8 October 1940. Bill Millington. Australians in the Battle of Britain.

Australians in the Battle of Britain. 8 October 1940. Bill Millington

Bill Millington and 249 Squadron continued to be busy. On 8 October, flying V6692 on every occasion, Bill carried out four patrols: the first, at 7.35 a.m., a 45 minute patrol to Rochford; the second, at 9.00, a 55 minute patrol of Hornchurch and Biggin Hill; the third, at 12.20 p.m., another 55 minute patrol of Hornchurch and Biggin Hill; and the final one for the day, a 30 minute two-man patrol. Yet again no action and, yet again, little break between sorties.

One of the patrols was a bit more exciting. George Barclay recalled that on one of them, Bill took off before the leader, Flight Lieutenant ‘Butch’, Barton, B Fight’s OC. Everyone thought Bill had taken over the lead and so formed up on him. As soon as Bill realised what was happening, he ‘tried to buzz off’. The others then thought that Butch’s R/T must be unserviceable as he appeared to be indicating someone else to take the lead. George, who was leading Yellow Section, took over only to discover his R/T was out of order! So Sergeant Beard, who was Yellow Two, took over. So much time was wasted, with confusion reigning that ‘it took us the dickens of a time to straighten out the shambles, meanwhile we were grand pickings for the Me 109s!’ Happily, the patrol ended without any sign of the enemy.

It may have been a quiet day in the air on the 8th (with a few more to come in the next couple of weeks) but when he had the opportunity, Bill was a good shot, having had already notched up a score of 9 destroyed and one shared destroyed, two damaged and two probables. His ‘eye’ didn’t come naturally. It had been honed after years of rabbit shooting. This photo shows a successful outing in 1939 near Clarendon in the Adelaide Hills.