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

[Danny42C]

Danny starts flying again, but not for long, and becomes a Gentleman of Leisure.

The die was cast. I went straight up to Finningley for a refresher Course. My instructor was a P2 Lamont (= F/Sgt - the short-lived "four-star-brandy" rank system had come into effect for aircrew SNCOs). A few hours on a Harvard and it was if I'd never been away. (It's true, it's like riding a bike, you don't forget). One day I went up for half-an-hour's solo aerobatics. Rusty after three years out of the cockpit and grossly overconfident, I tried an upward roll. I ended up stuck vertically with zero on the ASI (the only time I've ever seen that in the air !), the engine stalled and the prop stopped. I was too slow even to stall-turn out.

I closed the throttle, turned the stick loose and left the aircraft to look after itself. This it did, tail-sliding for a moment and then tumbling out untidily into a dive. Speed came back, prop windmilled, engine restarted and normal service was resumed. When I got down, it struck me how closely my predicament had resembled the hoary old "Line to End All Lines". (From memory, it went: "There a' was, upside down, hangin' in me straps, fcuk-all on the clock but the maker's name, stick hard over, spinnin' like hell - and still climbin' " - but there are other versions).

Then back onto the Spitfire again. These were Mk. XVIs, which as everybody knows are Mk. IXs (the best of all the Merlin Spits) but fitted with the General Motors licence-built Merlin 266s (the "Packard Merlins"). These engines were every bit as good as the original. The Spits were just as nice as I remembered, more powerful, heavier and less "floaty", but still quite as delightful to fly. I had about 15 hours on them at Finningley, and 10 on the Harvard.

The next step would be to convert me onto these new-fangled jet things. But there was only one conversion school (Driffield) and quite a backlog for it. My pencilled-in date was February 1950: it was now mid-August 1949. And now they hadn't got the wartime gaggle of Transit Camps any more. They reached a solution agreeable to all parties: "Go home on indefinite leave on full pay plus ration allowance. We'll call you when we're ready."

This is a "bit of all right", I thought. We were living in Heswall (Wirral) now. Hoylake was just up the road, they had a lake and a sailing club with "Fireflies", a small Lido and Hilbre Island to go out to. (RAF West Kirkby, where I'd been incarcerated on arrival at Liverpool, is not far away). On full pay (even if there wasn't much of it) and ration allowance, and no Mess Bills to pay, I could live the life of Reilly.

And there was a girl in Hoylake .......... Paddy, where are you now ?

G'day, mates,

Danny42C.


You can't lose 'em all !