大象传媒

This story is contributed by Norman Davies, who was a navigator with 117 Squadron in Burma. It is added to the site with his permission. Flying Officer Davies had been trained as a navigator in Canada and takes up the story of his war service on his return to the UK.

We had crewed up in Canada, a pilot, a wireless operator and a navigator, which was a crew of a Dakota 鈥� a DC3, that was the basic crew. So we'd crewed up and we'd trained together...Flying Officer Pink, Flying Officer Davies and Sgt Jennings and so when we got back to this country we stayed together as a crew.

There were nine of us in all, three separate crews and we disembarked at Southampton and they sent us up to Lytham St. Annes where we were awaiting our posting. It was a very laissez faire thing...it was marvellous.

Then one day the superior officer came in and said 鈥淩ight gentlemen...you are posted to Karachi in India ...Here's a travel warrant to London for you 鈥� make your own way from there鈥�. Now, can you imagine! So we got down to London....it was December 1944, just before Christmas. So we went along to the RAF place there and said we had something to show that we'd been posted to Karachi. But the RAF didn't want to know ..... they said 鈥渨e haven't got anything going out that way 鈥� why don't you try BOAC鈥� which was just beginning, so there was nothing...and they suggested 鈥渨hy don't you try the Americans?鈥� So we went along to the American place there in London and said we want to fly out to India. And they said 鈥淥h yes, we'll fly you out to India. But you have to go down to Cornwall鈥�. So we went down by train to St. Mawgan in Cornwall ....and fly out we did, on a cold December morning in a Liberator which was converted from a Boeing. So we were flying via Naples ....the war had more or less finished there.
Half way to Naples two of the engines failed, so we had to land very quickly in Naples .... and they said 鈥淲e can't fly you any further...you'll have to find your own way from here鈥�. So we were stuck in Naples for a couple of days, but then the RAF agreed to take us as far as Cairo. So we got on a DC-3 which was taking us to Cairo, and believe it or not we took off from Naples and when we got near Malta we had more engine trouble. So we had to land in Malta and spent a couple of days there. Eventually we got from Malta to Tripoli and then from Tripoli to Cairo. Then of course they said 鈥淲e're not going any further, you'll have to find your own way from here!鈥�

So we were getting a bit fed up by now. We'd already been more than ten days getting from Lytham St. Annes to Cairo, but anyway we found a very friendly civilian and we flew the last bit in a Sunderland Flying Boat from Cairo to Karachi....and so we'd made it. And we reported to the authorities in Karachi, and said we'd come and they said 鈥淲e haven't heard of you...we weren't expecting you鈥�. As far as the Air Force was concerned we could have disappeared off the face of the earth. No-one would have missed us!

Anyway they got us in and we did our initial training in Rawalpindi in the North West of India, and then on the 2nd April 1945 I was posted to 117 Sqdn ..which was then based in a place called Hathazari was just outside Chittagong.

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