quite very often anyway and I was quite happy to stay in the Air Force and, er, I was considering a life probably in the Air Force but anyway they wanted me back home again. Let’s see, my father had died 1940, then my sister in ‘44 and I think it left my mother in a rather tight hole, so there was nothing for it but for me to come back home farming and I then stuck to farming the rest of my life.
DK: So how old were you by the time the war had finished then?
AO: I’d be twenty-one in, um, in end of, end of November ‘45.
DK: Not even twenty-one? [slight laugh]
AO: [slight laugh] Yes, yes.
DK: So, from then onwards was, has your life been on the farm?
AO: Yes, mostly I’ve been on the farm since then, yep, but same farm. I came to this house here, I came here in 1957 I came here, so I’ve been here ever since.
DK: Have you, have you remained in touch with your crew at all or —
AO: Yes. I keep touch. As I say, my navigator died about four or five years ago but I was constantly in touch and went to visit him in Australia as well. And my pilot is still alive. He lives in Majorca at the moment, but unfortunately the poor chap’s got Parkinson’s disease and he’s very, very deaf as well, probably due to the Lancaster engine noise, probably. I don’t know. And the other, the rear gunner, I was in touch with him. I picked — I lost contact with him altogether. He was in the farming world and I picked him up about — not far from Duxford, he lived in the end of the days but his life was a bit of a tragedy. He’d been adopted and his life was messed up completely and going from one place to another and had a lot of problems with family life and he died a few years ago. I did go and visit him a year or two before he died. And then the rest of the crew I haven’t been touch at all with them. I say, I knew, once, the bomb aimer, Norman Kirkman. He was a professional footballer before the war. I think Preston or Burnley, one or the other. Preston I think it was, and he came to, er, visit on a weekend in Leeds with my old pilot. But me and the pilot, old pilot and navigator, were the only ones in touch all the time, constantly in touch, while we could and were healthy enough to travel about. And Bill Edmonds came from Australia each year for several years to the reunion in Lincoln.
DK: Do you still attend the union— reunions, the reunions for your squadron, do you still attend those?
AO: Yes. We used to travel — when they first had them at the war. They started the reunions more or less after the end of the war and I missed the out first ones few to start with and they used to travel about to different parts of the country each year, er, in February-time. And then my first one was about, around about, 1956 I went to Doncaster. They had one there. And from then onwards it — a great lot of guys to be with, of course, been with them during the war years and they were good company to be with, all these fellas, you know. And, um, from then onwards we went to — oh, we went to Grimsby twice, er, Grimsby, then Cleethorpes, er, and then we decided then travelling was so bad in the winter, February-time. We were caught in a very bad winter there and we decided to have it a bit later in the year, in May, and stick to Lincoln and have it in the — what was the Grand Hotel in Lincoln. Because The Saracen’s Head was the place we used to mostly to congregate mostly in Lincoln of course, near the bridge there but it’s not any more. I don’t know what it is these days now. The other place we’d congregate, if you could get through the door, because it was packed with aircrew all the time. But then I stuck to farming life then for, for right up until twenty years ago, twenty-odd years ago. I retired then when I was sixty-five, twenty-five, twenty-six years ago coming up now it is, yeah.
DK: How do you feel now looking back after all these years about, you know, your period with the Air Force and Bomber Command is it something you, you know, you look at with pride and [inaudible]
AO: Yes. It was, it was a period of my life I wouldn’t have missed it for anything, that period of my life, yep. It was a good eye opener and also for me to meet an awful lot of people, you know.
DK: OK. I’ll stop there.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Taff Owen
Creator
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David Kavanagh
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-06-03
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AOwenA150603
Conforms To
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Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
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00:52:24 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Aneurin ‘Taff’ Owen was born neat Dolgellau, near Penmaenpool in Wales, and joined the Royal Air Force at the age of 18 in 1942. Taff was a farmer’s son and as such was put into a reserved occupation, so some of the areas of the Royal Air Force were not open to him. He became a wireless operator/air gunner after his training in 1942. He tells of his sighting of his first aircraft at the age of nine and of seeing a travelling flying circus, which fanned his love of flying. Whilst he was training, he flew in Dominie biplanes before progressing onto Proctors. He tells of flying in Ansons and going to 27 Operational Training Unit in RAF Lichfield flying in Wellington bombers before serving in a Heavy Conversion Unit at RAF Lindholme on Lancaster. He then transferred to 153 Squadron based at RAF Scampton. His tells about his first trip which was an operation on the submarine pens in Kiel and he tells of his training for Operation Manna and the food drops into the fields in Holland. He also says that the image on Pathe News showing a Lancaster flying over St Paul’s on VE Day is the Lancaster he was in at the time. He tells of catching chicken pox and having to repeat his courses, his problems with a navigator who was colour blind, and the heavy losses experienced at the Operational Training Unit. After the war, in 1946, despite wanting to stay in the Air Force, he returned to farming, retiring when he was 65 years of age.
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Staffordshire
England--Yorkshire
Germany
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
Germany--Kiel
Netherlands
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-05-08
153 Squadron
27 OTU
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
bombing
demobilisation
Dominie
Gee
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Master Bomber
military living conditions
navigator
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Lichfield
RAF Lindholme
RAF Peplow
RAF Scampton
RAF West Freugh
RAF Yatesbury
recruitment
searchlight
submarine
Tiger force
training
Wellington
wireless operator / air gunner
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1106/11565/ARossiterHC150913.2.mp3
fec6b127aef3d0344f0ef2e51fba0776
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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Rossiter, Harry
Henry Charles Rossiter
H C Rossiter
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Harry Rossiter (1922 - 2019, 1332079 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator / air gunner with 115 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-09-23
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Rossiter, HC
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AS: This is an interview for the International Bomber Command Centre at Lincoln carried out by Adam Sutch on the 23rd of September 2015 with Mr Harry Rossiter who carried out a full tour as a wireless operator on Bomber Command. Harry, thanks ever so much for agreeing to this interview. It’s fantastic to get the chance to talk to people with, with such memories. Could we start with a little about where you come from and your background before you ever joined the Air Force?
HR: Yes. I was born in Stratford, East London on the 11th of August 1922. And when I was ten years old, we moved out in to Essex. In a place called Laindon which you may, talking of the Battle of Britain I had a ringside view of that. Anyway, we’ll come to that presently. In 1938 I was a member of a District Scout Rover crew whose aim in those days was to do anything for public service and learn to lead the proper life. And part of it was I joined the air raid precautions. That was in April 1939. I took an anti-gas course. Learning all about the various types of poison gas that might be used against the British civilian population. Following on from that I became a cyclist messenger when the war actually broke out in 1939, at the age of seventeen. And it was very well organised on a district basis. The idea being that if the telephone service broke down there was an admirable means of district communication. I served in that until I joined the RAF. I cycled up to the Romford Recruiting Centre where I said I’d like to be a telegraphist in the Navy. ‘There are no vacancies at the moment but the RAF desperately need wireless operator air gunners. What about that?’ So I said, ‘Well yes. Alright. If they’re so —' [laughs] So I could do six words a minute Morse code from my time in the Boy Scouts which came in very useful. Ultimately on the 16th of January I attested at Uxbridge as 1332079 AC2 Henry Charles Rossiter. And they said to a gang of quite a lot of us, ‘We’re not ready to start aircrew training yet as far as you’re concerned. You can go home and wait six months and we’ll send for you on RAF pay. Or you can come in straight away.’ So, we all looked at one another. Well, we’d all said our goodbyes and whatnot so we’ll come in. And so, a group of us was sent to Northern Ireland on ground defence outside Lisburn, Lisburn Landing Ground it was called, which actually was a blessing in disguise because by the time we did start aircrew training we was marching like all seasoned airmen. And I noticed that particularly. One of my, a chap I became rather friendly he came straight out of the [unclear] university and he was seen, found crying because he was homesick. But by the time we left there he was just one of us and quite a decent chap. I do hope he survived the war. His uncle was an air vice marshal and he wrote to his uncle several times, ‘When are we going to start our training?’ In August ’41 we did. I went to Blackpool to do Morse training. And then we were sent to ground operating to get experience and so I went to 16 Group Headquarters in Gillingham which was an area combined headquarters. And I was there for six months doing ground operating. Which is very useful. I’ll tell you a funny little story about that. The sets we had were like packing trunks. About, you know, about a foot wide, deep, called the Tin 84. Thirteen valve set, excellent radio. And there was a repair gang that used to go around keeping them in order. One of them was a Sergeant Moran and he was known, always known in his absence as Spike Moran. So, one day I’m sitting there and it went dead. And instead of engaging brain before mouth I said, ‘Spike. My radio’s dead.’ And of course, he came and thumped his fist on the table, ‘How dare you call me Spike? Sergeant Moran to you’ [laughs] Anyway, profuse apologies and the set was fixed. In August ’42 [pause] wait a minute. I’m ahead of myself. I said I went to Morse training. I forgot to say in the August, in the Autumn of 1941 we went to Yatesbury in Wiltshire where Number 2 Signals School where I did my radio. And I played, I played trumpet in a brass band in a dance band and cornet in a brass band and my training suffered for a little bit. But anyway, I passed and as I say we were sent on ground operating. Then in August ’42 went to Madley in Herefordshire to do flying training. We flew in the Domini. That’s a twin-engine aircraft with five, five students, the pilot and instructor. And we took it in turns to sit on the radio and do an exercise. I wondered what that scruffy looking biscuit tin with the rope handle was doing in the corner but I managed to keep my food to myself. That’s alright [laughs] Anyway, following on from that we did some training in the Percival Proctor. A single engine aircraft. Just myself and the pilot. And I passed alright and then I was sent to gunnery school in Walney Island just off the coast at Barrow. Now these, the Gunnery School there used the Boulton Paul Defiant. Rather unusual for gunnery training but that’s all they were fit for really after their initial success and of course they were quite good as a night fighter. But the fighter, fighter command couldn’t use them anyway. Did my training on Defiants. This is August. No, it was later than that. My memory [pause] where were we? Oh yes. I’ve got it here. September 1942 posted to Air Gunner’s School, Walney Island. And of course, it was still summery weather and after we’d done our little detail the pilot hopped along the beach to Blackpool and we flew along the sand almost at zero feet. All the holidaymakers waving to us. And after that we finished our gunnery school, gunnery course. ‘We want four volunteers for Coastal Command,’ So, Bomber Command’s not too clever these days. Yes, all right. What we didn’t know of course was that it was to train on torpedo bombers. The Bristol Beaufort which wasn’t very clever [laughs]. To cut a long story short we went to Number 5 OTU where they trained people on Bristol Beauforts. A crew of four. A pilot, the observer who was a navigator/bomb aimer and two wireless operator/air gunners. And we were quite a happy team as regards the crew. And then we did our torpedo training and then they said, ‘Right. You’re going off to —' They didn’t tell us in words of course. It was a bit hush hush but what it transpired, what it came out to us we were to reinforce 217 Squadron in Ceylon. So we found ourselves at Portreath in Cornwall on the 12th of June ready to fly out. But the radio, there was trouble with the radio so delayed for twenty four hours. Anyway, we flew out and when we got to Karachi in India where all the aircraft entering India had to be serviced and made ready for tropical service, you know. Water tanks and all that sort of stuff. Special air filters and all that. They declared all Bristol Beauforts were now obsolete. Considering that we went to the Bristol Aeroplane Works and collected a brand new Beaufort and it had got twenty hours off the assembly line it seems an awful waste of taxpayer’s money. But there it was. We kicked our heels at the aircrew transit port in Poona. And all aircrew in those days were more or less during the war quite multi-national. A lot of Australians. And of course they kicked up a fuss. They were a bit uninhibited and who could blame them? They’d come all the way from Australia and then they’d only been messed about by the stupid poms as they called us. Anyway, be that as it may. In November we left Bombay on a troop ship and got home eventually on the 4th of January. And after leave we went to the Advanced Flying Unit in Millom to start re-training on Bomber Command. And after training we joined a squadron, 115 Squadron on the 15th of August 1944. And the rest, and the rest as you say is history. Not quite I suppose because we had and we were very lucky. We were attacked by night fighters several times but the skill and the sharp eyes of the gunners and the skill of the pilot we never received any damage at all. The only time we did the Germans were holding out at Le Havre. We went there four times. The first couple of times were rather, was a bit tragic in a way because a lot of Frenchmen got killed. They’d sent us to the wrong place. But the last one we did we were well and truly we found them and they put a cannon shell in our port outer. We stopped it but a Lancaster can fly well on three engines so we were in no danger but that’s how low we were. They said, ‘Do not bomb below nine hundred feet if the cloud base is at such.’ The bomb aimer, being a very enthusiastic Northern Irishman, I won’t use his exact words he just said, — concern [laughs] ‘The flak. Let’s bomb.’ Which we did and as I say we got a cannon shell in our port outer for our sins. The only time we ever got damaged. And I remember standing up in the astrodome looking, plugged into my radio, making that extra pair of eyes and in the night time it was, well it’s as though you’re watching a film in a way. I can’t quite explain it. Deep down you were, you were scared. Anybody who says they weren’t either have got no imagination or they’re telling lies. You couldn’t help it. You knew damn well what was going on. I mean you could see a Lanc, a Lancaster, it wasn’t quite as pitch black as you might think. What with the fires we were flying over and the searchlights you could see quite a distance and you could see a Lancaster suddenly a big, a great big red ball of fire. A big ball of fire as they say, there it goes, and the bomb aimer would say, ‘Chalk port.’ Which meant somebody had got it, you know. And that’s how it was. And then we did a lot of daylight raids and that was another danger. I’ve got the piece here to show you in here. This is, this is A Flight. The Flight I was in. Yes. Those two aircraft, those mentioned on there, they said they collided. But we had other ideas about that because we were bombing on radar. Very accurate. There was a great deal of accuracy with this stuff called GH. And it resulted in several aircraft trying to be in the same spot in the same, in the sky at the same time. And of course, what happened? They dropped their bombs on the one below. And though it just, it just says they collided. But three times standing looking up I looked straight up in the open bomb bay of a Lancaster direct above us. Obviously, they knew we were there otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here but three times that happened. It was scary that was.
AS: And because both of these aeroplanes are down as collided —
HR: Yeah.
AS: The explosion took both aeroplanes out.
HR: Absolutely and that means Runnymede panel. That means there’s no known grave.
AS: Yeah.
HR: At Runnymede there’s a memorial to twenty seven thousand RAF and Allied aircrew who have no known grave.
AS: Yeah.
HR: So, some of them just, well they were all atomised I suppose you’d say. A full bomb load. Two aircraft colliding on their way to Dortmund. That’s where we were going. And the last occasion we were flying our last drop and there’s a bit of a tradition to be try and be the first back. So, the skipper tried a little experiment. I was looking out the astrodome and I could see the bursts of the anti-aircraft. They had got our height exactly and each burst was coming closer. The rear gunner said, ‘Skipper. They’re knocking on the back door.’ So he quickly dived back into the cover provided by Window. Metalised strips that confused the German radar. That was the other, that was the other case when we nearly, when we were in danger. But David, David Jenkins, the pilot, he was completely unflappable. If you look at that photograph, you’ll see. The next. He’s the tallest one. Now, that one, that’s Bill Ranson, a pharmaceutical chemist in civvy street. He was about ten years older than us. A hard headed Yorkshireman. And [laughs] they didn’t get on too well together but it never showed up because we functioned as a very good crew together. But he would sometimes say, ‘Jenks,’ he called him Jenks for short, ‘We’re one degree port of track.’ [unclear] Completely unflappable and he rightly got the DFC. If, if you look, if you look at that I can tell you. That’s the flight engineer. He was, he was a regular. He joined as a boy, a boy entrant, as a mechanic. That’s the mid-under gunner. Where are we? See that there? That’s a .5 sticking out the bottom. He sat astride a big hole with a .5 pointing up like that because the Germans used to go underneath.
AS: That is unusual. Does, does that mean then that you didn’t have H2S?
HR: That’s right. Yes.
AS: You had a .5 fitting.
HR: That’s right. Yeah. And next to him is Bill Ranson I told you about. That’s Bob. Bob Patton from Dungannon. The bomb aimer. And that’s myself. And that’s Bill Gorbon, the rear gunner and this chap is Reg Bijon from Vancouver. Royal Canadian Air Force. He’s the mid-upper. So we had eight in our crew instead of seven.
AS: So, many nations. From Canada to Yorkshire.
HR: Oh yes. Yeah. They had a lot of Australians, New Zealanders. One or two West Indians. Several Canadians. Bomber Command was really a multi-national force. One of our flight commanders was from the South African Air Force. And he achieved a little bit of notoriety. Well, that was the wrong way because he was doing a good thing. Towards the end of the war the Germans had taken all the food they could from Holland and they were starving. So 115 Squadron was selected to drop them some emergency food parcels. The Germans agreed not to fire on them and this chap, this South African, Captain Martin his name was, he led, he led the first drop of food to the starving Dutchmen. Later on, of course it was very well organised. And when the war ended the Americans joined in as well and dropped it. Ever so many food parcels for the starving Dutchmen. Anyway, so our tour came to an end of ops. We all went our different ways. I think I’m the only surviving member, they’re all they’re nearly all dead now, they are. I used to keep in, keep in quite contact with him. Bill Gorbon. He moved to Canada. Who else? Oh and of course, David. David Jenkins, the pilot. They’ve all, they’ve all shuffled off I’m afraid. I’m the last surviving member of the crew. Now, what are my thoughts about Bomber Command? Well at the time we were doing a job to shorten the war. Occasionally you thought, you know, those poor buggers down there are getting the rough end of it. But then we were told it was necessary because there was a lot of talk about area bombing. We were always given a target to bomb. Factories. Always factories. We did a lot of Ruhr bashing. And there’s only one, one occasion when we were aware of it. We did a raid on Stettin which is a long way away. We took off, we took off at dusk and landed at dawn. We were out all night on that one. Nine hours ten minutes. And it was a ship repair facility and the idea was to burn the workers out of their homes so that they couldn’t work on the ships. That was the idea. Now the only time we ever mentioned, ‘Your target tonight is the old city of Stettin which is occupied by a lot of people repairing ships. If your raid is successful, they won’t be able to any more.’ It wasn’t particularly aimed at the population. It was just aimed at their houses so they had to move out. Whether it worked or not I don’t know. We did several raids on Stettin. The raid I did was with another crew. That’s how I came to do thirty ops, because normally only the pilot, his first trip was with another crew so the rest of the crew only did twenty nine but I did another one with another crew and that’s how I did thirty. After my ops I was posted to an air sea rescue station at Beccles. They were flying the Warwick which was like a larger version of the Wellington and they could carry an airborne lifeboat. It dropped on three parachutes. And on the station strength there I was working in the ops room as what they called signals briefing. If a crew was going out they all took it in turns to put them up to date if there were any changes. I always used to remind them make sure you switch your sets on and check that they’re on. Because there was [laughs] an unfortunate incident that happened regarding a rather senior member. Anyway, that’s by the way. That was part of my job and while I was on the squadron. I was promoted flight sergeant. And in due course of time I was promoted warrant officer. Well, the station closed in August ’45. Just after VJ day. And 280 Squadron as they were were sent up to Thornaby on Tees. So, there we are. There were four of us, four warrant officers doing this job, signals briefing as it was called, and we were all out of a job. And the chap who took over the command of the station said, ‘Look you chaps I’ve got four jobs for you. Pick them out and please yourself.’ And we looked and one of them was station warrant officer. And that’s the one I picked. So, I suddenly found myself the senior NCO on the station. Only about a hundred and fifty men left because they were just packing up stores mainly. But I had a job to do and I did it. And one of them, before the signals staff were posted away, ‘Mr Rossiter would you like to take the wireless operators out in the perimeter track and give them a spot of drill?’ I thought yeah okay, ‘Righto sir,’ and I did. And they, you’re not supposed to move when you are giving orders. So, I’ve got a good voice and they’re marching along and a lorry went by just as I shouted out, ‘About turn.’ And you’ll never believe this. Half of them turned and the other half didn’t. So, they were [laughs] ‘About turn,’ and of course they both turned inwards and they collapsed with laughter, you see. This is perfectly true and it couldn’t, it couldn’t have been worked better if they’d prepared for it. It was so funny. But that was my experience of drilling. Anyway, the time came when the station completely closed and they sent me up to Thornaby to do the same job with the squadron. Briefing. Signals briefing. And I was discharged from there. Well there’s one little thing. My Lorraine was born in March ’45. She was just coming up to fourteen months old and my wife said, ‘Can you try and get a pushchair?’ Well there was a Halfords. Just across the river from Thornaby is Stockton on Tees and there was a Halfords there. And I bought a pushchair for the grand sum of two pounds ten shillings. Quite a sturdy thing and just before I left Thornaby the group captain said to me, ‘Well, I see you’ve had a year’s signals experience. You’d probably keep your rank if you stayed in the regular Air Force,’ because normally you drop a rank. He said, ‘You’ll probably keep yours but I can’t make any promises.’ I said ‘Well sir I’ve got a daughter — a wife and daughter, and I think my first loyalty is to them. So, thank you very much sir but I must decline the offer.’ So, the following day I’m walking out the station. I’ve got a kit bag, an attaché case and a pushchair. Transport. And I walked out and he came by and said ‘I see what you mean by domestic responsibilities!’ he said [laughs] Yeah. That ends my tale of RAF service and — any questions?
AS: Absolutely, Harry. That, that is the best, most joined up, most coherent presentation I have ever seen.
HR: Thank you.
AS: Ever heard. Thank you very much for that. I think we’ll pause and have a chat about some of the things that are in it if that’s alright.
[recording paused]
AS: There is of course more after RAF service, Harry.
HR: Yes. When I was discharged from the RAF in May 1946 I could strip a Browning gun in the dark and I could send Morse and receive Morse code at eighteen words a minute. I hadn’t got enough flying hours in to join civil flying so I went where I could earn money and it turned out to be the Ford Dagenham. Ford’s at Dagenham. Building gear boxes. The pay was good and their formula was very simple. You work and we’ll pay you accordingly and I got a decent wage but my health began to suffer. I did six years. There I was, half asleep, taking the gear box off the line, putting the back end on, putting it back on. Forty seconds that took and I could do it without thinking about it. Anyway, as I say my health began to suffer. I was always catching colds and my hands were perpetually permeated in grease. So wherever I did, you know. Anyway, I said to Edna, my wife, ‘I need to get out of there. I need an outdoor job.’ Right. You know, ‘You can see I’m not all that much.’ She said, ‘Why don’t you join the police force?’ Well, I was horrified. Me a copper? But it was the best thing I ever did.
AS: Yeah.
HR: Because I was outdoors. The middle photo there is when I was a village policeman. A constable. Village constable. And the one above is my wife standing at the door of the police house. A place called Horndon on the Hill in South Essex. And I had six very happy years there. Or we did. They used to come and speak to her as much as they spoke to me because if she didn’t know she knew where, some way to find out and she was very popular in the village. And she loved it and so did I. But in the fullness of time they decided to make me a sergeant and I was posted to Chelmsford and I was in the town there. And then I was sent on a rural section. I don’t know if you ever watched that programme “Heartbeat.” Well it’s similar to that but, mind you not all my men were on duty at the same time. I had to spread them out over like most of the day and night. But that was called a rural section at a place called Danbury which is an Essex beauty spot. I stayed there for six and a half years and then I bought my own, we bought our own house in Braintree. This particular job, a rural sergeant you had to live on the job. So they posted me back to Chelmsford town where I was a station sergeant for about six months. Then I asked to be transferred to Braintree where I was living. So, I finally finished up resigning, retiring from Essex police in August 1977 after twenty five years’ service. And then I went to the Lord Chancellor’s Department in charge of court security at Chelmsford Crown Court. And then I became a county court bailiff. And that was a most interesting job. As a county court bailiff you were entitled to, you were able to do, make legal arrangements. Suppose you owed this sum of money I would come to you and say, ‘Now, you owe this sum of money. How can you pay it? Have you got any way of paying it?’ Well we could manage so much a month. Well, I said, ‘Sign your goods over to me. So long as you do what you say you’re going to do you won’t see me again.’ And occasionally I would, if they were a bit overdue I’d call on them and collect the money. It didn’t matter to me. I wasn’t supposed to but the person got their money. That was the important thing. That’s why I considered that to be the most important. I did get a couple of pats on the back for it. Whenever you’re bending the rules a little. If they’re overdue you’re supposed to take their goods away. But then the plaintiff had got their money. You know. That was the most important thing. So I quite enjoyed doing that.
AS: That’s great. Look. I think we’ll pause again there.
HR: Okay. My arms hurt.
AS: Yeah.
[recording paused]
HR: We were all sent. The three of us, and my friends. The four of us who volunteered were sent to Turnberry. It’s now a golf course but it was an RAF station. On the top of the hill overlooking the golf course as it is now is a large hotel. That was an aircrew hospital. Anyway, I say there was a bunch of us and then there’s this big room. I seem to remember there was some booze knocking about. I’m not quite sure about that. I know it was all very friendly. And I started talking to a chap. He was a Londoner. A chap called Ted Hall. He came from Ely and he was a furniture designer. A bit older than me. So he came to me and he said, ‘I’ve found a nice pilot,’ he says, ‘I think he’s very intelligent. Come with me,’ So we went, and Bill Thompson his name was and he came from Largs in Ayrshire. Quite a well to do family. His uncle was Lord Mackay. He used to run British Caledonian but I didn’t know that at the time. A very likeable chap. Same age as me. A civil engineer. And then we looked around. Of course, we had what they called an observer. An observer being the one who had both trades of navigator/bomb aimer and he wore the O brevet. And we found this chap was sitting in the corner looking rather disconsolate so we went and spoke to him. He was an older man. [unclear] Monroe. He came from Wimbledon. And so he came and we, the four of us got on very well together. We were together for a year — 1943. And we never never ever had a crossed word between us at all.
AS: And you were all first tour were you?
HR: No. This was, we never did do a tour. This was Coastal.
AS: Yeah.
HR: This was Coastal Command training.
AS: Yeah. So, when you crewed up none of you had ever been on operations?
HR: Oh no. That’s quite right. Yeah.
AS: Okay.
HR: Yeah.
AS: Can you think back to, to what the OTU training involved?
HR: Yes. It’s a Coastal Command. As I say they were torpedo bombers. But they were also used for general reconnaissance. So did a lot of navigational exercises over the Irish Sea and to the northwest of Scotland. What’s the furthest outpost? I forget the name of it now. Out in the Atlantic. We had to fly there by dead reckoning and there was no problem with that. Spot on time. ETA. There it was. You probably know. I just can’t remember the name of it now. It’s a rocky outpost.
AS: Rockall?
HR: This is on the northwest of Scotland. I don’t think that was the name. No. I’m not sure. You may be right. I can’t remember.
AS: I’m rarely right, Harry. We can check that out on the map.
HR: I mean that’s, that’s how, sorry, he was good. Course we all clapped hands [laughs].
AS: Were you involved in the navigation with him? Were you taking bearings, QDMs and all the rest of it?
HR: Well, this involved mainly him. But he did ask me twice for a QDM. You know what that is of course. But mostly his mathematics were spot on which is one of the reasons why I couldn’t. I had to be a wireless operator because my, I left school when I was fourteen. A thorough training. A very good training. The 3Rs.
AS: Yeah.
HR: Excellent. Laindon High Road School. Excellent school. But, oh yeah, one thing I forgot to mention. In November, when I was on the squadron the signals leader, he said, ‘Right son, I’m putting you up for a commission’. Alright but when it came to it of course the flight commander, a Squadron Leader [Gorrey?] I remember him very well. He put a piece of paper and on it was A+B=C. He said, ‘Do you know what that means?’ And it just blinded us. And I said, ‘I’m sorry, sir. I haven’t a clue.’ I mean the most simple. I know all about it now but I didn’t know then. So he said, ‘What sort of education did you have?’ I said, ‘I left school when I was fourteen, sir.’ ‘Oh I see. Well, I’ll pass you on to the squadron commander. See what he thinks.’ Wing Commander Shaw. I remember the name. He said, ‘Well, you’ve obviously got some quality otherwise you wouldn’t have been recommended but I’m afraid your lack of education shows.’ I said, ‘Yes sir. It’s no more than I expected.’ He said, ‘Try again in six months’ time. In the meantime, find a good officer and see what your shortcomings were.’ That’s rather funny. It’s all written down there. And the Irishman, is that him, yes Bob Patton from Dungannon. He got himself blind drunk. He was missing for twenty four hours. They found him in the toilet, dead drunk.
AS: The gents, I hope.
HR: Was he a good officer? [laughs] Flying officer, in fact he was. Anyway, there we are. But the war, the war in Europe finished in six months because I’d finished my ops in December ’44.
AS: On, on the Coastal you told us there were two wireless operator/air gunners. Did you switch duties?
HR: That’s right. Well we had a gun turret in the Beaufort. Two gun turrets. So, one worked it and then another day he’d say, ‘Harry, would you like a turn and I’ll go and sit in the turret?’ That’s how we worked. Very friendly. As I say this lot we performed quite well. We all seemed to do our job. There was no arguments in the air but when we finished our tour the group captain said, ‘We’d like you to go on Pathfinders. You’re a good crew. But you’ve got to go together. So he said, ‘I’m not flying with him anymore.’ So that was that. So there, as I say we had so we had a reputation as a good crew. Otherwise they wouldn’t have said that.
AS: So when, when you’d come back from India you’d been in the Air Force quite a long time.
HR: Two years. Yeah.
AS: Were you really keen to get on to operations or —
HR: Well, yeah we were really. I mean, we were completely in the dark as to what we were going to do. Didn’t know we were going on to Bomber Command. We guessed we might be. The possibility. But we didn’t know until all of us got our embarkation leave. We thought to RAF Number 2 Advanced Flying Unit. And that’s what it was about.
AS: And so you, in a sense you’re going through the training mill again.
HR: Yeah.
AS: For a very different job. What —
HR: So 1943 was a complete waste of time because that’s when we did all our Coastal Command training.
AS: Yeah.
HR: A complete waste of time. And then when you shudder, it makes you think, taxpayer’s money. I mean. There was about twenty crews. Not as many as that. About fifteen. About fifteen. I think it must have been at least fifteen crews flew out from Portreath to India. Diverted to join 217 Squadron in Ceylon. As I say that was as far as we got. Karachi and Poona. Poona was just a, just a rest camp really. It didn’t, the CO was a Wing Commander Beck and I really felt sorry for him because he did his best. Him and his adjutant was a Squadron Leader Findlay Fleming. They did their best to find us things for us to do but the Aussies didn’t appreciate it very much. One day, oh and incidentally we were all issued with 38 Smith and Wessons when we left to go to India. Why, I don’t know. We never knew. Anyway, afternoon in Poona all taking a nap and these Indians, there’s a road ran through the camp, these Indians with their monkeys performing tricks. ‘See the monkey dance sahib?’ You know. And suddenly a bang bang bang. Looked out and there’s these chaps running for their lives. And this Aussie is sort of clinging around this post of his, blazing away, over their heads of course. ‘You, waking us up. Waking us up you silly bastards,’ et cetera et cetera. So, there was a hell of a stink of course. They called in all our revolvers. We didn’t want them anyway. But there you are. That’s typical of Aussies. There was another occasion too when we were on OTU. A couple of chaps came in late and they were arguing the toss so one of these Aussies, ‘Put that light out.’ ‘Get knotted.’ ‘I said put that light out.’ Old gunner et cetera. So he pulls out an air pistol and shoots the bulb out.
AS: Yeah. On, on this year, or more than a year when you were training and then on the Coastal and out to India did your music, did you take that through or did, as well?
HR: Yes. At various because I used to do a lot of trumpet playing. Because what happened, when I was twelve I was in the Boy Scouts Brass Band and there was [unclear] at a place called the Manor Mission which is the only part of old Laindon left. Everything else has gone. Anyway, and they had an adult brass band and one of them volunteered to be the band master. So he said to my uncle who had played tenor horn in the band, ‘If we put Harry on tenor horn you’ll see he practises won’t you?’ He said, ‘Of course I will.’ And he did. That was quite fun actually. That’s when I started playing. But we didn’t use the expression cool in those days but it was cool really for a young man to play cornet. You were playing a tune you know. You were somebody. So I did, I graduated to cornet. I tried euphonia first for a while which I quite liked but I had to get on cornets which I did. And that graduated to trumpet playing. And I played in a village dance band called the Rio 7. There were never seven as far as I knew. Edna said they were crap. Those were almost exactly her exact words. But we were the only band in the village so we got plenty of work playing the trumpet. When I went into the RAF, if there was any opportunity, I did some trumpet playing. When I was on my signals course, as I say I played. There was a Training Wing dance band. I played second trumpet. A big band it was too. Mostly Glenn Miller stuff. And other places where we moved to if they had a dance band I’d go and sit along, sit down with them, you know. So I did a fair amount. And 1945 I was in the Beccles place after my tour. Of course, the end of the, the end of the war in Europe there was a lot of parties and that little band we had, we were in great demand and my nose started bleeding. When I saw the MO, he said, ‘Well you’d better pack up the trumpet for a while. It’s a good job it did bleed,’ he said, ‘It may have given you a stroke. High blood pressure like that. So leave it. Leave it off for about six months.’ So I was thinking, alright. I’ve got to play something. I know. I’ll learn to play the piano. So I go in to Beccles and find this lady, very well known in show business called Madame Shapiro. And she gave me the piano lessons and she said, ‘What you’ve got to do is to play scales and play scales every day for an hour at least. You’ve just got to do it and the sooner you can play scales without looking at the keys you’re ready to start playing.’ Well, I hadn’t got the patience. In any case If I started doing that in the sergeants mess I’d probably have something thrown at me. So, I never really did get, did master the piano. But it went off and I was back playing. In 1963 it was, in the police force, the Essex Police Band was formed and Edna said, ‘Well I know you like playing. You go along and play if you want to but you might regret it.’ Very prophetic. I’ll tell you about it in a minute. So I went along and played in the Essex Police Band and I was their principal cornet for a while till somebody along, came along a bit better than me. Then I was the deputy principal cornet. There we are there. That’s it. You can see me sitting. That one. That’s the Essex Police Band 1972. And I had some quite happy times. And what she meant by, ‘You might regret it,’ I was in charge of a small section in North Chelmsford called Melbourne Park and myself and five constables. And the chief constable came along to see me one day, Sir John Nightingale. ‘Sergeant Rossiter, why haven’t you passed your promotion exam?’ I said, ‘I suppose I haven’t studied hard enough.’ He said, ‘Well bloody well get on with it. I need inspectors.’ Well that was most unusual. I’m not kidding you. You don’t get chief constables telling that to sergeants every day. He was inviting me to be, he said ‘I want you to be an inspector but pass your exam.’ I never did. Too much playing you see. That’s what Edna meant. She said afterwards, ‘Well, perhaps you might have been a bit worrying. You’re happy being a sergeant, aren’t you?’ I said, ‘Yeah. It don’t worry me.’
AS: Fantastic. When, when you were back and it’s after D-day by this time you were posted to, to the heavies to crew up all over again. What was that process like? Much the same or —
HR: Much the same. Well it was slightly different. This was at Silverstone. A big old bomber OTU there. We went there in early April and, well actually what happened was in between OTU [pause] no, the AFU at Millom and the OTU we had, we had ten days leave so I got married. In March 1944 we got married. And there was another humorous situation because the vicar, we knew him quite well, I said I’ve only, ‘I’ve only got a few days,’ you know. So he said, ‘Oh that’s alright. I can get you a special licence. Don’t worry about the banns. You haven’t got time for the banns.’ So he got me a special licence. And we were married in this church, ‘And I now pronounce you man and wife’ and he said it, so funny, he said, ‘Oh go on Harry. Kiss her’ [laughs] as if needed prompting. Yeah. And so, there you are. And I, Edna said, ‘Well ask them for an extension of leave then. They can only say no. They can’t shoot you.’ So I did. And of course it came back, ‘No. Come back.’ So, when I started OTU which was at Silverstone, it was a big crowd, about two hundred of us sitting in this room. And the instructor said, ‘One of your number recently took himself a wife. He liked it so much he wanted an extension.’ Ha ha. And my friend said, ‘I bet that was you.’ It was [laughs] Anyway, he left and said, ‘Get yourselves crewed up.’ Well we were wandering about. Now who did I meet first? I can’t remember really. Yeah. Who was it who I met first? No. It wasn’t Bill. I think it was Jenks actually. Yes. I went up. I saw this tall chap with pilot’s wings and he stood here, I said, ‘You looking for a wireless operator?’ ‘Yeah. You’ll do,’ he said. ‘That’s alright. Yeah.’ And then we were joined, who was on next? [pause] One of the gunners. Which one was that? The French Canadian. Reg Bijon. He was the next one. And then, I don’t know how we got on to Bill. Bill Ranson, the navigator. I suppose he was looking sorry for himself. I don’t know. And the flight engineer. We did all our Bomber Command training on Wellington’s which strictly speaking didn’t need a flight engineer. But nevertheless he was part of the crew. And then when we learned to fly four-engined stuff, Stirlings it was called a Conversion Unit. A Heavy Conversion Unit. Then we acquired an extra gunner which was Bill Gorbon. A farmer from Northwich in Cheshire.
AS: Wonderful. Now, you, you’d come off twin-engined coastal. Virtually early, early war so you were doing wireless and DF. Did you have to learn a lot more to cope with the equipment in the heavies or was it much the same equipment?
HR: It wasn’t, it wasn’t a question of it. Just that the, there were, that’s why we had to go to this. Because of the Bomber Command way of doing things. It wasn’t very complicated and already got the basics thoroughly ground in after the service with Coastal Command. As they, as they say, take it on board. It’s quite easy really. Radio silence was strict but there was one. This trip I did with the other crew was different. It was a wind finding aircraft. It’s all in those notes. As you know when you drop a bomb it’s liable to be knocked off course by the wind. So they had to feed, to steer, you steered to allow for it. And that was called wind finding. So what they did, this particular crew every half an hour the navigator and the bomb aimer between them estimated the speed, the speed and direction and I was handed a slip of paper and told to send it back to base. In the Morse code, you know. It was all Morse code. I did it every half an hour. And when Bomber Command, because we weren’t the only aircraft doing it and they worked out what, decided what was a good mean average wind speed and direction and half an hour before zero hour on the raid it would be transmitted to the whole force to be used.
AS: So everybody set the same wind vector on to the bomb sights.
HR: Yeah. Yeah. And it did help but as you know in 1944 things were starting to get better because we had the Gee. The Gee. The Gee box as it was called. A very good thing. Oh that was another funny story. At Beccles this 280 Squadron, occasionally one of us would be sent up with one of the crews to see how they got on and we had a load of ATC boys. About four of them anyway. And the Warwick was quite roomy. A table about this big with, and, so one of them said, ‘Can you show us how you work out.’ So I said, ‘Yes. You —’ I had a copy of the receiver in the thingy, ‘See those bits,’ you know they were lined up, you know. And took the readings off them and put them on to the chart. And we were over the North Sea at the time but according to my calculations we were just off the coast of Cornwall. I thought my face was red. I was using the wrong chart, that’s why [laughs] So we got the right chart and managed to save my face.
AS: Because there, there was more than one Gee chain wasn’t there?
HR: Yeah.
AS: Yeah. Could we talk a little, a little bit about preparations for, for a mission briefing and what not?
HR: Yes. Well —
AS: What was your, you know, day for a raid or a night for a raid? What would be a typical?
HR: Suppose it was a night raid. The, over the tannoy would come, ‘There will be a lecture for navigators at 12 o’clock,’ at so and so. And that was the beginning. That meant that we were going on ops that night and that’s how they announced it. So all the navigators got together and of course they were given all the details and usually joined by the pilots. They found it a good idea to do so. They were allowed to do so if they wanted. Most of them did. And then posted up in the sergeant’s mess and the officer’s mess would be the battle order. A big A4 sheet of paper detailing all the crews that were on it. And that’s when you knew. And then you went on to the main briefing which would be about two hours before or about an hour before take-off time due. Then first of all you’d would get the intelligence officer saying what the raid was all about. Then you get the Met. And then you get the squadron commander. Then you go into details and they used to talk about all, about all up weight, the amount of petrol you were carrying and all that sort of stuff. Don’t quite know what good that was but there you are. And then as I say the squadron commander would go into the details and what to avoid. What’s this and what’s that and don’t forget your banking. We didn’t have, didn’t have a mid-under gunner at first. We used to do banking searches like that to make sure nobody was hiding underneath. And there was, oh yes that was another funny thing which is in there. Before we got the mid-under gunner Paddy the bomb aimer said, ‘I’m going to drop a flare.’ You know, the bombs go. ‘Would you mind walking down and see if it goes?’ Well, we were at oxygen height so I clipped an oxygen bottle to my parachute harness and down I went. Down the fuselage and just as I got to the chute I saw it go down. Zunk. And then suddenly I was thrown off balance. We were being attacked. And I’m in pitch darkness I hadn’t a clue. There’s an intercom socket but I couldn’t find it. So about five seconds there was a bit of panic because I didn’t know what was going on. Whether we were going down in a dive or whatever. But I couldn’t stand up and the reasons why it was the bottle had become detached from my parachute harness and I was treading on it. And that was why I couldn’t stand up. I did. Plugged in and it was okay. I said it went, you know and that was all he wanted to know. But yeah, it’s one of the, one of the only times really when I really was what you might call blind panic because you don’t know what’s going on.
AS: So that was a fighter attack.
HR: Yeah.
AS: At this stage of the war what, were the fighters your chief concerns or the flak or collision or or what?
HR: Fighters really. Yeah. No doubt about it. But they had, they had choice, you know. They were spoiled for choice. And the infamous raid in March on Nuremberg. You may have, if you ever, if anybody talks about the Nuremberg raid they talk about the one in March which was a complete and utter fiasco. We lost a hundred bombers that night. A hundred. Ninety six were shot down, mainly by night fighters and another ten were written off when they got home and crashed. A hundred and six I think is the official figure. One of them is mentioned in there as being number ninety six or something. Shot down.
AS: Picking up on that, and not so much the raid but the loss of aeroplanes, what, how big a factor was, was the weather? Did you ever go out and the weather changed and you end up with this —
HR: Yes.
AS: Big mess over England.
HR: The very last one. December is when Glen Miller was killed. And I’ll tell you what happened. Well it’s been generally accepted what happened. December the 15th we were sent out to bomb a place called [Siegen?] and there was a lot of, the weather was putrid and all civilian flying was cancelled, you know. There was no question of it. Because what happened of course as we climbed up to fifteen to sixteen feet icing took over and one Lancaster, when one Lancaster crashed because of it they called us all back. Well we never landed with a full bomb load. We used to jettison our bombs in The Wash but others jettisoned them in the Channel. What the popular theory is now is that Glen Miller’s plane was brought down either by a direct hit from a bomb but more likely from a blast from a bomb. Because there was a rear gunner reported seeing a light aircraft plunge into the water. It must have been Glen Miller’s plane because there was no other plane out.
AS: Yeah.
HR: That’s the only time. There was another occasion I believe. In that box file is my flying logbook.
AS: Shall we pause and get that?
[recording paused]
AS: Okay. Harry, so we’re, we’re back again with the tape running. We’ve just been talking about an example where the smooth bomber stream perhaps didn’t quite happen on the [ Siegen ] raid. Could you tell me what happened then?
HR: Yes. There was very very thick cloud. A lot of Cumulonim about which was a rather dangerous cloud. So we were dodging that but when we finally broke cloud about fifteen thousand feet the bomber force — the Lancasters and Halifaxes were all over the sky. So whoever was leading the raid decided to do a big loop. A circuit I suppose you’d call it. And as he did it so we all formed up and so we headed for the target in some sort of order.
AS: So this was a force of hundreds of bomber aeroplanes.
HR: About two hundred and forty.
AS: Doing a merry go around in the sky.
HR: That’s right. Yeah.
AS: And not, not troubled by flak?
HR: No. We weren’t actually [pause] of course I couldn’t tell you where we were but we were certainly over the continent somewhere. Because of the thick clouds as I say when we finally, obviously trying to avoid collision in the cloud but when it finally did break through as I say we were scattered far and wide. And I was standing up looking out the astrodome. I saw it all happen.
AS: And this, this actually was your second consecutive trip to [Siegen ] and the first one.
HR: We didn’t.
AS: In your logbook says —
HR: Didn’t get there. Recalled.
AS: Duty not carried out. What was that about? Was that the weather?
HR: The weather, yes. Icing. Icing.
AS: Okay.
HR: After icing had brought down one Lancaster they called the rest of us back. And that was the day when Glen Miller was killed. And it’s a popular belief now that he was killed by jettisoned bombs in the Channel because he couldn’t land with a full bomb load. And our squadron jettisoned in the Wash so we weren’t responsible. But some squadrons jettisoned in the Channel. And we think Glen Miller was brought down by some of the bombs.
AS: Okay. Did you have, as a squadron and as a, as a group particular forming up procedures to join the stream and places to go?
HR: No. We were just told to fly in a sensible, sensible gaggle formation and just be careful to avoid collisions.
AS: And this was on daylights presumably.
HR: On daylight raids. Yes.
AS: Was it any different at night?
HR: Well you couldn’t see. Although, as I say visibility wasn’t as bad as you might think at night time but you couldn’t sort of, you couldn’t see everywhere and in any case another Lancaster, perhaps it was a half a mile away or so it would just be lost in the darkness. But we did see others sometimes and we always used to try and keep clear. But I don’t, I don’t remember any cases of collisions at night, strangely enough when you might have thought it would have happened.
AS: How about coming home? Did you, well your navigator would do it but did you come home on Gee to particular points?
HR: Well, we did, you had this course of course to come home on and we had Gee to help navigation. What we had to be careful of when joining the circuit to land was intruders. At Witchford they used to have, and all the airfields had a red, red light flashing out their code so you could know where you were. And if they were switched off that was to warn you that German fighters were about. Of course, you were coming in to land totally relaxed and they would nip in and shoot. In this book there’s a record of intruders at Witchford where, where I think three Lancs were lost one night through intruders.
AS: Wow. Can you remember the procedure then? What if the light goes out? What happened then? Do you scatter or go to a beacon or — ?
HR: No. You just continue flying but you’re very much on the alert. Until they just gave up and went off. It was all clear and the light would come on again and we’d land.
AS: When you landed and a big sigh of relief, switched everything off there’s the debriefing. Could you tell me some details of how debriefings used to go?
HR: Well, as soon as we touched down that was a moment for relaxing and a great sigh of relief. Whoopie we’re home again. Thank the good lord. Yeah. That was, that was the feeling and a noticeable lack of tension. Because when you were taking off you’re flying into the unknown. You don’t know what’s going to happen. Whether you would be coming back or not. But when you had come back and decided all was safe then we used to get out and say, ‘Jenks, well done,’ you know. And he’d say, ‘Well, never mind. I couldn’t have done it without you lot.’ It was a great relief. And then we used to go to be picked up by the crew bus and given cups of coffee with, laced with rum which used to, strangely enough helped us to sleep. And everybody got asked whether they had anything to say, you know. And we’d say, ‘I saw ——' And one would say, ‘Yeah. I saw a chop,’ he’d say. ‘Whereabout were you?’ ‘We were just passing over the middle of the target and saw a chop out to starboard.’ There was a little bit of, I don’t know what you’d call it but it’s put about that the Germans put up what they called Scarecrows. Things that explode to make you think it’s one of your bombers being, being hit by night fighters or flak. Well, the Germans denied any knowledge of that. They said, ‘No, we didn’t.’ So it did seem as a little bit of thing to try and keep the morale up. It wasn’t, well they weren’t, that was the Germans trying to scare us. The Germans said no that wasn’t the case.
AS: So potentially at least the Scarecrow story was put out by your own.
HR: Yeah.
AS: High Command.
HR: Yeah.
AS: Yeah. And you’re talking about, about tension and the release of tension. When, one of the things that what one certainly reads about that for trips, long trips sometimes Benzedrine or wakey- wakey pills were available. Did you as a crew or an individual have any experience of, of this?
HR: Well, you were, you were given the choice. You were given the Benzedrine tablets. I usually took one. We weren’t sillily taking them. Just the one. There was one raid when we were coming back and I found myself, see I sat in a seat with the bench in front of me with the Morse key on my right and the set in front of me and I was down under the, my head was banging underneath the table and I was sound asleep and I came, obviously because what happened when they wore off you didn’t exactly go faint but you’d used up all your energy as it were.
AS: Okay. What — so they were freely available. Were they, well they weren’t on the table like sweets but did the medical officer hand them out or —?
HR: You know I can’t remember.
AS: I’m not surprised.
HR: Let me think. When we were, when we were being briefed we were given flight rations. Glucose sweets, chewing gum. I don’t remember ever getting chocolate. I know we used to get these boiled sweets and chewing gum. Chewing gum was very useful because as you got higher so your eardrums tend to stick and if you’re chewing gum they didn’t. That was the reason for these you know, it’s [pause] And I just can’t remember about the wakey-wakey pills as we used to call them.
AS: It was certainly available to you and I mean looking –
HR: Oh yes.
AS: At your logbook here. Stettin is a nine hour flight.
HR: That’s when, as I say we took off at dusk and landed in the dawn. Out all night.
AS: So would you take them, as you say on take-off but regularly or just when the longer flights or a mix really.
HR: I have to admit I can’t remember.
AS: It’s not, it’s not surprising.
HR: You know.
AS: Yeah.
HR: I remember taking the odd one but I certainly never took them in the daytime. I know that. Never took them in the daytime. Only for night time.
AS: Okay.
HR: Because obviously in nature you sleep at night so you’re in opposition to your body’s usual clock so you had to take something to compensate to keep you awake. That’s what it, really the reason for them.
AS: There’s a lot of, a lot of notes on flak in your, in your logbook.
HR: Yeah.
AS: An ever present danger.
HR: Oh yes. The German ack-ack was extremely accurate. It was very good. That’s why we dropped these metalised strips which completely confused their radar screens. But if you were out by yourself you were dead. Absolutely a sitting duck as far as they were concerned.
AS: What was your crew or your skipper’s attitude to weaving to try and avoid the flak? Did he do it? Or did his navigator persuade him not to?
HR: No. As I say we didn’t seem to have that problem because of the Window. I can never, can never remember — I mean as I say that the last occasion I mentioned in daylight when it did. It certainly changed height. Got back in the Window stream as it were. But apart from that I don’t think so. We were more, we used to weave of course if they were, if we were being chased by a fighter which apparently obviously worked because as I say I wouldn’t be sitting here otherwise. I’ll tell you a little thing that I only thought about it in recent years. At being briefed, it might be about twenty odd crews sitting in the big room all around a big table. You know. Seven, seven husky young men and a few hours later their remains are being shovelled into one coffin.
AS: Did you — ?
HR: Didn’t know about it at the time of course. It’s only, it’s only come out recently. It’s all, it’s in here. It’s all in there.
AS: Yeah. Its perhaps a very insensitive question but did you, when you were looking around the room of twenty crews did you ever get the feeling well he’s not going to come back.
HR: Yes. It did. We wondered. You know, the chap sitting there. He might be brash and bragging about his feminine conquests or something like that, you know. Yeah. I wondered, I wondered if he’d be doing the same tomorrow night. You know. Or tomorrow morning. Did occasionally. Not, not very often. You’re too preoccupied with your own thoughts, I think. Am I going to make it somehow?
AS: Yeah. On, on those own thoughts. Although you were very close obviously as a crew did you keep them very much to yourself? Did you ever discuss in the crew these issues of survival or not?
HR: No. It was never, it was never discussed amongst ourselves. No. I suppose, well I can’t explain it really. When you’re on the ground and after raids or before it you would, you would talk about other things. Sometimes I’d talk about music because there was this Welsh flight engineer. He had a good voice. He used to like singing. And talk about Welsh music sometimes. Things like that you know. Anything but, shall we say. Yeah. I often chatted. And sometimes when you were up, when you were flying the skipper would say, ‘Cease idle chatter.’ Yeah. It didn’t happen very often though in the air.
AS: So, so is it fair to say that, as young men you, you had to fight this personal battle, internal battle as well as being on top of your training and doing your job?
HR: I can’t say I’m aware of that. I used to think of, obviously at the time when I was on ops I was married and Edna was expecting actually. You know. I’d think about her and what she would say if she got the telegram. If I didn’t come back, you know. But not a great deal. My memory doesn’t serve me all that well. I don’t remember ever being in very, in much intensive conversation. We used to go to the squadron pub called the Lion of Lamb which is now just called the village, The Village Inn it’s called in Witchford it’s called. You went in there and all sorts of silly things, silly games you know. Singing around the piano perhaps.
AS: Yeah. Your, your ops were, were quite close together. There’s not a lot of stand down time was there? At this, at this period of the war.
HR: Yeah. There was some of course. But as you can see in red and green. Any in blue would be non-operational. Sometimes we were called upon to, if an aircraft went in for a major inspection. It needed an air test and the very last trip we did together was an air test. That was in January ’45. I think you’ll see it there. Air test.
AS: Yeah. Yes. Transit Thornaby. Yeah.
HR: And the only one I ever saw again was David. The pilot. David Jenkins. I never saw any of the others again. I spoke to them. Bill Gorbon, the rear gunner, he emigrated to Canada. He died in Toronto, I think. He was living near Niagara Falls. And Bill, Bill Phillips, the flight engineer, he’s dead. As a matter of fact, it’s through him, writing to him, I’ve still got the letter somewhere that he got out, he sent a letter. It just came out of the blue really, “You may remember me. I was your flight engineer.” Et cetera et cetera. And that’s how I got in touch with the others. And he started it really. As I say two or three of them. I mean, I was told that he was dead, and that he was dead. I don’t know about, that’s Les [Algon?] the mid-under gunner. He comes from Edmonton, and Bill Ranson was from Doncaster but I never knew anything about them at all.
AS: It seems a fairly common part of of service, or at least Bomber Command life that crews were almost deliberately dispersed I think.
HR: Well, I don’t know about that. I’ve got, I’ve only got these records because they’re my friends and this is a boyhood friend of mine in Laindon. We were in the Scouts together and he was a navigator on 83 Squadron. And he had three lucky escapes. The first time — that was a raid on Stettin and the aircraft was damaged. Was fatally damaged and they ditched in the sea. And they all got in their dinghy and floating along. Suddenly one of them fell out. He stood up. And they were off the coast of Sweden and [laughs] they thought the rough seas, rough seas were coming their way. It was the breakers on the beach. So they were very lucky. And the second time they were coming, they went out on operation but they’d developed, two of the engines packed up so they had to bale out. And, but then he did a second tour and in November 1943 they were shot down over Berlin and he was killed in action. And this other one with, he was the one who gave me the dig in the ribs and said, ‘I bet that was you, his name was Peter Barnes. He was on Beauforts. We were on Beauforts together. And they were killed on their first op in a brand new Lancaster. The first, the first the first operation for the Lancaster and the first operation for them and they were shot down at Russelsheim. That’s why I keep those.
AS: Yeah, I can, I can understand that. Did you mainly have you’re your own aeroplane?
HR: Mainly yes. It survived the war. It’s HK5 78. That’s the serial number, you know. Because some of the aircraft went from squadron to squadron so they had different squadron letters. We were, as you might be able to see on there KOC. C for Charlie.
AS: Charlie. Yeah.
HR: KO was the squadron letters. Because there were three flights. Each flight, eight to ten aircraft so of course you run out of letters in the alphabet. So the Flight C had a different course, different letters. KO was A and B Flights and C Flight was A4. And in November ’44 195 squadron was reformed using C Flight. And they went off to a place called Wratting Common and then we acquired another C Flight with the letters IL. And that’s how it worked. And some squadrons did different. They would say C flight would have the letter, they would put the letter F2 or something like that. Another way of doing that. But that was number 3 Group. That was the way we did it in 3 Group. One squadron that was part of our base, 514, they put up twenty two aircraft. That was the Nuremberg raid. Only four came back. They lost eighteen aircraft. That’s how it was. Yeah.
AS: Did you ever have anything to do with the emergency landing grounds? Woodbridge or Manston or Carnaby?
HR: We knew all about them but no. No. We, as I say we only got, we only got damaged once and that was just the one engine. We knew all about them of course.
AS: Yeah. A different theme entirely if I may. When you weren’t on ops was there much training? Dinghy drills?
HR: No. The only thing that used to happen if you weren’t on ops each each aircrew trade had its own leader. So, all the wireless operators, all the air gunners, all the navigators if they weren’t on ops they had to meet up and the leader of their trade, I mean ours was called the signals leader would give you any latest information. Points to watch, you know and anything that was new and you had to go. I remember this one chap, the signals leader was a Flight Lieutenant Hartley. A very nice chap. A gentleman. But one [laughs] he had to tell him off about his language and the strange thing was about that man I had some email from a relative, “I understand you knew… his name was Marston, Sergeant.” ‘Yes, I remember Sergeant Marston because he was told about his language.’ He wasn’t the only one of course who swore but Mr Hartley didn’t like a lot of it in open. And as I say it was during one of these sessions that he said to me, ‘I’m putting you up for commission.’
AS: Going again in another direction. When you were in Bomber Command, out in the pubs or wherever or on reading the press and listening to the newsreels what sort of sense did you have of how the population thought about Bomber Command at the time?
HR: There wasn’t much to tell about that. If we, if somebody had said to them, oh think of all those civilians that were killed, you know. Hamburg was the worst. Forty two thousand people were killed in air raids in Hamburg. They talk about Dresden. Twenty seven thousand. I mean that’s bad enough. Two wrongs don’t make a right and all war is evil. Whatever people say. If anybody talks to me I say civilians were killed. Yes. But then all war is evil. But what people used to think at the time was ---— bloody good luck. They started it, you know. We remember Coventry and Rotterdam. Of course, as you know Exeter took quite a pasting. Now, I’ve got a book. Oh, it’s upstairs, called, “The Baedeker Raids.” And it’s a lot of, and there’s one [pause] now where was I at? Let me think. Is it in here? No, I don’t think so. No. Anyway, there was in the, in this book it mentions Exeter and it said Number 17 Regent’s Park took a direct hit and it wasn’t this house. It was over there. The numbers were different.
AS: Yeah.
HR: But then all the tiles were blown off. That’s why there’s a lot, there’s a lot of moss on them. Because instead of the earth with the material I’m thinking of? They’re concrete tiles and they, ‘cause the moss, a lot of moss. And somebody suggested I ought to have the roof cleaned. A number of builders came along and one of them, common sense, said, ‘Does your roof leak?’ I said, ‘No.’ He said, ‘Well leave it alone. There’s extra protection.’ I’ve never thought of that. But that’s why.
AS: Yeah.
HR: Anyway, there we are.
AS: So very much the public was, was supportive.
HR: Oh yes.
AS: Behind you during that.
HR: Absolutely. Yeah.
AS: When it was over and you went back to civilian life do you think that support changed over time as new ideas came in?
HR: Not in the current population because they were, it’s very well for the people to talk about in the piping days of peace. They’ve got to, people have no idea how people were during the war. They can only guess unless they, they’ve still got parents old enough to tell them. It’s so totally different. You can’t really reconcile the two points of view really because people thought differently. I mean some people saw their relatives blown to pieces by bombs. We know that we killed more of them then they did of us and two wrongs don’t make a right and war is evil. But there it is. That’s the war. I did, I did send a letter up once to The Express and Echo. I think it’s in one. I don’t know if it’s in there or not. I’m not sure. Talking about this and I said. Oh yeah. Talking about the Memorial. That’s right. It’s a waste. I said, ‘Never mind about your thoughts about civilians. That Memorial is to the fifty five thousand five hundred men who were killed in action. Not killed or wounded. Killed in action.’ No other, no trace of them, you know. Their graves are there to be seen. And that’s a lot of people and if you’d have told them, I mean as I say this chap when we were sitting at OTU and talking about it I thought, ‘You don’t know it mate but you’ve only got about four months to live,’ you know. You didn’t think of that. Didn’t think of it of course. We thought we’d all survive. I had some good friends. One of that crew that collided, the wireless operator, he was a Canadian named Joe Dunsford, Flying Officer Joe Dunsford. He always had a book under his arm. Never went without it, ‘Hiya Harry. Read any good books lately?’ And suddenly he wasn’t there. You know.
AS: Yeah. Did you go to the opening of the Bomber Command Memorial in Green Park?
HR: Yes.
AS: Yeah.
HR: I was in the salute area. Gina was with me. I’ve got, I’ve got photos of all that. This lot is Sunday. Last Sunday at St Paul’s Cathedral.
AS: Wow.
HR: You show me what they are and I’ll tell you what they were. Oh, that’s Mitch coming out of St Paul’s toilet. They’re four members of the Yatesbury Association, three members of the Yatesbury Association who I met there.
AS: So you all trained or did part of your training at Yatesbury Wireless School.
HR: I did my training.
AS: Yeah.
HR: They didn’t. The other three are they were all post war. That’s inside, that’s inside the City of London Guildhall where they had a reception after.
AS: And that is a large chunk of your family.
HR: That’s it, yes. That’s Lorraine who you’ve just seen. Gina. Gina, my granddaughter. My son in law and my grandson. You know, the one who’s up there. The Batchelor of Science.
AS: Why is it that aircrew always attract stunning blondes?
HR: Do you know who that is?
AS: I don’t.
HR: Have a look. It’s somebody quite famous actually.
[pause]
AS: It’s Carol Vorderman?
HR: That’s right.
AS: It is.
HR: It is.
AS: She’s had her hair blonded.
HR: That’s right. Yeah.
AS: She lives less than two miles from me.
HR: Does she?
AS: I didn’t recognise her.
HR: And there’s that one. I was wearing, I’ve got a little pin badge shaped like a Lancaster. It's in my lapel. And she explained to this city alderman, she said, ‘See. That’s the four Merlin engines on the Lancaster,’ she was saying to him.
AS: The same.
HR: The same. That’s a copy of the same one.
AS: Yeah. Fabulous. I’ll just pause that.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Harry Rossiter
Creator
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Adam Sutch
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-09-13
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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.
Format
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01:19:05 audio recording
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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ARossiterHC150913
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Air Force. Coastal Command
Description
An account of the resource
Harry Rossiter grew up in East London but his family moved to Essex which gave Harry a “ringside view” of the Battle of Britain. He volunteered as a bicycle messenger and tried to join the Royal Navy as a telegraphist. He was encouraged to join the RAF to train as a wireless operator. He was originally posted as support for 217 Squadron in Ceylon but he was later returned to England and posted to 115 Squadron at RAF Witchford. His crew survived a number of night fighter attacks while on operations. He recalls the losses on Bomber Command and his demobilisation in 1946. Harry had always had a love of music and played the trumpet and cornet in dance bands throughout the war and into civilian life.
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Julie Williams
Carolyn Emery
Spatial Coverage
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France
Germany
Great Britain
India
Pakistan
Sri Lanka
England--London
England--Cambridgeshire
Atlantic Ocean
Atlantic Ocean--Rockall Bank
Poland--Szczecin
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946
115 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
Air Gunnery School
air sea rescue
aircrew
bombing
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
Defiant
Dominie
entertainment
fear
Gee
Lancaster
memorial
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
perception of bombing war
Proctor
RAF Barrow in Furness
RAF Madley
RAF Millom
RAF Witchford
RAF Yatesbury
training
Window
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1190/11763/AWebsterJK161004.2.mp3
f9224f5c0c2f75e44c5edc90e00ebe87
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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Webster, Jack
Jack K Webster
J K Webster
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Jack Webster (Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator with 514 and 138 Squadrons.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-10-04
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Webster, JK
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
DK: Right. It’s David Kavanagh on the, I think it’s the 4th of October 2016, interviewing Jack Webster at his home. If I just put that there we’ll try and ignore it. If I keep looking down I’m just making sure it’s still going.
JW: That’s right.
DK: I’m not being rude. That’s looks ok. Ok. Could I just sort of ask first of all what you were doing immediately before the war?
JW: I was working in the Public Analyst’s Office.
DK: Right.
JW: Clerical more than anything. And it was a reserved, or it got known as a Reserved Occupation and did I want to join up or not and of course, I said no. Anyway, suddenly, when I was eighteen I suddenly changed my mind.
DK: So, what year would that have been? You were eighteen?
JW: ’25. ’42.
DK: 1942.
JW: December ’42.
DK: So, was it the immediate choice to join the Air Force then? Or —
JW: Oh yes. Yeah. I suddenly decided. The idea of flying suddenly appealed to me.
DK: Right. So, what, what did you, where did you start your training then at with the RAF?
JW: Well, I went to a selection board first.
DK: Right.
JW: At Cardington, and they offered me wireless operator air gunner. They said they’d got too many pilots. And, and they sent me to sort of deferred. Sent me back home and told me to hang on. And then in June ’43 I finally joined up.
DK: So that was a letter through the post was it that you got?
JW: Yes.
DK: From the joining office.
JW: And went to Viceroy Court, in St John’s Wood. Was there about three weeks I suppose and that was the start of the career so to speak. But I mean from there I went to ITW, Initial Training Wing at Bridlington and I can’t remember how long we were there but —
DK: What would you have been doing at the ITW?
JW: It was drill mostly. Drill and admin lessons. And then from there went on to Number 4 Radio School at RAF Madley in Herefordshire where it was more or less all day long Morse more than anything because they suddenly had done away with the air gunnery part because the Lancaster didn’t need the, they had the separate gunners so they just had a straight signaller or wireless op.
DK: Yeah.
JW: And any road I don’t know how long I was at the Radio School but I finally managed to pass out at eighteen words per minute Morse.
DK: Did you enjoy Morse code? Was it something you could do easily?
JW: I wouldn’t say I enjoyed it or it wasn’t easy. We got fed up with it in the end. I mean, I think some of them almost went crazy with it. I mean all day long the instructor would set up a creed machine and he’d sit back and read his paper while we sort of sent messages and things to each other. But anyway, I finally passed out there and got the brevet S and then I was sent to Dumfries Advanced Radio School, Advanced Flying Unit and we, that was on Ansons. They were just the pilot, navigator and the bomb, and the wireless op.
DK: Was that, would that have been the first time you had flown then?
JW: Oh no. I did flew, we flew at Radio School.
DK: Right. Ok.
JW: In, first of all in the old Dominie and I was sick the first time. And then after that we went on to Proctors. They were just the pilot and the wireless op and we had the pilots who were on, had sort of completed their tour. They were on rest period really but they were just flying I suppose and they were fed up with flying anyway. And of course, we had the trailing aerial which used to allow, there was a case of one of them tried to shoot up a plane in the led weights that went through the windows of the trains. They had a strict instruction. No shooting up the planes. But anyway, going back to, I went to Dumfries and, on Ansons and it was the wireless ops job there to reel the undercarriage up which —
DK: Oh right.
JW: By hand which was quite a job. And we flew up and down sort of the Irish Sea, over the Isle of Man and all this sort of thing. More or less more for the navigator than the wireless op because the wireless op was the same as what we were doing all the time really.
DK: Yeah.
JW: And, and then from the, we went to OTU at Chipping Warden.
DK: Can you remember which OTU it was? The number?
JW: I can’t. I don’t know if I’ve got it down in here.
DK: I can check later.
JW: I can’t think where I would have it. Oh, yeah. I have it.
[pause]
DK: That’s ok.
JW: Number 12 OTU.
DK: Number 12 OTU. Ok.
JW: At Chipping Warden. That’s it. And then from there —
DK: What type of aircraft were at the OTUs?
JW: Wellingtons. And that’s where we crewed up and I finished up with a, at the time all the rest of them were all Canadians.
DK: Right.
JW: Until we got to Heavy Conversion Unit when we picked up the pilot engineer.
DK: So how was the crewing done at the OTU? How did you meet your pilot?
JW: We just sort of walked around and I think somebody came up to me and said, ‘Have you got a crew?’ I said, ‘No.’ That was the pilot and he said, ‘Well, you know do, do you fancy joining me?’ So, I mean one was as good as another as far as I was concerned. That turned out he’d already had the two gunners, the navigator and bomb aimer. All Canadian. So, he said, ‘If you don’t mind Canadians.’ So, no. I didn’t. That didn’t worry me.
DK: Can you remember his name? Your pilot’s name.
JW: Yeah. Flight Lieutenant Elwood. Keith Elwood.
DK: And he was Canadian.
JW: Canadian. Yeah.
DK: So what did you think of the Canadians then? As you met them there.
JW: Oh, I got on alright with them there. Yeah. We always went around as a crew. Yeah. Yeah. We picked up the engineer at Heavy Conversion Unit.
DK: Right. Can you remember where the Heavy Conversion Unit was?
JW: 1668 at Bottesford. Between Grantham and Nottingham. Yeah. And —
DK: He was English, was he? The flight engineer.
JW: Yeah. He was English.
DK: So you were the two English and the rest —
JW: Two English.
DK: Were Canadian.
JW: Five were Canadians. Yeah. And, and then, and then from there we were posted to Feltwell. Yeah. RAF Feltwell which was the 514 Squadron at Cambridge.
DK: 514.
JW: And we were, we were only there for one operation and then we got posted to Tuddenham with 138 Squadron.
DK: So where, where was your first operation to with 514?
JW: That was to a synthetic oil works in the Ruhr at a place, I don’t know how you pronounce Hüls and I always remember that some of the plane, it was bombed up and had a four thousand pound cookie and fifteen five hundred pounders and it was a disappointment really. It was a GH bombing through cloud and where the pilot sort of, you fly in a rough formation and the pilot had the equipment or that, the leader had the equipment to determine when to drop that and when he opened his bomb doors you all opened yours. When he dropped his bombs you dropped yours. It was all very well until we nearly over the target then all the planes suddenly made contrails and it was like flying through cloud and after a touch you couldn’t see a thing. The navigator, I said, ‘I think they must have dropped them by now.’ So the pilot went up above the contrails and you could see and they were there. They’d turned off. So we circled around and the navigator, he said, ‘Well, we’re roughly over the target.’ So he just let them all go.
DK: So you never bombed with a GH leader then.
JW: No.
DK: You just —
JW: No. It was —
DK: And this was in daylight presumably.
JW: This was in daylight.
DK: Yeah.
JW: How I don’t know what. When we got back obviously they got interrogated. They didn’t interrogate the wireless op because there’s nothing we could see anyway, really. But what happened with them I don’t know what they, whether they said anything. Whether that was why we suddenly got posted I don’t know [laughs] but 138 Squadron had then converted from special duties. They were at Tempsford. They’d converted the special duties on to heavy bombing.
DK: So just going back a bit presumably it was at the Heavy Conversion Unit that you saw, first flew on the Lancaster was it?
JW: That was when we first flew it. Yes.
DK: So, what were your feelings about flying on that compared to the Wellington and —
JW: Well, that was, that was quite an upgrading so to speak. I mean that was a heavy bomber compared to the Wellington. And you know, everything. It seemed more spacious and yeah —
DK: So, then you’ve got on to 138 Squadron. That’s Lancasters again presumably.
JW: That was Lancasters again. Yes.
DK: And where were they based? 138.
JW: At Tuddenham. Just, we were settled at Mildenhall. In fact, I think we did have one pilot that came back with a bomb load and landed at Mildenhall by mistake instead of Tuddenham. In the night time I suppose that was easy because the two dromes, the drem lighting you know it sort of entwined one another.
DK: So when you were flying out on an operation then what, what’s your role as the wireless operator? What? What do you do when you’re —
JW: Well, the main thing is you just listen. The main thing was you had to listen in every half an hour to base and if they hadn’t got any message they would transmit a number and you had to record that number to prove that you’d heard the —
DK: Transmission.
JW: The transmission. But apart from that it was possibly the navigator might need a loop aerial bearing. Or the Group might transmit a wind, a different wind speed and if there was any recall or cancellation they would, that would come through them.
DK: So, once you got a message you would immediately tell both the pilot and navigator.
JW: If there was, yes.
DK: Yeah.
JW: Yeah. It, it was very rare to get a message. Obviously, there was no verbal messages. They were —
DK: What about your Morse Code training? Did that come in useful when you were once on operations?
JW: I didn’t really use it a lot. It’s funny that all these things you learn, you are taught, they don’t come in to use. I mean, I suppose had we got in to trouble Morse would have been handy then.
DK: What would have been your role as wireless operator then if the aircraft was in trouble?
JW: Well, to send any emergency position that we were at.
DK: Right.
JW: Or if we were coming down in the sea. But other than that there was not much you had to do.
DK: So how many operations did you fly?
JW: I only did five.
DK: Five. So, one with 514 and three with —
JW: Four with —
DK: Four with. So, five altogether.
JW: Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
JW: But the, I suppose the, the one I remember most is a daylight on Bremen. The allies were waiting. We were going to go in to Bremen and we were supposed to go and soften them up and they routed us over Wilhelmshaven. And the Met man said before, and when we took off, before we took off he said, ‘There will be ten tenths cloud so you should be alright.’ Of course, when we got over there it was clear. It was. And we were then sort of getting near the target and the rear gunner suddenly, the light came on on the intercom and the rear gunner came on. He said, ‘Oh skipper, the kite behind has been hit.’ So, I got a bit, in the astrodome to have a look just in time to see two of them baling out. I thought well this is, this is getting too close. And we’d hardly got clear of them and suddenly we got hit. Not a, it was just a thump more than anything and the pilot called up he said, ‘Everybody alright?’ Everyone was alright. He said, ‘Can anybody see anything?’ And nobody could see anything. No damage and it wasn’t until we landed that we saw the, there was a hole in the fuselage just near the elsan and the trimmer tab on the rear elevator had been got. It was gone. Of course, he knew there was something wrong because it didn’t fly quite right and there were holes under the, in the wings. Under the wings. But apart from that just after that the master bomber cancelled the operation anyway because the target was obscured with smoke and cloud so —
DK: So you never bombed then.
JW: We bombed.
DK: Oh, you had.
JW: We had bombed.
DK: Oh right. Right.
JW: Yeah. But they stopped it after. I got a, I got a report on the one there somewhere [pause – pages turning] Yeah. The raid [pause] Yeah, the raid was hampered by cloud and by smoke and dust from bombing as the raid progressed. The master bomber ordered the raid to stop after a hundred and ninety five Lancasters had bombed. The whole of numbers 1 and 4 Groups returned home without attacking. So, I found out. I got the result off the internet. That was the, oh we went to Kiel. That’s when we capsized the Admiral Scheer and the Admiral Hipper and the Emden were badly damaged.
DK: Did you manage to see the battleships down there? Or —
JW: No. It was dark. It was night.
DK: It was dark.
JW: Night. There was five hundred and ninety one Lancasters and eight Mosquitoes. There was only three Lancasters lost. And at Bremen there were six hundred and fifty one Lancasters, a hundred Halifaxes, seven hundred and sixty seven aircraft altogether.
DK: Have you got the dates of those? Can I —
JW: Yeah.
DK: So, it’s the 9th 10th of April 1945 was Kiel. And then 14th 15th of April Cuxhaven.
JW: No. That was —
DK: Oh, Potsdam. Sorry.
JW: Potsdam. Yeah.
DK: So, 14th 15th of April 1945 Potsdam.
JW: Yeah.
DK: And then 22nd April 1945 Bremen where your aircraft was damaged.
JW: Yeah.
DK: Do you remember the Potsdam raid at all?
JW: That was night time. That was very [pause] We expected it to be a lot worse than it was. But —
DK: Just outside Berlin isn’t it? Potsdam.
JW: That’s a, that’s the suburb of Berlin.
DK: Yeah. Yeah.
JW: That said that was, that was the first time Bomber Command four engine aircraft had entered the Berlin defence since March 1944. But there was only one Lancaster shot got down by a night fighter.
DK: Were you ever attacked by any —
JW: No.
DK: Aircraft.
JW: No.
DK: So just that one incident of damage. Yeah.
JW: One damage. That was the only time we, yeah.
DK: So, moving on then. Presumably you were then involved in Operation Manna.
JW: Manna. Yes.
DK: And how many operations?
JW: I only did, we only did one Manna drop because it was a job to get on. Everybody wanted to do it and some of them were lucky. Some did quite a few. But we only got the one.
DK: Can you remember whereabouts in the Netherlands you dropped the food?
JW: The Hague.
DK: It was at the Hague.
JW: At the Hague. But I think it was probably the race track. They had a big cross out on the ground. And I can always remember as we got there I sort of looked out and you could see a German soldier standing there with a rifle and people were waving sheets and things. The words of my navigator, ‘Gosh,’ he said, ‘Look at those poor bastards.’ Yeah.
DK: So how did that make you feel dropping the food to the —
JW: Oh, that was, that was good. And I mean after that we, I only did the one but in 1983 there was, in the little booklet we used to get every sort of I can’t think what it was called now. I’ve got loads of them. Oh, “Intercom.” That’s right.
DK: Right.
JW: That’s, we used to get that every so often and there was a piece in there about anybody who took part in Operation Manna, if they were interested in having a reunion to contact this chap. So, I thought, I said to my wife, ‘Oh I don’t know. I’m not going to bother.’ ‘Go on. She said, ‘You don’t, you never know.’ So anyway, I contacted him and we had a smashing time in Holland for the weekend. I got a huge piece. I know I typed it all out and on the way back we decided we would meet the following year at Droitwich and we had quite a good weekend there. And then we got invited back to Holland by the Dutch people and we went back there in ’85. Sorry, in ’83. ’85. ’89 and 2000 and gosh they wouldn’t let you pay for anything.
DK: They, they were pleased to see you were they?
JW: Oh, they were. And the first time when we went there we went in to the sort of hotel they’d booked for us and the room was full of sort of chocolates and sweets, drinks and a little thing you know, ‘Thank you for what you did.’ I mean we got more thanks from the Dutch people than we ever did from Bomber Command. It was, yeah and they had one, they actually had a reunion last year but unfortunately I wasn’t in, couldn’t go anyway. But I don’t think there were many of them left.
DK: So, were, were you involved in Exodus as well then?
JW: Yes.
DK: The picking up of the POWs.
JW: The POWs. Yeah.
DK: So, what, can you remember where you landed to pick them up?
JW: Yes. At Juvencourt. There was, we did six I think. Five or six. And brought them back twenty four at a time. And it was there that one of them from 514 Squadron crashed on take-off and they, they lost the whole lot.
DK: Oh dear.
JW: They never did know what happened. They wondered whether the prisoners moved about and upset the balance of the aircraft. They don’t know.
DK: Did you actually see the aircraft crash?
JW: No. No.
DK: Ok. Just —
JW: No.
DK: So, what was the, what was the prisoner’s reaction when they saw you and they were, you were flying them home?
JW: Oh, they were quite pleased to see, I mean it’s funny we, we had, we had to hand them out five cigarettes, a little packet of boiled sweets and a sick bag. And we, we didn’t have any parachutes then. They said it would look bad to have parachutes on when the prisoners didn’t have so we flew without parachutes.
DK: And were they mostly Army POWs?
JW: They were Army POWs. Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
JW: And some of the them were, I can remember one chap when, as we saw the cliffs at you know, the white cliffs come in to sight tears came in to his eyes. He was, he’d been away quite a while I think. But oh, they all had trophies. Helmets and bayonets and things. But —
DK: So, what, after the war is finished then what, what —
JW: The war was over. Yeah.
DK: So, what were you. What did you do immediately after that? Did you stay in the RAF for very long?
JW: Oh, they kept us on because they kept us on for what they called the Tiger Force for Japan. And it wasn’t until, well then after that we then did what they called Operation Review which was flying over different parts of the country, and different flying up and down taking photographs. It was as boring as anything. I mean, I think one of them was nine hours we had.
DK: What, what was the point of that then? Just —
JW: They were make, forming new maps I think.
DK: Oh, for map reading.
JW: I think it was. We never did really know why but that’s all we could assume. That they were making some new, new maps.
DK: So that was Operation Review.
JW: Review. Yeah.
DK: The only reason I asked you that is just literally yesterday somebody was asking me what Operation Revue was and nobody knew.
JW: Oh.
DK: You’ve answered the question.
JW: Yeah.
DK: Thank you. So you never really found out what it was for.
JW: Not what it was for. No. We saw a lot —
DK: Were all the squadrons doing this or just yourselves?
JW: No. I don’t, I honestly couldn’t say.
DK: Yeah. So, you were just flying up and down the country taking photos.
JW: Yeah. I mean it was hard on the navigator. He had to work out exactly when to turn and of course they all had to, the photographs all had to overlap.
DK: Right. I’d better tell. I’m going to tell them now what it is. Oh right. Thanks. So, so when did you actually leave the RAF then?
JW: 1947.
DK: Right. If I could just go back a stage you said that you were earmarked for Tiger Force.
JW: Yes.
DK: Going off to the Far East.
JW: Yeah.
DK: What was your feelings when the war, the war suddenly ended?
JW: Well, I suppose we, you know I think we knew. Or you could see it was going to end I think. But they wouldn’t let us go until I don’t know when. That must have been [pause] No. I can’t think. I mean, suddenly they just said, oh you’re redundant and they posted us. They posted. I got posted to [pause] God, I can never remember numbers. My memory for names now. It was RAF Molesworth. That’s it. And there was only, there was nobody in charge there. A, I think a flight sergeant. The bar was open all night. You know. It was, the Americans had left a radiogram there with one record and this one record was, “Off We Go in to The Bright Blue Yonder.” Gosh. And, and that record went and in the end somebody smashed it. But I was, I don’t know what. I was put in charge or asked to look after the cycle store. And that was a huge Nissen hut full of bicycles. And nobody wanted a bike anyway so I [laughs] —
DK: So really the, the war has ended and they really didn’t know what to do with you.
JW: They didn’t know what to do with us.
DK: So, after you’ve left the RAF what did you do then? What was your career?
JW: I went back to the Public Analyst for a very short time. I mean, the thing that, I think when I finished in the Air Force I was earning fifteen and thruppence a day which was pocket money because clothes and food was all found. And when I went back to the work I was earning five pound a week which was nothing really. But —
DK: Was your job left open for you then?
JW: Oh, yes.
DK: So, they —
JW: Yeah
DK: They had to take you back.
JW: They didn’t have to. No.
DK: Right.
JW: Because I left on my own.
DK: Oh ok.
JW: But I wasn’t there that long when I then got a job with the Norwich City Council as a rent collector. And from a rent collector I got to a housing inspector and that’s when I finished.
DK: So, looking back now, seventy odd years later how do you feel about your time in the RAF?
JW: Well. I must say I enjoyed it but when I, it’s funny at the time you don’t think about it but when I look back and I think of the times we took off. Look, every time we had a Cookie on board and a load of bombs and a full load of petrol and you then realise if anything had gone wrong on take-off that would have been the end anyway and —
DK: Did, did you think about those dangers at the time then?
JW: No. That’s what I’m saying. I didn’t.
DK: Yeah.
JW: At the time.
DK: It was full of petrol and high explosives.
JW: Yeah. I didn’t think about it at the time.
DK: Yeah.
JW: But it’s looking back now and —
DK: Do you think that’s because you obviously were a lot younger then? And —
JW: This is it. It was. Yes. Definitely.
DK: Don’t feel the dangers.
JW: And it’s the same I suppose over the target. You think it isn’t going to happen to us you know.
DK: It’s always going to happen to somebody else.
JW: Somebody else. Yeah.
DK: So how, did you stay in touch with your crew then afterwards?
JW: Well, it’s funny. I tried. I tried to contact them and I couldn’t and I, it all happened. I got, this is a long story really but I got an email from a girl whose father was at Waterbeach.
DK: Yeah.
JW: Oh, I said Feltwell. I meant Waterbeach.
DK: Ok.
JW: And she came over here with her mother. Her father had died. She came over here with her mother. Oh no. Her father hadn’t died then. She came over with her father and her mother to visit old places where he’d been and while they were here, her mother they were waiting for a train and her mother had a heart attack and died. And anyway, she then told me that she’d been in touch with several people at Waterbeach and as she heard that we’d been there did I remember her dad who had since died? But I said no. I pointed out that we were only there a short time. And anyway, she suddenly contacted me and said she had heard from a chap who was stationed at Waterbeach and he was trying to contact me. And she gave me his email address and I, I got in touch with him and he had moved from Canada to New Zealand. He’d married and moved over to New Zealand and he gave me an address, email address of someone. A museum in Canada where I might be able to contact the rest of the crew. So, I went on to this email and I couldn’t. There were pages and pages of people wanting to contact. And so I left a message. You know, “Anybody in Flight Lieutenant Elwood’s crew of 138 Squadron —” And I forgot all about it and suddenly I got an email, “I’m Flight Lieutenant Elwood’s son. Unfortunately, my dad has died.”
DK: Oh.
JW: And so —
DK: Do, do you know when he passed away? Your pilot.
JW: I don’t. No.
DK: No. No.
JW: No.
DK: Right.
JW: And at first, the pilot. The engineer had also died. I don’t know how I got in touch with his wife but no, I tried no end of times to try and get in. Even when I met Canadians over in Holland. So I left messages with them to, they were going to try and contact.
DK: You never got in contact with any of the crew then.
JW: No.
DK: No. That’s a shame.
JW: Only the navigator who —
DK: Oh right.
JW: He then, he couldn’t remember a thing about what we’d done.
DK: Oh right.
JW: He’d, he’d shut everything out.
DK: Can you remember the navigator’s name?
JW: Yes. Keith Evans.
DK: And was it Keith Evans who had gone to New Zealand then?
JW: Yes.
DK: Oh, right. Ok.
DK: Yes.
JW: And then he, it was Keith Evans who got you in touch with the Canadians.
JW: No, not Keith. Johnnie. John Evans.
DK: John Evans. So, it was John Evans who went to New Zealand.
JW: Yeah.
DK: He was the navigator.
JW: He was the navigator.
DK: It was he who put you in touch with the Canadian Museum.
JW: Yes.
DK: Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
JW: So, did he, is he still alive or —
JW: No. He’s dead.
DK: Right.
JW: He died of cancer.
DK: Right. And, and he totally blocked out everything.
JW: He blocked out everything.
DK: So you never actually met him then.
JW: No.
DK: Just emailed communications.
JW: Emailed. He couldn’t remember. He couldn’t even remember us getting hit. He’d shut out, he said right from the start he had, he was seeing a psychiatrist or something. He’d shut everything out. All he could think of was the people he might have killed.
DK: Right.
JW: And he shut everything. In fact, he said, ‘Can you tell me about the hit? When we got hit.’ So I tried to tell him on an email as best I could but he couldn’t remember anything.
DK: Did you hear from him again after that? Once you two had —
JW: Oh, we corresponded.
DK: Right.
JW: Backwards, and you know quite regularly.
DK: And did any of it come back to him do you know?
JW: No. No. It’s funny. Operation Manna did.
DK: Right.
JW: He remembered that.
DK: But the, but the actual operations over Germany he’d blocked out.
JW: He couldn’t. No. Or he didn’t know. Whether he didn’t want to I don’t but —
DK: But you say he’s since passed away.
JW: He’s, he’s since died. Yeah.
DK: Ok. I think that’s probably enough. If I stop this now. Well, thanks for that anyway.
JW: Yeah.
DK: That’s really interesting. Thanks for your time.
[recording paused]
DK: So, your crew then. Left to right. So that’s you.
JW: That’s me. He, we called him Sealevel he was so short. He was Clark. L Clark.
DK: Al Clark. Yeah. So what, what he was then?
JW: He was the bomb aimer.
DK: Bomb aimer, so and —
JW: Curly Watson. He was the engineer.
DK: So, he was the other English.
JW: Pilot. The other English chap. Yeah.
DK: Yeah. So you’ve got sergeant.
JW: The first names I don’t. Bulward. his name was Bulward, definitely.
DK: Bill Ward.
JW: Bul, Bulward.
DK: Bulward. Right.
JW: They called him Bull, I think.
DK: Right. Bulward.
JW: That’s Keith Elwood.
DK: That’s, that’s the pilot.
JW: Pilot.
DK: Yeah. And then —
JW: That’s John Evans, the navigator.
DK: Yeah.
JW: And there’s Dave Richardson the rear gunner.
DK: Right. Ok. I notice on here. You mentioned a couple of the Cook’s Tours.
JW: Oh, yes. Yes.
DK: So, what did they involve then?
JW: That was, that’s funny. I had a, I don’t know whether I’ve still got the letter. I had a letter from, oh here it is, from a woman at Downham Market. It was in the book. Have you seen the book, “Yours.” There was a letter in there from this woman that when she was in the WAAFs she flew on a, what they called a Cook’s Tour. She said, “But nobody will believe me.” So I wrote back. Wrote and told her and said that was quite right and and I got a letter to thank me.
DK: So, did you do a number of the Cook’s Tour’s?
JW: Only two.
DK: And did, was there WAAFs on board yours?
JW: No. I can’t. In fact, one of them, one of them had ATC boys.
DK: Oh right. So, and can you remember whereabouts in Germany you went to see the damage?
JW: Oh, we went to Cologne. I can’t really remember now. Actually, it didn’t sort of —
DK: Right.
JW: I I can’t remember other than Cologne. Obviously, we went. What I can remember is coming back we flew, we circled around the Eiffel tower. I said, ‘Well that’s something nobody else had done.’
DK: So, what was people, what was the, the people on board, what was the reaction when you saw the damage on the cities down there?
JW: Well, I honestly, I can’t say what they because I suppose most of them were in the, they weren’t where I was because I was sitting at the, at my place and there’s no room for anybody else there but, so they were either in the cockpit standing where the pilot, behind the pilot or in the bomb bay or even some of them had a ride in the upper turret.
DK: And were they mostly ground crew then on the Cook’s Tours?
JW: Most of them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I can’t remember any WAAFs.
DK: Right. But you were able to confirm this WAAF that written it in. She’d written a letter then.
JW: Yes.
DK: Yeah.
JW: I’ve got the, if I can find it here. That’s such a —
DK: Right.
JW: Picture. [pause] Oh you never, I don’t think you’d ever read it now. Oh, I must have thrown it away, I think. She put, “Dear Mr Webster, thank you for writing to the editors of, “Yours,” regarding the Cook’s Tours. I’ve received thirty letters from people who either went on one on the trip or verified they did take place. It brought back a lot of memories. One lady wrote to me from — ” I can’t see what it is, it’s gone. And told me there is a table in the Crown Hotel there with names of crews carved on it. I’d love to go back. I wish I had written down the names of the crew I flew with and the WAAF corporal. She passed out going over the Channel. It was quite [pause] especially when —”
[pause]
DK: Right.
JW: “When the pilot dived down at a ship. I’ve often wondered what the message was in code. I could see flashing. I also remember seeing Cologne Cathedral and Essex.”
DK: Essen.
JW: Essen. Oh yeah. Essen. I thought it was Essex. Essen. “I was posted to Bletchley Park after the trip and I was demobbed on the 11th of April ’46. I said I would never volunteer for anything again.” [laughs] Oh it goes on. It’s torn out.
DK: Does it have her name there? The lady’s name.
JW: Yours sincerely, Mrs K Dorrington.
DK: Dorrington.
JW: Queens Road, twenty. That’s from Epping in Essex.
DK: And what’s the date of the letter?
JW: 9.9.’95.
DK: Right. So, a while ago.
JW: Yeah. She was probably in a worst state than this letter you know.
DK: So you mention here Operation [Sun Bombs]. A trip to Castel Benito.
JW: Oh yes. I think that was to give us a holiday more than anything. We were there about three days. All we did was sit around the swimming pool and, well, and went swimming. And it’s funny there was a Flight Lieutenant Banbury who was in 138 Squadron and I’ll always remember he stood on the diving board and he did a dead man, you know where they [pause] I’d never seen it done before. But the funny thing is after I was demobbed I happened to see in one of the local papers that a Flight Lieutenant Banbury had been killed at Watton flying an Anson with some ground staff on board and he hit the caravan coming in to land.
DK: Oh right.
JW: To think he’d flown a Lanc and all that and got crashed off in an Anson.
DK: There’s two more operations here. You’ve got Operation Sinkum.
JW: Oh yeah. That that was just flying out over the Wash dropping a lot of the spare bombs. Old bombs.
DK: And then Operation Spasm.
JW: Yeah. That was a trip to Berlin.
DK: Oh right.
JW: The first ones that went they were lucky. They took cigarettes and bought them for marks and they came back and they could change as many marks as they liked. When we went we could only change back to marks what we’d changed. Took out.
DK: Right.
JW: Yeah.
DK: Can you remember where you landed in Berlin?
JW: Yeah. What was the name of it?
DK: Was it Templehof, was it?
JW: Temple. I think it was.
DK: Yeah.
JW: Yeah. That’s the only one I can —
DK: So, you flew to Templehof and landed.
JW: Landed.
DK: In a Lancaster.
JW: In Lancs. Yeah.
DK: Oh right. And so what, what did you think of Berlin now the war’s ended and you’ve landed there in the centre of the city?
JW: I can’t remember much. We saw the Reichstag. We went to the Olympic Stadium. But apart from that I, I know I went in somebody’s bedroom. The chap, I was after stockings and he took me in to this, his wife was still in bed and he fished under the pillow and came out with these nylons for cigarettes. But —
DK: Was Berlin damaged? Was it?
JW: Well, it was what we saw of it. Yeah.
DK: And you didn’t see any Russians there or anyone or anybody else.
JW: No.
DK: So you were just in the British Sector.
JW: Just in the British Sector. Yeah.
DK: And was there many Lancasters on this trip to Berlin then to land there or, can you remember?
JW: Well, not from my squadron there wasn’t.
DK: No.
JW: I don’t know whether. I suppose other people, I don’t know if other people went there.
DK: Ok. Well, I’ll stop that. Thanks again. I’ll stop and turn it off.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Interview with Jack Webster
Creator
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David Kavanagh
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-10-04
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AWebsterJK161004
Conforms To
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Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Format
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00:48:28 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Jack Webster applied to join the RAF in December 1942 and attended a selection board at RAF Cardington, and was eventually called up in June 1943. After initial training he went to 4 Radio School at RAF Madley passing out from there with eighteen words per minute on Morse Code. From RAF Dumfries Advanced Flying Unit flying in Dominies and Proctors he was posted to 12 OTU Chipping Warden where he crewed up with a Canadian crew, his pilot Flt Lt. Keith Elwood. After completing their heavy conversion on to Lancasters at RAF Bottesford, they were posted to 514 Sqn at RAF Feltwell where they completed one sortie to a synthetic oil installation at Huls. He and his crew were then posted to 138 Squadron at RAF Tuddenham and carried out a further four sorties with them. He and his crew also took part in Operation Manna and Operation Exodus. He left the RAF in 1947.
Temporal Coverage
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1942-12
1944
1945
Spatial Coverage
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Germany
Great Britain
Netherlands
England--Herefordshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Norfolk
England--Northamptonshire
England--Suffolk
Scotland--Dumfries and Galloway
Contributor
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Julie Williams
12 OTU
138 Squadron
1668 HCU
514 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
bombing
Cook’s tour
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Initial Training Wing
Lancaster
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Bottesford
RAF Chipping Warden
RAF Dumfries
RAF Feltwell
RAF Madley
RAF Tuddenham
training
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1238/16152/AMartinEJ181202.2.mp3
dcc21034e9fc49c0be47fc6c89fc524f
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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Martin, John
Ernest John Martin
E J Martin
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Ernest 'John' Martin (b. 1922, 1469537 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator, was shot down and became a prisoner of war.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-12-02
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Martin, EJ
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
GC: Ok, ok. Hello, my name’s Gary Clark, I’m at the home of John Martin to interview John for the oral history digital archive for the International Bomber Command Centre, and hello John.
JM: Hello.
GC: And, welcome to your interview, and can we start with your date of birth and where you came from?
JM: The date of birth is the 16th of June 19- 1922, which makes me ninety-six.
GC: And, so what made you think to join the RAF?
JM: Well, in my youth very, very few people could fly or could afford to fly, aircraft were very few on the ground and this came, I'm sorry to say not as a- The idea of getting at the Germans, I joined up with the idea- I could see an opportunity to fly [emphasis], which I did of course. So, that was the- I must be honest, that was the main reason but, I'm always glad I joined the RAF because it’s a great experience, you meet so many people from different parts of the world, so I enjoyed that and valued that part just as much as being able to fly. So, that was it [chuckles].
GC: So, how old were you when you?
JM: I was nineteen when I volunteered, yes, and I was in what was a reserved occupation then, and if you’re interested in this bit, so I could get into- I never imagined myself- I'd only had an ordinary elementary education, I never imagined myself being accepted for aircrew and flying and pilot or anything, navigator. So, I thought, well an armourer you’d be quite close to the aircraft and I volunteered as an armourer [emphasis] and I went to the recruiting centre, passed the medical, everything was going well, and suddenly somebody came up and said, ‘Mr Martin, I'm sorry we can’t accept you, you’re in a reserved occupation’, I packed up again [laughs]. So, I didn’t get in as an armourer but then I knew that if you could get into aircrew, any occupation you might be have- Might be in then was ignored and aircrew took priority. So, very gingerly- Well the- There used to be advertisements in the local, in all papers, national papers and everything wanting people for aircrew, but it always stated at the bottom of the advertisement that a secondary education is essential, or words to that effect, and of course I'd had elementary education so that was me out all the time, and then I noticed after- Well probably a year [emphasis] I would think, they dropped that bit about the secondary education so I volunteered for it, and I got accepted. No, prior to actually volunteering I knew my maths were not good enough and that but luckily, I had this friend who’d had a better education than I, he was keen to get into aircrew, so he coaxed me along up to a better standard and off I went to volunteer and to my surprise- Oh there’s a wireless operator you see, I thought that’s not aiming too high and I was interested in wireless you see, and I thought that’s a very interesting job to be in. Anyway, I went before the selection board as a potential wireless operator, and if you could imagine a row of six group captains and they hardly knee[?] it and they’re sitting there nodding to each other like this, and I thought I'm never going to get through this. To my surprise at the end of the interview they said, ‘Well, Mr Martin we think you’ll make a very good pilot and we’re going to enlist you as pilot’. Which I did, I was over the moon about that of course, you know. Anyway, I was called up- Put on deferred service for some months and then called up, report to St Johns Wood in London and went through all the procedures and you get tuition in morse code and maths, and the interesting bit of it is a lot of the lectures and tuition takes part in a building of Lords Cricket Ground. In fact, it’s the [emphasis] room I think, where the committee sits and I presume drink whisky and watch the match going on, and this is where we sat, and on the wall at one end there’s a picture of W. G. Grace looking down on us [chuckles] and I really thought I'd gone up in the world then, you know, and we had- Used to use a lot of the zoo, the London Zoo buildings for things. Anyway, this went on, having more tuition in maths and sitting in the classroom there then, this (I forget who he was) a flight lieutenant or something came in and said, ‘Right, all you lot are bomb aimers’ [laughs] just like that, no- And it turned out in the end we learned that there was a great shortage of bomb aimers so they were going to use all the recruits in that purpose and I did find out at a later date, whether it was in force when I joined or not, but they never recruited people as pilots or bomb aimers or navigators, they were PNB’s so they could be used for any position in the crew you see. So, anyway, I don’t know where I found the courage but I spoke up for myself then, I said, ‘Look, I wanted to be a wireless operator, you told me I was a pilot and now you say I'm a bomb aimer, I'm not too- I’d like to go on- Carry on to be a wireless operator’. Oh, he didn’t know about that, he said, ‘I’ll let you know about that later’. Anyway, he came back in a couple of hours into the classroom and said, ‘Yes, that’s alright, you can go on as a wireless operator’. So, packed up in London and went off to Blackpool then, where you do elementary things like morse and semaphore, semaphore and drill, foot drill and all of that on the promenade, yeah.
GC: Square bashing was it?
JM: Square bashing yeah, and then you go off to a signal school that specialises in signals and I went to Yatesbury in Wiltshire, No. 2 signal school I think that, and then in those days wireless operators were not taken directly onto the next stage of training, they were put out to get a bit of experience as a ground wireless operator, and believe it or not I was sent to a mustang squadron [chuckles] which is an army co-operation squadron and they didn’t have a morse key on the station and the only thing to with signals really was that I had to fill in a book for a dispatch rider to take off up to London to say- To state the service ability of the aircraft on the squadron. But it was very, very interesting on that squadron, and the commander, the squadron leader commander, I've never known a person like him before or since [phone rings]. Yeah, and as I say it was very enjoyable because the CO was a very down to earth man, he called a spade a spade and that was it and he told you what he thought of you or- And he was very easy to get on with. In fact, the- When I did the second day I was there, the flight sergeant who I was working under said, ‘The old man wants to see you’, oh, so went off, timidly got to his office and tapped on the door and he bellowed, ‘Come in’, and he’s on the telephone when I get in there so I’m standing there rigidly to attention, and he said, [mouthing and motioning to sit down] he means me to sit down in a chair, and actually I looked around to see if somebody had come in behind me, you know, no it was me [emphasis] who got to sit in the chair, never heard of anything like that before. Next thing you know, he’s- A cigarette packet, ‘Cigarette?’ [laughs]. It was a shock if anything, you know, to come across this, that such a person was running this squadron, and that was his way of going on all the time, you know, and he called most people by their Christian names and, and he was a fine man to be under but quite- Never met anybody before or since like him [chuckles] and what they were- Would of done of course, they would’ve been preparing for the invasion I suppose, you know, they were an army co-operation squadron and they used to set off from, from the airfield with, oh several lorries carrying their own runways in a roll and when they came back after probably ten days they all looked like a load of tramps [chuckles], not had a shave or anything it was, you know, really a rough bunch, and- Apparently where they were there was a NAAFI van which the- Only the other ranks were allowed to use, anybody but- Up to a corporal you can use the NAAFI, but there’s the poor officers and that they got nothing, but the CO he gets onto one of the guys, ‘Here, give us your greatcoat’, put on his greatcoat and went in the NAAFI [laughs]. You can- You know, I never met a man before or since [chuckles] like him, it’s just how he went on. But it was grand and then- Anyway, my posting came through to continue with the air operating wireless course, and he got me in the office, he says, ‘Look here’, he said, ‘Do you really want to do this? Bloody dangerous this Bomber Command lark’ he says, and I said, ‘Yes, I think I would’, ‘You sure?’ he said, ‘I can get you off, you can stop here with me if you like?’. I said, ‘No, I think I like’, ‘Well, alright, well good luck to you, best of luck to you’, and off I went, and you go then to the, to the next signal school where you do- Start off with the ground duties but then you convert to air operating, starting off on an aircraft which is- Which we called the de Havilland Domni- Dominie, and it was in- Had a civilian life of a de Havilland Rapide. What it was, was a seven-seater airliner which they used to use to go to the Channel Isles and that sort of- Short trips like, and it was rigged out so that there were five pupil wireless operators and one instructor and you took off and flew fairly locally for a while, keeping in communication on the wireless from- In the aircraft, doing everything they tell you, air comms, set exercises you see, and then when you get a bit more advanced you go on longer trips and a bit higher to start taking loop bearings on the loop aerial, and then when you completed that successfully, got through that, you go on flying solo on your own on these little aircrafts, Percival Proctor they were called, and to our delight they were fitted out for the civilians, you know, had the lovely head lining in and the seats were all leather and all that they did, they took one of the front seats out of the aircraft and I sat on the back seat and my equipment was in front of me either side of the pilot. That was very, very nice but the problem is that the pilots who were flying these Proctors, quite a portion of them were fighter pilots and some of them had been in the Battle of Britain and they were as mad as hatters [chuckles]. They would be doing all sorts of twists and turns and there you are with a- Your log book strapped to your knee, with a pencil in your hand and one minute you’re trying to force the pencil off the paper because they’re climbing so rapidly, and the next minute they’re diving so hard you can’t get the pencil down to the paper, and here’s the morse signal still going on of course, which you’re supposed to be taking down and that, and- But the thing was that if you complained about them you’d probably get far worse next time. But luckily there were some quite nice pilots on there and especially stuck in my mind was two officers of the Royal Indian Air Force, and they were still wearing their turbans, they had special earphones and they were real [emphasis] gentlemen, you know, and when you come down, they say, ‘Did I do that well, for you? I didn’t-’, yes and you know, real gentlemen they were. Anyway, got through that, quite alright. I say after the struggle with these mad pilots and then the next stage of training, went off to a place on the Welsh coast, not far from Bridgend to do what they call an emergency gunnery course, but it doesn’t entail any flying at all, it’s a ground-based flying, two Brownings on a- Mounted on a pedestal and that’s the only- And that was all was necessary really because when you get up into the four-engine bombers you don’t go near the guns anyway. So, it was only an emergency course, and then, the end of that this is when your presented with your wings, which is a great occasion of course. I can always remember the old group captain, I think I can imagine they kept him locked away somewhere and when it came to the wings presentation, they got him out and he comes along with, ‘Oh congratulations my boy, congratulations’, he gets to me and says, ‘Congratulations old boy’, phew [emphasis] and these great whisky fumes [chuckles] all over me, and his uniform was more green then blue he’d had it that long, but there’s a nice old boy, did the job well. And then you go off to- From there when all that is completed, we went off further up the Welsh coast near to Caernarfon, which is now Caernarfon airport I think, but you do what you call, advanced flying training and we were equipped with Ansons, Avro Ansons there which is a very nice aircraft to fly in and it was known as the flying glasshouse because great big Perspex canopy, and it was used in the early days of the war by the, by the Navy- In co-operation with the navy, coastal command, looking for U-Boats, that’s a submarine, and it would’ve been a very good aircraft but, the problem of course it was very slow, and- But it was very nice aircraft to fly in and we did some wonderful flying from there, going up the west coast of the country, over the isle of Anglesey, quite close to the Isle of Man and you could see all- And you had a map in front of you as well and you could pick out all these little tiny islands, and some of them were so small they were just a grass patch, no houses, and sometimes you could see who I presume was the farmer rowing across the [chuckles]. Oh, and the weather of course was extremely great, it was in June 1943, and it couldn’t have been more ideal flying if you’d have paid thousands of pounds to do it, and during that time you get your first experience of night flying. That was a bit of a scare to start with [chuckles], nobody told me that you can see the exhaust gases burning flying past and I thought it was a fighter [emphasis] on our tail [chuckles] but no, it’s the sparks coming off the two engines. You get used to that and then when you, when you finished that course you feel fairly competent then, and the next step is off to Operational Training Unit, and we went to a very nice station called Cottesmore in the- Rutland, Rutlandshire, and it was what you call a peacetime station, built between the wars and you had all the mod-cons there, very comfortable but in fact we, the trainees were billeted in a country house about a couple of miles away, or less, perhaps only a mile, but we were taken each way by bus, didn’t have to walk or anything, lived like gentlemen we did, and that was very interesting. But then, suddenly, ‘You’re all gonna be moved’. ‘You’re all going to be moved’, and there was a rumour that the Americans were going to come to Cottesmore and we thought, oh fancy giving it to them, you know, and we went to a brand-new airfield called Husbands Bosworth, that was in- On the borders of Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, and- To complete the Operational Training Unit course, and this of course, you really get down your flying operational aircraft or, and you’re really getting down to business, and you do (with the whole crew)- Start off by doing what they call circuits and bumps, that’s taking off and landing, taking off and landing, taking off and landing. But, one problem about that is, that the airfield was nowhere near complete in its construction and the pilot had to watch out for lorries [chuckles] and one chap actually took about three feet off the end of his wing tip on a GPO engineers' lorry, you know. Very difficult it was, but there you are it happened [unclear] then- And the CO of course, of the station, would be under pressure to get going, ‘Come on get it going’, and all that. He couldn’t say, ‘Well give it a rest’ or anything, and so it went, and you, you do things like drop bombs from there, and all the while you’re doing wireless exercises which are done in co-ordination with the rest of the- But everybody’s learning then, the pilot, the navigator, the gunners. You’re all learning but all learning your own bit.
GC: So how did you- What was it like being crewed together then? How did you crew up?
JM: Ah yes now should’ve mentioned that. At Cottesmore, you’re all brought together in a room, and believe it or not there’s tea and biscuits on hand, and you sit down at these little tables and get talking and move about if you want to, and the idea is that you form a crew entirely on your own bat. Nobody guides you or orders you or anything, and I saw this very strong nice looking chap, bit older than us and I thought he looks nice and steady and I went up to him and said, ‘Do you want a wireless operator?’, ‘Yes, yes’, and he’d already got navigator and a bomb aimer and thing, so it was just a matter of getting a rear gunner, which we did, a very good one, Dick Walton[?], and that’s how we formed up, and that’s the most informal thing I've ever know I should think [chuckles]. Now, I was talking to- Or rather, in correspondence, with a modern fighter jet pilot and he said, ‘Yes, that was the fine idea, but it’s not allowed anymore ‘cause they thought it- You got too familiar with each other’. So, although they’ve only got a crew of two, they change every so often. I suppose, they must’ve found this an advantage, but in those days, we got together ourselves and did everything together really, and, and that’s how it went, and as I say you’re doing things which get more and more advanced, your exercises that you do, and you finish up with a quite a long cross-country trip and then in those days, from that station we were converted to what was the, the main airfield. We were a satellite of a larger airfield and we were transferred to there to complete our training, still on the Wellingtons but, doing more advanced and much longer cross-countries, probably six, seven hours perhaps some of them, you finish up with that is, and then, the next thing to do- That’s all been done on Wellingtons but the poor Wellington had been pushed out by now and it was four-engine bombers. So, you were then sent off to what they call the conversion unit, that was to fly. And we had the advantage there which didn’t last much after we did it, of flying all three of the heavy bombers, the Stirling, Halifax and Lancaster, and each had their qualities. The old Stirling was the most comfortable and spacious. The only thing of course is that, you couldn’t fly very high which wasn’t very good on operations. The Halifax was quite a good aircraft to fly in and you were on two levels, which was quite- Something never experienced before, the pilot and the engineer are on a higher level, navigator, wireless operator, down on the lower level, but very comfortable aircraft to fly in. And, then of course the Lancaster, and before we finished the, what they call a conversion course, it became quite obvious that they wanted all the Lancasters on the squadron, and we were engaged taking Lancasters to a squadron and bringing back their Stirling or Halifax- No they kept- Never Halifax, always Stirlings [unclear], flying the Stirlings back, and I learnt afterwards that that’s what the only aircraft they had on the conversion unit, they didn’t get a chance to fly Lancasters because Harris, our boss, butcher Harris as we called him, he was a very hard man and thank goodness he was, because he was one of the few that really got on with the war, and he wanted every Lancaster on a squadron, bombing Germany. For some- I’d learnt from somewhere, that he got a bit of a grudge against the Halifax, and I don’t know why, if he fell out with the manufacturers or what, but he was all for the Lancaster, that was the thing and- So we finished up on Lancasters and went to a Lancaster squadron, number 166, and that’s where you learn what you let yourself in for, because that’s when you start to see, ‘Well he didn’t get back last night’, ‘No he didn’t, no’. There was a chart in the CO’s office and we were all called in there to start with and, I'm looking at this chart and at the end of- There’s a great list of names there of the crews that are there, not there but had been there, and at the end of one or two of them there was a star [emphasis] and I said, said to the CO, ‘I suppose sir, they didn’t get back, they got shot down?’, ‘No [emphasis] they’ve finished their tour’ [chuckles]. Which was a bit of a shaker, you know, and that’s how it was actually but, we only managed to be on our third before this fighter got us. Each time to Berlin we went. But of course, you don’t get used to going to Berlin because you go a different way each time and come back a different way, and in any case when you’re up at twenty-thousand feet there’s no sign posts or say, ‘Oh yes, we turn right here’, or anything like that, you’re all- You’re depending entirely on your navigator and you do get one or two markers on the way that are dropped by the pathfinders just in front of you. But if you’re not pretty well where you should be, you wouldn’t see the markers anyway so, there you are. So, the navigator had to be pretty well up on it, and the first time we went to Berlin, I didn’t know it at the time, but we were in the very first wave, and when we got there, there was nothing going on at all, and I switched over to the intercom because most of the time of course, the wireless operator is not listening to- His listening to his own wireless signal. Switched over to the intercom to hear the skipper saying to the navigator, ‘Are you sure we’re there Jock?’, and Jock saying, ‘Yes I'm sure we are Jimmy, we are, we are’. Jimmy said, ‘Well we must be early, we’ll have to do a dog-leg’, and just as he said that, the flak opened up and you could hear everybody in the aircraft go [gasps], like that. Terrible sight, and you just think you will never [emphasis] get through that, you know.
GC: Are you aware of the other planes around you?
JM: Oh yes, very much so and you can see them getting shot down which isn’t- Doesn’t add to your [chuckles] morale very much, and you realise that some of them never stand a chance of getting out, probably being hit by an anti-aircraft shell and just explode straight away. But, anyway on this third trip we were just very nearly up to the target and I was still switched off the intercom, listening to what we called then was tinselling and it was- What you were tasked with was listening out on the receiver, you’re given a frequency band at briefing and you keep switching over this band and you’re trying to pick up enemy ground to air, or air to ground patter and what you can do then is, once you know the frequency, you can tune in your own transmitter to that frequency and there’s a microphone in one of the engines and as you press the key, the noise of that engine would be sent over the frequency, much to the annoyance of the Germans on the ground and in the air, you see.
GC: So, you’re jamming them in a sort-
JM: Jamming of it, yeah, yeah. So that’s what you were doing a lot of the time, but I don’t know if this was just a squadron thing or whether it was accepted throughout Bomber Command but they said, ‘You can, with a long stretch reach back to twiddle the knobs on the receiver and at the same time look out at the astrodome, helping the gunners looking for fighters’, you see, and I was doing this right and the every so often, twice an hour, you get what you called a group broadcast that’s coming through for No 1 Group, and that’s very important that you get that because there’s no telling what might be on it. But mainly it’s telling you what winds have been found by the pathfinders just in front of you, which you immediately give to the navigator because he wants that for his flight plan. Anyway, I look back at the clock and its ten-past eight, I thought oh time to get that broadcast so I swung round very quickly and I didn’t have time to readjust the set and these canon shells came flying past my arm and I was smothered in green crystals or burning- Something burning from the shells exploding. I was sparkling with green, and I realise later how lucky I was, they must’ve just ripped past my arm. Well, I know they did ‘cause I saw them, and anyway I knew then it was time to get on- Switch back to the intercom and I switched back to the intercom to hear immediately the skipper saying, ‘Bail out, bail out’, because he knew the aircraft had been that badly hit, you see, it was hopeless, and the navigator and I (he sat just in front of me), we stowed our parachutes side by side on the other side of the aircraft. We were just like one man grabbing our chutes and clipping them on. All you wear while you’re flying, of course is a harness but you can’t wear the parachute pack because you were- Be too obstructive to any work you’re doing, so you stow your pack separately, making sure you know where it is of course, and off we went to try to bail out. Now, you’ve got a strict drill to follow, which you’re always told from when you first start on Lancasters and I was supposed to open the rear door of the cockpit, go down the fuselage and out of the back door with the mid-upper gunner, and as soon as I opened the door, the flames [emphasis] I could see and it appeared the whole fuselage was burning fiercely. But even so I could look through them a bit and see Bob Brown the mid-upper gunner climbing out of his turret, but the turret itself was right keeled over to one side, it must’ve caught a lot of the heavy canon shells I should think, and-But there was Bob Brown climbing out of it. So, I thought he’d have a good chance of getting out. So, my first thought was slam this door shut again to keep the flames back and I thought, what I'll do, I'll follow the rest of the crew out through their escape hatch in the nose, and the bomb aimer would go first, so he should do because he’s laying over it, and then would be the navigator and then the pilot and then the engineer, I think that was the order. But you had to stick to the order that you went on. And, I thought, well, what do I do, you know, well I can’t barge in on them. So, by that time I knew the aircraft was in a very steep dive, so I thought well there’s something I can do and I went and struggled forward, got in the pilot seat, tried- The idea, try to pull the aircraft out of the dive, but as soon as I touched the stick I knew it was useless, it was flopping about, I think the controls had been cut down in the fuselage, so I couldn’t do that, and I thought well I'm going to die now, and I was certain I was going to die. So, I went back and sat in my seat, and then in all the panic I remembered that I- On my desk at one side you’ve got two buttons and if you press them simultaneously it blows up the IFF set down in the fuselage which is a means of identifying whether something coming up behind you is a friend or foe, and also of course when you’re coming back or going out the, the ground crew at- The ground people want to know who you are. So, that was what that was for, but of course I didn’t want it falling into the hands of the enemy. So, you got strict orders, I pressed the two buttons and blow it up but, of course in my panic I'd forgotten to do this [chuckles], but I did do it when I came back, whether it was still there to blow up or whether it had been blown away I don’t know. But I thought this is it I'm going, because the aircraft by then was almost standing on its nose I should think, and- The next thing I remember was this huge red flash, but no- I didn’t- I don’t remember any noise in the explosion, and the next thing I knew I was spinning over and over in the air and seeing this great piece of fuselage go flying past me, it was that close, I'm very lucky that it didn’t hit me, and then the parachute opened, but I can’t remember pulling it myself. I rather think that what happened that, as I was being blown out the D-ring on the pack got caught in a piece of the wreckage which pulled it and just like- Out I went. But anyway, we were flying at about twenty-thousand feet when we were first attacked, but when I got enough sense to look down now that the parachute having opened, I think there was no more than a thousand-feet, very close [chuckles] and looking down I think, I'm going to go straight in that canal. I thought it looked just like a canal, the long straight thing. I thought, well that’s alright I don’t mind where I drop [chuckles]. But as it- Well I found out later it was a main road, and it was wet, so from above it would look like a canal. But I landed in this, it was like semi-rural area and I landed in this small field but I didn’t have enough sense to get myself off the ground, I was being dragged along by the parachute and it was quite some time before I thought I’ve got to stand up and collapse the thing, you know, which I did eventually and managed to uncouple it, and I lay there for some time thinking how badly I'd been hurt, I knew I'd been hurt, my head and my knees and arms, pretty painful. But then I thought come on, go on, you’ve got to get away from here because we get no end of instruction what to do, get as far away from the scene of the crash as possible and you might stand a chance of evading, and I've got that in my mind, I thought I've got to get rid of this parachute for starts and I could see a straw stack or a hay stack, so I thought that’s the place, put it in there. But of course, I learnt later that must’ve been obvious to the Germans where I'd put it as well [chuckles]. But anyway, I staggered along, hardly knowing where I was going, next thing I knew I'd gone onto this main road and straight away two soldiers there with fixed bayonets and rifles got you. So, you know that-
GC: So, you got caught then?
JM: Took me across the road to their- And I think what it was, there was a searchlight unit because when I got inside this hut thing, they- I could see they were Luftwaffe personnel, they weren’t army, they were Luftwaffe and under German rules all things like anti-aircraft guns and searchlight are controlled by the Luftwaffe aren’t they, not the army, as we were in Britain like. So, anyway, the good thing was they were very kind to me really, and they immediately sent off for a medical sergeant and he came and he was a nice old boy he was and spent a lot of time, and I couldn’t think what he kept pressing my leg for, and I know now what he- He was seeing if I'd got any flak buried in my legs you see, I'm sure that’s what he was trying to do. But, anyway, he gave me quite a lot of time and attention, and he bandaged my head up in paper bandages, and he said, you know, more or less told me I was- Would be alright, and then they- The rest of them told me that in a little while I'd be taken to their headquarters, and in the meanwhile I thought I'd got some coins in my pocket and that’s forbidden, you shouldn’t take any money with you when you’re flying, and I thought I’ll get rid of this, so I gave it away as souvenirs [chuckles] and they were very grateful to receive them you see. So, then I was carted off in a car to the, what I presume was the headquarters of these searchlight units, and I was taken upstairs into a, quite a large room and there sat a sergeant and to my surprise he was holding my parachute [chuckles], I presume it was mine, he tossed it over and motioned to me to put it on the floor and lay down in front of him, and he sat at the desk with his pistol on the thing there listening to this wireless that’s playing very German regimental music, all night long, and he said, ‘You mustn’t move’, and that. So, then next morning I was taken off downstairs again to a hut, somewhere outside this building which I presume was the living quarters of some of these people, and they were quite kind to me and I was surprised how many of those could speak English, and one of them I spoke to- Speaking to, he says, ‘Where did you, where did you live?’, and I thought, should I tell him this? You know, and I thought no it can’t do any harm, I said, ‘Well, you know the Wembley Stadium?’, ‘Jah, Jah, Jah’, said, ‘Near there’, ‘Near Wembley Stadium [emphasis]?’, ‘I played football there as a youth’ [chuckles]. Yeah, so quite easy to get on with but- And they even gave me a midday meal but I couldn’t eat it, you know, perhaps it was the shock and concussion and all that and it wasn’t very appetising, but they were getting stuck into it and when they asked me, ‘Aren’t you going to eat that?’ and I said, ‘No’, well they were all in and, you know, they soon finished it off [chuckles] because I learned later that their rations weren’t very good either, the ordinary- I think the front line troops were treated very well but they went down in stages, the quality and quantity, till they got down to what they call garrison troops and they were the people who’d be guarding us you see, and they didn’t get very much, well I don’t know about much but their fare wasn’t very good, bit of old German sausage which they called wurst I think, and couple of slices of black bread, you know. But anyway, I was kept there and they told me that very soon I'd be collected and taken in to Berlin, and we weren’t very far out of course now. Anyway, they ushered me out and there’s this great long Mercedes there, the longest Mercedes and poshest Mercedes I’d ever seen. There were these two smart Luftwaffe guys in the front, sitting there, but in the back was David [emphasis] the engineer, head bandaged up like this and he were grinning, grinning and laughing his head off at seeing me coming out, I'm [chuckles] stumbling and that. Anyway, I was let in and the, the chap, the officer in the passenger seat he immediately whips out his pistol and said, ‘You two know each other?’, and, ‘No, no, we don’t know each other, no, it’s another Englishman, you know’, and he seemed to accept that, but we knew from- We used to get a lot of lectures from intelligence, you know, and you tell them as little as possible. I mean if they knew we were in the same crew that would be helpful to them, and we were always warned about the interrogation we were going to get. Anyway, we were taken off in this car to Tempelhof airfield, which was like a small airfield more or less in the centre of Berlin, I think, and we were put down in the cellar and before long we were joined with some more RAF aircrew, obviously been shot down that night and they looked a bit knocked about like us I think, and we were told that we’d be there for a while, then we knew we were going off to a place called Dulag Luft. We’d heard a lot about Dulag Luft from our intelligence and this is where they interrogated every allied airman. You all went there for this interrogation, and- But we set off by train, a passenger train and we sat there like lords in the passenger- But the sergeant in charge of the party, he warned us, he said, ‘Now, whatever you do, make yourself’, in his own words, ‘Make yourself as scarce as possible, be as inconspicuous as possible’, he said, ‘Because the civilian population are very hostile towards allied airmen’. So, we understood this and we kept as quiet as we could. Anyway, we arrived at, where's Düsseldor- I’m trying to think of the town that Dulag Luft was attached to-
GC: It was- I’m not sure.
JM: I’ll tell you later when I think of it. Anyway, we get to our destination and we’re waiting on the platform for some transport to take us to Dulag Luft from the rail station to Dulag Luft, and ooh anyway while we were waiting there, there was a plate layer working on the line, he gets up his hammer and takes a swing at one of our chaps and this of course drew the attention to all the crowds on the platform as to who we were, and they started to come forward en masse and, luckily this sergeant in charge of the party, that was escorting us- [whispering in background].
GC: Frankfurt?
JM: Yeah. Yes, the crowds on the platform they realised who we were, allied gangsters as they called us, gangsters we were and they surged towards us en masse and it’s very, very frightening but, luckily- I don’t know if it had happened before to this sergeant who was in charge of us, but he immediately pushed us up against the wall and formed a D round us with his troops and they raised their automatic weapons and they made it quite clear even to our English ears that if they came to (this crowd that were coming), if they came any closer, he would open fire, you know, and there was a bit of a hesitation there, but eventually all grumbling and mumbling they split up and went away. But I shall always be extremely grateful to that sergeant, the way he handled that situation. As I say, whether it had happened to him before, but he certainly did it right, and did it in quick thinking. Anyway, from, from Frankfurt station, believe it or not, we went to the Dulag Luft interrogation centre by tram car [emphasis], which seemed a bit odd but when you think about it, it’s very efficient, we were the only ones on the tram and we got on the tram just outside the station and it put us down, right outside Dulag Luft, and as we went into the place, you go up the first insight into what you’re going to get there, the- As you approach it, you were obviously going into the main door and we could see that one of the windows had been deliberately broken and it had been stuffed up with the foil that we used to drop on bombing raids, that fooled radar and it had the code name of Window, and they pushed it in there and what they were saying is, ‘We know what you call this stuff and you thought it was a secret didn’t you?’ you know, and that’s your first touch of psychology you might say [unclear]. Anyway, we were moved into the main hall and then almost immediately we were split up into individuals and I was marched out between two or three Luftwaffe airmen, taken into a room where I was made to strip out entirely, no consideration to any injuries that I've got, you know, get stripped out and they got my clothes and immediately in the- In our battle dress blouse, around the waistband at the back where you had sewn in the back (we knew it was there ‘cause we) like a passport type photograph and with great gesture and that, they got their knives and cut that out, you know, ‘We know where to look for that’, you know. Trying to demoralise you all the time, you see, and then you also- One of your buttons on your battle dress has got a magnetic dot on it so it would act as a compass and they, ‘Oh there it is’, and cut that off, you know. They were being as psychologically cruel to you as they possibly could, you know, and then they did things like light a cigarette and blow the smoke in your face as though to say, ‘We Germans have got everything’, you see, you know?
GC: Yeah.
JM: And, we had been warned about this sort of thing so it was a bit of help, but then we- The last thing that they did, we were issued just- Not long before I was shot down with some long john underpants and they were made of pure silk and wool and they were very good for keeping the cold out, well more on the airfield because I didn’t need them really where I was in the Lancaster it was too hot, but on the North Lincolnshire airfield, unofficially we were wearing them all the time, not just for flying duties, you know, and they were holding these up as if to say, ‘These old fashioned things we modern Germans, you know, don’t wear those anymore’, you know. In other words, they were, as I say, humiliating you as much as they possibly could. Anyway, they must have a button somewhere and they pressed this button and in came two guards with bayonets- Rifles and bayonets, took me off down what seemed to be endless corridors in to a little tiny cell, and there’s a bed in there, probably no more then- Well if it was two feet wide that was as much as it was, and there wasn’t much room at the side to get into it, so the cell must of been very small in width, and down the end was a very small window, very high up in there, and I was pushed into there and the door [claps] slammed and you knew you were inside then, and there was few dirty old blankets on the, on the bed, but we had to get on the bed ‘cause there was nowhere else to go, there was no standing space. So, anyway I was listening to what was going on up and down and I knew that I had nobody in the cells at the side of me, I was entirely on my own and it was quite, quite demoralising that was, you know, because you’ve got to remember that in an aircrew, you’re working with people all the time and it doesn’t do your morale much good to be shut away on your own, you see-
GC: By now you’d have been-
JM: And they probably knew this, you see, the Germans, yeah.
GC: And you’d have been worried about your crew members as well, wouldn’t you?
JM: Yeah, yeah and- Anyway, I was shut in there and later on in the day they brought me two slices of black bread, which I just couldn’t eat and some Ersatz coffee, which I couldn’t drink. Well, I just had a couple of sips of it but, anyway, that was the food I got that day, then the next morning I got what would be their breakfast, which was the same again, a little steel mug of coffee and a couple of black slices of bread which I had to have a nibble at, but I couldn’t finish them all and that’s how it went on for the, about the first day and a half. But then, they come and collected me out of the cell to take me to be interrogated, and this is where I stepped into real trouble because- I gotta go back to the squadron now that- We do the ops we’re on, we hadn’t been briefed but the washing facilities on the headquarters group of this dispersed airfield were much better than on the living site, so I thought, oh chance to go wash here, so I stripped out and had a good wash, came away, left my identity tag hanging on a hook. So, this chap starts to interrogate me, and hinting straight away that I wasn’t an airman at all, I was an agent dropped for espionage purposes, you know, and he suddenly- I said, ‘Well, you know, I’ve got my uniform”- uniform yeah, ‘You were wearing no identity tags’, and of course it- Well I knew, I’d missed them just before take-off, but I knew there was no time to do anything about it, and of course, I didn’t know I was going to get shot down but, I never realised the significance of them, I thought they would accept the uniform and that would be it. But he kept on about it, you know, and, ‘Right, well tell me who the crew are’, and then he gets on to that, he said, ‘You don’t even- Don’t seem to belong to a crew either’, you know, and he took that line about me being a, an agent rather than an airman, and I was dismissed back to the cell to think about a bit, you know. I came back- He had me back the next day, taking up the same line, you know, asking me different questions and he was on- I said, ‘Well, I’ve got uniform on, you know’, he said, ‘I can go and buy those in Paris in the black market, as many as I like so that means nothing’, you know, and I thought well, that’s it, so I felt really hopeless and he kept me there- No he didn’t, yes. Then he let me go back to the cell, yeah, and the next morning I was once again ushered out, into the corridor and I knew I was going to interrogation once again which I was dreading. But, although I didn’t realise it, I was being led in a different direction and I encountered quite a different person there, and he more or less greeted me and said how we’re both wireless people, ‘Technicians’, he said, ‘So we understand each other, don’t we?’, you know, ‘Yes’ [chuckles]. And then he was talking about different thing- Then he suddenly says, ‘Were you carrying fishpond?’, and this shook me rigid because only two or three days before being shot down, all wireless operators had been summoned to the operations room, to be introduced to a new piece of equipment that we’re going, going to be fitting soon to the squadron. Absolutely [emphasis] top dead secret. Its code name was fishpond.
GC: How did he know?
JM: Yeah, and of course this really shook me rigid, you know, and I was thinking what I was going to say, but he- I didn’t have to think up an excuse, he said, ‘Come with me’, and he led me off into another room, and there he gave me my second demonstration of fishpond, because it was all set up there working. So, this shook me but he didn’t dwell on it too long and next thing I know, I'm back to the cell, you know, and I thought that’s a funny thing, you know, nobody’s supposed to know about that, and then I was back to this first man again, was still saying that I was- Obviously I was a case for the Gestapo, and he couldn’t deal with me and then he suddenly whips around and says- Questioned, say, ‘Right, tell me your crew, tell me about your crew’, and of course, I knew- Didn’t- Couldn’t- Knew I didn’t- Mustn’t tell him about that, because it would link me with them and link me to a squadron, but it’s very difficult when you’re actually facing it. But the main [emphasis] thing I think you feel more than anything, it’s the isolation. The whole time you’re isolated as a prisoner, whereas when you’re in the aircraft- In an aircrew, you’re mixing with other people all day and everyday sort of thing, and you notice that, you feel that very much, and how much on your own you are. Anyway, I went back again two or three times to this first man and on one occasion, he said, ‘Right, if you’re aircrew as you say you are, tell me where you were trained?’, and of course I knew I couldn’t tell him that, and another boy said, ‘You no need to think you’re telling me anything’, he said, ‘Look in there’, and he tossed this great thick book towards me, and I opened it up, and, he urged me to, he went, ‘Look at it, look at it’. I opened it up, and I could see it was in alphabetical order, there’s a list of all RAF establishments and what units were stationed there, what squadrons there were, and I thought, well what do I do about this? But luckily his telephone rang and he was answering that telephone and it seemed that the telephone call was more important than dealing with me, so unbeknown to me he must have a little button at the side of his chair, pressed that and the guards came and took me away again. So, I thought that got me out of that [chuckles] one, you know. And then, next time I went back again to the wireless man and he was asking me questions that I knew I mustn’t answer, but he wasn’t very persistent, he wasn’t the bullying type, he was more friendly than anything, which once again we’d been warned about, the friendly attitude, and- Then again, at least another two times, I went back to the man who I’d now- I now called the espionage man, and he said, finally- All the while on the desk he’d got this file, and he must’ve been a wonderful actor because he got me frightened to death and he’d look at this file and then eventually close it, said, ‘Right, this is now, is [emphasis] a matter for the Gestapo’, you know, and off I went to the cell, think, well this is it. Then that afternoon I was feeling, you know, what they gonna do with me, but, that afternoon there was this terrible feeling in the cell that the whole building was shaking and all the air was being drawn out of the cell, and I couldn’t think what it was really, but then it came to me then. What it was, was the- When the Americans bomb, they do what they call carpet bombing, and they fly in formation and the bomb leader- The leader opens his bomb doors and once the rest of them- And they let the bombs go in one go and it has a terrible effect. We saw the results of this actually going through the streets of Frankfurt. Not just individual buildings that had been bombed, vast areas [emphasis] and it had just been bulldozed just to get the road clear, and the rest of the area was just a load of rubble, you know and- Anyway, I had to put up with that, that was very frightening, and- Another thing was, that came to me at that time, that the intelligence people back on the squadron, all the while during training were talking about Dulag Luft and they said, ‘If they keep you there more than ten days, watch out, you’re either telling them- You might’ve told you something or they think you’re going to’, and this was day nine [emphasis] I think, and I thought I don’t know, don’t think I've told them anything, and the last words, the last interview was with who I call the- The man who threatened me with the Gestapo, he closed this book and said, ‘Right, that’s it you’re off to Gestapo’. So, the next time the guards stopped outside the door, I thought that’s where I'm going, and I went off between these two guards, could hardly feel my legs [chuckles] I was so frightened, I thought well I’m off now to the Gestapo, and when I got a bit further along, we came to this door and it appeared to be going to the outside and I thought, it’s even worse, they’re gonna shoot me now, I'm going to the firing squad now, you know. Anyway, they opened this door, and there’s a big crowd of the lads in there, all laughing and joking and smoking cigarettes. I was released then, and oh what a relief, and then next thing you think is David the engineer who went down, got out with me, coming out grinning all over his face, head bandaged up. So, that was the end of Dulag Luft, and that afternoon, that very afternoon, we were marched off- No not marched- Taken in lorries to what would’ve been a marshalling yard I would think, on the rail, it wasn’t a passenger station, and we were loaded onto these trocks, and once again we were- We could recall and identify them as being for prisoners because before being shot down- Looking at the news reels at the cinemas in, in- Back in Britain, we often saw these Jews being loaded into these cattle trucks, being prodded in and then exactly what it was like, all barbed wire around the thing, you know, and I thought, that’s it. Anyway, we got in there and it wasn’t too bad, there was- Wasn’t room to lay down, but we could sit with our backs against the wall, and the guards had the centre section where the doors were, so no chance of getting out of there, they occupied that, and off we went in this, in this trock after about a half an hours wait, and we didn’t know where we were going to of course, but we knew we were- Kept stopping with the train, each time we thought well this is it, this is where we’re getting out. But, no, we realised later we were being pushed into a siding, to allow other trains to come by, and we also knew that we were going in the direction of the Russian front, because the train going in out of action were loaded with things like lorries and field guns, the trains coming in the opposite direction to us were loaded with wounded, wounded soldiers, all bandaged up and some you could see looking through the windows on stretchers, they looked- You know, a terrible sight really, although they were the enemy, they [chuckles]- We still had a little sympathy for them, and- Anyway, that’s what we did, kept stopping in sidings. Eventually, we got to where we were going to, this Stalag right up in North- East Prussia, right, to the North of East Prussia, and we were- Not a very long march from the train, but certainly well under guard and marched into there, and then we were put in a compound and there were only us few English or British chaps, there were Empire people in there, there were Canadians of course, Australians and that. All the rest were Americans. We had to mix in with them, but they were alright, we got on with them fine really, and the funny thing like I put in my book, that our idea of Americans we got from the films that we saw in the cinemas, and we knew that they were all rich, they went out in big cars, took their girlfriends out to big slap-up dinners and all that, and they hailed a taxi just by doing that and run there. Of course, we knew about the cowboys and all that, but we realised these were just ordinary people like us, you know, they had an ordinary job and earnt an ordinary living doing it, so they were very much like us. But we learnt a bit about the American Air Force and that, and of course they’d all- Most of them had come out of liberators, or B-29’s, you know. As I say, we got on fine with them, we played their ball games with them, but what we couldn’t understand is the way they tried to barrack the striker while he’s waiting for the ball to be delivered, and they’re all shouting insults and telling him to hit it when he shouldn’t hit it and all that. Couldn’t understand that, because, thought nothing like our cricket is it, you know [laughs]. But we got on with them quite well, and then suddenly for no reason known to us- Well it was probably because there were more and more Americans coming in, that the British and Colonial Empire people were moved out of that compound into another compound, where the- They were all British or Australian or Canadian in there. But we understood them more, they were in the same air force as we were, and what we did notice straight away was much more organisation there, and the next thing we realise is a man comes into the hut, all dressed up smart, collar and tie, all that thing, and he’s got the BBC news bulletin reading to us, which is wonderful really. They were much, you know, they’d been in the- Most of them had been in the bag two or three years or, perhaps some of them more. In fact, there was one man there, and he was shot down on September the 4th, 1939, that’s one day after the war, and there was another man who’d been in there that long, or nearly that long, and he was actually- Let me try and explain how they ran the aircrews then. You had the navigator and pilot, they were together all the time, but the gunners and the wireless operator were not included in the crew, they were in their own ground trades and then when there was operating, they would be called in to crew up and go off on a raid. And this particular man, he was living out in civilian accommodation with his wife and children and as usual, he sets off to work and he’s a fitter by trade, but he hadn’t been on the job many minutes before he was called in for briefing, and off he went and was shot down. So, he went off to work in the morning, leaving his wife and children, and she didn’t see him again for-
GC: Five years, maybe?
JM: Five years [chuckles]. Yeah, laughable now but, no. But, anyway, we joined up with them and actually in our hut, there were people from my squadron and of course we could yarn[?] a bit about that, and then came the thought of being overrun by the Russians, who were- Because remember, we’re out in the North-East part of Germany, quite close to the Russian front, and we could hear the guns getting louder and louder, and we thought the Germans were just going to clear off and leave us. No, no chance about that, they collected us all together, went off, although it was a hurried exit, it was very well organised, no panic whatsoever. But, when they came to our compound, K, they sort of split it down the middle and the line of huts opposite to us, which included our navigator- Our engineer, Dave, he was in there, they were taken off and we were left there for the time being, and they- Those that went out with that patch, they had a terrible time they did. They were off to the, off to the coast of the Baltic from there which wasn’t very far, and there they were put on this old ship, an old merchant ship that was- Used to carry coal, and they were rammed down into the holds, down a little narrow ladder, and there was hardly room to- Hardly space to put your feet. Of course, I didn’t know about this, I had to learn all this from David when I met up with him later, and also there is a book telling you all about it, which I've read and learnt a lot from that. But they were rammed down into this. No water, no sanitation, anything, and they set off sailing, and somebody found that there was an E-Boat following them, and they thought what’s going to happen, they’re gonna get out there, they’re going to take the crew off and sink us, you know. Also, known to the- ‘Cause they’re all RAF, but it was a great mine raid area, a lot RAF mine laying in that area, so every time they hit something, bit of flotsam, they thought that’s it, you know, had all this to put up with until they landed eventually in a port further down the coast, where they were taken off there, put into some railway trucks, but never- They weren’t driven off, they had to stop there all night. Once again, hardly any water, hardly any room to move. But in the- Next morning, they realised that the guards that had taken them on the ship and that, had gone, and in their place were these young Kreigsmarine people (be the equivalent of the Hitler youth) and they were the most arrogant people they could- And they were each armed with a bayonet, and they were sharpening these bayonets in front of the prisoners, letting them see they were going to use them, you know. Anyway, they set off from out of these trocks on a march, and there was a great big German officer leading the march and he was so tall and spritely, they couldn’t keep up with him marching, they had to run, and there were these young Kreigsmarine guys, anytime that anybody dropped behind a bit, they’d slash ‘em with these bayonets. Most terrible, and I mean, what a miracle and I’ve only just dodged this for being on the right side of the compound, and they were taken off to a new [emphasis] camp, new prison camp, and they were treated pretty badly all the while I think there. But, as I say luckily, I wasn’t on it but- Now, with us, we were- We went right off to Poland, long train ride and we landed up in a place called, where was it? Anyway, this Polish- Small Polish town, and we were marched from there to the prison camp, and it was really better off than in the old camp, much more room to move about, but of course, no more to eat, starvation was always apparent, and we learned that it had been used previously as a Polish officers training camp, and the Germans were still using part of it for training purposes. But we were allowed out, almost until it got dark, and we had much further to walk around in, seemed a lot better you see, no more food of course, but and it- Of course it was getting much warmer by then, after the cold weather up in the Baltic, and, you know, reasonably well. But, then of course it wasn’t long before we could hear the Russian guns to the East of us, but we didn’t think we were going to get liberated then, we’d learned our lesson from the previous camp, and sure enough they gathered us up and off we went back to the train from there, and up- Back up into Germany itself again to just North of- Can’t quite think of the name of the-
GC: That’s alright.
JM: Way up into, into- More towards the North at Hannover, thirty miles to the North of Hannover, and we were there and the food got scarcer and scarcer then, but the lucky thing was that we could see much more air activity going on, but of course, what we were waiting for was the army to come along and liberate us, but- The Red Cross parcels which were- Had been our life saver because we were certainly slowly starved to death under the German rations, but we weren’t well fed at all, including the Red Cross parcels, but they did stop us from actually dying of hunger, and they became more scarce because even the commandant said, ‘when we put a barge onto the river or the canal, it’s shot off, if we put a train onto the rail road, it’s shot off, if we put a ship in the port, it’s bombed, what can we do?’ But that was good news, but that didn’t help us [chuckles] much and- Anyway we, we thought, you know, we were getting near and then of course, D-Day came along, which was a great booster to us, and we heard about that over the secret- No we didn’t. The Germans themselves posted that up on a notice in the camp, and the wording of it was, was something like this, ‘At last the allies have delivered themselves to us. Now we will apply a pincer movement and those that are not wiped out will be driven back into the sea’, and we didn’t want to hear the rest of the thing. For us, the allies had landed and that was it. But the- We were still getting the British news bulletin through the secret radio and from what we heard from that, yes, they’d landed and they were pushing across fine, hardly any opposition at all, you know. But, when we- Well it would’ve been two years, eighteen months later anyway before we got the truth that they were having a terrible battle once they’d landed to gain any ground at all, and the German forces were very much amassed down there. But we weren’t told this on the news, they were- According to them we were making great strides, you know, and we began to think, well, where are they [chuckles]?
GC: Yeah, that’s the propaganda I suppose?
JM: Yeah, yeah, and- Anyway, this went on for long enough and yes, they did gain- Took over- Took the whole of France for instance, and the Russians of course were advancing from the East, and we were making headway in Holland and Belgium. But then came the winter of 1944 and instead of coming forward in Belgium, they- According to the reports we were getting off the radio, they were being driven back. Very demoralising. But, anyway, we were getting hungrier and hungrier by then. We wondered if we’d ever, ever survive. But, eventually, we were- The forces did catch up with us and the first we knew of them, was one single British tank came up near to the camp, blew a farm house to pieces and then turned round and went back again [chuckles]. But within about two days, there was an armoured car came right into the camp, from the seventh Royal Irish Hussars, and the poor guys inside, they couldn’t get out because of the crowds around them cheering and waving but- Took them [chuckles] probably half-an-hour to get out of the front, they were showering us with bars of chocolate and some bread, and tins of bully beef and that sort of thing, and- Which of course, we all pounced upon, and then it was some time, some hours before anymore armoured cars came up but we weren’t- We couldn’t think what to expect when the front came up to us. The only guidance we had was what happened in World War One, when we imagine there were thousands of troops with fixed bayonets would come forward and fighting every inch of the way but, these guys were arriving, they were clean [emphasis], admitted, they got tin hats on but they marked us welcome off the barrack square [emphasis], you know, all clean uniforms and- Of course they all got a small arm or something with them, wasn’t what we expected at all, and then some more heavier forces came up-
GC: So, when the- When they came forward then in the armoured truck, where were the German guards, had they, had they gone had they?
JM: They’d gone then, yeah. Well- I’ve got to tell you a bit. Just before they got to us, they took most of the camp out, but it was my idea, my idea actually, I don’t know how I thought of it. We concealed ourselves in an empty hut, so we were left in the camp.
GC: I see.
JM: You see, but they took everybody else out. Now, that was a stroke of luck, because almost the first night- The first day after they were taken out the camp, they were strafed by our own Typhoon aircraft, with rockets, fire and machine guns and there was no end of them killed from our hut [emphasis]. So- But what happened was, and as I say I’ve got this idea of concealing ourselves in an empty hut and let them take them out, and we would perhaps be able to wait until the forces came up. But- Actually, what happened, before any forces came up- Came onto us, any, caught up with us, they were forced to bring these prisoners back and this is where we- When we learnt, and how we learnt what happened to them, and there were several in our hut who were dead, killed, you know. So, we had- Did do a lot of good by not going out with the rest of them. But, then of course we were all there, no food or anything, but I did manage to find a few rotten potatoes which I shared out amongst our group, but then I became terribly ill, I was sick and- Terrible temperature, and I put it down to these rotten potatoes, and I really felt like dying, I didn’t care what was going on outside, I was in that bed, with as many coats and blankets I could get over me, and then somebody come back and said- Somebody came in to the hut and said, ‘The British medical officer’s come back’, to get me out there and see him, you know, and I thought, well I don’t know, I might as well die, you know, but then I thought, well it’s my only chance and I got up. When I got to his surgery, there’s a great long queue and all the time I was having to go off with diarrhoea, you know, but luckily all the rest of the queue were doing the same thing [chuckles] so, so you eventually got to see the MO and he said, he said, ‘No, it’s not- Nothing to do with that food’ he said, ‘You’ve got dysentery’. He said, ‘There’s a lot of it about and unfortunately there’s nothing I can do for you really’, but he said, ‘Take these two white tablets’, and an orderly came out and gave me two tablets and he said, ‘What you’ve got to do is get back to your bed, keep as warm as you possibly can, and that’s all I can say for you’. Which I did, went back there, and it was at that time when these other cars came in so. I don’t think I went down to see the first one, I was feeling too, too ill, you know, but things improved. I got better, a lot better after that, I suppose it’s when you start getting some food.
GC: Yeah.
JM: And then came the news that they were going- Started to take us home, take us out, and we’d already decided amongst ourselves in the prison camp that those who’d been prisoners the longest would be the first to go, and that system was followed right through. But, when I went, I was feeling quite comfortable, got plenty of food, I'd got over the dysentery, had plenty of food and we could go out and about. But, there was one thing there that we thought we were going to cop it again, they- One of the regiments, I think it was one of the guards regiment, bought up their band [emphasis] in the back of a lorry, and they set up there, all their instruments in the back of the lorry and they were playing this wonderful music to us, and suddenly [imitates firing] machine gun bullets everywhere, they- We scattered in all directions but the band, they seemed to go in an orderly manner under their lorry, as I said, perhaps they were used to it, but we weren’t [chuckles] and- But I don’t know whether we were the actual target or what, but anyway, as soon as it was done, the band were back up onto the- Back on the lorry playing away but we didn’t start listening for a while after that [laughs]. We were too scared, but it was a very good gesture, you know, and then what happened when they started- When my turn came, we were driven through on a lorry, army lorries, to an airport, way over to the West, it was called Diepholz, the place, and it had obviously seen a lot of war because the whole of the airfield was- Well, you could see where there’s been craters filled in, they had either been severely bombed or artillery fire creating all- But it’d all been filled in and the airfield was back in operation again, so. We were in- Put into army tents, which wasn’t too bad at all and, next morning they started to take us off in these Dakotas, and- But we thought because we, we- Thought we weren’t gonna get away that day, we thought gonna have to wait a longer day. Oh, must tell you one thing. As we were going on this journey, we came to a river, big river, I think it was the Elbe, and the bridge across it had been destroyed and the army had put a pontoon bridge there, and these army lorries that we’re in, they stood that high, terrific height off the ground, and as we drove onto the first pontoon it healed [emphasis] over to one side, and there we were looking at the river [chuckles] we thought, we’re going to drop into there, but took a bit of getting used to and you were certainly happy to get to the other, the other side [chuckles]. But that was on the way to the airfield, as I say we got there and they laid on a good meal for us there, and they got these tents ready for us to sleep in, and the next morning as I say they started to take us back, but we were told that we would be- Have to wait until the morning, but then they came again and said, ‘One of the Dakota crews has volunteered to do another trip because the weather’s so good and they can do it’, so off we went, that night. No, it was still light, afternoon then when we set off, and we flew westwards of course from there and, in this- These camps that we went to, we joined up with the army, in fact there were more army prisoners than RAF, but the thing was, that these army prisoners, none of them had flown [emphasis] at all in an aircraft, you know, they had been fighting in the desert and Italy and that, and they were quite strange to an aircraft so. But anyway, we got in this Dakota which was- We could see it’d been fitted out to drop paratroops actually, and they got flying along there and then the cockpit door opens and this guy comes out, handing out sweets and chocolates and the man sitting next to me in a really terrified voice, he said, ‘Who was that? Was that the pilot?’, and I had to tell him, I said, ‘Well, it’s probably a second pilot or’, I said, ‘He’s perhaps gone onto automatic for a bit’. But he was really frightened this guy, you know [chuckles]. Anyway, we approached Britain from the North Sea of course, but then he must’ve done- Whether he was ordered to do that, or whether he did it on his own back, he must’ve turned to the South quite a bit, and brought the aircraft up flying straight at the white cliffs of Dover.
GC: Could you see that then?
JM: And he got, got one of his crew to make sure we were all looking out through the cockpit window and these white cliffs of Dover came up and he went straight over the top of the-
GC: How did you feel at that time?
JM: Oh, oh, bit tight in the throat, you know, and we went off to an airfield in Buckinghamshire, called Wing, and we were met there by WAAFs, Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, took us and lead us back to this reception area where there was tea and cakes waiting and then there was a quick medical examination. That was a funny bit as well. Imagine these people, with some of them had been in prison camp for five, five years, they’d never seen a woman, well only if they’d seen one, it would be in the far distance, and when we came they’d set up this emergency medical centre and it consisted of about six cubicles of- Done up with sacking or something like that, just temporary things, and- But one of them was staffed by a lady doctor [emphasis] and we found this out, I'd just been called into one of them and as I went to go through this door, the door sprung open further up and this chap came tearing out, being followed by a lady doctor saying, ‘Don’t be so damned ridiculous’ [chuckles]. But I thought to myself afterwards, well, it wasn’t very well thought out that was it, you know? I mean they didn’t have many lady doctors anyway, but I thought [laughs] and- Anyway, we all went through that and they did a good check on us and, and then we, we went off then, I think they must’ve split the army then from the air force personnel ‘cause we went on a train straight to RAF Cosford and we were all very well received there. We came off the train and unusually the train at Cosford is very near to the main entrance of the camp, you had hardly any distance to walk and we got into this- Well a dormitory I suppose it was ‘cause you gotta remember in those days RAF Cosford was the main RAF hospital for the whole of Great Britain, you see, and- So we were taken into this what I suppose was a ward and then into a bathroom, where, oh I- We put out whatever we were carrying in this ward and then we were lead off to a bathroom and there was a bath, full of water at just the right temperature, there were big white towels waiting there for us, oh absolute luxury. We dived into these baths and wallowed about in there, and then we- When we’d had this bath we came out and they showed us where we were going to sleep, and there were the beds laid out with lovely clean, white sheets and they turned back ready to get into, there’s pyjamas laying on the top of the bed, well we couldn’t believe it, and I think that was the best nights sleep I ever had. But the funny thing happened the next morning, in my early days, I think it was the first signal school I went to, there was a flight sergeant there, he wasn’t a technical man at all, he’s there purely for discipline and he was a right swine, you know. If he- I think his objective was is to have every one of you on a charge before you left, you know, and he was being shouting and hollering all the time, you know. Anyway, I woke up next morning from this wonderful sleep in this wonderful bed to be handed a lovely mug of hot tea, and who’s [emphasis] giving it to me but this flight sergeant [laughs].
GC: Oh, incredible.
JM: And I couldn’t help saying to him, ‘I’ve seen you before’, and told him where it was. No, I didn’t tell him where it- I said, ‘I’ve seen you but, where it was’, and I said, ‘I can’t remember which one it was but it was in a signal school’, and then he said, ‘Yatesbury’, and then he said, ‘I think I remember you too’, and he said the date of when I was there, you know, got it all in his- He had nothing else to think about I suppose [chuckles]. Anyway, that was a very rewarding to me, you know, it was like a revenge if you like, but he spoke very, very friendly, you know, the old flight sergeant had gone, you know, he was on this new job of receiving prisoners back. But, anyway, they then had- We had more medicals then at Cosford and we were fitted out with all new uniforms, well battle dress and we were even given- Asked us where we wanted to go, and the found out the times of the trains and every- They couldn’t’ve done any more for us, and it was actually on May the 2nd, I think, when we were [unclear] and according to air force rules and regulations, summer begins on the May the 1st, so there was no greatcoat for us, but the weather had changed completely and it started to snow and these people more or less said [unclear] to the rules and they went and found these greatcoats, and we were very glad of them too, to go out and- Next thing, there we are, we’re out standing on the platform going home, and, wonderful, and then I must tell you about a wonderful coincidence that, Adelaide my wife, course I'd met her years before because I was- Did my OTU course at an airfield quite close to her village, but that didn’t come into it really because she herself was in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, she was stationed down in Gloucestershire, but we met because she went to the local dance and that’s where we met, and we kept in touch, well when I moved away of course to different places, we kept in touch and I saw her three or four times I suppose after- Before being shot down. But I didn’t know what had happened, or anything, she could’ve gone off with somebody else or something, you know, but when I got to my sister's house where I intended to go, because my parents had moved away from London then. Thank goodness they did because of the flying bombs and rockets and that. They’d moved into Huntingdonshire, and I sort of- Well, I didn’t- I did go there on leave a little bit, but for the seven day leave I only spent about two days there and I wanted to get back into London where the- You couldn’t say the bright lights in those days ‘cause there weren’t many but, the life then, the London life, yeah, and- So, I decided that’s the place I'm gonna make for, from Cosford, I’ll go to my sister's house, which was quite close to where we used to live actually, and I could see there was a lot more damage been done around there and I knocked on the door and I was very apprehensive, I thought, well, anything could’ve happened, you know, I thought they could’ve been killed or moved or something like that. Anyway, a few seconds went by and my sister opened the door, and shouts, ‘He’s home, he’s home’.
GC: Wow.
JM: And why she shouted that was, unbeknown to me there was a family reunion being arranged at her house, ‘cause they knew I was-
GC: You were back?
JM: Free, yeah. They didn’t know when I was coming home actually, and they had arranged this reunion and also quite by coincidence, Adelaide, or Ann as I used to call her in those days, that was her name in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, she had been on leave, but on her way, she decided to call and see my sister, and she was there too.
GC: Wow.
JM: [Chuckles] Wow, it was unbelievable the coincidence, you know. But then, she was due back then, she had spent most of her leave and I think she had one or two days to go. So, we said between us, ‘Shall we see if you can get some more leave?’. So, every quick communication then, there was- You wouldn’t be able to telephone in those days, sent a telegram off to her CO, could she have a further forty-eight hours leave. Next day, the answer was back, ‘Take seven [emphasis] days compassionate leave, plus forty-eight'.
GC: Wow.
JM: We had a lovely time together, you know, and it was really very nice. But I think that’s as far as we’ll go, I'm back in England.
GC: You’re back in England, yeah, and that’s a good place to finish yeah?
JM: Yeah, and- But we were very- For the whole of the way, from the RAF point of view we were treated very well indeed and we had a very good rehabilitation course, a month or so, six weeks after we came home and we had a nice long leave and we- Everybody did everything they could for us, you know, very good. But then I went back working for them then [chuckles] at Cranwell, but that was quite enjoyable really, we- Adelaide and I were married then, and we managed to get to living out accommodation which was extremely rare, or scarce that any is going spare and especially in an establishment like Cranwell, there were thousands of people there and there was quite a number of them were seeking rooms so that they could get their wives up there. But I was lucky, working on my section was this old guy and he was an ex-merchant navy wireless operator really, and he knew everybody I should think on this vast camp of Cranwell, I think he knew everybody from the air commodore downwards, you know, he could speak to anybody, he was also the station band master. But he, knew somebody who knew somebody, who got some rooms to let and he- And I used to work with him, you see, so [unclear] and he said, ‘I think I've found you somewhere’. So, we- And it worked very successful. Adelaide got on very well with the landlady and we could go- Got plenty of spare time at Cranwell and we could go off every weekend and we went to- All worked out very well. And then the day came when I was demobilised [chuckles] yeah. End of story.
GC: Yeah, well that’s great. Thank you very much John, and-
JM: No, it was good.
GC: It’s been a pleasure, thank you.
JM: Ah [chuckles].
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 John Martin
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gary Clarke
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-12-02
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AMartinEJ181202
Conforms To
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Pending review
Format
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01:42:47 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
John Martin was born in June 1922 and lived in London. He always wanted the opportunity to fly and so at the age of 19 volunteered to join the Royal Air Force as an armourer. He was not accepted as he was in a reserved occupation. Eventually he reapplied as aircrew and was accepted as a wireless operator. He describes his signals training at RAF Yatesbury, involving flying in Dominies and Proctors. June 1943 saw him undertake advanced flying training with 14 Operational Training Unit at RAF Cottesmore and then RAF Husbands Bosworth flying Wellingtons. He completed conversion to Lancaster bombers before being posted to 166 Squadron. January 1944 saw him flying an operation to Berlin, where his aircraft was shot down. He describes how he had to get out of the burning aircraft before parachuting in to a field where he was captured. Initially he was taken to Dulag Luft near Frankfurt, where he was interrogated and believed to be a spy as he had no identification tags with him. Eventually imprisoned in a prisoner of war camp in North Prussia. As the Russian forces advanced, John was moved to another camp in Poland, and then again to one north of Hanover. Here the prisoners heard about the D-Day landings in June 1944.
Allied troops arrived and repatriation to the United Kingdom was carried out by C-47 aircraft. On arrival in England, he and other returning men were taken to RAF Cosford where they were given baths, clean beds and new uniforms. Rehabilitation courses were provided, and John served at RAF Cranwell until he was demobbed.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Wiltshire
England--Leicestershire
England--Rutland
England--Lincolnshire
Germany
Germany--Oberursel
Germany--Berlin
Poland
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Diepholz
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-06
1944-01
1944-06
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Nick Cornwell-Smith
Tilly Foster
Jean Massie
14 OTU
166 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
bale out
bomb aimer
bombing
C-47
Dominie
Dulag Luft
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Operational Training Unit
prisoner of war
Proctor
RAF Cosford
RAF Cottesmore
RAF Cranwell
RAF Husbands Bosworth
RAF Yatesbury
shot down
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/303/17187/LWhiteR3006061v1.2.pdf
944a1b8b6e073930d6db9eb058f1ee6f
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
White, Roy
Roy McPherson White
Roy M White
Roy White
R M White
R White
Description
An account of the resource
Eight items. An oral history interview with Roy McPherson White (1925 - 2018, 3006061 Royal Air Force), his log book, Service and Release Book, and five photographs. He joined the RAF in 1943 and after training, served as a wireless operator until 1947.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Roy White and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-09-01
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
White, RM
Requires
A related resource that is required by the described resource to support its function, delivery, or coherence.
Stationed at RAF Yatesbury (No.2 Radio School),
RAF Aqir (No. 76 Operational Training Unit and No. 26 Anti-Aircraft Cooperation Unit), RAF Abu Sueir (1675 Heavy Conversion Unit),
RAF Khormaksar (Aden Communication Flight).
Aircraft in which flown: Proctor, Dominie, Wellington X, Liberator VI, Baltimore, Ventura, Albacore, Beechcraft, Mosquito, Anson.
Roy White was born in Perth, Scotland in 1925. He lived in Scotland until the age of nine, before moving to London, after he received a scholarship to the London Choir. Roy performed with the choir at the 1937 Coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth.
Roy left school at fifteen and went to work in the fabric trade at 16, he joined the ATC as a Volunteer Reserve, before joining the RAF in 1943 at the age of 18.
Roy recalls going to Lords Cricket Ground on the “Hallowed Turf” to join up. Roy was accommodated in some near by flats by the RAF. Roy’s brother was also in the RAF, in Costal Command and was a Navigator.
Roy was stationed at RAF Yatesbury (No.2 Radio School), RAF Aqir (No. 76 Operational Training Unit and No. 26 Anti-Aircraft Cooperation Unit), RAF Abu Sueir (1675 Heavy Conversion Unit), RAF Khormaksar (Aden Communication Flight).
Aircraft in which he flew: Proctor, Dominie, Wellington X, Liberator VI, Baltimore, Ventura, Albacore, Beechcraft, Mosquito, Anson.
At RAF Yatesbury Roy could easily do the required twelve words per minute in Morse code, and had an excellent American trainer who could do forty words per minute, along as sending and receiving the messages. At certain times, Roy was allowed to teach the class, but was mocked by his fellow classmates. Roy also learnt about the different parts of the radio, how to take them apart and fix them, along with how to fault find on the radio. The signaller would receive a message every thirty minutes, on the mission flight. This message could be about the target, or the weather condition, or even to return to base. The radio waves could also be used to help the Navigator find the correct location. As the Signaller was listening out constantly for messages, he wasn’t on the main crew radio.
Roy also learnt how to take a gun apart blindfolded, which he struggled with but found useful. Roy and his best friend Billy failed the initial training exams, and had to resit them, wit the next unit that arrived. While waiting to complete his exams, Roy worked as a porter at the local hospital, moving the wounded solider sent over from France.
Once Roy had passed all his exams and training, on his passing out parade, he borrowed a uniform for the parade. His uniform was having his brevets sown on by a WAAF on the base.
As part of the Air Crew training for a Signaller to correctly use the radio on board. Roy had to learn about the theory of radio waves, and learn to complete different sounds tests, along with the PNB system test.
When training as an Air Gunner, Roy learnt about the different parts of a .303 riffle and did some clay pigeon shooting. He didn’t receive much Air Gunnery training, as he was to fly on B24 Liberators (the main bombers used in the Middle east) and they used .5 guns, which he didn’t train on until he was in the Liberators.
Roy sailed to Egypt via Gibraltar, as he was a trained Air Gunner, the ships Captain on the merchant convoy, appointed him Ships Gunner and told him to expect to fire the guns. Roy did daily four-hour shift, U-Boat watches on the journey.
When Roy finally arrived RAF Abu Sueir, along with all the other crews. They were locked in a hanger for twenty minutes and told to crew up for the Vickers Wellington that they were to fly. Roy joined a crew with four South Africans and two other Scotsman. The South African crew mostly spoke to one another in Afrikaans.
When Roy was training on Wellingtons, due to a fuel tank problem. The Wellington crashed on landing. Roy banged his head on the radio set and was in hospital for a few days. After the crash, they were assigned a new pilot. The rear gunner got stuck in the Wellington, due to the mechanism being broken.
Roy and the crew then converted to B24 Liberators, which he flew until he left the RAF in 1947. After the war he returned back to his pre-war job in fabric, before running a Antiques shop with his wife before retiring.
Daniel Richards
Dublin Core
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Title
A name given to the resource
Roy White’s RAF Flying Log Book for navigators, air bombers, air gunners and flight engineers
Description
An account of the resource
Roy White’s RAF Flying Log Book from 15th March 1944 to 16th April 1947, detailing his training and duties as a wireless operator.
He was stationed at RAF Yatesbury (No.2 Radio School), RAF Aqir (No. 76 Operational Training Unit and No. 26 Anti-Aircraft Cooperation Unit), RAF Abu Sueir (1675 Heavy Conversion Unit), RAF Khormaksar (Aden Communication Flight).
Aircraft in which flown: Proctor, Dominie, Wellington X, Liberator VI, Baltimore, Ventura, Albacore, Beechcraft, Mosquito, Anson.
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
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LWhiteR3006061v1.1
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
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
David Leitch
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Egypt
Great Britain
Israel
Yemen (Republic)
Egypt--Port Said
England--Wiltshire
Yemen (Republic)--Aden
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
1946
1947
aircrew
Anson
B-24
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Mosquito
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Aqir
RAF Yatesbury
training
Ventura
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/673/17408/LAndrewsPF181152.1.pdf
4e6693a47e90ded841a6d3ff0ebe5c28
Dublin Core
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Title
A name given to the resource
Andrews, Andy
Peter Frederick Andrews
P F Andrews
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview with Andy Andrews (1924 - 2022, 1811552 Royal Air Force) and his log book. He flew operations as a wireless operator with 10 Squadron before he was shot down on a mine laying operation 14 February 1945 and became a prisoner of war.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by 'Andy' Andrews 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
2017-09-11
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
Andrews, PF
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
The page for 14 Feb 1945 has the note ‘Attacked by fighter over Denmark, aircraft blew up at 18000 ft, landed by parachute on the island of Zeeland, taken POW, liberated at Moosburg, nr Munich by Americans. Pilot F/O Grayshan and Navigator F/Sgt Berry both killed.’
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
Andy Andrews’ navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book for P F Andrews, wireless operator/air gunner, covering the period from 16 August 1943 to 13 December 1945. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and post war flying. It also gives details of being shot down and baling out over Denmark and landing on Zeeland and becoming a prisoner of war and being liberated by the Americans at Moosburg, Germany. He was stationed at RAF Yatesbury, RAF Barrow, RAF Lossiemouth, RAF Rufforth, RAF Melbourne and RAF Upavon. Aircraft flown in were, Dominie, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Halifax and Oxford. He flew a total of 19 operations with 10 Squadron; 3 daylight and 16 night-time operations, before being shot down on his 19th operation. Targets were, Essen, Cologne, Gelsenkirchen, Munster, Sterkrade, Duisburg, Hagen, Osnabruck, Bingen, Hannover and Bohlen. His pilot on operations was Flying Officer Grayshan. This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form: no better quality copies are available.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike Connock
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
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
LAndrewsPF181152
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
License
A legal document giving official permission to do something with the resource.
CC BY-NC 4.0 International license
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Denmark
Germany
Great Britain
Denmark--Region Sjælland
England--Cumbria
England--Wiltshire
England--Yorkshire
Germany--Bingen (Rhineland-Palatinate)
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Essen
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Hagen (Arnsberg)
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Osnabrück
Germany--Saxony
Scotland--Lossiemouth
Germany--Oberhausen (Düsseldorf)
Germany--Münster in Westfalen
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1944-10-28
1944-10-30
1944-10-31
1944-11-01
1944-11-06
1944-11-18
1944-11-21
1944-11-22
1944-11-28
1944-11-29
1944-11-30
1944-12-01
1944-12-02
1944-12-03
1944-12-08
1944-12-09
1944-12-22
1944-12-23
1944-12-30
1944-12-31
1945-01-05
1945-01-06
1945-01-12
1945-01-13
1945-01-14
1945-01-15
1945-02-13
1945-02-14
1945-02-15
10 Squadron
1663 HCU
20 OTU
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
bale out
bombing
Dominie
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
mine laying
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
prisoner of war
Proctor
RAF Barrow in Furness
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Melbourne
RAF Rufforth
RAF Upavon
RAF Yatesbury
shot down
training
Wellington
wireless operator
wireless operator / air gunner
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/16/19615/LAtkinsonA1042303v1.1.pdf
4976658f4383bc124022f9606cde9a15
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
Atkinson, Arthur
Arthur Atkinson
A Atkinson
Description
An account of the resource
Seven items. An oral history interview with Warrant Officer Arthur Atkinson (1922 - 2020, 1042303 Royal Air Force) his log book, service material and two photographs. Arthur Atkinson trained as a wireless operator and spent eighteen months at RAF Ringway before being flying 34 operations with 61 Squadron from RAF Coningsby and RAF Skellingthorpe.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Arthur Atkinson 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
2015-06-23
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Atkinson, A
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
Arthur Atkinson’s observers and air gunners flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Observers and air gunners flying log book for Arthur Atkinson, wireless operator, covering the period from 28 April 1943 to 19 January 1946 and from 16 September 1950 to 30 September 1950. Detailing his flying training, operations flown, instructor duties and post war flying with 19 reserve flying school. He was stationed at RAF Stormy Down, RAF Yatesbury, RAF Bobbington (RAF Halfpenny Green), RAF Husbands Bosworth, RAF Winthorpe, RAF Syerston, RAF Coningsby, RAF Skellingthorpe, RAF Silverstone and RAF St Athan. Aircraft flown in were, Dominie, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Stirling, Lancaster and Oxford. He flew a total of 34 operations with 61 squadron, 30 night and 4 daylight operations. Targets were, Stuttgart, Toulouse, Tours, Aachen, Paris, Brunswick, Munich, Schweinfurt, Bordeaux, Lille, Bourg-Leopold, Duisburg, Eindhoven, Nantes, Ferme D’Urville, St Pierre du Mont, Argentan, Rennes, Gelsenkirchen, Limoges, Prouville, Vitry, Beauvoir, St Leu D’Esserent, Culmont-Chalindrey, Nevers, Caen, Thiverny, Courtrai, St Cyr and Givors. <span>His pilot on operations was</span><span> F</span>light Lieutenant Acott.
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
LAtkinsonA1042303v1
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
Netherlands
Belgium--Kortrijk
Belgium--Leopoldsburg
England--Leicestershire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Nottinghamshire
England--West Midlands
England--Wiltshire
France--Abbeville Region
France--Argentan
France--Beauvoir-sur-Mer
France--Cherbourg Region
France--Caen
France--Givors
France--Lille
France--Limoges
France--Nantes
France--Nevers
France--Rennes
France--Saint-Cyr-sur-Mer
France--Saint-Pierre-du-Mont (Landes)
France--Senlis Region
France--Toulouse
France--Tours
France--Vitry-sur-Seine
Germany--Aachen
Germany--Braunschweig
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
Germany--Munich
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Stuttgart
Netherlands--Eindhoven
Wales--Bridgend
Wales--Vale of Glamorgan
France--Bordeaux (Nouvelle-Aquitaine)
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
France--Langres
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1946
1950
1944-03-15
1944-03-16
1944-04-05
1944-04-06
1944-04-10
1944-04-11
1944-04-12
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
1944-04-28
1944-04-29
1944-05-10
1944-05-11
1944-05-12
1944-05-19
1944-05-20
1944-05-21
1944-05-22
1944-05-23
1944-05-24
1944-05-25
1944-05-27
1944-05-28
1944-06-03
1944-06-04
1944-06-06
1944-06-07
1944-06-08
1944-06-09
1944-06-21
1944-06-22
1944-06-23
1944-06-24
1944-06-25
1944-06-27
1944-06-28
1944-06-29
1944-07-04
1944-07-05
1944-07-12
1944-07-13
1944-07-15
1944-07-16
1944-07-18
1944-07-19
1944-07-20
1944-07-21
1944-07-25
1944-07-26
1944-07-27
14 OTU
1661 HCU
17 OTU
61 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
bombing
bombing of the Creil/St Leu d’Esserent V-1 storage areas (4/5 July 1944)
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)
bombing of the Pas de Calais V-1 sites (24/25 June 1944)
bombing of Toulouse (5/6 April 1944)
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
Proctor
RAF Coningsby
RAF Halfpenny Green
RAF Husbands Bosworth
RAF Silverstone
RAF Skellingthorpe
RAF St Athan
RAF Stormy Down
RAF Syerston
RAF Winthorpe
RAF Yatesbury
Stirling
tactical support for Normandy troops
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/302/20735/LLambAM1827673v1.1.pdf
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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
Lamb, Alexander
Alexander McPherson Lamb
Alexander M Lamb
Alexander Lamb
A M Lamb
A Lamb
Description
An account of the resource
11 items. An oral history interview with Alexander McPherson Lamb (b. 1925, 1827673 Royal Air Force), his decorations, album and photographs. He flew operations as an air gunner with 15 Squadron.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Alexander Lamb and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-07-25
2017-08-16
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
Lamb
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
Alexander Lamb’s flying log book for navigators, air bombers, air gunners, flight engineers
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.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Great Britain. Royal Air Force
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Log book and record book
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
LLambAM18276
Description
An account of the resource
Air gunners log book for Alexander Lamb covering the period from 21 June 1944 to 24 June 1947. Detailing his flying training and operations flown and it also contains photographs of aircraft and some RAF certificates. He was stationed at RAF Stormy Down (7 AGS), RAF Market Harborough (14 OTU), RAF Wigsley (1654 HCU), RAF Feltwell and RAF Mildenhall (15 Squadron). Aircraft flown in were, Anson, Wellington, Stirling, Lancaster, Oxford, York, Lincoln, Dominie, Hadrian, Tiger Moth. He flew 5 operations (4 daylight and 1 night-time) with 15 squadron. Targets were Munster, Bocholt, Kiel, Heligoland, Bremen. He also participated in supply dropping in the Netherlands (Operation Manna), Operation Exodus returning POWs, Baedeker or “Cooks Tours” to see the devastation of German cities and Operation Post-Mortem, testing German radar devices. His pilots on operations were Flying Officer Barton, Flying Officer Darlow and Flying Officer Dunn. The log book also lists his post war RAF flights.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mike French
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
Netherlands
England--Leicester
England--Norfolk
England--Nottinghamshire
England--Suffolk
Germany--Bocholt
Germany--Bremen
Germany--Kiel
Netherlands--Rotterdam
Netherlands--Valkenburg (South Holland)
Wales--Glamorgan
Germany--Münster in Westfalen
Germany--Helgoland
Netherlands--Hague
England--Leicestershire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
1946
1947
1945-03-21
1945-03-22
1945-04-13
1945-04-14
1945-04-18
1945-04-22
1945-04-30
1945-05-02
1945-05-07
1945-05-24
1945-05-29
1945-06-04
14 OTU
15 Squadron
1654 HCU
air gunner
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
bombing
bombing of Helgoland (18 April 1945)
Cook’s tour
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lincoln
Operation Exodus (1945)
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
RAF Feltwell
RAF Market Harborough
RAF Mildenhall
RAF Stormy Down
RAF Wigsley
Stirling
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
York
-
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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
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
Silhouettes of British, American, German and Italian Aircraft
Description
An account of the resource
A leaflet with silhouettes of aircraft listed for the second grade test of the Royal Observer Corps Club. There are side, plan and head-on views of 62 aircraft. 53 views are included for the second grade test.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
The Royal Observer Corps Club
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
12 printed sheets
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Training material
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920001,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920002,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920003,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920004,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920005,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920006,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920007,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920008,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920009,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920010,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920011,
MCurnockRM1815605-171114-0920012
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
Wehrmacht. Luftwaffe
United States Army Air Force
Regia Aeronautica
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.
Anson
B-17
B-24
Battle
Beaufighter
Blenheim
Boston
C-47
Catalina
Defiant
Do 18
Do 215
Do 24
Dominie
Hampden
Harrow
Harvard
He 111
Hudson
Hurricane
Ju 52
Ju 86
Ju 87
Ju 88
Lysander
Magister
Me 109
Me 110
Oxford
P-40
Proctor
Spitfire
Sunderland
Swordfish
Tiger Moth
Wellington
Whitley
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1173/22585/LTurnhamK1850743v1.1.pdf
60af354d52897c1730aa17cb44ec26e3
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
Turnham, Ken
K Turnham
Description
An account of the resource
11 items. An oral history interview with Flight Lieutenant Ken Turnham (1924 - 2018, 1850743, 197068 Royal Air Force) his log book and documents. He completed 29 operations as a wireless operator with 115 Squadron.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Ken Turnham and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-09
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Turnham, K
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
Ken Turnham's navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Ken Turnham’s RAF Navigator’s, Air Bomber’s and Air Gunner’s Flying Log Book, from 27th October 1943 to 14th April 1945, recording training and operations as a Wireless Operator. Based at RAF Yatesbury (No. 2 Radio School), RAF Mona (No. 8 (Observers) Advanced Flying Unit), RAF Lossiemouth (No. 20 OTU), RAF Langar (1669 Heavy Conversion Unit), RAF Feltwell (No. 3 Lancaster Finishing School) and RAF Witchford (115 Squadron). Aircraft in which flown: Dominie, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Halifax Mk 2, Lancaster, Oxford. Records a total of 28 completed operations (17 day, 11 night) plus one re-call. Targets in Germany are: Bruchstrasse (Langendreer), Chemnitz, Cologne, Dessau, Dortmund, Dresden, Duisberg, Essen, Hallendorf, Henrichshutte, Hohenbudberg, Hüls, Kiel, Ludwigshaven, Munster, Neuss, Nuremberg, Potsdam, Rheydt, Saltzbergen, Siegen,Trier, Vohwinkel, Wesel and Wiesbaden. His pilot on operations was Flight Lieutenant Briggs. Final entry (April 1945) reads “CERTIFIED COMPLETION OF FIRST TOUR”
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
David Leitch
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 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
LTurnhamK185074v1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Great Britain
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
England--Cambridgeshire
England--Norfolk
England--Nottinghamshire
England--Wiltshire
Scotland--Moray
Wales--Anglesey
Germany--Bochum
Germany--Chemnitz
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Dessau (Dessau)
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Dresden
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Essen
Germany--Hattingen
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Krefeld
Germany--Ludwigshafen am Rhein
Germany--Marl (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Münster in Westfalen
Germany--Neuss
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Potsdam
Germany--Rheydt
Germany--Salzbergen
Germany--Salzgitter
Germany--Siegen
Germany--Trier
Germany--Wesel (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Wiesbaden
Germany--Wuppertal
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944-12-16
1944-12-21
1944-12-23
1944-12-27
1944-12-28
1944-12-31
1945-01-02
1945-01-05
1945-01-06
1945-01-22
1945-02-02
1945-02-03
1945-02-08
1945-02-13
1945-02-14
1945-02-15
1945-02-18
1945-02-19
1945-03-02
1945-03-06
1945-03-07
1945-03-08
1945-03-11
1945-03-14
1945-03-17
1945-03-18
1945-03-21
1945-03-24
1945-04-13
1945-04-14
1945-04-15
115 Squadron
1669 HCU
20 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
bombing
bombing of Dresden (13 - 15 February 1945)
Dominie
Halifax
Halifax Mk 2
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Operational Training Unit
Proctor
RAF Feltwell
RAF Langar
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Mona
RAF Witchford
RAF Yatesbury
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
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/551/23206/LLancasterJO103509v4.1.pdf
e53d269e0e5ab164673c1254d702ec5a
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. Four
Description
An account of the resource
Pilots flying log book for J O Lancaster covering the period from 21 November 1951 to 19 November 1953. Detailing his test pilot flying with Sir W G Armstorng-Whitworth aircraft Ltd based at Coventry. Aircraft flown were, Meteor, Rapide, Proctor, Valetta, Lincoln, Dominie, Anson, Oxford, Desford, Tom Tit, Sea Hawk, Canberra, Hunter, Auster, Provost and Tiger Moth. The log book also contains newspaper clippings relating to J Lancaster breaking the sound barrier in a test flight in a Hawker Hunter
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
LLancasterJO103509v4
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Coventry
England--Warwickshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1951
1952
1953
aircrew
Anson
Dominie
Lincoln
Meteor
Oxford
pilot
Proctor
Tiger Moth
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1371/23292/PThomasAF20080026.2.jpg
f0e84a794bc5cd375b53cf0a74cc3ba9
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
Thomas, Arthur Froude. Album 7
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
2020-02-11
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
Thomas, AF
Description
An account of the resource
47 items. An album containing photographs of British and German aircraft, news cuttings and Arthur Thomas' decorations.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[Photograph]
de Havilland Dragon Rapide.
The Dragon Rapide made its first flight in April 1934, entering service as a light transport. World wide sales of 200 had been completed before the outbreak of war, with production totalling 728 when the series ended in 1946.
[Photograph]
de Havilland D.H.82 Tiger Moth.
The success of the D.H.60 Moth as a civil trainer led to the development of the D.H.60T Moth Military Trainer version. The D.H.82 first flew in October 1931, Orders for the new type began to flow in, & the aircraft was accepted by the Royal Air Force as the Tiger Moth Mk 1, of which 134 were built. The main variant however, was the D,H, 82A Tiger Moth Mk II, of which 8706 were built. After the war considerable quantities of these fine aircraft were released into the civil market. 420 D.H.82B Queen Bee radio controlled target aircraft were produced, & 1520 D.H.82C adapted for winter conditions were built in Canada. Used by G.B. Australia, Belgium, Burma, Canada, France, Neterlands [sic], New Zealand, Norway, Portugal & Sweden.
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
Dragon Rapide and DH 82 Tiger Moth
Description
An account of the resource
Photo 1 is a port side ground view of a civilian Dragon Rapide.
Photo 2 is a starboard side view of a flying Tiger Moth.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two b/w photographs on an album page
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
PThomasAF20080026
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
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
David Bloomfield
Anne-Marie Watson
Requires
A related resource that is required by the described resource to support its function, delivery, or coherence.
Workflow A completed
Dominie
Tiger Moth
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1173/23870/MTurnhamK1850743-151002-01.1.pdf
07235aa0f8e224b278802efdfb6ab14b
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
Turnham, Ken
K Turnham
Description
An account of the resource
11 items. An oral history interview with Flight Lieutenant Ken Turnham (1924 - 2018, 1850743, 197068 Royal Air Force) his log book and documents. He completed 29 operations as a wireless operator with 115 Squadron.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Ken Turnham and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-09
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Turnham, K
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
Memories of WWII
Description
An account of the resource
Booklet produced as part of 'Their Past Your Future's series produced for the Heritage Lottery. This is based on Ken's memories of his training for and operations with Bomber Command and his post war service in the Royal Air Force, as described to a family friend.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ken Turnham
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Printed booklet
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MTurnhamK1850743-151002-01
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. Bomber Command
Royal Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Germany
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.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944
1945
115 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
bomb aimer
bombing
bombing of Dresden (13 - 15 February 1945)
coping mechanism
crash
Dominie
fear
final resting place
flight engineer
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
killed in action
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
military ethos
navigator
Operational Training Unit
pilot
Proctor
promotion
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Witchford
RAF Yatesbury
recruitment
training
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/638/24023/LShawWH189217v1.1.pdf
bc32b8d8ccaa9151d11d5390350503ed
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
Shaw, William Horace
W H Shaw
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Shaw, WH
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with William Horace Shaw (1892171 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a wireless operator / air gunner with 37 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-10-27
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
William Shaw’s navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Navigator’s, air bomber’s and air gunner’s flying log book for W H Shaw, wireless operator, covering the period from 26 November 1943 to 16 February 1947. Detailing his flying training, operations flown and post war flying with 37 Squadron, 168 Maintenance Unit, transit aircraft section and Middle East communications and support. He was stationed at RAF Yatesbury, RAF Evanton, RAF Aqir, RAF Abu Sueir, RAF Tortorella, RAF Shallufa and RAF Heliopolis. Aircraft flown in were Dominie, Proctor, Anson, Wellington, Liberator, Dakota, Argus, Warwick, York and Oxford. He flew two operations with 37 Squadron. Targets were Verona and Freilassing. His pilots on operations were Wing Commander Harris and Sergeant Tulley. The log book also contains a portrait photo of him and two photos of the targets. It also lists his civilian flying details.
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
LShawWH189217v1
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Egypt
Germany
Great Britain
Israel
Italy
Egypt--Cairo
England--Wiltshire
Egypt--Ismailia (Province)
Germany--Freilassing
Italy--Foggia (Province)
Italy--Verona
Scotland--Ross and Cromarty
North Africa
Egypt--Suez Canal
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943
1944
1945
1946
1947
1945-04-23
1945-04-24
1945-04-25
1945-04-26
1945-06-03
37 Squadron
aerial photograph
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
B-24
bombing
C-47
Dominie
Heavy Conversion Unit
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
Proctor
RAF Abu Sueir
RAF Aqir
RAF Evanton
RAF Shallufa
RAF Yatesbury
target photograph
training
Wellington
wireless operator
wireless operator / air gunner
York
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/596/25236/LLathamPA[Ser -DoB]v1.pdf
072ab5be42f614e5f379d1947dfc140a
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
Latham, Peter
Peter Anthony Latham
P A Latham
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Latham, P
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview with Air Vice Marshall Peter Latham (b. 1925) and his log book. He flew operations as a pilot with 26 Squadron.
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
Peter Anthony Latham’s pilots flying log book
Description
An account of the resource
Pilots flying log book for Peter Anthony Latham, covering the period from 22 February 1945 to 24 January 1948. Detailing his post war flying training and flying duties with 26 squadron. He was stationed at RAF Perth, RAF Cranwell, RAF Keevil, RAF Fassburg, RAF Chivenor, RAF Sylt, RAF Ahlorn, RAF Zeltweg, RAF Gutersloh and RAF Gatow. Aircraft flown were Tiger Moth, Harvard, Spitfire, Tempest and Auster. His log book also lists him as having flown Dominie, Oxford, Vampire, Meteor and Sea Fury. This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.
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.
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
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
LLathamPA[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. Fighter Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Austria
Germany
Great Britain
Germany--Celle Region
Austria--Zeltweg
England--Devon
England--Lincolnshire
England--Wiltshire
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Gütersloh
Germany--Lower Saxony
Germany--Sylt
Scotland--Perth
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945
1946
1947
1948
aircrew
Dominie
Flying Training School
Harvard
Meteor
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
RAF Chivenor
RAF Cranwell
RAF Keevil
Spitfire
Tiger Moth
training