大象传媒

Submitted by The British Schools Museum Hitchin on behalf of Ron Skinner.

One day, early in the War, there was great excitement in London Road, Baldock when a loose barrage balloon drifted into view from the general direction of Cardington, where they were known to be stationed - or 'tethered' might be a better description. After a while, a British fighter aircraft flew on to the scene and made an attacking approach on the balloon. I think it was a Spitfire (that's how I now remember it!) and I am still convinced that I heard machine gun fire. What is certain is that shortly afterwards the balloon began to sink. Would it hit the house, or crash nearby? No! Rather disappointingly it drifted well to the North East of Baldock and, so far as I recall, landed in the Clothall Common fields.

It must have been during the Summer of 1943, at the tender age of nearly 9 years, that I was allowed to cycle to an airfield at Steeple Morden. I was accompanied by David, a teenager evacuee who was billeted with us. He was an aircraft fanatic and the great attraction at the end of our epic journeys was a busy American airfield filled, at that time, with Thunderbolt fighter aircraft. The main role for these rather fat, ugly aircraft was to support American daylight bombing raids to the enemy-occupied Continent. We always picked a spot on the road above Littlington village. It was just across a ditch from an American armed gun position and we would talk to the men on duty. The fighters would fly in over Littlington, seemingly pointing straight at us, but then drift rapidly and some distance to our right, with wheels down for an often bumpy landing. I remember, particularly, that the field was so uneven the planes disappeared below our horizon before they stopped. They were, indeed, exciting days. I have since read in the record books that there were any number of dodgy landings (at least one with wheels up!), but I cannot say that I witnessed quite such dramatic events. It seems that I also missed - perhaps fortunately - a B26 Marauder which ran out of runway and finished up straddling the very road on which we plane-spotted.

My visits to Steeple Morden came to an emphatic end when a Flying Fortress (B17) from nearby Bassingbourn crashed and exploded at our fighter airfield, causing substantial damage and several fatalities. After that, my parents definitely forbade me making any further visits.

East Anglia was, of course full of American aircraft and the Flying Fortress's were probably the most common and recognisable of sights. It was less frequent, but not that rare, for me to see them limping back over our house, from a mission, with chunks missing or with engine propellers clearly buckled.

In August 1944, I did witness a much more horrifying event. It was a Sunday morning and I was still lazing in my bed, reading a book and half aware of a constant drone of heavy aircraft; a common occurrence at that stage in the War.

Suddenly the monotonous drone changed to an urgent scream of straining engines. I leapt to my window in time to see two aircraft going down in flames, somewhere beyond the Weston Hills, and a pitiful few parachutes following in their wake. Two American B17's had collided. Part of the wreckage crashed onto a house at Friend's Green, near Weston, killing a woman evacuee and a small child. It was a sad irony, indeed, that the woman had moved from London to the safety of the countryside only to perish through Allied activity. Fourteen American aircrew also perished and only 4 survived. I thought at the time that the aircraft had taken off from Bassingbourn, but a recently published (August 2000) booklet, entitled Mission 179, about the incident, shows that they came from Parham airfield, which was near Framlingham.

Apparently, Luton was to be the first turning point as the aircraft headed for Brest. The booklet contains eyewitness accounts, but the only point I could have added to the story (if I had been asked!) would not have been kind and possibly not valid. I remember, sometime after the event, talking to a GI who was visiting Baldock from Bassingbourn. We kids were always asking them for chewing gum! - "Got any gum chum?" was an expression on many young lips in those days. This chap was a NCO Air Gunner and he said that they often did not put on their parachutes until they were approaching enemy territory.

My sixth birthday fell on Sunday, 15th September 1940. Of course, nobody knew then that it was later to become 鈥淏attle of Britain Day鈥�. It was around that time that our family was being driven home to Baldock in a friend's car after a visit to Cricklewood and my Grandparents. There was an air raid on and I can still vividly recall looking up out of the car window at contrails which twisted and turned high above the Edgware Road. It was an air battle; there is no doubt of that. Having looked at RAF records, it seems most likely that this was on Friday 27th September. That was the day when Colindale underground station was destroyed by German bombs.

Presumably the Luftwaffe were after Hendon aerodrome, which was very close by. Two RAF fighter squadrons had, in fact, moved from there only the day before. I remember, also, looking down from that aerial 'display' and seeing that we were travelling at what seemed a very reckless speed and overtaking other vehicles, more or less in the middle of the road. I said something about how fast we were going and our driver then slowed down. I often wonder what day that was and how close we were to danger. That could have been either from the air or other traffic!

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