Joey Jacobson's War

by Peter J. Usher

  Notes on Sources

  Letters and Diaries

  The letters and diaries of Joe Jacobson and his father Percy, and the letters Joe received from his friends, are held by the Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives (CJA) in Montreal. They are catalogued as the Percy and Joe Jacobson Collection (P0094). It includes 239 letters from Joe Jacobson, of which 139 were to his family, sixty-nine to his friends (mainly the three other members of the Pony Club), and thirty-one to others (of which twenty-five were to Janine Freedman); thirty-one letters from his family to Joe, of which twelve were from Percy and nine from May; sixty-eight letters to Joe from the Pony Club (most of them written by Monty Berger); and a few from other people.

  The diary collection consists of Percy Jacobson’s diary, 1939–45; May Jacobson’s travel diaries, 1930, 1950, 1954; and six of Joe’s diaries, of which two were written during his high school and college years (1936, 1937–39), one during his time at Manning Depot (July 1940), a daily diary in two parts (18 January 1941–27 February 1942), and an operational diary (August–December 1941).

  The collection also includes four of Joe’s notebooks (October 1941 through January 1942), dealing with various problems of the bombing campaign, reading notes, reflections on politics and squadron life, and the outline of a play, along with Joe’s RCAF Flying Log Book (1940–41). Some related material, including correspondence, is in the CJA’s Monty Berger collection (P0015).

  The photos used in this book were (with the exceptions noted) held by the Jacobson family, some of which were subsequently donated to the Canadian Jewish Archives.

  Joe and Percy corresponded with each other on a more or less weekly basis from September 1939 to January 1942. Percy kept a diary throughout the war, in which he recorded events both public and private, and reflections on them, every two or three days. Joe kept diaries intermittently in his late teens, a habit he resumed very briefly after enlisting. Upon completing his training in western Canada, he began a daily diary that he kept for the rest of his life. He began an operational diary (contrary to regulations) when he started his regular bombing runs over Germany, and soon began filling notebooks on subjects ranging from his critique of the conduct of the air war to thoughts inspired by his current reading material to fundamental questions about politics, religion, and the self-examined life. Joe also corresponded with his close friends on a frequent but less regular basis.

  Virtually all of Joe’s letters seem to have arrived at their destination, and subsequently saved by their recipients, with a few notable exceptions. According to his surviving correspondence, most of the letters he wrote home during his first month in England – at least three letters to the Pony Club and another three to his family – never arrived in Canada. But once the flow began, very few letters seem to have gone missing, although delivery remained slow and intermittent in both directions, and letters sent over several weeks might arrive all at once. Even airmail service, new that summer on a space-available basis, took at least two weeks. Although some of Joe’s letters suffered the cuts of the censor’s scissors, there is no evidence that any were blocked in their entirety.

  However much Joe valued his incoming mail, whether from family or friends, very little of it has survived. Living as he did in cramped quarters while in service, he kept his possessions to a minimum. He saved none of the letters he received from his friends while in training or active service. A few of Percy and May’s letters written to Joe before he left Canada survived; so also did those that they sent to Joe at Coningsby in January 1942, but did not arrive there before he was killed. They were subsequently returned to Joe’s family by the RAF with his personal kit. Monty Berger was the keeper of the Pony Club’s correspondence, and he generally ensured that the chain ended with him. He left Canada several months after Joe, so much of it remained in Montreal.

  When Joe left Canada, he tucked his diaries in his desk drawer at home. How his personal diaries and notebooks from England found their way back to Montreal (save possibly one) is related in Chapter 30.

  Newspapers and Periodicals (1936–42)

  Canada

  High school annuals: Westmount High, West Hill High; Kitchener-Waterloo Record, Montreal Gazette, Montreal Star, Old McGill, McGill Daily, Regina Leader-Post, Saturday Night, and Westmount Examiner.

  United Kingdom

  The Aeroplane, Daily Express, and Sunday Express.

  Sources by Part

  Preface

  On servicemen’s personal letters and diaries as sources, see the introduction to Richard J. Aldrich, Witness to War (London: Corgi, 2004), and the introduction to Audrey and Paul Grescoe, The Book of War Letters (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2003), as well as Paul Fussell, Wartime: Understanding and Behavior in the Second World War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 145, 291.

  The changing character of Bomber Command memoirs is illustrated by the following selection (in order of first publication date):

  Cheshire, Leonard. Bomber Pilot. London: Hutchinson, 1941.

  Rivaz, R. C. Tail Gunner. London: Jarrolds, 1943.

  Gibson, Guy. Enemy Coast Ahead – Uncensored. 1946; Manchester: Crécy Publishing, 2003.

  Tripp, Miles. The Eighth Passenger. London: Macmillan, 1969.

  Bushby, John. Gunner’s Moon: A Memoir of the RAF Night Assault on Germany. London: Allan, 1972.

  Peden, Murray. A Thousand Shall Fall. Stittsville: Canada’s Wings Inc., 1979.

  McIntosh, Dave. Terror in the Starboard Seat. Don Mills: General Publishing, 1980.

  Renaut, Michael. Terror by Night. London: William Kimber, 1982.

  Sawyer, Tom. Only Owls and Bloody Fools Fly at Night. Manchester: Goodall, 1982.

  Johnson, P. The Withered Garland: Reflections and Doubts of a Bomber. London: New European Publishers, 1995.

  Silver, L. Ray. Last of the Gladiators. Shrewsbury: Airlife Publishing, 1995.

  Hewer, Howard. In for a Penny, In for a Pound. Toronto: Stoddart, 2000.

  Death by Moonlight: Bomber Command, was broadcast on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation network on 19 January 1992.

  Part One

  Lord Moran (Charles Wilson), author of The Anatomy of Courage (London: Constable, 1945), was Winston Churchill’s personal physician.

  On the situation and outlook of Montreal’s Jewish community at the beginning of the war, see Gerald Tulchinsky, Canada’s Jews, a People’s Journey (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008), particularly Chapter 9, “The Politics of Marginality,” 283–327; and specifically for the Jacobsons, see Peter J. Usher, “Removing the Stain: A Jewish Volunteer’s Perspective in World War Two,” Canadian Jewish Studies 23 (2015): 37–67. For a novelist’s perspective on inter-ethnic relations in Montreal at that time, see Gwethalyn Graham, Earth and High Heaven (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1944).

  I am indebted to Edith Low-Beer (née Jacobson), Janet Kwass (née Jacobson), Brian and Denise Infield (née Michaels), and Yvette Kale (née Kostoris) for background on the Jacobson, Kostoris, and Freedman families provided here and in Part Two. My thanks to Monty Berger, Gerald Smith, and Herb Ross for information on the Pony Club, and to Robert Willinsky for information on his mother, Cecily Willinsky (née Samuel). A retrospective on the 1938 McGill Redmen team appeared in The Globe and Mail on 11 November 2004.

  Attitudes to enlistment in Ontario in the fall of 1939 are described by Jason Braida, “The Royal City at War: The Military Mobilization of Guelph, Ontario during the First 18 Months of the Second World War,” Canadian Military History 9, no. 2 (2000): 25–42; and Ian Miller, “Toronto’s Response to the Outbreak of War, 1939,” Canadian Military History 11, no. 1 (2002): 5–23.

  Information on the Preston Furniture Company is contained in the Percy Hilborn Papers in the Cambridge [Ontario] City Archives. For more on Joe’s experience in Preston, see Usher, “Removing the Stain.”

  The crisis of late May is lucidly described by John Lukacs, Five Days in London, May 1940 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999). For a concise a
ccount of Canada’s war preparedness, see David Bercuson, Maple Leaf Against the Axis (Don Mills: Stoddart, 1994). On air force mobilization, see W. A. B. Douglas, The Creation of a National Air Force: The Official History of the Royal Canadian Air Force, volume II (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986).

  Information on Joe Jacobson’s enlistment and subsequent training in Canada is contained in his service file (LAC, Service Files of the Second World War – War Dead, 1939–1947, RG 24/27825). On air force selection, see Allan D. English, The Cream of the Crop, Canadian Aircrew, 1939–45 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1996); “RCAF Personnel History, 1939–1945,” n.d., MS, DHH 74/7. For some consequences for Jewish recruits, see Peter J. Usher, “Jews in the Royal Canadian Air Force, 1940–1945,” Canadian Jewish Studies 20 (2012): 93–114.

  On the British Commonwealth Air Training Program (BCATP), see F. J. Hatch, Aerodrome of Democracy: Canada and the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, 1939–1945 (Ottawa: Department of National Defence, Directorate of History, 1983); and Douglas, The Creation of a National Air Force. For the progress of Joe’s training at each school, I have relied on the BCATP unit daily diaries (LAC, RG24) for:

  • No. 1 Manning Depot, Toronto

  • No. 1 Initial Training School, Toronto

  • No. 3 Air Observer School, Regina

  • No. 2 Bombing and Gunnery School, Mossbank

  • No. 1 Air Navigation School, Rivers

  • Temporary Embarkation Depot, Debert

  Accounts of initial training at about the same time are provided by Hewer, In for a Penny, In for a Pound; Silver, Last of the Gladiators, and also for air navigation training at Rivers, Jack Watts, Nickels and Nightingales (Burns-town: General Store Publishing House, 1995).

  Personal characteristics of Joe’s air observer classmates were obtained from LAC, RG24, Service Files of the Second World War – War Dead, 1939–47. Individual attestation papers provide information on place and date of birth, parents’ place of birth, education, employment, father’s occupation, and religion. Of the one hundred air observers who graduated in the late winter of 1941, forty-five were killed in service. Their files, along with information on two other individuals taken prisoner of war, provided me with a nearly 50 percent sample of Joe’s class.

  On air observer training, see Initial Training Schools, Syllabus of Instruction, n.d., BCATP Flying Training, DHH 181.009(D89A); W. G. Goddard, History of Air Navigation Training in Canada, 1945, MS, DHH 74/17; Hatch, Aerodrome of Democracy; C. G. Jefford, Observers and Navigators and Other Non-Pilot Crew in the RFC, RNAS, and RAF (Shrewsbury: Air Life, 2001); Thomas Ritchie, An Air Navigator’s Navigation in the Second World War (N.p., n.d.) (Canadian Air and Space Museum Library); Royal Air Force, Manual of Air Navigation, Air Publication 1234, vol. 1 (London: H. M. Stationery Office, 1938) (amended and reissued 1940, 1941). On the course setting bombsights used in training (and on the automatic bomb sight described in Part Two), see Air Ministry, Air Publication 1730A, vol. 1, Bomb Sights (TNA, AIR10/2676). For personal accounts, see W. A. Hockney and M. D. Gates, Nadir to Zenith, an Almanac of Stories by Canadian Military Navigators (Trenton: Self-published, 2002); John Iverach, Chronicles of a Nervous Navigator, published by Mrs. Peggy Iverach, 1997; Silver, Last of the Gladiators, and Watts, Nickels and Nightingales.

  For the details of Joe’s flights during training and, later in this book, operations, I have relied on his RCAF Flying Log.

  Part Two

  On the convoy system generally, see Arnold Hague, The Allied Convoy System 1939–1945: Its Organization, Defence and Operation (St. Catharines: Vanwell, 2000). For specific details on the April and May convoys, see Hagues List, www.convoyweb.org.uk/hague; for individual ships, see variously the logs (TNA, ADM 53), movement cards (TNA, BT 389), and passenger arrival lists (TNA, BT 26) for Duchess of Richmond, Georgic, Johan van Oldenbarnevelt, Laconia, Montcalm, Montclare, Nerissa, Pennland, Rajputana, Royal Sovereign, Royal Ulsterman, Vancouver Island, Wolfe. Sailing details and passenger departure lists are in LAC, Directorate of Movements 1939–48, R112-386-6-E.

  For the wartime occupation of Iceland, I have relied on Donald F. Bittner, The Lion and the White Falcon: Britain and Iceland in the World War II Era (Hamden: Archon Books, 1983); and James Miller, The North Atlantic Front: Orkney, Shetland, Faroe and Iceland at War (Edinburgh: Berlinn, 2003).

  Letter extracts regarding the spring convoy and the Iceland stopover are in DHH 181.009(D283), Censored Letters, vol. 1, Convoy Indiscretions in Canadian Mail, ref c.7 supplement – Chief Air Advisor, A.I.1 (z) to HQ RCAF, 26 May 1941, and supplements. On the general atmosphere in Britain in 1941, see Angus Calder, The People’s War, Britain 1939–45 (London: Jonathan Cape, 1979); Norman Longmate, How We Lived Then: A History of Everyday Life during the Second World War (London: Hutchison, 1971); and for some views on the political situation, “Cato,” Guilty Men (London: Gollancz, 1940); and George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius (London: Secker and Warburg, 1941). On the Blitz, see C. Fitzgibbon, The Blitz (London: MacDonald, 1970); and Gavin Mortimer, The Longest Night: Voices from the London Blitz (Toronto: McArthur, 2005).

  On the fate of the first air observer class, see R. V. Manning, “Graduation of the First Observer Course, BCATP,” The Roundel 12, no. 8 (1960): 14–15, and for P/O Hill, his service file, LAC, RG 24/27747, and TNA, AIR 27/435, 42 Squadron Operational Record Book.

  An account of the history and operation of wartime postal censorship in Britain is provided in the History of the Postal and Telegraph Censorship Department 1938–1946 (London: Home Office, n.d.) (TNA, DEFE1/3330). Information on the censorship of mail to Canada is provided in DHH 181.009 (D283), Censored Letters (4 vols.), and on the period March–June 1941, RCAF Personnel in Britain, A.I.1(z), Report c.7, General Summary, and Report c.10, General Summary, with supplements.

  On the relations generally between Canada and Great Britain with respect to the air war, see B. Greenhaus, S. J. Harris, W. C. Johnston, and W. G. P. Rawling, The Crucible of War, 1939–1945: The Official History of the Royal Canadian Air Force, vol. III (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994); W. S. Carter, Anglo-Canadian Wartime Relations 1939–1945, RAF Bomber Command and No. 6 [Canadian] Group (New York: Garland, 1991); Report, Minister of National Defence for Air, Mission to United Kingdom, 30-6-41 to 24-7-41, DHH 181.003(D132); and Douglas, The Creation of a National Air Force. For Canadian servicemen’s views, see DHH 181.009 (D283), Censored Letters, and DHH 181.009(D1096), Carbon Copy of Pamphlet Prepared for the Information of R.C.A.F. Personnel Proceeding Overseas from Canada, RCAF (Overseas) Headquarters, London, 10 September 1942.

  For details on No. 25 OTU (Finningley), I have relied on the unit’s Operational Record Books, as well as the memoirs of others who were there at the time, notably Bushby, Gunner’s Moon. Additional information on Joe’s Canadian pals who trained in 5 Group is found in the Operational Record Book for No. 16 OTU (Upper Heyford), TNA, AIR 29/655. My account of aircrew training and of the circumstances of Operational Training Units in 1941 is based on information in TNA, AIR 2/4169, AIR 10/2315, AIR 14/1157, and AIR 20/1385. On the specifics of Bomber Command’s perceived navigational requirements, its navigation training policies, and crewing issues in Hampden bombers, see TNA, AIR 2/4467, AIR 14/9, AIR 14/16, and AIR 14/64.

  My description of the censorship system is drawn from History of the Postal and Telegraph Censorship Department; DEFE 1/332, photographs for official history; and DEFE 1/408, Instructions for the Use of Postal Censors.

  I am grateful to Mark Connelly for suggesting a detailed review of the Daily Express and the Sunday Express (at the British Library) as a source for Joe’s views during the summer of 1941.

  Target for Tonight is preserved at the Imperial War Museum, London. For commentary, see S. P. MacKenzie, British War Films 1939–1945: The Cinema and the Services (London: Hambledon Continuum, 2001).

  Part Three

  The statement by Lord Trenchard is cited in
Andrew Boyle, Trenchard, a Man of Vision (London: Collins, 1962), 470.

  Of the many books that have written about the origins, development, and execution of the Royal Air Force’s strategic air offensive doctrines, as well as the development of night bombing, I have relied especially on Robin Neillands, The Bomber War (Woodstock: Overlook Press, 2001); Richard Overy, The Bombing War, Europe 1939–1945 (London: Penguin, 2014), especially Chapter 5, “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Bomber Command 1939–42,” 237–301; The Strategic Air War Against Germany 1939–1945: Report of the British Bombing Survey Unit (London: Frank Cass, 1998); and Sir Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany 1939–1945, vol. 1 (London: H. M. Stationery Office, 1961). Among the key documents provided in Webster and Frankland’s Appendix (vol. 4) are the various Air Ministry directives to Bomber Command, and the Butt Report, referred to below. For how Bomber Command presented its air offensive to the public, see Mark Connelly, Reaching for the Stars: A New History of Bomber Command in World War II (London: I. B. Taurus, 2001). For Bomber Command’s increasing application of scientific expertise to its operations, see Randall Wakelam, The Science of Bombing (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2013). For further details on bombs and bombing, see Karl Hecks, Bombing 1939–1945 (London: Robert Hale, 1990); Roy Irons, The Relentless Offensive, War and Bomber Command 1939–1945 (Barnsley: Pen and Sword, 2009); and J. A. MacBean and A. S. Hogben, Bombs Gone (Wellingborough: Patrick Stephens, 1990).

  Detailed progress of the offensive is provided in Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everett, The Bomber Command War Diaries: An Operational Reference Book 1939–1945 (Leicester: Midland, 1996). For an overview of Bomber Command’s conduct of the air offensive during the first two years of the war, I have relied on TNA, AIR 8/423, AIR 8/440, AIR 9/131, and AIR 14/194, and on the monthly Headquarters Operational Record Books (AIR 24/229-241), including especially the nightly intelligence narratives and the daily strength returns (AIR 22/36-39) for 1941–42. For detail, I have relied largely on the correspondence files between the Air Ministry, Bomber Command Headquarters, and Group Headquarters, including conference minutes (AIR 14/1926–60). On the problems of navigation in particular, see TNA, AIR 14/66, AIR 14/450, AIR 14/498, and AIR 14/516. Most of these files include correspondence, memos, and minutes covering several months or even years, and must be read against related files. I have listed only the most important ones, and I have not cited the individual pieces within them except for direct quotes.