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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1817/32365/BWittyARWittyARv1.2.pdf
a568d561e92d25b45be271b0cecccb86
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Title
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Witty, A R
Witty, Ron
Witty, Ronald
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2017-03-23
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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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Witty, AR
Description
An account of the resource
118 items. The collection concerns Flight Lieutenant Ronald Witty DFM (1520694 Royal Air Force) and contains his log book, navigation charts and logs of all his operations, photographs and correspondence home from training in South Africa. He flew thirty operations as a navigator with 12 Squadron before going as an instructor on 1656 HCU and then 576 and 50 Squadrons after the war.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by David Witty and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
TIME OUT FOR WAR
[black and white sketch of Avro Lancaster bomber]
A factual account of war-time experiences
By Flight Lieutenant Ronald Witty D.F.C., B.Sc., A.R.I.C.
[page break]
TIME OUT FOR WAR
A factual account of war-time experiences
By Flight Lieutenant Ronald Witty D.F.C., B.Sc., A.R.I.C.
[page break]
[underlined]Author’s Foreword[/underlined]
At the insistence of my family, who are somewhat in the dark as regards what I got up to during World War Two, I have compiled the following account.
My memory of the wartime years still remains very clear, helped by some brief notes in diaries, my log book, some letters and, importantly, the navigational logs and charts of all thirty bombing operations in which I took part in 1944. Using them I could still tell you where our Lancaster crew was, within two or three miles, at anytime during those operations of more than fifty years ago.
[underlined]Acknowledgements[/underlined]
Many thanks to my wife Yvonne and my family for their various contributions in getting the raw material organised, and to Mike Fong for his help with the photographs.
[page break]
[underlined] CONTENTS [/underlined]
[underlined] Chapter. [/underlined] [underlined] Page No. [/underlined]
1. Decisions 5
2. The Stirling Castle 15
3. South Africa 21
4. Back to England 33
5. Operations 1 - 20 43
6. Operations 21 - 30 55
7. Instructing “ferry trips” & crewing up for second tour. 69
8. Lancaster ME 758 PH-N “Nan” 81
9. GEE, A.P.I. and H2S 85
10. The German Defences 87
11. Reflections on Survival 89
12. Postscript 93
Bibliography 97
Glossary of Terms 99
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[blank page]
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[underlined] PHOTOGRAPHS [/underlined]
Following [underlined] Page No. [/underlined]
[underlined] East London, 1943 [/underlined] 32
Left to Right - Fred Rolph, Author, Dorita, ? Parker (uncertain)
[underlined] ‘B’ Flight, Air Navigation Course No. 12 at 41 Air School, Collondale, East London [/underlined] 32
Left to Right - Bond, Chippendale, Cox, Osborne, Jones, Sadler, Author, Hill, Woodland, Wilson, Marshall, Albans
[underlined] Ops Crew, 1944 [/underlined] 54
[italics] Mid Upper [/italics] - Stan Swain, [italics] Bomb Aimer [/italics] - Tom Crook, [italics] Navigator [/italics - Author, [italics] Pilot [/italics] - Fred Holbrook, [/italics] Rear Gunner [/italics] - Tom Tibb, [italics] Flight Engineer [/italics] - John Squires, [italics] Wireless Operator [/italics] - Jock Poyner
[underlined] Ops Crew and PH-N (‘Nan’) [/underlined] 54
Poyner, Tibb, Author, Swain, Crook, Holbrook, Squires
[underlined] The Author and PH-N [/underlined] 54
[underlined] Second Tour Crew, May 1945 [/underlined] 80
Two Gunners, [italics] Wireless Operator [/italics] - ‘Artie Shaw’, [italics] Pilot [/italics] - Bill Addison, [italics] Bomb Aimer [/italics] - Jack, [italics] Navigator [/italics] - Author, [italics] Flight Engineer. [/italics]
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[underlined] The author en-route to Wickenby, June 1945 [/underlined] 84
[underlined] PH-N, June 1945, with the author and member of the old ground crew [/underlined] 84
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[underlined] Chapter 1 : Decisions [/underlined]
Hull Grammar School - an old established seat of learning, with many famous pupils. I was proud of the old school and here I took the School Certificate Examination in June 1937. I passed in eight subjects with a Distinction in Chemistry. A selected group took Additional Maths, taught by the Headmaster, F. Mayor. This introduced me to differential calculus at the age of fourteen. I spent two terms in the Lower Sixth Science pending my sixteenth birthday, in March 1938. Although Maths was my favourite subject, it was more practical at that time to use the Chemistry. In those days, there were fewer universities and unless ones parents were very wealthy, one left school at sixteen.
I started work in the laboratories at British Oil & Cake Mills, H.O.M.Co, Stoneferry, Hull, within easy cycling distance from home. They were part of the Unilever Group, and were a very good firm, with sports and social facilities. I had little spare time for these as I immediately enrolled at the Hull Municipal Technical College, beginning in September 1938. I found that my School Certificate qualification gave me exemption only from the Northern Universities Matriculation and not from the London University Matriculation. This meant that I couldn’t enter for the External London B.Sc. in Chemistry. The difference between the Northern Matric. and the London Matric. was that English Literature was a compulsory subject for the latter. This seemed irrelevant in the context of a Chemistry Degree. However, I entered for the A.I.C. (Associate of the Institute of Chemistry). The A.I.C. and B.Sc. people took the same classes, but instead of taking the Inter-B.Sc. examination, after two years of Evening Classes one was given slips of paper certifying that one was up to Inter B.Sc. standard in Maths.
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[NOTE: PAGES 8 AND 9 MISSING]
and Physics. (These I duly obtained in May 1940.)
Meanwhile, I was fully aware of what was brewing up in Europe with Hitler and his gang making monkeys of the old-school politicians. The ruthless annexation of Austria, followed by that of Czechoslovakia, despite the pathetic delaying tactics of Britain and France, in addition to Hitler’s bellicose threats, made it very evident to me that war was becoming almost inevitable. The facts and figures produced by Winston Churchill underlined the growing military potential of the German forces. The weak capitulation of the British and French diplomats on the matter of the Sudetenland confirmed my belief that it was only a matter of time.
I was heartened when at last Britain and France gave their support to Poland, and actually felt relief when, after the German attack on Poland on September 1st 1939, they honoured their obligations and declared war on Germany. I realised fully how terrible a step it was, but there was no reasonable alternative. Sooner or later we had to face reality.
It was still very eerie when the first air-raid warning sounded on Sunday, September 3rd. 1939.
I carried on with my evening classes (three evenings a week), cycling to and from the Technical College throughout the black-out and occasional air-raid alarms. In fact, I didn’t miss a single class up to the time I went into the R.A.F. in April 1942.
I seem to remember that it was during the very first session of evening classes that I first met Walter Suddaby, who lived in North Hull. He was a quietly-spoken pleasant lad and we had similar ideas of humour and became friends for the duration
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of our time at the Tech. Of course, having full-time day jobs plus three nights a week at the Tech. and other evenings writing up notes and studying at home, we didn’t get together outside the course.
When the war started I was just coming up to seventeen and a half and “Sudd” was about the same age, maybe a month or two older. We followed the events of the war, wondering how it was going to affect us, but with no clear idea what we were about to do in the future.
War came to Hull spasmodically but with increasing intensity as the years passed. The German Luftwaffe found the city an easy option. Placed on a distinctive bend of a wide river estuary, it wasn’t too difficult to spot even at night, when most of their attacks were made. Also it wasn’t a great distance for them to travel, reducing navigational problems on the way. There were many air-raid warnings when inland targets were being sought and the “All-clear” didn’t sound until the last of the enemy aircraft cleared the coast on their way home. Hull often received an extra “bonus” if the Germans couldn’t find their original target.
As the war progressed the age of conscription for service in the armed forces was reduced to nineteen years but there was provision for students who were within two years of the final exams. to obtain deferment until after those exams. I remember quite clearly discussing the situation with “Sudd” and another Tech. student as we stood with our ‘cycles in the middle of the town. We agreed that we wouldn’t apply for deferment because “our qualifications wouldn’t amount to much if Hitler won the war”. “Sudd” and I would volunteer for the R.A.F. and the other lad (I can’t remember his name now) preferred the Fleet
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would be affected by the transition from my mundane earthly existence into the realms of flight. I had at the back of my mind some disturbing recollections of not being too comfortable on fairground rides, so I was just a little apprehensive. On this account I asked my mother not to tell people that I was going as aircrew, so if things didn’t turn out too well I wouldn’t be a public disgrace.
At Lord’s the centre of the famous stretch of turf was cordoned off but the perimeter offices had been converted into depots dispensing all the items of kit we were likely to require plus the inevitable kit-bag. Here we had our introduction to authority in the shape of sergeants and corporals, who shepherded us around the establishment until eventually we were marched off to our billets. My lot were in a converted block of flats in Viceroy Court, St. John’s Wood, which had been re-equipped with service beds and lockers.
It was all very strange, finding oneself amongst a crowd of strangers from various walks of life. The only thing we definitely had in common was that we were “all in the same boat”. We had so many adjustments to make from our previous individual routines that we more readily accepted our imposed companions and most of their idiosyncrasies. The main exceptions as far as I was concerned were smoking and crude language. I had earlier decided that smoking was bad for the health and ruled that out. After hearing some of my new associates, apparently unable to complete sentences without including at least one “f” word, I concluded that the repeated insertion made both the speech and the user appear idiotic and resolved never to stoop to it. I never did.
Various N.C.O.s, mainly corporals, undertook to instil
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some military discipline on our “shower” and in a few weeks we were marching around in shiny boots and brand new uniforms with shiny buttons and getting regular hair-cuts so we didn’t get picked out during inspections.
Although I was in London there was no scope entertainment-wise. Pay for an A.C.2 was 2s. 6d. a day. I was making a voluntary allotment home of 1s 0d. a day, so when pay day came after two weeks I had to quote my last three numbers, 694, step forward, salute and receive the princely sum of £1. I think I managed to get to a Lyon’s cafe once or twice whilst in London. Most of the “entertainment” consisted of walking around some of London’s famous streets.
We all looked forward to getting to an I.T.W. (Initial Training Wing) and acquiring some more useful instruction than the rudiments of drill. Unfortunately, by the time my posting to No. 5 I.T.W. at Torquay came through I had a problem. Due probably to being a little run down towards the end of the evening class session in Hull, combined with swinging arms up to shoulder-level during our marching exercises I developed an abscess under one arm. If I reported sick I would miss my posting and would be stuck in London for another three weeks, so I kept quiet and only mentioned the matter when I got to Torquay on 9.5.42. I was immediately hospitalised with a temperature of 104 degrees F. and operated on the next day.
“Home” in Torquay was the Toorak Hotel, appropriately modified with service beds and lockers. We commenced a range of studies including navigation, meteorology, signals, armament, aircraft recognition, hygiene and anti-gas. We continued with drill and physical training in addition to the regular exercise we
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got marching along the hilly streets in Torquay. The thing that regularly bothered me, being only five feet six and a half, was the constant effort to keep pace with the taller people at the head of the column, generally six-footers. I seemed to be airborne most of the time! We had as our N.C.O. Sergeant Ditchburn, who was the Tottenham Hotspurs goalkeeper. We found him to be quite a reasonable type and certainly preferable to a pre-war regular. He was firm but genial and had a good sense of humour.
As we progressed with our I.T.W. course we were rewarded by promotion to L.A.C. (leading aircraftman) which involved wearing a propeller badge on the sleeve. This embellishment in addition to the white flash worn in the forage cap gave us quite a smart appearance. Pay shot up to 5s. 6d. a day! Much of the time that summer in Torquay we didn’t wear our tunics – it was too warm, particularly when being marched around at 140 paces to the minute. I must admit that marching like that with arms swinging to shoulder height did look impressive and when it was N.A.A.F.I. or W.V.S. break time there was no problem achieving 140 despite the hilly streets, particularly when “racing” other squads.
I can remember learning Morse and using the buzzer and the Aldis lamp, also learning to rectify faults in the Browning 303 machine gun. Two other events associated with those days spring to mind. On one occasion we were all on the beach when we got our first sight of the enemy. A couple of Messerschmitt 109s came swooping in at low level to attack the shipping in the harbour. They also opened up with machine gun and cannon fire at random. We lay flat on the beach and had a very good view of the crosses on their wings. Fortunately we had no casualties.
The other memorable event was a dramatic introduction
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to dinghy drill. An inflated aircraft dinghy floating in the harbour at Torquay was the objective of our escapes from a mock ditching. In turn and singly we had to don a sodden uniform and a Mae West and jump into the harbour and make our way to the dinghy. This was reasonably straightforward for swimmers, but as a complete non-swimmer it certainly presented me with a problem.
For a start the water was about 14 feet below the harbour wall so there was no easy option. It was a case of jumping into the unknown or not showing up very well in front of everyone – so I jumped.
It seemed a long time before I surfaced and then managed rather laboriously to dog-paddle to the dinghy. I realised that it would not have been a realistic exercise in, say, the North Sea for real.
Time passed and we were kept well occupied with lectures, exams and drill (including rifle and continuity drill) and a memorable cross-country run of a mile or two which included ploughing through a duck-inhabited pond. We returned to the Toorak Hotel soaking wet, smelling horribly and legs stinging from nettle contact. On another occasion we were taken by a rather ancient local train and dropped off in small groups at stations along the line skirting Dartmoor and given the task of finding our various ways across country to a pub four or five miles away, somewhere in the middle of the moors. There we downed a pint or two of excellent cider. Fortunately we didn’t have to walk back!
[page break]
[blank page]
[page break]
[underlined] Chapter 2: The Stirling Castle [/underlined]
Eventually, I think it was about 15.10.42, we were posted to Blackpool after some embarkation leave. We were billeted in typical Blackpool boarding houses complete with landladies. Ours was “Holmleigh”, Crystal Road. When “Sudd.” got my letter with the Blackpool postmark he was surprised but rightly deduced that I was going abroad. He said he wouldn’t mind being in my place. He was completing a wireless course at Cranwell. He had at one time also been billeted in Blackpool and had enjoyed his accommodation. He wished me good luck and suggested that to be on the safe side I should send my future letters to his home address in 5th Avenue, North Hull.
I received his letter just before we were moved to Liverpool and transferred to the “Stirling Castle” one of the Union Castle Line’s fleet which had been converted for troop carrying. That was on 26.10.42. Our accommodation consisted of long narrow benches and tables for the day-time and hammocks for sleeping. I recall the awkward and maddening time getting even the blankets to stay in the hammock. At night we must have looked like a tin of sardines. Next day the ship moved out into the river and our time was spent “spud-carrying” (2 hours) and then “fatigues” such as cutting butter, etc. from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. Talk about slave labour!
On the 28.10.42 the ship turned to face the river mouth and we had our first boat drill. At 1 p.m. the following day we sailed, leaving Liverpool and the Royal Liver Buildings, then passing the Isle of Man and Stranraer as we headed round Northern Ireland. We got used to the hammocks but there was a snag. They isolated us from the movement of the ship and the full extent of the sea movement was not apparent until we
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dismounted next morning and hit the heaving deck. By now of course, we were getting into the Atlantic. It was better, if somewhat chilly on deck. I was a little sick and didn’t bother about fish breakfast. The afternoon was pleasant and we were entertained watching Aldis signals from escorting warships and a sister ship, the “Athlone Castle”. There were six ships in our convoy.
On the third day our convoy had increased to seven ships with six escorts and we were moving more slowly. Depth charges were dropped during the afternoon. Two days later we were joined by a merchant cruiser but there were now only two destroyers or frigates in sight. The temperature was increasing as we headed in a generally southerly direction and we changed into tropical kit.
We wrote letters and listened to the B.B.C. when we could, and were pleased to have good news of the North African theatre. Pontoon was a popular pastime but we also spent some time swotting our I.T.W. notes. In between we watched flying fish and were fascinated by the phosphorescence of the water. One ship left the convoy, with a small gunboat as escort.
As the temperature rose and we estimated our position as approximately 28 degrees West we speculated about the possibility of visiting South America. Our thoughts were re-focused when a destroyer Aldis message mentioned U-boats. This was a particularly profitable time for the German submarines, as the Royal Navy had not had time to recover from a series of severe set-backs in ’41 and ’42 and had only the minimum capacity for escorting convoys. On the credit side, the German Enigma Code had been broken, (we, of course, knew nothing about that) and so it was possible using devious routes to
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avoid the U-boat packs.
On 10.11.42 we were reduced to two escort vessels. Next day, Armistice Day, I bought a poppy – amazing that someone had such foresight! We reckoned that we were now about 4 degrees S. and 28 degrees W. We were now joined by the cruiser H.M.S. London and were also rejoined by the merchant cruiser. On 12.11.42 we spotted a Catalina flying boat so we knew land wasn’t too far away and from then on we saw aircraft every few hours. It reminded one of the dove with the olive branch. On 14.11.42 we were told we would be in port tomorrow.
AT 0530 next morning I got my first glimpse through a porthole of a low-lying stretch of land on the starboard with an orange-coloured beach, backed by trees, palm and deciduous. We were in an inlet running roughly north-south. A Brazilian biplane (it looked like an Italian C.R. 42) flew past and I spotted a Grumman Goose (American amphibian) and a Catalina – at least the aircraft recognition was paying off! There was a small harbour vessel with white-dressed pilots and officials to see us in, together with what appeared to be a tug (the “Aquina”). We were surrounded by canoes and skiffs of all sizes, fitted with sliding seats and crewed by handsome Brazilian boys. There were sailing boats looking somewhat like Red Sea feluccas. We saw loads of bananas and pineapples passing by and liberty men going ashore in launches. We had arrived at Bahia.
In the evening it was impressive, after weeks at sea and years in blacked-out England, to see all the lights ashore and red flashing street signs, together with the green flashes of trams. The land rose steeply from the sea shore with buildings at the foot and the top with trees in between.
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About 5 p.m. the next day our ship took the place of the “Athlone Castle” at the quayside. We had a London fire-engine pumping fresh water aboard and a British-made crane (Bath) loading stores. Some of the firemen threw oranges and bananas up to us. The water replenishment seemed to go on for quite a bit of the next day.
Wednesday 18.11.42 was a red-letter day. We went ashore for a couple of hours. (We had the “honour” of being the first Allied troops to land in Brazil after their belated declaration of war on the Axis). We were marched through the colourful streets, being followed by children who were delighted to have coins thrown to them. We halted and dismissed for a few minutes in a local park where there was a monument to the foundation of the Brazilian Republic. Everyone was after drinks and fruit, a complication being the exchange rate. I had a shilling, 100 reis = 1/4d.; 1,000 reis = 1 milreis. We then formed up and marched back to the ship.
We left Bahia the following afternoon on the final long leg of our journey to South Africa. We were escorted, presumably as a precaution against loitering U-boats, by a Brazilian “Harvard” fitted with bombs. Our convoy now consisted of three transports, two smaller ships, a destroyer and an armed merchant cruiser. By the next day we were well away from Bahia with no sign of U-boats.
Our time was occupied by tests in navigation, signals etc. We played chess and pontoon, and wrote letters (“airgraphs”). We listened to Wing Commander Ritchie, D.F.C., the author of “Fighter Pilot”. We had boat drills at regular intervals. Then on 25.11.42 we changed back into “blues”, and were duly inspected, prior to our second pay parade aboard the “Stirling Castle”.
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We estimated our position as roughly 25 degrees South and 5 degrees West, i.e. about halfway from Bahia to South Africa. I have a note on 27.11.42 that I saw the doctor and an albatross! I’d been bothered by bronchial catarrh for about a fortnight, possibly due to the stuffy conditions below decks at night-time. I used to take a book to the stairwell and read to get myself good and sleepy before climbing into my hammock so that I had a chance to fall asleep without coughing and disturbing everyone around. I can still remember the label “Mist. Expect.” on the medicine bottle in the sick bay which I visited at regular intervals!
During the next few days we were joined by a merchant cruiser and then saw two Venturas over our convoy. We were obviously in another danger zone and portholes had to be closed during the day as well as at night.
On the afternoon of 30.11.42 we sighted Table Mountain and very soon afterwards the wreckage from a ship torpedoed early that morning. By 8 p.m. we reckoned we were well east of Table Mountain when paravanes were brought into use against the possibility of sea-mines in the seas around the Cape.
We continued out of sight of land until on 4.12.42 we arrived at Durban. Everyone crowded on deck as we edged slowly into harbour at the end of our 5 weeks voyage. We were told to look out for the “Lady in White”, who made it her business to greet all the visiting troops at the dockside. Suddenly, there she was in a long white dress and picture hat.
She began to sing to us, using a megaphone, in a song clear voice several heart-warming songs such as “Rule Britannia”
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and finally “We’ll Meet Again”. At the end of her mini-concert the troops responded with cheers and whistles and the ships’ sirens joined in.
By 6 p.m. we had disembarked in our khaki uniforms and were entrained, six to a compartment, on our way to 48 Air School, a joint R.A.F./S.A.A.F. base, near East London. The journey was fascinating – I suppose being back on land and away from the ship helped a lot. We were back in civilised surroundings, a comfortable train and enjoyable meals served without us having to move a muscle. The scenery was magnificent, rolling hills with rocky outcrops. We often caught sight of forward and rear section of our train as we negotiated the snaking track. The evenings were notable for the brilliant displays of fireflies.
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[underlined] Chapter 3: South Africa [/underlined]
We reached Woodbrook, just three miles outside East London, on 6.12.42 after our two-day rail journey and were pleased by the wooden huts provided for our accommodation. We had an excellent dinner, filled in various bits of paperwork and got the bus into East London for the evening. It really was another world, walking through well-lit streets past well-filled shops, rather like a throw-back to 1939.
We discovered that new courses began every three weeks so we had quite a bit of time on our hands. In the meantime, I reported sick and got further treatment for bronchial catarrh, but really it was just a matter of time and it wasn’t long before I was O.K. again.
It wasn’t long before we were acclimatised, conditions being just about ideal in East London, temperatures being generally about 10 degrees F. warmer than we were used to in England. The coastal situation had quite a modifying effect compared with more inland Air Schools. We had the occasional sharp storm with heavy rain, but generally in short spasms, not enough to inconvenience our exploration and enjoyment of our unexpected “holiday”. Car lifts were readily available to and from the town. The harbour was usually worth a visit – we encountered various nationalities including Dutch seamen from a submarine depot ship. The shops were all set out for Christmas – this seemed at odds with an evening temperature of 70 degrees F. at 19.45 hours. A favourite indulgence was fresh strawberries and ice-cream in a local restaurant. For our entertainment and refreshment there were several volunteer-run facilities including the U-NO-ME Club, Toc H, and S.A.W.A.S., rather like the W.V.S. at home, where you could sit around and chat or play
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games. I was quite keen on table-tennis and snooker which I generally played with my pal Fred Rolph (an ardent Brentford F.C. supporter). It was also quite pleasant on the beach, or attending the “Colosseum” cinema. I also caught up with my correspondence, sending airgraphs and receiving letters from my parents, dated October.
Christmas Day was spent in the camp with lunch served by officers and sergeants. We went short of nothing. There was turkey, pork, pudding, cake, fruit, sweets, nuts, ices, beer etc. In the afternoon we rested and we had little room for tea.
It seemed a life in limbo. There was a world war going on many miles away but we were temporarily detached from it and waiting to get on the conveyor belt.
We obviously had some of our time occupied with lectures, drill etc., but were impatient to get on with something more meaningful. We were intrigued by the political situation and the segregation of the white and black communities. The coloured people did the menial jobs and seemed to accept their lot with resignation. They were housed generally in single-room huts on the outskirts of the European city. Quite a few thousands of black South Africans were enlisted in the Army but they served only in menial ways. Strangely enough they seemed quite keen on Army life. One day when I was on police guard near the main gate I witnessed a squad of them being drilled by one of their own N.C.O.s in their free time on the road just outside the camp. They put quite a lot of effort into it and were trying hard to be smart. They didn’t have any firearms, of course, or we might have been anxious! By and large, the R.A.F. lads sympathised with their situation in their own country.
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On 7.1.43 there were rumours of our course starting on 25.1.43. We filled in the time attending lectures, carrying out various duties, marching etc., and going into town when we were free. About this time I bought myself an Omega watch (£5.10s.) and a Tissot watch for my brother. The Omega watch is worth mentioning as I relied on it exclusively during all my navigation (training and operational). I got them from a Swiss jeweller’s shop in East London in early January ’43. (I still have the Omega, though it was accidentally broken around 1970).
We played a lot of table-tennis and snooker and I wrote home and to Walter Suddaby, and my brother Norman who was also in the R.A.F. (training as a wireless operator). Keeping up with the washing was another regular activity. My wash-day was usually at the weekend and consisted simply of washing my clothes in the wash basin using a bar of “Sunlight” soap, rinsing thoroughly and then spreading them out on large rocks in the sun to dry. Trousers were creased by placing them carefully under the mattress.
Eventually, we started our course proper on Monday 25.1.43, with three periods of dead-reckoning (D.R.) navigation, one period on instruments, two periods on signal procedure and one practicing on the Morse buzzer. From this time on we were kept solidly at our studies for the next eight weeks, including examinations to keep us up to the mark.
It was during this time, however, that Fred Rolph and I were invited to visit the home of Dr. G.J.C. Smyth of 30 St. Georges Road, in East London. He and his family were most hospitable and regularly entertained us when we and two other R.A.F. lads had a few hours to spare at weekends.
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We spent a lot of time in the spacious garden playing tenni-quoits, which was most enjoyable and enabled us to “let off steam”. We maintained this contact until just before we left South Africa. We didn’t see a lot of the Doctor himself, as he was pretty busy, but Mrs. Smyth and the family looked after us very well.
For the flying stage of our training I was posted on 27.3.43 to No. 41 Air School at Collondale which, I was pleased to discover, was only about eight miles from East London, thus enabling me to continue having pleasant weekend breaks at the Smyth’s. Fred wasn’t quite so fortunate, in that he was posted to No. 47 Air School near Queenstown, approximately 100 miles inland, which made it more awkward for his journeys to the Smyth’s. Fortunately he could make it by rail.
After the minimum time to settle in and only three days into our studies our class of twentyfour trainee navigators, divided into “A” and “B” flights, came face to face with reality by way of the Avro Anson. This was a twin-engined monoplane with a great safety record. I can recall it was already practically obsolete from a military point of view, being far too slow and almost unarmed, but provided a good steady platform for training purposes.
Appropriately, my first flight ever in an aircraft was on April 1st. (This by strange coincidence happened also to be the 25th. anniversary of the foundation of the Royal Air Force in 1918). I was first navigator with another pupil as second navigator in Anson “V” (3153) piloted by 2nd. Lieutenant McIndoe of the S.A.A.F. The aim was to give us air experience and to try out our map-reading skills while navigating as best we could from Potsdam, (a nearby village) around a laid-down
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cross-country route of about 250 miles. As first navigator I sat at the plotting table carrying out the chart plot and maintaining the log of events. The second navigator armed with a topographical map (i.e. showing the main ground features on the route) tries to identify features passing below the aircraft which are shown on his map. When he gets a positive identification he notes the spot on the map, the precise time of this observation and passes both pieces of information to the first navigator, who then plots them, using the latitude and longitude on his chart. This flight became the first entry in my flying log-book.
On subsequent flights the two navigators took it in turns to be first and second navigator.
The earlier trips were inclined to be a bit rough and ready technique-wise, but as experience increased we became more confident in our judgement of when to give the pilot an alteration of course. In reality, we had many factors in our favour, navigating in South Africa. The weather was generally very good and so was the visibility. The ground features were easy to interpret, nowhere near as congested as we were to encounter later back in Britain. The aircraft was usually only a few thousand feet up and the pilots were quite familiar with the territory, so although they played the game one was aware that they wouldn’t let things get out of hand navigation-wise. If you spotted a railway track it was a big help because there weren’t many railway lines in the whole of the area. Sizeable towns were few and far between and so were much more readily identified.
At this stage we were already encountering the fundamental problem of air navigation – estimating and allowing for the effect of the wind, a continually varying factor. As anyone observing a light aircraft flying in a crosswind will know,
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the aircraft doesn’t travel in exactly the direction it is pointing. It drifts sideways to an extent depending on the wind-speed and direction, (wind velocity). If the aircraft is supposed to be travelling from point A to point B it is not sufficient to point the nose directly at point B unless the wind is from dead ahead or dead astern, a most unlikely occurrence. One has to apply a correction to the heading according to the wind velocity. Knowing the aircraft’s heading from the compass and its airspeed from the airspeed indicator the navigator can plot an “air position” according to the time elapsed on that course. If at that time he can identify the actual position of the aircraft relative to the ground by visual or other means and plot that “fix”, the line joining the “air position” with the “fix” shows both the wind direction and the effect of the wind over the time of the plot and hence the wind velocity. This velocity can then be used as the most up-to-date information for use in making any necessary alteration of course to allow for the wind effect.
We proceeded with ever more sophisticated exercises as the course progressed, flying mainly with South African but occasionally R.A.F. pilots and included photography, astro-navigation (night-flying), over sea exercises, formation flights, flame-float exercises (also involving night flying), and low-level map reading.
Meanwhile we were kept hard at it with our ground studies which involved D.R. (Dead Reckoning) theory, D.R. plotting, compasses meteorology, maps and charts, instruments, radio navigation, reconnaissance, photography, aircraft recognition, signals (both lamp and buzzer) and Astro-navigation.
With any subject involving calculations I found no real difficulty because I had always enjoyed Maths. Notwithstanding
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the confidence this gave me, I could not see much relevance between the training we were getting and the realities of operating at heights of 10,000 to 20,000 feet on dark nights with the ground practically invisible, under enemy fire. Astro-navigation seemed to be about the only independent means of navigation, but when one thought about what that entailed in practice it didn’t seem such a good idea. Inherently Astro-navigation did not appeal to me as sufficiently accurate. In order to get a fix one needed to take observations by sextant on three stars distributed at reasonable angles in the night sky through the perspex dome in the roof of the bomber aircraft, each observation taking a minimum of 2-3 minutes, not forgetting to note the time of the observation and having to calculate a position line from a book of tables and transfer it along the track on the chart. Then, if one was lucky, one had three lines which crossed producing a sizeable triangle, somewhere within which lay, hopefully, the position of the aircraft. The biggest criticism was the vulnerability of an aircraft flying straight and level at a steady airspeed for up to ten minutes over predicted anti-aircraft fire and being followed by night fighters with radar. At this stage I was puzzled how the job could be done and I just had to hope that all would be revealed in the fullness of time. Meanwhile, I was thankful not to have experienced any ill effects from my encounter with aviation and felt that I should be able to cope reasonably well in the future.
It must have seemed very tame for some of our South African pilots after coming from combat in North Africa to spend time “taxi-driving” we “sprog” navigators. We heard strange stories about some of their antics as they tried to relieve the boredom, but the Anson was a most tolerant aircraft and almost flew itself. In my log book I have the names Jooste, Nasmith, Efroiken, Van Rensburg, Moll, Mannheim, Van
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Heerden, Steyn and Duveen, along with R.A.F. pilots Cowan and Hill.
Suddenly, on 1.7.43 I, with four other members of pour course (No. 12) at 41 Air School was sent for interview by W/C Pettit and two Squadron Leaders. I was genuinely taken by surprise, wearing a somewhat scruffy battledress with two or three buttons missing. I had nothng [sic] to lose and I ran down the C.E.B. exams in general. I noted “it seemed to work”.
The following day, more prepared on this occasion, I was interviewed by Group Captain O’Grady. I was stumped by a question on details of the D.F.C. He was very pleasant and at the end I felt I would have liked to have another interview, knowing more about him. It turned out that I was considered O.K. for commissioning, along with John Tebbut from “A” flight.
I was somewhat surprised, considering that I had at no time applied for or even thought about a commission at this early stage in my training. More so, because during the first interview I had rejected the possibility of staying in South Africa as an instructor on the grounds that pupils would be likely to take more notice of instructors with operational experience. I omitted to say that I would have felt like the blind leading the blind.
[underlined] Results of Courses from 29.3.43 to 10.7.43
Air Navigation Course No. 12 Held at 41 A.S. South Africa [/underlined]
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[underlined] Subject – Poss. – Obtd. [/underlined]
D.R. Theory – 100 – 63
D.R. Plotting – 300 – 229
Compasses – 100 – 74
Meteorology – 100 – 72
Maps and Charts – 100 – 94
Instruments – 100 – 76
Radio Navigation – 100 – 79
Reconnaissance – 100 – 72/A
Photography – 100 – 94/AA
A/C Recognition – P. – P.
Signals – 100 – 96
Astro-Navigation – 100 – 97
Flying times on Course Day 76.45 Night 17.20
A/C Type Anson
Air Exercise Assessment AA (Above Average)
[underlined] TOTAL MARKS OBTAINED 81 PERCENT PASSED [/underlined]
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Remarks: An Above Average Navigator
Signed by W/Commander Pettit
There were still three more air navigational exercises to fit in before our graduation day on 10.7.43. To present our brevets we had Rear-Admiral Scott. When it came to my turn the conversation was as follows:-
“Where do you come from, my boy?” “Hull, Yorkshire, Sir.”
“There’s not much of Hull left is there?” “No, Sir.” etc.
The evening celebration was quite informal but the Group Captain did take the opportunity to compliment us on a good parade.
A big dampener, as far as I was concerned, was the news I had received from Fred Rolph, about the time I had my first interview for a commission. He’d made a mess of the Astro-Navigation exam and then came up against a problem in the D.R. Plotting. He said in his letter of 29.6.43, “Do you think I could remember how to do it? I sat there cudgelling my brains and thinking of Edna” (his girl-friend back home) ”and the Astro exam and I couldn’t think how to do it.” He tried to remedy the plotting but only succeeded in getting deeper in the mire. In fact he needn’t have worried so much about the Astro exam – he obtained 67 percent, but he didn’t know how. It was worrying unnecessarily about the Astro that contributed to his failure in the D.R. Plotting. The outcome was that nine members of his course, including Fred had to re-sit their D.R. Plotting exam a day or two before I was getting my brevet. This meant a delay of three weeks for Fred but he added a P.S. “Edna won’t mind waiting three weeks extra after nine months. (I hope!)”.
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Unfortunately those three weeks meant that he never caught up with me again, and his next letter, posted from the Smyth home on 26.7.43 didn’t catch up with me until four months later, when I had no idea where he would be.
I had done my packing and said goodbye to the Smyth’s and boarded the train for Cape Town. Denis Smyth, probably about eighteen or nineteen years old, took me to the station by car, followed the train and saw me again at Cambridge just down the line. I was really sorry to leave the Smyth’s, after all their kindness. Next day, Tuesday, we passed through Queenstown very early in the morning, and on Wednesday afternoon we arrived at Cape Town. We completed the journey to the I.F.T.C. Westlake (Imperial Forces Transit Camp) by electric railway and we were ensconced in Hut 6/26.
During the next ten days I explored part of Cape Town and did some shopping. I managed to get items such as 1/2 yd. braid (pilot officer), a badge, some shirts, shoes, socks, gloves, hankies, and a raincoat and posted several small parcels of goodies to the family in England.
On Sunday, 25.7.43 I settled up my mess fees, collected my pay and a £15 travelling allowance, packed the little that remained to be packed and was transferred at the last minute to the draft prior to the one I had expected. In a very short time we boarded the “Mauretania”. There were eight of us in a cabin, but it was luxurious compared with the hammocks and benches in the “Stirling Castle”. There were five R.A.F. Pilot Officers, two Navy types and one civilian attached to the R.A.F. Next morning we sailed for England about 11 a.m., after a boat drill at 10 a.m.
Like the “Queen Elizabeth”, the “Mauretania” was
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constructed just before the war and proved extremely useful in transporting troops throughout the war. The “Mauretania” alone carried more than 380,000 troops during 55 voyages and must have been a high priority target for German U-boats. My brother travelled to Canada in the “Mauretania” for his aircrew training, shortly afterwards.
Our accommodation was section C3 on C Deck and our Mess No. 69. Mealtimes were pleasant affairs – I have an autographed menu from the luncheon on Wednesday August 11th 1943 in the Officers’ dining room. Nothing pretentious of course, but a big leap back to civilised behaviour. In contrast, acting as orderly officer one day, accompanied by a corporal I had the job of seeing the other side of life and asking the airmen on the mess decks for “Any complaints?” Thankfully everyone seemed reasonably happy with their lot.
So we passed our time in comfort on our fairly direct (apart from a brief call at Freetown), journey back to Liverpool. This took about half of the five weeks of our outward journey on the “Stirling Castle”. By this time the submarine menace had been reduced considerably.
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[photograph of three men and one woman]
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[photograph of the crew with signatures]
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[underlined and centred] Chapter 4: Back to England [/underlined and centred]
Once we docked in Liverpool we were soon on the train and on our way to No. 7 P.R.C. (presumably Personnel Receiving Centre) at Harrogate on 14.8.43. From there we went on our disembarkation leave. I believe I got most of my officer’s uniform fixed up in Hull and maybe some items in Harrogate, where we had to return before posting.
On 8.9.43 my posting came to 3(O) A.F.U., Halfpenny Green, an airfield situated in the West Midlands between Bridgnorth and Dudley. (Today it is a civil airport). There during the next few weeks, I was to take part in No. 138 Air Observers Advance Navigation Course. It seemed an impressive title although a little anachronistic when the replacement of Observers by Navigators had already spread to South Africa and Canada with the Empire Training Scheme. We were already wearing the “N” brevets which replaced the previous observer “O”, as we arrived for the course.
The “advanced navigation course” conducted on Ansons served two purposes. It showed us the difference between map-reading over the wide-open spaces of South Africa, where it was relatively easy to pick out significant features such as a main road or a railway line, and the more complex problem in European map-reading. The more densely populated areas introduced a corresponding profusion of ground detail. Secondly, it extended our experience quite logically without the further complication, on a short course, which might have been occasioned by using an unfamiliar aircraft. On the other hand, the disquieting feeling remained over the relevance of map reading from a few thousand feet, half the time in daylight, compared with the coming operational navigation mainly at
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night, largely out of sight of the ground and at around 20,000 feet, while covering the ground more rapidly in a four-engined aircraft and with the added distractions caused by the opposition.
The thirty-eight and a half hours flying time accrued at Halfpenny Green, brought my total flying time to one hundred and thirty-two and a half hours, roughly one-quarter being night flying. My one recollection of those days was, on the completion of a particular night exercise, walking from the airfield to the hut on a beautiful Autumn night along a narrow country road with not a soul in sight and humming a popular tune of those days.
The next posting was to No. 84 O.T.U. (Operational Training Unit) at Desborough in Northamptonshire. That was on 12.10.43. This was a recently established O.T.U. and the roadways had only been laid that Autumn. It was also pretty wet weather during the first few weeks there and we aircrew, marching between our Nissen huts and lectures found ourselves on roads covered with mud from the soil excavated during their construction and piled nearby.
The O.T.U. was equipped with Vickers Wellington twin-engined bombers, which had been the main-stay of Bomber Command for some time but was being progressively replaced by four-engined types. However, the Wellingtons, or “Wimpeys” as they were usually called, looked large and impressive and very business-like compared with the Anson to which I was accustomed.
Other huts were occupied by other categories of aircrew – pilots, bomb-aimers, wireless operators and air-gunners. Very soon we would have to perform the transition from individuals to aircrews. To this end we were assembled in a large hangar and
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told to get ourselves sorted out. This was very much a lottery. We were teaming up with people we had never met before to undertake dangerous operations during which we would be bound to depend implicitly on these strangers being able to do their jobs efficiently. I suppose this was accepted because we were “all in the same boat”. In hindsight, I don’t think anyone could have suggested a rational alternative.
I cannot remember just how it came about but I found myself “crewed up” with three sergeants (pilot, Chris Derrick; wireless operator, John (Jock) Poyner; a rear gunner, Tom Gibb from Glasgow), and a Pilot Officer bomb-aimer making up the crew of five for the Wellington. This was the stage at which the division between commissioned and non-commissioned aircrew became apparent. We commissioned “types” were quartered in huts segregated from the huts of the N.C.O.s, and we had separate messes. We attended lectures according to our aircrew duties, e.g. navigator or whatever and only got together as a crew when flying was in the offing. It wasn’t done for officers and N.C.0.s to go around in “matey” groups.
On the morale-boosting side, we navigators were soon relieved to learn that our big worry about how we could possibly navigate accurately at night would be considerably relieved by our introduction to an almost magical device known as a Gee box. Basically this measured the aircraft’s distance from each of two ground stations and where these measurements coincided gave the geographical position of the aircraft. On the debit side it was jammable by the enemy and could not be relied upon beyond the enemy coast. Nevertheless it would give us a sound beginning to our task when we went out on operational flights.
We flew in a “Wimpey” for the first time on 8.11.43 with
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a “screened” pilot instructing our pilot, Sgt. Derrick on the take-offs, circuits and landings, commonly known as “circuits and bumps”. The significance of this dawned on me in the course of time.
Our pilot was given his solo check, went solo (with members of the crew) and had three further lots of “circuits and bumps”. Then we took the gunners on an air-firing exercise and did some dual “circuits and bumps”, two thirds of them with six different screened pilots. I think we must have met most of the instructors of “B” flight, some of them several times. Sometimes we were airborne several times a day, four times on three occasions. Our pilot seemed to have some trouble with his steering around the perimeter track and wandered off it occasionally. When this happened we were liable to be bogged down as the ground was so muddy.
On a couple of occasions I flew in the rear turret because the gunners were occupied with ground training and the policy was for there always to be a pair of eyes in the rear turret to warn of the proximity of other aircraft both in the air and on the ground. I did not care for the cramped conditions and I cared less about the landings, when my helmeted head hit the turret. In my ignorance I thought it was just one of the things that went with flying heavy aircraft. I was thankful I was a navigator.
Now the bomb-aimer had to “get in” a bit of practical work, dropping eleven and a half pound practice bombs at the local bombing range. We had been to the bombing range once at night and once by day, both times with a “screened” pilot. Now we had to carry out the same exercises “solo”. The high-level bombing by day was carried out, apparently satisfactorily but night bombing presented difficulties. We had bomb-sight trouble
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on a number of occasions and four attempts were aborted. On the last occasion our bomb aimer was sick and on our return to base our pilot reported “bomb-aimer u/s” instead of “bomb-sight u/s”.
At this stage we parted company with Chris Derrick – he was considered unsuitable as the pilot of heavy bomber aircraft. We heard that he carried on flying Oxfords, twin-engined aircaft. [sic] We also saw no more of our bomb aimer, F/O Valentine. I missed listening to his gramophone and classical records of an evening.
During these early weeks we were rudely brought up against the realities of the job. One of our Wellingtons was shot down one night by a German intruder aircraft from a height of about 10,000 feet, possibly on a practice bombing exercise. Two members of the crew, including the F/Lt pilot, who had some operational experience on other aircraft, were fellow occupants of the same hut as Valentine and myself. I was one of the bearers at the funeral service in the local church.
Within a few days we had a replacement pilot, Sgt. Redman, a rather taciturn character and we were transferred from “B” flight to “D” flight. We also had a replacement bomb-aimer, Sgt. Tommy Crook.
Obviously Sgt. Redman had already satisfied the Air Force that he was competent to fly Wellingtons because, without any preliminaries whatsoever, our first outing with him was on a daylight cross-country (i.e. navigational exercise) in the company of a screened pilot. That was on 28.12.43. By the 10.1.44 we were completing our series of navigation exercises (in which we suffered simulated attacks by R.A.F. fighters) in what must have been record time, as the Air Force attempted to
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makes us catch up on lost time.
Unfortunately the cross-country on Route 92/19 turned out to be a somewhat traumatic experience. (In those days I don’t think the word “traumatic” was part of the vocabulary as it is today). Part of the route during a five and a half hour flight took us about 100 miles out over the North Sea and everything was going satisfactorily and the Gee set was working O.K. when Sgt. Redman suddenly announced that the aircraft had stalled. In front of me on the navigator’s table, was a duplicate altimeter, showing 8,000 feet. I watched, somewhat numbly, as the needle began to “unwind”. I can only suppose the other crew members were similarly afflicted. There was certainly no chatter and no panic.
We all knew that the next words from the pilot were most likely to be “Prepare for ditching” which would mean taking up positions to minimise injury when the aircraft hit the sea. The altimeter continued to “unwind”. There was no instruction from our pilot to the wireless operator to try to inform base of our predicament and no word as to what was happening. At 4,000 feet, halfway down to the cold North Sea with virtually no chance of survival, the aircraft levelled off, still without a word of explanation from our pilot. It transpired what had happened was that the pitot tube, which feeds the air pressure for the airspeed indicator had “iced up” so the air-speed appeared to fall. The pilot, partly through inexperience, had feared the worst and informed us accordingly. We were relieved to get “home”.
In unanimous agreement the crew decided that we had no confidence in our pilot and did not wish to fly with him again. Because of my commission, I had the unpleasant job of forwarding the crew’s views to our superiors and we did not
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meet Sgt. Redman again. However, by the contribution of our two pilots, the rest of the crew were deemed to have completed the O.T.U. course, and after a spot of leave we were posted to a holding unit at Methwold, in Suffolk on 8.2.44.
It must have been at Methwold that, whilst puzzling over the fate of our temporarily headless crew, I happened to meet an American lieutenant pilot serving with the R.A.F. He had a very English name, Braithwaite, and hailed from Hollywood and had lots of flying hours behind him before he left the U.S.A. He was waiting to be given a crew. He didn’t have a pronounced American accent and discussing our mutual situation we got on very well together. We both thought it would be the ideal solution if we could join forces, i.e. if he could take our pilotless crew. Unfortunately, the authorities preferred to give him a crew who had lost their pilot doing an operation as second pilot with another crew for experience before operating with his own crew.
Our crew was posted on 25.2.44 to No. 1653 H.C.U. at Chedburgh, (also in Suffolk), which was in No. 3 Group of Bomber Command. Here we were in the land of the Stirling four-engined bomber – we would much rather have been on Lancasters. However, looking back on those days, I am certain that it was a turning point as far as our crew was concerned. In addition to acquiring a new pilot, Sgt. G.F. (Fred) Holbrook and a mid-upper gunner, Sgt. Stan Swain, we were joined by our flight engineer, Sgt. Johnny Squires, an extremely useful asset over the next six months or so. Johnny was already serving in the Army when the war started and had got to the rank of Captain in the Black Watch, pretty good going considering he wasn’t much taller than my five foot six and a half inches! Anyway, during the middle years of the war the Army had a comb-out of junior officers of 40 years and more and it was
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decided that he would be better employed in his basic occupation, engineering, in civilian life. He was not enraptured with the idea and, knocking ten years off his age, joined the R.A.F. for aircrew training as a flight engineer.
He was, of course, much older than the rest of us. I was just coming up to 22, our wireless operator, John Poyner, was just 22 and Fred Holbrook was probably about the same age. The rest of the crew were younger, the gunners probably 19 or 20. You could say he was almost a father-figure, but we daren’t have suggested any such thing at the time.
He was really first class at the job, always calm and never at a loss, whatever the circumstances. He was a really steadying influence and, personally, having already “lost” two pilots along the way and now having a third unknown factor taking over, I felt much happier about our future knowing that Johnny was sitting up there alongside Fred. That feeling was reinforced as we progressed steadily with the local flying and then with navigational exercises on Stirlings (Mark I and III).
The Stirling, which was the first of the R.A.F.’s four-engined bombers, built to a 1936 specification, gave the impression of a long dinosaur waiting to attack or pounce. The undercarriage was enormous and at first sight made me wonder what the altimeter in the cockpit read! It was a good aircraft but had serious limitations, the main one being its maximum altitude. I understand that this was due to its wingspan being limited by the standard hangar width of the day.
Whilst other Bomber Command aircraft normally operated at about 20,000 feet, this ‘plane could barely manage 15,000, so it seemed it would be unwise to get mixed up with
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people dropping things from a mile above.
After five weeks at Chedburgh we were able to erase such thoughts from our imagination as we went on leave prior to being transferred to the Lancaster Finishing School at Hemswell in No. 1 Group. I still have one souvenir from the Stirling era, a horizontal scar on the bridge of my nose, due to colliding with the rear end of the tailplane whilst walking around a Stirling on a very dark night. Fortunately it was only local flying – not a navigational trip – and I was able to clamp my first aid dressing on to the spot immediately and stop the bleeding until we returned. That was to be the only injury I sustained in the Air Force.
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Walter Suddaby
I kept in touch with Walter at varying intervals throughout our R.A.F. careers and I knew he’d been with his crew to 1658 H.C.U. (Heavy Conversion Unit) at Riccall (halfway between York and Selby) to train on Halifax bombers. I had plenty of reminders when I later travelled through Riccall on my way to and from work at Selby. I heard when he got onto 158 Squadron at Lissett, near Bridlington and then no more.
I cannot remember just how it happened that his brother, Frank, cycled over from their home in North Hull and found me home on leave, but his tidings were terrible and I was shocked. Walter had been killed in extremely unfortunate circumstances. In “The Bomber Battle for Berlin”, Air Commodore John Searby explains what happened on the night of 24/25th March 1944. “Over the Dutch coast P/O Simpson” (Walter’s pilot) “called base saying his port and starboard outer engines were damaged”. (It would be Walter transmitting the message). “and nothing more was heard until he was reported having crashed at the water’s edge at Ingham near Cromer, Norfolk, where a minefield was laid years before against possible invasion. The aircraft blew up and all were killed.” Apparently, having little altitude, the pilot attempted a crash landing on the beach, and had either forgotten about the mined beaches or had little alternative but to take the risk.
A later publication, by W.R, Chorley. reported the crash as happening on the sand dunes near Winterton-on-Sea, Norfolk.
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[underlined] Chapter 5: Operations 1-20 [/underlined]
I can still remember my first close-up encounter with the Lancaster – no, I didn’t bump my nose. Compared with the ungainly appearance of the Stirling, the Lancaster looked sleek and business-like. On entering the cockpit I was greatly impressed by the appearance of the in-line Rolls Royce Merlin engines, of which I had heard so much since I became interested in aviation. My confidence soared. It increased further when I heard about the H2S (air-borne radar equipment) and the A.P.I. (air position indicator). Not that I had any time for practice at Hemswell – the object of the exercise was the transference from one four-engined bomber (the Stirling) to the other (the Lancaster) which mainly meant lots of take-offs and landings for our pilot and familiarisation with the new aircraft and its numerous instrument panels and dials for pilot (Fred) and flight engineer (Johnny).
We were airborne for a total of barely eleven hours (some day and some night) during our brief stay at Hemswell and in no time at all we were making the short journey, on 26.4.44, by crew bus I believe, to Wickenby and No. 12 Squadron. At Wickenby, which was a war-time constructed airfield, I was again segregated from the rest of the crew as they were all sergeants. My accomodation [sic] on the officers’ site was in a Nissen hut, similar to that of the crew on the N.C.O.S’ site, which I later wandered over to inspect.
I had a distinctly unusual and rather disquieting introduction to my new “home”. There was only one person there when I arrived, P/O Adam (Jock) Varrie, who I believe hailed from Lockerbie. (Currently domiciled in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe). He had lost his crew on operations whilst he was ill,
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and had been given the job of assistant to the Flight Engineer Leader. He had arrived at Wickenby in September ’43 and had done quite a lot of ops. before losing his crew. He told me that during his time at Wickenby he knew of only one crew and “one odd bod” who had survived a tour of 30 operations, i.e. from the two squadrons Nos. 12 and 626, operating from Wickenby. I decided there was no point in worrying and to take a limited objective.
I had a few science books with me and I did look at them on several occasions but I decided to defer the idea. Instead, I suppose partly in bravado, I decided to read Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” which I found in the Library at Wickenby Officers’ Mess. I wondered how far I’d get with it under the circumstances. I did in fact get through the lot, more than 1,000 pages, in instalments! For moral support I said the “Lord’s Prayer” each night as I lay in bed, trying to give full interpretation to the words. Secondly (and rather trivially) I always polished by flying boots before going off to briefings. It was rather foolish in hindsight, because if I’d had to parachute down in enemy territory, polished boots would not have been a good idea, if one was trying to evade capture even if you managed to rear off the leg parts. Looking back, I suppose it was a case of “Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition”.
At the Navigation Office I encountered F/Lt. R. Stancliffe, our Squadron Navigation Officer and was impressed by his relaxed and friendly attitude. I soon encountered something which I found very inspirational. In some pigeon holes or racks in the Nav. Office there were a few navigators’ logs, one of which left an enduring impression on me. It had been compiled by F/O D.A. Colombo who had gone missing, along with his crew, on the Berlin raid of 24/25 March ’44, i.e.
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just over a month earlier and the one on which Walter Suddaby and his crew were lost. His log seemed to me like a work of art, hardly the kind of craftsmanship one would have believed possible, given the circumstances prevailing at that particularly hazardous period in the history of Bomber Command. I decided, then and there, that if I couldn’t make Colombo’s standard I’d have a good try. I never met him but I never forgot him.
Our crew was placed in “B” Flight of 12 Squadron and we were airborne just twice, both on 28.4.44, for “fighter affiliation” (i.e. dodging a Spitfire) combined with air-sea firing practice for the gunners and a simulated night attack on Bristol. I don’t remember whether we managed to fit in a short leave but just over a week later we were detailed for our first op. on 7.5.44.
The first and second ops. were not very demanding, one on a target near Rennes in France and the second to a target in Belgium. The latter attack was aborted on the instruction of the Master Bomber, due to poor visibility and we were ordered to return with our load.
Between our first and third ops. we got in quite a lot of navigational practice (and much needed H2S practice) on five cross-country exercises. This period also helped very considerably in getting us working together as a crew and becoming familiar with our surroundings, both aloft and on the station.
Our third and fourth ops. were on German territory, but only just over the border from Belgium. They were attacks on two marshalling yards at Aachen and met with considerable resistance, the loss rates being 6 percent in the first case and 7 percent in the
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second.
Railway marshalling yards were beginning to assume very considerable importance in view of the impending invasion of Europe by the Allied Armies. Anything that would impede the free transit of German forces to the coast could obviously be helpful to our forces, and Aachen was an important railway junction in that respect.
On the second of the Aachen trips we made the aquaintance[sic] of Lancaster Mk.1 ME758, PH-N, the former being the Manufacturers (Metropolitan Vickers) number and the latter comprising No. 12 Squadron’s letters and the aircraft letter. This was to become our regular aircraft, in which we were to do 25 of our 30 ops. The Aachen trip was N-Nan’s tenth.
On all night operations and quite a lot of the day ones I travelled secluded from the outer world by my black-out curtain. I sat at the navigation table, which was situated to the rear of the pilot’s armoured back-rest (the only armour in the aircraft), facing the port (left) side of the aeroplane. The reason for the black-out precaution was, of course, the angle-poise light which illuminated my chart and navigation log. Any emerging light would not have been appreciated by the crew as a whole and would not have been good for the pilot’s night vision.
I had devised my personal system of navigation in an effort to simplify the calculations. In fact, I had gone decimal and worked in tenths of hours and tenths of minutes instead of minutes and fractions. For example, in the early stages of an operation when I wanted to ascertain the actual wind velocity, which was ever-changing and sometimes considerably at variance with the meteorological information, I took Gee-fixes at
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6-minute intervals or sometimes 12, knowing it was then simple mental arithmetic to multiply the measured vector from the air position (thank goodness for the A.P.I.) to the fix by 10 or 5 respectively to find the wind speed in knots (nautical miles per hour). This saved a lot of messing about with the manual computer.
It was just as essential to keep in touch with the wind velocity as with your actual position so that you had the ability to correct your course in order to hit the next turning point on your route. It was always a case of working with hind-sight. You could only assume that the wind affecting you over the next few miles would be similar to what you had just experienced.
Miscellaneous observations such as times of bombs being fused and released, times to drop and rates of dropping of “window” (i.e. anti-radar aluminised strips), times and rough location of the positions of aircraft being shot down (including some alleged to be “scarecrow” devices fired into the air by the enemy to pretend they were R.A.F. aircraft which had been destroyed in mid-air), whether parachutes were seen, sightings of enemy aircraft, target indicators, radio information via the wireless operator, and anything which might be of use to “intelligence”, all had to be logged with time of occurrence and estimated positions relative to our aircraft and its heading.
We fitted in yet another cross-country exercise on 29.5.44 for H2S practice. (See page 88. for technical details). The log book entry reads “Window (aircraft) lost and aileron damaged. A.S.I. (Air Speed Indicator) read 360 m.p.h. plus in dive”. The necessary repairs were soon made.
With the invasion imminent we got a number of short-
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haul trips, including attacks on a radar-jamming station near Dieppe which was later found to have been made “with great accuracy”, a gun position at Sangatte, near Calais, (as part of a deception programme to keep the enemy guessing where the landings would come), and the attack on a coastal battery at St. Martin de Varreville on the Normandy coast on the eve of the invasion. On the latter occasion the H2S screen was covered with numerous luminous pin-point echoes of the invasion fleet on its way across the Channel.
On the next evening we were supposed to bomb a railway switch-line at Acheres in the suburbs of Paris, but there was too much cloud for the safety of French civilians so the Master Bomber ordered us to return with our loads. (Not much fun, landing with a full bomb load!)
That counted as our eighth operation. The next couple of night operations were also concerned with inhibiting the Hun, one being against a landing-ground at Flers in Southern Normandy and the other attacking the important railway junction of Evreux, about 50 miles west of Paris. So far our ten ops. had not been too stressful and had averaged only about four and a half hours night flying.
Targets were marked by the Pathfinder Force (PFF) with various coloured devices which could be varied according to pre-arranged plans during the period of the attack and could be over-ridden by instructions from the “Master of Ceremonies” (Master Bomber) according to eventualities arising during the progress of the raid.
By the time I was operating, the P.F.F. system had been developed over the better part of two years into a formidable
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system, but there were occasional human errors. When this happened the whole or part of a raid could go awry.
On the night of 12/13 June 1944 we took part in the first raid of a new oil campaign, the target being the Nordstern synthetic oil plant at Gelsenkirchen in the Ruhr. In addition to my normal duties I was one of a number of navigators on the operation to be detailed for “wind-finding”. The idea was for the force as a whole to have the benefit of the information obtained from selected navigators and apply it to their individual needs. We calculated the wind velocities at successive stages en route and had our wireless operators transmit the coded information back to base for analysis and consideration by meteorological staff, who then reported back to the main force the outcome of their deliberations in terms of up-to-date information on wind vehicles.
From my log for the trip I see that I sent back wind velocities from seven stages of the outward and return trips. I was quite happy with the navigation and had given the pilot the final correction to the course to the target, then calculated and given a wind velocity to Jock Poyner, our wireless operator, when our pilot spotted what he believed to be the target markers about 30 degrees to starboard and altered course towards them despite my disbelief, when we were approximately 20 miles from the target. Our clear instructions were to bomb the markers so that is what happened. We bombed just after 0101 hours, i.e. within our allotted range of 0100 to 0104 hours.
Many years later I read an illuminating account in “Bomber Command News” in an article spanning “Six months in the life of Bomber Command, a day-by-day account of support for the Allied invasion forces.” This covered the period 23.5.44
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to 31.12.44, including the attack on Gelsenkirchen. It reported – “Owing to the good work of the Pathfinders the attack opened with exceptional accuracy. Later a rogue target indicator fell ten miles short of target and was bombed by 35 aircraft. All production at the oil plant ceased with a loss of 1,000 tons of aviation fuel a day for several weeks.” On my part, I compared the photograph taken automatically when our bombs were released, with the large wall mosaic in the Intelligence library of photographs taken by R.A.F. reconnaissance aircraft. Not having the benefit of the information which was quoted so many years later in “Bomber Command News”, I estimated from our last alteration of course before the target approximately where to look on this huge map for the place we had actually bombed.
From a few distinctive features on our photograph I was able to find the matching spot on the wall map – with a difference. Our picture showed unmistakably a dispersal point on the perimeter of an airfield which must have been constructed during the years since the reconnaissance photographs were taken. So the airfield personnel probably had an exciting night! The probable explanation is that whilst the real target was obscured by thick smoke from burning oil, the markers dropped ten miles away in open country were clearly visible. Seventeen Lancasters were lost, 6.1% of the Lancaster force of 286.
For a bit of variation we flew the following night for a couple of hours practicing night fighter evasion (with an R.A.F. fighter).
On the evenings of 14th and 15th June ’44 we operated in Bomber Command’s first daylight raids since May ’43. The objectives were the fast German motor torpedo boats (E-boats) and other light German naval forces based at Le Havre and
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Boulogne, which were threatening Allied shipping off the Normandy beaches. We flew in loose “gaggles” (there had been no training in formation flying) escorted by Spitfires of 11 Group. The E-boat threat to the invasion beaches was almost completely removed. R.A.F. casualties were very light.
We next had an aborted attack on a switch-line at Aulnoye, about 20 miles south of Mons. After a discussion between the Master Bomber and his deputy it was decided not to risk civilian casualties as it was too cloudy to bomb with accuracy, so we set off back with our loads, jettisoning the delayed-action bombs shortly after we left the French coast.
On the night of 12/13 June ’44 the Germans began their V-1 (flying bomb) attacks on London. Between 15-16 and 16-17 June, 144 flying bombs crossed the Kent coast and 73 reached London. This stung the British authorities into action and Eisenhower, the Supreme Commander of the invasion forces, agreed that retaliatory action (code name CROSSBOW) should rank second in priority only to the urgent needs of the battlefield. From mid-June to mid-August attacks on V-weapon objectives became one of Bomber Command’s major concerns, absorbing about 40% of its effort and correspondingly reducing its ability to bomb Germany.
Our first involvement came with a daylight attack on a flying-bomb site about 10 miles south-west of Calais. As the promised target indicators were not visible at the stated time we bombed on the Gee co-ordinates. That was on 22.6.44.
I think we must have had a week’s leave after our 15th “op”, because “N-Nan” flew five operations with three other crews before we returned to the fray. Then it was back to the
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Pas de Calais to attack the Domleger V-1 site, (my log says “flying-bomb supply lines”) in another daytime operation on 2.7.44. It was rather cloudy so again we “homed” to the target on Gee before the bomb-aimer, Tommy Crook, was able to take over and bomb visually.
Now followed a trio of fairly lengthy night operations all involving railway marshalling yards at important centres in France. On the nights of 4/5, 5/6, and 12/13 July, we visited successively Orleans, Dijon, and Tours (not exactly Cook’s tours). On the first night the loss rate was 5 percent, on the second nil, and on the third about 3 percent. This was rather strange because the Dijon trip was by far the longer route, taking eight and a quarter hours, compared with about six hours for each of the others. The results were satisfactory, particularly at Orleans.
I had cause to remember the bombing of the French railway system just over a year later when involved in flying our forces home on leave from Italy because the French railway system was still in a mess from our efforts in 1944 (see later). There was also an occasion when I was attending a symposium on analytical chemistry at Birmingham University in either 1954 or 1958 when I became involved in a discussion with a young French scientist, whilst queueing at the refectory. When he asked me if I’d been to France, I said “Not exactly” and admitted I hadn’t set foot in France although I had visited during the war.
I had no idea what his reaction would be, and was greatly relieved and pleased when he slapped me on the back and spoke warmly of his admiration for the way the R.A.F. had managed to knock out railway goods yards close to the towns whilst causing the minimum of civilian casualties. He did not have such a good opinion of the U.S.A.A.F. with whom he chose to make the
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comparison. I wish that I had made a note of his name and address! It was a completely unsolicited testimonial. After a gap of another week we went on our 20th operation to the railway yards and junction at Courtrai (or Kortrijk as the Belgians have it nowadays). Both targets were devastated. Casualties were 3 percent.
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[black and white photograph of 7 airmen in uniform standing in a row in front of a Nissen hut]
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[underlined] Chapter 6: Operations 21-30 [/underlined]
Taking part in the first major raid on a German city for two months, on the night of 23/24 July, we went to Kiel. It was our twentyfirst [sic] operation. The elaborate deception and the surprise return to a German target must have confused the opposition because Bomber Command lost only four aircraft out of 629 taking part. Kiel suffered heavy damage. The bombing force appeared suddenly from behind a Mandrel jamming screen, operated by the Radio Counter-Measures squadrons of 100 Group, and took the defences by surprise. In the space of 25 minutes nearly 3,000 tons of bombs fell on the town and port, inflicting enormous damage to the U-boat yards and many other areas.
Rescue and repair was hampered by 500 delayed-action bombs and unexploded duds. There was no water for three days, no trains and buses for eight days and no gas for cooking for three weeks. Looking at my log, I see that I had a fault on the H2S and also that when we were well on the way home I had a dabble with the bubble sextant, taking three star shots for practice. I was glad I wasn’t dependent on them.
On the night of 24/25 July we took part in the first of three heavy raids on Stuttgart. This was a more arduous trip, the return trip taking eight hours forty minutes. I had to Sellotape two Mercator charts together to lay down the route which took us via Normandy and south of Orleans to just beyond 9 degrees E longitude, and the majority of two double-sided log forms. Once again, I had the added duty of “wind-finding” for the main force. As it happened, the winds were the lightest I encountered on operations, barely reaching 20 knots at any stage and often less than 10 knots from between west and north-west.
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From the intercom. and audible noises off I gathered, in the seclusion of my snuggery, that the reception committee was doing its best to welcome us as we neared the target. Someone spotted a night-fighter immediately ahead of us but fortunately it was crossing our route and was banked away from us, probably after some othe [sic] prey.
(See page 91 “The German Defences” for further information on the tactics of the night-fighters).
We bombed within half a minute of the time I had in my flight plan and speeded up to the next turning point on our route, just three minutes beyond the target, where we made a sharp turn to starboard on to the next leg of 18 nautical miles, before another starboard turn over the Schwabische Alb range. We had just settled onto our homeward route when trouble arose. The port inner engine packed up, probably due to flak, and had to be feathered.
That meant we had ahead of us, all being well and no further complications, a four hour journey on three engines. We hoped we didn’t encounter any night fighters and were thankful for light winds for the next part of our journey.
Actually, being relieved of the bomb load, “N-Nan” managed very nicely on its three Rolls Royce engines and I was able to continue the job of sending wind velocities back to base, the first on our return journey being only fifteen minutes after “losing” the engine. Altogether, on this op. I see that I managed to send back ten wind velocities covering various stages en route. We did lose a little time but by the time we crossed the south coast of England we were only ten minutes later than our planned time and we didn’t have to queue for landing back at Wickenby. Casualties amounted to 3.4 percent of the 614 attackers.
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Two days later, on 27.7.44 we were airborne locally to air test the new engine and also the replacement for a damaged tail-fin, do some air-sea firing and take a passenger to Sandtoft.
Our 23rd operation was much shorter and less exciting. On 30.7.44 we were part of a very large force of 692 aircraft sent to bomb six German positions in front of a mainly American ground attack in the Villers Bocage-Caumont area. Our target was near Caumont. Cloud caused difficulties and we had to orbit and descend to see the target indicators before bombing. Only four aircraft were lost. We were down at Wickenby after four hours.
During the previous week I had been greatly surprised to see among new arrivals on 12 Squadron an old acquaintance from South African days. Furthermore, he was the other navigator commissioned at the same time and so we had consecutive Air Force numbers. We had both been on No. 12 course at 41 Air School though he was in “A” flight and I was in “B”. Due to the vagaries of the R.A.F. posting system, he had arrived at Wickenby three months after myself. He was F/O J.A. (John) Tebbut. We were naturally both excited by this coincidence – he could easily have gone to one of the many other airfields and squadrons and I hadn’t encountered any of the other navigators of No. 12 course since I left 41 Air School.
I readily agreed to fly with him locally (and unofficially I believe) so that I could help him master the H2S equipment. We flew in “N-Nan” on a local cross-country lasting just over two hours on 31.7.44. When he wasn’t tied up with his crew we had a good natter about things in general and then he asked if I would like to borrow a book he had been presented with at Christmas 1943. I still have the book in front of me as I write, with its
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inscription “from Harold and Sylvia”.
Operation No. 24 couldn’t have been more brief. It was on a flying-bomb site at Les Catelliers, in the Pas-de-Calais. Navigation was normal down to the south coast near Selsey Bill except that I concentrated on H2S to the exclusion of Gee equipment. After that I relaxed as our formation was led to the target by Mosquitos. (I do not thing the Navigation Officer approved – he scribbled “Average Nav.” at the foot of my log). We were home again after three and a half hours.
Next day, 3rd August, we were briefed for a daylight attack on a flying-bomb site at Trossy St. Maximin, not far from Chantilly, about 25 miles north of Paris. The wind was light and the navigation straightforward. This time I relied mainly on Gee and my decimal-hour system taking Gee fixes at 1215, 1221, 1227, 1233, 1239, 1245, 1251, 1257, and 1303 hours i.e. 6 minute intervals and obtaining seven measurements of wind velocity in that time. For the next fix, at 1309, my fix was a bearing and distance from Selsey Bill, using H2S.
On crossing the coast the bombs were fused and selected and we proceeded at our eventual bombing altitude of 11,000 feet. We kept “bang on” our route and crossed the French coast within seconds of our predicted time. Other Lancasters were visible all around. At position “H” on our route the time was 1408 as we turned (dead over the turning point according to Tommy Crook, our bomb-aimer, and headed towards Compiegne, our last turning point before the target. Compiegne was only 14 nautical miles (4.3 minutes) away at this time and I thought I would have a look at this historic place as we turned towards our target. It was the place where the Armistice was signed in a railway-carriage in 1918 and the self-
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same place where Hitler insisted on reversing things in 1940.
I moved forward into the cockpit and was feeling pleased as Compiegne appeared below our banked wing-tip. Then I looked for our accompanying aircraft and eventually spotted them as small specks ahead of us. They had obviously cut the corner, missing out the right-angled bend at Compiegne and were well on the way to the target. There was only one other Lanc. anywhere near us and it was probably half a mile away on the beam.
We were now faced with a straight run onto the target of 21 nautical miles, which would take over 6 minutes, at only 11,000 feet in a cloudless sky and with no-one with whom to share the flak. The odds were very heavily stacked against us, but we carried on according to form. No-one panicked – we were all pretty quiet – but that run-in onto target seemed to take an awful long time.
We were subjected to very intense anti-aircraft fire – the gunners must have been rubbing their hands in anticipation. The conditions were ideal for them – a large aircraft at moderate height on a steady course in clear visibility. We were surrounded by shell-bursts, to the extent that the crew of the other aircraft thought we’d “had it”. We bombed in the middle of our allotted time bracket for bombing, which was obviously not the case with the vast majority of our companions, who were now miles away. Our aircraft was very fortunate to survive. Our recent replacement port inner engine was hit and had to be “feathered”. One of the other engines was damaged and three petrol tanks hit.
Our bomb-aimer, Tommy Crook, and flight engineer,
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Johnny Squires, received minor injuries from the “flak” which they later professed to be worthwhile in exchange for the wound-stripes they were then entitled to wear on their sleeves.
About 12 minutes after leaving the target and nearly halfway back to the coast, we saw a Lancaster on fire about five miles ahead and counted five parachutes opening as the crew baled out. That Lancaster “hit the deck” two minutes later.
It might just as easily have been our aircraft. Once we had crossed the French coast we breathed a sigh of relief and reduced the airspeed to ease the burden on our remaining engines. We were only 8 minutes later than scheduled back at Wickenby.
It so happened that our Squadron Navigation Officer had taken part in this operation and he was obviously in one of the aircraft which had taken the short cut, missing out Compiegne. I quite surprised myself by marching into his office later and telling him what I thought about it. I wondered, later, if it wasn’t our pilot I should have had words with, as he should have realised what was happening and stayed with the “gaggle”, or at least told me what was afoot. On the other hand it was possibly a throw-back from the Gelsenkirchen raid when he missed the target by sticking strictly to orders rather than follow my directions.
The outcome was that our aircraft “N-Nan” needed extensive repairs, having between 50 and 60 flak holes. (Johnny Squires gave me a piece of German flak found in the Lanc. – I still have it). It didn’t take part in operations again until ten days later, piloted by F/O G.S. Whyte to Falaise on 13/14 August.
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In the meantime we were sent on a sea-mining (or “Gardening”) operation in Lancaster PH-W off the French coast to the west of La Rochelle on 10/11 August.
This was our 26th op. and in this regard our crew was running neck and neck with another crew captained by F/Lt G.C. Owens, with a Canadian navigator F/O G.L. Wistow, who were both in my hut on the Officers’ site. I didn’t know George Wistow all that well, but I knew he was very well thought of in Canada. Mail delivered to the Mess was generally placed in a pigeon-holed framework but the “W” pigeon-hole was inadequate for the volume of Wistow’s letters so his were tied in a separate bundle placed just below the W’s. Like many Canadians he was a very outgoing type and usually went around with his pilot in his free time. Although only eight aircraft were taking part in this operation, Wistow’s was one of them, PH-X, JB716.
The object was to lay mines (or “Vegetables”) in channels believed to be used by U-boats operating from La Rochelle. This was where our H2S was to be of use in determining the dropping points of the mines on a bearing and distance from a feature on the Ile de Oleron.
The obvious hazard was the flak we were likely to encounter at our mine-dropping height of only 5,000 feet from both the Ile de Oleron and the Ile de Re. Night fighters wouldn’t have to make much altitude either.
Our route took us via Bridport on the south coast, then south across the Channel and the Brest peninsular and descending gradually to 5,000 feet to reach a turning point at 47 degrees N and 4 degrees W over the Bay of Biscay, from where
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we headed south-east towards our destination.
The islands indicating our mining zone appeared quite clearly on the H2S so I directed our route, map-reading by the H2S for the last few miles. When we reached our release point on a bearing of 335 degrees (true) from Boyard Ville we dropped our mines at 4 second intervals whilst maintaining the same bearing. There was a considerable amount of light flak but we did not receive any damage and were soon climbing back to 10,000 feet on our way home. Our mines had been dropped around 0058 G.M.T., i.e. within the 0050 and 0100 range allotted and we landed back at base at the time our pre-flight plan had calculated for our arrival, all despite a certain amount of apprehension about having to use a different Lancaster from our old faithful “N-Nan”.
Unfortunately, PH-X, with F/Lt Owen’s crew did not return. We heard later that they were badly shot up by flak near the mining area, struggled back to England but left it too late to bale out, crashed and caught fire. The wireless operator and the mid-upper gunner were the only survivors. They were both badly injured but fortunately they managed to crawl out without getting burned. They were in hospital for some time but both survived the war. Stan Canning, the wireless operator still lives in Birmingham. (I managed to contact him in 1997).
There were continual reminders for me in the post-war years of both George Wistow and Walter Suddaby as I journeyed between York and Selby. On the main road I passed through Riccall where Walter was stationed at the H.C.U. (Heavy Conversion Unit) prior to going on to Lisset and 158 Squadron. On the alternative route I had to pass through the village of Wistow.
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I think our crew must have gone on a week’s leave because the next entry in my log book was ferrying Lancaster PH-Z from Wickenby to Ludford for a major inspection on 21st August. Perhaps it was a good job it was only a twenty minute flight! Anyway we travelled back by road.
We discovered, on our return from leave, that John Tebbut and his crew had gone missing during our absence, so I was left with the slim blue book on “Cloud reading for pilots.” which he had lent me two or three weeks before. By this time of course, all his kit and possessions had been collected and I couldn’t see a lot of point in trying to catch up with them for the sake of the small inexpensive book which remains among my souvenirs.
Very strangely, a couple of years ago, I found John Tebbut’s name recorded on the Wickenby Roll of Honour with the date 24th June 1944 although my log book records my flight with him on 31st July 1944. W.R. Chorley in “R.A.F. Bomber Command Losses in 1944” obviously had the same source of information, reporting the loss of John’s crew “without trace” on 24th June during an operation on Saintes. I know they’ve got the records wrong but how can I do anything about it after 54 years? So many people were involved in making the records of operational casualties that inevitably mistakes were made. One such instance I can point to is the appearance on the Wickenby Roll of Honour of the two crew members who survived the crash which killed George Wistow and four of his crew mates. One of them, the wireless operator, is still alive and the other, the mid-upper gunner died in 1992. I presumed they must have died of their injuries until I came across their names in the Register of Members!
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By the time we renewed our acquaintanceship with “N-Nan” she had completed two more missions, her 42nd and 43rd, with two other 12 Squadron crews. We got her back for her 44th and our 27th operation on 25/26 August. This time the target was the Opel motor factories at Russelheim, E.S.E. of Mainz, where amongst other products, components were being made for flying-bombs.
Navigation was becoming pretty routine by this stage in my career, and although it was a nine-hour trip I managed to keep my concentration all the way, filling in reams of calculations with no noticeable variation in quality right through the exercise. This was recognised by the commendation “Very good nav.”. from our Squadron Navigation Officer written on the bottom of the log. Wind-finding for the main force was again an extra duty. Our scheduled time on the target was 0106 to 0110 – we actually bombed at 0107.
My log included two entries at 0054 and 0126.2 recording aircraft being shot down, with rough bearings relative to our heading. Also noted was a precautionary practice stall with just over twenty minutes to go to Wickenby. Our tailplane had received some damage and it was considered best to try out pre-landing manoeuvres whilst we still had plenty of height (about 8,000 feet). Anyway it can’t have been too bad. One thing I found was that after so many hours of continuous concentration, and then going through de-briefing, I didn’t have any problem sleeping!
The verdict on the operation, not immediately available, was that it inflicted very considerable damage and that the forge and gearbox factory were put out of action for several weeks. The attack was considered ”much more profitable, both in
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damage inflicted and in the lighter losses incurred” than the visit by a force a fortnight earlier.
Operation 28, our second attack on Kiel, turned out to be a rather bumpy ride. On the outward journey we stayed at 2,000 feet, heading E.N.E. until we were three-quarters of the way to Denmark before climbing on the same track to 12,000 feet. At 7 degrees East we turned to starboard and headed almost S.E. as if to attack Hamburg. Navigation was simplified by the fact that Heligoland stood out quite sharply on the cathode ray tube of the H2S with, of course, no confusing signals possible. I obtained bearings at ranges of twenty seven and three quarters and nineteen nautical miles as we passed well to the north of the islands, placing us right on track. At the same time we were climbing to 19,000 feet, and I sent back to base the third of the wind velocities I had dutifully measured.
We crossed the German coast dead on track, crossed the Kiel Canal still heading as if for Hamburg, but when about 25 nautical miles short we turned sharply port on a north-westerly heading to Kiel. As we turned we saw red target indicators going down S.E. of us, so it looked as if there was a diversionary attack on Hamburg. Ahead we saw the first illuminating flares going down but it looked as if there would be low stratus cloud over the target. Then we saw red indicators going down ahead of us. Using the H2S I measured the remaining distance to Kiel at 15 nautical miles, or 3.6 minutes time-wise. Then the green target indicators appeared dead ahead and our bomb-aimer, Tommy Crook, took over. The bombs were dropped at 2309.7 so we were very close to our planned time on target of 2310. We turned away at 2310.1 and, looking at the H2S, I reckoned we must have been “bang on” our aiming point.
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Our H2S fix at 2312.3 showed us right on track to our turning point over Kiel Bay, from which we turned westwards to cross the narrow neck of Germany roughly 20 nautical miles south of the Danish border. From our next turning point on the western German coast, we were to descend from 19,000 feet to 7,000 feet as we put the nose down and pushed up our airspeed from 160 to 200 knots. We had only left the coast between 10 and 15 miles astern when we saw a burning aircraft falling about five miles away on the port beam.
At 2340 all was going well and we were only 2 miles south of track, but only seven minutes later we were encountering static in heavy cloud at about 17,000 feet so Fred altered course, first onto 150 degrees, and then 180 degrees and then 210 degrees, as I could see from my repeater compass, to try to go round to the south of the cumulo-nimbus band. I managed to get a fix using Heligoland which now showed us 14 miles south of track, but we were still heading predominantly south looking for a gap in the clouds. We levelled out at 12,500 feet and turned onto 240 degrees. We were now about 24 miles due west of Heligoland and 20 miles south of track.
Fred decided to descend below freezing level on a heading of 270 degrees (west), but we encountered severe turbulence which upset some of our instruments, (apart from the crew!) and without any action by the pilot the aircraft was thrown around onto an easterly heading, all in the space of a couple of minutes! Fred turned south once more and I got another fix on Heligoland which showed that in a period of almost six minutes we had actually made good only 5 miles and that in a southerly direction. We kept on trying to avoid cloud, first on 240 degrees, then 210 degrees and back to 240 degrees.
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Another fix at 0010 hours showed us only 10 miles north of Nordeney, in the East Friesian Islands, known to be the outposts of German flak batteries. We weren’t keen on re-entering German territory and fortunately we found a gap in the clouds and altered course, thankfully, onto 290 degrees as an estimated direction whilst I calculated a more accurate course to intercept our originally intended track back home.
By 0051 we were practically back on track and hastening homeward at 220 knots. I resumed full navigational control of the aircraft and was soon back in the old routine. We arrived over Wickenby only 15 minutes later than our flight-planned time, thanks partly to using a somewhat higher airspeed than planned over the last hour of our journey, despite a certain section of our route seeming rather like an eternity.
The Navigation Officer’s comment written on my log was “Must have been a big, big cloud!!!” I wish he’d been with us to enjoy it! I think we had probably encountered what is know as a “line squall”. The report in Bomber Command News“ (Summer 1988) says “472 aircraft attacked, very heavy bombing in the town centre with widespread fires fanned by strong winds. 17 Lancasters were lost. In W.R. Chorley’s “R.A.F. Bomber Command Losses in 1944” six Lancasters are individually listed with their crews as “lost without trace” and two as “crashed in the North Sea” on that operation. One of the aircraft lost without trace was PH-A from 12 Squadron. I wonder whether they had cloud trouble but fared worse than we did?
Looking back on this experience I marvel not only at the robustness of the Lancaster but also that of the gyrocompass and the air position indicator (A.P.I.) which it served.
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It was back to routine on our 29th operation, which took us by day over Reading and Eastbourne to another flying-bomb site at Fromentel in the Pas-de-Calais. This was such a short-haul trip, lasting barely three hours, that we were able to take our maximum bomb load of 15,300 lb, or very nearly 7 tonnes in today’s parlance. One innovation this time was that the bomb-aimer took over the navigation from the French coast onwards and map-read us the 21 miles to the target, which was in any case, well marked with red target indicators, (T.I’s). We bombed one minute later than planned, but it was all pretty uneventful.
Our final (30th) operation took us on a daylight attack on a V-2 rocket store at St. Riquier, just a few miles from Abbeville. Eight other V-2 stores were being attacked on the same day, involving a total of 601 aircraft. Again things went very much according to plan and we bombed right on time. We did, however, climb to 14,500 feet to avoid flak as we headed back for the coast near Dunkerque. There was some flak damage to the aircraft, just to prove it’s not wise to take things for granted. Six Lancasters were lost. So we ended our operational tour of 30 ops. tidily on the last day of the month (31.8.44). I got an “excellent” proficiency assessment from the O.C. of 12 Squadron, Wing Commander Maurice Stockdale, which is recorded near the end of my log book. That gentleman now lives in Fleet, Hampshire.
One outcome of a successful tour of “ops” was my receiving the D.F.C., gazetted on 12 December 1944. I later learned that our pilot Fred Holbrook (who began his tour as sergeant, progressed to warrant officer half-way through the tour, and was commissioned after 23 “ops”) also received this award.
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[underlined] Chapter 7: Instructing, Ferry Trips & Crewing up for second tour [/underlined]
Just as quickly as our crew assembled in O.T.U. days we were dispersed. We went on leave, (I think it was for a week and I visited the B.O.C.M. laboratory early in September. The only home address I had for a member of the crew was for Johnny Squires. It’s such a long time ago I can’t remember how and when we got our postings, but I can’t remember meeting up again with the others at Wickenby. I was posted to No. 1656 H.C.U. (Heavy Conversion Unit) at Lindholme, near Doncaster, early in September.
I found I was amongst a bunch of experienced navigators condemned to instructing pupil navigators in the use of H2S (airborne radar). Part of the instruction we could do using simulators in a sort of classroom but the nitty-gritty part was actually flying with them on cross-countries. The four-engined aircraft at Lindholme were at first mainly Halifaxes (Mk II) but over the time I was there, (nearly eight months), they were steadily being replaced by Lancasters.
The one common factor in the flying instructing in H2S was that on each occasion (and there were forty-six of them) I flew with a different trainee crew who were leaving the airfield for the first time in a four-engined aircraft without the assurance of a “screened” pilot aboard. In every case they were all complete strangers to me, with the occasional exception of the navigator who I might have met on ground training exercises, and so there was a considerable element of the unknown when one took off with them on a four or five hour cross-country exercise. This might sometimes be extended to include simulated bombing by H2S or the dropping of small practice bombs at the local
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bombing range. When the “screened” pilot flew with a “sprog” crew he at least had his salvation in own hands in the case of emergency – while I knew nothing about piloting an aircraft for real. A “screened” pilot had generally successfully completed a tour of “ops” which was a fair enough way of sorting out the men from the boys.
Maybe I shouldn’t have put it quite like that – after all I was now a “screened” navigator, not that I felt all that screened in this situation. Anyway, I did my best to pass on my experience to a succession of navigators and there was never any suggestion of my being “grounded” and someone else doing the job.
Generally the H2S simulated bombing was done at the turning points on the navigational exercise. When the bombs would have been released if we were bombing for real, we operated (without looking out of the aircraft) a downward pointing camera to give us a line-overlap series of photographs which could be examined later to check the expertise of the use of the H2S as the sole bombing aid.
I still have some line-overlap series as souvenirs of the time we “bombed” Luton, Skomer Island (off S.W. Wales) and the Skerries (just to the N.W. of Anglesey). These were most impressive when the target happened to be largely obscured by cloud that would have made visual bombing difficult and yet there were identifiable points visible through breaks in the clouds on the photographs to prove that the bombing run had been “bang on”. As the H2S was just as effective by night as by day, these photographs helped instil confidence of its effectiveness in the pupil crews. Later we had a more sophisticated camera attached to the H2S set which took pictures of the scene on the cathode ray tube.
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Inevitably there were tricky moments. I can well remember coming in to land at Lindholme after a cross-country with one pupil crew. The pilot misjudged his landing and we touched down on the grass some distance from and running roughly parallel to the runway. Ahead of us loomed some large building. The pilot tried to turn the Lancaster and the undercarriage collapsed, so we skidded to a belly-landing. As calmly and unhurriedly as I could, I suggested that we got out quickly in case the aircraft caught fire. (We might have ruptured a petrol tank and the engines were still hot). Fortunately all was well and no-one was hurt. I have a picture in my log book of this unhappy Lancaster lying on its tummy and the succinct comment on the exercise of 15.1.45 – “Last trip by “X”. In another similar incident “Jock” Niven, another of our flying nav-instructors had to leave an aircraft somewhat hurriedly and, in squeezing his rather plump form through the emergency exit, got out either without his trousers or with them in disarray.
On another cross-country the powers that be tacked on a fighter affiliation exercise (to practice evading fighters) which upset my stomach somewhat and I had to go back down the fuselage to use the Elsan (chemical toilet) – in my log book I have a minute sketch of myself as a match-stalk man, being sick into a bucket! I survived other fighter affiliation exercises without undergoing that particular indignity.
It was just before the half-way stage of my sojourn at 1656 H.C.U. I learned that I had been awarded the D.F.C. for my work on 12 Squadron, and when I went on Christmas leave Mother presented me with a cutting from the “Hull Daily Mail” – I’ve no idea what happened to that.
Judging from the gap between entries in my log book I
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presume I had another leave after completing my duties as an instructor because the next entry shows me flying as navigator in a crew headed by F/Lt Bill Addison, who had acted as flight commander towards the end of his duties at Lindholme.
We were part of a newly assembled crew, each member having completed a tour of thirty operations, preparing for a possible second tour of operations. We had been laid off for a minimum six months (in my case eight months), to rest us from our first tours and at the same time make use of us in the training of further batches of aircrew.
In typical inflexible service fashion we found, much to our chagrin, that we were treated as beginners without an “op” behind us. Another possible explanation is that with the ending of the war in Europe, the R.A.F. had to keep us temporarily occupied and this was the easiest way to do it. For a couple of months (May to July ’45) we went through the same routine that our first crew had to undergo at No. 1653 H.C.U., omitting the “circuits and bumps” but making up for this by doing twice as much of the other H.C.U. catalogue. Halfway through this our crew was transferred to No. 576 Squadron, based at Fiskerton near Lincoln. To use a prevalent expression we were all “cheesed” or “browned off” with our lack of recognition. The war in Europe had ended but we were expecting to be sent to tackle the Japanese.
On 17.7.45 we had a cross-country with a difference, code-named “Cooks Tour”, visiting Rotterdam, Arnhem, Essen, Cologne, Aachen and Antwerp. The idea was partly to impress the natives and partly to let us see the havoc wrought by Bomber Command during the recent campaign. I believe we carried a few ground-staff personnel as observers.
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Then the R.A.F. at last found something to keep a large number of bomber crews occupied. We were used as troop carriers, flying to and from Italy, taking service personnel from and on leave, respectively. This was, I suppose, a kind of poetic justice. We had wrecked the railway system in France so that it was impossible to transport troops by land at anything like a reasonable speed, if at all, so we got the job.
On our first trip, early in August, we went to Bari, on the Adriatic coast and brought back on leave twenty members of the 8th Army. It can’t have been at all comfortable for them, sitting on the metal floor of a Lancaster, but I expect the novelty of the situation helped to distract them, and at least they were getting home quickly. Another novelty was that their kit bags were slung up in the bomb bays of the aircraft in place of bombs, but we didn’t drop any. On arrival in England we had to land at an airfield with Customs facilities, where the troops had to display their acquisitions (or loot).
The second trip was to Naples on 22.8.45. We had glorious views of Vesuvius on the approach to Pomigliano airfield. The next day was free and we managed to visit Pompeii. In Naples we were beset by bare-footed urchins competing with one another to swop lire for pound notes. Some R.A.F. types took packages of coffee to sell at inflated prices to the deprived Italians. On the following day we were due to carry another twenty passengers back to England.
Bill and I had to attend an early morning briefing, ready for a very early start, but take-off was postponed for a few hours and we had to attend a second briefing. Bill was rather tired and asked me to modify our official route by cutting off one of the corners. Instead of taking a north-westerly route running roughly
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parallel to the west coast of Italy and then heading due west towards the French Riviera I was to go over the top of Corsica to the French Riviera. As the highest ground on Corsica rose to about 9,000 feet it would be essential to be sure of a good safety margin for our passengers but as we didn’t have oxygen for them we would have to compromise – I reckoned that if we crossed Corsica at 11,000 feet that should be satisfactory. In fact I observed the approach to the east coast of the island on the H2S. We climbed to 11,000 feet and stayed there until we left the west coast behind us and then descended to our authorised height for the rest of the journey. The twenty minutes or so at 11,000 feet had negligible effect on our passengers. (The rule was that you needed to use oxygen if you flew over 10,000 feet for more than one hour).
The results of this change of route, whilst not affecting our passengers, remained to be seen. Whilst the pilot and myself were attending our second briefing some of the other members of the crew had wandered off to our aircraft where they were accosted by an R.A.F. groundstaff airman who was on leave in Italy but would rather spend his leave in England. Our crew members didn’t see why not and when the rest of us reached the Lancaster they seemed to have got it all arranged. Bill didn’t like it, but surprisingly, agreed on condition that if this “hitch-hiking” was discovered we knew nothing about it.
Our stowaway apparently got away from the Customs airfield at Glatton and went on his way. The trouble began when my chart was routinely scanned by the Navigation Officer and our short cut was revealed. Bill and I were interviewed separately about this breach of discipline but as I was subject to the captain’s instructions it largely devolved on Bill. Whilst the matter was still under consideration our stowaway put his
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spanner in the works. He had somehow to get back to Italy before his leave expired.
He knew we were from 576 Squadron from the aircraft’s lettering and notwithstanding the fact that he had already put us in jeopardy with his outward flight from Italy, he tried to get to our airfield at Fiskerton, near Lincoln, in the hope of a return trip. Unfortunately, he got mis-directed to our base airfield, where, being dressed in khaki drill whilst everyone else was in blue, the service police soon spotted him and took him for questioning. He told them almost the whole story – the only thing he didn’t give away was with which crew he had travelled. The pilot and I were confronted with this chap and we both denied having seen him – I truthfully didn’t recognise him as I hadn’t paid particular attention to him at the critical time.
We could have been right up to our ears in it but for our station intelligence officer withholding a vital piece of evidence. He knew from the time of the ‘bus that our stowaway had caught from Glatton that ours was the only aircraft from our squadron which could possibly have landed him in time, thanks to our cutting the corner on our route and being one of the first aircraft back to England. The intelligence officer told us later how he had worked things out. I suppose one or both of us might possibly have been court-martialled for this serious breach of discipline but nothing happened. Except, one day Bill Addison had to report to Group Headquarters where he saw one senior officer and was reprimanded for cutting the corner, then went (on the same visit) to see another officer to be told that he had been awarded the A.F.C. for his work as an instructor, to add to the D.F.C. he already wore. As it happened, I didn’t fly again with Bill Addison as his demobilisation cropped up very soon afterwards.
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The Japanese surrendered that August, so now there was a general feeling of anti-climax. Personally, I knew I couldn’t throw away four years of studying and I couldn’t get out of the Air Force quickly enough now that the “raison d’etre” had been removed. I tried to get back into the habit of studying science at Lincoln Technical College but found the available course too elementary and had to give up that approach. Later on I had a piece of good news from our R.A.F. education officer. He had made enquiries and discovered that London University had modified its regulations, my School Certificate of 1937 now being acceptable and giving me exemption from the London Matriculation exam. This meant that when I did get back to studying I could aim for the London B.Sc. Special qualification, which had the advantage of an intermediate examination (with certificate) en route.
Our crew was broken up and despatched to various points of the compass. I received a letter from our wireless operator, “Artie” Shaw a year later, just after I was demobilised, from R.A.F. Seletar, Singapore but never heard from any of the others. However, by strange coincidence I did run across Bill Addison again. I encountered him at Lloyd’s Bank in York somewhere about 1960, and it turned out that he was living in Osbaldwick, barely half a mile from our house on Hull Road, York
I was posted to 50 Squadron at Sturgate, a recently constructed airfield near Gainsborough and joined the crew of F/O Titchener. That was in September 1945. We were soon on the Italian ferry trips again, flying to Naples on three more occasions to bring home service personnel. Twice we brought twenty army types and once we afforded the ladies a bit more room to spread themselves by seating only fourteen of them
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(A.T.S. and Q.A.I.M.N.S.) in the space normally occupied by twenty army blokes, but it was the same metal floor.
After that it was back to routine with plenty of cross-countries thrown in. I see that on one night exercise, operation “Bullseye”, we went via Hamburg, among other places, to a target on the island of Spiekeroog in the German chain of East Frisian Islands. This was very near the scene of our memorable exploits whilst battling with the elements during our return from Kiel about sixteen months previously. This time however, things were entirely different – no cumulo-nimbus and no danger of flak. On the way back to Sturgate there was a problem. Visibility had seriously deteriorated and for the first time in my flying experience our aircraft was diverted to Carnaby, near Bridlington, where there was a special emergency airfield, much used during the war. This had exceptionally long runways to accommodate crippled aircraft returning from ops and also an emergency flare path called F.I.D.O. (Fog Investigation and Dispersal Operation) which used containers of burning gasoline down the sides of the runway to cause local dispersal of the fog.
We landed safely and found that we would have to stay there till next day. We didn’t think much of the food or the very cold accommodation (it was early January 1946). Maybe there was some problem with our aircraft because another Lancaster from 50 Squadron collected us the following afternoon and flew us back to base.
Nissen huts were never warm in the winter. I can well remember a period during the winter at Sturgate when icicles formed on the inside of the door and my bed was one of the two either side of the entrance.
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The solid fuel stove was halfway back down the hut and I finished my insulation by piling the contents of my kit-bag on the bed before trying to sleep. Some of the stuff consisted of flying gear which I never needed on operations because the Lancaster was warm enough without it.
By late January, 50 Squadron was transferred to the much more hospitable Waddington airfield, just south of Lincoln. Waddington was constructed originally during the first world war and opened as an R.F.C. flying training station in 1916. Now it was a thoroughly modern establishment with permanent accommodation, workshops and offices. I was soon pottering around with various pilots on trivia like bombing at the local range, air-sea firing (for the gunners), four short cross-countries with A.T.C. cadets, air tests (one with an A. V. Roe test pilot who managed to take off in less than half the length of the runway).
There was operation “Frontline”, a propaganda tour of the British Zone in Germany. Just for a change we did a couple of meteorological trips (code name “Operation Seaweed”, both lengthy exercises in excess of eight hours, which took us up to latitude 62 degrees North, passing Fair Isle and the Shetlands with a turning point roughly halfway between the Faroe Islands and the most westerly coast of Norway.
We carried a meteorological observer to take the required data readings, to which I was able to contribute the locations in latitude and longitude and measurements of wind velocity at our height. It was all rather boring but after seeing such wide expanses of ocean for such a long time it was nice to return to land.
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Then there was the novelty of my one and only trip in a Lincoln bomber, the successor to the Lancaster, in which we would probably have done our second tour of operations (against the Japanese). My last flight in the R.A.F. was an abortive air sea mission on which we had to search an area of the North Sea off the coast of Scotland. We did sight an empty dinghy, which was very good going considering how tiny they are from any appreciable height, but no sign of any people or aircraft debris. The lost aircraft was later found in the hills of Northumberland.
To fill in a few more weeks before I was demobbed, in August 1946 I was sent, under protest, on an instructor’s course at Finningley. It was interesting in that I got to appreciate more fully the equipment I had been using on a regular basis, but futile from the teaching point of view since I would be leaving the Air Force almost immediately. I suppose our C.O. had been required to send so many persons and it was just a matter of making up the numbers, the Air Force being well into a state of disintegration.
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[photograph of the crew in front of their aircraft]
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[underlined] Chapter 8: Lancaster ME 758 PH-N “Nan” [/underlined]
Whilst I was home on leave, sometime in June 1945, it so happened that my brother Norman was also at home. We took our bicycles and crossed the Humber by paddle steamer, then cycled south to Wickenby. By great good fortune we found my old aircraft, ME 758 PH-N “Nan” still very much in existence. She had eventually completed more than a hundred operations, the latest ones being to drop food to the starving Dutch just before the Germans capitulated. There was also one of our old ground crew in attendance and he told us that “Nan’s” next exercise would be to take part in a fighter affiliation exercise, i.e. manoeuvering [sic] violently with a fighter aircraft. This didn’t seem at all considerate after what that aircraft had gone through! Anyway Norman took a photograph of “Nan”, myself and my ground crew corporal to add to tone he had already taken of me and my bike! I still have both pictures.
It was only a few years ago that I learned more about “Nan”. That was when I obtained a copy of “Claims to Fame. The Lancaster.” by Norman Franks. This book celebrates the Lancaster “centenarians” – 34 machines that achieved the remarkable goal of flying 100 or more operations. A Lancaster crew’s first tour of duty stood at 30 operations, but both men and aircraft often failed to reach even half of that total. Skill, training and team work would all increase the chances of survival, but luck played a large part in deciding which Lancaster would be found by a night fighter or hit by flak and which would escape to attack again. Only 34 Lancasters in Bomber Command survived 100 operations, about 1 percent of the number which were lost on operations. “Nan” was the only centenarian from Wickenby which was the base for two squadrons, 12 and 626. Franks, through some meticulous
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research has been able to compile a fairly comprehensive narrative for each Lancaster, including crew changes, missions flown and events and incidents during the service career of the aircraft.
Our crew flew in PH-N for the first time when we did a two and a half hours cross-country exercise on 26.5.44 after we had completed three ops. on different Lancasters. We did our fourth op. in her (it was her tenth) when we went to the Rote Erde railway marshalling yards at Aachen. The defences were strong and losses 7 percent (12 out of 170). A day later, 29.5.44, we did another cross-country in her and it turned out to be a rather “hairy” experience.
My log entry merely states “Window lost and aileron damaged. A.S.I. (air speed indicator) read 360 m.p.h. + in dive”.
I cannot remember the cause, but no great harm was done. The damage was repaired and we began a series of eleven ops. in her over the next three weeks up to 22.6.44 covering a variety of targets, including the first daylight raids by Lancasters since 1943, when we attacked the docks at Le Havre and Boulogne, on two successive evenings and virtually ended the E-boat threat to our cross-channel invasion shipping.
This took our total of ops. to 15 and “Nan’s” to 22. Whilst we enjoyed a week’s leave, “Nan” did five more operations with three other crews. We then did four of “Nan’s” next five ops., three of them being to the important French marshalling yards at Orleans, Dijon and Tours, bringing us to 19 and “Nan” to 32.
“Nan” then managed two more trips without us before
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we did three night ops. in five days, returning from Stuttgart on 24/25.7.44 on three engines. Two days later we were air-testing “Nan” with a new engine and tail fin. This damage was not mentioned in Norman Franks’ account nor indeed was there any mention of the operation on Stuttgart, which was our 22nd and “Nan’s” 37th op.
After a couple of short daylight ops. to French targets we were scheduled to attack the V-weapon launching site at Trossy St. Maximin. This, as I have already described in some detail, was the worst experience of our tour and which we were very lucky to survive. Once again this was not mentioned in Norman Franks’ account. In fact he summarises “Nan’s” record as follows:-
“Nan” was almost totally free of mechanical problems, although towards the end of its career the aircraft’s starboard engine caught fire on 2nd February 1945, causing the crew to abort a trip to Wiesbaden. This particular Lanc. was also lucky to escape serious damage from the German defences: only once was damaged recorded when its hydraulics were hit by light flak at 0612 hours during the attack to support Operation “Goodwood” – the Allied breakout from Caen on 18th July 1944.”
This was one of a couple of ops. done by other crews, presumably whilst our crew was on leave after our 19th op. on Tours. That damage cannot have been too bad because the Caen trip was followed, the same evening, by an op. on Scholven!
In the aftermath of the Trossy operation we had to do our next op. in PH-W whilst “Nan” was being repaired. “Nan” didn’t get back on ops. until ten days after Trossy – a long lay-off in
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those days!
We had “Nan” back for the op. on Russelsheim on 25/26th August. Our tailplane was damaged to the extent that we practised landing manoeuvres whilst we still had plenty of height before actually landing at base on our return. With the exception of our op. in V-“Victor” on 28.8.44, when “Nan” was not flying with any crew, possible due to overhaul, we completed our tour in “Nan”, receiving light flak damage on our last operation.
So once we’d got “Nan”, after our three “starter” ops., we did 25 of our remaining 27 trips in her, which must be something of a record in itself.
Altogether she completed 106 operations, six “Manna” sorties (taking food to the starving Dutch people) and two “Exodus” trips (the flying home of released prisoners of war).
Looking back it seems such a shame that after seeing out the war she was “struck off charge” on 19.10.45 and “reduced to produce” i.e. scrapped.
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[black and white photograph of airman in uniform on a bicycle leaning against a wall]
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[underlined] Chapter 9: GEE. A. P. I. and H2S [/underlined]
My work as a navigator was enhanced out of all recognition by three devices put at my disposal over a six-month period. “Gee” was a godsend after the dismal future I had anticipated relying to any extent on str-navigation. It was a system based on the transmission of synchronised pulses from a “master” (A) and two “slave” (B and C) ground stations. The two “slaves” were situated about 200 miles apart, with the “master” in the middle, and the cathode ray display on the “Gee” set in the aircraft showed the respective differences between the times at which the AB and AC signals were received. When these measurements were plotted on a special chart covered with two distinct sets of parabolic lines it was a simple matter to fix the aircraft’s position with great accuracy. This accuracy gradually declined as the distance from the transmitting stations increased and the crossings of the two sets of curved lines became more acute. Furthermore it was susceptible to interference from enemy jamming stations to the extent that it could not be relied upon beyond enemy shores.
It still gave us the all-important chance of determining accurate measurements of wind velocity and so getting off to a good start on every operation. It also helped to verify one’s position on the way home after leaving the enemy coast and simplified getting back to the right airfield. The Air Force had understandably kept the information about “Gee” from us until it was absolutely necessary to introduce this master stroke. It certainly “bucked up” we navigators no end.
The second of the marvellous pieces of equipment was the air position indicator (A.P.I.). This showed the changes in latitude and longitude of the moving aircraft which would occur
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if there were no wind. It was a mechanical device which combined the inputs of the gyro compass and the air speed indicator, keeping a continuous record of the actual courses and speeds flown, including all deviations from the intended, and including “spur of the moment” tactical manoeuvres. This made life a lot easier by removing much of the drudgery in the manual plotting of lines on a chart by means of ruler, protractor, dividers and calculator.
The third item was airborne radar, known as H2S. This had a rotating transmitter, known as a scanner, housed in a “blister” beneath the aircraft and a receiver at the navigator’s side, the whole system being self-contained. It produced, on a cathode-ray tube, a rough picture of the ground over which the aircraft was flying, irrespective of cloud or darkness.
Water areas, which reflected none of the transmitting signals from the rotating scanner showed darkly on the screen. Land areas (or ground returns) appeared green, but a more reflective area such as a built-up area showed up as a more luminous patch often, but not always approximating in outline to the shape of a town. It was up the navigator to use his other information gleaned en route to decide which town he was observing on the screen. The chief use was navigational for there was a range-finder on the screen and a bearing indicator so one could obtain a bearing and distance from an identified town or feature. It was also possible to carry out bombing attacks without sight of the ground and the equipment could not be jammed by the enemy.
Unfortunately, German night-fighters had, for some time before our tour of operations, the capability of homing onto H2S transmissions - more about this later under “The German Defences”.
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[underlined] Chapter 10: The German Defences. [/underlined]
To counter R.A.F. and U.S.A.A.F. attacks the Germans had to deprive the German forces of 75% of their heavy anti-tank weapons. These 88mm guns had to be used for ant-aircraft purposes, scattered all over Germany and occupied territories because the possible targets were so numerous. 900,000 soldiers manned those guns and, in addition, hundreds of thousands of expert tradesmen could not be used by the German Army because their skills were needed to repair bomb damage. Meanwhile, the increasing requirement for day and night-fighters for defence against the bomber offensive, deprived the German Army on the Russian front of much of its accustomed close support as Messerschmidt 110s and Junkers 88s were drawn westwards.
Our most deadly opposition came from the German night-fighters. The German pilots had long known that the blind spot of the British bombers was below the fuselage but had not been able to exploit this fully because the fighter had generally to be aimed at the bomber to make use of its fixed forward-firing weapons and this could be difficult at night. However, in the autumn of 1943, an ingenious fitter at a Luftwaffe airfield devised the prototype of the deadly “schrage musik” - “jazz music” - a pair of fixed 20mm cannons pointing upwards at 60 degrees. Having located a bomber with the aid of radar or using the bomber’s radar (H2S) transmissions, the fighter pilot could then fly unseen and fairly safely manoeuvre below their target and fire incendiary cannon shells into the petrol tanks between the two motors in the wing, being particularly careful to avoid the bomb bay in the belly of the aircraft. It was then only a matter of seconds before the bomber exploded. The victims had no chance.
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Using this technique, an experienced night-fighter pilot could account for several four-engined bombers in a single excursion, there being so many targets available.
I sometimes wonder if and at what stage our superiors realised the situation and whether they had to decide between warning the crews of the dangers of H2S transmissions and maintaining the advantage of the navigational aid. I am sure a lot of H2S sets would have been little used over Germany if the crews had been presented with the true scenario. To be fair, our leaders would not at the time have been in a position to accurately attribute the proportion of bomber losses due to night fighters as opposed to anti-aircraft fire, but they must have had a rough idea.
What other crews saw was a sudden mid-air explosion and burst of flame. Someone put out the story that these were “scarecrows” fired into the air by the Germans with the intention of making the crews believe they were bombers being shot down and thereby affecting the bomber crews’ morale!
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[underlined and centred] Chapter 11: Reflections on survival [/underlined and centred]
Many factors contributed to my survival, beginning with my decision that I wanted to do the navigation on a bomber aircraft. At the time I volunteered for aircrew this was one of the two jobs of the observer, who was also responsible for dropping the bombs. The latter task was subsequently delegated to a specialist bomb aimer. When I enlisted in November 1941 (after passing the preliminaries three months earlier), there was a bottle-neck in the training scheme for navigators. I was deferred for five months, otherwise I would have been starting my tour in the winter of 1943-44, probably about January. That would have been a rotten time with bad weather and numerous long-distance trips including a high proportion to Berlin.
Then there was the length of the training period which took two years from the end of my deferred service to reaching the operational squadron, partially due to the necessity of fitting in to laid-down training schedules at the succeeding stages, notably:-
(a) the gap between completing the I.T.W. course and catching the boat to South Africa,
(b) five weeks at sea on a circuitous submarine-evading route to South Africa via South America,
(c) several weeks between arriving at 48 Air School, South Africa and starting the course there,
(d) the return to England,
(e) several more weeks delay at O.T.U. whilst the R.A.F. decided that our original pilot wouldn’t make the grade.
All these delays took me nearer to D-Day and the invasion of Europe by the Allied Armies. The increasing
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diversity of the targets needing to be attacked in order to assist the coming assault meant that there was a greater proportion of shorter range tactical targets and only seven over Germany itself. (Air Marshal Harris would have preferred to keep hammering away at German targets but had to give priority to the invasion requirements.) In the final stages before the landings there were attacks on coastal batteries, and radar stations, but the longer term “softening up” was by attacking a large number of railway centres to seriously impede German troop movements and supplies to the invasion front.
We were fortunate in not being “downed” by anti-aircraft fire on a few occasions, particularly near Stuttgart, when we returned on three engines and on the occasion near Compiegne when we got 50-60 holes in the aircraft and two of the crew received minor injuries. We were lucky in our encounter with the severe storm on the way back from our second trip to Kiel. And we were never attacked by a night-fighter, despite getting a close-up view of one on the Stuttgart operation.
On the positive side, we had a well-disciplined crew who didn’t waste time on unnecessary nattering on the intercom. What’s more, there was never any visible or audible sign of fear or distress.
We kept very close to our scheduled routes and times on almost all occasions, i.e. we kept in the middle of the bunch so it wasn’t quite so easy to be singled out.
I am sure that the toughest time for bomber crews was in the six months prior to us joining 12 Squadron. Nevertheless, I was surprised to discover in an “Analysis of Total Losses of Lancasters by Months” in the Wickenby Register Newsletter of
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May 1994 that 12 Squadron lost 31 Lancasters in the six months Nov. ’43 to April ’44 and 27 in the four months that our crew was operating. I suppose that might be explained by the ops. not being so frequent during the winter months.
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[underlined and centred] Chapter 12: Postscript. [/underlined and centred]
After all these years I cannot remember just when or where I was demobbed and received my “civvy” suit. I know that officially my last day of service was 16.10.46 but I believe I was out a few weeks earlier.
I know that I picked up where I left off. I went back to work for B.O.C.M. at the laboratory in Stoneferry and I re-enlisted for Hull Technical College evening classes. As an ex-member of the forces and a background of studying chemistry for almost four years I knew I was eligible to apply for an educational grant of something over £3 a week to proceed on a full time course to a professional qualification. (Out of this, textbooks etc. had to be purchased). This would have meant giving up the day job which paid over £4 a week.
I knew that after four and a half years complete absence from my studies I would have to revise from the very beginning, but now that my School Certificate was accepted as giving me exemption from the London Matriculation exam. I decided that I would defer my application for a grant and aim to take the London Inter B.Sc. examination the next June. The Inter B.Sc. course took two years of evening class work so it meant I would have to cover one-half via the 1946-47 evening class course and the other half by swotting up from textbooks and my old notebooks. If I succeeded in passing the exam, comprising Maths., Physics and Chemistry, I would at least have that certificate to my name and I couldn’t have been further on if I’d taken advantage of the grant. Anyway I took the gamble although I found the readjustment rather tough. It was very amusing when attending an early lecture in Physics to hear the same old lecturer, Mr. Robson, repeat the same hoary joke that
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Walter Suddaby and I had heard in 1938 concerning his friend’s dog who was christened “Hysteresis” because it was always lagging behind.
Back at home there was a problem. My parents had been separated for some years, partially due to the war. The Luftwaffe destroyed Spillers’ flour mill, where my father worked, during a night raid in July 1941. Shortly afterwards, his firm offered him alternative employment at their Wallasey mill, which he accepted. At the tip of the Wirral peninsula he was now well over a hundred miles from Hull, so he wasn’t able to come home every weekend. My brother Norman, although a year younger than I, joined the R.A.F. shortly before I left home, due to my five months deferred service.
So by the time I had to report to the R.A.F. in London my mother, in a matter of a few months, was reduced from a family of five to my young sister Hazel and herself. This was very hard for her in the middle of the war, particularly as the air raid alerts still sounded regularly in Hull.
It was assumed that we should resume as a family when the war was over, although no-one knew when that would be or whether it would be possible. My father settled in Wallasey and mad regular payments to mother. At one time he tried to persuade her to join him in Wallasey but she declined for two reasons. She had worked hard all her life and used a very small legacy from a relative in New Zealand to enable the family to move into a modest home of our own and she was intent on having it ready for our return.
By the time I was “demobbed” things had become more complicated. My father had formed a relationship with his
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landlady and had no intention of returning to Hull. Mother’s situation was uncertain unless there was a legal separation, which would obviously take some time to come to court.
After passing the Inter B.Sc. exam, in June ’47, I had another decision to make. I could apply for the ex-serviceman’s grant or continue at evening classes for another year and then take the Subsid. Maths qualification, clearing the way to the B.Sc.(Special) in Chemistry. This would mean dropping all contact with chemistry for a year. Being slightly mad, but having confidence in my maths, I carried on at the Tech. evening classes for another session! and continued to work full-time at B.O.C.M. I duly passed the maths exam in June ’48.
In the meantime, the legal formalities of my parents’ separation had been formalised on a proper financial basis.
When I got my exam results I composed a letter applying for an educational grant as an ex-member of the forces, pointing out that I had already saved the country money by completing part of the course via evening classes. How could anyone resist that? I got a favourable response and I arranged to leave B.O.C.M. and complete my education full-time but still at the Hull Technical College, commencing in the autumn.
My two post-war years at B.O.C.M. had been spent on the routine testing of ingredients for animal feedstuffs, a boring occupation which I had now endured for six years altogether, plus six years of evening classes. I knew it had to be full-time or nothing.
Fortunately for me those last two years at B.O.C.M. were by no means wasted because it was there that I met a charming
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young lady assistant. Yvonne and I found that we had very similar outlooks and much in common and, although I was transferred to the Foster Street laboratory for the latter part of my stay with B.O.C.M., we maintained contact. In subsequent years I must have cycled a few hundreds of miles between North Hull and East Hull!!
It was rather odd attending the degree course. There were a couple of other ex-forces students, but the majority of our fellow pupils were about eight years younger. An advantage over attending a university was that the staff and the geography were all familiar and I had great faith in the staff, especially Messrs. L. Balmforth and G. R. Dennis.
I proposed to Yvonne on New Year’s Eve ’48 – ’49 with the proviso that I had to concentrate on first passing my final exams in 1950. Fortunately, she accepted!
I found those final two years hard going but I took my A.R.I.C. exams in April and the B.Sc. Special in Chemistry (London External) exams in June 1950 and waited in some trepidation for the results. I didn’t wish to go through all that again. I was now 28 and I’d had enough of college for my lifetime! However, all was well and I had both qualifications.
Now the way was clear to seek employment and plan for the wedding, which took place on September 30th, 1950. It rained all day! Subsequent events would take another book!
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[underlined and centred] Bibliography [/underlined and centred]
FRANKS, Norman
“Claims to Fame. The Lancaster” (Arms and Armour, 1994)
RICHARDS, Denis
“The Hardest Victory. R.A.F. Bomber Command in the Second World War.” (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd. 1994)
HASTINGS, Max
“Bomber Command” (Michael Joseph Ltd. 1979)
CHORLEY, W.R.
“Royal Air Force. Bomber Command Losses of the Second World War. Vol. 5 Aircraft and Crew Losses. 1944” (Midland Counties Publications. 1997)
SEARBY, John (Air Commodore)
“The Bomber Battle for Berlin” (Guild Publishing, 1991)
HARRIS, Sir Arthur
“Bomber Offensive” (Greenhill Books, 1998)
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98
[underlined and centred] Glossary of R.A.F. Terms. (Official and Unofficial).
A.P.I.
Air Position Indicator
A.S.I.
Air Speed Indicator
“Bang on”
Spot on, “Wizard”, 100%
“Cheesed off”
Browned off, fed up.
“Circuits and Bumps”
Practice take-off and landing
Cumulo-nimbus
Thunder clouds
D.R.
Dead reckoning with a calculated wind
Elsan
Aircraft toilet
Feathered
Engine switched off with propellor blades turned to reduce air resistance
Flak
Anti-aircraft fire
F.I.D.O.
Fog Investigation and Dispersal Operation
“Gardening”
Laying sea mines
GEE
Radio navigation aid, grid box
H2S
Radar navigation and bombing aid
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I.T.W.
Initial Training Wing
O.T.U.
Operational Training Unit
P.F.F.
Path Finder Force
Pitot/tube
An open-ended tube mounted externally on the aircraft facing directly into the air flow to provide a convenient and accurate measurement of the aircraft’s speed.
“Screened”
aircrew rested from ops at end of tour and transferred to instructing
“Solo”
Unsupervised flight
Sprog
Inexperienced aircrew
V1 and V2
Robot flying bombs used by the Germans commonly called “doodlebugs”
“Vegetables”
Mines laid by the R.A.F.
“Window”
Aluminised strips used as an anti-radar device.
100
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
Time out for war
Description
An account of the resource
History of wartime experiences of Ronald Witty. Starts with schooling and early employment just before the war in Hull. Mentions German bombing of Hull and volunteering for the RAF. Describes training in London and Torquay before departing on a troop ship for South Africa. Describes navigator training and activities at Woodbrook and Queenstown. Continues with trip back to England and continuation of training at RAF Halfpenny Green, Desborough (Northamptonshire), RAF Chedburgh, and RAF Hemswell. Goes on to describe his operational tour on 12 Squadron at RAF Wickenby including accounts of some operations including some daylight operations during the Normandy campaign and against flying bomb sites as well as mine laying. Tour culminates with award of Distinguished Flying Cross. Concludes with account of subsequent tours as an instructor at RAF Lindholme and other stations and including account of flying on Cook's tour of German cities. Adds chapters about his Lancaster ME758 PH-N "Nan" as well as another on GEE, A.P.I and H2S. Contains many b/w photographs of RAF personnel and aircraft.
Creator
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A R Witty
Format
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100 page printed book
Language
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eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BWittyARWittyARv1
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
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Yorkshire
England--Hull
England--London
England--Devon
England--Torquay
England--Lancashire
England--Liverpool
South Africa
South Africa--Durban
South Africa--East London
South Africa--Cape Town
England--Staffordshire
England--Northamptonshire
England--Suffolk
England--Lincolnshire
France
France--Rennes
Germany
Germany--Aachen
France--Paris
France--Normandy
France--Evreux
Germany--Gelsenkirchen
France--Le Havre
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
France--Calais
France--Dijon
France--Tours
Belgium
Belgium--Kortrijk
Germany--Kiel
Germany--Stuttgart
France--Orléans
France--Pas-de-Calais
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
France--Domléger-Longvillers
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-03-29
1943-07-10
1943-07-27
1943-09-08
1943-10-12
1944-02-25
1944-04-26
1944-04-28
1944-06-14
1944-06-14
1944-06-12
1942-06-13
1944-06-22
1944-07-23
1944-07-24
1944-07-25
1944-07-30
1944-08-03
1944-08-31
1944-12-12
1945-07-07
1945-07-17
Contributor
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David Bloomfield
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
1 Group
12 Squadron
1653 HCU
1656 HCU
3 Group
50 Squadron
576 Squadron
84 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
aircrew
Anson
bombing of the Boulogne E-boats (15/16 June 1944)
bombing of the Le Havre E-boat pens (14/15 June 1944)
Bombing of Trossy St Maximin (3 August 1944)
Cook’s tour
coping mechanism
crewing up
Distinguished Flying Cross
faith
Gee
H2S
Halifax
Halifax Mk 2
Heavy Conversion Unit
Initial Training Wing
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Master Bomber
military living conditions
military service conditions
mine laying
navigator
Nissen hut
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operation Dodge (1945)
Operational Training Unit
Pathfinders
RAF Chedburgh
RAF Desborough
RAF Fiskerton
RAF Halfpenny Green
RAF Hemswell
RAF Lindholme
RAF Methwold
RAF Sturgate
RAF Torquay
RAF Waddington
RAF Wickenby
Stirling
tactical support for Normandy troops
target indicator
training
V-1
V-2
V-weapon
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/327/3486/AShuttleworthHJ151021.1.mp3
1e229b0a918cfe3b6d74219097f584c4
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/327/3486/PShuttleworthJ1501.1.jpg
59a7d9a38c1dae94a5276abcaff86f0f
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
Shuttleworth, Joe
Hugh Joseph Shuttleworth
Hugh J Shuttleworth
Hugh Shuttleworth
H J Shuttleworth
H Shuttleworth
Description
An account of the resource
One oral history interview with Hugh Joseph "Joe" Shuttleworth.
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
2015-10-21
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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Shuttleworth, J
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AP: This interview for the International Bomber Command Centre’s Digital Archive is with Joe Shuttleworth. A 50 Squadron rear gunner. The interview is taking place in Surrey Hills which is a suburb of Melbourne. It is the 21st of October 2015. My name’s Adam Purcell. So, I think we’ll start, if you don’t mind Joe with can you tell me something of your early life, growing up? What you did before the war.
JS: Well I grew up and born in Brisbane and had a pretty charmed life. Went to a state school. Wasn’t much but was good at ball games and I enjoyed life with my mother and father. Father had a job whereas, you know in the Depression years in the 1930s times were pretty rough really. I remember kids taking food out of rubbish bins at school. That didn’t ever happen to me. My mother and father came from Victoria and they moved up to Queensland at some point about 1920/21. And they came. Big families. And I had the opportunity of being sent down to, to Melbourne when I was ten and again when I was fourteen and caught up with my, my relatives on both my mother’s side and father’s side. And after a long time my mother and father agreed to, that I join the air force. So I went to the air force place and I was accepted to air crew. And that was February 1941. That was before the Japanese war but I wasn’t called in for a uniform until May of 1942. By that time the Japanese were well advanced in the, in Northern Australia. I was at 3 ITS. The Initial Training School that was based at Sandgate and the waterfront was just outside, you know. Do you know? You know Brisbane I suppose?
AP: I don’t. I don’t know it very well but —
JS: Do you know Sandgate then?
AP: No. I don’t actually.
JS: The water was just outside the area there. There I was told I wasn’t accepted to go in aircrew because I had an eye deficiency. I wasn’t smart enough to be accepted as a navigator. They were the boys with all the brains. So I enlisted as a wireless operator/ gunner and went to Maryborough where I was there for about seven months. Whilst there I got the mumps and I was in the, in the hospital at the camp for a few days and then I went down to a convalescent place nearby. Spent a couple of very enjoyable weeks there. Life in Maryborough was, was pretty good and we stayed in huts of about forty blokes in there. Food was pretty good. I palled up with a particular bloke who came from Bundaberg. He had a brother that was killed in the early stages of the war. And we saw a bit of Bundaberg, went down to the various beaches on the back of his motorbike. Then after Maryborough went down to Evans Head to a, to a gunnery school and did a bit of flying there. We had Fairey Battles aircraft pulling a drogue and we’d have a pretty, what do they call it, a go gun to shoot at the drogue. About 5 o’clock everybody was saying to me go down to the, to the beach. Occasionally I went to Lismore for the weekend and I stayed at a hotel there. Was presented with the, with the wings and went back to, to Brisbane. Stayed around on, on leave there for a few weeks. The air force then sent us down to Melbourne. We, I was able to get caught up, caught up with my relatives. Uncles and aunts on both side. Saw my grandmother who died when I was overseas. And then, surprisingly the air force decided to send us back to Brisbane. We sailed from Brisbane in about May of ’42. Went down to the wharf and got on to a ship. A Dutch ship. The [pause] What was its name? Anyways, under, under American command. We had bunks down in the holds of the ship. It was, the air was pretty putrid there. I elected to sleep out most nights on the, on the deck. Sometimes I got a bit wet but just a light shower. Life was pretty good. There was lots of good reading material there. Particularly a publication, a Saturday Morning Post, err Saturday Evening Post. But it ceased publication but I read a lot about American life. We had nineteen days on the, on the Pacific. Didn’t see another ship. Didn’t see any land at all. But it was a very enjoyable nineteen days. The weather was pretty good the last couple of days going into San Francisco. In San Francisco it got a bit rough but not too bad. Went in under the Golden Gate Bridge and the ship docked just in the bayside outside Alcatraz at the, the big prison there. After about a day and a half we went across to, to Oakland. Got on a, sent on a train and we went on the train — spent about four and a half days on the train going across America. Went up through Sacramento and that’s where I saw my first snow. I hadn’t seen snow in my life because my previous trips to Melbourne were in the summertime. It was. There was no, no snow up there [unclear]. And we went to, we sat up during the daylight hours and there’d be an American negro putting down the beds that we could sleep on at night. But it was very interesting going across America, seeing. I recall going across on the boat — we didn’t have any ice cream and I think I had the best ice cream in my life at Salt Lake City early one morning. Bought a, bought a packet. It was great. We continued on the train across the, across the Mississippi which the negro, the negro fellow pointed out to us and went outside to a place called Taunton which was outside Boston and there we had some leave. Got down to New York. Saw The Rockets. They were a dancing team. Also, the Rockefeller Centre which is an ice rink there. Lots of American people skating around on, on ice. Went down to Philadelphia to see a, the father, I previously worked in Brisbane at the SKF Bearing Company and an American GI, I believe went in there to enjoy himself about his father being employed at the SKF Bearing Company in Philadelphia. So, I went down there, introduced myself and they looked after me very well. Went back to Boston. We used to get leave in the, during the day. Went down to, to Rhode Island. And life was, was pretty good really. Then we went down to New York. Got aboard the, the Queen Elizabeth and at that time in the next berth was the Queen Mary and alongside again on an adjoining wharf was the Normandie, the French ship which was sunk there — caught fire and they pumped so much water I think it was always suspected it was a, as a ploy really because the Normandie would have been a great asset to the allies ferrying troops to and from Europe. There was only about two hundred Australians there. We were selected to do anti-craft, anti-aircraft watch on the, on the ship. And that was a bit, a bit of a thrill for a twenty year lad on the QE. Was it just the Queen Elizabeth? The QE1 it was subsequently called. Spent about four and a half days getting across the Atlantic. Went in to Scotland to, to Greenock. Stayed there on the ship for about a day and a half and then got on a train and sent down to Brighton. And one, one evening I was out on the, doing the anti-aircraft watch and a Sunderland circled around and it was pretty atrocious weather and I thought not Coastal Command. It’s not for me. I’ll take my risk on Bomber Command. So, after a few weeks in, in Brighton I was sent to 29 OTU at Bruntingthorpe which is now still an operating airfield. The equivalent of something like Moorabbin. It’s not, not an RAF station. But Bruntingthorpe initially was pretty much lectures and the operation of turrets and I did reasonably well on that. I was selected by a flight lieutenant, a Scotsman from Dunoon in Scotland and he, he thought I had potential evidently. There was another chap, Bill Bottrell. He was an Irishman and he had an Irish wireless operator and they were very keen for me to join their crew but I didn’t do so. But fortunately, or unfortunately they were all subsequently killed. At the OTU we lost two aircraft. One disappeared off the Wales Coast and another coming back from dropping pamphlets over France crashed. There was an Australian air gunner, rear gunner, he died. And the only person who got out of it, a chap named Terry Wilder who I subsequently met and I’ll refer to him later. The flying was at an subsidiary airfield Cresswell. And on OT, on Wellingtons, which were pretty well clapped out, one night we were doing circuits and bumps as I used to call them. Just circling around. Mainly to get the pilot practising in flying the Wellington. Circuits and landings and take offs. But one night when we were just about on air speed of about a hundred, a hundred kilometers an hour got a tyre burst and the aircraft crashed and slewed around. We all walked out of it unscathed but the risk was that sometimes in those circumstances if it caught fire because the Wellington was only fabric covered. Then whilst at Bruntingthorpe the adjoining village was at Lutterworth and there was a bit of a fair there one night and I was walking around and girls, two girls came up and one girl, Joyce Barry asked me did I have any change which I was able to oblige but I palled up with the other girl Freda who I subsequently married. We, we spent a lot of, a bit of time together. I was, after leaving Bruntingthorpe, I went up to Bitteswell and converted there to four-engined aircraft. Particularly the Lancaster. What’s so interesting in my father’s era pretty well they were all smokers but in our crew, there was only two smokers — the wireless operator and the top gunner. And that was pretty representative of the situation, I think, everywhere really. So, it’s the attitude to smoking has changed so much over the years. At, at Bitteswell we could, I was sent up to Skellingthorpe to do fighter affiliation work. We had Australians flying Tomahawks and, you know they were just making a simulated attacks on the aircraft and there would be a camera so that it would record what you did and the circumstances. We also changed the wireless operators at Bitteswell but I was up at Skellingthorpe so I don’t know really what happened. I wasn’t there to. Then we went to Morton Hall. To a commando school really. Jumping over fences and getting through wires etcetera. Unfortunately, I sprained my ankle on the second day so I was, did very little. I often thought subsequently that Morton Hall could have been the Command Centre for 5 Group but I, I don’t know whether that was right or not. Also, when we were at Bruntingthorpe we could hear engines running and just talked about, you know a place down the road running engines. We subsequently found that it was Frank Whittle, subsequently Sir Frank Whittle developing the jet engine. What happened then? I think we went to, posted to Skellingthorpe. Now, one thing about Bitteswell, that was a permanent RAF station and the accommodation was in brick buildings whereas at Skellingthorpe it was a wartime aerodrome. Lived in what we called Nissen huts — accommodation for about ten crew. And there would be a stove in the centre of the hut where we burned coke to keep us warm in the, in the cooler times. Also, before we went to Skellingthorpe went to Syerston. That was another permanent RAF station where the accommodation was in brick buildings. Actually, I saw my first snow drop at Syerston. That was the first I’d seen in England. Life on the, on the squadron, 50 Squadron and the flight insignia on the aircraft was VN and I’ve got a plate inside where that, the N is showing. We tended to go up to the flight office about 9 o’clock in the morning to see whether there was a war on. If there wasn’t we’d go out to the aircraft and have a mess around. Have practice of getting out of an aircraft into a dinghy. The food was pretty, pretty reasonable. It was certainly the best available in England. Sausages were mainly a lot of bread. I often thought I wouldn’t eat baked beans again but I quite like them now and again. But certainly, food at the squadron was the best available in England on the operations. If the war was on we were given an evening meal and briefed as to where the aircraft, where the target would be. The wing commander would say where, where the target was that night. We’d see the target. The flights into Europe, we did a lot of trips to Berlin and they were generally about ten hours. Sometimes you went in, flew over France. Other times it would be over north, over Denmark and into Berlin that way.
Other: Do you want a drink of water, dad?
JS: Pardon?
Other: Would you like a drink of water?
JS: No thanks. No. Yeah, perhaps so.
[pause]
JS: The great losses of aircraft at that time — we would be sending out about seven hundred and fifty aircraft and we’d generally lose about fifty. So, on a tour of thirty, statistically it’s impossible to get through a tour but some, some did.
AP: What time was this?
JS: Pardon?
AP: What time was it? What? Or when was it?
JS: We tended to, to go off just before dark. About an hour, this is English time. I suppose it would be about 8 o’clock really because there was double daylight saving over there then. So it was, you know normally light till about ten and we’d probably take off about eight and get back about ten, ten hours later. That was coming back after a flight. The, all the, the squadron leader and the wing commander and sometimes the air commodore would be there to greet you. Hot, hot chocolate drink to drink. It was a bit hard at times, you know. It would come back to you, you had to go to bed but sometimes representatives of other crews didn’t survive. On one occasion we did three, three flights in and, then in four days we did two daylights. Take off at daylight. Another one we turned, turned up about midnight. Came back in the light and flew over England. And I recall one particular occasion coming back over the south coast of England, seeing the white cliffs of Dover and up through England. I often thought that, you know life was pretty great really. What else? When I was at Skellingthorpe I used to go down and see Freda, my wife and often hitch-hiked back and often stood outside the Trent Bridge Cricket Ground waiting for a lift back to Skellingthorpe which is just outside Lincoln. Eventually, one night coming back there was a flash about 11 o’clock high and I felt immediate pain in this eye. I think one of the crew dragged me out of the turret. We got back to, to England and went to, to hospital at Rauceby which was outside Grantham. And there they gave me the decision that they couldn’t do anything about the eye. It would have to come out because the piece of metal there was, was too big. And then after about, oh about a month in hospital there I went up to Hoylake which is outside Liverpool. The RAF had taken it over as a convalescent. It was a public school and they’d taken it over as a reception recuperation place for aircrew personnel and I had a few months there. Quite, you know, life was good. Used to have various exercises to keep us, keep us young and fit. One particular bloke that I met at Rauceby, an RAAF bloke, an RAAF bloke he came from Barcaldine in Queensland. He’d married one of the, the nurses at the hospital. A bloke named Templeton. I guess he came, eventually came back to Australia. The, after Hoylake I went back to, to Brighton and they asked me did I, they told me I was declared unfit for further flying. They asked me did I want to go up to Kodak House and stay in a clerical position or come back to Australia. And I said, ‘No. I’m going back to Australia,’ but I went up to Kodak House and did clerical duties there for a couple of months. That was, that was alright. Eventually they sent, took me back to Brighton and I waited then a decision on, on going home to Australia. Whilst in London I had the husband of a cousin of mine on my mother’s side who had been in the Royal Navy since about fourteen or fifteen years of age. He was a lieutenant there and I saw quite a bit of Keith. Also, Australia House they had a Boomerang Club where they used to serve luncheons there. It was all done in a voluntary capacity. A lot of Australians would go there and meet fellows that we’d met at various times at our training. Eventually the word came. Get on a train. Went back to Greenock. Back on the Queen Elizabeth. Back to New York. By that time there were very few Australians there. Only, only about a hundred of us and there was no, a few Americans going back after being injured in various parts of the UK. Well, whilst at Hoylake we went down to the luncheon. The BBC news came on and announced D-day. That was a great thrill. It was eventually on. My brother in law, Fred is my sister’s husband, he was in the, in the army and you know he got out at Dunkirk. Went around to North Africa. Involved in the, in to Sicily and in to Italy. Back to England and then went into Europe about two, about two days after D-day. So, they certainly had a tough, tough life. One of the things at the RAF stations we used to have sheets on our beds. That’s something that we didn’t ever have in Australia but we had lovely blankets and the idea was to hang onto your Australian blankets because they were real wool and warm whereas the English blankets tended to be a bit feltish. At [pause] New York we, we had constant leave. Went down to one of the United Services Club and they invited me to go down and meet a couple of girls there, you know. Palled up with one girl. Went out with her and she took me home to a place on Great Neck and introduced me to her sister and her father who was involved in the forestry business and, yes they looked after me very well. Took me to a nightclub. Café society. And I got a signature of Joe, Joe Lewis — the American world champion boxer. Had quite a number of other signatures in that, in that RAAF diary but it’s disappeared like a lot of other things. Back on the train to San Francisco. This time we went on a more southerly route in those rather poorer areas of America. Whereas the country up north around Denver, you know was lovely and prosperous but the southern parts looked, looked pretty tough. Went to a staging camp, Petersburg. Was there for about a fortnight. American people often took us for drives around the country. Eventually we went on to a ship, the Monterey. One of the American liners. Went to, sailed it across. The ship was full of Americans going out to the Pacific war, warfare. Sailed into Finschhafen, saw my first American Duck in the water there. Spent a couple of days there. Then went up to Hollandia, changed ship there on the Swansea and that came down to Oro Bay and Milne Bay and back to Brisbane. That’s about it.
AP: That was pretty well your story. Well, we may as well go, have a look at some of the things in a bit more detail if you don’t mind.
JS: Yeah.
AP: I love it. I ask one question and thirty minutes later we, we’re just about finished. We’re not really. Where were you when you heard that war was declared? And how old were you and what did you think at the time?
JS: I was [pause] When the Japanese invaded or are you talking —
AP: Well, right back at the beginning. 1939.
JS: Oh yes. Yes. I remember. I was working then at the SKF Bearing Company in Brisbane and a couple of months after the war started it was obvious we wouldn’t be able to get ball bearings and roller bearings from Europe where most of it was coming from. Not a lot from Sweden. So, the boss said to me, ‘Well Joe. Sorry.’ But I was a stock clerk there and quite an interesting job. Enjoyed it. So, I was able to get a job at a warehouse in Brisbane — Hoffman’s and Company who sold supplies to, to the small shops in those days. Of course, there was small shops over the Brisbane area and over the Queensland area. And I was there until I was, went into the air force then in, in May of ’42. One thing too that I may, should have mentioned. At Sandgate we were, just before lunch, there was an American Airacobra who flew around the station. But he got too low. Dipped his wing in the water and crashed. And in those days I was pretty, pretty fit so I and a few others swam out but he was dead unfortunately. Whilst I didn’t see it that same afternoon another one crashed out, out into the sea.
AP: You were on the Reserve. The Air Force Reserve for a fair time, I think. You said it was.
JS: Yeah.
AP: It was almost a year.
JS: From February. Yeah.
AP: Yeah. What, did the air force give you anything to do in that time?
JS: Yes.
AP: Or did you just carry on?
JS: We attended educational classes in airmanship and particularly Morse code which I never really ever mastered well. Formed quite a few friendships of fellows there. In Brisbane a number of fellows who, who went to, to England there was a very high casualty list amongst them. Fellows that I went to school with, who knew in various parts, you know, didn’t come back. But I, when I was discharged at the [pause] just after the world war, the Japanese capitulated, I joined Veterans Affairs and worked at Veterans Affairs for a couple off months off forty years. First in their administrative offices in Brisbane. In Perry House. I was there for a few years. Then I went out to the Greenslopes Hospital. Was there until 1959 when they, for the last six months I went to Kenmore which was a TB sanitorium out [pause] out Lone Pine way. Out that direction. And then in 1960 I applied for positions. The blokes ahead of me weren’t going to move from Brisbane. My father had died. My mother was living with us and we were in a, built a home in Corinda in Brisbane and we’d only two bedrooms. My mother was in the lounge and she had relatives in Melbourne of course so I applied for a job in Melbourne. Eventually went to, to Heidelberg and I was there most of the time in Heidelberg. My last job there was director of administration which was an exceedingly interesting job. You know, in charge of the domestic services, food services, ordinary stores and administrative people. And I had a lot of liaising with the, the medical people and specialist departments like occupational therapy, physiotherapy. Yeah.
AP: So that’s the repatriation hospital at Heidelberg.
JS: Heidelberg. Yeah.
AP: Yeah. Ok.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Just for context because this is going to the UK.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Why did you pick the air force?
JS: I had a fear of fighting in the trenches of France.
AP: Did you have any —
JS: And I was always interested. We lived in, in Sherwood in Corinda and it wasn’t so many miles across to the Archerfield Aerodrome. And I often used to cycle out or being taken out by somebody to see visiting aircraft. Had a few joy flights out that way. My father, airlines had prospered, it meant that caught an aircraft, a Stinson to Townsville and then changed aircraft. He was going to Cairns and he got into a Dragon Rapide. Only a little two-engined aircraft. And going out the weather closed in. They landed on the beach. Stayed there for a couple of hours. The pilot said, ‘We’ve got to get out the tide’s coming in too quickly.’ So, they went on to Cairns. Now, fancy that happening that way.
AP: Now [laughs] yeah. It’s a bit different. I was going to ask you something about that. Alright. The first time you went in an aeroplane. Apart from those joy flights. When you were in the air force tell me about your first flight if you can remember it.
JS: At Maryborough. That was my first flight.
AP: What, what did you think of it?
JS: They were pretty basic aircraft but they were pretty good in those days.
AP: That was a Battle?
JS: They had wireless sets and you’d practice your Morse code and verbal communication. Yeah.
AP: Very good. You’ve told me how you got to the UK. That’s very good. When, what [pause] that was the first time you went overseas?
JS: Pardon?
AP: That was the first time you went overseas?
JS: Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
AP: Yeah. What did you think of wartime England? First. First thoughts on arrival.
JS: Oh, lovely country. Lots of beautiful girls. Lots of warm beer. It was pretty hard to get cold beer in those days. The countryside was absolutely beautiful.
AP: Alright. That leads on to the next question, I guess. The beer question. What did you do to relax when you weren’t on duty?
JS: Where?
AP: What did you do to relax when you were not on duty?
JS: Where?
AP: Ah, well anywhere. On the squadron. On OTU. That sort of thing. When you were on leave. Or not even on leave.
JS: Very often I was going to and from Lutterworth to see my wife.
AP: And you actually got married in England.
JS: Yes.
AP: Yeah. That’s —
JS: Got married on the 30th of December 1943.
AP: Tell me about a wartime wedding.
JS: It was at Bardon Hill just outside Coalville. We toasted with a bottle of Australian wine. How it happened to be there I’m not quite sure but it was there. I realised, you know, that people in England had it pretty tough in comparison to, to life in the Australian household. You know they didn’t have a bathroom. They’d have a tub which, which you’d have a wash in that. Whereas of course in Australia, you know I grew up in a house, a timber house on stilts. Had a copper down, down under the house where you washed your clothes. But if you wanted a hot bath you had to bucket water up in to the bathroom. I remember a chip heater being installed to heat the water in the bath. That was a great advantage. Subsequently of course before the war it was put in an electrical system [pause] And domestic appliances. In those days there was no dishwashers, vacuum cleaners or anything like that. Cleaning the floors was done by a broom or down with a cloth. Hand and knees. I remember my mother, you know washing the floor and polishing the floor which was in those days was linoleum. Whereas these days we’ve got all these modern cons and every, and of course, you know people get fairly gigantic loans to get into houses but you know they, they want and expect everything at the same time. All of those modern cons. Two cars in the family which is pretty well a necessity these days.
AP: Different, different times I think, Joe. Different times.
JS: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: Alright. We might, might talk a bit about, well ok the aircraft. The Lancaster. What did you think the first time you saw a Lancaster?
JS: Yeah. Well it was, was built to carry bombs. Pretty light construction really. I saw the one earlier this year. Went up to the War Memorial in Canberra. And whilst we, we thought it was huge back in 1943 you know, they’re pretty tiny now. And one of the, one of the things that the RAF didn’t miss on. You know, you often thought that the aircraft would be attacking you in to the, in to the turret but what was happening would be German aircraft perhaps a thousand feet down below you and what they didn’t know — the Germans had a gun pointing up like that and of course the aircraft was sending out a certain amount of exhaust fumes so we were sitting ducks to the German fighter pilots. And the RAF didn’t ever wake up to the fact that this was what was happening.
AP: Did, did the crews themselves have some sort of an idea of that? Or —
JS: No.
AP: There was just no, no one had, they just disappeared.
JS: It didn’t seem to get through to anybody.
AP: No one worked it out. What’s a turret look like when you’re in it? You’re sitting in your turret. What’s in front of you? What’s beside you?
JS: There was, in a Wellington it was two guns — 303s. And in the Lancasters four. Four guns. The ammunition. Every, about every tenth shell would be a tracer so that you could see it in the sky. I didn’t ever fire a gun at a fighter pilot. A fighter. I didn’t see one. And of course, our gunnery was 303s whereas the English, the German fighter pilots certainly .5 or 20mm.
AP: Yeah. There was a bit of an unfair fight, I think.
JS: Yes. Yeah. The, the Halifax, I didn’t ever have a flight on it. I was very impressed with the turret in the Halifax. A Boulton Paul whereas it was a Fraser Nash in the Lancaster. And I’ve been told that they were easier to get out of if there was an emergency.
AP: I’ve heard of that sort of thing. That kind of declares my next question null and void. But I suppose you did fighter affiliation. What’s, what’s the drill when you, if you were to spot a night fighter somewhere —
JS: Yes.
AP: What happens next? What’s the drill?
JS: You’d do a corkscrew. Down. Down to port or to starboard. So, go down and up, down and up again to get out. That was a case of being attacked from the rear by an aircraft. Now that didn’t ever happen to me and I don’t think it happened to too many.
AP: What was a corkscrew like in a turret?
JS: It was up and down, you know. That wasn’t, that wasn’t too bad you know. In the turret of course, we had heated, heated suits on. One night coming back across Denmark mine petered out and I had a fairly cold trip back. But I survived alright [laughs] the temperature outside me would be down. Down to about fifty degrees centigrade. Centigrade.
AP: What, what was your evacuation drill if you had to leave an aircraft in a hurry? What would you have done as the rear gunner in a Lancaster?
JS: Well, you had to get around, open the doors, grab your parachute. The parachute wasn’t in the turret. It was inside the aircraft. Grab the turret and either get it back and jump out of the, from the turret or get out through the main door. And the idea was to roll over so that you didn’t get hit by the tail fin.
AP: It sounds like it would take a fair bit of time that you probably might not have had.
JS: Yeah. And if you were doing it at say eighteen thousand, you know we would be bombing at about twenty one thousand. You know. You know, coming down all of a sudden. Pretty hard getting out I’d imagine.
AP: How many, how many trips did you actually do?
JS: Twenty five.
AP: Twenty five. And it was the twenty fifth trip which you were injured.
JS: Twenty fifth I met my Waterloo.
AP: Do you know what it actually was that hit you? You said you never saw a fighter.
JS: No. I suspect it was — of course the Germans were sending out anti-aircraft fire from the ground. But I strongly suspect it was one of these, these fighters that were down below, below me and sent up a shell hoping to knock out the aircraft. Perhaps his shot wasn’t all that good and hit the turret.
AP: Was that the only damage to the aircraft that you know of?
JS: Yes.
AP: Yeah. So, and you were the only one injured.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Luck of the draw isn’t it?
JS: Yeah. Luck of the draw.
AP: Yeah. Very much so. Do any of your other operations stand out in your memory at all? Any, any other interesting ones?
JS: There was one particular night there was a bit of a disagreement between the navigator and the pilot as the track which we should go back on and we wandered over, over France and got coned by about a half a dozen searchlights. We thought we were a bit lucky to get out of that and didn’t deserve to get out of it really. Another night, taking off, the aircraft swung across to starboard and pretty much out of the control of the pilot really. Scooped off the runway. Got up alright but was a bit dicey there for a few minutes. You know there was a tremendous amount of people killed over there as a result of sheer accidents really. You know there was six hundred and fifty two thousand killed in Bomber Command and a very high percentage of those were due to accidents and not involving operations.
AP: Yeah. It was a large, it was, was a certainly a large —
JS: Yeah.
AP: Before they even got on to a squadron let alone —
JS: Yeah.
AP: Yeah.
JS: There was about four hundred plus or minus a few Australians killed over in, in Europe.
AP: Yeah. There were quite a few.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Oh, Morton Hall. I was going to ask you about that. My great, this is the personal bit for the tape. My great uncle, so my Bomber Command connection spent some time at Morton Hall as well.
JS: Yes.
AP: It’s written in the back of his logbook. I don’t know what he did there.
JS: No.
AP: So, if you could expand a little bit on that that would be really cool.
JS: Just a commando school to make us physically fit. It was, you know, it was important to be fit for flying. It was also if you happened to parachute down into Europe to try and escape. You know. It was good fun and I enjoyed it very much until the second day I sprained my ankle.
AP: That was the end of that.
JS: Harris, the, in charge of Bomber Command. We didn’t ever see him at the airfields. We used to refer to him as Butcher Harris.
AP: London is, is something that comes up often in these interviews. Aircrew sort of seemed to gravitate to London on leave or as they were passing through on the way to other things. Obviously, you spent a little bit more time there than most at Kodak House.
JS: Yes.
AP: But I’m interested in perhaps in what, what sort of things you did in London. What did you see? What did you do? When you weren’t, when you weren’t necessarily at work.
JS: Well I used to see my cousin a fair amount. We’d often go out for a few drinks. He knew the London area pretty well. He’d been there since well before the war. Knew a place down near Victoria, Victoria Street station where we could get some steak. That was a pretty important factor over there. We weren’t great drinkers. I was never a great drinker, and I wasn’t a smoker.
AP: That’s, yeah that’s it’s something that a lot of people seemed to meet friends in London as well.
JS: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: The Boomerang Club for example.
JS: Yeah.
AP: There was a signing in book or something. You’d look through and go, ‘Oh, I know him.’
JS: Yeah.
AP: Yeah. Very good. I guess we’re getting pretty close to the end of my list of questions. You said you weren’t a great drinker. Did you spend any time in the local pub near Skellingthorpe? What was it called? And what happened?
JS: No. We spent more, more time in the local pub at Lutterworth drinking some of the warm beer. Looking at the fire. There was always a fireplace so, and there was always somebody who could play a piano, have a sing song and very enjoyable nights.
AP: Excellent. Piano is something you don’t get very often these days either.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Alright. I guess we’ll jump down towards the end now. You’ve told me what you did in civilian life. How is, how do you think Bomber Command is remembered and what sort of legacy do you think?
JS: Well, unfortunately, of course they got a bad name on the, on that last raid to Dresden. A lot of people think that that was unnecessary. I think it was probably at the request, to some degree by the Russians and of course not only did the RAF operate at Dresden the Americans sent daylight aircraft over there. And that seems to be, seemed to be forgotten. You know, Harris after the war he didn’t get any, any knighthood. He went back to South Africa, I think. I’ve got an idea he went to Kenya where he’d come from originally.
AP: So, for, how do you remember your time in Bomber Command. What did you get out of it, I suppose?
JS: A great experience. Great experience. I had a world’s trip.
AP: I guess that’s —
JS: A selfish, selfish attitude but that’s what it was.
AP: That’s —
JS: I, you know, saw places. I’ve never been back to England. I haven’t been outside of Australia at all.
AP: That was, that was your one opportunity and you grabbed it.
JS: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: Very much so. Well, I guess that’s, that’s really all I’ve got for you.
JS: Yeah.
AP: So, thank you very much Joe.
JS: That’s alright.
AP: It’s been a pleasure.
JS: How much do I owe you?
AP: [laughs] Not at all.
[recording paused]
JS: Control at the aerodromes were girls.
AP: Ah yes.
JS: Talk you in. Sometimes you’d come back after operation — you might be ten or fifteen thousand feet and you’d come down on five hundred feet levels.
AP: Someone would have to control that.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Yeah. Do you, do you remember much about the process of arriving back at the base?
JS: Well I was, you know we were treated like heroes when you came back. As I’ve said before the station commander and the wing commander if he, sometimes he’d be on operations but generally he wasn’t. They were there to, to greet you. And sometimes the commodore within 5 Group was 54 base and that covered Skellingthorpe, Bardney, number 9 Squadron. And 463 and 467 at Waddington. It was 54 base and there would be an air commodore in charge of that and sometimes he’d be there to, to greet you.
AP: That’s pretty [pause] yeah. Excellent so , ok why not keep going? When you, when you arrived back you come back to dispersal, the engines shut down. What do you feel? What do you think?
JS: Relief. It was nice to get out. Out of that aircraft. Get some of that flying gear off. You know these Taylor suite. These great huge yellow heated suits. Get that off and out of uniform would have underclothing. Cotton. Warm underclothing. Long strides and singlets. So, you liked to get that out of the aircraft. Outer garment off. It was a relief of that’s another one towards the twenty five, from the thirty. They didn’t, we’d hoped to, our aim was to complete the thirty and then go to Pathfinders. Kind of liked an eagle on my uniform but I didn’t.
AP: Did the rest of your crew go on?
JS: No. No. They were all, all killed.
AP: Oh really?
JS: They went on flying and were killed.
AP: So you, I guess you got away with it didn’t you?
JS: Yes. Yes, I was one of the lucky ones.
AP: Yeah very much so. What was, what actually was the target that night and when, what night was it. Can you remember?
JS: No.
AP: No. Sorry. That you were. That you were — sorry.
JS: Yeah. Well I was in hospital.
AP: Sorry.
JS: Yeah.
AP: The night that you were injured what was that?
JS: Berlin.
AP: Berlin. On which trip? What night? Do you know what the date was?
JS: 25th .
AP: Of?
JS: ’43. No. No ’44. ’44.
AP: ’44. So, March. Was that March?
JS: Yeah.
AP: Yeah. Ok.
JS: Yeah.
AP: Ok. My great uncle was on that trip as well.
JS: Yeah. Of course, as you know they had some disastrous trips. Leipzig, they lost seventy nine and about ninety six, ninety seven at Nuremberg.
AP: Yeah. They were all in, in that area.
JS: Yeah.
AP: And there was a Munich trip in there as well.
JS: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: And there was a whole bunch. Yeah. That was a particularly bad time to be operating actually.
JS: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: Yeah. Wow. That’s, you were very lucky then.
JS: Yeah.
AP: To be taken off ops then.
JS: Of course, the Americans saved us really with their capacity. The manpower and their capacity to build ships and provide aircraft. I don’t think England would have been able to survive without American help. If the Japanese hadn’t have come in I think ultimately Hitler would have been, invaded England.
AP: It could have been a very, very different war.
JS: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: Yes, that —
JS: You know, the American capacity. I know was probably a stunt but they, they built one of those Liberty ships, about ten thousand tonnes in three and half days. Working twenty four hours, seven days.
AP: Craziness. Shows what wartime economies can, can achieve.
JS: Yeah.
AP: To a certain extent for unlimited. Very good. Ok. Anything else you have to add?
JS: No.
AP: Just before I turn it off again.
JS: No. That’s about it, I think.
AP: That’s about it. That’s, that’s very good actually.
JS: Yeah.
AP: That’s some very good stuff there.
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Interview with Joe Shuttleworth
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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IBCC Digital Archive
Type
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Sound
Language
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eng
Format
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01:03:05 audio recording
Creator
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Adam Purcell
Date
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2015-10-21
Description
An account of the resource
Joe Shuttleworth was born and raised in Brisbane but also spent a lot of time with family in the Melbourne area. He volunteered for aircrew and soon began training as a gunner. After initial training he sailed to the United States and on to the UK. While at operational training unit at RAF Bruntingthorpe he went to the local village where a chance encounter led to meeting his future wife who he married in 1943. He was posted to 50 Squadron as an air gunner and was based at RAF Skellingthorpe. On his twenty fifth operation which was to Berlin he experienced a sudden flash and a searing pain. One of the crew managed to pull him out of the turret. He was taken to hospital at RAF Rauceby where he lost his eye. The rest of his crew continued to fly but they were all killed in a later operation. Joe returned to Australia where his wife joined him a year later. He remembers his time with Bomber Command as a wonderful experience which led him to see the world. After the war Joe never left Australia again.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Australian Air Force
Spatial Coverage
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Australia
Great Britain
United States
England--Lincolnshire
New York (State)--New York
Queensland--Brisbane
Victoria--Melbourne
Germany
Germany--Heidelberg
Victoria
New York (State)
Queensland
Conforms To
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Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
Contributor
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Julie Williams
Temporal Coverage
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1939
1940
1941
1943
29 OTU
50 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
bombing
crash
Lancaster
love and romance
mess
military living conditions
Nissen hut
Operational Training Unit
RAF Bitteswell
RAF Bruntingthorpe
RAF hospital Rauceby
RAF Morton Hall
RAF Skellingthorpe
take-off crash
training
Wellington
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0fe7e11ac29997643bdadaafb0ca7c4b
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/328/3488/ASmithJ160312.1.mp3
6c84a152556073ed657df032c82e6d84
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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Smith, Jean
J Smith
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview with Jean Smith (2105009 Royal Air Force) and a photograph. She worked as a clerk in the aircraft manufacturing industry before the war and later served as a secretary in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force. She served at 27 Operational Training Unit at RAF Lichfield.
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
2016-03-12
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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Smith, J
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AP: This interview for the International Bomber Command Centre is with Jean Smith, who was a WAAF at Lichfield among other places during World War Two, she in fact I met her husband who was a Stirling flight engineer, so this is gonna be a good one. My name is Adam Purcell, the interview is taking place at Jean’s home in McCrae, south of Melbourne and it is the 12th of March 2016. So, Jean, I thought we might start from the beginning, it’s probably a good spot. Uhm, can you tell me something of your early life, what, where and how you grew up, uhm, education, first job, that sort of thing.
JS: Oh, well, I was born on the 1st of January 1922 and born in [unclear] 6, moved to, uhm, Welwyn Garden City and that’s where I spent my school life. I went not to the local primary school and I went to Hitchin Grammar School, was the nearest secondary school to Welwyn Garden City and then I went to Pitman’s College in London and at the same time the family moved to Amersham in Buckinghamshire. I was always very keen on horse riding and show jumping so that’ s where I spent most of my spare time in my youth. I did a secretarial course at Pitman’s College and also studied for my civil service exams, which I passed very well and went in, I chose the Air Ministry, my father told me I was very silly to do that. He was a civil servant, he knew better than me but I wanted to go into the Air Ministry. And then the Air Ministry split and was the Ministry of Aircraft Production which I went into. We spent our time typing out and preparing all these contracts for small firms to make Wellington bombers and Spitfires and Hurricanes a year at least before the war started. Then the war started and by that time I had met a very nice young man at Halton number 1 school of Aircraft Apprentices and he was passing out that year and he was sergeant apprentice and he, when the war occurred, he went straight over to France with the British Expeditionary Force, he was a fitter of course, and then managed to escape back from a French fishing village, on a French small fishing boat back to Folkestone and as soon as he got back to Britain, he, then we were, the Battle of Britain had started and we were very short of pilots for all our new aircraft, fighter aircraft and he trained as a Hurricane pilot and sadly he was shot down in the Battle of Britain. I wanted to go into the Air Force straight away, into the WAAF, but my father wouldn’t let me, he said, no, not until you are twenty one, why that magical number? I got in at twenty in the beginning of 1942 and I wanted to be a flight mechanic or a radio operator but of course they conned me and they said that you’re already trained and you’ll save your country such a lot of money [laughs] and so I went in as a secretary and all I did was my two months training at Innsworth Camp with thousands of other girls, usual routine, learning to march, to salute and hygiene and air force laundry, marches. And there were no mirrors on our training station so we had to learn to do our hair, put our make-up on and put our caps on and tie our ties without anything other than your little compact mirror and that was a bit of a thing. Anyway, I was posted to number 27 OTU Lichfield and I wanted to be in Fighter Command, now I was going to Bomber Command. Anyway, I arrived at 27 OTU and I found out what a lovely station it was, friendly and happy. And, [sighs] I became secretary to the Chief Flying Instructor Wing Commander Jackson, he was a South African and he’d done his first tour on Hampdens and I, my office was part of the orderly room, training wing orderly room down in flying control on the edge of the air field and I was stunned when I used to see all these young officers and flight sergeants and warrant officers coming in, all the instructors coming into our office, I was strapped dumb and they were all decorated and they’d all done their ops on Wellingtons and Hams, not Wellingtons, Hampdens and another aircraft, we used to call them coffin boxes, Hampdens, can’t think of the other one, uhm, and I was so naive and young, all these young heroes coming in, breezing in, and of course I quickly learned all the slang, you know, di digitate and you’re in the fertilizer business and [laughs] so on and so on, the prangs and they really did say jolly good show when they came in up to doing something [laughs], well, uhm, so, the Waafery was two miles down the road, uhm, I think it was a place, a little village called Streethay, it was on the main road and it was two miles away and it was surrounded by high barb wire fencing and sentries at the gate and I remember, some of the aircrew boys saying: ‘Why do they, why do they surround your place as if it’s like a prison?’ and I used to tell all the Aussies: ‘To keep you randy Aussies out’. We had a little pub called the Anchor, a tiny little pub that had been a coaching inn and it was just, all about a quarter of a mile down the road from our camp and, of course we were all armed [?], we were all given service bikes, we could all ride a bike because we had to ride to and fro to camp and coming down on summer evenings, especially when I was first there, lot of the girls used to stop and go in for half a pint of beer before they went in for their tea [laughs]. Oh, I was so pure and innocent, it took me six months before I set my first footstep, I’d never been in a pub in my life, [laughs]. Anyway we used to go into the Anchor a lot for a quick drink and also of course on the nights in the winter, when night flying was cancelled, when it was thick pea souper fog or rain streaming down, you couldn’t see an inch before you, we all used to wait around in our hut after we’d had our tea at night and suddenly over the tannoy the message would come: all night flying cancelled, all night flying scrubbed, over and out. And we’d all say whoopee and get the curlers out and put all the glamour on, those were the days of big pink rouge cheeks and thick horrible makeup called powder cream, we used to plaster all over our spotty faces and big cupids bow lips bright red and mascara [?], which came in little black blocks and you spat on it and rubbed it with a little brush, and thickly coated your eyelashes. The trouble was it wasn’t waterproof so if you went to the pictures and it was a sad film you, also all the girls came out with streaks of black down their cheeks [laughs], we’d all be trying to wipe of our black tears. Uh, we had a lot of fun in the Hut 2 and, as I say, we used to put all our makeup on and then best blue and dash down to the pub and then we’d wait there, we’d order our drinks, just half a pint of beer and you’d hear all the boys coming down and all the bikes going bang, bang, bang on the pub wall and they’d all come streaming in and in half an hour the whole place would be a thick fug, you could hardly see across the room, cigarette smoke and I always remember cigarette smoke and all the wet wall, there was always a big fire on in the lounge bar and the piano, oh, piano would be going like mad with all the songs getting naughtier and naughtier as the night went on [laughs]. And it was good because these boys were doing their, they were doing their operational training, they were, they’d come from all their various schools, pilots from their flying school, wireless school, gunnery and they’d come together and they’d been put in big room and told to make up a crew of five which would be pilot, navigator, wireless operator, he was also a gunner, uh, a gunner and a bomb-aimer and they would then convert onto Wellington, twin-engine bombers, the good old Wellingtons which were nicknamed Wimpies, they were, they were going up doing circuits and bumps all day and all night and it’s all very well, I was shattered actually when I got there, because the number of accidents in training was shocking during the war and I don’t think a lot of civilians, I didn’t think there were going to be all these terrible accidents and my first job, as soon as I settled into my, into my office, my first job was to type out a form 765C, I think five copies I had to do, you had to do five copies, one went to Bomber Command, one went to Group Headquarters, one went somewhere else and this particular form 765C, which was an accident report form for Bomber Command, it was a Cat E, and Cat E was total wreck all crew killed, it started with Cat E which was just nothing, you know, somebody knocked a, knocked a whole in a [unclear] or something like that, but the Cat Es were all full and of course when I’d done that and send that off and I was appalled cause I said to the sergeant in charge of the orderly room: ‘Does this happen often?’. ‘Oh, yes’ he said turning to me, he said, ‘Oh, we’ve had one accident, we should have another two in the next week’. Sure enough we did and next day I, and next morning I, after I’d done the general correspondence with the Chief Flying Instructor, the CFI, I had to go and sit down and we did letters of condolence to the various parents and wives and I know there were two Australian families and I thought how dreadful, all those miles away and I suppose no air mail, so I suppose in five weeks, will take five weeks for the letters to get to the parents somewhere in the outback of Australia and it just hit home, the war really came home to me in those first few days at my new station. And I was to see a lot of very nasty accidents and I think you know there’s always, it always makes me shudder now when I hear of a bad accident to a large airliner, you think of the horrible noise and the smell and that sort of vile cloud of black, black grey smoke and then the dark red flames going up and I’d seen dead bodies being carried out of planes and it’s so terrible and it did happen so often and of course we were very near the Peak District, Staffordshire, Derbyshire was the next door county and of course the Peak District and the boys did their night flying training in all weathers, terrible weather in full blackout and there they were flying around with all the peaks not very far distant and all the, all the Welsh mountains not very far away so, we had quite a lot of accidents hitting mountains. There used to be a comical character, in a magazine which was circulated to the air crew every so often and there was a little pilot called PO Prune and he was always saying: ‘Do not come down to sea!’ and he always held his finger in the air and that was called the irremovable digit [laughs] and he was always telling people all the things they, all the aircrew telling them what they must look out for and what they mustn’t do and constantly it was: ‘Do not come down to sea!’ Never come down lower than a certain height. And life went on very smoothly at 27 OTU. I remember, uhm, I turned twenty one of course at the end of that year, on New Year’s Day 1943 and there was, on Saint Valentine’s Eve there was a WAAF dance. Morale had been bad among the WAAF at that time because we’d had an awful lot of accidents, one girl had lost her young husband only a few months married, several girls had had bad news from their boyfriends in Africa because at that time our tanks, it was the first time when our tanks were being pushed back by Rommel and there was bad news from all our various fronts and the U-boats were having a feast downing our convoys, rations were being tightened for civilians, it was a very bad time, so, all the officers, and our WAAF officers decided, have a dance, I think it was the, our WAAF, the WAAF was formed in 1938 or ’39 just before the war and it was an anniversary for the WAAF and of course we couldn’t be allowed to wear civilian clothes, you weren’t allowed to wear civilian clothes, you had to be in uniform all the time. So, they got round that by saying, we’ll have a fancy dress dance for the WAAF, not for the airmen, the airmen have to come in uniform for the girls. So, we all rushed home, if we had a 36 hour or 48 hour leave, we all rushed home and said to our mothers, what have we got, got all the bits out, my mother dyed some spare cloth, she dyed one lot red and made me a very full skirt and then she found a bit of blackout curtain and made a little bodies and the boys in the dope shop painted a sickle and hammer on it, cause they were, the Russians were our gallant allies in those days and I’d also I got a little [unclear] in civilian life, a little, pretty little embroidered blouse, Hungarian blouse. So I went as a Russian peasant and my aunt had given me a beautiful silk Japanese kimono which she had before the war, it was a really beautiful thing. And my best friend, Hibbie, Brenda was her real name, Hibbie was dark-haired and very petite and I lent this kimono to Hibbie and she did her hair up with a comb in it and went as a Japanese girl, a horrible [unclear] [laughs] and so we all got it, we were told to get in the transport, we could go in our fancy dress and we were all glamourized that, we’d had all our hair set, we’ve had to get in the transport in order to go up to main camp but we had to take our uniforms with us to, to camp, so that we came home, back to camp in uniform. Anyway, we got up to the big NAAFI on the main camp and the station band which was very good started to play and the boys came in and we were dancing and a couple of young men came in and they, they were just in working gear, with scarves round their neck. They walked over to the bar, meanwhile ten of us had coloured a huge table near the bar, so, we were all there, sitting and chatting and these two young airmen came along and the older said; ‘Hello, girls, can we sit with you?’ And I said: ‘Oh, yes’. And they dragged out the young man along, she seemed very shy, blushing about being among with all us girls, anyway this was to be, this was my husband-to-be and he didn’t ask me to dance and I was getting up and dancing with all these other boys and then I said: ‘Don’t you like me or don’t you think I can dance very well?’ He said: ‘I can’t dance, he said, I’ve never danced in my life, he said, there’s a boy in our hut being trying to teach some of us to dance but, he said, I come from the isle of Lewis, and we are free Presbyterians, we are Calvinists, and we believe dancing is very sinful’. But he said: ‘I don’t’. And he said: ‘I’d like to learn to dance’. He said: ‘Will you dance with me now?’ So, he danced with me and trod all over my feet, he was such a, oh, he had lovely blue eyes and he was a very nice boy with that beautiful Highland accent, very soft and of course I really fell for him and he said, so after the last waltz we, he said to me: ‘May I see you at to transport?’ I said, ‘Oh yes’, I said, ‘You have to wait outside because we’ve all got to change back into our uniforms’. So we go into another room, change back and I found that I got all my uniform there except that I hadn’t got my, we didn’t have suspender belts in those days, we had corsets and [laughs] large, pink corsets with suspenders on the end and I found I left my back at camp. So, I put my stockings on, I went out to transport, I was holding my skirt with my stockings up and there is this nice boy waiting for me and eventually, you know, after we all chit chatting and talking, the driver said: ‘Get in girls!’. So, he said: ‘May I kiss you goodnight?’ and I said: ‘Oh, yes!’ and I put my arms up around his neck and my stockings fell down [laughs] and so obviously it must, it must have been ordained that this would be my future husband. Oh, we only had five dates before he went off, he was a fitter on our camp, and we had five dates and he went off for his aircrew training and the young man and the older man who’d introduced him to us girls was Norman Jackson, who went on, he went off on the flight engineers course too, he was a fitter. And he went on to win the VC, he climbed out on the wing of his burning plane, he stuck a fire extinguisher into his tunic and climbed out and the other men were sort of holding onto his parachute pack and then a flame [unclear], he managed to put most of the fire out but the flames blew back all across his face and hands and unfortunately in all the shemozzle, well the fire extinguisher of course went, fell off the plane and but his parachute started to open so he had to go off, they couldn’t drag him back and he was a POW. The Germans cared for him pretty well but years later, apparently he worked, somebody told us that he worked in a high class Rolls Royce showroom selling Rolls Royce, he probably would be helped after the war, but he was a prisoner of war for a long time. Uhm, no, from about 1943 to 5 and uh, unfortunately we tried to get in touch but it was very difficult after the war, everything was in such a muddle and we never got the chance to meet him again. And, so, Jock wanted me to be his steady girlfriend but most of us WAAF didn’t like, didn’t like to be, it was the boys who wanted to be serious but we didn’t like to be serious with any of them or getting, most of us didn’t want to get engaged or married because we all felt with aircrew that once they got married or they were engaged, they were, they became very serious and much more careful and it was, we all felt talking to aircrew boys that it was the worst thing to be very careful, it was far better to be gung-ho and able to take risks than, and not have to think about a wife or a serious girlfriend. But I wrote to him the whole time he was on ops, I didn’t see him for eighteen months, I wrote him the whole time he was on ops, and I’ve got most of his letters and unfortunately he hasn’t, he didn’t, he couldn’t keep many of mine because most of them threw letters away, personal letters were thrown away. Uhm, aircrew on ops, it wasn’t a wise thing to keep anything from love life or anything like because if you were killed or taken prisoner, the RAF police went in and put everything into, uhm, boxes and all that was sent to the parents and sometimes, or wives, and sometimes it was far better that certain things weren’t known. So, I mean, you know, even things like condoms, they were told not to keep in their lockers and things like that because of the attitude in those days. So, uhm, eventually in 1945, I was posted to 3 and 5 Group at Grantham, the top groups which commanded the operational squadrons and we were working in a large country house on the edge of Grantham and we were billeted in a lovely old Edwardian house right in the middle of Grantham, not far from the Great North Road which ran through Grantham at that time. And it turns out, when I was reading the biography of Bomber Harris, when he was a young air commodore at the beginning of the war, that was his living quarters, his house with his wife and young daughter and they, eventually it was withdrawn as living quarters for RAF officers and became the living quarters for mainly the clerical and secretarial staff and actually discipline was very easy in the house, this was the place where we were living, uhm, because we were all very trustworthy women who’d worked as personal secretaries all the war and so were trusted to go and come without having to book in or book out. So, I knew I’d been keeping in touch with Jock and I knew by then he’d finished his tour of ops and he was a fighter engineer instructor at Woolfox Lodge, just down the Main North Road and he’d got a motorbike and so I said, you know, I said, he said, you know, did I feel like taking up the friendship again, and I said if he was interested, yes, fine. So, he came up on his motorbike to Grantham and we renewed our friendship, which of course brought something to our romance and we married at the end of 1945, once all the, when the war was over. But, to go back to Lichfield, I would have gone on Lichfield, unfortunately my very nice Chief Flying Instructor boss went back to do a second tour of ops so I was getting some, I was going to work for someone else. But sadly he went back on ops and he lost his life, his plane crashed over Germany and he lost his life and it was very sad because he’d married an English girl and he had two lovely children because I used to, when there were officers mess dances, I used to go and babysit for him, cause I always felt, I always used to sit next to him in his car when I was taken out to his house. [unclear] for the night and I used to feel like a queen sitting next to a senior officer [laughs] going past the guards [laughs] and they were all saluting [laughs] and so I used to look after the children and then he, and I’d have breakfast with them and he’d go, we’d go back to camp next morning. But very sadly, we were moved from our nice wooden house, we were moved into new Nissen huts, this was when conscription came in for women at the end of 1942 or the beginning of 1943 and we really suddenly became inundated with all these conscripted women, they hated us, we hated them, we were volunteers, they were conscripts, and they didn’t want to be in the services and we made it clear that we wanted to win the war and we were going to win the war [laughs] and so on. Anyway, we were moved to new Nissen huts, which had been built in the winter and were still, the concrete floors were still very damp and it was terribly, terribly cold, I know, we discarded our sheets and used to sleep between blankets and we put on our pullovers and our slacks over our WAAF pyjamas, which were nice and warm and thick but still not thick enough and we heat bricks up and wrap them in newspaper or old bits of cloth to put in the bed and even so in the morning your breath used to be frozen, right down the blanket, a little icicle. Anyway it was so cold, and I got flu and I didn’t do any, I got a cold and then it went into flu and I didn’t do anything about it and didn’t go sick, that went into bronchitis and the bronchitis very quickly turned into pneumonia and I was at work and I went all funny and they had to get an ambulance to take me to sick quarters and I must have been very ill because they put me in a private room which was normally kept for officers and I was wrapped in the officers white blanket because if I’d been, other ranks blankets would have been grey [laughs] and they gave me the new miracle drug, MB363 or some, it was a new sulphanilamide drug and it worked wonders on pneumonia and I was sick for, very sick for a few days and then eventually I lost my voice and I was sent down to Waafsey quarters to convalesce and in Waafsey quarters they had a dreadful sergeant, a woman sergeant, a WAAF sergeant in charge and she used to have all us patients up every morning, we had to get on our hands and knees in our pyjamas and polish the floors [laughs]. I couldn’t speak [laughs]. We had a little wind-up gramophone in sick quarters and the only record we had was some well-known singer of the day singing, we’re having a heatwave, a tropical heatwave, it isn’t surprising, the temperature’s rising, she certainly can, can, can [singing] [laughs]. We played it and played it and played it. So then I went back to work but by then my boss had gone and the senior medical officer decided that I’d been so sick and I’d also had a lot of very nasty boils and said really you should have a series of injections for vitamin B but unfortunately vitamin B is kept for aircrew only so I can’t give it to you, and he said, I’m going to do the very next best thing, he said, I’m going to arrange a posting to group headquarters and he said you’ll have much better food, you’ll get fruit and he said you will be in much better quarters, but of course when I went to group headquarters it was all very nice but no aircrew, no any young men. The only thing was, we had a big Canadian Bomber Command station not far from us and a huge American camp so we used to go to the American camp and that was the first time we saw, for several years that we saw oranges and ice cream, they gave us ice cream [unclear]. But to go back to Lichfield, before I leave Lichfield to go to 93 Group Headquarters in Derbyshire, I must tell of the most exciting thing that happened to all of us and that was our station taking part in the first thousand bomber raid on Cologne, I think it was the 30th, 31st of May 1942 and that was very exciting, I mean, we didn’t know where, that the target would be Cologne but we all knew something big was on. Apparently, I’ve read all about the thousand plan but at first poor old Bomber Harris thought [unclear] make the bombers because the Coastal Command was going to be in it and their bombers were going to take part and the navy bombers, but at the last minute the navy and coastal or they say so, Coastal Command withdrew so we were left with less than a thousand bombers and Bomber Harris said they must: ‘Churchill had said it must be’, and Bomber Harris said it must be a thousand bombers so they racked in all the training stations and every screen was allotted a crew and so cause always at the end of OTU training the aircrews always went on things called bulls eyes [?] or light tight raids just over the coast of France either to straf, shipping or to drop leaflets and just over the coast and then back again, to give the young aircrew a taste of what it would be like but now we were going to have everything, uhm, every crew we could put, even if they were going with an instructor, the screen instructors and so, of course our poor old Wimpies, I mean, all those operational training units, all the heavy conversion units, the aircraft were already second hand, they’d all been used on operational flying, they’d all been used and abused I mean, you, when you talked to a flight engineer as my husband was, they were running those engines very often at revs never put down in the makers note and they came to the instructional units, and they were pretty knocked about a lot of them, a lot of them been hit and repaired and they weren’t very good and that’s probably what caused a lot of the training accidents. And so of course my husband, cause I didn’t know him in those days but than I knew, but I knew all the mechanics, all flight mechanics and fitters were working all around the clock to get service for aircraft and aircraft were taking up on their tests and then repaired again and again, the, don’t you want to stop [whispers]?
AP: No, no, you’re alright.
JS: And then they, then the uhm.
AP: But I will get you to move the microphone if you can, slip down [laughs] it was fine as long as you put your hands on [laughs]. There.
JS: Then, uhm, the uhm, so, they were very, very busy and we knew, because our, the control tower was next to K2 Hangar where my future husband worked and we knew where they were working cause we very often worked very late at night and you could hear all the noise and claying in the hangars and so we didn’t know the actual date until the actual date occurred the 30th of May and suddenly all, everybody was called on deck, everyone, you were just told to do all sorts of jobs, I know I was giving out sealed maps to the navigators and the pilots and we were getting all sorts of things together, all the Red Cross, the Australian Red Cross used to send wonderful parcels across, and the Aussie boys used to share, all the RAAF boys always shared their Red Cross parcels which were marvellous, full of all sorts of goodies and we were getting all those things ready and there were planes obviously being air tested and the whole station was busy with people, all with very definite looks in their eyes, all going about our business, sort of, with a lot of extra jobs to do and wherever you walked on the station normally when planes were bombed up, you wouldn’t see any bombs because they’d just be out of dispersals, but there were bomb trolleys everywhere, you were weaving your bikes all among all the different things, keeping a wary eye on the incendiary bomb boxes, which were painted red because if incendiaries fell off and the box broke open, the incendiaries could, they were very touchy and could often go off and you know, they were very dangerous. So, then of course the boys went for briefing and we were all hanging about, we had, I remember we had our tea and everyone, everyone was very quiet, very serious, the whole station. Of course, when there’s any big operations on the station is closed down and there is no leave and there’s no out coming or incoming personal phone calls or anything like that. So, we were all very busy, doing our various jobs and then I remember after briefing, they all came into the, into our big room in training wing and we were giving out the various, you know, chewing gum, barley sugars, cake, all sort of, parcels and things, cigarettes and off they went. We all had our quick tea and a whole host of us went down to wave them off, and I always remember that night, quite a mass of people were all standing underneath the balcony of flying control and all the top brass of the station, all the senior officers who weren’t flying men were above us, they were all out on the balcony and all the flying men, they were all in the planes, they were all been allotted to [unclear] crews and the three Padres all went, [unclear] and other denominations, Padres, they all went off choice and quite a few of our senior officers, who were ground staff chose to go with the crews, they said they backed them up and they wanted to go, you know, to give them heart as someone was there with them and we heard the first, to see a station, I’d never been on an operational station but my husband’s told me a lot about it but to see these planes or to hear them going, you know, we were standing there and of course always bombers during the war were around in dispersals, all dispersed around the airfield and you’d hear that coughing and choking sound of each engine starting up and revving up and then slowly, slowly. It was a rule that they mustn’t taxi fast because during the war all our rubber came from, well, what’s Malaysia and Indonesia now and of course rubber was very difficult to get and actually it hit the Germans more because of, you know, we were downing any German ships trying to get rubber, they couldn’t know they couldn’t get rubber because it was still British and but all aircraft, all aircrew were told to taxi slowly, because if you taxied fast it wore the rubber out more quickly. We were told that with our bikes, that we must only put our bikes into the bike racks with the rear wheel because if we put the front wheel in, it wobbled about and wore the rubber out [laughs]. All these silly things that happened during the war [laughs]. Uhm, so, then the, the first aircraft came weaving down past the control tower and I always remember the pilots window open and seeing the pilots face, each pilots face white in and his helmet faming [?] his face and he waved to all of us and, as they went slowly past, and we all gave thumbs up and he gave thumbs up and then slammed the window too and they went along to the runway, the end of the runway which wasn’t far away from us and of course they revved up each engine, one must be like a four-engine bomber station where they ramped each engine up to shrieking and you could see, you could see in the dusk, you could see all the dust and leaves and twigs flying and then of course they’d get a green from the airfield control and the caravan down at the end of the airfield and each one revved up and they took all the whole of the runway to get off to clear the hedge at the far end and almost before they were over the hedge, the next one was going down the runway, you know, heavily loaden with bombs and oxygen and high octane fuel, a living bomb themselves and we were all waving and we stood there long after the ground crew had put out the flarepath and long after the dim lights on the balcony had gone out off and all the officers had gone in, we all stood there, sort of not speaking, you know. And next morning of course lying in beds, you know, when the dawn was breaking, we were lying in bed, a lot of us hadn’t slept much that night, hearing the first faint roar of the aircraft coming back and counting back, we only lost one aircraft and they were actually, they had gone to another station, we were lucky but several of our aircraft had to turn back, cause that was the trouble on the training stations, Harris did get his, he got just over a thousand but actually before they got to the enemy coast some were turning back and I mean, once one engine goes in a Wimpey, you know you can’t go on. And of course, you know, we were lucky as I say, we, I and my friend who worked in training, when we dashed down on our bikes before breakfast to go and have a look, I think we run up to Flying Control, up the stairs to Flying Control to have a look at the big board to see who was back and that was quite an exciting night and so, and of course later on Jock told me all about, you know, his operational life and he had some exciting times. But, I went on to, Group Headquarters and of course you were working for senior officers, uhm, there were just one or two flight lieutenants, most of them were squadron leaders, ah, and of course you had air vice-marshals, all the people with the mess of scrambled egg on their caps and you were doing some, we were doing very secret stuff actually at that time and because of course, when I was at, yes, it was, 1945, yes, that was when I, that was when D-Day occurred and we all knew, because they cancelled long before D-Day, they cancelled all long leaves, all seven, fourteen day leaves and even forty eight hours weren’t very, weren’t given out very much. I was lucky, I wasn’t very far from my home and my home was by then in Buxton in Derbyshire because my father was in the civil service and he was in the customs & excise on the Board of Trade, and they were evacuated out to Buxton in Derbyshire. A lot of places, Ministry of Aircraft Production, were evacuated to Harrogate, all the non-military, there only be the Air Ministry, Admiralty, War Office, the Home Office, Colonial Office and, well, the Foreign Office, they were the only ones that stayed in London. All the other departments went out in case of being bombed, so, my dad’s office was in the big Palace Hotel, the biggest hotel in, uhm, in Buxton in Derbyshire and which is a beautiful place and so I wasn’t, when I was at Group Headquarters I wasn’t very far away. I could hitchhike to Derby and get a train to Buxton, so I was lucky I could get home for thirty six hours, but, I, uhm, for D-Day we all knew something was afoot but nobody, I don’t know why none of us put two and two together that it would be D-Day and we were doing all sorts of things so we used to, when you are on duty at night you know we’d be sitting the, only two or three of us on duty and we’d be having to take lots of coded messages and stick them onto paper and they’d go to various officers and the tele printers would be chattering all night with stuff from Bomber Command mainly and of course, then of course we, I came down to early lunch on, actually on D-Day and I went into the airmen’s mess and there was this little huddle around a tiny little radio that they got in the corner of the mess and I said: ‘What’s going on?’ and they said: [makes a shushing sound] ‘it’s on!’ So we all got our ears together listening. And I, cause I was very interested actually and had been interested for a long time because, of course I’d moved up with my parents, I’d left the Ministry of Aircraft Production and I moved up to Buxton when they moved to Buxton in 1940 and, I’d worked for the, I’d had a job as a secretary, as a town clerk in the town hall and the junior clerk who was a year younger than me, he had to wait till he was called up, he was in the home guard, he had to wait till he was called up because his mother was a widow and he was sort of contributing to the family so he waited until he was called up and the non, the local government offices were like the civil service and some big firms. When men were called up, their service pay was made up to their civilian pay, what they were earning in their civilian pay by the civil service and they were very, that was very good, so he had good money all the time. And we used to go out together, I was doing, everybody did voluntary work during the war, my mother rolled bandages and made up, she rolled bandages and made up, she old dressing kits for the army in her spare time, my dad used to fire watch and I used to go and work in the services canteen at the town hall in, about three evenings a week, pouring cups of tea or stirring backed beans for all the troops, cause we had troops everywhere, every town was full of troops, and, this, my boyfriend Morris, he was in the home guard, so he used to come and pick me up after his guard duties on reservoirs and oil damps and so on and, walk me home and I was, he was called up and went into the West Yorkshire Regiment and for years, I mean, Jock knew all about my romance with Morris, and the West Yorks were one of the first, they were one of the first to go on D-Day onto the beaches for the British crowd and I always wondered how he’d got on and my friend across the road, my neighbour across the road, she does genealogy and she’s looked up a lot of my family for me and she looked up Morris for me and if he’s alright and he got through obviously and he married two years after me and they had a daughter. And, so that was nice to know. So, that was our D-Day excitement and then of course I went, I was posted on to 3 and 5 Group Headquarters at Grantham, where of course I met Jock again. And our romance took off but nothing was, I mean, it was very easy living and very easy working conditions at Grantham compared to what I’d had and the war was almost winding down then so we had a very easy time of it and eventually of course once D-Day came, oh yes, D-Day, not D-Day, once VE-Day came, oh, we’ve all danced in the streets, there were civilian women dancing in their nighties in the streets and the street lamps were put on, and of course they’d obviously been preparing for VE-Day because all the street lamps went on and Jock and I, we used to go to a little park in Grantham and we had a special seat and that was our Snogging Seat and [laughs] we used to kiss and cuddle and on our Snogging Seat and we were very put out, after we’ve been down singing, drinking and you know, all the boys, he and all the boys climbed up, they put, they climbed up on the town, Grantham town hall roof and one of the boys tied a pair of WAAF blackouts, twilights, pair of WAAF knickers on the flag staff, certainly weren’t mine and Jock and I went round to our little park and our Snogging seat was no good anymore because there was a big lamp above it and it was lit up [laughs]. So, that was that but, he of course, he did his ops on Stirlings, so, I don’t know if whether you’ve heard, the losses on Stirlings were terrible and whenever we met people after the war and he said he was on a Stirling Squadron, they said; ‘Well, you are one of the few to get through!’ And half way through his ops, they took them off quite a lot of bombing ops and they put onto dropping, uhm, sea mines mainly in the Baltic, up the Gironde Estuary and so on, and then, that was quite tricky stuff, the only two or three would go out, it was quite tricky stuff because those sea mines going down on parachutes of course they were very touchy and they have to be, you have to fly at a certain level so that they would drop into the sea and then they come up to a certain level in the sea and lie there under the sea. And of course, while he was doing that, while he was dropping all these mines in the Baltic and so on, his father, who had been in the Royal Navy during World War I and then he went back into the Royal navy in World War Two and he was on minesweepers off our coast, off the western of [unclear] and the Minch, he was minesweeping for the British convoys coming and going. So, he was sweeping them up and his son was sowing them, they were called gardening operations and so he, they were doing well and also they were dropping a lot of stuff to the Maquis, the French Maquis in the Alps and he said, that was a very leery thing because he remembers, you know, cause Stirlings hadn’t go the height, they couldn’t get the ceiling like the Lancaster could so you often had to fly through gorges, these alpine gorges and he said, very often wingtip to wingtip you’d see this black icy glassy rock each sideof the wingtips and quite a lot of aircraft of course got smashed up in those gorges. And they also dropped to the Maquis, he had a quite an exciting experience, once they were quite high up in the Alps and they had just signalled and they received a torch signal back from the Maquis and they were coming to drop their, they had a lot of stuff including a Gee, of course it was always a flight engineer and a bomb aimer who were pushing it out in a big hatch, they had a special hatch who pushed all the stuff out and they were coming down in a steep curve and suddenly the floodlights, the searchlights went on and guns started, obviously the Germans were waiting for them and because they just went straight up, they took off and went off but he said he always wondered how the poor devils on the ground got on. And they did quite a lot of that sort of thing and they had, they were, they had a nasty time when they took off one night and the plane had been going, they’d been up all day, they’d headed up and down on air test and as they took off, one engine failed as they were taking off and they carried on, I mean three engines were, the Stirling was a tough plane, even though it couldn’t get the height, but second engine failed as they went over the end of the runway, and then the third engine started coughing and it was wintertime and there was a ploughed field next to the airfield, I mean they got a full bombload and the pilot said to Jock the engineer, he said; ‘I’ll have to go in’ and shouted out crash, you know, crash positions and they went in and he, Jock was up with the pilot, he was up in the cock pit and he said, all the earth, we went nose, he said, all the earth came over the cockpit but, he said, fortunately, he said, the little escape hatch so, he said, the pilot went out there and I went out the back and got out and we all got out and he’d expected the bombs to go off but nothing happened. So they were very fortunate and one [unclear] them was, see they’d had problems with this particular aircraft several other times and they had actually come back, they didn’t, I think they’d only returned twice with a bum aircraft and then this crash, and one the engineers, warrant officers came up to them and said: ‘Uh, yellow aye!’ and apparently he got roasted because they found out this aircraft was in a bad condition but it still went on flying and we were very interested because I think the Bomber Command War Diaries gives a detail of every aircraft that flew. And Jock was really through one day and he said, Jean, he said, this is so interesting, apparently it was sent off to a Heavy Conversion Unit and it only did two flights and then it disappeared somewhere over the coast of Ireland, the west coast of Ireland out to the Atlantic it disappeared with the crew, the [unclear] crew and never seen or heard of again, so obviously it was still playing out. He said there were always bum aircraft, lemons, like cars and but they were very lucky to get out of that. And then another time they were on their way to target and they were hit by cannon shell and an Me 109 went underneath them, obviously aiming for the engine, hit the starboard side, blew his flight engineer’s panel out and, cause all the lights, everything went out, and shrapnel flying around and this great big jagged hole and you could see the starboard engine and he was a bit stunned and he said: ‘I couldn’t breathe’ and he said: ‘I could feel this something warm dripping down my back’ and but he said, ‘it didn’t hurt, he said, my knee hurt’, he had got shrapnel, small shrapnel splinters in his knee and but he said, the navigator was groaning and he said, as soon as I sort of pulled myself together, the pilot was checking the crew round, fortunately the intercom was still working and he said, ‘engineer, are you ok?’ and Jock said; ‘I think so, I can’t breathe’. He said: ‘I’ll check’. Well, he found, he got a hydraulic pipe blown around his neck and that was what was dripping hot oil down his back, not blood [laughs] and his, a big lump of shrapnel had hit his parachute, bent his parachute buckle, harness buckle, perhaps bent it and set his Mae West off, that’s why he couldn’t breathe [laughs]. And it had wicker shade and gone, made a real mess, gone right into the groin of the navigator, I mean, the navigator sitting right behind the black curtain, you know, quite nice and all, nice and protected from anything nasty and he was the one who was the worst hit, well, he, Jock grabbed the first aid kit and he went straight up over and he, the navigator was in a really bad way and Jock gave him, cause they all had whole series of small morphines, he gave him morphine and cut and sliced his trousers and put a big shell dressing on his wound, he was and sort of dragged him to a lying down position and then he went to the wireless operator whose poor right hand was pouring blood and he said to him, he said to, don’t give me morphine, he said, cause he practiced Morse with his left hand, he said I’m carrying you on, he said, I don’t want to have morphine and go out to the wood, just shove a shell dressing on this and actually it was worse than it looked actually when they got back but they were still on their way to target so they were among a whole stream of bombers, it was very difficult turning round in a stream of bombers and the pilot said to Jock, he said, engineer, how is our fuel situation? Of course by that time Jock was checking with the torch what was left of his dials and switches and he said, can we get to target and back? As long as we have enough to get back home. And Jock said, that was the time I turned from a boy into a man [laughs] and he said, yes, so they went on and bombed and came back and they landed with very little fuel and the navigator of course went straight to hospital. The wireless op only had a week or two off, his wounds healed and, oh, Jock had only dressings put on his knee. But the others were ok, but, you know, see, they had no officer in their crew and actually that would have warranted in many crews that would have got a DFC or DFM for the [unclear] but DFM was not given out in great numbers and having no officer to sign it all because, yes, that’s it, the navigator was the only officer and of course he was in hospital so he wouldn’t be, he was unconscious by the time, so he wouldn’t have been able to write anything else, that sort of put the kibosh on any medal for the crew but I mean that was quite something I thought to go on to target and then come back. But that went on, as they all, oh you talked to a lot of the aircrew and I mean, that went on, there were so many crews that went west, that should have got medals, you know, for what they did. And, so he was very pleased and actually if he hadn’t died when he did, he would have, he did qualify for the French [unclear] again because he was flying, they did their last two ops just before, just on D-Day, they came, their last operation was on D-Day and that was another well-kept, that was a such a well-kept secret, I mean, the aircrew didn’t know, it went out that night, and they were given targets north of Normandy and they were dropping all these funny little sacking parachuters, which had firecrackers on them, so when they landed, it sounded as if they were firing shots and they dropped them, there a quite a lot of planes dropped them in various parts of Northern France and a lot of Germans did think that that was where the invasion was taking place and of course they went out, I think it was after midnight, cause it was only just into France, and they came back just as dawn was breaking and Jock was busy at his dials and only the pilot, the pilot must have looked down and he said: ‘Oh, boy, it is on!’ and he said, we all rushed and had a look and he said; ‘What a wall of ships!’ he said it the most amazing sight, he said, it send cold shivers down their backs and they’d also gone out and been minelaying a couple of nights before in the Gironde Estuary and he said, that was a terrible place for being armed, and he said, only three Stirlings went and he said their’s was the first to go in and of course they dropped these sea mines which are touchy even in the aircraft, you know, can go off and he said he looked round and his great friend was in the next aircraft, and was hit, went up and then the third bomb went up, so, they’d been given a route to come home across the South of France and then across the Channel, but the pilot had him put the nose down and went out in the [unclear], into the Atlantic and they came in through, came back through Cornwall [laughs], they didn’t want to know any more having lost their team mates [laughs].
AP: Ah yeah.
JS: But they often used to come, cause they laughed after they hit the target, they loved finding trains to shot up and any roadways and shot up any convoys and anything and they’ve would come back with bits of haystack and leaves of trees and [unclear] but the Stirling was, he used to say cause eventually he went on and became a flight engineer instructor on Lancasters and he said, yes, they were, they were wonderful aircraft cause they could do the distance, they could carry the arms but he said, he said, our Lancaster wouldn’t have survived that first crash with a full bombload, he said, they were beautifully built, he said, they were a lovely, comfortable aircraft and he said, they were so sturdy, and then they could fly very low, but how stupid of the Air Ministry to cut their wings of ten feet to get into the normal hangar, I mean why not build the odd hangar to conform to the wing? Say, were some funny things in the, there were some weird, weird things went on, you know, people with all sorts of suggestions and as I say, this front wheel of your bike, I was put on a charge cause I put the front wheel of my bike in, I was late on duty and I flung my front wheel of my bike in and the service police came round and of course you had a number on and tracked it to me and I was put on a charge! And I remember being marched in without my cap and of course was one of the officers I knew and worked for and he [unclear] said: ‘Now, what have you been up to?’ And the WAAF officer looked [unclear] [laughs]. There was a WAAF officer and someone along this sort of thing and he gave me three days jankers and I went down to the cookhouse cause normally you got all these filthy, big greasy ben maries [unclear], huge things, this big cooking greasy stuff, you’ve got them to clean out, but they said: ‘Oh, we’ve got nothing for you to do’ and they gave me some tea and cake [laughs]. It was a good laugh and it’s funny when we’re all, of course now I go into the Air Force Association and of course, we always go, my daughter and I always go to the Odd Bods November dinner and we meet up together and we, it’s, I mean, even for years all those old chaps and they were facing hell and you wondered how they had the nerve to do it and yet they all said: ‘Best years of our lives. Best years of our’, Jock said it, I said it, and I mean our living [unclear], I I’ve seen the ranks, living conditions and food was terrible and the living conditions were often awful and what you had to do. Cause we had, when we were at Lichfield we had to, at one period, probably be ’42, ’42 more than ’43, there was a lot of business, Germans were dropping odd parachutes, two or three parachuters and of course we had a fifth column of people who were Pro-Nazi, Fascists, some even before the war, Royal Family, you know, old Edward the 8th and his bird, you know, they were all quite Pro Hitler and, we, we were, that was when there had been attacks on planes, that was when they used to keep the planes all in a line or on tarmac and they started to put them down in dispersals, the ones that were in use, any spare ones would be dragged out and put on a farmers’, in farmers’ fields under the trees and we had a couple of Wellingtons near our Waafery, near the Waafery and we were asked, we were told to do guard duty and you’d, there’d be two or three of us and, I mean, it was so absurd, was at wintertime and we’d wear our gas capes which came neck to floor and airmen’s wellies so you had to ware about three pairs of socks, because you were in these great big wellies and our tin hats of course and gas mask respirators at the ready and we were armed because see, the WAAF, the Women’s Auxiliary Airforce, the auxiliary women, we couldn’t be forced to carry arms so we were armed with truncheons, there were three girls with truncheons and we’d be out in the rain and mud, parading round these Wimpeys, we opened the hatch, we used to open the hatch and get in and sit up in the pilot’s seat and, oh, I loved the smell of aircraft, so aircraft [laughs] and not long ago the RAF went to the museum at Moorabbin, you know it was so lovely to smell a real aircraft inside, those oils and petrol and everything and sometimes we’d have an airman with a rifle. And at the same time they also had, we had a mock invasion and all they, they didn’t know what to do with the WAAF because all the airmen had arms with, with blank, you know, ammunition, and they had thunder flashes and they were, there were two, there were the enemy and all the ones [unclear] and all the aircrew weren’t armed and they didn’t know what to do with the WAAF so they told us we had to go and sit in the toilets [laughs]. And I remember cause there were thunder flashes, being blasted out against the wall, just outside, cause they knew we were in the toilets and the others were chucking thunder flashes [laughs]. And we, we said, why can’t we be out among it all. Anyway, they, you know, we had all those sorts of funny things and at the same, around the same period, when there was a threat, a real threat of airfields being invaded and they said, if there’s a last minute stand [unclear] on parade one morning last minute stand, would any of you girls volunteer to learn to load Lee-Enfield rifles? And you would be at the back and the men would be throwing their rifles to you to reload, you’d be throwing back loaded rifles and so on and so on. Then we all stepped forward, everyone, we all wanted to carry arms, it was funny because some, quite a lot of men, especially the aircrew said, oh, they didn’t want women to carry arms, we were nice, gentle girls, women, we didn’t need to, what we wouldn’t have done to a German with a bayonet! We, I mean, my dad was in the army in World War I, and I always, you know, used to talk about bayonet charges and things. Anyway, we all learned, we learned to dismantle a Lee-Enfield rifle and to clean it and then we learned to arm it and so on, and then they said, the sergeant down the rifle range said: ‘Would any of you girls like to volunteer to fire a rifle?’ and we all stepped forward and he said: ‘Oh, there’s too many of you’, he said, ‘we only have five rounds each’ [laughs] at least we got to fire a Lee-Enfield rifle [laughs] and I came back with a big [unclear] [laughs]. But, I mean, we very always said that we couldn’t carry arms, it seemed ridiculous they had a whole army there of women who were dying to carry arms. The ATS, my sister in law, Jock’s young sister, she went into the ATS towards the end, she was called up and she went into the ATS and, but she was put in as a cook, they didn’t, as a conscript, they were just, you’ll be a cook, and they had a horrible time but a lot, some of the ATS girls they were our viewfinders on the keg guns but they didn’t fire the guns but they were, they were very good on the viewfinders and but we, we actually in WAAF actually had the best of the women services in the war, I think we worked alongside our main army, you known we were always there and among the aircrew and helping to do things and I mean, we had, you know, there were flying mechs and battery charges and girls they are all among working among the aircraft and we all ate together, we didn’t eat in separate messes, we ate in the airmen’s mess and, I mean, we did everything except sleep together. And some of the girls did [laughs] but, you know, I think we were much closer because the air forces is a nice service, you know, it's a sort of much more specialised and you get different type of person in the air force, I think. And I now belong to the Royal Naval Association, I’m only an associate member, a lot of us RAF people go to the Royal Naval Association which is only a [unclear], [unclear] or [unclear]. They were lucky, the naval people, cause like our RAF Squadrons and the RAAF were all on our squadrons so there was a great closeness between the RAF and the RAAF and the same with the navy, quite a lot our RNAF were in on British ships and there’s quite a closeness and cause they, they obviously got into, they got in with the ones down here, the naval people got down here, got in the British navy got in ex-services associations with the Cerberus crowd, and they bought a block of land and it’s a lovely big block and the Cerberus as a sort of war memorial put up this memorial building and it’s, it’s not huge but it’s got a large hall and big kitchen, toilets, and a bar and outside a big barbecue and it’s really nice and once a month they have a meal and they get together and of course there is always a Trafalgar Day in October, you go and we always have a big Nelson thing, and drink our toast and rum, tot of rum and apparently they British Navy send out every year, they send out this small keg of naval full strength rum which is, cause in the navy it was always, when everybody used to have rum everyday but it was always watered down, it’s very, very strong and they are still saying this Cerberus, this ex-service crowd, still send out, I don’t know how much longer they will do it, this rum and of course the air force crowd, we sit at one table and the navy crowd are so different to us, we are very prim and proper lot, we are behaved, cause they always make fun of us, sailors are very rough and the funny thing, their wives and so on, they all sit at tables on their own and the men all sit at tables whereas we’ve always air force have always been men and women together and they, they told us the first time on when we were invited first for Trafalgar Day and they said, you air force types, don’t stand when the royal toast and the toast to Nelson is said, because apparently in the old sailing ships not very much headroom, do you know, those sailing ships, tiny old sailing ships like Nelson was in and they had a complement of eight hundred, fourteen inches for a hammock, that’s where you slept, fourteen inches, you’ve [unclear] and I noticed that a lot of those ex-servicemen, the old chaps, they, there’s a lot of them missing fingers and arms and hands, quite and I mean, you don’t see this among air force crowd. Quite a lot of them have, you know, half an arm or several fingers off and obviously, you know, I suppose with their big guns and things, I suppose stuff and I don’t know anything much about the navy cause it’s only my, up in Lewis of course most of them go into the navy, there were only four men from the Isle of Lewis who went into the air force during the war, Jock had always wanted to fly since he was a little boy, he’d always wanted to fly, and I mean as a crafters son he got back his chance because there is not work up there and you know, money was small but most of the men went into the navy or the merchant navy and the only ones that went into the army would go into the Highland regiment, the Seaforth Highlanders in [unclear] cause he had two uncles who were pipers and his sister, one sister was called up into the ATS, his, other sister, his older sister, unfortunately she couldn’t pass the medical for the ATS cause she volunteered, and she went into the NAAFI, cause the NAAFI was a good backup, you know, they had those little vans and they had, ran the canteens and they were very, very good and you’d find each station would have its specialised, you know, cakes and things cause I knew at Lichfield they made beautiful [unclear] cakes and we always used to go out to the NAAFI event who did outside about 11, or 10, or 10.30, or 11, everyone used to go, everyone, officers and everyone used to go out with their mugs and you’d always say; ‘Tea and a wad!’ [?] [laughs] [unclear], pig lardy, heavy things, we were always hungry [laughs].
AP: Pretty good. Let’s have a look. You have spoken for an hour and twenty minutes without a break, that’s pretty impressive [laughs].
JS: [laughs] Well, I’ve got no one else to talk to!
AP:
JS: I’ve got the cat.
AP: You’ve got the cat.
JS: He’s lying on my bed in the bedroom.
AP: I’m more than happy to assist. You’re absolutely fascinating so far. Uhm,
JS: I talk too much.
AP: We love this sort of stuff, this is really, really good.
JS: But then, then my cousin, there was my cousin, now I’m talking about the Isle of Lewis and as I say, my husband he once he went to primary school and he won a scholarship which, living in the village where he lived, fifteen miles away from Stornoway, where the only secondary school on the island. He won a scholarship but there was no bus you had to board in town and his parents, this was during the Depression, his parents couldn’t afford the books because, sometimes scholarships had a living allowance for books, uniform and living out but there was nothing like that during that particular year, so he couldn’t go to secondary school and he, I mean, there was me, I had a grammar school education and I was a hopeless scholar, absolutely hopeless, the only thing I was ever good at was English and history, and I never got anywhere with anything until I went to Pitman’s College and then I come out here and I saw one of my daughters teachers, when she was at primary school, said to me, oh, you ought to study and become a teacher, because we were desperate for teachers, so I investigated and I did, I went through, did my GCSE and so on went up the exhibition building and did my HSC and did very well, it was totally different doing it as an adult. Well, I hadn’t got horses or boys, that’s a thing, the two loves of my, oh, I was a terrible flirt in the Air Force. I was a student, I’ve been a quiet, studious girl as I say horse mad and I got in the Air Force and I suddenly discovered men and I didn’t read a book, I had boyfriends galore, I found a little address book and all these addresses are Americans, Canadians, New Zealanders, cause they all wanted you to write to them and we wrote letters to all, we’d sit on our beds and write letters to all these different boys you never saw again. But, I mean, love affairs were no sex, I mean to start with, VD, we were shown all these film of VD when we [unclear] training stations and that would put you off sex forever and if you were pregnant you were chucked out of the WAAF and you were never allowed, you could go back into the ATS if you’d had an illegitimate baby but you weren’t ever allowed back into the WAAF. Oh, we were very pure and high [?] but, uhm, cause Jock was shocked when I said, Oh, I said, the only thing that kept me a virgin was VD, the thought of VD and getting pregnant. And he said, oh, he said, I’m very disappointed in you, because I thought you had higher morals [laughs]. Well, I said, I didn’t want to get pregnant and I didn’t want to get VD.
AP: Oh dear.
JS: And when you’ve done the VD report for the station, for all the Czechs and the Poles, they were the worst. They used to have to go to Cosford once in a week to have these horrible, I won’t, well, you probably know what they used to, used to inject them with mercury and where but it was very painful apparently and we used to see the bus going and they all used to have their heads down and we used to see the bus going to Cosford once a week and we all used to go [laughs ironically], they all used to have their heads down [laughs]. And, as I say, I used to do the VD report and Lichfield had two satellite stations, Tatenhill and Church Broughton and they of course used to, uhm, they had Czechs and Poles. Now I mean, the Czechs and the Poles they were, they were so brave, oh, they hated, they loathed the Germans, they absolutely, as long as they could kill a German their happiest time but they were dreadful and of course in this VD report they had to say when they went to the MO and it was discovered, they had to fill in a form, they had to, legally didn’t have to give the name of the woman but they had to give where they, whereabouts they thought they contacted it, usually under a tree or in a field [laughs]. Contracted it, I should say. Or, and roughly the age, and the age could be anything, of the woman, I mean, they wouldn’t know, but the ages could be anything from fifteen to about seventy [laughs]. And of course, all the girls used when I was typing the VD report, all the girls used to come and look through the papers, weren’t supposed to [unclear] and titter and make very [unclear] remarks and, but they were the worst cause I and after the war I met several Polish, ex Polish airmen and I always used to say to Jock, oh, I don’t think I’d better shake hands with him [laughs]. And they were very nice people [laughs] so you know but we had men of every nationality you could think of at the service, you know, of the Commonwealth and so on you. We had lots of South Africans, New Zealanders. Now, the New Zealanders, they never had the funny accent they have nowadays, it’s funny, they spoke much more like Australian men. They didn’t have that funny twisted accent. I don’t’ know where they got that from, cause it’s really weird. And of course New Zealand, when we were going to emigrate, I wanted to go to Australia because I wanted to, we were living in Scotland and I wanted sunshine and of course all the.
AP: So you went to Melbourne [unclear]
JS: Of course, all the Aussies had told me what a wonderful country it was. Jock wanted to go to New Zealand because full of Highland, Gaelic-speaking Highland people and of course their Scottish country dancing is impeccable, similarly if you couldn’t go and of course they were only taking building, tradesmen or farm workers. So he, cause he’d gone back to his basic trade by then, he was maintenance engineer with British overseas, no, British European Airways. And he came out here, the old Australian National Airlines brought him out here cause they were so short of maintenance engineers so he saw it advertised, applied, they took him, brought him out six months ahead of me, cause they had hostels for me and, uh, so, when New Zealand was no good, he went down to London and applied to Canada house [?], he phoned me up and he said, we can be in Canada within three months and it was winter and I’d got flu and I, you know, I get, my nose was streaming, my eyes were streaming, I said, you’ll kill me if you take me to a country with all that snow and so he didn’t and so that’s why we applied for Australia and of course we’d read all these books about Australia and we decided, oh, the best place would be West Australia, the climate there was beautiful, Albany, and you know, the climate was supposed to be absolutely wonderful and cause ANA brought him out to Essendon aerodrome, so, he was Melbourne [laughs]. I remember when the first time we took the caravan up to Darwin and I’d only been in Darwin a couple of hours, and I said to Jock, Gee, how [unclear] would cost to move house and the furniture up here? Oh, I’d loved to have lived in Darwin. Cause Darwin years ago was lovely but the last time we went to Darwin it was, it had grown in population, it was very commercial but the first few years, when we used to take the caravan up North, it was lovely. This, and, people, all the young people used to stop, you know, older people and say: ‘Oh, hope you are going to stay up here, cause we, it was too many young people, we need some grandparent type people’. Have you always been in Melbourne?
AP: No, I’m from Sydney.
JS: Oh, your [laughs]
AP: Yeah, I came down from Sydney about five years ago for work. So.
JS: I’ve, you know, I’ve been through Sydney on the bridge, to go on the car, wiht the caravan, we’d been there over the, on the bridge and we’ve also been underneath.
AP: Oh yeah?
JS: And I’ve been to Sydney to change planes. I’ve never been to Sydney as a town.
AP: A lovely spot sometimes. Anyway, uhm, you were telling me before we started the tape, uhm, about something that was going on, one day when you were doing the, I think it was the group VD report about a certain squadron.
JS: Oh yeas, about that, about the.
AP: Yeah, so, can you tell us that story again for the benefit of the tape?
JS: Yes. God, what was it called the,
AP: Fauld.
JS: Oh yes, the Fauld, the day the Dam went up, yes it was in 1944 and it was the Fauld explosion and uhm, oh yes and I’d gone upstairs and was typing away at this huge, great big long-carriage and those long-carriage typewriters you never see them now, great big thing, very, very heavy and so I was typing away and it was this funny rumble that went through my feet, I have felt this funny and heard, we all stopped because it sounded like air raids and, we, it was only, must have been seconds, barely minutes and suddenly this rumble got bigger and my typewriter really big jammed, it went [makes a repeated booming noise] and I sort of set back and I looked at the dirty, green wall in front of me and there was this little crack and it started to open and it came down in a big curve and I just, I just watched it, cause funny it’s like when you’re in an air raid when you bombs and you tend to watch them, you’re sort of rooted to the spot. I mean I remember once was a terribly bad crash on our airfield at Lichfield and we were all in our office, we heard this terrible thud, screech, metal, you knew it was a crash, that metal noise and we looked out of the window, the side window and there’s this flame and it was sliding across the airfield, right out on the airfield, on the runway and it was beginning to slide straight towards training wing and we just stood there, we were just stood rooted to the spot. That was the time when, it was horrible. The operators see the girls at the radio while the radio operators took the planes up, and now the girls, they rushed to the window when this thing happened and they left us with the intercom switched on and of course, see, those Wellingtons you know were geodetic and they had axes along the body but obviously the boys were burning, the thing was a degrees of heat and they were screaming and you could hear it from above, you‘d hear the screams, it was horrible and we were rooted to the, I, everybody, nobody said a word, I mean, I, nobody passed out or anything like that, but it was really horrible and of course then the fire, cause naturally the blood wagon, the ambulance and the fire engine were always right beside flying control, they went straight out cause they got foam and it had stopped but it was a fact that it could actually, I mean if nothing had been done, it could have banged into our building. We were so struck with that and it was like that in that Fauld thing, and we were sitting, as I say, immediately somebody said, oh, there must be a bad air raid somewhere, funny we haven’t heard the sirens because often we did have [unclear] and I mean once our airfield was very lightly attacked by one aircraft and I mean, you’d simply, you’d, over the tannoy they’d simply say even before the sirens died you’d hear: ‘red alert, red alert’ and we’d always have our respirators with tin hats on our chairs and all you do is [unclear] your respirator on your shoulder, put your tin hat on and all fire alert, slip trenches outside, you’d run like hell once you got outside because you were scared and you’d, the slit trenches were so nasty because they’ve been used as toilets [laughs] by people going to a frat night they were very smelly and I know, a friend of ours, poor men, they jumped, he was the first one to jump into the slit trench and someone had obviously been doing the other business in there and when he got out, all the others came on top of him and he noticed and he was sitting there a nasty smell and when he got out, he found his knee, he’d gone straight into someone’s poo and he said he got a knife and cut his, he said, he couldn’t bare it [laughs]. Like poor Jock, one time on an air test and he was moving about the aircraft and they hit an air pocket cause they were low and [unclear] went up and he and the mid upper gunner were both, and they couldn’t move because of the way you are rooted you know in the planes and he said, he saw in slow motion [unclear] came over. They’re supposed to be emptied every trip and it all come over the two of them, [unclear], he said, we, he said I took my flying without equipment on a stick [laughs]. Oh God, he said, I went straight up to the showers, he said, I just showered in my uniform and then he said, I took that off and he said I was in the shower spitting it [laughs]. But and the mid upper gunner was the same, but poor old Charlie [unclear] but there was, it was always very pooey, very smelly in the, in the trenches because you’d sit there with your tin hats and things do fall on you, you’d hope no bomb would fall on you but, I mean, we weren’t like the fighter stations, they had it regularly, they were bombed regularly, down more on the coast down south we were, we were lucky we were in the Midlands but I mean along it was all Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, cause Jock’s Squadron he was 90 Squadron and they were in Suffolk. Cause they always used to rendezvous at Cromer Pier when they were went off, the you know when the whole gaggle of paints [?] were going out, they’d fly from their station and go up round and round to get height and then go straight out and they’d have some to rendezvous, Cromer Pier was a great place for a lot of them and others would, they’d get into formation and then they’d pick the other formations up, all up from all up the coast and we went to Cromer when we, one trip we had overseas in the 1970s I think, we went to Cromer and it was beautiful day because I know he was swimming in the North Sea and I, he said: ‘Oh, I’m lying here, look at me up!’ Thinking about me circling around over here before we went out, we’d stay off and went in from their area, they went in to France over the Frisian Islands. Cause he always said, I always put, as soon as the pilot said enemy coast ahead, he said that’s when I always pull my, he was always scared of his eyes being burned, you know, injured, and he said, I always pull my googles down cause some of them didn’t and got their eyes burned. He said, I was always terrified of getting my eyes burned. But he never, he still, you know, they had three pairs of gloves, silk and wool and then leather, but he nearly always worked with his silk gloves cause he was using bars and things and [pauses] but as I say, I still think, you know, but we probably don’t remember the nasty parts, you only think of the fun parts. When you say it was, it was the best years of our lives. I tell you why, because after the war it was so horrible. After the war we went back into Civvy Street and you had this awful feeling you weren’t wanted. See, people had, who’d been in fact prison officers [?], they’d all got jobs and they were looking after, this is my job and we don’t want you people coming in and move, you know, with all, you’ve got medals and we haven’t and so on and so on. And then the idea was that we should all forget the war, get on with the peace and everything was so grey and actually we were then more severely rationed, that was when bread was rationed and onions and potatoes. I cued for hours for all those things, because we were feeding Europe and particularly because we had to feed poor old Holland, cause they were starving but we were feeding the bloody Germans, that’s what got up our noses and we should have done what Joe Stalin said, Joe Stalin said at one big conference, he wanted Germany totally disarmed and made into the food bowl of Europe, got rid of those bloody Germans. I still hate them and I’ve got German blood in me, I’ve got Prussian, great grandfather. I still hate them like mad, I can’t forgive but then I was going to tell you about my cousin. Can I tell you about my cousin?
AP: You certainly can. [unclear]
JS: My cousin, there was another boy like my husband, he, now, his was a very sad story. His father, like my father and my father’s two sisters both married men during the war that were in the trenches. My sister Nora married this soldier and he ended up the war, after the Great War, in a lunatic asylum, he’d, he was shell shocked, absolutely shell shocked. And Nora always told her little boy Bill, who was born, she was married I think in 1916 and had him in 1917 and she told Bill, growing up, that his father was dead. And because in those days to be in a lunatic asylum, you know, was like having a baby illegitimately, it was one of these, you didn’t talk about those sort of things, Gee, woman had a Hysterectomy, that was women’s [unclear] and you didn’t mention that, everything was so, [makes a shushing sound] proper, and anyway poor Bill, he grew up. Uhm, Nora went and when my grandfather was widowed, he went up to Lancashire or Derbyshire, where he’d come from and he opened a little corner shop and Nora went up and lived with him and worked in the shop and Bill grew up and went to the local primary school but then Grandad died during those years and the shop apparently wasn’t making much money so, Nora came down and stayed with us and Bill, they stayed in our house for a little while until, and aunt Nora’s a widow of a service man, was supposedly a widow of a service man, she got a council house, we were living in Welwyn Garden City at that time, I was going to the local Handside Primary School and Bill came along too. Now Bill would have been about three or four years older, three or four years older than me, and I’ve got his photo somewhere, and I couldn’t find it today and he was a nice looking boy and of course you know, I was only a little girl about eight or something like that and, eight or nine, and, oh, I was in love with Bill, I used to tell my parents and everybody I was going to marry Bill and I remember, cause Bill loved, he had a Meccano set and Bill loved his Meccano and cause with my little itchy [unclear] fingers, I remember, could I have put that, no! He hated me, I was always around his Mecco, trying to or reading his comics, and I remember at school, we were changing classes one day and the big boys came out of whatever they’ve been and he’s, and of course I’m saying to all my other friends, that’s my cousin, that’s my cousin Bill and you know, Bill’s looking everywhere except, we were twelve or thirteen. So, you know, that’s my cousin and so they went and lived in their house and eventually they moved to Luton in Beds, and Luton was the centre of the hat-making industry, of course in those days I mean everyone made more hats, felt hats, women wore hats all the time, straw hats and felt hats in the winter and my aunt was pretty good at her job and Bill got a job as a young, he had, when he left Handside Primary School, during Depression there were so few jobs he got a job as an errand boy. They would take boys as errand boys on delivery bicycles, like you used to see in that funny comic series Open All Times [sic], it how you would have seen it on TV, and always had errand boys. I mean, when my mother went shopping, she would carry a little shopping basket but she would only get the perishables like the meat or eggs, a bit of cheese or fish, she would carry that home, everything else was delivered either sometimes by delivery man, mainly by errand boys on funny big arm bikes with a huge thing. And errand boys were all everywhere, of course they got a pittens [?], I mean, there was no real big dole or anything in those days, so, they only got a little bit above of what the dole would be and as soon as they, all these errand boys turned eighteen, see, they had to go on to adult wages, so they were all sacked. So that was when Nora moved to Luton and Bill got a job in a factory, you know, he was just a general factotum sweeping up and so on and he could see, like a lot of boys of that era, that it was much better in the forces, so he joined the Royal Air Force in those days when they used to wear the breeches and the grey patties and tunics up to your neck and the peak caps and he was stationed at Cardington where the balloons were, all the big balloons. And RAF Cardington and of course he saved up and bought a motorbike and so on and my dad had had a motorbike and they were motorbike crazy, he used to come over and see us a lot. And then of course, uhm, he, that’s it, he went in, he hadn’t got the educational qualifications to go to Halton, to the School of Aircraft Apprentices to be a fitter because you had to have secondary education for that, with maths and so on. He went into the trade of, is not a trade now, machine tool oiler and setter, next, really, a machine, he would end up as a machine setter which was a very good trade. So, that was what he was doing when war started, and about the same time it was, it was beginning in 1943 when all the four-engine bombers were starting to come in and we were really doing something over Germany, we were the only service other than the navy, the only service really doing anything in the war. And Bill wanted to go as aircrew, I don’t know why he never said why, and he, he applied to be aircrew and they turned him down, saying, you know you are a school tradesman, someone will have to be trained in your place, stay as you are. So he said, right, I’ll go on strike. Well of course he was marched up to the commanding officer who said: ‘I could court martial you and that would be the end of your air force career’. But he said: ‘I’ll tell you what, boy, he said, you can go in as aircrew and can go in as a bloody bomb aimer’. So, he went in, he was trained as a bomb aimer, he was at Skellingthorpe. Now he was on Lancasters. Now, the Air Force in 19, 1943, ’44, I think it was October 1944, the Air Force had been trying to decimate Brunswick because it was full of factories, war factories and they’d been, they’d had raid after raid, there was going to be a really big raid, a huge raid on Brunswick and that night the huge [unclear] went out including Bill’s Lancaster and they were all so even other, this shows you how our Air Force had grown from 1942 when we were couldn’t make, could barely make a thousand, there were other small diversionary raids on that would draw fighters away and it was a highly successful raid. It was, the town was absolutely decimated. They only had three or four minor raids on it afterwards, just to clean up and only one of our aircraft was missing that night. That was my cousin’s aircraft. I managed to find this out. I found out from the Bomber Command War Diaries and then I was in the library only a month or two ago, and there’s was a wonderful book which I had written down somewhere which has all, it’s a big book about all our prisoners of war, it has all our prisoners of war and of course Bill’s name was in. And apparently they were badly hit and their navigator, funnily their navigator, navigators always seem to get hit, their navigator was badly injured and they, I mean, it must have been hell in the plane because apparently, you know, it was going round and how, how on earth you can move about in a plane that is going down like that I don’t know. They, he said, he told us afterwards, he said, two of them, he and another, the engineer apparently, had to drag the poor old navigator to the biggest exit and his parachute came open, started to open in the plane because they just had to bundle everything out but he seemed to go down alright but they, they never, then he jumped and the other man jumped, that must have been the gunner I think. When they got down, when they landed in Germany, cause it wasn’t far from the target, they, cause he’d forgotten all of the correct things to do, he didn’t take his helmet, and all the hoo-ha getting them out, didn’t take his helmet off, and he was nearly strangled, all the cords went round his neck, he was [mimics a strangling noise and laughs] and then his big flying boots he had they were unzipped, they came off, [laughs]. So there he was in his socked feet and they couldn’t find any of the other crew in the dark of the night and they started to down this long road and you know on the continent they very often they put all this plane trees along the sides of the road and there were all these sapling trees with thick sacking wrapped round them, so to keep them up to sporting post cause they were, so he and the other bloke they cut all this sacking off to wrap around Bill’s feet and they looked around and there were all these plane sacking across the road, all these [unclear]. And he said the next thing is a couple of nights, he said, it was very cold, he said, a couple of nights we just got water, rain water, where we could find it in the fields and he said, we got turnips from the fields and ate them turnips and carrots and he said, we got to this little township and he said, in the dark we could see this building with all these bikes outside. We thought if we can get a bike how much easier and cause they knew the direction they were going, you know, towards the west trying to get to our troops. Anyway, they both grabbed the bikes and cause they must have made a noise, next thing all these German troops come out and they take them prisoners and apparently it was outside the SS headquarters [laughs]. Then, the next thing, he was an officer, now, that what I always think about my cousin Bill, his bomber aimer training, he’d been send over on the ATS scheme to Canada and he’d obviously the smart lad, been commissioned, you know, I mean, drop us off a commissioned, who wouldn’t take it, but Bill took it, and he was, he came out as a flight Louie. So, he went to Stalag, the officers camp, Stalag Luft III, the great escape camp and cause he talked, I mean, he didn’t tell us an awful lot but they were all helping, you know, that were these, they made bags to wear inside their trousers to take the earth and they’d sort of sprinkled the earth if they were walking about or playing games and he said, oh, he said, I could have been in the last group, he said, to go, he said, all us tail enders, he said, of course by that time they’d been captured and but he told us quite a bit about that terrible march that the Germans did, not just from Stalag Luft III, but from several of the prisoner of war camps. They were going to massacre the prisoners but why they started, they started to march them to the east and it was the middle of winter and of course a lot of them had thin shoes and uniform thin and they didn’t have any, they had a bad couple of holes of thin potato, growl potatoey water and they were all being marched along with all these German guards and if any of them fell by the way and didn’t pick themselves up, they’d either shoot them or bash them with a rifle butt. And I mean, Bill didn’t say anything much, just told us about this and he said, fortunately, he said, I, and he wasn’t a very strong chap and he said, you know, he said, it was pretty sickening, he said, we were helping the ones that were really, couldn’t walk but, he said, it was pretty sickening and fortunately we ran into, oh, we were spending, we’d been put into an empty prisoner of war camp for overnight and he said, fortunately or unfortunately the Russians came along. But, he said, there was a lot of problems with the Russian soldiers. They were trigger-happy and he said, we were warned that if we tried to sort of get out of the camp to start going to the east again, to try and join up with the British who weren’t far away, that we would, you know, that these trigger-happy Russians and he said, they came into our prisoner of camp and they treated us as if we were the enemy. He said, they just took wrist watches and all the money, anything of any value. They took even cat badges and things like that. And he, so they were told to play it very cool, and be very quiet, and just, they stayed in this prisoner of war camp for a few days and behind the barbwire and the Russians were circling around outside and suddenly the Americans appeared full force, tanks and guns and things and they immediately, the Russians sort of, they ushered the Russians, there were only a few Russians by then, they ushered them off and took the aircrew to an American camp, to a British camp but he said it was a pretty nasty situation. He said, when you’ve been a prisoner of war and then suddenly your allies come and treat you almost as badly.
AP: Said one of my interview subjects a few weeks ago, he said: ‘Then we were liberated by the Russians’, he said.
JS: There.
AP: Actually, we were recaptured by the Russians [laughs]
JS: Yes, that’s what he said, that’s what it was like, and he said, you didn’t feel comfortable, you didn’t feel safe,
AP: Very, very similar.
JS: Weird.
AP: Strange stuff. So, Bill came home [unclear]?
JS: Bill came home but it was all very sad. Now, we came out here in 1952 and Bill had, he’d had a job and he’d got a very nice girlfriend, they were going to get engaged and then his mother, apparently, I mean, we weren’t near him at the time cause my father said, if only I’d known, you know, but his mother then said, you can’t get married Bill, there’s mental problems in our family, in your father’s family and he and I think Nora was very possessive and I think Nora wanted him to be there for her life. And she, I mean, had, we don’t know how she brought it to him but she more or less said, you know, if I, in the end she told him, you’re father’s a raving lunatic in a padded cell and Bill said, I want to go, I didn’t know I had a living father, he said, you should have told me years ago, I want to go and see him and of course there was a real breakup between them and in the end she gave him the address of this place. He went to this mental home and he saw his father, more or less a slobbering lunatic, you know, and in a padded cell. And he came back, broke his engagement, I think he had a complete breakdown and he was having a treatment, he went in as a sort of outpatient and apparently he was getting on very well and he got a job as a gardener and he was still having light treatment but of course he got to know a young nurse there and of course the authorities would never let the nursing staff make boyfriends of the patients. So she was immediately posted somewhere else and I suppose he saw another friendship gone. I mean, the poor boy was probably craving for love and I just, look, I go around, I’m sure these years since Jock died, if I were religious, I mean, I’m an atheist, if I were religious, and if I were a catholic, I’d say I’d be going through a sort of Purgatory because I’ve been looking at all the things I should have done, I should have been a better daughter, I should have done better at school, I should have been a nicer wife, I mean, I wasn’t nasty but I was, you know, things I shouldn’t. And I think of Bill, and torture myself, if only you had kept, you know, written to him more often, if only you’d asked him to come out, we were living in a caravan over on the north side of town on our block of land, building our house out of pocket more or less, building where [unclear} house our first home and I couldn’t sponsor him. And the next thing, he was living in digs and working as a gardener and I suppose he just had this complete, what’s the use, because I know the feeling myself. And I had a letter from his landlady, apparently he put his head, and when she was out one day he put his head in the gas oven and I mean, my lovely cousin Bill, and I, a year I was so fond of him and it broke my heart. And nobody else in the family took more. Jock didn’t know him well and dad and mum didn’t take much notice. And my dad was very hard, he was very hardened by World War I, and what he went through, and you know, I, it haunts me all the time, that nice boy and I mean, you know, flying and so on and then, every sort of romance, every bit of love broken up and I, blame my, well, look as I always think of mental hospitals, because that’s what happened when Jock fractured his skull, and, oh, he was, I mean, I could, it was a huge and I mean nowadays he probably would have had a brain operation, fortunately he had very strong bones but you could feel this huge jagged bone underneath his skin, huge scar and he said to me, he wasn’t going to ask me to marry him cause he said, he said, I in the end he did and he said, look, he said, I lay it on the line, he said, if you marry you are not going to get the man you would have got had I not had this accident, he said, and I know what it’s done to my brain, he said, I know you won’t get the man that you deserve. And, I mean, I was madly in love, I didn’t care and, but, I know he did, he wasn’t nasty or anything, but he had a nose operation, uhm, oh, in the 1980s, ‘70s, had a nose operation and when the, he had a, like me, he had a deviated sept, to my [unclear] had it done, my nose was twisted and his nose was badly twisted and he couldn’t breathe well and he had this [unclear] surgeon, she said his bones were all overgrown and pressing on nerves and he used to have these occasional days, a couple of days when he would have a terrible headache and he would wake up in the morning, he’d still go to work but he would, he wouldn’t talk to me, he’d just look at me, glassy-eyed, his eyes would just sort of glare at me and he wouldn’t say a word, he wouldn’t answer me and it would all clear over, I mean, I didn’t mind that, it didn’t worry me, he wasn’t cruel or anything to me. But, I mean, I put it down to what he had on his head. But, he was taken from the local hospital to the big service hospital at Rauceby out in Lincolnshire, very big hospital which had been a mental home, a mental hospital. And I used to go, I used to walk about five miles, my bosses used to let me off early, they were very good and I used to walk about five, used to walk down the old roman road, the old way and right out in the middle country this big, huge building and all these corridors and every so often they’d be huge, heavy doors with double locks on because they were all pushed back with great big long corridors and then every now and again there’d be a little passage and that led to the padded cells. And I heard groaning one day and I tiptoed, I was on my way to see Jock, I tiptoed down and there was this poor young aircrew boy, I mean, he didn’t see me, he was bandaged over his eyes, he obviously burned top to bottom and he was hung on straps and he just got holes for his nose and mouth and all bandaged up with his arms up like this and he was groaning away and he was and I actually saw all this sort of pale blue padding, all ceiling, walls, floor, everything, they put the very worst burns cases in there, I suppose peace and quiet and, cause a lot of them were screaming you know, would disturb the other patients. But I know Jock must have been very ill because when I first came to visit him, the RAF nursing sister, she said: ‘Are you his fiancé?’, I said: ‘Well, we’re not engaged but we are going to get married when the war ends or when the war’s over’ and she said, you know, you know your boyfriend is very seriously ill, she said, I want to warn you, he is very seriously ill. And I mean, all they did with him there, he had his head sort of wedged in a wooden frame and he lay there for a couple of weeks in a wooden frame and they fed him stuff like [sighs] you don’t see it now, it’s sort of made from bones and, bones and brain and stuff that we used to be called, it was called something in old-fashion, it was like a sort of jelly, carsford [?] jelly, that’s it, it was made by bones and I think brains and it was the most tasteless stuff, cause I had to taste if his, cause it was supposed to help remake bones [unclear].
AP: Ok.
JS: So, that was, he obviously was very ill but they never cleared, they never gave him an x-ray to after, he was x-rayed when he had the accident, never gave him an x-ray to clear him and he managed to get back onto flying because he went for his aircrew board to see if he was fit for flying. And there was, there were two doctors and the old chap more or less told the other bloke he could go, the other doctor he could go, he said, oh, I’ll deal with this case and he was an old doctor and he came from one of the Hebridean Islands and he spoke Gaelic and of course he saw from Jocks docs where he came from and they spoke for about an hour or so in Gaelic and the doctor apparently said: ‘Ah, you are fit for flying!’
AP: So this, I think we were talking about that before we turned the tape on. This was the motorbike accident for Jock.
JS: Mh, yes.
AP: Wasn’t it?
JS: That he, he had scars, I mean, you know, cause his googles were broken and his nose was damaged and the size of his mouth was split, his eyes were all split at the side, he had slight scars, but it didn’t damage his beauty, I think he was quite nice looking [laughs]. But he was the love of my life, he was a lovely man. We laughed our way through time and it was all giggle, giggle, giggle, all the time.
AP: Very good. Uhm, what else do I have. Can you, well, we might back up a little bit. Can you tell me where you were and what your thoughts were, obviously you’ve already told me that you expected war to come but when you actually heard that Britain is at war. What were your thoughts and feelings and what were you doing at that point?
JS: Well, that’s rather dreadful because I told you I was in the Ministry of Aircraft Production and obviously war was coming, well war was coming very close because that, you know, what’s his name, had been over, Chamberlain had been over and come back with a piece of paper and then of course Germany had walked into Czechoslovakia and in that interim period we were working twenty-four hours, they’d got camp beds in a big room and we were and it was a Sunday and I was on duty, I’d, cause I was living at Amersham at the time, I’d come up, I’d think I’d slept the night an hour in the bed there which was in the Ministry of Aircraft Production was, the offices were in Berkeley Square and we, in the West End of London just walked up and Piccadilly was just and the Green Park was just up the road and I, we were called, they said to, we were working and they said to us girls we are all going down to the big hall because there is going to be a speech by the Prime Minister, because we all knew Germany had [unclear] and everyone was cock-a-hoop, oh, we’re going to be at war, oh whack-o!, sort of thing and of course, see [unclear], I mean, in 1939 I was seventeen, young and silly. We all were, a big typing pool of girls, all silly girls and we sat in the hall and the speech came on and he said we are now at war and we all said whoopee! And the air raid siren went and we were told to go to the shelters, or go down the corridor and we all rushed to the big windows and there wasn’t a soul to be seen in Berkeley Square. The Queen Mothers, the Queen’s dressmaker William Hartnell [sic] had room, had his big shop and rooms just opposite, not a soul to be seen anywhere, only a big red big fat barrage balloon going slowly up. And we were all, where are the Germans? And we all thought it was wonderful, then we all sang, Pack Up Your Troubles and It’s a Long Way to Tipperary and we were all throwing paper around and thought it was wonderful. And then of course I went home and my father said: ‘Bloody little fool!’ [laughs] He said, you wait, you don’t know what war was like, he said, now, and I remember when Dunkirk happened because I had an aunt, my mother’s sister married my uncle and they lived on an island at Thames Ditton, which isn’t far from Surbiton in Surrey, an island in the river Thames, that’s where the Thames widens and Richmond Park, beautiful royal park, is on the other side. And my uncle had a little cabin cruiser I think and they were given orders, everyone was given orders to take, the navy came round to, all those people on the island had boats and they were given orders at Dunkirk time to take their boats, they had to take their boat down to some part in the Thames estuary and the navy would deal with them and they were all hitched up to a, I don’t know whether it be onto a torpedo boat or a destroyer, I don’t think a destroyer would be too big, they were hitched up on lines and they were taken over to pick men up and brought them back. He only went over the once, cause I think he had engine trouble coming home and you know, all this sort of thing was happening and I and dad said, after Dunkirk I mean it was only then the Battle of Britain started almost and I remember we, dad and mum and I went for a walk and dad, we were talking about the war and he said, I don’t know, he said, what have we got? He said, we’ve only got these young men and a few young men with planes and he said, they are going to be overwhelmed by the German Air Force, who’d been practicing in Spain in the Spanish war, he said, they are going to be just shot down and he said, I just wish I’d kept my World War I revolver with three [unclear], one for you, one for mum and one for me. And that was dad, he said, it’s going to be a bloodbath if they come over. But then again quite a lot of us in years later in the ex-service things, we were talking, there were all, I mean, there was the man in the street who could do what he’s told and he couldn’t care less, as long as he’s got a warm bed and three meals a day and I mean, Hitler had obviously impressed the German people, I mean, obviously, well, I mean, they had been in a bad, in a terrible way in the Depression and we were, and we’d come through that terrible Depression and I mean, if you had someone who started to tell you, oh, we are going to do this and we are going to do that and we, you know, we are all going to live in a united Europe and do very well, and a lot of the, a lot of the upper crust, a lot of the aristocracy were very Pro-Hitler and, but there was in recent years, there have been things discovered, there’s been an underground headquarters found which, they’ve got no records of anywhere in the War Office or, anyway and apparently it has come out that there was a big, like resistance movement already being organised by Churchill and the patriotic people, very patriotic leaders of the country. Now there would have been civil war I think, I think it would have turned into civil war. You know, lot of us ex-service people have been talking, cause I’ll tell you this. In recent years, with the way life is, with the permissive life and it’s all me, me, me now and the way things are going politically, I mean everywhere not just our [unclear], our politicians are bloody twits, all of them and everywhere seems to be the same and all these do-gooders and letting all these people into Europe and a lot of us ex-service people are saying, perhaps it would have been better, saying, was it worth it? Was it worth all those lives lost? Would we have been better under Hitler? If you’d kept your nose clean and done what you were told you’d probably be just as well off. Cause the German people were. The only thing is of course, you’ve got things like the, those concentration camps, I mean, you’d think of that. The concentration camps, I mean, would we want concentration camps? This is the thing. You’ve got. And I mean, I was only reading the other day about the Japanese, if we hadn’t atom bombed them, they had, form the Emperor down, they had been given orders that every prisoner of war, civilian as well as service, which would have been a hell of a lot of civilians cause they had a lot of Dutch people and so on were to be massacred, it didn’t matter how you do it, squashed them, hanged them up, knifed them, staked them, all the most horrible of things, that every non-Japanese was to be got rid of, so, I was just as well we get the atom bomb off, cause we saved a lot of innocent people’s lives. But I mean, you know, there’s quite a lot of us, especially you know like in the navy get-togethers and things, and everyone says, was it really worth it, when you think of all your mates. And I think more or less one of the reasons that we say it was the best time of our lives, it was a wonderful time in the majority of people, civilians and service, we were all pulling together, we all had one ideal, and it was a very legitimate war. We had one ideal and there was the mateship, the companionship. I mean, I never came across anything nasty, I never came across rape or anything in the services, in the women’s services and everyone was so, you know, working together and the great comradeship and friendship and helping each other, cause life was difficult and harsh at times and we all helped each other. And, you know, you would put your friends before anything else, you know, to help your friends and support them and perhaps I’d think it’s more that when we say it was the best years of our lives, that terrific comradeship. And it really to me and of course to me all the time and then it’s something we all say in the RAF association, you know, those young men who sacrificed their lives and the way they were treated after the war, the way the bomber boys were treated and they must never be forgotten. My daughter gets on my nerves cause she said, oh, one day will come and everyone will forget them, I said, no, they won’t after all they don’t forget Nelson and the sailors that fought at Trafalgar, they don’t forget the soldiers that fought at Waterloo, that saved Britain and there was, both of those were narrow squeaks, [laughs], I mean Waterloo was very near the knuckle, they were and so was Trafalgar, cause Nelson was, cause right from a little girl I always Nelson was my big one time hero and we’ve had a film of his life, we also, one year we had a film of a sort of mock-up thing that they did in Britain of these battleships and they had an actual broadside, cause Nelson, Nelson did it, instead of fighting each ship broadside on and opening the cannons, he got, he laid his flotilla, all the enemy battleships were like front and back, you know, all in lines and then he came along with his flotilla like that and they simply opened up, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, broadsides and split the ships right through and he brought that manoeuvre into being, I mean, he was a real, I read a lot about naval battles, I read, my reading, I read occasionally a biography or a travel book but my reading is all war books.
AP: [laughs]
JS: Oh yeah, I’m on the [unclear] and up there.
AP: I can see in the collection of books [unclear].
JS: I’m, I’ve been getting out of the library, I’ve been reading about [unclear], or I think submariners that’s even worse than bombers. I once met a submarine man and he was such a nice, gentle, little chap and I used to think, how can you go down under the sea, all those thousands of feet, oh, with depth charges?
AP: [unclear] a lot of fun.
JS: But I, I do, I read a lot and I’m reading a lot at the moment about World War I cause there have been a lot of programs, Tony, oh, he’s Sir Tony now, the man who does the walks through Britain, he’s done a very three or four weeks running on a Sat, Sunday afternoon about going through World War I. My dad in World War I, he was in the trenches and then they were sent to Mesopotamia and that’s of course Iraq and then they were sent to Salonica, but they were sent through Palestine cause I know he had a bathe in the Black, in the Dead Sea, and said, oh, you just float on the top of the salt water but he saw Lawrence of Arabia, Lawrence of Arabia, he and another man, they came on their camels and he said, we’d just come out of the lines, we were fighting the Turks and he said, we’re all filthy and dirty and he said, we were having our rest and he said, cause dad started as a private and went up to, he went right through the ranks and was commissioned in the field and went up to captain and he said, I was in the headquarters and he said, this man in all his silk, was only a short man, in all his silk Arab robes came in and they wanted maps to getting from somewhere to somewhere and they were going to take a place, they were going to take the surrender of a place and the Aussies got there first [laughs] and took the surrender, and all these [unclear], all these two [unclear] men [unclear] Arabs they got there after us but then before that dad had seen the Australian light horse going up not very far away cause I think it was Damascus and the Australian light horse came through going up to Beer Sheba and he said, again we were all filthy, our poor old infantry, cause he was in the rifle brigade, he said, oh, the poor dirty old infantry and he said, we were all lying around and he said, suddenly, he said, in the middle of all this filth and dust, he said, these, like a vison, he said, these tall, they all seemed to be tall according to them, these tall bronzed young men and he said, everything, he said, their horses were gleaming, their saddlery was glowing and he said they got these, whatever, they got, I don’t know what they’re called in their hands and just, and they were all laughing and the Aussies were all laughing and joking and you know, the rifle brigade gave them a cheer and saluted them and they were all happy and I mean that was a real fluke, that the Turks had their machineguns set for them there, they’d had mown the horses down if they’d been able to and they got them locked all in a mess and apparently, cause you, I mean, if you’re on a galloping horse you know what’s it’s like on a full gallop, it must be pretty deadly to see all these waving their swords and shouting and, you know, shrieking and shouting and horses neighing and the thud of hooves, just imagine it. And it was a complete triumph but that means at some poor devils [unclear] worst of course and horses. Yes.
AP: So, oh yes, I have, we’ve covered a fair bit. [unclear] We’re still going.
JS: I shouldn’t have kept you.
AP: No problem at all.
JS: Four hours.
AP: I’ve loved it, it was really good. However, uhm, I do have one last question. It may well be the most important one all my interviewees is this. Uhm, in your opinion, how is Bomber Command remembered and what legacy has it left?
JS: How is it remembered? Well, I suppose all of us who’ve had anything to do with them will remember them for the, they were the, they were our little white hope in all those long years when we were waiting and waiting to try and get into enemy, try and do an invasion, they were our only white hope and they were, I mean, if it hadn’t been for Bomber Command, bombing the factories, roads, every, keeping them on their toes, and keeping them short of things, it might have been terrible on D-Day if we hadn’t done something, I mean, why isn’t Bomber Command universally, why is it always this bloody Dresden thing comes up? All the time it comes up! And it seems to me, Canada and Britain seemed to have fostered this, I don’t know why and I would like to see Bomber Command remembered for the fact that they were our one big bastion against Germany for those interim years before D-Day and I would, well, I hope that, I would like to see them remembered more as a special thing, as we remember the Battle of Britain, I would love to see a sort of Bomber Command Day or something but the way they are still remembered I don’t like this attitude, it always comes up Dresden. And I mean why, you’ve got a German [unclear] who agrees that Dresden was hiding a lot of things and still there’s these people, so, well, I’m glad that there’s this big memorial in Britain because I think that it’ll be there and it’ll be like that wonderful memorial in Green Park, so at least you’ve got something always there in front of people, but I mean, you know, I still think there should have been a Bomber Command Day and a Bomber Command Medal, I mean, I mixed with these old chaps and it’s so sad, I don’t know, it’s so sad and remembering what they did, I remember you see the crews and their average age was between eighteen and twenty two, I mean, I think Jock’s crew they had their, I think their navigator was, he was grandad he was thirty, no, no, it was their, I’m sorry, it was their rear gunner, he was thirty, he was ex-metropolitan mounted police, cause the only way the police could get in the services was volunteer for aircrew, so he went in and yes, Ron, he was thirty two and married with children and they called him grandad but I mean, they were young men and I look at young men now and think my God, they were either in charge of a bomber and seven men’s lives or they were in a motor torpedo boat, interestingly, I never thought much of Jack, John Kennedy when he was president, I didn’t like the Kennedy family at all but I’ve read a very interesting book about him and he was a very brave young man too in that motor torpedo boat, a very brave young man but you when, and talking to them and of course you’d say how did you feel, what was, when you knew you could be going to your death? And a lot of them have said, well, you couldn’t let your mates down, you didn’t want to go but you couldn’t let your mates down, cause Jock said the first, oh, he said, I looked forward to my first op but he said, after that I didn’t look forward cause he said, oh, he said, when we went over the target and I looked down and he said it was a vision of hell and he said I still, he said, I still wasn’t that scared until I got back. But I remember, see some people, they were, you know they were terribly superstitious, I mean, Jock always, he had a [unclear] bit, those tiny [unclear] bits with a hole through it that one of his relatives gave him and he had a tiny little silver thimble which he got the leaves that he, when he went into the air force, he had a Christmas pudding at his aunt’s place and he got this silver thimble on a chain, teeny tiny little thing, the size of his little nail and he had one of my suspenders and he’d always have them pinned on his flying suit and, when he was cremated and I put, they were always kept in our bedside cabinet and I took them out and I tucked them under his pocket, you know, so that when he was dressed and being put in his coffin, they would go with him on his last flight but I mean, they had, the pilot had a teddy bear and he always had to rub its stomach when you got in so that was always stuck behind the pilots seat and some of them, he always told he’d get through he always said to me, don’t worry, he said, I might get injured but he said I have a feeling I’ll get through, now, other boys didn’t and I remember when I was giving out some of the Red Cross comforts one night when they were going on one of these small ops and from Lichfield, there was a lovely young navigator, he, blue eyed and very fair curly hair and always a lovely smile and you know, he’d been one of the boys, we’d all been in the pub together, singing, we all knew each other quite well and I remember him coming up and he leaned across the table and he was a big tall boy and he picked me up, just picked me up under the arms and gave me a big kiss and he said, bye bye Jean, he said, I won’t see you again, I mean, a great big smile, and I said, I can’t remember his name and I said, oh come off, he said, no, he said, I know, he said, I know I’m on it tonight and he didn’t come back and he was quite jovial about it but quite a lot of them and Jock had friends that he knew and he said some crews, he said, some crews, when you were on your operational station he said you knew as soon as they walked into the mess as a new crew, he said, they had the look and the smell of death on them, he said, you knew that they wouldn’t last long, cause on his squadron, 90 Squadron, theirs was the first crew for ten months to do, to get through full operational tour and actually they did thirty two and they were asked to go on a last one and his mechanics said to him oh, one of his mechanics said, oh god, I wish you weren’t going on this one, but he said, It’ll be alright and it was, thank God, that was the one where the two friends got blown up. But I don’t know ways remembering Bomber Command, how do you make people remember? I just hope that they’re never, well, I just hope they’re never forgotten for what they did because that was a horrible job. And I, you know, you, as I say, we used to see them and they were twitchy, you could see a lot of them were twitchy when they were going down to dispersals and they’d laugh, they’d be like little boys, ah, and they’d light a cigarette and then they’d take two puffs and then put it out and then light another one, I mean, and in transports the WAAF drivers taking them down, they liked the WAAF to take them down to their planes, they much preferred a WAAF than a man driver and it was the same with the wireless operators, the radio operators in flying control, they, oh, Jock used to say, oh, he said, when you are tired out and he said, you know you’re being told, a force comes on telling you, you’re going in a stack and he said, all you want to do is get your feet on the ground and he said to hear that quiet woman’s voice, he said, a man’s voice never did anything to me, he said, you hear that quiet woman’s voice talking you down, almost sympathising with you, and he said, you know, it did something for you and I think, you know I think, they were full of nerves. Jock said, you were, he said, you were always very quiet in the transport, he said, some would joke with the driver, the WAAF driver about her boyfriends or things like that but he said you’d, he said, the worst part was the waiting, he said, the waiting for the word off, cause sometimes when they were down by the aircraft all bombed up, it was cancelled and that was horrible cause he said, if it was cancelled you think oh god, I’ve got to go through all this again tomorrow night and every time they got back it’s one off towards the end of your tour and he said, once you got into your aircraft, he said, cause, engineers, the bomb aimer very often did the second pilot’s job during a trip but always take off and landing, the engineer was always with the pilot cause he helped the throttles and so on and switches and he said, you sat down, you did your cockpit check, you did your crew check, he said, you forgot everything, you had so much to do before take up, off and once you were up you had so much thing cause the engineers were checking labour entring every fifteen minutes, fuel thing and of course any lights going out or oxygen not coming through or things like that, they were always, he said, we are, he said, I was always busy, I didn’t have much time to sit down at all, but he said, you were always so busy, you never thought it was only, he said, we always used to be so glad, we always used to give a cheer when we saw the Channel coming back, he said, when you saw the sea [unclear] those usually be or everything going up from the coast, or defences, he said, you saw the sea, he said, you just prayed you got across the sea cause so many of them didn’t. And the awful thing was that of course some poor sods that landed on beaches and then the beaches were mined or the aircraft went into mined areas and blew up, just as they thought they were there. They did one time come, they were short of fuel and they had to use Woodbridge, you know, Woodbridge was a huge, right just over the coast, gigantic, but he said, they said, and the next one most wonderful thing was when he said you saw your beacon, cause that’s another thing that caused crashes coming home, the, all the, on the east coast all these huge airfields and their satellites all the circuits were intercepting so you got planes twiddling around everywhere, all the time during the war the sky was never free of aircraft, it seemed to be, always aircraft doing something cause they’d all the train, people training and then there were people going here and there to other stations and going off out. One of the most wonderful things was when I was down in London on leave, I was walking near Buckingham Palace I think, it was with my mother and aunt and walking near Buckingham Palace and a huge squadron, cause it was right near the end of the war and I mean they were just it wasn’t easy in those days, they were going over and it was, the war was almost into Germany and all these Flying Fortresses went out, hundreds of them went right over Buckingham Palace flying out, quarter of an hour later [makes a whooshing sound] along comes a little fighter squadron, cause they had to, they picked their fighter umbrella up cause the fighters were much faster, all these Hurricanes and Spitfires all riffing a long, making a lovely noise and it was quite inspiring because I’d only seen aircraft going out at night one by one and circling round and listening to the [unclear] in the clouds and that was, that was not as exciting as seeing a whole squadron, of cause they did a big box formation, they were quite classy, and once they, once their jolly old formations were broken they were really limping and we were better with our open formations and once they had, it was nearly, it wasn’t before the end of the European war but it was not far off, we had a conference at, oh no it must, no, no, this was at Lichfield so it must have been, no, must have been, I left, I left late 1943, I went to Group Headquarters so it must have been 1943, we had a Stirling bomber coming to this conference, a Lancaster bomber and a Flying Fortress, now you could see the three of them, a Stirling just towered, the Lancaster was fair and the Flying Fortress, which everyone said oh [unclear] big planes, it was so small and the Yanks took us, our boys took us over there [unclear] and the Yanks planes, I mean I wouldn’t like to be a gunner on an American fortress and you know with this wide open bitterly cold I mean they wore a lot of warm things must have been terribly cold and they were more or less each side gunner, they were more or less bashing buttons and there were all the machine guns, all strings of ammunition everywhere, you had to pick your way through these strings of ammunition and it wouldn’t have been very nice at all, wouldn’t have been nice at all, so and cause, you know, the Lancaster of course you’ve got the big bulkhead but you’ve got a bigger one in the Stirling cause Jock said there was always the trouble you know when you had to get down to the rear gunner and you got an awful long way to go and it was, and you’ve only got a catwalk, is bitterly cold [coughs] if you hadn’t got, even through your silk glove you could feel the cold if you put your hand on the side of the aircraft [coughs] then you get that bloody great bulkhead, climbing over there with all that flying kit [coughs] horrible.
AP: Quite, quite amazing. Well, I think you’ve covered all the questions I had.
JS: [coughs] [unclear]
AP: I only had to ask three of them. [laughs]
JS: I apologize.
AP: No, no problems at all, there is some fantastic stuff in there. [unclear] I love these sorts of interviews I love the best, cause I come in, I ask one question and I just sit back and listen.
JS: Oh, as long as you don’t mind, I do apologize.
AP: Ah, I loved it.
JS; [unclear]
AP: yeah, yeah.
JS: I’ll make another cup of tea.
AP: Thank you very much. I’ll turn this off.
Dublin Core
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ASmithJ160312, PSmithJ1601
Title
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Interview with Jean Smith
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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IBCC Digital Archive
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Sound
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eng
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02:40:04 audio recording
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Pending review
Pending OH summary. Allocated S Coulter
Creator
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Adam Purcell
Date
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2016-03-12
Description
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Jean Smith worked as a clerk in the aircraft manufacturing industry before the war and later served as a secretary in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force. She served at 27 Operational Training Unit at RAF Lichfield.
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
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Great Britain
England--Staffordshire
Temporal Coverage
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1942
1943
1945
Contributor
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Peter Schulze
27 OTU
aircrew
bombing of Cologne (30/31 May 1942)
control caravan
control tower
crash
flight engineer
ground personnel
love and romance
memorial
military living conditions
military service conditions
mine laying
Navy, Army and Air Force Institute
Nissen hut
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
perception of bombing war
RAF Lichfield
runway
service vehicle
Stirling
superstition
training
Wellington
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/277/7906/PIronsH1501.2.jpg
62e8999adc6227a8e1dcf9d08e401fbc
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/277/7906/AIronsH150723.1.mp3
113b2cff64ef934152b89828f1ea404f
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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Irons, Harry
Harry Irons
H Irons
Description
An account of the resource
Two oral history interviews with Harry Irons (1924 - 2018). He was an apprentice tailor in London, but lied about his age and joined the RAF aged 16. He flew operations as a rear gunner with 158, 462 and 9 Squadrons.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-07-23
2016-07-30
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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Irons, H
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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AM: Okay so, this interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is Annie Moodie and the interviewee is Harry Irons. The interview’s taking place at a hotel near Kings Lynn and we’re here for the 9 Squadron Association hundred year dinner.
HI: Yeah that’s right, yeah.
AM: And it’s the 23rd of July 2015. So, off you go Harry. Tell us –
HI: Er, actually I won a scholarship to go to a grammar school, but my father insisted that I left school at fourteen so I could go to work and earn a wage. So, being in the east end the only jobs you could get was either tailoring or cabinet making. There was a whole area that’s – it was a big Jewish area and the, most of the people were either tailors or cabinet makers, and they were good, very good, brilliant craftsmen. So I took a job on as a trainee tailor and I was doing that for two years until I was sixteen, nearly sixteen, and we lived in an area of London called Stamford Hill and one evening we, me and a few other chaps were on the hill, and we see the huge blitz on London, and we actually see the whole of the City of London literally ablaze. Enormous, as far as your eye could see was buildings all, all ablaze, that was the City of London. Actually, they weren’t after the City of London, what they was after was the Docks, and they just, their bombing, what we used to call creeping, crept back from the Docks into the City of London and once it hit the City of London course everything went up in flames so, two or three friends said ‘we’ll, we’re gonna join up.’ I was sixteen at the time, so we went up the recruiting office in Kings Cross, London, and I told ‘em I was seventeen and a quarter, how they believed me I don’t know but they said ‘alright you’re in,’ and that was at the end of 1941, and I was called up in January 1941 [unclear]. The blaze was – the bombing was in 1940 and we joined, we joined up at the end of 1940, and 1941 they called me up and I went to a place near where it was called Bridgnorth then six weeks square bashing [?] there and they said ‘you’ll have to wait to sele’ – they asked me what I wanted to be in the air force, I said ‘I wanna fly,’ they said ‘alright, we’ll put you down for either a pilot, navigator or an air gunner and we’ll sort that out later on.’ Anyway, I went to Bridgnorth, done my six weeks training, and they sent me to a RAF station, Wisbech in Cambridge and I had to do menial jobs there, in the cook house, in the stores, waiting for, to go on a course. In the mean while they told me I was gonna become a wireless operator air gunner, and I’ve got to wait for a course to come up, a vacancy for the course to come up, so I stayed at Wisbech ‘til August ’41, and then they posted me to Blackpool on a wireless course and everybody in the RAF went to Blackpool to do their wireless course, and you had to stay in a, all the border houses were commandeered, and all the aircrew used to live in these border houses and the thing was when you’re at Blackpool you got up to twelve words a minute which we all did, and then from there you’re posted to another sta, er, air force station to continue your study ‘til you become up to eighteen words a minute –
AM: When you say eighteen words a minute, doing what?
HI: Morse code.
AM: Morse code right, okay.
HI: Yeah, dit dah dit dah dit dah dit. Anyway, we was all queuing up to wait for postings and the sergeant came out just like that he said ‘you lot, over that side. You lot, that side,’ and fortunately or unfortunately I was in that lot on that side and we become airgunners. Not wireless operators, airgunners. Just airgunners. And the reason for that, I didn’t know at the time, was the heavy bombers, the Lancasters, were going on production, and there was, they were short of airgunners, because they had to carry another air gunner so they said ‘you lot over there, you become airgunners,’ and I went back to Wisbech – I was a bit cheesed off about it all anyway, couldn’t do much about it, and I waited another couple of months and then they sent me on a gunnery course, a place called Manby [emphasis] in Lincoln, it’s a big air force gunnery school there, and we done six weeks training there as gunners, gunnery, and I got the huge total flying hours of nineteen hours, that’s all I got, and they said – and from there you’re supposed to do a four month, five month operational training course, that’s getting accustomed to actually doing bombing raids on enemy territory. But then whatever happened they said to me ‘you’re being posted straight on a squadron’ and I tell you what, I was a greener than this.
AM: [Laughs] we’re sat on a green settee, for the record.
HI: Yeah, yeah. It was as green, I was as green as anything then. ‘Cause I got nineteen hours and I didn’t know what to expect. Anyway, I was posted to Waddington [emphasis] to Number 9 Squadron. And when I arrived there, as it was luck [exhale of breath] was in my favour because a flight lieutenant named Stubbs came up to me and said ‘you’re gonna fly with me as a mid-upper’ and I said ‘fair enough.’ They’d already, he was already on his second tour, he’d already done thirteen trips on Wellingtons [emphasis].
AM: So you didn’t do the usual crewing up thing?
HI: Never done anything like that, no.
AM: You just –
HI: No, no they just sent about ten of us to 9 Squadron, ‘cause I was just converting from Wellingtons onto Lancasters, and consequently they was one gunner short because the Lancaster carried a mid-upper. So he said to me, anyhow I didn’t know what it was all about actually, he said to me ‘the rear gunner I’ve got at the moment is a big Australian,’ he was about six foot three [unclear] ‘and he’s too tall for the turret’ he said ‘what we’re gonna do is you’re gonna do your first trip in the mid-upper and after that you’ll go in the rear turret, and the Australian will go’ –‘cause in the mid-upper you can pull your legs down, straighten you know, you’ve got plenty of room, so what we done then, we done – as time’s gone on, this was 1942, round about June 1942 and we started getting to used, well the crew getting used to flying a Wellington twin engine bomber onto a four engine bomber. And that, you use what they call conversion, and that’s pretty difficult ‘cause you learn how to fly an entirely different aircraft, land it, you got to find out all the different things, the different systems and the turrets, anyway we done about six weeks training, well not, training it was, well converting from the one engine to the Lancaster, and then September ’42 we was in a crew, we had a big crew and we used to lay and loll about smoking, swearing everything else [laughs] anyway, they said ‘ops tonight.’ So, before you went on operations you done what they call a night flying test [emphasis], you took the aircraft up, you tested the bomb site, you tested the, the bomb bays open and closing, you tested the turrets and you give a, you went outta sea and give the guns a little squirt, see everything was alright, the compass [emphasis], check the compass and the, the under carriage we’d dropped up and down a couple of time to make sure it was alright, and we landed, and as we landed, the bomb aimer had already done thirteen trips on Wellingtons, and this is vivid, and as we’d come out of the steps of the Lancaster, the bomb aimer’s behind me, and coming along the road was tractor carrying a four thousand pound bomb, and fourteen hundred incendiaries, and the bomb aimer said to me ‘oh, we’re going to Happy Valley tonight.’ He said ‘by that bomb load, we’re definitely going to Happy Valley,’ and I thought ‘well that don’t sound too bad, Happy Valley,’ I thought ‘well Happy Valley, that can’t be too bad,’ I didn’t know that that was a nickname for the Ruhr Valley. The whole of the Ruhr Valley was called Happy Valley, and I didn’t realise at the time but the Happy Valley, the Ruhr Valley, as you went in you got a brilliant [emphasis] reception and a better, a, what you say, a bye-bye on the way out, and I tell you what, right I’ll go on, anyway we – it was always ritual, always [emphasis] for bomber crews to have bacon and eggs before they went on ops, always. Didn’t matter where you were, all the time I was in the air force, I done sixty bombing trips, and every time we went on a bombing trip we got bacon and eggs [emphasis] and if we come back we got bacon and eggs. And that was a luxury in those, in wartime, and then of course the joke was, always the joke ‘if you don’t come back, can I have your bacon and eggs?’ you know. Anyway, we went to the, we got – there was a bit of a rigmarole getting ready, you had to, you had to have your bacon and eggs and you go down to – most, most aircrew wrote a last letter, most of ‘em. I think the majority of aircrew wrote a last letter home to their wives, and they used to put them on the bed, and I’m afraid to say, I seen many, many, many letters being collected by the padre, many, that’s why I never wrote one myself. Anyway, we had our food, our bacon and eggs, we were all laughing and joking, you know we were young blokes, and we went to the crew, to the briefing room and we all sat down to see who would come in, and the map [emphasis] had a huge sheet over it, and the CO always, always done it, come in, whipped the sheet off and there was the target. So the bomb aimer said to me ‘I told you.’ It was Dusseldorf, he said ‘there you are,’ he said ‘I knew we were going there’ he said, ‘we’re going to Happy Valley,’ and I still didn’t twig on, ‘oh well, that don’t sound too bad,’ thinking of German girls tryna start [?] kisses you know what I mean. Anyway, we went down to the crew room and the atmosphere changed completely [emphasis]. We went in the crew room and the whole squadron was in the crew room ‘cause we had cabinets for all our flying gear and used to get dressed in there, and as I walked in, all the crews were there, it was dead silence, and everybody was looking at each other, there was no jokes, no laughing, nothing. And there was simply a – the atmosphere was incredible [emphasis] to what it was in the mess having our egg and bacon. Anyway, we got dressed and it was – airgunners dressing was long underpants, pure silk, and a vest that was silk and then your shirt and then your pullover, and then a, over the shirt you put a, I think it was, no, before you put the shirt on, as we put the shirt on we put an electrical heated suit with gloves and electrical heated gloves and body and feet, which was really, really important. And over that we put our uniform ‘cause you had to wear a uniform, if you never wore a uniform, I never realised but at night if you’ve was parachuted out in civilian clothes you was likely to get executed, which many, quite a few boys did get executed, especially by the civilians. And over that we used to put a huge [emphasis] fur jacket and fur trousers, fur lined boots, and there we were –
AM: Fur trousers?
HI: Fur trousers, yeah [murmur from AM]. You know, thick, made of the same material as your jacket. Irvin jacket, you had Irvin trousers, thick Irvin trousers and they used to tuck them inside your boot, zip your boots up and there, you could hardly move by then, but – and I’ll tell you what, on a warm day you was walking out you was absolutely sweating [emphasis, laughs]. Anyway, we went out to the aircraft and everybody smoked, everybody smoked [emphasis] except the skipper, the skipper didn’t smoke, he never drunk, never went out with women, he was absolutely – they said in the officers mess that they couldn’t understand the man, he wouldn’t, he never swore, he never smoked. Anyway, he – a good pilot mind you. Anyway, we got in the aircraft and I was in the mid-upper, first time. And in the mid-upper turret of the Lancaster, I’ve got a picture of it, you had a fantastic [emphasis] view –
AM: Hmm, all round.
HI: All three hundred and eighty degree. You could see everything [emphasis]and I got in the mid-upper, and I never got, I was still raw, we done, only done six weeks training, and I plugged in the electricity for the heater ‘cause if we, even in the mid-upper the temperature was about forty-five, fifty below zero. Worse still in the turret, rear turret. Anyway, we got ready and then the crew room, nobody was talking, it was like that, nobody spoke, and off we went. We took off at Waddington, and the thing was at Waddington they had no runways at that time. There were two squadrons of Lancasters there and no runway. All we had was grass, and in the winter it was very, very difficult with full bomb loads to takeoff. Before that, when we arrived at Waddington there was a squadron there, 44 Squadron, a Rhodesian squadron, and apparently they was the first squadron in the RAF to be equipped with the Lancaster, in March, April, round about April. And what they’d done, they’d decided to do a daylight raid, a low level daylight raid on a town called Augsburg in Germany. They sent six Lancasters flying at zero feet right across France, right into Germany –
AM: At zero [emphasis] feet?
HI: Zero feet, I mean zero – well when I say zero feet, about half of these buildings.
AM: Right okay.
HI: Can you imagine six Lancasters –
AM: No [laughs] –
HI: At that height over, just ducking over the trees, going as low as low as they could, else they would have invade [?] the radar.
AM: Right.
HI: Anyway, what happened – unfortunately there was squadron of Messerschmitts flying, I don’t know if it was practicing or flying, and of course they see these six Lancasters, and they immediately they shot down five [noise of shock from AM]. So outta the six they sent, one come back badly, badly damaged, and his name was Nevillson [name unclear] and he got the VC. The other five that was shot down got nothing [emphasis] so, he was fortunate, he was leading the squadron from the front and they gradually cut the other five down and he managed to avoid and managed to get back badly damaged. So, I’m just telling you that because it deal with another operation I went on. Anyway, we all got ready to takeoff, and everything was quiet in the – nobody spoke, when we was on ops, very rarely we spoke. The only time we spoke is when we was being attacked, when the navigator was giving instructions to the pilot, or the bomb aimer or me or the mid-upper or the rear gunner could see something downstairs they could identify and then inform the navigator what we see, and that helped him to crack the course. ‘Cause in those days, 1942, we had no radar. We had what they called Gee-box up to the coast and once we hit the coast the Germans blocked it, so it was from then onwards it was the navigator used to have to go from one spot to another spot, estimate the time of arrival at the other spot before he made a correction to the course, and of course things improved later on in ’43, and the gunners helped a lot because they could, especially the rear gunner could see, or the mid-upper could see different –
AM: Rivers, train lines and stuff like that.
HI: -- objects, yeah. And sometimes that wasn’t possible, there’d be ten-Thames [?] cloud. And then navigation become very, very difficult. And don’t forget we didn’t have no radar help whatsoever, but we managed and we flew over, as we took off we flew over the Dutch coast and the bomb aimer, he used to lay pronged in the nose [very unsure about what was said here], he said ‘skipper, enemy air coast [?] ahead, flak, flak.’ Always gunfire was called flak [emphasis]. So I looked down and I see all these beautiful, indescribable [?] lights, every colour, reds, blues, greens, there all tracers [?] from what they call night flak. They went up to about eight or nine thousand feet and then it dropped down again. And that’s when flak –
AM: And how high were you at that point?
HI: We was about twelve thousand feet. So when I looked down from mid-upper and I see that flak below us and I thought to myself ‘if that’s flak, we’ve got nothing at all to worry about.’ So we flew over Holland, don’t forget this was the early phase of bombing. Before that the bombing was nothing ‘cause they had obsolete bombing, bombing aircraft and no idea whether they reached the target. It was only in beginning, half way through 1942 they was giving the apparatus so they didn’t really find the target. Anyway, you crossed the Dutch coast and I’m in the mid-upper, spinning it round, and for about, I should imagine it was about hour, hour and a quarter, then the bomb aimer said ‘target ahead skipper.’ So then I thought to myself ‘well I’ll have a look to see what this target is all about,’ and I swung the turret around and I had really [emphasis], really the shock of my life. In front of us, with no exaggeration, was one solid massive explosion of shells. Absolute whole area was full up of high explosive shell fire, and we gotta fly through that. And searchlights were creeping about, and they had one searchlight which was radar operated and it was a different colour, it was blue, very light blue. And that was a searchlight, never missed. It went up bang, like that, straight onto an aircraft. It was radar controlled [coughs] excuse me [pause to drink] so when I see this huge massive explosion ‘cause I had a beautiful view, so I thought to myself ‘cor blimey, surely we haven’t gotta go through all this.’ And I could hear it, and the plane was bumping up and down from the force of the explosions and the skipper said to me ‘mid-upper, keep an eye above you, because bombers above you will drop their bombs on you’ which happened many times. So I said ‘okay skipper,’ and – we called the pilot skipper, always called him a skipper. Doesn’t matter what rank he was, always a skipper. Anyway, we, I started looking up and there right above us was a Lanc, bomb bay open, ‘cause you know the bomb bays were enormous, I says ‘there’s a bomber above us skipper with his bomb bay open, dive port.’ We dived port, good job we did because he was ready to drop his load, so we slammed our bomb bay shut, because we was on a run as well and, and the bomb aimer said ‘we’ll have to make a correction on our way into the target.’ You must realise that all around us these huge [emphasis] explosions of shells, I’m telling you not few, hundreds [emphasis] of ‘em exploding into the sky. Anyway, as we were flying in, the skipper said ‘skipper, I’ve lost the target point,’ he said ‘we’ll have to round again.’ And I just told you, the skipper never swore. I’ll tell you what [laughs] he said to the bomb aimer ‘you are a silly chap’ [laughs]. There was a few more words. So we slammed the bomb bay shut, went right through that target, went all through that explosions and the plane was rocking about, could hear shrapnel hitting the bloody machine, in our machine, and we went round and we do a dogleg. We approached the target like that, and then we go like that, like that, in again. But you had to be very, very careful ‘cause when you left the target and you was gonna come in again, you was coming across the last of the bombers that was going in. And it was very, very, very dangerous. Anyway, when we went round, and by that time the German radar was on us and it was giving us a real, real shellacking [?] I’ll tell you. Anyway, we made our run round, opened the bomb bay, dropped our bombs, slammed the door, slammed the door shut and what we usually do then, you couldn’t – slammed the doors shut but you couldn’t get away, you had to stay straight and level for another forty seconds because the camera was turning around and at the same time you was dropping what they called a photo-flash [?]. That was in the fuselage. And as the photo-flash dropped down, the cameras turning over, and they took a picture, an actual picture, of you bombing the target, which was very, very important because if you didn’t bring back a picture the intelligence officers said to you ‘well it’s your word against mine that you went there,’ even if the aircraft was full of bloody holes, they still say ‘we don’t believe you,’ well, ‘not saying we don’t believe you but you’ve got no proof that you went to the target so it don’t count, so you can go all that way there and back for nothing,’ which happened several times. Anyway, we slammed the bomb bay down, we made a dived [emphasis] to the port, turned round and come back and that’s when your trouble started, the fighters. But that time they wasn’t so dangerous as what they were to be. They, we used to see the fighters flying about and straight away, I don’t know if it was instinct or not, when I see a fighter, I wouldn’t fire on him unless he was interfering with us, I let him go, because generally you’d find on a fighter he had huge [emphasis] canons and you had no chance, I tell you, you had no chance whatsoever.
AM: So you’re just causing trouble for yourself really –
HI: Yeah because they could stand off from two, three hundred yards and you couldn’t do nothing about it, ‘cause your 303 went about a hundred yards and started dropping what they called a gravity drop. They had canons and he could rake you [?] which happened a couple of times. Anyway, we slammed the bomb bay shut, and we started coming back, and the bomb aimer said to the skipper and the navigator, ‘skipper, we can’t breathe. We’ve got no oxygen.’ And what had happened, the shrapnel had cut through the oxygen lines, so the skipper said ‘alright, so what we have to do is dive down below ten thousand feet,’ which we did do, and coming home in the mid-upper I thought to myself, ‘if this is bloody Happy Valley, I hope we don’t go anywhere that’s miserable’[laughs]. And I’ll tell you what, it’s a terrible, terrible place. Anyway we got down to – we crossed the Dutch coast at about four thousand feet, and these beautiful lights we see were flashing past us like that, all over, and lucky enough we managed to get through a few bangs and we were damaged but not that bad. And we dropped down about two thousand feet and we headed home, and I thought to myself ‘dear oh dear, I got thirty of these, thirty trips to do like that before we get a rest.’ And we landed, and I was exhausted. Even at that age, at seventeen, I was exhausted. And we went into the briefing room and I stood there and we was asked a load of questions, and they said to me, it was only my first trip, they said to me ‘what do you think?’ And I said ‘I see four or five bombers exploding in the sky,’ I said ‘apart from that everything was alright.’ He said ‘you never seen no bombers’ – this was the officer, the briefing officer telling me that, he wasn’t even a flyer. He’s saying ‘you didn’t see no bombers blowing up, that was scarecrows.’ What the Germans were firing up shells to mimic a bomber exploding, and they kept this up right the way through the war.
AM: So it was true, you hadn’t, you’d seen the scarecrows, not a bomber blowing up.
HI: No, no they were actually aircraft blowing up in the sky. They did admit after the war there was no such thing as a scarecrow.
AM: Ah right.
HI: They admitted it, the Air Ministry, but they kept it a –
AM: So why did they say that?
HI: Well they – one of the reasons was they didn’t want us to duck and dive about. They wanted us to fly straight and level, ‘cause it was dangerous anyway, ducking and diving. But every time we went back we say we seen three or four, sometimes more than that, explosions, literally exploding in the sky. They said ‘no, that’s German scarecrows to demoralise you.’ Anyway, we got back and in the briefing room he said, he told me about the scarecrows so I thought ‘oh well, that’s it.’ Anyway, I didn’t know how exhausted I was, it was only a four and three-quarter hour trip. I went to bed and I felt absolutely exhausted. And I think the mental strain of the first trip. Anyway, we went back to the mess, we went to bed, and I think next morning we had a day off. The following day I think we went to Bremen, and the reason why went to Bremen, or Bremen [different pronunciation, shorter vowel sound] as they called it, they was building the submarines, the U-Boats there.
AM: Right.
HI: And we went across the Baltic that time. We didn’t see no flak until we hit Bremen, and the flak was unbelievable. It was worse than Dusseldorf.
AM: Were you in the rear gunner at this –
HI: I was in the rear turret, yeah.
AM: So you’d moved to the rear turret by this time?
HI: Yeah. And different position and the different visibility of the – when you’re in the rear turret you can see that way, see the bits you couldn’t see really above you or at the side of you –
AM: Or behind you.
HI: And at that time, the Germans were only attacking from dead astern, port over or starboard over . That was the method of attacking at that time [emphasis], things were getting much, much worse, but they had a little bit of a chance because if they come in close you had four guns here and you could – you had a bit of a chance, not a lot, but you had a bit of a chance. Anyway, I think it was after that trip, couple of trips, I complained to the engineering officer that the rear turret, that the oil for the Merlin engines was coating the Perspex in the rear turret, which obviously, the exhaust was coming out. So we was sitting in the crew room, the officer come in, he said ‘we solved the problem of the oil on the turrets,’ and I thought ‘well that’s good’ ‘cause after about two hours this oil used to go onto the Perspex, it was starting to be difficult to see outta it, and when we went out there [chuckles] what they had done, they had taken the whole Perspex out [chuckles]. So there we were in a rear turret with no bloody Perspex, and I tell you what, it was cold [emphasis].
AM: How did that – what so nothing between you –
HI: No, just – they took the whole of the front of the Perspex out. We used to look through, they took out because the oil.
AM: So it was just you [emphasis] and sky –
HI: Yeah, yeah.
AM: Nothing between you?
HI: No, no. Well the Perspex only stopped the slipstream but they took the Perspex out. Yeah, on all the Lancs, but they solved the problem [laughs]. Anyway, we –
AM: But the oil would just hit you in the face instead.
HI: Yeah, but it was, it wasn’t so bad because you could just wipe it with your glove with it [AM laughs]. But, we got rid of the – it wasn’t such a huge amount but it was enough oil to stop, to obscure your sight a bit, you know. And you had to be really, really on your toes all that time you was in that turret. It was bitterly cold in there, forty-five, fifty below zero, was nothing.
AM: Did you ever have an occasion when your suit didn’t work, or?
HI: Yes sometimes it, it didn’t work a couple of times. I burnt me foot ‘cause it was a new, new idea you know, they’d, after the war they made electric blankets [AM laughs] that was only through the electrical heated suits and it’s the short shirts – it’s like everything in the war, everything was crash, bang, wallop, get ready , but every gunner was issued with an electrical heated suit, and they were good when they worked. So I’d done my first op, and I thought I was proud of myself, but I had other twenty-nine to do. I mean, twenty-nine successful [emphasis] ones, so you can, you can go all the way there, and you get, you get engine trouble and you gotta come back, that don’t count. Even in respect of what you’ve gone through, it didn’t count.
AM: You had to drop your bombs on the target for it to count.
HI: Yeah, the gunner target, yeah. You see, what actually happened, I think at the beginning of the war, the few of them used to go to North Sea, drop their bombs and come back and say yeah they’ve, they’ve, and they – ‘cause they realised Germany wasn’t being bombed really, it was a, the most that we got to was five miles from the towns [?] so what they decide to put the camera in, and the photo-flash. And that stopped it all, ‘cause you had to bring back a picture. The first thing they asked for when you walked in, ‘have you got your picture?’ It was the first thing – [unclear] you’d land on the aircraft, there was a [unclear] photography unit come out and take the film out, and there’d be developed or they used to take it back to the crew, the, where we was being briefed, and they could see if we bombed the target or not. Anyway, so we went to Bremen, we gained a good shellacking [?] and we done a bit of damage there, and we come back, and I was blowing my chest out, I’d done two trips [laughs]. The following, following day, er day after that, we went to Wilhelmshaven, and that was worse. That’s where I was really in full, full strength of building submarines there, and we did – it was devastating the bombing we done there, it was very successful, they held up the submarine building for a long while, and then I’d done, I’d done three trips, and I was, you know, thinking to myself, well –
AM: Were you scared?
HI: Frightened outta my bloody life. The first one, I told you, that first one, Dusseldorf, I could not believe, I could not [emphasis] but everyone was the same –
AM: Did you talk about it?
HI: No, no we never talked about it, no. I’ll tell you one thing, we used to get crews coming straight from OTU into the squadron, ‘cause their losses were horrendous you know, we was losing so many aircraft, and they’d say ‘what’s the ops like?’ and we’d always used to say ‘you find out, you find out yourself.’ We never said ‘oh it’s terrible over there’ or nothing, never. And I don’t know if that helped them or not, but a lot of the crews only done one trip before they got shot down, hell of a lot of ‘em. Just one – in fact, what they used to do when a crew come from OTU, they used to let the pilot fly with an experienced crew on his first trip, so he’d understand what an actual raid was. Very often he never come back off his first trip, it happened time and time again. The crew used to be walking about the station with no, waiting for a new pilot. Yeah, happened many times. Anyway, after Wilhelmshaven we went back to Happy Valley again, and this time, I tell you what, I thought Dusseldorf was bad, we went to Essen [emphasis] and Essen was something out of this [noise of disbelief] something outta, I tell you what, it was absolutely ferocious. The flak was enormous, everywhere you look there was shells bursting, aircraft blowing up in the sky, aircraft going down in flames, and I had something with me because we just went through – we always got hit, always got hit with flak, big holes in the aircraft, but when we got back they used to bang ‘em and tap ‘em back and –
AM: Bodge [?] ‘em up.
HI: Yeah, that’s it [chuckles]. Anyway, we went to Essen, then we went to Munich, and I’ll tell you how my luck is, what happened, losses at Waddington on 9 Squadron, even those few weeks I was there, was horrendous. So they sent two scientists down from Cambridge with a new device to put into the rear turret so that when a fighter was five or six hundred yards away, which we couldn’t see, they could see us on their radar, this instrument was radar. It could pick up the fighter and warn us with a red light that there was a fighter in the close vicinity. Unfortunately the first time the squadron was equipped with them, we lost two aircraft and the Germans must have sorted the, must have examined the wreckage and seen this device in the rear turret and copied [unclear] a wavelength or whatever it was, anyway we went to Munich and that was a long trip, that was about eight and a half hours and we went over, and how the navigator found Munich I’ll never know ‘cause we went over in ten-tenths cloud, that means to say underneath you was solid cloud, but he found Munich as – before we reached Munich the cloud broke and there was Munich and we did, we did give it real good hiding.
AM: Is this day time or night?
HI: It’s night time –
AM: It’s night time isn’t it?
HI: Never, never done daylight.
AM: But you could still see it, so how come you could see it at night time?
HI: We could see it yeah because the – a couple of people had been bombing it and the searchlights –
AM: Right.
HI: And you could see the town anyway. You – but that’s why bombing – they, they said ‘well why did you bomb areas’ – the only way you can do night bombing was to, at that time was area bombing and in that area you probably got a load of factories you could destroy, but you couldn’t pick out – it was very, very difficult to pick out an individual target so you had to bomb an area, they used to pick an area out. This was before pathfinding [murmured agreement from AM] so we used to drop flares ourselves, we dropped a few flares as we was going in, or people before us would drop a few flares, and you’d sit and the bomb aimer would see the target.
AM: Who dropped the flares, the bomb aimer?
HI: The bomb aimer, yeah. Someone on the squadron [very unclear what was said here] would drop a few flares and then down they went, but that was the beginning, when we really first started bombing Germany, before that it was a joke. Anyway, we bombed Munich and we made a good frame [?] on it actually, and coming back the skipper said ‘I think we’ll fly through cloud’ because the fighter activity, we could see the fighter flares, and so he said ‘if we go through cloud we won’t meet any fighters,’ which we did do, so we was flying for about an hour in the cloud and all of a sudden the cloud broke clear, and believe it or not, right by my rear turret, as I looked outta my rear turret was a Ju-88. I tell you what he was no more than thirty yards [emphasis] behind us. And he opened fire with his cannons and the tracer went just above the aircraft, just missed us. The reason was that he was so close and we was up and down like that and I suppose as we went down he fired and he missed us. Anyway, we opened fire, me in the rear turret and the mid-upper ‘cause he was right close to us, and down he went, he spun over and down he went.
AM: So you got him?
HI: Yeah we got him, yeah.
AM: Which one of you got him, do you know?
HI: We don’t know, I think –
AM: Both of you?
HI: We both opened fire on him, and he was more surprised than what we were, he never expected it, and down he went. Lucky enough because usually once the night fighter got on your tail, it was very, very difficult. Anyway we, when we got back we told the intelligence officer that this night fighter had followed us through ten-tenths cloud for an hour ‘till the cloud broke. So they put two and two together and realised the apparatus they’d put in the turret was sending out a ray for the Germans to pick up and that’s what he was following us on. So what – immediately they took the radar thing out of the turret and I don’t know if it made any difference or not. After that we were talking and laughing about it and they said ‘you gonna do some low level formation flying in daylight,’ so we thought ‘well surely we’re not gonna have another daylight raid after the huge loss to 44 Squadron,’ and I mean we never even considered [emphasis] that they would do anymore daylight raids. So anyway, we done this practice formation, well it’s not formation flying – at that time there was over ninety Lancs in 5 Group, and there was ninety of us flying over Lincoln, around this area, right on the ground, well I don’t mean on the ground, as high as these buildings. Everyone was moaning down below because can you imagine ninety Lancasters flying about thirty or forty feet and they said ‘you’re gonna have to cut the squadron of Spitfires doing damning runs [?] on you.’ So I’m sitting in my turret, and the Spitfires come straight for me, and he was so close our slipstream hit his, hit his wings, and he turned like that, and being so low, he couldn’t, he couldn’t get outta the dive and he went straight in the deck. And I was ‘that don’t sound too bad, that’s gonna happen.’ Anyway –
AM: What happened to him? Crashed? Killed?
HI: Crashed, just crashed yeah. And when I looked along the road there was about three or four Spits on the deck, burning [emphasis] doing the same thing, come straight in –
AM: So they were killed?
HI: And the slipstream, they had no chance of correcting, correcting, ‘cause it’s too low on the ground. Anyway, on the Saturday they said ‘there’s gonna – report to your flights ‘cause there’s gonna be a daylight raid.’ So we went out to do the what they call a night flighting test, and when we landed there was the trailer, but all it had on it was six [emphasis] one thousand pounders. So we knew it was gonna be a long, long journey. We were – a bomb load like that was only a third of the weight of what we’d usually take to the Ruhr, so we were, obviously it was gonna be a long journey. We went to the briefing –
AM: Can I just ask, so why obviously, ‘cause that would conserve the fuel because you had a lighter load?
HI: Yeah we had to take more fuel and less bombs, so –
AM: Yep, okay.
HI: So actually we knew the distance when we see a big petrol load [emphasis] going in we knew we were on for a – we see a small bomb load we knew, the petrol, it was being loaded up for all the tanks and we knew we was on for a long trip. Anyway, we went and had our – even at that time, we’d already had breakfast, but they sent us out and said ‘we’re gonna have bleeding bacon and eggs’ [laughs]. That was always done, it don’t matter what time of the day it was bacon –
AM: Well what would happen if you didn’t like bacon?
HI: Well –
AM: What did they get, sausage?
HI: There were a few Jewish people who, they had to eat the bleeding bacon [laughs].
AM: Did they, they ate it?
HI: Yeah, well, by then I’d done five or six trips, and I thought ‘so I better eat the food, you never know what’s gonna happen.’ Anyway, we went to the briefing at about ten o’clock, Saturday morning, it was, in October, round about, I forget the date, about the tenth of October, and we went to the briefing, and the officer come in, pulled the blind down, and there it was. Place called Le Creusot. It was right on the other side of France, nearly on the Swiss border. It was a nearly ten and a half hour trip and we were looking at each other, and they said ‘you’re to fly as low as possible, even lower than that if you can,’ and they said ‘there’ll be two hundred Spitfires,’ or hundred, two or three hundred Spitfires ‘escorting you to the coast,’ but the trouble was the Spitfires went to the wrong bleeding place, we never see ‘em. So we crossed the French coast at about the height of these buildings, and then you imagine what a sight that must have been , ninety-two Lancasters flying –
AM: What a noise [emphasis] never mind a sight.
HI: Yeah, there was loads and loads of ‘em. And all we got was the French girls waving at us and I thought ‘that’s handy,’ and everybody was coming out and waving, it was a beautiful day, and we went right across France. I mean right across France, looking, wondering where the fighters was ‘cause there was thousands of by that time, ’42, there was hundreds and hundreds of fighters in France –
AM: German fighters?
HI: Yeah, German fighters in France. Anyway, we went right across France, there was no incidents, everybody was waving, and we approached the target [coughs] excuse me, and six of us had to break off and bomb the power station that was supplying the electricity to this huge armament factory in Le Creusot. It was a huge armament factory, nearly as big as what the Germans had, and they was producing armaments for the German army. So we broke off, telling you now there was six of us who broke off, Guy Gibson was with us, he was on our port side, and he was on 106 Squadron, Guy Gibson was on, and his second in command was flying the other Lanc, and on our starboard side was two Lancasters from 50 Squadron on the other side, we was in the centre and there was six of us. We broke off and went straight to this power station. Oh, and as we approached the power station, one of the Lancasters on our starboard side just went straight in the deck and exploded. We were – he had six one thousand pound bombs on it, and it literally went straight in the deck and exploded. What happened we don’t know.
AM: Don’t know.
HI: Anyway, the five of us carried on, Gibson was on our portside with his second in command and we was in the centre, and the last one of 50 Squadron was, was on our starboard side. Anyway, we bombed the power station and we absolutely flattened [emphasis] it. We was carrying six one thousand pounders, and we went and we climbed up a little bit and dropped ‘em, and we could see that the whole place was flattened. In fact, the factory was – actually I went back there last year, to the factory and it’s bombed, still bleeding bombed [unclear, laughs]. Anyway –
AM: Did you get your photo?
HI: Pardon?
AM: Did you get – not last year, I mean in 1942.
HI: No we didn’t, I don’t think we took a photo because it was daylight and everything –
AM: So they knew –
HI: Everyone was bombing the same target. Anyway, the ninety Lancs turned round, it was ninety-two ‘cause when we turned around there was only ninety-one, one had blown up in the sky, and we came back over the – by the time we’d got to the French coast it was getting dark –
AM: Still flying really low level?
HI: Yeah, and we started climbing when we got to the French coast, and as we passed the French coast it was getting dark, and we was flying for about another thirty or forty minutes, and all of a sudden the sky was smothered in bloody high explosive shells again. So the pilot said ‘where the bloody hell are we,’ so the skipper said ‘ I think we’ve, I’ve miscalculated and we’re flying over Jersey,’ and we were over Jersey with these huge explosions coming up, anyway the pilot called him a nice fella again, he said ‘stupid chap you are’ like that, and we branched out and come back, but that was a catch that, Jersey was very, very heavily armed, and anybody strayed off the course they wait for you. Shot down quite a few bombers over there. Anyway, we got back and went to the briefing, we were told exactly what had happened, and they confirmed that we done a good job there –
AM: Good.
HI: And I thought ‘there won’t be no more daylight raids after that.’ And we went to, in a week, we had a couple of days off and we went to Genoa [emphasis], and we couldn’t make out why we was going all the way to Italy, it was eleven hour trip to bomb Genoa, but we soon found out because on the Thursday [emphasis] they said, a briefing for Saturday, a daylight raid. So we said ‘surely we’re not having another daylight raid, we was lucky we got away with La Crusoe.’ Anyway, believe it or not, the target was Milan, and we was gonna bomb it, in daylight, taking it from a very, very low level ‘till we got to the Alps, we couldn’t go low level so we had to wander through the Alps, and there was ninety- two Lancasters, darting and diving through the Alps.
AM: Had the Spitfires turned up this time?
HI: No we never see no bloody Spitfires at all this time, and same again, we went right across France, no opposition whatsoever. We went through the Alps, and this is what I call a terror raid. We went across Lake Como about hundred feet then, we climbed to three hundred feet, and there was Milan waiting for us. No air raid shelter, no flak, they never expected British bombers to come all the way from England in daylight, never expected.
AM: Could you, were you low enough to actually see people in the –
HI: Pardon?
AM: Were you low enough to actually see people?
HI: It was, we was that low, we dropped down to about a hundred feet, hundred and fifty feet over Milan, we could see everybody in the streets, in the restaurants, we could see ‘em all. And we see ‘em started running about, there was no alarm given, and the city was completely open, and imagine ninety-two Lancs with six one thousand pounders on. We caused absolute havoc there, and a few of the boys I know were machine gunning, which I thought was wrong. Anyway, we climbed up again, came back, slid our way through the Alps, dropped down again to nought [?] feet and came right across France again.
AM: You missed Jersey that time.
HI: Yeah, we missed Jersey that time. We had our pullovers on [laughs].
AM: What did you feel about that then? The fact that you could actually see people?
HI: Oh we could see ‘em yeah, yeah because we –
AM: What did you, did you talk about it afterwards?
HI: No, we never talked about air raids, never mentioned it. Once you got back it was finished. No body, and same as the logbook, all we used to put in the logbook was the raid, the time, we never, what we should have done was put a little, exactly what happened, but when you put your books into the commanding officer to be signed once a month, [unclear] shooting, just put down what the raid was and that was it, that was what we used to do. But we should have done, we should have put the whole story of what exactly went on. And after that raid believe it or not the Ities [?] didn’t want to know anything more about the war, and there was huge – we had a big publicity the next day in the Daily Express, had a huge photo of Number 9 Squadron, coming back off the raid, and they reproduced it in Italy with, English Gangsters they called us, and there we are. I think we lost four aircraft that night, I don’t know where we lost them, might have been technical trouble, I don’t know, but, to go all that way in daylight and not see a German fighter was incredible. And after that we felt ourselves very, very, very lucky. It was about my ninth trip then, I was one of the top, experienced men then –
AM: And you’d shot somebody down by then.
HI: Yeah, yeah. But we’d, we were the top men in the squadron, we’d done about nine or ten trips.
AM: And you were seventeen.
HI: Yeah, yeah. And from then things got worse. Worse and worse and worse. The –
AM: In what way worse, Harry?
HI: The fighters got much more efficient, and their radar got much more efficient. Their guns got more efficient. Search lights got better, and more, and they had guns that fired with radar and they never missed. I remember later on in the year on my second tour we was bombing a place in the Ruhr Valley, and we was going in, our squadron, and as we was going in, there was people in front of us bombing, and they’d already turned starboard and coming out again, and for some reason, I don’t know, a Halifax [emphasis] I don’t know if it was in our squadron or the squadron beforehand, instead of going hitting the target, I don’t know what happened, he turned and joined the aircraft that was coming out of the, from the bombing run, which was in daylight, and there was a big gap between us going in and those coming out, and then he flew across, and as he flew across the flak went bang, bang, and the third shell hit him right underneath, and just exploded, yeah. Why he done that I don’t know, ‘cause we was all in the shadow of the silver paper we was dropping, and that helps with the – this one had got outta range with it going across and they shot him down straight away, yeah. And as it went on, we used to get leave every six weeks, and Lord [pause] what his name, Rank, Rank, wasn’t Rank, it was the er, the bloke that owned Morris, BMC, owned BMC, and he said, and he gave every aircrew bloke that was on ops, when he went on leave he doubled their pay, for a weeks leave yeah, he done that right through the war. Must have cost him a fortune.
AM: Every airman?
HI: Yeah, well it was in Bomber Command.
AM: In Bomber Command.
HI: Who was flying. He used to give ‘em – he used to, he used to double our pay, yeah.
AM: You know what, just going back to operations, you know the gaps between them, as in a day, a couple of days?
HI: All depending upon the weather. It was entirely dependent upon the weather. If the weather was, it was a bright – I’ll tell you one we went one, we went on one and I still think about it, it was a full light night, getting onto Christmas I think it was, and they said ‘there’ll be no ops tonight because there’s bright moonlight and no cloud,’ and it was suicide to go over there. Anyway, they said they’d picked out sixteen Lancasters, they’d picked out about eight from our squadron, four from 44 and I think four from another squadron, they said ‘we want you to do a low level night time raid on small towns just outside the Ruhr Valley.’ And the excuse they gave us was that the civilian population wasn’t getting any rest from the bombing raids on the Ruhr Valley and they was letting them come to these small towns to get rest. That’s why they wanted to go over there and liven ‘em up. So, it really was a terror raid and we carried sixteen one thousand pounders with a delayed charged of about half an hour, and we found this small town, we was after, just outside the Ruhr Valley, and we went right down, it was brilliant [emphasis] moonlight we were in, we went right down this village or small town and dropped the sixteen one thousand pounders right down the centre of the town. And I often wonder what happened about that, but I don’t, there was no need really to do that bombing really, but there you go, that was war.
AM: Well you called it a terror raid.
HI: Pardon?
AM: You called it a terror raid?
HI: Yeah, yeah, and that was Christmas, went home and had some leave, came back and we started again. And by that time, all the crews that I knew when I joined the squadron in June had all gone, they’d all gone. All been shot down.
AM: Every single one.
HI: Yeah, and they was all new recruits except us, and we was all NCOs.
AM: What do you think kept your plane – why your crew when all the rest of them got shot down? What can you say?
HI: I don’t know, I don’t know. I’ll tell you, shall I tell you?
AM: Go on.
HI: Well, what they used to do, before you went on a raid they used to give us a bag of sweets –
AM: Go on, keep going. I know the story, but keep going.
HI: Oh you know the story do you?
AM: You told me earlier on, but tell me again.
HI: And, we couldn’t undo the sweets with the cellophane, so we used to throw them out of the rear turret, and the Germans knew that and that’s why they never shot us down. ‘Cause they wanted the sweets [laughs]. That’s only a joke [both laugh]. I don’t know, I got no idea. Well, what actually happened, the crew I was with, I said they’d already done fourteen trips on Wellingtons when I joined them, they finished, and they finished, we finished our tour, was up to about sixteen, fifteen or sixteen trips, and I was left with no crew, and I was sitting in the mess, and a bloke walked in, I knew him as Sergeant Doolan, pilot, and he said ‘my rear gunner Robbie has just been killed, would you take his place?’ That was, that was luck really, so I said ‘alright, I’ll become your new rear gunner’ which I did do, and we was an NCO crew, and we was the only crew to, that I know of, all the time I was there, that finished the tour. And how many crews we lost, Lord knows.
AM: But you were the common denominator.
HI: Yeah, yeah –
AM: From the first sixteen and then fourteen and then the –
HI: Yeah, and then, we was all NCOs and we finished the tour, yeah. And I think the pilot got the DFM, and none of us got even a mention of a medal. And there was – but the thing was, what was happening by then was the Germans had come up with a new technique called Schräge Musik, that was what they’d come up with, they’d put two cannons at eighty degree, put the two cannons behind the cockpit at eight degrees so there was the aircraft, and these two guns stuck up like that –
AM: Okay.
HI: And all they had to do, they had radar, and all they had to do was coast [?] yourself underneath a bomber and just fly underneath him. You didn’t have to have no sight, no tracer, it just went underneath the aircraft, up to the petrol tanks, quick squirt, and we used to see ‘em blowing up but we couldn’t make out, we used to come back and tell ‘em that we seen aircraft blowing up in the sky, there was no flak and no fighters we could see, and the, and they literally shot down thousands [emphasis] of bombers, and not once did they ever mention what was going on at the briefing, not once. Never.
AM: Would there have been any way to avoid them if you’d have known about them?
HI: Well, if we knew and known about it, which they knew what we’d be doing, we’d start jiggling up and down, so they wouldn’t get a clean shot at us, but then when you think about it, you get five or six hundred bombers doing that in pitch darkness, you’re gonna get, gonna get a lot of problems. And that was it, but they were shooting them down, ah, unbelievable. Yeah, you had to be lucky really, because if you bowed out you had to be lucky, because if the civilians, you come out near a target and the civilians get hold of you they’d rip you to pieces. Yeah, and the Gestapo shot a few as well. If you was lucky the Luftwaffe got hold of you, was alright, but, or the army got you –
AM: But you never got shot down?
HI: No, I never got shot down, no.
AM: What happened at the end of your first tour, then?
HI: What happened then, finished my tour, didn’t get no bloody medal, don’t know why not –
AM: Even though you shot one down, ‘cause people got medals for that didn’t they?
HI: Yeah I know. Anyway, I went as an instructor, and then I realised how risky this business was, because all [emphasis] that was coming from OTUs were crews being trained in Canada. And when you think they were being trained on single engine aircraft in beautiful weather, all they had to do was follow the railway line from one point to another, everything was easy. Of course when they come to London, especially, and England, especially where, with the weather, and was OTU we had to train ‘em for three or four months before they went on operations, and hell of a lot of ‘em got killed on accidents, but they were very raw, they should have had much, much more training, but then again –
AM: And how old were you at this point? Eighteen?
HI: Yeah, eighteen, about eighteen and a half yeah. And I was an instructor, and apparently, I carried on for a little while and the, we had a bit of a go – oh they sent me up to a place up in Scotland to a gunnery school to do some – the instructors up there wanted to get on ops, don’t know why, but they said ‘you go up there and relieve them,’ about ten of us went up there, and we were in the mess one night, and we all got drunk and caused a bit of a havoc and we went in front of the CO next day, he said ‘I’ve had enough of you blokes, I’m posting you.’ So I thought ‘oh go on, I’ll be posted somewhere out in the Middle East’ or somewhere like that, and anyway I got posted to South End, about fifteen miles from where I lived, and I was thinking ‘be at home every night’ and while I was there, what we was doing there was flying drogues [?], the flak along the south coast, we had a big drogue pulled behind, and I tell you what, when I see that I knew we had no chance at all. They had these, we had to use a toeless drogue, and they used to fight, not at the drogue, a couple of degrees past the drogue, because they kept hitting the drogues and it was becoming expensive. So, but the flak [emphasis] to follow you, right, same height, would follow the drogue all the way along. Anyway, after a while they said ‘you’re posted,’ and this I knew was why the government knew what was going on in Germany with the fighters. They said ‘you’ve been posted to the 77 Squadron, Halifaxes.’ So I thought ‘alright,’ so and when I got up there –
AM: Where was that? Where was it?
HI: Er, Full Sutton I think, yeah Full Sutton. And when I got up there, the CO said he wanted to see me when I got up there, so I thought ‘that’s handy, the bloody warrant officer and the CO wants to see me, I must be important’ and he took me out to the, where the arment [?] officer, out to a Halifax, and what they had done they’d cut a big hole in the bottom of the Halifax and placed a point manual point five over the hole –
AM: Point five –
HI: Yeah, point five, point five machine gun.
AM: Okay.
HI: A much bigger shell than the 303. And they said ‘have you seen any German fighters coming, coming at you, you’ll be able to handle ‘em.’ So they knew what was going on. Anyway, we took off for Duisburg and I was sitting there – I was bleeding freezing, can you imagine there’s a big hole like that, about twenty thousand feet and –
AM: Hang on where’s this, is this in the middle of the plane?
HI: In the middle of the plane.
AM: Right, okay.
HI: A big hole.
AM: Where the bomb doors would have been?
HI: Er, it was different in the Halifax.
AM: Okay.
HI: It was different from the Lancaster. Most the bombs – up, further up and underneath the wings as well.
AM: Right.
HI: Anyway, they dug this hole, cut this hole in the Halifax and they had a point five there, and I sat there, and can you imagine it was about forty-five below, and it seemed the whole world was coming through that bloody hole. The pilot was moaning, the bomb aimer was moaning, and the – anyway, we’d done the bombing raid, come back and they complained bitterly about it, and that was the last that – and they said to me ‘we’re posting you to Driffield, to an Australian squadron’ and that’s where I went then, as a rear gunner at 462 Australian Squadron. I stayed there for a couple of months and I don’t know what happened there, I don’t know if I’d lost my logbook or – anyway, I done about eight or nine trips here and never even registered, and then they posted from there, from 64, er, 462 Squadron on Driffield to its other squadron which was at Driffield –
AM: Why did you keep, why did you keep getting posted to different ones?
HI: Well the pilot I went with in 462, bloke, Australian called Heurigen [unsure of spelling] – 462 they posted away completely [emphasis] but he, he stayed, he said ‘no I wanna stay here at Driffield’ and he went onto 466, and he took me with him. And when he finished, I was in, I didn’t know what to do, and they said ‘we want you to go to 158 Squadron at Lissett’ and that’s where I finished. I don about another ten trips there, and they said to me ‘you done enough, that’s it.’
AM: What was Lissett like?
HI: Nissan huts, terrible. Baking hot in the summer, freezing [emphasis] in the winter. And you come back off an op and you had to go in one of them bloody tin huts. The bedding was wet, yeah. But I survived.
AM: You did.
HI: Yeah, I really survived, yeah. All, most of them, all my friends went there, yeah, a lot.
AM: Was the DFC then for the number of operations you went on?
HI: Number of trips I done, sixty trips, yeah. Yeah, I done more now actually, but –
AM: Well the ones that didn’t yeah, didn’t get counted.
HI: Yeah.
AM: And then so from that point, when you did your last tour, sorry your last operation, then what happened, were you sent to demob?
HI: No, they said to me ‘what was your trade?’ The war had finished, and they said to me ‘what was your trade before the war? What did you do?’ and I said ‘I was an apprentice tailor,’ they said ‘we’ve got the job for you’ I thought – they sent me down to Newmarket on the racecourse, in charge of about eight or nine WAFs on sewing machines. I don’t know why they thought I was – they were making lorry covers on these machines, and they put me in charge of ‘em. Oh, when I was there.
AM: What was that like Harry?
HI: [Laughs] had a little giggle [laughter].
AM: So what, how old are you at this point you’re about twenty –
HI: About twenty, yes. Yeah, about, getting on for twenty.
AM: So go on, you had a little giggle [HI laughs], tell me [HI laughs] go on, tell me some stories.
HI: Yeah I was charge of them, that’s it [laughs].
AM: Right, alright then.
HI: Yeah and then I stayed in Newmarket – oh blimey, it’s, oh it’s only twenty past.
AM: No, we’re alright.
HI: Newmarket was a bombing station if you believe it or not. The Rowley Mile was a runway for 75 Squadron, a New Zealand squadron, and after the war they turned it into a Prussian [?] depot. They was dropping all the aircraft into Newmarket and crushing ‘em.
AM: Crushing them?
HI: Crushing ‘em. Hundreds of ‘em. Into this big machine they just went pfft like, just crushed ‘em up, piled ‘em up. As far as we could see was one huge pile of aluminium.
AM: Going back to you though, so you’ve had your giggle with your WAFs –
HI: Yeah.
AM: Then what? Did you get –
HI: I had a couple of giggles [laughter from both] but it was handy there because we could get up to London from Newmarket, they had a railway station –
AM: How long was it before you were demobbed then?
HI: Er, got demobbed in forty, 1946, August ’46.
AM: So quite early, a lot earlier than a lot of ‘em then? ‘Cause you’d been in the whole –
HI: I’d been in the whole, since [unclear] yeah. I come out, about to find a job, I couldn’t go back to tailoring, I’d missed it you know. Anyway, I tried, went back to tailoring and learnt a little bit. Things were very difficult when we come out, we had no houses, you can imagine London, there was all bloody roofs off the buildings, and then we had to wait for a house. I was married then.
AM: I was gonna say, where did, where did you meet your wife?
HI: I knew her from the, from the blackout. I was sitting on a seat in the blackout and she came along with her friend and we started talking and that’s how it started, and I, it was only when I [unclear] and we got married in forty, 1945, Christmas 1945, and I remember we, we done a couple of trips, and I remember I bombed Dresden, we bombed Dresden just after Christmas, February, but we got married on the Christmas, and I shouldn’t have got married ‘cause we had nowhere to bloody live, better than living with the mother-in-law for a little while, got fed up with 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/.
Creator
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Annie Moody
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
2015-07-23
Format
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01:15:35 audio recording
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AIronsH150723
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Conforms To
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Pending review
Spatial Coverage
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Germany
Great Britain
Italy
England--Lincolnshire
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Harry Irons. One
Description
An account of the resource
Harry Irons left a tailoring apprenticeship to join the Royal Air Force and trained as a wireless operator but actually became an air-gunner. He describes the uniform he wore and the unreliability of heated suits. Discusses the invention of scarecrows which crews believed were sent up by the Germans to distract and demoralise them. Also describes a number of operations including to the Ruhr Valley and a number of daylight operations including Le Creusot (17 October 1942) and Milan (24 October 1942). Goes on to discuss the removal of Perspex from Lancasters to prevent oil from exhausts from affecting visibility, the introduction of radar into the rear turret and it’s quick removal after it was found as used by Germany and Schrage Musik. He returned to tailoring following his retirement from the Royal Air Force.
Contributor
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Katie Gilbert
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-10-24
1942-10-17
158 Squadron
462 Squadron
5 Group
50 Squadron
77 Squadron
9 Squadron
air gunner
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
Bombing of Augsburg (17 April 1942)
bombing of Dresden (13 - 15 February 1945)
briefing
Distinguished Flying Cross
fear
Gee
Gibson, Guy Penrose (1918-1944)
Halifax
In the event of my death letter
Ju 88
Lancaster
military living conditions
military service conditions
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Nissen hut
radar
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Driffield
RAF Full Sutton
RAF Lissett
RAF Manby
Scarecrow
Spitfire
training
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/471/8354/ABirkbyB150729.1.mp3
40d49652d36d4a48be5610dad7fe0f43
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
Birkby, Bessie
B Birkby
Tess Birkby
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
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Birkby, B
Description
An account of the resource
Three items. An oral history interview with Leading Aircraftswoman Bessie Birkby (1924 - 2019) and two photographs. She was a Women's Auxilliary Air Force driver stationed at RAF Binbrook, RAF Kelstern and RAF Scampton.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Bessie Birkby and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2015-07-30
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AM. Ok so this interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre, the interviewer is Annie Moody and the Interviewee is Bessie?
BB. Birkby.
AM. Birkby, and the interview is taking place at Bessie’s home Wath on Dearne on the 30th of July 2015. So if perhaps Bessie just to start with tell me a little about your background, about your parents and school and stuff like that.
BB. Shall I tell you my age first?
AM. Go on tell me how old you are.
BB. I am ninety one going into ninety two. I was married to my husband Walter Birkby he always got called Wally I got called Tess that was my nick name and eh we had been married sixty three years when Walter died. And eh anyhow I was eighteen when I joined, had to join, because eh my sisters were nurses but I worked in a shop. So it was either going in munitions or going in the forces.
AM. How old were you when you left school Bessie?
BB. I was fourteen.
AM. So what did you do straight from leaving school?
BB. Mostly working in shops, you know [cough] like grocery shops and eh I loved it but then of course I was working in a shop when both my sisters were nurses. So I had to choose, either going in the forces or going in factories where you make bombs and things.
AM. Ok, you could have stayed in the shop, but you wanted to do something?
BB. But I fancied going in, in the forces so I joined and eh my mum put me on the train in Doncaster and I was crying and she was crying but I still wanted to go. But I’d never been, I never left home or, my father worked in the pit and my mum she had five children. I was next to the eldest and eh so we were both upset at me going but I still wanted to go. I was going as far as Bridgenorth anyhow I got on this train and off I went. When I got there, it was a long journey and when I got there, on the last train. I remember where I had to change but I don’t remember where or anything. So I met up with the girls that were going in to join to be a WAAF.
AM. What year was this Bessie?
BB. What year was it it was 1942.
AM. ’42.
BB. Yeah and so [cough] eh when we got there to Bridgenorth, ‘course you had to have a medical and all sorts of thing like that.
AM. What was that like.
BB. Well I had never really been away from home, I never sort of got undressed in front of anybody and it, it was an ordeal. And eh but anyhow I carried on and I made friends and I was very popular because I could do make up, I could do hair and all sorts, I used to love it you know, beautifying. I got lots of friends because they used to come to me.’Oh Bessie will you do my hair or will you do this, pluck my eyebrows?’ And I really enjoyed it but anyhow we had to get up early to get your knife, fork and spoon and what have you. You had to go outside for to wash yourself and eh and anyhow we started marching, we used to have to go on parade. And eh so anyhow I don’t know how long I was marching and what and then of course I put in to be a driver but of course I had to go along to be em trained [?]. So I had to go with girls I go to me MT Sections and em got sort of well anything you know [a little confused].
AM. When you put in to be a driver did you have to have an interview or anything or did they say yes you can be a driver then?
BB. No I had to, in fact they sent me to a place where there were balloons you know and I had to practice putting a balloon up which was like driving a car.
AM. Tell me more about that, how do you put a balloon up.
BB. I was posted to Scotland and so and there we didn’t have we had to go in digs in peoples houses. This lady I went into she were a lovely lady and she took to me. In fact for years I wrote to her but we lived in Borough Muir West and and I were really I loved it sending the balloon up.
AM. What do you mean ‘sending the balloon up.’?
BB. You had to fly it.
AM. How big was it?
BB. Huge, didn’t you remember them balloons, well they were huge weren’t they?
Unknown Male. Like a Zeppelin.
AM. Oh like a Zeppelin? Oh eh I have got you.
BB. They were like as big as a caravan.
AM. Like a barrage balloon?
BB. Yeah.
Unknown Male. So that planes would fly into wires that were holding them.
BB. ‘course it got me going to change gear and one thing and another to learn.
AM. So where were you, were you on the ground.
BB. I were in a cage and balloon were over top of me, I used to have to send them up and Germans were coming over, you know it were queer. But anyhow I think I was there about six months and eh there must have been a place for me to start up for me driving and I was posted to Pwllheli in North Wales then again.
AM. So down, up to Scotland and then across to Wales.
BB. Yeah, down in Pwllheli oh that were, I was six months there but you had to do eh, besides learning to drive you had to do, learn how to eh maintain your vehicle in the morning you put and inspection for your water, your battery what have you and then [cough] you go out driving on the roads. I used to go in all these eh country lanes it were in Pwllheli.
AM. Who was it that were doing the instructing.
BB. We had men instructed.
AM. What were they like?
BB. Well I don’t recall.
AM. What were they like with you I mean, were they ok, women learning to drive?
BB. I were a ‘right with learning this balloon business I knew how to change gear, do the footwork because you had to do it like driving a car and so I was very lucky because I soon learned to drive but I was there six months so I had a thorough training but when you passed out you had to pass out on three vehicles.
AM. Different ones?
BB. Yeah a little one, small and then a fifteen hundred and then a thirty hundred weight and then of course later on it in the time I got to drive a two ton, were it, what were it, crew bus. I used to drive the crew bus. I was first posted to Binbrook when I passed out driving but there were lots of girls who failed and they couldn’t go back driving they had to remuster to another job. But I was very fortunate I passed it all and then I was posted to Binbrook and they were just forming our Squadron 625 Squadron and it was Bomber Command. I forgotten what Group was it One Group? Bomber Command, 625.
Unknown male. You were stationed, no you would have been in Five Group.
BB. Can’t remember.
AM.Anyway 625.
BB. 625 Squadron.
Unknown male. It would be in Five Group.
BB. Yeah and so they were forming this Squadron and then from Binbrook I was posted to Kelstern which was a few mile away because there was a lot of aerodromes in Lincoln at that time, weren’t there and so this were all new but we all had eh to sleep in these eh tin things, what did you call them?
AM. Nissan huts.
BB. Nissan huts and there were ten beds, you just had your bed and what have you. You didn’t have sheets, aircrew had sheets but not.
Unknown male. Aircrew had sheets.
BB. But not.
AM. The girls didn’t .
BB. And we were in these, fireplace in the middle and it were a little round thing and and I don’t know what it, I think it was coal or coke and that were only heating you had. You had to go outside for toilets and what have you, ablutions, it were you know. But, oh it were marvellous and at Kelstern I got very friendly eh and I were post, I were given a job on the ambulance. So I lived in sick quarters and eh with being at Kelstern when that snow came, nobody could get anywhere could they. It were terrible but I [cough] used to take the MO, the Doctor down into Lincoln and I used to drive him about on the small ambulance. There were bigger ambulances for a crew and eh this particular day we were going down into Lincoln and the MO he were a marvellous fellow and he had flying boots on, big coat but then eh, now he says ‘ I shall be about two hours so you go market, have a look round and meet me so and so, and we will come back to camp, to Kelstern.’ So anyhow I did that and I thought while I’m in, ‘cause where I lived down at the old mill at home we had apple trees, pear trees and all sorts. So I thought ‘ I will buy me self some apples.’ And I am [unclear] eating me apple and I went to pick the MO up like and I said ‘would you like and apple sir?’ he said ‘yes I would,’ he said ‘now don’t be getting tummy ache.’ You know before tea time I started reeling, the nurses were saying ‘we are going to fetch the MO to you.’ Because I were crying with pain and of course they fetched him from Officers Mess. When he came he said ‘my dear I will have to take you down to Louth Infirmary.’ They operated on me with appendicitis before midnight. Do you know he stayed with me because I was crying, I wanted me mum, Oh I were in a state. Me mum managed to come and see me I were in a farm house.
AM. So it weren’t the apple. [laugh]
BB. [laugh] No, well I don’t know what it were, anyhow he were brilliant and he stuck with me until next morning when I come round. In them days putting you to sleep it were horrible, dreaming and what not. Anyway he gave me some leave and I were at home about a month I think. Anyhow it was when that snow was on of course there were no flying. So of course I went back to Kelstern and then a month after we got a message to say we were all moving to Scampton.
AM. Just before you moved to Scampton what did you do then when you got back to Kelstern?
BB. I went back on the ambulance
AM. Still the ambulance, so you were driving the MO around who, what else were they using the ambulances for, the crew or.
BB. Well they used the ambulances to follow them back didn’t they? They used to be many a time crashes ‘cause they used to shoot at them didn’t they? It were horrible. Anyhow eh I carried on then and then of course we all went to Scampton, I can’t remember the date at all. So anyhow I know for a fact that all Lancaster bombers from Kelstern, they all got toilet rolls where bombs used to go and they let them all go over the fields and there were white toilet rolls when we moved, when we moved.
AM. Why was that then.
BB. It was just a bit of fun for the farmers, these were aircraft doing this. Anyhow we got to, to and of course with me this one job I did eh I didn’t always be on ambulance. I remember eh there were er er an Officer in command of our MT and he came to Kelstern and he said to whoever were in charge of our MT at that particular time ‘I want one of your best drivers, because I am going visiting eh we shall be away about three weeks.’ He says ‘ I want somebody I can trust.’ And and I was a good driver so they picked me. So he were brilliant now he says, we had a good car, it were really good and we set off and we were going all up North to go to Topcliffe and all them aerodromes and we had to visit all MT departments. He says as we were setting of he says ‘now then I want you to relax and I want you just to think of me as your father. Whatever you want you must tell me and if you are ever in trouble or whatever you do when we get to different Stations I’ll get you sleeping quarters. And I’ll see that you are put, well looked after and you will not have to be frightened and you will have to get in touch with me if, if you are frightened.’
AM. What did he think you would be frightened of?
BB. I don’t know.
AM. All them men.
BB. I didn’t think of it then. You know I weren’t frightened because we lived out, when, when we were girls we lived down on our own in countryside we used to go to school and we couldn’t go home for dinner because it were too far away. We lived down at old mill didn’t we?
Unknown male. Aye [unclear]I remember being down there.
BB. In fact when I used to go home on leave I used to arrange, I used to hitch hike home to as far as Doncaster when I had the leave and eh what I did I used to catch the double decker bus from Doncaster and it always used to go to Brampton Church where I had to get of me last call, you know and it always used to get there about ten o’clock. And where we lived at the old mill I got off the bus and then I come on some steps and to go down these steps and down the road and what I used to do. Me mum used to be watching out for that double decker bus, she could see it from where we lived. And I used to whistle we had two dogs and me mum used to say ‘go on she’s come our Bessie, go and meet her.’ And they used to come as far as bottom of green them dogs and come and meet me home. And we had a big long orchard going down another way didn’t we?
Unknown male. Yeah.
BB. He knows where old mill were ‘cause it were a lovely, lovely cottage where we lived.
AM. Sounds it.
BB. Aye me mum always used to, always she used to always save me a little bit of steak and give me a cuddle. She used to spoil me, anyhow that were, I’m cutting me tale aren’t I. Anyhow I did that for three weeks and I got leave again given and it were wonderful, I enjoyed it and he were a gentleman and we had a burst, we had a burst tyre, I think we were near Topcliffe and and he said I’ll do it and he changed wheel. I said ‘I can do it I am capable.’ He said ‘I’ll do it. ’Because I had been driving. It were marvellous that and, and I were right proud to think they had chosen me, oh it were lovely. Anyhow, and then when we were posted to Scampton that’s when I met me husband but he already got a girl, lady friend. One of me first jobs there was sick quarters again on the ambulance, well I had small ambulance but they had quite a few big ins. Because in fact they had another Squadron there besides our Squadron. In fact there were they had just done eh where they dropped them bombs?
AM. Oh Dambusters.
BB. Yeah we must have been at Kelstern when that was on, it was soon after that when we were posted to Scampton.
AM. So it was 617 Squadron the other one then?
BB. Yeah so anyhow.
AM. What was it like being there with, how many women and how many men ‘ish a lot more men than women?
BB. Oh yeah.
AM. So what was it like.
BB. Well it, I don’t know it well you just did a job you were twenty four hours on and twenty four hours off weren’t we. I really, I had a wonderful life. I met me husband I’d been there quite a bit before I met him.
AM. Tell me a bit more about what you did, you drove the small ambulances.
BB. Yes.
AM. And then what or were you just driving the ambulance right through because I’ve got a picture of you here with the.
BB. That was at Binbrook.
AM. Oh was that at Binbrook.
BB. That was me first.
AM. Right
BB. Yeah that was at Binbrook.
AM. So you were an ambulance driver at Scampton.
BB. And I have another one a lovely one it’s in a it’s in a, in fact somebody came knocking at door one day and said we’ve seen your picture in a pub in Cleethorpes. It was me stood agin a van an RAF vehicle and it’s a lovely picture and it was in this on this, and then above there were all women marching, another two pictures. I am on this picture but I can’t remember myself being on it because I couldn’t see properly, but anyhow.
AM. Tell me about meeting your husband then? [unclear]
BB. Well he already got a girl friend.
AM. On the Base.
BB. On the Base and she was a parsons daughter but nurses used to kid me on and they used to say Bessie ‘you can’t have him because.’ But they used to call me Tess, I didn’t get called Bessie ‘you can’t have him because he has got a girl friend.’ I said ‘I’m not bothered but I’ll keep trying.’ Anyhow he went on leave didn’t he and when he was on leave she went out with a Pilot. Well I didn’t tell him but somebody did so I go me, I don’t know how it came about but I got talking to him and eh, and eh he took me to the pictures and it were Pinocchio, they were a picture on camp and we started going out together then and he had to go to Italy ‘cause they went, what did they go for.
AM. Were they dropping propaganda leaflets and stuff like that.
BB. Aye and he came back with a big thing of fruit and he gave it me and then we went home and I met his mum and dad in Bradford. He lived in Bradford.
AM. What was Wally, he was an Air Gunner.
BB. Yeah he got to be Warrant Officer before he, ‘cause there is his warrant up there, aye but when I met him he was a Sergeant. Then he got to be Flight Sergeant then he were. He ended up looking after prisoners of war eh after war finished. I mean he stayed in a bit longer than I did but eh I came out because I were pregnant.
AM. You were married by then?
BB. I loved him and, and so well we had been married all them years.
AM. You had been married sixty five years.
BB. We had a lovely life in RAF because girls used to come and Bessie pluck me eyebrows, Bessie do me hair, they used to say Tess to me like
AM. Tess
BB. I used to have some gloves on and I used to have Tess written on them. I used to be, I used to drive crew buses at Scampton and it [unclear] ambulance job.
AM. So what was driving the crew bus like, what, what was that?
BB. Well, I mean many a time within two minutes, they’d one go off and two minutes after another one, they were two minutes
AM. Oh eh the planes?
BB. Hundreds, loads, fifty, sixty oh and we used to wait at the end of the runway eh no flying control weren’t it. We used to stop against flying, and then we used to sort of go, go and dodge about or what have you and be there when they came back. Used to be watching them but once when I were driving the ambulance and there were planes came back and Germans were following them because they used to have to put runway lights on. If you were driving a crew bus and you were going to pick lads up that were coming back and they used to say ‘be early for me.’ You know didn’t they, used to breathing down your neck and eh [cough] and there would be no lights on. And you would be driving on and you would see this black brrr and you would go on grass. Oh it were mad and I mean, and but it was sad and all weren’t it especially and there used to be seven coffins go out and you know. They used to follow them back did Germans. It were terrible, they were nearly ready for landing.
Unknown male. Yeah when you were in circuit.
AM. The German fighters, fighter planes.
BB. Yeah but I had a lovely life, I enjoyed every bit of it and I loved him all me life.
AM. Good.
BB. I did really.
AM. What did you do after the war, did you come out more or less straight away.
BB. Well I were quite well on with having me baby but eh I’d been in four years and eh and he come out [cough] eh, [pause] mm, I know I had two children, pity me husband was still in he were looking after Italians and and they were brilliant eh they didn’t make no bother for me husband he was in charge of them, in fact they made him a cabinet.
AM. Where was that Bessie?
BB. It was where Terries are, is it Ipswich where we used to go picking because we got into married quarters, I had me baby she was nine month old, he was still in RAF. And eh, and eh and we were in married quarters and we used to be picking these cherries and eh ‘cherries, excuse me.’ Eh but I had lots of jobs really, I didn’t only drive the ambulance and crew bus I had lots of jobs you, you, you were detailed you know they would leave you so long in the ambulance and then you would be so long on this crew bus and then you would probably eh. I used to have different vehicles, vehicles where I could pop in home going through to Sheffield, yeah I did. My mum used to say ‘Oh goodness me there’s our Bessie, look what she’s got that big thing.’ And I used to be in this two, three ton lorry and and you had to jump over wheels. They couldn’t believe it and eh [laugh] she used to, oh it were lovely. I did used to drive lots of different vehicles and of course I got to be LACW that were leading aircraft woman. But I could have been a corporal but you had to go inside and I didn’t want that job, so I never.
AM. You enjoyed the driving?
BB. I did, I loved it and of course me husband he didn’t drive then Wally but eh he had a, he had a motor bike and we used to go up on leave and I used to ride on the back of his motor bike, but when he got out of the forces he went to the School of Motoring and he got a job British School of Motoring. Because he went to Blackpool, Lytham St Annes with RAF. He had to remuster because eh when flying had finished you know. So; but they were happy days.
AM. Lovely, did you drive after the war?
BB. Oh yes it stood me in good stead that because there weren’t many women drivers. Yeah, I got a job as soon as I got me two little ones to school. Me mum used to live nearby because she moved from where we lived and she got near to where I lived an she used to have two children for me.
AM. So what did you do?
BB. I used to drive for eh, eh war veterans and I used to go out selling bread and cakes and what have you and I had a real good job there.
AM. It must have been, so this was in the 1950’s.
BB. Our eh yeah 1947 Jeff were born and Nigel were born in 1946. I didn’t come out while I think. She were born in March and I didn’t come out until the middle of February because I weren’t showing, couldn’t tell.
AM. As long as you weren’t changing wheels.
BB. I’ve still got me pay book and I’ve still got me husbands pay book.
AM. Oh I might have a photograph of them as well.
BB. I know.
AM. That was excellent, thank you.
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 Bessie Birkby
Creator
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Annie Moody
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
2015-07-29
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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ABirkbyB150729
Conforms To
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Pending review
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Bessie Birkby grew up in Sheffield and volunteered for the Women’s Auxilliary Air Force in 1942. She first worked in Balloon Command in Scotland and then trained to be a driver in North Wales. She was then posted to 625 Squadron at RAF Binbrook but later transferred to RAF Kelstern and worked driving ambulances. She discusses driving the station Medical Officer into Lincoln in the snow and driving crew buses. She developed appendicitis, and had an emergency operation at Louth. Transferred to RAF Scampton, she again drove ambulances and crew buses, she met her husband Wally an air gunner and they were married for sixty five years. She talks about how the station was attacked by night fighters. While in the RAF she managed frequent visits home, sometimes in RAF vehicles. On leaving the Air Force she had three children and worked as a driver selling bakery items.
Contributor
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Hugh Donnelly
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
Royal Air Force. Balloon Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Shropshire
Wales--Pwllheli
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942
Format
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00:31:39 audio recording
625 Squadron
entertainment
ground personnel
love and romance
medical officer
military living conditions
Nissen hut
RAF Binbrook
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Kelstern
RAF Scampton
service vehicle
training
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/652/8923/PWadeR1503.2.jpg
0b506137cd4da312b391a18185ae0198
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/652/8923/AWadeR150726.1.mp3
95701c1624fa69e8a17fb1a5fdcce23c
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
Wade, Ron
R Wade
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Wade
Description
An account of the resource
Four items. An oral history interview with Ron Wade (b. 1917, Royal Air Force) and three photographs. He flew operations as a wireless operator with 58 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by Nigel Huckins
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
AM: Okay, so this interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is Annie Moody, and the interviewee is Ron Wade, and the interview is taking place at Mr Wade’s home in, near Cheltenham at Bishops Cleve on the 26th July 2015. So, Ron, if you just may be start off with just a little bit about your background, about your school days and what your parents did? Off you go.
RW: All right now, it’s switched off
AM: [Laughs]. Okay, so off you go Ron.
RW: Right. What do you want first?
AM: Well just tell me a little bit about your, what your parents did, and school days, where you were born, just a little bit of background about you.
RW: Yes, right, I was, you’ve got the date I was born.
AM: I have.
RW: And um, my parents, I was one of four children, I had two sisters and a brother. Unfortunately my brother was killed during the war, not on operations, but he, after I was shot down, he was working for the gas company and he would have been, um, he needn’t have joined, let’s put it that way, but er, because I was missing believed killed for six months and he said, ‘they’ve got Ron, I’m going to take his place’, and he joined the RAF. He was coming home on his birthday, 1943, on a motorcycle, and I was the motorcyclist in the family and taking risks a place, he hit a lorry and was killed outright, and so my parents had a rough time because I was, they thought I was, I was injured they didn’t know how badly and so um, they had a rough time.
AM: They must have done, yeah. What did your parents do Ron?
RW: My father was, they had a grocery shop at the time, but before the war my father was a Master Grocer and he was made redundant by the person he worked for it as a, I was born. Let’s start off where I was born. I was born in Stoke-on-Trent and Longton was the name of the one of the six towns, not five towns, they forgot Fenton, and so, um my, that was my father, he was a Master Grocer and those days, when he was younger, to be a Master Grocer was quite a trade. And so um, he, my mother worked in the Potteries in Longton where most of the china was produced and Ainsley and all the top china work, and she was a Paintress, a freehand Paintress, and er, the, also my sister, one of my sisters was also a paint, a freehand Paintress on pottery.
AM: Where did you go to school?
RW: I went to school at Woodhouse, it was called Woodhouse and er, an Elementary School. I wasn’t very good [laughs] at maths but I enjoyed school, but when came the age of fourteen, in those days you had to pay to go to Grammar School. We couldn’t afford that, so at the age of fourteen I was kicked out and I left, and so um, I wandered around trying to get a job. If you think, this was in the thirties and a lot of unemployment and so I was told to go and get a job. So I got a job in a factory at Longton and it was a bit rough because I had to, as a warehouse boy, I was paid five shillings a week and one of my jobs was to scrub the floors, light a fire under a heater in the factory so they could bring their food and put it on the top to heat it up for lunch. If I was late getting all that done, I was in dead trouble [laughs], but scrubbing the floors, it was so the one floor from downstairs, the ovens, we had two big ovens, one gloss and one biscuit, that we called biscuit ovens, [coughs] and then after a while the former warehouse boy he er, he worked in the moulding, he became a moulder in the moulding shop, and he said, ‘have they got on to you yet about moving from here?’ and at that time, I was scrubbing the floors with a scrubbing brush, cold water, down the steps, all wood, wooden steps, cleaning the steps going down there [laughs]. And so and er, then the crunch came when they said ‘right, pack it in, you go downstairs and help unloading from the ovens’ and what happened, it was, they’d be firing and then they used to open up after the firing, take all the bricks away from the entrance and then for twelve hours it would be cooling off. And then they got me with the others, the people unloading right from the top of the ladders and they brought it down and it was still very, very hot ware and then they got me with the others, carrying ware like dinner plates, [laughs], carrying from the oven. Up the stairs, two flights of stairs, along the corridor, which I had to clean [laughs] and into the warehouse, where the women were and they unloaded from the baskets. And one day, I was going up with a basket full of cups and saucers, and I used to carry them on my shoulder, basket on my shoulder and one hand on my hip, going up the same flight of stairs and I caught a water pipe that was sticking out from the stairs, just caught the basket and I had a choice. Shall I go down with the basket [laughs] or try and retrieve what I could, but I decided to let the basket go [laughs] and save myself.
AM: Save yourself.
RW: And there the ugly manager, who was one of the bosses sons stood at the bottom, with his hands on his hips and he saw, he saw all the ware down there, all smashed, and he said, ‘I’ll stop that out of your wages’ [laughs].
AM: And did they?
RW: No, no, they’d have been forever [laughs].
AM: I was going to say wages probably wouldn’t have been enough, would they?
RW: No [laughs] so that was that.
AM: So that was your introduction to work.
RW: My introduction to work.
AM: What about the RAF, how did you come to join the RAF?
RW: The RAF yes - what happened there?
AM: What made you want to join?
RW: From there, I went, I had several other jobs you know, trying to make a living in the 1930’s, wasn’t easy, and I walked around for miles getting jobs for five shillings a week. And then I was always interested in the RAF and I wanted to fly and so I went to join up when the war started and er, they said, ‘no, no’. I said ‘I want to be a pilot’, because my uncle had been a pilot and been killed, and um, but I always, right from a tiny child, wanted to fly, I wanted to be a pilot, and so they said ‘no, we have enough pilots’, and um, my maths wouldn’t have been good enough anyway.
AM: This was right at the beginning of the war, 1939?
RW: Oh yes, the beginning of the war, when the war started.
AM: So you would be twenty two?
RW: Twenty two, that’s right and I had been married. I made the mistake of getting married, and er, anyway I had a daughter by that marriage and she is now ninety seven, eighty seven, sorry, and amazingly enough, she visits me, she stills lives near Stoke-on-Trent.
AM: Yes, excellent.
RW: And she comes now and then to visit. I, then, that’s right, oh they said, ‘if you want to go into aircrew, if you want to fly, we can offer you the um’, what shall I say, oh yes, ‘offer you the way you can get into aircrew and you can be the wireless operator, and then from wireless operator, you would be an air gunner. That’s the only thing we can offer you if you want to fly’, and so this is what happened. I joined up, I was called up and I offered my services then, and I was called up in January 1940 and I did my ITW in Morecambe, sent to Morecambe, and that was quite an experience, because we all walked down the street in Morecambe and they said, ‘you eight in that house, you eight in the next house’, and so this went on and as we were allocated this one house and the dear lady, who was the boss of the house, she was coming downstairs and we were just coming into the house, into the hall and she said, ‘I didn’t want you here, I’ve had enough with guests through the summer’, [laughs] and so that was our introduction to this place. She wouldn’t let us use the lounge, we had a little room at the back and then they had a kitchen, where we were allowed in, but not the lounge [laughs], and I wasn’t very popular with her because I didn’t like her attitude, and she said we had to be in at ten o’clock at night and so one of us used to stay around, say like if we went to a dance, you see, and so this is what we did and er, we made it enjoyable. I think the pranks we got up to such as I cut out a skull and crossbones and put it in the light that it shone, the light shone through the skull and crossbones [laughs]. They had um, a, a bit of a showcase in there and I saw er, a cup in there, I thought, the old man, poor devil, he was really under the thumb with the old girl, and I saw a cup in there, an inscribed cup and I thought, marvellous, he must have been a runner or something like that, and so when I examined the cup, fortunately the door wasn’t locked on the showcase, and I was disgusted to see that it was for mineral waters [laughs]. The cup was given for being very good with his mineral waters, and so what happened there was, I filled it with cold tea [laughs]and I wasn’t very popular at all.
AM: No.
RW: We were allowed to go upstairs to our rooms, she complained about, about the rifles, we all had our the Enfield rifles.
AM: Because you were square bashing?
RW: That’s right, yes, up and down the streets, and so um, she complained because we put our rifles in the umbrella stand in the hall, so she said, ‘no, they must go upstairs and under your beds’, so fair enough, this is what we did. But at ten o’clock in the mornings, we had to get up early, but at ten o’clock we had a tea break and so we all, the whistle went and we all had to fall outside in the street and er, the old boy had to make the tea, you see. By the time he’d made the tea for the eight of us, the whistle went again [laughs] so we had to form up outside again, and er, also the rifles had to keep going upstairs under the beds [laughs], so by the time we had done all these things, then we were going to be late on parade so that’s fair enough we managed it.
AM: Oh good.
RW: Yes, and then we were eventually, we were called by the CO, we had to go, we were called into the CO’s Office in Morecambe and – left, right, left ,right, halt - and er, we stood, the eight of us there, and we stood in front of the CO, and he had his bits of paper on his desk and he said ‘which one of you is Wade?’, so - left, right, left, right, halt - ‘Right, I’ve had complaints from your landlady’, and er, he read out all these different things that I had done in the house. And then I tried to explain, I said ‘I’m guilty of what she said, but it’s very difficult to go up and down the stairs in our boots and not make a noise’, that was one thing that she went on about, and the other thing was that she had to take up the stair carpet and so we were making more noise going up and down the stairs and this went on for a while, but the CO, ‘well, you won’t be here for very much longer’, which we weren’t fortunately, but next door they had a marvellous time, the eight in there, and they were allowed into the lounge and they had a piano, and the pianist there, I’m trying to think of his name - Ronnie, Ronnie, but he played at the BBC and er, his friend ran the Squadronaires.
AM: Right.
RW: I forget his name now, they were a nice couple of guys, and they also were able to fraternise with the two daughters [laughs] so they were unhappy to leave Morecambe [laughs]. Anyway we went from Morecambe up to um, to do the wireless course, wireless operators and er, so as I say I joined in January and when I went to Swanton Morley, no, not Swanton Morley, I’m trying to think of the name of the place we went to now.
AM: No, never mind
RW: It’ll come, and um, that’s right, and so I started a course there as a wireless operator and er, I did quite a few months there, doing Morse. Very difficult, very difficult and I was very happy to leave there [laughs].
AM: Did you pass?
RW: I passed, yes, we had to, and from there I was interviewed, now I was hoping they were putting me onto a pilots course [coughs] and I was interviewed by a group, and they were ex pilots from the First World War and um, as I sat there they were asking questions, ‘why did I want to fly?’ and I said ‘I’ve always wanted to fly since, I, since being very small’ and so er, I thought I am going to get my course as a pilot. But the one question one of these old boys threw at me was, ‘what would your feelings or attitude be, if you fired at a German and you saw his face disintegrate due to your bullets?’ I said ‘bloody good show, that’s what I joined for’ and so [laughs], and they all looked at me, you know, ‘who’s this crazy guy we’ve got here’ [laughs] and so that went on, and I thought, oh no, they’re going to put me on a pilots course. ‘No’, they said, ‘no, you will be an air gunner’. So I went down to South Wales and did an air gunner’s course there and this is just about the end of the Battle of Britain, and er, we were being bombed and shot up every day and night there, and er, and I was chased down the runway one day by a Junkers 88 and I managed [laughs], the bullets were going all around me and I got behind a sand bin and they came through the sand, the bullets from this 88 and then the hut, the hut we were in the, the normal RAF Huts.
AM: Nissen Huts.
RW: Yes, that’s right, all wood, and er, one day they bombed and destroyed the one each side of ours then we had to lie down flat as they strafed us, the bullet holes through the hut, through the wood.
AM: And this was at training camp in South Wales?
RW: In South Wales, yes, day and night. We weren’t allowed, as air crew, we weren’t allowed to sleep in the huts so we had to go out in the field and within tents and sleep outside, and there again, I was a bit crazy and I slept behind the beds. I put my mattress down there and then I thought ‘what’s it going to be?’ and my DRO’s, one of our men, was killed because he didn’t get in the tents, so I was turfed out of there and I had to go into a tent and er, that was the end of the Battle of Britain.
AM: Of the Battle of Britain.
RW: Yes.
AM: What was the training like Ron, the air gunner training?
RW: Oh it was intense, very intense and we had, had er, we had the um, Fairey Battles, Whitley’s 1’s and 3’s which were, they were pretty awful things this is why they had, and the Whitley 5’s we finished up on, they were also rubbish, [laughs] sorry to say. And um, as I said training had to be intense because we were the only ones carrying the war to the Germans, Bomber Command, and so from there other things happened you know, I was lucky to get away with we were, because they were bombing night and day.
AM: Because of the bombing?
RW: And so er, from there I went to OTU at Abingdon.
AM: Abingdon, Oxfordshire.
RW: That’s right, Abingdon, and er, that was very intense. We had very few hours off and because we were needed, and so from there a very good friend of mine, he was a pilot doing his training too and we were formed up into fives.
AM: So it was five, there were five of you in your group?
RW: Five in a group.
AM: This was for a Whitley?
RW: Whitley 5, yes, and er, Mac was his name, MacGregor Cheers and I’ve got it in my book, and he didn’t want to be a pilot, he wasn’t happy training as a pilot, poor Mac. There was me, I wanted to be a pilot and he would have rather, rather been an air gunner but it didn’t work out that way.
AM: How did you get together as a crew?
RW: Oh there we er, we had, later on when we got to the squadron, I moved on to 58 Squadron er, from training and um, this, our CO there, he said ‘I’ve been having too many complaints from you, from all air crew about the Whitley’, and we said ‘we’d rather be on the Wimpeys’, you know the Wimpey?
AM: I don’t know the Wimpey.
RW: Yes, the Wimpey was the one, I’m trying to think of it now, the Wimpey. We were on the Whitleys, I was flying on the Whitleys, this was the, this will probably tell you in the book there [looks through the book].
AM: I can’t find it, never mind it doesn’t matter.
RW: Anyway, we’ll find it yes. It’s my age [laughs].
AM: You’re allowed [laughs].
RW: And so we said we’d rather be on different aircraft, we didn’t like Whitleys, and he said, ‘anymore complaints and you’ll be off flying, you’ll be grounded’, he said ‘you fly in this and it’s a very good aircraft and you have to fly it’.
AM: Where was 58 Squadron based then, at that point?
RW: We were at Linton on Ouse.
AM: Okay.
RW: And that is where we had to form up and choose the crew, choose the fives, and er, it was very good, very good. And, oh yes, when I arrived there, our flight commander came through the hangar, I came from one door and he came through the other door, flight lieutenant, and um, he said ‘my god, we are glad to see you’, he said, ‘we had a rough night on Berlin last night and we had one aircraft left in our flight’. So he said, ‘come and meet the lads’, so off I went in the crew room and er, I met the lads and er, he said ‘right, this is Ron, Ron Wade, and er, he wants a cup of coffee. What do you want, tea or coffee? Who’s on making coffee?’, ‘Oh, I did it yesterday’, ‘now make him a cuppa, whatever he wants’, so I met the lads that way. But er, how we formed up in a crew we went into flying control and into the room there and all milling around meeting each other, formally or informally and this is where we formed up, and er, I was very lucky guy. I had a lucky war really because my original crew, I was taken off, we did two trips, two trips, I forget where it was now, but they said, ‘right that’s me softened up so you are being replaced by this Graham (I think his name was), Graham, because he ditched in the sea and he has been on leave for a couple of months, but he will be taking your place’, then last heard of, they came down in the sea, so this Graham had two trips, two operations both into the sea and the second time they weren’t recovered, so I was very lucky there, but I said to Amy, ‘how must his parents have felt?’
AM: Yes
RW: Because I think of him now, taking my place I had through good luck and he had the bad luck. My folks had the bad luck with my brother being killed and me being [unclear] after six months they thought I’d been killed.
AM: So just wheeling back a bit.
RW: Yes.
AM: So you didn’t, you were taken off that crew and then, presumably, put with another crew?
RW: Yes
AM: And did some more operations?
RW: Yes, with another crew, and then I was waiting to get on another crew and er, it was rather boring because I was sweeping, I was cleaning the snooker table and I got very good at snooker, and I was waiting and then I had several attempts to go on ops but something happened every time. And then on a Whitley 5, they um, they had a lot of what you call exacter trouble. If they snatched too hard then it would go fully fine and we would have to turn back and so er, this happened, different things happened and I didn’t get, because I had, I just, oh yes, what happened, from the trip before, it had been a bit hairy, got a few holes in it and er, I had a premonition from that, that as we were coming into land, I saw the runway and I thought I won’t see this again, I’m going to be killed. Strange feeling, it was a very, very, it, it and I knew I was going to be killed, strangely enough and I wanted to get this trip over, the next trip over, all my crew who were going to be my crew were on leave and I should have waited to come back but this is on January, January 8th I think, I think it’s in there, the book. Oh yes, my roommate, I won’t mention his name, but he came back from leave and he said that he was tired, he knew what the trip was going to be, it was a tough one, Konigsburg, and er, the CO said, ‘there are two fighter areas’, so he said, ‘keep North and be very wary because of the fighters’, and I knew that it was going to be tough because of so many things going on there. And so er, I volunteered for this, and he said that he was tired so the sawbones gave him a pill and told him to go to bed, so I volunteered, do you want to go to bed because always a thing come back, leave, he had a tough one, crew didn’t make it, we were losing so many in those days. And so off with his name, on with mine, just the [unclear] they wanted and er, I thought, I’m going to get it over with, and so off we went and this is when we were in Holland, North Holland, and then we had, they hit the port engine and we set on fire.
AM: Where? On the way to drop your bombs?
RW: Yes.
AM: On the way there.
RW: On the way there, yes, and er, we thought we were going to come down in the North Sea, we were going over the North Sea at the time, and January you didn’t live very long in the North Sea, and so we thought, that’s it, and all the rest of the crew were aged nineteen and I was the oldest.
AM: You were an old boy, twenty three?
RW: Twenty three, yes, and so um, the navigator said, ‘I don’t think we’ll make it, we are not going to make Holland’ and so the skipper said, ‘right I don’t know what you are going to do, but it’s no use coming down, we’ll have to go down into the sea and about five minutes that will be it because Whitley’s didn’t swim very well’ [laughs]. And so I was in the, I was flying as a rear gunner at the time, operating as a rear gunner, and by the way before that I had done a trip from um, the, when I was at OUT, I’d been, I was on a crew, going, dropping leaflets over Italy. We had a trip to Turin and it’s in the book there and dropping leaflets and we were attacked by two fighters and I told the pilot to do this um, manoeuvre to get away from them and um, then when we came up again, they fired at us and then I had the new Brownings, four of them, and they really did damage because I fired at them and then they turned and smoke poured from both of them and they retreated and went back. I didn’t know if they went down or not but they weren’t happy, and so that was an earlier.
AM: So that was Italy,
RW: And I was going to tell you.
AM: So now, now you’re on your way to Holland?
RW: That’s right on operations, I’d gone from there and I had a photograph taken by picture post in the turret, in the rear turret, showing off these new Brownings , and er, yes, so back to the squadron, on our way to Wilhelmshaven and then we were hit and I thought that’s it, this is my premonition coming because fire broke out and it was getting close, my job to get, we were given the order to bail out although if we wanted to over the sea, but by this time the navigator had informed us that we could make it, we just made it, North Holland, so we had been told to bail out. I had to get out of the rear turret somehow, we’d been losing height at quite a pace, so when I got out of the rear turret, because my parachute was in the fuselage, and so I had to open the rear doors of my turret, crawl out, then the order was to get my parachute and harness, ‘cos there’s no room in the turret for them, so my training was that I got these and then I had to get back into the turret with great difficultly, close the doors, turn ninety degrees and then go out backwards.
AM: Right
RW: But fortunately for me, as I was getting my parachute and harness and I put them on, the first wireless op came down the fuselage and he jettisoned the door, waved to me and the sparks and flames coming past the fuselage door, and he waved and jumped through this. Now I’m not getting back in that turret, I’ll never make it and so I was going after him and so I made for the door and, what happened next then, and, oh yes, I was about to jump and then out of the corner of my eye I saw the navigator coming down dragging his parachute and harness. He hadn’t put it on.
AM. Oh no.
RW: And so I couldn’t leave him, the plane was slipping like this – slipping, slipping, slipping - we lost a lot of altitude and we were getting pretty close, and so he couldn’t do anything because he was almost falling over every time the plane went. What had happened, the two pilots had gone from the door, from the front.
AM: So they’d bailed out?
RW: They’d bailed out, because he’d given orders for us to bail out by then, and as I say don’t forget that all the rest of the crew were nineteen, they very young. And so he went, that’s right, so I went back and zipped him up and then pushed him out, hoping that he’s there [laughs], then I went after him. Then I don’t remember anything else, apart from it had been snowing through the night, it was a very, very bad night and um, it was about eight o’clock and then I came down in this field and er, the place is called Anna Paulowna, a little hamlet, and the next morning um, a man going to work on the farm and er, he just saw me and I was covered in snow, and it had been deep snow through the night, and he found I was still ticking.
AM: So you were unconscious?
RW: I was unconscious because, what had happened, the Dutch people told me afterwards, that I had gone towards the plane, so we must have been pretty low when I bailed out. I was the last one out, and so that’s why I don’t remember anything, they said that they called to me to come away ‘cos I was making for the plane, so it wasn’t very far away, but as, what I remember when I bailed out, that I was hoping that the parachute would open [laughs].
AM: Quickly.
RW: Quickly, and the um, I wasn’t scared, strangely enough, I just wasn’t scared, and the only thing I could think of, I missed my bacon and eggs, because the only time we had bacon and eggs was when we came back from an operation, then I was calling swear words to the others ‘lucky bastards’ [laughs].
AM: No bacon and eggs.
RW: [Laughs] You’ll be having my bacon and eggs and that’s all I could think off [laughs]. I’d been looking forward to that, and then they called me to come away from the aircraft and so what had happened then, as the ammunition had been exploding, then I stopped one in the back of the head and so I’d been treated in hospital there and um -
AM: So the Dutch people found you?
RW: Yes
AM: And took you to hospital?
RW: No, oh no.
AM: Oh right.
RW: They called the Germans, because if they’d been found, they took me into the hamlet where they lived and then they called the Germans because if the Germans had come and found me first, we’d have all been shot. So the Germans took me away and then they took me into hospital because I’d stopped the bullet in the back of the head, the doctor said I was very fortunate because if it had been any deeper I would have been killed, which was my premonition. And if it had been over a little, I would have been blind and so what happened, I lost, I found out later, I lost the least of the senses that was smell and taste and I’ve never been able to smell and taste since. I can taste, I was tested for it when I came back home and I can taste sugar, salt, vinegar.
AM: So things that have a strong taste.
RW: That’s right yes, that’s all I can taste, so that was it.
AM: So you are in the hospital, you’ve been treated?
RW: Oh yes, I’d been treated.
AM: Then what happened?
RW: What had happened, I had an enema, do they call it? It was a hell of a mess [laughs] and then I was in this ward and er, I was, I remember being in this bed and looking up and there’s a fellow waving to me across the ward, and I thought, ‘who the hells that. I don’t know him’, and this went on for a whole day when he was waving and that was the navigator.
AM: Right
RW: And I didn’t recognise him and this went on and after a while it came, my memory came back again.
AM: So that’s two of you in the hospital?
RW: That was in the hospital. Oh yes and um, when I got talking to the navigator again, he said, ‘careful’, because I was well known for my dirty jokes at times [laughs], anyway different thing he said, ‘be very careful what you say because that one there, is a Nazi’. The only time they listened to the radio was when Hitler was making a speech so he said, ‘very, very careful what you say’. He used to go to the cupboard there, get this radio out, switch it on when Hitler finished speaking, disconnect, back in there, so he said, ‘be very careful’ [laughs], and from there I went in an ambulance, that’s right. They took me to an old camp, the French, French and Belgians in there and um, I’d asked one Frenchman there, he spoke English, if he could get me some information because we were right next to an airfield and they were working on the airfield, and I said, ‘can you get me an old coat to wear and er, then I can make my way with you to this airfield’. Somehow I was going to, although I was a wireless op, I knew the controls and I was going to try and steal a plane and get back home.
AM: This is in the first camp after the hospital?
RW: In the first camp, yes, and er, it was a rough old camp. I remember the blanket I had was 1917, and er, it was rough, and er, and I’ll never forget having, oh yes, they said, ‘can’t you taste that?’ I said, ‘why it’s all right’. I was eating this stuff, sauerkraut [laughs], rough sauerkraut, they were dished up with, I said, ‘no’ [laughs]. Anyway just after that, next day, two great big Nazi’s came in, ‘wait’, so this Frenchman must have, must have told them what I was up to because they took me and after seeing films of people being taken for a ride, I went in this Opel I think, I think the car was an Opel, it was an Opel, and the one as big as Gary. I had one each side of me, I was down middle of them, and off we went and er, I was taken down to the station, down near the station, into the large, like a town hall - left, right, left, right - up in front [laughs], not so nicer man, this CO, and he said, ‘right, this and that’ [unclear] it was a big desk, I’ll never forget and he said, ‘this man here has had his orders, and he is going to take you on the train to Frankfurt and he’s been warned and told that if you try to escape, or do anything, he will shoot you dead’.
AM: He spoke to you in English?
RW: Oh yes, oh yes in English, and so um, I was, people were trying to attack me on the way up, up to this town hall.
AM: Civilians?
RW: And one man came with a knife and the guard had to fend him off and others because they’d had an air raid there, you see, and so off I went, and went up to this town hall and that’s when he had his orders, anyway I was taken back down to the railway station.
AM: What town was this Ron?
RW: This was in Cologne.
AM: You were in Cologne by then.
RW: Yes, and I was driven right the way down there, and so I thought, oh yes. When I was in the waiting room and other er, Germans were in there, you see, drinking coffee, suppose that’s coffee and things like that, nothing was offered to me [laughs] and so then I said oh, ‘stand up’, and the door opened, as this door opened a major (unclear) he came in.
AM: An English, a German?
RW: No a German, a German major, he came in and they all gave the Nazi salute, ‘Heil Hitler, Heil Hitler’, yes, I came out I said, ‘Heil Churchill’, oh, he was just turning to go and I said this, and he got his gun out his Mauser, his Mauser or whatever it was, and I thought, well you’ve done it this time [laughs], and then he said ‘English schweinhund’ (unclear) off he went. I got away with that one [laughs], especially as I had just had this
AM: The warning?
RW: Warning yes, and um, and that was that and so when the train came, we went up to Frankfurt and um, he was watching me like a hawk.
AM: Were you handcuffed to him or anything?
RW: No, no.
AM: There was nowhere to run to though is there?
RW: No, but all the way I was wondering how I was going to belt him and looking at the window, how strong is it because I was going to smash it with his rifle, you see.
AM: Right.
RW: And it was quite a journey, beautiful trip from Cologne, up to Frankfurt but that’s in my mind all the time, how am I going to get out of here and get rid of him [laughs], and then the chance didn’t come, didn’t come. His eyes were on me every step of the way, he was scared he would have been shot if I had escaped, and so we went to my first real prison camp that was up to the um, what they called, it wasn’t a Stalag, before the Stalag.
AM: Was it a Dulag, Ron?
RW: A Dulag, and once again this officer, German officer came in and I was in the cell there, and one very high window, and er, oh he said, ‘I speak English very well, I was educated in Oxford’, and er, he said, ‘you will find we will treat you very well now, but er, a few things to add’, and er, he said, ‘this form here’, he’d got a form with a red cross on the top, ‘so all you need do is answer a few questions, so there you are’, and he said, ‘first of all, do you smoke?’, and I smoked in those days, so he got a packet of Capstans and a box of Swans.
AM: Vesta.
RW: Vesta matches, put them on the top there and there I was, smoking away, ‘right then, first things, name, rank, number’, that’s all right, name, rank, and number, and so put those in, he said, ’good, then we will let your parents know or what have you, that you are alive and well and injured’, and so um, that’s all right. ‘Now these other things’, and I looked on this form, ‘what squadron, your CO, what was his name, and the airfield you took off from, what was the aircraft you were flying, note it down here’. ‘There we are and that’s all I can give you, name, rank and number’. He said, ‘surely you want your people to know, you want your parents to know you’re alive?’, ‘yes course I do and that’s what you have to do because that’s all I’m giving you, my name, rank and number’. Then he became a German, and he went red and he did a lot of words came out that weren’t English and he said, ‘then you’ll stay here until you do fill that in’, and [laughs], and he grabbed the matches and cigarettes and put them in his pocket, and so I was fortunate in as much as I had to be taken up to the hospital to get my bullet hole seen to [laughs] and so I got away with that. Next cell he, whoever it was, had had a rough time, I heard him groaning and yelling and I think they beat him up because he wouldn’t answer and I refused too. The next morning they had taken my uniform away through the night, they’d taken it, I had to strip it off and they took it all away. The next morning, I saw they knew where the map was in the shoulder, then they’d taken the button off.
AM: So all the stuff that was to help you to escape?
RW: That’s right, they knew where it was, they’d taken it and the needle, the compass needle had gone out of the button [laughs] so then you weren’t full of tricks, and so that was Dulag, and from there, I was taken, I went to, yes, Stalag Luft 1, yes, I was taken there next.
AM: Were you still being taken on your own or were you with other prisoners by then?
RW: No I went in, the other prisoners I met there in Dulag and um, you know it was great to meet them and speak English, it was great and they’d give tips and that. I went to Stalag Luft 1 and um, then we stood at the gate welcoming the boys coming in and it was a sandy soil and we got them to throw the lighters and things in there, because the guards were trying to keep us back, you see, and as we went towards the gate, we did this at every camp we went to, throw your things in, throw them in, throw them in, because they had been stripped of things mostly and so what they did, pick them up and give them back to him and then, and then when we couldn’t get down to things, we just trod them in.
AM: Trod them into the ground?
RW: Into the ground as they forced us back, because them bleeders were very sharp [laughs].
AM: So you could go back for them later?
RW: Yes that’s it, and especially went from Stalag Luft 1 and then did about eighteen months there and then we were moved to Stalag Luft 3 and er -
AM: So what year are we now, 41 probably?
RW: My god, yes.
AM: So you were shot down early 41.
RW: January 41 yes.
AM: And then you were in hospital and eighteen months.
RW: I wasn’t in the hospital for eighteen months.
AM: No, no, the hospital and then you were in Stalag Luft 1 for eighteen months.
RW: That’s right.
AM: So we are now?
RW: Now in Stalag Luft 3.
AM: Probably early 43?
RW: About 43.
AM: By this time.
RW: And we did, and went to this new camp, er, we hadn’t heard of before.
AM: How did they move you, on trains?
RW: Yes, and er, yes, on cattle trucks, they weren’t very clean. There’s wire both sides of the entrance of the cattle truck and we were put in twenty each side, standing up, you couldn’t sit down, we were packed in. When you think half a cattle truck, and so this is how we moved, sometimes we had better accommodation but this new camp we went to was Stalag Luft 3, everything is new there, all the huts were new and so we started a different life.
AM: Were you the first intake into Stalag Luft 3?
RW: We were yes, from Stalag Luft 1 into Stalag Luft 3, and then, after that, they started to bring the RAF prisoners from other camps into Stalag Luft 3, and er, they said, ‘you’ll never escape from here, we’ve learnt too many lessons’, but we did, the lot, a lot of people said they tried, escaped from there and they probably tried but they didn’t succeed and it was difficult, and then all the different things, books had been written by prisoners [laughs] and things, no, it was very difficult. I tried once and out of the corner of our hut, I got down and one man from Cheltenham said, ‘you’ll get us all shot, you know’ because I dug through the floor and dug down and I could see where workmen had been, electricians or something yes, been working outside and there was a trench near the camp, near the um, wire and so I got down there and then got out there in the early hours of the morning. It was dark and er, I thought I can get under the wire, get under there, escape, fair enough, so I tried this and then I heard a guard approaching with his dog. Dogs, they were more like wolves, and he had got this one and I heard him coming along and so I got out of there, swiftly went up the road, oh yes, and I had an experience, I ran between two huts and I didn’t see wire stretching from one hut to the other and I ran into it, and it got me in the mouth, took me off my feet and I was strung up and the wire went into my mouth and forced, forced my teeth out. I lost seven teeth, and I landed on my back and then there was the guard and the dog, and he was afraid of that dog as I was [laughs], they weren’t trained to be friendly and so I was put into the cooler from there.
AM: What was that like?
RW: Rough. I had water to drink, bread, well when they say bread, black bread, just bread and er, I was in there for over a week.
AM: On your own?
RW: Oh yes, yes, oh yes.
AM: And no teeth.
RW: No teeth, they’d come out, I have no teeth now. I tell people that um, if I’ll say I had my teeth out, all paid for [laughs]. But um, all the time we were trying to, if we had any ideas about escaping, we had they had to go to this Massey who was the -
AM: What was the name sorry, Ron?
RW: Massey, Group Captain Massey, and you had to give your ideas to him for the escape committee, but something we noticed when we first went into Stalag Luft 3, that one part where the fence was, they hadn’t built any German huts or anything there, it hadn’t been finished. And so John Shaw, my good friend, he noticed this first and he said, ‘we’re gonna go try that’, he said, ‘we go first, the four of us’, I forget the other one and he said, ‘I go first because I noticed it first’. I said, ‘okay, then I’ll go, you get away now, I’ll go follow on’.
AM: How were you going to get out, were you going to tunnel under?
RW: Tunnel under there because they hadn’t built anything that side, so this is what we are going to do, and so you’ve got to appreciate, so John decided to go. What happened, bang, bang, and I have a photograph I’ll show you, with John, and shown in his coffin, he was shot right through the heart, so if people thought that these guards were asleep in the huts, no, and they were crack shots, they got him right through the heart, poor John.
AM: So the other three of you didn’t go?
RW: No, we’d been discovered that was it.
AM: Did you know the people who were involved in the great escape?
RW: No.
AM: No.
RW: No, they were mainly officers. You see what happened, we started off these tunnels under the cooking, took that away and then got all that (unclear) and then dug down to do the tunnels, but then again, we said this would happen, the officers took over, we started it as sergeants and then they said, ‘no, we are going to take over’, and then we were moved eventually to Heydekrug.
AM: To?
RW: Heydekrug.
AM: Which is?
RW: Heydekrug.
AM: Which is another camp?
RW: Which is another camp, yes, so we’d done a lot of work. I was, I helped out with moving the earth wearing these things there, but the soil, the soil we brought up from below, it was a different colour, so we had to take this earth from down below, walk around, walk around and distribute it and dig it in as we were moving, because they were watching us all the time.
AM: These are from the tunnels you dug?
RW: That’s right, yes [laughs], and we were getting rid of the earth, tons of earth, you know. It’s boring.
AM: Well yes, what else did you do in camp?
RW: Oh all kinds of things, apart from trying to escape [laughs], and er, we wrote shows. We did this, you see, and Les Knowle became a very good friend of mine and he was a pianist before the war, before he joined up and he, a professional pianist, was very good too.
AM: Was he the one next door to you in Morecambe or a different pianist?
RW: No, no, it was a different one.
AM: A different one.
RW: No, Les Knowle, he was a different one. This one I’m trying to think of his name, Ron, I forget now, but he went on to the BBC and worked from there and he was on the RAF Band.
AM: Yes.
RW: And then he became well known.
[Interruption]
AM: I’m just going to pause for a moment.
RW: Have you anywhere else.
AM: No, no, so we’ve got shows, what about, did you do any education they had?
RW: Oh yes, yes, and um, I’ve a pencil, and I was studying maths actually and I was going to do a course on maths and it was difficult because it was very, very cold, very cold, up in Lithuania, this was and getting close to Russia and so I was studying and then trying to write out holding the pencil.
AM: So literally holding it with whole of your hand?
RW: That’s right.
AM: Trying to write.
RW: Trying to write, it wasn’t easy, but it was quite good and then I studied, I was studying, was architect because I had been in the building trade, you see. I was taken away from the factory when I was fourteen.
AM: When you were fourteen yes.
RW: By my brother-in-law, who was, um, he’d come to the factory, fortunately before they absolutely killed me [laughs], and he said, ‘you, out’ and he took me away and made me an apprenticeship joiner.
AM: So you were a joiner. Going back to the camp in Lithuania.
RW: Oh Yes.
AM: So what happened then as, what did you know about what was happening in the war?
RW: We had clever people as sergeants, not all officers then. We had people from all walks of life as sergeants.
AM: As sergeants yes.
RW: And er, we had entertainers from the stage, and I wrote um, with Les Knowle, he wrote the music and I wrote the words for shows on the stage and I’ll show you a picture of him, but I don’t know if you have ever heard of Roy Dotrice?
AM: Yes
RW: You have? Well Roy, I’ll show you a picture.
AM: His daughter was an actress, Michelle.
RW: That’s right, he had two daughters, one lives in the States, Michelle, I was watching her the other night.
AM: And was he in the prison camp with you?
RW: Yes, yes, and then I never thought that he would, because he was very young, he was born in Jersey and he changed his age. He was very much younger than me then and he came over to the mainland and joined the RAF.
AM: What happened at the end of the war, how did you find out that the war was ending and what happened?
RW: Oh yes, now then, we had our radios that were built out of things, things we’d stolen from the Germans. I remember walking behind one man carrying, carrying a box and stealing something out of there and when they, they used to um, we used to be woken up in the early hours of the morning by the Nazis. They used to come in and get us out of bed, tear the place apart, and never put it back again, and all things taken out and then we would be walking around the compound from the early morning to late at night while these Nazis were searching and they, yes, and they used to go away with things. Oh yes, we used to steal their hats and their gloves and they weren’t very happy [laughs], and also if anyone escaped, they used to have what we called a sheep count, and they’d form up the barriers so we used to have to go through, and they’d check and check the numbers, you see, and we used to go through and then we used to go back round, and come in again, in the end they had more prisoners than they wanted [laughs], and that was one gag we got up to, and then some had contact at home. You’ve possibly seen it in the letters they used a code in a letter which the Germans couldn’t spot.
AM: To say where they were?
RW: That’s right, all kinds of things.
AM: So how did you find out that the war was coming to an end? From the radios?
RW: From the radios we had, yes. We had certain guys who were very clever, clever electricians among us, all kinds of things they used to do, where if a German came in the front about or something, a buzzer would ring at the far end telling whoever was doing something, escape committee at the other end.
AM: To stop them?
RW: Then bury the stuff again.
AM: Gosh.
RW: And then all things like that and um, the, yes, parts for the radios be stolen from the Germans [laughs] and they would build a main radio that one clever man used to operate. I forget the names now and um, they used to come around the huts and give us the, the news we used to get daily news, we knew exactly what was happening back home, and e,r when the invasion came, the first time, the Germans were gloating when they said, ‘that was your invasion’, when so many Canadians were killed, remember, my minds going.
AM: On the beaches at, yes.
RW: Yes, where so many were killed, and the Germans thought that was our invasion. They said, ‘you’ve had your invasion, you’ll be here’, I was told that I would be there for the rest of my life, they used to enjoy telling us this, that we would be there and we will be rebuilding Germany.
AM: Because they would win.
RW: That’s right.
AM: Sadly for them but thankfully for us.
RW: Oh, thankfully for us.
AM: They didn’t.
RW: But they loved telling us that we would be there forever.
AM: When it did all end? Were you involved in the long march?
RW: Oh yes.
AM: You were.
RW: That was the worst part of it.
AM: Gary’s making faces.
Gary: I’ll leave it.
RW: Okay. That was a tough one, the long march.
AM: How long were you on the march for, Ron?
RW: I can’t think now.
AM: Months, it was months, wasn’t it?
RW: Months, months, bad weather, bad weather, so many died, and then we were, we had no food and they’d been trying to get through to us and then this one Red Cross wagon appeared and he said, ‘this is the third load I’ve had. I’ve been shot at, and destroyed, then I have gone back and got another load’, and finally, well you know the story.
AM: Sadly.
RW: And some sights there, on that march, and one man, he was signalling with his coat in the meadow, this meadow where we were, shot up by the fighters and I saw him just cut in the air.
AM: Shot at by German fighters?
RW: No, by our fighters.
AM: By our fighters.
RW: Yes, they thought we were Germans.
AM: Right.
RW: And he was just cut in two, Roger. Next time I saw him, just his legs standing there, top half gone and they killed forty, fifty of us there, it was a rough one. Oh, and we were in twos, they delivered these Red Cross parcels, we shared one between two, and when we were shot at by Typhoons by the way, based locally and all the way through, we’d been shot at by Spitfires, and what have you, Hurricanes, they thought we were Germans. And on one occasion, we were walking, they made us walk at night because, so through the day, we had to sleep in barns with their animals, and the Germans, the German people used to give things to the guards but nothing to us, not like this country where there were prisoners, their prisoners there given food but we never got anything from the Germans. If we wanted a drink, we had to wait till we got to rivers, lakes, or something or get washed.
AM: So how did you get rescued in the end?
RW: Oh that is another story. The 10th Hussars. We were hearing reports our, our troops across the Rhine and how close they were getting and we were being marched away, we were going to be hostages and Hitler would have got rid of us eventually, we’d have been shot or what have you. We were heading for Norway somewhere and they were taking us as we were going to be hostages, but so many things happened we were shut up, barns were set on fire, men were there.
AM: With men in them?
RW: Yes.
AM: Yes. But the 10th Hussars were?
RW: The 10th Hussars caught up with us and oh, they were marvellous, they treated us like royalty. They set up trestles in this village in Ratzeburg in Lubeck, Ratzeburg, and er, this little village and it was in March, was it May?
AM: So May of 45?
RW: We went through Luneburg, where they signed the Armistice, and we went through there and then we came back through there when the signing had been done, and it was marvellous, so they set up tables there with food on, couldn’t eat it.
AM: I was going to say, could you eat it?
RW: No, no. One man died because he tried, he tried to eat, couldn’t. Then we came back from Lowenberg on Lancasters and I’ll never forget seeing white girls, posh ladies all made up, I thought they, I thought they were on the stage somewhere, heavy lipstick.
AM: Once you got back you mean?
RW: And this is when we, no, when the 10th Hussars. Oh yes, that’s another one, we had the, this major, English major. I said, ‘can I help?’ because I had had stomach trouble and couldn’t eat anything, so I felt this marvellous feeling.
AM: Freedom.
RW: Freedom, marvellous after four and a half years, freedom. And I’d stuck my neck out several times, one man, I bent down to pick up food or something, I don’t know what it was, peas somebody dropped on the road, and this guard, he came behind me, kicked me up the backside and I went over and I got up and turned round to gonna belt him, and the look on his face, and his Tommy gun was there waiting for it, just what he wanted. All they wanted, an excuse.
AM: To kill you?
RW: Yes and er -
AM: When you saw the Lancaster?
RW: Oh yes.
AM: You’d been in Whitleys, what did you think of the Lancaster?
RW: We saw the side of it really [laughs].
AM: Four engines.
RW: Four engines, yes, marvellous.
AM: So they brought you home in the Lanc.
RW: Yes, they landed at, forget now where it was, down South somewhere, and as we landed they opened the door and a lovely young WAAF came, and I had my box with some belongings in. This girl got it and I grabbed it back from her she said, ‘it’s all right you are home now’ [laughs] and er, she led me off and as I was talking to her, going up to the hangar, I said, ‘this is a holiday’, this is VE Day, you see. I said, ‘you’re on holiday, what are you doing here?’ She said ‘oh we volunteered, we were the lucky ones’. I couldn’t understand it ‘cos we were filthy and the first this they did - whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
AM: Shower?
RW: Not a shower.
AM: Water?
RW: No - debugged.
AM: Oh right, oh sorry, they sprayed you?
RW: That’s right, yes, before anybody could touch us [laughs] and then they had all this food out, I couldn’t eat anything, not a thing, and then from there we came up on the train to where we went, see that photograph, and we came up there, all there, all the records were up there. That was marvellous. Then one day we were taken over, over there, records and what have you, but I went home and that was a rough time because I found my wife, I had my daughter, was that much older, she was only two and a half when I went away, she was seven she didn’t know me, didn’t know me, didn’t want to know me. And er, then my wife had met me at the station, although I didn’t want to see her because I’d had reports and she wrote to me and didn’t want to know me ‘cos she’d met an American and she wanted to get married to him. And so um, that was my homecoming, didn’t want to know me. I‘d had a letter from her saying she wanted a divorce, which I wanted too after that, and then my folks had been trying to meet the train to tell me what she had been up to, what she’d become, well you can understand it, it had been a long time.
AM: Yes.
RW: But the way she did it, she dyed her hair, it was red, and er, I’d asked a friend in camp who came from Stoke, from near where I was, where I lived, if he could find out why, what’s happening because she didn’t write to me. I’d only one letter that I had and she wanted more money, it’s all she was interested in.
AM: So your pay while you were a prisoner of war goes to your wife, doesn’t it?
RW: That’s right, it went to her and then she wanted more money, and so I came back and went up and met my wife, as I say, I didn’t know anything what she had been doing, no one had told me and this friend in camp, I’d asked him to find out what was happening, why I hadn’t had any letters from my, my wife and er, he put it off all the while. I said, ‘have you heard from your wife?’, ‘no’. I didn’t know anything about it.
AM: He wouldn’t tell you?
RW: No, and so when I got back, it was my wife who knew, my wife. He said to me, he said, ‘Ron, I couldn’t tell you what I found out about her’.
AM: No.
RW: Couldn’t tell you. So I met her and she was all over me and I met all her sisters and her brothers because it’s difficult, very difficult because my folks had been trying to meet me off the train but she’s the one who had been told.
AM: She’s the one who’s entitled to know.
RW: That’s right, and she’d got the time of the train, she met me, all the other trains had been coming in my side had been.
AM: They all missed you?
RW: They’d all missed me, everyone.
AM: Oh dear.
RW: My homecoming and I felt like going back.
AM: You married again though. Amy.
RW: Yes.
AM: I’ve met Amy and she is lovely for the record.
RW: Yes, oh the best thing that ever happened to me.
AM: Wonderful. I’m going to switch off now, Ron.
RW: Yes okay.
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 Ron Wade
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Annie Moody
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
2015-07-26
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AWadeR150726, PWadeR1503
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.
Format
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01:44:54 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
British Army
Description
An account of the resource
Ron was born in Stoke-on-Trent. He left school at fourteen and tells of his experiences working in a pottery factory doing odd jobs until he was called up. He joined the Royal Air Force in 1939 at the age of twenty-two. Ron trained as an air gunner at RAF Morecambe after initially wanting to be selected for pilot training. He completed his air gunner training in South Wales at the end of the Battle of Britain - he tells of being strafed by a Junkers 88 and the damage that was inflicted to the Nissen huts. Ron flew the Whitley, which he did not enjoy. He then went to an Operational Training Unit at RAF Abingdon before moving to 58 Squadron based at RAF Linton on Ouse. Ron tells of being forced to bale out in 1941 after his Whitley was attacked by two German fighters over the the Netherlands. He did not remember that much since ammunition was exploding and a bullet hit him in the back of the head, leaving him with memory, taste and smell impairment. Ron also tells of his first interrogation by a German officer and how his humour nearly causing trouble at the at Cologne railway station. He was transferred to Stalag Luft I and then to Stalag Luft III. Ron tried a few times to escape but was discovered every time - he also details the death of his close friend during one attempt. Ron was eventually transferred to Stalag Luft VI (Heydekrug, Lithuania) which was his last camp before the end of the war. However, with the end looming, Ron was then forced to go on the long march. He then tells of some of his memories of the event, including being strafed by British fighters. Ron was freed when the British Army 10th Hussars caught up with the group near Lubeck, and he tells the story of his homecoming in May 1945.
Contributor
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Vivienne Tincombe
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Oxfordshire
England--Yorkshire
England--Lancashire
Netherlands
Poland
Germany
Lithuania
Poland--Żagań
Germany--Barth
Lithuania--Šilutė
Wales
Germany--Oberursel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940
1941
1945-05
58 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
animal
bale out
bombing
crewing up
Dulag Luft
escaping
Ju 88
Nissen hut
Operational Training Unit
prisoner of war
RAF Abingdon
RAF Linton on Ouse
RAF Morecambe
Stalag Luft 1
Stalag Luft 3
Stalag Luft 6
strafing
the long march
training
Whitley
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1568/35500/BFreemanWFreemanWv1.2.pdf
3f3caa442d86d0abdb3348aa0c6b5c21
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
Freeman, Bill
William Freeman
W Freeman
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
2016-12-07
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Freeman, W
Description
An account of the resource
11 items. The collection concerns Bill Freeman (1806695 Royal Air Force) and contains his log book memoir and photographs. He flew operations as an air gunner with 550 and 300 Squadrons.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Monica Snowball and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[underlined] 1 [/underlined]
5TH APRIL 1943 SAW ME LEAVE TWICKENHAM to REPORT FOR SERVICE IN THE ROYAL AIR FORCE. MOST OF MY FRIENDS HAD ALREADY BEEN CALLED UP, SO IT WAS A RELIEF TO BE JOINING THEM AT LAST. EVEN SO IT WAS A WRENCH TO BE LEAVING HOME. I MADE MY WAY TO LORDS CRICKET GROUND NEAR REGENTS PARK IN LONDON, UPON REPORTING TOGETHER WITH MANY MORE, WE FILLED IN MASSES OF PAPER WORK & WERE KITTED OUT. FIRST A MASSIVE KIT BAG & EVERYTHING ELSE WAS JUST SHOVED IN. IT WEIGHED A TON. AFTER LUNCH WE WERE PARADED IN SOME SORT OF ORDER & MARCHED TO VICEROY COURT. A RECENTLY BUILT LUXURY BLOCK OF FLATS, WITHOUT ANY LUXURIES. THE FLOORS WERE PLAIN CONCRETE, THE ROOMS CONTAINED 1 BED AND 1 CUPBOARD PER BODY, OF WHICH THERE WERE ABOUT 1 DOZEN PER ROOM. WE WERE INSTRUCTED TO UNPACK OUR KIT, CHECK EVERYTHING FOR SIZE. ANYTHING NOT FITTING WAS TO BE EXCHANGED THE FOLLOWING DAY. PARADE THE FOLLOWING MORNING, IN UNIFORM WAS AT 8 AM, BREAKFAST WAS AT 7 AM BED HAD TO BE MADE UP IN ARMY FASHION, READY FOR OFFICER’S INSPECTION. A DRILL SERGEANT WAS ASSIGNED TO INSTRUCT US AND INFORM US ABOUT WHAT WAS TO BE EXPECTED, THERE WAS ABOUT 20 OF US IN OUR FLIGHT. OUR FIRST DAY WAS TO BE TAKEN UP WITH MEDICAL & INJECTIONS. SO OFF WE WERE MARCHED TO SOMEWHERE NEAR THE ZOO. WE WERE A RAGGED LOT, BUT HAVING DONE TRAINING & DRILL WITH THE HOME GUARD IT WAS EASY FOR ME TO FIT IN. THE MEDICALS & INJECTIONS & LUNCH TOOK ALL MORNING QUITE A FEW OF THE LADS WERE OVERCOME & LAID OUT ON BENCHES. THE SERGEANT WASN’T TOO PLEASED AT THIS, HE [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 2 [/underlined]
THAN THE OTHERS, COULD YOU FIND YOUR WAY BACK TO VICEROY COURT?” I SAID “YES SERGEANT” HE SAID “VERY WELL, MARCH THOSE THAT CAN WALK BACK, I WILL HAVE TO GET A WAGON TO TAKE THE OTHER SHOWER BACK”. STAY IN YOUR BILLET UNTIL I COME BACK” I TOLD THE OTHER LADS WHAT WAS GOING ON & THEY ACCEPTED THAT IT WAS BETTER THAN HANGING AROUND FOR A COUPLE OF HOURS. SO OFF WE WENT AND IN 15 MINUTES WERE BACK AT VICEROY COURT. THE LADS WERE GLAD TO LAY ON THEIR BEDS FOR THE REST OF THE AFTERNOON, I MANAGED TO SEE THE SERGEANT IN THE KITCHEN AND SCROUNGED TEA & BISCUITS, WHICH WENT DOWN WELL. THE DRILL SERGEANT WAS QUITE HAPPY ON HIS RETURN TO SEE ALL HIS FLIGHT WAS ACCOUNTED FOR & DISMISSED US UNTIL 8 AM PARADE THE FOLLOWING MORNING, BUT WE HAD TO REMAIN IN QUARTERS, NO TRIPS INTO TOWN. THE FOLLOWING MORNING WAS TAKEN UP WITH CLASSROOM WORK ON AIRFORCE PROCEDURE & WORKING. AFTERNOON FREE TO GET OVER THE EFFECTS OF THE INOCCULATIONS. THE FOLLOWING MORNING WAS TAKEN UP WITH DRILL & MARCHING, AFTER A WHILE THE SERGEANT PULLED ME OUT & TOLD ME TO TAKE OVER. HIS WORDS WERE “LETS SEE JUST WHAT YOU DO KNOW”. SO THE HOME GUARD TRAINING WAS COMING IN USEFUL & ALL WENT WELL. IT WENT SO WELL THAT FOR THE REST OF THE WEEK I WAS GIVEN THE JOB OF DRILLING THE OTHERS WHENEVER THE NEED AROSE. TO MY ASTONISHMENT THE LADS TOOK IT WELL – WE HAD NO TROUBLE. MAINLY BECAUSE AT THE END OF THE DRILL SESSION WE WERE ALWAYS FIRST IN THE QUEUE FOR MEALS. WE WERE POSTED to [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 3 [/underlined]
of THE WEEK. BEFOR [sic] WE LEFT, THE DRILL SERGEANT SAID “GOOD LUCK, YOU’VE HAD A GOOD REPORT ON YOUR RECORD, THIS WEEK HAS BEEN AN EASY ONE FOR ME.” BRIDLINGTON OUR BILLET WAS A HOUSE IN RICHMOND ROAD. THE COURSE WORK WAS AIRCRAFT RECOGNITION MORSE CODE SIGNALLING & GENERAL DRILLING ETC. THIS LASTED 6 WEEKS. THOSE THAT PASSED THE TEST WERE POSTED TO BRIDGENORTH IN SHROPSHIRE. HERE WE WERE INSTRUCTED IN THE WORKINGS OF THE FRAZER NASH TURRET & THE BROWNING 303 MACHINE GUN, AIRCRAFT RECOGNITION WAS AGAIN A MUST. ALL WAS CLASSROOM WORK WITH A MAJOR EXAM AT THE END OF A FUTHER [sic] 6 WEEKS, THEN OFF TO STORMY DOWNS IN SOUTH WALES. STORMY DOWNS WAS APTLY NAMED. THE DROME WAS ON THE HILLS CLOSE TO THE SEA & THE AIRCRAFT WERE AVRO ANSONS WITH A GUN TURRET MIDWAY ALONG THE FUSELAGE. THE PILOTS WERE THOSE BEING RESTED AFTER A TOUR OF OPPERATIONS. [sic] ALL OF US CADETS HAD NOT FLOWN BEFOR [sic] & THE PILOTS TOOK GREAT DELIGHT IN THROWING THE AIRCRAFT ABOUT TO SEE IF THEY COULD MAKE US AIRSICK. FORTUNATELY I STOOD UP TO IT PRETTY WELL, AND WHILST FEELING A BIT SQUEEZY AT TIMES, MANAGED TO KEEP THINGS UNDER CONTROL. HERE WE DID AIR TO AIR FIREING [sic] & PRACTICE CINE CAMERA GUNNERY, WITH OTHER AIRCRAFT ATTACKING. HAVING AT LAST GOT THE RUDIMENTS OF WHAT AIR GUNNERY WAS ABOUT, WE WERE EXAMINED & PASSED OUT AS AIR GUNNERS, GIVEN 3 STRIPES & THE RANK OF SERGEANT AND SENT ON 7 DAYS LEAVE. I [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 4 [/underlined]
AIR GUNNER, ALL IN A MATTER OF 5 MONTHS OF JOINING. THE LEAVE WENT QUICKLY & I HAD BEEN NOTIFIED THAT I WAS TO REPORT TO HIXON IN STAFFORDSHIRE, TO BE CREWED UP, & SO IT WAS AT THE END OF AUGUST ’43 THAT I WAS TO MEET THE CHAPS I WAS TO FLY WITH. IT WAS A QUEER MEETING. WE STOOD AROUND IN OUR VARIOUS GROUPS WIRELESS OPS, BOMB AIMERS, NAVIGATORS, & AIR GUNNERS THE PILOTS THEN APPROACHED EACH GROUP AND ASKED INDIVIDUALS IF THEY WOULD LIKE TO JOIN HIS CREW. BY THE TIME HE CAME TO THE GUNNERS HE HAD ALREADY GOT THE OTHERS TOGETHER. HIS OPENING LINE AS HE CAME UP TO ME WAS “CREWED UP YET GUNNER?” I LOOKED UP TO SEE A CHAP OF MY OWN AGE, FAIR HAIRED & WITH A BIG SMILE AND A TWINKLE IN HIS EYES, AND A SERGEANTS STRIPES ON HIS ARM. WHY I ASKED MYSELF WAS HE ONLY A SERGEANT. MOST PILOTS WERE OFFICER RANK. I REPLIED THAT I WASN’T CREWED UP, HIS NEXT WORDS WERE OFF PUTTING “HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT BECOMING A HERO & WINNING MEDALS” HE SAID. “NO THANKS” I REPLIED “THE ONLY MEDAL I WANT IS THE LONG SERVICE ONE” HE LAUGHED AND SAID “YOU’LL DO, COME AND MEET THE OTHERS” WITH THAT WE INTRODUCED OURSELVES. THE PILOT WAS RON JONES FROM BRIGHTON. HE HAD BEEN PUT BACK TO SERGEANT PILOT BECAUSE HE HAD UPSET too MANY “BIG WIGS” THE NAVIGATOR WAS ART CRICHE CANADIAN FARMER. THE BOMB AIMER ANOTHER CANADIAN DAVE BREMNER A YOUNG COLLEGE BOY FULL OF FUN THE WIRELESS OPERATOR WAS KEN SMITH, SHORT, TUBBY FROM DEWSBURY & A COMIC. SO [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 5 [/underlined]
GET THEMSELVES INTO A TEAM, FOR THE ESSENCE OF A BOMBER CREW WAS EACH TO HAVE THE CONFIDENCE OF THE OTHERS. HIXON WAS AN OPPERATIONAL [sic] TRAINING UNIT. FLYING WELLINGTON TWIN ENGINE BOMBERS, OR WIMPYS AS WE LOVINGLY CALLED THEM. WE FLEW AS A CREW MAINLY. PRACTISING TAKE OFFS & LANDINGS. HIGH & LOW LEVEL BOMBING CROSS COUNTRY NAVIGATIONAL TRIPS OF 4 TO 5 hours AND GUNNERY EXERCISES. I ALSO HAD TO GO ON A SPECIAL GUNNERY COURSE & RECOGNITION COURSE AT THIS TIME MY SHOOTING WAS NOT VERY BRILLIANT, BUT THANKFULLY IMPORVED BEFOR [sic] IT WAS NEEDED. GRADUALLY IN THE WEEKS AHEAD, WE BECAME RELIANT ON EACH OTHER, WE WORKED HARD TO BECOME A TEAM, UNTIL WE ALMOST KNEW WHAT THE OTHERS WERE THINKING. SOCIALLY WE HAD VERY LITTLE CONTACT WITH EACH OTHER, BUT ONCE A WEEK WE HAD A CREW MEAL IN A LOCAL PUB, THE 2 CANADIANS BEING OFFICERS, PAID FOR THE MEAL & THE SERGEANTS PAID FOR THE DRINKS. OUR OTHER CONTACT WAS ONLY DURING FLYING TRAINING, WHICH WE ALL TOOK SERIOUSLY AND IT PAID OFF LATER ON. MY SPARE TIME, MOSTLY EVENINGS WAS SPENT IN STAFFORD, DARTS SNOOKER & DRINKING IN THE LOCALS. I HAD MADE FRIENDS WITH ANOTHER GUNNER NAMED TONY. HE WAS ABOUT THE SAME AGE AS MYSELF. A BLONDE, BLUE EYED, HANDSOME FELLOW. AN ONLY CHILD OF DOTING PARENTS & VERY SHY. I DONT THINK HE HAD EVER HAD A DRINK BEFORE JOINING THE AIRFORCE. MANY TIMES I HAD TO TAKE HIM BACK TO CAMP WORSE FOR WEAR. DURING ONE OF OUR EVENINGS [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 6 [/underlined]
GIRL FRIEND, WE USED TO GET THE LORRY TO TAKE US IN TO STAFFORD, THE [sic] INTO THE PUB FOR DRINKING DANCING. HE WOULD GO OFF WITH HIS GIRL & I WOULD PLAY DARTS OR SNOOKER, UNTIL IT WAS TIME TO GO BACK TO CAMP. ALL OUR MATES WOULD PILE INTO THE LORRY, IN VARIOUS STATES OF INEBRIATION ESPECIALLY TONY, TOWARD THE END OF OCTOBER ’43 OUR CREW HAD BEEN ON A CROSS COUNTRY FLIGHT OF ABOUT 5 hours AND WERE READY TO LAND, WHEN WE SAW THAT THERE WAS A PLANE ON THE GROUND ON FIRE. WE WERE ALLOWED TO LAND & IN THE FLIGHT OFFICE WERE TOLD THAT THE CREW WAS TONY’S & THAT THEY MANAGED TO GET OUT, EXCEPT TONY IN THE REAR TURRET BEING TONY’S MATE I HAD THE TASK OF COLLECTING HIS PERSONAL BELONGINGS AND PRESENTING THEM TO HIS PARENTS WHEN THEY CAME TO CAMP. I VOWED THEN THAT I WOULD NOT GET INVOLVED IN ANY CLOSE FRIENDSHIP WHILST FLYING AGAIN & NEVER DID. THE EVENING AFTER THE ACCIDENT I WENT INTO STAFFORD, INTO THE PUB WHERE I KNEW HIS GIRL FRIEND WOULD BE. AS SOON AS SHE SAW ME ON MY OWN SHE KNEW THAT SOMETHING HAD HAPPENED. THERE WERE NO TEARS AS I TOLD HER. WE FINNISHED [sic] OUR DRINKS AND SHE JUST SAID “THANKS BILL” & OFF SHE WENT WITH HER CROWD. SHE HAD SEEN IT HAPPEN BEFOR [sic] & NO DOUBT WOULD SEE IT HAPPEN AGAIN, AS WE ALL DID. A WEEK LATER WE HAD OUR LAST FLIGHT AT THE OTU it was TO BE A TRIP OVER SOUTHERN FRANCE. WE WERE LOADED UP WITH [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 7 [/underlined]
DETAILING ALL THE NEWS OF THE PROGRESS OF THE WAR. ALSO WE HAD BUNDLES OF FOIL STRIPS WHICH WERE TO BE RELEASED AT A GIVEN TIME AT A GIVEN PLACE, THESE FOIL STRIPS REFLECTED THE SIGNALS OF GERMAN RADAR & GAVE THE APPEARANCE OF A HUGE FORMATION OF BOMBERS, IT ACTED AS A DECOY & DREW FIGHTER AIRCRAFT AWAY FROM THE TRUE BOMBER FORCE. WE ACCOMPLISHED THIS MISSION WITHOUT MISHAP & WERE THRILLED THAT AT LAST WE HAD BEEN PART OF A RAID. THEN IT WAS A 14 DAY LEAVE. IT WAS DURING THIS LEAVE THAT I CELEBRATED MY 21ST BIRTHDAY ALBEIT, A LITTLE EARLY, BUT AFTER FLYING IT SEEMED QUEER NOT TO HEAR THE ROAR OF AIRCRAFT ENGINES. ALSO THE FLYING ROUTINE WAS MISSING, SO WHILST IN [sic] WAS NICE TO BE HOME WITH THE FAMILY I WAS NOT SORRY TO BE GOING BACK. THERE WAS MORE TRAINING TO BE DONE & I HAD TO GO FOR A WEEKS GUNNERY COURSE TO BINBROOK. THIS WAS AN AUSTRALIAN BOMBER STATION, VERY OPPERATIONAL [sic] & THEIR LOSSES WERE HIGH. THE FIRST PERSON THAT I MET AT BINBROOK WAS A CHAP I HAD DONE MY INITIAL TRAINING WITH AT STORMY DOWNS. A WELSHMAN FROM TREDEGAR & AN EX POLICEMAN NAMED VICTOR JONES. VIC & I HAD BEEN PUT FORWARD FOR OFFICER SELECTION AS WE HAD TOPPED THE COURSE TABLES. THERE WAS ONE OFFICER PLACE PER COURSE. I WAS NOT OVERKEEN & THOUGHT THAT ONLY 5 MONTHS DID NOT JUSTIFY BEING MADE AN OFFICER. THE BENEFITS [sic] OF BEING AN [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 8 [/underlined]
WHEN SHOT DOWN YOU WOULD BE ENTITLED TO BETTER TREATMENT. VIC GOT THE OFFICERSHIP, MUCH TO MY RELIEF. AFTER THE DAY’S GUNNERY PRACTICE, I USED TO MEET UP WITH VIC, BORROW HIS SPARE UNIFORM & WE WOULD HAVE A DRINK OR TWO IN THE OFFICERS MESS, WHICH WAS VERY ENJOYABLE. AFTER A WEEK I LEFT BINBROOK THANKFULLY MY SHOOTING HAD IMPROVED & I WAS MORE CONFIDENT IN MY JOB. SADLY I HEARD A FEW MONTHS LATER THAT VIC HAD BEEN SHOT DOWN I REJOINED MY CREW AT BLYTON 1662 CONVESION [sic] UNIT. WE WERE TO FLY HALIFAXES. ONE OF THE MOST DANGEROUS AND CONTRARY AIRCRAFT AND SO EASY FOR INEXPERIENCED PILOTS TO CRASH. HOWEVER, RON, OUR PILOT MASTERED THE BRUTE & WE COMPLETED 10 DAYS THERE. DURING THIS TIME OUR CREW INCREASED BY 2. THE FLIGHT ENGINEER CALLED GEORGE, I NEVER DID KNOW HIS SURNAME. HE WAS A LONDONER & HAD WON HIMSELF THE GEORGE CROSS MEDAL FOR HIS PART IN THE BLITZ. OUR PILOT TOOK AN INSTANT DISLIKE TO HIM & ALWAYS FELT THAT GEORGE WAS ONLY WAITING TO WIN MORE MEDALS, WHICH WAS AGAINST OUR CREWS WAY OF THINKING. WE ALWAYS SAID THAT OUR JOB WAS TO REACH THE TARGET DROP THE BOMBS & GET HOME IN ONE PIECE. HOWEVER GEORGE WAS GOOD AT HIS JOB & WAS NEVER GIVEN THE CHANCE TO PLAY THE HERO. – MUCH TO HIS DISGUST - . THE OTHER MEMBER WAS THE MID-UPPER GUNNER JOHNNY JOHNSON, SHORT & [missing words]
[page break]
[underlined] 9 [/underlined]
HIMSELF TO HIMSELF & CAME FROM NORTHAMPTON OUR ORIGINAL 5 NEVER REALLY GOT USED TO BECOMING 7. BUT WE ALL DID OUR JOBS AND MADE A DECENT CREW. WE TRANSFERED [sic] (MUCH TO OUR RELIEF) to LANCASTERS AT HEMSWELL FOR A WEEK AT ELSHAM WOLDS AFTER A COUPLE OF FLIGHTS IT WAS FINALLY ONTO 550 SQUADRON AT NORTH KILLINGHOLME NEAR GRIMSBY, OUR FIRST TASTE OF OPPERATIONAL [sic] LIFE. IT WAS NOW MARCH 1944. KILLINGHOLME KILLINGHOLME [sic] HAD ONLY JUST OPENED UP IN JAN 44 & THE FACILITIES WERE VERY SPARTAN & WE HAD TO ROUGH IT FOR SOME TIME. SLEEPING ACCOMODATION [sic] WAS A NISSEN HUT, STRAW MATTRESSES ON IRON BEDS & TWO COKE STOVES FOR HEATING, BUT AS THE C/O SAID “YOU’LL BE PLENTY WARM ENOUGH, FLYING.” WE SETTLED IN WELL TO SQUADRON LIFE. WE STILL HAD TO TRAIN DURING THE DAY. WE WORKED WELL TOGETHER & DEVISED A SYSTEM SO THAT WE WERE AS EFFICIENT AS WE COULD BE. THEN ON THE 10TH APRIL 1944 OUR PILOTS NAME APPEARED ON THE FLIGHT LIST. THE ROUTINE THEN & IN FUTURE TO BE REPEATED OFTEN, WAS, 10 AM IN THE MORNING, CREW BUS TO THE AIRCRAFT WE WERE TO USE. Q-QUEENIE, EACH OF US CHECKED & RECHECKED HIS PART. THE ENGINES WERE RUN UP & THE PILOT CHECKED EACH ENGINE SEPERATELY. [sic] ANYTHING HE DIDN’T LIKE WAS ATTENDED TO & CHECKED AGAIN THE WIRELESS OP. CHECKED HIS EQUIPMENT. WE [missing words]
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[underlined] 10 [/underlined]
HAD TO CHECK MY GUNS WERE IN WORKING ORDER AMMUNITION RAN SMOOTHLY INTO THE GUN. THE AMMUNITION BELT WAS FOLDED INSIDE THE FUSELAGE & RAN IN TRACKS INTO THE TURRET. COULD NOT AFFORD A JAMMED BULLET, IF NEED AROSE, TO MESS THINGS UP. THE TURRET HAD TO WORK SMOOTHLY THE HYDRAULICS FREE FROM LEAKS & AIRLOCKS THE ELECTRIC HEATING FOR MY FLYING SUIT HAD TO BE WORKING, FROZEN FINGERS AT A CRUSIAL [sic] MOMENT to BE AVOIDED. THE INSIDE PERSPEX WAS CLEANED so THAT VISION WAS CLEAR. EVERYTHING CHECKED & RECHECKED, THEN & ONLY THEN THE PILOT WAS ADVISED THAT EVERYTHING WAS O.K – THE BOOK SIGNED. WE HAD A FIRST CLASS GROUND CREW & RARELY FOUND A FAULT, WHEN WE DID, IT WAS PUT RIGHT. BY FINDING OUT HOW MUCH PETROL WAS BEING PUT IN & THE WEIGHT AND TYPE OF BOMBS WE COULD WORK OUT THE DISTANCE AND TYPE OF TARGET of the opperation. [sic] ALL WAS TO BE REVEALED AT THE BRIEFING ABOUT 2 hours BEFOR [sic] TAKE OFF NO ONE WAS ALLOWED OUT OF CAMP UNTIL TAKE OFF. AT THE BRIEFING it WOULD BE DISCLOSED THE TARGET, THE COURSE to BE SET TIME OF TAKE OFF, TIME OVER TARGET & TIME BACK. WE WERE ISSUED WITH AN ESCAPE KIT IN CASE WE HAD TO BALE OUT & CHOCOLATE & CANNED DRINK FOR THE JOURNEY. ALL RELEVANT INFORMATION WAS GIVEN & DIJESTED. [sic] THE NAVIGATOR THEN HAD TO WORK OUT HIS FLIGHT PLAN. OUR NAVIGATOR WAS SLOW & METHODICAL. I NEVER KNEW HIM TO [missing words]
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[underlined] 11 [/underlined]
ON, TOO SOON OR TOO LATE MEANT THAT YOU WERE ON YOUR OWN & EASILY PICKED UP BY RADAR, SEARCHLIGHTS or FIGHTERS, SO THEN TO TAKE OFF. OUR TARGET ON THAT FIRST TRIP WAS MARSHALLING YARDS AT AULNOYE. TAKE OFF 23.35 time over TARGET 02.25 WE PILED INTO THE CREW BUS WITH 2 OTHER CREWS & WERE TAKEN OUT TO OUR AIRCRAFT THERE WAS A BIT OF LAUGHING & JOKING & AS EACH CREW LEFT, IT WAS “CHEERIO, SEE YOU AT BREAKFAST”. WHEN OUR AIRCRAFT WAS REACHED, WE ALIGHTED, SAID “CHEERIO” to the GROUND CREW & CLIMBED ABOARD, THE JOKES STOPPED & WE WERE EACH LEFT TO OUR OWN THOUGHTS “HOW WOULD WE COPE UNDER FIRE” WE SHOOK EACH OTHERS HAND, PATTED THE SIDE OF THE AIRCRAFT & MADE OUR WAY TO OUR POSTS. MINE WAS A LONG WALK TO THE REAR, STOWING MY PARACHUTE OUTSIDE THE TURRET I SWUNG MYSELF IN, PLUGGED IN MY ELECTIC [sic] HEATER, CHECKED IT & SWITCHED OFF, RUNNING THROUGH ALL THE CHECKS I REPORTED OVER THE INTERCOM THAT ALL WAS O.K. EACH MEMBER IN TURN REPORTED AND ALL WAS SET. AT THE APPROPRIATE TIME THE ENGINES WERE STARTED & CHOCKS AWAY WE WERE MOVING TO THE END OF THE RUNWAY. GIVING THE THUMBS UP SIGN FROM THE GROUND CREW SERGEANT. ONE PLANE AFTER THE OTHER WERE SIGNALLED OFF & SOON WE WERE AIRBOURNE [sic] & REACHING 20,000 FT [missing words]
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[underlined] 12 [/underlined]
LIKE A TRAINING EXERCISE. SOON IT WAS OVER THE FRENCH COAST & COURSE SET FOR TARGET TARGET [sic] REACHED SPOT ON TIME. FEW SEARCHLIGHTS AND A BIT OF “ACK-ACK” GUNFIRE. THE BOMB AIMER LINED UP HIS TARGET & GAVE THE PILOT DIRECTIONS. I FELT THE AIRCRAFT RISE AS HE REPORTED “BOMBS GONE SKIPPER” THE PILOT REPLIED “THANK YOU BOMB AIMER, LETS GO HOME” & AS WE PASSED OVER THE TARGET I COULD SEE A SERIES OF EXPLOSIONS, FIRES BURNING & SEARCHLIGHTS TRYING TO PICK US UP, VERY LITTLE “FLACK” SUGGESTING THAT THERE WERE A NUMBER OF NIGHT FIGHTERS ABOUT. I REPORTED THIS TO THE SKIPPER. HE SAID “KEEP YOUR EYES WELL PEELED GUNNERS. THE WORST IS BEHIND US.” WE HAD A QUIET JOURNEY BACK. LANDED. REPORTED IN & WENT TO BREAKFAST. ALL OUR CREWS WERE BACK SAFELY AFTER WHAT WAS A RELATIVELY EASY TRIP. BUT AS ONE OLD CREW SAID IT DOESNT HAPPEN OFTEN, COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS BREAKFAST WAS A GOOD FRY UP AND SUDDENLY I WAS TIRED & SURPRISED TO SEE IT GETTING LIGHTER IT WAS 6 AM THE TRIP HAD TAKEN 5 hours NO REPORTING UNTIL 12 NOON AND SO TO SLEEP. AS IT HAPPENED WE WERE NOT OPPERATIONAL [sic] AGAIN FOR OVER A WEEK, BUT THERE WAS NO SLACKING, WE STILL HAD TO PRACTICE AND WERE ALWAYS KEPT INFORMED OF DIFFERENT TECHNIQUES BEING USED. IF WE WEREN’T REQUIRED FOR FLYING WE COULD GO INTO GRIMSBY FOR CINEMA, PUBS & ENTERTAIN [missing words]
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[underlined] 13 [/underlined]
WHICH WAS USED BY THE RAF, AND NICKNAMED THE “MUCKY DUCK,” NOISEY & SMOKEY. IT WAS THERE THAT I FIRST MET UP WITH THE “YANKS”. WE GOT ON REASONABLY WELL ONCE WE WERE USED TO THEIR WAYS, BUT COULD NEVER UNDERSTAND WHY THE WHITES WOULD INSIST ON BLACKS BEING FORCED TO DRINK ELSE WHERE, AND ANY TROUBLE USUALLY AROSE BETWEEN THE TWO. BACK IN CAMP WE KEPT LOOKING AT THE OPPERATIONS [sic] BOARD AND AT LAST ON THE 18TH APRIL WE WERE DETAILED. OUR ROUTINE CHECKS OF THE AIRCRAFT WERE DONE AND ABOUT 8 pm WE HAD BRIEFING. THE TARGET WAS ROUEN. THE DOCKS & MARSHALLING YARDS. AGAIN EVERY THING WENT WELL. WE STAYED OUT OF TROUBLE, DID THE JOB AND CAME BACK TO BASE. TWO NIGHTS LATER WE WERE FLYING AGAIN, THIS TIME TO COLOGNE IN THE RHUR. THE HOT SPOT OF GERMANY. THE LARGE MUNITIONS FACTORIES OF KRUPPS & STEEL WORKS WERE ALL ALLONG [sic] THE RHUR. WELL DEFENDED. THIS TIME IT WAS NO JOY RIDE. WE SAW IT ALL. SEARCHLIGHTS “FLACK” AND THE AIRCRAFT TOSSED ABOUT BY NEAR SHELL BURSTS. NO DAMAGE TO WORRY ABOUT. WE SAW OTHER AIRCRAFT BEING ATTACKED BY NIGHT FIGHTERS & GO DOWN IN FLAMES. THE TARGET WAS ONE MASS OF FIRES & BOMB BURSTS. IT SEEMED ENDLESS. BUT EVENTUALLY WE WERE THROUGH, BOMBS DROPPED & TARGET BEHIND US. THE SKIPPER CHECKED EVERY ONE WAS O.K. APPOLOGISED [sic] FOR THE BUMPY RIDE & SAID “I’LL BUY YOU ALL A BEER WHEN WE GET BACK”[missing words]
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[underlined] 14 [/underlined]
A COUPLE OF SCARES FROM NIGHT FIGHTERS, BUT MANAGED TO EVADE THEM AND LOSE OURSELVES INTO THE DARK NIGHT SKY. THE C/O HAD BEEN RIGHT, IT HAD BEEN PRETTY WARM FLYING NO NEED FOR COKE FIRES. TWO NIGHTS LATER WE WERE IN THE RHUR AGAIN TO DUSSELDORF. MUCH THE SAME HAPPENED, BUT WE RETURNED O.K. NO DAMAGE. THEN KARLSRUHE A COUPLE OF NIGHTS LATER, WE HAD A BIT OF DAMAGE, BUT MADE IT HOME, BUT THAT WAS A LONG TRIP AND TOOK 6 1/2 hours. MOST OF IT TRYING TO KEEP OUT OF TROUBLE, WE HAD TO PICK UP ANOTHER AIRCRAFT FOR OUR NEXT FLIGHT TO ESSEN ON THE 26TH APRIL. BY NOW WE HAD EXPERIENCED IT ALL. EVERYTHING THAT COULD HAPPEN AND THOUGHT WE WERE BEING LUCKY TO GET AWAY WITH IT. WE HAD DEVELOPED A GOOD WORKING SYSTEM BETWEEN US GUNNERS WHICH KEPT US OUT OF THE WORST OF IT. THE REST OF THE CREW ALWAYS CAME AND SAID THANKS ON LANDING GEORGE WOULD HAVE PREFERED MORE ACTION. ON THE 27TH WE WERE BRIEFED FOR FRIEDRICHAFEN AFTER ABOUT 30 MINUTES ONE ENGINE BEGAN SIEZING UP AND HAD TO BE CUT, THE SKIPPER SAID WE WOULD HAVE TO GO BACK. GEORGE WANTED TO CARRY ON ON [sic] THREE ENGINES BUT RON WAS AGAINST IT & TO GEORGES DISGUST TURNED THE PLANE ROUND AND HEADED HOME. RON RADIOD [sic] BASE & WAS TOLD TO JETTISON THE BOMB LOAD OVER THE NORTH SEA. THIS WAS DONE AND WE [missing words]
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[underlined] 15 [/underlined]
ENGINE WAS PLAYING UP, SO IT WAS A RELIEF TO PUT FOOT ON LAND. ON THE 30TH APRIL WE WERE BRIEFED FOR A TRIP TO MAINTENON MARSHALLING YARDS IN FRANCE THIS TIME A NEW TECHNIQUE WAS TO BE USED. WE WERE INSTRUCTED TO ARRIVE AT THE TARGET AREA AT A GIVEN TIME. TARGET INDICATORS WERE BEING DROPPED (YELLOW FLARES) AND WE WERE TO CIRCLE UNTIL ORDERED TO OUR SPECIAL TARGET (GREEN FLARES) OTHER AIRCRAFT WERE GIVEN (BLUE FLARES OR RED FLARES TO BOMB ON. EVERYTHING WENT ACCORDING TO PLAN AND THIS WAS THE BEGINING [sic] ON THE PATHFINDER TECHNIQUE AND PROVED A GREAT SUCCESS FOR PINPOINT BOMBING. THE AIRCRAFT USED WERE THE MOSQUITO’S WITH A 2 MAN CREW THEY WERE FANTASTIC. THERE WAS, HOWEVER, TO BE A SERIOUS SET BACK A FEW DAYS LATER A PERIOD OF FULL MOON HAD JUST BEGUN, AND USUALLY THAT MEANT A STAND DOWN. WE WERE THEREFOR [sic] SUPRISED [sic] ON THE 3RD MAY TO SEE THE ROSTA UP FOR EVENING OPS. AND OUR CREW DETAILED. WE DID OUR USUAL CHECKS IN THE MORNING. EVERYTHING O.K AND THEN BRIEFING ABOUT 8 PM. WE WERE INFORMED THAT THE TARGET WAS MAILLY-LE-CAMP IN FRANCE JUST SOUTH OF PARIS. THIS WAS A GERMAN PANZER TANK TRAINING CAMP AND WITH THE IMPENDING INVASION WAS BETTER DESTROYED. THERE WAS TO BE TWO TARGETS. WITH OUR NEIGHBOUGHS, [sic] GROUP 5 TAKING THE FIRST. OUR GROUP [missing words]
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[underlined] 16 [/underlined]
TO DROP TARGET INDICATORS AND EACH GROUP TOLD WHEN TO ATTACK AND WHAT COLOUR FLARE TO BOMB ON. GROUP 5 ARRIVED AND CIRCLED ON YELLOW MARKERS UNTIL GIVEN THE ORDER TO BOMB. THIS THEY DID SUCCESSFULLY. GROUP I (OUR GROUP) ARRIVED, SOME A LITTLE EARLY AND WERE INSTRUCTED TO CIRCLE OVER THE YELLOW MARKERS UNTIL GIVEN THE ORDER TO BOMB. IN THE MEANWHILE GERMAN FIGHTERS HAD ARRIVED AND GIVEN BRIGHT MOONLIGHT AND LANCASTERS FLYING AROUND IN CIRCLES, HAD EASY PREY. THE PATHFINDERS ORDERED THE PLANES TO KEEP THEIR POSITION AND THE AIR WAS BLUE WITH PILOTS REMONSTRATING, IT WAS PANDEMONIUM. OUR PLANE WAS APPROACHING THE AREA AT THE CORRECT TIME AND THE PILOT DECIDED TO CIRCLE SOME WAY AWAY FROM THE ACTION UNTIL WE HAD THE ORDER TO BOMB ON THE RED FLARE. THIS WAS ACCOMPLISHED WITH DUE HASTE AND ACCURACY. ONCE THROUGH THE TARGET WE WERE CONTINUALLY HARRASSED BY GERMAN FIGHTERS. ONE IN PARTICULAR CAME FROM AFAR AND I COULD SEE HIS TRACER BULLETS GOING OVER THE TOP OF US. AS HE GOT WITHIN RANGE I OPENED FIRE AND HE PEELED OFF. I KNOW SOME OF MY SHOT HIT HIM. HE WHEELED ROUND AND CAME IN AGAIN, WELL OUT OF MY RANGE. BUT AGAIN HIS TRACERS WERE HIGH AND I SAT THERE FULLY EXPECTING TO GET THE FULL IMPACT. OUR PILOT WAS TWISTING AND TURNING [missing words]
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[underlined] 17 [/underlined]
SUDDENLY HIS FIRING CEASED AND ROUND HE WENT AGAIN. THIS TIME HE JUST SAT OUT OF RANGE, WAGGLED HIS WINGS AND FLEW OFF. – WHY? – EITHER HE HAD RUN OUT OF AMMUNITION, OR HIS GUNS HAD JAMMED, EITHER WAY, IT WAS A RELIEF AND I SAID A FEW WORDS OF THANKS TO OUR GARDIAN [sic] ANGEL WE HAD OTHER ENCOUNTERS AFTER THAT BUT ARRIVED BACK WITH ONLY A FEW GASHES. ALL OUR OTHER CREWS ARRIVED BACK TO BASE AS WELL, AND HAD FARED [sic] IN THE SAME MANNER. OUR GROUPS LOSSES WERE 28 AIRCRAFT AND GROUP 5 LOST 14. WE WERE LUCKY BUT NONE OF US WOULD EVER EXPERIENCE ANYTHING LIKE IT AGAIN – OR FORGET IT – THE PATHFINDERS NEVER AGAIN MADE SUCH A MESS OF THINGS AND WENT ON TO BECOME A GREAT SUCCESS. THERE WAS A STORY THAT WENT AROUND SOME TIME AFTER. THE SPECIAL DUTIES FLIGHT AT BINBROOK UNDER COMMAND OF SQUADRON LEADER BILL BREAKSPEAR HAD BEEN AGAINST THE RAID BECAUSE OF THE BRIGHT MOON AND CLEAR SKY AND HAD SAID SO TO HARRIS, BUT HAD BEEN OVER RULED. AT THEIR NEXT MEETING BREAKSPEAR STORMED OUT OF THE ROOM WITHOUT SALUTING, HARRIS CALLED HIM BACK AND SAID “DON’T YOU SALUTE AIR CHIEF MARSHALLS” BREAKSPEAR REPLIED “NOT STUPID ONES – SIR,” HARRIS WAS NOT NAMED THE BUTCHER FOR NOTHING AND APPEARED NOT TO CARE ABOUT LOSSES OF MEN. AFTER MAILLY WE HAD A REST FOR A [missing words]
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[underlined] 18 [/underlined]
WHICH BY NOW WAS BECOMING A WAY OF LIFE RENNES (FRANCE) DIEPPE (FRANCE) ORLEANS (FRANCE DORTMUND, AACHEN (GERMANY) TWICE ACHERES (FRANCE THIS WAS ON THE 6TH JUNE (D. DAY). WE TOOK OFF JUST AFTER MIDNIGHT AND RETURNED 5 1/2 hrs LATER TO BE TOLD THAT BRITISH & ALLIED TROOPS HAD MADE A SUCCESSFUL LANDING IN FRANCE. ALL OPERATIONS AFTER THAT WERE TO FULLY SUPPORT GROUND TROOPS FLEURS (FRANCE) ON THE 9TH ACHERES (FRANCE) 10TH THEN ON THE 13TH JUNE CAME THE SHOCK. WE WERE TO BE POSTED TO 300 (POLISH) SQUADRON TOGETHER WITH 5 OTHER EXPERIENCED CREWS IT SEEMED THAT 300 SQUADRON WERE LOSING A LOT OF AIRCRAFT AND WAS UNDER STRENGTH NO ONE WANTED TO LEAVE KILLINGHOLME WE HAD BUILT UP A GOOD REPUTATION LOSSES WERE LOW MISSIONS WERE ACCOMPLISHED AND WEIGHT OF BOMBS PER AIRCRAFT WERE THE HIGHEST IN THE GROUP. HOWEVER, ORDERS WERE ORDERS AND WITH MUCH MISGIVINGS WE WENT TO FALDINGWORTH NEAR LINCOLN. WE ARRIVED AND WERE SHOWN OUR QUARTERS, SAME NISSEN HUTS SAME TYPE OF BEDS NO OTHER COMFORTS THEN TAKEN TO THE MESS FOR A MEAL. TO PUT IT MILDLY POLISH FOOD HAD LITTLE ATTRACTION FOR US AND WE SETTLED FOR A GOOD FRY UP OF EGGS AND BACON. WE MANAGED TO INSIST ON AN ENGLISH MENUE. [sic] THE AIRCRAFT WE WERE SUPPOSED TO FLY WERE A DISGRACE AND FALLING TO PIECES [missing words]
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[underlined] 19 [/underlined]
to FLY THEM AND OUR C/O BACKED US UP. WITHIN 2 DAYS WE HAD NEW LANCASTERS DELIVERED AND ON THE 14TH DID OUR FIRST OPERATION FOR 300 SQUADRON TO LE HAVRE. THE STATE OF THE OTHER AIRCRAFT THE POLES WERE FLYING GAVE US A GOOD IDEA WHY THEIR LOSSES WERE SO HIGH. BUT WITH OUR SUPPORT THINGS WERE TO CHANGE AND NEW AIRCRAFT ARRIVED ALMOST DAILY. THE POLES WERE A FRIENDLY LOT. VERY QUICK TO BUY A DRINK FOR THEIR ENGLISH FRIENDS, WE HAD BEEN WARNED NOT TO DISCUSS POLITICS, AS PART OF POLAND HAD BEEN HANDED OVER TO RUSSIA IN A DEAL BETWEEN ROOSEVELT CHURCHILL & STALIN. WE SETTLED IN VERY UNEASILY TO OUR NEW SQUADRON. MORE THOROUGH CHECKS ON EVERY NUT AND BOLT. WE DID OPPERATIONS [sic] TO AULNOYE (FRANCE) RHEIMS (FRANCE) AT THIS TIME LONDON WAS BEGINING [sic] TO GET ROCKET ATTACKS AND WE WERE SENT OUT WITH PATHFINDERS MARKING TARGETS, TO THE ROCKET SITES, THESE WERE MAINLY IN WOODLANDS HIDDEN BY TREES AND HEAVILY CAMAFLAGED [sic] WE STARTED DAILIGHT [sic] BOMBING. SOMETHING NEW FOR US. WE WERE USED TO BEING ON OUR OWN, NOT FLYING IN FORMATION. WHICH WAS FOR US, DOWNRIGHT DANGEROUS & DISPENSED WITH RIGHT FROM THE START. THE “YANKS” HAD OUR ADMIRATION FOR THE WAY THEY FLEW IN FORMATION AND IT WAS LAUGHABLE WHEN, AS [missing words]
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[underlined] 20 [/underlined]
IN PRETTY PATTERNS AND OUR STRAGGLY LOT ALL OVER THE PLACE. IT WAS ABOUT THIS TIME I WAS PROMOTED TO FLIGHT SERGEANT THIS MEANT A LITTLE EXTRA CASH AND WAS MOST WELCOME, AS VERY OFTEN WE HAD TO VISIT A RESTAURANT IN LINCOLN TO GET A DECENT MEAL. I BECAME QUITE A REGULAR CUSTOMER AT MRS HOLDEN’S FOR HER DELICIOUS CHICKEN LUNCH, AFTER WHICH AN EVENING IN THE SARACENS HEAD. OR AS IT WAS AFFECTIONALLY KNOWN “THE SNAKE PIT”. BY NOW THE 2ND FRONT WAS GETTING ESTABLISHED AND WE WERE ATTACKING TARGETS SUCH AS AULNOYE (MARSHALLING YARDS) RHEIMS (TROOP PLACEMENTS) SIRACOURT (ROCKETS) VIERZON (TROOPS) ORLEANS ROCKET LAUNCHERS IN DAYLIGHT, ALMOST EVERY DAY AND NIGHT WE WERE OUT. SOMETIMES RUNNING INTO FIGHTER AIRCRAFT, SOMETIMES HEAVY GUNFIRE BUT WE STEERED CLEAR OF TROUBLE. THEN CAME CAEN ON THE NORMANDY FRONT. THE BRITISH TROOPS WERE BEING HELD UP IN THEIR ADVANCE AND THE INSTRUCTIONS FOR US, WERE TO BOMB A VERY HEAVILY DEFENDED TOWN AND PANZER DIVISION. THE PATHFINDERS WERE TO GO IN FIRST AND DROP THEIR FLARES AND GIVE US INSTRUCTIONS ON WHICH COLOUR TO BOMB WE TOOK OFF AT 8 PM AND STILL VERY LIGHT WE COULD SEE ALL OUR OTHER LANCASTERS MAKING THEIR WAY TO DIFFERENT TARGETS, THERE WOULD BE 20-30 PLANES ON 1 COLOUR FLARE [missing words]
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[underlined] 21 [/underlined]
WAS STILL LIGHT. OUR USUAL BOMBING HEIGHT WAS 20,000 FT FOR THIS ONE WE STARTED OFF AT 10,000 FT. BUT BECAUSE OF CLOUD HAD TO DECEND UNTIL WE COULD SEE OUR FLARE. BOMBING HAD TO BE SPOT ON BECAUSE OF THE NEARNESS OF BRITISH TROOPS ON THE GROUND. WE COULD SEE THE HOUSES, TROOPS, EVERYTHING – ESPECIALLY OTHER AIRCRAFT CONVERGING ON THE SAME TARGET SOME LOWER SOME HIGHER, THOSE THAT WERE HIGHER WERE OPENING THEIR BOMB BAYS RIGHT OVER HEAD OF US, AND AS I HEARD OUR BOMB AIMER SAY “BOMBS GONE” I COULD SEE ABOUT 3 OTHERS HIGHER, RELEASING THEIRS. I JUST SAT THERE AND PRAYED. THE BOMBS WERE FALLING ONE AFTER THE OTHER AND THANKFULLY MISSED THE TAIL, BY HOW MUCH I DONT KNOW BUT IT LOOKED PRETTY CLOSE. OUR LOSSES DURING THAT TRIP WERE PUT DOWN TO OUR OWN. WE WERE TO DO A COUPLE MORE TRIPS LIKE THAT. ON ONE WE EVEN GOT DOWN TO 1500 FT WHICH WAS VERY, VERY LOW. THEN ON THE 31ST JULY WE WERE TO DO OUR 30TH TRIP AND THE LAST ONE OF OUR FIRST TOUR. THEN ON TO 14 DAYS LEAVE. WE TRIED NOT TO THINK ABOUT IT UNTIL WE HAD OUT FOOT ON ENGLISH SOIL AGAIN, THIS TIME A ROCKET SITE. NO HASSEL. [sic] NO FLACK. NO FIGHTERS ONLY ON THE RETURN DID AN ENGINE PACK IN, AND WE HAD TO LAND AT A DIFFERENT BASE. WE WERE DEBRIEFED, AND WHEN THEY HEARD IT WAS OUR [missing words]
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[underlined] 22 [/underlined]
THE AIRCREWS CAME OUT. IT WAS ABOUT 3 AM IN THE MORNING. WE HAD A BIT OF A PARTY BUT WE WERE LOOKED UPON LIKE FREAKS THE QUESTIONS WE WERE ASKED, IT WAS ALL A BIT OVERPOWERING. NEXT MORNING WE WERE NOT ALLOWED TO FLY BACK TO BASE THEY SENT A CAR TO TRANSPORT US AND A FRESH CREW TO TAKE OUR PLANE. ON ARRIVAL BACK AT FALDINGWORTH WE WERE DROPPED OFF AT THE C/O’S OFFICE TAKEN IN HAD A SHOT OF WHISKEY WITH HIM, SHOOK HANDS AND TOLD THAT ON THE FOLLOWING DAY WE WERE TO START OUR LEAVE. GET EVERY THING PACKED. THAT EVENING WE MET UP AS A CREW FOR THE LAST TIME. HAD A DRINK OR TWO AND SAID OUR CHEERIO’S. THE FOLLOWING MORNING RON, OUR PILOT & I WENT TO LINCOLN STATION CHANGED TRAINS AT PETERBOROUGH AND HENCE TO LONDON. THERE HE WENT OFF TO BRIGHTON & I TO TWICKENHAM.
JOB DONE, - NONE OF US MET UP AGAIN.
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TAILENDERS END TALES.
[circled 1] IT WAS DURING OCTOBER 43 THAN [sic] OUR PILOT CALLED A CREW MEETING. HIS OPENING WORDS WERE “WE HAVE BEEN TOGETHER LONG ENOUGH, I TAKE IT THAT WE ARE HAPPY WITH THE WAY WE OPPERATE [sic] TOGETHER”. WE ALL AGREED. HE CARRIED ON. “AS I SEE IT. I AM JUST THE DRIVER. ART (NAVIGATOR) GIVES ME THE COURSE. I FLY IT OVER THE TARGET. DAVE (BOMAIMER) [sic] GIVES ME DIRECTIONS. – I FLY IT -. KEN. [deleted] YOU [/deleted] I RELY ON YOU TO GIVE ME CORRECT MESSAGES THAT COME OVER THE RADIO. AND I ACT ON IT. BILL. – AS GUNNER, YOU ARE OUR EYES. ANY TIME YOU SEE WE ARE BEING ATTACKED, YOU GIVE ME DIRECTIONS FOR EVASIVE ACTION. – STRAIGHT AWAY. ALL OF YOU, TELL ME, I WILL FOLLOW YOUR ORDERS WITHOUT QUESTION OR HESITATION. – ANY QUESTIONS NOW.” DURING PRACTICE RON & I EVOLVED A SERIES OF MANOEVERS [sic] FOR EVASIVE ACTION. THAT THEY WORKED WAS ONLY DUE TO THE WAY THE LANCASTER WAS BUILT.
[circled 2] ONE NIGHT WHILST ON A TRAINING FLIGHT WE RAN INTO AN ELECTRICAL STORM. LIGHTENING FLASHED AND THE AIRCRAFT WAS TOSSED ABOUT BUT WHAT WAS MOST FRIGHTENING WAS THE WAY SPARKS WERE LEAPING FROM ONE METAL OBJECT TO ANOTHER. RUNNING THE LENGTH OF THE GUN BARRELL AND ALL ROUND THE TURRET I WAS GLAD WHEN WE WERE OUT OF IT.
[circled 3] ON SQUADRON THE GROUND CREW WERE FANTASTIC
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THE SERGEANT WAS THERE IN THE MORNINGS AND THERE WHEN WE TOOK OFF AT NIGHT. – AND THERE AGAIN ON OUR RETURN, WHEN HE SLEPT I DONT KNOW. BUT THEY WERE DEDICATED TO GIVING US THE BEST SERVICE.
[circled 4] OUR SQUADRON BASE AT KILLINGHOLME WAS CLOSE TO THE HUMBER RIVER. THE PORT OF HULL ONE SIDE AND GRIMSBY THE OTHER. VERY OFTEN BOTH PLACES WERE SUBJECTED TO HEAVY BOMBING BY THE GERMAN AIR FORCE. QUITE OFTEN THESE RAIDS CO-INCIDED WITH OUR TAKE OFF TIME, SO THAT BOTH AIRFORCES WERE IN THE AIR OVER GRIMSBY AT THE SAME TIME AND WE WERE OFTEN CAUGHT UP IN OUR OWN SEARCHLIGHTS. WITH THE NEXT GROUP OF SEARCHLIGHTS HOLDING A GERMAN BOMBER IN ITS BEAMS. WE HAD TO SIGNAL IN MORSE TO THE GROUND FOR THEM TO SWITCH OFF.
[circled 5] DURING THE TRIP ON AACHEN AT THE END OF MAY, ART, OUR NAVIGATOR ANNOUNCED THAT HE WAS ALWAYS SO BUSY PLOTTING THE NEXT COURSE AFTER THE TARGET, THAT HE HAD NEVER THE CHANCE TO SEE THE TARGET. THE NAVIGATORS CUBBY HOLE WAS ALL SHUT IN BECAUSE HE HAD TO HAVE LIGHT TO WORK BY. ON THIS TRIP HE DECLARED HE WOULD GIVE THE PILOT THE COURSE TO FOLLOW BEFORE HAND. SWITCH HIS LIGHTS OUT AND SEE WHAT WENT ON. THIS HE DID. IT HAPPENED THAT IT WAS A HECTIC NIGHT. AND THE FIREWORK DISPLAY WAS BRILLIANT. WE HEARD ART GASP. [missing words]
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I WOULDN’T HAVE COME.” I DONT THINK HE PEEKED OUT AGAIN.
[circled 6] 3RD MAY. THE PERIOD OF FULL MOON. WE TOOK OFF CLIMBED THROUGH BILLOWING WHITE CLOUD AT 10,000 FT INTO FULL MOONLIGHT. THE SIGHT WAS BREATHTAKING THE MOON SHONE ON THE CLOUDS LIKE DRIFTS OF SNOW. YOU COULD SEE FOR MILES, LANCASTERS ALL OVER THE SKY. OUR PILOT WAS SO CARRIED AWAY AT THE BEAUTY OF IT, HE FLEW THE AIRCRAFT LIKE A SLEIGH, SKIMMING THE TOPS OF THE CLOUDS AND WHOOPING LIKE A COWBOY. IT WAS INDEED A GRAND SIGHT. PITY IT WAS GOING TO BE SPOILT LATER THAT NIGHT.
[circled 7] AFTER WE HAD FINISHED OUR TOUR AND THE CREW HAD GONE OUR DIFFERENT WAYS, I WAS TO BE POSTED TO BRIDGENORTH AS INSTRUCTOR. IT WAS THERE THAT I WAS INFORMED THAT I WAS ELIGIBLE FOR 2 SERVICE MEDALS. THE 1939/45 STAR. AND THE AIRCREW EUROPE STAR AND CLASP. MY THOUGHTS IMMEDIATELY WENT TO GEORGE. HE MUST HAVE LAUGHED HIS SOCKS OFF.
Dublin Core
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Title
A name given to the resource
Bill Freeman's Service Career
Description
An account of the resource
A detailed account of Bill's time in the RAF, starting with drill at Lords, training at Bridlington and Bridgnorth then RAF Stormy Down. He passed the course and after seven days leave reported to Hixon for crewing up. He discusses training and his social life. He then transferred to Binbrook then Blyton, Hemswell, Elsham Wolds and N Killingholme.
He describes individual operations in detail. He and his crew were transferred to Faldingworth where the condition of their aircraft was poor. These were quickly replaced with new aircraft. His crew were successful and survived their 30 operations never to meet up again.
He concludes his memoir with seven tailender tales.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Bill Freeman
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
25 handwritten sheets
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BFreemanWFreemanWv1
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--London
England--Brighton
England--Dewsbury
Canada
England--Stafford
Wales--Tredegar
England--Northampton
England--Grimsby
France--Rouen
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Essen
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Karlsruhe
Denmark--Frederikshavn
France--Maintenon
France--Mailly-le-Camp
France--Rennes
France--Dieppe
France--Orléans
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Aachen
France--Paris
England--Lincoln
France--Le Havre
Poland
France--Pas-de-Calais
France--Caen
France--Vierzon
France
Germany
Denmark
France--Reims
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
England--Northamptonshire
England--Yorkshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Staffordshire
England--Sussex
Conforms To
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Pending text-based transcription. Under review
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.
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IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
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Tricia Marshall
Temporal Coverage
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1943-04-05
1944-03
1944-04-10
1 Group
1662 HCU
300 Squadron
5 Group
550 Squadron
air gunner
Air Gunnery School
aircrew
Anson
anti-aircraft fire
bomb aimer
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of the Le Havre E-boat pens (14/15 June 1944)
briefing
Churchill, Winston (1874-1965)
crewing up
entertainment
flight engineer
George Cross
ground crew
Halifax
Harris, Arthur Travers (1892-1984)
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
mess
military living conditions
military service conditions
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Mosquito
navigator
Nissen hut
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Operational Training Unit
Pathfinders
pilot
RAF Binbrook
RAF Blyton
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Bridlington
RAF Elsham Wolds
RAF Faldingworth
RAF Hemswell
RAF Hixon
RAF North Killingholme
RAF Stormy Down
searchlight
Stalin, Joseph (1878-1953)
tactical support for Normandy troops
target indicator
training
Wellington
Window
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1359/45951/SSmithRW425992v10002-0002 copy.1.pdf
12af6b6dff947f6f4e21b0dbbb02f12a
Dublin Core
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Title
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Smith, Bob
Robert Wylie Smith
R W Smith
Description
An account of the resource
125 items. An oral history interview with Bob Smith (b. 1924, 425992 Royal Australian Air Force) photographs, documents and navigation logs and charts. He flew operations as a navigator with 15 Squadron at RAF Mildenhall.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Bob Smith and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2019-03-25
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.
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Smith, RW
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Title
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Bob Smith's Memoirs Book 2
Description
An account of the resource
23 pages of Bob's memoirs.
Covers his training.
Creator
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Bob Smith
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
England--Brighton
England--Sidmouth
Scotland--Aberdeen
England--Salisbury
Scotland--Stranraer
Scotland--Ailsa Craig
Great Britain Miscellaneous Island Dependencies--Isle of Man
Scotland--Paisley
Scotland--Glasgow
France
France--Beauvoir-sur-Mer
Australia
New South Wales--Sydney
Queensland--Bundaberg
Queensland--Brisbane
New South Wales--Cootamundra
United States
California--San Francisco
Canada
Alberta--Edmonton
Nova Scotia--Halifax
Scotland--Gourock
Victoria--Melbourne
Manitoba--Winnipeg
Ontario--Trenton
Ontario--London
France--Châlons-sur-Marne (Arrondissement)
France--Caen
Germany
Germany--Kiel
France--Gironde Estuary
Poland--Szczecin
Netherlands
Netherlands--Eindhoven
France--Le Havre
Germany--Neuss
France--Calais
France--Pas-de-Calais
Atlantic Ocean--Kattegat (Baltic Sea)
Germany--Kleve (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Essen
Germany--Leverkusen
Netherlands--Vlissingen
Netherlands--Veere
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Homberg (Kassel)
Germany--Castrop-Rauxel
Germany--Dortmund
Germany--Fulda
Germany--Bottrop
Germany--Heinsberg (Heinsberg)
Nova Scotia
Manitoba
Poland
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal New Zealand Air Force
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Text. Memoir
Format
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23 printed pages
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Pending text-based transcription
Pending review
Identifier
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SSmithRW425992v10002-0002
1653 HCU
3 Group
467 Squadron
5 Group
84 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
anti-aircraft fire
bomb aimer
crash
crewing up
flight engineer
Gee
Hampden
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Lancaster Mk 1
Lancaster Mk 3
mess
mine laying
navigator
Nissen hut
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
Normandy deception operations (5/6 June 1944)
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
prisoner of war
RAF Andover
RAF Bishops Court
RAF Bridlington
RAF Cardington
RAF Chedburgh
RAF Cranwell
RAF Desborough
RAF Feltwell
RAF Halfpenny Green
RAF Harrington
RAF Mildenhall
RAF Silloth
RAF Stradishall
RAF Tempsford
RAF Waddington
RAF West Freugh
RAF White Waltham
RAF Wigtown
Stirling
tactical support for Normandy troops
training
V-1
V-weapon
Wellington
wireless operator
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1359/45995/MSmithRW425992-230825-02.2.pdf
934a1d70a17a0697f9ce5b48153226fb
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
Smith, Bob
Robert Wylie Smith
R W Smith
Description
An account of the resource
125 items. An oral history interview with Bob Smith (b. 1924, 425992 Royal Australian Air Force) photographs, documents and navigation logs and charts. He flew operations as a navigator with 15 Squadron at RAF Mildenhall.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Bob Smith 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
2019-03-25
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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Smith, RW
Transcribed document
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Transcription
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Prologue
Voices of the Past
O, There are voices of the past
Links of a broken chain
Wings that can bear me back
To Times
Which cannot come again
Yet, God Forbid that I should lose
The Echoes that remain. Unknown.
March 2003
Five years ago, after listening to friends, young and old, as well as journalists, editors and historians requesting War Veterans and Pioneers to write their memoirs I realised that perhaps it was a duty to my descendants that I should do so. Accordingly, I ‘bit the bullet’ and started a draft of “My Service during WW11 in the Royal Australian Air Force”.
It soon became apparent that I should have done so many years ago when the memories were still fresh, although there could be some wisdom in the fact that sometimes the perspective is better if viewed from a distance. Much time has been taken in getting back in contact with old mates and crew members to ensure that what I have written is as historically accurate as possible. I have even had researchers and historians in the UK verify some of the detail, as well as refer to a few publications that have covered the period of my ‘Operational Tour’ on XV/15 Squadron, RAF Bomber Command. I did keep a diary for a while, but discontinued same when I started Operational Training in the UK, as diaries were then forbidden. I did have, however, a good diary in the form of letters home and which my Mother kept. Unfortunately these were lost or mislaid before she died in 1979. I do have all my logs and charts as well as photos, other items and notes from mates that have assisted greatly. On a few matters the original draft had to be amended, but after a few years of revision and the acquisition of a computer I was able about six months ago to commence on the final record. There will no doubt be some further amendments and additions as more confirming information comes to hand. I will cover same in a ‘summary’ at a later stage.
The question will be asked, “Why didn’t I write my Service History soon after the war?”, and why have so many not put their experiences to paper? Some did, and they are to be congratulated and thanked for their efforts. For many there was the old service adage that it was “Infra Dig to Shoot a Line”. I consider it was a common decision of most who returned from active service in any theatre of war to get on with life and leave the war behind.
My father served in WW1 as an ‘original’ in the 41st Btn A.I.F. and went through a number of the great battles in France & Belgium. He was wounded 3 times and gassed. His younger brother was in the 9th Btn A.I.F. that landed on Gallipoli on 25th April 1915, where he was severely wounded, and later fought in France & Belgium. Their youngest brother, after whom I was named, died on active service in France after being wounded 3 times. As a boy I often wondered why Dad and his brother never talked much about the war except between themselves and other returned soldiers. I now understand. I have now been in the same position. With your mates who survived you can recall facets of your experiences in an atmosphere of mutual understanding.
War has made me a realist. Indeed there is a season for all things. Yesterday is history and there is nothing you can do to change it, although we do see some historians trying to sanitise the past. It is to-day that is God’s Gift in your hands, and Faith that gives you hope for tomorrow.
I hope that what I have written about my service in the Air Force will be a valuable record for someone in the years ahead.
Official Identity Card for the Royal Australian Air Force
Date of Issue 23 December, 1942
Letter from Employer Giving Approval to Enlist in the Airforce
Enrolment in the Reserve
Certificate of Enlistment
Enlistment in the RAAF
Rookie-AC2
When war with Germany was declared on 3rd September 1939 I was a student boarder at the Ipswich (Boys) Grammar School in my ‘Junior’ years of study. I had been enrolled at I.G.S the previous year under a Qld R.S.S.A I.L.A Scholarship that I had won because my father was a returned soldier from WW1 and I had attained a qualifying standard in the 1937 State Scholarship exams. At that early stage, although under the age of 16, I had ambitions of joining the Air Force if the war were to carry on for many years, which it did.
After sitting the “Junior Public Exams” at the end of the 1939 school year, which I passed with above average results (4 A’s, 4 B’s and 1 C) I was accepted for employment in The National Bank of Australasia Limited at its Harrisville Branch. I took the place of Gordon McDougall who had enlisted in the RAAF. He went on to graduate as a pilot and lost his life in a flying accident in East Lothian, Scotland on Monday 6th September 1943.
The war did continue in Europe through 1940, and in early 1941 when I turned 17 years of age I took the opportunity to enrol as a correspondence student with the Air Force Cadets. I received educational material and exercises in Physics and Mechanics, incorporating the theories of flight and navigation etc. Exams were set for each lesson and in my case these were checked and marked by the Headmaster of the Milora State Primary School where I attended and sat the 1937 State Scholarship exam. Early in 1942 on reaching the age of 18 I was given the opportunity to make a formal application to enlist in the RAAF, subject to parents’ and employer’s consent. I made the application to the Bank and their approval was forthcoming on 31st January 1942, subject to a few qualifications as I was still a temporary clerk on probation which meant that my re-employment after the war would be subject to reassessment at the time. My parents gave their consent on my promise not to start smoking or drinking in the Air Force until I reached age 21. This promise I kept well beyond that time, as I have never been a smoker, and only a moderate drinker since into my 30’s. When I returned from active service in 1945 I realised what an enormous stress I had placed on my parents, particularly as my father had seen active service on the battlefields of France & Belgium in WW1 and my mother prayerfully relied on the strength of her Faith. Her prayers were answered.
Armed with the necessary consents I forwarded my application to the RAAF Recruitment Centre in Brisbane and on 13th February 1942 had completed the RAAF’s Form P/P/39A for Air Crew entry I was now on stand-by as it was policy for actual flying training not to commence until the recruit was of age 19.
In 1942, after the entry of Japan into the war and posing a real threat to Australian territory the government of the day was actively engaged in calling up qualified males into the Militia Forces. Apparently to keep a priority on Air Crew ‘hopefuls’ the RAAF instituted a call-up of those on ‘the reserve’ by creating the mustering of Air Crew Guard in Queensland, New South Wales & Victoria. It was under this mustering that I received my call-up to report to No.3 RAAF Recruitment Centre in Eagle Street, Brisbane on 21st May 1942. My position at the Bank was taken by John Neville Keys, the son of the then Manager at Boonah Branch, Neville Keys. He went into the next RAAF call-up, was given the number 426112 got his ‘wings’ as a Bomb Aimer and lost his life with No.466 Squadron Bomber Command on 11th April 1944 when shot down by a German night fighter on a raid on the railway installations at Tergnier in the lead up to the “D” Day invasion of Europe. I reported to No.3 Recruitment Centre along with 191 other recruits who were passed medically fit and duly enlisted, with service Nos from 425819 to 426010 inclusive, and proceeded on posting No.3 Recruit Depot at Maryborough, Qld with the rank of AC2. Authority P.O.R.135/42. I was given the No.425992, placed between No.425991 Bill Washbourne and 425993 Des Webster. Bill came from the Warwick district and Des from the Kilcoy area. This was to avoid surname of Smith under consecutive numbers. The same applied to the Jones & Murphies. The only Smith who remained in strict numerical order was 425891 Robert Angus Martin Smith.
We proceeded by train that evening to Maryborough where we were issued with uniforms, dungarees, boots, toothbrushes, razors etc and settled into barracks with palliasses and introduced to the Air Force life on 6 shillings a day for 7 days a week with free meals, accommodation, medical & dental treatment. In those days the Bank made up the difference in pay, which was not great but amounted to a bit of compulsory saving.
I Settle Into Life as a Recruit
Soon settled into a daily routine of a route march early in the morning while there was frost on the ground before breakfast, drills, lectures and vaccinations. Leave was granted most evenings and over the week-end. It was quite a common practice for the airmen to commandeer a push bike after going to the pictures in town, ride it out to the station gates and leave it there. The recruit depot was situated on the Maryborough aerodrome. Maryborough in those days was a town where everyone rode bikes, and the locals soon got to know where to look for their missing mode of transport. After three weeks intensive initiation into air force life we were passed as suitable recruits for Air Crew training and were split into several groups and posted to various RAAF stations in Queensland & New South Wales to serve as Guards until posted to an Initial Training School.
Bill Washbourne, Des Webster, Col (Snow) Wheatley and myself were posted to No.1 A.O.S at Cootamundra N.S.W. on 13th June 1942. Authority No,140/42. We travelled by train from Maryborough and arrived in Sydney only 2 weeks after the Japanese midget submarine attack on that city. We had to change trains in Sydney. At Cootamundra we were joined by Air Crew Guards from other States. Duties at Cootamundra included guarding the Ansons parked on the station aprons overnight, station perimeters, main gate guardhouse and the fuel depot about a mile out of town. Guard duties were usually 4 hours on and 4 hours off. The winter chill was a bit of a shock to the Queenslanders but we were treated generously with the issue of an extra blanket. Ice creams taken on duty at night to help you through your 4 hour shift could be left on a post, or tail of an aircraft and would not melt. If there was a sneaky wind blowing and the opportunity was judged safe we would crawl into one of the aircraft for a bit of a break. It was a fair risk that no one was doing the rounds to check on you.
Duty at the fuel dump was more relaxed. We stayed in a tent, and had trained the possums to eat fruit and chocolates out of our hands until they became a real nuisance. Horse riders, probably going home from the pictures or a dance in Cootamundra and travelling along the road that passed by the dump would be challenged “Who goes there?” Most took it in good humour, but occasionally one would get a bit stroppy but remain cautious in case we decided to fire a shot into the air and scare their horse. To relieve the monotony one night I fired a couple of shots at something flying overhead in the moonlight. Unfortunately these were heard back at the station and in no time a vehicle with more guards for reinforcement turned up. To the N.C.O who arrived I had to give a quick explanation. Told him I had challenged a person who had come through the fence, and when he didn’t stop but went back through the fence I fired a couple of shots after him. A bit of a recco of the area was made but nothing found, so I was instructed to report to the C/O’s office the next day. This I did along with others who were on duty at the time. They supported my account of events, but we were ordered to go to the rifle range for target practice and assessment. I was given 5 shots at the 200 yard range and scored 2 bulls and 3 inners, and explained further to the C.O that I would have fired close enough to the intruder to give him a fright. He ordered a close inspection of the site in daylight to see if there was any evidence of clothing caught in the barbed wire fence but nothing was found. I should imagine the C.O’s report on the incident would make interesting reading. Bill Washbourne was on guard duty with me at the time and at a reunion of the Air Crew Guards in Brisbane in the 1990’s he was surprised when I told him there was no intruder. He confirmed that at the time they all thought I was serious.
My first encounter with an aircraft accident and death was at Cootamundra on 21st September 1942. A Beaufighter from No.31 Squadron stationed at Wagga Wagga flew into our circuit and on turning to come in to land stalled and crashed about a mile from the station. The squadron which had been equipped with Beauforts had changed over to the Beaufighter only the month before. It was flown by F/Sgt. John Evan Jenkins (No.407435) and the second crew man, possibly the Observer, was Sgt. Vivian Sutherst (No.35755). Both were killed instantly on impact and are buried in the Cootamundra War Cemetery. I was with a few guards who were sent immediately to the scene of the crash, which we had to keep under guard for a couple of days. It was a sobering experience and I vividly remember the advice given to us at the scene by a senior sergeant that we were not to dwell on the death of the crew, but put it behind us, do our duty and get on with life. There was nothing we could do to change what had happened. That advice stood me in good stead through the experiences ahead and indeed through my life. It was while on guard duty at the crash site that we had some amusement shooting at rabbits. On one occasion a bullet ricocheted off a rock and as it whined its way across the country side it was amusing to see flocks of sheep scatter in its path.
The Presbyterian Church in Cootamundra had a very active Youth Fellowship Association to which I went with Bill Washbourne and other airmen. We were made most welcome and enjoyed many a happy time
On 16/9/42 we were officially attached to the newly formed No. 73 Reserve Squadron, but our routine on the station did not change.
On 11th October Des Webster and I were posted to No. 2 Initial Training School at Bradfield Park (Sydney) as our first step to Air Crew entry. There were also Air Crew Guards from other stations on the same posting, including Keith Mills, Noel Hooper and Eric Sutton who were at Maryborough with me. Since we enlisted our mustering was Aircrew V (Guard), with rank of AC11.
We were part of No. 33 Course at I.T.S. It was an intensive course of lectures on many subjects, but mainly on basic theories of flying, navigation, gunnery and bombing. Physical training played an important part and you were under constant observation for overall assessment as suitable for air crew and put through various tests to gauge reflexes and co-ordination before being interviewed by a selection panel to be mustered into a particular category.
A wide range of sports was available, including sailing, and evening leave passes were generous. Queenslanders who were issued with the tropical uniform were not allowed to wear it into the city (South of the Harbour Bridge), but that was not strictly policed. We would mostly go to the Anzac Club for a meal and then to a show. Then buy a packet of fruit, say 4 lbs (2 kilos) of Cherries for 2 shillings (20 cents) to eat on the train back to Lindfield and walk to the camp. If you fell asleep on the last train and got carried on to Gordon it was a long walk back to camp- had to hurry to make it by 2359 Hrs. Through the Anzac Club interstate and country servicemen could be introduced to residents in Sydney who were willing to extend home hospitality. I availed of this offer and came to meet Miss MacPherson, a retired Nursing Sister who had a unit on the slopes of the harbour at Neutral Bay. Mac’s place became a home away from home for a few young airmen. She was a dear soul and was like a second mother to a few of us. It was a great joy to visit, have a home cooked meal and occasionally sleepover on a Saturday night. She would make up a bed on the lounge and be amazed to find us sleeping on the floor in the morning. I kept up a regular correspondence with her while overseas, as did a few others, and 3 years later made a quick visit on my return in-transit back to Queensland after disembarking in Sydney.
While on the course a few of us including Keith Mills, Eric Sutton, Des Webster, Noel Hooper and myself were detailed to go to the University of N.S.W. where they were doing research into air sickness. We were good guinea pigs, as we were given vouchers for a meal of roast lamb and baked vegetables before the tests started. The tests involved being strapped into a stretcher and swung from ceiling to ceiling to see how long you lasted. I lost my meal after about 10 minutes as did most. As far as I can remember Noel Hooper was the only one who did not part with his meal.
The course finished on 1st January 1943 when we were assigned into various air crew categories for further flying training. The Selection panel tried to get me to accept a pilot’s course as my tests confirmed I was well suited to be a pilot. I pressed hard to be given a Navigator category as I was ‘interested in mathematics,’ and got my wish. Actually the main reason I applied for a ‘navigator’ was the good gen circulating at the time that those chosen for Navigator and Bomb Aimer courses would be going to Canada for flying training with the plan to go on to the U.K. to fly in Lancasters or Halifaxes. There was a proviso that you had to be 19 years of age by 10th January 1943, the date they would have to report back from pre-embarkation leave. (That was my 19th birthday and how I became to be the youngest of the draft). This was confirmed when we were given 10 days leave with instructions to report back at Bradfield Park No. 2 Embarkation Depot on 11th Jan 1943. As from 2nd Jan 1943 my mustering was Air Crew 11 (Navigator) and rank L.A.C. (Leading Aircraftman—not Lance Air Commodore).
It was not hard to take a weeks leave at home. It was a busy week visiting a few relations and then having to say farewells with many a prayer for a safe return from the war. I had made a good friend of the bank manager’s daughter, Jean Hall, and I had a feeling that many thought our friendship was more serious. I took Jean to a dance at the Harrisville School of Arts on the Friday night 8th Jan, but it was not like the old dances as it was overrun by RAAF and American airmen from Amberley which had now grown into a large air base servicing the Pacific war zone. Jean promised to write me while I was away and we did keep up a regular correspondence. A neighbour, Mrs Adams, gave me a poem with a sprig of white heather that I kept with me always. She had given the same to my father when he enlisted in WW1. My leave at home finished on my 19th birthday anniversary, Sunday 10th January 1943 as I left on the morning rail motor from Harrisville on my way back to Sydney, with a heap of goodies from home including a birthday cake.
At Home on Embarkation Leave with Mum, brother Alex and
sisters Margaret and Joyce – January 1943.
A Rookie Airman – No. 425992 ACII R.W. Smith
1942 – In Sydney
Embarkation Depot Sydney & To Canada
From embarkation leave at home I travelled on the “Kyogle’ line, 2nd division, from South Brisbane station arriving in Sydney and No. 2 Embarkation depot at Bradfield Park on Monday 11th January 1943. Leave was granted that night, so I went to visit Miss Mac with a piece of my birthday cake. The rest I shared with mates.
Leave arrangements while at Embarkation Depot were very generous. If no drafts for overseas postings had been issued and no particular duties allocated we were stood down after the mandatory morning parade until the next morning, or even over the week-end if it was on Friday morning’s parade.
The Waiting Period – Stand Downs, Outings and Farewells
There were a few of us who spent a lot of time together during this waiting period, mainly the youngest on the group to be sent overseas. Besides myself there was Keith Mills who had turned 19 only 8 days before me, Lou Brimblecombe whose 19th birthday was about 2 weeks previous to Keith’s, Eric Sutton who had his 19th birthday the previous August and Des Webster whose 19th birthday was in July. We all went on to train as Navigators and Keith, Eric and I became known as the 3 musketeers on the course in Canada. Des went on to train as a Wireless Operator. A few were over 30 years of age and we looked upon them as old fellows. Early in our stay Keith somehow met a girl whose father was a Fijian Envoy Representative in Sydney. Her name was Pat, and on the first Sunday there he asked me to join him and Pat and her friend Merle Green to spend the day at Cronulla and then go to Luna Park at night.
The next few days saw us assigned to some wharf duties at Waterloo and on Thursday 21st January we were detailed to the unloading of mustard gas bombs from an American liberty ship at Glebe Island. Keith Mills, Des Webster and I saw no future in this so we went A.W.L that night and stayed at the Allied Club in town. Stayed in town on Friday and went to the pictures at night with Pat and Merle. Took Merle home to Punchbowl and her parents insisted I stay the night with them. Went back to camp on Saturday morning to learn that we hadn’t been missed. As there was still nothing doing about overseas postings and leave had been granted over the week-end I went back into town, had tea and spent the night at Miss Mac’s. Went into town on Sunday morning to meet Keith, and we went with Pat and Merle for a train trip to Lawson in the Blue Mountains.
The next week saw the usual routine of parade, stand-downs, sports etc. On Friday we were placed on a draft with all leave cancelled and no telephone calls allowed. After lunch the unexpected announcement was made that leave was granted and extended to 1300 Hrs on Sunday 31st Jan. So I went out to Punchbowl to say my farewell to Merle and her family and thank them for their hospitality, and then on to see Miss Mac and the two girls who boarded with her. They insisted I stay for a home cooked dinner and stay overnight. Slept on the lounge room floor. Got back to camp at midday on Sunday to learn there was no further news on our embarkation and that leave had been extended to 0730 Hrs on Monday. As I had said my ‘Good-Byes’ I stayed in camp and wrote a few letters.
On Monday morning we were paraded and went on a long route march before breakfast and after lunch at 1300 Hrs given another stand-down. On Tuesday morning it was a swimming parade and early stand-down again. Wednesday morning was another swimming parade, a film on “Next-of Kin” after lunch and then stand-down until the next morning. Keith had got word out to Pat that we were still around, so we arranged to meet Pat and Merle in the evening and take them to the Prince Edward theatre to see “Reap the Wild Wind”. On Thursday morning we had another route march, pay parade (“The Eagle sh.. on each 2nd Thursday”) and stand-down at 1330 Hrs. It was the usual swimming parade on Friday morning, 5th Feb, and another stand-down after the 1330 Hrs parade until Monday morning. By this time we were beginning to wonder if were ever going to get on board a ship.
With a free week-end ahead I took the opportunity to contact Merle and meet her in town after work and go to the pictures and then see her home to Punchbowl. Again her parents insisted I stay over the week-end. On Saturday morning I went into town to buy a few magazines etc for the trip over to Canada and back to camp to change into tropical uniform of khaki shirt and shorts and back into town to spend the afternoon in the Botanical gardens and go with Merle to the pictures at night to the State Theatre to see “They all kissed the Bride”. Slept overnight at the Green’s and had a very quiet day on Sunday playing draughts and reading a very funny publication titled “One Big Laugh”. On the way back to camp that night the M.P’s boarded the train at Wynyard station and anyone wearing tropical uniform had to surrender their leave passes and were ordered to report to the guard house the next morning. Big trouble?? Wearing of shorts in uniform was not allowed south of the Harbour Bridge.
The Wait is Over
Monday 8th Feb 1943 dawned with guards on all gates at No. 2 Embarkation Depot, an early call to parade and orders given for clearances to be completed. All leave passes were cancelled, so no further use for the passes that were taken from us the previous night. This is it at last. After attending to clearances we were instructed to report back on parade with kit bags packed and ready to move on to buses at 1700 Hrs for transport to Woolloomooloo to embark at 1900 Hrs on the troopship “U.S.S. Hermitage”. It was a ship of 23000 tons which cruised at 18-20 knots. It was formerly the Italian cruise ship “Count Ciano” that travelled around the Mediterranean Sea as a floating casino on pleasure cruises. It had been captured by the American forces and had taken part in the landing of allied troops in North Africa and was on its way back to the west coast of America. We embarked as planned and had a good night’s sleep on board.
We were up at 0600 Hrs on Tuesday morning, detailed on to mess duties and instructed in ‘Abandon Ship’ drills while we lay at anchor in Neutral Bay to take on fuel after taking aboard fresh water, fruit and vegetables and other food supplies at Woolloomooloo. Spent the night at anchor in Neutral Bay and at 0830 Hrs on Wednesday 10th February it was ‘up-anchor’ and away, waving to the passengers on the ferries and sighting many hammer head sharks in the harbour. It was not long before we were out through ‘The Heads’ and setting course Nor-Nor-East into choppy seas with two Dutch Destroyers in escort. I started to feel a bit squeamy? But yes, managed to hold on to my breakfast. We are now under American terms for troops in transit—only two meals a day, but the canteen is open for an hour twice a day. As the Australian landscape slowly dipped from view everyone bravely sheltered their own feelings-generally a mixed feeling of adventure and uncertainty. Everyone realised and acknowledged that as we all went into flying training and operations over enemy territory not all would be returning to see their homeland again.
The destroyer escort left us at 0600 Hrs the next morning and we continued on a zig-zag course through choppy seas in light rain. I was detailed on to mess duties that afternoon and issued with Aussie Comfort Fund parcels. Soon settled into a routine. Those not on mess duties had to attend lectures-a good bit of armed forces psychology to keep the troops moulded into a unit with a common cause of complaint. A couple of albatrosses followed us for the first few days but they then peeled off formation on us. Sharks and flying fish were sighted and on Saturday a pod of whales was sighted on our port side. On Sunday morning we had church parade at 1000 Hrs and then ‘stand down’, but I was detailed on guard duties. Certain duties were allotted to the troops in transit such as mess duties/kitchen hand, deck patrol and shifts on the ack-ack gun at the stern. The ship’s officers were a bit concerned about the Aussies on the ack-ack gun as they were too keen to shoot at the ‘Met’ balloons that were released at regular intervals.
Monday 15th February, 1943, a memorable 2 days. We crossed the International Date line. So, we had Monday twice and the thought of only one day’s pay was given much discussion. Sufficient to record here that after our arrival in Canada due submission was made to RAAF Headquarters and suitable adjustment was made in our paybooks. A compensating adjustment was made on our return to Australia in October 1945. One of the Mondays was the end on my guard duty detail and the idea of lectures to fill in the day did not appeal, so I took a stroll around deck without my life jacket and was promptly apprehended and given 3 day’s kitchen duties, along with a couple of others who realised the opportunity to avoid lectures and enjoy more than two meals a day as we passed along the corridors with trays of hot food yelling “Hot Stuff” to warn others to be careful.
Pango, Pango
On Tuesday morning we sighted land ahead. American Samoa. Berthed in Pango Pango harbour in the late morning to take on fuel, fresh water and unload canned food for the American troops based there. Also embarked a contingent of American Marines. Those not on duties were allowed ashore for a couple of hours but had to remain in the vicinity of the wharf. As I was on kitchen duties I had to take on the scene from the deck, watching some of the fellows enticing the native girls in bright floral dresses to climb the coconut trees. Don’t think they were interested in the coconuts. Cameras were not allowed, under very strict orders, but some did manage to take a few snaps from the ship. We left Pango Pango at 0820 Hrs next day, Wed 17th Feb, and I finished my kitchen duties after midday. Had first good bath and change of clothes for a week, then strolled around the deck again minus life jacket and got another 3 days in the kitchen. Good Show!!
The next morning we sighted a cruiser and a passenger ship heading south-west, the opposite to our north easterly route. There was a rumoured submarine alert that night as the ship’s engines were stopped and we drifted for some few hours. Woke early on Friday morning to the sound of the ship’s fog-horns but there was nothing in sight. Crossed the equator that day with King Neptune coming aboard to put the rookies through the customary initiation ceremony. We all got a liberal coating of shaving cream. On Saturday morning I finished my kitchen duty ‘penalty’ and as the news on the bush radio was that we would be calling into Honolulu by Tuesday next, decided to stay away from penalty duties in case shore leave was granted. Lectures had been toned down a bit by now to make the days less boring. On Sunday, church parade was held at 1000 Hrs and then all were given stand down. So the “Bum Nut” club gathered around Russ Martin’s gramophone to hear Glenn Miller playing “In the Mood” for the umpteenth time, along with ‘Corn Silk’ and other hit tunes of the time. Just can’t remember how the group got the name “Bum Nuts”. Probably from Gum Nuts sitting on their bums on the deck listening to that one record and almost for sure would have been one of Russ Martin’s screwy ideas. Monday 22nd Feb saw the celebration of George Washington’s birthday with dinner of roast turkey, baked vegetables, salads and ice-cream. A welcome variation from the usual navy beans, saveloys and sauerkraut. A concert was held in the afternoon when we were presented with our ‘Crossing the Line’ certificates.
Honolulu
Sighted land early on Tuesday 23rd Feb and at 1000 Hrs berthed in Honolulu. Half of the RAAF contingent was granted shore leave that afternoon. I was in the other half who were given ‘liberty’ from 0830 hrs to 1200 Hrs the next morning.
So we were up early on Wednesday and down the gangplank at 0830 Hrs. I went with Keith Mills, Russ Martin and a few others primarily to buy new gramophone needles. On shore, the first thing we noticed was the number of shop assistants of Japanese descent and the heavily armed guards on all premises with a strong naval and military presence on the streets. We were wearing our tropical uniforms of khaki shirts and shorts and were taken as ‘boy scouts’ by many Americans, which did not go over too well. It was our first encounter with vehicles driven on the right hand side of the road and the ingrained habit of ‘look right’ before crossing soon had to be adjusted. I went very close to being hit by an army truck being driven by an Afro-American. It was a close shave, but fortunately my parents were not to receive that dreaded telegram.
Nowhere could we find gramophone needles-sewing needles, knitting needles. All sorts of needles, but no gramophone needles. Then it dawned on Russ Martin to give a play-acting role of a record spinning around on a turn table. And the shop assistant with a very serious expression said “You mean Phonograph needles”. Problem solved and mission completed. So the old record was going to cop a hiding for a few more days. There was other shopping to do, so we split up and went different ways. I stayed with Noel Hooper and we met an American Army Officer who took a real interest in us and invited us to have a look at the Pearl Harbour Naval Base. After going through a few check points, and might I add, given star treatment, we had to explain that we had to be back on board by 1200 Hrs and by then there was not enough time to go any further. We did get a view of the harbour and the devastation that had been caused and he agreed to take us back to the ship.
While we were ashore many seriously wounded and shell-shocked G.I’s from the Pacific Island battle zones were embarked for repatriation to their homeland. Many required full time medical attendants to apply necessary therapy to teach them to walk again and regain normal physical co-ordination. The ship was now crowded for the rest of the trip.
A band played on the wharf during the afternoon, and then it was ‘Aloha’ as we sailed away to strike rough seas and cold weather all Thursday and Friday, which kept us in our bunks and under blankets for most of the time. We were issued with sheep skin vests from the Australian Comforts Fund which were well received. The seas calmed down a bit by Saturday morning so I was able to enjoy breakfast of beans and an apple. Got some entertainment in the afternoon with the ack-ack guns firing at flak bursts. The Aussies also got some entertainment hearing the G.I’s calling their mates ‘cobras’ after hearing us call ours ‘cobbers’.
On Sunday 28th February, four days out of Honolulu, complaints were lodged about the breakfast because it was not hot. The weather was still cold and rainy. Church parade was held at 1000 Hrs. At 0100 Hrs we had advanced clocks by 30 minutes. In the afternoon I sewed some badges on Ben Smith’s overcoat and was rewarded with a sandwich-can only guess that he got it from the canteen. Clocks were advanced by 30 minutes at 0100 Hrs on Monday morning. We again woke to cold and cloudy weather but the sun managed to break through late in the morning. To keep us on our toes we were put through ‘Abandon Ship’ drill which didn’t go over too well with the American troops who embarked at Honolulu.
Up on deck after breakfast on Tuesday morning 2nd March to see a convoy ahead and a welcome to the sea gulls that had started to circle the ship as we moved towards land. Soon as it was a very spectacular view as we passed under the Golden Gate Bridge to enter San Francisco harbour and berth on the southern side opposite the famous Alcatraz prison island at 1600 Hrs when the tide was favourable. We were promptly disembarked, assembled on the wharf and marched to a ferry terminal to board the ferry across the harbour to Oakland where we were entrained and departed at 2000 Hrs for Vancouver.
We enjoy Our Trip to Vancouver Through to Edmonton
After a bit more than 3 weeks on the ship, it was luxury accommodation and service on the train, and I really enjoyed a good night’s sleep. It was breakfast in style on Wednesday morning as we sped through the foothills of the Cascade mountains, and we enjoyed the view of snow capped hills and frozen lakes for the first time. We descended on to the plains and farming communities of Oregon, fruit, chocolates, ice-cream papers and magazines (you name it) all available from the waiters on the train. We went through Roseburg, and on to Eugene, Albany, Salem (the Capital) and arrived in Portland just on dusk, with the snow capped Mt. Hood on the eastern horizon. The things we noted most during the day were the absence of fences between houses in the towns and cities, and the lack of paint on nearly all the wooden houses. Of course the Queenslanders could not help but notice the luxury of the train travel at speeds and stability that were unknown on the Queensland railways at that time. After such a full day of interest it was no trouble to settle back into the bunk for a good sleep as we travelled on overnight to Seattle and on to Vancouver.
Thursday 4th March was another memorable day. Woke at 0700 Hrs in Vancouver, had breakfast at the station then a pay parade to be issued with Canadian Dollars. Leave was granted from 1130 hrs until 1800 Hrs when we had to be back at the station. The Canadian hospitality came to the fore as we were approached by a Mr Keeler who introduced himself as a Rotarian (my first contact with Rotary) and offered a lift for a few of us into town to the tourist bureau and the YMCA where we enjoyed a meal for 5 cents. He arranged with us to call back at 1400 Hrs to pick us up and drive us around the sights of Vancouver and back to the station by 1800Hrs. There were three of us and as far as I can remember, although I am not sure, the other two may have been Ben Smith and Russ Martin. We were taken over the Lions Gate Bridge, through Stanley Park with its Indian Totem Poles and views of the snow capped Lions Head mountains as well as past the Houses of Parliament and through a few suburbs to be back at the station on time. After tea (what the Canadians called the evening meal) at the station we left by train at 2100 Hrs via the Canadian National Railways route through the Rockies to Edmonton.
We woke the next morning to be greeted by the most spectacular scenery as the long train snaked its way alongside frozen rivers and lakes and snow laden conifer tress in the foot hills, climbing all the time. All around were the majestic Rockies with not a tree on them but capped in snow. It was cold outside but we were in heated carriages with the same service that we enjoyed on the train from Oakland to Vancouver, but the waiters were Canadians. When we did stop at a station for the engine to take on water we could not resist the temptation to jump out and romp in the snow. Most were wearing their dungarees over the singlet and underpants, so it didn’t take long before the freezing temperatures scuttled them back to the warmth of the carriage. At our stop at Avola for 20 minutes it did not take long for a snow fight to develop and by some fluke or by accident a hard packed snowball hit the window of a carriage and broke it. (Jim Bateman it was). Anyway it made that carriage too cold for comfort so the occupants herded into adjoining carriages when we got under way again. Then we saw a bit of organization that you would not see on the Queensland Railways. As we pulled into Jasper the train stopped with the broken window right beside a ladder and a couple of tradesmen with the necessary tools and materials to repair the damage. In less than 20 minutes the new window was installed. We had now climbed to a good height and at Jasper there was a lot of sheet ice on the ground which caused us a few problems to stay on our feet. Three young boys gave us a bit of amusement as we threw our spare Aussie halfpennies along the ice and into snow drifts. After Jasper we crossed the Athabasca River and the highest point on the trip. From there it was downhill on to the prairies of Alberta. We had to stop for some unknown reason near Edson, before going on to Edmonton where we arrived early in the morning of Saturday 6th March 1943.
Avola – Where a carriage window was broken
Jasper – Where the window was fixed
During our 20 minute stop
We stayed on the train until 0600 Hrs and the arrival of a few canvas topped 3 ton trucks on to which we were loaded. The temperature was Minus 23. Fahrenheit and I soon realised that the best option was to be among the first to throw your kitbag in and jump in after it with others piling in after you to keep the cold at bay. We were taken immediately to No.3 Manning Depot (as the RCAF called it), given breakfast and allotted to barracks. We then had to assemble in the ‘Arena’ for a lecture on what to expect in our future movements and to remind us that in the RCAF the flag in front of HQ had to be saluted. This did not impress the Aussies. After that we were given leave until Monday morning. As a general rule most of the trainees under the Empire Training Scheme in Canada were given leave over the week-end. After a shave and a shower I teamed with an Ian Scott (RCAF) and went into town to the pictures and then to a dance at the Memorial Hall. It was very cold coming back to camp on the tram.
On Sunday morning we slept in until 1100 Hrs, then shaved, showered and had dinner before a few of us went into town to the YMCA which was well equipped with a ten-pin bowling alley, heated swimming pool, gymnasium, dance floor and dry canteen. Came back to camp reasonably early with Ben Smith and John Honeyman.
It was down to business on Monday morning as we were issued with flying suits and other gear needed. Photographs were taken for Identity Cards, Dental & Medical checks after dinner and then back into town with Bub Sargeant for a while before coming back to camp to write a few letters to home. On Tuesday morning we were paraded at 0900 Hrs and those mustered for training as Navigators were transported to Edmonton Airport where No.2 Air Observer School was situated, to be signed in, allotted to barracks and issued with text books and settled in after a quick trip into town to buy a few necessities. Three Australians-Jim Bateman, Bill Bowden and Geoff Cohen were assigned to Course No.71N1 along with a number of New Zealanders and Canadians. The remainder of the Australians, including myself, were assigned to Course No.71N2.
Navigators Course No. 71N2
No. 2 Air Observers School - EDMONTON, Alberta, CANADA
On Tuesday 9th March 1943, one month after embarking in Sydney, we started on the above course for training as Air Navigators. It was a rather quiet day, with the issue of text books and some navigation instruments. Even had time to write my first long letter home.
The following day however saw the start of what was to become a regular routine of breakfast, parade, lectures, dinner (at midday), more lectures, tea (evening) and study at night, interrupted on occasions with sport’s afternoons and later on with daylight and night flying. All interspersed with visits to the canteen where we soon learned to enjoy waffles with maple syrup, coke and ice-cream. On Friday at the end of the first week we experienced a very heavy snowfall, got issued with our navigation watches and had our first ‘Dry Swim’ as navigation exercises in the classroom are called. Leave was granted over most week-ends.
On Saturday morning we had another ‘dry swim’ to prepare us for our first flight and then it was stand-down until Monday morning. Church parades were always held on Sunday mornings. Went shopping on Saturday afternoon with Bub Sargent and to a show “Journey for Margaret”. Had a sleep-in on Sunday morning to 1100 Hrs, then shaved and showered and had a big dinner before settling down to write a few letters. Bub Sargent was doing the same and Keith Mills came by to try to get us to go out for tea.
On Monday 15th March we had the usual lecture periods, a pay parade at which the Red Cross managed to get a donation of $5- from us; study at night to keep up with the course. Between lectures the next day we were paraded for issue of battle dress, during which there was more snow fighting. For some reason Bub Sargent and I missed out on the issue that morning-they had probably run out of RAAF-Blue battle dresses in our size. Went to the pictures that night to see “In Which We Serve”. Bruce McGiffin came over from the Manning Depot while we were at lectures on Wednesday just to see how we were going. He was still awaiting a posting on to flying training. He was one of the “Bum Nut Club” on the troopship coming over. Got a letter from cousin Danny, in the Army in New Guinea, and answered it that day as well as writing home again. Lectures on Thursday included one on the camera which was very good. Made a visit to the barber before tea. On Friday we had more ‘dry swim’ exercises and at 1500 Hrs had a Wing’s parade for passing-out of earlier courses of Navigators and Bomb Aimers. Bub and I were issued with our battle dress, had a ‘signals’ lecture and I was put on my first duty on “Watch parade”. Cannot remember for sure now, just what that involved, but I think it meant you were not granted leave over the week-end. Had our usual lectures on Saturday morning, during which there was some excitement when a Boston crashed on the ‘drome. There was a false fire alarm in the barracks that night, probably something to do with Ben Smith smoking in bed. Was not feeling 100% and could feel the flu coming on. Still not feeling well of Sunday, just mooched around and went to bed early.
I Have a Spell in Hospital
On Monday 22nd March I was quite sick and stayed in bed, and was admitted to the Station Hospital with a severe attack of ‘flu. Bub Sargent and Ben Smith visited me after tea. The next day in hospital gave me something to write home about, particularly to Jean Hall who was a nurse in the Ipswich General Hospital. A nurse came and stripped me to the waist to wash me down, as she said, as far a possible. Then does likewise from the other end to wash me up as far as possible. Finally says “I now have to wash possible”. Slept most of Wednesday. Keith Mills and Ron Etherton dropped in with some mail that had arrived and on Thursday. Scotty Gall dropped in with some writing gear so that I could write a letter or two. Got discharged on Friday morning-missed the C.O’s parade. A couple of lectures in the afternoon and early to bed. Recuperated a bit on Saturday morning by sleeping in (no lectures) and then went into town after dinner with Bub Sargent. Met Ben Smith at the YMCA and went to a show at night. On Sunday morning did some study to catch up and after dinner went for a walk with Keith Mills and Ron Etherton, playing with some kids ice-skating in the frozen over gutters on the way.
Woke on Monday 29th March, (sister Margaret’s 18th birthday) to a great blanket of snow. 9 inches had fallen overnight, so the snow fights were alive again. This was when we experimented and discovered that an orange left on top of the ground froze solid in a very short time, but if buried in the snow took a long time to freeze We were due to have our ‘orientation’ flight the next day after muster and pay parade. The weather was dirty however, and this was scrubbed. Instead, we were given lectures on the layout of the Avro Anson, (the “Aggie”), and the 2nd navigator’s job of winding up the undercarriage after take-off, some 130 odd turns of the handle. For our training flights we were paired, the 1st Navigator did the log and plot charts and the 2nd Nav practiced map reading. I was paired with Scotty Gall, aged 30. After tea Keith Mills, Ron Etherton and I went to see “Random Harvest”.
Airborne at Last
Wednesday 31st March 1943 Whooppee!!! Airborne, Took off at 0907 Hrs in ‘Aggie’ No.6074 with bush pilot Mr Anderson on a flight plan: XD (Edmonton)-Wetaskiwin-Camrose-XD. Landed 1034 Hrs. What a familiarisation flight!!. Got a bit airsick and no wonder. The pilot thought the ‘Aggie’ was a fighter plane and shot up the school house at Looma where his girl friend was a teacher. Circled it a few times and could see through the windows as we flashed by.
Next day was April Fools Day but avoided being caught out as we had a packed day of more lectures. Then on Friday we had a few lectures and reported to the Records Office to have our fingerprints taken. Then in the afternoon we had our first photo flight taking hand held obliques. We were given a number of landmarks to photo and the pilot just went from one target to the next which was always in view because of the good visibility and the pilots local knowledge. No directions from the navigator were needed. In spite of the many banks & turns involved I did not get airsick, but others did suffer effects.
It was back in the air again on Saturday morning for another photo flight. This time it was taking vertical cross-country line overlaps from the school house at Namao to a bridge 2 miles S-W of there. Good fun-watch the drift. On these flights the duties of 1st and 2nd navigator were shared. Under strict instructions of course, not to let go of the camera when taking obliques out of the rear window. In the afternoon we relaxed—Ron Etherton, Keith Mills, Russ Martin, Lou Brimblecombe and I went into town, had two games of ten-pin bowling at the YMCA (Won the 2nd game), had tea at “Tony’s” and went to the pictures to see “One of Our Aircraft is Missing”. Back to barracks on the 2140 Hrs bus. As the weather conditions earlier in the week had set back the flying programme, some time was made up on Sunday. Church parade was held in the morning, and after dinner we were briefed for our first navigation exercise which was a flight of about 3 hours with 1st and 2nd Nav duties shared. Route was: XD–Fort Saskatchewan–Camrose-Lougheed-Mannville-Lake Yekau-XD. Took off at 1400 Hrs with Mr Ireland as pilot.
Training Continues
Included in lectures on Monday 5th April was a special talk from a Squadron Leader on the conditions prevailing in Britain. A signals lecture was held after tea, but I did not attend. On Tuesday morning, more lectures {classes on various subjects}, and after dinner we were transferred from “D” Barracks to a new barracks building across the road. Real ‘5 star’ accommodation, with central heating and bathroom/toilet facilities incorporated as well as the sleeping quarters. We still preferred to have some windows open and a bit of fresh air coming in, and Ben Smith still smoked in bed. It was quite a change, as before we had to run from the bath/toilet block back to your hut in temperatures that were unfit for brass monkeys. It was supposed to be a sports afternoon, but that had to be scrubbed.
On Wednesday morning we had another photo flight, this time with a female passenger, probably a friend of the pilot, Mr Lawrie. Then on Thursday we had a review and discussions on our first photo flight, as all the films had been developed and printed. This was followed by practice on the drift recorder. Leave was granted after dinner, from 1400 Hrs, but most of the class stayed in camp to catch up on studies and letter writing. After lectures etc on Friday I was rostered on Duty Watch parade, strolling around that night in rain & mud. More lectures on Saturday morning and more studies in the afternoon as we prepared for “Maps and Charts” exam. Duty Watch Parade before tea. Sunday was still wet and miserable and we studied most of the day, with Duty Watch Parades at 1000 Hrs and 1800 Hrs. A football appeared from somewhere, so a few fellows managed a game in the mud.
Got mail from home on Monday 12th April, with the photos that were taken when I was home on pre-embarkation leave. As the weather was still unsuitable for flying on Tuesday and Wednesday we were occupied with more studies and lectures as well as a game or two of football in the mud. I had to go over to the Manning Depot to have a photo taken and more fingerprinting. Got back in the air on Thursday for a photo exercise with the Ft. Saskatchewan bridge as our target. It was a very bumpy flight. On Friday it was back in the air again on Nav. Exercise No.2: XD- Bremner-Willow Creek-Beynon-Millet-Yekau Lake-XD. A very good trip. Got a telegram from home, and as it was the end of Duty Watch was granted 48 Hrs leave.
So on Saturday morning it was into town to do a bit of shopping, and while browsing through the book department of the Hudson Bay Company store I met a Mrs Gillespie who had some association with Australia, and she invited me out to tea that night, which I gratefully accepted. Went back to camp for dinner, and catch up on a bit of washing etc. Then went to Mrs Gillespie’s place, met her daughter Marsh who showed me over the nearby University after tea. Walked back to camp-about 6 miles. Caught up with studies on Sunday morning, and after dinner a few of us went on a long walk out past the riding ranch. It was about this time that John Stopp was posted from the course to another A.O.S. to complete his nav. course. (He went on to No.166 Squadron, and was shot down and killed on 13th June 1944 on a raid on Gelsenkirken-would have been very early in his tour)
On Monday 19th April we had our first exam in the morning on “Maps & Charts”. Got some mail, including Don Grant’s circular to the Bank staff in the services. Lectures that night on the stars-introduction to astro-navigation. More lectures on Tuesday morning and study in the afternoon to make up for the Easter Friday holiday at the end of the week. Collected my RCAF ID Card. Into the air again on Wednesday on Air Exercise No. 3 Took off at 0830 Hrs on route: XD-Bremner-Lloydminster-Marwayne-Bremner-XD. Almost went without my parachute harness, but it was a good trip. Went with Keith Mills to the pictures at night to see “Reunion in France”. Lectures all day on Thursday, and preparation for Air Exercise No. 4 which we were to fly next Sunday (Anzac Day). Stand-down on Good Friday so went out to tea with Mrs Gillespie & Marsh and met Lin Gilmore, a friend of Marsh’s and a brother of a Mrs Cairns who lived in Ipswich. Lectures again on Saturday morning and went into town shopping in the afternoon, met Lin and Marsh. Had tea with them and came back to camp to study. On Sunday (Anzac Day) we flew Exercise No.4 which was the first time we did an air-plot-previous flights were mainly map-reading. Route was: XD-Ft.Saskatchewan-Hughenden-Czar(Recce)-Wainwright-Ellerslie-XD. In the afternoon the Australians and New Zealanders held a remembrance service at the Cenotaph.
On Easter Monday, 26th April we had lectures in the morning and a photo flight in the afternoon. Then on Tuesday we had lectures all day. In the mail I got a letter from Don Grant with news about the bank employees who were in the services. On Wednesday we had an exam on “Magnets & Compasses” and flew Air Exercise No.5 in the afternoon. To Trochu & Torrington with a ‘recce’ of Three Hills. A very rough flight and most of us got air-sick. On Thursday we started studies on Astro Navigation and had a good lecture on Radio D/F Navigation which was very interesting. On Friday morning we had an exam on “Meteorology”, pay parade and an informative talk on the war in the Middle East. Late in the afternoon we took part in a Victory Loan parade through the streets of Edmonton with a pipe band leading the parade, and all the services involved.
Then on Saturday morning we flew Air Exercise No. 6 which was quite an experience. Mr Lightheart was the pilot and the route was: XD-Bremner-Scapa-Coronation-Bremner-XD. We climbed on track through cloud and heavy rain. Good experience in D.R.Navigation and instrument flying for the pilot. Most of the aircraft turned back but we soldiered on. At E.T.A Coronation came down through broken cloud and there under us was a small town and railway station that the pilot thought was Coronation, but he wanted to make sure and made a low level run past the station to see if we could read the station name. Too close the first time, so around again and stood off a bit further, when we were able to confirm that it was Coronation. So back into the cloud and D.R. Navigation back to Bremner and Base. I think at the end he may have homed in on a radio beam, but anyway I was pleased with the navigation exercise, and earned some brownie points for it.
The rain kept up in the afternoon so I went into town with Noel Hooper where we met Russ Martin and Bub Sargeant, and went to a dance with ‘Ivy” and a few of her friends that Russ and Bub had chatted up. On Sunday morning wrote letters home before dinner and in the afternoon went with Scotty Gall and Alex Taylor on a hike with the 20th Century Club. Here we met Alice Grosco, Mary, Isobel, Helen, Joe and a few others. Had a great time making a fire to toast marshmallows, and spin a few yarns about the ‘hoop ’snakes, and ‘wampoo’ pigeons in Australia. Alice became quite a good friend and kept up correspondence with me until I returned to Australia. On later hikes with Aussies on later courses she met Jim Cossart, who was on a Bomb Aimers Course, and was a friend of mine at Ipswich Grammar School in 1938-39. Jim lost his life on 14th March 1945 flying with 106 Sqdn on a rai to the oil plant at Luitzkendorf.
On Monday 3rd May it was lectures as usual and a crack at a D.R. Test in preparation for a mid-term exam on Friday. More lectures on Tuesday morning and two sports periods in the afternoon, when I would go out to the university track for athletics with a Canadian middle-distance runner, who was a good coach and gave me some good advice on the tactics of 440 and 880 Yard running. Brought my times in the 440 down to about 51 secs and the 880 to just on 2 mins. Called into town on the way back to camp and did some shopping. After tea did study on subject of ‘Photography’. Had our photography exam the next morning, it was an easy paper. In the afternoon we did another D.R. Test - ‘dry-swim’ for a bombing raid on Duisberg. Little did I realise then that I would bomb this target twice in one day seventeen months later. After that, prepared for a flight scheduled for the next morning. But the weather conditions worsened on Thursday and flying was scrubbed for the day.
In terms of arrangements made with Alice last week-end I phoned her (No.83882) to make a date for Saturday night. On Friday morning we had a C/O’s parade and our mid-term D.R. exam. Weather remained bad and flight scheduled for that night was scrubbed. Saturday morning was filled with lectures and after dinner it was flying again on Air Exercise No.6 that so many did not complete on the first attempt (to Scapa & Coronation). I had the job of 1st Nav. again, leaving Scotty to wind up the undercarriage and get a bit of map reading practice this time. It was a rough trip. Then, as arranged, I took Alice to a dance at the YMCA that night. Walked home in the rain.
A ‘phone call diversion during the week. Early in the week during a lecture the ‘phone rang and it turned out to be a girl wanting to speak Eric Sutton, or one of his pals. Somehow, I got the job, probably because I was nearest the phone and Eric saying that she would be referring to either Bob Smith or Keith Mills as he had mentioned those names to her when he met her last week-end. Three of us were regarded as the 3 musketeers, Keith & I were the two youngest on the course, and Eric was only a few months older. We had all enlisted on the same day as Aircrew Guards, been on separate postings for a few months, and then re-united at No. 2 Initial Training School at Bradfield Park to commence training as aircrew and mustered together to train as Navigators. To come on this course we were required to be age 19 by 10th January 1943, which was my nineteenth birthday, so I just made it as the baby of the course.
So to the phone I go - “All for one and one for all”. She explained that she had two very good friends and wanted to know if Eric and his two mates would like to join them one evening and go ‘shagging’. With a bit of quick thinking and with survival uppermost in mind I asked her to hang for a moment while I checked. It called for some reference to our Canadian Instructor which caused a bit of hilarity among the class and a few remarks about how you can be so lucky etc until he explained that in Canada the term meant ‘dancing’. With that bit of clarification and referral to Eric & Keith, I told her that we would be happy to meet them on Sunday afternoon. Had the usual church parade on Sunday morning and after dinner set off with Keith and Eric as leader to meet Mildred, Charlotte and Maureen. Spent some time with them at the YMCA and came back to camp in time for our first night flying exercise. It turned out the three girls became very good friends, I partnered Maureen O’Connor who was a primary school teacher. Took off at almost midnight on what was called exercise No. 21 for a 2 Hrs 45 mins flight, sharing 1st and 2nd Nav duties with Scotty Gall.
Monday 10th May saw us sleeping in until dinner time as we didn’t land from our night exercise the night before until after 0300 Hrs. Had lectures after dinner. Did very well with mail from home over the next two days. On Tuesday morning we flew exercise No.7, as 2nd Nav this time, and in the afternoon got the results of our mid-term D.R. exam. I got a mark of 87%, with which I was pleased. Had lectures all day Wednesday and a late night studying. On Thursday morning flew Exercise No. 8 “navigation by track error”, as 1st Nav. After dinner we were given leave. Went out with Maureen to the Capitol cinema and walked home with Keith who had taken Charlotte out, after we had seen the girls home. Made it a late night as it was an hour walk back to camp. Got more mail from home on Friday morning and had lectures all day. Detailed on Duty Watch Parade that night. Spent Saturday (15 May) in camp as I was on Duty Watch Parade, studied in the afternoon and prepared for night flying Exercise No.22. Took-off at 2305 Hrs, but had to return to Base with trouble in the starboard engine. Changed over to a ‘photo’ plane and took off again at 0045 Hrs (Sunday) for a 3 hours solo night flight. Didn’t get to bed until 0500 Hrs, but up again at 1030 Hrs to prepare for Air Exercise No.9, as 2nd Nav, that afternoon. Took of at 1335 Hrs, with Mr Barnard as pilot for a fight of 2 hrs 55 mins.
Had lectures all day on Monday 17th May and wrote 7 letters to friends at home to catch up on some of my mail. Also had to prepare for Air Exercise No.10 scheduled for the next day. It was lectures in the morning on Tuesday, and Air Exercise No.10 in the afternoon. Took off at 1355 Hrs with Mr Luyckfassel as pilot for a flight of 3hrs 15 mins as 1st Nav. It was a bumpy trip but a good navigation exercise as the pilot flew the courses given and didn’t tend to track crawl.
Wrote more letters and cards that night. Had lectures all day on Wednesday, and after tea prepared for Night Flying Exercise No.23. Took off at 2300 Hrs with Mr Rathbone as pilot on a trip that took 3Hrs 15 mins down to Little Fish Lake. It was time off in the morning so we slept in. Had 2 lectures after dinner and went swimming at West End before tea. It was then more evening lectures and preparation for Air Exercise No. 11 the next morning. This consisted mainly of preliminary work on the flight plan. On Friday morning took off at 0855 Hrs for a 3 Hrs trip as 2nd Nav, enjoying the scenery and pretending to be map reading with the pilot Mr Neale keeping an eye on your performance, as the pilots had to file a report after each flight. Had two lectures after dinner, and as it was the end of my stint on ‘Duty Watch’ I went out with Maureen to the Capitol cinema and saw “Hitler’s Children”.
On Saturday and Sunday had 48 Hrs leave pass after duty watch. Went into town and banked $40 in to an account I had established with the Royal Bank, to bring my balance up to $80-. It was Red Cross day in town so I bought a fountain pen, then called on Maureen to say I could not go out with her that night as I had accepted an invitation out to tea with Mrs Gillespie. After tea went for a walk with Marsh while Mrs Gillespie went to the pictures with a friend. Slept in as usual on Sunday morning and did some preparatory flight plan work for a flight scheduled the next day. In the afternoon went hiking with the 20th Century Club and we were joined by several Aussie Sergeants from RAAF No.30 course who had their wings and were in transit through Edmonton.
On Monday morning 24th May 1943 we took off at 0830 Hrs On Air Exercise No.12 with Mr O’Hanlon as pilot. I was 1st Nav and was satisfied with good results. It was a 4 hour flight and we had to plot a square search and leading line search patterns. Study after dinner, and then after tea I did my laundry that had been soaking for a few days and wrote a few letters home. Lectures on Tuesday morning and sports in the afternoon when we played softball and got beaten by one run. After tea we were up till late doing Aircraft Recognition. Had lectures all day Wednesday and prepared for flight that night. Took off at 2355 Hrs with Mr Craig as pilot on a 3 Hr 15 min flight navigating by D/F. Not a very satisfactory result as the pilot was obviously track crawling. After the night flight slept in until dinner time and then had a couple of lectures in the afternoon. Before tea went round to the University for athletics training (running & high jump). Got a telegram from home and at night it was practice with the sextant shooting a few stars. Called on to C/O’s parade on Friday morning and a passing out parade for Bomb Aimers. Sent a telegram home in the afternoon and as I was feeling a few sore muscles after yesterday’s athletic training I had a rub down and went to bed early. Had lectures on Saturday morning and moved to new classroom in new G.I.S. Buildings. Attended a Highlands Games in the afternoon where I represented the station in both High and Long Jumping. With not much success, but our team managed to come second overall. Met Marsh Gillespie at the games, who was there with two friends Pat and Betty. Flying was scheduled for that night, but had to be scrubbed owing to bad weather. Usual sleep-in on Sunday morning, and after dinner Keith Mills & I went out to Maureen’s home. Walked home in the rain.
On Monday 31st May it rained all day, but did not interfere with a full programme of lectures, but did cause night flying to be scrubbed again. Wrote home, and at night went out with Keith and Charlotte; Maureen was unable to come. The girls were going to Vancouver the next day. Bad weather continued all day Tuesday, so it was lectures all day and study at night. Got a card from Maureen on Wednesday to say the girls had arrived in Vancouver, and also got a letter from my old boss, Mr Lindsay Hall. We were supposed to have an Army Co-op exercise but that was washed out. Aldis Lamp tests in the afternoon and study at night. Put my forage cap in for dry cleaning. On Thursday (3rd June) had P.T. first thing in the morning and the “Synthetics on Astrograph”. Cannot remember what that entailed, probably an astro navigation dry swim. A morse test in the afternoon and two letters from home, one form Jean Hall and the Bank’s ‘Nautilus’ magazine. Answered Jean’s letter and also wrote one to Merle Green. It was usual C/O’s parade on Friday morning and our 13th week Navigation Test in the afternoon. Got a letter from Maureen, and after tea went in to town, went to a show, came back to camp and wrote a few letters. On Saturday morning we had more lectures, and after dinner wrote a couple of letters and did my washing. Went out to tea at Mrs Gillespie and went in to town with Marsh, bought progress numbers of Journal and Bulletin to send home. Usual sleep-in on Sunday and wrote more letters in the afternoon. Study after tea and preparation for a flight schedule for tommorrow.
On Monday 7th June we had lectures in the morning and flew Exercise No. 13 in the afternoon, as a 2nd Nav. Took off at 1425 Hrs and were airborne for 3Hrs 15 mins. More study after tea. Lectures most of the day on Tuesday with sports in the latter half of the afternoon. After tea went for athletics training at the university and came back to camp to prepare for tomorrow’s scheduled flight. Took off at 0855 Hrs on Wednesday on Air Exercise No.19 with Mr Williams as pilot on a low flying exercise of 3 Hrs 20 mins. It was great-best trip yet. After dinner got a letter from Maureen which I answered and also wrote some letters home. Had lectures all day Thursday as it rained all day. More running around in the mud, and athletics training at the university was cancelled. Friday saw lectures again all day, and start of another duty watch which I hoped would be my last time. The weather cleared up in the late afternoon and we were able to fly night exercise that night. Took off at 25 mins after midnight (Sat morn) with Mr Real as pilot. Usual 3 Hr trip as 1st Nav, being a night exercise. It was an interesting one on which a few got lost. Didn’t get into bed until 0430 Hrs so slept in until dinner time. Studied all afternoon as the study load was getting heavier, and it was early to bed as we had a flight scheduled for Sunday morning. Took off at 0855 Hrs with Mr Real as pilot, as 1st Nav on a flight of 2 Hrs 50 mins. Had dinner when we landed and slept all afternoon. Wrote a long letter home after tea.
For the week starting Monday 14th June we had a heavy programme of lectures and study as the weather continued to be poor, scrubbing all flying. I was on Duty Watch until Friday. It was still drizzling rain at the end of the week and on Saturday morning we had more lectures. After dinner Keith Mills and I went to a show, and then after tea we went to another show with Charlotte and Maureen, who were now back from Vancouver. Walked home from Charlotte’s home through large pools of water and mud. Was able to tell Maureen that I had received her card that morning that she had posted the day before in Calgary on the way home. Usual sleep-in on Sunday morning and study in the afternoon. Went to tea at Mrs Gillespie’s with Ian Pender and Don Plumb. Ian was on another course, and I cannot remember how Don came to be invited. A night flying exercise was scheduled, but had to be scrubbed.
On Monday 21st June it was still raining, so we had another full day of lectures and study. Got 2 letters from home. After tea managed to go to the university track for athletics training as the weather cleared during the afternoon. This enabled us to get airborne on Tuesday morning on Air Exercise No.15. Took off at 0855 Hrs, as 2nd Nav, with Mr Stewart as pilot on a flight of 3 Hrs 05 mins and managed to get some practice with the bubble sextant by taking a few shots on the sun. Rain came on again in the afternoon, so went to a film on the station “Road to Tokio”. It was still raining lightly on Wednesday, so it was lectures and study during the day, and after tea met Maureen in town and went to see “China”. Lectures all day on Thursday and training at the university track after tea. Saw Maureen and Charlotte on the way home. Weather cleared on Friday and was good enough to fly, so at 1435 Hrs took off with Mr Rungel as pilot on Air Exercise No.16 which was for only 2 hours.
On Saturday we got called for 2 lectures in the afternoon. Got letters from both of my sisters. Just after tea Maureen and Charlotte came riding bikes past the barracks so we had a bit of a yarn with them, but could not go out with them that evening as we had a flight scheduled for early the next morning. Immediately after breakfast on Sunday morning took off at 0910 Hrs with Mr Tibbets as pilot on Air Exercise No.17 as 1st Nav on a trip of 3 Hrs 25 mins to Cremona and a look at the Rockies. A very good flight. More athletics training at the university in the afternoon and then over to a sports ground where Keith Mills and Eric Sutton were playing cricket. Maureen, Charlotte and Mildred were there watching them. Took photos.
On Monday morning 28th June, we had ‘magnetism & compass’ exam and after dinner two periods of instruction/educational films. Two letters from Aussie in the mail. More training at the university after tea. On Tuesday morning another exam on Instruments and D/F. Went to the pictures after tea with Maureen, Keith and Charlotte to see “Happy go Lucky”. Was supposed to do Aircraft Recognition that night but missed it. Lectures all day on Wednesday and at 2355 Hrs took off on Air Exercise No.26. This exercise had been scrubbed about 6 times owing to bad weather. It was a 3 hour flight, which meant we didn’t get to bed until about 0400 Hrs on Thursday morning. So it was a sleep-in until 1045 Hrs.
Thursday 1st July was “Dominion Day” After dinner went to a sports meeting conducted by the Southside Business Ass’n, at the Southside Sports grounds which had a straight 220 yard track and a lap of about 880 yards. Ran in the 440 yards race and won it, for which I received the grand sum of $80-00. Soon after competed in the high jump, but could only manage 4th, which paid nothing. This was my first experience of a professional sports meeting that also included cycling. Athletes were not permitted to wear ‘spikes’. The dirty tricks played by the cyclists in team events really opened my eyes. Maureen and Keith and Charlotte came to the event and we celebrated afterwards by going out to tea at the Royal George on my winnings. At the meet 3 parachute jumpers put on a very interesting display.
Friday saw us with lectures all day and flying Air Exercise No.27 at night. Took off at 2355 Hrs with Mr Lannon as pilot on a good flight of 3 Hrs 20 mins. At this time of the year in Edmonton it is nearly midnight before it gets dark, so night flying is fairly restricted. Usual sleep-in on Saturday morning after night flying. Saturday afternoon and Sunday saw the usual week-end chores, study and letter writing.
Monday 5th July saw the start of 2 weeks of intensive lectures, study, flying and exams to complete our course on time. In peace time the course would take over 12 months but in the urgency of the war situation had to be concentrated and focus on the essentials. Flew Air Exercise No.18 that morning. Took off at 0900 Hrs with Mr Real as pilot on a trip of 3 hours. Then on Tuesday afternoon we flew Air Exercise No.20. This was blindfold exercise that took us all over the map for almost 3 ½ hours. We took off at 0900 Hrs with Mr Filby as pilot. Air Exercise designated No.19 must have been cancelled. Bad weather prevented any flying from Wednesday to Friday. Got a long letter from my brother Alex on Wednesday and then one from Miss McPherson in Sydney on Saturday. Lectures all day on Saturday and study at night before flying Air Exercise No.28 which was a night navigation on the same course of daylight exercise No.10. Took off at 2300 Hrs with Mr Barnard as pilot. Flew through storms and cloud out to Frog Lake. Slept in on Sunday morning-you were excused from Church Parade if you were flying the night before. After dinner studied meteorology for an hour or so and then went to watch Keith and Eric playing cricket and then we all met Maureen, Charlotte and Mildred at the corner of 109th and Jasper later in the afternoon.
On Monday 12th July we had our final D.R. (Navigation) test. Wrote home and did preparation for more flying tomorrow. A large bag of mail from Australia came in but I did not score a thing. Maureen phoned just after tea. On Tuesday(13th July) took off at 0835 Hrs with Mr Luyckfassel as pilot on Air Exercise No.21, which was a special, incorporating evasive action, designed to prepare us for active service conditions. More lectures in the afternoon and studied meteorology at night. Supposed to fly on Wednesday morning, but this was scrubbed-raining again. So we had our final meteorology exam. The rain kept up through Thursday and Friday so time was passed with sessions of lectures and study more lectures on Saturday morning, usual laundry chores and letter writing after dinner and as the weather had cleared prepared for flying that night after tea. This was night flight over the route of Exercise No.9 that we had flown in daylight two months ago. Took off at 2355 Hrs with Mr Kellough as pilot and as 2nd Nav. I had to practice astro shots with the bubble sextant. That meant a sleep-in on Sunday morning and as we had some catch-up to do in order to finish the course on time another night flight was scheduled that evening. Took off at 2325 Hrs with Mr McCall as pilot on the route of Exercise No.11 that had previously been flown in daytime.
It was the usual sleep-in after night flying on Monday morning 19th July. In the afternoon and on Tuesday & Wednesday we had a few final written tests. On Wednesday night our final night flying test was scheduled. Took off at 2300 Hrs with Mr Cusater as pilot on the route of Exercise No.12 flown in daytime. This flight of 3 Hrs 05 mins was the final air exercise on which we were assessed. On Thursday 22nd July after dinner we were advised that all had passed the course, and got instructions to attend to clearances for medical and dental and to hand in any equipment that had been issued to us. ‘Wings’ passing out parade would be held on Friday 23rd July 1943.
On Thursday night Keith, Eric and I took the girls out to The Barn and then went walked them home. We invited them to the ‘Wings’ parade, but they could not attend. Friday was a big day with the presentation of our ‘wings’ and the sewing of Sergeant’s stripes on our sleeves. At the pay parade after ‘wings’ presentation I was given a slip of paper with the instructions “Here is your Commission, it is now up to you to arrange for the issue of Officer’s Uniforms etc”. Also commissioned off course were Ivan Biddle and “Inky’ Keena who were posted to other Air Observer Schools as instructors, Ken Todd, Ted Hall, John Honeyman, Noel Hooper and Les Sabine. Ben Smith was on line-ball about passing and had to go to a review committee as at this stage he had admitted he had put his age back to enlist, and he was in fact aged 35 Yrs-not 30 years according to the records. Ben did eventually go on the fly in Bomber Command and lost his life on night of 24/25 Dec. 1944 on a raid on Cologne with 166 Squadron.
With kit bags packed and left at ‘despatch’ as instructed, I went to Maureen’s for tea. Her father drove me to the station where we left Edmonton by Canadian National Railway at 2130 Hrs for Toronto.
Reflections on leaving Edmonton
Thoughts that would be shared by all now on their way to the European Theatre of WW11.
All shared a sense of satisfaction and relief that we had earned our ‘wings’ as Air Navigators after a very intensive course of 4 ½ months that involved a total of 75 Hrs 55 mins of daylight flying and 34 Hrs 45 mins of night flying for the average member, and instruction and exams in 12 subjects such as Navigation, Maps & Charts, Magnetism & Compasses, Instruments, D.F/Wireless Telegraphy, Meteorology, Aerial Photography, Signals, Reconnaissance, Armament and Aircraft Recognition. In all I managed an overall pass of 82.4%. A few found the going hard towards the end of the course, as it was not easy and acknowledged the support, encouragement and assistance given by the chief instructor F/O. Brown (RCAF). He did encourage a few to hang in and was rewarded with their dedication and success. All realised though that there was still a long way to go with further training after our arrival in the UK before we were fully trained to assume the roll of a navigator in a crew on Bomber Command.
The main memories most of shared:-
• The extreme cold and snow covered prairies when we first
started flying, which made it difficult to judge height from
the air.
• The mud and slush when the snow did melt, and the river
thawed, and the great swarms of mosquitoes-large scotch
greys.
• The fields turning to green when wheat was planted and to
yellow as the dandelions came into bloom.
• The brown bears coming in close to town in search of food in
the late winter and playing with their cubs who often got a
disciplinary clout.
• Gophers popping in and out of their holes in the field beside
our barracks.
• Young children ice skating on the frozen gutters in the streets’
• Our own first try at ice skating on a frozen flooded tennis
court and being conned into playing ice hockey, which was
good because it gave you a hockey stick for support.
• The pain that a few suffered from frost bitten ears- in spite of
warnings.
• The Indian quarters that we passed through when walking to
town.
• The hospitality of the people.
• On a few reported occasions being mistaken for “Austrians’.
• The beauty of snow laden trees early in the morning.
• For Queenslanders—the 4 distinct seasons.
• Saluting the flag in front of HQ. The furore caused when an
item of female underwear was hoisted thereon one night and
the Aussies had no objection to saluting that particular
standard.
• The skill of the ‘Bush Pilots’ They were all civilians who had
good permanent work because of the Empire Training Scheme, but they were very competent at their job. True Canadian Geese-born to flying.
• Waffles and Maple Syrup and Coke and Ice Cream in the
Station canteen.
• Strictly taboo. But some made it** Flying under the high level
bridge.
• The sports facilities at the YMCA.
• Ben Smith’s accidents from smoking in bed.
Personally, there was the joy of wonderful friends made. The gang of the 20th Century Club and at the YMCA where I met Alice Grosco who kept up correspondence with me for two years after the war, until I told her I was going back to Scotland to marry Alma. Alice did have a special reason to keep in touch, as from a later Bomb Aimer course she met Jimmy Cossart on one of the Club’s regular hikes. He came from Boonah and was a boarder with me at Ipswich Grammar School 1938-39 and she was quite surprised when Jim told her he knew me. Later I was to meet Jim at the Boomerang Club in London on a few occasions until in the last months of the war he lost his life in a raid over Germany.
Perhaps the most cherished memory was the wonderful friendship that Keith and Eric and I enjoyed with Charlotte, Mildred and Maureen. They really treated us more like brothers and I would say did not put any pressure on us for a lasting relationship. We were welcomed into their homes. They truly were three girls who enjoyed the simple pleasures, and were good companions to each other. What you saw was what they were.
As we left Edmonton we were all aware that we were now on the way to the big adventure with its inevitable risks. Also we would soon be split up to go various ways. In fact when we got to Embarkation Depot at Halifax, after leave, a few of us would move into the Officers Mess, whilst the rest would be in the Sergeant’s Mess. But for the period of leave, and until we got to Halifax, those who were commissioned would continue with Sergeant’s stripes on our uniforms and stay as a group. Most important in our minds was to enjoy leave as we journeyed to Halifax across Canada with a break to visit New York. We had completed a course of flying training, all with over a 100Hrs up, and without an accident and with no loss of life.
These Were Fellow Course Participants
Following is a summary of the participants on the course and a brief detail of the operational experience of most, with pertinent information on those who lost their lives in training and on operations over Europe as well as those who were shot down and were taken Prisoner of War, or, in one case evaded capture.
After the war I kept in regular touch with Keith Mills, and since the late 1980’s with Lou Brimblecombe. We were the three youngest on the course. Eric Sutton did his tour with 622 Sqdn which was also based at Mildenhall where I served in XV/15 Squadron. And I did not get in contact with him again until December 2002, when he was traced living in Victoria. Roy Olsen moved to Tasmania after he retired as a school teacher and we had contact each Christmas. Noel Hooper, who came from the Nambour district died a few years after the war. Scotty Gall returned to work with the Bank of NSW and on retirement moved to Cooroy in Queensland, where I resumed contact in the early 1990’s. After his wife died he sold his property and moved to a retirement village in Brisbane, where he also died in 1999/2000. In one of those co-incidences in life, Scotty (or Vernon as he was known to his family) turned out to a brother of a friend we have known in the church at Alexandra Headland for many years.
It is interesting to note the service history of the ‘Todd’ Brothers, Ernie and Ken. They were both schoolteachers from the Newcastle area (both born in Canada). They enlisted together and went through initial training and operational training together and served on the same squadron flying in Wellingtons out of Foggia in Italy. They returned to their pre-service vocation. Ken, who was shot down and taken POW, died is 1986 at the age of 71 and Ernie died in 2002 at the age of 89.
Don Plumb “Bluey” did a tour in Halifaxes and died of acute leukaemia about 1987.
Course No.71N2-EATS-at No2. A.O.S EDMONTON, Canada. All members of RAAF
Duration 10/3/1943 to 23/7/1943,
Instructors:- F/O.W.H.Brown & P/O. Pogue ??? (both R.C.A.F)
NAME Number Birth Enlisted Discharged D.O.Death Posting on Rank Awards SeeNotes
Discharge ***
BIDDLE Ivan R. 424905 13/10/1913 09/10/1942 09/10/1945 8 O.T.U F/Lt Instructor in Canada
Goulburn Sydney
BRIMBLECOMBE C.L. 425592 23/12/1923 25/04/1942 07/12/1945 9 A.H.U F/O (218/514 Sqdn)
(Louis) Brisbane Brisbane
ETHERTON Ronald H. 423088 02/11/1921 20/06/1942 13/08/1944 76 Sqdn F/Sgt ***No.1
Sydney Sydney
GALL V. Scott 424915 08/08/1912 09/10/1942 16/04/1946 1315 Flight F/O (467Sqdn)
Mosman NSW Sydney
HALL Ernest T 406976 17/02/1914 26/05/1941 25/02/1946 9 A.H.U F/Lt Instructor in Canada
Perth Perth
HONEYMAN John 429498 23/05/1923 08/10/1942 15/02/1946 1656 C.U F/Lt D.F.C.
Deepwater Brisbane
HOOPER R. Noel 425851 16/12/1923 21/05/1942 21/08/1945 1 P.H.U F/Lt *** No.2
Nambour Brisbane
KEENA Ilford N. 424870 12/10/1912 09/08/1942 22/06/1945 9 A.O.S F/O Instructor in Canada
Ballengarra Sydney
LEWIS John H. 423142 27/01/1923 20/06/1942 08/11/1943 3 A.F.U. Sgt. ***No.3
Broken Hill Sydney
MARTIN H. Russell 418289 28/12/1922 15/05/1942 13/12/1945 21 O.T.U F/O D.F.C
Melbourne Melbourne
MILLS Keith C. 425954 02/01/1924 21/05/1942 27/10/1945 78 Sqdn W/O ***No.4
Mackay Brisbane P.O.W
MURTHA Harold H. 429473 30/05/1922 08/10/1942 05/09/1945 12 O.T.U F/O (463 Sqdn)
Brisbane Brisbane
OLSEN Roy P. 429479 10/07/1920 08/10/1942 15/11/1945 640 Sqdn W/O ***No.5
Bundaberg Brisbane
PALFERY Noel J. 424920 16/05/1914 09/10/1942 18/07/1945 467 Sqdn F/O (467 Sqdn)
Brisbane Sydney
PLUM Donald A. 424934 17/12/1919 09/10/1942 17/12/1945 96 Sqdn F/O (466/462 Sqdns)
Inverell Sydney
NAME Number Birth Enlisted Discharged D.O.Death Posting on Rank Awards SeeNotes
Discharge ***
SABINE C.W. Leslie 426165 08/12/1917 23/05/1942 01/07/1946 466 Sqdn F/Lt. D.F.C.
Brisbane Brisbane
SARGENT Allan J. 410098 19/10/1918 08/11/1941 22/01/1946 1 M.R.U W/O ***No.6
(Bulb) Williamstown Melbourne 44 Sqdn-P.O.W.
SMITH Benjaminn H. 424891 24/03/1914 09/10/1942 24/12/1944 166 Sqdn F/Sgt ***No.7
Merriwether Sydney
SMITH Ian H. 423913 20/10/1922 18/07/1942 18/06/1944 115 Sqdn F/Sgt ***No.8
Katoomba Sydney
SMITH Robert W. 425992 10/01/1924 21/05/1942 12/12/1945 32 Base F/Lt (XV/15 Sqdn)
Brisbane Brisbane No.3 Group RAF Bomber Command
SUTTON Eric C. 425910 04/081923 21/05/1942 17/09/1945 84 O.T.U F/O (622 Sqdn)
Gympie Brisbane
TAYLOR Alexander 424804 04/08/1920 09/10/1942 02/01/9/1946 R.A.F. F/O
Arncliffe Sydney Dumbeswell
TODD Ernest 424942 30/12/1913 09/101942 10/08/1945 3 A.O.S F/O (142 Sqdn)
Canada Sydney Italy
TODD W. Kenneth 424878 16/07/1915 09/10/1942 06/12/1945 142 Sqdn F/Lt ***No.9
Canada Sydney
General Comments
All participants in the above course were members of the RAAF, and many were recruited under the “Air Crew Guard” category in May 1942. They left Australia (Sydney) on the USS “Hermitage”, departing on Wednesday 10th February 1943, arriving via Pago Pago and Hololulu at San Francisco on Tuesday 2nd March 1943, where they disembarked and then entrained at Oakland to go by rail, via Vancouver, to Edmonton in Canada where they disembarked on Saturday morning 6th March 1943 when the temperature was reading –23 (Fahrenheit).
Course No.71N2 started on 10th March at No.2 A.O.S at the Edmonton airfield with Avro Anson aircraft flown by civilian “Bush” Pilots. Passing out parade and presentation of wings with promotion to Sergeant was held on Friday 23rd July. Eight members were commissioned off course to rank of Pilot Officer. No casualties were recorded on training.
All but 3 were posted to “Y” (Embarkation) Depot in Halifax Nova Scotia (spending some time on leave in Montreal & New York on the way) where they embarked on the R.M.S “Queen Mary” on Friday 28th August 1943 and sailed to the Clyde in Scotland where they disembarked at Gourock on Tuesday 31st August 1943 and entrained for overnight travel to the RAAF’s No.11 Personnel Despatch and Reception Depot at Brighton. From here most were posted to various advanced training units to be incorporated into a crew and fly in Lancasters & Halifaxes of Bomber Command.
Postings as listed in the above schedule are the postings as recorded at the time the airman was recalled to No.11 P.D.R.C at Brighton for repatriationto Australia, or upon date of death, or at time of loss on operation and taken POW. Sqdn reference under notes is one they did tour with (where known).
Course 71N2- Details of Casualties, either loss of life or shot down and taken P.O.W, or Evaded Capture
No.1. Ronald Henry ETHERTON No.76 Squadron. In Halifax 111 LL578 MP-H Bar on night of 12/13 August 1944 took off from Holme-on-
Spalding At 2129 Hrs to bomb the Opel Motor factory at Russelsheim. Crashed 2Km N.E. of Hamm (Germany)
and all crew were killed. They rest in France in the Choloy War Cemetery, which suggests their graves were
investigated by an American Unit. Of the 297 aircraft (191 Lancasters, 96 Halifaxes 7 10 Mosquitoes) that took part
in the raid 7 Halifax & 13 Lancasters were lost. 6.7% of the force. Local reports stated the factory was only slightly
damaged.
No.2. Rupert Noel HOOPER No.463 Squadron. In Lancaster 111 LM597 JO-W on night of 24/25 June 1944 took off from Waddington at 2229
Hrs on their first ‘op’ to bomb flying bomb base at Prouville. Crew, with exception of the F/Eng, were all
RAAF; believed shot down by night fighter. B/A, W/O/P and both gunners were captured and taken POW
Pilot, F/Eng & Nav (Noel) evaded capture Pilot W/Cdr D.R.Donaldson RAAF was among the most senior officers
to evade capture in 1944.
.No.3 John Hedgley LEWIS The Course’s first casualty, in training, on 8th November 1943 at No.3 Advanced Flying Unit, Halfpenny Green.
Buried in Chester (Blacon) Cemetery, Cheshire, England. Section A Grave No154
.
No.4 Keith Cyril MILLS POW. No.78 Squadron. In Halifax 111 MZ692 EY-P on night of 22/23 June 1944 took off from Breighton at 2230 Hrs to
bomb railway yards at Laon. First operation for most of the crew. Shot down by enemy fire and baled out. 5 were
taken POW and 2 evaded capture. All the crew, with exception of the F/Eng, were RAAF. Keith was arrested in
France and taken into custody by the Gestapo, being held with other members of his crew for about 3 months in
Buchenwald Concentration Camp until ‘rescued’ by the Luftwaffe and transferred to Stalag Luft L3 Sagan and
Balaria. POW No.8018. 4 Halifaxes were lost on this Laon raid.
No.5 Roy Peter OLSEN POW. No.640 Sqdn. In Halifax 111 LK865 C8-Q on night of 27/28th May 1944 took off from Leconfield at 2356 Hrs to
bomb Military Camp at Bourg-Leopold. Shot down by night fighter and crashed 0228 hrs near Antwerp. Pilot,
F/Eng & M/U/G were killed. Roy was taken POW and held in L7 Stalag Luft, Bankau-Kruelberg. POW No.95.
No.6 Allan Joseph SARGENT POW. No44 Sqdn. In Lancaster 1 LL938 KM-S on night of 21/22nd June 1944 took off from Dunholme Lodge at 2325
Hrs to bomb synthetis oil plant at Wesseling. Shot down by night fighter Pilot, B/A, W/O/P and R/G were killed
and are buried in Nederweert War Cemetery. Bub was taken POW and held in L7 Stalag Luft, Bankau-Kreulberg.
POW No.236. Of the 133 Lancasters & 6 Mosquitoes that took part on this raid, 37 Lancasters were lost—27.8%
of the force. 10/10 cloud was encountered and planned 5 Group’s Low-Level marking of the target was not
possible so H2S was used with only moderate success. 44, 49 & 619 Sqns lost 6 aircraft each. This was the last
occasion on which Bomber Command would suffer such a severe loss in operations to the Ruhr.
It is believed that above crew was the only Bomber Command crew lost in the war that comprised airmen from the 3 Commonwealth & Dominion air forces, plus a USAAF representative.
No.7 Benjamin Hartley SMITH No.166 Sqdn. In Lancaster 1 NG297 AS-K2 on night of 24/25 December 1944 (Christmas Eve) took off from
Kirmington at 1515 Hrs to bomb railway communications at KOLN-Nippes (COLOGNE). Crashed in the target area. All the crew were killed and buried locally, since when their bodies have been interred in the Rheinsberg
War Cemetery.
97 Lancaster & 5 Mosquitoes took part—5 Lancasters were lost over the target area and 2 more on return to
England owing to bad weather. Oboe marking was used with very accurate results. Local reports showed that
railway tracks were severely damaged & an ammunition train blew up. Nearby airfield,(Butzweilerhof) also
damaged.
No.8 Ian Harrison SMITH No.115 Sqdn. In Lancaster 1 HK559 A4-H on night of 17/18th June 1944 took off from Witchford at 0102 Hrs to
bomb oil installations at Montdidier. Dived into the ground and exploded with great force at Gannes (Oise), 5 Km N of St-Just-en-Chausse. All lie buried in the Gannes Communal Cemetery.
317 aircraft (196 Lancasters, 90 Halifaxes, 19 Mosquitoes & 12 Stirlings) took part in this and a similar targets at
Aubnoye and St Martin-l’Hortier. Targets were covered by cloud. Master bomber called off raid at Montdidier after
Only a few aircraft had bombed. Above was only aircraft lost on this operation.
No.9 William Kenneth TODD POW No.142 Sqdn. In Wellington Bomber took off from Foggia in Italy to bomb airfield on outskirts of Vienna. On 10th
May1944. It was crews 10th “Op”. Shot down by fighter in target area. In hospital in Vienna for short period before
going to Frankfurt for interrogation and to Stalagluft 3 at Sagan. And later to Luckenwald from where they were
repatriated to England..
NOTE
About 4/5 weeks after the course started John Henry STOPP, No.419738, born 3/7/1915 in Cairns Qld, Enlisted 10/10/1942 in Sydney was posted to another A.O.S to complete a Nav Course from which he was commissioned off course. On the night of 12/13 June 1944, flying with 166 Squadron on a raid on GELSENKIRKEN their Lancaster crashed in Holland and all on board were killed They were buried on 16th June 1944 in the ZELHEM General Cemetery It would appear that would have been very early in their tour of operations. .John Stopp was transferred when his flying Training-partner was hospitalised. I think it was Doug Rogers No.424609 who was commissioned off a later course and served in No4 Group RAF Bomber Command in Yorkshire - he was attached to 41 Base before returning to Australia.
Three other trainee navigators who sailed to Canada in the same draft were assigned to Course No.71N1. They were Jim Bateman No.423042 (149 Sqdn- awarded D.F.C), Bill Bowden No.424728 (261 Sqdn) and Geoff Cohen No.424725 who was commissioned off course and remained in Canada as an instructor at No.3 A.O.S.
Course 71N2 - Empire Training Scheme
No. 2 A.D.S. Edmonton – Alberta – Canada
10 March 1943 to 23 July 1943
Back Row: Keith Mills, Bob Sargent, Lou Brimblecombe, Noel Hooper, Eric Sutton, Alex Taylor
Middle Row: Ken Todd, Ernie Todd, Don Plumb, Noel Palfrey, Ron Etherton, Roy Olsen, Les Sabine,
Bob Smith, John Honeyman, Harold (Roy) Murtha
Front Row: Russ Martin, Ted Hall, Scotty Gall, Ian Biddle, W.H. Brown, ? , Ben Smith,
John Lewis, I.N. Keena, Ian Smith
We’ve Got Our Wings – Rookie Sergeants
The “Three Musketeers”
Eric Sutton, Bob Smith, Keith Mills
23rd.July 1943
As an L.A.C. in Edmonton
In Front of Wilsons Stationery Shop in Jasper Avenue
24 April 1943
Air Photography Exercises “Spring”
Bridge Over North Saskatchewan River about 1 ½ miles S.W. of Fort Saskatchewan
Looking S.W. in Direction of Edmonton Which is Visible in Distant Background
Notification of Selection for Appointment to Commissioned Rank
Effective 23rd July, 1943
1st July 1943
Dominion Day Sports – Winning the 440 yds
Eric Sutton, Keith Mills, Bob Smith
- at University Sports Ground
Keith said the Wrong Thing!
Have Wings *** Will Travel
From Edmonton, Canada to Brighton, England
We left Edmonton, with “N” Navigator wings and Sergeant’s stripes sewn on to our tunics, by train, at 2130 Hrs on Friday 23 July 1943. After the busy day of Wings Passing-out Parade and getting clearances we soon settled down to a good night’s sleep. Woke up in the early hours of Saturday at Saskatoon and travelled all day across the prairies through what seemed like endless fields of wheat and grazing country. It was almost express through Watrons, Rivers, Portage, La Prairie and arrived at Winnipeg at 1845 Hrs. Had a stop-over there and left again at 2000 Hrs. Into the bunk at 2230 Hrs for another good sleep. The scenery was different on Sunday as we moved into Ontario with mostly coniferous trees and a few Indian settlements. Arrived in Toronto at 0830 Hrs on Monday morning where those of us going to New York detrained and wandered around to have a look through a few shops before catching a train leaving at 1330 Hrs for Niagara. Had a few hours there to look over the Niagara Falls and then catch a train that left an hour late at 2230 Hrs down the Lee-High valley for New York. This was another train trip in the U.S. that went too fast to even count the telephone poles as they flashed by, and with the best of service from the Afro-American waiters on board.
New York and Sightseeing
Arrived in New York at 0900 Hrs on Tuesday 27th July and most of us including Keith Mills, Noel Hooper, Roy Olsen, Lou Brimblecombe, Russ Martin, Ian Smith, and Eric Sutton and myself made our way to the Anzac Club (somebody had the directions) where accommodation was arranged at the Wentworth Hotel-on the ground floor. Settled in to our rooms and had something to eat somewhere before we went to Madison Square Gardens where a circus was performing. After that we went to the Stage Door Canteen for tea, where we received a hospitable welcome and were given complimentary tickets for a few tours and shows the next day. Met the actress Connie Hayes there. On Wednesday morning we went on a sight-seeing tour during which we called into a few shops and I purchased a 2 ¼ X 2 ¼ Voigtlander camera which gave me good service for many years. After that we went to the Empire State Building and rode the elevator to the top. What a ride that was and what a view from the observation deck at the top. Keith, Roy, Lou, Noel, Russ and I then went for a stroll around Central Park where I took the first photos with the Voigtlander and on to the Stage Door Canteen for tea and more free tickets. The show that evening featured Xavier Cougat and his orchestra, the Andrew Sisters and other acts. We then went to a broadcast at the CBS studios before going back to the hotel.
Stayed in the hotel until midday on Thursday and then went to the Rialto on free tickets and on to the Rochefeller Centre to view an exhibition. Had tea and came back to the hotel to write a few letters. We were on the ground floor and it was hard to get a good sleep, the street outside was as busy at 0300 Hrs as it was at 1500 Hrs.
We Return to Canada
Noel Hooper and I decided that we had better do something about our Officers gear in Montreal and to leave New York a couple of days before the others. So on Friday morning we went to the station to enquire about trains. Met two girls going to the Statue of Liberty so went along for the ferry ride, back to the Anzac Club and a show at the Roxy. Caught a train by the skin of our teeth at 1850 Hrs. Had to change trains at Depew at 0500 Hrs on Saturday morning to go on to Toronto where we arrived at 0915 Hrs and left 30 minutes later for Montreal where we arrived at 1910 Hrs, running about 30 mins late as the train had hit a woman walking on the track about an hour out of the city. When we arrived we went to the YMCA where they arranged accommodation for us at 1491 Bishop Street.
On Sunday morning, 1st August, we went for a circular tour of the city by tram, jumping off at places of interest. Noel was bit non-plussed by the priests stopping on each step of a long climb up the hill to a large cathedral at the top. They appeared to pause briefly on each step in prayer. So, he taps one on the shoulder and recommended they install an escalator-a suggestion that was ignored. Asking directions on the tram was almost useless as the conductors gave the impression that they only conversed in French. We had tea at the YMCA and then went for a walk through the heart of the town. We must have given the impression of two lost souls as two girls approached us and started a conversation. Their names were Dorothy and Kay. They were students at the McGill University in Montreal and invited us to meet them the next afternoon and they would take us up Mont Royal to view the town by night.
We did our shopping on Monday morning where RAAF uniforms etc were available. Got issued with P/O’s braid, badges and cap, but decided to leave issue of quality uniforms and overcoat until we arrived in England. Met Dorothy and Kay as arranged in the afternoon and went up the mountain. As we had to meet up with the rest of our course on a train leaving Montreal at 1930 Hrs the next day the girls agreed to have dinner with us and then meet us again the next day at 1730 Hrs to show us over the University where they resided in one of the colleges on the campus. This we did on Tuesday after more sight seeing around the town and checking out of our accommodation. After our visit to the University it was a quick trip to the station with the girls to see us off and to catch up with the rest and board the train departing at 1930 Hrs. On the way to No.3 ‘Y’ Depot at Halifax. That was the Canadian designation for an embarkation depot.
Wednesday 4th August saw us travelling all day along the St.Lawrence River with its lumber mills, log jams and fishing villages and arrive in Halifax close to midnight raining cats and dogs. We were settled into barracks. Those who were commissioned off course were directed to the Officers Mess and Quarters and all others to the Sergeants Mess.
Halifax
Our late arrival did not prevent us being paraded at 0830 Hrs on Thursday and then attend to usual clearances etc. It seemed that there were still clearances whether you were arriving or departing. After dinner we were put through decompression chamber tests to assess our reactions to lack of oxygen. It was quite an experience as the chamber was decompressed to a height equivalent of about 18,000 feet. We were equipped with oxygen masks. At this height we were instructed to take off our oxygen masks under the supervision of trained personnel and to see how many times we could write the alphabet on the paper that had been issued. Supervisors kept an eye on each individual. I can remember being very pleased with myself as I visualised the alphabet written about six times on my piece of paper before I was told to put my oxygen mask back on again. Then I couldn’t believe my eyes-there was the alphabet written once and then down to about ‘m’ or ‘n’ before the pencil trailed away into a real scribble. Your mind had been telling you that all was well, so the danger of losing oxygen at heights over 10,000 feet was impressed on us. Most of us were non-smokers and had very similar results, but the smokers capacity to cope was really restricted and a couple had to be put back on oxygen very quickly.
On Friday we had a C.O.’s parade at 0800 Hrs and then it was back into the decompression chamber again for 2 hours, with oxygen masks kept on and listen to the supervisor giving more information on what we could expect flying for more than two hours at heights of over 20,000 feet. During this exercise the chamber was decompressed to a height equivalent of over 25,000 feet. After dinner it was P.T. exercise and games. Wrote a letter home and attended to a pile of washing that had accumulated.
Games of tennis and softball filled in most of Saturday morning. After dinner went into town with Ken and Ernie Todd (Ken had been commissioned off course but his brother Ernie was not) to the Anzac Club to give it the once over, and see what services and freebies were available there. Back to camp for a wash and change into clean clothes and after tea went back to a dance at the Anzac Club for a couple of hours. Slept in late on Sunday and spent all afternoon writing letters.
On Monday, 9th August, we were called on parade at 0800 Hrs for P.T. exercises and games. After dinner we underwent night vision tests, which I had trouble in passing and then back to more letter writing to catch up with my correspondence. Got a letter in the mail that day from Maureen. What seemed to be the established routine of parade, P.T. and games was the dose on Tuesday morning. For games, a rugby league match was organised for the Aussies and Kiwis between the Officers and the N.C.O.’s. It was a match that Keith Mills has not forgotten. I was playing on the wing for the Officers and going flat out for a certain try. I heard Keith behind me call out, “here Bob” when he had no chance of catching me. Not thinking I passed the ball back to Keith, who promptly propped, turned and set off back in the other direction. Unfortunately for him however, I was being supported by Kiwi P/O. Simon Snowden, of Maori descent and well built, and who was in the right position to effect a heavy tackle. Simon and I became good friends after that. Keith, I am sure learnt a lesson and did not appreciate the obstacle course we were put through after dinner.
On Wednesday morning, to keep us fit, we were employed on trench digging, and after dinner some of us were put through another night vision test. With a bit of assistance from a mate I did better than the test on Monday. Night vision was for gunners and not for navigators. Did my ironing after tea as we did not have the luxury of a batman yet.
Did well with mail on Thursday - 6 letters from home. After dinner went on a harbour cruise. I was on duty as Reception Officer that night and didn’t get to bed until 0430 Hrs on Friday. Received a telegram from home on Friday morning and another letter from Maureen. We had pay parade after which I went into town to buy a suit case, and did some ironing at night. On Saturday morning we had a lecture on ‘Rehabilition’ and I spent the afternoon writing letters to reply to those I had received during the week. Sunday was a very quiet day and a few of us went to a concert in the evening at the Anzac Club.
Monday 16th August was another good day for mail with 7 letters in the morning and 1 in the afternoon. So my correspondence was not up-to-date for too long. Pictures in the Officers Mess at night, “Desert Victory” and “The More the Merrier”. Usual parade and P.T. on Tuesday morning and into town after dinner for shopping and on to the Anzac Club for tea and a dance at night. More P.T. on Wednesday morning as we were waiting for a draft to embark. Went to see “Stage Door Canteen” at night with Simon Snowden. Since our football match we had spent a few times together looking around the sights of Halifax. Although he was of Maori blood, because of his surname he had become known as “Snowy”. Thursday afternoon was set aside for more sports and in the late afternoon we marched through town with a brass band at the head of the procession. It was into town again on Friday to buy a dressing gown and then to pictures at night to see “Jungle Book” Football practice occupied some time on Saturday morning. The bush telegraph was passing on a rumour that the “Queen Mary” was on the way from New York and would be calling within a few days, so I packed one of my kit bags in the afternoon. Slept in late on Sunday morning and after dinner went for a walk with Les Sabine around Mt Pleasant Park, and to the pictures in the Officers Mess after tea.
After mandatory parade at 0800 Hrs on Monday 23rd August we had lectures and a test on Aircraft Recognition. Managed to pass the test, but only just. After dinner went into town with ‘Snow’, met one of his mates and went to the Anzac Club for tea and a show afterwards. It was P.T. on Tuesday morning and we were given notice to be on parade again after dinner. That was a fair indication that a draft had been issued for embarkation. The draft was read out and as far as I can remember all the navigators from Course 72N2, except for a couple who did not come on to Halifax, were on it. We would be embarking within 48 hours. Broke off parade to have medical examinations, and then it was into town with ‘Snow’ again, who was also on the draft, for tea and the pictures to see “Song of the Islands”. On Wednesday morning we had to take our ‘Not wanted on Voyage’ baggage on parade and complete clearances. A few of us went to the Anzac Club that evening just to say good-bye to the place.
On Thursday 26th August 1943, we had pay parade in the morning, dinner and then our final parade with our ‘Wanted on Voyage’ baggage. We were then transported to the harbour and embarked on the “Queen Mary”. I was billeted in Cabin A24 with 14 others.
We Sail to the UK
Sailed early on Friday morning into good seas. It was back to two meals again while ‘in transit’. The ship had taken on a large contingent of American Servicemen in New York and it was very crowded. With such a large number on board, all were assigned to particular areas with coloured lines to follow to different venues to which they were allowed, such as sleeping quarters, bathroom facilities and Recreation and Entertainment areas. We had a limited deck space allotted to us and yellow lines to follow to the dining room and other colours to the toilets etc. On the lower decks the ‘other ranks’, mainly American troops, were assigned to sleeping areas on a shift basis.
The “Queen Mary” proceeded at full speed of over 30 knots on a zig-zag course and was unescorted. If you were walking down a passage-way when ‘she’ changed course by about 30 degrees you were pinned against the wall until ‘she’ got on a steady course again for another 15/20 minutes or thereabouts. You certainly had the feeling that a submarine would have very little chance of a torpedo attack. Time was passed playing cards, listening to music, reading the daily newspaper that was printed on board, writing letters and attending entertainment provided on board, which mainly favoured Officers. The seas stayed good all day on Saturday and at night most of us in Cabin A24 followed the relative coloured line to the large theatre on board to see a movie. Church Parade was held on Sunday, and another show in the theatre at night.
We continued to zig-zag through good seas at full speed all day Monday and enjoyed a concert in the lounge at night. On Tuesday we came around the north of Ireland and were greeted by friendly aircraft overhead and land in sight by mid-morning. This first sight of ‘the Old Country’ will remain in the memories of most on board for the rest of their life. There was a band of The Royal Marines on board and as we sailed up the Clyde past Arran with the Scottish coast of Ayrshire on our starboard the band played “Land of Hope and Glory”. As indeed it was at that time in history. There were not too many dry eyes on the decks, even among the American troops. We weighed anchor off Greenock and at 1900 Hrs were disembarked onto barges to be entrained at Greenock to travel to Brighton by rail.
Brighton, England
Travelled overnight and got our first encounter with a country at war with the blackout. Early in the morning the train steamed into the large railway yards at Crewe, then on to Rugby and the outskirts of London where we witnessed bomb damage for the first time. Arrived in Brighton at midday and were transported to No. 11 Personnel Despatch & Receipt Centre. Have never been able to work out how the despatch came before the receipt. We were assigned to billets. The N.C.O.’s to either the ‘Metropole’ or ‘Grande’ on the esplanade near the famous West Pavilion and the Officers to the Lions Head a bit further along to the east. Those establishments had been commandeered by the War Department and allotted to the RAAF’s No. 11 P.D.R.C, which had been transferred to Brighton from Bournemouth. So, on the 1st September 1943 we were officially disembarked in the United Kingdom. We spent the next two days attending to the requirements of reception, records, leave passes etc, and writing letters home as we awaited delivery of our ‘Not wanted on Voyage’ baggage.
In Central Park, New York
Roy Olsen, Keith Mills, Lou Brimblecombe, Bob Smith
Along the St Lawrence River - Part of the Aussie Contingent
Ross Martin and Ian Smith at the ‘Door’ in Tropical Uniform
In the Gardens – Halifax
P/O Bob Smith
Advanced Training-United Kingdom
Brighton, Sidmouth (Devon), West Freugh (Scotland)
Settling into No. 11 P.D.R.C. at Brighton, by midday on Saturday 4th September 1943 I had completed most of the requirements for reception and after lunch (now back to the system of calling the midday meal lunch and the evening meal dinner) I was rostered on my first duty as O.I.C. of one of the light ack-ack batteries on the esplanade, from 1400 Hrs to 1800 Hrs. Almost got court-marshalled when I gave permission to the two N.C.O.’s on the guns to fire a couple of rounds to test them. An English Army Major was soon on the scene to check on ‘the emergency’. After a bit of discussion he accepted my explanation and didn’t take the matter any further. After dinner I met ‘Snow’ who had also come over with the R.N.Z.A.F. contingent on the Queen Mary and who were also billeted with us in Brighton. We went to a dance at ‘The Palais’ that night. Had a very interesting conversation with a girl aged in her early twenties who came from Israel and was working her way through to a degree at an English University, as well as a couple of other girls who were more interested in ‘Snow’. They seemed to think he was a real heart throb. He was a good looking and good natured bloke.
This duty on the gun positions got me out of an awkward position on Sunday. We had Church Parade in the morning, usual roll-up, with quite a few Roman Catholics joining the Presbyterians. After lunch, by chance or design, Snow had met one of the girls we were talking to at the dance on Saturday night, and she suggested that he bring his friend along (that was me) as she had a friend to come with her and we could go to the pictures at night. Being a good friend I went along with him to the cinema on this blind date. Her friend turned out to be about 40 and did not appeal. There was no way I was going to be involved so I called Snow aside and explained the position. He saw my point of view and then backed me up with the explanation that I could not stay as I was rostered to go on Gun Duty in less than two hours. So I made a diplomatic departure and beat it post haste, feeling rather satisfied. Saw Snow the next morning and he told me I had made a wise decision.
On Monday morning I had more matters to attend to at reception. Mostly this was to deal with the issue of Officers uniforms etc. Got measured for my great-coat which was to be made by a tailor on Saville Row and issued with headgear-Officers for the use of.
Up to this point I had kept a small pocket diary since leaving Australia but discontinued the practice forthwith when it was brought to our attention in lectures and sessions held in connection with our reception at Brighton that diaries were not to be kept. This would be particularly enforced once we got on to operational squadrons. As a result from hereon I have to rely on memory and reflections with mates as we recalled our experiences in later years. For the next few weeks it was a daily routine of morning parade to hear who had been drafted to advanced flying schools etc, rostered on to duties such as the gun positions, or orders to attend lectures on the Brighton Pavilion. The beaches were heavily mined and this kept us on our guard when we were on gun duties, particularly when a stray dog wandered on to the beach. The Pavilion was also booby-trapped and was accessible only by walking a plank from the Esplanade.
When not on duties and on stand down we made regular trips to London on the train to get acquainted with the Boomerang Club in Australia House, and enjoy some food that was not available elsewhere. It also gave us an opportunity to explore that area of central London that was within walking distance and included many of the well known and historic buildings and landmarks. Here also, I was introduced to the Overseas Club whose members hosted Commonwealth servicemen on leave. I also had to go to London to be fitted and issued with my Officers Uniforms and Greatcoat. We were also introduced to sirens signalling an air-raid alert and ‘all-clear’, and the lives of Londoners who slept in the underground stations platforms. At Brighton the only enemy action I saw was one day when a German twin-engined bomber came in low over the channel, climbed to about 1000 feet over the town and as it circled around the outskirts dropped a stick of bombs and headed out to sea again. It was all over in less that two minutes and the gun batteries on the esplanade did not get a chance to fire at it.
I Go to Scotland On Leave
On 11th September 1943 I was given 7 days leave (authority POR 174/43) and headed off to Aberdeen to stay with Jim and Nan Joss to whom I had been referred by the Overseas League at the Boomerang Club. I wished to go to Aberdeen to have the chance to visit Kintore where by father and uncles spent leave during WW1. It was a wonderful introduction to Scotland, and the fore-runner of a few more happy times there when on leave which eventually led to meeting a lass who stole my heart, but more about that later. That’s in the future still. Got back from leave to learn that some of the course had been posted to Advanced Flying Units. Keith Mills and Eric Sutton and a few others had been posted to No. 4 Observer A.F.U. West Freugh, Scotland and John Lewis and Lou Brimblecombe had been posted to No. 3 A.F.U. at Halfpenny Green. A few weeks later John was to be our first loss of life when he was killed in an accident flying over Wales on a training exercise. A few days after I got back Noel Hooper, John Honeyman and myself were instructed to attend Course No.14 Aircrew Officers Training School at Sidmouth in Devon.
With necessary travel warrants and instructions we arrived in Sidmouth on Sunday 26th September. The three of us were impressed with the beauty of the English country side as we travelled through Hampshire and Dorset to Devon. It was hard to realise that the country was at war, until you passed an airfield or a large military establishment. We were met at the station and transported to the Training School that was situated in a stately mansion that was probably an up-market holiday resort in peace time.
More Training in Devon
The course was an intense period of lectures on Air Force Rules and Regulations, Physical Exercises, Field exercises with live ammunition, escape procedures and parade ground drills under an iron-fisted disciplinarian R.S.M. from one of the Guards Regiments, whom we referred to as the ‘screaming skull’, but not to his face. None of us was that brave. We were put over an obstacle course on the second day there and only a few of us managed to complete it in the approved time. I was still reasonably fit from athletics training and managed to go over all the obstacles except one, but within the time allowed. After 23 days we were put over the same course again and everyone passed, all the fittest they had ever been.
Field exercises included live ammunition with shots fired at medium range, hand grenades, firework crackers etc and it was our observation to identify the type and direction from which the detonation was heard and make quick decisions on evasion tactics. We were also given exercises in techniques of camouflage and the use of the terrain to move and avoid detection. In the event of being shot down over enemy territory it was your first duty to avoid capture. Parades and Parade-ground drills were real masterpieces with the R.S.M. in charge. The short straw must have had my name on it when it came to parade-ground drills. When we were given duties for colour parades and reviews. I landed the duties of S/M of Parade, Adjutant of Parade, C/O of Parade and Reviewing Officer of Parade. It is a mystery how I was not promoted immediately to rank of Air Commodore or above. Noel and John felt sorry for me-like b.hell they did!
On our first day we were fitted out and issued with khaki battle dress, army boots etc, and this was our standard dress for the course, except for evening meals when the traditions of dining in the Officers Mess were observed. A few got postings from the course either to A.F.U. or back to their unit. I remember one Aussie pilot who was sent to the course as a disciplinary measure after he pranged a ‘Wimpy’ on take-off at an O.T.U, apparently without injury to any of the crew. After about ten days he was posted back to his unit to take up further training with the crew. Nine Aussies started the course but there were only five of us there at the end. Leave was granted most nights and at week-ends, so we were able to spend some time in town and go to the pictures or a dance. Met a girl, Irene Collins, at a dance one night who asked me to escort her home-what a walk; I think it must have been to the next village. She worked in a shoe shop in town, and I did see her a couple of times after that when I went down town.
Most vivid memories of the course relate to small arms firing practice, throwing live hand grenades, and the cross country exercises when we somehow managed to make tracks through an apple orchard, stuff a few into our jackets and get back to discover that we had a sort of crab apple used for making cider. Also tried our hand at toasting chestnuts, but not much satisfaction there either. Drilling the squad when under the instruction of the ‘screaming skull’ provided a bit of entertainment, particularly when he decided to take over and show us how to do it. He would give the order ‘Quick March’ at the top of his voice and let the squad get down the road about 70/100 yards before giving the order ‘About Turn’. By the 50/60 yard mark the squad had agreed that from a certain person forward they would disregard the order, the ones at the crucial point would hesitate, and behind them they would do the about turn. That really curled the ‘mo’ and sent a string of invective over the countryside, when the ones in front said they did not hear him. He didn’t fall for it-had been through that mill many times before. We got the feeling that he would liked to blame the Aussies and give them a bit of extra drill, but as they were of higher rank he had to play it cool.
At week-ends we were given leave, although the whole course was de-facto stand-in for the local Home Guard Unit, we were given details of the mined areas on the beaches, most of which were at the base of high cliffs and difficult to reach. Generally it was the area immediately below these cliffs that were not mined. On our first Sunday Noel and John and I headed off west close to the coastline along the tops of the cliffs, almost to Exmouth from where we could see Torquay in the distance. As we had been walking for a bit over 2 hours, we decided to veer north to a village that had golf links nearby where we found a café and had lunch. We crossed a railway line, into a village called Otterton and followed country roads and lanes back to Sidmouth. The next Sunday we headed north towards Honinton and got as far as Aflington. On this walk, following roads and lanes off the main road we stopped to talk to some villagers to enquire if a village about 2 miles further north had a café that was opened on Sundays. They did not know, had lived there all their lives and had never been to that other village.
We would have walked about 20 miles on each of those Sunday hikes, and that kept us in good physical condition. Knowledge gained on the Sunday hikes proved very valuable later on and was put to good use. On the Tuesday of the last week we had our final test on the obstacle course. No problems for any of us, even up and over the poles that were fixed horizontally at varying heights between the trunks of two pine trees to a height of about 30 feet, the only obstacle that stumped me on our run over the course on our first day. I did not go over the top then, but under it. The next day we were given our final test of escape techniques. We were despatched at 0830 Hrs to go to a spot near the village of Axmouth which lay just south of the road to Lyme Regis and north of the seaside town of Seaton. It was up to us whether we went singly, or in small groups like a crew from an aircraft that had been shot down. But we had to get to the destination without being observed by the instructors who would be in positions at a couple of points along the way. The sergeant in charge of the exercise, when informed that Noel and John and I would stick together and go as a team for the exercise said that was a good idea and even recommended to the others to learn from these Aussies who often did well in this exercise. We did well, but it involved a bit of cunning.
Our plan was to let the field get away and ahead of us while we went to a café for morning tea to formulate our tactics. We had to be at the ‘target’ by 1600 Hrs. That gave us a bit over 7 hours to do about 9 or 10 miles measured in a straight line. We had prepared a bit beforehand, and by fair means or foul John had obtained a woman’s hat and shawl. After morning tea we set off walking to the village of Sidford less than 2 miles north of Sidmouth where we knew we could get a taxi and were sure that no scouts would be stationed along that route. I have a suspicion that John had had a discussion with a taxi driver in this village on one of our Sunday walks because we found him very co-operative and willing to help, although he was going to use up a bit of his petrol ration. Sometimes crosses my mind if he got a voucher from John to say his taxi had been commandeered for defence purposes. For him it was going to be a round trip of about 20 miles. I cannot remember what the fare was, but probably in the 5/10 Pounds range, and that was probably the best fare he had made on a Wednesday in war time. In the taxi we set off on the main road towards Lyme Regis and after about 5 miles turned right along a road that went past a quarry and then north-east to Colyford our destination for the taxi. On this last stretch we had a fair idea that scouts would be stationed, so John donned the hat with the shawl over his shoulders and sat up and surveyed the scene while Noel and I crouched down so as we could not be observed. With a bit of luck John spotted our friendly Sergeant sitting under a tree about 15 yards inside a field with a ditch between him and the road. No other scouts were seen. We left the taxi at Colyfield and walked the last mile or so to Axmouth and the designated meeting place. No one was expecting escapees to come in from a northerly direction so we arrived without being spotted to the amazement of the team that had congregated there. We timed things so that we did not arrive until just after 1530 Hrs. A few had already arrived carrying flags to indicate they had been spotted by one or more look-out scouts. Not long before 1600 Hrs the Sergeant, and other spotters arrived and were about to announce that no one had spotted the 3 Aussies, when he looked around to spot us and cried “How the hell did you three get here??” We told him we did not spot any other look-outs, but we did see him under a tree and where he was.
We had our story ready that we were coming up a ditch beside the road when we spotted him and realised we could not pass along that ditch without him seeing us, so we back-pedalled a bit using trees along the road as cover, and then crossed the road and away a bit to the north, which brought us in from that direction. We told him we were within the length of 2 cricket pitches from him, and that really had him flabbergasted. Somehow or another he got the correct information by Friday morning, and told us he was not very impressed, but couldn’t decide whether to admonish us for not entering into the true spirit of the exercise or just acknowledge that we had exercised initiative that we had so often been instructed to do.
Sunday 24th October saw the completion of our Air Crew Officers Training School, and on Monday morning we set off by train back to Brighton. We went via Salisbury where we had a stop over to have a look around the town and visit the famous cathedral. During WW1 my father had been billeted on Salisbury Plains with 41st Battalion A.I.F. and used to talk about the Cathedral and his visits around the area. I did not know it then, not even until the 1980’s, that my paternal great grandparents had come from East Hagbourne in Berkshire about 20 miles from Reading in the area that we were to-day travelling through.
Back at Brighton on Tuesday it was a return to the usual routine of morning parade, lectures and stand-downs as we waited for a posting to an Advanced Flying Unit. During this time we were attending a lecture in the old ball room on the Pavilion when the whole pier was rocked by an enormous blast. Someone had detonated one of the booby-trap mines on the end of the pier and really started some activity. We were evacuated very quickly. Never heard any more reports and whether there were any casualties apart from a few sea gulls. At Brighton a new contingent of EAT’s N.C.O.’s and Officers had arrived and the duties on the ack-ack guns had been assigned to them which gave us more time to take visits up to London.
My Posting Comes Through - Scotland
On Parade about 6th November my posting came through to No. 4 (Observers) Advanced Flying Unit at West Freugh, near Stranraer in Scotland. There were other navigators on the same posting that were on a course after No. 71 and arrived in Brighton about a month or so after I did. These included Keith Nunn, Hector Craig and Soapy Campbell. Noel Hooper and John Honeyman were posted to an A.F.U. affiliated with No 5 Group Bomber Command. I seemed assured to going into No. 3 Group which operated in East Anglia.
Those going to West Freugh left Brighton by train on Monday 8th November, travelled overnight, changing trains probably at Carlisle, and arrived in Stranraer and on to West Freugh by RAF transport on Tuesday to attend to the usual requirements of reception for a course that was due to start the next day. Keith, Hector, Soapy and I were all billeted in the same Nissen hut in the Officers quarters.
We certainly got our introduction to the Scottish weather coming into their winter. The famous Scotch Mist just hung on and on, in fact for the first six weeks we were there we never saw the sun from the ground, but at 2,500 feet you were above cloud and in clear sky. For the first few days we were kept in the lecture rooms for revision in most of the subjects we had studied at Edmonton and talks on what to expect as we moved on to become acquainted with new navigation aids etc that were coming into use in Bomber Command. Our air exercises at West Freugh over the 8 weeks we were there comprised 30 Hrs 35 mins of daylight flying and 18 Hrs of night flying atSS heights between 1500 feet and 5000 feet. The air exercises over routes as detailed in my log book were mostly over the Irish Sea area to landmarks in Northern Ireland, Wales and the Carlisle area to the East. In most cases the exercise started from Ailsa Craig, a landmark island in the Clyde Estuary. You had to be wary of your height and track to ensure you did not come to grief on the Isle of Man.
A great advantage of flying with RAF Staff Pilots was they flew the course given to them. They couldn’t see the ground anyway most of the time. This gave good experience in D.R. navigation and was a great help in charting an air plot. They were mostly very experienced pilots who had served with the RAF in India as well as on operations at home and were very experienced in flying Ansons and Oxfords.
Some Flying “Incidents”
The starting point of Ailsa Craig nearly caused an accident on one of our exercises. We had climbed through cloud and on course etc, when I said to the pilot we would proceed on our first course of the exercise from E.T.A. Ailsa Craig, which would have been not far out because of the short distance we had flown. He insisted on going below the cloud to get an accurate fix from which to start our exercise. Our course was nearly too accurate, as when we broke cloud at about 800 feet Ailsa Craig was almost dead ahead, and the faithful “Old Aggie” as we called the Anson flew past the cliff face too close for comfort. The pilot circled the island, flew a bit north of it and then came back on the course we were to fly on the first leg and climbed back into the cloud over the island with a satisfied look on his face.
On another exercise the first course was eastwards to Wigtown, and then on to Silloth, past a mountain that was about 1500 feet high near Gatehouse-on Fleet I think it was called ‘Crefell’ and it had claimed a few aircraft crashing into it, so we had to make sure we were at least at 2000 feet. For the exercise we had been given ‘met’ winds of 30/49 Knots from the west. By the time we got near Gatehouse-on Fleet it was obvious that the true wind was over 70 knots and in response to radio message we were recalled.
A flight of less than 30 minutes out took over 2 hours on the return with the Aggie at maximum air speed. Coming over the top of one of those high mountains you had the feeling you could just have jumped off like from a moving tram. A night exercise was scheduled to fly to Newcastle to give us navigation experience and the air defences there some dry-swim practice. Before we got as far as Silloth we were recalled as Newcastle was in fact being raided by the Luftwaffe. Sometimes I have wondered about the co-incidence. It was on one of those exercises that I had a bout of air sickness and on landing the pilot put it in his report. The O.C. Training ordered me to report to the M.O. for an assessment. I cannot remember what his examination involved but I was not scrubbed from flying.
On 30th December we were detailed on navigation exercises flying at 5000 ft. Two navigators were assigned to an exercise flying over the Irish Sea due south to Holyhead in Wales and then north west to Ballyquinton Point in Northern Island. This had the Isle of Man along this path. The two navigators on this route were Keith Nunn and Harold ‘Hal’ Peters, both graduates of No. 74N course. Most of the route was covered in cloud with base at about 1000 feet. It turned out to be a tragic day. The aircraft in which Hal Peters was flying must have descended through the cloud too soon and crashed into a mountain on the island. Hal was 33 years of age and came from Bentleigh in Victoria. He was buried in Andreas (St Andrew) Churchyard on the Isle of Man. My last navigation exercise at West Freugh, a week later, was over this same route.
Another flying incident at West Freugh that remains in my memory concerns the crash of a Hampden twin-engined bomber. A few of the RAF pilots were discussing the flying capabilities of this aircraft, a few of which were stationed at West Freugh for coastal surveillance work. A F/Sgt. pilot was arguing that the aircraft would not pull out of a spin. One of the ex-India RAF Officer pilots disagreed and said when the weather was clear enough he would take one up to about 5,000 feet, put it into a spin and pull out. He did this a few days later in sight of a few onlookers - but unfortunately the aircraft did not pull out of the spin and went down to crash into the sea. One of the ex-India pilots was heard to remark “That is only four of us left now”.
Leave in Oldhall – I meet Alma
As I had advised Jim and Nan Joss in Aberdeen that I had been posted to West Freugh, Nan wrote back to say that she had been in touch with a Friend/Cousin in Paisley and she and her husband would be happy to host me if I went to Glasgow. We were given 48 leave pass one week-end so I took the opportunity to go by bus, getting off at Oldhall between Paisley and Glasgow to visit Ronnie and Molly Whyte and their daughter Alma who lived at 39 Tylney Rd, Oldhall. This led to many enjoyable leaves in Aberdeen and Paisley when I came to be accepted freely by both families over the times ahead and which was eventually to see Alma and I marry. I think that we would both agree however that it was not love at first sight.
Hector Craig, who had some relatives in Glasgow came with me on the bus on our two week-end leaves. We were not happy with the smoke filled busses filled with farm workers in heavy sweaty smelling clothes, and not a window opened. It was winter, damp and cold, but some fresh air was desirable, so we would open the window a bit near our seat to get a look that only a Ranger’s fan would give a Celtic fan. Ronnie Whyte was a staunch Ranger’s follower and I was soon to learn of the rivalry between those two sides. The passion for football, what we called soccer, was new to us.
Our course at West Freugh was completed on 7th January 1944. Our posting came through the next day and we were given a few days to complete clearances-the usual medical, dental etc and pack our Officer issue steel trunk for despatch to our new station. Keith Nunn and Hector Craig and I were posted to No. 84 Operational Training Unit at Desborough in Northamptonshire. We realised then that we were destined for No. 3 group Bomber Command that was equipped with Lancasters. We were given 7days leave and travelling time and had to report to Desborough by 24th January (Auth POR 2/44). Travelling warrants were issued at the Adjutant’s office on 11th January, a day after my 20th birthday anniversary, and I went on leave to Aberdeen for a week and then to London for a few days to catch up with mates at the Boomerang Club.
Now it was on to joining a crew, further training as a crew with more advanced aircraft and at heights above 10,000 feet. As it turned out it was to bigger and better things and experiences that made men of us. ......
West Freugh – Laundry Hung Out to Dry In Our “Heated” Quarters
At Aircrew Officers Training School
Sidmouth, Devon
Noel Hooper, Bob Smith
Bob Smith, John Honeyman
Training as a Crew
Crew Formation at No. 84 O.T.U. (Operational Training Unit)
Desborough, Northamptonshire
For operational training I was posted to No. 84 O.T.U at Desborough in Northamptonshire, an Operational Training Unit under the control of No.3 Group, (RAF Bomber Command) as from 25th January 1944. This Unit was flying ex-operational Vickers Wellington X’s, with unit identification “IF”. This was our introduction to flying above 10,000 feet in aircraft equipped with oxygen. Radio I/D was “Foodramp”.
Along with Keith Nunn and Hector Craig I was accommodated in the Officer’s Quarters and went through the usual reception procedure. A programme of lectures and ‘dry-swim’ exercises started immediately and went on for two weeks. Flying exercises started on 15th Feb, crewed with a staff pilot and flying as a 2nd navigator under supervision, to gain experience on new special navigation equipment and flying at heights of 10,000 to 15,000 feet, wearing oxygen masks. Instructors, mostly with operational experience, assessed our work and passed us as satisfactory to proceed further into the formation of a crew and on to further training towards posting to an operational squadron. Over that first month lectures and tests occupied a lot of time, and were most interesting as we were instructed in new equipment coming into use, some of it still on the secret list. During that second fortnight we flew 2 daylight flying exercises and 1 night exercise of between 4 and 5 hours each. On 28th February after flying a special daylight exercise of 4 ½ hours at 15,000 feet all the aircrew under operational training were assembled at 1700 Hrs and told to sort themselves into crews by the next afternoon.
On 1st March 1944 our crew was formed. In the morning pilot F/Sgt. Ron Hastings approached me to see if I had been claimed yet and when he said he had obtained another Aussie as a Bomb Aimer and two RAF fellows who had come through a gunners course together and wanted to be together in a crew, I agreed to join them. Soon afterwards we approached a Wireless Operator who had many flying hours to his credit and had come from a unit where he was an instructor. So, for the time being we had a crew, with a Flight Engineer to be added when we went on to conversion to four engined bombers:-
The Crew:
Pilot F/Sgt Ronald William Hastings RAAF No.423112 Born 11 Nov 1922
Nav. F/O Robert Wylie Smith RAAF No.425992 Born 10 Jan 1924
B/A F/Sgt Harold Edward Burns RAAF No.422144 Born 5 Nov 1915
W/Op.F/Sgt Victor Frederick Pearce RAF No.1196145 Born 17 Jul 1920
M/U/G Sgt George Henry James Malyon RAF No.1432616 Born 7 Jan 1923
R/G SgtDonald George McFadden RAF No.1387716 Born 26 Feb 1923
All aircrew were volunteers, so the RAF fellows were in the RAF Volunteer Reserve. Between ourselves we were called respectively, Ron, Smithy, Bobby, Vic, Mike and Mac.
On 2nd March most of the newly formed crews, including us, were sent to the satellite ‘drome at Harrington, about 4/5 miles away, to fly a high level bombing exercise in daylight and then about 6 hours on circuits and bumps (which gave the navigator nothing to do) over 2 consecutive nights, and on the next night 2 ½ hours on high level bombing. Having completed these exercises it was back to the main ‘drome on 8th March to start a very intense month of flying training in daylight and at night. These exercises were always over approved set routes, sometimes with an experienced pilot as we went on long night flights, fighter affiliation exercises and high level bombing. Lectures still continued at times during the day and there were breaks for sports and evening/week-end leave.
Dealing With an Emergency
On 13th March, flying in an older Wellington 111 No. X3995 and letter coded “U” for Uncle we had an emergency forced upon us on take-off after lunch. Just as the aircraft started to lift off the runway the flap over the port wing fuel tank inlet sprung open, causing that wing to stall. As that wing started to drop it was only the quick corrective action by Ron that saved us from disaster. It took the combined effort of him and the Bomb Aimer who was standing beside him to hold the joy-stick hard over to starboard to keep the plane on level flight. The control tower had noticed our wild take-off, and before we could gather our wits they contacted us with a call “Foodramp Uncle-are you in trouble”. Ron replied with a brief description of the problem and immediately got a message back to circle if possible and come into land immediately as they would have emergency vehicles standing by. An experienced pilot was put in direct contact from the control tower to assist Ron. Although we did not know it at the time, sirens were sounded on the ‘drome and a fire tender, ambulance and crash wagon were rushed on to the tarmac. Ron instructed me to keep the runway on our starboard wing in sight and guide him around to the downwind end. Then, as he lined the aircraft up on the runway and started a landing approach he ordered all except “Bobby” Burns, the B/A, to take up crash positions, leaving the intercom to all positions open. With the two gunners I took up the crash position. Vic, the wireless operator, was tuned into a BBC radio broadcast and was not aware of the emergency, although he admitted later he thought the flying was a bit rough. I learned a lesson from this as I should have tapped Vic on the shoulder as I went past him to the crash position and beckoned him to join me.
Ron and Bobby managed to control the aircraft sufficiently to make a reasonable landing although it gave a severe lurch to port as we touched down, causing Mac, who was next to me in the crash position and had started to get to his feet as soon as the wheels touched the ground, to fall against me and force my head on to the side of the fuselage resulting in a bit of a lump on my right temple. Mac thought for a minute that he had severely hurt me as we both ended up lying on the floor. This lurch caused Vic to look around and see Mike, Mac and myself in the crash position and to wonder what was going on. So we had a bit of explaining to do. We were all O.K, and saw a certain humour in what happened next. As soon as we came to rest Ron contacted the control tower with their sign and the message “Foodramp Uncle here—we have pancaked”, only to get the immediate response “Foodramp Uncle, if you have pancaked you have not pancaked here”. A quick look around and we recognised the surroundings—we had landed at Harrington, the satellite strip. As they say, all is well that ends well, (in spite of Murphy’s Law). Transport was immediately sent out to the aircraft to take us back to the base ‘drome for a quick medical assessment, but we said we were O.K. The M.O told me I would probably get a black eye if any bruising came out and that my flying helmet had probably saved me from more serious injury. In reflection, it is possible that if Ron had attempted a full 360 degree turn back to the runway we had just taken off from, the outcome could have been much worse.
The M.O did not say anything about not flying for a day or two. The experience certainly strengthened our confidence in and respect for Ron, and taught us valuable lessons. We did not hear what happened to the ground crew responsible for fuelling the aircraft and ensuring that the wing flaps were properly secured. Probably went on a charge and received some form of punishment. The aircraft was given a thorough inspection, before it was moved and flown back to the base ‘drome. The undercarriage must have experienced some stress when we touched down. We flew again in the same aircraft four days later on a high level bombing exercise and had no problems.
By 8th April we had completed all the requirements of the course at O.T.U and were passed as fit material to proceed to conversion to four engine aircraft. We were given about 11 days leave (Auth POR 15/44) and instructed to report to No. 1653 H.C.U (Heavy Conversion Unit) at Chedburgh in Suffolk on 21st April. A signal had come through that a crew was required for an Australian Squadron in No.5 Group with a condition that it must comprise at least 4 Aussies in the crew. The only one to qualify on our course was P/O. George Edwards (Pilot) who had crewed with Keith Nunn as his navigator. Both had known Ron Hastings prior to this time. Keith had known Ron and his father before the war. Both Ron’s father and Keith were employed in the then Union Bank of Aust- later to become the ANZ Bank. Ron & George had trained together as pilots. That crew eventually went on to No.467 (RAAF) Squadron at Waddington in Lincoln and were shot down on their second ‘Op’ on 29th June 1944, bombing the flying bomb base at Beauvoir in France. George was killed and Keith was captured and taken POW. After the war Keith resumed his career with the Union Bank. I have no recollection of where Hector Craig and crew were posted to.
Previous Service history of our Crew members
Pilot “Ron”
When he was born in 1922 his family surname was ‘Heuzenroeder”. His father was employed in the Union Bank and in the mid-1930’s with the world scene focussing on the Nazi regime in Germany, and the bank considering his transfer to Manager of a country town, they requested him to change his surname. Ron was in secondary schooling at the time and chose the name ‘Hastings’.
Ron enlisted in Sydney on 20th June 1942 and was posted to No.2 I.T.S. at Bradfield Park. On 15th Oct 1942 he went to No.5 E.F.T.S at Narramine in N.S.W and on 17 Jan 1943 to No.8 S.F.T.S at Bundaberg in Queensland. On 7th May 1943 he graduated with his pilot’s wings and posted to No.2 Embarkation Depot with rank of Sergeant. Embarked in Sydney on 25th May 1943, travelling via the USA and arrived in the U.K. on 7th July 1943 at No.11 P.D.R.C at Brighton. On 7th Sep 1943 posted to No.15 (Pilot) A.F.U at Andover before posting to 84 O.T.U at Desborough on 25th January 1944.
Nav. “Smithy”
Enlisted 21st May 1942 at No.3 Recruit Centre, Eagle St, Brisbane in an intake of ‘Aircrew Guards’ and posted same day to No.3 Recruit Depot Maryborough Qld. On 13th June 1942 posted as ‘Air Crew Guard to No.1 A.O.S. Cootamundra N.S.W. where on 16th Sep 1942 was posted into No.73 Reserve Squadron. On 11th Oct 1942 posted to No.2 I.T.S. Bradfield Park , Sydney and on 2nd Jan 1943 to No.2 Embarkation Depot, Bradfield Park. Embarked Sydney on 8th Feb 1943 on troopship “U.S.S. Hermitage” to San Francisco and then by train to Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. On 7th March 1943 posted to No.2 Air Observers School at Edmonton. Graduated with wings as a Navigator and granted a commission on 23rd July 1943. On 4th Aug 1943 posted to No. 1 “Y” (Embarkation) Depot at Halifax, Nova Scotia. On 26 Aug 1943 embarked on the “Queen Mary” to the UK. Disembarked on 1st Sep 1943 at Gourock, Scotland, and then by train to Brighton, England and posted to No.11 P.D.R.C. on 2nd Sep 1943. On 27th Sep 1943 attended Air Crew Officers Training School at Sidmouth, Devon, for a 4 week course. Posted 0n 9th Nov 1943 to No.4 (Observers) A.F.U at West Freugh, Scotland and on 25 Jan 1944 posted to No.84 O.T.U, Desborough,England.
B/Aimer ‘Bobbie’ or ‘Rabbie’
Enlisted on 25th April 1942 at No 2 Recruit Centre in Sydney and on same day posted to No.2 I.T.S at Bradfield Park. On 15 Aug 1942 posted to No.2 Embarkation Depot at Bradfield Park. And on 21st Aug 1942 posted to No.1 E.D. at Ascot Vale, Victoria. Embarked in Melbourne on 7th Sep 1942 and ‘disembarked’ No.3 Manning Depot, Edmonton Canada on 2nd October 1942. On 11th Oct 1942 posted to No.5 A.O.S at Winnipeg and on 29th Dec1942 posted to RCAF station at Trenton, then on 21st Feb 1943 posted to No.4 Bombing & Gunnery School at Fingal and on 16th May 1943 to No.4 A.O.S at London Ontario. On 13th Oct 1943 posted to No.1 ‘Y’ Depot at Halifax, Nova Scotia. Embarked at Halifax on 22nd Oct 1943 and ‘disembarked’ 31st Oct 1943 at No.11 P.D.R.C. Brighton, England. Posted to No.4 A.F.U. West Freugh, Scotland on 23rd Nov 1943 and on 25 Jan 1944 to No.84 O.T.U. at Desborough, England.
W/Op. Vic.
Enlisted in the RAF 2nd Dec 1941. Commenced flying training in August 1942 after transfer to the RAF V.R. After completion of Wireless Operator’s course was posted to Bobbington as an instructor prior to posting to No.84 O.T.U. Desborough on 25th Jan 1944
M/U/G. ‘Mike’
Enlisted in the RAF on 5th May 1941, in the RAF Regiment. Initial Training at Cardington, and on 30th June 1941 posted to White Waltham and Cranwell for a ground observers course before posting to the Outer Hebrides and Orkney Islands. In June 1943 volunteered for flying duty (R.A.F.V.R) I.T.W Bridlington ,Yorkshire and Air Gunnery Schools in Shropshire and Bishopscourt, Northern Ireland. Graduated with wings in Dec 1943 and posted to No.84 O.T.U, Desborough on 25th Jan 1944.
R/G. ‘Mac’.
Enlisted in the RAF on 5th Feb 1942 and served in the RAF Regiment until June 1943. when he volunteered for flying duties and had the same postings in flying training as ‘Mike’, which is why both wanted to stay together in the same crew. Both came from London.
The Crew in front of a ‘Wellington X’
Ground Staff
Mac, Vic, Mike, Bobbie, Ron Smithy
Hours flown at No.84 O.T.U.
Daylight – 34 Hrs 30 mins Night – 30 Hrs 30 mins
No. 1653 H.C.U. (Heavy Conversion Unit)
Chedburgh, Suffolk
This unit was equipped with ex-operational Stirlings 1 & 111. Unit I/D. H4.
On 21st April we were posted to No. 31 Base (No.3 Group R.A.F.Bomber Command), Stradishall, Suffolk, under whose administration were No.1653 H.C.U. and No.3 L.F.S. Feltwell for training in 4 engined heavy bombers. A Flight Engineer, straight from training at a Rolls Royce training school, was appointed to the crew. As a general rule this was a Flight Engineer’s introduction to flying. Sgt. Ron Partridge was added to the crew, and immediately earned the nick-name ‘Pheasant’ by Ron. His training in the Merlin engine at the Rolls Royce establishment was not put to use while we were flying Stirlings with radial engines, but was going to be valuable when we graduated on to the Lancaster Bomber. Ron was destined to stay with our crew only for our first 6 operational sorties.
After 3 weeks of extensive lectures, introductions to and instructions on the special equipment that we would be using on a squadron, most of it specialist to a particular crew member, and general information that applied to all given by experienced personnel on what to expect on operations over Europe as well as survival and escape techniques it was back to practical flying exercises. At first these were with an experienced pilot for dual familiarisation flights of circuits and bumps and then on to a high level navigation and bombing exercise before Ron was allowed to go solo with his crew.
We did not escape the now accepted ‘emergency’ that can crop up on training flights. On our last ‘dual’ flight on the morning of 18th May we had a F/O. Gill as Captain. On take-off he cut one engine to give Ron the necessary experience in that situation. It almost backfired as the aircraft we were in, R9287 H4-Y (Yoke) was rather sick on 3 engines and refused to climb while the under carriage was still down. Fortunately Chedburgh was on a plateau and the ground fell away from us. The under carriage was retracted and we did manage to gather a bit of speed to give us a safety margin above stalling. The ‘killed’ engine refused to re-start, so Ron also had experience with landing on 3 engines. An eventful 25 minutes. After lunch we were transferred to another aircraft and Ron was allowed to go solo with the crew for 2 hours of circuits and bumps.
Involved in a Diversionary Flight at Time of Normandy Landing
Over the next 18 days and nights we did a number of special cross country navigation and bombing exercises and then flew what was an ‘Op’, but it was not credited as such. It was on the night of 5/6th June 1944, the eve of “D.Day”. We took off at 2310 Hrs on a special exercise flying at 12000 feet which took us out over the North Sea, approaching the Belgian coast near Ostend and at about 20 miles from the coast altered course to roughly Nor-East for 15 mins, before turning to port and then heading back to base crossing the English Coast near Orfordness. We had been on a diversion raid to draw attention away from the landings on the Normanby Coast of France. When we got back over Suffolk we were given a triangular course to fly, still at 12,000 feet, until it was all clear for us to descend and land. Below was an extensive procession of aircraft heading towards France, so we soon realised that the invasion of German occupied Europe was under way. We landed about 0130 Hrs on 6th June, “D.Day”, and were informed that General Dwight Eisenhower would be broadcasting a special announcement later in the morning.
A day or two later we were paraded and given the duty of scouting through a near-by ‘wood’, as there had been a report that a parachutist had been seen to jump out of a German aircraft that had flown over. About 30 to 40 airmen hiked through that wood and surrounding fields, but found nothing. Later in the afternoon two farmers walked up to the guards at the station’s main gate with a suspect in tow. One was carrying a hay fork in a menacing manner. They found him on the edge of the wood, probably waiting for night to fall before moving on. Never did hear what the sequel to that was.
On 12th June, in the afternoon, we were detailed to take an aircraft on a flight test. On arrival at the aircraft we were met by a senior officer who informed us that an important passenger was on board who we had to deliver to Tempsford, the base of No.161 Special Duty squadron, and to fly below 500 feet all the way there and back. So I had to prepare a quick flight plan to Tempsford. When we got on board we discovered that our passenger was a very attractive young French lady, probably in her early 20’s, who was to be parachuted out over France that night on a special mission. What a girl?
No. 1653 Chedburgh – Suffolk
F/E Sgt Ron Partridge Added to The Crew That Went to “Ops”
Smithy, Bobbie, Ron, Pheasant?,
Mac, Mike, Vic
Two days later we completed out training at Chedburgh with a high level bombing and fighter affiliation exercise which involved corkscrews for which the Stirling was not particularly suited, and neither was my stomach. I have to admit that I did suffer some air-sickness on such occasions. On 14th June we were advised of our positing to No. 3 Lancaster Finishing School at Feltwell in Norfolk and to attend to our clearances from Chedburgh.
Hours flown at No.1653 H.C.U.
- Daylight 27 Hrs 25 mins, Night 20 Hrs 25 mins
No. 3 L.F.S. (Lancaster Finishing School)
Feltwell, Norfolk
Still under our posting to No.31 Base, Stradishall we were attached to No.3 L.F.S from 18th June 1944 for a concentrated 10 day course of lectures and instructions and our introduction to the “Lancaster 1”. The squadrons of 3 Group were equipped with the Lancaster 1 and Lancaster 111. The course was mainly for the pilot. Instructors were pilots who had completed tours on the ‘Lanc’.
P.O. Treasure was assigned to our crew for 3 hours of dual and solo circuits and bumps in daylight on 23rd June and for the same at night the following day. The next day we were on our own for a test flying a triangle over Norfolk for over an hour and 2 days later flew a cross country navigation test of over 3 hours.
It was a great thrill to eventually get on to Lancasters. A vast improvement on the Wellington and Stirling and truly the most successful heavy bomber of WW11. It was a ‘plane that gave the crews a feeling of confidence. Its power and manoeuvrability and load carrying capacity exceeded all others at that time. As far as I was concerned I had reached my goal. After some operational experience, you wee convinced that every one who operated in the light and medium bombers in the early years of the war deserved a ‘gong’.
On 27th June 1944 we were advised that we were posted to No.XV/15 Squadron at Mildenhall, Suffolk, a permanent RAF Base and one of the jewels of Bomber Command.
Hours flown at No. 3 L.F.S.
- Daylight 4 Hrs 20 mins, Night 6 Hrs 20 mins
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Bob Smith's Memoirs
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Bob Smith
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2003-03
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Turkey
Turkey--Gallipoli
Australia
Queensland--Brisbane
Queensland--Ipswich
Queensland--Maryborough
New South Wales--Cootamundra
New South Wales--Sydney
New South Wales--Wagga Wagga
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Royal Australian Air Force
Royal Canadian Air Force
Royal New Zealand Air Force
Description
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Bob's memoirs from his early training until he became operational.
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eng
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Text. Memoir
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107 printed sheets
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MSmithRW425992-230825-03 copy
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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.
106 Squadron
115 Squadron
142 Squadron
15 Squadron
1653 HCU
166 Squadron
3 Group
4 Group
44 Squadron
467 Squadron
49 Squadron
5 Group
619 Squadron
622 Squadron
640 Squadron
76 Squadron
78 Squadron
84 OTU
Advanced Flying Unit
aerial photograph
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Anson
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crash
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-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/200/3335/PBaconSG1601.1.jpg
70945e1921ef54e6d100ad826375db35
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/200/3335/ABaconSG160216.2.mp3
b7fb370705e8e6280c2275db97ad276e
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Title
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Bacon, Stephen Granville
Stephen Bacon
Stephen Granville Bacon
Stephen G Bacon
S Bacon
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Stephen Granville Bacon (1921 - 2023, 1351298 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as an air gunner with 12 Squadron before he was shot down and became a prisoner of war.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2016-02-19
2016-02-16
2016-01-18
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
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Bacon, SG
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
BW: This is Brian Wright interviewing Sergeant Stephen Granville Bacon at his home in Burnley on Tuesday 16th of February at twenty past two. Start us off -
SB: Err, excuse me a minute -
BW: Go on.
SB: Warrant Officer Bacon.
BW: I beg your pardon.
BW: Warrant Officer Bacon.
Other: Is that different?
BW: They only gave me your rank as sergeant.
SB: That’s what I finished up as. A -
BW: That’s fine.
SB: Warrant officer
Other: Is that higher than a sergeant? I don’t know.
BW: It is. Yes.
Other: Oh right. Warrant Officer
BW: That that was all they gave me, sergeant. So, Warrant Officer Stephen Granville Bacon can you just confirm for me please your service number and your date of birth.
SB: 1351298 as I already told you. That’s my service number and my date of birth is 2 3 21. 2nd of the 3rd 21.
BW: 2nd of March 1921.
SB: Yeah.
BW: And you were born in Barton on Humberside. Is that right?
SB: Yes.
BW: And what was your, you say you were from, your family was you had eight siblings. Is that right? You were one of eight.
SB: I’m one of eight.
BW: I see and -
SB: I had five brothers and two sisters.
BW: And were you the eldest?
SB: No.
BW: Eldest brother?
SB: I was the youngest bar one.
BW: And what was your home life like in the 20s and 30s? What would you describe it as?
SB: Strict. And that’s all I can say. I mean we used to have a time to be in at night before dark. Anything like that. We strictly adhered to that. So it was really strict.
BW: And where did you go to school?
SB: Pardon?
BW: Where did you go to school?
SB: I went to school at Queen Street School, Barton upon Humber which was a church school in actual fact.
BW: Were you a religious family?
SB: Pardon?
BW: Were you a religious family?
SB: No.
Other: You were quite poor I think. Am I right?
SB: Mind your own business.
BW: And so what age did you leave school?
SB: Fourteen.
BW: Which was I think standard at that that time wasn’t it?
SB: It was standard age at that time. And that was -
BW: Did you leave with qualifications or anything or not?
SB: No. I finished up in a class of my own x7 and WH Aubrey was the headmaster and I’d go to school and there was only me in this x7 and he’d just say Stephen just pop along and see if Mrs Aubrey wants anything. Any errands running or anything. And that was my last year at school.
BW: Yeah. Just running errands for -
SB: Oh yeah. There was no point in me being there on my own. It just wasn’t the class, the only one in the class I think and it was quite pointless. I did go to school as soon as I joined the air force.
BW: And what, what age were you when you joined up?
SB: Eighteen I think. Eighteen. Nineteen. I forget which. Eighteen I think. Was I?
BW: And what, what prompted your decision to join the RAF? Why? Why the RAF and not the other services?
SB: I had an ambition to fly but it didn’t work out that way. I joined when I went to enlist in Hull at Kingston I, ‘What do you want to be?’ I said, ‘I’d like to be flying in the air force.’ ‘Very good. But you can’t. You’ll have to join up as a AC plonk’ as they called it. AC2. ‘and then you’ll, you’ll have to put a remuster application in.’ Well, after several remuster applications I eventually was accepted to go to Weston Super Mare in front of a selection board and I think there was eight of us at that time. I didn’t see any more but I got a recall after seeing, being in front of this selection board to tell me I’d been accepted. From there I had to go to St Johns Wood in London for a deep medical.
BW: Ahum.
SB: And then from there I went to Craven Hill and then I went to Dalcross and that’s when I started flying.
BW: Whereabouts is Dalcross?
SB: Scotland. And there were Boulton Paul Defiant aircraft, we, which was a single engine plane with a turret on and the pilots, I think the majority of them were Polish. Quite nice chaps. A bit haywire when they got in the air. In fact, I remember the pilot who was flying, I was flying with we landed and he said, ‘I can’t give this in Steve.’ That was the, there were drogue, drogues towed and we used to fire at the drogues. He said, ‘You’ve got too many bloody holes in this drogue.’ I said, ‘Well you took me too bloody near’ and that was the attitude. Free and easy. Aye. But enjoyable. Oh aye.
BW: And so while you were there you were training as a gunner. Is that right?
SB: Yeah. That was all we did we used to fly over the North Sea, follow the drogue and fire at the drogues and that was our training.
BW: How successful do you think you were at that?
SB: I seemed to be fairly successful. I finished up with taking ten of us down into England and dropping them off here and there and I think it was because my name was first on the alphabet. More or less B. I seem to get all these things and in actual fact I was posted to India when I was stationed in Blackpool. The only fault was I wasn’t in Blackpool. I was in Burnley [laughs] and of course I had to go for the high jump and another, in front of another board and I explained what was going on and funnily enough I got in charge of the party going to Mold, I think, in North Wales and this party was eventually India on the, and though we didn’t fly we sailed on the Mauritania.
BW: On the Mauritania?
SB: Ahum I think it was its last trip.
BW: I see.
SB: In actual fact and the largest boat to go through the Suez Canal but they were quite pleasant at being a warrant officer. I had advantages. We’d waiter service at the table. We were on A deck and we used to look down at the motley crew on the other deck. Oh aye. My job was check the armoury so I used to go down into the bowels of the ship every morning, casually check and that was my day. The rest of it was deck quoits and all sorts of entertainment. Oh aye.
BW: You say you were already a warrant officer at that point.
SB: No. I was only a sergeant.
No. Are you -
SB: Oh at that point, going to India
BW: Yes.
Other: That was after the war isn’t it?
BW: Yeah.
SB: Yes. Aye
BW: So that was some time after your service in the war then when you went to India. Is that right?
SB: Yeah.
BW: Ok.
SB: There was no vacancies for flying. So -
BW: Ok.
SB: I took going to India which was quite an education.
BW: So coming back then to the early part of the war and your career. You said you went to school in the RAF and so you -
SB: Yeah.
BW: Was this before your gunnery training or after or part of it?
SB: It was before. I passed flying exams on Thorney Island which is not far from Portsmouth and the flying officer there he said, ‘I’ll set you an exam Steve. The equivalent to the flying job.’ And he did and that’s how I come to go to Weston Super Mare. He recommended me and I finished up in front of this board at, selection board in Super Mare.
BW: And was your intention when you joined up to be air crew air gunner or did you actually want to fly or navigate? Was your ambition higher than to be gunner or were you -
SB: My ambition was to fly. I remustered for a pilot but I didn’t get, it didn’t happen while I was vacant. I was otherwise engaged in Germany. [laughs]
BW: I see. I see.
SB: I was there two years in Germany.
BW: Ok. So you had your initial time in England as, as sergeant and you were trained on Boulton Paul Defiants as air gunner.
SB: Yeah.
BW: What happened after that? What was the next stage of training for you?
SB: That was it.
BW: Did you go to a conversion unit or an operational training unit?
SB: I went from Dalcross which was Boulton Paul Defiants. I went from there to Wickenby which was 12 squadron.
BW: And what period in the war was this? What sort of year was this?
SB: 1942.
BW: Ok so you finished training at Dalcross which I’m guessing would be summer ‘42. And you went to Wickenby to continue flying as a gunner. On, on what aircraft? What were you posted on to?
SB: Lancasters.
BW: Lancaster. So this would be a new squadron for you and a new squadron entirely because 12 squadron was only formed in September ‘42.
SB: [?]
BW: Or thereabouts.
SB: It was a very basic place were Wickenby. Very basic. Nissen huts.
BW: And did you live in the nissen huts with all your crew or was there another crew with you?
SB: No. We, in the nissen hut I was in we were all gunners.
BW: So you were all on different aircraft but you were all the same trade.
SB: Yeah.
BW: Ok. That’s interesting. Some, some huts were occupied by crews and so there’d be two crews in there but in your case you were just billeted with other gunners -
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: Entirely.
SB: Oh yes. In actual fact during my stay in Germany I, at the, where was it? I don’t know where it was somewhere down in the interrogation place it was and they give me papers to look at and I noticed one of the chaps who was with me in this nissen hut he’d drowned. It was at the side of his name - drowned. It was all propaganda them showing us these things.
BW: So when you were at Wickenby and you joined this new squadron how did you meet the rest of your crew?
SB: I haven’t a ruddy clue [laughs]. I’ve no idea whatsoever. My crew was three Australians, two Canadians, and myself and a fellow from Tadcaster and I was the youngest.
BW: Do you recall their names and what they did?
SB: Now then. Now then.
BW: I believe your pilot was Featherstone. Is that right?
SB: Bob Featherstone. The -
Other: There was the piece of paper that we thought were your crew but we weren’t sure. Have you got your glasses?
SB: Oh aye. Well I’ll tell you what they were.
Other: Oh right.
SB: There was Bob Featherstone the pilot. Laurie. Laurie Hickson, navigator. No, Laurie was the radio operator. Jack [Ebblestone?] was the navigator. Tommy Fouracres was the bomb aimer. My friend, the other gunner, I’ve no idea what his name was. All I knew him as was Robbie.
BW: And would he be Canadian?
SB: Robbie was a Canadian. And he wasn’t in the billet with me, with the other -
BW: What-
SB: With the other gunners. Robbie.
BW: Was he a mid-upper gunner or a front?
SB: Who?
BW: Robbie.
SB: Robbie was rear gunner.
Other: Yeah. Steve wasn’t a rear gunner.
BW: Ok and there was one other. A guy called Cooper.
SB: Engineer. Don’t ask me why, I don’t know because I couldn’t see him climbing on the bloody wings if anything went wrong with an engine. Quite surplus to requirements in my opinion was the engineer but we had to put up with it.
BW: And his name was Freddie you say?
SB: Harry.
BW: Harry, beg your pardon.
SB: Harry Cooper
Other: F H Cooper.
SB: He was a director of John Smith’s. Not John. There’s two of them. John -
Other: Sam Smith’s.
SB: John Smith’s
Other: John Smith’s Brewery.
BW: I see. And how did you all get on as a crew?
SB: Very well. Bob. Bob Featherstone, he was a very reserved sort of a person. He didn’t smoke. He didn’t drink. I remember being in the mess one time and I said, ‘Would you like a drink Bob?’ He said, ‘Yes,’ and I said, ‘What would you like?’ He said, ‘A glass of milk.’ And I got him a glass of milk. [laughs] but the rest of the crew were, me being from Barton on Humber I didn’t spend much spare time other than Barton on Humber like according to what the Germans told me the aerodrome was eighteen kilometres northeast of Lincoln. I didn’t know that.
BW: That’s right. That’s absolutely right.
SB: They like, we used to get before flight we used to have a briefing all the crews all together and we used to get lectured and what have you and one of the things was, ‘Now if you have the misfortune to be shot down and captured during your interrogation a little old fellow will come and he’s a member of the International Red Cross. He isn’t.’ And lo and behold I think it was in Frankfurt where this interrogation camp was and lo and behold eventually this little old chap came and he said, ‘I’m from the International Red Cross,’ and I said, ‘Don’t kid me.’ I said, ‘You’re not. I got that told that before I left England.’ ‘Oh. Oh.’ And that finished that and he give up trying to convince me he was the International Red Cross fella.
BW: So coming back just to Wickenby itself you were quite a mixed crew as you say two Canadians and three Australians and two British.
SB: Yeah.
BW: But you didn’t mix a lot on the base. You said you went back to Barton on Humber quite a bit.
SB: Well I -
BW: Is that right? To see your family.
SB: They used to be workmen and there was a workman’s bus went from Wickenby to Barton upon Humber which was rather convenient when, when I was available.
BW: And so you spent your free time mainly at home.
SB: More or less. Yeah.
BW: Did you get to socialise on the base with the crew before missions or after missions
SB: No not to any degree I think. No. I remember after the war I was on a course in Tadcaster and I found out my engineer’s telephone number was and I rang him and I said, ‘Hello Harry.’ I said, ‘This is Steve. I’d like to ask you and your wife to lunch with me. I’m at John Smith’s.’ ‘Oh. Oh well, well I’m helping my son to do some decorating.’ I thought oh. So I didn’t hear any more of it.
BW: But you still had to fly together in the -
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: In the aircraft.
SB: Oh yes. Oh yeah well I mean you don’t fly together. I mean, I was very remote on top of it. Robbie was remote at the tail of it and the others were at the front.
BW: So -
SB: We were two isolated persons other than RT.
BW: So your position in the Lancaster was a mid upper then was it?
SB: Yeah.
BW: I see,
SB: Three hundred and sixty degrees viewing. In actual fact I was walking, I’d been cleaning my guns and I’m walking along the aerodrome and I saw a fella on top of a Lancaster and I thought, ‘What the bloody hell is he doing?’ So I give a shout and I said, ‘What the hell are you doing up there?’ ‘I’m cleaning guns.’ I said, ‘You what?’ He said, ‘I’m cleaning my guns.’ I said, ‘Hold it. Hold it’ I said, ‘Stay where you are,’ and I went in the plane and through the main there was a cover some, behind the turret or front of the turret I don’t know which it was and he didn’t know you could rotate your guns manually and always park them over the tail and he was trying to climb over the bloody turret to clean his guns and he was a commissioned air gunner. He was a pilot officer. I couldn’t, I couldn’t believe a pilot officer didn’t even know how to rotate the bloody turret and was going to climb over it. I mean if he’d fallen off I mean it’s quite high up is a turret gun when it’s on the deck. Aye a pilot officer. How the hell he became a [governor/gunner?] I don’t know.
Other: [You’ve only told this to protect the innocent?]
SB: Oh yes it, another incident I might recall was, I don’t know why we were on [Denham?] Golf Course and we were intermingled with the army on dive bombing. This was not flying and there were, what was the popular twin engine plane? I forget. Anyway, they were dive bombing and this plane’s coming down and there’s four people walking across the aerodrome. They should not have been there and as the plane took off knocked a fellas head off.
BW: Wow.
SB: There was just a red flash and he was gone.
Other: I didn’t know they got that close to the ground.
SB: And as far as I can remember it was Sir Christopher de Bath. I think that was his name but he shouldn’t have been where he was. They just let the pilot fly a bit and then they brought him back and he was ok but that was not in my agenda as a -
BW: No.
SB: As a gunner. I mean we all gunners were all trained on the same things. Turrets and guns and that’s it.
Other: What was the golf course?
SB: Hmm?
Other: Was the golf course, did the golf course go across the aerodrome or something?
SB: No. I don’t, no. No. I don’t know during the war I don’t know if it was permissible the golf course no it was -
Other: [It was…?]
SB: They were using the golf course obviously for, to be a plane without any obstruction. No buildings or anything.
Other: Oh I see. He was probably looking for his ball.
SB: But I do remember that fella getting his head knocked off.
Other: Oh God. I didn’t realise they flew that close to the ground.
BW: So you’re on operations now at Wickenby and what sort of routine would you follow for missions? What sort of preparations would you make for a mission if you were on roster to -
SB: Well obviously -
BW: Conduct a raid?
SB: We had to look to our guns to start with. Then we all who were flying collected together for a briefing on where we were going, what height we were flying, what we expected to come across. Other than that we just clambered into the aircraft and away but it was very boring I should think just sitting there and not many, I mean, I never fired my guns in anger and neither did Robbie and as I say it was rather boring sitting there and no, no fighter aircraft or anything.
Other: Not much fun.
SB: Like Ruhr Valley. Well that was rather lively anti-aircraft gun and Berlin when we crashed and whatever the hell happened to us I don’t know. That was different. I can’t remember much anti-aircraft so whether there was flying, planes flying, fighters I don’t know but according to information I got from someone in Lincoln there was also another three -
Other: Oh yes.
SB: Lancasters went with no survivors.
Other: Yeah that’s right.
SB: So whether it was because of that I didn’t recognise any anti-aircraft fire and they were shot down by aircraft I don’t I don’t know but we were fortunate we were straight down and very, I only met Bob Featherstone, I only met him for a few minutes because we were separated. We were stripped naked and separated, put into different, separate cells and he said, ‘We just touched over five hundred mile an hour, Steve. In a Lancaster bomber.’ And I remember I sat there and I thought, ‘Bloody hell this is it.’ And nothing I could do. I just sat there. Initially I thought he’d put the nose down to get out and home but it wasn’t. They pulled the plane out of this dive and I thought I was going to go straight through the ruddy bottom with the pressure and and that’s what Bob said. He said we reached over five hundred mile and hour and then after we pulled out we seemed to be flying straight and level and Bob came on the RT, ‘Bale out. Bale out.’ So I said, ‘Just a minute, Bob.’ He said, ‘What’s that.’ I said, ‘Can’t we reach Sweden?’ ‘No.’ ‘Oh that’s just too bad then,’ and we, course getting in and out of a mid-upper wasn’t very easy and by the time I got to the back door Robbie, the rear gunner at that time, he was sat on the doorstep. The door had gone. He’d got an axe to it and opened it with an axe and he was sat there and as I got there he climbed back in and I said, ‘What’s to do Robbie?’ ‘I can’t get out.’ And I said, ‘Have another try.’ I thought I had to do something here and he got back sitting on the doorstep and I gave him a bit of encouragement and he went. But I sat on the doorstep and I rolled out and I didn’t find any problems whatsoever. Why, whether he’d lost his nerve or what I don’t know.
Other: He probably didn’t fancy landing in Germany.
BW: And you don’t recall how the aircraft was hit.
SB: No I don’t know whether it was hit-
BW: Whether it was fighters or flak.
SB: Gun whether it had been hit with a fighter or anti-aircraft I’ve no idea whatever. All I know is the plane crashed. I know it crashed because I saw the ruddy thing crash. I was hanging about up there. And but I’ve no idea and I’ve only heard that our plane crashed. I’ve no idea why it crashed or what caused it to crash but -
BW: And do you recall this was on your fourth sortie. There were two previous trips to Essen and one to Berlin. This was a second trip to Berlin.
SB: Ahum.
BW: And it seems this was the last time that the squadron visited Berlin through the rest of their tour but do you recall what it was like on the approach to the target. You say as a mid- upper you had a good view. Were you looking around -
SB: No problems whatsoever.
BW: For fighters? Could you see the target ahead?
SB: As we, I don’t know which it, whether it was so but you’re talking about the target. Towards the end of, or when I was flying the Mosquitos came into action and the Mosquitos used to drop flares and we used to bomb the flares but the Mosquitos used to pick the target, drop these flares and we’d bomb on the flares.
BW: You didn’t see much of Berlin at this stage below. Sometimes crews report seeing targets on fire or explosions on the ground.
SB: No. No. I can’t recollect seeing anything. No. I mean as we were approaching targets Bob used to corkscrew to upset the ground crews and that sort of thing.
BW: And were you picked out by searchlights at all?
SB: Only once. We got searchlight and went straight, Bob went straight down it and pulled out. Other than that we weren’t bothered with searchlights. Not like the pilots are today. Have you read in the papers about this -
Other: Laser.
SB: Oh dear.
BW: Yeah ridiculous isn’t it? Do you, do you recall the earlier trips at all over Essen?
SB: No. I mean I remember one time we were on low level practice and old Bell , Squadron Leader Bell got in touch with, ‘Mr Featherstone. You’re on low level not a bloody altitude.’ Well that upset Bob and of course I can see all this. We went down, we went down and we went down and there was as I say there was workmen on the Wickenby and there was a steamroller there and our, the people on that steam roller had never moved so bloody fast [laughs] when Bob went down and they must have thought he was going to hit it. I did as well. [laughs]
BW: And in general how did you find it? Flying in a Lancaster?
Other: [What did you call it?]
SB: It was what I’d always wanted. I mean going like a cross country over this country, Ireland very nice oh very oh yes very exciting. Not exciting. No. It wasn’t exciting but it was what I always had wanted.
Other: Cold.
SB: Oh we had four pairs of gloves on. A pair of silk, a pair of woollen, gauntlets and electric and we’d an electric waistcoat and electric slippers. Course at the back of the plane there was no heating whatsoever. Forty degrees wasn’t abnormal. You couldn’t touch your guns with bare hands or you just stuck to them. Oh it was very cold but [I had?] my fun here. I enjoyed it.
BW: And did you take hot drinks with you or anything like that?
SB: Pardon?
BW: Did you take hot drinks with you during the flights to keep warm?
SB: All we got flying was chewing gum and a small can of orange juice. A small can of orange juice by ten thousand feet was solid ice so were not much help really. Oh no it’s, I mean, I couldn’t move anyway. I mean I was just stuck in a turret on the top of the ruddy plane and that was it.
BW: Up there in the cold.
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: And this time of the year is the end of ‘42 and the squadron only became operational on the 27th of December so your early trips were in January ‘43 so it would be particularly -
SB: New.
BW: Cold at that time.
SB: It was cold. Damned cold. Oh yeah.
BW: It was cold at the best of times.
SB: In actual fact –
BW: At altitude.
SB: I landed in a field with several inches of snow and of course being in air force dark, darkish coloured I’m burying my chute and I looked up and there’s two fellas there. Both with guns. I suppose they were kind of home guard and we weren’t allowed to, we were advised not to take guns because if you did like the position I’d been, I was in they would have shot me because they thought I had a gun but we didn’t and these two chaps took me to a house and they must have rung the police or something. Anyhow, a guy, I remember he had a brown uniform which I don’t know what that was and he interrogated me. He says, ‘What, what, how many were in your aircraft?’ I said, ‘Only me.’ ‘Oh.’ I thought he doesn’t know much about this. He says, ‘What do you mean only you? I said, ‘We jettisoned tanks on the aircraft.’ I said, ‘There was only me.’ ‘Ah gudt gudt gudt. Here you are,’ and he gave me a twenty packet of Gold Flake cigarettes. I light up and he toddles off. A few minutes later he dashes in to the room, ‘You lied to me.’ [laughs] ‘I find another man.’ Well he found seven eventually but it was funny being given Gold Flake cigarettes but I lost them of course. When he found the second man he took my cigarettes off me but it was a bit of a comic. But we went to, I think it was an air force camp and that’s when they stripped us completely, put us in separate cells and eventually they transported us down south to, I think it was Frankfurt, I’m not sure about, that to an interrogation camp. There were quite a lot of people in it. Mostly air force of course and that’s when the little chap from the International Red Cross came up but and then of course we were taken to a Stalag 8b. Because of something happening with the Canadians who raided Dieppe, something about them tying prisoners of war hands handcuffed and the Germans wanted to have reprisals but they hadn’t enough Canadians to suit their purposes so they drafted the air force. There was about three hundred of us and we were in handcuffs. They were put on. They were decent about it. They put them on in the morning and took them off at night and of course it’s amazing what people get up to. They soon found out how to manipulate the locks on them and if the guards had been decent we’d just throw them in the box. If they hadn’t they had to undo every, every one. And, and they used to be radio reports put up in the billet. In the billet I say they were proper huts. No windows in. There were windows but they’d no glass. Very little water, just a dribble. No chance of getting washed. We were dirty. We stunk. Must have done. And lousy. Me and Harry Cooper the engineer who was, there were three high bunks in this place and er and initially they’d started with boards but the prisoners found a better use for the boards which was making a fire to get a brew and as time went on we got Red Cross parcels that usually a parcel between two but they were all tied with string and we collected this string and we made nets to replace the boards on the beds. At the finish I shouldn’t think there was a bed with boards on it. Only Red Cross string. And [pause] you must excuse me I’m looking for a handkerchief. I’ve just found one. Oh yes and we used to get tenth of a loaf a day which were about that much.
BW: About an inch and a half.
SB: Aye. Identity disc was just a tenth of a loaf and some used to, you could cut it. The bread was so like a solid mass and you could cut it so ruddy thin and some of the chaps used to cut and spread it out over the day. I used to do the same but I used to eat it and hope for the best and we used to get, they used to bring a dustbin thing in occasionally and that was supposed to be soup. I remember one soup what we called bedboard soup. It just tasted like sawdust. We were hungry but nobody could eat it. The toilets were forty seaters. Four banks of ten so you could have a chat while you were [laughs] aye. Four banks of ten and during the summertime if we got Red Cross parcels they used to stab all the tins so we couldn’t save them for making escape purposes. So, if we couldn’t consume them we used to throw them over to the next compound which was the Russians and they were very grateful to a point. I remember when they decided to move us from Lamsdorf which was on the Polish border and they set off, sent us all off marching, hundreds of us. I don’t know how many was in the camp at the time but I think it was, there was twenty five thousand in and attached. Most of them were on working parties. There were, ‘cause it was an army camp. They decided that they were going to move us away from the Russians. I don’t know why. And this was in January. A little bit of snow and what not and we started marching and I remember the first stop was at a brick works and I got bedded down on some blocks of clay and we’d, we’d all got a [?] blanket and eventually the blanket became too heavy and too much of a damned nuisance but we just, we were like bloody zombies walking in the snow and very little or nothing to eat. I remember one time that we were walking along and there was a potato clamp. Are you with me? You should be.
BW: Ahum.
SB: One of the lads took a dive for the potato clamp and he was shot through his shot through his face and that’s how desperate we were. I mean sometimes we were just laid in an open field. A derelict factory. Course no bedding. No cloth. No -
BW: No provisions of any kind.
SB: We’d no washing facilities whatsoever so we never got undressed for about three months and we must have smelled a bit ripe [laughs] but it was all part of it and it was war.
BW: And this period of time would have been January ‘45 is that right? This would have been January ‘45 or thereabouts when you were marched out of the camp.
SB: ‘44 ‘45 I forget which.
Other: [It would be towards the end of the war wouldn’t it?]
SB: Like another point as I said we used to get Red Cross, Red Cross parcels. Maybe two. Occasionally and they used to stab it and we used to throw it to the Russians and of course the Russians they were marched with us on this walk and they were separated from us in so far as we were in a compound and they were in the next compound and we were in a huge marquee and on the floor was small branches off fir trees and that was it and we’d no water but the Russians had a tap and when we went to the Russians and asked for water. ‘Cigarette’ and ‘cigarettes.’ Well, they knew damn well we’d no cigarettes. We didn’t get no water. That was the gratitude for giving them the parcels.
BW: I was going to say yet you’d been throwing parcels over the wire to them.
SB: Yeah and er -
BW: And they wouldn’t let you have water.
SB: Eventually we got, the Germans left us. The guards left us. We were in a camp with nothing and me, and I got friendly with an Australian soldier and we decided to have a walk and we were walking around the countryside. We saw a house with a light in it and we went and knocked on the door and there were a lot of mumbling and grumbling and I said, ‘What’s to do, Joe?’ He says, ‘I don’t know.’ Anyhow, Joe could speak French. He started talking in French. Eventually we got in this house. There was eight Madagascans and they’d got a set boiler, you know, a boiler with a fire underneath it full of meat and they give us as much as we wanted but nothing else but meat. No bread, no veg, no, just meat but by heck that meat was good and that was, I never met Joe again. The Americans came and at that point my legs were tight in my trousers. Beri beri I think they said it was and I went and found a medical, an American medical chap and he said, ‘Sorry I can’t give you anything.’ He said. ‘All I have is two or three aspirins,’ he says. ‘I’ve used everything I had.’ He says, ‘It’ll wear off eventually when you start eating.’ [laughs] And then we got in some clapped out Dakotas aeroplanes and they flew us back to Cosford which is near Wolverhampton I think.
BW: That’s right
SB: And there we were stripped again and deloused and treated like royalty. Oh yeah. They couldn’t do enough for us and then we were despatched home and then after I think I had four weeks leave and then I got sent to India and that was the end of the war for me. I I in actual fact I was in India in Delhi and I thought there’s all these bloody people getting relieved and they were conscripts. They’d completed their two years [and they would be ?]. So I got in touch with the officers and I said, ‘What’s my position?’ I said, ‘I’m an RAF volunteer reserve I suppose,’ I said. ‘I don’t know.’ ‘Oh we’ll see what we can do with you,’ and the next day I was on a train to Bombay. And there they were very obliging again, ‘Well we haven’t a place cabin-wise for you. You can go on this ship or you can wait till there’s a cabin available on another ship.’ Oh I said we’ll get the [excuse ?] let me get on it and I think it was the Scythia if I can remember right and I came back home and I, I was in a bit of a state. I’d no qualifications. I was a machinist before the war in a cycle works and I daren’t say I was a machinist or I would have been reserved occupation so I just said I’m a labourer. Anyhow, as I say I came back here and I got sent to Blackpool. I spent a lot of time in Blackpool and I met my wife. [back then?] as she was a young woman and we got married and I’d no qualifications whatsoever and of course going to Burnley it was either went to Burnley or Barton. Well, naturally I’d no, no say in the matter. It was Burton and I thought well I had to find something. I went as a coal miner. Had a few months in a coal mine and I got dermatitis and so I had to come out and my wife said, I used to see these in the paper, situations vacant and there used to be overlookers wanted. Overlookers wanted. I said to me wife, ‘What’s this overlookers?’ She said, ‘Oh you’ve no need to bother about that. You won’t be one.’ I said, ‘Its hard luck then.’ Anyhow, I took a job at just over three pound a week. Three pound a week and I thought well it’ll keep me going cash wise and I got in to the, this job three pound a week was at the end of the war and before the war the mills used to get large amount of coal on the canals but after the war it was delivered in three ton trucks and my job was wheeling it over the ruddy boiler and tipping over for the fire beater and I’m shovelling this coal one day and a fellow walking down the yard and he stopped. He said, ‘What are you doing?’ I politely told him [laughs] it was running off my nose was the sweat and ‘Aye all right.’ And he toddled off and a couple of hours later, ‘You’re wanted in the office, Steve.’ Oh I’ve got set for being rude with that fella and it was this same fella wanted to see me. He said, ‘How about coming working for me?’ ‘And who are you?’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I look after this mill. I look after four in Blackburn, one in Morecambe, outside Morecambe, Whiteland. ’ I said, ‘Right. What’s the reward?’ He said, ‘Oh you’ll be a lot better than what you are now,’ he said ‘And I’ve a van you can use,’ And I got into the textile trade then through this fellow Harry [Makenson] I’ll always remember his name. He looked after me. He made me an overlooker as they called it, was a maintenance engineer on looms and I I seemed to cotton on to it and I finished up manager of a weaving mill. I mean initially I didn’t know one end of a bloody shuttle to another and that’s how I finished. George Street Mill closed down and it’s gone now. It’s been knocked down. I retired and I’ve been retired thirty odd year.
BW: Ahum.
SB: But er no my war experiences was, this march oh that was grim was that. Oh bloody hell. I I ate raw chicken and raw rabbit what they if the people had left them, forgotten them, we didn’t forget them. Oh I think I weighed seven stone something when I and they sent me on four weeks holiday. I went back and, ‘Right. Get on the scales,’ and I did. ‘Get on the scales again.’ I did. ‘Something wrong here.’ I says, ‘What’s the matter?’ ‘You’ve put on thirty odd pound in forty eight days. What have you been doing?’ ‘Well,’ I said. ‘I must confess.’ I says, ‘I’ve been drinking Guinness.’ I said, ‘I’ve been drinking about an average of about fifteen bottles of Guinness a day. ‘
Other: Good grief.
SB: He says, ‘You what?’ I said, ‘Oh yes.’ That’s where my money went and I got back to my ten and a half stone and now I languish at twelve stone. [And you must excuse me ‘cause I must go to the toilet.]
BW: No problem.
[pause]
SB: My escaping [laughs].
BW: I was going, I was going to ask you actually -
SB: Which was rather farcical.
BW: I believe you made a number of escape attempts.
SB: I er, in actual fact I never escaped. I was always someone else. The first effort was I swapped identities with a fella. An old, well to me an old fella. He would be about forty He was a member of the Pioneer Corp which was a non-combatant unit and I swapped identities with him and eventually I got drafted to a working party on an aerodrome and our job was looking after the grounds but it didn’t work out very well. It was alleged that someone had managed to dodge the guards, got in an aeroplane, couldn’t read the ruddy things and jettisoned the petrol out of it. We were straight back to the camp. All lot of us. That was number one. I reverted back to my position in the air force and its surprising there wasn’t a lot more people doing the same as me but anyhow, eventually I got another one. I got friendly with one in the army camp and he was fed up of working. I mean they’d no option. They had to work.
BW: So you were, rather than being, let’s say, given protection because of your rank and aircrew you were actually put to work. You were in labour gangs were you?
SB: At my rank no. My rank I couldn’t go to work. I wasn’t allowed to work. The soldiers were compelled to work so the only thing we had to, well I had to do was change my identity and as I say I changed with this guy. He was a Pioneer Corp and we got drafted back to the camp because of this misdemeanour, this alleged ditching the juice from the aircraft but whether that was true or not I don’t know but that was the reason I heard and eventually I got fed up and I got this other fella. I can’t remember his name. I know we were doing some work in [Gliwice] and I decided I’d had enough and I got hidden away and the guards were a bit slop happy and I was left and I had a couple of three days and that was it. I had nothing to eat so I got picked up.
BW: So you manged to give them the slip and spend three days away.
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: Two or three days.
SB: Oh yeah. Course I used to walk at night and hide in bushes and whatever during the day and oh that was the second time I think there was a field with a kind of a basin in it full of bushes. Ideal for sleeping. Only trouble was I was prodded in the ribs and it was a fella with a rifle. He could speak, he spoke very good English. And he says, ‘Come on. Come with me.’ And he was a farmer and he took me to his house, rung the local police and he was talking and he said, ‘I’ve come from America.’ He says, ‘It’s the worse bloody days’ work I ever did. He says, ‘Coming back here’ he said, ‘But you know the feeling. It’s your country. Well come and,’ he said ‘It’s the worse bloody thing I ever did in my life.’ He says, ‘I daren’t do anything but ring the police.’ And a policeman came on a two stroke motorbike. He made me push his motorbike and he walked on and I had a night in jail and the guards came from the camp to take me back and I settled back again and then I got the urge again so I picked on a fella going as an air force man. Aye, I often remember his name. They called him Bill Major from Liverpool. Only fault was Bill got fed up with being in the bloody camp. He was so used to going out to work so he changed his identity so when I eventually, where was it oh I was at a brick works and I was there one day working and I saw a spanner and I thought bloody hell that looks like the bolts on windows. It was a little, it had been a little school where we were billeted in, on this brickwork and this spanner it fitted the nuts so I got, pulled them out one side and got out and I was a gentleman I put them back and screwed them back and the lads who I’d got friendly with they came back and they said, ‘You left us in the real bloody muck,’ he said. ‘They didn’t know how you’d escaped.’ He said, ‘How did you escape?’ I said, ‘I found a spanner and I opened the bars and I walked out.’ There again I got caught again and of course every time I got caught I used to be sentenced to solitary confinement and it was solitary. 5 o’clock in the morning, fill a pail with water, scrub your deck out, stand your bed up. The bed was a few pieces of wood with rope across but you had to stand it up so you couldn’t sit on it and if you didn’t do it in their time they just used to kick the bloody bucket over and your cell was swimming in water but we put up with it. And there was one fella there one time I was in solitary and the padre used to come every day to see him. He was a New Zealander and it seems he’d been on a working party and he’d seen a chain on the ground and so he just picked it up and threw it into a machine and it was dodgy whether he was going to be shot or not and this padre used to come every day to see him and after the war I saw his photograph in the paper. He’d been awarded the BME is it?
BW: Um could be MBE.
SB: MBE aye. And so obviously he didn’t get shot and he got back home. Oh yeah. Aye. But I’m surprised there wasn’t a lot more of them swapping identities with soldiers who, well some of them had done four years. I’d a brother. My brother, he was a marine. He was taken prisoner on, [pause] where?
Other: Crete.
SB: Island.
Other: Crete.
SB: Crete. Oh Crete aye and one time I’m in in solitary and they used to take us out. Geneva Conventions again. They used to take us out and we used to walk around in a little circle. We had to get this exercise in and one day one, the fella said, ‘How long have you been here?’ I said, ‘I’m just doing fourteen days.’ ‘Well how did you get from Crete er from Germany er Italy?’ I said, ‘What you are talking about?’ He says, ‘Haven’t you just left Italy?’ I said, ‘No.’ I said, ‘Were you a marine?’ He said, ‘Yes.’ I said, ‘That’s my brother.’ What happened he’d met my brother in Italy. But no there was some comical things happened. Oh yeah. Oh aye.
Other: [Not?] very comical.
BW: But you didn’t have to have your escape attempts approved as might be the case with others in some camps. You acted on your own initiative to try and escape.
SB: Oh I just went. I just went. Oh I wouldn’t. No. No I knew I couldn’t go anywhere because I couldn’t speak German but I thought well I’ve got to do something and as I say it became something of a, like I changed the third one Bill Major who got fed up of being in the camp because he’d always been used to working so he swapped identities with another fella so when I got back I had to find out who Steve Bacon was. [laughs] Quite funny really but oh no they -
BW: How were you picked up each time? I know you mentioned a farmer found you sleeping under a bush at one point. How were you picked up other times? Were you, when you were out of the camp were you not afraid of being picked up by the army or handed over to the Gestapo or something like that?
SB: I can’t remember to be quite honest. I’m just trying to think. I had that farmer and then we were sent back because of someone ditching the ruddy petrol out the aeroplane and then the third time I went Bill Major, Bill Major, Bill Major. I can’t remember how I got caught that time but I got caught and that time it was a bit of a nuisance. I got caught and of course I got sentenced to fourteen days, well it was twenty one days then. It had gone up. But I had to go to a straflager which was a part of the camp reserved for potential what not, isolation and in there, there were mostly soldiers messing about there because of the women and I remember one chap he was, he had to go to civilian court and he went and he came back and he said, ‘Right.’ He said, ‘Right, here you are.’ He’d taken all the lightbulbs out the ruddy waiting room of the court he’d been to. Oh there was some humorous ruddy things. Oh yeah aye oh aye but as I say I never escaped because I was never me. I was this Pioneer Corp chap. I belonged, I belonged the Pioneer Corp and I was a gunner and then I was an ordinary soldier with Bill Major and I’m talking I got back I’d done my solitary and I got back to the camp and back to the air force compound and I’m walking around one day. ‘How are you going on mate?’ I looked around, ‘I’m alright. Why?’ ‘You don’t know me do you?’ No it’s surprising what they got up to. I said, ‘No. I don’t know you.’ And he said, ‘I was in straflager with you,’ he said, ‘But I’ve escaped.’ He’d escaped into the camp. [laughs] what happened to him I don’t know but they used to get up to all sorts of ruddy tricks. They used to put this radio bulletin up every morning and of course the Germans, ‘They must have a radio.’ They cleared all everybody out. The camp was on a moor, moorland in actual fact as I previously said with a forty seater toilet where they used to pump it out and they used to spread it around the camp to stop digging tunnels and what not and, what was I going to say? I’ve forgotten. But they emptied the camp completely. They’d dogs in and all sorts in looking for the radios that wasn’t there but we had bitterly cold on this moor but we, we did it and, oh aye. And another time they used to, we used to have roll calls of course in fives and one day we were out nearly eight hours. They couldn’t figure out how we’d missed, they’d missed somebody and every time they went five, ten, fifteen. There were three hundred of us and somebody had bent down to tie, reckon to tie their shoelace. One missing. And they’d go again and they’d get it right. That’s right. And they were so bloody stupid. That’s right. Aye aye. ‘We’d better have another check,’ and so they’d check again and somebody had bent down and it would be the same again. One missing. And they’d dogs and they’d officers of all bloody sorts in the camp that day in our compound and they never found the one who was missing but it was our discomfort but we used to put up with it and that was it. It was part of the gang kind of thing but as I say I never escaped because I as never me.
BW: What were relations like with the guards? If people are managing to build rudimentary radio sets they must get the components from somewhere. What were relations like with the guards? Did you, were you able to bribe them or -
SB: Oh, no. They, they -
BW: Persuade them to do things for you?
SB: They didn’t like it. No, no. I know there was one, I did see one fella shot. He was being marched through the camp, past our compound with a guard, a guard with a rifle and all of a sudden he had his coat over his arm and he just threw it over the guard’s head and galloped. He didn’t gallop fast enough. They shot him. They shot him and he was dead. Aye.
BW: Just coming back to, I’m interested in the point where you talked about getting out of the aircraft and you took to your parachute. How were you then picked up? You landed in a field of snow and then -
SB: Picked up with two, two like home guard. I don’t know -
BW: Ok.
SB: They’d guns. That’s all I know and they took us to a house and there was a young boy in this house in actual fact and I had my escape kit with me. I thought, well there was chocolate in it. He wouldn’t eat it. He wouldn’t touch it. No. We had an escape kit. The chocolate and vitamin tablets and what have you and money but not German money. I don’t know. I think it was franks. I don’t know but -
Other: I think you thought it was the home guard didn’t you?
BW: And so they reported to the police that they’d picked you up and presumably the police came for you.
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: What, were you taken to a civilian jail? Or were you -
SB: Oh yes.
BW: Passed to the Gestapo? Or were you -
SB: Oh yes I had a night in the jail and the guards came from the camp, a couple of guards take me back. Kept them occupied. But oh no it had its humorous side.
BW: And news of your aircraft being lost must have reached home. There’s a letter here which is a reply from the wing commander at 12 squadron to your mum, ‘In response to your letter.’ She was asking about getting your personal effects sent back. When you got back to your family do you recall what had happened from their point of view? Were they told by the squadron you’d been lost? Did they know you were in a prison camp or what was their take on events?
SB: Well they initially telegram.
Other: Yeah that’s the other one Brian. That’s the telegram from to say he was missing in action or something.
SB: Your son is reported missing and then another one was something about Lord Haw Haw. You wouldn’t know that would you?
BW: William Joyce yeah.
SB: William Joyce, yeah. He broadcast my name as a prisoner of war and they sent my mother another telegram stating that take it with a pinch of salt.
BW: Yeah there’s an official telegram here that says, ‘Regret to inform you that your son Sergeant Stephen Granville Bacon is missing as a result of air operation 17th, 18th Jan 1943. Letter follows. Any further information will be immediately communicated to you. And that’s from, that would be air ministry I think but it’s, it’s er named from, I think Wickenby but so they’ve been informed by telegram. How, how did you end up on Haw Haw’s broadcast? Was this a regular thing to name POWs? Or was it -
SB: I’ve no idea. I haven’t a clue. I didn’t know until after I got back.
BW: Yeah.
SB: That it had happened.
Other: Yeah. I think they’d already had a memorial service for him in the [Barton?] church I believe.
SB: Oh aye. It was a long after the war I, my nephew sent me a paper cutting and it was from the local paper, Hull Times I think it was. And there was a list of names, ‘Would anyone who knew these people get in touch with us.’ They’re all, these people who had been killed during the war and Stephen Granville Bacon was one of them. I’m still here [laughs]
BW: Well it’s like when you were in the prison camp. You didn’t escape. That was somebody else. Somebody else was killed, it wasn’t you.
SB: Yeah it was. I was amazed when I got that paper cutting. I think I have it somewhere.
Other: That’s quite recent isn’t it?
SB: Yeah.
Other: Yeah.
SB: Aye.
Other: Yeah.
SB: Anyone know anything about these people who were killed during the war.
Other: Well I think it was something like -
SB: I knew a lot about him [laughs]
Other: Something like six months or so after that initial letter and Lord Haw Haw and his mother had to go around the village then apologising to everybody for -
BW: Right.
SB: Oh aye. Well er -
Other: Having a service for him.
SB: Like what was it now?
Other: I don’t know if she was more embarrassed [?] or what [laughs]
SB: Oh it was old Tom Everett. He was one of our neighbours. He must have been listening to Haw Haw and he heard this and of course he dashed out and went out to my mother’s, knocked on the door, ‘Your Steve’s a prisoner of war.’ [laughs] It must have been a shock for the old lady but aye that was Tom Everett.
BW: So you, just coming back to the point when you’re first captured were you in, did you meet up with the other members of the crew. Were you fairly close together when you were picked up? Or, I mean, was there any chance of escaping? Or making your own -
SB: We were all picked up at separate times.
BW: Right.
SB: And they must have got in touch with these, this I’m sure it was an air force camp that we were taken to where they stripped us and I mean they were looking for compasses and such like things and compasses used to be all over the ruddy place. I had it in the lapel of my coat. Bob Featherstone, I know he had one in his pipe. He didn’t smoke but he had a compass in the bottom if this pipe but the Germans knew all, all these things. They knew where to look. When we got our clothes back they were torn where they’d looked in the seams and what have you but oh no it’s surprising how much they knew about us as we knew about them aye.
BW: And you were handed over from civilian police straight to the camp. So there was, was there any formal interrogation that took place?
SB: No, not at that point. No, no, it was, as I say I think it was Frankfurt this camp we went to which was just an interrogation centre and it was very populated but they used to be in separate cells and they’d turn the heat up, heat up on us in the cell and it used to get bloody hot and then they’d switch it off altogether and it would just go just the opposite just to cool, just to loosen you off a bit. Aye. Oh aye.
BW: How long were in the interrogation camp at Frankfurt?
SB: I’ve no idea.
BW: Roughly.
SB: Eventually we were put on a train with no shoes. Nobody had any shoes on and we were taken to Lamsdorf on the Polish border. I remember the train it was it was luxury I mean there were seats in it but they were wooden seats but er and that’s how I got to Lamsdorf by train.
BW: Were there guards on the train?
SB: Oh yes. Oh aye. Aye, there were plenty of guards on the train and of course when you’ve no shoes it’s a big handicap.
BW: Did you get your shoes back or any shoes when you got to Lamsdorf?
SB: Any shoes, clogs, all sorts, wooden clogs. Not, not like what we used to wear. Not the proper clogs, wooden clogs. Most bloody uncomfortable.
BW: Lamsdorf had a reputation for being a tough camp. It was apparently notorious for poor conditions of construction, sanitation and overcrowding and had the highest number of British POWs there by the time of 1944 but you mentioned the sanitation conditions. Were the barracks that you were kept in were they, were they overcrowded at all or did you feel like you had enough room?
SB: Well I suppose we were overcrowded but it was all three tier, three tier bunk things and sanitation oh we’d, we’d as I say we had this forty seater, four banks of ten which used to be pumped out regularly and spread around the area to give it a bit -
Other: Pleasant.
SB: Of perfume but other than that there was no bathing facilities whatsoever. Oh no. As I say we were, we were lousy. Me and Harry, our engineer, I got friendly with him and we used to put out a blanket each and we used to have a bit of a line and we used to go and we used to stop at forty bugs.
Other: [?]
SB: I remember my mother must have had a brainstorm. She sent me a pair of pyjamas. Now, how the hell I got them I don’t know but I put them on and on the first night I’d, or the first morning when I took them off they were just polka dotted where I’d been bitten. I didn’t use them anymore. Oh no the sanitation was nil other than toilets but there was no, no shower. We’d a big trough thing with a pipe on top and water used to dribble out of it but you couldn’t have a wash. No.
BW: I’d just like to show you some pictures of a camp and just see if you think they reflect conditions or construction similar. The first, the first set show open type huts if you like. Purpose built long barracks and these aren’t the same camp as yours but do they -
Other: I think we took some pictures. There’s some stuff on the internet somewhere cause my son typed in Stalag 8b one day and came up with, oh and he instantly recognised the latrines I think. ‘Oh I remember that.’
BW: Yeah.
SB: I can’t recognise these at all. What is it?
BW: They’re, it’s a different camp but -
SB: Ah. Oh no.
BW: It’s -
SB: Totally different. That’s more like -
BW: It’s shown close to a town.
SB: I was going to say that’s more like ours. They were -
BW: Yeah.
SB: Proper barracks.
BW: Yeah.
SB: But they’d no windows ‘cause I suppose the previous tenants had bashed the bloody things out. Oh no. That, that is Stalag 8b of course. I mean, Bob -
BW: Were you -
SB: Bob Featherstone, our pilot, I mean we never saw him. He was a commissioned officer. He went to an Offlag.
BW: Ahum
Other: [?]
SB: So we didn’t see Bob again until, well I did see him again after the war. He was a, he was on the immigration situation going to Australia. Persuading people to go to Australia and persuaded me but my wife said no and that was it. Oh yes. Oh aye
BW: Were you close to a town or was, you said Lamsdorf was up on a moor.
SB: Oh it was isolated.
BW: Were you in reach of a town or just -
SB: Oh no, no it was -
BW: Middle of the country.
SB: Completely isolated. There was, what it doesn’t indicate there used to be turrets on stilts kind of thing on each corner of the camp.
BW: Similar to that.
SB: Oh there we are. Yes. There we are.
BW: These are pictures of guard towers and –
SB: Oh aye
BW: Barbed wire.
SB: And there used to be barbed wire and about six or ten feet from the barbed wire there used to be a single wire and if you went past that you were asking for trouble from that.
BW: You would be shot presumably.
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: It was like, like a trip wire I guess. And so there was plenty of barbed wire on the outer fences shown there. Were there two or three layers of barbed wire?
SB: Oh it was a fair depth of barbed wire. Oh yes. I never fancied this tunnelling business. Oh no. That didn’t appeal to me at all. I took it that changing identities was a lot easier.
BW: What put you off digging?
SB: Hmmn?
BW: What put you off digging or tunnelling?
SB: Well a bit claustrophobic I should think. And that Dulag Luft that’s an air force camp.
BW: Ahum.
SB: Well they didn’t have the opportunities like we had for swapping identities with soldiers going out to work because they were all senior NCOs and they weren’t allowed to go to work so they had an advantage but it was a disadvantage as well.
BW: It’s interesting that you took the opportunity to join a working party and go outside the camp. Was it the opportunity to get away from the camp a little bit that appealed or was it the idea of just having something to do?
SB: I think it was something to do. As I say I’d no ambitions about escaping completely because I couldn’t speak ruddy German and it was keeping the Germans occupied as well as anything else but er -
Other: If it’s alright I’m going to leave you to it.
BW: Do you want to, sorry?
SB: A grand lad. He looks after me with bills and -
BW: Yeah.
SB: He explains what, my heating, I haven’t a clue about it. I just had him on it this morning. He used to be in charge of a soft drinks factory and he used to drink like a fish but not soft drinks. It used to be beer.
BW: And this was your dad who was in charge. So, and that would, he would have died only shortly after you joined up then, presumably.
SB: In actual fact I didn’t get my first leave and I got a telegram to say he was dangerously ill and so I put an application in and I got a weekend and I always remember I was in, where was I? Duxford. And I went to see the station warrant officer and explained to him and he just calmly said, ‘And how many times is this your father’s died?’ I said, ‘As far as I know it’s only the first time.’ And I had a fortnight, a weekend, and he died before I got there. And when I went back I made an appointment to see the station warrant officer, ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘Now then. What can I do for you?’ I said, ‘You can’t do anything for me.’ I said, ‘I’m going to give you some information.’ He said, ‘What’s that? I said, ‘My father died for the first bloody time,’ I said, ‘And you remember what your remarks you made.’ He didn’t say anything. Oh aye. I had a brother in the navy for twenty years. One of my brothers was on mine sweepers. One of my brothers was a fireman and the other one, who was taken prisoner on Crete, he was a steeplejack and that’s the thing I can’t stand is bloody heights.
BW: And yet there you were in the mid upper position on a Lancaster.
SB: Oh that didn’t seem not the same feeling. I don’t know. It’s something different. I mean I had no qualms about jumping out. Well you don’t jump out. Well I didn’t. I rolled out but I never thought about it but Stan, my brother, who was a steeplejack I was talking to one of his workmen and they said, ‘Well he’s a bit of a son of a bitch.’ I said, ‘Is he?’ Hey said, ‘Yeah but there’s one thing about him. He wouldn’t ask you to so anything he wouldn’t do.’ But I said, ‘He’s different to me. I would be scared to bloody death.’ Oh yes. He died. Stanley died. He wasn’t ill. In fact Stuart came and knocked at my door. I answered it. ‘Yes Stuart. What’s the matter then?’ He says, ‘Stan’s died’. I said, ‘You what?’ He said, ‘Stan’s died.’ ‘My brother?’ he said, ‘Yeah.’ He was three years older than me and we used to fight like bloody hell as kids. I remember oh aye. He used to collect birds eggs. And I, and the brother in the navy he brought us a football and a pair of football boots each and of course we used to fight like hell who was going to have the ball. Is it your gang or is it mine? And he used to keep his eggs I think with a bowl on top in the bedroom and he, we’d had an argument about who was going to have the ball and I thought, ‘Right.’ So I went and took the drawer out and boom boom boom broke all of his eggs up and we used to have gangs of us and if they thought about it they’d just get us upset and say, ‘Who broke Stanley’s eggs?’ [laughs] And we, in those days we used to make our own enjoyment. I mean we had a three valve tel, three valve radio but for that we’d no nothing and we used to split up a couple of gangs and, Fox and Hounds and we’d have limits of where we could go. We’d go hide in trees and all. It was a totally different world to now. We never used to be in the house. No. And if we were, if I went home with my shoes wet. [Boing.] So I used to, I used to have socks on of course so I’d rub my bloody shoes up my socks so I wouldn’t get that bloody slap back from my mother. My father never touched us but my mother made up for it. Oh aye. Those were the days oh yes. And as I say I was, I was starting work at fourteen because well the money was seven and six a week then.
BW: And so you were working from the age of about fourteen when you left school up until the point, as you say you joined the RAF and you were a machinist at that point.
SB: Yeah. Like I, Elswick Hopper Cycle Works and I used to be in the machine shop. I was foreman’s stooge I think. The stooge was a fella called Tup Franklin and he said, ‘You’ve no need to mess about with turning Steve. Just do whatever wants doing. Put belts on and sharpen tools,’ and he says ‘Just sharpen drills’ he says and I got on very well with him and not being tied to a bench or anything like that it was just the job I wanted. And er -
BW: And then when war broke out you say you felt -
SB: Oh well.
BW: It was your duty to join up.
SB: Oh me and a fella called Donald Cook who was a pal of mine we were sat on, there used to be a drain goes past our houses and into the country and there used to be a [form sitting ?] where the road went over it and we were sitting one day and I said to Donald Cook, I said, ‘Right, Don. I’m going to join up.’ He said, ‘Right, Steve. I’ll join up with you.’ So we got on the train and the ferry. I think it was six pence and we joined up in Kingston upon Hull. Aye the old paddle steamer and the bar, of course we weren’t old enough really for drinking we didn’t drink but the bar opened up as soon as they cast the ropes off the pier. The bar opened and it used to close as soon as it got to the other side. Twenty, twenty minutes normally but as I was reading somewhere, I don’t know where, something about the estuary the Humber being very dangerous. Sandbanks. And I remember the sandbanks. If you got the ferry at low tide oh it’d take ages to get back. Only a, you could spit across nearly from Hull to New Holland and I had a friend, Noel, Noel Stamp. He was a shop assistant in Hull and the times he used to be late coming home. Two or three hours oh aye oh yeah but were no worse for it. We, we did very well. All my family did fair. As I say I met my wife in Blackpool. She was on a fortnight’s holiday when there used to be wakes weeks and Burnley used to have a fortnight followed immediately by Blackburn and there were her and a couple of cousins and I’m stood outside a pub waiting for it to open. A shortage of beer at that time and I got talking to a sergeant and an Irishman, a soldier, in, while I were in the queue and when the pub opened we dashed in and we got sat at the same table as three young ladies. One of them of course happened to be my wife. And she died though. She’s been dead forty odd years. A grand lass but it had to be, but it’s funny how things work out. I mean no one would have expected me to be finish up a manager of a ruddy weaving mill. I couldn’t, I never, I was never a weaver but I had to be a weaver to be an overlooker but Harry [Makenson], this guy who stopped and asked me what I was doing when I was shovelling bloody coal, he, he put me in to be an apprentice overlooker in [Burnley] and my wife was correct. They turned me down. I wasn’t local. My family didn’t work in the mills or anything like that so as my wife forecast they turned me down. So I saw old [Makenson] and I said, ‘Oh Harry I got turned down.’ He said, ‘Yeah, I know. Don’t worry about it. Come to Blackburn.’ He said, ‘I’ll get you in.’ I went to Blackburn. I went to the front of the committee and oh yes, oh yes and I was in and I was an apprentice. Harry [Makenson], he looked after me. He was a bit crude at times. I was his apprentice overlooker which I’d never been a weaver yet. Totally foreign to me and he said, ‘Right, Steve,’ he says, ‘Them boxes there.’ He says, ‘There’s machines in them, I want them running.’ He says, ‘You’ve got a bricklayer there to do anything you want him to.’ I opened these boxes and they were automatic [widening?] frames in them and with faults and mistakes I got them all running. He said, ‘Right, you’re coming up to [Longsham?] Mill.’ He said, ‘You’re going to be an overlooker.’ I said, ‘At last?’ He says, ‘Yeah.’ I was there about six months and I got called into the office and me and a fellow called Jack Sowerby, he was in the same position as me and Harry [Makenson’s] there. He says, ‘Now then,’ he says, ‘I know what I’m doing.’ He said, ‘I’m asking,’ I forget his name, Jimmy or Harry or whatever. He says, ‘I’m going to ask you do you want to go down to Highfield Mill and it’s shift work and this Harry said no. ‘Right. Steve, you’re going.’ [laughs] I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ He says, ‘You’re going to be an overlooker.’ I said, ‘I know I am. I’m an apprentice.’ He says, ‘You’re not. Not anymore.’ He said, ‘I’ve one finished. A foreigner.’ He said, ‘He’s finished down at Highfield Mill. You’re going there’ And they were Japanese looms and I used to spend the first few days looking to see what happened and I got on very well. I had maybe good luck and good judgement I don’t know but I was immediately an overlooker and then he opened another mill. He said, ‘I’m opening a mill Steve. You’re going to look after it.’ ‘Oh,’ I thought, ‘Christ almighty what next?’ But that mill it closed down through slump and then I came back to Burnley. I was in Blackburn for twelve years and I came back to Burnley and that’s where I still am. I don’t regret anything.
BW: No.
SB: No. I’ve had a, I’ve been a coal miner, I’ve been a ironstone miner at Stanton at Scunthorpe, I’ve been an industrial painter. I’ve, I’ve tried everything until I got settled in textiles. Aye.
BW: Interesting that you had a couple of jobs as a miner and yet when you were in the prison camp you didn’t fancy tunnelling.
SB: No.
BW: Did you ever feel claustrophobic as a miner?
SB: No but I, that, that, that totally different. A coal mine is six to eight feet high.
BW: Ahum.
SB: Other than the actual face and as they move the face along they move this passageway and rails so it was a different atmosphere. In the ironstone mine that was what they called room and pillar system and they’d go that way and go that way and leave a diamond shape to support the roof. That was the room and pillar and I was a a pipe fitter strangely enough but the, I forget, I think they called them eggs. I’m not sure only the pipes were made with a lip on and you put this adaptor in and it was airtight. It was all compressed air was the machinery fans and drills and everything and so I finished up as a pipe fitter but that was thirty foot high and it’s all, I think it’s closed now. Not, not because I left it but [laughs] it’s amazing what you can do when you have to do, oh aye.
BW: And were you aware of other tunnellers in the, in the camp? Were other activities going on like that?
SB: No. I don’t know of any. No but I did hear say that if they found any they’d, instead of pumping the toilet on the field they’d pump it into the tunnel. That would be a deterrent of course [laughs] but I never heard of any but as I say I was surprised I didn’t know any air force fella do the same as I did but I don’t know why. I mean to sit there and play bloody cards all day long there, Oh no it’s, you’ve got to get moving and of course there was always the chance of being shot I suppose. I don’t know.
BW: Some of the other activities here that went on in some of the other camps I’ll just show you were there similar things going on in other in Lamsdorf at all or not. They show a meal at one Christmas and they show a sports team -
SB: Oh yes.
BW: And amateur dramatics.
SB: There was. Oh we’d ladies. [pause] Oh yeah. Oh yes there used to be baseball and as I say ladies. They were fellas dressed as ladies and I knew one and the last time I heard of him he’d died on the isle of Ibiza. What did he die of? Aids. He was a queer. Denholm Elliot. And the first time I I saw him after the war I was, we were in the Odean cinema in Burnley and before the programme there used to be a screen come down with adverts on and lo and behold Denny, Denny Elliot was there advertising cocoa. But it didn’t, he was, he was definitely feminine. Oh his attitude and he was one of the main actors or actresses whatever you might call them and they used get organised and they would give a concert occasionally, oh yes.
BW: Did you sense any of that with the other guys who maybe dressed up?
SB: I didn’t meet any. Denny was the only one I met. Oh no he was a nice, nice lad. Very inclined to be a bit delicate but nature’s a queer thing. I never criticised Denny. I mean he lived his own life. He was seventy odd I think when he died but he died of aids on Ibiza.
BW: And was he in, he was in the same camp as you then.
SB: Yes.
BW: At that point.
SB: Oh yes.
BW: That’s where you met him first.
SB: Aye. No, I mean, in between times I mean we used to play cards. We knew cards inside out. Bridge. Bridge was the main game of cards and I used to, we used to cheat like hell. Like not really cheating but you might, I don’t know if you know bridge at all.
BW: I don’t know the rules of bridge to be honest.
SB: Well, it’s a case you make bids. I’ll bid one club. Well I’ll be the diamond which was over a club and then bid the heart and then the spade was the top card and we’d, we used to have, we had two packs of cards and we used to use we used to get thirteen cards each if I remember right and we’d start bidding. Well me and my partner we worked it out that I’ll bid a diamond or a diamond you missed the [?] out and of course that told your partner something about we were about a real system of cheating but there was nothing at stake. I mean it was just friendly. Well to a point it was friendly. But oh no but I suppose it was a hard life.
BW: Were there opportunities for sport?
SB: Pardon?
BW: Were there opportunities for sport?
SB: Oh, no. You were, you were pinned into your own compound. They were kicking the ball about but as a team no there wasn’t ‘cause I mean it was a transit camp. Here today and gone tomorrow working parties.
BW: Did you get to see much of the commandant?
SB: No. Oh no.
BW: Did you ever see him when you were brought back to camp having tried to escape? Were you taken to him?
SB: No. I went -
BW: For punishment or -
SB: I only saw his underlings. Aye. But no it was a fixed effort. You got seven days, you got fourteen days, you got twenty one days depending on how often you went there. I got to twenty one but er -
BW: Twenty one days in solitary.
SB: Yeah and it was solitary. They, they, you could figure out you could sit somehow and get comfortable and the guards would creep down but it was a concrete floor and they had jackboots on and it used to crackle so they gave themselves away. We’d stand up then immediately we heard this crackling. Oh yeah.
BW: And what sort of size of cell were you in?
SB: Pardon?
BW: What sort of size of cell were you in in solitary? What sort of size of room were you in?
SB: Oh only a little room. A width of a bed and another bed. About that maybe.
BW: So maybe six foot across most.
SB: Yeah six or eight foot maybe. We’d a high window and we’d hear a frog [croakus?] at night. Oh aye, the frogs kept us company at night. Oh yeah.
BW: And so was the window high up. Was it open?
SB: No. No it wouldn’t open.
BW: Oh.
SB: No.
BW: But even then you could hear the frogs outside.
SB: Oh yes. oh yes there was twelve solitary confinement cells but as I say it was solitary apart from this quarter of an hour we used to have walking around this circle which was one of the Geneva Convention rules that they had to have exercise.
BW: And do you think they treated you fairly in the camp in respect of the Geneva Convention or were there things that they should have done that they didn’t or -
SB: I think they were fair in so far as it wasn’t everybody who could have white bread. It was the sick and infirm who got white bread and this brown bread that we got which soldiers got as well it was bloody awful. It was so packed it was like clay and you could cut it as thin as a newspaper but we only got a tenth of a loaf so it didn’t really trouble us a lot [laughs] Oh yes. Yeah.
BW: And you mentioned getting the Red Cross parcels. Were they regular or did you -
SB: Oh no -
BW: Sense that they had kept -
SB: Intermittent.
BW: They were intermittent. Did you sense -
SB: Now and again and as I say two to one parcel.
BW: Do you think they were keeping those parcels behind for their own good?
SB: I don’t know. I’ve no idea. No. I never give it a thought.
BW: Yeah.
SB: No. But no I can’t say we were ill-treated they just hadn’t anything to give us. I mean, as I say, white bread was very unusual. You had to be ill or something. That was for ordinary people not us prisoners of war. No. I think, like they say, the Germans prisoners of war who we took got a lot better treatment. They got better treatment ‘cause it was available.
BW: Did you feel that you were treated differently to the Russians? You say they were in the compound next to them. The Germans had quite a different view of the Russians. Do you feel that or did you get an idea that -
SB: No I -
BW: They were treated more harshly than you?
SB: I didn’t, I didn’t have any idea to compare. I’ve no idea how they treated them. I mean funnily enough I was on the, oh Ibiza and I used to go drinking and my, I was favourite in a bar run by Germans.
BW: So many years after the war you went to a bar in Ibiza that was run by Germans.
SB: Yeah. Oh yeah. I got on very well with the Germans and they got on very well with me I suppose but no it was all over and done with and hope it never happens again.
BW: And in the years following how, how has it been when you’ve seen public response to Bomber Command and the, let’s say the commemoration of them? How have you, have you seen a change over the years that people from Bomber Command have been treated?
SB: Pardon?
BW: How do you feel the veterans of Bomber Command have been treated after the war? They’re, do you feel there’s been a change in attitudes since.
SB: Well I think just a nucleus of people forgotten. It’s one of those things that happened and that was it. I mean Bob Featherstone, an Australian. I mean he came from Australia. He was a school master and then he finished as a rep for the immigration authorities persuading people to go to Australia and I’d been mean I was working in Blackburn at the time and I went home, and my wife said ‘There’s been a man to see you Steve.’ I said, ‘Who was it?’ She said, ‘I don’t know.’ I thought. ‘You’ve to go down to the Labour Exchange at 8 o’clock tonight.’ I says, ‘Why? I don’t know that I applied for any position in anywhere.’ Anyway I went down and there’s Bob Featherstone sat. ‘Come and sit at the side of me Steve.’ And he was talking to people and he was telling them the truth. He said well, the whole point is you’ll get accommodation and you’ll have to, after three months you’ll have to find your own accommodation and different things and I was talking to him afterwards and I says, ‘What about me going Bob?’ ‘Oh you can go anytime’ He said, ‘I can find you a job. I’ve two houses. I’ve one in Geelong and I’ve one in Sydney.’ He says, ‘You can one for as long as you want.’ Oh I thought, ‘Bloody good.’ Anyhow, of course he was only in Burnley for a day and he came to our house and had a meal with us and then he went of course on his travels. He said, ‘Keep in touch, Steve.’ He says, ‘You can fly or you can go by sea.’ He says, ‘Let me know.’ And I was talking to the wife and I said, ‘Alice,’ I said, ‘You’ve got to think one thing.’ I said, ‘You might never see your parents again.’ I said, ‘It’s twelve thousand mile away, ‘I said and you won’t be able to pop over at weekends.’ ‘I don’t want to go Steve.’ I said ‘Ok.’ So I rung Bob and I said, ‘Bob,’ I said ‘it’s off. The wife says no.’ I often wonder what I would have done in Australia.
BW: Yeah.
SB: And Laurie. He was, he was another Australian. He worked on the railways. And Tommy Fouracre. He died. He was the first to die I think. He were a farmer in [?] or some such ruddy place. And the Canadians I don’t know what the Canadians were. I have no idea.
BW: It’s interesting that on that raid as you said before all of you escaped from the Lancaster as it was shot down and yet the three other aircraft that were lost on the same raid over Berlin all the crews were killed.
SB: That’s amazing. I’m wondering if it was as I say I didn’t think or I couldn’t remember ackack. I wonder if the ackack was kept off and the air fighters came in. I mean -
BW: And none of the other crew in your aircraft indicated to you what had happened even when you met up with them afterwards.
SB: No. All I know the plane crashed. Whether it, what it was hit, where it was hit, if it was hit I don’t know and as I say Bob only a few minutes with us and then he was off to an Offlag so I couldn’t get to know off Bob.
BW: And were you all, I don’t recall this being mentioned before and it’s only just occurred to me were you all kept together in the same camp apart from Bob who was taken off to an Offlag were the other six of you kept together? Or did you -
SB: In Stalag 8b?
BW: Yeah.
SB: We were. Oh yes we were held together. We used to play cards with one another and we used to, but nobody wanted to do what I did. I don’t know why. We all have our own funny ways.
BW: So the other guys although they’d all been taken prisoner and all detained in the same camp didn’t try to escape like you did.
SB: No. I mean the, to get out of the camp itself was impossible because there was such a depth of barbed wire and these towers on corners with machine guns. I mean it was hopeless. So there was only one way. Changing identities with somebody who got fed up with working.
BW: And when the camp was emptied and you were walking presumably westwards at what stage were you technically liberated? I mean were you taken to another camp and held there or were you -
SB: We were, I don’t know how long we were on the march. We were like bloody zombies and we finished up in this camp. There was Frenchmen in it in actual fact. There was four Frenchmen killed by a French aeroplane who mistook the camp and and we went to this camp and as I say there was a bloody great big marquee and branches on the floor for us to sleep on and in actual fact there was a young fella younger than me he got frostbite and it had -
BW: Infected his leg.
SB: Aye. He died. He died. He was only twenty one and we were there for maybe a couple of days and then the Americans came. The Germans had gone. There was nobody in the camp only us prisoners and then as I say the old Dakota came along and took us to Cosford and -
BW: And then you were back in this country.
SB: Yep. I was back to work. [laughs] Aye. I enjoyed being in India. I was in Bombay. I was in Madras and I was in Delhi and of course being a warrant officer I had a bit of a [sway?] and some of the lads they all, they always called me Red. I had red hair. If anybody was around it was sir but otherwise it was, ‘Hey Red, just a minute.’ ‘Oh Red. How about getting us on to the race, Guindi racecourse.’ I said, ‘I’ll see what I can do.’ And I’d get the big, I forget what they called them, bloody thing, the big van thing with windows and we’d go to the races at the weekend. Oh aye. It was useful being a warrant officer [laughs].
BW: Rank has its privileges.
SB: Oh yes. And like if I put my raincoat on and the cap badge or the same as officers and they’d salute me and I’d salute them back the silly buggers. I remember going, going to, oh I was going from Blackpool to Barton. I changed, I was travelling by coach and I changed coach at Leeds and as I got on the coach, ‘Oh very good. Right. Ok now.’ They’d been waiting for an air force officer and mistook me for him and the ruddy coach had been waiting for this fellow and it was convenient. It took me to Hull.
BW: Very good. I think that is all the questions I have for you. So -
SB: Well it is nice talking about it again.
BW: Thank you very much for your time. Thank you very much. It’s been great talking to you.
SB: It was an experience.
BW: It was a good one I hope. It was for me.
SB: Oh yeah.
BW: So thank you very much for your time Mr Bacon. Thank you.
SB: It’s been a pleasure.
Dublin Core
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Identifier
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ABaconSG160216
Title
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Interview with Stephen Granville Bacon
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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IBCC Digital Archive
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Sound
Language
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eng
Format
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02:21:47 audio recording
Creator
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Brian Wright
Date
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2016-02-16
Description
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Stephen joined the Royal Air Force in Kingston upon Hull. He wanted to be a pilot but became a mid-air gunner instead. He started at RAF Dalcross where he trained on Boulton Paul Defiant aircraft and went to 12 Squadron at Wickenby on Lancasters.
Stephen describes the preparations for missions, the cold and how the pilot would corkscrew as he approached targets. Following two trips to Essen and on his second trip to Berlin, his aircraft crashed. Another three Lancasters went down with no survivors. Upon landing in the snow he was captured by the German home guard and sent to an interrogation camp at Frankfurt. A person, claiming to be from the Red Cross tried to interview him but Stephen had been warned of this ruse and refused to answer any questions.
He and the other crew members were taken to Stalag VIII-B in Lamsdorf, near the Polish border. The conditions were very difficult with very little water and food. They burnt bed boards from their three-tier bunks to make tea and replaced them with string from Red Cross food parcels. The sanitary conditions were poor. Stephen, however, felt they were treated fairly.
He describes in detail the deplorable conditions in the camp. During his stay he escaped three times by exchanging identities with a member of a working party but was recaptured every time and punished by solitary confinement. He knew he had little chance of escaping as he couldn't speak German but wanted to keep the Germans occupied. He discusses some of the amusing incidents which occurred and outlines the entertainment activities in the camp. Stephen’s mother was informed he was missing, and his name read out as a prisoner of war by Lord Haw-Haw [William Joyce].
In 1945, he embarked on a gruelling march to escape from the approaching Russian army, often resorting to eating raw chicken and rabbit. Eventually the guards disappeared and he was picked up and looked after by the Americans and flown back to England for medical treatment. Stephen developed beriberi, weighing only seven stone. He was flown back to RAF Cosford in a C-47. After treatment he was sent to India as there were no flying post available in England. After the war ended, he was sent home to Blackpool for demob and worked in the coal mines, as a coal handler in the mills, a maintenance engineer and finally as a mill manager.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
Poland
England--Lincolnshire
Poland--Łambinowice
Germany
Germany--Berlin
Contributor
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Julie Williams
Terry Holmes
Sally Coulter
12 Squadron
air gunner
aircrew
bale out
bombing
Defiant
Dulag Luft
escaping
military service conditions
Nissen hut
prisoner of war
RAF Dalcross
RAF Wickenby
sanitation
shot down
Stalag 8B
the long march
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/205/3340/ABatesP151009.1.mp3
f5fd2ef009e496cfc1da092a451f6c89
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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Bates, Philip
Philip Bates
P Bates
Description
An account of the resource
One oral history interview with Philip Bates (1307447 Royal Air Force). He flew operations as a flight engineer with 149 Squadron until his aircraft was shot down and he became a prisoner of war.
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
2015-10-09
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.
Identifier
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Bates, P
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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BW: This is Brian Wright interviewing Mr Philip Bates at home in Urmston, Greater Manchester on Friday 9th of October at 2pm. Mr Bates could you please confirm your full name?
PB: Yes. Phillip Bates.
BW: And your rank.
PB: Sergeant when I was shot down but warrant officer when I returned back from being a prisoner of war.
BW: Ok. And do you recall your service number at all?
PB: Yes 1307447.
BW: It’s surprising how that -
PB: And I can tell you my prisoner of war number as well
BW: Ok.
PB: 222803
BW: 222803
PB: Stalag 4b.
BW: Ok. And what squadron were you on, sir?
PB: 149 at Lakenheath.
BW: Ok. So if you could just give us an idea of what your life was like prior to joining the air force so where you grew up and any sort of significant movements before joining the RAF and what prompted you to join.
PB: Yeah. Well I’m a native of Burnley, Lancashire, a cotton weaving town, until I was employed as a junior clerk with a local manufacturer but once the war started I was keen to get in and immediately after the fall of France I volunteered for the air force. And -
BW: So this would be May 1940.
PB: This would be May 1940 and went to Blackpool for a fortnight square bashing.
BW: Ok.
PB: Those of us who were on that particular course were then posted to Cosford and -
BW: Ok.
PB: Nobody thought about anything in those days except the imminent invasion of Britain and we who’d been in the air force a fortnight were given the job of defending Cosford against German paratroopers which was the most farcical thing you could ever imagine so a friend and I very quickly sneaked away to the orderly room and volunteered for training as flight mechanics and we both -
BW: Ok.
PB: Trained as flight mechanics and then as fitter 2E’s and my friend was posted to 149 squadron where I met up with him in 1943. I went to 86 squadron, Coastal Command flying the Beaufort torpedo bombers and moved from there to Scotland and eventually I was sent to Sealand to a huge maintenance depot on a six month potential NCO course with the intention that when I returned back to my unit I’d be made a corporal but whilst I was at Sealand a Manchester landed and this was June 1942 and I went to look at this Manchester. I’d never seen anything bigger than a, than a Wellington before and this thing was stood there with its bomb doors open and this was a few months after Butch Harris had taken charge and I looked up into that bomb bay and I said to myself. ‘Bomber Command is no longer a joke. It’s big. It’s getting bigger. I’ve got to be part of it,’ and so the next day I volunteered for training as a flight engineer.
BW: Ok.
PB: And I trained early in 1943. Posted to a Heavy Conversion Unit at Waterbeach where I was crewed up with a crew who had just finished their OTU on Wellingtons and we went from there.
BW: And so just thinking back to your decision to join Bomber Command. You’d already had some technical training -
PB: Yes.
BW: At that stage.
PB: Yes.
BW: And so you wanted to further that as a flight engineer.
PB: Well the obvious job for a fitter 2E was to be, was to be a flight engineer.
BW: Ok.
PB: And it didn’t require a great deal of training to bridge the gap of course.
BW: And there were a number of guys who went through Halton. Did you do any training for flight engineering at Halton or not? With [?]
PB: No. St Athan.
BW: Right.
PB: St Athan.
BW: So you weren’t one of Trenchard’s brats or anything?
PB: Oh no I wasn’t a brat. I was too old to be a brat [laughs].
BW: And so it was the sight of the Manchester that prompted you to join.
PB: Yes.
BW: Properly Bomber Command.
PB: Yes, yes.
BW: Were you able, at that stage, to volunteer for flying duties or did that come later? Did you foresee that as being part of that trade as a flight engineer?
PB: Once I became a flight, once I became a flight engineer obviously I was going to go into Bomber Command.
BW: Ok. And -
PB: When I arrived at St Athan I was given choices I could train to be. I could train to be on Stirlings or Halifaxes or Lancasters or Sunderland Flying Boats or Catalina Flying Boats. Now, as a fitter I’d always worked on radial engines and so I chose this, I chose the Stirling for the reason that it was Bomber Command and it had radial engines. It perhaps wasn’t the wisest choice. I’d have been better off on Lancasters probably but I I I liked the radial engine so that’s why I chose Stirlings.
BW: Speaking as an engineer how did you find the radials then? Were there, were there particular properties about them that you liked?
PB: Yes. They, they, they were more powerful than the Merlin for starters and they were more dependable and they could take more, they could take more damage.
BW: That’s er that -
PB: When I when I was a boy very keen on aircraft now to me the inline liquid cooled engine was just a big motor car engine. The radial was a proper aeroplane engine.
BW: Ok.
PB: That’s what it was all about for me. The radial was a proper aeroplane engine. The other was just a big motor car engine.
BW: I’m sensing there there’s a difference between the aerial engine and flying. Did you have a wish to fly at an early age?
PB: Well as a fitter whenever I worked on an aircraft and a pilot came along to do a test flight I invariably asked if I could go up with him so I flew on, I flew on Lysanders, Blenheims and Oxfords as a passenger.
BW: And which of those was your favourite? Which was -
PB: Oh the Lysander.
BW: Really?
PB: Oh gorgeous. You’re going, you’re going along and there’s a slow, you heard a terrible creaking noise and the slots and slats worked and the flaps come down.
BW: Ahum.
PB: And you could practically stand still. Wonderful aeroplane. Wonderful.
BW: They used that -
PB: Aeroplane.
BW: On special duties -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Squadrons.
PB: Short take off, short landings.
BW: Yeah.
PB: Yeah.
BW: But they were, they were a lovely aircraft to be a passenger in.
PB: Oh yes.
BW: Was it?
PB: It was a marvellous aeroplane was the Lysander. I loved it.
BW: Did you get many flights in those?
PB: Yes quite a few. Yes. I was on, I was on an ackack calibration unit. We worked in concert with the defences of Edinburgh the Forth Bridge and the Rosyth dockyard and I was once in a Lysander where we did dive bombing exercises on the Forth Bridge which was fantastic.
BW: Brilliant.
PB: Absolutely fantastic. It was like being in a JU87 almost.
BW: And this was just to calibrate the ackack guns as you say.
PB: Yes.
BW: To make sure they had the right sort of -
PB: Yes.
BW: Ranging or -
PB: Yes. Yes.
BW: Distance. There were no rounds fired in these -
PB: No. No. No just -
BW: Just to make sure.
PB: Calibration yeah.
BW: Right but either way the pilot imitated a dive bombing manoeuvre on a
PB: Yeah but we had a real clapped out aircraft.
BW: So having had some experience of Lysanders, a single engine aircraft and Oxfords the twin engine.
PB: Yeah.
BW: You then -
PB: All radial engines of course.
BW: And radial engines yeah you then opted while you were at St Athan to go forward for Stirlings.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And what was the course that lead you from St Athan to your squadron? How, how did you go about getting that?
PB: Well, we, we completed our course and we got our brevies and were posted to, to Waterbeach Heavy Conversion Unit and I was introduced to a pilot, a Pilot Officer Cotterill and he was my skipper and I then met the rest of the crew and we took it from there. Did our heavy conversion training.
BW: And how long did that take? Roughly.
PB: Not very long. Maybe about eight weeks I suppose. Something like that.
BW: And was most of that or all of it daylight sorties or were there night time -
PB: No.
BW: Ops involved as well?
PB: We did, we did two four hour sessions of daylight take offs and landings, circuits and bumps. Take of twenty minutes to take off and land for four hours. And having done eight hours of that in daytime we did another eight hours at night and then after that we did, we did cross country flights.
BW: And when you met your crew at this point did you stay together from the conversion unit through to, on operational squadron as the same crew or were the members interchanged?
PB: We lost two members. We lost two members shortly after we joined the squadron.
BW: And was there a reason behind that at all?
PB: Yes. Our first, our first navigator, Geoff was a regular soldier stationed in India when the war broke out. Browned off. To escape he volunteered for training as air crew. He had a stammer which didn’t help and he was a useless navigator and we knew he was useless and our first trip was a very simple mine laying in the North Sea and he flew us straight through the balloon barrage at Norwich coming back and the next day he packed his kit bags and left us.
BW: And was that his choice or -
PB: No. No, that was forced upon him.
BW: Right ok so it wasn’t something there like a moment of self-awareness. He decided to leave.
PB: No. No, he told, he told us he said, ‘They decided I’m not suitable for Bomber Command. I’m being posted to a Coastal Command station.’ Well I think that was just a face saver on his part. I can’t imagine what happened to him but he couldn’t navigate for toffee. Even, even, even with a Gee set he was useless.
BW: Ahum.
PB: And then we did two mine laying trips. We did a lot of fighter affiliation exercises and our mid upper gunner [Bolivar?] a Londoner was brilliant during, during fighter affiliation. Now, Len, Len the wireless operator was always sick. He spewed up everywhere and I sat there and think, ‘Why don’t you crash the bloody thing and get it over with.’ That’s how bad I felt and Bob was as happy as could be but we did two mine laying trips. One in the North Sea -
BW: Ahum.
PB: And one in the river estuary at Bordeaux and then our first target was the opening night of the Battle of Hamburg. 24th of July.
BW: This would be 24th of July 1943.
PB: Yeah. The next night we went to Essen. The next day our mid upper gunner reported sick with air sickness. Now, how he suddenly became air sick overnight I do not know but that was the end of him. So we had a new navigator and a new mid upper gunner.
BW: Sometimes after raids like that men would be removed if they were felt to perhaps have broken at some stage. Do you -
PB: Oh yes.
BW: Do you think that might have been an impact?
PB: Yes. He was still, he was still on the station when we were shot down and I’ve often wondered what he made of it that morning when he woke up and found five empty beds.
BW: And so if I can just touch again on the fighter affiliation. What kind of exercises were carried out there?
PB: Well either, either a Spitfire or a, or a Hurricane would make mock attacks on us and the gunners would give instructions to the skipper as to what evasive action to take and it was quite, it was quite, because our bomb aimer was a failed pilot who could fly, fly a Stirling perfectly well and the Stirling had dual controls so him and the pilot used to work together and we could really throw it about. Really throw it about. You could never have done that on a Lancaster what we did with a Stirling,
BW: No. There was only a single set of controls.
PB: Yeah. Oh it was a wonderful aircraft. Wonderful manoeuvrability aircraft. Couldn’t get very high but by George it could, it could manoeuvre.
BW: And so you mentioned about the raid on Hamburg. That was pretty close to being your first operational sortie.
PB: That was our first target yes after two mine laying trips.
BW: And what, what do you recall about that at all because it was Operation Gomorrah, the raid on Hamburg was pretty significant.
PB: It was operational. What, what, what was most fascinated me most was the colours. The colours of the lights. Reds, greens, yellows. Searchlights, blue searchlights, tracer shells, flak it was an incredible sight. An incredible sight and when you see, when you looked down and someone had just released a string of four pound incendiaries you’d get this brilliant white light like that and then it slowly turns red as the fire gets going. An incredible sight.
BW: So you’d see a sort of a line of white which would -
PB: Yes.
BW: Presumably be the magnesium -
PB: Yeah.
BW: In the incendiaries -
PB: Yes.
BW: Setting fire to the building which was then of course -
PB: Yes.
BW: Catch turn orange and burn.
PB: Yes it was quite remarkable.
BW: And did you only make the one raid on Hamburg or did you return because there was -
PB: We, we, we -
BW: Four days I think.
PB: In ten days this was our introduction to the target. In ten days we did four Hamburgs, an Essen and a [Remshite]
BW: Wow so you flew right through the raid on, or the operation against Hamburg -
PB: Yeah.
BW: In that case.
PB: And the second night of course. The night of the firestorm oh, deary deary me, that was terrible.
BW: Were you aware at all of what was, what was going on? It seems a lot of information has come out subsequently. What were you sort of aware of the damage at that time?
PB: Well where -
BW: While flying.
PB: On the second night when we were back over the sea I went up into the astrodome and looked back and there was only one fire in Hamburg that night. It looked to be about three miles across and it came straight up white, red and black smoke thousands of feet above us and I said over the intercom, ‘those poor bastards down there.’ I couldn’t help myself. It was a terrible, terrible sight. I’ve never seen anything like it on any other target.
BW: At once it’s a spectacular sight but it’s also when you see that sort of thing -
PB: We, we, we killed forty thousand people that night.
BW: When did that, when was that made aware to you? When did you become aware of that sort of statistic? Was it pretty soon after or was it -
PB: Well the newspapers reported it a couple of days later and gave the number of dead.
BW: Right.
PB: And quite honestly I was disappointed. I thought from I saw it must have killed more than that.
BW: It sounds like they might have underestimated.
PB: Yeah. But forty thousand people were killed that night.
BW: Ahum.
PB: Compare that to how many were killed in London in the entire period of the war. There was no comparison.
BW: No. It’s different isn’t it?
PB: But we never, we never, we never achieved anything like Hamburg again until Dresden of course and in Dresden it only killed twenty odd thousand.
BW: And so Hamburg has obviously made quite an impression for that reason.
PB: Hamburg, I think was undoubtedly Bomber Command’s greatest success of the war. I’ve just, I’ve just read a book by Adolf Galland who was in charge of the German night fighters and the things he says about what the consequences of Hamburg and what it meant to the High Command and the changes it was, it shattered them. Completely shattered them.
BW: So it had, it had certainly had ramifications on the ground but it had more ramifications for the Luftwaffe High Command is what you’re saying.
PB: Yes. Yes. It terrified the German fighter defence to pieces. Terrified them.
BW: And did you see many night fighters at this stage over Hamburg? Were they active?
PB: No because it was it was the first, it was just the introduction of Window and everything was at odds.
BW: And so Window was the anti-radar -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Jamming mechanism.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Where they chucked out strips of aluminium.
PB: But they recovered, they recovered from, from Window very very quickly and they got, they got a new form of defence which was more effective they forced it out before, before Window and I’ve read the German view that Window did more harm than good for Bomber Command in the long run because it completely organised their defences.
BW: But at least on that night or on those nights that you were flying over Hamburg the fighters were ineffective because -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Of the use of Window.
PB: The first night there were eight hundred aircraft and we lost twelve.
BW: Wow.
PB: And most of those were lost because they were off course. Separated away from the protection of Window.
BW: Were there any hits from the ackack below? German anti-aircraft fire was renowned as being very accurate. Did you feel that as you were flying over there?
PB: The one thing, the one thing that fascinated me about ackack was that the smell of cordite filled the aircraft. You were flying through clouds of the stuff but when we landed the bomb aimer and I always got our torches and we searched underneath the aircraft and if there was no damage we were disappointed. We expected to have been hit.
BW: So that, that, sort of, I suppose summarises or encompasses your first few trips on operations. What happened after Hamburg? What were the next -
PB: Well we flew on -
BW: Significant raids for you.
PB: We flew on the last two raids ever carried out on Northern Italy and we flew twice to Nuremberg which we always regarded as a particularly important Nazi target and we did a few other various towns in the Ruhr and then on the 31st of August we went to Berlin and that was something else. That was an absolute complete fiasco.
BW: And this was still 1943?
PB: Yeah. Yeah.
BW: In August ’43.
PB: Yeah. The raid on Berlin on the 31st of August. Well the trouble was we’d been, we’d been to Monchengladbach the night before and we quite often did two nights, two consecutive nights. Well, you do Monchengladbach you get very little sleep, you go for briefing and you’re told its Berlin. There were howls of rage from all the air crews and that manifested itself later because that night about eighty aircraft ditched their bombs in the North Sea and returned early. Biggest number ever ‘cause people weren’t prepared to go.
BW: That, that almost sounds a bit like a mutiny in a way doesn’t it?
PB: It’s not far off.
BW: Down tools.
PB: It’s not far off really but the raid was also badly planned. All the damage to Berlin had been in the west and it was intended that this raid should do damage in the east and so we were sent to a point south of Berlin. There was Berlin on our left. We expected to fly seventy miles east. Split-arsed turn, fly seventy miles back and approach Berlin from, from the east. Now, nobody did it. The pathfinders put their markers down two miles south of where they should have been and we all approached from the south so the creepback extended miles and miles and miles. We killed less than a hundred people in Berlin. We lost over two hundred airmen killed and over a hundred prisoners of war. It was a complete and utter fiasco.
BW: Wow and that simply stemmed from, as you say, the pathfinder markers being dropped two miles south.
PB: And we’re coming from the south.
BW: Yeah.
PB: You can imagine it, practically no bombs and the Germans that night for the first time put down these parachute flares. It was like driving down the Mall with all the lights on. It was an incredible sight and it’s such a big place to get through. It takes forever.
BW: And so the gunners clearly with those parachute flares they could have a clear sight presumably of the bomber stream.
PB: And you’ve got day fighters looking down.
BW: Wow.
PB: As well as the night fighters looking up and you’ve got the schragemusik by this time as well.
BW: Which are the cannons in the back of an ME110 to fire vertically underneath the bomber yeah.
PB: Yeah or a JU88.
BW: Yeah.
PB: Or a Messerschmitt 110.
BW: Yeah.
PB: Seventy degree angle, in between the inborn engine and the fuselage hit the main tanks. All you’d see is a great big flash in the sky and that’s it. It was gone.
BW: The crews often said they didn’t know they were there.
PB: No.
BW: Those who survived didn’t see them.
PB: You could see an aircraft flying peacefully and then the next second it’s a ball of fire and you’ll see no tracer and a myth arose and the myth was that the Germans were firing a new type of bomb, a new type of shell which we called a scarecrow and it was designed not to shoot aircraft down but to explode and give the impression of an aircraft blowing up and for months navigators would log these and they weren’t scarecrows. The Germans never had a scarecrow. They were aircraft blowing up.
BW: Actually the aircraft themselves.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And -
PB: And the irony of that is that in the First World War the British had upward firing guns to attack zeppelins.
BW: Ahum Yeah.
PB: [laughs] They never learn.
BW: Because they were difficult to shoot down as well. But so ok from, from there that’s two operations on the trot really. Monchengladbach and Berlin.
PB: Yeah.
BW: You mentioned those airmen killed. Were any of those from the squadron? Did you know any of those guys at all? Were there Stirlings in that lot that were shot down?
PB: Er we there was a raid on Berlin on the 24th of August as well but we were on leave but a crew that we trained with went missing that night and a friend of mine got shot down on the night we were on. A fella called Lew Parsons. He was shot down on the 31st .
BW: Luke Parsons?
PB: Yeah. L E W, short for Lewis.
BW: Oh I see. Lew Parsons.
PB: He was a flight engineer.
BW: And he was shot down on the 31st of August.
PB: Yeah. Yeah. But it, it was a dreadful night. Anyway, the next day our skipper and our navigator were commissioned officers and so the next day we met up with the skipper and he said Johnny’s reported sick and Johnny was our navigator. Flying Officer Johnny [Turton ]. A fantastic navigator. Absolutely fantastic and he’d gone sick and later in the day we were given a replacement. Another flying officer but a New Zealander by the name of McLean and he was the exact opposite from Johnny. Johnny was a big outgoing personality who radiated confidence. This chap had no, no, no personality whatsoever. He was with us five days. We scarcely ever saw him. We scarcely ever spoke to him. We never even learned his Christian name. And he got us shot down.
BW: And that was, of course then going to be your last -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Last flight.
PB: Yeah 5th 5th of September. Mannheim.
BW: Ok. I was just going to ask a question there and it’s just gone from my memory but I’ll probably come back to it. So, oh yes how far into your tour were you at that point? It sounds -
PB: That was our fifteenth trip.
BW: So exactly halfway through.
PB: Exactly halfway. We knew with Johnny we could do, we could do the tour because he was so brilliant but without him we were lost and he finished his tour. He joined another crew, finished his tour got his DFC, survived the war. He was brilliant.
BW: It’s strange how fate goes isn’t it?
PB: Yeah. Yeah.
BW: Before we move on to your experience of being shot down I would just like to ask about what it was like for you as a flight engineer in the sort of preparation and flying out. What sort of things you would do? Perhaps if you could give us a sense of preparation you would go through to -
PB: Yes.
BW: To board the aircraft.
PB: Yes.
BW: What it was like to then go up in a Stirling.
PB: Well to begin with once we got out the aircraft there were a great many pre-flight checks to do. One of them was to go up onto the main plane with a member of the ground crew. Now, we had fourteen petrol tanks on a Stirling. Sometimes we only had the four main ones. Sometimes we had fourteen. Sometimes we had a mixture but my job was to go up on to the main plane with a member of the ground crew and he would open up the filler caps on all the tanks that were supposed to be full and I had to check visually that they were full to the, to the brim. Now, every night I’m stood on the leading edge of a Stirling. I’m twenty feet above the ground. I think when he moves to the next one and I follow, if I slip I’ll roll down the main plane I’ll fall fifteen feet to the tarmac and at the very least I’ll break an ankle and I’ll be alive tomorrow morning and I always, always considered that thought. I never did it of course. The thought was always there. It was in our own power to be alive tomorrow morning [laughs]. But once, once in the air my two main jobs was one to monitoring engine performance making sure the pressures, temperature etcetera were as they should be and that we were flying at the right airspeed and the right revs and the other was calculating every twenty minutes I had to calculate the amount of petrol used from whichever tank doing the past every twenty minutes recorded so that I always knew how much petrol remained in each tank because they weren’t over generous with their petrol allowance and people did run short very often. So that was, that was important, to keep, to know exactly how much petrol you had and where it was.
BW: So even though you’d done inspections and the ground crew had correctly filled the tanks presumably you could encounter unknown winds and like a headwind.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And use your fuel more quickly.
PB: As I understand it the calculation was made. This is your track. It’s so many miles. You’ve so much petrol. We’ll give you so much and we’ll give you another three hundred and twenty gallons as a, as a reserve.
BW: Reserve.
PB: But of course you get off track, winds are against you, anything can happen. You can’t hold height, you’ve got to get into rich mixture to climb again. All sorts of things could happen to make you use more fuel.
BW: And that would include of course having to take evasive action over the target or anything like that.
PB: Yes, evasive, any time when you had to open up the engines and go into full fuel. We were using a gallon a minute.
BW: That’s pretty significant and that’s just through one engine. A gallon a minute through an engine.
PB: No. It’s, that’s the aircraft.
BW: Oh, the aircraft. Ok.
PB: A gallon a mile through the aircraft.
BW: Oh right.
PB: A gallon a minute through each engine yes.
BW: And I think you said the Stirling was a, was a lovely aircraft to fly. What was your experience generally of the environment in which you were having to work? Was it cramped or was there enough room to do your job?
PB: I’ve only been in a Lancaster once and it horrified me. There’s no space to breathe. You could hold a dance in a Stirling. It was huge and because of the short wingspan it was so highly manoeuvrable. It was a beautiful aeroplane but it couldn’t get any height. Couldn’t get any height.
BW: A limited ceiling.
PB: We had to fight to fly at thirteen thousand. On the last night at Hamburg. The night of the big storm we did two runs over Hamburg at eight thousand feet with the bomb doors frozen up.
BW: Wow.
PB: That was a terrible night.
BW: Just out of interest the air supply gets pretty thin around ten thousand feet. Did you ever have to use oxygen?
PB: It goes on automatically at ten thousand feet.
BW: Right.
PB: Ten thousand feet, oxygen on and skipper charges into S gear.
BW: Into S gear.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And does that give you extra boost through the engines?
PB: Yeah. Yeah.
BW: Ok and were you able, in some cases crews had to stow their parachutes. Were you able to move around with your parachutes on or did you stow it?
PB: No it was always stowed. Always stowed away.
BW: How did it feel when you were actually bombed and fuelled up ready to go and you’re at the threshold of the runway and you’d got the green light. Could you just talk us through that?
PB: Well -
BW: What you were feeling there and what you were doing?
PB: I experienced three feelings. Between briefing and going out to the aircraft, absolute terror. Once we delivered the bombs and the photoflash had gone off, wonderful. Once back eating bacon and eggs very, very satisfied. Those were the three emotions that I suffered.
BW: How did it feel when you were given that that green light? Presumably as a flight engineer you followed the pilot through on the throttles.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And you feel this surge of power of the engines going.
PB: Yeah all all the while was concentrating on getting the thing up because the Stirling had a violent swing. It had this ridiculous undercarriage and because of the torque of the engines it swung to starboard and you had to correct that swing either on the throttles or the stick. Now, if you got a cross wind as well that swing could be quite dramatic and it went like that and then like that.
BW: So a violent swerve either way.
PB: The undercarriage just collapsed you don’t want an undercarriage collapsing when you’ve got a thousand -
BW: No.
PB: Incendiary bombs stuck in the belly [laughs].
BW: Were there any incidents where aircraft were unable to take off because of that? They perhaps didn’t control the swing or there was a cross wind.
PB: Oh yeah. The very first Stirling on its very first flight in the hands of a very skilled test pilot on its very first landing wrote its undercarriage off.
BW: Simply because of the swing due the power in the engines.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And the imbalance.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And yet it looks from, as you say, the size of it -
PB: Yeah.
BW: It looks a very stable beast to fly.
PB: It’s incredibly strong that way. It’s not very strong that way.
BW: So longitudinally strength.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And laterally not so good.
PB: It was a very strong undercarriage but it’s so tall it [put a side strain on it] like that.
BW: Yeah.
PB: It goes. Time and time again.
BW: And of course these are pure manual controls. They’re not power assisted in any way.
PB: Oh no. No.
BW: So, but it was generally very smooth to fly and very easy to fly once you were airborne.
PB: Oh it was a beautiful aeroplane to fly. Beautiful. It really was. It was like a [? ] You could do anything with it.
BW: How many were, were in your crew? There were normally seven in a Lancaster.
PB: Seven yeah.
BW: The same in the Stirling.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And you had initially for your first part of your tour you had Johnnie [Turton] as your navigator.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And your pilot. Who was your pilot?
PB: Pilot. When I joined him in May it was Pilot Officer Bernard Cotterell.
BW: That’s right.
PB: By the time we were shot down he was Acting Flight Lieutenant Bernard Cotterell.
BW: Is that C O T T E R -
PB: Yeah.
BW: I L L?
PB: Yeah. E L L.
BW: E L L. And so who are the, you mentioned your wireless op.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Um, who was Len -
PB: Len Smith. Bomb aimer was Alan Crowther.
BW: Alan Crowther.
PB: Yeah the rear gunner was John [Carp?] a Scotsman.
BW: John [Carp?]
PB: He was always known as Jock rather than John.
BW: Jock.
PB: And the new, the new mid upper gunner was a Newcastle lad called Ray Wall.
BW: Ray Wall.
PB: Yeah, Ray Wall. There were only five of us, as I say, left from the original crew and of those five I was the only survivor. The mid upper, the mid upper survived and this new navigator survived?
BW: And so from there we’ve looked at sort of the raids and the preparation for them. What sort of things would happen on the return to base? You’d obviously be debriefed but what form would that take?
PB: Well, we, we, we always flew at the recommended airspeeds which got you the most miles per gallon. A lot of people just simply flew back as fast as they could regardless of wasting petrol so we were invariably the last aircraft to land which meant we always had to queue up to wait to be de debriefed which was a nuisance but then of course it was the bacon and egg lark. Bacon and egg time and off to bed.
BW: And what, what was the accommodation like? You were all crewed up. Were they in nissen huts. Was there a crews either side or was it -
PB: We, we, we were in a nissen -
BW: Different.
PB: Hut and I think we shared it with two other crews and one morning, one morning you would find that half the beds are made up and all everything’s gone because they had disappeared but the thing is you never, you never associated with anybody outside your crew. There was no point to it.
BW: Really.
PB: No point to it at all. A crew was a very. very tight little, little group. We did everything together.
BW: And so even though there would be two other crews in the, in the nissen hut with you you would still socialise only with your own crew.
PB: Oh yeah we never bothered with anybody else. Very rarely spoke to anybody else even.
BW: And where did you go during your off-duty hours? Where did you socialise?
PB: Oh the village pub in Lakenheath.
BW: Do you recall the name?
PB: No, I don’t actually. No.
BW: Ah.
PB: But I do remember there was a Mrs Philips who used to provide us with suppers some times. Just across the road. She used to put on bacon and egg suppers. I don’t know where she got the bacon and eggs from but she used to put on bacon and egg suppers.
BW: Just as a special treat for you.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And the rest of the crew.
PB: But you know you sit in the village pub at night and you were surrounded by farmers and butchers and bakers and all the rest of it. People for whom the war was just something they read about in the newspapers and you were just so happy, you’re so happy. It’s wonderful. There’s nothing like a crew. Nothing. Incredible relationship. Incredible.
BW: And did you have opportunity to mix with other locals? Not just the, the tradesman there, if you like, the farmers and the bakers or whatever?
PB: No. The only time we went out, off the camp was to go in to the little pub. On the nights we weren’t flying. We were in there every night we weren’t flying.
BW: Were there station dances at all or anything like that?
PB: No. There was no station. You’d the airfield there, you’ve the mess here and your billet over there and something else over there. If you didn’t have a bicycle you couldn’t exist in Lakenheath.
BW: So quite a distance between -
PB: Distances are immense. And I’ve visited it since the war. It’s an American town now.
BW: Yeah. It’s, it’s a huge place.
PB: Oh it’s a big place and when I, when I was there talking to them they produced some information about the wartime use and they spelt Stirling as if, as if it was the bloody currency [laughs].
BW: Were there, just out of interest, were there other crews in the pub where you went or was it pretty much just you guys?
PB: Well no doubt there were.
BW: Right.
PB: But we just sat in our corner and nothing else existed.
BW: Right.
PB: Nothing else existed.
BW: So tucked away in your own -
PB: Yeah.
BW: In your own little world.
PB: And there my skipper named my first daughter.
BW: Right.
PB: My skipper. I don’t know how we got on, how the conversation got around to that actually but one evening for some reason the skipper said if my wife and I were to ever have a daughter we were going to call her Penelope. I never forgot that and so very many years later when my first daughter was born she simply had to be Penelope. I had no choice.
BW: Well. As you say it obviously comes from being a tight crew.
PB: Yes.
BW: And that connection.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Ok. You mention then about your trip to Mannheim and this New Zealand navigator.
PB: Yeah.
BW: About your, of your crew.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Who, who got you shot down?
PB: Yeah.
BW: Just talk us through that if you would, please.
PB: Well we had a full petrol load which means a minimum bomb load of course. We were briefed for Munich and when briefing had been completed the CO said there’s a Mosquito on its way to Munich at the moment because it’s feared the weather may break down there so we’re going brief you for a possible alternative for Mannheim. So we had a second briefing then. Now, we’d no idea where we were going which meant of course the navigators had two flight plans to prepare. They’d doubled the work in the limited amount of time so they were under stress from the start. So we, we, we retire to our aircraft. Do all our pre-flight checks and the CO comes around in his van and says Munich is scrubbed. You’re going to Mannheim. So off we go. Immediately we cross enemy coast we were hit by flack. Now this had never ever happened to us before. He’d taken us straight over a, straight over a gun batt. I was shocked and I thought I’m going to spend, I’m going to spend the next hour checking the fuel in the hope we were losing fuel and we could turn back. And I went and did a meticulous check on the fuel but we weren’t losing fuel of course. Now, the raid was cleverly designed. You’ve got Ludwigshafen, the Rhine, Mannheim. If you fly over Ludwigshafen into Mannheim a creepback occurs. You get two targets for the price of one. And so that was the way we were to enter. So, to make sure we got it right for each wave of the attack the pathfinders was putting down a red marker. Now if you turn on a red marker on to the right course you flew straight over Ludwigshafen straight to Mannheim. So as we, as we were approaching the point where we could expect to see the flare the navigator says, ‘Keep your eyes open now. You should be seeing a red flare any time now.’ And suddenly there’s a red flare there and another red flare over there.
BW: So one to your left and one to your right.
PB: Yeah. So which, which is, which is the correct one? Only the navigator knows which is the correct one. ‘That one,’ he says.
BW: On the left.
PB: Nearer to the target. We get to the target five minutes early. The skipper makes what I still think was the right decision. He said we’d been hit by a bomb once at Nuremberg so we knew that. You’re either the only one over the target or the bombs are coming down from Lancasters. The skipper did an orbit but unfortunately the radar picked us up and as soon as we start to go in a blue searchlight comes straight on.
BW: Which is the radar guided one.
PB: Yeah and then then the column builds up and we’re flying straight over with the bomb doors open. So we continued like that until the bomb aimer got a sight and then you let the lot go in one go and we didn’t wait for a photograph. And over a target I always went up in to the astrodome facing backwards to help the gunner search for fighters and I was up there [ and we slowly began to pull away? ] and there were only a couple of searchlights on us and I thought I’d better check on my engines cause they’re getting a terrible thrashing. You’re only allowed a few minutes on full power so I get down, I get down from the pyramid and have a very long, I have a very long lead on my intercom so I can, don’t have to keep plugging and unplugging and I get down and I’m just going over to the instrument panel and suddenly there’s a terrible screaming and Len, Len the wireless operator had been just behind the main spar pushing out pushing out the window came running up through the main spar screaming, tripped over the pyramid, fell across my lead, pulled it out so I lost all communication and he fell at my feet and then this huge fire broke out in the fuselage and I’m steeling myself to stand and step over Leonard’s body to get to the fire extinguisher and out of the corner of my eye I see the mid upper gunner get out and put his chute on. I turn around. The navigator’s already on his way down the steps so instead of going for the extinguisher I go for my parachute and follow the navigator. I get to the top of the steps, the hatch is open. The navigator’s gone. I slide down. I get my feet through. The bomb aimer had gone up in to the second pilot’s seat to help the skipper. He started to clamber down from the, from the seat as I go past. I get my legs through. I feel a pressure on my back. I turn. Alan’s got his knees pressing in my back, tap him on the knee and go and as I go I feel the aircraft break in two and Alan never got out. So the rear gunner and Len were killed by the fighter. The skipper was wounded by flak that also set the port inner on fire and the skipper and Alan never had a chance of getting out because the aircraft had broken in two. The tail unit with the rear gunner’s body in it landed a considerable distance away. The main wreck landed right on the German Grand Prix racing track at Hockenheim.
BW: Wow.
PB: I have the map. I have a map showing the exact position and I saw the fire. It was a huge. We’d over a thousand gallons of petrol on board. We had enough petrol for Munich and the three in the aircraft were completely destroyed. Only, only fragments of bone left. The air gunners body was complete and so in the cemetery now at [Bad Tolz?] there’s a, there’s the rear gunners grave there, then there’s a headstone for Len, a headstone for the skipper, a headstone for Alan but what bits of fragments of bone there were are all buried in front of the skipper I’m sure. It was just symbolic. Never, never let the relatives know that of course. Never mention fire to the relatives but those two graves were empty and what bits there were were in front of the skipper which is right and proper.
BW: And you, you must have been pretty close to the ground when you baled out yourself.
PB: No. Oh, no. I was about ten thousand feet.
BW: Oh right. It was, it was the sense I was getting that it was almost a last minute sort of thing where you were able to escape.
PB: No. No, the aircraft broke in two very quickly. It was a tremendous. What happened I think the JU88 killed the rear gunner and then from, there’s a pump on the starboard engine, and dual pipelines to the rear turret that power the turret. Now I think it hit those pipelines. You’ve got hydraulic oil pressure, high pressure, high temperature came out and that’s what caught fire. The fire then came underneath the mid upper gunner, hit Len when he was doing the window in and stopped before it reached me but it was, it was a terror, it certainly was a fire and although I didn’t know till much later virtually simultaneously flak knocked out the port engine and the port inner engine and wounded the skipper and Ray, Ray told me later that when the skipper gave the order to bail out he [signed to say] as if he was badly hurt.
BW: And then at that point, the stricken aircraft, it must be almost I guess vertical if it’s broken up at that point.
PB: It didn’t, it didn’t go like that when it hit the ground it was it just come straight down like that.
BW: Yeah.
PB: I dare say some of it is still there buried under that racetrack. Some of the engine. But later I had a friend in Germany who was, who was in Ludwigshafen. He lived in Ludwigshafen. He was a schoolboy in Ludwigshofen. He may well have been on the flak gun that night for all I know.
BW: That would have been a coincidence wouldn’t it?
PB: Well after, he worked for the postal service after the war and when he retired he set himself up as what he called an air historian and he excavated a lot of shot down bombers and he was very keen on Bomber Command and he provided me with a lot of information and he produced a woman who’d been a schoolgirl in Hockenheim and on the morning after we crashed, after we were shot down, a neighbouring woman knocked on her door and she had what they described as a Canadian airman with them. It was in fact a New Zealander and the girl’s mother gave him a drink of water and later in the day the girl’s interest was aroused and she and a girlfriend went out to look at the crash and she provided me with a map of the actual crash site just by the, so whenever the German Grand Prix comes on I always, always watch it for a few minutes. I don’t like grand prix racing but I always watch it for a few minutes.
BW: Just that particular one.
PB: Yeah. That’s where it crashed.
BW: And have you been back to Hockenheim at all?
PB: No. No, I’ve not. No, I’ve not.
BW: But the information’s come through to you.
PB: Yeah.
BW: As to what’s happened.
PB: Peter provided me with a lot of information.
BW: What’s the air historian’s name? Do you recall?
PB: Peter Mengas M E N Mengas G A S.
BW: G A S.
PB: Peter.
BW: And is he still around?
PB: I don’t know. I’ve not, I’ve not heard from him for a year or two now.
BW: So you’ve managed to get out of the aircraft yourself.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And this is night-time. About ten thousand feet over Germany.
PB: Yeah 1 o’clock. It was just about midnight on my watch. It was 1 o’clock in the morning German time.
BW: And you pulled the rip cord and -
PB: Well, no. This was the problem when I, when I first joined the squadron I got a harness which could be adjusted. Now, I moved about a lot in the Stirling. I’ve controls there, there, there and there.
BW: All around the -
PB: And I used to [bend down?] around number seven tank and the shoulder strap would fall off and I thought I’ll get this fixed but I never did of course so when I baled out I was terrified of falling out of my parachute so I daren’t open it until I got myself you know [? ] as I could.
BW: Sort of braced against the straps were they?
PB: And when I opened it and I felt oh that’s it but it wasn’t that was just the parachute pulling the pack off my chest and then bang.
BW: The snap of the canopy.
PB: And I took all the weight there. The shoulder straps were up here. I came down in agony. I don’t know why it didn’t castrate me.
BW: Because of the tight grip around the -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Groin area where the -
PB: And then when I eventually I saw the ground rushing up and I rolled myself into a ball as I’d been taught and this buckle took two ribs with it.
BW: On the left hip.
PB: Yeah. Broke, broke two, broke two of my ribs and so I, it was, it was very painful. Very painful. And this is funny really by the next day my left side had seized up and I’m walking in a westerly direction trying to get to France [laughs] and, I don’t know and there was just one house which I had to pass and I thought, I thought a girl stood in the window had spotted me. I wasn’t certain but I thought she had. Anyway, I kept going and suddenly I hear a shout and I turn around and there’s this chappy running towards me and running behind him is a woman, presumably his wife and the two things I didn’t believe. I didn’t believe that fighting men put their hands above their heads like the baddies in the cowboy films and I didn’t believe the Germans went around saying. ‘Heil Hitler,’ to each other but as this chappy approached without any conscious effort on my part my hands went up. This one went up. This one wouldn’t.
BW: Your right one.
PB: He saw me like. He stopped running [?]and, ‘Heil Hitler.’
BW: So because you can’t raise your left arm you can only raise your right arm he thinks you’re doing the salute.
PB: He thought I was a Luftwaffe chappy. ‘Heil Hitler,’ he said [laughs] Well, I just I was in a pretty perilous state by this time. I just collapsed in to hysterical laughter. I just stood there and laughed and laughed and laughed and his wife came along and she sized up the situation immediately. She put her arm around me, took my weight on her shoulder and led me towards the town and the very first house we came to she made a very, very cross old woman let me into her kitchen, sit me down and made me a cup of coffee. So this woman very unwillingly gave me a cup of coffee. I hadn’t drunk anything for twenty four hours and I took a sip and I thought, ‘Bloody hell, I can’t drink this. It’s absolutely disgusting,’ and I thought, ‘Well if I don’t drink it it’s a great insult to this woman who’s been so incredibly kind to me,’ so I had to drink it. That was my introduction to the German diet oooph [laughs].
BW: And so you managed from a rough landing in a loose parachute in God knows where -
PB: Yeah.
BW: To get yourself together. You didn’t meet any of the other crew at this point because you obviously talked about -
PB: The -
BW: Yourself.
PB: The mid upper gunner landed right next to a railway signal box and was arrested within seconds. The navigator landed in a tree and had to be rescued. So they were captured very quickly. Both of them.
BW: So there was just you on your own at this point.
PB: I was on my own.
BW: Were you knocked unconscious or, or did it take some time to come around? I mean you’ve obviously had to get rid of your chute and -
PB: No I, I, I was shocked. I was shocked obviously and I was in pain from these ribs but I said I’ve a duty to the RAF and that was to get to Gibraltar. [Laughs] It’s a long way away.
BW: Yeah.
PB: I’d got the Rhine to cross for one thing. That’s not, that’s not easy. [laughs].
BW: And so the, the people that, that met you I mean you talk about heading west towards France and Mannheim is, is quite deep in western Germany.
PB: Yeah.
BW: So you’re actually being met by Germans at this point.
PB: Yeah.
BW: But they assist you.
PB: Yeah.
BW: So what then happened? Did they, they pass you on? Or -
PB: Well this couple took me to the police station where the other two were already held although I didn’t know it and we were kept there for about three days and a couple of Luftwaffe chappies arrived to take us up to Frankfurt to Dulag Luft interrogation camp and when we left we were given a bundle of the rear gunner’s clothing and his flying suit had hundreds of holes in it. The cannon shells must have hit the turret and exploded, it was absolutely riddled and his helmet and his, his oxygen mask was soaked in blood and there were the four guns from the rear turret as well. So we had that to carry. And we had, we had an adventurous journey. We couldn’t, it, this was the most successful raid on Mannheim Ludwigshafen at that time and it was complete chaos and we had to go by train in to a big detour so we travelled that day and went to a Luftwaffe camp and stayed the night in the guard room there and the next day we go back to the railway station and it was a, it’s a station something like Victoria in Manchester. A long corridor with steps going up to the various platforms. We were on the platform and what I call a typical Daily Express German came along, feather in his hat and oh he was furious he was furious and Hitler had issued an order to all military and police units that if civilians get hold of airmen before the authorities do the authorities were not to interfere. They must leave it to the discretion of the civilians what to do with them and this one was stark raving, oh he was angry. And in the air force there’s an offence known as silent contempt. You don’t do anything but you look at an officer who’s ticking you off and look at him and make it obvious you think he’s [lowly?] and it’s a serious crime in the air force. Well Ray and I were giving this chappy the silent cont and the navigator said, ‘Stop being a bloody fool.’ He was a good deal older than we were and eventually this chap storms off and we thought, ‘Oh that’s shown him.’ A few minutes later he’s back at the head, the head of a posse and they’re obviously, obviously intent on doing us serious bodily harm but fortunately there was, there was a train on the other side of the platform. Now, whether it was a troop train or not I don’t know but half a dozen soldiers got out and ranged themselves between us and the, and this crowd and our two Luftwaffe chappies whipped us down the stairs, along the corridor and up another platform and hid us in a room that was obviously used by guards full of red and green lamps and flags and so on and we hid in there until our train arrived and then ran back as fast as we could and got put on the train. But it was, when we thought about it later we were very nearly hanged or beaten to death or kicked to death or something very near but it was only, it was only those soldiers who saved us and that was contrary to Hitler’s orders.
BW: Because the RAF crews at this time presumably were being christened terror flieger.
PB: Yeah. Oh yeah.
BW: And so the civilians were -
PB: Yeah. Yeah.
BW: Properly against them.
PB: Well there were a hundred Bomber Command people were killed by Germans and more than two hundred Americans because Americans, there were a lot more Americans. They had ten to a crew.
BW: And at this point in a station as you mention they’ve reunited you with the navigator and -
PB: Yeah. Well they were in the police station. Unknown to me at the time.
BW: Yeah.
PB: I met them when we got out of the police station. But before I left they gave me a shave. A fierce little barber came in and then he got out this razor and I thought, ‘I hope to God the air raid sirens don’t go off.’ [laughs]
BW: Yeah ‘cause he might, he might stop shaving you and decide to use the razor for something else.
[laughs]That’s the only time I’ve been shaved with a cut throat razor. I don’t want to ever experience it again. [laughs]
BW: So they’ve tidied you up and reunited you as a crew.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Presumably they didn’t interrogate you at this point even though you were in a police station. The Luftwaffe officers took you over and put you in a transport. Is that right?
PB: Yeah. We were taken, we were taken to Dulag Luft at Frankfurt and there I was put in a cell there. Quite a big cell really. It had, it had, it had a very long radiator attached to one wall and there was a bed attached to the floor alongside a radiator and there was a table and two chairs and there’s a bucket in the corner and two windows with shutters on from outside and a very dim light. No ventilation and all I could do was lie flat on my back with these ribs and although it was mid-September the heat on the radiator was turned up full. So I lay there for three days getting hotter and dirtier and stickier and the air getting fouler and fouler and then suddenly somebody opened the shutters. A very smart Luftwaffe officer walked in with a couple of files under his arm, put them on the table opened the windows wide and motioned for me to join him, poured two cups of English tea, a plate of English biscuits, a packet of English cigarettes and then the interrogation started.
BW: And at this point is there just you and this Luftwaffe officer?
PB: Yeah.
BW: In this cell?
PB: Yeah.
BW: And so he’s expected you to get up from the floor to the chair to sit in front of him. Nobody has assisted you at this point?
PB: No. No. No.
BW: So presumably your body’s quite stiff as well.
PB: Very very stiff indeed. Very stiff. I never -
BW: Well -
PB: I never had any medical attention at all. Never. I’ve got a great knob of bone there that will never heal.
BW: And so the interrogation begins and presumably, from what you’re staying, this is daytime at this point.
PB: Yeah. When he put these files down on the table there were two of them and the top one said Royal Air Force Bomber Command 149 squadron. I thought, ‘How the hell does he know 149?’ I said, ‘I wonder if the others had been forced to talk,’ and I had pictures of Humphrey Bogart being tortured by [laughs] but it was obvious the rear part of the fuselage wasn’t burned and the letters OJ. So, he gave me, he have me a great deal of information. First, generally about the air force and then specifically about 149 squadron.
BW: And because the letters on the aircraft had not burned through.
PB: No the -
BW: So the squadron’s code OJ were still visible.
PB: OJ means 149. They knew that so as I understood it he was trying to do two things. He was giving me a lot of information most of it factual but some which he picked up and he hadn’t had checked yet [or someone had corrected] and from my reaction [he got?] and then he picked up bits from me that he could put. That was the whole purpose of it. I don’t know what did affect the war effort. I don’t think very much. Anyway, eventually he finished and this was the middle of September and he said, ‘Are there any questions you want to ask me?’ I said, ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘What’s been happening in the war in the last few days?’ He said, ‘Italy has surrendered.’ I said, ‘Oh good. One down, one to go.’ [laughs] Well he didn’t like that [laughs] so he picked up his files and he left.
BW: You weren’t tempted to salute him either.
PB: But when we, when we were being transferred by cattle truck from Dulag Luft to Saxony to Stalag 4b we were in these cattle trucks and we had a German guard in with us and we had with us at one stage the only German I ever felt sorry for. He’d been born in Germany and when he was a very small child his people had gone to America. He’d been brought up in Brooklyn. He had a tremendous Brooklyn accent and he’d, they’d never taken American nationality and early in ‘39 or late in ‘38 they’d come to Germany on holiday and he was immediately conscripted and there he was [laughs]. Oh dear. So I’d never known anybody feel as sorry for himself as that poor fella. He said, he described his comrades, he said, ‘Bloody mother f***ing, c**k s***ng krauts,’ and those were his comrades [laughs].
BW: And they didn’t speak American -
PB: Deary, deary me,
BW: So he got away with it.
PB: Oh he did feel sorry for himself. And I’ve often wondered what happened to him because when the Ardennes offensive took place Hitler put a lot of American speaking Germans into American uniforms and of course they were shot immediately if they were captured. He was an absolutely perfect candidate for that job.
BW: Yeah. Quite possible.
PB: So I don’t know what happened to him but oh deary me he did feel sorry for himself
BW: And so it seems a fairly, alright it’s uncomfortable but it seems a fairly civil interrogation from the Luftwaffe officer before you -
PB: Oh it was very friendly. Very friendly very friendly. I mean I’d been lying in there for three days thinking about Jimmy Cagney and Humphrey Bogart and it was nothing like that [laughs]. No, he was charming. Really charming.
BW: And how soon after the interrogation ended and he stormed out did you then leave for er -
PB: Well I left the cell then went to the main part of the camp and stayed there for about a week until there was enough of us to make up a wagon load.
BW: And this was still at Dulag Luft.
PB: Yeah.
BW: In Frankfurt.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And so you’re there a little while longer transferred to Saxony.
PB: Yeah and we were lucky and we were unlucky. We were unlucky in the fact that all the luft camps run by the Luftwaffe were full and so we were sent to the biggest prison camp in Germany which was run by the army. It contained about ten thousand permanently and it had scores of working parties attached to it so that prisoners used to come in and get recorded and then sent out to work in mines or factories or quarries or whatever so there was a regular turnover. There was about ten thousand of us there permanently but a tremendous lot of Frenchmen, a couple of thousand Russians who were starving to death and various other nationalities and of course the German army didn’t have the same relationship with us that the Luftwaffe personnel would have had. In fact they hated us.
BW: Was there any, any ill will directed towards you because you were air force?
PB: They didn’t like us. They told us, they said, ‘When Germany wins the war you’ll spend the rest of your lives building the cities that you’ve destroyed but if Germany lose the war you’re soon to be shot.’ That was their attitude.
BW: And even though this was an army camp they, it sounds as though they weren’t just, were they just military personnel? The ten thousand French and Russians were they soldiers that were captured?
PB: Well I don’t know what they were.
BW: So they could have been.
PB: They were dressed in civilian, some in civilian clothes,
BW: Yeah.
PB: Some in bits of clothes. Some were in military uniform but we were lucky too because this was September. Italy had retired from the war. The Germans had taken over the Italian prison camps and they set up two new compounds in 4b. An RAF compound and an army compound. Now, a couple of thousand Desert Rats who’d been prisoners in Italy came in just as we did. Now, without them we’d have been in a right mess because the Germans gave us nothing.
BW: So you were on low rations and you were, were you made to work at this stage as well?
PB: No. No. They couldn’t make us work. Not with our ranks.
BW: Right.
PB: But you know we were put into a hut which has three tier bunks to sleep a hundred and eighty men. They gave us a sack which contained something or other which was supposed to be a mattress, two pre- First World War blankets and that was, that was all they gave us. No knife, fork, spoon, no cup, no plate. Nothing. And yet the food comes up, a great big vat of soup and all you’ve got’s your bare hands. So the army helped us a lot there.
BW: Presumably because they were allowed or brought with them their kit and they shared it.
PB: They brought with all their kit, yeah. Yeah. I mean they’d been prisoners years some of them.
BW: So they knew, they knew how it worked.
PB: They knew the ropes so yeah they knew the ropes alright but the difference between the army and the air force was, was, was incredible. The army compound was run like a barracks. There was a sergeant major in charge of each hut. Total control. And each morning at 7 o’clock there was roll calls outside in decent weather. The roll call in the army compound took fifteen minutes. The roll call in the RAF compound could take two hours. That was the difference in our attitudes. The army would say, ‘We’ll show them what real soldiers look like.’ and we’d say, ‘We’ll cause them so much bloody trouble they’ll wish they’d never been born.’ Different attitude of mind altogether.
BW: And so this is the, the British army in their compound.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Organising themselves to do their roll calls -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Like that.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And the RAF took the view well we’re there to -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Make a nuisance of ourselves.
PB: That’s it exactly. One day the Germans got so exasperated they brought the senior sergeant major and they stood him there and we’re all lined up in fives and he starts telling us we’re a disgrace to the bloody nation, we’re a disgrace to the air force and the replies he got. He’d never been spoken to like that in his life before. Never, ever, ever. He just went redder and redder and redder. Eventually, he turned on his heel and went and we never saw him again.
BW: Gave that one up as well.
PB: I know we really, we really did everything we could and we tamed the Germans eventually and it went whenever a German entered our hut whoever saw him first would shout, ‘Jerry up’ and whatever you were doing you could get away. At the end of the war the German would walk in to the hut, he’d stand at the door and shout, ‘Jerry up’ and wait two minutes before he walked in.
BW: It’s interesting you, you made a comment just before that although the Germans gave you nothing they didn’t make you work either because of your rank.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And the thinking was in the, in the early days with the RAF aircrew was that if they were all sergeants they would be treated better in prisoner of war camps.
PB: Not treated better, just treated differently in that they didn’t work.
BW: Right. So it was a case of you’re not made to work you were just -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Well you were just there and you exist, sort of thing.
PB: Yeah and the food of course was disgusting. The flour was ten percent what the Germans optimistically called wood flour. Which was sawdust. We, we, we had soup at lunchtime. A great vat of soup. We had [minute?] soup which was disgusting. We had [mara?] soup which was even more disgusting and most disgusting of all we had a soup that apparently was made from what was left of sugar beet after the beet er after the sugar had been extracted and we got a handful of boiled potatoes, usually rotten. That was the midday meal and then in the late afternoon you got a piece of bread to be divided between five people and a blob of white stuff which was supposed to be butter, it was about ninety percent water, and a spoonful of jam apparently made from beetroot or swede or some such and you’d get this piece of bread and it’s not a big piece of bread and it’s got to be shared between five people and every, every one of the five pieces had to be absolutely identical with the other four so we picked the man with the best irons and steadiest hand and he cuts the bread up and he gets last choice and the five pieces and he gets the last choice.
BW: And it went on like that for days.
PB: But we had the Red Cross parcels fortunately.
BW: How often were they delivered? Were they regular?
PB: Every Monday we got a Red Cross parcel.
BW: And were they delivered intact or were they interfered and inspected by the Germans.
PB: They were delivered intact until it was decided that they were being used in escapes and so after that they were all opened and every tin was punctured so that it had a limited lifespan. You couldn’t, you couldn’t store it up.
BW: And you see in war films, popular war films, the sort of black market operating in a prison camp and trading and bartering. Does that, did that ever happen?
PB: Oh yes, it was all, with cigarettes you could buy anything. Now in the RAF compound we had two people. We had an English and an Italian name. A chappy called [Gargini]
BW: [Gargini]
PB: Now he was, he was a skilled technician in British, in BBC television and he was an absolute wizard with the electricity. He built at least two radio sets and he also made a succession of heaters, immersion heaters, which you could put in a cup of cold water and fire up in no time at all. And we had another chap who was in fact was a civilian. Terry Hunt his name was. He worked for British Movietone news or some similar company and if you went to the cinema in England during the war from time to time to time on the newsreel you’d see shots taken from the nose of a light bomber during attacks on France. Now Terry was one of the men who took those photographs. He was given a degree of training. He was given an RAF uniform, he was given a RAF number, an RAF rank just in case he was shot down and captured and he had a camera. He had it inside a hollowed out bible with a little hole in the spine through which he took his photographs. Two quite remarkable men there.
BW: And that, that bible with the camera in he used in the aircraft and he kept with him in the prison camp did he?
PB: No. He got it whilst he was in the prisoner.
BW: Oh made it in the prison right.
PB: How he got through well cigarettes you could get anything with cigarettes. You could buy a woman for three cigarettes but there were no women.
BW: And in that case there must have been some sort of interaction with the German guards at that point -
PB: Oh yes.
BW: To be able to bribe.
PB: You waited. You waited until after dark and then you went out and found a guard and said [?] ‘Yah yah yah,’ out it came from a bag in his gas mask case gave him this bit of bread ‘[?] cigarettes?’ ‘Nein. [?]Nein. Deutschland caput’ [laughs]
BW: A piece of bread for twenty cigarettes.
PB: But you could buy anything with cigarettes.
BW: And did you partake in that yourself, did you?
PB: Oh yeah I was out most nights if I had cigarettes buying bread. It was, it was much better bread than we had. It was rotten bread but it was much better bread than we had.
BW: And did you, did you feel able to strike up a rapport or even an element of trust with some of these guards. Were you always meeting the same one or did you have to interact with others?
PB: No, whoever happened to be walking around the compound at the time. Some relationships must have been, must have been formed because big items were bought and of course if there were ever workmen in the camp all their tools were raided. They soon [? ] their tools.
BW: So there were, there were guys in the camp who were raiding the Germans’ tool sets.
PB: Yeah you see we, we had, you know, you got hundreds of air crew. You’ve got a couple of thousand senior NCOs in the army. You’ve got every talent. You’ve got architects, musicians, dancers, journalists. You got all sorts of people and it was amazing what could be done.
BW: And I believe they had classes in the prisoner of war camps as well to keep the men occupied.
PB: Oh yes. We, we had a little library in each hut. Some of them manned by professional librarians, we had lecturers. We had, we had a theatre group and a radio theatre group. We had people who went around individually giving lectures. The most popular lecturer was a chappy, an army man, who’d worked for a very prestigious London undertaking firm and the stories he had. Oh deary me. Deary, deary me. He was a popular lecturer he was.
BW: And so was your days, were your days regulated in any sense? Was there a structure put to you?
PB: No. You had a roll call in the morning, a roll call in the evening. That was it. And then you had the food arriving at mid-day and again about tea time and other than that you were on your own.
BW: So would you have about two meals a day then? Your main midday meal and a meal in the evening?
PB: I don’t think we ever had a meal at all really [laughs].
BW: Well, yeah.
PB: But yeah that’s the way it worked.
BW: Yeah.
PB: On Fridays, on Fridays, Friday was a big day. On Friday you got pea soup and pea soup was so good we didn’t get any potatoes on Friday. Well pea soup was the only soup we ever really ate. The pea soup was quite good.
BW: And do you still like it to this day or does that remind you?
PB: I like pea soup. Yes.
BW: Yeah.
PB: But we Lancastrians had a Red Rose Society. The Yorkists had a White Rose Society and there was a motoring club for people interested in cars or motorbikes. There were all sorts, all sorts of things set up. Every hut was given the name of a British football team. My hut was Wolverhampton Wanderers and a league was set up and matches were played and points scored and then in the RAF compound we formed the rugby pitch as well, I played a lot of rugby.
BW: Even, even though you’d had a bad injury from parachuting you were still able to play rugby.
PB: Eventually. It took, it took, it took about six months until I felt really free but -
BW: Did you manage to get any medical treatment from the British -
PB: No.
BW: While you were in the camp?
PB: Never. Never. I never bothered the British. By then it was healing. They even, even tried to play cricket but that didn’t work. The ground was too soft.
BW: What sort of ground was it? Was it sandy?
PB: It was sort of sandy soil, yeah.
BW: So and we’ve probably all have an image here of Sagan and the Great Escape -
PB: Yeah.
BW: And the sandy -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Sort of soil
PB: Yeah.
BW: And it was pretty much like that was it?
PB: When I played rugby every time I I got a graze and there was any blood it always went, always went rotten. I always had to go and get it, get it drugged up always, always went rotten.
BW: And what sort of drugs could they give you? Was there penicillin?
PB: Red Cross. Red Cross I don’t know what they were but the Red Cross provided drugs and we had, we had certain medical. We had a couple of army doctors as well. We had an English woman in the camp.
BW: Do you recall her name at all?
PB: Well we knew her as Mrs Barrington. She was an English woman. I don’t know whether she was divorced or widowed but sometime in the 20s or very early 30s she had a son called Winston and they had a holiday in Switzerland and met a German who got on very well with and they went back again a few months later and she married him and she and her son went to live in Germany. And then when, when 1938, ‘39 came along and war was obviously imminent she sent her son back to England to live with her parents and in due course he joined the air force in Bomber Command, got shot down, wrote to her where she was living in Vienna and she wrote back and eventually she decided she wanted to be nearer to him then that so she left Vienna and went to live in Muhlburg which was about five kilometres from the camp.
BW: Muhlberg.
PB: Muhlberg yeah and by this time her husband was a very high ranking Luftwaffe officer and when she moved to Muhlberg her husband came with her and we know that he visited the camp and we know that he met the commandant but we don’t know what happened there of course. We don’t know whether some informal arrangement was agreed between them or whatever but it was a fact that airmen were never allowed outside the camp because they’d just disappear but Barrington got outside the camp with French working parties several times, met his mother in Muhlberg and by early 1945 she was getting worried about what her fate would be when the Russians arrived and he reported that to the, to the escape committee and they decided she should be brought into the camp and the next time he went out he took some spare clothes [and met her] she came in to the camp, put in to RAF battledress and was hidden away under the stage in the theatre and stayed there for a few weeks till the end of the war. Not only until the end of the war but until we got away from the Russians but it took us a month to get away from the Russians.
BW: So you mention there about hiding her under the stage in the theatre -
PB: Yeah.
BW: In RAF battle dress uniform.
PB: Yeah.
BW: How did the, the tide of war affect you because many prisoners were forced on the long march but presumably if you were in Saxony in sort of lower -
PB: Yeah.
BW: South eastern Germany. Were you part of that of that -
PB: No.
BW: To evacuate the camps.
PB: No we weren’t in Poland. We were in Germany. Now, by this time the air was full of British and American fighter bombers. Everything that moved was attacked and the commandant gave us the opportunity, ‘If you want to be marched west across the Elbe we’ll take you,’ and the Poles of course jumped at that chance. They didn’t want to be with the Russians. And we said, ‘No. We’ll stay where we are until our allies arrive.’ [Laughs] Our allies.
BW: So you all managed to stay in the camp without being evacuated.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And so this Mrs Barrington stayed in the -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Theatre at this time.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Under your protection.
PB: Yeah she kept hidden. Eventually, when the, when the Russians arrived they made no arrangements whatever for us and so all we could do was break down this perimeter fence and stream out into the countryside to search for food and that went on for about three days and then the Russians got themselves organised and clamped down on it. We came and got a bargaining counter. They held thousands of British and Americans and there were tens of hundreds of thousands of Russians in the west and the Russians wanted them back. Many, many of them even wore German uniforms and they knew if they went back they knew what their fate would be so they didn’t want to go back so there was a lot of bargaining and we were part of the Russians strong hand and then they marched us out of the camp, marched quite a considerable distance and they put us into what was obviously a big maintenance depot full of huge workshops and we were billeted there and still nothing was happening so we began to drift off in twos and threes and tried to make our way across the river on our own which eventually we did. We, we were relieved by the Russians on St George’s Day, the 23rd of April and I reached the American lines on my 24th birthday. The 23rd of May. Exactly one month later. And then it was like moving from hell in to heaven. I lived for a week on steak and ice cream.
BW: You didn’t, you’d been on such bad rations there was no problem moving to that sort of -
PB: No. No. Never had any -
BW: High protein diet.
PB: A lot of people spent a lot of time sat down with their trousers around their ankles [laughs]
BW: You obviously had a tougher constitution.
PB: Yeah -
BW: So it didn’t affect you.
PB: It didn’t affect me. But oh it was great with the Americans. Even went to the cinema. They had a mobile cinema. I saw a film about a book which I’d read whilst in Germany. And then, then we were flown by Dakota to Brussels and handed over to the British. We arrived in Brussels on a Saturday afternoon. The British gave us a ten shilling note and a handful of Belgian coins and turned us loose on Brussels for a Saturday night [laughs]. And the next day we climbed on board a Stirling and flew back to Kent and from Kent we went up to Cosford which was a receiving centre and Cosford had been my first station in 1940.
BW: So this was almost a reverse of your trip out there because you’d gone out on a Stirling.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And then you were flown back from Brussels to Kent in a Stirling.
PB: In a Stirling.
BW: How did it feel to be back on your old sort of type of plane again?
PB: Oh it was funny really. About, about four Stirlings and one Lancaster landed and everybody but me and two other fellas ran for the one Lancaster. [laughs] I was more than happy to get into a Stirling.
BW: And that, that night in Brussels when you’d got a ten shilling note in your hand.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And a few Belgian pennies that must have been pretty memorable. How did it, how did it feel?
PB: I had a terrible emotional shock. There was a great big underground convenience and I was stood in there weeing away and in walked two women cleaners [laughs] and that rather set me back. I don’t remember much about what happened that night actually. I know I’d no money left at the end of it.
BW: Justifiably lost in celebration I think.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And so you were only twenty four at that stage.
PB: I’d just had my twenty fourth birthday, yes.
BW: And you, I guess you got, in retrospect, you got back to the UK pretty quick. I mean the war had only been over sort of three weeks when you were then passed over to the, to the British.
PB: Yeah.
BW: In May.
PB: Yeah.
BW: ‘Cause obviously some guys in service had to wait a long time to be repatriated.
PB: Oh some didn’t get back until well after the September.
BW: And so when you get back to Cosford.
PB: Yeah.
BW: What happened then? Were you able to, I mean, were you still in touch with your other crewmates at this point in your -
PB: No. No. Long lost them somewhere along the way. We were, first of all we were made to give a written description of how we were shot down which seemed to me to be to be a waste of time and then we were medically examined and bathed and haircuts and kitted out with new uniform and then we were sent on six weeks leave on double rations and by this time of course I’d been, I’d been qualified long enough to have become a warrant officer. And I had a lot of back pay. Got paid all the time.
BW: And how, how did they pay you? ‘Cause now it goes straight into your bank account but then did they give you cash?
PB: Cash.
BW: Or did they give you a cheque?
PB: I can’t remember. I can’t remember. I didn’t have a bank account so I don’t, I don’t really know. I know I had a lot of money to come. Several hundred pounds. I’d earned it. [laughs]
BW: Absolutely.
PB: I’d done more damage to German morale as a prisoner than I ever did as - [laughs]
BW: If I can, if I can just hop back to a point you made in the camp. You said there was an escape committee.
PB: Yes.
BW: And as I say they’re sort of impressions of, of “The Great Escape” come to mind. Were there any escape attempts made there?
PB: Oh yes there were people escaping all the time.
BW: Successfully?
PB: A couple of hours, two days. Maybe a week if you were lucky.
BW: So there was quite an active escape -
PB: Oh yes, yes.
BW: Committee from the RAF there.
PB: Oh yes there was a lot of escaping. What, what, what was a popular thing from time to time a British soldiers would come through the camp to be registered and recorded and photographed etcetera and then sent out on working parties and some airmen got the idea it would be easier to escape from a working party then from the camp and so they exchanged identities and this in the end caused tremendous confusion to the Germans because there was a New Zealand soldier, a Desert Rat who’d been captured and held in prison in Italy and he’d escaped and got in with a with a group of partisans and as he was the only professional as it were amongst the partisans he soon became their leader and he carried out minor acts of sabotage and he became a sort of Robin Hood and rumours were circulated about this new Zealander who was doing this, that and the other and the Germans got to learn of this and eventually they captured him and they decided to send him to Germany for trial but it wasn’t known whether he was to go to Berlin or to Leipzig so as 4b was about halfway between the two he came to 4b and was locked up in the [straflagge] and there he made contact with French working parties. French used to work in there regularly and the French notified the British and it was known that if he went to either Berlin or Leipzig and was put on trial he’d be found guilty and he’d be shot and so they decided that he had to be rescued and a plot was formed and the French removed a window from the room where the showers were in the [straflagge] and put it back in a temporary position and he was briefed that when it was known that he was going to leave he was to insist upon having a shower and he was to go in to the shower room and escape from this window and be smuggled in to the camp and one day quite out of the blue we were all told to get over to the French compound as quickly as we could and to start a riot and we all got there and started fighting and jostling and messing and shouting and all the German cars were rushing to the French compound and this chappie escaped and he was hidden above a ceiling in a hut up in the dark, in the rafters and remained hidden until the end of the war. And the gestapo arrived and they made our lives hell for a week and they tore the camp to pieces and eventually we put about the rumour that he’d now left the camp and was on a train going to Switzerland so they all moved out to Switzerland [laughs] to the railway lines then and we were left in peace but he remained in the camp until the end of the war and eventually got back to New Zealand.
BW: Wow.
PB: Remarkable story.
BW: I mean yeah he was -
PB: I’ve got his name somewhere in a book but I can’t remember it off hand.
BW: It would be interesting to, to find his name and look him up.
PB: Well I can get it for you.
BW: Doesn’t, doesn’t need to be straightaway. We can get that afterwards.
PB: I can get it for you in a flash.
BW: Ok well just pause the recording for a moment.
PB: So we’re just looking at a book here called “Survival In Stalag Luft 4b”
BW: Yeah.
PB: And his name is Tony Hunt.
BW: Terry.
PB: Terry.
BW: Terry Hunt.
[pause]
PB: 136
[pause]
PB: Frederick William Ward he’s called.
BW: Frederick William Ward.
PB: Yeah. Born in February 1912. Captured in North Africa in July ‘42. [pause] That will tell you about him there.
BW: Yeah.
PB: Fred Ward and this is, this is in the book by Tony Vercoe um which I’ll look up.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Um it says that he, he was captured and then interrogated and then will go into more detail about the activities with the French workers as you say. There’s a description there.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And then this lady you mentioned is called Florence Barrington.
PB: That’s right. Mrs Barrington.
BW: With a thirteen year old son, married a German photographer and that also gives us the correct name of, just so that I’ve got it right, Muhlberg M U H L B E R G so that helps identify -
PB: Yeah. Muhlberg.
BW: The camp.
PB: Muhlberg on the Elbe.
BW: Yeah. What I’ll do if you don’t mind I’ll have a look at this separately and sort of off air of the recording.
PB: Yeah.
BW: But that, that’s great that is good information.
PB: Yes. You’ve got the full story there.
BW: So we were talking just briefly before about some of the escape attempts and how you’d helped to rescue this New Zealander from, from being shot.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Were there any other memorable attempts at all?
PB: Yes. Yes, there was one other memorable one. I had a friend, Fred Heathfield, who was a Halifax pilot with 51 squadron. He’d been shot, he’d crashed landed a Halifax on three engines in the pitch dark in Belgium and lived to tell the tale and I think the only thing that kept him alive was that he had his parachute on his chest and that took the main force of the impact. He got two black eyes and a broken nose. He was eventually captured in an hotel in Paris but he was, he was a pilot. I was a flight engineer. There was a Luftwaffe field a few kilometres away from the camp and Fred and I decided that if we could steal a JU88 we could fly at low level to Sweden and we, we started to try to get some information about German aircraft but by this time the Germans had issued a warning to all prison camps saying that because of the seriousness of the war situation there were certain areas of Germany which could not be identified but which were of importance to the, to the safety of the country and anybody caught in such an area without authority would be shot out of hand so we decided not to bother and we gave what information we had to an Australian pilot. What was his name? I’ve got a book by him in there. Anyway, this Australian pilot had a Canadian bomb aimer in his crew and I think he’d been brought up in the French speaking part of Canada because he spoke French like a native and also had quite a good knowledge of German and they decided that they would put this plan into operation but instead of flying to Sweden they would fly east and land behind Russian lines and give themselves over which to me sounded like a suicide note. And they left the camp. They went they went out with a work, we agreed to provide cover for three days so for three days the Germans wouldn’t know they were missing and they went out with a working party and disappeared and it was the night of Dresden. The night they went out was the night of Dresden and they, they, they walked. They were stopped several times and were able to convince whoever stopped them that they were French volunteers who were being moved from one job to another job and were on their way there and they got to this airfield and they lay up in the woods surrounding the airfield to watch what was going on and a JU88 landed and it was refuelled and they thought that’s it. So they find a log of wood and they picked it up and put it on their shoulders and marched to the edge of the airfield, put it down, got inside the JU and, what was his name? Anyway, he sat in the cockpit looking at the instruments and the controls and sorting out what’s what and the ground crew come back and said, ‘What are you doing in here? Foreign workers aren’t allowed in German aircraft. Clear off.’ And they got out, they picked up their log of wood. They walked back to the camp and I remember it plainly I was stood at one end of the hut and the door was at the far end and suddenly, Geoff his name was, Geoff and his bomb aimer Smith come walking down the hut and the Germans never knew they’d been away. Never knew they’d been away. And they’d been sat in a JU88.
BW: And they’d nearly got away with it.
PB: If they’d landed. I mean the Russians didn’t ask questions. If you got out of a German aircraft they shot you.
BW: Yeah.
PB: It was the daftest idea I’ve ever come across in my life but that’s what they’d decided on. Geoff Taylor. He was, he was, he was a journalist in Australia and he wrote a book called “Piece of Cake” which had a forward by Butch Harris of all people. I’ve got a copy in there and that was the most audacious escape but of course like all other escapes it came to nothing in the end.
BW: And were there quite a few others who tried and -
PB: Oh yes. It was sport.
BW: Captured.
PB: It was sport. This notice that the Germans issued said escaping is no longer a sport but that’s what it had been. When you read about people who spend all their time organising an escape they’re just a bloody nuisance to everybody. They ruin life in the camp. Everybody has to give way to them. They’re not going anywhere. They might be out for a week but they’re back.
BW: And in the meantime everybody else is perhaps suffering.
PB: Everybody’s inconvenienced, yeah.
BW: Yeah but they’re getting more inspections presumably.
PB: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. To have a fella like Bader in your camp must have been hell. Absolute hell.
BW: That’s why they decided to put him in Colditz.
[pause]
BW: And you hadn’t been tempted to try yourself. You were making yourself a nuisance in the camp you made life -
PB: Only this -
BW: Miserable for the Germans.
PB: Mad plan we had to fly to Sweden which we gave up on. It was impossible. But we had an Australian pilot killed in the camp in a flying accident. This Luftwaffe camp was only a few kilometres away and once the airmen there realised that there were now airmen in 4b occasionally they’d come over and give us a bit of a, a bit of a thrill. They did and they’d come across in a JU86 which was an obsolete bomber based on a, on a civil aircraft. It was a bit like a Hudson it was and it were coming over the camp in a shallow dive right along the full length of the French compound which was the biggest and climb away and all the airmen in the compound would be going like this.
BW: Waving.
PB: And the army went mad. The army said, ‘You’re going to kill us all the way you’re going.’ You know, these lads know what they’re doing. Anyway, one came over one day and it wasn’t an 86 it was an 88 a powerful, big, powerful machine and he came perhaps a bit steeper than usual and when he pulled up his tail mushed in and his tail went into a wire fence and it dragged about twenty feet of wire and two or three fence posts with it. The tail plane hit this, hit this Canadian pilot who was walking around the compound. Killed him instantly. One of the posts hit his companion and badly injured him and I was in our own compound and I could see through the French huts and I saw this thing. It was no higher than that. I don’t know why the airstream wasn’t tucked in the ground and eventually it climbed away with all this wire streaming behind him and the Luftwaffe gave a splendid funeral to this Australian and we were told that the pilot had been stripped of his brevvy, stripped of his rank, and posted to the eastern front as a common foot soldier. I think, it think they just told us that to pacify us. I can’t believe for a moment that that’s what happened but that’s the story they gave us but to be killed in a flying accident walking around a prison compound it’s a bit much isn’t it?
BW: Yeah and as you say there’s got to be some for the tail wheel to be that close to the ground that there’s got to be the plane itself has got to be very, very low.
PB: It was no higher -
BW: Ten feet or less
PB: Than that. I don’t know why the airstream wasn’t hitting the ground.
BW: And that you’re indicating’s about two foot -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Three foot.
PB: Yeah I just saw it go I could see it between the huts.
BW: Wow.
PB: And then it just climbed away with all the stuff just trailing behind it. Beautiful piece of flying. Wonderful skilled bit of flying.
BW: Just unfortunate consequence.
PB: Yeah. So we did get excitement from time to time.
BW: How did it feel when the Russians came to liberate? I mean -
PB: Oh -
BW: You must have had a pretty limited amount of information getting through and an impression of what the Russian forces were like. How did it feel when they -
PB: Well -
BW: Came into the camp?
PB: Well the first thing on the newsreels I’d seen pictures of refugees in France and suddenly early in April we got German refugees going past the camp and it was, it was an incredible sightseeing German refugees like that and they were streaming past the camp to get over the Elbe. And then we could -
BW: The Elbe must have been quite close to the camp
PB: Oh it was only about five kilometres and then we heard gunfire and then on St George ’s day early in the morning someone rushed into our hut shouting, ‘The Cossacks are here,’ and we went out and on the main road there were four of the scruffiest most dreadful looking men I’ve ever seen in my life. On horseback. Oh they did, they looked murderous, every one and they were loaded down with sandbags full of food and ammunition and God knows what and they just sat there and later in the day the infantry arrived and they made no provision for us whatsoever. Nothing. So we just broke out of the camp to steal food and steal drink as well and steal women as well no doubt but the Russians clamped on that and then they started to register us and they were going to send us to a Black Sea port, Odessa or some sort of place, and sail us home from there they said. When the Americans are only five miles away. The other side of the river. And they started to register us and they had great big women, great big fat women, tables outside, taking the records, and they got some funny ones. There was a Micky Mouse and James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart and it became chaotic and eventually we just said oh blow this and they packed it in and then they moved us, as I say, out of the camp and up into this maintenance depot.
BW: So they realised you were giving them some spoof names -
PB: Yeah.
BW: And not helping at all
PB: We sat in this maintenance depot about five of us who were all together and suddenly the most horrible screaming and I said the Russians have either got a woman or they’ve got a pig let’s go and to find out which it is. So we followed the noise and we came to a place and there were two Russians. There was one dead pig lying down and there’s another Russian with a pig like a cello with his hand way inside of it and the pig screaming away and we sit and we watch all this and we’re thinking they’ll give us something and we watch and we wait and eventually they killed it and they cut off the ears and gave us the ears. They took two pigs and gave us the bloody ears off one of pig.
BW: And kept the rest for themselves. And in general when they, as you put it, got their act together in terms of organising the camp presumably they re-erected the fence post that had been torn down.
PB: It became a far, far, far worse place than it had ever been.
BW: Yeah.
PB: They turned it into a punishment camp for German civilians. There were hundreds, if not thousands, of Germans died in that camp over the next five years and so the natives at Muelburg are attached to us really. We both suffered in that camp. It was a dreadful place. What it must have been like when it was dreadful when we were there. What it must have been like.
BW: And they weren’t bringing the civilians in while you were there?
PB: No, no.
BW: They presumably -
PB: No. It was after, after they’d repaired it and repaired all the damage we’d done.
BW: Yeah.
PB: And I think it was about five years they had it as a punishment camp. Must have been hell on earth. Hell on earth. Hundreds if not thousands died and this was just because of complaining about some regulation or other that the Russians had imposed. Anything at all, straight in there. Shocking that.
BW: But they didn’t, did they impose a regime on you as RAF crew waiting to be repatriated during that sort of interim period of April, May.
PB: Well it was all chaos. It was all chaos. I had quite an experience on VE day. They had their VE day a day later than ours because apparently they weren’t satisfied with the arrangements that the west had made so they decided to have their own, their own VE day the next day and I was, I was walking in the German town. Why I was alone and not with any of my friends I don’t know but I was alone and I was walking through this town and suddenly two Russian officers grabbed me and took me to their mess and gave me a huge meal. All, all looted German property of course. Animals, vegetables. The lot. And a particular sweet which I learned later was made from sour milk and it was absolutely gorgeous and after the meal they took me to a public hall where there was to be an address by a general followed by a concert and it was full of full of Russian soldiers, men and women, in all sorts of different uniforms and this general came onto the stage and I got, I got an example of what it was it was like being in a totalitarian state. He made a speech and the only words I heard were Churchill and Roosevelt every now and again he’d pause and somewhere at the very back of the, of the gallery [clapping sound] and immediately everybody’s clapping and immediately they all stopped like that.
BW: As if somebody was coordinating it.
PB: Someone’s coordinating. The whole thing was coordinated and eventually the speech finishes and we had this concert and it was absolutely fantastic. Oh the music and the dancing and the singing unbelievable. Unbelievable concert. It was terrific. Now what happened when it finished I’ve no idea. I haven’t a clue what happened to me that night. Not a clue. Not the slightest idea. I know I joined up with my friends the next day but what happened that night I don’t, I’ve no idea but I’ve never seen anything like the performance that these women who seemed to just move like that.
BW: Gracefully across -
PB: No, no leg movement at all.
BW: The stage yeah.
PB: And the Cossacks down on their heels kicking. Oh it was a fantastic concert and the singing and the balalaika playing. A night to remember that was. And that was VE day. VE day Russian version.
BW: How had you managed to celebrate it in the camp at all? You mentioned it was quite different to our celebration were there any –
PB: Well we didn’t know. We didn’t know it was VE day.
BW: So the only indication you got was from the Russians when they -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Held their celebrations.
PB: And as I say by this time we weren’t in the camp and in fact we’d broken and were trying to get across to the Americans on our own.
BW: And you mention you were in the town at this stage in Muhlberg.
PB: Ahum.
BW: What, what was it like what was your sense of being in the town? Were there, firstly, was it damaged but also were there German civilians who might be hostile.
PB: No.
BW: To the RAF at all.
PB: The civilians couldn’t get us in to their houses fast enough. We were never we were never short of somewhere to sleep or somewhere to wash.
BW: Right.
PB: Because I think the theory was if ten drunken Russians hammered on the door at midnight looking for women we would go to the door and say it was under British occupation you’ll have to go next door. It never worked out in practice [thank God] but that was the theory I think. They couldn’t get us into their houses fast enough.
BW: So a bit I suppose a bit of a protection there for them if the -
PB: Yeah.
BW: If the Russians had seen western RAF aircrew in a house -
PB: Yeah.
BW: They would be less likely -
PB: Yeah. Yeah.
BW: To interfere with it.
PB: And we slept we slept on a feather bed with a feather bed on top of us with a great big bed oh it was wonderful.
BW: And the Germans managed to put you up in the sense that they would feed you as well.
PB: Yes. Yes,
BW: Even though they would have probably been rationed at this stage and -
PB: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, they couldn’t do enough for us.
BW: And did you get to go back to Muhlberg in the intervening years?
PB: No, because I don’t know where we were. I don’t know where the Russians had moved us to.
BW: Right.
PB: The, the Stalag 4b Association organised trips to Muhlberg later and they became very popular because the Muhlberg people themselves were in the same boat but I never went. In fact they had a trip this year starting off in Berlin and moving down to Muhlberg.
BW: And when you came back to the UK we picked up the story at Cosford and we picked up the extra pay that you’d been awarded.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And you were washed and brushed up. What then happened to you sort of post war from Cosford?
PB: Well I was given three options. I could come out immediately or I could go to oh what’s the Yorkshire town, the spa town?
BW: Harrogate.
PB: Harrogate. On a rehabilitation course and then come out or I could opt to stay in until my normal release date. Well I thought there was still a chance of getting back on flying and getting out east and bombing Japan so I opted to stay in and I got posted to a, to a Mosquito squadron near, near Newcastle and there, there I became in effect the squadron warrant officer. I sat in an office all day doing nothing but we had a very, very good rugby team. Our sports, our sports officer was a first class scrub half and we had a very good rugby team and we won the group cup without any difficulty and we got drawn in for the semi-final of the national cup and we got drawn away against Ringway and we came down to Ringway and we found that although paratroopers are army the people who trained them were airmen and practically every one of them was a rugby league professional. So, we turned out on a rugby pitch at Ringway about six hundred red cap paratroopers lying around the pitch cheering their side on. We were up against these great hulking fellas who were fit like butchers dogs. Oh they murdered us. Absolutely murdered us.
BW: And do you still retain an interest in rugby league despite that? Do you follow -
PB: Not rugby league. I don’t like rugby league but we were, they were playing rugby union but they were rugby league professionals.
BW: Right.
PB: But when we got back, when we got back to Acklington I thought that’s it. There’s nothing, nothing doing for me now so I asked to be released and I was released within days.
BW: And was that in 1945?
PB: That would, no, it would be 1946.
BW: ’46.
PB: Yeah.
BW: From Acklington and from then on what happened in your civilian life?
PB: Well, I couldn’t settle.
BW: Your post war life.
PB: I couldn’t settle. I got I got a job as a clerk with a, with a big chemical manufacturing company and I was in this office with about six other people who were as dull as ditchwater, been there forever and all I was doing was calculating lorry loads [eight car loads used to go there and six car loads to go there?] making up that and oh it was absolutely soul destroying. I stuck it I think for three months and then I thought I can’t, I can’t, I can’t settle to this so I then decided I thought the only way to get some companionship again, get some comradeship again was if I joined the police force so I went to, I went to the police station in Burnley and they said, ‘We’ve no, we’ve no vacancies but we can put you in touch with our central organisation.’ So they did and I was called for interview at Wallasey and got into the Wallasey force with three other people and when we went to the police training school we found that three people on the course were Burnley recruits. Burnley. But this gave me my first insight into the police they were recruiting people but they wouldn’t recruit Burnley people. They wouldn’t have anybody who lived in the town going into the police force. So that was the first lie from the police. I worked hard. I came out top of the class and we got to Wallasey and for the first fortnight I was sent out on patrol with another policeman who’d been on patrol for years and I learned how to, I learned which cafes you could sit in the back rooms of and drink coffee and I learned all sort of tricks that really you shouldn’t be doing and it was a complete and utter waste of time and in a small force like Wallasey the opportunity for promotion were very, very few and far between. You had people who had been pounding the beat for fifteen years. They’d passed their sergeants examinations, they passed their inspectors examinations and they were still pounding the beat and the only way you could get on was to curry favour. Start oozing up to some officers and telling tales. It was the exact opposite of comradeship. Everybody’s telling tales about everybody. I thought I can’t stick this so I resigned from that and I was playing rugby in Burnley then and one of the team was a cotton mill owner and he said, ‘If you ever want a proper job I’ll give you a job in a cotton mill,’ so I went to work in his cotton mill and that was no good. And all the time I’m in touch with my bomb aimer’s father. Had regular correspondence and I said to him, ‘I can’t settle I’m going to go back into the air force.’ And he said, ‘Well don’t do anything for the next fortnight,’ and I received a letter -
[interview transmission interrupted]
BW: Alright, so we’re only, we’re only a couple of minutes from the end and I was just asking Mr Phillip Bates that after the end of the war in conclusion he’d said that he’d had a good war but it had had its moments um that were not entirely enjoyable but that overall he’d enjoyed it, his service in the RAF but I was asking just about the commemorations and the national, now centre, at Lincoln and you mentioned that you’d been down to London for the unveiling of the memorial there.
PB: Yeah.
BW: At Green Park.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And you got to meet Camilla as well did you say?
PB: Yes Camilla and the Prince of Wales. I got to shake both their hands. The Prince of Wales surprised me really. It was probably, it was probably the hottest day of the year and everybody had taken his blazer off and I was wearing my Raf Ex-Pow Association tie and the Prince of Wales came along and immediately recognised my tie which surprised me. And as he shook my hand he said, ‘Where did they keep you?’ I said, ‘Stalag 4b, sir.’ He said, ‘Were you a digger?’ I said, ‘Oh no I wasn’t a digger, sir. No. I left that to other people,’ and he was quite jovial and then of course he moved on and made his way down the line but I was amazed that he recognised my tie instantly.
BW: That’s a very nice point that, you know, he’s identified you by that.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And spoke to you particularly because of it.
PB: And part of the Royal Air Force. I’ve got photographs of it all.
BW: And how about now that there’s a centre for Bomber Command in Lincoln?
PB: Well yes he’s lost his football again. I was due to go there and a friend of mine, Dominic was taking me but when it came to it I wasn’t fit to go. I couldn’t have sat in a car for three hours. I just couldn’t. And then another three hours coming back. And Dominic also had a cold so we were ashamed to admit it and then again it’s Lincoln. It’s Lancasters. Bugger the Lancasters I say.
BW: Well perhaps it didn’t prove as reliable as the Stirling because it didn’t fly. They were trying to get the Lancaster flying for the Friday unveiling but they didn’t and I think it may have flown -
PB: Yeah.
BW: The day after but -
PB: What annoys me they chopped up every Stirling. Now, you think they could, it was the first four engine aircraft we had. You’d think they could have had two or three for museums wouldn’t you?
BW: Ahum.
PB: But no they chopped up the lot and that really does grieve me.
BW: And even now they’ve got a Halifax in Elvington.
PB: Oh I’ve seen that.
BW: Which is nicely renovated and so on.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Doesn’t fly.
PB: And it’s got, it’s got the Stirling’s engines in it as well. It hasn’t got Rolls Royce in it it’s got Hercules. It’s a mark iii. It’s that one. The mark iii.
BW: That’s the picture on the wall yeah. And there is a Halifax that they dug out or pulled out of a Norwegian fjord in 1973.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And that is in the Royal Air Force Museum in London.
PB: Yeah. Well for years we hoped that they’d would find a Stirling somewhere but er somewhere in Holland but they never did.
BW: Ahum ahum.
PB: A great shame because it was a beautiful aeroplane.
BW: Could take, from what you were saying, could take a fair bit of punishment and keep flying.
PB: Yeah it was a lot bigger than a Lancaster of course but it had some disadvantages you see. It couldn’t fly high and it couldn’t carry big bombs. It didn’t have a bomb bay. It had three separate ones which gave immense strength to the fuselage because you had these girders running the full length but you could only get a two thousand pound bomb in it so we mostly carried incendiaries.
BW: So just thinking in brief terms about the structure of a bomber formation in that case because you’d see that the pathfinders were going first to mark the target.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Presumably the Stirlings would then go in with the incendiaries.
PB: No. No, we were our main raid was either five or sometimes six waves.
BW: Right.
PB: And the Stirlings were always in the third wave. We got some protection from the first two waves going out and some protection from the last two waves coming back because we were a bit slower than they were. So we were always in the third wave.
BW: Right.
PB: Except, except Peenemunde. Now, that, that’s a terrible story. The night before Peenemunde we went to, we went to Turin and somewhere our radio packed in and we didn’t get the message telling us that East Anglia was fogged up and we had to land in Kent or Sussex. Wherever we could. We didn’t get that message so we arrived back at Lakenheath and asked for instructions to land and they said. ‘You can’t land here. It’s totally fogbound but if you get over to Oakington you might just get down.’ Well, we got over to Oakington, the other side of Cambridge and we just landed. They closed the, closed the airfield immediately we landed and they debriefed us and fed us and provided us with beds and in the early afternoon we went down to the airfield and the Lancasters of seven group were being bombed up and we knew we were on again that night and we were going on leave the so next day so we weren’t anxious to go bombing that night. Anyway, we’d no choice we started the port outer. Come to the port inner, nothing. The starter motor was dead. The starter motors they had in Oakington would fit a Lancaster, it wouldn’t have fit us so we rang Lakenheath to tell them. Eventually a lorry arrives with some fitters and a new starter motor and we landed at Lakenheath just as the squadron is taxiing out for take-off and we were very, very happy because we were going on leave the next day and then I discover we’d missed bloody Peenemunde and at Peenemunde the Stirlings went in first at five thousand feet in brilliant moonlight and all the fighters were circling in Berlin because Mosquitos were dropping target indicators on Berlin. The Germans got away scot free. Eventually the Germans twigged what was happening and got the fighters over and shoot down forty Lancasters and Halifaxes. Stirlings, scot free.
BW: And because you, they’d have been in the first wave.
PB: Yeah.
BW: They got away with it.
PB: There were three, there were three targets. The first one was at the very southern end was all the housing and the Stirlings destroyed that and then the next waves destroyed the science laboratories and then the assembly works and we missed it and it’s grieved me the rest of my life. I’d have given anything to have been on that raid and we were so happy that we weren’t. Oh, a friend of mine got shot down that night. No. I’d have loved to have been on Peenemunde.
BW: I mean that was, that was announced at fairly short notice. It was, you know sometimes a raid has to be planned quite well in advance.
PB: Yeah.
BW: But this was because of the intelligence about the weapons.
PB: Yeah.
BW: They were developing their short notice.
PB: The crews weren’t told, they were told that they were attacking an experimental place for new radar [and the better job of the radar they’d better defend themselves because they destroy all the latest airborne radar] that was the story that was given to aircrews.
BW: Interesting.
PB: Oh I’d have given anything to have been on that raid. Anything. Five thousand feet, brilliant moonlight and you were the first in.
BW: As you say it’s how fate goes isn’t it?
PB: Yeah.
BW: But -
PB: I’ve just been to the funeral of a friend of mine. George. He trained in Canada as a navigator. As a Mosquito navigator which is a specialised navigation job. He qualifies, he gets his brevvy, he’s ready to join the squadron and the war stops. They never even, he never even saw a Mosquito. Oh what a terrible thing to have happen to you. Terrible.
BW: Gone through all that. Well, I was reading in the prep really that they launched a raid on Peenemunde.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And just looking here at some of this um yeah it says here that 149 squadron took part in the early offensive against Germany.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And took part in the first thousand bomber raids with Stirlings.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Made a significant contribution to the battle of the Ruhr, Battle of Hamburg and the raid against the V weapons experimental station at Peenemunde.
PB: Yeah.
BW: And then between February and July ‘44 and in addition to dropping high explosives on the enemy the squadron helped supply the French maquis with supplies, arms and ammunition by parachute.
PB: Yeah.
BW: Of course that would be after you’d been shot down.
PB: About eight weeks after we were shot down Stirlings were taken off German targets completely. Some of them converted to Lancasters. Those that kept their Stirlings were used to drop supplies in France and to do mine laying and later to tow, to tow gliders but they never went to Germany again. The loss rate was unsustainable. I’d been on raids where we lost one in every five Stirlings. You can’t, you can’t keep that up for very long.
BW: No. No. Not at all. Do you think there was a particular weakness perhaps in the Stirling that the losses were so high or was it just good -
PB: You couldn’t get any altitude.
BW: Just because they were restricted to -
PB: Yeah, yeah.
BW: Low ceiling.
PB: Altitude. I mean, I had friends who flew at twenty two thousand feet. On a good night we would get thirteen. On a poor night we would get eleven. Everything that was thrown up reached the Stirlings and everything that was coming down reached the Stirling as well [laughs].
BW: I think you mentioned at one point a bomb hit your aircraft. A bomb -
PB: Yeah.
BW: Dropped from the aircraft above.
PB: This was the Nuremberg. I think it must have been a thirty pound incendiary because it went straight through. If it had been a four pound I think it would have stayed in the wing and burned. If it had been [eighty] it would have taken the wing off. Left quite a sizable hole.
BW: I would just like to show you this. There’s a photo here of a Stirling crew of 149 squadron based at Lakenheath.
PB: Oh.
BW: And I just wonder whether you might recognise any of the names. It’s only a longshot.
PB: Oh.
BW: But there’s -
PB: As I say we never bothered with other crews really.
BW: No.
PB: Except the ones we trained with at -
BW: But it looks like it’s outside the mess at Lakenheath that picture.
PB: Yeah I don’t recognise the photograph. Crowe, that’s a familiar name, Crowe. Oh he was a POW that’s why I know him. Was he a flight engineer? I knew a Tweedy in prison but he was a soldier. I don’t recognise the faces at all. Don’t know why their wearing uniform instead of battledress but there we are. Battledress were far more comfortable. That’s interesting. 27th of September. Oh well they would have been newcomers on the squadron when we were there. The average life expectancy was only six weeks. I had two friends, both on Halifaxes -
BW: Thank you.
PB: Both shot down on their first trip and my friend who were in training, a flight engineer on 15 squadron did four operations and got shot down twice.
BW: Right. I think that sort of brings us to the end as I say unless there is anything else you want to say.
PB: Well I hope I haven’t bored you.
BW: Not at all sir. No not at all there’s plenty of information. Some really interesting and diverse experiences. It’s been very kind of you to share those with me.
PB: It’s a pleasure.
BW: So thank you very much -
PB: A pleasure.
BW: For your time um what I’ll do is I’ll come to the signing of the release form now and a couple of photos so I’ll end the recording there and we’ll sort out the paperwork.
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ABatesP151009
Title
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Interview with Philip Bates
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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IBCC Digital Archive
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Sound
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eng
Format
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02:13:03 audio recording
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Pending review
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Creator
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Brian Wright
Date
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2015-10-09
Description
An account of the resource
Philip Bates grew up in Lancashire and joined the Royal Air Force in 1940. He served as ground crew with Coastal Command before remustering as aircrew. He flew operations as a flight engineer with 149 Squadron until his aircraft was shot down and he became a prisoner of war.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Air Force. Coastal Command
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
Poland
England--Lancashire
England--Suffolk
Poland--Tychowo
Germany
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Hamburg
Germany--Nuremberg
Temporal Coverage
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1942
1943
1944
1945
Contributor
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Julie Williams
149 Squadron
aircrew
anti-aircraft fire
bomb struck
bombing
bombing of Hamburg (24-31 July 1943)
Bombing of Peenemünde (17/18 August 1943)
displaced person
Dulag Luft
entertainment
fear
final resting place
flight engineer
ground crew
ground personnel
Heavy Conversion Unit
home front
incendiary device
Ju 88
Lysander
Manchester
Me 110
military living conditions
military service conditions
mine laying
Nissen hut
prisoner of war
RAF Lakenheath
RAF St Athan
RAF Waterbeach
Resistance
Scarecrow
searchlight
shot down
Stirling
training
Window
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/858/11100/AHarrisHST150909.2.mp3
0644ea5d3fae401b624fe3f915057fc0
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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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Harris, Harry
Harry Stracan Thomson Harris
H S T Harris
Sam Harris
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Flight Lieutenant Harry Stracan Thomson Harris (162261 Royal Air Force). He flew two tours of operations as a navigator with 103 Squadron and later with 105 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-09-09
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.
Identifier
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Harris, HST
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
BW: Alright. This is Brian Wright and I’m interviewing Mr Harry Harris on Wednesday the 9th of September at 2:25 in the afternoon in his house. So, Harry, you were in the RAF, in Bomber Command. What was your rank when you left?
HH: Flight lieutenant.
BW: Ok. And start us off. Just please tell me about your home life before the war.
HH: Well in 1939 I lived in ‘Trose and I went down to London to start a chef’s course at the Westminster College for Cookery and I stayed with an aunt who lived in London. I was there during the Blitz and then my, my cousin and I didn’t agree so I was evacuated to Exeter as an evacuee.
BW: Right.
HH: But I didn’t like it at Exeter and I came back to London. Started, re-started on the course and I lived in a sort of YMCA place beside the River Thames and it was the centre of the bombing there and, but I liked it. I went out every night to watch the bombers. But then I had to leave and I found out later, my aunt had been paying for my education and she had to stop work and look after her parents. So, I had to go home and I worked for a year in a mental, the hospital of a mental asylum.
BW: And what year was that?
HH: That was in 1941. And then when I became seventeen and a half — it was 1940, I came back. And when I became seventeen and a half I volunteered as a pilot at Aberdeen. Then I went to Edinburgh about July to do the course. The tests and things. And they drilled me then as a navigator and I found out much later, when I was at the RAF flying college that if you got a certain, they did a maths test and if you got above a certain number you automatically qualified as a navigator. Under that you became a pilot or an air gunner. And we used to, when we found out we used to call them the dim pilots [laughs] because they couldn’t pass the test. But then I went to, went to London to Lord’s Cricket Ground. That was where we think we met. And then went down to Torquay. Babbacombe near Torquay, for the first course. Training course. And then from there to Eastbourne for another course and from there went to, to South Africa for our flying. We landed at Cape Town and went up to Pretoria and then down to Port Elizabeth where we did our course. Our flying course. And then passed out and got our wings. I got mine in November 1942.
BW: And this was your navigator wings.
HH: Navigator. Yes.
BW: Right. What prompted you to become a navigator? I think you mentioned earlier you wanted to be a pilot.
HH: A pilot. Yeah. Well when I went —
BW: Why the change?
HH: When I went to this board at Edinburgh. I forget what they called the board. Screening board. And we did, you know, oral interviews. We had written tests and one was a maths test and apparently that’s when the heavy bombers were coming in and they wanted navigators and so they did this by choosing above a certain percentage in the maths test. You were automatically selected as navigator.
BW: Ok. And when you went down to Cape Town for the, for the flying was that the navigational instructional part of flying?
HH: Yes.
BW: So you were put in an aircraft and learned to navigate.
HH: That’s right. Yeah. We flew in Oxfords. Yeah.
BW: Ok.
HH: At Port Elizabeth. And there used to be three u/t navigators in an aircraft. One was navigating. One was sitting beside the pilot and using the wind to find out the winds and the other one did the Astra. And —
BW: The Astra being the star navigations.
HH: Astra navigation. Yeah. And on the second last one of our course we flew out over the sea and our course commander was an ex-naval officer and we flew over the sea and we saw all these lifeboats. A tremendous number of lifeboats. We couldn’t communicate with them so we came back to Port Elizabeth and they sent out a boat and picked up all the survivors. But the next day we went out again. This time I was sitting in the front with the pilot and I saw a boat. It was a U-boat.
BW: Right.
HH: And the pilot, the South African pilot and he turned towards this U-boat and started diving. Now this U-boat came up, there was three gunners at the far end of the boat with a gun and they were firing at us and the shells were just going two or three feet above us because they weren’t allowing for us going down. So we carried a depth charge and as we got closer the three men ran towards the conning tower. As we got closed the conning tower was closed so they couldn’t get in. We dropped the depth charge and at this time we were only about fifty feet and this time we turned. There was nothing left. The U-boat had gone. And years, years later I met the course commander and, you know I asked if anything had happened about that. And he said, ‘No. They never confirmed the loss of a U-boat.’ Yeah.
BW: So you weren’t sure whether it had dived and avoided it or whether it had been hit.
HH: No. We didn’t know.
BW: There was no trace of it.
HH: No.
BW: Right. And that was just on, that was just on the training.
HH: [laughs] Yes. On training. That was our last trip. Funny. We went back to Cape Town and then, I forget where and we got on the boat again to come home. And we were in the South Atlantic when we, the ship ran into the wreckage of a ship that had been torpedoed. We lost a propeller and had to go in to New York and we got there on the 26th of December. And we were there for three weeks. Beautiful.
BW: Very good. And so, you then must have come back from America.
HH: We came back to New York.
BW: At some point.
HH: Back to Glasgow. Yeah. And then we did more flying at Wigtown on Ansons. Just to get acclimatized, you know, with the country. And then we went to the Operational Training Unit and it’s all written down there. That’s where we met the first of the crew. The pilot was Ken Murray and he’d trained in America and he wanted to fly on fighters. And when he found he was going to be flying on bombers he wasn’t a very happy chap I can tell you. But we got on well.
BW: Good.
HH: And the first day there they had to crew-up and at the end of the day there was twelve of us hadn’t crewed-up. That was two crews. So we want to the pub in Loughborough and somehow we got together and we stayed together.
BW: And this was The Golden Fleece in Loughborough. Is that right?
HH: Yeah. And the other crew that were there that night they were killed at the Operational Training Unit. They crashed on take-off and they were all killed. So if I’d gone with the other pilot I wouldn’t be here today.
BW: That’s fate isn’t it?
HH: It is. Yeah.
BW: So you were based in, in Lincolnshire.
HH: Yeah. Elsham Wolds.
BW: Or Leicestershire. About there. Is that right? At that time?
HH: Pardon?
BW: You were based around Leicestershire at that time if you were in Loughborough.
HH: At that time. Yeah. We must. We did our first operation from there.
BW: So where were you, where you were based at this point on — had you joined operations at this stage? Now you’d crewed up.
HH: No. No. We, we went. We did our flying training on Wellingtons. Wellington 1Cs. And at the end of the course we went on an operation to Dunkirk. And it’s all written down there. And when we got over the target we got hit by flak but we managed to get back home. The hydraulic system had gone. So had to wind down the undercarriage. Wind down flaps. And the next morning the engineer came and said that the shell had missed the fuel tank by three inches [laughs] And we wouldn’t be here.
BW: Wow.
HH: Yeah. He had it all. He said three inches.
BW: And so the early part of your flying career then you were flying in Wellingtons.
HH: Yeah. Wellington 1Cs. Yeah.
BW: And from then on, I mean we understand that you went on to fly Lancasters.
HH: On to Lancasters. Yeah.
BW: How many operations did you fly on Wellingtons?
HH: One. Just the one.
BW: Just the one.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And how was the change made, or the decision made for you to fly Lancasters?
HH: Well we, from the Wellingtons we went to train on Halifaxes. And then when the pilot was capable of flying the Halifax we went on to Lancasters. And then when they were satisfied that he was fit then we went to 576 Squadron, Elsham Wolds.
BW: And Elsham Wolds is also in Lincolnshire isn’t it?
HH: Yeah. Lincoln. Lincolnshire.
BW: And how did you find that change from Halifaxes to Lancasters? Was there—
HH: Oh, I loved the Lancaster. Yeah. That was, yeah.
BW: And there are more, are there the same number of crew in the Wellingtons?
HH: Yeah. Same number of crew. Yeah.
BW: Ok. So you were able to keep the same crew together?
HH: Oh yes. The same crew. Yeah.
BW: And what were the living conditions like on base at that time?
HH: Well, there was Nissen huts. I suppose we got used to them. Each Nissen hut got somehow fourteen, somehow twenty beds and you just got used to it. You had, well they just had the basics I suppose.
BW: Just a bed and blankets.
HH: Bed and blankets in them.
BW: And a stove in the middle.
HH: Yeah. Yeah there was three, I forget what they call them now. Three square things made up the mattress. Yeah. And that’s all there was. And the washing facilities were always outside. And in the wintertime there was no heating in the ablutions and so the water was freezing cold. Sometimes frozen altogether. And the heating inside the stoves [pause] well you used what you could. Logs or anything we used to use just to keep the place warm when we were there.
BW: Did you have the hut to yourself or were you sharing with another crew?
HH: We shared. Until we got to the squadron we shared with another crew. When we got to Elsham Wolds we had to wait until they got the Nissen ready. And we got the Nissen and we found out later that we had to wait because the crew that had occupied the Nissen had gone missing. And there was room for two crews actually but we only ever had the one crew in it. The losses was pretty heavy so we only ever had just the one. Just ourselves.
BW: And were you fairly close to the aircraft? Or to the mess?
HH: No. We had to get —
BW: Whereabouts on the base were you?
HH: We all had cycles. It was about a mile, a mile and a half to cycle.
BW: Each day. Just to —
HH: Yeah. Just to get up to the main part.
BW: Right.
HH: Yeah. Yeah. All the living accommodation was spread away from the airfield.
BW: Right. I’m just going to pause the recording for the moment.
[recording paused]
BW: I just paused the recording there to allow us to just put the door to and avoid any background noise. So, continuing on you were at Elsham Wolds then. You were flying Lancasters. And you were living in Nissen huts.
HH: Yeah.
BW: At the edge of the airfield. What were your, or describe for me if you would please a typical sortie for a Lancaster operation from sort of getting ready to do the operation and then flying it and then coming back. What was that like?
HH: Well we, we used to, every morning we went and got breakfast. Went up to the squadron offices and sometimes we would go ahead and do an air test and we’d wait until about lunchtime and then they would say whether the operations were on that night or not. That was usually around lunchtime. And then the briefing was with, there was a navigation briefing first. Just the navigator, the bomb aimer and the pilot there. And we got told the target, the route and I made out the flight plan. And when that was finished we went to the main operations room where the station commander, he would, all the crews were there and he would tell them where the operation was and that was the first they would know. We had known maybe half an hour, three quarters of an hour before but then they only knew then. And they went through the drill — what was happening, what the target was and any questions. And I can’t remember anybody ever asking a question [laughs] and then we went to the aircraft and took off at the allotted time.
BW: It, it’s been said at certain times that aircrew had superstitions. Were there any that you were aware of on your aircraft or in your crew?
HH: Any? Any what?
BW: Superstitions or habits or, guys would take, for example personal items with them as lucky charms. Were there any instances like that?
HH: See that picture behind you.
BW: There’s a, on the wall is a picture of, like a little gollywog.
HH: Yeah.
BW: Was that yours?
HH: Yeah. My wife, when we came back from South Africa my girlfriend, now my wife she bought me that and I wore that every time I flew. For the rest of my flying career I flew with that.
BW: And what’s —
HH: It’s downstairs.
BW: What sort of size is, is that? Is it, it must only have been a little figure was it?
HH: It was — high. Yes. It’s downstairs.
BW: So about three to four inches. Yeah Three or four inches tall.
HH: It just fitted inside the pocket. Yeah.
BW: Right. So that was your lucky charm that you took on a mission.
HH: That was my lucky charm. Yeah.
BW: It seems to have worked.
HH: The lucky charm and a box of matches in that pocket. And twenty cigarettes in the other one [laughs]
BW: About —
HH: I never ever flew again without that mascot. And I flew over nine and a half thousand hours.
BW: Wow. And did the, did your other mates have any similar things?
HH: Yeah. They had similar things but I can’t remember what they were.
BW: Right.
HH: But every one of them had a mascot. Every one [laughs]
BW: So you get into the aircraft. You get into the Lancaster and prepare. What sort of things would you start to do and the others start to do to, to get ready?
HH: Well, we, first of all we went to pick up our parachutes and Mae Wests. And then we got in a truck that took us out to the aircraft. We’d get inside and prepare. Like the pilot and the flight engineer would do all the checks. Checks. Myself and the bomb aimer, you know would get the flight plan and check all the other instruments were there. The wireless op was the same. And the air gunners, they would check all their equipment. And then it would be time to, to go to the take-off point. The take off point was a caravan and they gave a green light to take off. And beside that caravan, every time I can remember there was a crowd of WAAFs there. And airmen but mostly WAAFS would come to see us take off. And, and that, I was thinking back. That was the time that we were most frightened. Take-off time. Every time we talked it was, in case we would crash on take-off.
BW: Because the aircraft is fully loaded and fully fuelled.
HH: Fully loaded. Yeah. Had full fuel and we had a big cookie each. What was it? Two tonnes plus incendiaries. And one night we didn’t take off properly. We went through, past the end of the runway, through the fence at the end of the runway and luckily there was a quarry underneath and we went down in the quarry and came out at Brigg before we started to pull up again.
BW: So if there hadn’t been a quarry at the end of the runway — ?
HH: That was, we would have gone [laughs] That was, that was the worst one. Yeah.
BW: Wow.
HH: Yeah. That quarry saved us. And it was a long time it ever happened because we would fly over Brigg which was quite a few miles away before we started to climb.
BW: And yet the other aircraft would have been similarly fuelled and armed.
HH: Yeah but they —
BW: And they got off all right.
HH: Yeah. Yeah. Don’t know what it was. No. No.
BW: So, on the flight out you’re now airborne heading towards the enemy coast. What sort of things are happening in the aircraft at this stage?
HH: Well, on the Lancasters then we had a navigation aid called Gee. You know, where we could fix our position within, you know a half of mile. But once it got outside Britain the signal faded and the Germans were jamming it anyhow. So after that you relied just on, I don’t know the Pathfinders would pass winds and you used to use these winds because they had H2S which gave a map of the ground. But the winds weren’t always accurate. Sometimes a long, long way out. And so we, we just had this Gee. That was all.
BW: And apart from that there was just dead reckoning presumably.
HH: Dead reckoning. That’s all there was. Yeah.
BW: Did you —
HH: But then we got an aircraft. It was fitted with H2S [laughs] That was towards the end and that, that was absolutely different altogether. Yeah.
BW: Made the job a lot easier.
HH: Yeah. It did. Yeah.
BW: So did you have to circle the airfield to form up?
HH: Oh yeah.
BW: Or did you meet the formation over a certain point?
HH: No. We, you were given your take-off time and the first crews took off first so, and then you had time to set course over the airfield. That’s sometimes you’d get airborne and it was twenty, twenty five minutes before you got back over the airfield for the right time to head out. And it was strongly, they put, always had the new crews on there. They should have put the older crews on that but they didn’t. They didn’t in our squadron.
BW: So you had, you had a separate take off time to be airborne.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And you then had to be overhead the airfield at a certain time to set course.
HH: Yeah. All aircraft. Well if it was fairly light you could see the other aircraft. Otherwise you didn’t.
BW: And did —
HH: And I think there were some crashes there too.
BW: And did you see much of the other aircraft throughout the rest of the sorties?
HH: No. No.
BW: Missions.
HH: Not unless they were caught in the searchlights. No.
BW: So —
HH: We did, it was all night stuff we did.
BW: So presumably then very rarely would you actually see other aircraft in the, in the formation.
HH: No. You wouldn’t. No.
BW: How did it feel then? Did it feel as part of a combined effort or did it feel pretty much as a lone crew out there?
HH: Well it just, it was just the sort of thing you did, you know. I don’t know. As I said the only time we saw other aircraft was when they were caught in the searchlights. And over a target, you know when the target was all lit up then you could see other aircraft. Usually then there was full searchlights. But no. In the darkness we never saw anything.
BW: So when you left the shores of England and you were flying out over the Sea were you able to see France or the Dutch coast at all?
HH: No. No. No. It was always dark. Always dark. Never saw the ground.
BW: Did you ever receive any attention from the flak guns on the ground below or from night fighters at all?
HH: We once had night fighters and the rear gunner, he fired his guns but then I don’t know what happened. It just disappeared. That was the only time.
BW: And so when it came to being over the target what would be happening in the aircraft then?
HH: Well, the bomb aimer would be down giving directions. He’d find the [pause] the what do you call it? [laughs] The target indicator. And it was red, blue, whatever it was. And he’d find that and he’d head towards that and give directions to the pilot — left, left, right. And then the flight engineer and the pilot were in their seats. I would get out of mine and I would stand behind the flight engineer to see what was going on. And the, then there’s bombs gone and then they had to wait because the camera would take a photograph. So it was like forty seconds I think till the bombs went down and once the photograph was taken it was bomb doors closed. I would give the pilot the next heading and off we’d go.
BW: And all this time on the run in to the target and the run out you had to keep straight and level.
HH: Oh yes.
BW: One, in order to, to allow the bombs to fall accurately but also to allow the photograph to be taken.
HH: Had to be absolutely straight and level. Yeah. Yeah.
BW: Were there times when that wasn’t possible?
HH: The only times if you’d got behind another aircraft and then you’d go bumpety bump. That was awful. But when I was, later when I was in Mosquitoes and doing the bombing that was beautiful. The Mosquito could hold itself nicely. But the Lancaster, no. There was always aircraft in front. It was a bit bumpy, you know.
BW: Just because of the turbulence —
HH: Turbulence. Yeah.
BW: From the aircraft ahead. And so once you’d dropped the, dropped the bombs and turned for home what sort of things were going on then? What —
HH: Well, that was, I think that’s when we lost a lot of the aircraft but I’m not sure because the German fighters then, they were all from over the place, had gone. They knew where the target was and had gone there and there was lots and lots of fighters.
BW: So the gunners were pretty active.
HH: We could, we could see the other aircraft being shot down. We’d see the tracer bullets and this sort of thing. It’s quite a lot of, the worst one was on the Nuremberg raid where we lost ninety five. And on the way out it was a long, straight course and the fighters got up. And I was inside there, I didn’t see anything but the flight engineer was saying, ‘There’s another one,’ and the pilot said, ‘It’s only dummies. It’s only dummies. They’re just shooting dummies. There’s no aircraft there.’ And when we got back to base, at the debriefing he said, ‘And we lost an awful lot of aircraft on the way out.’ Oh [laughs] Trying to keep us from being frightened. Yeah.
BW: When, during the flight back did you begin to feel safe again?
HH: I think we felt safe all the way really. It was just we’d done the job and I was just getting back.
BW: Ok.
HH: I can’t, all I was worried about mostly was when we could pick up the navigation. Gee. You know. To be sure we were in the right place. But I, I don’t think we were. I could be wrong but I don’t think we worried too much going back. You know. It was going out. The very worst time was the take-off. That was, we all agreed that was the worst time.
BW: So once you were in the air the nerves started to settle a bit with doing your job.
HH: You were doing your job then. Yeah.
BW: So, roughly how long would each sortie or each operation have been then?
HH: About six hours. It’s all in there somewhere. Each one. About six hours I think. Yeah. But then after a while we started going to the French targets and that was, you know five hours maybe. And the very last one was on D-Day. We went to Vire Bridge in Northern France. And that was the first time that the bomb aimer had seen where the bombs landed. And two of them landed on the bridge. He was so happy we hit it.
BW: What was the name of the bridge again?
HH: Vire. V I R E.
BW: Oh. I see.
HH: Yeah. My eldest daughter’s, well she’s been going to France for years to a motorbike thing and she brought back a picture of somewhere around. There is a picture of Vire Bridge.
BW: Obviously rebuilt since your bomb aimer put two bombs on it.
HH: Yeah. Funnily enough on Mosquitoes I only once saw where the bombs dropped. It was a Cookie we carried. No, I wasn’t. Sometimes. And I can still see it. Yeah. There was a very, very wide road. A canal running along the side and a building with a massive door at the side. The bomb landed in the middle of this so it must have blown the door, must have blown the side off the factory. That’s what we were aiming for. The factory. That was the only once.
BW: And the bomb hit. It landed on the road. Or landed in the —
HH: Landed on the road. Yeah. It was halfway between the building and the canal.
BW: But it still blew the factory down.
HH: It would have. It was only about ten fifteen yards from the wall so it must have blown it right, right out. And the factory too, I hope.
BW: And when you returned to base after a successful operation what then happened? You mentioned debriefing.
HH: The debriefing. Yeah. You went in front of the intelligence officers and they, they mainly the questions, you know. They wanted to know anything and we just told them about the trip.
BW: And what sort of questions would they ask?
HH: Oh, about the Pathfinders. Did they drop the right, did they drop the right colours and that? Did you think they were in the right place? And this sort of thing. About the timing. Did you see any enemy aircraft and enemy gunfire? That was the sort of things they wanted to know. Just the defences.
BW: And once you’d had the debriefing? What? What then?
HH: Oh, we went back. Handed in our parachutes and Mae Wests and then went for a meal in the mess.
BW: How did you spend your spare time between operations?
HH: Well, we were at Elsham Wolds and it was quite, quite a long way to, Brigg was the nearest place. And Scunthorpe was beyond that. And we’d, initially we’d all go out together, all seven of us and we’d go to Brigg and drink in the pub there. And we had bicycles so we’d cycle there and cycle back. And then the pilot got commissioned so he sort of left us then and we split. We did the same as before. And then the bomb aimer and the flight engineer, they met a couple of people and they went to their home. You know and they sometimes stayed overnight if they could. And the two air gunners, they went on their bikes and they cycled all the way up to the Humber and they went together. So there was the wireless operator and myself and we just went our own way to the pub and the dance hall and back. That was it. Go to Scunthorpe. Got the train to Scunthorpe and get the last train back.
BW: And were you on ops every night or were there periods —
HH: Oh no. No. No. No. Very seldom it was two nights in a row. Sometimes there’d be a week’s gap or something. And every four days, every four weeks we had a week’s leave. But because of the losses sometimes we got leave every three weeks. Yeah. The losses were pretty heavy at the time.
BW: How did you spend your leave when you got the opportunity?
HH: With my wife. She, we lived not far apart in the village and we used to go out dancing and that sort of thing. That was all. In the summertime, well in the summertime then we had the bikes and we went biking, walking. But in the wintertime that was all there was because she was working all the time.
BW: How did you meet?
HH: Well we lived, my father and mother, my father was in the Royal Marines during the First World War and my mother was in the Women’s Royal Air Force near [unclear] in 1919. And they both lived in ‘Trose and they both went as nurses at the asylum, Montrose Royal Asylum. They both went as nurses. They met and got married and then I came along. And in that asylum, it was a small community and Mary’s father was the grieve. I don’t know, the head farmer. He was in charge of the farm. It was a great big farm. A really huge farm. So, you know, all the kids, we used to all play together and that in the grounds of the asylum. That’s how we met.
BW: And so you’d knew each other for a while before the war started and before you joined up.
HH: Oh knows, we played together and her brothers and that since we were five years old, you know, so. But it wasn’t until I was going overseas that I had a few days leave and I met her. And we just had a couple of days, you know going out and then we wrote and then it was another about fourteen months I think before we met again. Yeah.
BW: And how did you re-meet? When did you —
HH: Oh we kept writing all the time. Yeah. And then we got married in 1947 because I was going to be posted to an airfield in London, or near London. And I’d phoned the adjutant and he said accommodation was no problem. My wife would get a job. That was no problem. He guaranteed everything. So we got married. Went on honeymoon. Three days later we were going out the hotel and the porter came around and said I was wanted on the phone. I thought, ‘Oh. There’s only, there’s only the Air Ministry know I’m here.’ So I went and they said, ‘You’re posted to Singapore. You’re leaving in one week’s time.’ And so I went off to Singapore and at that time you weren’t considered married until you were twenty five. Well I was only twenty three. So it was eighteen months before she could join me.
BW: Just because of the service rules.
HH: Oh yeah. Eighteen months.
BW: So just, I’d just like to go back. You mentioned about flying Mosquitoes. At what stage during your career, your service career did you change to Mosquitoes?
HH: Well, when we finished operations on Lancasters I was posted to a Canadian run Operational Training Unit. They were flying Wellingtons. It was run by Canadians for Canadians but in this country. And the only RAF people there were the station commander, a group captain and a wireless operator. He’d done a tour of operations himself. But we were the only RAF personnel. And instead of lecturing I used to just to go up, fly with them in an aircraft with the trainees. And that was all that was done so I got fed up with this and I went and saw the station commander and said I wanted a posting. And he said, ‘No. No.’ And every Monday morning I went. In the end he said, ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I’ve arranged for you to go before a commissioning board.’ And so myself and the wireless operator went before this commissioning board and got our commissions. And the next day I went to see the group captain [laughs] He said, ‘Now, don’t tell me.’ I said, ‘Yes.’ And a week later he, he arranged for me to go on Mosquitoes. That was good.
BW: And did you move onto that squadron on your own or were there any mates that went with you?
HH: No. Just on my —
BW: Just on your own.
HH: Just on my own. Went to the, what do they call it where you all met? The pilots and navigators. And I crewed-up with this George Nunn. He crewed-up with me. He picked me [laughs] And so we flew together. We flew on Oxfords at first during this training and then on to Mosquitoes. And then on to the squadron. And then when the war finished in Europe I had a navigator friend, he was from the West Indies and he was going to London to meet his own people. So, I went down to London with him to this pub. It was full of West Indians and, but we had a good time. And then they said that 105 Squadron, Mosquito squadron was going to start training for the Far East. I thought — oh. So, I went back to thingummybob and saw the wing commander and I said I would like to transfer to 105 Squadron. And he went up in the air because he was organising this sort of, what do they call it [pause] West Indies. A big aircraft thing. Commercial aircraft. He was going to be the boss and he was looking for people to fly. And so I kept on and he said, ‘Well,’ he said, ‘You haven’t got a chance going by yourself. You have to find a pilot.’ Well, George wasn’t keen because he wanted to go back to his old job but when he, when he heard that he said, ‘Right. Away we go.’ So we got posted to 105 Squadron. And we were doing this, this new bombing aid they had. And we were ready. Just to be ready to go to the Far East when the war finished.
BW: But you got, you got out there it must have been late 1945 then.
HH: Yeah.
BW: In that case.
HH: Yeah. So 1945 finished with Mosquitoes and I went on the training on what they called BABS. It was a blind landing aid. And we went to various Transport Command stations and taught them how to fly this. And then I got, got married and then Singapore on 48 Squadron.
BW: And what were you flying there?
HH: Dakotas.
BW: How long were you out in the Far East?
HH: Just over two and a half years. I flew a lot to Hong Kong. India. Bangkok. A couple of times to Australia. It was quite good. A good trip. Yeah.
BW: How did you find the change from navigating in Lancasters to Mosquitoes? Both aircraft have different, slightly different reputations.
HH: Yes. Well —
BW: What was the experience like for you?
HH: The big, the big thing with the Mosquito was the space. It was the pilot sitting, like a pilot would sit, sit there.
BW: Yeah.
HH: And I would sit here [laughs] and he had all these instruments in front of him. And just down below was the bomb bay. So that, you know, after the space in the Lancaster, you know, a table this size you just had a thing you picked up like that.
BW: A notepad.
HH: It was a chart and everything there.
BW: Yeah.
HH: So it was quite different.
BW: It seems different in the sense that when you were in the Lancaster you would be working as a single navigator.
HH: Yeah.
BW: But yet, when you were in the Mosquito you would be doing two roles because you were the bomb aimer as well.
HH: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah, we got trained on bomb aiming. Yeah. We got, we did our training, bomb aiming training on Mosquitoes and I remember flying over somewhere in Lincolnshire one day bomb aiming and something happened going towards the target and something happened and the bomb went. The bomb released. And [laughs] you saw it and it landed in a farm yard. So we went back and, you know reported it because there was maybe something wrong with the bombing. Anyhow, the next day we got a phone message from a farmer. He invited us all out for a drink [laughs] Because they’d gone to the farm, they’d apologised. He wanted to know who they were and he invited us all out. Not us but the whole squadron for a drink. So I don’t know what had happened. If he had insurance or something like that.
BW: Was it a practice bomb that had dropped? Or —
HH: A practice bomb. Yeah.
BW: Yeah.
HH: Fifteen pounds. You know.
BW: Yeah.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And it just happened to come off the —
HH: Yeah.
BW: Off the release and into the farmyard. What sort of operations were you flying in Mosquitoes then? And how, how different were they to those on the Lancasters?
HH: Well the Mosquitoes we did, I think it was fifteen trips to Berlin. We did nineteen trips altogether and fifteen to Berlin. And it [pause] it was, I don’t know. In some ways it was easier that a Lancaster trip. We never worried we’d take-off. That never worried us. And it was just a case of getting to the target and it was a lot shorter time. Four and a half hours to Berlin and back instead of nine hours. And now, you used to get down, do the bombing and never had any problems.
BW: Were you part of the Pathfinder Force on Mosquitoes?
HH: No. No. Not the Path, no.
BW: Or were you —
HH: We were just ordinary. Yeah. No, we had the Pathfinders in front of us. They dropped the target indicators. And it was, no, it was, I don’t know it was just the two of us there sitting like this, close together. And sitting in there somewhere we left Berlin one night and we were always they always got coned by the searchlights. Every time we went there. And I just, I used to like that because I could see inside the bomb bay, you know. See the bombs and everything. We never minded. And we were coming back out one night and the searchlights, you know and it was no good trying to dodge them and suddenly the searchlights stopped. They all dropped. And I looked. There’s was a blister at the side and I looked behind and I could see lights. Red and green lights and I thought, I said to George, I said, ‘There’s some silly bugger going in there with his lights on.’ I said, I said, ‘No. He’s overtaken us. I said, ‘Direct to starboard. Go.’ And George, and they were pffft. The cannon shells came right across. And one of them took the top off the aircraft. We went down and the searchlights had come on. George got blinded and we were going whoooa and essentially —
BW: Apparently down.
HH: There were, the heavy aircraft were bombing, I forget the name of the place and we could visualise that and he turned and got the aircraft right and then looked at the altimeter and we were only about fifteen hundred feet above the ground and we’d come from twenty four thousand [laughs] Oh God. And anyhow we made it back. And it was years later when I was at the RAF flying college I was reading about, you know this thing and on that night, at that time, at that place, this German fighter that shot down a Mosquito [laughs]. I thought that’s great. It was the exact time and everything as that.
BW: If, if that’s the same account as I read about that was a raid over Potsdam. Near Berlin. Is that right?
HH: No. No. That was. We were at Berlin actually itself.
BW: Berlin itself.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And is it, was it right that the report said it was a Messerschmitt 262. It was a jet. A German jet.
HH: Yeah.
BW: So they were using those as night fighters.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And, and you were very lucky not to have put his bullets into the cockpit.
HH: Yeah. Just lucky we dived in time and just in the, oh and one, one of the bullets had gone through the tail fin. Right through the middle. The next day the ground crew there were sticking sticks through it [laughs] I thought, oh my God, that was close. Yeah. It was nice.
BW: I believe on that, on that particular raid on, as that was happening and you were spinning down you ended up upside down and you were on the, on the canopy.
HH: On the top. Yeah.
BW: So you were being pulled out of your seat.
HH: Yeah. Oh yeah.
BW: While the aircraft is upside down and you were on the canopy trying to get your parachute together. Is that right?
HH: I undid my harness to, to go down and get my parachute and open the bomb doors. Open the exit place. And it wouldn’t open. And so I got back and then I was sitting on the seat and she went pffft. Yeah. On our first Lancaster raid we never got to the target. We lost two of the engines and we had a full bomb load and a fuel load so we turned back and headed for The Wash to jettison the bombs. And the bomb aimer thought, you know, we thought well in case anything happens we’d better get ready to bale out. He couldn’t open the doors. Just, it was the pressure and that, it just wouldn’t open. So if anything had happened we couldn’t have got out. But we jettisoned the bombs over The Wash and then jettisoned some of the fuel because it was a tremendous amount of fuel we carried.
BW: But you managed to land safely.
HH: Oh yeah. Yeah. We did. Yeah.
BW: And were you ever caught in searchlights on other raids as well? You mentioned —
HH: Oh yeah. Lots of times. Yeah. Especially on Mosquitoes. Every time we went near the target they picked us up because they had a lot, a lot of searchlights then. But on the Lancaster I think there was only two or three times we got caught in searchlights. Just for a short time.
BW: Did the pilot have to take evasive action?
HH: Well in the Mosquito, we stopped because we couldn’t get out of them. They were, you know coming from all sides and it didn’t matter. On a Lancaster he could get out of them. Yeah.
BW: But you were never intercepted by fighters except for the, for the one occasion.
HH: Except for that once. Yeah. And very lucky.
BW: Were there other raids over France that you, that you recall? You mention one on the —
HH: Vire. Yeah.
BW: Vire Bridge.
HH: The one, the worst one of all was [pause] oh my memory. Starts with an M. It was the marshalling yards in the north of France. Now, what Bomber Command didn’t realise was that the Germans were sending troops up to the battlefield and the big anti-aircraft was based at this railway station. And we went in. If I remember rightly it was ninety five Lancasters from Number 1 Group. And we went in and just it was murder actually. And I think we lost forty nine. It’s all there somewhere. This stuff. Ninety five and we lost about half of them. That German anti-aircraft unit was stationed there and we were, for the Lancaster we were flying, you know at fifteen thousand feet. Which is ideal for them. Yeah. That was a tremendous loss.
BW: There’s a lot of reports I’ve seen of the German anti-aircraft fire being extremely accurate. It was always at the right height.
HH: Oh yeah. Yeah.
BW: But you never got hit yourself.
HH: No. Just that once in a Wellington. You know, that first flight. That’s the only time we got hit.
BW: You mentioned about flying on or around D-Day. Were you flying operations in support of D-Day? Do you remember anything about the build up?
HH: We didn’t know anything about it. D-Day was the 6th of June. We went out to a target in Northern France on the 5th of June but we didn’t know. Nobody knew it was about D-Day. And coming back, on the H2S on the Channel I saw the Channel was full of ships. And I said, ‘It’s the invasion. It’s D-Day,’ and we went back to, to Elsham and they said it’s D-Day in the morning and we just all laughed. And I said we saw them, you know, on the radar. And of course it was. Next day was D-Day. It was tremendous seeing all these ships. Yeah. But then we did our last trip then and that was it.
BW: And so very soon after that you finished flying on Lancasters. Just after D-Day.
HH: Yeah. On D-Day. That was our last trip. Yeah.
BW: And then you changed then to flying Mosquitoes.
HH: Now the pilot, he went back on Lancasters in ’45. Mid-upper gunner and the rear gunner, they both went back on operations ’45. But the wireless operator he just got to a squadron when the war finished. And the flight engineer, he didn’t want to do anymore because he’d got married.
BW: And did they let him? Let him —
HH: He was training. Yeah. He was. Yeah. Oh yeah. He spent his time training.
BW: But all the way through that you managed to keep together as a crew.
HH: Oh yes. Yeah. Yeah. And then we met again in 1978. It’s all written down there. It’s a long long story. It was a young chap. He went to Bristol to see the boat racing there. And he was staying the night in a pub and he saw an axe hanging up behind the bar and he asked the barman. He said, ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘I used to break up aircraft after the war. During the war and after the war. And that’s from one of the aircraft.’ And he says, ‘Oh which aircraft?’ And he said, ‘Oh it’s got on it.’ And the bloke went and found out and it was our aircraft we used to fly in. And he lived in Kent. And he went to an air gunner’s meeting and met our air gunner and said, ‘Do you know, and it was our axe.’ And so from there you know we all got together then. It’s all written down there.
BW: Yeah.
HH: Bit by bit we wrote. And then they formed the Elsham Wolds Association. That’s how they got in touch with me from there.
BW: And were there more than one squadron based at Elsham Wolds?
HH: Yeah. Two squadrons there. 576. Was it 103 Squadron, I think? Yeah. I’m not sure. I think it was 103.
BW: And were they both Lancaster squadrons?
HH: Yeah. Yeah.
[pause]
BW: And so it seems you’ve had a pretty eventful and successful career and managed to avoid the, sort of impact of anti-aircraft fire.
HH: Oh yeah.
BW: And night fighters.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And all the sort of other dangers that people experienced in, and you —
HH: I was really lucky. Yeah. Really, really lucky.
BW: Did you ever know any crews that became prisoners? That had been shot down over France?
HH: Yeah.
BW: Were any captured?
HH: I think it may be in there. If not I’ll —
BW: Ok.
HH: I tried to, there was thirty two of us passed out in South Africa. At the end of the war there was only eleven of us alive and three of these was prisoners of war. I contacted you know because like the magazines, aircraft magazines they used to print losses you know. Who was killed and that. And I used to keep a look out for it all. Yeah. There’s eleven and I met, you know I met all eleven eventually.
BW: So you’ve done a lot of work to keep track of those guys that you met.
HH: Oh yeah. Well that’s —
BW: You keep in touch with them.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And that chance reunion in a pub down south with one of your, was it a bomb aimer who saw the axe over the, over the, at the pub?
HH: No. No. It was another bloke. Just a chap who was out there.
BW: I see.
HH: He lived in Kent and he went, he went to the Air Gunner’s Association because he thought maybe somebody knows about this axe. And he was right. Our mid-upper gunner did. And so it was he was he that formed the Society at Elsham Wolds. John. He’s been here once or twice. John Wiltshire. That was his name.
BW: John Wiltshire. And is he still around? Has he passed?
HH: I don’t know. I don’t know.
BW: Right [pause] Something I’m intrigued about if I could just ask. It’s your nickname. You have a nickname. Sam. Is that right?
HH: Yeah. Well —
BW: How did that come about?
HH: Well when we were going out to South Africa on the boat we used to have drills. You know. We had rifles and bayonets. We used to do drills and one day we were doing a drill and I dropped my rifle. And the course comedian, of course he says, ‘Sam, Sam pick up thy rifle.’ That was a song that was going at the time.
BW: I see.
HH: That stuck with me ever since. ‘Sam, Sam pick up thy rifle.’ [pause] Then when I went to that Canadian OTU I got Jock then. Jock Harris.
BW: Jock Harris. And you have the same surname of course.
HH: Oh yeah.
BW: As Bomber Harris.
HH: Yeah. The RAF.
BW: Was that ever put to you? The same nickname or —
HH: No. No. No.
BW: The RAF only had room for one Bomber Harris.
HH: Yeah. Only room for one.
[pause]
BW: Are there any other sort of memorable operations or, or events that perhaps spring to mind?
HH: Let’s think. No. I think we had it very easy really. [pause] No. The first Mosquito operation was fogged-in at base. It was fogged-in and we were running out of fuel and the pilot, George, he’d seen an airfield further back so we went back. We found this airfield and we were just, just wait to land and the engine stopped. Went bump on the runway and the fire brigade and that came out and got us out, you know. Bundled us out the aircraft and left the aircraft on the runway. And Lancasters, it was a Lancaster base and they were circling around the top because they couldn’t land. So we went and got debriefed and went to the mess and were having a cup of cocoa or something and there was a great thump on my shoulders. And I looked around. It was a chap who I lived next door to, we were born within three weeks of each other. We lived next door to each for about fourteen or fifteen years and he was on the one of the Lancasters. And he said, ‘Is that your heap of wood lying out there?’ [laughs]
BW: Is that your heap of wood lying out there?
HH: Yeah.
BW: Yeah.
HH: Jim Cassell. He’d got a mighty slap [laughs]
BW: What a way to meet up after living all that time next door to each other.
HH: Yeah.
BW: And then bumping into each other.
HH: Yeah.
BW: Literally in the, in the debriefing room. Which was your favourite aircraft, do you think to fly?
HH: The Lancaster during the wartime. But after that the Britannia was a beautiful aircraft. Yeah. That was the best one. But during the war the Lancaster. Yeah.
BW: You mentioned when you went out to serve with 105 Squadron in the Far East and you continued to stay out in the Far East for about two and a half years. At what stage then did you leave the RAF and what prompted the move?
HH: Oh 1968. I went to [pause] let me see. I left 48 Squadron. Came back to this country. I did a course, instructor’s course and then I instructed people to become navigators. In two places. And then I went to a place where they were training pilots on Meteors. I was a navigation officer and all sort of things. Then I went to RAF flying college as an instructor and was there for a while. Then went on Transport Command on Hastings, Britannias and VC10s.
BW: So you pretty well stayed on multi engine aircraft.
HH: Oh yeah.
BW: All the way, all the way through. Even though when you were instructing navigators for Meteors.
HH: Yeah.
BW: You weren’t flying Meteors yourself.
HH: Oh yeah. I flew in Meteors.
BW: You were. Right. You flew Meteors as well.
HH: Yeah. I, one of the blokes, he was a Polish bloke and at that time there were at the Farnborough thing. You know flying an aircraft straight up and then it would sort of come down, you know so he said, he got me flying. He said, ‘We’re going to try that today’ [laughs] We went up and the thing toppled over backwards and I was going to, I said, ‘I’m going to eject,’ and, ‘No. No. No,’ and he pulled it out then.
BW: So instead of going up nice and vertical and coming back tail down there the same axis you fell out backwards.
HH: Yeah. That’s the last time he tried it. Yeah. And I flew with Gus Walker on Canberras at the flying college. We did a trip to the North Pole from Norway but we ran out of oxygen just about seventy miles from the North Pole and we had to come back and we descended to the oxygen level and we landed at this place in Norway, Bardufoss. And as we landed we ran out of fuel and bump. She came down with a crash.
BW: You were very lucky there again.
HH: There. Yeah. Yeah.
BW: Just made it home in time.
HH: Just made it.
BW: With no fuel.
HH: Yeah. Gus Walker. He was a really nice bloke. Gus. We were up to the top there once before and the Canberra couldn’t get back in. We were going to land then further south and there was a Hastings there and no pilot except Gus and he’d never flown a Hastings before [laughs] And he says to us, he says, ‘Will it be alright if I fly it? And we said, ‘Yeah. Yeah.’ And he flew it down there. Flew it to Oslo. It was alright. One of the funny things was when we was on Britannias there was a scare over Germany where a German aircraft or something had buzzed a civil aircraft. And somehow it got arranged that newspaper people would come and fly in a Britannia and this sort of thing would be, would be happening. And I was a navigator and Gus Walker was in charge of this lot. And he came up to the flight deck and we were chatting there and forgot all the fact that everything was going through to all the passengers as well [laughs] And then I looked up and I said to the pilot, ‘That’s not the airfield. We’re at the wrong airfield. Another airfield across there.’ And then I thought oh my. And Gus Walker went back and when we landed all the press came out and then one of them come across. He said, ‘That was good. I listened to all that. That was really really good. I enjoyed that.’ But nothing came out in the papers happily.
BW: So you managed to find the right airfield eventually.
HH: Yeah. Gus Walker. Yeah.
BW: Did you come across any famous pilots in the RAF at all? There were well known guys. People like Gibson flew Mosquitoes. Did you ever come across —
HH: Douglas Bader. I met him twice. Once when he was doing the instructing on, just after the war. I met him down south somewhere. And then when I was on 48 Squadron in Singapore he, I don’t know, he came in there to the mess. I don’t know. I can’t remember. And he recognized me in the crowd and I thought [laughs] and everybody’s [pause] yeah. He was a nice bloke.
BW: Ok. Is there anything that you would like to show us on the computer at all. But I think —
HH: I think you’ve got it —
BW: It might be a case of printing it.
HH: I think it’s all on there.
BW: Ok.
HH: Wherever you have it. Yeah.
BW: Ok.
HH: It’s all there. I hope. But if there’s anything else just phone. I’ll get it.
BW: Ok.
HH: I’ll tell you about these logbook pages.
[pause]
BW: Just going to have a look at some logbook pages.
[pause]
BW: We’re just, we’re just looking at one of the logbooks. Would you just describe what it says on the citation there? It’s dated 8th of October 1946. Is that right? At the bottom there.
HH: On 8th October 1946. Yeah. Something Headquarter 46 Group. Letter reference 46 at C250 something, something dated 20th of August 1946.
BW: What does the, so it says at the top. “Incidences of avoidance by exceptional flying skill and judgement of loss or damage to aircraft or personnel.” And it says, “Flying Officer HST Harris DFC, whilst navigation instructor on an Oxford aircraft EB798 during — ”
HH: “Exercise.”
BW: “Exercise.”
HH: “On eureka.”
BW: “On eureka.”
[pause]
HH: “Eureka homings”
BW: “Eureka homings from St Mawgan.”
HH: “From St Mawgan. The starboard engine failed and was feathered by — ”
BW: “By his skill.”
HH: “In operating the radar screen he enabled his pilot to carry out the shortened BABS. Let down.”
BW: “Guidance.”
HH: “And made a good landing in conditions, bad weather and poor visibility after breaking cloud at two hundred and fifty feet with the runway immediately ahead. By his knowledge of his radio aids and his skill in the operation of these he helped his pilot to save the aircraft from —"
BW: “Damage. Saved the aircraft from damage and the crews from —"
HH: “Injury.”
BW: “Injury.”
HH: That’s a long time ago [laughs]
BW: So that —
HH: 1946.
BW: Yeah. That is a citation that was presumably made into your logbook for skill in flying and avoiding an accident and injury to crew.
HH: Yeah.
BW: That’s very unique.
HH: That’s this one here.
BW: Well done.
HH: In six —
BW: So, 608 Squadron.
HH: Downham Market.
BW: Downham Market.
HH: That’s operations. Yeah.
BW: I’ll just pause again while you look for another document.
[pause]
BW: So —
HH: This is a bit here.
BW: So, for your services you were awarded the DFC. Was that because it was standard for aircrew or —
HH: No. It’s —
BW: For people to be awarded after so many missions or was there an act of gallantry.
HH: There wasn’t anything definite. But all pilots, when they did a tour of operations, all pilots automatically got a DFC. But I did fifty operations and I suppose that’s why I got it.
BW: Because you’d done over fifty ops.
HH: Hmmn?
BW: Because you’d done over fifty ops.
HH: No. The war finished then. No. Yeah, I could have done a lot more. Yeah.
BW: It’s quite something though to have come through so many operations. As you said before particularly because so many aircrew were killed during that time.
HH: It was just less than two months ago on the television they were doing some sort of programme and they said only one aircrew member in forty [pause] only one aircrew member in a hundred was it, survived forty operations. I forget the exact number now. I know that was forty operations and there were very few people.
BW: Yeah.
HH: That had done that.
BW: Yeah. That’s quite something. That’s quite an excellent sort of achievement really.
HH: See these things here. You’ve seen them [pause] This. My navigation logs. That’s, I think, I don’t know which aircraft that is. Put that other light on.
BW: So these are on, let’s have a look.
[pause]
BW: So these navigation logs are also recorded in —
HH: Yes.
BW: Wartime service so did you have to fill out effectively two logs.
HH: Some of them. Some of them are. Not all of them I don’t think. I’m trying to see.
BW: You Ok?
HH: Yeah. Where’s the switch? Oh, it’s up here [pause] The light switch is on there.
BW: So did navigators have to fill out another log as well as their own flying log?
HH: No.
BW: For operations.
HH: No.
BW: Or was this just done as an instructor?
HH: This light doesn’t work now. Oh wait a minute. Maybe it does. No. It’s broken. That’s why it’s off. I think the bulbs gone. Yeah. It’s —
BW: It’s alright.
[pause]
BW: Ok.
HH: You’ve got that all on there.
BW: So these records are all on the disc as well.
HH: Yeah. Yeah.
BW: Ok.
HH: It’ll take a lot of printing out.
BW: It looks like it. Yeah.
HH: And that’s.— [pause]
BW: Ok. I’ll just pause the recording while we look through for the documents.
[recording paused]
What I’ll do I’ll end the recording there. We’ve had a look through some documents and photographs of your time in the Far East. So all that’s left to do is, on behalf of the International Bomber Command Centre is just to say thank you very much for your time Mr Harris. It’s very good of you.
HH: You’ll find a lot of things in these.
BW: Thank you.
HH: These CDs. Yeah.
BW: Yeah. We’ll arrange to get your CDs and documents copied by one of the other volunteers. They will send somebody out but they weren’t able to do that today. So we’ll sort that out for you. Thank you.
[recording paused]
BW: Very much so. Yeah.
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 Harris
Creator
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Brian Wright
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-09-09
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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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AHarrisHST150909
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Pending review
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01:19:59 audio recording
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eng
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Harry ‘Sam’ Harris grew up in Scotland and volunteered for the Air Force. He trained as a navigator in South Africa. On the penultimate day of his training he flew over a multitude of lifeboats bearing the survivors of a torpedoed ship. The next day he flew over a U-Boat above water and the pilot turned the aircraft to attack it. On return to Great Britain he was posted to 576 Squadron at RAF Elsham Wolds. After his first tour he wanted to continue to fly and was posted to a Mosquito Squadron. He discusses being attacked by a Me 262. He notes that of the thirty two men who passed out with him in South Africa only eleven were left after the war and three of those had been prisoners of war. After the war Harry stayed in the RAF and flew in a wide variety of aircraft.
Contributor
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Julie Williams
Spatial Coverage
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France
Germany
Great Britain
Norway
South Africa
Arctic Ocean--North Pole
England--Lincolnshire
Germany--Berlin
Scotland--Montrose
Temporal Coverage
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1939
1940
1941
1942
1944
1945
1946
105 Squadron
576 Squadron
608 Squadron
aircrew
Anson
bombing
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
briefing
C-47
control caravan
crewing up
debriefing
Distinguished Flying Cross
fear
Gee
Halifax
Lancaster
love and romance
Me 262
Meteor
military living conditions
military service conditions
Mosquito
navigator
Nissen hut
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
promotion
RAF Downham Market
RAF Elsham Wolds
searchlight
service vehicle
submarine
superstition
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/315/3472/APayneAJ150811.2.mp3
ee6769cc020c59ef42f4867ae1c03636
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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Payne, Alan
Alan John Payne
Alan J Payne
Alan Payne
A J Payne
A Payne
Description
An account of the resource
Two items. An oral history interview with Alan John Payne DFC (1315369 and 173299 Royal Air Force) and his log book. He completed 18 operations as a bomb aimer with 630 Squadron.
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
2015-08-11
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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Payne, AJ
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB: Right. My name is Chris Brockbank and I’m conducting an interview with Alan Payne in Wendover, Buckinghamshire along with his grandson, Aaron Payne. And we’re going to talk about his life and keep the tape running until we need to have a break. So, Alan could I ask you to talk about your life from the earliest days please and then your childhood and how you came to join the RAF and then your experiences. And then after the RAF what you did. So over to you —
AP: Well, I was born here in Wendover. My father was a coal merchant. He had his own business. He even had, he even had his own coal trucks. Coal trucks. And I attended a local junior school until I passed to go to the Wycombe Technical Institute where I did technical studies. I had quite a happy childhood. I had one brother who unfortunately now has dementia. He’s younger than me but he does suffer with dementia. But then as I say, I had a childhood in Wendover. Local school. Then went to High Wycombe Technical College. The war was on then. I didn’t want to join the army or the navy so I volunteered for the Royal Air Force. I was seventeen when I volunteered. So, volunteering for the air force meant I was safe from being recruited in to the army which I did not want. And I had about a year to wait until I was called up and I got notice to report to Lord’s Cricket Ground in London. That was the recruiting place. Lord’s Cricket Ground. Just basic stuff there. Lots of inoculations. We were put up at Abbey Wood and then from there we were sent out to Torquay first of all for basic training. Drill. Law. This type of thing. Then from there I went to Brighton for a time. There again it was basic training. They were, they housed us in the hotels along the front. One thing I do remember about that time was Richard Tauber who was appearing in the, in The Pier Concert Hall and I saw him and thought what a wonderful chap he was. He was an Austrian Jew of course and he got out of Germany before the trouble started. But that’s one thing I do remember about that time there. This is all basic stuff.
[pause]
CB: So, after Brighton what did you do?
AP: After Brighton.
CB: What did you do in Brighton?
AP: Well, after Brighton — I did mention Torquay didn’t I?
CB: Yes.
AP: And then Brighton. Then from Brighton we were sent, we were sent out to South Africa. I was quite lucky really because I was sent to train with the South African Air Force and we were — we had to transport up to Liverpool. Got on a boat called the Volendam. A Dutch boat. The Volendam. And we departed for South Africa in convoy and that journey took, I think, four or five weeks. We stopped at Freetown on the way to refuel and then into Durban. And from — Durban was just a holding centre. And then from Durban we were posted to East London. East London. Where we started our training in flying and I hadn’t really flown before then. But we started flying then on Avro Ansons and that was basic navigation. And at Queenstown — that was navigation and then, and then from there we were posted to the gunnery school where we did bomb aiming and air gunnery. Pause it just a minute Chris while I just make reference?
CB: Ok. So, your logbook will remind you.
AP: Port Alfred.
CB: Yeah.
AP: It was Port Alfred where we went to for gunnery.
CB: Ok.
AP: A very nice little seaside town not far from Queenstown. Went to Port Alfred. There we were on Airspeed Oxfords. And then whilst there for [pause] to get us used to the night time flying we were sent to a little place called Aliwal North. And the runways there were lit by flares. So there was no lighting there. Just these flares that we had to land on but that gave us our basic training for night flying. And it was at Port Alfred that we passed out and had a, we had a passing out parade in Queenstown. We had a very good do there and I do have the, a copy of the menu.
[pause]
So, having, having finished our training we, we were sent down to Cape Town and we sailed back from Cape Town in the old Queen Mary with no escort at all because she relied on speed to get us through. I think she did about thirty three, thirty five knots. So we sailed back in good time and on the way back too we were taking a whole load of Italian prisoners of war and we escorted them back to — Liverpool that we went in to. And then to finish our training I was posted to Dumfries in Scotland where we did basic training. Bombing, map reading, this type of thing. And from Dumfries we were sent to a holding station at Harrogate. And I always remember the CO there was Leslie Ames, the old Kent cricketer. He was the CO at this hotel. Had a very cushy job really, in the war, didn’t he? But we were there for a few weeks and then we were posted to Turweston — an Operational Training Unit where we were on Wellington bombers. And it was at Turweston and this, and this other station, Silverstone that we were crewed up. And it was rather strange — we were all let loose in a big hangar and we had to sort of had to find our pilot and navigator, bomb aimer, wireless operator. We just got together and sorted ourselves out. That was the way it went in those days. I was lucky because my pilot, Geoff Probert, was an ex-guardsman. We called him grandfather because he was, he was thirty odd. He’d volunteered as a pilot and we were all in our early twenties so he looked after us really. And he was a jolly good captain. Anyway, we did our OTU training and we were all, we were all crewed up and ready to go and at Silverstone we also did some cross-country stuff. And then the next move was to Winthorpe. A Conversion Unit. And we converted then to Lancasters and that’s when the training really started. And I was there in October, November ‘43. And then at the end of November we were posted to East Kirkby. That was, that was the operational station. We were posted to 630 Squadron which was a wing of 57 Squadron. I always remember that part of my service well really because it was just like a builder’s site. There was mud everywhere. There was just basic, basic accommodation in Nissen huts. A central stove. Everything was running with condensation. The clothes were damp. Everything was damp. And it was a very cold winter then. In fact, we did our first op on the 2nd of December to Berlin. And everything was centred on getting the aircraft operational. The fact of our comfort didn’t really enter into things but we managed and, but as I say it was pretty rough at that time. There was no basic comforts. There was no basic comforts at all and the weather was so cold too. We started off with six trips to Berlin and the weather was so bad we hardly saw the target at all. We were bombing on Wanganui flares through cloud cover. During that time, we did Berlin, Stettin, Brunswick, Berlin, Magdeburg. As I say, six Berlin trips. But, at the same time although the weather was bad we did find time to get out to the Red Lion at Revesby which was our local pub. And we had a bit of relief there.
[pause]
The worst trip I had really was the one to Nuremberg. That was at the end of March. It was March 30th. We were attacked then by an ME109 but luckily, he missed us but he did fly pretty close. But we were lucky really. As I said we had some near squeaks. And one of the things that did, that I always found amazing was the fact that you’d be flying along in the dark and all of a sudden you got over the target and there were planes everywhere. And we had two, we had two narrow go’s where we nearly collided with another Lancaster. But as I say we were very lucky in many respects. Another op we did was the one to Mailly-le-Camp. That was, that was a military camp and that was a bit, that was being marked by Group Captain Cheshire. And everything went wrong that night. Everything was late. We had to circle and circle until we could get in to bomb on the flares that had been set by Cheshire. And then following on then, on the run up to D-Day we were more or less doing trips on marshalling yards, bridges, anything that would hamper the movement of the Germans. When D-Day approached [pause] when we finished our tour, just before D-Day in fact, although our last trip, the end of March 1944 was mine laying in Kiel Bay. And there we were hit by a — attacked and hit by a JU88. We caught fire but luckily the fire, for some good reason went out. We were jolly lucky then. But as I say we’d done twenty nine trips then and the CO came to us. He said, ‘Well,’ he said, ‘You’ve had it now. You can finish.’ But on the social side there I did know a young WAAF girl called Pat who more or less adopted the crew. No. We adopted her. And she took a liking to me and we spent a lot of time together. I’ve got a little picture of her here. We used to go cycling together and went to the pub at Revesby. I got very fond of Pat but of course when it came to [unclear] to go to see her. I don’t know whether he has or not. As I say by the end, by the time we’d finished, the end of May, the weather was, the weather was better but it had been a pretty dreadful winter. Anyway, at the end of our tour we all broke up and we all went our different ways. First of all, I went out to Moreton Valence where we were doing instructing and doing compass swings and basic stuff. And from there to Llandwrog in North Wales. And then I was quite lucky then because we were sort of messing about doing not much in particular and then a posting came through. They wanted, they wanted a navigator to go out to Palestine. So, I was, in the first instance I was sent out to Saltby, a Conversion Unit. And then to Matching and I crewed-up then with a guy called Flying Officer Nichols. And we were, as I say on Halifaxes which was a better aircraft for transport work than the Lancaster. The Lanc had a very narrow fuselage whereas with a Halifax you could get two lines of chaps down either side of the aircraft. And we did container dropping, glider towing. Anything which would help the 6th Airborne. We were attached to the 6th Airborne Division then and we went out with them to Palestine which, in 1946, wasn’t very healthy really. Because the Irgum Zvai Leumi were — and Begin, they weren’t very happy with us then. They blew up the King David Hotel. They shot two of our sergeants in [unclear]. You may remember that. We always had to look at, mind our backs because the — at that time, I shouldn’t say this but the Jewish weren’t very friendly towards us. And we used to go out to, they used to, they were bringing their migrants in by boat and part of our duty was to fly over the Med to report boats coming in. At the same time we did exercises down to Bagdad with the Airborne division. We did quite a bit of flying up through, up through Italy and we helped then to bring some of the migrants back to Palestine. It was quite an interesting time really although we had to watch what we were doing. But as I say we used to fly to Bagdad.
CB: What were you doing when you flew to Bagdad? What was the main reason for that?
AP: It was an exercise for the 6th Airborne Division.
CB: So, you were moving troops.
AP: It was a very good camp at Bagdad actually. They had a, they had a very nice camp outside and we went there two or three times. There were lakes there and the flying boats used to come in there, you know. I quite enjoyed the time out there in a way had it not been for the fact that we were liable to be sort of potted at. We also went down to Khartoum which was one of the hottest places I’ve ever known. In fact, it was so hot there that we couldn’t run the engines up. We had to be towed to the end of the runway, start the engines and take off so they did not overheat, you see. That again was an exercise with the Airborne division and they would do, they would do parachute drops. That type of thing.
[pause]
AP: We did quite a few trips up too, from Aqir airbase in Palestine. We did quite a few trips up to Udine. Udine. By stopping at Malta to refuel and then flying up to the coast of Italy in to Udine. And there again, it was a case of exercising with the 6th Airborne Division.
CB: So, you weren’t doing any doing bombing. You were —
AP: Oh no. No bombing at all. No. It was all —
CB: Not even practice. It was moving people.
AP: Moving people about. Troops. Migrants. And then, come the end of August it was time for me to be demobbed and that’s the only time I’ve flown in a Dakota. I was flown down to Cairo with some other guys. Then we were flown back by Dakota to London via Malta into Heathrow. And Heathrow then, of course, was just a series of huts. There was nothing like there is today. But that’s the only time I’ve flown in a Dakota. Although, a few weeks ago, when I was up at East Kirkby I sat down at a bench with a colleague of mine. Got chatting. And the guy I spoke to owned the Dakota at East Kirkby. Maybe you know him. Do you know him?
CB: I don’t. No.
AP: Well, anyway, he happened to be there and it was his aircraft and we chatted away and he’s very fond of the Dakota. But that more or less tied up my time in, with the Royal Air Force and I didn’t know quite what to do for a time. But I had always wanted to go into building so I applied to become an architect and I was lucky enough to be accepted at the School of Architecture at Oxford. I had to wait a few months before there was a vacancy and our course at that time only consisted of thirty people. There were two girls and the rest of us were men and half of them were ex-service people. In fact Oxford in those days was full of ex-servicemen and we had to compete with the youngsters. But after five years I passed. That must have been in [pause] ’46 ’47 I went to Oxford. It must have been the early ‘50s. And in those days jobs were hard to find and luckily I had some contact in North Wales and I was found a position there to start my architectural career. And from there things just moved on. Do you want — is that?
CB: Married?
AP: Pardon?
CB: When you got married.
AP: Oh yeah. Well, back in, back at the end of the war.
CB: Ok.
AP: Sorry. I left that out.
CB: How did you come to meet your wife?
AP: Oh, at the ‘drome in Llandwrog in North Wales.
CB: That was an OTU was it? Training place.
AP: Yeah. It wasn’t an OTU. No. It was a training place. Actually, I was there on — it would be — not D-Day. VE day. VE day in Caernarfon and the whole town turned out. Do you know Caernarfon? Very nice little town.
CB: Yeah.
AP: We went into Carnarvon and I’d met Gwen then and we went out together and celebrated around the castle.
CB: Yeah.
AP: And that was before, before I went to Oxford of course.
CB: So were you able to earn money while you were at Oxford?
AP: Well, I’ll say one thing for the Labour government then they paid for our fees and gave us a living allowance. So that was one, that was one credit that we had, we had to bear. Not bear. To put up with.
CB: And Gwen was working as well.
AP: She was. Yes. Yes, she was working for a time. Then the children came along and that was it.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Housewives didn’t work in those days did they?
CB: They didn’t.
AP: They stayed home and stayed put.
CB: No. No. Going back to your early days. How were you actually selected first of all? How were you selected for aircrew because you might have done a ground job? So at what point —
AP: Well I remember going to Oxford. There was a recruiting centre there and I’d put down for, I’d passed as pilot, navigator, bomb aimer.
CB: Yeah.
AP: That was the categories. I passed for that and I had a medical at the same time there. That was in Oxford back in, when I was only seventeen. And then they selected you for aircrew training. Everybody wanted to be a pilot of course but it was a matter of luck when you, when the time came. If they wanted navigators you were a navigator. You know. Or pilot. As things turned out it’s just as well I did go as a navigator I suppose.
CB: In what way?
AP: Well, I survived.
CB: Right. Going then on to the training in South Africa. You wore the brevet of an observer. So how was the course structured and how did you have that brevet rather than a navigator brevet?
AP: We were the last course to do the observer. We were the last people to do the observer course. And after that it became NavB and bomb aimers. But we did the whole lot. We did the three. Bomb aiming, navigation, air gunnery. We did the lot. After that the NavB’s just did navigation.
Yeah.
But for that reason, when we got back to the UK the Lancs were coming in. They wanted bomb aimers. And having done the observer course we were, of course, selected to take on that job you see.
CB: But you did navigation. Oh you didn’t.
AP: I didn’t — well I did map reading of course in Bomber Command.
CB: Yeah. Right.
AP: Which was quite important in the run up to D-day because a lot of our targets then were marshalling yards, bridges, that type of thing and we had to do map reading and pin point bombing.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Because we daren’t drop the bombs on the French domestic.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Sites.
CB: Which was the problem with that Cheshire raid. Identifying the military camp which was close to a village.
AP: Mailly-le-Camp. Yeah. That was quite a tricky raid that was. In fact, that picture you’ve seen was done a day or two before or a day or two after.
CB: So, what was, what actually caused the holdup and why were so many planes circling? Waiting.
AP: There was a hold up. I don’t know. I don’t know what happened. We never did find out but everything — we were late getting there. I mean, we got there too early or Cheshire was too — he was in a Mosquito and he went in after we did and marked the target. But it was a very successful raid. Although we did lose quite a few aircraft in collisions. We had to circle around waiting for these markers to go down.
CB: Yeah.
AP: And Nuremberg has been well documented by John Nicholl of course but that was a complete disaster because it was a beautiful moonlight night. A beautiful night and you could see for miles but the winds were, the winds were behind us and we got there far too early.
CB: Right.
AP: I believe Rusty was on that raid, wasn’t he?
CB: He was. Yes.
AP: Well he would tell you that. I suppose.
CB: Yes. So, in terms of bomb aiming you’ve got the markers sent down. What colour were they and how did you respond?
AP: Either red or green.
CB: Right.
AP: Well we were told, we were told by the Pathfinders which to bomb on, you see. I didn’t, I didn’t like that aspect of flying really because you didn’t know quite what you were going to hit. It could be a hospital, a school. You didn’t know. Whereas with the runup to D-day you had specified military targets and you knew that you weren’t affecting the civilian population. Because I wasn’t at all happy with bombing. I didn’t do the Dresden raid thank goodness but wearing my other cap it seemed so unnecessary to me to have bombed Dresden. It was a beautiful city. I have been back since and they’ve rebuilt it and even so it did seem a great shame to do that at that point in time.
CB: So, in the Nuremberg raid did you get any damage to your aircraft?
AP: No. Luckily, we had a very good run but all around us we saw aircraft going down. Ninety six went down that night. As you know.
CB: Yes.
AP: And we were told, you know, that the Germans were using scarecrows just to frighten us. They weren’t scarecrows they were Lancs blowing up. It’s a horrifying sight to see a Lancaster, you know, completely burning out.
CB: Did you know about Schrage Musik then?
AP: Hmm?
CB: Did you know about the German upward firing Schrage Musik?
AP: Oh yes. Yeah.
CB: At that time?
AP: Well, yes. We had H2S you know. H2S. And we were convinced that they were homing in on that. As soon as we got over the coast. Because that used to give us a picture of the ground on the, on the radar screen —
CB: Yes.
AP: But we were, we were convinced that the Germans were homing in on this. It may not have been the case but it was, it was one constant battle between the fighters and us, you know.
CB: Yes.
AP: We had Window as you know which was metallic strips. That used to help. No. In a way we were very lucky and of course having Geoff Probert, a very senior chap, he was thirty two. In fact, we called him grandad because we were all in our early twenties, you know and he used to keep us in order.
CB: He did.
AP: Yes. He was very good like that.
CB: Yes. What about other members of the crew? What were they like? So, navigator. Who was he?
AP: Tom Mackie. Tom Mackie was the navigator. He did the same sort of training that I did but he just missed out on the observer course and did the NavB and do you know after the war he set up a firm called [pause] and he became a millionaire with his own aircraft. I’ve forgotten the name now.
Other: City Electric.
AP: What?
Other: City Electric.
AP: City Electrical. Which is worldwide. He died about a year ago. Because I was very friendly with Tom. But he had, he had his own aircraft. In fact we flew — I did one or two flights with him after the war. He and it all started with his gratuity. He got in, he got into the motor trade just at the right time and sort of built, sort of built an empire.
CB: So, he was the navigator.
AP: Yeah.
CB: What about your wireless operator signal? Who was that?
AP: He was the one chap — we do know the others have passed on but our wireless operator was [pause] well we just lost, lost track of him. We tried to locate him. Tom, our navigator, used to go to Canada where we thought he was but he could never find him.
CB: What was his name?
AP: Lawrence. Vic Lawrence. He was the wireless operator. Nice guy but we just lost track of him so whether he’s alive or not we just do not know.
CB: What about the flight engineer? Who was that?
AP: Eric. Eric. [pause] the name’s gone. It’ll come back to me.
CB: Was he a busy man in the sorties?
AP: Oh yes. He was nearly a second pilot in a sense. He sat next to the pilot and he adjusted the, he sort of adjusted some of the instruments and on take-off he would hold the throttles open. How stupid, the names gone. When he, when he left the RAF he moved down to the coast near Bournemouth. I saw him a few times after. And he, I’ve got a picture of him up there. His wife was an ATA pilot.
CB: Oh.
AP: She flew aircraft from the factories to the squadrons. Mainly Spitfires of course.
CB: Yeah.
AP: I don’t think women ever flew Lancasters. Not to my knowledge.
CB: A couple of them did.
AP: Pardon?
CB: A couple of them did.
AP: Did they?
CB: Yeah.
AP: Well I don’t know. I was told that it was most unlikely but you say they did.
CB: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: It was a big, complicated aircraft to fly — the old Lanc.
CB: Yeah. Yeah. And then your mid-upper. Who was that?
AP: A guy called Bradd. B R A D D. Bradd. What happened was after two raids our original mid-upper gunner went LMF. He couldn’t take it any more after two raids. And I was sent to pick him up. It’s mentioned in this book by John Nicholl. The names are — I’m sorry I should have done more research before you turned up shouldn’t I?
CB: It’s ok. We can look it up. So, what exactly happened to him?
AP: He just didn’t like it. He thought, he thought he wouldn’t survive. Well we all thought we wouldn’t survive really but there we go. We pressed on.
CB: Was he the only one person you met who was an LMF victim as it were?
AP: Yeah. The only one. The only one I met. And then when he left we had a guy come along called Bradd. Dennis Bradd. B R A D D. And when I’d done, when we’d done the tour he hadn’t quite finished his. He had to do some more ops to make up his thirty and unfortunately, he went down two or three trips after which was most unfortunate because he was a nice guy.
CB: And what about the rear gunner?
AP: Yes. He was, he was a bit older than most of us. He was in his late twenties. He survived but he’s passed on now of course.
CB: What was his name?
AP: [pause] Dear me. It’ll come back to me. It’ll come back to me. I just cannot remember at the moment.
CB: Ok. When you were doing your training what sort of people were there in South Africa? Did they tend to be only British people or did people come from other of the Commonwealth countries?
AP: No. The people that trained us were mainly South Africans. South African Air Force
CB: Trained you.
AP: Trained us. And they were very good. I always say that. I think we had a good training in South Africa and of course the weather was good. There was no hold ups with the weather. You could get on with things whereas the guys that trained in this country and Canada had problems with the weather sometimes.
CB: Yeah.
AP: But you see the air gunners joined us on the squadrons. They didn’t have any training really. They were mainly basic. Perhaps with a low education rate — without being unkind. As you know.
CB: Well their role was to run the guns.
AP: Run the guns. Yes.
CB: What do you see their role as being in the aircraft as a crew member? What was their main role?
AP: Well mainly to look out for fighters coming in at us.
CB: So, because they had guns their job was to defend the aircraft. Was that right? How often, in your experience, did they use their guns?
AP: Very seldom. Very seldom.
CB: Why was that?
AP: Well maybe we were lucky. I don’t know. But I think the rear gunner used his guns once and the same with the mid-upper chap that came along.
CB: The one who went LMF, it wasn’t a bad experience of a fighter attack that caused him —
AP: Not at all. No. Not at all. I always remember I had to, I had to go along to a — I was trying to think — it was in the Midlands somewhere. He was being, he was being held at a police station. I can’t remember why. But I had to sign for a live body and I’d never done that before. A live body of the gunner. He was quite a nice guy. He just couldn’t take it. in fact, on the way back we went in to Nottingham to a dance hall and I had a few beers with him, you know and then brought him back to camp and of course as soon as he got back to camp he was whisked, whisked into the guardroom and then they used to tear off the brevets and the sergeant’s stripes and they really went through it you know.
CB: Did they do that in public? On a parade?
AP: Yeah, I did see it happen. There was a place at Coventry where they did that. It was done on parade. It was very dreadful really what they did. In my opinion.
CB: So why did they do that?
AP: Just to set an example really. I mean, in the First World War of course they used to shoot them didn’t they?
CB: Yeah.
AP: Anybody that —
CB: Yeah
AP: At least they didn’t do that. No. You were pretty tough after that training. Well the gunners never had much of a training. I don’t know why he ever became an aircrew member really.
CB: How did he fit? Before he went LMF how did he fit in the crew? Was it fairly obvious that he was —
AP: Well we never had him. You see we never had the gunners for long. We did the basic training with Con Unit, OTUs and then the gunners only came along later on.
CB: So normally the gunners would join at the OTU on the Wellington. Wouldn’t they?
AP: Not they didn’t in the case with myself. No.
CB: Right. Ok.
AP: They joined us later.
CB: Right. At the —
AP: It was just the basic members.
CB: At the Heavy Conversion Unit.
AP: Yeah.
CB: Yeah.
AP: They joined at the Conversion Unit. Yes.
CB: Yeah. Right.
AP: Yes.
CB: And so, the engineer joined you though at the OTU. Oh no there was no engineer at the OTU because they didn’t —
AP: No. There was no engineer then. No.
CB: The Wellington didn’t have them.
AP: No. They came along at Con Unit. It was just pilot, navigator, bomb aimer. They were the main ones. And the wireless. They were the main ones who joined. Who were there.
CB: Right.
AP: From the word go.
CB: Now, you started off as an AC2. How did your promotion go and why?
AP: Well it was the time. You become a sergeant after, when you pass out. Then after a year you became a flight sergeant.
CB: After a year.
AP: After a year.
CB: Right.
AP: Then you got recommended. Certain of us got recommended for commissions, you see.
AP: Do you know what the basis — what was the basis of the decision for making people —
AP: I don’t know exactly. The CO. The group captain in charge really. No. I never quite know. I got one and the navigator got one and the rear gunner got one. We all got commissions.
CB: So, what was the rear gunner’s strengths that made him suitable?
AP: Do you know I don’t quite know. It was just the fact that he was over thirty by that time I suppose and he was a fairly senior bod and they decided to give him a commission. I can’t think of his name, you know. And I saw him a few times after the war because he lived up in North London somewhere. We had a few meetings together. It’s stupid the way names go isn’t it?
CB: It’ll come back to you later.
AP: It will.
CB: But did you, did you do many things together as a complete crew when you were on 630?
AP: Oh yes. We went out a lot together.
CB: What did you do?
AP: Our favourite pub was the Red Lion at Revesby which was about a five mile cycle ride which we did no trouble at all. And I told you we had this little lady, Pat, who took a shine to me. And she used to sing you know. She used to get up in the pub and sing. She was good like that.
CB: She was the WAAF?
AP: She was a WAAF.
CB: What did she do in the RAF?
AP: Well she was on the reception committees. When you came back she would help make you comfortable. Bring you cups of tea and things. Plenty of cigarettes everywhere which was crazy really but they did. And that’s what she did. They sort of picked the ones who were outgoing types of girls, you know. She was quite outgoing in that respect.
CB: So at the end of a raid how did you feel?
AP: Relieved. Relieved.
CB: So you got down. What was the process? The plane lands. Then what?
AP: Well we had the —
CB: You taxied,
AP: Debriefing of course.
CB: You taxied to dispersal.
AP: Oh yeah.
CB: And then —?
AP: Emptied the, emptied the aircraft out and then we had to be debriefed.
CB: Each one individually?
AP: No. We all sat as a crew with the debriefing officer and one of the girls would be with us. Give us tea and things like that. That’s how I met up with Pat really. Because she used to be doing that sort of work you see. And then we went out together to places like Revesby. It’s not far from — do you know Revesby?
CB: Yeah.
AP: The Red Lion there. It’s still there you know.
CB: Yes.
AP: Just the same.
CB: Yes.
AP: I often called in there when going that way to renew acquaintances. Yeah.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Yeah. I used to think nothing of cycling five miles then for a drink
CB: And how —
AP: Beer wasn’t easy to get hold up. Decent beer.
CB: Did it run out regularly?
AP: Yeah. And there was one pub we went to they were so short of glasses we drank out of jam jars. I forget which pub it was but I think that was The Plough at East Kirkby. No. The Red Lion at East Kirkby. We did use that very often. That got so crowded. It was so near the ‘drome. We preferred to go out to Revesby.
CB: Right.
AP: We went to Mareham too. That wasn’t too far away.
CB: Now, we’ve talked about the aircrew. We’ve talked about your debriefing. How did the link go with the ground crew? How? Did you liaise with them much or —?
AP: Oh yes, we went out to drinks together but on the whole not too much. No. They didn’t seem to want to be too involved but we did have one or two nights out with them certainly. And during the moon spells you could afford to have drinks. You knew you wouldn’t be called on. The exception being Nuremberg when they did call us out with a full moon but apart from that normally the moon was a quiet period.
CB: Right. And the crew chief. What would he be? Rank.
AP: Corporal or sergeant.
CB: And what was their attitude to the aircraft?
AP: Oh, they looked after their own aircraft. My word they did. They were very proud of it. You know. Keep it serviceable. There were so many, you know, became [pause] not de-serviceable. What’s the word?
CB: A wreck.
AP: Not a wreck exactly but, you know, they had to do a lot of work on them. They kept ours — they kept us flying all the time. That was one good thing. I feel sorry for this present Lanc. They’ve had this engine fire, haven’t they?
CB: Yeah.
AP: And it seems it’s quite a major problem. The air frame’s been affected around the engine mounting.
CB: Oh, has it? Yes.
AP: Yes. So, I’m told. So how long it will before it flies again I do not know. At the same time the Panton is hoping to get Just Jane flying but whether they will or not I don’t know. They say it’s going to cost a lot of money to get the airframe right and to get a certificate of air worthiness. That’s the problem.
CB: Going back to the war experience what was your worst experience on a raid?
AP: Well I wouldn’t say Nuremberg although Nuremberg was bad. I wouldn’t say it was the worst one. I think the worst one was Mailly-le-Camp where we seemed to be buzzing around for ages waiting for things to happen.
CB: This is the Cheshire raid.
AP: Yeah. I don’t blame Cheshire at all. He was a good, he was a good chap. In fact, we did a Munich raid some time afterwards where he took off about two, he took off two hours after we did [laughs] and we flew down to North Italy and then we headed north for Munich and bombed Munich and Cheshire had moved in in the meantime and dropped his flares with a Mosquito. Yes. He was good like that and of course [pause] the Dambuster fellow. He went down in a Mosquito didn’t he?
CB: Gibson. Yes.
AP: Guy Gibson. Couldn’t think of the name for a minute. I hope you’ll pardon me forgetting names.
CB: That’s ok.
AP: As I say these things are affecting me a bit. These.
CB: Could you talk us through your situation as an air bomber because you’re the person looking at the flak coming up. So, at what — so could you talk us through the point the pilot hands over to you. Could you just talk us through what you did? What it was like. How you dealt with it.
AP: Well the air bomber, the air bomber or bomb aimer as some say — the official title is air bomber by the way. His job really was to take over when the bombing site was coming up and to guide the pilot to the markers. And we were told what marker. It was either red or green normally. And of course, we had to, we had to man the guns. I never fired the front guns but they were there if necessary. But we always used to say, ‘Left. Left. Right.’ ‘Left. Left,’ you had to say. You didn’t say left or right. It had to be, ‘Left left.’ Or right. That was one — so that sort of did away with any sort of errors you see. But as I say the bomb aimer saw everything going on more than anybody else. The poor old navigator — he didn’t see a thing. He was behind closed curtains. Probably just as well. He didn’t see a thing. The wireless operator too. But the bomb aimer was there to see everything.
CB: So, what were you actually seeing? Because the run in takes how long?
AP: Oh, it could take anything from thirty minutes to two or three minutes. We were flying, I’ll say one thing about the old Lanc you could get up to about twenty three, twenty four thousand feet and it seemed like ages going in, you know. With flak all around you. It always seemed you could never get through the flak. It always seemed there was a hole in the flak and you were in that hole, you know. Just marching along. We got hit once or twice but only minor stuff.
CB: So, when you’re on the run in the pilot is effectively saying, ‘Over to you.’ Is he?
AP: Yeah. Yeah.
CB: You’re not actually controlling anything yourself but you’re telling him what to do.
AP: Oh no. He’s got the controls to guide the thing. We’re just saying either, ‘Left. Left,’ ‘Right,’ or so on. You know.
CB: And then —
AP: We had, of course, control of all the switch gear. You know, the bomb selector.
CB: Ok. So just talk us through the bomb selection because you had a wide range of ordnance on board so how did that work? There was a sequence.
AP: Well it was pretty much automatic really, you know. Our main bomb load used to be a four thousand pound cookie with incendiaries. And it was all automatic. Once you, once you got over the target you pressed the button and everything worked automatically. And the camera which was in the back of the aircraft which we didn’t like. That was phosphor bomb.
CB: So, there was a sequence that the bombs left.
AP: Yeah.
CB: What was the sequence?
AP: Well the cookie normally went first. The four thousand pounder. Followed by the incendiaries. We did have raids where we had fourteen one thousand pound bombs but normally on the mass bombing it was to cause fires which I didn’t go much on to be quite frank. But there again it was a, that was the way it was directed we should fight the war.
CB: Right. So, the cookie was non, it wasn’t aerodynamic. It was just a cylinder so —
AP: Like a big dustbin. Yeah.
CB: What did it do? It was a blast bomb.
AP: A blast bomb. Yeah. That blasted everything so the incendiaries would come along and set fire to the blasting but there were so many bombs being dropped I don’t think they made much difference really. And we were given a time to, we were given, different squadrons had different times to approach the target you see.
CB: Right.
AP: And the Pathfinders [pause] they would, you know, they would direct the bombers to what they thought was relevant at the time. Yeah.
CB: So, the Pathfinders were circling. Or the master bomber was circling. Giving instruction was he?
AP: They — I wouldn’t say they would. They used to go in first and mark the target but I don’t think they hung about. It wasn’t healthy to hang about.
CB: I meant the master bomber would stay and watch. Would he?
AP: In the mass raids — no. In the more selective raids like Munich and some of the other raids he’d be there all the time. But on the mass raids early on, the Berlins, it was just a question of the Pathfinders coming in, marking the target and then getting the hell out of it.
CB: So what heights were you normally, normally delivering your load?
AP: Twenty one, twenty three thousand. Yeah. Pretty high really. We were above the Halifaxes and Stirlings. I always felt sorry for the Stirlings. That’s why I quite liked meeting that friend of yours.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Because how he survived I do not know but he did didn’t he?
CB: Extraordinary.
AP: Did he do a full raid?
CB: He did. So I’ll cover that with you later. But the air bomber bit is interesting because we don’t necessarily have much detail on that and so that’s why I’m just asking you a bit more about it. And —
AP: Yeah. Well, as I say, it varied over the course of my time you see. First of all it was mass bombing, then more selective bombing and then pinpoint bombing as we approached D-day you see. The whole character of the thing was changing actually.
CB: So, when, when you did the pinpoint bombing. Was that with markers?
AP: No.
CB: ‘Cause a lot of it’s daylight isn’t it?
AP: No. No. Not daylight at all. No. No. We had to do it by map reading and —
CB: Ok.
AP: There were no markers then. No.
CB: No. ‘Cause we’re talking, for you we’re talking we’re talking pre-D-Day.
AP: On some day there were only two squadrons. Only twenty or thirty aircraft, you see.
CB: Yeah.
AP: That was, they were the interesting raids really. They were the raids I preferred because we knew then that we were bombing specific targets to the, for the good of the army. And we were trying to upset the German transport movements.
CB: Yeah. So, going back to you’ve released your bombs. You’ve got a camera and then there’s a flash that goes down.
AP: There’s a flash. Yeah.
CB: Does that, how does the timing work for that? Do you set it as the bomber aimer?
AP: That, again, is all automatic.
CB: So —
AP: We didn’t, we didn’t like the phosphor bombs because I mean, if they hang up they were deadly you know.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Did you have them at all?
CB: I know what you mean. Yeah.
AP: They were at the back of the aircraft.
CB: Yeah.
AP: By the toilet.
CB: Right.
AP: But as I say they would drop automatically and then they were timed to go off to take the photos as the bomb, as the bomb exploded.
CB: Because the time of their firing would depend on how high you were.
AP: Yes. It was all, it was all done automatically you know by the, by the experts shall we say.
CB: So, what was the purpose of the camera?
AP: I frankly don’t know. It seemed to me to be a bit unnecessary but at least it proved you’d been there. There was a danger you see, I suppose that some crews may not have even have bombed the target. And that was proof you’d been there. Oh, I got some good aiming point photographs. I think that’s why they awarded me the old DFC. We got some good aiming point photographs.
CB: At what point did you receive the award of DFC?
AP: After the, after the tour. They analysed things you know and we’d had a good record of aiming point photographs.
CB: Who else in the crew?
AP: The pilot did. And myself. I thought Tom MacKay, the navigator should have had one because he was very good chap. In fact, he flew, when Gwen was ill he flew her out to Switzerland twice you know to try and get her better treatment but it didn’t work. She had Parkinson’s. But he knew somebody in Switzerland, in Geneva who he thought might help her because he lived out there for a time. And he arranged, he had his own, as I say he had his own aircraft and we flew her out there a couple of times but it wasn’t to be.
CB: When you came off operations you now went on to training other people you said.
AP: Yeah.
CB: What was that like in contrast?
AP: A jaywalk really. There wasn’t a lot to do really, you know. We had to find, we had to find time. We had to sort of find jobs to do really because although we were helping to train other people we were doing compass swings and things like that. We were back on Ansons and it all seemed a bit airy fairy after Lancasters but it had to be. You know, we were training. We were sending out the new crews coming along.
CB: Was there a sense of relief doing it or was it just boring?
AP: A bit of both. A bit of both.
CB: So, when you came to be demobbed how did you feel about that?
AP: Well I was demobbed, of course, from Palestine. And that’s when I mentioned I was flown in a Dakota back to Heathrow which was just a series of huts in those days. We had a good long run. They paid us for a good long holiday. Two or three months I think. Then I went on to Oxford, you see.
CB: How did you come to meet your future wife, Gwen?
AP: I was in the Royal Air Force then.
CB: What was she?
AP: She wasn’t in the air force. No. She wasn’t Royal Air Force. The other girl I had, that I knew, was Pat. She was with me at the Operational Training Unit but I’d finished by the time I went to North Wales.
CB: By the time you finished your tour did you feel short changed for not doing thirty or was there a sense of relief?
AP: Well it was a sense of relief I think. We were quite badly quite shot up on that. We were mine laying you see in [pause] we were mine laying in — what’s the name of the port.
CB: Brest.
AP: We were attacked by a JU88.
CB: And what height would you be flying for mine laying?
AP: Oh we were quite low. We were quite low. I’m trying to think what [pause] what was the first question you asked me?
CB: What? The sense of relief? I asked you earlier what your worst experience was.
AP: Well that was one of the worst. Yes. [pause] Kiel Bay. I couldn’t think of the word. Kiel Bay.
CB: Where’s that.
AP: We were laying mines in Kiel Bay.
CB: Where’s that? Oh, outside Kiel.
AP: Kiel. Yeah.
CB: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: Kiel Bay. I couldn’t think of the words for a minute. You see, I mean, despite the ops we had one or two occasions where we boomeranged. You know, something went wrong with the aircraft and we had to return. It happened to the guy who died a few weeks ago. The New Zealand, the New Zealand Dambuster fellow.
CB: Yeah.
AP: He had to, he had come back because he had a hit and his compass was put out of action. And we had one or two cases like that.
CB: Les Munro.
AP: Yes, I couldn’t think. Len Munro. Yeah.
CB: Les. Yeah.
AP: Les Munro I meant. I met him a few times.
CB: Did you?
AP: A nice guy he was.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Did you ever meet him?
CB: He was over recently. I never met him but he was.
AP: I met him at Aces High two or three times. He had his girlfriend with him. He’d lost his wife but he had a lady companion who was very pleasant. She used to help him but he was pretty active right to the end. Well, I didn’t see him at the end of course. As I say there was cases too when you would get all ready to go. All the build-up and everything and then it would be cancelled. All that sort of getting ready. Nearly all, not all day but you had to do a night flying test before where everybody went up and flew for about half an hour and tested everything and then you’d come back and then go to briefing. So that was all part of the game but those didn’t count.
CB: Was that a frustration?
AP: Frustration really. Yes. Having spent the whole afternoon or a bit longer getting ready and then to find it was cancelled. That happened a few times and that didn’t count.
CB: So, what was the atmosphere before you went on the raid amongst the crew?
AP: The atmosphere. It’s a job to pinpoint it really Chris. We were all a bit apprehensive I suppose really. A bit apprehensive. Is it recording? But some of the crews used to have a pee on to the — on to — what was it now? There were different ways people had to let off steam. We all had our little [pause] I had a little St Christopher I always took with me. Geoff, the pilot, had a scarf. And I remember one raid, we were ready to take off and he’d forgotten his scarf. Luckily, he had his motorbike with him and he shot off to the billets, got his scarf and came back. It made us a bit late but he was determined he wouldn’t fly without his scarf. We all had these little [pause] what’s the word? Keepsakes.
CB: Did everybody do that?
AP: Lucky charms.
CB: Yeah. Lucky charms. Did everybody?
AP: Yeah most had. I had a little St Christopher which I’ve lost now but I did have one and I always made sure I had it.
CB: And when the tour was over was there a feeling that you would get together at some stage afterwards or was there just an acceptance that you were being disbursed?
AP: There was just an acceptance. That’s the problem really. You were sort of lived together for six months. You were living together, you know and then you suddenly break up and everybody goes their own way. And we didn’t all get together afterwards. We tried. Geoff Probert, my skipper, he went to Hatfield and I never did see him. We tried to meet up once or twice and we never did. Then he went up to Sheffield and he died fairly young. ‘Cause he was older than the rest of us. So getting together was a problem. I did reach some of the guys afterwards but you see after the war you really had to forget all about it and I did for about five or six years. Going to Oxford you had to get your head down and get down to studies and you more or less forgot all about the war. It’s only now, in latter years, that we begin to think about it again.
CB: But did, what did you feel the general public’s attitude was to people who had been effectively on the front line? After the war.
AP: Well, as I say I didn’t really think too much about it then. I think people were quite sympathetic to what we had done. Some people thought we were having, having it too cushy. At least one thing — we came back to white sheets. We didn’t sleep in dirty, muddy trenches which I would have hated. We came back to a decent bed after a raid and we were looked after.
CB: Yeah.
AP: With our eggs and bacon.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Which no one else could get.
CB: No.
AP: That was a great relief to have eggs and bacon and that type of thing. So some people thought that aircrew and submarine people had been molly coddled but we had a fairly dangerous job to do.
CB: A final question then. You’ve touched on it already. How did you feel about what you were doing in actually aiming — effectively aiming the aircraft and dropping the bombs?
AP: How did I feel?
CB: Each time.
AP: I didn’t like the area bombing because you never quite knew where your bombs were landing. I was always a bit perturbed about that. I had that in my mind you know but we had a job to do. And they started the bombing first so we had to sort of — they bombed Coventry and London didn’t they? But as I say towards the end of the war with the bombing — the run up to D-day it was a different cup of tea really.
CB: Yeah. And was your bomb sight — what was that like?
AP: The Mk 14.
CB: Yeah. Were you happy with that or —?
AP: Oh yes. Yeah.
CB: Yeah.
AP: Of course they’ve improved no end now. In fact, if you when you’ve got time I’ll take you to the Trenchard Museum at Halton where they’ve got some of the old Mk 14 bomb sights. You want to go to go there, you know.
CB: We will. The Americans claimed that their bomb sights were so much better for accuracy. That’s why I ask the question.
AP: I think ours was pretty good. We got some good aiming point photographs. The Americans may have been better because they did their daylight stuff didn’t they? Mark you they did catch a pasting didn’t they? On some of these daylight raids. Didn’t they?
CB: Absolutely.
AP: Yeah.
CB: Well, we’ve done really well Alan. Thank you so much. I’m going to stop the tape now and we’ll have —
AP: I’m sorry. I should have done genned up with this. There are things I forgot didn’t I?
[Recording paused]
CB: Hang on. Just as an extra then Alan. We talked about Pat and I wonder first of all when you went on a raid what was the reaction of the WAAFs as you set off?
AP: Well there was a great deal of cooperation. I think they felt that, you know, most of the crews knew a WAAF somewhere down the line and they were invariably at the end of the runway to wave us as we went off. Without them we’d have missed it. They weren’t there when we came back of course. They were all in the debriefing huts waiting for us to come back. But no, they cooperated. I think they realised what we were doing and I felt that their presence helped a heck of a lot.
CB: So, in terms of Pat she clearly was a major factor in your life then.
AP: During that time. Yes. During that time, she was. Helped to take off the stress off the bombing ‘cause we used to go for cycle rides and things together, you know and she’d come out drinking with us. And she used to sing. She had quite a good voice. I don’t know where she learned to sing but she used to get up and sing. She was a bit, sort of outgoing in that respect. There aren’t many girls who would get up in the pub and sing are there?
CB: Probably not. But how did this break up in time?
AP: What?
CB: This relationship you had with her.
AP: Well we didn’t — when I got posted away of course, I mean, I couldn’t keep up with meeting all the time and I suppose we did write for a time of course and gradually I suppose the letters got less and less and it just faded away but I often wonder what happened. Even now I often wonder if she’s alive still.
CB: In your experience with 630 Squadron Association are there any people who were ground crew personnel who have been members or did it tend only to be aircrew?
AP: It’s funny that you should say that. I met a, we had a meeting at Aces High with Bomber Command and there was a WAAF there who was a driver at East Kirkby. She lives now in Bournemouth and she was there with her son. I didn’t know her at the time but she told me she was on transport. You know they used to drive the crews out to the aircraft and she was doing that. Well, she’s older than me. She was ninety three I think she told me. So that’s one case but there aren’t many of the old WAAFs turn up.
CB: No.
AP: We do see — now who was, who was the inventor of the bouncing bomb, now.
CB: Barnes Wallis.
AP: Her —
CB: His daughter.
AP: His daughter comes along. You’ve met her have you? She often comes along with — oh [pause] the last remaining bomb aimer. I saw him the other day. His name is gone now. He was up at East Kirkby. Johnny Johnson. He’s written a book. The farmer’s boy he was, wasn’t he? Have you read the book?
CB: I haven’t. no. But he —
AP: Oh, I’ve got it. I haven’t read it. I gave it to my other son because he was a farmer. Johnny Johnson.
CB: Ok. That’s really good. Thank you very much.
[recording paused]
CB: One more question now, Alan. People tend to have an affection not just for lucky charms but for aircraft so were you normally with the same plane? Or what was the situation?
AP: We were normally with the same plane. Yes. There were occasions of course when we didn’t have the same plane. But it was always nice to have the same plane. And LEY was ours. LEY.
CB: And if you flew in another one how did you feel?
AP: Oh, it didn’t really bother me too much but it was just nice to know you had your own aircraft.
CB: Because they tend to have specific characteristics.
AP: I suppose they do, really. Yes. Yeah.
CB: Ok. Thank you.
[recording paused]
CB: Ok.
AP: Well there was a survey party had got lost in the Sahara and they asked for volunteers to go and find it. Well, they had a sort of point where they thought he was and we had to make for that and then we started to do a square search based on the visibility. And we found it and they waved to us and we radio’d back where they were. But that’s just one little thing we did and we had to volunteer for that. We had this note that these people were lost in the desert.
CB: Yeah. A practical humanitarian task.
AP: Well yeah. Yeah.
CB: Let me just take you back to that JU88 encounter because that could have been fatal.
AP: Oh easy. So easy.
CB: So what happened? What height were you etcetera and how did he find you? And —
AP: Well it just happened. We were sailing along and all of a sudden these bursts burst of cannon fire all around us. I mean the rear gunner should have seen him really but he never saw him and I think he was — he wasn’t underneath us. He was behind us. Normally the idea was to come up from the underside.
CB: Yeah.
AP: And fire in to the petrol tanks.
CB: Yes. Yeah. So the, so the gunner — he was coming from behind and the gunner didn’t see.
AP: Didn’t see him. No.
CB: What was the — in the dark this was.
AP: In the dark, oh yes.
CB: Yeah. Yeah. Right. So, he starts firing so the shells are exploding is that right?
AP: Yeah.
CB: Then — then what happened?
AP: Well there weren’t many shells actually. In fact, you know, we thought he would come back because the plane had caught fire. Luckily it went out. And we honestly thought he would come back for another go but he didn’t. I think he thought he’d got us and that was it. And old Geoff, the pilot put it into a steep dive and started to corkscrew and we lost the JU88.
CB: So, the corkscrew might have been the solution.
AP: Yeah. Yeah.
CB: But what happened to the strikes? Where were the strikes on the aircraft? On your plane.
AP: Well, as I say one was on the rear turret and the other side and one in the wing but apart from, it didn’t really do any sort of damage structurally. Although one caused a fire, you see. And one —
CB: Where was the fire?
AP: I’ve got a picture of this machine gun. The machine gun is all bent over where the shell hit it. And the rear gunner — he was jolly lucky to be alive. He really was.
CB: So, let me get this straight the shell hits the rear turret. In the gun.
AP: It hit the end of the gun. It was remarkable. It really was.
CB: And the gunner wasn’t injured.
AP: No. He wasn’t hurt. He was sort of knocked out, you know. He was semi, he was sort of, you know, the blast sort of knocked him out temporarily. He was sort of muttering away, you know, half in and half out but he came around and we still had the mines on board, you know. That was another thing. We didn’t jettison. We went on and dropped them afterwards ‘cause when he attacked we were still going in on to the target, you see. In to the bay, Kiel bay. And that was our twenty ninth raid. And I think the CO, Wing Commander [Dee?] saw we’d had enough. ‘Oh, you can stand down now,’ he said.
CB: After. After that. Yes. So, you dropped your mines successfully.
AP: Yeah, we dropped the mines.
CB: What height would you drop a mines from? ‘Cause you can’t do it from height ‘cause it’ll break.
AP: No. You can’t do it from height. No.
CB: So what height were you dropping?
AP: I think we must have been about twelve thousand feet. Something like that. Yeah. A long time ago now. You tend to forget these things don’t you?
CB: Sure. Yeah. Thanks.
Dublin Core
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Identifier
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APayneAJ150811
Title
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Interview with Alan Payne
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.
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IBCC Digital Archive
Type
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Sound
Language
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eng
Format
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01:21:03 audio recording
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Pending review
Creator
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Chris Brockbank
Date
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2015-08-11
Description
An account of the resource
Alan Payne was born in Wendover, Buckinghamshire. He volunteered for aircrew with the Royal Air Force and after initial training was sent to South Africa where he trained as an observer. When he returned to the UK, he was allocated the role of bomb aimer and after joining a crew he was posted to 630 Squadron at RAF East Kirkby. His first operation was to Berlin. He describes the operation to Mailly-le-Camp as one of his worst experiences with Bomber Command. Returning from an operation on Nuremberg his aircraft was attacked by an Me 109 and on their last operation mine laying off Kiel they were attacked by a Ju 88. After his tour Alan became an instructor before being posted to Palestine. When he was demobbed he undertook training at Oxford University to become an architect.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
South African Air Force
Spatial Coverage
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Germany
Great Britain
South Africa
Atlantic Ocean--Baltic Sea
England--Lincolnshire
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Nuremberg
Germany--Kiel
Temporal Coverage
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1944-05-03
1944-05-04
Contributor
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Julie Williams
630 Squadron
aerial photograph
aircrew
Anson
bomb aimer
bombing
Bombing of Mailly-le-Camp (3/4 May 1944)
bombing of Nuremberg (30 / 31 March 1944)
coping mechanism
crewing up
debriefing
Distinguished Flying Cross
ground crew
ground personnel
H2S
Halifax
Ju 88
lack of moral fibre
Lancaster
Me 109
military living conditions
mine laying
Nissen hut
observer
RAF Dumfries
RAF East Kirkby
RAF Silverstone
RAF Torquay
RAF Turweston
RAF Winthorpe
Scarecrow
superstition
target photograph
training
Wellington
Window
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/358/6094/AHayleyCA160224.2.mp3
24880b7e4d452a04df441ffcc72a2c71
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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Hayley, Jack
Jack Hayley
C A Hayley
Cecil A Hayley
Description
An account of the resource
Eight items. Collection consists of a log book, an interview and other items concerning Flight Lieutenant Cecil 'Jack' Alison Hayley DFC. Items include photographs of aircraft and people, a letter concerning his Distinguished Flying Cross and well as newspaper cuttings concerning operations, his wedding and the award of the Distinguished Flying Cross. After training he completed tours on 625 Squadron at RAF Kelstern, then 170 Squadron at RAF Hemswell before going on to a bomber defence training flight flying Hurricanes and Spitfires.
This collection was donated by Jack Hayley and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Hayley, CA
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.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-02-25
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB: My name is Chris Brockbank and today is the, Thursday the 25th of February 2016 and I’m sitting here with John Longstaff-Ellis talking to Cecil Alison Hayley.
JCAH: No.
CB: Otherwise known as Jack and his wife Barbara about Jack’s experiences in the war but can we just start in your earliest recollections Jack?
JCAH: Yes.
CB: Of family life and -
JCAH: Yes.
CB: And how you came to join the RAF.
JCAH: Yes. Yes. Well, I was born in Caterham as I say. My father had an ironmonger’s business in the Croydon Road, Caterham it’s, ‘cause there was lower Caterham and upper Caterham. We were in the lower, lower Caterham and I was I was born over the shop, over the ironmonger’s shop. So earliest recollections I was the youngest of three boys and I was five years younger than my eldest and three and a half years younger than my, the middle one. Harold was the eldest and Leslie was the middle one. I have very few recollections of life before primary school which was at Caterham Board School they called it. It’s on Croydon Road, Caterham which I suppose I started when I was, I don’t know, five I suppose and then, well while I was there I, my interest in those early days, well when I was old enough was Scouting. I started off as a Wolf Cub and went on to Scouting but can I just I stop there.
[machine paused]
JCAH: The thing is my secondary school, ok. So if we could start again. Are you ready to start again?
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: Ok. Right. I I went to my secondary school which was Purley County School which, when I started there was near Purley but they had, had to extend the school and make a completely new building and the new school was built at Chalden and I used to cycle from Caterham up, because it was up on the hill, I had to go through Caterham on the hill and I was interested in rugby, I used to play rugby. I wasn’t very interested in cricket but I did join the school cadet corps when I was at Purley County School and I learned to play the bugle there in the band. So that took me up to the age of eighteen when I left school which was 1938, no, seventeen, that’s right. 1938. And my first job was with a small insurance company in the city and our offices were in the Royal Exchange and I was on the mezzanine floor looking out of the window right across to the Bank and Bank Square, the Mansion House and the Bank of England. It was a beautiful position to be in. Anyway, I suppose I was there until, where are we, ‘39, probably 1940, the office, oh no it was before the war they, in 1938 they obviously decided they would move out of London and we moved to Aylesbury and the offices at Aylesbury and my wife happened to be the secretary to the district manager at at the branch there at Aylesbury and she managed to fix me up with accommodation in Stoke Mandeville, Moat Farm and I was well fed there during the war. It was a lovely place to be. Anyway, we, my wife and I, her parents were farming in Weston Turville and I used to enjoy going over to the farm and taking part in the farming activities and eventually, well we got engaged so now we’re coming up, I, of course, I was eighteen when war broke and, but it wasn’t, for some reason or other it wasn’t ‘til 1941 they started taking any interest in me and my service and I had interviews and I, at that time I hadn’t any great ambition to go flying because my family history was in, in the navy and I assumed perhaps I would go in to the navy. But then they were desperate to get young, young chaps to join as air crew so I was persuaded to join the air force and my first, I had to report to the Lord’s Cricket Ground at St John’s, St John’s Wood which was the, what they called the Number 1 Air Crew Receiving Centre which was abbreviated as ACRC and in typical RAF slang became marcy tarcy [laughs]. So, yes I was probably there for probably two or three weeks getting kitted out and being introduced to RAF life and from my first part of training was Initial Training Wing at Newquay in Cornwall and there I did our usual square bashing and getting training in aircraft recognition and Morse, all these sort of things before, so I was probably there four or five months I suppose in Newquay and then yes I heard that I was being, of course by this time of course I knew I’d been selected for air crew training but then we had to go through what they called a grading school which was at Cliffe Pypard near, near Lyneham. Up on the top of the hill. A little small airfield and I think we flew Magisters there and we had twelve hours in which to go solo and if we didn’t go solo, unless there was any other particular reason, you continue pilot training then we were selected for pilot training and of course the alternative was trained as a navigator. So Cliffe Pypard. Yes. Could I just stop a minute there?
[machine paused]
JCAH: So from there we were sent to Heaton Park in Manchester which was the Air Crew Disposal, Dispersal Centre and eventually we were allocated to a convoy going out from Glasgow to take us across, across the Atlantic to Canada. We actually landed in New York and took the train up to Monkton in New Brunswick where we were held pending being sent on to our first training station. So I was there about a couple of weeks and then we took a train journey from New Brunswick across to Calgary and I think we started on the Monday and we got there on the Friday [laughs]. The only main stop we had was at Winnipeg where I think we changed trains and the local ladies were very good to us and came along with all sorts of goodies and they treated us very well and from there we went on to Calgary. I think it was the Friday we arrived and of course the steam trains then were fired by, by wood. Wood fired steam trains, and we used to wake up every morning covered in wood soot. Not a very comfortable journey. Anyway, so having arrived at Calgary we were posted to the 31 Elementary Flying Training School at De Winton where we flew Stearmans mostly. Boeing Stearmans during the day but we also flew Tiger Moths. The American, the Canadian Tiger Moth which had the luxury of a canopy above us instead of being an open cockpit and we used, we used to fly those mainly to introduce us to instrument flying but the main training was on the Stearmans so that took us from September ’42 to, yes to the end of November ‘42 when we were, I was posted to Number 38 Flying Training School at Estevan in Saskatchewan in the middle of the prairies in the middle of the winter. It was pretty harsh but it’s surprising how we coped really and of course the accommodation was all centrally heated you know. Anyway, so we were flying the Anson there. The Canadian Anson with the Jacob engines and it had the luxury of hydraulic undercarriage instead of, you know the British Anson you wound up as well. I don’t know. About eighty winds. So that was, but it’s interesting as well of course a lot of the time we were landing on snow which was very, you had very little references to judge your height and it was a good, good training. And well we did all the normal things. Cross country training of course, instrument flying as well as all our ground training in navigation. Did a lot of Morse code training, aircraft recognition, those sort of things and eventually we completed, I completed my training in April ‘43 and qualified for my wings which I was very proud of and then we were returned to Monkton to the dispersal centre at Monkton for our return journey across the Atlantic and while we were there there was, I remember this, Jimmy Edwards had been training out there and he and a few others managed to get together and produce a show for us which was good fun. Anyway, so we, I was going to say on our outward cruise we had a bit of a panic because one of the ships was torpedoed and it wasn’t ‘til after we got back that there was a news item in the new New York papers of the torpedoing of this ship, it was a cargo ship who managed to struggle into New York so that was interesting. But of course I, whilst I was at Monkton I was commissioned before I came home and so the journey home was far more luxurious in the Ile de France. It was, had been converted into a troop ship so yes we were living in luxury. A little episode, if I could go back to the outward cruise. We were in an American convoy and the sister ship of the one we were in had been, gone down with fire so there were very strict no smoking rules on deck, no below deck. You could smoke above deck and I was caught smoking below deck and my punishment was to work in the kitchen which, this was the officer’s mess and it was nice to pick all up the titbits, the luxury titbits such as oysters, fried oysters. So it wasn’t a bad punishment. Anyway, returning, the home trip was as I say very comfortable and so we, let’s see, we, the first posting was to Harrogate which was another personnel receiving centre and then on to Bournemouth for some reason or other and then we started, we went to Little Rissington which is a suburb of, of the big flying training station. No. Yes. No. That’s right we went to Little Rissington and then we were posted to a satellite of Little Rissington at Windrush and there we were flying Oxfords to get acclimatised to a different type of flying in this country as compared with Canada with the wide open spaces and roads that went either north west or east west. North, east, south and east, west. It was quite different and then of course coping with the restricted areas and so on in this country and during that time I, we did some instrument flying training at the Beam, what they called the Beam Approach Training Flight at Docking where we, they had an approach system which was pretty primitive. Anyway, we were only there oh about ten days and then I finished my training at Madly in September ‘43 and was then posted to a radio school at Madly, west of Hereford on the River Wye and there we were flying radio cadets. I was flying the Domini, the RAF version of the Rapide and the other flight was flying Proctors and single aircraft, single engine aircraft. I must say the old Rapide was very reliable and quite nice to fly. The only snag was there was no seat as such. You were just sat on a cushion with your legs stretched out in front of you which after an hour or so could be pretty, you could get a bit stiff. Anyway, it was an interesting period and we could just choose where we flew just as long as getting practice of operating in the air there, the radio equipment and I got to know the area quite well. The Black Mountains and going north to Cheshire and out that way. So that was, that took me up to March 1944 and at that stage I was about to start my operational training but a little incident. I, my wife and I had arranged to get married in November ‘43. Let’s see, ’43 perhaps and but, that’s right, I was at Madley and a week before we were getting married I was told that I was going on a course and it was they called a junior commander’s course and this was up in Inverness and I thought if any course I was going to go on I thought it was going to be an operational course but to spend, to, prior to my wedding arrangements for the sake of a stupid administrative course was, there was no way I could talk them out of it. Consequently our honeymoon arrangements went by the board and so we got married on the Saturday, yes and that Saturday night we spent in a hotel off The Strand. I think it was the Surrey Hotel if I remember rightly and most of the night was spent in the basement because of the air raid [laughs]. So that was my honeymoon night and the following day I, we had to get, I had to get on a train all the way to Inverness which in those days was it was impossible to find a seat on the train so we just had to squat on our kit in the corridor. So all in all that was a bit of a disaster. So having done that I was then posted in March ‘44 to 83 Operational Training Unit at Peplow. That’s in, in the Midlands. And there I flew the Wellington and I was there for about three months. I forget how many hours we flew but one little incident. The Wellington is infamous for its brake pressure. You had to watch your brake pressure all the time and the dispersal areas there were pans, dispersal pans and the land just dropped away from around the dispersal pan and I suddenly discovered I was out of brake pressure and I had to lurch over the side and down the slope, which I got a red endorsement which was eventually cancelled but that was an unfortunate incident. It learned me a lesson. Taught me a lesson. So Peplow [unclear] Park. Air crew. Yes. So having completed training on a Wellington I then went on to the Heavy Conversion Unit at Sandtoft which was in the Hull area. That sort of area. And I suppose we did about thirty or forty hours on the, on the Halifax and then on to the Lancaster Finishing School at Hemswell and that was October ‘44. I was there only for just over two weeks and I had my first training, first appointment to a squadron which was 625 squadron at Kelstern and I was there for nearly two months when 170 squadron was reformed. It was previously a reconnaissance squadron beginning of the war and was disbanded and was reformed at, at Kelstern and I was, we were first of all at a little place called Dunholme Lodge. It was very much a wartime station and it was right alongside, on the, from Scampton on the opposite side of the Ermine Street, the main road to the north and I suppose it was only, I don’t know, might be four miles separating us from Scampton and consequently we had to have a common circuit around both airfields and this all got a bit fraught and I think they decided it was bit too dangerous and we were, I was posted then back to Hemswell and I, well finished my training, finished my tour on 170 squadron on the 15th of April ‘45. If we could just stop there. Yes. Just -
[machine paused]
CB: We’re talking about Lancaster and Halifax so -
JCAH: Yes.
CB: How, what, what were the differences between those then Jack?
JCAH: Well I mean -
CB: And which did you like?
JCAH: The Halifax was quite a heavy aircraft to fly and quite difficult to land successfully. It was quite hard work but the Lancaster was quite different. It was so easily controlled. The controls were more positive but not, not heavy and the manoeuvrability was so much better than the Halifax and the, I suppose as far as the air crew positons it was the same, similar. It simply, you had a Perspex canopy over you as pilot and of course no heating. You just relied on winter clothing to keep warm. So, no, the experience of training, going on to Lancasters was quite remarkable really. The sheer manoeuvrability and particularly when it come to using corkscrews to avoid fighters. Giving maximum deflection all the time. But no so as far as -
CB: What about rate of climb? Was there a difference in that?
JCAH: Yes. I think probably it was better. I think, I think with the four Merlins I can’t remember what the Halifax had in the way of engines.
CB: Well the early ones had Merlins and then they went to -
JCAH: Yeah.
CB: The Bristol Mercuries. .
JCAH: Yes. Hercules.
CB: The Hercules. Yes.
JCAH: Yeah. No. I think it had a climbing and of course I suppose the maximum ceiling was around about twenty thousand feet. We were normally operating, I suppose, about eighteen, eighteen thousand feet. That sort of height. So going back, going, talking about actual incidents during my ops I suppose I’ll just of give a summary of -
CB: What was your first raid?
JCAH: Sorry?
CB: What was your first raid?
JCAH: Yes. It was with another crew to introduce me to what was, what happened during a bombing raid and this was an operation on Le Havre in daylight. Yes. So 625 squadron I had, I did twelve sorties with 625 before going on to 170 squadron and I did nineteen sorties with 170 squadron. Making a total of thirty one sorties all together and total flying time during my operations was a hundred and eighty one hours. By that time I had just reached a thousand hours altogether when I finished my tour. But I suppose one particular incident comes to mind when we were over Dusseldorf and we were coned by searchlights and of course you’re a sitting duck then to all the ackack anti-aircraft fire in the area and I simply stuck the nose down and called to the engineer for full power and I shall never forgive him saying, ‘What?’ when I was wanting immediate power [laughs] and you see he was questioning what I was saying. I said, ‘Full power,’ and so we just stuck the nose and just got out of the area as quick as possible. But on return we’d no, had no injuries in the crew but the aircraft was pretty well peppered and on landing I realised that my starboard tyre had burst and that was obviously lurching down. I kept it as straight as I could for as long as I could and then I just veered off on to the grass to clear the runway for the other aircraft coming in but looking at it the next morning was, it was out of commission. That, my aircraft was TCD. Our squadron letter was TC and I, I was D-Dog. I don’t think we had a P. TCP [laughs] Anyway, I suppose in about three or four days it was back in working order and I successfully finished my tour. So -
CB: Just -
JCAH: Yes.
CB: Go back on a couple of things.
JCAH: Yes. Ok.
CB: The crews. So you crewed up.
JCAH: Oh yes.
CB: At OTU. How did that work?
JCAH: Sorry?
CB: You crewed up at OTU.
JCAH: That’s right.
CB: How did that work?
JCAH: They were just, well we had, no we didn’t have an engineer I don’t think.
CB: No.
JCAH: No. No. Just pilot, navigator, signaller and I think we had one gunner. That’s right. But then going on to the heavy aircraft we were, we were seven. Pilot, flight engineer, navigator, radio operator, bomb aimer and two gunners. Mid-up and two guns. Seven. No. It’s amazing how crew selection, we were just left to mix with each other and somehow we gelled and and I I was very successful, very lucky with my crew I think. My navigator in particular. He was, he was excellent. There was one occasion when we had no aids at all from the target, I forget which target it was and we were completely on dead reckoning radar based on past information on winds and so on but he got us home safely and we managed to recognise landfall on the English coast and got in safely but no, I was, and I was glad that I was eventually awarded the DFC and he was awarded the DFC as well. That pleased me no end because he was a great cont, made a good contribution to the operation of the crew. So you just -
CB: So you got, got a crew. Sorry.
JCAH: Sorry? Yes?
CB: Yes, just, you got a crew at OTU. Normally there was six on the Wellington.
JCAH: We didn’t have a -
CB: Yeah. But some flew with four.
JCAH: Yeah.
CB: Was there a shortage of gunners and bomb aimers?
JCAH: I’m just trying to think whether we had two gunners at that stage. That I can’t quite remember. We certainly didn’t have a second pilot but then again -
CB: They were probably -
JCAH: I suppose, did we? I think we must have had a bomb aimer because we had to practice bombing.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: Yes. We must have had a bomb aimer so that was at, on the Wellington.
CB: So when you were at, when the crew selection took place who was, were they gelling on you or how -
JCAH: It’s difficult -
CB: Or had some of them already got together? What happened?
JCAH: We got chatting to one another. I mean they had no means of knowing what my performance as a pilot was like and it was all a question of trust. But as I say it worked out very well. Yeah.
CB: So when you got to the HCU you then got the, a flight engineer.
JCAH: Yes. Flight engineer.
CB: And was he allocated to you or how did that happen?
JCAH: No. I think much the same thing happened. Of course we had a crew then to decide amongst us who we liked really, or who appealed to us.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: So that made it easier so, so -
CB: How many of the crew were commissioned other than you?
JCAH: My navigator was commissioned and strangely enough my mid-upper gunner which was unusual for a gunner, to have a commissioned gunner. And the rest of them were non-commissioned.
CB: And how did the crew get on in the, in flight and -
JCAH: Yes. I think -
CB: In the evening.
JCAH: You had to avoid being too familiar on the operations and you had to be strict on your intercom identifying each other as a pilot and not by name, that sort of thing so there was no misunderstanding. But yes my, yes my radio operator, he was Australian. A young Australian but he gelled very well. In fact we had a Bridge crew on board, the radio operator, the navigator my, the mid-upper, all four of us played bridge and we always had a pack of cards with us when we were sitting around waiting for something to happen which was good fun. So -
CB: Socially? So in the time off did the crew do things together or did there -
JCAH: Oh yes.
CB: Tend to be factions?
JCAH: No. Not at all. Of course we were in separate messes obviously but we were, certainly at Dunholme Lodge, we were billeted as a crew in old nissen huts with a coke boiler in the middle and the fumes that used to come off that boiler were quite, well sulphurous put it that way and not very, but anyway, we survived that but of course our messes, we used separate messes but we used to, in the evenings we used to obviously go out to the pub together and relax.
CB: So you were married. Were any of the others married?
JCAH: My engineer I think was married. My navigator wasn’t then I don’t think. No. No. I think my engineer and I were was the only ones who were married.
CB: Where was your wife during the war?
JCAH: She was in Aylesbury and -
CB: With her parents.
JCAH: Yes. On the farm at Weston Turville. Of course you had to be careful in those days just what you said on the telephone. You couldn’t really say anything about your operational activities at all but no we kept in touch and obviously an anxious time for her. But -
CB: How did you manage to get time together?
JCAH: During the tour I think we only had one occasion when we were, had a period of two or three days leave when we could get together. But I do remember when we were on OTU my wife managed to come and join us. She stayed at a local hotel and she managed to meet my basic crew at that time but that was the only time really we got together. Yeah.
CB: You didn’t manage to get loan of a small plane to fly in to Halton.
JCAH: [laughs]. No. No.
CB: Or Westcott.
JCAH: Yes because my father in law’s farm actually bordered on to the airfield at Halton at Weston Turville and just before the war an auto Gyro crashed.
CB: Right.
JCAH: On the airfield and in their hall they had the joystick from the remains of the auto Gyro I remember. Anyway that’s all a bit irrelevant.
CB: So you finished your tour.
JCAH: Yes.
CB: So that was when?
JCAH: It was February 1944.
CB: Yes. ‘45. ’44.
JCAH: ’45.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: I beg your pardon ‘45 and then there was an extraordinary posting was on to 1687 bomber defence training flights flying Spitfires and Hurricanes if you please. Coming off Lancasters this was quite, quite a different experience but we used to do, practice fighter affiliation.
CB: Yes.
JCAH: On the squadron bombers.
CB: Where was that?
JCAH: That was back at Hemswell strangely enough. Actually yes actually they were at Scampton when I first joined them and then they went back to Hemswell and as I say we used to fly Spitfires during the day and the Hurricanes at night.
CB: Oh did you? What were they like?
JCAH: Well they were, I mean they didn’t compare with the Spitfires. The handling and manoeuvrability. It was a steady, steady old aircraft but the Spitfire was great fun to fly. So manoeuvrable. Mind you there were times when I really didn’t know what I was up to. In fact it was in 19, where are we? ’47. We had the first open day after the war. Hemswell open day and part of the programme was the three of us were doing a tail chase and supposedly bombing a target in the middle of the airfield and the cloud base was only around about a thousand feet and we, all three of us winged over and I suddenly realised I really hadn’t got enough height to pull out of this dive and this hangar was coming out on my right and I was literally [stalling all around this dive?] and I honestly thought that this was it. Anyway, when I taxied in after this flight I had about twenty yards of telegraph wire on my tail wheel which shows you how close I was to the ground.
CB: It thrilled the audience.
JCAH: Oh yes. You know. Highly delighted.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: But I never heard the result of the loss of telephone communications in the area [laughs].
CB: Yes.
JCAH: I never did hear.
CB: What was the significance of having the fighter, the Spitfire for day affiliation and the Hurricane for night?
JCAH: Well really the Spitfire with the narrow undercarriage it was quite tricky to land particularly in a crosswind. It was very, you were sort of teetering all the time whereas the Hurricane the undercarriage went outwards, that’s right and so you had a wider wheel base and they were more stable in the landing process. Apart from that, I think that was the main reason why we used to fly Hurricanes at night. But there were times. The Lancaster used to have little blue lights on the tail side of the wing tips and there were times when I thought I was chasing these two blue lights only to find I was chasing a star. Got into all sort of peculiar situations. So I wasn’t a great night fighter pilot. [laughs]
CB: How long were you there?
JCAH: Let me see. Hurricanes. ’45. Well, I have it in here. Yes. [pause] Yes I was there about eighteen months. Yeah. Yes.
CB: End of ’46.
JCAH: Yes. October ‘46 I finished my tour there.
CB: Then what?
JCAH: Well it disbanded. The unit disbanded and I I was put on to headquarters duties I think. I was, when the chaps were demobbed they had what they called a release book which gave a little history and I had to make a little summary of the person’s history but really not knowing much about them at all but I used to make up some complimentary remarks but that was the main thing I was doing there.
CB: Where was that?
JCAH: Sorry?
CB: Where?
JCAH: Still at Hemswell.
CB: Right.
JCAH: As I say Hemswell took up a very big part in my RAF career at that time because then Lincolns were brought into Hemswell and I joined 83 squadron on Lincolns. The intention was they were being trained for operations in the Far East against Japan.
CB: Right.
JCAH: And of course that didn’t come off and so I finished on 83 squadron in March 1949 and it was then that I was posted to Defford. What they called the Telecommunications Flying Unit doing, flying the equipment from the Radar Research Establishment, airborne experience and that really was quite a remarkable unit because they were using aircraft which weren’t required for their original duties. Consequently while I was on the heavy flight, what did I here? So I was flying Lincolns, Yorks, a Tudor 7 and a Wayfarer. This was on the, we had a heavy flight and a light flight, you know, flight and when we had a slack period in heavy flight I used to go across to fly some of the lighter aircraft which included Meteor, Meteor 7, Mosquito, Vampire, Firefly, Canberra, Brigand and we had had some communication aircraft. Valetta and the, the Devon, the service version of the De Havilland Dove which we used for communication flying but I mean on one month I had nine different aircraft on my logbook.
CB: Amazing.
JCAH: But that -
CB: So you enjoyed that.
JCAH: Pardon?
CB: You enjoyed that.
JCAH: Well, it was, it was good fun and it was amazing you used to go across to the light flight and you’d get the handbook out and just chat with the chaps because I mean, well a Mosquito did have two pilots but I mean, the others, the Meteor and the Canberra and the Vampire had all single seat and you couldn’t get any dual training and you just had a chat with the chaps who were flying and read the pilots notes and off you went.
CB: So was the Meteor the first jet that you flew?
JCAH: It was either the Meteor or the Vampire. It looks as though, yes.
CB: And did -
JCAH: Yeah.
CB: And did you go in a training version of that for your first flight in jet?
JCAH: No. I think probably not formal training but went along with one of the other chaps who was flying it regularly. Yes that was quite an experience.
CB: Because the Meteor 7 is a T7 isn’t it?
JCAH: Sorry?
CB: The Meteor 7 is a trainer. T7.
JCAH: Oh right.
CB: And –
JCAH: Yes. And, yes, and the Meteor 4 if I can remember. Yes.
CB: Was a single seater.
JCAH: Yes. So that’s the way we went on.
CB: So when did you finish that?
JCAH: Where are we? Yes in May 1952.
CB: What was your wife’s name?
JCAH: Noreen.
CB: Noreen.
JCAH: Noreen.
CB: How is that spelled? N O R E E N.
JCAH: N. Yeah.
CB: Yeah. And did she come up to stay with you then at that time? Were there quarters?
JCAH: Yes. Now we’re talking about 1947 and it was only then that we were allowed to make arrangements to live out locally. We were with our wives and families, if you had them and I found a little cottage. It was, well it was attached to a bigger, still a cottage but we were just one up and one down and this was in Kirton Lindsey which was just north of Hemswell and it was about, yes, about seven miles. I used to cycle from there to Hemswell but the extraordinary thing with this little cottage was that the downstairs floor was wooden and the bedroom was a concrete floor. It was quite extraordinary and of course we had a little scullery, a little small scullery which we used as a pantry and an old coal range which we used to cook on. So it was all rather primitive but we were so pleased to be living together and, yes it wasn’t ‘til, yes, that was Hemswell. It wasn’t until I got to Defford that we had official married quarters but being a wartime station there were just single bed accommodation and I think where we were used to be the WAAF area when WAAFs were there and as I say they were just single brick quarters but we had, I think we had two bedrooms and a kitchen and bathroom so it was comparative luxury from our original -
CB: But that was an air force -
JCAH: Sorry?
CB: That was an air force building.
JCAH: Yes. Actually at Defford the, it was a Ministry of Supply station and it was just the aircrew who were the service, RAF element. So the interesting thing was as my, as I say my grandson is in a practice in Malvern.
CB: Malvern.
JCAH: Malvern. Yes. And living in Worcester and we, it was about a couple of years ago we paid a visit to them and I said I would like to go back to the Defford area and see what’s left because the flying discontinued there. They went to, moved to Pershore but there was still they had these big aerial discs on the airfield but I discovered they’d got a little museum there because Defford during the war was a very important station developing all the radar stuff and they’ve got a little exhibition there and my grandson introduced me as being, being there just after the war and they were very interested in this and they were talking about this road, Swimming Pool Road and of course the airfield was built on the Croome Estate, the Earl of Coventry’s estate and the entrance to our mess area was one of the big arches from the estate and the road leading from the arch up to where our mess was was known as Swimming Pool Road and they couldn’t understand this. Anyway, I was able to tell them we had a fire reservoir outside the mess which we took advantage of and used it as a swimming pool and we knew it as well that’s how it got its name but I was able to tell them the origin of the name which is quite interesting. So we’ve diverted a bit.
CB: We have. But after Defford, so May ‘52 where did you go from that?
JCAH: Yes. I went, for my sins I was posted to Germany as a station adjutant at RAF Celle. This was in August ‘52 and it was a big station. We had three flying squadrons with Venoms. They had Vampires and then Venoms and three RAF regiment squadrons and various other [unclear] so it was a big station and a lot of activity of course. Not being au fait with administration it was very daunting to say the least and not only that, one of the subsidiary jobs was married, married quarters, I was responsible for married quarters and the problem of allocating quarters to people who were desperate, you know, to come back from England and get quarters and that caused all sorts of problems but fortunately I hadn’t been there long when they posted a WAAF officer who took over that. That part. But what else? Oh yes I was responsible for the station police and there were some police dogs there and that was all part of my responsibility. So really it was two and a half years but I made some very good friends there at the time. Particularly amongst the RAF regiment squadrons and two particular families I stayed with them until they died. All four of them died now. But as I say, we had, it’s surprising when you’re away from home, posted away from home you make your entertainment in the mess and we had a lot of fun with fancy dress balls and all that sort of thing and there were compensations.
CB: Now this was a former Luftwaffe station.
JCAH: Yes.
CB: So the facilities were pre-war Luftwaffe.
JCAH: Yes. The accommodation -
CB: What was that like?
JCAH: Was very good. Yes. The mess. The mess accommodation was excellent and we had, you know, properly built married quarters. Yeah. That side of it was, was excellent you know. And of course I, I’ve got a, I haven’t mentioned my, the birth of my granddaughter, sorry, my daughter Anthea. Yes we were at -
CB: When was that?
JCAH: Yes, we were at Defford when she arrived. She was originally supposed to be born at a nursing home at Upton on Severn but she was an awful mess. She was upside down and extended and they decided they couldn’t cope with her at the nursing home and I had to take her into Birmingham. This was mid-winter and we’d had a lot of snow and it had thawed and then frozen and I had as my first car was an old standard 10, pre-war standard 10 where the suspension was almost nil. My poor wife driving over this corrugated ice all the way to Birmingham was quite extraordinary. Anyway, she arrived safely on the 5th of June, sorry the 5th of January 1951 and of course I had to wait, when I went out to Germany I had to wait probably three or four months before married accommodation was available but anyway she was, I suppose she was about two. Yeah, ‘53 and we, in those days in Germany you were, you were provided with a housekeeper so, and Renata, our housekeeper she also acted as a nurse to Anthea and they got on, she loved my daughter and it meant that we could go away and leave her with her and go on trips down the Rhine and this sort of thing. So -
CB: So when did you leave Celle?
JCAH: Celle? Yes. It was, my records run out. It was in about March ‘55. Yes I had just about two and a half years out in Germany and I was then posted to Transport Command and –
CB: Where was that?
JCAH: I did a conversion training on Hastings at Dishforth and then I joined 24 squadron at Abingdon on Hastings. I suppose at the end of ‘55. Yeah. The conversion training was only about forty or fifty hours and that was the beginning of another interesting period in my flying career because as I say I was on 24 and we used to say in brackets C Commonwealth squadron because it, they posted quite a few Commonwealth people on 24 squadron and our squadron leader, he was a squadron commander was an Australian and there were various other people from the Commonwealth but most of my experience on Hastings was flying out to Australia to send, fly supplies and personnel to the Woomera guided weapons range and also to the, oh dear, [unclear] they, they were just preparing for the atom bomb going up there.
CB: Christmas Island.
JCAH: Well no. That was the H bomb. This was the first atom bomb. Actually I think they had blown up one. Well this was a big preparation and of course we spent a lot of time, flights, we used to bring supplies and personnel to, we used to fly out of Edinburgh Field, the RAF base near Adelaide and it so happened I did have some relations living in Adelaide so it was quite convenient to be able to look them up but I, we were actually there. Maralinga, that’s right, was the, where the bomb went off and I was actually there when they exploded the atom bomb. That was quite an experience and everybody, every individual had to be accounted for before they set off the bomb and we were told obviously to face away and we were told when we could turn back and see and well it was pretty hefty sound when the bomb went off but the interesting thing was all the, they sent up rockets which left tracers going in different directions to indicate the direction of what was happening to the air following the bomb and the next day, I think it was the next day or might have been the day I was, I had to fly some samples from Maralinga up to Edinburgh. What am I saying? To Darwin. A civil flight to take them back to the UK and I was told how low I could fly. I could fly over the area but it was just like the face of the moon. All arid and, but to see these white clad figures walking across there was quite remarkable and of course the radio just went berserk to some extent and I had a strange feeling of saliva drying up in my mouth. It was quite definite and whether it was the effect of the radio activity, I suppose it must have been. Anyway, that was that and then of course then the H bomb came along and we were supplying, flying supplies out to that out to Christmas Island. Yes. That, let me think. Yes I’ve got to try and recap.
CB: We’ll have a break.
JCAH: Yeah.
[machine paused]
JCAH: Early ‘57 when we were flying out to Christmas Island.
CB: Right.
JCAH: To prepare for the –
CB: You were still on Hastings then.
JCAH: Yeah.
CB: Yes.
JCAH: But we used to, while we were on Christmas Island we used to take flights up to Honolulu to fly supplies for the station there. It was mostly boxes of whisky [laughs] but all sorts of things we used to go up to Honolulu to keep the Christmas Island supplied which was quite a nice diversion. So, yes, by then, we started off, 24 squadron started off at Colerne and then they moved, sorry at Abingdon and then we moved to Colerne near Bath and eventually we finished up at Lyneham and by, and then of course the Britannia came along so I joined 99 squadron at Lyneham in August 1959 and started training on the Britannia. So that was 1959. Lots of interesting flights. I know we took the Cranwell cadets out to, I’ll have to see if I can find it, the equivalent, the American air force equivalent of Victors. I wish I could find it now. Anyway, that was quite interesting and we were well looked after by the American air force in, it’s on the east side of the mountains in America. And my mind is beginning to go blank.
CB: Ok.
JCAH: So well that’s all sorts of interesting flights on the Britannia.
CB: So how long were you flying the Britannia?
JCAH: Yes. Let’s have a look. [pause]. 1960 [pause] ‘61. Yes, I finished flying the Britannia in February 1962 and they wanted to make way for the young second pilots coming on to become captains so they decided the older ones would stand down and I then went to Benson on the, at the, in the operations room at Benson which would be ‘62. I’m running out of – and I was there ‘62 to ’64 and I was told I was going to Aden on a year’s unaccompanied tour and, well, I was expecting to retire within the next year or eighteen months and I said, ‘No but I’m retiring shortly.’ And I obviously wanted to do a bit of preparation before leaving the service but no they wouldn’t be moved so I had to spend a year on my own in Aden and that was at the time just before we pulled out and it was getting pretty uncomfortable out there. The bombs being dropped all over the place. In fact we had one occasion where we were in, I was at headquarters Middle East at Steamer Point and on one occasion where a bomb went off in the mess and the chap who was laying it made a mess of it and blew himself up and fortunately nobody else. It was intended to go off later on in the day. And another occasion we were entertaining, it was dining in night and this, I was sitting with some nurses, RAF nurses and this grenade landed on this, this girl’s soup plate and it didn’t go off. Oh dear. And so, but that’s the sort of life we lived out there. It was pretty uncomfortable that year. I did manage to get home, I think for a week, at one period. So that was ‘65 and then my final tour in the RAF I was at Odiham in the ops room there which was then headquarters of 38 Group which was a part of Transport Command. And I always remember watching England win the World Cup on television there while I was there and then I finally retired in 1967.
CB: From Odiham.
JCAH: From Odiham. Yes.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: And, yes, I was just wondering, I mean, I was looking around for some civil appointment and I got to hear about the CAA wanting ex RAF people as operations officers and I managed to pass an interview for that. So, well, that was ‘67 and I started off with the accident and investigation branch, in the Adelphi I remember, in London and then I was, I used to go to court cases where there were people being summoned for low flying and all this sort of thing and I used to be the operational advisor to the legal people but that was only for a short time and then I went in to the licensing department. Of course it was, let me think, yes it was air ministry I think still when I was there. Then it became the Department of Trade and Industry, no, no, became Board of Trade and then finally Department of Trade and Industry. This was the time when Heath was trying to cut down on civil service and he decided that he wanted to offload the air ministry side to another separate authority and that’s when the CAA was formed. So, yes, I was, yes it was quite interesting [flight?] licencing and I eventually chaired ICAO. You know, the International Civil Aviation Organisation was in Montreal and I was put on to a group in, at Montreal to update the licensing aspects of what they called Annexe One of the international convention and this was the, what did they call it? Anyway the licencing aircrew, licensing requirements for the various licenses. There was the commercial pilot’s licence, the air and transport licence and eventually I did chair this committee and we finally produced amendments which I never saw implemented but I gather later that they were, I heard that they were implemented. What was the other thing?
CB: So when did you retire from the, from that?
JCAH: 1984.
CB: 1984.
JCAH: ’84.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: Yes. Yes, it was. I used to get quite a few chaps from the service that I knew who were coming along and I had one chap in particular he, there was the Air Registration Board Examination to qualify to fly a particular aircraft and they had this qualifying exam and he was trying to give me past papers but they just didn’t publish them and he was one of these chaps, you know, he was trying to be clever to try the easy way out. Anyway, that was a minor incident. So I retired on my, virtually on my birthday April ‘84 and I’d been retired about four weeks and my wife died.
CB: Ah.
JCAH: Yes and obviously we’d made all sorts of plans.
CB: Oh dear.
JCAH: And of course I haven’t mentioned how I came to Wokingham. How, to live in Wokingham. It was when I’d finished my tour in Germany we decided we would put our, try and to put some roots down somewhere because my daughter was coming up for schooling and I was going in to Transport Command and be away a lot. Anyway, we went up to the Ideal Home Exhibition and saw these houses and liked the look of them and were told they were being built in Wokingham. I’d never heard of Wokingham. Anyway, we came down and had a look where they were building and the town and we liked it and so that was in 1955. December ‘55 we actually moved in. Where are we? Yes, that’s right, come back, 1955 we actually moved in and I’ve been here ever since in Wokingham but, so having, my wife having died we were living in rented accommodation at the time because we were intending to move to -
BH: I thought you’d look at me. No. I can’t remember.
JCAH: It’s silly. I know the place so well. The name is not, just not coming. I’ll think of it.
CB: Right. Around here was it?
JCAH: Sorry?
CB: Was it around here?
JCAH: No. Up in the Midlands.
CB: Ok.
JCAH: Near Leicester.
CB: Ah.
JCAH: I know the place.
CB: But not in Rutland.
JCAH: Yes. In Rutland and the capital of Rutland was.
CB: Oakham.
JCAH: Oakham. Thank you very much and we’d actually put a deposit down for a house in Oakham. I wasn’t all that keen on it but my wife had become disenchanted with Wokingham and we’d had friends at Cottesmore who we used to visit regularly and of course Rutland Water had been developed then. It was all very nice in that area but in, of course my wife then died while we were still negotiating. The people we were buying from hadn’t got a house and they were trying to find a house. It suited me because I hadn’t actually retired when we, but anyway my wife having died I wasn’t going to move up there on my own and I sold the house and during that period when the prices were really escalating and it did me a good turn financially by this period while we were waiting. Anyway, I was, so I was then looking around for somewhere to live and I came down here and I didn’t know this existed and I thought well this is a nice place. It would be nice here. And I walked down the bottom of the road here and a retired clergyman who used to help us at All Saints Church, he saw me and I told him, you know, I was looking for a house and how nice it was. He invited me in. I walked back up to Wokingham and I met a lady who was my next door but one neighbour in my first house in [Frogall?] Road and she asked me how I was getting on. I said I was getting on alright but I was just looking for a house and I’d just been down to Milton Gardens and how nice it was. She said, Well I’ve just had lunch with a lady and she told me, and who lived in Milton Gardens and told me she was putting her house on the market the following Monday so I immediately got in touch with her and we settled it without agents or anything and that’s how I came to number eleven over there. So that was, where are we in dates?
BH: It was about ‘90 wasn’t it?
JCAH: Yes.
CB: Well, you retired in ‘84.
BH: I was still working –
JCAH: Well -
BH: I was still working when you -
JCAH: Yes, it was the end of ‘84 that I actually moved in.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: So I knew Barbara before through the church and she used to play tennis with my wife so we knew each other but I know we were neighbours for seven years and I used to be in the kitchen over there getting ready to go out and play golf and I used to see Barbara going, and poor girl going out to work and here I am going off to play golf. Anyway, it was, it took seven years before we, well we did one or two things together didn’t we? And went to concerts together and one thing and, well I used to have Christmas parties, I was chairman of the Residents Association and I used to have a Christmas party and Barbara always used to come over and help me clear up afterwards. It gave me a good impression anyway. So in the end -
CB: Got all the ticks.
BH: You waited until I retired -
JCAH: That’s right.
BH: Before he proposed.
JCAH: And I said, ‘This is stupid, why don’t we get together?’ And I came over here.
CB: Very good. Smashing.
JCAH: So there we are.
CB: That’s been great.
JCAH: The end of a fairy tale.
CB: Well the whole thing -
JCAH: The fairy tale ending.
CB: Worked very well didn’t it?
JCAH: Yeah.
CB: Thank you very much for that. There’s just one thing and that is fast backwards to your promotions. So you started as an SAC because you were well educated.
JCAH: Yes and I was commissioned.
CB: And then how did it go from there?
JCAH: I was commission at the end of my training when I got my wings.
CB: Yes.
JCAH: I was at Monkton. I, I, yes. I was because I remember going and buying my uniform.
CB: Yeah.
JCAH: In Monkton. In the town. And then of course while I was at Defford the first station commander there I didn’t get along at all. I had a dispute about the married quarters and somebody else wanting the same one. Anyway, I wasn’t very popular there and he didn’t recommend me for a PC. And then the next chap came along and I got on very well with him and he recommended me for my permanent commission and I’d taken promotion exam and I’d taken the Staff College Qualifying Exam and did all I could and, well this would be 1951 and they decided that they’d put an age limit of thirty on appointments to permanent commission and I’d just gone over, over the thirty so that was the end of that but I was quite keen to stay on in the air force and I settled for this limited promotion one. Commission.
CB: So you were already a flight lieutenant.
JCAH: Yes. Oh yes. Yes. I finished up the war as a flight lieutenant.
CB: Yes.
JCAH: And that was confirmed. I was an acting flight lieutenant at the time.
CB: Yeah because you were acting VR.
JCAH: Yes and I was eventually confirmed and I stayed as a, as a old flight lieutenant but as I say I enjoyed my RAF career and a lot of interest.
CB: Well Jack Haley thank you very much indeed.
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 Hayley
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Chris Brockbank
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-02-24
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Julie Williams
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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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01:27:23 audio recording
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AHayleyCA160224
Conforms To
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Pending review
Description
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Jack Hayley was born in Caterham and worked for an insurance company before he joined the Royal Air Force and trained to be a pilot. He trained to fly in Canada and after going through an Operational Training Unit in England, he was posted to 625 Squadron at RAF Kelstern. And after completing twelve operations he joined 170 Squadron where he completed a further nineteen operations. While waiting for operations he would play bridge with other members of his crew. After his tour he was posted to 83 Squadron and served with Transport Command in Germany, Australia and Aden. He was present during the testing for the Atom bomb and also flew supplies to Christmas Island in advance of the hydrogen bomb test.
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Royal Air Force. Transport Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Australia
Germany
Great Britain
Yemen (Republic)--Aden
Christmas Island
England--Lincolnshire
Germany--Düsseldorf
Yemen (Republic)
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1938
1940
1941
1944
1945
170 Squadron
625 Squadron
83 OTU
83 Squadron
aircrew
Anson
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
crewing up
Distinguished Flying Cross
Dominie
Flying Training School
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
Hurricane
Initial Training Wing
Lancaster
Lancaster Finishing School
Lincoln
love and romance
Magister
Meteor
military living conditions
Mosquito
Nissen hut
Operational Training Unit
Oxford
pilot
Proctor
RAF Clyffe Pypard
RAF Defford
RAF Dunholme Lodge
RAF Hemswell
RAF Kelstern
RAF Little Rissington
RAF Madley
RAF Peplow
RAF Sandtoft
RAF Windrush
RCAF Estevan
Spitfire
Stearman
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
York
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/571/10351/PFraserDK1607.2.jpg
828f411fd5d597dfada38965fb175eb1
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/571/10351/AFraserDK170906.1.mp3
6e80c8e10b6e853c39c6a101482fe2b7
Dublin Core
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Title
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Fraser, Donald Keith
D K Fraser
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Fraser, DK
Description
An account of the resource
12 items. Two oral history interviews with Warrant Officer Donald Keith Fraser DFM (1924 - 2022, 1566621 Royal Air Force), a memoir, his log book, photographs and service material. The collection also contains an interview with Sylvia Fraser, his wife. He flew a tour of operations as a flight engineer with 101 Squadron.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Donald Keith Fraser and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-11-04
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. 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.
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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CB: My name is Chris Brockbank and today is the 5th of September 2017 and we’re in Whitchurch talking to Donald Fraser whom we’ve, DFM whom we’ve spoken to before. But in this case there there’s a particular interest that we haven’t really had the opportunity of covering which is how the aircrew got on with the ground crew and what was happening on the ground. So, Donald what were your impressions of ground crew?
DF: Well, my impressions of ground crew firstly I’d like to say about the whole ground staff rather than the ground crew. They were very good and the fact that on a station the size of Ludford the total personnel would be around about two thousand five hundred out of which two hundred and fifty or thereabouts would be ground crew. It was about ten percent. And it was that ten percent that got the most publicity and the credit for what was happening.
CB: Aircrew.
DF: Aircrew.
CB: Yeah.
DF: But without the support of the ground staff this would not have been possible because the dedication and the help that they gave to the aircrews to make sure that everything they needed to go and do whatever they were going to do and come back needed their help. And also, to make sure that everything they required was there for them to have the best chance of returning home. In twenty four hours most stations had something happening. They never stopped. There was always some work to do and one of the one’s that I think done a marvellous job was the catering staff whereby they had to produce two hundred, two hundred and fifty meals at close notice to make sure that the aircrew again had this before they went on their operation. And this may be changed later or earlier and they always had to have some ready which they did, ready for us to have. And this went through the whole staff. Parachute staff had to make sure that that was all perfectly and had all been checked and so on and including the staff that worked on the, the [pause] I was going to say the ground crew who operated the bombing up of the aircraft. A very important job but a very dangerous job because these were heavy bombs and they could cause quite severe damage if they fell off or came in contact with staff themselves. Also, the staff that filled the petrol into the aircraft their selves they also had a hard job. This all had to be done on time before the aircraft could move and the bowsers held two, two thousand five hundred gallons of petrol. Each aircraft that was being fully loaded took two thousand one hundred and fifty four gallons. And these, all jobs, remember that all these jobs had to be done outside. The aircraft all the time stayed in the open so in the middle of summer they had the high temperatures to take care of and all that. In the winter it was the reverse. Snow, sleet, temperatures below zero but they never seemed to worry about that. They’d done the job. Made a lovely job of that and made sure that all was ready for again the aircraft ready for taking off as it should be.
CB: We’ll stop there for a mo.
DF: Yes.
[recording paused]
CB: Right. Restart now.
DF: Most, most of the stations, well the aircrew were flying from were built as during the war for [pause] to use against the Germans they and as long as the runways and the, anything to do with flying was correct I think it was fair to say that the staffing and that was forgotten about in such that the accommodation for on most of the stations was Nissen huts. One hut for a flying, one AA aircrew in each Nissen hut. The only heating they had was one stove in the middle of the room and the chimney went up through the top. In the summer they were very hot and we had visitors such as field mice and earwigs and they caused quite a lot of problems to us. In the winter we had the opposite. Cold. Imagine coming in in the early mornings without any heating on and then if there was any condensation it dripped down the curves of the Nissen huts on to your beds. Not very, very conditions, very good conditions to be under. The toilet and washing facilities were possibly anywhere from twenty yards to fifty yards away from the Nissen huts their self and most of the time the water was cold other than warm. And finally, the messes. The sergeant’s mess and that was at least a half a mile away from the Nissen huts. Also being in a big Nissen hut and with no paths to them that hadn’t been made because of the timescale and the necessity to get everything ready for the squadron flying. And at Ludford they got the name of Mudford rather than Ludford because the normal run of things was rubber boots was the only thing you could use to be safe to take from one place to another. Stop there a minute.
CB: Ok.
[recording paused]
CB: I’ll ask you the question. You spoke about drips of condensation. Why was that?
DF: Because there was no insulation around the double layer of metal round the Nissen hut itself. It was very unusual and very cold to be under these conditions.
CB: And that’s why it was so hot in the summer.
DF: It was hot in the summer also.
CB: Right.
DF: The conditions were —
CB: Ok. Yes, thanks.
[recording paused]
DF: And I want to talk about our own ground crew. The squadron policy was that after a crew had done a number of operations, probably four, five, then they were given their own aircraft and their own ground crews to look after them. And as far as we were concerned we, after completed seven operations we went on leave on the 16th of October, returning a week later and then we were told by the CO that a batch of new aircraft was coming in to the squadron and one of them was for our crew. X2. So X2 became our new Lancaster. I was delighted because to have a new aircraft where the engines hadn’t been in any way in trouble with any people not knowing what they were doing or some, from the start it was ours engines. We would look after them and make sure they weren’t over revved or such like and that that so when we came back off leave we were told that and I said to Wally, our —
Other: Pilot.
DF: Pilot. I said, ‘I think we’ll go down and have a talk with the ground staff who are looking, going to look after our aircraft.’ So, we asked where the standing area was and they told it was near the perimeter fence line just on the corner. So down we went and we said who we were. We’d come to have a chat with them about the future and our aircraft of X2. The ground crew were made up of five people. Four flight, four engineers, fitters and one person in charge. Mac. He was a flight sergeant. So, he said, first of all, ‘Where do you come from?’ I said, ‘Scotland.’ He said, ‘I know that but where in Scotland?’ ‘Fife.’ ‘Oh, that’s alright then.’ He said to the lads, ‘We can live with that, can’t we?’ I said to him, ‘Where do you come from?’ He said, ‘Lanark.’ I said, ‘Oh, that’s alright then. We’re both not far apart. We’re both in the central belt so we’ll get on fine together.’ So, he said, ‘I’m sorry for the state we’re in.’ I said, ‘What do you mean?’ He said, ‘All, our overalls are dirty and wet and that. But —’ he said, ‘We’ve been waiting for the new aircraft.’ I said, ‘What difference does that make? A new aircraft.’ He said, ‘Well, when we get the new aircraft here the aircraft face away from the fence line and what we do is we wash our overalls in a bucket of petrol and then hang them up on the fence and when new ones start up the engines the heat from the engines it dries our clothes. So we were waiting for your aircraft to come here so we can get our clothes dry, and that.’ And he then said, ‘Well, what do you do? Are you a crew that work as a team?’ I said, ‘Yes, very much so.’ I said, ‘What about you? Do you do the same as the ground crew?’ He said, ‘Yes, we’re very determined. Our main reason for being here is to make sure that this aircraft, any aircraft we have is fully looked after and ready to fly when the pilot wants it.’ So, that’s good. And he says, ‘Have a look in our little hut at the back there and you’ll see what I mean.’ So we went around, had a look in his hut and there was a mixture of components for aircraft. Wheels. There were two or three wheels, there was parts of undercarriage, there was hydraulic parts, everything you could think of was stored in there. I said, ‘Why would you get all this here?’ he said, ‘Well, we brought a lot of it with us from our last station but every time aircraft is going for breakup we try to take off whatever’s useable in case we need it to put on aircraft because if we don’t it takes so long to get new parts from headquarters that the aircraft would be out of air —
Other: Condition.
DF: Condition for a few days. So, we make sure that we have all these parts available and we can keep the aircraft in the skies.’ ‘Well, that’s good.’ So he says, ‘Can we work as a team?’ And I said, ‘Well, I think we will do. I think you’ve made a very good start to help us. We’ll do that.’ So he said, ‘Well, we’re expecting the aircraft to be in tomorrow morning.’ I said, ‘Oh, that’s good.’ ‘But,’ he said, ‘We should have to look through it all to make sure it is all in the right order.’ I said, ‘Well, what about if ops is on?’ He said, ‘Well, that, it will go on ops if ops is on, you know. It will be your aircraft for tomorrow night but we’ll try and do what we can beforehand to make sure that everything has been checked.’ He said, ‘It should come alright from headquarters but sometimes there’s odd things that doesn’t work properly.’ So, the next day operations. It was our eighth operation to Leipzig and the aircraft did come in about lunchtime so the ground staff had [two to three] hours to look at it. They’d done their best. They said afterwards, ‘We haven’t hadn’t done it all. But we think we’ve done all the main things so it’s, as far as we were concerned useful to go in the air.’ So that’s what happened. We unfortunately found it started up all right, we got in to the air fine but after a time we had certain troubles. Electric troubles. Also troubles with the communication between staff, crew staff within the aircraft. So we decided that in that condition we couldn’t make it to the main target so decided to bomb a small target in Brussels in Belgium which was a operational workshop for the Germans. So, we bombed that and returned to base. When we got back the crew and ground staff was waiting for us and said, ‘You’re back early.’ We told them what had happened. ‘I told you.’ Mac said, ‘I told you we might not get it done. Now, I know what we’ve got to do. We’ll have it ready for you tomorrow.’ So that was the finish of that one. We continued helping him as far as we could because we had come to an agreement that when we came back from ops if there was any problems that we’d leave a note in the aircraft saying check this and check that. Or that if we had used the oxygen bottles or that also to make sure they would replace them because I think one of the problems was that the checking of these things especially the oxygen bottles was done by shaking it and there could be a spot in it or they could be almost full. So by getting them to replace them as long as they’d been used, to replace it made sure that there was oxygen there because these bottles were supposed to last fifteen minutes but I think in some cases they’d been used the [pause] when we’d had the aircraft the previous night or previous time ops was on and they’d been checked right enough but just by shaking them and there was probably only a few minutes of oxygen left in the bottles. So that alone was a good thing when you had your own aircraft because we would make sure that tiny things appeared to be small things but probably very important things at the end of the day. Everything went well for a long time and then our ground crew was helping us all they could. We came up to one of the worst Berlin raids of the war. It was on 17th of December and it was called Black Thursday. The problem was thick fog on return from Berlin all up the east coast of England and the, I’m not going into full detail on this but we found that there was no place near our own station to land. We were sent up to Hull. Hull. And there we came across the barrage balloons which had never been, well we thought they hadn’t been brought down. Thye were still at five thousand feet. They had been brought down but we didn’t know that and we took, we come off the coast thinking we’d be inside and there would be no balloons there. Anyway, we got a check from manned beacons saying that they knew where we were but they couldn’t see us and one asked subsequently to put up a bit of a searchlight up for us which we said yes. The searchlight instead of coming up in to the air went along the ground and what the pilot and I saw was, in front of us was a two story farmhouse and how, what happened after that, we don’t know why it should have happened but what must have been dist, a further distance than we thought because as soon as we saw it the first thing we saw was the house by fully, engines up to the full and pulling, two of us pulling the stick back then shoot up and we managed to take that. It was just like going over, taking a horse over a fence that he didn’t want to go over. And our rear gunner said what he saw was, first of all he was forced forward on to his guns which was funny because he was looking at the back of the aircraft, not the front, what he saw was chickens and hens running across the farmyard. So, we decided that, well we knew what height we were at. We were at four or five feet. Actually, when we pulled up our rear wheel caught the garden gate and —
Other: The farm gate it was, wasn’t it?
DF: The farm gate and that. So we decided we would make our way back to base which we did and as we were travelling along our bomb aimer said, ‘Oh, I’ve seen something. It’s the café we often have our cup of coffee in the morning at the station.’ So then we knew where we were so we decided this time we were about two hundred feet. We knew what height we were at but decided to ask base if we could come down. They said, ‘If you can you can try but we would suggest that you won’t have much chance.’ Anyway, we decided we would do that but in Lincolnshire at that time there were so many —
Other: Stations.
DF: Fields, stations in there round about that the three mile outside rim [pause] Distance from the aircraft outside ring were so close that they overlapped and as we were coming around thinking we were still going to land at our own station we had missed and crossed over on to the next station’s outer ring which was Wickenby and again we managed to see the airfield. Very risky. But we managed to get down there and we were on the ground and called up our own station saying we’ve landed. They said, ‘You haven’t landed. You haven’t landed here. Where are you?’ We looked at each other and said, ‘Well, we’re on the ground, I think.’ And then we got another voice coming on saying, ‘This is Wickenby Airfield. We think you’ve arrived. Arrived with us. We don’t know but there’s something landed on our runway. Stay where you are. We can’t see you. We’ll come and pick you up when we can.’ Which they did. We had the night there. The aircraft in the morning was still where we had left it. We decided we would start it up and take it home. We started the engines up. They ran for two or three minutes and then begin to cut out, each one in turn. That’s all the fuel we had. So, we had to be refuelled and got back to base. When we got back to base Mac, who was in charge, ‘Where have you been?’ I told him what had happened and said could he have a look at our tail wheel? ‘Have a look at your tail wheel? Why?’ I said, ‘Well, I think we caught it on your farm gate.’ He said, ‘What?’ I said, ‘Yes. We caught it on the garden gate.’ ‘Well, the next time you want to go through a gate make sure you open the thing first.’ That was all that he said to us.
Other: It wasn’t quite as polite as that, was it?
CB: Is that right? [laughs] Yes.
DF: Yes. He said, ‘We think we heard you go across last night. You were late. We think we heard you pass over the airfield.’ He thought it was us anyway because of the noise of the aircraft but, he said, ‘The rest of my crew said it wasn’t and then we heard an aircraft had crashed in the higher slopes past Louth. So we decided it must have been you and we went to bed.’ So that was that. Stop there.
CB: Ok.
[recording paused]
CB: So when you landed after an op then you talked to the ground crew. What forms had to be filled in?
DF: Well, as far as we were concerned there was no proper form. There was a piece of paper which sometimes there was no ground crew there. Other times there was. If there wasn’t we would just leave another paper on the, in the aircraft.
CB: Yeah.
DF: They would pick it up when they came in the morning. If there was we just put in likely, probably, “Have a look at the hydraulics,’ or ‘The wheels are taking a long time to be pulled up or put down,’ or, ‘We had trouble with the communication line between us and the rear gunner.’ Or ‘His heated suit’s not working.’ That’s the sort of thing we put on there. Just common things.
CB: So how would it be that sometimes the ground crew met you when you came back. Other times they didn’t. Why was that?
DF: I think it was just, I don’t think they had need to meet us at all. But our ground crew seemed to want to have somebody there just to make sure the aircraft did come in and what was required of it.
CB: Yes. I was just thinking that you must have had equipment failures or various little challenges on the way. How was that communicated? Was it you and the pilot or the pilot or just you?
DF: That was done usually at briefing.
CB: Which followed the —
DF: Which followed the —
CB: The landing.
DF: The landing. Yeah.
CB: Right.
DF: At the briefing. Then —
CB: With the intelligence officer.
DF: That’s right and all the crew was together so all the crew had their say. And I’d probably say, ‘Well, we had trouble with — ‘This and that and I think the air gunner would say, ‘Yes. My suit wasn’t working.’
CB: Yeah.
DF: Or the navigator had some problems. But each member of the crew told the —
CB: Right.
DF: Intelligence officer.
CB: Ok.
DF: What the problems were and also they told the crews there, intelligence people what they’d seen on the route.
CB: Ah.
DF: If they’d seen —
CB: Yeah.
DF: An aircraft go down, if there was any parachutes from it and if we could have a check where it was then that probably helped the intelligence people to know where the aircraft had to come down and things like that. And that was all said at the debriefing which could take up to a half an hour and an hour sometimes depending on how much damage or such was done to the aircraft.
CB: At the debriefing with the intelligence officer, it was always an intelligence officer doing it, was it?
DF: Yes.
CB: Or sometimes an NCO?
DF: No. It was always, as far as we were concerned always an intelligence officer.
CB: And what was —
DF: Sometimes male. Sometimes female.
CB: Yes. What was the process? You go in and sit down. Then —
DF: You’d go and sit.
CB: The captain starts it does he?
DF: Yes. You go in to the briefing room and you were called up. One left. The next one come. Funnily enough we were landing nearly always first. We had a technique that when we came across the English coast normally we would, from there the pilot would get on and say, ‘Permission to land.’ Even though we were probably thirty miles away. And we got that permission and that gave us the first chance because you were stacked up if you were later.
CB: Oh right. Gamesmanship job.
DF: Yeah. So, I think it did, it meant that they got to know us, I think.
CB: Yeah.
DF: But we, by this time we were getting to be the crew that had got near to the end of their operations so they lifted that from us you know and I think nearly every time we were first down which gave us the first choice of the briefing.
CB: Very good.
DF: So —
CB: Ok. Hang on.
[recording paused]
CB: Right. Starting again.
DF: Yes. Well, what we were talking about was the 17th of December. Christmas day came along. Not much later. We had flown the night before and arrived in to the station about 5 or 6 o’clock in the morning and we were debriefed and then went to, to bed. Getting up about 1 o’clock for Christmas dinner and that. Afterwards, I decided that I hadn’t seen any of the ground crew so I thought I’d take a walk out to the aeroplane. And when I got there there was Mac standing in front of X2 and the first thing he said, ‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ I said, ‘What do you mean?’ He said, ‘The aircraft. Isn’t she a lovely machine?’ I said, ‘Yes, she is.’ And I said, he said to me rather, ‘How many ops have you done on, with her now?’ I said, ‘I don’t know.’ He said, ‘Well, I can tell you. You’ve done twelve.’ I said, ‘Oh, you’re keeping note.’ He said, ‘Yeah, because the last few aircraft I had most of them had only done one or two and that was the end of them but you you’ve done twelve on it so we’re getting along nicely.’ So, I said, ‘Well, I just came to see what was happening. Have you had a look at the hydraulics yet?’ ‘Yeah. I’ve repaired them.’ And then by this time our pilot, Wally he came up. He said, ‘I thought I’d find you here.’ So he said, ‘Is the aircraft being checked over?’ I said, ‘Yes, it is. It’s ready for an air test.’ He said, ‘Well, how about us doing it today? If ops are on tomorrow we’ll be alright because I don’t think there will be on Christmas day.’ So we decided to call up Control, got permission to do an air test and I said to Mac, ‘Are you coming with us?’ He said, ‘No. I haven’t got a parachute.’ I said, ‘Neither have we.’ So, he said, ‘Oh well, I’ll come.’ So we got off and Lincoln Cathedral was only about twenty miles away so we went over the top of it and we looked down at it. A marvellous sight to see the Cathedral there standing on the top of the ridge and Lincoln below it, you know and I said to Mac, ‘How about take my seat and have a look around?’ So, he did. And I think you could see tears coming from his eyes. And I thought then well we probably wondered what the war was about but seeing that I think we knew it was the right thing to do. So, we carried on and done our check. Everything was well, landed and when we got out we hugged each other. And then we decided it was alright. Come away from the aircraft and that, that was Christmas Day, you know.
CB: But how did it effectively, that you just agreed with you and the ground crew that it was ok.
DF: Yes.
CB: You didn’t have to fill in anything to do?
DF: No. No. No. No.
CB: Because it’s a mixture of pedantic form filling.
DF: Yes.
CB: And —
DF: But on this occasion, no.
CB: Yeah.
DF: As long as the, there I gave you. It was right.
CB: Right.
DF: On the thing so then the [pause] I think the next day we were, we were at Berlin and the next thing that happened, well during January and February things went well. There was no problems at all with that and the crews, the ground crew had done all they could to help us all the way through and the great group of lads done their best for us. I think the next time was on the 1st of March. Ludford was under three feet of snow and there was ops on that evening. So, by lunchtime we knew there was operations on. So, there was a plan that we needed to clear four hundred yards of runway so everybody on the station irrespective of the size or type or anything were expected to give a hand to clear it with shovels and spades and that except one and everybody did it except one man. One. A Canadian. A flight lieutenant. He said, ‘No. It’s not my job.’ So anyway, everybody put their hand in to it and they managed to clear that amount. That was the plan was that if they could do that the aircraft could take off and they would be refuelled and bombed up at Wickenby which was alright.
CB: Just down the road.
DF: Just down the road. So that’s what happened. We were the first plane to take off. Managed it. The two after that managed it. The fifth, three after that managed it. The fifth didn’t. It swerved off the runway into the bank of snow and completely stopped any more from taking off. That was four aircraft which was important because we were the only aircraft using ABC and the result was that the four of them, that again the raid was to Berlin. It meant that four 101 aircraft was in the line of the aircraft travelling out and travelling back and gave sufficient coverage to make it safe for the rest of the aircraft. Otherwise, I don’t think the raid would have taken off without some cover at that time. And we landed again at, back at Wickenby and came back to base two days later. But the following morning the CO came on and said to the whole staff about the excellent job they had done the night before. Congratulated them all and said it was a success because the aircraft had taken got off and that, you know. Except the one Canadian and we heard later that the CO had taken him out at midnight and made him work two hours clearing snow while he went back to bed. That was our last operation on the 1st of March. And we stayed on the station for another two or three days after that because the new rear turret by this time had been put on the aircraft and we were the first one to use it on that raid.
CB: This is with the 2.5.
DF: 2.5s.
CB: Yeah.
DF: And the, after that we stayed on to air test it for high elevation flying and that and we stayed on two days on the station to do that. So, and after that I went down to see Mac and his squad before we left the station because we were then finished operations and when he, when he saw us, he said, ‘Well, what are you doing after you have some leave and that?’ I said, ‘Well, I don’t know yet. I’ll probably be instructing.’ So, he said, ‘Why can’t you be an instructor here?’ I said, ‘Well, I can’t. I have to do what I’m told to do, you know.’ He said, ‘Well, you could do it from here because a lot of these young people coming through need some help, you know.’ I said, ‘Well, I can’t do anything about that.’So, he said, ‘Well, if you do another tour we’ll be there to help you again.’ I said, ‘Well, that’s fair enough. Hopefully, it will be six months from now.’ You know. So that’s how we left it. But there’s one thing I hadn’t said yet was that we had an engine failure on one of the operations. I think operation sixteen. It didn’t show up when we were flying but when we come back we had been damaged by flak and that and somewhere when they checked the engines over decided that they were too badly damaged from flak even though it was still running so it had to be replaced. It was replaced and when we started it up it was running, slow running but was far too high. It was very strong and and that. It wasn’t cycling down. Just a low rev.
CB: What’s your low, slow running rev rate? Revs.
DF: I couldn’t tell you that off hand.
CB: Roughly.
DF: Roughly it was very very slow. Just ticking over, and it wouldn’t come down to that so I said to the ground crews, ‘You’ll have to check that over.’ And they said, ‘Well, does it make any difference?’ I said, ‘Yes. It could make a big difference. The difference between the time that it stands on the, getting to the take off point and —'
[telephone ringing]
CB: We’ll stop there. Just a mo.
[recording paused]
CB: And what
CB: I mean what —
DF: With us —
CB: What causes an engine to need to be replaced.
DF: Just if it’s really badly damaged and the insides of the engines were, you know the whole thing.
CB: Damaged by flak.
DF: Damaged by flak or damaged by —
CB: Fighter.
DF: Yes. Or on fire.
CB: Oh.
DF: Again, the same thing. Either flak or that you know. That, and of course if you use a fire extinguisher on there then it goes all through the engines. Then it is a replacement engine.
CB: So, in case of the problem with the Lanc at the BMF what were the sorts of faults? They’re talking about some kind of swarf what sort of faults would you find in a Merlin engine?
DF: Difficult to say but I think the lack, probably the lack of oil in the working in the engines itself that, you know the insides were all cut separately out and I think the wearing away of that by the lack of fuel, lack of —
CB: Oil.
DF: Oil and things like that. That sort of thing. That’s the most common thing.
CB: What would that be? Low pressure oil pump. Or —
DF: Probably that. Not pressure of the —
CB: Or an oil leak.
DF: Probably either. Yeah.
CB: So the case of the two where you had to have them changed what was the cause to the —
DF: Well, one was fire in the engine which everything was more or less ruined from that point of view and the other one as I say was the one that was hit by flak but it didn’t show on the outside of the engine or the working of the engine but it did. It was then decided they would replace it. But as I was saying the slow running, it’s on again now, is it?
CB: Yes [pause] We’re running.
DF Good. The slow running was far too high.
CB: Yeah.
CB: So I said to the ground staff they had to get that down. They said, ‘Well, we’ve done all we can.’ I said, ‘Well, it’s still up. Get it down.’ And then Mac said, ‘Well, there’s another we’ve just replaced down at the, one of the other aircraft has just been replaced by a the new engine and it’s the same. Its engine’s running fast.’ So I said, ‘Can I have a look at them then?’ ‘What, you have a look at them?’ I said, ‘Yeah. Why not?’ You know. ‘Well, if you think you can do anything.’ Remember I had been on a carburettors course earlier on. Just after I had finished at Blackpool. So I decided to have a look and one of things I remember what the old man said who was there, ‘Don’t take everything you see as being correct.’ That was what the old man said on this course. So I got up to the stands and looked at the engine and looked at the bars that came, joined up the rods that joined up all the parts and for that and I picked up the [unclear] Well, they looked the same but if I changed that one to another one as I’d done on the course we’ll see what happens. So I changed them around. They were both almost the same level and left, changed them round and I said to them, ‘Try the engine now.’ Which they did and they got the revs right. This batch that came out from headquarters or where ever they were made with the rods placed in the wrong part of the aircraft.
Other 2: Crossed over.
DF: Crossed over, yeah. So, Mac said, ‘Oh, I can’t go and tell these people that it was you that found it.’ I said, ‘Well, you take the credit for it. You say you found it.’ They were happy about that so he did. He went down and said, ‘Well, we found the problem. Change —’ so and so, ‘And they’re alright.’ So, when we were leaving he said, ‘Well, I must say I learned a lot more about carburettors and that from you than I ever knew before.’ He said, ‘I’m going to take it on.’ He said, ‘We’re saving fuel.’ He said, ‘We are saving fuel.’ He says, ‘Probably by saving that little bit of fuel will probably save some people’s life.’ And I said, ‘Yes. Probably our own for that matter.’ Because we had only had two or three minutes of fuel.’ ‘Well, yeah.’ He said, ‘Probably the means of saving your whole crew, you know. And that’s how we left. We parted at that.
CB: Yeah.
DF: And that was the end of our ground crews at that time.
CB: Altogether.
DF: Yeah.
CB: So, when you got to the end of the tour what did you do with the ground crew? Did you go and have a drink? Or —
DF: Went and had a meal together.
CB: Right.
DF: And the, of course, I wasn’t [pause] I hadn’t touched a beer all the time I’d been flying. Never touched any alcohol.
CB: Yeah.
DF: But that night I think we had one or two.
CB: As little as that.
DF: As little as that. Yeah. So that was the end of that. So —
Other: You had a great Christmas dinner at the, on the station, didn’t you?
DF: Yeah. We had. Well, it was a sad, is that still on at the moment?
CB: Ok. So, we’re going to pause for a bit.
DF: Pause on that and just —
[recording paused]
CB: Right. So, let’s just talk about that. So, first of all, your crew. Were you all NCOs or was there a mixture of commissioned?
DF: To start with we were all NCOs.
CB: Right, and so was the ground crew always the same one?
DF: Yes. All the —
CB: So —
DF: All the time on, on X2.
CB: Right. So —
DF: From our eighth operation onwards.
CB: Right.
DF: It was the same crew.
CB: So, in practical terms there was this, a continuity even though some of your crew got commissioned on the way. So —
DF: The pilot only.
CB: Only the pilot. Ok. And to what extent did you, what shall I say indulge in social activities together? I mean what would you do as a ground crew and air crew together?
DF: We didn’t do very much on that at all. We’d meet in the mess now and again but as I say I wasn’t drinking so we didn’t have any beer at all. But the other thing was that during, we always flew during the dark nights when the moon was up then. Then it was more or less a fortnight of less flying put it that way. Just it was just the odd flight, so —
CB: Less flying because —
DF: Because there was the moon.
CB: In other words you could be seen too easily.
DF: Too easily.
CB: And you needed cloud cover.
DF: Yeah.
CB: On the way.
DF: The darkness cover.
CB: So, you wanted the target clear.
DF: Yeah.
CB: But the transit in cloud.
DF: Yeah.
CB: Right.
DF: Or at least dark anyway, you know. But during these days the pilot and I always had a morning time where we had a half an hour, an hour together in, in the cockpit.
CB: Oh right.
DF: Talk about things and that. And occasionally Mac, he would come in and have a chat with us also because not so much to do during these times and one of them was I remember Wally saying to me, ‘Can you swim?’ I said, ‘No.’ He said, ‘Neither can I.’ So, I said, ‘Why are you asking that?’ He said, ‘Well, if we have to come down in the sea what would we do if we can’t swim?’ I said, ‘Don’t come down in the sea.’ He said, ‘Well —'
CB: Sounds like a good move.
DF: So, Mac come and said, ‘Well, I can’t swim but I wouldn’t think about coming down in the sea anyway. I would stay in the aircraft.’ I said, ‘Well, you’re right, Mac. I would stay in the aircraft also.’ So, Wally said, ‘Are you saying that even if you wanted to or had to come down in the sea you wouldn’t come out?’ I said, ‘No. I’d stay in the aircraft.’ So, he said, ‘Well, why do we need these Mae Wests?’ I said, ‘As far as I’m concerned, we don’t.’ So, he said, ‘Well, would it not be better for us, yourself and that to have the jackets? You know, the leather jackets.’ I said, ‘Well, if we could get one at a reasonable price it would be.’ So, Mac said, ‘I know where people sell them fairly cheaply, you know.’ I said, ‘Well, can you get them easily?’ He said, ‘Oh yeah. I can get a couple of leather jackets for you.’ I said, ‘Alright.’ So, Wally said, ‘Ok then. We’ll replace the Mae Wests for a jacket then.’ So that’s what we did. When we told the rest of the crew they said, ‘Oh, I think we’ll keep our Mae Wests in case we come down in the sea.’ I said, ‘Well, that’s all right.’ I said, ‘I don’t think we will come down. The idea was that we would try and make the shore and that was it. So he often came in just for a chat you know and something just to help things along.
CB: Did your crew do a pairing job? Were there two aircraft that they had a responsibility for or just yours?
DF: Just ours.
CB: Right.
DF: Just the one. Yeah. Just the one.
CB: And how often did you come back with damage to the aircraft?
DF: Most.
CB: And what was their reaction to their aeroplane being damaged?
DF: ‘You bring it back. We’ll get it ready for the next day.’ That was all that was said. ‘You bring it back. We’ll do it.’ I said, I said, ‘Well, if we can get off with the bomb load on we’ll bring it back.’ And that’s what happened. I was sure of that. If we got off the ground we’d bring it back again.
CB: Yes.
DF: And that, so they were quite happy with that. And they did. They got it back in good condition for us.
CB: Now, now this is a variation of what we’re looking for but it does tie in and that is the role of the flight engineer on take-off is what?
DF: The role on the, on take-off from our point of view and our crew point of view was that the pilot looked after the running of the aeroplane itself. Keeping it on the right line and after revving up and letting off the brakes the throttles was passed over to me and I opened the throttles remembering to open the outer port side slightly more than the others because the Lanc always swerved to the —
CB: To the left.
DF: To the left. And that —
CB: The torque of the engines did it.
DF: Yeah.
CB: Yeah.
DF: That’s right. So we, that’s what happened. Soon as we came to the end of the runway or near the end of the runway if we were a bit short I would then put it through the gate to get the extra revs from the engines.
CB: Yeah.
DF: And the, as soon as we were in the air I dropped that back because that was when I was saying that we knew what the engine would do. You know, they were our own engines so we knew what was happening.
CB: Yeah. Getting through. Getting the revs is putting the throttles.
DF: It’s the certain level of the gate.
CB: Yes.
DF: Pushing the throttles through this gate and that gave you the next —
CB: And how many settings beyond the gate?
DF: There’s just the one.
CB: Just the one. And what does it actually mean going through the gate?
DF: Just giving you extra power from the super —
CB: From the super charger.
DF: The super charger. Yes.
CB: Right. So it’s opening up the supercharger a bit more.
DF: That’s right. But you didn’t want to do that for long.
CB: No.
DF: Because it was screaming at you, you know.
CB: Right.
DF: That’s why I say having control of your own aircraft —
CB: Yes.
DF: You could look after the engines better than somebody —
CB: Yeah. So that’s leading me to the question what’s the ground crew’s interest in how much you put it through the gate? Do they want to know that?
DF: No. No. They never asked us. No. No. Of course, I think some pilots had done that all the time.
CB: Oh.
DF: It was just full revs. They wanted to get off the ground. We were just taking care of engines.
CB: Yeah. Yeah.
DF: And that.
CB: Ok. Just pause there again.
[recording paused]
CB: When did you come in to the squadron?
DF: July 1943. And to me it was a great time to, to join 101 Squadron. A squadron which received all the latest aids such as Window, ABC, FIDO and rear gun turret. That was all things that were just coming into being and we seemed to get all these things as early as anybody else and it was the time when the Battle of Hamburg had just finished and the Battle of Berlin was just starting. A great time to be there. It was a happy squadron considering the working and living conditions as we talked about earlier on. And even although it was only approximately five percent of my life it was a time which I would never have, [pause] I was pleased that I flew with 101 Squadron and wouldn’t have missed it for anything. And also changed my life for the future completely, the war did and that and the, allowing us to have a much better, happier, enjoyable life after the war which I don’t think would ever have happened if there hadn’t been a war and as I say I took up forestry and I think it, even for Sylvia too it was a good life. It wasn’t a job. It was a way of, way of living and it was better than a good way of doing it. So we enjoyed ourselves and happily we had taken up that position at that time. That’s all I was going to say on that you know.
CB: Ok. Just quickly on a couple of other things you were getting the new technology. That meant the ground crew had a part to play in that to be sure that it was working, so how did they deal with that?
DF: They had to do —
CB: Did they have special training like you?
DF: Yes. They that that special training. There wasn’t one for each aircraft. There was the three or four covered, I can’t tell you just how many but three or four covered the planes and they went from one to the other doing these jobs and if there was two or three different assessing had to be done. It was probably two or three people. One doing this and one doing that on the planes.
CB: Did you also have the tail warning radar Monica?
DF: We did but we didn’t because of ABC coming in. We lost that. We had that and we had fitted other things.
CB: Because of weight.
DF: Because of weight. Yes. Because the, what do you call it, the ABC was about, I don’t know, a couple of hundred weight or something.
CB: Oh, was it? So, do you want to just describe what was ABC?
DF: ABC was a —
CB: I mean, effectively it’s an electronics package, isn’t it?
DF: Yes. And person [pause] it’s difficult to say. The operator who could speak German breaking in to the German lines of communication between ground crews and fighters.
CB: Yeah.
DF: And stopping the, getting information back to them by jamming the, the whatever, what do you call it, line we were on and that by using the noise of the engines and that was what it really was. Just a jamming programme to —
CB: So, there was a microphone in the engine which they broadcast the sound from —
DF: Yes. That’s right.
CB: To jam the German —
DF: The German —
CB: Fighter communications.
DF: The communication between the ground crew and the fighters.
CB: What I was getting at was whether that wouldn’t work all the time so it had to have work done on it. Did they have a, did that introduce a new specialty in ground crew to deal with it?
DF: Yes. Yes. Yes. Of course, every aircraft had it, had it all had to be checked. The radius for it was supposed to be fifty miles. It could cover fifty miles out.
CB: Oh right.
DF: That was why the four aircraft was sufficient to cover.
CB: The whole a bomber stream.
DF: Bomber stream. And that. But it was successful but the effect was that by doing the jamming the aircraft could then be picked up by other fighters who wasn’t in the same range as the ones that were being jammed and they could pick off the Lancaster. That’s why 101 squadron had the heaviest losses in Bomber Command.
CB: So effectively although in practical terms ABC was emitting signals as well as receiving signal.
DF: Signal. Yeah.
CB: And it was the radiation effectively from that that the German fighters locked on to.
DF: Locked on to. That’s right.
CB: Yes
DF: And as I say even though they flew on every, on most raids it was possible but they had the highest losses and flew far more operations than any other squadron.
CB: With the, with the special operator running this and the gear itself that put a lot of weight in. What did that do to your bomb load?
DF: It didn’t affect the bomb load. What they did was to take out the [pause] like the heavy metal support behind the pilot’s seat. The pilot’s head rather. These things were taken out instead of dropping the bomb load.
CB: Yeah. We’ve covered lots of things. Catering. But what about the medical side?
DF: Funnily enough we never come against them. I think only once one of our crew, [unclear] once one of our crews they had an earwig which had [unclear] got in to his ears and they couldn’t get it out so they had to go to the hospital to get it taken out. And the other one of course was the mid-upper gunner when we lost him on the flight to Berlin with what they said was lack of moral fibre.
CB: He did what?
DF: Lack of moral fibre.
CB: Oh yes. Right.
DF: I think we talked about that.
CB: We have. Yes, but it’s a link. Yes.
DF: So —
CB: Yeah. Now, some of the times the aircraft would come back damaged and on fire.
DF: Yes. We’ve had a —
CB: So —
DF: Engines on fire.
CB: Yes.
DF: But that, we had two occasions we had up to a hundred holes along the wings and the fuselage.
CB: So, when the plane came in to land in those circumstances was it followed by ground crew?
DF: No.
CB: To the [pause] Fire crew and ambulance.
DF: No. No. They didn’t. We didn’t. Well, I know about what the damage was anyway. In fact, on one occasion we had done a [pause] we were caught in a thunderstorm and couldn’t get out of it and we were pushed from twenty thousand feet down a bit and up again. The last time we did in a power dive to get away from it and to pull it out we were down to about four thousand feet by the time the two of us had to pull back on the stick and when we landed and looked at the aircraft the rivets along the front, underneath the front of the wings had sprung.
CB: So, they had to re-rivet that.
DF: Re-rivet.
CB: You mentioned earlier about damage with flak.
DF: Yes.
CB: How did they mend that?
DF: Mostly it was just a cover they put over.
CB: Aluminium or fabric?
DF: Well, in some places it was fabric. Other times it had to be aluminium because on the wing or on the main job [pause] but they seemed to get done very quickly. I mean I never watched them doing it but they seemed to —
CB: But how would they do that? How would they make it attached because they didn’t, they wouldn’t have glued it?
DF: No. I think it was rivetted it. Yeah. I’m sure it was rivetted but as I say I can’t be sure on that.
CB: Right.
DF: Because I never had the time to watch them.
CB: The other one we didn’t talk a lot about is air traffic. So, what did you call them then? That’s a post war name, air traffic, isn’t it?
DF: Yeah.
CB: What were they called in the war?
[pause]
DF: This is the control between the control and the —
CB: Well, aircraft in the air and on the ground. So that was the watch office, wasn’t it?
DF: Yes. And we had to call. Call sign. Well, I can’t remember it now. 101 Squadron was known for its good library. I think our sign was [pause] I don’t think I have it.
CB: We’ll perhaps come back but so for take-off how would they communicate with the aircraft from the watch office?
DF: Usually just X2 proceed to end of runway. Then —
CB: But on the RT or did they use an Aldis lamp?
DF: Always, occasionally it was from the, the inwards. Other times it was just by the Aldis lamp. Mainly by Aldis lamp. Just a green light was given.
CB: So, the Germans couldn’t pick up that there was a take-off about to happen.
DF: Take off. That’s right.
CB: But when you returned to the field then what?
DF: It was by name. Just like a like K.
CB: But on the RT.
DF: On the RT.
CB: Yes.
DF: The pilot would just get on and say, ‘X2, permission to land please.’
CB: Yeah.
DF: And then they would just say yes to whatever it was. And then as you got near to land you would probably get another saying X2, height three thousand feet or five thousand feet depending on the number of aircraft that was in the, circling to land.
CB: So, you come in to the circuit. We’re in the dark. What do you do first thing?
DF: Well, put on lights. You could use the lights in the dark over the airfield. And that’s the first thing that went on but other than that you were just watching.
CB: Who put down the undercarriage?
DF: I did.
CB: Right.
DF: Yeah. It was just the pilot said, ‘Undercarriage down.’ And push. Push down and that’s it. Or, ‘Undercarriage up,’ just and he used the flaps of course obviously but one thing about him, he was, he was good at landing at night but in the day time he was —
CB: A bouncer.
DF: A bouncer [laughs] I think the reason was that in the night when we were getting almost on the ground I would pull the throttles back and we just got in nicely but during the day, he was controlling it during the day so — [laughs]
CB: [laughs] Right. We’ll stop there. Yes.
[recording paused]
CB: So, the fuelling up and the armoury, rearming of the aircraft would be done before you arrived, would it.
DF: Yes. That’s right.
CB: How would they do that?
DF: They had done it. Part of their job during the day they would fill up with the petrol depending on the lengths of the operation. You got two hundred gallons was the average. Whatever was the average rate of juice by a Lancaster. So, if you were doing six hours you got twelve hundred gallons plus an extra hundred gallons.
CB: Spare.
DF: To spare. That’s how it was worked out. That was all done by the ground crew before we’d take off. And the ammunition and that was also determined by the armourers before we —
CB: Right.
DF: Got in the aircraft. But having said that never once did our gunners fire a shot during the whole —
CB: Didn’t they?
DF: No. Except testing their guns. But other than that their policy was don’t get involved with fighters unless they attack you personally.
CB: Yes.
DF: Because as soon as you do you open yourself up to not one fighter but half a dozen fighters.
CB: So, what you’re saying is their job was to defend the aircraft but not to attract opposition.
DF: It wasn’t our job to.
CB: Shoot down other aeroplanes.
DF: Other —
CB: Right.
DF: Fighters or that so we didn’t do it. The only time we’d done it was on the last raid when we were on the, the new turret at the back. We were told by squadron, ‘Tonight if you see fighters fire on them because they’ll be taken so much by surprise.’ There was only six aircraft had it on and went out but the Germans didn’t know that so —
CB: Had what on?
DF: The guns.
CB: Oh, the big guns.
DF: The big —
CB: The new .5s.
DF: .5s.
CB: So, you could reach them. Yes.
DF: So, we could. And it shook up them more than it shook up Lancasters.
CB: Yes.
DF: And that was the only time that our gunners fired.
CB: Right.
DF: A shot.
CB: And they really were firing at fighters.
DF: Yes.
CB: Yeah. Did they, did they get them?
DF: I don’t think so.
CB: No.
DF: But instead of letting them go and saying out in the aircraft, ‘Fighter. Port. 11 o’clock.’
CB: Yeah.
DF: Or whatever it was. That, that was said but there was no action taken.
CB: Right.
DF: That night. As soon as that was said the guns went off. I think it shook them quite well.
CB: Good.
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 Donald Fraser. Two
Creator
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Chris Brockbank
Date
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2017-09-06
Format
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01:59:40 Audio recording
Language
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eng
Type
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Sound
Identifier
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AFraserDK170906
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Conforms To
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Pending review
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Pending OH summary
Description
An account of the resource
Donald Fraser completed a tour of operations as a flight engineer with 101 Squadron. He discusses the importance of ground personnel, his crew, his operations and the conditions at RAF Ludford Magna. He describes having to stop his mid-upper gunner from jumping from the aircraft without his parachute, and being lost in fog when returning from an operation. He also discusses the role of the eighth man in 101 Squadron crews jamming German radio signals with Airborne Cigar.
Spatial Coverage
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Germany
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
Germany--Berlin
Temporal Coverage
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1943-12-17
1943-12-25
1944
Contributor
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Julie Williams
101 Squadron
aircrew
bombing
flight engineer
ground crew
ground personnel
Lancaster
military living conditions
military service conditions
Nissen hut
RAF Ludford Magna
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/796/10778/ADayMH171128.1.mp3
9ea556174e92adc2ad5ddbbaed1cf558
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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Day, Margaret Helen
M H Day
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Margaret Day (b. 1924, 2015932Royal Air Force). She served in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-11-28
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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Day, MH
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
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CB: My name is Chris Brockbank and today is the 28th of November 2017, and with David Bray we are in the home of Margaret Day who was a WAAF in the war, and her husband Charles who’s already been interviewed. So, Margaret what are your earliest recollections of life?
MD: I think my earliest recollections are when I was three years old my father was in the Navy, and we went to Gibraltar. I had an older sister who stayed behind because she’d just started school. She stayed with grandparents. And a younger brother. And the Admiral at the time CNC, the Mediterranean was Admiral Townsend, and it was his daughter Helen that was my godmother. How I got my middle name. We had a small cottage on the, a stone cottage on the Rock. Admiralty House was halfway up the Rock, and I remember we had my brother and I had a donkey called [Burrabareeko]and we had a pannier each side. I was three and he was two I suppose and we used to go up and down on this donkey. And also the Admiral had two cows because everybody else on the Rock apart from the Governor had to drink goat’s milk. And they used to milk the cows and I remember being sent down with a jug when it was milking time to go back up the [laughs] back up the steps to take the milk home to my mother. And when I was four years old I started at an Army school which was, there was a lot of Army regiments there. I went to this Army school and we stayed there until I was five.
[pause]
CB: Ok.
MD: Then we came back to Portsmouth and my father was on the staff of Sir Roger Keyes as he was then.
CB: Admiral Sir Roger Keyes.
MD: Admiral Sir Roger Keyes.
CB: VC.
MD: He later became Lord Keyes.
CB: Yes.
MD: And my father was happy about that because he had served at Zeebrugge with Roger Keyes. I think, I think Sir Roger was on the large battleship or whatever it was. My father was in a small, a Mersey, Channel err cross Channel thing. A ferry called the Daffodil. And after the raid on Zeebrugge they renamed it the Royal Daffodil. And so because he had served with Sir Roger at the time they said that everybody deserved a VC. So they allocated three and the men were all asked to vote who should get them. And my father always said he voted for Sir Roger, and so he was very happy to be at Portsmouth with him. And strangely enough Sir Roger Keye’s eldest son Geoffrey that I knew because of being in the dockyard. He got a VC at Libya.
CB: Oh yeah.
MD: At some raid they did.
CB: On the Rommel raid. Yes.
MD: Yes. So, it was quite a unique family. So, I then went to school in Portsea until I was seven, and the commissions in those days were two years. If you were with the Mediterranean fleet it was two years. With the Atlantic fleet was three years. So of course all the sailors were hoping to get the Mediterranean fleet but, so my father was sent to Malta so we moved from inside the dockyard. My parents bought a house in Copnor, North Portsmouth, and he was, he was sent to Malta then. So, we, we just, but unfortunately when he’d been there a couple of years my mother had pneumonia and died. So he came back from Malta and the family was split up. And I then went back to Gibraltar with my father. My sister and brother stayed at home because they were settled. Apparently I didn’t settle very well, so he took me and I was fostered by the head gardener of the Rock. So I then lived in the grounds of Government House and I went to, then to another Army school. Came back when I was eleven [pause] My father then remarried a nursemaid. The Admiral in Gibraltar at that time was Austin, Sir Admiral Austin, and my father married the nursemaid that was, that he met there. And so we then moved to Gosport where he worked at, he was stationed at the St Vincent which was a training school for young boys. I think they were sixteen. And then the war came in 1939 when I was fifteen. I had to leave. I left school when I was fourteen and went to work across the harbour at Southsea to a large furnishing place. We did the soft furnishings for the royal yacht which was the Narlin in those days. And when the war, when the bombing started my father wanted me to come back to Gosport to work. So I went to work for Boots. And in 1940 one of the first daylight raids of, of the war was Portsmouth and Gosport, and a large bomb landed in our garden and I was trapped in an air raid shelter with my step mother and two neighbours which sort of went right up in the air and twisted. So we had, fortunately next door to us the Royal Air Force had taken over the balloon barrage thing and the airmen came out and managed to get us out of this air raid shelter. One of the people in it was taken to hospital so it was pretty scary. And my father was then sent to the Isle of Man because the St Vincent was evacuated there and the Isle of Man was full of internees. And there was no work there for, for me and my stepmother didn’t like it so we came back to Gosport and then I was, went to Overton to stay with friends. And since I was seventeen and a half I joined the WAAF. In those days you had to be eighteen to join the ATS or the Wrens and I was anxious. My sister was in the, in the WAAF and my brother had joined the Navy and my father was still in the Navy so I wanted to join up so as soon as I was seventeen and a half I joined. I applied to join the WAAF.
CB: Stop there for a mo.
MD: Yes.
[recording paused]
CB: Before we go on with your RAF career.
MD: Yes.
CB: I’d like to just dwell a little on the point of being on the receiving end of the air raids.
MD: Yes.
CB: So, because it was a Naval area there was obviously there was considerable attention.
MD: Yes.
CB: From the German bombers.
MD: Yes.
CB: The bomb landed how close to the Anderson shelter?
MD: Well, just a few, about fifty yards or so I should think.
CB: Right.
MD: Right. What would you say? It was very close. It was right in our garden.
BCD: Maybe twenty yards.
Yes, it looks to me as though it’s less than that. And so how, what was the, how did you feel the impact?
MD: Well, it was very strange. We, we always went. There were lots of air raid alarms, and we always went to the shelter. And as I say it was daytime and we had gone to the shelter and we could hear the, the guns. The anti-aircraft guns and the bombs. And all of a sudden there seemed to be a very [pause] a movement. I felt the earth moving and we sort of moved up slightly. Very gently. And but then of course all the earth started piling in which was rather frightening because we didn’t know how much earth was going to fall on us. But fortunately the balloon barrage people were next door and they came and dug us out. There was a Fort. Fort Brockhurst just across the road from us and a medical officer from there came out and had a look at us all. As I say one of the ladies had to go to hospital. But it was, it was terrifying.
CB: How many people were there in the Anderson shelter?
MD: About four. There were two, two ladies and I was a young girl and a younger child.
CB: And your stepmother.
MD: Yes, my stepmother. That’s four. Four altogether. Yes.
CB: Right. So you said that the explosion lifted the —
MD: Yes.
CB: Anderson shelter.
MD: Lifted us right up.
CB: Did it then land back where it was or did it move it away?
MD: It landed back where it was but —
CB: But you got covered in. Were you actually covered in the earth?
MD: Yes.
CB: Or just trapped by the earth?
MD: Well, my father had built this. When the Anderson shelters were built people were instructed how to make them safer and he had covered it all with a lot of earth. It was all covered over. And then of course the bottom. The earth came from the bottom and from the top and it was sort of piling in on us and that was, that was more frightening really because I began to get earth in my face and my mouth and I was afraid I was going to suffocate. But fortunately these men came out and they’d got crowbars and managed to open the thing up and pulled us out by our feet. Oh, that’s right, because my feet were above my head so I remember being dragged out by my feet.
CB: And how did they get the others out? The same way?
MD: The same way. Yes. But it was very difficult. I think my stepmother and I were on the top and for some reason the little girl and her mother were underneath so it was the lady that was underneath that was most seriously shaken up or damaged.
CB: And so it was like an earthquake in a way.
MD: Oh, it was. Yes.
CB: And this was daytime.
MD: Yes.
CB: So what were you dressed in at the time?
MD: Oh, ordinary clothes. Yes. I think it was about lunchtime.
CB: And you were in the shelter because there was an alarm. The alert.
MD: Because yes, there was an alert.
CB: How did that work then?
MD: Well, there was a, it’s a sort of a wailing siren that you can hear and as soon as you hear the siren you would go to the shelter and then the all clear was a flat note. So you knew when it was safe to come out.
CB: And how far away was the shelter from where you were? Where the house was.
MD: Well, it was it was quite close.
CB: Right next to it.
MD: I would say, I would say it’s closer to the house than the crater because these are pre-war built in the 1930s but they weren’t, they weren’t large gardens. They were —
CB: Was, was this a Navy house?
MD: No. My father had —
CB: The one he’d bought.
MD: He’d bought this house. Yes.
CB: Ok. Right. So, after that how did you feel? When you were pulled out?
MD: Well, yes I was very nervous after that whenever the sirens went off. So I was glad to be evacuated to Overton. To the rector and his wife who were friends of my step mother.
CB: Where’s Overton?
MD: Hampshire.
CB: Oh right.
MD: Near Basingstoke.
CB: And what happened to the shelter? Did they rebuild it or —
MD: Do you know I don’t know because we, we left.
CB: Because the house was wrecked as well was it?
MD: Well, it was half. Yes. It had to be boarded up and we had to move all our possessions.
CB: Did you?
MD: Into storage. And so I don’t really know what happened to that.
CB: Did your father sell the house later then?
MD: Yes.
CB: Or did you eventually go back there?
MD: No. He sold the house later on. Yeah.
CB: Right. Ok. We’ll pause there for a mo.
[recording paused]
CB: Just on the Anderson shelter. Normally I think that they tended to dig out into the ground a bit.
MD: Yes.
CB: To make the top of the shelter lower. What was the situation with this one?
MD: To get the sides in.
CB: Right. In to the ground.
MD: Anchored. To anchor the thing. Yes.
CB: But with the bomb hitting the ground nearby.
MD: Yes.
CB: It shook the whole of the ground. Is that it?
MD: Yes. It lifted it up.
CB: Yes.
MD: Yes.
CB: Yes. So you decided to join the WAAFs.
MD: Yes.
CB: And the Army and the Navy you had to be older.
MD: You had to be six months older.
CB: Yes.
MD: I was very anxious to join up so –
CB: Yes. So, what did you think you’d do when you joined the RAF?
MD: I wanted to be a radio operator at sort of speaking to aircraft. But they hadn’t got any vacancies so they gave me a maths test and said that, ‘You can be a wireless operator.’ So, I said I was keen to join so I took that.
CB: And what did that involve?
MD: Well, first of all we went, I went to Gloucester where we were kitted out for about five days and after that we went to Morecambe in Lancashire to do the square bashing and stuff, and then I was sent to RAF Hutton Cranswick in Yorkshire, which was a fighter station at the time. But we were billeted at Leconfield because there were married quarters there, and that was bomber.
CB: How did you get between the two during the day?
MD: By, by transport, lorries, trucks.
CB: Open trucks were they?
MD: Yes. Yes. And —
CB: So when is this? What year are we talking about?
MD: Talking 1941 ‘42. I joined in ’41 and I think by ’42 I’d been posted.
CB: So, what was the training at Hutton Cranswick?
MD: Well, it was just, just general really because we were only there for two or three weeks. We were sent to the signals section, and they sort of gave us a little inside knowledge of what went on. But then we were posted to Lancashire, to Kirkham in Lancashire which was quite a large station and we used to go by train every day into Preston to the GPO where we were taught the Morse Code by civilians.
CB: How did you get on with that?
MD: Yes. I passed out. I passed the course and then went to Compton Bassett in Wiltshire for technical training. We had American radios and equipment there. So we had to, and learn all the procedure.
CB: How long did that take?
MD: That was six weeks. And then I was posted to RAF High Wycombe in 1942.
CB: So that was Bomber Command Headquarters.
MD: Bomber Command, yes. Bomber Harris was there at the time. He used to swoosh about in his car with someone driving him. Airmen scattering all the way. Very fast he used to drive on the roads. And originally I was what we call down the hole. It was underground and it was just communications between the various Groups. And after a while I was, came up from there to a monitoring section where we just monitored all the airwaves. And at one point I went to Beachy Head where they were tracking beacons and spurious beacons that the Germans were putting about and we had to —
CB: Navigation beacons.
MD: Navigation beacons for the aircraft, yeah.
CB: How did you do the monitoring then?
MD: Well, we sat with earphones on and tuned into the various frequencies, and wrote down whatever we got.
CB: Were you tracking where the beacon was situated and how did you do that?
MD: Well, it was —
CB: Because it wasn’t in Britain of course.
MD: No. No. But you could, you could pick up where the beacons crossed so —
CB: Do you know what they did with the information?
MD: No, I don’t. It was supposed to be top secret. We weren’t, we were very hush hush in that section. We were told not to speak to anybody.
CB: No.
MD: Yeah.
CB: How did you know what they were doing with the information?
MD: I, I didn’t know what they were doing.
CB: It was just you said the beacons crossed. The transmissions crossed.
MD: Yes. Well, that was when you could pick up the frequencies. You could get the frequencies of the beacons.
CB: How long did that last?
MD: That lasted until 1945. I was there for about three odd, three odd years.
CB: Based where?
MD: In High Wycombe.
CB: So that was only temporary at Beachy Head.
MD: Yes. That was just one off and then back again.
CB: And how did you like your job?
MD: I loved it. Yes. It was quite interesting. We always knew when there were raids on and basically what was going on.
CB: So, in your work at High Wycombe how would you describe what you were doing most of the time?
MD: Well, just receiving. When we were down the hole.
CB: Air signals or ground signals?
MD: Morse.
CB: All Morse.
MD: Morse Code.
CB: Yes.
MD: Yes.
CB: But was the origin of that transmission by radio or was it on the ground?
MD: It was from aircraft.
CB: Right.
MD: Yes.
CB: And you, using Morse you then wrote down. So what was the information that was coming?
MD: Well, it was usually in code so we would just write it all down and then in the hole they had a section where they could decode all the information.
CB: Right.
MD: There was some plain language but mostly it was code.
CB: So what was the origin of the, the transmissions from the aircraft? Where were they?
MD: Well, wherever they were flying.
CB: They were on raids.
MD: Yes.
CB: Right.
MD: Yes.
CB: And why would they be sending back signals?
MD: I don’t know. I suppose it, so it’s telling how they were getting on. I don’t know.
CB: I was just curious because —
MD: Yes.
CB: They had to maintain signal silence.
MD: Yes.
CB: Normally.
MD: Perhaps, perhaps when they were a certain distance they could communicate and say where they were.
CB: What I’m getting to is that you’re receiving it and putting in to plain language.
MD: Yes.
CB: It then goes to somebody else. But I wonder what, you receive it and write it down as a code.
MD: Yes.
CB: Is what I mean to say.
MD: Yes.
CB: Someone else decodes it.
MD: Decodes it.
CB: Did you find out very often what was actually in the signal?
MD: No. No.
CB: Was it, did you feel a need to know, or did you have a curiosity about it or did you just leave it?
MD: Yes. We were curious, but it was all very secret and the code section was mostly WAAF officers and you didn’t mix with any of the people that were doing the work.
CB: And what rank had you achieved by this time?
MD: I was a corporal.
CB: Right. How long did it, did you get corporal when you reached High Wycombe or what stage did you?
MD: No. At that, I became a corporal when I was overseas, sorry.
CB: Right. So when you were at High Wycombe.
MD: LACW.
CB: Yeah. Just to put that into context, you carried on in the RAF after the war, did you?
MD: Well, no.
CB: Or did you finish when the war finished?
MD: I finished more or less yes, when they started demobbing people.
CB: Ok.
MD: I was demobbed in 1946.
CB: Right. So we’re still back at High Wycombe.
MD: Yes.
CB: You’re feeding the code section. You started that in ’42 ’43 was it?
MD: Yes.
CB: When did you actually finish doing that job?
MD: Well, when I was posted overseas.
CB: And when was that?
MD: 1945.
CB: Ok. When the war in Europe had finished was it?
MD: It was, I think we were at, we were at sea coming along the Mediterranean when it was VE Day.
CB: Right. Where were you going? You’d been posted where?
MD: To Egypt.
CB: Right. And did you know what you were going to do when you were in Egypt?
MD: No. It was Telecommunications Middle East.
CB: Ah.
MD: And they were sort of the hub between the UK and the Far East and the Persian and Iraq force.
CB: So you got the information of VE day on the, when you were on the ship.
MD: Yes.
CB: What was the reaction of the people on the ship?
MD: Well, they were all delighted of course. It was a ship called the Georgic, and we left from Liverpool, and went out in to the Atlantic and picked up a convoy and came through the Straits because there were still submarines, U-boats lurking, and I think we were about halfway to Egypt when we heard the news.
CB: And what was people’s reaction in terms of —
MD: Very celebrating. Celebratory. Yes.
CB: Yes. And were you allowed to have lemonades on the ship?
MD: No. No, there was no —
CB: It was dry was it?
MD: Yes. Absolutely. Yes.
CB: So when you, when you got to Egypt what happened then?
MD: We got off at Port Said, and went to [pause] by lorries up to Almazah which was a sort of transit camp where we were in tents, and I remember there was a Camp Seymour where there was a sandstorm which was if you were in a tent it was was pretty horrific. But then I was posted to Telecommunications Middle East, TME where we were in concrete huts. Thirty girls to a hut and surrounded by a high wooden fence. They called it the WAAF compound.
CB: Why did they put the fence up I wonder?
MD: [laughs] Well —
BCD: She didn’t tell you she was on my Watch.
MD: Sorry?
BCD: Telecommunications Middle East when you were on my Watch. B Watch.
CB: Coming to that.
MD: It’s got nothing to do with him. Sorry.
CB: That’s Charles putting in a couple of comments. We’ll, come to Charles in a minute.
MD: Yes, don’t take any notice of him.
CB: Right. So there were thirty girls in a hut and you —
MD: Yes. A concrete hut.
CB: Oh, concrete.
MD: Yes.
CB: Crikey, right.
MD: Surrounded by a wooden, several huts surrounded by a big wooden fence. They called it the WAAF compound and they had guards on the thing. We didn’t have a, we had showers. But of course there was no air conditioning or anything so it was pretty hot, and chemical toilets. There was no running water.
CB: And is this place on the edge of a town or an airfield or in the desert?
MD: No. It was right out in the country at a place called [Kaf el Farouk?]
CB: Oh yes.
MD: It was several miles from Almazah. Right out in the desert.
CB: So in your time off what did you do?
MD: Went into Cairo because it was like fairy land, because there was no rationing, no blackout and there were troops of all nationalities. There were lots of Americans, lots of South Africans, all people congregating there so it was lively and, but of course I was only getting two pounds a fortnight or something so I couldn’t buy any of the clothes [laughs] but it was a, it was like, like going to fairyland after the UK.
CB: So when you got in to Cairo what did you actually do then? Window shopping?
MD: Yes. We used to go to the cafes and have ice creams and you meet up with various other people, airmen or people who were there and there were some places for troops. Canteens and stuff. Places that were —
CB: Actually in Cairo.
MD: In Cairo, yes.
CB: And you could have a drink there.
MD: Oh yes.
CB: Just stopping a mo.
[recording paused]
CB: Start. Starting now.
MD: Yeah. Well, I was very fortunate because one of the girls that came with me from High Wycombe to Egypt was a widow. Her husband had been a major in the Indian Army and he was killed in Aden and she had joined the WAAF. But before that she had, her father was an Army officer and she had lived in Cairo and she had friends in Cairo who ran a [unclear] there. And so we could go there either to, on our sleeping out passes or just to visit and we could go to the various cafes and things. But she, this, this [unclear] was [pause] there were a lot of Army officers there who were being billeted there and so they were very kind. I remember one of them had a car and took us out to the pyramids which was wonderful because it, it was just the pyramids in those days. We’ve been back on a cruise ship and it’s all surrounded by bazaars. But you could, you could drive out in the moonlight and there’s the pyramids and it was just and I had always been interested in Egyptology since I was a child, and so I [pause] and also on leave we could, this girl and I we went to Cyprus once. We managed to get a lift on a Dakota. Another time we went to Jerusalem. And another time we went to Luxor. So it was, it was really very, very nice. Very enjoyable.
CB: So the aircrew were quite friendly about these sorts of things.
MD: Well, if there was a spare seat you could, you could get, but I remember that you sort of sat on a wooden bench either side of the Dakota and the air turbulence. There were no seat belts or anything, and we were hopping up and down with the turbulence. It was quite a hairy, and those old Dakotas rattled so and they made a dreadful noise. But it was, it was the visit to Cyprus which we stayed up. There was a place for troops up in the Troodos Mountains. So she and I stayed there for one of our leaves. So we managed to get around quite a lot.
CB: How did you manage to get back in time then as it was an ad hoc arrangement?
MD: Well, that’s, we couldn’t get back in time. We got there alright, but we couldn’t get a flight back for a day or so, so we were in a bit of trouble when we got back.
CB: When you got a bit of leave how long was that?
MD: I think we used to take seven days at a time so that we could spread it out and go to different places.
CB: What we haven’t talked about is the difference in the uniforms between being in Britain.
MD: Yes.
CB: And being out in Cairo.
MD: Yes.
CB: And Egypt and then going to Cyprus and so on.
MD: Yes.
CB: So what was it? What was the uniform like in Britain?
MD: Well, it was a tunic with a, and a skirt with a cap and a cap badge. Grey stockings and black brogue walking shoes which you weren’t allowed to wear anything but the regulation shoes so, and shirts with detachable collars which weren’t very nice and knickers they called blackouts which were huge voluminous garments. Of course, we didn’t have any coupons to buy anything else so —
CB: Oh, so you couldn’t but anything anyway.
MD: No. So, we you just had to make do with your uniform.
CB: And did you ever walk out in your free time in civilian clothes or were you always in uniform?
MD: No. Occasionally you could get a sleeping out pass with civilian clothes which —
CB: What, what would cause them to give you that?
MD: I, I don’t know really.
CB: Would it be a special event like a birthday or a wedding or something?
MD: Probably. Yes. Yes. It wasn’t, it wasn’t very often. Most of the time we had to be in uniform and carry our 1250s with us and —
CB: Carry your 1250s. Yes. Which is your ID.
MD: Yes.
CB: For people who don’t know. So was it the same uniform in the summer and in the winter in Britain?
MD: Yes. But when we got to Egypt it was the blues in the winter and we loved the summer uniform. We had sandals and socks and little short khaki skirts and blouses, and forage caps which was much nicer than the caps here.
CB: And the uniform was a lighter material. What was it made of?
MD: Sort of a heavy linen I suppose.
CB: But, but thinner than the UK uniform.
MD: Yes. Yeah.
CB: So how did you feel from a heat point of view?
MD: Well, we were young and I suppose we didn’t really notice it so much. I was only twenty one and it was all so exciting to be in the Middle East.
CB: Right.
MD: No. The uniforms were very comfortable.
CB: And where you worked what was the, what were the facilities there? What sort of building was it?
MD: This, this was underground. A Centre underground so it was, it was, it was quite cool but there was no air conditioning. And I remember the first day I went down there I saw one of the airmen pick up one of these sort of folding chairs and bang it on the floor. And I said to him, ‘What are you doing with that chair?’ And he, he said, ‘I’m getting rid of the bugs.’ So every time I went on duty I had one of these chairs I had to bang it on the floor. They didn’t have proper fumigation or anything so —
CB: What did you do with the bugs? Did you tread on them or what?
MD: Yes.
CB: You liked the crunch did you?
MD: No [laughs] No, but they had a fierce bite these.
CB: Did they?
MD: Yes, they were so it, as I say there were, they had certain fans but it was really very warm.
CB: Underground.
MD: Yes. We had to walk there and it, but we had, we did shifts of course which were not very —
CB: What were the shifts?
MD: Eight to twelve. Twelve to six. Six to eleven. And eleven to eight the following morning.
CB: Was that hard going or fairly easy with that sequence?
MD: Well, it did mean that you got a, you had a sort of a stand-off in between, which meant we could go out. I think if you came off at eleven err at 8 o’clock in the morning and you weren’t on again until the following day it, it was quite, quite alright. It was a bit indigestible but —
CB: So, how did the sequence work? So you would be say on an eight till twelve. Then would you do that for a week or ten days?
MD: No.
CB: Or what would you do?
MD: No. It was, it was continuous rolling. The shifts just went on like that the whole time.
CB: Yes. But did you move between the shifts is what I meant. So —
MD: No. If you were on a certain Watch —
CB: Yes.
MD: Your watch did these particular hours.
CB: Yeah. You were always on that.
MD: And you always did the same hours.
CB: That’s what I meant. Yes. And after a month they didn’t change to a difference shift.
MD: No. No.
CB: Which one were you normally on? Well, were you on?
MD: Well, I was on B Watch as he says but —
CB: And B was which? Which was twelve to six was it?
MD: Yes. But then you would do the same. I think there were four different shifts.
BCD: Yeah. Four Watches.
MD: Four Watches.
BCD: And we used to go on at 8 o’clock in the morning.
MD: Yes.
BCD: Until mid-day.
MD: Yes.
BCD: And then mid-day until 8 o’clock at night.
MD: The following day.
BCD: 8 o’clock the following day.
CB: The following day. That’s what I’m getting at. Yeah.
MD: Yeah. I’m sorry.
CB: So it was a rolling shift system.
MD: Yes. Yeah.
CB: So you would gradually get to working at night.
MD: Yes.
CB: And then you gradually get to work in the day.
MD: Every fourth night you would, you would be on duty all night.
CB: Right.
MD: Yes.
CB: And then when did you get a break? Was it seven days on and two days off, or how did it work?
MD: I I think it was —
BCD: We used to have the four Watch system but we used to have a week off in between.
CB: Oh right. So once you’d done four shifts rolling.
BCD: We did that for about three months or so. Or quite a, quite a lot of time and then we had a week off.
CB: Before you had time off. Yeah.
MD: Yeah.
BCD: That’s when we used to go together to Alexandria or somewhere like that.
CB: Ok.
BCD: I used to take Margaret —
CB: Ok. So, well let’s come back to that. So, I’m just going to stop there for a mo.
[recording paused]
CB: So, after you’d done the four shifts.
MD: Yeah.
CB: You end up at eight in morning.
MD: Yeah.
CB: And then you’re off for twenty four hours before you start again in the morning.
MD: Yes.
CB: How did you get, adjust to this constant change to your sleep time?
MD: Well, you just did it. I mean —
BCD: With difficulty.
MD: Yes. There was no [pause] the cookhouse was open all the time, so when we went on watch at 11 o’clock we could call in the cookhouse for some rations and then come, then come straight off and go to breakfast and then sleep. And then the following day start again one ‘til six.
CB: Right. So what was the food like?
MD: Oh.
CB: Because it’s hot weather. Was it a different menu from the one you would have in Britain?
MD: Yes. It was. It was slightly different but [pause] not a —
CB: So, what was the staple diet of your survival?
MD: I don’t know. I suppose it was [pause] there was, there was a lot of beef, which we couldn’t get in, you couldn’t get in the UK so but we soon got tired of it. I don’t know why they had so much but, and we used to get fruit from, the South Africans used to send fruit to the girls. They were very kind and on another occasion they sent us material so we could have dresses made. And on another occasion they sent nylons. So, the South Africans were very good.
CB: Of course being there it was easier to get meat.
MD: Yes.
CB: To you.
MD: It was.
CB: From South America and South Africa.
MD: Yes.
CB: Yeah. What about eggs?
MD: I don’t recall ever having eggs.
BCD: Pardon?
MD: We didn’t have eggs.
CB: No.
BCD: We had eggs Margaret for breakfast.
MD: In the officer’s mess.
CB: Right. And just as a comparison what would you eat in Britain?
MD: Yes.
CB: In those days. What was the menu like there?
MD: Well, that was very stodgy food. A lot of bread and margarine, and stews and sometimes rice pudding or something. It was, it, it was very unimaginative.
CB: But designed to keep you warm.
MD: Yes. Keep, keep you going.
CB: All by the RAF cookbook.
MD: Yes.
CB: Ok. So back to Egypt.
MD: Yes.
CB: Here you are on a shift system, a Watch system that runs continuously for a month.
MD: Yes.
CB: Before you get time off. Seven days off. In your time not on shift what could you do? Was there a NAAFI on site or what was there?
MD: Yes. There was a NAAFI. And also we had a swimming pool too so, and they used to have camel races and gymkhanas and things.
CB: How did you get on riding camels?
MD: With difficulty.
CB: But the gymkhanas were actually with horses were they?
MD: Donkeys, I think. Mules. Yeah.
CB: They were difficult to persuade?
MD: Yes [laughs] Had to give them a good kick, and [pause]
CB: Ok.
MD: But we had a lot of swimming which was very nice.
CB: Big pool.
MD: Yes. Quite a big pool. Not Olympic size but a fair size one.
CB: Was this in a compound where there was quite a bit of green because it was well —
MD: No. No. It was all sand.
CB: All sand.
MD: The only greenery was around the flagpole in the, in the, in the entrance as you came in. There was a flagpole with the RAF flag and the TME crest and they used to try and indent for a waggon load of Nile mud and if they could get this mud it was put around the flag post and there would be a very few flowers and outside the CO’s office there would be a few flowers but the rest was all sand. There was nothing else. No earth at all.
CB: You talked earlier about sandstorms.
MD: Yes.
CB: If you were in a tent with a sandstorm what precautions are you taking there? They’ve got sides on the tents. Are they able to bury those and does that work?
MD: Well, the ones at Almazah, there was a sort of a foot of brick work and then there was a gap and then the tent flap. So, so the sand just came in.
CB: Free of charge.
MD: Yes. Yeah.
CB: So you had a job to clear that up.
MD: Yes.
CB: In fact, what do you do? Because of the wind and the sand do you all wear handkerchiefs or how do you deal with keeping it out of your —
MD: Well, just scarves really.
CB: Yeah.
MD: We had neckerchiefs and they —
CB: All the time.
MD: Yeah. But there weren’t, there was a lot of local labour, so they did the clearing. The shovelling out.
CB: The donkey work.
MD: Yes.
CB: What about things like laundry? How did that —
MD: We had, the girls could send their things to the laundry and that was quite good.
CB: So they, their aroma was fairly fresh but the blokes all were a bit smelly were they?
MD: I don’t know quite what the airmen did but we had, we had very nice laundry and our shirts, our khaki shirts came back very freshly laundered, the skirts.
CB: So, we talked earlier about when you were in Cairo.
MD: Yes.
CB: What things happened there that were good and not so good?
MD: Well, there’s a certain amount of rioting and one of our girls was caught up in somehow and got killed.
CB: How was she killed?
MD: Shot.
CB: What was the riot about?
MD: There was a lot of trouble about upper Egypt. Apparently, the British promised the Egyptians that they, they could have upper Egypt. As it seemed time went on and they didn’t. They didn’t ever get it, still haven’t. There was a lot of demonstrations and —
CB: And what did they do with the demonstrations? Were they quite violent or just shouting a lot?
MD: I think mostly shouting and waving sticks about because they didn’t have any guns or ammunition. Mostly the Fellahin. They were very poor and —
CB: What were they called?
MD: Fellahin.
CB: Fellahin.
MD: The Fellahin. Yeah.
CB: And how regular were these riots?
MD: Not, not very regular. Six monthly I suppose. I don’t know whether they —
CB: And the RAF had headquarters there. How did they protect that?
MD: Well, that was in, I don’t think, in Cairo they had —
BCD: Well, the headquarters was boarded up all around.
MD: Yes. They —
CB: Did you ever go there?
MD: No. There was, there was a Number 5 Hospital that I was put into once when I had a problem but that was all.
CB: So, the medical facilities were —
MD: Yes.
CB: Quite good were they?
MD: Yes, they were. And there was a WAAF medical officer at Heliopolis that you could go to if you didn’t like the MO.
CB: Didn’t like?
MD: The MO.
CB: Yeah.
MD: Sometimes they were a bit [pause] they weren’t very sympathetic to the girls, you know. They, they thought we were a lot of wilting violets and they, they weren’t very helpful. So if, I had rash on my face so I opted to go to the MO at Heliopolis and she sent me to the hospital in Cairo. I was there for a few days.
CB: So all in all how did you rate your stay in Egypt.
MD: I liked it very much. Very happy there.
CB: What was the most pleasant part of that?
MD: The travelling I think. I was able to go to Cyprus, Jerusalem, Luxor and later on when I met up with my husband we went to Alexandria.
CB: So how did you meet him?
MD: Well, he was the officer. One of the officers of the Watch. And I was the, I was in a department called snags which I liked.
CB: What was that?
MD: Well, we had a system called [Codnasti] which was a call sign operator’s number, NR number, directions, address, subject matter, time of origin, ending and if any of those went wrong the message would go to the wrong place or they would lose the subject matter or something. So when I went on Watch there would often be quite a stack of messages that had lost their way as it were. And I’ve always liked puzzles. I still do lots of puzzles and I had to sort out what had gone wrong and where they should have gone to and —
CB: And, and was there a lot of this in Morse that you were handling still?
MD: Yes.
CB: Or was it different?
MD: Some of it was morse and some was plain language.
CB: And you had to write this down having, because what rank were you here?
MD: I was a corporal.
CB: Right.
MD: And I had another girl who was an LACW when she was, we did it between us.
CB: Did you have more than one person reporting to you at any time, or always just one person was it?
MD: Just the one person yes, just the two of us working.
CB: Yeah. Ok. So how did this link with your husband to be start?
MD: Well, he was, he was one of the officers of the Watch. And you had to get things signed all the time. Keep going signing things and —
CB: Was he falling behind a bit and you had to chivvy him up?
MD: No. He was, he was always seemed to be walking around taking note of what was going on. So —
CB: You cracked —
MD: As he passed through I’d get him to sign something.
CB: He couldn’t escape.
MD: Quite.
CB: Management by walkabout.
MD: Yes.
CB: Worked quite well. So how long were you then in Egypt, and when did you come back?
MD: I went over in 1945, early in the year. I think April. I think. April or May and I came back July I think the following year. I would have liked to have stayed longer. It was so nice.
CB: Where did they post you to when you returned?
MD: No. I was immediately demobbed because I’d, I’d done five years and joined up when I was seventeen and a half and did five years so I had quite a high release number.
CB: Now, that was what it based on was it? The length of service.
MD: Yes, and, and your age.
CB: Yeah. Where were you demobbed?
MD: In Liverpool. Came back on the Mauritania and spent about five days being demobbed and debriefed and —
CB: What was the debriefing?
MD: Well, where, where you’d where you’d been and what you’d done, and —
CB: For the records or were they trying —
MD: Records.
CB: To find out if there was anything of importance that —
MD: No. I think it was just records. Yes.
CB: And the men had a set of clothes given to them when they were demobbed.
MD: Yes.
CB: What happened to the ladies?
MD: Well, we had, I think it was thirty coupons which was hardly enough to buy shoes and a coat. I had a few clothes left behind, but when I left home but — [pause]
CB: Did they give you any clothes?
MD: It was very, very difficult. We didn’t get any clothing. No.
CB: At all.
MD: No.
CB: Right. The men all got a suit.
MD: Yes. We just got clothing coupons.
CB: Right. So what did you actually do next then?
MD: I went to London where my father was now working in the House of Commons, in Black Rod’s department. And I, I was reinstated by Boots. You could apply for reinstatement and I went to a branch in, in London. And then I got married and it was back to the RAF again.
CB: When did you get married. And where?
MD: 1947.
CB: When?
MD: January 4th 1947. Chelsea Registry Office.
[pause]
CB: A good address then.
MD: What do you mean?
CB: Chelsea.
MD: Yes. Oh yes. I lived in Chelsea.
CB: Right. With your parents.
MD: Well, with my father.
CB: Yeah, with your father. Yeah.
MD: Yeah. He’d separated by then.
CB: From your step mother.
MD: From my step mother.
CB: Right.
MD: So he, he was living there. He was as I say he was, worked at the House Of Commons. A special badge messenger in Black Rod’s department. And —
CB: So when you were married where did you go and live?
MD: Well, for a short time in Haringey.
CB: Haringey.
MD: Yes. But, but that’s until we, my husband was posted to Marlow in Medmenham. Medmenham.
CB: Medmenham.
MD: And so we had lodgings in Marlow. Two rooms in a, well two rooms in a house. It was quite a big RAF station at Medmenham at that time and then from there we went to Pembroke Dock where we lived in a miner’s cottage with a tin bath on the wall. When the wind blew the bath used to swing to and fro.
CB: How did you fill the bath?
MD: Well, we had a, bought a huge pan from a gypsy and used to put it on the stove and fill it with hot water and we gradually filled the bath up. My daughter was born in a Nissen hut in Pembroke Dock.
CB: So you moved from the cottage to the Nissen hut did you? Or that was just the delivery room? The Nissen hut. Your daughter.
MD: The Nissen hut was the, was the RAF with the —
CB: Right. In medical, sick quarters.
MD: Yes. And then my husband was demobbed and we came to St Albans. And from there to Harpenden and here we are.
CB: Very interesting. We’ll just pause for a mo.
[recording paused]
CB: So you’re in this miner’s cottage.
MD: Yes.
CB: What was the, at what time of year are we talking about here?
MD: Well, it must have been the winter because my daughter was born in February.
CB: Yeah.
MD: And —
BCD: We went down there in late autumn time.
MD: Yes.
BCD: To Pembroke Dock.
MD: Yes.
CB: So, how did you heat the cottage?
MD: It was coal fires.
CB: Supplied by the Air Force.
MD: No.
CB: The coal.
MD: No.
BCD: No.
MD: No. In, in those days if you, if the officer was under twenty five he didn’t get a marriage allowance so we were, we were pretty hard up actually. Had to buy coal and pay rent.
CB: Do you remember what the rent was?
MD: What was the rent in the, in the Pembroke Dock?
BCD: About two pounds a week.
MD: Something like that. Yes.
CB: Quite a bit of money then.
MD: It was. Yes.
CB: With the bath you’ve had to put a lot of effort into boiling the water.
MD: Yes.
CB: In the tin.
MD: Yes.
CB: So you fill the bath. How full would you fill it?
MD: Well, about a third I suppose really and you had to carry the water from the, there was a very tiny kitchen, and the bath had to go in the living room which was very, these cottages are very small and carry the water from there to there and gradually fill up.
CB: So after one had had a bath what happened?
MD: I think, I think my husband was able to bath on the station.
CB: Right.
MD: It was just me I think.
CB: Yeah.
BCD: I used to swim in the sea too. Get it off a Sunderland Flying Boat to just —
CB: Dive in.
BCD: Yeah, just dive in.
CB: So you had a salty bloke come back.
MD: [laughs] Yes.
CB: But in practical terms did you share the bath sometimes? That is to say one did it, and used it, and then the other?
MD: No. I don’t think so. You always had a bath or shower on the station didn’t you?
BCD: Yes, I did. But occasionally as a bit of fun I had a bath.
MD: After.
BCD: At the cottage.
MD: Yeah. After me. Yeah.
CB: And then you had to ladle the water out.
MD: Had to carry this huge thing out by the handles and tip it down the drain, and put it back on the wall.
CB: I had to do that at school.
MD: Did you?
CB: Yes. Anyway —
MD: Which school was that?
CB: I’ll tell you later [laughs] So then you, from, from Pembroke Dock then you came, then your husband was demobbed.
MD: Yes.
CB: Himself.
MD: Yes.
CB: So then you moved on to other things.
MD: Yes.
CB: And your, what about your son? Where was he born?
MD: He was born in St Albans.
CB: Right.
MD: Yeah.
CB: Ok. So what was the most memorable thing you would say happened to you in your service in the RAF?
MD: Well, I would think going overseas and being able to travel around the Middle East.
CB: Yeah.
MD: It was pretty dull at High Wycombe. Not much excitement.
CB: No. You were able to travel around a bit on public transport at High Wycombe were you or was that a bit restricted?
MD: Well, there was, there was a bus service so you had to pay to get on a bus and go in to High Wycombe. Sometimes we walked because it was, would save money.
CB: Down from Naphill.
MD: Yes. Down the hill.
CB: And then the hard drudge back up again.
MD: Yes. Yes. I’ve done that a few times. Yeah.
CB: But you were fit.
MD: Yes.
CB: Enabled you to have a good appetite to eat the quality RAF food.
MD: [laughs] Yes.
CB: Right. Well, we’ll stop there for a mo.
[recording paused]
MD: I remember seeing her on Pay Parade.
CB: So, I just want to go back to your initial training.
MD: Yes.
CB: Which you did at Morecambe.
MD: Yes.
CB: What exactly did you do there?
MD: Well, it was mainly marching and lectures.
CB: What were the lectures on?
MD: About the RAF and discipline and that sort of thing.
CB: And did they talk about the air war because we’re right in the war now?
MD: Yes. No.
CB: Did you do aircraft recognition or —
MD: No. It was very basic really. We were, we were billeted with civilians in, landladies.
CB: Yes.
MD: And the food was a bit scarce. I don’t know how much they were paid per person but they didn’t provide a great deal of food.
CB: What about the people who were on the course with you?
MD: Yes.
CB: What sort of people were they?
MD: Well, we were, we were all, all together really. We hadn’t separated out into our trades or where we were going. So it was just sort of you came from Gloucester, got your uniform, went up to Morecambe and we were just sort of settling into service life really.
CB: And, what I’m getting at is your father was in the Navy. What rank was he in the Navy at that time?
MD: He was a chief petty officer.
CB: Right. So, he was a fairly senior man at the time compared with some of the other [pause] so you came from a family of a senior NCO.
MD: Yes.
CB: But you would have got people from all sorts of walks of life.
MD: All sorts of walks of life.
CB: What sort of background were they?
MD: Yes.
CB: What sort of people were they?
MD: Well, basically very nice. There were some rather rough people as you might say, but basically your average citizen I would say. Working class people.
CB: And how did they adapt to, because you knew about service life.
MD: Yes.
CB: If only from the Navy but how did they adapt to this circumstance?
MD: I think some of them found it rather hard. The discipline and having to be on time and things like that.
CB: And all of them had had jobs before had they?
MD: Yes. Most of them had.
CB: Had any of them just left —
MD: Some of us were volunteers and some had been conscripted of course.
CB: Ah, ok. So how did the conscription work?
MD: Well, they called people up in batches. Rather like they did the men, I think. If you weren’t in a Reserved Occupation you had to go in one of the services or be directed in to something.
CB: And how did they feel about that? The ones conscripted.
MD: Well, they, they just had to put up with it. They didn’t have any choice really. They weren’t, they weren’t very happy to be where they were but —
CB: Did you form a lasting friendship with anybody at that stage?
MD: Not at that stage. I did when I was in the Middle East but the thing was when we got home we were all in different parts of England. We didn’t have telephones or mobiles or communication. We didn’t have cars. It was very difficult. Once you sort of went to your different areas. It was, it was just letter writing really. And I, I still keep in touch with some of the girls. One in particular that was [pause] joined up with me. But —
CB: What did she come on? What did she do eventually? When she took a trade what trade did she go to?
MD: Telephonist.
CB: As well.
MD: Yes. Not wireless telephonist.
CB: Oh no, telephonist. Right.
MD: Telephonist. Yes.
CB: And where would she have been posted in that case?
[pause]
MD: I think it was Leighton Buzzard.
CB: Right. Stanbridge.
MD: Yes.
CB: Yeah.
MD: And that was another thing you see. You were, often you were posted all in different directions so it was very difficult to keep in touch with people.
CB: Sure.
MD: In those days.
CB: Because you wouldn’t know where they were.
MD: No.
CB: Because the security —
MD: Yes.
CB: Was such that you weren’t allowed to say where you were stationed, were you?
MD: Exactly. Somewhere in England you had to put. Somewhere in England.
CB: Right.
MD: I remember when we were going on, on overseas and my brother was also, he was in the Navy and we, we worked out a code. If you said, “Give my love to all the people at number 6,” it meant that that was number six and that would be a place. So we’d try, we tried to get around it to let people know basically where we were.
CB: On a list.
MD: Yeah.
CB: Number 6 on the list.
MD: You put a list of all names of the places you thought you might be and if you say, “Give my love to all the people at number 3,” And then you would look on the list and that would tell you.
CB: Was this something to do with the fact that you were dealing with Morse Code as a code and so you followed the same concept yourselves.
MD: I think so yes. Probably. But we found ways of letting people know.
CB: Yes. Now of the people in other courses what famous person did you —
MD: Well, Sarah Churchill was in the intake above me.
CB: Oh right.
MD: So, and I remember seeing her on Post Parade. She was getting letters, and she’d, she’d married this American comedian Vic somebody or other but Randolph Churchill had rushed to America to stop her marrying him but arrived too late I think, so [pause] But anyway she was in the WAAF and then later she went to Medmenham as a photographic interpreter. And she had bright red hair.
CB: How did you know who she was?
MD: Well, because I, I knew her. I knew her by sight. She had this very bright red hair. And her picture had been in the paper a lot.
CB: Ah, that’s how you knew who she was, did you?
MD: Yes.
CB: Yes. So the security was a bit, was that from pre-war times or —
MD: No. That was.
CB: In the war.
CB: During the war. Yes.
MD: So variable security here identifying the prime minister’s daughter.
MD: Yes.
CB: In the paper.
MD: Yes.
CB: Yeah.
MD: Yeah.
CB: Right. And of the people who you trained with —
MD: Yes.
CB: How many of those got to more exalted heights?
MD: I think some of them became sergeants but, or if, if they wanted to do physical training or anything like that they would reach the rank of warrant officer but basically we were erks or corporals. There wasn’t much promotion.
CB: Ok. Because the RAF was a, a meritocracy compared with the other forces they say.
MD: Really?
CB: And I just wondered how you had seen that in operation.
MD: I think there were sort of people from all walks of life and, but there wasn’t any huge differences. I, I remember the thing that surprised me most when I joined the RAF was that everybody used Christian names whereas before that where I was working it was always Miss somebody and Mr somebody and even your next door neighbours were Mr and Mrs and it seemed very nice and friendly when I joined the Service that everybody used Christian names.
CB: Right. Well, Margaret Day thank you very much indeed for a most interesting conversation.
[recording paused]
CB: Just going back to your time in —
MD: Yes.
CB: In Egypt. There were a lot of people there so there would be a hundred and twenty people or something on a shift.
MD: Yes.
CB: And largely WAAFs but there were also men as well. What was the mix of tasks? Were they the same or did the men have a different role?
MD: I think mainly the girls did the signals work and, and some of the other, some of the men were sort of in charge of departments. But basically they were being moved a lot at that time and it was being more or less taken over by, by the WAAF.
CB: Right.
BCD: The men were mainly the engineer section.
CB: Right.
BCD: Anything went wrong they — [pause]
MD: RAF Regiment and that sort of thing.
CB: What did the RAF Regiment do?
MD: Well, guard the airfield.
CB: Oh, guarding it.
MD: Yes.
CB: Yeah. And was there a barbed wire fence around the whole place then to protect it from marauding tribesman?
MD: No.
BCD: You could see very little above ground. Everything was covered in sand you see. Massive place underground.
CB: Yeah.
BCD: But nothing from the top. The other thing that, you talked about eggs.
CB: Yes.
BCD: On our night shift we had our own canteen there with staff running the canteen and I used to look forward, about 2 o’clock in the morning, the staff used to have a half an hour off during that to have my egg, chips and bacon. That was lovely. And — [pause]
CB: Was this because you were in charge of a section or because you were air crew?
BCD: Well, no. I, my function was because of my technical ability on telecommunications and anything connected with that.
CB: Right.
BCD: I must admit I took to the training for radar and telecommunications, and I really got down to it and did pretty well. That is why I used to lecture in the Middle East. They used to call me to lecture to various —
CB: Various people.
BCD: Various functions and things. I lectured to various squadrons and whatever.
CB: Right. Well, we’re stopping 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 Margaret Helen Day
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Chris Brockbank
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-11-28
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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ADayMH171128
Format
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01:15:16 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Navy
Description
An account of the resource
As her father was in the Royal Navy, Margaret attended school in Gibraltar, Portsmouth, and (after her mother’s death) Malta, before returning to Gosport in the UK when she was eleven. In 1939, she was fifteen and working for a company making soft furnishings for the Royal Yacht. Margaret recalls when the bombing started in 1940 with attacks on Portsmouth and Gosport. On one occasion, a bomb fell in their garden and trapped them in their Anderson shelter. Margaret remembers being terrified, being rescued by RAF personnel who pulled her out of the earth by her feet, and one lady requiring hospitalisation. At the age of seventeen, Margaret joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force and trained as a wireless operator. Her brother had joined the Royal Navy and her sister the WAAF also. Following initial training, she trained as a wireless operator at RAF Hutton Cranswick, RAF Kirkham, where she learnt Morse code, and RAF Compton Basset. In 1942, she was posted to RAF High Wycombe, bomber command’s headquarters. Based underground, her roles included communicating between Groups, monitoring radio frequencies to locate enemy navigation beacons, and recording encrypted messages from aircraft sent in Morse code. In 1945, Margaret was posted overseas and was on a ship in the Mediterranean heading to Egypt when news of VE Day came through. She joined the Telecommunications Middle East facility in Egypt. She recalls living in tents during sandstorms and visiting Cairo, the Pyramids, Jerusalem, and Luxor. She also visited Cyprus on leave in a Dakota C-47. After five years' service, Margaret was demobilised in 1946.
Contributor
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Andy Shaw
Julie Williams
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Egypt
Great Britain
North Africa
England--Buckinghamshire
England--High Wycombe
England--Portsmouth
England--Wiltshire
Egypt--Cairo
England--Hampshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940
1942
1945
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending revision of OH transcription
aircrew
bombing
ground personnel
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Nissen hut
RAF Compton Bassett
RAF High Wycombe
RAF Kirkham
shelter
Victoria Cross
wireless operator
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/542/8782/AHardingV150520.2.mp3
73090ff7946ff4451cdd82def306eea2
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
Harding, Victor
Victor Thomas Harding
V T Harding
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Harding, V
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Leading Aircraftsman Victor Harding (1234463, Royal Air Force). He served as an airframe fitter.
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
2015-05-20
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
CB: This interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre. The interviewer is Claire Bennett; the interviewee is Mr Victor Harding. The interview is taking place at Mr Harding’s home in Queen’s Court, Retford, on the 20th of May 2015. Well Vic, would you like to tell us the date and place of your birth?
VH: Er, 05-03-22. We was in Middlesex.
CB: And can you remember your early childhood?
VH: Yes because I was born outta wedlock, and my mother sent me down to a home in Kent, to, to join the forces.
CB: And you stayed in a – you were in a –
VH: I stayed in a home – what you call a home for little [unclear], my daughter knows it ‘cause she took me there. And I was there ‘till I was nineteen ‘till I volunteered, joined the Air Force.
CB: And do you remember much about it? What are your memories of it?
VH: What the home?
CB: Yes.
VH: It was marvellous. It was run by ex-military people and they’re very very good to you. Plenty of discipline and everything, oh yeah. And when I was eighteen, that’s when I volunteered to join the Air Force then.
CB: What –
Other: You learnt, you learnt a trade in the home, didn’t you?
VH: Pardon?
Other: You learnt a trade in the home.
VH: Oh yes, in the – they, after you finish your schooling age, they had different trades there. They had the printing department, a cobblers, carpentry, tailoring department, trades to learn when you’ve finished doing your schooling.
CB: And you went in for –
VH: Tailoring. Because the war broke out, and then I volunteered for the Air Force.
CB: What made you choose the Air Force in particular?
VH: I don’t know really [laughs]. I just fancied it, you know. And they asked me if I wanted to be aircrew or ground staff, so I thought ‘I haven’t got the brains to be aircrew’ so I volunteered to be in the ground staff to maintain the air craft.
CB: You were mechanically minded?
VH: I was flying mechanic air frame lot of the time. Everything by the engines, yeah,
CB: Would you have liked to have flown?
VH: I would have done if I had brains, yeah. [Both laugh]
CB: But nobody said you didn’t have any brains, this is what you perceived. [VH laughing]
VH: Well, I didn’t think I would be qualified for it enough sort of thing.
CB: So where did you start your training? Where did you join up?
VH: I went to Blackpool, and I done my – I can’t remember whether it was six months training at Kirkham for a flight mechanics course. When I passed out, I was sent to Cottesmore to Operational Training Unit.
CB: And what was your training, you know, like? Did you enjoy it?
VH: I did, really enjoyed it.
CB: How did you get to the, the training place? Was it on the train?
VH: No the Air Force took me there, you know. I went to Cottesmore –
CB: Yes.
VH: And I was on old Southampton’s [?]. All the old stuff sort of thing ‘till I was qualified, and then when I was paid, I was put onto Bomber Command then.
CB: But, you would get your posting wouldn’t you, and then you’d have to get to your posting destination –
VH: That’s it, yeah they –
CB: Did you, did you go on the trains during the war?
VH: Pardon?
CB: Did you go the trains during the war?
VH: Trains?
CB: Mm.
VH: No.
CB: No?
VH: No, never went on trains.
CB: So how did you get around? Did the –
VH: The Air Force took me around, you know.
CB: Right.
VH: To different stations, yes.
CB: Right. So, so you’d, a group of you would go perhaps and they’d take you to the stations?
VH: Yeah.
CB: And what was your, you know, your time training? You know, what kind of accommodation did you have?
VH: Well, sometimes I was in Nissan huts, sometimes I was in buildings, you know. All depends where you were stationed sort of thing.
CB: Where was, where do you think your best station was? You enjoyed the most?
VH: Oh, best place was at Lakenheath. It was a brick building, but when the Yanks came and saw it they took it over. So we were putting Nissan huts [laughs].
CB: Well the Nissan huts I think were pretty sparse weren’t they?
VH: Yeah.
CB: And cold, is that your –
VH: That’s it, yeah.
CB: Is that how you remember them, or?
VH: Yeah.
CB: Am I wrong?
VH: That’s it [laughs].
CB: So you went – so your first main posting –
VH: My first posting was at Cottesmore.
CB: Right, and what planes would you be on?
VH: I was on the Anton’s, Oxfords, and just the, all the things to tinkle about with, you know. ‘Till I was posted on Bomber Command.
CB: And the planes, were they easy to maintain, or?
VH: Yeah, they were quite easy really.
CB: You learnt quickly?
VH: Yeah I did, yeah.
CB: Was it good training?
VH: Oh yes, I had six months training at Kirkham.
CB: And what were you –
VH: I was flight mechanic air frames on everything bar the engines.
CB: Right, so you would main – so what would that entail? So, tell me about, you know, all the details of it.
VH: Well, you looked after the runners and the balance and everything, you know.
CB: Right. And then you entered Bomber Command.
VH: That’s it, yeah.
CB: So your first, first job would be, or your first posting rather, would be –
VH: Ah [pause]. Cottesmore was the first one I went to with Operational Training Unit.
CB: Yes.
VH: Yeah.
CB: On OTU?
VH: Yeah.
CB: And, where did you go to after that?
VH: I went to quite a few stations. I went to Bardney for a while, Woodhall Spa, er, Lakenheath, Marham, all different stations you know. With all different squadrons that I went with.
CB: Yes, and what was your work there? Same sort of thing?
VH: Flight mechanic airframe. I done that everything bar the engines.
CB: What planes were you working on?
VH: I worked on Wellingtons, Mosquitos, Lancasters, Hamdy Hamptons [?].
CB: Did you ever go for a flight in these, any of these?
VH: Oh yes. So when they used to do something to the airframe or engines, you used to, we used to go up with them for an air test [emphasis]. Yeah.
CB: So you did you go for any long [emphasis] trips in them?
VH: Not really long trips, no. First I went I think was Peterhead, when we went up there to refuel them.
CB: And did you enjoy the flight? Do you think – did you –
VH: Well I love flying.
CB: Did you regret not going for aircrew?
VH: I don’t, no [laughs]. I think I would have enjoyed it, you know, but I might not be here today [both laugh].
CB: So where was your accommodation, say at Bardney? Where was – were you still in the Nissan huts?
VH: No, I think I was in buildings there, I think, I’m sure it was.
CB: Was it, were you, did you have accommodation with a family. Were you –
VH: No didn’t have it with no family.
CB: It was in an Air Force –
VH: Air Force quarters, yeah.
CB: Air Force quarters.
VH: Yeah.
CB: And what did you do, where did you go for relaxation in Bardney? Do you remember?
VH: Not really. Used to go out with the lads, you know, and have a drink and a smoke [laughs].
CB: Pubs? [VH laughs]. Dare I suggest? Do you remember Bardney at all?
VH: Not a lot, no.
CB: So your, was your life mainly in the, on the camp basically?
VH: It was on the camp, yes.
CB: So, the planes – explain to me how it works. So what would be your typical day?
VH: Well you go out on the dispersal plane [?]. The aircraft was there and you had to test the rudders, the elevators, the wings and everything. Then you had to test your hydraulics, make sure they are working and everything.
CB: And then you’d –
VH: Then you had to sign a form, Form 700, detailing what you had done and everything, and the pilot used to say ‘okay, I know that you’ve checked it.’
CB: And what planes would these be? Would these be –
VH: I used to be on Lancasters, Mosquitos, Hamdy Hamptons [?], Wellingtons –
CB: And what – but what about Bardney? Was it – what was it at Bardney?
VH: Bardney?
CB: Mm.
VH: I think I was on Lancasters there.
CB: Mm.
VH: Yeah.
CB: What did you think about the Lancaster as a plane?
VH: Marvellous aircraft, lovely.
CB: Did you think, you know , when you first saw it, overwhelming really? Like the size of it.
VH: Well, the size of it yeah [emphasis]. I mean, the wheels were bigger than me [both laugh].
CB: But was it a case of just, you know, getting on with the job as it were?
VH: Well it – true, yeah. I enjoyed the job, I did really.
CB: What was the food like that you had there?
VH: Very good there.
CB: And can you remember –
VH: And I met some very nice people, you know. Ground staff and aircrew and everybody and, I got on well with everybody.
CB: So you enjoyed your time there?
VH: I did [emphasis]. If I hadn’t got married I think I would have kept in the Air Force [both laugh].
CB: When did you meet your wife?
VH: In forty, forty-six, yeah.
CB: So after the war?
VH: No, just before I finished the war, yeah.
CB: Oh right. So you – I mean, good food in Bardney –
VH: Oh I had good food all the time I was in the Air Force, I can’t complain.
CB: Well, ‘cause there was rationing on wasn’t there?
VH: Pardon?
CB: Rationing on.
VH: Oh yeah, but we weren’t rationed [laughs].
CB: No?
VH: No.
CB: So you just had your normal food then?
VH: Yes, well, our food was lovely. Very good.
CB: Did you have a bike to go around on, or?
VH: I used to have a bike yeah, ‘cause when I was at Woodhall Spa I used to bike to Boston most nights, you know, if I wasn’t on duty and things.
CB: Right. So, ‘cause these, these airfields were spread out, weren’t they?
VH: Yeah.
CB: A lot of them. And you needed a bike.
VH: Oh yeah.
CB: So you were dealing with Lancasters, and where did you go after Bardney? Can you remember?
VH: No I went to that many. I went to Theddlethorpe [?], Bardney, Lakenheath, quite a few all local. All round Lincolnshire way, you know, most of them.
CB: Mm.
VH: The first I went away was at Marham in Norfolk.
CB: Yes?
VH: Mm.
CB: And what did you make of that? Did you –
VH: Marham?
CB: Mm.
VH: Quite a nice place. That’s where I had my first squadron of Mosquitos there.
CB: Right.
VH: Mm.
CB: So you worked on the Mosquitos there?
VH: Oh yes. I liked them I did [both laugh].
CB: The wooden wonder. [?]
VH: We had the first squadron of Mosquitos and first day we got there at Marham the Germans came along and dropped flares. I thought ‘oh there we’ve had it.’ But we got away with it [laughs].
CB: Is that the first time you’d had any –
VH: We had Mosquitos, yeah.
CB: Is this the first time you’d seen enemy action as it were, dropping bombs?
VH: Well it was, dropping flares over the place yeah. We thought ‘we’re in for it’ that night but we got away with it [both laugh].
CB: Oh dear. And do you remember anybody in particular, you know, friends?
VH: In the Air Force?
CB: Yeah, friends.
VH: Oh yes. Guy Gibson.
CB: If we’re – erm yes, that was at Woodhall Spa.
VH: Yeah.
CB: Did you work with him, or on – well, you were on 627 Squadron.
VH: Yeah. I was with Guy Gibson, I worked with Richard Attenborough, Group Captain Cheshire.
CB: Yes.
VH: Mm.
CB: So at Woodhall Spa, which is – did you finish at Woodhall Spa? Was that your last one before the end of the war?
VH: I think it was. I’m sure it was, yeah.
CB: And you were on 627 Squadron there –
VH: Yeah.
CB: Is that right? Were you, you were with other squadrons. 149 did you say?
VH: Yes, I was, yeah 149 Royal Canadian Air Force –
CB: You worked with the Canadians?
VH: Yeah, and [pause] a Jamaican squadron, I don’t know whether it was 139, I can’t remember what that was but whatever squadron it was I got on well with all of them. Canadian and the Jamaica squadron.
CB: Excellent. So at Woodhall Spa, how did you get there? Did you, did the Air Force take you there?
VH: Air Force. Wherever it was the Air Force took you.
CB: ‘Cause I think –
VH: Transport, you know.
CB: Right, ‘cause I think most people arrived at the station didn’t they?
VH: Yeah.
CB: And then they’d be picked up.
VH: Well I did. One time I was posted to, er, where was it, Oakington was it? Yeah, and I got a transport ticket to Oakham, yeah, I got the wrong place [both laugh]. I don’t think, I made a blunder [?].
CB: Well it can’t have been easy travelling around in the war.
VH: Oh yeah.
CB: You know, on the trains or whatever.
VH: Well it’s true.
CB: So you arrived at Woodhall Spa, and, on Mosqutios?
VH: Yeah.
CB: Did, where did you live at Woodhall Spa? Were you on –
VH: In billets.
CB: Again, what is –
VH: Woodhall Spa.
CB: - what is now Thorpe Camp? Was that where you were?
VH: Where?
Other: Thorpe Camp. You know where they’ve got the museum and that.
VH: Oh yeah.
CB: That’s where you were?
VH: Yeah.
Other: Yeah.
CB: What did you make of it, or what did you –
VH: Of Woodhall Spa?
CB: Yes.
VH: I loved it. Nice place.
CB: Did you go into the town very often?
VH: Yeah, I used to walk to Tatteshall and places like that which was nearby.
CB: Did you, you know, how did you relax there at Woodhall Spa? Would the, would the ground crew ever, you know, mix with the aircrew?
VH: Oh yes, quite often, yeah. I had a good mate there, Canadian chap, and I can always remember one night in the – he sat awake, the crew generally get together chatting before they go on a raid, and he was a rear gunner, and he was chatting [?] that night and I went over to him and I says ‘what’s wrong George?’ And he says ‘we’re not coming back tonight,’ I says ‘well don’t talk stupid.’ They didn’t.
CB: Wow.
VH: He had that premonition they weren’t coming back.
CB: Did you ever –
VH: That did upset me, you know, that did.
CB: Did you get that a lot, or was that just one you remember? Do you, you know –
VH: Ooh no, I remember quite a few who didn’t get back.
CB: Mm. But then, did they –
VH: Waited for them, but they never returned.
CB: Did they had the premonition though before they went?
VH: Yeah, one or two did.
CB: And how did you feel about that? It –
CB: Well I felt awful really. When you’re waiting for them and they don’t return, you know, really hits you.
CB: Mm. What was the atmosphere at, in the, on the airfield?
VH: Oh, it was very good really, yeah we all got on well together. The ground staff and the aircrew, you know.
CB: And you would, as you say, you would relax together, and –
VH: Oh yes, I mean, if you had no raids on and everything you’d go out and have a drink with the lads and the aircrew, you know.
CB: Do you remember the, where you would go in Woodhall Spa?
VH: No, I can’t remember, you’re going back –
CB: I think, I think it was the Mucky Duck, wasn’t it?
VH: Oh that, I was gonna say the Mucky Duck! [Other speaks in background but is unclear what is said. VH replies but this is also unclear.]
CB: Yeah, I think that was quite popular there wasn’t it?
VH: It was, yeah [both laugh]. Then I used to cycle sometimes into Boston.
CB: Yes. So you’d cycle into Boston did you say?
VH: Yeah, cycle into Boston, yeah.
CB: Right, that’s a fair way.
VH: Well, it was really, but –
CB: And, on your own, or with your friends?
VH: Yes, with a girl from there.
CB: Oh right [both laugh]. And what would you do in Boston? What did you think of Boston?
VH: I liked Boston I did. Boston Stump and all that. It’s quite changed from what it used to be, but it, I thought it was a lovely place at the time.
CB: And what did you do, where did you go?
VH: Go for a drink [laughs].
CB: Did you go to the glider drome? I think that was a popular place. No? Perhaps for the aircrew.
VH: Was it Withamgate [?]?
CB: Yeah.
VH: We used to go round there, and the Boston Stump and all round that way, hmm.
CB: So you enjoyed that?
VH: I did [laughs].
CB: And what would, ‘cause – there was some famous station commanders, well not, commanding officers at Woodhall Spa. Do you remember Cheshire?
VH: Group Captain Cheshire, yeah.
CB: What do you make –
VH: Guy Gibson.
CB: What did you make of Cheshire? What did you think of him?
VH: I got on well with all of them, yeah.
CB: Can you remember –
VH: They were quite good to us, they were really good to all the ground staff really, you know, ‘cause they relied on us sort of thing to look after them, didn’t they? [Unclear, both laugh].
CB: Indeed they did [VH laughs]. Especially I think, erm, Leonard Cheshire, he was particularly fond of his –
VH: Yeah. Cheshire [unclear] at one time didn’t they?
CB: Yes. And he would come and talk to you at, you know, when you were mending the aircraft?
VH: Yes, I mean, when there was no raids on or anything and things were easier, we used to go out and have a drink with them sort of thing, you know, they were just like talking to anybody. Except when you’re on the parade ground it had to be ‘sir’ sort of thing, you know.
CB: Did you do much parade ground?
VH: Pardon dear?
CB: Were you on the parade ground very much? Did it, was that part of your life?
VH: Playground?
CB: The parade ground.
VH: Oh, we didn’t do a lot on the parade ground, no, because it was mostly time on the, looking after the aircraft, you know.
CB: So you missed some of that out?
VH: Yes, oh yeah, we didn’t have a lot to do on the parade ground really.
CB: What was the discipline like?
VH: Pardon?
CB: What was the –
VH: Discipline? Discipline was quite good, strict, you know. See, see, discipline didn’t really bother me because being in a home was run by all ex-army people, I was disciplined there. I had to march to school and everything, you know. So going in the Air Force, it didn’t really hit me.
CB: So your time in the, the children’s home –
VH: Made me more or less fit for the Air Force really.
CB: So you look back on those as happy days, and –
VH: They were, yeah. That home was very good. ‘Cause my daughter took me up there few years back didn’t you, and it’s not the same place now, it’s been taken over by retirement people, and when they knew I was one of the boys who had been there, ooh they shook my hand didn’t they [CB laughs] made quite a fuss of me.
CB: Were there girls there as well or was it just boys?
VH: No, just boys, yeah.
CB: And you made some good friends there?
VH: Yes I made some good friends there, yeah.
CB: Did you manage to keep in touch with them afterwards?
VH: One or two of them, but when I went with my daughter last time, and I saw one or two of the names in the church who’d been, passed away, and killed and that during the war. That really upset me.
CB: Hmm. So at Woodhall Spa, another CO was Tate. Did you, did you come across Willy Tate very much?
VH: Pardon?
CB: Willy Tate, he was –
VH: Willy Tate? I can’t remember dear.
CB: No.
VH: No. You meet that many people you know, you can’t remember all their names, sorta thing.
CB: No, no of course not.
VH: No.
CB: So tell me what you remember of Guy Gibson.
VH: I found him very very good. Very good to the ground staff. I think he was a bit trick [?] with the aircrew, but to the ground staff he was magnificent.
CB: Well, that’s wonderful. So, you got, did you have a relationship with him? Did he you know help you, or come and chat?
VH: Not really no. Just ‘how are you sir’ and ‘your aircraft’s ready’ and that sorta thing you know.
CB: When the planes came back from their raids, and they were –
VH: That was lovely seeing them come back [laughs].
CB: Yes.
VH: But when you’re waiting, and yours don’t come back you think ‘oh, has it crash landed somewhere’ or ‘has it landed at another airdrome?’ And eventually you hear it hadn’t come back. It really upset you.
CB: Hmm. And then it would be your job to, to mend them. And get them back right?
VH: Yeah.
CB: Hmm. So were there any events that you can remember at Woodhall Spa? You know, things like, I don’t know, collisions, or, you know –
VH: There been one or two crash landings. I seen crash landings, yeah.
CB: What did you – can you remember how you would –
VH: We didn’t do nothing to it, the air, er, the fire engines and everything used to go out to them.
Other: But you remember the – when they were training for the Dambusters don’t you?
VH: Pardon?
Other: When they training for the Dambusters.
VH Oh yeah, when they training for the Dambusters. We wondering what was happening because they was training for about two or three months before they actually done it, and they come over and did what we called hedge-hopping, just come over the hedge, just miss us, you know, and you think ‘what’s going on?’ [CB laughs]. And they kept it a secret right ‘till the night they went. When they came out that night they said ‘this is it,’ so we said, ‘what,’ ‘what we’ve been training for you know when we come back’ [CB and VH laugh].
CB: So they were –
VH: Very secretive, it was.
CB: Yes.
VH: But when they came back they said ‘we done it’ [laughs].
CB: Right [both laugh]. So was – that was at Scampton, were you at Scampton at all?
VH: No that was at, er, Woodhall Spa [emphasis].
CB: Right.
VH: I never went to Scampton. Only went there for my medals didn’t I? That’s all.
CB: Mm. So you – how do you remember your wartime career?
VH: Yes I can do, yeah.
CB: And you, how do you remember it, with –
VH: Well I think it was quite good really because the – I was disobedient at home so going to the Air Force, that was more or less the same, sorta life, sort of thing.
CB: Mm. So [pause] the – I think some of what the personnel, the aircrew at Woodhall Spa, they were, they were known for their pranks, some of them. And I suppose the low flying would have been one of them.
VH: It was, yeah.
CB: Did you have any, many air raids there?
VH: No not really, no.
CB: So you, the Germans didn’t attack you –
VH: No.
CB: At Woodhall Spa? It was [unclear]
VH: No, no, they came over when we were at Marham, Norfolk, when we had the first squadron of Mosquitos. I thought ‘this is it,’ flares came down but as soon as the gun fire opened up they went [both laugh].
CB: So do you remember any time – the time that Guy Gibson took off on the night he was killed? Do you remember anything about that?
VH: Er, he just came out, and he just said ‘I’m gonna take this aircraft’ and that’s it. Just didn’t come back.
CB: No, he was with Warwick –
VH: Mosquitos.
CB: Yes, because he wasn’t too familiar with them, was he?
VH: No.
CB: So –
VH: It could have been that you see.
CB: Yeah. Was he – do you remember what his manner was like, how he –
VH: He was – I found him quite good myself.
CB: But he wanted to get back flying, didn’t he? Do you remember anything about that particular night, as to how he was?
VH: No, he came out that night and says ‘do you mind if I take the, this Mosquito?’ and I said ‘no sir,’ and he just got in it and went.
CB: And what did you feel when he didn’t come back?
VH: Well I felt awful really, you know. I wondered what, if he really knew in his own heart whether he was going to do anything. You don’t know what’s in their mind, do you really?
CB: No, no you don’t. But you, you just thought it was just another, another plane that hadn’t come back.
VH: Yeah.
CB: You didn’t –
VH: That’s true.
CB: Did you know straight away that – I mean he could have landed somewhere else. When did you find out that –
VH: Ah, we didn’t find out for [pause] two, two, three hours after. They must have rung round to see if he’d landed anywhere else, but, he hadn’t, so.
CB: No.
VH: I think over the hills was it, in Kent I think, where he actually crashed, I think.
CB: He crashed in Holland.
VH: Yeah, oh was it Holland?
CB: Yeah.
VH: I knew it was somewhere –
CB: Yeah, coming back from an operation. So, you, you remember it with fondness, the –
VH: Pardon?
CB: You remember it with fondness, your time in Bomber Command –
Other: Fondness, you enjoyed it.
VH: Oh I, I enjoyed all my life [?], I loved Bomber Command.
CB: So –
VH: And everyone I worked with. We all seemed to be like a family, sort of thing, you know, we worked ever so well together, the ground staff and the air crew did.
CB: And you went to Lakenheath. Were the Americans there at Lakenheath when you were there?
VH: Pardon?
CB: Were the Americans at Lakenheath, when you were there?
VH: Was I –
CB: Was the –
Other: Were the Americans there? Were the Americans there?
VH: Americans? Oh yeah, they took over because it was a nice place, you see [CB laughs]. Better than where they were! It was all big buildings and they took over and we were put in Nissan huts! [Both laugh].
CB: What did you make of them? Did you, did you get on well with them?
VH: Well we, yeah they were alright [both laugh].
CB: Did you have better food when they were around?
VH: Oh yes, definitely yes. They got the best off [both laugh].
CB: And where were you? Were you in billets again at Lakenheath?
VH: Yeah.
CB: So erm, did you ever have to, you know, live in, with a family or anything like that, or were you always in billets?
VH: Er, in billets or Nissan huts, you know.
CB: Yes.
VH: Yeah.
CB: So, you’re coming towards the end of the war. How did you feel, you know, we’ve just had VE day. How did you feel? You know, was it a relief, or were you, how did you feel?
VH: Well, I don’t know really. I don’t know whether I was [unclear] in the Air Force, but I’d just got married before I came out, you see so –
CB: Right, so where did you meet your wife?
VH: In Nottingham.
CB: At a dance, or?
VH: Pardon?
CB: Was it at a dance? A dance?
VH: Dance?
Other: Where did you meet Mum?
VH: Oh, I was having a drink [both laugh].
CB: And you obviously looked, saw her, and, you know, liked each other. So how long was it before you got married?
VH: Only about six months I think. Yeah, wasn’t long [both laugh]. And I got lovely daughters and a lovely son, he’s passed away bless him, about three year ago innit?
Other: Hmm.
CB: And did you –
VH: I had two lovely children, they certainly looked after me, they still do [both laugh], don’t you chick? Somebody does.
CB: Do you remember getting married, and the rationing?
VH: Oh yes. I had a double wedding. That’s my wife up there.
CB: Oh, that’s lovely. Where did you get married?
VH: Hyson Green, yeah.
CB: Well, she looks very nice with her dress on. So, the rationing didn’t bother you very much?
VH: No. Said ‘are you gonna get married the usual?’ and I says ‘no.’ [Both laugh.]
CB: And where did you live after you were married?
VH: Nottingham, yeah.
CB: And when did the war – was the war finished by then?
VH: Oh yeah, it had finished, yeah.
CB: So you, you came out of the Air Force in –
VH: Out of the Air Force in 1946.
Other: You made your suit though didn’t you?
VH: Hmm.
Other: You made your suit.
VH: Yeah I made my suit.
CB: Oh wow! You made your own wedding suit, that’s –
VH: Yeah because, in that home where, that I was telling you about, there was all different trades, and I went in the tailoring department. I done four years at, four years apprenticeship before I joined the Air Force, so I made my wedding suit.
CB: You kept the skills going [both laugh]. So what did you do when you came out of the RAF?
VH: Er [pause], I went to the co-op [?], I was only there one day, and then, I went to Boots then and I was there for thirty year.
CB: Worked in Boots the chemists?
VH: Yeah.
CB: Oh, what did you do there?
VH: Making medicines and everything [unclear from Other].
CB: Oh.
VH: And then when they stopped making their own medicines, I went on security, and stuff like that.
CB: So you were there for a long time. In Nottingham all the time?
VH: Oh yes –
CB: You settled there.
VH: Never left Nottingham did I? I was at Boots thirty year I was at Boots.
CB: Did you keep in touch in your, you know, your friends and your comrades in the Air Force?
VH: No, no, never kept in touch with any of them.
CB: Although you had good relationships with them all? You didn’t feel –
VH: But we didn’t, we didn’t keep in touch with each other no.
CB: So, your thirty years, what did you – [unclear] didn’t work in those days did they, do your wife, your wife, didn’t work?
VH: My wife? Yeah she was working, yeah.
CB: Did she work?
VH: What was mum now?
Other: Machinist.
VH: Oh, machinist, that’s it [both laugh].
CB: And then you had your children.
VH: Yeah, two lovely children. And my grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, they’re all marvellous to me they are.
CB: What did you feel about how Bomber Command was treated after the war?
VH: In which way?
CB: Well, when Churchill made his speech, he didn’t, after the war, he didn’t mention Bomber Command.
VH: I know.
CB: Because of all the bombing, and –
VH: Yeah.
CB: How did you feel about that? And you’ve only just had your clasp that you’re entitled to. How did you feel, after the war, and how you were –
VH: I don’t think they treated them as they should have been treated, myself, because they’d done a marvellous job.
CB: And you – you’ve gone down, have you seen the memorial in London? Have you gone –
VH: No I haven’t, no.
CB: But you – have you gone back to any of your stations that you’ve been at, because –
Other: We’ve been to Conningsby, we’ve been to a few with you, I’ve taken you to a few haven’t I?
VH: Yeah.
Other: Woodhall Spa we’ve been to.
VH: Yeah.
Other: We’ve been to Scampton now but –
VH: Been to Scampton –
Other: [unclear] did you?
VH: Hmm.
CB: So you, you went back to Scampton recently, I think, when was that?
VH: Yes, er, that was when I had my [papers shuffling].
CB: Your medal. Your medal.
VH: In that book there. [Papers shuffling, pause].
CB: I think, er [pause] ah. And what did you [pause], how did you hear about this, did they get in touch with you?
VH: No, when I moved to here, to Retford, I lost my medals, so I wrote up to administrative ends [?] explained who I was, when I started and when I, when I got demobbed, and they dealt and sent them back, er, sent me a new lot.
CB: And how did you get to go to Scampton? Did they write to you?
Other: A gentleman from Scampton in the RAF came to us here, and said could they present them to him.
CB: Oh. So what did you feel about that?
VH: It was great, wasn’t it?
Other: It was lovely.
VH: All the family went, it was lovely.
Other: It was a very special day, yeah.
VH: Yeah.
CB: They made a fuss of you?
VH: Yeah [laughs].
CB: Well that’s a lovely, lovely thing to remember, isn’t it.
VH: It is, yeah.
Other: And they also presented medals to these gentlemen, they’d just come back from Afghanistan.
CB: It’s lovely. [Pause]. Right Vic, so –
VH: I went, I went out to get the aircraft ready, prepared because there was a raid on, when the crew came out, I was just sitting there, and I’d got this terrible pain, you know, they says ‘come on we want to go,’ and I says ‘I can’t get out!’ So they lifted me out, and they rushed me to Kings Lynn hospital, I got my appendix [laughs].
CB: Do you remember the hospital you were in?
VH: Er [slight pause], no, er, it was Kings Lynn, but I can’t think of the name of the hospital.
CB: And how long were you in there?
VH: I was only in there a couple of week, if that.
CB: It’s quite a long time these days [both laugh]. And then it says you were transferred to Addenbrookes.
VH: Yeah, yeah I had something wrong with my thumb –
CB: Right.
VH: And the Air Force made a mess of it, so I ended up in Addenbrookes to have me nail took off.
CB: So what do you remember about being in hospital?
VH: Not a lot really, well, when I came out I got a fortnight’s holiday, er, was a camp.
CB: What was the food like?
VH: Good [emphasis, both laugh].
CB: So you, they sorted out your appendix problem –
VH: Oh yes.
CB: And then you, you went back. So it was, [pause], that’s some sort of home, admitted to Stowe, erm, I can’t quite read that. Was it just some sort of home that just was like a convalescent home was it?
VH: Yeah.
CB: And you were in there for a little while.
VH: Hmm yeah, two weeks I think [chuckles].
CB: So they certainly looked after the –
VH: They certainly looked after you, yeah.
CB: [Pause]. So you’ve lived in Retford for, how long now?
VH: Ten years now, innit chick? My daughter got me over here so she can look after me [laughs], don’t you chick.
CB: Do you get involved in any Bomber Command, you know, reunions, or?
VH: Oh no –
Other: You’ve started to now.
VH: Started going to a bit now, haven’t we, yeah. Scampton. We’ve been to one or two dos there haven’t we?
Other: Mm.
VH: Where was it that we went the other week?
Other: Woodhall Spa.
VH: Oh yeah we went to Woodhall Spa the other week, at a reunion day.
Other: Scampton last week, and a Lancaster came over.
VH: Yeah [laughs]. The Red Arrows were there, giving a display weren’t they. Lovely.
CB: Well I think, think that’s about it Vic, that’s been very, very interesting.
VH: Thank you very much.
CB: Thank you.
Dublin Core
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Interview with Victor Harding
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Clare Bennett
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2015-05-20
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Sound
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AHardingV150520
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Pending review
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Leading Aircraftsman Victor Harding.
Language
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eng
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
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00:38:26 audio recording
149 Squadron
627 Squadron
Cheshire, Geoffrey Leonard (1917-1992)
fitter airframe
flight mechanic
Gibson, Guy Penrose (1918-1944)
ground crew
Lancaster
military living conditions
Mosquito
Nissen hut
RAF Bardney
RAF Cottesmore
RAF Kirkham
RAF Marham
RAF Woodhall Spa
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/539/8775/AYoungM150515.1.mp3
fbd69f68e247e629198a234c42efa918
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Young, Margaret
M Young
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Young, MD
Description
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An oral history interview with Margaret Young who served as a wireless operator in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force.
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2015-05-15
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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.
Transcribed audio recording
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DE: This is an interview with Margaret Young in Heckington on Friday the 15th of May 2015, I am the interviewer I’m Dan Ellin. So Margaret could you start off by telling me a little bit about where you were born and how you grew up and your schooling and that sort of thing?
MY: Right, well I was born in Leith, which is a suburb of Edinburgh, in 1925, went to school there, secondary school went to Bellevue school and from there went to work in Princes Street in R W Forsyth’s, in the ladies shoe department and from there when I turned 18 I had to register and if you didn’t volunteer to go in the services the authorities could send you anywhere, and as I didn’t want to go to munitions or the land army I decided I’d like to be in the Air force [laughs]. So I went and registered and joined the WAAF that was just after my 18th birthday which was in 43. Then I was called up to go to an initial interview early in 44 then after that I was sent for and told that I ‘d been accepted and I had got a railway warrant to take me to Wilmslow for initial training, that was in march 44.
DE: Why didn’t you want to join the land army or one of the other services?
MY: Well, I did want to join the Land Army but my mother and a few others talked me out of it because they were country people and they knew it was very hard work [laughter] and it was the uniform that attracted me [laughter] to be wanting to join the land army, as I got older and got more sense I realised that I did the right thing by joining the WAAF.
DE: You didn’t fancy any of the other services the ATS
MY: No
DE: Or the WRENS?
MY: No I don’t know why blue has always been my colour [laughter] as you can see.
DE: Quite. So what was going through your mind on your train journey to Wilmslow?
MY: Och, I can’t really remember but it must have been a bit strange because I had never been away from home before and there was only my mother and myself because my father died when I was two and a half, and there was only the two of us, and it was strange to be going away, but it was adventurous at the same time, and I was, sometimes when I got there I was a bit homesick but its something you just learn to live with.
DE: So can you remember what sort of things did they have you doing or happened to you at the recruitment centre?
MY: Well first of all we were kitted out with our uniforms, and we had injections which weren’t very pleasant because in those days you had a needle put into your arm unscrewed and you left the needle in and you moved on to the next doctor re-screwed another injection and gave you another dose, and we also had a vaccination as well thats – and also we had what we called FFI’s Free From Infection, to see if you had anything in your hair or any skin disease, you had all those medicals. We had a foot inspection as well to make sure our feet were alright [laughter] for marching and that was it. Different days we had different lectures, how to conduct yourself as a WAAF and when to salute and it was the badge on the officers hat that you were saluting, not the officer and how to salute the long way up and the short way down. [inaudible]
DE: What happened if you got these things wrong, these lessons wrong?
MY: Well I suppose they would take into consideration we were raw recruits and probably get a telling off I suppose, I never got one [laughter]
DE: And the FFIs how did they work? Was it –?
MY: You had to strip to the waist with – and go through different - and be examined by doctors to see if you were alright.
DE: Aha, and was this individually or – ?
MY: Well no you just all queued one behind each other and went forward and there were different doctors in little cubicles and that was it.
DE: Can you remember how long you were there at the reception area?
MY: I can’t, I think it was about three weeks I don’t think it was any longer than that, but I can’t honestly remember.
DE: Did you make any friends?
MY: Oh yes you make friends there but not lifelong friends because you were all going in your separate directions, when we went we were- . That’s where they decided what trade you were going to be and I was picked out to be a wireless op. I don’t know why, maybe, I knew the Morse code because I had learnt that when I was in the Guides, and whether that helped me or not I don’t know, but they decided that I was to be a wireless op. So then, at the end of our training we were all taken, sent on, to our different places -. I was sent to Blackpool that’s where the wireless ops did their first three months of their training it was a six months course, and we did the first three months in Blackpool and the second three months at RAF Compton Bassett in Wiltshire.
DE: Ok, can you remember whether there were any tests or interviews that you had to do to pick which trade you were going to be sent for?
MY: Yes we had, we had some pictures of designs where you would pick out something but I can’t really remember much about them, that’s, you know, they must have just decided, we were either going to go to that sort of, I don’t know, trade or what I don’t know but that was it.
DE: Did they take your choices or your opinions into consideration or was it just – ?
MY: Not, not really they just more or less told we were going to be. Yeah!
DE: How did you feel about becoming a wireless –
MY: Oh I was quite happy yeah, I was quite happy about it, I didn’t know it was going to be such a long course at first, but yeah I quite, I enjoyed it.
DE: Before we move on and talk about further training, what was the accommodation like at the reception centre?
MY: Oh it was just wooden huts held about thirty odd people, because we had some bunk beds as well, I happened to be on the top of a bunk bed right at the very end, so I had a good view of everything [laughter] and that, but then when we went to Blackpool we were in civilian accommodation. We were in Reeds Avenue most of us were in Reeds Avenue and that, that area of Blackpool and we used to march every day from there to the Winter Gardens where we had our Morse school. There was the ladies in one section and the airmen in the other.
DE: And how did that training work? What was a typical day like?
MY: You went in the morning, you got your Morse lessons, learnt the Morse code and learnt how to tap the machine and then we had procedure lessons and we also had technical lessons, where we learnt how to put a plug, an electric plug together, and the procedure one was how messages were written down [pause] it was alright, gradually we used to march around from one – because there was only the wireless school in the one place, the other classes were held in anywhere that was empty, a shop that was maybe empty. I don’t know how true it is but we used to go to Burtons and they always said that’s how I went for a Burton or I’m going for a Burton but I don’t know if that’s true or not but we were told that.
DE: Aha
MY: It was different shops and then we marched along the prom, doing our marching and sometimes we did our PE lessons on the beach,
DE: So were you – ?
MY: So it was like a big long holiday [laughter]
DE: Was it the summer time you were there then?
MY: From April, yeah April, May, and June and July so it was summer time yeah.
DE: Ok
MY: Then we got leave that was the first leave we got after half way through the course, before we went on to RAF Compton Bassett.
DE: How long leave did you get?
MY: Probably about 10 days.
DE: Did you go home?
MY: Oh yes! They gave us warrants railway warrants to take us from –
DE: And what was travelling on the trains on a warrant like?
MY: Well it was alright, but the trains were very packed and there weren’t so many about then they were few and far between and they were always packed mostly with service people.
DE: I have read an awful lot about people who hitchhiked, did you ever you ever do any hitchhiking?
MY: Yes, from Compton Bassett we did some hitchhiking up to London or - , but not very often because the doodle bugs were about then, but we did, I’ve been on the back of a Queen Mary which is a long – with aircraft bits on it, you know, oh yes we did a bit of that, but never on our own we always made sure there was two of us [laughter] at least, there, I don’t, I can’t remember if that was drummed into us or not, it may not have been but we decided my friends and I that we wouldn’t do it on our own.
DE: So did you start to make friends when you were doing the training?
MY: Oh yes! You had lots of friends, well all the people on your - , there is a picture there, of our class that one up there forty, forty [inaudible] that was about the size of the class and these were our instructors along the middle. So there is one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight – [silence] there’s about twenty of us in a class and the instructors were –
DE: Did the instructors look like the civilians?
MY: Some of them were civilians yes, they did mostly the procedure and the technical [pause] but they weren’t all, there were some RAF ones as well on different courses, you see, because you stayed with the same instructors throughout your course.
DE: I See. Did you have any time off perhaps in the evenings in Blackpool?
MY: Yes, yes, yes we were out most evenings but we didn’t have the money because we were paid fourteen shillings a week and we got paid once a fortnight, and that was to pay for your NAFFI cups of tea and your cigarette ration 20 big cigarettes and 20 little ones, woodbines [laughter] and your chocolate ration, you got once a week but you had to buy that and you had to buy your soap and any other cleaning stuff you needed you know, for buttons [?] you had to buy all that yourself.
DE: But your accommodation and your food was - ?
MY: Oh yes accommodation was free, you got your mug and your cutlery and you carried that around with you.
DE: What were the billets like in Blackpool?
MY: They were alright but they were very small the room I was in had been a big front room and the bay window was divided in half and half of the room was two girls in it, and the other half of the room were two WAAF in it, and you could have, there was a wash hand basin in our half but it wasn’t in the other half, so we had the two single beds and the wash hand basin and there was a little cupboard that you could - , but we didn’t have many clothes because we just had our uniform and the rest went into your kit bag which didn’t hang up.
DE: Ok, so what happened to all your civilian clothes then?
MY: You didn’t take them with you, you went with what you joined up in, when you first went, then you took them back when you went back on your leave.
DE: Ah, ok, so you had your first half of your training in Blackpool and then you moved to [talks over the top] RAF Compton Basset.
MY: RAF Compton Bassett. Yes in Wiltshire.
DE: Was that different sort of training or- ?
MY: Well no it was further training really, it was, really you were getting your words up, you started up with about four or five words a minute and you got up to twelve to fifteen, sixteen words a minute, so it was really the advanced end of your training,
DE: So it was more practice?
MY: Yeah, yes, and that was wooden huts, big wooden huts there.
DE: Did you go there with the same class?
MY: No, no, no, there, from there we were, oh yes we did from Blackpool to Compton Bassett yes, some of the girls didn’t come because they didn’t pass and they were FTd, further training,
DE: Aha
MY: For two weeks so they would join another group so you did get some new ones in with your lot.
DE: Were you worried that you wouldn’t pass?
MY: I was worried about the procedure because we had a civilian instructor and when you’re eighteen you will laugh at anything, but I think he must have had indigestion [inaudible] because he was always eating white tablets and kept frothing at the mouth and we laughed at that instead of listening what he was saying half the time [laughter] but we got there in the end, so that was it that was the end of the training.
DE: So then what happened?
MY: Then we got our postings, we were asked where we would like to go, and I just said ‘somewhere in Scotland’ because I wanted to get back up to Scotland [laughter] and I did get up – they sent me to RAF Banff [?] which is right in the north of Scotland in the Merry Firth, but there was only myself went there at that time so I was the only new girl that went. But new ones kept coming in from other places you know, and we had Nissan huts there, Nissan huts, they held I think it was either fourteen or sixteen I can’t remember, three, six, nine, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, and a black stove in the middle and a toilet at the end so you didn’t have to go out to go to the toilet [slight laughter]
DE: Luxury then? [laughter]
MY: But I enjoyed it we worked in what they called the WT cabin and we worked shifts, we worked a four watch system there, where you went on duty at eight in the morning till one o’clock then when you came off at one, you went on again at midnight then you did from midnight till eight in the morning, then you had from eight in the morning till five o’clock that next afternoon you went five till eight then the next time you went on from one till five then you got a day and a half off in between your rota, your four watches.
DE: That’s quite, quite stressful I would imagine?
MY: It was, because we worked all night, and then of course you had to go for your breakfast, so you, or a meal when nobody else was going and the cooks in the cookhouse didn’t care very much for us going in at those times having meals, but they were good they were good yeah, you know they used to pull our legs and say oh you’re a nuisance and what have you, maybe a bit stronger words than that but [laughs] but I’m not going to say them [laughter]
DE: And then I suppose you had to try and sleep at the wrong time of day as well?
MY: Yes, well there were erm [pause] Wire- I can’t remember what they were called them, there were huts where you would perhaps watch people on them, you were on watches at slightly different times, but I, when I went there they were full and I had to go into a normal hut where the people came in at lunchtime and if you were trying to sleep you just couldn’t, you had to wait till they went back to work in the afternoon and then you would get another sleep, it was, you just put up with it.
DE: So were you tired and hungry very often then?
MY: Not, I wouldn’t say we were hungry because we had the NAFFI which we could go to and that’s when I first had cold chip sandwiches because you would get somebody to bring you in, the NAFFI closed at eight o’clock at night and you’d get somebody to bring you in a plate of chips and two slices of bread and butter and of course you had that when you wakened so they were cold, the chips were cold so you had cold chip sandwiches before you went on duty at midnight, but even that was, you ate them and quite happy to eat them, that’s when the cooks weren’t giving us anything to eat at that time of night, so, that was it you just got on with it.
DE: So your shifts, you’re either doing a long eight hour shift or a short four hour shift?
MY: Yes, three or four hours it was, the midnight to eight o’clock one was the hardest one.
DE: So were you on your own listening to the - ?
MY: No there was some, one two, there was at least three sometimes four WAAF and there was a Corporal in charge the people were in the building, there was the telephonists and the duty officer and that they were all there. Because if we got messages in they were in code and they had to go to the decoding officers to be decoded.
DE: And you, you just listened to Morse?
MY: We just listened to Morse till the war finished and then I was writing down as usual and I realised that I was writing plain English into these five, these little squares, and it was one of the pilots sending a message to say that he was escorting a U boat into Sullom Voe, in the Orkneys, and that was the first time I’d had English over the [inaudible] –
DE: So normally you were just writing down jumbles of meaningless letters?
MY: There was always four letters and a number in each block of five and you had to put them in these blocks, because these four letters and a number meant a certain phrase.
DE: Oh I see, yes
MY: Which we didn’t know what they meant,
DE: No
MY: And they were probably changed every so often.
DE: Did you get any bother with getting the, getting the code words wrong?
MY: I don’t know, nobody ever said, we were never called, at least I was never called in to say that I had taken down the wrong things, so I don’t know about anyone else, I never heard of anybody else being [pause] taken in.
DE: Was it, was it really busy would you sit there and it be message after message or would you sit there and nothing – ?
MY: Well it just depends, if they were out on a strike, because it was called the Banff strike, and we had a Norwegian squadron and they went up to the shipping and the Norwegian fjords because they knew them like the back of their hands, you know, and, but sometimes that was in sort of the five, maybe, no that would be during the day time, they would go [?] because I don’t think they went out much in night, but you did get the odd message through at night, because there was only two of us on duty at night.
DE: So if it was quieter what would you do to pass the time?
MY: Sleep under the bench [laughs]
DE: Was that allowed?
MY: Yes, well the corporal was there you see, and if they only had two machines and there was four of us there on duty, he let, he halfway through he would, waken the ones that were sleeping under the bench get up, and change over.
DE: But when you were on duty it was sit at -?
MY: It was sit, you sat there and if you wanted to go to the toilet you had to ask permission and somebody else would take over while you went.
DE: So I imagine you are sitting there with headphones on?
MY: Yes
DE: Do you have those on all the time?
MY: Yes
DE: Was there, was there a background noise, or was it – ?
MY: No it was just quiet, yes, [pause] yes, no it was quiet, but you had to be, you couldn’t just sit there and go to sleep and nod, because you just were waiting in case something came through.
DE: And how long were you there for?
MY: Ah [pause] I can’t remember, I was there on VE day anyway, I was there a while before and awhile after, because we left, after the war finished we were made redundant, the wireless operators, because they had far too many and it was in plain language they didn’t need us, so many of us, because we had a satellite where we had another lot of wireless ops at Fraserborough, and of course they all came back and they had far too many, so twenty of us were posted ten of us went to Hednesford, and twenty of them came to Cranwell, I was in the twenty that went to RAF Hednesford and that’s where the 104 PDC [personnel dispatch centre] where we demobbed the men mostly from overseas. There again we used to work all night because they would come in, go into the wooden billets and they had a corporal in charge of each hut, and he would bring a list of the names and numbers and the rank, in, and while they were being seen to we had all the documents delivered into our office and we had to go through all these documents. First of all put them in alphabetical order then when you, the list came in you had an idea where you could look for the documents in the A’s or B’s or C’s.
DE: And these are their service records and things?
MY: That was the service records, sometimes they were full of sand, because most of them had come from the middle east there was sand all over the place [slight laugh] out of the boxes and we then, after we got the documents we separated them into a pile for the pay, pay room, the medical service then they went to another pile for the demob suits.
DE: And they had you working overnight again?
MY: Yes, because sometimes a boat load, if a boat load came in, there was well, thousands, two or three thousand of them, and we had to get the documents ready for them going to, what they called the machine, to go through the machine in the morning, with the [inaudible] and corporals in charge.
DE: So how long did the demob process take for them then, was it - ?
MY: About three days it was very quick by the time, sometimes they went out in two it depends, if there weren’t such a big lot a big amount of them, they could sometimes two days they would go through quicker.
DE: And were they billeted at the - ?
MY: Yes they were all in wooden huts, yeah.
DE: But with a quick turnaround so they were there for a couple of days then, then they were civilians?
MY: That’s right and then you’ve got the rail, we had to write out the railway warrants where they were went, were going to on leave. Now here's an incident once, there were some Welsh came in and they wanted us to write down where their railway warrants were going, and we had to ask how to spell them because they was double L’s and what have you and there was one group there must have been about a dozen of them, and they were with a sergeant and they got nasty with us there was two of us doing this, because we had to do a red copy and a blue copy, one went with them and one stayed with us, and they got nasty with us and my friend Betty, she says ‘I’m not standing for this I’m going to get the flight sergeant’ who was in an office across the road from us so she disappeared and left me with all these men [laughter] however when she got over there the flight sergeant wasn’t there but the wing commander was, and he said ‘what’s the matter?’ and she told him and he came across and he stopped their leave for twenty four hours, he says ‘my girls work here night and day to get you men out as quick as possible’ and he says ‘and you stand there and start swearing at them because they can’t spell where you’re going’ he says ‘so you can just go back to your billets for twenty four hours’ Well we were frightened to go out [laughter] in case we saw any of them [laughter] but we never saw any, there was no trouble, but that was just one incident that happened, you know, but most of the time the men were that pleased to be back they were jovial and joked with us and that, you know, because we were the first white women they’d seen since they were over abroad [laughter] sometimes.
DE: So were they flirting [inaudible]
MY: Oh yes! Most of them flirted [slight laugh] but you just sat there and took it, you know, laughed and that was it, got on with your job, because you couldn’t spend time with them because there was so many of them, you’d be too busy getting them out and through you know, you just had to get on with it.
DE: What about the men in your earlier postings did you have anything to - ?
MY: Not, not, not really I did, we, I mean we used to go to the dances and things but you just danced with the airmen and that was it, some of the girls made [pause] friends, but I’m afraid I wasn’t one of them, not till I met my future husband at Compton Bassett and he was a regular in the RAF, and was redundant the same as me and doing office work.
DE: So you got posted back to Compton Bassett then?
MY: No that’s when, no, well we did later on because he was a regular and we got married in Blackpool because at that time you had to be three weeks in one place before you could get married, well being in the service you couldn’t go home or that you had to be married there and that’s why we were married in Blackpool. Then they gave us leave for our honeymoon because they wouldn’t, you couldn’t get leave together, [inaudible] we were working in the same office but when we were married they relented and let us go, where we went up to Scotland back to my mother [laughter]
DE: So where did you meet him?
MY: At Compton Bassett in the office [pause] then he as I say he was a regular, he did thirty three years in the RAF and when he was demobbed [pause] now I was going to – what was I going to tell – Yeah when I was demobbed he not long after we came up to Scotland he was sent on, he was asked if he would be, go on his commission and he and he went on his commission and he passed out as a flying officer and then he finished up at RAF Digby as a flight lieutenant in the signals unit, that [pause] that was it. I was demobbed after we got married; yeah I got demobbed early because you could get out earlier if you were married. But as I say I went back to Compton Bassett he was posted to Compton Bassett and that time I went back into officers’ quarters instead of wooden billets, which was a bit different [laughter]
DE: So what were the officer’s quarters like?
MY: Well they were very nice, yes, we had three, nice three bed roomed ones, they were semi, semi attached but very nice and we had a nice little patch which was good.
DE: So did you follow him round with all the postings then, where did you go?
MY: Most of them yes I went to Singapore, for three years then we came back, that’s when we came back from Singapore we went to Compton Bassett then from Compton Bassett we went to Aden and we did two years in Aden then from Aden we came up to RAF Digby and that’s where we retired from in 1968 and that’s why I am now living in Heckington. Well that’s it
DE: It’s probably a bit of an odd question but, what do you think about the way the war and the RAF have been remembered?
MY: Oh well I think now it’s been good that they are doing all these things like VE day and VJ day and Battle of Britain day, they’re doing it again because its Seventy Five years in September from the Battle of Britain, and I’m sure they will be doing quite a few things then and I think the school children are learning more about it now than some of the youngsters did, you know, just after the war their history and that was further back but now I think the schools and that the children are learning a lot about it, and I think it’s good.
DE: Did you ever have any reunions or anything like that?
MY: I have WAAF, I joined the WAAF Association in 1988 I think, yeah 1988, and we have had reunions and AGMs, and we started out with between three and four hundred, we’re down to now, I went to my last reunion and AGM in April this year and we went to Coventry and there was only about fifty of us there [pause] but they have allowed, now the RAF, the WRAF and the RAF if any of the ladies want to join and some of them have joined in with us but our standard was laid up in the church in London St Clementine’s and that’s where our standard is now the WAAF standard, [inaudible] Can I help you with anything else? I think we’ve covered nearly everything.
DE: I think you are probably right, we probably have, let’s have a look at the things I’ve scribbled down. I’ve got a couple of questions. One you were talking about going for a Burton, I mean can you just explain that?
MY: Well if you fall, or if you anything odd happens, you say oh you’ve gone for a Burton, but that’s, it’s just a saying it’s like the chads, you know, when you had the wall with the little man’s face above it we called them chads, little imaginary men, [laughter] that did all the things that upset people [laughter] that was it, that was going for a burton that was - , but as I say I don’t know how true that is, I’ve heard it once or twice in different areas so it could be true, because it started right away back then you know.
DE: Where there any other funny sayings or slang terms that were unusual for the forces?
MY: Not really not that I can say on here.
DE: [laughter]
MY: No, no there weren’t any, we used to sing different words to some of the songs but I can’t remember them, you made up your own words sometimes, because we were a right mixture of people in the billets, you know, came from all different places and I mean some places I had never heard of before, when you’re only eighteen you don’t, you just live in your, before you joined up you just lived in your little community.
DE: Yes
MY: And that was it, geography, I must admit I always liked geography at school and I still like geography, I still like to find out where places are and what have you. That, there’s a picture there me at [?] at RAF Cranwell college at the Battle of Britain last year there’s, one, two, three veterans, four veterans and a veterans wife then the air officer commanding of the college and another one there and I was invited as a veteran there last year and I’ve had a another invitation this year to go to the seventy fifth one on the 11th September. So, and that’s through being in the The RAFA, the RAF Association which we belong to, I belong to the Cranwell branch.
DE: I see, you were saying how such a wide selection of different people from different places, did you always get on?
MY: Mostly, yeah they were mostly, yes, and some were older than me because I was younger you know, some had been in two years longer than me before I’d joined up, but no we got on very well together, I never found it difficult. One friend I kept in touch with because she was another Scot she was the one that went in, in to find the flight sergeant and found the wing commander instead, you know about the men
DE: Oh yes, yes.
MY: At Compton Bassett, and I kept up with her till she died, she lived up in Scotland, I visited her, it would be about five years ago she died, and I visited her probably two years before that you know, and that was the last I saw her, but she was the only one that I really kept in touch with because we’d been together for quite a while we were at Banff together then she live up, not far outside of Edinburgh so we did keep in touch, but she’s gone, and the other lady that I said, I met her at one of our reunions and she has died but that’s the one I went to school with.
DE: Oh I see,
MY: She has died [pause] so that’s it.
DE: Ok then
MY: Do you think we’ve covered everything?
DE: I think so, I’ll probably think of lots of more things to ask as soon as I [laughter] walk out the door.
MY: Yes [laughter]
DE: So we’ve been chatting, well you’ve been chatting for 42 minutes
MY: Have I?
DE: Yes, thank you very much.
Dublin Core
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Title
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Interview with Margret Young
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Dan Ellin
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-05-15
Type
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Sound
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AYoungM150515
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Pending review
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
Margaret Young grew up in Scotland and worked in a ladies shoe department. She volunteered for the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force at the age of 18 and served as a wireless operator. She talks about the medical and reception centre and training, learning Morse code and the wooden accommodation huts. Once trained, she was posted to RAF Banff, and talks about the shifts and accommodation. She was later posted to RAF Hednesford, where servicemen were demobilised.
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Linda Saunders
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
England--Staffordshire
England--Wiltshire
Scotland--Aberdeenshire
Temporal Coverage
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1944
Format
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00:42:13 audio recording
aircrew
demobilisation
ground personnel
love and romance
military living conditions
military service conditions
Morse-keyed wireless telegraphy
Nissen hut
RAF Banff
RAF Compton Bassett
RAF Hednesford
training
wireless operator
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/834/18874/YGeachDG1394781v3.1.pdf
0ac2178ce957f882e1ba3691a9434011
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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Geach, David
D Geach
Description
An account of the resource
<a href="https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/218400/"></a>52 items. The collection concerns Warrant Officer David Geach (1394781 Royal Air Force) and contains his diaries, correspondence, photographs of his crew, his log book, cuttings and items relating to being a prisoner of war. After training in Canada, he flew operations as a bomb aimer with 623 and 115 Squadrons until he was shot down 24 March 1944 and became a prisoner of war. He was instrumental in erecting a memorial plaque to the Air Crew Reception Centre at Lord’s Cricket Ground in London. <br />The collection also contains a scrap book of photographs.<br /><br />Additional information on his crew is available via the <a href="https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/218400/">IBCC Losses Database.</a><br /><br />The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Harry Wilkins and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2016-03-14
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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Geach, DG
Transcribed document
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Transcription
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[Cover Page]
PJZ4 HUT 7
PER ARDUA AD ASTRA MIM
[/Cover Page]
[page break]
[underlined] BOOK 2 [/underlined]
COMMENCING MY FLYING TRAINING, AND MY ADVENTURES UP TILL THE TIME OF LEAVING ENGLAND
[page break]
[underlined] Saturday June 20th [/underlined]
Our first stage in flying training has commenced, we are no longer cheesed with periods of studying, drilling, & various other binding pastimes. Our journey from St. Andrews to Carlisle was pretty uneventful, we caught the connections, & arrived here at about 1 p.m. Dragging those two kit bags around was pretty deadly, & we were glad to dump them. All the lot of us, 19, are in a large room of a hut, rather a collection of huts called the town-centre. This is just opposite the station, the actual station is about 4 miles out from Carlisle & the name of it, is Kingstown.
I know it seems early to form an opinion, but we all dislike this place intensely. It is very hard to describe, but we have never known a place to cheese one so completely. The general air of the place & the slip-shod way it is run all contribute to discourage us more than anything.
[page break]
There is a civilian here parading around in a W/O's uniform although he has the badge of a civil airways on his arm. He goes under the title of S.W.O. - what cheek, & we have to address him as Sir. Although he is unable to put us on a charge he can give us an hours digging on fatigues, & he makes good use of that. From what we can see he practically runs this station, despite the officers.
That is one of the main faults here, the place is half R.A.F. half civvie, & a general fiasco ensues. The food is catered, & served by civilians, & one word describes it, disgraceful, honestly! I never thought food could be served out in such a state. It is not my personal feelings, everyone is the same, & one only has to see all the cadets eating hot meals in the Y.M.C.A. to realise it. The officers cant [sic] do much about it only request [?] the chap who is in charge of the mess to alter things, needless to say there isn't much difference.
[page break]
In a big gloomy converted hangar now called the 'Crew Room', why I don't know, are our lockers. We have one ordinary sized steel locker between two of us, & we both have to keep our flying kit, kit-bags, P.T. kit, & books in this, it is almost impossible to close the doors. P.T. is every day & we change behind the lockers, have a terrific long roll-call, run to a nearby field for about 10 mins. P.T. & run back again. Hurriedly changing we rush to the N.A.A.F.I. & find a large queue there, the time being 11.a.m. & the N.A.A.F.I. closing at 11.15 a.m. we never get it. So we never have a cup of tea while we are here in the morning.
Another annoying rule is that once we enter the gate in the morning at 8 a.m. we are not allowed out till 6 p.m. even during the dinner-time, so we drift around aimlessly. There being only 4 lavatories & 3 wash-basins available for the couple of hundred cadets here, we even have to queue for those necessities. Yes I have never seen a station where there are so many things wrong and so few right.
[page break]
The ground lectures are a farce, and they might just as well scrap them. First thing every morning or afternoon we have Aldis practise, [sic] & I have heard it rumoured that some people take it. We have had one Navigation lecture, stuff we did right at the beginning of I.T.W. Armaments, a chap came & nattered about the Browning Gun, the Signals Officer is a P/O an Observer from the last war, who seems slightly wrong in the head! A large part of the programme consists of going to the Cinema Hut for M.O.I [sic] films, of, the Enemy has Ears, variety, some of these bring home to one how vital it is to be guarded in conversation.
For entertainment each Sunday and Monday night they have a movie film, free, Bing Crosby & Bob Hope are on this Sunday in 'Road to Zanzibar'. Once a fortnight there is a dance in the mess and a good few women from the town come. They had one the evening we arrived it was a pretty good band. Well being tired I don't feel like writing any more so will close.
[page break]
[underlined] Wednesday June 24th [/underlined]
We have been here exactly a week now, & are wishing we had gone to Perth for it must be better than here. I don't know whether the A.M. realises it, but a place like this & a training system like these Grading Schools is enough to make anyone completely fed up with flying. I remember last week the first time I went up, I guess it was the biggest thrill I have ever had. Strapping myself in with the Sutton harness, I waited & then we gradually moved forward, gaining speed & all of a sudden I had a shock for looking over the side I saw the ground about 50 feet below us, I had not noticed that we had left it. Sitting there admiring the view I felt a strange sense of exaltation, as if I had left worldly things behind, & was all alone in the universe. I was jerked out of my isolation by the instructors voice crackling through the inter-com, & we began the business of flying.
[page break]
Being the first time the instructor didn't give me any of the patter, he just let me get used to the new sensation. I had rather a shock when he cut the motor, & announced he was going to practise [sic] a forced landing, although he didn't actually touch down he would have made it easily. Coming [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] [inserted] back [/inserted] he flew low along the course of the Eden, & this was great, I got a bigger kick out of the low level flying than anything. The following lessons were all graduated each hour for teaching one thing e.g. the first lesson - straight & level flying, then medium turns, climbing, gliding etc. on to take-offs. landings & spins. It certainly is marvellous how correctly trimmed the aircraft will fly by itself almost smoothly, yet as soon as we touch the controls she lurches about - gremlin trouble - maybe.
I think the whole idea of Grading Schools are a farce though, & every instructor & pilot on 'ops' that I have spoken to agrees. They maintain that it is impossible
[page break]
to discern whether a fellow will make a pilot in 12 hours or not, the time is too short. A fair amount depends upon one soloing in the time, & yet a fair few well known pilots today soloed after 12 hours. Another point is that the instructors can't take any real interest in a fellow for no sooner have they got him up to the soloing stage, when he goes & someone completely new comes in his place. So I guess no-one can blame them for feeling cheesed & not being able to give the individual attention to us that we need. All these points & the atmosphere of this station as well all go to make us lose heart in the flying & ask are we being given a fair deal.
From our point of view we definitely are not, for we know that if we had received our papers a couple of months before we did, we should have missed this scheme & gone abroad as usual, & stood
[page break]
a much better chance of getting our wings being, as we would be on a full E.F.T.S. course. From the A.M's [sic] point of view I suppose they are fully justified. They are short of Observers, & these new Air Bombers, so the easiest way is to just whizz a few [one indecipherable word] potential pilots off the course, & re-muster them. As they say it being for the good of the country our personal feeling don't count. It certainly is hard when you have set your heart on being a pilot, & volunteered for it to be just placed on one side, without a fair trial of one's capabilities. Still there it is, but it seems ever such a great waste of youthful enthusiasm & keeness [sic] to me, I can see, and also feel it myself, the old spirit gradually dying away & being replaced with a browned-off feeling, & a 'nothing matters' outlook. It is the way that this country has always been though, & I guess it always will be. Who are we to question the wisdom of the great.
[page break]
[underlined Sunday June 28th. [/underlined]
The end of the week, and a fast-moving week at that, things sure have happened speedily. Four of the boys have finished their course already & are going on leave tomorrow. This is embarkation leave, just in case we should get a pilot, which I doubt. Amongst those going are 'Nob' Davies & Cooper, they were withdrawn from lectures & their flying speeded up to four hours a day at times. Consequently they often reached a period when the instructors words would go in one ear & out the other, they just couldn't take any interest in it. Cooper soloed at 10 hrs 25 mins, but 'Nob' didn't. The way they are rushing us through with this flying, they are either desperately short of aircrew, or else are getting our 12 hours over with just because the training system is so choked & they have to get as many through as possible. I think the latter is the case, & as usual it benefits all but us.
[page break]
I guess I should have finished my flying by the end of the week, & be on leave, it seems rather absurd to be home on leave again, seeing I only left a fortnight ago - still I'm not grumbling. I had my 7 hour progress test with the F/Lt. in charge of C flight & didn't do too bad, I learnt afterwards I had 555 marks which is average. As long as they don't rush me with my flying I'll be alright. One of the fellows from St. Andrews have [sic] been taken off because he gets nervous every time he goes up. It's hard lines on him, for some people are made that way & he has gone through his I.T.W all for nothing.
There is a fair in the park in town & we will go there tonight, for it is Carlisle's stop-at-home holidays week & they have different attractions. Carlisle itself is quite a nice town, a lot more livelier than St. Andrews, & a very fine park. They have a large Y.M.C.A. here - the John Peel Hut, & it
[page break]
really is a fine place. If people only knew how much these places matter to service men I am sure they would receive more support.
Cooper has received a letter from a pal at Manchester who has been classified as a pilot. He said it is a matter of luck what percentage of pilots they require at the classification time, whether we get a pilot or not. I must say it doesn't sound too hopeful, still maybe whatever happens is for the best.
I did spins for the first time this week, it is a queer feeling when the aircraft stalls & lurches forward & the earth spins round & round. This was a thing I managed to get hold off [sic] quite easily & could do pretty well. My instructor did half an hours aerobatics yesterday & I hardly knew if I was on my head or heels. He is a real decent fellow though, never binds a bit even when I make silly mistakes, not like some instructors.
[page break]
[underlined] Wednesday July 1st. [/underlined]
My brief period of flying is over, it certainly was short & sweet, it lasted under a fortnight, & from that someone can tell whether I would make a pilot after a few hundred hours flying - maybe. Right at the last couple of hours my instructor was changed because another instructor didn't like his pupil, there was a switch & now my instructor has the chap. This other one binds more, but I [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] [inserted] was [/inserted] not worrying about that for I had [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] at last got my landings O.K. So he promised me half an hour to go solo on Tuesday, but it seemed that right at the last Fate took a hand. For on Tuesday I was called out of lectures & told I would have to let my solo go & do my last two hours, & get my 12 hours test over that morning. Feeling pretty cheesed I did & did fair in my test. They told me the fact that I was about to solo would go on my record yet I doubt if that will cut much ice.
[page break]
Today I & Jack Dawsett [?] have been dashing around with our clearance chits, trying to locate people, who don't want to be located. We managed to get them in the end & got our clothing settled. Because a few chaps flew on Sunday they issued Daily Flying Returns with everyone down as having 'Attended Lectures' being as we didn't know we omitted to sign, so Dodds the W/O fellow, put us on an hours digging tonight, our last night too, I'd like to meet him outside.
Still my outstanding thought, is thank the Lord we are leaving this place. Tomorrow we only have an F.F.I. & get our warrant & ration cards then we are away, & most probably will be able to catch the midday train - then home and some good food. I expect Mary will get a shock when she sees me. Ah! well I'll close this my last entry at Carlisle, my first flying school, & not the last I hope.
[page break]
[underlined] Sunday July 12th. [/underlined]
It is a week & a half since I have made an entry, only I never enter anything when I am on leave, don't combine business with pleasure in this case. I am now at my fifth station, as I have mentioned, Manchester in this case. After enjoying seven days leave I was due to report here on Friday at midday. To do that I would have had to catch the 4 a.m. train from Euston & sleep on the station all night. So I took the 8.15 am. with Jack Dawsett & practically all other cadets went on it as well. We arrived at London Rd Station about 1.45 p.m. & caught a 1d services bus to Victoria Stn. where we connected the train to Heaton Park. This type of train is electric & reminded me of a cross between a London Metropolitan Train & an armoured train. We finally arrived at the park at 2.30 pm. Nobody said anything, all was bustle & confusion, hundreds of cadets wandering around, harrased [sic]
[page break]
N.C.O's endeavouring to get some semblance of order, what a panic.
To anyone who has never been to Heaton Park the word "Park" is apt to be misleading. The place is over 500 acres of natural country, complete with hills, vales, woods, streams, lakes, and in peace-time must have been a really lovely place. It was originally owned by an Earl, his name escapes me, & he presented it to Manchester Corporation for a public park, which in its turn was taken over by the R.A.F. At the time of writing the mansion itself forms No. 1 Squadron's offices, the officers mess, & various other rooms contain service branches. The huge lawn is a parade ground - can hold over 2,000 men. The Cafeteria built for the public is our mess, & another one has been built for No 2 Squadron's Mess. In the natural theatre by the stage & pavilion are lots of tents & more by the tennis courts, & everywhere one looks, ugly Nissen Huts have served [?} themselves up.
[page break]
It certainly has spoilt the appearance of the park, but I'm afraid we don't care about the beauty a lot. We are constantly moaning about the terrific distances we have to walk from place to place on the station. Talk about dispersal, everything is miles away from anywhere else. Jack & I are in billets outside the camp, we are both in nice houses, I have good rooms. The only trouble being in the morning when we have about a 2 mile walk to get to the mess for breakfast. I always have to dig Jack out, & sometimes we miss it.
The food here on the whole is pretty good, & one thing there is plenty of it. Being as there are about a thousand cadets here, they certainly handle the queues quickly. Not so with the N.A.A.F.I. this is in the tea-bar that is by the boating lake, & it is a devil of a wait outside, then a mad scramble at the counter with no orderliness at all. Consequently tea fly's [sic] over everyone & tempers become short.
[page break]
We got fixed up pretty quickly on the day we arrived, issued with mugs etc. and all the usual performances were got through, that always have to be done on joining a new station. After some searching we located our billets & nearly dropped dead getting our kit-bags there. The following day we commenced the programme, what there is of it. Nothing is hardly done here, for it is just a Classification centre, & then a posting Centre. Discipline is very slack indeed nobody pays any attention to the N.C.O's & people slide off when & where they like, there is rarely more than 3/4 of the flight present when a check is taken. This is rather a rest cure in some ways.
I have met 'Nob' Davies & Cooper, they arrived on Tuesday, & are in tents! We have Saturday afternoon off, but have to come all the way over to the park on Sunday, just to answer a roll-call. For the church parade is held on Wednesday. Well, thats [sic] enough for now, I'll describe the station & Manchester more next time.
[page break]
[underlined] Wednesday July 15th. [/underlined]
Life just slips uneventfully by, and we [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] slide along in a regular rut. Most of our day is spent in dodging off, our sergeant is one of the nervous & conscientious type, & fusses like an old hen. The [deleted] trob [/deleted] trouble he takes to get us all in the open-air swimming bath is marvellous, but then he never succeeds. The fellows in camp are allowed out till 11 p.m. each night excepting Friday & Saturday when it is 23.59. Almost the entire camp pours into town, by means of the electric train service, or various buses.
Manchester is more after my idea of fun, for it is large like London, and very busy. There are bags of up to date cinemas, the prices are rather high though. There is a good theatre the Palace, they sometimes have productions there prior to them opening in the West End. Strangely enough there are poor facilities for troop canteens, one
[page break]
Y.M.C.A. which is always packed, a C.W.L. canteen, equally crowded, and a Forces Canteen on Victoria Stn. which is pretty good, but with limited accommodation like the others.
We certainly lead a gay life, and we pay for it, the money really pours away, we spend £2 pocket money a week easily. Admitted about 15/- a week goes on food in the cafes, but we also go to the films about 3 or 4 times weekly & dances twice. The Ritz Ballroom is a pretty good place, but gets very packed. There was a dance in our mess in the week & that was well crowded.
Coming back from town we catch a train they run at every ten past & twenty to in the hour & the late ones are very crowded but we generally make it. Jack and I get out at Bowker Vale the station before Heaton Park, as it is right by our billets, I don't stay out late though, about 10 to 10.30 p.m – so far.
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treated as children, & numbers, but never human beings, and last of all, these long hanging about periods, all tend to dull the edge of the keenest appetite. It certainly is a shame, there are thousands of young fellows who volunteered to join Air Crew, & I am not line shooting when I say we are treated as though we were the last people that were needed in this war.
We had Navigation the other day, in a long Nissen Hut, one can't really whip up any enthusiasm here. Most of our days are the same we always try to slip off early to tea, before the colossal queues appear, then we can get an early start into town. I believe we might get a 48 hr pass this weekend, I hope so, for I feel as though I have been away ages. That sure is a rush on the London train, and also coming back, Sunday night, still I wont [sic] mind that as long as I get home.
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[underlined] Tuesday July 28th. [/underlined]
Today is my 19th birthday, and has been quite an eventful day, I had a Greetings telegram from Mary & cards from the family & friends. Beside this however it was our classification day, & I am now a A/T Air Bomber. The parade was held this morning, we were all marched, through the rose gardens, down to a beautiful green, with a small lake, a truly peaceful spot. There we layed [sic] upon the grass & listened to the Wing Comdr. reading out our destinies. There were about 30% pilots out of this parade. I felt sorry for one fellow who was made a Navigator, he flew so well at Grading School, and went solo in a record time, that he had a letter of congratulations from Group. Yet after that he was made a Navigator, ah! well it is a funny system.
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[underlined] Wednesday July 18th [/underlined] [pages in wrong order]
The lady with whom I am billeted informed me upon my arrival that it would be unlikely I should be here more than 10 days, well, that has passed, so we are wondering how long we will be here, it won't be longer than 3 weeks I should say. 'Nob' is expecting to be classified Monday or so, I wonder what he will get. It is a weird way they appear to classify them, nobody knows how they do it. A fellow who got a pilot the other day was taken off the flying coarse after 5 hours & told he would never be able to fly. Still I wouldn't mind an Air Bomber, its [sic] a nice short course, & that's what attracts me at the moment. We may be classified at the same time as 'Nob' I hope so, might as well get it over with. There'll be some disappointments, I guess.
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There is a familiar cry at this place, "Stand Still!" Every time we are on parade someone screams that, an officer or an N.C.O. everyone of them love saying it. Parades are fairly lengthy here for after the roll calls etc. long lists of fellows are called out for various reasons. Then the N.C.O's in charge of the flights are called out at the double & their instructions issued regarding the day's programme. This place is apt to get rather deadly after awhile, life becomes too monotonous.
I hear they are opening a new N.A.A.F.I. for 2 squadron, this should ease the pressure on the other one. The complement of the station is growing for fellows are coming in & none being posted. The weather is lousy rain and more rain and one never sees a blue sky, oh! give me the Sunny South!
[underlined] Wednesday July 22nd [/underlined]
The Classification Parade was held on Monday, but our flight wasn't on it. 'Nob' Davies, was made an Air Bomber, he was pleased over that, Cooper a pilot, Brayshaw a Navigator, there were about 40% pilots, I should say a rather large total. I thought we should have been classified, well, maybe we will have our chance next week, if I get an Air Bomber I'll be happy.
We have been on Camp Co-operation lately, this is rather a farce. On a camp this size, & so short staffed, there are bags of work that has to be done by the cadets so different flights are detailed for these. They are varied these fatigues – beg pardon – if anyone should make the mistake of referring to them as fatigues, they can be placed on a charge. Anyway, we sweep clean, paint, build
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fences, tend vegetables, dig, and everything imaginable! Needless to say there is bags of skiving, (or slipping off) as its [sic] called. Salvage is the biggest dodge, practically all the cadets are on this after the Church Parade, Wednesday. The S.W.O. who is a decent little fellow, has 27 years service in, is pretty keen on salvage.
I am not feeling bitter or anything, when I express the sentiment that the Press should know the full details of Air-Crew Training, I am merely voicing the feelings of almost every cadet under training. For in practically every case one sees, keen enthusiasm, turn into a oh! – what the hell attitude, it is unavoidable. The Wing Comdr here, admits this but states this can't be helped, I don't think so, if it were all reorganised, by young brains we could really get somewhere This changing from station to station, being bound at by dumb N.C.O's
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I am pleased with myself though, if I can get a posting pretty soon, the course is only 12 - 14 weeks, & I shall be home on leave for Xmas as a sergeant. The stations we are posted to are Dumfries, Stourbridge, Isle of Man, & it is rumoured that there is a station opening at Reading, I would like to be posted there, its [sic] near enough to London. I am now in 'H' flight with a decent crowd of fellows, & a really smashing corporal, he's the opposite of the sergt [sic] we had, this one wangles us off everything, & gets plenty of opportunities for skiving. It was only a rumour we were having a 48, I didn't really credit it, for we had, had one the previous weekend. This certainly is a station for rumours, anything is believed here, postings, different methods of training, everything wildly buzzes around amongst the cadets. Now my next worry is when I shall be on a posting I guess, ah! well I shall remember my 19th birthday.
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[underlined] Saturday 1st August [/underlined]
Well, there is a posting of Air Bombers, but I am not on it, 'Nob' Davies is though. It was the first half of 'F' flight & as I am in H flight, we will have to wait awhile I guess. It is to Bobbington near Stourbridge I believe it is a pretty good station, they are due to leave tomorrow evening. So at last 'Nob' is on his way, 12 weeks & then he will have his tapes, [?] lucky guy.
We are definitely getting cheesed with this place, we can thank the Lord for having Oxenbury for a Cpl, he is about the best N.C.O. I've ever met. He gets us off different things & plays around, boy he sure takes a lot of the burden off us. I guess we'll stroll around this afternoon & have tea in John Lewis's cafeteria, that is quite a nice place, than finish off with a show. The cinemas are about the best choice for the
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dances are so crowded, we sometimes go to the dance in the Y.M.C.A. though. On our first Saturday here, we went to Belle Vue, I didn't think a lot of the fun fair, it was rather dear too. We went into the Speedway & enjoyed quite a good programme, we were going into the all-in wrestling after, but decided we didn't have time. What a job it was to get back, though, thousands of people dashing for the buses, huge queues everywhere. Phew! I thought we would never [one indecipherable word] but luckily we jumped on one & got back O.K.
They are having a regatta here on the lake, shortly, I don't mind watching as long as it isn't on our Saturday afternoon off, they can pull little tricks like that, all too easily. We have had Navigation again this week, we professed not to know the computer again, so the instructor went through that. Ah! well anything that averts work is a good thing.
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[underlined] Sunday 16th August [/underlined]
I haven't made an entry in this diary for a fortnight, owing to the fact, that there has been hardly anything to enter. Life has just slid along in the hum drum way it does at Manchester, without anything important happening. By every right we should have been on a 48 hour pass this [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] week end, [sic] it was our turn, but they jumped us heaven knows why, so two sergeants in our flight are going to have an interview with the C.O. about it. I hope we get it next weekend, heaven knows I need it, I feel I have been here for months.
This certainly is a meeting place for everyone, from all different times in ones life. I have already met Frank Young who was in my room at Hall Rd, he is a Navigator W/T, & will 'cake' the wireless, being [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] a wireless officer in the Merchant Navy, before he
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joined up. In my flight now is 'Bill' Bailey who was in my class at school, I never knew he had joined up, I had a great surprise, when I met him. Also another chap I have bumped into was Jimmy Twigson [?] who I worked with first of all, he is an Air Bomber, so far I haven't met any fellows from the office who joined up with me.
The regatta finally got cracking after it had been washed out once by a torrential downpour of rain, number 2 squadron won it. Last night we had a pretty good time, we generally get pretty tight in the Gaumont Long Bar, one of the few places that we can get Youngers at. I have had a letter from 'Nob' giving all the 'gen' on the course and it seems there is a fair amount of work more in fact than I thought. Still whatever it is the sooner we are on it the better.
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[underlined] Monday 24th Aug [/underlined]
Well, we had our 48 hour after all the week end just passed. The two sergeants had an interview with the C.O. & he expressed surprise that we had been missed, & agreed to grant one. We were lucky to get away a bit earlier than usual, and after a frantic struggle managed to catch the 2.15 p.m. from London Rd. What was more akin to a miracle was the fact that I acquired a seat, something very much out of the ordinary. I spent a most enjoyable week-end, & naturally finished up feeling pretty cheesed at having to return. Then followed the old scramble for the midnight train at Euston, with crowds of cadets everywhere. Then we would try to snatch some sleep during the journey & arrive in Manchester around five. The grey dawn would be breaking & there would be the lucky ones who were huddled up, waiting for an early train to take
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them into London on leave - how I envied them. Our eyes would be continually closing & we could hardly keep awake & then we would trudge to Victoria Stn. for the first train to Heaton Park. 48's sure are fun but hellishly short, & terrible to return from.
The past week we have had another corporal, helping Oxenbury, & what an object. He was in the band, & had two fingers in plaster maybe he caught them in his harp, & he had the queerest voice I have ever heard. Nobody could tell whether he was shouting Left or Right, or what, it was a perfect mess. He doesn't seem to be with us now thank the Lord. There are rumours circulating of an Air Bombers posting, but we have heard so many ones like this that we are inured to them now. I think I will go to the WAAF's dance at the Bowler [?] tonight, they are generally pretty good.
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[underlined] Saturday Aug 29th. [/underlined]
The rumours of a posting weren't rumours after all, we are actually going, but there is a lot of doubt & puzzlement in our minds. When they announced the place we were going to - Hastings, I nearly jumped for joy when I heard that, for I had never dared to hope I would be so near London. Then we found out that all the Air Bombers, 400 of them were going, which seemed rather strange, & now the news has gone circulating round, that this place isn't anything more than another Manchester - we just have to await a posting from there. I'll leave this entry awhile & finish it tonight, something may have turned up by then.
It is now night & our fears have been realised, the Wing Comdr. in his address to us, told us Hastings was another pool from where we would be posted. Still it is nearer
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to London, & I might be able to get home, it does seem silly to have a station so near to Jerry I think. We are leaving tonight, there will be a glorious beer [?] up before we leave I guess.
This afternoon there were the Inter-Squadron Sports, & although it was Saturday afternoon no-one was allowed to leave the camp, everyone had to watch it. Even us who were leaving that night, weren't allowed out for our last few hours, it doesn't seem much, when one mentions it, but believe me, when one experiences how you can be pushed & pulled around well it isn't so hot.
I think I'll trot out with "Bud" Flanagan tonight, on a pub-crawl, & drawn my sorrows. We have to report back at 9 p.m. for a check & supper & then after the usual delay, I guess we will be on our way. So it finally is goodbye to Manchester, I seem to have been here ages, ah! well, it wasn't so bad after all.
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[underlined] Wednesday 2nd Sept. [/underlined]
Here I am down in the sunny South again, & it certainly is a change to see a lovely blue sky again after Manchester. Yet what wouldn't I give to be back there I never realised how easy it really was. Still theres [sic] no time to cry over spilt milk and I'd better recount what happened when we left.
As I guessed we all went out and became gloriously tight, & rolled back into Heaton Park for the final checks. What a shambles – they first tried to call the roll in the dark - heaven knows why. Trying to do that with 400 fellows at least 300 of them well under the weather, was just asking for trouble. About twenty voices would answer for each name called out, as nobody knew who was present & who was not. Then some fellows began throwing pieces of earth at the officer holding the flashlight, gee! it was a fiasco.
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Then, finally it penetrated the official mind, that, it would be a lot easier if they went into the mess hall where it was light - so in we went. Here they got through a roll call of a sort, & as time was passing they decided we had better have supper. This was easily the best meal I have had at Manchester & one of the best in the R.A.F. It was fried egg, or was it eggs I wasn't sober enough to remember, & a lovely golden brown potato ball, it went down well I know. They finally moved us off then, & we were passed through the door one at a time, between two officers so they were able to get a proper idea of who was missing at last. 'Taffy' Evans was there tight to the eyebrows & screaming himself with laughter at another fellow who had a few flowers stuck in his great pack. All the time Taffy, unknowingly, had a terrific bunch of them, sprouting all over his pack & webbing! When he passed the officers, one reached out despairingly to stop
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him, but as if he said "oh! whats [sic] the hell", let him go.
We marched to the gate, laughing and singing, & there came to a halt, we waited half an hour & moved across into the station. The train arrived after a little while and we all dived in with the usual scramble for seats. I got settled with the three Scotties, Bob, Bill, & Jock, & tried to snatch some sleep. Our carriage had the windows hermetically sealed, & believe me, they put a good few men on troop trains, fellows sleeping on the floor & everywhere, phew! it was hot. Being a troop train it was going right through with no changes, a blessing. I awoke early next morning cramped & thirsty & attacked my meagre rations, some of which where bad. I had the devil of a shock when some while later we pulled into Willesden Junction, I thought we had crossed the Thames long ago. It was heart breaking to pass right through London & across Chelsea Bridge, so near & yet so far to home, but not a chance of reaching there.
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We picked up speed when we were clear of London, & were soon rushing through Tunbridge & on & on till we finally arrived at St. Leonards.
Our worst fears were realised when we saw our reception party, all the N.C.O's had smart uniforms, terrific creases, dazzling boots & buttons & worst of all brilliant white blancoed [sic] belts. It certainly was a home of bull we judged - & we were right. They fell us into line & away we went, with them constantly whipping up our step, I thought bitterly it won't be long before they have broken us in. After a tidy march we reached our quarters, Marine Court, a magnificent huge modern block of flats. What a target for Jerry I thought, about 12 floors of huge glittering white stone & glass. The usual settling in process followed, bedding, rooms, wash, eat, 'gen' chats by different officers & the C.O. details of parades, all the old routine, then time to ourselves. One's first job on such occasions is always to dash off letters with the new address to all & sundry. Being late, & myself being tired I'll close this until the next entry.
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[underlined] Sunday Sept 6th. [/underlined]
To continue with the life of this station, the C.O. seemed very gruff & hellish bad tempered at times, but he was alright if everything went right. A Flight Lieut Observer there, everyone hated the sight of, a supercilious cocky guy, a last war Obs. incidentally with Gen Service & Victory Medals up. Our squadron C.O. seemed one of the biggest baa-lambs under the sun a hell of a binder. I think everyone retired with some misgivings on Sunday night as to what the morrow would bring. Our rooms were lovely, I was in one on the 7th floor with three other fellows, the room had French windows opening onto a balcony overlooking the front & the rear, the balconies were out of bounds.
Reveille was at 6.15 a.m. and up we scrambled, & came down five floors to the dining hall. The food here was terrible & very little of it, there were scores of complaints that day, but very little action. We waited for awhile [sic] before we were served, here they have a ticket punching
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idea, that ensures nobody goes around twice for a meal, I can't imagine anyone that would. After breakfast we scrambled [?] beds, & then followed a rush of bulling brasses sweeping the room, & making bed packs, & then we dashed down in time for the parade at 8 a.m. This was held in a tiny street at the rear of Marine Court. After a helluva lot of 'attentions' & Stand at Ease', there came the familiar "For Inspection Open Order March", & then we came under fire. I have been on many inspections but never one like that, the A Sqdn C.O. P/O Stuttaford, was meticulous to the point of ridiculousness, ever such tiny faults were magnified into major offences, it was terribly cheesing. At last it was over & after the usual 'guff' about making ourselves 'lots smarter', the days [sic] programme commenced.
We were soon to become familiar with the curriculum, first we marched to the streets around Warren Sq for 2 hours drill. Foot drill after our I.T.W was long passed go it was binding, then we were marched back & given a quarter of an
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hours [sic] break, during which it was impossible to get ones nose in the N.A.A.F.I. & we weren't allowed out to any cafe's. Right after this we paraded in P.T. kit & ran about 2 miles to White Rock Park, where we had 2 hours P.T. & then ran back again. Dinner followed that, then the whole afternoon was devoted to a route march. It was hellishly long & I know it crippled a lot of the older N.C.O's the F/Sgt didn't show his nose in any again. This programme was adhered to rigidly every day of this week. In the end we began to wonder if we were on a Commando Course or what the hell. The bull was continued all the [one indecipherable word], the usual stuff of rooms being scrubbed with trimmings like polishing the brass on the window frames & black polishing gum boots. Our food has improved slightly but not a lot.
Yesterday we went to a local cinema for a 'gen' chat by a Flt/Lt. Observer, just off 'ops' who is taking a hand with a course they are organising. It seems to me rather a farce being mainly
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I.T.W subjects & hardly anything we will get on our course, we are too cheesed off to worry now though. There is leave as the C.O. graciously calls it one 36 hour pass once a month, & this is stopped at any time if there is any little thing wrong with the rooms. The laundry is a decent one here thank the Lord, but the system of giving out mail is chronic, instead of giving it out to each flight N.C.O. 'Chiefy' or F/Sgt Tate shouts it out for the whole squadron, bloody poor system.
He is one of the biggest binders I have met, & thats [sic] saying something here. On inspections in the morning, what with him, Stuttaford & half a dozen others screaming 'Stand Still', 'Take his Name', I realise what the Guards go through. One hardly expects it in Air Crew though. To make up for the lack of food in the barracks we eat a lot in the cafes, there seems to be plenty of food in town, luckily there are bags of fruit too. Gee! but I guess we will all heave a sigh of relief the day we leave here.
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[underlined] Thursday 10th Sept. [/underlined]
This certainly is a lot quieter than Manchester, when we drill in the streets it sends a shiver down my spine at times; They are all deserted & nearly all the large boarding houses empty & boarded up with broken windows paint peeling off, & cracked walls, it is a ghost town in some parts. Around London Rd there is plenty of life, though, & also in Hastings itself. Most evenings we spend in cinemas, the films are very old at times, but the seats are good, & at cheap prices too.
Our routine is the same this week as it was last, but I am feeling lovely & fit now. With bright sunshine most of the time & the sea air it is a lovely change. On Sunday I dragged my 'biscuits' [?] & pillow out onto the balcony & lay there sunbathing all day. Strangely enough most of us like the route marches now. Admitted Sgt. James (one of the best) generally takes them & we march 3 miles & then lay down in a
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field & sunbathe.
I now have a 'distinguished' post, I am 'A' Squadron's Messing Representative, and it was marvellous the way I was given the position. After returning from a route march one day, we were dismissed & I happened to be standing around with my hands on my pockets. 'Chiefy' Tate pounced on me immediately, "Name & Number?" he said, getting out his note-book, I argued thinking I was on a charge, but he took my name, & then said, "For having your hands in your pockets, you are A Squadrons messing representative", ho! ho! such is service life eh!
I think I shall put in for a pass this week end, for I'm getting a little cheesed & the way things go on this station one never knows when they will be cancelled. This certainly is the place for alerts, there's a warning every hour, but hardly any action at all. I'm expecting a real 'do' one of these nights. I hope it isn't tonight anyway for I feel really tired and want a good nights [sic] sleep.
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[underlined] Monday 14th Sept. [/underlined]
This is a fine bloody station I am now on "jankers", and this is how it happened. I got my week end pass after a bit of humming & hawing, & spending the Saturday morning on rifle drill. I caught the train O.K. & got home about 5.30, after a meal & a wash & brush up I went over for Mary. We had a swell weekend, well I say weekend it was only a day really, too short. However I caught the train from Victoria O.K. & although I had to stand all down I didn't mind it was a nice trip. All the cadets poured into Marine Court & handed in their passes & then so to bed. I got into my room and put on the light to get into bed, when in walked an S.P. & [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] took my 1250 for having the lights on after lights out. Holy Mackerel! "Lights Out" was at 10.45 p.m & this was just gone 11 p.m. & not allowed a light for a few minutes to get into bed. This is an example of red tape carried out to the maximum. Anyway we were marched before P/O Stuttaford
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& after him having his little bind, he awarded us 4 days – 4 days hell! in this place it equals 7 days on any other station just for a little offence like that – anyway today I started.
Its [sic] wonderful what scam they get for S.P's the sgt. in charge of the jankers parade screamed and bawled as if we were the most hardened criminals, oh! its [sic] not worth describing it. He gave me an ultimatum to get my hair cut tomorrow or else – . We worked for two hours from 6 - 8 p.m. cleaning lavatories – oh! to be in air crew. The parades each day are at 7 a.m. (that means early rising) 1 p.m. to make sure we can't get out in the dinner - time. Then 6 p.m. when we work till 8 p.m. parade again at 9 p.m. & at 10 p.m. Ah! well the first day is nearly over anyway. I hear that C Squadron when charged with the same offence were only awarded 2 days, there will be a do about this, the sooner we are off jankers the better.
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[underlined] Wednesday 16th Sept. [/underlined]
My jankers have finished, so short & sweet they were too. As I [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] prophesied there was a moan over C Squadron only getting 2 days & us 4, & it had its results this morning. We were on drill in Warrior Sq when old Stuttaford came round & called us out. In a big hearted tone he told us that owing to our rooms being very clean (he'd moaned about them the day before) he would let us off the last 2 days jankers. Quite an amusing effort on his part to save his face. Still we didn't bother to query the if's & buts we were off and that's all that mattered.
I nearly dropped in for it again this afternoon though – in fact I'm not sure whether I have or haven't. Being Wednesday afternoon I went to the Messing meeting and made the usual complaints over the food, which has improved considerably but is still fairly bad. After this I found everyone was down in the garage
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on Armaments, not feeling like this, I went up to my room & dropped my biscuits & pillow out on to the balcony & lay out there reading a pile of Daily Mirrors.
I heard footsteps in the building but took no notice of them, happening to look up I saw Stuttaford gazing, horrified at me. Boy! I thought here's where I really get it, opening the door he screamed "Come in here", there followed quite a scene, & finished by him shouting for Sgt. Tasker [?] to take my name & no. Tasker [?] was decent & he may do something for me, I hope so anyway.
Think I'll go to the cinema with Bob & Bill, "They Died with their Boots On" is in Hastings. This course or farce of a course is getting pretty binding, I'll be glad when its [sic] over I know the Sten Gun inside out. The Sgt. Pilots & Observers who take us are as cheesed as we are, so its [sic] a fine state of affairs
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[underlined] Monday 21st Sept. [/underlined]
Events moved fairly quietly up to the weekend, I was never charged for being on the balcony, so I guess old Tasker was able to get it "washed" [?] he's a decent old stick. I felt sorry for Taffy he had a pass for the week end & had arranged with his girl, for her to travel from Birmingham to London & he would meet her there. Then on Wednesday Stuttaford came round in an even worse temper than usual, and swore his mug (that is displayed on the bed lay out) was dirty. It wasn't much good arguing with him, Taffy was awarded 3 days 'jankers', Thursday, Friday, & Saturday. So he lost his weekend pass as well, & had to wire his girl, cancelling the arrangements – all that just for a drinking mug – reputed to be dirty, its [sic] funny what swines there are in the world. I'm gonna fight like hell for a pass on Oct 16th as Don and Betty are being married & I must be there.
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This morning what I had been expecting to happen did, it was like this:- The morning was devoted to a swimming parade in White Rock Baths, an event which was appreciated by all, even though we did have to pay 6d each to get in. We paraded promptly about 8.45 a.m. in the little street at the rear of Marine Court & away we marched. As usual we marched through the streets of the town & then out onto the promenade by Warrior Sq. Hardly had we marched onto the prom, when there was a roar of aero engines, which made us look out to sea hastily. There was a low lying mist which suddenly parted & two F.W. 190's flying about 20 ft above the water rushed in. Luckily they were between us & Marine Court, consequently being unable to fire upon us without altering course. Before we had time to move at all they lifted off the water & each released, the 500 Kgm bomb, they had slung underneath, at
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Marine Court.
There was a minor explosion as one entered, but being on D.A. we took advantage of the delay to dive for cover, then with a roar it exploded. The other missed the building & exploded in the small park behind. Everything had happened so swiftly & with such surprise that not a shot was fired at the raiders. We continued on to the Baths, but all agog to get back & see what had happened. As we turned onto the gradient next to Marine Court, we observed that the 7th, 8th, & 9th floors, above the dining hall were blown in & quite an amount of damage done to the 10th, quite a lot of damage for one bomb, but it wasn't a very solid place, more for show in summer time. I must record here, our true feelings when we saw the damage, onlookers standing around apparently expected us to burst into tears, but if they had, had the time we did there I daresay they would have acted the same.
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We cheered, & meant it, and cries of "Bullsh– Mansion Gone at Last", & Critchleys Palace Destroyed", (Critchley was reputed to have shares in every place we were billeted) greeted the night. One dear old soul gazing at us, & apparently hard of hearing for she couldn't have heard our remarks, said loudly "Ah! the 'boys' will get their own back for this", needless to say the 'boys' received this with obvious merriment. Bob, Bill, & myself had dinner in a cafe we weren't intending to hang around for hours, upon returning we were told to go down to the car park in the basement. Here lots of salvaged equipment was heaped & we settled down. Each floor was ordered upstairs in turn to clean their rooms or what was left of their rooms. At last came the 7th & up we trooped, [?] glad at last to get a look at what was going on.
Some boys on the salvage party were having a fine time slinging stuff around. Our room wasn't damaged except for a few cracks & the door
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blown in. We staggered up & down to the basement (9 floors in all) carrying kit bags & bedding, until we were cheesed & skived off for a rest. Leaning on the balcony of the 11th we watched the demolition party at work. The street below that we had paraded in 15 mins before Jerrie's arrival, was covered with large [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] blocks of stone & debris, so I'm glad they insisted on punctuality there. Anyway the demolition party were throwing pieces of stone etc. onto the pile and amusing themselves & the onlookers by aiming them at a lamp standard underneath, & in this way succeeded in completely ruining it.
About 5 p.m. we were told to parade on the prom, & were then marched past Warrior Sq about 110 yds. to the Eversfield Hotel which was our new quarters. It was a dark & dingy place, and we didn't like it as much as Marine Court, but Taffy & I got a room to ourselves, with our own wash bowl, quite lucky. Naturally our first action was tea, then unpack & well here I am
[page break]
[underlined] Friday 25th Sept. [/underlined]
I am writing this amidst constantly changing surroundings – on a train. You see, we settled down to normal work again on Tuesday lessons in the Victoria Hotel once more, & apart from numerous clothing parades for those who had to be re-kitted, & wangling of kit by a good few more everything went on the same. The C.O. came & shot an awful line about the bombing happening, because a few had disregarded orders & gone out on the balconies when a reconnaissance plane had come over at 25,000 ft a couple of days previous. He apparently overlooked the fact, that on the day of our arrival he himself had told us the Hun would know we had arrived. Even if this was so, he greatly under rated the German Secret Service (particularly active in Hastings), & also I would have liked to have met the fellow who could see a human being from 25,000 ft. Well everything was O.K until yesterday & I went to a messing committee meeting at Marine Court & had hardly returned to Eversfield when with a roar, 11 F.W's or ME 109's roared past the window about 30 fit off the deck. A few
[page break]
seconds later came the clump of exploding bombs, getting nearer, I ducked & waited. Nothing happened, so I looked out of the windows again, the raiders were already well out to sea, & three others who had been circling round in the sun ready to take a hand if any of our boys came along joined them.
About 11 bombs had been dropped, three up on the hill leading to the sports field one on a blind home, two by the Victoria Hotel, and three in Warrior Sq, where I had been a minute before. A single V.G.O. was mounted at each end of Marine Court, & one fellow got off a good few rounds at them – a good show. Unfortunately not like the Monday, when nobody was injured there were a fair few civilian deaths & casualties, also our boys didn't escape. They had been marching back from football, when they were spotted, a F.W dived & let his bomb go on the houses nearby & two others side slipped to roof top height & opened with cannon & machine gun. I think about 6 chaps were killed & 30 injured, it was a swine being unable to strike back.
[page break]
'Nobby' Clark appeared in the mess last night & said he had contacted the A.M. & we would leave Hastings as soon as possible. He was right too, they woke us up at 3 a.m. this morning & we packed, hung around & had breakfast & then left at 6.30 a.m. It was a 4 mile walk to the station – to carry 2 loaded kit bags it was impossible, I carried them for a bit, then dragged one, & finally sat down by the road with some others, really worn out. P/O Stuttaford came along carrying a suitcase (he had sent 6 fellows down to the station with his stuff) and shouted at us like pigs to get moving, my blood boils when I think of it. We struggled on for a bit, & then rested again - he screamed at us again then a Sgt took pity & said he'd take charge of us, & we hopped on a bus. We got in the troop train, I think there were about three and at 8 am. we moved off, our destination is secret, [deleted] [one indecipherable word] [/deleted] but everyone knows it is Harrogate. It broke my heart to travel through old London, & not be able to get out. We stopped for a 1/4 hour about 2 miles from Mary's place, we expect to arrive in Harrogate about 5 p.m.
[page break]
[underlined] Tuesday Sept 29th [/underlined]
I certainly get around I'm writing this at Manchester & am on a draft at last. We were billeted in the Grand Hotel at Harrogate, & received us so well that after 13 hours on 2 sandwiches & an apple, they gave us two slices of bread, no butter, & a few pieces of cheese – a fine supper. People hear of the glory of the R.A.F. its [sic] a pity they don't hear how they train aircrew. I was put on a draft right away with 18 others, & we spent Saturday getting kitted out & wasting time. I am glad I shan't be staying in this hotel, it used to be a WAAF's billets. [sic] There is plenty of 'bull' here, polished floors & everything, lights put out with a master switch & everything. Saturday afternoon we looked round the town, it wasn't a bad place, high prices & queues & everybody endeavouring to forget the war, but bags of women, there being all the Civil Service, a WAAF & AT.S training place. I saw a girl I worked with before she was evacuated to Harrogate but didn't speak to her. We saw Abbott & Costello in " Rio Rita" in the evening.
[page break]
Next morning away we marched to the station, "Nobby" gave us a farewell talk, & W/O Roberts bound to the last, "Chiefy" Tate unbound a little but I doubt if the meant it. The journey to Heaton Park didn't take long and we arrived here Sunday afternoon & passed through the old familiar gates, we had a good meal upon arrival. As our so called embarkation leave was 3 months previous we were entitled to another 7 days & naturally expected to hear something about it. On Monday though we were paraded & marched straight off to camp co-operation. My God! nobody knew anything about us, the C.O apparently didn't want to see us, we could get no 'gen' from anyone, here we were on the point of going overseas & being denied a chance of saying cheerio to our people. Its [sic] funny how they can bugger you around when they fancy to. When we were entitled to leave & to be put on fatigues & told nothing that was too thick, its [sic] funny how C.O's appear devoid of human feelings. Well, we will just have to wait hear [sic] eating our hearts out.
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[underlined] Wednesday 7th Oct. [/underlined]
I am writing this aboard the Queen Mary now under the name of HMT 02. we came on board this morning. No leave was granted to us at all at Manchester, we hung around all that time & could have had 7 days leave easily. Nothing was done until the last two days, we did fatigues all the time. Pat Kinsella had an interview with the C.O regarding leave, but was told it wasn't definite how long we would be at Manchester, how delightfully vague, still I guess there is no good crying over spilt milk.
We were allowed out into town for the last afternoon and had to report back fairly early. There followed the same old roll calls and a fine supper, just the same as when we went to Hastings. We entrained just after midnight, at Heaton Park, & being a troop train it was crammed as usual with little ventilation. We travelled through the night & arrived at our port at 8.30 am.
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Our port of embarkation was Greenock & we stood by on a tender for a couple of hours, engrossed in the busy scene on the Clyde. Every variety of naval craft, destroyers, corvettes, transports, cruisers, an aircraft carrier, & scores of landing craft dodging about, truly a busy scene. At last we moved out to our transport which we could see was a large one, & by hookey! it was a size when we got alongside. We passed in through a door way down in her side, & were given a berth number. In each cabin, they used to be single or double I should imagine are 12-15 bunks, pretty crowded, its [sic] a lovely ship though. The dining hall is colossal, one can't imagine they are afloat, we shall have that fact borne upon us, after tonight I guess as we sail then.
I'll close this now & on my next entry we will be a 1,000 miles away from land. This closes this book, and my next one will be about our trip and my experiences over in Canada.
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CONCLUDING BOOK 2 AND FINISHING MY GROUND TRAINING IN ENGLAND.
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[Faint handwritten dates on outside of back cover]
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
Book 2, Commencing my Flying Training and my Adventures up till the time of Leaving England
Description
An account of the resource
Second of David Geach's diaries, describing his training for aircrew at Kingstown, Heaton Park, Hastings and Harrogate until his embarkation to Canada on the Queen Mary. Covers the period from 20 June 1942 to 7 October 1942.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
David Geach
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One handwritten diary
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Diary
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
YGeachDG1394781v3
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Carlisle
Scotland--Perth
England--Manchester
Scotland--Dumfries
England--Stourbridge
Great Britain Miscellaneous Island Dependencies--Isle of Man
England--Reading
England--London
England--Hastings
England--Harrogate
Scotland--Greenock
Canada
Scotland--St. Andrews
England--St. Leonards (East Sussex)
England--Berkshire
England--Sussex
England--Worcestershire
England--Lancashire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-06
1942-07
1942-08
1942-09
1942-10
Publisher
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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
Joy Reynard
David Bloomfield
aircrew
bomb aimer
bombing
entertainment
Fw 190
gremlin
ground personnel
Me 109
mess
military living conditions
military service conditions
navigator
Navy, Army and Air Force Institute
Nissen hut
observer
pilot
RAF Heaton Park
sport
training
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/834/18899/YGeachDG1394781v5.2.pdf
10162827a32d552c966e4454065fa9f0
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
Geach, David
D Geach
Description
An account of the resource
<a href="https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/218400/"></a>52 items. The collection concerns Warrant Officer David Geach (1394781 Royal Air Force) and contains his diaries, correspondence, photographs of his crew, his log book, cuttings and items relating to being a prisoner of war. After training in Canada, he flew operations as a bomb aimer with 623 and 115 Squadrons until he was shot down 24 March 1944 and became a prisoner of war. He was instrumental in erecting a memorial plaque to the Air Crew Reception Centre at Lord’s Cricket Ground in London. <br />The collection also contains a scrap book of photographs.<br /><br />Additional information on his crew is available via the <a href="https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/218400/">IBCC Losses Database.</a><br /><br />The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Harry Wilkins 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
2016-03-14
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Geach, DG
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[blank page]
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GOVERNMENT OF CANADA
NO. 288
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[underlined] Wednesday 17th March. [/underlined]
Back in England again, gee! its great to be home, I don’t know how fellows must feel being overseas 10 years or so, 8 months was enough to make me feel really thrilled at the sight of old England again. Beg pardon! I should have said Scotland, for it was up the firth of Clyde we slipped and anchored off Greenock. It was a nice morning & the fields & hills looked really pleasant in the sunshine. As we slid along we were shot up by Hurricanes and Martletts from the Auxiliary Aircraft Carriers. There were quite a few of the latter, converted merchant men turned into A.C. Carriers, quite large some of them. Beside this, the usual swarm of naval craft lay around. Destroyers, & corvettes slipped past, & occasionally the sleek black hulk of a submarine would slide along; in the distance. There was a Catalina station, with quite an amount of activity going on. One of the “Cats” landed quite close to us in a flurry of foam, nice looking jobs! We anchored just by three aircraft carriers & the modern battleship Howe, there was quite an amount of Aldis flashing, but far beyond our limited 8’s. I was glad I was on guard as I had a fine view, whilst all the others weren’t allowed up on deck.
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We docked on the 15th about 3 pm and it was 24 hrs. before we got off her. Being as there were no large docks as at Boston & New York everyone had to be taken off in lighters, & there were a good few thousand to go ashore. The lighters seemed like little toys alongside the Queen Elizabeth, although in reality they were quite large two funnelled vessels. Pumping oil in was a large tanker she really was a size, a smart looking American ship, with the T of the Texaco Oil Coy. on her funnel covered by the grey war paint. We struggled into the boat in full webbing lugging the kit bag, that everyone had crammed with cigarettes, chocolates, cosmetics, & heaven knows how many with stockings, for everyone at home. Quite a delay ensued before the lighter was packed to capacity, then away she went. My God as we passed alongside the Q.E. we could get an idea of her size, she was immense. As we drew further away, & saw the cluster of ships around her, dwarfed to doll size, looking like a duck with a swarm of ducklings we realised what a prize it would make for Jerry U Boats. No wonder they had claimed to have sank her, that made us laugh when we were on it. She really had a rakish cut, though, and as we neared the dockside, gazing back through the [deleted] Deff [/deleted] half mist, I was glad I had had the opportunity of travelling on the two largest ships afloat.
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On the dockside we had the inevitable hours wait with packs, full webbing on, but being as it was our priviledge [sic] to moan we indulged in it to the full, & were cheered by it. The troop trains were drawing away and at last our turn came. Comfortable seats were taken, our mass of webbing crowded everything out of the way but nobody worried away we [deleted] wend [/deleted] went, into a lovely drizzling evening, it may sound dim, but were we glad to see the rain again, after months of continuous snow without a drop of rain. It must have appeared depressing to the Canadians, raining on their arrival, bearing out tales of the island when it always rains, that they had heard, but to us it was home & heaven. Everyone waved out of windows & from streets as we slid along, everything was so friendly. Some of the fellows tackled the canned rations they had of Beans & Hash etc. but I stuck to the Biscuit & Sweet ones. Into Glasgow we rattled, onto Edinburgh when the NAAFI gave us tea on the platform, & so to Harrogate. Here we were assembled in the [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] dim light & pushed into lorries & away we went to Pannel Ash, three miles out of Harrogate to a large school. Here we whizzed around getting bedding & filling forms and having an eagerly awaited breakfast. However I am getting tired so I’ll continue in my next entry.
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[underlined] Sunday 21st March [/underlined]
As I said we arrived here at Pannel Ash, about 5.30 AM. on the 17th & they told us to be on parade at 8 A.M. to start the whirl of kitting, form filling and heaven knows what else before we went on leave. It sounded a line of bull to us, but the magical word leave was enough to keep us moving. We rapidly discovered that there were two of the biggest b-s I have seen here, & the two most influential. No 1 the C.O. and No 2 the W.O. I can truthfully say the C.O. or Sqdn/Ldr was the most illiterate fellow I have ever seen holding a commission. They say [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] he was an N.C.O. pre-war & just got a lucky push. The W.O. vies with him for our hatred, he is a fat red faced guy & a real nasty piece, just loves to catch one of us N.C.O’s with something wrong. It is something like a Gestapo purge, they are [deleted] [indecipherable letter] [/deleted] possessed with the idea, that because we have come back from overseas we are no longer fit for aircrew, are a pack of scare-crows, are unruly & undisciplined etc. etc. Admittedly the Guards could give us a few points on smartness but hell! we haven’t had time to get back into the rut of drill again. Our job doesn’t depend on whether we can drill smartly either, a point which they always try to hammer in.
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We have whizzed about filling in reams of forms, kitting up to the English scale once more, this was a scream Some of the fellows had thrown away nearly all their service kit in order to make room for their presents, & they certainly had some 664B action. When they can’t think of anything for us to do, we drill, with the C.O. binding continually. The latest purge is haircuts, & as mine hasn’t been trimmed for about 6 – 7 weeks I’m right in the line of fire, guess I’ll need a lawn mower on my mop. On the evenings that we can get away we generally walk into town to see a show, the trouble with this town is it is [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] lousy with aircrew. When we first arrived we were so tired that we got some bed hours in, & wrote letters with the old 2 1/2' stamp on again. It was quite good to write a letter, & in a couple of days get a reply come buzzing back. The family & Mary had a surprise as they didn’t think I would be home for a couple of days, Mary is trying to get leave at the same time as myself. We should be going on leave pretty soon now, yippee! will we hit the high spots, & guess I’ll be glad to hand over their presents after lugging them quarter way round the world & guarding them, ah! well it wont [sic] be long now.
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[underlined] Thursday April 8th [/underlined]
Time certainly has flown by, but in a glorious fashion, since I made my last [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] entry. In the last couple of days we got packed, stowed our flying kit, & personal kit in the in the cellars & were all ready to move. The great day was Wednesday the 24th. and the coaches came to take us to the station. All the A.G.’s had gone a couple of days before, but only for 7 days, as they needed them, I felt sorry for them as we were all getting 14. After some waiting the train drew in, & we piled in heartily, it was well organised, all the London fellows were in one train those going South, Portsmouth etc in another, & Midlands & North a third. We got a good seat & old Fred Porce was opposite me so we arranged to travel on the Met to Plaistow together. On the journey we dozed & ate a little of the rations, & thought & made plans of what we would do on leave, then finally we drew into London, bang on! Fred had a monster kit bag crammed with tinned goods, & it certainly was a weight, we both had to drag it along to get on the Met. Sinking into a seat, not daring to remove our packs, for fear we wouldn’t get them on again, we soon became wedged, & I had the devils
[page break]
own job to struggle out, when we reached my station. It was really great to get home again, there was a great welcome, everyone saying things together & I know, I forgot lots of the things I wanted to tell them. Mary & my sister certainly were enthusiastic over the cosmetics, most probably be run in for hoarding.
Leave time as usual simply whirled by, shows & films, different people to see, & places to go. I saw Frank Pritchards mother, apparently I just missed him at Greenock, he went back on the Queen Elizabeth, they must have embarked the morning after we disembarked. Life always seems to be like that just missing people, well, I hope he likes Canada, one thing he won’t get the hellish winter conditions I had. I could kick myself missing the mildest winter England had for 17 years, & catching the coldest Canada had for 19 years. Anyway time flew, & yesterday it was time for me to return, they ran a special train for us, good show, & at 5 PM I met Norman & all the boys, & back we travelled swapping stories of leave. Harrogate once more, & in the Grand Hotel, where we were billeted when we arrived from Hastings, & so here I am.
[page break]
[underlined] Wednesday 14th April [/underlined]
We are ‘squaddied’ now, (placed in a squad) and waiting for the lectures to commence. Still the memories of our leave keep coming back to torture us, in heaven knows when we will be home again. Won’t be till after O.T.U. I’d wager, some fellows say we get some after AFU but I doubt it. Most of the fellows here whilst they are waiting for a posting are sent to Whitley Bay on a 4 week Commands Course with the RAF Regiment, I don’t quite know whether I relish the idea or not. The first few days we were back we didn’t do anything merely route marches, occasionally if we had a decent fellow in charge we would lay down in a field for the afternoon, but that wasn’t often. That state of affairs rarely lasts long however & we were soon put in a squad and commenced lectures. These are held at the Majestic Hotel, & we parade and march there each morning and afternoon. The lectures themselves are the same as they are anywhere the inevitable Signals, Armaments, Aircraft Rec, & Bombing Theory, they certainly cheese us, & I have a hell of a job to keep awake.
[page break]
There is quite a bit of P.T. as well, & we always have to run up to the Crag or thereabouts then turn off, for a general town of Yorkshire, around 5 miles or so. A fellow who was already in our room when we arrived, (a pilot on singles) is on the permanent P.T. squad, this is a hell of a racket. You are put on this when you have finished all the lectures. They parade in the morning in P.T. kit, or more often than not trousers, vest & jacket, then after roll call, go for a run by themselves to the Cing Café & sit there gazing at the view, & eating scones & supping tea till nearly dinner time, then they trot back for their midday meal. In the afternoon they repeat the process, maybe add a game of football, if they feel energetic, always ensuring that they finish in plenty of time for an early tea, & a quick get away to the cinema. Still you can’t blame them, they’ve been here nearly four months & I’d be really fed up.
Looking around at the thousands of aircrew here, & hearing of the thousands of Canadians & Australians at Bournemouth it amazes me. All these aircrew hanging around waiting to get onto operations and they can’t, & it goes right to the
[page break]
bottom of the ladder, to the fellow just joining up for aircrew who has to wait nearly a year after he has been accepted, to get into the RAF. If only we could clear the bottlenecks & get all these fellows on ops’ what a mighty bomber fleet we should have. Surely it isn’t the shortage of aircraft, we should be turning out enough by now. It must be a bottleneck at O.T.U. & AFU & not enough to cope with the flow of crews, or the most likely explanation they have been piling up here, owing to there being limited flying during the winter. I daresay there will always be the same situation here, though. As for myself I’m quite content, we have a decent room, Norman, Henry, Jack, & Ron & myself all together. There’s a wash basin in the room & a bath room next door, which is good. The food isn’t bad either, it is a rush for meals now that we are on [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] lectures. There isn’t much to do in town but go to the cinema I have been six nights running, but there’s nothing else available. One thing about coming in at night the lights are switched off at 10.30 PM by a master control, so we always creep in, in the dark, stumbling over things. Rumours of leave here are as prevalent here as at any other posting centre, but after a while we discredit them all.
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[underlined] Wednesday April 21st [/underlined]
Norman, Harry & myself are still here, but Ron & Jack are at Whitley Bay now, getting that cave man complex on the North Sea now. The went off in the traditional RAF style full webbing etc, & kidding us about our getting posted up there when they had nearly finished. Us not to be outdone assuring them, that there was an AFU posting on the way & they were merely clearing the dim ones out. I wouldn’t mind betting we’re “joes” though & get sent up there shortly. In the meantime we are just continuing with lectures, we have had one period of wet dinghy drill. We went in the swimming baths, belonging to a school, now occupied by the Civil Service. Being as the changing accommodation in the boxes is inadequate a lot of fellows changed on the spectators seats at the far end. There are a lot of full length windows, & as the boys changed & stood there in the altogether, quite a lot of the female Civil Servants opposite found a sudden lack of interest in their work. We have to don full flying kit and Mae Wests, & as a crew jump in & swim to the dinghy & climb in. It wasn’t so bad in the water, but when one went to climb into the dinghy, their weight
[page break]
soaked, with water, became apparent, & it really was a struggle to get aboard.
I have been with Norman to visit his Aunt & Uncle living here. His Uncle is in the Civil Service & took us to their club they have on the Ground Floor of a Hotel. Its a nice place with refreshment bar, dance hall, games & card rooms, we went to a nice dance there the other day. It is so nice to meet someone like that, because Harrogate is a hell of a place if one knows nobody. Being as it is crammed full of aircrew & soldiers, every place of entertainment is bound to be packed. There is nowhere to go but the cinemas really cos the dances are pretty dear. Most probably with the idea of keeping the services away, because the citizens really resent the troops being here, & hate the war being forced on them. It really is a “Forget the War”, town. The solitary Y.M.C.A. & a couple of small Forces Canteens do sterling service, but are overwhelmed & can’t cater for all their customers This leaves the troops at the mercy of the money grabbing café owners. The Copper Kettle being one, 2 small sausages & a few chips being 3/6’, out of an ordinary soldiers 2/6 a day its not even funny. Yes this town certainly wants re-organising & a few of the rackets squashed.
[page break]
[underlined] Tuesday 27th April [/underlined].
We are on the point of recommencing our flying in England we have arrived at our Advanced Flying Unit, at Bobbington near Stourbridge. So we did steal a march on Ron & Jack after all, I bet they are annoyed about it, but still most probably they will be posted soon. They called us all out together all our little clique, & when they said Bobbington we jumped for joy as most of us are Southerners and didn’t fancy going up North again. There was quite a dash around & quite a bit of bull with kit inspections & parades, clothing parades, & Heaven knows what else. Bags of waiting around & queuing as usual, arguing and scrambling for different things. At last all was done & our kit was left downstairs in the lobby ready to go next morning. We went out in the town to have a last night celebration, I am a bit sorry now that I have left there, as it was pretty good there, and I had some decent times with Norman’s Uncle & Aunt. Still there it is the training system doesn’t worry about individuals, & it is the only way I guess. Anyway after that last night we staggered in rather merry & noisy stumbling through the pitch black corridors of the hotel.
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Up the next morning bright and early, early anyway I dunno so much about the bright. With bull to the last we had to parade in full webbing and march to the station. We got fixed up on the train O.K. & commenced our first stage of the journey to Leeds. It was crazy weather, raining like anything, when we arrived at Leeds we were going to have a stroll around but the weather deterred us. The train to Birmingham was crowded & although we had a carriage reserved, bags of civilians crowded in & as there were elderly women & women with babies, we gave them the seats, but boy! was it a squash. At Birmingham we darted around unloading the kit & dashing over to another platform to catch the Wolverhampton train. We were beginning to look like porters after lumping the kit around all the time. The train had to wait a few minutes until we had loaded everything, the guard was a bit peeved but there was nothing he could do. Off we bowled and then found we had left Norman behind, nothing could be done then so on we went. At Wolverhampton there was a lorry waiting so we loaded it all on & climbed on the kit. We were rather shaken by the distance we were from the town through miles of country lanes until we finally arrived here.
They say that first impressions are often misleading, & I hope so, because our first impressions of this place is that it is a bloody awful station. We are in a damp Nissen hut with a concrete floor, that clouds of white dust rise from on the slightest stir of anything. Being ‘pupils’ as we are termed we aren’t allowed to eat in the sergeants mess, they say it isn’t large enough. We may go into there for letter writing etc. after 5.30 P.M Our meals are in the airmen’s mess, and we queue up amongst all the a.c’s and it is no exaggeration that we get less food than them. I have experienced it many a time the WAAF has given the fellow in front a ladle full, & had one ready for the next chap. Then looking up & seeing they are aircrew they tip half of it back. The mess is terrible and so is the food. All this we have found out in our few hours of being here, tomorrow we start the course. Our ablutions is a place not finished, no bowls or mirrors, just a line of taps containing freezing cold water – grim isn’t the word for it. By all accounts aircrew are disliked on this station by all & sundry from the Groupy downwards, we meet him tomorrow. – Norman has just rolled in he followed on the next train, had quite a shock when he found we had gone.
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[underlined] Sunday May 2nd. [/underlined]
We have been here long enough to dislike the place entirely, & the sooner we leave here the better for all of us. On our first day we met the W/O in charge of the school, Alves his name is, & we didn’t take much of a liking to him. He gave us quite a few warnings with a long list of “Donts”, [sic] & impressed upon us how the “Groupy” disliked aircrew and was always ready to catch them out, then he marched us off to see the big noise himself. All the time he was marching us along in threes he was binding “Stop that talking”, and “Swing those arms”, just like the old I.T.W. back again, it gets a bit cheesing at this stage. We had the ‘welcome’ address in the station cinema a rather bare place that is still undergoing completion. The Groupy bore out all the stories we had heard about him, a rather mean faced individual. During the talk he broke off three times to tear a strip off a poor M.T. driver who had the misfortune to be starting his lorry & drowning the old man’s voice, what a type. Quite a lot of his talk was devoted to the subject of WAAF’s we weren’t to go around with them or associate to any given extent, & if he caught anyone near the WAAF site it would be too bad. Anyone would think it was a convent here, still from what I’ve seen of the WAAFs here, I can’t see anyone wanting to associate with them.
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Our day is quite a long one here, we rise & have our icy wash then dash over to the airmen’s mess to queue for our “breakfast”. Back to the hut to dash around making up our beds & sweeping the floors, then on parade at the unearthly hour of 7.45 A.M. Even at I.T.W. we went on parade at 8 A.M. nowhere have I seen it as early as this, a quarter of an hour doesn’t sound very much, but one can pack an awful lot into it in the morning. Lectures are from 8 AM. to 10.15 then a quarter of an hours break, lectures from 1.30 to 5 P.M. a half hour for tea, then back for an hours lecture 5.30 to 6.30. The latter is the worst of all I think, we have to dash from the classroom to the mess, which takes about 6 mins, queue for our meal, bolt it down then dash back to the classroom, all in half an hour, we’ll all be suffering from indigestion before long. Unless the instructor taking us is willing to let us off a little early then we are unable to catch the 6.30 p.m. bus into Stourbridge.
Each day we have an hours P.T. & there is a mad F.O. for the P.T. officer, at least we call him mad, he is one of these very keen types he used to be a champion swimmer before the war. The first
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time we went over the assault course, it was pretty gruelling. Twice round a half a mile track then into a veritable maze of climbing over walls, crawling under wire, balancing along poles ten feet high. One part was swinging along on a single rope across a pond until we were able to wrap our legs around a tree & pull ourselves in. The P.T. instructor a Cpl that was showing us got about three quarters of the way across to the point where the rope sagged the most & there he fell in. He had his long blue P.T. trousers on too, boy! did we laugh, needless to say he didn’t join in. Twice we have been on hellish long cross country the P.T. officer being bang on at running cracks along at a hell of a pace. Then he binds us because we dont [sic] do so well & shoots the bull about being fit for flying etc. We bind him back, & tell him to have a crack at aircrew it is quite a scream. The trouble is we generally arrive back at about 12.45 & have to wash & dress & dash for dinner in three quarters of an hour, so invariably we arrive back late for classes.
The NAAFI here is a pretty good one, we have our break there, they have a good selection of cakes. In classes we are doing all the old familiar Bombing Theory over again, & using the Bombing Teacher. We do our flying on Ansons, seems we are never free from them, I’m really cheesed of winding that undercart up & down.
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Yesterday, May Day, was our day off, not because the RAF favoured the Labour Party, but it just happened that way. After quite a bit of wangling they finally granted us the priviledge [sic] of getting off an hour earlier [inserted] Friday [/inserted] There was a bus running at 5.30 P.M. & we went into town on that & there caught a bus to Birmingham, we were able to book beds at the Services Club that night. Jimmy Selkirk, Harry & I went out on the beer as Norman had gone by train to Oxford as his fiancé was there spending her leave. We eventually found a pretty low dive & finished the night there. The next day we wandered around for awhile, then went to a cinema, & travelled back on the 9 P.M. bus to catch the 10.30 P.M. from Stourbridge to the camp.
The other day we had our flight photograph taken, we all agreed to look cheesed in it, to register our disappointment of this place, & it came out pretty well. We have been to the station cinema here, they charge us 1/- it isn’t too bad, if only they didn’t have rows of old seats on the same level. Because if one is sitting a fair way back it is impossible to see over all the heads on the same level as yourself. I wonder if we will get leave after this place, I hope so, there are the usual rumours floating around, first we will then we wont, [sic] I guess we wont [sic] know till it arrives.
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[underlined] Sunday 7th May. [/underlined]
I should say roughly half our time has passed here, as most chaps remain here a [deleted] fortnight [/deleted] [inserted] month [/inserted] anyway roll on the next fortnight, & lets get to hell out of here. It is a fairly hum drum existence with the lectures & so forth. On Monday we had a pleasant diversion in the form of wet dinghy drill, in Stourbridge baths, I rather like it as we are able to swim about afterwards – Turning the large bomber dinghy over when one is in the water with full flying kit, will be some job in the North Sea, I reckon. It isn’t too bad in the baths, but then there is no rough sea or wind to contend with.
The F/Sgt in charge of us is a pretty good guy, pretty quiet, & got quite a bit of service in, he is thoroughly cheesed with the station. Beside the famous old Theory of Bombing lectures he takes us on the Bombing Teacher. We were up there the other day & looking from the open window, when old Alves went dashing past. Tom Alan commented “Old Alves is on the warpath”, boy! he must have had keen ears because he called us down & bound us rigid. For the Gunnery lectures there is an F/O A.G with a V.F.M. he is a Welsh chap, shoots a fair amount of lines, but is really a good type, his lectures make a welcome break. For the aircraft rec. there is a nattering little sgt A.G. who absolutely cheeses everybody, nobody likes him. The other chap a tall F/Sgt is a good egg though, livens up the epidiascope slides with an occasional nude woman.
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The map reading periods are O.K. too. the F/O who takes us did his tour out in Abyssinia, I believe it was on Valentine or some obsolete kites. Thinking of it, it must have been a pretty easy tour, but he is a good chap, a Flt/Lt D.F.M. who is also there, shoots bags of lines, but they are worth listening to & at this stage, we are ready to lap up all lines. A chap who ‘nattered’ to us the other day about ‘ops’ in the Middle East, said at the beginning of the campaign, the crack Italian liner Rex was in the harbour at Tobruk. They were briefed to attack & did so, but they were made to bomb with 25 lb H.E. naturally they were like pin pricks, & that night she whipped up steam & was away. An Air Commodore was slung out of the RAF for that. We went out on a lorry the other day for practical map reading, & drove around the lanes, stopped & had to find where we were & make tactical sketches. About three times we did this, & then had to change into our P.T. kit, that we had brought, leap out of the lorry & run the 3 miles back to camp. It rather reminded me of the hunt with the hounds leaping from the van & tearing down the road. We have been on Groupie’s parade, & he certainly is down on aircrew, the parade was a real bully one, bags of shouting & everything. He whizzed through the permanent staff without saying much, & when he came to us, he went really slow & bound practically everyone rigid, & the W.O. almost wore his pencil out, taking names.
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Yesterday was our day off again & once more we spent it in Birmingham. We were unable to get in at the Services Club & had to go to a large house converted into a hostel, it was pretty good. This week saw the commencing of our Flying here, I made three flights all day bombing exercises. The first one was Wednesday, & came off alright, there is a village fairly near the range & that made me twitter. It is a bit more awkward to bomb from the kite than from the Canadian Anson, because there is no perspex panel in the nose. Also the sliding panel is metal, not perspex, this necessitated having it always open, causing quite a draught. On Friday Harry Jamieson & I did two more flights with an ex-operational pilot F/O Ryan. It was pretty grim because he hadn’t the technique of the steady bombing runs, like the regular B.G pilots. The kite would be bouncing around necessitating us giving corrections & sometimes we would be nowhere near the target so we had to call ‘Dummy Run’. He would scream & bind & curse like the clappers, & said “It’s a bloody good job you’re not over a target”. That kind of stuff never gets anybody places though, & only leads to a bad exercise. We do a few of these Day Bombing trips, maybe some Night bombing, & then some Night Combined exercises. These are only cross countries but they give them the high sounding titles. We’re beginning to get really cheesed with all this training, no wonder chaps get stale, & lose all their interest & enthusiasm.
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[underlined] Friday 14th May. [/underlined]
Life still flows in its uninteresting way, we have done some map reading trips. We go on a small cross country of 3 legs, with the pilot & 3 B.A’s each who map reads one leg of the trip. They are O.K. if you get a decent pilot, who puts the Forces programme on the intercom, & is fairly tolerant with the map reading. I was up with ‘Taffy’ Evans & Norman Griffin the other day & we had a binder! Poor old Taffy chopped in the mire, by losing himself completely. The pilot was one of those tricky individuals who would fly the aircraft so a village was directly under the nose, & out of sight, & then ask you suddenly where it was. We coped anyway.
I had a good laugh the other day, whilst standing by in the flight hut for a day bombing exercise. There were a couple of chaps from the previous course there, also detailed for a bombing exercise. Like us all they weren’t very keen on it, but the antics of one of them kept me in fits. He was small with dark wavy hair, & a perfect cherub face, chubby rosy cheeks etc. looking about 17. Every few minutes he would pop to the door & gaze at the sky. Any cloud, no matter however small, was greeted with a beaming smile & the exclamation “Wizard” drawing out the last syllable, as it meant there was a faint hope of the exercise being cancelled.
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Whilst every time the sun burst forth he would scowl & slump disconsolately back in his chair, resigning himself to Fate. In the end they took off & so did we.
The lectures are still as binding & unvarying. Yesterday our “Chiefy” was taking us on Bombing Theory & although he is a good chap, he is a real lousy lecturer. Bombing Theory being one of the driest subjects in itself he succeeded in putting half the class to sleep in a quarter of an hour. Then a Sqdn/Ldr Education Officer from Group slipped into the room, & after listening for 10 mins, took over the lecture. For the next half hour, it even became quite interesting, & some points were cleared up, which I for one had been doubtful over for a long time.
So far rumours that we will not get leave at the end of the course have gained strength, I hope they turn out false. When the last few days arrive W/O Alves gives the Senior Man a list of the O.T.U’s to which we are to be posted & then the course is left to sort them out amongst themselves, I hope we get some decent ones.
Norman has had an old cycle of his sent up, it is quite handy for getting around on, and half the course use it. It might be a good idea to get one if I land on one of there really dispersed drones I hear about. I played a game of football earlier & am just beginning to feel the effects, so I’ll have supper at the NAAFI & turn in.
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[underlined] Thursday May 20th. [/underlined]
We had our day off on Tuesday, & a crowd of us caught the bus outside the camp into Wolverhampton. The morning was spent looking around the town & then after dinner in a nice little café we found a decent park & spent the afternoon. After tea in the Forces Canteen above Surton’s we got down to a steady pub crawl. I have never seen a place like it, for so many girls of 16 – 17 in the pubs. Old Pete Rawlings had quite an amusing encounter with one, but this is not the place to disclose it. Anyway after closing time, four of us wandered around in a happy stupor till we sobered up a little & realised we had better look around for means to return to camp. We finally phoned a taxi who took us right into the camp, & off we bowled to bed.
As far as the flying part goes we are on the last stages, that of day and night cross countries. I don’t know which one the greater bind the latter gets it by a narrow margin, I think. It will be a relief to get to O.T.U. & go on a really organised X country. So far I have been on two day trips & five ‘scrubs’, it is an inoffensive word – ‘scrub’, but conceals a lot. When we are due for a day X country we hand our names into the Guard Room & then at 5.30 or 6 AM an S.P. rudely awakens
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us, to tear off for early briefing, breakfast & take off at 8.30 A.M. – there are afternoon X countries but I haven’t had the luck to get on one yet. It is binding to get up, see the rain, & knowing in advance it will be scrubbed, tramp 10 mins through the rain to the briefing room, & wait until they inform you officially it is cancelled. Now we are getting wise & only two going up, one with Norman’s bike to nip back & arouse the others if by chance, flying is on.
On a night cross country, our main function is winding the undercart. Actually we are supposed to do some infra red bombing, but no-one has been known to see the target, the pilot hates stooging around, & the navigator is chomping to set course. Consequently we sit & shiver in the darkness, maybe once in a while giving a beacon position to the Navigator, or taking over the controls while the pilot dives to the back. We had a little excitement on one trip when the weather was closing in over the airfield when we returned, but we got in O.K. The only good thing about it is we sleep the next day, & it breaks the monotony. A kite crashed the other day killing the occupants, they weren’t on our course. The S.S.Q. backs onto our billets though & the blood wagon was outside with the bodies in while they were getting things ready inside. It was a fairly sobering thought, but I guess we shall see more of it, the closer we get to ‘ops’.
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[underlined] 25th May. [/underlined]
Once more a change of address, I am now at my O.T.U. at Hixon, Staffs, having arrived here today. Most of us came here, some went to Whitehead & four to Lossiemouth. ‘Taffy’ Evans has gone to Whitehead & ‘Buntie’ Rogers, Norman, Jimmy, Harry, & most of our clique are still together. Naturally the Lossiemouth posting wasn’t wanted, there being no Scots on the course, so it was drawn for, I thanked the Lord my name didn’t come out of the hat.
Anyway the usual clearance procedure was got through & we were driven by lorry into Wolverhampton this morning. There was a couple of hours to kill before the train & we spent them in town. Although the distance from Bobbington to Hixon isn’t so great as the crow flies it took us a few hours by train with the changing. Transport came out after we phoned from Stafford station, & I was surprised to find the airfield was 8 miles, out from the town, at least – somebody had told me it was nearer than that.
We are all in the same hut, they are not Nissan huts, but kind of asbestos boarding & wood, on concrete bases, much better & larger than the Nissan hut. Each collection of huts is called a site & given a number, the site with the mess etc. is called Command Site, these sites are dispersed over a wide area, & are a considerable distance from the airfield. Apparently a cycle is a very handy thing, Pete Rawlings has one now.
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A course arrives here every fortnight, & we are No 17 course. After nearly a fortnight of ground training terminating with exams, we commence flying, by this time we have ‘crewed-up’ of course. This is the stage where we crowd of Air Bombers will finally split up, because inevitably after each of us joins a crew we shall go about with them, I shall be sorry, because we have been together a long while, but this breaking up of friendships happens again & again in the RAF as ours is an odd course number (17) we move to the satellite airfield, Seighford, when we have completed our ground training & finish our O.T.U. there. It is situated the other side of Stafford & is more dispersed than this, but there is a lot less discipline, as chaps say who have been there.
As usual on arrival at a new place, we have been pumping all the fellows that we can find on the various aspects of the course, & every conceivable thing attached to it. We haven’t collected much ‘gen’ yet though, beyond the fact that we parade outside the mess, after breakfast tomorrow, with the rest of training wing personnel, & then the S.W.O. will march us to the Training Wing for roll call. Apparently this is an everyday procedure & is fairly strictly adhered to. I have written off the letters to home & Mary as usual on arriving at a new station, with the address & what gen is available, & now I’ll close this entry and get into bed I think, then tomorrow I’ll start one of my last stages towards a squadron.
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[underlined] June 1st. [/underlined]
Things have changed somewhat since I last wrote. I have just returned from a compassionate 48 hr pass, which I went on when I received some very bad news from home. The C.G.I. said that I would have to revert back a course, so I am staying here on 17 course, whilst the boys on 17 go over to Seighford. We would have broken up anyway so maybe it is just as well this way. They finish their ground training this week and then my course commences the following week.
This O.T.U. course lasts approximately 3 months, after the fortnights ground training, it is all flying training with an occasional lecture slipped in. Half of the time, (the first half of the 3 months) is day flying, & the other or second half night flying. The exercises are similar in each case, we commence circuits & bumps with an instructor, then after our pilot has flown solo with us as a crew, we complete our circuits & bumps without the instructor. Then day bombing with a ‘screened’ or instructor pilot & a ‘screened’ Air Bomber after the first exercise, we do the rest alone, there are quite a few of them too. The same procedure is followed for gunnery & fighter affiliation, although most of the actual firing exercises are done with four gunners & a ‘screened’ gunner in one aircraft. Then we do a cross country with a ‘screen’, & afterwards another couple by ourselves, each longer in duration.
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The same procedure is followed for night flying, as far as is practical. Then at the end of the course comes the pièce de resistance – a leaflet [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] or “nickel” raid on France. I hope we are able to do one, as sometimes the weather prevents it & crews do a “bullseye” instead. This is an exercise over England, combining Fighter Command & the ground defences, except ack ack naturally. It isn’t that I am all that keen to see what the other side of the Channel is like, but I think it affords quite good practise, before going to a squadron and the real thing.
From what I have seen of the actual station here it isn’t too bad. The mess is about 8 minutes walk from our site, & the food is pretty good, (a lot better than Bobbington anyway) it is laid out fairly well too, & the waitresses serve us sitting down. The ante room & billiards rooms are quite large, & the station cinema, isn’t too bad, they are improving the latter I believe. Getting in & out of Stafford is rather a snag, there is a liberty bus from the Guard Room of an evening, but we are required to book seats the previous day by dinner-time, & as we rarely know that far ahead if we are going in, it is generally by taxi that we arrive there. At the moment I am acting as runner in the Discip Office until the next course commences, I wonder what sort of chaps they will be. Pete Rawlins has crewed up with the pilot that I originally had, he seemed a decent chap.
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[underlined] 8th June. [/underlined]
Well, I have been on the course nearly two days now. There wasn’t much for me to do last week stooging around in the Discip. Office, so I was given a 48 hr pass over the weekend. So I said goodbye to all the boys as they moved over to Seighford during the week end, though I shall see Norman a couple of times in Stafford if we can arrange it. I was lucky travelling into Stafford, I had just come out of the Guard Room with my pass, when an MT Corporal said “Going into Stafford, Sarge?”. So in I travelled in style, lolling back in the Groupie’s car, the driver was going to meet the Groupie at the station.
When I returned yesterday I had expected to find the billet empty, but I had switched my things to the corner bed, just on the off chance, somebody might roll in. They certainly had – a whole room of Canadians, pilots, navigators, and Air Bombers. On the whole they seem a pretty decent crowd, pretty noisy, but full of life and really generous & anxious to be friendly, I like Canadians quite a lot, anyway. I had to smile, because as soon as they found I had been on the previous course, they kept asking me all sorts of ‘gen’ about the course, in exactly the same manner as I had done a fortnight earlier. It was precious little I could give them. Then today we started the ground work, it was exactly the same as my first few lectures on the last course, they follow a strict pattern here.
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[underlined] June 13th. [/underlined]
I have arrived at a stage which will play a most important part in my immediate future – I am crewed up. In a bomber a man’s life is wholly in the hands of his crew members, and the closer they are together, and the better they are as a team, then the more chance of survival they have. I [deleted] a [/deleted] had always understood that considerably rare, and quite an amount of time was allotted at O.T.U’s for the purpose of selecting crews. Hixon has proved the fallacy of it, everyone starts the course separately as a course of pilots, & course of navigators or Air bombers – W/Ops etc. They remain in their classes for the first lot of lectures and hardly have any chance of meeting the various other categories of air crew, the only chance being in the mess or the billet. Suddenly like a bolt from the blue it is announced that everyone must be crewed up in two days or else they will be allocated by the instructors into a crew. A mad flap then starts, people go wandering about, staring into each others faces, vainly trying to sum up whether a person will be an asset to crew up with – or otherwise. Having experienced this on the previous course, I thought it best to let matters take their own course.
Friday night, I was sitting in the mess, after writing a few letters, having a quiet drink & waiting for the sandwiches to arrive for supper. At the next table to me, were two Canadian
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pilots from my billet, McCann who slept next to me & Cecil Kindt who slept opposite McCann. They had been drinking for a while and were both pretty mellow, as Kindt went out to get some more drinks he [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] leant over me and said, “Mac said would you join him at the next table”, so I moved over to where McCann was sitting.
We chatted for a couple of minutes, then he asked if [deleted] [indecipherable letter] [/deleted] I was crewed up with anyone. When I replied in the negative, he said “Well how would you like to sling in with me, and be my bomb-aimer?” I rather liked him, and so I had found a pilot. Cecil Kindt returned with the beer and we had a drink to it. Well, I think I had better put on record my impressions of Mac, as he is always called, & the other crew members. Len McCann, though I’ve never heard anyone call him Len, is only about 5’ 4”, and almost as broad. He said he has lost a lot of weight over here, & that he weighed 220 lbs in Canada, so he must have been tubby. For his weight & size though he isn’t so very fat, he has some superfluous flesh but is extraordinarily thickset under it. The amusing part of him is his neck which is very short & seems almost as thick as his shoulders are wide, actually he takes an 18 1/2" collar. The other fellows often call him for no reason at all, just to watch him turn around.
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He cannot swivel his neck as we do, but has to lift his shoulder & turn as one would with a stiff neck, yet the action is not a slow one; he takes all the kidding in very good part. In features he strikes me as very similar to the comedian Lou Costello, having the same cheery round face & turned up nose. He had his hair cropped right short in Canada & now stands up in a mass of wiry black bristles. With a short bristly moustache this completed my description of Mac, with whom I shall be for long time – I trust.
I asked Mac if he had a Navigator, & when he said he had one in mind, I told him of another one, who seemed quite a ‘gen’ chap to me. He was a Canadian & Mac knew him & told me he was a real farmer, & that he always ‘nattered’ nineteen to the dozen, so we didn’t ask him. On my advice Mac tackled the navigator he had in mind, just in case somebody else should snap him up. Nobody had, and he became our navigator.
His name is Ken Price, also a Canadian, and I cannot give a better description than say he is the exact image of Gary Cooper. It may seem as though I am rather a film fan, but the resemblance is remarkable. He is tall & lean, very quiet and reserved, and seems a thoroughly decent chap all round. By all accounts, from what the other navigators say he is a darned
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good man at his job.
Then this afternoon Mac introduced me to the wireless/op. he had chosen. Bill Bowery is his name, and he is English coming from Sunderland. He seems quite a keen type and knows his gen, his broad “Geordie” accent tickles us, but it is nowhere near as broad as Jimmy Selkirk’s was, or others I have heard. In appearance, he is about 5’ 8” well set, with straight auburn hair, brushed down, he seems to have an expression as though puzzling or enquiring over something, & that may be a good thing. Anyway there are four of us now, we shall get a rear gunner in a day or so, & the five of us do O.T.U. together.
Mid/Upper Gunners do their Gunnery School somewhere and then join us at the end of the course, generally in time for the “Nickel”. As we are flying Wimpeys there is no accomodation [sic] for them, & it would be a waste of time their coming here all through the course. Also in Fighter-Evasion Tactics the Rear Gunner gives all the instructions, as the co-operation between the pilot & him is the result of their training at O.T.U. The remaining member of the crew, the Flight Engineer we will pick up at our Heavy Conversion Unit, and then we will be a full crew of seven. I hope the other three members will be as good as these, & we should have a rattling good crew.
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[underlined] Thursday 17th June. [/underlined]
On Monday we found ourselves a rear gunner. Mac had noticed a chap who looked pretty keen, but I had heard him ‘nattering’ away and didn’t go much on him. I had another one in mind, fairly similar in appearance to the above mentioned one, and pointed him out to Mac, so he told me to go ahead and contact him.
Nobody has asked him to crew up, and he agreed to pitch in with us. He is a pretty decent kid, he is only 18, I know I’m only 19 myself but he looks very young and he is only about 5’ 5” and slimly built. He is a Londoner and comes from fairly near me, the most important thing, he seems to know his ‘gen’ on gunnery pretty thoroughly. His name is Johnny Watson.
So there we are the five of us, who will do O.T.U. together as a crew and pick up the other two afterwards. Somehow I can’t help wondering sometimes what lies in store for us, and the ability of a crew counts for such a lot in emergencies. Still ours looks pretty good to me, even though it does seem rather early to say it.
At the moment we are completing our ground lectures, and then tomorrow we start our exams. They aren’t actually long ones, or terribly important, although if one makes a pretty poor showing they are liable to be put back a course. The only subject
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I am hazy on is gun turrets, I had hardly any instruction on them at B. & G. School, then here a couple of hours were devoted to it. As it happened I was at the back of a crowded class room, and the diagram being on the wall, well I just couldn’t see a thing.
We have had some lectures together as a crew although for the majority of them we remain in our aircrew categories. There is an old Wellington Mk I in the Airmanship Hangar, & is sitting on supports, so that undercart drill can be carried out. We scramble all over it, learning the positions of various things, petrol cocks, escape hatches, crash positions, oxygen bottles, dinghy releases, & a 101 other things necessary to learn in an aircraft. A couple of times we have scrambled out of it, on dinghy or baling out drill – hope I never have to use either. The Wimpey is a real battered old thing, but it was used for the “1,000 bomber” raid on Cologne. Apparently to make up a 1,000 aircraft they called on all the old kites at O.T.U’s & anything that could get airborne was used. If the public had only known some of the old kites that were used they would have had a shock.
The airmanship instructor, Sgt Peacock, did a tour on Lancs as a mid/upper gunner and saw quite a bit of action apparently. One would think he would at least get a crown at the end of the tour, but his is well overdue.
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[underlined] 21st June [/underlined]
‘Midsummer’s Day’ – it certainly has been glorious weather too, I’m afraid the long daylight evenings mean later day flying for us and consequently less evenings off. We officially started our Flying Course today, though our crew weren’t on today, we commence our circuits and bumps tomorrow.
The results of the exams were posted up today. I had done well in everything but Turrets, on which I made a horrible ‘boob’ – it was as I expected Macgillvray the Canadian pilot opposite me in the billet was cursing because his Bomb Aimer, another Canadian named Dodson, had come bottom in the B/Aimer course. Apparently Dodson is a bit of a woman chaser, & didn’t bother staying in to do any swotting for the exam. Macgillvray was giving forth “He wants to get down to some studying instead of getting on the nest so much”, and so forth. The most amusing part is that Macgillvray is one of the biggest wolves I’ve known. He has a stock of Tangee lipsticks & cosmetics, with a few silk stockings which he uses as bait for the women, - he says. I have never known him to part with anything in the fortnight he has been here & he has been with a couple of women. It is dead funny to hear Mac slang him about them, as Mac has very little time for women. He isn’t a misogynist but he just doesn’t bother. Anyway most of his remarks although screamingly funny are quite unprintable.
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We are all in ‘A’ Flight, a whole course comprises a Flight which goes round in strict rotation, as the courses commence Day or Night Flying. Our Flight Commander Sqdn/Ldr. Ford seems quite O.K. he gave us a welcoming natter, and was very much to the point regarding keeping the crew room tidy, punctuality etc. still he is quite right in stressing these points. This afternoon I squeezed in an hour’s practise on the Bombing Teacher. There is a system here where the various aircrew categories each have to put in so many hours practise on exercises relating to their own particular aircrew duties Bomb Aimers have to do 20 hours in the Bombing Teacher, 10 hours on the Link Trainer, and 6 hours operating a secret navigational instrument. Navigators have to spend quite a few more hours on this instrument than we do, and also take a certain number of astro-shots. W/Ops have to get [deleted] [indecipherable word] a stated number of Q.D.M’s fixes etc. & Gunners get so many hours, spotting turret training, and other exercises, I haven’t found out what the pilots do yet. All the exercises which are carried out on the ground, that is practically everyone’s except the W/Ops have to be fitted into our spare time. That is when we are hanging around the crew room & not flying, then we can nip across & tick off an hour in the Bombing Teacher or the Link. During the rest of the course, although we are flying most of the time, we still have some lectures, as crews on matters of general interest & importance.
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[underlined] 27th June [/underlined]
Sunday again – although it is very similar to all the other days of the week, here. We have a Church Parade, first thing, all the pupils fall in at Training Wing and then march to the airfield, along the perimeter track, to a temporary parade ground outside a hangar, its about 1 1/2 miles from Training Wing. Anyway all the station is on parade there, & we take our place, the Groupie then rolls up for the flag hoisting, inspection and so forth. The flag is flown on a double line & pully attached to the extension of the hangar roof, where the door slides back into. Today the S.P. that was doing the flag hoisting pulled the flag up O.K. then when he gave a pull to unfurl it at the top nothing happened. He pulled & pulled & still no joy, the poor devil got very red in the face as the Groupie was waiting to give the order “General Salute”. However there was nothing else for it, & shamefacedly he hauled it down, & not daring to risk it again, pulled it up already unfurled. After the salute we had to march off in squadrons to another hangar where the pulpit was an RAF lorry covered with the Union Jack and a piano, for hymn singing on. When this was over we were marched off dismissed, and then everything carried on as in a normal day. On all stations when flying is done there is no break for Sundays as they had in the peace time RAF, funny how one almost loses track of the days that way.
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Although we are still on the circuits and bumps stage we are about at the end of it, and will soon be onto some more interesting exercises. All of the crew except the Navigator fly on circuits & landings, & he is lucky not to, it gets pretty binding after the first hour or so. When we first started a ‘screened’ pilot flew with ‘Mac’ giving him the ‘gen’ and everything, and after a little while let him go solo. We were a little apprehensive, in case the short time given, wasn’t enough to let Mac become acquainted with the new cockpit layout. However everything went O.K. and then we continued on our own with circuits & bumps. It hardly seems as though we are off the ground before we are getting ready for the approach & landing. Some of the landings we bump up & down quite a few times & Mac [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] refers to these as the “Grasshopper Blues”. I sit in the collapsible seat, for the second pilot, & it is O.K. seeing everything that goes on, but I wouldn’t like to be in the W/Ops position, feeling the bumps & jarrings, without seeing what was what. For some of our circuits we go over to Seighford and do them there. Actually if we could fly continually we could do them all in a couple of days. However in order to make the aircraft go round, & keep all the crews at the same stage in training, we are allotted the same length of detail. Sometimes a crew does get ahead of the others by luckily striking good weather every time, & never scrubbing an exercise through snags.
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[underlined] July 4th. [/underlined]
American Independence Day – I expect all the Americans around here are making whoopee. There are always a lot in Stafford, they come from the large transit camp at Stone, a small town 6 – 7 miles from here. All American aircrew, I believe, entering or leaving the country pass through there.
We are making steady progress on the course, we have managed to get three bombing exercises done, we are a bit ahead in that respect but behind in Fighter Application & a couple of other things. As I said before it is a matter of luck sometimes the kites are U/S & that puts us behind on that type of exercise for a while, it pretty well evens up at the end though. On the first bombing exercise we went up with a ‘screened’ pilot & a ‘screened’ bomb aimer. Mac had never made bombing runs before, it is only pilots that have been instructors, & staff pilots at B & G schools who have that experience. The ‘screened’ pilot was there to instruct Mac on how to make the corrections of course, that I asked for, & various other little points. There wasn’t very much need for the ‘screened’ bomb aimer, as bombing is very similar on whatever aircraft one flys in. The main point, he was there to point out, was in the method of giving corrections of course. In Ansons the pilots could flat turn them, thus the sighting angle was practically round when you gave “steady”, and a good pilot could hold it practically as it was. However a Wellington has to have banked turns, consequently if the bomb
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aimer waits till the target is in the drift wires of the bomb sight & then gives “Steady” – the pilot flattens out and the target is then way off to one side, so it requires some practise to estimate when to say “Steady” thus making the target come into the drift wires when the pilot flattens out.
Poor old Mac has a hell of a time on run ups, he is so small that he can just see out of the windscreen. He watches the target whilst making his run up, & then when I give a correction, he slides down in his seat to kick the rudder bars, & his head is below the windscreen level, so then he has to pull himself up again to look out. He told us he is actually just under the height standard for a pilot but flannelled his medical.
We did a low level bombing exercise yesterday, & once more took up the two ‘screens’. My first bomb overshot by about 300 yds, & so did the next, I checked every setting on the bombsight, & all were correct, so I called the ‘screened’ bomb aimer & told him, & he could find nothing wrong. So I tried the third one & that was 300 yds overshoot again, then I realised I was taking a line of sight with the back & fore sights as for high level, whereas for low level bombing the back sight, & front beads are used. I told the screen & he told me to carry on & they would make the exercise a grouping one. That is by maths they discount the different sighting & work out where the bombs would have landed, using the front beads. The exercise came out to 47 yards so it ended O.K.
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[underlined] 10th July [/underlined]
The time is slipping past and we are well on the way to finishing our day flying. We had rather an amusing incident the other day, amusing that is to everyone but Mac. He always taxies rather swiftly & as we were passing the control tower, we reached the part where the perimeter track, dips a little. Consequently we gathered speed and started to swing, instead of throttling back & braking, Mac decided to open up the opposite throttle to swing us back. However he over-corrected and we swung back across the perimeter track & onto the grass the other side, in the direction of the runway. Again Mac opened the opposite throttle, and again over-corrected, & we crossed the perry-track once more & raced towards a hangar. Mac clamped on the brakes for all he was worth but it wasn’t enough, the hangar doors were fully open, & we struck the edge of them with our port main plane & sent them thundering across. It must have shaken the people inside to see the hangar doors suddenly move swiftly. From our point of view it was quite amusing, one moment there was hardly a soul [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] in sight, then with the same effect as if someone had kicked an ant-hill, people came pouring out from the hangar, & clustered around the kite. The pièce de resistance was the fact that we had cut clean through the ropes that held the Groupie’s flag & this was now drooped nonchalantly over our astro-dome. – Groupy took a dim view of it. Poor Mac sweated blood, but he only got a strip torn off, but the kite had a mains-plane changed.
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[underlined] 17th July [/underlined]
We had an enjoyable night in Stafford this week, as usual we got set into a regular pub crawl. Old Mac is all against this, he likes to get settled in at one pub and stay there all night drinking steadily. His words of wisdom are “Jeeze, you’re wasting valuable drinking time, going round looking for other pubs, - sit here”. I have never seen anyone drink so much, and affect them so little, it is amusing. He can knock back the pints and I have never seen him, what you might call drunk, merry yes, but inebriated – never. His personality is amazing everyone everywhere gets to know him, & all like him, he will sit and ‘natter’ with people for hours, and tell the most amusing stories of his life in Ottawa, and recount anecdotes of his numerous friends. He certainly is a tonic to have around. While we were in Stafford we saw the Gunnery Leader, he is an Aussie Flt/Lt, and a real lad when he is sober. Now he was out on the beer, evidently, & was strolling down the High St, with his hat on the back of his head, a dingy old battle dress on, & swinging, a gent’s black umbrella, rolled up (where he got [deleted] [indecipherable letter] [/deleted] it from I dont know). On his other arm was a real brassy blonde – he certainly doesn’t give a damn.
All our bombing exercises are finished and two of our three cross country trips, I have one more gunnery trip to do, and so has ‘Nipper’, thats [sic] what we call Johnny now. I rather like the Air Firing trips which are carried out in Cardigan Bay, then
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they generally fly to Rhyl, & fly at about 30 – 50 ft just a little way out from the shore. There are always lots of holiday makers there. Cecil Kindt had a strip torn off the other day, through an Air Firing accident. They were sent out over the Wash to fire so many rounds into the sea, this in itself is pretty boring and the gunners always look round for some sort of a target. His rear gunner spotted some sort of an old hulk and fired at it on a couple of runs. Apparently it was a wreck & their [sic] were a couple of divers, & salvage men working on it, & one leapt into the water, because of the bullets. God knows how the rear gunner didn’t see them, anyway they got the kite’s letter, phoned to the shore, & by the time Cecil landed the pressure had been put on Sqdn/Ldr Ford as he gave it to Kindt hot & strong.
Macgillvray has been providing laughs all round with his amorous adventures. Not so very long ago he met a nurse in Nottingham, a very nice girl by all accounts, a widow, anyway it wasn’t long before Macgillvray was staying at her flat. However he couldn’t get to Nottingham very much so he began associating with a WAAF Sgt here on the camp. One thing about him he admits openly what he is after, anyway she wasn’t that type, but after a little while with Macgillvray she was. Now she is crazy over him, & runs about after him, whilst he is very off handed. At the same time he meets an A.T.S. girl, on leave who lives in a house, a couple of hundred yards from our billet. It didn’t take him very long to string her along
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as well, so there he is with three strings to his bow at the same time – no wonder he looks a wreck. The amusing incident arose the other night when the WAAF Sgt saw him coming out of a corn field with this blonde A.T.S. She was furious & drinking with him the next night she said “Don’t let me see you with that – tart again,” which for her is a very strong word. Jokingly one night she said she was the “Three-hook Wonder”, hook meaning Stripes, Macgillvray, & Mac, who also knows her well, immediately changed it to the “Three-Hook Blunder,” & later cut it down to “The Blunder,” & so it has remained – poor girl.
They are a pretty decent bunch of fellows in this hut, we have had a little reshuffle in order to get crews together. Some of the original Canucks are in other huts, whilst Johnny, & Bill are now in here so we have all our crew. Macgillvray has his Navigator – Lance Weir, & his Bomb Aimer Dodson, both Canadians in here. Weir is a really decent chap, very quiet spoken, some of the boys kid him & call him “Toody-Fruit,” because he has a habit of rubbing talcum powder over his body. Frankie Allen, pilot, Yelland, navigator, & Tom Hughes – bomb aimer, all Canucks form another crew. Hughes is very decent, I have only one pair of pyjamas & when that was at the laundry he saw me dive into bed in the altogether, & asked the reason. When I [deleted] said [/deleted] [inserted] told [/inserted] him he tossed me a Canadian Comforts pair & said “Keep it, I’ve got five other pairs”, it was good of him. Their rear gunner Rose, an English chap is here, a small comical fellow, they call him John L. after the boxer Sullivan, because he wears long pants like him. Cecil Kindt, with Sam Small, navigator, and Macdonald, b/aimer, all Canadians, complete the hut.
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[underlined] 22nd July [/underlined]
We are now the senior course here, and have now moved on to become the ‘night-flying’ flight, tonight we expect to start our night circuits & bumps, some of the chaps commenced last night. They hoped to squeeze us a 48 hr pass in between the end of day flying & the start of night, but we were a little behind as a course through unavoidable incidents, so we had had it! I am sorry the day cross country trips are over, as I really enjoyed them, we generally flew to Rhyl, and I camera-bombed the pier. Then drill was done as if we were on an ‘op’ & that was our coast we were leaving. We then flew across to the Isle of Man which separated the enemy coast, & I would camera-bomb the quay at Ramsey. With a brilliant sun, & flying in our shirt sleeves everything looked lovely. The sea was a sparkling blue and invariably there would be a huge convoy spread about, a never failing source of interest to us. However we had been warned to keep well clear of them, as the naval gunners were very trigger itchy, and one of our crews had been fired on by an aircraft carrier. We would fly across the Isle of Man, head North, then turn in at the English coast once more, & return to Cannock Chase for a bombing exercise of 12 practise bombs on the range, & then return to base. The rations were pretty good, we always saved our tin of orange juice to drink on a morning after the night before it was very good, I suppose we will get the same on night X-countries.
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On the first one we had a ‘screened’ pilot, then the next one did by ourselves, the third & largest, we carried a full bomb load of 250 lb H.E’s filled with sand, except one which was live. This I had to bomb on a sea range with and photograph the splash. We had a ‘screened’ bomb-aimer/navigator on this one, an F/O pretty decent chap. [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] [inserted] He [/inserted] asked Mac if he would let him do some tight turns over his home in Aberystwyth as we were passing over it. Mac agreed but quickly retrieved the controls when he saw we were almost stalling.
For night flying we report to the flight just after 6 P.M. to see what is on, naturally it is broad daylight then. Then if we are not on till late we can go to the Station Cinema, as we did last night. It is the usual effort, it is in the lecture hall, when we first came the cinematograph was mounted on a large table, so if one sat well back, the noise of the machine drownded [sic] the sound track. Now they have built a brick projection box, and have provided a wooden platform for the dearer seats – with the usual front two rows reserved – Officers Only.
Looking back at my last entry, I see I have forgotten to mention ‘Pinky’ Tomlin. He is a Canadian Bomb Aimer, but his pilot, & navigator are commissioned, & his W/Op & R/Gunner are in another hut so he is ‘one alone’. He is pretty tubby & really loves food, he bought himself an electric [deleted] plate [/deleted] [inserted] heater [/inserted] to use as a grill, & cooks things from the numerous parcels he receives from home. He was a scout master back in Canada – not a bad chap, rather hail-fellow-well met.
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[underlined] July 30th. [/underlined]
Night circuits and bumps are almost completed for us – Thank God! – they really are binding. We follow exactly the same procedure as with our day flying, first of all with an instructor, then Mac solo’ed and we carried on by ourselves. The first couple of times were O.K. but then it grew monotonous staring out into the blackness, with just the circuit lights to relieve the unbroken darkness. I suppose an artist gazing at them would murmur “Pearls cast upon a black velvet background”, but to us they mean “Keep me under your port wing, and fly at [symbol] 1,000 ft.” The Dren lighting takes some getting used to, the flarepath lights are only 15 watt bulbs and are hooded and secured to give a 15o vertical, and 40o horizontal spread of light, only in a down wind direction. Consequently one can only see them, immediately facing into them, as soon as we have taken off we can no longer see them. It was funny when Bill first saw this, he is generally working on the radio, then he looked out of the astro-dome for the first time on night take off, and called on the A/T “Hey! they’ve switched off the flare path now we are airborne”. Johnny has the worst job, sitting right at the end of the kite, cramped in his turret, and feeling all the crashes and jars of landing far more than us. Every now & again, I go lurching along the catwalk with coffee for him. Bill was quite eager to sit in the cockpit, so I change places with him sometimes & listen to dance music on the radio.
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We get more time off now than we did on night flying, our day off now becomes a night off. So we have the day off after night flying, then that night off & the following day until 6 P.M. Should night flying be scrubbed the night before, then one can make two nights and two days out of it, providing one hasn’t put in a pass. On a couple of days off we have been into Birmingham and stayed at the Services Club. At least we did the first time, the second time they were full up, so we had to doze in arm chairs & so forth. Mac took me into the American Red Cross, I didn’t think we could go in there, but it was O.K. The food in there is very good indeed, I believe it is sent over from the States. I took Johnny in there on our second visit and he thought it was an excellent place, they are certainly superior to our Services Clubs.
There is another instructor in the Bombing Section now, a Sgt Bomb Aimer, just finished his tour of ‘ops’, Sgt Mason his name is, quite a decent fellow. He gave us a ‘natter’ on what life was like on a squadron at the moment. It certainly cleared up a few points and provided a shock. According to him it is a pretty odds on chance that a crew will get the chop before finishing a tour. On his squadron only about 4 crews finished, as far as he could recollect all the time that he was there. It certainly isn’t a rosy future anyway, still there’s always the chance we will be one of them to come through.
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[underlined] 5th August [/underlined]
We have only about a fortnight left before we finish here, one crew became well advanced so they were sent over to Seighford onto 17 course the previous one to ours. At the moment we are on Night bombing exercises, and somehow we always seem to be ‘joed’ for the very last detail. Consequently we hang about all night waiting to take off, and finally get the exercise in between 6 & 7 A.M. when it is beginning to get light. Then we arrive back in the hut to find all the others are up and have been for hours – they nicknamed us “The Dawn Patrol”.
Our first prang on this course occurred the other night. There have been some major prangs on other courses while we have been here, and a few minor ones [deleted] [indecipherable letter] [/deleted] on our course, this was our first major one though. We were circling the airfield waiting to land, when we saw a kite overshoot, prang and burst into flames, not far off the end of the runway, we couldn’t see much detail at all. So we continued to circle and await instructions, then all lights were extinguished and we were ordered to land at Seighford. Over we went and lobbed in then with three others crews, and naturally were wondering what had happened.
We had a meal in the mess, & then as there was nobody around to fix us up with beds, we had to doze on chairs in the mess. After breakfast, which was quite early,
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we decided to sleep on in the ante-room, as Hixon was going to phone when we were to return. However the C.M.C. had locked the ante-room, & said it was always out of bounds in the morning, and would make no exception for us – nice type. So we had to sit on the grass outside the mess for a couple of hours.
I met Derek Ashton over there, they will be finished in a day or so, & so would I if I had still been on that course. I couldn’t have had a better crew than what I have now, though. Ashton said they liked Seighford better than Hixon as there was no ‘bull’ there and it was a lot easier to get into Stafford. The only snag is, it is far more dispersed than Hixon is.
We didn’t get back to Hixon before 1 P.M. as we were held up for brake pressure. It turned out to be Carr’s crew who had pranged. They were making a flapless landing with an instructor, owing to trouble with the flaps. The instructor was flying it, and he approached too fast, overshot didn’t make it, and crashed on the railway lines, when the kite immediately caught fire. Luckily they were all unhurt except Sgt Mann, the ‘screened’ bomb aimer, he was burnt slightly on the face, and has been admitted to hospital for a short while. It seems Fate that he should get through a tour unscathed and then have this happen at O.T.U.
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[underlined] 12th August [/underlined]
Only a week to go, and then most probably we shall fly over enemy territory for the first time – on a ‘nickel’, I hope we do one anyway. The course is split practically in half with the first half slightly ahead of the others – we are in the latter. I said goodbye to Norman and the boys on 17 course, when they came over here, they have to get cleared here as well as at Seighford. Pete Rawlings was chatting to me about his skipper, he was the one I would have had on 17 course. He said he was a damn good pilot, but he would ‘natter’ such a lot on the inter-com. – I should have hated that.
We certainly get good meals on night flying, they have opened, a place especially for us near the cinema. It is a pukka little cook house, with a Cpl & two WAAFs, just for our flight. The Cpl is a good type & we get steaks & eggs for our flying meals, it is bang on. Although we are not supposed to officially, we go there for supper, if there is no flying detail for us that particular night. There is a real craze for cards now, & Hughes, Mac, Bill, Johnny & myself & various others, often play Blackjack & Pontoon, of a night if we aren’t on. We start in the evening & play till the small hours & then stagger down to see what Flying supper is. The Canadians are fond of playing “Shoot”, & have a school regularly in the locker room.
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If night flying is scrubbed for everyone, most of the boys turn in at 11 P.M. or so, in order to have the next day free. However Mac & a couple of others hate getting to bed at that time, preferring to turn in late, & sleep the following day, as if night flying was on. They generally get Pinky Tomlins, electric heater out, & cook things out of their Canadian food parcels. Mac is really amusing when he gets nattering about “Chicken soup with noodles”, & “weeners” & various other Canadian foods. Naturally they kick up a fair amount of noise, and the boys trying to sleep shout out uncomplimentary remarks to Mac, as he is generally telling an anecdote or a story about back home. Then he immediately bellows back “- this is a night flying hut, get out of that bed, you lazy so & so”. The amusing part is the following day, when they are all up & about, & Mac is trying to sleep through the noise. He will sit up & shout “Quiet, let a guy get some sleep”, & they laugh & generally Hughes will give him a shake & say “Come on McCann this is a night flying hut”, & various cracks until Mac aims a boot. They are a good bunch of boys though.
Another good thing about this night flying is that we don’t bother about the C.O’s billet inspection every week. We just put a notice on the door “Night Flying Hut – Do Not Disturb”, & funnily enough nobody does.
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[underlined] 19th August. [/underlined]
Our O.T.U. Course has now ended, the perk was last night when we did a “Nickel” to Rennes. The first lot of our course left a few days ago, they had to do a ‘bullseye’ exercise to finish as there were no “nickels” laid on. They got 10 days leave, & posted to Lindholme to go on Lancasters, that is where we will go, everyone goes onto Lancs from this O.T.U. We had another cross country to do, the usual long stooge right up to the Orkneys, with airfire and bombing at Caernarvon – what a farce.
Yesterday we were told that all the remaining crews would finish with a ‘Nickel’ that night, & we have to take up the kite we would be flying in and Air-Test it. The tail trim proved to be U/S on ours & another was put on, with another crew air testing it. At evening time we assembled in the intelligence room for briefing, it was a pukka briefing, like they have on a squadron, with the Sqdn/Ldr Intelligence Officer taking it. Then the C.O. & a couple of other officers said a few words, & briefing was over, they even had an S.P. on duty outside the door. We put all our personal belongings in an envelope with our name on it, collected our escape kits & foreign money, then off to the locker room to dress.
Half of the crews were going to St. Malo, and the rest of us to Rennes, we were flying the same track & course to Isigny at the base of the Cherbourg peninsula, & then to Avranches our next pin point, where we would continue our various ways. Soon we were all dressed, then into the crew bus & out to the kites.
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They were lined up together, & as R/T isn’t allowed on any ‘ops’ take-offs, a yellow verey was to be fixed from control for the signal to start up engines, then a green verey, when it was time for the first kite to start taxying out. The photographic vans drove out with the camera magazines, & the LAC, rather a gigolo type, who handed up mine, uttered the famous words “Wish I was coming with you”. Suddenly up went the yellow cartridge & the ground crews leapt into action, and the roar of engines shattered the summer’s evening. Johnny then called up to say none of the lights would work in his turret, & the spare fuses had no effect. This caused quite a flap, ‘bods’ went dashing everywhere, & both an armourer & a fitter came dashing along when it was a job for an electrician. During this time the green verey went up & the first kite taxied out, Macgillvray was next, on our right and he waved to us, as they went out, we were still waiting there as the kites on our left followed Macgillvray out, & soon we were sitting there alone. The Groupy came whizzing over in his car to see what the electrician was doing, but at that time one came along with the fuses that had to be changed inside the fuselage. So everything O.K. at last, we taxied out by ourselves, the others all having taken off. All the officers were on the control tower and they waved as we went past, then onto the runway, a green from the A.C.P. and off we went. The others were circling base to gain height, & there was 10 mins to go before setting course, so we were O.K. for time. We set course with them, & made up our height by the first turning point.
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It was quite dusk as we crossed the coast near Southampton, & it was quite dark when Ken said “We’re getting near the enemy coast”. I strained my eyes to peer through the darkness, & after a little while made out the long narrow neck of land, that I had memorised so well as the Cherbourg peninsula. Then I saw my first flak, the sudden whitish flashes on the ground, & after a brief while, the flashes (like twinkling lights but not so harmless). I felt a sense of false confidence, as it seemed remote from us, but the truth was there wasn’t very much flak, and nobody would have worried much. I told them we were starboard of track, & we altered course & soon crossed the enemy coast. Johnny said there was quite a bit more flak going up at the chaps behind us.
I pinpointed the river at Avranches, & after a while we came to the dropping place, it was 15 miles S.E of Rennes owing to the wind. We had to follow the bombing procedure, & drop them by a distributor in order to space them out. A sudden shout from Johnny caused a flap, & as he said “There’s thousands of them floating everywhere,” I cursed him as I wanted to give the order “Close Bomb Doors”. Eventually we shut him up and returned to base. It was an uneventful return journey, & we landed tired but happy (admittedly mainly because we were going on leave). Carr got quite a bit of flak over St. Malo.
We slept in this morning for a while & then got going on our clearance chits. Mac has met the Mid/Upper who has joined our crew, but the rest of us haven’t seen him yet. Tomorrow morning we will complete our clearance chits, then off on 10 days leave, before going to a Con Unit. So goodbye to Hixon.
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[underlined] 29th August. [/underlined]
Since I last wrote various changes have taken place. On the morning of the 20th, the day we [deleted] went [/deleted] left Hixon, we reported at the Adjutant’s office for our warrants & passes. He came out very apologetically & said a last minute change of posting had occurred, we were to go on Stirlings & report to a Con. Unit at Woolfox Lodge, after [underlined] 6 [/underlined] days leave. Losing four days leave didn’t seem too good to us, also we had heard pretty duff reports of Stirlings on ‘ops’. Still off we went – the orderly room had told us the Con Unit was near Cambridge & the warrants were made out to there.
I caught the evening train back, but when I went to the Cambridge R.T.O. they said Hixon Orderly Room had boobed, & Woolfox Lodge was near Stamford. As there were no more trains that night, I had to spend the night in the Nissen hut there, rather grim. In the morning I met Johnny & Pinky Tomlin, & we travelled to Stamford, we had to change at Peterborough and there met some more of the boys. At Stamford we phoned for transport, but it was a few hours before it arrived and we had [deleted] dinner [/deleted] lunch in the George Hotel. Mac & some of the others arrived here yesterday and are in the hut near to ours, and today we have been tramping around with our arrival chits, but as the course commences for us tomorrow we won’t bother to finish them. This course has already been on a couple of days, they were as unprepared for us, as we were for coming here.
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[underlined] [deleted] August [/deleted] [inserted] September [/inserted] 5th. [/underlined]
First, I had better bring my crew up to date, as we have a full crew now. Don Keeley the Mid-Upper Gunner, who joined us as we left Hixon is tall & very dark, his face has been sunburnt so much it leaves one with the impression almost of an Indian, he is quiet a good looking chap & seems very decent. Our engineer was allotted to us by the Engineering Leader, and is a Welshman, Jack Barker. He is about 5 ft 5” with a cheerful face, & crisp wavy hair, we haven’t had a lot to do with him yet, as quite naturally he still goes around with the engineers who came with him as a course, from St. Athens, I think I can safely say that we have got a very good crew, though.
This station is far more dispersed than Hixon was. It is cut in half by the Great North Road, to the East of the road is the airfield itself, whilst to the West are the living & communal sites. Our billet is a quarter of an hours walk to the mess, then from the mess it is a 20 min walk, to the other side of the airfield where training-wing is. There are no ablutions on the sites, and washing kit is stolen if it is left in the ablutions by the mess, so we wash from an old rain water tub at the back of the hut.
We have a ground course of a week to 10 days here, comparable to that at O.T.U. only bringing newer work into it. At last I have met the MK. XIV Gyro Bombright, the one I shall actually use on ‘ops’ – it certainly is a bag of tricks. In a day or so we will have our exams, & then commence our flying on Stirlings.
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[underlined] 14th [deleted] August [/deleted] [inserted] September [/inserted]. [/underlined]
The exams are over, everyone passed O.K. and we are now underway with our Flying Conversion. For the engineers, this is when they fly for the first time, as they pass out from there [sic] training school, and come straight here to be crewed up, without ever having flown before. It seems pretty hard on them, to have only a few hours air experience before they arrive at a squadron and go on ‘ops’.
Stirlings are the largest 4 engined bomber there is, and the cockpit is certainly a height from the ground. They have a long undercart, & it is quite a common prang, to see an undercart wiped off, as the aircraft have a tendency to swing & if one brakes severely & swerves, the undercart is quite likely to go. I have to fly as second pilot in there, and attend to boost, revs, flaps & undercart, it takes both of us to get the kite off the deck & they take a hell of a long run.
For a lot of our circuits and bumps we flew over to a Yankee airfield, they had Fortresses. We used to fly there for 2 hours or so & then return. Before Mac had soloed, he was taking off there, & the kite swung viciously & shot across the grass straight towards a Fort. There were some mechanics working on it, and they looked up to see a Stirling thundering at them, without pause they leapt off the wing, fell over picked their selves up & dashed off. If it hadn’t been dicey, it would have seemed ludicrous, however, the screened pilot took a hand, pulled at the controls, & we took off right over the Fort. Mac soloed O.K. a little later, & now we are on X-countries.
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[underlined] 22nd [deleted] August [/deleted] [inserted] September [/inserted] [/underlined]
Our Con. Unit is nearly over, & we shall soon be on an operational squadron, different instructors speak in glowing terms of their old squadrons, & advise us to try & get posted there so we don’t know where we are. At the moment we are commencing our night X country period, this is a tricky airfield to taxi on at night.
Macgillvray has been going out with a WAAF M.T. driver here, & at last it seems like the real thing he is talking seriously of marriage. When he left Hixon, “The Blunder”, went into Stafford with him to stay the night, & then spins a 48 hr pass with him at the Strand Palace. Macgillvray was half & half about telling her to go, however when he arrived here he wrote, & told her he didn’t want to see her again. She wrote back & said as soon as she got a pass she was coming to have it out with him. Then a letter arrived yesterday saying she would arrive in the evening, & would he meet her in town. Macgillvray religiously stayed in camp all evening, & every now & again the phone would ring for him, it was her, phoning from Stamford, & it was really funny to see him keep telling chaps he wasn’t in. Suddenly, the boys came in with the news, she had come out on the 10.30 P.M. bus, & fixed up with the WAAF Officer to stay the night. Macgillvray was off to his billet like a shot. [deleted] Next [/deleted] [inserted] This [/inserted] morning, the Blunder, was in the dining hall, early, & waiting behind the servery, when Macgillvray came in, she dashed out, & told him exactly what she thought of him, in a loud voice. Everyone listened interestedly, & the cooks even ceased serving in order to hear clearly, Mac went deadly white, & after a while walked out, with the Blunder behind. Anyway that was exit to the Blunder. We’ve certainly had some laughs here.
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[underlined] Wednesday [deleted] August [/deleted] [inserted] September [/inserted] 29th. [/underlined]
At last the time has arrived, and what a time I have had to wait for it, 2 1/4 years ago I volunteered for aircrew, & right up till now I have been training for the real job, & we have arrived at last on a squadron. It is a new squadron just forming, No 623, and we are stationed at Downham Market with No 218 squadron. We left Woolfox about 8 AM. on Monday, and caught the 9.15 AM. to Peterborough, where we arrived about 10.15 AM. Deciding to spend the day we trooped out and started off with a large meal in the Silver Grill, a very satisfying start. During the afternoon we looked over the Cathedral, and afterwards went to the cinema to see Tyrone Power in “Crash Drive”, pretty good. Another large meal at the Silver Grill then off on the 6.46 PM. to Downham Market. Naturally the trains were late and we reached Downham Station around 10 PM. & phoned for transport. When it arrived we threw the kit on, we were getting rather cheesed with it by now, after lumping it on & off different trains, and out we went.
It was rather a grim reception, they told us we couldn’t have a meal, & then we found out there was no accommodation for us. So we drove round in the dark in a lorry and they found room for us in ones & twos with the erks, it was pretty grim organisation.
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They locked our kit up in a hut, my overcoat & groundsheet amongst them, so of course it poured of rain during the night & the next morning. Being as the station is all clay like most of the Fen country, it was one helluva mess. Like all Bomber Stations it is horribly dispersed, & we tramped around miserably in the wet, with our arrival chits. The mess was large and new, & very bare, & the food just happened to be pretty grim, so I’m afraid we took a rather poor view of the station, things look a little better now though.
There is a rigged up cinema & I believe they have occasional shows there, but there isn’t a lot of entertainment available. The town [deleted] of [/deleted] or village of Downham is only 15 mins walk from the mess, but there isn’t much life in there. They have one rather ancient cinema with old films & a dance hall, that is always over crowded & 21 pubs, the latter is over shadowed by Stamford’s 63. I don’t think we will be going in there very much. There were three crews arrived from Woolfox together, Pete, Macgillvray & ourselves, Carr is travelling down too today, as he hadn’t finished his flying at Woolfox. We are binding for leave as most crews get it on arrival but our efforts haven’t been successful so far. Our first two ‘ops’ here are mining trips & the pilot was a second “dickey” (pilot) trip, before we start we have to do a bullseye though.
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[underlined] Monday 4th October. [/underlined]
Things are looking quiet a bit better now, the mess seems comfortable, & the food really is good. Up till Saturday we didn’t do much, mainly hung around & had a few lectures, & got our kit into the parachute section. This is a new idea, they have a large room, with lockers, & hang our kit up properly, to dry etc, also testing it each time, then when we want something we go & ask for it & they bring it out. If they have found any stuff U/S they tell us what it is so we can change it, it’s a good scheme. The essentials such as chute, harness, helmet, boots, & ‘K’ type dinghy, are laid out already when the crew is on ‘ops’. No waiting or anything its quite a good scheme. We drew our electrical kit & our new flying boots, from stores, there [sic] boots are the new type with leather boots as bottoms, they have a knife in the side to cut the upper off, should we land in enemy territory, & thus leave a fine pair of walking boots.
On Saturday our bullseye arrived and we were briefed in the afternoon for a 7.50 PM take off. We got away a few minutes late but with no mishap & climbed over the drome then set course for Bedford, this was the starting gate of the bullseye. About 15 mins after we left there, we were coned by about 20 beams & passed on to other cones. We were diving all around the sky but we were
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held pretty well for around 10 – 15 minutes, before we got out. At Portsmouth we were held for around 2 minutes, & again at Beachy Head, then we headed for the target – London. We came in over Croydon & Lewisham to run up to our target, Westminster Bridge. There were about four cones in action with about 30 beams in each, and they all had a kite in, jerking like mad. Whilst they were occupied we were able to slip in smoothly on our bombing run without interference. The searchlights blinded me a bit though and I was unable to get a good line of sight on the bridge, but took the photographs. The black out of London was pretty grim, there were bags of lights about, & the docks were clearly lit up along the river & so were the main railway stations. I don’t think I would fancy an attack on London though, the defences seem pretty hot. After London we went to Bedford again where the bullseye finished, so we had no engagements with fighters. From here to base then up to Goole and back on another I.R. stooge. It was pretty nippy & poor Johnny & Don in the turrets were frozen stiff. There were hardly any fighter interceptions I guess the fighter boys didn’t feel like playing. Anyway back to the bacon & egg, the usual natter with the other crews on various points & then off to bed, for a nice lengthy sleep.
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When we got up at dinner time yesterday it was to be told that we were operating that night – mine laying, it rather shook us. Briefing was at 4 PM. & we learned we were going off the Frisian Is. (a fairly short trip) & taking 6 x 1500 mines. Back to the mess in the bus for the operational meal, then over to the billet, where like old men we clamber into our long flying underwear. Even though it is all pure rayon lined it makes me itch, just not used to long legs & sleeves I guess after jockey shorts & singlet. Our next move is back down to the dressing room in the parachute section, where we collect our kit. We never put the stuff on otherwise we would sweat moving around & then it would freeze when we got up & defeat the clothing. Out to the kite in the bus then, dump the kit on the grass & everyone climbs in for their last minute check of their equipment. Whoever D.I’d the first turret did a poor job, because the reflector sight was left on & the guns weren’t loaded, so I got cracking on those & tested the tuner, then climbed down for my initial bombing check. The engines were run up, tested, then shut down again & we climbed out for a smoke and sign our various forms. The Wing Comdr & Sqdn Ldr drove out to give last minute tips & see if there were any snags, then we all climbed aboard again, fully dressed now, all hatches closed, & taxied out.
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The first aircraft was due off at 7.35 and took off dead on time, we were third, got the green from the ACP opened up & away we went. They are a bit of a job to get off with a heavy load & we didn’t miss the trees by much but we made it. We set course for Cromer, where we were leaving the coast, at 1500 ft, we were staying at that height so Jerry couldn’t pick us up, then climbing to 5,000 ft at the last moment to avoid any flak ships. Everything went fine, poor old Ken was sick again, he certainly has guts to keep flying and navigating when he is often queer. We had to climb quickly at the mining area, & the revs wouldn’t increase for the minute, consequently we nearly stalled. At 1500 ft with that bomb load we would [deleted] dive [/deleted] have dived straight into the waves, it was touch & go for a minute but worked out. The mines were dropped, one [deleted] f [/deleted] could feel them drop, & back we went. When we got back to Cromer there were lots of searchlights & they picked us up, but shut off when we flicked our nav lights on & off. They suddenly coned a single engine kite so we watched it like hawks just in case, there have been a lot of intruders around this area. There was a large fire about 50 miles off the port bow, enemy activity maybe. We landed O.K. though were interrogated & off to the mess, when the siren went so we had just dodged it, still we were safe then. A bang on supper then off to bed for another good rest.
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[underlined] Thursday 7th October.. [/underlined]
Life is proceeding along fairly smooth lines, and we are pretty well settled in. The other night when we did our mining trip, the main force went to Kassel. Clarc Carr went with another pilot to get his second ‘dicky’ trip in. The pilot he went with had 23 trips in & was on the point of completing his tour, but they never returned. Poor old Clarc, he was one of the best chaps I have met, he never got in a temper with anyone, yet he was pretty tough, it’s a shame that such fellows have to go. It really shakes us when fellows we have been with for a long while get the chop, brings it home the hard way. They have sent his crew home on 3 days leave, I don’t know what they are doing after that, whether they are returning to ‘Con’ Unit to pick up a new skipper, or stay here as ‘spares’, the former would be better I should think.
Speaking of spares they grabbed Don, our mid upper to go in somebody else’s crew on Monday for the raid on Frankfurt, as their m/u.g had gone sick. It was rather a nerve I thought both asking a crew to fly with a chap they didn’t know, & worse for the gunner to fly with a strange crew. They did the same thing to Smith, Macgillvrays rear gunner, if they keep this thing up they will
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soon be doing away with the crews & just have a pool that they draw on, I always thought that if somebody was sick in a crew the whole lot was declared U/S. there is a word they have when referring to men they call them ‘bodies’ or ‘bods’, & how right it is, you are just merely a figure on paper. Every morning the big noise walks into the flight office & asks the flight commander “How many crews have you, fully operational?”, and then demands those that aren’t be made so in as short a time as possible. That is all they are interested in, is, how many crews have they available for an ‘op’, regardless of how much flying you’ve done, just recently some of the chaps have been on the main force 3 out of 4 nights. Anyway all kites returned from Frankfurt O.K. and Dan gave us a vivid description, it was very interesting but I guess we will be seeing all we want of it very shortly.
Tuesday night we were on ‘stand down’, but Wednesday we were briefed for a long mining trip to La Rochelle, right down near the Spanish border. There was a hell of a front expected at base around 6.30 so they were rushing us off at 5.50 & come back to meet the front over the Channel & battle through it. There was severe icing from 7 – 15,000 so we had to try & climb above it, not an easy job in a Stirling, the extent was possibly
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right up to the London area as well. The briefing & everything was terribly rushed & we tore around in a mad flap to get everything done, and we were all dressed & on the point of going out to the kite when they scrubbed it, what a life, tonight we were in it again but it was scrubbed once more.
Last night I decided I would see what Downham was like so I ambled in with the boys & was I cheesed. I had seen the [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] film on at the little cinema, so all there was to do was sit in a smokey pub, & swill lousy beer. At last the smoke made my eyes ache so much I came home. Macgillvray was on a short mining trip last night, & a Picture Post reporter was going along. They sent down 4 camera & news men, & took photographs of them having an operational meal & were going to take bags more in the kite, but it was scrubbed, what bad luck, a chance like that only comes once in a life time. The traditional RAF bull was in evidence, for the photograph they had a spotless table-cloth, cream crackers on the table, & a Cpl WAAF waiting on them. Actually we queue up for our meals & a long one at times & eat of [sic] bare dirty tables, & the only biscuits we see are hard dog ones. – We did our first day flying, here, today, took two kites up on air tests, we were doing a loaded climb but that was scrubbed, at least we know what the drome looks like in daylight now.
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[underlined] Sunday October 10th. [/underlined]
We look like having our first leave in a few days we are officially due to go at 0700 hrs on Thursday 14th, until the following Tuesday midnight. The chaps generally get away on the Wednesday, & if they are very lucky & they aren’t on ops on Tuesday they get away Tuesday afternoon which is pretty good. I only hope we are that lucky, Mac has to do a second dicky & if he gets that in tomorrow night we may be on ops the following night (Tuesday) & mess things up a bit. Should it be scrubbed tomorrow, Mac will go Tuesday & we can go Tuesday afternoon, I am afraid we are unscrupulous enough to hope that the weather is lousy tomorrow night. He has got his Flight through at last, & is now ‘Chiefy’ McCann, it is well overdue, but the Canadians get back pay on crowns, one of the numerous ways they are better than the RAF, so he has about £16 back pay to come. The comical part is that after all this waiting & binding now it has appeared in P.O.R’s the stores have no crowns so he is unable to wear it – poor Mac.
Friday night we went on our long mining trip, off Bordeaux in the estuary of the Gironde. We took 4 1,500 mines a fair weight, our all up weight was 69,784 lbs. The briefing was at 6.0 P.M. it shook us but they were having a late take off because the room was nearly full & they were waiting for it to die down as the German fighters have an easy time in the bright moonlight. The bus took
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[inserted] [newspaper cutting showing a WAAF with a mine] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
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us back [missing words] as our operation [missing words] wasn’t until 8.45 we had bags of time to fill in. Lots of Forts went over then & we watched them the next day we learned they had been to Bremen. We had our egg & at 10.25 the transport took us back, we didn’t have to struggle with our kit as we had taken it out in the afternoon. The run up & testing commenced, then shut down while we donned our kit & start up once more. We took off bang on time & 5 mins later set course. Old Petch who was the only other one beside us going swung on take off & hit his undercart against some iron rails for fog lighting & they wouldn’t let him take off, consequently we were the only ones from this station that went.
It was practically 10/10ths cloud down to the coast, it cleared there & I was able to get a wizard pin point on Selsey Bill, our crossing point. The moon was like a searchlight & we felt all naked illuminated up there, it set quite a bit after they told us it did, because there was the time of setting as seen by a ground observer, whereas we were at 12,000 ft. The cloud built up more & more over the Channel until it was 10/10ths again on the French Coast and we were unable to pin point. It remained like that most of the way, the least it was, was 7/10ths, approaching the target area it began
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to clear & I got down into the bombing hatch ready. I was determined to get my night vision up to scratch because if we couldn’t pin point we had to bring the mines back. The green indicator target on the VCP was glaring on my vision panel like a searchlight so I piled my long cushion over it. Then I wanted to see my target map so hopped to switch on the light for a brief second, next the cushion fell down & the light glared again, I dove back at that. I was hopping around like a rubber ball, & sweating lest I should miss the coast & be unable to pin point. Suddenly I saw it, it was pretty dark, I could make it out clearly though, then we passed out to sea over the first island & swung out to rear to clear the island defences. Then altering course we swung in for the mainland once more, I was straining my neck, thats [sic] the worst of the Stirling bomb aimers window, the Lancs have a beauty. After a bit I made it out we were heading up the Gironde estuary, so we made a left hand turn & came bang on the corner of the estuary, which was our pin point. Setting course on a D.R run we dropped the eg O.K. & set course home. Just after we left the flak began to open up on the islands & one searchlight probed around, but they weren’t near us.
Stooging along happily with thoughts of home & bed we were shaken by a show of
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flak suddenly thrown up. We had got a little port of track & were too near Nantes, they had some accurate heavy flak down there, because of the Fort raids on the U Boat Bases. Anyway they were too accurate for our liking the first burst exploded with quite a crash underneath us & burned the kite a bit. We did some hectic weaving & finally got clear, it was a sticky moment though that predicted stuff is deadly they reckon to get you on the first burst. Nothing happened on the way back beyond sighting another Stirling, the cloud thickened over England, & when we reached base they diverted us to Tangmere, although we could have got in. So we had to fly back all the way we had come down to the South Coast. Arriving there after 6 hrs 40 mins flying we found 11 other Stirlings there. We had a meal, & the guy told us you can sleep as long as you like they gave us good accommodation, boy! we needed sleep. Hardly had we laid our heads down when they dragged us out saying we had to return right away. Then we had to wait 3 hours before we were re-fuelled & away. Two squadrons of Typhoons scrambled while we were there, straight off down wind a lovely night. Flying back to base I could hardly keep my eyes open we had had no sleep for nearly 36 hours. We certainly slept well on return. Today there hasn’t been anything doing because of the lousy weather. Jack Spackly & Ron Winnitt have arrived here, they were with me from Manchester & all through Canada, I was glad to see them arrive here, they are in 623.
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[underlined] Sunday October 24th [/underlined]
It is a fortnight since I last made an entry but I have been on leave during that time, & following my maxim of never letting work interfere with pleasure I made no entries in here. I had a fine leave, Mary was able to get the time off & that made it just right we saw a couple of shows, popped around to a few friends & had a wizard time. There was one disappointment overshadowing it though, Ken didn’t come on leave with us, it all began a little while before - . A fair number of times through his earlier training, so he tells me, and during the time we were with him at O.T.U. and on Conversion Unit, he was sick during trips. He tried hard, by doing everything he knew to overcome it, but unsuccessfully. Then on our first mining trip to the Frisians he was sick at the target area & we had to rush to drop them & there was a fair flap resulting as I have previously mentioned in the kite nearly stalling in. Poor Ken, he reckons he is to blame but I don’t think he has anything to worry about, out of the lot I think he did his job the best & the smartest. He was sick a lot on the long mining as well so he reported sick a couple of days afterwards to see what the M.O. could do.
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He was given some Anti-Air Sickness capsules, & tried them without effect, so the M.O. grounded him for a little while. Then they took Ken’s case up a little more & the Wing Comdr said he would have an interview with him. This was the position on the day we were going on leave Tuesday 12th, Mac also hadn’t done his second dicky trip. So Ken was hanging around all morning waiting for the Wing Co to say he would see him, & we were worried in case he wouldn’t catch the 3.51 London train with us. We left him waiting at the camp & told him to whizz down on his bike if there was a chance of catching the train, if not, to follow us down on the later train. On the road we got a lift to the railway station in an army lorry & had a cup of tea in the café next door. Waiting on the platform later, the [deleted] [indecipherable letters] [/deleted] train was almost due in, when Ken came dashing up. Everyone was overjoyed because we thought he had just made it, but he told us the Wing Comdr. had cancelled his leave and he had to remain behind to get 15 hrs Fighter Affiliation in, to see how often he was sick & then go before a Medical Board. My God! as if anyone wouldn’t feel lousy after 15 hrs. Fighter Affil. Also with the weather as it had been, a stinking yellow fog, there didn’t
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appear to be much chance of flying. It was a hell of a twist all the way round, and poor Ken was on the receiving end. There was nothing to be done, however, so off we had to go without him. I felt pretty rotten though seeing him standing there watching us go on leave, & having to ride back & spend a week by himself.
As I said previously I had a fine time, the days flew swiftly as they always do, & the last day arrived. I had arranged with Johnny to meet at 5.30 in Liverpool St to catch the 5.40 P.M. However he arrived up from Bristol early & came over to my place, so we travelled up together, & met Jack on the station. The train was very crowded & we had to bunk in the luggage room, at the first stop, Bishops Stortford, lots of people got out & we got a seat easily. At Cambridge there was about a 20 minute wait so the three of us got out for a cup of tea. A porter told us it wouldn’t be going for a while yet & we had plenty of time. We were only in the canteen for about 3 minutes and as we emerged, saw the train about a quarter of the way along the platform. I broke into a sprint with Jack about 10 yds behind and Johnny 10 yds behind him. Down the platform we raced, porters shouted out “Clear the Way”, and people skipped
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nimbly aside, luckily the platform was fairly empty. Some people shouted encouragement, other shouted “You’ll never make it”, but unheedingly we pounded quickly on.
One American soldier told us it was just like the races, first I flashed past, and he turned to watch me when Jack whizzed by. As he swivelled his head to watch him Johnny shot past, so he ran after us to see the result. Down the whole length of Cambridge platform we raced & closed the distance to about two yards, I had already selected the door I was jumping for, when we reached the blacked out part of the platform. There were no lights at all & it was as dark as the pit, I tried to maintain speed but cracked against a pillar and spun around like a top. So the chase was abandoned & we stood watching the tail light disappear into the darkness. We were in rather a fix as all our kit was on the train, none of us had hats & Johnny had no belt either. After hunting around & getting wrong directions from a few people, we contacted a porter, and old sweat from the last war, who was very helpful & took us to a fellow, who sent off a wire to the different stations telling them to take our kit off the train & send it to Downham. That done, with certain misgivings as to whether it would work out we went over to the A.T.O.
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Here we phoned the camp and told them we would be arriving late & fixed things up. That done we adjourned to a nearby pub & treated our helpful porter to a few. After that it degenerated into a regular crawl, hatless & hands in pockets we rolled round Cambridge. Greatly warmed by the beverage, we didn’t notice the hardness of the bunks, & I didn’t suffer as I did on the previous occasion I slept at Cambridge ATO. We travelled on to Downham on the 8.13 AM. next day & arrived about 9.15. As I feared they hadn’t any of our kit there, so I thought “Goodbye to that”. It rather shook the S.P’s in the guard room when we rolled up with no hats or anything, they didn’t say anything, though, I shudder to think what would have happened at a training unit under similar circumstances. Within an hour of arriving back we were flying on an air test, maybe they thought we would forget how.
We haven’t done much since arriving back, the weather has been pretty rough. The situation regarding Ken appears pretty obscure, he didn’t get much flying in as he predicted, now he is just hanging about to see what the score is. I hope they wont [sic] take him out of the crew he is such a decent chap. Its growing late & the other guys are binding for the lights out, so I guess I’ll put more next time.
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[underlined] Thursday 28th October [/underlined]
The weather still remains duff, after days of rain, it has changed into pretty thick fog every day. The last time we flew was over a week ago when we did a loaded climb in “D”, we now have I for Ink, instead of D. For the time being Ken is out of the crew, we are all praying it wont [sic] be for long although we have another decent chap in his place, Les Gray another Canadian. The whole situation is pretty vague, Ken himself feels he would rather not go on in case he should be sick one time & we wandered into a flak area whilst he was sick. As for us, we would put implicit faith in him whatever happened, & I just hate to lose him. So nobody knows what is going to happen, we’re just keeping our fingers crossed.
To keep ourselves amused now quite a bit of our time is spent in seeing films, I have seen a couple of decent ones on the camp recently. The other day they had the power off all day, no electric light, wireless or anything, I certainly think they ought to get there [sic] fingers out with the lighting in the ante room, it is very dim. Last night seeking amusement further afield, Mac, Jack, Don, Johnny & myself went in the liberty bus to Kings Lynn. We had a good meal when we arrived there, & then saw a decent show, coming out from there, Jack, Johnny & myself
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went into a dance, while Mac & Don went to the Duke’s Head for a meal. I think they had the best of the deal, because the dance was pretty corny, & then when it finished at 10 P.M. we were tramping all over the town trying to find a place with something to eat without success, it was pretty grim.
We got back to the bus O.K. & off we went, by this time a thick mist had rolled in, add to this the fact that our driver had a fair number of drinks under his belt, & we went weaving all over the road. It wasn’t long before we went into the ditch, & a fellow raised a laugh by asking “Does this count as an op?” We lifted the thing out of the ditch, then he found he had taken the wrong turning so back we had to go. It took us 1 1/2 hours to travel a 25 minute journey, we heaved a sigh of relief when we arrived back here. It would be that night too that they had an ENSA show at the camp and who should be in it but Pat Kirkwood, I would have liked to have seen it. Our next leave is due on the 24th November & I have written to Mary & told her to book some shows up. It is rather a long chance, that we will be there on time, even providing all goes well. Still I think it is worth trying. Ah! well I’m tired we didn’t get much sleep last night so I’ll turn in.
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[underlined] Monday November 1st. [/underlined]
Friday was just one of those uneventful days, though the mist seemed to have lifted a bit, a few very keen types were speaking eagerly of the prospects of flying, but the main horde, including all of our crew, nearly, retired to the mess early & buried theirselves [sic] in the newspapers, springing up eagerly to get in the dinner queue. That evening we went into town to see an Abbot & Costello film, it wasn’t bad, with a simple meal of fish & chips, we wandered back, what an uneventful life this is. Saturday was no better, but we really put some work in on the kite harmonising all the guns. We made quite a job of it, having Bill & Jack run backwards & forwards with the harmonisation board. The only thing that marred it was the fact that both Johnny & myself broke our lateral levelling screws on the reflector sights, necessitating harmonising them over again. We have been informed that it is nigh on impossible to get any small nuts & bolts of that type, so we are waiting for them, meanwhile the kite is unable to go on ops without the two reflector sights harmonised. So a kite has to stay back because of two nuts & bolts. Just a classic example of the important part played by the small cogs in the big wheel.
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Yesterday the weather seemed to be better, but there was nothing doing in the morning so we put in quite a bit of work on the kite. In the afternoon though there was a sudden flap, to get as many aircraft airborne as possible, so off we went for our air test. We have a new kite now I Ink instead of D Dog that we used to have, yesterday was the first time we had flown in it. She seemed a pretty decent kite, if we can do a loaded climb on it, & see how much height we can get out of it, it will be O.K. In the evening I just remained in the mess & went over to the hut early, I just seem to be in a state of lethargy here, with no inclination to do anything. We tried to get the fire going in the hut, these stoves are grim things at times. All the time we are chopping fences down & scrounging wood & ‘borrowing’ coal from out of the dump opposite. Most times that we light it, huge clouds of smoke belch out in every direction and there is a frantic rush for the doors to breathe some fresh air in. Last night was an exception though, the fire lit right away, & it gradually warmed up until it was giving out a heat like a blast furnace. It isn’t very often that we get it to go like that though, still I am nearest to it, I had that in view when I chose my bed.
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Today we had quite an interesting time, the morning we spent going round the bomb dumps. Practically all the bomb aimers went out, and at the dump we saw how the carriers are fixed on, & then at the firing point how they are flared. It was quite a sight in the dump to see all the rows of bombs laid out in their rows behind the blast walls. The corporal who was giving us the gen set a 4 lb incendiary off for us to show us how they went, boy they certainly burn, they seem better than the ones the Jerries dropped on London in the blitzes. We handled all the equipment & all of it was quite different from the stuff we had been taught throughout training all that was obsolete a good while before. Finally we went out to the kites to watch them bomb up & then try the various ways of releasing hang ups, it was quite a useful morning.
This afternoon we flew again, to level the bomb sight, & then to continue to Goodestone for a bombing exercise. It went off pretty well, but I don’t know how they are going to figure out where bombs are where, because we didn’t have 3073’s and didn’t inform the range as we dropped each one. As there were at least four kites bombing, they seemed to be showering down. Most certainly there will be some news in the morning.
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[underlined] Thursday 4th November. [/underlined]
There has been some flying recently but not a lot we have been up on a couple of air tests but on the whole the weather is still rather grim. We have been putting in quite a bit of work on the kite, Johnny, Don & myself have had our guns out & cleaned them. They were in a hell of a mess as they were packed with grease, then somebody borrowed our kite & the dope of a bomb aimer fired my guns, mucking things up well & truly. We have got them back again now. Tuesday afternoon they gave us a stand down, its funny no sooner do they say stand down & the fellows have started trekking into the different towns, when the old sun comes out & things are fine again, I bet they gnash their teeth.
All of us except Mac caught the 2.3 P.M. into Cambridge, had a look round, & a decent tea then booked our beds in the W.V.S. Afterwards we saw a show, then diving into a pub for a drink we landed in a flight passing out party. They had just finished their exams at Cambridge I.T.W. & were celebrating, when we entered somebody said “Here’s the gen boys”, at which I nearly fell over. Still they plied us with free beer so that was bang on, they also asked quite a bit about their future training & ‘ops’. Maybe quite a few lines were shot, but we had enough shot at us
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during our training so it was our turn. They all had bright blue uniforms, ‘bully’ white belts, close cropped hair, a general sprog appearance altogether. I shudder to think I was like that once, though not to such a degree, but I was & so must everybody who goes in for aircrew, we didn’t notice anything strange then. They had various toasts & I’m afraid I smiled a little cynically when one chap said “Goodbye to all exams and binding”. Still we had a good time, followed by a meal in a nearby café & then to bed. We rose at 7 AM. & went round to another W.V.S. place for our breakfast, then from there to the station to catch the famous 8.13 AM. to Downham.
They were taking a squadron photograph, & naturally Jack & I had to roll up late and miss being in it – such is life. Last night they had an ENSA show to which we went and surprisingly enough it was quite good, we almost got in without paying, but not quite, it would have helped our financial status quite a bit. Today we had to take the Flight Commander’s kite up an [sic] Air Test it, a doubtful priviledge. [sic] The bind was it was 12 midday when they rang the mess and told us & we were already in the dinner queue, so out we had to go & tramp back to the flights. We came down fairly late so didn’t go back again, but phoned into town & booked our seats for the cinema it was a good film, though I’d seen it before.
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[underlined] Sunday November 7th [/underlined]
Friday was quite a busy day, in the morning there was a smashing lecture by a Dutch F/O who had been shot down in a Lanc. & had got back from Holland. We had been listening to him for about 10 mins & lapping every word, when they came in and dragged us up for flights affil. typical RAF. The bind was there were two crews in the same kite, ourself [sic] & Bennett. We stooged around for over an hour but the fighter didn’t show up, so back we had to go, I was pretty cheesed about missing that lecture though. They put us up again in the afternoon, & after a bit of stooging around, boy! that fighter could fly. I sat in the Wops seat all the time, listening to “Music While You Work” poor old Bennets Engineer was sick, he must be quite a lot because he had a paper bag ready with him. I felt a bit grim once or twice, because they were really throwing the kite around. I am O.K. if I can see out to see whats [sic] doing, but if I am in the middle of the kite unable to look out then its rough.
Ken has gone on leave at last, this was the one he missed when we went, he has gone to Iver, Bucks & to London. I have told him to pop in at my house I hope he does. Meanwhile he has let me ride his bike which comes in very handy at this blasted place. Friday
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night it was given out on the radio that F/Sgt Aaron who used to be with 218 had been posthumously awarded the V.C. The citation said his courage had never been surpassed, & by jiminy they were right. In absolute agony & with severest wounds he had diverted the kite on from Turin to N. Africa, where he died 9 hours after, it was a marvellous show! The air bomber who flew it & landed it, belly landing, with 4,000 lb still on received the C.G.M. & most of the crew the D.F.M. They arrived back from Gibralter not long ago, with tins of sugar & heavens knows what else besides.
All our trips recently have been in other kites ours was U/S, when we came down from a flip they found the tail plane was only secured with about 3 nuts & bolts, we nearly had it that time. Yesterday it was put serviceable again & we had to take her up for a couple of hours. It had rained cats & dogs in the morning so there was a stand down & we were the only joe’s flying, & Saturday afternoon too. We were caught in some hellish storms but dodged them, then found parts with clean weather, & played tag with the cloud tops it was good fun. I broke a bigué and then we couldn’t get the undercart down, so poor old Jack & Bill had to set to & wind it down. We all held our breaths when we came in but it didn’t collapse & we were O.K.
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The Wing Cmdr was attacked by a JU88 on a gardening trip to the Baltic the other night, & they claimed it shot down. Who is to dispute them, I bet they went nowhere near the thing, as everyone else thinks & its popular talk that the Wing Cmdr. may get a gong for it whether its true or not I don’t know. There is something funny going on Stirlings haven’t operated against a land target for a month now, & there are all sorts of rumours going around. We are going on Coastal Command, are going out East, are converting onto Lancs, are towing gliders, are only going to do mining trips, these are but a few of the speculations floating around, there certainly seems to be something in the air. The most obvious solution I think is they are waiting until a .5 mid under gun is fitted, we also have to operate this, quite a few jobs we have now.
It has been bitterly cold all day today, whilst harmonising my front guns I gashed two fingers & I didn’t feel it, nor did it start to bleed for a good while, my fingers were so frozen, it’s a real touch of winter. There are two fires in our huge ante room & that is the only method of heating the place. Consequently there is a circle of fellows packed tightly around it, & another circle around them waiting for someone to vacate a chair at which there is a mad rush. The rest of the fellows just have to hover around hoping to catch a glimpse of the fire or of moving into the outer circle.
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[underlined] Thursday 11th November. [/underlined]
The cold weather continues, it takes ones breath away just walking down to the flight, I am glad there are no ‘ops’ on from this station nowadays. I wonder what is happening, it certainly is funny, Stirlings off ‘ops’ all this time, must be something behind it all. The rumours are flying as thick as ever, but nobody has any definite ‘gen’ at the moment. We will find out in due course I daresay. Yesterday we went on rather an interesting trip, an Eric, which is a daylight bullseye. Naturally the only defences we had to combat were fighters, & we didn’t have any engagements, so everything went smoothly. Our route took us across London three times, & pin pointing became very interesting, as I found the various places I know. The balloons were quite a sight, flying at their operational height, there seemed literally hundreds of them. Old Father Thames looked grand in the sun with the boats chugging slowly up & down, there was a fair amount of shipping off Tilbury & Grays & a convoy at Southend. At Chatham there were a fair amount of naval vessels, but nothing like peace-time. We followed the Thames up to attack our target Tower Bridge, there was a certain amount of difficulty in finding this owing to cloud that had rolled across. We eventually made it though.
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Being used to stooging along by ourselves at night it was a novel experience for us to see about another hundred bombers all around, on the same course & height. It was rather tricky at turning points, some kites E.T.A’s would be due slightly before one’s own & they would turn & come cutting across, diving underneath, or lifting above, there must be some close shaves at night, which the darkness hides. When we returned to base the weather had changed down so we had to stooge around for a bit, but we landed quite safely.
Our leave is due on the 24th, and we are beginning to make our arrangements, praying to the Lord, that nothing crops up & we lose it. I had a letter from Bill today, saying that old Bob Blackburn, who was in our room at I.T.W. had got the chop on his 13th over the Ruhr. He always maintained there was nothing in superstition & insisted on third lights, I guess it was just Fate that it should be his 13th, I hope he managed to bale out safely. We lost a crew the other night on a long mining off the Spanish border, Johnston was flying with them as rear gunner, it was his first trip. He was in Carr’s crew that is the second one gone, these mining trips certainly don’t seem to be such a stooge nowadays.
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[underlined] Sunday 14th November. [/underlined]
What a hum drum life this is, & a cold one. Rush for breakfast, fight to get a wash basin then trudge down to the flights. Knock around in the Bombing Office for a while to see the score then out to the kite for a D.I. It’s a hellish cold job polishing the perspex on the first turret, especially the outside I have to mount a rickety iron ladder, & perched up there 25 ft in the air polish away vigorously with frozen hands, each movement causing the ladder to sway. We generally continue to get back to the flights at 11.15 AM. in time for the NAAFI van. Then back to the mess, with more chances than one of being called back for an air test, just as we are about to go into dinner. The afternoon’s procedure is very similar, if we aren’t flying, it is link or Gee, Astro or something, until we scuttle back to tea. Over to the billet, then, to coax a fire into the stove & all huddle round it. Gangs of fellows scour the immediate vicinity of the huts for wood, posts are pulled up & everything of an inflammable nature seized upon. There is a huge coke dump opposite & every evening sees a dozen fellows or more filling buckets & other articles. These stoves are quite our pride & we take an experts delight in raising a large fire in a short while.
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If we aren’t writing letters we are listening to records on a gramophone that Bill managed to ‘borrow’ from the W/T section, I wish we had a wireless here, though. Sometimes we attend an ENSA show, the one this week wasn’t so bad. Friday afternoon we had a stand down so Jack, Johnny & myself bowled into Cambridge again, following the routine of our previous visit, but not having the luck to fall into any flight parties again. So far this month we have gone in quite a few flying hours the weather has been lousy on quite a few trips. Last night we were stooging round in a rain storm trying to find a bombing target before we were recalled, Saturday night, too. The other day Mac, Johnny Don & myself went up with Wiseman’s crew for Air to Air firing over the Wash. After landing & unloading the blasted ammo. when it came to my turn the Martinet ran out of fuel & had to return.
The other day on our Air Test, Mac feathered the starboard outer to test it, but couldn’t unfeather it. After a few unsuccessful attempts we gave up & landed with it feathered, & got down O.K. too. If it isn’t the undercart refusing to come down, its something else. Still old I Item is quite a good kite now, & we can get a fair turn of speed from it.
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[underlined] Thursday November 18th [/underlined]
Quite a lot of things have happened in the few short days since I made my last entry. First like a bolt from the blue came the news that the squadron was being disbanded. It was quite a shock we are supposed to be moving to Chedburgh shortly & there given individual postings. Everyone is thoroughly cheesed about it, we were just getting settled in here too, all the top bags, Bombing, Nav & Gunnery Leaders are fine fellows, one couldn’t wish for a better bunch, I guess that’s typical of the RAF when one gets a piece of cake, they aren’t allowed to eat it. 214 squadron which is at Chedburgh is coming here in our place & we are gradually breaking up. They say we are converting to Lancs & if so it may be time that Stirlings are gradually dieing [sic] out of Bomber Command & the Lancs taking their place. If we are moving in a few days, as the tale says, then it will mess our leave up, after all our arranging, its driving me nuts, we never get a leave that works out smartly. Johnnie Smythe a Nav. from Sierra Leone has had a letter from the people there saying they want to adopt 623 Sqdn. & have collected 100 to £150,000 for our benefit – phew! that’s over £250 per head ground & air crew, of course it would be used for the betterment of the squadron, building a wizard crew room, & various other things.
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The Wing Cmdr. has been up to Group to raise Cain, I don’t know if he has had any satisfication, but I & everyone else hope we stay here together. Monday night we had our Sqdn party, strictly bachelor, the air crew paid for it all, & invited the ground crew to show their appreciation for their maintenance of the kites. There was lots of beer & everyone was happy especially old Mac he was well under, a gang of them started down the mess before the party, then rang Downham for a taxi to take them to the party 200 yds away. There was a championship table tennis match between a couple of top notches in peace-time & then the winner issued a challenge. Ginger Morris who used to play for England, had been waiting for this to just bowl out & beat him. The only fault was Ginger had been imbibing heavily & consequently could hardly see the ball, so lost easily. At 10.30 P.M. it broke up and Mac got in at 5 AM. he had wandered over to the mess to shoot the bull & fell asleep there.
Poor Johnnie has been feeling grim and was very bad the other day & went sick, & they chopped him in dock with flu. Jack was also feeling bad but has recovered, but Don is in bed very queer & I feel it myself, what a crew, but this place is enough to give people all the illnesses under the sun.
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Tuesday night, six Canadians came & gave a concert show, they were a travelling party all [indecipherable word] & they put up quite a performance too. Last night there was an ENSA show which I thought rather good, so we haven’t done too bad for entertainment. Today held a big shock for quite a few people, Group came through to say there was a big do, & 218 & 623 were on the main effort. All crews available were put on, & after 6 weeks they thought it was a laugh & a joke, but realised it was true. Mac was due to go on a second dickie with Sqdn/Ldr. Overton, but it was scrubbed at the last minute as Overton’s Navigator was sick. Petch has gone with Flt/Lt. Willis, & Macgillvray with Flt/Lt. Nesbitt, I hope the morning saw them all back safe & sound. Apparently we are still an operational squadron, but for how long is the question. There is also a fair amount of mining & a new crew is taking our kite, so Don & I were out there this afternoon checking on the turrets.
The other afternoon we had a wizard lecture from a Lieutenant in the Navy. He had quite a few experiences to recount he had been on the Greton in the Graf Spee battle & in the U-Boat War, & seen quite a bit of excitement in the Med., he was very interesting to listen too. [sic] His story showed both sides of the picture too, we weren’t always winning. He said a good word for mining, the results of which were definitely assessed as 1 ship sunk every 11 mins which is good going.
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[underlined] Sunday November 21st. [/underlined]
The squadron definitely is disbanded, though in the meantime it is fully operational. The Wing Co. leaves on Dec 6th to some O.T.U. I believe. Sqdn/Ldr Smith adding his D.F.C. to his D.F.M. is going to an O.T.U. also, - as a flight commander, he has both his tours completed now. The Navigator Leader has already gone, & the Wing Co. has been asking crews what squadrons they would like to be posted to, but nothing is promised. Anyway it appears we are remaining in 3 Group & not going onto Lancs, so that is one theory squashed. Right now we are just praying that nothing will crop up to cheat us of our leave, there are only two days to go. We have arranged to get on the 11 AM pay parade Tuesday & hope to catch the 11.48 AM London train.
Three kites were lost from here on Thursday’s trip to Ludwigshaven – one from 218, & two from 623. Poor old Ray Bennett was one, Johnny Smythe was his Nav. I only hope they baled out, F/Lt Wallis was the other & Petch was with him on a second dicky. That leaves only Macgillvray & us with complete crews from Hixon. P/O Ralph & F/Lt Nesbitt turned back with engine trouble, so it wasn’t too good for 623. It was even grimmer on Friday night, they were going to Leverhulme or something a small place just north of Cologne, & a pretty easy trip it turned out.
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623 only managed to get two kites off the deck, & there was hell to pay, there was quite a bit of finger trouble, though. They said Group sent through the bomb load too late, but then it was the armament officers first experience of bombing up for ‘ops’. Bombs were being sent out to kites that were U/S with engine trouble when others were standing there with engines running merely waiting for bombs, consequently most of them never got off in time. They told one chap to take off 5 mins after time & catch the force up, he told them what to do. Another just got off & set course over the runway in his take off. Wiseman was waiting for one more 1,000 lb H.E. when the Armament Officer said that’s O.K. take off without it, this made the C. of G somewhere in the region of the rear turret – Wiseman’s reply was rather flowery. So poor old Mac didn’t get off again & still has to get his second dicky in. All the kites got back safely but were diverted owing to local fog, one of 218’s was pretty shot up by flak, and pranged at Chedburgh. The kites that were on mining also returned safely. Nesbitt has been told that his tour is completed now, so they are screening him after 24 trips, still that’s enough for anyone, and if I had that number under my belt I would feel very contented.
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Johnny seems a lot better now, we have popped in to see him each day, & he is having a regular rest cure, he intends trying to come out tomorrow as he doesn’t want to miss his leave – nor do any of us – keen types. Ken & I went to the camp cinema the other night, quite a good show but the place is like an ice box. There is a real fiasco here, the water supply is being cut right down, apparently the camps normal consumption is 52,000 gals a day, & the water company will only supply 10,000 gals daily, until their reservoir rises. Consequently all water on the sites is cut off & we cant [sic] have any baths or showers, & now we have been informed we are not supposed to wash or shave in the mess ablutions. This means not washing or showering day in, day out, I wonder what the M.O. thinks of it! There are a couple of water carts that come round the sites & people fill up old cans etc. Even of we hand round all cans we are never on the sites, our whole day is spent down the flights or in the mess. The whole situation is preposterous and it’s a pretty poor show for an RAF camp.
I went into town last night, for the first time for over a week, it was a real pea souper of a night & we muffled right up. The film was quite a decent one, & a drink after made a little break out of the monotony.
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[underlined] Wednesday December 1st. [/underlined]
Another fair interval since I last made an entry, & for the old reason that I have been on leave, we arrived back last night. After all the sweating & heartbreaking we eventually got away on Tuesday, & we did sweat as I will account. On the Sunday, before going on leave, when I last made an entry there had been rumours of something big coming off the following day, as all Ground Crew N.C.O’s had been ordered to have their kites in really tip top condition. Monday dawned a thick misty day, visibility wasn’t more than 50 yds, Jack & I danced for joy as Mac couldn’t possibly do a second dicky that night & we would definitely go on leave on Tuesday, what a fine world it was. Down at the flights a rude shock was awaiting us there was ‘ops’ on that night & Mac was going as second dicky to Sqdn/Ldr. Overton. Everyone thought it must be a farce, it was bound to be scrubbed, the Met reckoned it would clear though. However out we went to the kite & gave it a thorough D.I. because Sgt Ralph was taking it. Gradually the weather cleared, and gradually our hopes sunk, because if Mac got his trip in we would be definitely on “ops” the following night instead of on leave. Every few moments we would gaze at the cloud formations & the fast disappearing mist & try to cheer each other up, although we all felt we had had it.
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We had found out all tanks were to be filled that meant Berlin or Italy & it all pointed to The Big City. Briefing was at 2.30 P.M. & off they went & I went out to the kite again, Johnny was still in dock as his guns had to be checked but Johnny Hyde the Gunnery Leader was out there to do them. At this time the sky clouded over really black, & everyone was certain the Met had boobed. When large drops of rain fell I could have danced for joy, but as though the Met had exercised a superhuman influence the skies miraculously cleared as take off time grew near. The crew came out to I Item & I spoke to the Air Bomber for a bit & happened to see the Nav’s charts, & Berlin it was. I wondered whether Mac was twittering inside, Overton was taking Les Gray, our Nav. who had only done a Nickel before. What a task without even having done a Mining to navigate to Berlin & back. When the actual take off started the weather wasn’t too good but they went, they scrambled at 5 P.M. & set course 5.30 P.M. with our best wishes. During the evening five kites returned early but old Mac wasn’t amongst them, they were mainly 218’s kites too. So off we went to bed, hoping to hear old Mac come banging in at about 2 AM he did. It had been a fairly quiet trip he said, cloud cover all the way, & no fighter sightings. Les’s navigation had been bang on & he was personally congratulated by the Groupie.
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There had been a lot of reporters and photographers there & someone said a B.B.C. chap, lots of lines were shot anyway, we listened to all the story & then sank back asleep. When the morning came it seemed as though our luck was really out, it was clear as a bell. Jack & I grabbed two bikes & dashed down to the Flights to see whether we were on or not. What an anxious half hour that was, the Wing Co. rang for P/O Ralph who was acting Flt/Comdr. then & he came out with lots of papers etc. our hearts sank, but then he said “Nothing on, only mining” we could hardly believe our ears. Back we tore & dressed up for pay parade & a speedy get away. We reckoned without Pay Accounts, with their typical efficiency they paid us at 11.45 AM instead of 11 A.M as it was supposed to be. So we missed the 11.47 train, still nothing mattered then we were off & going home. Scorning the RAF food we had a dinner in Sly’s Café then a drink & homeward bound.
I had a fine leave although the weather wasn’t so hot, that night (Tuesday) it was Berlin dunno if any Stirlings went but we didn’t send any at all. During the leave I saw quite a few shows, among them the new film “For Whom The Bell Tolls”, also read the book, both very good. We arrived back O.K. without any incidents we only stopped 5 mins at Cambridge so couldn’t recreate our previous escapade.
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Johnny was looking very seedy going home, as he had only come out of the dock that day, he wangled round the M.O. He came back looking fit though, we all seemed to have reduced our colds. Ken had been down to Pastow for his Medical Board, & has been taken off flying. So we have definitely lost him, it is goodbye to a fine Navigator & one of the finest fellows it has ever been my priviledge [sic] to meet. We are lucky to have an equally good chap to fill his place they are much alike in many ways. Old Jack Yardley the W/Op who is in our hut & also suffered with air sickness went down with Ken & he is also off of flying.
This morning we did the inevitable Air Test, it always happens the day one returns from leave. I Item is still here, someone buckled a wing tip whilst we were away, there are only four kites left now, they have ferried all the others away. So we should be leaving in a few days, but where to nobody knows yet, rumours are flying as thick as ever. One thing that is definite 214 Sqdn are arriving here on Monday so we will have to leave by then. It is so cold as anything today, there was a frost like snow this morning. If this weather continues & gets worse during the winter I would welcome a posting to Italy or somewhere warm. Talking of warmth, I think I’ll turn in, bed is the best place to warm anyone up.
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[inserted] [newspaper cutting about the raid on Berlin with a photograph of the crew led by Flying Officer Wiseman, and including Sergeant Twydell, engineer; P/O Craig, Sergent Foreman, Sergeant Copley F/Sergeant Brasington, F/O Theriault, and Flight Sergeant Macgillvray, second pilot] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
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[underlined] [missing words] December. [/underlined]
The cat is out of the bag, & there were a few surprises in the bag too, the gen has been dished out as to where we are all going. We all leave tomorrow on the 2 P.M. train, except for those who were due for leave & they went today, (our luck was in we were the last ones to get away, all leave was cancelled after we went). The Wing Co. went a few days ago to 90 Sqdn at Tuddenham, & P/O Ralph, Macgillvray & somebody else are going as well. After all this time then we are parted from Mac, it’s a pity, we two crews have been together a fair while, we are the only ones from Hixon now. By the by. Macgillvray appeared in the newspapers, there was a large photograph of old Wiseman & crew being interrogated upon their return from Berlin, & Macgillvray was in as second pilot quite celebrities now. That B.B.C. chap was here he gave a hell of a ‘bully’ story after the 1 P.M. news the following day.
To resume we and about six other crews are off to Waterbeach to convert onto Lanc IIs. As they have Hercules engines, we wont have Jack, as he won’t have to take another course. Four or so of the crews have gone on leave, today as they are due for it & they arrive there a week after us. It came as quite a surprise we all thought we were set on Stirlings, it will be quite a
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bind, circuits & bumps & screened cross countries all over again, oh hell! There is a squadron there as well 514, I wouldn’t mind being put on that, pray to the Lord we are. Four chaps are being transferred to 218 Sqdn. Overton & Wiseman are amongst them, they say Overton will have to revert to F/O. Nickie Nesbitt went back to P/O & Vickers the Engineering Leader did also, daresay they will have ‘em back again soon though. Some of the postings were to 199 & 149 Sqdns I believe. Last night we were put on the main effort, right in the middle of getting cleared from here, quite a flap. It was only 2, 4 & 6 tanks and 8 x 1,000 lbs & 6, x 5,000 lbs, as it must have been to these rocket gun emplacements they are building to shell London. It was scrubbed though, the minings went & poor old P/O Puch got the chop, his B/A Sutherland was a good guy, they were only an a short mining, too, quite shaking.
The latest Berlin raid where they lost 41 two war correspondents are missing, one got back though, gee! if they were paying that reporter £200 for going on a mining trip, heavens knows what those boys were raking in. One thing is sure from the way the Lancs are operating nearly every night whatever the weather, our tour will be over pretty soon one way or the other. We were paid today & finally cleared from here, last night we went into town to the dance & to the Crown for a farewell ‘do’ before we said goodbye to the hallowed precincts of Downham.
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[underlined] Thursday December 9th. [/underlined]
This entry is being made at Waterbeach, another new station this is my eighteenth station since I have been in the RAF, like Crosby & Hope I certainly get around. We left Downham Monday dinner time, and in the rush I missed saying cheerio to Ken, and was sorry but I have written to him. As usual when they tell you transport will be waiting, there was none, so we walked it was about 15 mins to the billet. The tales of the billets etc. being good inside the camp are quite true, the only snag being we aren’t in the camp. Our quarters are in the inevitable huts “Con Sight” as we call it though it is listed as Conversion Site. The Con Unit (1678) is almost entirely separate from the squadron we have our own mess about 5 mins walk from the hut. The food is good, better than at Downham, but the mess is bare, empty & cold. Not being many crews here either, it is generally isolated, & not very cheering. The squadron have a smashing mess in the camp, with living quarters above, very handy, wish we were in it.
I think the most shaking thing is that breakfast finishes at 7.45 A.M. right on the dot, so we have to be up really early. Then breakfast over we wash & are supposed to be at the flights at 8.15 A.M. It is a 25 min walk too, so we have to start out in time. There is [underlined] P.T [/underlined] 8.15 till 8.30 AM. then lectures.
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The walking is rather a bind as we didn’t expect it here, poor Mac is looking somewhat slimmer, as he lost his bike at a [deleted] [indecipherable word] [/deleted] wild party, before leaving Downham. Tuesday was occupied with filling in the arrival chits as usual, then yesterday & today we have had ground lectures, weather permitting we may commence our circuits & bumps tomorrow. There was nothing new in the ground work, the bombing side of the Lanc. is simpler than the Stirling. We carry cookies on there now, there is no second pilot, so I have lost my comfortable seat. This is compensated by the much better bombing compartment, there is a fine huge vision panel in the nose, no more straining one’s neck to get a line on the target. One also enters the turret from the bombing compartment, so there is no chance of being locked in the turret. The performance of these aircraft are pretty good, especially speed & climbing power.
Tuesday afternoon we went into Cambridge, there is a pretty decent bus service to & from there. In the village there isn’t a lot of life but a couple of decent pubs do a good trade. I have just heard from Bill Taylor, & he tells me poor old Jack is missing now, he was on the same squadron as old Bob Blackburn who is now reported killed. Its pretty grim to hear of the old pals getting the chop, wonder if I’ll be alive at the end.
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[underlined] Monday 13th December. [/underlined]
The weather at this place is as bad as at Downham, I didn’t think there could be another place as bad. Mac’s day circuits & bumps are now complete & we are ready for a day cross country which finishes the day flying & then on to night c & b’s. I rather like the lay out of this station, it is very neat and compact, of course that is because it was a peace time station. I wish we were billeted in the camp although I understand the food in the permanent mess isn’t as good as in ours. On Friday the Duke of Gloucester came down to inspect the camp, we knew a full 24 hrs before who it was, the old grape-vine certainly defeats security. On the Thursday morning the Bombing Leader asked us who it was as he wasn’t able to find out. Our six crews were joined for a cheering party we had to line up opposite a line of WAAF’s at the gate & cheer when he left. I haven’t been on P.T. yet I have a hard enough job to get up in the mornings. Mac has managed to scrounge an official bike now, that is one thing he moves fast for. Every Wednesday they have a C.O’s parade and march past, there is a fair amount of bull here considering they have an operational squadron, I guess it is because they have the Con Unit still, yes, the more I think of it, the more easier 623 appears.
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[underlined] Tuesday December 21st. [/underlined]
We are now back on an operational squadron again, 115 Sqdn at Witchford near Ely. Our course finished here last [inserted] Sunday [/inserted] night and yesterday & this morning we were completing our clearance chits. It wasn’t such a bad place, & the work was pretty easy, the ground work was nothing new at all, except a new photo flash fuse. Our first flip was a day cross country at 23,000 ft, a really binding trip, 10/10ths all the way, just sit there and freeze about 25o below. Then after the night circuits and bumps, we were on a Bullseye, Sunday night. Or rather a Flashlight exercise, because the I.R. bombing is abandoned over London, & they have a target of three red lights to simulate T.Is, & at various distances of a couple of miles altogether were white lights flashing various Morse characters, so on the photograph, one could tell in theory how near the bombs would have landed. That trip was a cold one as well but we had a hot time with the defences, a solid belt of searchlights all the way round, & a hell of a cone sight over the target, we were picked up on our bombing run & they sure dazzled me. We rather preferred to remain at Waterbeach with 514 Squadron owing to the compactness of the station. They don’t operate such a lot, the other night they landed at Downham Market, practically all kites were diverted. It was a black night, & the Met boobed badly, all England almost was fog bound, & we have heard from reliable sources that 65 kites either crashed or had to be abandoned owing to weather. With the 30 kites lost that made 95 kites, the public will never know of that.
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The transport brought us by road from Waterbeach it is 13 miles & when we reached Witchford there was a howling gale & the rain was lashing down. Nobody knew where we were supposed to be billeted & we were driving around the place, dashing in & out of huts, until soaked to the skin, we eventually found one. Roger’s crew is in the hut with us, we are on 4 site & it is about two miles from the mess. I have seen some dispersed stations but this is the worst of them all, the mess is a 30 min walk from the flights as well, we certainly use Shanks Pony here, it is killing Mac he hasn’t done so much walking for ages. The usual thick mist is everywhere that is the trouble in East Anglia. Everything about the station & squadron seems to be grim, at one time it was a happy squadron & contented, but this station has got everyone down a lot; they have only been here 3 weeks. To give a typical example of the way the place is run, they moved here via Berlin. The crews were sent off to Berlin from this base & on return had to land here, what a fiasco that must have been, tramping round in the dark trying to find billets etc. Leave here is about every 12 weeks, its incredible, they don’t appear to worry whether you have any or not. There is no operational meal before ops, just tea & a couple of sandwiches & the rations are pretty small, & no coffee. No transport is organised to take us into Ely, & there are hardly ever stand downs, there appears to be a complete lack of interest in air crew, oh! well I’m too cheesed to write any more.
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[underlined] Monday 27th December. [/underlined]
Xmas is over now, & I’m none too sorry really, it wasn’t a lot to shout about. Now we are settled down a bit better, but its hard to shake off the feeling of being cheesed here, everyone is, the old chaps of 115 Sqdn, the fellows on 196 the sqdn that was here before, & ourselves the mix crews from 623. The Bombing & Engineering Sections are in the same room, the Bombing Leader is a decent chap, but I don’t see how you can get to know the other bomb aimers, they don’t make any advances or anything. We flew the second night we were here on another Flashlight exercise, & were getting around O.K. but as we were running in towards London for the target, all the searchlights began homing us away from London, so we realised there was an air raid in progress, & beetled back to base. There they told us over the W/T to continue with our exercise & we had to beetle up North & keep cracking around. The trip took us 6 1/2 hours & they didn’t give us any rations at all, I was absolutely frozen, & had an electric waistcoat on, but that didn’t keep my legs warm, I was glad when we landed. On Thursday night, Mac did his second dicky they have to do them on these kites as well, of all places it was Berlin again. Thats [sic] two second dickeys he has done there now, packing ‘em in alright. I think it is a terrible feeling waiting around for them to come back I would rather go myself, he returned O.K. there was one missing from here.
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On Xmas Eve afternoon Bill & I cycled the 26 mls to Waterbeach & back to collect the Xmas mail for about a dozen fellows, we could have used a truck coming back. That night we all went into Ely to the Lamb Hotel to commence the celebrations. What a night it was, & what a head I had next morning. On Xmas Day the officers mess invited us over in the morning then came over to our mess in the afternoon, it was more of a drunken brawl than anything else. Bags of broken bottles & glasses, it is grim like that, we were supposed to serve Xmas dinner to the airmen, but I felt too grim to go across. Our tea that night was really wizard, it was served buffet form, & there were sausage rolls, cakes, pastries, sandwiches, sardine on toast, spam & chopped egg, trifle & cream cake it was grand! There were two fights, because tempers were rather frayed after drinking. Afterwards we all tramped into town to have our Xmas Dinner for the crew, in the Lamb Hotel, it was pretty good, we were in bed pretty early that night. Boxing Day was very quiet, we had our turkey dinner at 7.30 P.M. it was well served, afterwards there was a dance in the mess. There wasn’t a single decoration in the mess for the Xmas just lovely & bare. Anyway that was the end of the festive season, & this morning we donned battle dress once more & got cracking on the same old grind.
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[underlined] Thursday 30th December. [/underlined]
We have made a start at the squadron now, they don’t waste a lot of time, last night we began ‘ops’ here with a trip to Berlin. The pre-briefing was at 1.30 P.M. & Les & I got cracking on the maps and charts before all the crews arrived at 3 P.M. for the main briefing. Our route was worked out to try to bluff Jerry in believing the attack was being carried out on Leipzig or Magdeburg. We went straight for those places and as Mossies opened the dummy attacks on both towns we suddenly turned north & headed for the “Great City”. Taking it on the whole it wasn’t a bad trip twenty kites lost when over 700 were sent.
The trouble with these early take offs is that we don’t get a meal before we take our kites away & start dicing. At the end of briefing there is a mad rush to grab a cup of tea and a couple of sandwiches at the back of the room; then down to the locker room to change. Out we lumber to the transports, & they take us to the waiting kites. Here we dump all our heavy kit & climb in to check all our equipment & run the kite prop to see everything is bang on. Then we shut her down, & climb out to complete our dressing, a few minutes for a smoke for those that need it, then 20 minutes before we are due to take off we climb aboard again & start up. As the time approaches we taxi out & take our place in the line, then one by one [missing words]
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Round & round we circle, then as the time for setting course arrives we make the last circuit and away we go. By this time we are at about 13,000 ft & generally by the time of crossing the English coast we are a little [deleted] of [/deleted] over 15,000 ft. I carry out all my Bombing checks & put the front guns on Fire, all ready for something, we begin our vigilance here, as the German fighters often operate right across the North Sea. At our turning point we are at our operational height of 20,000 ft, & we set course for the Dutch Coast. Approaching the coast the flak can always be seen coming up from Texel or other equally well defended spots. The cloud was 10/10ths awarding us a natural protection from the searchlights.
Every now & then along the south some place would start throwing up flak, if it came close we weaved but generally didn’t bother. Quite a few times a fighter would drop three flares, lighting up quite an area of sky, if they were too near for safety we corkscrewed quickly, with everybody searching the sky carefully. The searchlights would also shine on the clouds in large concentrations causing us to be silhouetted to any fighter above. Two markers were dropped on the route to guide us away from hot spots, we didn’t see the first, but the second at Leipzig was plainly visible. The dummy attacks had commenced & there were some red & green T.I’s & a few bombs, they were certainly throwing up some flak, we had to nip in between Magdeburg & Leipzig, it was very warm & we got away as soon as possible.
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Just after leaving Leipzig I had a momentary panic when three ME110’s came whizzing past us going the opposite direction to Leipzig, I guess they came haring back later when Berlin opened up. We were running into a head wind coming up to the target & I thought we were never getting there; the T.I’s were burning there, & the cookies exploding, & the flak was pouring up, although it wasn’t too heavy; but we never seemed to be getting any nearer. As we eventually approached I could see the glow of a large fire reflecting on the clouds. Then “Bomb Doors Open” – “Running Up”, “Left Left” “Steady” “Bombs Gone” “Bomb Doors Closed” & away we went. The return journey was much the same as the outward, but we found the W/Op had turned the inter-wing balance cock the wrong way & we had lost 200 galls. So we had the worry of whether we would be able to make it or not. We crossed the English coast O.K. and were trying to make base, when the fuel warning lights started to flicker meaning we were almost out. There we were at 400 ft to [sic] low to bale out & unable to use up petrol to climb, just expecting the motors to cut at any moment. Suddenly a drome appeared & we screamed in there without announcing or anything but we were down & that was the main thing. It was a P.F.F. place Warboys, we didn’t get the egg there & had to sleep in a chair in the mess, so it wasn’t so good, next morning we flew back to base, & had a badly needed sleep. There was one missing from here which wasn’t so bad, however that was our first major ‘op’ over.
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[underlined] Monday January 3rd [/underlined]
Well that’s another year gone and 1944 is here, I wonder if this year will see Germany out of it, somehow I doubt it, though I think she will be well on the way. Last Friday ‘ops’ were on, so we had visions of seeing the New Year in over the other side. Briefing was at 3 P.M. again and the target was Frankfurt, it was an attempt to fool the Jerries and make them think we were going to Berlin, somehow I don’t think it would have been successful, anyway just as briefing it was scrubbed and we didn’t cry over it. There was a New Year’s Dance on in the gym, so we went there and got pretty merry, eventually getting into bed around 4 A.M.
Getting up well the worse for wear in the morning we were shaken to find there were ops on again that night. Pre briefing was 1.30 P.M. but the main briefing wasn’t until 9 P.M. there being an operational meal before we took off. The target was once more Berlin, this time we were going in from the north with a dummy attack on Hamburg though I wasn’t so sure that that would fool them. Take off was at a quarter to one in the morning a hell of a while to wait up till. This time they sent the fighters out to meet us and the fun started right over the Dutch coast. The flak was as eager to greet us as ever.
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About 10 mins after we had crossed the Dutch coast I saw a burst of tracer go streaking across the sky then suddenly flames burst out on a Lanc & she slowly peeled over & went spiralling down through the clouds, then a few seconds later a huge glow shot up – poor devils. It couldn’t have been more that five minutes afterwards when Johnny the rear gunner screamed “Corkscrew Port”, I thought “here it comes” & gripped on. I guess whoever they are they all feel a bit of panic at such moments, I know the flesh on my back crawled as I kept anticipating the feeling of bullets ripping into my back. However we dodged him, it was a JU88 who came screaming down and fired a burst at us, he broke off the attack though. The flak in the target area was quite a bit heavier this time & it was really close, the return journey took us a fair bit longer as we were pushing against the wind. There were quite a lot of fighters lobbing down three flares at a time, it certainly is a hell of a feeling when one is battling along in the dark, & suddenly one is lit up as plain as daylight, & the feeling that every fighter in the sky is leering down at you is no fun. Mac generally swears and corkscrews viciously. We got back to base without mishap, shot the lines at interrogation then trotted off to another bacon & egg meal. There were 28 missing on that raid out of about 450 kites so it was heavier losses, none were missing from here which was good but 3 didn’t take off, and 3 turned back. ‘We got to bed at 10.30 A.M.
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At 2 P.M. we were awakened by the Tannoy blaring for all Navigators to report to the briefing room at 4 P.M. for pre-briefing. My God! there were ops on again & we were feeling nearly dead from lack of sleep already. It certainly set me back when going into briefing the target map showed Berlin again, gee! three times in five nights to the Great City it was pretty rough. Take off was at 12.20 P.M. because we were fighting to avoid the moon, even then it wasn’t set when we took off, but it had set before we reached the enemy coast. Things were pretty lively because there was a ninety mile an hour gale blowing and we had to go straight to Berlin, with no dummy attacks, & boy were they ready for us. For miles around the target it was like day with lanes of flares and kites whizzing around. It certainly was hectic over the target, I was expecting a fighter attack at any moment, & when the bombs had gone I got in the front turret & scared old Mac by flashing the guns backwards & forwards. Altogether we were in the thick of it for nearly 25 minutes it seemed like 25 years. I thought we would never get clear of there. It took us 2 1/2 hours [deleted] for [/deleted] to reach the target & 4 1/2 hours returning, because we were battling almost head on against the gale, it seemed an eternity before we reached the French coast. We reached base O.K. & tumbled in at 10.30 A.M. & boy! did we need the sleep, we lost one from here & I believe 27 on the whole effort.
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[underlined] Saturday 12th January [/underlined]
Its quite a while since I wrote here, but as usual I have been on leave in the meantime. There were no ops on the Tuesday after I last wrote, but on Wednesday there were. It was to Stettin & the route was all around Norway & the Baltic, then the stream suddenly headed south to Berlin, where Mossies started a dummy attack & the main force suddenly swung west to Stettin. The trip was terribly long 8 hr. 32 mins at the minimum & it was cutting it fairly fine with a full petrol load. At the last moment the route was lengthened by another three quarters of an hour, so that if we had made the trip we would have landed in the North Sea, consequently all Lanc IIs were scrubbed, the I’s & III’s went though & only lost 15 I wouldn’t have minded going. The next morning at two hours notice we were told we were on 7 days leave & had to rush around to get away that day.
We returned Thursday night, & got to bed about 1 A.M., then as it was the 4th day after the full moon, we were sure there would be no ops. Because 4 days before & 4 days after the full moon is the moon period & there are no ‘ops’. However Chopper Harris shot us up by putting ops on, after the morning air Test we dashed off for dinner then Les & I went back for 1.30 pre-briefing. The target was Brunswick, the place that the Forts went to a couple of days previously. They attacked aircraft factories about 20 miles from Brunswick, & we attacked the town.
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It was a real daylight take off, & when we were approaching the Dutch Coast it was quite light behind us, so I was expecting a head on attack. The weather was quite clear so the searchlights were active, there was quite a cone on Texel, & three large dummy fires as well, they must have quite a faith in the dimness of Air Bombers to bomb there. Our route took us quite close to Bremen, & there was a T.I. marker there cascading yellow. Later as we were getting close to the target we had to come really close to Hanover, & they were pretty active there. She had a hell of a lot of searchlights and if anyone strayed across the old flak would poop up. The attack started when we were a quarter of an hour from there, down went the T.I’s & up came the old flak. At briefing they said it would be pretty quiet, and that the Americans had destroyed 150 fighters for us – lovely it sounded. However there was quite a bit of flak and damned accurate, & more fighters milling around there us & other crews had seen before. I saw four kites go down in flames, [inserted] & burst [/inserted] on the ground, it was really grim. There was a lovely fire burning a huge thing with the green T.I’s in it, then a minute later our load went crashing down to help the conflaguration. The return journey wasn’t so bad there were numerous red flares dropped that burnt for a very short [deleted] [indecipherable letters] [/deleted] while, not like the usual fighter flares. We landed at 10.20 A.M. came butting back to beat the moon rise, we lost Blackwell & Christianson two senior crews, which was pretty grim, 38 [missing words], it certainly was no easy raid.
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[underlined] Tuesday January 18th. [/underlined]
The weather certainly is grim, we haven’t flown since Friday, there has been a thick fog, and these last two days it has rained, but tomorrow promises to be clear so I guess there will be ops on then. According to the Press the Brunswick raid was fairly easy, they certainly harped out some guff, one of them said there were no fighters over the target & the Luftwaffe was fooled. I was looking at the official list of combats & sightings over the target, & there really were some. One chap from here claimed a confirmed & a probable. Three times over the target Bill the W/Op. happened to knock our huge nose light on, it put five years on my life, ‘cos the first time nobody knew who did it, & I was crouched there with my hands over it, & cursing like a madman. F/Sgt Foggarty who was with us put up a damn good show, over the target he was attacked consistently for half an hour by fighters & an engine (stbd inner) hit by cannon shell. He feathered it and it fell right out, he came down from 23,000 ft to 7,100 ft before he could pull out, & had to stay down low all the way. He sent out an SOS because he thought he wouldn’t make it, & the Jerries followed our homing procedure identically. They homed with searchlights to a ‘drome in Holland, lit it up & gave him a green, luckily his Gee operated and he battled off in a hurry. He crash landed with 3 engines, one bust tyre, no flaps or brakes, & nobody hurt. The engineers right arm & leg were rendered useless over the target & he carried on, but they both got a gong. Beside the two we lost we had three kites written off through fighter attacks, Waterbeach lost two. Dimmock was one of them he came back from leave with me the night previously.
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[underlined] Monday January 24th. [/underlined]
Still no more ops, in a week, at least no ops that we have completed. Last Thursday we were on the Berlin trip, it seemed a pretty good route, but there was a terrific long sea leg up to Denmark. I hate that, I don’t mind baling out over land ‘cos you have some chance, but there is no sense in baling out over water as by yourself in a Mae West, a chap wouldn’t last a couple of hours. So the only thing is ditching, then if the kite is out of control & we are unable to ditch, we’ve had it. However soon after taking off we couldn’t see any other kites & Johnny & I were picking up opposite drifts from what they should have been. Suddenly Mac checked his compasses and found they were all haywire, we were well off track, and crossed the coast at Ipswich instead of Cromer. Then trying to steer a straight course we went round in a huge circle. It was impossible for us to go on so we tried to jettison fuel in order to land. Mac & Jack tried to jettison fuel to bring our load down, but were unable to do so. We had to jettison the cookie, and flew sixty five miles out from the coast & let her go. So back we went, & were we cheesed, & hate a turn back, it was our first. Jimmy Rodgers returned earlier with a U/S rear turret & W/O Robbins with a U.S Rev counter, Anderson got lost & bombed Wilhelmshaven & I believe F.O Ogden came back after 4 1/2 hrs we were airborne 2 hrs. We lost P/O Canning, on his 19th trip.
[page break]
[inserted] [newspaper cutting on raid on Magdeburg] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[duplicate page]
[page break]
The following night we were going to Magdeburg, with a dummy attack on Berlin, by 15 Mosquitoes, & 20 Lancs (dont [sic] fancy that). There were 690 kites detailed, quite a few for a place that size, we were taxying out, & were almost at the flare path when the kite in front of us became bogged, it was old Howby in F, Freddie. The dim of an ACP let us get right on top of it, before flashing a red, so there was no room for us to turn & go round the perimeter in time to take off. There were other guys in the same position as us & there we all sat whilst the minutes ticked by & we were scrubbed, did we curse. In all eight kites didn’t take off & we lost one, Waterbeach lost four, which was grim, and they say six returned early, I don’t know if thats [sic] right, if so only six kites got to the target & back, it certainly was a chop raid.
Hardwick the chap who was at OTU with us has 5 weeks more [deleted] week [/deleted] grounded, he is cheesed. He gave us some news of fellows at OTU. Doc & his crew are P.O.W’s poor old Cecil Kindt had the chop, Chiefy Young is a P/O with 15 in & his navigator Shields has his W/O they have [deleted] [indecipherable letters] [/deleted] been doing O.K. Bouchard is O.K. with 9, old Towne is in jail, stripped for beating up a town low level. Mac met, Pat Macguire, who was Petch’s Navigator, in London, he said Petch was killed outright. They have an English chap who was a staff pilot in Canada. Ray Bennett was killed outright, but Johnny Smythe his dark navigator is a P.O.W. I don’t know about the rest of the crew.
[page break]
[underlined] Sunday 30th January [/underlined]
Everything was peaceful until Wednesday & then ‘ops’ were on again, bags of twitter, we beetled out to old G George to see everything was bang on. The weather wasn’t too hot & everyone was sure it would be scrubbed. When we found out it was Frankfurt, we were certain we wouldn’t go as before we had been briefed for it & hadn’t gone, sure enough it was scrubbed. The Forts went there the other day though, (yesterday in fact) 800 bombers, they certainly must have wanted to rub that place out. However the following night (Thursday) we were dicing once more & it was the old Faithful Berlin again. It seems strange but I have on obsession for that place, I wouldn’t go so far as to say I like it, that would be plain dumb, but I am less disturbed when we go there than anywhere else. Why I am at a loss to explain as it is the longest & hardest trip we will ever have to do. All I know is I wouldn’t mind doing quite a few there, I hope it isn’t a fateful fascination & we get the chop over there.
We had a strong westerly wind blowing behind us & the outward trip only took 2 1/2 hrs, whilst the return took 5 1/2 hrs. Our journey wasn’t too bad, we had a nasty moment when Les told Mac to turn on a course of 037o & Mac thought he said 137o. We were on it for 2 minutes before I saw a Lanc. cut across us & I queried our course.
[page break]
[inserted] [two newspaper cuttings regarding a gale over Berlin causing fires to rekindle] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[duplicate page]
[page break]
This caused us to stray over, Brandenburg I believe it was & by jimini their predicted flak was damned accurate. It burst at the dead same height about 200 yds in front & another lot off the starboard beam. Another few seconds & we were flying through the black smoke puffs. As we saw the P.F.F. flares go down (they were a couple of minutes early) the first fighter flares dropped. Some of the kites had obviously arrived early & been stooging around, waiting for zero hour, because the flak had been going up for a while already. By the time we arrived, we were in the blasted last wave as usual, there were scores of yellow fighter flares making a lane into the target & another one out of it. There was one fair sized fire going but not so big as I have seen, just after the W/Op watched my cookie go through the clouds he reported a huge explosion. I smile to think it might have been me, but one can never tell what happens in a concentrated attack like that.
Two minutes after the bombs had gone, Don the Mid Upper spotted a fighter, & called to Johnny to watch it. Then we heard Johnny’s excited voice over the inter-com, “Its a JU88, he’s coming in he’s crossing over now, get ready to corkscrew port, - corkscrew port go”. I was scrambling up to the front guns & just reached there in time. Our corkscrew was so violent that neither of the gunners were able to open fire, it also
[page break]
must have surprised the Jerry because he overshot above us, & skidded in a stall turn about 200 yds away from our nose. I remember thinking “My God what a bloody size he is”, somehow I had never realised how large a 66ft wing span was for a fighter. Anyway he was in the wing right & a no deflection shot my fingers squeezed & I nearly whooped with joy, when I saw the tracer striking the rear of the port engine & the [deleted] sp [/deleted] mainplane between the engine & the fuselage. Then he dived down to port at a hell of a speed & my little bit of fun was over. It shook me that I was the one to open the attack, as the B/A’s don’t often get a crack. I think it rather shook him to be fired at from the front as he didn’t break away there again.
The battle really started then, & it was a battle too. Up he came from underneath, & Johnny yelled “corkscrew” & opened fire, we could hear his guns shattering, & we were zooming around the sky. Johnny said he hit the port engine again, as I hit it previously & some sparks & flames shot out then subsided to a glow, I think everyone thought we had had it then, though I must hand it to that fighter pilot he really had guts. Round he would come firing right in close & both our gunners would return the compliment. We were corkscrewing violently all the time and my stomach felt as though it was being torn apart & my head smacked against the perspex. Mac & Jack were both thrown against the
[page break]
[inserted] [two newspaper cuttings of the Berlin raid from two eye-witnesses] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[inserted] [newspaper cutting regarding the 12th major bombing raid on Berlin] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
roof too. Every now & again a huge stream of tracer would pour across the top of us, & my mouth was dry with fear as I saw the cannon shells exploding at 600 yds. The gunners would be shouting “Corkscrew keep corkscrewing – here he comes again,” then the guns would chatter & we’d roll around. When it came to the break aways I kept praying he would come up to the front & I could get another crack but he never did. I would yell “Where is he?” each time but he would dive right down underneath & they would lose him, it was a separate sighting & attack each time. He made 7 attacks on us, I thought it would never end, on the third he hit us in the elevator trim. Then on the fifth attack a cannon shell exploded in the port wing & bullets ripped through the port inner nacelle. Though we couldn’t tell where the damage was we could only feel the hits. However we gave him quite a bit of punishment, we all hit him, & on the seventh attack, the glow in his engine suddenly became brighter & he dived down & that was the end of the attack, we claimed him as a probable. The whole engagement lasted 18 to 20 minutes it seemed like years, I had one moment of real fright in it. In the middle of a corkscrew with squirts of tracer everywhere I felt a violent blow in the left leg & thought “Hell, I’ve been hit” but it was all the heavy bundles of window that had shaken loose & crashed on my leg.
[page break]
We were at 18,500 ft when the attack started & were down to 13,000 ft at the end, the corkscrews were so violent, the Elsan came right out & was all over the floor & the ammo from one of Johnny’s tanks was all out. My God I was really thankful we had seen that through, one doesn’t often get continuous battles like it. Mac had a fair amount of work with no elevator trim but there was nothing vital hit and the kite flew O.K. We managed to get back on track but we were pretty late, everything went pretty well until it came to the part we squeezed between Frankfurt & the Ruhr. Everything was O.K. until some wicked predicted flak shot up about half a mile to the starboard, there were only three bursts then suddenly there was a Lanc. with flame pouring from the nose & three of her engines. She held her course for a short while, then swung round in a huge circle, came behind, assumed course for half a minute or so then plunged down, I hope they got out. I thought the return journey would never end, I hate it as long as that. We came out pretty well south of track, but we were back O.K. a fair few landed away through lack of fuel. The bullets that ripped through the port inner [indecipherable word] punctured the tyre, but we didn’t know, and landed with a flat tyre, swerved off the runway & there we were. The crash wagon & blood wagon tore out, & they insisted on us riding in the blood wagon.
[page break]
The M.O. insisted upon giving us some capsules, to make us sleep that night & wouldn’t let us go on ops the next night. He knew his ‘gen’ because when we woke we were pretty dizzy & weak from their effect & couldn’t possibly have operated. It was Berlin again, another 8 hr effort, it was a shambles here. They only got 9 out of the squadron airborne, & 2 of these returned, leaving 7 to go on to the target. Out of these 7 we lost 2 which is pretty grim, F/Lt. Aarvin & P/O Tyn were the ones missing. From the night before we lost F/O Harris & F/Sgt Morris, old Morris had been with us at Downham, they said he was in a dinghy, at least he was going to ditch, but they heard no more. Friday night, the RAF Bomber Command Band gave a performance here & was very good, Saturday there was a stand down we went to a camp dance. G George is U/S for a fortnight or so & we were going to take another kite tonight but they were so short of kites they couldn’t put us on. We are right hard up for kites now, two had a head on crash when taxying, nobody was hurt, but the kites are really ripped up. Another had incendiaries through it, they only sent 11 tonight, it was Berlin again, Chopper is really pushing ‘em in again. Old Foggarty has been awarded the DFM for the show he put up, I thought he would. So 623 has made a start here anyway. I wonder if we will be going to Berlin much more I should think it must be pretty well smashed up, they haven’t been able to get photographs for awhile.
[page break]
[inserted] [newspaper cutting saying that the Battle of Berlin is almost won and suggesting that Breslau may be the new Capital.] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[duplicate page]
[page break]
[underlined] Monday February 7th. [/underlined]
A week has elapsed since I last wrote, a week of doing practically nothing. That Sunday raid on Berlin was the last op there was, we got eight kites off I believe, & lost poor old F/Lt Hicks. He was the Asst. Flight Commander in our flight, a [deleted] [indecipherable letter] [/deleted] ‘Newzie’ & a good chap it was his 24th. There were no ‘ops’ then for a few days & then the moon period commenced. Our kite won’t be serviceable for nearly three weeks so they have given us J Johnny, Hicks’ old kite it was U/S & he took another when he got the chop. Sqdn.Ldr [indecipherable name] the ‘Corkscrew King’ had a real do. They had a contact on the Monica & instead of corkscrewing as they were told he asked the gunners if they could see anything. They were looking down & said “No”, & a fighter sitting about 10o up gave them a long burst while they were straight & level. He raked them right along, the rear turret smashed, the mid upper had about 20 fragments pass between his legs. A couple of cannon shells exploded in the fuselage, the [deleted] [indecipherable letter] [/deleted] D.R. Master Unit was hit, a large hole in the main plane, one prop damaged, Boy! they were really shot up. The only one who was hurt was the A/B who had a small piece of flak in his behind. We have been informed that the old Groupie has detailed us for an hours circuits & bumps for the bad landing we made returning from Berlin. That was with a burst tyre. God knows what he wants, I don’t even believe he knows we were shot up.
[page break]
[inserted] [newspaper cutting regarding the raids on Berlin] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[inserted] [newspaper cutting with a photograph of a Halifax III] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
It seems pretty definite that the German [indecipherable word]. is evacuating from Berlin to Breslau, its another 200 miles to the South East, surely they wont go there from here, it would be about a 10 hour trip. There is some talk that the tour is being reduced to 25 ops as they are pretty grim now with the Berlin trips, it seems pukka ‘gen’ I hope it is. During the week we have been doing loaded climbs on J to test her starboard outer now it has to be changed. We have also been trying to get some GH Bombing in but the weather isn’t so good. Yesterday we had the day off, they are giving crews a day off during the moon period. Johnny & I went home catching the 1036 AM. Sunday, & travelling back on the 8.20 AM. Monday, I had a wizard time.
On Saturday night we lost a kite on the Bullseye, it was Bishop who was at Downham with us. Poor old Jack Speechly was the Bomb Aimer, I had known him 18 months ever since Manchester, we did our training in Canada together, he was a rattling good chap. They had an American pilot with them, they were all killed, & they don’t know how it happened yet. The crash was found with them all in it, its really grim. That’s three of the crews that were with us at Downham gone now P/O Whitting Ginger Morris & now old Bishop, boy! I only pray we see the tour out & so do all the others. There’s nothing much happening, consequently there isn’t much to make an entry of, think I’ll snatch an early night.
[underlined] Sunday February 13th. [/underlined]
The moon period has definitely finished now and our period of rest is over. Once more ‘Chopper’ whipped a day off the end of it, we were briefed for Berlin & were out at the kites with about 30 mins to go before take off when it was scrubbed. The reason being the bad weather at base on return, it was pretty grim, & was a [deleted] poo [/deleted] wonder it wasn’t scrubbed before. I wouldn’t have minded the trip, because for a change it was a long trip out, & a short trip home. Last minute scrubbings are worse than some ‘ops’ I think after being keyed up all that time, still it shows there is still some of the Big City left there.
We haven’t done much this week, as the weather has been pretty duff, most of the time we tried some GH Bombing nothing came of it, owing to climate conditions. The other day we were up in a hell of a snow storm, all the time we were running before it & trying to find a way out. All the countryside looked pretty Christmassy with a coating of snow over the fields & villages. As I was in the rear turret all the time I was more interested in keeping warm. Our turrets got in grim condition during the moon period and we had to work like the devil all day to get it in shape. I was late for briefing through it and had a hell of a flap trying to get my tracks & maps all ship shape.
[page break]
All Jimmy Rodgers crew went to Cambridge on Friday, as two of [deleted] Jim [/deleted] Bishops crew were being buried there. It is terrible really four of them were married & a couple engaged, old Bishop was only married at O.T.U., I would never get married in war time for that reason. Looking at it soberly with all the chaps getting the chop it seems a hell of a mugs game still there it is.
There has been a fair amount of entertainment this week, we had a night out in Ely with a wizard meal in the KUMIN Café. On Wednesday night there was a dance in the gymnasium, then Thursday night we had a big social in the mess. They even went to the extent of polishing the floor, & in our grim mess that really is something. It went on until 1 AM. & there was bags of beer & eats, the food was very good, marzipan cakes, sausage rolls etc. £25 was allowed for it, so it should have been good. On Saturday there was another dance but I was cheesed with that & don’t think I will bother going again.
The siren is going now & there is some gunfire, be quite comical now, with us refraining from bombing Berlin owing to the met. here, & the Jerries using the same conditions to bomb us. They have left the bombs on the kites & only drained the tanks to 1500 so it looks as though they will be parking us along tomorrow. I guess now they have started again, Chopper will try & really finish Berlin, hope he doesn’t finish us.
[page break]
[inserted] [two newspaper cuttings regarding the continuing raids on Berlin and their effect] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[duplicate page]
[page break]
[underlined] Thursday 17th February. [/underlined]
All was quite [sic] until Thursday, when ‘ops’ were on again, & there it loomed on the briefing room chart, the [deleted] G [/deleted] Big City once more. It was another daylight take off, quite a sight to see all the kites streaming over the coast at Cromer. The first leg was a terrific long one up to Denmark, & it was quite light most of the way, but luckily got dark by the time we were crossing the coast. Those Danish islands can certainly poop up some flak, & I was glad when we hit the Baltic Coast. The last leg to the target was a terrific long one, straight to it, I couldn’t see that the Jerry would be fooled regarding the target, even though there was a spoof attack on Frankfurt-on-Oder. The P.F.F. boobed by sending the flares down before zero hour, & the flak certainly opened up. It was the heaviest I have seen there, I think he was relying more on that than his fighters. Running up I could see about six Halifaxes beneath us, they seemed quite happy as the flak was all bursting between 18 & 21,000 ft. We were carrying just one 8,000 lb cookie, which is quite a goodly size, it was handy in the way that immediately I said ‘Bombs Gone’ Mac could whip the Bomb Doors shut.
Bomber Command was trying new tactics this time the 1st, 2nd, & 3rd waves went one way, & we in the 4th & 5th waves went a bit south of them along another route. The idea was to split the fighter forces, & I think it succeeded we only saw two all night, one ME110 just after
[page break]
[inserted] [two newspaper cuttings regarding the raids on Berlin] [/inserted] [duplicate page]
[page break]
[inserted] [newspaper cutting about obliterating bombing techniques]
[page break]
leaving the target flashed across our nose. We ran into some flak though, getting off track a bit we stooged right over Magdeburg. Beside window there were two huge packets of nickels to throw out so I was sweating like anything shovelling it all out. Not much happened on our return journey apart from a few fighter flares & some rockets. We saw a kite go down in flames over the North Sea, I should hate to get the chop right back there. Two were lost from here, F/S Whyte who had 16 trips in & F/S Ralph who was with us at Downham. He had Pinky Tomlin, Petch’s old B/A, who arrived with a new skipper F/O Nice, beside losing his B/A he lost his rear gunner who went as a spare with Whyte. I hate this spare business they always seem to get the chop.
Yesterday we were briefed for Berlin, then scrubbed, then again tonight & were out at the kites before being scrubbed, the weather was terrible both days, yet they wait till the last minute before scrubbing it. We were read a message from Chopper Harris C in C. congratulating us on the progress of the Battle for Berlin. After the usual flowery comments on our ‘courage & steadfast spirit’ he said we were well ahead of schedule in the obliteration of the capital. He also said the Allied Command considered it the most important battle of all land, sea or air battles fought & yet to fight in the war. There was a long list of reasons of its immediate need to be liquidated, & he said he had to rush us to finish the job as the lighter nights and the Northern lights would soon be making their appearance. Well I hope there isn’t many more trips to be done there.
[page break]
22
[underlined] 60/520 [/underlined]
8
196
2443
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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Book 5, Return to UK
Description
An account of the resource
Fifth and final diary kept by David Geach chronicling his time training and on operations. He writes about his return from Canada on the Queen Elizabeth then his training in England which began with arriving at the Posting Centre in Pannal Ash, Harrogate. He was then posted to AFU Bobbington, training on Ansons. From there he went to O.T.U. Hixon and satellite station Seighford training on Wellingtons. He then went to Flying Conversion Unit Woolfox Lodge to train on Stirlings. Once training was complete he was posted to RAF Downham Market on 623 Squadron flying Stirlings on operations. When 623 Stirling squadron was disbanded he was transferred on to Lancasters. He was posted to Flying Conversion Unit 1678 at RAF Waterbeach to train on the Lancaster and then on to RAF Witchford where he undertook operations over Germany, including a number on Berlin. Covers the period 17 March 1943 to 17 February 1944.
Creator
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David Geach
Format
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One handwritten diary
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Text. Diary
Identifier
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YGeachDG1394781v5
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Scotland--Greenock
Scotland--Glasgow
Scotland--Edinburgh
England--Harrogate
England--Whitley Bay
England--Bournemouth
England--Stourbridge
England--Birmingham
England--Wolverhampton
England--Stafford
Canada
Ontario--Ottawa
Atlantic Ocean--Cardigan Bay
Wales--Rhyl
England--The Wash
England--Nottingham
Great Britain Miscellaneous Island Dependencies--Isle of Man
England--Cannock
Wales--Aberystwyth
Scotland--Orkney
France--Saint-Malo
France--Rennes
France--Isigny-sur-Mer
France--Cherbourg
France--Avranches
England--Southampton
England--Stamford
England--Cambridge
England--Peterborough
England--Bedford
England--Portsmouth
Netherlands--Friesland
England--Cromer
France--La Rochelle
France--Gironde Estuary
France--Nantes
England--King's Lynn
Italy--Turin
North Africa
Gibraltar
England--Thames River
Germany--Ludwigshafen am Rhein
Germany--Cologne
Germany--Berlin
England--Ely
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Magdeburg
Germany--Hamburg
Norway
Netherlands--Texel
Germany--Bremen
Denmark
Germany--Wilhelmshaven
Germany--Brandenburg
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Braunschweig
Germany--Hannover
England--Sunderland (Tyne and Wear)
Poland--Szczecin
Poland--Wrocław
England--Southend-on-Sea
Italy
Atlantic Ocean--Firth of Clyde
Poland
France
Ontario
Germany
Netherlands
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
England--Bedfordshire
England--Durham (County)
England--Essex
England--Hampshire
England--Lincolnshire
England--Norfolk
England--Northumberland
England--Sussex
England--Staffordshire
England--Worcestershire
England--Nottinghamshire
England--Warwickshire
England--Selsey (West Sussex)
Wales--Caernarfon
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
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Tricia Marshall
David Bloomfield
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-03
1943-04
1943-05
1943-06
1943-07
1943-08
1943-09
1943-10
1943-11
1943-12
1944-01
1944-02
115 Squadron
149 Squadron
1678 HCU
196 Squadron
199 Squadron
214 Squadron
218 Squadron
30 OTU
514 Squadron
623 Squadron
90 Squadron
Advanced Flying Unit
aerial photograph
air gunner
aircrew
Anson
anti-aircraft fire
B-17
bale out
bomb aimer
bombing
Catalina
Conspicuous Gallantry Medal
crewing up
Distinguished Flying Cross
Distinguished Flying Medal
entertainment
fear
flight engineer
Gee
ground personnel
Halifax
Heavy Conversion Unit
Hurricane
incendiary device
Ju 88
Lancaster
Lancaster Mk 2
Me 110
military living conditions
military service conditions
mine laying
Mosquito
navigator
Navy, Army and Air Force Institute
Nissen hut
Operational Training Unit
Pathfinders
pilot
RAF Chedburgh
RAF Downham Market
RAF Halfpenny Green
RAF Hixon
RAF Lindholme
RAF Lossiemouth
RAF Seighford
RAF Tangmere
RAF Tuddenham
RAF Warboys
RAF Waterbeach
RAF Witchford
RAF Woolfox Lodge
Red Cross
sanitation
searchlight
Stirling
target indicator
target photograph
training
Typhoon
Victoria Cross
Wellington
wireless operator
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1092/11551/PReptonB1801.1.jpg
b905c6ea618c945392e7963f17d5d221
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1092/11551/AReptonB180306.2.mp3
262211d521d81a32c139676920347e53
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
Repton, Betty
Betty Repton nee Jackson
B Repton
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Betty Repton (b. 1922). She served as a stenographer in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force at RAF Coningsby.
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
2018-03-09
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
Repton, B
Transcribed audio recording
A resource consisting primarily of recorded human voice.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
EM: Just talk in a minute. Stop worrying.
DK: I’ll just, I’ll just introduce this. David Kavanagh for the International Bomber Command Centre.
BR: Just interrupting. Have you —
DK: Don’t worry. Yeah. That’s ok. Don’t worry.
BR: Have you seen many elderly ladies like me?
DK: Yes. Yes. Three.
BR: Three.
DK: You’re my third.
BR: Oh.
DK: You’re my third. So, yes.
BR: And are they all with it?
DK: Oh, yes. Yes. Just like yourself.
BR: Oh yes. Yes. Just like yourself.
EM: Just like you.
DK: Now —
EM: Just keep quiet a minute.
DK: That’s ok.
EM: He’s just doing a bit of recording.
DK: Sorry.
EM: Just be quiet a minute. Yeah.
DK: So I’m interviewing, Betty Repton isn’t it?
EM: Yeah.
DK: Betty Repton, at her home, don’t worry about this, the 6th of March 2018. If I just, can I just move this over?
EM: Yeah. Do you want a maiden name?
DK: Yes. Could do.
EM: Jackson.
DK: Oh. So, that’s Betty Jackson [pause] That looks alright. Yeah.
EM: Ignore that.
DK: Ignore that. Pretend, pretend it’s not there. If I, if I lean over it’s just making sure it’s still working. So, so first of all can I ask you what you were doing immediately before the war?
BR: What was I doing?
EM: Before the war.
BR: I worked in a library.
DK: Ok.
BR: In Macclesfield. It was called a chain library and it was for the north west.
DK: Right.
BR: And that’s all I did.
DK: Ok.
BR: Until the war broke out and it so happened that I was engaged to a gentleman and his parents bought him a shop.
DK: Right.
BR: And they asked me if I would leave and look after it for his twenty first birthday. And in that time he was called up for would it be the militia?
DK: Yes. Yeah.
BR: I’m not quite sure.
DK: Yeah.
BR: To do training because he was called up in the Army.
DK: Right.
BR: And it so happened that I wanted to join the forces. A volunteer.
DK: Ok.
BR: And my brother was in the Navy and my other brother was in the Army so my mother said, ‘I’d like you to go in the WAAF. Then I’ve got one of you in each.’
DK: Each of the services.
BR: And I wrote to Eric, his name and told him I was going to join the forces. And he wrote back and said, “No girl of his was going in the forces.”
DK: Oh right.
BR: So that was the end of that. And so I just applied to join up and I went to Manchester to see a WAAF officer. And she gave me a test and I had to do handwriting.
DK: Right.
BR: And she said, ‘You’re a beautiful writer and you’ve a very good speaking voice.’
DK: Well, you still have.
BR: ‘What do you want to do?’ I said, ‘I’ll do, I want a job that, such as a telephonist.’
DK: Right.
BR: She said, ‘That would be ideal for you,’ and so I was put down to go on a course at Sheffield GPO.
DK: Right.
BR: To be a telephonist when they called me up. And, and then once I’d passed that I was just [pause] I’ve forgotten the word —
DK: Posted.
BR: Yes. To, well I was in the WAAF.
DK: Right. Ok. Ok.
BR: And I had to go to Bridgnorth.
DK: Right.
BR: And get my training done there and then the place that I first went to was 16 MU at Stafford.
DK: A Maintenance Unit. 16 Maintenance Unit.
BR: Maintenance Unit there.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And I was there and then gradually I went to various places.
DK: Right.
BR: And I ended up at a place called Winstanley Hall.
DK: Right.
BR: Near Wigan. And it was a private residence but it was very beautiful and the place that we had to travel each day was on the East Lancs’ Road and they called it RAF Blackbrook but it was underground.
DK: Oh right.
BR: And it was a switching centre.
DK: Yeah.
BR: For teleprinter operators.
DK: Right.
BR: But while I was at Stafford there were so many operators. Telephone operators.
DK: Yeah.
BR: That I never got a chance to get on the switchboard. There were so many.
DK: Yeah.
BR: So I used to sit there in the traffic office and if a message came through on the teleprinter we would get up and go and receive it and put your initials.
DK: Right.
BR: And I got so used to doing that that I thought I’d like to be a teleprinter operator. So I re-mustered and got a posting to Cranwell.
DK: Right.
BR: Where I did the teleprint. I couldn’t type at all. But everything worked out perfect.
DK: So the fact you couldn’t type —
BR: Yes.
DK: Wasn’t a problem.
BR: And so I got posted to this Winstanley Hall.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And, but during [pause]
DK: That’s ok.
BR: During this time my mother was taken ill.
DK: Right.
BR: And I had two sisters that had got children and I was the only single one. So I had to, to ask if I could be released to look after my mum which I did for three months. And in that time if she died within that time I was to be called up straightaway. And she died in the November and they called me back December. At the end of December. 1st of January 1944.
DK: Right.
BR: Because she died in 1943.
DK: Ok.
BR: And so I got posted to Scampton. That was the first posting after being released.
DK: Right.
BR: And that’s it. Scampton it was.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And it so happened that the Dambusters were operating there but they’d already been on the raid.
DK: Yes. Because that was —
BR: To the dams.
DK: That was 1943.
BR: So I was just one.
DK: Right.
BR: Of the WAAF, ordinary WAAF just doing a job at Scampton.
DK: And, and, and what was —
BR: And that’s —
DK: And what was your role at Scampton? Were you still on the teleprinters?
BR: What was that?
EM: Were you still a teleprinter operator?
BR: Yes.
EM: At Scampton.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And I stayed to be a teleprinter operator all the time.
DK: Right.
BR: At Scampton. And then I got a posting to Syerston.
DK: Right.
BR: And from Syerston I got another posting. This was within two years of each to Coningsby.
DK: Right.
BR: And that’s where I stayed until I was released from the services to go to, and get my discharge.
DK: Did, did you get to meet any of the aircrew at all?
BR: Did I?
EM: Tell, tell David while you were teleprinter operating at Scampton who, who came through the, who you handed the messages to.
BR: We handed them in. It was all to do with the flying.
DK: Right.
BR: And every time the kites took off there was a message. When they came back they was all debriefed and they put a message together and they called them a BCIR Report. Bomber Command Intelligence Report. So therefore you had to be in the section to type these messages that you plugged in to the stations around —
DK: Right.
BR: When they came back off of a raid. And they just, that was it. And it just, it was all the same.
DK: So you did this every time they went for, on a raid.
BR: Yes.
DK: And then when they came back?
BR: Yes. they went into debrief too, and I suppose the pilots told their own story because some came back and some didn’t. But they always sent a message whenever an aeroplane went off.
DK: Right.
BR: There was a message with the names of the pilot and the crew.
DK: Ok.
BR: To say they’d returned. Then they put this message together and it went to all the 5 Group.
DK: Right.
BR: Places.
DK: So eventually would, the messages would have got to headquarters here then.
BR: That was what?
EM: Where would the, would the messages have come to St Vincent’s and that? Where did the messages go? Just to the —
BR: I don’t know. I think St Vincent’s had something to do with the raid.
DK: Right. Ok. The planning.
BR: It was before I ever got. I didn’t get to the beginning of the Dambusters.
DK: No. No.
BR: To see them. It took place I think in May.
DK: Yeah. May ’43.
BR: And I didn’t get there ‘til December.
DK: Yeah.
BR: But then they, I think the Dambuster pilots and that were stationed at Petwood Hotel.
DK: That’s right. That’s correct. Yes.
BR: And I got married and I went to live at Woodhall Spa.
DK: Oh right. That’s a lovely village.
BR: And so of course I don’t know if you’ve seen the monument.
DK: Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
BR: Yeah. And I was there all the time it was being built.
DK: Oh right.
BR: So —
EM: Yeah, but —
BR: And —
EM: You’ve missed the bit about who you, you handed your bit of paper at Scampton to who did you hand your bit of paper to at Scampton?
BR: Oh, well —
EM: Guy Gibson.
BR: I just reported to the guardroom.
DK: Right. Ok.
BR: You know.
DK: Yeah.
BR: I just, I had to report.
DK: Right.
BR: To RAF Scampton.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And everything you did you had to sign in.
DK: Yeah.
BR: At the guardroom.
DK: Can you remember anybody you met there at Scampton?
BR: I met Guy Gibson.
DK: Ok.
BR: He used to walk past the window of the teleprinter room.
DK: Right.
BR: And go into the ops room. Now, the ops room was another room attached to the teleprinter off, but you wouldn’t have known that. But there was a window and if there was a message came through that had to be going to the ops —
DK: Yeah.
BR: You just knocked on the little window. It was wooden.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And it was forced back.
DK: Right.
BR: And who should take the message but Guy Gibson. Because I’d seen him walk past.
DK: Yeah. But he didn’t speak to you then.
BR: No.
DK: No. Oh.
BR: No. No. You just handed the message and that was it. But I saw him pass and I think he’d got the dog and then it was killed.
DK: Yeah.
BR: But I don’t know if it was killed in the time I was there.
DK: I think it would have been before.
BR: Which I think it probably was. And from that it was just routine. Every day the same. I just went on duty.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And off duty and that was it.
DK: Where did you used to go off duty? Was there anywhere you went?
BR: What was that, Elaine?
EM: When you were Scampton where did you live? Where did you, what did you used to do when you were off duty?
BR: We were billeted at Dunholme.
DK: Right. Yeah. I know.
BR: Across the road, down in to Dunholme village.
DK: I know.
BR: And there were Nissen huts.
DK: Right.
BR: And we stayed in those until I got a posting to Syerston. Then got to Syerston and we were in a block. I don’t know if it was G block.
DK: Yeah.
BR: I think they called it.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And —
DK: Did you, did you get on well with your other WAAFs?
BR: Yes. Made some wonderful friends.
DK: Ok.
BR: And little things happened. I sent a BCIR report, Bomber Command Intelligence Report this particular day and it was very long and the flight sergeant in Scampton office said, ‘Betty, if you can send this report without making three mistakes you will get your corporal badges.’ And I said to him, ‘Flight, I don’t want promotion. I don’t like giving orders.’ But now, you see, oh I think I was stupid but I’d just been a country girl.
DK: Yeah.
BR: Lived in a village and I don’t like giving orders to other, to other WAAFs.
DK: Did, did you used to watch the aircraft take off?
BR: No.
DK: On the raids.
BR: No.
DK: No.
BR: No. I was either on duty, and when we weren’t on duty we were down at Dunholme.
DK: Right.
BR: That was the billet.
DK: So you never really saw the activity on the airfields then.
BR: No. So, I was trying to think of something that I did at 16 MU.
EM: She’s got some nice photographs.
BR: Oh, the first time, it was the first posting I had, and another WAAF and I were going into Stafford. So you had to go to the guard room and report and sign.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And the WAAF officer there, well it was corporal, her name was Corporal Blood. Which I shall never forget.
DK: What a great name.
BR: And she said to me, ‘And which bus did you drive?’ I said, ‘I beg your pardon, corporal?’ She said, ‘Which bus did you drive?’ And I was flabbergasted. And she whipped my hat off and she plonked it on straight and she said, ‘That is how you wear your hat.’ Not —
DK: Oh. Like that. Yeah.
BR: Not at an angle.
DK: Like a bus driver. Yeah.
BR: And so I always remember her name and what she said.
DK: Yeah.
EM: I wonder if she’s still about.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And then she said, ‘Get off.’
DK: Oh dear.
BR: And that was the first, I thought I’ve got to be careful.
DK: I’ll tell you what shall I just pause it there? Shall I? Shall I just stop. Thanks.
[recording paused]
DK: Ok. Carry on.
BR: When I was at Woodhall Spa a WAAF had bought a cloth a yard wide.
DK: Yeah.
BR: It was plain. And she got people to sign it.
DK: Right.
BR: And she ran up to me for some reason and she said, ‘Betty, would you sign my cloth?’ So, I said, ‘I’d be delighted to,’ but it was my maiden name obviously and she embroidered my name on it and all the others that she asked.
DK: Right.
BR: The local reporter for the Horncastle News said could anybody, could they issue any information as to how that came about because the girl had lost it.
DK: Right.
BR: And it was found behind a cupboard at Coningsby. One of these metal containers that —
DK: Yeah.
BR: You know further in. And they’d found the cloth at the back. So she never took it home.
DK: Do you know what year they found it?
BR: And funnily enough does that prove?
EM: Yeah. What it was.
BR: It was the girl’s.
DK: Oh, here we go. 1986?
EM: Yeah.
DK: Yeah. 1986.
EM: And then they’ve lost it again.
DK: Oh.
BR: And so that —
DK: Oh no.
BR: I took that photograph of the girls and I phoned. Bill Skelton his name was and he said, I said —
EM: Horncastle News.
DK: Yeah.
BR: ‘I think I can help you with the cloth.’ He says, ‘Never.’ I said, ‘I can because my name’s on it.’ So he came to see me.
DK: Right. So —
BR: And it was put in the paper. Then a few years after.
DK: So you’re on that then.
BR: Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
EM: Here it is all about the cloth.
DK: Right.
EM: And they’ve lost the cloth again.
DK: So where was it last seen then? At Coningsby?
EM: Coningsby.
BR: So that’s Coningsby. My last station.
DK: Right.
BR: And there are the girls there. And the girl that did it was this one.
DK: Ok. Can you remember their name?
BR: That’s Wendy Taylor.
DK: Wendy Taylor.
BR: So, Mr Skelton that was, he wrote a bit about the paper and said they’d found —
DK: Right.
BR: But it disappeared again and a WAAF officer wrote the next part of it.
DK: Right.
BR: Is it there?
DK: There’s a new museum at Coningsby. I wonder —
EM: We’ve been.
DK: Oh right.
EM: We went a week last Monday.
DK: Ok.
EM: And she mentioned the cloth.
DK: And they’ve got no —
EM: No. They’ve lost, and they lost it and we mentioned it didn’t we?
BR: Yeah.
DK: What a shame.
EM: And I think her name was Donna who’s there now. And she’s going to see if she can find it. But that is, that’s history.
DK: Oh sure. Yeah.
EM: And it’s a fabulous story.
DK: Yeah.
EM: They found in 1986.
DK: ’86. And lost it again.
EM: But she’s going to try to find it again. Probably through social media. You know, this is how you’re going to have to get it out there.
DK: Well, what I can do is if I, if you can send me a copy of this I can put it on the IBCC’s Facebook page.
EM: Yeah.
DK: And see if that brings out any information.
EM: Well, the thing for me to do then —
DK: Yeah.
EM: If I scanned that and that.
DK: Scanned that and that.
BR: That’s the next letter —
EM: There look.
BR: That came.
DK: Yeah.
EM: Yeah. I’m going to scan these for David and send them to him.
DK: Right.
EM: And he’s going to see whether they can find the cloth or any of the people.
DK: Yeah. We can put an appeal out there.
EM: Yeah.
DK: On the Facebook pages.
BR: There were about the second time they contacted me for that one.
EM: Yeah.
BR: For the cloth.
DK: Yeah.
BR: It was a WAAF officer and that. Is there a write up about it?
DK: Yeah.
EM: Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
EM: Yeah.
DK: Well, we’ll see. We’ll see what we can do.
BR: And —
DK: I can get both the IBCC to look into it on their Facebook page and also the Coningsby Aviation Museum that’s recently opened. Or the Historical Centre or whatever it’s called.
EM: Yeah. But as I say we were there.
DK: Yeah.
EM: And they just seemed totally aghast that anyone and I said well this had been going on and as I say it’s 1944/46 look.
DK: So it was lost between the late 40s and about eighty —
EM: ’86. Found in ’86 and lost again.
DK: Oh dear.
BR: What’s the date of that? That one.
EM: It’s 1986.
BR: Yeah. Yes, so —
EM: But I’ll do that.
BR: I don’t think she ever got it, but its disappeared and it isn’t in the museum.
DK: Well, we —
BR: And that’s what they wanted.
DK: We’ll have to see what we can do.
BR: And they asked me on Monday if I would take the cloth to show them but we never got the chance.
DK: Right. Well, what I can do is I can send, if you email me all that I can send that to them. Both Coningsby and —
EM: Yeah.
DK: IBCC and they can put out an appeal for it then.
EM: Yeah. Because the other thing I don’t know if you’ve noticed somebody’s written on there Dinah Shaw.
DK: Right.
EM: And there’s a singer called Dinah Shaw.
DK: Oh right. Ok.
EM: And they don’t, is that right? Dinah Shaw. Isn’t there a singer?
BR: Dinah Shaw.
EM: Dinah Shaw. Dinah Shaw. And they’re not sure if it was the Dinah Shaw who was the singer who put her name on that cloth.
BR: Well, it probably was but I don’t know.
DK: Right. Right.
EM: And she’s quite a famous —
DK: Yeah.
EM: Person. Which is why they’ve written that there look.
DK: Yeah. So whereabouts is your mother’s name?
EM: Mum’s on this —
BR: I don’t know why. I don’t know why.
EM: Betty Jackson.
DK: Oh, Betty Jackson. There you go.
BR: Wendy came to me and there’s my name on there.
EM: Yeah. Your name’s there look. On the bottom.
BR: Yeah. E Jackson.
EM: Betty. No, Betty Jackson.
BR: I put Betty. Yeah.
EM: Yeah. But you see there Douglas Craig, all the names are quite —
DK: Quite clear aren’t they?
EM: Quite clear aren’t they? I mean I don’t know what they’d be like —
BR: And there’s lots of girls in there from other stations that I’ve kept at the back.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And put the names under.
DK: Well, it would be good if you could get all the names to the faces.
BR: Yeah.
EM: What do you want me to do then? Get the names?
DK: If you get the names to the faces on there.
EM: Yeah.
DK: I can either come back and scan these myself if you like.
EM: Well, it’s up to you.
DK: Or scan them.
EM: I can scan them at work and send them from work.
DK: We just need them at six hundred BPI.
EM: Yeah.
DK: Six hundred. Or DPI is it? Six hundred DPI.
EM: Dots per inch.
DK: Dots per inch.
EM: Yeah. Yeah.
DK: Six hundred DPI. If you can do that you can then just email them to me.
EM: Right. What I’ll do then I’ll get her to name, you see. I mean again they’re all here look.
DK: They were. Yeah. I see you’ve got a missing one there.
BR: Yeah. What’s that one?
DK: That’s —
EM: Peggy. Oh, Peggy Hassel. I don’t know where she’s gone.
BR: Yes.
DK: She’s [unclear]
EM: Oh, she’s there mum.
DK: [unclear]
BR: Oh yes. She’s there. Peggy Hassel.
EM: But they’re fabulous photographs aren’t they?
DK: They are aren’t they?
EM: I don’t know what that is.
BR: It was a job to get your photograph.
EM: What’s that? Who did that?
BR: Percy Bexton. Doesn’t it say on there?
EM: Yeah. And who was Percy Bexton, 1946?
BR: Yes. He was at Scampton and he was in the office. He says, ‘I’ll give you something to remind you, Betty of me and that’s what he did for me.
EM: Yeah.
BR: Yeah.
EM: They’re great, aren’t they?
BR: And that’s how I looked.
DK: Yeah.
EM: Yeah.
BR: When I got there.
DK: Oh yes. Yeah.
BR: That’s the one that’s enlarged there and —
EM: They’re good though aren’t they?
DK: So that’s Winstanley Hall in the background was it?
EM: That’s Winstanley Hall, isn’t it?
BR: Yes. That’s Winstanley Hall. And why I’m sitting amongst the daffodil apparently every year when the daffodils came out they were picked and given and sold to the hospital in Wigan.
DK: Ok. Right.
BR: And that’s the reason I’m sitting there with that in the background.
DK: I know the IBCC would love those photos.
BR: We were in Nissen huts.
DK: Yeah.
BR: That’s where we are in slacks and that.
EM: Yeah.
BR: It was a day off —
EM: Well, I’ll go through with you.
BR: Yeah.
EM: And make notes and then if I can scan everything.
BR: Yeah.
DK: And send to you.
DK: And send them to me.
EM: And you can choose.
DK: And I can send them on.
EM: What you want and don’t want, can’t you?
DK: Particularly the cuttings and we’ll see if we can —
EM: Yeah.
DK: Put the message out there about the lost cloth.
EM: But from Scampton then you went to Coningsby, didn’t you?
BR: No. I went from Scampton to Syerston.
EM: Right.
BR: But it was just, I think some of the Dambusters were posted there but I wouldn’t be certain.
DK: Yeah.
BR: But I never bothered about them. We never bothered about them. We were just WAAFs going on duty. Then we, that was it.
DK: So you didn’t mix with the men much then. Mix with a group.
BR: Well, we did because there was always a dance on the camp.
DK: Right.
BR: And the odd one would come to it but you’d just, they’d just come up and say, ‘Come on,’ you know, ‘I’ll have this dance with you.’ And you didn’t, it never made everything.
DK: Yeah.
BR: You know. They were just, when we were off duty we went to the dance. It was on every week. It wasn’t anything special and I wasn’t a dancer.
DK: Yeah. So how, so you left in 1946.
BR: 19 —
DK: ‘46. Yeah.
EM: You left. When did you go to Coningsby then? In 1945.
DK: ’45.
BR: Yes.
EM: Why? Did you get posted to Coningsby?
BR: Yes. I went from Scampton to Syerston.
EM: Yeah.
BR: From Syerston to Coningsby.
EM: Right.
BR: In 1945.
EM: Right. And so you were a teleprinter operator.
BR: And I was a teleprinter operator.
EM: At Coningsby.
BR: All the time. Yeah.
EM: But they, where did you live in Coningsby? You were in the Nissen huts in Pilgrim Square.
BR: We were. That’s right. That’s where those pictures were taken.
DK: Yeah.
BR: Outside with that cloth.
DK: Right. Yeah.
BR: I was Coningsby.
DK: So what, what was it like in a Nissen hut? Was it a bit cold?
BR: You see. I wish I could tell what he said.
EM: What was it like living in the Nissen huts?
BR: Well, it was alright because it was really, you slept in them and then you was going on duty and then when you come off duty if you were free we’d go in to Lincoln. To the YMCA. But Lincoln was not, it wasn’t a long way to Lincoln from Scampton.
EM: Oh, Scampton. We’re back at Scampton now.
DK: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
BR: But that’s what you did. And if not we went to the Nissen huts and —
DK: Yeah.
BR: Didn’t do anything there. We just used to sit around the fire and talk.
EM: What about when you were Coningsby? Where did you go when you were at Coningsby?
BR: Coningsby. Well, we were stationed at Pilgrim Square.
EM: Yeah.
BR: In the Nissen huts.
EM: Yeah.
BR: And well I shouldn’t say this it’s where my husband, where I met my husband. And if you want to know that story it’s lovely.
DK: Oh, well go on then. If you’re happy to tell it. What, what was your husband doing?
BR: He was a GPO engineer.
DK: Right.
BR: And he was, he wasn’t in the forces. What was it?
EM: Civil service wasn’t he?
BR: Yes.
DK: Yeah. Reserved Occupation.
EM: Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
BR: His area was Woodhall Spa, Horncastle, Digby RAF, Coningsby RAF. Everything to do with —
DK: Right.
BR: And he was at Blankney Hall when it burned down. And Stan came to mend the teleprinter I was on.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And also the telephone exchange was just there adjoining the teleprinter room.
DK: Right.
BR: So he went to mend the fault on the switchboard, came off and went to the room which was the GPO room to wash his hands. And he came back with his hands wet through and I said, ‘Here you are. Dry them on my towel. I’m going on leave for the weekend.’ So that was it. Off he went. About a quarter of an hour later the telephone rang and a voice said, ‘When did you say I was going to take you out?’ And I said, ‘Well, I think you’ve had a bit of bad luck. I’m going on a forty eight hour pass.’ And he asked the girls in this, what he knew, when I was coming back. And they said, ‘She’ll be back in Monday night. And she’s got to be in by 23.59.’ And he sat and waited for me at Coningsby Station for, to watch me get off the train. And there he sat in his little Austin 7. And he said, and I could have dropped dead, and he came and opened the door and he said, ‘I’ve come to pick you up.’ He said, ‘There’s a good film on at Boston. Would you like to go and see it with me?’ He said, ‘We’ll get you back for midnight.’ So off we went to Boston to see this lovely film.
DK: Yeah.
EM: Which was?
BR: Eh?
EM: What was the film?
BR: Oh dear.
EM: I know what the film was.
BR: What was it?
EM: “State Fair.”
BR: “State Fair.” That’s it. And that was it. And from then on when he came to the camp we just kept going out together and —
DK: So, so it was a good thing you were in the WAAFs then. Because of that you met your husband.
EM: Yeah. Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
EM: You met, you met dad through being in the WAAF and posted to Coningsby, didn’t you?
BR: Yeah.
DK: Yeah.
EM: Yeah.
BR: Yes. That was the last place.
EM: That’s why she lived in Woodhall Spa.
DK: Right.
EM: Because he lived at Woodhall Spa.
BR: And in my off duty Stan would pick me up. He’d be going out to one of the villages like South Kyme.
DK: Yeah.
BR: To a little telephone exchange and I’d go with him.
DK: Yeah.
BR: But if we saw another PO van he used to say, ‘Duck down,’ because —
DK: You shouldn’t have been there.
BR: I shouldn’t have been in it. But that’s what we did all the time.
DK: Yeah. Ok. I think let’s wrap up here.
BR: And we got married.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And went to live in Woodhall Spa.
DK: Right, then. Can I, can I just ask you finally how do you look back on your time in the RAF as a WAAF? How do you look back on it now?
BR: What was that?
EM: How do you look back on your time in the RAF as a WAAF?
BR: Yes. I loved every minute of it.
DK: Yeah.
BR: It was so interesting and it was a routine. And —
EM: But you enjoyed it didn’t you?
BR: Yes. I did.
EM: And you met some lovely people.
BR: Yes. And they were going to have a Ruhr tour.
DK: Right.
BR: That was to see the damage.
DK: Oh right. Ok.
BR: And every so often the aircraft, the Lanc —
DK: Yeah.
BR: Flew. This was just after the war. Oh, I don’t know if the war was on and you could put your name down for a Ruhr Tour.
DK: Right.
BR: And so I put my name down but I never got on the Ruhr Tour because I got demobbed in April ’41.
DK: So you never flew then all the time.
BR: No.
DK: When you were a WAAF.
BR: No.
EM: She never got to.
BR: That would have been the icing.
DK: I should say.
BR: And if I hadn’t met Stan, and we were getting married I would put my name down for, was it Singapore?
DK: Right. Yeah.
BR: I was going to stay in the WAAF.
DK: Right.
BR: And go off to Singapore. But it didn’t happen.
DK: It didn’t happen. No. Ok.
BR: And —
DK: Sorry, go on
BR: So that’s it.
DK: Ok, that’s great. I’ll stop it.
BR: There’s lots of little things that happened that, you know.
EM: What?
DK: Yeah.
BR: The one that sticks in my mind. Oh, when I was on the parade ground the first night being a volunteer there was a lot of girls turned up but by morning a lot of girls had gone back home because they could.
DK: Right.
BR: So of course we had to stay because they were going to issue uniform and the WAAF officer went around with a corporal I think to see if your hair was off your collar. And mine as you can see was quite curly and she pulled it out of, down on to my collar to see if it was going to touch my collar and she said, ‘Barber’s shop,’ to this corporal. And I said, ‘What does that mean?’ Well, I could. I couldn’t turn around and say, ‘Why am I going there?’ And so she said, ‘You’ll have your hair cut to a certain length.’ And I went to the barber’s shop and there was a young lad in it, and he was going to cut my hair and I said, ‘You’re not doing that.’ He said, ‘I’ve got to cut some of it off.’ So I told him how much he could take off which he did. And from then on I lost the curls that I did.
DK: Yeah.
BR: And got, put it in a roll. You put it in a roll and tucked it in, you know. And that was alright.
DK: So long as it was off your collar.
BR: Yes.
DK: Yeah.
BR: To get it off my collar.
DK: Your collar. Yeah.
BR: And then of course I go first time out the corporal plonked my hat on.
DK: Can’t win.
BR: And funny how I remember her name. Corporal Blood.
EM: It’s good though, isn’t it?
DK: Yeah. Yeah.
EM: Ok.
DK: Ok. Well we’ll stop it there. Thanks. Thanks very much for that.
[recording paused]
That was David Kavanagh for the International Bomber Command Centre interviewing Betty Repton nee Jackson at her home [buzz] on the 9th of March 2018. Also there was her daughter Elaine Mablethorpe. That’s Elaine Mablethorpe. 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 Betty Repton
Creator
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David Kavanagh
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2018-03-09
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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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AReptonB180306, PReptonB1801
Format
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00:37:08 audio recording
Language
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eng
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
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Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
England--Shropshire
England--Nottinghamshire
Description
An account of the resource
Betty (nee Jackson) worked in a library in Macclesfield before the war. When the war broke out, she went to Manchester to volunteer for the Air Force and trained as a telephonist. She did a course at Sheffield General Post Office before being posted to RAF Bridgnorth for training and then to 16 Maintenance Unit at RAF Stafford. Following training as a Teleprinter Operator at RAF Blackbrook she re-mustered and was posted to RAF Cranwell. She was released for three months to look after her ailing mother and was called back to the RAF in December 1944, being posted to RAF Scampton and later to RAF Syerston and then RAF Coningsby, where she stayed until being demobbed. When at RAF Scampton she was billeted in Nissen huts at RAF Dunholme Lodge. She handled Bomber Command intelligence report messages whenever a crew returned and met Guy Gibson. Betty met her husband Stan, a civilian General Post Office engineer, when being stationed at RAF Coningsby. Betty remembered a RAF officer who had a cloth embroidered with names of staff, but it had since been lost. When Betty and Stan married, they lived at RAF Woodhall Spa. Betty said she had loved every minute of her time in the RAF.
Contributor
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Sue Smith
Julie Williams
Temporal Coverage
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1943
1944-12
1945
Conforms To
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Pending revision of OH transcription
5 Group
Gibson, Guy Penrose (1918-1944)
ground personnel
Lancaster
Nissen hut
RAF Blackbrook
RAF Bridgnorth
RAF Coningsby
RAF Cranwell
RAF Dunholme Lodge
RAF Scampton
RAF Stafford
RAF Syerston
RAF Woodhall Spa
training
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/803/10783/PdiPlacitoLH1701.2.jpg
89587cbda0f20671b0c4ea1b85001701
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/803/10783/AdiPlacitoLH170209.1.mp3
bb9d0b5a910e57882406f39298fe61e0
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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di Placito, Lawrence Henry
L H di Placito
Description
An account of the resource
Two oral history interviews with Lawrence 'Lawrie' di Placito (1922, 1646268 Royal Air Force). He served in Air Sea Rescue.
collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
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
2017-03-09
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.
Identifier
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diPlacito, LH
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
DM: This interview is being conducted for the International Bomber Command Centre, the interviewee is Dav, the interviewer is David Meanwell, the interviewee is Laurie Placito. The interview is taking place at Mr Placito’s home in Line in Surrey on the 9th February 2017. Okay, Laurie so if we could start with you, your parents, where you were born and where you grew up.
LP: Yes, I was born in Chertsey, Surrey 21st 1st 1922. [Ringing sounds] with six boys, three girls and two children already pre-deceased at the age of three and four. I was educated at the Stepgate school, council school, until the age of eleven, where I passed the scholarship for the grammar school, which was Stroves Grammar School, Egham. And from there I left Egham, Stroves in 1936. I took up employment at the post office as a sorting clerk and telegraphist, at the wages of twelve shillings and sixpence per week, of which one shilling and three pence was stopped for unemployment benefit. War came, before the war came in 1939, I joined the sixth battalion of the Surrey Territorial Regiment, with the headquarters in Chertsey, Drillhall Road, Chertsey, which consisted then of two or three times a week marching up and down the roads, drilling and such like. This brought us up to the summer of 1939, before the war had started. I was called in to the office to say that I wouldn’t being going to the summer camp with the rest of the lads, because of my Italian parentage, I therefore, I was sort of thrown out of the Territorial Army. Now this clashed with my position at the Post Office because I was, at the Post Office I signed the Official Secrets Acts; the Postmaster told me, he said they can’t really do that he said, but things what they were, so I just had to accept it. Now in, war started September the 3rd 1939. I saw all my old friends go off before into the summer camp. They had about three weeks summer camp training. At the end of the training war broke out and these lads were shipped out to various places, with the barest of minimum of training, not firing a rifle in, in, anger or shooting, just all theory really. I therefore then, I left the post office and I was employed at a boatyard, building naval vessels in, on the Thames in Chertsey, where I was friendly, very friendly with another young lad. Now we’d talked about this air sea rescue business what we’d heard about, so we both decided to join. We went to Acton town hall to join the RAF Air Sea Rescue. We were called into separate rooms, but before this I didn’t have much knowledge of sea going, but David, my friend, he knew all about the sea and the points of the compass and such like and he genned me up on questions. So eventually we were called into two separate rooms. I was questioned concerning my knowledge of the sea but I explained I didn’t know much but anyway at the end of the day, I was accepted. You know, David came out of his room said how did you get on? He said they won’t accept me he said, because I am a trainee boat builder and I was only a labourer really, so that put paid to that friendship [laugh]. Going back previously to this, to early ’39, I was only seventeen, I went to Surbiton town hall near Kingston, was a recruiting office and I applied to join the Royal Scots Greys Cavalry Regiment, because I was so full of horses. Now the recruiting sergeant told me, he said for one thing you’re too young, you’re not seventeen and a half, he and another reason he said, forget about the horses he said you’ll never see a horse on active service. Well that, this was all previous to me joining up at the town hall. So, I waited quite some time for my application to come through before I was called up, and from there I received me travel warrant, to travel to Cardington in Bedford. Now Cardington was a pre-war airship station, and the airship mast was still in place where the, all the different airships used to moor. At Cardington I was issued with kit, which consisted of uniform, boots, shirts, etc. It was a bit of a hit and miss affair because you lined up in front of a counter and a fellow looked at you and said I think you’re about a size and threw you a coat or jacket hoping it would fit. Anyway, that soon sorted out. We was only there a very short time to draw kit, from there I was posted to Great Yarmouth, RAF Great Yarmouth to do basic military training. Now this consisted of marching up and down the, the roads, rifle drill, shooting, bayonet, with the bayonet with the dummy, you had to charge at the dummy with the bayonet. Now what that meant for me being an air sea rescuer [chuckle] I never, would never know., This was a very, quite basic training, but it consisted of assault courses, as I say, rifle shooting, the Sten gun what had just come into operation, using the Sten gun. Sitting in an enclosed room without your gas mask, when a gas was turned on you had to find your way, to get your gas mask on before the gas got too much for you, which obviously you had somebody standing by. We were there for about two, Great Yarmouth, we were there Great Yarmouth for about two, two months, marching up and down the roads. One particular thing I always remember was our drill corporal was a Yorkshireman, a Corporal Harrison. And on every march you had to sing On Ilkley Moor Bar Tat, I knew every word of Ilkley Moor Bar Tat. Anyway that came to an end and we travelled well at once to go to Tayport, on the Scottish Coast. Now Tayport, well obviously it was a port, but it was also home to RAF Leuchars It was an Australian squadron at Leuchars, mostly Australian squadron, but we were there just doing menial work ‘cause it wasn’t a training station for air sea rescue it was just a pit stop, so my day was employed either helping in the hangars, or we had a very zealous CO with his garden. That garden had to be kept up, it was pristine, there was even stones had to be painted white, all round the garden. What’s more, he had a dog, and this dog was obviously come and dig up where you had to. This lasted for a few weeks and for the first two or three weeks I was stationed, rather I was in barracks with the Aussie squadron, And all day long every time someone would come in it would play – what’s that Australian song?
[Other]: Waltzing Matilda.
LP: Yes, Waltzing Matilda, that would be on all day every day, Waltzing Matilda. Well eventually I came out of that, back into the English section of the RAF and from there, oh I had this thing of joining to be a flight, a flying airman, so I went into the office where you remuster, that’s where you changed your trade. Now I spoke to the recruiting I suppose he was an officer, I’m sure. I explained what I wanted to do. He said ‘Whatever for?’ Well I said I think I was just getting a bit fed up of waiting around for this air sea rescue. So I applied to be a wireless operator air gunner. His reply was ‘I’ll give you a bit of advice boy’, he said ‘Only birds and fools fly.’ Now I thought that wasn’t a very nice thing, because he’s sitting in an office all day long, with those poor fliers night after night out flying, doing a terrible job. Well, anyway, within the space of another couple of weeks I was posted and I didn’t hear any more of that application. So from Great Yarmouth I went up to Tayport, that’s how I got to Tayport. As I say I was at Tayport for a bit, killing time actually. And then we got posted to RAF Corsewall, Corsewall Point, that’s on the other side of Scotland. That’s at the head of Loch Ryan at the head which led down to Stranraer, the waters at Stranraer. Now here we commenced our training, our air sea rescue training proper. It was a very, very, what shall I say very complex because it covered so many subjects., We had to study for instance buoys, buoys how they was attached to lines underwater to a mooring called a mooring trot, how to scull a boat, a small rowing boat with one oar, navigation, morse code and semaphore flags. The morse code was, was [chuckle] was a bit of a laughable situation because you’d be paired off and you had to send, one would be sending, one would be receiving morse code course there was many rude messages sent from one airman to another! Also aircraft recognition you would be thrown cards and you, you had to say straight away, English bomber, English fighter, German bomber, German fighter such like, and also from school work you were given a books and pens and you had to write notes and notes down of rules of the sea, the meaning of flags and such like. And then there was the practical training where we were taken down to the waters edge to the port and it would be put on different vessels and you would practice how to work a boat. These were called sea plane tenders, there was a, an old hulk moored, moored out at sea and you had to come alongside. The coxswain would shout out ‘come along port side to or starboard side to,’ and you had to turn your boat round to starboard of course there was lots of times there was lots of crashes [chuckle] ‘cause not many boys were able to control boats like that. As I say it was very thorough, thorough training. It, although it was an uncomfortable billet. The billets were nissen huts scattered about in the woods. And for the washing facilities were very basic, you had wash tubs, but for the toilets consisted of, of a row each side just with sacking in between each person so you could have a conversation with the follow sitting opposite on the other side of you, and I’m saying when I said it was basic, it was basic. At the end of the, at the end of the, at the end of the huts, nissen huts there was a big container of a blue liquid. [Turns away] What’s that liquid, erm,
[Other]: I can’t remember.
LP: Perm, permanganate of potash,
[Other]: Yes.
LP: Every man had to gargle with it, permanganate, and if you didn’t and you went sick with a sore throat you were in trouble, you were on charge, as I say it was very basic the conditions. The nissen huts were equipped with a paraffin stove in the middle of the hut. Now you were issued with a ration of paraffin and that had to last you so much, so many days, or day or whatever it was. If you used it up that was your fault, but you’ve got to remember we’d be out at sea, or on the boats rather, you’d be wet and cold, so that paraffin did always last. Now another situation was you had to do guard duties, now the guard duties consisted of dotted around this camp, in the woods, sentry huts, well, just stands really, just a metal stand, you would do I think it was either two hours on or four hours off, or vice versa. This was after you’d done your days’ work at the training. Now, one of, one of the duties of the guard, night guard, was called a rover patrol, he would as the word say, he would wander round the camp just looking at different places keeping an eye. I’d have an old Lee Enfield rifle, First World War issue, with five rounds of ammunition. Now if you come across a German I don’t know what would happen [chuckle]. One amusing, well I don’t think it was amusing really, on my amble round the roving patrol I came across a big bowser, a big tanker, which I thought contained paraffin, I thought well this is lovely [laugh]. Now, I searched around to find a container, luckily I found this container, put it under the bowser, turned the bowser on but instead of paraffin it was all effluent, effluent that came out [laugh]. So I was in a bit of a state, the rest of the, that was cleaning me uniform. Food, I suppose for RAF food wasn’t bad you just had to line up and you were served by a WAAF, RA WAAF girls. But you held out, you had a mess tin, knife, fork and spoon and tin mug. You’d hold your mess tin in front of the WAAF and she would dish whatever was up – plonk. Well, the food wasn’t all that great, but another incident, rather amusing. The officer would come round. A shout would go up ‘Orderly Officer, any complaints?’ But the Orderly Officer would come round accompanied by an NCO, ‘Anybody any complaints?’ Well, one brave soul shouted out ‘Yes sir, I’ve got a caterpillar on my plate.’ The officer walked over, this is true, he walked over to the boy, he said ‘There sir, it’s a caterpillar.’ ‘Hmmm,’ he said, ‘just push it off’ he said, ‘with your spoon.’ ‘Well, I wasn’t going to eat it sir.’ So that was another happy episode. Previous to this I forgot to mention, when I was at Great Yarmouth there was one particular airman, late in the afternoon he would go up to the NCO in charge, say a few words to him and off he would go, well we had to continue till the end of the day. So I said to this boy, after a couple of visits I saw him. I said what do you say? What gets you to come home so early? ‘Well, I’m in the boxing club.’ So I was always interested in boxing as a youngster so I said ‘Can I join?’ he said we’d be only too glad to have you. So I joined the boxing club there which was an asset really, I boxed and a couple of times at Great Yarmouth amongst the RAF. Well also, now also, back up to Tayport, not Tayport Corsewall Point, Corsewall, there was a boxing section there. And the fellow in charge was a guy who was an athlete, a pre-war was a runner, he wasn’t a boxer, a runner oh can’t remember his name. We used to have running, training before going on duty so I joined the boxing club there. Now, I did very well there really, because I’m not praising myself, but every Sunday we had what’s called a uniform parade. We had two uniforms, there was the best blue. Now on this best blue parade, everybody was lined up on a Sunday morning had a full inspection, the flag would be hoisted, the CO of the whole section would come round and inspect each man, so he gets to me, the Orderly Officer who was with him taps me on the shoulder and says you stay there you and I thought ‘Now what’ve I done?’. And so when the parade was dismissed and everyone went, the CO and officers came up and congratulated me ‘cause I’d boxed the night before apparently and I won my two bouts. I always remember one because it was an officer and I anyway that was the end of that but also stationed there was, I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard of him, a Steve Donahue, now he was a champion jockey of England, Steve Donahue, like our Lester Piggott today. Well his son was Pat Donahue, now Pat Donahue was an officer, first of all he was just a NCO but the second time I visited he was an officer and he was a very good boxer. Pat, Pat Donahue, a very good boxer and I was very friendly with Pat although it didn’t do him any favours but was just the fact that we became good friends what with him being an officer and me being NCO, just a private. What more can I say about that? Oh, another amusing incident, on a Sunday as I say, you had the day off. They used to run the transport buses into Stranraer, which was quite a bus ride away and there were no such thing as seats and you was just clinging on, hanging on as best you could. I was hanging on at the back of the bus, and the fellow next to me, he said ‘Where do you come from?’ I said ‘Oh, you probably wouldn’t know, a place called Chertsey, in Surrey,’ and he laughed, he said he lived at Everstone. Now he turned out, he was Worts w-o-r-t-s funeral directors and Harry Wort was a funeral director, well there again there was another strange quirk because when we finally moved from Corsewall Point to various stations Harry moved off and I didn’t see Harry again till he arrived a year later when he turned up at Newhaven, he’d spent what they called the white man’s grave, the Gold Coast in Africa. Well, I don’t know quite how long we were at Corsewall Point because, it was a very long, as I say, it was, covered a lot of work, classroom work, practical work, seamanship and such like but eventually I passed out from the giddy heights of AC2 to aircraftsman first class with a rise in pay. [Laugh] I’ve got my figures actually what rise in pay. Shall I get those figures now? Well, my rise in pay, my pay in 1942 that was three shillings per day. And out of that three shillings, I made an allotment to my mother of one shilling and sixpence per day, so that was ten shillings and sixpence per week. And this was for twenty four hours a day service. [chuckle] But then in March 43 I was a AC1, I was getting four and ninepence per day and I was still one shilling and sixpence to my mother. August the 1st 1943 I was receiving five shillings and threepence and still making the allowance of one and sixpence to me mother and I think it was not until 44 that I was getting six shillings per day [papers shuffling]. But I had, had a very good family. My sister used to regularly send me money, so really I wasn’t too bad. I did not smoke, when I say I used to drink, it was, you couldn’t afford to drink a lot anyway. Now [pause, shuffling of papers] Can I go back to my days at Great Yarmouth?
DM: Oh yes, yes.
[Other]: [ Cough]
LP: Yes, during my days at Great Yarmouth, the raw recruit, you obviously jumped to any order that you were given. Now, the second day I was there, the corporal in charge tapped me on the shoulder ‘Haircut Hughes!’’ I said, ‘Corporal,’ I said, ‘I had a haircut yesterday.’ He said ‘You’ll have another one today.’ So everybody tapped on the shoulder had to have a haircut. Now after you had your hair cut, you had to give the barber a sixpence, so he must have done very well out of – him and cohorts. And also at Yarmouth I think it must have been a big college because it was a big open room with showers, no shower enclosures, just open showers. You had to have a shower today – another sixpence. So that was quite a lump out of my, those must have made good living the barber and the shower man. And also I must, [shuffle of papers] injection time. Now it would be a column of men you had to bare one shirt sleeve, go past a so called medical orderly for an injection. There was no just holding your arm, just walk by one big stab. No change the needle. Next one up, another big stab. And I see grown men what I don’t know if it was fright or nerves just collapse on the ground.
DM: Can you remember when you started actually active service? When you’d finished your training. 43 or 42
LP: It was the beginning of 43. January 43, yeah. Now, I’ll come to that now. I was posted from Coreswell Point, Scotland to Gosport, Portsmouth. I was only there a very short time and this consisted of we were based on Stokes Bay, part of Portsmouth Waters, Southampton Waters, it was a testing ground for torpedoes. At the end of a long runway, a seaway, was an old hulk, bored, the aircraft would come down, drop the torpedo obviously aiming for the hull. And our job was to patrol up and down retrieve the torpedoes and so forth. Well that lasted only could have only been there only a few weeks. From there I got a posting to Newhaven. Now Newhaven was a very busy station. And it was there that the actual air sea rescue began. I was, I was told to find a billet in the town, Newhaven town, because the actual nissen huts were full and the, a certain number of airmen were billeted with families in houses. Well I was stationed with billeted with a Mrs Cook, her husband was away on war work, she had two children and an old grandmother, but she did look after me. She used to obviously get a ration allowance for food. As I say, from there I was taken straight on to high speed launch 190. Now it took quite a bit of get used to because you were mucking in with old hands really and I was a newcomer, but I got quite capable. My first job was a gunner. The gunner at this time there was a stand outside each a stand either side of the wheelhouse with a Vickers drum fed machine gun. Now my job was to hang on to that machine gun. Don’t forget the boat is not just cruising up and down its moving. But, as I say it was, it was a drum-fed machine gun but these didn’t last very long as it wasn’t so long after the guns were taken off of that and then we had a for’ard gun, revolving turret with twin browning machine guns, that was my next job I was a Browning machine gunner front turret. The turrets, the armament on the boat as I say they disbanded these two shields machine guns. There was a front turret, a rear turret, and then they decided to put a twenty millimetre Oerliken canon right at the stern of the boat. Well that did slow us down a little bit, the cannon. For there I was the gunner, that was my job, I had to be in the gun turret, and it was only after that I took my second class coxwain’s course, I was called in one day, the CO said I think you should take a coxwain’s course. From there I had been at Newhaven, I don’t know, five six months, I was sent up to back up to Corsewell Point for another bout of training as a coxswain. Well I passed that out, that meant a, that meant a rise in pay and also a jump in rank from leading aircraftsman to corporal. By this time I was quite, what shall I say, well quite at home on the boat: I knew what to do and what not to do. And my job was to be in the wheelhouse. There was a first class coxswain, the skipper and the second class coxswain in the wheelhouse. And you took it in turns to coxswain the boat.
DM: How many of you were there on the boat?
LP: Well on the boat, the boat consisted of the skipper, obviously an officer, a flight sergeant first class coxswain, a second class coxswain, a wireless operator, a medical orderly, two engineers, and two more gunners. Roughly, sometimes you’d have eight of you, sometimes there’d be ten of you. Now, the day consisted of hours and hours of searching, we had, the first boat that was always called the first boat, on first degree, that was usually, the rendezvous thirty miles south of Beachy Head, that was the usual one for the first boat, you’d be on station if you were the first boat you’d be on station, at six o’clock you’d be on station if not near that you’d be on your rendezvous. Now when you were on your rendezvous, patrol up and down just waiting orders really, it could be a long, long long day. But suddenly you’d get a crash call now this was taken by the wireless operator and ours was a very good one named Norman and a good wireless operator too. If he didn’t have his helmet on, Norman he would have it by his side. Now he could pick up our particular call we were a seagull, seagull something, I forget my number but we were seagull something. As soon as Norman heard that, he’d get the signal and that came from the Navy. Now although we were RAF Coastal Command, we were directly under the command of the Navy when it come to positioning. So you would take the course of that call and go up and down, up and down and what you would do call a square search, you would do a certain distance, a mile, one way, turn starboard right then back again so you were doing a search square all the way to where it had been reported – a crash. And you would report search and search and whatever you did your search. Now sometimes you’d be there all day log and do nothing but another time you’d be flying here there and everywhere. On one particular, one particular search, I’ve got it written down here somewhere, we had a crash call I was a gunner at the time and I was still in the front turret. This was in my early days. We were patrolling along and suddenly this spitfire came overhead. I didn’t know it was a spitfire at the time, fired his machine guns in front of us. At first thought I thought it would be a German, he turned round, turned round again and then I could see it was a spitfire, and he took us right up to this pilot sitting in his dinghy, which was a good save, we saved him. Now on that journey, the turret and I’m not exaggerating or making it up, a mine floated past and I could have stretched out and touched it. But there’s nothing I could do about it. It wasn’t the first mine I’d see, they was quite frequent. Quite often you would see a mine broken free of its moorings floating. Now we used to have to report the Navy and the navy would send out a vessel and destroy it. But that was very handy when they would explode the mine you’d get buckets and buckets of dead fish, or stunned fish and it was just a case of scooping the fish up. Although when I was in a private billet I used to have, the landlady used to supply my rations, but the rest of the crew, or those who weren’t in private, they would draw rations for the day and we would have what they call a galley which consisted of a methylated spirit stove and you would do your cooking, but the fact that I wasn’t part of it didn’t make any difference really, you was just part of mucked in together. Clothing, clothing we were well-equipped. We had duffle coats which no other RAF had, proper rain coats, rain macs, we had sea boots, jack boots, just slippers for ordinary time on the boat when you were in harbour and also our CO he was Squadron Leader John D. Syme, a very, what shall I say, a man’s man. His main concern was the welfare of the boats crews. Now all of the boats crew and the probably the base crews as well, we had sheets to sleep in, not just a blanket because the ordinary issue was blankets, two blankets, but John D. always made sure we had sheets, clean sheets. On board, when you slept on board if you were on duty at night, then you would sleep in a sleeping bag, and you had fold down bunks.
DM: Would you be at sea?
LP: I’m sorry?
DM: Would you be at sea when you were sleeping?
LP: Yes. You would, there was no regulation you would be at sea eight hours, ten hours and then come home. It didn’t work like that. You went out until you were called. You just couldn’t say well it’s time to come home, you just did as you were called. As I say, I’ve got a record of it here where you’d be out. You’d do a crash call and that would take a day and then you’d still have to go out. So the hours was long. Also, another thing, it was, it was the only base in the whole of the RAF Air Sea Rescue that received a rum ration, going back to the old days. Once you’d been at sea so many hours, you were entitled to the skipper’s, to the skipper’s, to the skipper’s thoughts it was time for a rum and everybody had a rum ration. And if you stayed out longer and longer you still had another rum ration. But that was entirely up to the skipper.
DM: Did you ever get attacked? Did you ever get attacked?
LP: No. We were always told you must never open fire on anything unless you were attacked first. We lost a couple of boats on the, what they call it, the early landing, where it was a failure?
DM: What was that Dieppe?
LP: Dieppe, yes. We did lose a couple of boats, I wasn’t at Newhaven at the time, but we did lose a couple of boats there. Two or three got killed. When DD come here around we had armour plating put on top of the wheelhouse. And on the part of the fore deck was armour plated and you had a big five white star painted on the fore deck for aircraft recognition as an allied sign. Now I’ve got somewhere I picked up Germans, shall I tell you about?
DM: Yes, that would be very interesting.
LP: Right.
[Other]: Doc here ten past one in the morning.
LP: Yeah, ten past one in the morning, crash call to position 360 degrees Hove two and a half miles, search the area till hours when message received to return to harbour. After seen in dinghy airmen picked up German wireless operator from a JU88. We searched the area for the remainder without result. Returned to Newhaven, and prisoner handed over to Naval authorities at 0705 hours.
[Other]: No further incident 1400 hours.
LP: Then 1400 hours we searched till quarter to five, 1745 hours. Now going back to that German,
DM: Yes.
LP: Now going back to that German. This was early hours of the morning and we picked him up with a searchlight. Previous to that there’d been an air raid over Newhaven, the district. The funny part of it was. We kind of felt it was we picked, he’s sitting in the dinghy, he’s got a very pistol in his hand. We said ‘Are you all right? Are you all right?’ friend, no answer, he didn’t answer. And it took several minutes to realise he wasn’t British or Allies, he was a German. Part about it was on this particular journey the engineer was a Belgian. His name was Albert, They called him Albert. Now Albert wasn’t a regular on the boat, it was a one-off. Now Albert, was forced to leave Belgium in the German invasion. Albert hated [musical sound]
DM: Yes.
LP: Albert hated Germans he realised it was a German he was for throwing him back in! Well, it took a bit of persuading, but another interesting thing was, I kept his very pistol, the Nazi very pistol and had a whistle attached, and part of his parachute we divided up, silk parachute. I had quite a nice piece of silk parachute which I gave my sister for her baby girl at the time wasn’t it. It made her christening gown. I think the skipper had his boots, I think the skipper had his boots. Anyway we took him back to harbour. Oh, we clothed him, we had dry clothing, gave him dry clothing, we took him back to harbour and then it was quite a way from the water’s level to the harbour wall – which was up a steep. Somebody had the bright idea of blindfolding him. Well he put the blindfold on and he was absolutely shivering. He thought we were going to shoot him. Anyway we got him up on board and got him to naval and it was a couple of weeks later that a complaint came through that somebody had taken his fur lined sea boots, flying boots and I kept that very pistol and the whistle for not, four, five, years back.
[Other]: Four, five years.
LP: Years, then I gave it to somewhere in Newhaven.
[Other]: Museum.
LP: Newhaven.
[Other]: Museum.
LP: Yes, museum at Newhaven. Anyway to pick somebody up early hours of the morning just with a searchlight, he was lucky, wasn’t he?
DM: He was.
LP: Another. Which one’s this one?
[Other]: The Walrus, where you rescued the men from the Walrus.
LP: Not the one off the French coast was it?
[Other]: Don’t think so, no.
LP: This is another. This made the headlines in the paper this rescue. [shuffling of paper] That’s the original but,
DM: That one: ‘Six RAF men saved in the battle of the Seine’?
[Other]: That one.
DM: Six men saved from the wreck of a Wellington bomber, so that was you, you rescued those men?
LP: Well, it’s strange really, I won’t go into all the details of how we got there.
DM: Well you can do.
LP: Can I?
DM: Yeah.
LP: Well, shall I read off that?
[Other]: Hmmm
LP: If I read it off that, I can’t read it. [Pause] There’s a lot to read isn’t it.
[Other] You dropped the lifeboat.
DM: Which bit are we talking about? So they obviously came down over the other side of the Channel, the French side of the channel.
LP: The mouth of the Seine.
DM: Right. So why were you, were you sent there or were you already there?
LP: No, no we were on patrol in the channel when we got a call, so we had to break off from where we were to go there. Now, two RAF launches took place.
DM: When was this, do you know? Oh yes, July 17th 1943.
LP: Yes. Two launches were sent there. Now I was on 190 and after you see all the air, fighting going on we found that airmen, six airmen, were in an airborne lifeboat, it was one of the first that had ever been dropped. They climbed out of their dinghy into this airborne lifeboat. Now I think the other boat was 177, 190 177. 190, we reached the crew first. Now our coxswain, the first class coxswain, Bert Underwood, a very good coxswain, in his anxiety, he came along a little bit too fast for the crew. We threw ‘em a heaving line, we were going a little bit fast for them to hold onto the line, consequently we passed. 177 behind us, they picked the crew up. Strange part was, they picked the crew up, turned round and gone straight back to Newhaven. Now we were left out there, off the French coast [laugh] with this lifeboat. First of all, orders came ‘Sink the lifeboat, return to base’. So on board we had a tool chest consisting of axe and various tools these were passed along. At the last moment a message came up again, ‘Return to Newhaven with lifeboat.’ So that meant towing, so consequently, we had to put the tow line on the lifeboat and tow it back to Newhaven which took ages, ages. I don’t know what time we got back, I never know what time we got back, but that was a good rescue that.
DM: Did you rescue any other bomber crews during?
LP: Yes, yes. That another one? Routine patrol in the channel, a fine day, round about mid-day skipper said it’s about time we had something to eat, so we were preparing something to eat, when looking up at the sky, we saw a US American fighter bomber a P38 I think it was, a twin-fuselage. That disappeared and then we saw a parachute gently floating out. We followed him, where the parachute was going to land, and it turned out that when he had pulled his cockpit cover he’d dislocated his arm. He was floating in the water, unable to save himself. We were alongside in minutes. One or two of the crew jumped overboard, held him up while we got alongside him, and picked him up and took him back to base. I’ve got a letter from his CO, this letter is dated 29th of March 1944. Dear Sir, The excellent work of the members in your command when they rescued First Lieutenant T.G. Giles, United States Army, from the waters of the English Channel on the 16th March 1944 cannot be allowed to pass without an expression of appreciation. It is my very great pleasure to send you this letter of commendation for bringing about an operation with such happy and favourable results in the case of an officer of my command. Lt. Giles was forced to bail out of his plane while returning from an operational mission over occupied enemy territory. In so doing he sustained severe injuries. His condition was such that he was practically helpless when he reached the water. He was not able to find his dinghy and he would not have been able to get into it if he had and he was not even able to inflate his Mae West. It is fortunate indeed that launch 190 commanded by Craig as was brought alongside without delay. This pilot could not have survived any length of time in the sea on his own. The prompt and sure action of the ASR personnel in this instance merits the highest praise. The courageous action of the men who when over the side to render assistance is most noteworthy. I am fully aware that this rescue is not an isolated incident, but one of a number of superb accomplishments on your parts that have saved many ditched airmen, both British and American, under catastrophic circumstances, but one cannot disregard that if it were not for the immediate aid given so skilfully and successfully, and I am sure that Lieutenant Charles would not be alive today. The sentiment of the whole of this organisation when I express that thanks of a job well down. The crew of the HS190 was the Skipper, Flying Officer Craig, Flight Sergeant, first coxswain, Sergeant Placito, second coxswain, leading aircraftsman Fiddler fitter, LAC Hayes Leading aircraftsman Leading Aircraftsman Hyde crew. That was a good rescue that one.
[Other]: It was.
LP: There’s so many more [chuckle].
[Other]: Still there’s a sad one.
LP: How about or bore you too much, if you left me that, well there’s not much attached to that one, not so far off the French coast there were German floating stations which consisted of a bed, provisions for downed airmen. And on a couple of occasions we came across these stations but fortunately or unfortunately there were no airmen alive in it. We just inspected them, took note of what was there and left.
DM: Do you have any stories around D-Day? What happened on D-Day with your group?
LP: Well on D-Day it was quiet actually, our D-Day was very quiet. Our boats weren’t considered deep sea going; they were built for speed. Pictures of them where they came out. I’ve got no big thing about D-Day. We went out early, picked up odd, odd bits of floating material rafts and such like but no actual rescues. D-Day was a quiet day considering the other days you would be there all day and all night.
DM: You were talking earlier about a rescue involving a walrus.
LP: Yes,
DM: Okay so this is where you picked up a civilian body.
LP: 0710 routine patrol over Beachy Head. Crash call to position search direct by Beachy Head Beachy Head Station, that would be the station at Beachy Head.
DM: Coastguard, or maybe coastguard?
LP: Coastguard, that’s the word. We carried out in company with a Walrus and sir sea rescue aircraft at 1445 received another call to position. On position at 15:15 hours quantity of wreckage found at 1600 hours we sighted a body of a civilian
[Other]: Civilian.
LP: Position 5 degrees off Newhaven seven miles delivered body to police. Returned to patrol until 2115 hours. [shuffle papers] Yes, we picked that poor boy up, that civilian bather. What wasn’t nice, the skipper wasn’t pleased to take him on board, no he thought about either sinking the body or, but he was told, yes, that was sad that.
DM: Take you on now to the end of the war. What happened when hostilities ceased?
LP: Yes, just let me et me thoughts. Yeah, I finished the war off as a transport driver actually.
DM: How did that happen?
LP: The Japanese war finished in
[Other]: August.
LP: August. Okay then yeah. When peace, okay then, when peace was signed with Germany in May, it meant that there was no longer essential for so many routine patrols to take place owing to the fact that it was just friendly aircraft. When peace was signed completely with Japanese surrender, the station the RAF station I don’t know what to try and say.
DM: You were still at Newhaven?
LP: Yes, still at Newhaven. I know what, the end of the German surrender the Japanese war was still in. It was decided to send boat to the Far East. The boats that were chosen to go were copper plated hull that is the hill was plated with copper plate to stop borings from sea insects. 190 although I wasn’t aboard at this time, 190 got as far as Gibraltar when it was halted and that the operation to go to the Far East was aborted, was no longer necessary, The reason I was no longer on board at this time I failed a medical exam and you had to be A1 to be a boats crew. So I was taken off HSL 190 and given a shore job. I was lucky enough to be made a transport driver. We had a Bedford vehicle used to run messages to Thorley Island and into Brighton. This was a very good job because it was so easy going. The reason I got the job was an old friend of mine who was on 190 was a transport driver his job was to drive the warrant officer his name was Stevens a nice gentlemanly man, Steves, Stevenson, he was to take him where he wanted to do to go. Bill Stoneman used to frighten the life out of him wherever he drove. He wasn’t a driver he relied on somebody else to drive or whether Bill did di deliberately or not I don’t know but he fell out of favour with the WO I was called into the office by a friend of mine, Don Stovey, who was a clerk and said that Warrant Officer Stevenson wanted a new driver, a different driver would I take the job. Of course I jumped at it. So from there on I was the station driver. The strange part about it was, I was the only one knew where the vehicle was kept. It was kept in a side street in Newhaven in the town. So consequently we used it on many occasions at night for our trips into Brighton, [chuckle] but I think this soon came to an end when I think it was spotted by another, a Marines, not a Marines, a motorcraft, I beg your pardon a motorised section of the RAF in Newhaven at the time and I think it was one of their vehicles that was mistaken for us and anyway from then on the vehicle had to be kept outside the officers mess on the harbour. Yeah.
DM: So you finished your time in the RAF as a driver.
LP: I finished sa a driver, yeah.
DM: Can you remember when you were demobbed?
LP: I’m sorry?
DM: Can you remember when you were demobbed?
LP: I got demobbed in 1946 I don’t know, middle of 46, something like that, I was demobbed, yeah.
DM: Did you go back to the post office or
LP: No I didn’t I no, I didn’t I just worked for me brother-in-law driving and one thing an another. But it was such a funny thing feeling you know being under orders twenty four hours a day. I forgot to say, that when it got near D-day time, all the civilian billets were closed and where we used to have single beds in the, in the nissen huts they were all double bunked so, to get all, so all the boys were on call. Yeah, it was a good job driving because quite often they, the officer would go into Brighton to pick up papers and also the rations were picked up in Brighton at the, one of the big hotels I think it was the Metropole or the Grand Hotel which was run by RAF, yes, it was the Australians had taken over. Which was the hotel that was bombed? Was that the Metropole?
DM: That was the Metropole.
LP: Was it? Yeah.
[Other]: I think it was.
LP: Yeah, I think it was the Metropole yeah, well the Australians were living there they had taken it over, and that was also then, I used to have to go in for a clothing exchange because what usually happened, well it always happened, if you had something worn, your clothing were worn and you thought need a change we had a storeman at Newhaven, Tiny Wellman, he was a big fella, they called him Tiny Wellman, he was the storeman, and it was up to him if you wanted a new pullover or a new shirt or whatever, it was up to him whether you got it or not. Which was, you know he either liked you or didn’t like you. But after that, all the clothes were kept at Brighton and it was my job, I could take clothing in and exchange it, so consequently I did a good, had a good job changing clothes for the boys that wanted, you know new shoes, whatsoever. But you used to get up to all sorts of tricks to earn a shilling, because one particular, in the Metropole, the Australians had taken over, and there was one room with dozens of pairs of shoes, they would throw the shoes in, me and a friend of mine I used to take with me, we would sort out shoes, take ‘em in to the clothing exchange, get a new pair of shoes for pair of old ones. The things you did. [Chuckle] I tell you one other happy episode too. When the war ended, horse racing started, and Brighton was, I think it was the first race course in the south of England to open. Now, there was no signalling affairs, there was no way when the horses. I don’t know if you understand horse racing but when they go down to the start, there was no way that they knew where the horses were at the start or when the start, starting gate opened or not. So they came to Newhaven to look for a signaller or signallers. One of my best friends was a signaller so he said you come, he said you can do the transport, so I used to take the transport, it lasted for about three or four days. We would take two men down to the start of the racecourse, and two men at the finish with Aldis lamps because there was no speakers as such, and they would signal when the horses were ready to go off, to start, they would signal to us they’re off and then obviously we knew if they’d won or lost so we had a good few days, three or four days with that. But going back to that American we saved he piled cigarettes, whatever, in a day or two the CO sent down. I didn’t smoke, it didn’t matter to me, but one of the do-gooders there tried to put the block on it, to say you know you didn’t do it for, for cigarettes. Obviously we didn’t do it for that but that was his kindness to do it wasn’t it. I would have liked to have met that American some time.
DM: Yeah, I suppose all the people you rescued you don’t really know what became of them after they walked off your boat, that was it, they were gone.
LP: Yeah. We used to have something about the size of that polished wood and every rescue you’d put on you’d put a roundel on, you know, RAF roundel, you’d stick one of those on and we had that on the.
DM: Did you used to put a swastika on when you rescued a German? [Laugh]
LP: No, we didn’t put a swastika on, no. We had two Germans, two particular Germans. One German, I had only been there a short time. He was in the water or in a dinghy. We picked him up and he had the sense enough when he’d baled out he’d wrenched his leg and his leg I don’t know, was half off or half on the sense enough to have tourniquets round his thighs. We saved him. There you are, years and years ago.
DM: Yes, thank you.
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 Lawrence Henry di Placito. One
Creator
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David Meanwell
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-02-09
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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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AdiPlacitoLH170209, PdiPlacitoLH1701
Format
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01:27:39 audio recording
Language
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eng
Coverage
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Royal Air Force
United States Army Air Force
Wehrmacht. Luftwaffe
British Army
Royal Navy
Royal Air Force. Coastal Command
Description
An account of the resource
Lawrence di Placito served as a second-class coxswain on the RAF Air Sea Rescue launches during the Second World War. He was born in Chertsey and attended Egham grammar school where he was a member of the cadet force. Upon leaving school in 1936 he was employed with the Post Office as a clerk/telephonist. Early in 1939 he joined the 6th Battalion East Surrey (Territorial Army). Lawrence went through military training, but he was told he would not be allowed to remain in the unit because of his Italian parents.
At the outbreak of war, he left the Post Office and was employed building naval vessels at a boat yard on the Thames in Chertsey. It was here that he first heard about RAF Air Sea Rescue, which he successfully enrolled into. Following training at various establishments he was posted to Newhaven on High Speed Launch 190 as a gunner.
Lawrence describes rescue operations: a Spitfire leading them to an airman in a dinghy; a Wellington aircrew rescued close to Le Havre on 17 July 1943; a German wireless operator who baled out from a downed Ju 88 and his parachute being divided amongst the crew, and finally rescuing the United States serviceman T G Giles who baled out of a P-38.
Occasionally they would come across mines that had broken free. These would be guarded until the Navy arrived and detonated them. This would result in the surface being covered in stunned fish which the crew would be able to scoop up.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Chertsey
England--Great Yarmouth
England--Newhaven
England--Bedfordshire
Atlantic Ocean--English Channel
France
France--Le Havre
England--Norfolk
England--Surrey
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-07-17
1944-03-16
Contributor
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Ian Whapplington
Anne-Marie Watson
Conforms To
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Pending review
Pending revision of OH transcription
air sea rescue
animal
bale out
ground personnel
Ju 88
military living conditions
military service conditions
Nissen hut
P-38
RAF Cardington
RAF Great Yarmouth
shot down
Spitfire
sport
Walrus
Wellington
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/849/10845/AHackerHA170819.1.mp3
624d4dab61b9f38cda4574f96ea22848
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
Hacker, Harry
Harry Austin Hacker
H A Hacker
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Harry Hacker (b. 1923, 1682646, 191354 Royal air Force). He flew operations as a bomb aimer with 40 Squadron.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2017-08-19
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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Hacker, HA
Transcribed audio recording
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Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
DB: This interview is with Harry Hacker on the 19th of August in Lindfield at 10.50am. Harry, can you tell me a little bit about what your first contact with aircraft was?
HH: My first contact with aircraft. It was in 1939 at the age of sixteen. I’d just left technical college and I went to work with a factory. It was a Rootes motor manufacturing firm in the district of Speke on the outskirts of Liverpool, and many of these factories were turned over to government production of aircraft because war was just about imminent and that, it was, they were building at the time when I joined them originally as an apprentice but the apprenticeship scheme was scrapped when the war started. They went over then to twenty four hour shifts and that was building the Wellington. The long nose Wellington. That was the second modification of the Wellington. A wonderful aircraft. It later on turned out to be quite an important one as far as Bomber Command were concerned. And that was my first contact. Working with skilled engineers building the Wellington bomber. I never ever thought at that time that I would finish up flying with bombers. And I worked for about, I don’t know probably a year maybe at the Blenheim manufacturing and then I, then decided to go for a more permanent and future apprenticeship as a Post Office engineer. So then I applied and was taken in and worked as a post, Post Office engineer. It was during this time the Blitz was going on and I joined the Home Guard and served originally as the, in the LDV, the Local Defence Force. That was in the May I think it was and later on it became the Home Guard. So I belonged to the Home Guard of the Post Office and we used to guard our own Exchanges and the Post Offices. Places of importance. And that was it. During my work as a youth in training I worked with another chap. And because of the Blitz going on they decided to change our studies at Night School to day time because there was the Blitz and we were going to Night School as it was so called on a Saturday afternoon. So one Saturday afternoon another a friend of mine, a chap called Dougie Irving who later on became a gunner in the RAF, we decided we’d play hookey from Night School and we went along to the Recruiting Office to join up. There we met this big strapping sergeant major who approached us as if we were two naughty boys and said, ‘What do you guys want?’ We said, ‘We want to join up.’ He asked us what our profession was and when we told him we were in Post Office engineering he said, ‘I can’t. Sorry you guys I can’t take you because you are in a Reserved Occupation.’ So, we thought oh, what a shame. ‘Is there nothing whatsoever?’ He said, ‘Well, there are two outlets for volunteers and one is aircrew with the RAF and the other is with submarines in the Royal Navy.’ So we both immediately said, ‘Aircrew. We’ll go for aircrew.’ So he took our names and addresses and sent us home. And then it was some weeks later we got a call up if you like for necessary interviews, a selection board which was required for RAF where you sat before a board of, of, of aircrew officers and they would fire questions at you. Mathematical questions. All to do with your education. What standard you were at. And eventually after that selection board we then had a further day of medical. Medical examinations which was one of the strictest medicals I’ve ever undertaken. And eventually we were accepted, given the little lapel badge of the RAF Volunteer Reserve to, so that members, any members of the public who were inclined to criticise young lads that weren’t joining up could see that we were already accepted into the RAF Volunteer Reserve. We were sent home then to await call up. Eventually from there I think it must have been quite some weeks later we were, I got a draft to, to go, a rail draft to go down to London and, and make for Lords Cricket Ground which was then, in those days we didn’t realise it but it was a big recruiting centre for aircrew. And that’s where I spent my initial days. In the Regent’s Park area. We were billeted in some new flats in Hall Road in St Johns Wood and a lot of our marching was all around the areas of, of London. And of course part of our uniform then was a little white flash that we, we wore in our forage caps to indicate that we were trainee aircrew and that was quite treasured by us young lads, you know. It was quite something to distinguish you, if you like from anybody else. And we used to march around very proudly around the streets of London. Hall Road and the Great North Road out from Marble Arch. All around that area. And Regent’s Park. And they were exciting days in those days. All young lads together billeted in these new flats. No bedding of course. You just had a straw mattress that you were given which was on the floor and a brass ashtray in the middle which you had to keep highly polished. But it was great fun in those days.
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I didn’t, that’s another story actually is I joined up with, he went to a different place. He was called up at a different time to me so I never saw him again but strangely enough oh in about nineteen, 1960s I think it was I was working then running a safari camp in East Africa. In Kenya. I’d got into the safari business and we used to go to the rail head every now and again to collect supplies at a place called Mtito Andei and at this, at this, there was a little hotel. It was a halfway route between Nairobi and Mombasa and I went in there one day in to the bar and who do I meet but Dougie Irving who, who we had both volunteered to join up with way back in ’39. So that was quite a meeting. After, after Lord’s Cricket Ground if I remember rightly we were shipped to a village up in Shropshire called Ludlow and during these early stages because the flying schools, elementary flying schools and all that were all very much crowded. They were looking for jobs to keep all us young fellas occupied and they sent us to, it was a big estate in, in Ludlow. I forget who it belonged to. Some member of the aristocracy. But Ludlow I can always remember, and we were supposed, we were told supposedly we were building roads on this estate. Very convenient for the owner but we were told that it was part of our toughening up, and there we went through very strict disciplinary training. We had the corporals there who were very, very strict in our training. So our early training was along the lines of strict yeah in every aspect of strict but also to speed up our thinking and our reactions and what have you. So everything was done very, very quickly. And I can remember after that, later on I went to ITW which was in Aberystwyth in Wales where we did all the educational subjects, all the ground subjects of flying — navigation, aero engines and so on and so forth, and our instructor there was a Welshman called Tommy Barnes who was at that time, I think a middleweight champion boxer. And what he, he was a great a real human character, he loved, he used to take us, march us out into the country and then stop us outside a pub somewhere and say, ‘Well, I’m going in there for a drink. You chaps can do what you like for the next half hour.’ Of course, we all gravitated into the pub. But when we met, he met us on train coming in he said, ‘Now, you’ve probably been told that you will march at such and such a pace here,’ he said, ‘But,’ he said, ‘That’s a lot of bullshit.’ He said, ‘We do it faster than that.’ We, we marched like the old Green Jackets, I believe which was a hundred and forty paces to the minute. So everything was smart and quick in, in marching and in drill. It was all to get the mind really working and it certainly worked. We were billeted in a very nice hotel. Stripped of all the furniture of course but it was good accommodation on the seafront at Aberystwyth and there we sat all our exams. All our ground subject’s exams. All of us youngsters had one single ambition and that was because of what we had witnessed in the Battle of Britain. All the young boys quite naturally their age wanting adventure. All wanted to be fighter, fighter pilots. But then of course the whole campaign, aerial campaign was expanding and strategic warfare was coming into place long distance which the RAF had never experienced before. Long distance navigation and long distance bombing into, into Germany. So they introduced a scheme called the PNB scheme, which was the pilot, navigator, bomb aimer scheme because they were wanting so many different types. Prior to that they’d only wanted pilots and observers. So we, there really was the whole Air Force was expanding in to various categories. And eventually we went to Flying School which was in Brough in Yorkshire just outside I think, believe close to Hull. There was an aircraft factory there but also a strip which they had turned into a training ground. There I went on to really find out what flying was all about. We were introduced to the Tiger Moth and taught how to fly the Tiger Moth. And funnily enough the Tiger has got, when you open the throttle, has got quite a sorry, quite an extreme torque, which, and it tends to swing to the right. So the introduction that the pilot instructor gives you is that he gives you the pedals, he takes charge of everything else. He gives you the pedals and he pointed to a chimney. A tall chimney on the horizon. He said, ‘Now, I want you to head the plane towards that chimney.’ Of course, as he opens the throttle it swings around to the right so naturally you instinctively hit the left pedal and it swings to the left. So your initiation of flying you’re going down the runway or, yeah just weaving from side to side. So it teaches you really what, what is happening in, when you open the throttles what to expect. And then later on of course you then when you start flying you then come around to the landings and landings were extremely difficult because the early aircraft in those days, the Tiger in particular had a tail wind. It didn’t have a nose wind. It had a tail wind so you had two, a main undercarriage and you had a tail wheel and the idea there was to put all those three points down at the same time. Known as a three point landing. And that was very difficult. What you had to do was when you were coming in to land is you’re gradually pulling the stick back until you get to an estimated twenty feet off the ground and then you ease the, ease the stick, it was only a stick right back in in to your, in to your middle. So then if everything has gone right you then adopt a stalling attitude and down it sits on the three wheels which are the three points which all sounded very interesting but very difficult to find. So you finish up usually either estimating your height wrong and you suddenly drop out of the sky at about thirty feet and you finish up bouncing along the runway. So that’s the most difficult thing in flying. Then once you start flying the first thing they teach you then is how to get out of a spin because you could get into a spin very easily when you’re learning to fly. You stall your aircraft and whichever rudder you’ve got on you will spin and you are heading for earth and that is quite an experience. What you do there is you pull the stick right back. When you’re at a reasonable attitude pull the stick right back and get the nose of the aircraft coming up until eventually you stall. As you are stalling you kick the pedal depending on which way you want to spin. Right or left. And your aircraft finishes up then going down in a vertical dive either clockwise or anti-clockwise. Quite an experience to see the earth going around beneath you like a record. But then you have to then centralise your, your controls because you can’t get it out of the spin without you’ve done that because you’ve lost control. Your stick is floppy. Everything. Your rudders. It’s all, it’s all gone. There’s no control whatsoever. So what you have to do then is centralise your stick. Push your stick right forward and then give it a pedal the opposite to the way you’re rotating until eventually you finish up in a straight dive and then you pull the stick gently back into your stomach and you come out of the dive. So that’s the first thing they teach you. And then after that then they teach you the rest of flying. Rate one turns, turns starboard or port and they then rate it at rate one, rate two, rate three, rate four. Rate four would be a complete right angle. So you had various degrees. Again, this was a difficult aspect to get together because you had to have the right amount of rudder and the right amount of stick on it to, to control your ailerons and your rudder. And if you, if you didn’t control it right you were either skidding or you were slipping in so your turn had to be on the clock at rate one, rate two and you were following this clock. And that was another difficult point of, of flying but the whole experience was, was quite fantastic. I had two instructors over that period. My first one was a sergeant pilot who had never been in combat but then later on for some reason or other he didn’t turn up and I had a Battle of Britain, a Battle of Britain man. His method with the control was quite different. When being taught by the first instructor everything was done gently and smoothly. When I had this Battle of Britain pilot he said, ‘Come on. Bring it down and turn. Come on. Move the stick. Really move it.’ So, he was teaching you really to do everything quite positive and fast, you know. None of this gentle business. You wouldn’t have time for that in combat. The whole lot was, was quite different, and I did eight hours in that actually. And then during that period we were then went through a selective progress. You were doing various aspects of mathematical calculations. Night vision exercises. All sorts of varying exercises. What they, what they were trying to do at the time then was to see which category of aircrew would, you would be most suited to. I, I don’t know whether that was the reason but I particular, I had particular good night vision so I finished up being selected as trainee as a bomb aimer. And later on after going to Heaton Park outside of Manchester which was a big collection point if you like for all the different categories that they were looking for. A school where you could actually go and finish. Finish off your flying. And I finished up then being sent to Blackpool which was used as an embarkation centre and we were shipped down to Liverpool and from there went, I found myself on a convoy heading for South Africa. The journey by convoy to South Africa was quite interesting. It transpired, we didn’t realise it at the time it was one of the biggest convoys going because they were also shipping troops to the Middle East and to Singapore out to the Far East. And we were about, I think in all we were something like five or six weeks at sea because we were all over the Atlantic to avoid U-boat wolf packs, which were operating at the time. I think we had something like twenty three ships in the convoy. All loaded with troops. I was on the Strathmore which we had, I think, I believe it was about something like five thousand troops which was quite something, and we were billeted on all sorts of decks and usually the accommodation was a bunk. There wasn’t the room for enough bedding and that was an experience. That was my first sea voyage out into the Atlantic and experiencing some of the very deep waves. But as I say we were about, about six weeks. Eventually we had the usual crossing the line procedure when we crossed the equator and going down the west coast of Africa my first contact actually with Africa was in Sierra Leone. Freetown. That was quite an education, where we didn’t get ashore there but we were dropping off some troops then that were known as the West African Frontier Force who wore hats very much like the Australians with the, with the side up at one time. And but that was quite interesting. And then to pull in to African ports in those days we’re talking you know way back in the ‘30s and early ‘40s was quite something. It was like the famous, “Sanders of the River.” I think that was made many many years ago with, I think a man, an American singer called Paul Robeson. But it was quite a sight to see the village as it probably was then of Sierra Leone with all the grass huts and what have you and all the natives were coming out in what were termed bumboats and they were all after trading what little they had with the troops on board. But also they developed a habit. Some of the troops would throw coins over the side and these natives would go diving after pennies and it was quite remarkable. So, we had twenty four entertainment there with the local natives and for money and that we’d throw over the side for them they would load a little basket with probably things like pineapples, fruit and stuff coming up which we had never experienced then. It was quite something. And then from there on we went down the west coast of Africa which was my first experience of the sight then of German, used to be German West Africa which is now nowadays Namibia. And on from there seeing the sights of, of tropical seas with flying fish coming out of the water, flying alongside the troop ships. Dolphins and porpoise. And first experience of seeing a whale. The sperm whale spouting water off the coast. Fascinating. Until eventually we came within sight of Cape Town to see the famous Table Mountain. We were in Cape Town for I think twenty four hours while they took on board some fuel and supplies and then on to Durban where we, of the RAF that were going to train there disembarked. The rest of the troops on board were going on to the Far East and Singapore. Little did they know unfortunately, at the time as fast as they were arriving there they were being taken prisoner by the Japs because we were losing Singapore then. But and then we were, we had a lady, I forget what her name was now, a South African lady, a Zulu, a very big stout lady had a fantastic voice and I believe she met every troop ship in by, she was standing on the quay and she would sing songs. And it was, it was something I’ve always remembered. She had a marvellous voice. She became really well known because her reputation, she met in every troop ship that was going around South Africa. And then we were shipped out to an ex-race course in, in just outside of Durban called Clairwood. Used to be a horse racing course and there we, it was like a distribution centre again, if you like until we were sent to the various flying schools. Later on I was sent to Port Elizabeth, to 42 Air School I think it was. Here two air schools. Went to one at Port Elizabeth and later on another at East London where we did various aspects and here we went to our bombing training which was mainly what we’d being bomb training for but also training in navigation and air gunnery. So a lot of different aspects of aerial combat. Our bombing targets were out in the Indian Ocean. It was a twelve foot square raft I think painted orange or yellow and that was our target. And I had the privilege in that time in the whole of Bombing School of breaking the Bombing School record by every, every one of my exercises had been within I think it was a hundred yards diameter of the target and I broke the record there. So right close to the end I had one that was not as good as my previous ones and the query going on then amongst the pilots was because they had a bet on, I believe to see when I would have a fail. Fail one. This went on but then they discovered it was they had a hole in the tailplane of the aircraft which was causing it. They put that down as an excuse. But then anyway later on air gunnery training. Flying at low level and there we came across the, the Lewis gun. Lewis machine gun and the Thompson sub-machine gun. Using those flying at low level firing those at ground targets. So the training was pretty comprehensive until on the Christmas Eve of [pause] when would that be? It would 1943, I think. I think, I think we had Wings Parade and we all got our wings which was a very proud moment. Our bombing training usually took place in the Avro Anson which was a strange aircraft. It used to flap its wings like, like nobody’s business you know which made you a little bit nervous but then, you know we were told so long as it moves its ok. Mobility is fine. When it’s too stiff no good. And, but the thing about the Anson, our bombing bay where the bomb aimer in training used to lie was, was like, it was a sliding door. It wasn’t as later on we had Perspex. It was a sliding door which you slid back. So in effect you were looking out over open space which took a little bit of getting used to. And that was the Avro Anson. Our gunnery and navigation was done on Airspeed Oxfords. But as I say both schools at Port Elizabeth and East London. But there were good aircraft but nowadays very ancient aircraft but the Anson was a very popular aircraft in its day.
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Time off we were given. The South Africans were very hospitable people. We had, we had one difficult group amongst them, in amongst the Afrikaaners in particularly. I think they were called the [unclear] I think, which was Afrikaans. But they were not so much pro-German but anti-British because of the reputation of the British in the Boer War when a lot of the Afrikaaners died in, in what was then the first type of concentration camp. And we had to be very careful sometimes. Especially if we were out at night and coming back, walking back to camp. We had one or two of our lads would be hijacked by these people and, you know taken miles out, in to, in to the bush sort of thing and either beaten up or stripped of clothing. And apart from that the South Africans were very hospitable. So, their homes and their farms, many of them were farmers were open to us boys. One particular farm I went to at a place called Tarkastad and it turned out they were lovely people there. Turned out that they were descendants of Nelson. How, how it came about I don’t know but that was what they, they told us. That the, I think it was the lady was a descendant of Lord Nelson, Admiral Nelson. But they were lovely people. At that, at the same time I took up dancing for something to do. Ballroom dancing. And another chap and I called Pat Keene who later on unfortunately we lost on operations, but he was a great buddy of mine and we took up dancing together and we had then the youngest dancing teacher in South Africa. She was only seventeen, I think. A girl called Ada Krueger. And there again they were a lovely family. We were often invited in to their home, and I finished up eventually one evening with Ada doing an exhibition dance. And I can always remember when she was teaching the tango. The tango in those days you had to keep body contact with the right side against the, against the, your partner’s side. Always close contact. A very passionate dance. A very emotional dance. But then we always found something to do. And the people as I say were lovely. They really were lovely. Until the day arrived as I say when we got our wings and the future ahead of us. We were then waiting to be shipped. We didn’t know where to. It was either to be the Middle East or back home to the UK. In my case it turned out to be the Middle East. I was posted up to Egypt and then eventually on to Palestine where I did my operational training. On the way up we found it very interesting. Putting into the ports of Mozambique which was then Portuguese East Africa, seeing Zanzibar and Madagascar from the ship in the distance on the horizon and then were pulling into Mombasa. And we were in Mombasa for twenty four hours. Again, that was fascinating to see an early African port as it was in those days. We were not allowed ashore of course so it was a question of always wondering what, what lay beyond the palm trees and the horizon little knowing that some years later I would be emigrating to this country and spending thirty odd years there. That was fantastic. But the morning we left Mombasa it was a Sunday morning and it was church service on board the ship. And we were about an hour, two or three hours away from Mombasa heading north when we were having church service and the padre announced to us that a ship that had passed us going towards Mombasa an hour before had been sunk by a submarine. So we must have come within sight of that U-boat commander but either he wasn’t interested in us or he couldn’t catch us because we were then alone. We were no longer in convoy. We were moving as fast as the, the ship would take us then and, and weaving around. So maybe we were fortunate in being a difficult location for the U-boat commander. But the ship that had passed us going towards Mombasa a couple of hours before had been sunk. Our next port of call then was, would be, I think Somaliland. We pulled in to Djibouti, I think it was and then on to Aden. Aden of course then was a, was a British possession or colony. So that was quite an experience to see the sights of Aden. Again we didn’t go ashore. We had lots going on with the latest coming on to the boat. That was a lot of fun. And of course we were entering in to the Red Sea then and that, was very, very hot because you had land on both sides port and starboard within view and it was very, very hot indeed. And it was so hot, that’s where I believe the expression ‘posh’ came from. In the Indian days when you were sailing, sailing as it was in those days. People going out to India had a saying you go out, say port side out and starboard side back so you had the best side of the ship to, to the cooler side of the ship both ways. And that’s, I believe the origin of the famous word POSH. Port Out, Starboard Home. Then we had the experience of the Suez Canal. We went ashore at [pause] not Suez. Yes. We went ashore at Suez for a little while and then we were told we were disembarking then and going to Cairo. We went to Cairo and in to Cairo we, again a big selection. A big centre. I forget what you would call them now. Like a demarcation where all categories of all types were all placed in there ready to be posted to various units and we found ourselves then posted to Palestine where I did my operational training and converted then on to Wellingtons. And that was an education because the Palestinians then were becoming very difficult. The, the, many of the Jewish refugees from, from Europe were wanting to settle in Palestine and there was lots of conflict going on at the time. And again they had two terrorist organisations. Oh dear, I did know the name of them. I can’t forget. I can’t remember the name now but they, they were, again we had to be wary because sometimes our lads could be treated, you know pretty roughly if if they got their hands on any of us. But at the same time the population as a whole again were very generous and it was really good. We had, I think seven weeks I think in an operational training where we were converting on to Wellingtons. That I would say was equally, as equally traumatic in training as operations because converting then from smaller aircraft where you had instructors converting on to, in this case the bomber aircraft, the Wellington, a much bigger aircraft where you initially had instructors and after that you were on your own. So then you were learning to fly under such conditions and it was tough and we lost a lot of members there. At one time we went through a period where we were having funeral parades almost every day and you were losing a lot of the lads you’d trained with just in operational training. We did have one incident. We were attacked by enemy and that was, we were on a navigational exercise up to the Lebanon from Palestine. Up in to the Lebanon and I was at the controls at the time because I was also training to be a co-pilot as well and flying along merrily there in the pitch black and suddenly found tracer fire coming from behind us over the wing. So I took the necessary evasive action and then nothing happened. He disappeared. We can only assume that he came from Crete which the Germans had occupied then and obviously realised that bomber crews were training there so they were having a go at some of us novices. But that was the only incident. Bombing exercises were a little more difficult. Our targets then were out in the desert at Jordan and funnily enough when you were flying over the desert we found navigation exercises over the Egyptian and desert in those days very, very difficult because you’d got no landmarks whatsoever and its sometimes difficult. And this time we were trying to find a target measuring something about twelve yards square in, in the desert is extremely difficult. But then we were using real bombs and in training in South Africa they were only eleven and a half pound practice bombs. Now, we were going on to much bigger ones. Two hundred and fifty pounders. One or two tricky incidents that we experienced. One, one was, we were flying at night over the Jordanian desert I think it was when suddenly there were navigation lights coming straight towards us and our pilot who was an Australian called Hack Butler instead of, as one should have when you meet aircraft coming towards you, you turn port to port. So when you see the red light which is a navigational light you turn to, you turn away. But this time our skipper decided to go underneath the approaching aircraft. He did a quick dive. And as he did a quick dive I left my seat which was in the dickie seat next to the pilot, banged my head on the roof. But then I immediately thought then that everything sort of leapt out of, I immediately thought in the back in the fuselage we had two one hundred pound magnesium photoflashes which when you press the bomb tit and your bombs went away the photoflash took a photograph of what you were doing and I immediately thought what would happen to these because these were only lying in the flare chute and gravitation was the only thing holding them there. So I immediately thought my God maybe these things have been pulled out. I, I’ve never moved so fast in all my life. There was no question of of, of fear whatsoever. It was just a reaction and I thought I’ve got to do this whatever the precaution I was going to take. It had to do it quick because we only had seconds. If the cable had pulled the detonator on these fuses we’d be blown out of the sky. And I went over the main, the Wellington had a main spar between the wings which cut across the fuselage and that was in a confined aircraft sometimes difficult to, to cross over. That’s where the navigator and wireless operator sat. I don’t remember clearing that at all. Went straight over it and there I found my two flash bombs had actually pulled out but, and I quickly rubbed my hands together unscrewing the detonator caps hoping it hadn’t been struck. And I was lucky. It was ok. I took the detonators out but that was a, that was a close call. I got marked in my logbook after that. The bombing leader marked me down as, “This man is very erratic in his behaviour. May improve on a squadron.” That was put in my logbook which I thought was quite funny. And another time we had the roof hatch flew open on us. It obviously hadn’t been connected properly. It flew open on us. So it was my job, I was standing on my seat with the wireless operator and navigator holding on to my belt while I pulled the doors and then closed them. So I was standing there with the top half of me sticking out of the fuselage. All down to, if you like inexperience. We were young lads training there. And how we joined together as as aircrews is rather interesting. Unlike the Americans where the Americans usually allocated who you flew with the Air Force adopted a voluntary basis and when we arrived at the transit place in Jerusalem when we first arrived in Palestine we were all, all together and you would meet in, in hallways for lectures and all sorts of things. So you were all mixing together and this was, you were given then the opportunity if you joined up with somebody else or you made pals with a navigator or an air gunner and you got on quite well together you asked, ‘Shall we fly together?’ And this was how the RAF then formed their crews together which was very good because it was, it was left to the human individual to pick. And we had quite a mixture. The pilot was Australian. My navigator was a very serious man called Geoff Partridge. He was from Cheltenham. Myself and my wireless operator were from Liverpool. Both from Liverpool. We were both Liverpudlians. And our tail gunner was a West Indian, Arthur Skerritt and he was quite a character. And from then on we were flying together. I suppose almost a year as a crew. And that is in itself is quite an experience. You fly together through all sorts of conditions as a crew. As a team if you like which your strongest member is your weakest link if you like and you come together as a family so that later on when you find yourself on operations, usually you kept silence unless there was anything needed, any need to talk because you were looking out for enemy aircraft all the time. You could tell by the inflection in a man’s voice, whoever it was talking, how he felt. And that, you didn’t want to let your comrades down. So this welded you together weak or strong. Whatever it was which you knew each other intimately by the sound of their voice, how they felt and what have you which counted for a lot when it came to operations later on. On completion of, of operational training we were sent back to Cairo, to Heliopolis again, to the transit camp and then from there on we were shipped this time as a crew by the old, the old faithful DC3 and we, they flew us to Foggia in southern Italy where we joined 205 Group RAF, and attached to the American 15th Air Force. And we then became part of what was known as the Mediterranean Allied Strategic Command which was broken up into three. You had a Strategic Command which we were attached to. The American 15th Air Force where we used to do the daylight bombing mostly and sorry, where the Americans would do their daylight bombing mostly. We would, most, most of our operations were night time operations but we worked together then for squadron for something like seven months I think, in which time I did thirty nine operations. But it was, it was again an experience. Typical of, of RAF or British if you like. We RAF members, we had ten squadrons all, well, eight squadrons. Two South African squadrons of the Royal Air Force and then they formed in different Wings. I was with 40 Squadron and 104 Squadron of 236 Wing. And there we operated on for the whole of the period that we were there. Very often the Americans were on the same airfield. They lived in a style of luxury that, yeah they flew, they had casualties, they did a marvellous job but their accommodation was far superior to ours, their food was far superior, in fact if I can remember, our food was mostly dehydrated and it was terrible stuff. Potatoes. Dehydrated potatoes was like rice pudding. Terrible. And I did the whole period, seven to nine months on the squadron I can’t remember getting an egg through our own people. I think later on I think a lot of it was going on the black market because the Italians were, were starving. They really were. So we, we used to scrimp and scrape. I remember Christmas time when we pooled together and I think we paid about seventy pounds for a pig. So we had roast pork for Christmas dinner. But we could trade with the Americans. The only thing Americans lacked was Scotch Whisky and aircrew, NCOs and officers got a spirit ration. So for a bottle of Scotch Whisky you’d get a jeep from the Americans. For a crate they’d give you an aircraft. But it was quite amusing but they had everything. We were under canvas, old torn shredded tents from the desert campaign which were alright in the Italian summer but in the Italian winter then of ’44 and ‘45 was dreadful. Feet, feet of snow all over the place and cold. We’d reached the stage we had no heating in the tents. We were make do and mend until eventually our group captain signalled headquarters and said, ‘If I don’t get heating for my aircrew and ground crew I can’t guarantee the efficiency of, of my Group.’ And we got, within twenty four hours we got Valor stoves. So they were there. Somebody had them somewhere. But a lot of it then was black market. You could get about seventy five pounds which in those days was a lot of money for a flying jacket off the Italians, you know. But you always had to watch who you were dealing with on the, on the black market because the RAF had special branch there amongst them and if you were caught trading any RAF stuff you were for it. But an interesting time as well as, as well as an experience time to be flying operations. When my, my first operation by the way was to the south of France. That was the invasion of southern France which was six weeks I think after D-Day. That was my first operation. Reasonably calm one. We saw a lot of our ships. Convoy of ships going in over sea. We had to make sure our IFF which was a signal you’d send from the aircraft automatically Identification Friend or Foe. If you didn’t have that switched on the Navy boys would open fire on you no trouble at all. They wouldn’t wait. But it was a fairly eventless operation. We succeeded in bombing the dock, the docks at Marseilles and then back. That was a very interesting operation. We were flying in to the sun so we were following the sun. Quite a strange experience. But my second operation was my real baptism of fire. In those days in Europe there were, the enemy were relying on, because Germany itself produced no fuel, only synthetic oil a lot of the oil was coming from the Caucasus in the Ukraine and the Ploieşti oil fields of Romania. Because of their value of course they were both very heavily defended. The Russian advance then which was beginning was retaking the Caucasus, so the Germans apart from odd satellite oil fields in the odd country here and there their biggest supply was the Ploieşti oilfields at Romania which were quite notorious. And the enemy we were told was relying on about sixty percent of its fuel oil and it was then at the stage where it was fighting for its existence. And the oil then was transposed from Romania which was very close to the Black Sea. So it was quite an operation, and also when you were getting briefed in Nissen huts which we had then, all assembled, all the air crews that were flying that day you were allocated a flight. You had A Flight, B Flight and you were told that morning which flight you was, on the flight board there whether you were operational that day, that night or not and you would assemble in a Nissen hut. In the Nissen hut everybody, all the aircrew all together all chatting away you know. All you could hear is gabble, gabble, gabble gabble but I’d never seen a Nissen hut go quiet so quickly as when the intelligence officer stands up and he says, ‘Good evening gentlemen. Your target for tonight is — ’ and he would tell you what the target was. When he mentioned Ploieşti the whole Nissen hut went dead quiet because we knew what the opposition was there. It was a, I don’t know something like maybe a six hundred mile flight there over enemy territory. Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania, heavily patrolled by night fighters and then also we were told that they had two elite squadrons. I believe they were Romanian squadrons but flying the famous 109, F109. The 109 was I think produced by Focke as well as, as the, other aircraft. I can’t think what the other manufacturer is now. If somebody, anyway, that’s beside the point two squadrons who would be over the target because they were, they were elite squadrons and they weren’t afraid of even though their own defensive fire was going up into the sky they weren’t afraid of flying in amongst the bombers. So, and plus the fact that the whole oil fields, the whole area was surrounded by very massive ack ack fire. I mean the famous JU88 anti-aircraft gun which was notorious on the German side plus many light ack ack all dug in in the hills. It was forming an umbrella if you like over the target. Really something to contend with and also they had masses of searchlights. Amongst the searchlights you had what we call, what were known as master searchlights which were a very intensive blue one and they were controlled by radar. So they would track you by radar and get you. And if you ever got one of these master searchlights on you then all the other searchlights would cone in and they would get you in a cone. And we used to say if you were caught in a cone it’s like walking down Piccadilly naked you know. And you really felt sometimes it was quite something to get out of. So we were always advised then never to fly straight and level for more than about twenty five seconds at a time because that’s how long it would take the enemy to track you, get a shell in their gun and get it to where you were supposed to be. So we were always, going in towards the target, lots of evasive action. You were looking out for night fighters as well, and a hell of a lot going on. So you’d not only be bounced around the sky by ack ack fire, you could even smell the cordite but you were also dodging and weaving the, the searchlights and everything and the sky was full of smoke. But also running up to the target you could see tracer fire both from the ground and from our own boys going in. First of all the Pathfinders ahead of us. They would be answering enemy fire with their own gunners. So, it was like, it was like a Dante’s Inferno ahead of you, you know. The, the target indicators. The Pathfinders used to drop red, no green I think in the first instance. No. They would like to light the place up with flares. Just fill the sky with flares lighting up. From the flares they themselves would hope to identify the target proper. And if so then they would drop green target indicators usually if they could in the form of a triangle. In the middle of that triangle was your target. If they found, the following Pathfinders found that they were spot on then they would drop red target indicators right on the target so we had three forms of target observation to bomb on. First of all the red indicators. If we saw those, if they were in place. Sometimes they weren’t. Green as a result if the red ones weren’t there. If they weren’t there then you bombed visual because you’d memorised from the photographs of the area. You’d memorised what your aiming point was. And that was the critical time when you were coming up to the target when you’d got no choice. You had to stay straight and level and that’s when you were holding your breath. And that’s when your training and your discipline comes in to being because as a bomb aimer I know my crew had fought hard to get me there, it’s now up to me to do the job properly. So they’re listening to my voice giving corrections, ‘Left. Left. Steady. Right. Steady.’ Correcting the pilot, trying to get my target in the tram lines, and, and keep it there and hope to God while you’re doing that you’ve got to stay in the air. One time we had, on the run in we had an aircraft, one of ours just disappeared in an orange flash. He’d obviously been, had a direct hit either in his bomb bay or fuel tanks and that was quite chilling when you saw that sort of thing happening. Also you see flaming aircraft going down around you. So it’s, it’s Dante’s Inferno. It really was something. And this was only my second operation. Anyway, we managed to, to, to get to the target ok, dodging all the flak. You could even smell the cordite as you were going through and I dropped my bombs. Just as I dropped my bombs a yell from the, from the, from the gunner saying there was a fighter coming in starboard quarter up because you divided your aircraft in to sections. And the air gunner would tell you then and also at the same time that he heard it the wireless operator was doing nothing because you had radio silence, so he’s standing in the astrodome also helping to look out for night fighters and he yelled another one coming in from starboard. So we had two fighters coming in on us. Now, the critical point here if you are a really good gunner. He’s well trained and keeps his cool he’s firing his machine guns by, he had a graticule of sights which are circles and if he identified the enemy aircraft that’s coming at him then he knows what type it is. He also knows what sort of armament it’s got and what range he’s likely to open fire, if your air gunner is right on the ball and I reckon our chap was. So he would say where the aircraft was coming in from. In this instance was coming in from starboard and the gunner had said his was coming in from starboard quarter up. So in other words coming in from the top. So this indicated when he, when he’d estimated that the enemy would open fire he would, first of all he would say, ‘Enemy fighter coming in. Starboard quarter up. Stand by.’ [pause] ‘Corkscrew starboard.’ So you always corkscrewed, which was an evasive action in the direction of the enemy fighter because that narrows the angle and, and it makes it more difficult for him to keep his, his sights on you. Also, he’s travelling faster than you are too. A lot faster. So, if your gunner’s got it right then he would shout, ‘Now.’ And immediately we had that, ‘now,’ then we would, up front we were waiting by. We had the warning from him telling us which way to start our corkscrew. As soon as he yelled, ‘now,’ that’s when we would start it, and when he estimated the enemy was going to open fire. And when he shouted, ‘now,’ in this instance we immediately started a climbing turn to, to port. We were going to starboard. We were going to starboard, the same side that he was approaching. We were also going up because he was approaching from up. So we were trying to make it as difficult as possible for him to maintain his sights on you. Yeah. Fighters coming in that way so you’re doing, you were starting your corkscrew there. And a corkscrew literally was you’re climbing, you’re diving, you’re climbing, you’re diving and you’re alternating all the time to try and make it as difficult as possible for the enemy to keep his sights on you. And that was quite important. Anyway, we managed to shake them both off. But as we were doing that, up front we saw our airspeed indicator was down to stalling speed as we thought. So we thought Christ we’re going to fall out the sky any minute. So immediately, do you remember we were talking about spinning, how to get out of a spin? We immediately thought we would get in to a stall here which would be bloody difficult with a big aircraft. So immediately we pushed the sticks forward to gain airspeed. It was only after a few seconds we realised we weren’t stalling at all we were actually diving because what happens is when you throw the, all your instruments on a Wellington are controlled by a gyro. When you’re throwing the aircraft around the sky these gyros get toppled and it takes about twenty minutes for your instruments to come back working. But then you are really flying by the seat of your pants. And so we found ourselves in a steep dive. We thought Christ, you know, the wings are going to come off. It took two of us on the controls to pull it back. And we could feel the aircraft juddering as we were pulling it out of the dive, and we finished up almost down in amongst the, all the derricks, and down in amongst all the flaming chaos. So we thought we’d survived the dive. We got out of it alright so we thought we’d stay low. Anyway, we’d already bombed our target, our bombs and we thought we were keeping low because night fighters don’t like fighting at low level at night so we stayed quite low level for, for quite a bit until we got well clear of the target area and then we resumed our cruising flight then to go home. But even then we still had two hundred, six hundred miles of, of control we were told by night fighters, about two hundred controlling the approaches to and from the target. So it was a very difficult target Ploieşti. And that was my second operation but it taught us an awful lot. We survived it but it taught us an awful lot and enabled us to get through thirty seven more.
[recording paused]
The rest of the tour, I completed thirty nine operations in all, the rest of the tour varied from bombing targets. Some of the targets we had on the squadron were mine laying along the Danube. They were quite dangerous ones because it was low level and if ever you were hit at those, those sort of heights you had no chance whatsoever of parachuting or even recovering. So they were very very difficult. We lost a few of our chaps on those low level mining of the Danube. We were occasionally, one time we were bombing tank works. I think it was in Austria. Herman Goering tank works in Austria. We were coming back from that one and we must have been hit in our port engine because we had a fire in the port engine and also we noticed we were losing fuel, and consequently we were finding it very difficult getting back home and maintaining height. So we had to break radio silence then because normally when you were well away from your target you would radio base to say that you were coming home and they were ready, preparing for you. In this instance we had to break radio silence and we told base that we wouldn’t make home. We’d lost an engine, had an engine on fire and that we were losing height. So they gave us an alternative which we had no idea where it was. Somewhere in the western part of Italy near the coast. But they were just, all we had were coordinates and we had a wonderful navigator. Our navigator, he was so good. He never liked flying. He used to lock himself away in his, in his navigation cupboard especially when we were over the target. He would lock himself away and keep quiet there and, but he was a super navigator. So much so we christened him Pigeon. He was like a homing pigeon. Very rarely would we have to change the, change the original navigational ports that he’d given us. He used to correct it now and again on the way. But this time we got these coordinates and as an alternative landing strip. We had no idea who it was. Where it was. We knew by the look of the, the coordinates it was somewhere near the front. The front line. So we just hoped to God we weren’t going to come down in enemy territory. Anyway, we managed to put the fire out on the aircraft and we were aiming for these coordinates. Pitch black night it was. Absolutely pitch black. We were losing, losing height and we were getting a little bit worried here you know. Nothing to see. We had no idea where we were, or the new direction we were heading and all these coordinates, and we were losing height and we were, eventually we got out about fifteen hundred feet and we thought we’re going to have to consider possibly ditching in the, in the sea just off the west coast of Italy. When we were thinking about this suddenly ahead of us came two lines of lights and they would be acetylene torches in those days. Many landing strips used these as, as marking our landing strip and we saw two of these. We thought thank God for that. We’re going to get down. Didn’t know whose airstrip it was. So, anyway normally when you’re going in to land if it’s an emergency you would fire off a red signal and hope to get a green one in reply. So we were going to, we were going in anyway because we were so, that we had no option. So we fired a red, a red flare to show that we were, that it was an urgent landing. We were coming in. Anyway, we managed to safely touch down, ran along the runway and just as we turned off the runway at the end our final engine because we only had two engines in the Wellington kicked off. That’s, so we had really come home on a wing and a prayer. But were we home? We didn’t know. We climbed down the ladder to get out of the aircraft. We saw two jeeps coming towards us with chaps in fatigues armed to the bloody teeth. So we got out and stuck our hands up in the air and said to the best of languages which is that we were allied airmen. Not a word was said to us. We were both, all pointed to go in to both of these jeeps. Couldn’t understand the language. It certainly wasn’t Italian. You know. We thought where the bloody hell are we? You know. It’s not German either. Anyway, we finished up in a Nissen hut two or three hundred yards away. When we went into the Nissen hut we were approached by a tall officer in, in battle fatigues but he also had wings up and he said in perfect English, he said, ‘Good evening gentlemen. We’ve been expecting you. Welcome to Brazil.’ We had landed unbeknownst at a Brazilian fighter bomber base which was part of course of the Tactical Strategic Command attached to, attached to the American Air Force. None of us knew at the time that Brazil was even in the war. Anyway, they gave us a wonderful time for about four days we were there. They sent for our own Maintenance Unit. They obviously told our squadron that we’d landed alright and we were safe and they sent their own Maintenance Unit to sort out our Wellington and get it, get it flying. We had a wonderful time while we were there. We realised that we were I think just north, just north I think of Rome or just south of Rome. We were close to Rome anyway so we hitchhiked in to Rome and that was the quite a, the first time I’d ever seen Rome. It was quite a colourful episode because there were troops and there were allied airmen, troops all over the place in different uniforms, and mostly armed to the teeth. But Rome was very peaceful because the Germans had pulled out of Rome and they’d left it an open city because it’s such a biblical and historical city they didn’t, they had that at least humanity about them. So that was quite enjoyable. Anyway, we eventually when we got to, our own unit had fixed our aircraft ready to go and the, the mess boys wouldn’t think of us settling our mess bill with them. We got that for free. So we thought, well right, this is a fighter bomber unit so let’s give them a fighter bomber take off. So we did, with our Wellington. As we got airborne although we didn’t, we didn’t pull back on the stick to get straight up we kept as low as we could and gave the boys a really, really fighter take off. They were all lining the airstrip waving us off. That was a fantastic time but then for us it was reality. We were then going back to, to our own bomber unit. Back into reality. Back in to, in to the war. So that was an exciting episode. Getting home on a wing and a prayer [laughs]. At the end of operations the group then was a mixture. 205 Group was a mixture of Wellingtons. We had ten squadrons of Wellingtons but also a mixture of Halifaxes and Liberators, American Liberators which the RAF were using then. We were converting on to those but because we had done at this stage done thirty nine operations, and it was decided it wasn’t worth, we were getting near the end of our tour anyway, it wasn’t worth bothering to, to transfer to a different type of bomber. So we were made tour expired which was quite a relief to be suddenly told, ‘Right. You’re finished chaps. You’ve done your operations now. You’re going back. Back home.’ Home to us then of course was Cairo. That was our base. So we went to Naples and waited a few days in Naples. That was a sad sight to see. Most of the Italians there were starving, and particularly outside the billets where we had women breast feeding their children you know as obviously to, it was a show of give us some, give us some food whatsoever. Which was pathetic to see. It really was sad. So we did. We gave them what we could in the way of food, chocolate bars and stuff like that. Cigarettes. Anything they would treasure because they had nothing. All the industries and everything had been ruined with the fighting in Italy and they really, the only thing they had was their vino which was a vermouth I think. But even then I think that was, that was, had been tampered with and had stuff added to it to improve its quantity and we were coming out in all sorts of sores and what have you and so, but it was a sorry sight to see. We waited there for a while and then again we were flown back to Cairo by DC3, and we didn’t [pause] Yes. We went to Cairo but then I was posted to a permanent, which was then a peacetime RAF station at Alexandria. And by then I’d been commissioned. On my latter weeks on the squadron I’d been commissioned. And when they have a mess do in, in the officer’s mess in an RAF squadron it’s the duty of the sprog officer as we called them, the junior officer, to toast the king. And I was given my job. I was a brand new officer. I was as nervous as bloody hell. And that’s when you have to, you know pass the port if I remember rightly from right to left. Pass the port to the table and then the sprog officer stands up and says, ‘Gentlemen, I give you the toast. The King.’ And that was quite an experience. Then I was posted to a telecommunications unit because I’d had some experience in my early youth in telecommunications and it was there that I, we had a lot of WAAFs there at the time and that’s where I met my first wife. Patricia. And she was from American parentage and born and bred in Kenya. And we started going out together and funnily enough it was strange when you look back on it but understandable to a degree. When, when the chaps were out in Cairo just enjoying themselves for the evening out and that sort of thing a lot of the girlfriends were WAAFs quite naturally. But when you came back in to, to the, it was a big unit in Heliopolis, when you came back in there there was nowhere to say goodnight. So, what the RAF would kindly do they set up a big marquee near the guard room when you went in the entrance. There was this big marquee so when you wanted to say, say goodnight you went in to the marquee which was pitch black. No lights whatsoever so you knew there were other couples in there with you and that’s where the good night cuddles went on you know. That was quite funny. And eventually we became quite serious and I started to hear in the end a lot about East Africa. And then eventually I worked at a telecoms unit and then I did some work on [pause] a lot of the Japanese prison camps had been taken over and internment camps. So all these people were coming back from the Far East and many of them were in a sorry state. In a sorry state, having been, some of them had spent four or five years in prison camps, and they were in a dreadful state. Some of them even had their hands grafted together. They’d been caught stealing. Their hands had been skinned and been sealed together. So there was a big, it was political how these people were treated by, by the forces so they set up in a place called Adabiya which is at the base of the Suez Canal. A big Reception Centre for all these people coming back. And they had all the forces represented there and this was a big field which had hangars and everything there. So they had welfare organisations. The British Red Cross was there. I had, I was posted there as RAF liaison officer to work with the, with the British Red Cross and to represent the RAF victims coming back who were captured. And also to, I had six padres under my control as well. That was an education. We all had, we were billeted in a place called Adabiya which is just south of the Suez Canal. That was an eye opener to see all these religious leaders. And one in particular I can always remember. The Methodist, the Methodists even today probably, they preach non-alcohol. I’m not sure whether that’s true but this character was was a Methodist and he was the biggest drinker of the lot. Our pantry in these digs was full of empty bottles of liquor. They were a boozy crowd. They really were. All six padres. And I tackled this, this Methodist and I said, ‘What about this? I thought your sect, particular sect preached non-indulgence.’ He said, ‘Yeah, that’s true Harry,’ he said, ‘But while I’m here I’m away from my parish,’ he said, ‘So I’m taking advantage of it.’ And I mean it was quite amusing to work with these characters. And I had a launch at my disposal, so that I could go out with all these ships. Any ship that was available because we’d lost so many ships during the Atlantic war and the Pacific for that matter they were using any ship that was available to bring these people back. Forces and civilians. And as I say many of them were in a sorry state. Some of them particularly the men had married all sorts of creatures when they came, and they were on the loose more or less in India waiting to be shipped back and they were meeting all sorts of some of them were very unsavoury characters and [unclear] And it was, and it was sad to see so we had the job, I particularly had the job of going on board these different aircraft from Naval aircraft carriers to the Mauritania which was then a passenger liner. All sorts of ships coming in. It was good in many degrees because you went on board especially Naval ships they had good food on Naval ships. And that was the first time I came in contact with the old Jacobs biscuits again. Things we hadn’t seen during the war. But that was education. I worked a lot with the Red Cross. I got one or two commendations from the major general which I was quite proud of at the end. The work I’d done with the Red Cross. And I was given a Humber Super Snipe actually that came out from the desert. One of these abandoned sort of surplus aircraft, cars at the end of the war. I had one of these at my disposal so I used to run around a lot of people. And then you brought these people ashore off the, off the boats and into this big area that had warehouses and you had entertainment. Mainly it was to clothe them because they were coming back in rags. It was to clothe them for the coming cold weather in Europe and the UK. So we were kitting them out with, with clothes and giving them decent meals and giving them entertainment as well at the same time. So it was quite an organisation. Mainly political. It was, you know who was going to get in government at home, so nothing was spared. Everything was, was there for the benefit, quite rightly, for the benefit of these people. And that was an interesting people. When I finished that job I was in, I took on the job of Canal welfare. I was given the job of the RAF welfare officer of the Canal Zone. Again, that was an education crossing the, we had a, I think there was a Swimming Club actually on the Canal itself and you had to be very careful there with ships coming down. I can remember one, one day swimming in this place. Trying to swim across the Canal. It was only about, I believe ninety nine yards wide and three or four of us were out swimming in the Canal one day when a tanker, a tanker came down and it was loaded and being loaded it was heavy in the water and the water either side of the tanker went in towards the tanker. And as this tanker was going by we found ourselves being drawn towards the tanker swimming like hell. No matter how hard you were swimming you weren’t moving. You were standing still. But if you swam like hell because in fear of being drawn in to, in to the ships. So odd little experiences like that along the, along the Canal Zone going to, from there to Cairo one day across the desert which was about a hundred miles. And I had this lovely Humber which was a powerful station wagon then, and a very narrow tarmac road across the desert. I’m going across this road like hell and it was used by oil tankers a lot as well and I hit an oil patch and I did then what we, what we used to call a ground loop. My car started spinning around, shot off the road in to the sand and as soon as it hit the sand of course it did stop but I was thrown straight out of the cab, into the sand. That was quite an experience going there. But I did that trip often between the Suez and Cairo until eventually I was shipped home. When I eventually again because they were short of transport it took a long time. It was 1946 by the time that I was given transport and that only took us as far as Marseilles, south of France and then we went by train across France and, and that was an experience, crossing from Calais to Dover. To see those white cliffs again and see the UK after I’d been away four years then I suppose and that was a lovely sight to see the white cliffs of Dover again. And then later on I was demobbed and was settling back with my parents in Liverpool when Patricia in the WAAFs followed me to the UK and I met her in Merseyside and she stayed with us for a while and then we got married. And that was in 19 — we were married in 1947 I think it was. And it was a little while after that she wanted to visit her parents again so we went out. I’d never met the family, so we went out and in those days because there was still a shortage of shipping it was very very difficult. So you had to, to get a ship to Mombasa. You had to sign on that you would agree to carry what they called passenger transport which were virtually like troop ships. Troop ships. You didn’t have the luxury of a cabin to yourself so men and women, married or not were all divided. So the men slept together, women slept together, and then you came together at mealtimes which was quite an experience. But to go back through the Med again it was, you know renewing old territories. Down the Suez Canal again. Down the Red Sea and along the Indian ocean and back to the port of Mombasa which I had come in to I think four years or whatever it was previous to that and wondered what was ashore. This time I was going to find out what was ashore, and eventually we disembarked there. It was a pretty eventful trip out there. It was, it was a bit rough still because it was only shortly after the war. Everything was still shortage. Rationing. Accommodation as I said. We were separated. But eventually we arrived at Mombasa, went ashore and that was an experience then when I first joined the East African Railways to go up to Nairobi. That was an education. The first time I’d been on an African train, a Colonial train as it was in those days where you had sleeping accommodation and we had, they had for couples they had what they called [coupes] which was a cabin for two which you converted your seat in to a bunk bed because it was a long trip up to Nairobi so you hired bedding, and there you had a little toilet and shower room off your cabin. And that was an experience travelling across the bush into Africa, I hadn’t seen it before and travelling through the bush country of Africa gradually going up to Nairobi which is then at an altitude of five and a half thousand feet which was quite something. Altitude up to, other than flying we’d not been used to living at. So that took you quite a while to acclimatise. But then after, I think we were about ten hours, I think on board the train stopping various places. Every time we stopped of course we had the locals coming along with whatever produce they had. So they’re trying to sell you their produce through the open windows of the train and that was really experience Africa truly. East Africa. Wildest Africa if you like. Apart from the civilised part of South Africa which I’d trained in seeing that for the first time quite an education. Seeing the wildlife, wild animals from the train which you could see elephants and all those sort of things. Zebra all wandering around the bush. Quite an education. Until eventually arrived in Nairobi and I was a bit nervous because I was meeting the family for the first time. They were all there. My mother in law, her sister in law, brother in law, and one or two of the cousins. And the trains in there, the East African Trains the doors opened inwards, whereas here on British trains the doors opened outwards. So when we arrived there we got the window down, there’s the family all standing on the platform waiting to see what this new son in law was going to be like and I’m trying to open the door, pushing out and it won’t go and I’m kicking it like mad, you know. And then suddenly, I think it must have been my mother in law she reached forward and opened the door. Immediately I’m down to size straightaway. I felt a right clown having tried to kick this door open and it opened the wrong way. So that was, that was my experience of meeting my in-laws. We then went to the famous New Stanley Hotel in Nairobi which in itself was quite a place in those Colonial days. It was a very well-known hotel. It had a long bar which then was the, reckoned to be the longest bar in the world, and, but it was also a meeting place for people from all the world. Especially people coming out then to see East Africa because East Africa was then opening up many ways. It was developing after the war. Lots of things were going on and the hunting profession was coming in. They were making films and so all and everybody would all congregate at this New Stanley hotel. So that’s where I spent my first couple of nights there. And that was quite an education because on the outside, on the pavement the first, again the first time we had experienced pavement sort of dining. They had a place, it was christened the Thorn Tree because there was one. One tree in the, in the pavement. Big patio style pavement out at the front of the hotel and that’s where everybody sat. If you ever wanted to meet anybody in Nairobi that’s where you met. And now the period that I was there, not so much in the early stages, later on back in Nairobi I met many film stars in those days because they were doing lots of films then and I met people like William Holden, Deborah Kerr, Sydney Poitier, one or two British stars. Oh dear. One chap born in, born in, in Ditchling down the road here. But it was interesting meeting lots of those people. Later on of course when I went in to the safari business, I worked for Bill Holden who then was part owner of a safari club called the Mount Kenya Safari Club and he was quite a character to work for. But it was an adventure to me. And then a couple of days there and I’d got into, the family had got me out to Tanzania as they were living in Tanzania then because they had a ferry business there on Lake Victoria. And it was a ferry across the five mile mouth of the Mara River which transported passengers and vehicles from the south side to Tanzania to the north side which was a five mile crossing and eventually on the road to Kenya and so I had a work permit to run this ferry. I’d never been, I’d never operated a ferry in my life before. My sailing knowledge was nil but I learned very quickly and that was the very first time when we flew from Nairobi. Flew in a DH Rapide, a De Havilland Rapide and that was quite a, that was about a three hour flight. That was very interesting, and our flight didn’t know it at the time but we crossed over what is now known as the Serengeti National Reserve where the great migration takes place. Nothing was known about the migration in those days. A few scientists knew about it but my first experience of seeing that was seeing a line of buffalo that must have stretched from where we were seeing up in the air every, every bit of close on a hundred miles and something like a hundred yards to a quarter of a mile wide. Quite a sight to see. Never realised what I was witnessing but that was my first sight of the famous Mara migration which has often been on television ever since. And that was my first experience of wildlife. But then I was given command of this ferry crossing which we later, as a family bought, a lot of war surplus was going then and the ferry was being operated by an American motor launch dual multi-hulled motor launch called the Grey Goose and that used to tow pontoons. So it was on the pontoons that we carried these people and vehicles and then this war surplus auction came up in Mombasa and one of them was a Canadian built landing craft and it was a twenty five ton landing craft. So my mother in law, she was a widow at the time she put in a bid for this and her bid which was two hundred and fifty pounds which was a fair amount of money in those days. Nowadays nothing. We got this twenty five ton landing craft that had never been used, still in its packing cases, all packing case plus two beautiful big Gray Marine engines which in themselves were quite worth a fortune. And we got these in I think the total consignment was about seventeen cases which we had a thousand miles to ship to where we were on the shores of Lake Victoria. And we eventually, we shipped it together and started building it together. We had no facilities whatsoever. The only thing we did have, my mother in law then she was a widow and she had a boyfriend who was ex-REME, British Army REME and he’d got his, taken his demobilisation out in Kenya, in East Africa and he set up a business out there. A garage because he was a REME engineer. So he was very useful. So we got together and, and contrived, we built ourselves a rampway. We managed to get our hands on some old railway sleeper lines, some old sleepers, and we built ourselves a ramp so that we could launch this thing. We started to build it and everybody said this thing’s, as I say its twenty five ton and they said the local Europeans, about a hundred Europeans in this place, a doctor, a few hospital staff, district commissioner, my parents, my wife’s family only a handful of Europeans there they all said, ‘You’ll never get this thing launched.’ We did. We built it. We pushed it. We hired three hundred convicts from a local prison and we pushed this thing into the water and I operated that for a whole year and that was quite an experience. And also my first experience of hippopotamus which used to be roaming the garden at night because our house and plot was right down to the lakeshore. So we used to get those wandering around the garden at night. You had to be very careful. And during the day you always had to watch for crocodiles swimming as well, because just along the side my mother in law’s plot of land was a pathway down to the water where the local native women used to go and do their washing. That was of course a magnet for the crocodiles. The crocodiles were often lying off shore. We had one or two episodes with those over the period I was there, but on the whole it was quite, it was my experience of East Africa. I used to go with my brother in law who was then a teenager still at school. His family had been in the hunting profession. His father and his uncles, father and grandfather had all been professional hunters in those days which was the thing if you wanted a guide to take you around the country you hired one of these people. They were not only, many people think afterwards that a professional hunter was a killer of wildlife. He wasn’t. In a way he was an honorary warden so he was a conversationist. Yes, his job would be to guide people out into the country particularly Americans used to come wanting to hunt for trophies but he himself did very little shooting. He would back up his client if his client got in to danger at any time but he was a very knowledgeable man. He knew the country, he knew the language, knew the natives, knew the wildlife which was very important. So, I found myself being introduced in to this atmosphere and that’s when I did my first big game hunting which was exciting but eventually it didn’t appeal to me at all. I went over to eventually after a lot of experience I became a professional guide but mostly photographic. I carried a rifle many times, yes. But always and especially running the camp that I pointed out to you early on. I ran that for three years taking people out on photographic safaris, and again being fortunate enough to meet all sorts of people and it was my first contact with royalty. With Prince Michael and his mother Princess Marina. But that’s another story.
Dublin Core
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Interview with Harry Hacker
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Denise Boneham
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IBCC Digital Archive
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2018-08-19
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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
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AHackerHA170819
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Pending review
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01:42:46 audio recording
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eng
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Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Description
An account of the resource
Harry Hacker first came into contact with aeroplanes at the age of sixteen whilst working as an apprentice for Rootes Motor Group who were making Wellington aircraft. He was a member of the Home Guard and after applying to join the RAF went for basic training in London. He was however selected to become a bomb aimer and was posted to South Africa for training. He was posted to Palestine via Cairo where he joined his crew and began training on Wellingtons. After completing training he and his crew were posted to Italy and joined 40 Squadron attached to the American 15th Airforce. His first operation was to bomb the docks at Marseilles and his second to bomb Romanian oilfields. When he had completed his tour of operations he became a liaison with the Red Cross helping with the repatriation of prisoners from the Japanese camps.
Contributor
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Julie Williams
Spatial Coverage
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Egypt
France
Great Britain
Italy
Kenya
Romania
South Africa
North Africa
Egypt--Cairo
Egypt--Suez Canal
England--London
France--Marseille
Kenya--Mombasa
Temporal Coverage
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1943
1944
1945
40 Squadron
aircrew
bomb aimer
bombing
Nissen hut
Red Cross
searchlight
Tiger Moth
training
Wellington
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1401/27272/BMooreDMooreDv1.1.pdf
6f33157a0b1575c878747146f837b62b
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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Moore, Dennis
D Moore
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
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2015-05-06
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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Moore, D
Description
An account of the resource
37 items and two albums.
The collection concerns (1923 - 2010, 1603117, 153623 Royal Air Force) and contains his log books, documents, photographs and two albums. He flew operations as a navigator with 218 and 15 Squadrons.
Album one contains photographs of his family and his training in Canada.
Album Two contains photographs of his service in the Far East.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Terrence D Moore and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Transcribed document
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Transcription
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Dennis Moore
28.06.1923 – 30.10.2010
[photograph]
Autobiographical notes
DM Memoirs (Second Edition)
Compiled and edited by Terry D Moore
[censored lines]
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Foreward
In late 1991, following the end of the Cold War and the cessation of hostilities in Iraq. the Government's "Options for Change" defence review led to the disbandment of several RAF squadrons, one of which was XV Squadron which had played a significant role in the first Gulf War. As a former member of this squadron, in which he flew as a Lancaster Navigator during the Second World War, my father was invited to attend the disbandment ceremony in Laarbruch, Germany, and I had the privilege of accompanying him as his guest.
Although he continued to serve in the RAF until 1964, Dad had never talked about his wartime experiences but, during the long car journey to and from Germany, all that changed – the memories flooded back as though it were yesterday. The stories became very familiar to me as they were regularly recounted at the many air-shows and Squadron Reunions we attended over almost two decades
Sadly, he did not live to celebrate his birthday on 28th June 2012, the day on which Queen Elizabeth II unveiled the long overdue Bomber Command Memorial in London's Green Park. However, my wife Penny and I proudly attended as his representatives
[photograph]
The ceremony, honouring the 55,730 airmen who lost their lives during the Second World War, was attended by more than 5,000 second world war veterans and it brought to mind the last words of the Antarctic explorer, Captain R.F. Scott: "had we survived I would have had a take to tell . . . . . . ." Well he did survive – a thirty-three sortie tour with Bomber Command, and his tales are told in the form of these "Autobiographical Notes" which he compiled following our trip to Germany in 1991.
I spent many hours editing his notes, which I illustrated with photographs from his albums and, thankfully, was able to get his seal of approval before he died. Since then I have added more photos and later material which I found in his papers. I am certain that he would have approved.
[photograph]
Terry Moore, July 2012
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[photograph]
"60 years on" – with PA474 at RAF Lossiemouth, May 2005
[photograph]
Pam and me at XV Squadron "90th Birthday" reunion, Lossiemouth
4
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Dennis Moore
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
1923 – 1939
I was born at 98 Camden Crescent, Chadwell Heath, Essex on 28th June 1923. The youngest child of Thomas and Mary Moore 1, brother to Thomas (Owen) 2 and sister Joyce 3.
About 1926/7 the family moved to 150 Croydon Road, Beddington, Surrey.
My education began at Bandon Hill School, Wallington.
At the age of 7 I fell ill with infantile paralysis (Polio). I was taken to St. Thomas's Hospital in London where I spent nearly 3 months. I was immobilised in a body splint but do not remember much about the treatment except having pins stuck in the soles of my feet periodically (mostly in middle of night!). Apparently I was very lucky to have been diagnosed so quickly and affected in whole body rather than in particular limbs. I only remember there being some form of epidemic in the ward and visitors were not allowed for three weeks or so. The doctor promised me 5 shillings (a lot of money for an eight year old in those days) if I could walk unaided from the end of my bed to the end of the bed opposite by the time my parents were allowed back in. He had to pay up! All together I was off school for nearly a year. I started back in a wheel chair but soon discarded it!
In 1934 I got a place at Wallington County School for Boys. I was not very good at school but just about managed to keep up, though mostly somewhere near the bottom of the form! I only once ever obtained good results in exams when I managed to come [italics] first [/italics] in a science exam, and that was only because, by chance, I had swotted up the night before on all the right things!
I joined the school Scouts (9th Wallington {County School} Troop) and did quite well. Our Scout Master, A. D. Prince, was the school science master. I became Patrol Leader of the 'Owls' and eventually obtained the King's Scout badge and the 'Bushman's Thong'. Nearly every holiday was spent camping or 'Trekking'. In 1937 I attended the Scout Jamboree at Zandfoort in Holland (pictures in green photo album). None of us liked the very militant contingent from Germany who threw their weight about at all the 'get-togethers'.
[photograph]
Joyce, Dad, Mum and me
I represented the Scouts at swimming and the school 2nd XV at Rugby. All my spare time was taken up with tennis at Beddington House Lawn Tennis Club, playing and helping to maintain the tennis courts.
My swimming ability arose from the Polio recovery therapy. Long daily sessions were spent in the hospital pool and then in the local swimming baths in Croydon.
Our house was quite close to Croydon Airport and two of my friends lived actually overlooking the airfield. We could recognise all of the airlines and aircraft that we saw landing and taking off each day. This aroused my life long interest in flying.
1 Thomas Henry Moore (1892-1967), Mary (née Tait) (1893-1984)
2 Thomas Owen (b. 3 October 1917, d. 2 November 2010)
3 Joyce (b. 11 July 1919, d. 16 May 2012)
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1939
Mid-June – our summer holiday at The Hartland Hotel, Hartland Point, Devon was delayed so that I could take the last exam of Matriculation (Economics) but I did so badly that we need not have wasted the extra day. I left school at the beginning of July, aged 16
War started on 3rd September and we listened to the radio broadcast by Neville Chamberlain, which was immediately followed by the Air Raid warning and all of us really though that we were about to be annihilated.
I started work at 'CUACO' (Commercial Union Assurance (Marine Department)) in Lime Street, London. Starting Pay was 21 shillings & sixpence (£1.12 1/2) per week and a railway season ticket cost 13 shillings (60p) per month. My boss was called Godin. I spent most of the time making onionskin copies of documents – before the days of photocopiers! The Underwriters were almost like gods and had to be treated as such. The firm had a lunch club in Ropemaker Street (near Moorgate Tube Station). It was a very old and decrepit building and we had one of the top floors, which could only be reached by very rickety stairs. It was well worth the 10-15 minute walk to get there, through the many alleyways and quick-cuts through other buildings, as the meal was free!!! Later, this building was destroyed by bombing and the Barbican now stands on the site.
I joined the AFS (Auxiliary Fire Service) as a Messenger.
1940
Joined the CUACO Tennis club. Played on the sports ground in the Sidcup area. In late summer I witnessed the bombings in the surrounding area.
The evacuation of Allied Forces from Dunkirk, following the German advance through Belgium, Holland and France, took place at the end of May and was completed around 3rd June. I had holiday from work a few days later and went on a cycle tour of Devon. I caught the train to Exeter, then cycled & stayed at YHA's from there. I passed many camps of army people who had just got back. They were not allowed to send mail without it being censored, so I acted as 'Mail Boy' for many of them who called me over from inside the fence. One of the hostels I stayed at was at Waters Meet (now a National Trust site) and the Warden and I were the only two people there. He took me into Lynton (or perhaps Lynmouth) and introduced me to real cider. It did not take much of this to wake up next morning with a very thick head! However, a long hike up the river soon altered that. At Salcombe, I managed to hire a motor boat (dinghy) and could not understand why the chap who hired it to me insisted that there was a full tank of petrol. I now imagine he must have thought that I was going into the Channel to pick up more 'Dunkirk Survivors' – I must have been very naive at the time!!
The 'Battle of Britain' started in earnest about 12th August. I had been playing tennis at Sidcup when the first bombing of airfields started. On the 15th (or possibly the 18th), I was in the garden at 150 Croydon Road Beddington when aircraft flew over with bombs dropping from them aimed towards Croydon aerodrome. The following day I was called to the Bourjois factory with the AFS to try and get underneath some girders to see if anyone was trapped. A few days later, Dad took us all to live with the Robsons in Charlton Cottage, Copperkins Lane, Amersham, which they rented for a short while. I joined the local Scout Troop (1st Chesham Bois) and met the King family. After short time, by general consent, I was made Troop Leader.
I travelled up to London daily by train with George King & his brother. On one occasion, after a very heavy night raid, it took two hours to walk from Paddington to Lime Street through the devastated city. I camped out at weekends at Chalfont Heights and Great Hampden.
The Blitz was at its height during this period and London and the surrounding area were seemingly bombed every night.
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1941
Early in year the folks moved back to Beddington but I stayed on and lived with one of the King family at 'Rose Cottage' in Chesham Bois. I visited Len Reynolds (see Gunboat 658) who worked for Sun Insurance and had been evacuated to Wrest Park, Silsoe, Beds. I cycled from Amersham via Luton and was chased by a dog for a long way up the A6. Recent visits to Wrest Park are somewhat nostalgic.
24th April 1941, on leaving Chesham Bois, I was presented with a Photo Album by George King and members of 1st Chesham Bois Scout Troop.
[photograph]
Len Reynolds and myself in uniform
Changed jobs soon after a devasting German bombing raid on London on 10th May and started with Gold Exploration & Finance Company of Australia, which had been evacuated to Sandroyd School, Oxshott. The first few days were spent in the old office in Basinghall Street helping to move files and papers from the partially bombed building. During the week I lived at Sandroyd (in a small house called Kittermasters) and cycled home to Beddington at weekends. By the end of the summer the Blitz had more or less finished but a German bomber (or parts of it!) crashed in the grounds of Sandroyd one evening while we were out drinking in a local pub!
Volunteered for RAF and attended the selection centre at Oxford University (not sure which college – visits in recent years in no way help me to recognise anything about it). Had a long session with medics to decide if my previous infantile paralysis (Polio) would allow me to be considered for Aircrew. After an interview with four Senior Officers, it was decided that I had passed 'A1' and was 'sworn-in' for deferred service. My actual service in the RAF counted from then. Mum was very upset when I informed her as she was convinced that I would be unfit for any service in the Forces due to my previous medical history and Dad was upset that I had volunteered for the [underlined] RAF [/underlined] because he had already booked me as a nautical apprentice with a post on the Prince Line vessel "Black Prince". I had actually done myself a great favour as the ship was sunk quite early on with the loss of all the crew!
Took part in amateur dramatics at Sandroyd together with others from English, Scottish & Australian Bank (ES&A). Performed in Xmas panto as a character in sketches of the Weston Brothers type. They were very popular Radio characters of the time.
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1942
Early spring, I was called up as U/T Aircrew and reported to Aircrew Receiving Centre (ACRC) at Lords cricket ground and billeted in "Viceroy Court" (one of numerous apartment blocks in Regents Park area). During the first week or so we were kitted out, received inoculations, vaccinations, took night vision tests and attended numerous lectures in various part of the cricket ground. Many of the staff were well known cricketers of the day. Spent about eight or nine weeks here with some odd short periods of leave (weekend passes) so I was able to get home quite easily.
[photograph]
At home in the garden 150 Croydon Rd, Beddington
Posted to RAF Bridgenorth & RAF Ludlow where I helped to build the camps. We lived in tents and were treated like 'dirt'. Most of the time was devoted to learning how to 'skive-off' each evening and get back into camp without being caught! Ludlow was famous for the large number of pubs and we took advantage of this to avoid being seen by the SPs (RAF Police). Fortunately, both postings were quite short lived.
Summer was spent at Initial Training Wing (ITW) Newquay. Billeted in the "Penolver Hotel" on the seafront. I seem to remember it being next door to the "Beresford" (pictures in album). Our Sergeant, called Sgt. Hannah, was very strict but fair and we got on well with him. In the photos I recall many of the faces but I cannot put names to any of them. A certain teaspoon, still in use, came from a little cafe where we had our brief coffee breaks! A glorious summer – spent much time on the beach and in the sea, as well as clay pigeon shooting on the cliffs.
Since I had elected not go to pilot basic training selection but [italics] to train as a navigator [/italics], I remained at Newquay with 2 others while the rest of the course did their 'Tiger Moth' time. We met up again at Heaton Park, Manchester after they had finished their pilot checkouts. Had a miserable time hanging about waiting for next posting. Billeted in a filthy boarding house with a scruffy landlady and every one of the NCOs seemed to make life difficult.
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1943
Early in the year I finally got a posting to Empire Air Training in Canada. We entrained to Greenock (Glasgow) and boarded the Troop ship [italics] Empress of Scotland [/italics].
[photograph]
RMS Empress of Scotland (formerly Empress of Japan)
Hundreds of us were bundled together in tiers of bunks in makeshift accommodation on the port side, fairly well forward on the boat deck. It was a blessing being able to get out into the open quickly as some of the others were down below, almost in the bilges. We spent hours queuing for food but it passed the time quickly. We sailed on our own and had numerous alerts but nothing was seen or heard. Eventually we docked in New York, although we all thought we were going to [underlined] [italics] Halifax! [/italics] [/underlined]
By train up to No. 31 Personnel Depot Moncton (New Brunswick), stopping for nearly a day in sidings in Portland (Maine). People were very hospitable and made us meals and food for the rest of the journey.
It was freezing cold in Moncton but the huts were very warm and I remember barrels of apples at the end of each hut, which were always kept topped up with crisp, juicy, sweet red apples. Although well below zero outside, we never seemed to feel the cold. Time-off was spent in the town of Moncton, mostly in Macdonald's(?) drug store, eating very cheap T-bone steaks and drinking pints of milk. No shortage of food made it a regular paradise after rationing. We also spent hours ten-pin bowling, both in Moncton and in the alley back at camp.
I cannot remember what we did on duty, but do remember coming into contact with a Welsh corporal by the name of Gee who was the most obnoxious individual I have ever come across and who made our life a misery. It was a relief to join the epidemic of Scarlet Fever that swept through the camp. I was quite ill but lucky to find that one of the doctors was the husband of one of the girls that I had worked with at Sandroyd. He helped me when I was fit enough for convalescent leave by suggesting that I didn't go on my own to Montreal but to stay with one of the local families who took in Service people and looked after them. He introduced me to a couple called Tait who lived in Shediac, a place some 50 miles away, near or at the coast. They seemed to like me and 2 days later arrived back to take me home with them. They already had a number of Australian 'Tour Ex' aircrew staying with them, a couple of whom were in a very bad state and were being sent home by way of Canada and America.
[photograph]
The Tait residence was a huge detached property and they had a lovely red setter dog called Terry who took an immediate fancy to me for some reason and was my constant companion for the rest of my stay with them.
The Taits cosseted me right from the start and were most intrigued to find that Mum's maiden name was the same as theirs. They were most concerned when they saw my patched pyjamas and other clothes and really didn't understand when I told them about
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clothes rationing and all the other shortages. They immediately took me shopping to buy a whole set of new clothes and underclothes. Early in my stay they asked if I had ever had oysters and when I said no they immediately took me to a place called Pointe du Cheyne(?), which was 75 miles away up the coast, for an evening meal out. The place specialised in fried oysters and I had a whole plateful of them. They were marvellous and the taste still lingers on even though I have never had them again since. They seemed to think nothing of a 75-mile drive each way just for a meal out. I was introduced to all the inhabitants of Shediac – or so it seemed – and during my stay with them took me all over New Brunswick, visiting all the towns and villages and spent a day in Fredrickton visiting various relatives at the University.
It was a terrible break to have to leave them and get back to real life. One thing however was somewhat sobering and that was the discussions I had with the Australians before they left. I learnt from them what it was really going to be like to go on Bomber operations once training was finished.
Almost as soon as I reported back to camp in Moncton I was posted to No 1 Central Navigation School – Rivers Manitoba. The trip was a 3-day ride on the train and that in itself was a fascinating experience. Eventually I arrived at the town of Brandon after a short stop off in Winnipeg.
No. 76A Navigation Course began almost as soon as I had arrived and lasted from 17th May 1943 to 1st October 1943. After nearly a month of groundwork, I had my first flight in an aeroplane on 5th June 1943. I spent 3 hours 10 minutes in Anson 6882 flown by P/O Davey. [underlined] [italics] I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. [/italics] [/underlined]
[photograph]
76A Navigation Course 17th May – 1st October 1943,
No. 1 Central Navigation School, Rivers Manitoba, Canada
The others on the course were an amazingly good bunch and a number of us used to work and play together in almost perfect harmony. Only three pupils were 'scrubbed', for various reasons, during the course and the list of those completing the course is in my green photo album. Seven of us formed a small group.
Paul Bailey
Ken Waine
Joe Meadows
Doug Holt
Rick Richardson
Don Finlayson
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We were given regular 48-hour passes and the 75 miles on the train to Winnipeg was quite an easy journey. At Eatons, the major department store, we were able to arrange to stay with local people. Nearly all my visits were to a family living in Assiniboine Drive but quite early on Don Finlayson discovered that he had a relation in Winnipeg that he had never heard of before and we spent most of the time at his place, only going back to the others to sleep. I do not remember the name of the people I used to stay with, although I have a vague recollection that their name might be Oliver.
Finlayson's relatives had a youngish daughter and before long all seven of us paired up with other girls. As can be seen from the photo album we enjoyed many happy hours in the Cave Supper Club and danced to the music of Marsh Phimister (Marsh was still around in 1979 when we returned to Winnipeg to visit my cousin Tom Moore4 & his wife Marg!).
THE CAVE SUPPER CLUB
[photograph]
Date SEP 15 1948 No. 9 GIBSON
On one 48-hour pass I travelled to Toronto (or Montreal, I can't remember which) to meet my cousin Tom, whom I had never met before, but still managed to find him amongst the crowds on the Mainline Station. He took me to Hamilton Ontario were [sic] he was billeted. I think we also went to London Ontario but am not certain. He looked after me quite well and we seemed to get on well together, although it was a very short visit before I had to get back to camp.
Although I had never done very well at school, I suddenly discovered that I was just as clever (if not more so) as the others and I began to do well on the course. In the end I managed to finish 2nd on the course and along with 6 others was given an immediate commission as a Pilot Officer whilst all the others were promoted to Sergeant.
About the 5th October I returned to Moncton and almost straight away entrained to Halifax and boarded the Aquatania (or was it the Mauretania?). We sailed without a convoy again but had air cover at both ends with only a small gap in the middle. It was a smooth crossing, in much superior accommodation to that on the journey out. I met a Canadian who, it subsequently turned out, used to work opposite Tom Moore at Ogilvy Mills in Medicine Hat. – Small world!
We landed back at Greenock and I was posted to Harrogate for Officer kitting-out and indoctrination. I stayed at the Queen's Hotel in some luxury and, as there were lots of Civil Servants evacuated to Harrogate, the social life was extremely good. Went to numerous dances and parties including Christmas and New Year.
4Tom Moore (1916-1992) Margaret (nee Rutherford) (1914-1999)
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1944
Posted to No. 1 (O) A.F.U. (Advanced Flying Unit) Wigton, Scotland on or about 10th January and started No. 193 Air Navigators AFU Course.
Towards the end of January I 'went sick' with an undulant fever. Local Medical Officer did not believe me until I got rapidly worse and eventually was transferred to Hospital near Stranraer where Glandular fever was diagnosed. Whilst there, a survivor from a crashed Anson was brought in and all the 'stops' were pulled out to help him survive. Although nearly every bone in his body was broken he gradually rallied and started to make a miraculous recovery. Having recovered from Glandular Fever, I was diagnosed to have a mild leukaemia and started getting massive injections of iron and ate liver until it almost came out of my ears. Walked for miles in the surrounding countryside with some of the other patients and after a while felt fitter than I had for a long time.
I rejoined No. 226 Course on 7th April and finally finished there on 2nd May. I was posted to No. 12 O.T.U. (Operational Training Unit) at a place called Chipping Warden near Banbury. I arrived at Banbury railway station on my own and started enquiring about transport to the RAF Station. I met a Squadron Leader Pilot who informed me that he had already arranged for transport, which would be along in 'about an hour'. We sat and talked and I learned that he was called Nigel Macfarlane (Mac), a Rhodesian, who had already done a 'tour' in Hampdens. He told me that we were both two days late for the start of the course, although through no fault of our own. He seemed to be quite interested in me and my background.
When we arrived on the course, we discovered that most of the others had already had time to choose their own crews and Mac immediately asked me to be his navigator. Together we then looked around for the rest of the crew.
Eventually we got ourselves sorted out and finished up with
Pilot – Squadron Leader Nigel G. Macfarlane
Navigator – Pilot Officer Dennis Moore
Bomb Aimer – Pilot Officer Fred H. Shepherd
Wireless Operator – Sergeant 'Napper' Dennis Evans
Mid Upper Gunner – Sergeant Jimmy Bourke
Rear Gunner – Sergeant 'Nobby' Clarke (655)
The Flight Engineer, Sergeant 'Johnnie' Forster (later to become Pilot Officer), joined us later – after we had left Chipping Warden.
Fred Shepherd wore an 'N' brevet as he had completed a Navigation Course but for some reason had been re-mustered to Bomb Aimer at the end of his course?
The OCU aircraft identification was 'FQ'. All the flying was done in Wellingtons and it is worth noting that one of these – Z1735 – 'S', actually set a record of longevity by operating at this unit from early 1942 until January 1945. We only flew in this aircraft once. During the course both Fred & I were made Flying Officers and the Sergeants promoted to Flight/Sergeant.
We were on an exercise on the night of 5/6th June (D-day), and at the time could not understand why there were so many other aircraft in the sky!
On the 10th July we completed our first Operational flight on what was called a 'Nickel'. We dropped leaflets over Angers in France. The trip was successful and no difficulties other than 'Flak' were encountered.
Much of our flying here was from the 'satellite' airfield of Edgehill which was some distance away and actually on the site of the old battlefield.
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We finished our training about the 15th July, by which time we all seemed to work well together and all the instructors rated Mac very highly.
Posted to No. 1653 HCU (Heavy Conversion Unit) Chedburgh, Suffolk, on or about 28th July after leave. Flying on Stirlings commenced on the 14th August, firstly on 'A' Flight doing mostly circuits and bumps by day & night and then on 'C' & 'D' Flight doing Cross Country, followed by high level bombing practice. During the course we had 2 undercarriage collapses but otherwise the Stirling was quite a pleasant aircraft to fly in.
We did a fair bit of interchange of jobs except that our flight engineer, Johnny Forster had now joined us and he got the major share of actually flying it. I had a short lesson and also a session in the rear turret. It was here that I discovered that I did not feel at all happy looking down. I actually dropped a stick of practice bombs and did very well. On the ground we also did exercises at each other's job and on the gunnery range my '4 sec' burst disintegrated the moving target!
Whilst doing each other's jobs we found out that Mac (the pilot) had attended the Specialist Navigators Course just when the war started (he had come over from Rhodesia and joined the Air Force in 1938). This made three of us who were so-called navigators and it could have presented a problem, particularly as Fred Shepherd rather fancied himself in that role. However, on one trip, Fred started to try and give changes of aircraft heading to Mac from 'pinpoints' that he had observed on the ground without letting me know. Mac had no hesitation in telling the whole crew that, although there were two others who 'at a pinch' could possibly take over, there was only one navigator in the aircraft whilst he was Captain and that was me!! – and he had every faith in my ability to look after all of us as far as the navigation was concerned. This certainly boosted my ego and from then on we all got on famously.
The course was completed on the 4th September and we were quickly posted to No. 3 LFS (Lancaster Finishing School) at Feltwell where we arrived on 7th. Feltwell was a grass airfield with no runways but, nevertheless, we finished our conversion in 4 days and then rushed to No. 218 Squadron at Methwold so that Mac could take over the job of c/o 'A' Flight. We discovered that a few nights previously the Squadron had lost 5 aircraft, one of the crews being the Flight Commander. This was somewhat of a shattering experience to start off with but fortunately our first operation was a relatively easy one, bombing by daylight 'V1' bomb sites at Boulogne. 'Flak' (Anti-Aircraft shells) was quite heavy but there was no fighter activity.
During the rest of September we did two more daylight trips and 1 night trip to Neuss near Dusseldorf. During the early days of Oct. we converted to a form of specialised bombing called 'G.H' – an extension of OBOE. This used a tracking beam and a crossing beam for the release point. On this system the bomb aimer only had to set up the bomb release and I did the actual bombing run and release. The exercises we did proved to be extremely accurate and we regularly dropped practise bombs to within 50 yards from 20,000 feet.
Methwold was built just before the war but had no permanent brick buildings and accommodation was in Nissen huts dispersed in the woods, some over a mile from the Mess, which could only be reached over muddy footpaths. It started to get quite cold in these huts quite early on and scrounging for fuel for the stoves became a major pastime. Barbara Sharp, who used to live five doors from us in Beddington, turned up at Methwold but she did not stay for long. The film 'Journey together' was shot at Methwold and David Tomlinson the actor (of 'Bedknobs & Broomsticks' with Julie Andrews) was on one of the Squadrons. The author – Miles Tripp was a bomb-aimer on the Squadron and his book "The Eighth Passenger" tells of his crew and what happened to them both during and after the war. He talks of one trip taking off at a certain time when we actually took off 1 minute before him on the same operation. My experience and his seemed to differ completely on this particular occasion (see copy of his book obtained 20/01/1994!!).
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During October we completed 2 daylights and 3 night ops and after 1 trip (at night) in November Mac was posted to Mildenhall as Commanding Officer No. 15 (XV) Squadron and promoted to Wing Commander. The next day he sent an aircraft over to fetch us and we then joined the Squadron officially. As the C/O's crew we did less trips than anyone else and as Mac decided to act as a check pilot for the first trip with all new crews, we were asked to fly with one of the Flight Commanders called Flight Lieutenant Pat Percy (known to us as 'Tojo'). This was not a popular move as he was not of the same calibre as Mac but for special trips Mac flew with us and the difference was noticeable by everyone. Tojo was promoted to Squadron Leader in mid-December and we finished the month carrying out 3 daylight and 3 night trips. One of these was as 'Master Bomber' on the Schwammenauel Dam with Mac.
[photograph]
Mildenhall, December 1944
XV Squadron crew, with Lancaster "C" Charlie, ME844
[photograph] [photograph]
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1945
New Year's day opened the month with a 6 hour 5 minute night trip and during the rest of the month a further two night ops and three day trips were completed. On the 14th, returning from Saarbrucken, the East Anglian weather deteriorated so much that all aircraft had to be diverted. We finished up at Predannack in Cornwall and it was an absolute shambles. It is amazing that there were not any collisions as aircraft with very little fuel left tried to get into unknown airfields.
Most of our spare time when 'ops' were not in the offing we used to spend at the Bull at Barton Mills. Mac had his wife Margaret (from Nottingham) and his baby son Ian living there and the whole crew went to keep her company, particularly when Mac himself was not able to be there (see note at end of 1945). He often went with 'Sprog' crews on their first operation, to try and make sure that they were capable of operating on their own. We made many friends from No. 90 Squadron based at Tuddenham, which was also nearby and particularly with a Squadron Leader Pete Dunham and his crew who we subsequently saw blowing up on a daylight operation (see scrapbooks)
Only 2 trips in February (1 day – 1 night) both with Mac, and during this time Johnnie Forster was commissioned and Fred & I took him to London to get kitted out.
About this time I first met Pam. She was going out with Fred and visited him at Mildenhall. For some reason or other we were walking back to camp from the village as a group and Fred chose to go off with somebody else and Pam walked back with me.
Also around about this time I had bought a car and 'passed my test' by driving on leave with 4 passengers down through the centre of London. BAU 62 was a blue Ford saloon named 'EROS' which I bought for £30 at an auction of the effects of a deceased pilot.
Sometime during the month, my sister Joyce came up to visit. She stayed at a small pub quite near the main camp. I have always thought that it was called the George but visits in recent years have failed to find a pub with this name. [italics] (27/05/2014 – Fred Shepherd confirmed that it was "The Bird in Hand" which is just outside the old main gate – Ed) [/italics]
7 Daylight ops during March and mostly with a Canadian bomb-aimer called Tom Butler who stood in for Fred who was deputising for the Bombing Leader. On most of these we led either the Squadron, the Base (No. 32) or the whole Group. A Base was a small group of RAF airfields & 3 Group comprised all the Heavy Bomber Squadrons in East Anglia. All these 'daylights' were flown in quite tight formation – depending on the opposition! To boost moral back at the Squadron, our return over the airfield was always in as tight a formation as possible. On 23rd March we bombed a very precise area on the German side of the Rhine at Wesel (we were the lead aircraft), in preparation for our troops crossing. From all the aircraft bombing, 80 despatched and 77 actually bombed, only one bomb fell outside the perimeter (not us!) and that was as a result of a 'hang up' and not the fault of the crew. In Dudley Saward's authorised biography of "Bomber" Harris, this attack was listed as – 'perhaps the best example of direct support of the Army were the attacks on troop concentrations in Wesel on 23rd March by seventy seven heavies dropping 435.5 tons of bombs immediately prior to the Army launching its crossing of the Rhine and capturing Wesel'. Montgomery wrote to Harris – "My grateful appreciation of the quite magnificent co-operation you have given us. The bombing of Wesel yesterday was a masterpiece and was a decisive factor in making possible our entry into that town before midnight".
At this stage of Bombing Operations in Europe the number of 'Ops' required to complete a 'Tour' changed week by week. At the beginning of the year it was more or less standard at 30 but then it went up, first to 35 then to 40 before coming back down to 35 again in early March. When we went on our 33rd trip on 14th April we still expected to have at least another two to do. It was very much of a pleasant surprise to be told that we had finished as the tour had just been reduced again to 30!! One of the most difficult of trips was always the last with the crew
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so worked up that inevitably things went wrong and the crew failed to return. We were lucky not to have had to go through that trauma. Although so late on in the war, losses were still extremely high, with aircraft being shot down by flak and the more modern German fighters even by rocket aircraft. Losses averaged 5% per trip right up to the end. The end of the European war (VE Day) came on my last day of 'End of Tour' leave and after some celebrations on the way eventually got back to camp to find the mess having a huge party which spread onto the front lawn with fireworks and a colossal bonfire.
Without having much time to think about what was happening, the crew split up and I was posted to Catterick for "Disposal", leaving on the following day. I drove up to Catterick on official petrol coupons and went through the boring process of half choosing and half being told where to go next. At the time it seemed like a good idea to elect for Transport Command to get away from having to stay in Bomber Command and being posted to the Far East in what was known as 'Tiger Force'. I had hoped that I could get on to routes in-and-around Europe!!
After a further leave, when I had to drive on 'acquired' petrol, I was eventually posted to No. 109 Transport OTU Crosby-on-Eden near Carlisle, arriving around the beginning of June. After 4 weeks 'Ground' school – after a false start, I crewed up with:
Pilot – Flying Officer 'Butch' Harris
Signaller – Warrant Officer Ernie Omerod
and flying on DC3 (Dakotas) began on the 7th July and finished on 27th August. On the 1st August the unit was reorganised as 1383 Transport Conversion Unit and it was here that the news of the dropping of the Atom Bombs was announced, as well as the end of the war. Another tremendous party to celebrate.
I was then posted to India! Departed for Morecombe to await transit instructions. Pam came up for few days and we went fishing for Dabs with the others! On 7th October departed for Holmsley South (Hampshire) and the following day we left in a York (MW167) of 246 Squadron for Karachi via Malta, Cairo and Shiebah, arriving on the 10th. Spent a whole month kicking our heels in Mauripur (Karachi) before moving on (see photo album).
On 16th November departed in Sunderland (ML786) for Calcutta. Had a 7 1/2-hour flight, taking-off and landing in the appropriate rivers and enjoying the luxury of a civilian aircraft even though flown by a Wing Commander.
Arrived on 52 Squadron at Dum Dum, Calcutta and almost immediately started route flying in Dakotas. Places visited:
Akyab
Bangkok
Bombay
Canton
Chakulia
Chittagong
Comilla
Hong Kong
Meiktila
Nagpur
Rangoon
Saigon
Although now 3 months since the war finished, there were still the last of the Japanese soldiers (now prisoners) working at various places we flew to and there was much evidence of the utter destruction caused by their occupation. Most of our flights were to ferry the civil and military occupation forces back and forth and even to the more remote areas.
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were spent on a round trip to Rangoon via Meiktila where our Xmas Dinner was a bacon 'sarni' (we actually had flown in the bacon!)
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1946
New Year's day was spent en-route to Bombay having only returned the night before from Rangoon again. During the month we flew some 71 hours.
Until 5th May we flew with only very short breaks in between and in one month (March) flew 106 hours. It was in March when we had to divert whilst flying over Hainan Island and the only option open to us was to go to Canton (China). We became the first British aircraft to land there since the beginning of the war. As I was the senior British Officer on board the aircraft, the British Consul would only talk to me even though I was not Captain of the aircraft. He was virtually useless and was going to try and arrange for various families to accommodate us in ones and two? The American Consul offered to put everyone up in his Headquarters and I agreed to this much to the annoyance of the British bloke (I seem to remember his name was HALL). Within a few minutes everything was arranged and all 30 odd people allocated a bed, even though somewhat crowded. The crew adjourned to the bar and, as the song 'Rum & Coca-Cola' was all the rage at the time, that's what we decided to have. It slid down very easily and after eating out at a local Chinese Café we eventually returned rather noisily, tripping over various passengers beds in the process. In the morning 7 of the passengers refused to fly with us and decided to return to Hong-Kong by boat. We did the trip in a matter of minutes whilst they took nearly the whole day. To give them their due, when we met up again in Hong-Kong, their spokesman apologised to us and admitted that we knew our own job better than they thought we did and then he bought us all a further round of 'Rum & Coke'.
Soon after this episode we were allocated a very young 2nd pilot called Terry Glover, who ousted me from my usual position in the right-hand seat. After a very scary let-down into Hong-Kong (letting down well out to sea and flying very low level over the water and between the numerous islands) we were guided by our new pilot into a dead-end which was not very popular with 'Butch', who immediately climbed very rapidly, put me back in the right-hand seat and then did a smart 180 before doing another letdown. This time I was lucky enough to find the right way through the islands and from then on I always sat in the front unless the conditions were CAVU (Clear and Visibility unlimited). In 1946 Kaitak airfield was a very different airfield compared to today. The main runway was usually only used from one end (from seaward) as a 1200ft. mountain blocked the other end. It was just possible to land the other way by just scraping the top of the 'Hill' and cutting back on everything, dropping like a stone then pulling out at the last moment!! We did it a number of times but only when the weather was good and even then it was quite exciting. After the war the whole of the mountain was removed and dumped in the sea at the other end of the runway, thus extending the runway considerably. Photos in the brown embossed album just about show this hill. More pictures in the album show various other views and other places. We stayed in a transit 'Hotel' called the 'Arlington' and did a great deal of sightseeing. Bearing in mind that the colony had only just been recovered from the Japanese, there was plenty to see and do. A suite in the Peninsular Hotel (the largest at the time) had been occupied by the Japanese General commanding the colony and was fitted out to remind him of home and even had a little stream running through the bedroom!!
One of the delights of our stays in Hong-Kong was the chance to be able to drink fresh cold milk and we always made a beeline for the local Milk-Bar as soon as we arrived and indulged in the luxury of a long cold pint!! Food also seemed plentiful and we fed well in one or the other of a Russian Café on the mainland, which was called "Timoschenko's" or the "Paris Grille" over on Kowloon.
Our stops in Saigon were also not without their drama as well as relaxation. The French always resented our having taken over from them and a continuous subtle 'infighting' was always taking place. The airfield was run by a joint-force and both the French and British Flags flew side by side on separate flagpoles over the airfield Control Tower. The British troops started one night by taking the French pole down and sawing a foot off the end before putting it back up so that their flag was slightly lower than ours. Apparently it took them a long time to notice but when they did, they reciprocated. Eventually new flagpoles were required and these
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got progressively longer and longer. One evening we arrived to discover the French very much up in arms because the following day their General Leclerc was coming on an inspection visit and they had caught our chaps taking their flag away altogether. As a result we were prevented from parking our aircraft in its usual position and were made to place it in part of a semi circle of aircraft on the tarmac in front of the Control Tower. We told them that we needed to leave at our usual time the following morning (around 8.30 to 9.00) to give us plenty of time in daylight for the 6 1/2-hour flight to Hong-Kong. They chose to ignore us and insisted we park where they told us, despite our protests. When we arrived early the next morning from our hotel in the town, French troops and a large band were already drawn up inside the semi circle, awaiting the arrival of General Leclerc. We carried out our normal preparations, including starting up the engines and testing them out! This infuriated the French and when we went back into the Control Tower for Met. and Flight Clearance briefing, they threatened to arrest us. The British staff winked, gave us a full briefing, with both Met. and the arrival times of visiting dignitaries, and assured us that they would give us taxi and take-off clearance. Walking casually through the French ranks, we informed one of the officers that they would need to move whilst we taxied out but nobody moved. We then decided that it was time to go, so started up our engines again and called for taxi clearance. We got no reply so started to move forward very slowly. The troops decided to give us room to get through and moved aside, but as we turned it was necessary to rev up the port engine and this we did somewhat more enthusiastically than usual. When we managed to look back the bandsmen were chasing their sheet music all over the airfield, so we gave an extra blast just to complete the havoc. As we did so the controller came through advising us to take off immediately and clear the area. Once airborne, the British controller bid us 'good-day' and thanked us for our 'co-operation' and we could hear the glee in his voice. Almost immediately we were formatted upon by 4 Free French Spitfires and we had visions of them shooting us down. However, they stayed with us for nearly 10 minutes before breaking away sharply and going back the way we had come. We found out on the return visit that they thought we were the General's aircraft and that the General's aircraft had landed before they got back. Apparently he was NOT amused to have to arrive without an escort and the Band still not fully reformed!!
On top of all this there were Dacoits and Bandits operating in the area, and there were gunfights around the airfield and Saigon on a number of occasions. Despite all this we enjoyed our leisure in Saigon, the French Club 'Ciercle Sportif' (see Photos).
About this time, I had applied for a job with BOAC through Mr. Robson who was something to do with the Ministry of Transport. I had been given a very good character assessment by our Squadron Commander (see his remarks in my Log-Book) and had hoped that the experience of 'route' flying would stand me in good stead.
In mid May we were given 2 weeks leave and we decided to find the coolest spot we could, so decided to visit Darjeeling. We went by train to a place called Siliguri, which is at the base of the Himalayas. By the time we got there we were hotter than ever and did not relish another train ride up to Darjeeling. However, we joined a miniature train which slowly but surely wound its way up the mountains and it got progressively cooler all the time. When it got near to the top it was going round and round like a corkscrew and in many places it was possible to step off the train, as it was moving very slowly, and then walk up a few steps to meet the line again and wait for the train to come past again. There is a picture of this in the photo album and this little railway is in fact quite famous. By the time we reached Darjeeling I was freezing cold and we had to hang about whilst accommodation was arranged for us. I remember flopping down on a bed in a dingy "guest house" and the next thing I remembered was waking up in the local Forces Hospital. It seemed that I had gone down with a severe bout of flu and some other chest bug as well. I was extremely well looked after in this hospital and there were a number of Sikh and Ghurka officers in the place as well. They all had serious complaints of some sort but as I got better they were a good crowd to be with. Towards the end of the 14 days leave, the others that I had come up to Darjeeling with departed back to Calcutta and I was given an indefinite extension, with sick leave on top. Before leaving the hospital, I was taken by the others to visit the highest racecourse in the world. It was at a place called Lebong and was at 14,000 feet. It was about the size of a large football ground and spent most of the time in
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cloud. Betting was a hazardous affair, as it was not unknown for the horses to disappear into cloud on the far side of the curse, only to re-appear in a completely different order when they came back into view! However, it was very pleasant to be able to sit in a reserved box, rather like the Royal Box at Epsom, drinking our cool drinks and placing a bet when the mood took us. We never ever won anything but nevertheless didn't lose much either. One morning, very early, a whole gang of us hired horses and rode the 15 miles or so to a place called Tiger Hill where we hoped to witness sunrise over Everest. We did see Everest but the sunrise was not quite where we had thought it should be. It was a magnificent sight, however, and well worth the effort to get there. The ride back was less pleasant and we all finished up vowing never to ride a horse again. Needless to say I never have.
One of the patients from the Hospital was a chap called Captain Weston who had a very rare skin complaint which was caused by the heat and humidity of the climate on the plains. His skin peeled off in layers and as a result he nearly died. It was only in the cool of the hills that his skin was able to grow again but as soon as the Medics tried to get him back home the whole process started again. Apparently on one occasion they got him as far as Calcutta ready to catch a plane out but unfortunately the aircraft takeoff was delayed and they had to rush him back to Darjeeling having already lost nearly the whole of his skin again and once again seriously ill. I have often wondered what ever happened to him when I left.
So many people out in India and the Far East suffered from skin problems as well as the dysentery types of disease. Apart from the time in Darjeeling I cannot remember being free from some form of diarrhoea varying from slight to chronic as well as 'Prickly Heat'. We all took Malarial prevention tablets called Mepachrine, which gave a yellowy tinge to the skin. Having the 'Trots' while flying was somewhat of a problem in itself. The Dakota only had one toilet and with 35 odd passengers most of whom suffered from the same problem made things somewhat complicated!! The prickly heat was no respecter of rank and once we had an Air Commodore on board who asked if he could come up front so that he could take his Bush Jacket off and get some cold air to his body. I had never before seen anyone who was so badly affected. His whole body was one mass of it and most was infected through scratching. We opened the side windows for him and after about an hour's flying he got some slight relief. He was most grateful to us and thanked us profusely before going back to the cabin to exercise his authority over the more junior members of his party. The Medics had no cures for any of these problems in those days although they could bring some help to the dysentery sufferers.
I was very reluctant to leave the cool of Darjeeling but eventually had to and took a mad taxi ride down through the tea plantations to the railway at Siliguri and almost finished up with a heart attack as the driver was desperate to show off his skill at negotiating hairpin bends on two wheels and only one hand on the steering. The road drops from about 12,000 feet to sea level in something like 15 miles and did not seem to go more than a few hundred yards without at least one hairpin to turn back on itself. The heat at sea level hit me like an oven and the train ride back to Calcutta was enough to make me swear never to complain about being too cold again. When you are cold at least you can find some way of keeping warm but there was absolutely no way out there that you could cool off when you were too hot.
Back in Calcutta the Monsoon had started with a vengeance but I was immediately informed that I was on the next 'demob' contingent and also that I had been offered a job as Navigator with BOAC as soon as I was 'demobbed'. Very soon after I was on the train again, en-route to Bombay. This took 3 days and we played cards nearly the whole time. I swore that I would never play 'Solo' again after that. It was sweltering hot the whole time and we had all the windows open to catch the air from the movement of the train but most of the time we just got the smoke and smuts from the engine. Food was only available at each of the many stops and since the train was only carrying troops it was a mad rush each time and more often than not we had to scramble back onto the train as it started to pull out of the station without having got anything.
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At Bombay we waited in the transit camp at WORLI until our turn came. After about two weeks we finally boarded the SS Samaria, a small passenger boat, which we were told would take 13-14 days to reach home. As we sailed out of the harbour a large liner steamed in and we were told that it would embark its passengers and sail again within 12 hours and only take 7 days to get home. Sure enough the following day we were galled to see it steaming passed [sic] us with all the troops on her decks jeering at us as they shot past. We were absolutely livid at the time and as everyone was anxious to get home as soon as possible we all felt hard done by. However, we heard later that the liner had broken down and had turned round and gone back to Bombay during the night. Like the tortoise and the hare the laugh was on us as we chugged slowly but surely and arrived in Liverpool after 12 days.
After disembarking we were quickly put through the 'demob' procedure including handing in our air force kit, medicals and being issued with civilian clothes and a rail warrant home and with the minimum of fuss we caught the train to London. All this happened within 24 hours of disembarking and, similarly quickly, arrangements were made for our Wedding on 19th October at St. Andrews church Leytonstone. After a Honeymoon in Hastings I was due to start with BOAC at the beginning of November. However, following a visit to my old civilian company to tell them that I did not want my old job back, I was introduced to Air Commodore Powell who was running SILVER CITY AIRWAYS and decided to join them instead, which I did on 5th November. On the 8th I was navigating an Avro Lancastrian G-AHBW (City of London) from London Heathrow to Nairobi Eastleigh, Captained by Ex-Wing Commander Johnny Sauvage DSO & bar, DFC, arriving back to the 4 huts of Heathrow on the 24th. During December we did 3 trips to Malta and back, one of them in the then record time of 4 hours 55 minutes (see cutting from the Malta Times). Thus ended a very eventful Year.
[photograph]
Sliver [sic] City Airways – December 1946
Johnny Sauvage and crew with Lancastrian G-AHBW “City of London”
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1947
At the end of my RAF Transport Command Course at Crosby on Eden in 1945, I had been
awarded a certificate which was recognised by the Department of Civil Aviation. Also in February 1946 I had been awarded a Second Class Navigation Warrant number 422, which was also recognised by the D of CA. Whilst working in the office of Silver City Airways (1 Great Cumberland Place, London), I was able to study the additional subjects required to obtain a Civil Aircraft Navigator's Licence. I passed all except [underlined] signalling [/underlined] and re-took this and one other subject to obtain full First Class Civil Licence in May. After another full aircrew medical, licence number 2116 was issued on 7th June 1947.
On 13th June I started flying again with Captain Storm-Clark in G-AHBV "City of Canberra" to Verona. After a further 2 months in their office (during which time Terry was born, we moved from 63 Fladgate Road, Leytonstone, to38 Warham Road, South Croydon, as well as attending a XV Squadron reunion at the Holborn Restaurant on 22nd August), I joined up with Captain R. C. "Hoppy" Hopkins as his navigator on a VIP Dakota G-AJAV. This aircraft was very luxuriously fitted out, with only 6 seats and very superior accommodation. Hoppy immediately 'promoted' me to 'pupil pilot under instruction' and I spent most of my flying time with him sitting in the second pilot's seat, often on my own, while he chatted with the passengers. We flew to France, Belgium, Germany, Portugal and Iceland, as well as locally. I was very disappointed when the aircraft was chartered to fly Churchill out to Marrakesh and I was taken out of the crew. Another pilot took my place to act as formal second pilot/navigator. Hoppy was very upset particularly as the new chap was not a very experienced pilot and had never previously acted as navigator. He had long arguments with the MD of the company (Air Commodore Powell) expressing the opinion that he 'would rather fly with an experienced navigator who at a pinch could fly the aircraft than fly with a not very experienced pilot who, at a pinch, might possibly be able to navigate the aircraft'. Unfortunately the MD would not give way and blamed the charterers, who had insisted on there being two qualified pilots on board and the firm could not afford to have a crew of four (excluding stewards etc.).
In the event I was sent to Belfast to pick up a crew to ferry a Sandringham flying-boat to Buenos Aires. The pilot was called 'Pappy' Carreras (because of his age) and we got on famously together. As well as navigator I was 'promoted' to become 'Mooring Officer', which meant that I stood in the bows to slip the mooring before take-off and had to attempt to catch the mooring buoy with a boat-hook on landing. I had thought that slipping the mooring would be very simple but more often than not it was impossible to do as the aircraft was pulling against the tide and the loop would not come off without the engines being revved hard to take up the slack. Often we surged forward so quickly that I did not have time to get the loop off before we were passing the buoy – still attached to it. Mooring after landing was also just as tricky and I lost a number of boat-hooks before I finally mastered the technique!!
On the way we ate and slept in the 'boat' as the accommodation and cooking facilities were superb. On the leg between Dakar (West Africa) and Natal (Brazil), Pappy commented that although he had done the crossing a number of times, he had never seen Saint Paul's rocks. I gaily said that this time we would see them, not realising how small they were in the wide expanse of ocean. He immediately took me up on it and some 8 hours later (the crossing took 10 hours 20 minutes) was more than astonished when I suggested that if the others were to look out of the starboard windows they might see the rocks in about 5 minutes time. More by pure luck than anything to do with me, we passed them some 6 minutes later about 1/2 mile away. From then on I could do no wrong!!
Pappy had flown during the Spanish Civil War in 1936 but unfortunately for him – on the wrong side – so that he was no longer able to go home. His flying with F.A.M.A. (Flota Aerea Merchante Argentina) meant that he had to be very careful not to ever get diverted to Spain.
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Christmas day was spent in Buenos Aires and I was able to buy some presents there that I could not get at home. (A Tri-ang bus (No. 15) and Xmas Decorations – some of which are still in use today!!) We arrived back in London on New Years Eve (without Pappy who of course normally operated from B.A.)
As a result of my various trips abroad I did not spend much time at home, although when I did, I usually was able to have plenty of time-off from work.
Sometime round about October, Terry had gone into Great Ormond St. Hospital to have a growth removed from his neck. It was more difficult to remove than had originally been thought and when he was able to come home he became very ill with Gastro Enteritis and was taken to the Mayday Hospital in Croydon. He was desperately ill to start off with and took a long time to recover.
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1948
Worked mostly in the office until April, having attended a 52 Squadron Reunion at the Waldorf Hotel on 20th February when, on 8th April, I ferried a MOSQUITO out of Turkey via Jersey & Rome landing at IZMIR. Had trouble with Turkish Customs over three wooden deer bought in Rome. They could not seem to understand way anyone should want to buy such things! An insight into to [sic] the mentality of the Turks we came into contact with is highlighted by the fact that the Turkish government had purchased 100 odd SPITFIRES and a similar number of 'Mossies'. The deliveries were almost complete by the time we took ours out there but they only had managed to have one Mosquito & two Spits' remaining serviceable by that time. The story goes that one Spitfire XI was delivered one evening and the pilot handed it over to the ground crew asking if there was anything they wanted to know about it. During the night it rained hard and when they were getting it ready for a test flight they discovered that the cockpit had a pool of water in it. To cover up the fact that the cockpit hood had been left open in the rain, one bright spark took his drill with the biggest bit that he could find and bored a series of holes in the floor and to let the water drain out!! The Turkish pilot duly took off but came back in after a fairly short flight and refused to sign the acceptance certificate because the aircraft would not pressurise. Apparently the Spitfire XI was one of the first aircraft to have cockpit pressurisation!!!
In May we went to Canada to pick up a Dakota which had just been converted for a company in South Africa. I stayed in Montreal whilst the rest of the crew went down into the States to pick it up. At the time I thought the whole set-up seemed strange but the fact that aircraft were being flown illegally into Israel at the time never occurred to me. Eventually we set off from Montreal to Newfoundland but I didn't prepare properly and we wandered miles off course and I was unable to get a pinpoint fix because I could not recognise any ground feature. Since I had been sitting in the second pilot's seat I eventually decided to go back and try to fathom out why we were 'lost'. After a long period I suddenly realised what I had done wrong – I had borrowed a Canadian map that had the various airline tracks marked on and along the side were the courses to steer. What I had not noticed was that they were magnetic and not [underlined] true [/underlined] bearings. I had applied a correction for the wind and applied variation as usual to arrive at the course for the pilot to steer. As variation in that part of the world was something like 30 degrees, we had in fact been flying 30 degrees off course!! Once I had sussed this out I was soon able to recognise where we were and to start pointing us back in the right direction. Sighs of relief all round!! If we had had some decent radio equipment aboard it would not have been so bad but the aircraft was stripped right down to bare essentials – In retrospect another odd thing.
When we landed at GANDER my preparation was suddenly very much more thorough, the next leg being across the Atlantic. With the fuel that we could carry there were three choices of route bearing in mind the winds that could be expected in the weather systems that existed. First, to head straight across to Ireland and make for Shannon – this was ruled-out as there would be barely enough fuel to do it. Second, to go southwards to the Azores. This was the best for fuel, wind & weather but without radio navigation aids was rather risky – if we missed our landfall there was nowhere to divert to within range of the fuel remaining (if any!). Third, to head for Iceland, which was much the nearest. Unfortunately, with the low-pressure system to the north, the winds would be headwind and very strong. This would again leave us very short of fuel and, as well as this, the landing conditions forecast were not very good. As a result of our discussions we decided that unless we waited a couple of days for the weather to improve, we should consider a fourth possibility of taking the short leg to Greenland, refuelling and then heading for Iceland the following day. This would only, so we thought, take one more day and would allow us to assess the fuel situation when approaching Iceland and perhaps carry on direct to Scotland and, in fact, save us time. This we finally decided to do and although we were unable to get clearance due to radio interference, the controller assured us that it would be alright as he would radio through later on whilst we were on our way. After a very frightening flight to Bluey West One, up a long fiord, we arrived only to be refused landing permission as the flight had not been cleared. Since there was no way we could get back to Gander and there were no other diversions they eventually agreed to let us land. When we did
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the aircraft was surrounded with soldiers and we were told that we would be interned until clearance could be obtained from Washington because of the Israeli situation!!
So there we sat for 7 days whilst the powers-that-be decided what to do with us. We had all bought loads of food to bring home as meat was still rationed and other foodstuffs were in short supply. We had a small fridge on board the aircraft but they would not allow us to run one engine to keep it cold and they would not store it for us. There we were, surrounded by huge Glaciers, whilst all our 'loot' went slowly off. In the end we had to dump nearly all of it. I got sunburned sitting on the nearest glacier and this did little to improve our tempers. Eventually on the 7th day we were allowed to file a flight plan to Weeks (Iceland) and we took off at 22.45 that night. At that time of year it was still almost broad daylight and we landed and refuelled in Iceland, at night but still light enough to see. Two hours later we were off again and landed at Prestwick after a 5hr 40min flight.
After this I was transferred back to flying with Hoppy but in a Bristol Wayfarer (freighter) this time. The first trip was to Karachi via all the short legs possible. We were delayed in Nicosia whilst a new propeller was sent out and we helped the engineer to change it. There was no help forthcoming from the locals (civilian & RAF) although I cannot remember why. This took 7 days and then we were delayed for a further 9 days by the Iraqi Government, so that the whole trip had taken 24 days. It was about the time of Partition in India and the whole of the region was in turmoil. I met a chap that I knew well who was running some form of charter company out there, who offered me a job on the spot, at a ludicrously high salary, if I would join him the same day. The offer was so attractive that I was sorely tempted but I did not want to break my contract with Silver City and leave Hoppy in the lurch. I suspected that the job was either gun running or illegal transport of refugees, so in the end I turned it down. I was to learn later, that the day after we left he tried to take off from Karachi and the plane was so grossly overloaded in the tail that it stalled just after becoming airborne and all aboard were killed outright. As we suspected the cargo was found to be arms and ammunition!!
The next trip was out to Iraq on charter to IPC (Iraqi Petroleum Company) and we flogged up and down the oil pipelines. Having been stuck in Baghdad last trip we had all suffered from the lack of liquid refreshment (alcohol banned and water somewhat 'iffy'), so I bought two bottles of orange squash in Malta to take with us. When I opened my case in Baghdad I discovered a somewhat wet and sticky mess where one of the bottle tops had come loose. Just about everything was covered in juice but it was not until we got to Bahrein that I was able to get everything washed and the case swilled out! It was lucky that we stayed there an extra day or else I would have had to bring the whole soggy mess back home with me. As it was the case was never the same again, even when I relined the inside with brown paper. Terry had the case for a number of years and finally gave it back to me in 1991!
At the end of September I, along with a number of other navigators, was made redundant and then I started my first experience of having to hunt for a job to keep the family fed!! I applied for a job with Flota Aerea Merchante Argentina and, along with another navigator from Silver City called Ross Plews, was called for an interview in their offices in the West-End. We were horrified to see a crowd of 20 or 30 people waiting and spilling out on to the pavement outside. We debated what to do and had decided that, as we were almost the last ones there, it was not worthwhile waiting. We were just about to walk away, when who should try to push past us than Pappy Carreras, who immediately asked me what the crowd was about. When we explained her said, "Wait there while I check in". This we did and within minutes we were called to the front of the queue, much to the disgust of most of the others, and both of us went into for interview to discover Pappy sitting at the long desk with three other officials and I was introduced to the others by him. He then said, "this is the chap I have flown with down to BA and he is the one I would choose without seeing any of the others. If his friend is as good as him we may as well take him on as well – has anyone any objections? – No! – Good! – That's it then! – Let's send all the others away. Welcome to FAMA Dennis – You are hired”.
That's how I came to be flying on an Argentinean York, en-route to Buenos Aires in the first week of November. We were delayed in Natal for three days whilst an engine fault was
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corrected and I got badly sunburned whilst swimming in the sea when there was no shade. Having arrived in Buenos Aires we were met with welcoming arms and I started to look around for somewhere to live but very shortly after a new decree was issued by Eva Peron (she was the power behind throne!) limiting the number of non-nationals working in the country. As FAMA was 75% British, 15% German and the rest Argentinean, this caused immediate problems and, since we were the last to arrive, we were scheduled as the first to go. I was offered the opportunity to navigate a force of Lincolns as a show of strength over the 'Malvinas', provided I gave up my British nationality and took on Argentine citizenship. This I refused to do and so started a week of negotiations to collect some form of compensation and what was already due to me. The expression 'mañana' really came into play and it took all our wits to find someone high enough in the organisation who had the power to do something about our plight. They, in their turn, did everything they could to beat down our demands. Once again it was Pappy Carreras who came to our rescue and we eventually got a flight back with Pappy (see 'Crossing the Line' certificate) landing back in London on the 3rd of December. We came via Madrid and Pappy had been given permission for the very first time to re-enter Spain. Even then he decided to stay in the Airport – just in case.
Once I got back I was quite surprised to get a number of phone calls from various firms offering me a job and I was able to pick and choose, finally agreeing to start at the beginning of the New Year with Flight Refuelling, the firm founded in 1934 by Sir Alan Cobham to investigate the use of air refuelling, and who's pioneering system is still in use today. The BERLIN AIRLIFT was under way and all the Charter firms were fighting for the work that it generated.
[logo] Berlin Airlift [emblem]
[drawing]
[inserted] TX 276/1281 [/inserted]
AVRO LANCASTRIAN – FLIGHT REFUELLING LTD
47403
On 23 June 1948, the Soviet forces occupying the eastern part of Germany blockaded all rail, road and waterway supply routes from the Allied Western Occupation Zones in Berlin. With less than one month’s supply of food and fuel, the prospects for the two and a half million Berliners looked bleak. Only three severely restricted air routes remained as a lifeline between the besieged city and the western world. The Allies responded immediately with a miracle of logistics – The Berlin Airlift. Codenamed Operation Vittles by the USAF, and Operation Plainfare by the RAF, over a period of 11 months Allied aircraft made thousands of flights into the cramped airspace of Berlin and succeeded in supplying everything the city needed. Every available aircraft from RAF Transport Command was in service, as well as hundreds of USAF aircraft and even civil charter firms were called upon to supplement the effort. The operation became so skilled that the Soviet Command eventually realised that they had failed and on 12 May 1949 the blockade was finally lifted.
Avro Lancastrian G-AGWI represents an aircraft which was originally delivered to British South American Airways (BSAA) at Heathrow in January 1946. The aircraft was registered to the Ministry of Civil Aviation for a short period in 1948 before being sold to Flight Refuelling in January 1949. The aircraft was then allotted fleet no. Tanker 26 and flew 226 sorties on the Berlin Airlift.
[inserted] I FLEW IN 13 OF THEM [/inserted] [diagram]
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1949
I report to Flight Refuelling at Tarrant Rushton and am crewed up with a very experienced ex-Air Lingus pilot. It was not until later that I was to discover that he had been sacked from them due to being drunk in flight! After an air test we departed in a Lancastrian for Wuntsdorf just outside Hanover on 13th January. The airfield was RAF and being used by them to fly Yorks on the airlift. It was very crowded with both aircraft and people and we were billeted in a small place called Bad Nenndorf about 10 miles away. There was a reasonable sized Hotel where all Flight Refuelling crews were accommodated. The following day we did two trips into Gatow carrying PETROL.
B.T. O'reilly was the name of the pilot and he became somewhat of a legend on the lift. However he was not a very reliable pilot when sober and, although he boasted that he could land the aircraft better 'on a sea of gin' than any other time, sometimes he was positively dangerous. On one occasion whilst flying into Gatow, I saw him climb out of his seat and then push past me and go to the back of the aircraft. I thought it would be a good idea to go forward and keep an eye on the instruments to make sure 'George' was doing its job properly. To my consternation, I saw that the aircraft was trimmed into a shallow dive (perhaps to counter his moving to the toilet at the rear of the aircraft?) and there was no sign of him returning back to his seat. When we descended below 1,000 feet I decided to get into his seat and was absolutely astounded to discover that the autopilot was not even engaged. I climbed it back up to the proper altitude and called the wireless operator to go and look for 'BT'. He reported back to say that 'BT' was 'out cold' on one of the seats at the back and he could not get him to register that he was needed! At this point we were committed to carry on towards Gatow as we were in the air corridor in the Russian Zone, so I decided that I would make up some story to over fly Gatow and hope that by the time we had got back to Wuntsdorf 'BT' might have surfaced. In the event, just as we approached the Beacon to start letting down to land, 'BT' pushed up to the front and demanded to know why I was in the pilot's seat. We swapped over and I pointed out that he had not put 'George' in when he went down the back. His reaction was happily to say, "these aircraft fly themselves!!" and then carried on to make a perfect landing. I was must relieved when I was asked to take an aircraft back to Tarrant Rushton with another pilot and never had to fly with him again. I was crewed up with a better chap on our return to Germany.
At the end of April we moved to Hamburg and started flying into Tegel instead of Gatow. In June I was allocated yet another pilot who was very young and inexperienced and I was not over happy with him either. When we were withdrawn from the airlift in mid-July, I had completed 89 flights back and forth to Berlin and also carried out a number of ferrying flights to Tarrant Rushton. (See Lecture Notes and 50th Anniversary Celebrations 1999)
[photograph]
With Col. Gail S. Halvorsen – "The chocolate pilot"
Berlin Airlift 50th Anniversary, Berlin 1999
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Two books fully detail the Berlin airlift and the part played by the civil participants (they have been suitably annotated). The one by Robert Rodrigo is the better of the two.
The end of the airlift deposited hundreds of aircrew (many of whom had only just come back into flying for the good money) on to the job market and I was unable to find another flying post. Thus ended my civil flying career.
After flying for so long, finding an ordinary job where my abilities would be of some use and would be recognized by prospective employers, was very difficult. One day I saw a friend from schooldays called Peter Filldew whom I had met at Mildenhall during the war, where he was the orderly-room clerk. He suggested he might be able to get me a job with his firm of Estate Agents (Fielder & Partners) in South Croydon. He obviously gave me a glowing recommendation as my interview was quite short, and I was offered a job as a Negotiator with a very low salary but very good commission on completion of any property that I obtained for their books or was instrumental in selling. The work was very hard and I had to spend long and unsociable hours including Saturdays & Sundays but I managed reasonably well once I gained the necessary confidence.
Soon afterwards we moved house to 248 Croydon Road and this stretched our resources to almost breaking point. The car, BAU 62, which I had bought during the war, had to go and I only managed to get £5 for it and it almost broke my heart to see it being driven away. The bungalow cost something like £1,200 and I got somewhat into debt to raise even the 10% and buying fees. Everything was based on my getting the commission on sales that I thought I should be able to earn. 1949 ended with me still working for Fielder.
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1950
One day at Fielder's, I overheard the receptionist speaking on the phone to someone called Macfarlane and casually asked what were his initials. On being told that they were N.G., I asked to speak to him and asked if he recognised my voice which, after a short pause, he did and we immediately arranged to meet. This caused uproar from the sales manager called Chillcot, who insisted that Mac was already one of [italics] his [/italics] clients and I was not to be allowed to deal with him. All my explanations fell on deaf ears and I had to phone from home to explain this to Mac. He agreed to phone up and cancel the appointment we had made and say that he was not interested anymore. We arranged to meet one lunchtime and go home to our bungalow. I then told the Sales Manager that through his stupidity we had lost a good client and this started an antagonism between us.
The meeting with Mac was quite an event and he suggested that I should re-apply to come back into the RAF and he would back my application if he could. He was still a Wing Commander but holding a post at the Air Ministry and he thought he should be able to pull a few strings.
As a result of this meeting I decided to apply and, after a long wait, was called for interview by a panel, who seemed to feel that wartime service was not a good recommendation for a peacetime commission and they did not even listen to what I had done subsequently. After a further long wait I received a letter addressed to Flight Lieutenat [sic] D. Moore informing me that they were unable to offer me a commission but they would be prepared to let me return as 'NAV 2' (which was the same as Sgt.) As much as I would have dearly loved to have got back into the Service, my pride would not let me accept such a reduction in rank and I therefore wrote back straight away telling them what I thought of their offer.
Working for Chilcott became very difficult and it was obvious that things would come to a head soon. Just when I was expecting to start collecting my first big commissions I was told that I was no good at the job and 'fired'. They would only pay me up until the last day at the basic rate, and no commission money. I appealed to Fielder but he was obviously being influenced by his sales manager and would not help me.
On the job market again, I could only get menial jobs, first as a temp in what then equated to the DHSS issuing new National Insurance Cards and then a more permanent job in the Gas Company working in their costing department. My job was to cost out all the job sheets for the week from the job rates for the various jobs and individuals. This job was running weeks behind when I joined and it did not take long before I was able to catch up and sit waiting for the current week's work dockets to arrive. When the head of my section saw this he 'warned me off' and checked every item of my work so that we looked as though we were still working weeks behind time again. This got very frustrating and I started to look around for another job.
Through the good offices of the Officers' Association I was passed a number of job openings and eventually was interviewed by a firm of grocery distributors called Harvey Bradfield & Toyer. They wanted a salesman to help introduce a Milton's product called Deosan to cafés & restaurants as a means of getting to be their suppliers for groceries as well. I was given the whole of South London to canvas and had to do it all by 'cold selling' and without the use of any transport of my own. Fortunately I made my number with the Public Health Office and frequently got called by them to visit establishments that they had found to be 'unhealthy' and I was able to introduce 'The Deosan method of food hygiene' to them quite easily. I found that the standard of cleanliness in most places I visited to be almost non-existent and the large 'posh' Hotels were the worst. I found this job quite interesting but although I did not feel I was doing a very good job of it, the firm seemed quite happy with my work.
1950 ended with me still trudging around south London and hardly making enough money to live on. Christine had been born on May 28th and this did not make things any easier.
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1951
At the beginning of the year I was still working for H.B.T. and being called-on to visit various places in the South London Area. I asked for a special visit to the Head Office to discuss my work with my boss, who still seemed quite happy with what I was doing but made no effort to increase my wages. I do not remember exactly what I actually earned each week but it was round about £50 per month.
During the last week in March I was in Croydon on a visit and decided to call again on my friend in the Recruiting Office, and here I was asked if I had thought about applying to rejoin the RAF. When I explained about having applied once already and had only been offered 'Master Aircrew' which I had turned down, the Senior Recruiting Officer asked if I would mind if he phoned Air Ministry to find out what the latest situation was. I was quite happy for him to do this and did not expect anything to come of it. It was quite a surprise when he phoned me the next day to say that if I were to apply again I would be given every consideration, so I got him to help me fill in the necessary forms which he duly sent in. It was only a few days later that I was called for interview at the Air Ministry and I went with a totally different attitude to the previous time. When asked the first question which inevitably was 'Why do you want to rejoin the RAF' I decided to take the offensive and replied 'I am not sure if I do – I want you to convince me that I should'. From this point on I could do no wrong.
A greater part of the interview came from a Group Captain on the panel who kept asking me questions about the Argentine and seemed genuinely interested in the answers that I gave. The panel were all smiling when I left and the 'Groupie' asked me to wait for him outside. He then told me that I would be hearing within the next few days – at which I laughingly said that the last time I had heard that remark it had taken over 6 weeks for them to contact me. He assured me that he literally meant 'the next few days' and then asked me if I would wait for him and walk down to the Tube with him. This I did and he told me that he was due to be posted as the next Air Attaché in Buenos Aires hence his interest in my comments.
Two days later I was called for an Aircrew Medical and, having passed this easily enough, was offered a new commission in the RAF as a Flying Officer to start at Air Ministry on April 16th (this was barely 3 weeks since I visited the Recruiting Office in Croydon). Needless to say I accepted and duly reported for duty on the day required and then spent a month getting kitted out and doing some odd jobs for a Wing Commander in one of the departments there. Along with 13 other people reported to Central Navigation School at Shawbury on 23rd May for a Navigation Instructors Course. I teamed up with Jimmy Cuthill (with whom I shared a room) and Bob Hunter (who was a Canadian serving in the RAF).
[photograph]
Navigation Instructors Course, Shawbury 1951
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On 17th June I went with most of the others to Sick Quarters to have our inoculations brought up to date and as soon as I had had mine I began to feel odd. We all trouped back to the classroom and settled down to a lecture on 'how not to lecture' and I could feel myself 'blowing up like a balloon' and my heart racing like mad. I bemoaned the fact that I had never had a reaction to 'jabs' before and I really did feel rough. The Instructor eventually noticed that there was something wrong and told me to go back to the Mess and lie down. I remember 'floating' back and one of two gardeners asking me for the time and me just laughing back at them because I could not see the time on my watch. The next thing I knew was someone asking me how I felt and me just laughing like a mad thing again, and then later somebody standing over me and saying "I am just going to inject some adrenalin into you – you will find yourself shaking but try not to fight it – just let yourself go". I was then carried out to an ambulance and taken to the Station hospital. It seemed like hours before the shaking stopped but eventually it did and I felt very much better – in fact even asked for something to eat as I was hungry! Needless to say, I did not get a meal but was allowed a drink. After a while the M.O. (doctor) came to see me and explained what had happened. I had suffered an 'angino-neurotic' type of reaction to the inoculation and this was extremely rare and quite often fatal unless caught in time. It seems that when the lesson finished everyone wandered back to the Mess for lunch and, since it was a little late, everyone went straight in to eat except Jimmy Cuthill, who decided he ought to check up to see how I was. He found me unconscious on the bed and immediately called for the M.O. but could not find him. Fortunately he looked in the dining room and when he saw him eating his lunch insisted that he came up to our room immediately. The M.O. told me that if I had been left much longer I could very well have died. The humorous part of the story was that, after a good night's sleep and a hearty breakfast in bed, I felt completely fit and was allowed to rejoin the others in class. They were all sitting moaning about sore arms and feeling rotten and I was 'feeling no pain' and was able to 'lord' it over them for the rest of the day!
Flying started on my Birthday on Mark XI Wellingtons! and the course finished with an overseas flight using special navigation techniques (Grid Navigation). I was then posted to No. 1 Air Navigation School at Thorney Island and I reported there on 13th August. This was a prime posting and I was very pleased to get such a good one. However, it soon became obvious that something was not quite right. When I applied for married quarters I was told that I would not be considered "just yet" and no explanation was given when I queried this. When I tried to find out which courses I would be looking after I was allocated as course tutor and then, a little later, told that I was to be held in reserve pending the arrival of another course tutor. I then learnt that this new chap was Les Dibb who had been in the same Group at Shawbury and had hoped to be posted to Thorney but had eventually been posted to Lindholme. It then became fairly obvious that some 'string pulling' had been going on by someone at Thorney.
For the Open Day at Thorney I had arranged for Pam to bring Terry down for the day to look around and see the show. Nobody was more disappointed than me to have to tell her when she arrived that we were not going to be staying, since I had just been informed that my posting to Thorney was cancelled and that I was to report to No. 5 Air Navigation School at Lindholme on 19th September. Terry enjoyed the show until two aircraft flew over and dropped bags of flour (to represent bombs) and fake bangs designed to simulate the explosions & the crashes from the 'Anti Aircraft guns' frightened the life out of him. He yelled his head off and did not want to see anything else and all he wanted to do was to go home.
Just before leaving Thorney I met Ernie Ormerod (signaller) from back in 1946 as well as another signaller that I knew called 'Chuck' Radcliffe who was also on 52 Sqn. I really did not have enough time to do more than say hello before I was on my way.
I duly reported to Lindholme somewhat bitter about the whole thing but was immediately made Course Tutor under Flight Lieutenant 'Mick' Munday on No. 2 Long Navigation Refresher Course. This comprised 6 Officers and 1 NCO who had either been off flying for some long time or who had just come back into the Service. One of them, Flt.Lt. Willis, had been on the same course as me at ITW in Newquay. At the time he was re-mustering from Corporal SP
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(RAF Police) and we had given him a hard time during 'rough and tumble' games on the Beach. He subsequently became the Navigator with Prince Charles when he was learning to fly. They were a good crowd and I got on well with all of them. Our Classroom was a concrete hut, which had been used by the Poles as a church during the war and all the walls had been panelled with carved wood and decorated with religious artefacts. I could not get into quarters so I started looking around for somewhere to live (without much success), so I had travel up and down to Beddington whenever I could manage a weekend off. Without a car it was very difficult but I did manage to get lifts from time to time.
[photograph]
[underlined] No.2 L.N.R. COURSE. [underlined]
BACK ROW:- F/LT. CARR, F/O. GREEN, SGT. JONES, F/O. SWINFIELD.
FRONT ROW:- F/LT. WILLIS, F/O. D. MOORE, F/LT. H. MUNDAY, F/LT. HINGE, F/LT. ROWLAND.
NEGATIVE No LIND 290G 9 UN52/UNCLASSIFIED
When the Long Nav. refresher course finished we started to run navigation courses for National Service people. We found this to be very frustrating as most of those on the course were not the slightest bit interested in what they were doing and they had only chosen to become 'Navigators' as an easy way to spend their time instead of becoming 'PBI' (soldiers!) It was further made much worse when we were informed from a higher source that none of them were to be 'failed' (some political reason no doubt). One of them (a Pilot Officer Simpson) was so bad and such a bad influence on the others that we fought tooth and nail to get him 'scrubbed' but all we did was to made [sic] trouble for ourselves for 'making waves'. I shall always remember his face when he eventually 'passed out' as a navigator and was promoted to Flying Officer. He boasted openly that he was cleverer than us because he had 'beaten the system'. At the time I could only hope that he never had to put a flying crew at risk, as he would surely kill them all and himself as well. I often wonder what happened to him.
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1952
In the New Year we decided to sell the Bungalow and find somewhere up near Lindholme whenever we could. I negotiated with a Sergeant Paine who wanted to sell his car, and he agreed to accept a deposit and the balance as soon as we had sold the house. I did make it clear that I could not possibly pay him until the money came through from the solicitors and we had not even found a buyer for the Bungalow. At the time he seemed quite happy to agree to this but later had doubts and then started to cause me hassle. The car was a Hillman Minx Reg. No. FA7136, which served us well until about 1956.
In the meantime I found a house that the RAF were prepared to take on as a 'hiring' in Crabtree Drive at Five Lane Ends, Skellow, Just off the A1, about 7 miles North of Doncaster and I was able to start setting up a home there. Nowadays the Motorway around Doncaster rejoins the A1 just there and you can just see the road from the Service station at the junction.
The Bungalow sold quite quickly and we got £2,850 for it, having paid about £950 when we bought it. It took a while for all the loose ends to be tied up but eventually I got the money, paid off Sgt. Paine and moved the family up to the new place. Pam was sadly disappointed with it but the people were all very friendly and she began to like it after a while. We had a number of excursions from there and went to the sea at Hornsea on two or three occasions.
Having done well with No. 2 LNR Course I applied for a permanent commission but the Group Captain (Laine – I think) told me that I did not have the right kind of experience to suit me for a permanent career and turned me down. The Chief Navigation Instructor was Wing Commander Hickey (nicknamed 'Bone dome'), who also did not think much of me either. I rather think it had something to do with my leaving Thorney Island under odd circumstances.
After only a year and just getting settled into the house, I was surprised to find myself posted yet again. This time it seemed like a real improvement but very much a 'desk' job as one of the Navigation Examiners at the Command Examination Board, Flying Training Command at Shinfield Park just outside Reading. Our offices were in old huts a little removed from the main building and here began one of the more interesting posts of my career. We managed to find a bungalow to rent from a Mrs Samways at 36 Wood Way, Woodley and we were able to move from Doncaster quite quickly.
Having settled in, I was allocated the exams for the navigator's finals that I would be responsible for. These were: astro-navigation, maps & charts and magnetism & compasses. I also had to set the general navigation paper for pilots. I did not have much time to think before having to do a full set of exams and, only by Christmas, start to really appreciate the scope of the job.
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1953
To start off with, I had discovered that the questions on the subjects that I was to specialise in had previously been picked out by the examiner from a 'bank' of questions based on what had been set previously. After thinking about it for a while and based on my own experience decided that it was possible for the Instructors at the various Training Schools to work out a permutation which would more or less guarantee to predict over 60% of the questions.
All the exam papers were vetted by the newly appointed Chief Examiner (Gordon Arkley) and I did not have much difficulty in convincing him that we should be a bit more professional and he agreed that I could start-off by changing the system in one subject to be going on with. I started with astro navigation and set what I considered to be a very practical paper instead of the usual theory one. I sat back and waited and on the day of the exams the phone stated [sic] to ring and complaints came in thick and fast – 'Unfair', 'Not what we have been used to'; 'We were not able to prepare the students!' etc., etc. As a result, I was asked to attend a high power meeting of all the Chief Navigation Instructors and the senior people on the Examinations Board. In the meantime, I received all the papers for marking and the results showed that one school did very well but all the others failed miserably. When I was grilled at the meeting I was very pleased to have the backing of my own boss. When all of them were presented with the evidence that, apart from the one school, the others had not covered the syllabus properly and 'only taught what was necessary to get the students through the exam', there were a number of red faces and I was not very popular with them. However, the Chief of the Examination Board asked the schools to go back and put their houses in order and told them that from here on in, [underlined] [italics] all [/italics] [/underlined] examinations would be based on the new method and not on the 'Question Bank' method'. He then congratulated me on setting a fair and very practical paper, which should have been welcomed instead of being complained about. So began a new regime and after a while everyone agreed that things were much better than they used to be. We also move into better offices.
Gordon Arkley dabbled in amateur dramatics and had contacts with the film studios at Pinewood. One day he took me across there for lunch and introduced me to Glynis Johns and Robert Newton as well as a couple of other famous film stars whose names escape me. After a very 'boozy' lunch, we went across to the film-set and watched for a couple of hours. I cannot recall which film it was but it became one of the big hits of the 1950's. It was a most interesting experience.
During the year, I managed to get in a few hours flying from White Waltham airfield, mostly in Ansons, to visit other Flying Training Command units (to the Isle of Man and also to Northern Ireland). I also flew in a Procter, a Prentice and a Chipmunk.
It was just before Christmas, when I was sitting at my office desk, busy painting the air traffic control vehicle with black and white squares for the model airfield that I was making for Terry's Xmas present, when the Air Officer Commanding (Sir Arthur Pendred) chose to make his inspection (without notice) of the Examination Board's offices. I really thought I was in for big trouble for doing private work in duty time. When asked what I was doing, I decided to say precisely what, and why I was doing it! He did not blink an eyelid, had a good look at the model and then, as he turned for the door, wished me a happy Christmas and hoped that I managed to get it all finished in time!! Needless to say I put it all away quickly and tried to get on with some 'proper work'. I still expected that there would be repercussions but there never were. Some 5 year later (16/7/58), I was stationed at Pershore and I was flying with Group Captain Innes-Crump to a meeting at West Malling. When we entered the Bar in the Mess to get a drink before lunch, there was a large group in the corner surrounding a very senior officer – It was Sir Arthur! I was never more surprised in my life when he broke off talking to the others and called across to me to come and join his party. He greeted me as though I was a long lost friend and, remembering my name, ordered drinks for me and the Group Captain before asking me, with a smile on his face, if I ever managed to get [italics] that [/italics] Xmas present finished in time!! A marvellous man.
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1954
Started building model aircraft again and flew them in the fields at the back of the bungalow. After losing a glider, I made a Hawker Hunter powered by a 'jet' engine (in fact it was a pellet that had to be lit!) and Terry became quite upset when it got lodged up a tree. He started school in Woodley and has been back there recently to retrace his steps.
Bob Hunter, a Canadian who had been on the same course as me at Shawbury, was also based at Reading and he was always popping round to our place. He and his wife Marg are pictured, in the photo album, with us at the New Years Eve Party.
Having sat and worried about what happened last Xmas, was quite surprised to be offered, in February, a job on the Air Staff as Command Search & Rescue Officer & also to look after the Command Film Library. Apparently there was considerable opposition from some of the others working there (mostly Wing Commanders and above) as normally only 'Permanent Commission' officers were offered this sort of post. However my new boss, Wing Commander Bagott, made it quite clear that someone 'on high' had approved my appointment and immediately suggested that I apply for a permanent commission (my original commission was 'Short Service' – i.e.: 8 years). When I pointed out that I had already applied and been turned down and was reluctant to go through it all again, he offered to have the necessary forms filled in and all I needed do was sign them! By the end of the day this was done, and two days later I was called away from my office to attend an Assessment Board. I was totally unprepared for this but was assured that I did not need to go and get 'dressed up' and 'not to worry'! The interview took about 2 minutes and was a complete farce – we just passed pleasantries! Within a few minutes I was told that, of the 13 candidates having been seen, I was the only one to be recommended. After a few days I was called for another interview with an AVM Allison who carried out a proper 'grilling' but he was very pleasant about it and made it quite plain that it was just a formality.
Shortly afterwards I was offered a brand new Married Quarter and we then moved into 15 Salmond Road, Whitley Wood – right opposite the Baggots! The appointment to a Permanent Commission was not confirmed until 25th August and backdated to 1st June 1954. (I had already been informed verbally quite early on).
[certificate]
In my new job I did a fair bit of visiting and on one occasion, whilst flying with Group Captain Alvey stopping off a [sic] various Units, I had a further brief meeting with Mac (my 'skipper' on Bomber Command). Due to my interest in model making I also got involved in the RAF Model Aircraft competitions and was 'asked' to act as a Judge on a couple of them (see pictures in album).
Here I was introduced to my first flight in a jet aircraft – the Canberra. I have to say that I did not particularly enjoy it (I got air-sick).
My work was very absorbing and most of the dissenters soon began to accept me. I enjoyed mixing with quite senior officers and only found it difficult to get on with some of the 'upward pushing' more junior people. We became very friendly with our next-door neighbours – The Lacey's and we all got on very well together. Christine had started school here and most of the children from 'The Patch' went there as well.
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1955
Having got nicely settled down in our Married Quarter I was somewhat disappointed to receive a Posting Notice in early January. However, I was told that it was supposed to be a prestige posting and about two weeks later I left Reading in a heavy snow blizzard on my way to the Royal Radar Establishment Flying Unit at RAF DEFFORD, near Worcester.
The Mess was deserted when I arrived in the gloom of a Sunday evening, with the snow still pelting down. Later, one or two others came in for a drink and were so friendly that I began to feel a little less dejected than I had been during the journey there. So began almost 5 years of a marvellous posting.
Initially, I lived in the Mess and immediately started flying in various aircraft, on trials of equipment designed by the 'boffins' at the Royal Radar Establishment at Malvern. My first flight was in Hastings TG503 piloted by 'Bert' Welvaert, aged 36, who claimed to be 'the youngest grandfather in the Air Force'. I next met up with Bert at the Berlin Airlift 50th Anniversary in May 1999
[photograph]
Bert Welvaert and myself standing if [sic] front of Hastings TG503’.
This aircraft is now on permanent display at the Allied Museum in Berlin.
I flew in the following types (in no particular order) during my stay on the unit (over 1000 hours all told):
Hastings
Lincoln
Shackleton
Dakota
Varsity
Ashton
Wayfarer
Marathon
Hermes
Devon
Valetta
Meteor
Canberra
Vampire
Whirlwind (Helicopter)
Fairly early on, I quite often flew with a pilot called Flt. Lt. Chase in a Hastings and around March time was scheduled to fly with him again on a trip to Farnborough. One of the other navigators, a Canadian (whose name I cannot remember), asked me to swap with him as he needed only a couple more hours to make up his first '1,000 hrs' before he left the unit to return to Canada. I agreed to do so just to do him a favour, but in the event I did myself a very special one as the aircraft crashed on take off from Farnborough, killing the navigator and severely injuring the flight engineer. The pilot and signaller were less severely injured and the two passengers in the back escaped with only minor injuries. When the news was first
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received, many of us were briefed to quickly break the news to the various wives and families. I was allocated the flight engineer's wife, wishing like mad that I had been able to go to the signaller's instead. However, as it turned out I was lucky again, as the signaller, whose wife had been told that he was "OK and not too badly hurt", had a relapse the following day and died from 'secondary shock'. On the other hand, John Mills the flight engineer, who had not been expected to live, remained in a coma for nearly a month and suddenly woke up one morning demanding to be fed as he was [italics] starving [/italics]! Although he finished up with a plate in his head, he actually returned to flying about six months later. The pilot recovered enough to return to flying but was posted away quite quickly when it was established that he had attempted to take off with the flying control locks still in place (i.e. [underlined] Pilot Error [/underlined])!
It is worth pointing out however, that the Hastings had mechanical locks of a new type instead of the old wooden blocks that fitted on the outside and had to be removed before getting into the aircraft. With the new method there was a lever in the cockpit that had to be actuated to release the locks. If the lever was operated whilst the aircraft had airflow over the wings etc., it did not release the locks as it was designed to do. As a result of this accident a modification was introduced to rectify the fault.
The funeral of the navigator took place in the local church in Pershore and I was a Pall Bearer for the funeral of the signaller in Scarborough. Once these funerals were out of the way, life gradually got back to normal.
After a short while I managed to find a 'hiring' – a large detached house in a very nice spot – 'Severn Croft', Bevere, in Worcester – and moved the family away from Reading. We have lots of expensive furniture, curtains etc., which has to be put away in store for safety. Started to make friends with the 'Lentons & Skeers' for Terry & Christine.
Peter was born in December and a new house is started in the field next to us. I did not fly at all this month and managed a fair bit of time off.
Pictures of us at the Summer Ball are in the photo-album.
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1956
The new Flight Commander (the unit split into two flights – 'A' Flight for piston engined & 'B' for jet aircraft), Sqn Ldr Tebbutt, shared an interest in model making and he started building a model boat whilst I stick to aircraft. I made a Tiger Moth, which flew well, and we used the airfield at weekends. Other aircraft that I made seemed to crash too easily and the Radar servicing Manager suggested that I use radio control. He offered to help me build it but I decided to put it into a model boat rather than aircraft as this was much safer.
Early in the year I got myself elected Mess Secretary, which slowed down the flying somewhat – sometimes to only 10-12 hours each month.
Being Mess Secretary became an almost full time job and, mixed in with developing a new radio control system to put into the destroyer that I built, my time was fully occupied and very rewarding. Two major Mess functions during the year and, as this was such a small Unit, I found myself suggesting, designing and constructing all the decorations for both of them. Fortunately the civilian component of the Unit made sure that I was able to get marvellous procurement & engineering assistance.
Peter was 1 year old just before the Christmas Ball and lots of locals attended his party.
1957
Started flying helicopters and was allowed to take the controls on odd occasions, eventually having some 'formal' instruction. I was told that fixed wing pilots are somewhat difficult to convert whereas other aircrew categories with good 'air sense' usually learn quite quickly. After about 10 hours dual I became reasonably competent and passed the 'brick wall' of it being in charge of you, to you being in charge of it!!
[photograph]
RRFU Defford, 1957
Group Captain Innes-Crump took me under his wing and nominated me as his navigator. We did various trips to conferences etc. and eventually he let me do most of the flying and some take-offs & landings (in a Devon). Many of the pilots started to let me fly the aircraft from the right-hand seat and eventually I even landed a Hastings all on my own (or at least I thought I did).
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[page break]
[photograph]
Lincoln at zero feet!
Flying with Group Captain Innes-Crump (OC, RRFU Pershore)
At end of October the Unit moved from Defford to Pershore and took on a somewhat more formal atmosphere, which was not to everyone's liking.
10th December 1957, Peter's 2nd birthday and disaster on the Unit. One of 'B' Flight jet aircraft went missing and presumed crashed in the hills over North Wales. I had to visit the wife of one of crew members to warn her that her husband 'would be late home'. A dreadful story to delay the almost inevitable. As a result I was also 'late home' for the Birthday Party and could not say why – I was not very popular!!
Next day, along with others, flew a 4-hour sortie to see if we could find the crash site. Although flying very low ourselves amongst the treacherous hills, we could not find anything. Just before we were due to leave the area, we received a message that Mountain Rescue team had found the site and both crew had been killed. It was some way from where we had been looking near 'Drum Hill'. Another funeral to attend, and just before Christmas too. However see picture in album of us at Xmas Ball a few days later!
1958
Lots of flying each month this year mostly in:
Hastings
Varsity
Devon
Valetta
July – see item, 5th paragraph of 1953 re. Sir Arthur Pendred. Also see article & photos in 'Air Clues'.
The atmosphere at Pershore was not the same as at Defford. However, we all became very settled in at Bevere and friendly with neighbours – Lentons around corner, the Hucksters at the back and the next-door families on both sides. – A very pleasant year.
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1959
At beginning of year got in regular flying each month. Flew in a Meteor for the first time with Wing Commander Lawrence as pilot. Also did some more helicopter piloting but had become quite stale after so long.
April was particularly busy, flying, but after the first few days in June got caught for admin work.
On 10th July I was handed a signal informing me along with others (but not Flt. Lt. Smith mentioned in signal – see photo-album), that passage was booked on the FLANDRE, sailing 17th July, to attend a training course on the 'Thor Missile' in the USA. Mad panic to get ready and needed to get a Dinner Jacket for the voyage and other items at a time when I was particularly low on funds. Pam was not very happy with the idea of me being away for so long and having to look after everything on her own. Fortunately the neighbours at Bevere were all very supportive.
Travelled First Class by train from Worcester via London where we were joined by another group of RAF but who considered themselves very superior and tried to keep apart from us as much as they could. The Flandre was a French passenger liner of some 15,000 tons and the First Class passengers (mostly American – and us of course!) were extremely well looked after. After a very enlightening voyage and a charter flight to TUCSON Arizona, we started our training on Thor missiles at Davis Monathon AFB. Our group consisted of: self; Flt. Lt. Colin Reeve; Flt.Lt. Walker; Flt. Lt. Evans & Flg. Off. Nancarrow, together with Americans: Captains Jim Hadsell; Mel Schaffer & Carl Heintz. After an intensive 'ground' training period there, we travelled by car with Jimmy Hadsell via the Grand Canyon and Hoover Dam to Vandenberg AFB California.
[photograph]
Davis Monathon AFB, Tucson Arizona
Standing (in uniform), L-R: Flight Lieutenants John Evans, Jeff Walker, Colin Reeve, Myself
Below: USAF Captains Jim Hadsell and Mell Schaffer, Flying Officer Frank Nancarrow,, Captain Carl Heintz
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When the training had finished, another charter flight back to New York and thence on the SS America back to Southampton, where I was met by the family, who had been driven there by Mr Lenton.
Posted to No. 82 Squadron SHEPHERDS GROVE as Launch Control Officer in December.
[photograph]
RAF Thor Launch, July 1959
Vandenberg AFB, California
1960
Found a bungalow in Diss – about 10 miles from Shepherds Grove – to take on as a 'Hiring'. We moved from 'Severn Croft' on a very bleak and foggy day. It was very nostalgic as we had started to 'put down roots' in Worcester and very difficult as far as Schools were concerned. The journey was very hazardous as the car was loaded down with all the last minute items – Including the animals. At one point near Diss we finished up in a field because the fog was so thick – but eventually got to Diss about 4 hours later than planned.
I had not been in the Bungalow for long and was at home one lunchtime, when a Victor en-route for Honington, passed overhead quite low making a horrible roaring noise. We all rushed outside to see the aircraft on fire and will the crew to eject (we did not know at this time that only the pilots had ejection seats). Eventually, parachutes were seen to open but the aircraft dived into the ground about 2 miles away. As I was in uniform, I decide to drive towards the crash sight [sic] to see if I could help – but before I could get within a mile of it I was held up by masses of sightseers crowding the narrow lanes. In the end I gave up and returned home. It transpired that 2 of the crew had been killed – one of them opening his 'chute too late and the other (one of the pilots) getting out too late.
Spent the whole of the year on shift covering 365 days a year and having responsibility for 3 Thor nuclear missiles every time I was on shift.
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1961
Was selected to join the Feltwell Thor Missile Training Flight after categorisation by Bomber Command. [italics] Second US trip, this time to Vandenberg AFB, California for THOR test firing] [/italics]
[photograph]
82 Squadron crew. With RAF THOR Missile, Vandenberg AFB
1962
[inserted] Fl/L Moore [/inserted]
Headquarters Bomber Command,
Royal Air Force,
High Wycombe,
Bucks.
[underlined] Order of the Day [/underlined]
[underlined] To all Thor Squadrons and Stations [/underlined]
The decision to phase out the Thor Force of Bomber Command in no way detracts from the vital role which the force played in the past, and the significant part it will continue to play in future, until the very last missile is withdrawn.
Thor was the first strategic missile system operational in the West. At a time when the threat to this country came almost entirely from manned aircraft, you were the most formidable part of the defence of the United Kingdom, and the Western Alliance.
You in the Thor force have maintained a constant vigil day and night for almost four years. You have maintained a higher state of readiness in peacetime than has ever been achieved before in the history of the Armed Forces of the Crown. I am well aware of the sacrifices, so willingly accepted, that this constant readiness has imposed on the officers and airmen of the force.
I am content that History will recognise your devoted service in the cause of peace. I know that I can rely on you for the same devotion during the rundown phase, as you have shown since the birth of the force in 1958.
[signature]
(K. B.E. CROSS)
Air Marshal.
Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief.
Bomber Command
2nd August, 1962.
Announcing the rundown of Britain's THOR missile defence programme
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1963
A very severe winter and had great difficulty travelling back and forth. On the way to Shepherds Grove, while driving along a cutting through a snowdrift, a car coming the other way crashed into me. Although my car was damaged, after temporary repairs I managed to drive it back to Diss and put it in to garage for proper repair. In the meantime, I used the Vespa scooter to get to the Units to do my categorisations. Strange, but everyone seemed to know I was coming, so the grapevine seemed to be working overtime.
All the pipes froze up at 102 Victoria Road, including the underground ones from the mains. Had to get water from our next-door neighbours, who remained unaffected. The Council eventually cleared the mains by passing an electric current in some way.
In July I was informed that [underlined] [italics] my services were no longer required by the RAF [/italics] [/underlined] and that I was to have a 'Last Tour Posting' somewhere nearby. I was shattered by this news as I had very high ratings in my job and good yearly assessments. I appealed to the Group Captain who was as much astounded as I was, particularly as other officers were being kept on whom he would 'court martial' given half a chance. Eventually he informed me that somewhere, someone with 'influence' didn't like me, and I must have upset whoever it was. So no reprieve!
Middle of July, I was posted to 721 Mobile Signals Unit based at Methwold as Commanding Officer – very strange! I was met with the results of a drunken brawl amongst members of the Unit under the previous CO and it took all of my energy and some very smooth talking to get it sorted out. Managed to restore unit pride with only two people being posted away and reprimands for a couple of others. It turned into a happy posting once I got everyone on my side. Managed to get damage fixed without any further problems.
The unit acted as a bomb plot for the "V" Force and had the call sign 'BRANTUB'. Unfortunately in October the unit was ordered to move to Lindholme. So much for it being a 'Last Tour Posting' [underlined] [italics] near [/italics] [/underlined] present residence.
1964
The Lindholme posting was not as bad as expected. Fell ill with flu just as move took place and when I finally drove up there from Diss I found the Unit on an isolated site, well away from the rest of the Station (see photos in 'Nostalgia' album). Everything was in good order and working well, all thanks to the good spirit now on the unit and a Warrant Officer who worked wonders to get it going. I now had an assistant, Pilot Officer Frank Moss, who was a navigator on Vulcans. Since we were acting as a "Bomb Plot" for the "V" Force, I think the idea was for him to persuade me to give good scores despite some of the dismal results they had been getting previously!
Made a number of suggestions for improving our lot on the Station and moral was very high. Managed to get us out of AOC's inspection and this also went down well. On the operational side I was able to invent a means of our not having to listen to the sound put out to simulate "Blue Steel" bombing. This was achieved by converting the sound signal into a visual meter display so that we could watch rather than having to listen for 10 minutes each run. Everyone at Bomber Command were surprised that nobody had thought of this before.
After we had settled in and were given a good result from the Bomber Command Inspection Team, I managed to arrange our shifts so that I could get away for longer periods. Finally, at the end of October, I was given a firm retirement date. I was given a very emotional farewell from the Unit and, although the practice was frowned upon in higher circles, I was given an inscribed watch as a going away present from all the members of the Unit (some 26 people excluding myself).
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From Lindholme I was finally posted to Honington to begin formalities to leave the Air Force. I only spent a few days there, handing in Kit and obtaining all the necessary clearances. On 19th November I drove away from Honington having finally 'retired'. I shall always remember it being rather like a dream but I do recall listening on the car radio to a program featuring Pam's cousin, Christopher Gable, who was leaving the Royal Ballet to take up an acting career (Christopher's last performance with the Royal Ballet was in 1965. He died in 1998).
The break was so great that I was hardly able to make any plans for the future.
Right: The final farewell
[Ministry of Defence Crest]
MINISTRY OF DEFENCE
MAIN BUILDING, WHITEHALL, LONDON, S.W.1.
TELEPHONE WHITEHALL [indecipherable number]
29th October 1964
Dear Flt. Lt. Moore
The Secretary of State for Defence has it in command from Her Majesty The Queen to convey to you on leaving the Active List of the Royal Air Force her thanks for your long and valuable services.
May I take this opportunity of wishing you all good fortune in the future.
[signature]
Flight Lieutenant D. Moore
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1965
I managed to get a job with Marconi at Southend working with the modifications team and liaison with the RAF! It was very poorly paid but it was the best I could do under the circumstances.
We decided to move away from Diss and chose Chelmsford as the best place to settle down. It was the nearest into London that I wanted to go and the furthest out that Pam wanted to be. We started looking around and were particularly interested in some new houses being built on a development on the edge of town on Springfield road. They were more than I could really afford and the one we liked was suddenly sold to someone else. We needed to move quite quickly and when we saw a chalet bungalow, which Pam seemed to like, we decided to set the wheels in motion to buy it. No sooner had we paid a deposit than one of the new ones came back on the market, even before the walls had been built, so we decided to buy that one instead. I managed to commute half of my £500 a year RAF pension and the £250 translated into a cash sum of nearly £6,000, which only left a small mortgage requirement. The purchase proceeded reasonably smoothly and we finally moved into 2 Llewellyn Close on 9th April 1965. Moving into a newly built house was not such a good idea and all sorts of snags were encountered.
Only earning a pittance and very unhappy with what was expected of me, I started to look around again for another job.
1966
Got a job as Training Officer with Littlewoods operating out of Basildon, visiting all their stores in the south of England. Found it very difficult as all the lady supervisors were very suspicious of me and not at all co-operative. Was suddenly called up to Liverpool and made redundant with no reason given.
1967
Spent the whole year job hunting and at last got a job with John Zinc just outside St. Albans.
1968
21/10/68 – 13/12/68. Completed a Training Officer course (construction Industry) in Slough.
Finally got a reasonable job with Balfour Beatty in Bread St. London but had to leave after they moved to Croydon.
1970
At last I got a decent job! Started with Powell Duffryn, Great Tower St. London on 19th January but made redundant when they de-centralised
1971
After spending most of the year job hunting I finally started working for Letchworth and District Printers Group Training Scheme on 1st December
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[page break]
1972
After travelling the 43 miles back and forth to Letchworth every day and finding it very tiring, we decided to look around for housing in Letchworth. I made up my mind that I wanted to be as near to work as possible and not have to travel any distance at all. Unfortunately this was a period of 'gazumping' and although our offer on the nice house we found in Cloisters Road and had been accepted, suddenly they had another buyer prepared to offer more. Reluctantly we bid for our present house and once again the offer was accepted. At the time of the year it looked much better than it actually was and, to make things worse, the day after swapping contracts the house in Cloisters came back on the market. We had easily sold our Chelmsford house and had completed on that, so we could not afford to change our minds. We finally moved into 116 West View on 15th May 1972.
Having been promised help in re-location by my employers, the Committee that had originally made the offer changed and all the new lot were prepared to give me was £100. I was not very happy about this and made my feelings very plain. But they just shrugged their shoulders.
1973 – 2010 No further entries
[photograph]
Celebrating my 80th Birthday
DM Memoirs (second Edition) Compiled and edited by Terry Moore, October 2010
Appendix and additional photographs – January 2011
Postscript – May 2012
Foreword – July 2012
[italics] The editor accepts no responsibility for inaccuracies [/italics]
45
[page break]
Postscript
The funeral service for my father took place at Harewood Park Crematorium, Stevenage, on Thursday 11th November 2010, attended by family, friends, representatives from the XV Squadron Association and colleagues from the North Herts. Branch of the Aircrew Association, of which he was president.
Like most airmen of his generation, Dad had a great affection for the Avro Lancaster, in which he spent many flying hours as navigator in both war time and peace, so it seemed most fitting that his ashes be scattered from the only remaining Lancaster still flying in this country.
[photograph] [photograph]
In May 2011, my wife and I made the ninety-mile trip to RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire where the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight is stationed and left the casket in the care of the Public Relations Manager who was to make the necessary arrangements.
[photograph] [photograph]
Dad took his "last flight" on 29th August 2011 in Avro Lancaster PA474 escorted by the Spitfire and Hurricane of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight. His ashes were scattered over North Norfolk, England.
[chart]
BBMF flight schedule for 29/08/2011
Terry Moore, May 2012
46
[page break]
1945 Appendix 1 Operational Sorties – September 1944 – April 1945
[underlined] NO 218 SQUADRON RAF METHWOLD Aircraft Letters "HA" [/underlined]
[underlined] 17/09/1944 [/underlined]Sortie No: 1 (Daylight). Target [underlined] BOULOGNE [/underlined]
Aircraft – PD277 Code "A". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 2 hours 45 minutes
762 Aircraft – 370 Lancasters; 351 Halifax; 41 Mosquito. Dropped more than 3000 tons of Bombs on German positions around Boulogne in preparation for an attack by Allied troops. The German garrison surrendered soon afterwards.
1 Lancaster & 1 Halifax lost.
[underlined] 23-24/09/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 2 (Night time). Target [underlined] NEUSS [/underlined]
Aircraft – PD256 Code "J". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 4 hours 35 Minutes
549 Aircraft – 378 Lancasters; 154 Halifax; 17 Mosquito. Most of the bombing fell in the dock & factory area. A short local report only says that 617 houses & 14 Public Buildings were destroyed and 289 people killed/150 injured.
5 Lancasters & 2 Halifax lost.
[underlined] 26/09/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 3 (Daylight). Target [underlined] CAP GRIS NEZ [/underlined]
Aircraft – NF 934 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlare [sic]
Flying Time – 2 Hours 55 Minutes
722 Aircraft – 388 Lancasters, 289 Halifax; 45 Mosquito – 531 aircraft to CAP GRIS NEZ (4 Targets) and 191 aircraft to 3 Targets in CALAIS. Accurate and intense bombing of all targets.
1 Lancaster lost
[underlined] 28/09/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 4 (Daylight). Target [underlined] CALAIS [/underlined]
Aircraft – PD277 Code "A". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 2 Hours 35 Minutes
341 Aircraft – 222 Lancasters; 84 Halifax; 35 Moquito. [sic] Target area covered in cloud but Master Bomber brought the force below cloud to bomb visually. Bombing was accurate.
1 Lancaster Lost
[underlined] 14/10/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 5 (Daylight). Target [underlined] DUISBURG [/underlined]
Aircraft – NF 934 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 4 Hours 5 Minutes
This raid was part of a special operation. (See page 601 of Bomber Command Diaries)
1013 Aircraft – 519 Lancasters; 474 Halifax; 20 Mosquito with RAF fighters escorting.
3574 Tons of HE & 820 Tons of incendiary.
13 Lancasters & 1 Halifax lost.
[underlined] 15/10/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 6 (Night time). Target [underlined] WILHEMSHAVEN [sic] [/underlined]
Aircraft ? Code "C". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 4 Hours
506 Aircraft – 257 Halifax; 241 Lancasters; 8 Mosquito.
Last of 14 Major raids on Port of Wilhemshaven [sic]. Bomber Command claimed "severe damage caused."
No record of any losses noted.
[underlined] 19/10/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 7 (Night time). Target [underlined] STUTTGART [/underlined]
Aircraft – NF 934 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 6 Hours 30 Minutes
565 Lancasters & 18 Mosquito in 2 forces 4 hours apart.
Serious damage caused to central and eastern districts (including BOSCH factory)
6 Lancasters lost.
[underlined] 23/10/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No. 8 (Night time). Target [underlined] ESSEN [/underlined]
Aircraft – NF 934 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 5 Hours 5 Minutes
1055 Aircraft – 561 Lancasters; 463 Halifax & 31 Mosquito. This was the heaviest raid on Essen so far in the war and the number of aircraft also the greatest number on any target. (These results achieved [underlined] without [/underlined] the Lancasters from 5 Group!! 4538 Tons of Bombs dropped.
[underlined] 29/10/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 9 (Daylight). Target [underlined] WESTKAPELLE (WALCHEREN) [/underlined]
Aircraft – NF 934 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 2 Hours 15 Minutes
358 Aircraft – 194 Lancasters; 128 Halifax & 36 Mosquito.
11 different ground positions attacked. Visibility was good and results were accurate.
1 Lancaster lost.
47
[page break]
[underlined] 04/11/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 10 (Daylight). Target [underlined] SOLINGEN [/underlined]
Aircraft – NF 934 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 4 Hours 30 Minutes
176 Lancasters of 3 Group. The raid was not considered successful as bombing scattered.
4 Lancasters lost
Note: Aircraft NF934 Code "G" went "missing" on 12/12/1944
Squadron Leader N.G. Macfarlane promoted to Wing Commander and posted as Officer Commanding No: XV Squadron RAF Mildenhall in mid-November and sends aircraft to fetch whole crew from Methwold
[underlined] NO: XV SQUADRON RAF MILDENHALL Aircraft letters "LS" [/underlined]
[underlined] 28/11/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 11 (Night time). Target [underlined] NEUSS (DUSSELDORF) [/underlined]
Aircraft – HK 695 Code "V". Pilot – Wing Commander N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 4 Hours 40 Minutes
145 Lancasters of 3 Group & 8 of 1 Group. GH Bombing attack. Modest damage.
No losses.
[underlined] 05/12/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 12 (Daylight). Target [underlined] SCHWAMMENAUEL DAM [/underlined]
Aircraft – ME 844 Code "C. Pilot – Wing Commander N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 4 Hours 40 Minutes
MASTER BOMBER – 56 Lancasters of 3 Group attempt to "Blow up" this Dam on river ROER to help American Army. Target covered in cloud. Only 2 aircraft bombed. No losses.
[underlined] 06/12/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 13 (Night time) Target [underlined] LEUNA MERSEBURG [/underlined] (Near LEIPZIG)
Aircraft – NG 357 Code "K" Pilot – Flt. Lt. Percy
Flying Time – 7 Hours 20 Minutes
475 Lancasters bombed Oil Target in Eastern Germany, 500 miles from UK. Cloud cover but considerable damage to the synthetic oil plant. 5 aircraft lost
[underlined] 08/12/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 14 (Daylight). Target [underlined] DUISBURG [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 357 Code "K". Pilot – Flt. Lt. Percy
Flying Time – 4 Hours 20 Minutes
163 Lancasters of 3 Group bombed on GH through cloud on railway yards. Good results.
No losses.
[underlined] 14/12/1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 15 (Night time). Target [underlined] MINING KATTEGAT [/underlined] (off KULLEN POINT)
Aircraft – NG 357 Code "K". Pilot – Flt. Lt. Percy
Flying Time – 7 Hours (Landed LOSSIEMOUTH)
30 Lancasters & 9 Halifax. Mines accurately laid. (see H2S photo) Diverted to Lossiemouth on return. No losses.
[underlined] 28/12//1944 [/underlined] Sortie No: 16 (Daylight). Target [underlined] COLOGNE [/underlined] (GREMBERG)
Aircraft – HK 693 Code "B". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 4 Hours 50 Minutes
167 Lancasters of 3 Group. Marshalling yards. Accurate bombing. No losses
[underlined] 01/01/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 17 (Night time). Target [underlined] VOHWINKEL [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 6 Hours 5 Minutes
146 Lancasters of 3 Group. Successful attack on railway yards. 1 aircraft lost
[underlined] 03/01/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 18 (Daytime). Target [underlined] DORTMUND [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 4 Hours 45 Minutes
99 Lancasters of 3 group. GH attacks through cloud on Coking plant (HANSA). Accurate bombing. 1 aircraft lost.
[underlined] 07-08/01/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 19 (Night time). Target [underlined] MUNICH [/underlined]
Aircraft – HK 618 Code "G". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 7 Hours 45 Minutes
645 Lancasters from 1,3, 5, 6 & 8 Groups – Very successful raid causing severe damage (see Terry's book – "Fliegeralarm" – Luftangriffe auf München 1940-1945)
11 aircraft lost and 4 crash in France
[underlined] 13/01/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 20 (Daylight). Target [underlined] SAARBRUCKENt [/underlined][sic]
Aircraft – ME 849 Code "L". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 6 Hours 20 Minutes
158 Lancasters of 3 Group attack Railway yards. Accurate but some overshooting
Divert to Predannack on return because of bad weather at base.
1 Aircraft lost
48
[page break]
[underlined] 16-17/01/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 21 (Night time). Target [underlined] WANNE EICKEL [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 5 Hours 5 Minutes
138 Lancasters of 3 Group attack Benzol plant. 1 Aircraft lost
[underlined] 23/01/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 22 (Daylight). Target [underlined] COLOGNE [/underlined] (GREMBERG)
Aircraft – PD 234 Code "E". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 5 Hours 55 Minutes
153 Lancasters from 3 Group attack Railway Yards. Good Visibility – Results variable
3 aircraft lost and 1 crashed in France
[underlined] 09/02/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 23 (Night time). Target [underlined] HOHENBUDBERG (DUISBERG KREFELD) [/underlined]
Aircraft – PD 234 Code "E". Pilot – Wing Commander N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 5 Hours 10 Minutes
151 Lancasters from 3 Group attack Railway Yards. 2 Lancasters lost
[underlined] 19/02/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 24 (Daylight). Target [underlined] WESEL [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 444 Code "Y". Pilot – Wing Commander N.G. Macfarlane
Flying Time – 5 Hours 15 Minutes
168 Lancasters from 3 Group. Good attack with best results around railway area
Leading Aircraft for whole of 3 Group. (I navigated and everyone else followed me!)
1 Lancaster lost
[underlined] 02/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 25 (Daylight). Target [underlined] COLOGNE [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 5 Hours 30 Minutes
858 Aircraft – 155 Lancasters from 3 Group. Only 15 aircraft from 3 Group bombed because of GH failure. All other bombing highly destructive. Cologne captured by the Americans 4 days later. 6 Lancasters lost
[underlined] 04/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 26 (Daylight). Target [underlined] WANNE EINCKEL [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 4 Hours 55 Minutes
128 Lancasters from 3 Group bombed on GH. No losses.
[underlined] 05/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 27 (Daylight). Target [underlined] GELSENKIRCHEN [/underlines]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 5 Hours 35 Minutes
170 Lancasters from 3 Group. Leading Aircraft for whole of 3 Group.
1 Lancaster lost
[underlined] 11/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 28 (Daylight). Target [underlined] ESSEN [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 6 Hours 5 Minutes
1079 Aircraft – 750 Lancasters. Attack accurate and Essen paralysed.
Leading aircraft for 32 Base. 3 Lancasters lost
[underlined] 22/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 29 (Daylight). Target [underlined] BOCHULT [/underlined]
Aircraft – PA 235 Code "E". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 5 Hours 15 Minutes
100 Lancasters from 3 Group. Leading aircraft for Squadron. Town seen to be on fire.
No losses
[underlined] 23/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 30 (Daylight). Target [underlined] WESEL [/underlined]
Aircraft – PA 235 Code "E". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 4 Hours 35 Minutes
Special GH attack to support Rhine crossing. 80 Lancasters from 3 Group.
Signal from General Eisenhower congratulating the crews concerned on their very accurate bombing.
[underlined] 29/03/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 31 (Daylight). Target [underlined] HALLENDORF [/underlined] (SALZGITTER)
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 7 Hours 5 Minutes
130 Lancasters from 3 Group. Attack on Benzol plant using GH. Leading aircraft for Squadron.
No losses
[underlined] 9-10/04/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 32 (Night time). Target [underlined] KIEL BAY [/underlined] – MINING
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 6 Hours 10 Minutes
70 Lancasters. No loss on Mining but 4 lost on main raid on Kiel (Very accurate - Pocket Battleship Admiral Scheer hit and capsized. Admiral Hipper Emden badly damaged.)
49
[page break]
[underlined] 14//04/1945 [/underlined] Sortie No: 33 (Night time). Target [underlined] POTSDAM [/underlined]
Aircraft – NG 358 Code "H". Pilot – Squadron Leader Percy
Flying Time – 8 Hours 35 Minutes
500 Lancasters. Attack successful and severe damage caused
1 Lancaster lost to night fighter.
Tour completed because the tour requirement was reduced from 40 to 30 whilst we were over Potsdam.
References Air 27 1352 (218 Sqn)
Air 27 204 & 205 (XV Sqn)
[photograph]
End of Tour, Mildenhall, April 1945
Lancaster "H" Howe, NG538
L-R: P/O Johnny Forster (flight engineer), Flt Sgt Jimmy Bourke (mid-upper gunner),
Ft Sgt 'Nobby' Clarke (rear gunner), Sqn Ldr Pat "Tojo" Percy (pilot), Flt Sgt Dennis "Napper" Evans (wireless op.)
F/O Tom Butler (bomb aimer), F/O Dennis Moore (navigator)
[photograph)
End of Tour, Mildenhall, April 1945
Lancaster "H" Howe, NG538
Squadron Leader Percy & Crew with ground crew
50
[page break]
1945 Appendix II
[underlined] Lancaster NG 358 Mark B1. XV Squadron (15) Coded LS-H [/underlined]
This aircraft was built by Armstrong Whitworth at their Baginton factory and was one of 400 delivered to the RAF between July 1944 & February 1945. The previous LS-H was HK 648 and NG 358 first appeared on the squadron in Mid-December 1944. It was finally 'Struck off charge' on 19/10/1945
[photograph]
Dates actually flown in this aircraft:
30/12/1944 Day 1450 'GH' Bombing Exercise
1-2/01/1945 Night 1610 6.05 VOHWINKEL 146 a/c, 3 missing
03/01/1945 Day 1250 4.45 DORTMUND 50 a/c
16-17/01/1945 Night 2307 5.05 WANNE EINCKEL 138 a/c, 1 missing
27/01/1945 Day 1005 Air Test
02/03/1945 Day 1200 5.30 KÖLN Led 32 BASE, 531 a/c, 6 missing
04/03/1945 Day 0946 4.45 WANNE EINCKEL 128 a/c
05/03/1945 Day 0940 5.35 GELSENKIRCHEN Led 3 Group, 170 a/c, 1 missing
11/03/1945 Day 1200 6.05 ESSEN Led 32 BASE, 750 a/c, 3 missing
29/03/1945 Day 1230 7.05 HALLENDORF Led SQUADRON, 130 a/c
09-10/04/1945 Night 2000 6.10 KIEL BAY MINING 70 a/c
14-15/04/1945 Night 1825 8.55 BERLIN (POTSDAM) 500 a/c, 2 missing
The crew of 'H' – 'HOWE' on the above flights was:
Pilot Squadron Leader Pat Percy
Navigator Flying Officer Dennis Moore
Bomb Aimer Flying Officer Tom Butler (Canadian)
F/Engineer Pilot Officer Johnnie Forster
Wireless Op. F/Sgt. Dennis Evans
Mid Upper F/Sgt. Jimmy Bourke
Rear Gunner F/Sgt. Nobby Clarke
Other 'operations' in other aircraft were flown with Wing Commander N.G. Macfarlane as Pilot. (see note below)
51
[page break]
[underlined] Explanations: [/underlined]
Bomber Command was split into GROUPS (mainly 3 & 5 Group) – each Group split into 3 BASES and each Base comprised 2 or 3 airfields on which there were usually 2 SQUADRONS. Each Squadron was normally split in two FLIGHTS although sometimes they had three. 3 Group Base were Nos. 31; 32 & 33. 31 Base comprised STRADISHALL & WRATTING COMMON plus one other; 32 Base comprised MILDENHALL, LAKENHEATH & METHWOLD. 33 Base comprised WATERBEACH, WITCHFORD & MEPAL. The other Squadron at MILDENHALL at this time was No 622 (Australian). Each Squadron normally had 24 aircraft and a 'MAXIMUM EFFORT' was achieved when all of them flew on an OPERATION ('op').
All daylight trips were in tight FORMATION and Bombing was done on 'GH' – which was operated by the navigator who actually 'pressed the button'. The Bombing Leaders were distinguished by the double yellow bars on the tailfin/rudder. All others in the flight bombed on the Leader. A limited number of Squadrons & Aircraft in No 3 Group were fitted with this equipment, which was extremely accurate.
Note. Mac (or Nigel, as I now am allowed to call him) lives in a retirement home near Capetown, South Africa. At the Mildenhall register meeting in May 1995 I was told he had died. The following day I was able to contact his son Ian (whom we had 'baby-sat') who is now a Harley Street Consultant and he put paid to this rumour.
Nigel & Margaret visited the UK June 2000 to celebrate their 60th Wedding Anniversary and Pam & I were invited to their Party. Not able to drive at the time so unable to go. Terry offered to pick him up and take him with us to Squadron 85th Birthday celebrations at Lossiemouth. Unfortunately he was not well enough so Terry & I went to Lossiemouth on our own.
1945 Appendix III
[italics] The Operational Sortie which the crew decided had turned me from being a "very Good" Navigator into an "ACE" Navigator. (Their words - not mine!!) [/italics]
An operational order was "posted" quite early in the morning of the 7th January 1945 and the fuel load was 2154 gallons (the maximum) so we all knew that we were in for a long haul. At the pre-flight briefing Munich was announced as the target and we were allocated HK618 "G" (George) with Squadron Leader Percy as pilot. We learned later that 645 aircraft from 1;3;5;6 and 8 Groups loaded with 1 x 4000 pounder (Cookie) and clusters of incendiaries, carried out a very successful bombing raid causing very severe damage. (See photos in Terry's book). A total of 11 aircraft were lost and another 4 crashed in France (nearly 3%, which was quite high at this time).
Getting airborne at 1830, the flight out was quite uneventful from a navigational point of view with 'Gee' working well and covering a good way down into France. Having bombed on a well lit (burning) target, the Alps were now the only visible landmarks and, at the appropriate time, we turned onto a northerly heading based on the wind component calculated on the way down across France. We kept going on this heading, expecting to pick up something to give us a 'fix' but unfortunately nothing was forthcoming, and at the ETA at the French coast I asked if any of the crew could see anything. Nobody else could see through the cloud but the rear gunner (who had a good downward view) finally called to say that we had just passed over a 'Pundit' flashing what turned out to be Manston!! Quickly turning on the IFF (identifying friend not foe) and crossing the Thames estuary, a quick calculation, the message" Maintain heading – ETA base in 17 minutes" was passed to the pilot. EXACTLY 17 minutes later the pilot reported "overhead base – joining circuit. Well done Navigator" Thus ended a 7hour 45 minute flight and the very tired but elated crew gathered in the briefing room to be met, as usual, by the padre dishing out the rum ration for those that wanted it. I was quite happy to have my share while we were being de-briefed, with a crew enthusing over my marvellous navigation (all the way back from the south of France without having to change heading once!!) and then off to the quarters behind the Mess to a well earned sleep.
What was never mentioned to anyone – and the crew in particular – was that, had the heading been just ONE degree to starboard, we would have gone sailing – literally – up the north sea and, because of the cloud cover, not know why we never made it back to base – if we had survived the ditching in the dark and subsequent days adrift in the North Sea – that is!!!
52
[page break]
1945 Appendix IV
[underlined] Dakota Flights (as Navigator) July 1945 – May 1946 [/underlined]
109 OTU Crosby on Eden
08/07/1945 – 23/07/1945 DAY 18.55, NIGHT 7.45
PILOTS: Flt/Lt Mason & Flt/Lt Samuael
Aircraft registrations: FZ609 KG502 KG619 KG658 KG664 KG666
B Flight 1383T/C.U
26/07/1945 – 27/08/1945 DAY 49.55, NIGHT 26.15
PILOTS: P/O Zygnerski & Flt/Lt Herringe
Aircraft registrations: FL652 KG373 KG392 KG638 KG726 KG644 KG649 KG657 KG726
52 Squadron RAF DUM-DUM CALCUTTA
01/12/1945 – 08/05/1946 DAY 345.25, NIGHT 13.50
PILOTS: Mainly F/O Harris but also Flt/Lt Ruddle, F/O Lofting, Flt/Lt Earwalker & F/O MacArthur
Route flying from Calcutta to Bangkok, Saigon (Ho Chi Minh), Hong Kong, sometimes calling into Chittagong, Meiktila, Hmawbi, Rangoon, Canton
Aircraft registrations:
FL507 FL612 KG212 KG502 KG573 KG923
KJ813 KJ814 KJ820 KJ904 KJ963 KK190
KN211 KN219 KN231 KN239 KN240 KN299
KN301 KN308 KN341 KL507 KN534 KN573
KN600 KN604 KN630 KN633 KP211
Total Hours: DAY 413.35 NIGHT 47.10
Appendix 1949
[underlined] "Lancastrian" G – AGWI/1281/TX276/111 [/underlined]
I flew 13 Sorties as Navigator in this Aircraft on the Berlin Airlift.
Registered 28/11/1945 to Ministry of Aircraft Production.
Certificate of Airworthiness No: 7283 24/01/1946.
Delivered to BSAA (British South American Airways) Heathrow 27/01/1946
Named 'Star Land'
Registered to Ministry of Civil Aviation 16/08/1948.
Sold to Flight Refuelling Ltd. 16/01/1949 and Registered to them 18/01/1949.
Allotted Fleet No. 'Tanker 26' and flew [underlined] 226 [/underlined] Sorties on Berlin Airlift
Scrapped at Tarrant Ruston 26/09/1951.
Berlin Airlift
[logo] Berlin Airlift [emblem]
[drawing]
[inserted] TX 276/1281 [/inserted]
AVRO LANCASTRIAN – FLIGHT REFUELLING LTD
47403
On 23 June 1948, the Soviet forces occupying the eastern part of Germany blockaded all rail, road and waterway supply routes from the Allied Western Occupation Zones in Berlin. With less than one month’s supply of food and fuel, the prospects for the two and a half million Berliners looked bleak. Only three severely restricted air routes remained as a lifeline between the besieged city and the western world. The Allies responded immediately with a miracle of logistics – The Berlin Airlift. Codenamed Operation Vittles by the USAF, and Operation Plainfare by the RAF, over a period of 11 months Allied aircraft made thousands of flights into the cramped airspace of Berlin and succeeded in supplying everything the city needed. Every available aircraft from RAF Transport Command was in service, as well as hundreds of USAF aircraft and even civil charter firms were called upon to supplement the effort. The operation became so skilled that the Soviet Command eventually realised that they had failed and on 12 May 1949 the blockade was finally lifted.
Avro Lancastrian G-AGWI represents an aircraft which was originally delivered to British South American Airways (BSAA) at Heathrow in January 1946. The aircraft was registered to the Ministry of Civil Aviation for a short period in 1948 before being sold to Flight Refuelling in January 1949. The aircraft was then allotted fleet no. Tanker 26 and flew 226 sorties on the Berlin Airlift.
[inserted] I FLEW IN 13 OF THEM [/inserted] [diagram]
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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Dennis Moore Autobiography
Description
An account of the resource
Dennis Moore's autobiography, compiled and edited by his son, Terry Moore.
Creator
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Dennis Moore
Format
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53 typed sheets
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
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BMooreDMooreDv1
Coverage
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Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Germany--Weeze
England--London
England--Wallington Garden
Netherlands--Zandvoort
England--Croydon
England--Hartland
England--Lynton
England--Salcombe
England--Amersham
England--Newquay
England--Manchester
Scotland--Greenock
United States
New York (State)--New York
Canada
New Brunswick--Moncton
Maine--Portland
New Brunswick--Shediac
New Brunswick--Fredericton
Manitoba
Manitoba--Brandon
Manitoba--Winnipeg
Ontario--Toronto
Ontario--Hamilton
Ontario--London
Alberta--Medicine Hat
England--Harrogate
Scotland--Stranraer
France--Angers
Germany--Neuss
England--Carlisle
England--Morecambe
Pakistan--Karachi
Malta
Egypt--Cairo
Burma--Rangoon
India--Mumbai
China--Guangzhou
China--Hainan Sheng
China--Hong Kong
India--Darjeeling
England--Liverpool
England--Hastings
Kenya--Nairobi
Italy--Verona
Morocco--Marrakech
Northern Ireland--Belfast
Senegal--Dakar
Brazil--Natal
Argentina--Buenos Aires
Turkey--İzmir
Israel
Newfoundland and Labrador--Gander
Greenland
Iceland
Cyprus--Nicosia
Iraq--Baghdad
Bahrain
England--Blandford Forum
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Hamburg
England--Skellow
England--Worcester
England--Scarborough
England--Pershore
Arizona--Tucson
California--Vandenberg Air Force Base
England--Diss
England--Chelmsford
England--Basildon
England--St. Albans
England--Slough
England--Letchworth
England--Stevenage
France--Calais
Germany--Duisburg
Germany--Wilhelmshaven
Germany--Stuttgart
Germany--Essen
Netherlands--Walcheren
Germany--Solingen
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/571/10320/BFraserDKFraserDKv1.2.pdf
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Fraser, Donald Keith
D K Fraser
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Fraser, DK
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12 items. Two oral history interviews with Warrant Officer Donald Keith Fraser DFM (1924 - 2022, 1566621 Royal Air Force), a memoir, his log book, photographs and service material. The collection also contains an interview with Sylvia Fraser, his wife. He flew a tour of operations as a flight engineer with 101 Squadron.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Donald Keith Fraser and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
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2016-11-04
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WO DONALD KEITH FRASER
DFM 1566621
101 SQUADRON
JULY 1943 – MARCH 1944
CREW NAME: WL EVANS
[photograph of Donald Fraser]
[page break]
[photograph of Bomber Command Memorial]
[page break]
Contents
Page
Chapter A Introduction. 1
Chapter B Prior to World War II. 3
Chapter C Joined RAF 23rd July 1942. 7
Chapter D 101 Squadron Base Ludford Magna. 11
Chapter E 101 Squadron Operation Dates and Targets. 15
Chapter F 101 Squadron Notes on Various Operations. 17
Log Book and Battle Orders. 34
Chapter G Christmas 1943 and Christmas Dinner Menu. 41
Chapter H After Operations posted to Heavy Conversion Units. 45
Lindholme. 45
Bottesford. 47
Cottesmore. 51
North Luffenham. 52
Chapter I Advances in Technology. 55
What if? . 57
Chapter J Aircrew Bomber Command. 59
Wartime Bomber Squadrons. 60
Bombing of Berlin. 60
A Day in the Life of a Squadron. 61
Clothing Worn on Operations by our Crew. 62
Contact made with Two Crew Members plus information on others. 63
Chapter K The Lancaster Story. 67
Further notes relating to Black Thursday including information given by Len Brooks our Rear Gunner. 73
[page break]
[four photographs of author and Avro Lancaster]
[page break]
INTRODUCTION
Over the past 50 to 60 years I have enjoyed reading many books about bomber crews who flew with Bomber Command during World War II especially during the period from mid July 1943 until the end of the war. These books contained many accounts of true grit and heroism carried out by crew members. There are, however, a few experiences recalled which appear doubtful, a number of reported instances which are far-fetched or quite ridiculous to have suggested could have occurred.
Crews of the heavy bombers normally consisted of seven crew members all of whom were well trained to carry out specific tasks and as a team made up a competent crew capable of carrying out the various operations asked of them.
Operations were normally carried out over Europe (mainly to Germany) targets being the main industrial areas, factories, railway junctions and yards and eventually towns and cities, such as Berlin, Hanover, Hamburg, Leipzig, Frankfurt to name a few, all of which by 1943 the inhabitants were heavily involved in production for the German war effort.
The Bomber crews objectives were to carry out the operations they flew on to reach the target, drop their bombs and return home safely with their aircraft undamaged. Remember all these young men were volunteers, highly trained with the Pilot usually the “Skipper” and Captain, this was not to say that he gave all the orders and that no crew member acted until he gave that order. The Flight Engineer and Wireless Operator were the most mobile within the aircraft, therefore, if a situation occurred within the fuselage either or both could intervene by giving a quick call to the “Skipper”, or should a fault occur with the engine, the Flight Engineer would usually be the first to notice and carry out the essential remedy while informing the Pilot of the situation with procedure carried out. For a crew to be efficient and confident they had to be alert at all times, watching, listening and acting immediately. Survival required a highly trained crew team with loads of confidence in one’s self and in the other crew members and in the aircraft, so giving them a very strong attitude to press on.
A dedicated, loyal and skilful ground crew, a strong reliance in the Almighty (or what faith one had) and with very importantly more than normal, good luck, having lady luck on your side.
I have therefore put on paper a few experiences which happened to our crew while flying over Germany during mid 1943 to mid 1944. The following are not from diaries – they are what I recall after a long time. The experiences are genuine, the timing may be a little out, but to the reader it will still show the excitement, the pressure, sometimes fear, but above all the confidence and determination the crew had to carry out the task involved and return back to base with a full crew still intact.
A question I have been asked many times “why did you enjoy flying and with such odds against staying alive?” My answer, I loved flying, I enjoyed the excitement and I volunteered. I also liked the thought of coming back to base to a good meal and I felt safe and secure in my sometimes cold bed with its nice white sheets, compared to the Army personnel who
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worked under much more difficult conditions not knowing when they would eat or sleep and under conditions just as dangerous as ours, in fact, in many, more so.
By the end of writing I hope that I provide you with some idea of what these then young crew members of Bomber Command endured when flying over Germany for 6 to 7 1/2 hours at a time in a Lancaster bomber with around 2,000 gallons of fuel stored in tanks in the wings and with up to five tons of bombs slung under their feet along the fuselage, travelling at 250 miles an hour in the dark at 20-21,000 feet in height with temperatures of from -10 to 20oC below zero and with German fighters trying to shoot them down and with anti-aircraft guns (which could be very accurate) also trying to blow them up, just to make our journey a little more scary at times to find that on returning when we reached the English coastline that it was covered in thick cloud and dense fog making it almost impossible to find somewhere to land. Some of the words most suited to express the emotions of the crew in certain situations could be excited, interesting, scary, fear, relief, apprehensive and difficult.
I think, however, that the Brylcream boys done a very good job all these years ago.
Happy days!
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CHAPTER B
PRIOR TO WORLD WAR II
1919-1939
The First World War ended in 1919 after four years of fighting and with a very heavy loss of life on both sides. Those who were lucky enough to survive and return home found it extremely difficult to find employment.
The Government had created some opportunities by forming the Forestry Commission with the role to establish over the coming fifty years a supply of timber sufficient to make the UK self sufficient in wood requirements. This was to be created by the purchase of large areas of land, mainly in Scotland and North England (cheap less productive land) then cultivating and planting this land with conifer species. To achieve this management had to be trained and forestry workers had to be recruited.
Forestry schools were established throughout England and Scotland to educate and train management staff. One such school was opened at Dunkeld in Central Scotland where a Mr Simpson received his training and he afterwards took up the post of Nursery Manager at Tulliallan Nursery, Kincardine on the Forth.
During the war the larger estates had suffered from the lack of gamekeepers and staff to carry out the maintenance and control of vermin etc, therefore there were many vacancies for people interested to fill these posts. My father and two of his brothers did just that, they became keepers on some of the very large estates in Scotland.
My father and mother were married shortly after the war and he took up an appointment as a game keeper on a large estate near Stirling, where my sister Jean and elder brother Sandy were born. In 1923 he moved to take up Keepering on Tulliallan Estate near Kincardine. The family lived in the East Lodge which was situated adjacent to the main road from Kincardine to Dunfermline and next to the land belonging to the Forestry Commission nursery. This is where I was born on 24th August 1923. Two years later the family again moved, this time to take on the position of head keeper on Donibristle Estate and lived in the small village of Auchtertool, Fifeshire where my two younger sisters, Betty and Mary were born. These were from what little I can recall, were happy times, the family did not have much spare cash but had sufficient to satisfy the family needs.
Mr Simpson lost part of his right arm during the first War and had an artificial part fitted. In 1949 I joined the Forestry Commission Research Branch and guess where I was stationed, at Tulliallan Nursery and Mr Simpson was still there. He told me that when my father left the East Lodge in 1925 he bought his hens and chickens from him. In 1950 the Forestry Commission built around 20 houses for its staff some 400 yards west of the East Lodge and Sylvia and myself were lucky enough to have one of them. Mr Simpson played an important role in our lives over the next 30 years, however this is another story.
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Moray estate during the winter months arranged a number of pheasant shoots to which a number of friends and associates of the Lairds (The Earl of Moray) were invited to attend.
The 29th January 1929 was one of those days and the shoot covered the area which my father was responsible for. The morning started with rain, however the shoot commenced and the guns and beaters started with good success. A good number of birds were raised and shot, as the day continued the weather became worse and by lunchtime, thunder and lightning had started so it was decided to call the shoot off. During the morning a few birds had been shot, but had not been collected by the dogs so my father with his two spaniels decided he would retrace the morning route and see if he could collect lost birds. The weather continued to deteriorate, while he was crossing a fence he was hit by lightning. As the day went on and he had not returned the other two keepers decided they would go and look for him. They found him where he lay by the fence with his two dogs nearby. This was a terrible and tragic day for all concerned, my mother with five children all under the age of 11, no house and little money coming in to support the family. My mother did have two sisters who stayed in Edinburgh and who visited fairly regularly and helped all they could with the family. The estate owner, the Earl of Moray and the Estate Factor were very helpful and within a week or two, arranged for the family to move to Aberdour where they gave us a house with a fairly large garden (this became quite a good asset especially when the War came).
I was told when I was much older that at the time there was much talk about what should happen to the family the suggestion being that the family should be split up with the three girls staying with mum and the two boys (Sandy and myself) being placed with other people possibly with a relative or with other people. Our mother strongly disagreed and said none of the family would leave they would stay together. I believe that my mother made the right decision, had the family been split up, our lives would have been totally different and not for the better in my opinion.
These were hard times for our mother (in those days there was not the same support or financial assistance available to call on as there is today) however somehow our mum managed to sort things out and keep all the family together. Unfortunately we as children were too young to contribute in the way of bringing in money to the home, our mum was a very likeable person and soon made friends and was extremely capable of working to earn money, she turned her hand to doing housework and helping people in their homes and for two days each week helping in Donibristle Estate house, which meant a fairly long walk to get there (one mile each way).
She and her sisters were always very happy smiling people always ready for a joke, this helped to make life much better for everyone. She still had friends on the estate and the whole family occasionally in an evening would take a walk of around three miles to visit Mr and Mrs Linton, he also was a gamekeeper on the estate.
Our mum was also a good Christian and attended church fairly regularly and also enjoyed attending some of the concerts and meetings held in the village hall, she also was a member of the WI.
The estate was very good to the family we received twice a year a load of fire wood, which myself and Sandy would chop up into suitable sizes to use on the fire. In the Spring the estate workers would come to dig over the garden and planted potatoes which helped greatly, this meant that all we (Sandy and I) had to do was keep the garden free from weeds and hill up the potatoes and plant some vegetables.
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As time moved on and we the children grew older all by the age of eight or nine years managed to find jobs. Sandy and myself delivering milk before going to school and then delivering groceries after school and at weekends Jean our oldest sister assisted in the Cooperative grocery shop. This of course all helped to bring in some money.
The school leaving age at that time was 15. We all attended Aberdour school initially. At the age of 11 the choice was either moving to Burtisland school which was a technical college or go to Dunfermline high school, both schools were a distance away from Aberdour and required travelling by bus. All the girls, Jean, Betty and Mary enjoyed Dunfermline High, while Sandy and myself went to the technical school. We all got excellent grades in the exams. I left school in 1938 at a time when the job situation was very limited with little choice. I had two interests, first to be a forester, my dream being to see all the high elevation land covered with trees as it was during much earlier times and take part in that operation. Secondly to become an Engineer.
I applied for two jobs, one on the Moray Estates to become a trainee forester, the other to become an apprentice mechanic with a garage company in Kirkcaldy.
Both replied and I decided to take up the forestry appointment. This proved very enjoyable and I loved the variety of jobs and gained volumes of experience working with two brothers, Bob and Will Ewan. Will Ewan was foreman and took a liking to me and gave me all the encouragement and opportunities to carry out everything which was available. The Second World War commenced on the 3rd September 1939 and when I was 17 1/2 years old I volunteered to join the RAF on flying duties and became a flight engineer. So in the end I got both my dreams to come true. After the war being demobbed in 1946, I took up an appointment to become a probationer at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. In 1948 I joined the Forestry Commission Research Branch.
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6
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CHAPTER C
JOINED RAF 23RD JULY 1942
The Second World War started on 3rd September 1939. I’m not going into details regarding the reasons why Britain thought it necessary to do so as I believe most people know the reasons.
Prior to the war during the summers of 1937 and 1938 the Territorial Army held their camps on the outskirts of Aberdour on grass fields owned by Mill Farm, which was situated adjacent to the Sheriff Road. To us as youngsters it was exciting and interesting to see double rows of horses tethered along a single rope and the troops living under canvas in large tents. To see the different tartans depending on which regiment was resident in camp at the time, such as The Black Watch, The Camerons or The Gordons.
They were the first troops to be called up for service followed by people from certain professions and the general public of different age classes, one had to be 18 years old before being recruited.
All three services required recruits and there was a certain agreement of allowing people to join the service of their choice, however, if one service was short of personnel then recruits had no choice but to go where sent.
I was sixteen years old when the war started and when my time came to be called up I wished to join the RAF and, if possible, to fly on reaching my 17th birthday. I decided I would volunteer for the RAF on flying duties. Volunteers usually were given the opportunity to serve in the service of their choice.
I recall discussing the war with a few of my colleagues and suggesting that this war would change the face of Europe, and would also change all our lives completely if we survived.
I was called up on 23rd July 1942; my orders were to report to Warrington Recruitment Centre. My stay there was for two days where I, along with many more of my own age were fitted out with uniform and all other necessities. We then travelled to Blackpool to commence our training and embark on a flight mechanics course.
Blackpool like many other seaside resorts had many private residences available (usually used as holiday accommodation or bed and breakfast), these were now being used to accommodate RAF recruits.
I with others was billeted in Montague Street, South Shore near to the South Shore beach. This turned out to be excellent, the landlady treated us extremely well, and we each had our own bedroom and facilities. She had to supply us with breakfast and evening meal, and normal washing facilities. In fact for all the time I was in Blackpool, which was just under a year I stayed there, the RAF supplied our towels etc. In fact two evenings a week we had what was called ‘shower parades’. In total there was near 10,000 RAF personnel billeted in
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the town, so through the town certain buildings such as baths or swimming pool areas were converted into showers, rows and rows of showers with dressing accommodation alongside.
The recruits such as ourselves were divided into groups of between 40 and 50 and each group had a corporal in charge, he was in charge of all our activities such as the shower parade. We had to assemble at a point near to our billet on certain evenings each week. The corporal would march us to the showers then afterwards march us back, he was also responsible for us on all other activities.
The course of flight mechanic was a very intensive course covering both theory and practical work. This was carried out at Squires Gate near St Anne’s, three miles east of Blackpool and was originally a small airport. The hangers were converted to workshops for training purposes.
We were transported in bus convoys daily, morning and evening to and from the base with our same corporal, Lofty Clark, in charge. We also carried out the usual training and skills necessary to be a good soldier including physical training, assault course, rifle drill and route marches. Most of these were carried out on the area around the South Shore pleasure ground. The mechanics course lasted for five months. At the end of each fortnight we had verbal exams and after six weeks written exams, each exam had to be passed before one could move on. If I remember all our group passed their exams.
After the mechanics course we were given two weeks leave and on return commenced on a fitters course, which lasted a further five months, the same routine as previously. What I forgot to say, we had a break in the morning and afternoon when the NAAFI vans arrived serving a bun and a cup of tea.
By the end of the further course we were capable of dismantling an aircraft engine and reassembling it with success. We also had a basic knowledge of the aircraft workings at this stage before moving onto the next stage of our training, the flight engineer course.
We were divided into those who would be flying on Halifaxs [sic] and those who would fly on Lancasters, fortunately I was selected to fly on Lancasters.
Blackpool was a fairly good place to be stationed at, as with its many parks there was always plenty of opportunity to play sport, which was very much encouraged by the RAF. I spent most weekends playing either football or rugby; in fact for the 1942‑3 season I played rugby for Blackpool’s third team. There was little time in evenings for anything, as I said two nights were taken up with shower parade, then most weeks a further two nights for other activities. Every Sunday there was a church parade, one had to attend the parade but not the service if it was not your religion. Most places in Blackpool were closed, however, the lower levels of the tower were still open and I remember the organ was still being played and the ballroom was open at certain times.
For the flight engineers course those of us that were to fly on Lancasters were transferred to St Athans, South Wales. The course was originally intended to last eight weeks however, on arrival we were told that flight engineers were in such short supply that the course was being crammed into two weeks. To enable this to happen we worked a 12‑hour day, seven days each week, however, the course was a success and we all knew the basics about the Lancaster workings, although we still had not flown in a Lancaster.
At the end of the course we were split up into groups of six and told to report to a certain Air Training Unit. I had to report to Lindholme near Doncaster, where other members of crew which included pilot, navigator, bomb aimer, mid upper gunner and rear gunner were already
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at Lindholme operating as a crew for a period of four weeks awaiting for flight engineers to become available.
On arrival we were introduced to our crews and the following day we were flying as a complete crew, however, not on Lancasters (Lancasters were too scarce to be used on training duties). We flew on Halifax, this was a heavy bomber and gave the pilot the opportunity and experience of flying heavy aircraft. We continued training and flying at Lindholme for a further week.
As a complete crew and along with one other crew from the same course at Lindholme we were posted to 101 Squadron which was based at Ludford Magna seven miles west of Louth Lincolnshire. This was a recently built airfield; the runways and perimeter roads were complete along with the aircraft stand pods. Accommodation was nissen huts as were the messes. Roads and paths around the areas were still not laid; Wellington boots were the order of the day.
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CHAPTER D
LUDFORD 101 SQUADRON
Ludford Magna
Ludford Magna, a small village situated on the main road between Louth and Market Rasen, was to change dramatically as the area was chosen to be the site for one of the new warfare RAF bomber airfields. Work commenced in spring 1943 and by May the airfield was ready for occupation however, as with many other war built sites, many buildings were far from being useable.
The airfield had three runways with the main runway, which was two thousand yards long from north to south. The other two runways were 14 hundred yards, one of which ran east to west. They were all connected by a narrow perimeter track of which there were 36 standing pods. All personnel accommodation was nissen hut type buildings and erected on the north side of the main road running through the village, some distance from the main airfield.
101 Squadron took over occupation of the airfield in late June but even then there were no hardcore paths leading to the billets or the ablution blocks. This meant that travelling to and from billets or airfield, the only serviceable footwear was rubber boots. We as a crew arrived in late July and I remember squelching in the mud around the base and when it rained circumstances were even worse, and it did rain quite a bit during the autumn and winter hence the airfield got the nickname of Mudford (instead of Ludford) and was well deserved.
On days when operations were planned the routine was briefing which was held at a certain time when all crew members met in the briefing room where the CO (Comanding [sic] Officer) addressed the crews stating which crews were flying and which if any were on standby in case any crew members were unable to fly.
The CO would then open the curtains on the wall covering the maps and the target, after which the various heads of section gave details of weather expected on route over target and on return, also bomb load, fuel load and any other relative information such as height levels expected to be flown at by the different aircraft. Lancasters usually flew at one or two thousand feet higher than the Halifax, which would be flying at around 19,000 feet.
It was most important for 101 Squadron to keep strictly to the timing and height levels as with ABC (Airborne Cigar equipment) on board, 101 Squadron crews task was to cover the rest of the bombers flying on the operation, along the route to the target, through the target and on the return route. Example, if the target time was 20 minutes for all aircraft to pass through the target and if 101 Squadron had 22 aircraft flying, each aircraft would be allocated a time through the target of one minute apart.
This put considerable pressure on the navigator and pilot, the route was always discussed among the crew members such as pilot, bomb aimer and engineer in order to help and assist the navigator to stay on course such as any landmarks, heavy barrage of ack ack or search
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lights, as these would usually mean certain industrial areas, towns or cities. Also if weather conditions were good possibly a certain bend on a river or railway, or road crosses, these markers were always very helpful to the navigator to keep him on course and on time.
All crew members had different personalities we all, however, accepted that we were professionals and some of the best in our trades, and that belief and the fact that we worked extremely well as a crew. We trusted each other’s judgement and carried out the requirements without question.
The crew (our crew) was organised similar to a football team we had a captain in our pilot Wally and with a few key team players who had the ability to carry out other members’ duties. They were Navigator, Jimmy, could act as bomb aimer, Eric our bomb aimer had sufficient knowledge of navigation to bring the aircraft home, and myself as engineer could in an emergency takeover and fly and land the aircraft. The gunners were the crewmembers most out of touch with the others. In my position I could watch their turrets for movement and could keep in touch with them, and if for any reason their turrets were not moving I could give them a call. I could easily see the mid upper gunner Bill and see the rear gunner guns Len when they turned to port.
Eric our bomb aimer lounged in the front compartment of the aircraft on lookout for other aircraft and to aid the navigator, his map reading was spot on, and he liked to give a commentary of what was happening leading up to the target – such sayings as men it’s bloody marvellous, we are bang on time over the target, then this was his time he was in control, he was very precise with his left slightly, right a little, hold it there, left a little. I would be watching for other aircraft and for fighters, and as he said on this occasion that it was over Berlin I said hold it Eric another Lanc is just passing immediately beneath us. He said: “I have missed the target we will have to go round again”. In this situation Eric was in control and Wally our pilot even with a few strong words said to Jimmy our navigator “give us a new course to bring us round again”. There were the occasional shouts from the gunners such as “fighter on port, eleven o’clock” or “watch that searchlight” or “collision between Lanc and Halifax – no parachutes, poor bastards”. The wireless operator Norman (Nobby) was good at his job he never panicked. Nobby could obtain bearings when others couldn’t. I think he did naughty things on the frequencies to get priority. He had the warmest place on the aircraft.
Jimmy our navigator was superb, conscientious, every course had to be accurate and everything he did he gave a reason for his decision. Wally our pilot would discuss with him the situation for the change of course and automatically changed course. Wally was an excellent pilot, steady and a good captain and we worked well together, we the crew called him our taxi driver. Taking off with a full bomb load and possibly two thousand gallons of fuel was the most nervous part of the trip, after receiving the green light he would taxi onto the runway, line up, test the engines remembering we had probably some waiting for five to ten minutes, with slow engine revolutions which could overheat the engines. We together would open up the four throttles when the engines were screaming he would release the brakes and the aircraft would start rolling along the runway. When we reached the 90+ speed he would require both his hands on the controls and I would push the throttle controls fully forward, keeping the port engines throttles slightly ahead of the starboard engines throttles, as I found that the Lancaster tended to veer to the port on take off or nearing the end of the runway. If we were still on the ground I would push all four throttles through the barrier, this gave the extra power we only used this in extreme cases, as it was hard on the engines and used extra fuel. Once in the air Wally would say “undercarriage up” then “flaps up” and we would start climbing on a spiral course until we reached the height of around ten thousand
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feet before setting course on our operation. I would adjust engines to obtain speed required with minimum revs.
As I previously said 101 Squadron operated ABC, which meant we carried an eighth member of crew. A specialist, his job was to jam German radio transmissions to the night fighters’ ground based controllers, his operating place was just behind the main part of the port side about 6 ft square with no external vision. It was said that these members had no one crew to fly with and were allocated a crew on an operation base, this maybe true however we were a very organised crew and this arrangement did not apply. We therefore were allocated Ken as a crewmember and he flew with us during the remainder of our tour.
101 Squadron radio call was for aircraft ‘Bookworm’, control tower ‘Bookshop’.
Returning to after briefing was completed we returned to the mess where a meal was always arranged which consisted of a main course of egg, bacon and chips. We then dressed into our flying kit, collected our parachute and made our way to the crew room where we collected our flying rations, these consisted of sandwiches, Horlicks tablets chewing gum and a flask of coffee or tea. If you wished wakey wakey pills to help keep you awake while flying (none of our crew ever indulged in these) we also collected a package containing money and maps of the countries over which we would be flying on the chance that we may be shot down.
After a few operations, the crew was allocated our own aircraft, for us X² the dispersal point was quite a way round the perimeter track and close to the road. The aircraft was parked facing away from the road and perimeter fence so when Mac our ground crew sergeant in charge of X² and his colleagues required to clean their dirty, oily boilersuits they would wash them in a can of fuel and hang them on the fence behind the aircraft, then when the engines were tested the slipstream would blow dry their clothes.
There was usually four or five technicians allocated to each aircraft with either a corporal or sergeant in charge. They were a grand bunch of lads, dedicated and had to work in the open under all various weather conditions from high summer temperatures to severe cold and winter weather conditions. They also had a remarkable collection of spare parts hidden away in their crew hut, which they built up over time from broken Lancasters. This enabled them to carry out repairs and patch up any enemy damage that had been inflicted on the aircraft. This meant that the aircraft could be kept serviceable and ready for action without delay and not having to ground the aircraft while waiting for spares from the stores.
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CHAPTER E
OPERATION DATES AND TARGETS
[photograph of author]
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Operations 101 Squadron 1943-44
Operation – Date - Place
1 - 20th August 1943 - Leverkusen.
2 - 30th-31st August 1943 - Munchen Gladbach.
0 - 31st Aug-1st Sept 1943 - (Abortive) Berlin. Starboard outer feathered, landed on three engines.
3 - 3rd-4th September 1943 - Berlin. Held in searchlights for five minutes.
4 - 23rd-24th September 1943 - Mannheim.
5 - 29th-30th September 1943 - Bochum.
6 - 2nd-3rd October 1943 - Munich. Shot up over Amiens landed Tangmere.
7 - 5th-6th October 1943 - Hanover.
8 - 20th-21st October 1943 - Leipzig. Electrical problems.
9 - 3rd-4th November 1943 - Düsseldorf.
10 - 10th-11th November 1943 - Modane. Fuel shortage, landed Tangmere.
11 - 18th-19th November 1943 - Berlin.
12 - 22nd-23rd November 1943 - Berlin. Rear turret frozen up.
13 - 26th-27th November 1943 - Berlin.
14 - 16th-17th December 1943 - Berlin. Heavy losses fog on return. Many fighter flares around target area.
15 - 20th-21st December 1943 - Frankfurt.
16 - 24-25th December 1943 - Berlin. Rear turret u/s starboard outer feathered.
17 - 29th-30th December 1943 - Berlin.
18 - 1st-2nd January 1944 - Berlin.
19 - 2nd-3rd January 1944 - Berlin. Mug passed out through lack of oxygen.
20 - 5th-6th January 1944 - Stettin. Best photo in bomber command.
21 - 15th-16th January 1944 - Brunswick.
22 - 27th-28th January 1944 - Berlin.
23 - 28th-29th January 1944 - Berlin.
24 - 15th-16th February 1944 - Berlin.
25 - 19th-20th February 1944 - Leipzig. Heaviest losses in group.
26 - 20th-21st February 1944 - Stuttgart.
27 - 24th-25th February 1944 - Schweinfurt. Best photo in group.
28 - 25th-26th February 1944 - Augsburg.
29 - 1st-2nd March 1944 - Stuttgart.
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CHAPTER F
101 SQUADRON
NOTES ON VARIOUS OPERATIONS
In late July 1943 after completing my flight engineer course and joining the other crew members at conversion unit Lindholme near Doncaster, with two other crews we arrived at 101 Squadron based at Ludford Magna. The crews were always known by the name of the pilot and out of the three crews that arrived, two crews had the name of Evans; W L Evans and A H Evans. I was the flight engineer assigned to W L Evans’s crew and had flown with them at conversion unit, however, the records had been mixed up and showed me as flight engineer to A H Evans’s crew. The simplest method of resolving the problem would have been for me to join A H Evans’s crew and the other flight engineer to join W L Evans’s crew. W L Evans, however, said definitely not, I was his engineer and in no way was I not flying in his crew, the records were therefore corrected.
For the next three weeks we worked as a crew getting to know each other and familiarising
ourselves with the aircraft. When we were told that we were to be on operations we had
flown 33 hours in total, 12 of which was night flying.
Both crews flew, our first operation was on 22nd-23rd August 1943, the target was Leverkusen. There was of course much excitement among us and especially when at briefing the curtains covering the maps on the wall were opened and we saw the target, we were the new bods not knowing what to expect. We listened carefully to what was being said by the various Heads of Section regarding the weather, hot spots to miss along the route, where fighters could be expected and where flak would be very heavy.
Leverkusen was a German town situated in the near proximity of the Ruhr Germany’s main industrial centre, where a high percentage of their heavy equipment was made. The Ruhr had been visited many times and considerable damage carried out which helped delay their war equipment this was an operation to attack specific targets, which would further upset and delay their war effort.
After briefing we returned to the mess for a meal, which usually consisted of egg, bacon and chips. Takeoff was scheduled for around 21:30 hours so before that we had to collect our parachutes rations and packet containing money, maps etc to cover the countries over which we would be flying in case we had to bail out.
We then changed into flying kit before catching the crew bus out to our aircraft. The next task was to carry out the pre-flying checks on the aircraft, then start the engines.
Wally then taxied the aircraft along the perimeter track towards the takeoff runway, waiting in the queue for the aircraft in front to obtain the green light to takeoff. Then our turn, green light given, we turn onto the runway, line up at the end, carry out the formal checks between pilot and engineer. Wally our pilot and skipper then holds on the brake as I open up the four
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throttles, pushing the port two slightly ahead of the starboard two, let brake off and feel the aircraft rush along the runway increasing speed rapidly (this was the most exciting part of the operation as far as I was concerned).
As the throttles are fully opened and as the end of the runway is nearing, the heavy aircraft laden with fuel and bombs leaves the tarmac behind. Relief. Pilot: “undercarriage up” engineer “undercarriage up, brakes on off”. Pilot “flaps up”, engineer “flaps up”. As the undercarriage and flaps are raised you could feel the plane sink a little before starting to climb. Pilot to navigator: “course and speed, and height”. I would then reduce throttle to minimum revs to produce power sufficient to keep climbing at the speed asked for, then as far as possible synchronise the four engines to cut out unnecessary noise. The noise from four Merlin engines was a noise that you never forget.
Taking off and managing to get this large aircraft off the ground safely while possibly carrying two thousand gallons of fuel stored in the wings and a full bomb load under your feet, as I said previous, was always the most exciting part of the operation as far as I was concerned and I always marvelled at Wally’s skills in achieving this without any mishaps. I was always relieved, happy and knew that everything would be all right until we had to do it all again on the next operation.
We had no troubles with our landing at base on return from Leverkusen, taxied to our parking space, caught a crew bus which took us to the debriefing room where we received a nice hot cup of tea or coffee with a spot of rum in if wanted. The debriefing consisted of an Intelligence Officer asking a number of questions about what we saw on route, anything unusual, searchlight positions around built up areas, flak, fighter activity. Did we see any planes being shot down and did we see any parachutes appearing and anything else, which may be of interest.
We were then able to return to the mess for breakfast. While having breakfast, A H Evans and crew arrived, we had a few words regarding the operation and made our way back to our billet for a few hours sleep, luckily it was coming up to high moon period so for the next ten days there were no operations.
The second operation, which both crews were on, was to Munchen Gladbach on 30th and 31st August, we had another fairly quiet trip without any problems and landed safely on time at Base. We heard that two planes were late, one of which was A H Evans, we held on at breakfast hoping to hear some news. News came through that a SR Lancaster had landed further south due to fuel shortage, it turned out not to be A H Evans and crew. The following day we heard the dreaded news that A H Evans’s crew was reported missing and presumably shot down. This was later confirmed.
This was a new experience for us to know that seven young men who we had been friendly with, even for a short time, were no longer around. The engineer had come through the same training as myself – mechanic course fitters course at Blackpool – followed by flight engineers course at St Athans, then crewing up at Lindholme. He was slightly older than myself therefore not in my squad although I did know him on the course to say hello, and as you know both crews joined 101 Squadron on the same day and I almost changed places with him.
The same routine was followed each time we took off and continued to be the most anxious time and possibly the most scary and nervous moments of each operation. We soon realised that each operation was different with its own hazards and that flying over Europe for however short or long a period, it was a very dangerous and frightening place to be.
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The normal procedure for all aircraft after takeoff was to start to gain height, circling the area until reaching a height of around 10,000 ft before setting course for the target. Around the Lincoln area there were at least 20 airfields, each with at least 20 aircraft flying on each operation, that was why the residents living in the area knew when operations were on by the noise of 400 planes all circling to gain height. Once a course was set we tried to reach a height of at least 15,000 ft before crossing the enemy coast.
There were certain things that we had no control over such as the weather, the conditions on route could be quite different from that forecasted. Increased wind speeds, a tail wind instead of a nose wind, these affected the navigator greatly who was trying to stay on route and be at a certain point within the time space of the operation. More so with 101 Squadron, responsible to give protection by using ABC over the full length of the operation. Thunderstorms and heavy clouds could also cause icing up of the engine air intakes and front edge of the wings (remember temperatures could be as low as -20°) and if not dealt with could cause engine failure.
Fog, however, was the most serious problem, thick fog in the UK on return. Blanket fog so thick it was impossible to see anything from the air or the ground, this caused heavy losses of aircraft as returning from flying with low fuel levels, trying to find a landing ground was impossible, for many resulting in heavy losses in aircraft and crews. Conditions improved slightly when FIDO was installed on some runways.
There were hazards from conditions which crews did not expect as the Met weather forecasts had given much more favourable conditions, otherwise we should not have been flying. As soon as we flew over the Dutch coastline we expected to be greeted by flak and if ground conditions were good by enemy fighters, depending on the operations route, flak could be very heavy and accurate especially round the towns and cities. Searchlights then also came into play especially those with the strong blue coloured lights. If caught by one of these it was almost impossible to lose them they were also radar controlled by anti-aircraft guns, which were especially accurate and many aircraft became casualties.
There was also a fair risk of collision bearing in mind that on the route to the target there were possibly between 400 and 600 large aircraft (100 ft wingspan) all travelling in the same direction at the same time, making for the same point and expected to be over the target all within the space of 20 minutes or less (granted there would be a range of heights between some, possibly within a band of 2,000 ft). Think of it as 600 cars travelling along a motorway all doing 70 miles per hour, all expecting to pass point ‘A’ at between 01:00 and 01:20 hours. If congestion occurred the car driver would see and would slow down, there was no way of changing lane or slowing in an aircraft. It was therefore very clear to us as a crew early on that flying over Europe was a very dangerous and frightening place to be and if we were to succeed we had to work as a team, be alert all the time whether for two hours or eight hours. This we managed fairly well, we recognised that the safest place to be was in the middle of the concentration along the route. It was usually those who had strayed off course that were picked off by fighters or became casualties by flak.
Our navigator Jimmy was therefore a very important member of the crew (he was an exceptionally good navigator) the rest of the crew could also help him which we did if conditions were clear telling him of certain markers, such as there is heavy flak ahead to 11 o’clock, or we are just passing over a river with a railway line and road alongside or such like information.
He could then take action if necessary and give a change of course to Wally our pilot, or if we had a strong tail wind ask me to reduce speed slightly. So we had two-way conversation
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between key members such as navigator, bomb aimer, pilot and engineer but only with reference to the operation in hand.
The rear and mid upper gunners role was to continually scour the sky by rotating from side to side in their turrets, with one turning to starboard the other turning to port, the bomb aimer controlled the front myself had the only view to watch the gunners and watch ahead and to the sides, while the bomb aimer carried out his other work such as dropping window or preparing for his bombing run, therefore we were fairly well covered. If another aircraft came close or overhead, or below us on our bombing run a crewmember could give the alarm. If a fighter was seen and showing interest then mostly the gunners gave the alarm “fighter starboard, 2 o’clock, dive now!”. Wally would dive immediately and carry out a corkscrew manoeuvre then return on to normal course, this usually worked. If for any reason I could see the gunner’s turrets not moving I would give them a call, only once was it necessary to take further action (this is recorded later) usually they were just having a short rest or such like.
Fuel was also a concern, petrol was rationed throughout the UK as most of the supplies had to be imported, therefore fuel for aircraft was also closely regulated on Lancasters to 200 gallons per hour flying time. Therefore if the estimated time for an operation was seven hours, fuel allocated was 1,400 gallons plus 200 extra, a total of 1,600 gallons.
The flight engineer therefore did have some control; it was dependent on how efficient he was in regulating the engines (similar to driving, there are good drivers and not so good drivers). The Lancaster had six fuel tanks, three in each wing with the small tank on the outside of the wing which could only be pumped into the middle tank, the other two on each wing could be used in tandem or individually to feed the engines.
It was the engineer’s responsibility to use the fuel distribution the most successful way so that whatever happened the maximum fuel was available to keep the engines running. To such ends I fully used the centre tanks each fuelling the two engines on port and starboard when sufficient was used pump tank fuel into tank two, then using fuel evenly from the other two tanks to supply the port and starboard engines.
If anything unforeseen happened such as a tank being damaged from enemy flak or fighter guns, the minimum fuel loss would occur and I could re-adjust my method of usage by opening and closing valves.
All engines could be run from one of the four tanks, this meant keeping a log and recording every ten or fifteen minutes. It was also necessary to record engine temperatures and oil pressure and with experience listening to the noise of the engines could give a good indication of how efficient they were running. Fuel could be saved by making sure that, when possible, the engine revs could be reduced and that other control on the aircraft such as flaps, etc were being used at optimum levels. This saving in fuel could be the difference between touching down safely or not, on the odd occasion when fuel loss occurred from a leaking tank or when on reaching the base area it was under thick fog and extra flying was necessary to find a suitable landing site.
Life on the base was very mixed, flying on operations was usually carried out during the dark nights of the moon and these two weeks could be hectic, operations could be on two consecutive nights resulting in our crew getting to bed at around 05:00 hours and then having to be ready for pre-briefing and head of section meetings, followed by main briefing at 15:00 to 16:00 hours and once again ready for takeoff by 21:30 hours. Other times operations could be scheduled and then cancelled because of possibly extreme weather
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conditions over the UK or over the target area. The dark nights were therefore a continual case of being ready to fly when called upon.
The period of high moon was more relaxing. Training and practice still had to be carried out such as bombing practice for Eric; this was carried out on targets set in the North Sea a few miles off shore. Gun practice for Len and Bill carried out on a moving target towed behind a small plane off the coastline.
The station had an excellent gym where one could keep fit which was essential and a very good library of general reading material and technical information. I also spent a considerable amount of time on the simulator improving my flying skills and landing procedures, also the period when crews could have some leave. I always travelled home on these occasions.
We were on base during the autumn (harvest time) as a crew we decided to help the local farmer with stocking and collecting his grain crops as our accommodation Nissen huts were situated near to the farmstead, in return he offered us a pile of fire wood to keep our stove lit during the colder nights as the coke ration was rather limited.
Ludford Magna was a small village supporting two pubs, a post office and a small but very nice church during the 11 months, which I spent at the base. I had never been in either of the pubs. I had attended the church service on a number of occasions.
The Women’s Institute also ran a small unit situated on the main street where one could obtain a nice cup of tea and a cake, also within a mile radius there were two small cafes which crew members frequently visited during the day for a tea and a bun.
During off flying periods we as a crew fairly regularly visited the Kings Head Hotel in Louth where we had a meal. Crewmembers also received generous leave, seven days approximately every 6‑8 weeks depending on weather and operation timing. We had extra rations of chocolate, vitamin tablets and cigarettes. On leave from Ludford I always travelled home to Aberdour in Fife, Scotland. It was a long, slow journey, going on leave we usually managed to go by transport from the base then catch a train at Louth to Grantham where we could catch the train on the main line travelling between London and Edinburgh. This was usually an overnight train and usually very packed by other military personnel doing the same. The train usually reached Edinburgh during the night or very early morning then another wait to catch a train to Aberdour. The conditions occurred on the return journey unfortunately the train reached Louth early in the morning when no such transport was
available; it was then a seven mile walk back to base.
Leave was a time to catch up with family and friends and especially to catch up with sleep and to chill out and rest. I said earlier that we did have good rations of sweets, chocolates and cigarettes which I usually was able to take some home.
During the winter 1943/44 we had several days of heavy snow and naturally this added to the mud when it melted, it also meant that to keep operational the runways and perimeter tracks had to be cleared of snow, every available person, air crews and ground crews, armed with spades and shovels turned out to clear the snow. We were treated with the odd drop of rum to keep the cold out and our spirits up, and to keep us digging.
Our billet nissen huts had snowdrifts around them, these Nissen huts were unlined and in bad weather there was considerable condensation inside and this used to run in the corrugations of the sheeting and if the temperature was cold enough, it would freeze. We did have heating in the form of a round pot stove with chimney from top of the stove up through
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the roof. Coal or anthracite was the main fuel, it was of course rationed and in short supply. There were raids between huts to obtain extra supplies. The odd chair went missing along with any spare pieces of wood to help out. If you were lucky and had sufficient supply to completely fill up the stove and get it and part of the chimney extremely hot then it would keep the hut warm until the next morning.
During the summer the problems were different, it was earwigs that would climb up the inside of the huts and occasionally drop into beds. I remember one of our crew members, I can’t remember who, while sleeping an earwig crawled into his ear and he had to pay a visit to the MO to have it removed. Field mice could also cause annoyance.
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NOTES ON VARIOUS OPERATIONS
Operation 3
3rd/4th September 1943
Target: Berlin
We had a reasonably quiet trip keeping clear of the various hot spots on route and staying well on course, searchlights were many on the approach to the target with some very powerful blue lights. As we prepared for our bombing run we got caught by one of these powerful lights and no matter what we did we could not lose it, and if we did a further light caught on to us. We were flying at 22,000 ft; Wally decided the best manoeuvre was to put the aircraft into a power dive and loose [sic] height quickly.
After four minutes we were down to 18,000 ft and still dazzled by its glare just then a Halifax, which was flying at a much lower altitude, drifted across under us and the light caught on to it, then the Halifax completely exploded. It had received the full blast possibly intended for us. These blue searchlights and guns were radar controlled and worked together.
We reached the target and bombed at the lower level then set for home and had a quiet trip back to base. We were a bit shaken up by what had happened to the Halifax and in future made a mental note to keep well clear of blue searchlights. The navigator noted in his log the position of this light so if possible it could be targeted for special attention.
Operation 6 (705 hours)
2nd-3rd October 1943
Target: Munich
Takeoff time for the operation was 18:45 hours. For us as a crew this was a quiet trip, we had no problems with enemy fighters, searchlights were few and by keeping strictly on course found no problems with ack-ack. We reached the target on time, bombed and started on our way home still without any troubles, then as we thought we were doing well without warning we were shot up by anti aircraft guns near the town of Amiens which caught the underside of the body of the aircraft and along the wings. From this we developed a fuel leak. In trying to evade further damage from the anti aircraft guns Wally put the aircraft into a power dive at around 21,000 ft, trying to pull it out took Wally and myself great strength pulling on the control column, we were down to 5,000 ft when we finally levelled out. On inspecting the aircraft at Tangmere we found that many of the rivets on the lower side of the wings had been stripped open owing to the strain on the wings caused by the speed in diving, and counted over 80 holes of various sizes along the body and wings however after refuelling the following day we decided the aircraft was airworthy and safe enough to fly back to base where we could have repairs carried out quickly. Mac was not amused when he saw the Lanc X not X² but was pleased that we had brought it back safely for his team to repair it.
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Operation 8
19th/20th October
Target: Berlin
During the week previously I had been told that more new Lancasters would be arriving at base and the one with X² as its recognition number would be allocated to our crew and from then on for our use on operations. Up until that date we operated on whichever aircraft was available. Mac, a ground engineer (Sergeant) had arrived on the station in July, until now he was a spare engineer, X² became his charge for all servicing and repairs. We struck up a great relationship between us and after each operation, as soon as possible I would contact Mac and tell him of any problems which we had experienced during the flight. I was thrilled to think I would be the only person operating these engines and I could nurse then [sic] whenever possible and be reasonably sure that they had not been misused for no good reason. Mac had warned me that because of the lack of time, the aircraft had been checked and was serviceable, however, he and his team had not yet had the time to check all electrical and hydraulic circuits.
Takeoff was 17:30 hours and all went well until I retracted the undercarriage, it appeared to lift ok but the warning lights indicated that it had not fully locked. We proceeded to circle and climb and as we reached the Dutch coastline Nobby, our wireless operator, was having problems with his equipment, I then had a temperature gauge on one of the engines reading an excessively high temperature. The engine appeared to be working satisfactorily, however, we were still only a short time into our operation. I was concerned what may continue to happen and without radio contact we could have a problem.
We still had a full bomb load on board and high levels of fuel, under these conditions we could not return to base and land without losing our bombs. Wally was in agreement with Jimmy our navigator, they decided that they would set course for Texel and drop our bombs on the installation there. This we did then returned to base. As we had no contact with ground control we landed without permission.
On return before landing, however, we dropped our undercarriage and as the lights were not showing we did do a shallow dive with a quick pull up, this jerked the undercarriage down and all was well. The problems were resolved, the pressure gauge was faulty, meaning the undercarriage was not fully engaging because of limited pressure on the hydraulics.
Operation 10
11th/12th November 1943
Target: Modane
Normally as we have said previously operations were usually carried out during the nights when there was no moon. This was full moon; a beautiful bright night with clear skies which meant that aircraft flying could be seen for great distances. We had no trouble in reaching the target with little or no opposition from enemy fighters, searchlights or flak. Even on the way home it was trouble free and we could see and watch the marvellous sights of the high mountains as we passed over them and then without notice flying over Amiens a blue searchlight ‘coned’ us, immediately followed by heavy and accurate ack-ack fire which burst very close to us, causing some damage to the underside of the aircraft and to one of the fuel tanks, luckily no crew member was injured.
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This was not a great problem it only meant isolating the tank involved, eventually causing a fuel shortage. I said we would not have sufficient fuel to reach base, so Jimmy (our navigator) gave Wally a course for Tangmere in South England where we landed. On checking we found that the aircraft was not too badly damaged around 50 holes of various sizes along the underside of the fuselage and two holes in the side and front window where a piece of shrapnel entered in and out again, as well as cutting a hole in the sleeve of my flying jacket. This I did not know until I was removing my jacket.
The following morning we refuelled and returned to base.
Operation 14 (Black Thursday)
16th-17th December 1943
Target: Berlin
This was supposed to be a very quiet trip as reported at briefing in the late afternoon. The weather was so bad over Europe that no fighters would be able to fly therefore the route would be straight to the capital Berlin, and straight back out – should be a very easy journey, unfortunately things did not turn out this way.
As we crossed over the Dutch coast the weather took a dramatic change and instead of cloud and thick fog, conditions were good for flying and the fighters which were supposed to be sitting on the ground were flying on strength and interrupting the bomber stream, and we noted a few running battles and a number of aircraft being shot down. Within a short time it was clear that this was going to be a night to remember. The attacks continued all the way to the target, fortunately we remained clear of any trouble except for seeing the odd fighter going in the opposite direction.
There was the usual heavy concentration of searchlights and heavy activity of ack ack over the target creating a heavy barrage. We bombed on target and set on our route for home, this proved uneventful for us although we did see a few fighter battles being continued.
The weather by this time was beginning to close in with much more low cloud as a result Wally decided to carry out a gentle decent, reaching the coastline at around 2,000 ft and by this time we knew that there would be trouble with low cloud and fog. We were alerted by base that Ludford was fog-bound and that we should proceed to Driffield, this was when it became very difficult. By now all the crewmembers were active in trying to find any ground markers all with little success, Eric who was still in his front position shouted “pull up Wally – I’ve just seen a barrage balloon”. Jimmy quietly informed us we must be over Hull, I’ll use this as a reference check.
By now we had been in the air for 7 1/2 hours and from my calculations our fuel was becoming in short supply. Nobby (wireless operator): “I’m picking up a signal” RT messages from Dishforth and Catfoss but they could see no lights through the fog.
Then Catfoss offered to put a light on for us, they, however, realised that we were very low and put the beam aimed parallel to the ground.
Presumably, because of the light what Wally and I saw was a farmhouse and buildings, we both acted simultaneously, Wally pulled the control unit full back, I slammed the throttle fully open, luckily I had been flying with the engine booster pumps on so there was no delay in the engines producing full power. As the power emerged we somehow managed to lift the aircraft over the buildings we must have been only feet away from the ground because as the
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aircraft pulled up the tail wheel clipped the farm entrance gate, I think that it must be true to say that the beam of light from Catfoss saved our lives.
Wally: “How much fuel have we left?” My reply, ”Very little, what should we do?” Jimmy: “Take course for base and try to land there”. We decided to return to base and as luck would have it Eric caught a brief glimpse of something he recognised followed by a few sodium lights of the outer ring lights and as we circled round Wally said “I think I will go round again as I will then have a better chance of landing”. “No” I said, “we do not have the fuel for that”. So with some quick manoeuvring he managed to bring the aircraft back on course. Unfortunately, as I have said previously there are so many airfields in Lincolnshire that the outer perimeter lights cross over each other and this is what happened to us because we were flying so low we managed to pick up the occasional light expecting it still to be the lights for Ludford. Unfortunately we had crossed over and unbeknown to us were travelling on the lights for Wickenby. On having a glimpse of the runway lights Wally turned in and asked for permission to land thinking it was Ludford, Ludford control said yes but we can’t see you. We landed safely part way down the runway the fog was still very thick. Wally to control: “We have landed but fog too thick to see”. Control: “You have not landed where are you?”. Wally and I looked at each other “Wally we have haven’t we?” Then a further voice came on, this is control Wickenby we think you have landed here “who are you?” Wally told them and asked them to give directions. Leave the aircraft where it is, we think it is still on the runway, we will send transport to collect you when we find you. After 20 minutes a crew bus collected us and eventually dropped us off at the mess where we had a meal and it was Wickenby.
Wickenby was a wartime base similar to Ludford and with similar living accommodation. We were given a nissen hut where we had a cold bed. As we were extremely tired after our ordeal we had a good sleep.
We woke up to a much better day and there on the runway was Lancaster X² just where we abandoned it. I arranged for fuel and a starter trolley to be delivered, prior to refuelling Wally and I started the engines, carried out the pre-flying checks.
The engines fired up and ran for 2 to 3 minutes then began spluttering and then stopped. We had run out of fuel, the decision not to go round again was the correct decision.
Mac our ground engineer and his staff were there to meet us on our return and gave hand signals in order to park up on our parking point. Mac said: “where have you been” and gave me a big hug. “I think I heard the old girl last night and we came running out hoping to see her, I’m sure it was her she has a noise all of her own, a sweeter, quieter noise”. However, when we checked the time we thought that we must have been mistaken because we were sure that she did not have the fuel to last that time. Then we heard that a Lancaster had crashed on the rising ground hear [sic] Louth so we then went to bed – none of our aircraft landed last night, apparently they are scattered across the east side of England as they are from all the other bases round about.
“Is she ok?” Mac asked. “Yes” I say. “You might however check over the engine booster pumps as they were used a lot last night”. Mac: “What’s happened to the cowlings around the tail wheel?” Me: “Oh, give the tail wheel mounting a good inspection Mac”. Mac “Why, what happened, surely Wally didn’t do this on landing, he usually lands on the main wheel first”. Me “No, we hit a gate”. Mac “You what? You hit a gate, why didn’t you open it first!” Mac: “Yes, will check her over and make her ready for tonight if required”. Fortunately the fog again returned with poor visibility, it was 4 days before we flew again and then the operation was Frankfurt.
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We found out later that out of the 483 Lancasters that flew that night 25 were lost over Europe from a combination of attack from night fighters, flak and collisions. Another 29 Lancasters from crashes, which occurred due to the thick fog conditions experienced around the airfield on returning home and trying to land.
Mac also confessed that he and his engineers were completely fed up with the time they had spent working on the carburetting on the engines, ensuring that the fuel taken up by the engines was the least possible and me insisting that they check the volume over and over again until no more could be done.
He now agreed that all the effort made now paid off as if not there was no way that she could have kept flying for that period of time (8 hours 30 minutes) and he said thank you.
Each aircraft carried seven crewmembers, 101 Squadron aircraft carried eight crewmembers. On the attached page there is a paragraph which Len Brooks, our rear gunner told his recollection of the night’s events due to the fog.
Considering the events of that night in a rational way it is difficult to believe what happened could have happened with a satisfactory ending.
We had travelled across Europe direct to Berlin and back escaping enemy fighters, flash lights and enemy ack ack fire without mishaps, only to arrive back in Lincolnshire to find all the eastern side of the UK that the cloud base had almost reached ground level. Base diverted us to Driffield and we found ourselves over Hull and among barrage balloons. We were flying low to try to find some marker which we could relate to such as outer ring lighting or runway lighting, as there were a number of airfields in that area.
Nobby our wireless operator said I’m picking up RT messages from Driffield, Dishforth and Catfoss but they could not see us because of the fog. Catfoss offered to put a light up for us realising we were so low, their beam was almost parallel to the ground. How was it that the beam came on at that precise moment? How was it that we acted so quickly with the control column and obtained such a quick response from the engines? The aircraft must have climbed at 40‑45% because as the power took over the tail wheel caught the gate leading into the farmhouse, meaning that the aircraft was at most four feet from ground (travelling at 150 miles per hour), this meant covering the ground at 88 ft per second. The time we had to clear the farmhouse and building was less than one second, how could that happen?
We know what Len Brooks said, he felt the power from the engines and looked down and saw the chickens in the farmyard scampering away from their coupes denoting that the aircraft had climbed exceptionally quickly. How did the aircraft pull itself up and over a two storey building in such a short distance? What would the consequences of been had the aircraft not made it? How many people were in the house; farmer’s wife and family? How many children? In fact what was their experience of it, did they sleep through it or were they very scared? We don’t know. How many animals were in the steading, was there a milking herd of 20 to 30 cows? The destruction could have been tremendous, as it was no one was injured as far as we know.
We gained some height; Jimmy gave Wally a course back to base. Why was it just at that precise moment that the fog thinned to allow Eric to recognise an object followed by the sodium lights of the base outer circle? Wally saying that he thought he should go round again, I say no we haven’t the fuel, Wally doing an unconventional manoeuvre to bring the aircraft back on course and immediately picking out further lights of the outer ring. However, by this time we had left Ludford outer ring and crossed over onto Wickenby outer ring. We kept on circling round very low to keep lights in sight and luckily spotted the runway lights
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and landing part way along the runway thinking we had landed at base surprised to find it was Wickenby we had landed at, then being told to abandon the plane where it was on the runway. Had we been directed to taxi off the runway and round the perimeter track to a conventional parking area I think the engines would have cut out on the way giving all the crew a complete shock. As it was it was only myself and Wally who realised the seriousness of the situation when we started the engines the following morning.
As I said earlier this was supposed to be a very uneventful operation, in and out of Europe. The average trip to Berlin was around 7 1/2 hours flying time, fuel 1,750 gallons, this I consider could have been estimated at around 7 hours maximum flying time, 1,700 gallons.
I realise that I was always considered better at conserving fuel than most engineers however, how did our aircraft manage to stay airborne for 8 1/2 hours and give out as soon as we touched down. This turned out to be a very exciting but frightening night, how was it that we managed to avoid the various objects we encountered and still managed to bring X² back safely. This was an episode that as a crew we never talked about.
Operation 16
24th/25th December
Target: Berlin
Takeoff time if I remember correctly was early evening in order that we should reach the target before midnight. On board each aircraft was a mix of various bombs, high explosive, incendiaries and delayed timed bombs triggered to explode on Christmas Day.
It was an uneventful night for us, keeping our place on route, seeing some ack-ack activity
aimed at those aircraft, which strayed off route and seeing the occasional night fighter gun tracers streak across the dark sky.
We reached the target on time and Eric was preparing for his bombing run when I noticed that the oil temperature gauge on the outer starboard engine was reading very high. I had to decide the best action, normally on the bombing run I would be on lookout watching for other aircraft approaching us from above or below us and was all the other spare members of crew, it was critical to have maximum look out because of the concentration of aircraft all making for the same point. Many collisions occurred in these situations; damage could also take place by aircraft flying above by dropping their bombs without watching what was below.
I said “Wally, feathering starboard outer”. Wally to Eric: “Cancel bombing run, engine feathered, have adjusted revs on other engine”. Jimmy: “Wally take course so-and-so and go round again”. This was a very difficult and dangerous decision to take as our aircraft would be on an entirely different direction from all other aircraft and exposed to enemy fighters.
We as a crew had previously discussed what we should do in the event of something like this happening, the conclusion was that after flying all this way to the target our first priority was to put our bombs on the target, so any distraction must be remedied first before the bombing run was made. Hitting the target was the only reason for being there. Eric carried out his bombing and the result was that the bombs scored a direct hit, this was confirmed from a self-operating camera situated in the bomb bay and rolled when the bomb doors were opened.
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Afterwards we set off on our return run on three engines but because of limited power instead of holding our 20,000 ft altitude Wally and I decided to make a gradual descent, passing over the enemy coast at 5,000 ft and making our way direct to base on the instruction given by Jimmy our navigator.
The engine proved to be suffering from a faulty gauge, this, however, we had no way of knowing and had it been an engine seize up and possibly resulted in an engine fire, we could have been in serious problems being an easy target for enemy fighters. Wally made a very professional landing on three engines, of course he always did make a good landing in the dark, it was during daylight that he always had a few Kangaroo jumps before rolling along the runway.
Operation 19
2nd/3rd January 1944
Target: Berlin
I would expect that everyone would experience fear on a number of times during their lifetime being frightened is nothing to be ashamed of. Fear can be brought on instantly by such things as an explosion, a fire or such like, then fear can turn to panic. Controlled fear can be felt when one expects that they are likely to die, on the motorway getting caught up in an accident when cars are travelling at speed.
Our crew experienced such emotions once when on operations over Berlin when our Lancaster was hit by ack-ack fire, which exploded very close to us and caused severe damage to the fuselage from shrapnel, also causing loss of all communication. After checking all engines and fuel supplies, and assessing for any further damage I realised that Bill’s (our mid-upper gunner) turret was stationary with no signs of movement from him. I knew that something must be wrong so I touched Wally gave the thumbs up and pointed towards the rear. I collected a portable oxygen bottle and on the way through the aircraft I touched Nobby on the arm and signalled him to follow me. True enough Bill was not in his turret, with the light from my torch we found him trying to open the fuselage rear door and in his panic he had no parachute with him. He seemed very strong and determined to leave the aircraft. The only way to prevent this happening was to hit him with the oxygen bottle. We were able to man handle him back to the rest bed. When giving him the oxygen bottle he began sucking
it like a baby, we made him comfortable with a blanket then returned to our positions.
This episode had taken over 30 minutes at probably the most dangerous period of any operation over the target with lights being shone from the torch and loss of lookout crewmembers (mid-gunner and myself). Luckily the aircraft was not too badly damaged between 40 to 50 holes along the fuselage.
In early January Bill reported sick, which meant that we required a mid upper gunner, Dave who had lost his crew was looking to join a new crew, so he joined our crew and flew with us until we completed our tour of operations.
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Operation 28
25th-26th February 1944
Target: Augsburg
I have little recognition of what happened on this trip, it however was of great importance because this was the first time on any operation that Lancasters had been fitted with 2 x 0.5 guns in the rear turret instead of the 4 x 0.303 guns. Furthermore it was only 101 Squadron who had them.
These turrets were made by a small local company from Gainsborough and designed in conjunction with 101 Squadron’s technicians; this gave the Lancaster a much greater firepower.
At briefing it was announced that six aircraft, which included our X², were fitted with 0.5 guns and that crews should take the initiative and attack fighters rather than take evasive action.
All I remember of what must have been relatively quiet was that the 101 Lancasters that were carrying the new turrets and firing at the fighters, it was the fighters that were taking evasive action and as the fighters were unaware that only a few aircraft were fitted with these much more effective guns. Over the next few operations there was much less fighter activity which was much less effective.
On a number of operations as well as dropping window we also dropped leaflets, the leaflets were typed in German and gave information as to how the war was progressing (propaganda information).
All operations were usually carried out at twenty thousand feet plus for Lancasters, other types of aircraft would bomb at slightly lower heights because of the thin air at above 10,000 ft. Oxygen had to be taken through masks and also because of the altitude temperatures could drop to as low as -20o, so much so if you touched any metal part of the fuselage with your bare hand it could stick to the metal and because of condensation one had to free the ice from your mask frequently.
Operation 29
1st-2nd March 1944
Target: Stuttgart (8 hours 10 minutes)
During the 1930s and 40s the winters could be very severe with long periods of frost and snow. March 1944 commenced with heavy and prolonged snowfall resulting in Ludford runway being covered in over 8 ft of snow which had to be cleared before flying could continue. At that time there was no heavy snow clearing equipment available, only the normal tractors that were on site, therefore to move the snow every person on the station not on duty was put on snow clearing. The aircraft standing points were cleared first so that ground crews could operate then the task of clearing the main runway commenced spades and shovels were the tools of the day. Generally I think everyone enjoyed it with plenty of high jinks and laughing, many snowmen being made along the runway edges.
Operations were ordered for that night 1st March therefore the runway had to be ready for takeoff by 16:00 hours. It was crucial that 101 Squadron was available because we were the only Squadron operating CIGAR a jamming device which prevented German radar from
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contacting their fighters to give them instructions. Bomber Command refused to fly without 101 Squadron’s aircraft.
It was determined that the runway would not be fully cleared, however, if four hundred yards were ready aircraft could take off with a light fuel load, fly to the neighbouring airfield Wickenby, fully fuel and bomb up there.
Briefing took place mid afternoon; flying was laid on for 16:00 hours. We were the first plane off without trouble, a further two followed, the fourth didn’t make it on the cleared runway part, ploughed into the snow and skidded off the runway closing it. This meant that four of 101 Squadron’s aircraft carrying CIGAR were available. On the operation the aircraft were spread out along the route covering the period of the raid. (ie approximately five minutes apart)
Our aircraft was fuelled and bombed-up at Wickenby and took off among the planes from Wickenby. The operation as far as we were concerned was quiet, with few fighters, no troubles. We bombed on time and returned for home crossing the Dutch coast at around 10,000 ft, then continued to base Wickenby, then de-briefed, had breakfast and then to bed. We stayed at Wickenby for two more days before we could return to Ludford.
On our return our Squadron Commander told us that we had completed our tour of operations and since the squadron moved to Ludford we were the only crew that had achieved that, so he didn’t want to test our luck any further.
The following two days were spent testing the new rear turret with the 2 x .5 guns under various flying conditions, including high level flying at 25,000+ ft and it proved to be equally good under all conditions.
Five days later we all went on leave, this was the break up of the crew after which none of us met again, during the war that’s how things happened.
Before going on leave I went to see Mac to tell him the situation. “Can’t you stay?” he asked “where are you being posted to?”. “I think I may be posted to Lindholme as an instructor”. “Why can’t you stay here then and instruct here? I will miss you, you’ve taught me more about carburettors and how they work. I know I told you you were a pain in the neck to my chaps, you demanding that they check and monitor the engines performance to obtain maximum fuel savings. I will continue to carry out your instructions and to see if I can help save other crew’s lives as we have just recently experienced on X²”.
“If you do a further operation tour, come back here and I will try to look after your aircraft again for you, all the best, good flying”.
Operation Highlights
I have highlighted only a few of our more exciting operations, many of which have been written about and described by other aircrew presumably because these were the operations which for some reason caught the headlines and probably they were the crew members which survived.
It must be remembered, however, that every operation had its dangers. The fact that the aircraft flew over enemy territory was a dangerous place to be, with it being usually in darkness and with anywhere up to 600 aircraft plus on many occasions, all making for the
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same target within a time limit of between 30 to 60 minutes alone had its dangers and problems.
When I say that we had a quiet trip this usually meant that our crew had no major problems and every member carried out his duties as an individual and as a team member. This did not mean that minor problems did not occur such as the rear turret freezing up causing problems for Len (rear gunner) from severe cold and lack of visibility or wireless operator loosing [sic] contact with base or even Wally and myself with ice forming on the wing edges from travelling through cloud. On one occasion the whole crew suffering because of being caught up in a thunderstorm, the aircraft being thrown about like a toy, falling immediately to 1,000 ft and back up again, something that no one had any control over.
Cold was a further concern; the temperature could fall as low as -20 to 30oC below zero. The metal of the aircraft if you touched it with your bare hand, the skin could stick to it therefore gloves had always to be worn. There was warm air circulated throughout the aircraft this was controlled from a duct situated near to the wireless operator’s station and at times should he become very warm would turn it down.
Oxygen masks were also worn as above ten thousand feet oxygen was necessary and it was a continual task to have to remove the ice from your mask, as it built up due to the moisture created from breathing. As you can imagine the gunner being isolated from the main cabin area suffered even more.
The enemy could also cause a few problems on route. Fighters had an advantage over the heavier, slower bombers and the fact that bombers had four engines creating a fair amount of exhaust flame and light made it easy for the fighters to see us. Generally if a fighter was spotted by the gunners in time it was safest to take evasive action.
The action would come say from the rear gunner ‘fighter 3 o’clock approaching’ following ‘dive, dive to port’. The skipper would immediately throw the aircraft into a dive and do a corkscrew manoeuvre, regaining back on his normal course. This generally worked; it was the fighter which was not spotted by the lookouts which caused the problem as they would normally attack from below the rear of the aircraft strafing the fuselage with bullets.
Search lights. The normal searchlight could be a problem for aircraft at lower levels and were situated around most towns, cities and industrial sites, however, there was another much more dangerous blue searchlight, much brighter which could penetrate to much higher altitudes and operated in conjunction with anti aircraft guns. Being caught by one of these was an unfortunate experience and usually resulted in severe damage or the loss of the aircraft. We on one occasion suffered this experience, the blue light locked on to us and no matter whatever we did it was impossible, after about three minutes Wally decided to put the aircraft into a controlled dive to loose [sic] height, as we did so a Halifax aircraft which was operating at a much lower height came across our track. The anti aircraft guns operating in conjunction with the searchlight opened up and the Halifax just blew up. We had a lucky escape.
As I said some anti aircraft guns operated in conjunction with searchlights, however, the bulk of them were situated around towns and cities and created a heavy barrack in order to keep the bombers from bombing at low levels, the result could be seen and occasionally heard, and on one occasion over Amiens felt.
Returning from Modane on a bright moonlit night without warning this small unit of guns opened up and a shell exploded very close to us, fortunately not causing any injuries to the crew. Shrapnel caused damage to the fuel lines causing a leak in the pipe and holes appeared
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in the fuselage, and along the wings and side windscreen of the aircraft. We made an emergency landing at Tangmere in South England and on inspection found over 100 various size holes along the length of the fuselage and wings.
The piece of shrapnel that hit the windscreen had entered through the starboard side unbeknown to me had ripped through my flying jacket sleeve and gone out through the front window, again, lady luck was with us.
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Log Book and
Operations Record Book
(Battle Orders)
Every crew member kept a log book showing every date, time and flying details carried out.
I have copied some pages which correspond to copies of the Squadron’s battle orders, referring to operations 14, 15, 16 and 17 as detailed in my log book.
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[page from authors logbook]
[underlined] TOTAL FLYING HOURS NOVEMBER 101 SDN [/underlined]
[underlined] DAY [/underlined] 3 hrs 30 mins
[underlined] NIGHT [/underlined] 39 hrs 45 mins
[underlined] TOTAL 43 hrs 15 mins [/underlined]
DECEMBER
16 – Lanc III X2 – WO EVANS – FE – 14 OPS – [underlined] BERLIN [/underlined] QUIET TRIP – HEAVY LOSSES – FOG ON RETURN LANDED AT WICKENBY – 8 hrs 30 mins.
20 – Lanc III X2 – WO EVANS – FE– 15 OPS – [underlined] FRANKFURT [/underlined] MANY FIGHTER FLARES AROUND TARGET AREA – 5 hrs 50 mins.
24 – Lanc III X2 – WO EVANS – FE– 16 OPS – [underlined] BERLIN [/underlined] REAR TURRET U/S STRB OUTER FEATHERED – 7 hrs 10 mins.
28 – Lanc III X2 – WO EVANS – FE– 17 OPS – [underlined] BERLIN [/underlined] 6 hrs 40 mins.
[underlined] TOTAL FLYING HOURS [/underlined]
[underlined] DAY [/underlined] 0 hrs 0 mins
[underlined] NIGHT [/underlined] 28 hrs 10 mins
[underlined] TOTAL 28 hrs 10 mins [/underlined]
[underlined] DECEMBER 101 SDN [/underlined]
[signature] OC ‘C’ FLT.
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[indecipherable page]
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[indecipherable page]
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[indecipherable page]
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[indecipherable page]
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CHAPTER G
CHRISTMAS 1943
I always thought of Christmas as a time for giving and receiving, a time of joy and happiness, a time for families to come and meet and join in the happiness of the event. It was of course a time to remember, to consider ones relationship with family, friends and others and how relationships could be improved. Christmas 1943 was different; it was a time of anxiety and many other emotions, anxiety not only for the crewmembers but more so for the folks at home.
Before joining the RAF we lived in a small village where everyone knew each other. There was three of us in the forces, my older sister Jean, my brother Sandy and myself, living at home with my mother our two younger sisters Betty and Mary. So quite often my mother would be stopped in the street and asked how one of us was getting along, furthermore she had received a telegram stating that I had not returned from an operation and that further information would be forwarded when received (one must remember that at that time (1943) telephones were a luxury so the only method of communication was by the Post Office. Christmas 1943 was also the first Christmas that we had not all been at home).
The ground crews also had similar feelings when waiting for their aircraft to return from an operation and then the relief when they saw the aircraft landing and taxiing in.
There was also a period of what today would be known as pressure, then it was just part of the job although some individuals did suffer from depression and for some this ended their flying career. All crew members had to be physically and mentally fit to survive.
It was early morning on Christmas Day 1943, we as a crew had just returned from an operation, the target Berlin. After debriefing we arrived for breakfast at around 6:30 hours, the atmosphere in the dining room was best described as noisy as you would expect from 150 young men aged between 19 and 23 years old, until you really looked around and saw one, two even three empty tables then the atmosphere changed to a more sober one.
Christmas dinner was being served at 13:00 hours, this gave us time for a few hours sleep before arriving back at the mess around 12:50 hours. The meal was good and all seemed in high spirits. We finished eating and were enjoying a cigarette when the duty officer arrived, he slowly walked up to the bar and turned the Toby Jug sitting there towards the wall, this was our first indication that operations may be on, slowly the mess began to empty as the air crew members began to leave.
It was a cold but pleasant afternoon as I hurried along the perimeter road thinking of past Christmases and remembering the simple things, the pink or white sugar mice, an apple and orange possibly a few sweets, we never had many presents, hand knitted socks or gloves, then my thoughts were interrupted by seeing coming towards me a tractor pulling a bomb trolley with a mixed load of bombs on board, and further to my left I could see a fuel bowser topping up a Lancaster. Normally the aircraft were filled with 1,200 to 1,400 gallons of fuel
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sufficient for a five or six hour trip, if the trip was going to be longer then the aircraft were topped up.
On arrival at our Lancaster X² Mac, our ground engineer, was there standing in front looking at the aircraft, I said ‘”what are you doing?” Thinking he answered “isn’t she beautiful, I don’t want her to fly tonight. I am the happiest sergeant on the Squadron. Before I arrived at Ludford I had been with 101 Squadron for 18 months and during that time I had lost seven aircraft under my control. Since being here and in charge of X² and you as the flight engineer after five months I still have the same aircraft. Do you know how many operations you have flown in X²?” “No I don’t “, I replied. “Eleven and six of which was to the big city Berlin and we are still going strong.” “Let’s go and carry out ourground checks”, I said.
We had just finished when Wally our pilot arrived. “I thought I would find you here” he said. “I thought we could carry out a test flight and check out the hydraulics on the undercarriage?” “Yes I have fixed them” said Mac. “Let’s go” said Wally, “coming” I said to Mac. He hesitated then said “I haven’t got a parachute”. “Neither have we” I said.
We fired up the engines, taxied out, got the green light from control and were airborne. I then vacated my seat and let Mac have it. As I checked all the fuel and engine gauges etc we climbed to around 300 hundred feet, flew in a south west direction and as we banked to starboard there standing on the ridge was the magnificent building Lincoln Cathedral with the city spread out below it. We were privileged to see it yet also very humbled and it seemed than that what we were doing was right and that this was a ‘just war’ and had to be won. I touched Mac on the shoulder and pointed down. I’m sure he was brushing a tear away.
Ten minutes later we had landed with everything ok including the hydraulics as we closed the rear door of the Lancaster X² we hugged each other and I’m sure we all said a short prayer, at least I did.
[inserted] [Christmas dinner menu RAF Ludford Magna Sergeants Mess 1943 [/inserted]
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Briefing was scheduled for 19:00 hours. All two hundred of us where [sic] there on time and the Group Captain arrived and slipped up onto the platform, the wing commander brought us all to attention. I noticed that the curtains covering the map on the wall stayed closed “I’ll be brief” said the Group Captain, “all flying has been cancelled for tonight because of severe weather conditions over Europe. I also wish to thank you all for the maximum effort and success, which has been put in during the past five months. Good show and good flying from now on. I will let you go to continue your Christmas celebrations, have a good time, good night and god bless”. Mac got his way and X² did not fly on Christmas night.
Briefing was scheduled for 19.00 hours and as I said all flying was cancelled, this only lasted for 15 minutes, after which all the members of the 25 crews that would have flown, along with all the other necessary ground staff support teams necessary to service such an operation (all in 350‑400 young people) were now free to do as they wished, however as by now it was around 19.30 the choice was limited, retire to the mess or the local pubs.
As we the crew were now making our way back from the briefing room, Norman (our wireless operator) announced that he was visiting the pub to see if they had any beer “Are you coming?” “No” I said “I’ll make my way back to the mess”. Bill (our mid upper gunner) said “I’ll join you for a beer”.
The technical section of the squadron was situated on the south side of the main road which ran from west to east through the village from Market Rasen to Louth. The living accommodation and messes were located on the north of the road.
On reaching the main road instead of crossing and carrying on up the lane to the mess for some reason I turned right and continued along the main road, as it was extremely dark walking in the centre of the road as this was the safest place. As I continued I heard music and singing coming from the pub on the right everyone seemed to be happy and enjoying themselves, further on and on the left was the other pub ‘The Black Bull’. I could hear footsteps coming and going, but could not recognise the people, here also was the sounds of people enjoying themselves.
A little further along the road on the left stood the small church, as I approached I could hear the organ music and the congregation singing carols. I remember thinking if I was thinking of attending church I should have dressed. I was in battle dress and should be in uniform, however to return to the billet and change it would make me too late for the service.
I found myself at the church entrance I looked through the entrance hall, I could see a chink of light coming from under the heavy door. I pushed the door open and heard the creaking noise, on entering I stood for a few seconds to allow my eyes to become accustomed to the light, a few members of the congregation hearing the door turned to see who entered, as I moved across to take a place in the pews an elderly gentlemen from the other side came across squeezed me on the shoulder gave me his hymn book “we are on verse three god bless” and returned to his place. The church was fairly full mostly of elderly people man and female with a few children, all were singing and appeared to be enjoying it, the service was not a format which I knew, however I felt good to be involved and somehow very pleased to be there. All those in church appeared to believe in what they were singing and doing and further more believed that all the service people on the base were doing what was right and that they all had their full support that the war was a righteous war and a war that had to be won.
At the end of the service I quickly left the church and made my way back along the main road. I was somehow excited so much so that I remember running all the way and turning
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right until I reached the mess. There were a number of people sitting around having a drink and/or reading. A colleague was reading the picture post magazine which had an article covering 101 Squadron. When I asked him if I could have a look, he said “I’ll keep it for you”. On the centre two pages was a photo of a Lancaster with staff standing around and on the wings etc, inspecting the photo closely I noticed that it was not a 101 Squadron Lancaster as it did not show the special aerials to work ABC. (The programme had been arranged unfortunately while we (our crew) were on leave and a Lancaster from Wickenby had been used).
I checked to see if the rations had come in and found a good selection of cigarettes were available Woodbine, Captain, Players and Gold Flake and there was also some chocolate.
The dining room was closed, on a trestle table at the end was a collection of bread, cheese and butter. I took a few rounds of bread and a chunk of cheese and made my way back to the billet, on arrival I found Wally, Eric, and Jimmy were there and they had a good fire going, making the chimney almost red hot. They were sitting reading and asked “where did you get to?” “Church” I said “you should have said I would have come with you” said Eric, “I didn’t know, I brought some bread and cheese for toast if you want it”. “Thank you” said Wally “have a mug of tea, the teapot will still be hot on the stove”. “I called in at the mess they have cigarettes and chocolate in. Only a letter for Bill which I have brought back. He and Norman were going to the pub. Where is Len (our rear gunner)?” “Oh, he has gone to try to hitch a lift home to Grimsby, remember if opps are on tomorrow give him a ring to let him know so that he can return, I have his telephone number” said Wally. “Do you want something to read?” asked Eric. “No” I said, “I think I will turn in and catch up with some sleep”.
This 1943 Christmas was at least different from all previous ones and part of my life which I will never forget.
The next time we flew was on 30th December and then again the following night on 31st December both operations were to Berlin. Mac continued to service X² and over the next 3 1/2 months we completed a further 13 operations to complete our first tour.
We didn’t always bring the aircraft home in the same condition as we started, however, we always brought it back and Mac and his crew always managed to repair it and have it serviced ready for the next trip.
We completed our tour in late April 1944 and the crew were all split up and we went our separate ways all as instructors. I joined the staff at Lindholme as a flight engineer instructor. In June D‑Day arrived, we were again temporarily called up as reserved in case the invasion went wrong, fortunately all went well. I was later transferred to Bottesford then Cottesmore and ended up at North Luffenham where by now VE Day had arrived in June 1945. We were again crewed up to join the Tiger Force to operate against Japan. Luckily for us VJ Day came much sooner than expected with the use of the hydrogen bomb being used on Japan, which stopped us from being posted to the Far East.
I stayed at North Luffenham until demobbed. Lincoln Cathedral played an important role in our lives as we used to use it as a landmark when returning early in the morning from operations and provided weather conditions were good, when we saw the cathedral we knew we were safely home again. Sadly Lancaster X² only flew two more operations after we finished and was lost over Mailly le Camp, France on the 3rd/4th May 1944.
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CHAPTER H
HEAVY CONVERSION UNITS INSTRUCTOR
LINDHOLME
BOTTESFORD
COTTESMORE
NORTH LUFFENHAM
After Operations
After completing our tour of operations with 101 Squadron in April 1944 the crew went on leave for around ten days and while on leave I received information informing me to report to Lindholme on such a date.
Lindholme was 1656HCU the conversion unit, which I had reported to prior to being crewed up and joining 101 Squadron. Ludford Magna as I had said previously was an airfield specially constructed as a utility base to carry on the war against Germany. All buildings, temporary constructions accommodation nissen huts were situated in small groups situated around the unit site.
Nissen hut accommodation for up to eight persons situated in the wilds half a mile from mess, flight units ablution block 20 yards away with washing and shower facilities, no heating (as you can imagine it was very cold in winter). The accommodation had a stove in the centre of the hut with a chimney, which went up through the roof, used coal or anthracite as fuel and required lighting daily. These huts were extremely hot in summer with regular visitors such as field mice, ants and earwigs. In winter they were extremely cold and damp with condensation running down interior sides and dripping on beds etc.
Lindholme was a peacetime permanent station which had all the niceties available, good roads comfortable, centrally heated one-person accommodation with all mod cons including dining room with waitress service. This to me was the biggest difference between Ludford and Lindholme.
Lindholme then was a conversion unit where pilots and crews had completed their initial training on smaller aircraft then upgraded to the heavy, four engine bombers such as Halifax and Lancaster. Lindholme trained Lancaster crews; it was here where additional crewmembers such as gunners and flight engineers joined in.
Having completed a successful tour of operations my role now was to introduce flight engineers who had completed their year long course, at possibly Blackpool and St Annes’s as up to this time these trainees had only briefly seen the interior of a Lancaster, far less done any flying.
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Unfortunately because of the shortage of Lancaster bombers arriving to the squadron, the conversion units such as Lindholme were still using Halifaxs [sic], this did not cause too much of a problem for the other six members of the crew (except the engineers) as it was a heavy bomber and the handling regarding flying and landing was similar to the Lancaster giving the pilot the experience of flying a large, heavy plane.
The engineer’s role was the same on all heavy bombers so the experience gained was still valid and it still gave him the necessary confidence. The difference being some of the instruments and dials on the Halifax were in different positions to that of a Lancaster. The crews would have a period of familiarisation on reaching the squadron before finally carrying out operations.
Life was so much more comfortable working on a base with all mod cons as expected for the 1940s.
My role along with others was to aid the trainee engineers to familiarise themselves with the aircraft inside and out, and when flying with their new crew, introduce the engineer to his role such as to the large number of switches and dials on the main panel and also the instruments on the engineer’s panel.
One of the main tasks was how to change flying on the various fuel tanks safely, the other how to feather an engine if required without causing any problems, how they as a person fitted in with the other crew members. Therefore while the pilot was under instruction with a pilot instructor mainly on what we called circuits and bumps, which was taking off, flying around and landing again. I would also fly and show the engineer and make sure he was confident and safe in his execution of his duties.
The time varied depending on how quickly the pilot took to prove himself capable and the instructor pilot was satisfied that he could safely fly and land such a plane, this could take anything from a few hours to many hours.
I used the experience, which I had gained over the past year of flying many hours in different conditions to make sure that these young operators had a better chance of completing a successful tour than I had. I tried to emphasise on them the need to be fully committed to their job of making sure they knew their role and capable of carrying out all the safety checks which should be carried out by themselves even although someone has said that they have done so, that they used the engines efficiently and monitored the fuel available as economically as possible. I had prepared a schedule, which if used in conjunction with the gauges and filled in every fifteen minutes in flight or so gave instant information if any problem had or were occurring to the fuel position, when action could be taken.
Lindholme being a permanent station was well equipped and had space available for each crew members to have their own section huts which proved most usual [sic] and I spent a good part of my time being available to talk with these trainee engineers, discussing any problems or whatever.
In any month I spent on average around 50 hours in actual flying time either day or night flying. This was made up of flying with possibly 10 different pilots on 26 to 30 different flights. The flights were generally around the airfield at fairly low altitude, up to two hundred feet carrying out circuits and landings with pilot, instructor and conversion crews. We therefore did not carry parachutes; this also gave the trainee crews a little more confidence to think that we had confidence in them.
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In June 1944 two days after D-Day I attended an instructors course at St Albans, South Wales lasting for four weeks, which proved most instructive, enjoyable and created confidence with ample time for self expression. After that I took the opportunity to attend any other courses, which became available such as a course on jet engines – something for the future, update course on the improved Merlin engines coming into service and a short course on Stromberg carburettors. The RAF at this time was looking to the future and on the levels and quality of staff they were likely to require once the war ended, but with the peace still to be kept for years on. At present most if not all of their engineers and a station or base engineer were all from senior ground staff, so when I was asked if I would wish to embark on such a course (the course was quite complex covering all aspects of engineering ground and in flight) I said I would.
After quite a lot of time on reading (time which I had) I eventually sat the paper and was very happy with the results 89% success, this was of course only part of the paper an oral examination was also required which up until I was released from the RAF I had not taken, however, these showed on my records.
1668 Heavy Conversion Unit,
Bottesford
After leaving 101 Squadron I spent a short period at Lindholme as a Flight Engineer Instructor before moving to Bottesford. Bottesford was another war time base similar to Ludford Magna and from where Lancasters also flew, however, in early 1944 it had become surplus to requirements.
The living accommodation instead of being Nissen huts were constructed of fabricated wooden framed units. Being available it was used as a holding base for American troops waiting for D Day resulting in the accommodation being left in a dreadful state.
During August 1944 1668 Heavy Conversion Unit took the base over and myself and few others were in the advance party. On arrival we found it difficult to find accommodation suitable to live in however, after a few days of hard work managed to make progress with repairs. Among the early arrivals were two air gunners both of whom had completed their tour of operations. Jock on Wellingtons and Jack on Lancasters. The three of us became really good friends for all the time we were on the base. In fact, Jack is still a good friend, he now lives in North Cirney Nr Cirencester and we have a card from him each Christmas.
The base was situated midway between Newark and Grantham on the left, half a mile off the main A1 road, walking or cycling were the only methods of transport for getting around the base or for travelling further afield.
We had been at Bottesford for just over a week when this night the three of us decided to have a ride around, on reaching the main road instead of turning left for Long Bennington and Newark we turned right towards Grantham. After cycling along the A1 road for about three miles we came across a signpost, which read Marston and Dry Doddington so we decided to go left and see where the lane would take us. After a mile we came upon a nice looking pub on the corner of the crossroads called the Thorold Arms where we decided to call and have a beer this being Friday evening. The pub was open, furthermore this was the first time that I had entered a pub since I joined 101 Squadron, as I had promised myself that so long as I was flying on operations I would not have a drink.
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Training at Bottesford got under way relatively soon and by early September crews for conversion to Lancasters were arriving in number. The routine was very similar to that at Lindholme.
Crews arrived without any experience of the Lancaster and it was our role as instructors to train the flight engineers to a standard where he was competent and safe to act on his own, and to pass on my experience which would make him feel more confident, while other staff members were doing the same for the pilots and the other members of the crew.
Bottesford as I said previously was a base built around 1942 to a standard sufficient to allow Bomber Command to carry the war to the enemy, where heavy bombers such as the Lancaster could operate from. Carrying a bomb load to most destinations necessary and to cause severe damage to their war effort.
From the staff viewpoint it was a complete change from the comfort offered by a peacetime base with all the mod cons, even including waitress service in the dining halls.
Bottesford was however a very happy unit where, so long as the training and flying was carried out on time to a very high standard, all was well.
It was becoming clear that with D Day over with the Allied Troops now moving across Europe as expected and on course, that victory in Europe was only a matter of time with the need for heavy bomber operations becoming limited. This meant that the training for crews could be relaxed and extended, therefore to ensure the trainee flight engineers interest and enthusiasm was kept alive. Two other instructors and myself introduced a short course on engine maintenance, this course lasted three weeks, the purpose of which was to strip down an engine completely, then reassemble it so that it would fire up and run. We had available to us a Lancaster, which had recently run off the runway on landing and was declared not airworthy. The four Merlin engines were still in good condition; this meant that with four engines and four trainees working on each we could entertain sixteen students.
The course proved a great success and it was felt that all those involved had afterwards a better understanding of the engines, which could possibly save their lives in the future.
As the weeks passed three of us, Jock, Jack and myself, had more free time and when on an evening we decided to leave camp we usually ended up at the Thorold Arms. By now we knew many of the locals as well as the family and were being brought into the evening events, such as playing darts. There were a number of really good dart players and eventually we, along with Sylvia, also became an excellent partnership.
Five months on. Christmas 1944 was a completely different Christmas to that of 1943, by now Sylvia and myself were seeing quite a lot of each other and I was still on duty over Christmas, I was asked to spend Christmas day with the family, we had a lovely time. A few days later I was on leave and travelled north to spend New Year with my family in Aberdour.
Our friendship blossomed and we were spending more and more time together and with Sylvia’s family and friends. Sylvia had a brother and three sisters; Roy was the oldest followed by Eileen then Sylvia, with Gert and Brenda the two younger sisters. Roy was also in the RAF on air-sea rescue and spent most of his time overseas.
Eileen was on munitions working in Grantham; Sylvia also worked in Grantham in ladies hosiery. Gert worked in a bakery with Brenda still at school.
In the evenings when the pub was open Sylvia helped serve in the bar with her father and mother Gert usually at weekends. During early 1945 flying at the base continued smoothly
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and generally without incident. We had one scary incident during night flying practise, an enemy light bomber managed to evade the radar controls and came in along the runway following one of the Lancasters and dropped cluster bombs along the length of the runway. This did cause some excitement as these bombs could explode from the vibration of the landing aircraft. Fortunately the runway was cleared without any injuries.
The other excitement was when one of the Lancasters, which we had just received from squadron required an air test to check its airworthiness before being put to use as a training aircraft. One of the staff pilots and myself as engineer was asked to carry out the test which we did, doing all the usual flying and checking the various instruments and controls. We decided to put it in a downward power dive, at first all was fine and the controls responded perfectly then it happened the port outer propeller began speeding up. No matter what we tried it continued to increase then it disappeared, the two on the inner engines seemed all right, the propeller in the starboard reached well above the normal speed but stayed in place. We quickly reduced our speed and dive, and made a quick return to base and landed on two engines, the aircraft did not pass its airworthy test. We found out later that it was a fault with the balance plates on the, then, new four paddle bladed propellers.
I, by now, had spent eight months as an instructor resting from the pressures of flying on operations and I knew that in the near future it may be necessary to do a further thirty operations, either across Europe or possibly against Japan. A few of us were thinking along the same lines and discussing the possibilities with others of forming crews.
There were two staff pilots on the base who were seriously thinking to the future, with whom I would have been happy to fly with and to this end we took every opportunity of carrying out test flights and then engaging in some low flying, which we expected would be necessary for the future especially if the enemy were the Japanese.
I increased my link training and spent considerable amounts of time keeping fit and up-to-date on all aspects of flying which could be beneficial to our survival. There was suggestion floating around that a new Tiger Force was being formed, which was likely to operate against Japan.
The river Trent gave an excellent corridor to practise low flying as there was at that time no obstacles such as power lines, telephone lines or high buildings to restrict flying. The river banks were relatively high with a river width in excess of 130 ft where the Lancaster wingspan was 101 ft and could easily be tucked in below the level of the banks, great flying, great excitement and very satisfying.
The war in Europe was progressing well, the need for heavy bombers was becoming less and with now limited targets. In mid April a few of us were informed that it was almost 12 months since we last flew on operations and it would now be necessary to do a further tour, more information would be available shortly.
On 8th May 1945 the Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill, announced the termination of the war in Europe to the whole country and his speech was broadcast over the station Tannoy system at 3pm. The afternoon was then devoted to sports activities and there were parties in all messes during the evening.
I was not on base, this was the date selected on which I was to be presented with my DFM at Buckingham Palace by King George VI. My mum and Aunty Kate travelled down from Edinburgh on the overnight train in the early hours of the morning; I joined the train at Grantham. As usual it was standing room only so I met up with my mum and Aunty on the platform at Kings Cross station. If I remember correctly the investitures commenced at
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11am so we had time for breakfast then made our way to the palace. There were many RAF personnel there as well as family members to watch the ceremony and see their relatives presented with their medals. We were all greeted on arrival and then informed of the procedure.
The King seemed very thin and poorly, dressed in an Admiral’s Naval uniform. After shaking hands with him and him pinning the medal on my uniform he asked me which squadron I flew with. I told him 101 Squadron, he replied “One of the elite I believe, good flying”.
We were out of the palace by 1:30pm, by this time the news that the war in Europe was over was known and London was beginning to fill up with people. Everyone was in party mood, singing and dancing or just walking around. London had been under blackout conditions since the start of the war in September 1939. Today things were different all the dark days were over; the people of London were showing their joy. Every light possible, which could be lit, was lit and the streets looked most inviting, it was an amazing sight. My mother and Aunt Kate were booked to stay the night in London so I saw them to their hotel then I made my way back through the crowds to Kings Cross and caught the train back to Grantham. What a day to be in London, VE Day the 8th May 1945 celebrating the end of the war in Europe. There was a real sense of relief and everyone was there to have a good time and to party.
The train was again packed, mainly with service personnel making their way home on leave. I arrived at Grantham around 5pm and from the station phoned the Thorold Arms expecting to speak to Sylvia. She and Eileen had gone to the church service and not yet returned so it was Sylvia’s dad that answered, he said he would tell Sylvia on their return that I had arrived in Grantham. It was agreed that Sylvia would come and meet me cycling on one bicycle and pushing the second for me to ride back to Marston, however, on her travelling along the A1 road towards Grantham she met a person she knew cycling from Grantham. She stopped and asked him if he had seen an airman walking and he said no. Previously to this an RAF vehicle had passed Sylvia with RAF personnel on board, thinking that I had thumbed a lift and that I would be dropped off at the road end leading to Marston she decided to turn back. As I was not waiting at the road end she then thought that I must have decided to go back to Bottesford, collect my own bicycle and return to Marston later.
Sometime later Gert happened to look out of the window at the Thorold Arms and shouted to Sylvia “Jock is coming down the road”. Sylvia, thinking she was having her on didn’t believe her until she herself looked out the window. My other pals Jock and Jack had already arrived and all including the locals were having a great time. As the evening progressed and the drink continued to flow a game started where the aim was to collect as many possible pieces of other peoples [sic] ties by cutting off the ends, this was all taken in good fun until one person who had just been given a new tie for his birthday, that day, by his wife and she was not amused at seeing it being cut to pieces.
The end of the war in Europe sealed the fate of most of the war time built heavy bomber bases, they had completed their usefulness for which they were built, that in giving Bomber Command the opportunity required to take the war to the enemy, which they had accomplished very successfully.
Food on the stations was very good with a real selection most of the time. Sundays was the time when the menu suffered as most of the catering staff had time off and tea was usually laid out to help yourself, mostly cheese, bread and butter, and possibly a few cakes. This possibly was the reason why on Mondays the sweet was often bread and butter pudding, something I didn’t like then and even now when on a menu I still shy away from.
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This was the time that Petula Clarke was often on the radio, in fact every lunch time she recorded a song especially for RAF Conversion Unit 1668.
Bottesford was no exception for within six weeks the complete Conversion Unit was closed down and I, along with others, moved to new surroundings to the peacetime base of Cottesmore where all the staff enjoyed the luxuries of a permanent built unit. Working conditions within the base were very relaxed, with all enjoying a five day week when most weekends were free unless on duty. Flying hours, however, as far as I was concerned still reached between 33 to 44 hours each month.
During June onwards, now that the war was over in Europe, it was still most important that the peoples of Europe, friends as well as enemy, that Britain controlled the airspace and continued to show this by having continued aircraft flying in the skies around.
Certain trips were carried out in order to show ground staff, who had carried out such an excellent job in sometimes terrible conditions to keep the bases and aircraft serviceable along the last five years the opportunity to see for themselves what conditions across Europe looked like now. These trips were given various names: the Ruhr Express, Cooks Tour, Happy Valley Express, each lasted five to six hours flying time where up to 12 to 15 personnel were on board plus the crew of four.
I, as Flight Engineer, was on a good number of such trips. They were enjoyed by most and showed the devastation which had occurred to many of the towns and cities across Europe, in vast areas which had received attention from bombing by the RAF followed by the destruction caused by the Armies fighting their way to Berlin since D Day.
The destruction was terrible with many large areas just a pile of rubble or shells of buildings still standing. The thing which impressed me most was the number of churches and round towers such as commercial chimneys which still stood.
Such a trip would cover from a base to Ijmunden, Amsterdam, Arnhem, Nijmegen, Wesell Dortmund, Essen, Duisburg, Düsseldorf then back to base. Or base to Cologne, Bonn, Aachem Rotterdam then home.
Cottesmore
Cottesmore was situated between Grantham and Stamford, four miles west of the A1 road near the village of Ashwell and six miles north west of Oakham, so our move was only a few minutes flying time. There was much movement between stations, which gave the opportunity of visiting different locations which we heard about but not visited, such as Drem in East Lothian, Ternhill and Shawbury in Shropshire, and many others which helped to make life more enjoyable.
Being stationed close to Stamford and the main road north it wasn’t difficult to hitch a ride or at worst catch a bus or train to Grantham.
Our stay at Cottesmore was fairly short lived; we then moved on to North Luffenham another of the pre war built stations with all the usual mod cons. North Luffenham is situated south west of Stamford, one mile off the A6121 road. Before leaving Cottesmore I had confirmation that we were crewed up and to expect instructions shortly regarding a further tour of operations in the Far East but before that certain procedures would have to be carried out, such as doctors reports and certain jabs given. However, six weeks on and we were still waiting.
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The war against Japan was expected to last for some considerable time, however, the introduction of the Atom Bomb by the Americans and the use of them by the American Air Force brought the Japanese war to a very quick end. We had at the time just received our preliminary dates and instructions for flying out to the Far East. This announcement that the Japanese had surrendered cancelled this and we missed the opportunity of joining the Tiger Force. The use of the Atomic Bomb on two Japanese cities seemed, and was, a terrible thing to do and caused terrible casualties among the Japanese citizens in these two cities.
However, if it had been necessary for US troops to land and fight their way through all the various islands the casualty list was estimated that it could have been one million plus service people.
North Luffenham
The war in both Europe and Japan was over which meant that working conditions at North Luffenham changed as from now. There was less requirement for further training of Lancaster crews. There were a large number of service men and women in all three services hoping and wanting to get back to Civvie Street as soon as possible. The government also had a problem in that across the country there were not the organisations or jobs available to employ all those excess to requirements service personnel. Therefore a delaying action was in place to slow down the release. Lancasters were of course used for various operations such as dropping food supplies to the people of Belgium and Germany and for bringing home prisoners of war from Germany and elsewhere and from bringing to the UK survivors from the torture camps.
The top chiefs of all three services were of course now considering the future of the armed forces. The Air Force was no different, we had won the war but not the peace, the peace may be a lot more difficult and to that end the Air Force was trying to assess and ensure whatever happened they had sufficient of high quality personnel to carry out this purpose. Therefore as personnel were being demobbed, if they should have certain qualities they were being given the opportunity to stay on by being offered certain incentives.
While at Luffenham I took the opportunity of attending as many courses as possible, improving my knowledge and information regarding the services and of course continuing to add to my flying hours, something I enjoyed doing.
Our job on the unit was similar to any other staff member, flying still took priority, other duties such as Duty Officer and such like was also now part of our programme.
I recall an interview which I had with the Group Captain Section Leader arrived at the flight office and said “Jock, the Wing Commander wants to see you”. “What have I done?” “Nothing, it’s good news, make your way to his office for 11am.” “I’m flying at 10 o’clock”. “Ok, after that will do”. I arrived at his office next day around 9.55 am, his secretary showed me into his office. I saluted, he said “Good, come and sit down” then the interview went something like this: “I have been looking over your record and I see that you have carried out a lot of flying, almost 2000 hours. There are not many people who can live up to that, you must enjoy flying?” “Yes I do”.
“I also see that you have attained a pass, in fact an extremely high pass on the Chief Ground Engineer course, unusual for aircrew even although you are a Flight Engineer”.
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“Your flight commander also told me you were highly respected and thought of at Cottesmore because of your work with Engine Service course. You would seem to be going back to Civvie Street?” “Yes sir”. “Do you want that?” “Possibly”.
“Even with all your exceptional work the war is over so I can’t recommend you for a medal however, what I can offer you – you know that the Air Force is looking for people like yourself for its future success – therefore the offer I am prepared to put to you is stay on in the Air Force as a Chief Ground Engineer with Flying Officer on entry (permanent) with good promotional opportunities to at least Flight Lieutenant or even Squadron Leader. Think carefully about it, don’t make your mind up now, come and see me in one week’s time.”
The unit continued flying and with training. The war being over the RAF was keen to show off their aircraft such as the Spitfire and the Lancaster, which had been so brilliant during the war, to the general public so a number of open days throughout the UK were arranged whereby the public could come along and see over all these war time aircraft. These days proved very popular.
To show off the Lancaster we landed at the base involved, stayed for four to five hours opening the Lancasters up and allowing people to enter by the rear door, make their way up through the fuselage past the pilots positions and exit through the flaps in the bomb aimers compartment, at the front of the aircraft reaching the ground by ladder. Two of the open days I remember going to were Finningly [sic] and Haverford West.
During my time in the RAF I only met up with my sister Jean on one occasion and that was when I was at St Athans in South Wales, she was stationed at Bridge End and we managed to meet for an hour or two, where we met I cannot recall. My brother Sandy was stationed at Swinderby for most of his time in the RAF as a fitter servicing Lancasters, and even although we were relatively closely stationed to each other we never once met up and even when I occasionally landed at Swinderby we never managed to get together. Of course these plans were always last minute arrangements and we might only be there for an hour or so before taking off again.
After two weeks I made a further appointment to meet the Group Captain and told him that after serious consideration that I had decided to leave the RAF and return to Civvie Street. I believe that he was disappointed, he wished me success in whatever I decided to do, we shook hands and I left his office.
I was demobbed on 10th September 1946 at Uxbridge then travelled north to Stamford, Sylvia had earlier moved to Stamford to further her career as a shop buyer, by working in a much larger ladies fashion store, travelling to Stamford on a Sunday evening, returning home in the Saturday evening. This meant that we saw more of each other on my time off.
The other opportunity that was open to me on my demob, as I had over a 1000 flying hours, was to join BOAC. Unfortunately the base was Australia and the airline travelled between Australia and Ceylon. Also available because I had A‑level passes on RAF teaching courses gave me the opportunity to train as a technical course teacher.
Both of which I declined and decided to return to Civvie Street and continue in forestry, which was always my first choice and as my future notes will show.
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CHAPTER I
ADVANCES IN TECHNOLOGY
WHAT IF?
Advances in Technology
Most of the technology was designed to combat the increasingly efficient enemy night fighter’s control system, in July 1943 window was used for the first time. Window was made up of thin strips of aluminium foil (approximately 9" long) packed in bundles of approx 100. It was the bomb aimer’s responsibility to drop these down a small chute filled in the front compartment every 15 minutes along route. With all other aircraft doing the same, the concentration played havoc with the enemy’s ground and air radar sets, however, it could not deter the enemy fighter threat for a long period of time, as the Germans managed to overcome this problem.
During D-Day window was used with great success in fooling the Germans that a second landing area further east along the coast was to happen. 101 Squadron completely serviced this operation by dropping window, continually moving across the channel for 48 hours, which meant that German defence forces were stretched along the French coastline rather than being able to concentrate on the D-Day landing site. By the time they realised their mistake the landing had a strong hold.
Other new aids such as RDF (Radar Direction Finding) known as Monica was trialled by 101 Squadron, but was short lived simply because the enemy night fighter crews became efficient at tuning into the signals omitted by Monica.
In July 1943 another new system known as Ground Cigar was operating twenty-four hours a day from a site on the Suffolk coast, jamming the whole of the 38‑42 MHZ band known to be used by the German fighters.
It became obvious to the boffins that to be really efficient the system needed to be airborne, it was envisaged that a single Bomber Command squadron should be allocated the new RLM role and would operate within the main part of the bomber stream. This highly responsible task was given to 101 Squadron, the new system was known as ABC or Airborne Cigar. The ABC required an additional crewmember known as a Special Duties Operator; the area behind the main spar normally occupied by the aircraft emergency couch was converted to accommodate the new equipment. Externally, 7 ft long aerials were fitted to the aircraft, two along the spine and the third under the forward fuselage. The special duty operators were German speaking and became the eighth crewmember in 101 Squadron crews.
The role was to jam the radio transmissions made by the German night fighters ground based controllers. ABC equipment consisted of a panoramic receiver and three transmitters; the receiver could pick up all 24 different frequencies being used by the crystal controlled VHF sets. Its eight crystals each covered three wavebands used by the Germans’ night fighter
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crews to receive the necessary information about the bomber stream location. Once the operators were able to use their German language skills to find the active controller frequency he put down a key connected to one of his transmitters, which broadcast engine noise on that frequency effectively jamming it over a range of around 50 miles. He repeated the process until he had his three transmitters effectively jamming three German frequencies.
In theory, eight of the 101 Squadron Lancasters could cover all 24 frequencies in use during the night.
This equipment was quite weighty therefore so-called unnecessary equipment such as the steel plates behind the pilot’s head and the steel door behind the front compartment were removed to counter the weight increase.
ABC was very effective in jamming the German night fighter’s ability to connect quickly with the main bomber stream. The other downside was when the 101 Lancasters specials were operating their equipment these aircraft could be readily picked up by German night fighters and searchlights. With the squadron suffering much heavier losses than any other squadron in Bomber Command. There was a plaque in the middle of Ludford Magna remembering the 101 sacrifice, it read:
[border] 101 Squadron Lancasters based at Ludford Magna
from June 1943 with highly secret ABC radio and 8 man
crews flew on every major Bomber Command mission
suffering the highest losses of any squadron in World War II [/border]
Ludford Magna was also selected as one of the first airfields in the group to have FIDO fitted. FIDO (Fog Investigation and Dispersal Operation) this was justified because of 101 Squadron’s key role within Bomber Command.
The equipment consisted of two pipelines running along the edge of each side of the main runway with perforated holes in the pipes. In extremely foggy conditions when aircraft were due to land petrol was forced along the pipes which was then set alight, this helped clear the fog sufficiently to allow aircraft to land safely. One of the disadvantages being should an aircraft with fuel leaking or swerving off the runway an explosion could occur causing loss of aircraft.
This equipment came into us in January 1944. The standard rear turret fitted to the Lancaster was the Fraser Nash with four 0.303" (rifle calibre) machine guns, which were always thought to be of poor quality in terms of armament. A new turret was built by Rose Brothers of Gainsborough after much discussion with personnel from 101 Squadron. The new turret was easy to control, had more room for the gunner and better vision. Six aircraft from 101 Squadron were the first to receive the new turret. Our aircraft X² was one of the six (2 x 0.5 calibre).
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On 25th/26th February 1944 when we visited Augsburg, operation 28, Len our rear gunner was excited about the possibility of using them against a German fighter and witnessing what effect it would have.
1943‑44 was an excellent period to join 101 Squadron. The squadron had just moved to a new base at Ludford Magna near Louth, Lincolnshire and was well placed to carry the war to the enemy. A highly rated squadron within 1 group, a squadron which was given every opportunity to prove itself as one of the best and we were so lucky to be part of it.
The squadron was involved in all that was happening. New equipment was becoming on stream such as ‘Window’, ABC, upgraded Lancasters, FIDO and the introduction of the more superior rear turret. As days and weeks passed our crew was becoming the most experienced so as a crew were very much involved, we flew on the operation when Window was first used. We were also on the operation ABC was first introduced into Bomber Command and our aircraft X² was one of the six aircraft fitted with the new turrets.
These were exciting times, sometimes frightening, anxious and tiring, however, as a crew we worked as a team. We were loyal to each other, dedicated in what we were doing and hence very satisfied with the results we achieved. On completing our tour of operations we were the only crew that had completed a tour of operations since the squadron moved to Ludford Magna. Statistics showed that if Lancasters lasted more than five operations they were exceptional.
All who served in the forces have memories, some good, some not so good. My memories of being in the RAF are of being good and exciting times not to be missed.
My memories of being part of 101 Squadron are also of exciting times, with plenty of different experiences, most when flying. Some exciting, some frightening, one or two horrific, others best forgotten, however, a part of life which I am proud to have been part of and on the whole really enjoyed.
On 12th June 1944 I received confirmation that I had been awarded the DFM.
What if?
The situation seemed very strange, here was seven or eight young men from various backgrounds and from different areas of the United Kingdom, who had for the best part of a year lived and dined together. Worked as a close team under very difficult and dangerous conditions and after completing a tour of operations went on leave a few days later, moved from base on to other jobs and from then until the end of the war had no further contact with each other. In fact until recent years I still had no contact. It was 2001 when I met up with Norman our wireless operator and then years after that out special operator Ken.
What if when I joined 101 Squadron Wally Evans, our pilot, had not insisted that I was his engineer and I had joined A H Evans’ crew as their engineer? A H Evans’ crew were lost on their third operation.
What if when our Lancaster was caught by the blue searchlights over Germany, if the Halifax which drifted a few thousand feet below us into the path of the searchlight at that split second and received the full impact of the guns had not done so? We would be just another statistic.
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What if when over Amiens we received only comparatively slight damage from exploding shrapnel which passed through the window, just caught my flying jacket sleeve and then went out through the windscreen? Had I been standing three inches to the right the result could have been very different.
What if on returning to base from operations over Berlin on 16th December 1943, when caught up in thick fog and was diverted, if the beam light put up by Catfoss had not been at that precise moment when we were flying at zero feet from the ground we would have ploughed into the farm house. Another aircraft lost on operations. Or when on reaching base Wally had not accepted my advice and decided to go round again on another circuit before landing, we would have crashed due to shortage of fuel.
What if I had decided to accept my commission and stay in the RAF as a Station Engineer probably reaching rank of Squadron Leader or had joined BOAC as a flight engineer possibly based in Sidney Australia, or had taken up the opportunity to become a teacher teaching technical subjects? Life would have been so different, however, I believe I made the correct decision, in fact I know I did. This however is for another time to discuss.
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CHAPTER J
AIRCREW BOMBER COMMAND
WARTIME BOMBER SQUADRONS
BOMBING OF BERLIN
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A SQUADRON
CLOTHING WORN ON OPERATIONS BY OUR CREW
CONTACT MADE WITH TWO CREW MEMBERS PLUS INFORMATION ON OTHERS
Aircrew Bomber Command
A typical description of a bomber crew at the time was provided by the ministry publication entitled Bomber Command. The men of Bomber Command are appointed to fulfil a special mission. Their life is not that of other men, not even those in the other branches of the service. It’s very physical conditions are different for them now; a day is much of the night, as much of the day is a time for sleep and repose. Discipline is constant yet flexible. Triumph and disaster are met with and vanquished together.
Air Marshall Arthur Harris, Air Officer Commanding in Chief Bomber Command 20th February 1992. He was known as Butch, the opinion of him varied in accordance with our losses, if they were heavy then his popularity (if that was the right word) suffered. You must remember that most aircrews never saw him when he visited Ludford, I thought he was stone faced, severe and even cynical over our effort. I disagree with those who dubbed him arrogant – he certainly was not. Nevertheless, if his crews did not see enough of him to love him they certainly appreciated what he was doing for them, he gave his command a much-needed sense of purpose. Up to the end of 1941 many people tended to regard strategic bombing as little more than a wasteful sideshow. It was Harris who proclaimed loud and long
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that Bomber Command was vital to the war effort and that his crews should be given the best of everything, because their efforts would be decisive in the final outcome.
After a successful raid the C‑in‑C would send a signal to the squadron saying good show keep it up this meant a great deal to men who knew that they stood a less than even chance of surviving a tour of operations.
Harris was also a great innovator, he called for better navigation and bombing aids, better lit flare paths and increased safety conditions on take offs and landings.
GEC was one of the aids which he had pressured for which enabled the navigator to plot his position relative to a ground station, this turned navigator from an art into a science.
Wartime Bomber Squadrons
People of the younger generation can get the impression that Bomber Command was one big, happy family. This was not so, squadrons were very much individual entities, we didn’t mix much with other squadrons and they assumed the character and charisma of the people who were on the squadron at the time.
As a result, few outsiders will ever appreciate what it was really like to serve on a bomber squadron unit. Not wishing to dwell on the dark side of squadron life I was twenty years old at the time, life was for living, we got on with the job. The higher direction of the war was for the older types – 25 years old and above. They were enjoyable days and of course we always expected to come back, suffice to say therefore that at least 277 aircraft were lost or went missing from 101 Squadron between July 1943 and 1945 and that the squadron lost 1094 crew members killed in action and 178 taken prisoner of war.
This was the highest casualty rate of any RAF squadron in World War 2.
Bombing of Berlin
It is difficult for ordinary citizens to visualise the effect of concentrated aerial bombardment.
Un Sangro front in Italy, often spoken of as the biggest land bombardment of the war, 1400 tons of shells came down in eight hours. Remember the front was many miles in length and mostly open country yet they smashed the German defence and prisoners spoke of the astounding paralysing effect of these heavy bombardments. Now compare the figures of the air assault, take as an instance only one raid in January 1944, 7300 tons of bombs went down on Berlin in 30 minutes. Remember too that the bombs fell into built up areas on a shorter front than a land attack. Remember too that tonnage for tonnage a bomb contains a much higher explosive charge than a shell. No city, no defence system could stand up to such attack for long delivered as Bomber Command was doing.
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War time Bomber Station – a normal day’s work load
The total number of personnel on the stations was around 2,500 including officers, male and
female personnel.
The station was equipped to perform as an individual unit like a small town with runways of sufficient length so that the aircraft could take off and land from where to attack the enemy.
It carried sufficient supplies of food, stocks of all the necessary maintenance supplies such as aircraft parts, tyres, turrets, engines and down to all the other small items like rivets screws everything necessary to keep the aircraft flying.
In every hour of the day people were working and with 2,500 staff on board the station could exist from the rest of the country for weeks. Time meant very little to staff and many would not know which day in the week it was or which date in the month it was. Sundays were just another working day.
The work was continuous, outside interests were possibly intentionally forgotten, all friends and family had to remain outside the airfield boundaries.
The best way of describing a normal working day is by eight am the bomb handling crews would already be hard at work sorting out the various bombs, such as the 4,000 lb (cookies) mounting them onto low engine driven trolleys, others would be packing the incendiaries into special cases, similarly all the other bombs likely to be used on operations. All these would be loaded onto special transports and dispatched around the airfield to the Lancasters which would be flying later that day if operations were on.
This operation would carry on well into the afternoon. Other staff would be doing the same with cartridges, feeding thousands of them into their ammunition belts and distributing them to the guns in the aircraft.
Other airfield staff would be filling the fuel bowsers which held 2,500 gallons of petrol and filling up the Lancaster fuel tanks which held 2,140 gallons. The fill up amount would depend on the time of the operation (Lancaster used an average of 200 gallons per hour). At the dispersal points ground crews would be carrying out their inspections on the aircraft under their control, engine fitters would be carrying checks on engine’s plugs and instruments, turrets and undercarriages and tyres, while others would be doing other pre-checks on the airframe wings, intercom and oxygen bottles etc., should any faults be found then an air test would be necessary to be carried out by the Pilot and Flight Engineer to make sure all was well. If a fault was still found and was connected with the flying ability of the aircraft further work would have to be carried out, a further air test would be required. Occasionally a complete engine may have to be replaced putting great strain on the ground crews.
While all this was happening other special staff would be working against time. The Intelligent Officer checking maps and up to date information regarding the target and route. The weather people checking the last minute weather conditions.
In messes the kitchen staff would have to prepare breakfast, lunch, tea and supper for around 200 people on top of that when operations were on a meal consisting of chips and egg had to be prepared and served approximately two hours before take-off time for the aircrews. In the locker rooms each flying crew had to have a parachute, flying helmet, safety aids, maps and money of the countries over which they would be flying, in case of being
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shot down. Sandwiches, extra rations prepared by the WAAFS and parcelled up to include chocolate, fruit, chewing gum and other items of refreshment.
The Station Officer and Flight Commander would be selecting the crew and working out the technical data for the journey.
Up until now the aircrews who may have been flying the evening before would be, during the morning, catching up on sleep (having got to bed around 4 to 5am), and in the early afternoon catching up with information etc. from their own Flight Officer or be visiting the aircraft to discuss with the ground crew, Sergeant-in-charge, any problems from the previous operation. Then probably the Pilot and Flight Engineer would have to carry out a test flight.
Once it was announced that operations were on, the aircrews had to attend briefing, have their meal then collect all necessary equipment from the locker room ready for being transported to the aircraft, to carry out the pre-flight checks ready for take-off. Only then after this could the ground crew relax, have a meal, a wash and have some time to themselves, if there was any time left, then be ready for the aircraft returning home anytime from five to eight hours later depending on the distance of the target.
Crews on return were interviewed by the Interrogation Officer, then have their meal and then to bed for hopefully a good sleep, to be ready for what were to happen the next day.
The Clothes Normally Worn on Operations by our Crew
In Bomber Command there was no laid down dress code for air crew to wear when flying on operations, every Squadron in fact every person had his own preference, all had to wear the RAF uniform, however what they wore under or over was entirely up to individuals (the RAF uniform had to be worn for safety reasons in case they landed in enemy territory, in uniform they became prisoners of war, in ‘civies’ they were most likely to be called spies and possibly shot).
Most of the operations carried out on Lancasters (in fact from all heavy bombers) were from heights of 20,000 ft or over where temperatures could drop to as low as -35 or -40oC below zero.
There was a certain amount of heating within the aircraft, this was heat which originated from the engines through ducts and entered the fuselage in the wireless operators compartment, therefore while the wireless operator and the navigator were roasting a little of the heat could be felt by the pilot and engineer, the bomb aimer who was in the front and the gunners in their turrets received no benefit, they had to source heat from other means.
As I indicated earlier it was an individual choice what clothing they wore, however I can tell you what our crew would normally wear, starting with the most comfortable.
Wireless operator: Normal RAF battle dress, heavy white jersey up to the neck, Mae West, parachute harness, flying boots and silk gloves.
Navigator: Normal RAF battle dress over silk underwear, heavy jersey, Mae West, parachute harness, flying boots, leather shoe foot with lamb’s wool tops (easily cut off), silk gloves plus leather gloves.
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Pilot and Flight engineer: There was much less heat reached the front of the aircraft therefore we wore silk underwear, long johns under RAF battle dress, heavy white woollen jersey up to neck, leather gloves over silk gloves. No Mae West, parachute harness, flying boots leather shoe base and leather flying jacket.
Bomb aimer: He usually flew in the nose of the aircraft which could be very cold, he wore silk underwear, long johns, RAF battle dress usually two heavy woollen jerseys and heavy over suit, Mae West, parachute harness, silk gloves, woollen gloves and a pair of leather gloves on top plus the normal flying boots.
The two crew members who suffered most from the cold were the gunners.
Mid upper gunner: he was still within the aircraft which gave some comfort. He wore two complete suits of silk underwear, two woollen jerseys, RAF battle dress, unheated over suit, heated over suit, Mae West, parachute harness, woollen scarf, woollen head cover under his helmet, three pairs of gloves, silk, woollen and leather, heated flying boots.
Rear gunner: This was the coldest place in the aircraft in fact he was actually outside the rear of the plane, so if it was expected that the temperatures would be around -20oC he would wear that similar to the mid upper gunner however if the temperatures were expected to drop to say -40oC he would add on extra layers of clothing and wear five pairs of gloves.
The gunners flying suits were electrically heated from a plug-in switch as were their helmet and gloves, their flying boots were also electrically heated, therefore if everything worked properly they were reasonably comfortable, this was however not always the case, a fault in the electrical system, possibly caused by enemy action, then they had problems and could receive severe frost bite, resulting in loss of fingers, toes or even more.
When the gunners were dressed up to ready to fly, it was difficult for them to walk and reach their position in the aircraft. The rear gunners especially looked like the advert for Dunlop tyres!
One of the main reasons for all crew members wearing silk gloves was if you caught the metal part of the aircraft with your bare hand it was so cold that the moisture from your skin would stick to the metal and leave you with severe injuries.
In the aircraft flying at over 10,000 ft oxygen had to be used which meant using masks attached to the helmets, which every few minutes you had to break the ice which had formed around the mask from just breathing.
The oxygen was also distributed through the aircraft from a single supply at each crew position there was a supply tap, there was also emergency bottles at each position, these would last for around 10 minutes.
We all also carried a whistle which was attached to the top left hand buttonhole of our tunic. The sound from a whistle carries much further than the human voice. It could be used to attract attention to one’s self in a dangerous situation or for making contact with others.
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Contact made with Two Crew Members after 60 Years plus information on others
Living in Scotland during the 1950’s and 60’s we had little choice of attending any of the activities which took place such as Airfield Open Days, Squadron reunions, or fly pasts, and it wasn’t until the early 1970s when we moved down to Shropshire that we began attending the occasional ‘open days’ (by this time Brian was old enough to be interested), Sylvia’s mum and sister’s home was in North Hykeham, Lincoln, only a short drive from Waddington RAF station, so this was our first visit of many which proved interesting and a good days entertainment.
We then in 1998 decided to revisit Ludford Magna (101 Squadron airfield) and the small church in the village where a Book of Remembrance was, the Book of Remembrance was of interest to me as it contained all the names of the aircrew that had been lost during the period which 101 Squadron had been there, as I said in my earlier notes that when we arrived at Ludford in July 1943 there was four crews two of which had the name of Evans, WL Evans and AH Evans, at Lindholme Heavy Conversion Unit. I was crewed up with WL Evans’ crew, and carried out my training with them, however when we arrived at Ludford somehow the paperwork was wrong and I was crewed up with AH Evans’ crew. It was suggested that as neither crews had been on operations the obvious thing was just to leave the paperwork as it was and for me to change over to the AH Evans crew, and the other Flight Engineer to take my place, Wally Evans would not agree, I was his Flight Engineer and that was how it had to be. All four crews flew on the same operations, on our first two, all returned, on our third AH Evans crew did not return, and by our fifth operation only our crew WL Evans were still operating. Checking in the Remembrance book sadly, I was able to read and realise how lucky I was that Wally had faith in me all those years ago.
While in the church we met a lady who looked after the church and was in fact decorating it with flowers, as she said this weekend coming was the 101 Squadron Association Reunion, when a service was held in the church followed by the laying of wreaths at the small memorial and afterwards the Women’s Institute laid on in the village hall tea and cakes for all, and if the weather was kind the Lancaster bomber would give a flying display.
In the year 2000 I joined the 101 Squadron Association and have attended the reunion every year since in early September, and in recent years Brian and Pauline have also joined us, joining the Association has proved very good as we have met many veterans who were flying during our time in the Squadron and other very interested people. It was through the Association Newsletter that I made contact with some of our crew members whom I had not heard from for nearly 70 years. They are Norman Ellison, our Wireless Operator and Len Brooks, our rear gunner.
In the summer of 2002 after writing a short article for the 101 Squadron Association Newsletter I was contacted by Chris, the son of our Wireless Operator (Norman Ellison) asking if I was the Donald Fraser who flew with his dad in 1943‑44 with 101 Squadron. After the telephone call Chris arranged for Sylvia and I to go to his home to meet his wife Christine and James his son, he lives in Exeter, his dad’s home was in Dawlish only a few miles apart. Chris then took us to meet his mum and dad, it was great to see him after 63 years and as such was quite emotional for both of us. It was so good to meet his wife Pauline. We stayed for around two hours before travelling on our way to Woolacombe. We met up again over the next two years, unfortunately Norman’s health deteriorated and he passed away on 13th February 2005. We attended his funeral, since then we exchange Christmas cards and the odd telephone call each year with his wife and Chris and his family.
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Norman also kept in touch with Wally Evans (our Pilot). After the war he emigrated to Australia where he lived for a number of years before returning to the UK in the mid eighties when he again contacted Norman, they then tried to contact all the other crew members, unfortunately the only member that made contact was Len Brooks, our rear gunner, Norman understood that Wally died in the late eighties.
Len Brooks, our rear gunner, we all knew that he lived in Grimsby for most of his life. During our time at Ludford whenever there was no flying on, he would take the opportunity to visit home which only took him over an hour to hitch a lift. If there was any change on flying one member of the crew would give him a telephone call and he would return to the Squadron very quickly.
During the 1980s and 90s there was a large number of books written covering the war and Bomber Command, I enjoyed reading many of them, even although as you know I did not believe all that was written, many of the books covered the time we were flying, as a result many of the operations we flew on were mentioned in them. There was a series of books written by Patrick M Otter on Bomber Command One Group, the group which 101 Squadron was in and operated throughout Lincolnshire. On reading one of Otter’s books called “Maximum Effort” I came across a picture of a number of air gunners while they were stationed at Lindholme as Instructors during their rest period. On a closer look I recognised one as Len our rear gunner. On contacting Mr Patrick Otter in 2004, he said it was 16 years since he spoke with Len at his home in Cleethorpes. However he could find no trace of him in the local telephone directories, he said he had left a message at the RAFA club in Cleethorpes to see if anyone knew what became of him, and if he had any response he would drop me a line. We thought that he had passed away around 2001‑2002.
I also made contact with Ken Lewis our Special Operator through the Newsletter, Ken also wasn’t in the best of health, however he arranged for his son in law to drive him from Reading (his home) to Lincoln. We had a great time at the Reunion lunch catching up with the past in September 2006, Ken’s profession was in Insurance which he spent all his working life in. Unfortunately he was unable to attend any more reunion meetings.
At the end of the war Norman had been in touch with Bill Blaynay, our Midupper gunner, who part way through our tour of operations after an unfortunate incident was released from flying. He told Norman that he had been reassessed and had his Sargents [sic] rank reinstated, other than that we have no other information about him.
There was still two more crew members still unaccounted for, Jimmy, our Navigator and Eric, our Bomb Aimer.
Shropshire during the war had a number of Heavy Bomber Airfields, Ternhill, Shawbury and Cosford which are still in service today. Prees, and Sleap, were both wartime bases flying Lancasters, at Prees the hangers are being used as storage units for commercial companies. Sleap is now the home of Shropshire Flying Club using part of the runway, a few buildings and the Control Tower. It is open to the public, where you watch the small aircraft flying and one can enjoy and a good cup of tea and a cake and have a good chat with people who are still interested in flying.
There is also a small Museum covering plane parts from World War II. In the last three years Sylvia, myself and friends occasionally drop in for a cup of tea, by now we know a few of the staff who are all Volunteers and very interested people.
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Jimmy Grant, Navigator
On one of our visits in 2012 I had taken with me the 1943 Christmas Dinner menu for 101 Squadron, all the crew members had signed it in the inside, most people looking at the menu thought that we had had an excellent meal considering there was a war on.
Mike Grant one of the longer serving volunteers at Sleap Museum, who aids in researching the items that are given to the Museum before they go on display to the public.
Meantime he is also tracing the history of the oil pipeline which carried the millions of gallons of oil from the ports, across the UK down to the Channel ports and on to the D Day landing sites and beyond. This will be a very interesting book to read when it is published, soon.
On seeing the menu Mike said “I know this signature, he is one of my family, see how he writes the ‘G’ and the ‘r’ in Grant, we all write our signature the same way, and we were all told off at school for not writing properly”. We worked out that Jimmy our Navigator was his uncle. After the war he said the family had gone their separate ways, as many families did, so he had no idea where Jimmy would be now – it’s a small world.
We still have no idea of what happened to Eric our Bomb aimer.
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CHAPTER K
THE LANCASTER STORY
It became clear reasonably early in the Second World War that if Britain had any chance of winning, Bomber Command had to take the war to Germany, deep into its industrial heart, which was not possible with the short range light Bombers.
It was decided by the War Council that a much larger aircraft which could travel further, with a much heavier bomb load into Germany was needed, hence the introduction of the four engined heavy bomber, the Halifax and the Lancaster.
1942 marked the turning point for Bomber Command, Marshal Travis Harris (later known as Bomber Harris) was appointed Leader of Bomber Command. He believed that Bomber Command given the necessary aircraft and equipment, could play an important role in winning the war by strategic bombing of Germany’s industrial towns and cities.
Harris ordered a 1000 aircraft raid on Cologne be carried out. Fortunately the operation was credited as a success, this persuaded the Government to allocate Bomber Command high priority for aircraft and more importantly navigation aids and radar which were vital for accurate delivery of bombs on targets.
The development of the Lancaster continued with a few prototypes being produced, the production of Lancasters increased slowly at first and gradually stepped up reaching their peak by the end of 1944.
The earlier two engine bomber had a second pilot to aid the captain with a crew number of five, however on the four engined heavies where crew members could move around the fuselage, a change was necessary. The heavies had a mid upper gun fitted requiring a mid upper gunner; because of pilot shortages owing to the increase in numbers of new squadrons coming on stream and the increased complexity of the four engine bomber, this called for a specialist engineer to replace the second pilot, so the flight engineer was created, the standard crew of the Lancaster comprised of seven specialists, Pilot, Navigator, Flight Engineer, Wireless operator, Bomb Aimer, Mid Upper Gunner and Rear Gunner. Each was an expert in his own field and each a vital cog in the overall crew, rank played no part in the airborne life of the crew.
The Lancaster was involved on most of the important operations, such as the Dambuster Raid on 16/17th May 1943, The Battle of the Ruhr, Battle of Berlin, (Overlord, the name given to the Invasion of Europe 6th May 1944) and Operation Thunder Clap, mass raids against supply and communication targets such as road and railyards continued, and against German naval shipping at Le Havre.
In late July a bombing campaign against the V-weapon sites commenced as there was fear that Germany had a new secret weapon, raids were carried out on launching and storage sites, these operations took much of Bomber Commands efforts throughout the autumn of 1944 as did the attacks against the French railway in support of Overland. In September the
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Navy believed that Tirpitz (the German Battleship) which was anchored in the Kaa Fjord in Norway was about to put to sea. Bomber Command was again given the task of destroying her. On the third attempt on 12th November 31 Lancasters attacked the Battleship. This time on arrival the weather was clear over the ship, no smokescreen obscured the target, during the attack several hits were seen by the Lancaster crews, followed by a heavy explosion, one of its magazines blew up, then the mighty Battleship rolled over and capsized.
By the end of 1944 the Allied Armies were approaching the Rhine, come the end of March 1945, they had crossed the river in strength and were advancing on Berlin.
Bomber Command’s role assisted by the United States Eighth Airforce was to support the Allies by bombing Military targets, and in supporting the Russian Army on their advance from the east on Berlin.
The last major attack of the war took place on 25th April 1945 by the bombing of the Bergholf (Hitler’s Eagles nest) and the SS barracks nearby.
The war in Europe ended on 8th May 1945 (VE Day), however just previous to that operation Manna was put into action, which was dropping vital food supplies to the starving civilian population of the Netherlands (the Germans agreed to the dropping areas) a similar operation dropped food parcels to the Dutch population. A large number of Lancasters were involved, these operations stopped on VE Day.
With the war in Europe over, plans were made for the repatriation of British and Commonwealth prisoners of war under the code name Operation Exodus, many Lancasters were converted to carry 25 passengers for this purpose. Flights continued bringing prisoners home from across France and Germany. Receiving camps were set up in the United Kingdom for the thousands of men returning home from Europe.
Although the war was over in Europe, many Lancasters were preparing for war in the Far East, known as the Tiger Force, it was agreed that 10 Squadrons of Lancasters would be used until the New Lincoln Bomber came on stream which had much longer fuel ranges. Fortunately the Japanese war ended sooner than expected (because of the use of the Atom bomb) resulting in Tiger Force not being required. Myself along with many other crew members were very relieved, because flying over Japan would have been very difficult and dangerous.
After the war the Lancaster continued flying carrying out various roles until the new aircraft came into service, of the approximately eight thousand Lancasters that were built only a few are left with only two airworthy aircraft, one in Britain and the other in Canada.
During World War II Lincolnshire was known as Lancaster County, because of the large number of squadrons scattered across the County (28 in total). Today most of the land then used is now returned to agriculture. It is still difficult to travel around without driving past the site of a famous airfield.
The airworthy Lancaster belongs to the Lincolnshire’s Lancaster Association, based at RAF Coningsby and is part of the Battle of Britain memorial Flight. Each year this flight performs at many air-displays entertaining thousands of people and serves as a living memorial to those air crew who gave their lives in the defence of their Country.
There is a second Lancaster which has its home also in Lincolnshire at East Kirby and belongs to two brothers, Fred and Harold Panton, the aircraft is maintained to a very high standard,
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where the public can have a taxi ride in the Lancaster, and enjoy the sound of the four Merlin engines.
The people of Lincolnshire were the first to know when the RAF were on operations, as with 28 squadrons based throughout the county and each squadron with at least 20 aircraft serviceable, the sound made from over 2000 Merlin engines, as they circled and climbed to reach a height of 10,000 ft before setting out across Europe was tremendous. People from the Netherlands told me (after the war) that during the war they lay in bed at night hoping to hear the special sound made by the British bombers, and as they passed over, they wished them success in their operation and prayed that the young men who flew in them returned home safely.
During operations I listened to the four Merlin engines purring away for five or six hours, the sound was magic and something I will never forget.
I am one of the thousands who have been entertained over the years by attending many of the fly pasts and open days, where the Lancaster has been carrying out the flypast, firstly to hear the sound of the Merlin engines which is music to my ears, then to see this superb aircraft flying towards you at around 200 feet nearly always brings a tear to my eyes for memories past.
Date: 30 Aug 1943
This picture was taken from the camera operated in conjunction with the opening of the bomb doors and Bomb Aimer releasing his bombs on our 2nd Operation to Munchen Gladbach. The picture plotted the bombs hitting the target.
[photograph of bombs hitting target]
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Lancaster Bomber
Specification
Length: 69ft 4ins (21.08m)
Wingspan: 102ft 6ins (31.00m)
Height: 20ft 6ins (6.23m)
Maximum Speed: 300+ mph
Range loaded: 2,600 miles app
Ceiling loaded: 24,000 ft
Internal payload: up to 7 tons
Full fuel load: 2,140 gallon
4 Merlin engines 1390 hp
(The latest Lancasters could be better in all specifications)
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[photograph of Avro Lancaster bomber]
[photograph of Avro Lancaster cockpit]
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[inserted] 16th December 1943 14th op. [deleted] Page 3 [/deleted] [/inserted]
Black Thursday
[inserted] Further notes on our 14th operation on 16th December 1943 [/inserted]
[crest]
AT A minute before midnight on the night of December 16. 1943 Lancaster LM395 emerged briefly from low cloud just north of Caistor. There was barely time for the pilot, Sgt Stan Miller of Scarborough to register what was happening before the Lancaster struck high ground near the town. When rescuers arrived they found no survivors among the crew of seven.
Crashes amongst Lancasters returning from ops or on night exercises had become an almost regular occurrence in Lincolnshire by the winter of 1943. But that night something awful was happening as the 1 Group aircraft returned from a round trip of eight hours to Berlin.
The raid that night had been specifically planned to catch the defenders fog bound on their nightfighter bases across Northern Europe. Instead, the mist came down and shrouded many of the airfields in Eastern England as the bombers were returning.
That night 483 Lancasters and 15 Mosquitos raided Berlin. Twenty-five aircraft were lost to a combination of night-fighters, flak and collisions over the German capital. At least another 29 Lancasters were lost in crashes when the bombers returned to airfields blanketed in fog.
1 Group suffered more than most with 13 aircraft being lost and 56 men killed in crashes on or around their bases. 100 Squadron was hit hardest of all, losing four aircraft, including two which collided right over the airfield at Waltham. 460 at Binbrook lost two as did 166 at Kirmington. And single aircraft were lost from 625 Squadron at Kelstern, 101 at Ludford and 12 and 626 lost a Lancaster each at Wickenby.
During briefings that afternoon, crews had been told that Bomber Command had been waiting to mount a raid on Berlin when the weather was so bad that the fighters would be grounded and they would have an easy trip. This was to be it.
The planned route was straight in and out again over Denmark. But the fighters, which were supposed to be sitting on fog-shrouded airfields across Holland, Belgium, Northern France and Germany, were airborne, and the first intercepted the stream of Lancasters over the Dutch coast and there were running battles, until the bomber stream turned for home across Denmark. Twenty one aircraft were shot down and four lost in collisions over Berlin itself.
The weather became progressively worse as the aircraft returned and by the time the 1 Group Lancasters began arriving they found the cloud base had almost reached ground level.
Crashes began to be reported from almost every airfield. Tired crews were unable to pick up the circle of lights which by then had been fitted around most of the dromes. Some came down in open fields, some, like LM395, simply flew into the Wolds. At Waltham, two Lancasters from 100 Squadron, O-Oboe and F-Freddie, collided as they circled looking for the funnel of lights that could guide them to safety.
One man who remembers that night vividly is Wing Commander Jimmy Bennett, who had arrived at Waltham three weeks earlier to form the new 550 Squadron which was due to move to North Killingholme in the new year.
Bennett. with two tours behind him already, chose to fly that with 'Bluey’ Graham and his crew.
"Our take-off was early, about 4.30 in the afternoon, and even then visibility wasn't very good and it was plain we were not going to be in for a very pleasant journey,” he said.
The bombers emerged from the cloud cover which was supposed to protect them over the North Sea. “There was no high cloud and at times we could see dozens of aircraft around us," Bennett recalled. "The clouds below cleared slightly over the city, we dropped our bombs and got away again. There was some fighter activity but we were not bothered.
"Coming back the cloud started to increase again and it was clear that by the time we reached England it would be almost right down to the deck. Bluey decided to come down through the cloud over the North Sea. In conditions like that it was always wise practice. Lincolnshire may have been fairly flat, but other places weren’t and there were always a few of what we called "stuffed clouds" around, clouds which contained something hard, like a hill.
"We dropped down into the mist but Bluey picked up the outer circle of sodium lights at Waltham, stuck his port wing on them and followed them round until he found the funnel and put her down.
“We rolled along the runway to the far hedge and we were already aware that planes were coming down all around us, landing at the first opportunity, so we decided it would be a lot safer to leave the aircraft where it was and walk the rest of the way.”
73
[page break]
Black Thursday
[picture of aircraft]
100 Squadron had suffered terribly that night. So had 97 Squadron at Bourn in Cambridgeshire. It lost no fewer than seven aircraft in crashes.
The 1 Group Summary, which was circulated to all squadrons at the end of December, recorded: “No opportunity for striking at our objectives must be lost. This being the case, it is obvious that, in addition to the enemy on the far side, the elements of this side still have to be mastered.
“As an illustration, after the raid on Berlin on December 16/17, a widespread and unpredicted deterioration in the weather at our home bases occurred.
"No diversion areas were available and many deplorable accidents resulted while our aircraft were endeavouring to break cloud and land."
The Summary continued: "An investigation has now been completed which shows the accidents cannot be attributed to a common factor. Some aircraft broke cloud too quickly, some broke cloud too slowly and continued to sink, whilst others ''slipped in” on a turn while endeavouring to keep the airfield lights in view."
It added: "Conditions were vile and unexpected yet 136 aircraft landed safely. We must continue to strive for better airmanship and more effective ground control.
But no number of investigations and changes to procedure could erase the memory of that wooden hut near Louth for Wing Commander Bennett.
One crew which narrowly escaped joining the casualties that night was one from 101 Squadron at Ludford. [inserted] X2 [/inserted]
Len Brooks, who was the rear gunner in a Lancaster flown by Sgt Walter Evans, remembers that they were diverted to Driffield because of the bad weather. Over East Yorkshire they were picking up RT messages from Driffield, Dishforth and Catfoss but could see no lights through the murk.
Then Catfoss offered to put a light up for them. " They realised we were very low and put the beam almost parallel to the ground right on us. I remember feeling the power go on. the nose lift and suddenly I saw under the turret chicken huts, a garden shed and finally chimney pots flashing by. That Iight had saved us.”
[inserted] This refers to the aircraft being suddenly given full power to lift itself over the farm buildings [/inserted]
Mr Brooks also remembers the first time Ludford's new FIDO fog dispersal system came into use. This consisted of a system of petrol burners the length of the runway, the theory being that the heat generated would drive the fog away. It worked, too, the only problem being that the hot air caused a great deal of turbulence over the runway.
He recalls that two aircraft ahead of them declined to land, despite the exhortations of the station commander, Group Captain Bobby Blucke. When it came to their turn they were so low on fuel they had no option and Evans virtually forced the Lancaster down onto the runway.
[inserted] [symbol] Len Brooks our Rear Gunner He was looking backwards from the aircraft therefore had a completely different view from the others of the crew [/inserted]
[photograph of the rear gunner, Len Brooks]
102. An unknown gunner standing by his turret. 12 Squadron, Wickenby, May 1944.
74
[page break]
Training the Crews
[crest]
BEFORE BOMBER Command could launch its projected expansion in late 1943 and 1944 it had to have a ready supply of crews. And that meant an increase in training establishments.
Changes in the training system meant that each Group became responsible for turning out its own heavy bomber crews. With Lindholme in South Yorkshire as the Base station, Heavy
Conversion Units were set up at Faldingworth, Blyton and Sandtoft with other training units being based at various times at Hemswell, Ingham and Sturgate.
Most of the1I Group crews were to go through these training bases and many felt that flying with operation squadrons was considerably safer than in the HCUs.
Until more Lancasters became available, their conversion to four-engined heavies was largely on Halifaxes, and in particular on the early Mark I and lls. They were underpowered aircraft which had already been discarded by operational squadrons in favour of either Lancasters or the much superior later marques of the Halifax. They also had some nasty habits, particularly when inexperienced crews tried one particular manoeuvre which effectively blocked the airflow over the tail and was responsible for the destruction of a number of these aircraft.
One ex-12 Squadron crew remember starting six cross-country exercises from Sandtoft and failing to complete one of them. There was little wonder that Sandtoft became known throughout 1 Group as Prangtoft.
Sandtoft itself was, like the other training airfields, originally intended as an operational station.
The site. which is alongside what is now the M180 between Scunthorpe and Thorne, was selected by Air Ministry surveyors in January 1942 as suitable for use by heavy aircraft and work started that October on the construction of the airfield. It was intended that it would come into use as a bomber airfield in January 1944 but in the meantime, it was decided to earmark the new station for a Heavy Conversion Unit.
It officially opened in December 1943 (although it was by no means complete, not unusual with newly-opened airfields in 1 Group at the time). The first unit to operate from there was A Flight of 1667 HCU which moved in from Faldingworth, followed by its other two flights. Later in the year a fourth Flight was formed and this became the Flying Instructors’ Flight which in turn provided the training for instructors within 11 Base which also included Lindholme and Blyton.
[photograph of gunnery instructors]
133. Gunnery instructor at Lindholme in 1944. On the extreme left is Bob Dunston, an Australian who had lost a leg while serving with the 8th Army at Tobruk and later volunteered for the RAF as an air gunner. The picture comes from Len Brooks of Cleethorpes, pictured second from the left.
[inserted] Second from left is Len Brooks our Rear Gunner [/inserted]
75
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[blank page]
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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WO Donald Keith Fraser
Donald Keith Fraser's memoir
Description
An account of the resource
Memoir describing his life and service career in the RAF. He also gives a list of 29 operations he participated in with notes on specific operations, and recounts a brief history of the Lancaster.
Creator
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Donald Fraser
Format
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80 typewritten pages
Language
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eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BFraserDKFraserDKv1
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
France
Germany
Great Britain
Poland
England--Lincolnshire
France--Modane
Germany--Augsburg
Germany--Berlin
Germany--Bochum
Germany--Düsseldorf
Germany--Frankfurt am Main
Germany--Hannover
Germany--Leipzig
Germany--Leverkusen
Germany--Mannheim
Germany--Mönchengladbach
Germany--Munich
Germany--Schweinfurt
Germany--Stuttgart
Poland--Szczecin
Germany--Braunschweig
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
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Tricia Marshall
David Bloomfield
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942
1943
1944
1 Group
101 Squadron
1667 HCU
aircrew
bomb trolley
bombing
bombing up
briefing
Churchill, Winston (1874-1965)
Cook’s tour
dispersal
Distinguished Flying Medal
fear
FIDO
fitter engine
flight engineer
flight mechanic
fuelling
Gee
George VI, King of Great Britain (1895-1952)
ground crew
Halifax
Harris, Arthur Travers (1892-1984)
Heavy Conversion Unit
Lancaster
memorial
military ethos
military living conditions
military service conditions
navigator
Nissen hut
Operational Training Unit
perception of bombing war
perimeter track
petrol bowser
radar
RAF Bottesford
RAF Catfoss
RAF Coningsby
RAF Cottesmore
RAF East Kirkby
RAF Lindholme
RAF Ludford Magna
RAF North Luffenham
RAF St Athan
RAF Waddington
RAF Wickenby
runway
searchlight
service vehicle
Tiger force
Tirpitz
tractor
training
Window
wireless operator