The Squadron That Died Twice--The story of No. 82 Squadron RAF, which in 1940 lost 23 out of 24 aircraft in two bombing raids by Gordon Thorburn

Author:Gordon Thorburn [Gordon Thorburn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781784186937
Publisher: John Blake Publishing
Published: 2015-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

Bristow, like all his WOp/AG colleagues in those days, had to know a great deal about the workings and practicalities of wireless to be able to get his unreliable and temperamental kit to work in the unforgiving circumstances of hostile flight. Now he had a similarly unreliable gun in his charge that he knew almost nothing about. At least he could be comforted with the thought on this first trip that his pilot and observer, whom he was supposed to defend with said gun, had both been on ops before. Anyway, they went to Le Havre, the Seine estuary. They saw no tanks, and they were not disturbed by fighters so Sgt Bristow remained a machine-gun virgin, and they came home with their bombs.

On 12 June, as the Germans entered Paris, Bristow was up again but with a different crew just north of Le Havre, again no losses for the squadron, but that run of luck finished at Le Gault la Forêt, way over to the east of Paris in the Reims/Épernay area, where an allegedly huge concentration of tanks brought raids all day. The promised French fighter cover did not materialise and three out of nine 82 Squadron Blenheims were shot down, with two of 21 Squadron flying from Bodney, plus five France-based Battles.

Why the 82 Squadron crew captained by Sergeant Albert Merritt should fall into the Waddenzee, well north of Amsterdam, can only be guessed at. Being so far off track on a ‘routine’ daylight raid, even though there was rain and cloud about, must have meant damage over the target, possibly a dead or wounded observer, or a wrecked turret meaning no wireless to get a fix.

There were three categories of fix at this time. A first-class fix was obtained when three ground stations on the UK mainland bounced a radio signal off the aircraft and, receiving a strong signal back, found their intersecting point. The position was calculated, probably within a mile, and transmitted to the aircraft. Lesser degrees of confidence, due to weakness of signal or fewer ground stations receiving, produced second- and third-class fixes. As bad weather interfered with the process, poorer quality fixes had to be given when precision was most needed.

UX/X crashed near the target with only the WOp/AG, Ken Harris DFM, being killed. Charlie Breese and his observer were taken prisoner. P/O Eyton-Williams, a new pilot, kept his machine up long enough to reach more friendly territory but was injured in the crash. The observer, Sgt Carbutt, was anything but new. He’d seen all that action on 17 May with Morrison. He, the officer and his mate, WOp/ AG Sgt Augustus Spencer Beeby, kept ahead of the Germans and returned to Watton. Gus Beeby was one of the new boys brought in immediately after Gembloux, so he’d only been on the squadron three weeks. He stated: ‘Our skipper was wounded by the flak but he managed to crash-land about three miles beyond where the Germans were. We got him out, set fire to the aircraft, and looked for help.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.