A Spitfire Pilot - Part 25
72 Sqn –A Bounce, A party and A Tale of Two Spits
Anyway on one of the early sweeps that Bob Oxspring took us on, we were jumped over Dieppe, and got split up a bit. Bob was flying with his number 2 and I had mine, not George this time, and as we were coming back over France a 190 shot down in front of us and Bob told me to have a go at it and he would stay up top and give cover. Well, that suited me, because we were half way across the Channel by then, in a good position, and I had a bounce, so down I went. Now the 190 was going like the clappers, as they always do, so instead of following him right down, I pulled out so that when he eventually straightened out, as he had to, lower down, I’d be that much nearer. Everything was going like clockwork, until I suddenly heard a hell of a great bang in my ear. Naturally I thought the other 190 had got in behind me and let fly, so without pausing, without time to read a book or think, I yanked back on the stick and gave it full right rudder and hoped for the best. I was down to about 5000’ then. When I came to, I was somewhere about 12,000’, on my own, not another aircraft in sight, and the aircraft felt a bit strange. Well there was nothing left to do, so I ambled home, but on the way back over our coast I was looking at the wings and I thought ‘Well I don’t remember them being like, that, it must be me.’
The centre of the wing, by the cannon, seemed to have a slight bump in it, but I thought, well it must have been there before and I hadn’t noticed it. It was a bit rough to fly and I imagined that one of the trim-tabs had been torn off the wing or the aileron and that was the reason for it flying a bit left wing low. Well I got back to Biggin and it landed a bit faster than it normally did, but I got down alright and I taxied back to the dispersal and as I got out, Jack Hilton came over to have a word with me and without turning round and having a look at the aircraft, I told him that I thought some of the trim had come off and would he have a look at it, because it was flying a bit lop-sided. OK he said and that was that.
So I got back to the dispersal and was chatting with Bob Oxspring and Co. and Jack Hilton came over, he said.
“Robbie, I’ve brought your aircraft over for you”
I said, “Oh, Yeah?”
He’d parked it right outside, right next to the CO’s aircraft. As you know the Spit has a certain amount of dihedral. Well they’d parked my aircraft, as I say, next to the CO’s and the difference was quite alarming. I’d doubled the dihedral at least, the wingroots had come away, and the bolts were showing on the underside, and it was also buckled from the cannon outwards, consequently it was a sort of gull-wing effect.
Now in those days we were flying with the old type hoods which had a flat side and a knock-out panel which was kept in by split-pins. The idea being that if the windscreen misted over, you knocked out the panel and had clear vision. Now what had happened to me was that the wind had got under the panel and ripped it off, and the resulting noise, was, I thought, the chap shooting at me.
I came in for a fair bit of stick from the rest of the pilots who said,
“Don’t make a noise or Robbie will bale out!. Don’t slam the door or Robbie will do something dreadful!” and it went on like that for ages.
I had to write a long report for Farnborough because I think it was about the first time someone had only half-pulled the wings off a Spit and got away with it.
Anyway, the ATA (Air Transport Auxiliary, the civilian operation that delivered and returned aircraft from factory to squadron, often flown by women.) brought in another nice new aircraft for me and had the squadron letters put on and the signwriter put “Connie” on the side as usual and I tested it and all was well.
Then we had a party for the 900th Hun to be shot down from the Biggin Hill Sector, and I’d arranged for Mum to come down and spend the night in Bromley and I’d pick her up in the car, take her to the Mess, when it was all over, run her back to Bromley. At that time, as you’ll appreciate, there were two aircraft on the squadron, both with RN-H and both with “Connie” written on them. Anyway, I was most anxious to introduce Mum to all the chaps on the squadron who hadn’t met her and we arrived at the mess and I proudly introduced her to “Timber”, who by this time was three parts under. He was a tall lad and he leant over Mum after I’d introduced her and instead of saying something nice such as how nice to see you, what a nice bloke you’ve got, he just stared at her and said,
“So it’s your bloody name we’ve got on half the bloody aircraft in the squadron!” Mum, as you can imagine, was somewhat embarrassed.
Anyway, it was a good do and later on I took Mum back to Bromley, despite the entreaties of “Timber” and Hugo Armstrong, who decided it would be a great thing if we could get Mum to stay in one of the rooms occupied by a WAAF and the WAAF would move out and I would move in, but we didn’t really fall in for that idea.
Apart from coming down for the party, Mum used to come down from London of an evening and we’d arrive at The White Hart or another place in Bromley, meet the chaps, have a few beers and Mum would catch the last train back to London and I would go back to Biggin. But being close to London, Biggin was a great place to be.
I said the Germans weren’t very early risers, but once when I was on dawn readiness with Johnny Lowe, we got told to scramble as there were two bogies over Dover somewhere. So we took off about 7 o’clock in the morning, it was a beautiful day and the sun was as bright as anything, but unfortunately the vector they sent us on meant we flew straight up into the sun and we literally couldn’t see a thing, so we had to jink from side to side and pray that we’d see the Jerries before they saw us, which was highly unlikely in view of their position. Anyway we were flying about 200 yards apart and I suddenly saw silver streaks going down towards Johnny Lowe, so I yelled at him to break, which he did and the first 190 that was having a go at him, shot past and straight out onto the Channel and away and the second one dived down, came up behind him and I, by this time, had turned in towards Johnny and I thought this was a great chance, we might get something down over our coast.
But immediately the 190 saw me coming, Johnny by this time was obviously going away, he did a half roll, got down to ground level and went home like a bat out of hell. Well I poured on everything but I couldn’t get anywhere near him so I didn’t even get a shot at him.