Glad to get out of the army
Nobody, they didn't have any decent, well-educated officers or anything like that ,they more or less, people that just had to push in and national service, like I turned 21 and you just had to go, so you got your number up and that was it. But I was always in trouble in the army. I did more kitchen duty than anybody. Put it this way, I was so pleased to get out of the army.
I didn't know that I was going to be selected but you did a lot of groundwork during, you know, your marching days, you had to do Morse code you and I was very lucky to have been a training accountant, I handled most of the technical work and the paperwork that they wanted. They checked you on various subjects and algebra and all that sort of thing, what you could do and what you couldn't do. And from there on, I suppose, they selected me.
The hardest instructor in the place
We had to go to Narromine – you know New South Wales? We were on the Tiger Moths – and I got the hardest instructor on the place – but when I look back, he was good – you know what I mean? And what he put me through…
When he said low, he meant low, because you know the grass it grows up like this up at Narromine – and you'd see a fence, a fence line, well naturally you'd ease yourself up, cause you got 50 or 60 feet – and he used to get the stick and jam it down and he said "I meant low flying!" And even when I went for my first solo the Squadron Leader was amazed what sought of landing I did, because I'd been so used to seeing the deck, you know.
And I learnt a lot from my - in Canada for the same way. Well he finished - got killed at Klintworth. But like we're supposed to be doing this, doing this and doing that, do navigation, do this, and do that, then he'd say 'Oh come on, you've done enough." – Then he'd start, him and his mate would start we'd do dog fighting and all that sort of thing – and he'd show you all the tricks of how to make an aircraft slide – you know, all the tricks. I was lucky I had two good instructors.
Petrol shortage over Germany
With a Spitfire, our biggest trouble was use of petrol, we were really to a point over Germany where, with what I feel, we should have headed for home because we were running short of petrol and we were, jumped, I don't know if we were jumped, but we were basically attacked by a fair number of 109s and 190s and as luck happens, the lower got one and the other lad got two and I got one and then it was a case of heading for home because we would have been outnumbered completely and with very little petrol.
Flying under the radar
Where we did a lot of the work from – a place called 'Lympne'. Well it was lucky it was on a sort of a plateau – we'd take off with a fair load of petrol – we just got over the treetops at the end of the strip – it was only a very small strip – and but we were lucky that we could gain our airspeed going down onto what we used to call the 'Romney Marshes', and that pretty well sea level – and skip across the channel at a low scoop – the lower you were the less chance of the radar the other side picking you up. So you could get over with any luck with too much firepower when you hit the coast of France – and, so if you had somebody a bit chicken in the squadron and got up 3 or 400 feet – well then you knew he got Hell the other side. There's a lot of luck in the game.
The secret to staying alive
Well there is something - try to help your ground crew and everything like that – that was the secret to staying alive – you know, even after hours – like they weren't paid very much – and if you had a bit more money in your pocket – well you looked after them. And to get a good maintenance crew was half the way to surviving.
Rank inequities
The biggest trouble I found was that, like, when you first start off as a sergeant, half the Englishmen were already officers before you ever got to the squadron. There was, Sergeant, Flight Sergeant, Warrant Officer, Pilot Officer, you've got to go through all those ranks before you become a Flying Officer. Whereas half of them got it handed down from, sometimes, not on their own benefits but from their fathers before them.
It was a very, you start talking to me about, you know, what they were doing, the Commonwealth, now they've altered the Commonwealth training scheme now, I believe once you go to a pilot you've all got an equal thing, I don't know, that's what they tell me. But in those days, as I say you'd probably have to go through three or four ranks and in the air you might be in charge but when you got on the ground you had to go to the sergeants' mess and they went to the officers' mess.
Dog eat dog
From another point of view, right, D-Day was a marvellous thing but things I did in the aircraft before and after were a lot more dangerous than D-Day. You're there and you had to do a job and that was it. We did an awful lot of strafing of reinforcements and all that sort of caper. Probably people wouldn't like to see that again, just a case of dog eat dog, sort of thing, if you didn't do it, somebody else would do it wouldn't they?
