So interesting....
No need to say "Keep it up " with your record, Wiley, but it is so interesting to read of what I went through but in so different a way and to such a different set of rules. It was interesting to see how the Aussies came first when previous education came into it and I would say that this leadership quality was reproduced when it came to nationalities on the Squadrons. Certainly the first Mosquito Squadron to be formed in the R.A.F. had an Australian Station Commander, "Groupie Kyle, later Sir Wallace, and of course the venerated "Hughie " Edwards V.C. D.S.O. D.F.C. etc as Squadron Commander and later, the Governor of Western Autralia. There were also Australian Flight Commanders such as Bill Blessing . I remember several Canadian Pilots and it is true that there were many New Zealander Observers as we called them in those days ( They sported the Flying keyhole to use an euphism ! ). In my own training at I.T.W. it was always the Scots who surpassed everybody in the more celebral of the courses such as Maths, Navigation etc. I remember that there seemed to be a preponderance of "Geordies " and Canadian Air gunners and Irish W/op A.G's. Possibly the Geordie strain might have come from the traditional stature of mining communities but the rest ? Apropos that, the W/Op. A.G., in the later stages i.e. 1943 onwards, of the Bomber Command offensive , very rarely, if ever, fired a gun in anger as the nose gun was taken out as superfluous in Lancs. and Halifaxes. There was, but not often seen, a category of pure W/op.who had not received any gunnery training. Thanks a lot for an extremely interesting story and I wonder what "Health and Safety " would make of the training today ?