大象传媒

CHAPTER 2
Eventually the orders arrived for us to embark on HMT Andes, a modern ship, built to sail up the river Plate in South America...As the river Plate is a shallow river, the ship was consequently built with a shallow draught and flat bottom. This did not make for comfortable travel in rough seas or a heavy swell. I found myself accommodated down in the forward hold on A deck, which was unpleasant. We were allotted hammocks and I was given the task of scrubbing corridor floors in a heaving sea. The voyage took 10 days from Liverpool to New York and we sailed a very circuitous route to avoid U boats. Because we were classified as a fast ship we were not escorted in convoy and relied solely on our speed and avoiding action to make a safe trip. It was early November and started cold as we headed North but a few days later we were in warm waters and a lot farther south. We were fed well on the ship enjoying bread that was unbelievably white after English wartime grey bread that we had grown used to.
Some way off the coast of the U.S.A. we were met by a Martin Mariner flying boat which escorted us to the entrance of the Hudson River. Sailing into New York on a beautiful clear day the Manhattan skyline was most impressive and the Captain had to order the men not to all stand on one side of the ship admiring the view as it was upsetting the trim of the vessel. A patrolling airship hovered above us as we entered the Hudson river.
Having tied up at the quayside we were rapidly transferred to ferryboats which took us across to New Jersey where we were put on a train which would take us up North to Canada. While we were boarding the train Red Cross workers gave us bananas, something we had not seen for several years. We started our journey up beside the Hudson river and all the streetlights and houselights were on. It was like fairyland after being used to the endless blackout of wartime Britain. We slowed down as we passed through Poughkeepsie and threw our British pennies to the children who stood beside the railway track. The sound of the train whistle and the bells that rang as we passed through level crossings were all so different to us.
Eventually we fell asleep as the train made its way through northern New York State. Next morning found us crossing a part of French Canada, little communities with prominent churches were a regular feature but also large tracts of open countryside devoid of habitation.
In the morning we reached the banks of the wide Saint Lawrence river at the town of Riviere du Loup where the railway turned East towards the province of New Brunswick and our destination of Moncton. 31 PD was to be our camp for a week or two until we were sent on to our Elementary Flying School.
Moncton was not an attractive town, especially in midwinter. It was damp and cold, but the accommodation was reasonably comfortable and the food better than we had been used to in England. Fruit juice for breakfast was a novelty to us, also Hershey bars and other candy bars were something new to us. The camp was very large and there were always a large number of Air Force personnel passing through to or from their training centres. There were plenty of canteens for the boys in town and most were run by the various church organisations. On Sundays it was often a case of trying a different church service each week to see which church had the best reception after the service with coffee and cakes! One of the "ice cream parlours" used to offer the 31 PD special, an enormous "banana split".
We were glad to finally move on to our Flying Training School and the journey there was quite an event. It took several days and nights on the train and the winter scenery as we travelled around the northern shores of the Great Lakes was unforgettable.
The forest covered shoreline bordering the frozen ice seemed endless; the lakes themselves appearing more like inland seas.
At one point we passed a prisoner of war camp, many miles from the nearest habitation. Escape from such a place would have been very hazardous, especially in wintertime. At Sault Sainte Marie we left Lake Superior and headed on West across the province of Manitoba and miles of endless flat prairie with hardly a hedge or tree to be seen until we reached the city of Winnipeg.
We were travelling on the Canadian National Railroad, one of the two systems crossing the thousands of miles from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the other being the Canadian Pacific Railroad. From Winnipeg we crossed into the Province of Saskatchewan, still flat prairie, and when we reached the city of Regina we turned South towards the American border.
Our destination was 25 E.F.T.S. at the small town of Assiniboia. However we got off the train at a tiny halt called Congress and were transported from there to our airfield by bus. The campsite consisted of wooden two storey huts each built on an H plan. The aircraft we were to fly at Assiniboia were Fairchild Cornells, low-wing monoplanes with an in-line Lycoming engine. They had a covered cockpit that was a big improvement on the Tiger Moth, particularly in the extremely cold temperatures that we were to be flying in. It was an excellent little plane with no obvious vices and performed well in aerobatics.
The airfield itself was a simple triangular runway layout and the surrounding terrain was extremely flat. The nearest population was at Assiniboia town, about a mile to the South of the camp. This was a typical "cowboy town" laid out on a grid system with a wide main street and a railroad station alongside large grain elevators. These grain elevators were a regular feature of the prairie panorama standing high on the skyline and often bearing the name of the town on them, a fact that was often a great help when trying to navigate on cross country flights with very few natural features to assist as landmarks.
Time passed quickly and on January 27th 1944 I flew solo after 6 hours 35 minutes instruction. To be honest, I had flown 12 hours as a passenger at grading school but this was not counted as tuition.
During training one fact was always a worry and this was that anyone making a heavy landing was supposed to report the fact immediately to his instructor. This was of course a safety measure to avoid any subsequent failure of the airframe from the strain it had suffered. However pupils were not always quick to own up to having made a bad landing and so spoil their record. This resulted in more than one fatal accident when a wing folded up over the cockpit in flight. On another occasion a landing wheel fell off an aircraft as it was taking off, flown by a very inexperienced pupil. There were anxious moments when he was signalled with a red verey light to instruct him to not to land. Meanwhile an instructor hurriedly took off to display a spare wheel to the poor boy in case he was not aware of what his problem was. He was then guided down to land on the grass beside the runway, where he made a satisfactory landing only to be reprimanded for not pushing back his canopy before touchdown. A safety measure always advised for easy escape in event of fire.
The ground school training was run by a civilian company. We learned our morse code in a novel fashion by playing bingo. There was a small incentive of a nickel or dime prize for every full house. It was here that I managed to win the class navigation prize. This was a relief after my previous disaster at Torquay.
On the camp we had a large outdoor skating rink and we would spend a lot of our off duty time there. The air was so cold that frost would build up on our eyebrows and nostrils and on one evening the temperature fell to 57 degrees below zero. Despite the low temperatures the air was so dry that one didn't feel the cold as much as expected. Sometimes we saw what were known as "sun dogs". These took the form of two bright spots some distance either side of the sun and were caused by the reflection of ice crystals high up in the atmosphere. The sunsets over the prairies were unforgettable.
I spent Christmas day in the town of Assiniboia with a family who tried to give me a happy day but somehow it was not easy.
At New Year we were given a few days leave so a friend and I accepted an offer of hospitality from a couple who lived in Indian Head, a small town to the East of Regina. The Badenochs were very kind. Their son was serving in the RCAF in the UK and they treated us like members of their family.
A sad duty that occurred from time to time was having to
serve as pall bearers at funerals of members of our course killed in flying accidents. One duty that was made almost a pleasure was attending blood donor sessions when we were rewarded with coffee and doughnuts.
At one point during our stay at Assiniboia we put on a stage show to entertain the camp and everybody was roped in to take part in the song and dance acts.
On one occasion I took up a Cornell for a solo aerobatics session and after carrying out the required loops, rolls, stalls and other manoeuvres. When I landed I was told that I had taken the wrong plane. I had taken one that was not fitted with the special batteries and carburettors for inverted flying! Not to be recommended!
A dangerous situation occurred on one training flight, when low flying with an instructor. At about 50 feet a flock of small birds flew up in front of me and caused me to duck my head. In so doing, I pushed the stick forwards and narrowly escaped hitting the ground.
Low flying was always a thrill as the speed was so much more visible. We would be taught to fly up the prairie section lines that marked the land boundaries and then execute steep turns at the intersections onto a 90 degree change of heading.
After graduating successfully, a party of four of us decided to spend a week's leave in Chicago. One of our party had contacts there and organised hospitality for us in "Windy City" It was a great success and we were given a very enjoyable time. It was a long journey from Assiniboia by way of Winnipeg and the twin cities of Minneapolis and St Paul and then through the city of Milwaukee. We travelled from Minneapolis on a superb diesel air-conditioned train the Hiawatha Express. We slept at the Servicemen's Centre on Michigan Boulevard situated on the waterfront of Lake Michigan. We went to dances at two enormous dance halls, the Aragon and the Trianon. Something out of this world to me. We drank our Bourbon and Coke with the girls that our friend had organised for us and were in a world of our own.