By the Skin of my Teeth: The Memoirs of an RAF Mustang Pilot in World War II and of Flying Sabres with USAF in Korea

by Colin Downes

  My billet was in a luxury apartment at the lower end of Avenue Road close to the entrance to Regent’s Park; a very superior residential area. Before the war the houses along Avenue Road had a local byname of Millionaires’ Avenue. I shared a room that overlooked the park with four other cadets. When I opened the window I heard gibbons whooping to one another from the nearby London Zoo.

  Before undertaking intelligence and suitability tests we had a very comprehensive medical examination, during which I withheld the information that I suffered from asthma in my childhood and also migraine attacks. Although these attacks might be as frequent as once a month in my early teens, by the time I left school they were very infrequent. As I had heard the medical board was turning down applicants with flat feet I thought it best to say nothing. In the OTC I had at least learned an old army phrase – never volunteer anything! The medicos, although quick to reject the unfortunate ‘flatties’, were unable to detect my latent asthma and migraine. I had successfully cleared an anticipated hurdle and the rest was up to me. It was my ambition and intention to fly Spitfires, failing that, any single-seat fighter. Fighter and instructional flights were of short duration and I always had a warning of an impending attack, which, if it happened in the air, would enable me to get back on the ground. My big worry was that if I flew multi-engine aircraft with flights of long duration and if I was the only pilot, I had the responsibility for the safeguard of my crew. I therefore resolved that if I was not successful in obtaining fighters I would come clean regarding my problem. Little did I think that in the Mustang some of my sorties would be in excess of four or five hours. As it transpired, I did not suffer any migraine attacks and it proved to be an adolescent malady.

  During the process of the grading tests, medical examinations and drill training a strange interlude occurred. In the middle of the night all the apartments in our block suddenly filled with members of the Metropolitan Police Force supported by our own Service police. Most of the activity was in the apartment next to mine as this massive display of the law paraded through the rooms like an excerpt from The Pirates of Penzance. The hiatus abated and the reason for the invasion became apparent with the arrest of a cadet by the name of Cummings. His short stay with us ended with a change of billet to the Bow Street police station where he was charged with murder. It appeared from press reports that the police charged Cummings with the murder of several prostitutes in the West End of London. The press previously reported the murders as the work of a modern Jack the Ripper. The murders were all under similar circumstances in London’s West End, whereas the infamous ‘Ripper’ operated in the Whitechapel area of London’s East End. When we tried to associate this violent butchery with the quiet, unassuming aircraftman sipping tea and munching on a NAFFI bun in the canteen, it appeared too incongruous for words.

  The senior airman of our particular intake and billet was a regular corporal fitter remustering for aircrew selection. Cummings slept in the same room as the corporal, and the corporal became the star witness in the No. 1 court of the Old Bailey when Cummings appeared to answer the charge of the murder of three prostitutes. An additional charge was the attempted murder of a fourth prostitute. It transpired that Cummings, who kept to himself and was very much a loner, went out on his last hunting sortie in uniform. On entering the room of his intended victim Cummings attempted to strangle the girl. However, she fought back so successfully that Cummings bolted, leaving his service respirator behind. With his name, rank and number clearly marked on the canvas bag of the respirator the police were able to arrest Cummings about four hours later. This was their first positive clue and identification of the modern Jack the Ripper, whom they suspected of at least three other unsolved murders as the modus operandi was similar.

  Cummings was convicted of the murder of the three prostitutes and paid the paramount penalty and was hanged. Why this completely unlikely looking young man went on a similar killing orgy to that of ‘Jack the Ripper’ was not apparent, although suggestions indicated reasons theological rather than sexual. Cummings was, reportedly, an only son dominated by a widowed mother. This reasoning explained the non-consummation of the contracts with the women before their murder. Under the circumstances it appeared strange that he volunteered for aircrew. Some years after the war, I visited the famous museum of the Metropolitan Police College at Hendon when stationed there with No. 601 ‘County of London’ RAuxAF squadron. I saw the famous gas respirator marked with Cumming’s name: without this vital clue Cummings may have continued the killings before being detected. Regrettably, this was not to be the only time the RAF received adverse publicity for a multiple murderer. Some years later a pilot with Errol Flynn good looks murdered two women, one in London and the other in the south coast resort of Bournemouth. In this case the motives for the murders were certainly sexual and Neville Heath paid the same penalty as Cummings.

  Following the Cummings’ arrest, my group moved from our pleasant billet by the park to a slightly less superior apartment in a less affluent area closer to Lord’s cricket ground. In this move we were to experience a decline in the quality of our lives as we came under the control of what we referred to as the White City Gang. In the renowned cricket ground and headquarters of English cricket was the headquarters of the aircrew induction centre. The air officer in charge was an Air Commodore Critchley, better known as Brigadier Critchley, CEO of the British Greyhound Racing Syndicate at the White City Stadium. Given a command in the RAF Air Commodore Critchley moved from Shepherd’s Bush to St John’s Wood bringing some of his staff with him. Some of these he commissioned and the rest he made NCOs, with the sergeants and corporals put in charge of discipline, drill and the daily running of the cadets. The corporals took great delight in the power of authority delegated to them particularly with the university entrants, haring us from dawn to dusk with enough drills, route marching with full pack and equipment, and interminable kit inspections and bed layouts to deter a Guards recruit. The slightest infringements brought abuse with marching or doubling punishments, and we considered them representative of the worst excesses attributed to the dog racing world. The wingless officers, hardly ever seen, kept under cover in the comfortable quarters of the MCC. We accepted this with some grumbling and humour directed at the tormenting NCOs, who being the butt of largely schoolboy jokes reacted with some venom. For our obvious contempt they were able to exact revenge later to a degree that we could not possibly foresee.

  The aptitude and grading tests took place in Abbey Lodge, an apartment block adjoining Regent’s Park on Abbey Road. Here the medical examinations took place and our turn came for inoculations. Whereas the previous tests and examinations were in the apartments of the building, the inoculations took place in the basement. These inoculations covered every conceivable disease known to man around the world, and probably many others unknown to man. Never thereafter, despite serving overseas in every theatre, was I to receive so many injections at one time. We paraded in puris naturalibus line astern and proceeded down a long corridor past rooms containing the medical staff. Alternately prodded in various tender places and made to cough and bend over, we shuffled along until we arrived at the administration of the needles. Here there were no niceties of new needles as two large hypodermic syringes, more suited to the veterinary profession with the needles blunted by the multiple applications, were thrust into each arm and another two thrust into each breast. The syringes were withdrawn leaving the needles in place while four more syringes were attached with additional inoculations. This was at a time before the problem of drugs and aids but infectious hepatitis was common overseas. At this point some cadets collapsed in a faint. We then dressed and our drill instructors marched us back to our billets in quick time. Dismissed at our billets the orders were to parade in ten minutes in full marching order with an inspection to follow. Such an inspection required boots to be ‘spit’ and polished, with brass buttons and fittings shining brightly, and the webbing clay piped; somehow we managed to survive.
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  The following morning we all had varying degrees of fever and sickness. Our arms and chests were so painful it was very difficult to move and the only way we could dress was by dressing one another. After morning roll-call the usual orders followed for marching drill and inspections despite our obvious distress and objections. When the time came for parading some of us were unable to answer the call and some kits were not laid out correctly, and some beds not made. The rest of us reeled around in a comatose state. The corporals went berserk and called the sergeants. They in turn, not getting the response they expected to their orders, called the senior warrant officer. He had an authority amounting to God but even he was unable to work a miracle on the sick cadets. He in turn called a junior officer who sent for the squadron leader in charge. It was very obvious that many of us were sick and in distress, and certainly in no condition to carry out the planned programme. However, the squadron leader disregarded our protests and ordered us back to billets for inspection. By the time the inspection was due some cadets were lying down on their beds and some were in their beds. Others were sitting around unwilling or unable to lay out their kits and during this confusion, among the shouted orders and vague threats the ugly word, ‘Mutiny’. Eventually the dog racing gang left us alone while they reported to their master.

  The following day our group paraded in some disorder for the morning roll-call and we found ourselves marched to Lord’s cricket ground escorted by the instructors, an officer and two RAF policemen. On that famous cricket ground we halted in front of the MCC pavilion and standing on the balcony were the air commodore and his senior officer staff. This was the first and only time during our stay that we saw him or the senior staff. Ordered to attention we listened in astonishment as Air Commodore Critchley informed us that our presence before him was the result of a serious breach of good order and discipline; the consequence of which required the reading of the Riot Act from King’s Rules and Regulations. The second in command, a group captain, read the appropriate paragraphs of warning for conduct prejudicial and infractions mutinous. In my feverish state I had the impression of a bad dream and imagined again the strains from The Pirates of Penzance, expecting the pompous air commodore to break into song, I am the very model of a modern air force general. I am sure none of us comprehended the situation as the whole incident was ridiculous in the extreme and blown out of all proportion, with no attempt to investigate that which should have been obvious to the senior staff. We could only assume the dog track gang had their revenge with a good hatchet job on the recalcitrant cadets; and the hallowed halls of the MCC probably exuded a powerful odour of mendacity. Air Commodore Critchley concluded the parade with remarks concerning the seriousness of our situation and that our fate rested in the hands of the Air Ministry pending an inquiry. As can be imagined this did not go down well with a group of volunteers selected from universities to fly and possibly die for King and Country. We marched back to our billets in an ugly mood and before being dismissed for the day our instructors ordered us to pack our kit for departure to Brighton the following morning.

  The word Brighton was familiar to us not only as a famous seaside resort but also as the RAF Disciplinary Centre at Brighton. Known euphemistically as ‘Prune’s Purgatory’ it was a persuasive penitentiary established to curb the excesses of over-enthusiastic and exuberant aircrew. The majority of the ‘black sheep’ at Brighton were guilty of flying or disciplinary misdemeanours. The modus operandi was a disciplinary course of drill, route marching, cross-country running and a commando type assault course over a period of a month. To house these winged miscreants, the Air Ministry commandeered two of the best hotels on the south coast. The officers occupied The Grand Hotel, and the NCO aircrew The Metropole Hotel. We found ourselves billeted in the Metropole with the staff not sure how to treat us, as we were not only the largest single group sent to Brighton but the only air cadets. The staff probably expected us to be a bunch of rowdy and undisciplined undergraduates, but when it became apparent that we were all unwell from the reaction to a massive dose of inoculations they relaxed and were sympathetic. After a half-hearted attempt to follow the usual routine it became significantly modified. Left very much to our own devices, the commanding officer endeavoured to get the Air Ministry to expedite our embarkation for the completion of our flying training. As a result, our disciplinary course became more of a vacation than a punishment and our stay in Brighton a relief from the St John’s Wood Gulag. We never heard the result of any Air Ministry inquiry; and shortly after our departure overseas it was reported that a cadet collapsed and died under similar circumstances. This resulted in some changes in procedures and staff at the aircrew induction centre at St John’s Wood.

  Ten days after arriving at Brighton we entrained for Manchester and Heaton Park on the north side of the city. Heaton Park was where the Air Ministry located the aircrew destined for the Commonwealth Air Training Schemes in Canada or Kenya. The RAF camp staff lived in the permanent buildings of the park but the transit aircrew had tents, beds and bedding issued for billets. After erecting the tents and settling in we found it necessary to dig irrigation ditches to drain the ponds of water formed by the rain around the tented area. Manchester lived up to its reputation and Jupiter Pluvius was in an ugly mood during our stay. As the tented area reverted to a swamp I decided that being a good camper was hazardous to my health and I moved into the city. I checked into the Midland Hotel commuting to the park for roll-calls and embarkation instructions. After a wet ten days our group proceeded to Liverpool for embarkation on an American convoy sailing for Boston, and from there we joined flying training establishments in the USA. We boarded a pre-war cruise ship, Thomas H. Barry, with three other cruise ships converted to troop carriers. The convoy escort consisted of an old battleship, the Arkansas, a cruiser and six destroyers.

  So we said good-bye and good riddance to an induction process distinguished only by a colleague charged with murder and the only aircrew cadets charged with mutiny. My quest for wings had navigated a bovine confrontation, survived porcine stupidity and demonstrated the advantage of wings over webbed feet. After the war whenever driving down Avenue Road before entering Regent’s Park, or on the way to the West End down Abbey Road past the apartments that housed the aircrew medical centre, or watching a cricket match at Lord’s, or visiting the London Zoo in Regent’s Park, I remembered an anthropoid zoo that was the RAF aircrew induction centre with names such as Cummings, Critchley and the White City Gang indelibly imprinted in my mind. I read Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 many years later and all became clear. Now when I consider similar examples of military incompetence, abysmal organization and command, allied to crass stupidity in the best Gilbert and Sullivan fashion, I remember my induction into the RAF and my stay in London and Manchester in 1942.

  My voyage to the United States was not without incident. Sailing from Liverpool the battleship Arkansas as the slowest ship stationed itself in the centre of the convoy with two troop transports either side. The cruiser headed the convoy with the six destroyers stationed three either side of the troop ships. In this formation we sailed across the Atlantic at a leisurely cruising speed. Our course took us south in the hope of avoiding the U-boat packs, and five days out of Liverpool on a fine day with calm seas I sat on the foredeck taking in the afternoon sun. Suddenly an explosion appeared aboard the Manhattan ahead of us on the starboard station, and black smoke poured from the ship as it swung out of the formation. The escorting destroyers circled the convoy dropping depth charges. There was no sign of U-boats as the convoy slowed and circled the now stopped and burning Manhattan. This continued for an hour as I expected at any moment the arrival of another torpedo. At sunset the convoy headed west for Boston with the battleship and the three remaining transports escorted by four destroyers. The cruiser and two destroyers remained with the ‘Manhattan’ that now listed visibly. We arrived at Boston without further incident four days later and the newspapers reported that the Manhattan was under tow. Th
e Manhattan arrived at Boston and after repairs returned to troop carrying for the rest of the war.

  I continued by train to Florida to a civil flying school operated by the Embry Riddle Flying College of Miami. The school operated from an airfield near Clewiston on the west side of Lake Okeechobee. This large circular lake measured approximately 30 miles in diameter. South of the lake stretched the wetlands of the Everglades and to the west and north the cypress swamp gave way to savannah with cattle ranches and citrus farms. The airfield was grass without runways measuring just over 1 mile square and surrounded by a large irrigation ditch. In the centre of the field the control tower, technical and administrative buildings, together with the living area formed an island with an access road dividing the field into the primary and advanced flying landing areas.

  The primary area operated Stearman PT-17 aircraft, and the advanced area the North American AT-6, designated ‘Harvard’ by the RAF. The Stearman PT-17 was a twin-seat biplane larger and more robust than the DH Tiger Moth, with a more powerful Continental radial engine of 220 hp. It had a maximum speed of 124 mph, a service ceiling of 11,000 feet and a range of 500 miles. It was a fine training aircraft and was also popular as a crop dusting aircraft. The PT-17 had a much better performance than the Tiger Moth and had the advantage of wheel brakes and a tail wheel instead of a tail skid. The aircraft was not difficult to fly, but like the Tiger Moth and all good training aircraft it required attention and some muscle to fly well, particularly in aerobatics. The flying instructors were all civil pilots and most of them had long experience in flying instruction; although some had crop dusting experience while others had travelled the country ‘barn storming’ before the war. My instructor was another expatriate Irishman named O’Neil. He was a large and powerfully built man with black hair and eyes to match the black heart he tried to portray. This Irish-American had a colourful disposition that emerged during instruction. My experience with the idiosyncrasies of Sergeant Murphy stood me in good stead with Mr O’Neil, although he had a more descriptive, demonstrative and violent approach to teaching than the more benign Murphy. This no doubt stemmed from his barn storming days and even minor transgressions of flying techniques produced comments, with appropriate epithets, such as, ‘When I say fly at an airspeed of 110 I mean just that; not 109 or 111!’: or, ‘When I say steer 270 degrees, I do not mean 269 or 271 degrees!’ Other transgressions produced more descriptive comments and exhortations to stop flying like a turkey, or worse. Some admonishments often brought a more violent reaction and demonstration of wrath as a sharp rearward jerk on the control column sent the Stearman into a sudden and violent snap roll. Some pupils found this approach to instruction hard to take. When questioned on his hard-nosed attitude to his pupils, O’Neil replied that if his students could not take his haranguing how would they respond to cannon or machine gun fire when up against the Luftwaffe? As is often the case, O’Neil’s bark was worse than his bite. If one accepted his way of instruction without resentment and was cooperative and eager to learn, he revealed more humane qualities with a bawdy sense of humour. O’Neil was a very experienced pilot with a fund of tall and unlikely tales, and I learned a lot from him apart from flying. He acquainted me with much that was novel to me, including such curious American fraternities as the ‘Mile High Club’. According to O’Neil, while endeavouring to qualify for membership of the Club flying a small low wing Piper aircraft he assumed, what in flying parlance instructor’s refer to as an ‘unusual position’, causing the aircraft to go out of control. This caused his companion to panic and become lodged between the control wheel and the seat, sending the plane into a terminal dive. Fortunately for O’Neil he had decided to raise the bar and qualify for the ‘Mile and Half High’ category that allowed him sufficient height in which to recover. I cannot, of course, vouch for the veracity of what certainly was a most descriptive tale.