大象传媒

FURTHER Chronicles OF A CHARMED LIFE
By Jack Bartley
The period commencing with the outbreak of the 2nd World War in 1939 until the German invasion of the Low Countries in May 1940 has been dubbed by historians as the 'Phoney War'. Whilst this may have been true for a large part of the Armed Forces, it certainly was not for the aircrews of R.A.F. Bomber Command. Although no attacks were made on mainland Germany for fear of retaliation from the much stronger Luftwaffe, offshore Naval targets were sought and bombed in daylight sorties carried out without fighter escort, resulting in quite severe losses of men and machines.
The Blenheim aircraft of 21 Squadron at Watton were deployed on warship reconnaissance and bombing of the anti-aircraft 'flak' ships guarding the approaches to the German naval ports. These flights of up to 5 hours duration were interspersed with long periods of 'standby' spent in the hangar crew room playing 'Ukkers' (Ludo) whilst awaiting the call for briefing and action.
In June 1940 all operational aircrew below that rank were promoted to Sergeant. Prior to this Wireless operator/Air Gunners were 'other ranks' and as such were subject to normal station duties including guards, which could mean you were flying by day sitting behind a machine gun, and slinging a rifle for 4 hour spells patrolling the dispersed aircraft through the icy nights that the '39/40 winter produced. The one privilege we enjoyed, apart from the princely sum of an additional shilling per day flying pay plus sixpence a day for the Air Gunner badge, was a monthly 2-day leave pass.
I was due such a pass after duty on the 7th of April, 1940, the morning of which found me on 'standby' from dawn. After breakfasting I jumped into the back of the 'garry' with the ground crew bound for the dispersal aircraft on the Griston side of the airfield where I did my Daily Inspection (DI) of the radio gear of the aircraft to which I had been allocated for the duty, signed up the Form 700 and returned to the crew room. After numerous Ukkers games we were stood down at 3pm and I wasted little time in catching a train to my home in London.
I arrived back from leave to hear the shock news that Johnny Ball, the Wop/Ag who had taken over from me had been killed, together with his pilot and observer, on the first morning of my leave, when the aircraft had an engine failure on take-off.
The leave roster had proved extremely fortunate for me. However, I did not entirely escape the consequences of the tragic incident. I attended the burial of the crew that morning and on returning from Watton cemetery was detailed to fly to Shawbury to ferry a replacement aircraft from the Maintenance Unit there. Going to my flying clothing locker I realised that my helmet was missing and remembered with a jolt that I had left it in the ill-fated aircraft, where I had needed the earphones that it housed for my DI, expecting to have flown in the aircraft later that day.
Luckily I was able to borrow one for the ferrying flights, but my luck deserted me when I went to Stores for a replacement. The issues F/Sgt was adamant that I either produced the old one or signed a Form 664b to pay for a new one. This presented me with the gruesome task of searching the wreckage of the Blenheim in a field nearby for something which might be accepted as part of the helmet assembly. The stench of the numerous fragments of cooked and uncooked human flesh that I encountered might well have nauseated me had it not been for the over-riding compensatory realisation of how closely it had come to being my own.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.