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    The Night Air War
    The Night Air War
    The Night Air War
    Ebook486 pages9 hours

    The Night Air War

    By Martin W Bowman

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    Of the 7,953 Bomber Command aircraft lost on night operations during the Second World War, an estimated 5,833 fell victim to Luftwaffe night fighters. In this detailed re-enactment of the air war over Western Europe and the raids flown by the men of RAF Bomber Command, the author has pieced together official data and the words and memories of the pilots and air crew who participated in the proceedings. Across fifteen chapters, many unique experiences are regaled, enlivening the history of the night bombing raids that were hurled against Hitler's war machine during the latter half of the Second World War. They span the period between November 1943 and 1945 and cover the encounters between the Luftwaffe and RAF Bomber Command during their heyday. 'No Operation Was Easy' was a commonly coined phrase amongst this group who, night after night, struck out at targets such as the 'The Big City' (Berlin), Stuttgart and the Ruhr. These truly epic stories, gleaned from the memories of the men who made up Bomber Command, serve as an appropriate epitaph to their collective effort.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOpen Road Integrated Media
    Release dateJul 31, 2015
    ISBN9781473864252
    The Night Air War
    Author

    Martin W Bowman

    Martin Bowman is one of Britain's leading aviation authors and has written a great deal of books focussing on aspects of Second World War aviation history. He lives in Norwich in Norfolk. He is the author of many Pen and Sword Aviation titles, including all releases in the exhaustive Air War D-Day and Air War Market Garden series.

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      Book preview

      The Night Air War - Martin W Bowman

      Chapter 1

      The Big City

      Coming back from Cologne on 29 June 1943, a German fighter sprayed our Halifax on the port side. I was the only casualty. I landed in Norwich Hospital with a penetrating gunshot wound in the chest, no one else was hit! I was in hospital for four weeks and got two weeks sick leave. On return I was crewed up with another crew, as my original crew had picked up another navigator. My new crew were being transferred from 76 Squadron to 35 Squadron the next morning, so we were stood down that night, but the rest of the Squadron went to Nuremberg that night. Two crews did not return and one of them was my old crew. I corresponded with their families but, sad to say, they were never heard of again. I, as sole survivor, carried on with the new crew with a Norwegian pilot and Norwegian engineer and completed a number of ops. On 2 December 1943 we were briefed for a ‘do’ on Berlin, but were shot down before reaching the target. The pilot was killed, but the rest of us parachuted out and were eventually taken prisoner. This was my twentieth trip and was my last as we were prisoners for 15 months in Germany. So when you have time to think, it makes you wonder! I always say that that German bullet on 29 June 1943 saved my life.¹’

      Flight Lieutenant J. C. McDougall, navigator, Halifax EX167 TL-C. 1st Lieutenant Gunnar Hoverstad RNAF, the pilot was KIA; Sergeant Arne Storm RNAF the flight engineer, was taken prisoner, as were the other members on the crew. From 18/19 November 1943 (when 440 Lancasters and four Mosquitoes were dispatched) to 24/25 March 1944 Berlin was subjected to 16 major raids, which have gone into history as the ‘Battle of Berlin’.

      Albert Speer, the Nazi Armaments Minister, was having a conference in his private office in Berlin on Monday 22 November 1943 when the airraid alarm sounded. ‘It was about 7:30 pm’ he recorded. ‘A large fleet of bombers was reported heading toward Berlin. When the bombers reached Potsdam, I called off the meeting to drive to a nearby flak tower, intending to watch the attack from its platform, as was my wont. But I scarcely reached the top of the tower, when I had to take shelter inside it; in spite of the tower’s stout concrete walls, heavy hits nearby were shaking it: Injured anti aircraft gunners crowded down the stairs behind me; the air pressure from the exploding bombs had hurled them into the walls. For twenty minutes explosion followed explosion. From above I looked down into the well of the tower, where a closely packed crowd stood in the thickening haze formed by cement dust falling from the walls. When the rain of bombs ceased, I ventured out on the platform again. My nearby Ministry was one gigantic conflagration. I drove over there at once. A few secretaries, looking like Amazons in their steel helmets, were trying to save files even while isolated time bombs went off in the vicinity. In place of my private office I found nothing but a huge bomb crater.’

      The attack on the Big City was the greatest force sent by Bomber Command to Berlin so far and it was also the last in which Stirlings operated as part of the Main Force. Altogether, 764 aircraft eventually took part in the raid (a Lancaster crashed on take-off) which opened with red TI and skymarker flares and were maintained without a break until the close of the planned period. Six blind markers had marked the target area and release point by zero-hour. The markers and flares were concentrated, although the absence of any photographic evidence made it impossible to assess their accuracy. Crews’ reports suggested a highly successful attack and this opinion was confirmed by the enemy’s complaint of a ‘heavy terror raid’. A Mosquito over the target at zero+7 reported that two main fire concentrations 7-10 miles apart were reflected on the clouds. This reflection could be seen for 80 miles on the way home. It was not until 20 December 1943 that a photograph of the ‘Big City’ was obtained revealing damage caused by six major raids of which the operation of 22 November was the second and the most effective raid on Berlin throughout the whole war. Several firestorms were reported, approximately 2,000 people killed (500 in a shelter which received a direct hit and 105 crushed in a panicked rush at a shelter next to the Neukoln gasworks (where a large explosion took place) and 175,000 bombed out. Not least, more than 50,000 soldiers had to be drafted in to help in the following days. Twenty-six aircraft were lost and two Halifaxes collided on return near Barmby Moor, Pocklington killing both crews.

      The extremely hazardous weather conditions on the night of Tuesday the 23rd of November, which seriously hampered German night fighter take-offs and landings and improvements in RAF jamming of German navigation signals helped keep losses down when another 383 aircraft - 365 Lancasters, ten Halifaxes and eight Mosquito markers - again made the long haul to the ‘Big City’. From a distance of 30 miles the air crews could see the smoke cloud almost 19,000 feet high over Berlin from the eleven major fires that had continued to smoulder since Monday night. This time the attack concentrated mainly on the western part of the capital with its three large rail installations: Westend, Bahnh Zoo and Bahnhof Charlottenburg. The night was clear and there were only a few clouds to hinder visibility, so that operational conditions were far more favourable to the German air defence than on the previous night. The bombing force again used the same direct route and the Jägerleitoffizier (JLO, or GCI-controller) made an early identification of Berlin as the probable target. Bomber crews noticed that flak over the target, which was again cloud-covered, was ‘unusually restrained’ and the Path Finders carried out sky-marking but many of the Main Force crews aimed their bombs through the cloud at the glow of the fires burning from the previous night. One of the Mosquito sky-markers on 139 Squadron was flown by Group Captain Leonard Slee DSO DFC with Major John Mullock MC of the Royal Artillery and latterly the 5 Group Flak Liaison Officer occupying the navigator’s seat. It was Mullock’s first trip to Berlin but not his first with Slee. In 1942 Mullock had flown with Guy Gibson to Italy and had participated in raids on Lübeck, Rostock, the Renault works and Genoa and had flown on the Lancaster piloted by Group Captain Slee on the 20/21 June operation on the Zeppelin works at Friedrichshafen.

      Slee took off from RAF Wyton at 18.12 hours carrying twelve white drip flares - ‘Spoofs’. They were to release them at twenty-second intervals while over the centre of Berlin. Mullock was kept busy dropping ‘Window’; one bundle of which represented one aircraft echo on enemy radar screens. It did not jam, but confused and ‘cluttered’ the screens. The major was also trying to rub ice off the inside of the perspex in the nose of the aircraft, which he found exhausting; it was -47° outside and very warm inside resulting in heavy condensation. They dropped their white flares at 20.12 hours from a height of 32,000 feet. Mullock saw them ignite and thought how they compared with the ones the Germans used.

      Mullock later reported: ‘After the attack had been going for four to five minutes the flak was entirely barrage, spread over a vast area and wildly dispersed in height. No bursts were seen above an approx height of 23,000 feet. There seemed to be no attempt to fire a barrage over any one part of the city as might have been expected. The rate of fire of most of the guns would appear to have been something in the region of five to six rounds per minute. Several of the blind markers were undoubtedly shot down in the early stages by predictor control (unseen fire). This was due to the fact that the backers-up were late and thus did not provide any cover. When the attack on Berlin had developed concentration and window cover obviously precluded the use of radar. The impression gained was that the defences were in a state of utter confusion and were firing blindly and wildly.²

      This time, a handful of experienced Nachtjäger braved the elements. Twelve ‘Tame Boar’ crews shot down thirteen of the twenty bombers (all Lancasters) that were lost. (A Mosquito marker aircraft was also lost to flak). Further losses were avoided by ‘Spoof’ fighter flares dropped by Mosquitoes north of the bomber stream, which caused some diversion of the night fighter effort and fake ‘Corona’ instructions ordering the German pilots to land because of fog at their bases. When the Nachtjagd introduced female commentators to give the ‘running commentary’ to the fighters to beat the ‘Corona’ interference this was swiftly countered by a female voice from England. Later the transmission of three or four superimposed German voices would be used. Eventually, instead of attempting to imitate the German commentators, British operators would set out to simply irritate them by blocking the air waves by reading lengthy passages from the writings of Goethe or the speeches of Hitler.³

      Finally in the fire-glow over Berlin the bomber crews were able to observe many details of the destroyed city districts. The whole complex around the Wilhelmstrasse, the Brandenburg Gate area and the Tauentzienstrasse, Potsdam Square, the Anhalter Strasse and many other building-lined streets were completely destroyed. Berliners once again began clearing away the debris and devastation as fire crews tried to extinguish the blazing fires. Doktor Joseph Goebbels the German Propagandist wrote that this was ‘one of the worst nights of his entire life.’ Although the flames were still soaring skywards he hoped that Berliners would overcome the worst difficulties by noon and get ready for the next night. ‘It would be wonderful’ he added ‘if we had one night’s rest.’ (Goebbels’ got his wish. On the night of 25/26 November 236 Halifaxes and 26 Lancasters attacked Frankfurt).

      Next day Goebbels was given a general picture of the situation in Berlin by his chief assistant, Schach, the Gauleiter of Berlin, which Goebbels described as ‘a sad one indeed. I just can’t understand how the English are able to do so much damage to the Reich’s capital during one air raid. The picture that greeted my eye in the Wilhelmplatz was one of utter desolation. Blazing fires everywhere… Transport conditions are still quite hopeless but I trust we shall soon master our difficulties sufficiently at least to start an emergency service to all sections of the city… In our home in Hermann Goering Street things are pretty desperate. The top floor is burnt out completely. The whole house is filled with water. It is practically impossible to live there; there is no heat, no water and all rooms are filled with pungent smoke… The poor people, who are the victims of these low-down methods of English warfare, are really to be pitied.’

      In the east of England the squadrons took stock. Apart from the twenty Lancasters that were missing, five more had crashed in England with eleven men killed and another fourteen injured. One of the Lancasters had crashed on the beach at Chapel St. Leonard’s, Skegness; another had crashed at Manor Farm, Harpley near Bircham Newton in Norfolk and a third had crashed into rising ground at High Mowthorpe Farm near Malton, Yorkshire after being hit by flak over Berlin. ‘V for Victor’, a 9 Squadron Lancaster at Bardney skippered by 26-year old Pilot Officer Norman John Robinson, almost made it home but at 11.45 am villagers at Belchford near Ludford Magna heard the bomber circling low in the fog. They briefly caught sight of the Lancaster as it clipped the top of a row of trees close to the village church before ‘V for Victor’ roared up, stalled and then crashed nose down into a field nearby. Robinson, who was from Carbury, Co Kildare, and five of the crew were killed instantly.

      At South Norwood in London Vera May Pitman would wait for news of her husband, Flight Sergeant Bertram John Pitman, the 21-year old bomb aimer. He and Flying Officer Charles Godfrey Hinton, the 25-year old second pilot, from Cheltenham, Sergeant Robert George Taylor, the flight engineer, Flight Sergeant Thomas Rhodes Davis, the 20-year old navigator, from Streatham and Sergeant Walter Espley Jones, the 23-year old wireless operator of Saughall Massie all died with their pilot. Flight Sergeant L. E. Mitchell and Sergeant J. Casey, the two gunners, were thrown clear. Despite having facial burns Casey went to the assistance of Mitchell who had a broken leg and burns to his face and hands. He had dragged himself clear before the Lancaster went up in flames. Villagers gave both men first aid before they were taken to RAF Hospital, Rauceby for treatment.⁴

      The raids on the German capital caused shock and consternation throughout Germany which reached the very highest levels of command. Dr. Robert Ley, head of German Labour Front and Reichsleiter of the political division of the Nazi party was reported to be furious because the German fighters did not take to the air during the ‘unfortunate’ night. Goebbels added: ‘What if the weather was bad! After all the English fly in bad weather from their southern English airports [sic] all the way to Berlin; but the German fighters can’t rise from the ground in Berlin because the weather is unfavourable! You can’t simply surrender the capital of the Reich to the terror of the enemy. If we conduct war on such squeamish principles we won’t get very far.’

      On the fourth in the series of Berlin raids on 26/27 November 443 Lancasters and seven Mosquitoes were dispatched to the ‘Big City’. Before the operation had got underway, a Lancaster on 83 Squadron at Wyton which was being bombed up, exploded at dispersal killing eight personnel and injuring four.⁵ An electrician entered the aircraft to make final adjustments to the flare chute mechanism which contained a live and highly sensitive, magnesium flare - commonly referred to as the photoflash, which was released with the bomb load to record the point of impact of the bombs. It was said afterwards that the photo flash slipped from the launching tube and exploded immediately, setting off the 4,000lb bomb which atomised everything within range.

      The Berlin force took 45 minutes to cross the coast. Another 157 Halifaxes and 21 Lancasters flew a diversion on Stuttgart. Both forces flew a common route over Northern France and nearing Frankfurt they split. At first the JLOs thought that Frankfurt was the intended target. The difficult weather conditions had resulted in only the most experienced German crews being ordered to take off and 84 fighters engaged the RAF formations. The weather was clear over Berlin but, after their long approach flight from the south, the Path Finders marked an area 6-7 miles north-west of the city centre and most aircraft bombed there.

      Once again Group Captain Slee flew in a Mosquito with Major Mullock as his observer. They took off at 18.55 from Wyton. Over Cologne they saw several aircraft coned and surrounded by intense flak. As they neared Koblenz, searchlights could be observed as far as the eye could see. Just south of Koblenz, twenty searchlights made a determined effort to illuminate them and many fighters were seen around Frankfurt. They approached Berlin from the west and could see the defences of Brunswick and Magdeburg in action with the vast amount of searchlights. One in particular - the master beam with its bright blue extra wide light - could be seen in a dense and wide belt all around Berlin. Thirty-one beams were counted ahead of them, it seemed as light as day in the aircraft. They had arranged to communicate with a Mosquito flight commander over Berlin, but when they were coned, they called: ‘Hello Junior, do you see that poor fellow cornered up there, well that’s us!’ After they had dropped their spoof fighter flares they then dropped twelve bundles of ‘Window’. On his return Mullock reported that: ‘Considering the heavy bombers were beneath the Mosquito, it was most remarkable that the searchlights were able to select targets above. It would appear radar could only operate successfully against aircraft considerably above the Main Force and out of the ‘Window’ cover. The initial pick-up must have been accomplished by means of radar after which it would appear that the control was visual. Condensation trails were a great help to searchlights. One pilot was coned at 28,000 feet over Berlin, escaping from the beams almost immediately after losing sufficient height to ensure that condensation trails did not occur. It was an old trick of the Germans to leave a gun blacked out until an unsuspecting aircraft was well within range of the majority of defences; many pilots were caught by this ruse.’⁶

      Damage was considerable and civilian casualties were high. Thirty-eight war industry factories were destroyed and many more damaged. Many of the animals in the Berlin Zoo had been evacuated to zoos in other parts of Germany but the bombing killed most of the remainder. Several large and dangerous animals - leopards, panthers, jaguars, apes - escaped and had to be hunted and shot in the streets. Goebbels wrote ‘the English [sic] aimed so accurately that one might think spies had pointed the way… Another grand assault comes due on the city. This time it is not the turn of the city centre so much as of the Wedding and Reinickendorf districts; the main target in Reinickendorf is the big industrial munitions plant.’ The Alekett factory, the most important German maker of field artillery, producing half of the entire output, was set on fire and despite attempts to put it out it was destroyed. Smaller amounts of bombing fell in the centre and in the Siemensstadt (with many electrical factories) and Tegel districts. The great Berlin Assembly Hall was burnt to the ground. ‘That is a heavy blow’ wrote Goebbels… ‘Back to the bunker in the Wilhelmsplatz. The situation has taken a more threatening turn as one industrial plant after another has gone up in flames. The sky arches over Berlin with a blood-red eerie beauty. I can no longer stand to look at it. The Führer too is very much depressed. The situation has become even more alarming since one industrial plant after another has been set on fire.’ Just two German night fighter aircraft were lost. Twenty-seven Lancasters were shot down and 79 more damaged but the battle was not over yet. The aircraft returning to eastern England encountered fog and by 0100 hours the weather worsened. It was to prove fatal for thirteen Lancasters, low on fuel or badly shot up, that crash-landed at bases in Yorkshire and another, on 619 Squadron, was ditched at Fourholme Sands in the Humber Estuary. A second Lancaster on 619 Squadron crashed near Hutton Cranswick. On 12 Squadron Lancaster ‘E-Easy’ flown by Pilot Officer R. S. Yell RAAF swung off the runway at Wickenby on return and Sergeant A. G. Twitchett landed wheels up at Binbrook. Both crews were uninjured. A 106 Squadron Lancaster flown by Pilot Officer Ronald Frederick Neil returned early with one starboard engine surging and he was unable to maintain height. He jettisoned his bomb load and approached Metheringham on three engines but overshot and crashed in a field nearby. Sergeant A. L. Parker the rear gunner was the only casualty, suffering a broken arm. He was absent on 2/3 December when Neil and his crew were killed on Berlin.

      A 49 Squadron Lancaster piloted by Sergeant Roy Joseph Richardson RAAF crashed on the outer circuit at Fiskerton and caught fire killing the pilot and four of the eight crew. Low on fuel Flight Sergeant Joseph Watson Thompson DFM piloting ‘K for King’ on 50 Squadron made several attempts to land at Pocklington before finally hitting a farmhouse at Hayton north-west of Market Weighton. Thompson and four of his crew were killed and the two others were injured. Two women in the farmhouse also died. ‘X for X-Ray’ on 50 Squadron at Skellingthorpe captained by Pilot Officer E. F. Weatherstone landed at Melbourne and struck a van, killing the driver, before running into ‘A for Apple’, setting it on fire. It was left to burn out. Amazingly no-one on either crew suffered injury.

      A Lancaster on 100 Squadron flown by Pilot Officer L. J. Stow crash-landed at Waltham (Grimsby) on return. A Lancaster on 626 Squadron at Wickenby piloted by Flight Sergeant Keith Neville Windus RAAF crash-landed at Barton Bendish in Norfolk. All the crew died. A second Lancaster on the Squadron crashed at Lissington in Lincolnshire on return but no one was injured. At Holme-on-Spalding Moor a Lancaster on 630 Squadron undershot but the crew were uninjured.

      Just before reaching Berlin the starboard outer engine failed on ‘G for George’ on 408 ‘Goose’ Squadron RCAF flown by Flight Sergeant R. T. Lloyd RCAF, followed by a malfunction in the rudder trim mechanism. This caused the aircraft to lose height, but from 18,000 feet they still managed to bomb at sixteen minutes after midnight though the bombs fell some distance short of the aiming point. The engine magically restarted but then the intercom to Sergeant M. A. Robert the Canadian mid-upper gunner, failed. Near Magdeburg ‘G for George’ was hit by flak and Robert was wounded in the foot. They were then attacked by a Ju 88 night fighter and the Lancaster was hit in the mid-upper turret. The engine pressure to the starboard inner engine fell and was feathered. Lloyd set course for Stradishall but on reaching it safely, he decided to go on to Fiskerton. On arrival the starboard outer engine cut and the rudder trim packed up, sending the Lancaster into a shallow spiral dive from 5,000 feet. Lloyd ordered his crew out, but this was countermanded as the escape hatch proved difficult to open and he decided to crash-land. A call of ‘Darkie’ and ‘May Day’ by the wireless operator received no acknowledgment but Sergeant L. Lane managed to pick up another aircraft and received some directions from them. Lloyd finally made a belly landing in a sewage disposal ground 1½ miles south east of Lincoln with no further injuries to the crew.

      On 103 Squadron at Elsham Wolds Flying Officer Robert William Brevitt’s Lancaster collided with a Halifax on 428 ‘Ghost’ Squadron RCAF returning from the diversion operation on Stuttgart⁷ while approaching Middleton St. George airfield. Brevitt and five of his crew and all seven members of the Halifax crew were killed. Another Lancaster on 103 Squadron landed damaged at Croft.

      Nineteen-year old Pilot Officer Bradfield Lydon’s crew on 103 Squadron at Elsham Wolds was typical of those who flew night after night during the autumn and winter of 1943-1944. Stanley J. J. Edwards was the wireless operator; ‘Ben’ Benroy, bomb aimer; James R. ‘Jimmy’ Thomas, flight engineer; 30-year old Paul Collings, mid-upper gunner and the rear gunner, Alfred John ‘Jackie’ Bristow, a Cockney who was from Hackney and navigator, Flight Sergeant Thomas C. Forster the ‘Senior Professional’ being 32 at the start of their tour. Bradfield Lydon was known to the crew as Brian, his second Christian name. Stanley Edwards, whose middle names were John Joseph in honour of his grandfathers, was popularly known as ‘Eddie’. ‘We placed great reliance on Eddie our wireless op’ recalled Tom Forster ‘who on at least one occasion saved our lives by obtaining a loop bearing fix when ‘Gee’ was unserviceable and we only had dead reckoning to rely on to determine our position, because so many of our ops were above unbroken cloud for much of the flight.

      ‘Elsham was a very happy station for me, particularly as it was only 10 miles from the ferry crossing to Hull New Holland. My wife’s family lived in Hull, so on almost every stand-down, I cycled to New Holland and spent a night or more in Hull. We had a great spirit of camaraderie and worked well together. I was only a year or two older than Paul. There was a great bond of friendship especially between Paul and Jackie who I believe was only 20. They frequently accompanied one another on jaunts to the bright lights of Scunthorpe and were accommodated on numerous occasions by ‘Irish Maggie’, who provided beds for the boys from Elsham and other units who had, by mischance or deliberation, missed the last train back to Barnetby. These two had been known to earn numerous free pints from the locals by assuring all the occupants of a pub that they were the only example of father and son serving in the same crew in the whole of the Royal Air Force! A complete lie but this was quite feasible from their appearance but somewhat let down by their accents. Paul was from Plymouth and Jackie from Hackney!

      ‘I remember our first briefing for Berlin on 18 November 1943. The squadron commander announced the target as ‘The Big City’. Our bomb aimer, Ben Round, had been at 103 a few months before I joined the squadron and had done one or two of the earlier Berlin ops, strolled casually from his desk, a row or two in front of me, puffing on his ever-present pipe. ‘No different from any others’, he remarked reassuringly. To look at him you would have thought he was an architect leisurely drawing up plans for a house. He spoke with a lazy drawl and was perhaps the most unflappable type I met in the service. Later, before we went for our pre-op meal, I called in to see the squadron adjutant and asked him if he knew where the target was for tonight. ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘I’ve never heard so many lavatory chains being pulled.’ I had gone to see him to tell him my wife was expecting a baby the following day and that if I didn’t come back could he make sure the news was broken to her gently. I gave him her mother’s name and he told me to leave everything to him. The drill was for the local police station to be told and a policeman to go round and break the news, rather than the news to be contained in a telegram. In the event, the policeman wasn’t needed and my daughter turned up on 30 November.

      ‘On the morning of 1 December I strode into the adjutant’s office and proudly announced I was the father of a baby girl. ‘Congratulations’ said the adj. ‘I ventured: ‘What about a spot of compassionate leave?’ He looked up in amazement. ‘Don’t you know there’s a war on and this is an operational station?’ But then he added: ‘I’ll see what I can do when there’s a stand-down. We were sent to Berlin again the next night and to Leipzig on the 3rd and on the morning of the 4th I decided to stay up to see if we were on again that night. When we were assured there was a stand-down, I collected my 24 hour pass and then had an eight hour train journey to Manchester and saw my daughter for the first time. Then I fell into the deepest sleep I have ever experienced before starting an even longer journey back only to be told when I arrived at Elsham we were still on stand-down. I could have had another day at home. During those last twelve days of November the crew maintained they as well as my wife experienced labour pains!

      ‘On that Leipzig raid, we had been diverted to Middleton St. George in Northumberland where one of our Lancs had attempted to land at the same time as one of Middleton’s Halifaxes was in the funnel and the two were enveloped in flames just short of the runway. Miraculously, two men had survived.

      ‘We were delayed at the base for three days because of bad weather along with a number of other crews and as we had no spare clothes with us and no shaving tackle, we had rather an uncomfortable time. Ben, the bomb-aimer and Jackie and Paul, our gunners, were sent back to Elsham by train while the rest of us had to remain to bring back the Lanc when the weather cleared up. On the way south, they had to change trains at Northallerton and, having a little time to spare, decided to take a stroll round the town, carrying with them the pigeon in its metal cage which, at the time, was part of the bomber crews’ equipment. Their arrival in the town coincided with a security exercise and they were immediately challenged by two WAAF SPs who asked to see their service identity cards. ‘Don’t carry them,’ said Paul. ‘We’ve been on ops’. ‘How do we know you’ve been on operations?’ asked the WAAF corporal. Paul held up the pigeon and said: ‘Take a look at this. What do you think we are; pigeon fanciers?’

      ‘I recall the frantic efforts of the secretary of the Sergeant’s Mess trying to get in the members’ subscriptions before they went for a Burton and he had to write the debts off. I was also rather fond of playing chess but it seemed that every chap who played chess with me went missing on the following operation, so I found nobody would play with me. ‘Every squadron had it cynic. You know the type, always in the same corner of the mess bar with a lugubrious expression on his face and a perpetual moan on his lips. He was in full cry one night when I went into the bar at Elsham. He said: ‘All this guff in the newspapers about the accuracy of RAF bombing. Cologne Cathedral unscathed in the middle of all the devastation. Shall I tell you why the Cathedral wasn’t hit? Because it was the bloody aiming point!’

      Nineteen year old Sergeant Alfred ‘Alfie’ Henry Johnson, flight engineer on Sergeant Gilbert Charles Denman’s crew on 100 Squadron at Waltham near Grimsby went to Leipzig. On 7 December when he and the crew had four ops under their belts, he wrote. ‘The flight engineer’s job is quite interesting, but boy! It’s bloody hot on ops, especially over Leipzig and Berlin. I’ll be jolly glad when this mess has been cleared up so that I can come home, get married and settle down’. ‘Alfie’ or ‘Yonker’ as he was known on the crew had been born on 17 August 1924 at Wayford near Stalham in Norfolk close to the Broads. At Stalham Primary he began flying model aircraft propelled by rubber bands. In 1938 at the age of fourteen he had left school, the normal leaving age at that time, to commence an apprenticeship at a local garage. On 27 December 1942, just four months after his eighteenth birthday, ‘Alfie’ was called up for service in the Royal Air Force. He was destined to serve his country ten days short of only one year. His operational flying, which began with an op to Leipzig on 22 November 1943, lasted approximately two months. On one of their two trips to Leipzig Lancaster ‘H-Harry’ developed engine faults Then again on another raid flying in the same Lancaster, this time en-route for Berlin, they had to abort the operation because of oxygen problems, returning to make an unscheduled touch down at Binbrook. The Squadron was on ‘stand down’ between 3 December and the 15th due to an accumulation of adverse weather associated with the full moon.

      On 16 December Denman’s crew were given ‘F-Freddie’ to fly as part of 100 Squadron’s contribution to the Berlin raid. They were one of seventeen Lancasters led by their new Commanding Officer, David Holford DSO DFC* who, at the age of 22 he had finished his second tour; a total of sixty operations⁸ and was on his third tour.

      Holford had been awarded the DFC at 18 and the DSO at 21 for his leadership in attacks on the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. On first impression Holford appeared smallish in stature, softly spoken and inconspicuous amongst the more animated, exuberant personalities but he was charismatic; a devil-may-care person determined to dissipate frustrations. He went out of his way to help crews having trouble reaching operational standards but no condemnation of them escaped his lips. Green crews from OTUs, the pilots especially, were inspired by Holford’s talks. For before them was living proof that with luck and a degree of skill, survival was possible.⁹ On operations he had one idiosyncrasy. After the normal ‘All set boys? Here we go!’ he would sing, ‘I’ve got spurs that jingle, jangle, jingle as we ride merrily along’ until ‘Wheels up!’ was ordered. David Holford and his wife, a WAAF intelligence officer at Elsham Wolds had been married only a matter of weeks and were staying at the Ship Hotel in Grimsby. Also staying at the hotel at the same time was Wing Commander Jimmy Bennett and his wife. Bennett, with two tours behind him, had arrived at Waltham three weeks earlier to form 550 Squadron, which was due to move to North Killingholme in the New Year.

      Holford would pilot ‘N-Nuts’ on the Berlin trip. Bennett chose to fly with ‘Bluey’ Graham and his crew. In all, 483 Lancasters and ten Mosquitoes were detailed carry out the attack on the ‘Big City’ using the bomber route leading directly to Berlin across Holland and Northern Germany. No major diversions would be flown but a further five Mosquitoes would drop decoy fighter flares south of Berlin. On the return flight the Lancasters would take a northerly route over Denmark.

      At Waltham Jimmy Bennett’s take-off was early, about 4.30 in the afternoon. ‘And even then visibility wasn’t very good and it was plain we were not going to be in for a very pleasant journey.’

      Gilbert Denman’s crew took off fifteen minutes’ later for their fifth operation. For one 100 Squadron crew there was more than the usual apprehension, as they would finish their first tour if they successfully completed this trip, but as Pilot Officer L. J. Stow sat in ‘K-King’ with its engines running up in readiness to taxi out, he received news that the ‘Gee-Set’ in his aircraft was unserviceable. He to break radio silence, which he did by transmitting the cryptic message, ‘K-King; ‘Gee’ set unserviceable’. Within seconds control replied, ‘Roger PC-King’. A few minutes later the radar van came tearing along the perimeter track dodging taxiing Lancasters to arrive at the dispersal with a replacement set. It was very quickly installed and tested and they were on their way. The ‘Gee’ set was a vital navigational aid which allowed navigators to pin-point an aircraft’s position at the beginning and end of a trip. It was jammed by the Germans over most of Europe. Flight Sergeant Allen James Kevis, Skipper of ‘Q-Queenie’ also awaited the signal that would send them on their way to Berlin. Kevis had that morning, along with another pilot, taken part in a fighter affiliation exercise.¹⁰

      Along a lane just wide enough for a truck and a ditch each side at Elsham Wolds at around 4.30 that afternoon Marie Harris an ATS driver from the Ack-Ack site at Goxhill Haven was driving a load of stores to a site in the Guy Truck, which had an open front and canvas covered back. ‘Coming up to a farm on my right’ she recalled, ‘it was very low cloud and the Lancasters were taking off into the circles, up and away, as I looked up and raised my right arm in a salute. They were so low and so near I felt I could nearly touch them. One went into low cloud and I was thinking it’s a wonder they don’t crash they are so close together, when in a split second as it came out of the cloud. God, it was a head-on crash with another Lancaster; one almighty explosion and all Hell was let loose. It was awful. I couldn’t believe what had happened practically over my head, just over the farmer’s field. I was so stunned, streaks of fire shooting all over the road and my truck. I pulled on the brakes and jumped in the ditch but only for five minutes thinking some of the crew could be saved, so I ran up past the farmer’s house, bits and pieces flying all over, just passing a barn and someone caught hold of me from behind and wouldn’t let go, kept saying ‘No Lass, No Lass’ there’ll be nothing. It was the old farmer. In no time at all the fire engines etc were arriving. I pulled myself together and went back to my truck in a daze and drive onto the site, still couldn’t believe what had happened. When I pulled up at the Guard Room I was just rooted to my seat and couldn’t stop crying, thinking of the Bob’s, Alec’s and Bill’s - whoever - just blown to bits. It was awful. The guard called the Sergeant took one look at my truck with all the bits and pieces and burns on the canvas and said ‘she must have been under it.’ They took me into the Mess and gave me a hot mug of strong tea and 20 minutes by the round stove, (they were really kind). I felt better and had to get on with it, so back to Goxhill. On arriving our MT Officer was concerned. Did I need to go to the MO? No Sir, I’ll be OK but when I went to bed I couldn’t shut my eyes. This terrific explosion flashed before me every time. I was like this for quite a few nights.’¹¹

      After they had become airborne and gained altitude, the crews found cloud base at 2,000 feet persisting to 18,000 feet, but there were no icing problems. Nearing the coast of Holland, from where they flew direct to the target with no major diversions, they found that the German Controllers had plotted the bombers’ courses with great accuracy. They were intercepted by many German fighters, with more being guided into the bomber stream throughout the approach to the target and others awaiting them in the target area. Many combats ensued. The Lancasters were able to shake off the opposition on the return flight by taking a more northerly route via Denmark. Some crews reported that they had met little opposition and described the raid as quite uneventful. This was thought to be very unusual for Berlin. Widespread mist and fog at 150-300 feet in the North German plains reduced the overall effectiveness of the fighter defence and 23 aircraft, mostly Bf 110s had to abandon their sorties prematurely yet Bomber Command lost twenty five aircraft in the Berlin attack, with another five lost from the diversionary force. Ten of these were shot down by fighters inbound to the target, five fell to

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