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This story was submitted to the People’s War website by Karolina Kopiec on the behalf of Mr Norman Edwards and Mr Tom Edwards, and has been added to the site with their permission. Authors fully understand site's terms and conditions.

Three Brothers At War

Brothers Tom, Norman and Walter Edwards all served as aircrew, Tom as an air gunner, Norman as a Spitfire pilot and Walter as a Hurricane and Dakota pilot. Despite leaving school at 14, each was commissioned, a considerable tribute to the quality of elementary education in the 1930s.
Air gunner Thomas William Edwards, born 1921, returned from the war to become a top executive with shoe manufacturers and retailers William Timpson Ltd. On retirement, he returned to Art, one of his first loves, obtained and ‘A’ grade in an Art/Design exam and enjoys ‘chairing’ a little local group of enthusiastic amateur artists. His paintings include a Halifax (for himdelf0, a Spitfire (for brother Norman) and Hurricane (for young Walter). This is Tom’s story.

There were quite a few ‘highlights’ while serving with 158 Squadron from November 1942 to July 1943 including being hit by flak during raids on Duisberg and Berlin, returning twice on three engines, the time my flying boots flew away — and finding a broomstick an invaluable aid to survival!
Explaining the ‘flying’ flying boots, they disappeared because when returning from a raid low on fuel and losing height our skipper Nick Smith ordered bale-out positions. I sat there with my portable oxygen bottle and intercom plugged in, waiting for the word to go. I held on to a stanchion and opened the hatch and, ready for a quick jump, stuck my feet out — the slipstream whipped off both my boots which went away into the night.
Then Nick saw a runway just off the coast, cancelled the bale out alert, and we landed safely.

AC2 boots
I couldn’t get another pair without reporting the loss to stores and paying, so I flew from then on in my old AC2 boots with two pairs of socks. All the better to walk back in, if needs be.
Broom handles? We took one with us to poke at the magnesium flare — used when taking a photograph — in case the flare became stuck in the tube. This was pilot Nick’s brilliant idea.
The flare did get stuck in the tube during an Essen raid. Wireless operator Bill Hatch managed to shove it out before it set fire to the aircraft. It exploded just below the aircraft, too close for comfort. The photograph wasn’t much good either.
Broom handles then became very scarce in the stores.
Icing was the problem on a Berlin trip, making us late over the target. We were spotted by an FW190, one of their best and most heavily armed fighters. He got into position, pilot Nick responded promptly to our ‘dive port’ cires and his cannon fire sailed over the top of us. He came back into my view again, Ted Smith and I belted away at him, and then we got into some cloud cover. We never knew whether we had hit him.
Nearing Duisberg, on what was supposed to be our last but one trip, we were ‘coned’ by searchlights and completely blinded. Even at 20,000 feet it was a helpless, naked feeling. Nick twisted, dived and corkscrewed but could not escape — and the flak came up. Then it suddenly stopped and we knew we were in the night fighter zone. Nick carried on his evasive action down to 5,000 feet when all want dark again. We were full of hole but the engines were still going and we got home.
Tour expired, I then got married in 1943, on 15 May — my birthday. On returning to the station Ted Smith and I were told that a new crew were minus two gunners. Would we help out — we did, and were ‘ops’ again.

New Captain
Our new captain was ‘Bluey’ Mottershead, who is now the President and Secretary of the 158 Squadron (RAF Bomber Command) Association.
It meant three trips to ‘happy valley’ — Mulheim, Wuppertal and Gelsenkirchen — and then twice to Cologne, receiving a bit of a pounding on the first run. I didn’t mention these five extra trips to my bride’.
An interesting statistics which I learned when a book entitled ‘In Brave Company’ was written about 158 Squadron by W.R. Chorley — when the Squadron number is reversed it gives the total number of aircrew death suffered by the Squadron.
I was pleased to be awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal and to be commissioned, both helping with my subsequent posting to Lossiemouth as a gunnery instructor.

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