Bombs Gone

by Richard Townsend Bickers

  “Captain to wireless op ... stand by to send a Mayday ... we’re losing height ... don’t know why. Must be some damage to the elevators ... must have been hit and it’s been aggravated by vibration. Come up front, Ronnie.”

  A moment later Clive was there, and asking, “Can we make it, or will we have to ditch?”

  “If she goes on at this rate, we won’t clear the cliffs.”

  The beaches were mined, so they could not make a landing on the nearest wide stretch of sand.

  Down to 400ft and still sinking. Ridley told Pyne to send an S.O.S., the Mayday signal. The direction-finding stations would take a bearing. It was 2.35 a.m. If they ditched, it would be within five miles of the coast and an air-sea rescue launch or some fishing-boat would pick them up. It would be very cold.

  It was in their favour that the sea was fairly calm. Waves posed a problem. To alight in the direction that they were running meant that you could dig your nose into the side of one and be flooded at once when the aircraft broke its back; as well as decelerating with a nasty jar. To land across them meant the risk of hitting a crest and being tipped sideways so that the wingtip dug in and dragged the aircraft straight down.

  The combined strength of both pilots could not coax S to climb and they struck the sea, skimming across the wavetops and heading landward, four miles from the Norfolk coast. The icy water rushed in with a rending of canvas and twisting of steel; a sizzling of engines abruptly dunked and giving off clouds of steam. The old Wellington settled smugly, its crew waist-deep in water that was already making their legs numb. They waded and floundered and swam, choking and spluttering with cold and from swallowed briny water. They released the dinghy from its housing in the starboard engine nacelle and heaved themselves aboard.

  Teeth chattering, Ridley said, “So m-m-much for your b-blasted m-m-mascot, Corporal Pyne.”

  “W-w-well, sir ... he ... he’s a s-s-sailor ... so n-naturally he w-wanted to go for a s-s-sail.”

  “Did you bring him?”

  “No, sir ... I let the bastard drown! He’s gone down with the Wimpey.”

  When, several hours later after a colder and more miserable night than any of them had ever imagined possible, they were delivered back to base, Ridley’s greeting by his flight-commander was characteristically offhand in the best R.A.F. style.

  “I must say, Derek, that was a drastic way of getting rid of an aeroplane you had a grudge against.”

  Twelve

  The Staffelkapitän said, “Jafü has decided to put us back on night operations. It seems the Tommies have taken to poking their noses into our seaplane bases at night. The General is going to let the seaplanes continue taking off during the night, because he does not intend their mine-laying to be interrupted; and because he knows they will attract the enemy and give us a chance to shoot him down.”

  Reinert listened with a spreading smile. He asked, “Are we going to get any help from the searchlights?”

  “We can count on that, but there will be no Freya to give us long-range warning. It will have to be standing patrols again.”

  “Have they been operating in the bad weather too?”

  “It has not deterred either the Tommies or our own mine-laying boys. So we should get plenty of trade.”

  “How about several of us on patrol at the same time, at different altitudes?”

  “I’ve been thinking about it, but the Gruppen Kommandeur isn’t keen on it, on account of the collision risk.”

  “What aircraft has the enemy been sending over?”

  “Bombers: Wellingtons and Hampdens, so far.”

  “Good. They’re easier meat than the Blenheims.”

  “You can prove that by shooting one down as a wedding-present to yourself,” Ebeling said with a touch of malice. He did not approve of his friend’s marriage at so early an age. It had been precipitated by the overheated emotions generated in wartime, he felt sure. He was cynical enough to think that Lotte’s charms would lose some of their fascination when their relationship no longer had the piquancy of a clandestine affair. And Werner would find her demanding his attention when he wanted a night out with the boys; which would irritate him. Anyway, Ebeling found variety in his love affairs the spice of life. He added: “You’d better be quick about it, too. You’ve only got two days to go before they put the shackles on you.”

  “That’s no way for a best man to refer to the silken bonds of matrimony,” Reinert chided him.

  This caused general laughter. They had all been teasing him about his imminent new responsibilities and he had, in response, been pretending to be very pompous about them. “Silken bonds of matrimony” was a splendidly baroque flight of fancy which delighted them as much as it pleased Reinert to have thought it up.

  Being on night flying duty, they were released at midday to rest. Reinert was full of energy. He had arranged to take Lotte out that night, the last time he would see her before their wedding. He telephoned to tell her of the enforced change of plan and that he would spend a couple of hours with her that afternoon.

  “I would rather you had a sleep,” she said.

  “I will, later on; after I’ve seen you. If I don’t come this afternoon I won’t see you again until Christmas Eve: in church.”

  “We’ve had some more presents. Isn’t it exciting? Everyone has been so generous.”

  “We’re so lucky.”

  Lent went to the parachute-store to break the news to his girl that he could not take her to the cinema that evening.

  “Never mind,” she whispered, so that her eavesdropping colleagues could not hear. “We’ll be together all day and all night after you’ve attended Leutnant Reinert’s wedding. Two days and nights with nobody to interrupt us: just think of that.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow, anyway.”

  “Tomorrow, your first priority will be to get a decent sleep after flying all night. I won’t meet you at all unless you get a proper rest first.”

  “Don’t worry: I can’t stay awake after I’ve been on night ops. I collapse into bed and nothing can rouse me until I’ve had my eight hours.”

  She gave him a smile that was supposed to be arch. “I bet I could.”

  “I’m sure you could. See you tomorrow.”

  “I’ve got something for you, before you go.”

  “What is it?”

  She delved into her small haversack that lay on top of the counter across which the parachutes were issued, and brought out a small wooden figure of Father Christmas.

  “A lucky Santa Claus. Take him with you every time you fly.”

  Lent smiled with pleasure and surprise. “Why, thank you: I certainly will. I’ll never leave him behind.”

  *

  Ridley had been given O for orange again for that night. The aircraft still had most of the newness about it that had pleased him the last time he had flown it. It seemed to be a lucky one. So far, neither flak nor fighters had damaged it. The squadron Engineering officer had been holding it back on every possible occasion and its operational hours were still low. There seemed to be a stronger smell of glycol as fumes impregnated its canvas, and a slight tang of cordite smoke had also worked its way into the fabric. But the leather of the pilot’s seat still had its pristine aroma and there was not yet an intrusion from the Elsan lavatory astern.

  He landed from his air test that morning in a cheerful frame of mind. His D.F.C. had just been gazetted and he would be going to Buckingham Palace to receive it early in the new year. He would be allowed to take two guests with him. His mother had been widowed when he was 16, and had remarried. His stepfather and he did not like each other. He was damned if he would invite him. His mother would probably protest about that, but fond though he was of her he would be adamant. So, would Shirley come to the Palace if he asked her? She seemed as delighted about the ribbon on his chest as he was himself; and as proud. Could he invite a girl who was merely a friend, or did it have to be a fiancée? If so ... He fell into a pleasant reverie.
>
  He would ask her about going to Buckingham Palace when he saw her on Boxing Day. It was a bit soon to think of proposing to her, but at least if she agreed to accompany his mother and him it would bind them more closely together.

  Ridley thought it unfair that the whole crew had not been given medals. They all deserved them, if he did. But the captain always got the most credit. Noakes had been given a D.F.M.: which, though well merited, seemed to both of them to be invidious. If Noakes had earned one, so had Redfern.

  “Your turn will soon come,” Ridley had told the other three, a little shame-facedly. “It’s all bullshit, really, and the whole squadron ought to get a gong. But my name happened to come out of the hat.”

  “That’s how I feel, sir,” said Noakes. “You deserved yours, all right, being captain, like, and having all the responsibility. But there’s no reason why I should get one and not Vic or Stan.”

  “Yours was a good one,” Ridley assured him. “They’ll get theirs next time, if I have anything to say about it.”

  Three other captains and air-gunners had been similarly decorated and his modesty was not assumed. He really did believe that there was as much luck as merit in the matter. His crew had had a particularly rough time, what with having to bale out and ditch, and they had never turned back with technical trouble or allowed the worst of weather to deter them. Their bombing had been among the best, too. But who could definitely say that his or Noakes’s had been the most important contributions?

  He had the facility of being able to fall asleep easily at virtually any time of day. With the accumulation of weariness and nervous strain of the past fourteen weeks, sleep came to him more readily than ever. He would often doze off deeply for half an hour in a chair: sometimes even in the bustle and conversation of the rest hut.

  After lunch that afternoon he put on his pyjamas, took yet another look at he sky, pulled the curtains to, and the P.G. Wodehouse novel he was reading fell from his grasp five minutes later. Overton, peeping in shortly afterwards, tut-tutted quietly and switched off the bedside light. He wouldn’t disturb Mr Ridley at teatime. He’d keep him a slice of cake and make a fresh pot for him when he woke; make him some toast as well, if he wanted it. Couldn’t have a nicer young gentleman to look after. And the way he was going, with a D.F.C. so early in his career, he’d wind up an air-marshal one day.

  *

  Ridley’s target for that night was the island of Sylt, north of the Frisians and with its northern half lying off the Danish coast. It was known primarily to the R.A.F. as an enemy seaplane base and to the Germans as a nudist colony. Low flying over it in summer to enjoy the spectacle of naked female sunbathers was a popular Luftwaffe pastime.

  There had been a general briefing before the first aircraft took off, to begin the unbroken vigil that would be carried on from dusk until dawn, over Sylt and the whole Frisian chain. Before going out to their aircraft, Ridley took his crew to the Operations Room for a final check on weather, enemy activity and any messages the patrolling Wellingtons may have sent. They maintained wireless silence, but signalled sightings, attacks and any attacks on them by enemy fighters.

  “Nothing new,” the duty controller told them. “All quiet.”

  “Weather?” asked Ridley.

  “No change in the forecast.”

  They rode out to dispersals in silence, the three troops smoking furiously. Ridley often wondered why Noakes didn’t give up the habit, if he was such a keen rugger-player.

  The ground crew stood grouped about the port wheel of the Wellington, their breath steaming in the cold air, stamping their feet and hunching their shoulders. The squadron-commander and Eric Skelton, who was taking off later, were waiting to see each crew off. Ridley was not in the mood for an exchange of trite pleasantries. He had the tight feeling in his intestines that preceded every operational departure.

  He got rid of the C.O. and flight-commander as abruptly as he decently could and thankfully climbed the ladder into the enclosed world that would cocoon him for the next six hours. For eternity, if things went awry.

  O for orange burst willingly into life, pulsing and throbbing with a good healthy roar that was only a little muted by helmet and earphones. A pleasant contrast with that cross-grained S for sugar that had dumped them in the drink the other night. Orange was eager to take off, what was more, and climbed as gaily as a lark as soon as Ridley asked it to.

  All the familiar, reassuring routine actions clicked comfortably into place. They flew at 1,000ft with the lowest of the scattered clouds 3,000ft above them. The moon was bright and Clive had enough chances to take star shots to confirm that they were on the right course. The wind seemed to be behaving itself. It blew from the west, as predicted, and checks taken with smoke floats dropped through the flare shoot confirmed that it was more or less of the strength that the Met man had forecast. Or guessed, according to one’s point of view.

  They had taken off at 10 p.m. They should reach Sylt in 95 minutes. The three hours they would spend patrolling it would include the time at which seaplanes were most likely to take off. By 5 a.m. at the latest, they should be sitting down to bacon and eggs with the prospect of a whole free day before them and a night off duty during which the other squadron would be doing the work. There’d be a bit of a party in the mess, Ridley was thinking, with Christmas not much more than twenty-four hours away by then and the prospect that there would be no ops for two or three nights. He remembered the last Christmas, when he had still been training, a newly-fledged pilot very conscious of the wings on his chest. He had not imagined then that only a year later there would be a D.F.C. ribbon there as well.

  “E.T.A. Sylt ten minutes,” Clive said.

  “OK, Ronnie. We should pick it up in about five minutes, then, unless a cloud drifts across the moon.”

  “It’s a good night for Jerry to go mine-laying, too.”

  “It is that. And there’s enough moonlight for us to see one of those big seaplanes if one of them cruises past. Noakes ... Redfern ... how about it? Like to have a go?”

  “I don’t mind doing the fighter boys’ work for ’em, Skipper.” Noakes was full of good cheer.

  Redfern said confidently, “If we see one, Skipper, you just turn towards ’un and leave the rest to me, look.”

  “And when he misses I’ll do the job from back here,” said Noakes.

  Two months ago neither gunner would have dreamed of this kind of badinage and Ridley would have cut it short at once. Their shared experiences, particularly in the last few weeks, had wrought many changes. They were more at ease with each other, every man was confident of himself and of his comrades. The separation between officers and other ranks had dwindled by an imperceptible amount every time they flew together, until now it had almost ceased to exist when they were in the air. They had started as a randomly selected crew, become a team and matured into a clan. The spirit they had generated had been founded on respect and developed into liking. They were friends now in a way that took no notice of artificial barriers of rank and enforced discipline.

  Ridley was reflecting on this when Redfern’s voice broke into his thoughts.

  “Front gunner, Skipper. Sylt coming up dead ahead.”

  “Thank you.” Ridley leaned forward. There it was; the usual demarcation of waves breaking whitely on shore, and phosphorescence; backed, here, by broad white sands agleam in the moonpath.

  They tracked up the western shore, a mile out to sea and still at 1,000ft. The long, narrow island looked innocuous. They knew it was far from that. Apart from the air base, there were strong flak defences abetted by searchlights. It was like circling cautiously around a snake that was pretending to be asleep while you knew perfectly well its eyes were following you closely, Ridley thought. Well, they’d take the sting out of the Sylt serpent, given the chance.

  Up to the far end, turn and down the other side. Nobody down there seemed to mind. He had reduced power as much as he dared, to keep the noise down. But surely the sound of
their engines must carry as far as that? The gun predictors must have known they were there, too.

  Down to the beginning of their orbit and back up on the seaward leg once more. Around the tip ... and there was a sudden glimmer of light ... evenly distanced flecks on the water, reaching out from the island’s eastern side.

  “Captain to crew. I can see a flarepath. Prepare to bomb.”

  Other eyes had seen it at the same time. And seen them. Five minutes earlier, Reinert had said, “Can you see anything on our port beam?”

  And Lent, presently, had replied, “Yes, Leutnant, now you point it out, I can. Indistinctly. May be one of our seaplanes on its way back.”

  “Let’s have a look.”

  Reinert had swung the Messerschmitt to the west and gone cautiously closer to the other aircraft. It was a black, unrecognisable shape against the moonlight. He lost 300ft of altitude to put them below it and hoped to limn it against the moon more clearly. Presently he saw the stab of exhaust flames from two engines and a little while after he was able to determine that this was not a float-plane.

  Lent said, “It’s not one of ours.”

  “I can see that. Let’s get it in profile.”

  They climbed and soon the shape was stark in black silhouette.

  “A Wellington,” Reinert said with relish.

  “Beam attack?” Lent asked.

  “You want all the fun, don’t you? No, I’ll make a pass from beneath, tail to nose: shoot it in the belly.”

  “It’s going down, Leutnant.”

  “Damn! The flarepath has come on. That will hold their attention, anyway.”

  Reinert turned away to correct his approach, losing height as he went.

  In the Wellington, Clive had settled at the bomb-aimer’s station and was beginning his approach. A seaplane was taxiing out.

  “Bomb before it takes off,” Ridley said with some urgency. “Put a stick right down the middle and we’ll prang the whole show.”

  “Left-left ... left-left ... more ... right ... steady ... hold it ... right a bit ... left-left ... steady ... steady ...”