Alan Bodger and his 576 Squadron crew pictured at a snowy Elsham dispersal early in 1944. Note the four .303 guns in the back of the truck. (Elsham Wolds Association)
There was to be no let up for the Lancaster crews or Berlin. Operations were on again the following day and, once again, the red ribbons on the target maps stretched to the German capital. It was to be a smaller-scale raid this time, involving 383 aircraft, the lowest number on any of the attacks, and, as on the previous night, it was to be a matter of ‘straight in and straight out’ with no feints to fox the defenders. 166 lost an aircraft, with both gunners being killed in night fighter attacks, while F/O Charles Jones and his crew failed to return to Wickenby where another 12 Squadron aircraft had earlier being wrecked in an accident. A 460 Squadron aircraft crashed at Kelstern during a pre-raid air test, killing two members of the crew, while two aircraft from the squadron were lost on the operation itself. The pilot of a 100 Squadron Lancaster which was brought down over Berlin was later rescued from one of the many lakes surrounding the city and was taken prisoner along with three other members of his crew.
Elsham intelligence officer Lucette Edwards with pilot Geoff Maddern on the flight deck of his Lancaster. (Elsham Wolds Association)
103 Squadron lost one Lancaster during that attack but when Berlin was visited again on the night of November 26-27 it was to lose three over the target with another written off with battle damage after a crash landing at the 6 Group airfield at Croft in North Yorkshire. A fourth aircraft, flown by F/O Robert Brevitt, was diverted to another Yorkshire airfield along with several other aircraft as visibility dropped at Elsham. As F/O Brevitt arrived in the circuit at his diversionary airfield, Middleton St George, his Lancaster was in collision with a Halifax II of 428 Squadron and crashed two miles from the airfield. Only one of the crew survived while all seven men in the Halifax, which was returning from an attack on Stuttgart, died. That night 103 Squadron had set a new Bomber Command record by supplying 30 of the 443 Lancasters on the raid.
It was a bad night all round for 1 Group. Three aircraft from 101 Squadron, two of them ABC-equipped, failed to return, while 550 Squadron, making its operational debut from Waltham before its move to North Killingholme, suffered its first loss, F/Lt Peter Prangley’s Lancaster crashing on the outskirts of the city. His aircraft had been set alight by anti-aircraft fire and he remained at the controls after giving the order to bail out. It is believed at least four men got out of the aircraft before it went out of control, two surviving while the body of a third, flight engineer Sgt Alan Ward, was found in the River Havel. No trace was ever found of the navigator, F/O Geoffrey Harris. 12 Squadron had one aircraft wrecked on take off and another on landing with battle damage, although both crews escaped, that of Sgt Arthur Twitchett being killed on a Berlin raid a few weeks later. Not so fortunate were the new boys of 626 Squadron at Wickenby, the squadron losing one aircraft over Berlin while a second crashed near the airfield on its return. This involved F/Lt Wood’s crew and their Lancaster actually came down in the middle of the station’s WAAF site close to the village of Holton Beckering. The aircraft tore through the site, narrowly missing one hut before its nose was torn off and the aircraft slithered to a halt in a field just short of the airfield, the crew walking away unscathed. This was the final operation of the crew’s tour and they were determined to land at Wickenby, despite other aircraft being diverted. They opted to land on instruments, unaware that the beam approach was wrongly calibrated. A third Lancaster from the squadron, flown by F/Sgt Keith Windus RAAF, crashed trying to land at Marham, killing all on board. There were other losses that night for 460 and 166, two of its Lancasters failing to return.
The MT Section outside Elsham’s main hangar. Note the Lancaster in the background undergoing an engine change. (Elsham Wolds Association)
A third Lancaster from Kirmington was attacked by a fighter over France which raked the full length of the aircraft, wounding the Canadian rear gunner Sgt George Meadows in the back and temporarily putting both turrets out of operation. The fighter then made a second attack, this time a cannon shell exploding in the cockpit. The elevators were damaged and the pilot, F/Sgt Roy Fennell, jettisoned the bomb load and ordered the crew to bail out. The bomb aimer, Sgt Ron Moodey, jumped but at that point F/Sgt Fennell managed to regain control and turned for home. The aircraft was to be attacked again several times by fighters but were driven off by fire from the rear turret where, despite his wounds and loss of blood, George Meadows refused to leave his position. F/Sgt Fennell managed to land the aircraft at Ford in Hampshire and it was only then that the severity of the wounds suffered by the rear gunner became known. Sgt Meadows was to receive an immediate award of the Conspicuous Gallantry Medal but was to spend some considerable time in hospital recovering from his injuries. The body of the bomb aimer was later found in France, his parachute unopened. Sgt Fennell and his crew, minus Sgt Meadows, were to be killed on the final raid in the Battle of Berlin in March, 1944.
A snow-covered A Flight dispersal Kelstern before an air test, winter 1944. (Eric Thale)
The air battles over Berlin were now reaching their full fury. On the night of December 2-3 Berlin was hit yet again with another major raid, a force of 458 aircraft, mainly Lancasters, again taking the direct route. The fighters were waiting for them and of the 40 which failed to return, 18 were from 1 Group with another aircraft crash-landing on its return to Kelstern. It was a particularly black night for the Australians at Binbrook, with five of their aircraft being shot down. Among the 28 men who died that night in 460’s Lancasters were two journalists, Norman Stockton of the Sydney Sun and Capt Nordahl Grieg, a Norwegian war correspondent, poet and relative of the famous composer. They had arrived at Binbrook five days earlier along with Colin Bendall, the air correspondent of the Daily Mail with the object of reporting at first hand on the bombing of Berlin. Capt Grieg was amongst his country’s best known writers and had spent time in China reporting on the civil war. He was an avowed anti-fascist and escaped to England on the same ship which carried the Norwegian royal family in 1940. He was commissioned into the Norwegian Armed Forces as a war correspondent and was one of a number of journalists given permission to fly with Bomber Command that night, Ed Murrow of CBS and Lowell Bennett, another American who was working for the Daily Express, flew with 50 Squadron from Skellingthorpe, near Lincoln.
Grieg flew from Binbrook with the crew of F/O Alan Mitchell, their aircraft crashing some 40 miles from Berlin. The body of the Norwegian was never found. Norman Stockton went to Berlin with F/O James English and his crew, their aircraft exploding after being attacked by a night fighter near the target area. Colin Bendall was more fortunate and made it back safely. Ed Murrow was also to return to Skellingthorpe but the Lancaster carrying Lowell Bennett was another casualty that night although Bennett himself escaped by parachute and spent the remainder of the war in a PoW camp. Binbrook’s other casualties that night included the crew of S/Ldr Ted Corser, a popular flight commander with 460 Squadron.
S/Ldr Canham (centre) and his crew with H-Harry of 625 Squadron at Kelstern late 1943. They had originally been with 100 Squadron and brought their Lancaster with them. It was lost over Berlin with a different crew at the end of January 1944. (Author’s collection)
Four of the Lancasters which left Wickenby during the late afternoon of December 2 were lost, three from 12 Squadron and a fourth from 626, flown by S/Ldr George Roden DFC. 101 Squadron lost three ABC Lancasters and among the men who died were F/Lt George Frazer-Hollins DFC and his special operator, F/O Arthur Weldon, both men being on their second tours, Weldon having flown earlier as a wireless operator. The third crew survived to spend the remainder of the war in captivity. At Elsham four full crews were lost, three from 103 and one from 576, flown by F/Sgt John Booth, a 20-year-old Australian. At Waltham, always regarded as one of the ‘lucky’ stations in Bomber Command, all but one of the 27 Lancasters sent by 100 and 550 Squadrons made it home, W/O Alan Collier’s aircra
ft being hit by flak near Hanover. One of 100 Squadron’s Lancasters had a fierce battle with a night fighter over the target and the rear gunner, Sgt Johnny Knox, was killed. Another man lost that night was S/Ldr John Garlick, who had won a DFC with 12 Squadron at Binbrook back in 1942. He was flying a 97 Squadron Pathfinder aircraft which was attacked by a night fighter and remained at the controls of the burning aircraft to give his crew the chance to escape.
Despite the awful losses Lancasters from 1 Group were sent on another long trip to Leipzig the following night. A diversionary attack on Berlin by Mosquitos drew off the bulk of the Luftwaffe night fighter force and losses were reduced with only two failing to return. P/O Charles Plumridge’s 100 Squadron aircraft was shot down by a pair of night fighters near the target which then collided and crashed in flames, much to the satisfaction of the four crew members who got out of the Lancaster. The other loss was at Elsham where a 576 Squadron aircraft failed to return. There was also a very lucky escape for two other crews, one from 100 Squadron the other from 460 which collided over the target. The port wing of the Binbrook aircraft struck the underneath of the fuselage of the 100 Squadron Lancaster. Both aircraft were damaged but managed to make it home. The two crews then planned a night out together in Grimsby to celebrate their good fortune but it was never to taken place, the 460 Squadron crew failing to return from their next operation.
Bad weather and adverse moon conditions gave the weary aircrews the opportunity of some rest over the next two weeks. This came to an abrupt end on the morning of Thursday December 16 when the teleprinters at 1 Group HQ at Bawtry began to chatter. Operations were on again and, once more, the target was Berlin. This was a day which was to go down in Bomber Command annals as Black Thursday, not particularly because of the losses over Germany, bad though they were, but of the return of an old adversary, the weather which proved disastrous for many of the returning bombers. It was a misty day but the Met men were confident that visibility would improve and that conditions over Germany would keep much of the night fighter force on the ground. Neither forecast proved to be correct.
550 Squadron’s O-Oboe showing the scars of a battle with a night-fighter over Berlin at the end of January 1944. Both turrets were wrecked and the gunners killed and parts of the fuselage shredded by cannon fire but O-Oboe made it back to the emergency airfield at Woodbridge where this photograph was taken. The aircraft was so badly damaged it had to be scrapped. (Roland Hardy)
The raid got off to a bad start, with two Lancasters from Elsham, one from 103 and the other from 576, collided over the village of Ulceby minutes after taking off. The collision, or at least the tremendous explosion as the bomb load went off, was seen by many people on the ground, including children on their way home from schools in the villages stretching from Ulceby to Barton. There were no survivors. Over the target itself 1 Group lost a further five aircraft but it was when the attackers began to arrive back over Lincolnshire that the real problems began. The cloud base had come down, in some areas, almost to ground level. Worst affected was Waltham where four aircraft were to be lost, two in a collision in the circuit and two more in crashes near the airfield. Three 460 Squadron aircraft crashed along with two each from Ludford and Kirmington. Among the Binbrook casualties was the crew of F/O Francis Randall DFC, the 21-year-old Australian pilot who had escaped that mid-air collision during the Leipzig raid. He circled in the gloom for 45 minutes before apparently running out of fuel and crashing into trees surrounding the bomb dump at Market Stainton. All those on board were killed but the crews of the other two from 460 survived. In all 1 Group lost 13 aircraft as tired crews tried to land in awful visibility, killing 59 men. The highest profile casualty was 22-year-old W/Cmdr David Holford, the man who won a DSO with 103 Squadron in 1942 and who led the first four-engined bomber raid of the war in 1 Group. He had recently taken over as CO at 100 Squadron and had opted to lead the squadron that night, only to die in the most tragic circumstances (See a full account of David Holford’s story in the following chapter).
F/O Len Young DFC at the controls of D-Dog of 103 Squadron, December 1943. (Norman Storey)
Another man who flew from Waltham that night was W/Cmdr Jimmy Bennett, the CO of 550 Squadron, and a close friend of David Holford. He was flying with ‘Bluey’ Graham and crew that night and, in an interview with the author, was later to recall: ‘Our take off was early, about 4.40 in the afternoon, and even then the visibility wasn’t very good and it was plain we were not going to be in for a very pleasant journey.’
The cloud cover cleared slightly over the North Sea and there was far more fighter activity than they had hoped to see but they dropped their bombs and got away with no trouble although they did see a few aircraft in flames, caught by either fighters or flak.
He went on: ‘However, coming back the cloud started to increase again and it was clear that by the time we reached England it would be right down on the deck. Bluey decided to come down through the cloud while we were over the sea, always a wise practice in conditions like those. Lincolnshire may have been fairly flat, but there were places where it wasn’t and there were always a few of what we called “stuffed clouds”, which contained something hard, like a hill.
‘We dropped down into the mist and Bluey picked up the outer circle of sodium lights at Waltham, stuck his port wing on them and followed them round until he found the funnel and put her down. We rolled along the runway to the far hedge and we were already aware that planes were coming down all around us, landing at the first opportunity, so we decided it would be a lot safer to leave the Lanc where it was and walk the rest of the way.’
As they did so he looked up and saw what appeared to be the red starboard wing tip light on a Lancaster. It appeared to be going the wrong way round the circuit. Then there was an almighty crash as it collided with another bomber going in the opposite direction.
Later he accompanied the station commander at Waltham, G/Capt Nick Carter, to Fulstow where the village hall had had been requisitioned as a temporary mortuary where the bodies of between over 30 1 Group airmen were laid out in straight lines. It was a sight which was to remain with him for the rest of his life. Later, he had the awful job of going to the Ship Hotel in Grimsby to break the news of David Holford’s death to his widow, Joan. The couple had been staying there until they found a home near the airfield.
Canadian bomb aimer F/Sgt Bill Kondra, who was a member of F/O Tommy Heyes’ crew, also witnessed the collision over Waltham. He and his crew had just made it back from Berlin and were thanking their lucky stars they had got down safely when they saw the flash and heard the sounds of a collision. ‘It was something I will never forget,” he was later to recall.
F/Sgt Pat Doyle’s 625 Squadron crew never made it to Berlin that night. On the outward leg they ran into a severe thunderstorm and icing on the aircraft became so severe that their engines began to surge and the Lancaster started to lose height. They jettisoned their bombs and turned for home, St Elmo’s Fire flickering from the wings. It was a frightening experience made even worse when the navigator, Sgt Dave Winlow, announced they were close to Kelstern but they couldn’t make out anything in the murk below. Then, just as the skipper told the crew to be prepared to bail out, they saw a flicker of light. Down they went and found themselves over Ludford Magna, only a few miles from home, where they landed safely. This was one of four ‘early returns’ at Kelstern while, of the others dispatched on the raid, only two Lancasters would make it back safely that night. Nine were diverted, six of them to Blyton and the others to Ludford. W/O Don Baker’s aircraft was shot down near Hanover with only one of the crew surviving while American pilot Arnold Woolley’s Lancaster crash-landed at Gayton-le-Wold, not far from the airfield, killing two of the crew and injuring the survivors. Another Lancaster, flown by W/O Ellis, overshot on its return and then made a spectacular belly-landing on the airfield.
Eight of 101’s Lancasters were diverted to Lindholme on their return. Another was diverted to Falding
worth but, unable to find the ground, the crew bailed out safely. Another, flown by 20-year-old Sgt Norman Cooper, crashed near Eastrington in East Yorkshire while attempting to divert to Holme-on-Spalding Moor while two others, the aircraft of F/Sgt Peter Head and Canadian F/O Ron MacFarlane, failed to return.
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