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Danny42C
12th Jul 2012, 20:38
Hipper,

You mean Subhas Chandra Bose and his followers; when it all went wrong they were desperate to surrender to a British army unit rather than an Indian, well knowing what fate would await them there (so I have been told). Don't think any IAF prisoners were suborned.

Will have a look at the link - thanks!

Danny.

Danny42C
12th Jul 2012, 22:01
Jack

At that stage ('44), I don't think Partition had even been considered as an option; we planned to hand over a united India to a successor Goverment. Planned ? I think it was more of an aspiration: we wished to grant Independence to India as Augustine prayed for chastity - "but not yet".

Churchill said something to the effect that "he had not become the King's First Minister to preside over the dissolution of the British Empire" (I stand to be corrected). And India was not merely "the brightest jewel in the Crown", it was pretty well the whole thing. Of course, the Indian officers of all Services could sense what was going on. In fact, they had only to wait three years, but that was by no means clear to anybody then.

It was decision time for the Anglo-Indian community; they had always been in "no man's land", now they must choose which way to jump. My impression (for what it is worth) is that their hearts said "Britain", but their heads had to admit "India", where they already had a strong base in the railways, posts and telegraphs. Many Anglo-Indians rose to high rank in the IAF.

It is almost seventy years since I left India; I do not know how things are now,

Danny

pzu
13th Jul 2012, 00:48
On the subject of India

Danny & others, please excuse the intrusion

This thread is currently running on Pprune and may be of interest

http://www.pprune.org/jet-blast/490388-50-words-english-india.html.

PZU - Out of Africa (Retired)

Danny42C
13th Jul 2012, 15:50
pzu,

No intrusion at all, Sir ! All are welcome in our Virtual Crewroom, so long as they bring something relevant to the feast - or seek advice from the Old Man in the Corner - or put him right when he's plain wrong !

Yes, I love what we used to call (in no mocking way) "Babu" English, with its wonderfully old-fashioned, P.G. Wodehouse-style expressions.

And they were taught to speak clear, grammatical English as you say, often by the good nuns or the Christian Brothers or others of that ilk (see, I'm doing it now). This is more than today's educational system here seems able to do, which in turn accounts for the preponderance of newsreaders of sub-continental descent who grace our TV screens.

And given a choice of a call-centre voice from the Gorbals or Bangalore, I know whom I'd choose ! (Yes, I know the Glaswegians can understand one another, but that doesn't help the rest of us - particularly those of us who live, like you and I, in God's own county).

I've taped Radio 4, will now settle down to enjoy.

What ho, chaps!

Danny42C

BEagle
13th Jul 2012, 19:38
Back in 1976, which is slightly longer from today than it was from Danny's back then, I did God-knows how many compass swings on Hunters at RAF Brawdy whilst holding 'twixt TWU and OCU.

Same basic technique, but the heading accuracy for the 4-point swing had to be within a couple of degress. At least we had a turntable of sorts; you taxyed so that the 'inside' wheel was on the turntable, then turned with locked inner wheel. Take the readings from the groundcrew mate, fill in the figures in the book, then adjust the G4F box accordingly. Then do the check swing; if all OK, taxy back and write the jet up. If not, then do it all again....:uhoh:

Now there was only one minor snagette. You had to do the whole thing with the hood closed so that the E2B was correct. Summer of '76 with the hood closed and no cooling meant that one became a sopping rag after such an event, particularly in the T7 with its big hood.

One Friday afternoon, I finally managed to get a T7 into limits and taxyed back to the line. Then a long walk across the aerodrome back to my flight office, only to find that everyone else had locked up and gone home. So another long trudge to the guardroom to draw the keys, before I could finally dump my bone dome, turning trousers and leg stranglers, grab my SD cap and walk back to the OM.... Where the first Happy Hour beer barely touched the sides.

Come Monday morning, the Flt Cdr told me "BEagle, OC *** sqn was driving home and saw you on the main drag looking rather dishevelled in flying kit without your hat on...".

"Boss, I'd just spent an hour cooking in a T-bird, walked miles and found you'd all buggered off, then walked to the guardroom and back to get the sodding key. Please give OC *** sqn my apology and tell him to stick it up his ar*e!"

"Hmm, I'll probably rephrase that....."

(*** could perhaps be 234, but I won't say.....).

Danny42C
13th Jul 2012, 21:29
BEAgle,

There speaks the voice of experience ! (we can only sympathise). Was the E2b really so important that they had to cook the operator ? IIRC, it only had 5 deg. markings, I had a stick-on thing on the screen of my car in the early '60s which was much the same (and about as accurate!). And if the hood frame was the cause of the bother, didn't it worry the main compass as much as the E2b ? (speaking as one who vaguely recalls the Gyro Fluxgate, but nothing later !)

Our Vengeances got two twirls only, and had to count themselves lucky with that (which may have been a factor in our Flight getting good and lost on our way to war, in circumstances where a cub scout would have had no trouble in finding the way).

Now your small turntable with a locked main wheel on it: that's so obviously the answer, it would have to be big enough to take the whole outside bogey of the big boys (can you lock a single bogey ?). The tug and push-pull dolly would have to be "de-gaussed", but if you can do it with a 20,000 ton liner, a tug should be easy.

(Very Sad Story of WW2: our ship arrives in port and parks. Sighs of relief all round..... we're home and dry now..... switch off de-gaussing cables..... there was a magnetic mine sitting right under the keel !)

Danny42C

Union Jack
13th Jul 2012, 21:45
At that stage ('44), I don't think Partition had even been considered as an option; we planned to hand over a united India to a successor Government.

Many thanks for the very interesting clarification, Danny, particularly in respect of the Anglo Indian perspective - shades of Bhowani Junction.

It had been my understanding that a form of partition had been considered as far back as Lord Curzon's time as Viceroy, and that Jinnah had pressed in the early 1940s for the creation of Pakistan. Fiat lux!

Jack

Danny42C
13th Jul 2012, 23:19
Jack

I'm surprised that Partition was on the table as far back as Curzon; that Very Superior Person would surely have reacted to the mere mention of Indian Independence in much the same way as Churchill (was it?) He shrank with horror at the idea of Ghandi ("that half-naked fakir") being received in audience by the Viceroy, instead of being "trampled by elephants" in front of the steps of the Secretariat for his insolence.

Jinnah, of course always demanded Partition, as he had no trust in the good faith of the Congress in an united India (and he was probably right). As I heard it, Mountbatten did his best to talk him round, without success. The UK Government had to accept Partition or delay Independence, and that was then "not an option".

But I am no authority on the recent constitutional history of India, all I know was the street talk of the time. Fiat Lux ? I'd have to be careful. ("What is Truth?", asked Pilate),

Danny

Union Jack
14th Jul 2012, 10:27
Many thanks, Danny, for your interesting and erudite response.

Having done some homework, I realise that Curzon's ultimately unsuccessful foray into partition related solely to Bengal rather than to overall Indian independence so, whilst I may have been right in principle to refer to a "form of partition", I was clearly wide of the mark on a wider scale. I lives and I learns, and I am very taken with your quotations!

So, no more politics for me - I'll stick with "Though no love was lost between the RAF and IAF elements, when it came to a question of keeping the aircraft flying, both elements put in their best".......... ":ok:

Jack

Taphappy
14th Jul 2012, 20:50
Danny,
Sounds like you had fun integrating with your IAF colleagues,in truth the day of the Sahib was on the wane.
Petet.
You learn something every day, I was not aware that there were differing grades of AC2.

Next steo on the wya was a posting round about November or eaely December to Heaton Park in Manchester which was a transit camp for budding PNBs and from where you were supposed to proceed to the next stage of training which for me was to Air Navigation School.
My main memory of Heaton Park was being on parade every morning usually in pouring rain when the names of these selected for drafts to the flying schools in Canada,USA and Southern Africa were read out and quite a number from my intake hit the jackpot.
The powers that be did not seem to know what to do with us and so far as I recall there did not seem to be any laid down programme but we were involved in such activities as bayonet practice,grenade throwing and rifle shooting at the butts. Quite what these activities had to do with aircrew training one can only guess but it was entertaining.
The accommodation at the Park was mostly in Nissan huts and given the prevailing climate, most of the times the walls were running with condensation. In fact one of the areas in the camp was nicknamed "consumption valley".
However there was a silver lining since the fleshpots of Manchester were only a short journey away and the NAAFI club there served up some good nosh.
After a few weeks along with 20 odd others my name was called out at the morning parade. Great!! we thought, at last we are off to foreign climes only for our hopes to be dashed when we were told that we were being sent on detachment to RAF Strubby in Lincolnshire, the home of 619 Squadron for a period of 3 months.
After settling in we were all allocated to various sections, some to SHQ,those who could drive to the MT section,some to the armoury and some including me drew the short straw and were sent to work at the bomb dump. Not the best of places since it was midwinter.
There was an H2s trainer at Strubby where the navigators honed their skills and after a month at the bomb dump I was moved there as a general dogsbody and at last I managed to get near an aircraft as I would assist the radio mechanics when they carried out the daily inspections on the Lancs.
Strubby was a well dispersed station and the living quarters were a long way from the aerodrome so we were all issued with bikes which were also useful in getting to the nearest civilisation which was either Alford or Louth.
After 3 months in March 45 we were posted back to Heaton Park having experienced a little of what the real Air Force was like but no further forward in our training.

Petet
14th Jul 2012, 23:07
Taphappy

I have just been researching the bomb stores (at RAF Graveley) and learned all about earth traverses, fuzing point buildings and the like. I can imagine it was not the best of jobs in the winter.

I would love to hear more about living conditions .... what was it like inside a "dormitory" nissen hut for example?. Was it just a place for you to sleep or somewhere where you spent free time?

Did you and the other recruits just accept "holding" as par for the course or was it frustrating; did the frustration ever boil over or did the military discipline prevail?

Sorry, so many questions, but I am really glad you are contributing, as your experiences relate to the research that I am doing.

Regards

Pete

Danny42C
15th Jul 2012, 00:19
Taphappy,

Strubby rings a bell with me! It was my first posting after leaving the Shawbury ATC School in July of 1955, I was there until 1958; we were the flying satellite of the Empire Flying College at Manby, with Meteors and Canberras.

We had a "hiring" in Mablethorpe. The place was fine in summer when the holiday crowds came in, but it was a cold and empty place in winter, and I'm not surprised you missed it off your list of local "bright lights".

Even in 1955 it was still a Nissen wartime-style camp, and I can well imagine that three winter months there would be no fun. It sounds as if you're being messed about royally in true RAF style! It was ever thus.

Danny.

Padhist
15th Jul 2012, 09:51
Petet
Did we get frustrated? Oh yes, I had been attached to Harrowgate for 10/12 months and sent out on various detachments to keep me quiet. On one occasion three of us decided that since no one would notice we would report to one of these a day late... What an error that was. We were all on a charge and given SEVERE REPRIMANDS This does not sound very much but had the effect of delaying our promotion to Flight Sergeants by 12 months and I am sure also delayed my commission for some years.
Paddy

Petet
15th Jul 2012, 14:43
Paddy

Would be interested to hear a bit more; did they fill your day or did you have to partly fill it yourself?.

What would have been a typical day and would that be 7 days a week?

Regards

Pete

Danny42C
15th Jul 2012, 15:03
Paddy (if I may call you that),

That was outrageous! How much did you lose? (the difference x 365 between Sgt and F/Sgt). I ought to remember, was three weeks overdue for my Crown before I got my (backdated) commission. Never did get the money.

But for a trivial offence like that - I would give a first-offence chap no more than 7 days CB, would you? - (But, now I come to think of it, can you give a SNCO "CB"?). I'm very rusty on K.R.& A.C.I.s, can a Sergeant ask for a Court Martial if he feels himself hard done by, or is it just officers?

(Chugalug, Counsel's Opinion, please!)

In 1945 I was Officer under Instruction at a Court Martial where a W/O Flight Engineer had caused a Catalina on an anti-submarine patrol to RTB because of a foolish prank. He only got a "Severe Rep.", it was water off a duck's back for him.

Danny.

Chugalug2
15th Jul 2012, 17:11
Chugalug, Counsel's Opinion, please!
If I may M'Lud, I read from my Roneo'd Flight Cadet notes as follows:
Accused's Rights to Elect Trial by Court Martial
Before awarding any punishment other than a severe reprimand or a minor punishment, or where a finding of guilty (whatever the punishment) will involve a forfeiture of pay, a commanding officer (or a subordinate commander) must ask the accused if he wishes to be tried summarily or tried by court-martial.
Failure to ask this question may result in the whole proceeding becoming a nullity
I'm obliged to you M'Lud.
(Bows deeply, retires to table and proceeds to rearrange paperwork in order to look busy)
So it would appear that there was not a right to CM as the cost was not in a forfeiture but in delayed promotion. Catch22 as usual prevails!
Edited to add that the devil (as always) is in the detail. If the offence was AWOL, then:
Convictions of absence without leave leads to automatic forfeiture of pay no matter what punishment is awarded...
Whenever an accused is found guilty of absence...he must, before his punishment is awarded, be given the right to elect trial by court martial no matter how slight the punishment it is proposed to give...
so the offence charged is the key, no doubt the all inclusive "Conduct to the prejudice of good order and air force discipline" can be used to avoid that problem.

Blacksheep
15th Jul 2012, 18:57
As an avionics engineer, could I butt in to explain a bit about the evolution of compasses and compass swinging?
Purely magnetic compasses evolved to gyro stabilised compasses using a "flux detector" that served as the actual compass. On smaller aircraft these were (and in many aircraft, still are) swung in the traditional manner. In larger aircraft such as the B707, VC10 and early B747s for example, an "electrical" swing was used. An electro-magnetic table would be placed below the flux gate and instead of the earth's magnetic field being held steady while the aircraft was moved, the aircraft would remain stationary while a simulated earth's field was rotated beneath it. With the advent of inertial reference systems employing laser gyros the compass system has disappeared. IRS is far more exact than magnetic detection and the compass swing has disappeared. The standby compass is "swung" against the inertial system, usually during revenue flight, and it is in any case only accurate within 5 degrees. Lugging an A380 round a compass base would be an interesting procedure to say the least :)

Danny42C
15th Jul 2012, 20:08
Blacksheep,

Now you've set all our minds at rest - you've wrapped it up nicely - I live and learn. Thanks! (Pom Pax, cancel elephant order!)

"A thing of the past" So I wasn't too far off track (at least in respect of the big 'uns), it seems.

Danny

Danny42C
15th Jul 2012, 20:28
Chugalug,

I am indebted to M'Learned Friend ! Of course - Secn. 40 - there's no escape from that ! Even so, I think Paddy and his companions were treated very harshly. Pity they didn't have a European Court of Human Rights in those days - there must be some sort of right to turn up a day late if you feel like it.

Danny.

LowNSlow
16th Jul 2012, 04:06
Just to return to the swimming for non-swimmers for a sec if I may.

My dad was a Flight Engineer on Halifax III's, returning from Canada in 1943 and ending up on 158 Sqn (he did a number of ops on the famous Friday the 13th). As a F/E it would be his job to assist the dinghy out of the wing if the aircraft ditched. Unfortunatley he swam like a brick so he managed to persuade the PE instructor that he would do a width of the pool at St Athan instead of a length. He then proceeded to open every door along a corridor opened onto the pool, sprinted down the corridor, leapt as far across the pool as he could and beat the water into submission to get to the other side!

He had a nice cushy number as an airframe mechanic in Canada working on Ansons and Oxfords in a Nav School before deciding that bomber ops were the way forward. Luckily he survived 36 ops before transferring to Stirling V's after VE-Day flying to Mauripur (Karachi) from Stradishall via Stoney Cross - Tripoli - Lydda (Israel) - Iraq (Habbaniya). Although he was a regular having joined in early 1939 and a Flying Officer by this point he then decided to become a teacher and never flew again until going on holiday to Spain in the early 1970's.

Petet
16th Jul 2012, 08:25
LowNSlow

Brilliant anecdote .... thoroughly enjoyed reading it over breakfast this morning .... today there would have been a health and safety officer blowing his whistle and pointing to the "No running" sign

Sadly, St Athan has been largely dismantled (although the army has taken over parts of it) and very few records exist of the days when the FE's were trained there.

Regards

Pete

foxtrot-oscar
16th Jul 2012, 13:07
Hi Danny,

Just re-read the whole thread and found quite a bit of dust flying 'round....
One thing, you say
quote:
"Then a forced landing after an engine failure put me "hors de combat" for a couple of months, and when I came back...."

Please please elaborate on this, this is the kind of detail, nerds such as me live for.

Thanks

Tim

pbeach
16th Jul 2012, 15:02
LowNSlow,

Thanks for the memory of your father, My grandfather was posted to 158 Squadron also as a F/O just as the war ended after doing a tour as a F/E with 51 Squadron and then spending 12 months at 1663 HCU. From his log book it looks like they converted to Stirlings around June/July 1945. He also has the same "trips" in his log book, he stayed with 158 until it was disbanded on 1st January 1946. He stayed in the RAF until 1958.

I think it highly likely that they knew each other :-)

Regards
Paul

Danny42C
16th Jul 2012, 15:30
foxtrot oscar

Tim,

Never fear - all will be made plain in due course, but a bit later, and always supposing I last that long.

Danny.

Taphappy
16th Jul 2012, 15:35
Petet
Yes working conditions at the bomb dump were not that great but I only did it for a few weeks and I take my hat off to these bods who worked there year after year for six years.
So far as the nissan huts were concerned they were basic in design usually with a concrete floor and a potbellied stove in the centre. Usually the fuel supply was pretty meagre and lots of scavenging had to be done to keep the supply up. I leave that to your imagination.
The stove then became the focal point of the hut with the inmates crowding round it to keep warm. We did use the hut for more than sleeping, that was were most writing letters, reading etc was done otherwise it was down to the Naafi or Sallyann.
Waiting time between courses was a bind and yes frustration did set in and eventually we all became a bit bolshie but kicking over the traces was self defeating as you were always on a sticky wicket and open to punishment.

Danny42C
16th Jul 2012, 19:24
Taphappy and Petet,

Sad story,

Valley, spring 1951; coke stove in my half-Nissen looked a bit scruffy; let's give it a coat of paint; used black gloss (!); autumn came; bit chilly one day; asked batman to light stove late afternoon; tea in mess, back to Nissen.

Stovepipe smoking nicely, opened door.

Wall to wall to roof thick choking black smoke, flung door and (small) windows open, room uninhabitable till midnight, freezing cold, stank for weeks.

Better luck next time!

Danny.

Danny42C
17th Jul 2012, 00:18
Early in December, they decided to get some value from their new Squadron. A signal came in to move to Double Moorings. "Double Moorings?"........"Never heard of it !".......A lat & long was given, we plotted it..... "It's Chittagong !"... .."No, it isn't".....The fix was a couple of miles away, between Chittagong and the sea. Most of us knew the area well..... "There's nothing there !"........ It was pointless, we'll just have to go and see. If we can't find anything at the spot, we'll land at Chittagong and take it from there.

The RAF (B) Flight took the lead in this bemused frame of mind, crossed straight over the Bay and reached the coast just off the position. Our Flight Commander, "Bill" Boyd Berry (henceforth "BBB") took our box round in a wide sweep. It really did look as if there was nothing there. We were in loose formation, spread out so that everyone could have a good look.

I spotted it first - or thought I did; the outline of a strip seemed to swim out of the bare paddy fields like a figure in a Ishihara plate.* I was on BBB's wing, I waggled and pointed downwards. He signalled me to take over the lead, and the rest strung out behind; I sincerely hoped that I was right. BBB hung some way back, ready to overshoot with the rest if I rolled myself into a ball on touchdown.

* Used to test for colour blindness: if you're colour blind, you can't see the numeral which is "hidden" among other colours.

But I was right. There was a strip there, but only recently bulldozed out of the paddy bunds, never been used, unworn and so perfectly camouflaged. The rest trundled in after me, and we surveyed our new home. It didn't amount to much, and we didn't stay there long, moving very soon down to the "forward" strips inland and south of Cox's Bazar. We moved several times, Joari was one, and I think Ramu II was my last place (but S/Ldr Thomas seems sure we started at a place called Mumbir - never heard of it! - which is not to say that he wasn't right, and that was where we first moved).

In fact, Double Moorings would hardly rate a mention, were it not for a Good Deed I did there one night, and these were so rare that the memory has stuck with me for a lifetime. The circumstances were unusual. At Chittagong there was a Hurricane squadron. Two or three pairs were detailed for a night attack on Akyab airfield. But on return, for some reason, they were to land back with us, and recover their aircraft back to Chittagong the following morning.

So far so strange, but perhaps they were going to do some quick, urgent repair to their runway in the rest of the night after their chaps had taken off. It was a nuisance to us; we would have to find and lay a gooseneck flarepath along our strip, whereas Chittagong had proper lighting on its runway. Still, there had to be a reason, even if we didn't know it.

What made no sense at all, was that they were also to leave the pilots with us for the rest of the night after they got back after midnight. (They'd only need a 15 cwt truck to pick them all up, and it was only a two-mile trip back to their bashas in Chittagong.....Why ?) And we had no spare accomodation - we'd have to "double-bunk"; there was only one charpoy per head. People would have to sleep on the floor.

To cut a long story short, after a short struggle with my conscience, noblesse oblige-d; my chap could have my de-luxe DIY bed (Mk.2); I would kip on the woven palm matting floor. The bearer made up my bed for the stranger, I found a spare mossie net, wrapped it round me and settled down, trying not to think of the "long-leggity beasties" of the night.

My houseguest came in about 0100, and lit the hurricane lamp. "How did you get on?".........."I gave Akyab a 'jao' - Akyab gave me a 'jao' ". I deduced that there had been an inconclusive exchange of fire, but little more. He was very grateful for the bed, I struggled off to sleep in a warm glow of quixotic nobility (didn't last).

(Jao is the imperative of Jana - is that right? - "to go"). Col. John Masters ("Bhowani Junction" - "Bugles and a Tiger") scathingly notes that most of us British out there learned only the imperative case of any verb ("Jai Hind" - "Quit India" - was a bit of graffiti (directed at us) often seen on walls, etc. in the last years of the Raj).

However, we started operating at Double Moorings - I see from my log that we flew in on the 12th December, I flew my first 'op' with 8 on the 17th from there, and we stayed until the 22nd January, when we moved to Mumbir (?)

Nearly all our 'ops' are entered in my log as 'A.S.C.' (Army Support Close), and I was a bit curious to read on three consecutive days: ASC "as on 10th" (January '44). Looking back to the 10th, I find "Kyathwengyaungwya" (think I mentioned that before), so writing it out once had been enough! (It was said that everywhere in Burma ended in 'bong, chaung or dong': it was not far from the truth).

At last we had our teeth into the job that the Vengeance might have been designed for. And now I'm going to abandon (for the time being) my chronological tale to revert to my "Jottings" format: two essays, one on "Vengeance in Offence". and the other (not surprisingly). "Vengeance in Defence". (I hope the Moderator will permit).

Bedtime now, Goodnight all,

Danny42C


Not to worry

Blacksheep
17th Jul 2012, 09:23
Usually the fuel supply was pretty meagre and lots of scavenging had to be done to keep the supply up. I leave that to your imagination.
Some years ago I was sent on a course in Hatfield and we were accommodated at RAF Stanmore Park. In a WW2 hut, with pot bellied stove - but with no coal. It was January. The hut had twenty bed spaces and there just four of us. By the time we left we had burned 16 chairs, 16 bedside lockers, 16 wardrobes, all the linoleum, the handrails from the outside corridor to the outside ablutions and we had started on the tar paper roofing of the ablution block. So, if you were the SWO at RAF Stanmore Park in January 1969 you now know what happened to your "transit" accommodation and with a bit of simple research you can trace at least one of the culprits.

Nothing changes. The RAF may not have traditions, but it certainly has well established "habits" ;)

Danny42C
17th Jul 2012, 15:24
Blacksheep,

Who'd be an Inventory Holder ! (if he'd been out with us, he could at least have blamed the white ants).

I take it that the Coal Store was carefully guarded - did they still whitewash the stuff to reveal theft, as they did in the War years ?

Danny.

Chugalug2
17th Jul 2012, 21:40
Danny,
When a Squadron went "walk-about" in the way that you describe, how much went with it? Other than the aircrew flying the aircraft there, presumably the rest piled into MT and followed. Your MT or the Station's from whence you came? I guess the convoy would include the remaining aircrew, groundcrew, admin (Adj and clerk?), together with all your kit, spares, files, and possible sundries ( I dunno, mascots, furniture (Co's desk?), en-route rations, etc). What was at Double Moorings when you arrived? An RAF Station, nothing, or something in between? Most moves these days are detachments from parent units rather than entire units proceeding lock stock and barrel. A little light on this arcane process would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Danny42C
18th Jul 2012, 00:34
Chugalug,

If I'd only my old memory to rely on, your question would have floored me completely. Fortunately, our old pal S/Ldr Thomas comes to my aid. It seems that, (according to his memoir), all the ground crew plus all their kit and equipment (and MT?) went by rail to Calcutta. There they embarked in some sort of cargo ship (he relates how the dockyard mateys used their cranes simply to toss the Sqdn's equipment into the holds) and that it took four days to get across to Chittagong. (What were they using for motive power - paddles?)

Double Moorings was a basha camp plus a strip and that was all. According to S/Ldr T. there was precious little else and life was pretty rough to start with for all ranks. For the aircraft and crews must have flown over before the ground party could leave Chaara, so we must have had a few days looking after ourselves before they caught up with us.

Oddly, I haven't the faintest recollection of that time, but as I see we flew over on the 12th, and I flew a sortie from there on the 17th, the Ground Party must have lost no time in unpacking after arrival!

Danny.

LowNSlow
18th Jul 2012, 03:11
pBeach, I'm sure they must have at least bumped into each other!! My Dad started off as an airframe fitter with 151 Sqn (Hurricanes) moving from North Weald to Stapleford Tawney after they were bombed out. In late 1940 he was transferred to 51 Sqn (Whitleys)in Wyton. He was about to be arrested for painting the statue of Oliver Cromwell in Huntingdon in red, white and blue when he was posted to Crete. While he was en route to Liverpool docks Crete fell and he was sent to Canada instead.

What was your Grandfather's name? I'll be back in Blighty in August and I'll ask the old feller if he remembers your Grandad. By 1945 Dad was teh Deputy Flight Engineer Leader so he would have at least met all the F/Es.

Peter

pbeach
18th Jul 2012, 08:30
LowNSlow,
Have PM'd you via your PPRuNe account.
Regards
Paul

savimosh01
19th Jul 2012, 18:03
Response to Icare9 who posted the names of the three 110 Squadron air crew killed Nov. 11, 1943

On October 14, 1943 the Squadron moves again, this time to Kumbhirgram, about 25 km northeast of Silchar, under the command of S/L Leonard Frank Penny DFC. In November S/L Penny leads the Squadron into action. Their target is the south-bound road out of Imphal toward Tiddim. Of the ten aircraft that arrive over the target, Penny’s is the only one that fails to bomb. He is more successful on his second raid of the same area when the Squadron intervenes in an artillery battle and tips the balance in favour of the British.

On November 11, 1943 three 110 Squadron members are killed. Commemorated at Gauhati War Cemetery, Assam, India are:

Cpl Alfred John Arthur Burrows, age 33, RAFVR
LAC John Joseph Crockett, age 24, RAFVR
LAC James McKendrick Hall, age 31, RAFVR

One close call the Squadron has with the Japanese takes place when they are driving out to their aircraft for a bombing run. Reg Duncan is sitting on the end of the truck and notices some airplanes overhead, telling the boys, “We have Mohawks for fighter support today.” Then he sees the Rising Sun and shouts, “They’re not Mohawks!” The truck comes to a screeching halt and the men dive under it as quickly as the enemy comes tearing down in a shoot-up. “Bullets ripped the shirt off my back and smashed through my fingers, slicing the guy in front of me. We were banged up but no one was killed.”

Source: Mosher, Sara V. "Remember Me: No. (110) Hyderabad Squadron Royal Air Force". Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, 2011.

Danny42C
19th Jul 2012, 19:10
Looks as though I may be off-thread for a while.... Laptop has gone ape, it will copy/paste fine from Notepad (on which I now do all my drafts) to Wordpad and vice versa, but will not paste as a Thread reply; I do not propose to type it all out again !

Any suggestions will be gratefully received (Post or PM) - not too technical, please.

Danny42C


If it isn't one damn' thing, it's another.

Chugalug2
19th Jul 2012, 20:28
Danny, I've no idea why it has got the sulks, but when in doubt with a computer, reboot (ie shut down and restart). If you have already typed out your latest missive, then "save as" from the file menu, give it a name to retrieve it and a location, such as desktop, before you do that. After restarting log back into pprune, locate your script and copy it and then try the reply/paste sequence again. Good luck, hope it works!
OK?
Edited to add, maybe the first thing to do is simply to log out of pprune, shut it down, start it again, log in, and try again. It might just be a fault on this site. Worth a try.

Danny42C
19th Jul 2012, 22:24
Chugalug,

Thank you for the kind advice, have followed it but no joy, I'm afraid. It's the same on other PPRuNe threads (and I've not "joined" anywhere else I could try it on), but what's really foxing me is the fact that copy/paste is working in and between Notepad and Wordpad, but not between either and PPRuNe - it's almost as if they don't like PPRuNe !

Will get it sorted out eventually, I suppose.

Goodnight,

Danny.

Chugalug2
20th Jul 2012, 07:36
Danny, sorry to hear that you are still having trouble. I have sent you a PM but if others can think of anything that might help then please do so. My only other thought is that you left click in the text block to ensure that there is a flashing cursor before right clicking and selecting paste into it...

Fareastdriver
20th Jul 2012, 09:02
Can you email it to somebody who would post it.

Danny42C
20th Jul 2012, 09:43
Fareastdriver,

Sounds like a good idea as a stopgap (daughter has suggested that too) Will see if it works.

Real answer: chuck it back at A***s !

Thanks, Danny

Reader123
20th Jul 2012, 15:26
Go out into the street and find somebody less than ten years old. They'll show you how to do it...

How are you copying and pasting?

dogle
20th Jul 2012, 16:13
Danny, on the very few occasions on which I have been reduced to somewhat unecclesiastic language by failure of copy=>paste operations, I had - inadvertently - closed down the source (copied) tablet before completing the paste ... with the frustrating outcome you describe.

Danny42C
20th Jul 2012, 16:33
Reader123,

I fear you may be right. But if you wish to appreciate the enormity of the challenge involved, read #2307 - #2312 on p. 116.

My system is as Chugalug explained in his #2310, and it has worked fine for quite a time now. This is something right out of the blue yesterday.

I suppose we'll ferret it out in the end, and meanwhile I'll keep you posted, but it's no more story TFN, I'm afraid. I'll leave the field clear for Taphappy. (I'll not be bone-idle, I'll store up a few episodes in advance of publication).

But thanks for the suggestion all the same.

Danny42C

Danny42C
20th Jul 2012, 16:52
dogle,

That's exactly the sort of thing I would do, but in this case I've just checked: I can copy on Notepad, fail to paste on Prune, then go to Wordpad and post the same text successfully there, all in a minute. (I've just done it).

It's got me beaten !

Danny42C

Danny42C
20th Jul 2012, 20:01
Success at last !!! - this has been put on thread by the E-mail attachment route (suggested by Fareastdriver and executed by Danny's Daughter).

CORRECTION:

After repeatedly saying that the RAF Flight on 8 IAF Sqdn. was "B" Flight (trusting to memory), it occurred to me to look at my log...... It was "A" - at least I say so, and all my Squadron and Flight Commanders seem to agree. ( I shall now stand in the corner with the Dunce's cap on.....D)

(Note: As a typical Vultee Vengeance sortie has been described in detail in an earlier Post (#2651 p.133), there is no need to include any further description here......D.)

The Vengeance was mainly used in Burma as a substitue for artillery. The hilly jungle country made the deployment of of guns difficult, and in any case the 14th Army didn't have enough of them. From the end of '43 onward it was trying to push the Japanese armies back down south in the Arakan, and east on the Assam fronts.

The Jap was a very good defensive fighter, especially skilled in digging-in in strong points from which it was very difficult to dislodge him. He didn't give up when he was tired or wounded. He didn't give up when things were hopeless. He didn't give up if he were sick or starving. He fought till he died. He never surrendered. If you want to know what it was like to be a British soldier facing him in the Burma jungle, read "Quartered Safe Out Here" by George Macdonald Frazer (the "Flashman" author), who fought out there with the 14th Army.

This was where we came in handy. From our rough, dry-weather "kutcha" strips 30-40 miles away, we could put up "boxes" of six aircraft, each carrying two 500lb and two 250lb bombs. It adds up to a formidable total of 9,000lb, nearly four tons of high explosive. This we could deliver accurately, on a point, in about 30 seconds.

It was more than a battery of 25-pounders could put down in a morning, even supposing they could bring up so many rounds. Moreover, the concentration of the bombing meant that, even if every Jap were not killed in the strike, the noise and blast would stun him long enough for our forward troops, who would be close nearby, to rush the position and finish off with grenade, rifle and bayonet before he came to his senses.

The difficulty was the "point". From 10,000 ft the jungle is just a bobbly green wooly jumper. The formation leader can map-read into the general area of the target, but needs help to pinpoint it. This was obvious to us but not always to the Army. I recall one incident, when we were being briefed by a new Army liaison officer (we had one with us most of the time). Having described the target, our Captain ended with some helpful words: "You'll have no difficulty in finding this place - there are two very tall trees just to the north of the positiion". To our eternal credit, the whole briefing tent took this in boot-faced silence. No one giggled or batted an eyelid. But , "Two tall trees" passed into folklore !

We worked an answer out with the Army. The forward troops got smoke bombs for their mortars. They made sure a mortar was zeroed-in on the Jap position, then waited until they could hear and see us coming. With practice they could put the smoke down early enough to alllow the formation leader room to plan his bombing run, but not so soon as to allow the smoke to drift away. This smoke was the key to the whole thing. The formation leader's bombs had to be spot-on, for they kicked up so much dust that you couldn't see the mortar smoke. Each following pilot aimed for the centre of the dust cloud covering the target. Results were surprisingly good. There was often the odd bomb adrift, of course, and as our troops were usually fairly close by, some sad acccidents. But then, there has never been a war in which that hasn't happened (and never will be).

The Jap reacted quickly to this tactic. He'd lob a smoke bomb at us the moment he saw aircraft coming, and there'd be two lots of smoke. This was ineffective, for if the line ran east-west, you'd obviously go for the southern smoke. He could have finessed by putting his smoke further south behind him, to draw the bombs down there (at risk to his own people). But before this became a problem, the Army got coloured smokes, and a colour was agreed for each strike. This was too much trouble for the Jap, and he never bothered to counter it.

Some strongpoints had been hit so often that we had no difficulty in finding them. I remember one hill which had all the vegetation blown off the top. In the morning sun, this bald peak shone like a big brown breakfast egg sticking up out of the jungle. You couldn't miss it. (EDIT: I have been reading up Google/Wiki on the "Battle of the Admin Box"; they describe a Point 551 which had been hammered to such effect that its height AMSL was reduced by five feet. This might well be our hill).

This kind of work was our bread-and-butter. But a change is as good as a rest. We went further afield, but not too far on account of our limited range. Fuel consumption is high with a loaded bomber in formation, and our radius of action was no more than 200 miles. There was a story that locally made long range tanks had been tried on the Vengeance, but the extra weight and drag of these rough and ready bolt-ons needed so much extra power (and therefore fuel) that you got no further with the things on than you did before without them.

The range we had was enough was enough for us to reach Akyab from Chittagong and the Cox's Bazar strips. From Khumbirgram in Assam we could get over the hills into the upper Chindwin valley. But generally our ASC sorties only lasted an hour or so in the Arakan, two hours in Assam.

As soon as a sortie lands back, the "turnround" starts. The aircraft have to be checked, refuelled and re-armed (in our case bombed-up) ready for the next trip. Quick turnround is the mark of an efficient Squadron. You have only limited resources in the shape of fuel bowsers, bomb trolleys, bomb winches and men - particularly armourers. The trick is to use every short cut you can think of (Ryanair and Easyjet wrestle with the same problem today).

A fighting airforce concentrates on turnaround, for in effect it multiplies its strength. If you can fly twice as many sorties in a given time, you're twice the size. This factor was crucial in the Arab/Israeli 1967 "Six Day's War". IIRC, Arab intelligence estimated that the Israelis could turn round their Phantoms five times between dawn and dusk. They managed eight on the day!

On "A" Flight, we had our own "secret weapon". Bombing-up is a slow business. The bomb trolley has to be manhandled under a wing station or bomb bay. Take the case of a wing: with the trolley positioned under the rack, a winch is mounted on top, and the cable passed through the wing. Then the rack is disconnected from below the wing, attached to the cable and lowered for attachment to the bomb. With electrical connectons made, fusing links fitted to the bomb, and the steadying clamps tightened, rack plus bomb has to be slowly winched up (by hand) back up to the wing and secured. Then the winch and cable have to be removed. All this can take up to a good quarter of an hour.

We had "Hatch", a New Zealand farmer of huge size and strength (and as mild and aimiable a chap as you'd hope to meet), now Flying Officer Hatchett of the RNZAF. We didn't need a winch for our wing bombs. A rack was disconnected and clamped onto its 250lb bomb. We folded a couple of empty sacks for padding on Hatch's back, he bent down under the bomb station, four lads lifted the bomb onto his back, and guided it as he straightened up and forced it into position under the wing. Twenty seconds of effort saved ten minutes on each wing of each aircraft. (EDIT: Curiously, neither F/O Hatchett (nor any similar name) appears on the Bharat-Rakshak List of 8 Sqn personnel, but I can assure you that he was there).

Of course he could lift only the wing bombs, the internal 500lb ones still had to be winched up into the bays, but even so we saved a third of the time bombing-up would otherwise have taken. There was no difficulty with the air crews, as we were so close to the fighting areas, our sorties rarely lasted much more than an hour. An hour's rest and a glass of "char" from the char-wallah after debriefing, and we were ready to go again. By then the ground crew would have our aircraft ready and waiting for us.

It looks as though we are back in business now!

Goodnight,

Danny42C


If at first you don't succeed............

Chugalug2
20th Jul 2012, 20:43
..then try, try, and try again! Great to see you back in business Danny, and well done to your daughter and FED for coming up with the DS solution. Hopefully you will soon be able to resume normal operations when the gremlins have had enough fun.
Suddenly we are back on the offensive with close air support to an Army that targets everything via "Bushy Topped trees, etc". You say that they soon cottoned on to your needs, but how was that done? Were they briefed by radio to put down the smoke bombs in the way you describe? Did they all have such radios? In these days of FACs talking direct with, and calling in, the Air Support as required, we have to remember that comms were in a different league then.
Forward troops come up against a Japanese strong point that they need help with to dislodge. So they radio back for it to be bombed, that is passed onto your Army Liaison Officer who then briefs you and agrees the timing. That is then passed back to the forward commander who ensures that his mortar crews are prepared with their smoke bombs to coincide with your arrival. Something or nothing like that?
Your Kiwi sounds formidable indeed and should perhaps have earned not so much just a mention in the Unit Roll, but recognition of his efforts above and beyond the call of duty.
Oh, just remembered, re my query on the ground move of the Squadron, I should have realised that it would be done via the Indian Railways, a vast concern that outnumbered the Army I believe, and the only way to move around the sub-continent, unless by air of course!

Danny42C
20th Jul 2012, 21:53
Chugalug,

I'm sorry to say that we didn't take much interest in the planning of our operations; if pressed I would have to say that Wing signalled the Squadrons with targets and times, and we just got on with whatever the ALO and IO gave us at briefing. All comms were W/T, of course, except for a few field telephones.

As far as troop movement is concerned, the railways were the main thing, as you say. But in our time (and I would not be surprised if it were so still), there was no through line over the Sunderbands; part of the journey had to be by river steamer. (If you went much further north, it may have been possible). But even back from Assam, which is a fair way north, we had to take to a paddle-boat at one stage back to Calcutta.

This was an enormous hindrance to all our supplies moving east from Calcutta, but fortunately we had been able to stop the Japs in '42 before they took the port of Chittagong, and I would suppose that sea transport carried a great deal of the supplies through there to the forces in the Arakan. (The 8 Sqn ground party came over that way).

From Chittagong there was a spur down to Dohazari about 60 miles south, but after that it was MT, Dakotas, bullock carts and mules! (didn't see any elephants).

The Indian railways were truly an impressive organisation, they were steam-hauled until quite the recent past, reasonable as India had vast coal reserves, like China, but not much oil. Their operation was the stronghold of the Anglo-Indian community, to which I beleve it was reserved by law.

Goodnight, Chug,

Danny.

Chugalug2
21st Jul 2012, 07:59
Point taken, Danny. I, for my sins have just attended a 50th anniversary reunion for when our entry was released upon an unsuspecting RAF. Only now, after all those years, have some of the i's been dotted and t's crossed in my mind. It is enough to do your own job without interesting yourself with how others did theirs!
Having said that you paint a vivid picture of the logistical challenge of getting your Squadron set up at Double Moorings and into action in the shortest time possible.
A quick look at Google Maps illustrates the problems, with the two great ports of Calcutta and Chittagong separated by the swamped delta of the Sundarban.
From Chittagong the railway still stops south at Dohazar. In Chittagong (for it extends now to the sea) there is a Double Moorings Police Station but that is all. Presumably your Pied a Terre lay close by. As did the enemy of course, and hence your presence and the need for the move.

Fareastdriver
21st Jul 2012, 08:44
Danny. I know that you have left already 110 Sqn in your saga but I also served on 110 Sqn far later in Singapore in the late 60s. This is lifted from my log book on the last day of 110 Sqn's existance.

http://i229.photobucket.com/albums/ee224/fareastdriver/img019.jpg

I apologise for the writing but after landing I had to make up my monthly summary in a hurry so as to get to the start of the Disbandment party.


I am not Ron Jones.

Taphappy
21st Jul 2012, 15:06
Danny,
Glad that you are back on course again and after reading your latest posts I am somewhat hesitant about putting my mundane experiences on this thread.

March 1945 and back at Heaton Park for a couple of weeks and then the same group of u/t Nav/Wops are once more sent out on detachment, this time to Gransden Lodge. a PFF station and home to 405 RCAF squadron equipped with Lancs and a Mosquito LNSF squadron.
As had happened at Strubby we were once again spread round the various sections and this time I was allocated to the armoury and my only abiding memory is of being told to paint the stones surrounding the building white. Soul destroying stuff.
In these days I was quite a useful football player and Gransden being mainly staffed by Canadians who were not that good at the sport it was reasonably easy to gain a place in the station football team which led to trips away to other bases for matches thus helping to relieve the monotony.
We were still at Gransden on VE Day and a huge party for all personnel was held on the sports field, the beer flowed like buttermilk and there were a few inebriated airmen and WAAFs by the end of the day.
The squadron moved out towards the end of May and soon afterwards we were recalled to Heaton Park
A couple of weeks later we were on the move again,this time to a small camp on the outskirts of Reading.It was not an aerodrome and we had no idea what we would be doing there. Next morning we found out and this was an odd sort of detachment. There was an HMSO(His Majesty's Stationery Office) warehouse in Reading and this was to be our place of employment. This was a civilian establishment and we were the only RAF people there.
We were issued with bus tokens and would take the bus to and from the warehouse each day, it was like being back in civvy street.
The job was to make up orders placed by various RAF establishments of the various forms required to run an Air Force and ensure that they were despatched on time.
Petet asked in a previous post if we just accepted these delays in training but this time we had had enough and being in a mutinous mood we led the guys at HMSO a merry dance, mixing up orders and generally putting a spanner in the works until they were glad to get rid of us. Incidentally I never found out what the function of that camp was.We only slept and ate there.
By VJ day we were back at Heaton Park having given up on any idea of ever flying and towards the middle of September we were informed that we had been remustered to straight W/op and that we were being posted to Bridgenorth for a refresher ITW course about a year after doing the original one.
Seems like you had to go back to move forward.

Danny42C
21st Jul 2012, 23:03
Fareastdriver,

Thanks for the sight of your last logbook entries for 110 - I never knew it was still in existence as late as '71. Was it ever reformed after that, do you know? And were they still carting around the "constipated tiger" of Hyderabad in your day?

I was a bit intrigued by the "Mr Hoxtin" (?) who's down on the airtest as 'First Pilot' on the 10th. Was he a civilian (in which case, how come?) or a Warrant Officer? (I bet it was quite a party at the end!)

And of course, I'm most grateful for your technical suggestion, which has put me back on the road again,

Cheers,

Danny.

Danny42C
22nd Jul 2012, 00:08
Taphappy,

I can feel for you in the situation you were in, b-ggered about from pillar to post in an organisation which had clearly lost its purpose and was winding down all the time.

I'd had my fair share of transit camps (as had all aircrew trainees), but at least we had the Holy Grail of our brevets always in our sights. You seem to have had your hopes lifted and then repeatedly dashed, and now a second lot of ITW. What on earth could they teach you now that you hadn't learned before? Seems like the "white stones" ploy - give him something, anything, to do, rather than do the obvious thing: send him home on indefinite leave (on full pay + ration allowance) until you can decide what to do with him.

Even when you'd "got through", there were always the times when you were "supernumerary", a sort of dogsbody at everybody's beck and call. Strangely enough, some of the odd jobs you collected on these occasions turned out the most interesting of all.

"Mundane experiences" - yes, please! It was all part of the warp and weft of Service life in those days. It is a truism that War is 90% boredom and 10% sheer terror; the humble day to day stuff seems just as interesting to our readers as the glorious deeds of valour.

"Reculer pour mieux sauter" as you say,

Keep it coming!

Danny.

phil9560
22nd Jul 2012, 02:25
Its all fascinating Taphappy ! Wonderful reading your memories.Please carry on !

Chugalug2
22nd Jul 2012, 07:40
Taphappy, there was it seems an RAF Reading and, just as you recall, there seems to have been no stated purpose for it nor named units based at it. However, the co-ordinates given put it close by the railway station and hence probably never "on the outskirts". It seems to have occupied 8 Gun Street! I wonder if that was the "front door" of your place, or more likely perhaps yours went after a completely different ID, named after some hamlet or village around there.
The only airfields around Reading that I could find were RAFs Woodley, Theale, and Smiths Lawn (all 50Gp EFTS) and further out RAF Hampstead Norris (12 Gp OTUs). Do any of those ring a bell?
Stations-R (http://www.rafweb.org/Stations/Stations-R.htm)
Edited to add, to the East lay RAFs White Waltham, Waltham St Lawrence, , and Bray Court (EFTS), to the North RAF Henley (EFTS), and to the South RAF Shinfield Park (HQ Flying Training Command!)

Fareastdriver
22nd Jul 2012, 10:52
Danny.
The standard was laid up at St Clement Danes and is still there, probably for ever.
That Mr Hoxtin was Roy Moxam, a senior test pilot with Westland helicopters. We were having problems with engines running down so we were doing a few trials to see if we could find a cause.
That included running a Whirlwind with a fire engine pumping water a full chat into its engine intake to see how long it would take to put the flame out.
It took a surpringly long time, actually.

Taphappy
22nd Jul 2012, 16:05
Chugalug2

Interesting stuff butI can assure you that the camp at Reading was not near the railway station but was on a bus route somewhere near Wantage Hall.
The Gun Street location might have been the site of the HMSO.
Cheers
John

Chugalug2
22nd Jul 2012, 16:26
Could well be Taphappy, as the HMSO docs were ones for the RAF. BTW I would point out that if you were near Wantage Hall, then you were quite close to Shinfield Park (HQFTC). Your administrative "creativity" could have been dealt with summarily by a galaxy of Air Marshals, if only they'd known ;-)

Taphappy
23rd Jul 2012, 13:01
Chugalug2
Your mention of the word Shinfield ringa a bell and on looking at a map of Reading I see a Shinfield Road which is quite near Wantage Hall and I am pretty sure that on the way out of Reading the camp was on the left hand side of this road.
It was a small camp and I would not have thought that it was the HQ of Flying Training Command but perhaps it was only the living quarters.
Can't say I ever saw any Air Marshalls wandering about but had we realised we were in such august company perhaps our actions at HMSO would have been somewhat different!!!.

papajuliet
23rd Jul 2012, 14:27
The 1946-47 edition of Who's Who in British Aviation shows Shinfield Park as the HQ of Flying Training Command. AOC was AM Sir Arthur Coningham.
Tel. no Reading 60471.....!
Within the Command were -
21 Grp. Spitalgate, Grantham
25 Grp. Buntingsdale Hall, Market Drayton
23 Grp. South Cerney
50 Grp. Sylvesters, Berkeley Avenue, Reading

Wander00
23rd Jul 2012, 16:48
Shinfield Park - hmm - about 1965 I took a drill squad of cadets from Cranners to HQ FTC - CinC was Sir Patrick Dunn. I think it was a bash for the 25th Anniversary of the foundation of the Command. Had just done a rehearsal when a message came that I was to report to the lawn in front of the Officers Mess - I turned up to be faced by the CinC and his predecessors - getting a glass of sherry down my throat was, in the circumstances, a bit of a challenge.

Chugalug2
23rd Jul 2012, 16:57
If you do a search for Cirrus Drive, Reading, on Google Maps, and follow it back to the roundabout where it starts, then zoom in down to street level, you are looking through the gateway to an old and substantial house surrounded now by a Barratt Homes Estate. I suspect that house was Shinfield Park, HQFTC. No doubt the grounds were populated with a hutted encampment and now all gone. The usual signs of previous RAF MQs, ie roads such as Spitfire Way, Hurricane Avenue, Lancaster Road, etc, are all absent. Perhaps they were replaced with the more aspirational ones of Zenith Ave, Pascal Crescent, Aphelion Way, Rossby and Perigee, as well as Cirrus Drive that the site now boasts.
Edited to add that the site backs onto the ECMWF (European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasts), which rather explains the choice of road names. Perhaps it constitutes their MQs!

Danny42C
23rd Jul 2012, 17:01
Fareastdriver,

Thanks for the information (that 110 is just a memory now) - and I suppose in your time the "Hyderabad" part of the name had been dropped by the Politically Correct RAF. Were you a bit puzzled by my "Constipated Tiger" query? The full story is in my Post #2559 p. 128. (Perhaps the white ants did get it after all !)

I've only just realised the significance of "winding-down" in a chopper (never was very bright). Having to surrender to gravity never was a soft option, and though I was never in Malaya, I would think that it would be much like Burma in that good forced landing sites were few and far between.

Cheers,

Danny.

Danny42C
23rd Jul 2012, 21:39
Good News - my gremlin has vanished as mysteriously as he came. All back to normal! (fingers crossed).

Being so close to the "sharp end" had its advantages. We were almost entirely spared the usual time-wasting visits by high-ranking notables from Calcutta or Delhi, keen to get in a bit of "front line" time to boast about when they got back. Not entirely, one such party came down to have a look at us in early '44, keen to see how this mixed squadron was getting on. As both flights were furiously busy just then, we gave an impression of rather more harmony than in fact existed, and our visitors were duly impressed. They stayed the night.

At breakfast one asked: "What was that clanking noise we heard during the night?"........"Fifteen Division's tanks moving up" "How far away are the Japs?"......."About thirty miles"......Nothing was said, but our visitors disappeared with the speed of light. I grimly recalled my school Shakespeare (Henry IV Part 1), and the young Percy's scornful words: "Came there a certain Lord, neat and trim'ly dressed" - the epitome of the red-tabbed Staff Officer through the ages. (Nagged by this individual to hand over his prisoners, the weary warrior: "I, all smarting with my wounds being cold, answ'd him roundly, I know not what" - but we can guess!)

We lived in luxury compared with the P.B.I. in the jungle. In bamboo bashas, with mosquito nets and camp beds (in my case, my DIY travelling bed), we were quite comfortable and reasonably well fed, although a lot of bully beef was on the menu - (our Hindu colleagues had to turn a blind eye). The cooks could generally find something to curry; rice was no problem in Burma, and you could always get hold of eggs and the odd scrawny chicken. Nobody starved.

It was unwise to bring the odd cold chicken leg back to your basha for a midnight snack; the scent would attract baboons and you might awake to find a ferocious squabble going on over the titbit by your bedside. The thing to do was not to interfere, but let them get on with it; the beasts had fearsome teeth and were quite ready to use them. As with most wild creatures, they were no trouble if you left them alone.

There was nothing to distinguish one ASC job from another, just another puff of white smoke against another dark green background, a dive and another big cloud of dust and smoke. One trip (by 82 Sqn at Dohazari?) gave particular satisfaction. The Army had a small clearing up front in the Box from which they evacuated their badly wounded in (I think) Stinson "Reliants". Somehow the Jap had managed to get a small mountain gun into range and was causing a problem. We got a "fix" on this gun, (Lord knows how), put in a strike, the gun was no more, the gunners went to join the ancestors and the Army was well pleased.

IIRC, the drill was that the "Reliant" took the casualties back to one of the Cox's Bazar strips; if they were in extremis the MFH at Cox's would patch them up; otherwise the empty 'Daks' coming back from air-drops to the Admin Box landed on some strip and took them on to Calcutta (or up to Chandina, near, it seems, a big hospital in Comilla). The 'Reliant' went back for more. (All this I was told - in the MFH? - any medic from those days who can confirm/deny?)

Not all our sorties were trouble-free. One morning George Davies was hit in the hydraulics over the target (sounds a bit painful), and pulled out of the dive with just enough fluid to get his brakes in before the hydraulic power failed. One undercarriage leg was dangling. He couldn't do anything about it, or close his bomb doors, and it slowed him down a lot.

By arrangement, the front three carried on home by themselves. I'd been No.4 - ("in-the-box"), but now we back three reformed to put George in the lead, with one of us each side so that our gunners could offer him a little extra protection from an attacker coming in from either quarter. We had a Hurricane escort that day, two pairs. One pair went on with the front three, the other stayed with us, sweeping side to side a mile astern to give us some rear cover.

In this configuration we limped home without further incident. Paddy Lamb and I landed; George worked on his problem, but try as he might, he couldn't get the other wheel down or the first one up. They'd tried everything without success. It was obvious that any any attempt to land must write-off the aircraft and probably them with it. They headed it out to sea and abandoned it. Both floated down unhurt on land and the aircraft splashed down in the Bay. That was about the only case where the loss of a Vengeance could certainly be put down to ground fire, although there would be others (such as mine) where it was strongly suspected.

It was a common enough story in itself, but there was an unusual twist to it. S/Ldr Thomas (whom we know well), tells a remarkably similar story of a VV which developed a hydraulic fault shortly after take-off, and had to be abandoned in the same way. In his version, the empty aircraft turns back and circles round, threatening one of the parachutes at each pass (very much like my story of the dropped Form 1 at Carlstrom Field long ago).

I never heard of this occurrence, and wonder if we are hearing a much embroidered version of the George Davies affair (could it be? - remember that S/Ldr. Thomas's reminiscences were written 40 years after the event). If that is the case, it is strange (and typical of the IAF "chippiness") that it is told without a single mention that a British crew were involved !

Goodnight, chaps,

Danny42C


Keep smiling!

Chugalug2
25th Jul 2012, 22:03
So notch one VV up to the Sun God, no matter, the important thing is that the crew were alive and well and took exactly the right decision.
Ah, SOs chasing gongs etc, but staying only long enough to get them! Was there a gong in it for them this time, or would they have really had to "get some in" to get a Star?I would hope so!
The Stinson Reliant was a rather impressive aircraft by the looks of it, a sort of Mini Beaver, and rather more substantial than the Piper Cub or Auster utility types usually associated with casevac. Of course Mr Vultee and his associates didn't do "small" did they? So no real surprise. The Haynes Manual equivalent for the type is 4283, the pilots notes for the RAF AT-19 is 4282. here:-
Reliant (http://www.avialogs.com/list/itemlist/category/809-reliant)

Danny42C
26th Jul 2012, 17:28
Chugalug,

No, I'm afraid there was nothing in it for the Top Brass who came slumming from time to time. Everybody in Theatre got the Burma Star, even if he'd spent his whole time polishing an office chair in Delhi (it was ever thus).

Yes, the Reliant looks a very capable not-so-little thing. AFAIK, I never saw one, and your link looks interesting - thanks! (I particularly liked the archaic US expression "ship" - that takes me back - and had to smile at the ernest injunction not to confuse the Carburetter Heat with the Cockpit Heat (as if I would ?)

I would have thought that the poor devils on the stretchers would find it a bit more roomy and comfortable than (say) an Auster (did we have those then?)

Cheers,

Danny

Chugalug2
26th Jul 2012, 19:28
We did, Danny, "we" being the RAF, the RAAF, and the RCAF. Special AOP RAF Squadrons were formed with RA and RAF personnel. They were supposed to operate the Stinson Vigilant, of which 100 were ordered but were "severely damaged during shipping"! So 100 modified Taylorcraft Austers were ordered instead and operated in North Africa, Italy, France, The Low Countries and Germany. There was also an RAF Squadron equipped with them in Burma, as well as Australian ones in the Pacific Theatre. Finally, some RCAF Squadrons were formed at RAF Andover and seconded as detachments after D-Day.
Their role was Artillery Spotting, but I have no doubt that they were often the quickest means at hand to move the wounded, do general recce, and to act as an aerial jeep:
Taylorcraft Auster - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylorcraft_Auster)

Danny42C
26th Jul 2012, 21:48
Chugalug,

Once again, thanks again for filling in the gaps in my knowledge! Rooting about in Wiki, I find that Vultee did have a "puddle-jumper" in their stable - they'd taken over Stinson in 1940; the Stinson "Sentinel" was renamed their "Voyager", it seems.

Danny.

kookabat
27th Jul 2012, 06:00
I've got the service record of a 222 Sqn pilot (Spitfires then Tempests) who spent some time between 'tours' flying for '84 Group Communications Squadron' (Treble Two being part of 84 Gp) - ORBs for 84 Gp CS record multiple flights in Austers that he completed in late 1943-early 1944 in northern France and the Netherlands. They were used for general 'odd' jobs for the operational squadrons, it seems - eg ferrying pilots to pick up other aircraft or doing the mail run etc. So the Austers got around a little bit (though at no great speed I'd reckon...).

Adam

Danny42C
27th Jul 2012, 14:59
Taphappy,

Please check PMs,

Danny.

Danny42C
27th Jul 2012, 15:21
To Kookabat.

Adam,

If your chap was flying about over France and the Netherlands in 1943 and "early" 1944, then he sure wasn't just "doing odd jobs"! (We didn't get ashore on the continent until June '44 - "D" Day).

More likely he was was ferrying agents and dropping off stuff for the Resistance. Usually they had Lysanders, which could land on nothing and take off on next to nothing, but I suppose an Auster would do.

Anyway, thanks for the information,

Danny.

Danny42C
27th Jul 2012, 17:39
I shall take this opportunity to tell the full disconcerting tale about our front guns. Whether they were really as unreliable as generally believed, I do not know, for no one tried to fire them for long (and most people didn't try at all). There was a reason for this. The gun fixings in the wings were apt to work loose with the vibration of firing. The first indication that this was taking place was the unwelcome appearance of the alloy "blast tubes", slowly sliding forward out of the leading edge of the wing, as the rounds deviated sufficently to "clip" the sides of the tube on their way out.

If you carried on firing, things grew worse, with the rounds popping out all over the leading edge. Nobody wanted a sort of runaway buzz-saw chewing away inside the wing. So after several episodes of this (on test and on attempts to harmonise the things), and efforts at curing it proving unsuccessful, it was generally agreed that the guns were more trouble than they were worth, and best left alone. The armourers heartily approved of this, for it was a devil of a job to clean them, buried as they were well back in the wing structure. Accordingly, the first belts we had painfully put together at Chaara stayed untouched, AFAIK, for the life of the aircraft !

I must emphasise that this may only have affected the .300 guns I would hope that the .50s in the Mk.IVs were better anchored down. For now the 4-degree incidence the MkIVs had would have made strafing easier, as they could see where they were going and what they were aiming at, and that always helps. (It helped even more that the Mk. IVs never fired at anything, to my knowledge - possibly in Aus?).

Conclusion.

Looking back, with a lifetime's hindsight, it has always seemed to me that the heart of the Air Ministry (and by extension, that of ACSEA and AHQ Delhi) was never in this Vultee Vengeance business. I think they had been panicked into the original order by a sort of "Stuka effect", and now regretted it when they saw the thing in the metal and realised how useless it would be to them in Europe. "Sweep it under the carpet" - and we were the carpet.

Having said that, '42 and early '43 were desperate days out there and we had no excuse for not wringing every ounce of use out of what little we had to work with. Two months' really intensive bombing and formation practice, and I'm sure that all four RAF squadrons could have moved up to Assam or the Arakan in March '43, and done ten week's useful work before the onset of that monsoon, instead of just the 2-3 they actually did.

The next year was better, as we'd all got into our stride, but why discard the Vengeance at the end of the season? (particularly as it was now demonstrating its full potential). Even our early comers had not come out until mid - '42, they were not due for repat until mid - '45. The aircraft were there, we knew how to use them, we had the people. So why not keep going for one more ('44 - '45) season ? (It would be the last as well, but we didn't know that then).

Yes, the Mossies were coming out (not without problems) in mid - '44. So? Form four new Squadrons with them and leave us alone! I'm sure there was plenty of work (and room) for everyone, The Arakan was honeycombed with two years' worth of 'kutcha' strips which would now have dried out and be ready for use again.

It was not to be - the axe came down in summer '44 - all water under the bridge now, of course.

Next time we'll start on Defence,

Cheers,

Danny42C.


All good things come to an end !

Chugalug2
27th Jul 2012, 19:50
Yea Gods, Danny! When you say that:
The gun fixings in the wings were apt to work loose with the vibration of firing.
You mean that the guns themselves were working loose in their stowages? How on earth were these aircraft ever offered for service in such a state. Didn't Vultee have some responsibility here, or were the guns fitted outside of their control? If so by who?
The aircraft seems to have had very little RAF input, even the Mk1 Pilots Notes being Roneo'd off if I remember correctly. Having said that, I also recall that the UK Purchasing Commission did just that, ie bought them rather than obtaining them via Lease Lend, correct? Surprising then that we didn't have some recourse to the manufacturer or the US Govt, depending on who we paid for them.
I suppose though that the real world meant that you were in Burma, a long way from AHQ Delhi, let alone the UK. Everything was your problem and thus any solution was yours as well. That you chose to not arm them and thus not use them seems eminently sensible. Not too much difference I guess from putting concrete ballast in place of cannon in modern FJs!

Danny42C
27th Jul 2012, 21:24
Chugalug,

I fancy the whole initial production was rushed, with no proper Service trials. When the fault became apparent, it was obvious that the aircraft was far too sluggish to be any good as a gun platform, anyway, so the guns were regarded as little more than ornaments. We had a good dive bomber, and had to be content with that. For that matter, I don't think that the Stuka did all that much with its rifle-calibre front guns. (I think there was a Mark with "tank-buster" pods (40mm?) on each wing), but I can't see it hoisting those aloft and its 750k bomb.

You are right, the AN and AP series were purchased by the UK, only the EZ onwards and of course the FB and FD (Mk.IIIs) were Lend - Lease (info from Peter C. Smith "Vengeance"). I think our purchase contracts were with Vultee and Northrop direct. Frankly, I never felt the need of a front gun (but a .50 in the back would have been nice - and 2 x .50 even nicer !)

Really, the (originally) weak rear gun mounts were more of a problem, but we seem to have got those really fixed. The guns did not break away when I reduced my aircraft to scrap (story a bit further on).

Danny.

kookabat
29th Jul 2012, 00:59
Oops! Call that a brain fart, Danny - the years should have read 1944-45. The pilot concerned (one F/L Leo McAuliffe) was in action with 222 around D-Day (indeed he's mentioned in the Austalian Official History for flying four patrols back to back on June 10, totalling seven and a half hours' flight time, refuelling and rearming from a temporary airstrip within the bridgehead itself) and it was well after the invasion that he was getting around in his Auster - between September 1944-January 1945. Then he went back to 222 when they reequipped with the Tempests.

Sorry for the confusion!!

Adam

Ripline
29th Jul 2012, 10:37
Slight thread drift for Danny42C: a nice 1943 Kodachrome shot on the Veangence production line at Vultee. Culled shamelessly from JB.;)

Amazing WWII Homefront Kodachrome Photos....YES AMAZING - Ashtar Command - Spiritual Community Network (http://www.ashtarcommandcrew.net/forum/topics/amazing-wwii-homefront-kodachrome-photos-truely-amazing?xg_source=activity)

Photo 6

Ripline

Danny42C
29th Jul 2012, 14:40
Kookabat,

Never mind, Adam - we all have our "senior moments" !

Danny.

============

Ripline,

Thanks for the link - we often forget the enormous amount of unsung handwork which has gone into the complicated mechanisms they gave us to fly.

Too often it was a case of "Youmakeum - Webreakum!"

Danny42C

============

Taphappy
29th Jul 2012, 16:04
Beginning of October 1945 and having been remustered fron Nav/W to straight W/op I am back at Bridgenorth for the refresher ITW course which was to last for around 6 weeks.
The course was much the same as the original one although there seemed to be mote emphasis on square bashing and PT which we probably needed as standards had slipped during the previous year.
At the end of the course we were posted to No4 Radio School at Madley for a W/ops course. Madley was near Hereford and was widely dispersed with the various living and working sites scattered round the aerodrome.
The accommodation consisted of wooden huts which were divided into rooms each containing two double bunks and accommodating four bods. The only facilities on the living sites were the lavatories and the ablutions were over a mile away near the mess hall so that when you left the hut in the morning you were fully equipped for the days work by which time you were too knackered to think about venturing out againOn the odd evening we might spend some time in the NAAFI before returning to the billets.The various lecture huts were also dispersed and a good part of the day was spent in marching between the various sites often retracing your steps.
Our first parade was a visit to the stores to be issued with with flying kit, the usual paraphenalia of helmet,oxygen mask,3 pairs of gloves, silk inner, woolen and leather gauntlets,flying boots and of course an extra kitbag.
It was a pretty miserable station but it was here that we were to be introduced to the mysteries of the TR1154/55 wireless set as well as the Theory of Radio,fault finding, operating procedure and such like subjects not forgetting Morse instruction which took up to 3 or 4 hours per day and at which we were expected to reach a speed of 22wpm. Some of the guys had difficulty with this and were taken off the course and the odd bod had what was known as "Doolally Tap" and went a bit strange. hence my user name of Taphappy.
We also spent time in the Harwell Box which contained standard aircraft radio equipment built to simulate live aircraft conditions including engine noises.There we would practice communicating with the ground station. When we finally got airborne the conditions were a lot more difficult than operating from a Harwell Box.
After about three months it was neccessart to pass examination on all subjects in particulat that your morse speed was up to the required standard before you could proceed to the next stage of training.
Luckily I managed to get through OK but a few of the course didn't make it and were posted elsewhere.
Enough for now.

Danny42C
29th Jul 2012, 17:00
Taphappy,

Of course! It was that kind of "tap". I should have guessed that instead of going on about taps and barrels. No excuse with the time I spent in India, where everyone knew of the Deolali (Doolally) Tap (I think "Tap" referred to a slight case of sunstroke, which was supposed to make you "lightheaded" - or plain bonkers!)

Never mind, we'll soon have you in the air, and then the fun starts. Keep it up!

Danny.

Chugalug2
29th Jul 2012, 20:38
Taphappy, if your experience is anything to go by then staying in the UK for aircrew training was a rather worse bet than going overseas for it. I suppose that the response to any outspoken dissatisfaction would be, "There is a war on you know!".
Now at least you are learning your trade, and with the help of the "Harwell Box" too. Could you describe that a little? We have already been told of simulators for the Air Engineers and Air Gunners, as well as of course the Pilots' Link Trainer. Presumably it simulated not only inflight noises but poor R/T and W/T conditions as well.
In the modern era of VHF/UHF/SAT Comms, it is perhaps not fully appreciated what a key man the W/Op was on a crew. Having flown the Hastings, which admittedly had upgraded its fit from the 1154/55 to the STR18B, his skill with the key was often the only way to send and receive ATC and Wx info when out of V/UHF range. If that didn't work you were indeed both deaf and dumb, with no idea at a Crit Point what the Wx was doing ahead of, or behind you. In Bomber Command of course he had additional duties, but I'll leave that to the better qualified than I...

DFCP
30th Jul 2012, 21:45
At least at the start this will be a similar story to that of Taphappy.
I volunteered in Nov 43 and went through the medical etc in Cardiff---this involved an overnight stay and I still recall my surprise at so many failing the medical since I had qualms because I had a major operation when I was 5 I emerged with deferred service and a 3 million service number which I think were reserved for ex ATC members.

My school must have later provided a recommendation as I applied for a University Short Course. I dont recall being interviewed but early in 44 I received notification that I was to go to Edinburgh University in April for a 6 month RAF Short Course.

We were not paid ,nor did we wear uniform during this period. The 23 guys on the course were mixed in with the regular students both for lectures and living quarters. We also took ITW subjects and spent some time each week at the EUAS HQ located in an old house close to our living quarters in Cowan House on George Square.

At this time I think we were all 18 = or - 6 months. Three were from NI and the rest of us from all over the UK.
The only flying I did during this period was once as a passenger in a Dominie from Turnhouse.
Both the CO of the UAS and our civilian monitor provided assessments of our capabiliies at the end of the course .

So in October we finished the course and went home on leave and then made our ways to ACRC by this time located in Torquay.
I suppose the total number of UAS people who arrived with me were several hundred --including Richard Burton --ex OUAS. We were put into various hotels in the area. I was in Alta Vista in Babbacombe. As we had in effect completed ITW in Edinburgh I dont think we did anything but square bashing,PT,route marches ,a swimming test and aptitude tests.

Also in Torquay at that time there were a lot of ex PACT guys--and perhaps some Direct Entry U/t,s. The ex UAS men were now mixed up--at Alta Vista we had both Edinburgh and Southampton people but I dont recall much contact with the others.

The UAS guys all got PNB category as a result of the aptitude tests. Recollection is that very very few of the PACT men got other than AG. I have since often wondered why they didnt riot!

December came and we were all sent on leave with instructions to return to Bridgenorth very soon after New Years Day.

Danny42C
30th Jul 2012, 23:18
As for the Jap defences, it was an article of faith among us that no AA gunner ever hit anything except by the purest chance, and you can't provide against that. What we couldn't understand was why the Jap never tried to intercept us - for as far as I know, he never did. But we had to live with the thought "there's always a first time" - it was at the back of our minds on every sortie. Every raw recruit must think of that first day:

"When the hugly bullets come a' peckin' up the dust,
And no beggar wants to face 'em, but every beggar must"............ (Kipling).

It was such an obvious thing for him to do. To start with, he had the aircraft, the Nakajima "Oscar", a small but very good fighter mounting 2 x .50 guns (later ones 2 x 20mm cannon). He didn't have many, but two would do. Of course Burma is a big place; there were no radar or any other early warning systems. The chances of running into each other were remote.

But our attacks on their Army positions were so regular that you'd think it worth their while to put up a standing patrol for a couple of hours a day over the area. They'd draw blank for a few days and then get lucky. It was a very real possibility. So what form of defence should we try?

We could forget about the dive. No one could touch us there. At the bottom, we would be scattered, low down, and going very fast. Our camouflage was excellent against the jungle. At worst, the Oscars might get one down there. Nothing could be done about that. Far and away their best bet would be to catch a box on the way to the target, and this is what we expected.

The danger was recognised, of course, and we were sometimes given an escort of two pairs of Hurricanes: one pair for top cover and the other sweeping a mile behind. It was a kind thought, but the Hurricane was so inferior to the Oscar in almost all respects apart from its ability to absorb punishment, that our escort would have had its work cut out defending itself, never mind us. This escort appeared only randomly, and we could never see any particular reason for it - perhaps when they had nothing more important to do.

The accepted tactic was that a formation should stand and fight. There were exhortatory posters. I recall: "STRAGGLERS DIE"......... "BIRDS OF A FEATHER, STICK TOGETHER"........... and "SHOULDER TO SHOULDER TO SHOULDER MEANS CONCENTRATED FIRE - STAY IN FORMATION AND THE JAP WILL SOON TIRE"........ (that raised a few eyebrows, the Jap didn't "do" tired).

These were heroic sentiments, fully in accordance with the declared view of our contemporary Admiral Tom Philips out there that: "a properly handled capital ship can always beat off air attack". Japanese torpedo bombers proved him wrong off the coast of Malaya. He went down in "Prince of Wales" (one of our newest battleships), and with him the old "Repulse" and some 1500 men. It was one of our worst naval disasters of the war, and sealed the fate of Singapore, Malaya and Burma.

It was decided that we would stay in formation and use the 12 rear guns in defence. We had done some "fighter affiliation" exercises with the Hurricanes during training, and tried a DIY version with a VV as "fighter" - a task which fell to me on account of my fighter OCU experience. This was not a good substitute, but better than nothing, I suppose. The main impression on me was the excellence of our camouflage - if I took my eye off the "box", it had simply disappeared.

I thought then, and think now, that the whole idea was absurd. The only result would be to give the Oscars a six-times bigger target for their guns. "He who fights and runs away"............would have made much more sense. We could have devised a "bomb burst" (like the Red Arrows), where we fanned-out, rolled over, dived and scooted for home individually. At worst the Oscars might get one instead of the lot, which would be the likely outcome if we all stayed together.

I would think that many people were secretly of the same opinion, but no one dared voice it. Were we not heirs to the glorious "Few"? Were we not supposed to "press on regardless"? It seemed dishonourable even to think of such a thing. But a dead hero is no use to himself and very little use to anyone else. ("Who hath honour"? asked old Sir John Falstaff "him that died o' Wednesday") In the event, there was never an interception (nor, I think, with the Aussies in New Guinea), so we'll never know what might have happened.

At this point, I must put it on record that our Vengeance operations must rank among the safest ones in all the War. They did not even carry the risks of the so-called "nursery ops" back home (these were attacks on relatively unimportant and poorly defended targets on which new Bomber Command crews might (if lucky) be sent to "cut their teeth" before the more serious work to come).

Nearly all our people flew all their sorties over a two-year period without a scratch. The Jap fighters never tried to intercept us and their AA was largely ineffective. Very few of our losses could be put down to them with any certainty. Almost all were due to flying accidents, as ever the result of carelessness, stupidity, weather or sheer bad luck.

Next time we'll go back to Danny's story.

Goodnight, all,

Danny42C



Look to your front !

Danny42C
30th Jul 2012, 23:33
DFCP,

Let me be the first to congratulate you on your entry to our noble company - there are three of us now, and that was quite enough for the Musketeers !

Now this Thread can really get into its stride again !

Cheers,

Danny.

Edit: What does PACT stand for ?......D.

Petet
31st Jul 2012, 09:33
DFCP

It is great to hear, what will hopefully be, one of many instalments relating to your journey through ACRC, ITW and trade school(s) towards the coveted brevet.

I am particularly interested in Torquay, as the flight engineer that I am researching went through ITW there (September 43); so would love to hear more about life there before you move off to Bridgenorth.

I have obtained a copy of the ITW training schedule and wondered if yourself, Taphappy, Danny or anyone else could tell us a few tales about some of the subject matter:

aircraft recognition
air reconnaissance
anti-gas
armament
engines
hygiene
instruments
law
physical training
meteorology
navigation
principles of flight
signals
Regards

Pete

DFCP
31st Jul 2012, 15:33
Good am Danny and Petet. I suspect the PACT Pre Air crew Training scheme was started when there was an aircrew shortage--unlike 1944.when there was a surfeit The idea was, I think,to give accelerated schooling to those who did not have a School Certificate.
Until a few years ago I had thought ALL the PACT guys with us got AG as a result of the "Aptitude" tests. However I met one of them---George Lovat-- who had been at Torquay with us and went on to pilot training and eventully a tour on Tempests in the ME.He then emigrated to Canada and owned a crop dusting operation in the Maritimes
I cant comment intelligently on the ITW course as practiced in EUAS.All I recall is that we had lessons in the HQ building which also served as a mess.All meals though were taken with the regular students in Cowan House
Anyway we arrived in Bridgenorth which seemed a deadful place in winter AND I suspect in summer.
Shortly after arrival we were advised that those interested in staying in the service could apply for an accelerated training course at Cranwell. I was interviewed but not accepted. My impression was that the ex Oxford and Cambridge UAS guys got preference--certainly none went from the EUAS contingent. A long time afterwards we heard that one of the lucky ones was on open arrest for stealing RAF petrol when his A/M father awarded him his "wings" at Cranwell . I believe the "accused" ended up a Group Captain but died after retirement from a fall improperly diagnosed by the NHS.
I dont recall anything but misery at Bnorth but we cant have been there long because my first flight at Grading School was on Jan 15/45 This seems strange as the next log book entry is Feb 5th
Grading School was for all of us who had not elected to skip this and become N,s. Several of us went to Abbots Bromley, a satellite of 16 EFTS Burnaston --still all ex UAS but not all the EUAS would be pilots were with me. Dual instruction on Tiger Moths for around 12 hours with the possibility of soloing, Towards the end of our time there we experienced our first accident. A Tiger with Sgt instructor and pupil on spinning training collided with a low flying Halifax. All were killed and I was among those who pulled out the dead Halifax rear gunner from T-OG which crashed almost on the airfield.
I soloed at AB after 10 hours and then we all went on to Heaton Park around mid March
Detachment to Woodhall Spa followed with 617 and 627 resident there.I got one flight in a Lanc and was located in the mid upper during a practice bomb run at Wellfleet. I got chastised by the S/Ldr/ Captain . He said I had swung the turret during his run in and this affected his aim[.
I dont recall doing anything constructive during my time there--no bomb loading or anything. At the time 617 was after what I think must have been the last of the German battle wagons. They were using 22,000 pounders and on one occasion at least landed back at Woodhall with the bombs on board because of weather conditions over the target.
From there we were given embarkment leave prior to returning to HP
Back at HP about 10 of the 23 EUAS guys were advised of their now U/T pilot category.As the story unfolded though I believe only 3 obtained their RAF Pilots brevets--though none in WW2! All I remember of HP was marking the --convoy number? on our kit bags and it was off to Liverpool.
By the standards of that time in aircrew training we were quick since the time between ending Grading School and setting sail for Canada was only about 6 weeks.
We were already under way on the Athlone Castle before VE day --May 8/45.The trip to Halifax was uneventful though the experience and smells made me glad I had not volunteered for the Navy!

Taphappy
31st Jul 2012, 15:44
DFCP

Welcome to the thread, it will be interesting to see how your training experiences compare with mine. Like Danny I am puzzled by the expression ex PACT men

BEagle
31st Jul 2012, 17:27
PACT = Pre Air Crew Training.

Danny42C
31st Jul 2012, 18:33
BEagle,

Thanks for enlightening Taphappy and me ! - now what was it, please ?

Danny.

====

Petet,

Can't help much, but think "Hygiene" in the Services usually meant one thing only; apart from that I had: "The Principles of Construction of The Deep Trench Latrine", which may come in handy one day - you never know.

Our Aldis lamp practice involved one group on the cliff top and the other on the beach. The sender sometimes wobbled about a bit, whereupon the receiver would signal back "FOCUS"; this invariably triggered the response "WHAT - ALL OF US ?" (We thought it funny at the time).

Our "armament" was a single Vickers G.O. gun; they couldn't spare us a Browning. Otherwise I would have known (so Wiki now tells me ) that the Browning is an "Open-bolt" gun, the block stops at the rear, so it has to have a REAR SEAR, which has to have a RETAINER, which seems to need a KEEPER, and there is a SPRING mixed up in it somewhere (Padhist - was it? - and I have remembered this useful information all our lives - much good has it done us).

Danny

====

Chugalug2
1st Aug 2012, 08:51
DFCP, a belated but very warm welcome to the thread. Wow, three stories running consecutively again, just like old times! You have scarcely started and yet the realities of wartime have already struck home. No survivors from a mid air collision 'twixt Tiger Moth and Halifax. A clearer illustration of the hazards of the very crowded skies of wartime UK and the urgent need to export the training schools abroad could not be bettered.
From a personal point of view I get the feeling that there was an urgency just to get on with it, not only because of the understandable impatience of young men who wanted to fly, but because of the perception that the end of the war was already in sight. A perception shared with the RAF perhaps, seeking a cadre of those "interested in staying in the Service". With almost everyone signed up "for the duration", was that a generally held view? Was there a fear that you might all have just missed the boat?
Yet you are about to embark for real and follow in the wake of Danny & Co, across those still seemingly very dangerous seas, for what we know now was not then known for sure. The fat lady was yet to rise and deliver her long awaited rendition... it was not yet over!

Taphappy
1st Aug 2012, 15:26
Chugalug2
I can't really add much to what I have already said about the Harwell Box, it may be that poor reception was simulated but to me honest so much is lost in the mists of time.
R/t in these days had a very limited range and when the weather closed in and the nav was in trouble the w/op could be instrumental in getting you home..
So far as those training overseas having any advantage over the UK, it is hard to tell.So far as I know none of the lads from my ITW intake who were sent to Canada around Dec44/Jan45 finished their courses as the Empire scheme gradually closed down.

DFCP
Comparing my experience with yours, it seems that between your arrival at ACRC and departure for trade training a period of 8 months elapsed, certainly much faster than the norm whereas between my arrival at ACRC and departure for trade training the period was 18 months
Was there perhaps a fast tracking scheme in operation for UAS bods?

DFCP
1st Aug 2012, 21:16
In reply to Chugalug----in my case I had always wanted to be a pilot and at this stage of training it was all fun with any operations way in the future. I think there was a similar attitude among the others in my group. though unlike me,at this stage,I dont tink many considered staying in after the war.
Taphappy--Certainly UAS people had preference---how else could one justify us ALL getting PNB while the PACT guys did not. This SUPPOSEDLY because that was how the aptitude tests came out.
OK we are now on the way to Halifax on the Athlone Castle--not I think in convoy because VE Day had just occurred. Yet I thoink we must have taken a southerly route as we saw flying fish.
As we disembarked there were ladies on hand to give us "goodies" and then it was on the train to Moncton.
As some of the EUAS u/t pilpots ended up in the US I,m not sure whether at this stage of the war they came thru Moncton or via a US camp in NJ.
My impression is that by say April 45 there was only one EFTS running in Canada---No 23 at Yorkton Sask and one SFTS in Calgary both under RCAF control. Similarly in the US most of the RAF traing schools had closed down. In fact I recall reading an account of one being closed about Feb 45 during the visit of an RAF 'wheel".
Moncton was not very inspiring . However I was surprised that despite the fact many thousands of trainees had passed through there I was still welcomed into a home there--as I recall the address was 260 and a 1/2 High Street.It was a long train ride to Yorkton --several days.
U/t Navs went to Summerside on Prince Edward Island or Rivers or Portage La Prarie in Manitoba near Winnipeg. R Burton went to Manitoba though at this stage I had no knowledge of him.
I am surprised to note that I first flew at Yorkton on July 1 so,while I have little recollection of Moncton I must have been there about 6 weeks.
So Course 139 began with a Fam Flight in a Fairchild Cornell. There were still a few RAF instructors on base but almost all my instruction was from an RCAF F/O--Art Sutcliffe.My guess is that there were about 40 u/t pilots on 139 divided into two flights --we alternated between morning and afternoon flying with ground school arranged the same way.There were other pilot Courses underway but I have no recollection of them. On 139 there were 3 or 4 of the EUAS people and I think the rest of the course were all UAS.We were paid at RCAF rates and the food was good!
It was the usual EFTS course, all on Cornells. I see I ended with a total course time of 88.45 hours---37.05 of which were solo.
All had gone well until VJ Day on August 15th--VJ Day. We were the only course that wasnt closed down immediately. We were allowed to graduate Aug 31. At the commemerative dinner we were called "The last of the Many'
Fear of failing the course was always present though I dont recall any c/t,s Maybe they were dispatched quickly back to Moncton. Between Aug 15 and 31 we had a strange fatal accident. On a solo flight a student just dived into the ground--rumours were rife---he had a Union Jack with him, he was unhappy that we werent going on to SFTS,--just in time for the Calgary Stampede---. he had an unhappy love affair . The truth?
We must have left Yorkton around Sept 1 with a travel warrant to Moncton and 3 weeks for transit./leave

Hipper
1st Aug 2012, 21:39
DFCP - 'At the time 617 was after what I think must have been the last of the German battle wagons.'

This clip from Pathe shows the raid on the Panzership Lutzow at Swinemunde, Poland (starts at 0.59). It's by 617 Squadron and dated 16th April 1945.

WINGED WAR - British Pathé (http://www.britishpathe.com/video/winged-war/)

A five-ton bomb achieved a near-miss and opened up 30 m of Lützow's side and she assumed a 56 degree list to starboard. Two 1.000 lb bombs which hit the forward and aft 28 cm magazines failed to explode. The ship was finished but one main turret was repaired and used against the Russians until the shells ran out. She was then scuttled and remained on the river until 1947 when the Russians managed to refloat the ship and towed it to Gdansk Bay where it was sunk.

Danny42C
1st Aug 2012, 22:02
DFCP

Your Post (#2822) seems to have "jumped the queue" - obviously because your Moderator's check delayed it, and then he's "slipped it back into the pack" at the original date/time of submission. Result: Taphappy's and my query about the "PACT" men looks as though it's been answered before it's been asked. All sorted out now!

Don't you dare correct your marvellous 'typo' (was it intentional ?): "deadful" (Bridgenorth). Haven't we all known "deadful" places in our RAF travels ? (I shall include this new word in my vocabulary forthwith!)

And congratulations on your First Solo. Now you are a full member of the Throttle Benders Union (life will never be the same again).

Keep it coming!

Danny.
=====

Chugalug,

As you say, the rundown had started in DFCP's time, but the War was by no means over in Europe and looked as if it could go on for ever out East - at the rate we were going then. As for the RAF looking for potential recruits post-war, they may have been putting out feelers at Oxbridge, but the lesser breeds would be firmly shown the door in '46.

Moderator permitting, I may get round later to my RAF experiences after I got back in '49, but once shared a room then with a (very nice) chap just out of Cranwell. He told me that the current thinking there was: "We'll do no good with this Air Force until we get rid of all these old wartime people".

Three of us now! Just like old times, as you say. (I hope we'll be able to keep up the old standard).

Danny.
=====

Taphappy,

You're right about the limited range of R/T in those days. Neither the TR9 we had in the Spitfire or the US set in the Vengeance were much good any further than you could see. We had to wait for VHF. All right for talking to the chaps in the same formation, but that was about all.

Conditions for flying training were vastly better in the New World even without a war. Life in a Tiger Moth with Halifaxes buzzing about (and vice versa) must have been hazardous in the extreme (to say nothing of the Barrage Balloons!)

I don't think the UAS people would be shown any favours per se. But if they had a fair amount of Tiger Moth time in, it would obviously count in their favour.

Danny.
=====

pzu
2nd Aug 2012, 00:51
Hipper et al

From the same source an interesting piece

SHEPHERD, THE PAINTER aka SHEPHERD PAINTINGS - British Pathé (http://www.britishpathe.com/video/shepherd-the-painter-aka-shepherd-paintings)

inc 'Q - Queen - 617's last Lancaster

PZULBA - Out ofAfrica (Retired)

Chugalug2
2nd Aug 2012, 09:08
For those, like me, unfamiliar with the size and nature of RAF Bridgnorth, an excellent site showing all aspects of it is here:
RAF Bridgnorth. 1,000 photographs and memories of RAF basic training at the No.7 School of Recruit Training Bridgnorth. (http://www.rafbridgnorth.org.uk/indexinner.html)
Unfortunately the bulk of the pictures seem to date from the immediate Post-War period. Nonetheless, the "deadful" nature of it is clear!

Danny, I can quite imagine the talk of getting rid of "all these old wartime people" in the shiny new silver jet age of post war Britain. As an ex Sleaford Tech Grad myself I can do no more than dissociate myself entirely from such talk. That period is marked in my mind as having some of the best Very Senior Officers leading the RAF that it has ever had. Every one, whether at Group, Command, or MOD, had served in WWII and had the gongs to prove it. They also had the humanity and sense of selfless duty that came with it. I remember the one armed (lost when attempting in vain to rescue aircrew from a burning aircraft crashed on take off from the RAF Station he commanded) RAF Inspector-General, Gus Walker. A more affable and loved VSO it is hard to imagine.

DFCP
2nd Aug 2012, 15:36
Thanks Hipper though I cant quite match the detail.
I,m sure 617 was carrying and returning with their Grand Slams, evident because of the removal of the bomb bay doors.
April 15th 1945----As I had embarkation leave and some time at HP before boarding the Athlone Castle some days before VE DAY --May 8th I would have guessed what I witnessed was before April 15th.
That said there wasnt much German naval might left to bomb by that time!
So perhaps my time recollections are off and maybe another squadron was also involved with smaller bombs and 617 never did drop their bigger bombs

Icare9
2nd Aug 2012, 16:02
DFCP: If it helps at all, I believe the date of that crash at Yorkton was 17th August. No need to go into who etc, just another wartime crash...

I have located a serial for the Halifax as NA317 giving similar details as you, perhaps same source, but Squadron OCTU/HCU lettering just doesn't seem right.

I'm afraid there were simply too many RAF casualties (let alone the Allies) in the first two weeks of March 1945 to locate a Halifax crew and two u/t casualties. Nothing came up on Abbots Bromley as a crash location. (Not that I'm querying the veracity) just tracing who it might have been.

Great to have you here, please continue!

DFCP
2nd Aug 2012, 16:08
Danny 42c
While I might like to have a claim to fame over "word invention", "deadful" was a typo.
The RAF,s preference for UAS types for the post war officer ranks reminded me of a story of Royal Navy officer types
RNR were sailors pretending to be gentlemen.
RNVR were gentlemen pretending to be sailors and
RN were neither pretending to be both.
As you will learn later in my story, post war it seemed to me that, in the RAF, interest or competence in flying seemed to be secondary to the ability to having "officer like qualities"

DFCP
2nd Aug 2012, 16:22
Icare9
Thank you--yes Aug 17th --two days after VJ Day sounds right.
T-OG and NA317 for the Halifax are engraved in my memory even after 60+ years. The Halifax was from a Transport Command Conversion Unit ?in Shropshire. I did have more information on the crew and actual airfield at one time.
The Halifax wreckage was so close to the AB airfield perimeter that we easily walked/ran over to the blazing remains

papajuliet
2nd Aug 2012, 16:38
The book Staffordshire airfields in the Second World War says.......on 9th March 1945, Tiger Moth DE473 was returning from a low flying exercise and on it's landing approach, when Halifax VII of 1665 HCU at Tilstock collided with it. Both aircraft came down north of Redmore Wood, north of Abbot's Bromley village.[ Redmore, in fact, should be Radmore]

DFCP
2nd Aug 2012, 16:50
Danny I would guess your ex Cranwell guy in 49 would have been on a later course than those who were selected for accelerated training in early 45. I think the only name I recall from that bunch was Omerod from I think Manchester
I have often wondered how those guys prospered but there doesnt seem to be a Cranwell course nominal roll available.
In the case of the 23 of us who were in EUAS, we have been able to trace the destinies of most, but the search for Davidson,Jackson, Maybe and,McClaclan has been unsuccessful---all were 18ish and u/t PNB in Jan 1945 Some may have now joined the 10 known RIP. We would be interested in any info on the "missing"

papajuliet
2nd Aug 2012, 19:04
Further to my last message,Colin Cummings' book "Though without Anger" shows the Halifax as NA317 - it was flying at low level across the airfield in conditions of haze and low sun when it collided with the Tiger Moth. The names of crew members, of both aircraft, are listed.

ACW418
2nd Aug 2012, 21:04
Gus Walker was the Station Commander of RAF Syerston (where I did my BFTS on JP3's and JP4's) and saw a taxying Lancaster on fire bombed up with a 4,000lb bomb and a lot of incendiaries. He went straight to the aircraft and tried to remove the incendiaries to prevent the 4,000 lb bomb exploding. He was unsuccessful and lost his right arm in the explosion.

The sort of leadership we rarely see today. I met him while at Syerston and he was a nice bloke who could chat to Acting Pilot Officers even though he was an Air Marshall.

ACW

Taphappy
2nd Aug 2012, 22:06
So on to the next part of the course, ground instruction continued but at last we were getting airborne.The first few flights were made in a DH Dominie which was the RAF version of the civilian DH Rapide, a twin engined job. The passenger cabin was fitted out with 4 or 5 TR1154/55s and conveyed a W/op instructer and 4 or 5 pupils.The instructor was Polish with a limited knowledge of English. His basic word was "Transmeet Transmeet" as he helped us make our first radio contacts from the air.The duration of these flights was usuallt 1 to 2 hours and I found them to be quite turbulent which made me feel decidely queasy.
After the Dominie flights we graduated to the Percival Proctor a single engined aircraft where the W/op sat up front beside the pilot but at a lower level practically sitting on the floor.The pilot did not have etc a great view when taxying so the W/op had to hang out the cockpit door and enter into his log " Starboard watch kept".
The Proctor flights lasted from 1 to 2 hours and during this time we practised contacting various ground stations to obtain QDMs,QTEs etc as well as listening out for group broadcasts which were transmitted at regular intervals and woe betide you if you missed one of these.
The trailing aerial had to be wound out during these flights snd you had to remember to wind it in again before landing or run the risk of paying for it if you failed to do so. After each flight you had to submit your log for examination and hope you would not be called to account or have to explain any of your actions.
By the end of May 46 having completed the requisite ground instruction,reached a speed of 20 to 22 wpm in morse and carried out the flying exercises successfully I had qualified for the "S" flying brevet and with it Sergeants stripes around 3 years after first volunteering.
These were duly presented at the passing out parade and meant an increase in pay to 9 shillings per day, Not a big deal when you consider I was receiving 7/6 per day as an AC2.
Now it was a case of waiting to see what will happen next.

Danny42C
2nd Aug 2012, 22:18
Chugalug,

Although I was never at Bridgnorth, the sight of those dismal wooden huts is still depressing - most of all that tall stove pipe, and the thought of the standard cylindrical coal stove below, which usually emitted more smoke than heat ! It only warmed the lucky ones down that end of the hut (where, by a strange coincidence, the Corporal's Room was normally to be found).

I agree - "there were Giants in those days". My first Air Traffic posting was to Strubby in 1955; it was the flying satellite of Manby, then the Empire Flying College whose Commandant was Air Commodore "Gus" Walker. My wife and I were introduced to him at the Autumn Ball that year, it struck me then that there was "no side" to the man at all - he treated all ranks with equal courtesy.

I think at that time that the College had a Hunter F6, but no T7: "Gus" could not be dissuaded from having his prosthesis modified to grip the Hunter stick, and to fly it without any dual. He got airborne, his Staff, CFI , Instructors and everybody else on the Station held their breath and gnawed their fingernails until he got down. They don't make 'em like that any more! (another of the same ilk was AM "Batchy" Atcherley).

Danny,
====


DFCP,

I must admit, the way the selection worked out, it does seem that the UAS people went to the head of the queue on that basis alone. How much "extra schooling" did the PACT men actually get? You really need Maths and Physics to School Cert. level to absorb Navigation, Aeronautics and Meteorology at ITW, which is why it was a requirement for Pilot/Observer training in the earlier years of the war.

It was a big jump from Elementary School (which is what we had in those days) to Grammar School level, and I doubt the ability of the RAF to bridge the gap in a few weeks. The subsequent "aptitude test" would simply reflect this. These people had no chance (of PNB) from the beginning.

Two questions I must ask: what did you think of the "Cornell"? As I remember, it was a monoplane rather like our Miles "Messenger" (EDIT: "Magister", of course!) - did it have any winter protection?, like that which their Tlger Moths enjoyed.

And did they really pay you at RCAF rates ? The tale I heard in the UK was that the RCAF was paid better than the USAAC, but the latter attracted all the envy for being "overpaid". How did it compare with the RAF rate for an LAC (which I assume would be what you were at that stage).

This is excellent stuff - keep it coming !,

Danny,
====

Taphappy,

So you're off in the Wide Blue Yonder now, and with luck will never look back. The first, soul-destroying part of training is over, the brevet is up, congratulations! 9/- a day does sound a bit measly, but (let's face it) the three stripes on your arm still meant something. You lived in equal comfort, and probably ate better in the Sgts' Mess than in the Officers', and it only cost you sixpence a day or thereabouts. Count your blessings !

By May '46 the war was well and truly over and people were being chucked out left, right and centre. Were you still on the RAFVR engagement you'd enlisted on (which was hostilities-only), or did they try to switch you to a regular RAF term?

It gets better by the day. Keep up the good work,

Danny,
====

Petet
2nd Aug 2012, 22:20
Thanks for another interesting account of your life; I have just seen some pictures of W/OP training in a Dominie ... the sick bags must be hidden from view!

As you mentioned pay, one thing I have not been able to get to the bottom of in my research is the use of "The Airman’s Service and Pay Book" (Form 64 Parts I and II)

I have seen examples of duly completed Pay Books (Form 64 Part II) from the period but can't find out how it was used. It does not appear to have been used at Pay Parades ... have you any recollections on the subject?

Regards

Pete

Chugalug2
3rd Aug 2012, 11:17
ACW418, thank you for correcting my somewhat blurred recollection of Gus Walker's heroism at Syerston. Did any of the crew survive then? Was his action acknowledged in any way?

Danny, thank you for your recollection as well. I never had the honour of speaking to ACM Sir Gus Walker, but his reputation for affability and openness only served to compound the surprise felt when told of his alleged behaviour at top table at an RAFC Guest Night that I attended whilst there (I was very much at a bottom table!). The guest of honour was a serving Luftwaffe General, who had been a high ranking officer in its wartime predecessor. Gus was said to have pretty well ignored him all night, despite sitting right next to him. As to who the General was, I do not recall, so I have no idea what role he might have played, but obviously there were some very strong feelings and memories awoken that evening.

Ah yes, "Stoves Coke, Huts Heating for the use of". The South Brick Lines, where the new boys began their perilous and uncertain journey towards possible graduation three years hence from the College across the road, dated back to the RN days of HMS Daedalus but have since been flattened by the usual RAF policy towards any such heritage, be it its own or others.
Being, as their name suggests, of brick construction they were better insulated than their wooden counterparts. Nevertheless, the cold winter easterlies soon made themselves felt unless you had the stove drawing like a veritable blast furnace. Once the chimney pipe was glowing a nice cherry red you were as comfy as could be, subject of course to the possibility of another hut's occupants carrying out a retaliatory raid (never justified of course). That would often involve them climbing up onto the snow covered roof with a bucket of water which they would then endeavour to pour down the chimney. Comfy would change promptly to steam, smoke, and a smell that required immediate evacuation and an attempt to apprehend the fleeing perpetrators of said outrage.

Taphappy, a Dominie with five 1154/55s, five students, an instructor, and a pilot? It must have rivalled the Guinness record for telephone kiosks. And you say it actually flew with such a load? What a tribute to Sir Geoffrey and his team. Presumably you didn't all transmit at the same time but had to wait your turn?
As to the Proctor, did KRs allow of a "Starboard Watch" allowance? I only ask as my first set included the conditions for Hard Lying allowance payment when required to man a Flying Boat all night, taxying it into wind for fear of dragging anchors, or such like. That was until the amendment removing all such references was issued (long after the last Sunderland had gone to the great slipway in the sky!).

Petet
3rd Aug 2012, 12:46
Chugalug

Thought I would show a picture of the Dominie "telephone kiosk" that you mentioned (Original Source: Not known).

http://50and61squadronassociation.sharepoint.com/siteimages/4%20training.jpg

aw ditor
3rd Aug 2012, 13:53
Chug2

The weapon of choice (down the chimney of the Junior Entries hut stoves) for the Senior 6* Entry was a Lino' polish bomb tin' which exploded as it got to the bottom of its "travel" blowing open the doors of the stove. They eventually desisted after we used dustbin lids to knock them off the roof!

AD, with apologies for Thread creep

Danny42C
3rd Aug 2012, 16:18
Chugalug,

Gus's deed of heroism took place in December '42, when I was out of the country, but I always believed he got a George Medal for it. Checking on Wiki, I find that it was not so, although he certainly deserved it, and it was awarded to other RAF personnel for very similar actions during the war. I don't know how many (if any) of the crew survived, but I believe a HE bomb
blew up, so it would be unlikely.

Dominie story: I was the ATC in the tower at Shawbury one summer Sunday afternoon (it was then still a Master Airfield, the School instructors also worked the Tower). Must have been '64/'67. A Dominie in the area called "Pan". It had been bringing back the RAF parachute display team (Red Devils?) from a show.

They'd lost an engine, the thing couldn't maintain height on one, the pilot invited his passengers to do the decent thing and lighten ship. They were quite happy to oblige; seven (or nine?) floated down over Shropshire; the Dominie landed safely at Shawbury. A harassed S.D.O. spent the rest of the evening laying on transport to try to round up the castaways from the various taverns in which they had taken refuge.

Danny.

Danny42C
3rd Aug 2012, 16:57
On 24th February '44, Stew Mobsby and I took off on our 53rd sortie, flying No. 3 to BBB. We were going some way down south (Donbaik?), and the formation was climbing more slowly than usual, as we had plenty of time to get up to our bombing height. I think we took off from Ramu II, but cannot be sure - there were so many places, we were moving all the time and they all looked the same.

So quite soon after taking off we passed over the battle area (the Second Arakan campaign was reaching its climax) fairly low. Johnny Jap would take a pot at us, of course, but then he had a go every time we came back from a sortie and did no serious damage, although it was not unusual for aircraft to land back with small arms hits. On this occasion, I felt and heard nothing out of the ordinary, and neither did Stew. Twenty minutes into the climb, I had a look round the instruments. Oil pressure was zero.

Engines don't run long without oil, and I didn't fancy life as a Japanese prisoner. I signalled BBB (drew my hand across my throat, and pointed to the engine!), and started back. I warned Stew to be ready to bale out, we were at 3,000 ft and could easily manage it. The next few minutes were nail-biting, but then we were back over friendly territory again.

I was thankful, but starting to have doubts. The engine was still running smoothly. What was more, neither oil nor cylinder head temperatures were rising. I began to think that all I had was a dud oil gauge. With every mile my suspicion grew. By the time base was in sight (there was nowhere closer to land), I'd convinced myself. My screen was clear of oil, so the prop can't be throwing it out. Stew said we weren't making smoke, so we can't be burning it through the engine. The two temperature needles hadn't shifted. It had to be the oil pressure gauge, and I felt a bit of a fool.

Even so, I might have put it down off a straight-in approach, but these were awkward and difficult in a Vengeance because of the very poor forward view at low speeds. So we normally flew circuits. As there seemed to be no hurry, I did so now. Bad mistake! Downwind, I dropped the wheels and started my checks. The engine seized.

It had shown no sign of distress. Now there was just dead silence and a stationary propeller blade staring at me. The Vengeance was a poor flying machine and no glider at all. It went down like a sash weight. It was doing just that from a thousand feet - too low to bale out and no time even to think of dumping bombs. I took a last look at the runway, but it would have been suicide to try to get in from where we were with no power.

Nothing for it but crash-land straight ahead. I yelled "Brace" at Stew, lifted the wheels and cut the main switch, to stop the fuel pumps and avoid sparks. I can only remember thinking "I must keep 150 on the clock to have any hope of rounding-out at the bottom". Then my mind goes blank.

A mile or so away was an RAF Repair and Salvage Unit. I would think that most of its trade was in salvage. They did not have to go far to collect mine. As far as they could see, I was making for their clearing, but sank into trees before I got there. I must have rounded-out all right, for the aircraft survived touchdown to go skidding through the jungle. They told me that the tail unit came off first, then trees removed both wings. So far things may have been tolerable inside, if a bit bumpy, for we were having a ride in a sort of high-speed tank. Then the engine broke out.

Deprived of its battering-ram, the relatively light remaining structure hit something hard, broke apart just aft of the gunner's cockpit, and stopped abruptly in the shape of an inverted "V". The front fuselage and cockpits remained intact, the bombs stayed good as gold and the fuel did not go up. Thank Heaven for the brick-built Vengeance! (anything else would have disintegrated and killed us!)

More of the story next time,

'Night all,

Danny42C


These little things are sent to try us!

Fareastdriver
3rd Aug 2012, 17:40
Caught out by the old piston engine 'gotcha'. Oil pump fails, oil stops moving so the oil at the temperature bulb stays at the same figure. I have known two similar occasions. Both thought the pressure guage was U/S bit luckily both were in the circuit.

DFCP
3rd Aug 2012, 19:49
DANNY 42C--I think the PACT course was 3 or 6 months.I had never really thought that education level would have had relevance in the Aptitude Tests. Unfortunately I dont have Taphappys memory but I think many of the tests were to check dexterity and mental alertness---maybe a test with flashing lights where you had to extinguish them in a certain order---or a series of shapes that you had to insert in the correct hole
The Cornell was not unlike a Magister with an enclosed cockpit, around 100mph cruise with a Ranger engine---easy to fly but perhaps not as good a training vehicle as the Tiger M.
As we were only at Yorkton during the summer the enclosed cabin was of no import.
The Saskatchewan landscape was generally flat with excellent visibility. Our cross countries were perhaps 40 miles a leg with grain elevators--marked with the towns name ,or towns themselves, as turning points. I had relatives in a town called Kamsack---perhaps 40 miles away--not in our flying area but I never even visited them by road.
So my first and only visit to Kamsack was during a Yorkton reunion {1995?} It was more a"drive around" than a visit In mid morning there were drunks lying around ---alcohol is I believe a problem with the Inuits, my relatives had long since died. What was surprising was the number of empty and derelict "villages "and churches in the area.The "villages" had only been a small cluster of wooden houses.maybe a store and an ornate church which tied in with my impression that the area had been populated way back by Russian /Ukranian immigrants.I think that the mechanisation of the now huge grain farms, the decreased need for labour and automobiles led to Yorktons expansion and the villages extinction.
I will check with "survivors" to see if indeed we received RCAF pay rates!

Taphappy
3rd Aug 2012, 20:39
Petet
Thanks for the sight of the Dominie, it certainly brings back memories. Unfortunately the RAF did supply sick bags, if you were sick all over the aircraft you cleaned it up.
The only thing I remember about pay parades was the crowd of bods and the SWO shouting "all the A's" at which point those with a surname beginning with A would move forward then the B's and so on. There were the usual ribald comments when all the B's and C's were called.So far as the Pay Book is concerned I haven't a clue what if any entries were made in it.
Danny42C
Yes I should have been grateful for small mercies,gaining admission to and enjoying the delights of the Sergeants Mess.
It also seemed strange that we were allowed to finish our course in 46 when as you say experienced aircrew were being shown the door left right and cenre.
I was still on my original RAFVR engagement and don't any pressure being brought to change that.
Chugalug2
Pity that KRs did not account of "Starboard watch kept". The Domimie did manage to stay airborne with that load but it must be remembered that we were all lightweights in these days, not an ounce of fat!!!

Hipper
3rd Aug 2012, 21:06
At Duxford there is a flying DH Rapide which takes passengers up for price:

http://www.classic-wings.co.uk/res_website.asp?supplierCode=CLA100&page=dragon_rapide

They also fly a Tiger Moth there.

Danny42C
3rd Aug 2012, 22:56
Fareastdriver,

Thanks for the possible explanation! Amazingly, no one at the time, or in the years since, has ever offered that as a cause for the failure of the Oil Temperature Gauge to react (the more I think about it, the more probable, I would say).

Danny.
=====


DFCP (and Taphappy),

Knowing nothing about it, I'm in way over my head in the matter of the PACT Courses. There was no such thing in my day; acceptance (provided you had School Cert) seemed to rest on the whim of the Selection Board after a ten-minute interview.

I never realised that the PACT Courses lasted as long as 3-6 months, and were, as you say, "to give accelerated schooling to those who did not have School Cert". You can do a lot in that time with motivated students.

As for "Aptitude Tests", I am wholly sceptical. To my simple mind, there is only one way to find out who is suitable for a pilot and who not - put 'em in an aircraft and see!

Now on the "Officers and Gentlemen" aspect, I'm with you all the way. It was certainly a factor in the selection for commissioing at our "wings" stage in the US. I make no argument for or against it, it just is so. It has always been so. It may well have played a major part in the selections in your cases.

Danny.
=====

DFCP
4th Aug 2012, 16:38
TAPHAPPY--On Pay Parades I think we also had to shout out our last three--eg "756"!to receive our stipend.
DANNY---I am sure all of us in the EUAS Short Course had at least the SC and some of us HSC. We really need some ex PACT fellow to give us accurate info on their course.
As my story rolls on there will be more evidence of the officers and gentlemen aspect of RAF life. Am I not correct in thinking that as the war progressed both the USAAC and the RCAF commissioned a much greater %age of aircrew than the RAF?.
But I digress ---In Sept 45 I must have taken the train from YorktonToronto and then made my way to the US border at either Niagara Falls or Buffalo. I was in uniform and my RAF identification was adequate to get me into the US. Times have changed since 9/11 with a passport now being mandatory!Until then a drivers licence was adequate from Canada.
So I hitchhiked --with Larry Martin from Cornwall----to NYC and then up the coast via Boston to Moncton.
After maybe a few weeks in Moncton it was back to Halifax and the UK via the Ile De France.Disembarkation leave and on to Bircham Newton/ Docking.
Welcome to thousands of U/T aircrew coming back from overseas---discipline was lax/non existent and I understand that at ths stage Burton would disappear to London for days to further his stage career. I do remember an aerobatic display there by a DH Hornet---to boost morale?
Eventually several things happened. Those who said they would "sign on" were promised further aircrew training, the rest went in dribs and drabs to Eastchurch---another deadful place--- for remustering.
It was not clear but it appears the signing on "ceremony" was only at brevet time. One of our group tells me that at Bishops Cpurt those who declined to sign on were not given their N brevet.Yet a P who got his wings and commission in Norfolk declined to sign on unless they gave him a better idea of his career path. He spent the rest of his time in ATC until demob in Dec 47.Of those we have traced ,one signed on and became an N on Brigands in Ceylon, another N was invalided out before graduation. One P I have mentioned above and another P went on to Lancasters and Neptunes . He--IWF Terry--- was killed later when Captain of the Vanguard that crashed in Switzerland
I gather demobilisation was MUCH quicker in Canada and the US. Group 63 must have been given to those who went ACRC in October 44. There was also a system known as a Class B early release which could be obtained if you first got accepted by a University.
Now, I am not sure why I didnt take either path but instead was remustered to Clerk-- Personnel Selection. Biggin Hill was the locale for the course and I was made a Corporal.
Clerks PS gave paper and pencil tests to anyone leaving the service who wanted career guidance.We just administered the tests , an officer gave the advice.
Cpl Gerry Stroud and I roamed around the country from a base near Cranwell and this freedom was almost our undoing. We had a batch of travel warrants which we filled in ourselves. Somehow the SWO who was in any case irate at our freedom found out there were anomalies in this warrant area . Actually we had been using them to go home on weekends but had the good sense to always make them out to a destination beyond our homes. "Just breaking our journey" was how we left our home rail station. So when we were put on a charge for --perhaps--misuse of travel warrants --we would not have done ourselves any good by producing the used warrants. The night before we were due to appear on a charge we devised a solution.
We burned all the warrants except for the serial number area. At the hearing we just pleaded that as we panicked and started to burn the warrants we realised we would need them for evidence. The misuse case collapsed and we got minor punishment for something like "destroying Crown property"
And so it went until demob in Dec 47 from RAF??? in Lancashire----at this stage -no brevet--- but I did get an ill fitting suit! But the story isnt over.

Petet
4th Aug 2012, 18:01
PACT CENTRES

My understanding is that the PACT Centres offered six month courses to those failing their education test at ACRC. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find the course syllabus.

APTITUDE TESTS

I found an interesting article about the development of the aircrew aptitude test whilst researching the subject a few months ago. For those interested, the link is:

http://ftp.rta.nato.int/public//PubFulltext/RTO/MP/RTO-MP-055///MP-055-25.pdf (http://ftp.rta.nato.int/public/PubFulltext/RTO/MP/RTO-MP-055/MP-055-25.pdf)

Danny42C
4th Aug 2012, 18:28
DFCP,

All the USAAC Pilot and (I think) Navigator and Bombardier "Aviation Cadets" were commissioned as 2nd Lieutenants at the end of their six-month Course. The other aircrew trades were mostly "Enlisted Men" (all Sergeants ?), but there were some Officers among them.

As to the RCAF, I am not so sure (there were RCAF Sergeant-Pilots and Observers), but my impression was that the % who were commissioned at "Wings" point was much higher than the RAF's 20-25%. The same appeared to me to be true of the RAAF and RNZAF.

Out in India, VJ day made considerable numbers of NCO aircrew of all trades surplus to requirements; the RAF continued to pay them in accordance with their rank, but employed them as MT Drivers, Clerks and Storemen, etc, until their "Demob Number" came up and they could be returned to the UK. Other ranks were likewise "kicking their heels" in large numbers, discipline suffered and the well publicised "mutinies" occurred, mainly in the northern cities . I believe this "misemployment" went on in the UK, too.

As for demob in the UK, could your place have been Padgate? - that rings some sort of bell with me. And the "Vanguard" - would that be the one whose loss was due to pressure bulkhead corrosion from toilet effluent leakage?

You and your pal seemed to have had a commendable degree of initiative in making the best of service life - and your instinct to "destroy the evidence" was very sound. It has saved many far more guilty than you!

You're quite right about the "last three" on Pay Parade. Whatever else you forget in life, you'll never forget them!

Cheers,

Danny.
====

Petet,

The Link sounds interesting. Will have a look (don't think it will alter my opinion).

Thanks,

Danny.
====

Taphappy
4th Aug 2012, 21:21
DFCP
About the time I completed the W/ops course, a new word "redundant" entered the vocabulary and allied to that was the dread word, Eastchurch which was were you were posted to if you were unfortunate enough to suffer that fate.
When I see your dates of entry to ACRC Oct 44 and demob Dec.47 compared with mine of ACRC May 44 and demob Jan 48.(Should have been but more of that later) it has jogged my memory and I think that I must have agreed to extend my service by six months. How could I forget something like that!!. Perhaps that is why I was allowed to qualify. I look forward to the rest of your story.

Chugalug2
5th Aug 2012, 06:45
Petet, thank you for the excellent pic of the interior of a fully manned W/Op flying classroom equipped Dominie. I had clearly got hold of the wrong end of the stick, for it appears (tho' Taphappy will correct me no doubt) that there is but one T1154 at the front LHS, and a corresponding R1155 on the right (or are there two such crates, one set behind the other?). Presumably the students shuffled forward when it was their turn on either one. That makes more sense when one considers weight, space, power demands, and instructor monitoring (BTW where did he sit I wonder?). Still looks very cosy though, doesn't it?

DFCP, glad to see that you made the most of your opportunities to see the world, both in N.America and the UK! Mis-employing aircrew, expecting to be fully trained in highly skilled but dangerous roles, in mind numbing clerical duties was obviously a recipe for disaster. Danny reminds us of the infamous FE RAF mutinies, though I suspect that the main driving force there was that their Theatre was right at the back of the demob queue. Unless you were for staying on, then the sooner you were demobbed the sooner you could get your civilian life back again and that all important job. There must have been a real fear that the tail enders would find only the scraps left. The whole business must have had the air of an anti-climax about it. The world was suddenly a safer but much more mundane place to live in!

As regards officer/aircrew selection, I seem to recall being told that the oil drums/ planks/ lengths of rope/ and crocodile infested grass that set the scene for so many of us that came through later were all thanks to the Luftwaffe. Can anyone else confirm or deny that? Presumably it was all part of the booty (that included the RAFSA boat Sperling) seized at the end of the war. By that I mean the concept of testing team leadership, not the oil drums, planks, and lengths of rope!

DFCP
5th Aug 2012, 12:57
Petet---I assume PACT courses were instituted when there was still perceived to be a shortage of aircrew.
This was not of course the case in 44 and maybe I read that when Churchill found out about the surplus there was a sharp reduction instituted in the training pipeline.Evidence of this was the closing of some of the US and Canadian schools even before VE Day
While I dont think I have seen it mentioned much in this thread wasnt Harrogate full of trained pilots in 44 and on?

Petet
5th Aug 2012, 13:48
DFCP, the first 4 PACT Centres were opened in March 1943 as the Air Crew Training Wing, based in Brighton, could not cope with the number of recruits failing their educational test. By September of that year there were 21 centres.

As you say, the whole system was grinding to a halt in 1944 due to the surplus of men. The PACT centres began to close down in August 1944 as the intake figures (and therefore the number of men failing their educational test) dropped off; the last 2 closed in February 1945.
[Source: "Observers and Navigators" C G Jefford]

On the subject of the 1944 surplus (which was due to the success of the training programme [3,000 PNB's per month] and changes in policy / technology) the book suggests that "holding" reduced costs as it was far cheaper to have a half trained aircrafthand than a fully trained aircrew sergeant .... hence the frustrations for those enlisting post 1943.

blind pew
5th Aug 2012, 15:24
Vanguard - no the corrosion crash was at ghent in November 71 - the week I joined BEA - and was the first of eight hull loses the group had in my six years with them.
The corrosion had been known about for two years prior to the pressure dome rupturing - and deemed insignificant.
The Swiss crash was eighteen months later and the result of navigation error.
I seem to remember that the French national grid used the same frequency as one of the ADFs.
As usual fantastic thread guys - thank you.

radar101
5th Aug 2012, 16:52
ACW418 said

Gus Walker was the Station Commander of RAF Syerston (where I did my BFTS on JP3's and JP4's) and saw a taxying Lancaster on fire bombed up with a 4,000lb bomb and a lot of incendiaries. He went straight to the aircraft and tried to remove the incendiaries to prevent the 4,000 lb bomb exploding. He was unsuccessful and lost his right arm in the explosion.




In Enemy Coast Ahead Guy Gibson (who was OC 106 there at the time) recounts that as he was being stretchered away he asked Gibson to do 2 things:

1. Try and find his arm as it had a brand new glove on ...
2. Ask Bomber Harris if he would accept a one-armed Station Commander in a couple of months.

Somewhere on the net there is a 1950s film clip of the first Vulcan to visit the USA - with Gus at the controls. Imagine the Yanks' expressions when after landing, a one-armed pilot climbs out!! The film is interesting in that his missing arm is skillfully masked by a casually draped windcheater.

Danny42C
5th Aug 2012, 18:34
Chugalug,

It's true that the whole Demobilisation process was a bit of a shambles, but it could not have been otherwise, as we were "bounced" into it by the sudden end of the Far East War, which no one could possibly have foreseen. The general idea was that all hostilities-only men were allotted a "Demob Number", This was calculated by a very complicated system of "points" - rather like the "ladder" to gain a Council House.

You got so many for age, so many for length of sevice, so many for being married, so many for children, so many for length of overseas service, so many for.........(well, use your imagination, if you can think of anything else, then that probably went into the pot, too).

Based on this, the chap with the most points got Demob Number 1, and it went on from there. It was Civil Service clerk's dream, for it was all pen-and-paper work (thank goodness, we didn't have computers - the results might have been quite horrendous). Ideally No.1 got out first, the rest followed in orderly sequence. But we ain't in an ideal world.

All sorts of snags cropped up, No. 265 might get out three months before 242, because 242 was stuck in Bombay and we were short of shipping. The Services wanted to keep key people - at least for a while - and negotiated exemptions. Some people wanted to delay 'demob' (Service life, at which they had grumbled so long and so hard, suddenly seemed not too bad after all, and the sunshine was nice).

The opportunities for cock-ups were legion, and we got them in full measure. This resulted in all kinds of gross unfairnesses; this, coupled with things like misemployment, loss of acting ranks and status and (worse) no employment at all in vast Holding Camps, produced an explosive brew. No doubt Wiki gives a reasonably accurate view of subsequent events in an India already seething with nationalistic ferment. "Jai Hind", indeed ! Most people were trying to get out !

As for this oil drum and plank routine, I was lucky - my Commission came up "with the rations", or rather with my Sqdn. C.O.'s chagrin at having Dominion High Commissioners planting Pilot Officers on him willy-nilly. (Some folk get all the luck!). The "Sperling" must have been nice (and Hitler's "Strength through Joy" place at Winterberg was useful), but you can keep all this boy-scout caper for my money - if it was their idea. (We were nearly as bad, do you remember the "Beer and Skittles" letter and the gefuffle which followed?).

Danny,
=====


Petet and DFCP,

Thanks for the full account of the PACT Courses - it's all clear now. I think the Arnold Scheme and the BFTS Schools in the USA called a halt in mid-'43, but would have to hunt for my sources. Harrogate was bung-full of trained and half-trained aircrew all through the war, I think - all squeezed into the Majestic Hotel !

Danny.
=====

DFCP
5th Aug 2012, 19:09
Petet---Thank you very much for the link to the history of Aptitude Testing in the RAF.
In 44 these were in their infancy when compared to the current battery--I also note that on P24 there is an article by another S/Ldr about assessing OFFICER LIKE QUALITIES! I,m not sure he includes "competence to do the task" in his treatise but I guess we have come a long way from the WW1 canard--"Forward men, I,m right behind you"

DFCP
5th Aug 2012, 19:18
Blind Pew---I had the Invicta Vanguard crash report and as I recall there was some faulty soldering in one of the nav aids and there was some question on the Co Pilots qualifications/competence.
They ran into a mountain on their approach. It was a Christmas shopping expedition out of Lulsgate with most or all on board being from Wells/Cheddar

Danny42C
5th Aug 2012, 20:06
We'd had a lifetime's entitlement of luck in the last few seconds, but were in no position to appreciate it, both knocked out in the crash. My luck had stretched even further. I'd been wearing my "Ray-Bans" under my helmet, with my goggles pushed up on my head. When we hit the final obstacle, the cable retaining my shoulder harness snapped and I went face first into the instrument panel.*

By rights, the glass lenses should have shattered into my eyes and blinded me. But, as far as we could make out, the goggles had taken the first impact, in the next millisecond the lenses must have jerked out of the frame and away from my eyes. The frame buckled, scooped the bridge off my nose and ploughed into my forehead and left cheek. And that was the extent of my injuries !

* (The P-40 recently found in the Saraha has the "Needle&Ball" glass smashed. It's dead centre of the panel: it's the only broken instrument glass - cf 682al's pic on #2709 p. 136 - every picture tells a story.
Stew had been facing forward, braced head down on his navigation table. He broke a bone in his left wrist and got a bang on the nose, leaving him with an odd disability - he couldn't smell! This was no great loss out there and he got scant sympathy on that account, but it earned him a nice lttle lump sum from the War Pensions people later.

The RSU people ran over to pull us out; watchers at the base had seen us go down and sent the ambulance. I came to briefly as they were loading me on a stretcher, and remember the hot sun on my face. I couldn't see as my eyes were full of drying blood. "How's Stew?" - "He's all right". I looked a lot worse than I actually was, and that had an amusing sequel.

I came to fully in a Mobile Field Hospital at Cox's Bazar. They'd had mostly malaria and dysentery cases, and were quite chuffed at getting two proper "battle" casualties. Stew got a big cast on his arm and his nose shrank to normal size over the next few weeks. The enthusiastic medics sewed up my face and made up a new bridge for nose out of a patch from my thigh. Kept in place by a "saddle" of dental plastic, this wasn't perfect, but has done very well.

We were looked after quite efficiently by a staff of RAF nursing orderlies, for the three (I think) RAF wards. (The Army, of course, had the lion's share of the Field Hospital: it was an army surgeon who did my job). We must have spent about a month there, then "threw away our crutches" (Stew's cast and my nose 'saddle'), and prepared to go off to Calcutta on convalescent leave.

First task would be to secure our belongings. The ambulance crew had reported back to the Squadron what they'd seen when they'd picked us up, but of course it had taken them some time to reach us and I'd been bleeding all over everything in the meanwhile. So the tale they told was pretty gruesome; the general opinion was that they'd seen the last of me.

No use my kit going to waste. My DIY bed was a prize legacy, they had a draw for that. The rest was shared out among the others; there was no use trying to send stuff after me, it wasn't worth it and the chances were that it wouldn't reach me if they did. (This was standard procedure - anything personal or of value would, of course, be secured for safe keeping by the Adj. or I.O. - we are talking about clothing, bedding and towels etc., which you could quickly and cheaply replace).

Six weeks later the bad penny turned up. A shamefaced procession turned up with various items of my kit: "Sorry about this, old man - didn't think you'd be needing it any more!" And of course I recovered my bed - not that I would need it for long, for all the VV Squadrons were ordered to cease operations in June, and we would shortly be moving out (as it happened, never to return).

That done, we went off to "Cal" for our leave (transport no problem, you could always cadge a ride on the many 'Daks' which were continually shuttling Cal-Chittagong-all points-east. I will not describe our leave now, as I plan to make a separate Post out of Calcutta; it is worth a Post on its own.

The Thread is hotting up nicely now!

Goodnight, all.

Danny42C


Worse things happen at sea.

DFCP
5th Aug 2012, 22:07
Danny 42C Thanks for the education on demob numbers----and I thought it was simply based on when you got to ACRC!.Incidentally those from N Ireland were not subject to this arrangement.
Some of our P,s were training at the US base in Phoenix until VJ Day---but I believe training then stopped--almost in mid air.
I got demobbed--not from Padgate --another deadful place!---maybe it was Wharton-- in Dec 47 and spent the next 9 months at ICI as an apprentice/labourer.
Oct 48 I started at U of Birmingham ---As I had my HSC I could have started in 2nd year but I chose to take the full 4 years.There were about 30 of us taking a BSc in Mech Eng --about 50/50 ex service and straight from school.We got an annual living ---Further Education and Training--- allowance for ex service people of around 200 pounds and all fees were paid by HMG
November 48 I applied to join BUAS and was turned down. I now have the paper assessments of me by the three man board,all S/Ldrs or above. I did not impress them--bad attitude,security minded--wanted a PC or a university degree.Anyway I was not happy as I knew some of those who were accepted and I was not impressed by them.
Early in 49 there was another recruiting visit and this time I just made the grade because I now know from the paperwork that it was the CO who agreed to take the risk of accepting me. He thought he could make something of my--HE NEEDS DISCIPLINE.
In those days the UAS,s were like a flying club but you got paid and there were no restrictions on hours flown
We were all in civvies and classed as Cadet Pilots .Castle .Bromwich was our flying base with maybe 6 Tigers and 2 RAF instructors for the 20 or so CP,s. It took me about an hour to get out there from Selly Oak --two trams---but it was worth it
I re soloed in March 49 after only 30 minutes dual. But I did 13 circuits on that solo and I have never understood why my instructor said I was OVER confident. I would have thought this performance had demonstrated UNDER confidence.
Summer Camp in 49 was at RAF Aston Down,Bassingbourne in 50. By tis time we had Chipmunks and I got a couple of rides in a Harvard during these two week camps
It must have been in 1950 that I was the first recipient of the Chancellors Cup awarded to the best BUAS cadet. Then ,and even now, I have no illusions about this. My keeness/over attendance was good for the CO,s career and it was this rather than OLQ that worked in my favour
I think we got about 1/6 an hour while at CB ,presumably normal day pay during the fortnight of Summer Camp AND a 35 pound bounty each year.
Around this time the CO--S/Ldr JAC Aiken---advised me that a mistake had been made. Anyone who joined the Squadron having completed EFTS ,like me, should be a PO----of course no back pay or seniority were involved.I think it was around this time that the CO suggested he sponsor me for a PC on my university graduation.Again recruiting univesity graduates would be part of his career path but I wasnt interested
By 1951 I was in my third year and one of my fellow students, PMR Walton had just become CO of 605 at Honiley. This was at the time of Korea and training/retraining had come back into fashion. With my encouragement Aiken and Walton arranged for me to go on a "wings" course that summer at Oakham on Harvards
There were maybe 4 of us --two sponsored by the Belfast RAuxAF Squadron and one---who rightly said his family owned a bank--Hoare--from one of the London Squadrons.The others had "engineered"being called up , I was a volunteer. They got a bounty--I did not, despite taking it up with my MP. I know--NEVER volunteer.
My instructor was a Canadian--F/L Hoover--- and I graduated August 29th,I now had 418 hours AND an RAF pilots brevet!.
So now it was on to Honiley and 605.On Sept 11 I took a Harvard up to RAF Newton for an RAuxAF commissioning interview with one of the Atcherlys.Sept13 Walton took me up to Horsham St Faith in the Meteor 7 . After a few dual flights he sent me solo on the 14th. A week or so later he sent me solo ,again from HSF ,in a Vampire 5.
I remember that flight well. No one had briefed me really and I tried a loop at 30,000 ft----I dont recall exactly what happened but it sort of fluttered down until I came to. Later on in my 605 time I went up with our resident RAF instructor in the 7 to practice single engine flying.throttle back one engine,raise the nose, the airspeed bleeds off and it becomes increasingly difficult to hold on sufficient rudder to keep straight. Told the exercise was over dumb me took my foot off the rudder and in an instant we were on our back---Lucky I was with an experienced instructor!The only other problem I had was loss of oxygen at height but my wing man took charge and guided me down. On a more amusing note, if we flew near Daventry on a Sunday am we got heavenly organ music on our radio--this maybe at 30,000 ft over cloud.
While we flew week ends it was possible to fly during the week though it was more likely that only a Harvard would be available.
I suppose we did all the exercises that a regular RAF fighter Squadron would do---snake climbs through cloud,practice interceptions ,QGH ? letdowns.One exercise, we went to the London area to intercept a flock of USAF B29,s coming in from the East
Before I joined 605 they had one Vampire land on the Severn mud flats---fuel pump failure? and while I was there our only Sgt Pilot caught a wing tip on take off. He immediately returned and landed down wind,running into a walled aircraft parking area. By a miracle he was thrown out of the cockit and flew in an arc held by his parachute shrouds to land on his back on the grass sloping behind the wall---no serious injuries.
But my 605 time was coming to and end.
I had been offered an ICI job in Buxton, Dowty Cheltenham had turned me down for a graduate apprenticeship---this before I had the time to tell them to "stuff it" and U of Toronto was offering 6 month jobs as "instructors" This I accepted.
June was a busy month-- university graduation,marriage and off to Summer Camp in Malta.I missed the graduation ceremony because of camp but I told Walton we were leaving for Canada in August---I TURNED BROWN---Leaving the ship etc.etc. As a result I was not allowed to fly a Vampire out to Malta but travelled in the back of a Hastings with the "troops".
Funny thing is that some years later Walton emigrated to the US and lives about 35 miles away-- I have spoken to him by phone but we have not met! I can understand his feeling about me in 52 as he had put in effort to get me my wings and in to 605
We flew out of Takali and were able to get in some air to drogue firing---recollection is that it was hot humid and hazy.
But the story isnt over!

Chugalug2
6th Aug 2012, 18:54
Well at least we get two different payoffs!
Danny, your brush with death, for that is surely what it was bears repeating anyway, for it illustrates the tightrope that aviators tread all the time, and how the what ifs can lead to salvation or disaster at the slightest whim. Then to have to recover all your kit as well merely adds insult to your injuries. Reminds me of the farewells to those who went their way mid way through basic training. "Cheerio old chap, good luck. Oh, have you promised your "Cere" Boots to anyone? If not can I have them?". So off to Cal with you, see you later!

DFCP, my head is spinning with the demob, Uni, UAS, RAuxAF, etc etc. Slow it down a bit please, if I might beg you. It really is of great interest to know how that enormous outfit, the RAF of WWII, wound down at the end of the war and what that meant to its wretched incumbents. The RAuxAF alone is now a far off item of which we knew little. What a great flying club to belong to, to be paid to fly Meteors and Vampires at the W/E before going back to the "real job"! Already you are set to go back to the land from which you have only just returned, but first you are in that great cross roads of the Med, Malta. Not Luqa though, with which many here are familiar, but Takali. So hopefully we will take a deep breath now, settle into our accommodation there, good, bad, or indifferent, and take in our new surroundings. Over to you, Sir. Oh, just to acknowledge your sage advice. As pertinent as ever of course; never, never, never, volunteer!

Radar 101, thanks for the anecdote re Gus Walker's injuries sustained at Syerston. "Get me my arm back, its got a new glove on it!". Classic!

DFCP
6th Aug 2012, 19:16
Chugalag--I appreciate your suggestion to slow down and recognise my inputs have been over enthusiastic in length and frequency,
Just before I read your comment I was checking the next long segment --- fortunately I hit the wrong button and, it appears, lost it all!
Danny 42c---After reading of your engine failure and rapid descent I think it should be Lucky Danny---but then WE who are still here are all lucky while too many were not so fortunate.

Danny42C
6th Aug 2012, 19:20
Fareastdriver,

So I have - "Senior Moment" ! - (Scrubbed).

Ta, Danny.

Danny42C
6th Aug 2012, 20:50
DFCP,

Timidly, I must second Chugalug's suggestion to space it out a bit (I'm only a third way through on adding my two-cents worth in commentary on your #2867).

Hit wrong button - lost Post! It seems to happen to everybody when they start. Fareastdriver (#2307) and Chugalug (#2310) helped me when I had just crawled out of my pram (only six months ago - how time flies!)

Solution is to draft elsewhere (I like Notepad - wider page than Wordpad). There's no formatting, but you can easily do that at the end when you've pasted it on the PPRuNe reply sheet.

Draft on Notepad (make sure you save it, or that will do the dirty on you, too). Copy and paste onto PPRune - then that can do its worst, and you can always try again, you've lost nothing. (And you've got a complete File of your Posts to refer to).

Of course, if you're a plutocrat with Word (or a postgraduate in Computer Science), please ignore this attempt to teach Grandmother how to suck eggs!

Best of luck!

Danny.

Danny42C
6th Aug 2012, 23:12
DFCP,

Your last Post (#2867) chimes with so many of my memories that I hardly know where to start.

Quoting from that Post:

........"training at the US base in Phoenix until VJ Day---but I believe training then stopped--almost in mid air".........

The last BFTS remained open to November '44, but it is not clear what my Source means. If the last Course started then they'd not finish till May '45; but there'd still be three months to VJ Day.

......."allowance for ex service people of around 200 pounds and all fees were paid by HMG".........

In '46, on release, I found myself running a Ministry of Labour "Resettlement Advice Centre". Much of the work involved these Educational Grants, and they were surprisingly generous. Any ex-serviceman who could reasonably claim that, but for the War, he would have gone on to University could, if he could now secure the offer of a place, be funded to take it up. And you wouldn't starve on £200 p.a. in those days (£5,000 now). Many a family was brought up on less.

Not surprisingly this Scheme proved very popular. For in practice it meant that any boy who had a matriculation from school and then gone straight into the Forces, could claim. I processed many such cases, well knowing that, of every ten young men in front of me, nine would, in former days, been perfectly content with an office job in a Bank or the Civil Service like mine, and never dreamt of University.

But it is hard to prove a negative. Who knows what might have happened six years ago? You had to take their word for it. Years later I had a colleague on a Squadron who'd neatly carried this one stage forward. Leaving the RAF in '46, he'd taken a degree under this scheme, then applied to the RAF for a graduate PC. He got it, retired a Wing Commander and died a few years ago.

....."by 1951......one of my fellow students, PMR Walton had just become CO of 605 at Honiley"......

Hadn't he done well ! As you started in '44, he must have gone through training, got commissioned and made Squadron Leader in seven years, and that's good going in anybody's book. Moreover a command of an Auxiliary Squadron was a "career post", as were those of the (RAF) Adjutant and Training Officer. I was at Thornaby from '51-'54 alongside 608 Squadron, their Training Officer was "Mike" Beavis, who would be destined for greater things.

Curiously, the lesser members of the Auxiliary family had R.Aux.A.F. C.O.s, our Regiment had a S/Ldr. and the Fighter Control Unit (where I was the Adj), a Wing Commander (for no discernable reason).

......."I graduated August 29th, (1951?) I now had 418 hours AND an RAF pilots brevet!"......

Now that's doing it the hard way - they should have given you two brevets !

......."interview with one of the Atcherleys"......

It would have been "Batchy".

......."No one had briefed me really and I tried a loop at 30,000 ft----I don't recall exactly what happened but it sort of fluttered down until I came to......

Tried that myself one day. Got round all right, but on the way down stick started "snatching", realised I was in first (and last!) Vampire to go supersonic, (got the brakes out in time).

......"The only other problem I had was loss of oxygen at height but my wing man took charge and guided me down"..........

You were lucky to recognise the symptons and to have enough "mind" left to be able to tell him and stick with him !

......."On a more amusing note, if we flew a Sunday am we near Daventry one got heavenly organ music on our radio--this maybe at 30,000 ft over cloud"..........

I remember a similar experience over the West Country in a Meteor 4 in '54 - I was trying to get it up to 40,000 ft, but don't think I made it. Can't remember what frequency I was on (but, now I come to think of it, it was just a matter of Stud A or Stud D, wasn't it ?)

......"While we flew week ends it was possible to fly during the week though it was more likely that only a Harvard would be available"........

When I was at Thornaby, it was the other way round (608 always seemed to have a Vampire to spare during the week - that is, the "Auxiliary Week" (Wednesday to Friday), Saturday and Sunday the Auxiliaries had them, Monday and Tuesday were our "Auxiliary Weekend" - luckily we had a Harvard and a Tiger, usually one or both were available

......"practice interceptions ,QGH ? letdowns"......

Yup: "QGH, GCA and Bar !" (and I bet you tormented poor ATC with "Speechless/No Compass/No Gyro/ Double Flame-outs!")

......"Sgt Pilot caught a wing tip on take off"......

Lucky. My instructor at Driffield in early '50, P2 Willis, did that, cartwheeled and that was that.

Last saw Takali in '91, out of the window of a 320 going into Luqa. Think it was partly built over even then (I never flew from Malta).

Moderator will have our guts for garters!,

Goodnight, Danny.

pzu
6th Aug 2012, 23:55
Danny

Did you know my Dad at Thornaby? - Ken 'If you must' Crossley

PZULBA - Out of Africa (Retired)

Danny42C
7th Aug 2012, 12:10
pzu,

Doesn't ring a bell right away. Could I have a few clues please - what was he doing, what dates, which unit, etc. ?

Cheers,

Danny.

pzu
7th Aug 2012, 14:11
Hi Danny

Dad was with 608 from 51 - 53 as ATCO/SATCO, daytime job was ATCO with Airwork at Usworth

He was an AG in WWII attached to 31/34 SAAF in Italy

When Airwork folded he went out to East Africa with EA DCA

PZULBA - Out of Africa (Retired)

Apologies to rest on intrusion into this Brilliant thread

blind pew
7th Aug 2012, 15:24
Remember the immense HF antennas near Daventry-possibly the source for the music. Think they were used by the BBC world service but stand to be corrected.

Re the Vanguard prang - definitely a crash in the area due to the EDF basic power transmission frequency being the same as a beacon but could have been another set of victims - there were so many in those days.

DFCP
7th Aug 2012, 15:46
Danny 42c
One of our group told me a couple of years ago how his training in the US---and I,m pretty sure it was at Falcon Field ---ceased abruptly on VJ Day.
608 and Thornaby bring a lot of memories back to a Stockton born boy. I recall seeing my first --two-- Hudsons heading North--to Leuchars?---on Sept 3 or 4th 1939.I can go further back and recall a Rhodesian Hamden pilot crashing at night on rising ground to the S of the field. Didnt see you when I flew in there on March 31 1952 in a Harvard!
605 CO--- maybe 2 or 3 years older than me--he had been an instructor at Church Lawford and joined the Squadron as an Auxiliary after demob and coincident university entry. He took over as CO when his predecessor emigrated to Rhodesia.
FETS---- I know I paid 42 shillings a week for digs and perhaps the grant was less than 200 pounds/year. I regarded it as adequate but not generous--the BUAS pay was an added benefit

Taphappy
7th Aug 2012, 16:23
Chugalug2
Yes the picture of the Dominie disproves my story of it being fitted with 4 or 5 TR1154/55s and I can only put it down to a fragile memory.
The drill was that each of the trainees took their turn at the set with the instructor sitting alongside. The Dominie does look plush in comparison with other service aircraft.

Any how back to Madley where those who had gained their brevet were awaiting posting.
These postings came through in early June and some were posted to Eastchurch to retrain in some ground trade but luckily I received an overseas!! posting to Jurby in the Isle of Man where No5 Air Navigation School was based. The job was to be a Staff W/op flying in Ansons normally with a crew of four comprising Staff Pilot,W/op and 2 trainee navigators. The flights usually consisted of 3 to 4 hours xcountry navigation exercises and weather permitting most of the staff aircrew flew every day.
All in all it was a pleasant posting, the airfield was on the coast and Douglas and Ramsey were in easy reach by the steam train which ran in these days.
However this idyllic situation was not to continue as in Sept 46 the unit was transferred lock, stock and barrel to Topcliffe in Yorkshire.
More later

Fareastdriver
7th Aug 2012, 18:29
I know I paid 42 shillings a week for digs

If you had high class digs you had to pay 2 guineas.

DFCP
7th Aug 2012, 18:49
Danny 42c---A correction---2 u/t navs who were at Summerside at the same time I was in Yorkton think that we got the Canadian equivalent of our RAF LAC pay.If this is correct we were somewhat protected in that I believe the pound got 4.8 US dollars during the war---around 1.6 now

DFCP
7th Aug 2012, 18:58
Far East Driver---I wasnt sure how to spell guineas but able to do the coversion to shillings!--- It was not high class. In the evening, three of us would study, huddled around a fire "damped down" with wet tea leaves

Danny42C
7th Aug 2012, 19:32
DFCP,

No, the wartime (fixed) rate was $4.08 to the £, not $4.8 ! So a LAC on 5/6 a day got $1.12 per day, or say $33 per month. A US Aviation Cadet (on the identical Course) got $200 !

I don't know if the discrepancy was as great in Canada.

So you followed the "Boro' !" Checked the log, last flew 22 Feb '52, nothing till Apl 7. What was I doing in March? - can't remember. I wasn't ill, or anything like that. It may have been the time the F.C.U.'s C.O. had to resign as he had got a headmastership away somewhere, and I was acting C.O., and would have had a lot of running about between Thornaby and the T.A.A.F.A. in Northallerton over the choice of the new one.

S/Ldr Martin was the 608 C.O., John Newbould (of the meat pie family) was the Adj [EDIT: No he wasn't, he was John Newboult, and nothing to do with them], and Mike Beavis the Training Officer (ring any bells?).

Another thought, if you came in on a Sat/Sun, I'd have been up to the eyes in it. My HQ (an old Ops Block) was opposite the Station HQ, near the main gate. The Mess, of course, was in the old house (Thornaby Hall). All gone now, of course.

Happy days !

Danny.

Danny42C
7th Aug 2012, 21:21
pzu,

No intrusion at all, Sir !

Name still eludes me, but there would not be more than one Aux ATC, and I have a faint memory of a "nice little chap" (if that is "off the beam", my apologies). Could that have been your Dad ?

There may be a lead. Around '52 - '54, the Aux ATC bought a 1939 Austin 10 "Cambridge" saloon (Yes, I know they used the name again in '60).

For this he paid £450, for a car which I know sold new for £185 ( which shows the state of the second-hand market in those days) - admittedly it was in lovely nick (the best I could afford was a Bond "Minicar" for £199 !)

Do you recall this Austin car ? (you would have been very small). If so, I know your Dad. He would have been in the Tower one dark Sunday afternoon when I called "joining, downwind and finals" at Thornaby, then did a roller at Middleton by mistake ! (the visibility was very bad !)

Happy days,

Danny.

pzu
8th Aug 2012, 01:08
Danny

On Airwork pay even supplemented by Aux pay, I doubt if Dad could have raised £45 never mind £450!!!

Also he stood about 5'10" so not 'little except to me at 6'0" and my son at 6'4"

I don't remember an Austin though he did know Reg Vardy!!!!

PZULBA - Out of Africa (Retired)

BEagle
8th Aug 2012, 07:17
The BBC site at Daventry used over 20 high power shortwave transmitters, each running about 250 kW of power.

It's highly probable that the aircraft's own internal wiring acted as an antenna at such frequencies, with sufficient signal level to become audible.

In the later 1970s, we were at Barksdale AFB and the crew chief would use a long lead to talk to us during pre-flight and start-up. Unfortunately this lead also picked up the local MF radio station.....a Southern bible-bashing station. So every time we crewed in we had to tolerate all the "Amen, brother" rants from some passionate Southern revivalist god-botherer - which made challenge and response checklist reading somewhat awkward.

Were any of you chaps on the Empire training scheme ever cornered by American bible-bashers?

Fareastdriver
8th Aug 2012, 07:41
Off thread a bit but when I was in Belize in the 70s I walked past a chapel where there was an American evangelistic bible basher giving it stick; and so was his congregation. You could walk on the Halleluiahs coming out of the door.
Round the back was a Lincoln with USA registration plates. At the rear were two dark suited ushers stuffing shoe boxes full of money into the trunk.

During and immediately after the war five shillings (five bob) was known as a 'dollar' to reflect the US$4/£.

aw ditor
8th Aug 2012, 08:57
Used to pick-up the BBC at Kinloss in the early 60s' from their Lossie transmitter on the various "Squawk Box" circuits in the Squadron. Lightened up waiting for the routine weekly bo----ing of Crew 6 by by the then Boss who wore a Flying Orifice' brevet!

Yamagata ken
8th Aug 2012, 12:19
Slightly OT and late, but here's hoping. I have my father's service record (79th HAA Regiment RA). He was serving in Italy. It reads: Post Hostilities A Planning Committee CMF 27/8/1944 to 24/9/1944. (CMF = Central Mediterranean Force) Army Welfare Training Centre CMF 25/9/1944 to 17/6/1946. So, the CMF were planning to wind down in August 1944. I'm sure he was happy to swap a slit trench for a comfortable bed in Rome.

Danny42C
8th Aug 2012, 16:18
To All Comers - Greetings,

Radio Interference - it sometimes works the other way. At Geilenkirchen in the early '60s some of our UHF frequencies triggered off the alarm systems in the huge Brunssum (?) coal mine which lay under the airfield. Don't know how they sorted that out.

BEagle, can't remember being pestered by Jehovah's Witnesses or the like over the airwaves or on the ground, but they wouldn't get past the MP on the gate, and in any case we were mainly "out in the sticks" in the States.

Landing the Meteor T7 on one - the stuff of nightmares ! The tale I heard (at Driffield in '50) was that they originally flamed one out (to make it more "real" - which it sure did), until some statistician at Command worked out that the number of accidents in training from this source (per 10,000 hrs) exceeded the failure rate of the Derwent V engine over the same period. Reluctantly, they went over to the softer option of pulling one back to idle, and that was hairy enough for me.

If you really wanted an out-of-body experience, a spin in the thing would do. "A rough ride can be expected" said the Pilot's Notes, and they weren't kidding.

DFCP,
I quote: ........."Didn't see you when I flew in there (Thornaby) on 31st March, '52 in a Harvard"......... Who was I ? - how would you recognise me then?.......... How would I recognise you now?........The beauty of PPRuNe is our anonymity: we're all disembodied spirits in our Virtual Crewroom!

Taphappy,
Jurby - must have been nice. When I was a boy, we used to spend our summer holidays in Ramsey, and had many a trip on the electric tram to Douglas. Never knew the steam train got up so far north in the island, must have puffed up the west coast!

pzu,
Looks like no joy, I'm afraid.......A pity........So many names, so long ago........

Yamagata Ken,
Your Dad seems to have struck lucky in the end. CMF Army Welfare Training Centre in Rome from September '44 to June '46 (it was a rotten job, but someone had to do it !)

Cheerio all round,

Danny.

Taphappy
8th Aug 2012, 19:14
Danny 42C.

Sulby Glen was the nearest station to Jurby and Ramsey was 3 stops further on.The journey you have mentioned would be the Electric Tram which ran from Douglas to Ramsay via Laxey wheel.More useless information.

DFCP
8th Aug 2012, 19:29
Danny 42C
Despite your age being in advance of mine it seems you dont suffer from memory loss like me!
I wont argue the exchange rate--I THINK I remember being in a Bournemouth hotel in 51 when Wilson assured me that the pound in my pocket was still worth a pound as he devalued to --2.8? I think in WW2 the C$ was below the US---it has since been as high as 1.07 but is now "engineered" to be very close to par.And I THOUGHT that in 45 as LAC,s we got something above 7 shillings a day
608--I never knew anyone there and I had left the area for S Wales in 1940, returning for visits only---on one of those, post war, I went to a display at Thornaby where a pilot, I think from Tern Hill slow rolled a Harvard into the ground . Your equivalent in 605 in my time was F/Lt Crossman--my saviour in the Meteor 7 episode.Thank God we never tried spinning in a 7. And no one ever warned me of the danger of turning oin Finals with the dive brakes still out! 400 Squadron apparently spun the Vampire 3 without too much sweat. The CAHS had an interesting article a few years back on the RCAF Vampire experience. The bought them because they could buy more of them than Meteors with some left over WW2 pound credits
The Boro!---I often think of the pittance guys like Wilf Mannion got when compared with to days "stars"
"A roller at Middleton"---still happens--a C17 put down on a small airports 3600 ft runway in the Tampa area a couple of weeks ago.
MSG---do you recall the story about the ghost in what was the Officers Mess?--now a hotel. Supposedly a pilot who didnt make it practicing SE landings in a Meteor--- he was killed by the mess masonary. When I go up to Toronto I meet RCAF survivors from MSG---one was shot down so quickly after arrival at MSG that he never even got into Stockton.!

Taphappy
8th Aug 2012, 21:22
DFCP
I have a tough time trying to work out all these abbreviations you come up with. Am I correct in assuming that MSG refers to Middleton StGeorge?

Danny42C
8th Aug 2012, 22:23
DFCP,

Thanks for the compliments to my memory - pity it's no use on what happened ten minutes ago ! IIRC, Harold Wilson devalued to $2.40 some time in the '60s. You're likely to be right with 7/- a day for an LAC later in the war - my 5/6 relates to '41, when an AC2 got a magnificent 2/- a day to bless himself with !

The fatality at the airshow at Thornaby happened around September '51, I came up there shortly afterwards; people were still talking about it. Again IIRC, he was trying a roll far below his authorised height.

The MSG accident has passed into legend now. I was told he tried to overshoot on one from the runway in a T7, the thing swung off onto the grass and headed into one of the O.M. living wings, charged into the window of his own room (on the ground floor, of course), and he might have survived but (in the words of John Henderson, later the Teeside Airport SATCO (he had been with me at Strubby) "the lintel fell on his swede!" His ghost is reputed to haunt that wing of the building (now the St. George Hotel); when civil crews had to overnight there, the hosties wouldn't sleep in it (I'm told).

Teeside (ridiculously: "The Durham and Tees Valley International Airport") is a shadow of its former self now, don't know what will happen to it.

Curiously, when I did the Meteor conversion in early '50 at Driffield, like you, I don't recall any prohibition on having airbrakes out with wheels and flaps down. In fact, I'm sure I remember doing just that once turning finals, and being rather perplexed at the rate at which height was bleeding off, before the penny dropped. But then, wasn't the golden rule: "don't let the speed drop below 150 kts until the landing is absolutely in the bag!"

Yes, "when I were a lad", professional footballers were happy with £5 a week - at a time when the average weekly man's wage was £3 a week (and it didn't reach that till the War) source: "The Ministry of Labour Gazette".

Yes the Vampire was cheap - why else would the Irish Air Corps buy 'em (and they also bought some of the weird two-seat Spitfires).

Them were the days !'

Danny.
====

Taphappy,

Quite correct ! Danny.

Pom Pax
9th Aug 2012, 05:44
Exchange Rates (http://www.miketodd.net/encyc/dollhist-graph.htm)
From 1940, and through the war, although no longer on the Gold Standard, the £/$ rate had been pegged by the British government at $4.03, and in at the end of the war a world conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, decided on a variation of the Gold Standard.
Britain adopted this new system in December, 1945, maintaining the pound at $4.03 ... at which point the Americans sowed the seeds for one of Britain's biggest financial crises.

After immense pressure on the pound (and after nine months of continual statements that it would not happen), on 18 September 1949 Stafford Cripps devalued the pound by over 30%, giving a rate of $2.80

1967 saw another crisis in the British economy and Harold Wilson announced, in November 1967, that the pound had been devalued by just over 14%, resulting in an exchange rate of $2.40. This was the famous "pound in your pocket" devaluation, where Wilson tried to reassure the country by pointing out that the devaluation would not affect the value of money within Britain.

Free float from 1971

Rate of pay for National Servicemen 1957 4/6d per day.

A and C
9th Aug 2012, 08:37
The Isle of Man steam railway system was quite extensive up until 1963 when most of it was shutdown, the railway played a big part in the costructon of the wartime airfields by moving the large quantity of rock from the quarry's in foxdale to the airfield sites at Jurby and Andreas.

The railway history is recorded in the railway museum at Port Erin but also worth a visit is the former station hotel in Peel, now called The Creek it has a few photos of the glory days of the railways that can be viewed while enjoying some of the best Beer and pub food on the island.

The two of the three wartime airfields on the island are still active, Ronaldsway is the islands airport and being run by politicians it has ideas of greatness far above its station with prices to match. Andreas is now only used by microlights on a regular basis with occasional use by light aircraft. Due to the wartime runways breaking up I don't see Andreas lasting much longer especially with the IOM government shortsightedness in actively discouraging runway improvement at Andreas the light aircraft that have been pushed out of Ronaldsway will soon have nowhere to go and the tourist industry will suffer as the lighter end of GA won't use Ronaldsway.

The other interesting relic of WW2 is the remnants of a Home Chain station at Dalby, only the bunkers now remain mostly inhabited by sheep.

Blacksheep
9th Aug 2012, 12:42
Another thought, if you came in on a Sat/Sun, I'd have been up to the eyes in it. My HQ (an old Ops Block) was opposite the Station HQ, near the main gate. I was in the last of the Light Blue to operate at Thornaby - 1261 Squadron, Air Training Corps. Our HQ was in what was known as "The Barrack Block" which was next to the old Ops Block. This building still stands as one of the last original RAF buildings. This is how the site looks today:

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b360/689124/1261HQ.jpg

Chugalug2
9th Aug 2012, 13:19
Danny 42C :-
Teeside (ridiculously: "The Durham and Tees Valley International Airport") is a shadow of its former self now, don't know what will happen to it.
I remember staying at the St George (nee Officers Mess) in my Dan Air days. We had the morning free so wandered around the easily identifiable late pre-war RAF Station buildings. Guard Room, Service Institute, Barrack Blocks, etc all readily identifiable. I was a bit confused by the latter as the camp had been built with the later blast protection concrete raft flat roofs, but here was one sporting a tiled gabled roof. My confusion was soon remedied by a chap asking pointedly if he could help us. Turned out to be the site foreman of the company now owning said blocks. He explained that the concrete rafts were as good as ever but as they were converting the blocks to student accommodation (for Teeside Poly/Uni) the decision had been taken to "pretty them up" hence the gabled roof.
BTW the Meteor assy fatal accident that impacted the Mess is explained here:
teesside (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/phillip.charlton/teesside.html)
True to form it only adds to the mystery of this affair. The lead story relates that it hit the inside face of the West Wing, ie the far wing looking at the picture (and where I was told that it hit). However we are then told that where it hit was the outer wall of the Mess to the right of the picture, ie the East Wing. Wouldn't be a good story though if it didn't have many variations!

thegypsy
9th Aug 2012, 14:17
I remember staying at the St George Hotel years ago and the walls between the rooms were wafer thin and I got next rooms morning call on his phone reverberating through the wall. Not best pleased as I was on a night flight that evening. ( Second of three on the trot!) Oh the joys of the IT business, which I soon got out of never to look back.

PS Never saw or heard the Ghost.

mikehallam
9th Aug 2012, 14:31
National Service Pay ?

RAF, in 1959 two years started at RAF Bridgenorth as an 'Aircraftsman' at 16/-per week {"All found"}.

mike hallam.

DFCP
9th Aug 2012, 16:23
Pom Pax,
Thank you your lucid input on exchange rates--my obviously addled brain was off on dates,people and rates.

26er
9th Aug 2012, 16:27
I was called for National Service in Nov 49 and the pay as an AC2 was 4 shillings a day or 28 shillings per week on the pay parade, which of course we never actually got because of deductions for barrack damages. Couldn't understand this at first as we'd not been there long enough to do any damage to our hut, though we had wrecked the empty adjacent one looking for fuel for the potbellied stove. Bah, Padgate !!

DFCP
9th Aug 2012, 16:41
Danny 42C---Tees Valley Airport. Can anyone explain why it appears to have lost its place as the NE airport.? Newcastle seems to have taken over that job.
I used to check out TVA on my occasional UK visits in the 70-95 time frame and I recall that they seemed to do well with a link to LHR and various outside UK destinations--including I think charters to N America
At one period werent DC9,s with US registration,yet I suppose Brit crews, being used for the LHR link?. As the 9 was not I think ever given UK certification I did wonder how this was possible/allowed

Danny42C
9th Aug 2012, 16:58
Taphappy and A & C,
Yes, happy days in the I.O.M. Climbed North Barrule many a time as a lad, and looked out over Sulby Glen and Jurby (before the airfield was built, this would be in the mid-thirties).
Remember Laxey, they had the most fearsome wasps I've ever met!

Pom Pax, DFCP, 26er & Mike Hallam,
I'm sure you're right with the wartime rate of $4.03 (my $4.08 wasn't far off). The £ didn't exactly "float" after '71, did it? - more like "sank" !
4/6 pd for a National Serviceman in 1957 ? Or 16/- pw in 1959 ? (Either way, better than my 14/- pw in '41).
Or 4/- pd, £1/8/0 pw in 1949 (26er).

Blacksheep,
I would think that the "Barrack Block" at Thornaby was exactly that - my airmen were in it. As for the (old Coastal Command) Ops Block, it was the HQ of my (Aux) Fighter Control Unit - I reckon it'll be there a while yet, I had six feet of reinforced concrete over my head, and that will take a bit of knocking down. I suppose they've removed the blast walls round the place.
Is the "Oddbods" still across the road?
The new properties look very nice. Thanks for the pic.

Chugalug,
Another version of the tale has him breaking & entering (rather ungallantly) through the wall of the Mess Ladies Room.
Will have a look at the link now - Ta!

Thank you, one and all,

Danny.

Danny42C
9th Aug 2012, 17:12
DFCP,

I think TVA fell between the two stools of Newcastle and Leeds Bradford. Don't really know. The last operator of the LHR shuttle (BMIbaby ?) gave it up some time ago.

They certainly had a DC9 working the route (5 turns per day) in '90 , and for some years after that, then a 737 took over.

That's about all I know,

Danny.

DFCP
9th Aug 2012, 18:02
Danny 42C

August 52 Southampton-Montreal on the maiden voyage of the MAASDAM---a LOT better than my earlier trip across on the Athlone Castle.
On to Toronto and "work" "instructing" U of T students in engineering drawing-- very much a case of "the blind leading the blind"
Toronto had two RCAuxAF Squadrons who flew from Downsview alternate week ends using the same Vampire3,s
I applied and was accepted by 400. Much later I found that my timing had been fortunate.
Prior to my arrival, 400 had a series of fatal accidents in both Harvards and Vampires. The bad PR that resulted led Ottawa to "parachute" into 400 a guy called Rohmer--- an ex WW2 Mustang DFC pilot involved in the air attack on Rommel in 44 In 52 he was the RCAuxAF W/C i/c both 400 and 411. He proceeded to sort out what he considered the "wheat from the chaff" among the 400 pilots. Among his "chaff" was Ross Stevenson who later became Chief Pilot at Air Canada
I.m not sure that there wasnt another fatality even while Rohmer was i/c. A Vampire practicing inverted flight for an exhibition stayed inverted too long and flamed out.
On reflection his purge perhaps led to excess caution in the Squadron as I note I had 5 trips in the Harvard before I was let loose again in a Vampire
Rohmer became a very succesful lawyer,with political involvement and,a Major General in the Canadian reserves.There are photographs of his several encounters with the Queen and he has written many books. Excerpts from his GENERALLY SPEAKING are on the internet

Fareastdriver
9th Aug 2012, 18:14
When I left the RAF in 1978 Mr Bristow sent me to Teeside airport to fly his Puma 330Js. The ghost in the officer's mess was a fantastic chat-up line.

DFCP
9th Aug 2012, 20:44
Danny 42C
Another 605 memory
We went to West Raynham for reasons unknown the week end of Oct 6-7 1951.
While there the Leuchars? wing of 24? Meteors came into view in a line of vics of 3-- a very pretty scene, but hardly fighter style. They landed in this formation and I assume had lunch and then it was back for a mass take off. Certainly one and possibly two didnt make it. There was a black cloud from one over the hill. I understood no one was killed

Danny42C
9th Aug 2012, 23:35
Back on the squadron, the engineers debated. The engine troubles which had plagued the Vengeance the year before had mostly been cured, and the most likely explanation for the failure was a lucky shot hitting an oil tank or line. But in the condition I left the aircraft, it might have been hit by a 3.7 AA shell and look no worse. They returned an open verdict.

In an earlier Post I have worked out that the Sqdn finally moved to Samungli (Quetta) on 6.8.44, so it stayed on in the Arakan doing nothing much for three monsoon months. Early In that time it must have left whatever kutcha strip it was on and fallen back on a paved strip (I think Chittagong or Dohazari) or they would never have got the aircraft out of the mud to fly away. And both these places were rail points,from which the ground party could move. I have only vague memories of that time, but I flew a couple of times (non-op) in July, and I think I was loaned to 244 Group in Chittagong to do some paperwork, so I wasn't altogether idle!

Once the decision had been taken to stop VV operations, there was absolutely no reason to leave us in the Arakan a day longer. For although there were dozens of kutcha strips, there were relatively few with a paved runway and drainage: these should have been left for the Hurricanes, Beaufighters and Mohawks who could still do useful work even in monsoon conditions. We were just cluttering up the place.

We became entitled to a "Wound Stripe" apiece. This daft and short-lived thing may have been peculiar to India. I never heard of it after I came back. The idea was similar to the American "Purple Heart", at which we poked much fun (it was said that you could get it for being nicked by the camp barber!) But it was entered on our records, and I seem to remember that I had an inch-long gold lace stripe to sew on my khaki tunic sleeve. As we never wore tunics (only bush jackets or shirts), it didn't seem worth bothering with.

Stew and I had been amazingly lucky: we both knew we'd live the rest of our lives on borrowed time. It's a pity that no photographs were AFAIK, taken of the wreck - it would have been quite a memento in my logbook. But then, after all, over the years I've had a reminder every time I've looked in a mirror!

(He and I parted soon after this, as I was posted away from Samungli, but were reunited the following year, when he rejoined me as my "Adjutant" in Cannanore. Having come out to India much earlier, he went home earlier. I looked him up once (in Southend) after the war, but then, I'm sorry to say, we lost contact.

Many years later I watched a TV documentary about some oil sheikh's new racecourse complex in the Gulf. The architect was mentioned. There couldn't be two of that name! He appeared. Incredulous, I looked at this little, bald, fat chap - a far cry from the wiry young man with the Byronic looks I remembered. (Ah, the ravages of time !)

There is a present-day slant on the tale of my crash. In any forced landing a pilot has to make the best of a bad job. He can do no other. In two cases which have hit the headlines in the last year or so ( the 777 which just managed to flop over the fence into Heathrow and the Airbus ditched in the Hudson river), the pilots concerned have been surprised to find themselves publicy feted as 'heroes'.

My case was the same as theirs (in kind, though much smaller in degree). Naked self-preservation was the name of the game. Three questions arise: Did I do a good job? - Yes! Was I incredibly (in the true sense of that much abused word) lucky? - Yes! Was I a "hero", in any sense? - Sorry folks, but No! I did what had to be done, and so did they, and we all got away with it, and there's no more to be said.

That's all for the moment,

Goodnight, all,

Danny42C


It's the way the cookie crumbles.

Blacksheep
10th Aug 2012, 06:45
I reckon it'll be there a while yet, I had six feet of reinforced concrete over my head, and that will take a bit of knocking downDanny, that car park in front of the houses is exactly where your Ops Block stoodbut, like Jericho, the walls came tumbling down. . . Use Google Streetview and you can see some more of the old RAF buildings that were just inside the gate. The Oddfellows building is still there, but the pub isn't what it used to be.

Andy Capp Land? That's Hartlepool. Stockton boy meself.

Taphappy
10th Aug 2012, 07:41
The move to Topcliffe was made in early September and if you were lucky you found a spot in one of the aircraft flying over, otherwise it was a journey by sea and rail/road.
Topcliffe was a pre-war station so most of the buildings were of brick construction and the sergeants mess had live in accommodation with rooms for 2 so you only had to walk downstairs for the dining and ante rooms. Sheer luxury.
The job was much the same as at Jurby but in addition to the Ansons the unit was supplied with Wellingtons which were used for longer trips of up to 6 hours.
Like all flying establishments, Topcliffe had its share of accidents and there was one bad period of 2 months when we had 5 mishaps. First a Wimpey crashed just after take off, it went into a steep climb until it stalled and dived straight into the ground. 3 of the crew 4 were killed and the 2nd pilot baled out and survived.
This was followed by 2 Wimpeys colliding in midair over the airfield with the loss of 4 crew in each aircraft. Then another Wimpey overshot and came down in a field, the pilot was injured and the plane was a write off. Shortly afterwords one came down in the North Sea with no casualties and another took off on a night detail and disappeared with the loss of all 4 crew.
Around this time someone in the Air Ministry had a brainstorm and new aircrew ranks of Aircrew 1,2,3,4 and Master were introduced to replace Sgt F/Sgt and WO. Most of the Staff Aircrew became either Pilot 2 or Sig 2 even those who were WOs and many of whom were decorated and had a tour of ops behind them. Not a very popular move. None of us ever wore the new badges of rank.
I remained flying at Topcliffe until my demob date came up at the beginning of January 48..
All the official demob parties were over and on the evening before proceeding to the demob centre two of my fellow W/ops( who were also going for demob the next day ) and I decided to go into Ripon for a few beers.Coming back to base suitably lubricated one of us suggested that it would be nice to have a last flight, we knew that there was night x country laid on that night due to take off at midnight so made our way to the crew room where we persuaded 3 of the W/ops on the detail that they would be better off in bed. They did not need much persuading so off we flew in 3 separate aircraft.
Around 0530 I picked up a wt message from Topcliffe to the effect that we were diverted to Lakenheath as the weather had closed in. Panic stations at the navigators table and a call from the pilot “Jock come up here and read these pundits” but by this time I could hardly tell a dot from a dash. We landed safely at Lakenheath to find the other two Wimpeys containing my 2 miscreant friends sitting on the tarmac.
After a couple of hours sleep we phoned the Signals Leader at Topcliffe whose comment was “ what the hell are you doing there” or words to that effect.
Topcliffe remained closed in for a week and when we got back you can imagine the reception we got from a very cheesed off Admin Officer.
The outcome was we were not demobbed for another 2 months when we flew practically every day. Perhaps the RAF way of punishment.
Not quite the end

Danny42C
10th Aug 2012, 13:36
DFCP,
The balbo of 24 Meteors from Leuchars sounds an odd idea. But: "The West Raynham Story" tells of a later ATC tragedy which was told as a cautionary tale to all budding ATCs in my day (would have to look it up now, but it involved a number of Hunters and - I think - some of the pilots, too).

Blacksheep,
So they knocked my old Ops block down at last (is nothing sacred?). I suppose the rubble went into Billingham Bottoms, like all the other slum clearance spoil from Middlesbrough in the '60s - '70s. (and no cracks about "monkey-hangers", either, please. Actually I'm at the other end of the conurbation - D).

Taphappy,
There was a widespread superstition that crashes never came singly, if you had one, you could count on three at least. Then you'd have a clear run for weeks. As many of us could recall, there seemed to be something in it.

Ah, the "Hennessey Four-Star Rank System" - one of the RAF's stupider ideas (and believe me, there were many - how about the 1950 new-pattern Officers No.1 SD Jacket?) Could never remember whether you went up or down the 4-star scale, I believe they actually thought of building separate Messes for these new creatures they'd called into existence.

Put some more coke on the stove,

Greetings, all,

Danny.


Quos Iuppiter vult perdere, prius dementat ! (Those whom the Gods wish to destroy...........)

Taphappy
10th Aug 2012, 20:33
Danny42C
If I remember correctly.
1 star= Cadet
2 star= Corporal
3 star=Sergeant
4star=F/sgt.
The aim was to provide separate messes for aircrew NCO. (divide and conquer) but probably when the powers that be realised the cost of doing so, they saw sense and eventually reverted to the previous ranks and badges

Union Jack
10th Aug 2012, 22:48
The aim was to provide separate messes for aircrew NCO. (divide and conquer) but probably when the powers that be realised the cost of doing so, they saw sense and eventually reverted to the previous ranks and badges

Perhaps to avoid any unfortunate comparison with their own star rank system!:}

Jack

PS Only joking .....

Taphappy
11th Aug 2012, 10:30
Danny 42C

Got that one wrong should have read.

Aircrew 1= F./sgt
Aircrew2= Sgt
Aircrew3=Sgt
Aircrew4 =Sgt'

lasernigel
11th Aug 2012, 11:41
It has truly been wonderful to see what went on "behind the scenes" and your careers in the War and hopefully what you did later.

Danny42C, I was hoping you were going to stay on a bit in the Burma campaign, to see if you were ever stationed near my Uncle's Sqn.
My Uncle Fred sadly got shot down at the age of 21. As far as I can gather from things my Dad said, he started his training in Canada, converted to Hurricanes in South Africa before his posting to his Sqn. They were very close as cousins and got up to all sorts of mischief as kids growing up together.
He was on a mission to bomb a bridge in Burma when he got shot down. They didn't find his remains until 1956, My Gt Uncle and Aunty were too poor to have him shipped back to UK.
Following the Sqn history they were based at Tuliha when he went on that mission. Before and after at Kangla, which I can find on a map but not Tuliha.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/lasernigel/fred1944Small.jpg

Danny42C
11th Aug 2012, 16:19
Taphappy and Union Jack,

I have been very naughty and lifted this from Wiki (no doubt SIB is on the way soon - will plead insanity, throw myself on mercy of Court).

Changes in 1946—Aircrew. On 1 July 1946, NCOs serving as aircrew were assigned different rank badges which distinguished them from ORs in ground trades. The new ranks were:

Master Aircrew equivalent to Warrant Officer: Eagle within wreath below Royal Arms

Aircrew I equivalent to Flight Sergeant: Three 6-pointed stars within wreath below eagle below crown

Aircrew II equivalent to Sergeant: Three 6-pointed stars within wreath below eagle

Aircrew III equivalent to Sergeant: Two 6-pointed stars within wreath below eagle

Aircrew IV equivalent to Sergeant: One 6-pointed star within wreath below eagle

Aircrew Cadet for trainee aircrew: Empty wreath below eagle


It looks curious to me - how were the three grades of ex-Sergeants differentiated? - Seniority? Looking at my log, I see that I had instruction from two P2s (Finningley in '49, Driffield in '50). (With their obvious wealth of experience, I would have expected them to be P1s). Can anyone help?

Master Aircrew: why didn't they just go back to Warrant Officer when they finally had to acknowledge that the whole change had been stupid from the outset ?

Loss of face, I suppose. Exactly the same happened in the Strange Case of the New (1950) Sealed Pattern No.1 S.D. jacket-plus-new-Mess Kit-jacket monstrosity. After two (or three?) A.M.O.s had promulgated this thing, each more insistent than the last that This was It, and there was No Possibiliy of any future Change of Mind - another A.M.O. changed it !

But they couldn't just crawl back into their holes. Something had to change, to distinguish it from the wartime pattern. They chopped off the lower button, put a small flat button under the buckle which was neither use nor ornament, this was the New New S.D. Jacket!

The Wise Virgins (in the Biblical sense) who had sat tight throughout, simply cut off the bottom button from their old jackets, shrugged the buckle down a bit to cover the old buttonhole (which was pretty unnoticeable anyway); they were quids in.

The Foolish Ones, who had been Good Boys and had Done What Teacher Told Them, were left holding the baby - and well out of pocket. Did the Air Ministry offer to compensate me? Dream on!

lasernigel,

After that rant - Thank you for the kind words! 'Fraid neither of the places you name rings any bells, and we didn't have much social contact with the Hurricane boys, as they were normally on different strips. (Wouldn't it be wonderful if your Uncle (RIP) turned out to be the chap to whom I gave up my bed in Double Moorings !)

It had long been the invariable and honourable practice to bury the British Soldier where he fell. In my mind, it is better that way and the C.W.G.C. will care for the grave in perpetuity.

There is a corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. (Rupert Brooke?)

Your Great Uncle and Aunt would have had nothing to reproach themselves with. Rich and poor stayed where they fell, and it was better that way. (the business of bringing coffins home is a modern thing).

I have a few more words on Burma before I go, but my story there is nearly ended.

Cheers,

Danny42C

DFCP
11th Aug 2012, 19:17
Danny 42C We note that after your dangerous war service and crash you realised you were on borrowed time, yet by 49 you were back flying Meteors!
To finish my Canadian story
400 Squadron was fine but somehow not the intensity of flying I had found in 605.
By this time the only ex WW2 pilots left in 400 were ex fighter jocks--Rohmers doing. There were some pilots who had taken advantage of an RCAF scheme that was superior to the UK UAS,s. Canadian students could spend their summers between university years getting their wings so then they could then move into the Auxiliary Squadrons. Some of them also joined Air Canada with 400,s blessing.
Two lessons from my time with 400 were first, that one doesnt fly OVER Lake Ontario in a single engined aircraft in winter.Two of us were taking a Harvard to Montreal from Hamilton and I was taking the direct route. across the lake. I was advised to follow the coast line.
Then in Montreal waiting for the train back to Toronto it was suggested we take a train that arrived iin Toronto after midnight. That way we would get 2 days subsistence!
I ended my active association with 400 when I took a job a job 200 miles East of Toronto-- shift work in a new chemical plant. I hated it-- Canadian winter nights in an open building werent fun. So when an RCAF recruiter came to town I was available. With a "promise" that I would make W/C by the time I was 39 it was off to Ottawa for the medical. It must have been 2pm and I was standing there naked waiting for the MO to return from lunch. Memories of undesireable aspects of service life came back to me. I dressed and made my way out and back home. Never heard from the RCAF again!
So that was the end of my service "career" but several years later I was involved in selling fire resistant hydraulic fluid for large civil aircraft---try selling a sole source US made product to the French in the 1960,s!

Taphappy
11th Aug 2012, 21:58
Danny42C

That question also puzzles me and I have to say that I never came across any Aircrew 111 or 1V types before I was demobbed. Perhaps some of our more junior(in years) colleagues might have the answer.
Cheers

26er
12th Aug 2012, 08:57
I began flying training in 1950, starting the ITS course at Wittering just after the '49 Christmas break. At Easter the whole lot moved to Jurby. After about a month we went on leave and then reported to Ternhill. Before that we were called cadet pilots/navigators and wore the empty wreath on our sleeves. At 6FTS we became officer cadets, wore the white tabs on our collars and lived in the officers mess. The wreaths disappeared and those of the course judged fit were cadet corporals, sergeants or under officers and wore normal rank badges. Cadet U/Os (normally the course leader)wore a white lanyard on their left shoulder. At some time I believe I was officially an "officer cadet pilot four" but probably only to describe a pay scale. Our instructors were P1s or P2s. Round about the autumn they reverted to normal nco ranks and several of the P1s sewed sgt chevrons over their previous badge so that the crown was still visible, making them flight sergeants. I don't remember any master pilot QFIs, certainly not on the squadron.

It was normal for only three or four of a course of twenty or so officer cadets to be commissioned on graduation. However just before our graduation in May 1951 an edict came telling the FTS to increase the number. I remember being interviewed by the station commander who asked how I had done on the previous weeks escape and evasion exercise. I had successfully evaded. In the week before the wings parade the man from Gieves was rushed off his feet as we found the ratio of pilot officers v sergeant pilots was reversed compared with previous courses. On the morning of the graduation parade I was told I had won the "ground training trophy" and still have the little silver cup. So I put my award of a commission down to evading and swotting. There can have been no other reason. Of the twenty two who passed out six (including me) were national servicemen.

From that time onwards all students starting at FTSs became acting pilot officers though if those officer cadets still in the system were appointed A/POs or not I don't know.

DFCP
12th Aug 2012, 14:56
26 ER
Interesting saga. I had heard of NS pilots though this seemed strange
when compared to only a few years earlier when there was such a surplus. I suppose there were so many surplus u/t,s in 46 that continued training could only be offered to a few. In your case do you suppose it was shortage of regulars or a desire to train pilots without the RAF having to engage in a longer time relationship?Any idea what the terms of service were for the none NS pilots?
Mention of Tern Hill reminds me of flying a nav or instrument exercise from Cottesmore to TH and back in 51. In cloud both ways and in that era I suspect we had no way of knowing if there were other aircraft in our vicinity---dangerous!.

Danny42C
12th Aug 2012, 16:10
Union Jack, DFCP, Taphappy, 26er, - Greetings,


It would seem that in the early '50s Air Ministry had got itself into a right tizzy over the question of titles and NCO aircrew rank badges and (as was its wont), being in a hole, carried on digging with enthusiasm.

I never remember seeing a PI, a P3 or a P4, but we had two or three Masters on 20 Sqdn. in '50/'51; plenty more of them found a home in ATC in the years to come. Perhaps we have got as close to the bottom of the Star business as we are likely to get. I think that, apart from the Masters, it was dead by '52.

I am disturbed to read of the monopoly that Gieves seems to have have been allowed to establish (several Posters have recounted that they had virtually no option - they were more or less marched in to be measured for their new uniforms by that firm's tailors).

I came back in early '49, you could do at least as well at Monty Burton's (provided you were more or less a standard size) for very much less. As late as '55, they would do you a No.1 SD suit for £14/15, and I remember in '41 it was £7/19/6. Even the rest of the licensed highwaymen (Moss Bros, Austen Reed et al.) were cheaper - and a new P.O. was not exactly flush with money ! - (except in India).

DFCP, I'm amused by your RCAF recruiter's blarney about ("a W/Cdr by 37") Put not your faith in Princes - or Recruiting Offices!. Strangely enough, I remember a quite sober article in the "Saturday Evening Post", in which the writer had calculated that anyone starting Flight School in the Air Corps then (early '42) would finish a Major at least. (The crucial "if" wasn't mentioned!)

Some last thoughts about Burma soon (and No, I didn't bury any Spitfires, crated or otherwise).

Danny.

Danny42C
12th Aug 2012, 18:21
In comparison with some of the early Posts on this Thread, it must be admitted that my operational experiences must rank as rather humdrum and tame. Yet in the wake of the shining knights at the head of any column, there must always trudge the files of humble men-at-arms, the "spear carriers"; their contribution to the battle is every bit as vital. Some recent Posts ago I read a phrase which stuck in my mind: "We each had to fight the War we were given". (I wish I'd thought of that myself) .

This is so profoundly true that it invites a good look at the implications. Every one of us was given a different War to begin with. The War you started with may very well turn into something quite different. Hard Wars can turn soft, and vice versa. At every step, you are at the mercy of blind chance. There is little point in trying to arrange your future, and in any case the old adage is doubly true: "Be careful of what you wish for - you might get it!". I have always found it better just to "go with the flow" and take what the morrow brings.

After that bit of homespun philosophy, and before I retire to the back areas, I shall relate some odd stories which have drifted to the surface of my memory in the past few weeks (I hope I haven't told them already - if so, skip 'em and tell me).

Danny Falls off the Wing.
I've already stressed the small risk involved in Vengance air operations (my Post #2819 above). Indeed, one wag declared that the greatest danger we were exposed to was of breaking an ankle, jumping down from the aircraft after a sortie. Curiously very nearly that happened to me one day.

The aircraft was being refuelled, and I was standing on the wing, chatting to the refuellers. I was directly behind the filler cap, they overfilled the tank and several gallons of petrol sloshed back round my feet I'd been wearing a pair of the very popular sambhur skin Desert Boots, with about an inch of sponge rubber on the soles.

Somewhere in the world there may be a researcher who wants to know the Coefficient of Friction between sponge rubber and petrol-soaked alloy sheet. I can tell him - it is Nil ! Still erect, I slid down and off the wing to land in an untidy heap on the pool of petrol on the ground below. The ground crew fell about laughing, but it was some time before I was able to see the funny side of it.
===========

A clever Doggie,
The Engineer Officer, Flt. Lt. Steele, had a dog, mostly bull terrier, called Scruffy (and never was an animal so aptly named). Scruff had been given a juicy bone from the kitchen, and had settled down in front of the Mess verandah to enjoy it.

But a passing kite-hawk had designs on this bone too, and adopted the same tactics as the birds at Worli on my first Christmas out there. It flew a tight left-hand circuit round the basha, swooping down and making a grab at the bone each time round.

The indignant dog dropped the bone and made a grab at the bird every time, but it was too quick to catch. This went on for some time; it was stalemate; the bird couldn't get the bone and the dog couldn't get the bird. We watched this in growing amusement.

Then something clicked in the dog's brain. Instead of chasing after the bird, he ran clockwise back to the corner, jumped in the air and met his tormentor almost head-on. There was a roar of rage, a clash of teeth, a cloud of feathers and an anguished squawk. The bird flew unsteadily off minus most of its tail feathers and bothered him no more, Scruff swaggered back to his bone, "dusting his paws off". Applause all round !

That's all for tonight,

Danny42C


The onlooker sees more of the game.

Icare9
13th Aug 2012, 00:14
Danny et al
Please don't let this thread come to a staggering end.
I have been enthralled by your war experiences, no more (nor less) vital than those whose mantles you uphold.
It must be acknowledged that without the appearance of any other WW2 contemporaries either this Thread dies or we move on in time.

Only new (well in terms of appearance here) blood from other contemporaries (few in number) or we must perforce leave this thread to close.

Are there really no others (or families) that can this flame uphold?

Chugalug2
13th Aug 2012, 09:13
A resounding "Here, here" from me, Icare9. I certainly do not read this thread as some sort of alternative to a WW2 Comic book, expecting it to be full of daring-do and heroic over-coming of impossibly dangerous odds. Rather I see it as the long march of every-man, as evidenced by the description of huge reception centres, the many initial training wings, basic flying training schools that circumvented the globe, ditto the advanced ones, operational training units that used long forgotten synthetic aids to teach the life or death skills before they had to be used for real, and of course the reality of Service life, seemingly inexplicable decisions that frustrated the burning desire to get to grip with an enemy that had brought so much misery to the world.
Danny as always says it best:
Yet in the wake of the shining knights at the head of any column, there must always trudge the files of humble men-at-arms, the "spear carriers"; their contribution to the battle is every bit as vital.
So come on, men-at-arms, this isn't a race to finish first. It is the minutiae, the detail, the "oh, by the way..." afterthoughts that are the very essence of this thread. So back-track, go on into peacetime, discuss arcane aircrew ranks that most of us have never even heard of, just don't say "job done, nothing more to add" and cease posting.
For myself this is an exercise in vicariousness. It fell upon your generation to rise to the challenge of the military dictatorships, not mine. Inevitably one wonders how well ours would have done. The obvious answer is no doubt, well much the same, but in your posts we discern the personal qualities that seemed to have been required, perseverance, determination, yet being resigned to the hand you're dealt with and an having an air of diffidence that yours was but an insignificant part of an enormous whole.
I remain as convinced as ever that this nation was blessed with the right generation in place at the right time. Gentlemen, I salute you all and humbly beg to thank you all for being there.

Danny42C
13th Aug 2012, 15:51
Icare9 and Chugalug,

Thank you for your generous words of support. I still think there must be a fair number of old-timers about, whom we haven't reached yet, and who would be only too glad to relive their WW2 days on this Thread if only we could get to them. It has to be through the medium of their families now, for relatively few are on-line themselves, I think.

We must stress that the Moderators seem already to have widened the scope to allow all brevets (Taphappy is worthily carrying the flag for the W/Ops). Now how about the groundcrews, on whom our lives depended, who did such a magnificent job (often in terrible conditions), and on whom we relied so much? Please come in - even if you had unflattering opinions of some aircrew!

Meanwhile we'll keep going (there's life in old dogs yet!).

Dum spiro, scripto,

Danny.

26er
13th Aug 2012, 16:07
DFCP

The saga of National Service Pilots.

I was employed as a met observer at LAP (as it was named in 1949) and read in "Flight" that the RAF were to train 200 n/s pilots each year. I went to the RAF recruiting office in Ealing and took some preliminary tests in the knowledge that I was shortly to be called up. It was a surprise, nonetheless, to arrive at Padgate on 28/11/49 and find that my name was known and a bunch of us were earmarked for aircrew selection at Hornchurch as soon as the initial issue of kit had taken place. The following week we were there, did the tests, and returned to Padgate for a couple of days until the results came through. Those selected went to the aircrew holding unit at Driffield. (It still brings back memories when smelling avtag as the whole station seemed to reek of it from the Vampires.) After a few days we were off home for Christmas having already sewn our cadet pilot laurel wreaths on our sleeves. After Christmas we reported to No 1 Initial Training School at Wittering and began training. All n/s guys were trained in the UK as otherwise insufficient time would be available what with sea transportation etc to Rhodesia, and then later to Canada.

At that time national service was for eighteen months in which time with no hold-ups you could just complete the course to "wings". A further agreement to being taught to fly was that you would then spend the next five years flying, either with the RAuxAF or the RAFVR. I believe it was in the winter of 1950/1 that national service was increased to two years which enabled me to complete 202 AFS at Valley (dual on Meteor T7s and solo on Vampire F1s and F5s), and most of the course at 229 OCU Chivenor. The training organisation notched up a few pegs during this period due to Korea. I don't know how many of those n/s guys who started training actually completed it but quite a high percentage decided they liked the life and signed on for either four or eight years. And for BEA and BOAC after their RAF service, e.g. Norman Tebbit.

In my case, having left after two years and having flown lots in the Chipmunks of the RAFVR I rejoined the mob and became a QFI on Meteors. During this time (Sep 52 - 54) I had several n/s students so the scheme was still operating. Also several reservists were recalled to the colours for a three month stint about then, and as their civil life had been disrupted they also signed on. But I imagine with the Korean stalemate the need had vanished and by the mid fifties the scheme finished. And shortly after that the RAuxAF and RAFVR were liquidated. RAFVR(T) staff pilots still continue though.

Danny42C
13th Aug 2012, 17:13
26er,

It never rains, but it pours! A few short weeks ago I was bewailing my lot as being the lone last surviving voice of the WW2 story.

Oh me of little faith ! Now we are four, and the joint's jumpin'!

Let me be the first to welcome you aboard (I'm sure DFCP won't mind) and many more of your memories, please.

Cheers,

Danny.

DFCP
13th Aug 2012, 18:49
26ER--Excellent--you have answered questions I had been mulling.
You certainly were able to spend your NS productively.Your relatively quick progress through the "system" would bring tears to any 43-45 U/T
Increasing the NS obligation when you were already in doesnt seem fair. I suppose this decision was made because of Korea.
But you havent finished your story!
Danny 42c---Last week I watched a replay of a documentary about the war in the Pacific--the casualties ,certainly among the US Marines, were way beyond anything experienced in the European war.
I dont recall whether you have mentioned any losses during your Vengeance work but certainly if you had been shot down and taken prisoner the Japanese "Stalags" could not be compared with the RELATIVELY" Ritzy" German version---so what you were doing was very dangerous work even if you werent killed.
A couple of reminiscences.
It must have been in the 70,s that,while visiting my parents in Somerset I was invited to a party.
One of the guests was a L/Cdr? Sheperd living in quaint Dowlish Wake and I believe well know in the FAA.
He introduced me to another guest he had brought along --"Ziggie"--I chatted with him a little but couldnt quite place him---his English had a trace of American about it---but we drifted apart without exploring this.
Next day there was a display at Yeovilton and a German navy 104 went in killing the pilot.
The pilot was "Ziggie" and like many/all German 104 pilots was trained in Arizona.
The other story is more pleasant.
One of the 400 Squadron RCAuxF pilots had,in the 40,s, flown Hurricanes in the Western Desert---shot down, he was flown to a POW camp in Italy. When the Italians dropped out of the war,with the Germans in pursuit, he was able to escape through the mountains to Allied lines.
Sent back to the UK and now on Spitfires he had what was probably an engine failure and parachuted out over N France. The Resistance took care of him, escorting him through Paris and eventually over the Pyrenees into Spain.
I dont think double escapers are common and certainly not successful double escapers.
He was recommended for the MC but this was turned down on the grounds that the MC was an Army decoration---that said I did note in a recent RAF obit where someone had got an MC.
When I heard his story I wrote to Maggie Thatcher asking for reconsideration---no response.
Never mind- at 90 he continues to fly his Piper on floats---and there is an article about him in the August " Fly Past"
Danny Let me second your welcome to 26er and any others who pop up----your enthusiasm leads me though to what I think is my last story --and 100% true
It must have been in the 80,s we were invited to dinner in the rotating restaurant on top of the tower which overlooks Niagara Falls. The host was i/c maintenance of the tower and also a Polish ex RAF pilot. After dinner he took to his office where he had a series of photos of those who had chosen to commit suicide by jumping off the tower--the photos he said were part of his duties.
Fast forward and I get a newspaper cutting---our Pole had been taking friends up in a Cessna. He low flew over his house and with his wing tip beheaded his next door neighbour who was on his garden tractor--the neighbour was an ex RCAF Lancaster pilot.
The Pole was sentenced to prison for manslaughter--I dont think he had a valid licence either.
Several years later and another cutting. The Pole, post "clink", had been swinging someones prop--it kicked back,hit on the head and he was killed.
As they say over here--"What goes around,comes around"

Hipper
13th Aug 2012, 19:20
This may be of interest, posted on the Aviation History and Nostalgia forum:

http://www.pprune.org/aviation-history-nostalgia/492869-michael-welchman-ww2-saaf-no-40-squadron-pilot-web-site.html

Taphappy
13th Aug 2012, 21:26
26ER
Welcome to the thread, we look forward to reading your experiences.
DFCP.
Your story of the ex Polish RAF pilot reminds me of some of the many Poles who were staff pilots at Topcliffe. One in particular would chuck an Anson around as though he was flying a Spit,his favourite trick was to deliberately stall the kite and then dive to earth scaring the daylights out of the pupil navigators. He was also known for his indulgence in illegal low flying.They were unable to return to Poland because of the Communist regime and had stayed on in the RAF.

Danny42C
13th Aug 2012, 22:30
DFCP,

AFAIK, there were no certain cases of RAF or IAF Vengeance casualties due to Japanese action. All I knew of were flying accidents of one kind or another.

Peter C. Smith (Vengeance ! 1986) mention cases of aircraft going straight in after dives, but these were far more probably due to late pull-outs - we can never know.

Aircraft were lost due to enemy action, but no people (to my knowledge).

Your "Ziggie" would be a Sigmund (German) or Zigmunt (Polish), of course.

The F-104 was renowned as "the widow maker".

Danny.

Hipper
14th Aug 2012, 19:33
A German told me that if you ever wanted a Starfighter all you had to do was buy a small plot of land. One would arrive in due course.

Biggles78
14th Aug 2012, 20:50
There is a present-day slant on the tale of my crash. In any forced landing a pilot has to make the best of a bad job. He can do no other. In two cases which have hit the headlines in the last year or so ( the 777 which just managed to flop over the fence into Heathrow and the Airbus ditched in the Hudson river), the pilots concerned have been surprised to find themselves publicy feted as 'heroes'.

My case was the same as theirs (in kind, though much smaller in degree). Naked self-preservation was the name of the game. Three questions arise: Did I do a good job? - Yes! Was I incredibly (in the true sense of that much abused word) lucky? - Yes! Was I a "hero", in any sense? - Sorry folks, but No! I did what had to be done, and so did they, and we all got away with it, and there's no more to be said.
Danny, what you have said in the above quote I tend to agree. Landing a disabled aircraft does in most cases not make you a hero. HOWEVER, you, all your colleagues in uniforms of assorted colours plus the usually forgotten Merchant Marine crews, who put yourselves in harms way time after time ARE Heroes. There are no ifs or buts about this, just a simple fact.

In another Forum the poster mentions he met a Lancaster pilot at a museum. The words he spoke to the pilot (is there ever an ex-pilot), I thought, says it all. "Thank you for your service". I wish I had thought of those words myself. To all the contributors of this incredible thread and all the other contributors who are reading it who have put themselves in harms way defending our way of life;
Thank you for your service!! :D :D :D

If a Moderator reads this, there is a calendar function on the vBulletin software. Could a reminder be set that will trigger each year on the 6th of June to remind us and so we can remember the Hero who started this topic, Cliffnemo; Lest we forget.

Danny42C
15th Aug 2012, 01:12
Biggles78,

Thank you for the warm words of appreciation and gratitude, which I humbly accept on behalf of all the members of my generation, in particular those of us whose good fortune it has been to be able to say: "I was with Harry - on Crispin's Day !" (and who "show our scars" on this Thread).

I am pleased you make mention of the Merchant Navy crews, for in many ways they were the forgotten men of WW2. In the RAF, even suffering the dreadful losses of Bomber Command at home, at least they had interludes of a few days of (relative) safety, and a little comfort, between operational sorties.

But to live a life where you are constantly in deadly peril, with the "sword of Damocles" of a sudden torpedo always over your head, day and night, must have demanded a special kind of courage. Wearing no uniform (apart from IIRC, a little "MN" lapel badge) to earn public respect, often working in the most miserable conditions, they brought in the food, raw materials and the war supplies without which we could not survive - never mind fight a war. They were not richly paid, and deserve a little honour now.

I must stand by the last sentence of the quotation you cite: "I did what had to be done, and so did they, and we all got away with it, and there's no more to be said". (Of course, there were millions who did not - it was always a matter of blind chance).

"Heroes" ? I prefer the much-quoted: "They were just ordinary men who did extraordinary things".

I like your idea of a "Cliff's Memorial Day", although this Thread in itself is a tribute to the very gallant gentleman (RIP) who founded it. What do other people think ?

Goodnight,

Danny42C

Chugalug2
15th Aug 2012, 12:27
26er, great to have you on board, and carrying the banner for n/s pilots. I joined the RAF as a Flight Cadet in 1959, so by then n/s was already running down. Many saw it as an unwelcome imposition, but in your case it was surely the chance of a lifetime.
The only way I was ever going to fly was if HMG was footing the bill.It did so in getting me a Flying Scholarship while still at school (having already sent me solo in a glider) and would now train me as a military pilot. Unless you were very lucky in whose child you were, and who they or you knew, that was almost the only way to become a pilot. Here I think the RAF deserves a plug for instead of drawing from many generations of RAF families (which of course there wasn't) it merely required anyone to have attained the required educational standard, passed an interview and tests to ascertain if you were aircrew material. So we came from all walks of life (mostly educated at Grammar Schools admittedly) but shared in common the burning desire to fly which we shared with all those that have posted in this thread.
BTW the Vampire has been instanced here as best representing this period of the new "jet age" RAF. I have always felt the de Havilland twin boom jets to be some of the prettiest shapes in the sky. Perhaps those that flew them then (we didn't, being the first course on the Jet Provost) thought differently.
Pilots Notes for the various marks of Vampire here:
Vampire (http://www.avialogs.com/list/itemlist/category/280-vampire)

Blacksheep
15th Aug 2012, 12:28
They were not richly paid, and deserve a little honour now.Not many people are aware of it, but when a merchant ship went down, the crew's wages were stopped until such time as they went back on the pool and joined another ship. Cruel Sea indeed!

pzu
15th Aug 2012, 15:28
My Dad had a good phrase - not sure where he cribbed it from?

"I had a good war, a) I survived and b) they made me an officer and a gentleman"

Not bad for an apprentice pattern maker who left school at 14/15

PZU - Out of Africa (Retired)

DFCP
15th Aug 2012, 17:57
26ER---It would seem from your experience that certainly by 1949 the RAF had dispensed with Grading Schools in the pilot selection process. Perhaps they had the aptitude tests fine tuned by that time--what was the failure rate up to 'wings"?---thinking a little further I suspect that in WW2 failure rates were somewhat "adjusted" according to "Needs of the service"
26ER and Danny 42c----you two are either side of my age and both of you chose to renlist rather than go commercial.
In 1952 at 26 I vaguely considered commercial aviation but judged that my flying experiece would be of little consequence when compare with the real WW2 guys,a little older, but many of them with lots of 4 engined time.
I am in touch with another RAF pilot my age who after staying in until 54 went commercial.He had a very interesting life but it would seem some rocky times too.
Did either of you consider commercial?

26er
15th Aug 2012, 19:13
DFCP

I doubt that most of us old farts can really remember what it was like to be twenty. When I was at Valley having just passed my 20th birthday I wrote to BEA explaining what a greart loss to their airline it would be if they didn't offer me employment. I heard nothing until after I had been demobbed for about a week (early December) when a letter arrived at my Mother's home having been redirected from Valley to Chivenor to there, asking me to attend an interview the previous day! I phoned and was told, "we've all been in the forces, young man, and quite understand the problem - can you come tomorrow?". Which I did, to be asked questions such as "what is full throttle height". They were interested as the chairman of the board said that I was the first applicant he had seen with jet experience. (all of about 100 hours) The outcome of this was to be told that they had filled their training quota for 1951 but they would like me to join in October 1952. In those days all training was done in the winter months. That seemed to be a lifetime away and to cut the story short I rejoined the mob. My life then continued in the usual manner for the RAF in those days, though I always consider myself lucky to have survived the high attrition on Meteors in '52 - '54, even as a "mini god QFI". So I finally handed my watch back in '69, (though I've still my Dalton computor and perspex ruler in my desk) and in 1970 joined BEA. Many of my RAF colleagues from the mid fifties were senior captains by that time and there was I a sprog again, but even so it was a good job - certainly better than going to work in a proper job - and rather like the airforce in many ways but being paid more and being less buggered about, although that was not a given. The Hamble guys were less willing than ex service folk to follow the rules. I finally finished commercial flying on my 60th birthday, that being the retirement age at that time though shortly after it increased to 65. And I carried on in the RAFVR(T) until 65 having flown Chipmunks and Bulldogs with them for twenty years.

So you could say that luck came my way through National Service like many colleagues from those days who still meet up and enjoy a jar or three together. But the real guys were those like Danny, Regle and Cliff. There were so many about when I started, with uniforms covered in real medals - DSOs, DFCs, DFMs and one with a George Cross who became a postman but they were Old Farts, perhaps 30 years of age. As I said earlier, can you really remember being twenty?

Danny42C
15th Aug 2012, 19:37
Bomb Doors and the Tin Box.

It was at Chittagong one afternoon and we had a solo Vengeance about to leave for Calcutta. Time was tight, there was only just enough to get there before dusk. At the very last moment, the phone rang in the Flight Office. There was an Army officer on his way home on urgent compassionate leave. He was too late for the last Dak shuttle, could we give him a lift? It would save him a day on the train. Of course !

By now, our pilot had the engine running; we held the aircraft intil a jeep screeched up with our man - and his big steel uniform case! (aka tin box). It was too big to go in the back with him, so while we found a 'chute and were strapping him in, two of our chaps would load this thing in the bomb bay. The pilot did not want to shut down and lose more time, so they had to do it with hydraulic pressure in the system.

The pilot half-opened the doors and held them open with the cockpit control on a knife-edge (the bomb doors are double-folding - see the Camden Vengeance pics (#2627 p. 132). This was highly dangerous (and strictly forbidden), the control might slip and the doors crush an arm flat in a moment.

Struggling in the hot and dusty propwash under the aircraft, pushing it in with bits of stick, they had got the box over the lip of one door - and the control slipped. There was a nasty crunch. Bomb doors are stronger than tin trunks. Desperately, they signalled the pilot to open up again, pushed the sorry remnants of our passenger's worldly goods in, flagged the pilot to close up, gave him the thumbs-up and away he went.

I never did hear the end of the story. It wouldn't be a total loss unless he had a bottle of ink (or Welfare Scotch) inside. Uniforms would only need a good press, and you could get these tin uniform cases in any bazaar for Rs.30 - not that he'd be doing much shopping on his rush home !

Maintenance Hiccup,

I went across to Dispersal one morning to check on my aircraft. By now the (largely Indian) ground staff should be finishing the D.I.s. The last item would be an engine test run. One of the basic rules was: "Do not try to take any serious power out of (any) engine until the oil temperature has risen 15 (C)". Normally this happens very quickly, but there are rare chilly winter mornings and this was one of them. The engine mechanic had decided to speed things up with a very fast tickover.

He'd overdone it; an oil line or joint had blown. The stuff was pouring out of the bottom, but as he was concentrating on the other cockpit checks, and the engine noise blotted out the shouts and waves of the onlookers, it was not until two chaps grabbed the wingtips and violently see-sawed (oil was being blown all over the lower fuselage and tail), that they got his attention and he shut the engine down.

Now the rest of the 21 gallons was forming a quickly growing circular pool under the aircraft. It was at this point that I came on the scene, and never in my life have I seen a look of such utter misery as that on the little chap in the cockpit. I think his name was Subramanian (?), which is a Tamil name from South India. Naturally darker-skinned than his northern counterparts, he looked almost blacker with grief and apprehension.

Well he might, for the (RAF) "Chiefy" had arrived, incandescent with fury. Not wishing to become a witness in a case of an airman about to be assaulted by a SNCO, I tactfully withdrew. Someone recovered our parachutes (which we left in the seats most of the time), without too much oil on them, and I transferred to another aircraft. But I shall never forget that face!

The aircraft would be u/s for a while, everything forward of the firewall would be smothered in oil, the rear fuselage was covered in it, and I suppose there'd be so much oil on the tyres after they pushed the thing out clear of the pool that the covers would have to be scrapped (the individual dispersal pen wasn't much good, either).

What happened to him? Can't remember, but if S/Ldr Sutherland had taken over from S/Ldr Prasad by then, I wouldn't give much for his chances !

Primitive Radar in Arakan.

During our time in the Arakan in '44, Radar was in its infancy out there (I think we might have still have been calling it "Radiolocation"). But there was a small radar unit not far from where we were. I am not sure whether it was purely experimental, or intended to work with the Spitfires which were then in action in the theatre. A small group of us who were not doing anything in particular that morning took a 15cwt and went over to see this Wonder of the Age in action. It was on a kutcha strip with a flight of the Spitfires on it.

The Radar people were housed in a large basha, I forget what sort of aerial array they had, but it was small, low and not very impressive. Inside it was very hot and stuffy, and very noisy too from the row from the diesel generator truck outside. We had not got round to a rotating timebase yet (the "Plan Position Indicator"), they were still working on the linear timebases which we had used in 1940. We gazed in awe at these mysterious "spikes" which, we were assured, meant aircraft; the distance along the line denoted the distance away. I suppose the array would rotate (manually).

Suitably impressed, we enjoyed a glass of "char", and checked with the operators before leaving. We were solemnly assured that there was no aircraft activity within thirty miles. We could relax on the way back. We thanked our hosts, and were walking back to the truck. Half way to it we heard the sound of unfamiliar engines and then the rattle of gunfire: a pair of hit-and-run Oscars came through on a firing pass down the runway. They didn't hit any of the Spits, which were all well dispersed in the trees.

We'd dived into a handy ditch beside the track, there was stagnant water in the bottom as we'd recently had a light shower (the much smaller North-East monsoon). In this were the usual leeches: we were all in shorts and rolled up sleeves: they thought Chrismas had come. There followed a five-minute session with puffed cigarettes - you put the hot end to the leech's bum, he lets go (wouldn't you?) and drops off. You must not try to brush him or pull him off, he'll come off all right but leave his mouth-parts in the wound, the result being a very nasty, festering sore.

Our faith in the Marvels of Science somewhat dented, we accepted the apologies of the technicians - apparently the Japs had come in "under the radar" - an excuse I would often hear in the years to come !

Back to another promised story ("Calcutta") next time, before I leave Bengal for good.

'Night, all.

Danny42C.


Stand-at-ease!

Hipper
15th Aug 2012, 19:44
DFCP - the late regle posted on here about his time with Sabena, starting here I think:

http://www.pprune.org/military-aircrew/329990-gaining-r-f-pilots-brevet-ww11-52.html#post5120193

He had a very interesting time in commercial avaiation, especially as described in his posts on page 89.

Danny42C
15th Aug 2012, 21:16
Chugalug,

Yes, the Vampire flew prettily, too. I liked it very much (Mk.IIIs on 20 Sqdn, Valley, '50-'51, and rides begged on IIIs and Vs from 608, Thornaby, '52-'54). Much more pleasant than the Meteor, which I recall as being all push and no lift. And you could see where you were going when taxying!

Thanks for the link - will enjoy this.....D


DFCP and 26er,

I would have loved a chance of civil flying in '46, but with 600 hours of s/e time, there was no hope. A friend of mine was told, firmly but kindly, by Aer Lingus (?): "As far as we are concerned, single engined flying is not flying, and single engine time is not flying time".

Other firms took the same view, and you can't blame 'em. Why take on an unknown quantity, when you'd a queue at the door with logbooks bulging with two and four hour times?

No option but a return to the Civil Service, fed up with that by '48, managed to get a short-service commission in '49, stayed in till '72. Have now drawn my pension for almost 40 years (got my money out of them at last!).......D

DFCP
16th Aug 2012, 01:27
Hipper---Thank you --I followed all thru Reggies fascinating career on this site. He of course had considerable multi time--Halifax and Mosquito-- when he got into Sabena. It was nice to read his compliments about working for Sabena.I lived in Brussels in the early 60,s and several times flew up to Hamburg on a Sunday evening in one of their Convairs--always a VERYcold meal.
In retrospect the drive to Zaventum was always amusing. Just before you came to the airport you drove over a bridge and then as you turned left you came head on to an undertakers operation with a coffin standing straight up in the window!
Danny 42c-Your views on employment prospects make sense. The guy I referenced earlier had Dakota and York experience before he left the RAF in 54 --even then it was a struggle . I suspect that unless you got into BEA or BOAC there was much turmoil in the industry with attendant insecurity
I dont think it was as difficult in Canada since AC took several of the 400 people who had only 250 ish hours all told. but then I,m sure the 400 Squadron connection helped them get in.
In your 20+ years--49-72--did these consist of a series of SSC and was there any truth in my impression that it was practically impossible to get above S/Ldr without a PC.
And do I recall--RAF or RCAF? that there was an "up or out" policy--eg if you hadnt made S/Ldr by 50 you were retired---but I should have had no fear--"W/C by 39" the RCAF recruiter said--so nice to hear but NO I didnt believe him!

DFCP
16th Aug 2012, 13:54
Danny 42c
No doubt the Vampire was more pleasant to fly than a Meteor but as a fighting machine I wonder--in air to ground live firing I recall the Vampires nose danced around as you fired.
I think the Meteor was light on ailerons and heavy on elevators but you certainly knew you were "motoring" with lots of thrust That is, "lots" by 1950 standards

Danny42C
16th Aug 2012, 17:10
DFCP,

I've no experience with the Vampire as a gun platform (didn't have any guns in them in 20 Sqdn !) so must defer to your superior knowledge. Yes, the Meteor was more of a projectile than an aircraft, wasn't it ?

Turmoil wasn't the word for the aircraft industry in the years immediately after the war. Anybody with a "B" licence, and who could scratch the money together to buy a war-surplus C-47 (refitted as a DC-3), set up in business as "Xxxxxxx Airlines", employing ex-RAF pilots. These would fly for peanuts or less just to keep their "B" licences (on which they'd blown all their gratuities) alive. (Maintenance ? - don't ask !)

But for every Freddie Laker who made it, a score of others went to the wall in short order; another hopeful would set up in the same DC-3 as "Yyyyyyy Airlines"; same again. It was a wonder that the poor old things could fly at all with the weight of paint on them. BEA or BOAC ? Dream on !

I came back on a 8+4 SSC, Boss put me up for a PC, AOC said "fine", C-in-C Fighter Command (AM Sir Basil Embry), took one look and found that, although I had gone to a rugby school, I didn't even play for the Station. Thumbs-down!

In all fairness, I must have been a dead duck from the start. A 30 yr old F/Lt with less than 2 yrs seniority was just what the Command didn't want. (I'd be about 36 before I came into the time frame for promotion, far too late).

You had to have a PC to get past S/Ldr ? You had to have a PC to get to S/Ldr ! Luckily for me, the "Limited Career" PC was introduced in '52. The deal was: "we'll keep you on for a pension, you'll not get past F/Lt".

This was at first open for entry only into the Aircraft and Fighter Control Branches; I put in for ATC - accepted. Then they extended it to "Pilot"; I switched - acceped again. CMB ploughed me for flying, opted back (are you following all this ?) - accepted.

Result: retired as F/Lt. with 23 yrs seniority in rank (can anyone beat that ?)

Cheers,

Danny.

Taphappy
16th Aug 2012, 20:32
Back in Civvy Street but like many other ex servicemen I found it really difficult to adjust but found an antidote to the problem by enlisting in the reconstituted RAFVR in 1948 for a 5 year period.
Flying was done at Scone near Perth in Ansons piloted by civilian pilots employed by Airwork who ran the Reserve Flying Centre. One was committed to weekend flying and 2 weeks camp each year. This would normally be done at your home station but it was possible to make arrangements to go elsewhere.
This was an ideal situation still being able to get airborne on a part time basis and being paid for it.
Unfortunately when my time was up in 1953 there was no offer of re-engagement as the RAFVR was being run down and it must have been very expensive running these centres in various parts of the country . Thus ended my official connection with the RAF.

Danny42C
16th Aug 2012, 23:02
Taphappy,

"Thus ended my official connection with the the RAF". But please, not with us ! There must be many a tale yet in your times with the VR in '48. Think hard !

I myself joined them as an F/O in that year in Fazackerley (Liverpool), but in the time before I went back into the RAF in summer '49, IIRC, they hadn't organised any training.

Danny.

Union Jack
16th Aug 2012, 23:03
You had to have a PC to get past S/Ldr ? You had to have a PC to get to S/Ldr !

Which inevitably reminds me of the time when I was still a two-and-a-half ringer, riding a Service bicycle (known as a Pusser's Red Devil, despite usually being black - don't ask!) through the Naval Base at Rosyth, when the captain of the visiting US submarine for which I was the liaison officer stopped me and said, "In the US Navy we wouldn't let a Lieutenant Commander ride a bicycle", to which I replied, "In the Royal Navy you have to be one to get one!"

Jack

PS DFCP I note that you said that "I am in touch with another RAF pilot my age...." In the spirit of Danny's exhortations, perhaps he can be induced to join the happy throng ....?

DFCP
17th Aug 2012, 01:31
DANNY 42C--Yes Danny I could follow all your saga--I would never had made it- Sports---could never understand ,when at school ,the fun involved in running around in winter in short trousers and shirt wrestling in mud in rotten weather===then in summer you wore long white trousers,a shirt and pullover--so except for squash I was cured of "sports" early in life.
A friend here was a Boulton and Paul apprentice and became an RAF pilot in the 60,s--went on to Shackletons and as an F/O was told he would make a good JUNIOR officer!--so he bailed out but got no joy looking in the UK civil field. It was at the time of Vietnam and US airlines werent getting the usual flow of ex US service pilots, American Airlines recruited him in London along with several other ex RAF pilots--including some with only singles experience. Retired at 60 as a Captain on 767,s Which reminds me
26ER----Didnt BA or BOAC pilots retire at 55?--I assume that, as here , it is now 65
Union Jack The ex RAF friend I referred to lives in Alicante. Several years ago he was going to write a book about his experiences-- the stories made wonderful e mails!---but he never did go ahead with the book and is now not in the best of health. He had ended up on 737,s with Air Algerie but earlier he was "trooping"with Hermes to Africa and the FE
BTW I note several comments on the lethal F104----around 1965 I visited HFB in Hamburg where they were developing the Hansa twin jet---forward swept wings. They had engaged an American as test pilot. Swede????. Earlier he had been a test pilot for GE ---the 104 had a GE engine--he had dead sticked a 104 at Edwards AFB. After I met him he went on with the Hansa to Madrid for hot weather trials--got into a deep stall,bailed out but was caught by the tail and was killed.
Too many of my stories seem to end in tragedy---apologies

Union Jack
17th Aug 2012, 18:26
Flying was done at Scone near Perth in Ansons piloted by civilian pilots employed by Airwork who ran the Reserve Flying Centre.

Taphappy and anyone else with an interest in Ansons should be sure to have a look at the link in Post 79 in http://www.pprune.org/military-aircrew/492889-guidance-those-reaching-age-55-a-4.html and the following few posts. With grateful thanks to Samuel:ok:

Jack

Hipper
18th Aug 2012, 08:27
Mention was made of S/L Gus Walker earlier (starting page 142, post 2832).

Here's a little bit more about him, starting at the end of the first paragraph:

I (http://www.3bktj.co.uk/wood13.htm)

Danny42C
18th Aug 2012, 17:30
CALCUTTA

("City of Dreadful Night " - Kipling).

For servicemen stationed in Calcutta and all points East, Calcutta (now "Kolkata") was the destination of choice for leave, just as Cairo was in N. Africa. Indeed it was the only choice, even if you were going further afield, you usually had to go through "Cal" in the first place. I must say the new name makes no sense to me. I believe the name derives from "Kali", the Hindu goddess of death, and "Ghat" a landing place on a river, specifically where cremations take place. It is quite easy to see how that might sound like "Calcutta" to the first Europeans who asked. There is a story that an early explorer in Australia, seeing a large hopping animal, asked an Aboringine (by signs) its name. "I don't know", came the reply - "Kangaroo" !

Why change "Calcutta" to "Kolkata"? They sound very much the same as "Bombay" and "Mumbai", and "Peking" and "Beijing". And how have Delhi and Bangalore avoided a change (so far) ? And why has Madras changed to "Chennai" - which sounds nothing like it ? It's a mystery to me.

You arrived in "Cal" by air at Dum-Dum, or by train at Howrah station. Dum-Dum was out to the East of the city. There was a very large munitions factory there; the place has given its name to the flat-nosed bullets which were first manufactured there, and which have a much increased stopping power.

On arrival, if you were not entitled to, or could not scrounge a lift, on some service transport, you climbed aboard a taxi, always an old open American tourer: "Grand Hotel", you said, "Chowringhee" - to let the (invariably) Sikh driver know that you were familiar with the city and couldn't be taken on an expensive ride round town.

During the war, the Grand was the leave base for all aircrew. It is still there, now the Oberoi Grand, with five stars and prices to match. Then they let in service officers and NCO aircrew, but no other BORs. You shared, two to a room (no choice of your room mate). Full board was ten rupees a day (about £ 30 in today's money); this you could easily afford - about a day's pay for a sergeant-pilot, much less for an officer.

We gorged ourselves, I remember there were about ten courses on the menu at lunch and dinner, and nobody batted an eyelid if you worked your way through from top to bottom. This you could easily do if you'd been living in the field on service rations for a few months.

One of my chance room mates told an interesting story. He was a young American who'd joined the Air Corps as an Aviation Cadet at much the same time as I. "Washed out" half way through Primary School for some flying misdemeanour, he'd left the Air Corps (which he was perfectly entitled to do), and applied to the Chinese National Airways Corporation ( a distant ancestor of Cathay Pacific).

They used American crews, and had taken him on as a second pilot on their DC-3s with which they flew a regular service "over the Hump" into China from Calcutta to Kunming. Their business (very lucrative, I believe) was to ferry urgent supplies to the Nationalist leader, Chiang-kai-shek, who was fighting the Japanese invaders (without much success).

All my chap had to do was to keep the thing straight and level on course and look out for mountain tops. He was really no more than a human autopilot, even with thirty hours flying time he could do that. His captain would navigate and do all the take-offs and landings. For this simple task they were paying him Rs750 a month, three times what the RAF was paying me for bombing the Japs and being shot at into the bargain - and he'd failed that same Course I'd passed ! Not for the first - or last - time, I realised there's no justice in this world!

But I must admit that his pay was really danger money. It was a thousand mile haul, and the DC-3s had to get right up to their ceiling to get over the "Hump" (the Ta Liang Shan range - 18,000 ft.) There were losses; it was rumoured that some of these were the result of "off-manifest" (smuggled) cargoes, which earned the crews many times their pay, but overloaded the aircraft so that they just didn't manage to scrape over the tops in cloud.

Early on, I was given a useful insight into practical ethics. The '42 Bengal famine was at its height, basically because we'd lost Burma and all its rice exports, aggravated by the business acumen of the Bengali rice merchants, who were sitting on their stocks, waiting for higher prices. In consequence, when you strolled down Calcutta streets in the mornings, you skirted delicately round the previous night's starvation corpses awaiting collection by the trucks of the Calcutta Municipality (this was long before Mother Teresa's time).

My interlocutor was an Old India Hand. I was a tender-hearted youth in those days. "Why can't we do something for these poor devils ?" "Listen", said the OlH, "you have a hundred starving Indians". "You have a whip-round and collect enough cash to feed them for a twelvemonth". "Then you go back - do you find a hundred well-fed Indians ?" "You do not". "What do you find ?" "You find a hundred and fifty starving Indians".

This is a gross exaggeration, but it embodies a grim truth. Any zoologist will tell you that every animal population will (disease and predation apart) increase until it is limited by its food supply, and it is obvious that it must be so. What is not obvious is that this applies equally to human populations. It is not pretty to see this happening on our TV screens, and it evokes the generous outbursts of charitable effort with which we are all familiar. I do not say that these are pointless, but even if all the monies donated could immediately be turned into food on the spot (and this is often very far from the case) the same remorseless logic would apply in the end.

More about "Cal" next time,

All the best,

Danny42C.


You never can tell.

West of London
18th Aug 2012, 21:58
From the Independant newspaper talking about Churchill
“I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.” This hatred killed. To give just one, major, example, in 1943 a famine broke out in Bengal, caused – as the Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen has proved – by the imperial policies of the British. Up to 3 million people starved to death while British officials begged Churchill to direct food supplies to the region. He bluntly refused. He raged that it was their own fault for “breeding like rabbits”.

Chugalug2
18th Aug 2012, 23:29
Danny, there is one thing worse than stepping around the sleeping bodies for whom the streets of Calcutta were their homes and that is to step around their lifeless corpses. The suffering that was, and still is, a daily fact of life for many of India's citizens is both terrible and seemingly insurmountable.
The Hump will be a familiar term for those who have read Ernest K Gann's Fate is the Hunter. they will recall that he flew Liberator freighters on it, based in Nagpur.
Overloading in his case led to barely missing the Taj Mahal and the many Indian workers cleaning and restoring it on scaffolding erected for the purpose. The monument lay close to and in line with the Take-Off runway, though in this case it was more of a stagger-off.
The cause might ring a few bells with many who read this. The night shift fuelled and loaded the aircraft, the morning shift then did the same...

Danny42C
19th Aug 2012, 14:46
Chugalug,

Yes, it is still the case that a large part of the world's people live in conditions that are almost beyond our comprehension.

Your chap wouldn't have been going over the Hump when he nearly missed the Taj after take off. It's at Agra, a long way West. Probably he'd loaded up there and would go on to Dum-Dum (or even further East - Gauhati ?) to top up with fuel before taking to the hills.

I believe the Taj was under "scaffolding" (bamboo poles lashed together with string) for most of the war; it wasn't the beauty spot it is now. Never saw it myself - would like to have done so.

Danny.

Chugalug2
19th Aug 2012, 15:12
Danny, of course Agra as you say! Obviously time I dug out my copy of Fate is the Hunter and read it again, and to brush up on my geography! Anyone (especially those who have flown multi engine transports around the world) who has a love of flying and who hasn't read this book should. Other than to say it is set mainly in the 1930/40's, initially in the NE of the USA, then into the global setting of WW2, and finally into the post war US civil aviation world, it is best left to its readers to judge. In many ways the settings are immaterial, for it is the way that Gann can describe a cloud scape, an approach in poor weather, a rapidly deteriorating technical situation, that really rings the bells.

Taphappy
19th Aug 2012, 16:03
Union Jack.
Thanks for info, nice to see old Annie flying again'
The last time I visited the Museum of Flight at East Fortune they were rebuilding an Anson 19, still had a lot of work to do as it was more or less just a shell.
When I was a part time wallah with the VR at Perth there were a couple of Anson 19s on the strength, in these the W/ops position wa s up front next to the pilot rather than the rear of the fuselage.

Danny42C
19th Aug 2012, 23:08
West of London,

I have never sought to set myself up as an authority on anything on this Thread, and this subject is no exception. I merely saw the consequences at first hand. However some general points can be made. All authority in India resided in the Viceroy, but Provincial Governments had been elected in the thirties, these were in most cases Congress led. These enjoyed a fair degree of autonomy, and cannot be absolved of their share in the disaster.

It is true that HMG (in the person of Churchill) could direct the Viceroy in matters of local policy, but he had many other problems on his plate (there was the direction of the War to attend to). The suggestions that the famine deaths were in some way due to "his personal hatred of Indians", or the result of imperial policy, are to my mind ridiculous. What advantage would lie in that ?

I quote from the Independent writer: "a famine.....caused, as the Nobel Prize -winning economist Amartya Sen has proved - by the imperial policies of the British......." Wiki has an extensive article on the "Bengal Famine of 1943" , and an even more extensive "Talk" section on the subject, which are both well worth reading, although you may well despairingly conclude: "Tot homines, quot sententiae".

My Old India Hand merely stated the facts of the matter as he saw it, in the same way as Malthus had theorised a century or so earlier. (I now think we are so far off Thread, that we had better leave it before the Moderator wields the axe).

Danny42C

Davaar
20th Aug 2012, 15:31
"In the Royal Navy you have to be one to get one!"


During the Suez Campaign of 1957 (1956?) the RN was very strict on petrol consumption. At RNAS Culdrose one could revel in the vision of the Captain and his acolytes cycle in formation round the airfield during "Captain's Rounds". I believe there was a modified protocol for the saluting of bicycle-borne senior officers: Pedestrian matelots and lesser lights must en passant salute the bicycle-borne, but the bicycle-borne was excused returning the salute. I do think, though, that the b-b had to give an "eyes left" or "eyes right" as appropriate.

All this talk of "PC"! I rose to the height of squadron bicycles officer. At one time the squadron moved and bicycles had to be returned to stores. I issued the order for them all to be returned to my bicycles shed, and so it befell. In the gloom at the back was the remnant of a once-proud bicycle, no wheels, I think. Anyway I had it loaded with the rest and sent off to the stores on a truck ("barge"?). Minutes passed and the telephone rang for S/Lt, as he then was, Davaar.

'Twas Commander (S): "What in H*ll is this?". Briefly put, the RN can LOSE a bicycle ("I've still got to render my A-25"), but, a propos my wreck, it cannot "WIN" or "ENGENDER" a bicycle. "Explain!"

Aha! I held various stores in excess, which I traded with others of my modest rank, and some I kept. No more accounting for excess. Yet another lesson in Naval life.

I also remember at that time looking out the crew-room window (or should that be "scuttle") at a sight passing strange. A running figure appeared far away on the peri-track carrying what appeared to be a wand of some sort, making his way towards our little home-from-home. He eventually arrived with bosom a-heave for breath, and it turned out that he came from some Officer On High, bearing a message for our CO ---- in the cleft or cleave of the cleft or cloven stick that he delivered. Saving power, you see, and someone indulging his boyhood memories of Sanders of the River.

Danny42C
20th Aug 2012, 16:30
I have only shadowy recollections of the Grand. The frontage looked out over Chowringhee Road, and across the Maidan to the Hoogly river. Outside the hotel entrance there always seemed to be a sacred cow reclining on the pavement, and of course no one could even think of shifting it - that would cause a riot. But the Hindu concern for these beasts did not extend to actually feeding them. They might garland them with marigolds, but it was quite in order to let them starve. It called to mind the old doggerel:

"Thou shalt not kill, but needst not strive,
Officiously, to keep alive".

Circumnavigating this cow, and ignoring the everpresent beggars ("Sahib, Sahib, backsheesh, Sahib"), you entered the long entrance hall of the hotel. In it was a shop-in-shop, "Bright & McIvor's", British military tailors. There was only one other of these in Calcutta (to my knowledge): "Ranken's" in Old Court House Street. You would only go into these establishments to buy home pattern (and UK prices) blue (or khaki) uniforms, greatcoats or caps.

For khaki drill slacks and shorts, and cellular bush jackets and shirts, you'd go round to the "Hog Bazaar" behind the Grand, and get what you wanted for a few "chips" (rupees) from one of the many "dherzis". (It would be from one of these that our naive Navigator bought his unofficial gold-lace double wings and the oversize rank braid - story in an earlier Post).

Old Court House Street, besides Ranken's, housed the Great Eastern Hotel, quieter and more exclusive and expensive than the Grand. This was the haunt of the more senior officers, and I doubt whether a Sgt-pilot would be allowed to darken its doors - not that anyone ever tried, IIRC. Over the road was "Firpo's", coffee shop plus ice cream parlour par excellance. They did an ice-cream sundae with chocolate sauce which haunted our dreams in the heat and dust of Burma. Doing good business was "Bourne & Hollingsworth", photographers, where every newly commissioned officer posed for the photo to send home. Nearby was a grimmer memorial, the site of the Black Hole of Calcutta.

Not far away was a curiosity in the town centre - another airfield ! "Red Road" was no more than its name suggests, a long straight stretch of a park road that had been closed off for use as an airstrip. It was cambered, it wasn't very wide, and the approaches were over the city buildings (much like Templehof in Berlin). Operating from it must have been a dicey affair for anything bigger than small communications aircraft. I know Hurricane pilots used it, for my shipboard friend on the way out, Ronnie Bray, was a ferry pilot on Hurricanes: he told me that it was a difficult place to get into, and I can well believe it.

The question was: why have it there at all ? There were two perfectly good airfields (Alipore and Dum-Dum) serving Calcutta already, and others not far away from which a defence (such as it was) of the city could have been mounted. I think it was really intended to bring in the top brass, for it was only a short stroll to reach the Great Eastern from their staff Ansons and Proctors at Red Road.

To get round town you used rickshaws. It is well known that a horse can pull seven times as much as it can carry, and the same goes for a man. Although the man-powered rickshaw is terribly Politically Incorrect these days, it provided an income for the rickshaw-wallah that at least kept him and his family from destitution. He would take you a mile for a few annas (and that was several times more than a Bengali gentleman would pay), and most of the time we kept within that radius of the Grand.

You could not carry much kit, or two of you, or go very far in a rickshaw. The next step up the transport ladder would be a "tonga". An emaciated pony pulled a two-wheeled trap, with the driver (no fatter than his pony) perched in front of the axle, and the two passengers facing the rear behind. You had to be careful to balance the load, or the back would go down and the unfortunate pony be lifted off the ground in its shafts. His nosebag always seemed to be stuffed with green fodder, which naturally came out the other end the same bright colour.

The final stage would be the taxis already discussed, but they were only needed for trips out to the airport, or Howrah station, or to places like the Botanic Gardens. However, they were an essential part of the answer developed for a particular problem. Provisioning front-line Messes with bar stocks and items extra to basic rations was always a hit-and-miss business with the constant moving about, and various strategems were devised.

One of the more successful of these was put in place by the RAF Vengeance squadrons, and it worked like this. A crew would be given a week's leave from the Squadron to Calcutta; they would be entrusted by the Messes with a shopping list and the cash to cover it (and not forgetting the Carew's empty jars). They would take an aircraft and land at Dum-Dum at a pre-arranged time and day (normally Saturday).

There they would be met by the previous week's leave crew, who would be holding a taxi well laden with their filled orders. They would stow this stuff in the aircraft and fly it back. The new crew took the taxi back to Calcutta, and made it their first job to put in the order for their supplies, to be collected first thing the next Saturday morning. They would pick up the stuff from the suppliers, load it into a taxi and drive out to the airfield at the appointed time. And so on, and so on.

It worked like a charm. Flying meant two day's extra leave for the crews; the Squadron only lost the use of the aircraft for the duration of the one round trip. As it was in everybody's interest to keep the arrangement going, and anyone who upset it would not be popular, there was rarely a hitch. Of course, the first # Crew had to find their own way to Calcutta, getting a ride on one of the shuttles if they were lucky, or spending 36 hours on train/boat if not, but after that it worked fine.

Enough to be going on with - there's plenty more to come,

Danny42C


Take cover!

West of London
20th Aug 2012, 17:43
Danny, I had no intention of implying that you had set yourself up as an expert and if in posting Churchill’s reported comments I did this then I apologise unreservedly. They seemed, to me, relevant and in support of your post.
I found the quotes whilst researching the background of my father’s service with the RAF (82 then 113 Squadrons) in India and Burma between March 1942 and November 1944.
Sorry, I do not read Wiki when it comes to matters of opinion or politics.
I have very much enjoyed reading your posts and those of others, they have greatly increased my knowledge and understanding and I thank you. David

Danny42C
20th Aug 2012, 17:47
Davaar,

Greetings! Yes, the RAF reluctantly let us ride round on bikes in uniform, but drew the line on open umbrellas - whether on or off bikes. ("Bringing the King's uniform into contempt and ridicule !")

Ah, the A-25......"Cracking show - I'm alive ! - but I still have to render my A-25 !" (If puzzled, think F.765C of evil memory). Do you know many/any of the verses of that wonderful ballad? From memory to start you off:

(To the tune of: "Toodle-ayoodle-ayoodle-ayaye !)

"They gave me a Seafire to beat up the Fleet,
I polished off "Rodney" and "Nelson" a treat,
Forgot about the mast sticking up on "Formid",
And a seat in the "Goofers" was worth twenty quid!
Cracking show............"

and:

"Went off from "Ark Royal" in a Seafire one day,
Came in to land with the hook stowed away,
Came over the flight deck, the batsman gave "CUT",
And we float,float,float,float,float,float,
Float,float,float, PRANG!
Cracking show............."

(I'm sure Union Jack could add a verse or two!)

At Leeming, we had progressed beyond a cleft stick. Our chap had a bike and a satchel: we called him "Wells Fargo".

Danny42C

EDIT: "Sanders of the River" was one of my favourite reads as a boy ("Speak the language of the land, Bosambo !"). My father served in the Army as an instructor in the Nigeria Regiment ca 1900 - 1905. He said that Edgar Wallace had the W. African detail about right.........D.

ACW418
20th Aug 2012, 21:42
Danny,

I attended a meeting of Probus today and was having a conversation with one of my fellow members who flew Hurricanes in your part of the world. He had an engine failure and had to force land in the Burma jungle - broke his back but survived. However, I am getting off the point. When I told him I was reading this thread and currently it was largely about the Vultee Vengeance he said that he once got a lift in one to Calcutta and that they got a total of twelve of his colleagues in the back. I was a bit sceptical and asked how the heck you could get twelve blokes in a cockpit meant for one WOP/AG. He said the Vengeance had a large fuselage! Is this his memory playing tricks or would it have been possible?

ACW

Danny42C
20th Aug 2012, 23:01
David,

Absolutely no need for any apology, I assure you! It's true that Churchill said many things unwisely, and he may quite possibly have said the words attributed to him by the "Independent" writer (he was, after all, viscerally opposed to the break-up of the Empire).

But to extrapolate from that (as the quotation from the article appears to do), that the British Government engineered the Famine (or hindered relief efforts) is IMHO simply untrue. In saying that, I have to stress that I have no specialist knowledge of these horrifying events, I was only a simple witness of them.

It was (and is) my intention to make this clear, and to stress that I must not be quoted as an authority on the subject - no more than that. For controversy still rages round it (cf the "Wiki" entries). My own opinion ? There was a very large element of cock-up involved, whatever the other causes (and they were many and complicated) might be.

Hope that clears it up (no offence taken!) Hope to hear from you again - this is exactly what this Thread needs to keep going,

Cheers,

Danny.

Danny42C
20th Aug 2012, 23:31
ACW418,

I think the greatest number I've seen in the back was five, but then we would have had the guns, the gun mountings and ammo cans still in position. If all these were stripped out (as they might be post VJ day), then ye-es, you might do twelve.

I don't like the reference to "fuselage". With the guns etc. out, there would be a lot of space below and behind the "step" which carried the gunner's seat; it would be very cramped and uncomfortable (and you couldn't see out). More seriously, the control runs ran along the bottom (I think), and you don't want a chap parked on them ! C. of. G. would be off the scale !

I have lived too long to say that anything's impossible, but......,

Danny.

Danny42C
22nd Aug 2012, 17:47
What did we do with our time ? Well, what we did not do was to embark on an orgy of vice (forget the Fry's Turkish Delight ads, it wasn't like that at all). If you wanted that sort of thing, you could find it, but in my experience very few people did. By day, there was the Calcutta Swimming Club pool, and an air-conditioned cinema (the very first that most people had ever seen) a few doors down from the Grand in Chowringhee. The Victoria Memorial and the Botanic Gardens were a taxi ride away, but well worth seeing.

And then there were the Bazaars, where you could stock up with almost anything you wanted - except razor blades! And there was always "Firpo's". By night we varied the Grand cuisine at Chinese restaurants; it was reckoned that your chances of food poisoning there were much less than in an Indian. In any case, after spending a few months out there, most people developed brass stomachs and could eat most things without fear of consequence.

A regular port of call was the Base Accountant, from whom you drew cash. His office was in (and I am not making this up) Sir Hamish Mukerjee Street. I know the Scots were very strong in Calcutta's history (notably in the jute trade), but how a Bengali (even one who had served the Raj so well as to earn a knighthood) came to have a Scottish Christian name is beyond me.

Calcutta got bombed one night in early '43. The "Calcutta Statesman" (like the "Daily Telegraph") headlined: "Calcutta takes its place among the much-bombed cities of the British Empire". It was a gross exaggeration. Jap bombers had dropped a handful of small anti-personnel bombs. They knocked a few chips out of the masonry and killed a few sleepers on the pavements, but did little damage. But the effect on the populace was enormous. Bengalis are not a martial race. Panic took hold.

It was estimated that a million and a half fled the city in the next 24 hours, on foot or on anything that moved. The hotels were denuded of staff, the guests at the Grand had to fend for themselves for days until the terror-stricken mob dribbled back. When you consider the effect that the Japs had achieved, with so little effort, in a city crammed with important military units, you would naturally expect them to keep up the good work, and try again.

So they did a few weeks later, but that night we had a remarkable bit of luck. Another flight of three Jap bombers was making for the city. So contemptuous were they of our defences (and with good reason) that they flew in formation with their navigation lights on. Foolhardiness on this scale should be rewarded, and it was.

A Flight Sergeant Pring was on patrol with his Beaufighter. He saw these lights and, curious to know who these idiots might be, went over to have a look. Identifying them, with some surpise, as Japanese, he tagged on behind, closed up stealthily into point-blank range, and opened up with his four cannon. The birds of a feather stuck together (as we were enjoined to do), so he was able to bag all three in one go. He got a well earned DFM, became the toast of Calcutta, (and was KIA some time later); the raids ended.

Google some time ago led me to some old Calcutta memoirs, and a slightly different story of the interception was offered. In this Pring was vectored onto his prey by ground radar in the same way as Fighter Command had been in 1940. This would need the same equipment, in particular an array of "Chain Home" 360 ft (?) radar masts.

As all the country around was flat as a pancake, these really ought to have been noticable, and it would have been nice to have been told about them (did we have NOTAMS then ?) But I never heard a whisper of, or ever see any such things. And the story I have recently told about the simple radar hut in Arakan suggests that we were a long way from such sophistication out there.

Later in the war, a welcome alternative to the Grand appeared in the shape of the Elgin Nursing Home. This was (as you might suppose) in Elgin Road, off Chowringhee, half a mile north of the Grand. During the war, it had become virtually an aircrew hostel. They charged the same as the Grand, but it was much quieter.

Calcutta was the source of "Carew's" Gin, the staple of bar stocks in every Mess in India. Before the war, there had been plenty of British duty-free spirits out there, but shortage of shipping space had cut these supplies off (and also things like India Pale Ale, specially brewed to stand up to the journey out there).

Very limited quantities of Scotch came out as "Welfare" items: these were eagerly competed for and hoarded. "Carew's" was a quite acceptable substitue for English gin, and there was a "Rosa" rum which was tolerable with plenty of fruit squash. After all, in a country where sugar cane is grown, it is as cheap and easy to make good rum as bad.

Vodka was unknown then; the locally produced "brandy" and "whiskey" were bought, but only as a substitute for the meths (which they closely resembled) which you needed to fire-up the incandescent mantles in the pressure paraffin lamps which were widely used. "Carew's", in its four- gallon blue jars, has been mentioned several times already. At home, during the war, I think that a tot of whiskey or gin sold for 4d, which would give the pub a mark-up of 50%.

Nobody quibbled about paying the exact equivalent (4 annas) out there, but the mark up now was nearly 200%, so the Messes could not help but make money hand over fist. (What happened to it all at the end, when they were being closed by the dozen ?). Don't know, but I harbour dark suspicions. I only hope HMG didn't get its hands on it.!

At last, back to our long farewell to the Arakan next time,

Cheers to all,

Danny42C


All's grist that comes to the mill.

Green Guard
24th Aug 2012, 06:24
gosh...we r all guessing about WWIII (WW3) and here already WW eleven is in th past....

GANNET FAN
24th Aug 2012, 08:32
Davaar, you are quite correct. I remember my father (Cdr Exec RNAS Eglinton) being being saluted by a CPO on a bike sitting ramrod straight and a sharp eyes right. Perfectly correct even if it did look a bit odd!

Reader123
24th Aug 2012, 15:04
Great stuff, Danny, please keep it coming. My father was stationed at Dum Dum in '46, presumably whence he went to the cinema you mentioned.

More on Flt Sgt Pring here - brief description with the sale of his medals.

Dix Noonan Webb: Medals: Auction Archive: Search Catalogue Archive: Lot 568, 30 Jun 98 (http://www.dnw.co.uk/medals/auctionarchive/searchcataloguearchive/itemdetail.lasso?itemid=15050)

And here is an entire article on him.

http://www.rquirk.com/176Sqdn/Sircar/Sergeant%20Pring%20and%20the%20Calcutta%20Hurricane.pdf

which includes the immortal line (just like Danny's on the VV) "And in view of the demonstrated ineffectiveness of the AI Mark 6 Hurricanes in the
U.K. , it was decided to send the 12 Hurricane II C (NF)s to India!(8)
Imperial habits die hard."

Icare9
24th Aug 2012, 20:42
sigh...
Green Guard, it's taken you until 2,966 posts before you but in with your enlightening comment. Add something useful or move on, please...

Danny42C
25th Aug 2012, 05:21
Now that the brief day of the Vengeance was over, the idea seemed to be that they should be put "out of sight, out of mind" -as far away as possible on the subcontinent. The spot chosen was Samungli, a small airfield a few miles to the West of Quetta (in Baluchistan), and just about touching the SE Afghan border. My memory of those days is extremely hazy.

However, the distance involved was just short of 2,000 miles. How the air movenent was planned, I do not know, but would guess at two 300-350 mile stages per day with two overnight stops en route. It seems (from S/Ldr Thomas) that one British crew crashed on arrival and were killed, but I have no details, as I travelled on the main (rail) party (and there must have been an advance rail party to welcome the air party to their new home).

Why didn't I fly? - Don't know (could it be that there were not enough aircraft to go round, and as I'd pranged mine it would serve me right). I thought that we entrained at Chittagong, but S/Ldr Thomas says Dohazari, so I'll take that as read. For the next sixteen days my little world was our group of four in a train compartment. All RAF, we were the M.O. (very nice chap, name forgotten), F/O 'Pete' Ganthony (Signals), * the Engineer Officer (F/Lt Steele) and myself.

(Note *: After Samungli, I saw S/Ldr Ganthony just once more, close to death from a brain tumour in Halton hospital in 1959).

So where was Stew? We certainly didn't leave him behind, he was with me at Samungli, he must have basely deserted me and cadged a ride as supercargo on another aircraft.. Of course ! Stew was still a Warrant Officer; he couldn't have been with us (yes, it still mattered in those days). As an SNCO on the train, he would have been much less comfortable than the "Orficers", he must have squeezed himself into the back of a VV as the better option.

F/Lt Steele must have taken over the dog "Scruff" later at Samungli, and the dog must have given his bird-catching tour-de-force there (#2922 p.147), for he certainly wouldn't have been left behind, and he wasn't with us. This often happened, the original owner had to go home tour-ex, he couldn't take his dog on the troopship, the dog would have been the pet of the whole section/flight, so he was among friends, he would soon settle down with a new master he knew well already.

We started in some style. The East Bengal Railway had dusted off the Official Saloon of the Chief Operating Superintendent(ca 1880) for the Sahibs' use (have you seen Queen Victoria's Royal Coach in the York Railway Museum?). But we travelled in mahogany, crystal, chintz and polished brass only as far as the eastern ferry terminal somewhere in the Sunderbands. Then stern-wheel paddle boat again (might even have been the same one which had brought us from Khumbirgram six months before). Finally "bog-standard" first-class for the rest of the way.

And it was quite a way. The arithmetically minded reader will have worked out that we averaged 125 miles per day, and Puffing Billy could do better than that. The trouble was that the insertion of our (quite long) special troop train into the already crowded rail schedules was causing chaos. So for hours at a time they had to pull us off onto some siding or other to unscramble the blockage, before letting us back on the main line again. When we got into the northern and north-western areas, we were overrun with monkeys at some of these halts. We had to close all doors and just rely on fans and the louvred shutters to get a bit of air.

Food was never a problem on Indian railways, all ranks could always get something to eat at any station. S/Ldr (Corporal then) Thomas was under the impression that the IAF were left to fend for themselves, whereas the Sahibs were "fed on the train". Nobody was fed on the train; there was no such thing as a dining car on any Indian train I was ever on; the (far better) arrangement was that the train stopped at a station for half an hour or so while the passengers enjoyed a meal, then climbed back aboard.

Alcohol helped to relieve the tedium of the endless days, our M.O. reported that one ingenious solution found in the IAF coaches was meths and raisins shaken up in a bottle. We had prudently invested in a 4-gallon jar of "Carew's" gin (Rs 65, Rs 4 back on the jar) before we left. This is 24 bottles, six apiece for the sixteen days, so we should suffer little pain. The problem was the "chaser". For some reason, the supply of fruit cordials seemed to be concentrated over in the East. At first, we could buy bottles of squash at. shop price from the stations en route. Then they became scarcer, and we had to buy at "peg" price. Then they dried up altogether.

The resourceful M.O. sallied out into a local village with an IAF airman as interpreter, returning with a big bag of fresh limes. We had our mess tins, and the little burner, and plenty of sugar. Water was no problem. We cut the limes up and boiled them. The result was quite creditable: we could enjoy our "Collin's" again in the evenings; the cooled loco boiler water would be fairly sterile, even if the cooling had been done in a "chagal" * hung out of the moving train window.

(Note *: Canvas water-bag, water slowly seeps through, cools by evaporation).

At every long halt, a queue of men would form at the footplate steps with tin kettles, and anything that would serve as a kettle, to "milk" the loco and brew tea. The tap is at the bottom of the steps (might be worth knowing one day); the kindly (always Anglo-Indian) drivers didn't mind; the extra few gallons were neither here nor there at the next water stop. At about the fresh-lime stage, the train ran through the Sind desert and we clocked our best figure on the journey - 132 (F) late one afternoon (cf : "It ain't half hot, Mum !").

The last day on the train came to an end, that night we were to climb the Bolan Pass up to Quetta (I think we were double-headed now). The lime juice had been finished, fruit squash was unobtainable for love or money. Necessity is the mother, etc....... We looked around, there were still a couple of tins of "Carnation" milk.........it didn't taste at all bad, but I can't see it catching on commercially!

In the morning, we thought we'd died and gone to heaven (no, nothing to do with Carew's and tinned milk). Quetta is over 5,000 ft amsl; it is really a Hill Station; the temperature was hardly warmer than the English summers we used to know, and above all it was dry. There is no monsoon there. We were going to enjoy our stay.

All about Samungli next time,

Goodnight, all - (and a special "thanks" to Reader123 for the wonderful link about Pring and the Calcutta air raids; told me much I didn't know).

Danny42C


All in the day's work !

Chugalug2
26th Aug 2012, 09:05
Move over Michael Portillo. Great Railway Journeys?
The spot chosen was Samungli, a small airfield a few miles to the West of Quetta (in Baluchistan), and just about touching the SE Afghan border.... the distance involved was just short of 2,000 miles... I thought that we entrained at Chittagong, but S/Ldr Thomas says Dohazari
Now that's a Great Railway Journey! One wonders though how strategically necessary it was to move these 'assets' such a great distance, at such great time and cost, not least of all in lives, as it tragically transpired. But perhaps I pre-empt your revealing that very explanation Danny, in which case I'll consider myself deservedly chastised.
The advantages of steam power are many and various, but supreme amongst those must be the ease of having a "brew up", of whatever nature. Yours, I suspect, removed all pain and ensured that the sixteen days passed for the most part in good cheer. Such a journey graphically illustrates the huge distances in what was still the Jewel in the Crown of the British Empire, but saving it from the Japanese ironically hastened its removal from the British as well. Funny old world...

fredjhh
26th Aug 2012, 16:28
To Danny42C

Never lose touch with Pprune. Re-joining has driven me up the wall.
I stopped regular communications when I finished my flying training but certain other points caught my eye and I answered them, still fascinated by the whole theme.
Then the fate that struck Reg and Cliff hit me at the end of April and, when the Doctors said they could do nothing for me, Leucaemia, non-smoker, etc.
two or three months seems a very short time to get on with your affairs.
Just returned home from two weeks away in a "Home" to give my familly break.
Communications will end abruptly. Will send my home address privately to Danny.
Fredjhh

Danny42C
26th Aug 2012, 17:27
Fred,

Please don't talk about apologies !

I know how the entire readership of "our" Thread will be as saddened as I am by your news. Quoting loosely from a past Post (about Bomber Command on 'ops'): "We'd all got tickets booked to the same destination, it was just that some chaps had taken an earlier train". We, the dwindling little band of wartime survivors, all hold those tickets now and we know it.

Please Post still, but only if and when you feel up to it.

I'll P.M. you at once with my address and phone number, and wait.

God bless you,

Danny.

Chugalug2
26th Aug 2012, 17:55
Fred, Danny has spoken for us all, authors (like you) and readers. I can but add my sadness at reading your message. How typical though of your courage to post it (and to have a moan about PPRuNe in doing so :-). Everyone will I am sure be thinking of you and praying for you. Again, as Danny said, God Bless You.
Chug

Danny42C
26th Aug 2012, 19:22
Chugalug,

By no means should you be chastised ! As things turned out, it would have been better (and infinitely cheaper) to disband 8 Sqn when VV ops ended in summer '44, scrap the aircraft and disperse the crews, then reform it in the November as a new Spitfire XIV unit with new pilots. But you never know, perhaps it might be a good idea to hang on a bit just in case ! (Something like that may have been in the mind of AHQ Delhi - perish the thought of a simple cock-up !)

Yes, the old steam engine had a lot going for it; Indian Railways stayed steam-hauled for many years after the war. As for the Jewel in the Crown, it was pretty well the whole thing, I have read that the Crown ruled directly over more subjects in India than in the rest of the Empire put together (but I cannot quote a source). It had its own department of State (the India Office), whereas all the rest were lumped together in the Colonial Office. The Viceroy was the plum political appointment of the day: out there he was God for all practical purposes and ruled in appropriate splendour.

When would Indepedence have come had there been no war ? And under what circumstances ? Could Partition have been avoided ? Those are some of the most tantalising questions of 20th century history: now they must for ever remain unanswered.

Terribly sad about Fred, hope my reply was adequate.

Danny.

Taphappy
27th Aug 2012, 13:31
fredjhh

So sorry to hear your news.
As a fairly recent contributer to this thread I had read all your posts with great interest and in company with Reg, Cliff and now Danny you have kept this thread alive with your riveting stories. My thoughts and prayers are with you at this time.

John

Bushfiva
27th Aug 2012, 13:48
fredjhh, you are among friends.

Tabby Badger
27th Aug 2012, 14:33
Fred,

After 25 years of service I thought I knew a lot about RAF history.

Not even close! The personal viewpoint makes a lot of difference.

I thank you, sir.

J Alex

kookabat
27th Aug 2012, 22:23
Fred,
Words never seem enough at times like this - but thank you. For your wartime service, for getting stuck into this thread to tell us about it, and for letting us know your latest news.Our Thoughts and prayers, from all over the world, are with you.

Sincerely,
Adam

Danny42C
28th Aug 2012, 01:08
This is one of those periods when the "Funny Things which Happened On the Way to the Theatre" are more interesting than the show itself. First, Samungli: then a quiet little airfield from which we did hardly any flying (it is now an important PAF base). There was nothing for us to do, and the fact that we were about five inches of boost short at full bore, because of the altitude, meant that a VV would have trouble enough getting off the ground "light". With 1500 lb, it would be problematic - AFAIK, nobody tried. 8 Sqdn. were the only ones on site and, I believe, would stay there until November when they were to be re-equipped with the Spitfire XIV. Meanwhile it would be "dolce far niente", and I was quite partial to that.

Things did not start too well. During our long train journey, I'd taken off my watch and looped the strap round the top of the name card holder frame on my bunk. On arrival at Quetta, in the bustle of packing and getting my kit off, I'd forgotten the watch and got to the end of the platform before I remembered. I raced back - I can't have been away more than a minute. But in India that was more than enough. It was an expensive mistake.

Hardly had I got unpacked and settled in, than I went down with malaria for the second time. I blame the train. It is not practicable to rig up a mossie net on a train bunk, and as the air is in constant motion round a moving train, the mossie has no chance to settle anyway.

But we had been stationary for hours at a time, often at night. Now there are all sorts of malaria, but in our day there were simply two: "Benign Tertian", and "Malign Tertian" (BT & MT). The first is bad, the second worse. BT is usually treatable in SSQ (or even in your own basha). This time I had MT and it put me on my back in a military hospital in Quetta. I honestly thought I'd "had it". (There is also a rare "Cerebral" malaria, with a high mortality rate, and another insect-borne disease: "Dengue" fever, a sort of "Malaria-lite", much milder, which lasts about a week).

When I was on my feet again, the first priority was a new watch. This was not straightforward. They were very scarce, and to ensure that they went only to deserving characters, you had to get a Certificate of Authorisation from a magistrate to begin with. A modest "bung" to the Clerk helped things along, I had my "chitty", and I presented myself at the "West End Watch Company" which had been warmly recommended to me. I spotted a small "military" style "Bijou", very plain, in a massive stainless steel case. It was ticketed at Rs150. That was quite a lot - about five month's salary for an Indian doctor - or a week of my pay. It would be about £12 then, say £600 today.

Well, I thought, I'll start at Rs100 and see how far down we can get (the shop was a cut above a bazaar stall). To my surprise, the salesman wouldn't shift - it was take it or leave it. "What is the world coming to?" I thought, but finally had to capitulate. I had to have a watch - and he knew it. I shelled out the Rs150 with very bad grace. It was about three years before I found I was running around with a Longines on my wrist. It is there yet, and will be with me to the end, I trust.

Quetta was a pleasant place, it was full of military units and a prestigeous Staff College. There was a military open-air swimming pool - a rare treat - with a little stall where they turned out egg-and-tomato sandwiches made in Heaven. An egg is an egg the world over, but those tomatoes...... Luscious, sweet, flavoursome, juicy, paper thin-skinned.....what a contrast with today's supermarket armour-plated offerings, tasteless, bred only to last for ever on the shelf.

At Samungli I had an experience which I am sure has been aired more than once in fiction, but which I can assure you actually happened to me. One of our airmen had been charged with the theft of some welfare stores, it was a serious matter, the case was being considered for Court Martial. I had been detailed to take the Summary of Evidence, which is the necessary preliminary.

I had got my witnesses available and ready to give evidence, I had my chap in front of me, and was obliged by law to ask him whether he required the witnesses at the Summary to give their evidence on oath. In almost every case the accused declines, for this means that any evidence he will give will also be on oath, and he does not wish to add possible perjury to the list of his alleged crimes.

But in this case, the accused did so require - I think he'd been "got at" by some barrack-room lawyer - so I had to find a Bible. I knew where one was, on a shelf in the Orderly Room. I adjourned the proceedings and went to get it. It was a dusty, cheap affair, bound in black cloth, and had seen long service. All the lettering had worn off the cover and spine, but it would do. I riffled the pages. It was a dictionary.

I had a short struggle with my conscience, and my conscience lost. My witnesses all solemnly swore on this dictionary (I took good care to grab it back each time the moment the last words had been spoken). As most of the witnesses contradicted each other, and some were manifestly lying, the result was a bit of a dog's dinner. Higher Authority binned the Summary with some barbed remarks about the quality of its preparation, and the charge was dropped.

I sometimes wonder about the legal implications of my peccadillo. Would such an oath bind in Law ? After all, "mens re" is the thing, isn't it? If the witness believes he is taking the oath, isn't that enough? It's a nice point. Could a charge of perjury stick? And what could I be arraigned on - "Perverting the course of Justice?" - (and then there's always "Conduct Prejudicial !" - "Sacrilege?" (don't you have to have a Consistory Court for that?)

I was all set for a pleasant, not too strenuous autumn. The RAF seemed to have forgotten all about me.

No such luck !

Goodnight, chaps,

Danny42C


No rest for the wicked !

Chugalug2
28th Aug 2012, 07:10
Ah, Danny 42C? Caught up with you at last old chap. I was asked to help forward this Pass to you, though what use one intended for Burma might be to someone now in NW India I have no idea:-
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x199/chugalug2/BurmaPass.jpg

Fareastdriver
28th Aug 2012, 08:46
------and the Japanese will give you even more.

Danny42C
28th Aug 2012, 18:38
Chugalug,

I never cease to marvel at the way you keep pulling these wonderful rabbits out of the hat ! (For the benefit of late joiners to our happy band, here is the relevant excerpt from my #2714 p. 136).

I quote: "It also held leaflets in Burmese, for villagers you might meet and whose help would be vital. In translation they read, so I was told, something like this":

"Dear Friend",

"The bearer of this letter is a British soldier come to save you from the hated Japanese who have caused so much sorrow in your land. If you treat him well, hide him from the Japanese, and help him to reach the British Army, you will be very well rewarded by Government".

This was all very well as far as it went, (and the Burmese were generally well disposed to us, particularly the Naga and Kachin tribes in the north), but I couldn't help feeling that if I floated down in or near a village that we'd just blown off the map, it wouldn't go down too well with "Dear Friend" - always supposing I could find one who could read".

The remarkable thing is - after the survival itself, over 70 years, of one of these leaflets from WWII Burma - how closely my memory of the English text (which I'd never seen - it wouldn't have been on the original, of course) corresponds with the real thing.

I must say, however, how suspicious it looks that sixteen lines of Burmese seem to condense into six lines of English !

I would suppose that unused leaflets would be handed back to the I.O. with the rest of the escape kit, but my stuff would be a bit battered and bloody. I certainly wouldn't have had a leaflet with me in Samungli.

**********************

Fareastdriver,

Too true ! Any aircrew would be straight for the chop. I remember a photograph of the time (taken by a Jap, but which had come into Allied hands somehow - "leaked" ?), which showed a captured Sgt-Pilot kneeling, blindfold, quietly resigned, as a Jap officer "addressed" his target with his Samurai sword much as a golfer addresses his ball before the swing.

Thank you both,

Danny.

Danny42C
30th Aug 2012, 17:03
(Gone quiet all of a sudden, hasn't it ? Let's have it back on its proper place on Page 1...D)

The time frame becomes obscure at this point (I'll try to clear it up later, after a good root round in Wiki), but the sequence of events is clear in my memory.

One afternoon I came back from a swim. "Boss * wants to see you", they said. This was not good news. The only time S/Ldr Sutherland wanted to see anybody was to tear a strip off them. What had I done? Could my subterfuge with the dictionary have come to light? I'd kept my mouth shut, of course, but might the accused or one of the witnesses have called in the Orderly Room and recognised it back on the shelf? It was possible. I tried to construct a defence on my way to Squadron HQ.

(Note * I'm not sure that that expression was current in those days, but it was in everday use in my later RAF service, so I've no hesitation in using it . But "Staish" is entirely foreign to me - so I avoid it.......D).

The Adj pointed to the door without a word. I tapped, went in, snapped to attention and threw up my smartest salute. S/Ldr Sutherland was a man of few words. "Get your kit packed - you're on the morning shuttle (from Quetta) to Delhi. Adj's got your Air Movement Authority, he'll give you all the details, Good luck." "Thank you, Sir" - salute and out !

John had the paperwork on the desk. "What's this all about?"......."You're posted down to Yelahanka"......"What for?"......"Well, you know the Mossies have been grounded for a while?....... I nodded, everybody knew that ...... "How does that affect me?"........."They're setting up a sort of quick conversion course to use the Mossie crews on the Vengeance until they can get the Mossies sorted out"...........This was the daftest idea I'd heard for a long time, but "ours not to reason why"........ "Where do I fit into all this?"........"You'll be an instructor"........."But I'm not a QFI"......."Who checked you out on 'em, then?"......(he had a point there !)... ......"Will Stew Mobsby be coming as well?"......"No - they don't want any Navs or AGs"

"What about my Clearance Certificate?"........."I've sent a lad round with it this afternoon, you only need to pay your Mess Bill"...It was a fait accompli. He produced my high priority air movement, which allowed me to take all my kit with me - an unheard of concession - it amounted to 126 lb (this was a measure of the urgency with which the affair was being conducted).

I said farewell to Stew and the other chaps. The pilots would be kept back, and I think some would stay until the Spitfire XIVs came in (about November). And at that point (according to Bharat Rakshak) all the RAF Navs and Wop/Ags seem to have been cleared out and scattered all over India.

Flying down South (Quetta-Palam-Nagpur-Yelahanka), I thought a bit harder about this short conversion course, and tried to imagine what might have been in the mind of AHQ when they decided on it. Gradually it dawned on me that perhaps it was not as stupid as it first appeared. At that point, the Mossies had all been grounded (full story below), but the reason for their numerous failures had not yet been established with any certainty, and it was by no means out of the question that the fault might be inherent in the materials, design and construction of the aircraft: the things might never be fit for use in SE Asia.

If that proved the case, then the only stopgap for the moment was the recently discarded Vengeance, and it might be a long time before the Allies (who had only been ashore in Europe for three months and had their hands full) could provide another ground-attack type for the Far East. We all know now that victory would come in Europe in eleven months: we did not know it then. (Hitler gambled on a quick summer victory in Russia in '41: he was bogged down in there for four years). We had to plan for the worst-case scenario, the Vengeance might have to soldier on for two or three years more.

Assuming that to be the case, who was going to crew them? Most of the existing crews were still in India now, but many of them would be tour-expired by the end of '44 (this particularly applied to Dominion aircrew who had left their home countries, then done six months' AFU, OTU and general hanging about in the UK before coming out to India). Although they were ready and willing now, we had to plan for the long term; the Mossie crews were just beginning their tours. Better to bite the bullet, it was easy and quick to convert them onto the Vengeance, do it now.

For the same reason, it would make no sense to round up all the original 36 ex-fighter OTU pilots, who had come out at the end of 1942 and were now unemployed, to fly the Spitfire XIV s which were scheduled to come into action in early 1945. They would all be nearly tour-expired by then. It is true that 8 Sqdn. had a large proportion of RAF pilots on their Spitfires, but these were people who had come out much later. Whether they ever achieved their goal of a 100% Indian manned Squadron before Independence, I do not know.

So that was what I was going down to Yelahanka for. I did not promise to be an onerous job. I resolved that they would get the same instruction as I'd had myself eighteen months before. ("Here's the Vultee Pilot's Notes - there's the cockpit, this is the best way to get up to it, we'll go over it together now, this afternoon I'll take you up in the back for half an hour to get the feel of it - then it's all yours - any questions ?"). All they'd need then would be a bombing range, practice bomb racks and bombs, and time.

I had no idea at all about how this "Conversion Course" was organised or who would be running it, and I'd never seen Yelahanka. I did not expect the Mossie pilots to be exactly jumping for joy at the prospect - my heart bled for them, after my own disappointment with the Spitfires the year before, they could jolly well join the Club.

There's plenty more to come !

Evenin' all,

Danny42C


What next ?

Chugalug2
30th Aug 2012, 22:06
Well you kept quiet about that one, Danny! It seems that I was indeed rocking the boat in querying the need for the transfer of the Vengeances and the entire squadron to NE India, for it seems that their Airships were making a very understandable contingency plan should the Mossies have to remain grounded. I promise that I will try to curb my impatience in future and wait for the interlocutor to.. well, locute!
Ah, how many of us have had similar thoughts coursing through our minds when told, "The boss wants to see you"? Having to pack and go at no notice must have seemed like a blessed reprieve compared with the scenario that you had mentally rehearsed.
So off on your travels again on this Cook's Tour of the sub-continent. To Bangalore if Google Maps is to be relied upon, or at least its northern outskirts. The only airfields now at Yelahanka are Yelahanka AFB and Jakkur, but of course neither is necessarily where you are headed for, is it? So I'll wait to find out. See what I did there? I'm just patiently waiting. No problem at all. Quite relaxed. Simply waiting. Easy...

Danny42C
31st Aug 2012, 00:07
Chugalug,

As always, a timely and pertinent comment (caught me with my last cup of cocoa !). Your interlocutor locutes, as follows :-

You were right the first time: (moving us 2,000 miles to no purpose was not a really bright idea). As for our Airships having Contingency Plans - they wouldn't have recognised a Contingency Plan if it bit them on the bum. The whole war out there had been conducted "off the cuff" from the beginning.

This was inevitable: the enemy had the advantage of surprise: "Thrice armed is he that hath his quarrel just - but four times armed is he who gets his smack in fust!" We could only react.

"Events, dear boy" had led us round by the nose, from the time the impregnable Singapore and unsinkable "Prince of Wales" fell to the Japanese version of "Events".

When the Mossies first started to fall apart, the official reaction was: "this isn't really happening, it's just a bad dream, if we close our eyes tight it'll go away". AFAIK, the "reverse-conversion" decision was not taken until mid- October, whereas the Mossies had been claiming lives since May. If the Air Staff had seen the red light then, there would still have been time to "hold" the six VV squadrons in readiness west and south of Calcutta (just in case).

"Contingency Plan" ? Of a sort, I suppose - but made "on the hoof" after disaster had struck them. But isn't hindsight a wonderful thing !

As it turned out all this is acedemic, as will shortly appear. (Oh, it was Yelahanka AFB - and civil airport now, I think)

Goodnight, Danny.

Danny42C
2nd Sep 2012, 02:06
And where were the Vengeances we were going to convert them on? Why hadn't they given me one from 8 Sqdn ? (they'd never do anything more with them until they were scrapped): I could have flown it down myself. Here I've some hazy ideas. In the first place, these were the aircraft that had served through the '43/'44 campaign (In the case of the RAF Squadrons, '42/'43 as well).

They'd had hard use, flying from very rough strips (and had some rough handling !). They'd always been operating in clouds of dust, which couldn't have been doing the engines much good. (Why did our Merlins have to be "tropicalised", while the big American (and British) radials just took it in their stride?) If they've plenty of new VVs on the shelf in Mauripur ( Mk. IIIs) - as it seemed they had - then let's have 'em now.

The four RAF Squadrons, which had operated with the Vengeance in Burma for the past eighteen months, had been scheduled to re-equip with the Mosquito FB VI (with fresh, fully trained crews from the UK), for what would prove to be the last year of the war (although we didn't know it then, of course). From early '44 the aircraft and crews started coming out. The changeover began. (S/Ldr Traill, he who put his aircraft up a banana tree, was on his way to AHQ Delhi to make the final arrangements for the handover of 45 Sqdn when his fatal, unexplained accident happened). At first all was going smoothly. Then disaster struck.

The Mosquito was a brilliant aircraft, and its great selling point was that it was made of wood (almost uniquely among the operational aircraft of the day). This was much cheaper, and in more plentiful supply than aluminium alloy, and employed wood craftsmen for whom there wasn't much other call in the middle of a war. So now is the time to relate the sad story of the Mossies. What was the trouble?

Simply, they started to fall to pieces in mid-air. An aircraft could be flying along, there'd be a rending crash, the two occupants would find themselves a few thousand feet up "without visible means of support", with a cloud of splinters a quarter mile astern and two Merlins hurtling to earth. Most, but not all, managed to get rid of their seats, pulled the ripcord and floated down unhurt.

Examination of the wreckage showed that in most cases the main spar had catastrophically failed; the glues holding the many laminations (which gave it its strength) had let go. The first answer was obvious, the damp, heat, moulds and bacteria in the Far East were responsible; unless a solution were found soon the things were useless out there.

Not every aircraft was affected, but you didn't know which ones until something happened, so all had to be grounded. (One explanation offered somewhere in Bharat-Rakshak, was "White Ants" - and although the little beasties would have devoured the Mossies with pleasure if they could, I can't see them shinning up the main undercarriage or tailwheel assembly to get to the Promised Land).

Then someone drew attention to the fact that 684 (PR) Sqdn in Calcutta had been flying Mossies (Mks. II,VI,IX, & XVI) since September '43, and theirs hadn't been falling apart - yet. Clearly there must be something different about the later production aircraft - but what?

The best brains in the industry laboured night and day on the problem. There may have been considerable political pressure applied, for a fortunate coincidence may have worked in our favour. 684 Sqdn had a pilot, F/O Robin Sinclair, on strength and he had a friend at Court. Daddy was Sir Archibald Sinclair, the Secretary of State for Air in the War Cabinet. (How the wires must have hummed!)

Finally, careful analysis of the glue recovered from the wrecks revealed that some of the stuff was sub-standard, (A scurrilous story going the rounds was that some sub-sub-sub contractor had been found using wallpaper paste, but I place no credence on that). Quality Control was improved and the next batches of aircraft stuck together and did sterling work, climate or no climate, until the end of the war.

My Record of Service shows that I went down to Yelahanka on October 25th, and when I got there, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and ready to go, I was told (not for the first time): "That was Yesterday - It's All Been Changed !" They'd just "Found Out the Cause of the Bother"; the quick-conversion idea was out of the window (to the enormous relief of the Mossie crews, who'd regarded it with the utmost horror); I was out of a job, on strength of SHQ Yelahanka, for 8 Sqn. had no interest in taking me back.

Bit of an anti-climax !

Goodnight, all,

Danny42C


It's just one damn' thing after another.