Britain at War 2015-01

LUSITANIA SUNK! THE TRUTH IS FINALLY REVEALED

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BRITAIN’S BEST SELLING MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY

ESCAPE FROM COLDITZ IN PICTURES

Re-Live the Run of the Red Fox

JUNE 1941

A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS

Blitz Mystery Solved

SECRET TRIAL

FOR YOUR EYES ONLY German spies ashore on Britain’s south coast in 1940

TANK DEFENCE OF CRETE

How Two British Matildas tried to resist German Paratroopers

PLUS:

Leicester Herts Tw Blitz Heroism, oT Sussex M ragic Brothers, e109 Rest oration, Norfolk Channel War Memorial, Islands U nexplode Mines PL d US Local Mil more of your itary His tory

HORROR OF THE FIRST AIR RAID “I Tried To Wake Him, But He Was Dead. Then The House Fell In…”

SURPRISE ARNHEM RELIC: STIRLING FUSELAGE PRESERVED

JANUARY 2015 ISSUE 93 £4.40

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From the www.britainatwar.com Should you wish to correspond with any of the ‘Britain at War’ team in particular, you can find them listed below: Editor: Andy Saunders Editorial Consultant: Mark Khan Editorial Correspondents: Geoff Simpson & Alex Bowers Australasia Correspondent: Ken Wright Design: Dan Jarman EDITORIAL ENQUIRIES: Britain at War Magazine, PO Box 380, Hastings, East Sussex, TN34 9JA Tel: +44 (0)1424 752648 or email: [email protected]. ADVERTISING ENQUIRIES: For all aspects of advertising in ‘Britain at War’ Magazine please contact Alison Sanders, Advertisement Sales Manager Tel: +44 (0)1780 755131 or email: [email protected]. GENERAL ENQUIRIES: For general enquiries and advertising queries please contact the main office at: Britain at War Magazine Key Publishing Ltd PO Box 100, Stamford, Lincs, PE9 1XQ Tel: +44 (0)1780 755131 Fax: +44 (0)1780 757261 SUBSCRIPTIONS, BINDERS AND BACK ISSUES: Britain at War, Key Publishing, PO Box 300, Stamford, Lincs, PE9 1NA Email: [email protected]

SUBSCRIPTIONS, BINDERS AND BACK ISSUES HOTLINE:+44 (0)1780 480404 Or order online at www.britainatwar.com Executive Chairman: Richard Cox Managing Director/Publisher: Adrian Cox Group-Editor-In-Chief: Paul Hamblin Commercial Director: Ann Saundry Production Manager: Janet Watkins Group Marketing Manager: Martin Steele ‘Britain at War’ Magazine is published on the last Thursday of the preceeding month by Key Publishing Ltd. ISSN 1753-3090 Printed by Warner’s (Midland) plc. Distributed by Seymour Distribution Ltd. (www.seymour.co.uk)

Editor A

S WE went to press the news was breaking of Her Majesty’s Government’s intention to repay £1.9 billion in unpaid loans relating to the First World War — a tangible reminder if ever there was one that, as a nation, we are immersed in the history of that war and of others since. A reminder, too, that the cost was not just in loss of life and human suffering but in fiscal areas that have gone on silently affecting this nation’s debt, unseen and below the surface. Additionally, and rather more poignantly, the removal of the poppy installation from the moat of the Tower of London has now been completed leaving nothing but an empty and slightly muddy swathe of ground. Just as the artist intended, it portrays the life that once was there but was then dramatically swept away, reflecting the rather more painful cost of that conflict. Of course, it isn’t just the First World War that leaves us with unusual or ‘unseen’ footnotes. Stories from the Second World War remind us that in daily life we are sometimes unwittingly immersed in that history all around us. This was particularly driven home to me whilst helping put together Joshua Levine’s feature in this issue relating to the German spies who came ashore on the Kent coast in 1940. Walking the very ordinary streets in the very ordinary town of Lydd, Kent — I don’t use the word disparagingly but in the sense of ‘usual’ or ‘typical’ — I couldn’t help but be struck by the fact that a truly extraordinary tale unfolded here almost 75 years ago. How many people, even those who live in these same ordinary houses or walk in these singularly quiet streets, are aware of the remarkable tale that unfolded here? That, of course, is part of the joy in bringing these amazing stories to life for the readers of ‘Britain at War’ and we look forward to continuing to do so throughout 2015. During the coming year we will be looking at events of 100 years ago, including the sinking of the Lusitania (see our feature in this issue) and, later on, at the costly Gallipoli campaign. These were events that have almost become by-words reflecting the awfulness of war and are very real reminders that the cost went way beyond the fiscal concerns that have recently been the focus of The Chancellor of The Exchequer’s attention. We wish all our readers a prosperous and peaceful New Year.

All newsagents are able to obtain copies of ‘Britain at War’ from their regional wholesaler. If you experience difficulties in obtaining a copy please call Seymour on +44 (0)20 7429 4000. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part and in any form whatsoever, is strictly prohibited without the prior, written permission of the Editor. Whilst every care is taken with the material submitted to ‘Britain at War’ Magazine, no responsibility can be accepted for loss or damage. Opinions expressed in this magazine do not necessarily reflect those of the Editor or Key Publishing Ltd. Whilst every effort had been made to contact all copyright holders, the sources of some pictures that may be used are varied and, in many cases, obscure. The publishers will be glad to make good in future editions any error or omissions brought to their attention. The publication of any quotes or illustrations on which clearance has not been given is unintentional. We are unable to guarantee the bonafides of any of our advertisers. Readers are strongly recommended to take their own precautions before parting with any information or item of value, including, but not limited to, money, manuscripts, photographs or personal information in response to any advertisements within this publication.

© Key Publishing Ltd. 2014

Andy Saunders (Editor)

COVER STORY

A pair of Heinkel 111 bombers over London during the Battle of Britain introduces our feature taking a detailed look at the story of two of these aircraft lost over England in the Blitz. The Heinkel 111 was the very much the mainstay of Luftwaffe bomber operations in 1940 and 1941 and our feature covers two losses from K.Gr 100, a specialist ‘Pathfinder’ unit, during one night in June 1941; one of them shot down over the Channel and the other coming down in south east England after its pilot had made a remarkable forced landing in rolling countryside, in the dark and in a burning bomber with no engines. Robert Taylor's painting, ‘Heinkel 111s Over London’, is reproduced by courtesy of The Military Gallery.

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Contents ISSUE 93 JANUARY 2015

FEATURES 26 ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR

46 A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS

40 JACK AND WALTER

54 THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX

The adventures of Short Stirling LK545 and its crew during Operation Market Garden — and how part of the aircraft served time as a garden shed. A newly discovered soldier’s collection tells a forgotten wartime story all too typical of the impact the First World War made on families and the communities in which they lived.

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How two Heinkel 111 bombers from an elite ‘Pathfinder’ unit were shot down over England on the same night during the summer of 1941 — and the confusion over who was responsible. Using step-by-step pictures from Colditz as it is today, we re-create one of the most audacious escape attempts from the fabled German schloss.

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REGULARS 6 BRIEFING ROOM

News, Restorations, Discoveries and Events from around the World.

10 NEWS FEATURES

Biggin Hill Chapel under threat, Channel Islands mines, Aussie crew cleared and more.

22 FIELDPOST

Your letters and emails, including a very moving response from the widow of Wing Commander Tim Vigors DFC.

62 DATES THAT SHAPED WORLD WAR TWO January 1945 under the microscope.

72 IMAGE OF WAR

Graffiti in an aircraft graveyard.

74 GREAT WAR GALLANTRY

In our month-by-month commemoration of medal awards, we reach January 1915. Lord Ashcroft selects a VC winner of great boldness.

80 RAF ON THE AIR: ‘A BATTLE OF BRITAIN CONTROLLER’ 32 HOME FRONT HEROISM

How ordinary people behaved in extraordinary times, as displayed by the people of Leicester when their city was blitzed.

The lively and thought-provoking broadcast of an actor who really was at the Battle of Britain — Ronald Adam.

84 FIRST WORLD WAR DIARY

The Great War goes global, as our monthly series continues.

102 RECONNAISSANCE REPORT

Special interest new books, including a D-Day gem.

114 THE FIRST WORLD WAR IN OBJECTS The iconic military ‘rum jar’ is this month’s choice.

Editor’s Choice GIVE THE GIFT THAT

LASTS ALL YEAR!

A subscription to BRITAIN AT WAR makes a great gift this Christmas. See pages 38 and 39 for details.

86 GUARDIANS OF RETIMO

How two British Matilda tanks tried to keep crack German paratroopers at bay during the valiant but hopeless defence of a Cretan airfield.

92 TERROR FROM THE SKIES

The world’s first air raid was inflicted on unassuming English towns of the east coast in early 1915. We recall the horrific night the Zeppelins came to Norfolk.

106 ONE LONG SCENE OF AGONY

As the centenary anniversary approaches of the sinking of RMS Lusitania, Britain at War re-examines the facts of an infamous wartime event. Was it a war crime — or a legitimate target?

64 FOUR MEN IN A BOAT

The astonishing story of four German spies who made a night-time landing on the Kent coast at the height of the Battle of Britain.

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BRIEFING ROOM |

BULLETIN BOARD EXPERTS HAVE carried out a controlled explosion on an unexploded Second World War bomb found on a beach in Selsey, West Sussex. The 500lb device is said to have been a large anti-submarine bomb dropped from an aircraft, and was probably unearthed due to heavy rainfall and strong winds. Paul Greenwood of the Selsey Coastguard said: “A member of the public reported finding something suspicious to us and we cordoned off the area. Throughout the course of the year, many such finds have been reported in the Bracklesham Bay area due to heavy aerial and maritime activity during the conflict.” Mr. Greenwood added: “Our message is, if you come across anything suspicious, don’t touch it. Get in touch with us on 999 and we will investigate. More finds of this nature in the area are very likely.” RESIDENTS OF a village in Suffolk are calling for a permanent memorial to Lieutenant Joe P. Kennedy, older brother of US President J F Kennedy. Lieutenant Kennedy lost his life when his aircraft, containing 21,000Ibs of explosives, blew up over Blythburgh in August 1944. Kennedy and his crew were based at Fersfield and were scheduled to take part in a secret mission to Northern France before the incident occurred. Local organisations are now proposing a tribute to the fallen US serviceman and his comrades. Huby Fairhead, Curator at Norfolk and Suffolk Aviation Museum at Flixton, said: “If someone doesn’t do something soon, he will be forgotten.” WORK HAS begun on a new war memorial dedicated to British service personnel who fought during the Korean War from 1950 to 1953. The project has been funded by the South Korean government in gratitude for British involvement in what is often called ‘The Forgotten War’ in the United Kingdom. At a ceremony marking the beginning of its construction, South Korean President Park Geun-Hye formally cut the turf at its site in Victoria Embankment Gardens, London. Also present were HRH the Duke of Cambridge and over 50 Korean War veterans. A scale model of the memorial was unveiled during the service which features a bronze statue of a British Soldier, designed and sculpted by Philip Jackson. Alan Guy MBE, 81, of the British Korean Veterans association, said: “We’re the only country that served in the Korean War that doesn’t have an accessible memorial in their capital city.” Around 82,000 British Service personnel were deployed to the Korean peninsula during the war with more than 1,000 of them losing their lives.  

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News • Restorations • Discoveries • Events • Exhibitions from around the UK

Gallipoli Show Set For West End

FOLLOWING PERFORMANCES at the Assembly Hall Theatre, Tunbridge Wells, the new First World War musical drama ‘The Dreamers’ (Britain at War, October 2014) will be making its West End debut in 2015.  The production will open at St James Theatre, Westminster, on 30 June, where it will run for two weeks. ‘The Dreamers’, named after the poem by Siegfried Sassoon, tells the true and moving story of Captain David 'Reggie' Salomons, who led his men to the Battle of Gallipoli in 1915 and was lost on board HMS Hythe along with 128 of his men, all of them from his small community of Southborough, near Tunbridge Wells in Kent. Coverage of this story in Britain at War was read by two young musicians, 28-year-old James Beeny and 24-year-old Gina Georgio, leading them to write the words and music to what has become a moving and highly professional production. The show has also resulted in support and involvement from stars of screen and stage. Since finding the story, the duo put together a cast of 21 young men and women from Kent and Sussex who had dreams of working in theatre.   The music is performed by the band Virgin Soldiers, led by James and Gina, and the cast portray the men of Third Field Company, Royal Engineers, and their families. Large screens feature narrators Amanda Redman and Christopher Beeny and special guests Sir Tim

'The Dreamers' is in the West End from 30 June for two weeks.

Rice, Philip Glenister, Sylvia Syms, Sue Holderness, Michael Buerk, Martin Bell, Pam Rhodes and Michael Simkins. During rehearsals, the cast described how they felt increasingly connected to the men and women they were portraying, and were touched that other young people were moved in the same way.  Over 700 schoolchildren attended the matinée performance and the cast has since received letters of congratulation from the young supporters and their teachers.  A 10-year-old girl wrote, “I think The Dreamers was the best play I have ever watched. I couldn’t take my eyes off the stage. I love the narrating because it taught me a lot about World War One. I will now always remember the soldiers who gave up their lives for us.”

In the run-up to the performances in Tunbridge Wells, Virgin Soldiers and the cast of The Dreamers performed snippets from the show at the Leeds Castle Open Air Concert; the West End Live Preview; Australia House;  Heroes at Highclere (home of Downton Abbey); and the We Will Remember Them Concert for Combat Stress at St John’s, Smith Square, London.  Lady Lucy French, a director at St James Theatre and greatgranddaughter of Sir John French, said, “This is exactly what the centenary should be about, young people engaging, getting involved, playing their part.  This music captures the essence of commemoration across the generations”. For more information visit: www.thedreamersuk.com

WW1 Railway Wagon Wins Restoration Cash THANKS TO a cash injection from a TV project, a First World War Class ‘D’ wagon is to be restored to its original condition. The work will also adapt the wagon to enable wheelchair users to enjoy the travel experience and understand what it was like for soldiers to be transported to the Western Front. The Class ‘D’ vehicle was built nearly 100 years ago to move munitions, stores and men to the battle front by rail in order to overcome the problems of transport caused by what was often a sea of mud and desolation. One side of the wagon had a near miss, with shell splinter holes and

damage to the main frame visible. This damage will be preserved in the restored wagon as an important part of its history. After the war the vehicle was used for over 40 years moving potatoes around the Fenlands and was later converted into an open coach and used for another 25 years giving

Class 'D' wagon to be preserved.

rides for holiday makers until 1985. After a period of outside storage it fell into disrepair and now needs a major rebuild. Owned and operated by enthusiasts on a site at Skegness Water Leisure Park, the Lincolnshire Coast Light Railway Historic Vehicles Trust has won £43,400 from The ‘Peoples Millions’ and ITV’s regional ‘Calendar’ programme to restore and preserve the wagon. It is operated with equipment including rolling stock originally built for the War Department trench railways of the First World War. This ‘D’ class wagon is an important part of Britain’s railway heritage, and a fascinating military relic in its own right.

Exhibitions from around the UK • Events • Discoveries • Restorations • News

| BRIEFING ROOM

100 Soldiers Welcome Tribute Locomotive TO MARK the centenary of World War One, East Coast Trains have launched a specially designed locomotive. Number 91111, ‘For The Fallen’, carries a livery filled with images, stories and tributes to regiments and the people who served in them from across the East Coast route between Newcastle and London. On 7 November 2014, 100 current soldiers and veterans lined platform 8 at London’s King’s Cross station to meet its arrival. It highlights the lives of five men from five regiments who served in the First World War, their regimental badges, and their modern-day successors. The soldiers lining the platform were drawn from each: the City of London’s Reserve Regiment, the Honourable Artillery Company, the Tyneside Scottish Royal Artillery, the Prince of Wales’s

Own Yorkshire Regiment, the Royal Regiment of Scotland and the Royal Dragoon Guards. Decorated with scenes of poppies and the Western Front, one side of the locomotive carries some of the Christmas Cards that Christopher Douglas Elphick sent from the Front to his new wife and their new born son. A member of the Honourable Artillery Company (HAC) he had enlisted in 1915 just five months after getting married. Their son Ronald was born in August 1916 and he enjoyed just one home visit to see his son before he left for France. On 15 May 1917 Elphick was reported missing during the Battle of Bullecourt. His body remained undiscovered for nearly 100 years but was discovered in a farmer’s field in 2009 and buried with full military honours at the HAC Cemetery in Ecoust St Mein on 23 April 2013.

100 soldiers greeted the train's arrival. (© CROWN COPYRIGHT 2014)

Next to the letters of Christopher Elphick is a giant portrait of another HAC soldier, teenage Gunner Douglas Elliott Brock. The son of a missionary, Douglas was born and grew up in China but a desire to serve his country saw him travel back to England at the young age of 17. Too young to enlist, he took a job at the London Branch of the Bank of Montreal until, shortly after his 18th birthday, he joined the HAC. He was sent to France as driver of a horse drawn gun carriage with 2/A Battery. In spring 1918 the Germans launched a new offensive on the Somme and during heavy shelling on 21 March, Douglas was killed, aged 19. The train was driven on the commemorative morning by Royal Marine Reservist Sergeant Colin Fisher who is a train driver for East Coast Trains in his civilian capacity.

Loco 91111 ‘For the Fallen’ joins sister East Coast locomotive 91110 ‘Battle of Britain Memorial Flight’, which features the insignia of the Royal Air Force Battle of Britain Memorial Flight and its three famous Second World War aircraft — the Spitfire, Hurricane and Lancaster.

RM Reservist Sgt Colin Fisher and (above) Gunner Douglas Brock.

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BULLETIN BOARD A SCHOOL in South Warwickshire has been presented with the Victoria Cross awarded to one of its former pupils. Colonel John Cridland Barrett VC, served during the First World War and was awarded the medal for his actions during a smoke barrage. Surrounded by lost and bewildered men in no-man’s-land, the then Colonel Barrett helped guide a handful of men to their objective of taking a group of German machine gun emplacements. The December 1918 citation reads: “Without hesitation he collected all available men and charged the nearest group of machine guns, being wounded on the way… In spite of this, he gained the trench and vigorously attacked the garrison, personally disposing of two machine guns.” In a ceremony at Arnold Lodge Private School, Colonel Barrett VC’s regiment, The Royal Leicestershire Regiment, presented the Victoria Cross to headmaster Nicola Craig. She said, “As a school, we are immensely proud of Colonel Barrett’s achievements… his enthusiasm, loyalty and commitment are values that we hold in high esteem.” Pupils at the school are raising money for the Royal Leicestershire Regiment Memorial Appeal, a charity aiming for £40,000 to build the monument at the National Arboretum site, Staffordshire. THE NATIONAL Museum of Flight in East Lothian has won a £1.3 million grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to help restore and develop two Second World War hangars on the site. The project, due for completion in 2016, will allow artefacts currently in storage to be put on display. These include uniforms, documents and photographs dating from when the site was home to RAF East Fortune. The station is considered one of the best-preserved WW2 airfields in the UK. AFTER 32 years since serving their country on the Falkland Islands, 19 veterans are to receive ‘The South Atlantic Medal’ following an extension of the qualifying criteria. Nearly 30,000 of these medals have been issued to veterans who fought in the conflict before 12 July 1982. Previously, this had not included servicemen present after this period due to the surrender of Argentine forces on 14 June. An extension has now been made up to 21 October 1982. Although these men saw no direct fighting, their duties included the clearance of landmines and seeing to the graves of the war dead: a Gurkha, Lance-Corporal Budhaparsad Limbu, died when his spade hit a grenade two weeks after the surrender. Prime Minister David Cameron presented the medals in a special ceremony recognising the men’s service.

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News • Restorations • Discoveries • Events • Exhibitions from around the UK

Christmas Truce Commemorations AS THIS issue of Britain At War goes to press the First World War Christmas truce is being commemorated close to the area of the front line where 100 years ago a brief ‘peace’ broke out, writes Rob Pritchard. In places along the front, British and German soldiers spontaneously suspended hostilities and marked Christmas 1914 with a short interlude of peace in no-man’s-land. Representations of the truce – such as the well publicised Sainsbury’s TV and cinema ad shown in the UK this year – usually involve a game of football being played between British and German soldiers, although the actual events relating to the playing of a football match have been subject to much conjecture. Whilst no definitive accounts exist, this is certainly believed to have taken place, although details of the final scoreline have never been recorded! On a more sombre note the truce also gave an opportunity for each side to recover their dead comrades and return them to their own lines for burial. Amongst the sectors in which these exchanges occurred was the area near Ploegsteert Wood (Comines-Warneton). In 1999 a cross was erected here by a

How one newspaper in Britain reported the Christmas truce of 1914.

group of amateur historians in memory of the truce. It has since become a well-known landmark and a stopping off point for many battlefield tours. The cross is maintained by the Patriotic Association of Comines-Warneton. The Tommies who fought here were quick to translate the Belgian ‘Ploegsteert’ into the more easily manageable ‘Plugstreet’ This year’s events in the area include a remembrance ceremony at St Yves during which the UEFA (European Football Union) president is inaugurating a monument aimed at reminding coming generations of the role the game played in this historic event.

Over the weekend there is a continuing re-enactment in an authentically recreated section of trenches constructed this year on a plot backing-on to the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery at Plugstreet Wood. A torchlight procession to the Cemetery from the Plugstreet 14-18 Experience Centre and a Royal Marines band concert form Friday’s programme. Saturday includes the showing of a First World War film and guided walks starting from Le Gheer. The people of Belgium are taking the remembrance of these events very much to heart and we will report in full on this event in the February issue of Britain At War.

Schools Erect Christmas Truce Monument MILDENHALL COLLEGE Academy pupils, staff and guests unveiled a historic memorial to the Christmas truce at the Peace Village of Mesen, Belgium, on 6 December.  Alongside pupils and staff members from the Suffolk academy, the distinguished guest list included the UK and German Ambassadors to Belgium; MEPs; the Mayor of Mesen; the Cabinet Member for Schools and Skills at Suffolk County Council; the President of Regional Government Detmold and the Governor of Paderborn.  Thought to be the first of its kind within Europe, the project has been led at every stage by pupils at Mildenhall College Academy and counterparts from Gymnasium Theodorianum School in Paderborn, Germany. Together they joined forces to produce both the memorial commemorating the 1914 Christmas truce and the unveiling programme.

The unveiling ceremony was hosted by pupils from both schools and included the story of how they created the memorial. A rendition of “Silent Night” will be performed, a carol that became famous for being sung in trenches on both sides of no-man’s land on that historic occasion.  Richard Kerridge, Humanities Faculty Leader at Mildenhall College Academy said: “We have come a long way since our first trip to the no-man’s-land spot where the soldiers came together to share Christmas in 1914. This monument is a product of the friendship between the pupils involved, and who were moved by this spontaneous act of humanity and resolved to design a fitting tribute.” The venture received funding from the German Monuments and Cemeteries Commission and the The monument to the Christmas truce Mildenhall Rotary Club, as well as both schools involved and the erected jointly by in an initiative between English and German schools. Academy Transformation Trust.

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NEWS FEATURE |

St George's Royal Air Force Chapel

MAIN PICTURE: The interior of the original chapel before it was burnt down in 1946. (G PEARSON)

threat to biggin

Future of iconic site in doubt • MOD “to relinquish owne THE MINISTRY of Defence has admitted that it is to dispose of the iconic St George’s Chapel of Remembrance at former RAF Biggin Hill, writes Claire Bracher. It confirms the news broken in the December issue of ‘Britain at War’ and places the future of the Chapel into grave doubt. An MoD spokesperson told Britain at War: ‘As the Chapel no longer provides support to a local RAF community and the number of serving RAF personnel using the Chapel is very low, continued support of the Chapel would be an inappropriate use of Defence resources. Consequently, the MoD plans to relinquish ownership, including the removal of administrative and ecclesiastical support, by March 2016.’ The news comes as a surprise, especially as it breaks on the very eve of the 75th anniversary year of the Battle of Britain, with the Chapel very likely to feature significantly during those commemorations.

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CHAPEL HISTORY

In June 1943, as a result of increasing losses of aircrew from within the Biggin Hill Sector, the RAF considered the idea of creating a permanent memorial. Coinciding with the destruction of the 1000th German aircraft by fighters from Biggin Hill there was also a strong desire to remember those who had died in the Battle of Britain and, indeed, to mark that victory.

ABOVE: The Book of Remembrance honouring all of those who fell from RAF Biggin Hill. (GEOFF SIMPSON)

Three prefabricated huts, constructed around steel angle-iron frames, were acquired and put together to form a Chapel and on Battle of Britain Sunday, 19 September 1943, the first commemorative service was held. The service dedicated the Memorial, the reredos (decoration behind the altar) and the Book of Remembrance. Present at the service was the Station Commander, Group Captain ‘Sailor’ Malan. Inside the Chapel, on either side of the altar, boards listed the names of those who had been killed, while squadron badges were placed across the top of the reredos. By the end of World War Two, about two and a half boards had been filled on each side of the altar. The altar itself marked the emblems of those nations who had been involved with Britain in operations from Biggin Hill and flags from those nations were hung on display at either side of the altar. With an area set aside for a quiet reflection it is easy to understand why the Chapel came to be well loved by those who served at Biggin

St George's Royal Air Force Chapel

| NEWS FEATURE

gin hill chapel

ownership” • “Inappropriate use of Defence resources” Hill. It was also said to be frequently visited by Winston Churchill, whose former home at Chartwell is only a few miles distant. In December 1946, the Chapel was all but destroyed in a disastrous fire, with only the angleiron framework, the brass name plaque to the Chapel and the brick fireplace remaining. The cause of the fire was never established but an electrical fault was thought most likely. Churchill was said to have taken immediate action to find out what could be done to rebuild it. With Ministry funds short in the aftermath of the war, the possibilities were limited. As a result, Winston Churchill himself, together with Padre Cecil King, launched an appeal to raise the money needed. Eventually, adequate funds were obtained through private donations via the appeal and the replacement Chapel was started in 1951. The foundation stone was laid by Air Chief Marshal The Lord Dowding, who had been Commander in Chief, Fighter Command, during the Battle of Britain. The Chapel was

completed by the end of the same year. Its design was closely based upon the original three huts and the intention behind the building was to recreate the atmosphere and ethos of the first. Its shape therefore is rectangular, not the usual cruciform of a church. The building was dedicated by Dr Chavasse, the Bishop of Rochester, as a permanent memorial in 1951.

ABOVE: The altar and reredos in the current chapel. (GEOFF SIMPSON)

CHAPEL WINDOWS

The Chapel’s most striking features are its windows and in 1954 an appeal was launched to raise money to fund the installation of the stained glass. Hugh Easton, designer of the Battle of Britain memorial window in Westminster Abbey, designed a set of 12 which were installed in 1955. They epitomise the reason for the Chapel’s existence, with the central figure in each window representing the spirit of a pilot. Each window tells a story of courage in the face of adversity, and is a poignant reminder of sacrifice. The window dedicated to 610 (County of Chester) Squadron, for example, was presented in memory of two brothers, both killed in action: Flying Officer Gerald Ivo Cuthbert (May 1940) and Major Sidney John Cuthbert, Scots Guards (July 1944). The inscription on the window reads: ‘All things that are, Weep for them, Weep for them, Weep for youth that laughed so bright, extravagantly fallen in flight’.  www.britainatwar.com 11

NEWS FEATURE |

St George's Royal Air Force Chapel

Two of the windows show the badges of Fighter Command and 11 Group, while another two depict the Hurricane and the Spitfire. The final window depicts the badge of RAF Biggin Hill, with the badge awarded by King George VI in 1951. It has a sword surrounded by a chain and its motto ‘The Strongest Link’ refers to the spirit that will not be broken. Taking the brunt of much of the air fighting over south east England, Biggin Hill certainly earned this motto. With such a high loss of life from the station it is not difficult to see why.

The Chapel’s Book of Remembrance is a replacement of the original and bears the names of 454 aircrew lost (This is one more name than on the reredos, as an additional name was added in 1995). The page on view is turned each day so that it corresponds to that day’s date. On 19 July, 1940, for example, almost all of 141 Squadron were wiped out, with ten aircrew killed. The long list of names are a glaring reminder of the losses suffered, and around the walls of the Chapel are testaments to those who fought valiantly from the station; the medals of Flying Officer Edward Mitchell of 79 Squadron, scrolls recording the granting to RAF Biggin Hill the freedom of Bromley and Orpington, a wooden bench with carved crests of Biggin Hill and of 133 Eagle Squadron and even the table from a local pub with carvings of Battle of Britain pilots’ names and initials.

CHAPEL STORIES

Around the chapel, every niche has a story to tell. The reredos holds the names of 453 aircrew who lost their lives on operations from airfields in the Biggin Hill sector. Across the top of the reredos, the main campaigns are shown in chronological order and the flags of those Commonwealth and Allied countries whose airmen served out of Biggin Hill are displayed. The canopy that covers the altar was embroidered with the emblems of the British Isles and Allied countries. Its quotation comes from Psalm 63, ‘In the shadow of thy wings I will rejoice’. Even the floor of the Chapel is equally striking with the blocks of parquet-style wood said to be made from the offcuts of wood used to make aircraft propellers. The cross and candlesticks on the altar were given to the Chapel by the Royal Australian Air Force and to the right of the altar hangs a Polish Memorial Plaque, given in memory of the Polish pilots who gave their lives in the Battle of Britain. The Bible, which lies on the altar, is one of the only surviving items from the original Chapel. Found in the burnt out rubble of the destroyed building, it was taken and restored. It spent many years in the attic of the man who found it until in the 1980s it was returned to the Chapel. Its very existence is extraordinary, resonating with the purpose of the site.

ABOVE: More representation of Biggin Hill’s very strong links with 92 Squadron is this ‘guardian’ fullsize Spitfire outside the chapel in the markings of Plt Off Geoffrey Wellum’s aircraft from 1940.

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THE FUTURE?

ABOVE: One of the stained glass windows, representing 92 Squadron. The windows are a precious feature of the Chapel and part of its unique ambience. (C BRACHER)

ABOVE: This table, inscribed with the names and initials of Biggin Hill pilots, came from a local pub that had been popular with the pilots and is inscribed with names and initials of RAF personnel. It is now preserved at the Chapel.

(C BRACHER)

The Chapel is recognised internationally as a symbol of sacrifice and remembrance and there is already some disquiet over its future status. Will the Chapel be preserved as the ‘permanent memorial’ it was intended to be? Or will its serene beauty and purpose be lost with possible transformation into a visitor centre? Whilst the future of the chapel remains uncertain, there is nevertheless a stated clear intent on the part of both the MoD and London Borough of Bromley to protect the site. The MoD says: ‘The RAF recognises the significant heritage of this site and its importance to veterans and their families, particularly those, whose loved ones’ ashes have been interred in the Garden of Remembrance. Therefore, when identifying a new owner, the MOD will endeavour to find an owner who will be able to preserve the rich heritage of the site for future generations.’ It remains to be seen to what extent the sanctity of the Chapel and its original purpose as a ‘permanent memorial’ will be preserved once the site is transferred out of MOD / RAF ownership and care. Watch this space.

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NEWS FEATURE |

Messerschmitt 109 Reconstruction

Messerschmitt

Restoration Riddle When historic aircraft restorers started work on the reconstruction to flight of a Messerschmitt 109 E-1, they little expected to solve the unexplained riddle over the forced-landing in Kent 74 years ago that cast doubt on the pilot’s motives.

EARLY IN the morning on 2 November 1940, a rare sunny day in what would be a month of heavy rain, Messerschmitt 109 E-1 4034 of 8./JG 53, piloted by Fw. Xavier Ray, force landed at Lower Hardres Farm, near Canterbury, in the middle of a large ploughed field. There was little damage other than bent propeller blades and a damaged undercarriage leg. Investigation by RAF Intelligence officers revealed that the markings on the fuselage were 6+1, in black outlined in white. The camouflage was yellow dappled green-grey all over, with a 10” vertical red band in the middle of the yellow engine cowlings and a red spinner. The rudder was also described as yellow. The data plate showed the aircraft to have been built by FockeWulf in 1939, serial number 4034, with the DB 601A enginhe having the serial number 10256. Later, all of these numbers would be crucial in the identification of a Messerschmitt 109 ‘hulk’ that would unexpectedly turn up in India. ABOVE: The aircraft as found in India, dumped in the yard of the Karnataka Technical College.

ABOVE: Part of the airframe stamped with the crucial identifying number, 4034. The engine number also matched that noted in the RAF Intelligence Report, thus making the identification process absolutely positive.

ABOVE: The sheared drive shaft from 4034’s engine, shown next to an intact example. This would have resulted in the DB 601 engine seizing up.

14 www.britainatwar.com

The Messerschmitt had been on a freelance ‘nuisance’ patrol and had no contact with the enemy, the guns being found to be unfired and with full ammunition containers. However, its pilot had reportedly complained before he had left that there were ‘engine problems’. Clearly, this was not considered to be a matter of any import or it would doubtless have been dealt with by the unit’s engineers and the aircraft grounded. As things turned out, it was a matter of considerable significance. Fw Ray blamed these ‘engine troubles’ for his forced landing, but the RAF noted in 1940: ‘Cause of crash not known but pilot made very good belly landing and aircraft is practically intact. No trace of bullet strikes or engine overheating but cause of landing may have been engine failure.’ Already, then, some doubt as to the reasons for the arrival of Xavier Ray’s Messerschmitt 109 had been voiced. Could it have been that Ray simply landed to get out of the war and to give himself up? Consistently, across the years, these have been the suggestions. The aircraft was recovered by A.V. Nicholls (Brighton) Ltd, a company contracted to recover crashed aircraft. It was noted that the gun-sight and clock from the Messerschmitt had already been removed by a Pilot Officer Jackaman from

the Air Ministry, and Pilot Officer Finch from RAF Hawkinge had removed various other parts, having apparently been given permission by a Lt. Rowan of the Royal Artillery who was guarding the wreck. However, the salvage party were asked to recover all of these items with the aircraft. Clearly, the two Pilot Officers should have been a little more discreet in their souvenir hunting! Meanwhile, the aircraft was taken to 49 MU at RAF Faygate, where, unusually, it was not processed for scrap but instead crated up for shipping to India. On arrival in India the aircraft was presented to His Excellency the Nizam of Hyderabad and put on display as having been ‘shot down by one the Nizam’s Spitfires’. The Nizam was probably one of the richest men in the world, and also a great Anglophile, donating funds to purchase Hurricane and Lancaster aircraft as well as sufficient funds to buy warships for the Australian Navy. As to ‘the Nizam’s Spitfires’, 152 Squadron, operating Spitfires during the Battle of Britain, became known as the ‘gift’ squadron of the Nizam. However, and although this aircraft had been attributed as a victim of the Nizam’s squadron this was not, in fact, possible; at the relevant time 152 Squadron (then based at RAF Warmwell in Dorset) were

Messerschmitt 109 Reconstruction

| NEWS FEATURE

ABOVE: The engine in India with the wings stacked in the background. Noteworthy is the ‘capped’ spinner over the more usual central aperture seen on the Messerschmitt 109-E.

not operational over Kent, and we also know there to have been no combat damage that might have resulted in its demise. After Partition in India, when a massive redistribution of power and land previously part of the British Empire was undertaken, the property of the Nizam was effectively confiscated, and this by now historically unimportant aircraft wreck was handed to the Karnataka technical college as an instructional airframe. Over time this became uninteresting technically, and was consigned to the college scrap dump. At this stage the fortuitous spotting of the aircraft by an Indian enthusiast ensured a deal was done, contracts formed and the aircraft removed to the enthusiast’s garage, situated under his house. The storage was unfortunate, because during the monsoon it half-filled with water and dissolved all the magnesium alloy castings on the engine and some on the airframe. However, the aircraft was sold to a military vehicle enthusiast living in France who later sold it on to a company called Rare Aero Ltd. For a while, there was some controversy in India when it was realised by the Indian aircraft enthusiast community that a very rare aircraft had innocently slipped away, and an opportunity lost to acquire it for an Indian museum or for private restoration. As a result, questions were asked about the disposal of the airframe by the

Karnataka college and while the supposed connection to the Nizam’s Spitfires having shot it down is now known to be incorrect it was, nevertheless, an important and rare survivor - albeit in derelict condition. However, the transaction was thought by both the college and the buyer to be contractually and legally sound and the aircraft was legally exported. Enquiries by the present owners to the Indian High Commission to comment on the controversy that was reported in the Indian newspapers have drawn a blank and it seems, officially, there is no interest in the aircraft. The owners have now commissioned restorers Retrotec Ltd to find all the missing equipment and parts and explore the possibility of making a start on the most difficult aspect: the engine. This is especially tricky following its unfortunate immersion in India, and with the crankshaft and con-rods rusted solid nothing appeared usable other than possibly the basic cylinder blocks and crankcase. To this end, an overhauled and unused DB601A engine recently found underneath a Luftwaffe hangar floor in Germany during re-construction work was acquired for Rare Aero. This engine had similarly rotted magnesium, but in this case it was just dampness, with the magnesium having acted as a ‘sacrificial anode’ and protecting the

steel parts which were found to be in as new condition. In addition, an externally complete display DB601A engine was generously loaned from the Berlin Technical Museum to Retrotec in order that drawings and casting patterns might be manufactured for all magnesium parts. During this process, and in the dismantling of 4034’s original engine, they discovered that a gear shaft in the accessory gearbox had seized and broken off and caused its gear wheel to go out of mesh, thereby starving vital lubrication to the many rotating parts in the back of the engine. Retrotec Ltd said: “It must be really unusual for investigators 74 years later to establish the cause of an aircraft crash. In this instance, we can say categorically that the engine stopped due to oil starvation once that shaft had sheared. At this point, the pilot had no choice but to come down in England.” In the restoration of this unique survivor of the Battle of Britain, then, it has also been possible to restore the tarnished reputation of a former Luftwaffe fighter pilot.

BELOW: No photographs have been located of 4034 in its original state, but from contemporary reports and evidence found on the airframe this is an artist’s impression of how it would have looked and how it will be restored.

www.britainatwar.com 15

NEWS FEATURE |

Battle of Savo Island 1942

HUDSON CREW CLEARED

AFTER 72-YEAR WAIT A ROYAL Australian Air Force crew has been cleared of blame for the heavy casualties sustained in an allied naval disaster, writes Philip Curtis. The battle of Savo Island, sometimes referred to as the First Battle of Savo Island, took place on 8/9 August 1942. At the time the Allied landings on Guadalcanal, and other objectives in the Solomon Islands, had just begun and could very well have been disrupted. At the Savo Island battle a Japanese task force attacked Allied naval ships at night, sinking four heavy cruisers, the Australian HMAS Canberra and the American vessels, USS Vincennes, Astoria and Quincy. There was heavy loss of life. Naval commentators have since argued that the Japanese commander’s decision to withdraw, while it was still dark, rather than attack Allied transports, prevented a greater disaster. The enemy force might otherwise have managed to inflict losses on Allied transport ships and put the advance in the Solomon Islands in jeopardy. At the time of the battle, the Allied force commander, Rear Admiral Victor Crutchley VC was absent in his flagship, the heavy cruiser HMAS Australia, attending a conference with the commander of the American amphibious force. In the United States early blame for the calamity was placed at a low level and on one RAAF aircraft, which had spotted the Japanese force. In his 15-volume account

ABOVE LEFT: Allied force commander Rear Admiral Crutchley VC, who was attending a conference at the time of the attack. ABOVE RIGHT: The RAAF Hudson crew, finally exonerated after more than 70 years. Wireless Operator Eric Geddes is on the right.

of the US Navy’s Second World War actions Rear Admiral Samuel Eliot Morison wrote: “The pilot of this plane, instead of breaking silence to report, as he had orders to do in an urgent case, or returning to base which he could have done in two hours, spent most of the afternoon completing his search mission, came down at Milne Bay, had his tea, and then reported the contact.” In fact, Sergeant (later Flight Lieutenant) Eric Geddes, the Wireless Operator of the Lockheed Hudson involved, had sent a message warning of the Japanese presence, even while two Japanese aircraft were attacking. Although Australian authorities accepted that this was the case, the slur on Geddes and his fellow crew members, Sergeants William Stutt,

ABOVE: The cruiser USS Astoria took part in the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway, but was sunk at Savo Island in 1942.

16 www.britainatwar.com

Wilbur Courtis and John Bell, remained in the United States until the case was taken up by Air Marshal David Evans, a former Chief of the Air Staff in Australia. Now Eric Geddes, the sole survivor of the crew, has received a letter from Greg Martin, Washington-based, Assistant Director of the Histories and Archives Division, Naval History and Heritage Command, who wrote, “A new generation of naval historians is questioning previous works, such as that of Rear Admiral Samuel Eliot Morison, often written too close to the end of a recently completed campaign ...... Morison’s criticism, in particular, was unwarranted.” Flight Lieutenant Geddes regards this as final vindication for himself and his crew. Rear Admiral Crutchley, commander of the force attacked by the Japanese, was cleared at the time of blame for the disaster. Born in 1893 and a godson of Queen Victoria, he was a cadet at Osborne and Dartmouth and served in the Dreadnought HMS Centurion at the Battle of Jutland. He was awarded a DSC for his actions as Executive Officer of HMS Brilliant, attempting to block the harbour at Ostend in April 1918. He took part in the further attack in May on HMS Vindictive, taking command when the captain was killed and earning his VC. At Savo Island Crutchley’s loss of four cruisers could have ended his career. Instead, he was cleared by an Australian Board of Inquiry and a further American investigation. He reached the rank of Admiral and was appointed to the grade of Chief Commander in the American Legion of Merit. He became Flag Officer, Gibraltar. Sir Victor Crutchley died in 1986 and was buried in the churchyard at Powerstock, Dorset.

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NEWS FEATURE |

Channel Islands Occupation MAIN PICTURE & BOTTOM RIGHT: Some of the S-mines found to be free of explosive, towards the end of the clearance operation. LEFT: The layers of mines in the cache pictured as they were discovered. The cache is slowly and carefully excavated.

ON THURSDAY, 14 November 2014, a farmer working in a field near the top of Harbour Hill on the tiny Channel Island of Sark made a most unusual find when he ploughed a field for the first time since the end of the Second World War, reports Simon Hamon. Like the other Channel Islands, Sark was occupied by German forces from 1940 (see Issue 92, ‘Britain Under The Jackboot’) until liberation in 1945. Despite having a population of just a few hundred, and being little more than two square miles in extent, Sark, just 24 miles off the coast of northern France, was heavily fortified by the Germans. Hitler was immensely proud of having occupied an area of British territory and he demanded every effort to retain possession. Consequently the main islands were powerfully fortified, with Jersey and Guernsey turned into fortresses. Unlike those two islands, where a large proportion of their populations evacuated to the UK, not a single one of the 471 Sarkese left the island. The defiant folk all remained to face the Germans together.

Attention turned upon Sark when, on the night of 3-4 October 1942, ten men of the Small Scale Raiding Force and No.12 Commando landed on the island tasked with undertaking a reconnaissance of the German defences on the island and capturing prisoners who could be interrogated. Led by Major Geoffrey Appleyard, the raiders found five Germans in a hotel. These were captured but one of them started shouting to alert other members of the garrison and he was shot. Two others were shot when they tried to escape as they were being taken back to the raiders’ boats. The fifth man was taken back to Britain. As a consequence measures were undertaken by the Germans to bolster Sark’s defences, work which included laying extensive minefields. These utilised large numbers of anti-personnel mines, including S-mines (Schützenmine), a cylinder containing 360 ball-bearings, referred to by Allied troops as the ‘Bouncing Betty’. A primary charge launched a base plate containing the main charge and the ball bearings which would be projected up to three and five feet high, before the main

BOTTOM LEFT & BOTTOM RIGHT: Mine clearance on the Channel Islands under way, using German prisoners, after the war — in this case on Guernsey.

WW2 GERMAN MINES charge detonated scattering the ball bearings in all directions. It was lethal within a radius of about 20 yards, but could inflict injuries up to 100 yards from the point of detonation. Sibyl Hathaway, the Dame of Sark, recalled the task that faced the authorities after the liberation in 1945: “Now that the war was over, we had to set about the business of the rehabilitation of Sark, no trifling matter after five years of enemy occupation. There were 13,500 mines to be cleared off our land … Our roads had been left in a shocking state by the Germans, who had brought over not only cars but two French

18 www.britainatwar.com

Channel Islands Occupation

| NEWS FEATURE

S UNEARTHED ON SARK whippet tanks. German prisoners were kept on the island for eight months to work under the Royal Engineers in order to clear the minefields and resurface the roads.” Eric N. Walker was a Bomb Disposal Officer involved in some of the mine clearances. “Once you had located an S-mine approximately, they were best pin-pointed by running your fingers through the grass in search of the protruding telltale spikes. It could take ten anxious minutes to find one mine, so making safe an area like this would eat away the hours, fray the nerves and rub raw the finger-tips.” It was dangerous work and the Bomb Disposal teams never operated without an ambulance and a medical orderly present. At one point during the detection process, as they were crawling slowly along on their knees, Walker’s detector man suddenly leapt to his feet and yelled, ‘Minen!’ “He had knelt down on the prongs of a mine,” continued Walker. “The three of us froze, knowing that one step in any direction could be fatal for us all. I was petrified and it took some time for my heart to calm down. I said a little prayer and we each began to check the area around our feet in turn, passing the detector

from one person to another, and marking each mine we detected with a flag.” The field where the mines were discovered in November 2014 had been an orchard and the area ploughed had been the former site of a pigsty until about ten years earlier when the corrugated iron structure was removed. In an attempt to extend the orchard the ground was ploughed and on the first run up the field the driver dislodged what he thought were antipersonnel mines. The matter was duly reported to the Sark Constable and the Guernsey Police’s Bomb Disposal Team. Over the following days the site was carefully cleared, during which work no less than 79 S-Mines were uncovered. The mines were all located in one area in the field and despite being found close together some were considered live and others were clearly empty cases. As traces of explosive were evident removal became a complex, slow and methodical process. It was a most unusual find and is considered by the officers present to have been a store hidden by the German forces prior to the liberation of the island, because none of the other caches previously located had been simply buried in a field. The Royal Engineers, such as men like Eric Walker, who

oversaw the removal of thousands of mines from Sark in 1945, had disposed of their mines properly. The discovery of this latest cache left in such a manner suggests that the Royal Engineers were unaware of this partial clearance by the Germans. There were two types of mine found; the standard SMi-35 and the less common (on the Channel Islands) SMi-44. The difference is that the igniter tube on the SMi-44 is not in the centre of the mine, it uses a push-pull igniter which detonates the mine at a predetermined height of approximately 36 inches. In total 51 mines were found to be free from explosive, while 28 required disposal by way of a controlled explosion.

www.britainatwar.com 19

NEWS FEATURE |

Local Updates

54 NEW NAMES FOR NORFOLK

MEMORIAL THE TOWN of Diss in Norfolk now has an extra 54 names on its war memorial, writes Geoff Simpson. The decision to remember the 54 comes after years of work by local historian Helen Kennett (TOP RIGHT). Helen explained, “About 18 years ago I read a letter from Mr. Basil Abbott (now Diss Museum Manager) published in the Diss Express. In the letter he was appealing for information about a soldier shown in an accompanying photo. “I contacted Mr Abbott, who said that there were other photos of men who had worshipped at the local Baptist Church. As there was a forthcoming World War I exhibition at the Diss Museum, I offered to research the men. “Mr. Abbott pointed out to me that there were names of casualties, who had attended the Baptist Church, but were not currently on the town War Memorial. “Two years ago I thought it was a fitting time, as the 100 year anniversary of WWI approached, to remember those whose names were missing from the Memorial. “I began further research on possible WWI casualties whose names might have been omitted from the memorial. At the time I had little idea where this research would lead especially as I thought that there were possibly ten or 12 missing names.

20 www.britainatwar.com

“Perhaps most importantly a number of sources hitherto unavailable to me in my early research were now available via the internet and my local library, such as the later census returns for 1901 and 1911, and military records. Careful re-reading of the Diss Express also furthered my research. “I found sadly that in some instances one brother from a family had his name included, another had not, and I therefore made sure to the best of my ability that this was addressed. In the meantime Mr. Abbott had spent well over a year raising funds for new memorial stones.” The church and the Royal British Legion arranged for the dedication of the new plaques at the 2014 Diss Armistice Day parade and service. Among those now remembered is Private Alfred Rice of 1st Battalion, The Cambridgeshire Regiment, who lived at Mission Road, Diss. Helen explains, “Over the course of the war Mission Road, Diss was to suffer a number of casualties among its families, both married family men and single men. When it was mooted that the St. Nicholas Chapel, in the parish church of St. Mary, could be restored as a War Memorial Chapel there was much enthusiasm for the scheme. Many bereaved parents from the road gave funds toward the cost.

“Having joined The Cambridgeshire Regiment, Alfred went with it to serve in Flanders. In July 1917 his regiment participated in the offensive around St. Julien, which was part of the first day of the Third battle of Ypres (Passchendaele). Alfred was posted as ‘missing’. In May the next year however a notice published in the local paper, reported his death. “Sadly this was the family’s second loss as his brother Frederick, had been killed in April 1917 aged just 20, whilst serving with the 7th Battalion, The Norfolk Regiment. Frederick had been employed at Diss railway station by the Great Eastern Railway for a year and was a porter. He had enlisted with the territorials at the outbreak of war. Listed on the Arras Memorial together with his comrades, he was also remembered on the original Diss memorial. Both men were members of the Diss Baptist Church.” A book by Helen Kennett, Diss and District in WWl, is due for publication in spring 2015.

SEND US YOUR NEWS Do you have news about military history from your area? Please feel free to tell Britain at War at the addresses shown in FieldPost.

Private Alfred Rice (LEFT) now commemorated alongside his brother Frederick, who was remembered on the original memorial.

New Exhibition at Hendon

| NEWS FEATURE

ABOVE: Albatros D.Va Replica.

ABOVE: Caudron G.3.

ABOVE: Sopwith Triplane.

The First World War

in the Air THE ROYAL Air Force Museum at Hendon has opened a new permanent exhibition to commemorate the role British airmen and aircraft played during the First World War. Officially opened by The Duke of Edinburgh, ‘The First World War in the Air’ tells the stories of the aircraft, the men who served as well as the women who played a vital role in aircraft manufacture and support services. It is housed in the authentic period surroundings of the refurbished Claude Grahame-White Hangar, a Grade II listed building used as an aircraft factory during the First World War. The Grahame-White Aviation Company began assembling aircraft here in 1910 and the factory grew rapidly during the conflict as a result of orders received from the Admiralty and the War Office. On show are an impressive array of aircraft, German as well as British, alongside background

static and multi-media displays, including examples of aero engines, weapons and air dropped ordnance. The exhibition explores what it was like to be involved in the earliest days of military aviation through the story of Britain’s air services, the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service. These two organisations merged on 1 April 1918 to become the world’s first independent air arm, the Royal Air Force. The experiences of pilots, ground crew and the factory workers who helped make the aircraft and associated equipment are all integrated. The aircraft on display comprise replica airframes as well as composite and original machines. Among the latter is a German Fokker D.VII, built in 1918 and abandoned by the retreating Germans. The Belgian Air Force used this aircraft until 1931. It was acquired by the English collector Richard Nash in 1937 and is believed to be a composite airframe.

An original airframe on display is a Sopwith Triplane which is known to have actually flown at Hendon. This is one of only two known survivors (the other is in Russia) of the type. It was rescued from the dump at RAF Cardington in 1936 and flown in the 1936-37 Hendon air pageants. The exhibition also explores the extraordinary expansion of Britain’s air services from 1,800 men in 1914 to the 290,000 men and women who were serving in 1918. The First World War in the Air exhibition was made possible with a grant of £898,558 from Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF). BAE Systems have also provided support.

MORE INFORMATION For more information on the exhibition and how to visit, visit the RAF Museum Hendon website http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/london/

www.britainatwar.com 21

FIELD POST

Our Letter of the Month is sponsored by

Pen & Sword Books

'Britain at War' Magazine, PO Box 380, Hastings, East Sussex, TN34 9JA | [email protected]

LETTERS OF THE MONTH

Who Really Shot Flt Lt Nicolson?

EDITOR’S NOTE: Such has been the interest shown in the case of Flt Lt J B Nicolson VC that we have had a really extraordinary number of emails and letters on the subject. Reflecting that interest, and notwithstanding a letter in the Fieldpost of our December issue, we have decided to run two more readers' letters this month that pick up a similar theme. Unusually, both of these readers will receive the Pen & Sword prize on this occasion.

SIR — The Letter of The Month for November concerned the controversy surrounding the winning of the sole Fighter Command Victoria Cross and the alleged wounding of recipient, Flt Lt James Nicolson, by a member of the LDV just before he landed by parachute. A photo of his bloodstained lifejacket was shown to support the theory that the holes supposedly made by shotgun pellets were probably caused by shell splinters. It is a reasonable proposition but the clinching garment would be the pilot’s trousers. Is it likely that his buttock wounds were sustained while in the cockpit in his seat backed by an armoured plate? It was probably the best protected area of his body while seated in a Hurricane. The medical attention he received would have quickly disabused Flt Lt Nicolson of any mistaken assumption that his buttock wounds had been caused by shell splinters rather than shotgun pellets. The difference between splinters and lead pellets would have been obvious to the doctor extracting them. An alternative version to those presented in the October and November editions is offered in ‘Baling Out’ by Robert Jackson

(Pen and Sword 2006). It recounts how Nicholson narrowly missed high tension power lines during his descent and approaching the ground he was hit by shotgun pellets fired by a Home Guard sergeant. It is agreed that if Nicholson had been hit by a .300 or .303 round from below the results were likely to have been far more damaging, but just how many rifles, .300 or .303, were available to the LDV in August 1940? My father lived in Southampton at the time and was a member of the Home Guard and

SIR - In relation to Flt Lt Nicolson being fired at from the ground by the LDV, Mr Evans states that, ‘there is circumstantial evidence that the fired cartridge cases found on the ground at ‘the scene of the crime’ were .303 cases whereas the local LDV were all issued with .300 rifles’. Certainly, the LDV were issued with American .300 P17 rifles. The presence of .303 (British) ammunition does not exclude the

reported the incident in his wartime memoir as follows: ‘There actually was one case of this [shooting descending airmen] at Southampton, a Hurricane pilot being shot by a Home Guard whilst coming down by parachute. Fortunately he survived, and the H.G. had very stringent instructions that this type of reprisal would not be tolerated’. Perhaps the last word should be from Nicolson himself who was reported to have remained conscious throughout and was firmly of the opinion that a member of the LDV was responsible for his further injury. Tony Martin By Email South Molton

presence of LDV, however, as they were issued with a variety of weapons, some of which were .303 calibre. Additionally, the area around the site where Nicolson landed could easily have spent .303 cases in evidence from air fighting that had taken place. To the untrained eye, the rimmed .303 case can also look very similar to the slightly longer, rimless .30.06 American round. Flt Lt Nicolson’s preserved tunic, lifejacket and shoe currently reside at the Tangmere Aviation Museum in Sussex and close inspection of this rather tattered uniform shows damage varying in size from larger jagged fragments to smaller

puncture marks. Looking at the uniform, it is not possible to ascertain conclusively what caused the damage, but the conclusion could certainly be drawn that it might have been caused by both cannon fragments and shotgun pellets. The National Archive at Kew contains files that relate to contemporary analysis of the effects of German ammunition showing the result of fragmentation analysis of a German 2cm High Explosive Incendiary Tracer projectile. Projectiles such as this are designed to fragment in a manner causing maximum effective damage. The projectile is designed to ensure it will fragment into pieces of optimal size to cause maximum damage to an aircraft — i.e. not too small. The fragmentation analysis carried out shows that most fragments are larger in size, with few of shotgun pellet size. Relating this back to Flt Lt Nicolson’s preserved uniform, and looking closely at the damage, both larger jagged holes/tears as well as some very small shotgun pellet size type holes are to be seen. Smaller pellet size holes are particularly evident on the outer upper right leg of the uniform trousers, consistent with a spread of shotgun pellets fired at a longer range. The conclusion after examining the actual damage to the uniform therefore does not conclusively prove the cause of damage by shotgun blast, but the existence of smaller shotgun pellet size holes could back up Flt Lt Nicolson’s claim to have been shot at by shotgun. As the National Archive at Kew is in the process of releasing RAF Casualty Packs (AIR 81), perhaps once Flt Lt Nicolson’s become available then a more conclusive answer will become available. Andrew Dines, by email

The author of the Letter of the Month may select a book of their choice (maximum value £25) from the extensive range of titles available at www.pen-and-sword.co.uk 22 www.britainatwar.com

The author of the Letter of the Month may select a book of their choice (maximum value £25) from the extensive range of titles available at www.pen-and-sword.co.uk

FIELD POST

'Britain at War' Magazine, PO Box 380, Hastings, East Sussex, TN34 9JA | [email protected]

Scharnhorst Sexism

SIR — Re: the ‘Channel Dash’ episode (Issue 91, November). Having been a WAAF radar specialist during the war, my mother suddenly announced during the latter stages of a very long life: ‘I told them I had seen the ruddy Germans, you know!’ She went on to explain that she was instructing at a radar unit on Hartland Point and, quite incredibly, had seen a radar return of what must have been the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau leaving Brest. There were a number of other vessels accompanying them, with the smaller craft circling protectively around the two capital ships. Apparently, it is sometimes a quirk of radar that in certain meteorological conditions the echo may ‘bounce’ off an atmospheric layer so the operator is able to see into the distance much further than might usually be expected. Everyone was aware that these ships might soon leave Brest and so she rushed to tell the officer in charge what she had seen. She was brusquely sent away with the unfortunate and rather sexist riposte, ‘If a man had seen them I would hold some credence to this fairytale, but you would best go and powder your flushed face and make a nice cup of tea!’ I quote

WAAF Section Officer Pamela Fry

her exact words, although in her mind they may have changed over time, but the message was clear. So, was a massive opportunity lost as a result of this apparent gender-bias? My mother was adamant that she had spotted them first, by a fluke, but that nobody would take any notice of her. And by the time they did, it was too late. How different the course of history might otherwise have been. After this brief interlude of lucidity in her failing years she never spoke of it again, but it was a fascinating tale. Joe Fry, by email

Take Care With Battlefield Finds

SIR — On page 60 of Issue 92 (‘Britons at The Bulge’, December) the picture of an item of ordnance is captioned as an ‘unexploded shell’. This is of course a very generic description of the item, but in this instance it is absolutely correct. On first inspection it appears to be a rather less dangerous armour piercing solid shot projectile. These are, as they sound, items of ordnance fired to punch a hole in an armoured vehicle by sheer kinetic energy and are constructed of solid steel. As such they contain no explosive content but are often fitted with a tracer element, designed to indicate the fall of shot. As such, these projectiles are essentially harmless unless dropped on your foot. They often feature as souvenirs and are on occasion utilised as very effective door-stops. The projectile in the picture, while appearing to be an AP solid shot round, is in fact a very much more dangerous item. It is an American 75mm PROJECTILE, FIXED A.P.C., M61, W/FUZE, B.D.,M66A1, AND TRACER, 75-MM GUN. I am speculating, but it may well have been fired from a Sherman tank armed with a 75mm gun.

While it is an armour-piercing projectile, it is designed to give both penetrating and explosive effect and as such contains a high explosive filling. It therefore is indeed an ‘unexploded shell’. The projectile in the picture has had its lightweight ballistic cap (designed to give better aerodynamic performance) knocked off, which often happens with these rounds. The base fuze can clearly be seen in the picture. It is therefore a highly dangerous item of unexploded ordnance that could easily be misidentified as something far less dangerous — i.e. an AP solid shot and taken as a potential souvenir. While this example has failed to function, all the safety mechanisms would have been set to allow the fuze to function and, as already stated, in a highly dangerous state. And that is something that cannot be overemphasised. This should indicate to all readers that items such as this that are found on battlefields or military training areas should always be treated as potentially dangerous, left well alone and reported. Peter Henry, by email

Could This Be The Berck Dornier? SIR — I write In relation to your piece about wreckage of a Dornier 17 found among sand dunes on the beach near Berck in northern France (Issue 92, December). Having researched Luftwaffe losses of the period in some detail I have come across this photograph of a Dornier 17 sitting among sand dunes and taken at around the time of the supposed loss of the Berck specimen. Irritatingly, the photo is taken from dead astern and thus provides us with absolutely no other clues as to the likely identity of the Dornier in question. While it takes us no further forward in

the identification of this specific aircraft or crew, and we have no idea as to the history of the recently discovered wreckage, I think it highly likely that this image is, in fact, of the Berck Do

17. Of course, there were both a good many Dornier 17 losses and a good many sand dunes along the northern coasts of Europe and so it is impossible to say with any certainty that it is the same

aircraft. That said, the similarities are striking and it would certainly be a remarkable coincidence if it were a photograph of another incident. Simon Parry, by email

www.britainatwar.com 23

FIELD POST

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Cornwall Liberator Update

SIR — I was intrigued by your letter from Michael Lucas in the December issue of ‘Britain at War’ asking if anybody knew what happened to the crew of Liberator FL910 in its crash at RAF Predannack. Living just up the road from there, I thought your readers might be interested in the little research I’ve undertaken. And I am sure that the finder of the photograph of FL910’s crash will also be interested to learn these additional details. In April 1941, 224 Sqn was in Northern Ireland for anti-submarine patrols but then moved to St Eval, six miles north east of Newquay, in Cornwall in December 1941. It remained here until February 1942 to fly patrols off Brest and attack shipping off the coast of Brittany. The Squadron then returned to Ulster for two months before moving to Tiree, Scotland where it converted from using Hudsons to flying Liberators in July 1942. This change of aircraft greatly increased the range of patrols over the Atlantic and they were then brought to Beaulieu, Hampshire in September for more anti-submarine operations, this time over the bay of Biscay and in attacks on shipping off the French Coast. It was from here that Liberator III ‘H’ FL910 took off on its last flight. The Liberator picked up on radar a U-Boat approximately 700 miles WSW of Fastnet travelling

on the surface. This was U-216, a type VIId minelayer, which had been part of a ‘wolf pack’ of 9. Flotille out in the Atlantic. She was commanded by Kapitanleutnant Karl-Otto Schultz and was returning from her first patrol, having left Kiel on 29 August. His one and only ‘ kill’ was the Boston, a 4,989 ton steam passenger ship sunk on 25 September 1942 by a spread of four torpedoes and with the loss of 17 killed out of a complement of 66 on board. The Boston had been travelling with Convoy RB-1. Fg Off Sleep turned the Liberator to engage the U-Boat, and at just 30 feet above the sea the Liberator released six depth charges. They exploded on impact with the U-Boat, sending casing fragments airborne which not only damaged the elevators on the tail of his aircraft, but pretty

much disintegrated them. The aircraft was now tail heavy and this attitude obviously induced a problem flying the aircraft. Adding to the problems was the fact that the other depth charges could not be jettisoned because of damaged gear. Flight Sergeant Lenson worked, for one and half hours, to manually open the bomb doors so that the other depth charges and loose heavy gear could be jettisoned. Flying the Liberator under these trying conditions was improved by having all the crew move forward into the nose of the aircraft, with both pilots having to fly the aircraft. About one hour prior to landing the control column had to be tied down forward with straps. They had also lost their radio and electrics and the batteries were switched off in case of fire.

They passed the Scillies at 1840 hours and decided to land at RAF Predannack. Over the airfield, the elevator cables suddenly snapped and the aircraft burst into flames touching down, but the crew were dragged out safely. Flight Sergeant Lenson then hauled Flight Sergeant R Rose, who had a compound fractured leg, from the wreckage. The rest of the crew escaped with cuts and superficial scratches and for their actions Fg Off Sleep was awarded the DFC, and his flight engineer, Flight Sergeant Lenson, the DFM. There were no survivors of the 45 man crew of U-216. I have also managed to find a photograph of the crew of Liberator III ‘H’ FL910 of No 224 Squadron, taken around 20 October 1942. Flying Officer Sleep (left) poses with three members of his crew, grim-faced but relieved after surviving their ordeal.  The crew are (from left): Flight Sergeant Ron Johnson (air gunner), Sergeant Sam Patterson (second pilot) and Sergeant George Lenson (flight engineer).  The Operations Record Book for RAF Predannack might have more information regarding the landing. This may be found in the National Archives at Kew under AIR 28/651. It appears that Flying officer David MacKie Sleep survived the war and died in 1989. Simon Bromage Truro, by email

Wing Commander Tim Vigors

SIR — My late husband was Wing Commander Tim Vigors DFC who is mentioned in your wonderful piece on Flying Officer Hilary Edridge (‘He Must Have Got Out’, December, Britain at War) I knew Hilary was a very great friend of Tim’s and how terribly upset he was at his death in the Battle of Britain. I did not know of the existence of the letter he wrote to Hilary’s parents until I read your feature. I thought it was incredibly moving.

24 www.britainatwar.com

It is important that the younger generation learn about the First and Second World Wars, and your magazine goes such a long way to educating them. Not a day went by that Tim did not remember his friends who perished in the war, especially Hilary. Again, thank you so much for publishing such a lovely tribute. Tim would most definitely have approved, and I wish that he could have seen it in print. Diana Vigors Newmarket, Suffolk.

ABOVE: Brothers in Arms: Tim Vigors (left) and Hilary Edridge

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ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR Short Stirling LK545

ARNHEM THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR When the RAF tried to resupply the beleaguered troops of Operation Market Garden, many aircraft, all too predictably, came to grief. With the help of first-hand accounts, we revisit September 1944 and focus on the surprising adventures of Short Stirling LK545.

MAIN PICTURE: A Short Stirling returns to the UK after a resupply mission over Arnhem. This is the aircraft, Stirling Mk.IV LK171, flown by RAF Harwell’s Station Commander, Group Captain Bill Surplice. Note that Surplice has had his initials painted on the aircraft. You can just make out the location of the pannier hatch at the bottom of the rear of the fuselage. (K.A. MERRICK)

T

HE OBJECTIVE of Operation Market Garden, which began on 17 September 1944, was to secure the bridges over the River Maas and the River Rhine, with the hope that the Allied forces could break into Germany and bring the Second World War to a speedy conclusion. The capture of the most distant of those bridges, over the Lower Rhine at Arnhem, had been the target of the British 1st Airborne Division. It turned out that only one of the airborne battalions, Lieutenant Colonel John Frost’s 2nd Parachute Battalion, had been able to reach the bridge and for four days the bulk of the 1st Airborne Division had been pinned down around Oosterbeek to the west of Arnhem, with the 2nd Parachute Battalion still holding out at the bridge.

26 www.britainatwar.com

It had been expected that the lightlyarmed airborne troops would only have to hold out for two days before the advance units of the British XXX Corps reached Arnhem. Yet, by 20 September these ground units had still not punched their way through the German forces that blocked the road to Arnhem. If the airborne troops were to be able to hold out any longer they needed to be resupplied. That job was handed to the RAF. From information that had been gleaned on the 19th, it was believed that elements of the 2nd Parachute Battalion were holding one end of the bridge and that one of the landing zones – LZ ‘Z’ – was still held by the 1st Airborne Division. For the resupply drop the RAF’s Transport Command was to provide 63 Douglas Dakotas from

46 Group, whilst its 38 Group would furnish 100 Short Stirlings. However, in the intervening hours the situation on the ground had changed and the airborne troops mainly held only a perimeter around Oosterbeek. The weather, which had restricted earlier efforts at resupplying the ground troops, was again a handicap during the morning of the 20th, with fog covering most of the airfields in eastern England as well as the target area. It was not until 11.30 hours that the fog had cleared enough for the aircraft to take to the sky. Flying as much as possible over the route which had been cleared by XXX Corps – in order to avoid German antiaircraft fire – the RAF crews were given a map reference where their drops were to be made. This represented a small enclosure opposite the Hartenstein Hotel

ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR Short Stirling LK545

in Oosterbeek, which had become the 1st Airborne Division’s headquarters.

A SAD AND MOVING SIGHT One of the pilots who set off for Arnhem that morning was Flight Lieutenant Roy Scott of 295 Squadron: “We continued en-route to Arnhem at about 3,000 feet. The flak was quite heavy and I can recall feeling through the seat of my pants, the air pressure from the bursts of flak which damaged the undercarriage area. As we approached the container dropping zone at Oosterbeek near Arnhem, I let down until we were at the height for container dropping – 600 feet – and reduced speed to about 140 mph. On the run in an aircraft flying ahead and just above us dropped his containers and they very nearly hit us. Whew! …

“My concentration was now on flying at the correct height and speed and following the bomb aimer’s instructions – left a bit – steady – steady – right a bit, etc. This seemed to go on for a long time and must have seemed like ages for the rest of the crew who at this point could just sit and watch. It couldn’t have been too pleasant for the two despatchers in the body of the aircraft either, whose job it was to push out the four packages through the hatch which was now open, as were the bomb doors ready for the release of 24 containers … “Then we were over the dropping zone, the bomb aimer pressed the release button and the containers were away, and we felt a little lift as each one dropped. We were hit several times by flak … “Out of the cockpit window I could

see a Stirling close to the ground with the engines on both sides on fire … The pilot belly landed and the whole thing seemed to explode in flames, a sad and moving sight.” That day, the 163 aircraft despatched dropped 2,400 containers and 1,408 panniers, but only 10.6% of this total of 390 tons of supplies were reported to be retrieved by the 1st Airborne Division. It had cost the RAF 14 Stirlings and three Dakotas. With the troops still holding out at Oosterbeek another major effort would be needed on the 21st. The pilots knew that they had to be very accurate with their despatching if the airborne troops were going to receive any supplies. The Germans would be ready and waiting. Losses had been heavy on the 20th; they would be much greater on the 21st. 

TOP RIGHT: Jeeps of No.2 Platoon, 250th Light Company RASC, head off to collect supplies from the drop zones on 19 September 1944. Note the pannier dropping in the background. On the right is the RASC Divisional Maintenance Area. (HISTORIC

MILITARY PRESS)

TOP LEFT: A remarkable entry in Flight Lieutenant Turner’s flying log book. (COURTESY OF

ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

www.britainatwar.com 27

ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR Short Stirling LK545 BELOW: Taken from the Oosterbeek perimeter, this picture shows Stirlings on resupply missions dropping their cargoes over Drop Zone ‘V’ on 19 September 1944. Note the bursts of antiaircraft fire among the open parachutes. (M. HODGSON)

RAF Harwell-based 570 Squadron was the lead squadron, and Gordon Frost’s Stirling was able to return to base with only superficial damage. Only one aircraft from Harwell failed to return – Stirling LK115, flown by Pilot Officer Denis Peel. “When we opened the bomb doors,” Peel later explained, “we were about seven or eight hundred feet and as slow as possible. We then realised we were being shot at and our starboard inner engine was on fire. I was told the fuselage was on fire and the despatchers had jumped out to avoid the flames.

MISSION ON Once again bad weather caused a delay to flying that morning for the 64 Stirlings of 38 Group and 53 Dakotas from 46 Group. The first wave, nevertheless, was able to take off at 11.05 hours, the second and third waves soon following. “Thursday 21st September dawned grey, more misty than ever it seemed,” recalled Gordon Frost, a navigator with 570 Squadron. “At the briefing we were told the airborne lads were really up against it, being inexorably boxed in a small area around Oosterbeek, in the suburbs of Arnhem. It was becoming clear that they were not going to hold the bridge. However, they needed all the supplies we could get them.” 28 www.britainatwar.com

LEFT: Pictured by a German Propagandakompanie, or PK, photographer, these are some of the many supply panniers dropped on the 18th that fell into enemy hands. (BUNDESARCHIV,

BILD 101II-M2KBK772-04/HÖPPNER/ CC-BY-SA)

BELOW LEFT: In time, the fuselage section was used as a pigsty, during which service this picture was taken in 1974. (COURTESY OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

BOTTOM LEFT: Mr Van Bergen, who salvaged part of the fuselage of Stirling LK545, sits beside the Arnhem relic which he had transformed into a garden shed. (COURTESY OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

“We dropped our container supplies in accordance with the instructions and then I decided we had no choice but to put the aircraft on the ground, which fortunately I was able to do. It was a great surprise when we got out of the aircraft to discover the troops in the area were German, and obviously much in control.” From RAF Fairford that day flew the Stirlings of 190 and 620 squadrons. This included LK498 skippered by an Australian pilot, Flying Officer Frank Pascoe. The squadron’s Operational Record Book describes the fate of Pascoe’s aircraft: “On the approach to the area it was very evident that the reception was going to be hot – the sky was patchy and dark with flak bursts; smoking aircraft could be seen falling headlong out of the sky, and enemy fighters, ME109s and FW190s, were much in evidence … The pilot reduced height to tree-top level to make the expected enemy fighter attacks less easy for them. At this height the aircraft was also a large, albeit fleeting target for enemy machine gunners and the rattle of bullets hitting the aircraft sounded like heavy hail against a window pane … Miraculously, no member of the crew was hit, although the aircraft was holed in a number of places … The DZ was found and the supplies were dropped, save some which failed to leave the aircraft, due no doubt to the release mechanism being damaged. At the DZ there were few signs of our own troops and it seemed possible, in the heat of battle, their supplies were dropped into enemy hands.”

ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR Short Stirling LK545 As the Stirling turned away, a false reading on the repeater compass due, no doubt, to the gyro unit being damaged, caused Pascoe to turn too far and the bomber banked round and back into the inferno. “Once again the aircraft was subjected to everything that the enemy could bring to bear – fighter attack, and heavy machine-gun fire. At this time ‘Taff’ Hughes [the flight engineer] decided to take a look from the astrodome at his four Hercules engines which, up to that time, had given no trouble. To his utter dismay he saw that both starboard engines were on fire. On the intercom he informed the pilot and then proceeded hastily but calmly to aft to shut off Nos. 2 and 4 tanks supplying those engines. The pilot operated the Graviner extinguisher system to the two starboard engines and then feathered them. “The fire abated momentarily, but soon burst back into life. It was obvious that the aircraft was doomed, but it was too low for the crew to make their escape by parachute. And there would not be sufficient power from the two port engines to gain height quickly, if at all. Frank Pascoe coolly announced over the intercom that he would put the aircraft down and ordered the crew to their crash positions. “The aircraft skimmed along very low, lopped off a few trees, lightly struck a farm building or two and then belly-landed in a large cultivated field, carving out a deep furrow, which might be expected from 30 tons of metal hurtling along at 100mph. On coming to rest the aircraft seemed full of chocking, blinding dust, but ‘Taff’ Hughes found his way through it to the rear door, which, surprisingly, he was able to open quite easily. He made a ABOVE RIGHT: The fuselage sectionbased shed in use in the 1980s. (COURTESY OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

quick getaway in the knowledge that the aircraft was still burning; there remained a lot of fuel in the tanks, and perhaps some of the hung up containers in the bomb bay were packed with ammunition – not a place indeed to hang around. “He was quickly joined in a nearby ditch by the wireless operator and the rear gunner. A few shouts brought over the navigator and the bomb aimer but where was the pilot, Frank Pascoe? Was he trapped in the wreckage? After a few moments he calmly emerged from the far side of the burning aircraft, and, on hearing their shouts, he joined the other crew members in the ditch.” From RAF Keevil, 21 aircraft were able to fly, with 196 Squadron supplying ten Stirlings and 299 Squadron contributing 11. Amongst the latter was Stirling EF323, in which Flying Officer Bassarab, the Intelligence Officer of 299 Squadron, was the aircraft’s navigator: “We flew in that narrow corridor past Eindhoven, which had proved so successful the previous day, but were ever mindful of flak. It wasn’t until we reached the DZ, still in the same relative locality, that we encountered opposition and here there was plenty.

ENEMY FIRE

Believed to have been taken on 20 September 1944, this photo of a 2cm FlaK 30/38 in position near the Leeren Doedel crossroads is poignant for what can be seen in the background – the wooden grave marker on the left in front of the trees on the far side of the road. This is believed to have been where one of, or indeed both, Driver James Bowers and Driver George Weston, both of 63 Airborne Composite Company, Royal Army Service Corps, were buried after their aircraft, the 575 Squadron Dakota flown by Flight Lieutenant Charles Slack (KG338), was shot down on the 19th. Both Bowers and Weston are still listed as missing. (BUNDESARCHIV, BILD 101II-M2KBK-772-26/HÖPPNER/CC-BY-SA)

“With airspeed of 140mph and height of 1000ft we lumbered in to drop our containers. As the last container dropped away and we passed the clearing and over the wooded section that surrounded the area, all hell seemed to break loose. Metal tearing through metal, angry black puffs completely encompassed us and no immediate escape in view. We were thoroughly boxed and the German gunners were letting us have the works.  BELOW: One of the many resupply aircraft shot down over Arnhem on 19 September 1944. With its nickname The Saint visible below the cockpit, this Short Stirling has been identified as EF267/5G-C, flown by Flying Officer D. Hardwick of the RAF Keevil-based 299 Squadron. (D. HARDWICK)

www.britainatwar.com 29

ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR Short Stirling LK545

… The chatter of machine-gun fire from the rear gunner could be heard through all the racket but his targets were well screened by trees, and I doubt if his fire availed any satisfaction … As we looked back the area seemed full of flak and aircraft; it was a terrible spot to be in and we were glad to be out of it.”

THE FLIGHT OF LK545 Flying the 299 Squadron Stirling LK545 was Flight Lieutenant Reginald Turner. With him were Flight Sergeant Price, the navigator, Warrant Officer Harvey as the flight engineer, Sergeant Moss was the wireless operator, Flying Officer Sutton was the rear gunner and Flight Sergeant Sedgwick was the bomb aimer. The two air despatchers from 253 Airborne Divisional Composite Company, Royal Army Service Corps, were Corporal Sproston and Driver Brackman. “Our journey had been quiet until we crossed the Rhine over the DZ,” recalled Turner, “when heavy, light and medium flak concentration opened up, followed by enemy fighters who were waiting 30 www.britainatwar.com

ABOVE LEFT & TOP: Two views of the mid upper turret position on the fuselage section of LK545. (BOTH COURTESY OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

ABOVE RIGHT: Markings on the fuselage’s interior. (COURTESY OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

RIGHT: A view of the fuselage section exterior. Part of an RAF roundel was still visible at the time of recovery. (COURTESY OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

outside the DZ area to catch who dodged to get in. We had no fighter cover, so enemy aircraft were able to attack in numbers, until air cover arrived later and the enemy dispersed. “While over the DZ we were hit by flak and the tail caught fire, forcing the rear gunner to bale out, after attempts had been made to get him out. I continued on course, but the fire got out of control, so I chose a position in or near our territory and crash landed at 062063E. No-one was hurt and the secret equipment was destroyed.

“Dutch peasants came up, welcomed us effusely [sic], told us our position and that the British were coming up. They took us to a house, fed us and contacted the underground, who took us to an Army contact for crashed air crews, who put a guard on our aircraft.” Over the Drop Zone (DZ) Cpl Sproston, the air dispatcher, had delivered the load of ammunition and other stores accurately and in a timely fashion, allowing Turner to effect a forced-landing and without the inherent dangers that would have been presented by the volatile and dangerous cargo. However, and whilst all of the crew managed to reach XXX Corps’ headquarters that night, their adventures were not quite over. En-route, the crew found themselves embroiled in a ground battle as the party they were travelling with in convoy chanced upon a group of four Tiger tanks which immediately engaged their vehicles. A number of the British trucks were knocked out, but a small party from the group took up a position in a nearby house with the redoubtable Cpl Sproston taking charge of a forward observation post. From here he directed fire from a Bofors gun which succeeded in fending off the attack. Some accounts have the Bofors gun knocking out two of the Tigers, but the likelihood of 40mm rounds inflicting terminal damage on this formidable piece of armour seems remote. However, for his actions that day Sproston was awarded a welldeserved Military Medal, the citation being noteworthy for its failure to

ARNHEM: THE SURPRISE SURVIVOR Short Stirling LK545

CLEMENT BURTON SPROSTON On 22 September 1944 Corporal Clemont Burton Sproston of 253 Company, RASC, 49 Air Dispatch Group of the 1st Airborne Division, was involved in a ground action with Flight Lieutenant Reginald Thomas Frederick Turner, RAF, after their Stirling aircraft had been shot down the day before. For his actions, Sproston was awarded the Military Medal on 5 April 1945. The citation in the London Gazette reads as follows:

CITATION:

“On the 21 September 44, Cpl SPROSTON was a member of a despatch crew of two flying in a Stirling Aircraft on a re-supply mision to the 1 Airborne Div at ARNHEM. On approaching the dropping zone the aircraft was hit by AA fire and caught fire. Cpl Sproston was given orders to despatch the load. Although the aircraft was well ablaze and the rear gunner’s ammunition was exploding inside the fuselage, Cpl Sproston continued to despatch the load, which consisted of high explosives, at the right moment. It was entirely due to Cpl Sproston’s coolness and courage in despatching this extremely dangerous load, that the pilot of the aircaft was able to crash land it without loss of life. After the aircraft had been crash landed Cpl Sproston and the crew of the aircraft eventually reached an Allied HQ from which they were despatched to Brussels in a troop carrying vehicle. On the way, the convoy, in which they were travelling, was attacked by four enemy Tiger tanks and a number of vehicles were knocked out. A small party from the convoy took up their positions in a house and Cpl Sproston was put in charge of a forward observation post from which, although under heavy enemy fire, he directed with great effect the fire of a Bofors gun. Throughout this little action Cpl Sproston’s courage and devotion to duty was an example to all.”

mention the alleged destruction of any of the enemy tanks. Not all the men taking part in the resupply that day were so fortunate. Of the 117 aircraft setting off on the resupply mission, 35 failed to return, as did many of their crews. Most of the losses were not the result of ground fire, however. It transpired that a German Jagdgeschwader (fighter unit) which was already in the air was ‘vectored’ against the largely unprotected supply aircraft. On subsequent days the RAF ensured that there was adequate cover. For all the sacrifice of men and machines, the results were disappointingly similar to the previous day. Indeed, just four per cent of the 412 tons of supplies dropped actually reached the stranded airborne troops. The RAF continued to try and supply the 1st Airborne Division up until the dismal end of Market Garden on 25 September, Day 9 of the operation. The resupply efforts began on D+1 and over the course of the following days, 38 Group and 46 Group flew a total of 611 sorties, undertaken by 371 Stirlings and 240 Dakotas. Of these 54 of the former and 35 of the latter failed to return to their bases. Not all of these were actually shot down, as some landed on emergency airfields in the UK and in Belgium. As a percentage the losses were remarkably similar, at 14.5% of Stirlings and 14.6% of Dakotas. In total, 1,445 tons of supplies were dropped in panniers and parachutes and 2,228 tons in containers. Only 6.4 % of that total was officially counted as received by the men of the 1st Airborne Division.

RIGHT: Another view of the fuselage exterior. BELOW: Loaded on board a Dutch Army truck, the surviving section of Stirling LK545 begins the journey to its new home with the Dutch Aircraft Examination Group. (COURTESY

OF ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

However, the tale of Flt Lt Turner’s coolness and Cpl Sproston’s courage had a remarkable postscript in 2003 when a new owner took possession of a house in the Dutch town of Beuningen, west of Nijmegen.

STIRLING TO STORAGE SHED When he examined his garden, Erik Peelen was puzzled by a mass of ivy growing in a thick clump over a clearly solid object underneath. As he pulled away the clinging vegetation he was astonished to discover a section of aircraft fuselage in astonishing condition and still bearing wartime RAF camouflage paint and markings. Each end had been bricked up, with a door added, thus turning the fuselage section into an improvised garden shed. It didn’t take long before Arie-Jan Van Hees, the author of an all-encompassing book on the resupply operation, GreenOn!, and his friend Frans Ammerlaan identified it as a five-metre section of the fuselage of LK545 which had come to grief nearby on 21 September.

ABOVE: The complete fuselage section before its recovery. (COURTESY OF

ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

BELOW: On the move again — with the assistance of the Dutch Army. (COURTESY OF

ARIE-JAN VAN HEES)

Further research discovered that it had been used as a pigsty and then storage shed until, more recently, it became overgrown and forgotten. Realising the historic significance of his ‘shed’, Erik Peelen generously donated the fuselage to the VLB Museum (Dutch Aircraft Examination group) at Deelen Airfield in the Netherlands and once the vegetation had been stripped away and the end walls taken down it was transported away by the Dutch army. Later investigation revealed stillevident flak damage from the action over Arnhem making this remarkable chunk of Operation Market Garden a historically important relic in its own right. Remarkably, the fuselage section’s survival is important in itself given that no single surviving intact example of the Short Stirling exists anywhere in the world today. Without a doubt, this must be the largest surviving aerial relic from Market Garden as well as one of the largest known pieces of surviving Stirling structure.  www.britainatwar.com 31

HOME FRONT HEROISM Leicester Blitz Night, 1940 Wartime tales of courage usually focus on the men and women of the armed services. But as the story of Leicester’s Blitz Night reveals, many civilians deserve equal respect for their admirable heroism under fire. Austin J Ruddy gives an inspiring account of what ordinary people can do in extraordinary times.

O

N 19-20 November 1940, the industrial Midlands city of Leicester suffered its ‘Blitz Night’, bringing death and destruction to its vulnerable streets. It was a terrible occasion, but paradoxically, was later described as “the greatest night in the history of the people of Leicester”. The Midlands Blitz had begun four nights previously. The Luftwaffe, infamously, brought their brand of aerial destruction to Coventry, as Hitler’s air force spread its campaign away from London to the provincial industrial cities. On the night of the 19th, Birmingham was the main target. However, as a diversionary attack, the Luftwaffe also set its sights on Leicester. Their bombers struck the unsuspecting city at 7.45pm, before the sirens had even sounded, having a free hand over the urban area and scattering bombs where they liked.

INTO THE FIRESTORM As the air raid developed, the inner city residential area of Highfields received a pummelling and soon, civilian casualties mounted. A doctor and his St John nursing team immediately responded. Little did they realise they were entering the eye of the storm. At 10.40pm, the city’s fire and ARP services were at full stretch, when a salvo of three heavy high explosive bombs fell on the Sparkenhoe Street/ Saxby Street crossroads, demolishing three of the four corners and flattening a hotel, shop and four houses. Up to 40 personnel were in the ARP depot in the Wesleyan Chapel schoolrooms adjoining Saxby Street Methodist Church, when the church received a direct hit. Amazingly, most of the ARP workers escaped with just minor scratches, though their equipment was destroyed. Their troubles were only just beginning. The main area of concern was directly opposite, on Saxby Street corner. Four were killed at number 56, a

32 www.britainatwar.com

HOME FRONT HEROISM Leicester Blitz Night, 1940 MAIN PICTURE: Leicester’s Bond Street ARP Mobile First Aid Unit, who performed important work at the height of the air raid and where the bombing was heaviest. Centre is Medical Officer Dr Ernest B. Garrett, in charge of the MFAU. Seated first left is St John sister Ivy Marsh. Seated third from left, next to Dr Garrett, is St John officer Carrie Wells. Seated third from right, also next to Dr Garrett, is St John nurse, Hilda Hefford. All four received St John Certificates of Merit for their courage. This photograph was taken in the weeks after the Blitz Night and despite their experiences during the raid, most of them are still managing a smile. (AUTHOR)

boarding house: Joseph Pertzin, aged 32, Miss Kathleen Tilley, aged 27; Frances Fowkes, aged 29 and William Johnson, aged 48. Two were killed next door at number 58, in rented apartments: Sidney Harper, aged 34, and Arthur Wood, aged 37, a furniture department manager of Lewis’s, Leicester. The 18 personnel of Leicester’s Bond Street Mobile First Aid Unit (MFAU), under 40-year-old Medical Officer Dr Ernest Berry Garrett, raced to the scene in their converted bus, the first time it had been used. Parking just opposite the incident, the party took over the kitchen of 80 Sparkenhoe Street as an emergency dressing station and attended to the first casualties they found, “with great coolness and endurance”. Joan Howes lived at the house and later recalled: “The bombs began falling and I went to the cellar. Shouting outside brought me running out and I helped pull two injured people from a cellar opposite. Shortly after, a doctor and ARP people crowded in to our house. They fitted our kitchen with wooden shutters as a temporary casualty station. “Then, a bomb dropped at the front gate on a medical bus parked there. We were instructed to get out quickly. As I ran from the cellar steps, I looked towards the front of our house, to see a huge wall of flames. Unfortunately, the nearest shelter had been cracked by blast and we had to move to another shelter.” No doubt attracted by the fires, this second salvo had fallen on the eastern corner of Stoughton Street/Sparkenhoe Street. The MFAU immediately blew up and was consumed by fire. Dr Garrett’s daughter, Mary Maynard recalls: “The MFAU was a converted single-decker charabanc, with an emergency operating table. My father was very proud of the bus and was very upset about losing it, as he had put a lot of work into it.” 

www.britainatwar.com 33

HOME FRONT HEROISM Leicester Blitz Night, 1940

AN UNLIKELY HERO Leicestershire’s highest wartime award for civilian gallantry was attained by an “unlikely hero” after a large parachute mine exploded near the end of the raid at 01.16am, on the corner of Knighton Road and Newstead Road, in Leicester’s smart Knighton district, killing eight residents. The Leicester Mercury explained: “The Wardens of Leicester were a determined and courageous body who gave their best that night and this is reflected in a George Medal and four Royal recommendations for brave conduct which were awarded to them. “Beaming, likeable, 54-year-old William John Higgott, an Inland Revenue Inspector, a man of rotund figure, ready open countenance and a bespectacled smile, was the warden who won the George Medal. “The London Gazette states: ‘Warden Higgott arrived at an incident immediately after a bomb had exploded and without regard for his own safety, entered a building which was a mass of ruins and in an unsafe condition. He came out with two children, one under each arm. He then returned and put out a fire in the upper part of the premises. He next went to a neighbouring building and extinguished a fire there. Subsequently he did extraordinarily good work and extinguished another fire where a large bomb had exploded at the corner of two roads. He showed a very high degree of courage and efficiency. Mr Higgott has been a Warden since 1938.’”4 The Leicester Evening Mail added: “When our representative rang Mr Higgott’s home last night to convey the good news, he was not in. ‘I know nothing about it,’ said surprised Mrs Higgott, when told her husband had won the George Medal. ‘People have said he did good work that night, but when I mentioned it to him, he just replied “Nonsense”.’ Mr Higgott, modest as ever, would not accept he had deserved the honour: ‘Hundreds did more than I did that night,’ he said.”5 ABOVE: The bomb-blasted remains of 80 Sparkenhoe Street, Leicester, which Dr Garrett and his ARP St John unit requisitioned as an emergency first aid post. Ironically, the sign on the shrapnelpeppered sign on the railings refers to the official ARP first aid post a quarter of a mile away. (VIA TERENCE BURFORD)

POLICE TRAGEDY Detective Constable Jock Joiner, then 24, witnessed the bus’s destruction. Earlier, Jock and his pal, DC Brian Hawkes, had been sent up on fire watch to the roof of the city’s Central police station, on Charles Street, as the hailstorm of incendiaries came tumbling out of the darkness. “We were surrounded by the buggers. My shoes were burning from kicking them off that bloody roof for two-and-ahalf hours,” Jock recalled to the Leicester Mercury in 2006. No sooner had the pair flopped into the canteen for a break, than they were sent out again: “Inspector Poole came in and said, ‘You, you, you and you’, pointing to me, Brian Hawkes, Len Norman and George Trump, ‘I want you to go up to Highfields. It’s taking a right hammering.’” Their job was to set up an incident post. They had not long set up their blue police lantern, when it was smashed by a nearby explosion. Jock and George were sent back for another lantern and set it up again:

BELOW LEFT: Dr Ernest Berry Garrett, MO in charge of the Bond Street MFAU. (MARY

MAYNARD)

BOTTOM: Three large Victorian homes on Knighton Road were flattened “so not even a course of bricks was left” by a 1,000kg Luftmine B parachute mine, which killed eight residents. Note the steel RSJ beam bent round the top of the tree on the right by the PM's fearsome blast. (VIA TERENCE BURFORD)

“We helped fetch the dead and injured out of houses in Saxby Street. You could hear whistles of the bombs coming down. Jets of flame shot from a fractured gas main in Sparkenhoe Street. The whole place was lit up like Piccadilly. You could almost wave at the bomber pilots – they came as low as they liked.” Jock recalled that shrapnel smashed into one man’s gas mask case, who instinctively put his hand up to his chest; the shard took his finger off. Suddenly, a blast smashed the breath from Jock’s body: “All I remember is a searing orange flame and gliding through the air, mouth wide open. It all seemed in slow motion. Oblivion.”1 Jock had been standing inches from his fellow officers and was left hidden under debris. He suffered from shock, shrapnel blew a hole in his steel helmet and the right side of his head was numb for months. It was two years before he could taste food. But Jock’s survival had been nothing short of miraculous. His colleagues Detective Sergeant Leonard Norman,

“All I remember is a searing orange flame and gliding through the air, mouth wide open. It all seemed in slow motion. Oblivion.”

34 www.britainatwar.com

HOME FRONT HEROISM Leicester Blitz Night, 1940

ABOVE: When a heavy HE struck the corner of Upper Tichborne Street and Highfield Street, five people were killed in The Ritz boarding house, left, and six people in the building that stood on the right. Packed boarding houses directly opposite were also destroyed in the blasts, bringing the total fatalities to 45. (LEICESTER MERCURY)

aged 34, and DC George Trump, aged 26, were killed instantly, with DC Brian Hawkes, also 26, dying early the next morning in the Leicester Royal Infirmary. PC Horace Burks was badly injured by bomb splinters and was off duty for six months. Mary Maynard says of this moment: “Father said the policemen were discussing the incident, when they heard a bomb falling: some dived one way, the others the other and were killed. I remember my father coming home. He was a tough man who didn’t suffer fools, but he looked pale, the way he used to after attending bad road accidents. He was grey with dust and his smart leather doctor’s shoes were cut to ribbons by broken glass.”

OFFICIAL CITATIONS Behind the paleness, no doubt there was a story to tell, not only of Dr Garrett’s bravery, but also that of his colleagues that night. We do have an official record: On 31 January, 1941, the Duchess of Gloucester, Deputy Commandant-in-Chief of the Order of St John, visited Leicester. She presented certificates of merit to members, highlighting the actions of the Bond Street MFAU. “Regardless of danger, Dr Garrett went to the assistance of casualties lying in the street,” read his citation. “He again established his post with equipment he had been able to save in a surface shelter and, amidst further bombing, freed casualties covered by masonry

BELOW RIGHT: The rescue of London evacuee Isaac Blaskey in Highfield Street. A locally-billeted Royal Army Pay Corps medical officer, looking at the camera, passes bandages to a St John nurse, her face hidden by the black helmet. Blaskey lies buried beneath the corrugated iron sheet, right. (LEICESTER MERCURY)

THE WORST INCIDENT The night’s worst incident, with the heaviest death toll, occurred in the Highfields district, bordering the mainline railway, when three heavy HE bombs fell across the Highfield Street/Tichborne Street crossroads at 9.55pm, destroying seven large boarding houses. The large, three-storey Victorian terrace houses proved unforgiving to those sheltering in their cellars, the bombs bringing the whole building down upon them. Casualties were high, with 45 dead. The incident was so serious that ARP Rescue parties were sent in triplicate. Leicester’s ARP Main Control telephoned Senior ARP Medical Officer, Dr Duncan Porteous, stating: “There’s some trouble in Highfield Street - will you go and take charge?” At 10.05pm, Police Inspector Jesse Weston also arrived and, as Incident Officer, took control of ARP operations — for the next 20 hours. Dr Porteous recalled: “He was everywhere, never in a hurry, but never wasting a second.” Two months later, Inspector Weston was awarded the OBE, the Leicester Evening Mail reporting: “Police Hero’s Task Amid Rain of Bombs: For 20 hours, Inspector Jesse Weston, wearing a white incident officer's smock, directed during an air raid. Although bombs were falling around him, he remained standing, exhorting everyone else to lie down. He was an inspiration because of the extremely calm and collected way he organised his men and directed Rescue parties. Chief Constable Cole said: ‘He was in control where the heaviest bombing occurred, directing operations, without break, from 7pm until 3pm next afternoon.’” This was not Inspector Weston's first gallantry: during the previous war, he won the Military Medal for single-handedly attacking a German machine-gun post at St Quentin in 1918. Leicester ARP Rescue squad leader Alfred Harris was also decorated. He and his squad rescued 20 casualties, working for 10 hours until exhausted. In March 1941, Harris and Weston received their OBEs at Buckingham Palace for “bravery in a Midland air raid.”

to render first aid and remove them to Swain Street ARP First Aid Post. The work of this officer and his unit was exemplary and deserving of the highest commendation. They displayed the utmost gallantry and devotion to duty in most trying circumstances.” 

www.britainatwar.com 35

HOME FRONT HEROISM Leicester Blitz Night, 1940

A NIGHT OF UNKNOWN WARRIORS

ABOVE: More HE bombs demolished properties directly opposite the Saxby Street incident, on the Stoughton Street junction with Sparkenhoe Street, running left to right. (VIA MALC TOVEY)

Tested By Bomb and Flame Leicester Versus Luftwaffe Air Raids, 1939-1945, by Austin J Ruddy, is published by Halsgrove Books at £19.99.

Although off-duty, Miss Ivy Marsh, a St John Ambulance Sister of the MFAU, went with her unit in civilian clothing to the incident. Her citation read: “Although in great danger, stunned by an explosion and half-buried under a fallen door, she worked while bombs exploded, attending injured DC Hawkes. She remained with him, until he was removed by ambulance.” Her “coolness, pluckiness and bravery” was recognised by Leicester Watch Committee, who presented her with a certificate for bravery; by the police, who presented her with a gold watch and by St John Ambulance, from whom she received a certificate of merit. The Chief Constable stated she displayed “signal gallantry and courage”. Miss Carrie Wells, senior first aid officer, heard a child crying for help. By the light of the burning MFAU bus, she found him in the street. The boy, Frank Thorp, aged 15, was dragged away from the burning vehicle and, with the assistance of a soldier and two wardens, she applied tourniquets to the boy’s arm and leg and carried him on a deckchair to Swain Street First Aid Post, a quarter of a mile away. Here, she gave what assistance she could, then returned to the incident, where bombs were still falling and reported again for duty. “Her

BELOW: Policeman line the route as the coffin of Detective Sergeant Leonard Norman is taken into St Hilda’s Church, Melbourne Road, on 23 November, 1940. (LEICESTER MERCURY)

36 www.britainatwar.com

Earlier in 1940, Prime Minister Winston Churchill had stated: “There are vast numbers who will render faithful service in this war, but whose names will never be known, whose deeds will never be recorded. This is a war of the unknown warriors…” It is clear there were unknown warriors in Leicester that night, whose deeds were left unpublished. For example, George Bernard Emmett, aged 45, of 43 Medway Street, was Group Warden for Highfields. He had given distinguished service in the First World War. As a corporal in the 1/5 Leicestershire Regiment, Emmett was awarded the Military Medal “for gallantry and dedication to duty”, leading troops after their officer was wounded during the penetration of the Hindenburg Line, France, in 1918. On Leicester’s Blitz Night, Group Warden Emmett was blown over the railings of Highfield Street synagogue, damaging his shoulder. (He tended the garden of the managing director of Cora’s hosiery, a large industry in Leicester, and Mr Corah paid for him to go to London to have his shoulder treated). Emmett’s wife also became a warden. Three months after the raid, Emmett received a typed letter from Chief Constable and Chief Warden Mr Oswald J.B. Cole: “As Group Warden in the area most heavily damaged, you worked with untiring energy in organising your wardens and during the greater part, you were under fire. Your difficulties were increased by the fact that telephones at five of your posts were out of action. I am aware you absented yourself from work the day after the raid, so you could continue duties as warden. I shall be glad if you will accept not only my personal thanks, but also those of the citizens of Leicester, for the splendid way in which you carried out your responsibilities as a warden. I consider myself very fortunate in having such men as you and those who work under you in the Wardens’ Service.” For ARP Medical Officer Dr Duncan Porteous, the female ARP workers stood out: “As the bombs whistled down, to see the young ambulance girls, without a smile, but without showing fear, impressed me more than anything else. They came to the incident, waited for casualties to be loaded, then took them to the First Aid Post.” Dr Porteous also found one terrified young girl buried alive under a collapsed house, at the end of a tunnel of bricks: “A young man volunteered to rescue her and inched his way through, then brought the child out. This was one of the night’s most outstanding acts of courage.”

courage and resource in the face of great danger were most commendable,” noted her citation. Sadly, Frank Thorp died next day at Leicester General Hospital. Nurse Mrs Hilda Hefford’s citation reveals that after escaping from 80 Sparkenhoe Street, she “showed courage in re-entering the house to help find morphia and instruments. She took part in the rescue of trapped men and twice entered the house, only leaving when ordered owing to the danger of fire.”

THE FALLEN Widower DS Norman left two children under 16. His funeral was held at St Hilda’s Church, Melbourne Road, Leicester, four days later. Neighbours lined the streets as the hearse bore his coffin to the church. Six CID colleagues acted as bearers and a guard of honour of 20 policemen formed outside the church. The Chief Constable and his Deputy attended. DC Trump left a widow with one child. His funeral took place in his West

HOME FRONT HEROISM Leicester Blitz Night, 1940

Midlands home town. DC Hawkes left a wife. He was buried in St Deny’s churchyard, Evington, Leicester. The Chief Constable, Deputy Chief Constable and other police lined the church entrance. In 2008, a new headstone was placed on his grave by Leicestershire Police Federation and in Upbeat, Leicestershire police’s in-house magazine, Jock Joiner said: “Hopefully, people will read about those lads who lost their lives in the line of duty. It’s important people remember.” Then-Deputy Chief Constable David Lindley also paid tribute: “Brian, George

and Leonard demonstrated enduring qualities including courage and commitment, service to community, putting others before self, regardless of risk and consequences. This is what we should remember them for.” Their names appear in a roll of honour at Leicestershire Police’s force headquarters.2 Some 108 Leicester citizens were killed that night, including six on ARP duties. Nowadays, when people talk of Second World War heroes, they commonly focus on daring fighter pilots or machinegun-brandishing special forces. But,

BRAVERY & SERVICE AWARDS George Medal (GM) HIGGOTT, Mr J.

Wardens’ Service

Order of the British Empire (OBE) HARRIS, Leader A.J. WESTON, Inspector J.

Rescue Service Police

Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) WINTERINGHAM, Mr F.

ARP Controller and Chief Fire Officer

St. John's Ambulance Certificate of Merit & King's Commendation for Brave Conduct GARRETT, Medical Officer Dr E.B. HEFFORD, Mrs H. LEE, Mr L. MARSH, Miss I. WELLS, Miss C.

SJAB/Casualty Service SJAB/Ambulance Nurse SJAB/Ambulance Officer SJAB/Ambulance Nurse SJAB/Ambulance Nurse

King's Commendation for Brave Conduct BAYLISS, Leader & ARP Officer Mr F. DAWSON, Deputy Sector Leader Mr K. FLEWITT, Mrs W.E. GARNER, Divisional Warden Mr J.B. HANFORD, Mrs M. LOMAX, Miss A. MIDGLOW, Squad Leader Mr D. PAULSON, Mrs B.

Works” ARP unit Wardens” Service Report & Control Service Wardens” Service WVS Mobile Canteen Report & Control Service Rescue Service WVS Mobile Canteen

TOP: Four people were killed at a boarding house, 56 Saxby Street, and two more at 58 Saxby Street. Note the striped signpost. (LEICESTER MERCURY)

ABOVE: The burnt out remains of the MFAU bus after it was struck by an HE bomb. The bomb blast flung it against this brick surface shelter, badly cracking it. The white cross marks the emergency exit. (VIA TERENCE BURFORD)

NOTES 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

LM 15.11.2006 LM 9.1.2008 LM 15.2.1972 LM 15.2.1941 LEM 15.2.1941

although their bravery is undoubted, these soldiers faced the enemy armed with weapons - the ARP services faced enemy bombs and bullets with nothing but their sense of duty. Whether it is Dr Garrett and his bomb-blasted St John team tending casualties at the Blitz’s epicentre, Group Warden George Emmett injured on duty, or “unlikely hero” Warden John Higgott GM rescuing two children from a blazing building, all deserve to be remembered. The police officers and Wardens Bernard Alderson and William Pratt, killed by bombs as they went to help others, are thankfully not forgotten. In 1972, the Leicester Mercury stated: “Whenever we refer to November 19, 1940, we call it the night there was a hero or heroine in every street. Throughout the city, the men and women of the Civil Defence services were literally taking their own lives in their hands. They fought fires, tore at mountains of rubble to rescue injured and trapped people, with bombs still falling and before the fires had died down. This was the greatest night in the history of the people of Leicester.”3 It's a claim hard to dispute.  www.britainatwar.com 37

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JACK AND WALTER Great War Legacy LEFT: The collection of photos, medals and memorabilia belonging to the Satterthwaite brothers. (HERTS AT WAR)

I

N 1914 Letchworth Garden City, Hertfordshire was a young town, founded on socialist principles and renowned nationally as a freethinking utopia. Consequently the garden city movement drew people from all over the region including families such as the Satterthwaites of Finchley, Middlesex. Of working class stock, the Satterthwaite family including two sons, John (known as Jack), and Walter, moved to Letchworth in the late 1900s to work in the town’s emerging printing industry. Both brothers joined the local Territorial unit, the Hertfordshire Regiment. This would have meant spending weekends and summer holidays training for a war that most did not consider likely or even a possibility. Jack, the elder, was soon found to be a highly capable soldier and rose to the rank of platoon sergeant in charge of men from his ‘new’ home town. When war was declared, men rushed to enlist from all over the country but for those serving in the already assembled units, such as the Hertfordshire Regiment, the wait was significantly less. The Herts were called on to follow the regular army out to the Western Front to meet the threat of the numerically superior German forces, then invading the Low Countries via Belgium.

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‘HERTFORDSHIRE GUARDS’ For Jack and his men the early months of the Great War saw the inexperienced part-time soldiers serving in the illustrious ‘Guards Brigade’ alongside the cream of the British Army; the Grenadier, Coldstream and Irish Guards. The Herts soon earned themselves a solid reputation with the affectionate nickname ‘Hertfordshire Guards’. For Jack, the now newly promoted Company Quartermaster Sergeant of No. 4 Company, duties aside from dayto-day military tasks included writing home to thank local residents for their generosity in sending comforts from home. It also fell to him to write to families of his men informing them of the loss of their loved ones. Often articles were published in newspapers, an example of which was published in the North Herts Express in August 1915 (NB: all contemporaneous newspaper accounts reproduced unedited):

CIGARETTES FOR OUR TERRIERS Letter of thanks from Sergeant J. Satterthwaite As already mentioned in our columns, Mr and Miss Beddoe, of Station Road, are collecting by means of a box on their counter cigarettes for the Letchworth Territorial’s in the trenches.

JACK AND WALTER Great War Legacy RIGHT: NCOs of the Hertfordshire Regiment c.1915. Walter Satterthwaite is 2nd from right. (GARDEN CITY COLLECTION)

On Tuesday we saw the box opened again and the collection for the week amounted to: 3 ½ ounces of loose cigarettes, 17 packets of Woodbines and 12s. 7 3/4 d. in cash. The cash has been turned into smokes and a parcel representing the collection for the week was sent off on Tuesday, Miss Beddoe paying the postage. That these cigarettes are greatly appreciated by Letchworth Territorials at the front is shown by the following letter received from Sergeant Jack Satterthwaite in acknowledging receipt of the previous weeks consignment:3rd August. Dear Mr. And Miss Beddoe,very many thanks for the cigarettes which you so kindly collected for the Letchworth Territorial’s. At the time we received them we were ready to leave our billets and proceed to the trenches, but I think I managed to let every Letchworth man have his cigarettes. We join in thanking you and all contributors very much for them. Sergeant Chisholm and Corporal Richards have both returned safe, so we hope that Letchworth will

MAIN PICTURE: The Satterthwaite brothers, Walter on the left. (HERTS AT WAR)

have the pleasure of seeing a few more of the Territorial’s home on leave. We spent our August Bank Holiday in the trenches and had several showers. Wishing you all the best of health, and thanking you once again. I remain yours sincerely, J. Satterthwaite. Jack and Walter were to meet again in November 1915 when Walter was old enough to join his comrades of the 1st Battalion Hertfordshire Regiment on the Western Front. Under the command and protection of his older brother, Walter saw his first action in trenches on the Somme sector of the front. On 16 April 1916 the Hertfordshires went into the trenches relieving the 13th Battalion of the Welsh Regiment, at the C2 sector at Festubert, a sector they were familiar with having previously served there. The Festubert landscape was largely made up of un-drained marshland. The section of the line here consisted of fortified ‘islands’ constructed of breastworks built above ground level, 

A newly discovered soldier’s collection tells a forgotten wartime story all too typical of the impact the First World War made on families and the communities in which they lived, both at the time and for many years afterwards. www.britainatwar.com 41

JACK AND WALTER Great War Legacy

as the digging of trenches was impossible due to swampy ground conditions. Referred to as the ‘island line’ the breastworks were on average about 60 yards apart, with no continuous line of trenches. It is described in the war diary of the 4/5 Battalion Black Watch (Royal Highlanders) who were holding the line immediately to the left of the 1st Herts: “The line held by the battalion brought back distinct recollections of trench warfare in the early months of the war. The main line held was the old British line from which the breastwork communication trenches ran forward some 200 yards to the old German line. From this point, boarded ways over the open led out to the island line some 500 yards forward in front, the ground underneath being very muddy, wet and very cut up by shell holes. Communications between these and the boarded ways looping round and over the rough ground. Work was being carried on nightly to form a continuous line but so far only two groups on the right had been joined up. Movement between them and the old British line was only possible by night. A reconnaissance found No Mans Land in a very swampy condition.”

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ABOVE LEFT: Letchworth Garden City’s famous temperance ‘pub with no beer’ was opened in 1907 as the Skittles Inn. It offered ‘fellowship, rest and recreation’ for workers, but all drink served at the bar was non-alcoholic, in response to the wishes of most residents. In 1925, it became known as ‘The Settlement’, a centre for adult education and local activities. It still exists today. ABOVE RIGHT: Billiards at the Skittles Inn, of which Jack spoke so fondly. (HERTS

AT WAR)

BELOW: Jack (extreme left, in uniform) goes off to war in 1914. (HERTS AT WAR)

The diary also mentions that this part of the line was subject to heavy shelling. Before deploying to the trenches at Festubert, Jack had given an interview to a local paper, the Letchworth Citizen. He had spoken fondly of the local Skittles Inn, Letchworth’s only ‘pub’, although as a ‘Temperate town’ at the time, alcohol was not on sale. The paper followed up with more news of him (unedited): ‘Sergt Satterthwaite writes Homesick for Skittles The following letter. Dated Dec. 10th has been received by Mr W.G Furmston, of the Skittles Inn. From Sergt. J. Satterthwaite, of Letchworth, who is at the front with 1st Herts territorials:‘I have been asked by Letchworth boys to drop you a line, as they would like to be remembered to you, and hope you were going on all right. I daresay you have read of our experiences, and I am sorry to say losses, but some of the statements in the papers are not all gospel. Still, we were busy for a week or so and we have done very well. We are now at a rest camp, which was much needed, as a large number of us were suffering with bad feet, chiefly frostbitten, but are now all right. We do not know when or where we are going

to next, but would not mind if it was to the skittles for a game of billiards’ That was to be his last communication with the newspaper. On 17 April 1916 Jack Satterthwaite was badly wounded, with the news reported in the North Herts Mail that week: ‘SERGEANT SATTERTHWAITE WOUNDED.- We regret to learn that Sergt. Jack Satterthwaite has been severely wounded. We understand he was shot in the body on the 17th, and is still dangerously ill. His parents, who live in common View, are advised daily as to his condition by one of the ministers at the hospital in France in which he is lying. The sergeant had only been back at the Front about a week when he met with his injury. We sincerely hope better news will soon be received by his parents to whom we offer our sympathy.’

JACK’S DEATH Tragically Jack Satterthwaite succumbed to his wounds while in hospital on 22 April 1916. A moving tribute later featured in The Letchworth Citizen : ‘Sergeant J. Satterthwaite Dies of Wounds A Promising Young Life Sacrificed for his Country

JACK AND WALTER Great War Legacy

Letchworth people will learn with deep regret and sorrow that Sergeant Jack Sattertwaite, 1st Hertfordshire Regiment, died of wounds last Saturday. The sergeant was probably the best known of our Letchworth Territorials, having been a Territorial for a long time before the war, and having been in France since his regiment went out there in the autumn of 1914. He has been home on leave three times since the war began, the first time after a short spell in the trenches. Some months ago his period of service in the Territorials had expired, and he also served the extra year, which the country can demand in time of war. In a spirit of patriotism and from feelings of loyalty to his Letchworth comrades in the trenches, Sergeant Satterthwaite signed on again for foreign service,

In recognition of this, the authorities granted him a months furlough which he spent in Letchworth. Only three weeks ago he was home again from the trenches on seven days leave, and on that occasion we had many chats with him. He was in fine health, and spoke modestly of the part he was taking in the war. The Sergeant had returned to the trenches only a week after his leave in England when he was shot in the body on the 17th inst. The sergeant underwent an operation, and on Tuesday his parents, Mr. And Mrs. James Satterthwaite, who live in 6 North Avenue, received a letter from the Chaplain at the hospital saying that the sergeant was still dangerously ill and that his condition had become worse. He gradually sank and on Thursday morning his parents received from the kindly chaplain information that their gallant son had passed away. Sergeant Satterthwaite was one of the brightest young fellows in Letchworth. He possessed a fine physique and was of a sunny, genial and sociable nature.. He was very widely known and greatly liked by all. We have frequently heard his comrades in the Regiment speak in the highest terms of the great care he took of his men and his anxiety to see after their comfort rather than his own. When he went back to the trenches three weeks ago he took back 500 cigarettes with him for the boys. Although he had quite as much as he could carry without them. But as Mr Beddoe had the cigarettes ready they were the gift of generous customers he wished to take them back with him so that so that the

ABOVE: Dated late 1914, Jack’s Platoon. He is in the 2nd row, 4th from left. (HERTS AT WAR)

BELOW LEFT: Headstone of Sgt Jack Satterthwaite.

(GARDEN CITY COLLECTION)

BELOW: Medals belonging to Jack & Walter Sattherthwaite. (HERTS AT WAR)

Letchworth lads could get them at the earliest possible moment. Sergeant Satterthwaite was formerly employed in Messrs. W. H Smith and Son’s bookbinding works, afterwards in connection with the Letchworth Model Dairy in Station Road and later at the Garden City Press. He was very well known at the Skittle Inn, where he used to resort for a game of skittles. It seems incredible that we are never again to see one who had become so familiar to us . Several of his letters from the front have appeared in THE CITIZEN and he was always glad to tell us anything he could when he was home on leave. We are sure the citizens of Letchworth will join with us in extending their deepest and sincerest sympathy to the sergeant’s bereaved 

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JACK AND WALTER Great War Legacy parents and theirs is a terrible loss. Mr and Mrs Satterthwaite's only other surviving son, Walter, is also in the Army’. Jack was buried in St Venant Military Cemetery with full military honours. After the war, Jack’s parents were asked by the War Graves Commission if they would like an inscription for his headstone. They chose: “Though far away we mourn him still. Peace perfect peace”

WALTER CARRIES ON With their only other son Walter now alone on the Western Front, the daily fear and uncertainty for his safety must have been a sobering and terrifying ordeal for his parents. For his war was far from over. Despite the untimely demise of his 25 year-old brother, Corporal Walter Satterthwaite fought on. Following the devastating losses on the Somme in late 1916, Walter was transferred from the 1st Herts to the to fill the ranks of the 6th Battalion Berkshire

HERTS AT WAR THE STORY of the Satterthwaite brothers and their wartime experiences came to light in June 2014 when Walter’s grandson, Brian Satterthwaite, donated the collection of medals, photographs and wartime documents forgotten for almost 100 years to Letchworth’s First Garden City Collection, a major partner of the Herts at War Project. Mr Satterthwaite explained: “I wanted the collection to go to somewhere where it could do some good and help others learn about the Great War”. The collection and the family story, along with many others, is on display in the “Herts at War” exhibition at Letchworth Garden City. Like so many old soldiers, Walter did not speak about his wartime experiences. Brian Satterthwaite recalled: “My grandfather never spoke about the war and although we knew that Jack had died in the Great War, we have never known any detail about what he did. When I asked before his death what had happened to his leg, he would reply “Don’t you worry about that, I earned it”. Herts at War is a community led project to commemorate the diverse experiences of Hertfordshire during the First World War. The project aims to uncover the untold stories of the county’s men and women, both on the fighting front and the home front, and commemorate these individuals a century on from the conflict. More information can be found at www.hertsatwar.co.uk

Regiment. With the Berkshires Walter fought bravely in some of the fiercest battles of the Great War including the infamous 3rd Battle of Ypres, today more usually known as Passchendaele. As a mark of his ability as a soldier he too was promoted to Sergeant, earning the coveted Military Medal for devotion to duty and bravery in the field. Like his brother, Walter’s luck was not to last - following on from the good news of the medal received by the family, came a notification to say that he has been wounded and was in hospital. Walter recovered from his wound but 44 www.britainatwar.com

TOP RIGHT: The Hertfordshire Regiment in July 1914.

(HERTS AT WAR)

RIGHT: St Venant Communal Cemetery, where Jack Satterthwaite is buried. (CWGC)

was wounded again in 1917 when he fractured his ankle. Once again the local papers reported on the news of one of the Letchworth Territorials: ‘ON HOSPITAL LEAVE-Pte Walter Satterthwaite, royal Berkshire Regiment, of 14 North Avenue, a former employee of the Letchworth Printers Ltd., is home on ten days hospital leave, after lying in hospital at Birmingham since January 5th, as a result of a fractured ankle and twisted knee, which he received whilst coming out of the trenches on January 4th. He is, we are pleased to state, now recovering and returns to his depot in England in a few days time.’ Walter again recovered, only to be severely wounded again in the knee in the latter stages of the war and spent many months in hospital. After recuperation in the UK, Walter was honourably discharged in 1919 though as a result of the wounds in his right leg was immobile for the rest of his life.

Despite his debilitating injuries Walter adapted back in to civilian life well. He worked full time for over 30 years, rarely missing a day’s work. To aid his mobility he was given a specially adapted motorised bicycle that allowed him to travel freely and also made him a well-known figure in the local area. In an interesting twist, Walter’s wife Alice was of German descent and the Sattherthwaite brothers had cousins serving in the German army during the Great War, a fact that makes their dedication and devotion to duty all the more commendable. Tragically, even over 40 years later, the impact of the Great War would still affect the lives of the Satterthwaites. With increasing pain from his wartime wound, in 1963 Walter was taken to hospital for an operation to amputate the limb and sadly died the following day as a result — surely one of the last casualties of a war that was fought from 1914-1918 but which was still taking its toll for many more years. 

The Western Front F_P.indd 1

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A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS Kampfgruppe 100

A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS As the Luftwaffe Blitz on Britain drew down in summer 1941, two German ‘Pathfinder’ aircraft failed to return from an attack against Chatham. But who shot them down and where did they crash? Chris Goss unravels what really happened that night.

B

Y JUNE 1941 the Luftwaffe’s night raids on Great Britain had become a shadow of the attacks experienced in the Battle of Britain 10 months earlier. Germany realised that such attacks were not having the desired effect while the busy Luftwaffe was now in action in the Balkans, Greece, the Mediterranean and, from June 1941, Russia. Even so, attacks on Britain did still occur, such as that carried out on the night of 13-14 June 1941 when the target was the Royal Naval dockyard at Chatham, Kent. ‘Pathfinder’ duties that night were given to the elite Kampfgruppe 100 (K.Gr 100) based at Vannes in Brittany and Verfahren equipped with X-Verfahren beam-bombing apparatus, enabling KGr 100 to pinpoint targets with a high degree of accuracy. Although the number of aircraft committed to this attack is unknown we do know for certain that two aircraft of the unit were shot down that night. One aircraft of 2./K.Gr 100 committed to the operation on 13-14 June had a very experienced crew on board with an average of 59 sorties each. Oberfeldwebel Paul Wierbitzky (pilot), Leutnant Hilmar 46 www.britainatwar.com

Schmidt (observer and aircraft captain), Feldwebel Herbert Schick (radio operator) and Feldwebel Kurt Braun (flight engineer) had flown together from the start of the war and after the Battle of Britain had returned to Germany for instructor duties before returning to operational flying during the latter stages of the Blitz. They did not expect things to be anything other than run-of-the-mill on this particular night. However, it soon became clear from the start that it would be anything other than ‘routine’ as Herbert Schick recalls: “Because of security considerations, the briefing of our mission took place only 2-3 hours before takeoff. Our Staffel Kapitän, Hauptmann Gerd Korthals, informed us of the target, the flying altitude, takeoff time for every single aircraft, and he also ordered the necessary frequencies for the X-verfahren and the normal radio traffic. Our aircraft was due to start first, next was Hauptmann Schnürpel, the Staffel Kapitän of 3 Staffel, and so on. But because of certain circumstances the take-off sequence had been changed so that we took off after Hauptmann Schnürpel. We were lucky – he was shot down that same night and unfortunately nobody survived.”

Little is known about Hauptmann Eberhard Schnürpel apart from the fact that he was also an experienced and long standing member of K.Gr 100. Originally the Gruppe Operations Officer when 3/K.Gr 100 was formed in July 1940, he became Staffel Kapitän, a post he would hold for the next 11 months.

A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS Kampfgruppe 100 INTERCEPTION As the German pathfinders got airborne, laden with incendiaries to light up the target for the following bomber stream, so RAF night fighters were also climbing over south–east England in the hope of intercepting any attackers. Two crews in the air that night came from the Bristol Beaufighter equipped 219 Squadron based at RAF Tangmere in West Sussex. In Beaufighter R2154 were Flying Officer Dudley Hobbis and his radar operator Sergeant Terry Clark, while in Beaufighter T4639 were Flight Lieutenant ‘Johnny’ Topham and his operator Sergeant Charles Berridge. Both crews had flown in the Battle of Britain and had already shot down aircraft by day and by night. No doubt they were keen to improve their score of victories, and before the night was done they would certainly be adding to their tallies, each with a ‘Pathfinder’ Heinkel. But the question is: who shot down who, and where? Both Beaufighters took off at 2326 hrs with ‘Johnny’ Topham ordered to

patrol south of Selsey Bill while Dudley Hobbis was instructed to patrol from Shoreham to Beachy Head. Both night fighters did so without incident for 75 minutes when all of a sudden two unidentified aircraft were detected by Durrington Control (ground controlled radar). Each Beaufighter was directed onto them as the raiders approached the British coastline. Dudley Hobbis was instructed to ‘Flash his Weapon’ — RAF radio code for ‘Switch on the Airborne AI Radar’ — and as Terry Clark activated his radar set the two airmen found themselves almost on top of an enemy aircraft, later identified as a Heinkel 111. It was to be a very onesided contest, and at 0057 hrs in the East Grinstead area, Dudley opened fire. His Combat Report gives us the detail: “I gave about a two second burst. I saw flashes of explosive shells hitting enemy aircraft and one particularly large and brilliant flash from its port engine. Enemy aircraft dived away belching black smoke and I broke away over him to the right...”.

MAIN PICTURE: Aircraft of K.Gr 100 take-off from Vannes for another sortie against England. LEFT: Heinkel 111s of K.Gr 100 over the North Sea during 1940. BELOW: An aircraft of K.Gr 100 taxies out for operations over Britain.

Eight minutes later, ‘Johnny’ Topham was vectored onto another enemy aircraft which was headed north. He stalked it for some time and when he could see the exhaust flames he opened fire just north of Worthing. Again, he takes up the story in his report: “No results were observed at the beginning of the burst so I lifted the nose lightly and observed brilliant green and orange flashes in the fuselage and pieces of similar colour appeared to be leaving enemy aircraft and passing over my aircraft. As I finished my burst, the enemy aircraft 

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A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS Kampfgruppe 100

dived steeply and turned to starboard through 180 degrees. My Operator reporting that it was leaving a trail of white specks behind it. I turned about but did not see enemy aircraft again...”

MISTAKEN IDENTITY The two He 111s from KGr 100 that failed to return that night were indeed the ones flown by Oberfeldwebel Paul Wierbitzky, the other by Oberfeldwebel Hans Wegner, whose Observer and aircraft captain was Hauptmann Eberhard Schnürpel. There can be no doubting that the two bombers fell to the guns of Hobbis and Topham. Despite this, confusion has reigned. All post-war analysis and publications referring to the two incidents state with some authority that Dudley Hobbis had shot down Schnürpel’s aircraft and ‘Johnny’ Topham had claimed Wierbitzky‘s. However, it was in fact the other way round as both crew member Herbert Schick and RAF pilot Hobbis prove: “Without any difficulties we reached the planned altitude and found the X-beam leading us towards the target.

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ABOVE LEFT : The crew of Heinkel 111 6N + FK of 2./K.Gr 100 with their aircraft shortly before being shot down over England.

BOTTOM: Happy pose for the crew. Left to right: Braun, Wiersbitztky, Schmidt and Schick. TOP RIGHT: One of the mobile X-Equipment beam transmitters. This one was situated at Audembert on the north coast of France.

About ten minutes before reaching the target I received a radio message telling us to climb up to maximum altitude because of strong night-fighter forces in the target area. I passed on this information to the pilot and the observer via intercom. The pilot’s answer was something like this: ‘Nonsense! We are exactly on the beam, we will be over the target in only a few minutes. Both of you at the back: Watch out!’

“Only a few minutes may have passed since that conversation when there was a loud bang in the aircraft. The port engine immediately burst into flames – I could not see what had happened to the starboard engine from my radio operator’s seat. The first reaction was to jettison the incendiary bombs. When I tried to transmit an emergency signal I noticed that our radio had been destroyed by bullets or shells. Then I

HELP THE BISMARCK! 27 MAY 1941 “ABOUT 27 aircraft of K.Gr 100 started from Vannes in an attempt to help Bismarck. The 6N + FK started at 05.00 hours with 250kg bombs and the aircraft were directed to the area by direction finding signals transmitted by a U-Boat near the Bismarck. These signals were sent out on 395 K/cs for 5 minute period at a quarter past and quarter to the hour. The signals were first picked up and were received satisfactorily, but when the 6N + FK was 800 kms west of Brest no further signals could be picked up. Although they knew themselves to be in the vicinity of the Bismarck bad weather and clouds at 900 feet forced them to abandon the search and return. One of the aircraft of K.Gr 100 was shot down on the return journey by an Me 109 operating from Brest, and another aircraft of the same Me 109 Staffel was said to have shot down a Dornier 17 in the same evening.” The above detail was contained in the RAF Intelligence Report into the loss of Heinkel 111, 6N + FK. The Bismarck was sunk by the Royal Navy at 10.40 hours that same morning.

hurried and fastened on my parachute because the pilot shouted, ‘Everybody bale out, I can’t hold the plane anymore!’. I was the second to bale-out and landed on a meadow with slight injuries to my head and back. Three hours later I was taken prisoner of war.” Dudley Hobbis didn’t actually see his victim crash, but he did report seeing “a tremendous number of incendiary bombs ignite on the ground”. It is a significant piece of evidence that enables us to conclusively tie victor to victim. Meanwhile, PC William Cross of the East Sussex Constabulary reported that at 0030 hrs a Heinkel 111 had crashed at 10 Acre Field, Lower Snailham, Guestling, and that all four crew member had been “rounded up”. The RAF Air Intelligence A.I.1(k) report of the incident gives us much more detail of events that night and illustrates just how much information

ABOVE: Close-up detail of one of the unit’s Heinkel 111 showing the Viking Ship emblem of K.Gr 100. Black distemper paint has been roughly applied to the undersides and over the light coloured bands on the propeller spinners to avoid reflection from searchlights during night operations. RIGHT: The field at Guestling with Snailham farm house, where Wiersbitzky skilfully landed his crippled Heinkel at night.

RAF intelligence were often able to glean about German air operations: “A number of aircraft, including the 6N + AL, 6N + CL and 6N + FK took part in this operation. The course as planned was obtained from a document found in the 6N + CL (Editor’s note - The He 111 coded 6N + CL was brought down on the night of 16-17 June at Bratton, Wiltshire). The ‘X’ beam from the Cherbourg transmitter was laid on the target on a bearing of 42°T.

The 6N + CL was to fly on 26°T to the beacon at Tocqueville and thence due north for 45km to pick up the beam in mid-Channel for the flight to the target. The outward flight was calculated as 485km at an average ground speed 241 k.p.h with the wind at 10,000 ft being 330° at 50 k.p.h. The return flight as planned was 163°T to cross to the South Coast of England near Rye, and thence on 231°T to the beacon at Tocqueville. From here the course was 203°T to Vannes. The homeward flight was 495km at an average ground speed of 342 k.p.h. The 6N + FK flew at 13,000ft and the visibility of lights was 50 km. On crossing the coast three English beacons were seen, a red one at Shoreham flashing DN, a white further north flashing AA and the third, also white, possibly north of Tangmere and flashing S. 

BOTTOM LEFT: Gerd Korthals of 2./K.Gr 100 pictured after completing his 100th sortie on 16 January 1941. BOTTOM RIGHT: Fw Herbert Schick poses astride the tail of his aircraft. The RAF report noted that due to 'nervous stomach trouble' he may have been due to be sent back to Germany.

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A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS Kampfgruppe 100

The 6N + FK experienced poor reception of the pilot’s beam and was intercepted before the first of the crossbeams was reached. The night-fighter approached from below when the crew were flying at 14,000ft. The port engine stopped within 20 seconds and the starboard engine caught fire immediately afterwards. The pilot, therefore, gave the order to bale-out. The crew think they were surprised by the night fighter owing to the fact their fifth man and gunner was ill and not flying with them and that the wireless operator, who would normally have been keeping a lookout at one of the rear guns, was working the W/T equipment preparatory to receiving the first of the cross-beams.” Further to the main body of this comprehensive report, the document also noted: “Three of the crew baled-out and made a good landing. The pilot crashed in the burning aircraft but was miraculously only slightly cut. Some 100–200 incendiary bombs [sic.] were jettisoned over the field just before the aircraft crashed; a cow was killed’”(Editor’s note - Given that we know the weapons load on board

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TOP LEFT: Pilots and aircrew of 219 Squadron outside the Officers Mess at RAF Tangmere. TOP RIGHT: Oblt Eberhard Schnürpel (right) who was shot down into the sea off the Sussex coast and killed during the Chatham raid on the night of 13-14 June 1941. With him is Oblt Ernst Steinbacher who took over from Schnürpel as Staffel Kapitan of 2./K.Gr 100 only to be shot down and killed whilst on another sortie to bomb Chatham on the night of 23–24 June 1941. BOTTOM & RIGHT: The aircraft crash-landed at Raversyde in Belgium on its return from the Chatham sortie.

the Heinkel that night exclusively comprised 1kg incendiary devices it might reasonably be concluded that many more than 200 were on board. Indeed, local records show that a total of 1,295 incendiary bombs fell in the parish of Guestling during the war, with neighbouring parishes recording totals of 59, 30, 80 and 20 incendiary bombs respectively for the entire duration of hostilities). Interestingly, the same report also notes: “It was stated that on 13 June 1941 the Fuhrer issued an Order of the Day that London is not be flown over or bombed unless and until the RAF attack Berlin” Whilst RAF Bomber Command were not over Berlin on the night of 13–14 June

they did, instead, send a raiding force of 36 Whitleys and six Wellingtons to bomb Schwerte, to the south of Dortmund. However, the Chatham raid was already ‘on’ for the night but, of course, it was some distance to the east of London and there certainly seems to have been no night bomber activity over the actual capital that night. In fact, the same RAF intelligence report goes on to note: “Further interrogation confirms this [that overflying the capital was prohibited that night] and it was said that because of this order, aircraft attacking Chatham on the night of 13–14 June were ordered to turn eastwards after bombing the targets in order to avoid any accidental flying over London.”

GROUND REACTION Whatever the facts, the pilot had been exceedingly lucky to survive a crashlanding at night in a burning and engine-less bomber in the undulating countryside of the Brede Valley. The sparse population on the other side of the valley watched as ‘…hundreds of sparkling lights flared and flickered across the fields’. They were, of course, the incendiary bombs that Hobbis had seen igniting on the ground as his victim went down.

A TALE OF TWO HEINKELS Kampfgruppe 100

Meanwhile, all of the noise and commotion woke farmer James Cooper of nearby Stocks Farm from his slumbers as he rushed to telephone to PC Cross, and asking him to “Come quickly! An enemy ‘plane is down and alight across the fields!” For William Cross, aka PC 114, the burning Heinkel and its hundreds of incandescent incendiary bombs were the only directional indications he needed to find the spot as he pedalled furiously through the lanes to the scene. There, he found Paul Wierbitzky detained in a cottage at Lower Snailham by a Mr Frederick Wood and immediately instructed ARP Transport Officer William Snushall to drive both himself and the German prisoner to Rye Police Station, later noting: “Three other members of the crew had been rounded up by the Home Guard and handed over to a party of the 7th Manchester Regiment.” The man Cross conveyed to the police station was later handed over to the 6th Manchester Regiment whose War Diaries later recorded: “The pilot, Paul Wierbitzky (Flt.Sgt), was handed over to this unit by Rye Police. Prisoner very experienced having been a pilot for some time before war declared. Stubborn. Little or no information divulged by him.”

For the crew of 6N + FK, the war was over and they were lucky survivors. However, what about Johnny Topham and Hauptmann Eberhard Schnürpel’s crew on board 6N + AL? Notwithstanding that Schnürpel had taken off first and appears to have been shot down second, Topham was also credited with an enemy aircraft destroyed and over the next few days the bodies of five German airmen were

PATHFINDER SPECIALISTS KAMPFGRUPPE 100 (K.Gr 100) was a specialist Luftwaffe bomber unit operating the He 111 aircraft that pioneered the ‘pathfinder’ bomber operations of the Second World War. Equipped with specialist radio-navigation bombing aids (‘X’ Equipment and ‘Y’ Equipment) in order to locate the targets, the aircraft then dropped flares or incendiary devices to illuminate the targets for the following bombers. The unit was formed on 18 November 1939 and operated in Norway and France before commencing attacks against the British Isles when it operated mostly from Vannes, France. Initially, the unit had a HQ or Staff Flight and two staffels: Stab./K.Gr 100, 1./K.Gr 100 and 2./K.Gr 100. In December 1941 the unit was expanded and became a Kampfgeschwader and re-designated KG 100. TOP: A night fighter Beaufighter as operated by 219 Squadron during 1941. LEFT: Sgt Terry Clark, photographed here as a Fg Off whilst still serving with 219 Squdron in 1944. BELOW LEFT: A group of 219 Squadron pilots and aircrew at the time of the incident. 'Johnny' Topham sitting second from left, Dudley Hobbis sitting third from left and Sgt Charles Berridge in the back row, second from right.

washed ashore. Oberfeldwebel Hans Wenger was washed ashore at Hove, Oberfeldwebel Josef Kuhm was washed ashore at East Preston, the bodies of Oberfeldwebel Ernst Sassenroth and Obergefrieter Anton Kerpf were washed ashore at Littlehampton as was the body of Hauptmann Eberhard Schnürpel. Proof positive that Topham’s ‘claim’ had come down in the sea. It is just a detail, perhaps, of the bigger picture of the ‘Blitz’. However, with the benefit of hindsight, and with the aid of recently obtained eyewitness accounts and reports, what actually happened over Sussex that summer night 74 years ago can be clarified with absolute certainty. 

RIGHT: This He 111 of Stab./K. Gr 100 was lost during the attack on Chatham of 23-24 June 1941.

www.britainatwar.com 51

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THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

Colditz Castle prisoner of war camp became famous for the repeated and ingenious escape efforts undertaken by the prisoners. One of the most astonishing was that of Lieutenant Mike Sinclair, the man they called the Red Fox. Britain at War now brings that attempt to life as we re-trace his steps in pictures.

THE RUNNING OF S

CHLOSS COLDITZ, or Oflag IV-C as it had become, was a high security prisoner of war camp in Germany during the Second World War. Here were placed the most troublesome Allied prisoners — which meant the Germans really had put all their (bad) eggs in one basket. Among its inmates was Lieutenant Albert Michael 'Mike' Sinclair, who, with the 2nd Battalion King’s Royal Rifle Corps, had been captured in northern France.1 In due course Sinclair was sent to Stalag XXI-D in northern Poland, but escaped in a handcart. He got as far as Bulgaria, having travelled through Slovakia, Hungary and Yugoslavia, before he was recaptured. Sinclair had studied Modern Languages at Trinity College, Cambridge, and his linguistic skills helped him considerably. 54 www.britainatwar.com

MAIN PICTURE: A view of Colditz Castle, the former Oflag IV-C, today. (ALL IMAGES HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS UNLESS STATED OTHERWISE)

ABOVE LEFT: Lieutenant Michael Sinclair, sometimes described as “the greatest escaper of them all”. (COURTESY

OF SCHLOSS COLDITZ)

On the way back to Germany Sinclair escaped from the train he was in through a toilet window. He was spotted and re-taken, having hurt his leg in the fall from the moving carriage. Seen as a difficult prisoner, Mike Sinclair was transported to Colditz in July 1942. Very shortly after his arrival at Colditz Sinclair was informed that he was to be court-martialled for an offence he had committed in Stalag XXI-D. He was taken to the nearest large city, Leipzig, for trial. Inevitably, Sinclair seized the opportunity and escaped (once again through a toilet window) while in a hospital at Leipzig where he was being treated for sinusitis. A few days later he was captured in Cologne. Back at Colditz, and after a period of solitary confinement, Sinclair made his next escape attempt. He slipped through

the German kitchens after lunch in the company of Dutch prisoner Charles Klein. They were both recaptured but not before they had reached Immendingen, close to the Swiss border in Baden-Württemberg.

THE FAKE FRANZ Sinclair’s next attempt was his most ambitious, and without question his most ingenious, to date. Sinclair was addicted to the ‘escaping game’, as his oldest companion Gris DavisScourfield recalled: “I would wake up in the middle of the night, as we were usually in the same room. Mike would be standing at the window just watching the sentries patrolling below, counting the number of seconds it took them to turn around and walk back on their beats. He was

THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

OF THE RED FOX LEFT: Stabsfeldwebel Fritz Rothenberger, or Franz Joseph as he was more commonly known, sporting his distinctive moustache. Lt Teddy Barton laboured to achieve the same effect for Sinclair using shaving brushes. (COURTESY OF

SCHLOSS COLDITZ)

constantly looking for information that might be useful to him.” Sinclair’s constant observing and thinking gave him the impetus for this next attempt, the idea for which he proposed in April 1943. It involved impersonating one of the best-known of the German guards, Stabsfeldwebel Fritz Rothenberger. A decorated First World War veteran, Rothenberger was known to the prisoners and guards alike as ‘Franz Joseph’.2 His nickname arose because of his similarity with that of the late Austrian Emperor of the same name — ruddy complexion, puffy cheeks, grey hair, portly bearing and an enormous ginger-coloured, white-topped moustache which covered half his face. It was this last distinctive feature of the German NCO which leant itself to imitation.

One of Rothenberger’s tasks each night, Sinclair had noted, was to inspect the sentries on the eastern terrace of the castle. He would undertake his rounds in the middle of the night to make sure they were alert and vigilant. The terrace was guarded by sentries posted 30 yards apart. Once he had completed his tour Rothenberger would leave through the terrace gate, which was manned by two guards — one who patrolled the catwalk above, the other who stood by the gate to allow guards and other personnel to pass through. The plan devised by Sinclair (now called the ‘Red Fox’ by the Germans) and Lieutenant Monty Bissell was that Sinclair would impersonate Rothenberger and walk up to the two guards, telling them that there was a disturbance on the other side of the 

www.britainatwar.com 55

THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

THE ESCAPE ATTEMPT: This room was used as the sick bay during Colditz Castle’s time as a PoW camp, though during that period the arch in the foreground was actually a wall. It was from this area that Sinclair, Hyde-Thompson and Pope climbed out of a window to reach the terrace below.

Having climbed out of a window in the officers’ sick bay toilets, the three fake Germans found themselves on this stretch of terrace before making their way down the steps in the foreground.

1 castle, and ordering them to hand over the gate key while they went back to the guardroom for further instructions. When the guards were away, two prisoners dressed as Germans would take their place at the gate. Bissell and Sinclair had calculated that it would take four and a half minutes for the sentry to march back to the guardroom, during which time 20 prisoners would swing down ropes from the castle windows and escape through the gate. If things went really well, a further ten would follow. Obviously, the ruse would soon be discovered and then the guard and the real Rothenberger would come hurrying back. The two imitation guards would, by this time, also have taken off ‘in pursuit’ of the escapers. Though the

Germans would know that something had happened, they would not know how many prisoners had got away nor which direction — or directions — they had taken. This would give the escapees a good chance of getting far away before the Germans could hope to begin tracking them down. The scheme obviously rested for its success upon how well Sinclair could impersonate Rothenberger. The prisoners had often observed the way in which the Germans obeyed instructions without question and it was hoped that this deference to rank would mean that the guards would immediately obey the fake Rothenberger without daring to challenge him in any way. This was not just a case of stereotyping, as one of the Germans, Peter Hoffman explained: “We

2 The final stretch of ground which the three escapers needed to cover to reach the sentry post and gateway through the wire. The building on the left was the guards’ quarters.

5 With everyone seemingly proceeding according to plan, Sinclair, Hyde-Thompson and Pope rounded this corner to head towards the sentry post and gap in the wire defences through which they would pass into the roadway that led away from the castle. A sentry post was positioned on the left hand side of this area. On the far side of the fence was a steep drop down to the stream below.

56 www.britainatwar.com

6

were proud of our Prussian traditions. We all thought Rothenberger was a real German soldier. He had fought in the First World War, he had an Iron Cross — and his moustache. Of course, if he ordered one of us young ones to do something we would certainly do it.”

THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

: MOMENT BY MOMENT Looking up at the north-east corner of Colditz Castle. The archway in the unpainted wall at the bottom of the picture is that through which the steps from the terrace beneath the sick bay passed to reach the lower level.

4

3 THE ESCAPE ACADEMY To succeed, Sinclair’s plan required considerable preparation. First of all, three German uniforms would be needed. As it was still cold at night, the Germans on duty wore greatcoats, so three of these were manufactured from blankets, which then had to be dyed the exact colour of grey. The insignia worn on the coats were made out of linoleum cut from the floor and painted with watercolours purchased in the canteen shop. Altogether some 50 men of the so-called ‘Escape Academy’ were involved in preparing for the escape attempt. One of the next tasks was to forge Rothenberger’s Iron Cross, which was prominently worn by the NCO. This was cast in zinc that had been stolen from the roof of the building. It was heated up on an open stove and was shaped with a broken table knife. Meanwhile, Rothenberger’s hat was produced by the men who provided the theatre props for the plays and shows that the prisoners were allowed to perform. For this an RAF cap was dyed green and fitted with a peak. Next, two dummy rifles had to be manufactured for the fake guards. These were constructed of wood with the use of a home-made lathe. The ‘rifle’ barrels were polished with lead pencils, and both weapons were provided with scabbards, while the ‘guards’ also wore a holster and pistol. The attention to detail was remarkable, with triggers for the rifles cut out of tin and the rifle bolts fashioned from the PoWs’ metal bedsteads.

Rothenberger’s pistol was a Walther P38. Normally, of course, it was in its holster with just the black base of the magazine at the bottom of the handgrip being visible. So this was the only bit that had to be made. The holster itself was made from cardboard with stitching pencilled on and dyed a dull red to imitate leather. While all this activity was taking place under the very noses of the Germans, Sinclair rehearsed his role as ‘Franz Joseph’. He studied Rothenberger carefully as he strode around the camp, and under the

Having walked down the steps, passed through the archway (visible just before the round tower) and down the remaining steps, Sinclair, Hyde-Thompson and Pope found themselves on this lower, wider, terrace. They immediately walked towards our photographer’s position, who in turn is standing in the general area where a sentry post was situated.

considered eye of the Colditz theatre impresario, Lieutenant Teddy Barton, Sinclair practised the German NCO’s movements and mannerisms. Barton was also the man responsible for Sinclair’s crowning glory— the great moustache. This he made out of shaving brushes. It took him 14 attempts until he was happy that he had created a satisfactory replica. The two false guards, Lieutenant John Hyde-Thompson and Captain Lance Pope, who both spoke German, also had to learn their parts well and be able to mimic the German drill. 

The spot where the plans and hopes of Sinclair, HydeThompson and Pope unravelled, their efforts to escape having been halted by the diligence of a guard posted at this spot. When the alarm was raised, the real Franz Joseph, Stabsfeldwebel Fritz Rothenberger, arrived on the scene via the tunnel on the right.

7 www.britainatwar.com 57

THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

8

The view from the spot where Sinclair, Hyde-Thompson and Pope were challenged, looking back across where their last few steps had been — the gate on the right is positioned on the terrace up which they walked. The German sentry and wire were positioned in the immediate foreground.

Each pass had to bear a photograph of the individual carrying it. For this Major William Anderson built an imitation box Brownie camera out of an old cigar box with broken spectacles as the lenses. One of the German guards provided the film and developer, presumably in return for gifts from the Red Cross parcels which the prisoners received. The preparations did not end there, as each escaper needed a map. These were copied from the few that had not been discovered by the Germans when new RAF prisoners arrived as maps were part of the RAF escapers’ pack with which each crew member was issued. The windows of the rooms where the prisoners were held were protected with iron bars and if the men were to escape through the windows the bars had to be cut beforehand. The windows were directly above the sentry on the terrace gate and so the cutting had to be carried out with the absolute minimum of noise. This painfully slow process was undertaken every night with the cut in each bar disguised with boot polish each morning. The bars were left with just a slither of metal until the night of the escape when the final cut would be carried out. The final item needed was a camp pass. At each checkpoint the pass had to be shown. For security reasons the

THE CIGAR-BOX CAMERA The scale of the prisoners’ operation was astonishing, as it must be borne in mind that getting out of the camp was merely the first stage to success. Once the men were out into the German countryside they would need authentic looking civilian clothes as well as a full set of papers. Making the civilian clothes was the responsibility of each individual included among the 30 potential escapers. The papers were produced by the camp’s forgery department. One of those forgers was Kenneth Lee: “Every day we sat at a table opposite each other painstakingly copying the German Gothic script on the paper forms. We started in pencil then carefully went over the top of everything in Indian ink. The raw materials came from the canteen shop and I suppose it never occurred to the Germans that we might be able to use this for escaping purposes, they thought we were all drawing still lives. There was always a stooge at the window to warn us if the Germans were coming. We had a special hide under the table to put our equipment in, and I think it took about ten seconds to cover everything up and do something else. I spent over three years in the forgery department and we were never rumbled.”3 58 www.britainatwar.com

colour of these changed every few days. As well as presenting his pass, anyone passing through a checkpoint would be asked the security code of the day, which was a number between one and 50. Clearly, information on these could only be obtained at the last minute. So, when everything was in place for the mass escape, Flight Lieutenant Cenek Chaloupka, a Czech airman, would swing into action. ‘Checko’ Chaloupka was an expert in blackmailing the guards. He would begin by talking to them, giving them coffee and cigarettes. Then he would give them little presents for their wife or children; they would exchange photographs and relationships would develop.

ABOVE: This fake officer’s cap provides an example of the skill the prisoners displayed in fabricating replica German uniforms. On display in the castle’s museum, it is a similar example to that worn by Sinclair.

Once the two were comfortable with each other, Checko would ask for something in return from one of them — such as the loan of a camp pass. If the guard refused, Checko would let it be known that the Camp Commandant would be informed that the guard had been accepting gifts from the prisoners. The poor guard would be hooked. Once he had handed over one valuable item he would be in real trouble if his superiors found out, so the guard had no choice but to keep on handing Checko whatever he asked for.

THE CAMP COMMANDANT

9 The tunnel through which Rothenberger approached the melee caused by the guard detaining the impostors. It leads through to the half of the castle that, at the time, formed the German Kommandantur. Having been shot, Sinclair was left lying on the cobbles in the foreground for some ten minutes while the guards frantically ordered a snap Appell. The escape was foiled.

Finally, everything was in place. It had taken many months of hard and careful work throughout the summer but by the beginning of September 1943, all was ready. D-Day was set for the 2nd. After the 21.00 hours Appell, or roll call, when Rothenberger was reported to be safely in the guardroom, the would-be escapers left their quarters using a skeleton key. Having made their way down to the first floor, the three fake Germans were lowered into the sick bay. “The escapers had cut the window grille in the toilet of the officers’ sick bay,” noted one of Colditz’s guards, George Schaedlich, “and had, from this

THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

...AND THE FINAL, FATAL RUN 1

corner, which no sentry could overlook, climbed down a short rope, hidden by the shadow. They had come down the steps behind the pavilion so that sentry 4 had to assume they had come from the guardhouse.”4 The story of that night’s action was later recorded by Hauptmann Reinhold Eggers, the Colditz Camp Commandant: “Round about midnight Franz Joseph [i.e. Sinclair] appeared on his usual rounds outside the castle walls, accompanied, however, by two sentries with slung rifles. He came to the last two of the guard posts on the east side of the castle. Here was the gate with the catwalk above it … The height of the catwalk above the ground enabled him to look over the edge of the canteen terrace and survey what had till then been dead ground all along the foot of the building. The last two sentries, over the gate, and on the beat up to it, had been on duty for about 20 minutes. “Franz Joseph dismissed the sentry below the catwalk with the remark, ‘Your relief is early tonight. We have had an air-raid distant warning.’ The guard was replaced by one of the men who had come with Franz Joseph but did not himself move off towards the guardroom, waiting apparently for his mate on the bridge above the gate to be relieved too and come back with him. “The Sergeant-Major [still Sinclair] then went up to the bridge and relieved the last sentry, replacing him with the second man he had with him. The catwalk sentry, having been relieved, descended the steps from the gate and was just about to march off when, for no reason he could later define, he decided to ask Franz Joseph for his SergeantMajor’s pass.”5

Looking down on the PoWs’ sports ground alongside the eastern side of the castle, the scene of Sinclair’s final, and fatal, escape attempt. The sports ground was surrounded by six-feet-tall barbed wire fences. An area of the slope where you can see the sheep was also included in the sports ground. Those prisoners held in solitary confinement had their own exercise area by the small bridge on the right.

Some accounts state that it was at this point that Sinclair had, “slipped up, by missing a particular mannerism of Frank Josef. He made the mistake of not looking both sides of the catwalk before crossing. This was immediately picked up the guard, who was more astute than he had been given credit for.”6 “For once someone obeyed the rules we had been trying to drill into our sentries for years,” continued Eggers, “and obeyed it in spite of himself. “‘Are you daft?’ asked Franz Joseph. ‘Don’t you know your own Sergeant?’” Faced with the choice of either persisting with the stubborn guard, or making a run for it with his two colleagues, Sinclair decided to continue with the façade. He became increasingly annoyed with the sentry and soon started yelling at him. The latter, however, stood his ground. “The pass seemed in order, but, nevertheless, the guard had a vague suspicion and pressed his warning bell,” continued Eggers. “He also covered Franz Joseph with his rifle and ordered him to put up his hands. Joseph cursed — not very fluently — but did indeed put his hands up. In due course a corporal and one man appeared from the guardroom in answer to the buzzer. Franz Joseph did not know the password when asked. The corporal drew his revolver and demanded Franz Joseph’s. There was a struggle. The corporal swore later that Franz Joseph tried to draw his pistol [which of course was impossible].” At this point, confusion reigned, with the German guards running around in panic and the NCOs unsure

2 Looking down the length of the prisoners’ sports ground at Colditz. The fence that Sinclair escaped over is roughly marked by the red dotted line. Having cleared the fence, Sinclair sprinted up the valley away from the direction of this photographer.

Once over the fence Sinclair initially ran across this stretch of ground. By the time he reached here, he was already being fired on, both by the guards behind him at the sports ground and others from the terrace at the top of the slope on the left. This was the same stretch of terrace over which his previous Franz Joseph escape attempt had passed.

of the allegiance of the men under their command or who to believe. Suddenly, a shot rang out. “‘Good God,’ said one of our three sentries present. ‘You’ve shot our Sergeant-Major.’”, concluded Eggers in his account. “But it was Lieut. Michael Sinclair, in almost perfect disguise, who collapsed to the ground. The true Franz Joseph appeared next on the scene, having heard the shots.”7

NOW OR NEVER As the guards ordered an immediate Appell in the courtyard, Mike Sinclair was initially left lying on the ground. He was not, however, seriously wounded, his determination to escape as strong as ever. Consequently, just four months later in January 1944, he and Flight Lieutenant Jack Best slithered down a 90-foot home-made rope, cut through the perimeter fence and were out. Both were caught a few days later at Rheine on the Dutch border. 

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THE RUNNING OF THE RED FOX Colditz Escape Step-by-Step

4

It is believed that this was the gateway or stretch of wall towards which Sinclair had opted to run after getting over the fence. The stream that ran alongside the castle passed through the wall to the left of this view, though this opening was covered by a grille at the time.

Sinclair remained undaunted and now planned his next attempt. Below the castle was the park, a flat area of ground where each day for an hour the prisoners were allowed to exercise. In 1941 a French prisoner, Pierre Mairesse Lebrun, had been catapulted by his comrades over the eight-foot high perimeter barbedwire fence and had then climbed the surrounding park wall and escaped. Mike Sinclair decided to try and emulate Lebrun’s achievement, but he was determined to accomplish it alone so that on-one else could be blamed if the attempt went wrong. Realistically, there was little chance of Sinclair getting over the wire unseen as, unlike Lebrun, he would have to climb the wire in full view of the German guards. Everyone in the camp knew that the end of the war was in sight but Sinclair remained determined to escape before then. By this time he had made eight unsuccessful attempts at trying to get back to the UK and the repeated failures had evidently worn him down

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and he was no longer thinking logically. On 25 September Sinclair went down to the park and walked round the inside of the perimeter with Lieutenant Grismond Davies-Scourfield. After around 30 minutes the guards had settled down and relaxed. At the most vulnerable point in the wire, Sinclair stopped and turned to his friend. Taking Davies-Scourfield by the hand he said quietly, “It’s going to be now or never.” With that, he leapt onto the wire and began to climb for all he was worth. He managed to reach the top and was actually balanced with his legs either side of the wire before he was spotted by the guards. They shouted at him to “Halt! Halt!” and then “Halt oder ich schiesse!” — Halt or I shoot!8 Sinclair, though, swung his other leg over the wire and jumped to the ground. As he picked himself up the first shots rang out. Then he was off, running as quickly as he could up the hill towards the park wall. More shots followed as Sinclair approached the wall. But by this time the Germans had his range

BOTTOM PIC: Although initially buried in a graveyard in Colditz, Sinclair’s body was exhumed after the war and re-interred in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission’s Berlin 1939-1945 War Cemetery. His grave can be seen at plot 10.L.14. (COURTESY OF THE COMMONWEALTH WAR GRAVE COMMISSION)

and a volley of shots splattered all around him. It was evident that there was no possibility of Sinclair climbing the wall and the next volley would be certain to strike him. He could have stopped, put his hands up and lived. Sinclair did not stop. The next volley of shots rang out. Sinclair fell to his knees and then crumpled forwards. A bullet had struck him in the right elbow and glanced off striking him in the heart. The ‘Red Fox’ had made his last run. Mike Sinclair was buried in the local cemetery on 28 September 1944. He was posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Order, being the only lieutenant to be awarded this decoration during the Second World War for an action while in captivity.  It was in this small open area that 26-yearold Lieutenant Albert “Mike” Sinclair was shot and killed on 25 September 1944.

5 NOTES 1. 2.

3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Sinclair had been commissioned into the 2nd Battalion in July 1939. Whilst Rothenberger’s nickname is generally spelt as ‘Franz Joseph’ (see for example, Michael Booker, Collecting Colditz and Its Secrets, Grub Street, London, 2005), the Emperor’s name is also spelt Franz Josef. See Henry Chancellor’s excellent book Colditz, The Definitive History (Coronet Books, London, 2002), pp.221-30. Georg Martin Schaedlich, Tales From Colditz Castle (Thomas Schaedlilch, Colditz, 2003), p.75. Reinhold Eggers, Colditz, The German Viewpoint (New English Library, 1961), pp.150-2. Anon, Colditz: A Pictorial History (Caxton Editions, London, 2001), p.122. Reinhold Eggers, ibid, p.152. Major P.R. Reid, Colditz, The Full Story (Pan Books, London, 2002), pp.243-4.

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JANUARY 1945

DATES THAT SHAPED THE SECOND WORLD WAR Key Moments and Events that affected Brit Britain

ABOVE: Troops of the first wave make their way ashore from their landing crafts at Ramree.

(JAMES LUTO COLLECTION)

 ASSAULT ON RAMREE ISLAND

The Luftwaffe launched Operation Bodenplatte. Described in some accounts as ‘the Luftwaffe’s last roll of the dice’, Bodenplatte was an attempt by the Germans to cripple Allied air forces in the Low Countries during the fighting in the Ardennes (the Battle of the Bulge). Over 800 fighters and fighter-bombers, predominantly FockeWulf Fw 190s and Messerschmitt Bf 109s, were despatched in this lowlevel attack on Allied airfields in Belgium and the Netherlands. Surprise was complete, and some 224 Allied aircraft were destroyed (of which 144 were RAF) with a further 84 damaged beyond unit repair. For its part, the Luftwaffe lost 62 aircraft to Allied fighters and 172 to anti-aircraft guns — losses that it never really replaced, particularly in terms of aircrew.

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Admiral Sir Bertram Home Ramsay KCB, KBE, MVO, Commanderin-Chief Allied Naval Expeditionary Force, was killed when the aircraft taking him to a conference in Brussels, Belgium, crashed on take-off at Toussus-le-Noble. Ramsay had retired from the Royal Navy in 1938 but, on the outbreak of war, had been recalled to duty and given command of the port of Dover. Involved in the Dunkirk evacuation he was knighted and given the rank of Admiral. Ramsay was responsible for organizing the Allied landings in Algiers on 8 November 1942 and then commanded the Eastern Naval Task Force for the invasion of Sicily. In December 1943, he was appointed Allied Naval Commander-in-Chief for the Normandy landings. Ramsay was one of the highest ranking British service casualties of the war.

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British forces started landings on Akyab Island in the area of Arakan.

The last RAF Bomber Command Vickers Wellington operation was flown by the crew of a 192 Squadron Wellington Mk.X based at RAF Foulsham in Norfolk. The Wellington was on a radar countermeasures flight over the North Sea “to investigate enemy beam signals connected with the launching of flying bombs and believed to emanate from marker buoys”.

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On Sunday, 21 JANUARY 1945, Allied troops carried out amphibious landings against the Japanese-held island of Ramree. One of the primary aims of the operation, which was assigned to the 26th Indian Division, was the capture of the airfield. The landings were successful, leading to the virtual destruction of the Japanese garrison in the six-week campaign that followed. In his despatch on the Ramree operations, ViceAdmiral Sir Arthur J. Power, KCB, CVO, Commander-in-Chief, East Indies Station explained why: “[The] disadvantages to the Japanese lay in the indescribable horrors of the mangrove swamps. Dark during the day as well as during the night, acres of thick impenetrable forest; miles of deep black mud, mosquitoes, scorpions, flies and weird insects by the billion and – worst of all – crocodiles. No food, no drinking water to be obtained anywhere. It can hardly be possible that in their decision to quit the Island the Japanese could have been fully aware of the appalling conditions which prevailed. It proved to be beyond even their endurance to exist for more than a few days. Prisoners taken out of the mangroves during the operations were found to be semi-dehydrated and in a very low physical condition … Of the 1,200 to 1,500 Japanese in occupation on the day of landing, only a few escaped. The remainder were either killed in battle or drowned in the mangrove swamps. Only twenty prisoners were taken in spite of all efforts of persuasion ...” Because of the losses suffered by the enemy troops, and the manner in which many died, the Battle of Ramree has become associated with reports of Japanese soldiers being eaten by saltwater crocodiles in the mangrove swamps. The Guinness Book of World Records has variously listed it as the “Worst Crocodile Disaster in the World”, the “Most Number of Fatalities in a Crocodile Attack” or the “The Greatest Disaster Suffered [by humans] from Animals”. Speaking in the House of Commons, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Anthony Eden, outlined the policy and work of the United Nations War Crimes Commission: “The United Nations War Crimes Commission was established in October, 1943. With the exception of the U.S.S.R. all the European Allies together with the Governments of Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, India, China and the United States are represented on it. The purpose of the Commission is to investigate all cases referred to it by any of the Allied Governments of atrocities committed by, or by order of, the nationals of any of the countries at war with any of the United Nations against nationals of the United Nations; to record and assess all available evidence upon such atrocities, and particularly on atrocities organised and committed in accordance with deliberate policy; and to report to the Governments of the United Nations cases in which the Commission is satisfied that an atrocity has been committed, naming, where possible, those whom they consider responsible.”

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DATES THAT SHAPED THE SECOND WORLD WAR Key Moments and Events that affected Britain

 THE V-2 CAMPAIGN

“The Angel of Death is abroad in the land, only you can’t always hear the flutter of its wings,” noted Winston Churchill on 15 January 1945. He was referring to the German V-2 campaign, which showed little sign of abating in January 1945. One of the Big Ben incidents that month (‘Big Ben’ was the codeword for a V-2 incident), of which there were 224, was No.625. It refers to the rocket that impacted at the northern end of Usk Road in Battersea, near the junction with York Road, at 16.02 hours on Saturday, 27 JANUARY 1945. The ARP services were quickly on the scene. By 19.00 hours, one of the rescue workers had reported that “the incident had settled down into a routine job”. Twenty houses were demolished by the blast, a further 50 badly damaged. Seventeen people were killed and 44 injured. BELOW: A girl among the ruins of her home after the explosion.

(US LIBRARY OF CONGRESS)

JANUARY 1945

Speaking in Parliament Winston Churchill gave a summary of the war situation. Towards the end he stated: “We have reached the 65th month of the war, and its weight hangs heavy upon us. No one knows what stresses are wrought in these times by this long persistence of strain, quite above the ordinary normal life of human society. Let us be of good cheer. Both in the West and in the East overwhelming forces are ranged on our side. Military victory may be distant, it will certainly be costly, but it is no longer in doubt.”

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“Recognizing the fact of the defeat of Hungary in the war against the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, and other United Nations,” the Hungarian Provisional Government signed an armistice with the USSR, USA and UK in Moscow.

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 GERMAN SEEHUNDS FIRST OP

Designed in 1944, the Kriegsmarine’s Seehund (Seal) midget submarine, also known as the XXVII B 5 or Type 127, of which 285 were constructed by the end of the war, carried out its first operational deployment on Monday, 1 JANUARY 1945. As part of Operation Debut, 17 Seehunds sailed from their base at Ijmuiden in the Netherlands. The target was a convoy at sea off the Kwinte Bank. It was a costly mission for the Germans, with seven of the submarines found beached, two sunk by British ships (one apiece by HMS Cowdray and HMS Ekins), one abandoned, one found drifting, and four posted as missing, believed to have been lost in bad weather. The remaining two Seehunds returned. The only success for the enemy crews was the sinking of the trawler Hayburn Wyke. Despite such an inauspicious start to their operations, the Seehunds gradually built a reputation for success among German midget submarines. From January to April 1945, Seehunds performed 142 sorties and accounted for 93,000 gross tons of shipping (though accounts vary as high as 120,000 tons). From the Allied point of view the type’s small size made it almost impossible for Asdic to get a return from the hull, while her very quiet slow speed running made her almost immune to detection by hydrophone. As Admiral Sir Charles Little, Commander-in-Chief Portsmouth, once stated, “Fortunately for us these damn things arrived too late in the war to do any damage.”

ABOVE: This Seehund is a captured example and one of four given to the French Navy as war reparations. It is on display in the Musée National de la Marine in Brest.

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Pied Piper, Tin-Eye and Cell 14. Moonlight landings by rowing boat on the Kent coast. It is the stuff of spy fiction — except it's all true. Joshua Levine reveals the story of the plot, capture and secret trial of Germany's preinvasion spies in 1940.

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N JUNE 2014, we learned that the British government was attempting to conduct an Old Bailey terrorism trial in complete secrecy. The Court of Appeal, mindful that transparent justice is a cornerstone of our democratic society, ruled that parts of the trial must be heard in public. Newspapers and television networks feared that a secret trial was beyond the pale. They all used the same word: unprecedented. But they were all wrong. A series of entirely secret trials had taken place in Britain during a period far more extreme than our own. The first, and most remarkable, of these trials took place in November 1940 at the Old Bailey. It concerned three Nazi spies, charged with treachery, who had landed in September on the south coast of England. They had been sent as the advance guard of the German invasion – and just as the Court of Appeal expressed its democratic concerns in 2014, so Alexander Maxwell of the Home Office wrote to the Home Defence Executive in 1940, expressing his department’s disapproval of the

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2. concept of secret trials. “Public opinion and public criticism,” wrote Maxwell, “is the most important safeguard for the proper administration of justice.” In his reply, Lord Swinton justified the secrecy: “I want to make it plain that there is much more in this than keeping the enemy in doubt as to the fate of his agents. The combined work of all the services has built up, and is continually adding to, a great structure of intelligence and counter espionage; and a single disclosure, affecting one individual, might send the whole building toppling. I have no love for unnecessary secrecy; but in this matter we cannot afford to take any avoidable risk.”

BELOW LEFT: The rowing boat in which Waldberg and Meier came ashore at Dungeness. Both were part of the operation codenamed Lena. BELOW RIGHT: Kieboom and Pons’ abandoned rowing boat on the beach. They were supposed to act as refugees from occupied countries.

The fact was that MI5 was building up a network of double agents whom the Germans trusted as loyal spies. MI5 had all sorts of plans for these double agents, a number of whom were Nazi spies who had been sent to Britain, captured, and been presented with a stark choice – either serve the British or face trial and execution. But not every captured spy became a double agent. Many were not considered suitable, and were sent for trial instead. And MI5 was brutally aware that a single piece of information from one of these trials had the potential to expose the entire ‘double cross’ system. The Home Office’s scruples about secret trials were admirable, but democracy would have to take a sabbatical to ensure its own survival.

FOUR MEN IN A BOAT Nazi Spies On Trial

1. Carl Meier

4.

2. Sjoerd Pons 3. Charles Van Der Kieboom 4. Jose Waldberg landmines, and weather conditions — but their training proved to be woefully inadequate. They received a month of sketchy instruction in Morse and cryptology, they were shown how to use their transmitters, and they were given a few perfunctory lectures about the structure of the British army. They were not told how to behave when they landed, nor were they provided with identity papers.

3. This particular trial was the culmination of a chain of events set in motion by General Alfred Jodl, the Chief of Operations Staff at Wehrmacht High Command. In July 1940, Jodl was responsible for formulating the preliminary plan for the German invasion of Britain. As part of his planning, Jodl spoke to Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, chief of the Abwehr (the German Intelligence Service) explaining that a network of spies was needed in Britain to serve as scouts in advance of the invasion. These spies, said Jodl, would have to identify suitable landing grounds, provide detailed information about defences, and guide the invading troops once they had fought their way off the beaches. Less than a week after Jodl’s preliminary plan had been delivered, Adolf Hitler issued his Fuhrer Directive No. 16, bringing Operation Sealion, as the invasion was codenamed, into official being. Sealion’s ultimate objective, according to the directive, was to occupy Britain “should it become necessary”. Hitler was not yet committed to an invasion. Given Germany’s inexorable military advance, his respect for the AngloSaxon people, and his desire to turn his attention eastwards, he remained confident that Britain would sue for peace.

When no approach had arrived by 19 July, Hitler addressed the Reichstag in uncharacteristically measured tones. It almost caused him pain, he told the assembly, to be responsible for bringing down a great empire which he had no desire to harm. He could see no reason why this war had to go on. His offer of peace reached Britain — and three days later, it was rejected by the Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax.

THE PIED PIPER Preparations for the invasion intensified. The most pressing preliminary objective was the destruction of the Royal Air Force, but with an invasion date set for the middle of September, it became imperative that Canaris’s spies were in place to guide the attackers. The operation to send them to Britain, codenamed Lena, was allocated to Major Nikolaus Ritter of the Abwehr’s Hamburg sub-office . A shortlist of candidates was selected by Walter Praetorius, a man known as ‘The Pied Piper’. He began searching for recruits in Belgium and Holland. This was logical: refugees from recently occupied countries were arriving in Britain in numbers. From a list Praetorius drew up, Ritter chose his favourites. The chosen few would be expected to report back on coastal troop positions, frequency of patrols, locations of

ABOVE FOUR PORTRAITS: The four spies. Recruited by the Abwehr, the German Intelligence Service, their task was to serve as scouts ahead of the potential German invasion of Britain. They were to provide detail on defence, to identify suitable landing places and guide invading troops once they had fought through the beaches. RIGHT: Used at the trial of the four men, this map showed the position where the two boats had come ashore and where Waldberg had been apprehended.

Such neglectful preparation might, perhaps, be the result of the speed with which they had to be turned into spies. But as MI5’s Guy Liddell observed in his wartime diary, it was difficult “to believe that they [the Abwehr] could have been so stupid, as having sent these men over without having schooled them properly and worked out plans by which they could be really effective.”  www.britainatwar.com 65

This begs a question — was the Abwehr stupid, overstretched, or had it deliberately neglected the men’s selection and training? The answer may turn on the fact that the Abwehr was not a loyal Nazi organization. Wilhelm Canaris, although personally appointed by Hitler, was never a member of the Nazi party. He was, in fact, a consistent — albeit careful — opponent of Hitler and Nazism, who filled key positions in the organization with like-minded associates. And even those officers who were not actively anti-Nazi were often unconcerned by the quality of their work. In a post-war memo, the historian Hugh TrevorRoper, at the time a counter-intelligence officer, wrote: “The operational officers of the Abwehr sat in Paris and Athens, in Biarritz and Estoril, enjoying the opportunities for self-indulgence provided by these resorts, undisturbed so long as a quota of reports was sent in. Whether these reports were true or false was unimportant, since there was no centralized evaluation.” Canaris once told a fellow intelligence officer that he did not care if every German agent in Britain was under control so long as could tell German High Command that he had agents in Britain reporting regularly.

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The success of Lena may have been irrelevant to the Abwehr so long as it could show that it was dutifully sending spies across the Channel. But, to go a stage further, it is not impossible that the choice of spies and their pitiful training amounted to an act of internal sabotage by anti-Nazi members of the organization. Nikolaus Ritter, the man responsible for Lena, was, after all, a trusted protégé of Wilhelm Canaris. The first four Lena spies were certainly a motley crew. Charles van den Kieboom was a half-Dutch, half-Japanese YMCA receptionist. Carl Meier was a failed medical student who spoke English with an American accent. Sjoerd Pons was an unemployed ex-Dutch army ambulance driver who could barely speak English, while Jose Waldberg was a French-born German who knew no English at all. He was, however, a committed Nazi who had spied for the Abwehr in France before its fall. The others had no experience of spying and no obvious credentials for the job. Pons and van den Kieboom were not even willing volunteers; they had been blackmailed into spying. It is little wonder that among themselves, the spies described their mission as Himmelfahrt – ‘the journey to heaven’.

THE SPIES ASHORE The journey began with the men being brought to within a few miles of the British coast, placed in rowing boats, and pointed towards the Kent coast. In one boat were Meier and Waldberg, in the other, Kieboom and Pons. The boats landed in the early hours of the morning of 3 September; one near Dungeness, the other by the Dymchurch Redoubt. They had with them binoculars, wireless transmitters, cases containing clothes, cigarettes and brandy, £30 in bank notes, and enough food for a fortnight, by which time, they had been assured, the German invasion force would have arrived. As might have been predicted, only Waldberg had the makings of a decent spy. In his 24 hours of freedom on the Kent coast, he managed to make wireless contact with his German handlers. The other three men were truly hopeless. Meier gave himself away by knocking on the door of The Rising Sun pub at Lydd at nine in the morning and asking the landlady for a champagne cider, and a hot bath. Lydd was no hub of cosmopolitan activity in 1940, and Meier with his foreign accent and ignorance of pub etiquette did not blend in easily. The landlady explained to him that a bath was not on offer, and asked him to call back later. On his way out he smacked his head on light fitting,

TOP LEFT: The black fibre suitcase carried by Waldberg and Meier looked innocent enough …although hidden inside was their secret radio, now held by the Imperial War Museum. (IWM)

ABOVE RIGHT: Pictured in November 2014, this is the exact spot where Waldberg and Meier came ashore with the new Lifeboat Station in the background. (G PEARSON)

BOTH BELOW: The foreshore at Dymchurch where Kieboom and Pons came ashore and the same scene today. (G PEARSON)

FOUR MEN IN A BOAT Nazi Spies On Trial

breaking it. (The broken light fitting was still extant in the bar during the early 1980s, and at least up until the premises ceased to be a pub: Editor) When he returned, he spoke to an air raid warden who asked to see his identity card. He replied that he had no card, and said, ‘We arrived here last night,’ revealing the existence of his fellow spies. Two members of the public stepped up to arrest him. “You’ve caught me, I guess,” Meier told them, “and I don’t mind what happens to me, but I don’t want to go back to Germany!” By the time of Meier’s arrest, Kieboom was already in custody. His beached dinghy had been noticed by a patrolling soldier in the early morning gloom, and he was spotted minutes later. “I am a Dutch refugee,” he shouted, “and if I can see one of your officers, I can explain the situation!” Pons, meanwhile, was spotted by a soldier in a nearby field. When he was challenged, he shouted, “I am a Dutchman!” and tried to explain, in broken English, that he had lost his companion. Early the next morning, Waldberg was noticed by a policeman as he walked along a railway line.

TOP RIGHT: The radio with which Kieboom and Pons came ashore displayed by a soldier of the Somerset Light Infantry. (HMP) BELOW RIGHT: In one message transmitted by Waldberg he noted an ‘unfinished block house’. Almst certainly these are the now demolished remains of the incomplete structure.

Brought together again, the men were sent to Britain’s wartime spy prison — just around the corner from Richmond Underground Station. Latchmere House, known as Camp 020, was run by Colonel Robin Stephens, known behind his back as ‘Tin-Eye’ for his everpresent monocle. Stephens’s role was to interrogate his prisoners, and to decide whether they could be used as double agents against their German masters. Stephens enjoyed his job — Christopher Harmer, an MI5 officer, remembers him rubbing his hands with glee on hearing

gently that it would be better if he confessed, because Stephens could become very angry indeed. Stephens also invented ‘Cell 14’. Just as George Orwell’s Room 101 contained ‘the worst thing in the world’, so Cell 14 was created to conjure up the prisoner’s darkest fears. It was a perfectly ordinary cell around which a tale of death and madness was spun. The prisoner was told that the previous occupant had committed suicide, that it was opposite the mortuary, that he would remain locked up without human contact until he confessed — or until he was taken away ‘for the very last time’. Fear and vulnerability often prompted a quick confession. Perhaps surprisingly, Stephens would

that a fresh spy had been caught. But before a prisoner could be used as a double agent, he or she had to confess to being a spy. Stephens used his own carefully crafted methods to extract confessions. One tactic, which he called blow-hot/blow-cold, will be familiar to viewers of modern police dramas. Stephens would begin by behaving ferociously towards the prisoner. A calm officer would intervene, apparently trying to pacify Stephens. The kindly officer would take the prisoner aside and explain

never allow physical violence to be used against his prisoners. But this had less to do with progressive thinking than with an understanding that confessions gained by torture were rarely reliable. While in Stephens’s custody, Waldberg confirmed that he had been a willing German agent – but the others denied being spies. Sjoerd Pons claimed that he had intended to give himself up as soon as he arrived: “I want to take it all to you,” he said, “I want to tell the police and take him my apparatus under my arm.’” 

‘BLOW HOT, BLOW COLD’

(G PEARSON)

BELOW LEFT: Now a private house, formerly the ‘Rising Sun’ pub in Lydd, where Meier had tried to buy ‘a champagne cider’ at 9 o'clock in the morning. (G PEARSON)

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ABOVE LEFT & RIGHT: This was the site at Boulderwall Farm where Waldberg had set up his transmitter. He was apprehended nearby whilst walking along the narrow gauge Romney, Hythe & Dymchurch Railway line. Today, the scene has been transformed through many years of gravel extraction but this is almost exactly the same site with the water tower and water works in the far distance. (G PEARSON)

FAR RIGHT: This photo of Catharina Pons, wife of Sjoerd, was found on him when he was captured. The couple were married in 1939 and divorced after the war.

Pons was asked whether he would be willing to become a double agent. “It is difficult,” he answered. “Difficult, is it?” replied Stephens, “Why? You love Germany, do you?” Regardless of his feelings for Germany, Pons was facing a dilemma. On the one hand, he believed that the Germans would arrive in Britain shortly, and he did not want to risk betraying them. On the other hand, if he refused the British offer, he might be executed before the Germans arrived. He asked Stephens whether he could be sent to America, where, he claimed, he had wanted to go all along. The answer, unsurprisingly, was ‘no’. It did not take long for Stephens to conclude that the men could not be used as double agents. For one thing, three of them continued to deny being spies. For another, their arrests had been locally observed and discussed. News of this might have filtered back to the Germans. Another factor was that Waldberg had made wireless contact with his German handlers. It was one of Stephens’s rules that the initial contact between a double agent and his enemy handlers must be made under British supervision. Waldberg might, after all, have warned his handlers of his imminent capture, in which case they

would now use him as a triple agent. And so the ‘Four Men in a Boat’ were sent for trial at the Old Bailey – with the exception of Waldberg who pleaded guilty, firm in his belief that the Germans would shortly arrive to release him from his cell.

THE TRIAL The trial, held in Court One before Mr Justice Wrottesley, began on 19 November 1940. The three men were charged with the new offence of treachery, introduced to fill a loophole as the existing crime of treason only covered British subjects. The trial was held in total secret, with jury members being told by the judge to “Make up some story if you are asked what you are trying.” Mr Justice Wrottesley also told them to keep “an open mind” — but at a time when spies were feared and hated, when Britain was expecting an invasion, when the Blitz had been raging for over two months, and when Britain and its dominions were fighting without Russian or American help – an ‘open mind’ was an extremely tall order. Rarely can a jury have approached a trial in a more prejudiced frame of mind. Which makes what was about to happen all the more remarkable.

THE INCRIMINATING MESSAGES

When Jose Waldberg was arrested he had a notebook contain ing transcripts, in French, of messages he had already transmitted. They were: ARRIVED SAFELY DOCUMENT DESTROYED ENGLISH PATROL TWO HUNDRED METRES FROM COAST BEACH WITH BROWN NETS AND RAILWA YS SLEEPERS AT A DISTANCE OF FIFTY METRES NO MINES FEW SOLDIE RS UNFINISHED BLOCK HOUSE NEW ROAD WALDBERG MEIER PRISONER ENGLISH POLICE SEARCHING FOR ME AM CORNERED SITUATION DIFFICULT I CAN RESIST THIRST UNTIL SATURD AY IF I AM TO RESIST SEND AEROPLANES WEDNESDAY EVENING ELEVEN O’CLOCK AM THREE KM NORTH OF POINT OF ARRIVAL LONG LIVE GERMA NY WALDBERG THIS IS EXACT POSITION YESTERDAY EVENING SIX O’CLOC K THREE MESSERSCHMITT FIRED MACHINE GUNS IN MY DIRECT ION THREE HUNDRED METRES SOUTH WATER RESERVOIR PAINTED RED MEIER PRISONER WALDBERG 68 www.britainatwar.com

Section 1 of the Treachery Act reads: “If, with intent to help the enemy, any person does, or attempts or conspires with any other person to do any act which is designed or likely to give assistance to the naval, military or air operations of the enemy, to impede such operations of His Majesty’s forces, or to endanger life, he shall be guilty of felony and shall on conviction suffer death.” The penalty was death and the stakes were high. In his examination-in-chief, Pons told his festively-named counsel,

Christmas Humphreys, that the Nazis had caught Kieboom and himself smuggling jewels between Holland and Germany. The pair, he said, had then been given a choice — either agree to spy for Germany in England, or be sent to a concentration camp. They had agreed to spy, said Pons, but had decided that they would hand themselves in to the police as soon as they came ashore. Pons preferred, he assured his counsel, England over Germany. Once he was ashore, Pons said, he had decided to wet his wireless set to make it unusable before surrendering it to the police. “I found a ditch, there was an inch of water in it. I pressed it down into water and mud. That was the best I could do,” said Pons. “What is wrong

FOUR MEN IN A BOAT Nazi Spies On Trial FAR LEFT: German interest in Dungeness continued, with this Luftwaffe aerial reconnaissance photograph from autumn 1940 showing the general area where Waldberg and Meier had come ashore, though their actual landing spot is just out of the photograph to the right. BOTTOM LEFT: Sir William Jowett, counsel for the prosecution in the spy trial.

with the sea?” asked the judge, “there is a lot of water there, you know…” “I could not find it again,’”said Pons. “Yes, you could,” said the judge. Pons then told Humphreys that having left his wireless set in the ditch, he had seen two men in the distance, and had walked towards them. These were the soldiers who arrested him. One of them had called out to him. “Did you mean to help the Germans when you got to England?” Humphreys asked. “No, sir!” Pons replied. He was attempting to convince the jury that he had done nothing, in the wording of the Act, likely to give assistance to the enemy. During his cross-examination, Pons was asked by the judge why he had not come ashore waving a white handkerchief. “We had all these incriminating things with us,”

Pons replied. “Why not throw them overboard and come ashore waving a handkerchief?” asked the judge. “I have not thought of it,” said Pons.

SUMMING UP AND VERDICT In his summing up, the judge offered his view of the evidence: “Had they [the defendants] gone to the first person they had seen and told the whole story, they had everything which was needed to establish beyond any doubt that their story was true: the boat, the brand new wireless set. Do you think that intelligent persons would have feared anything if they had taken that course? But instead of adopting a course like that, the course which they have adopted is one of hiding themselves so long as they could, the equipment so long as they

could — it is a difficult course of conduct to reconcile with innocence.” In relation to Sjoerd Pons’s defence, Mr Justice Wrottesley restated his opinion. “You may think,” he said, “that that is a cock and bull story.” The jury retired to consider its verdict half way through the third day of the trial — and an hour later it came back with a question. What should they do, the foreman asked, if they thought that one of the defendants had originally conspired with the others to spy for Germany — but that “when he arrived in England he decided that he would not do anything to help the enemy but he would make a clean breast of it here.” Sir William Jowett, counsel for the prosecution, stood and said that would be a verdict of not guilty. Minutes later, the jury returned with a not guilty 

BOTTOM MIDDLE: The festively named defence counsel, Christmas Humpreys. Pons told him that he and Kieboom had been caught smuggling jewels between Holland and Germany. BOTTOM RIGHT: Treachery Act. "If, with intent to help the enemy, any person does, or attempts or conspires...any act designed to give assistance to the enemy... he shall on conviction suffer death."

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verdict for Pons, and guilty verdicts for Kieboom and Meier. In Jowett’s view, expressed after the trial, Pons was only acquitted because the jury were not keen to see him executed. Pons certainly seems to have cut a more sympathetic figure than Kieboom, and it is certainly not unknown for juries to decide cases on emotion rather than logic. On the facts as presented, however, Kieboom and Meier had made attempts to hide their equipment, and conceal their identities, while Pons was unresisting and relatively co-operative after arrest. The jury may, therefore, have believed that Pons’s actions revealed a genuine desire to surrender once in England. The three guilty men, Waldberg, Meier and Kieboom were hanged at Pentonville Prison in December. After the executions, the veil of secrecy was set aside, and the public was informed that three men had been convicted of treachery, and executed. A photo of Waldberg’s radio transmitter even appeared in The Times. But the public was never told that a fourth man had been acquitted. The existence of Sjoerd Pons had to remain a secret. Pons was instantly rearrested by MI5 as he left the

dock and interned as an enemy alien. He was described, during his subsequent five-and-a-half year internment, as ‘a difficult, dangerous and surly customer’, who ‘expressed anti-semitic views as well as admiration for German efficiency.’ This is hardly the victimised Anglophile who appeared before the jury — and one wonders how his admiration for Teutonic efficiency could have survived his Abwehr spy training. Pons was deported to Holland in July 1946 on a flight from Hendon alongside other Dutch internees. He was taken into custody in Holland, but released two months later. He moved to France in 1953, and then to Spain where he died in 1983.

LEFT AND ABOVE: Carl Meier and his American fiancée, and part of his farewell letter. TOP RIGHT: Another German comes ashore at Dungeness in 1940. Wounded Messerschmitt 109 pilot,Uffz Heinrich Bley of 4./LG2 (head bandaged in the bow) has been rescued by the RNLI. On the shore are soldiers of the Somerset Light Infantry and local fishing families who had all been caught up in the spy drama at this same location just four weeks earlier. (G PEARSON)

LEFT: On 7 September 1940 the Luftwaffe launched its all-out Blitz on London. This made the British authorities believe that invasion was now imminent. (G PEARSON)

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A search through the case files reveals letters that Meier, Kieboom and Waldberg wrote to their loved ones the night before their executions. They died believing that these letters had been sent via the Red Cross — but they never were. A section of Meier’s gives an insight into his true state of mind, rather different from anything he had told the jury: “I went into this with both my eyes open, telling myself that a man who has an ideal must be willing to sacrifice everything for it or else the ideal isn’t an ideal at all, or the man isn’t a man at all, but a humble creature who deserves only pity.” The story of the four invasion spies is not simply an episode of Dad’s Army recast by the German Intelligence Service. It represents the only part of the German invasion actually to arrive, and it helped to prompt the invasion alarm on 7 September when the codeword ‘Cromwell’, an alert for ‘immediate action’, went out to the army. The story tells of a secret trial held during a war fought — ironically — to preserve liberties such as open justice. The justification for secrecy was that transparency would have offered an unthinkable advantage to an enemy of unparalleled evil. This can hardly be challenged by hindsight — but will R v. Meier, Kieboom and Pons ever be cited as the precedent for a future secret trial? Whenever the right to trial by jury is discussed, this case deserves to be invoked. As a nation, we should remember it with pride.  JOSHUA LEVINE published his first book in 2006, and has now written six best selling histories. His account of the Irish Troubles was nominated for the Writer’s Guild Book of the Year Award, and his history of the pilots of the First World War has been turned into a major British television documentary.. He has written and presented a number of programmes for BBC Radio 4. In a previous life, he was a criminal barrister.

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IMAGE

OF WAR

GRAVEYARD GRAFFITI Late September 1940

On 15 September 1940, later celebrated as Battle of Britain Day, Uffz August Klick of 3./LG 2 was shot down in this Messerschmitt 109 (W.Nr 2058) at Shellness on the Isle of Sheppey, Kent. Uffz Klick was taken POW. His Me 109 was photographed in the aluminium scrap processing depot at Adderbury, alongside wrecks of Dornier 17s and a Junkers 87 ‘Stuka’, during a visit by members of the Press. Chalked graffiti is scrawled on the fuselage around the ‘Mickey Mouse’ emblem of 3./LG 2. (PIC: G PEARSON)

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GREAT WAR GALLANTRY January 1915

GREAT WAR GALLANTRY JANUARY 1915 Throughout the First World War, the many announcements of British and Commonwealth gallantry awards appeared regularly in The London Gazette. In the latest of our unique commemoration, we examine some of the actions involved and summarise all of the awards announced in January 1915.

D

URING THE war, existing medals for bravery were extended to reflect the changing nature of conflict. Consequently, in terms of British and Commonwealth gallantry awards, the month of January 1915 was important in that it saw the announcement of the first recipients of the Military Cross. Instituted on 28 December 1914, the Military Cross was issued for acts of gallantry in the presence of the enemy to junior officers of the Army who were ineligible, on account of their rank, for the Distinguished Service Order. The Royal Warrant for the MC stated, “Whereas We have taken into Our Royal consideration the distinguished services in time of War of Officers of certain ranks in our Army; and whereas we are desirous of signifying our appreciation of such services … [We] institute and create a Cross to be awarded to

MAIN PICTURE: One of the first men to be awarded the Military Cross in January 1915 was Lieutenant John Henry Stephen Dimmer, of the 2nd Battalion King’s Royal Rifle Corps. In an earlier action (12 November 1914) he was awarded the Victoria Cross: “This Officer served his machine gun during the attack on the 12th November at Klein Zillebeke until he had been shot five times — three times by shrapnel and twice by bullets, and continued at his post until his gun was destroyed.” By then a Lieutenant Colonel, he was killed in action on 21 March 1918. (ALL IMAGES HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS UNLESS STATED OTHERWISE)

ABOVE RIGHT & LEFT: G V R Issue MC, as awarded to Lt Dimmer (NB: the reverse tarnished).

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Officers whose distinguished and meritorious services have been brought to Our notice.” Regarding the mention of “certain ranks”, The London Gazette announcement stated: “It is ordained that no person shall be eligible for this Decoration nor be nominated thereto unless he be a captain, a Commissioned Officer of a lower grade, or a Warrant Officer Class I. or Class II. in Our Army, or Our Indian or Colonial Military Forces, and that the Military Cross shall be awarded only to Officers of the above ranks on a recommendation to Us by Our Principal Secretary of State for War.” The obverse of the MC has straight arms terminating in broad finials ornamented with Imperial Crowns. At the centre of the cross is the Royal Cypher of the reigning

sovereign. The reverse is plain, but from 1937 the name of the year of issue has been engraved on the lower limb of the cross (though a number of earlier awards have been privately engraved with the year and/or the recipient’s name). The ribbon is 32mm wide and is decorated with three equal vertical stripes of white, deep purple, and white. Further awards are signified by a straight silver bar decorated with a crown in the centre. During the First World War, the Military Cross also became available to equivalent ranks in the Royal Naval Division and Royal Marines, as well as, subsequently, equivalent ranks in the RAF for acts of gallantry on land. In 1931 eligibility for the MC was extended to include those with the rank of Major or its equivalent. Then, in 1979, the Queen approved a proposal that a number of awards, including the Military Cross, could in future be awarded posthumously. Following a review in 1993, the MM was discontinued and the MC became available to all ranks of all services for exemplary gallantry on land in the presence of the enemy. The very first awards of the Military Cross, 99 in number, were announced on 1 January 1915. Over 37,000 awards of the MC were made in the First World War – there were also 3,000 first Bars, 170 second Bars and four third Bars. Amongst the first group of MC recipients was Lieutenant John Henry Stephen Dimmer, of the 2nd Battalion King’s Royal Rifle Corps. Dimmer was already a holder of the Victoria Cross, this having been announced in The London Gazette of 19 November 1914. The announcement of his subsequent MC does not elaborate on the action(s) leading to the award. 

GREAT WAR GALLANTRY January 1915

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GREAT WAR GALLANTRY January 1915

GALLANTRY

AWARDS GAZETTED IN January 1915

Victoria Cross Distinguished Service Order Distinguished Service Cross Military Cross* Distinguished Flying Cross* Air Force Cross* Distinguished Conduct Medal Conspicuous Gallantry Medal Distinguished Service Medal Military Medal* Distinguished Flying Medal* Air Force Medal* Total

1 19 6 99 187 35 347

* Indicates an award that has not yet been instituted. Mentions in Despatches are not included in this survey. MAIN PICTURE: The C-class destroyer HMS Falcon underway. Having served for the whole war in Home waters, mostly as part of the Dover Patrol, Falcon was lost following a collision with the armed trawler HMS John Fitzgerald on 1 April 1918. (IWM; Q18255)

MIDDLE THREE (MEDALS): A selection of MCs illustrating various issues of the award for different sovereigns. From left to right: G VI R (first type); G VI R (second type); and E II R.

Captain Robert Foster Dill was a recipient of one of the 19 awards of the Distinguished Service Order announced in January 1915. Serving in the 129th Duke of Connaught’s Own Baluchis, Dill was mentioned in last month’s issue in relation to the Victoria Cross awarded to Sepoy Khudadad Khan. Another announced was the DSO awarded to the Reverend Percy Wyndham Guinness BA. The London Gazette of 1 January 1915 states: “On the 5th November, at Kruistraat, when Major Dixon, 16th Lancers, was mortally wounded, he went on his own initiative into the trenches, under a heavy fire, and brought him to the ambulance, and on the afternoon of the same day, being the only individual with a horse in the shelled area, took

RIGHT: The final moments of the September 1914 Battle of Trindade shown in a William Lionel Wyllie painting, as SMS Cap Trafalgar goes to the bottom.

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a message, under heavy fire, from the 4th Hussars to the headquarters of the 3rd Cavalry Brigade.” Another of the DSOs announced in January was that for LieutenantCommander Edmund Laurence Braithwaite Lockyer. Born on 20

April 1879, Lockyer had retired from the Royal Navy, with the rank of Lieutenant-Commander, in 1913. Recalled on the outbreak of war, Lockyer was present at Trindade during the sinking of the German auxiliary cruiser Cap Trafalgar — it was for his actions in this engagement that Lockyer was created a Companion of the Distinguished Service Order. The SMS Cap Trafalgar was engaged by RMS Carmania in South American waters on 14 September 1914 and the two ships fought a vigorous two-hour duel, even using machine guns to target each other’s crew. Carmania, a former ocean liner, actually took more direct hits during the battle — 73 in total — but her own more accurate gunnery caused fires to spread on the German raider. Fortunately for the British ship, with her own bridge completely shattered and damage below the waterline making the situation ominous, the Cap Trafalgar began lowering life rafts before sinking soon afterwards.

GREAT WAR GALLANTRY January 1915

German colliers in the area were able to rescue 279 German sailors with between 16 and 51 of the crew cited by different sources as killed in action or drowned. Carmania’s crew suffered nine dead and several wounded.

It was the men of the Royal Navy and Royal Marines who dominated the 35 Distinguished Service Medals awarded in January 1915. Of these, 14 were “for service in the Dardanelles in Submarine ‘B.11’ on the 13th December” (see last month’s issue for details of this action). Sixteen DSMs were announced for “the operations round Antwerp from the 3rd to the 9th October”, whilst the remainder were “for the operations off the Belgian Coast from the 17th October to the 9th November”. One of the warships deployed off the Belgian coast was the C-class destroyer HMS Falcon. On 28 October 1914, while on anti-submarine patrol in company with HMS Syren she came under heavy accurate artillery fire from a German coastal battery. Falcon remained on station and returned fire until hit by an 8-inch shell which killed eight crew including her commanding officer (16 others were wounded). Falcon made it into Dunkirk for repair and was awarded the battle honour “Belgian Coast 1914–17” for her service.

Some of the crew of HMS Falcon featured in the gallantry awards listed in January 1915. Petty-Officer Robert Chappell, for example, was one of those awarded the DSM. Though both of his legs were shattered and he was dying, Chappell continued to try and assist in the tending of the wounded. He succumbed to his wounds shortly afterwards. Petty Officer Frederick Motteram, meanwhile, received the DSM “for immediate attention to the wounded under fire”, whilst Able Seaman Ernest Dimmock, “who directly the casualties occurred in ‘Falcon,’ [and] finding himself the only person unwounded on deck, went immediately to the helm and conned the ship”. 

ABOVE RIGHT: The shattered bridge of RMS Carmania after her victory over SMS Cap Trafalgar. BOTTOM LEFT: Another painting by William Lionel Wyllie. Both SMS Cap Trafalgar (on the left) and RMS Carmania suffered many hits in the single-ship action.

RUNNING TOTAL OF

GALLANTRY

AWARDS AS OF THE END OF January 1915

Victoria Cross Distinguished Service Order Distinguished Service Cross Military Cross Distinguished Flying Cross Air Force Cross Distinguished Conduct Medal Conspicuous Gallantry Medal Distinguished Service Medal Military Medal Distinguished Flying Medal Air Force Medal Total

38 226 20 99 831 1 93 1308

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LORD ASHCROFT'S "HERO OF THE MONTH" Bandsman Thomas Edward Rendle VC - Boldness

LORD ASHCROFT'S

"HERO OF THE MONTH"

BANDSMAN THOMAS EDWARD

RENDLE VC Bandsman Thomas Edward Rendle VC

BOLDNESS THE MANY Victoria Crosses and George Crosses in the Lord Ashcroft Gallery at the Imperial War Museum in London are displayed under one of seven different qualities of bravery. Though Bandsman Thomas Rendle’s award is not part of the collection, Lord Ashcroft feels that it falls within the category of boldness: “At certain times people take a calculated risk. With audacity, dash and daring, much can be achieved. In simple terms, who dares wins. Boldness combines force with creative thinking. It is impetuous and often completed before anyone knows what is going on.”

T

HE SON of a paper merchant’s packer, Thomas Edward Rendle was born in Bedminster, Bristol, on 14 December 1884. One of seven children, he and his two brothers all served during the Great War. Rendle was educated at St Luke’s School, Bedminster, before attending nearby Kingswood Reformatory. After leaving school, he joined the Army in Bristol on 5 September 1902, aged 17. Then, days later, he joined the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry (DCLI) in Bodmin, Cornwall. In the aftermath of the Second Boer War, Rendle was sent with a draft to join the 1st Battalion DCLI at Stellenbosch, Cape Colony, and the battalion remained in South Africa until March 1906. However, shortly before leaving South Africa, Rendle, who was a bandsman, married Lillian Crowe, herself the daughter of a bandsman, on 7 February 1906. After he returned to Britain, the couple had two children, a daughter and a son. Following the outbreak of the Great War, Rendle left for France on 13 August 1914. On 23 August, he took part in the Battle of Mons and, when a comrade was seriously injured, he commandeered a car to take him to hospital. Rendle went on to take part in the Battle of Le Cateau and Battle of Aisne in France and, at the end of November, the First Battle of Ypres in neighbouring Belgium. This battle formally ended on 22 November, after which trench warfare set in for the rest of the war. It was on 20 November that Rendle showed immense courage when a heavy enemy bombardment began at 09.00 hours. At the time, he was carrying out the task of stretcher bearer — a role given to bandsmen in times of war.

When a shell landed and exploded on ‘A’ Company’s parapet, some 15 men were buried in their trenches and others were wounded and killed. Rendle hurried to the aid of the buried and wounded. The fierce fighting extended to the afternoon and, at one point, with enemy artillery fire at its height, an officer sitting at the bottom of a trench was hit and injured. Realising that his comrade was in need of urgent medical attention, Rendle crawled towards Second Lieutenant Colebrooke, despite the fact that enemy snipers had the position well covered. After reaching the injured officer, Rendle administered first aid before scraping and scratching a path through the fallen earth. With the injured man on his back, the bandsman eventually crawled to safety without being hit. Although Rendle had escaped direct injury from the shell and sniper fire, his sight had been damaged by the high explosives that had detonated all around

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C

LORD ASHCROFT'S "HERO OF THE MONTH" Bandsman Thomas Edward Rendle VC - Boldness

When a shell exploded on the parapet of a trench during the First Battle of Ypres, a bandsman acting as a stretcher bearer leapt to the rescue. So began the story of the only VC awarded to Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry during the First World War. him. He was therefore invalided home. In the aftermath of his bravery, he was promoted to lance corporal and sent to recuperate at No.1 Temporary Hospital in Exeter. The award of his Victoria Cross was announced in The London Gazette on 11 January 1915. The investiture took place at Buckingham Palace on 12 July 1915 at a time when recipients of the VC were treated with celebrity status. In order to avoid the attention of the autograph hunters and female admirers outside the gates, Rendle and three other VC recipients needed a taxi to get them in and out of Buckingham Palace. In fact, Rendle was the only member of the DCLI to be awarded the VC during the First World War and he was also decorated with the Order of St George, 4th Class (Russia). After leaving hospital, the bandsman was never well enough to return to the front line. Instead, he took part in a recruiting

African veterans’ group called the Memorable Order of Tin Hats, “Moths” for short. With Rendle abroad, an imposter in the UK with the same surname — Joseph Rendle — started impersonating him around the country, using a VC that he had bought to add authenticity to his claims. However, he was eventually arrested, charged and fined. Rendle died from a coronary thrombosis at the Groote Shuur Hospital in Cape Town on 1 June 1946, aged 61. There were massive crowds on the streets of Cape Town for his funeral two days later. He is buried at Maitland Road No.1 Cemetery in Cape Town, while his VC and service medals belong to the DCLI Regimental Collection in Bodmin, Cornwall.  campaign and was employed as a musketry instructor. At one point, he found time to return to his old school St Luke’s, where he was given a warm reception by pupils and staff. After being invalided out of the Army on 12 November 1920, with the rank of sergeant, Rendle returned with his family to South Africa where, as the recipient of the VC, he was always much respected. For many years, he was a part-time bandmaster with the Duke of Edinburgh’s Own Rifles, Cape of Good Hope, and he also worked as caretaker and stationery controller for a branch of Standard Bank. Furthermore, Rendle was an enthusiastic member of a South

LEFT: Bandsman Thomas Edward Rendle in action on 20 November 1914. The original caption states: “Whilst heavy howitzers were dropping their shells upon a trench occupied by the Cornwalls at Wulverghem, Bandsman Thomas Edward Rendle, of the 1st Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry, was attending to the rapidly increasing number of wounded. Suddenly a huge shell burst upon the parapet of a trench nearby, completely shattering the top of it and burying some wounded men under the debris.” (ALL IMAGES HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS)

LEFT: Rendle pictured during his stay in hospital in Exeter. BOTTOM LEFT: A second drawing depicts Rendle, scraping the earth away with his bare hands under constant threat from shelling and sniper fire.

VICTORIA CROSS HEROES LORD ASHCROFT KCMG PC is a Conservative peer, businessman, philanthropist, author and pollster. His book Victoria Cross Heroes is largely based on his VC collection. For more information, please visit: www.victoriacrossheroes.com Lord Ashcroft’s VC and GC collection is on public display at Imperial War Museums, London. For more information visit: www.iwm.org.uk/heroes. For details about his VC collection, visit: www.lordashcroftmedals.com For more information on Lord Ashcroft’s work, visit: www. lordashcroft.com. Follow him on Twitter: @LordAshcroft

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THE RAF ON THE AIR Flying Officer Ronald Adam 

    

 B 15 PART

MAIN PICTURE: Spitfires of 222 Squadron scramble from RAF Hornchurch during September 1940. Leading the take-off is a Mk.I Spitfire with the code letters ZD-C. In the right foreground is an ex-610 Squadron aircraft. (WW2IMAGES)

MIDDLE RIGHT: A Luftwaffe raid in progress, an attack which may well have resulted in a scramble by the squadrons based at Hornchurch. German bombers are above what is now Thamesmead near Woolwich, 7 September 1940. (HISTORIC

ORN IN 1896, Ronald George Hinings Adams was a veteran of the First World War who served as a fighter pilot in the RFC and RAF. On Sunday, 7 April 1918, Adams was flying a Sopwith Camel of ‘B’ Flight, 73 Squadron, when was shot down during an offensive patrol to Amiens. He was, according to the official German claim, the 78th victim of Manfred von Richthofen. Badly wounded, Adams survived to be taken prisoner. After the war, Adams trained as a chartered accountant before moving into theatre management. In time he turned to acting itself — both on the stage and screen. It was in this period he dropped the ‘s’ from his surname. Adam rejoined the RAF on the outbreak of war in 1939, but this time it was not to be in a flying role. First broadcast on 22 May 1945, Adam’s account provides an insight into an unusual aspect of the RAF during the Battle of Britain, when he was a controller for the Hornchurch sector.

MILITARY PRESS)

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“When I was ordered to report to Hornchurch in 1939 the piece of paper was marked ‘A&SD Ops’. I knew that ‘A&SD’ meant Administrative and Special Duties branch, but ‘Ops’ conveyed nothing to me. In my flying days of the last war there had been no such expressions. But when I first entered the Operations Room I realised that that was what Ops stood for … “I stood and stared at the plotting table underneath the strong arc lights and wondered how long it would take me to assimilate and understand all the details of this queer room. For my first tour of duty I was put beside another officer a few weeks more experienced than myself and I faced a bewildering number of telephone keys. They all had little labels above them showing where they were supposed to be connected to, but the labels had a habit of shifting about. It was possible to think that you were phoning to a squadron at dispersal huts and find yourself connected to a surprised Air Marshal …

During the Second World War, RAF personnel regularly described their activities on the radio for listeners of the BBC. These broadcasts described their experiences in their own words and in effect provided the human stories behind the official communiqués. Each month we present one of these narratives, an account selected from over 280 broadcasts which were, at the time, given anonymously. TOP RIGHT: A view of the kind of scene that would have been witnessed by Ronald Adam during his time at Hornchurch — a Sector Operations Room, in this case that of RAF Tangmere. (HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS)

“After a few weeks I found myself transferred to the Controllers chair with all the business of radio telephony patter to learn and how to guide our own pilots to make contact with the enemy. A ‘Vector’ meant to give him a course to steer, ‘Bandits’ meant German aircraft, ‘so many angels’ meant so many thousand feet in height, and the electric phrase ‘Tally Ho’ from the pilot meant that your directions to him had been successful and he’d sighted the enemy and he was going to engage him. “The days of that Phoney War were interesting because we were learning a new job. We practised with our aircraft incessantly and every now and then the enemy would obligingly

put in an appearance over the North Sea and, more often than not, were successfully engaged. The radio stations around our coast, those tall masts that puzzled people before the war, were able to pick up and identify the enemy. The information was passed to us and our plotters plotted it with arrows on a great table map below us. We could find out the position of our own fighters from their radio transmissions and so a thrilling game of hide and seek developed while we waited for the ‘Tally Ho’. “Radar was in its infancy in those days and the enemy certainly didn’t appreciate its possibilities; nor, thank goodness, did we in ops

fully appreciate its limitations or we might have been more worried. The technicians knew of course but they didn’t split. For it wasn’t all that accurate and there were times when it could fail to give any information at all. If the enemy had known just how to outwit it, which it could have done quite simply, the Battle of Britain would have to have been fought in a very different way and with perhaps a different ending.” The Blitzkrieg was followed by a period of great uncertainty. “The battle of Holland and of Belgium and of France developed and things were pretty tough but it was Dunkirk that made my spirits rise again,” continued Adam. 

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THE RAF ON THE AIR Flying Officer Ronald Adam

“I can’t believe that the much vaunted Luftwaffe didn’t put out its best efforts to prevent the evacuation from those Dunkirk beaches. It was then that the fighter boys showed just what they could do to the Luftwaffe. For the handful of them that were available, clawed the enemy out of the sky. I know the Army wondered where the aircraft were. They couldn’t be expected to realise that a few dozen fighters were engaging hundreds of the enemy out of sight over the sea. I thought then that if that’s what the fighters can do there’s hope for us – if only we can get some more. “Then came the astonishing lull during July that puzzled us. We all knew how limited our resources were, how few aircraft and trained pilots we’d got ready for action and we didn’t and we couldn’t understand why the enemy didn’t come for us at once. There was about a six weeks pause. “We held our breath during it and then early in August 1940 the radar plots began to show the enemy assembling in the air behind Cap Gris Nez in France. There he was milling around as one formation after another joined up and we went to our loud speakers when our group headquarters gave the order telling the squadrons to take off. ‘Scramble’ was the word we’d use. ‘Vector 140, Angels 20” and Spitfires would tear into the sky and go off on their course over Maidstone climbing to 20,000 feet to meet the oncoming enemy. “As he came we’d sit there on the ground, watch the plots and gather such 82 www.britainatwar.com

information as we could from the Royal Observer Corps and from our Army liaison officers. We’d pass information onto the pilots telling them all changes in the enemy’s direction; how he was splitting up into different formations; what height he was flying at and guiding our fighters to the most advantageous position up in the eye of the sun ready to attack. “The Battle of Britain is summarised for me in one snatch on the radio telephone from a famous New Zealand fighter who is still alive. I heard his voice in my ear as he sighted the enemy, ‘Christ Almighty, Tally Ho! Whole bloody hordes of them!’ That will forever be to me the Battle of Britain. “During the next six weeks, as so many of us watched the battle in our skies in the South East corner of England, from just before dawn until after last light of those days of outstanding summer weather, the Spitfires flew and flew, and the air crackled not only with explosions but with the voices of the controllers on the radio and the answers of the pilots

and the breathless messages they passed to one another. When we came out of that strange bungalow building so near the main hangars of the aerodrome, we’d stroll around in the sunlight to the pilots’ dispersal huts on the other side and see them stretched out on beds or in wicker chairs fast asleep with their Mae West’s slung loosely upon them and their clumsy flying boots on their feet. “Every time the telephone bell rang in the dispersal hut, or every time a voice was heard booming on the loudspeaker, all the sleeping figures would wake up and listen and if it wasn’t an urgent call for them they’d fall back and be asleep in an instant. Generally the radio was on at full blast – that didn’t disturb them. The roar of aircraft taking off and the clatter of vehicles passing by, those didn’t disturb them either. But a telephone bell had them alert and grabbing for their flying helmets before it had stopped ringing. Often they were pretty nearly out on their feet. “For instance, after one long day’s flying, one of our boys landed and the Spitfire trundled along the ground and came to rest and nobody got out of it. The ground crew rushed out and tried to help their pilot but he was slumped in his cockpit. He wasn’t wounded; he was just fast asleep. “The ground crews themselves, stripped to the waist, worked day and night rearming and refuelling and repairing because the stock of [aircraft] replacements kept going down and the margin was getting narrower

BELOW LEFT: A marker used to help guide friendly fighters to enemy contact. It denotes that 20 enemy (red) aircraft, approaching at an altitude of 25,000 feet, are being intercepted by 92 and 72 Squadrons from RAF Biggin Hill. (COURTESY OF

DANIEL STIRLAND)

FAR LEFT: A reconstruction of the Sector Room at Duxford, which controlled the area from London to The Wash. Radio and telephone operators sat on the upper level, with plot operators in the white chairs. (COURTESY OF JON BENNETT)

TOP RIGHT: The plotting table in the surviving, and remarkably complete, wartime RAF Digby Sector Operations Room which is located in the original 1937dated bunker.

ABOVE MIDDLE: Ronald Adam was a successful actor both before and after his sterling RAF service during the Second World War, and later appeared in famous Battle of Britain-themed films such as Angels One Five and Reach For The Sky.

and narrower as the days went by. Occasionally some lone ferry pilot would arrive with a replacement, a new or patched up Spitfire – that was only on rare occasions. In those days, and at the beginning of September 1940, although I didn’t know it at the time, we were actually down to a few days’ replacements and that was all that stood between us and many grim possibilities. “I don’t think the boys had any conscious idea of being heroic; they’ve a horror of what they call line shooting. We, none of us, had a real knowledge of

how desperate things were in fact. But we realised, without needing facts, that this would be the end if it couldn’t be withstood. The boys’ abounding high spirits were rather stilled by September. They were strained and silent, but never for one instant did they fail to leap for their aircraft like scalded cats the moment the scramble was given. “Solidly and speedily the enemy poured across the Straits of Dover and still that magic eye of the radar spotted him and still the tired pilots went up to shoot him down while he bombed their landing runs beneath them. I remember in one of those bombing raids kneeling with the telephone in my hand. It was some sort of psychological comfort to kneel rather than to stand upright. “I remember getting the depleted squadrons off the ground to meet an oncoming raid and they were all off except the last section of three when the bombs fell. All three aircraft had opened up their throttles to take off. The first was blown upside down and slid about 200 yards on its cockpit. The second was blown in the air and both its wings fell off. The third was blown clean out of the aerodrome and into a nearby brook. “In the middle of the smoke and confusion a pitch battle raged in the middle of the aerodrome. The undamaged pilot of the second aircraft ran to the first one. He managed to pull the pilot of it out and was trying to carry him. Eric was a little fellow. He had great admiration for the big husky pilot he was trying to save, but the husky pilot had no

wish to be saved by Eric and the protests he made ended in a furious battle. “This raid drove [the] Operations Room away from its aerodrome and it retired to an emergency pitch some four miles away in a small unoccupied grocer’s shop where we almost sat on one another’s laps to control. We were bombed there within a few days of setting up. “So the heat was turned on and grew throughout August and the opening days of September until the historic day of September the 15th. I was controller on duty that night when my group rang through to give the score – 185 enemy aircraft destroyed, 14 pilots lost on our side. “It wasn’t the end of the Battle of Britain, but it was the beginning of the end. Less and less enemy bombers came with more and more enemy fighters trying to protect them and now more ferry pilots arrived with more aircraft and more pilots to fly them. Still, we knew there was much ahead to endure but we also knew that what we’d suspected at Dunkirk had come true. We had taken the measure of the Luftwaffe and thrashed his hordes with a handful of fighter pilots.” Such was Adam’s skill that Jeffrey Quill, the distinguished Spitfire test pilot on attachment to 65 Squadron at Hornchurch during the Battle of Britain, once wrote: “Apart from being highly competent at the actual job, his [Adam’s] voice had a quality of calm and unhesitating certainty ... The contribution of such men to the outcome of the Battle of Britain was incalculable.”  www.britainatwar.com 83

THE WINTER of 1914/15 on the Western Front was an atrocious one, with heavy rain, frost, snow and gales succeeding each other with hardly a break. In places, the ground was so sodden that movements of troops became almost impossible, making life in the trenches ever harder. The British, with steadily increasing numbers, were now able to take over some trenches from the French and to extend their general line. Actions at sea included the loss of HMS Formidable and what became known as the Battle of The Dogger Bank. The British Isles suffered attack from the first raids by German airships and through bombardment from the sea. The global nature of the conflict continued to be demonstrated with actions in Africa, the Middle East and India. It was in this month that the fateful decision was taken to launch the operation in the Dardanelles which would open yet another front, a further manifestation of what was truly a ‘world war’.

HOME FRONT

19 January First airship raids on England. German airship L3, attacks Yarmouth and L4 attacks Sheringham, Thornham and Brancaster, a wireless station at Hunstanton, as well as Heacham, Snettisham, and King’s Lynn. A third airship L6 is forced to turn back as a result of the bad weather.

HOME FRONT

9 January Walney Island battery (Barrowin-Furness) shelled by German submarine U-21.

WAR AT SEA

1 January HMS Formidable sunk by German submarine in English Channel. Early in the morning, she is engaged in an exercise in the English Channel in rough sea conditions. At 02.20 hours a torpedo fired by U-24 strikes the ship on the port side resulting in the vessel sinking with a large loss of life: 35 officers (including the ship’s Captain) and 512 men from a complement of 780. The high loss of life is attributed to the speed of her sinking, combined with bad weather.

WESTERN FRONT

25 January The Germans attack at Givenchy. After fierce fighting the advance of the enemy is arrested and driven back with difficulty.

DARDANELLES

28 January British Government decides to make naval attack on the Dardanelles

SOUTH WEST AFRICA 14 January The coastal town of Swakopmund in German South-West Africa occupied by Union forces.

SOUTH AFRICA

23 January Defence of Upington. A mixed force comprising Germans and men under command of Colonel Marie Maritz and Major Jan Kemp attack the Union force holding the town of Upington, in the Northern Cape province of South Africa, on the banks of the Orange River. The attack fails and after the Union forces counter-attack, Kemp is forced to surrender unconditionally. The remaining troops under Maritz are forced to retire.

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SOUTH AFRICA 11 January Last rebels in the Transvaal captured. A small band are taken near the Bechuanaland border trying to escape into German South West Africa.

WAR AT SEA

24 January Battle of The Dogger Bank The Dogger Bank is a large sandbank in a shallow area of the North Sea lying around 62 miles off Britain’s east coast and an important fishing ground for the British fishing fleet. Believing that British fishing vessels arre being used to spy on the movements of its warships the German Navy decides to attack the fishing boats. However, knowledge of the proposed attack has been intercepted and decoded by British Naval Intelligence. Royal Navy forces intercept and surprise the German ships sent to attack the fishing boats resulting in the sinking of the armoured cruiser SMS Blücher. The British flagship HMS Lion receives heavy damage during this action (See detailed article, Britain at War, Issue 91).

MIDDLE EAST

26 January Turkish advance on Suez Canal and Egypt through Sinai begins. The Suez Canal was of great importance to Britain’s strategic interests and its sea-borne communications with the Empire. When Turkey declared war, Egypt became a British protectorate. The Turks were therefore determined to make a bid to seize the canal. A force led by Djemal Pasha and the German Colonel Kress von Kressenstein, marches 20,000 men through the Sinai Desert and arrives on the eastern bank of the canal. They carry pontoons and bridges brought all the way from Germany. British aircraft spot the Turkish advance and as a result the British defenders are prepared.

INDIA/ASIA

7 January Affair of Spina Khaisora When the conflict began German agents based in Persia stirred up agitation among the frontier tribes along India’s north-west border, resulting in raids taking place across the border from Afghanistan. In January 1915 the British military post at Spina Khaisora is attacked. A relief force is sent and after desperate fighting the attacking tribesmen give way. The North-West Frontier was as dangerous a place to be as any during the First World War. On 7 January 1915 Captain Eustace Jotham serving with the 51st Sikhs, Frontier Force, is posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross: ‘For most conspicuous bravery on 7th January 1915, at Spina Khaisora (Tochi Valley). During operations against the Khostwal tribesmen, Captain Jotham, who was commanding a party of about a dozen of the North Waziristan Militia, was attacked in a nullah (a steep narrow watercourse usually dry until after rain) and almost surrounded by an overwhelming force of some 1,500 tribesmen. He gave the order to retire, and could have himself escaped, but most gallantly sacrificed his own life by attempting to effect the rescue of one of his men who had lost his horse’.

MIDDLE EAST

10 January British Defence of Muscat (Eastern Arabia) Muscat and Oman are thought strategically important by the Royal Navy and a Political Agent and small British military garrison are maintained in Muscat. German agents encourage disaffection among local tribesmen, leading to the reinforcement of the British garrison .On 10 January large groups of armed Omani’s advance and attack the garrison. The assault is vigorously repulsed by the British garrison forcing the attackers to withdraw.

EAST AFRICA

1 January Mafia Island seized by a British force Mafia Island lies off the coast of modern day Tanzania. A German possession in 1915, the British decide to occupy the island to enable it to be used as a base for operations against German sea raiders. A small German garrison holds the island and put up a vigorous defence when on 11 January a British force occupies the territory.

EAST AFRICA

18 January German forces under command of General Lettow-Vorbeck attack the British held town of Jasin. The town and British positions are surrounded and forced to surrender.

MIDDLE EAST

31 January Forces under Sayyid Muhammad Idrisi revolt against the Ottoman Turks and seize the Farasan Islands (off what is now the south western coast of Saudi Arabia). Idrisi then signs a treaty with Britain and hands the islands over to British control.

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The typed report supplied at the time by a Captain of the Royal Tank Regiment reveals much about the haphazard defence of Crete. While planning and efficiency were poor, courage and the ability to improvise were to the fore, as Martin Langsford describes.

O

N 8 April 1941 the 7th Royal Tank Regiment received orders that a party with requisite transport should prepare to leave Egypt within the week. Under the burning sun 35 men and six Matilda II tanks joined Captain H.S. Badrock at the quayside, where they were to board a transport ship bound for Crete, which was soon to be under German attack. Captain Badrock’s party landed at Suda Bay just before dawn on 13 May. It had been tasked with guarding the three main airfields at Heraklion, Retimo and Maleme, identified as the main landing zones for the expected German troops. Churchill himself had recommended that tanks could make a vital contribution to the defence of Crete and had wanted another dozen sent.1 But Captain Badrock had only his six Matildas and for the next few days he concentrated on getting the tanks and stores ready, should the invasion materialize. 86 www.britainatwar.com

MOVING THE TANKS Badrock began by guiding the four tanks bound for Heraklion and Maleme from the disembarkation point. He soon assessed that the island was not ideal for tanks and considered the machines’ deployment to be “a complete waste of time and material”. In his report he explained his views: “The country was absolutely unsuitable for tanks, consisting of nothing but orange groves, with the trees exactly the right height

BELOW: One of the Matilda tanks involved in the fighting at Retimo pictured after the war, on the beach near the airfield. (COURTESY OF

THE AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL; 131042)

to allow the turret of a tank to be made useless in the foliage and make the tank completely blind. There were two fairly large streams which could be crossed at only one point [and] all the streams on the island run in deep gulleys.”2 Alongside the problems with the terrain there was the constant presence of the Luftwaffe, and as a result all tank movements had to be conducted at night. With no way of travelling cross country the slow moving Matildas would be sitting ducks as they trundled along in single file on the long narrow roads. One tank crew survivor recalled how, “a swarm of Me 109s like angry buzzing bees beset our two tanks, hot flakes of burning metal flew off the inside of the turret into our faces.”3 The four tanks were intended to act as dug-in pillboxes, so Badrock had them laagered undercover, where they were to lay-up and wait for their positions to be ready. When he returned to the quayside he found that the Retimo tanks still sat helplessly unloaded. Frustrated,

TANK GUARDIANS OF RETIMO Defence of Crete 1941 MAIN PICTURE: The German invasion of Crete under way on 20 May 1941 in the area of Suda Bay. (HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS)

RIGHT: German Fallschirmjäger, or parachute troops, descend on Crete as part of Operation Mercury, 20 May 1941. (HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS)

he turned his attention to building up enough stores to keep his tanks operational throughout the battle. This was no easy task as the German fighters and bombers had effected an aerial blockade of the entire island with little to no supplies getting through. Fuel and ammunition were at the top of Badrock’s list. He was presented with a dwindling supply of fuel from the 3rd Hussars who were manning 16 Vickers Light Tanks on the island. Unfortunately, the remaining fuel was on a supply ship which had been added to the Luftwaffe’s growing tally of hits. Yet Badrock’s fears were laid to rest when foraging parties managed to save the fuel on board the burning ship and distribute it among the defenders. Badrock was now into his third day on the island when the Retimo tanks were finally unloaded, but when at last they made it ashore the tanks had to endure a 40-mile trip to the airfield. The tanks themselves were not in the best of condition; most were suffering from battery trouble and had been almost run into the ground during the fighting in Libya. In fact the 25-ton Matildas were rejected from the Desert Army on account of mechanical failures, which remained unrepaired.4

Predictably, it had taken only a few hours for the first of the tanks destined for Retimo to break down. When the Captain reached the stricken Matilda the Ordnance Officer accompanying the tank had already returned to start work on a spare. Badrock then proceeded to Retimo to see how preparations were coming along and found No.2 Matilda in position. He also learnt that the stricken tank was now on the move and destined to be at the airfield the next day. But on the seventh day this tank had still not been seen.

Badrock discovered that it had gone no more than ten miles and had broken down again. He went off to find the tank, deciding to take a spare from the Matilda already in position to be fitted to the troublesome vehicle. The crew, meanwhile, kept out of sight from the constant aerial threat. Badrock was woken on the eighth day by intensive air activity over the whole area, having spent the night at Kanea with Force HQ. He tried repeatedly to contact the position at Retimo but all communication was impossible. He therefore sat blind as events unfolded. 

RIGHT: Matilda tanks being loaded at a British port.

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TANK GUARDIANS OF RETIMO Defence of Crete 1941 LEFT: Having just completed their drop on Crete, Fallschirmjäger gather together their equipment. (BUNDESARCHIV, BILD 141-0864/ CC-BY-SA)

BELOW: Three unnamed men of the 2/1st Battalion AIF rest in an olive grove near the airfield. (COURTESY OF THE AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL; P10262001)

An hour into the battle the tanks were ordered to move on to the high ground where the enemy were massing. Having to stick to roads, the Matildas could not go far into the countryside to flush out the German attackers, who reportedly ducked down and found cover once they heard the rumble of tanks. One Matilda soon bellied on the edge of a ditch on the north side of the airfield while the second fell into a ravine some ten feet deep. On dismounting from his tank Lieutenant Simpson was killed by a burst of machine-gun fire, and with nowhere to go the remaining crews sat with their stricken vehicles and could offer no help to the battle.

Throughout the build-up Badrock was unknowingly suffering from the early stages of typhoid. On the ninth day his legs failed him and he became a stretcher case. It was only thanks to his driver Trooper Nash, who ferried him around the island, that he managed to escape, following the subsequent German capture of the island.5

AIRFIELD DEFENCE By 20 May the tanks had finally arrived at Retimo. Here they were kept as a mobile reserve by Lieutenant Colonel Campbell who was organising the defence. He had decided that, unlike the Matildas at the other airfields, their best use would be to keep them as a mobile reserve. Thanks to Campbell’s planning and concealment of his men and tanks German intelligence reported that the Retimo defences were almost non-existent and therefore the attacking forces were weaker than at the other landing sites.6 The defenders of Retimo were mainly Australian, men of the 2/1st infantry Battalion who had already been blooded in the Western Desert and had seen the Matilda earn the nickname the ‘Queen of the Desert’ during the successful campaign between autumn 1940 and spring 1941. There were also four battalions of Greek infantry whose

weapons were mostly manufactured before 1900, a number of Cretan police, some captured Italian guns manned by Australian gunners, two machinegun battalions, and a section of field engineers. Shortages in ammunition, mortars, medical equipment – even clothing – meant that Retimo was far worse off than the airfields at Heraklion and Maleme. At 16.00 hours bombs and low-level strafing raked across the airfield. Soon 2 Fallschirmjäger-Regiment under Oberst Alfred Sturm was being dropped on their positions. There were no anti-aircraft guns available for defence, but as the transport aircraft were flying so low it was reported that nine were brought down by small arms fire, Nevertheless, by afternoon 1,200 paratroopers had landed around Retimo.

ABOVE LEFT: A view of the area where the airfield was located at Retimo. This picture was taken after the war from the site of the Headquarters of the 2/1st Battalion AIF during the fighting in May 1941. The precise location is a spur on what was known as Hill D. (COURTESY OF

THE AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL; 131063)

Soon the Germans had captured most of the high ground around the airfield including the tanks and their crews. The Australian infantry were eventually pushed back to the airfield but during this time Lieutenant Mason, an officer from the Royal Army Ordnance Corps, had arranged for the bellied Matilda to be brought back to the base area of the battalion. He quickly formed a scratch crew from a nearby Carrier Platoon, which received some quick training in tank operation. The other Matilda still lay helplessly in the ravine, but appreciating the value that these vehicles could offer the defence Mason tasked a group to begin digging out the second vehicle. The Matilda and its new crew were first used for a reconnaissance towards a large olive oil factory. In command was Sergeant Huckett, who pushed on past  BELOW: Fallschirmjäger attack Allied positions during the invasion of Crete. (BUNDESARCHIV, BILD 101I-166-0508-31/ WEIXLER,FRANZ PETER/CC-BY-SA)

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TANK GUARDIANS OF RETIMO Defence of Crete 1941 at the two other airfields. He wanted to destroy his attackers at the earliest opportunity. This approach was deemed to be the appropriate technique to deal with airborne attacks; it was later used at Arnhem by the Germans with considerable success. The effectiveness of the British tanks on the island is still contested today. General Freyberg, Allied commander on Crete, suggested that it would have been better to get all six tanks together in one detachment rather than splitting them among the airfields.9 Yet the urgency shown by Mason to get the Matildas back into operation illustrates how the ABOVE LEFT: The lucky ones. A group of British soldiers who managed to escape from Crete, photographed later back in North Africa. FAR RIGHT: A Matilda tank dug-in in much the same manner as those during the action at Retimo. Although Badrock thought the terrain unsuitable, the Germans paratroopers feared tanks above all else.

BELOW LEFT: A Matilda tank in action. Their use on Crete is still debated today, with suggestions that they would have been better in one detachment, rather than split.

the factory to gauge the situation around the Retimo area. He linked up with the infantry dug in around the airfield but when leaning out of the tank talking to an infantryman he was hit in the arm and wounded. It was around this time that a threehour truce was agreed upon to clear the dead and bring in the wounded. Bandages were made from the silk parachutes that littered the battlefield.7 Campbell had identified the importance of the local village of Perivolia, which soon became the contested prize of both forces. On the 26th an attack was scheduled and the lone Matilda accompanied the infantry to attack in and around the town. But yet again problems ensued — the tank’s Besa machine gun jammed and with no fire support the attack was halted and then postponed. Repair work got the gun working again and an attack was delivered around an olive oil factory to the east of the airfield. Infantry rushed the buildings under fire support from the Matilda and overran the factory capturing 80 prisoners.8

LAST STAND A number of Allied soldiers were being held captive within the factory, including the Matilda crews. Despite being reunited with their tanks they were in no state to take back their vehicles as they were practically starved after living off just a few biscuits and little water. So the scratch crews kept their vehicles.

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With Perivolia still in German hands another attempt at re-taking the village was scheduled for the 27th. Lieutenant Lawry and three gunners from the Australian Artillery were in one tank, with the second Matilda commanded by Lieutenant Beddells supported by two gunners from 2/3rd Field Regiment. The crews were familiar with gunnery and employed the 2-pounder gun on targets as they moved towards the town. However, by this time the German paratroopers had been well supplied and were armed with more than just submachine guns. Lieutenant Lawry on the left flank was hit by an anti-tank round that penetrated the tank, killing the gunner and forcing the crew to bail out of the burning tank in full view of the enemy. The second tank commanded by Lieutenant Beddells had made it to the German forward positions when it struck a mine, which broke the track. The crew were forced to bail out under a hail of machine-gun fire, which resulted in all of the survivors being wounded, including Beddells who lost several fingers when reaching out of the cupola. Both tanks were finished off by mortar fire as they sat helpless just yards from German positions. Now without support from the tanks the attack was again called off. Facing impossible odds, the Allied forces were compelled to evacuate Crete. Unfortunately, owing to the fog of war, the garrison at Retimo never received the order to fight their way southward for evacuation, and soon the Australians were greeted with the sight and sound of Germans advancing towards the airfield. Depleted in numbers, low on ammunition and with no communications to the rest of the island, Lieutenant Colonel Campbell surrendered the airfield. But Retimo had not been captured by the Fallschirmjäger; the defenders were not defeated by their attackers but by the battle being lost elsewhere. Campbell’s approach at Retimo was different to that of the commanders

defenders of Retimo viewed the value of tanks. Out of all the possible threats that the German paratroopers could face, they feared the use of tanks the most. The Fallschirmjäger commander, General Student, expected to meet armour but still found that the tanks were more effective than he had first thought. “The few British tanks that were there shocked us badly at the start — it was lucky that there were not more. In fact we were surprised when no tanks burst in amongst the aircraft when we landed.” Many of the Retimo defenders attempted to escape from Crete but only a relatively small number succeeded. On a commandeered ship with over 100 men of all nations crammed on deck, including the men of 7 RTR, one survivor of that perilous journey to safety remarked: “It was HELL - but it was worth it. Now to get at `em again!”10 As for the Matildas at Retimo, it appears they remained for four years in the spot where they were knocked out. 

NOTES 1.

McD G Stewart, The Struggle for Crete: A Story of Lost Opportunity (Oxford University Press 1966), p.98. 2. 7th Royal Tank Regiment War Diary, Appendix X p 5. 3. McD G Stewart, op. cit., p.301. 4. Ibid, p.99. 5. Appendix X, Captain Badrock’s Diary Crete Campaign, p.6. 6. Callum MacDonald, The Lost Battle: Crete 1941 (Macmillan, 1993), p.189. 7. Ibid, p. 215. 8. C. Buckley, Greece & Crete 1941 (HM stationery Office, 1952). 9. McD G Stewart, op. cit., p.373. 10. “CRETAN ODYSSEY” Bovington Tank Museum library.

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MAIN IMAGE: A propaganda postcard purports to show an airborne L3 and exults in the airship’s accidental destruction during a naval co-operation mission in the month following its historic sortie. The crew all escaped.

S

CHOOL TEACHER Mary Telford was spellbound. She had never seen anything as weird as the “black leaden mass” hovering low in the night sky above the Norfolk seaside village of Horsey. Like some strange aerial apparition rising from the depths of darkness, “it seemed,” she thought, “to waver over the village as if uncertain of its route…” The time was 2015 hrs on 19 January, 1915, and, though it would take some hours to realise it, she had seen the German naval Zeppelin L3 bound for Great Yarmouth on a mission that would secure for her intrepid crew a place in history.

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For what Mary Telford likened to “a phantom”, lancing the spectral gloom with spears of searchlights, represented one third of an attacking force assigned the task of carrying out the first strike in a new strategic bombing offensive that would change the face of warfare forever. More speculative than spectacular, the trailblazing mission, which sparked a mixture of shock and outrage, succeeded in exposing Britain’s vulnerability to attack from the air and paved the way to more destructive bombardments in the months ahead. Yet for all the headlines and hysteria that followed, there was about this night of drama more than a hint of farce. In

fact, very little about the long-sought and much-delayed mission mounted by Fregattenkapitan Peter Strasser went according to plan.

ATTACK PLANS Strasser, the charismatic and courageous Chief of the Naval Airship Division, had been urging a strike against targets in Britain since the previous autumn. Until then, his small but growing force of Zeppelins had been confined to fleet co-operation and scouting duties, roles that a cautious German High Command was reluctant to endanger. Early proposals were for an audacious attack on London, targeting

TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915

Haphazard and wayward though it was, the first German Zeppelin attack on England a century ago was destined to have far-reaching consequences. Steve Snelling charts the fantastical and sometimes farcical raid that heralded a terrifying new form of aerial warfare. the docks and the Admiralty building in Whitehall and striking a blow against British prestige that would “cause panic in the population” and “possibly render it doubtful that the war can be continued”. Opposition from the Kaiser, on the grounds that such an assault risked damaging historic monuments and harming his Royal cousin, ensured the plans were shelved. Renewed suggestions for an attack on Britain as part of a joint offensive operation involving naval and army airships in retaliation for French air attacks on German towns were similarly disregarded for fear of provoking the

displeasure of the Supreme Warlord if any bombs went astray.   Strasser, however, refused to accept defeat and his sustained pressure eventually paid off in January 1915, when Admiral Hugo von Pohl, Chief of the Naval Staff, succeeded in wringing from the Kaiser permission for a limited air offensive against Britain. The compromise agreed sanctioned attacks on “docks and military establishments in the lower Thames and on the English coast”, but specifically excluded any assault on London itself. Germany’s naval airship division were ready. On January 10, the same day von Pohl announced the Kaiser’s

decision, Strasser forwarded a list of targets stretching from the Tyne to the mouth of the Thames. They were to be raided during the ‘dark of the moon’ - what was known as the ‘attack period’ - as soon as conditions were considered favourable. Commanders were instructed accordingly and given discretionary powers to continue or turn back over the North Sea depending on the state of the weather. The final arbiter so far as targets was concerned was the wind direction. Attacks were to be made to windward, giving the airships the helping hand of a following wind for their return flight. 

BACKGROUND IMAGERY: Damage in and around East Street and Albert Street, King’s Lynn & clippings from local newspapers immediately after the attack, publicising the damage wrought by enemy raiders in Kings Lynn and Great Yarmouth on 19 January 1915.

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TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915

PETER STRASSER Fregattenkapitan Peter Strasser (1876-1918), the charismatic and courageous Chief of the German Naval Airship Division, planned the first strike against England in January 1915 but was thwarted in his attempt to take part in the operation when L6 suffered engine trouble over the North Sea and was forced to return to base. In a strange stroke of fate, Strasser was killed leading the last Zeppelin raid of the war, when the airship in which he was a passenger was shot down off the north Norfolk coast by an aeroplane flying out of Great Yarmouth — the east coast town that bore the brunt of his trailblazing sortie.

Strasser’s commitment to the new strategy was such that he was prepared to devote three-quarters of his strength — three Zeppelins — to the raiding role, leaving only one airship for scouting. All he needed to begin his offensive was a spell of settled weather. It was a while in coming. On 13 January heavy rain frustrated the first attempt led by Heinrich Mathy, a recent recruit to the airship arm and future Zeppelin ace, even before the strike force had ventured beyond Heligoland.

MAIN PICTURE: L3 at her home base. Built in the spring of 1914, L3, commanded throughout its brief career by Hans Fritz, was the only airship in naval service at the outbreak of war following the loss of L1 and L2 to accidental crashes in the space of a single month in autumn 1913.

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ABOVE RIGHT: Aerial raider: the German naval Zeppelin L3 at Fuhlsbuttel. Note the open control car which exposed its crew to sub-zero temperatures during their epic mission.

A more favourable forecast five days later was all the encouragement Strasser needed to issue his pre-arranged attack order: “Distant scouting to west, only HVB [Handelsschiffsverkehrsbuch - the navy’s already compromised signals book for communicating with German merchant vessels] aboard.” Mathy’s curtailed mission had involved all naval airships, in contravention of his chief’s original instruction. The plan reverted back to a raiding force of three Zeppelins, with the crews of L3, L4 and L6 told to ‘stand by’. Targets were assigned and detailed instructions issued. L3, commanded

by Kapitanleutnant Hans Fritz, and L4, commanded by Kapitanleutnant Magnus Graf von Platen Hallermund, were to attack harbour installations in the vicinity of the Humber estuary, while L6, commanded by Oberleutnant zur See Horst Freiherr Treusch von  Buttlar Brandenfels, was assigned the more distant objective of bombing the docks clustered around the mouth of the Thames — the nearest place to London the Kaiser was willing to let them bomb. All three Zeppelins carried a mixture of explosive and incendiary bombs, though the amounts varied. The older airships L3 and L4, each with a 16-man crew and

TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915 30 hours worth of fuel, had a payload of eight 110-pound HE bombs and 10 or 11 25-pound incendiaries, while L6, with 11 men and fuel sufficient for 33 hours, had 10 HE bombs and 12 incendiaries in addition to one special passenger.

THE MISSION Ever the leader by example, Peter Strasser had determined to take personal charge of a mission he hoped would herald an unparalleled assault from the air that would bring Britain to its knees. Taking his place alongside Oberleutnant Buttlar Brandenfels, Strasser took off from Nordholz, near Cuxhaven, at 0938 hrs on January 19. A little over an hour later, at 1045 hrs, L3 lifted from her base at Fuhlsbuttel near Hamburg to be followed 12 minutes later by L4.

The long-awaited ‘angriff’ on England was under way, but for the German navy’s most senior airship officer any sense of satisfaction would be shortlived. Just five hours into L6’s flight, near the Dutch island of Terschelling and roughly 90 miles from the English coast, the crankshaft in the port engine broke, rendering it useless. With the danger of ice from freezing rain coating the outer skin of the Zeppelin during the return flight, the two surviving engines might not be sufficient to support the heavier weight. A decision had to be made and, brave man though he was, Strasser was not prepared to risk unnecessary disaster on the first operation. “I therefore decided in agreement with the commander of L6,” he later wrote, “but with a heavy heart, to turn back.”

ABOVE: With rudimentary navigational aids and scant protection against the elements, the early missions flown in open gondolas were as much a test of endurance as a feat of warfare.

ABOVE RIGHT: A fanciful German propaganda postcard depicts an all-out assault by airships on England. In fact, given the reluctance of the army and navy to co-operate together, it would be some time before Germany had sufficient strength to mount a largescale attack across the North Sea.

At a stroke, the strike force had been reduced by a third and, as L6 limped slowly back to base, the remaining Zeppelins were running into trouble of their own. The icy clear sky had given way to squalls of sleet and rain. By 1615 hrs, when L3 and L4 turned away from the necklace of islands off the Dutch coast to begin their crossing of a mist-shrouded North Sea, the frozen crews were already flying blind and forced to rely on compass readings alone. The next few hours were a constant battle against the elements. Buffeted by strengthening and contrary winds, they were blown steadily off course. 

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TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915

"IT WAS THE MOST UNPLEASANT EXPERIENCE I HAVE EVER HAD, AND I DON'T WISH FOR ANYTHING LIKE IT AGAIN".

Aboard L3, Fritz, alone of the two commanders, recognised the problem and the impossibility of reaching the Humber. An experienced airship captain who had commanded L3 since the day she was commissioned in May 1914, he had already displayed his skill in overcoming engine difficulties and combating the worsening conditions, maintaining height albeit at the cost of a third of his ballast. Now he proved his adaptability and determination. Rather than abandon the mission, a course of action in the circumstances he was perfectly entitled to take, he decided instead to steer for the coastline of Norfolk and the small naval port of Great Yarmouth, which had been among the potential targets listed by Strasser on 10 January. It was a bold move. Conditions in the exposed and unheated forward control car were appalling as officers and crewmen struggled against near sub-zero temperatures to find their way through

ABOVE: The bomb that fell in St Peter’s Plain shattered the premises of local builder J E Pestell which had to be demolished. His family’s living quarters were also badly damaged, but the only casualty was a pet canary. After the war, Pestell’s undertook the construction of the town’s war memorial. ABOVE RIGHT: A heavily bandaged Edward Ellis poses for the press outside his shattered home [nb, pictured in Zeppraid 11 and 12]. He was alone in the house at the time of the raid and had just gone into a back kitchen when the front of the house was blown out by the most lethal of all L3’s 110-pound high explosive bombs. ABOVE FAR RIGHT: Shoemaker Sam Smith was killed peering out of his workshop. LEFT: Elderly spinster Martha Taylor was caught in the open during a shopping trip.

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the freezing night. But their endurance was finally rewarded at 1950 hrs when the black bulk of L3 became the first Zeppelin to pass over the English coast. Unclear precisely where he was, Fritz descended, a searchlight stabbing the darkness in search of landmarks. Her eerie presence was immediately noticed by a party of Norfolk Volunteers who had just completed their weekly drill at Happisburgh Hall. One of them later reported seeing an “unusual light” lingering above the church tower which, as well as bathing the ground in brilliant light, lit up the belly of the airship. With the further help of a flare, Fritz was able to identify his landfall accurately and begin his 15-mile journey south. From Happisburgh to Great Yarmouth, L3’s extraordinary progress excited startled fascination among villagers drawn from their homes by an unnatural and unnerving drone many remembered as a “deep, loud whirring sound” that shattered the peace of a winter’s night.

What Mary Telford called a “leaden mass” vanishing, “obscure and dim”, across Horsey Mere was flying low enough to risk colliding with church towers in at least two villages along the way. One eyewitness thought the airship sounded so close to the ground it was going to land. Instead, and for reasons never satisfactorily explained, the Zeppelin released its first bomb, an incendiary, which fell harmlessly into a waterlogged paddock on farmer George Humphrey’s land at Ormesby St Michael. A few fragments of bomb casing and a small hole gouged in the ground marked the inauspicious opening of Fritz’s momentous attack. Great Yarmouth, its straggling harbour sprinkled with fishing drifters and a handful of small naval vessels, lay dead ahead in all its defenceless vulnerability, lit up like a belated Christmas tree. Passing over the neighbouring village of Caister, L3 veered out to sea before turning south-west to come in over

TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915

the town’s northern reaches. Three minutes later, at 2025 hrs, the first of 11 bombs was released tumbling onto the hapless resort . Great Yarmouth’s agony had begun. With a “flash and a loud roar”, another incendiary device burst on the lawn of a large house in Albermarle Road, not far from the Beach Railway Station. It was followed moments later by a high explosive bomb which landed at the back of Crown Road, near to a drill hall. Thankfully, it failed to explode. The residents living in and around the terraces adjoining St Peter’s Plain were not so fortunate. Here, for the first time in history, 110 pounds of high explosive dropped from the air on the British mainland struck with lethal effect.

IMPACT AND VICTIMS Fifty-three year old shoemaker Sam Smith and 72-year-old spinster Martha Taylor were the hapless victims of a devastating blast that shattered homes and reduced neighbouring workshops to ruins fit only for demolition.

According to one newspaper report, “not a single building” in the densely populated district “escaped damage” and “the experience of the inhabitants was terrible”. Terrified women, some of them carrying children in their nightclothes, reportedly rushed into the nearby York Road Drill Hall where soldiers of the 5th Essex quickly joined the rescue effort, scrambling through heaps of rubble in search of injured survivors. Many people enjoyed marvellous escapes. A father and son, out walking when the bomb fell, were blown to the ground but suffered nothing beyond a few cuts and bruises. In another house, where the roof had been torn off, a child was pulled alive from beneath a pile of mortar, tiles and ceiling plaster. But the luckiest man of all was Edward Ellis. He had wandered out of his sitting room just moments before it was torn apart by the blast. Buried beneath a door and a mound of rubble, the dazed and bloodied fish worker was eventually extricated by neighbours to find the

ABOVE LEFT: A postcard produced to mark the ‘first Zeppelin raid on England’ depicting scenes of carnage in Great Yarmouth. ABOVE RIGHT: Kapitanleutnant Treusch von Buttlar Brandenfels, commander of L6, was forced to abandon the historic first mission. The only pre-war naval airship officer still flying at the war’s end, he held the unique distinction of being the only Zeppelin captain to win the coveted Pour le Mérite, known as ‘the Blue Max’.

entire front of his house blown away. The shock rendered him temporarily speechless, but he later told a reporter: “It was the most unpleasant experience I have ever had, and I don’t wish for anything like it again.” Such sentiments were undoubtedly shared by fellow citizens who found themselves unwittingly in the path of Fritz’s indiscriminate aerial bombardment. Following four more UXBs, including one which narrowly missed a soldier on guard duty as it bounced off the quayside and splashed into the river, the next high explosive bomb brought carnage to the town’s Fish Wharf. “The havoc wrought hereabouts,” ran one report, “was almost indescribable.” A restaurant was lifted off its footings, its roof torn open and windows smashed; street lights were uprooted; a water main ruptured and surrounding buildings, including the Port and Haven Commissioners’ storehouse, Post Office and wharf master’s office, variously damaged. 

BELOW: The Royal Naval Air Service’s South Denes base on the shore at Great Yarmouth which became operational in April 1913. On the night of the first Zeppelin raid, three aircraft were ready for action but none took off to the chagrin of local citizens. Later in the war, aircraft flying from the base were responsible for the destruction of three Zeppelins.

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TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915 One shard of shrapnel penetrated a wall to punch a hole through a steelsided safe, but for all its evident force the bomb caused only alarm rather than fatal casualties. Two more bombs completed Fritz’s trail of destruction. Both fell close together on the harbour side, one of them riddling a steam drifter from stem to stern with shrapnel and hitting a maltings on the other side of the river. The other left the night’s largest crater and a portion of the bomb casing was found near the remains of the racecourse railings, some wrecked fish baskets and the body of a dog. Her supply of bombs exhausted, L3 turned out to sea and was quickly swallowed by the “unusually foul and dark night”. The raid, which had lasted barely 10 minutes from beginning to end, was over but Norfolk’s unprecedented ordeal was only half complete.

L4: TRAGEDY AND FARCE Even as Fritz and his crew were drawing away into a smother of freezing rain, Platen Hallermund

and L4 were following a meandering course snaking along the north Norfolk coast. Apparently oblivious to the wind’s impact on the mission, Platen Hallermund’s navigation was completely awry and would remain so for the duration of his blundering journey across the east coast. From the moment he reached land, near Bacton, at around 1955 hrs, L4’s commander was convinced he was flying over the outer reaches of the Humber estuary some 80 miles further north. In fact, very little about Platen Hallermund’s subsequent version of events bore any resemblance to the reality of a wayward and serpentine journey across a coastline he had utterly confused in the face of defences that existed only in his own imagination. His slow progress westwards was punctuated by a scattering of incendiaries - two falling on Sheringham, one in a field near Thornham and a fourth close to Brancaster church - as he criss-crossed the coast from Cromer to Hunstanton.

THE SPIES THAT NEVER WERE One of the more bizarre results of the airship raid was the wave of spy hysteria which followed in its wake. Within days of the attack reports began appearing in the press of mysterious motor cars “directing” one of the Zeppelins on its convoluted journey over west Norfolk to King’s Lynn. Some eyewitnesses spoke of two cars - one travelling to the right of the airship and another to the left - while another local resident saw only a single “dark-coloured, covered-in” automobile with “two enormous headlights”. The same observer noted: “The airship came on, and shortly after passing me the engine was stopped, giving one the impression that the pilot had lost his bearings. Directly after that the motor car came rushing from the Gayton Road and went swiftly towards Lynn. “Instantly, the engine of the airship was started again, and I could see the machine making a circling movement… A friend of mine saw what was evidently the same car standing in the High Street whilst bombs were actually being dropped in the town.” Given the fact that L4’s commander was convinced he was attacking targets around the Humber estuary such wild speculation was, of course, risible, but rumours of secret agents guiding the attack continued to spread even in the face of official denials. An investigation carried out by King’s Lynn’s chief constable, Charles Hunt, found no sign of suspicious activity. Indeed, one of only two cars to have entered the town on the night of the raid was carrying officers of the Worcestershire Yeomanry back from a dinner date. That might have been the end of the story, but for the intervention of King’s Lynn MP, Mr Holcombe Ingleby. Far from accepting the police version which had prompted one newspaper to describe the spy theories as the “hallucinations” of “imaginative folk”, he became increasingly convinced of an official cover-up, though for reasons he never fully explained. Despite being assured by the Home Secretary that his concerns were unfounded, he would not let the matter rest and launched his own investigation which he later published as a three-penny pamphlet. What Ingleby called a “plain, unvarnished tale” that exposed the dastardly “methods” by which the Zeppelin had found its way to King’s Lynn closed with a tub-thumping demand that the Government take tougher action to eradicate the ‘enemy within’. “However great the difficulties that stand in the way,” he declared, “nothing but a clean sweep of all possible enemies will satisfy the country.” Published a few months after the attack, The Zeppelin Raid in West Norfolk had no effect or influence on government policy which was focused on establishing improved defences designed to combat an actual, rather than imaginary, menace.

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TOP RIGHT: The scene in St Peter’s Plain, Great Yarmouth, near where a man and woman were killed and several other people had lucky escapes. ABOVE RIGHT: This bomb dropped by L4 over Heacham in west Norfolk was found two days later embedded in soil in a field between a school and a chalk-pit. It was later removed to Woolwich Arsenal for tests to be carried out. ABOVE LEFT: Chief Constable of King’s Lynn, Charles Hunt, holds the incendiary recovered from a house in Cresswell Street. Within days of the raid, the town’s senior policeman would be embroiled in controversy over claims that motorborne spies had guided L4 on her bombing run.

His subsequent explanation for his bewildering series of manoeuvres was, to say the least, puzzling. One of his turns north, he maintained was an attempt to “get behind the sea front” in order to “attack the Humber industrial area from the land side” and he expressed surprise that, “against expectations”, he had been unable to find the “north bank of the Humber”. Imagining the eastern shore of the Wash to be a part of what was then the East Yorkshire coast, he deposited two more bombs on the straggling seaside village of Heacham. They included his first high explosive bomb, another dud which half-buried itself in a field and was only noticed two days later, and another incendiary which was the cause of some amusement. It had fallen into a “washerwoman’s soft water butt”, blowing it to pieces. Arthur Neville-Rolfe, an Indian army officer who was at home recovering from wounds, cheerfully noted: “What she said about ‘them there Jarmans’ might have stopped the war had the Kaiser heard it.” Continuing briefly eastwards before turning south, L4, a searchlight showing from the control car, was plainly visible. The Rev I W Charlton, vicar of Snettisham, saw it “hovering over the church and vicarage at a great height”. He later wrote: “No sooner had we identified it as probably a German airship, then suddenly all doubt was dispelled by a long, loud, hissing sound; a confused streak of light; and a tremendous crash. The next moment

TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915

RIGHT: The grisly scene in Bentinck Street, King’s Lynn, on the morning after the raid. Soldiers pick through a mountain of debris left by the night’s most destructive bomb. In all, around 100 homes were either destroyed or damaged and two lives lost amid the carnage.

was made up of apprehension, relief and mutual enquiries, and then all was dark and still, as the sound of the retiring Zeppelin speedily died away.” The bomb, which shattered windows in the church but caused no injuries, gave rise to speculation that the airship’s intended target was the King’s Norfolk retreat at Sandringham. Even Queen Alexandra was taken in by the outlandish claims made in the popular press, prompting her to write two days later to Lord Fisher, the First Sea Lord. “This is too bad,” she commented, “those beasts actually went straight to Sandringham, I suppose in the hopes of exterminating us with their Zeppelin bombs - though, thank God, they failed this time… Please let me have a lot of rockets with spikes or hooks on to defend the Norfolk coast. I am sure you could invent something of the sort which might bring down a few of the rascals…” In the absence of any such novel devices, Platen Hallermund pressed on, the lights of King’s Lynn, visible “on the dark curve of the southern horizon”, acting as a magnet despite the best efforts of the town’s senior policeman. Chief Constable Charles Hunt had issued instructions to begin switching off the street lights individually as soon as word reached him of the attack on Great Yarmouth at around 2200 hrs. However, it was not until 2245, when he learned of bombs being dropped a few miles to the north, that he ordered the ‘master’ switch to be turned off. By then, it was already too late.

ABOVE: Several people had miraculous escapes from the remains of their homes after a single bomb laid waste to backto-back terraces in the heart of King’s Lynn.

A few minutes later, L4, having survived an imaginary storm of “heavy artillery and infantry fire”, began its bombardment of the as yet unidentified “big city” which lay at his mercy. The first two bombs fell near the railway line leading north to Hunstanton, one of them leaving a crater “large enough to bury a horse”. In all, some seven explosive and six incendiary bombs would be scattered across the west Norfolk town and, as with Fritz and L3 over Great Yarmouth,

ABOVE LEFT: Damage near the harbourside water tower on Great Yarmouth’s Fish Wharf in the immediate aftermath of the attack.

it was a single blast that was responsible for most of the casualties. The night’s most destructive bomb plunged to earth in Bentinck Street, amid a rabbit warren of crowded, poorly constructed, back-to-back terraces. Around 100 homes were damaged while the houses closest to the point of impact were reduced to mountains of rubble. In one, a four-year-old was blown from her bed into a fireplace, while her father lay pinned beneath an iron bedstead. Released by rescuers using a hacksaw, John Goate suffered a badly crushed foot but was well enough to give a vivid account of the night’s worst calamity. He told how his wife had distinctly heard a “buzzing noise” shortly before the explosion. She took it for an aeroplane, but he thought it was a motor car. Moments later, they heard the first of L4’s bombs. They just had time to put the lights out in the children’s rooms when the house was struck. 

RIGHT: A soldier surveys the damage to Drakes Buildings on the morning after the raid.

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TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915 “I gripped the bedstead rail and felt myself slipping through the floor, the bed with me,” he said. “I was in one room and my wife and children in the other, and we all slipped through into the ground floor and were buried in bricks and mortar and woodwork… “I was pinned down with the bedstead across my legs, and I found the more I struggled the further I got down, so I lay still and waited for the people to come and rescue me… “The only thing that really troubled me was that I could hear my wife and baby calling for help and I could do nothing… All the time we were under the ruins I could hear the baby screaming and my wife calling… but I heard nothing of the boy, and I think I should have done had he been alive.” Fourteen-year-old Percy Goate died in his bed, smothered by debris. “I tried to wake him,” his distraught mother

survivor, his hair matted with dust and broken glass, “was the people in the street who were shrieking.” The next bomb landed in another tightly-packed residential area, causing similar damage but, thankfully, no fatalities. Again, there were myriad tales of near-miraculous escapes: a youngster, Tom Walden, was deluged by plaster and rubble as he lay sleeping, but was successfully extricated, while a nextdoor neighbour escaped with wounds to the head as her home was wrecked by the blast. Of the remaining four bombs dropped by L4, one landed in a garden without exploding, another burst in an allotment and the last, an incendiary, crashed through a roof to land in a laundry basket. Later recovered by police, it was immersed in a pail of water and paraded in front of pressmen by the chief constable.

ABOVE: The satirical magazine Punch lampooned German triumphalism over the raid. Under the heading ‘Flight that failed’, the caption read: The Emperor: ‘What! No babes, sirrah?’ The Murderer: ‘Alas! Sure, None.’ The Emperor: ‘Well, then, no babies, no Iron Crosses.’ [Exit murderer, discouraged]. LEFT: Alice Maud Gazley, one of two people killed by L4’s bombs, with her husband, Percy George Gazley, who had been killed while serving in France with the Rifle Brigade a few weeks earlier. BELOW LEFT: Alice Gazley’s headstone in King’s Lynn cemetery also commemorates her husband’s death in action. ABOVE RIGHT: One of the last bombs dropped on King’s Lynn landed in an allotment near Cresswell Street. It uprooted trees, tore down fences and shattered windows but caused no injuries to people living nearby.

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later stated, “but he was dead. Then the house fell in…” The body of Alice Gazley was found the following morning. A 26-year-old war widow, whose husband had been killed during the fighting in France 11 weeks earlier, she had been lodging with friends next door to the Goate family. At the first sound of the Zeppelin’s approach, she had been heard to call out before rushing to the door moments before there was “a bang” and the house collapsed on top of her. Her friends were dug out of the debris alive. They were among 13 people treated in hospital for injuries. Many more suffered minor cuts and bruises, while a lucky few escaped from their smashed houses without a scratch. “The most heartrending thing,” recalled one

Out of all the bombs and incendiaries dropped only one - a high-explosive bomb which scored a direct hit on the engine house controlling the harbour’s dock gates - caused any significant economic or military damage. It was a poor return for so bold an effort, but as Platen Hallermund withdrew eastwards past Norwich and out to sea he was still blissfully ignorant of the bodged nature of his sortie. At 0045 hrs, with ice beginning to coat L4’s envelope, he sent off a brief and totally erroneous attack report: “Successfully bombed fortified places between the Tyne and Humber.” Nine hours later and just seven minutes after Fritz’s return, L4, her navigation on the homeward flight having proved altogether more accurate than the mission itself, landed back at Fuhlsbuttel.

TERROR FROM THE SKIES The World’s First Air Raid, 1915 BELOW: Teenager Tom Walden surveys the destruction close to his home. Buried inside his collapsed bedroom, he was dug out unscathed by his father.

"I tried to wake him, but he was dead. Then the house fell in". THE RAID’S AFTERMATH Scarcely had the crews been de-briefed than the war of words began in earnest. From Berlin, the deputy chief of the naval staff, announced: “On the night of January 19-20 naval airships undertook an attack on several fortified places on the English east coast. numerous bombs were dropped successfully in misty weather and rain. The ships were fired on, but returned undamaged.” In Britain, an outraged press condemned the raid as a cowardly attack on defenceless civilians and a flagrant abuse of international conventions. An inquest jury at Great Yarmouth considered a verdict of “wilful murder against persons unknown”, while at King’s Lynn the coroner gave the cause of  deaths as being “from the effects of acts of the King’s Enemies”. It wasn’t long before the Zeppelin raiders were being uniformly reviled as “baby killers”, even though the operation’s youngest victim was a teenager.

Less publicised were the recriminations from enraged Norfolk citizens and their elected representatives about the lack of defences or warning. Contrary to the German pronouncement, no attempt had been made to engage an enemy even though one of the towns attacked was home to a Royal Naval Air Station. Three aircraft had, indeed, been sitting by the slipways on Great Yarmouth’s South Denes throughout L3’s attack, but officers maintained that the Zeppelin was “lost from view”. In truth, any intervention could have had little but nuisance value. As the station’s historian later observed: “The three machines could not have done the airships any harm, as they were incapable of reaching anything like the heights that were possible to the airships, nor were they armed with any weapons, other than a rifle in the hands of the pilot.” And so to the final reckoning. According to official records, the 24 bombs dropped during the first Zeppelin

BELOW LEFT: Two children pose alongside an unexploded Zeppelin bomb during a subsequent raid on Norfolk. BELOW RIGHT: St Peter’s Plain, Great Yarmouth, today, showing Edward Ellis’ former house still standing — a survivor of the first lethal air raid on England. INSET RIGHT: A blue plaque over the door of St Peter’s Villa recalls Great Yarmouth’s night of terror in January 1915.

raid on England had been responsible for the deaths of four civilians aged between 14 and 72 and serious injuries to a further 16 people as well as causing damage estimated at £7,740 - almost £779,000 in today’s money. While an exultant enemy press hailed “a triumph of German inventiveness”, senior officers and politicians privately questioned the value of such attacks which achieved little of military importance at the cost, according to Chancellor Theobold von Bethmann-Hollweg, of creating “a very unfavourable impression on foreign neutrals, particularly in America”. Ultimately, the consequences of the raid would prove far more profound. For on a winter’s night a century ago, a touch paper was lit at Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn that would lead all the way to the holocausts of Guernica, Coventry, Dresden and Hiroshima. 

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BOOK OF THE MONTH



D-DAY DOCUMENTS Paul Winter

Publisher: Bloomsbury ISBN: 978-1-4081-9400-3 Hardback with dust jacket 520 pages RRP: £40.00 Illustrations  Appendices 

References/Notes Index 



BELOW: At exactly 08.32 hours on 6 June 1944, Sergeant Jim Mapham of No.5 Army Film and Photographic Unit photographed this scene on Queen Red sector in the centre-left of Sword Beach (the precise location is near La Brèche, Hermanville-sur-Mer).

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The Britain at War team scout out the latest items of interest

THERE IS, of course, an almost overwhelming plethora of books covering the general subject of D-Day and with last year seeing the 70th anniversary the market was almost flooded with new works. Of those, few were either refreshing or outstanding in content but one that very much succeeds is Paul Winter’s compelling collection of official War Diary entries covering every Anglo-Canadian spearhead unit and regiment to land on the beaches of Normandy. It is no ‘sit down and read cover-to-cover’ type of book but is, instead, a thoroughly comprehensive reference work. That said, its compilation is very far from dull. Paul Winter’s unprecedented tome is published in partnership with the National Archives, from where the documents covered are all sourced, containing not only 21st Army Group Intelligence Reports on the beach landings but also RAF photographic reconnaissance prints and, for example, the ship’s log from HMS Warspite. While these varied reports are dry and factual they are, nevertheless, important references for the more complete understanding of the D-Day landings and Operations Neptune and Overlord. Given that they are often straight transcripts of the official record in the National Archives they are useful and valuable tool for historians, writers and general enthusiasts. For example, it is an ideal accompaniment or companion if you are interested in battlefield

tours of Normandy and will tell you where the units were, and when, who was in command and what was happening. As such, it is almost a ‘one stop shop’ for the official data on the most significant military operation of all time. The various sections are interspersed with firsthand personal accounts – we find a particularly visceral report from Lance Corporal Rolph Jackson, 10 Platoon, D Company, The Queen’s Own Rifles of Canada. It might easily have formed the inspiration for Spielberg’s haunting landing scene in ‘Saving Private Ryan’: “My section was first from the LCA (Landing Craft Assault) and we were slaughtered. Our support craft were knocked out so we had no heavy weapons. My platoon, about 36 strong, went through what we believe was enfilade fire from five machine guns. We landed in the proper area, but no specialist gear reached the [sea] wall. All our assault engineers were killed in action. We were still in the water when cut down. I was loaded with around 3,000 Bren rounds, plus 36 Mills grenades. The sea was red. One lad was hit in the smoke bomb he was carrying. Another, a human torch, had the presence of mind to head back into the water. Our flamethrower man was hit and exploded. We couldn’t even find his body.” For the most part, though, this book is a detailed piecing together of official reports and there is an interesting contrast to the scene described by Lance Corporal Jackson in the Intelligence War Diary of The Highland Light Infantry of Canada which tells us: “The 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade landed without a

shot being fired on them.’ However, the same report also noted of the situation on the Highland Light Infantry’s beach sector: ‘It was an awful shambles and not at all like the organised rehearsals we had had. More than one offered a fervent prayer of thanksgiving that our air umbrella was so strong. One gun ranged on that beach would have done untold damage.” Without a doubt, you will be left better able to understand not only the organisation but also the mayhem and confusion that unfolded on the Normandy beaches. The official War Diaries provide a uniquely vivid answer to the question so many military historians ask: “What was it actually like to be there?” Many answers will be found in this immensely valuable reference because the detail recorded was immediate and contemporary and included only the information that the participating formations thought important to record at the time. It stands as a handy reference to cross-check against the published details in other books and accounts of the actions that day which so often are riven with myth and distortion. Who was who, who was where and who did what. All of it is here. It would, perhaps, be invidious to describe D-Day Documents as a ‘primary source’, but given its direct reproduction of the content of official War Diaries, and without any hint of editing or ‘correction’ through hindsight, this book is as close as it gets. I can only highly recommend it. REVIEWED BY ANDY SAUNDERS

The Britain at War team scout out the latest items of interest

LUFTWAFFE CRASH ARCHIVE

SPECIAL OPS HEROES

Volume 6

Michael Ashcroft



This fascinating and well-researched book details the stories of the men and the deeds behind 50 gallantry medals awarded to ‘Special Ops’ personnel that its author has purchased for his collection over the past few years. Of course, Lord Ashcroft is no stranger to the pages of Britain at War, as he writes a regular column featuring his ‘Hero of The Month’ in our First World War Gallantry series. Deeply interested in the stories behind British gallantry awards, he also has an unsurpassed collection of medals awarded for valour and bravery and his collection of Victoria Crosses, for example, can now be found in the Ashcroft Gallery at the Imperial War Museum with his collection of Special Forces medals due to go on display at the refurbished National Army Museum when it re-opens in 2015. Special Ops Heroes is a sequel to Michael Ashcroft’s earlier works, Victoria Cross Heroes, George Cross Heroes, Heroes of The Skies and Special Forces Heroes and it is bound to be one of the more popular titles in this fascinating series with royalties from the book going to The SAS Association and the charity Walking With The Wounded. Using diaries, eye witness accounts, medal citations, letters and interviews it tells the story of an extraordinary group of men who have been prepared to go undercover and behind enemy lines in operations that were always extremely high-risk and could easily have ended in capture, imprisonment, torture and death . Lord Ashcroft moves from the early missions by members of the Long Range Desert Group through to some of the most daringly executed and audacious raids of the Second World War right up to later 20th century conflicts in Northern Ireland, the Falkland

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Islands and the Gulf. Of those covered, we have, for example, Sgt Jack Byrne a legendary and iconic commando of the Second World War through to Sgt Bill Pickering a Special Operations Executive wireless operator through to Trooper Bob Consiglio of the SAS who lost his life in the Bravo Two Zero mission of the First Gulf War. Of the Northern Ireland ‘troubles’ the story of Sgt Graham Watts stands out as beyond remarkable in the tale of a man who was at the heart of a covert operation in 1973 which virtually wiped out the entire IRA command structure in Belfast. Shining through from every page is the sheer cold courage of highly motivated and extremely skilled men who risked all in the service of their country. Very often, they gave their all, too, and it is this astonishing element of the human spirit that clearly inspires the author in his keenly held fascination for the men of courage that he has consistently honoured and remembered across recent years. Appropriately, a Foreword is provided by SAS hero Andy McNab of Bravo Two Zero fame who says of the book that ‘…it did exactly what it says on the ‘tin’ ‘ and that he found the book ‘a real page turner’. This reviewer can only echo those sentiments. REVIEWED BY PETER WEBB

Publisher: Headline www.lordashcroft.com ISBN: 978-1-4722-2396-8 Hardback: 330 pages RRP: £20.00 References/Notes Index 

prodigious numbers that it became a war-winner. It was also one of the most

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downed machines together with artwork and maps. Publisher: Red Kite www.redkitebooks.co.uk ISBN: 978-1-906592-17-2 Softback: 125 pages RRP: £25.00

NIGHT OF THE ZEPPELIN David Long

THE LIONS OF CARENTAN

Fallschirmjäger Regiment 6, 1943-1945 Volker Griesser

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final days as Germany crumbled in the last days of the Third Reich. This excellent read is well written and researched and is comprehensively illustrated with a fascinating selection of images and maps. It also carries a number of very useful appendices. Publisher: Casemate www.casemate.com ISBN: 978-1-61200-281-1

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The Britain at War team scout out the latest items of interest

GREAT WAR RAILWAYMEN

FEBRUARY 2015 ISSUE

BRITAIN’S RAILWAY COMPANY WORKERS AT WAR 1914 – 1918

ON SALE FROM 29 JANUARY 2015

Jeremy Higgins

NO GUNS FOR LEICESTER!



THIS REALLY is a quality book on what is an oft-neglected subject and is undoubtedly the most comprehensive work ever conducted in its field. Quite simply, the contribution of the railway to the war effort between 1914 and 1918 both at home and overseas was crucial; without the railwaymen and the permanent way infrastructure, engines and rolling stock then the war would have ground to a halt and it was the only way that vast quantities of materiel, supplies and men could be moved around. Jeremy Higgins has meticulously researched just about every aspect of the railway at war, including the personal stories of over 12,500 of the astonishing 20,000 railwaymen who died in military service. Of those, Higgins details over 1,000 and thus brings alive the story of the railwaymen who served , as well as those who continued to serve in railwayrelated occupations, and the price that was often paid. His work also gives a good idea of range, scope and scale of the effort that was required to keep the service running and the war effort sustained. It is an effort that in part is portrayed on the jacket illustration showing British and French troops struggling to recover a derailed locomotive at Maricourt in September 1916. The detail of railway operations, including in far-flung places like Egypt and Palestine, is covered in superb detail together with accounts from the Home Front and Western Front alike including some harrowing detail of the Quintinshill Railway disaster in Scotland on 22 May 1915 which took the lives of 272 men, soldiers who were simply passengers caught up in this devastating railway accident. As a railwayman himself, the author clearly has both a passion

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In the two nights of air raids in November 1940, 108 people were killed in Leicester, 225 injured and around 200 houses destroyed, with damage to 5,000 more. Eleven industrial properties were also destroyed and 72 others seriously damaged, causing almost £24 million damage in today’s estimates. In Austin Ruddy’s second feature on Leicester’s Blitz he looks at the controversy surrounding the city’s lack of anti-aircraft guns, a controversy which also embroiled Winston Churchill. for and an affinity with life and work on the railway, although it was often death on the railway that stalked his predecessors of 100 years ago. Consequently, this book has very much the feel of one that has been written with a deep and abiding interest and a genuine desire to honour the service and sacrifice of his forbears, so much so that the sale of the book is intended to raise monies for the Army Benevolent Fund, the Soldier’s Charity, and Railway Benefit Fund. Certainly, the thumb-nail biographical sketches of some of those who died really brings the subject to life and his appendix listing all of the casualties is both sobering and ground-breaking in terms of its meticulous attention to detail. Appropriately, the book carries a Foreword by great railway enthusiast Michael Portillo who rightly describes 1914–1918 as ‘a railway war’, and an Introduction by General the Lord Dannatt, Chief of the General Staff, 2006–2009, who describes the drumbeat of war really being ‘the clickety-clack of railways across Europe.’ This is a book that will appeal greatly to those interested in looking at overlooked aspects of the First World War and to railway enthusiasts alike. It is also a book that this reviewer can most thoroughly recommend. REVIEWED BY JAMES McCARTHY-EDWARDES

References/Notes Index 

Soldier turned airman Ted Swales sacrificed his life to save his crew after directing one of the most destructive bombing raids of the Second World War. 70 years on, Steve Snelling charts the extraordinary story of the South African Master Bomber who became RAF Bomber Command’s last Victoria Cross hero.

SECRETS OF ‘Q’ CENTRAL

Publisher: Uniform Press www.uniformpress.co.uk ISBN: 978-1-910500-00-2 Softback: 348 pages RRP: £25.00 Illustrations  Appendices 

BOMBER COMMAND’S LAST HERO



Based in Leighton Buzzard, the Government’s telecommunications hub was a highly secret establishment through which was routed all telephone and teleprinter traffic and linked, among others, Bletchley Park, the Met Office, Central Government offices, Army, Navy and RAF Command Centres, radar stations and a host of other crucial nerve centres that were all key to running and winning the war. We tell its previously untold and compelling story.

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LUSITANIA The Truth

LUSITANIA THE AGONY, THE AFTERMATH

AND THE TRUTH The sinking of the RMS Lusitania, causing the deaths of over 1,000 passengers and crew, horrified the public on both sides of the Atlantic in May 1915. To most, it was an awful war crime, but others claimed that owners Cunard should take the rap. John Grehan recounts the story of the sinking, its courtroom postscript — and the truth that has only just been revealed.

O

N 4 February 1915 Germany declared the seas around the British Isles to be a war zone. The world was given two weeks’ notice, meaning that from 18 February that year Allied ships in the area would be sunk without warning. Even before this dire warning had been issued, passenger traffic had markedly reduced, but there were still enough people willing to risk travelling across the Atlantic for the Cunard Line to continue the sailings of its majestic liner RMS Lusitania.

106 www.britainatwar.com

Lusitania and her sister ship, Mauritania, were built by Cunard in 1907 with financial assistance from the British Government. The £2.6 million construction loan and the subsequent £150,000 annual subsidy were granted by the Government only because the ships were to be designed to Admiralty specifications which would enable the liners to be employed as large, high-speed auxiliary cruisers in the event of war. On 3 August 1914, the day before Britain declared war on Germany,

both Lusitania and Mauritania were requisitioned by the Admiralty as per the terms of the original contract with Cunard. When the ships arrived at Liverpool a Royal Navy officer was tasked with converting them to their new role by clearing space on the decks to give clear arcs of fire for the guns that would be fitted, and to find room for magazines.

LUSITANIA The Truth MAIN PICTURE: The Cunard Line’s RMS Lusitania before the war. When launched, she was the largest liner in the world. (ALL IMAGES US LIBRARY OF CONGRESS UNLESS STATED OTHERWISE)

RIGHT: A stylised depiction of the moment that a torpedo from U-20 struck the RMS Lusitania on 7 May 1915.

Before the bulk of the conversion work started, however, the Admiralty had a change of heart. Within days of the declaration of war most of the German liners were blockaded in their ports and no longer posed the threat which had been imagined. Though the two British liners remained on the Admiralty list and subject, if necessary, to Admiralty instructions, Lusitania and Mauritania were not armed. Back in passenger service, Lusitania continued her transatlantic runs to and

from New York. Her usual route to the United Kingdom took her round the southern coast of Ireland, where, on 4 May 1915, the German U-boat U-20 was on patrol. This U-boat had been at sea on a war patrol since the end of April 1915, and had already attacked three Scandinavian ships — one each from Denmark, Sweden and Norway — a British schooner, the steamer Candidate, and the cargo liner Centurion which was on passage to South Africa. 

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LUSITANIA The Truth

TOP MIDDLE: William Lionel Wyllie’s painting depicts survivors of the sinking of Lusitania among the dead and wreckage in the water. (HISTORIC MILITARY PRESS)

Kapitänleutnant Walther Schwieger sank just three of these — but in so doing had used all bar three of his torpedoes. He intended to leave two torpedoes for his voyage back to base. However, Schwieger had received a message from Germany advising him that Lusitania was due to make its approach round Ireland to its home port of Liverpool. So, now with just one torpedo to use, Schwieger prowled the shipping lanes that skirted the Irish coast. When the great four-funnelled liner steamed into view, Schwieger could hardly believe his luck. Though Lusitania carried civilians not guns, Schwieger believed that he was fully justified in attacking the great liner.

TORPEDOES! Eighteen-year old Leslie Morton had been posted as starboard lookout on Lusitania’s forecastle head that afternoon, 7 May 1915. Previously Morton had been an apprentice on a sailing ship but had signed on with his brother

108 www.britainatwar.com

as crew for Lusitania at New York. It was the ship’s 101st voyage from the USA to the UK, and she was nearly home. Morton spotted a streak of spray rushing towards the ship approximately 500 yards away. He called the bridge through his megaphone, “Torpedoes coming on the starboard side” and then rushed below to warn his brother who was off watch at the time. In his haste to find his brother, Morton did not wait for an acknowledgement from the bridge. The call was never heard by the officers on the bridge and the great liner sailed serenely on its course to Liverpool, unaware of the danger ahead. Then the lookout in the crow’s nest, Thomas Quinn, also saw the approaching torpedo, but by then it was only 200 yards away. Quinn hailed the bridge and this time the call was heard. But it was now far too late to take evasive action. Lusitania’s skipper, Captain Will Turner, ran up to the bridge as soon as he received the message. He got to

TOP LEFT: Launched on 18 December 1912, and commissioned on 5 August 1913, U-20 (second from left) in Kiel harbour in 1914. ABOVE LEFT: A survivor ashore still wears his life jacket.

his post just as the torpedo struck. A “terrific” explosion shook the ship, recalled a passenger who was leaning on the starboard rail on the boat deck. This explosion was followed just a moment later by “a sullen rumble in the bowels of the liner”. Another man on the port side of the ship, Charles Lauriat, said that he experienced “a heavy, rather muffled sound”. Almost immediately, Lusitania began to list to starboard. As water poured into the hole in her side, the bows of the liner were dragged lower into the sea. The ship was sinking, and sinking fast.

BOTTOM: RMS Lusitania leaves New York during the winter of 19141915, on one of its last such occasions — the last being on 2 May 1915. At the outbreak of war Lusitania still retained the Blue Riband for the fastest transatlantic crossing.

LUSITANIA The Truth

THE GERMAN DECLARATION On 4 February 1915, the German government issued its declaration of the naval blockade against shipping heading to or from the UK. It stated: “The waters round Great Britain and Ireland, including the English Channel, are hereby proclaimed a war region. On and after February 18th every enemy merchant vessel found in this region will be destroyed, without its always being possible to warn the crews or passengers of the dangers threatening. “Neutral ships will also incur danger in the war region, where, in view of the misuse of neutral flags ordered by the British Government, and incidents inevitable in sea warfare, attacks intended for hostile ships may affect neutral ships also. “The sea passage to the north of the Shetland Islands, and the eastern region of the North Sea in a zone of at least 30 miles along the Netherlands coast, are not menaced by any danger.” In due course the German embassy in the United States also took the step of placing a warning to travellers in 50 American newspapers. Dated 22 April 1915, it announced: “Travellers intending to embark on the Atlantic voyage are reminded that a state of war exists between Germany and her allies and Great Britain and her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to the British Isles; that, in accordance with formal notice given by the Imperial German Government, vessels flying the flag of Great Britain, or any of her allies, are liable to destruction in those waters and that travellers sailing in the war zone on the ships of Great Britain or her allies do so at their own risk.” Those intending to sail on Lusitania, and other trans-Atlantic ships, had been warned.

“Then from every companion-way, there burst an endless stream of passengers,” Captain Turner told the Daily Mail in May 1933. “The boat-deck was crammed with a silent crowd – mothers and fathers clasping their little ones, sons searching for their parents, and sweethearts clinging to each other, all wide-eyed with terror.” It was claimed that there had been no boat drills during the passage and no instructions on the wearing of life jackets. As the ship was still moving forward at speed, Turner thought that the lifeboats could not be launched safely and he ordered those people who had climbed into the lifeboats to get back out onto the deck. Only two of the port side

BELOW: As a concession to the increased danger following the outbreak of war, Lusitania was equipped with a number of additional collapsible lifeboats. RIGHT: Captain William Thomas Turner OBE, RNR, was in charge of Lusitania at the time of the sinking.

lifeboats were launched and because of the angle at which the ship was now listing, they slid down the side of the ship instead of dropping into the sea. As a consequence, both of these were so badly damaged by the rivets on the hull of the ship that when the boats hit the water they sank, leaving the passengers floundering amongst the waves. On the starboard side of the ship, just six of the lifeboats were successfully launched. At 14.28 hours, less than 20 minutes after she had been torpedoed, Lusitania went down. “In the twinkling of an eye the monster disappeared,” remembered

Oliver Bernard. “What I saw in the water was … one long scene of agony … floating debris on all sides, and men, women and children clinging for dear life to deck chairs and rafts. There were such desperate struggles as I will never forget. Many were entangled between chairs and rafts and upturned boats. One by one they seemed to fall off and give up … One poor wretch was struck by the oar which I was sharing with a steward … he seized and clung to the oar like grim death until we were able to drag him into the boat … we saw a woman floating quite near us. Her face was just visible above the water and her mouth was covered with froth.” 

“The boat-deck was crammed with a silent crowd — mothers and fathers clasping their little ones, sons searching for their parents, and sweethearts clinging to each other, all wide-eyed with terror” Captain William Thomas Turner told the Daily Mail

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LUSITANIA The Truth LEFT: The body of a victim of the liner’s sinking is carried away on a stretcher covered by a flag at Queenstown.

BATTLE FOR SURVIVAL For the survivors it was a battle for life. Miss Chrissie Aitken later gave this account: “One of the crew noticed that I had not a belt and he took off his own and fastened it round me. The ship was dipping over to one side terribly, and after we got into the boat, and it was lowered, a remark made by one of the stewards made me think our boat was to be swamped like the one before it, and I jumped overboard. I don’t remember anything then for a long time, but the lifeboat seems to have got away all right, for afterwards I saw some ladies who were in it, and they hadn’t even got wet. But a lot had happened before I regained consciousness. When next I remember anything I was floating amongst the wreckage, and the ship had gone. Everything seemed calm then, but I was a bit dazed and don’t remember clearly. A little bit away there was an upturned boat and three men on it. I struggled to it and the men pulled me up. We stayed there for a time – I don’t know how

long, and then a collapsible boat took us off, and later a minesweeper took us into Queenstown [now Cobh].” Another of the survivors was passenger William Scrimgeour, whose account of the sinking was published in the Dundee Courier on Wednesday, 12 May 1915: “I was at lunch when the first torpedo took effect. The dining-room was crowded, and there were many women and children at the table. Suddenly a terrific thud was heard. The concussion about wrenched the tables from their fixtures, and sent dishes clattering in all directions … Even the children knew that a dread calamity had befallen the Lusitania and when the murderous torpedo struck the liner’s side there arose a pitiful wailing cry all over the saloon. Women and children wept, and strong men clenched their teeth, seeing to stem a flood of emotion. “The entire company at once made tracks for the boat deck, two flights of stairs above the saloon, and within a few minutes the boats were

ABOVE: Beside the main A24 London to Worthing road in Holmwood, just south of Dorking in Surrey, is this memorial to Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt. One of four American “men of world-wide prominence” named in the 1918 film The Sinking of the Lusitania, Vanderbilt was last seen fastening a life vest onto a woman holding a baby. The inscription reads, “In Memory of Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt a gallant gentleman and a fine sportsman who perished in the Lusitania May 7th 1915. This stone is erected on his favourite road by a few of his British coaching friends and admirers.” (COURTESY OF

ANDY POTTER)

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BELOW RIGHT: According to the original caption, this picture of two survivors from Lusitania shows “Gardner brothers”, believed to be William (centre) and Eric (on the right), on 24 May 1915. The pair, New Zealand nationals, had been travelling with their parents, James and Annie, both of whom were lost. The elder of the brothers, Eric subsequently enlisted in the New Zealand Army and was killed at Passchendaele on 15 October 1917. William suffered from epilepsy following the sinking and was institutionalized for 40 years. 

surrounded by anxious passengers. No one risked going back to the cabins for lifebelts. Within a few more minutes the boats were being lowered, but the work was rendered difficult by the fact that after she was struck the Lusitania listed heavily. “It was the second torpedo that settled the Lusitania’s fate. If the Germans had simply wanted to sink the ship and had had the least concern about the safety of the innocent people on board, one torpedo would have been quite sufficient. I believe that everybody would have been saved … “I did all that I could to assist in putting women and children into the boats, and when I could no more I had to shift for myself. Knowing the ship so well and being a swimmer, I had long had a confident feeling that I would survive. I thought at least that I would be able to keep afloat until some rescue boats put in an appearance.

BELOW: Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, a millionaire sportsman and son of Cornelius Vanderbilt II, was one of the many who died on Lusitania.

“Running aft, I reached the water by sliding down the log-line, and as a result I sustained severe cuts on the fingers of both hands. I had not been in the water for more than two or three minutes when the Lusitania disappeared, and the action of the salt water on my cut fingers made my position uncomfortable. “I had been swimming about for some time, when a boat came along, and I was pulled on board. Before I left the Lusitania I cast off my boots and my jacket and vest. There were 63 passengers in the boat, which was supposed to carry only 50. Two-thirds of them were women and children, and we were two hours in the boat before a vessel took us into Queenstown.” Aitken and Scrimgeour were amongst the lucky ones as the disaster resulted in the loss of 1,195 passengers and crew. Just 764 survived, though for some time

LUSITANIA The Truth

this number remained uncertain. “The death toll in the Lusitania disaster is still not certainly known,” reported the Manchester Guardian on 10 May 1915. “About 750 persons were rescued, but of these some 50 have died since they were landed. Over 2,150 men, women and children were on the liner when she left New York, and since the living do not number more than 710, the dead cannot be fewer than 1,450. What the American people think of the crime is plain. Their newspapers are violent in denunciation; the public, except for the German-Americans, who have celebrated the event as a great and typical victory for their native country, are enraged. How President Wilson regards the affair no one knows. A semi-official statement issued from the White House says he knows the nation expects him to act with deliberation as well as firmness.”

LITIGATION After the loss of Lusitania a series of actions began against Cunard. Whilst some of these were brought in Britain, 67 actions against the Admiralty were instituted in the United States. All of the actions were brought either by passengers who claimed to have been injured or by the representatives of passengers who had lost their lives. The total damages demanded in the 67 US actions amounted to $5,883,479. Most of this was claimed for loss of life. The total claims for personal injuries amounted to $444,700 and there were some relatively small claims for loss of baggage. Many of the claimants contended that the Cunard Company was responsible

FAR LEFT: Needless to say, British and Allied propaganda capitalized on the sinking of Lusitania, portraying it as an act of German barbarism. Though America remained for the time neutral, the sinking of the liner caused a significant hardening of opinion against Germany, which eventually led to her entry into the First World War. ABOVE MIDDLE: A recruitment poster for Irish regiments. ABOVE RIGHT: Even on the opposite side of the Atlantic, the sinking of Lusitania was used for various propaganda and recruitment purposes, as this poster for the US Navy testifies. RIGHT: Two female victims of the torpedoing of Lusitania recuperating in hospital in Ireland. (HMP)

because portholes were left open, because collapsible boats were not left open and because the crew did not distribute life belts. The claimants also stated that even though Germany had announced publicly that the seas around the UK had become a war zone, Cunard did not take the necessary measures to ensure the safety of the passengers. There were a number of reasons for this. First, passengers had been assured that because the liner was such a fast vessel, submarines would not be able to intercept her. However, in order to keep costs down (to compensate for the reduced number of passengers willing to risk crossing the Atlantic), one of Lusitania’s four boilers had been closed down, reducing her speed from 25.5 knots to around 22 knots. In fact she was going far slower than that when she was attacked. The claimants also said that the ship followed its normal route, thus making it easy for German U-boats to lay in wait. No attempt was made to zig-zag and the captain had been instructed to enter Liverpool in daylight, rather than at night, when she would have had a better chance of avoiding submarines.

Some also said that, as Germany had given due warning, the sinking was lawful and that it was only because of incompetence on behalf of Cunard and the captain that the ship was sunk. Others also contended that the liner was loaded with highly explosive materials and that these exploded when the steamship was torpedoed. Finally, the liner had been painted in grey (when it had been requisitioned by the Admiralty) and thus “had the appearance and characteristics of a war vessel”. 

ABOVE: Justus Miles Forman, an American novelist and playwright who died on Lusitania. His body was either never found or remained unidentified. Forman’s butler would later state that before boarding, Forman had been anonymously warned by an individual with a German accent that Lusitania would be attacked, but he disregarded the warning and sailed anyway.

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LUSITANIA The Truth LEFT: The English-born explorer, Commander Jospeh Foster Stackhouse USN (Retd.) was another victim of U-20’s attack. Returning to be reunited with his wife and 12-yearold daughter in London, one of the last people to see Stackhouse alive had seen him “standing calmly on the stern”, having refused to get in a lifeboat saying “There are others who must go first”. His body was recovered and he was duly buried in Cork.

“There are others who must go first” Commander Joseph Foster Stackhouse

DEFENCE OF THE REALM ACT In June 1915, a proceeding was held in the Wreck Commissioners’ Court in the UK to inquire as to the circumstances of the destruction of the vessel. Lord Mersey, Wreck Commissioner of the United Kingdom, presided at those proceedings which continued from 15 June to 1 July. Thirty-six witnesses were examined. However, on 10 June, just before the hearing, significant changes were made to the Defence of the Realm Act, which made it an offence to collect or publish information about the nature, use, or carriage of ‘war materials’ for any reason. Previously, this had only been an offence if the information was collected to aid the enemy. This was used to prohibit discussion about Lusitania’s cargo, which was known to have included war materials. However, all the evidence presented at the inquiry that was deemed pertinent to Judge Julius M. Mayer’s American hearing was sent to New York. The American trial itself was opened before Judge Mayer and continued from 17 April to 6 May 1918, with 40 witnesses examined. A decision was rendered on 23 August. According to the Judge, the ship had more than enough lifeboats to hold the people on board and Lusitania was “seaworthy in the highest sense”. He also declared that “the proof is absolute that she was not and never had been armed nor did she carry any explosives. She did carry some 18 fuse cases and 125 shrapnel cases consisting merely of empty shells without any powder charge, 4,200 cases of safety cartridges and 189 cases of infantry equipment, such as leather fittings, pouches, and the like. All 112 www.britainatwar.com

these were for delivery abroad but none of these munitions could be exploded by setting them on fire in mass or in bulk nor by subjecting them to impact.” There was also evidence from passengers and crew that daily boat drills were undertaken and that the reason why some people had not witnessed this is because they were elsewhere during those sessions.

pressure of the water rushing in from the starboard side against the weakened longitudinal bulkheads on the port side would cause them to give way and thus open up some apertures on the port side for the entry of water.  Later, when the water continued to rush in on the starboard side, the list to starboard naturally again occurred, increased

THE LUSITANIA MEDAL

IRRELEVANT The speed of the ship was the next subject dealt with by Mayer. In this he accepted the need for reducing the ship boiler capacity as justified under the circumstances. With coal in great demand in warships and even at her reduced speed she was still “considerably faster than any passenger ship crossing the Atlantic at that time.” Mayer also said that the reduction in speed was “quite immaterial to the controversy”. Mayer believed that Cunard director, Sir Alfred Booth, was correct in continuing to operate “unless he and his company were willing to yield to the attempt of the German Government to terrify British shipping. No one familiar with the British character would expect that such a threat would accomplish more than to emphasize the necessity of taking every precaution to protect life and property, which the exercise of judgment would invite.” Mayer saw that the main reason for the large loss of life was the second explosion. “The explosive force was sufficiently powerful to blow debris far above the radio wires — i.e., more than 160 feet above the water ...  It is easy to understand, therefore, how the whole

The so-called ‘Lusitania Medal’ is familiar to collectors of First World War memorabilia in the form of an iron reproduction of an original produced by Munich medallist Karl Goetz. The piece has a diameter of 56.5 mm and is about 3 mm thick. It has become an almost iconic and instantly recognisable piece of period memorabilia. The original, however, was a rather more finely detailed bronze medallion. Goetz’s intention was to represent wilful neglect by the British authorities in allowing the Lusitania to sail in the face of the published German warnings in the USA. On the obverse of his medallion design, Goetz placed a depiction of passengers jostling to buy tickets from a skeleton in the Cunard booking office as the German Ambassador to the USA wagged his finger in warning. Meanwhile, a prospective passenger reads a newspaper bearing the strident headline: ‘U-Boat Warning’. However, the mere fact that the sinking had been ‘commemorated’ in Germany was a gift to British propaganda which seized upon its issue as demonstrable proof of the enemy’s frightfulness. Capitalising on this sentiment, reproductions were made in iron and sold in cardboard presentation boxes with an illustration of Lusitania on its lid and complete with an information sheet carrying the sarcastic heading: ‘ A German Naval Victory’. Beneath, details of the sinking were set out along with a comment in relation to the illustration on the medallion: ‘This picture seeks apparently to propound the theory that if a murderer warns his victim of his inclination then the guilt of the crime rests with the victim.’ Proceeds from the sale of these reproduction medallions in Britain and its Empire went to the benefit of St Dunstan’s Blinded Soldiers and Sailors Hostel.

LUSITANIA The Truth TOP MIDDLE: The body of an American victim of the liner’s sinking arrives back in New York on 24 May 1915. It is stated that 124 US citizens perished in the disaster, there having been a total of 159 Americans on board at the time. ABOVE LEFT: A Lusitania survivor pictured in London with an injured hand, 25 May 1915.

and continued to the end.  As might be expected, the degree of list to starboard is variously described but there is no doubt that it was steep and substantial.”

THE SECOND EXPLOSION The subject of the second explosion has been, and continues to be, the subject of much discussion. Many theories have been put forward, but Mayer, not having before him the testimony of Kapitänleutnant Walther Schwieger, decided that both explosions were caused by torpedoes. “There was, however, an interesting and remarkable conflict of testimony as to whether the ship was struck by one or two torpedoes,” wrote Mayer, “and witnesses, both passengers and crew, differed on this point, conscientiously and emphatically, some witnesses for claimants and some for petitioner holding one view and others called by each side holding the opposite view.  “The witnesses were all highly intelligent and there is no doubt that all testified to the best of their recollection, knowledge or impression, and in accordance with their honest conviction.  The weight of the testimony (too voluminous to analyze) is in favour (sic) of the ‘two torpedo’ contention ... because of the unquestioned surrounding circumstances. The deliberate character of the attack upon a vessel whose identity could not be mistaken, made easy on a bright day, and the fact that

the vessel had no means of defending herself, would lead to the inference that the submarine commander would make sure of her destruction. Further, the evidence is overwhelming that there was a second explosion.  “The witnesses differ as to the impression which the sound of this explosion made upon them — a natural difference due to the fact, known by common experience, that persons who hear the same explosion even at the same time will not only describe the sound differently but will not agree as to the number of detonations. As there were no explosives on board, it is difficult to account for the second explosion except on the theory that it was caused by a second torpedo.”  Mayer then painted the scene as he visualised it: “Two sudden and extraordinary explosions, the ship badly listed so that the port side was well up in the air, the passengers scattered about on the decks and in the staterooms, saloons and companionways, the ship under headway and, as it turned out, only 18 minutes afloat — such was the

LEFT: At Albert Dock, Liverpool, and within sight of the old Cunard building, is one of Lusitania’s four 23-ton propellers. It was salvaged from the wreck in 1982, by Oceaneering International. Other items recovered have included the ship’s whistle, docking telegraph, portholes, windows, dining plates and small items including several hundred military fuses, proving beyond doubt that the ship had been carrying munitions. (PHOTOGRAPH BY

MIKE PEEL; WWW. MIKEPEEL.NET)

TOP RIGHT: Lusitania Memorial in Cobh, Ireland. (WITH THE KIND PERMISSION OF PAUL O’FARRELL)

situation which confronted the officers, crew and passengers in the endeavour to save the lives of those on board.”

VERDICT — AND TRUTH Judge Mayer concluded that Cunard was not responsible in any way for the loss of the liner of her crew and passengers. The cause of the sinking of Lusitania “was the illegal act of the Imperial German Government, acting through its instrument, the submarine commander.” The case was dismissed without costs. Yet history has shown that Judge Mayer certainly did not have all the facts at his disposal. Rumours abounded throughout the 20th century that Lusitania was indeed a legitimate target because she was carrying a much wider range of munitions than had been declared, including thousands of rounds of .303 ammunition. Various dive teams reported the presence of armaments around the seabed wreckage. Successive British Governments would not be drawn into commenting on such a historically sensitive matter. Only in 2014 was the truth finally revealed under the 30-year rule that determines the release into the public domain of official British Government documents. It had warned salvage companies in 1982: “The facts are that there is a large amount of ammunition in the wreck, some of which is highly dangerous.” War crime or legitimate target? You decide. 

BELOW: Like Lusitania, U-20 did not survive the war. On 4 November 1916, it grounded on the Danish coast south of Vrist after suffering damage to its engines. The following day the submarine’s crew set off torpedoes in the bow to disable their vessel.

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The First W

rld War in Objects

THE BRITISH ARMY 'RUM JAR' NO.6

IF YOU are looking for any item on a First World War battlefield today to help convince you that the British Army was once there, it is the SRD jar, either complete or in fragments, that you are most likely to find. More commonly referred to as a ‘Rum Jar’ these stoneware vessels, usually marked with the initials “S.R.D.” in black, were an important part of everyday life for the men in the front line.

In his book Tommy the late Richard Holmes states that the rum ration was “a quarter-gill (one-sixteenth of a pint) per man per day”. He goes on to point out: “It was not a right, but had to be approved by divisional commanders on medical advice that conditions were arduous. In practice almost all divisional commanders granted the rum ration.” Canadian infantryman Ralph Bell wrote: “When the days shorten, and the rain never ceases; when the sky is ever grey, the nights chill, and trenches thigh deep in mud and water; when the front is altogether a beastly place, in fact, we have one consolation. It comes in gallon jars, marked simply SRD.” According to Brigadier Frank Crozier, “Rum properly issued, under supervision, tot at a time to each, an officer being responsible for the issue … is a temporary restorative in times of great stress.” The rum ration was commonly issued at the dawn stand-to, for, as veteran Frank Richards recalled, it “was very beneficial to us and helped keep the cold out of our bodies.” MAIN PICTURE: A typical First World War SRD jar, this example manufactured by Robinsons of Leeds. (ALL IMAGES HISTORIC

MILITARY PRESS)

Despite the prevalence of these containers, the exact meaning of “S.R.D.” has been much debated over the years. Some accounts state that the initials stand for “Special Rations Department”, “Service Rum Dilute”, or “Service Rum Distribution”. Indeed, it is the link with rum that had led to these vessels being known colloquially as “Rum Jars”. To the troops themselves, the letters stood for “Soon Runs Dry”, “Seldom Rarely Delivered”, “Soldiers Run Dry”, or “Seldom Reaches Destination”. It has become increasingly accepted, however, that “S.R.D.” in fact stands for “Supply Reserve Depot”. The Imperial War Museum, for example, takes this view. During the First World War the headquarters of the army’s Supply Reserve Depot was located in the area known as Convoys Wharf at Deptford on the River Thames. The site, which remained in use until it was damaged beyond repair during the Second World War, was located alongside the Royal Navy’s Victualling Yard, which was in turn responsible for providing the British Army’s rum supply. Many hundreds of thousands of these stoneware jars were manufactured during the First World War, both in the United Kingdom and across the Empire. They were supplied in various sizes (and colours), the most common being 1 gallon and 1/2 gallon. They were intended to hold any liquid (such as lime juice, soda, oil, ink and acid) and not just rum, though it is the latter with which these containers have become synonymous.

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FAR LEFT: A Bruce Bairnsfather cartoon entitled “The Spirit of our Troops is Excellent”. BELOW: An officer in his dugout during the First World War. Note the SRD jar bottom left.

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