蜜芽传媒

An Erk鈥檚 life, chapter 3
By Robert Hall

As the bombing offensive was growing and new squadrons were being formed, a number of us were posted. The Signals Officer tried to keep me but to no avail, I had to go, which was a pity as he had promised to promote me to a corporal, but I would have had to go to Marston Moor. Off I went to Wickenby in Lincolnshire. Again I was lucky as Chiefy was a Geordie so there was that bond. He used to give me the work to wire the extras and secret stuff onto new aircraft which arrived from the factory. My workmate was Fred from Birmingham who had been an apprentice electrician in civvie street; we got on well together. There was also a civilian electrician in the hangar; he was there to examine the new aircraft electrics before handing over to the RAF. His pay was much higher than ours and he was pretty dim, mind he had only had twelve weeks training in this work and was called an aircraft electrician. He used to ask Fred and I to help him out with faults he could not rectify. In return for our help he rewarded us with cigarettes and paid for our NAAFI breaks. When there were no faults we soon made one, by twisting the Plessey connection round one turn, then armed with the megger tester etc, soon put it right, to his delight, and also to our delight -- more cigs.

One night when I was duty electrician at the end of the runway the planes were taking off an a bombing mission when for some reason one halted two thirds of the way down the runway. The next plane had already started its run and ran up the back of the back of the first one. The rest were immediately stopped and ambulances, fire engines racing to the scene. A Tannoy request was announced for the duty electrician to report to Officer I/C of crash. I reported to him and was told to get on board of the aircrafts and disconnect the bombs. This was difficult, as I kept slipping on the foam the firemen had poured in, so instead of loosening the plates above the bomb housing I disconnected the main supply at the source, ie the batteries. I did this on both aircraft and explained to the duty officer what I had done. 鈥淕ood thinking, airman,鈥� was the response I got.

One morning when I woke up the rest of the airmen said 鈥淕osh, you鈥檙e a good sleeper, didn鈥檛 you hear anything during the night?鈥� I had been on duty the night before so had been extremely tired. They said 鈥淟ook outside.鈥� our chimney of the hut was knocked off and a Lancaster had crashed into the next hut whilst trying to make its way to the runway. In another incident, all our windows of the billet were blown out on one side; we rushed out and there was smoke in the distance. A cookie had exploded whilst the WAAF driver was driving them round to the respective aircraft to be loaded. I think it was Binbrook where this happened. On another occasion I was looking on, waiting for the armourers to bomb the plane up with practice bomb prior to connecting them up, when an armourer dropped one and it exploded. He ran round in circles shouting. Another airman clasped his neck which was spouting blood, and I had to keep firm pressure on his neck until the ambulance arrived. Later the MO rang Chiefy saying I had saved that airman鈥檚 life, but the other airman had lost his eyesight.

As there was always an odd number of aircraft to connect, the electrician who finished first did the odd one. I jumped up onto the last aircraft to connect up and found the other electrician was already in the bomb bay doing a light test, so I sat beside the wireless operator (the crew were on board doing their various pre-flight tests) when suddenly the WO knocked me aside, pointing to the porthole window: smoke was passing the window as I was making my way out. The mid-upper gunner also pushed me aside and dashed from the aircraft; an incendiary canister had fallen. I joined the rest of the ground crew trying to kick the incendiaries away from underneath the bomb bay of the aircraft, when an engine fitter clambered aboard and as the pilot had left the engines running he released the brakes and ran the aircraft away from danger. The air crew returned and we derided them, saying 鈥淲e thought you were the heroes.鈥� They replied 鈥淲e have seen the cookie go up, you lot haven鈥檛.鈥� It had been bombed up with the cookie, which was a 4,000lb bomb with cans of incendiaries surrounding it.

Another day I was working at the main fuse box when a party of new aircrew came on board with an experienced aircrew up in the cockpit. He was explaining that if the electricals failed one had to pull this ring, which he did. There was a mighty thud and they all looked at me. I said Yes, it was bombed up, we had better get out. There was the cookie lying on the ground and it didn鈥檛 go off, otherwise I would not have been able to write this.

Another day working at the mains electric box midships on a Lanc, a sprog aircrew came on board. One of them was saying 鈥淗allo Mr Hall鈥� -- he was one of my Wolf cubs. Shortly after, he was missing after a flight. Later in life I felt guilty not going to see his parents, but at the time one just thought, Oh -- one in two planes hasn鈥檛 returned, not thinking of the aircrew. I suppose this was life at the time. Now, one would have to be counselled.

Around this time Alice, by then my wife, had been on duty on some very nasty air raids, One in particular stayed with her all her life. The ARP carried out two little girls to her ambulance. They had been in an air raid shelter when it had been hit and both were dead. I suggested to her to get a doctor鈥檚 note and come down to Lincolnshire. Near our billets there was a farm on which I worked on my days off, and they kindly agreed to put her up for a while. We did manage to get lodgings in Langworth, a few miles away, and she got a job in a department store in Lincoln. She travelled there by train and I cycled to the aerodrome. This did not last very long as I was posted to a new squadron, 550, based at North Killingholme. I managed to get lodgings in Immingham with Les and Ruth Kicks, whom we became very friendly with, visiting each other after the war, then they emigrated to New Zealand.

Soon after this Alice found she was pregnant so returned home. A telegram was sent to me saying a girl had been born. So I asked our electrical officer for a 48-hour pass but he told me there was a war on and servicemen overseas couldn鈥檛 get home on a 48-hour pass. As I wasn鈥檛 overseas I thought this remark a bit silly. However, Chiefy said 鈥淚 cannot give you a pass, but take tomorrow off. So get away now and return the day after tomorrow, but don鈥檛 get caught.鈥� So off I went and returned without any mishaps.

Shortly after, VE day came. We were then bombing up the Lancasters with food parcels instead of bombs, to release over Holland. The Dutch were then returning prisoners of war from Europe. The station was slowly returning to a peacetime role, marching from billets to work or to the dining hall. Up till then we had only paraded once a fortnight for pay and occasional church parade and Wednesday afternoon sports day.

I was friendly with a corporal electrician who was a very keep road racer cyclist. I used to be his pace maker, so he saw the sports officer and started a cycling club. It wasn鈥檛 very well attended until the rest of the airmen realised it was a good excuse to get out of the camp for the Wednesday afternoon. One day, racing round the perimeter, the corporal got caught in the slipstream of a plane running its engines up. He hit an oncoming van and went right through the windscreen and broke both his arms. I visited him in Grimsby Hospital and I remember in the next bed was an airman covered from head to toe in bandages; he had been a driver of a petrol bowser which had exploded and he was not expected to live.

I often spent my days off in Immingham Docks, which had an excellent navy canteen, and, probably because I was from Sunderland and had worked for the Forge and Engineering Co., I was always invited aboard the merchant ships berthed there. One day there were six German U boats which our navy boys had brought from Hamburg. They gave me a mug of tea and told me about the devastation the RAF had done to Hamburg in retaliation for their bombing of London.

The 550 Squadron was disbanded with much pomp and ceremony and I was posted to Elsham Catering base. On arrival I was sent to the stores and the other airman there asked if I would take turns with him on an early start, as the bread and meat had to be collected at a nearby railway station. But I was also asked to light the WAAFs officer鈥檚 fire in her office, which I did not agree to. So on my first early turn I collected the meat and bread and waited for the lists from the Catering Officer, as six other camps had to be supplied from here including a German prisoners camp. The WAAF officer opened the sliding window of her office and handed me the lists for supplying these camps, remarking that her office fire was not yet lit. I stood there and said I had spent five years servicing aircraft and lighting fires for Officers was a general duties airman鈥檚 job, not a top-grade electrician鈥檚 job. I thought I would be put on a charge for this, but surprisingly, the Officer never mentioned it again. In fact she was always quite friendly.

As I was in the stores I never went to the dining hall at this camp. I had cornflakes and evaporated milk for breakfast (this was the first time I had seen evaporated milk in the forces). Every electrician in bomber command had an electrical boiling ring made from the lid of the bomb release box; the aircrew always threw these away saying they were an encumbrance. So I would cook a chop or piece of meat and potatoes on the ring for lunch and there was bread and jam etc.

I was only there for a few weeks and on leave met my old boss and he asked if I would go back to him, which I readily agreed. He said he was friendly with the manager of the local labour exchange and would enquire about a Class B release for me. I was only back in camp a few days when I was told to go and see the Commanding Officer. He informed me he was releasing me on Class B release, as building workers were wanted to rebuild Britain. So off to Cardington where I got my discharge and civilian suit.

The end 鈥� of life as an erk

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