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Below is a copy of a speech I wrote in 1994 and my family wanted me to put my story on this website! I have lived in England since the war finished and have a family here and some family still in Poland.

SPEECH:

For what you are about to hear you can blame one of your friends who persuaded me to come here and speak to you.
What I will tell you is not unique. There are many thousands of Poles that eventually found themselves in England and Scotland during the last war. They all, I am sure, could tell a very similar story.
I do not know the exact numbers - but England and Scotland must have suffered an invasion of probably 100,000 Poles during the last war.
The Polish Air Force alone accounted for about 20,000. In England, during the last war there were 10 Fighter and 4 bomber squadrons manned entirely by Polish personnel. One in eleven pilots in the Battle of Britain was a Pole.
Sadly - the victory we celebrated in 1945 did not result in Free Poland. Faced with the agonizing choice of returning to Russian‑dominated Poland or staying in the West - in Freedom three‑quarters of us decided to remain here. Some settled in France, some in Canada and the United States. Most, however, remained in England and Scotland.
However - going back in time. I was born to a middle class family - my father was a lawyer, my mother a teacher. I have a younger brother and sister.
In the 30s I was a school‑boy - life was carefree - I had a bicycle to go to school on in Summer and a pair of skis to go to school in Winter. Pre‑war Poland was virtually a one party State. There was opposition but it was weak in numbers and influence, and was not taken seriously.
Most government posts seemed to have been filled by generals and colonels - not surprising really because the Prime Minister himself was a Field Marshall.
But - from what I can remember it was a benevolent regime.
The latter part of 1938 and the Spring and Summer of 1939 were an uneasy period.
We all sensed that something was brewing up.
Europe was in turmoil.
Hitter's Germany annexed Austria, occupied Sudetenland and then Czechoslovakia fell.
France and England seemed to have been mesmerized by the audacity of it all.
Hitler then turned his attention to Poland by reopening the question of the Corridor to East Prussia.
Border incidents were staged and it became obvious that Poland was to be the next victim.
That seemed to have decided for the West that, enough was enough, and a stand had to be made somewhere.
England and France guaranteed Poland's frontiers, thus virtually ensuring war if Germany embarked on Adventure Poland.
What did Germany do?
Well - Messrs. Molotov and Von Ribentrop, to the dismay of the West, signed a non‑aggression treaty. That guaranteed Germany a secure behind in case she had to face the West. A secret clause in that treaty also carved up Poland. In the event of Poland being invaded by Germany - Eastern provinces would be annexed by Russia.
It is now mid‑August 1939. I came back from my gliding holiday and signed on as a fresher at Krakow University to read medicine.
My father was a colonel in the Polish Army Reserve and was called up for active duties and manoeuvres at the beginning of August.
The war started on the September 1st, 1939. At four o clock in the morning German Panzer divisions crossed the Polish Frontier at several points. They were confronted by cavalry Battalions on horseback.
Luftwaffe started bombing Warsaw and other cities.
Lectures at the university were suspended - I joined my father's Regiment.
The situation was chaotic. Nobody knew what was happening and how the war was progressing.
Radio bulletins were full of accounts of battles - mostly won by us.
There was even the very welcome news that France invaded Germany and British Bombers were destroying German cities. It was a pity they were only using leaflets. The Germans, I am sure, found good use for them.
In spite of all that good news, the Germans still, somehow, managed to advance deeper and deeper into Poland. My father's regiment was constantly retreating to take up new positions.
I never saw a German soldier. Not that we were a formidable fighting force. Like my father - they were all middle‑aged reservists. We were all equipped with rifles of W.W I vintage and a couple of middle‑aged legs on which to retreat to new positions.
I've still got mine - they now propel me round a golf course - I also use them for skiing.
Eventually, we arrived at the ancient city of Lvov.
To our amazement the German pursuit had stopped - they did not attack the city which was now full of Polish soldiers.
We were not amazed for very long - a couple of days to be precise - when we realized that there were two Russian divisions at the eastern gates of Lvov.
For one fleeting moment we thought that the Russians had come to help us. Not so. It was all prearranged by Messrs. Molotov and von Ribentrop.
So there we were - stuck - encircled in the city with nowhere to go — Germans to the West, Russians to the East.
We were given the choice of surrendering either to the Russians or the Germans. The Garrison Command chose to surrender to the Russians.
This was now the latter part of September and the weather during that fateful month was beautiful - not a drop of rain - it was a lovely late Summer - somewhat spoiled by war.
The surrender came - we gave up our rifles. Non-commissioned officers and other ranks were released and told to go home. All officers were detained. I swapped my private's greatcoat for that of a 2nd Lieutenants - so as not to be separated from my father. There must have been about 600 officers. We were all marched to a railway station and boarded a train.
The coaches were very uncomfortable - I think they must have come from Russia - each wagon had four long benches on which to sit and there was no lavatory but a hole in one corner that you were asked not to use when the train was stationary. Next morning the train left. The guards were very few in numbers and seemed very friendly. A Russian major was in command - and he was somewhat concerned because our food ration was very meagre. There was bread and a bit of pork - fat spread - but nothing very much else.
The train was slowly moving East. I tried to persuade my father that we must get out and escape before we got too far into Russia.
My father was reluctant - he felt - that because of his very senior rank -he ought to stay. Eventually I did prevail and on the 2nd night we got off the train. It stopped in the middle of nowhere, so it seemed, for the locomotive to replenish its water. At the same time we were also allowed to water the nearby bushes.
We were then herded back into the wagons. Just as the train was about to leave - we lowered ourselves - that is my father and I - through that corner hole and lay still between the rails.
We waited until the train was well out of sight before leaping back into the bushes again. We had three loaves of bread and some fat with us. We now started on our way back to Poland. We kept the railway line just in sight. We knew we could not have been that far into Russia because -remembering the geography of that region - there was quite a lot of Poland east of Lvov before Russia started.
We walked at night and slept in daytime. The countryside was very sparsely populated - we came across few hamlets but tried to keep well away. We wanted to make sure we were not discovered. We rationed the bread carefully. There was plenty of water in the streams. We mutilated our uniforms - stripped off the rank insignia. In case we were discovered - we were just ordinary soldiers told to go home. A most unlikely story but there was no other - we just had to make doubly sure that - until we reached Poland - we were not discovered.
On the twelfth night we came across a roadsign - it said Kotyry 3 km. We were back in Poland - hungry, tired and very dirty. We also had the first bit of very good luck indeed. One of my father's office friends came from Kotyry and we knew the address. We found the house and knocked on the door. When it opened there stood my father's friend in his pyjamas. He could not believe his eyes.
We had the first hot meal, a hot bath and a shave. He also gave us civilian clothes. We were soldiers no more.
Kotyry was a smallish village - the sort of place where everybody knows everybody and strangers are soon spotted. We had to leave and get back to Lvov where we could get lost among the multitudes of displaced persons. That journey we made by train and it took 3 hours.
Back in Lvov we found lodgings and took stock of our situation. I also met up with three of my schoolfriends who were to start engineering at Lvov University. Of course there were no lectures and nobody knew what was going to happen.
Lvov at that time was full of rumours that a Polish Army was being formed in France. My friends and I decided that we would go to France. That France was several countries away and about 1300 miles away from Lvov did not seem to deter us.
When you are 18 problems like that can be easily overcome.
There were 4 of us now. We discussed it with my father and planned the route. My father would not come with us. He was 50 and had a "gammy" leg - the legacy of a shrapnel wound from the first world war. He gave us most of his money.
There was only one feasible route and that was to get ourselves first into Romania. The frontier was about 200 km south of Lvov.
We went to the Romanian consulate and bought ourselves entry visas for Romania. I remember to this day that the visa was called "billet di libera trecere" with my photograph on it in the right top corner.
So far so good - we had our entry visas but there was no way that we would gain our exit visas legally. We knew that we would have to cross the frontier illegally and them present our billets d.l.t." once in Romania.
We said goodbye to my father and set off by train for a border town. I was not to see my father again for 20 years.
We arrived in that town and booked into a guest house. We were given a room with four bunk‑beds. Next morning we engaged a local guide that would take us across the border. We arranged to meet him about 9 o'clock that evening outside the church.
We had our evening meal, paid the bill and were about to leave the room when a local militia man appeared at the door - a rifle slung over his shoulders.
He wanted to know what we were doing in that town and where we were going next. I told him we came in search of a relative - we could not find him - and were just on the point of leaving for the Station to go back to Lvov. I had my hand in my jacket pocket with a revolver at the ready - the barrel pointing at him with my finger on the trigger.
Although he could not see it - I am sure he knew what was in my pocket - he kept looking at it. He was a little outnumbered and obviously thought R prudent not to question our story. He wished us a good journey back to Lvov. I told him that just as he came in - we were about to leave anyway - so we would follow him out of the room and out of the house. Once out in the street I told him to walk on and not to look back.
He had no choice - the street was deserted and there would have been no help available.
Poor fellow - he must have been as scared as we were - he looked about the same age as us.
We met our guide and set off for the frontier. We told him about our encounter with the militia so he thought it wise to make for a more distant crossing just in case the local frontier guards were alerted.
A small river marked the frontier at our crossing point. It was only about waist deep and perhaps 30 metres wide - the area was lightly wooded. We walked briskly through the no‑man's land and reached our crossing point. There was nobody in sight. We paid our guide -said goodbye and waded across. The water was icy cold - it was now the beginning of November. We reached the other side. We were in Romania - very wet and exhausted but also very elated that we made it, as planned, and still very much alive.
We kept the rising Sun to our left and walked in a southerly direction deeper and deeper into Romania.
After about 3 hours we met our first Romanian. He was a bizarre sight -a border guard, dressed in a very smart uniform with a few medals dangling on his chest mounted on a lovely white horse.
He approached us and saluted. He then spoke to us. We could not understand a word of what he was saying. It sounded very much like unintelligible Latin. He seemed to have been quite pleased to see us. We greeted him - bonjour, guten tag - tried Polish and Russian - all to no avail. We then proudly produced our "billets di libera trecere". He looked at it for a while and gave it back to us. I don't think he could read.
He beckoned us to follow him to a near-by village and we eventually arrived at the local police station. They gave us breakfast, took our particulars and told us in a very primitive French that we would be taken to Cemauti - a nearby town. We wanted to go to Cemauti because we knew there was a Polish Consulate there. We were transported there in a horse-cart - our walking days were over.
In Cemanti, for the first time in Romania, we could actually communicate with the local police officer in German. We asked him to see the Polish consul and were told that this would be arranged. We were given the address of the Polish consulate. However - we were also told that we would have to attend a court hearing and the charge would be illegal entry into Romania. This was a blow - what about our "Billets di Libera Trecere"!, issued by the Romanian consulate in Lvov - paid for and duly stamped with an official seal bearing King Carols head, we asked? Only to be told that without an exit visa these pieces of paper were worthless. The hearing would take place in about 10 days time. In the meantime we would be detained in the police station.
We were treated well and were quite comfortable - we spent most of our time playing pontoon. The cell door was not locked - we were free to wander around as we pleased - nobody seemed to take much notice of us.
What we did notice, however, was that the lavatory window looked out into the street and was only about waist high above the pavement. It would not be too difficult to get through that window - onto the street -and nobody would probably notice for a long time that we were missing.
Early in the morning - on the third day - after removing one and bending another bar of that window we clambered out into the street and made for the consulate.
When we arrived there it was closed - it was too early in the morning - but after repeated banging on the door we were let in by a sleepy doorman - and told to wait for the consul to arrive. We were very glad to be off the street and in the comparitive safety of the consulate premises.
The consul eventually arrived and was not at all surprised to see us. Obviously we were not the first fugitives to arrive at his doorstep.
He explained the procedure to us. We would be issued with identity papers and be given money to buy railway tickets to Bucharest. Once there we were to report to the Polish Embassy and they would take over. We were to leave Cemauti that afternoon. There were 4 of us and we were given 200 leis to buy tickets. We pointed out that single fare to Bucharest was 80 leis - how were we to buy 4 tickets. He apologised for not explaining to us the way one travels on Romanian railways. You do not buy tickets, he said, you pay 5 leis to get on the platform, you pay 20 leis each to the conductor when he comes to check your ticket - just in case you have one - you again pay 5 leis to get out of the station at Bucharest. At the end of your journey you will still be left with 20 leis each. And that's exactly how it was. We were left with 20 leis each on arrival in Bucharest.
We reported to the embassy. They provided us with an accommodation address and some money for food etc. It took them about two weeks to organise our identity papers and railway tickets to France. The train took us through Yugoslavia and Italy - Italy was not yet at war. This was now the end of November 1939. It seemed to have been a very slow train - stopping at nearly every station on that long journey. Eventually - as it emerged from the tunnel that marked the Italian-French border (at Modane - we all stood up and sang the Marseillaise.
These were momentous days in my life - so much has happened in just three months. At the beginning I was a student at Krakow University - then war started and ended - and my country was no more - then I was a prisoner of war and escaped and then another escape from Russian occupied Poland to Romania and now - after a leisurely train journey across Europe I found myself in France. I was just 18.
Ever since I was a boy I was mad keen on flying. I could not have been more than 7 or 8 years old when my father took me to watch an aeroplane take off from a near-by field. It forced-landed there the day before because of engine failure. I can still see the pilot walking towards his plane - wearing a long black leather coat and knee high boots, helmet and goggles. He climbed into the cockpit - the mechanic swung the propeller - the engine burst into life and the plane started its take-off run. It did not quite manage to clear the hedge at the far end of the field. As it hit the hedge it turned over and seemingly disintegrated.
We rushed over to rescue the pilot only to find he did not need any rescuing. He extricated himself from the wreckage - shook off the debris and walked off. I thought this was great - when I grow up I will be a pilot. Before the war everybody in Poland had to do national service. I elected to do mine in the Air Force. After a medical examination that pronounced me fit for aircrew duties I started my first flying training in gliders during my 1936 school summer holiday and continued in '37, '38 and '39. When I arrived in France I volunteered to join the Air Force and was sent to a gathering centre in Lyon. There were a number of Poles there already by that time.
I was classified as "eleve pilot" and given the rank of sold at 2nd class. There was no lower rank in the French Air Force. The pay was 50 centimes and 10 cigarettes per day. I still remember that the cigarettes were called "troups." - and seemed to have been a slimmer edition of "gauloise" - still today the staple diet of seriously smoking French citizens.
The food was good - we were issued with eating utensils and a half litre mug for coffee at breakfast time and wine with late lunch. Officially you were allowed half a litre of "vin ordinaire" with your lunch - there was water for those with delicate stomachs. I don't remember any of my friends having delicate stomachs.
As eleve pilotes we had lectures in aviation aspects - navigation, - airmanship and, of course, French. We also had to do ordinary square‑bashing and sentry duties. That was every soldier's lot.
I spent Christmas 1939 at Lyon-Bron aerodrome and was on sentry duty on Christmas day. It was my first Christmas away from my family - I was 18 and alone - and a very long way from home. I remembered last Christmas, the Christmas tree and the presents. It brought tears to my eyes.
The winter of 1939 in France was bitterly cold - there were ice flows on the Rhone floating towards the Mediterranean.
In January 1940 about 20 of us - all eleve pilots - were posted to Fez in French Morocco to an elementary flying training school. We came from one extreme climate to another - the temperature was in the high seventies. After completing the course there we were all sent to Marrakesh, not all that far away, to a secondary flying training school.
Towards the end of April, having finished pilot's training, I was posted back to Lyon-Bron. A Polish Fighter squadron was being formed there. I was now a fully-fledged "pilote de chasse - but still Soldier 2nd class with 50c and 10 troups and half a litre of wine for each day's service. However, we had no planes.
We were to be equipped with France's newest Fighter Aircraft - the Devoitine 520s . They never arrived.
We did some local flying in the station's old training planes.
This was now nearly the end of April 1940 and the end of the phoney war. Real war was about to start.
You may or you may not believe in premonition. Bid - on the night of, I think May 7th, 1940. I dreamt that I was sitting on a latrine (doing what one does on the latrine) when I saw a German Bomber approaching - flying quite low and heading straight for me - with its bomb door wide open. A bomb detached itself from the plane and was about to hit me when I woke up.
On the 10th of May, 1940 - at 5 o'clock in the morning - I was indeed sitting on that very same latrine - still half asleep - when I suddenly heard an air raid warning. I remembered my dream and smartly scampered into the nearest anti-aircraft ditch.
Several bombers dropped bombs on the aerodrome and straffed the buildings with machine‑gun fire. When it was all over and the all-clear sounded - the latrines were no more. Just one big crater. This incident is actually documented in the official French Air Force history of the 2nd world war, where it says that the latrines at Lyon-Bron were the only casualty of that air-raid.
The war in France did not last long. When the end was near and all of northern France and Paris occupied, we knew it would only be a matter of days before the rest of France fell.
Flying to England in the available aircraft was out of the question, the range was insufficient. We could, however, fly to north Africa. With that in mind - some of the squadron flew off. We landed at Marseilles but were refused refuelling. The aerodrome commandant said that "La guerre est fini"!
This shook us - we were convinced that France would carry on fighting from North African bases. That was not to be.
The squadron was disbanded.
Somehow we had to try to get to England. We went by train to Perpignan - on the French‑Spanish border -where we thought we should be able to get a boat to take us to North‑Africa. If that failed we would have to cross the border into Spain and be interned.
We did manage to get a boat from Port-Vandre that took us to Oran. The British consul there organised a train journey for us to Casablanca from where we were taken by a coaster to Gibraltar.
This was now the end of June 1940.
In Gibraltar we were put on a largish ship that eventually became part of a large convoy that would take us to England.
We were - of course - not told of our destination, and when for the first 4 days the convoy sailed due west - we were convinced we were heading for the States.
However - another 16 days and we docked in Liverpool on the 20th July, 1940.
We were very impressed with our reception. After disembarking we marched to Liverpool Exchange station - a train was ready and waiting for us - we were given a numbered seat, sandwiches and a mug of tea. No wine this time.
No sooner had we sat down the train moved away. It took us to Insworth Lane near Gloucester. On arrival we were bused to the RAF station, allocated our bed in a Nissen hut - and issued with a mattress and blankets. The next day we were all kitted out with uniforms etc.
After the chaos of France - this was indeed organisation "par excellence".
After interrogation and verification of our stories - it took about two weeks - we were given the rank of AC2. At that time it carried a salary of 2 shillings per day - and that was backdated to our arrival in Gibraltar. I was rich at last.
With about 20 pilots - all trained in France - I was next posted to Blackpool.
None of us could speak a word of English - but we were of course very eager to learn.
English was force-fed to us from 9-5 every day.
I spent about 5 weeks in Blackpool before being sent on a conversion course to fly British planes.
Aircraft controls are the same the world over. The only difference was that French instrumentation was metric - while we were operating in knots and feet and pounds per square inch.
We had several dual flights on Tiger Moths. before progressing to Fairey Battles. After several hours on those we were let loose on Hurricanes.
I was also promoted to the rank of sergeant. Hurricane was a lovely aircraft to fly - very friendly and forgiving.
On September 10th I was posted with two other lads to 303 squadron and stationed at Northolt.
At just 19 I was the youngest pilot with barely a few hours on Hurricanes.
Most of the squadron pilots were very experienced having flown operationally in Poland and in France.
I did not last very long.
On my second local flight - actually I was to deliver a Hurricane from Heston to Northweald. I managed to get myself shot down. I belly landed in a field. The plane came to a full stop after hitting a rather solid stony hedge. I bashed my face on the instrument panel - that knocked me out - I also broke my right arm.
Luckily the plane did not catch fire.
When I woke up in hospital with my face repaired but totally bandaged I thought I was blind - I also could not move my arm because it was splinted and immobilised.
I had no recollection of that flight and did not know why I was in hospital.
Eventually I was told that I was taken out of a wrecked Hurricane -unconscious with facial injuries and a broken right arm. I was also told that I was not blind - my left eye was certainly alright and my right eye would recover.
When they took the bandages off it was a great relief to see the face of a very pretty nurse with both my eyes.
I was in hospital for 2 months and then sent to Blackpool again to convalesce.
I also became a very rich young man again when I collected my backpay.
It was more than enough to buy a car. After a couple of months of convalescing I had a medical examination and was pronounced fit for flying duties. That was a relief.
I was posted to an O.T.U. It was nice to be flying again.
After finishing a course there a posting came to 302 Sq. (May 1941). The squadron was mainly engaged in Fighter sweeps over Northern France and Holland. We also acted as escorts for bombers.
We were very busy and lost several pilots. This time, however, I managed to complete the operational tour (55 sorties).
I was also commissioned now and sent to 58 O.T.U. - as an instructor this time - to teach young, fresh new fighter pilots formation flying, combat tactics and generally how to survive to fight another day - and what stupid things not to do - the latter I was particularly well qualified to teach.
I spent six months there and in July 1942 came a posting to 316 squadron for another operational tour.
The squadron was equipped with spitfires 5 B - these had clipped wings and were a delight to fly.
To begin with we were stationed In Yorkshire and engaged mainly in patrols. That was boring - nothing ever very much happened.
Things changed, however, when the squadron was posted to Northolt.
Again we acted as escorts to bombers - the targets were usually marshalling yards in Lille and Amiens in the Pas de Calais area. Le Havre-Cherbourg and Rouen in Normandy. Port installations at Brest were particularly heavily defended - we always met opposition there -and sustained considerable losses.
Towards the end of 1942 we also met our first F.W. 190's. It had an advantage over Spitfire 5's in speed and power - but the Spitfire was more manoeuvrable and could - in experienced hands - outfly the F.W. -just.
We lost a number of our new pilots to F.W. 190's. In those days it seemed that if you survived the first 30 or so operational sorties you were probably alright for many more. You seemed to have learned how to assess your chances - when to be brave and when it was prudent not to stick your neck out.
In Aug. 1943 I was again taken off operationals having survived another lot of operational sorties (127 now in total).
I was posted to No. 61 O.T.V. at Montford-Bridge and Havenden in Cheshire - again to instruct.
I was there for six months and remember it well because I nearly met my end there twice.
Once during a formation take-off when my right wing pupil nearly ploughed into my aircraft - we actually touched - and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it because there was another pupil taking off on my left wing. I do not know how we avoided each other - but I must have aged several years in those few seconds.
After the flight - at debriefing - when I tackled him about it he did not think he did anything wrong.
More of him later. On another occasion a pupil nearly collided with me at very low attitude when simulating an attack - I only just got away.
A sky full of Messerschmidts - provided you knew where they were -was a much safer place.
I had to endure it for six months. There was compensation, however.
Hawarden castle - which at the end of the last century was Gladstone's private residence - was now the living quarters and a training establishment for W.R.E.N. officers. And very pretty most of them were too.
We were frequently invited there for dances and other, even more pleasant, indoor activities.
However, in February 1944 I was very glad to be posted to 302 squadron.
I was back in Northolt again.
The squadron by now was equipped with spitfire 9's. Here was an aircraft that could hold its own with a F.W. 190.
Again our duties were mainly escorts to bomber formations. On many occasions we also escorted American flying fortresses - they invariably attracted stiff opposition from enemy fighters.
For the first time also we were being instructed in dive bombing techniques.
We soon learned that, with practice, it was possible to deposit your bombs very accurately - to within no more than twenty yards from the target.
That sort of accuracy could not be achieved by bomber aircraft because they operated at heights of between 15 - 25,000 feet.
Flying fortresses would usually fly at 25,000 feet or higher.
We soon learned why we were practicing dive bombing. The Germans were preparing installations for flying bombs - later nicknamed "doodle‑bugs".
Our targets consisted of launching ramps and underground storage facilities and therefore presented very small targets. They were situated mostly in the "Pas de Calais" area.
To render them useless - the ramp had to receive virtually a direct hit.
They were always very well camouflaged and heavily defended by anti aircraft fire.
You commenced your almost vertical dive at about 7-8,000 ft - always into a hail of bullets - got your target in the centre of your gunsight and pressed the bomb-release button at about 500 ft - that also activated your cine-camera that took pictures of your aim and target.
We did not like it because your survival depended entirely on luck and skill did not come into it. It was just about exactly the opposite when dealing with enemy fighters.
You nearly always came back with holes in your aircraft - our main worry was damage to the engine's cooler system. If that was hit the engine would seize up and catch fire within minutes. We lost quite a few aircraft because of just that.
Some of the pilots - remarkably there were very few of them - just did not have it in them to go through with that manoeuvre.
Once when leading the squadron - I remember one particular pilot that never commenced the dive but released his bombs at about 7,000 ft and stayed up above us.
When tackled about it at debriefing after the flight he said that he remained above us to act as cover and protect us from enemy fighters. Well there might have been some a hundred miles away!
Incidentally - that was the same fellow who nearly wrote me off during that formation take-off I that I described earlier.
We remained good friends - there was nothing personal about it. It was clearly a medical matter.
I even went to his wedding soon afterwards - and was very favourably entertained by the bride's very pretty sister. On June 6 we were briefed at about three o'clock in the morning. The invasion was on - we were to patrol the Neptune beach where British and Canadian forces would land.
We took off about 4.20.
The visibility was good but the cloud base was only at 2,000 feet and there was total cloud cover.
The sight that greeted us was unforgettable - an armada of ships and landing craft - of all shapes and sizes moving slowly towards France.
There were so many of them - so densely packed together it seemed that you could almost walk across to France.
We spent 2 hours patrolling over the beach - and observed the troops disembarking from their landing crafts and making for the shore.
By the time we turned back for England the returning ships and landing crafts were already a fair way up the channel on their return journey.
I flew again later that day and the sight was the same. A mass of ships sailing to France and another sailing back.
On the 7th and 8th of June the squadron again few twice each day patrolling the Neptune beach. On the 9th of June the weather closed in and flying was impossible.
On the 10th of June we again flew 2 sorties.
We were one of the first squadrons to land in France. A landing strip was prepared for us where we could land and refuel without having to fly back all the way to England just to refuel.
We were very elated - exactly 4 years after we had to leave we were back on French soil again - this time as welcome liberators.
However - a French farmer spoiled it all for us when he asked who was going to compensate him for that bit of land on which we landed - and for how long would we be needing it. That was not the greeting we expected.
After another 3 weeks the squadron actually used that air-strip as a more permanent base. We lived there in tents.
There was virtually no opposition from the air - our only casualties were from ground-fire - very often you came back with holes in your aircraft - that you didn't even know you had acquired until you inspected your aircraft after landing.
We were still very much engaged in dive bombing V. I. installations and bomber escorts. It was a very busy time for us.
When the allied armies eventually broke out of Normandy and started their advance through France and Belgium - we followed.
It came to a full stop when we reached the borders of Holland. The squadron was based in Ghent - a city of a thousand churches.
This was now October 1944 and I was again taken off ops. for a short rest and sent back to the comforts of England.
It was actually a Secondment to a unit based at Tangmere where we did some comparitive performance evaluation tests on all sorts of fighter planes - British and American.
That was actually a very interesting job from the flying point of view - but I was quite glad to be posted back to 302 sq. - still stationed in Ghent - just in time for Christmas '44.
After the hickup of the German breakthrough at Ardennes the allies started advancing again - we followed in their wake.
We were again engaged in ground support and bomber escorts that by now seemed quite superfluous because there was virtually no more Luftwaffe over the skies of Germany to oppose us.
The war finished on a sad note for me. My best friend was shot down over Lubeck by anti‑aircraft fire on what turned out to be the squadron's last operational sortie.
Peace broke out the very next day.
To end my story I would like to take you back to the very beginning when my father - and I escaped from the train that was taking us to a prisoner of war camp some where in Russia.
Well - that very train finished its journey in Katyn.
In 1959 - 20 years after I said goodbye to my father and left Poland I went back to see my family.
My father showed me a book. It was not an ordinary book - all it contained were pages and pages and pages of names of about 15,000 Polish officers that perished in Katyn in May 1940. The names of every one of my father's friends that were on that train were in that book.

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