by Lee Jackson
He stood, rubbing his temples while he searched for words. “You’re in the unfortunate position of not only decrypting messages from blocks of meaningless letters into German words but also understanding their content. That’s giving you a very narrow view of events, like looking through a straw. Given incidents such as the threat to the Boulier network; the nature of the camp where your brother is a prisoner; or, in this instance, the devastation to Coventry on schedule for tonight, each one of them seems like it should take priority.”
He closed his eyes, massaged the back of his neck, and let out a long breath. “You are not the only person to feel the pain that comes with advance knowledge of horrors arising out of compromises we make.”
Chagrinned, Claire apologized again. “I didn’t mean to presume—”
The commander nodded. “You need to think about what you’ll be exposed to if you take the promotion. Coventry will represent neither the first nor the last time that agonizing decisions will be made in which we could have saved lives by giving warning—and for the record, Coventry will receive the standard forewarnings issued to every community under threat, but nothing more.”
Claire listened with rapt attention. Watching Denniston’s face as he talked, she saw the pain behind his eyes stemming from what he must know.
“We make such decisions every day, and each time, what we do at Bletchley must be protected. If Hitler ever learns that we read his communiqués almost as soon as he does, he’ll change his codes, we’ll lose this war and our country, and I suspect a lot more people will die prematurely in horrific circumstances.”
He circled back to his seat and grasped the back of it. “If you join our analysis group, you will get a much broader picture. You’ll see a multitude of situations, each of which, taken in isolation, should be earth-shattering; but such is the scale of this war that it is another calamity within a universe of terrible, inhuman catastrophes.
“I don’t say that to be callous or uncaring. On the contrary, I believe we would betray our people by not making those judgments.” For a fleeting moment, he looked exhausted, haunted. “Such is the wickedness of the demon in Berlin.”
He pulled his chair out and took his seat. “Claire, you’ll need to assess whether or not you can deal with those realities. The evaluations of German communications in the analysis section inform our national leaders all the way to Winston Churchill about the facts, assumptions, and courses of action that shape those decisions. That’s what you’d be getting into.”
All that night, Claire heard the rumble of bombers passing overhead, reminding her of the terrifying first night of the blitz when she and Amélie Boulier had found refuge with hundreds of other people in the basement of a department store in London near the docks of Dog Island. For ten hours, they had sheltered while the seemingly endless bombing raid continued, with nowhere to run as each explosion seemed to come closer, bringing a terrifying sense of helplessness. And then they had narrowly escaped being burned alive.
Claire shuddered. That, or something worse, was the ordeal that Coventry faced.
Timmy cried out in fear from his bedroom. Claire rushed to him, brought him to her bed, and curled her body around his protectively.
A few days earlier, she had seen Luftwaffe message traffic regarding a new radio navigation system referred to as the X-Gerät. It was the latest in a series of German ranging technologies that markedly increased bomber accuracy. As a result, being nearly forty miles from Coventry, Claire suffered little fear of bombs dropping on her home. Nevertheless, she anguished through much of the night over what Commander Denniston had revealed and what the people in Coventry must be suffering. Because their city resided in a low area typically blanketed by mist at night, they had believed that German bombers were unable to identify it. The X-Gerät had demolished that myth.
Claire had often visited the beautifully quaint city. Founded in medieval times, it had transformed into an engineering and manufacturing center that had increased in importance to the war effort. As a result, the Luftwaffe had taken particular interest, and it became an obvious target. Hour after hour, the bombers flew over, and Claire heard, burying her sorrow in her pillow.
The news reports the next morning offered no relief. Claire read them in anguish, seized with guilt. The raid had lasted for more than ten hours with over five hundred enemy aircraft. So vicious was the attack that heat from incendiary bombs melted the lead roof on Coventry’s fourteenth-century cathedral. The liquified metal ran through the streets like a stream of molten lava, spreading noxious gases.
The foray had laid waste to the city, systematically destroying it with over two hundred and fifty fires and killing five hundred and sixty-eight people, that figure still rising from another eight hundred and sixty-three badly injured. Yet another three hundred and ninety-three unfortunates sustained lesser injuries. Further casualties had been limited by the practice of large numbers of Coventry’s citizens, after previous raids, to trek to nearby villages each night to sleep there in relative safety. People who sought refuge in air raid shelters had seen few deaths or injuries, but over five hundred homes and two-thirds of the city’s buildings, particularly its factories, had been destroyed.
With a heavy heart and heavier steps, Claire trudged into work at Bletchley the next morning. She intercepted some messages and started work on them at her desk but found concentration difficult. Commander Denniston’s words from the day before rang repeatedly in her ears: “If Hitler ever learns that we read his communiqués almost as soon as he does, he’ll change his codes, we’ll lose this war and our country…”
With an expression more resolute than she felt, Claire left her desk, made her way to Denniston’s office, and waited until he returned from a staff meeting. He finally appeared, looking haggard, and cast a glance at her that seemed cautiously pleased.
“I want to apologize again,” Claire said, “about yesterday.”
“No need. We won’t speak of it again.”
“I want to say, sir, that I appreciate your patience, and that, once we know Jeannie is safe, I’ll be honored to join the analysis group. If you’ll still have me.”
Denniston smiled tiredly and stretched. “Miss Littlefield, that’s the best news I’ve had in a while. We’ll keep a seat warm for you.”
5
November 19, 1940
South of Leicester, England
Compared to flying the nimble Spitfire, piloting the twin-engine Bristol 156 Beaufort night fighter was like the difference between racing the country lanes in a Maserati sports car and driving a late-model sedan on a straight road. Not that Jeremy had ever steered a Maserati, but he had been a passenger in one a few times when driven by one of his better-heeled aristocrat fellow fighter pilots, and Jeremy was already an ace from dogfights in Spitfires and Hurricanes against German Luftwaffe Messerschmitt 109s and 110s.
To be fair, this kite’s got nearly triple the power of a Spitfire, and it maneuvers well. The twin 1600-horsepowered Bristol Hercules engines were each more than a half-time larger than the single one that powered the iconic fighter through aerial battles. It lacked the sleek lines, the agility, the sense of having strapped on wings to fly, characteristic of the Spitfire. But the blunt-nosed “Beaufighter,” as pilots had dubbed this new aircraft, was a heavy fighter built for killing aircraft with a barrage of firepower, speed, and long-range flight capability.
The original production model had carried a pilot and gunner. The model Jeremy flew had been modified, its gun removed from the turret to make room for the new Air Intercept Mk IV air-to-air radar equipment, affectionately called the “magic box.” Further, the cockpit and fuselage had been shifted backward to adjust the center of gravity to accommodate the added weight. The result lent the plane a hulking appearance, with its pilot ensconced in the nose. Despite being wedged between the two giant engines, the aircraft provided a wonderful field of vision, with only the feathering-capable propellers protruding in front of the pilot.
Having been exposed to radar technology, Farlan immediately grasped its potential and embraced the opportunity when offered the job on the Beaufighters. He worked hard to improve his skills and had proven adept at spotting target planes on the magic box during training exercises.
Jeremy often wondered about the men who rode in turrets on bombers and fighters. They experienced every toss and turn of the aircraft, yet they had no ability to affect any of their twists, rolls, direction, speed, or any factor that determined where the plane would go or in what manner. That was particularly true in a Beaufort that could ascend or dive vertically and execute barrel rolls or any other maneuver to gain an advantage over a foe, and in the case of the Beaufighter, the operator did not even have a weapon with which to shoot back. In this job, his responsibility was to stare into a pair of glowing cathode-ray tubes at the most critical moments.
Jeremy fingered his array of trigger mechanisms and had to grin. What I lose in maneuverability compared to a Spitfire, I make up for in hellfire. This Beaufighter could train devastating firepower on enemy bombers and fighters with four 20 mm Hispano Mk II canons in the nose; six .303 Browning machine guns in the wings, four on the starboard side and two to port; and eight RP-3 130-pound rockets in the fuselage. With a range of fifteen hundred miles and a top speed of three hundred and thirty miles per hour, the aircraft posed a lethal threat to the Luftwaffe.
So versatile and effective was the base-model Beaufort that further variants, the so-called Rockbeau and Torbeau, were being discussed. The former was designed to provide close support for ground troops by firing volleys of rockets from the wing, and the latter to drop torpedoes against enemy shipping from a distance. Jeremy mused momentarily how such aircraft might execute their missions, but then returned his thoughts to the present.
He peered through the darkness blanketing the countryside. The massive radar system along the eastern and southern coasts of Britain, codenamed Chain Home, had spotted yet another huge horde of hostile aircraft massing to attack across the English Channel with the apparent target being in the midlands near Leicester, east of Birmingham.
For reasons unknown, instead of being controlled by their usual station at RAF Sopley near Bournesmouth, control of 604 Squadron Beaufighters had been passed to RAF Tangmere under 11 Group headquarters, which had vectored them east. He climbed into clouds, wincing as a jab of pain in his shoulder reminded him that he was not yet fully recovered from his wound. The controller, callsign Boffin, then turned him south over the Channel where he broke into a clear, moonlit sky over silver waters.
No one expected that Germany had ended its assault on the factories and airfields across Great Britain. But since October 31, the last day of heavy German targeting of RAF airfields, German strategy had altered, sending Hermann Göring’s bombers almost exclusively to drop tons of incendiaries and explosives on the hapless British population, tipping cauldrons of fire, destruction, mutilation, and death on the inhabitants of London, Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield, Southampton, Birmingham, Hull, Glasgow, and Coventry, with more cities sure to receive similar blistering onslaughts. Beginning in mid-August, Germany had dealt their carnage in attacks almost unopposed, striking at dusk with incendiary munitions that created furnaces, which in turn acted as beacons for heavy bombers, summoning them in the dark of night to deliver their deadly cargoes.
Jeremy had read newspaper reports about the air raid over Coventry and the devastation there. The plight of the city highlighted Britons’ justified demands that Winston Churchill’s government “do something” to stop the nightly incursions. More specifically, the prime minister looked to Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding to augment his wide-area ground-controlled air interception network that had so successfully countered Adolf Hitler’s daytime attacks on the RAF’s airfields and Britain’s ports and factories. Tonight, we’ll see how Dowding’s response works.
Using other aircraft as targets, Jeremy, Anderson, and Cunningham had practiced night maneuvers extensively over the past month, but this was no practice run. Once his Beaufort had left the ground, a controller vectored him toward the enemy, and as he closed with it, Farlan, in the turret behind him, watched for green blips on the cathode tubes to guide Jeremy into attack position.
Then, it was up to Jeremy to see and engage a dark phantom against a dark sky.
A crucial element of maneuver nagged at Jeremy, one that had not been mastered, and as yet, no solution had been developed. The concept of attacking the enemy called for fighters to ascend at an angle from below and behind their targets. The radar showed where the bombers were within three miles to a minimum of a hundred feet, but the operator would have to estimate the closing rate between the target and the pursuing Beaufighter from watching how fast the blips on the cathode tubes closed.
Since the fighters flew faster than their targets, acquiring that final view had proven difficult in practice, and therein lay the danger: overshooting the target at best, or ramming it at worst. But only after visual sighting had occurred could firepower be unleashed. And so far, the Beaufighters had not shot down a single nighttime bomber.
Despite himself, Jeremy’s mind wandered. During the weeks that he had trained with 604 Squadron, he had not mingled socially with other pilots. He missed his comrades from the 609th, to be sure. Additionally, as had many pilots since the war moved into the skies over Britain, he had remained aloof simply because losing friends had become so frequent and painful that distance was a common defense for maintaining equanimity.
Then for a fleeting moment, stirring thoughts crossed his mind of Amélie, the French beauty who had rescued him at Dunkirk. “Not now,” he muttered, jolting himself back to awareness. His eyes darted across the black emptiness, searching where the coastline must be—the guns there would be first to engage the German bombers as the leading edge of the attack crossed the shore. Flashes of light from midair anti-aircraft explosions would give warning that the bombers’ thrust toward Leicester was imminent.
Boffin called over the radio, “Hallo, Blazer Two Six. Orbit, orbit. Bandit coming your way at Angels 11.”
Throttling up, Jeremy radioed back, “Okay, Boffin. Orbiting.” The mammoth sleeve-valve engines growled deeper as the Beaufighter responded to his touch. Scanning his instruments, he called back to Farlan, “I’m going up to fifteen thousand. We need height.”
“Weapon ready,” Farlan called back, referring to his magic box.
Jeremy puffed up his cheeks and blew the air out, his mind going to his squadron leader, John Cunningham. Over the weeks that Jeremy had been with the squadron, he had learned much about the pilot. At twenty-four years of age, he was a quiet, unassuming man who dodged limelights. A handsome chap of average height with a firm jaw, he had apprenticed with de Haviland Aircraft Company on completing secondary school, and he had participated in designing two new planes, the T.K.2 racer, and a touring and training aircraft, the Moth Minor. Simultaneous with joining the company, he had been accepted into the Royal Auxiliary Air Force with 604 (County of Middlesex) Squadron. Proving to be a remarkable pilot, he had remained with the squadron for several years, and had recently been promoted to squadron leader, probably the youngest pilot in the RAF at this point to achieve that position.
Shortly after meeting him, Jeremy had asked Cunningham if he was related to the famous admiral in the Mediterranean. Cunningham had shaken his head. “Only by name.
I come from rather lowlier roots.”
“The admiral’s a hero now, after what his fleet pulled off in Taranto.”
Cunningham had agreed, adding, “With what our Beaufighters carry, they’ll make an equal mark on history.”
Jeremy also respected the commanding officer, Michael Anderson, a slender fellow with light skin; but the two had not spent as much time together. Anderson had left Jeremy’s training to Cunningham while he sought out more recruits for the night fighting squadron. However, to have occupied such a sensitive leadership position at such a young age, Jeremy figured that Anderson must be a pilot of unusual skill and judgment.
Boffin’s voice broke through the drone of engines. “Hallo, Blazer Two Six, contact imminent. Flash your weapon.”
“I heard,” Farlan called. “Magic box switched on.”
Jeremy felt a rush of adrenaline as he throttled up to full power. He gulped in air and twisted slightly in his seat while glancing down at his instruments with a grim smile. “You won’t get away clean tonight,” he muttered to his unseen foe. “If you’re lucky, you’ll limp home.”
After these weeks of training on the Beau, he felt confident that he had in his grasp a combat multiplier that could tip the balance in favor of the RAF, and more importantly, the people of Great Britain.
Boffin’s voice broke through the rush of wind. “You’re closing on a big boy. Maneuver into firing position.”
Once more, Jeremy glanced through his windshield at the darkness and saw nothing. Many times, he had flown near the tall towers of the Chain Home radar system that had alerted Fighter Command that an attack was inbound. He had thought idly a few times how nice it would be to have such a system inside the plane capable of making enemy aircraft visible to the crew at night and from a distance. He had not dreamed that it could exist within the span of this war.