Bombers doing 'strange' things on a mission

Hi;

This my first post, but what a GREAT informative website. Forgive me for this question but it's something that I have been curious about for a while.

I seem to remember reading once an account of the captain of a Short Stirling or Hampden returning from a mission and being unable to resist the temptation to strafe and an enemy airfield he happened to find below him. Was this a common occurence?

Steve

 

Hi Steve and welcome to the forum. I'm no expert on the bomber campaign (or many other things for that matter) but I have never heard of this sort of thing before. I was of the opinion that
a) the bomber stream would have been at too great an altitude to strafe an airfield.
b) the piddly .303s on British bombers wouldn't have much effect anyway.
c) I wouldn't want to stooge around an enemy airfield in a low, slow bloody great target for any passing fighter.
But as I said, I'm no expert!

Sure someone will be along soon with a more expert view.

Mike

 

As stated, I doubt that an urge such as that would swiftly be extinguished by the rest of the crew (if not by the airfield defences.
I'm sure that sometimes a bomber may have overflown an airfield unintentionally and that all gunners would let rip to suppress ground fire if possible, but unless you were in a Mosquito and at very low level in daylight (!!) you're not going to have time to do much damage AND you'd be provoking swarms of fighters after you.
At night, the only one with a chance of seeing anything would be the front gunner and staring into a 200 mph gale, rain, snow etc while trying to focus through goggles you're unlikely to hit anything. the rear gunner might let rip but most crews realised that the tracer rounds pinpointed their position to any waiting fighter, so avoided advertising their presence unless under attack...

Intruder missions were flown to disrupt enemy airfields, but not bombers.

 

Welcome to the forum

Cheers
Paul

 

I seem to remember reading once an account of the captain of a Short Stirling or Hampden returning from a mission and being unable to resist the temptation to strafe and an enemy airfield he happened to find below him. Was this a common occurence?Steve

Hi Robbo,

It did indeed happen. This may be what you recall reading:

Group Captain Robert McFarlane | Times Online Obituary

Group Captain Robert McFarlane

Bomber pilot known for the accuracy of his raids and his initiative in finding useful targets

HAVING joined the RAF Volunteer Reserve as a noncommissioned officer before war broke out in 1939, Robert McFarlane was called up on the outbreak of hostilities and served two tours of operations, winning two DFCs and a DSO. The first of his tours was in 1941, the early days of the bomber offensive, in which British crews flying such aircraft as the unwieldy twin-engined “flying coffin” Hampden bomber, bravely but vainly tried to inflict significant damage on German industrial targets.
By his second tour, in 1943, McFarlane was commanding a squadron of Lancasters, which with their superior range, bomb load and navigational aids had begun to make the RAF’s sorties much more destructive.
In between these tours, in February 1942, McFarlane was among those Bomber Command crews sent, along with Coastal Command and Fleet Air Arm aircraft, to try at all costs to halt the Channel dash by the battlecruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen and their escorts from Brest to the haven of north German ports. His valiant attempt, delivered at low level in overcast weather against an enemy mounting a formid-able anti-aircraft armament, was doomed to failure, as flak and cannon shells from enemy fighters tore his controls to pieces and jammed his bomb doors shut. But his skill and determination in getting his aircraft and crew back to base that day were rewarded with the second of his DFCs.
After the war McFarlane was granted a permanent commission. Staying on bombers he was chief instructor for the RAF’s first jet bomber unit, operating the remarkable high performance Canberra.
Robert McFarlane was born in Glasgow in 1914 and educated at Uddington Grammar School and the West of Scotland Commercial College. While working as a choirmaster and organist in Glasgow he joined the RAFVR and learnt to fly. When war came, he was called up as a sergeant pilot.
After training he was posted to 83 Squadron, operating the Hampden, which, with the Wellington and Whitley was to be the mainstay of Bomber Command’s strategic air offensive in the early years of the war.
At a time when British air raids were in general hopelessly ineffective, he was singled out as a bomber captain who got through to the target on two-thirds of the squadron’s sorties, which included targets as far apart as Cologne, Hamburg and Berlin, as well as long-range minelaying assignments to the Baltic and the Norwegian coast.
As a result of his accuracy he was selected to make a low-level attack on the giant power station at Knapsack, near Cologne. Although he got to the target area, cloud completely obscured the power station even though he came down to 500ft.Rather than waste his bombs, he carried on to Jülich, to the west of Cologne, where there was a gap in the cloud, through which he was able successfully to damage the railway junction from a height of 800ft. For good measure he had his gunners strafe an airfield near Jülich.
McFarlane was always on the lookout for targets of opportunity, whether or not the primary objective had been hit. On another occasion, while on the way back from a minelaying sortie to Oslo, he came upon an enemy vessel of 1,200 tons on which he dumped his two remaining wing bombs, setting it on fire. He then came round again to spray its decks with machinegun fire. McFarlane, who served most of his tour in 83 squadron as an NCO, was commissioned in November 1941 and awarded the DFC.
He flew several more operations before his squadron, by that time equipped with Manchesters, was ordered to get airborne to try to stop the dash through the narrow seas of the German battlecruisers on February 12, 1942. A posthumous VC was won by the Fleet Air Arm on that day of valiant failure to stop the enemy. But although the impudent feat of the German admiral in getting such a substantial force through the English Channel was regarded in some quarters as humiliating to British sea and air power — “Vice-Admiral Ciliax has succeeded where the Duke of Medina Sidonia failed” thundered The Times — there was no ultimate advantage to the Germans.
After being rested from operations, McFarlane returned to the front line in July 1943 when he was given command of No 50 Squadron (Lancasters) in 5 Group Bomber Command. With the RAF’s offensive gaining weight during the second half of the year, he led his squadron in sorties against such targets as Bremen, Cologne, Dortmund and Kassel. Near the the end of the tour he was awarded the DSO not only for the accurate bombing of his own aircraft, but for the manner in which his wise guidance improved the performance of the entire squadron.
McFarlane ended his war on the air staff of No 53 Base in 5 Group, and in that autumn he was given a permanent commission. His immediate postwar service included three years in the Far East, in Singapore and Hong Kong. After a period on the training staff at Bomber Command HQ he was then involved, as chief instructor at No 231 Operational Conversion Unit, in training aircrews to fly the Canberra jet bomber, which entered frontline service in 1951.
Among his subsequent appointments were that of station commander of RAF Wahn, the home of 148 Wing in the 2nd Tactical Air Force in West Germany, which operated photoreconnaissance Canberras and Meteor nightfighters. He was commanding officer of Wahn, 1956-58, during which time its squadrons were dispersed to Wildenrath, Bruggen and Larbruch, and the base reverted to Luftwaffe control. His final appointment was in the Air Ministry as deputy director in the Directorate of Logistics.
He retired from the RAF in 1962 and settled in Edinburgh. Recently he and his youngest son Ian instigated the MacRobert prize for excellence for cadets at Cranwell. The prize is named in memory of Lady MacRobert, whose three airmen sons were killed, two on operations and one in an accident. Her famous reaction to these awful losses was to put up £25,000 for the purchase of a Stirling bomber for the RAF — its name, MacRobert’s Reply.
McFarlane was twice married and is survived by his second wife, Marjorie, and by the three sons of his first marriage, to Dr Jane Weightman, an air force medical officer, which was dissolved.
Group Captain Robert McFarlane, DSO, DFC and Bar, wartime bomber pilot, was born on July 12, 1914. He died on May 19, 2004, aged 89.



They don't make them like that anymore.

Welcome to the forum

 

Alieneyes, superb post! Thanks.

 

Hello and welcome to the forum.

Regards
Tom

 

Thanks to all and particularly Alieneyes for the reply. I appreciate the warmth and friendliness of your welcome. I did indeed read that obituary to the remarkable Group Captain McFarlane.

Am currently on holiday in northern France and will find the piece in the book I read that quoted a Hampden pilot (I think) who got detached in fog/inclement weather from his stream but later found himself accidently tagged onto a German bomber airfield's training exercise and inadvertently joined their landing 'circuit' and patiently bided his time, waiting for his signal/turn to land and then proceeded to drop his bombload on their airfield on landing approach before coming around again instructing his gunners to turn their guns loose. Apparently he and his crew did a lot of damage to the airfield and enemy aircraft with his bravery and cheeky quick thinking... I will dig out the book and post more info.

Another example of lionhearted bravery...

 

While looking up the DFM citation and service history for someone on another forum I came across this:

http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/34915/pages/4809/page.pdf

Awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Pilot Officer Angus ROBSON (41471).

Awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal.

551385 Sergeant Wallace STOCKPORT.

One night in July, 1940, Pilot Officer
Robson carried out a bombing attack on
warships in the harbour at Wilhelmshaven.
Undeterred by a terrific barrage of enemy
gunfire, he swept down to the very low
level of twenty feet above the buildings, and
with conspicuous courage crossed the harbour
and pressed home his attack on an enemy
warship. Sergeant Stockport as wireless
operator air gunner fired continuously at the
enemy defences and searchlights with his
machine guns. Pilot Officer Robson has consistently
shown great daring and devotion to
duty, and Sergeant Stockport by his courage
and skill, has on many previous occasions
contributed to the success of attacks on the
enemy, often under the most trying weather
conditions
P/O Robson, an Aussie in the RAF, was killed one month later:

http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/all-anniversaries/22664-memoriam-those-air-force-pilots-crews-who-died-day-ww2-70.html#post524765

Pilot Officer ANGUS ROBSON (DFC) (of Australia)


21-22 August 1940

144 Squadron
Hampden I P4360
Op. Mitteland Canal

RAF P/O. A. Robson DFC † (of Australia)
RAF P/O. D L. Wingate †
RAF Sgt. A A. Wilmot †
RAF Sgt. H. Chambers †

Took off Hemswell. Lost without trace. All are commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial.

BCL Vol.1 - Chorley In Memory of
Pilot Officer
ANGUS ROBSON (DFC) (of Australia)
41471, 144 Sqdn., Royal Air Force
who died
on 22 August 1940
Son of Thomas Angus and Violet Anne Robson, of Woollahra, New South Wales, Australia.
Remembered with honour
RUNNYMEDE MEMORIAL

In Memory of
Pilot Officer
David Leslie Wingate
33470, 144 Sqdn., Royal Air Force who died on 22 August 1940 Age 21
Son of George Melson Wingate, and of Cecil Margaret Wingate, of Hertford.
Remembered with Honour
Runnymede Memorial

In Memory of
Sergeant
Arthur Alexander Wilmot
751064, 144 Sqdn., Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve who died on 22 August 1940
Son of Annie V. Wilmot, of Bembridge, Isle of Wight.
Remembered with Honour
Runnymede Memorial

In Memory of
Sergeant
Hunter Chambers
632993, 144 Sqdn., Royal Air Force who died on 22 August 1940 Age 19
Son of Hunter and Sarah J. Chambers, of Belfast.
Remembered with Honour
Runnymede Memorial
F/Sgt Stockport would be killed 2 years later:

http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/all-anniversaries/22664-memoriam-those-air-force-pilots-crews-who-died-day-ww2-61.html#post508456

RAAF FATALITIES IN SECOND WORLD WAR AMONG
RAAF PERSONNEL SERVING ON ATTACHMENT
IN ROYAL AIR FORCE SQUADRONS AND SUPPORT UNITS

404902 Sergeant ENGLAND, Kenneth Hayne

Source:

AWM 237 (65) NAA : A705, 163/107/102 Micro Film No 463 OAFH
Commonwealth War Graves records, W R Chorley : RAF Bomber Command Losses
of the Second World War, Page 125, Volume 1942
Aircraft Type: Lancaster
Serial number: R 5621
Radio call sign: OL – R
Unit: ATTD 83 SQN RAF

Summary:

Lancaster R5621 took off from RAF Scampton at 2216 hours on the night of 11/12th June
1942, detailed to carry out a gardening operation in the Baltic. Nothing was heard from
the aircraft after take off and it failed to return to base.

Crew:

RAF FO Sproule, M A Captain (Pilot) (POW)
RAF Sgt R C Driver, (2nd Pilot) (POW)
RAF PO Williams, D G (Observer) †
RAF Flt Sgt W Stockport, (1st Wireless Air Gunner) †
RAAF 404902 Sgt K P England, (2nd Wireless Air Gunner) †
RAF Sgt R H Dominy, (Mid Upper Gunner) †
RAF Sgt R R Vernon, (Rear Gunner) (POW)

The aircraft was hit by flak from a flak ship moored in the target area and exploded. Four
of the crew were killed and FO Sproule, Sgt Driver and Sgt Vernon were POW’s.
Those killed are buried in the Poznan Old Garrison Cemetery, Poland. The city of Poznan
is located in the west of Poland, on the main E30/2 road. The cemetery is in the north of
the town in the district of Winogrady.

Sgt Vernon a POW lost consciousness as the aircraft broke up but was rescued an hour
later by a German vessel searching for survivors.
Regards,

Dave

 

Wellingtons went down to the floor to strafe Axis transport in North Africa, so this wasn't unheard of.

All the best

Andreas

 

I think this counts as 'strange' (and thrilling)

The RAF pilot who dropped the Tricolor on occupied Paris - Telegraph

 

One of the strangest flights is discussed, at length, here:
The Mysterious end to Halifax V9976

I was told that the "Whisky" operation was so secret that it is not even listed in the Squadron's records !!!!

Ron

 

Read about Gatward's 'tricolour' mission a few days ago - great story.

Ron, 9 or 10 seems a lot for a Halifax crew, let's hope something can be found in the archives.

 

"A favourite storey that other pilots in the Squadron would tell of RCAF Group Captain Johnny Fauquier was the night over Bremen when he used his bomber to strafe searchlights. Radar directed Flak and searchlight batteries were creating havoc in the bomber stream. When a main, radar-directed searchlight would light up a bomber, other searchlights would fix on it "coning" it with light, then the Flak guns and fighters would chew it to pieces. Over Bremen Fauquier realised something had to be done, so he pushed his bomber into a steep dive and picked out an assembly of Flak and searchlight batteries. He leveled off just over the ground and directed the nose, mid-upper and tail gunners to fire on the batteries. He caused considerable confusion on the ground, smashing lights and directing fire away from the other bombers. It was especially amazing having done it in the Halifax II, as it was known to react badly to violent maneuvers, stalling and crashing."

 

The 214 Squadron ORB shows a number of operations from March to July 1943 that were low level at least on some legs in raids (usually the outbound ones) and there are numerous reports of their crews shooting up trains and other things on the ground.
Here is an account written in a letter to his Pilot by my father of a trip to Rostock on April 20-21 1943 where they flew at tree top height until just before the target:
"Having got a good pinpoint at the coast and having no further nav aids, I came up and sat with you prepared to map read us the rest of the way. We could see the tank defences along the coast (mainly big sort of angle iron contraptions) . The trees went by in an alarming way, and we could see doors being flung open and even people standing in the light of their homes. Dickie remarked that we could almost tell people we’d been in Denmark rather than over it. We crossed Denmark fairly fast (Jutland , that is), and crossed Fyn, Langland and Lolland. These are what they are called now but I’m not sure they were that on my chart. At one point there was a lot of light flak around and some of it was coming right at us. I should recall that the term ‘light flak ‘ refers to the type (Bofors with tracer) rather than to the severity! Hunt was in the front turret and started yelling “Those sons of bitches!’ , and opened fire on them . Tommy and Dickie joined in and I’m not sure whether we shut them up or just drew attention to ourselves. "
They increased their height approaching the target for a normal attack. The pilot was shot through the leg over the target by the Stirling in front of them in this case.
It was not unusual for 214 Squadron Stirlings to shoot things up on the ground while on an op.
Cheers
Dave Wallace

 

I have seen various reports of rear gunners firing towards or down searchlight beams, these have never explained the height they were flying at. However it is the same principle to this interesting subject.

 

Here is an example from my father's log book.

Take off time 2200 from Lossiemouth. Hampden 852. Crew: Pilot P/O Carter, P/O Davidson, Sgt. Layne, Sgt. Gilmore.

This aircraft was one of 24 tasked with a Gardening Operation (Mine laying) in Oslo Fiord. At that time the German capital ship Admiral Scheer was sheltering in Oslo harbour. Excellent weather conditions and a brilliant moon made pin pointing very simple. After gliding down from 6,000 feet the vegetable (mine) was dropped a little South of the allotted position from 600 feet. The wings bombs were released in error nearby in the sea. Considerable light flak with a few searchlights was encountered on the N.W. bank of the fiord. The searchlights were fired upon by Sgt. Layne On the return journey one engine cut out owing to lack of fuel. An S.O.S. was sent out and the aircraft landed at Lossiemouth Scotland and returned to base the following day. Total flying time 8.30 hours. This concluded a trying 10 weeks for 50 Squadron, during that time they lost 21 aircraft due to either enemy action or crashes.



20th September 1941 BERLIN (GERMANY)

The Hampden departed Swinderby earlier in the day for Swanton Morley, presumably because that airfield was nearer to Berlin.

Take off time 1950 from Swanton Morley. Hampden 158. Crew: Pilot S/L Mulford, P/O/ Watts, Sgt. Robertson, Sgt. Layne.

The crew was directed to bomb an aiming point in Berlin. On leaving Swanton Morley they climbed to 5,000 feet and eventually crossed the Dutch coast at 9,000 feet. On receiving a recall when just inside enemy territory, they dropped a flare to ascertain their position. The I.F.F. proved very successful against active searchlights*. A bombing run was made from South to North on the Rheine attacking a S.E.M.O. (Self Evident Military Objective) with the wing bombs. No results were seen. This aircraft was one of a force of 74 sent to Berlin that night. With weather conditions worsening all aircraft were recalled. 10 crews did not receive the recall and bombed other targets of opportunity. The aircraft landed at Finningley after a flight time of 7.20 hours, returning to base, the following day.

 

David -

Noticed your father was in Stalag 357 and Stalag Luft 3...in that order ? Was 357 still in Thorn or had it moved to Fallingbostel ? If the later, I can do a lot to help you with your research as I was based there for a long time. You can find a large number of camp pics at the Fallingbostel Museum website...

Roddy

 

David -

Noticed your father was in Stalag 357 and Stalag Luft 3...in that order ? Was 357 still in Thorn or had it moved to Fallingbostel ? If the later, I can do a lot to help you with your research as I was based there for a long time. You can find a large number of camp pics at the Fallingbostel Museum website...

Roddy

Thanks Roddy, I had seen the museum's sight before.

My father was at Stalag Luft 6, evacuated to Thorn and then to Fallingbostel and in January 1945 to Stalag Luft III and then onto the winter march etc.

 

17th April 1942.
405 Squadron RCAF based at Pocklington.
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