COMBAT AND COMPETITION.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

COMBAT AND COMPETITION
Hammering the damaged pillbox. Raking the trenches from end to
end. Willing our shells to tear such a monstrous enemy to shreds. Until
the ammunition ran out and our cannons clattered into silence.
It was Jimmy as usual who called us to order and we cruised home,
through the quiet autumn skies, drained of emotion.
A successful attack on the coastal batteries at Flushing brought the
Wing three useful recruits from the Spitfire equipped naval
bombardment unit to which I had been posted before D Day. It so
happened that Geoff Hartley had been controlling a shoot with HMS
Warspite against the same target. But the guns could not get it right
and salvo after salvo pitched uselessly into the floodwaters around the
gun emplacements. When the Typhoons appeared, and plastered them
with bombs, it was the last straw.
On landing Geoff applied for an immediate transfer and
encouraged Bob Gibbings and John Irving to do likewise. There was
a continual need for Typhoon pilot replacements and the last attempt
to recruit them, from the Spitfire squadrons of 2nd TAP, had not been
very successful. So they were welcomed with open arms and put
through a rapid conversion course with some genuine bombing
practice. Geoff and Bob joined 197 and John went to 263 where he
learned all about RPs by firing them in action!
There were other sorties to the north of Antwerp. Close support for
the troops fighting their way towards the Dutch border. Destructive
attacks on tiny hamlets. Picturesque little places, hugging the canals,
their gardens bright with marigolds as we swept low overhead. On a
fine evening you could still see them from the circuit. Burning houses,
angry red in the gathering darkness, and the smoke trails hanging low.
I almost bought it on one of those sorties, climbing in line astern,
close to the airfield. Just a brief glimpse of a shape materialising
through the cloud layer high above - plunging earthwards - striking
at the very heart of the formation. No question of any evasive action,
and barely time to register the slender outline, as the V2 hurtled past
my starboard wing and was gone.
The effect of that near miss was very odd. It created an
extraordinary feeling of euphoria, almost of invincibility. The sortie
had done its worst. There was nothing more to fear. Then, as if to
prove the point, we ran into a particularly nasty combination of low
cloud and concentrated flak - and I felt strangely remote and immune
from it all!
During our time at Antwerp Vis and V2s arrived at a combined
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