大象传媒

Returning to Woodstock brings back many memories for me, as this is where I was born and raised.

Woodstock itself had been a famous war town, the cornerstone of a famous hero 鈥楯ohn鈥� and the birthplace of an unmistakable defined future Prime Minister 鈥榃inston鈥� 鈥� both Churchills鈥�

My father had been involved in the First World War as a cavalry soldier, unsurprisingly I decided to follow in his footsteps and join.

When the war started I put my age up to 18 and signed up to join the R.A.F. On September 23rd I was sworn in at Padgate. After a bit of square bashing I was posted to Cranwell where I did a navigation and instrument course. I passed out very well and on completion was asked where I would like to be posted! I chose Brize Norton as the family business was at Woodstock & Witney. It was too good to last, after one week I was posted to France with about 20 other airmen; we were due to join a squadron near Paris. On arrival all was chaos, planes being burned and those that could fly were leaving. The party I was with has to make its own arrangements, so we grabbed a truck and decided to head south. After missing the Germans we arrived at Marsailles. An army transport Major directed us to the docks where we ended up on the Troopship Devonshire, (remember the song!)

After an exciting trip the boat arrived at Malta. We reported to the RAF command who told us that they had enough troubles of their own and that there was a boat leaving for Egypt and we should get aboard. On arriving in Alexandria the powers that be said there is a peacetime squadron at Khartoum needing more men.

The trip by Egyptian railways was awful and primitive with an engine at each end. They had a system of whistles for instruction, one blow meant to pull and two to stop, unfortunately the drivers got muddled and one would blow once the other twice and the result was that the train was either being stretched or squashed. Arriving at Waddi Halfa the track was a different gauge to the Egyptian railway, so we all had to change trains. In all, the trip took about ten days.

It was quite an experience when the 25 of us arrived at Khartoum, we were greeted by the whole station, I think they had been there for about 3 years and all looked quite mad (sand happy). The station was still on peacetime routine; the war had not reached it yet.
The day started at 06:30 and finished at 12:00 midday with no work on Saturdays or Sundays. After lunch we would don our civvies to go sailing, horse riding, tennis or travel over the Nile to Omderman where the film 鈥淔our Feathers鈥� was made. We had coffee in the village caf茅 opposite the Leper colony or visited Abdul the ivory king. He would make anything from ivory; Cigar boxes, shoehorns, paper knives, pistol butt plates, etc.

We had a very good jazz band which a friend and I started. When not on duty we played at the Great Britain Cabaret in Khartoum. One night a rival cabaret set fire to the place and all our music and instruments were burnt. We could not afford to replace them, but the C.O soon got organised. He got the Bombay out, flew to Assmara and arranged for everything to be replaced.

An important event in the Peacetime calendar was sheikh day when all the chiefs and native bosses were invited to an air display. The aircraft flew, dropped a few practice bombs and carried out a basic air display. During the display a Vincent crash-landed and the engine broke off. All the sheikhs clapped and cheered and they thought it was part of the show, then a Wellesley did a big shoot up, much too fast, broke off both wings. That was the end of the annual Sheikh day.

There were two squadrons 47 and 223. Wellesleys, Gordons, Vincents, a Walrus, a Valancia and a Bombay. The Valencia was used for carting spares round the Sudan. In a very strong head wind it would show 80 MPH on the ASI but would have to tack like a yacht to go forward.

The Bombay was also used for transport, but on a few occasions bombs were dropped by pushing them out the plane doors by hand.

We had a landing strip out in the desert about 30 miles for Khartoum. A skeleton crew were stuck out there one Christmas so we thought that it would be a good idea to take some music to them. We pinched the N.A.A.F.I鈥檚 Piano and with our jazz band bundled the whole lot into the Bombay, we flew the whole lot out to the strip to liven things up. I can鈥檛 remember how we got back or who flew as we had all consumed large amounts of alcohol. I do remember though that we played jazz whilst we flew back.

Our Aerodrome was shared with Alitalia Airways, and was being watched, as the Italians were about to enter the war they had several planes standing outside but until they joined in we all did routine flying, cross countries and the odd air test. I also spent many hours on the Link Trainer鈥�

At last the Italians came into the war, so we were immediately put on a war footing. Nobody really knew what to do, civvies were put away, guns were issued, the native workers started to scrape the rust off the bombs. A number of us dashed across to the Alitalia buildings to capture anything going. The Italians cleared off in one of their planes, we claimed all the cutlery and cut glass from their club and also two Savoy 79s, which we used for the beer run. When we examined the planes they had Bristol Pegasus engines and Vokes air cleaners, so most of the parts were the same as the Wellesleys.

At the beginning the aircrew / tradesmen situation had not been sorted out, trades were doing operations as well as our own duties. I flew a number of trips in the Bombay, Valencia and the Wellesleys. I did a number of trips with a Rhodesian squadron of Audax Dive Bombers. However, a new ruling came out after a while, the group 1 tradesman were to pack in the operations, so apart from the odd air test, or trips into the bush to fix damaged planes we were grounded.

During Christmas celebrations the squadron decided to liven things up in Khartoum. In the centre of town was a huge bronze statue of General Gordon on his famous camel. We took some paint and brushes and pained it red, white & blue. We also broke off some of the bronze tassels to hang up in the mess. The plot failed, someone had been in touch with the C.O and the following morning we were ordered to return to the statue, clean it up with thinners and weld the tassels back on. I have been told that the statue has now been brought back to England and is now somewhere near Wokingham in a gateway to a school or college.

At last the Italians packed in the war and the last big event was our squadron taking Hali Sellasi back to Addis Ababa to his palace. It was at this time that our life was considerably changed. The convoy route, known as the Takoradi Run, was started bringing planes across Africa, stopping at 200 mile hops via Kano, El Genena, El Fasha, Lama, El Obeid, Waddi Halfa to Khartoum. We were constantly flying to these strips to repair planes so badly assembled that some almost fell to pieces. I think the native mechanics that helped to assemble the planes only had tool kits comprising of hammers!

For several months the convoys were made up of one Blenheim and six Hurricanes, or Fulmers, but later we started getting American Tomahawks and Kityhawks lead by Baltimores, Marauders, Bostons and Glen Martin Marylands.

After about three years in the Sudan I was posted to the 鈥榗anal zone鈥� 107 MU then up to the Desert. After another year I was due to go home and joined the SS Orion at Port Sudan taking 500 German prisoners to South Africa. On arrival we went to Clarewood Transit camp. We were there for several weeks and during the stay the locals would call at the guardroom to take us airmen out for the day. My friend and I were picked up by a chauffeur driven Buick and taken to a large house in Durban, where we were met by two very lovely sisters who introduced us to their parents, the Livingstones. Their grandfather was Dr. Livingstone.

After several weeks we were once again at sea without escort, on the way home we picked up nine survivors from a torpedoed tanker. We called in at Freetown and then on to Liverpool.

I was given 14 days leave and then posted to second tactical air force in Romney Marshes at Lyd, living in tents under a foot of snow. After a few days I had words with the C.O. I explained that I was a specialist on Mk 14 bombsights and George so really there was not a lot I could do on Typhoons! He arranged for a posting to Melksham as an instructor. About this time I was put up for an engineering commission and had an interview but was also posted again, this time to 77 squadron, Elvington. The whole squadron then moved to Pocklington, we were there for a short while and then handed over to the Free French. What a muddle it was, we were all pleased to get out and leave them to it. The squadron then moved to Full Sutton and was re-equipped with the new radial engine Halifax.

I stayed with 77 squadron until the end of the war and was then finally posted to Brize Norton until my release. I was asked again to sign on with a commission, but after 6 solid years of service and war, time was time as I had, had enough. I had a ready made family jeweller business waiting for me in Witney and Woodstock. I wanted to go home.

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