Wensleydale,
Following your recommendation on #4 on "8 Sqn Query !" Thread, I bought the book - wonderful story and good value at (£1.87 + £2.80 postage !) Condition advertised as "Used - Good", but in fact mint with dust jacket - but I think I got the very last one at that price. Thanks for the steer !
Chugalug will be amused by this excerpt from p.44, as it bears out what he has told us about the pre-CRM days on the flight deck. Our hero has been posted to Dishforth on Hastings........
"...My crew status was second pilot, a misnomer if ever there was one. The second pilot had to lower and raise the undercarriage and flaps when told by the Captain, and, when instructed, turn the pitot heater on and off: absolutely nothing else - no landings, no take-offs, no taxying - the aircraft was in effect being operated by a single pilot and the passengers were one heartbeat from death. Had the Captain died, and most of them looked so old that they looked pretty close to it, I doubt if I could have landed and retained control of the aircraft. The aircraft was very big with four huge Bristol Centaurus sleeve valve engines and it was a tail dragger; if the worst happened, I hoped my four hours on Chipmunks with Flight Lieutenant Peile at the Cambridge University Air Squadron would prove a help...
Later on one of his Squadron COs was a Sqn.Ldr. "Sid" Walker - I'm sure he was a Flt.Lt. with me on 20 Sqdn in '51, and later made Wg.Cdr. IIRC.
Danny.