A Special Duty

by Jennifer Elkin

  The Germans were loathed for their cruelty, but partisans felt an even greater loathing towards the Russians, with whom they had been instructed, by their command, to cooperate. They believed that in helping the Russians they were merely assisting a permanent Soviet occupation, but nevertheless obeyed orders and reluctantly escorted the Russians through enemy territory, and passed on information to them, receiving little in return despite the fact that the Russians received regular supply drops of arms and ammunition. A sense of national pride was a factor for the partisans who, though poorly equipped, were fighting on their home soil and were not prepared to take a subordinate position. The Russians, with their regular supply deliveries and disciplined militias, were scornful of their neighbours, and automatically assumed a superior status. They co-existed in a state of armed neutrality with neither side respecting or trusting the other, but the Polish scouts, whose information network was second to none, were bringing back reports of a massive build-up of German troops in the surrounding towns and now they needed each other.

  The Polish units were poorly equipped for such a fight, and supply drops were a touchy subject because of the disappointment felt over the flow of arms reaching them from the Allies, for which they blamed Britain. Tom did his best to explain the difficulties of supplying them from such a distance given the prevailing weather conditions, but the partisans resolutely believed that their overwhelming struggle could have been better supported, had the will been there. A happier subject was the progress of the war, and they were particularly eager to hear news of the Polish units, led by General Anders, who were fighting with the Western Allies in Italy, and on the point of a breakthrough at Monte Cassino. They were naively convinced that Churchill was delaying the invasion of France8 in order to preserve his forces to fight the Soviet Union over the Polish question, and they followed events keenly. The Polish underground newspapers, which were in wide circulation, and Polish broadcasts from London kept them well informed, and both officers and men had been ‘filled with despair’ to learn of Churchill’s speech to the Commons in February, in which he praised his ally Stalin and said:

  “Here I may remind the House that we ourselves have never in the past guaranteed, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, any particular frontier line to Poland. We did not approve of the Polish occupation of Vilnia in 1920. The British view in 1919 stands expressed in the so-called Curzon line, which attempted to deal, at any rate partially, with the problem. I have always held the opinion that all questions of territorial settlement and readjustment should stand over until the end of the war, and that the victorious powers should then arrive at formal and final agreements governing the articulation of Europe as a whole.” [Hansard]

  As cooperation between the Polish and Russian groups progressed, Tom saw an opportunity to follow up on the possibility of an escape route via Russia, and he asked Kmicic to take him to the three Soviet commanders in the area, Yakovlev, Nadelin and Kunicki, in the hope that they could secure an agreement to repatriate the crew. This was disappointing for Kmicic, who considered the Russians almost as much the enemy as the Germans and he tried hard to talk Tom out of it, but the discipline and leadership that had been Tom’s trademark in the air kicked-in now, and he resolutely pressed Kmicic to take him to visit the Russian commanders.

  While a glimmer of hope was opening up for Tom’s group, Walter Davis remained hidden in the home of Jakub Dec, and was in the process of being given a new identity. The local AK partisans arranged false papers for him in the name of Wtadystaw Dec, and with this identity, and clothes given to him by the family, he settled in and began to learn the language. There was no possibility of escape at this stage and Walter’s fate was entirely in the hands of this remarkable family, who taught him Polish songs and jokes and treated him as a son. It is hard to imagine why they would put their own lives in such danger for the sake of a stranger, but this is exactly what they did, and the kindly Mrs Dec became a mother to Walter. The Germans were everywhere, but the family usually received a warning when they were coming and Walter was able to run off into the forest and hide until the coast was clear. A couple of times he didn’t have time to escape, and the fearless Mrs Dec, who he called ‘Matka’, hid him under piles of bean plants in the loft, or out amongst the raspberry canes. Walter initially slept in a loft over the cowshed, but later was moved to a more secure hiding place inside a covered haystack, which was accessed by removable planks in a partition separating the haystack from the threshing floor. Gaps in the planking gave him enough air to breathe and, on one memorable occasion, allowed him to watch a group of German soldiers as they helped themselves to one of the Dec family cows.viii This would be Walter’s life for the next five months, constantly in fear of being discovered and the consequences of that for the family who had been so good to him. Like his crewmates, he was no longer an RAF sergeant in the eyes of the enemy, but a guerrilla fighter, and he could expect no mercy if he were caught.

  Walter Davis (centre) with AK Partisans

  (Photo courtesy of Davis family)

  Eddie and Hap spent their first five days at Dulag Luft in solitary confinement on a diet of bread and water, and were threatened throughout their period of interrogation.ix This was the main reception and interrogation centre for newly captured airmen, and a transit camp, the sole function of which was to gather intelligence before moving them on to a prison camp for airmen. The name is short for Durchgangslager der Luftwaffe (Air Force transit camp) and conditions in the wooden cell blocks were solitary and grim, with a bed and just enough space to pace up and down. A radiator tended to swing from very hot to very cold to make life as uncomfortable as possible, and a string pull in the cell was the only way to get the attention of a guard for a toilet visit. Eddie recalled two interrogations in the first few days, and he was astonished at the detailed information held by his interrogators, who conversed with him in fluent English, some having studied in England. They knew the code letters of all aircraft, the Squadrons to which they belonged and, in the case of Halifax JP224, they told him that they knew the destination of the supplies because of maps they had found in the wreckage of the aircraft. The interrogation techniques were sophisticated, and relied on the use of detailed and personal information to induce the airman to talk by convincing them that the Germans had the information anyway. Eddie was stunned by one piece of information the interrogators had, which related to an incident with Squadron Leader Brotherton-Ratcliffe, who had taken a Dakota into Greece to pick up personnel and, though he did return safely, he had spent a couple of days bogged down in soft ground. The interrogator dropped this piece of information into the conversation, saying: “We know all about ‘Brother Rat’ – next time he lands on our side, we’ll have him”. They also tried to pin sabotage on Eddie and Hap, owing to the load being jettisoned prior to baling outx, but they stuck to a repetition of name, rank, and number, and were eventually released into the compound with the other POWs. One further interrogation followed on the 5th May, after which they learned they would be moved on to Stalag Luft 6, at Heyderkrug, in East Prussia.xi They were on the move again and, although I can only guess at how they felt, a few lines written by an unknown airman on a cell wall at Dulag Luft may offer an insight:

  “It’s easy to be nice boys

  When everything’s ok

  It’s easy to be cheerful

  When you’re having things your way

  But can you hold your head up

  And take it on the chin

  When your heart is breaking

  And you feel like giving in?”xii

  Notes

  1 Aurelia Mierzwinska.

  2 AK U AK OP-33 unit, commanded by Joseph Gniewkowski (‘Orsha’).

  3 AK OP-33.

  4 Armii Krakowa OP-33 unit.

  5 National Military Organisation (Narodowa Organizacja Wojskowa).

  6 Franciszek Przsiezniak.

  7 Last flight of the Halifax.

  8 Operation Overlord.

&nb
sp; CHAPTER 7

  WITH RUSSIAN PARTISANS

  Mikolaj ‘Mucha’ Kunicki and his Soviet partisan unit crossed the River Bug in the middle of April 1944, having received orders from General Strokacz, commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian partisan movement, to move into occupied Poland and disrupt the supply lines of retreating German forces. Kunicki and his battle-hardened unit arrived at Momoty Gorne on the 9th May, and Kmicic immediately invited him to his camp to discuss areas for cooperation, and to ask for assistance with the evacuation of the British airmen. Kunicki, who had just received an air-drop of supplies, was weary from his long trek and unfamiliar with the forest trails, so he asked Kmicic to come to him instead. Accordingly, Nina guided Kmicic and his party of twelve to the makeshift Soviet unit HQ, where they were stunned by the display of parachutes, radios, and arms scattered in abundance around the room. Moscow had even included vodka and wine in the supplies as a present.i Kunicki welcomed them and, noticing four unusually quiet, awkward-looking men in the group, asked who they were. “They are the English airmen”, said Kmicic, to which Kunicki responded, with a mocking nod towards the old Mannlicher rifles they carried, saying: “Such weapons are for fighting the Germans?”ii This was not a good start, but the two leaders retired for private talks and discovered that they got on rather well. When Kmicic raised the subject of the airmen, Kunicki agreed to inform his command in Kiev of their request to be flown to Moscow. Once the formal talks were over a bottle of vodka was brought out for toasts, but Tom and his crew, uneasy in this new environment, did not join in. Kunicki found this difficult to understand and asked: “Why such long faces, and why do you not drink?” The crew shrugged their shoulders and remained silent.iii They were strangers among a group of people they had no reason to trust, and in this new situation they confronted danger as a disciplined crew, as they had throughout their Squadron operations. Kunicki cut a striking figure in his military trench coat and Russian Cossack hat, and George, who had accompanied them to the Soviet camp, described him as an energetic and decisive leader. He was Polish by birth and had seen service in the Polish, German, and Russian armies. Tom later described him as: “A fine specimen of a man”1 and came to both admire and trust him, but at this first meeting, he was cautious.

  The following day Kunicki’s wireless operator, seventeen-year-old Ducia, tapped out a signal to General Strokacz, which read:

  “In the Vistula region an English plane was shot down by the Germans. The crew of the plane, officers WARRANT, STOREY T and Sergeants HUGHES, FLICTT [?] and KEEN are with me and have asked to be sent to Moscow. Your decision?”2

  General Strokacz, and First Secretary of the Ukrainian Central Committee Nikita Kruschev, could not have been entirely surprised by the news, since they were already aware of some unusual activity in the region south-east of Lublin. They had been informed by Commander Shangin3, who had recently entered Poland with a Ukrainian unit, that while waiting for a supply drop from a Soviet plane, parachuted containers had dropped from an unidentified plane, thought to be British. The unexpected bounty had consisted of German machine guns, ammunition, anti-tank rockets, grenades, and radios (with instructions in Polish). This was probably the jettisoned load from Halifax JP224. Strokacz and the Soviet Leadership in general, were particularly nervous about the infiltration of their units by German spies and, while it was likely was that these were genuine Allied airmen, it was essential to establish their identity before any decision could be taken about their rescue. Kunicki received a test question for Tom to answer on behalf of the crew: “Who is your Squadron intelligence officer?” To which he replied: “Curly Brown”. A second question followed: “Why?” Tom answered, without hesitation: “Because he’s bald”. This information was confirmed as correct, though not through the obvious channel of the British Military Mission in Moscow, but directly through the Soviet Military Mission in London, which checked it with the Air Ministry.iv General Montagu Burrows, head of the British Military Mission, was kept completely in the dark about the stranded airmen, and would later respond indignantly to this slight.

  Knowing the whereabouts of the men was one thing, getting them back was quite another. Allied servicemen were on the run or in hiding throughout Europe and the Balkans and, although escape lines were established in some countries, this was not the case for Poland, where the practical difficulties of flying servicemen back from such a distant location were compounded by Russia’s refusal to allow Allied aircraft to land on Soviet soil. There could be no reasonable expectation of a rescue mission, and yet, in exceptional circumstances, it was possible, as demonstrated by operation Wildhorn II.4 This highly secret bridging operation was executed by SOE Italyv without the knowledge of either the Russians or the Polish Section of SOE in London, and so there was little possibility of expanding it into a rescue flight for four NCOs, who were in the safekeeping of a Russian unit. The obvious escape route was through Russia. It was technically easier for a Soviet aircraft to undertake the rescue, but the dangers were still formidable.

  I find it a mystery why Strokacz and Kruschev should trouble themselves with four British airmen, but they did agree to help, and a plan developed that involved Soviet ace pilot Vladimir Pavlov in one of the most dangerous assignments of his career. Strokacz informed Kunicki of the decision to send an aircraft to pick the men up, and instructed him to find and prepare a suitable landing strip, the specification for which was quite precise. It had to be 1,750 metres long with a turning circle at the end, and firm enough to take the weight of a 13-tonne aircraft. He went on to suggest that Tom Storey, being a pilot himself, should lead the search for a suitable field. Kruschev then sent a message to inform Stalin that a British crew were sheltering with a Soviet partisan unit, and that a decision had been taken by the Ukrainian command to mount a rescue operation:

  “We have given KUNITSKY urgent instructions to select a landing strip. As soon as the strip is ready, we will immediately transfer the English airmen to Kiev. We have suggested to SHANGIN that he should forward the instructions and orders in Polish to the Central Committee of the Ukrainian Communist Party at the first opportunity.”vi

  On the 24th May, Kunicki gathered the men together to read out a telegram he had received from General Strokacz, letting them know that their families had been informed that they were in safe hands.vii Rita received her telegram at the Unicorn Hotel the following day, the 25th May, and the Stradling family in Ireland received theirs at the beginning of June. It puzzles me that Belzynski seems to have got an ‘in safe hands’ message through to Brindisi at the beginning of May, which the Squadron reported in their record book on the 17th May, and yet the families were not informed until the confirmation of their identities via Strokacz. Was it to protect the three airmen whose whereabouts were not known, or to spare the families from receiving good news that might later turn out to be false?

  General Strokacz ordered Kunicki, in that same telegram of the 24th May, to keep the airmen out of danger, and Kunicki took his orders seriously. Tom was genuinely grateful for this protection, but when asked the inevitable question about the purpose and destination of his flight over Poland, he did not give a truthful account, but instead gave one that was likely to impress. The secret nature of their work had been so drummed-in to the crews that Tom did not reveal the complete nature of the flight to anyone, though he came closest when talking to the partisans of the AK forest unit, who already knew about the supply flights from Italy. He seems to have adjusted his story according to the level of trust he felt, and he told Kunicki the same fanciful story he had come up with for the NOW partisans of Father John’s unitviii – that his Squadron had been ordered to bomb the oil wells at Drohobych5, and while over Poland his aircraft had been attacked and damaged by eight Messerschmitt. He claimed to have shot down three of the enemy aircraft before receiving a hit in one of his engines, and then a second engine failed, which forced him to jettison the bomb load. He said he had tried to reach the Soviet lines between Kovel and Lvov, but ha
d to order the crew to bale out when a third engine started to fail, finally jumping himself. He stuck to this fictional account, which had just enough truthful information to be plausible though it would not have fooled anyone with knowledge of the firepower of a special duty Halifax. Kunicki, dubious though he may have been about this colourful account, would certainly have liked the idea of Allied planes bombing the Drohobych oil wells, being under orders himself to destroy similar installations. Strokacz, having received Shangin’s report, knew that the aircraft had been on a supply mission, and this was the information he passed on to Stalin.

  Left to Right: Keen, Kunicki, Hughes, Storey, Ducia, Stradling

  The airmen began to settle into the routine of the Russian camp with renewed hope of rescue, and were reassured by the knowledge that Kmicic, who had been reluctant to hand them over, had set up his camp a short distance away in order to keep an eye on them. They struggled to understand or be understood by this comradely band of Uzbeks, Russians, Tatars, Ukrainians and Hungarian Jews, though George remained with them and did his best to interpret and Tom could talk to Kunicki in German so that orders were understood and obeyed. Because of Strokacz’ order to keep the men safe, Kunicki made sure that they were always with him and, since he rarely moved without Ducia and the portable wireless set that was strapped to her back, they formed a tight group of six. Kunicki had around two hundred partisans in his unit, many of whom had escaped from German prisons or forced labour camps, and their ranks were augmented by officers sent directly from Russia. One of these was the political commissar, who was responsible for the education of the unit on behalf of the Communist Party, holding weekly lectures on the subject of Party ideology and principles. He also appeared to be keeping a sharp eye on the new arrivals, and took every opportunity to engage them in conversation about their activities in Poland. The female partisans, about twenty five in number, served mostly as cooks or wireless operators, and were treated exactly the same as the men, even sleeping in the commander’s tent, but the British boys were not used to women soldiers and found them rather formidable, later recalling: “They were vicious – real partisans!”6 Seventeen-year-old Ducia wore a uniform and was treated as an officer, rarely leaving Kunicki’s side, but she would not reach her eighteenth birthday. Her lifespan could be measured in weeks, not months, and her death was certainly that of a ‘real partisan’. Injured in the battle for Porytowe Hill on the 14th June 1944, she shot herself rather than be captured.