COMBAT AND COMPETITION.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

CHAPTER SEVEN BALBOS AND BOOZE
hold station in the turbulent air, with 193's Typhoons proudly sporting
their new scarlet eagle insignia. Butch was on leave and I was happy
to be leading the Squadron again.
After the Victory Air Parades there were others. Until life seemed
to become one long round of formation flying and parties.
Photographic sorties continued, mainly to obtain information on ex
Luftwaffe airfields. Following the system which we had developed in
the later stages of the war, to assist in planning and layout, before the
Wing moved to a new location.
On one such sortie over Oldenburg airfield I saw a couple of coxed
fours practising on the Weser. The slim hulls and the swinging oars
brought back memories of prewar bumping races on the Severn at
Tewkesbury. It seemed like another world.
The target for my photographic sortie on 31st May was a grass
airfield south of Hanover. Shortly afterwards on the 8th June,
following yet another Victory Air Parade over Nijmegen this time for
Princess Juliana of the Netherlands, the Wing moved to its last home
at R16 Hildesheim.
Although the town itself had been heavily bombed the airfield was
virtually untouched. Our aircraft were hangered and the Wing was
accomodated in modern quarters.
For me at that moment the way ahead was clear - test flying if I
could make it - or failing that a career in the RAF. My name had
already come up on the first postwar list of permanent commissions,
as a substantive Flight Lieutenant with backdated seniority. It seemed
a good omen. I sat down and wrote a letter to my old friend at
Glosters, Frank McKenna.
Hildesheim was an interesting place. It had been the last base for
a staffel of the Luftwaffe's clandestine and special purposes unit - KG
200. From here they had operated a variety of aircraft, including
captured Fortresses and Liberators. In the aircraft graveyard, apart
from these, were examples of many German types, including the
outstanding Daimler Benzengined FW 190D. Typhoons from 146 Wing
had tangled with a couple of them briefly, shortly after the
Luftwaffe's last fling on New Year's day, and found themselves totally
outperformed.
From Hildesheim it was only a short distance into the Harz
mountains. Driving up the rack railway, when the road became
impassable, to reach the summit of Broken - almost 4000 feet above
sea level - where the ruins of a hotel and the distorted aerials of a
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