Gaining An R.A.F Pilots Brevet In WW II

[Wiley]

WOP/AG Peter Jensen. Instalment 5

On August 12 1942, the squadron had its first loss and of all people, it was the commanding officer, Halliday. The night before, we were on an op. and the WOP picked up an SOS. This was received by Group, who ordered out a search kite from 461. Halliday took off – he was the most experienced pilot and had once landed on the open sea. This time he was not so lucky and when they found the crew of the ditched aircraft in their dinghy, he attempted to land, but pranged and all the crew died except the navigator, who survived in a dinghy for five days before being rescued.

The flight commander, Colin Lovelock, took over the squadron. More recruits arrived and crews were re-arranged. Dudley Marrows became a captain and I moved to his crew as No. 2 WOP. No. 1 was a WOM from the RAF, Larry Donnelly. On 16th September, the squadron moved to Poole in Dorset.

My first flight with Bertie Smith was on 26th July, a training flight for 1 hour 10 minutes. The next flight was on 27th July, my first op., which lasted 12 hours 35 minutes. I flew 14 ops with Smith, then transferred to Dudley Marrows on 7th November and flew my first op. with him on 20th November after 12 training flights.

Life settled down to regular flying duties, mostly anti-submarine patrols over the Bay of Biscay or convoy escorts over the Atlantic, occasionally air-sea rescue searches. These became routine and nothing very exciting happened apart from an occasional sighting of an unidentified aircraft – when we ducked into the nearest cloud.

Early in January 1943, I was posted to a town called Chipping Sodbury where Parnalls had a factory producing Frazer Nash turrets, the type fitted to Sunderlands. Here I was taught the intricacies of the turrets. The course lasted only a week, but it was worth the effort.

Back to the squadron and the old routine until 17t March when I was posted to the Central Gunnery School at Sutton Bridge to do a Gunnery Leader’s Course to last two weeks. I turned up there with about 15 others, (can’t remember exactly), mainly from bomber squadrons, the intention being that we would return to our squadrons to be appointed squadron gunnery leaders. Here we were to fly in old Mk Ic Wellington bombers, with Spitfires to provide fighter affiliation.

The day we arrived we were given billets outside the station. I was billeted with a local vicar with a Canadian by the name of Town – can’t remember his Christian name. The next day, we were assembled in a room and the course explained to us. We were also harangued about safety procedures – they hadn’t had a fatal accident for six months and they intended to keep it that way. Anyone not observing correct procedures would be in trouble! We went to the parachute section and were given a combination parachute and Mae West all in one. I have never seen these before or since. Each one was numbered and we had to sign for the one we received. When I had advanced in the queue to be three from its head, the sergeant handing out the parachutes came to number 13 and he said: “No one wants that one,” and was about to throw it back when I said: “I’ll have it.” He gave me a queer look, but gave it to me and I signed.

We went out to the tarmac, where the Wellingtons (known as ‘Wimpies’), were lined up. We were split into fours and allocated an aircraft, which we boarded.

To board a Wimpy, you entered from underneath and climbed up into the aircraft through the second pilot’s position. When everyone was in, a piece of board was put down over the hole and that was the seat for the second pilot. A couple of ‘stirrups’ folded out from the sides of the hole for footrests.

The four gunners on my aircraft were distributed – one in the navigator’s position, one at the wireless, one in the crash position (at the main spar of the wing) and one (me) in the second pilot’s position.

It was a cloudy day, with a low cloud base (about 800 feet). We took off and climbed above cloud into sunshine, then an engine coughed and stopped. I wasn’t too worried – we couldn’t be far from base; surely we could return OK. We dropped down into cloud, then out and below. The first thing I saw were high tension cables in front of us. We missed them – (I don’t know if we went over or under them; I must have closed my eyes). I looked around - no airstrips; only fields, trees, then open countryside. All this time, the pilot had been talking on R/T, but unlike the Sunderland, this did not go through the intercom, so we didn’t know what he was saying to base.

I was still not too concerned and was watching how he was handling the aircraft. I noted he had seven pounds of boost on the good engine, (which was the maximum it could take), and he seemed to be calm. Suddenly he switched over to intercom and said to everyone: “Take your crash positions”, and I saw that we were only a few feet from the ground and heading for an earth wall higher than we were. (I found out later that we were over an old tidal swamp that had been walled in.) I knew that I didn’t have time to get to the crash position, so I braced myself, put my right hand on the windscreen and watched the wall coming towards us and silently called on the pilot to pull back on the stick to get us over the wall. He was a good pilot – he kept calm, held the aircraft down to keep flying speed, then at the last split second, pulled the nose up and got the nose over the wall. The middle of the fuselage hit the top of the wall and broke its back, then ploughed into the earth with a sickening ‘SCRUNCH’.

I was thrown into the windscreen, then dropped down to the bottom of the aircraft in an upright position as it skated along the earth. I remember seeing my legs being mangled amongst the geodetic structure of the fuselage – (the body was built of metal lattice covered in fabric) – and desperately trying to find a hand hold to pull myself out. After a surprisingly long time, the aircraft came to a halt and I was relieved to find I was still alive. However, my relief was short-lived, as I heard what sounded like crackers going off. I looked around and saw that the aircraft was on fire and the ammunition in the turrets was exploding.

I tried to free my legs from the wreckage, but they were totally pinned down. I looked around and where the aircraft had split open, I could see the pilot walking away. Stupidly, I said to myself: “It must have been a good landing.” (There is a saying in the Air Force: ‘Any landing that you can walk away from is a good landing.’) The pilot looked back, saw me, and ran back and started pulling the wreckage off my legs. I thought to myself: “I bet he pulls my right leg. If he does, it will come off.” Sure enough, he grabbed my right leg. I tried to stop him with my hand. He then grabbed my arm and pulled me clear of the wreck. Two other men came running up, grabbed my arms and dragged me about 50 or 60 feet clear of the burning aircraft, then raced back with the pilot to try to rescue the others on board.

I tried to crawl further from the aircraft, knowing that the tanks could explode at any second. But somehow, my limbs didn’t seem to want to work. I pulled my helmet off and ran my fingers over my head. A finger slipped into a hole in the top of my head – I pulled it out quickly.

A short time later, the pilot and the two good Samaritans came back and took me further away from the aircraft and made me comfortable with the help of a couple of overcoats. (I was shaking from head to foot with shock.) Apparently, the two rescuers were St John Ambulance men who just happened to be cycling past as we pranged.

They checked me over and told me no bones were broken, but I had concussion and lots of bruising and contusions – a bruise covered the whole inside of my right arm – and would I like a shot of morphia? I said no thanks. After some time, (maybe half an hour), the RAF Ambulance arrived. Apparently, they had got lost. The M.O. came up to me, took one look and produced an hypodermic. One of the St John men said: “He doesn’t want morphia.” The M.O. said: “We tell these blokes what they want or don’t want.” and rammed the needle into my arm. Well! I have never felt such a feeling of wellbeing as at that moment – the pain disappeared, the shaking stopped and I felt at peace with the world. Someone produced a cup of tea which I enjoyed immensely.

It seemed that of the other three gunners, one was killed – (he was in the crash position, where I should have been with him) – one had a broken back, and one, like me, had concussion etc. They started loading us on to the ambulance, and I heard the M.O. say to the pilot: “You had better come too, for a check-up.” The pilot looked at his watch and said: “No, I’ve got to get back to the station. Otherwise, I’ll miss out on lunch.” I thought: what a good idea. I started to get to my feet, saying: “I’ll come with you.” But was pushed back on the stretcher by someone saying: “You’ll come with us.” So the three of us ended up in Ely Hospital.