大象传媒

Memories Of Thomas Salter 鈥� RAF Veteran WWII

鈥淒on鈥檛 worry boys, it will never happen鈥�, said the headmaster to the school, congregated in the library and worried about the possibility of war. However, three days later, at the age of just 15, Salter was taken from his parents and family and evacuated 20 miles away to Dorking, to live with a family he had never met in the countryside. He was evacuated to a rich household, which was a large change for a city boy. The farm he stayed at, however, gave him many idyllic months, but with only one small school, he was only able to have a single lesson every here weeks, which led to his quitting school. His job as an office boy made him feel like the dogsbody of the world, so he joined the air training corps. In the air corps he had quite a lot of training in meteorology, and at 17 录 years old he was called up for a three-day examination in aptitude, intelligence and sight. When he successfully passed that, he was called up to St. John鈥檚 Wood, an air crew reception centre 鈥� he distinctly remembers his tearful mother, worrying about a possibly lethal situation, but he was home again that evening! He was then posted to the Initial Training Wing (ITW), and undertook three months鈥� hard work on navigation, engines, signals, physical education, meteorology and all related flying subjects, for which he had to be up at 6 am, and on parade at 8am for the rigorous lessons. He was then posted to flying training, at Carlisle, using Tiger Moth planes 鈥� amazingly he passed the test of having to fly solo at 80mph after just 10 hours of flying time, which he had done by 8 hours! He was then posted across the Atlantic Ocean on the Old Queen Mary, a boat too fast for any submarine to catch, before completing 6 weeks elementary firing school, and 13 weeks senior flying school, which sought and sorted the more mature, sobre-minded bomber pilots. The bombers and fighters then split 鈥� but Salter went as a bomber pilot, a twin-engine aircraft, and after a week he got his 鈥榳ings鈥� in a very serious ceremony. After his commission, another serious ceremony, he had to solemnly promise allegiance to the King, by vowing on the Bible. Following that, he had to move down to the operational training unit, (Nassau in the Bahamas), where submarines were operating in oil tankers from the gulf, due to the lack of blackout in America, causing the ships to be silhouetted against the lights. He also had the pleasure of no rationing, and his favourite delicacy was ice cream! After coming back to England, he had to patrol over the Atlantic, working as an anti-submarine bomber; of course the Battle of the Atlantic. Then, after an OUT navigation course that lasted 45- weeks, he was posted to Cylon, (now Sri-Lanka), in India, on an airfield in the jungle, (as this was in a hard place to find). The runway of the airfield was made of American sheet metal strips, on an area of jungle the Americans had cleared. During his stay here Flight Lieutenant Salter flew over Indian Ocean on regular sub-patrols in a squadron. It was while he was posted here that the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. This was a great surprise to the men, as the bomb was unheard of before. They wandered how could a bomb could be so powerful to destroy a whole city, as weeks of bombing in the blitz had not totally destroyed London! After the second bomb was dropped, while Salter was serving a few weeks of occupation in Malaya, he had the opportunity to see Nagasaki, although they could not go too near! The whole city had been completely destroyed, and in the whole wasteland only 1 wall of 1 story was left with the whole city as far as could see was completely gone. They had no doubt at all that the Allies would win the war. Britain had suffered the blitz, and so wanted to fight Most British people hated Germans strenuously then. During the war soldiers grumbled abut orders, but there was no question about not doing them. It was not much fun in jungle, as all the soldiers had to carry their own water, there were no real toilets and the local population stole food and supplies from the Allied soldiers, however, the soldiers got on well with most local people. Through the whole conflict, pilots were told to avoid combat if possible, as keeping submarines under the water was more important than shooting them and risking getting shot down.

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