They Spread Their Wings (35 page)

After a break in main force operations that lasted about ten days, during the morning of Sunday 23 May Arthur’s crew were told that operations were ‘on’ for that night (23/24 May) and they should get their aircraft air-tested: ‘We took off from Mildenhall and flew up to Lincoln. On the way there our route took us right over my parents’ house at Gedney Drove End. I saw our bungalow from 17,000 feet up and it looked like a little matchbox.’ The air test went fine and they were briefed to take off again at 23.20. The target was Dortmund and Bomber Command despatched 826 aircraft – the biggest raid of the war so far (with the exception of the ‘Thousand Bomber’ raids). Arthur recalled the operation:

I tested my guns with a three-second burst into the North Sea just before we crossed the Dutch coast at 14,000 feet. I remember thinking: ‘so this is what it’s like.’ We couldn’t get any higher in our Stirling, BF533, although the Lancaster and Halifax bombers were above 20,000 feet. Fifty miles from the target the crew could see it was well alight but I couldn’t see much because I was facing backwards of course. We reached the target, dropped our bombs and turned for home, then I could see what was going on. What a sight below; it was one massive great fire. I could still see the red glow in the sky maybe fifty to a hundred miles away from the target. It all went off well and we had no trouble. At the end of our four hour and five minutes trip we were debriefed, had the usual post-op meal and then off to bed.

Command adjudged the raid to be highly successful. Pathfinder Force had done its job well, marking the target accurately in the clear night sky, and large tracts of the city were destroyed. Over 2,000 tons of HE and incendiary bombs were dropped within one hour and under this onslaught most of the ground defences in the target area were crushed. The clear conditions also worked in favour of the flak and searchlight defences, which were intense at the beginning but as the attack developed, both these elements were suppressed. On the return leg, though, night-fighters were still active well out over the North Sea and a total of thirty-eight aircraft were lost that night, including six Stirlings.

Short Stirling BK611 of No 15 Squadron, with its ground crew. Named Te Kooti by its first crew, the Maori emblem can be seen below the open cockpit window. (Arthur Edgley via John Reid, Stirling Bomber Research Society)

Two days later, on the night of 25/26 May 1943, No 15 Squadron was among those ordered to bomb Düsseldorf in a raid, involving 759 aircraft, that Bomber Command later considered a failure. Arthur’s crew was on the squadron roster in Stirling I, BK611, coded LS-U. This aircraft was named Te Kooti by a previous crew whose pilot, Plt Off I.W. Renner, came from New Zealand. Painted on the port-side fuselage just below the cockpit window was a fearsome-looking symbol depicting Te Kooti, a Maori warrior chief. Take-off was at 23.56 and Arthur recalled the events that followed:

As before, I tested my guns over the sea then settled down to begin the long, lonely vigil, constantly turning the turret back and forth, straining my eyes in search of enemy night-fighters.

Somewhere around 01:30 we were on the last leg in to the target, flying at just over 12,000 feet altitude when I saw three or four flak shells burst close to us. Before anything could be done by way of evasive action another salvo of flak hit our starboard engines putting them both out of action, and the loss of the hydraulic pump in the starboard inner stopped my turret from working. As the Stirling began to shake violently, the skipper ordered the bombs to be jettisoned, then struggling to keep it level, told us to prepare to bale out. From his mid-upper vantage point, Bud Seabolt reported that the starboard outer was on fire with the prop missing and the inner engine was minus the cowling and its prop had gone, too. A few minutes later Bud’s voice came on the intercom again, asking the pilot if he could bale out. The skipper said ‘Yes’ and out he went, about five miles south-west of Düsseldorf. Although we had jettisoned the bombs the moment we were hit, Jack Wilson was still having great difficulty holding the aircraft level, so he gave the order for everyone to bale out.

When I found my turret wouldn’t work – it was powered by a hydraulic pump in the now-defunct starboard inner engine – I unplugged my oxygen pipe, intercom and electric wires to my heated suit; turned the turret by its emergency handle to centralise it, locked it, opened the turret doors and clambered back into the fuselage. I found my parachute pack in its stowage rack, clipped it on and pushed out the gunners’ rear escape hatch on the starboard side. The hatch cover was whipped away by the roaring slipstream and I sat down and began to edge myself out into its force. As I hung there swinging sideways I could see we were flying pretty level so, with the thought in my mind that we might yet be able to press on and maybe ditch somewhere, I made an almighty effort and pulled myself back into the aircraft.

Having hauled himself back into the aircraft, Arthur crawled back into his turret to use the intercom to tell his skipper that he had been out and struggled back in again. ‘He said “well done; with a bit of luck we might make it.”’ With his own gun turret out of action, he manned the empty mid-upper position. It was still in working order as it ran off a different engine and he rotated it to have a look at the damage. He said:

The starboard wing was a sorry sight but the port engines were running fine, although that wing was a bit low and the rudder was pushed hard over to one side to counteract the swing. The pilot was showing great skill in keeping the aircraft flying and I asked him what altitude we were at. He replied ‘9,000 feet’ and I began to think we might make the coast. A little later, though, I asked him about the altitude and he said we were down to 5,000 feet and told the wireless op and me to get rid of any excess equipment.

Arthur and Maxie began to throw out anything that could be lifted but still the aircraft sank lower. Now it was at 3,500ft. The navigator reported passing the Dutch border. The skipper said he could not keep her airborne much longer and told them to go to the forward hatch and bale out while he and Sgt Arnott, the bomb aimer, wrestled with the controls. It was time to get out! First to the hatch, Arthur turned the handle. To his dismay it broke away in his hand! Frantically waving the handle at the others, he shouted at them to go back to the rear hatch. Up the steps past the pilot, Arthur showed him the broken handle, pointed to the rear with it and Jack raised his hand in acknowledgement. The altimeter registered just 1,500ft. Arthur crouched by the rear hatch:

I beckoned the navigator to go and he slid off into the night. Then I bent down to go next but saw Sgt Pittard our flight engineer and I let him go out first. Then I sat down on the lip of the hatch ready to jump when there was a sudden renting, tearing, crash. I covered my head with my arms for protection as the bomber smashed into the ground.

That was around 01.45 on 26 May. From then, events developed rapidly:

The aircraft turned over and sideways a number of times before coming to rest. When my world stopped tumbling, I found myself still in the rear of the aircraft but miraculously I was unhurt. Wreckage was burning fiercely and there was the sound of ammo exploding all around. Picking myself up, I was able to scramble out and shouted to see if anyone else had survived. To my delight, Maxie the wireless operator shouted back, saying his leg hurt but he could walk. The pair of us removed our parachute, harness and flying clothes, tossed them into the flames then started looking for the pilot and bomb aimer but it was in vain as wreckage was strewn over a wide area and there was no sign of them. So we decided to make our escape.

Jack Wilson and Patrick Arnott died in the crash. Ron Pittard – who Arthur had allowed to go out in front of him – baled out too low for his parachute to deploy and he died as a result. Bud Seabolt, who baled out first, landed heavily and was badly injured, then captured and confined in hospital for some time. Plt Off Brian Cooper, the navigator, landed safely and he managed to evade capture until he was picked up in Brussels on 30 June. After spending two weeks in St Gilles Prison, Brussels, he was sent to Stalag Luft III.

Arthur and Maxie later found out that their bomber had come down near the village of Grubbenvorst, 300 yards south of the Horst-Venlo/Sevenum-Grubbenvorst crossroad, roughly 5 miles north-west of Venlo in Holland. After fifteen minutes weighing up their prospects, these two survivors of the crash decided to try to evade capture and using their escape kit compass, strode out westwards. An hour of walking brought them to the Venlo-Helmond railway line across which they could see a farmhouse. Knocking on a window woke up the farmer who, after an interchange of sign language, refused to let them into his house but gave them food and indicated firmly that they should go away.

Another hour or so of walking and they came to a second farm. Here they found some sacks in the yard and took them into a cornfield to make a bed of sorts. Arthur found sleep did not come, though, because the ordeal of the night weighed heavily on his mind. At 07.15 he and Maxie decided to press on. There was a village in the distance so, heading for it, they took a chance and knocked on another door. Their luck was in and they were given coffee and some hot food. Moving on they approached two men working in a field nearby who took them back to a house in the same village, believed to be near Someren. Resting here for a while, they received a note written in English telling them that the Germans were searching the area and they should move on towards Belgium. The man, Menheer Bomen, who had sheltered them gave them coffee, eighteen hard-boiled eggs, butter, cheese, bacon, two loaves of bread and a knife – a veritable feast and enough to keep the fugitives going for a few days. Arthur continued his tale:

When we were well clear of the village on a cart track, we hid in a ditch until about 20.30, then set off again. We stopped an elderly Dutchman on a bike and he told us to go to the next farmhouse. Here we were given cigarettes, a drink and some food and directions to the Dutch-Belgian border. Darkness was falling now so we walked as far as the village of Meijel which was reached just after 06.00 on the 27th. Thinking we should keep out of sight in daylight, we knocked on one door but were turned away, while another old woman and her son whom we approached said they could not help us either. You couldn’t blame them because it was dangerous for all so on we walked, until we came across a farmhouse on the edge of some heathland [Aan ‘t Elfde] and here we were given refuge until the evening.

Later that night the man we had met in Meijel, Menheer Smets, came to the farm. It transpired that he was a schoolmaster who spoke English and he brought us some civilian clothes. The people at the farmhouse added a few more items and wearing the civilian clothes over our uniforms, we left the farmhouse to walk across the marshy heathland. Shortly afterwards the schoolmaster caught up with us on his bike and gave us a map and directions on how to reach the Belgian frontier.

We walked all that night; hiding up in some straw in a farmyard at daybreak on 28 May, where we slept for a while. When we woke up and took a cautious look around we spotted a farmer milking cows in a nearby field. Eventually he came into our yard and had quite a fright when we emerged from the straw and approached him. Explaining to him who we were, he gave us coffee and food and later that day he and his son took us to another farm. Here we remained in a shed for the rest of the day, then as it grew dark we set off again for the frontier.

Our nocturnal path brought us into contact with a group of Belgian corn-smugglers who took us to a point about half a mile north of the town of Budel, close to the frontier. Parting company with the smugglers, we crossed the Weert-Eindhoven railway line, found ourselves another hay rick and went to sleep. At 05.30 on the 29th, wet with morning dew, we awoke and began walking again, keeping Budel church spire on our left so that we could keep clear of the town. Just before we expected to see the frontier we were stopped by a Dutch policeman who wanted to see our passports. I thought the game was up but we were able to make him understand who we were and he let us pass. At the frontier itself we approached a lone Dutch guard in a black uniform [Marechaussee?] and asked him for help. He, too, was sympathetic and helped us across the border by going ahead on his bike and signalling the way was clear. We had been lucky indeed – so far.

Over a period of several days Arthur and Maxie had been fed, hidden and guided by a variety of very brave Dutch folk. They had now reached Belgium where equally brave Belgians kept them moving. Indeed, it turned out to be a time of constant movement; to-ing and fro-ing between people and houses, not knowing where they were going from one day to the next; always living in fear of discovery. Much of the time sequence of the period that follows is derived from the contents of the MI9 debriefing that Arthur went through in 1945, with supplementary information from Belgian escape line histories and not least from Arthur’s own unpublished memoir written around 1986:

Just north of Achel we knocked on the door of yet another farmhouse. While the family gave us food a man who spoke English was brought to the house to talk to us. He instructed us to follow another man and this we did until we reached the outskirts of Neerpelt. This man, who also spoke English, arrived on a bike and guided us through Neerpelt and on to the outskirts of Overpelt. Here he stopped, told us we were now on the main road to Antwerp and biked off, leaving us on our own again.