大象传媒

... Continued from Part 1.

So on Monday 18th September 1939, with trepidation and pride I led the team into Fighter Command`s Operations Room that morning to take our stations. It was a large room with a balcony, and as we walked in there was a hush, followed by a very audible whisper 鈥淲omen鈥�, as many craned their necks from above. I shyly looked up at the central figure of Air Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding (later Lord D.) His impassive face belied his great belief in RDF (and subsequent improvements known as RADAR) and had done much to foster its inception.

大象传媒 in the Ops Room was to be on shifts, so for the first time many of us experienced the trauma of working during the nights and intervals during the day. Then suddenly, contrary to what we had been told, I was notified by the Air Ministry I had been promoted an Officer. I did not want to leave my job. Reluctantly I reported to my Company, got my Officers uniform, and found I was posted to Biggin Hill to prepare the WAAF quarters for a company of Airwomen who were due to arrive. Then just as I was leaving, this posting was cancelled and told to go on a Secret Course. This time it was Codes and Cyphers at the now well-known place, Bletchley Park.

After the Course, as A.S.O (Assistant Section Officer) I was posted to Bomber Command Operations Headquarters which was then based at Langley. They were awaiting the completion of their new complex near High Wycombe. It was then November 1939. In the new year we moved, our office was in the underground complex, and we lived in one of the Married quarters a short distance away. There were three Cypher officers. Again we worked in shifts, with life becoming much more intense as the War progressed. First it was the catastrophic Norwegian assault. Decoding became very urgent and difficult with some messages coming via Morse then teleprinter. Soon it was the German invasion of the Low countries. Many of our messages were 鈥淢ost Immediate and Secret鈥�, and it was often a panic to deliver them soon enough personally to the Ops Room, day or night, with often only one Cypher officer on duty at a time. As the Germans poured across towards France, and the evacuation of our troops from Dunkirk, we were working flat out: many of the messages detailing where our bombers should direct their bombs etc.

By the end of July I succumbed, presumably from so much time spent in the air conditioned atmosphere (which was not always perfect then). I was rushed to Uxbridge RAF Hospital with suspected Diphtheria - luckily it turned out to be severe tonsillitis. At that time Uxbridge, like so many other RAF stations in the South were experiencing constant air raids. and I was often put on a stretcher in a corridor, especially I remember after having my tonsils removed. I returned to duty as the days of the terrible Battle of Britain were unfurling. Although the Fighter planes were bearing the brunt of the onslaught, our Bombers were still continuously flying against lines of communication, and special sites. The office was as busy as ever, but by this time I was promoted Section Officer as more staff became available. During these crises times with talks of invasion, we were given target practise with Revolvers in our spare time, which was all a bit scary. It was not all confined to the air battles either, as the Germans pounded our cities and ports. By November life became a little less fraught, but one knew one could not relax.

To my surprise in December I was promoted Flight Officer and posted to No.1 Bomber Group Headquarters at Hucknall until it moved to Bawtry Hall in Yorkshire. I had no idea what this would entail. It was a new role to supervise and ensure the security of the Cypher offices and staff based at the many Bomber stations in the Group. This also entailed travelling, by RAF transport, to Bomber Command each month to collect Secret documents for distribution to the Group and stations. So having been office-bound, I now travelled miles each month visiting the Cypher Officers at their respective Stations, trying to deal with any problems and report to Headquarters. At Group, there were three other Cypher Officers. The stations were all operational, mostly flying Wellingtons, and one almost became used to hearing that planes did not return from their sorties, sometimes friends that I had met the day before. It became a very lonely life at times, sitting in a car, being driven over the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire countryside, not allowed to give anybody a lift unless authorised and at one time I even had an Airman 鈥渞iding shot-gun鈥� next to the Driver, when there were scares of German parachutists being dropped.

One day, I was being driven, by a new Driver, back from an outlying Station. It was wet and windy, when suddenly the car went into a violent skid across the road then back again to end upside down in a dyke. I can remember stretching to turn off the ignition as the Driver said she could not move, and I found the doors jammed. We were trapped. I must have been concussed because the next thing I vaguely remember was a man helping to get us out. By chance, on the unfrequented road, he had been passing in a large truck and caught sight of the wheels. Luckily neither of us had any severe visible injuries. The next day I was sent to the nearby RAF Sick Bay at Finningley. Then, I was sent to an RAF Hospital and Convalescent Home in Torquay, formerly a large hotel with lovely grounds. After about 10 days of treatment, I was pronounced `walking wounded`, no longer confined to a bed, and advised to take exercise. I was referred to the Resident PT Coach, Dan Maskell (later the Wimbledon Tennis Commentator) and I spent time `playing` against him or others on the very good tennis courts there. As I walked too through the Rest Rooms and gardens, I could not fail to see countless young pilots and others, their faces, hands and legs mutilated by horrific burns and dreadful injuries still recovering as best they could. It made me realise the great price they was paying.

Imagine my shock, when one morning walking down the stairs to breakfast, I noticed some bandaged men being brought into the Foyer. I suddenly recognised George, my good friend, a Bomber Pilot. Apparently they were on their way back from a Sortie over Germany when they were hit by Flak, and managed to crash-land somewhere in England, with some of the crew injured, and had been sent to the hospital. Thankfully none seriously. After a few days George was also a 'walking wounded'. It was as though Fate had brought us together briefly. We had time to talk as we walked through the gardens and the town. The war seemed to be far away. All too soon I had to return to Duty. As I left, he asked me to marry him. Despite many misgivings, sometime later we got married. When George finished his two Tours of bombing missions in September, he was posted as Flying instructor at a station in South Wales.

Later I received a new posting to No.5 Group Headquarters at Grantham in Lincolnshire, and strangely enough only a few miles from where my brother had been killed It was a larger Group, with the new Lancaster 4-engined bombers. Again it was more of the same, but a different countryside to travel and new WAAF officers to meet. There were however various new experiences. One day when I was due to visit a Station, our Commanding Officer asked me to take a Mr Moore to visit that Station. We chatted a lot in the car, he said he was sketching `Wartime Men at work`, and showed me a few he had done of the Miners. He remained at the Station, but when I got back to the Mess I found out he was Henry Moore the famous Sculptor. I certainly had not connected him and was sorry I had not asked for his autograph! One of the stations I also visited from time to time, was Scampton, the home of No.617 Squadron of Dam Busters fame.

Eventually we decided to start a family. So after 5 years of many experiences, I left the WAAF with many regrets. I had been in this National Service organisation since 1938, and in which I had enrolled with enthusiasm never anticipating its final outcome. A Service that had grown to take its place in the Annals of the History of World War 2.

George was later posted to Transport Command in Canada to fly new aircraft when they left the factories in the USA and Canada, to whichever destination they were needed. I never knew where he was, as any correspondence was very much delayed.

It was therefore a terrible shock, 9 weeks before the end of the War in Europe and with a young baby, that I received the Telegram - George had been killed in a plane crash in the Azores. After so many bombing operations in the earlier days of the war, it was so unexpected and doubly heartbreaking.

JOAN WATKINS (nee Morgan)
2004.

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