To So Few

by Russell Sullman

  He fired again, a longer, three second burst this time, hunched forward, willing the bullets onto their target.

  The enemy gunner had already begun to fire back, and Rose felt something hit the Hurricane, once, twice, three times, as if someone were hammering at the airframe, and then he was out of the deadly hose.

  But the shock of the impacts had scared him enough that he brought the throttle back and dropped further behind. He kept care to keep the 110’s tail-plane between them, hiding the Hurricane in the gunner’s blind spot, whilst the gap widened safely again. His Hurricane bounced the disturbed air caused by the enemy’s slipstream and from ground-effect.

  Water vapour from the disturbed sea and spray streamed over the canopy, as if he were flying through rain. It was difficult to see ahead, and it was difficult to aim. With the recoil of the guns and the low speed his aircraft teetered on a stall.

  A small piece of metal, ripped from the enemy aircraft, appeared and disappeared in an instant. A stream of tracer whipped close but not close enough to do damage.

  He felt rather than heard a handful of impacts on his kite, but they were not bullets but pieces of the 110. He fired again.

  And then the return fire suddenly ceased, and although the Messerschmitt continued to fly, the rear-facing MG15 machine-gun drooped impotently downwards; the gunner slouched behind it, head lolling.

  A lucky shot had hit and disabled, perhaps even killed, the gunner.

  Lucky for Rose. Not so for his opponent.

  Don’t forget your mirror. Keep checking the mirror…

  Thank you again, Lady Luck. He pulled up slightly, dropped back a little.

  Despite the enemy hits, the Merlin engine still roared healthily. The gauges read normal, and the aircraft responded normally to his commands, so he pushed the throttle forward again, but the Me110 had managed to pull away again as it tried to escape. He fired another burst hopefully, more tracer this time, the strikes showing hits, but without any appreciable result. A black blob, the size of a marble, hit the windscreen, spreading out unevenly, partially obscuring his vision for a moment before being spread thin into invisibility.

  Oil! The Messerschmitt was leaking oil! He had added to the damage further.

  He waited for the oil to thin on his windscreen, before he pressed the gun-button again, but this time the roar of gunfire was replaced by the pneumatic hissing that came from empty chambers. He tried again, with the same result. He banged the side of his cockpit in frustration.

  Damn it! He was out of ammunition. Now what?

  He trailed the Messerschmitt for a few miles as he pondered. Perhaps he should try and scare the enemy into ditching?

  Rose was about to make a dummy attack when he noticed another aircraft coming down from above and behind him. Oh Hell. The situation was going progressively from bad to worse. Who was this?

  Friend or foe?

  He pulled back into a climbing turn, keeping a wary eye on the approaching single-engine fighter. He needed to get into a favourable position. At low-level and without ammunition, he was very vulnerable.

  Please don’t let it be a Me109, he prayed silently. I can’t outrun it and I can’t outfight it.

  The R/T crackled, “Blue Three to Yellow Two, nice shooting, Sir, how about letting me have a go?”

  The other plane was a Hurricane. It was another aircraft from Excalibur Squadron, an experienced NCO who had survived France with two victories, Flight-Sergeant Jimmy Carpenter. Rose breathed a sigh of relief. He keyed his microphone.

  “Have a go, Jimmy. I’m out of ammo. Good thing you turned up. He’s all yours.” To his ears, he sounded high pitched and trembling.

  “Understood, Yellow Two.”

  Oops. Callsigns were there for using.

  The canopy hood was pushed back, and Rose saw Carpenter wave when the other Hurricane shot past, as the Flight-Sergeant took over pursuit. He tucked himself into the wingman’s position for protection, although it was as much for himself as for Carpenter.

  With Rose watching for enemy fighters, Carpenter concentrated on the fleeing German aircraft.

  They caught up with him as they passed close by the tail of the convoy. Luckily there was no ack-ack from the ships.

  With the rear-gunner out of the game and a disabled engine, with two RAF fighters on his tail, the odds were against the Me110 pilot, and as the first long burst from Carpenter’s guns chewed up his starboard engine and tore off shreds of wing, he decided to ditch his heavy, ailing fighter.

  A plume of spray shot up behind the bandit as it touched down on the sea, and then it disappeared for a moment in a bigger cloud of spray, emerged to shoot up for a moment, shedding debris, then fell back on the sea, propeller blades bent back by the initial impact. A tail fin spun away from the Me110.

  “‘Strewth. He didn’t try very hard, Sir. I think you’d already knocked him about quite a bit.” Carpenter sounded disappointed.

  “Yes.” Rose watched as the Luftwaffe pilot struggled from his cockpit. The wings of the Me110 were already awash, and the tail was slowly lifting up, as the heavier nose and engines began to sink below the waves. He glanced back inside, saw that there was no-one left to help in the torn cockpit, and that he was the only survivor. He scrambled down the wing, and cast himself away from the sinking plane in a little inflatable dinghy.

  Already a yellowish-green stain was spreading out from the dinghy’s marker chemicals to make rescue easier.

  The remnants of the Me110 settled lower, like a dark monster sliding back into the grey and silent depths of the Channel. Within seconds, it had slid beneath the surface, and there was only the dinghy with its surrounding stain to mark the 110’s watery grave.

  One of the convoy escorts had lowered a boat, and it was making its way to the sinking aeroplane.

  “We’d best head for home soon, sir.” Carpenter said respectfully.

  “Yes, you’re right. Of course.” He said shakily. “Just a minute while that boat gets here, then we’ll go. Would you take the lead, please, Blue Three?”

  “Yes, sir.” Rose tucked himself gratefully behind Carpenter’s wing again.

  Together they orbited, Carpenter in the lead, over the solitary German until he was picked up by the excited sailors.

  Not once did he acknowledge that he was aware of the two Hurricanes circling overhead. Instead he sat with his head dejectedly bowed, the picture of misery. No longer a powerful and capable conqueror, but a sad and lonely man, his colleagues dead and gone. Rose searched for feelings of guilt in his heart, but there were none.

  His body ached all over, his hands were trembling and he was drenched in sweat, but he was filled with a new found vigour, and could not remember a time when he had felt so very alive and conscious of his surroundings.

  But there was relief, too. The dice could have fallen another way. That German below, struggling in his dinghy, could so easily have been him if the enemy gunners had had a better aim, or had been more fortunate with their shooting.

  Skill and ability were important, but Luck played as great a part of this game, he understood now, and today, it had been with him. He realised with a shock that the fear that had lain in him, coiled up in his stomach like a slumbering serpent, was gone. All that was left was the exhilaration.

  He looked across and waved at Carpenter.

  God be praised, he was Still Alive!

  CHAPTER 10

  They were the first ones back, and Carpenter landed first.

  Rose was excited, but drained. Mindful of Granny’s warnings, he did not make the victory roll that he had promised himself in flight training, although to be honest, he really didn’t feel like doing one anyway.

  He wasn’t quite sure that he was even entitled to a victory roll.

  Right now, he just wanted to get down safely, and close his eyes.

  Safely back on the ground, he wearily pulled off his oxygen mask, and as Baker pulled back the canopy, his nostrils were assailed by the pungent smell of
fumes, hot metal and machine oil.

  Baker helped him loosen his harness, and Rose caught a whiff of liquorice, sweat and grease from the fitter, banishing the dryness slowly from his airways.

  Rose closed his eyes for a moment as cool air played on his face.

  Like an old man he fumbled his goggles off and unplugged his leads. The tension suddenly seemed to drain from him, like water from a colander.

  Carpenter patiently waited for Rose to climb down stiffly from the cockpit before he made his way over to join him. Rose’s legs felt like jelly, his body shaking from reaction, and he discreetly leaned against the Hurricane’s rudder.

  He was fearful for a moment then that he might pass out.

  His rigger, Joyce ran up to the Hurricane, his face shining hopefully, like a schoolboy about to be given a pound of sweets.

  Like Baker, he had noticed the torn and stained fabric over the gun ports, the black trails from the leading edge, and the scattered bullet holes, and had heard the tell-tale whistle from those open ports as Rose had come in to land.

  They knew that he had seen action, and had fired his guns.

  “Any luck, Sir?” Joyce looked expectantly at the young man with the marks of his oxygen mask and goggles on his strained face. As usual, Baker joined them, his jaws working agitatedly as he chewed the tough fragment of liquorice.

  Rose blew a strand of hair out of his eyes, and tried to appear nonchalant, although he felt he was about to fall over at any moment. He felt slightly sick and was not sure he could speak without his voice trembling. He spoke slowly, carefully, but with a wide grin that felt painful and contrived, stretching skin that felt as tight and hard as dried leather. Surely they must see how shaky he felt? The voice sounded like someone else’s, he thought with some detachment.

  “Wizard show! Had a crack at a couple of Me110’s. As I was feeling generous, I let ‘em have all my ammo. Certainly gave ‘em a bit of a headache.”

  Mm. That sounded suitably fighter-pilotish. His stomach ached. “Definitely two damaged, or one damaged and one shared, although they gave me a bit of a squirt, too, as you can see.”

  Would they see through the façade?

  They grinned excitedly back at him and, almost shyly, he thought, shook his hand in turn and congratulated him, before clambering up onto the fighter. Despite the paleness of his face, they glanced quickly at each other, marvelling at his calm, unhurried manner.

  “He’s a cool ‘un,” whispered Joyce. “If it wuz me, I’d’ve shit myself.”

  “Aye,” agreed Baker, “He’ll do me.” He stroked the Hurricane,“Two damaged! Good girl!”

  Joyce grunted in agreement as his practised eyes took in the bullet damage to his beloved Hurricane. “Yeah. Told you all along, din’t I?” He stared at the battle-damage with a professional eye. “No major damage. Have this right as rain in a tick.”

  “Told me, my arse…” replied Baker.

  Rose closed his eyes and leaned his head back.

  Now, if he could just lie down…

  Carpenter reached him and pumped his hand, then whistled at the shredded tailplane surfaces. “Whee-oo! Jerry certainly took a swipe at you! Well done, sir!”

  They looked up when another Hurricane appeared in the distance, and watched in silence as it approached and came in to land. They could hear the strange, resonating organ-like tones that came from the wind passing through the open gun ports in its wings.

  It was Smith, and he, too, had fired his guns.

  He taxied to dispersal, blipped the engine twice, impertinently, and then switched off. They walked, Rose rather shakily on still unsteady legs, to him as he jumped down.

  “Wotcher, Granny!” Carpenter greeted Smith warmly. “We had a little party. How about you, any luck?”

  Smith’s hair was dishevelled, face stained and his eyes tired, whilst his uniform was even more rumpled than normal.

  He removed his gloves and ran a hand through his tousled hair, but it just stood up all the more. Carpenter lit a cigarette and passed it over to Smith.

  Rose felt like giggling hysterically. Granny’s hair was standing up like a sheaf of corn.

  Smith took a long drag on the cigarette. “Got one of the bastards. Dornier 17 over the convoy. Blew him to buggery into a thousand flaming pieces.”

  He exhaled a long plume of smoke. “Still had his bombs on board. Stopped his shenanigans good and proper. Had a hell of a time getting away from the 110’s, though.” He spoke in a staccato, the words coming out like machine-gun bullets. He looked Rose over, his face oily and unreadable, and his eyes were cold.

  “I’m glad you managed to get back. How was it, Harry?” He looked carefully at Rose, taking the strained, drained expression and the too-bright eyes. The feelings of excitement and the exhilaration of combat were still powerful in him.

  “Wizard, Granny! I’m sorry I lost you. I tried to look for you, but there was a 110. I hit him quite hard, I think, but then I lost him. I didn’t see him go down or anything, but he was damaged, I’m sure of that. Then I had a go at another one, but ran out of ammo. Jimmy, here, finished it off.”

  Smith shook his head tiredly.

  “Actually, Harry, I’m just glad you managed to come out of that OK. It was a bit of a shambles.” He wiped his forehead, dropping ash from his cigarette onto his Mae West, “The Huns could have had us. We were bloody lucky to escape that bounce. It just so happens, though, that I was below you when you were attacking that first one. I had one of the bastards turning after me, and I’d lost too much height, so I couldn’t help. Sorry.”

  He grinned then, tightly, the lines on either side of his mouth pronounced, “You did really well. I saw your attack on the 110, and I also saw it blow up just after you made your firing pass. I even thought you were going to ram him, actually.”

  Carpenter coughed and looked away.

  Granny smiled wisely, “A definite kill, and I’ll confirm it, but you cut it a bit fine. Would have been a bit of a waste of my fine training if you’d left it a bit too late, eh?”

  He cocked an eyebrow quizzically, and Rose blushed in chagrin, despite the unexpected revelation of his success.

  Bloody Hell! He had shot down the first Messerschmitt 110 after all!

  A confirmed kill!

  It was hardly believable. He was amazed at how elated he suddenly felt. It was if his tired body was electrified.

  He’d shot down a Hun!

  More, he’d done it on his first operational combat flight!

  But, warned the little voice, he’d almost rammed the 110, as Granny had chided. His self-discipline and flying should have been better. He’d achieved his first ‘kill’, but more by luck than ability.

  He mentally resolved to take greater care, to try and control the excitement of battle.

  “Are you sure, Granny?” He asked.

  Smith, nodded, spoke quietly. “As eggs are eggs. You got one confirmed, there, definite. No doubt about that one. I was watching.” He smacked Rose on the back, almost knocking him down, and he tottered shakily, “You did well. But most of all, you managed to survive. That’s the most important thing. That’s something you can’t learn.”

  He smiled slightly, and shoved the cigarette back into his mouth, “Better still, you’ll learn from the experience. Bloody well done!” He drew on it, then passed the cigarette back to Carpenter, pulled out his pipe, and clamped it, unlit, between his teeth. “My first was a 110, too.”

  Rose found it difficult to believe it. The Me110 had exploded. That must have been the strange thunderclap of sound just after he had almost collided. He hadn’t even felt the shock-wave of the explosion; although he was so close it could have torn the Hurri to pieces, or thrown him out of control and into the sea. The thought made him go cold.

  “Are you sure, Granny?” He asked again, and shook his head dazedly, “I didn’t see him go down.”

  “I did. He went straight in. Out of control. No parachutes.”

  Carpenter la
ughed, “Well, sir, you can add one half-shared to that, because you certainly gave the other 110 a pasting before I had a go. He would have probably gone into the drink anyway, without any help from me. Anyway, we got the sod!”

  I must tell Joyce and Baker, thought Rose. They’ll be really pleased.

  Carpenter gripped Rose’s arm. “Come on, I’ll stand you a cup of that flippin’ awful NAAFI tea.” He indicated the NAAFI van that was making its way to dispersal. “Maybe we can get a piece of cake or a roll to celebrate. I’m starving!”

  Donald had driven up in his shooting brake. He had Skinner, Toby, his Labrador, and Farrell of B’ Flight with him. They had heard the tail-end of the conversation, and now they too offered their congratulations. Farrell looked at the dazed Rose with surprise and not a little envy, who was almost knocked off his feet by the ever-affectionate Toby.

  “You damned lucky hound! One confirmed and one shared! You’ve only been with us five minutes and you’ve already given half the blinking Luftwaffe the chop. This isn’t on, you know. All the totty’s going to go after you, now. No chance for a poor old sod like me!” He said, half-seriously. Farrell’s score card was still blank, even though he’d been in France at the end, and flown over Dunkirk. He heard shouting, and saw that other members of the squadron were on their way.

  Smith shook his head again. “With one and a half kills, I think you should be getting the tea in, Harry, old son.”

  He looked up into the sky, “No sign of the others yet.”

  Then Rose realised that the spaces at dispersals for Denis’ and Barsby’s Hurricanes were empty.

  Donald shook his head. “I heard that they’re on their way back. I believe Dingo got one, too. Renfrew got a few hits in his motor, so he took to his umbrella.”

  Poor Renfrew, so eager for a victory, but having to bale out instead.

  He noticed that Donald’s attention was elsewhere, and his eyes followed those of Donald’s to where a petite, fair-haired WAAF was standing forlornly some distance away, one hand shading her eyes, searching the distance.