大象传媒

My Mothers thoughts first, followed by my Fathers then his sisters:

I am listening to the remembrance service festival in November 2003 and I know what I will write about. It was long ago in those war years. I was a WAAF and stationed at Woolfox Lodge near Rutland and my position was shorthand typist for the unit 1665 HCU and our aircraft were Lancasters, we were training crews to fly them. Our band of instructors were flyers who had already done a tour of ops.

One morning my office door opened and Flt Lt Skinner DFC walked in, he was the wireless operator instructor. He sat down and said: 鈥� Paddy would you write a letter for me if I do a draft鈥�, of course the answer was yes. He handed me a sheet of paper addressed to a family in Australia. It was to tell them why their son would not be going home. You see he was Flt Sgt Middleton, the Captain of Skinners crew. They had been to Turin in Italy in a Stirling on a raid and were hit by anti aircraft fire, most of them were injured but the Captain somehow coaxed the damaged plane to the English coast when he told the crew to bale out and he turned 鈥淗鈥� for Harry out to sea to avoid crashing on the houses below them. His body and two of the crews was later washed ashore and lies buried in a little churchyard with a white cross and a stone wall that breaks the wind as it sweeps in from the sea. Flt Sgt Middleton was awarded the Victoria Cross posthumously as one of the greatest Captains whom any aircrew has had the honour to fly with.

It was a letter that I was so proud to type and send to that grieving family in Australia I shall never forget.

The postscript regrettably is that about a year later at the time of Arnhem I was sitting working in the office when a notice came through from HQ. Regret that Wing Commander Harrison and Flt Lt Skinner killed in action at Arnhem carrying petrol supplies in Stirling Mk IV, plane exploded, no survivors.

They went because the squadron was short of experienced crewmen, so we sadly said goodbye to a brave pilot and wireless operator.

Going back to the WAAF site that evening, across the runway instead of round the perimeter track I suddenly realised that a thunderous roar was approaching, it was a 鈥淟anc鈥� on take off. I dropped my bike and lay flat, scared stiff, and that gorgeous great black shape rose a few feet off the ground before me and took off into the starry sky. I dusted myself off and went on my way back to our hut. Another day was over.

LACW Ivy Pritchard
Service Number 463403

The Germans invaded Belgium, and the Belgium鈥檚 requested our assistance, we boarded with full kit, an RASC {Royal Army Service Corp} lorry. It must have been evening time as we were driven through the night. Most tried to sleep but there was a Ben gun post in the front back of the lorry and this was kept manned all night.
One chap refused to be relieved at the end of his two hours and stayed there all through the night. The beer was drunk and the lorry had to stop a few times so that the lads could answer the call of nature. In the early hours the lorry was travelling through a street lighted suburb and then it reach the main part of town. When it came to a bridge, (I think it was over a river, but it could have been a canal.} the lorry stopped and out we got.
One bren gun was placed on the road that ran alongside the water way, this covered the bridge. A barrier was put across the street and the orders were to stop anyone going either way. This was alright until the workers finishing time, when they crowded the barrier wanting to get home to their evening meal. After some persuasion they were allowed through. I wonder to this day that there might have been some Germans amongst them.
A rough sleep on the ground that night and back to the barrier the following day. The Royal Engineers then came along and blew the bridge. This seemed just a routine task to them, but they had to face an irate shopkeeper who wanted to know who was going to pay for the plate glass window that had been smashed by the blast, no one gave the shopkeeper any satisfaction. Towards evening time, the order to march back came. I cannot now remember whether we marched back or had a lorry ride to start, It I know that it was through streets that had their lamps lit.
The battalion crossed a bridge over a canal, and took up position on the canal bank. I was a stretcher bearer with B company and the company commander took over a house a little behind the canal bank where he had placed his sections to defend it. The German attack when it came was first with mortar bombs. Fortunately the house had a good cellar and we took cover in that. During a lull in the shelling, some wounded were taken to the rear, and what had been a pleasant modern farm house when we went in, was now a pile of rubble. After three days fighting there were several wounded in the cellar, and the order came evacuate all walking wounded, we did not get out of the cellar quick enough and our way was blocked by a German. We went back to the cellar and a German came and took us prisoner the next day.

Aunty Joan鈥檚 Story

At the beginning of the war my brother Fred came home on embarkation leave, soon after went across to France, he was reported missing after Dunkirk. I will never forget the day I received a phone call at the office where I worked in London to say he was a prisoner of war.

The days when we travelled up to London during the blitz after heavy London bombing we had to walk through burning buildings to get there as trains could only go so far, then the going down into the tube station on the way home crowded with people already sheltering for the night. The smell was indescribable. Being that much out of London we only had incendiaries or the occasional bomb if they had any left on the way home.

In the WAAF and being attached to Bomber Command we were a 鈥渃onversion unit鈥�. Pilots and crew upgrading from twin-engine bombers to four engines, it was a normal sight on returning to base after a night of circuits and bumps to see Sterling planes crashed on the runways.

In one part of the war when we were bombing Germany to see the planes taking off at night and then hearing them return hoping they would all come back unfortunately not every one did. How the crews were able to fly off each night knowing the odds stacked against them was incredible.

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