Most of my flying in Mosquitoes was done at night, so I will start in the morning of a typical day.
My pilot’s name was F/O Joe Reay. If we were required to undertake a sortie that night we would be told where our destination was to be and I would be given flight directions and then went away to plan the route. I would also be given details of what I was expected to carry out.
The next thing we had to do was to attend the Briefing later in the day. This was held in the Briefing Room behind closed doors for obvious reasons of security. If other crews were to be there they also would attend. The Squadron Commanders would all be there as would W/Cdr Donaldson.
RAF Foulsham, April 1945.
Eric with Pilot, Joe Reay.
Joe is wearing his DFC which he had been recently awarded.
The Briefing covered such things as where the German flak belts were, warning to the air gunners by the Air Gunners Leader to maintain alertness at all times. The colours of the day usually would be given, a combination of three colours red, white or green. The weather forecast was made by the Met Officer with warnings about possible fog conditions on return and diversion aerodromes stated. Cloud conditions were of obvious concerns to the Bomb Aimers. Radio silence was to be observed by the Wireless Operators except in an emergency. The Navigators were given the various courses to fly by the Nav Leader although these would probably have been given them at a previous Briefing, as I would have been.
As a Mosquito crew, we usually had had a much more detailed Briefing as we usually had a particular job to do over the target area using our Piperack jammers. We would be told when to switch these on to make it almost impossible for those on the ground to communicate with their nightfighters. Often we orbited the target area for up to 40 minutes at a height of between 25,000 and 28,000 feet and so generally out of range of the anti-aircraft guns.
All crews would have had their pre-op meal and then they all went to the locker room to pick up their parachutes and any other items of flying clothing, including a jacket to which the parachute would be attached if we needed to bale out.
As Mosquito crews were not required straight away because we had a much shorter flying time, Take-off times could vary by as much as half an hour or more for the main force.
At RAF Foulsham there was a sort of ritual which included singing one of the popular songs of the time. I suddenly thought of this only the other night as I lay in bed. I can remember some of the words which are really a sort of nonsense song:
A mule is an animal with long funny ears
He kicks up at anything he hears.
His back is brawny, but his brain is weak,
And what’s more he’s got
A stubborn streak.
So if you don’t care a feather or a fig,
You may grow up to be a pig.
Chorus:
So why don’t you swing on a star,
Carry moonbeams home in a jar,
And be better off than you are,
Or would you rather be a pig. (or fish)
Next verses start:
A pig is an animal his shoes with dirt on his face …
A fish is an animal …
I’m not sure that this is the only song we sang, but it tended to lighten up what otherwise would have been a pretty serious matter seeing that many of those who sang it might in the immediate future or at some more distant time, not survive.
On my first trip in a Mosquito we were to undertake a ‘Big Ben’ operation. This meant that we were to go on a Special Duty Patrol searching over Belgium and Holland to see if there were any Radio signals emanating from that region which might have some significance in regard to the V2s.
Our aircraft was a Mosquito MkIV numbered W4071 and lettered DT/K. It may be of interest to know that this aircraft was among the first batch of Mosquitoes ever built in 1941, and then still flying in February 1945!
This aircraft had seen better days and one of its problems was that it could not reach an altitude much above 22,000 feet, unlike the MkXIVs which we got towards the end of the war in April 1945, and which were pressurized, and had a very good heating system to the extent that we only needed our ordinary uniform plus flying boots and a helmet with an oxygen mask. We were completely unarmed.
To return to the basic script, we were fed and watered. We were also required to empty our pockets of anything which would be of interest to the Germans should we be captured. Even a bus ticket, or an address would have been of interest to them and such was the fear of giving them something which might indicate to them whereabouts we were stationed, we religiously observed the need to make sure we gave them nothing. After visiting the crew room to pick up our parachutes etc we went to our dispersal which was next to Flying Control building.
Seating in a Mosquito is a tandem arrangement, with the Pilot sitting on the left with his instruments in front of him, such as the control column, and pedals under his feet which help steer the plane on the ground and also act as brakes. The throttle controls are to his right as are the controls for changing pitch, and a lever which controls the flaps. He has a compass in front of him plus all the other dials which show him such things as engine temperature, petrol gauges, altimeter, rate of climb, and turn and bank indicators. He is in touch with me by his intercom.
My ‘office’ is slightly behind and to his right. In front of me is the principal navigation display called ‘GEE’. Behind me are the radios and a wire recorder, and switches to control the ‘Piperack’ controls which would be operated as and when needed, by a switch. The ‘Piperack’ is actually in the bomb bay but we will not be using it on this occasion.
I will have already given Joe Reay the Flight Plan from which he can see what course to steer, the time he is to turn on to the next course(s) to fly, and at what height and speed he is to maintain.
It is the pilot’s responsibility to sign the form 700 before climbing on board. This is to show an acceptance that all parts and controls that need to be checked are OK. This Form 700 was always signed and it may well be the procedure still, and will be examined should there be a fault or the aircraft does not return.
The Pilot gets in first with his parachute just as I get out first at the end of the trip. There is precious little room in a Mosquito. We buckle up our seat belts and plug in the intercom. Once the ground crew has closed the doors, the Pilot is ready to start the engines. He always begins with the Port (right) first, and then the Starboard (left) motor. Once the engines are running properly all that needs to be done is to get permission from the Control Tower so that we can move off. We taxi to the end of the runway and await a green light from the Ground Controller. The reason for this procedure is that we have to be reasonably assured that there are no other aircraft either coming in or already on the runway.
Off we go into the wide blue yonder and tell the Control Tower that we are airborne. The Pilot climbs on to the course I have given him and he switches off our navigation lights and switches on the IFF (Identification Friend or Foe) which gives out a signal to friendly AA gunners and Fighters as soon as we judge that we have reached the English Coast. This IFF had a drawback because it could be detected by the enemy, so needed to be switched off as soon as the enemy coastline came into view. We also have a rear facing Radar aerial called ‘Boozer’. Here again it had to be used with care because of the ability of German Nightfighters to home on to it. Often we would either not use it at all or only do so over the target area.
As soon as we reach 8000 feet the pilot tells me to switch on the oxygen. The Pilot might need to alter course fairly soon and by following the Flight Plan we are on our way. On this occasion we knew that we were unlikely to see the ground as we had been told to expect 10/10ths cloud all the way there and back. (I found out recently we were the only aircraft sent out on 12th February 1945!!)
However, our troubles were only just beginning because after about half an hour or more, the GEE equipment failed, which meant that we were left to fly on Flight Plan not being able to see the ground at all. We had been told prior to take off that we would only need to do one leg and return of the Antwerp plot and then turn for home. At the time I was not unduly worried as I thought that the Met forecast could not be too far adrift. How wrong I was!!!!
Having not seen hide nor hair of any V2s despite regular searching on the frequencies I had been given to scan, we turned for home. We didn’t make any calls by radio for at least 20 minutes. Radio silence was a must. I could judge that by then we might be at least over the coast of England, but through a brief break in the clouds I could see that we were still over some unfamiliar land which meant we didn’t know where we were. We were lost!
Nav to Pilot – “I think we may be lost, but I will try my GEE box again to see if it is working.”
Nav to Pilot – “There’s no joy from GEE. You have got some frequencies you can try.”
Pilot to Nav – “Okay, I’ll do that.” (Pilot is trying the frequencies.)
My Pilot had a number of frequencies that he could call up, some of them were on the Continent, but none of them answered.
Pilot to Nav – “There’s no response from anyone. Got any other frequencies?”
Nav to Pilot – “I’ll have a look on the map to see if there are any other ‘dromes in France where we can get in touch. We could try Juvincourt?”
(Pilot is trying the frequency.) Still no answer. Was the R/T working? All this takes quite a long time and all the time we are maintaining the Flight Plan Course.
Nav to Pilot – “Any joy?”
Pilot to Nav – “Not a sausage!”
Nav to Pilot – “You could try calling ‘Cartwright’.
Pilot to Nav – “No reply from Base. I’ll give it another go.”
Pilot to Nav – “Still no response. Do you think a ‘Mayday’ might do the trick? I’ll give it a go.”
Pilot to Nav – “There’s a faint call from ‘Kingsley’. Can you hear it?” (Later we found that this was Tangmere.)
Nav to Pilot – “Ask them to give you a QDM for Foulsham.”
Pilot to Nav – “The course they have given means that we are way off our Flight Plan. I’m turning on to that course now.”
After some time …
Nav to Pilot – “Try ‘Cartwright’. They must be within calling distance by now.
“Sturgeon 10 from ‘Cartwright’. Steer 045 Magnetic.”
You can imagine our surprise and puzzlement as we needed to make a full 90 degrees to get on the bearing of the course given!
Our call sign was ‘Sturgeon 10’. The Foulsham call sign was ‘Cartright’. We had the best part of 200 – 250 miles to go. Fortunately we had an adequate amount of fuel and barring any further mishaps we would arrive in about an hour. Which we did!
After we were both debriefed, we deposited our parachutes etc and reported the failure of the GEE equipment. We went back in a van to our meal of egg and chips in the Mess and so to bed. Neither my Pilot nor I were in the same Nissen Hut, so we could only really discuss the matter the following morning.
When we calculated the back-plot the next day, we reckoned we had been at least 100 miles further south than we should have been. We were in the Rouen area. What had happened was that unbeknown to us, there was an intense area of low pressure in the area in which we were flying. Now at the height we were flying, wind speeds are very strong, up to 80-100 mph. This meant that the wind forecast to be in a southerly direction turned out to be in a more northerly direction and we had in fact on our Flight Plan been adding some 60 miles each way because of the incorrect forecast. It’s no wonder that we didn’t pick up any transmissions since we were wholly over friendly territory. By the way, there weren’t any transmissions to be recorded in any case since V2s were not guided missiles, but we didn’t know it at the time.
This article is from the Summer 2008 issue of Confound and Destroy
