Lancaster by John Nichol

Author:John Nichol
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Published: 2020-05-27T16:00:00+00:00

Billy Strachan (left) and his crew. Their aircraft was named

Vizagapatam after the town in India that paid for it

It was a bitter pill to swallow, and he couldn’t help wondering why, at that time, so few West Indian and black African volunteers were selected to be pilots. But, like Billy Strachan, he had ‘personally never experienced any racism in the RAF. I had accepted the reason given for me to train as a navigator, never suspecting that, in my case, it had been anything but genuine. I still had not been subjected to any form of overt prejudice. A war was on and I was wearing a uniform. People were generally very friendly. Outside in the streets I occasionally heard a child say, “Look, Mummy, a black man.” That always brought me up sharp. Before coming to England I didn’t think of myself as black – a salutary shock!’

In the long run, around 5,950 people of colour from the Caribbean, Africa and Britain volunteered to join the RAF; 5,500 as ground crew and 450 as aircrew. They served with all UK-based units except Transport Command, whose personnel visited some countries intolerant of such integrated crews.12

As the war progressed, the RAF proved themselves more enlightened than other employers of the day. An Air Ministry Confidential Order of June 1944 stated that, ‘All ranks should clearly understand that there is no colour bar in the Royal Air Force. Any instance of discrimination on grounds of colour by white officers or airmen or any attitude of hostility towards personnel of non-European descent should be immediately and severely checked.’13 And this was generally observed. One Nigerian wireless operator/gunner not only experienced no problem with his crew; they even named their bomber in honour of him, painting on its nose: ‘ACHTUNG! THE BLACK PRINCE’.

Eighty per cent of Afro-Caribbean airmen served in Bomber Command, but so liberal was the official attitude that it is impossible to tell their precise number, since race did not feature on their personal records.

Cy Grant completed his training in February 1943 and crewed up with Alton Langille, his French-Canadian skipper, ‘who chose me as he was to choose all the other crew members – because we were the best at our respective trades. On 19 June, we were ready for ops.’

Their first raid was on Mühlheim near Frankfurt, three nights later.

‘As navigator, one was kept continuously occupied. The navigator’s station was just aft of the pilot’s position, with a small table on the port side of the cabin on which sat the chief navigational aid – the GEE radio navigation system. You did not see much of what was going on below. It may have been completely different for my pilot, having to fly the Lanc through all that flak, or for the gunners looking out for fighters. For myself, my sense of responsibility for getting us there and back was paramount, and that may be why the obvious dangers of the situation did not seem to get to me. In

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