Brigadier Bob Carr
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Brigadier Bob Carr
Brigadier Bob Carr, who has died aged 93, was among a small number of soldiers to be awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross during the Second World War.
Obituary here:
Brigadier Bob Carr - Telegraph
There's an account here:
BBC - WW2 People's War - Italy
"He had been flying over some territory, which our army was advancing over, led by The Sixth Armoured Division in their Shermans. He was directing his guns on to targets the regiment gave him, when in making a turn at the eastern end of the salient he noticed some Tiger tanks working their way around The Sixth. He had no direct link with The Sixth, so he noted position, speed and direction, wrote it on a note, which he put in a message bag and flew over the tanks to get their attention. Knowing his methods I think they probably thought he was in the tanks with them.
Sure that they knew he was there, he threw the message bag down to them and then watched as one of them drove right up to it and stopped. Then another backed up to it, two more formed up in either side to box it in and then a bloke leaped out of one of them, grabbed the bag and dived back inside. He watched as they sorted out his message, turned east and went tiger hunting.
A few days later a Sixth Armoured div jeep rolled up at our strip. A major jumped out with our message bag in his hand and went up to The Captain.
‘I say old chap, is this yours?’ he asked.
They spent the next ten minutes or so drinking tea and sorting out radio wavelengths. After that I think it became a regular thing for the Armour to ask for an Auster when they were moving forward and as far as I know it was a sound arrangement."
Obituary here:
Brigadier Bob Carr - Telegraph
There's an account here:
BBC - WW2 People's War - Italy
"He had been flying over some territory, which our army was advancing over, led by The Sixth Armoured Division in their Shermans. He was directing his guns on to targets the regiment gave him, when in making a turn at the eastern end of the salient he noticed some Tiger tanks working their way around The Sixth. He had no direct link with The Sixth, so he noted position, speed and direction, wrote it on a note, which he put in a message bag and flew over the tanks to get their attention. Knowing his methods I think they probably thought he was in the tanks with them.
Sure that they knew he was there, he threw the message bag down to them and then watched as one of them drove right up to it and stopped. Then another backed up to it, two more formed up in either side to box it in and then a bloke leaped out of one of them, grabbed the bag and dived back inside. He watched as they sorted out his message, turned east and went tiger hunting.
A few days later a Sixth Armoured div jeep rolled up at our strip. A major jumped out with our message bag in his hand and went up to The Captain.
‘I say old chap, is this yours?’ he asked.
They spent the next ten minutes or so drinking tea and sorting out radio wavelengths. After that I think it became a regular thing for the Armour to ask for an Auster when they were moving forward and as far as I know it was a sound arrangement."
