On every wartime bomber
station there is an intermission prior to the commencement of
operations. A period of time after the bustle of preparation has
died. The air testing, the refuelling, the bombing up, the
briefing are all behind. Now the waiting. It is a time of calm,
of anticipation,of apprehension, even of foreboding. It is
difficult to describe. Almost indefinable. Yet anyone who has
served on a wartime bomber squadron will be aware of it.It
affects everyone from the Station Commander down to the humblest
air craftsman second class. It is a feeling which having been
experienced will never be forgotten.
On Sunday 26th July 1942
around 2200 hours the calm of that intermission was about to be
breached as the operational crews of 115 Squadron spilled onto
the concrete perimeter path in front of the Flights. The engines
of their motor transports spluttered into life. 115 Squadron was
putting up fourteen crews as part of a 403-strong bomber force
destined for Hamburg. Eight of the crews were from A Flight, six
from B Flight. By the morning of 27th July Hamburg would have
suffered its most severe air raid to date. The Hamburg Fire
Department would be overwhelmed and forced to seek outside
assistance for the first time. 337 people would lose their lives
and 1,027 would be injured. 14,000 people would be made
homeless. Damage would amount to the equivalent of £25,000,000.
The attacking force would not
remain unscathed. Twenty-nine bombers would fail to return to
their bases. In particular A Flight 115 Squadron would take a
severe mauling. Half its operational strength would be lost.
Wing Commander Frank
Dixon-Wright DFC had led the briefing. This 31-year-old officer,
popular with his crews, was flying that night in Wellington
BJ615 KO-G. Some members of his crew had already completed a
tour of operations as had Dixon-Wright. They were second tour
men and respected by the other crews. Normally this crew would
fly with S/Ldr Cousens, Officer Commanding A Flight. Cousens was
on stand down.
Not every crew flying to
Hamburg was as well experienced. Sgt Jim Howells, a New
Zealander, had completed five operations as a second pilot with
other crews. Tonight he had been given a new A Flight crew. He
was to fly his first operation as an aircraft captain in
Wellington X3412KO-L. It was an auspicious occasion for the New
Zealander. There had been recent criticism of the Squadron for
failing to obtain suitable photographsof the target. He decided
he would show them. His crew would bring back a superb
photograph.
Sgt Jim Burtt-Smith and crew
had been with the Squadron for just over a month. They had been
allocated to A Flight. Having overcometheir operational teething
problems, including writing off a Wellington when returning from
a raid, they were now settled in to completing a tour of
30operations. Flying in Wellington BJ723 KO-B Hamburg would be
their ninth operational flight.
Another A Flight crew flying
that night was captained by Sgt Baden Fereday. Sgt Fereday was
an experienced pilot with 15 operational flights recorded in his
log book. Sgt Kelvin Shoesmith, an Australian, manned his rear
turret. His wireless operator, Sgt Glafkos Clerides, was a
GreekCypriot who had been educated at an English Public School.
The youngest member of Baden Fereday's crew was Sgt Frank
Skelley aged 19. Sgt Skelley had joined the Merchant Navy as a
boy. After war broke out he had transferred to the RAF to train
as aircrew. He acted as bomb aimer and also manned the front
turret. Sgt Harry Lindley was the aircraft's observer. This crew
had been allocated Wellington BJ670 KO-K.
At 0235 hours Hauptmann Helmut
Lent of the II./NJG1 was patrolling the skies around the Hamburg
area in a Bf110 night fighter.Helmut Lent was known as the
innovator of the night fighter arm. He was noted for
experimenting with new methods of attack. Later he would
practise andperfect a diving attack which would give him
sufficient speed to overtake a Mosquito and shoot it down. For
being the first German pilot to overcomethis versatile aircraft
he would receive special praise from Goering. Eventually he
would rise to the rank of Oberst with a position of high command
in thenight fighter arm. He would achieve 102 night victories
and 8 day victories before being killed in a flying accident on
5th October 1944.
A dark shape loomed into his
line of vision. Quickly closing the gap between himself and the
other aircraft he perceived the unmistakable bulky outline of a
Wellington bomber. Not wishing to overshoot and lose the enemy
aircraft in the darkness he eased back on his throttles. Had
Lent been able to read the serial number and code of the bomber
he was stalking he would have seen it was BJ615 KO-G. Wing
Commander Dixon-Wright and his crew were doomed. Their aircraft
crashed into the sea near the target at 0239. The only body
recovered from the water was that of wireless operator/airgunner
P/O J.Whittaker DFM.
Sgt Jim Howells, the New
Zealander, had managed to coax his Wellington up to 14000 feet
by the time he reached the target. Hewas carrying a mixed load
of high explosive and incendiary bombs. Despite the opposition
from the defences he was still determined to obtain a good
photograph of his bomb bursts. Reaching the aiming point his
bomb aimer released the bombs. This action automatically opened
the shutter on the fixed camera and released the flash bomb. All
the pilot had to do was fly a straight and level course until
the flash functioned. The photograph would then be taken.More
experienced, perhaps more prudent pilots would have had greater
concern for the immediate safety of their aircraft than bringing
back a photograph for the planners at base to study. The flak at
Hamburg was accurate and intense. In such situations following
the release of the bombs it was usual to stick the nose down in
a shallow dive, build up speed, and corkscrew like Hell away
from the target. Sgt Howells, the novice captain, was resolute.
Following a straight and level course he flew blissfully on. It
was a golden opportunity for the flak batteries and one they
could not ignore.
Almost immediately the
Wellington was ranged. Flak hit the port engine. It may have
damaged the propeller as well as the engine.Intense vibration
began to rack the airframe. Jim Howells quickly feathered the
propeller and switched off the engine. To his dismay the
aircraft began to lose height. He managed to weave away from the
target with no further damage to the bomber. Rapidly losing
height he crossed the German coast line in an attempt to fly
back over the comparative safety of the North Sea. It was all to
no avail. The Wellington would not stay in the air. Below he
could see clearly the tops of the breaking waves. He issued
orders for ditching. The observer collected all the survival
apparatus including the Verey pistol and cartridges and placed
them in a bag. As the bomber hit the sea a wall of water
cascaded through the fuselage. It tore the bag from the
observer's hand. When they clambered into the dinghy they found
the marine signals stowed aboard had perished. They were adrift
in the North Sea with no Verey pistol or any means of attracting
the attention of a passing ship or aircraft. They were to drift
like this for three days.
On the first day a Beaufighter
came close to them but did not see them. That night they drifted
within earshot of a fierce naval battle presumably between
German E boats and a convoy. On the second day two Spitfires
flew over without seeing them. On the third day a German
seaplane from Norderney rescued them and took them off to
captivity.
BJ723 KO-B carrying Sgt
Burtt-Smith and crew arrived in the target area about the same
time as Sgt Howells. It was advantageous for them that the
defences were preoccupied with another aircraft. They quickly
made their way to the aiming point, released their bombs, and
set course for the German coastline. Passing between Bremerhaven
and Wilhelmshaven they were surprised by a flak shell which made
a direct hit on their port engine.Smoke billowed out and fearing
that it would develop into a fire Jim Burtt-Smith feathered the
propeller and shut down the engine. The turning torque to portof
the starboard engine was enormous. He called the bomb aimer Sgt
Lionel Harcus out of the front turret. Sgt Harcus pulled the
rudder bar back and hung on to it. This offset the swing.
Increasing the revs on the starboard engine failed to improve
the situation. The Wellington was steadily losing altitude. The
heavy flak batteries were still pounding away at them and they
were dropping to within range of the light flak. Crossing the
German coastline their prospect of reaching base was zero. They
prepared for ditching.
Sgt Jack French, the wireless
operator, released the trailing aerial, sent out an SOS, and
jammed his key down. The resulting continuous note would be
picked up by the listening stations in Britain. When the aerial
touched the water the signal would stop. The listeners would
have the DF loop fix of the position of the bomber when the
signal vanished. Further it would give the pilot an indication
that he was down to approximately sixty feet. The bomb aimer and
the wireless operator retreated to their ditching stations. Jim
Burtt-Smith shut off the starboard engine and began to
glide,repeatedly dropping the nose and then pulling up gently.
He was worried. It was too dark for him to see if he was landing
into the waves. A cloud moved and the moon broke through. It was
behind him. He managed to turn the Wellington and approached the
sea tail down. The moon lit the sea like a flare path.
Everything went according to plan and they were soon safely in
the dinghy while BJ723 KO-B bubbled its way to the bottom of the
North Sea.It was 0300 hours. A seaplane from Norderney picked
them up at 0930 hours.
The aircraft in which Sgt
Fereday and crew were flying, BJ670 KO-K, was carrying one
4,000lb bomb. This huge bomb was not designedto be delivered by
a Wellington aircraft. Modifications to the bomb bays were
necessary. Most of the flotation bags had to be removed. These
werethe bags which gave the aircraft buoyancy in the event of a
ditching. As the perimeter of the bomb canister protruded below
the bomb doors these alsohad to be removed. When the bomb was
dropped the open space of the bomb bays would cause considerable
drag.
Reaching Hamburg without
incident, Sgt Skelley jokingly remarked that he wouldn't be able
to find the aiming point as the only part of Hamburg he knew
from his Merchant Navy days was the red light district. The
joking was soon to stop. The 4,000lb bomb was released from a
height of 12,000 feet and they made their way from the target
towards the German coastline.
Approaching the coastline they
were suddenly coned in searchlights and caught in a barrage of
very accurate flak. A huge burst by the nose of the aircraft
blew out the hydraulics rendering the gun turrets useless and
causing the undercarriage to drop down. Sgt Fereday's cockpit
navigational instruments were all damaged. He no longer had the
use of a compass. Sgt Clerides standing in the Astro Dome
watching for fighters shouted over the intercom that he had been
wounded in the leg. He fainted and in falling to the floor his
intercom plug was wrenched from its socket. From the rear turret
Sgt Shoesmith reported that he also had been hit. Baden Fereday
fighting to keep the aircraft stable momentarily lost control.
The bomber went into a dive. Sgt Clerides recovering his senses
and finding the aircraft plunging to earth immediately called up
on the intercom. Not realising hewas no longer connected to the
system and receiving no reply he assumed the others had baled
out. Scrambling back to the emergency hatch in the rearof the
fuselage he baled out. In the meantime Sgt Fereday had regained
control and flattened out at 8,000 feet. Without navigational
instruments he was flying by the seat of his pants. The
undercarriage and the open bomb bay were causing excessive drag.
Sgt Clerides landed safely in
the outskirts of a town. He was soon surrounded by a crowd of
civilians. Mistaking his Greek features for those of a Jew the
cry of Jude went up from someone in the mob. In a trice they
were rifling his pockets, punching and kicking him. Luckily a
detachment of the Luftwaffe arrived and rescued him. He was
whisked off to hospital in Bremen where an immediate operation
was carried out on his leg.
Back in the bomber Sgt Fereday
had no idea what course he was flying. He began to climb and
managed to regain his original height of 12,000 feet. Straining
to see the coastline ahead he was horrified to find he was
approaching Hamburg. Turning on to a reciprocal course he asked
Sgt Shoesmith to let him know if he thought the bomber was
turning to port or starboard. By this rough and ready method of
navigation they flew over the coastline and out to sea.
Unfortunately their track took them close to Heligoland where
once again they were engaged by the enemy defences. Swinging
westwards, losing height because of the drag, they began their
journey home over the North Sea. They were down to 1500 feet
when both engines cut out.Hastily switching to the reserve fuel
tanks they barely got the engines running again. Both port and
starboard engines were spluttering and cutting out continuously.
Ditching was inevitable. Unknown to them they were close to
Norderney the Luftwaffe air sea rescue base. Holding off at 500
feet Baden Fereday realised he hadn't released the pilot's
escape hatch. He struggled with this and as it opened he felt
the tail touch the sea. The tail bounced three times then the
nose dropped. The undercarriage caught in the waves pitching
them violently nose downwards. Baden's head went through the
windscreen.
Kelvin Shoesmith scrambled out
of the rear turret and fell into the sea. He became entangled in
the trailing aerial and wasbeing dragged down by the rapidly
sinking bomber. Frank Skelley and Harry Lindley swam to him and
released him. They all worked hard on the dinghyto inflate it
but it was riddled with shrapnel holes. Their task was
impossible.
In every Wellington bomber
there is a loose wooden box-like structure situated on the floor
below the Astro Dome. It is forthe crew member stationed in the
Astro Dome to stand on. This had floated out of the open hatch
just before the aircraft sank. They swam towards it.Each grabbed
a corner with one hand and clung to it. The other hand held on
to the adjacent crew member. So they drifted with the waves
breaking overthem continually. It was 0340 hours. The Wing
Commander and his crew were dead. The crews of Sgts Howells and
Burtt-Smith were drifting in the relativesafety of their
dinghies. This was a luxury and a lifesaver denied the crew of
BJ670 KO-K.
Kelvin Shoesmith was the first
one to die. The shrapnel which had pierced his side had also
penetrated his Mae West. Harry Lindleyrepeatedly blew it up to
keep his head above water. No one knew the extent of his wound
but the unequal struggle proved too much for the
21-year-oldAustralian. He began to show signs of distress. His
grip on the box loosened as he lapsed into unconsciousness. The
others tried to hold on to him buthe slipped from their grasp
and drifted away. Three airmen now clung to the box and each
other, bobbing up and down in the cold sea as the waves
cascadedover them.
Time seemed endless; they had
been in the water several hours. With the passing of time their
resistance to the cold had lowered.They were all feeling the
onset of exposure. Young Frank Skelley began praying. He prayed
out loud and long to his God to be allowed to live. His
anguished voice was lost in the vastness of the sea. The other
two tried to comfort him but as Baden Fereday was to say later,
"There wasn't much we could do
for him because we were all in the same boat."
Frank's prayers went
unanswered. The young airman began to exhibit the same distress
symptoms they had seen in Kelvin Shoesmith. His grip on the box
loosened. The other two were too weak to hold him. He floated
away as the North Sea claimed its second victim.
They had been in the water for
nearly six hours when a Luftwaffe air-sea rescue seaplane from
Norderney landed on the sea near them. It was just ten minutes
after Frank Skelley had died. Harry Lindley had almost lapsed
into unconsciousness. He remembers nothing of the rescue.The
seaplane crew boat hooked them aboard and deposited them on the
floor in a shivering heap. The two bodies floating nearby were
recovered, examined,then cast back into the sea.
On Friday 21st August 1942 the
body of an airman was recovered from Ho Bay in Denmark. It was
that of Sgt Kelvin Shoesmith. Sgt Frank Skelley was washed
ashore on the Dutch coast.
After the war Glafkos Clerides
qualified as a barrister. He became prominent in politics in
Cyprus. In 1988 he was up for election.The opposition began a
smear campaign accusing him of collaboration with the Germans
during his period of captivity. One of his supporters was a
Greek Cypriot millionaire businessman who owned a string of
hotels and several Greek newspapers. The businessman contacted
Baden Fereday and Harry Lindley and asked if they would visit
Cyprus and publicly refute the allegations. Harry and Baden
accepted the invitation. They were flown over to the island and
a chauffeur-driven limousine was placed at their disposal.
Accommodation was provided in the form of a magnificent suite in
a luxurious hotel. All their expenses were paid. They took with
them a short account of their final operation and this was
translated into Greek and put in the newspapers. They made
public statements to the effect that Clerides was a true
patriot.
Despite their support for
their former wireless operator he lost the election. However,
for fourteen days Baden and Harry enjoyed the free holiday of a
lifetime. Currently (1996) Glafkos Clerides is President of the
Greek Cypriots.
Written by Don Bruce - Observer 115 Squadron -POW Stalag VIIIB
© Jean Darley 2013. Please
respect the copyright.
This is an article that my father has written and is included
in hiscompilation of 115 Squadron's Roll of Honour.
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