No Place for Chivalry Read online

  Air raid warning red at 23.37. Observed an air action against E/A at 01.30 [sic] in the east. An aircraft was seen to fall in flames. Transport rushed to the scene at Terrington St Clement and found Blenheim L1458. The two airmen were brought to Sutton Bridge, the air gunner going to the sickbay at 03.00 and the pilot being found dead at 03.45. A guard was mounted over the wreckage, which was scattered over a 1,000 yard area. The ‘all clear’ sounded at 03.44 hours.

  First blood to the Luftwaffe – but then the situation changed. Flt Lt Duke-Woolley’s patrol line took him towards Sutton Bridge from where he, too, saw this searchlight activity and spotted the two aircraft involved. He gave chase at full throttle and his combat report takes up the story:

  Time 00.45. Observed a ball of fire, which I took to be a Blenheim fighter in flames, break away from behind the tail of the E/A. I climbed to engage this E/A and attacked from below the tail after the searchlights were extinguished. I closed to a range of fifty yards and opened fire. E/A returned fire and appeared to throttle back suddenly. My own speed was 130-140mph and I estimate the E/A slowed to 110mph. I delivered five attacks with front guns and during these my air gunner fired seven bursts at various ranges. After the last front gun attack my air gunner reported that the E/A’s port engine was on fire. As my starboard engine was now u/s, I broke off the engagement and returned to base, where several bullet holes were found in the wings and fuselage, including cannon strikes in the starboard wing and rear fuselage.

  Spirited return gunfire from the Heinkel caused no significant damage to the Blenheim, although Derek Bell realised he had had a lucky escape when he found a bullet had pierced and lodged in his parachute pack! Airspeeds mentioned here may seem quite slow but it will be seen that, certainly in the era of the Blenheim and Defiant, rarely did night combats involve speeds above 200mph.

  Duke-Woolley claimed the Heinkel as a probable but later that day (19th) an RAF intelligence report stated a Heinkel He111 H-4 had crash-landed in the shallows of Blakeney Creek on the north Norfolk coast. As the gruppenkommandeur of II/KG4, Major Dietrich Freiherr von Massenbach, his lead pilot Oberleutnant Ulrich Jordan and radio operator Ofw Max Leimer from Heinkel He111, 5J+DM, waded ashore into captivity carrying their wounded flight engineer Fw Karl Amberger, they would have had plenty of time to wonder where their planning went wrong. When interrogated they confirmed shooting down one fighter and then being attacked themselves almost immediately afterwards and having to force-land as a result.

  Honours were now even but the night’s action was not over yet. Sqn Ldr O’Brien’s own search line took him south from Wittering where, at about 01.25, searchlights coned another Heinkel He111 which he intercepted at 12,000 feet about ten miles from Newmarket. O’Brien’s combat report takes up the story:

  Opened fire at E/A with rear [turret] gun from below and in front as it was held by searchlights. The E/A turned to port and dived. I gave him several long bursts with the front guns from fifty to one hundred yards range and saw clouds of smoke from the target’s starboard engine and a lesser amount from the port engine. I overshot the E/A and passed very close below and in front of him. My rear gunner put a burst into the cockpit at close range and the E/A disappeared in a diving turn apparently out of control. I suddenly lost control of my own aircraft, which spun violently to the left. Failing to recover from the spin I ordered my crew to abandon the aircraft and I followed the navigator [sic] out of the hatch.

  This latter was not an easy undertaking.

  Interviewed by the writer Trevor Grove for a Daily Mail feature about the Battle of Britain, Raymond Duke-Woolley recalled what Sqn Ldr O’Brien had told him about that eventful night. He said:

  In the gunfight the Heinkel went down then Spike’s Blenheim went out of control in a spin. At that time, popular opinion among pilots was that no pilot had ever got out of a spinning Blenheim alive, because the only way out was through the top sliding hatch and you then fell through one or other of the airscrews! The new boy probably didn’t know that but nevertheless he froze and Spike had to get him out. He undid his seat belt, unplugged his oxygen and pushed him up out of the top hatch while holding his parachute ripcord. He told me afterwards that he felt sick when the lad fell through the airscrew. Spike then had to get out himself. He grasped the wireless aerial behind the hatch, pulled himself up by it and then turned round so that his feet were on the side of the fuselage. Then he kicked outwards as hard as he could. He felt what he thought was the tip of an airscrew blade tap him on his helmet earpiece but luck was with him that night.

  Raymond Duke-Woolley then went on to recount the rest of the tale, which may or may not have been simply a good RAF line-shoot, but nevertheless is a story that sums up Spike O’Brien’s character.

  He parachuted down safely on the outskirts of a village and went to the nearest pub to ring Wittering and ask for transport to fetch him home. He bought a pint and sat down to await transport and began chatting idly to another chap in uniform who was in the room when he arrived. After a while, thinking the chap’s dress was a bit unusual, O’Brien asked him if he was a Pole or a Czech. ‘Oh no,’ replied his companion in impeccable English, ‘I’m a German pilot actually. Just been shot down by one of your chaps.’ At this point – so the story goes – O’Brien sprang to his feet and said, ‘I arrest you in the name of the King. Anyway where did you learn English?’ To which the German replied, ‘That’s all right. I won’t try to get away. In fact I studied for three years at Cambridge, just down the road. My shout, what’s yours?’ So that’s just what they did: sat and had a drink.

  A Heinkel He111P of KG4, coded 5J+AM, had indeed crashed at Fleam Dyke near the quaintly-named village of Six Mile Bottom. Sqn Ldr O’Brien filed a claim for the kill and a telexed intelligence report said he thought the cause of his own crash was that he was shot down by AA fire. At 01:30 his Blenheim L8687 crashed and exploded, scattering wreckage over a wide area of Warren Hill, Newmarket and sadly his air gunner, Cpl Little, perished in the crash.

  But hold on a minute, what about the Spitfire? What Spitfire, you may ask? Well, in the darkness and confusion of this running battle a fighter pilot from 19 Squadron, Fg Off G W ‘John’ Petre flying Spitfire L1032, also attacked this same Heinkel at the same time as Sqn Ldr O’Brien. Petre’s account of the combat told of how he opened fire with his eight machine guns but had to sheer off hard to one side to avoid colliding with an aeroplane that simultaneously opened fire alongside him. In that split second he recognised it as a Blenheim firing at his target. Hundreds of bullets from all sides sprayed the bomber, killing one gunner, but when searchlights illuminated the Spitfire others of the crew manning gun positions gave back as good as they got. Now their explosive bullets hit the Spitfire’s fuel tank and set it on fire. Suffering burns to his face and hands Fg Off Petre was forced to dive away from the battle and bale out.

  Riddled with bullets, losing altitude and with both engines on fire the Heinkel, too, was mortally hit. Instinctively trying to shake off his attacker(s), pilot Feldwebel Willi Maier dived westwards and jettisoned the bomb load, most of it falling on Warren Hill on the outskirts of Newmarket. This must have been about the time that things went pear-shaped for O’Brien because when the Heinkel “… disappeared in a diving turn apparently out of control [he] suddenly lost control of [his] aircraft”, and the Blenheim also crashed at Warren Hill. With no chance of staying in the air, Maier baled out with those of his crew left alive. Flight engineer Fw Karl Hauck, observer (and aircraft commander), Oblt Joachim von Arnim and Fw Maier landed safely but radio operator, Fw Paul Gersch, was killed.

  When the RAF claims for this combat were submitted – quite separately – Sqn Ldr O’Brien was credited with a probable and Fg Off Petre a confirmed kill. Overall that night the RAF claimed to have destroyed seven bombers and probably three others but the Luftwaffe actually lost five aircraft and their crews. Four RAF fighters had been shot down with the loss of five airmen killed.

  Writing after the war
, Flt Lt Duke-Woolley expressed the opinion that:

  . . . in the early days, aircrew were totally unbriefed about the best way to shoot down enemy aircraft. They were told to aim for the fuselage but this was pretty ineffective, since bullets often hit crewmen rather than doing much damage to the aeroplane. When interrogated, one of the German pilots brought down that night [June 18/19], made it clear that his aircraft came down because all his instruments had been shot away rather than the aircraft itself not operating. The pilot had a seat with armour plating so he was reasonably well protected against attack from the stern. Later strategies were to go for the fuel tank, engines or a frontal attack on the pilot.

  It would not be right to bring this incident to a close without making reference to the earlier tale of the German airman in the pub who was said to have been up at Cambridge before the war. Somehow the tale seems to have been embellished in the telling and trying to unravel such pieces of information is the bane of research. The reader can reach his/her own conclusion. I have not been able to confirm it, as well as finding similar tales – the truth is elusive.

  First there is Sqn Ldr O’Brien’s version as attributed to Flt Lt Duke-Woolley above – of which it might be said 23 Squadron’s own historian has expressed some scepticism. Then there is a more succinct version in the book Air Raid! – also felt by that author to be dubious. Finally there are another two similar incidents recounted in an article entitled ‘First of Many’ that may have had some influence on the tale. The latter states that Oblt Ulrich Jordan, from 5J+DM which crashed at Blakeney, on being captured was taken to an army field dressing station where he met and recognised an army chaplain who was cox of a British rowing crew that won a 1936 Olympics race that Jordan had watched in Germany. A little later the same article states that Oblt von Arnim, from 5J+AM which crashed at Fleam Dyke, was taken to RAF Duxford after capture and entertained in the 19 Squadron mess, being looked after by Flt Lt Brian Lane. Lane’s wife apparently joined them in the mess and she and von Arnim recognised each other immediately from motor racing meetings they had both attended before the war. It’s a small world!

  Having survived this violent engagement Sqn Ldr O’Brien, posted from 23 to 234 Squadron to fly single-seat fighters, was killed in action over Kent on September 7 1940. Karasek did not survive much longer than his former skipper either for, having been promoted to sergeant, he died in an air accident on September 25 of that same year. During its operations from Wittering and Digby, air accidents also accounted for the loss of Flt Lt Percy Walker and AC2 Benjamin France (attached from 229 Sqn) when L1452 crashed near Gainsborough on November 4 1939. Air gunner, LAC Chrystall, escaped by baling out and said he thought the crash was due to his pilot being dazzled by a searchlight. In January 1940, Plt Off Roy Barritt and Cpl Ronald Wilson died when L1466 crashed at Helpston for unknown reasons and Plt Off Charles Cardnell and Sgt Cyril Stevens were killed when L1448 crashed at Peterborough on August 8 1940, shortly after taking off for a night patrol.

  By the end of September 23 Squadron moved out of Wittering for intruder duties based on the south coast and towards the end of November 1940, 25 Squadron arrived from RAF Debden to take their place in the sector and to be re-equipped with the Beaufighter.

  By way of contrast, another aspect of the night air war – that of the German intruder – will now be illustrated.

  Skegness, on the coast at the northern corner of The Wash, features in this narrative from time to time for several reasons, not least of which is that it was often one of the first friendly landfalls for RAF bombers returning from raids on northern Germany. For crews on these long-duration operations (some sorties lasted twelve hours or more), when it came to hazards in the harsh autumn and winter of 1940, if storms, fog or fatigue didn’t get you then a marauding Luftwaffe intruder just might. The story of one such incident begins in Skegness, not in wartime but on a sunny Sunday in September 1992.

  It was just another quiet seaside afternoon that coincided with one of the lowest tides of the year. Returning to station after a routine exercise with the Mablethorpe inshore rescue boat, in the gentle swell two hundred yards off the end of the pier, crewmen of the Lincolnshire Poacher lifeboat saw a glint of sunlight reflecting from a piece of metal. Recognisable as the tip of a propeller blade they marked the spot with a buoy. Returning at low water next day it was hauled from the seabed with the aid of the lifeboat launch tractor.

  Cleaned up, that three-bladed propeller, complete with hub and reduction gear, now stands in the lifeboat station with a simple plaque on which is stated the aircraft type, date of crash and location. Behind that simple legend, however, lies a drama enacted one pitch-dark autumn night more than half a century earlier.

  In the early hours of October 28 1940, Handley Page Hampden X3027 of 49 Squadron, based at RAF Scampton, made the long haul back from a minelaying sortie off the French port of Lorient, with Fg Off John Bufton in command. One of the early successes of the Luftwaffe intruder campaign, X3027 now fell victim to a Junkers Ju88 flown by Leutnant Heinz Völker of I/NJG2.

  Although the bomber hit the sea at 02.00, it was not until 02.50 that the lifeboat could be launched to search for the aircraft and its crew. This delay was said by locals to be due to soldiers being reluctant to open barbed wire barricading the beach. Despite the darkness, Sgt Frederick Bichard, wireless operator/air gunner (WOp/AG), was found and pulled from the water at 05.00, but sadly died later in hospital. Speaking afterwards, members of the public believed they heard cries for help offshore and once, a searchlight even picked out men in the water before orders came to douse the light owing to the presence of hostile aircraft.

  Lifeboatmen did not give up the search until the grey morning light confirmed nothing more could be done. The bodies of Fg Off Bufton and WOp/AG Sgt Bob Robertson were found on the beach but of navigator, Plt Off Konstantine Ballas-Andersen, nothing was found.

  This was Lt Völker’s first success as an intruder pilot. During the next nine months he was credited with seven claims until on July 22 1941 he too ran out of luck, killed in a mid-air collision with his eighth intended victim, a Wellington from 11 OTU Bassingbourn.

  Night combats, though, would not always involve multi-engine aeroplanes and of the many pilots guarding the way to Midlands targets, some worked best alone in a single-seat fighter. One such man was Richard Playne Stevens. Over thirty years of age when he joined the RAF, this pre-war flyer was old by the fighter pilot standards of the day. After a spell with army cooperation he was posted to 6 OTU at RAF Sutton Bridge from October 29 to November 26 1940, to undergo a Hurricane conversion course. Former Battle of Britain pilot Flt Lt Bill Whitty was an instructor at 6 OTU between November 1940 and August 1941 and he recalled: “We had ‘Cat’s Eyes’ Stevens as a pupil, he was desperate to get onto night fighters as his parents [sic] had been killed in a bombing raid.”

  Since his next posting was to 151 Squadron at Wittering he would arrive with at least a little familiarity with the area around The Wash. Ever the loner, all his air victories (fourteen confirmed destroyed) were achieved in a Hurricane fighter, without on-board radar and all while flying air defence sorties with 151 Squadron based at RAF Wittering. Popular myths have grown up about this legendary pilot, some of which suggest he wandered the night sky like a demon sniffing out the enemy by some superhuman process but this seems – like all myths – to stretch the truth somewhat. It was rumoured that he was driven by revenge for the death of his wife and/or children in an air raid on Manchester and that this accounted for his aggressive approach to night operations. This latter could infer that his contemporaries somehow acted differently or were less driven to get to grips with the enemy but that would do them an injustice.

  Like his contemporaries, Stevens was an excellent flyer under night conditions – perhaps better than most – but he had had the benefit of pre-war commercial night flying experience. He was therefore at home in the night sky but as for ‘wandering’ about the sky, let’s remember these were
all disciplined airmen who were despatched on orders and placed in or near potential combat areas, by an efficient ground control organisation. After that, naturally, they had the freedom for any action and aggression that the job demanded, wherever it might take them, for there were no rules once combat was joined. In the chapters that follow, an examination of night sorties originating or terminating in Wittering and Digby sectors, will show that defending night fighter pilots engaged the enemy across a vast area of England. They were limited only by their own fuel and ammunition supply. Cold and calculating perhaps but it was no place for the hot-headed, as the following sortie carried out by Plt Off Stevens himself illustrates.

  On April 8/9 1941 Coventry was still being hammered as the Blitz moved towards its zenith. Nine Hurricane and Defiant fighters were sent off by 151 Squadron, with orders to orbit Coventry on Fighter Night patrols. Flying Hawker Hurricane V6934, Plt Off Stevens took off from Wittering at 00.52 on the 9th and reached Coventry at his patrol altitude of 19,000 feet, well above the AA gun level. About fifteen minutes later he saw a Heinkel He111 below him, silhouetted against a cloud layer. Keeping the bandit in sight, a curving dive took him down 4,000 feet and brought him neatly into a quarter position just below the bomber’s stern, where at a range of only seventy-five yards he eased up the Hurricane’s nose and opened fire. The first burst hit the belly of the bomber causing a large explosion (seen by another 151 pilot nearby) and the bomber dived with flames streaming from the port engine. He put another burst into the fuselage, which brought more flames as it went into the cloud layer at 5,000 feet. Stevens followed and saw the Heinkel emerge ahead of him, still blazing and with the appearance of bombs and incendiaries exploding, it crashed to earth. Resuming his patrol just above the AA layer at 12,000 feet over the north-east part of the city, Plt Off Stevens saw another Heinkel He111 slightly above him travelling east. He tailed this one until he was within 200 yards when the ventral gunner spotted him and started firing at the Hurricane. Stevens dived underneath, fired a deflection burst at the nose and centre section from a hundred yards range then pulled up on the port side, gave it another burst and the ventral gunner stopped firing. At this point the dorsal gunner sent some accurate bursts of machine-gun fire at the Hurricane, hitting it several times and making Stevens drop back a little.