They Spread Their Wings (22 page)

No 123 Wing was on the move again and on 25 November took up residence at B77 Gilze-Rijen, between Breda and Tilburg, Holland. This former Luftwaffe base had two long concrete runways with plenty of hard standings and well-built permanent domestic buildings, which must have been a welcome change from living under canvas. At that time, though, the airfield was only 12 miles from the front line and also under the flight path of V–1s being fired at Antwerp – someone counted as many as 148 of these noisy beasts flying over the airfield in a single day!

Apart from the usual ‘cab rank’ sorties in support of the Canadian army, Typhoon operations at this time were mainly directed against German mechanised units and supply depots across the River Maas, together with attacks on the V–1 launch sites themselves. On 28 November 1944 General Eisenhower visited the wing and personally thanked all the pilots for their efforts in the drive from Normandy. Winter was setting in hard; snow was falling and with temperatures plummeting, everyone hoped that No 123 Wing would see out the bad weather in the comparative comfort of Gilze-Rijen. Field Marshal von Rundstedt, however, had other ideas.

During a period of atrocious weather that, significantly, had already grounded Allied aircraft for many days – and would continue to do so – on 16 December the 5th, 6th and 7th German Panzer armies began a massive counter-offensive in the Ardennes region that would become known as the Battle of the Bulge. Walter himself did not fly for a month prior to 25 December, when he logged twenty minutes: ‘Aerobatics (workout).’

General ‘Ike’ Eisenhower (centre) meets No 123 Wing CO, Gp Capt Desmond Scott (extreme right) and Wg Cdr Walter Dring (second from the right, with hands behind back) at B77 Gilze-Rijen, 28 November 1944. (John & Susan Rowe, Dring Collection)

Without air support, Allied forces were overrun or pushed back towards Brussels and in the direction of Antwerp. On 28 December, No 123 Wing was ordered to move 80 miles south immediately and take over airfield A84 at Chièvres from the Americans. Chièvres was 30 miles south-west of Brussels and from there, No 123 Wing was to give close air support to the American army. What with snow, ice and fog, it took until 31 December for the move to be completed. Not all the wing’s Typhoons could move to the new base because, according to Desmond Scott, twenty-two had to be left at Gilze as unserviceable due to repairs or normal maintenance checks.

Poor weather favoured the German army initially, but with the prospect of it improving, and with it the return of the Allied ground attack fighters, the Luftwaffe was mobilised en masse to mount what became a last-ditch, pre-emptive strike. Due to mounting resistance and with its supply lines stretched to breaking point, German ground forces were about to grind to a halt. If the Allied air forces could take to the sky, the whole German offensive would be in serious danger.

The pre-emptive air strike, code-named Operation Bodenplatte, was a tactical operation to be carried out by fighters and fighter bombers of the Luftwaffe against Allied airfields. The objective was to cripple Allied air forces and facilities in Belgium, Holland and northern France at a time when the Battle of the Bulge was in danger of stagnating. Launched on 1 January 1945, it was planned originally to coincide with the start of the counter-offensive but was delayed by the unsuitable weather for ground attack operations.

Among seventeen airfield targets was Gilze-Rijen. Over 1,000 German aircraft, mainly Fw 190s and Bf 109s, were committed to the operation. Eighty-one enemy aircraft from JG 3 and KG 51 were tasked to attack the airfields of Eindhoven and Gilze-Rijen and they hit these at dawn on the 1st. Fortunately for No 123 Wing, most of its ‘birds had flown’ to Chièvres, but Eindhoven was brim-full, with around 300 aircraft and vast stores, and bore the brunt of the attack. The wings there lost twenty-six Typhoons destroyed and thirty damaged, plus five Spitfires destroyed. Gilze-Rijen escaped lightly, since the Typhoons left on the airfield were well dispersed, and although the attackers had the freedom to make several firing passes over the airfield, only two aircraft were destroyed, while the anti-aircraft defences claimed three of the enemy.

The outcome of the ground battle is now a matter of history and by 12 January the pressure on No 123 Wing was off, allowing Gp Capt Scott to consider returning to Gilze-Rijen. In the almost three weeks his wing was at Chièvres, only five days were fit for flying, but during that time it was business as usual for the RP Typhoons as they hit enemy tanks and motor transport hard. Snow conditions were so bad at Chièvres as to require bulldozers to clear the runway and this left huge banks of snow, 8ft high, stretching down each side of the runway, ‘making it like a white-walled passageway’.

By January 1945 Walter Dring had been a pilot for three years, during which time he had accumulated 1,100 flying hours, of which almost 500 were operational. On 13 January, having been unable to get any aircraft into the air for some days, Walter sent up Flt Lt Prosser on a weather check to see if it was clear enough to send all four squadrons back to Gilze-Rijen. On his return Prosser reported that it was ‘no joy’ and the route was completely socked in by a wide front with cloud down to ground level. According to Desmond Scott this is what happened next:

I accepted Prosser’s report but Dring was not convinced and asked if he could go and take a look for himself. Perhaps there was a way round the weather. In front of his pilots I could not refuse his request, but I did not want to embarrass Prosser. Dring had been grounded for so long, I think he simply wanted to extend his wings. I said he could have a look if he so wished, but that I was satisfied with Prosser’s report. It was the same story: we would have to wait until the weather cleared.

Dring came back over the aerodrome and started a series of aerobatic loops, rolls and stall turns. It was Dring at his best, the master of the low attack, the smiling farmer who had taken to the skies. After completing a series of slow rolls he lowered his undercarriage and began the approach. There was no wind, but he seemed to have a slight starboard drift. Touching down, his aircraft ran along the runway for a few yards, swung sideways, hit the snow wall to the side of the runway, capsized and vanished in a great avalanche of snow.

For a few moments the shock paralysed me. I knew there was no hope, for the whole canopy that covered his head had been torn from the aircraft and thrown high in the air. In stunned silence we lifted his broken remains into an ambulance. It was only after returning to my caravan that I felt the full impact of his death. On the chair where he sat in the evenings lay his old cherrywood pipe with its bent stem. He would suck away at it for hours and use countless matches which often burned his fingers. Wing Commander Walter Dring DSO, DFC, the 28-year-old Lincolnshire farmer had been my loyal companion since the blazing days of Normandy. I had never been to Woad Farm, but I knew every inch of it. His wife, Sheila, was expecting their first baby.

Medical officer Fg Off George Bell also witnessed the landing:

He was still quite high as he approached the runway and some way to the port side. He then manoeuvred the Typhoon so that it was still travelling slightly sideways as it touched down. The surface of the runway was still icy in parts and his ’plane continued its sideways movement towards the neat walls of snow at the side of the landing strip. As his starboard wheel hit the wall of snow, the Typhoon reared up and turned over on its back with a sickening bang. I rushed to the scene and with the assistance of the crash crew, took Walter Dring from the cockpit. There was nothing we could do … he had died instantly from a broken neck. We went through the motions, transferring him into an ambulance and then to the operating table but by that time the news was spreading rapidly throughout the wing, ‘the Wingco’s bought it’.

George Bell could feel the mood of disbelief tinged with anger pervading the mess for the remainder of the day, and in the evening it boiled over with the pilots giving vent to their feelings and emotions over this tragic loss, in the way that pilots usually did. He recalled:

I sensed this was a night for flying people only. They had to show their feelings. I left quietly … and returned to my room. As I undressed for bed I discovered that I had Walter Dring’s wallet in my pocket. King’s Regulations stated that you didn’t carry identification with you when flying, so I had quietly removed the wallet sticking out of the Wing Commander’s breast pocket, to return it quietly to the Adjutant.

Walter Dring’s body was taken back to Gilze-Rijen when the wing began its return on the 15th, the move being completed by 26 January. He was buried in the military cemetery at Bergen-op-Zoom and is remembered on the memorial to Moulton Grammar School war dead in Moulton village church, and on a special panel in Weston church.

James Gordon Crampton, usually known as Jim, was the eldest son of Ruth and James Crampton, who ran the shop and post office in the village of Moulton, Lincolnshire, from 1914 to 1939. Educated first at the village primary and then at Moulton Grammar School, after leaving school he was apprenticed as a refrigeration engineer with a company in St Neots, Cambridgeshire. From an early age Jim wanted to fly aeroplanes and he made every effort to achieve his aim – eventually doing so with a little help from an innovative government scheme.

By the mid–1930s, the British government had become alarmed at the rapid rise in German military might and a scheme called the Civil Air Guard (CAG), which encouraged young civilian men and women to learn to fly, was introduced in July 1938. The scheme was conceived by Capt Harold Balfour MP, Undersecretary of State for Air, who opened negotiations with several flying clubs in the UK to identify those wishing to participate. The basis of this new organisation would be civilian in nature, operated by flying clubs around the country, who themselves would operate a separate Civil Air Guard section within the club. The Air Ministry paid a subsidy to participating clubs, with the aim of giving flying training to members of the public – both sexes – between the ages of 18 and 24. The annual membership fee for the individual was the sum of 2
s
6
d
(12½p in modern currency; equivalent to about £6 in 2012), tuition thereafter was 7
s
6
d
(37½p; equivalent to about £18 in 2012) per flying hour. This was a relatively low price when compared to the going rate of £3 per hour at a civil flying club at that time. It was expected that trainees would achieve an ‘A’ licence standard on the de Havilland Tiger Moth or Avro Tutor trainer after about thirteen hours dual and four hours solo tuition. By September 1938 forty-eight flying clubs had signed up for this scheme and although the cost was relatively small, trainees were expected to buy all their own equipment, such as a helmet and goggles. With aptitude and applied diligence it was, however, still possible for a trainee to gain a flying licence for the princely sum of about £10 (equivalent to approximately £500 in 2012).

In 1938 Jim was working as an engineer with the East Anglian Electrical Company, based in Stowmarket, and lived a bachelor life in a caravan at Alconbury Hill in Huntingdonshire. It was while here that Jim joined the West Suffolk Aero Club at Bury St Edmunds airfield in June 1939 and learned to fly through the club’s participation in the CAG training scheme.

The outbreak of the Second World War presented many a young man with the prospect of excitement coupled with a golden opportunity to learn to fly, and Jim was no exception. Volunteering for aircrew service in the RAF he was called up in June 1940 and received a rail warrant and instructions to report to No 1 Receiving Wing (1 RW) in Babbacombe, Devon. Seaside resorts all over the country were virtually taken over by the RAF as locations for initial training establishments, where the abundance of commandeered hotel accommodation allowed vast numbers of tyro airmen to be housed easily. Jim stayed at No 1 RW from 1 July to 14 July 1940. He now followed the path of a pilot u/t (under training) and on 14 July was posted just down the road to No 4 Initial Training Wing (4 ITW) in Paignton to undergo six weeks of pilot ground school. This type of study was just what appealed to Jim and he passed out satisfactorily, helped no doubt by his training with the CAG. Being in possession of a private pilot licence as a result of that training probably also enabled him to be graded at the ITW as pilot material without the need to go through the flying aptitude assessment stage at a ‘grading’ Elementary Flying Training School (EFTS). On 24 August Jim was posted to No 15 EFTS, a Class ‘C’ flying school located at Kingstown, Carlisle, and equipped with the single-engine Miles Magister tandem two-seat trainer aeroplane. Class ‘C’ was the smallest of the EFTS categories and Carlisle in August 1940 would at any one time be home to about sixty pupils, organised into two flights.