War Wounds

by Richard Townsend Bickers

  Templer was indifferent to popularity and unpopularity. He flew from time to time as either captain or second pilot. He preferred the former, because the supreme joy of his life — second only to making love to Alice — was piloting; and a second dicky did comparatively little, even if he was a self-invited station commander.

  That day, he was fortunate: two captains on each squadron were temporarily grounded; one with a cold and cough, a second sitting on a court of enquiry, a third on compassionate leave occasioned by his father’s sudden grave illness, a fourth under instruction at a court martial.

  The crew Templer chose to take over was normally under the deputy flight commander, a Cranwell-trained flight lieutenant who was conspicuous for being almost entirely bereft of a sense of humour, a brilliant cricketer and a martinet. Templer felt that the crew might even regard his own advent as welcome light relief.

  He sent for the second pilot, a Scottish short service commission pilot officer with a stubborn jaw and carroty hair.

  “I’m taking over your crew tonight, Macpherson. I’ll see you at Ops at sixteen hundred, for briefing.”

  “Very good, sir.” Macpherson looked faintly apprehensive.

  He returned hastily to the crew room.

  “We’re on the Battle Order, chaps. Groupie’s taking over.”

  A bullet-headed, dark-haired pilot officer wearing an observer’s badge, grinned. “Tough titty, Jock.”

  “Aye. For you. He eats observers for breakfast.”

  “Shite! I’d forgotten.” Templer had flown with an inept observer a few months previously, and sent him on a refresher course; after a dressing down which the victim had reported in awed terms and on the verge of tears.

  The three air gunners, two of whom were also wireless operators, and the senior of whom did that job permanently, looked glum and exchanged looks. The wireless operator stood up.

  “Better go and check my gear.”

  “Me too.” The front and rear gunners rose with him.

  “Which kite have we got?” the wop asked.

  Macpherson looked pleased. “C.”

  “That’s good.” The wop sounded relieved. C was a recent delivery and in pristine condition.

  “Briefing at sixteen hundred. The Group Captain will meet us in Ops.” Macpherson turned to the observer. “Come on, Jonah, let’s go there now and get some early gen.”

  “Windy?”

  “Aye. So are you: of Groupie, not Jerry.”

  Pilot Officer Jones grinned ruefully. “You go on to Ops, Jock. I think I’ll go and see the Adj and ask him if he knows the maximum sentence a court martial can give an observer who totally fails to find his target.”

  Macpherson’s craggy face broke into a smile, followed by a laugh: the one a rather horrible sight, the other a somewhat grating sound.

  “Och, the weather’s going to be gey fine all over Germany tonight. I heard the Met man say so in the mess at breakfast.”

  “So did I. That’s why I’m worried. When did you ever know that bugger make a correct forecast?”

  “Come away to Ops and talk to him. You can start plotting the route now, and shake Groupie to the roots at briefing.”

  “I suspect that the last person to shake Groupie at all must have been his nanny when he was about three years old.”

  When, at 4 p.m., the crew assembled in the Ops Room, Templer told himself that, for all the technical advances of the past 21 years, briefing was still a remarkably casual affair.

  It was not very different from the preliminaries to a departure from an airfield in France, with DH4s.

  To make it more reminiscent, there was a familiar face at the controller’s desk.

  Liversedge stood up and said “Good afternoon, sir.”

  “ ‘Afternoon, Ted.”

  Being addressed by his Christian name, Liversedge reflected, was probably the greatest change wrought by the intervening years. Even the closest familiars of their generation and class remained on surname terms throughout their lives in those days. Time had dealt quite kindly with them both. Templer, naturally spare of frame, seemed not to have added any surplus flesh, his hair was thick and untouched by grey. He had always stooped, with the fashionable cavalryman’s slouch. Liversedge, a Reservist after the Great War and a member of the Volunteer Reserve since its formation in the 1930s, was a prosperous quantity surveyor, now promoted to squadron leader. His dark hair was turning grey and a small bald spot was spreading on the crown of his head. But he still held himself well; and if his paunch had begun to bulge a trifle, that was because age had compelled him to substitute golf for rugger.

  “What have you got for me?”

  “Well, it’s first come first served, sir. Group have given us Cologne, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Essen, Hanover and Mannheim as targets. Captains are free to choose within the limit of three crews on each, between the two squadrons. You can choose your own routes and times of take-off: provided you’re over the target between midnight and zero two hundred hours.”

  “Mannheim!” Templer looked at his old observer with a wry smile.

  Liversedge, aware of what was in his mind, returned it.

  Templer turned to his second pilot and observer. “What d’you think, Macpherson? Jones?”

  “We came along to Ops this morning, sir, before I air tested the aircraft; to see what we could find out.” Macpherson looked faintly guilty. He brightened when the Group Captain nodded with apparent approval. “I… we… thought you might like a longish trip, sir: to take a good look at the other side.”

  “Go on.”

  “Hanover, sir.”

  “That will do very well. How about it, Jones?”

  “I’ve laid off some courses to all the targets, sir.”

  “Good. Let’s have a look.”

  They leaned over the chart that Jones spread on a table.

  “Yes, the routes you’ve chosen to Hanover and back look sensible. All right.” Templer looked round at Liversedge. “That’s it, then, Ted. Let’s say take-off at twenty-three hundred, time on target O-one-hundred, E.T.R. O-three-thirty.”

  The station Intelligence officer, whose posting to Scantlebury Templer had contrived in anticipation of war’s declaration, moved to the wall map. Squadron Leader Monks, another member of the R.A.F.V.R., a peacetime solicitor who had done his two weeks’ annual training at Templer’s station that year and the year before, was the Recording Officer of yore, grounded after his sufferings in Gallipoli. Grizzled, bald, desiccated, he looked the oldest of the three veterans, but was only Liversedge’s senior by three years.

  “Searchlights here... here ...” He pointed to several places. “Archie... er... flak... here and here...” He indicated many more. “Fighter stations...” His pointer travelled about the map again.

  “I see you’ve taken due note to avoid as many as possible, when you were plotting our route, Jones.” Templer’s dry tone seemed to suggest praise.

  Jones was gratified. “Yes, sir.”

  Templer turned his attention to the wireless operator. “You’ll get your briefing from your squadron Signals officer?”

  “We already have, sir.”

  “Good. You both saw him?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Templer, appearing suddenly to relax, smiled and spoke to Liversedge. “That’s it, then, Ted. Full load of leaflets, I take it?”

  “Full load, sir.”

  “It’ll take us fifteen minutes to get rid of it all. I’d like to have another look at the flak positions around Hanover.”

  *

  Alice smiled at her husband across the tea table in their comfortable drawing-room. With ornaments gathered during the 24 years of their married life and travels about the world, their own cushions and chintz loose covers for the standard issue furniture, their own curtains and occasional tables, some water colours and oil paintings of places they had known, she transformed every temporary abode into a cosy, familiar home.

  “I know that look, darling; like a po
inter waiting to be sent after a bird. You needn’t agonise over telling me you’re going on ops tonight.”

  He returned her smile; as always, with affection and, on occasions such as this, a rueful admission of having been out-manoeuvred.

  “Just as well I’ve never harboured any really reprehensible secrets.” He reached towards the low table set before the fireplace for a crumpet on which he spread Gentleman’s Relish. “Nothing to worry about. Just a short leaflet-dropping jaunt.”

  She knew better than to ask where.

  “How much longer d’you think we’ll be allowed to stay in quarters?”

  “Not more than another six months, I’d say. I’m afraid we’ll have to start turning out some of the troops from their married quarters, to make room for Waaf. Then the junior officers, to provide accommodation for the overflow from the mess. The War Establishment for the station is surprisingly high: about double our peacetime strength. As it is, I’m having to move out the families in two of the officers’ M.Qs to put Waaf officers into them.”

  “Such a shame. I feel a bit of a pig, sitting snugly here while the most juniors have the rough end of the stick.”

  “Swings and roundabouts, darling. We had to put up with that sort of inconvenience once.”

  “Not really. You weren’t a very junior officer even when we first went into quarters.”

  “True. I had a word with Crozier today: he says he’ll rent us the Dower House.”

  “Oh, spiffing!”

  Sir Miles Crozier, Bart, was the squire; and too old for military service.

  “That’s if I’m not posted before we have to surrender this quarter.”

  “Oh, darling! Any chance?”

  “Of promotion? Don’t see why not. Service expanding rapidly, and all that. Scores of new airfields being built. Mind you, I’d rather stay a station commander than go to a Staff job; even as an air commodore.”

  “I know you would, my darling; and I’d miss station life, too. But it’s bound to happen.”

  “It’s not as though we need the extra pay.” He teased her with his smile. “I’m tempted to let it be known that I have no further ambition than to be a group captain commanding an operational station.”

  She countered the ploy with a laugh. “If you did, you’d very soon find yourself in Training Command, my lad.”

  “For your sake, my love, I’m prepared to aim for Air Marshal and a K. You deserve to be Her Ladyship.”

  “Fiddlesticks! I’ve no wish to be pestered to sit on committees for good works wherever we go. But I want to see you given the recognition you’ve earned.”

  Templer fell silent and contemplative for a moment. When he spoke, it was quietly and without any of the levity that had been present.

  “I’d be a damned sight closer to it, would probably be an air commodore already, if it hadn’t been for the damnable Boche.”

  Alice rose from her chair, went to him and laid her cheek against his. “You’re longing to get at them, aren’t you. That’s the real reason you want to stay as you are: because you can sneak off on ops now and again.” She kissed him and he emerged wholly from his mood of introspection to respond.

  “I wish we could send the servants packing for an hour and go to bed,” he said softly.

  He stood up.

  “Sleep well, darling, and don’t worry. The Boche won’t bother bumph-scatterers. I’ll join you in bed in the small hours; give you the familiar five-o’clock nudge. All right?”

  She kissed him again. “Mind you do.”

  *

  Templer taxied C for Charlie along the blue-lit track towards the down-wind end of the runway. Memories of his last operational departure crowded into his thoughts. He did not count those on which he had set off to bomb rebels in the Middle East and India. The well-remembered odours of Great War aeroplanes returned. The Wellington, the Wimpy, bless her, had a good old-fashioned smell about her that made the old days seem not so long ago. The Wellington’s unique geodetic frame, both fuselage and wings, was canvas-covered; and canvas was treated with “dope”; which, in turn, smelled now much the same as it had 21 ... 25 years ago. There was also the same smell of oil and warm shock-rubber, of paint and hot metal. Templer felt very happy.

  Charlie lifted herself into her natural element as easily as a heavyweight pushing aside a welter. As soon as Templer was over the hedge, the airfield lights went off; to come on again only for the next departure or arrival. He set course for the first turning point, on the French coast, for their flight along France’s northern border. It was a long way round, but there was no flak in France. If they took the other route, on the German side of Holland’s eastern frontier, they would have a sea crossing and enter Germany through a narrow corridor that was easily defended by both flak and fighters. He climbed to 18,000 ft and at 15,000 the crew switched on their oxygen. It came comfortably through a mask now. Templer recalled with disgust having to hold a rubber tube between his teeth and how badly he used to dribble.

  The mask itself was not comfortable, for it chafed and roughened the skin. The cockpit began to grow cold. The gunners had tested their weapons on crossing the English coast and the whiff of burned cordite lingered. Petrol fumes mingled with the other familiar odours. Templer felt even happier as the cordite stung his nostrils, before he strapped his microphone and oxygen mask into position. Cordite meant bullets plugging into the enemy: perhaps not tonight, but some time soon.

  The chalk cliffs of Kent slid beneath. The waves breaking along the French shore made a white, phosphorescent line. France welcomed them with a flicking on of searchlights here and there.

  Templer broke the disciplined silence. “I hope the liaison is working and the French know we’re here.”

  The crew left it to the second pilot to reply. He said “Aye, sir”, respectfully.

  “I was shot up by French Archie ... flak ... not far from here, by mistake, in nineteen-sixteen; twice, come to think of it; and again in ‘seventeen.”

  A long silence; then Jones ventured “You’re taking it for granted we are where we’re supposed to be, sir.”

  The crew heard, with relief, a chuckle from the Group Captain.

  “That’s right, Jones: I’m in your hands. Where, by the way, do you put us?”

  There was no hesitation. “When I say ‘Now’, sir, we'll be seven and a half miles due south of Lille; give or take a hundred yards.”

  Another chuckle. “That qualifies for your squadron’s Line Book.”

  With the tone of one wishing to give generous credit where it was due, Jones said “The jeep got me a first class fix a minute ago, sir.”

  “Well done, Wireless Operator.”

  They relapsed into silence, the crew feeling cheered by their temporary captain’s good humour.

  The next time anyone spoke, it was Pilot Officer Jones again, to say “E.T.A. German frontier, five minutes, sir.”

  And, presently, “Crossing now, Captain.”

  “Thank you. Eyes peeled, gunners. I think you can leave the set now, Wireless Op, and take post in the astrodome.”

  The wop manned the waist guns, one on each side of the fuselage, amidships. In a moment he spoke from there, announcing that he was standing at the astrodome, the perspex blister on top of the fuselage, through which he had an all-round view, and which was primarily used for taking sights with a sextant, by the observer.

  “E.T.A. target, one hour, fourteen minutes, sir. We’ve had a stronger tail wind than Met forecast, and we’re getting some help from having it on our port beam now.”

  “Good. But it means a long plug home.”

  Templer remembered those long plugs home on the Western Front, when the prevailing westerly wind that had helped one to reach enemy territory impeded one’s return and made it easy for Boche scouts ... fighters… to cut one off. We shall see how much things have changed, he mused; if at all.

  A searchlight came on and swept the sky. Another, then a third, joined it.

  A
glare filled the cockpit. It grew brighter and dazzled Templer. The first beam steadied and held the Wellington. The other two beams settled on it.

  “Stand by for evasive action.”

  As soon as he had spoken, Templer banked and dived to port, then turned immediately and climbed to starboard: a corkscrew.

  Two beams still held them.

  He corkscrewed again, more violently, his bank almost perpendicular, his dives steep. One of the beams had not lost them.

  He waited for the flak to start bursting around the Wimpy.

  He reversed the corkscrew, climbing first and then diving, turning first one way and then the opposite.

  Momentarily they evaded the three searchlights; and then were caught again.

  The rear gunner said “Tracer from six-o’clock, up, sir.”

  Templer swung the aircraft from side to side, snaking and skidding. In the brilliance of the searchlights he saw a Me 110 storm past a few feet overhead. Its slipstream tossed Charlie about and made the controls judder. The geodetic fuselage was very flexible, which made the Wellington tiring to fly at the best of times. Templer had to fight to keep it on course.

  He, his second pilot, the front gunner and the wop in the astrodome had a clear view of the 110 turning to come in again, both aeroplanes bathed in white light.

  Templer made a series of corkscrews and yaws, skidding turns and short switchbacks. His muscles began to ache.

  Tracer ripped into the Wellington’s nose. Cold air rushed through the cockpit and down the whole length of the fuselage.

  “Front gunner, are you all right?”

  There was no reply.

  “Go and see, Macpherson.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Templer felt sweat break out all over him as he flung the heavy aeroplane about. He could hear a carrier note on the intercommunication, and presently Macpherson’s voice rose above it. He had plugged his microphone lead into the front gunner’s socket.

  “Second pilot to captain. Front gunner’s had it, sir.”

  “Are you sure he’s not just wounded?”

  “Aye, sir.”