[Woman of WWII 02] - Poppy Redfern and the Fatal Flyers

by Tessa Arlen

  “The wing commander let him continue to make a fool of himself: demanding my arrest for playing some sort of trick, or ‘stunt,’ as he called it. And then he extended his hand to me. ‘Been waiting to meet one of you ladies,’ he said. ‘I saw you land that Hurricane, splendid bit of flying. Congratulations and thank you for the work you do.’”

  Grable smiled. “I’ve never seen that silly little clot again, but I always look out for him when I ferry a plane to Biggin Hill—just in case he’s feeling plucky.”

  However much I respected Grable for carrying off a straightforward example of misogynistic behavior, I suspected that it wasn’t a story that Crown Films would feature, but her story had broken the tension. Zofia came out of her introspection. She clapped her hands together as she looked at me to emphasize her disdain for a world of men who unerringly jumped to the wrong assumption. Annie put her arm across Grable’s shoulders. “I can just see you standing there, waiting for that idiot to catch on,” she said.

  Vera Abercrombie came into the mess carrying a cup of coffee. Her face wore its perennially alert, businesslike expression, but she had probably been up for hours toiling over her delivery schedule.

  “Good morning, Poppy—your boss, Mr. Fanshaw, called and told me that you would be staying on for another day or two.” She waved a hand to where we were sitting. “You are most welcome to work here if you would be more comfortable than at the inn.” I thanked her and she turned to talk to her pilots. “Today’s schedule is on: the Met Office says this fine weather will continue to hold, but please check again just before you leave, especially if you are going north. Here are the chits for today’s deliveries.” She passed out white cards to each of them. Zofia was given two or three, as were the other girls.

  “Two Spits,” said June as she read hers. “One to Andover and one to Yorkshire, nearly a perfect day.” She almost smiled.

  There were mild exclamations of pleasure as the rest of them received chits for what promised to be a day of flying fighter planes.

  Wouldn’t you think they would be reluctant to fly after yesterday? Ilona’s voice brought the image of Edwina’s plane crashing through the thick canopy of the elm tree. I looked around at the group at the table; it was hard to fathom their mood this morning. When I had first sat down they looked as if they had been put through a mental wringer, but after a hefty breakfast here they all were comparing routes and ready to start their day. Winston Churchill would have been proud of them; no wonder they were the ATA’s poster girls.

  Letty waved her chit across the table at June. “A Walrus, all the way to blasted Lossiemouth. What is that, a four-hour flight? I can never remember. It’s ages since I’ve been that far north.”

  “More like five in that tub,” said June. “Too bad.”

  “You up to it?” Grable looked closely into Letty’s tired face. “Don’t fly if you’re not. Tell you what, I’ll swap with you. I’ve got two short trips in the Anson after I drop you all off.”

  “No, no, I’m fine, but thanks all the same.” Letty, who had taken on my aerial education, turned to me. “A Walrus is a heavy, cumbersome seaplane. It tends to wallow in the air and is even worse on takeoff. But I’m used to them; I have flown so many of them that it’s almost second nature now, but there are planes I prefer more, especially flying to Scotland.”

  “You’ll be just fine, Letty, just don’t work too hard at it. You can always put down at Market Harborough if you run out of steam.” I thought June’s rather phlegmatic response a little callous considering that her two deliveries would be in planes that were easy to fly.

  We sat around for another hour; trips were made to the map room and the Met Office on either side of Vera’s command post. Letty came back with her map and looked out at a blue sky. “Autumn weather is capricious in Britain. Sun one moment, a downpour the next, and morning and evening fog are commonplace.”

  “What happens if the weather gets really bad?” I asked her.

  She smiled. “Most of the time you can struggle through it, but if it gets rough you put down at the nearest airfield, and if it gets really wild, you just have to look around for a nice, big, flat field.”

  Vera Abercrombie came back into the mess. “Two Ansons are on their way in ten minutes. Please be ready by then.” She gave me a brisk nod, as if I were holding up their departure. “I hope your crew are here in a minute or two, Poppy. We can’t hold up the schedule for a piece of film; otherwise I’ll never catch up.” Her kindly demeanor of yesterday had evaporated to business as usual, and I wondered what her superiors had to say about Edwina’s crash.

  Annie was in the middle of reminiscing about their early ATA days. “This April, when they were delivering Spits to Malta, we had to sit in this mess for two days straight, all suited up and ready to go in an instant. Typical spring weather: low cloud and heavy rain. An hour went by like a day. And then it cleared, and it was go, go, go! Twenty of us delivered seventy Spits in the next fourteen hours to the aircraft carrier Wasp in Scotland.”

  “Annie must have knitted half a dozen scarves as we waited,” said Grable. “We all still wear them, or what’s left of them. They unravel at a fearsome rate.” There was a lot of giggling as they struggled into their flying suits and organized themselves for departure. I felt immense respect for their pluck and resilience, their determination to make the best of things. We were interrupted by Keith and Huntley, who had arrived in the van and set up their gear by the first air taxi that had landed on the airstrip.

  “Any chance of a cup of coffee?” Huntley asked.

  “I’m afraid not now.” Vera was looking at her watch. “The mess kitchen will make you some before you leave.”

  “Are we all going to the Supermarine factory?” Grable asked as we filed out of the mess past the table where they collected a thermos of coffee or tea.

  “No, Zofia and June are going to Armstrong. Now, listen, girls. Please remember to sign in for each plane you deliver and get your chits stamped, both when you pick up and again when you deliver. I want to balance my books this evening,” she called after them as we walked on to the mess door.

  Even after the enjoyment of recounting some of their adventures, they still looked tired and Zofia’s earlier introspection had returned, but their working day demanded their concentration. I watched them check for compass and map, and stow their chits inside their Sidcot suits. Letty was still fumbling the zip of her flying suit. “Goodness, I’m all thumbs, and these Sidcots are made for men.” She pulled her mouth down as she peered over her bosom to see the zip. “There it is, blasted nuisance.” She zippered up and looked around her. “Where on earth did I put my helmet?” She laughed as Grable handed it to her. “It will be ice-cold up north.”

  “Come on, girls, get a move on, don’t hold us up,” Vera called to the stragglers. “Letty, here’s your parachute; you left it by the door.” She picked up Letty’s forgotten chute. I suspected she would have been less lenient, but it was clear she was struggling for patience because of Edwina.

  We walked out onto the airfield. There was a sharp wind blowing in from the sea. “A southwester,” June shouted to Vera as she boarded. “We’ll make up for lost time with a tailwind.”

  “I don’t want to chivvy you, Letty, but would you just get in the plane?” The papers clipped to Vera’s board were fluttering in the breeze, and Letty was trying to tuck her hair up into her helmet.

  “I forgot my compass.” She paused and then started to climb up the ladder into the aircraft. “Don’t need one anyway. I could fly to Lossie in my sleep.”

  Keith had been filming as the Attagirls queued up by the aircraft; walking backward, he continued to film as they filed up into the two planes.

  “Still be here when we get back?” Letty turned on the last-but-one rung of the ladder and looked down at me.

  “Yes, I’ve loads of work to do. I’ll still be here,” I sho
uted back.

  “Good, then, I’ll buy you a drink.” She gave Keith a dazzling smile over her shoulder and put one hand on her hip in a glamour-girl pose as he cranked away.

  “Perfect, now pretend to blow us a kiss!” shouted out Huntley, and as she pouted her lips he said, “What an exit!”

  Bent double, we turned and ran as the ground crew pulled away the chocks and the pilots ignited their engines. The first plane started forward to the head of the airstrip. “And the women pilots of the ATA leave on yet another day of ferrying planes from manufacturer to airfields all over Britain. What planes will they deliver today? Hurricanes and Spitfires? Tiger Moths and Fairey Swordfish? Or perhaps the great Avro Lancashire bomber with its four mighty engines! Whichever aircraft they are allotted to deliver, you can be sure of one thing: these young women will know how to fly them!” Huntley intoned in a creditable imitation of the commentator Bob Danvers-Walker. As the planes lifted into the sky, Keith trumpeted “Land of Hope and Glory” between closed lips.

  “That last bit of film will make a good ending,” he said. “But I’m worried about the Spit demonstration from yesterday; if we cut out the accident and we only have a few seconds of her taking off and flying overhead, that won’t go down well with the great British public.”

  Huntley reached out and patted him on the shoulder. “We’ll let Fanny make that decision,” he said. He stopped, turned, and waited for me to catch up. “I don’t think I’ll ever forget making this one. I keep seeing that Spitfire barreling toward us. You know something?” He glanced over his shoulder at the shorn-off elm tree and lowered his voice. “I thought for one awful moment that she had gone off her rocker and was going to take us all out!” I could tell from his expression that he wasn’t joking.

  “Off her rocker?” I asked before he got distracted with packing up.

  “Well . . .” He looked guilty. “Don’t you think, deep down, that perhaps Edwina wasn’t playing with a full bag of marbles?”

  I half nodded and he shrugged and turned to Keith. “All right, Keith, let’s pack up the van and get back to HQ.”

  We straggled up the drive, carrying the last can of film, tripods, cameras, and sound equipment, and put them in the back of the van next to the film shot the day before. There was a strong smell of the chemicals used to develop film and I was glad I wasn’t driving back to London with them. Huntley polished his spectacles on his tie and settled them back on his nice straight nose. “You can drive, Keith,” he said, tossing him the keys.

  “Thanks, mate!” Keith got in behind the wheel.

  “How are you doing, Poppy? Do you have some pages for me?” Huntley said as he walked around to the passenger door.

  I must have had about three hours’ sleep, but I was pleased with what I had written. “I’m fine,” I said. “Here’s my outline.” I handed him an envelope of typed pages. “It’s almost complete. I’ll talk to Zofia and Grable this evening for more detail on their background. So, what happens next?”

  “Keith, the editor, and I will work on a rough cut this afternoon; then on Monday morning when you arrive, you can tailor your narrative to it and add any bits you need to. We get a thumbs-up from Fanny, iron out any wrinkles and that’s it. The commentator, Bob, will add the narration. Now we’ve got to run. Thanks for all you’ve done, Poppy—you’ve been a brick.” Just before he ducked his head to get into the van, he turned back to me, pushed his hair out of his eyes, and said, “I’d say this was a pretty significant start to your career with Crown Films.” His eyes met mine, and I blushed.

  * * *

  * * *

  THE TELEPHONE RANG again in Vera’s office and I lifted my head briefly from my work. Sir Basil had joined her twenty minutes after I started typing up notes at the trestle table where we had eaten breakfast. Their quiet voices barely reached me through the open door as they talked together. Every so often the phone would ring and one of them would answer with a monosyllabic series of yeses or nos.

  I lifted my head when I heard Vera’s voice raised in dismay and was halfway out of my chair before I reminded myself that I was just a guest at Didcote.

  “Dear God!” Sir Basil’s deeper voice reached me at the table. “Where? Where did she land?”

  “Land?” Vera’s voice was tight with suppressed emotion. “Basil, she didn’t land; she crashed.”

  Now I was on my feet, startling a slumbering Bess, who was stretched out on a sofa next to the heater. We both ran forward and stopped at Vera’s office door. I knocked and pushed it further open. The two of them were facing each other across her desk. Vera was still gripping the receiver of the telephone in a white-knuckled hand, her mouth opening and closing like a landed fish’s. They turned as I walked into the room.

  “Everything all right?” I asked, knowing that I would hear awful news.

  I watched Vera struggle for composure: she inhaled and held her breath, looking at Sir Basil as if he had asked her a question. She shook her head. “Letty has just pranged her plane outside of a village called . . .” Her breath came out in a long, shaky exhalation. She went to a large ordnance survey map of the south coast on the wall. “Here,” she said, more to herself than to us, as she traced a line from the coast inland. “At Elton. That was the Elton Home Guard on the phone.”

  “Anyone see what happened?” Sir Basil asked.

  “Yes, a local farmer saw her trying to land. He thought she was having difficulty, and then he saw her crash. He got through to the Home Guard.”

  “How long ago did she come down?”

  “About half an hour ago.”

  “Can you speak to her? Ask the Home Guard to get her on the phone. She is all right, isn’t she? I take it she bailed.”

  Again, Vera shook her head, her brows down, her mouth a tight, straight line. I thought I saw, for one brief human moment, pain: grief for a fellow pilot whom she had worked with from the start of the war. She closed her eyes as she struggled for self-possession and said in a steady voice, “No, Basil, she’s not all right.” She leaned forward, her hands flat on the surface of her desk, as if to prevent her from falling over. She looked up at him. “Letty was killed outright when the Walrus crashed into a stone railway bridge.”

  EIGHT

  I FELT THE OLD SICK, SINKING FEELING IN MY STOMACH AS I WALKED out of Vera’s office and sat down at the trestle table in front of my typewriter. A light rain was pattering against the window, the sky was low and heavy with dark cloud, and the cheerless empty room around me echoed the sound of rainfall. My hands were trembling so violently I had to hold on to them to keep them steady. Bess jumped up onto my lap. I wrapped my arms around her and bent my head to inhale the sweet dry-hay smell of her coat until the nausea passed.

  The phone rang again, and I was on my feet, Bess clutched in my arms. The empty feeling crept back as I walked toward the office. I didn’t care if it wasn’t my business, if it was unmannerly to intrude. Letty, generous and good-hearted Letty, alive and eating her breakfast nearly three hours ago, was dead, and I could hear the words “pilot error” before they were uttered.

  “Yes, just a minute, please. I’ll hand you over to Commander Abercrombie.” Sir Basil gave the phone to Vera as I came into her office and stood with his hands in his trouser pockets, head bent as he listened.

  “Thank you for returning my call.” Vera put her hand over the mouthpiece. “It’s the farmer who saw her crash.” And back into the telephone: “Mr. Mackenzie, yes, this is Commander Abercrombie.” She listened in silence for a couple of minutes. “Did you actually go over to the plane, Mr. Mackenzie? Yes, of course, I understand. How high do you think she was flying? Oh really! And how did the plane look to you? No, when it was still in flight. Ah yes, I see.” She listened for a minute longer. “Thank you so much for everything you have done, Mr. Mackenzie. Please call me if there is anything else you might remember. And by the way, someone from the ATA
Accidents Committee will be in touch with you in a day or two. Just tell them what you told me. Good-bye and thank you for your help.”

  She put down the phone and folded her arms. The stress of Edwina’s crash and now this news had layered years on Vera Abercrombie’s already prematurely aged face: her skin looked dry and lined; her tired eyes moved restlessly around her office as if desperately seeking resolution to this appalling dilemma. Letty Wills, well liked by her peers and one of the most proficient and reliable of her pilots, was dead.

  “Well?” Sir Basil smoothed his right hand over the top of his head. “What did the man have to say?”

  Vera wandered over to the map and traced again with her finger. “Letty was flying north from Supermarine at Eastleigh. She must have been following the railway line that leads north-northeast up to Edinburgh.” Her finger came to a halt, presumably where Elton was marked on the map. “Mr. Mackenzie, who witnessed the accident, was driving across his farmlands and heard the plane. He said it was flying low and in an erratic manner: one moment it banked to the left, then leveled out and immediately listed to the right. He calculated it was probably at about four or five hundred feet when he first saw it, but in sharp descent.”

  Sir Basil threw his hands up in the air. “What was she thinking?”

  Vera shrugged. “I really can’t imagine.” Her face seemed to have crumpled in on itself. She stood in front of the map gazing at it; perhaps if she looked long enough it might give her some sort of an answer.

  “Mackenzie followed the plane across a field. He said it looked as if as she was trying to land.”

  “On a railway line?”

  Vera nodded, her eyes miserable and uncertain. “He said that’s what it looked like. Just before it crashed, he said . . . he said that it looked as if the pilot was trying level the plane, and . . . he saw it dive straight into the stone railway bridge outside of the little town of Elton. He thinks Letty was killed immediately.” The stress of keeping a cool head and a calm mind was taking its toll. Vera’s mouth trembled, and she half raised her hand to her head. But Sir Basil wanted information and he wanted it now. “What did he mean by flying erratically? Did you ask him?”