War Brothers

by Patrick Slaney

  We had to learn rapidly before we met the enemy again, and by December, we were much better prepared for the next stage of the war. Clearly 1940 was going to be a year full of action as we were aware that the British expeditionary force had landed in France and were consolidating their positions. We also heard that Hurricane and Spitfire squadrons had been moved to French airfields. By the end of 1939, there were a considerable number of modern and well equipped fighters facing us.

  The unfavourable weather conditions continued into the first few months of 1940, and we spent most of our time in a state of boredom on the ground. There was obviously something significant coming as, on the days that we were able to fly in clear skies; we did spot a lot of our own troops being deployed to forward positions.

  On the 7th April, the brakes were taken off, and we went into action.

  We were called to a briefing on the evening of the 6th April. The room was packed with all the members of the two squadrons, including most of the ground crew. As the Kommandant strode to the front of the room accompanied by the other senior officers, a hush fell over the assembled masses. I felt particularly nervous and for some reason had a strong sense of foreboding.

  ‘You will be glad to hear that the waiting is over, and our illustrious leader Hitler has declared we are ready to attack the enemies who have declared war against Germany. Tomorrow the forces of the Third Reich will launch an attack on Denmark and will also invade Norway. Your role will be to eliminate the Danish air force, and, having completed that task, you will be responsible for protecting the landings in Norway. More detailed instructions will be given to you by your squadron leaders. Good hunting. Heil Hitler.’ He saluted and left the room.

  We were then organized into our squadrons where we received specific instructions for the operations to be carried out the following day.

  As the sun rose, ushering in a fine day in Lubeck, there was a cacophony of noise as more than fifty powerful engines rumbled into life, and roared as the planes took-off.

  I recalled the day last March when we had taken off from near Berlin full of enthusiasm and bravado and how we had returned after our mission totally deflated. Certain of our colleagues hadn’t returned, and the realisation had hit us that war was tough. When we had set out all the pilots were full of pride, but we knew remarkably little about the stark facts of war. I looked around me at my colleagues sitting anxiously in the cockpits of their Me109’s waiting to take-off. There were a lot of them who hadn’t seen action in Poland, and I wondered which ones wouldn’t be coming back.

  The flight in front of mine took off. I indicated to my flight it was time to go, pushing the throttle forward at the same time. I raced across the grass of the airfield and my war resumed.

  Denmark was overcome fairly quickly, and there was only one fatality in the squadron. Two days later the whole squadron was relocated to a captured airfield, close to Viborg in northern Denmark. This would reduce the flying time to the operational areas of Norway. We encountered only minor opposition as the planes put up against us were no match for our technology and our well trained pilots. We had learnt a lot of lessons from Poland and had put them into practice.

  On the 20th April, with most of our objectives achieved in the Norwegian theatre of operations, the squadron returned to Lubeck to regroup and get ready for the attack on Western Europe. We had only lost three planes in the operations over Denmark and Norway, largely because both air forces had been destroyed on the ground. We had encountered the RAF for the first time in Norway, but our squadron had only met one or two and they hadn’t been a threat.

  That all changed on the 10th May when the German invasion of Holland, Belgium and France commenced. All restrictions on the use of fuel were cancelled, and we were in the air as long as there was daylight. As soon as my flight landed back at base, the planes were serviced, ammunition was replenished, and we were ready to go again. We hardly had time to eat and had to make do with a breakfast before dawn and a meal in the evening after it got dark.

  We even had a continual supply of spare planes to replace any that were mechanically unfit to take-off. Losses were high, and we lost about twenty five percent of our strength. We rapidly ran out of back-up 109’s and also of pilots. New pilots and planes were arriving all the time to replace our losses, and one of my roles was to ensure that the new arrivals to my flight, received the basic skills to enable them to survive.

  Every morning, when I opened my tired eyes, I was hopeful that I would hear the welcome sound of rain and wind. The only days that I had a chance to recover from the unrelenting pressure were the ones that we couldn’t fly due to the bad weather.

  I didn’t escape the carnage but was extremely lucky to survive when my luck ran out. My flight was flying over Holland, protecting a group of Stuka dive bombers, whose mission was to attack Dutch defences near Amsterdam. There was a lot of flak being thrown up from anti-aircraft batteries, and I was unlucky to receive a hit from some shrapnel. Fuel started to leak, and I soon realised that I wouldn’t have enough to make it back to Lubeck.

  I headed towards Germany, and, once over friendly territory, I looked for a field that I might be able to land in without killing myself. My first attempt was a disaster, and I overshot the field I had selected, but on the second attempt, I managed to make a pretty decent landing suffering only minimal damage to the undercarriage. At least I survived. I found a farmhouse that luckily had a telephone. I was put through to the airfield at Lubeck, and was able to arrange for a recovery crew to come and collect me and my Me109.

  That evening I celebrated my survival in the mess. I had been reported missing along with two others, but they sadly turned out to have been killed. They readied another plane for me overnight, fitting my ‘Bekker seat’ to the new plane. At dawn, I took off leading my flight back into the action.

  Progress of the army in the countries that were being attacked was rapid, and by the 24th May the British army was pinned back in Dunkirk. Shortly afterwards, the Belgium army surrendered, along with the Dutch, so all our air resources now could be focused over the defeated enemy at Dunkirk.

  We then witnessed an extraordinary sight. Thousands of ships came across the Channel and started to pick up the British, French and other members of the defeated army, bringing them back to the south coast of England. Our role was to strafe the beaches where the defeated army was collecting and also attack the Hurricanes and Spitfires who were trying to protect them. It was our first real encounter with a mass of enemy fighters, and we suffered a lot of casualties.

  What I had dreaded was happening. We were now fighting the air force that my twin brother Chris was a member of, and the possibility of fighting against my brother was becoming a reality.

  I was intelligent enough to realise that my thoughts about Chris were endangering my life. I was actually looking at every enemy Hurricane, to see if I could recognise Chris. This resulted in a split seconds delay in firing. Realistically that might be the difference between survival and death. I was able to convince myself that the chances of encountering Chris would be infinitesimal, and I had better ignore the possibility if I wanted to stay alive.

  Looking at what was going on below me in the seas off Dunkirk, I was actually quite surprised at how relieved I felt that so many men were escaping. I learnt afterwards that over three hundred thousand managed to escape back to England.

  It was shortly afterwards that France surrendered, and the newspapers were full of pictures of Hitler in Paris celebrating the German victory. I was so tired that celebrations were beyond me, and I felt extremely lucky to have survived so far.

  Chapter 18

  We had a few days out of the firing line. We had been in action, with no rest days, for almost a month. Being a resident of Lubeck, I was allowed to go home for a few days. All I did was sleep.

  Shortly after my return to the Squadron, all the Oberleutnants an
d officers above that rank were called to a briefing.

  ‘I want to pass on to you the directions that the Fuehrer has issued, and it concerns the next phase of the war against Great Britain.’ The Kommandant sounded full of confidence as he addressed us. ‘There is going to be an all-out air attack on England, and this will involve every fighter and bomber squadron in the Luftwaffe. The squadrons based here in Lubeck are being relocated to airfields in the north of France. This will put them closer to the south coast of England and will enable you to spend more time over the operational areas. Our objective will be to defeat the RAF and destroy their airfields making it impossible for them to operate, which will cause the British Government to capitulate and seek peace. Heil Hitler.’

  ‘When will we be moving,’ one of the officers asked.

  ‘We will be moving in two days from now. The ground crews will leave on Tuesday, and the squadron will fly to France on Friday, by which time the airfield will have been set up to receive you. ‘

  ‘Can you tell us where we are going?’ another officer asked.

  ‘Not at the moment as we don’t want any information to get out prior to the move. There will be a party in the mess tonight to celebrate the successful invasion of France and the Low Countries. You can let your hair down, but we want you fully recovered by the time that you have to move.’

  With that, he terminated the meeting, and we all retired to the mess to start the party.

  The conditions that we found at our new location when we flew there on the Friday were extremely primitive as there had been no time to set up proper accommodation. The pilots were housed in whatever buildings were available while the ground crews were housed in tents. Field kitchens provided the food, so it was very basic and was often cold.

  The Battle for Britain was launched on the 10th July with our squadron’s role being to escort bombers as they went in wave after wave across the French coast and the south coast of England. Needless to say, we met heavy resistance as the RAF’s Spitfires and Hurricanes came up in their swarms against us. We lost a lot of bombers and quite a few fighters, so the mood back at our base was not a happy one. From my own personal point of view, the chances of me bumping into Chris had increased considerably as every fighter plane in the RAF was being thrown up against the Luftwaffe hordes.

  On 23rd July, I was escorting a large flight of bombers across Kent just before sunset. We were jumped on by RAF fighter planes which we didn’t spot early enough as they came out of the low setting sun in the west. I dived to avoid a fighter that had latched on to me, but I was too late and my engine received a direct hit and went on fire. Luckily I was unhurt and had avoided serious injury, but my Messerschmitt 109 was going nowhere.

  As the fighter that had just disabled me flashed past, I just caught sight of the pilot. It was unquestionably my twin brother Chris. It registered in my brain, but at that moment all I was concerned about, was getting out of my damaged aircraft.

  I was now diving, out of control, towards the ground. My large frame was wedged into my special ‘Bekker’ seat. If I was to survive, I needed to exit the plane, without hitting the tail. I eased myself out of the seat, threw the rudder over, and with all the strength that I possessed, pushed myself upwards. I exited the cockpit and just managed to miss the tail, pulled on the rip cord of my parachute, and, to my great relief, it opened successfully.

  Chris must have recognized who he had shot down, and he circled in his Hurricane making sure that I was OK. Taking my eyes off Chris and looking down at the ground, I could see that there were electricity pylons in the area that I was heading for. It now was getting quite dark, so I had considerable difficulty in picking out the cables. By pulling frantically on the lines of my parachute, I managed to avoid both pylons and cables, and I landed safely.

  Chris was still circling, keeping an eye on me and checking to make sure that I came to no harm. He then made a fatal mistake. He came to a very low height to verify that I had landed safely. Despite the canopy of his cockpit being fully open to give him better visibility, he didn’t see the cables. His plane collided with the cables and did an instant somersault. He was ejected through the open canopy when his Hurricane somersaulted. I stood there in horror as I saw my brother fly through the air and land in a hay rick which was situated in a corner of the field that I had landed in. His Hurricane hit the ground and became a blazing inferno. I ran over to the hay rick in a total panic. I was stunned. It was bad enough going through the trauma of being shot down, but I had also seen my twin brother killed in front of me.

  What did I do now? I heard the sound of a tractor coming down a lane towards the field. I had to do something quick and get away from there. I decided to switch tunics with my brother and also to switch our dog tags. Whoever found him would assume that he was Markus Bekker of the Luftwaffe, and there was no way that Chris Becker would have survived the inferno that the Hurricane had become.

  With great difficulty, I took off his RAF tunic and somehow managed to dress him in my Luftwaffe tunic. I was in such shock that I did it all in a dream. I ended up leaving the scene as an RAF officer but with Luftwaffe trousers. Hopefully, no one would look too closely below my waist.

  I slid off the hay rick and climbed over the fence behind the hay rick just as the tractor was entering through the gate at the other end of the field. I skirted around the field behind a tall hedge, keeping well out of sight of whoever was on the tractor. I found the lane that the tractor had come along, and headed away from the tragedy.

  Chapter 19

  It was now quite dark, and I was having considerable difficulty finding my way as there was a total blackout in operation. I decided that the best option would be to find somewhere to hide for the night. I then would set off at first light.

  As I walked along the lane, there was the dark outline of quite a large building beside me, so I investigated further and found a barn. Rather than stumble around in the dark, I went into the barn, and curled up on some hay to sleep. Hunger was my next problem. I hadn’t eaten for about sixteen hours, which was a problem as my large frame needed plenty of fodder to maintain its energy levels. Eventually, I managed to fall asleep and got some rest before I had to leave my sanctuary when the darkness receded at around 5:30 am the following morning.

  At least I could see where I was going now although all the signposts had been taken down. I was conscious that I didn’t have any flying cap and my head was bare. Chris had been wearing his flying helmet, and I obviously couldn’t wear that and had left it with him. I hoped my hatless state wouldn’t give me away.

  I came to a town, but had no idea where I was because of the absence of signs. As I was progressing through the town I heard a steam train in the distance, so there must be a station where hopefully I could get a train to London. I duly found the station and was able to find out that I was in Swanley as the name plate hadn’t been removed. I purchased a ticket from the rather sleepy looking clerk in the ticket office, and boarded the next train for London that arrived. Forty minutes later the train puffed into Victoria station and came to a grinding halt. I had survived the first part of my journey, and nobody had asked me a question or tried to talk to me. There were so many people travelling around in uniform that I fitted in a lot better than if I had been in casual clothes or a suit. The only people not in uniform were too young or too old to be serving their country.

  I knew from my previous train trip to Yorkshire in 1938 that the train left from Kings Cross station. I now had to transport myself across London on the underground.

  I arrived at Kings Cross at 9:30 am only to find that the next train to Harrogate would not leave until 11:15 am. With time to kill, I decided to risk buying some food as by this time I was weak with the hunger. As food rationing had been introduced earlier in the year the menu was extremely limited, but I was able to purchase a large portion of bully-beef pie with some bread and a cup of tea.


  Feeling much better and gaining in confidence I caught the 11:15 train.

  I hadn’t had a chance to have a proper look in Chris’s wallet, so, once the train was under way, I took it out and went through all the items in it. There was only one piece of paper that was vital, his service papers, which gave his rank, squadron, and personal details. An hour later the conductor came around checking tickets and with him was a policeman who was checking papers. I handed my ticket to the conductor and the service papers to the policemen. They both nodded at me and moved on. I didn’t have to say a word which of course would have been a possible giveaway with my pronounced German accent.

  It was a hugely relieved Markus that got off the train in Harrogate. The next difficult task would be to tell my father about Chris’s accident and probable death.

  It was with a lot of trepidation that I pushed open the door and entered the bakery. The lady behind the counter looked up and waved to me obviously believing that it was Chris. I moved past her and saw my father in the rear of the bakery with his back to me.

  ‘Dad, it’s me Markus.’

  He turned around with a look of surprise on his face which turned to alarm when he saw me standing there in an RAF uniform.

  ‘Markus, what is going on? Why are you dressed in an RAF uniform?’