A Spitfire Pilot. Part 5.
When we did solo aerobatics we were told to get as far away from the aerodrome as possible, go up to about 5000’ and then sort of more or less do what you like. I used to love doing slow rolls, but on one occasion I got the aircraft to the top of the slow roll and for some reason or another it would neither go up nor down, it sort of floated half on its back and half on its side and no matter what I did, nothing seemed to happen. So I took my hands and feet off, which is the normal thing, I’m told, if you’re in trouble in a Moth and you’ve got sufficient height. The thing eventually righted itself and I came home.
What with one thing and another life was really beautiful at Brough. The weather was becoming reasonable, we got a fair amount of flying in, the only snag being Hull was being bombed fairly regularly and consequently we’d spend one night in the aerodrome and one night away at some church hall where they’d fixed up umpteen camp beds. The church hall was at Beverley, a few miles from Brough and we used to get taken there by coaches and picked up again in the morning. Now one or two of the chaps had cars and consequently we used to pile into the cars, go and spend an evening in Hull, then, instead of going back to Beverley, we’d go back to the aerodrome and creep into our rooms. Of course by this time several of us had rooms on our own. This was OK until one morning the coach driver arrived at Beverely about half past seven in the morning, sat there waiting for the coach to be filled up, nothing happened. Went into the church hall to find not a soul had stayed there overnight. Consequently he came back, raised Cain and things got a bit naughty after that. Anyway, it was no great hassle, there was quite a nice little pub, near the church hall so we used to spend most of our time in there, creeping back just in time for the coach to pick us up in the morning.
I only had one fairly unfortunate experience at Brough but it turned out all right in the end. As I mentioned previously, one boundary, the northern end of the aerodrome, had the railway running along and the southern boundary was the River Humber and we’d always been told, whatever we do, don’t land in the Humber, ‘cos it flows like the clappers and there’s little chance of getting you out, which isn’t much help if you happen to finish up in the Humber. Anyway on this particular occasion I was taking off from the railway end towards the Humber and I’d just got up and the engine cut. So I shoved the aircraft down and landed, finished up pretty near the fence at the far end and as the engine was stone dead, I just sat there. Up came a Flying Officer, who was one of the other instructors, asking me what had happened. I explained to him and he said
“Ah, well, we’ll try again”
So they got some lads, swung the prop, engine started and back I went. Got to the far end, turned round, took off again. I’d only got about 100’ when the engine cut again, so once more I pushed it down and when I’d finished my landing run I must have been within about 3’ of the perimeter fence. They then decided that maybe there was something wrong with the aircraft so they had it pushed back to the hangars and the blokes worked on it. I never found out what happened and what caused it, but at least I was alright, so I couldn’t care less.
We’d now got to the end of the course and all that mattered was where were we going to be posted. I went down to the mess for dinner with some of my chums and there was a notice-board with lists of who was going where and I was delighted to find that I’d been put down for day fighters. I was more than chuffed. Sergeant Ellis, who happened to be wandering around there, came up and patted me on the back and said,
“Right, Robbie, the next time I see you, I want to see that top button undone.”
As you know, the hallmark of Fighter Command pilots was the top button of their uniform undone. It was a bit of a line-shoot, but it made for a feeling of pride and that extra bit of confidence, which is always useful.