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15 October 2014
WW2 - People's War

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Reminiscences of Wartime Experiences - RAF Sergeant C.E.Peck 1869271 1943-1946

by Leicestershire Library Services - Blaby Library

Contributed by听
Leicestershire Library Services - Blaby Library
Article ID:听
A3862703
Contributed on:听
05 April 2005

This story was submitted to the People's War site by C.E.Peck. He fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

My training commenced at Swansea Technical College and finally finished at RAF Bomber Command 514 Squadron Waterbeach Cambridgeshire.

It was during my final training at RAF Bottesford that I became familiar with most of my crew members who were from New Zealand. All of us were 18-19 year old lads thrilled to be flying and felt indestructible and were fearless in spite of the dangerous occupation we were in at the time. These young men, like us, were volunteers, who were prepared to travel from the other side of the world to help us fight for our country against Germany.

As the records now show, many never did return to their families and the country of their birth and it is because of their unselfishness and desire to help us in times of distress that their actions should never be forgotten by future generations.They were indeed wonderful "lads", who were prepared to give all for freedom.

There were numerous amusing experiences during our time together. Celebrating the 21st birthday of a pilot saw us in a local village pub with a table full of pints of beer. I decided to have an additional sherry without the others knowing when visiting the outside toilet of this countryside pub. So along with my bomb aimer we were paralytic by the time we reached the village dance hall, the final episode for our celebrations. There was no dancing the night away for us. We were both flat out and were thrown onto all the clothes in the cloakroom. All evening I was trying to figure out where I鈥檇 lost my best blue belt and hat and 鈥渨here was my bicycle鈥, as we had cycled that evening from camp. Refusing some 鈥楻ennies鈥 from a well meaning lady to sober us up we eventually 鈥榳alked鈥 to our cycles outside and arrived non the worse back to camp, whilst some of our mates struggled homewards after running into many ditches on the way.

Our final training camp at RAF Bottesford saw us camped in a Nissan hut in the middle of a farmyard. A wonderful place to supplement our diet! One Saturday afternoon it started snowing. That started an immediate evacuation of our hut in all sorts of undress and with their arms stretched wide, faces pointing to the heavens, they behaved like schoolboys 鈥 they had never seen snow before. It was something I shall never forget, it was brilliant!

They were many more occasions that will always be part of my memories; these lads should never be forgotten.

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