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Training
I left the R A F camp at Burton on Trent with all my normal gear, plus a fitters tool kit, which meant I was struggling. I had not been very long at Burton and due to the unusual way I’d been posted there had gone there with virtually none of my mates and I had been there for only a few weeks and hardly got to know anybody. I did not mind this, I normally make friends quite easily and looked forward to doing just that when I got to my new posting. The journey taught me something about comradeship. I had to change trains several times and on each occasion another serviceman gave me a hand with my kit from one platform to the next. I eventually arrived at a very small station just north of Cambridge where I lugged my gear onto the platform and looked around to see another airman doing the same a few yards away,
He was a big tough looking bloke who wore the legend Australia on his shoulder. He looked at me and grinned.
‘You going to 654 mate?’ he asked.
‘Yeh ,’ I said ‘Place called Bottisham, how far is it?’
‘Dunno ,’ he said ‘I’ll ask this station master.’
The station master told us that Bottisham was several miles away and we both had full kit and tool boxes, so we found a phone and rang to ask for transport, only to be told that the squadron was having a no petrol day. On which no vehicles could be started or run. We arranged with the station master to lave our toolboxes with him and walked.
Ernie McLellan was an engine mechanic as I was. He’d been in the Australian navy and left them to join the R A F. I had already started finding mates. We teamed up as training, boozing and brawling mates for some time.
654 squadron was different. It was R A F only on paper. Its whole ethos was Royal Artillery. The C O was a Major, all the pilots were Captains. Most of the personnel were gunners. The squadron was started by a group of Gunner officers who decided that shell fire could be observed and directed efficiently from a light airoplane, provided that the plane was being flown by a qualified gunner. The Air Ministry had no objections to teaching Gunner officers to fly and allowing them to fly R A F aircraft, but no way would they allow artillery gunners to look after the aircraft. The solution was to form an R A F squadron, with R A F ground staff to look after the planes, with all other work carried out by gunners.
As this unit would operate its aircraft from positions as near to the regimental headquarters of the guns as possible the ground staff had to be trained as gunners. So we, the R A F members had to undergo what was more or less infantry training.
Ernie and I were assigned to C flight and stuck together for this training. I enjoyed it and I think he did. After all the time I’d spent in gymnasiums leaping over boxes, swinging from trapezes and wall bars. Leaping over ditches and climbing ropes and all that sort of thing was easy. And when it came to swimming I was in my element. Bottisham was also the training ground for 3226 R A F servicing commando and we used their facilities. In the pub one evening I found the corporal who had taught me carburrettors at Cosford. He had got fed up with lecturing and got into 3226 for a bit of excitement. It was nice to see him again and down a pint together.
We soon got used to the idea that our sergeant was not really a sergeant, but a Battery Quartermaster Sergeant R A. ‘Q’ to everybody. He’d been in the royal artillery for twenty something years and knew all there was to know about guns and gunnery. Nothing at all about airoplanes. He was quite happy to leave that to us. A lot of the training was carried out by the officers. I can not remember the name of the one from A Flight who taught us how to use a knife and hands and feet as weapons, but I soon realized that most of the vulnerable points on the human body were the same ones you went for in Ju Jitsu. Which I’d done long before I joined. I’d also cut up the occasional pig at home, so I had a pretty good idea of anatomy from the point of view of attacking it. I’d also always had air rifles and air pistols as a kid and a standard revolver and rifle was much the same and were no problem.
Captain Carr of C flight taught explosives and took us on Infantry tactics with our brand new Tommy guns and hand grenades. Ernie and I had a ball with these games. I just had to remember to put my grenade safety pin in the wrong side to allow for left handed throwing. We armed them with standard four second fuses right from the start. It was great fun to us lobbing them into a trench, let them go bang move forward throwing a flash grenade into the trench and going in with it spraying the sandbags which stood in for enemy as we went. We did nearly get shot by Gunner Nut who just stood up and fired into the trench we were already in. Captain Carr yelled
‘Cease firing,’ and knocked his gun down. Probably saving our lives. Gunner Nut got promoted to Lance Bombadier shortly after. Were they trying to tell us something? A lot more about Captain Carr later.
Captain Bishop of C flight was something of a character in his own right. It was said he owned several whisky distilleries in Scotland and was therefore very rich. He certainly did not believe in the hard life for its own sake and made a point of buying a house close to wherever he found himself posted and installing his wife there. Once we had been allocated to our aircraft as mechanics. He had a wild Irish man Paddy Burns as his rigger. Paddy was a sort of soldier of fortune. He’d fought in Spain, done all sorts of things in France. And was probably prepared to do almost anything.
Captain Bishop very quickly set himself up with a house near the ‘drome and installed his wife. Next he gave Paddy his instructions. He was to go on parade and do his work and plus that was to read all the orders and gather all the information which the captain needed. In the evening he was to report to captain Bishop’s House to pass this information on over as much whisky as he could drink. Paddy found this arrangement very satisfactory.
There were times when Captain Bishop had to turn up. I remember one day when he was trapped into giving driving lessons to the Flight. He solved the problem by loading all of us into a Bedford troop carrier getting the bombadier instructor to drive into Newmarket where we all walked around looking at cinemas until he found a film which he thought he would like to see. He then stood by the pay desk and counted us by, paid for all the tickets and we sat and watched a film. We filled two rows across the place. When the film was over he observed that we had all missed the evening meal so we were all trooped up to the café for beans on toast. Which he just paid for. Can you wonder Paddy thought he was a great bloke.
Captain Shepherd I did not have much to do with. He took us for different aspects of the training and as far as I was concerned was O K. his ground crew never had a bad word for him so he was probably alright.
Captain Price the other captain was my pilot and did very little training with us as I remember. I found him arrogant and overbearing and almost from the very start we did not get on. The set up on the squadron was that it consisted of twelve sections split into three flights. A B & C. the sections were therefore A1 2 3 & 4 B 5 6 7 & 8 C 9 10 11 & 12. Each flight was equipped with an Auster light aircraft. A simple machine with at first, a Blackburn Cirrus minor engine. And very soon these planes were changed for Austers with De Havilland Gypsy minor engines. Simple four cylinder inverted air cooled engines. The Bedford three ton troop carrier we had was modified so that this airoplane could be loaded into it. The tail and main planes protruding out behind of course, but not a lot of trouble. The rest of the transport was the old, faithful B S A M20 motorcycle. A bit heavy and slow with its 500 cc side valve engine, but reliable and not much trouble. Arms were revolvers the standard Albion for The Captain and the motorcyclist. The American Thompson submachine gun for the aircraft ground crew. The Le Enfield rifle, for the truck driver and the Captain’s batman. And finally a Bren gun for the section as an anti aircraft weapon in which mode it had the hundred round magazine. We also had standard twenty eight round magazines for it.
Man power was first The Captain who had to be a gunner officer with lots of gunnery experience and a light Aircraft pilots license. His Batman, who often found himself lumbered with some of the cooking and should also be a driver.
The truck driver, who was also the radio operator. He had things like battery chargers to deal with to supply battery power for the Aircraft radio..
The R A F rigger responsible for the airframe, wheels, instruments, etc of the aircraft and the R A F Engine mechanic who was responsible for the Engine of the plane. Including the prop of course. Five men in all who could set up a completely independent landing strip and run it.
In section C 10 There was Captain Price. The driver operator Jimmy something, Les Archer the batman, Les Webb the rigger and myself the engine basher.
Nobody wanted the job of riding the motorbike, but I had always liked motorbikes and still do. So I got that, which set me up as some sort of mobile arsenal with a Tommy gun, a revolver, a half share with Les on the Bren gun and a couple of hand grenades. In most sections the R A F men took over the machine guns. I suppose the mechanics of the things appealed to them. As a Flight we did exercises, one of which was travelling along the south coast in a convoy where we managed to get quite close to a flight of German F W 120s which flew right past us. I was in a sort of gun turret on top of our section truck. Swung my Bren gun and tried to open fire on one only to find the thing would not fire. It had never been tested and was handed back to stores right after the exercise. I was annoyed, but there was nothing to be said about it.
Once we got a replacement we went up to The Wash where we did fireing at a drogue towed by an R A F aircraft. Les Webb and I working the gun between us got some bullets into the thing and were stopped from firing as they wanted it for another day.
We did a few training exercises around Bottisham. Ernie and I teamed up for most of them. They were organized by The flight Commander Captain Laird and during these I don’t remember seeing anything of Captain Price other than the few times he turned up to fly the Auster. I got to know most of the flight fairly well. And all this dashing about firing guns and throwing grenades I enjoyed. I managed to just about stay civil to Captain Price until one frosty morning he turned up at the Aircraft just as I was removing the covers. He had two civilian women with him, which annoyed me. Not so long previously Norman Ginn had been killed by a prop and he knew what he was doing around airoplanes. Two civilians who probably thought they knew it all were bad medicine to me, but I was prepared to put up with that until he set out on his impress the ladies routine by saying.
‘Barwick, I want you to adjust the mixture on this machine, its running rich.’
Now I was annoyed. In the Airforce pilots do not tell their mechanics what to do to an engine. They say what they feel is wrong with it and he should put it right.
‘I shall not adjust the mixture on this aircraft Sir for two reasons,’ I told him, ‘first as an A C 1, I am not qualified to do so’. This was pure flannel, I’d been doing this sort of thing for a long time, but this was the time to refuse. ‘And,’ I continued, ‘if you look under the engine you will see that spots of petrol which have run out of the volute drain have discoloured the frost. This means that the Ki Gas priming pump is leaking into the induction manifold thus causing the engine to run rich. It may have a worn seal of perhaps it just has not been turned off firmly enough. I shall check it.’
The Captain stamped off obviously annoyed. I suppose I could have been a bit tactful, but I did not think of myself as being there to help him get away with his bit of spare. Looking at a photo of me taken around that time I can see now that the excessive strain I’d been under on Trainer command had pulled me down. The long hours working like mad in cold windy conditions had had some effect on me.
I think I was just unlucky in getting that man as my pilot. I got along very well with the other pilots. Even The flight commander Captain Laird. A big ferocious highlander, who was said to be The Laird part of Cammel Laird, though he never said anything about it. He was in fact a really good Flight commander and a man for whom I later gained a lot of respect.
The squadron was commanded by Major Terry Willet. I had very little to do with him until we went into action, but I always got on O K with him even when I had to have an argument with him. There will be more of him later.
I suppose we were very busy at Bottisham. Nothing like I had got used to at Leconfield or even Burton, but there was enough to do. Ernie Mc Lellan and I got into Cambridge several times to taste the beer and I discovered that he was a natural brawler and we had to get out of several pubs rather quick. The man was a contradiction I found when he asked me if I could play whist. He’d found out that the good people of Bottisham ran a whist drive, I think every Sunday evening in the village hall and he was addicted to the game. I was only a moderately good whist player, but went with him. At these whist drive he was a different sort of person. A good player, he would indulge in polite conversation with all.
The folk of Bottisham must have thought what wonderful polite people Australians were. They would have been amazed to see him causing mayhem in the pubs in Cambridge.
I actually managed to get a couple of weekends off camp from there, but they left no time to go to Hull to see Doreen. The best I could do was hitch hike home and back. I paid for my ride on one of these. Somewhere between Cambridge and Bedford the little Singer car I was in, broke down. It’s owner had a few tools but knew nothing of engines and I took the points out, cleaned them and put them back for him.
On another trip home I thumbed a small car down just outside Bedford and sat in. The driver a very smart young woman asked me where I wanted to get to and I was able to say.
‘Just put me down at the bottom of Hoppers hill when you get there Miss’. She had been my teacher at school and had not recognized me. She was chuffed to see me and I had to give her an account of my travels etc. It was nice seeing her again.
I did get a proper leave before we went overseas and managed to get to Hull. At the end of it Doreen saw me off at Paragon Station. We did not talk much as we waited for the train to pull out. I leaned down and kissed her. And watched her standing waving until she was out of sight. A few moments which are still clear in my memory. That must have been in January 1943 I don’t think anybody got home for the Christmas 42, unless you count Captain Bishop. He’d got his home right there. We had quite a party as I remember. I don’t think I had one Christmas at home during my whole Airforce career.
We went overseas as a unit on 20/ 2/ 43. A drunken rabble who were loaded onto a train at Cambridge and transferred to a ship. The Nuew Holland at Gurock on the Clyde. The Nuew Holland was as its name implies a Dutch boat. A cargo ship she had been modified to be used as a trooper. The holds had been sectioned into about five layers, the lowest well below the water line. A central well had been left open to allow some ventilation, but the place was extremely claustrophobic and of course crowded. Space per person was allotted on the basis of as many men as possible were crowded around a dining table. This was the living space where you ate and slept. Hammocks were issued so that we could swing crisscrossed above the table with some sleeping on it and some below it.
We, the members of 654 Squadron were classed as gunners and were therefore regarded as the gun crews on the boat which had a couple of Six Pounders. The real gunners took them over and we the airmen did the anti aircraft Oerlikons. I am a bad traveler as they say and soon discovered that the most comfortable place for me on the ship was my gun position overhanging the starboard side, level with, but above the bridge. Here I was in my turret hanging out over the water where I could see the whole length of the ship. I could see the point of the bows breaking the water creaming phosphorescent lights along her side. I even eventually shook off most of my seasickness up there. I think there were three of us in the gun crew and we could talk to the ship’s lookout as he patrolled the top deck above the bridge with his powerful binoculars.
Food aboard was quite good, discipline fairly easy, but there had to be some order with so many people in such a confined space. I was accosted one day by a military policeman with.
‘Hey don’t you come from Olney?’ He was from Weston Underwood a couple of miles from Olney. He took my name and address and wrote home for his folk to tell my folks he’d seen me and that I was O K. I think they were pleased.
The ship slipped out of The Clyde in the night and headed out into the Atlantic to join a convoy where we found ourselves on the outer edge as having artillery mounted we were classed as part of the escort. Right in the middle of the convoy was a battleship, which I think was The Malaya. I liked the idea of some heavy support, but I understand she was only there to use the convoy as protection. When we hit heavy seas in The Bay of Biscay it was fascinating to watch her spear through the huge waves as if they didn’t move her at all. There was also a liner, which they said was loaded with women from the other services. We almost for certain knew now that we were heading for North Africa as we had desert gear and in any case the barmaid in the pub in Bottisham had told us that and the barmaid in the local pub always knows everything which is going on. The whole ship seethed with rumours as troopships always do I understand, but we were told by our lookout that we were right out in The Atlantic and if we went much further we should see the Statue Of Liberty.
We eventually passed through the Pillars of Hercules and the water became bluer the air warmer and the morale higher as we hoped we would soon be off the boat and get a bit of freedom. The engines stopped in the middle of the night and we were alongside a dock at Algiers. And there were kids by the dozen offering oranges and tangerines at giveaway prices. My mother had been told when our kid brother had been born that he needed oranges and sunshine to keep him alive and now I was wallowing in both and could not get them to him. It was bit frustrating.
We were disembarked and sent to transit camps. The R A F members to one at Housen Day and the artillery gunners to another and this caused a lot of anger. The Squadron was getting a Squadron attitude. They also had us on parade to do guards and found they could not do much with us on the parade because there was no drill devised for Thomson sub machine guns or Bren guns. We didn’t make it any easier for them.
I found myself doing a patrol guard on a warehouse area and I got the visit from the Warrant Officer and his thick sergeant. I let them walk past me and stepped out behind them, let them hear me load my gun and only allowed one to turn round. I didn’t like senior N C Os and was happy to show it.
We were soon on our way through The Atlas mountains to a place near Constantine where out aircraft had been assembled ready for us and we were at war. Now we worked as sections and I really had to start living with Captain Price. At close quarters he was no better than when I did not see much of him. Arrogant and overbearing. After a bit I didn’t try to get on with him.
Despite our differences we as a section did do some work. Probably quite useful stuff. We went through what was called The Fondouk gap with an armoured division which was I think commanded by another thicky, who it seemed to me lined his tanks up and yelled
‘Charge’. I think one of them got through. I went through on the old B S A picking a route between the burning tanks with the survivors pulling their mates out and burying them. Quite a baptism of fire. The operation was regarded I think as successful because we did break through, but I never heard of that armoured division again. We pressed on from there to I think the Casserine pass where we found ourselves in the path of the Eighth Army dragging itself out of the desert and dived back out of the way.
As soon as the dust settled we were attached to The Eighth who were held near Sousse, which they took and left to the Americans to take for film making purposes. We moved on to Hergla near Enfidaville a village at the base of the Cap Bonn Peninsular. This front was overlooked by what was called Takroona Castle and the army was held. We pulled into a sort of Olive grove as a Flight and precipitated our first enemy shelling. I suppose there were too many of us and we presented too good a target. By some miracle we had no casualties. Other than a bowl of rice I was cooking and had to leave to get into my hole and watch it burn.
It was at Enfidaville that Mac Makenzie of whom we see more in this story had a somewhat traumatic experience. He’d managed to get himself lost on a motorbike and approaching Enfidaville came to a roadblock. Just a wooden frame with barbed wire on it across the road, but enough to warm him not to go beyond it so he stopped and was about to turn round and go back when a couple of Gurkhas appeared from some ditch.
‘Not go that way Johnny,’ they said, ‘Germans that way.’ So Mac turned the bike round said .
‘Thanks,’ and was about to go when one of them suggested a cuppa tea. Mac was thirsty, it sounded like a good idea and he imagined that somewhere in the ditch they had a thermos or something. He was mistaken. They believed in fresh made tea, brought out an opened up petrol can half filled with sand, threw a lot of petrol into it and dropped a match it. All this a few yards down the road from the Germans they had just told him about. They made a brew and Mac sat with them and drank a mug, but he was downright glad to start the bike up and get out of the area.
Next we moved a bit further inland still attached The Indian Division where the Gurkhas were holding the line. It was a bit weird there because although they were there in numbers we never heard a sound from them until they were relieved by The Fifty First Highland Division. They piped themselves in and everybody within miles heard them. They took some casualties from shellfire and were relieved by the New Zealanders. As I remember we were working with a New Zealand field regiment supporting Maori infantry. They set up a shower near us, which we soon made use of and then The Maoris came out in small batches to use it. They had all sorts of weapons and transport, which they had taken off Germans and Italians. Berrettas Mousers Lugers they had them all.
I had a couple of difficult trips to make out of our position there. To do them I had to cross a sort of dried up salt mash, which had lots of tracks through it and doing the trip in the dark was dodgy. I solved the problem by using an old gypsy trick. Going across it, at every junction I pulled a turf, well it was a lump of rough weed really and dropped it in the track I’d just come down. On the way back I turned into the track with the clod in it.
We had section C11 on the strip with us. More of them later too. Their driver operator was a schoolteacher. Sam Perry from the midlands. An inquisitive chap; Sam noticed a sort of Arab village. More a collection of rough huts than anything and his curiosity was aroused enough for him to go and look into one. He only went once. He said the fleas came up at him in masses, he spent the next day defleaing himself.
We did some quite good work from this place, but my relations with Captain Price did not improve much. The Africa Corps surrendered when they were pegged down in Cap Bonn. This was something I had never experienced before. An army just packing it in. It presented few problems to our army. They and The Africa corps had been battling over the desert for so long they all knew the drill. As far as I could see all our army did was to tell them to go to some prisoner of war camp. Probably one they had built and go in it. And away they went.
Now we all wanted to go to look at Tunis and this was laid on by simply telling Snowy Mac Pherson the vehicle mechanic to fill a fifteen hundred weight truck with bods and go, so away we went. In Tunis we arranged a time and place to meet and went our own ways. Les Webb and myself did a bit of sightseeing and drinking. Got talking to a French family about the conditions in the place and made our way back to the meeting place where the gang were assembling. Here we found Snowy well and truly drunk. As any good Glaswegian would be, happily getting blokes on the truck. At this point some bloke appears who wanted to go the same way as we were going.
‘Your driver is drunk,’ he told us, ‘I’m a driver I’ll drive.’ Well nobody bothered and away we went, most of us well oiled, sitting in the back half asleep until the truck lurched sideways and half rolled into a wadi. I saw the sky appear as the tilt came off and having a well developed kink for survival dived for the opening, to land in soft sand in the moonlight. Then I scrabbled away from the place to get out of the way of the truck. Which I thought might be following me.
Bods were plopping down into the sand all around me and as things went quiet I looked at the nearest one to me which was giving a good impression of being dead. I turned it over to see that it was Andy Mac Meican.
‘Are you O K Andy?’ I asked.
‘What’s the matter?’ he asked.. Another Glaswegian he had to be told he’d been in a crash later.
Well there were no casualties, the tilt was put back on and a sort of crash truck was borrowed to lift the truck back onto the road. Snowy was put back into the driver’s seat as we considered him a better driver drunk than the clown who’d ditched us and we got back to camp.
We had a bit of heat wave about this time spent some time throwing our selves into the sea. Once more back near Hergla. I found a half washed away building there which was being eroded into the sea. There was a mosaic floor gradually being lost. I knew nothing of roman buildings and art at that time, but since then I’ve realized that I should have made copies of the mosaics. All I did was work with some big coloured blokes from somewhere in West Africa who were tying sticks of dynamite to stones lighting the fuse and stunning fish which we dived in to recover.
It was here that I learned a bit about Captain Laird the flight commander. I knew the Gypsy major engines were running a bit hot in the heat so I looked for problems from that and found that some of the latex in the plug leads was melting out through the braiding. This could be serious if let to go too far so I asked for new leads and got them fitted. I then Told Captain Price that as this we due to the conditions, all the other aircraft could have the same problem and therefore the fault should be reported to the flight commander and all aircraft should be inspected.
‘You have your job Barwick, other people’s machines are nothing to do with you,’ he told me. This is not the way it works with airoplanes and left me with a problem so I just went over his head to Captain Laird .
I found him in his tent / Office and told him that in approaching him I was disobeying an order from Captain Price. He, wearing his usual fierce expression demanded to know why and I told him. He sat a moment and then said.
‘Get out there Barwick, take each mechanic with you and together inspect every aircraft on the flight. Mine too, for the fault you have told me about. Well man what are you waiting for?’
‘And Captain Price sir?’ I asked.
‘I gave you an order man, what are you waiting for?’ he growled.
I think we found a couple of leads which needed replacing, but my relationship with Captain Price was at an even lower ebb from there on. This probably was the reason why he demanded that I be posted and replaced, so I went off to the guardroom and Ernie Mc Lellan went to section C 10.
Just at this time, our sister squadron 651, had one of its flights ordered out into the Sahara for something to an unknown destination. They were short of mechanics and wanted to borrow one. This was regarded as a job which could be nasty and I am sure that for that reason Captain Price recommended me for it, so I was warned to get my kit organized.
At this point Captain Price went to Q Eddlestone to explain to him that I had lost some of my tools and that he expected ‘Q’ to make sure I paid for them. I was annoyed by this, as I had lost a few things from my tool kit and Captain Price had been the one to lose them for me.
The day before I left 654 the commanding Officer, Major Willet, called me to the flight office.
‘Barwick,’ he said, ‘from your records it seems you have done quite a lot of night flying work’.
‘Yes Sir I’ve been on night flying,’ I said.
‘Well we want to fly this aircraft tonight. I want you to inspect it for night flying.’ He indicated an Auster.
‘This aircraft is not suitable for night flying, it has no landing lights, no navigation lights, no internal cockpit lights and no night flying equipment’ I pointed out to him.
‘Yes we know that Barwick, but we still want to fly it tonight‘ the C O said. I just said ‘OK Sir I’ll look at it’.
I went through the usual inspection routine, paying particular attention to control stiffness and all the usual things, which cause problems in the dark. Started it up and ran it, watching for exhaust gasket flash. All the usual in fact and then sat in it to test the magnetos. As I set the throttle to warm it up I noticed that the petrol tap. Which was a push pull type, was rather loose and the engine vibration was moving it. I found that some throttle openings sent it to the ‘Off’ position quite fast. I did the tests, shut her down and went back in the office.
‘That machine is not serviceable for night flying.’ I reported.
‘Why not Barwick?’ the C O asked.
‘Because the petrol tap vibrates off Sir, the aircraft is not safe. I would not let it fly in daylight and at night it is definitely not safe.’
At this point the pilot who regularly flew the plane joined in.
‘It has been like that for a long time,’ he said, ‘we know about it and allow for it. It’s perfectly alright.’
‘Nevertheless Sir. I shall put it unserviceable in the log in red and sign it as such.’ I told him.
‘What if I over-sign it, to say I think its serviceable Barwick?’ The C O said.
‘If you sign to say you see what I have put in the log Sir, it is up to you, I’ve checked everything else and the machine is O K.’ I said as I signed the rest of the log.
With that I went back to the guard-room and got my head down. I expected a busy day the next day.
I must have slept well, because I didn’t know a thing till morning, when I woke to find a stretcher parked by my side. I looked and found my old rigger Les Webb on it with a plaster on his brow. I shook him awake.
‘What are you doing here?’ I asked
‘That damned plane you D I’d last night, I went in it on its first takeoff and the bloody thing crashed and I banged my head look.’ He said accusingly.
‘Serves you blooming right’ I said, unsympathetically. ‘I say its not safe and you go and fly it, its time you learned better.’
I got away after a bit of breakfast, in a truck to 651 Squadron I think it was A flight and nothing was ever said about the plane crashing. Although the C O had a lot more respect for my word after that and showed it. I meantime was in A flight headquarters on 651 under Captain Bailey.
651 squadron had an earlier mark of Auster than 654. It had the Blackburn Cirruss minor engine. Very similar to the Gypsy major, but smaller. I had worked on them, so I was quite happy about that. They were preparing to go somewhere out in the desert for an unknown reason. Which I never did learn. They had a problem with the fact that they had acquired a B M W motor cycle. A big thing, which the Germans used to tow a sidecar with a heavy machine gun and two passengers on it. They had no sidecar and as a solo it was heavy. They did not have anybody who wanted to ride it. Could I? I had a ball with that thing. It had telescopic front suspension and plunger rear. A twin cylinder horizontally opposed engine, in unit construction with the gearbox. Shaft drive to a differential built into the rear wheel. Two ratio, four speed gearbox, sidecar drive with a lock, hand and foot change, everything. I soon got used to it. I could even use the reverse to pull it out of the ditch etc.
I rode shotgun on it from Sousse to Tripoli. We had four or five Austers and about a dozen trucks. One Auster had some minor bother with magneto setting. Which was easily put right and one of the trucks had some muck in the petrol which we had to deal with. We went by Sfax, and drove past a roman amphitheatre which in later years I thought must have been the old Carthage
In Tripoli I bumped into an old acquaintance from my training school days, looked around the airodrome there at all the wrecks, had a few drinks in the town and then we drove back to Sousse across the desert once more. I had enjoyed myself. I got on great with the lads and pilots, but when we got back to Sousse Captain Bailey called me into his office to tell me that although he had asked to be allowed to keep me he had to return me to 654. He thanked me for my work and told me he had put in a good report on me.
When I got back to 654 it was to find them very busy. B flight, were at Sousse docks loading onto a landing ship and I was sent to assist. I was soon involved in getting trucks loaded and lashed down with the turnbuckle clamps when there was a panic at the hoist which took vehicles from the hold up to the top deck. A rope had snagged and one of the stanchions of the hoist had crashed down hitting a bloke on the head. He was rushed off to hospital. Section B 6 was now short of a mechanic and there; crawling under trucks was Barwick.
It was grab your kit Barwick you are now in section B6 under Captain Butterworth. On your way to a beach landing somewhere. We did in fact land on a rocky beach right at the bottom tip of Sicily. The beach was rough, I had not been able to get hold of my side arms and the motorcycle was loaded in the truck. The planes were to be flown in as soon as a strip was available and there was no opposition. I had not got to know my new section, but I noticed that the driver operator was a bit young and looked awful nervous as he stopped at the top of the ramp, so I jumped up into the cab, said something daft and got him grinning. I had not noticed that Captain Butterworth had been watching this, but I got a nod of approval as we bumped ashore.
The Sicilian campaign was fast moving. We did a lot of charging about, working with all sorts of people. I can still not recall the names of the other section members, but they were great blokes and we got on well. We did get strafed a bit, but not seriously and I began to get a technique for using the Bren gun against low flying aircraft, but never was really sure I hit any.
We lived at times in Vineyards where I slept under my mosquito net and when I could not reach grapes from my bed I moved it. I drew a picture of my little patch on a photo letter, which I sent home with home sweet Home written on it and my mother told me when I got home that it reduced her to tears. Silly really, but I should have thought of that I suppose. Major Willet gave me a rousting for sleeping without my mosquito net on guard.
I was riding shotgun on a Flight convoy through the central mountains where we had been warned there were bandits as well as Germans. Which we might encounter. When the engine died on me. I watched as the convoy with the vehicle mechanic’s truck disappeared and started my checks. Petrol O K, spark, nothing at the plug. Points in the magneto OK. But no sparks, so I tried the magneto earthing brush. That was well worn down, I stretched it, replaced it and I was mobile again. When I found the section it had parted from the rest of the Flight and Captain Butterworth wanted to know what the problem had been so I took him to the bike and showed him. Asking him to ask the vehicle mechanic for one next time he visited Flight headquarters. He came back a few days later with a new one, which I fitted. This was O K till I went to flight myself to be accosted by the Bombardier mechanic with .
‘Here your Captain Butterworth’s mechanic ain’t you?’
‘That’s right,’ I said.
‘Well’ he said, ‘he comes to me, saying he wants an earthing brush for an M 20 B S A and I had no idea what that was and had to say so. He takes me to a motorbike and shows me and give a right old rollocking for not knowing. Don’t go telling that bastard anything about motorbikes in future.’
‘Sorry mate,’ I said, ‘I only asked for a new one and showed him what it was.’ But I was thinking that if he’d stopped to help me when I’d broken down instead of just giving me a cheery wave he would not have had the trouble would he.
Somewhere in the mountains I spotted a horse running spare. Reins dangling stirrups flapping about. It was obviously lost so I went up to it and led it back to the section. We found it something to eat and drink and noted the broad arrow on its rump so it was a British animal. Then we didn’t know what to do with it so we took it to the nearest farm we could find and handed it over to the farmer with a note to say that he was looking after it as instructed by Captain Butterworth. I think we got the message across O K, but years afterwards when I thought about it I realized that almost all the cavalry horses of the British army had been sold off to Ireland and then on to Germany. There was a good chance that it had been lost by the German army.
At another place we were using a well for our water supply at which not long previously both British and German infantry had been using until they met one night and shot each other up. I think they lost two and we three blokes.
Also around the central mountains we watched a town on top of a mountain being bombed by Marauders of the American forces for two days running and we knew The highland division was in there. We went through the next day in a very nervous state. Things did get mixed up a bit. The regiment we were working with had Four-fives and Five-five inchers. Quite heavy artillery pieces all set up when the lads noticed a couple of motorcyclists stopped on a sort of lay by close to them. They took no notice until they realized that they were Germans and then they rushed over with their guns and took them prisoner. They were quite cocky about it and then the next day they noticed two tanks stopped there and they realized that they were tigers. The crews were busy brewing up till they noticed the panic as the gunners worked to bring their guns to bear on them and then they dived back inside their tanks and roared away blasting the gunners as they went and causing quite a few casualties.
Then Captain Butterworth who had just landed on a strip for the first time and we pulled up near him to see him off. He flew almost directly at a huge mountain thinking to bank away from it as he cleared the edge of the ravine, which was at the end of the takeoff strip and promptly disappeared down out of sight from us. We waited for the horrible crash and cloud of smoke, which we expected, but instead heard him go through the gate on the throttle and then we saw him climb out of the chasm away to our left.
‘One thing for sure is that he wont come back to land here ‘ I said to the rigger, ‘I reckon we might as well get ready to move when he comes back’. When he did come back we were all set to pull out onto the road, so he could see we were ready to go and away he went with me tearing after him on the old motorbike until I saw him land. He met me as I headed toward his new landing strip and handed the bike over to him.
‘I’ve left a couple of blokes looking after the plane Barwick,’ he said, ‘I told them to expect you, I’ll bring the section along when I find them,’ and away he went on the motor bike.
I found a couple of infantry men standing by the aircraft and thanked them for looking after the old girl. I probably told them what had happened.
That evening the Captain told us that he really did think he’d had it when he hit the down draught from the mountain, but managed to scrape through just before he hit the rocks. What had annoyed him was that when he landed a couple of infantry lads had ran up to him and asked if he was O K. He told them he was. Asked them to look after the airoplane until I arrived and then went to see their Sergeant Major to O K the arrangement.
The Sergeant Major looked to see who the lads were and then said.
‘I don’t know about that pair Sir, they are ex desert army, they might steal anything.’ This annoyed the Captain who explained that he expected senior N C Os to back their men up, not run them down and that he was quite confident that the two men were perfectly reliable. This was Captain Butterworth’s way. He believed in looking after his blokes and expected others to do the same.
We moved eastward as the campaign drew to its end. Eventually sorting out a landing strip on the side of mount Etna with its smoking and flaming head. It was a sort of moonscape and very rough, but we found a reasonable strip. And then it was over, we had done quite well, I had got on well with the lads and The captain and we rejoined the Squadron at Catania airodrome which was littered with wrecks.
The highland division he taken up residence in Catania with their usual flair right on the main drag where they had marked off a piece of the pavement outside some big posh building and mounted a guard in full highland regalia to ensue that nobody walked on that bit. I presume they piped the sentries on and off at the changing of the guard. I was not there to see it.
From Catania we moved up to the straits of Messina to a village called Millazo a scruffy little fishing village where the headquarters assembled and the original mechanic of section B6 returned to the squadron and wanted his job back so once more I was spare and still down for posting.
My old flight C flight was sent along the northern coast to load onto landing ships to go on another invasion. We didn’t know where to of course, but I felt a bit left out of it all, stuck at H Q while they were busy. There was this about it I could now catch up on some much needed sleep so I crashed out face down in my tin hat on this filthy pebbly beach out of everybody’s way, I hoped.
I was booted out of this drunken stupor with.
‘Come on Barwick C flight has been torpedoed. There has been casualties, you are to replace Andy Mc Meican in C11, grab your kit, the truck’s waiting. Les Web and Andy Mc Alpine and several more are dead. Come on there’s a boat waiting for you.’

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