A Spitfire Pilot. Part 11.
First operational posting – 111 Sqn, North Weald – October 1941
The postings came through and I found that I’d been posted to 111 Sqn at North Weald, which was absolutely ideal for me, being not far from Woodford, where Mum was living.
During the leave we did our usual trip or two up to London and on one occasion we went up to the Queen’s Brasserie with several Australian chaps who were in the flight I had just left at Hawarden and had a very pleasant evening. A few beers here and there and tipping the waiter each time he brought a round and finally, when we were just going, one of the Australians tipped the waiter who, for some reason or another, turned round and said,
“Do you think that is sufficient, sir?”
Now as we had been tipping him all evening, the Australians took a pretty dim view of this, so one of the chaps said to the waiter,
“Well how much did we give you?”
So the waiter held his hand out with the money in it, so the Australian took the money back, picked him up and shook him and mentioned quietly that he was very lucky to be in one piece, and with that we left.
At the end of the leave, I got my gear together and said goodbye to Mum, as I didn’t know how long it would be before I would see her again, and went off to North Weald. Now when I arrived there, they were a nice bunch and flying had finished for the day so they took me into the Mess, had a nice meal and a couple of beers and chatted for a while and then as I wasn’t operational, they said, well you don’t have to stay the night if you don’t want to. So I said, right, jumped out of North Weald aerodrome, hitch-hiked back to Woodford, spent the night with Mum, got up at crack of dawn, walked up to the top of the road, by the church in the High Road (All Saints Church, Woodford Green, where my mother and father eventually married in June 1943)and hitch-hiked a lift with a builders lorry, which took me as far as Epping and I hitch-hiked again to North Weald, got there about half past eight and all was well. No one worried whether I was there or not.
I was taken down to the dispersal that morning and met the CO, a Squadron Leader Brotches, a little tiny man, but very, very pleasant; he’d been in the B of B and a very good leader, so I’d heard. We chatted, he asked me what I’d done on Spits and said,
“Ah, we’ve got a funeral tomorrow morning, you can be part of the funerals escort.”
Apparently some chap had been shot up, landed badly, and killed himself at North Weald, so he was being buried not too far from North Weald, but quite where I don’t know and that was my first experience of being on an operational station.
I was put in an aircraft and told to fully acquaint myself with the local area. Now I would have thought that someone would have come with me on the first trip and showed me the various points, but no, they just said take the aircraft up, have a look round and find out where you are, which I did. I flew all round Essex, up and down, looked at the coast, saw the Blackwater, tootled round, came back and then sat!
My first operational trip with 111 was a convoy patrol just off the East Coast. Before that I’d done about ten hours flying, a couple of cannon tests and formation flying and on this convoy patrol, I felt quite big, sitting in the aircraft, knowing that the guns were fully loaded and I was in charge. But in fact nothing happened at all, I just followed my No.1, ambled up and down the convoy, thinking any minute now we were going to be attacked by hundreds of 109s, and swivelling round and round and looking everywhere. In fact nothing happened at all, so for an hour and a quarter we stooged up and down the North Sea and then got called back. But a least I felt I was getting somewhere and it was quite a nice sensation.
Now the first time I went across to France it was October 20th and I’d been with 111 a fortnight then. We had to do a sweep to Dunkirk, which I see took and hour and fifty minutes, which seems an awful lot. There were a number of Czech pilots on 111 and I was flying behind one, whose name I must admit I’ve forgotten and I was on this sweep. I was told to just stick with him and to do everything he did and to keep an eye out for enemy aircraft. Well they could have flown up and down and across me for all I knew, I had my work cut out trying to hang on to this Czech pilot, but I just hoped that he knew more about it than I did, and if anything came up he’d look after me. But I must admit I felt somewhat vulnerable being the other side of Dunkirk and actually being over France. It’s not so bad when you’re over the Channel, because you think, well, if you’re shot down you‘ve got a very fair chance of being picked up and brought back, but over France it wasn’t so funny. Now as it happens, I’ve got a note in my log book, which says “No flak, no 109s.” It doesn’t alter the fact that your stomach still turns over and your nerves are still twitching just flying over there.
Out of circulation for a few days, more excerpts at the end of the week. JF