Chapter Six: Last
Christmas of the war.
Just another Working Day
When Dick Glyde returned to France after escaping from
Borsbeek, he was greeted by Squadron Leader John Dewar, 87 Squadron’s new
commanding officer who replaced Squadron Leader Coope on his posting to 52
Wing. It didn’t take Dick long to settle into squadron life after his
internment, escape and enjoyable leave in London. He may have missed out on the
royal visit of 6 December but he had a taste of the same sort of ceremony when
the prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, visited on 16 December. It was a
formal occasion. The Hurricanes were lined up on the tarmac, the prime minister
inspected the facilities, and Squadron Leader Dewar, Sergeant Francis Howell
and Dick were presented to Chamberlain.
Before Dick knew it, it was the first Christmas of the
war. It was foggy so both flights were on 30 minutes availability. The day was
celebrated in the traditional RAF manner, with the officers invited to the
sergeants’ mess to drink the Loyal Toast. The officers and NCOs then served the
yuletide meal to the ground crews who had kept the Hurricanes serviceable
despite the best efforts of mud, rain and, more recently, snow and bitter
winds. A show put on by the officers rounded off the evening. There is no
record of Dick’s contribution to the festivities but fellow Australian Johnny
Cock upset his audience in some way and left the stage ducking from a host of
oranges pelted at him by the ground crew. Hopefully Johnny caught the oranges
as the vitamin C-laden fruit would have come in handy over the next few weeks
as one by one 87 Squadron’s pilots were brought low by colds, bronchitis and
influenza. The French winter was almost unendurable and the warmth of Christmas
cheer soon dissipated as temperatures decreased. It was so cold, recalled Pilot
Officer Roland Beamont who had only arrived the month before, that the ‘huts
became coated with sheets of glistening ice and the doors and windows were
blocked with snow’.
While Dick Glyde had
been tuning his new Hurricane to perfection in early November before his
Belgian internment, Pat Hughes was again packing his bags. But it was not for
France. He had been posted from 64 Squadron and Church Fenton, but he did not
have far to travel. In fact, he was not even leaving Yorkshire. Like Des Sheen,
he was going to Leconfield. RAF expansion had gathered pace during 1939 and
fifteen new fighter squadrons were operational by the end of the year. Pat had
been posted to 234 Squadron which had reformed on 30 October 1939.
Squadron Leader
William Satchell took command on the 30th and the next day, his new flight
commanders, flying officers John Theilmann and Howard Blatchford, arrived from
41 Squadron. Pilots, administrative staff and airmen came from all directions.
But it wasn’t all one way traffic. Squadron Leader Satchell was injured in a
motor car accident on 2 November and hospitalised and Flying Officer Blatchford
returned to 41 Squadron two days later. ‘Thus’, as the squadron historian put
it, ‘terminating what must have been two of the shortest command appointments
ever’. Within days, Squadron Leader Richard ‘Dicky’ Barnett arrived, followed
by Pat on 8 November to replace Blatchford.
Although most on his new station were
Englishmen, Pat found that, like Church Fenton, Leconfield was home to many
members of the Commonwealth. For example, Pilot Officer William Hugh ‘Scotty’
Gordon was born in Scotland. Pilot officers Cecil Hight, Keith Lawrence and
Patrick Horton hailed from New Zealand (Horton, who was born on 20 May 1920,
was a student at The Hutchins School, Tasmania from March
1932 until December 1933, and was about
three years behind Stuart Walch.) And of course, Pat, who, like Jack Kennedy,
had by this stage lost his accent, was Australian. There was no sense in this
new squadron of the Antipodeans being treated like colonials. Keith Lawrence
recalled that his British friends might laugh at someone’s origins, but it was
all in fun and never to anyone’s detriment. They had many different backgrounds
but they all got on well.
The majority of 234
Squadron’s pilots had only just completed their flying training. As a flight commander, Pat was responsible for mentoring his new boys as they
adjusted to life in a soon-to-be operational squadron. He had obviously proved
himself capable of such responsibility on the occasions when he had stepped
into the shoes of his flight commander at 64 Squadron. But now his new pilots
were solely dependent on him to prepare them for operations. On the face of it,
it might have proved a difficult task. Pat was almost the same age as Cecil
Hight, who was born on 6 September 1917 and he was younger than some of his
pilots—Pilot Officer Kenneth ‘Ken’ Dewhurst, for instance, was 25 years old and
Pilot Officer Geoffrey Gout was 23. But the ages of the majority of his pilots,
ranged from 18 to 20.
Pat took his role as
flight commander seriously. By now he had notched up over two years experience
in the RAF. He had matured considerably; he did not exhibit any of the
boisterousness that had marked his Point Cook and Digby days. He may
have mellowed but his leadership style was uncompromising. Even so, he soon
commanded respect as the squadron’s ‘Australian mentor’. He was also, according
to Bob Doe, ‘one of the lads’, and ‘was not a remote figure’. They could look
up to him and share a drink at the pub. More importantly, he was a ‘cracking good pilot’, recalled Keith Lawrence.
‘What he could do with a plane!’
But what sort of aircraft? And, for
that matter, what
sort of squadron? Bomber or fighter? It was a mystery. Squadron Leader Barnett
was in the dark and the only aircraft on the new squadron’s charge were two
Magisters and no training aircraft, so no clues there. By 11 November, the
complement had increased to three and the pilots took it in turns to clock up 2
hours 30 minutes local flying in them and 40 minutes in the link trainer. It
wasn’t a good start to becoming an operational-ready squadron.
Confusion continued to reign when, on 16 November, one
Fairey Battle—a single-engined light bomber—arrived, as well as three obsolete
Gauntlets on loan from 616 Squadron which was also located at Leconfield. What
would Pat have felt at the thought of ending up as a bomber pilot after
disputing his initial categorisation at Digby? But still nothing was certain.
Rumours started flying—and were reinforced by the arrival of wireless
operator/air gunners—that perhaps they might be destined for Bristol Blenheims.
Then an Avro Tutor biplane trainer turned up. The pilots put in hours of flying
training and attended lectures on aircraft recognition, battle orders, radio
telephone (R/T) procedure and, almost incredibly given the lack of fighter
aircraft, air fighting tactics.
By the end of the month, the rumours were confirmed, and
the air fighting lectures finally made sense. Eight Blenheim F1 fighter
aircraft, as well as a dual-control Blenheim, arrived on 28 November, and
another three were collected from a maintenance unit on the 30th. They were a
fighter squadron.
Pat was now in his element. He had mastered the Blenheim
at 64 Squadron and, like his former squadron leader, was an advocate of tight
flying discipline. His B-Flight pilots took to the air to familiarise
themselves with Leconfield and environs and became adept at flying their new
Blenheims. By 22 December, 15 pilots had soloed on the Blenheim. And then the
more complicated training began.
Keith Lawrence recalled that, when the miserable winter
weather allowed, Pat insisted on drilling in the rigid RAF fighter attack
patterns. Bob Doe recalled that
they ‘were good at formation’ flying. They carried out many wingtip-to-wingtip formation exercises, constantly perfecting their
technique. On one occasion, however, the Australian flight commander was
accused of taking it too far.
Pat was leading and called his pilots to formate on him.
Tight flying in a Blenheim is dicey as the engines obscure the wingtips. Even
so, Pat’s men flew closer and closer to him. But it was not good enough. Pat
kept signalling Keith to move in and then the inevitable happened. Keith’s
Blenheim’s wing touched Pat’s. Pat promptly ordered his wireless operator to
bale out while he fought for full control. He landed safely but it taught him
there was such a thing as flying too close.
Pat and 234 Squadron were so busy there was little time
off for his second Yorkshire Christmas. Officially, 23 December to 31 December
was designated as the Christmas break but flying practice was carried out on
three days during the festive season. At North Weald in the south, however, it
was a different matter.
Stuart Walch and 151 Squadron had been grounded for
three days. The fog seemed even thicker on Christmas day and, yet again, no
flying was possible. But for once, Stuart and his friends did not seem to mind
their continuing exile from the air. The squadron diarist, who seemed a bit of
a wag, recorded that ‘today was one of the rare occasions when everyone was
glad to see fog, and Christmas was celebrated by the squadron in the
traditional manner.’ Festivities over, Stuart wanted to get back into the air.
He carried out a standing convoy patrol on the 29th and that was it. The ‘nil
report’ sortie just seemed to crown off a month with little meaningful activity
where the enemy continued to elude him.
With so little operational action, had Stuart managed to
escape from North Weald during Christmastide? The temptation, if he could
squeeze a few hours off the station, would have been great. Colonel John Crosby
Walch—Percival’s younger brother and Stuart’s uncle—was hosting a family
reunion at his country home at Devizes, Wiltshire. John had joined the
Tasmanian artillery at the outbreak of the Boer War and, in 1900, accepted a
regular commission in the British Royal Horse and Field Artillery. After the Boer War, he was
posted to India. He returned to England in 1909 with short postings to South
Africa. Promoted to major, he served in France during the Great War. He had a
good career. In 1917 he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and
Mentioned in Despatches and was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in 1918. His sister
Catherine Minna, who had settled in England when she married, would be there,
as would Stuart’s sister Brenda. Stuart’s mother, Florence, had returned to Australia in August,
but Brenda had decided to stay and take up voluntary
work. The Walch house party was shaping up to be a grand affair and Stuart
would not have wanted to miss either it or the chance to catch up with his
sister and the extended Walch family.
Meanwhile, Stuart’s old Point Cook classmate Jack
Kennedy had big plans for Christmas and they didn’t involve hanging around
Northolt. And why would he want to be tied to the station when 65 Squadron had
had little to do since the so-called Battle of Barking Creek?
There had been no operational flying during October,
after the move from Hornchurch, and none in November. Apart from the death of
26-year-old Pilot Officer Bryan Graham who hailed from Auckland, New Zealand in a
flying accident on 25 November, all was just the ‘usual squadron routine’.
Things appeared to be looking up on 2 December, when Flight Lieutenant Gerald
Saunders led a section to investigate an unidentified aircraft. Then there was
nothing to report, and no more aerial forays until 21 December, when Jack led a
section to investigate an X raid—an unidentified
aircraft reported by radar or Observer Corps which needed to be checked out—but
it was only a friendly, as was the one he was called out to investigate on 22
December.
With so little happening at Northolt, it was an easy
matter for Jack to be released over Christmas and he did not delay in hopping
into his Lagonda and driving to Whitstable and Christine Jourd. When he arrived
at Christine’s family home, he presented her with a huge box of chocolates. Not
terribly romantic, but luxury items were already disappearing from shop shelves.
Since ration books had been issued after National Registration Day on 29
September, and rationing of some essential items had been scheduled to start on
8 January 1940, rumours of hoarding were already rife. Chocolate wouldn’t be
included in the first lot of rationed items but sugar, of which 70% of
Britain’s supplies were imported, had been rationed in the last months of the
Great War and so it did not take too much imagination to realise it would soon
be on the restricted list. And indeed it was. As the war progressed, chocolate
became darker, rougher, more powdery and less palatable than the pre-war
variety. Jack’s luxurious gift was a boon for a sweet-toothed girlfriend. But
more than the chocolate, Christmas 1939 was another fleeting chance to forget
the war as the two young lovers rejoiced in their precious hours together.
‘A fine old English house’
Bill Millington was going from strength to strength at
Tern Hill. He had his first flight in a Harvard, under dual instruction, on 10
October. Two days later, after only three hour’s dual, he soloed. Then, during
a height test on the 21st, he broke his training squadron’s record, taking his
Harvard to 18,000 feet. Bill’s initial aerial success was not surprising given
the lessons he had taken at Parafield earlier that year. His dual hours clocked
up in the South Australian skies might not have been many, but they had given
him confidence and put him ahead of many of his training companions.
When not in the air, Bill visited local families,
introduced via Lady Frances Ryder’s hospitality scheme, and kept fit on the
squash court, which he thought ‘jolly good exercise’. He also played ‘scrum
half for the squadron rugby team. We usually manage to scrape up at least one
and sometime two matches a week’. In her most recent letter, his sister Eileen
asked if went out at night. He cheekily replied ‘quite a bit—out into the
blue’. He found night flying ‘rather tricky at first but becoming more
enjoyable every flight, depending mainly on the weather’.
As October drew to a close, Bill had some time off and
so visited his friend Glen Grindlay, who he had met at Lady Frances and Miss
Macdonald’s flat in Sloane Square. When Bill received his posting to Reading,
Glen had stayed in London until he was sworn into the RAF Volunteer Reserve on
8 August as an air gunner. Glen was enjoying the hospitality of Captain Codrington Gwynne Reid Walker and Bill was also invited to join
the Reid Walker family at Ruckley Grange, ‘a fine old English house’, located
about 20 miles from the training school. The handsome neo-Elizabethan house,
built in about 1904, was surrounded by extensive grounds which included
stables, plantations, water features and parkland. It overlooked a wooded
valley and, harking back to his youth when he helped his father in the garden,
Bill lost no time offering to help chop down trees and clear out the
undergrowth. Not every visitor to a handsome country seat would immediately
pick up an axe but Bill had a ‘pleasant time’. And then it was back to Tern Hill.
Over the next few weeks, Bill worked hard and, as in
October, had little time to fill in his diary, apart from outings with new
friends, the odd game of golf and a tour of some ruined castles. He put in time
in the link trainer and generally progressed well in his training except for a
mishap with Harvard N7030 on 25 November when he landed with the undercarriage
retracted. ‘Rather bad show’ but, fortunately, there was ‘little damage except
to airscrew’. He studied for the exams which marked the conclusion of his
intermediate training.
He received 86% in armament and 90% in signals but his
airmanship results of 57% let him down. Overall, he was ranked 22nd out of the
29 officers on the course, with an average of 71%, just below the officers’
average of 73.5%. Results in hand, he was off. First to Ruckley Grange again
for a few days tree felling and shooting, followed by a trip to London to visit
his relatives and Lady Frances Ryder, and to catch up with Captain Reid Walker
at the Cafe Anglais and Boodle’s, a gentlemens’ club in St James’s Street.
If anything outstanding happened training-wise in the
last weeks of 1939, Bill didn’t record it. His last diary entries were devoted
to his Christmas leave. At midday on 22 December, Captain Reid Walker picked
him up from the mess and drove back to Ruckley Grange where, by this stage,
Bill was feeling quite at home. Almost immediately, he rolled up his sleeves
and attacked the rhododendrons. Over the next few days he worked in the pine
plantation and the sycamores, and spent more time pruning the rhododendrons. He
was pleased to see Glen Grindlay again. Since they had last met, Glen had
completed a course at the gunnery school at Manby, and was just about to finish
operational training at Upper Heyford.
Bill liked nothing better than being with family and
friends, and with the Reid Walkers he had both. He was embraced by a large,
welcoming family who did not stand on ceremony and his first Christmas in
England since he was a lad was a warm, happy affair en famille. He had ‘a very
enjoyable time’, full of ‘hunting, felling trees, shooting, skating and
tobogganing’. He particularly took to ice skating, which he thought ‘a lot of
fun and I was duly initiated into the art, taking a number of falls in the
process. Actually I find it much easier than roller skating, but have to glide
into somebody or something to stop’. And then it was Christmas morning.
Bill and Glen leapt out of bed at 1.00 a.m. and sneaked
downstairs. They quietly let themselves out of the house and, securing axe and
rope, dashed through the snow encrusted grounds to a strand of trees where they
selected a well-shaped Christmas tree and then chopped it down. Alternately
dragging and pushing it, they returned at about 2.30 a.m. and managed to erect it
in the ‘large room set aside for the festivities’. As silently as possible,
Santa’s most recent helper elves decorated it. With the last fragile bauble
trembling at the end of a branch, they scooted back upstairs to sleep the sleep
of the not-so-innocent.
When everyone awoke and gathered by the tree, Bill was
‘given the job of Father Christmas’, to hand out the parcels and ‘things went
off exceptionally well’. Then, he and Glen ‘explored the old attics and lumber
rooms where we unearthed a number of old costumes, uniforms etc dating back to
the eighteenth century’. Christmas dinner was to be in fancy dress and so Bill
selected ‘the mess kit of a colonel of the Prince of Wales Volunteers which was
originally the property of my host’s grandfather’. Glen chose something a
little more feminine, and Bill thought he ‘made a very prim Victorian miss
until something ripped, when he was promptly christened “Loose Lucy”’.
Bill’s first English Christmas since childhood ‘was a
grand affair’. He and Glen settled down to ‘ten courses, followed by crackers
etc. We finished off the evening with dancing in the ballroom.’ It was a happy
day and riotous evening and, when they finally turned in about 2.00 a.m., ‘Glen
was too tired to remove his war paint’.
Glen had to return to his station the next morning and
‘was horrified to find that the lipstick was unmovable’. No matter how hard he rubbed,
it would not budge. The sight of him, ‘at breakfast in full uniform with bright
red lips’, elicited gales of laughter from Bill and their hosts. After
breakfast, with Bill offering encouragement over his shoulder, Glen ‘spent an
hour with hot water, scrubbing brushes and numerous jars of cleansing cream
removing the indelible lipstick. He vows he’ll never be caught again’.
In contrast to the good times and laughter at Ruckley
Grange, the final day of 1939 was a quiet one for Bill. He arrived back at Tern
Hill just before midnight on the 30th and spent New Year’s eve writing letters.
He did not celebrate the waning of 1939 and the dawn of 1940, but retired
early.
‘I’d hate like hell to go back a failure’
Every service pilot dreaded being ejected from his
training course, and John Crossman was no different. When he arrived at 9
Elementary Flying Training School at Ansty in Warwickshire on 30 October, he
immediately felt the pressure to fly quickly and well. He was in the air that
afternoon, and took over the controls of a Tiger Moth almost as soon as his
instructor, Sergeant Webb, cleared the aerodrome. He then flew ‘35 minutes strait
and level. At least I tried hard to do that. It was great’. He marvelled at the
sights from the dual cockpit: ‘The aerodrome and buildings are wonderfully
camouflaged and to see the ‘drome from the air it looks as though it is all
fields with hedges dividing them off. England from the air is just like a
patchwork quilt, all shades of green and the roads look like white ribbons.’
Next morning, he was in the front seat of Tiger Moth
N5472. Under Sergeant Webb’s careful guidance from the instructor’s seat behind
him, he taxied into position to take off. When they were airborne, Sergeant
Webb said, ‘You’ve got it’. John then ‘took over and flew it straight and level
for a while and then the instructor brought it down and I taxied back to the
tarmac’. It was a grand moment for John. After 65 minutes total dual, Sergeant Webb
was pleased with John’s progress and the young Australian hoped to advance to
turns the next day. As it happened, he had two training sessions on 2 November,
again practising straight and level flying as well as climbing, gliding and
stalling, and, finally, medium turns. He was quietly pleased that his ‘climbing
and gliding is quite good now and also my turns’.
John progressed
satisfactorily in his first flying week. Sergeant Webb told him he was ‘doing
quite well and wants me to do some more landings and a few spins and then go
solo’. Despite this vote of confidence, and the fact that ‘I have had no
trouble flying up to date’, John was a perfectionist and wanted more dual hours
under his belt. In particular, ‘I feel I’d like to do a few more landings
myself ... and get fairly proficient at it before I do go solo. But as the
Point Cook boys had found, the pressure was on to solo as fast as possible but
the English weather more often than not conspired to keep him out of the air.
And when John was grounded, his impatience grew. To make matters worse, like
Pat Hughes, he did not take to the English weather. ‘This
place is a damp, cold and miserable one (I mean England) and at times I’d give
anything for a good old Australian sun. We wouldn’t mind so much if the weather
didn’t stop our flying.’
On top of all that,
he experienced pangs of homesickness. ‘Have you bought
the piece of land you were talking of for the new house?’, he asked his parents
in a letter home. ‘If you do build again make my room a big one please, because
when I do come home I’ll be bringing lots of things.’
As Pat Hughes had
found before him, flying lessons—when they could have them—were often a case of
one step forward, and four backwards. After 10 hours 50 minutes dual, John
carried out a solo test on 15 November and, if this went well, he would be able
to graduate to the next stage of his training. But it did not go well. ‘Landed
all over the place again. In the air I fly well but am gone 30 feet from the
ground.’ Flight Lieutenant Williams, who took the test, kindly put John’s poor
performance down to a problem with his eyesight but a check-up revealed nothing
wrong. Perhaps John would benefit from another instructor? And so, under the
guidance of Pilot Officer Underhill, John continued dual instruction until 20
November when, with 14 hours 35 minutes notched up—10 minutes less than Pat
Hughes at Point Cook in March 1936—he retook the solo test, again with Flight Lieutenant
Williams. This time he was successful and was allowed a 10 minute solo flight.
Not only was it good not to have someone telling him what to do when he made a
mistake, but ‘it is absolutely marvellous to think that at last I’ve flown a
plane on my own as I’ve wanted to do for a very long time now.’
There was no time to
rest on his solo laurels. As Des Sheen had discovered at Point Cook, the
progress of trainee pilots was carefully scrutinised by their instructors. Three days after
John’s first solo, his course lost two trainees. John was lucky that Flight Lieutenant Williams had
given him a second chance, as those unhappy chaps both ‘failed their flying
tests and will be leaving for Australia soon’. And the reason? ‘They were both
taking too much time to go solo and after being taken up for tests were told
they were not fit for flying.’
Although John was
‘awfully sorry’ for the ‘poor beggars’ who had to pack their bags, it was hard
not to put aside his own dread that he too would be passed out: ‘I don’t know
what I’d do if I were given the order of the boot. It would look as though I
were letting everyone down when really to stay in the RAF a fellow has to be
able to fly almost from the word go.’
Although he told his
parents there was ‘no dishonour in being ousted like this’—perhaps softening
them up in case he had to join his friends on the return passage to
Australia—he believed there was something shameful about being turfed out: ‘I’d
hate like hell to go back a failure.’
With the ejection of
the two Australians from the training school, ‘not a few of us feel very
apprehensive about it as the course is very rigorous’. John did not often dwell
on the past, and he would never have dared, under normal circumstances, to
criticise his father, but his apprehension got the better of him and, in a
letter home, he admitted that ‘I have never regretted
anything more in my life than not learning to fly before I came here. It would
have made all the difference in the world.’ John was not the only one to rue his
father’s stubborn insistence in withholding permission to fly. A few weeks later, his Aunt Ann chided her brother on this very
point: ‘If only we could see ahead or rather that you had been able to, Ted. He
would have trained young and would now be instructing at a good salary and not
so likely to have to fight’. In less than 12 months, Ted would bitterly regret his obstinacy.
If John could not
change the past, he could at least exert some control over the present and he
and his friend Jack Burraston determined that they would not return home with
their tail between their legs. They had again arranged to share quarters and,
as they had on the Orama, spent extra
hours studying. ‘I am lucky in having such a decent
chap as Jack with me and each night we go over the day’s work and test each
other on what we’ve had.’
Their hard work paid
off. One more was scrubbed from the course but the places of the remaining
trainees were secure: ‘We feel awfully sorry about it,
especially as he was so very popular and such a great fellow. We will all miss
[him] very much. It wasn’t his fault, he just could not fly well enough. We all
feel very relieved now as we hear that there won’t be any more as the weeding
out is now finished.’
Pressure off, John
put away his homesickness, impatience and fear of receiving the order of the
boot and settled down to enjoy life and training. He took advantage of the
hospitality of some of the local families, courtesy of the
Dominion and Allied Services Hospitality Scheme, was
fitted for his RAF uniform—which required the assistance of a batman to cope
with the buttons—and gained in confidence and ability as he increased his solo
flying hours. On 19 December he ‘did some more low flying ... It’s great fun
and is in fact just about the best there is’ and, one month after his second
solo flying test, ‘started forced landings today. Had to cut out motor at 2000
feet and land in forced landing field which is very small. Successfully
accomplished it each time.’
The flying days whizzed by. ‘We haven’t been allowed to do much slacking as the Air Ministry is
rushing us all through at a great pace.’ John ‘thought we’d have to work over
Christmas and now we find we have a week off.’ After his warm welcome by Ann
and William Brawn at Chalfont St Giles, Buckinghamshire shortly after he
arrived in England, he had initially planned to spend Christmas with them if he
had time off. But, not realising the young Australian had family he could go
to—and without John disabusing him of this belief—the training school’s
commanding officer organised John and Jack Burraston to stay with: ‘Mrs Parkes
at Stratford-on-Avon. I have met her and she is very lovely and tells us she
has made all sorts of arrangements for us. I will probably be going down to St
Giles on the Wednesday or Thursday and will spend the rest of my leave with the
aunts. We are all trying to make the most of this leave as it will probably be
the last we will get for a long time.’
What John did not
realise was that his aunts had ‘looked forward and
prepared for Christmas but his letter written on the 21st did not get here till
Christmas Day.’ Despite their disappointment, they put aside the little treats
they had prepared for him and waited while John enjoyed Mrs Parkes’s
hospitality.
Like Bill Millington, John was welcomed by his hosts and
happily fitted into their Christmas preparations and festivities. Mrs Parkes,
known to all as ‘Granny Mary’, was ‘a wonderful woman and awfully kind’. The
family were well off, running ‘a big Buick and three Standards and have a staff
of servants. It must cost 40 pounds a week to run that house’. He
enthusiastically embraced the comforts of his affluent Christmas billet and was
in danger of letting them go to his head. ‘We sit at dinner and drink champagne
and look absolutely it. There’s no doubt how these people do live well.’
Mrs Parkes had ‘a very wise daughter of 19 rejoicing in
name of Diana. Really quite a decent kid’ and, on Christmas Eve, John and Jack accompanied
her to the local hospital, where she was working as a Voluntary Air Detachment.
There, they helped decorate the tree for the servicemen inmates. John became
quite fond of Diana, who reciprocated his brotherly feelings towards her, later
inviting him to her wedding. In Mrs Parkes he saw almost a surrogate for his
mother and he later told Mick Crossman that ‘you’d love
her, Mother, she is a wonderful woman and I’ve never yet had anyone but
yourself be so good to me’.
John enjoyed his time
with the Parkes family and, on Christmas Day, he and Jack both had: ‘An awfully good time, although not so terribly wild, in fact, we had
a very quiet time. You’d have loved to see Burry and I sitting down to
Christmas dinner with a terrific array of knives and forks on each side of us
and being asked by the butler what we’d have from champagne downwards.’
Despite the
excitement of his first English Christmas and ‘the
wonderful kindness the Parkes’ are showing us I feel awfully homesick for
Australia and the folks and Pat’. Two days later, he was at Chalfont St Giles for
an all too brief belated Christmas with his aunts. Soon after he arrived, Aunt
Mabel took him for a long walk about the village. As well as the local sites
such as the meeting house of the first Quakers and grave of William Penn, she
took him to the parish church. Coming from such a young country, he was
impressed by its age, ‘over 600 years old and Cromwell’s daughter is reputed to
have been married there’. They walked through the churchyard, and Mabel showed
him the grave of her sister, Florence, who had died in November 1935. She
regularly tended the grave, clearing weeds away and cleaning the carved
headstone.
On their way home, John experienced his first ever snow
fall, and was astounded by the ‘wonderful sight. Everything so still and white
and clean’. Ann Brawn looked on
bemused at her nephew’s reaction to something so mundane for them. ‘He was like
a child about it. Could have eaten it, scooped it up and must have a few
snowballs.’ Knowing her brother would want a full report of how his son was
faring, Ann also turned a critical gaze towards John. She noticed that he was
‘the picture of health. If anything not quite so thin’. She judged that,
despite chattering about his family, he was not pining for his life back in
Australia. ‘Don’t get any idea into your minds that he is homesick. He is not.
Everything is so new. He is more like a child, wondering what is around the
next corner and everyone is wonderfully kind to him.’ John was obviously
becoming adept at hiding his occasional yearning for home.
Ann was also pleased to report that John ‘wanted to know
every detail of your young life, Ted, and said more than once that he never
guessed that he should miss you so, but he did. I think he begins to see your
point of view, perhaps hazily so far’. On the negative side, she noticed a
tendency to contrariness in her young nephew, similar to her sister Mabel’s—‘If
anyone ever tells me to do a thing I simply don’t’—and she felt that John would
benefit from more discipline. She also saw that he was developing spend thrift
ways but realised much of it had to do with ‘meeting a class of people whom
even the regular English would not’. She was astounded at ‘what he spent on
smokes. Approximately what I have kept the home on (not counting Mabe) for the last four months ...
I’ll tell you for your comfort he is not fooling away his money’. But he was.
Like his friends, he purchased decorative wings for his
mother, had visiting cards engraved, bought lavish Christmas presents for the
Parkes family, his aunts and Uncle Will, and spent freely when on leave. But
Ann saw nothing of a problem that would haunt her in less than twelve months
and, despite some mild criticism, she saw only the good in the nephew she had
already come to love. ‘He has a GOOD heart’, ‘never speaks an ill word’ and
‘has no vices’. Above all, ‘he will be all right. Neither of you need worry.
His head is screwed on just where he wants it.’
Despite his earlier intention to spend the rest of his
leave with the Brawns and Aunt Mabel, John returned to London on the 29th.
There he met up with Jack Burraston and Diana Parkes at Paddington and they
caught the train to Stratford-on-Avon together. Before he left Chalfont St
Giles, Ann Brawn wanted to assure herself and her brother that John was indeed
happy with his new flying life. She ‘asked him if he likes it. He said it was
the thing. The one thing he has always wanted and he is as keen as mustard’.
Flying was indeed the one thing John had always wanted
to do and he had finally achieved his life’s ambition. He returned to Ansty at
8.30 p.m. on New Year’s Eve and, as others wondered what 1940 would bring, he
reflected over the last few months in England and the joy he experienced
whenever he took to the air. His dreams had come true. He was flying, but there
was an element of make believe to it all, as if the bubble of his dream could
burst at any moment. ‘New Year’s Eve. I didn’t think I’d be spending this one
in England at an RAF Station.’
‘Oh my diary who
records my hopes and fears’
Ken Holland spent two months at 3 Initial Training Wing,
Hastings. A few days after he arrived on 2 October, he moved from his original
13-bed apartment in the Marine Court Hotel to the ‘comparative luxury’ of a six
bed room. Making the most of the view across the English Channel, he ‘bagged a
bed by a window, plus window sill in a quiet nook’. It was, to Ken, ‘très bon.’
Life was full—drilling, attending lectures, and playing ‘rugger’. The food
looked all right, especially kidneys for breakfast, but more often than not it
was foul, and on one occasion some seemingly good jelly gave him a severe
stomach upset. He occasionally took himself off for a meal in town, on at least
one occasion enjoying a ‘superb’ grilled sole. He made friends and, when it was
time to let off steam, he joined in on the ‘very objectionable scrum in our
part of the room’. One of those friends—though not a roommate—was Charles
Palliser, from West Hartlepool in Durham.
Charles
who at 5 ft 6 in was known as ‘Tich’, was almost exactly a year older than Ken.
They bumped into each other in the mess one day and started chatting. Tich
talked about his Yorkshire childhood and Ken told him all about Australia. He
also spoke of his experiences at Airspeed Aeronautical College. Although
neither had flown at that stage, Tich thought Ken a nice boy, who was
particularly knowledgeable about aircraft generally as well as the aircraft
industry.
Ken
enjoyed his time at Hastings but he occasionally suffered from his isolation.
Despite the circumstances of his home life in Australia, he dutifully wrote to
him parents. He had not heard from his mother for some time and perhaps thought
she welcomed the lengthy separation from the son she had not wanted. His
loneliness at times became so intense it crowded out the feelings of rejection he
harboured, and he was delighted when he finally received a long overdue letter
from Ina Holland which revealed that none of his had reached Sydney. Always
welcome were ones from his guardian, Major Hugh Ivor Emmott Ripley, known as Toby
and his girlfriend, Seina Haydon. He pounced on Toby’s and fretted if Seina
Haydon was tardy in writing: ‘No word from Seina—believe she has a cold—God
forbid she has met someone else as I believe she is the girl for me for always
now. Being alone amongst so many one thinks more about people. T. is dear to me
as always and his letters help a lot but if my darling leaves me... .’
Ken
drew his uniform on 24 October. So many of the other boys had ill-fitting
tunics and trousers but his fit well enough. Lectures, drill, sport. The
pattern experienced by Bill Millington a few weeks earlier varied little,
relieved only by a trip to ‘Melorne’ at the beginning of November. And then
back to ‘routine drill’, ‘routine lectures’ and rugger. ‘Life very dull’. So
little was happening, in fact, that Ken took to recording the war news in his
diary to fill up the pages and counted the days since he had received letters:
‘No letter from T.—Nothing from S. for 12 days’.
As
November drew to a close, even his new friendships began to pall. The young man
who loved to spend quiet afternoons riding his motorcycle and reading poetry
was ‘so fed up with the crowd’ in his apartment and the new trainees arriving
all the time that he moved into a single room so he could at least have the
evenings to himself.
On
1 December, Ken wired Toby to meet him in Tavistock, in Devon. He also hoped to
catch up with Seina. Once there, he and Toby intended to stay at a pub for a
couple of days but the next morning a telegram arrived recalling Ken to
Hastings. Plans shattered, they shared a ‘super but slightly mournful lunch’. Then
Ken rushed to ‘Garmoe House’ to ‘see my darling Seina and hold her in my arms
for a minute’ before dashing to nearby Launceston to catch the train back to
Hastings. He could not get a through train so changed at Salisbury, hopped off
at Portsmouth and gate-crashed a friend’s 21st birthday party. Somewhat making
up for his ruined weekend, he caught up with ‘the old gang who looked fit’ and
stayed the night.
He
was up early on the 3rd to catch the 7.10 train and arrived back at Hastings at
10.00 a.m. He reported to the orderly room and discovered he was posted to 11
Elementary Flying Training School, Scone.
Ken
and his fellow trainees arrived at Perth station at 7.00 a.m. on 4 December. It
had been a long, bitterly cold trip, but he had managed to doze on the train by
laying tables across the seats in his compartment. A coach was waiting and
ferried them to the aerodrome at Scone, a small village a short distance
away. First off breakfast, and the shock discovery that a four months course
had been cut to eight weeks. (As it happened, this would not be the case).
Then, he was off to stores to draw parachute, flying kit and books. Next, the
trainees assembled and to meet the instructors. They described the training
syllabus and told their new pupils there would be regular examinations and if
they did not achieve the designated pass mark they would fail. And then, day
just about over, Ken was taken to his billet, a comfortable one, he was pleased
to note, with ‘good food and a super bed’. He wrote a letter to Seina, ‘had a
quick bath and turned in at 22.20 and slept like a top.’
Work started the next day for
Scone’s No. 23 Course. Ken was introduced to Flight Lieutenant Holmes, his
flying instructor. Holmes was a calm, serious but pleasant man. He was ever
tolerant of his pupils, and paced them carefully. As far as Ken was concerned
at least, he was also long-suffering with the patience of Job.
Like
Bill Millington and John Crossman, Ken quickly acquainted himself with the
Tiger Moth. Holmes took him up for 25 minutes so his new pupil could develop a
sense of the effect of the controls and become familiar with the cockpit
layout. Over the next few days he practised taxiing and flying straight and
level, medium turns and navigating through the mist. He moved onto gliding,
climbing and stalling. He blitzed his first navigation test, scoring 14 out of
15. He marked the passing of the 100th day of war on 11 December and the next
day was ‘up and spinning’.
As
John Crossman discovered, RAF training had its ups and downs, and after his
earlier success in the air, Ken encountered some failures. He attempted his
first landing but ‘V. bad indeed. Got a ticking off.’ He received almost full
marks in the next navigation test on the 13th but ‘made a hell of a mess as
usual’ of his spinning and circuits lesson. He kept ‘making silly mistakes’ on
the 15th and, when he spent most of the 16th trying to perfect his circuits and
bumps, he managed to leave the patient Holmes ‘hairless’. There was no improvement
on the 17th—‘absolutely hopeless’—and Holmes threatened to ground him. Ken
didn’t record his feelings in his diary that night but it would not be
surprising if was worried. Tich Palliser had soloed the day before, the first
on their course to do, and after only 6 hours 35 minutes in the air. Others
were also champing at the bit, and perfectly capable of taking the controls on
their own. Tich recalled that the ‘atmosphere on the course was really
exciting’. For everyone but Ken, perhaps, with the threat of expulsion hanging
over him.
But
Holmes didn’t ground Ken. Just as Flight Lieutenant Williams had given John
Crossman a second chance, Holmes must have seen something in his bright young
pupil who diligently went back to his billet most evenings—you couldn’t expect
a young man to stay out of the pub every night—to study. On 18 December, Ken
took his solo test with Flying Officer Sayers. He practised spinning and
circuits and when they landed, Sayers sent Ken up on his own. It was ‘a great
day’ for the young Australian. His ‘FIRST SOLO’.
Unlike
Pat Hughes, Jack Kennedy and John Crossman who seemed to regress when they
first soloed, Ken gained confidence. A naturally keen and vibrant young man, he
positively thrived after his successful effort and bristled with new found
skill and enthusiasm. With Holmes back in the instructor’s seat on the 19th,
Ken followed up his successful first solo with sideslips, circuits and bumps
and medium turns. Holmes came out of it ‘in good nick’ that day and Ken was
allowed to solo for 45 minutes. On the next day’s solo session, he carried out
‘a lovely left hand [turn] from 4000 to 1000 [feet], not easily pulled out of.’
He passed some more tests and on 21 December he had a ‘grand’ dual session of
low flying and map reading and delighted in seeing deer and a duck on the River
Tay. To top it all off he received the happy news that he had eight days of
Christmas leave. Life was indeed looking up as some of the trainees were not
permitted home leave. After notching up another 25 minutes dual flying and map
reading on the morning of the 22nd, he caught the train, final destination,
‘Melorne’. ‘What a joy to be going home.’
Ken
had a blissful Christmas. He and Toby exchanged gifts and then had Christmas
dinner at the Elliott Arms. They went to ‘Garmoe House’ for a party that
evening, and Ken did the honours as Santa Claus. His darling Seina gave him
socks, perhaps not the most romantic gift, but they would come in handy in the
worsening Scottish winter, as would the furry slippers and scarf from Toby.
Ken
and Toby walked home together and Ken could not have been happier. He had had a
wonderful Christmas with Toby and Seina, but incredibly, Boxing Day was to
bring even more joy. After a morning spent chatting and sipping sherry with
Toby’s brother Guy who had come to visit, he went on an afternoon shoot. He
hadn’t lost his eye, developed taking pot-shots at rats with his air rifle
during his Bondi childhood, and was pleased to bag a snipe. It was all ‘good
fun’. He then took Seina, who ‘looked stunning’, out to dinner and a dance.
Afterwards, they returned to ‘Melorne’ to discover that Seina’s parents had
stopped in for a few drinks. While Toby entertained the Haydons, Seina quietly
told Ken that her mother had asked if she were fond of Ken. Seina confessed to
the young man that she had initially hedged before answering truthfully that
she was. She did not, however, admit the cause of her hesitation. Ken had
earlier visited her at Torquay and had proposed. She did not accept, as ‘I
wasn’t very sure about it’. But as the war progressed, and ‘as life was
becoming so uncertain, I felt that perhaps it was the right thing to do’. After
gentle probing from her mother regarding her feelings and apparent closeness to
Ken, Seina decided she should marry the young Australian because it would give
him ‘something to hold on to in a very uncertain world’. And so, for perhaps
the wrong reasons, she told Ken she accepted his proposal.
Ken
was overjoyed. ‘S. said yes!’. And even better, the Haydons ‘were pleased!!!!’
Despite his humble origins, it seemed Toby’s guardianship gave Ken a social
cachet over and above that of poor Alex Hutchison who had been deemed such an
unsuitable match. But of course, Ken know nothing of that sad affair and was
delighted to record that ‘tonight they (mère et père) came into ‘Melorne’ and
asked T. if he approved and T. said yes in an indefinite sort of way and
vaguely said 25! i.e. my minimum age on marriage.’
Ken
did not explain why he had to wait until he was 25, but regardless of the
reasons, the young couple would have to wait some years. And perhaps Seina knew
this when she accepted Ken’s proposal. She would not turn 21 until 20 May 1940
and her fiancé was still a few weeks shy of 20. Wait aside, Ken was happy. He
believed Seina loved him and her parents were delighted with the match. Most
importantly, the only child, who was not wanted by his own parents, was being
welcomed into a large family, with the approval—of sorts—of the man he looked
upon as his father.
Ken
was due back at Scone on the 29th so did not have much time to spend with
Seina. Despite his joy, he had a small niggle of fear that his dreams for the
future might not eventuate.
Oh my diary who records my hopes and fears. I wonder
will you see me a P[ilot] O[fficer] RAF—married happily to S. and living at
‘Melorne’ with T. smiling benignly at us and still retaining his love—pray God
this last and most important will ever last.
