And all the time the aeroplane was rising and falling, sometimes yawing sharply from side to side, occasionally pitching steeply or leaping upward under the influence of errant air currents. So you took a bump on the head, bruised an elbow or a knee, knocked your knuckles painfully, maybe got a biff on the nose or forehead.
Flying in a twin-engined medium bomber was a rough job, whatever your particular place in its crew.
And that was without taking into consideration the intense cold and the danger of oxygen starvation that you incurred at heights from 10,000ft upward.
They had been flying for more than an hour and a half when Ridley, and Redfern in the front turret, spoke simultaneously. For a few seconds the intercom squealed with incomprehensible sounds, until the front gunner stopped talking. Then the whole crew heard the captain say, “Ships on the port bow ... about eleven o’clock ... must be five miles away ... there’s a slight mist down there.”
Then Redfern had the chance to say, “Front gunner to captain ... I see ’em, sir.”
Ridley glanced to his right, across the cockpit, towards the next aircraft in the V. Its pilot had turned to look at him and was jabbing his left forefinger forward and downward. Ridley raised his right hand in acknowledgement.
Clive appeared at his side and gave him a slip of paper on which he had noted their position at the time of the sighting. Then he peered out at the ships, turned and grinned at Ridley, plugged in his intercom at the second pilot’s position and said, “I wonder if the C.O. will go straight in?”
Before Ridley could reply, another voice spoke.
“Rear gunner to captain ... one-one-ohs at five o’clock, same height ... they’re in two formations, sir ... coming up port and starboard ... about twenty of them.”
Ridley made a sign to Clive to stay where he was. He would be more use as a second pilot for the time being than as observer: if Ridley were killed or injured, Clive would have to take over as pilot ... and if the C.O. decided to attack the enemy ships Clive would have to move to the bomb-aimer’s position, in front of the first pilot and to the left of, and behind, the nose turret.
Noakes reported again. “Rear gunner, skipper ... last Wimpey on the starboard of the second Vic going down in flames.”
*
Reinert had been flying in something of a daydream, his thoughts more on his newly-betrothed than on his task. Leutnant Falch had said the Tommies were bound to turn up. They couldn’t ignore a target like six minesweepers and two destroyers. The Blenheims that had spotted them earlier must have reported them. The Intelligence officer had checked the Blenheims’ identification letters and said they were from a fighter squadron. That was why they had not attacked. Their job, obviously, was to scout. The bombers had to come along before long. So there was no need to keep too sharp a lookout: it was only a matter of waiting for the fish to take the bait. Anyway, Lent had his eyes wide open.
Lent had his own preoccupations. There was a plump and playful red-haired girl in the parachute store who was much in his mind at the moment. He had been attracted to her straight away when he handed in his parachute for repacking and drew a replacement one. She came from the south, like him. And, also like him, she was of farming stock. With so much in common, and the Swabian dialect in which to converse privately when among non-Bavarians, they had quickly become bosom friends. And that was literally true, for her prominent bust had been the first of her attractions to catch his eye and he was now as familiar with its contours when bouncingly released from the confines of her service-issue bra as she was herself.
It wasn’t easy for a mere corporal and a female lance-corporal to find a place where they could be intimately alone together. Neither could safely enter the other’s quarters even by the greatest stealth. He was friendly with one of the P.T. instructors, who used to lend him a key to the gymnasium, where they could disport themselves on a mat, but that could be only a rare indulgence. Last night he had taken her to a cinema and they had parted without this delightful consummation, so he was feeling frustrated and sulky.
Seeing how cheerful and pleased with himself his pilot was that morning made Lent feel particularly glum.
Being ordered off on another patrol in the Heligoland Bight had added to his sense of grievance. It seemed to him that the Staffel got more than its fair share of work. True, another of the four Staffeln in their Gruppe had also been ordered up this time, which would take the pressure off a bit. But that could only mean that a really large force of the enemy was expected. So far, they had outnumbered the enemy every time he had been in action, but a surprising number of 110s and 109s got the chop every time, nevertheless.
It was a better day than yesterday, anyway. They could stay at a decent 1,500 metres and command a good view of the sea. What was as important as spotting the enemy early was that they could also discern those two destroyers and six minesweepers in good time and keep their distance. The Navy was highly sensitive to the approach of aircraft and opened fire without waiting to confirm identity.
The Staffel was flying in its usual five Rotten of two aircraft each. Today they were in V formation, with the other Staffel in similar order astern of them. Reinert and Lent’s aeroplane was on the extreme left of the leading V until the formation turned to starboard, when the aircraft to right and left of the leader made cross-over turns to his opposite side. Reinert was all in favour of that. It relived the monotony a bit. They made two turns, one to starboard to fly parallel with the coast for a while, then another to port, heading out to sea.
And then Reinert saw a group of bright flashes in the sky which told him the sun was being reflected from other aircraft. Oberleutnant Falch, leading the Staffel, saw them at the same time. He gave an instant warning on the radio.
The sun went in for a moment and the sparkling little shapes a few kilometres to the west became dark forms which were recognisable as either Wellingtons or Whitleys. Then the bombers began to turn and the German fighter crews could see that they had only one tail fin and had to be Wellingtons.
The two Staffeln separated, the leading one veering a few degrees to port and the one behind to starboard. This was a change of course, not a complete turn, so everyone kept the same station. Each pair was stepped 30 metres above the pair in front, so all the pilots had a good view of the approaching enemy.
The Staffelkapitän was the first to open fire. Tracer shells from his cannon drew long, coruscating lines across the intervening space. The Messerschmitts were still out of range of the Wellingtons’ machine-guns. The bomber on the extreme right of the formation had been hit in the rear end and shards of perspex from the turret erupted from it like brilliant specks of mirror. The Staffelkapitän shifted his aim and a few seconds later smoke and flame belched from the Wellington’s starboard engine. Then a flash of fire leaped up from the centre section, where the oxygen cylinders were, and from a fuel-tank in the wing.
The Wellington began to spin towards the sea.
Reinert opened fire on the nearest enemy bomber that was not already being engaged.
*
Squadron-Leader Rackham, at the head of the formation, held his course steadily to fly over the enemy ships from stern to bow. He maintained the height at which he had flown the whole way across the North Sea.
Ridley said to Clive, “Go for’ard, Ronnie, and get ready to bomb.”
Clive unplugged his intercom lead from the second pilot’s jack and squeezed past the pilot to lower himself onto the padded rectangle like a very hard bunk on which he could stretch out with his head above the bomb-sight. He plugged in again and said, “Skipper from observer ... in position.”
“OK, observer ... over to you.”
“Steady.” For the time being they would follow the squadron-commander and leave adjustments of course until the ships were closer and they could select a target.
The Wellington vibrated in short spasms each time Noakes fired the rear guns. The smell of cordite began to fill the fuselage.
Noak
es kept up a commentary.
“All one-one-ohs, Skipper ... no one-oh-nines yet ...”
“Pair coming in from six o’clock, high ... broken off ...”
The combined fire of all the rear gunners was covering the air space with a web of tracer. So far, the front gunners were not in action.
Noakes again: “One hostile going down in flames ... a pair coming in from four o’clock ... I hit one ... he’s broken off ... the other one’s pulled away ...”
Ridley saw a pair of 110s sweeping in from his port bow and heard Redfern open up. Tracer rippled away from the front guns.
A Verey light fizzed away from the leading aircraft and the squadron-commander began climbing to the clouds which were only 200ft above. In a few seconds the whole Wimpey formation was hidden in the lower fringe of cloud. A further few seconds and Ridley could hear the “crump-ump” of flak shells bursting unseen in the clouds ahead as the ships fired at random. He had been holding his breath and now he released it in a long sigh. As long as the ships kept firing, the 110s would keep well out of range: one threat was removed.
Gingerly Ridley nosed down until he was just in the clear. The ships were still a mile ahead.
The C.O. had emerged from cloud. Ridley saw light flak shooting past him. He watched Sqdn-Ldr Rackham’s bombs fall clear of the aircraft and burst on the sea 50 yards from the leading destroyer.
Another Wellington bombed, with the tracer tracks of light flak surrounding it. Its bombs burst between two of the minesweepers, which both rocked violently but seemed unharmed.
Clive said, “Target, destroyer ... left-left ... right ... right a bit more ... left-left ... steady ... steady ... left-left a bit ... right ... steady ...”
The muzzles of the destroyer’s heavy guns seemed to be aimed full in Ridley’s face, the curving paths of the lighter shells to be cutting their way directly towards his guts.
“Bombs gone!”
Ridley forced himself to hold steady.
The rear gunner called, “Bombs away, Skipper.” Thank God, at least they had not hung up.
Clive came scrambling back and into the second pilot’s seat.
Noakes reported again. “Destroyer turned, Skipper ... bombs missed ... about thirty yards ... water all over the stern ... can’t see any damage ...”
That was enough. Ridley heaved the Wimpey up into the clouds. The air was bumpy. Heavy flak was exploding close by.
Ridley said, “Observer ... go back and give me a course for base ... I’m turning ninety degrees to port onto two-four-zero now.”
Clive, moving quickly back to his navigation desk, looked at his watch, noted the change of course and the time on the chart and very soon gave Ridley a correction that would take them homeward.
They flew in cloud for 15 minutes, in constant anxiety lest they collide into one of the other Wellingtons. As soon as Ridley judged that the Me 110s were too far behind to be a menace, he broke cloud. At once he saw a Wellington a few hundred yards ahead, Noakes reported another astern and then one by one they began to see all the others until nine of them were safely on their way.
“Waste of time,” Ridley said presently. “I don’t suppose we sunk even one of them.” Until someone invented a much better bomb-sight, the only way to attack ships appeared to be from 500ft or under. Even so, if they were destroyers or bigger, 500lb bombs didn’t seem to bother them much.
Five
The debriefing was the most ill-tempered event in Ridley’s experience. Finding the ships had pleased them all. It was partly luck, but mostly good navigation. Luck entered into it only because the ships could have changed course or put into port since the Blenheims had seen them. Intelligent estimation of their probable position had proved right. But from then on nothing much else had gone right.
Fighter interception was to be expected, but being out-numbered two to one by a force which attacked from both flanks simultaneously was not entirely predictable. The immediate loss of one Wellington had been a warning of what could happen. At this point prudence had, quite rightly, influenced the squadron-commander. There was no point in sacrificing valuable aircraft and trained crews for poor rewards. Fighting a long, running battle with the Messerschmitts would have meant another three or four losses before the Wellingtons could bomb. Before making his own attack he had wisely led his formation up to shelter from the Me 110s’ persistent shooting. There was no time to go down to a few hundred feet: the ships would have made hay among them and few Wellingtons would have survived to bomb.
The only tactic they could pursue was to take what advantage they could of the fact that the ships’ flak was keeping the Me 110s out of the way for the time being, bomb from just below cloud and nip back into cloud again. The bomb-sights were meant for use at heights even greater than 5,000ft. Every pilot had made a courageous run: steady and of long enough duration to ensure the greatest possible accuracy. But the ships had twisted about, the bombers had been thrown around by atmospheric conditions and bomb blast. There had been one confirmed success: two bombs from different aircraft had sunk a minesweeper. There had been several near misses and men at open gun positions had been seen to fall, hit by bomb splinters or flung about by blast. But that was a miserably small amount of damage to inflict after a long flight and dropping so many thousand pounds of bombs. Aiming had been further bedevilled by the sea-mist that kept obscuring the targets. The ships had scattered as well as zigzagging, which meant that an aircraft could not do any kind of blanket bombing in the expectation that some of its bombs would most probably hit something.
All that stood to the credit of the operation was that everyone had shown a lot of guts.
Despite this, everyone came back to base feeling more than depressed: there was a sense of shame, unjustifiable though this was. By comparison with the few other anti-shipping raids the two squadrons had made, and with reports of attacks by other squadrons, all the crews felt that they should have withdrawn a few miles, gone down to 500ft and gone in again. Had they done so, not more than half of them would have survived but they could have done some real damage to the minesweepers and perhaps to the destroyers. But could they? Previous attacks had shown the inadequacy of the 500lb bomb filled with obsolescent amatol and the devastation that enemy fighters and flak inflicted when they had plenty of time to see the bombers.
Nobody doubted Sqdn-Ldr Rackham’s courage, but everyone would have preferred to be less wise and take a gamble. That was because they were all much younger than the squadron-commander and because nobody ever believed that it was he himself who was going to be killed. The only exception was Skelton, who was old enough and professionally well indoctrinated enough to know that it would have been folly, a crime even, to throw away aeroplanes and crews on a gamble.
It was vexing and confusing for very young men imbued with pride and patriotism and impelled by a sense of adventure.
*
“I guessed why you hadn’t called earlier,” Shirley had said.
“I hope you’re still free for this evening.”
“Yes, I’ve turned down all other invitations!” There was light mockery in her amused voice.
“Have you decided on a flick?”
“Do you particularly want to go?”
“Why, no: I thought you might, as there isn’t much else to do around here.”
“It would be nice just to sit and talk.”
No girl whom Ridley had invited out had ever made such an unorthodox suggestion.
He said, “If you’re sure ...”
“Quite sure.”
So he had called for her, found to his relief that her father was on camp, enjoyed a gin and tonic with her pretty mother while he kept admiring Shirley without being too blatant about it, and here they were in a country pub which had a famous dining-room. He had been there twice before, once with a girl whom he wanted to impress (it hadn’t got him very far) and once with some of the squadron to celebrate the declaration of the war which would give them all the chance
to win medals and promotion. In the intervening weeks two of them had been killed and two wounded. No one had yet won a medal or been promoted.
Had he been older and cynical, Ridley would probably have thought the Tudor coaching inn a mite self-conscious. Certainly it was aware of the motorist trade and the management had put the waitresses into distressing-looking mob-caps, flowered dresses and allegedly period pinafores or aprons. The log fire roared just a trifle too vigorously and the horse brasses winked with varnish applied on top of polish and elbow-grease. There were even inglenook benches on which the incautious were severely scorched about the legs. Roasts were served on pewter dishes. But the food was honest, the wine unpretentious and the table-lighting tasteful and romantic.
Before they had finished their first course, Ridley was head over heels in love.
When Shirley had said it would be nice to sit and talk, she might have said “sit and listen”. He was not aware that she was drawing him out and, reluctant though he was by instinct and by Service custom to talk about himself, he realised after some twenty minutes that she had contributed little but apparently interested questions and comments to the conversation.
He abruptly stopped talking.
“What’s the matter, Derek?”
“I’m being a bore. Sorry.”
“You’re not.” She smiled directly at him. “ I don’t suffer bores: I’d have pulled your leg long ago if you had been.”
“You’ve ... you’ve ... got me going on at most frightful length ... terrible line-shoot, really. I want to listen to you, not the other way round.”
“All right. I’ll give you a potted version of my life and times.”
From which it became increasingly apparent to the entranced young man that this peerless creature and he had more in common than anyone could have hoped for. Some deft — as he considered it — probing failed to reveal any particular romantic attachment, and when he tucked her into his car with a rug around her knees he had only one anxiety: should he or should he not kiss her goodnight?
Bombs Gone Page 6
