Memoirs of a WW2 Typhoon pilot -part 5
The deliberate mistake in part 4 was that the town of Windsor Mills (it is just called Windsor now) is actually to the east of Montreal, and not the west. You can see the remains of the old airfield on Google Earth.
Cliff, thanks for posting the picture of the "hooded" Tiger Moth. I hope to be able to post a picture of the Fleet Finches soon.
Pete's story continues...
After my initial couple of flights I found that I had a serious problem. I could not keep the aircraft straight on takeoff. The machine would start to swing off to one side and I would correct with the rudder, only to find that I had overcorrected and we were now swinging the other way! I did not seem to be able to overcome this. Fortunately Sgt. Farrell was a very good instructor and came up with the answer. On arriving at the flight line for my third or fourth flight he told me to take my boots off and leave them on the ground beside the plane. I was somewhat confused by this, but, being a dutiful airman I did as I was told. Lo and behold, when I took off with just socks on my feet I kept dead straight! It was obvious to him that I could not feel the rudder bar through my thick soled issue boots. From then on I flew in plimsoles at first, then shoes and later back into boots. I never had trouble again keeping straight on take off, even much later when I was flying aircraft with very powerful engines which gave very marked swing on takeoff.
Finally, on May 7th 1942, after 7 hours and 40 minutes dual instruction I made my first solo flight. Any pilot will tell you that there is no other feeling quite like it. The thrill of opening up the throttle with no familiar head showing in the front cockpit and the exhilaration of becoming airborne, knowing that you were in sole charge of this machine, was tempered by the slight apprehension at the knowledge that you still have to get the thing safely back on the ground again! Fortunately my landing was very good. Later on I found that this was not unusual for a first solo when one is keyed up and concentrating hard. It is a few hours flying time later on that the bumpy and sloppy landings occur, when the pilot feels that he knows it all and becomes over confident.
We worked a more or less straight eight hour day finishing at 5 pm unless night flying was scheduled. This meant that we had plenty of free time to enjoy the Canadian hospitality. This was rather odd in that we were in the middle of Quebec which was mainly French speaking. Due partly to the fact that the French section of the community felt that they had been let down by the British, and partly due to some internal politics which we found hard to understand, there was a certain amount of anti-British feeling so we found that we were totally ignored in the local village, treated politely but distantly in Windsor Mills, but were warmly welcomed in Sherbrooke.
On the camp there was a services canteen run by local Sherbrooke volunteers and three of us became friendly with one of the girls who worked there who was the daughter of a Sherbrooke bank manager. We met her family and the three of us became more or less their adopted sons whilst we were in Canada. Even after we left and were posted to St.Hubert just outside Montreal, we would travel down to spend the weekends with them. Mr and Mrs Mutchler certainly made us royally welcome and I remember that, when I left Canada, I wrote them a letter and signed it 'Your erstwhile protégé'. The only ways of getting to Sherbrooke were either by train, very much a local line with few trains and many stops, or by taxi. Usually six of us would club together to take a taxi and thus we got to know some of the local taxi drivers quite well. I remember one who drove a large Buick with an eight note horn on which he played tunes as we roared through the countryside. His favourite being 'D'ye ken John Peel'.
It was during this free time that most of us discovered how different Canada, especially Quebec, was from the U.K. The most noticeable from our point of view were the beer bars. Women were not allowed in, the 'counter' looked more like a bank than a bar, with a wire grille along the front, and there were a few tables, each with a shaker of sugar which was used to 'de-gassify' the very fizzy beer. We were a bit young to have a nostalgic feeling for the good old English pub! This was in 1942 when most of us had never been abroad before, did not know how to drive a car, and were, by present day standards, extremely unsophisticated. Some of the food was also unfamiliar. For instance, it was the first time most of us had seen sweet corn. Some of the lads from country environments refused to eat it since they looked on it as chicken food! None of us had ever seen a Juke Box before although these soon became familiar and we spent hours listening to the latest records - the most popular being the Glenn Miller orchestra. One tune in particular still brings back those memories when I hear it. It is still played quite often even today, and that is 'String of Pearls'. I think we must have worn out several copies of that particular record.
Even the English language had different meanings! What we called the pavement was called the sidewalk and the word pavement meant the road surface. I recall one chap making a very bad 'faux pas' when he said to a young lady, whom he had arranged to meet early in the morning for a day together, that he would "knock her up" at 7.30. It was, he quickly found out, slang for something very different!! However the Canadians were very tolerant of our weird behavior and, all in all, we were treated most kindly. In common with most service men abroad in a strange environment for the first time, we tended to drink too much and sometimes behave irresponsibly. Luckily Leigh Woodbridge, my friend from 'civvy' days, and I, were taken under the wing of the Mutchlers and always knew we had a welcome there so we had no need to seek out other entertainment which might have landed us in trouble.
More soon...