by Steve Holmes
‘What about Vanrenen?’ Bob Crosby chipped in, ‘what’s he called?’
‘You can call him what you like Geordie boy, but to his face he’d better be Skipper or Sir. Nothing more, nothing less and woe betide anyone that slips up.’
‘So he hasn’t got a nickname?’
Len Jones shook his head.
‘But you have, Geordie boy, I’ve just christened you Geordie.’ Len Jones looked for approval around the table and got a unanimous thumbs up. ‘Geordie it is then.’
He looked at John.
‘That just leaves you Flight Engineer Holmes; we ain’t having any ponce in our team called John.’ He stood up and rested on the table. ‘Any suggestions men?’
‘Needles.’
‘What?’
‘As in needles and pins.’
The joke raised a few laughs but no thumbs up.
‘The virgin.’
‘The what?’
‘The virgin, the bugger’s never been up in a plane before.’
Then Doug Handley piped up.
‘Sherlock, after Sherlock Holmes. When he takes over from Vanrenen we can call it Sherlock’s Squadron.’
The crew all laughed, Bob Crosby slapped John on the back.
‘Are you going to become the next Skipper, Sherlock? You know better than everyone else.’
‘Just give it a rest, lads, please. Okay I mucked up but when is this going to end?’
‘Look Sherlock, when you fuck up around here we never let you forget it. The theory is you will only fuck up once and when we’re in the air you’ll be on your best behaviour and with a little bit of luck we’ll all come back home in one piece.’
Len Jones’s analogy was an accurate one, one that made sense and suddenly John could see his crew mates for what they really were. The jokes were harmless, they meant nothing and at the same time the men were relaying an underlying message.
It said simply… trust us.
The village dance was somewhat frustrating for certain parties. While the rest of the crew took their chances with the pretty Welsh girls who’d come into Cowbridge in their droves, two men found it particularly frustrating having been married fairly recently. John and Reg stood at the bar nursing a pint each, both men more than content to look but not to touch.
‘I’ve everything I need back home, Sherlock,’ Reg announced. ‘I’m not going to let any of these Welsh girls get me into bother.’
A girl floated past the bar, no more than eighteen years of age with a bust that looked almost out of kilter with the rest of her body. Her face was as smooth as a peach, long auburn hair cascaded and flowed behind her and she smiled at the two RAF men as they stood and gawped.
‘We can look but we’d better not touch, Tam.’ John was missing his beautiful young bride more than ever. His son’s face was etched permanently on his mind and temptation, no matter how great, would never be able to come in between him and his perfect family. It was hard to resist a pretty face but it wasn’t impossible.
‘Well stacked though isn’t she Sherlock?’
John laughed, feigned a puzzled look. ‘Err… was she? I can’t say I’d really noticed to tell you the truth.’
Reg Tammas pulled John into a headlock and rained a few pretend punches into his face. ‘You’re some fella you are Sherlock, I’ll say. You’ve caused more hassle in the two seconds you’ve been with us than anyone I can remember.’
Reg Tammas broke the grip.
‘Something tells me we’re going to get along just fine.’
‘We are that Tam… we are that.’
Later that evening the beers kicked in and a more melancholy mood ensued. John was always one for contemplating after the effects of alcohol kicked in and his mood deepened as he thought about the family he’d left behind, his brothers wherever it was they were and his mother and father. He had a new family now, he told himself, albeit a temporary one. His temporary family would ensure that the world would be a better place for the permanent family he’d left behind. He firmly believed in what it was he was doing.
And that night he dreamt. He dreamt about huge aircraft and bombs and factories and ships and German airfields blown to bits. But towards the end of the dream there were visions of distressed children and weeping mothers and the shock of it all woke him with a start.
Vanrenen stood with a stranger at the front of the lecture room. He introduced him as Flight Lieutenant Bill Short from Berwick upon Tweed, a pilot instructor.
Vanrenen broke the news.
‘We’ll be going up this afternoon. 1500 hours.’ Vanrenen smiled. ‘Today, gentlemen, we will be taking our first trip in the Queen of the Skies.’
Vanrenen and Short took the morning class between them, before breaking for lunch. John’s legs were like jelly as he tried to stand to leave the room and for the first time he realised he was positively petrified.
Reg noticed too.
‘Look at Sherlock, Len, he’s shitting himself.’
John tried to laugh it off.
‘No I’m not. I’m just a little rough from last night… too many beers.’
But he was shitting himself and he knew it and so did the rest of the room. John didn’t notice as he walked outside that the rest of the team were gesticulating to each other in silence behind his back. They were concocting a ruse and poor old Sherlock would be at the centre of it.
‘Worst bloody plane in the RAF, the old Stirling.’
Doug Hanley drew on a cigarette as he walked down the narrow corridor that led the way outside. A large plume of smoke rose to the ceiling. John took the bait.
‘It is?’
‘Damn right it is, you’ve heard about the swing on take-off haven’t you?’
‘Yes I have, but…’
‘And the collapsing wheels on landing?’ said Chalky.
And so it went on for the ten minutes they stood and loitered outside before lunch. The entire crew tore the Stirling Bomber to pieces so skilfully that John Holmes was convinced his life expectancy had been slashed to that of a week-old kitten at the annual Cambridgeshire Fox Terriers Ball.
‘You dining with us today?’ asked Bob Crosby.
John shook his head and explained that he’d arranged to meet up with Lofty Matthews and Taffy Stimson. He wanted to see how their first few flights had gone.
‘Surely the Stirlings can’t be as bad as what you lot are saying?’
As soon as John had made the announcement, Doug Hanley had quietly slipped away to find Lofty and Taffy. He needed to bring them in on the joke.
John took lunch in the Sergeants’ Mess. He spotted Lofty and Taffy sitting with a group of other flight crew and walked over with his lunch piled high. It would be a lunch that he would not touch. Lofty and Taffy and the entire table had been ‘got at’. Doug Hanley had slipped out of the mess unseen, with seconds to spare.
Taffy introduced his pilot, Henry ‘Chuck’ Hoystead, an Aussie, who knew Vanrenen. Although Hoystead was an officer he was the exact opposite to Vanrenen and preferred to eat with ‘the boys’, steering clear of the Officers’ Mess whenever he could. Lofty’s pilot was also there, Warrant Officer Keith Prowd, another Aussie and a navigator, Flight Sergeant Clive Westoby.
For the next hour, John asked the questions and Lofty and Taffy’s crew answered them. To say they exaggerated the failings of the Stirling Bomber was the understatement of the year. Clive Westoby was particularly animated playing up the role of chief exaggerator to the full.
John was quaking in his boots as they approached the huge Stirling a few minutes before 3 pm. He was a little dismayed that he hadn’t had time to pen one last letter to his wife. It looked bigger than ever, almost taunted him as he approached it, daring him to climb inside. Bill Short gave him a little wave from the cockpit that towered twenty nine feet above him. Even climbing into the Stirling seemed fraught with danger. The most unpopular method of getting into the aircraft involved a 22-rung ladder climb direct into the cockpit which gave relatively e
asy access to the rest of the plane. It was not used very often but today, typical of the RAF, it was. Despite his misgivings John still had an overwhelming desire to get into the plane.
Every member of the crew had a one to one instructor with them, specialising in their own particular field. John’s man was a flight engineer with three years’ experience flying Stirlings. Archie Murray was an amiable guy from the Borders of Scotland and a good friend of Bill Short. Although a little shaky, John managed the ladder without a problem. Bill Short welcomed him aboard with a handshake and although Vanrenen was also on board, he had his face buried in a flight chart and neither noticed nor acknowledged the virgin Flight Engineer. Whilst the Stirling bomber was huge from the outside, the inside was a completely different story.
John tugged at his collar, feeling a little claustrophobic as he peered down the fuselage. To use a popular expression-there wasn’t room to swing a cat. Archie encouraged him to take a trip down the plane to familiarise himself with the lay out. Although he felt he knew every inch of the plane through the many months of training and study nothing could prepare him for this moment, knowing that within thirty minutes or so this huge monstrosity would be bumping and shuddering down the runway at 125 miles an hour attempting to make it into the air. As John climbed into the bomb bay and imagined it crammed with nearly eight tons of bombs (today it was empty) he wondered just how accurate the assessments of his crew members really were.
Just how bad was the plane? How cumbersome and badly designed was it, and more importantly what was the real life expectancy of the plane according to the RAF? How many sorties were a crew expected to make before they crashed or were shot down?
These were not questions he should be asking himself now, he thought, as he became aware of the first of the four huge engines sparking into life. He continued to crawl through the plane, annoyed at how cumbersome his attached parachute was becoming. The crew had been told to wear the chute at all times during the inaugural flight to get used to it. He passed the rest bed, which in theory would give a member of the crew a chance to catch forty winks on a particularly long flight. It was nonsense since no one in the crew had time to take a rest during any operation. Its true purpose was for wounded crew members, the dead or dying. The mattress itself gave the game away as it was covered with plastic sheeting to prevent blood soiling the bed.
Archie shouted through to him to take up his position.
The Flight Engineer’s instrument panel was positioned about six feet behind the second pilot’s seat and gave a perfect view out of the cockpit window when standing. Archie sat, making all the checks as John looked on with admiration. He worked the checks like clockwork, no notes, no manuals to help him, just an automatic routine. He made it look effortless. As the time for take-off approached John began to perspire a little. By now the crew and all instructors were in place, it felt like the black hole of Calcutta.
All four engines had been fired into life and Bill Short eased the huge plane forward as it lurched with an almost human like objection as if to say why are you disturbing me? The aircraft creaked and groaned and strained as it made its way towards the centre of the airfield. John felt every bump, every gap in the concrete approach road as it taxied towards the runaway. Bill heaved at the small wheel as the giant aircraft turned and as John peered over his shoulder a mile and a half of runway loomed up before him. It was the most terrifying two minute ordeal of his life as the huge Stirling thundered down the runway. The noise from the four engines was deafening as they strained to power themselves to the required take off speed. Bill Short’s hands visibly vibrated on the wheel, they were almost a blur and John couldn’t help but notice the determined but anxious look on his face. He closed his eyes, trying to block out everything until a swift dig from Archie Murray told him that he was here to watch and learn. He looked back over Bill’s shoulder and noticed the airfield perimeter fence draw ever nearer. They would never make it.
And still the aircraft seemed to fight against the pilot and he recalled the stories of the Stirling stalling at crucial moments, of poor manoeuvrability, the sheer bulk and weight of the craft, the wingspan that was too short and the legendary swing that could occur without warning as it left the runway. His mind was in turmoil as the engine noise increased again in a final effort to lift the beast into the air. And then the Stirling was airborne.
In an instant, in a split second, all of John’s anxieties had disappeared into thin air. The wheels and flaps came up, the engine noise died a little and as the ground disappeared beneath them the Stirling came to life. John felt an uncontrollable smile pull across his face. He lifted himself from the seat and gazed out of the window as if in a trance.
A cheer came from behind him. His wireless operator, navigator and bomb aimer had watched the terrified individual transform into a man without a care in the world; a man who’d just experienced one of life’s great wonders, how 46 tons of metal could defy gravity. And at that moment he realised that his colleagues had been winding him up, putting him to the test because he was, as Chalky had commented in the King’s Head in Cowbridge, a flight virgin.
But he was a virgin no longer and still the smile wouldn’t leave his face as he slowly fell in love with the noise and movement, even the smell of the Stirling Bomber. Archie Murray shook his head and grinned. He’d given up on his trainee flight engineer who had no hope of learning anything on his first flight. It was why the RAF sent up an individual instructor with every crew member, because flight engineers like John ‘Sherlock’ Holmes were absolutely useless and besotted with the Stirling, reduced to the stature of a schoolboy with a huge crush on the sexiest and most glamorous teacher in the school.
CHAPTER EIGHT
It would have been hard to describe John Holmes’s state of mind as the Stirling climbed to around 5000 feet. It was another world, but a world that he was more than comfortable with. He tried hard to tear himself away from the view outside as the aircraft climbed ever higher. It was a perfectly clear day and the English countryside looked like a huge patchwork quilt beneath him. Bill Short pointed out various landmarks during the short flight. They flew out over Newmarket and John marvelled at the miles and miles of gallops that had been used to exercise racehorses from the early 1800s. He spotted what he thought was a string of racehorses moving quickly against the contrasted green background. They looked just like ants. Bill Short flew the Stirling south over Ipswich and followed a line along the Orwell Estuary out into the North Sea. He banked the huge plane and followed a line along the coast before announcing to the crew that they were heading back towards Waterbeach and the airstrip.
It was what was known as circuit and bump training. They would take off, land and taxi back to the huge hangers. They’d repeat every check verbatim then prepare to take off again. The Stirling would be airborne for no more than an hour, circuit and bump, circuit and bump and circuit and bump again. John Holmes’s confidence in the aircraft grew and grew and by the end of the day he loved every single second of flying time. He loved every bump, every rattle, every turn the Queen of the Skies took and it had manoeuvrability in the air that John couldn’t quite comprehend. He couldn’t quite believe how something so heavy, so clumsy and big on the ground stayed up there, let alone fly like it did once in the air. Archie grinned at him and shouted above the noise.
‘Beautiful isn’t she?’
John simply nodded.
Everyone agreed that they had to celebrate John’s first ever flight and the rest of the crew’s first trip in a Stirling bomber. They went to the King’s Head in Cowbridge; that is everyone except Vanrenen.
‘She’s like a big, clumsy old woman on the ground,’ said Reg, ‘but Jesus Christ when those wheels lift off she’s as elegant as anything I’ve ever flown in.’
‘Incredible turning circle I’m told, don’t think Bill put her through her paces today.’
Doug looked at his flight engineer.
‘Didn’t want you shitting your pants o
n the first trip Sherlock… wouldn’t be good for morale if the virgin crapped himself would it?’
The rest of the crew laughed. John didn’t care. The jokes would continue but eventually die away. He felt part of the crew now, couldn’t wait to get back up in the air if the truth were told and couldn’t wait until they ditched their instructors and flew solo. But there was a lot to do before then. Reg explained that the next two weeks would be only circuit and bump, no real height or any night flying. Once the instructors were happy with the crew they’d let them go solo and they’d practice again and again and again.
After ten days the instructors deemed the crew competent and allowed them to fly solo for the first time. John admitted to feeling a little nervous but completed his pre-flight checks with ease. For the first time Vanrenen took the controls while Bill Short stood on the ground and watched. Vanrenen was supremely confident and handled the Stirling as if he’d been flying it for a hundred years. John couldn’t help but look on with admiration as he put the plane through a series of tight turns. Vanrenen shrieked with joy from the cockpit in an uncharacteristic show of emotion.
‘This ugly brute will out turn a bloody glider.’
John had the proof of the pudding. Reg had told him that the Stirling could outmanoeuvre a Bf 110 Night Fighter. He’d doubted him at first but now he knew the truth. As the plane climbed higher than they’d ever climbed before, Vanrenen announced they were flying cross country. He’d take the plane up to around 16,000 feet and they’d need their oxygen masks for the very first time. They would be in the air for over four hours.
They flew over Norwich and up the east coast past Grimsby and Newcastle upon Tyne. Vanrenen announced on the radio they’d turned due west and were following a line along Hadrian’s Wall out past Carlisle and into The Irish Sea. It was a beautifully languid sunny morning and the sun flitted in and out of the sparse cloud cover casting shadows on the swell of the sea below. Before long they were over the water and Vanrenen pointed out The Isle of Man in the distance. Before they reached the island the giant craft turned again and headed back towards land. Within the hour they had started their descent into Waterbeach. Vanrenen brought the Stirling down near perfectly. As far as John Holmes was concerned it was over far too quick. It was a beautiful perfect day and John had to remind himself there was a war on.
